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Labour Leader: Keir Starmer IV

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By all accounts this evening, she is a certain winner https://www.independent.co.uk/indep...bour-s-next-byelection-headache-b1844215.html

So Sir Keir has another by-election and another big test coming up. His future as leader may well rest on the result. Not sure he could survive another massive percentage loss like Hartlepool.

Might actually give him a bit of breathing space in the short term as the Labour 'haters' (for want of a better term) may consider it best to wait till he loses that and then call for him to go.
 
notaclue said:
By all accounts this evening, she is a certain winner https://www.independent.co.uk/indep...bour-s-next-byelection-headache-b1844215.html

So Sir Keir has another by-election and another big test coming up. His future as leader may well rest on the result. Not sure he could survive another massive percentage loss like Hartlepool.

Might actually give him a bit of breathing space in the short term as the Labour 'haters' (for want of a better term) may consider it best to wait till he loses that and then call for him to go.
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Tracy Brabin elected West Yorkshire's first mayor
 
One of the more insightful pieces I have read on Labour's problems.

https://brokenbottleboy.substack.com/p/classless-stop-trying-to-make-greggs

I am also struck by a problem I keep seeing between progressives (in which camp I would include myself) and leftists who see everything through a class lens. Although I am not completely settled on exactly what the issue is here except that it's often a false conflict based on the ideas that socialist and progressive politics are in conflict which plays into the hands of the right.

(I am getting very close to talking about intersectionality at this point. And I know that would just make the people here who use woke unironically explode so its perhaps best to change the subject :) )
 
droodzilla said:
Sorry but this is nonsense. The press camped out on Corbyn's doorstep every ****ing day despite him pleading with them not to out of consideration for his neighbours. His treatment by the press and by his own MPs was vile and a stain on our democracy.
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The press never went for his wife like they did for Blair’s. They did the same for Blair, re door stepping, so I don’t see the difference. As I said they tend to after Labour leaders, nothing has changed.
 
matthewr said:
One of the more insightful pieces I have read on Labour's problems.

https://brokenbottleboy.substack.com/p/classless-stop-trying-to-make-greggs

I am also struck by a problem I keep seeing between progressives (in which camp I would include myself) and leftists who see everything through a class lens. Although I am not completely settled on exactly what the issue is here except that it's often a false conflict based on the ideas that socialist and progressive politics are in conflict which plays into the hands of the right.

(I am getting very close to talking about intersectionality at this point. And I know that would just make the people here who use woke unironically explode so its perhaps best to change the subject :) )
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Interesting article. He’s wrong at the end though, Labour is dead. I’m assured of this daily on pfm.
 
Woodface said:
The press never went for his wife like they did for Blair’s. They did the same for Blair, re door stepping, so I don’t see the difference. As I said they tend to after Labour leaders, nothing has changed.
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You're consistently ignoring the part about Corbyn's own MPs slagging him off on the BBC every day. It was an order of magnitude worse than anything I've seen in my life.

But yeah, sure the far-right press love their misogyny too.
 
matthewr said:
One of the more insightful pieces I have read on Labour's problems.

https://brokenbottleboy.substack.com/p/classless-stop-trying-to-make-greggs

I am also struck by a problem I keep seeing between progressives (in which camp I would include myself) and leftists who see everything through a class lens. Although I am not completely settled on exactly what the issue is here except that it's often a false conflict based on the ideas that socialist and progressive politics are in conflict which plays into the hands of the right.

(I am getting very close to talking about intersectionality at this point. And I know that would just make the people here who use woke unironically explode so its perhaps best to change the subject :) )
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BBB is always worth a read.
 
droodzilla said:
You're consistently ignoring the part about Corbyn's own MPs slagging him off on the BBC every day. It was an order of magnitude worse than anything I've seen in my life.
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You can only possibly blame Labour for that. As a target end-user I find their constant inability to accept their elected leadership or to present a coherent ideology, moral compass or ongoing strategy utterly baffling. What are they actually for? What purpose does Labour actually serve. If they are incoherent and dysfunctional it is the duty of the media to expose this. Don’t get me wrong, I utterly detest most of the bigoted hateful far-right media in the UK, but politics is there to be scrutinised.

This is nothing new either, they have been fighting themselves like a sack of crack-addled rats all my voting life. Foot, Benn, Kinnock, Hatton, Scargill, Blair etc. Corbyn was the rule, not the exception. Labour have never presented a coherent or unified face that I am aware of, with the possible exception of the highly authoritarian Blair who followed a hard-right Republican US administration into trying to bomb a religion and other equally crazy things.
 
I'm not a political historian, and I know even less about the past goings on behind the scenes of the Labour party as it all happened either before I was born or very young.

It may be a naïve question, but if the party is so internally divided why are one side or the other even still in it?
 
matt j said:
I'm not a political historian, and I know even less about the past goings on behind the scenes of the Labour party as it all happened either before I was born or very young.

It may be a naïve question, but if the party is so internally divided why are one side or the other even still in it?
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The right have always dominated the machinery and Parliament so they'll never leave. Most of the left - MPs and members - *did* leave during and after the last big purge in the '80s. But where to go? The political left generally is small and weak: they're going to be marginal anywhere. In the party there's the hope you can at least put some pressure on the right, and that sooner or later an opportunity will arise to take the initiative - which happened! I never saw that coming. Who knows if it will happen again. I've basically left. I pay my fees so that if there's another unexpected opportunity I can vote: if I leave-leave I think it will be hard to get back in.
 
droodzilla said:
You're consistently ignoring the part about Corbyn's own MPs slagging him off on the BBC every day. It was an order of magnitude worse than anything I've seen in my life.

