"The change campaign needs two strands: the promotion of the values and leadership skills of whoever emerges as unity candidate and the exposure of Corbyn’s incompetence and failure as a leader by those who worked for him and gave up in despair."
Rather than focusing on the values of the alternative candidate - which leads to the dead end of the personalization of the candidate ("I'm a mother / married / gay / a woman / eat yogurt / love my dog / I believe in nice things - yeah, yeah, don't we all dearie") - it would be nice if a candidate promoted a political viewpoint.
Just for a change. Just a thought. It used to happen. It might be nice for it to happen again.
Corbyn did that, no?
Yes. He did. Which is why any challenger needs to do the same. They're not. They're arguing about his management style which may well be catastrophically useless. But that is not really going to fire up the Labour electorate and it is not really going to do anything to persuade voters outside that electorate that Labour is a party fit to be considered for government.
What is Labour for?
Answers on one side of the paper only, please. Give examples of what the answers mean in practice and your proposals for implementation. Points will be deducted for a one-word answer (e.g. "equality" with no further explanation).
Fundamentally Labour is, trite as it sounds, for the interests of the many rather than the few: for creating a society where the rewards of working hard are shared so that everyone can have a decent standard of living; where the risks of bad luck such as ill health or a lack of available employment are shared; where opportunities in life are not restricted by how rich one is born, or what jobs ones parents did, or ones race or gender.
An economic policy that provides work that pays properly, educational opportunity for all and a safety net for when things go wrong are pretty much the essentials.
Innocent Abroad is right - Labour is a party whose time has gone.
And yet I would bet good money it will remain and get millions of votes and hundreds of seats, and sooner or later will get back into power. Hard to see a route right now, unless the Corbynistas are correct, but it doesn't look like its going anywhere, even if its so split it seems like it should, or atleast be changed.
Permit me a bit of space to make a few points and hopefully illuminate a bit of light as a lowly Labour activist/officer/organiser:
There are two Jeremy Corbyns.
The first is a man who has fought a principled battle his whole life. A man with both the strength and conviction to lead both the party and then the country in a leftward realignment. A man who is collegiate and consensual who absolutely does not allow abuse or factionalism of any kind.
The second is a man who says those things but does very few of them and the ones he does do are ineffectual. A man who appoints shadow ministers to a broad tent then ignores them whilst making policy up on the hoof over his head. Who refuses to protect NEC members threatened with violence with a secret ballot.
The Labour Party faces a basic and deadly problem. We have had an explosion in membership - a very good thing. But a large proportion of those people believe in the first Corbyn. Those people who have actually met him and tried to work with him know the first Corbyn is a cartoon character, a poster slogan, a meme utterly disconnected from reality.
Not only that, but this mythical man has become Kim Jong Un. Venerated. Unchallengable. To question him is to out yourself as a BLAIRITE and we all know that BLAIRITES are TORIES. Anyone with a rational mind looks at these examples from the likes of Lillian Greenwood with horror. Multiple sources of evidence documenting different occasions and scenarios but all illustrating the same problem - the absolute inability of the leader to do politics.
For the people invested in the cartoon Jeremy all these MPs are liars. Deluded. Plotters in the Chicken Coup. "They all tell one side of the story". And they need to be deselected because How Dare They say a word against our Leader with his Mandate. Then we come to Tom Watson. Also elected with a substantial mandate. The difference being that we should ignore his mandate and have him DESELECTED as well apparently. The "fat disloyal bastard".
And its not just the MPs. The NEC are in on it. They voted for a freeze date (mandated in rules) AFTER JEREMY LEFT. And it wasn't on the agenda apparently, despite Momentum-supported Ann Black posting a lengthy report from the meeting proving it was.
And so here we are. The membership are blindly supporting a person who doesn't actually exist. Anyone who isn't Corbyn or 100% loyal is a Tory. We in the Labour Party can't trust the MPs the NEC or the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party but once Corbyn is re-elected we will persuade voters to not only trust the Labour Party but to elect us in a landslide.
We are, to put it bluntly, fucked.
I fully expect May to call an election this November and win a majority of 150. At which point the angry mob will no doubt denounce the electorate.
The real risk is that Labour will go into the next election with two candidates in large numbers of seats, splitting the vote and letting AN Other party win by default. Which is roughly what happened to the Liberals 1918-1924 and again in 1931 (and of course to Labour in the latter election).
Labour survived 1931, with great difficulty. The Unionists survived similar problems in 1906. But the Liberals couldn't. All that tribal nonconformist vote counted for nothing.
Is Labour the same? It looks unpleasantly like it. Certainly this is the nearest the party has come to destruction since 1931.
Permit me a bit of space to make a few points and hopefully illuminate a bit of light as a lowly Labour activist/officer/organiser:
There are two Jeremy Corbyns.
The first is a man who has fought a principled battle his whole life. A man with both the strength and conviction to lead both the party and then the country in a leftward realignment. A man who is collegiate and consensual who absolutely does not allow abuse or factionalism of any kind.
The second is a man who says those things but does very few of them and the ones he does do are ineffectual. A man who appoints shadow ministers to a broad tent then ignores them whilst making policy up on the hoof over his head. Who refuses to protect NEC members threatened with violence with a secret ballot.
Good post. I guess the ideal answer is to come up with a contender to succeed him who has all the qualities of the first Jeremy Corbyn, with few of the drawbacks of the second.
Problem is that there appear to be very few, if any, contenders.
Permit me a bit of space to make a few points and hopefully illuminate a bit of light as a lowly Labour activist/officer/organiser:
There are two Jeremy Corbyns.
The first is a man who has fought a principled battle his whole life. A man with both the strength and conviction to lead both the party and then the country in a leftward realignment. A man who is collegiate and consensual who absolutely does not allow abuse or factionalism of any kind.
The second is a man who says those things but does very few of them and the ones he does do are ineffectual. A man who appoints shadow ministers to a broad tent then ignores them whilst making policy up on the hoof over his head. Who refuses to protect NEC members threatened with violence with a secret ballot.
The Labour Party faces a basic and deadly problem. We have had an explosion in membership - a very good thing. But a large proportion of those people believe in the first Corbyn. Those people who have actually met him and tried to work with him know the first Corbyn is a cartoon character, a poster slogan, a meme utterly disconnected from reality.
Not only that, but this mythical man has become Kim Jong Un. Venerated. Unchallengable. To question him is to out yourself as a BLAIRITE and we all know that BLAIRITES are TORIES. Anyone with a rational mind looks at these examples from the likes of Lillian Greenwood with horror. Multiple sources of evidence documenting different occasions and scenarios but all illustrating the same problem - the absolute inability of the leader to do politics.
For the people invested in the cartoon Jeremy all these MPs are liars. Deluded. Plotters in the Chicken Coup. "They all tell one side of the story". And they need to be deselected because How Dare They say a word against our Leader with his Mandate. Then we come to Tom Watson. Also elected with a substantial mandate. The difference being that we should ignore his mandate and have him DESELECTED as well apparently. The "fat disloyal bastard".
