Labour Leader: Keir Starmer VII

[Nick_G]

All those Red Wall mugs who voted Tory,

The Tories are going to give it to them good and hard- say hello to your new “Levelling Up Minister”-

‘I think it is important that we look at a state which is extremely large, and look at how we can make sure that it is in full alignment with a lower tax economy”.

Austerity 2 with bells on.

And all those Red Wall votes to "get Brexit done". They've been conned and fallen into the Tory trap. All the warnings were just dismissed as 'Project Fear'. Well, I bet you're scared now.

 

[ks.234]

And all those Red Wall votes to "get Brexit done". They've been conned and fallen into the Tory trap. All the warnings were just dismissed as 'Project Fear'. Well, I bet you're scared now.

IMHO, Brexit was a symptom rather than a cause in that the neglect and consequent decline of our poorer regions started a long time ago.

The big con, which Callaghan colluded with, happened in 1979, and that con has sprung traps ever since. It was a con that said everyone would eventually be better off under the Tory economics of belt tightening and hard choices. We’ve had the belt tightening and hard choices, but we’re still waiting for any but a tiny majority to be better off. The trickle from trickle down dried up half a century ago. Brexit, as misguided as it was, was a shout against decades of political indifference and a desperate attempt to find a lost sense of identity.

Everyone, not just the Red Wall, has fallen into a trap. The trap is the lies about government spending being like household spending. It isn’t.

 

[Nick_G]

IMHO, Brexit was a symptom rather than a cause in that the neglect and consequent decline of our poorer regions started a long time ago.

The big con, which Callaghan colluded with, happened in 1979, and that con has sprung traps ever since. It was a con that said everyone would eventually be better off under the Tory economics of belt tightening and hard choices. We’ve had the belt tightening and hard choices, but we’re still waiting for any but a tiny majority to be better off. The trickle from trickle down dried up half a century ago. Brexit, as misguided as it was, was a shout against decades of political indifference and a desperate attempt to find a lost sense of identity.

Everyone, not just the Red Wall, has fallen into a trap. The trap is the lies about government spending being like household spending. It isn’t.

Oh yes. Brexit is a symptom, but by offering a referendum on EU membership the 'bastards' in the Tory party made damn sure it would be a symptom that they could manipulate to their advantage. Just appeal to the fear and prejudices in those voters and bingo! There's your Brexit, the bastards take over the party and then use Brexit to rebuild Britain in their own extremist image.

 

[ks.234]

Oh yes. Brexit is a symptom, but by offering a referendum on EU membership the 'bastards' in the Tory party made damn sure it would be a symptom that they could manipulate to their advantage. Just appeal to the fear and prejudices in those voters and bingo! There's your Brexit, the bastards take over the party and then use Brexit to rebuild Britain in their own extremist image.

Not disagreeing about Brexit, just that the take over happened sometime ago when Thatcher to over from the one nation Tories who worked within the social contract. To be fair a similar take over took place in the Labour Party and the LD’s as well as in the minds of mainstream economists. The take over was of the ideas of Milton Friedman, and even when his monetarist ideas have been shown to be a failure, the holy trinity of public spending cuts, deregulation and privatisation remain and remain largely unchallenged and form what Adam Tooze has called our current hegemony, a hegemony based on worship at the Church of Applied Friedmanology

Brexit took the holy trinity and turbo charged it, but the take over of ideology happened in 1979 and remains unchallenged today.

 

[Spraggons Den]

Starmer intends to renationalise the railways and his proposed new green energy company is going to be publicly owned.

Better than a kick in the balls.

 

[Seeker_UK]

Starmer intends to renationalise the railways and his proposed new green energy company is going to be publicly owned.

Bloody Labour right-wingers.

 

[Seanm]

Bloody Labour right-wingers.

The right do objectively have a tight grip of the party, and I can think of quite a few explanations for these announcements that are more plausible then the people in charge suddenly becoming left wing - I.e. dropping all their values, analyses, personal interests, allegiances and so on and embracing a tradition they’ve spent their entire careers vilifying. For instance: they might not be being completely straight with us. It wouldn’t be a first.

I’m not saying they won’t do these things but if they do do them, in a meaningful way, it will be because they have to, and there will be tradeoffs.

 

[Seeker_UK]

The right do objectively have a tight grip of the party, and I can think of quite a few explanations for these announcements that are more plausible then the people in charge suddenly becoming left wing - I.e. dropping all their values, analyses, personal interests, allegiances and so on and embracing a tradition they’ve spent their entire careers vilifying. For instance: they might not be being completely straight with us. It wouldn’t be a first.

Another alternative view is that they're building a strategy to win the election. As awful as you may think the current system is, this is the only way of winning the next GE, playing the Conservatives at their game. Now, whether that is a cynical ploy or a genuine attempt to offer a different set of policies, I and many other could not care less; it will be better than the current set. That will do for now.