But yeah, sure the far-right press love their misogyny too.
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Blair was also challenged from within quite regularly, however, this was stymied by him being in power. Corbyn never achieved this so had less authority. I don’t believe JC was uniquely persecuted by the media. Kinnock had to face down a number of internal challenges & never gained office so is probably a fairer comparison.

Starmer will now suffer a similar fate to Corbyn but you probably won’t be as bothered by this?

I have now resigned myself to watching from the sidelines, why should I really care?
 
matt j said:
It may be a naïve question, but if the party is so internally divided why are one side or the other even still in it?
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The hard left need the centre left because their supporters are less than 10% of the population. On their own they would be a small protest party rather than part of one of the two governing parties. The centre left need to live with the hard left because of the relationship between the party and the unions a significant proportion of whom support the hard left. It is a workable relationship when the party is doing OK and a problem when they are not.
 
Tony L said:
You can only possibly blame Labour for that. As a target end-user I find their constant inability to accept their elected leadership or to present a coherent ideology, moral compass or ongoing strategy utterly baffling. What are they actually for? What purpose does Labour actually serve. If they are incoherent and dysfunctional it is the duty of the media to expose this. Don’t get me wrong, I utterly detest most of the bigoted hateful far-right media in the UK, but politics is there to be scrutinised.

This is nothing new either, they have been fighting themselves like a sack of crack-addled rats all my voting life. Foot, Benn, Kinnock, Hatton, Scargill, Blair etc. Corbyn was the rule, not the exception. Labour have never presented a coherent or unified face that I am aware of, with the possible exception of the highly authoritarian Blair who followed a hard-right Republican US administration into trying to bomb a religion and other equally crazy things.
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Well, yes, the problem lies within the Labour Party.

As for the rest of your post, I can only repeat what I said to woodface: You're consistently ignoring the part about Corbyn's own MPs slagging him off on the BBC every day. It was an order of magnitude worse than anything I've seen in my life.

Here's what Labour "fighting themselves like a sack of crack-addled rats" used to look like:

 
What's this I read about the Tories moving the goalposts on the mayoral elections to FPTP? They really are shameless.
 
droodzilla said:
You're consistently ignoring the part about Corbyn's own MPs slagging him off on the BBC every day. It was an order of magnitude worse than anything I've seen in my life.
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I’m not ignoring it, I just place the blame for that 100% with Labour, 0% with the BBC (or any other media). Other leaders have faced rebellion, e.g. Kinnock vs. the various militant councillors, union leaders etc. I don’t see one as better/worse than the other. It is all a dysfunctional structure that is not fit for purpose. An orchestra where the brass and strings are playing totally different pieces/time signatures without paying even the slightest attention to the conductor. Voters do not want to buy this!

I am far beyond thinking any party has the right to govern by default. Simply not being the Tory Party is just not enough. They have to present a credible, coherent, focused and unambiguous vision and strategy and unify very solidly behind it. Without that they have neither function nor value and should just get the hell out of the way and allow something more intelligent to emerge.
 
Tony L said:
I’m not ignoring it, I just place the blame for that 100% with Labour, 0% with the BBC (or any other media). Other leaders have faced rebellion, e.g. Kinnock vs. the various militant councillors, union leaders etc. I don’t see one as better/worse than the other. It is all a dysfunctional structure that is not fit for purpose. An orchestra where the brass and strings are playing totally different pieces/time signatures without paying even the slightest attention to the conductor. It is what they always do.

I am far beyond thinking any party has the right to govern by default. Simply not being the Tory Party is just not enough. They have to present a credible, coherent, focused and unambiguous vision and strategy and unify very solidly behind it. Without that they have neither function nor value and should just get the hell out of the way and allow something more intelligent to emerge.
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You are ignoring the essential point. Militant etc. were framed as dangerous cranks at the time, rather than respectable political opponents. With Corbyn it was the other way around and it was amlost every day for five years. Indeed, Mandelson and his merry band of ghouls are still kicking the corpse.

I won't bang on about it any more for now but the reason I insist on this point is not out of some misguided loyalty to Corbyn. It is because I believe that if we accept the relentless and systematic delegitimisation of the leader of the opposition with nothing more than a shrug ("same as it ever was") it opens the door to many other horrors. We are living through some of them right now.
 
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Anyway... back to the Angela Rayner story, it appears that woodface was right after all:

https://www.theguardian.com/politic...o-a-seismic-event-with-angela-rayners-sacking
The Guardian was told that on one occasion Jim McMahon, the Oldham MP who ran the Hartlepool byelection campaign, told a meeting with the leader’s office that Rayner had been “dressed inappropriately” on a visit to the town on 21 March.

McMahon’s allies strongly denied he had been disparaging about Rayner, whose constituency borders his own in Greater Manchester, and said he was simply expressing displeasure about pictures that had been selected for a leaflet.

The photographs showed Rayner wearing leopard-print trousers, heavy-duty stomper boots and a hoodie during a visit to Hartlepool on a Sunday, when she had travelled there from her home in Tameside.
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Either clothes are really important in the Labour Party or this is just tittle-tattle. Who can say?

Some info about the reshuffle now coming through... first to go is Nick Brown, the Chief Whip.
 
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