And its not just the MPs. The NEC are in on it. They voted for a freeze date (mandated in rules) AFTER JEREMY LEFT. And it wasn't on the agenda apparently, despite Momentum-supported Ann Black posting a lengthy report from the meeting proving it was.
And so here we are. The membership are blindly supporting a person who doesn't actually exist. Anyone who isn't Corbyn or 100% loyal is a Tory. We in the Labour Party can't trust the MPs the NEC or the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party but once Corbyn is re-elected we will persuade voters to not only trust the Labour Party but to elect us in a landslide.
We are, to put it bluntly, fucked.
I fully expect May to call an election this November and win a majority of 150. At which point the angry mob will no doubt denounce the electorate.
This seems to me a very insightful post. Thank you. Oh dear.
I wonder if the PB Tories enjoying the turmoil in Labour (as am I) are perhaps taking their eye off the ball in just what they've ended up with in May.
With all the heartless cruelty and callous coldness of Thatcher but none of the Iron Lady's ability to give away lots and lots of free stuff, her stand offish, out of touch personality seems to belong to a bygone age, where it was expected that a Prime Minister was not one of us.
It seems to me there is an innate unelectability in May which as the Cruella De Ville meme starts to build and take root will only get worse. Thatcher took over from an incredible unpopular government at a time of established turmoil, gaining goodwill she could cement with a military victory and the biggest Socialist give away in British history.
May takes over from a neutral to mildly approved of government, only about to enter a sustained period of economic uncertainty, with no military capable of winning campaign even if one presented itself and nothing to hand out as freebies.
We can always plunder Scottish oil further, perhaps take from the Scottish renewables industry they will still vote No. Lol.
I fully expect May to call an election this November and win a majority of 150. At which point the angry mob will no doubt denounce the electorate.
That is an excellent post. You truly have my deepest sympathies. It's pious, but worth saying, our political system only works when there is a functioning opposition. The Tories were ineffectual in the early naughties, and Labour are now. That is so unhealthy. Only the most blinkered partisans can applaud the current situation. The Labour party is literally hateful.
Boo-fucking-hoo. No sympathy from me.
Even a majority of 150 would be less than the humiliation we had to endure in 1997 and 2001. 'things can only get better' when you're in the boss seat, but 'fucked' when the boot is on the other foot, is it? Don't dish it out if you can't take it.
We've been waiting quietly and patiently to get even for many years now. In our minds it's still about finally wiping the triumphalist smiles off the Blairites faces. I'd love to see a Tory majority of 200 and with the help of the insane Trot wing of the Labour party we might just come close to that.
''If they choose Corbyn they are accepting the second. If it is Smith, there is still a chance of the first. ''
I disagree. Let's say Corbyn went into 2020 with a genuinely hard left programme. How many labour voters would really notice? how many would desert? as Mr Southam says, its tribal.
OF course labour would lose. But they might retain 200mps, or maybe more. That doesn;t look like oblivion to me. Ask the liberal democrats about oblivion.
I am starting to think that the only chance Labour have of surviving is if May calls an Autumn election. That way, they still fight as one party, lose badly, even Corbyn accepts he's failed and resigns, and someone can start to clear up the mess.
Even twelve months' delay would allow Momentum to set up a parallel organisation or to start mass deselections. At that point there will be no way back. Labour will be irretrievably ruined and the way things are at present UKIP will be the main beneficiaries.
Will May do it though? Doesn't seem likely. Even so I think a wise statesman (sic) would.
Very little info available about Momentum Campaign Limited
Incorporated 24th June 2015 as 'Jeremy Corbyn Campaign 2015 (Services) Limited'
Changed their name on the 23rd of October to 'Momentum Campaign (Services) Limited'
And then applied for the latest change on the 15th of this month
It'll be the holding company for MOMENTUM. Have to always put it in block caps. It isn't MENACING as its intended to be unless its in caps.
It's a proper prole set up, Private company limited by guarantee without share capital, not one of those Bourgeois Capitalist public (or private) limited companies
That's blatant. More subtle American speechwriters plagiarise foreign figures... like Neil Kinnock.
Bearing in mind the peroration contained lines from the classic Rick Astley song I'd say some unlucky Republican staffer lumbered with Trump as their presidential candidate was having a laugh.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
Very little info available about Momentum Campaign Limited
Incorporated 24th June 2015 as 'Jeremy Corbyn Campaign 2015 (Services) Limited'
Changed their name on the 23rd of October to 'Momentum Campaign (Services) Limited'
And then applied for the latest change on the 15th of this month
It'll be the holding company for MOMENTUM. Have to always put it in block caps. It isn't MENACING as its intended to be unless its in caps.
It's a proper prole set up, Private company limited by guarantee without share capital, not one of those Bourgeois Capitalist public (or private) limited companies
Or unlimited companies for your joint stock operations
That is an excellent post. You truly have my deepest sympathies. It's pious, but worth saying, our political system only works when there is a functioning opposition. The Tories were ineffectual in the early naughties, and Labour are now. That is so unhealthy. Only the most blinkered partisans can applaud the current situation. The Labour party is literally hateful.
Boo-fucking-hoo. No sympathy from me.
Even a majority of 150 would be less than the humiliation we had to endure in 1997 and 2001. 'things can only get better' when you're in the boss seat, but 'fucked' when the boot is on the other foot, is it? Don't dish it out if you can't take it.
We've been waiting quietly and patiently to get even for many years now. In our minds it's still about finally wiping the triumphalist smiles off the Blairites faces. I'd love to see a Tory majority of 200 and with the help of the insane Trot wing of the Labour party we might just come close to that.
Go Corbyn! Go Blinkered Partisanship! Go Hate!
Yes, and some of us remember what a fiasco the Blair and Brown governments were. The corruption, the greed, the disastrous foreign policy towards Europe and the Middle East, the incessant spending of money on mindless frivolities like BSF or the M6 Toll to enrich their backers in big business at everyone else's expense, the protection of special interest groups and the public sector to the detriment of everyone else, the spin, the failure.
And I never want to go back to the era of complacency and all the evils that sprang from it that was engendered by the lack of a strong opposition.
Assuming that the change in company name applies to the whole 'Momentum' movement (and it's hard to see why they'd bother otherwise), then surely the reasoning is obvious? They've been accused, reasonably enough, of being an entryist organisation with their own agenda. With this change they can keep a straight face more easily when they say 'No, we are loyal Labour members giving our full support to the democratically-elected leader'.
This is about the parasite gobbling up the host from the inside.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
Hornsey & Wood Green is the 'first' and most obvious one that is likely to switch back I think. PPCs are being selected already though, so the Labour rebels will have to get their skates on.
Huppert will be taking back Cambridge from the trots.
Edit: Just seen the Lab majority in Hornsey - blimey !