I’m not saying they won’t do these things but if they do do them, in a meaningful way, it will be because they have to, and there will be tradeoffs.

That's what running a country is all about. The only time a 'cake and eat it' approach was tried ended very badly and got us Liz Truss.

 

[Tony L]

As awful as you may think the current system is, this is the only way of winning the next GE, playing the Conservatives at their game.

In fairness there won’t be much of an economy or concept of decency in public life left to shit on by that time. Labour will have to offer something a little different than just being the Tory dumpster fire continuity party.

 

[ks.234]

Another alternative view is that they're building a strategy to win the election. As awful as you may think the current system is, this is the only way of winning the next GE, playing the Conservatives at their game. Now, whether that is a cynical ploy or a genuine attempt to offer a different set of policies, I and many other could not care less; it will be better than the current set. That will do for now.



That's what running a country is all about. The only time a 'cake and eat it' approach was tried ended very badly and got us Liz Truss.

Labour is promising to increase government spending and pay down the deficit and the debt. You can have one or the other, you can’t have both.

 

[laughingboy]

Another alternative view is that they're building a strategy to win the election. As awful as you may think the current system is, this is the only way of winning the next GE, playing the Conservatives at their game. Now, whether that is a cynical ploy or a genuine attempt to offer a different set of policies, I and many other could not care less; it will be better than the current set. That will do for now.

On the one hand, this is reasonable - focus on appealing to the centre. It is clear that Labour needs to win the next election.

On the other hand, such strategy has led to a 'ratchet effect' of denuded public provision. We see the Tories in office (Thatcher, Austerity, Truss) aggressively take the country rightwards, attacking trade unions, reducing access to employment tribunals, shrinking or diverting into private pockets the money that is spent on public services, privatising, academising, centralising power. Then Labour come in. They make small steps leftward, but they don't undo any privatisations, and they don't undo the marketisation of public services, in fact they like some of this stuff - they introduce student loans, PFI, and 'light touch regulation' of the banks. And at the end of their term, things are better than when the Tories left power. That will do for now; but the underlying position is still further right than before the Tories were last in power.

And then the Tories get back in, and do radical stuff (Universal Credit, Austerity, Hard Brexit, Royal Mail etc). Labour get in and timidly dial back a few policies (they can't afford more, because the tax base has been squeezed). We end up still further right. The 'ratchet effect' continues. And the voting system ensures that the Labour Party have less time in power than the Tories.

At some point, Labour has to realise that even voters in the centre want some left-wing policies: people want publicly owned rail and utilities; people want an NHS that is not market-driven and stuffed with managers. Labour will not lose votes if they promise these things. Look at Philip Oppenheim's letter to the FT this week (Twitter), calling for a raft of reforms. Wherever left-wing policies are popular, Labour needs to be bold, or it loses even when it wins.

 

[ks.234]

On the one hand, this is reasonable - focus on appealing to the centre. It is clear that Labour needs to win the next election.

On the other hand, such strategy has led to a 'ratchet effect' of denuded public provision. We see the Tories in office (Thatcher, Austerity, Truss) aggressively take the country rightwards, attacking trade unions, reducing access to employment tribunals, shrinking or diverting into private pockets the money that is spent on public services, privatising, academising, centralising power. Then Labour come in. They make small steps leftward, but they don't undo any privatisations, and they don't undo the marketisation of public services, in fact they like some of this stuff - they introduce student loans, PFI, and 'light touch regulation' of the banks. And at the end of their term, things are better than when the Tories left power. That will do for now; but the underlying position is still further right than before the Tories were last in power.

And then the Tories get back in, and do radical stuff (Universal Credit, Austerity, Hard Brexit, Royal Mail etc). Labour get in and timidly dial back a few policies (they can't afford more, because the tax base has been squeezed). We end up still further right. The 'ratchet effect' continues. And the voting system ensures that the Labour Party have less time in power than the Tories.

At some point, Labour has to realise that even voters in the centre want some left-wing policies: people want publicly owned rail and utilities; people want an NHS that is not market-driven and stuffed with managers. Labour will not lose votes if they promise these things. Look at Philip Oppenheim's letter to the FT this week (Twitter), calling for a raft of reforms. Wherever left-wing policies are popular, Labour needs to be bold, or it loses even when it wins.

Just one point. It was Blair who introduced Academies, which with PFI, student loans and deregulation, might suggest a rather heavy hand on the righty tighty side of the ratchet!

 

[Tony L]

Look at Philip Oppenheim's letter to the FT this week (Twitter), calling for a raft of reforms.

I’m a big fan of the last paragraph!

 

[Nick_G]

I’m a big fan of the last paragraph!

There's a reason that the word 'Tory' is 75% 'rot'.

 

[Brian]

Starmer intends to renationalise the railways and his proposed new green energy company is going to be publicly owned.

Better than a kick in the balls.