Anyway Cambridge will be heading back at the least
Regarding Momentum/Jezza for Dictator Ltd, from the rule book:
Political organisations not affiliated or associated under a national agreement with the Party, having their own programme, principles and policy, or distinctive and separate propaganda, or possessing branches in the constituencies, or engaged in the promotion of parliamentary or local government candidates, or having allegiance to any political organisation situated abroad, shall be ineligible for affiliation to the Labour Party (Chapter 1 Clause II, 5A).
Involvement in such organisations not formally affiliated leaves members doing so subject to disciplinary action and expulsion.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
There really aren't very many seats in that category though. Cambridge, Brent Central, Hornsey and Wood Green, that Leicester seat the LDs took in a by election... struggling to think of any others...
That is an excellent post. You truly have my deepest sympathies. It's pious, but worth saying, our political system only works when there is a functioning opposition. The Tories were ineffectual in the early naughties, and Labour are now. That is so unhealthy. Only the most blinkered partisans can applaud the current situation. The Labour party is literally hateful.
Boo-fucking-hoo. No sympathy from me.
Even a majority of 150 would be less than the humiliation we had to endure in 1997 and 2001. 'things can only get better' when you're in the boss seat, but 'fucked' when the boot is on the other foot, is it? Don't dish it out if you can't take it.
We've been waiting quietly and patiently to get even for many years now. In our minds it's still about finally wiping the triumphalist smiles off the Blairites faces. I'd love to see a Tory majority of 200 and with the help of the insane Trot wing of the Labour party we might just come close to that.
Go Corbyn! Go Blinkered Partisanship! Go Hate!
Yes, and some of us remember what a fiasco the Blair and Brown governments were. The corruption, the greed, the disastrous foreign policy towards Europe and the Middle East, the incessant spending of money on mindless frivolities like BSF or the M6 Toll to enrich their backers in big business at everyone else's expense, the protection of special interest groups and the public sector to the detriment of everyone else, the spin, the failure.
And I never want to go back to the era of complacency and all the evils that sprang from it that was engendered by the lack of a strong opposition.
I think it was more the overwhelming mandate from the electorate rather than who was standing up at the dispatch box against them. Don't forget Lab had forgotten how to govern so of course they did some bonkers, work-in-theory stuff.
In 2010, the Cons would have been the same, save for the fact that they had on-site auditors and logic checks courtesy of the LibDems.
I wonder if the PB Tories enjoying the turmoil in Labour (as am I) are perhaps taking their eye off the ball in just what they've ended up with in May.
With all the heartless cruelty and callous coldness of Thatcher but none of the Iron Lady's ability to give away lots and lots of free stuff, her stand offish, out of touch personality seems to belong to a bygone age, where it was expected that a Prime Minister was not one of us.
It seems to me there is an innate unelectability in May which as the Cruella De Ville meme starts to build and take root will only get worse. Thatcher took over from an incredible unpopular government at a time of established turmoil, gaining goodwill she could cement with a military victory and the biggest Socialist give away in British history.
May takes over from a neutral to mildly approved of government, only about to enter a sustained period of economic uncertainty, with no military capable of winning campaign even if one presented itself and nothing to hand out as freebies.
Most of the time Thatcher was more unpopular than popular. She would have lost (to the Alliance) the first time she went to the country in 1983 had it not been for the Falklands; she would have lost (to Labour) the second time in 1987 had it not been having years of civil war. Thus Thatcher was more lucky than appealing: the support and devotion she gained from Tories came from her victories, rather than vice versa.
With the one rather large exception of how Brexit pans out, May is also lucky with the political environment, at least as far as her opponents (outside Scotland) are concerned.
"The change campaign needs two strands: the promotion of the values and leadership skills of whoever emerges as unity candidate and the exposure of Corbyn’s incompetence and failure as a leader by those who worked for him and gave up in despair."
hy.
It seems to me that post-1989 - other than the execrable Third Way - there has been no serious thinking on the social democratic left about what it should be about in a world where socialism/communism has effectively been defeated. That total gap where thought should be has meant that, other than spending tax revenues paid by bankers (and that particular golden goose is not really an option in the way that it was), the only thing on the Labour menu is a version of reheated socialism peddled by people like Corbyn and Milne coupled with some post-colonial sucking up to oppressed non-white people.
The Left has got out of the habit of thinking about ideas and it needs to relearn the habit, fast. I could provide them with a reading list, if that would help. In fact, if I can be bothered, I may even try and come up with some ideas for them. They certainly need all the help they can get.
There are so many obvious things. Our education system condemns millions of our fellow citizens to a life of relative poverty whilst the privately educated become ever more dominant in our public life. Even half of the pop stars had the advantage of being taught music at private school these days. But it is Gove that took up that chalice, not Labour.
We have a situation where wage differentials grow ever more obscene and we don't have a party willing to make the case for more distributive taxes.
We have an economy which is ever more focussed on London. Recent trips on holiday around southern England including a visit to Bluewater are a revelation. There is plenty of wealth in this country but it is becoming ever more focussed in terms of class and geography. Surely a centre left party could find plenty to chew on in this.
"If Corbyn won’t keep his promise the members will have to keep it for him." then the members will have to find someone better. The MPs tasked with finding someone better have clearly failed.
I am starting to think that the only chance Labour have of surviving is if May calls an Autumn election. That way, they still fight as one party, lose badly, even Corbyn accepts he's failed and resigns, and someone can start to clear up the mess.
Even twelve months' delay would allow Momentum to set up a parallel organisation or to start mass deselections. At that point there will be no way back. Labour will be irretrievably ruined and the way things are at present UKIP will be the main beneficiaries.
Will May do it though? Doesn't seem likely. Even so I think a wise statesman (sic) would.
The Tories do not have a working majority. Have major upset on their backbenches making them even less likely to get bills through than they were last year. And they need to get through massive constitutional changes not supported by MPs.
Combine that with Labour on our knees and she'd have to be the worst political leader in living memory* to not go for an election. A whopping majority delivering the government Absolute control. A mandate to drive through what is required. And a dead Labour Party.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
As Chairman of one of the (I think it was 5) constituencies where we refused to stand aside for the sitting labour MP to stand as an SDP candidate don't expect Liberal Democrats to be too enthusiastic to welcome a useless ex Labour MP! -Ours was Ron Brown in Hackney South(George Browns brother)
"The change campaign needs two strands: the promotion of the values and leadership skills of whoever emerges as unity candidate and the exposure of Corbyn’s incompetence and failure as a leader by those who worked for him and gave up in despair."
Just for a change. Just a thought. It used to happen. It might be nice for it to happen again.
This is the nub of the matter - spelled out at length in a great post from cyclefree in PT. Otherwise it's just bald-men-and-a-comb stuff, since at the moment who would argue that Labour is not heading for massive defeat next time whatever they do? Someone needs to say what the party is actually for. Both Smith and Eagle have been asked what their political differences from each other and from Corbyn actually are, and they just shuffle their feet and mutter incoherently. They seem to think that "I am not a Tory" is a philosophy.
It seems to me that post-1989 - other than the execrable Third Way - there has been no serious thinking on the social democratic left about what it should be about in a world where socialism/communism has effectively been defeated. That total gap where thought should be has meant that, other than spending tax revenues paid by bankers (and that particular golden goose is not really an option in the way that it was), the only thing on the Labour menu is a version of reheated socialism peddled by people like Corbyn and Milne coupled with some post-colonial sucking up to oppressed non-white people.
The Left has got out of the habit of thinking about ideas and it needs to relearn the habit, fast. I could provide them with a reading list, if that would help. In fact, if I can be bothered, I may even try and come up with some ideas for them. They certainly need all the help they can get.
The economy is the problem, for in the social dimension the issues and battleground between conservative and liberal are as clear as ever. Part of Labour's problem arises from having a socially liberal leadership (in the broadest sense) on top of two different but both socially conservative groups of supporters. And of course the LibDems represent the liberal viewpoint much more convincingly, even if the representation it deserves in parliament is denied to it by FPTP.
Somewhere between the collapse of communism and the 2008 crisis the left lost its way on the economy. I find economics difficult because it always seems that more more I try and learn, the less I end up understanding. Quite possibly no-one really understand anything and we are all heading for some sort of economic doom when the continually accumulating debt burden comes home to roost. Meanwhile, there ought surely to be more to say about the economy than leaving the right to largely leave it alone?
That is an excellent post. You truly have my deepest sympathies. It's pious, but worth saying, our political system only works when there is a functioning opposition. The Tories were ineffectual in the early naughties, and Labour are now. That is so unhealthy. Only the most blinkered partisans can applaud the current situation. The Labour party is literally hateful.
Boo-fucking-hoo. No sympathy from me.
Even a majority of 150 would be less than the humiliation we had to endure in 1997 and 2001. 'things can only get better' when you're in the boss seat, but 'fucked' when the boot is on the other foot, is it? Don't dish it out if you can't take it.
We've been waiting quietly and patiently to get even for many years now. In our minds it's still about finally wiping the triumphalist smiles off the Blairites faces. I'd love to see a Tory majority of 200 and with the help of the insane Trot wing of the Labour party we might just come close to that.
Go Corbyn! Go Blinkered Partisanship! Go Hate!
Yes, and some of us remember what a fiasco the Blair and Brown governments were. The corruption, the greed, the disastrous foreign policy towards Europe and the Middle East, the incessant spending of money on mindless frivolities like BSF or the M6 Toll to enrich their backers in big business at everyone else's expense, the protection of special interest groups and the public sector to the detriment of everyone else, the spin, the failure.
And I never want to go back to the era of complacency and all the evils that sprang from it that was engendered by the lack of a strong opposition.
I think it was more the overwhelming mandate from the electorate rather than who was standing up at the dispatch box against them. Don't forget Lab had forgotten how to govern so of course they did some bonkers, work-in-theory stuff.
In 2010, the Cons would have been the same, save for the fact that they had on-site auditors and logic checks courtesy of the LibDems.
Tony Blair's mandate was smaller than Major's, in terms of the popular vote. If the seats had been allocated for Labour as they were for the Conservatives in '92, he would have had an overall majority of around 30 and would have had to behave himself.
Assuming that the change in company name applies to the whole 'Momentum' movement (and it's hard to see why they'd bother otherwise), then surely the reasoning is obvious? They've been accused, reasonably enough, of being an entryist organisation with their own agenda. With this change they can keep a straight face more easily when they say 'No, we are loyal Labour members giving our full support to the democratically-elected leader'.
This is about the parasite gobbling up the host from the inside.
And I never want to go back to the era of complacency and all the evils that sprang from it that was engendered by the lack of a strong opposition.
I think it was more the overwhelming mandate from the electorate rather than who was standing up at the dispatch box against them. Don't forget Lab had forgotten how to govern so of course they did some bonkers, work-in-theory stuff. .
The 'weak opposition' argument is an outright myth. Many of the key figures from the Major administration were still around, having handed over a strong and thriving economy. History will judge these people well, especially compared to what followed - we're less than 20 years down the line and the narrative is already changing.
Only the most ardent leftist would argue that the scale of the defeat in 1997 was something that government deserved or brought upon themselves. As john Major remarked a few years later, and I'm paraphrasing somewhat, it was heartbreaking to see so many good MPs who had done nothing wrong ousted unceremoniously without a second thought, on the back of a mindless conformist bandwagon.
Why don't we just write the EU a cheque. I'm sure DD would have no problem with that.
It would simply be continuing the present system - no new cheque required. Pensioners who qualify are those who have paid in to the UK system throughout their working lives.
We have an economy which is ever more focussed on London. Recent trips on holiday around southern England including a visit to Bluewater are a revelation. There is plenty of wealth in this country but it is becoming ever more focussed in terms of class and geography. Surely a centre left party could find plenty to chew on in this.
The problem being that the bulk of the loud voices in Labour are representatives of, and beneficiaries from that very class and geography. Labour is a upper middle class Guardian reading party wondering why it isnt getting as many votes as it would like in some parts of the North.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
As Chairman of one of the (I think it was 5) constituencies where we refused to stand aside for the sitting labour MP to stand as an SDP candidate don't expect Liberal Democrats to be too enthusiastic to welcome a useless ex Labour MP! -Ours was Ron Brown in Hackney South(George Browns brother)
Combine that with Labour on our knees and she'd have to be the worst political leader in living memory* to not go for an election. A whopping majority delivering the government Absolute control. A mandate to drive through what is required. And a dead Labour Party.
It WILL be this November. Surely.
*Yes, even worse than Corbyn
Well, there's an argument for leaving Labour hanging and making sure they have time to split properly. But 6.8 on Betfair looks backable.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
I thInk they'd rather win the seat back with one of their own. The chances must be quite good right now.
I think the Orwelll estate need to be notified; the GOP convention last night was ripped off from the 'two minutes hate', barely disguised and cosmetically changed to become the 'two hours hate' instead.
There are so many obvious things. Our education system condemns millions of our fellow citizens to a life of relative poverty whilst the privately educated become ever more dominant in our public life
----------
For which Labour and their friends in the Teachers' Unions and the blob are largely responsible. Small wonder they make little headway in this area.
That is an excellent post. You truly have my deepest sympathies. It's pious, but worth saying, our political system only works when there is a functioning opposition. The Tories were ineffectual in the early naughties, and Labour are now. That is so unhealthy. Only the most blinkered partisans can applaud the current situation. The Labour party is literally hateful.
Boo-fucking-hoo. No sympathy from me.
Even a majority of 150 would be less than the humiliation we had to endure in 1997 and 2001. 'things can only get better' when you're in the boss seat, but 'fucked' when the boot is on the other foot, is it? Don't dish it out if you can't take it.
We've been waiting quietly and patiently to get even for many years now. In our minds it's still about finally wiping the triumphalist smiles off the Blairites faces. I'd love to see a Tory majority of 200 and with the help of the insane Trot wing of the Labour party we might just come close to that.
Go Corbyn! Go Blinkered Partisanship! Go Hate!