That can't be true. They are the same as the tories, also racist and corrupt.

 

[droodzilla]

On the one hand, this is reasonable - focus on appealing to the centre. It is clear that Labour needs to win the next election.

On the other hand, such strategy has led to a 'ratchet effect' of denuded public provision. We see the Tories in office (Thatcher, Austerity, Truss) aggressively take the country rightwards, attacking trade unions, reducing access to employment tribunals, shrinking or diverting into private pockets the money that is spent on public services, privatising, academising, centralising power. Then Labour come in. They make small steps leftward, but they don't undo any privatisations, and they don't undo the marketisation of public services, in fact they like some of this stuff - they introduce student loans, PFI, and 'light touch regulation' of the banks. And at the end of their term, things are better than when the Tories left power. That will do for now; but the underlying position is still further right than before the Tories were last in power.

And then the Tories get back in, and do radical stuff (Universal Credit, Austerity, Hard Brexit, Royal Mail etc). Labour get in and timidly dial back a few policies (they can't afford more, because the tax base has been squeezed). We end up still further right. The 'ratchet effect' continues. And the voting system ensures that the Labour Party have less time in power than the Tories.

At some point, Labour has to realise that even voters in the centre want some left-wing policies: people want publicly owned rail and utilities; people want an NHS that is not market-driven and stuffed with managers. Labour will not lose votes if they promise these things. Look at Philip Oppenheim's letter to the FT this week (Twitter), calling for a raft of reforms. Wherever left-wing policies are popular, Labour needs to be bold, or it loses even when it wins.

More succinctly, the Labour Party are the servants, cleaning up the mess after an orgy. Until the next one.

 

[ks.234]

More succinctly, the Labour Party are the servants, cleaning up the mess after an orgy. Until the next one.

…and pocketing a couple of discarded bottles half full of flat champagne. Trickle down at it’s finest

 

[sean99]

IMHO, Brexit was a symptom rather than a cause in that the neglect and consequent decline of our poorer regions started a long time ago.

The big con, which Callaghan colluded with, happened in 1979, and that con has sprung traps ever since. It was a con that said everyone would eventually be better off under the Tory economics of belt tightening and hard choices. We’ve had the belt tightening and hard choices, but we’re still waiting for any but a tiny majority to be better off. The trickle from trickle down dried up half a century ago. Brexit, as misguided as it was, was a shout against decades of political indifference and a desperate attempt to find a lost sense of identity.

Everyone, not just the Red Wall, has fallen into a trap. The trap is the lies about government spending being like household spending. It isn’t.

I agree that Brexit is a symptom, but I think a key underlying cause, that you've not mentioned is the deindustrialization of the UK (and I include the mines in that) without ANY plan to replace the jobs and income. Not only did this impoverish huge swathes of the country, create mass unemployment, and destroy communities and the peoples' dignity, but it helped to drive the permanent trade deficit, which in turn weakens the currency, and makes the country very prone to imported inflation.

Thatcher decided that an acceptable price for breaking the power of unions was the decimation of industry - in a similar way to how Boris decided that decimating the economy was an acceptable price for Brexit (and his own personal ambition).
It may be true that the coal mines had to eventually close due to global warming, but we were importing coal for years, and paying more per ton than home mined coal - for POLITICAL reasons. Plus now the UK has so little domestic industry that you are reliant on "inward investment".

 

[ks.234]

I agree that Brexit is a symptom, but I think a key underlying cause, that you've not mentioned is the deindustrialization of the UK (and I include the mines in that) without ANY plan to replace the jobs and income. Not only did this impoverish huge swathes of the country, create mass unemployment, and destroy communities and the peoples' dignity, but it helped to drive the permanent trade deficit, which in turn weakens the currency, and makes the country very prone to imported inflation.

Thatcher decided that an acceptable price for breaking the power of unions was the decimation of industry - in a similar way to how Boris decided that decimating the economy was an acceptable price for Brexit (and his own personal ambition).
It may be true that the coal mines had to eventually close due to global warming, but we were importing coal for years, and paying more per ton than home mined coal - for POLITICAL reasons. Plus now the UK has so little domestic industry that you are reliant on "inward investment".

I had in mind the impoverishment, unemployment and destruction of communities in mind in my first sentence about neglect and decline.

However, as you say, this was a very deliberate choice taken for underhand, cynical political motives of the worst kind, so neglect is not the right word. Quite what the correct word is to describe such calculated venom I don’t know. It is properly called shock therapy or disaster capitalism, but that seems to dignify it rather.

 

[Tony L]

More succinctly, the Labour Party are the servants, cleaning up the mess after an orgy. Until the next one.

Institutional Stockholm Syndrome. I have always found this baffling about Labour. Given the choice of being powerless in opposition for around 75-80% of the time under the Tory FPTP system or a key part of a broad consensus anti-Tory government for 100% of the time under PR they choose the former. As a party they are psychologically damaged.