Yes, and some of us remember what a fiasco the Blair and Brown governments were. The corruption, the greed, the disastrous foreign policy towards Europe and the Middle East, the incessant spending of money on mindless frivolities like BSF or the M6 Toll to enrich their backers in big business at everyone else's expense, the protection of special interest groups and the public sector to the detriment of everyone else, the spin, the failure.
And I never want to go back to the era of complacency and all the evils that sprang from it that was engendered by the lack of a strong opposition.
I think it was more the overwhelming mandate from the electorate rather than who was standing up at the dispatch box against them. Don't forget Lab had forgotten how to govern so of course they did some bonkers, work-in-theory stuff.
In 2010, the Cons would have been the same, save for the fact that they had on-site auditors and logic checks courtesy of the LibDems.
Tony Blair's mandate was smaller than Major's, in terms of the popular vote. If the seats had been allocated for Labour as they were for the Conservatives in '92, he would have had an overall majority of around 30 and would have had to behave himself.
Maybe, but the country was sick of the Conservatives and the mood was overwhelmingly positive and supportive towards Tone, allowing him freer rein, majority notwithstanding, than otherwise would have been the case.
The International Monetary Fund has slashed its forecast for UK growth next year after warning that the decision to leave the EU has damaged the British economy’s short-term prospects and “thrown a spanner in the works” of the global recovery.
The trouble with claiming there was no coup is... you know... that there was! And it was pretty obvious.... widely reported in papers, organized mass-resignation, attempt to keep Corbyn off the ballot etc.
I think the Orwelll estate need to be notified; the GOP convention last night was ripped off from the 'two minutes hate', barely disguised and cosmetically changed to become the 'two hours hate' instead.
Plenty of hate outside and outwith the GOP convention.
That is an excellent post. You truly have my deepest sympathies. It's pious, but worth saying, our political system only works when there is a functioning opposition. The Tories were ineffectual in the early naughties, and Labour are now. That is so unhealthy. Only the most blinkered partisans can applaud the current situation. The Labour party is literally hateful.
Boo-fucking-hoo. No sympathy from me.
Even a majority of 150 would be less than the humiliation we had to endure in 1997 and 2001. 'things can only get better' when you're in the boss seat, but 'fucked' when the boot is on the other foot, is it? Don't dish it out if you can't take it.
We've been waiting quietly and patiently to get even for many years now. In our minds it's still about finally wiping the triumphalist smiles off the Blairites faces. I'd love to see a Tory majority of 200 and with the help of the insane Trot wing of the Labour party we might just come close to that.
Go Corbyn! Go Blinkered Partisanship! Go Hate!
Yes, and some of us remember what a fiasco the Blair and Brown governments were. The corruption, the greed, the disastrous foreign policy towards Europe and the Middle East, the incessant spending of money on mindless frivolities like BSF or the M6 Toll to enrich their backers in big business at everyone else's expense, the protection of special interest groups and the public sector to the detriment of everyone else, the spin, the failure.
And I never want to go back to the era of complacency and all the evils that sprang from it that was engendered by the lack of a strong opposition.
There is clearly an inverse relationship between the size of majority and the good judgement of the government. No wonder the coalition was such an unsung success. Time for PR.
And I never want to go back to the era of complacency and all the evils that sprang from it that was engendered by the lack of a strong opposition.
I think it was more the overwhelming mandate from the electorate rather than who was standing up at the dispatch box against them. Don't forget Lab had forgotten how to govern so of course they did some bonkers, work-in-theory stuff. .
The 'weak opposition' argument is an outright myth. Many of the key figures from the Major administration were still around, having handed over a strong and thriving economy. History will judge these people well, especially compared to what followed - we're less than 20 years down the line and the narrative is already changing.
Only the most ardent leftist would argue that the scale of the defeat in 1997 was something that government deserved or brought upon themselves. As john Major remarked a few years later, and I'm paraphrasing somewhat, it was heartbreaking to see so many good MPs who had done nothing wrong ousted unceremoniously without a second thought, on the back of a mindless conformist bandwagon.
As we have just seen with the EURef, there can be more to it than that.
Rightly or wrongly, the perception was that the Cons were mired in sleaze, lurching from one scandal to another. Not to belittle as you say the work of a lot of great MPs and a great economic legacy, but people had had enough.
"The change campaign needs two strands: the promotion of the values and leadership skills of whoever emerges as unity candidate and the exposure of Corbyn’s incompetence and failure as a leader by those who worked for him and gave up in despair."
Rather than focusing on the values of the alternative candidate - which leads to the dead end of the personalization of the candidate ("I'm a mother / married / gay / a woman / eat yogurt / love my dog / I believe in nice things - yeah, yeah, don't we all dearie") - it would be nice if a candidate promoted a political viewpoint.
Just for a change. Just a thought. It used to happen. It might be nice for it to happen again.
Corbyn did that, no?
Yes. He did. Which is why any challenger needs to do the same. They're not. They're arguing about his management style which may well be catastrophically useless. But that is not really going to fire up the Labour electorate and it is not really going to do anything to persuade voters outside that electorate that Labour is a party fit to be considered for government.
What is Labour for?
Answers on one side of the paper only, please. Give examples of what the answers mean in practice and your proposals for implementation. Points will be deducted for a one-word answer (e.g. "equality" with no further explanation).
Fundamentally Labour is, trite as it sounds, for the interests of the many rather than the few: for creating a society where the rewards of working hard are shared so that everyone can have a decent standard of living; where the risks of bad luck such as ill health or a lack of available employment are shared; where opportunities in life are not restricted by how rich one is born, or what jobs ones parents did, or ones race or gender.
An economic policy that provides work that pays properly, educational opportunity for all and a safety net for when things go wrong are pretty much the essentials.
The problem is, that is indeed all trite and meaningless.
Innocent Abroad is right - Labour is a party whose time has gone.
That may well be true, but the people @Polruan describes still need a political voice. The Labour brand is so very strong that it would be a pity to lose that - throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
The 'weak opposition' argument is an outright myth. Many of the key figures from the Major administration were still around, having handed over a strong and thriving economy.
Of the six most senior figures in the Major government, two lost their seats, one suffered a serious heart problem within days of the election and had to give up frontline politics, two went to the backbenches and only one - Howard - stayed on for any length of time, leaving the shadow cabinet in 1999 before returning in 2002.
That left Hague, Lilley, Ancram, Gillian Sheppard and er, not many others to try and oppose 419 MPs with a mere 164 MPs.
Is it any wonder so many PFI disasters date from this time? Or that the government's foreign policy under the egregious Robin Cook consisted of lying down to have its belt tickled by the US and the EU? Or that so many diabolically bad laws were passed, ceding the supremacy of parliament to the ECHR? Or that the government pressed on with abolishing GM schools and the NHS internal market which had to be shamefacedly and expensively reintroduced when it was realised that their replacements were a much worse failure? Or that the government became obsessed with fox-hunting?
If you genuinely think strong oppositions don't matter, you don't understand adversarial democratic systems.
I think the Orwelll estate need to be notified; the GOP convention last night was ripped off from the 'two minutes hate', barely disguised and cosmetically changed to become the 'two hours hate' instead.
Plenty of hate outside and outwith the GOP convention.
And they are trying to channel that incoherent rage and make it into a party platform. Reagan and Eisenhower must be spinning in their graves, like Labour a once great party being taken over by extremists.
Peter Thompson A Moroccan man has stabbed a French woman and her three daughters in Alps holiday resort for being scantily dressed. https://t.co/L69Yhbr02o
The International Monetary Fund has slashed its forecast for UK growth next year after warning that the decision to leave the EU has damaged the British economy’s short-term prospects and “thrown a spanner in the works” of the global recovery.
"The change campaign needs two strands: the promotion of the values and leadership skills of whoever emerges as unity candidate and the exposure of Corbyn’s incompetence and failure as a leader by those who worked for him and gave up in despair."
hy.
It seems to me that post-1989 - other than the execrable Third Way - there has been no serious thinking on the social democratic left about what it should be about in a world where socialism/communism has effectively been defeated. That total gap where thought should be has meant that, other than spending tax revenues paid by bankers (and that particular golden goose is not really an option in the way that it was), the only thing on the Labour menu is a version of reheated socialism peddled by people like Corbyn and Milne coupled with some post-colonial sucking up to oppressed non-white people.
The Left has got out of the habit of thinking about ideas and it needs to relearn the habit, fast. I could provide them with a reading list, if that would help. In fact, if I can be bothered, I may even try and come up with some ideas for them. They certainly need all the help they can get.
There are so many obvious things. Our education system condemns millions of our fellow citizens to a life of relative poverty whilst the privately educated become ever more dominant in our public life. Even half of the pop stars had the advantage of being taught music at private school these days. But it is Gove that took up that chalice, not Labour.
We have a situation where wage differentials grow ever more obscene and we don't have a party willing to make the case for more distributive taxes.
We have an economy which is ever more focussed on London. Recent trips on holiday around southern England including a visit to Bluewater are a revelation. There is plenty of wealth in this country but it is becoming ever more focussed in terms of class and geography. Surely a centre left party could find plenty to chew on in this.
Mr. L., With full respect it is not only Labour that needs to have a rethink about wealth distribution and ownership. From time to time we see, on here, firm adherents of the Conservative Party, very gently, acknowledging this.
At some stage, I suspect in the not too distant future now that we have dumped the chumocracy, thinking about ownership, responsibility and distribution will become mainstream topics.
Of the six most senior figures in the Major government, two lost their seats, one suffered a serious heart problem within days of the election and had to give up frontline politics, two went to the backbenches and only one - Howard - stayed on for any length of time, leaving the shadow cabinet in 1999 before returning in 2002.
I forgot of course the best example of the lot - Lord Cranborne, whose deal over Lords reform, followed by his sacking, followed by Hague cravenly accepting the deal anyway both removed another senior and able figure and showed up in stark relief the weakness of the opposition.
And the House of Lords remains a dog's breakfast to this day.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
There really aren't very many seats in that category though. Cambridge, Brent Central, Hornsey and Wood Green, that Leicester seat the LDs took in a by election... struggling to think of any others...
Burnley is the 2nd most vulnerable ex LD seat and needs a bit over 4% swing
LDs are in a bad place. Even if they get a 5% swing against the tories they win back only 10 seats on UNS. And they won't get a 5% swing...
The trouble with claiming there was no coup is... you know... that there was! And it was pretty obvious.... widely reported in papers, organized mass-resignation, attempt to keep Corbyn off the ballot etc.
Indeed - Corbyn's sacking of Hilary Benn was a subsequent factor of an organised coup already in place, not the prelude to a mass protest by the PLP.
The 'weak opposition' argument is an outright myth. Many of the key figures from the Major administration were still around, having handed over a strong and thriving economy.
Of the six most senior figures in the Major government, two lost their seats, one suffered a serious heart problem within days of the election and had to give up frontline politics, two went to the backbenches and only one - Howard - stayed on for any length of time, leaving the shadow cabinet in 1999 before returning in 2002.
That left Hague, Lilley, Ancram, Gillian Sheppard and er, not many others to try and oppose 419 MPs with a mere 164 MPs.
Is it any wonder so many PFI disasters date from this time? Or that the government's foreign policy under the egregious Robin Cook consisted of lying down to have its belt tickled by the US and the EU? Or that so many diabolically bad laws were passed, ceding the supremacy of parliament to the ECHR? Or that the government pressed on with abolishing GM schools and the NHS internal market which had to be shamefacedly and expensively reintroduced when it was realised that their replacements were a much worse failure? Or that the government became obsessed with fox-hunting?
If you genuinely think strong oppositions don't matter, you don't understand adversarial democratic systems.
Also, the skills required for government are not the same as those required in opposition. It took the best part of the Tories' first term in government to work out that opposition required more than policy debates on the one hand and nit-picking on the other.
Administrative ability counts for very little in opposition (except in the leader, who has a party machine to run), but a person's effectiveness in the media and the Commons becomes far more important.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
As Chairman of one of the (I think it was 5) constituencies where we refused to stand aside for the sitting labour MP to stand as an SDP candidate don't expect Liberal Democrats to be too enthusiastic to welcome a useless ex Labour MP! -Ours was Ron Brown in Hackney South(George Browns brother)
The trouble with claiming there was no coup is... you know... that there was! And it was pretty obvious.... widely reported in papers, organized mass-resignation, attempt to keep Corbyn off the ballot etc.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
As Chairman of one of the (I think it was 5) constituencies where we refused to stand aside for the sitting labour MP to stand as an SDP candidate don't expect Liberal Democrats to be too enthusiastic to welcome a useless ex Labour MP! -Ours was Ron Brown in Hackney South(George Browns brother)
The International Monetary Fund has slashed its forecast for UK growth next year after warning that the decision to leave the EU has damaged the British economy’s short-term prospects and “thrown a spanner in the works” of the global recovery.
The International Monetary Fund has slashed its forecast for UK growth next year after warning that the decision to leave the EU has damaged the British economy’s short-term prospects and “thrown a spanner in the works” of the global recovery.
Is this the same IMF headed by a French politician who is about to go on trial for her role in a 400 million Euro fraud when she was the Frog's Finance minister. Hello, you expect me to take her pronouncements seriously.
The International Monetary Fund has slashed its forecast for UK growth next year after warning that the decision to leave the EU has damaged the British economy’s short-term prospects and “thrown a spanner in the works” of the global recovery.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
As Chairman of one of the (I think it was 5) constituencies where we refused to stand aside for the sitting labour MP to stand as an SDP candidate don't expect Liberal Democrats to be too enthusiastic to welcome a useless ex Labour MP! -Ours was Ron Brown in Hackney South(George Browns brother)
Lib Dems are not Labour Lite.
The problem was a lot of their voters were - half jumped ship the instant they weren't, and their other issues squeezed the rest.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
There really aren't very many seats in that category though. Cambridge, Brent Central, Hornsey and Wood Green, that Leicester seat the LDs took in a by election... struggling to think of any others...
Burnley is the 2nd most vulnerable ex LD seat and needs a bit over 4% swing
LDs are in a bad place. Even if they get a 5% swing against the tories they win back only 10 seats on UNS. And they won't get a 5% swing...
If swings involving the LibDems were uniform, they wouldn't have won those seats in the first place.
Probably already mentioned, but an interesting sub-plot from the YouGov Labour poll is that Corbyn is now LEAST popular with London members, and more popular in "provincial England". Despite the stereotype about how he's only popular with the Islington middle-class, while unpopular with "traditional" Labour members.
That squares with my anecdotal experience: in my Northern CLP, Corbyn is still very popular, people feel that they've finally got their party back. That is not so much about him being left-wing, but just the idea that there's finally a Labour leader who's "for the people" rather than another career politician just interested in scratching the backs of the other rich sods down in London. The PLP "moderates" have a lot of work to do to shake off that perception.
What? The GINI is the same as it was in 2003 ffs. Fair enough to argue that we've made no progress, but spiralling inequality? Another sad victim of the Hyperbole Fairy.
Interesting piece from Mr. Brind, but the faith in Corbyn seems largely ideological, and (as the EU shows) ideologues often do not permit reality to intrude upon beautiful theories.
Mr. Llama, no, it's the IMF that said Osborne's approach would kill growth, then had to perform a volte-face when the UK became the best performing economy in the EU.
"The change campaign needs two strands: the promotion of the values and leadership skills of whoever emerges as unity candidate and the exposure of Corbyn’s incompetence and failure as a leader by those who worked for him and gave up in despair."
Rather than focusing on the values of the alternative candidate - which leads to the dead end of the personalization of the candidate ("I'm a mother / married / gay / a woman / eat yogurt / love my dog / I believe in nice things - yeah, yeah, don't we all dearie") - it would be nice if a candidate promoted a political viewpoint. .
Corbyn did that, no?
Yes.
Fundamentally Labour is, trite as it sounds, for the interests of the many rather than the few: for creating a society where the rewards of working hard are shared so that everyone can have a decent standard of living; where the risks of bad luck such as ill health or a lack of available employment are shared; where opportunities in life are not restricted by how rich one is born, or what jobs ones parents did, or ones race or gender.
An economic policy that provides work that pays properly, educational opportunity for all and a safety net for when things go wrong are pretty much the essentials.
The problem is, that is indeed all trite and meaningless.
Innocent Abroad is right - Labour is a party whose time has gone.
That may well be true, but the people @Polruan describes still need a political voice. The Labour brand is so very strong that it would be a pity to lose that - throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
To say that it's meaningless to argue for properly paid work, social safety nets and social mobility through education is quite a scary condemnation of the political discourse. I think Labour's time might be over but it's not because those aspirations are outdated (in fact May's stated aims, if not necessarily her actions, aren't a million miles away). What has killed Labour is trying to build a coalition based on two other priorities: equalities which have come to be seen as the priority in and of themselves rather than as a means of tackling inequality of economic and social opportunity; and internationalism as a guiding principle in all circumstances rather than only where it serves the purpose of socialist solidarity and shaping economies in pursuit of the key socialist outcomes. The fact that a Labour leader is required by his MPs to campaign for the European project but encouraged to accept continued dismantling of elements of the welfare state safety net tells you everything about the weirdness of Labour's current coalition.
I wonder how many relatively moderate Labour MPs may look at seats they have recently taken off the Lib Dems and conclude that a rosette switch might prove wise where the Lib Dems were still functioning and able to put up a good showing.
As Chairman of one of the (I think it was 5) constituencies where we refused to stand aside for the sitting labour MP to stand as an SDP candidate don't expect Liberal Democrats to be too enthusiastic to welcome a useless ex Labour MP! -Ours was Ron Brown in Hackney South(George Browns brother)
Lib Dems are not Labour Lite.
The problem was a lot of their voters were - half jumped ship the instant they weren't, and their other issues squeezed the rest.
We know that to be the case too, given how many people and commentators saw it as an instant betrayal to deal with the Tories, before any details came to light - despite saying the might, they were expected to only work with Labour, practically an official anti-Tory pact. Which apparently is being floated again in some quarters.
What? The GINI is the same as it was in 2003 ffs. Fair enough to argue that we've made no progress, but spiralling inequality? Another sad victim of the Hyperbole Fairy.
I rather think that Mr Snowden is being sarcastic.
A Moroccan man has just stabbed an eight year old girl, her two sisters and their mother at a French Alps holiday resort. He wasn't happy with the way they were dressed.
What? The GINI is the same as it was in 2003 ffs. Fair enough to argue that we've made no progress, but spiralling inequality? Another sad victim of the Hyperbole Fairy.
I rather think that Mr Snowden is being sarcastic.
I maybe slightly overheated such that my sarcasm detection meter is temporarily malfunctioning .
The trouble with claiming there was no coup is... you know... that there was! And it was pretty obvious.... widely reported in papers, organized mass-resignation, attempt to keep Corbyn off the ballot etc.
Indeed - Corbyn's sacking of Hilary Benn was a subsequent factor of an organised coup already in place, not the prelude to a mass protest by the PLP.
Yes, when Donald Brind writes "They all tried to make a go of the Corbyn project but ended up resigning after Corbyn sacked Hilary Benn in the middle of the night" - I am sure that Corbyn supporters will have quite a different view on this sequence of events! There's nothing wrong with being fiercely loyal to Labour and opposing Corbyn being its leader. But I think sometimes a view to the bigger picture is needed than "Corbyn sacked Hilary Benn in the middle of the night"... I mean, what preceded that, and why did Corbyn do it? Were the resignees fully committed to the Big Tent right up to the moment that Benn was sacked, then all of a sudden this mysterious and unprompted sacking changed their minds?
Some people may think that, but I think there will be a lot of grassroots Labour members who take a rather dimmer view of it all.
Comments
Labour survived 1931, with great difficulty. The Unionists survived similar problems in 1906. But the Liberals couldn't. All that tribal nonconformist vote counted for nothing.
Is Labour the same? It looks unpleasantly like it. Certainly this is the nearest the party has come to destruction since 1931.
Incorporated 24th June 2015 as 'Jeremy Corbyn Campaign 2015 (Services) Limited'
Changed their name on the 23rd of October to 'Momentum Campaign (Services) Limited'
And then applied for the latest change on the 15th of this month
Problem is that there appear to be very few, if any, contenders.
Transport Salaried Staffs Association, National Pensioners Convention, and erm The Guide Dogs For The Blind Association
https://twitter.com/ddiamond/status/755295291801268228
At this rate in 50 years time there will be a 4 year degree course on the events of just the last month....
One director, listed as a parliamentary researcher.
Who also runs:
NEW HOPE FOR LABOUR (DATA HOLDINGS) LTD
MOMENTUM CAMPAIGN (SERVICES) LTD
Boo-fucking-hoo. No sympathy from me.
Even a majority of 150 would be less than the humiliation we had to endure in 1997 and 2001. 'things can only get better' when you're in the boss seat, but 'fucked' when the boot is on the other foot, is it? Don't dish it out if you can't take it.
We've been waiting quietly and patiently to get even for many years now. In our minds it's still about finally wiping the triumphalist smiles off the Blairites faces. I'd love to see a Tory majority of 200 and with the help of the insane Trot wing of the Labour party we might just come close to that.
Go Corbyn! Go Blinkered Partisanship! Go Hate!
Even twelve months' delay would allow Momentum to set up a parallel organisation or to start mass deselections. At that point there will be no way back. Labour will be irretrievably ruined and the way things are at present UKIP will be the main beneficiaries.
Will May do it though? Doesn't seem likely. Even so I think a wise statesman (sic) would.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/156984
And I never want to go back to the era of complacency and all the evils that sprang from it that was engendered by the lack of a strong opposition.
This is about the parasite gobbling up the host from the inside.
Huppert will be taking back Cambridge from the trots.
Edit: Just seen the Lab majority in Hornsey - blimey !
Anyway Cambridge will be heading back at the least
Political organisations not affiliated or associated under a national agreement with the Party, having their own programme, principles and policy, or distinctive and separate propaganda, or possessing branches in the constituencies, or engaged in the promotion of parliamentary or local government candidates, or having allegiance to any political organisation situated abroad, shall be ineligible for affiliation to the Labour Party (Chapter 1 Clause II, 5A).
Involvement in such organisations not formally affiliated leaves members doing so subject to disciplinary action and expulsion.
There really aren't very many seats in that category though. Cambridge, Brent Central, Hornsey and Wood Green, that Leicester seat the LDs took in a by election... struggling to think of any others...
In 2010, the Cons would have been the same, save for the fact that they had on-site auditors and logic checks courtesy of the LibDems.
We have a situation where wage differentials grow ever more obscene and we don't have a party willing to make the case for more distributive taxes.
We have an economy which is ever more focussed on London. Recent trips on holiday around southern England including a visit to Bluewater are a revelation. There is plenty of wealth in this country but it is becoming ever more focussed in terms of class and geography. Surely a centre left party could find plenty to chew on in this.
Now what?
Combine that with Labour on our knees and she'd have to be the worst political leader in living memory* to not go for an election. A whopping majority delivering the government Absolute control. A mandate to drive through what is required. And a dead Labour Party.
It WILL be this November. Surely.
*Yes, even worse than Corbyn
Somewhere between the collapse of communism and the 2008 crisis the left lost its way on the economy. I find economics difficult because it always seems that more more I try and learn, the less I end up understanding. Quite possibly no-one really understand anything and we are all heading for some sort of economic doom when the continually accumulating debt burden comes home to roost. Meanwhile, there ought surely to be more to say about the economy than leaving the right to largely leave it alone?
The 'weak opposition' argument is an outright myth. Many of the key figures from the Major administration were still around, having handed over a strong and thriving economy. History will judge these people well, especially compared to what followed - we're less than 20 years down the line and the narrative is already changing.
Only the most ardent leftist would argue that the scale of the defeat in 1997 was something that government deserved or brought upon themselves. As john Major remarked a few years later, and I'm paraphrasing somewhat, it was heartbreaking to see so many good MPs who had done nothing wrong ousted unceremoniously without a second thought, on the back of a mindless conformist bandwagon.
But no refunds for the customers...
https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/#/politics/market/1.125203945
----------
For which Labour and their friends in the Teachers' Unions and the blob are largely responsible. Small wonder they make little headway in this area.
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/jul/19/imf-cuts-uk-growth-forecasts-following-brexit-vote?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
And it was pretty obvious.... widely reported in papers, organized mass-resignation, attempt to keep Corbyn off the ballot etc.
Rightly or wrongly, the perception was that the Cons were mired in sleaze, lurching from one scandal to another. Not to belittle as you say the work of a lot of great MPs and a great economic legacy, but people had had enough.
That left Hague, Lilley, Ancram, Gillian Sheppard and er, not many others to try and oppose 419 MPs with a mere 164 MPs.
Is it any wonder so many PFI disasters date from this time? Or that the government's foreign policy under the egregious Robin Cook consisted of lying down to have its belt tickled by the US and the EU? Or that so many diabolically bad laws were passed, ceding the supremacy of parliament to the ECHR? Or that the government pressed on with abolishing GM schools and the NHS internal market which had to be shamefacedly and expensively reintroduced when it was realised that their replacements were a much worse failure? Or that the government became obsessed with fox-hunting?
If you genuinely think strong oppositions don't matter, you don't understand adversarial democratic systems.
I paid £3 for the
privilegehonour!A Moroccan man has stabbed a French woman and her three daughters in Alps holiday resort for being scantily dressed. https://t.co/L69Yhbr02o
REMAIN 48%
At some stage, I suspect in the not too distant future now that we have dumped the chumocracy, thinking about ownership, responsibility and distribution will become mainstream topics.
And the House of Lords remains a dog's breakfast to this day.
LDs are in a bad place. Even if they get a 5% swing against the tories they win back only 10 seats on UNS. And they won't get a 5% swing...
Administrative ability counts for very little in opposition (except in the leader, who has a party machine to run), but a person's effectiveness in the media and the Commons becomes far more important.
More spiralling inequality revealed in the latest ONS data. https://t.co/0pGEVrkSf5 https://t.co/DbRu5xbGUC
Lib Dems are not Labour Lite.
Labour is authoritarian and anti free trade.
Lib Dems are liberal and pro free trade.
Assuming it wasn't actually him phoning in to LBC
I thought we were heading to recession?!
Back B Sanders @ 110.0 for POTUS £4.53 ;
Lay B Carson @ 95 for GOP VP pick £5.00
https://twitter.com/patrickwintour/status/755376382348238848
That squares with my anecdotal experience: in my Northern CLP, Corbyn is still very popular, people feel that they've finally got their party back. That is not so much about him being left-wing, but just the idea that there's finally a Labour leader who's "for the people" rather than another career politician just interested in scratching the backs of the other rich sods down in London. The PLP "moderates" have a lot of work to do to shake off that perception.
Interesting piece from Mr. Brind, but the faith in Corbyn seems largely ideological, and (as the EU shows) ideologues often do not permit reality to intrude upon beautiful theories.
Mr. Llama, no, it's the IMF that said Osborne's approach would kill growth, then had to perform a volte-face when the UK became the best performing economy in the EU.
https://twitter.com/ChrisGibsonNews/status/755392349795221504
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/19/man-stabs-french-woman-and-her-three-daughters-for-being-scantil/
Nuts.
Some people may think that, but I think there will be a lot of grassroots Labour members who take a rather dimmer view of it all.