Labour Leader: Keir Starmer VI

[Tony L]

- not just PR but a serious effort to widen participation and reform political party funding…

How would you do this? Our two main parties each have a clear funding mechanism which goes right to the heart of their history and ideology; the Tories being the wealthy establishment elite, oligarchs, landowners, inherited wealth and titles, the Labour Party the political voice of the Trade Union Movement. They are what they are. Admittedly neither represent the vast majority of us who are in neither category, but it is hard to see how either would accept funding reform, or even could do so conceptually. Things are obviously far harder for all other contenders who have to survive via memberships, donations, crowd-funding etc.

 

[droodzilla]

How would you do this? Our two main parties each have a clear funding mechanism which goes right to the heart of their history and ideology; the Tories being the wealthy establishment elite, oligarchs, landowners, inherited wealth and titles, the Labour Party the political voice of the Trade Union Movement. They are what they are. Admittedly neither represent the vast majority of us who are in neither category, but it is hard to see how either would accept funding reform, or even could do so conceptually. Things are obviously far harder for all other contenders who have to survive via memberships, donations, crowd-funding etc.

I don't know but the main parties already get some public funding (short money) so there's scope to do it. Probably make it contingent on new parties being able to demonstrate a certain level of popular support...

Also need tighter controls and harsher sanctions on campaign spending.

A whole myriad of issues to fix before the entire house falls down.

 

[ks.234]

Also: stop the revolving door between politics, the media and big business. Complete electoral reform - not just PR but a serious effort to widen participation and reform political party funding + many other measures, I expect, all of which will be fiercely resisted by anyone who benefits from the status quo.

There's a hell of a lot to do but that's what happens when democracy is left to rot over several decades.

Yes, agree with everything you say, but for me the rot started in 1983 when Thatcher said…

“The state has no source of money, other than the money people earn themselves. If the state wishes to spend more it can only do so by borrowing your savings, or by taxing you more. And it’s no good thinking that someone else will pay. That someone else is you.”

“There is no such thing as public money. There is only taxpayers’ money.”
​

This is the big lie that still dominates today. If we wait for electoral reform or for the media to change it’s spots, we will be waiting a very long time.

Yes we have a media that ignores this lie every time it’s repeated, and yes, the Preston’s of this world should know better, but how many times do we as individuals ignore the lie when it’s repeated in our own conversations and online?

I for one will no longer ignore the lie. I can’t. Not only is Thatcher’s statement untrue, it is profoundly undemocratic. It is undemocratic because it’s says to the electorate that if it votes for any improvements to society not sanctioned by government, the taxpayer will be presented with a bill. It puts a price on what we can vote for.

A democracy that comes at an artificial cost to the poorest in society is a democracy that needs urgent reform

 

[Joe Hutch]

Well, to be fair the rot started several years earlier, when James Callaghan said:

'We used to think that you could spend your way out of a recession, and increase employment by cutting taxes and boosting Government spending. I tell you in all candour that that option no longer exists, and that in so far as it ever did exist, it only worked on each occasion since the war by injecting a bigger dose of inflation into the economy, followed by a higher level of unemployment as the next step.'

 

[Tony L]

A democracy that comes at an artificial cost to the poorest in society is a democracy that needs urgent reform

Though again we are back at the basic concept of democracy. Anti-democratic forces such as the Tories and Labour can only enforce their ideology (including economics) due to a system that very deliberately and cynically silences alternative perspectives at a local level. A system that has thrown my vote away at almost every election I have voted in. No political party in the UK has ever had a legitimate majority behind absolute power they assign themselves. None has had the mandate to dictate, yet we lurch between partisan dictatorship at almost every election.

The first thing to do it to stop silencing real opposition and end our system of illegitimate majority rule. That way new thinking can start emerge. It is the only way to challenge establishment orthodoxy short of violent revolution, and no one with an IQ over room temperature wants to see that!

 

[ks.234]

Well, to be fair the rot started several years earlier, when James Callaghan said:

'We used to think that you could spend your way out of a recession, and increase employment by cutting taxes and boosting Government spending. I tell you in all candour that that option no longer exists, and that in so far as it ever did exist, it only worked on each occasion since the war by injecting a bigger dose of inflation into the economy, followed by a higher level of unemployment as the next step.'

Yes, this is very true. But the Callaghan was such an economic ignoramus that he thought going cap in hand the the IMF was a good idea.

I perhaps should have said that the rot set in with Thatcher, but yes, Callaghan started the ball rolling in this country.

 

[ks.234]

Though again we are back at the basic concept of democracy. Anti-democratic forces such as the Tories and Labour can only enforce their ideology (including economics) due to a system that very deliberately and cynically silences alternative perspectives at a local level. A system that has thrown my vote away at almost every election I have voted in. No political party in the UK has ever had a legitimate majority behind absolute power they assign themselves. None has had the mandate to dictate, yet we lurch between partisan dictatorship at almost every election.

The first thing to do it to stop silencing real opposition and end our system of illegitimate majority rule. That way new thinking can start emerge. It is the only way to challenge establishment orthodoxy short of violent revolution, and no one with an IQ over room temperature wants to see that!

Not sure I disagree with anything you say there, unless you are suggesting that I have advocated violent revolution, but I’m not sure what it is the the quote you have selected that you are arguing against, or indeed if you are arguing against!

Also, I’m not sure what it is your are saying is the ‘only’ way to challenge establishment orthodoxy? There are clearly more ways than one to challenge establishment orthodoxy, or there are until this government closes them down!

 

[Enfield boy]

If we go for some sort of public funding how do new parties come into being? Assuming that the tories and Labour in it's current form are excluded, cos they're both corrupt and rubbish, that leaves the LibDems who are corrupt and rubbish, the Greens with 1 MP, Brighton and? The 3 parties that Frog faced Pillock led and the Monster Raving Loonies. All of the above will seek to avoid any competition.

 

[Cav]

I think most agree that "something needs to be done".

Tories are in power for ever; Labour can do nothing; LibDems do whatever they do; people here and elsewhere wring their hands and demand things must change.

OK: what is the realistic and practical way to change it and how will it be brought about?

 

[Brian]

I think most agree that "something needs to be done".

Tories are in power for ever; Labour can do nothing; LibDems do whatever they do; people here and elsewhere wring their hands and demand things must change.

OK: what is the realistic and practical way to change it and how will it be brought about?

Nobody here knows, they don’t even know which Labour MPs are not right wingers and could form a new, centre left party, which imo seems the only possible way forward if accepting Labour is a right wing party as is claimed here. There isn’t going to be a completely new party appear, a party full of new faces nobody has ever heard of, that’s for sure.

So, Labour is blamed for the mess the tories have made, excuse after excuse is created to justify not voting for them and we continue on with a tory govt.

 

[Tony L]

OK: what is the realistic and practical way to change it and how will it be brought about?

To my mind it has to happen in stages. The first stage is to recognise the problem is one of systemic failure, and our political classes are not there yet by a long way. The second is to grasp that the existing system is the way it is to return absolute power to a wealthy elite with only a fraction of the electorate behind them. It is what it is. It is doing what it was designed to do. The third can only really be achieved a shared manifesto pledge between all non-Tory parties to implement a proportional and accountable democracy. This would ensure there will never again be a Tory majority as they have never once in history had a mandate to rule. That is phase one done.

Phase two is a gradual rebalancing and rebuilding into a consensus form of government. It will be whatever we vote it to be, stale old powers will wither as new views and perspectives emerge. I’m sure there will be some very wrong turns along the way, but we have to trust in people’s ability to make the choices that define their own lives. The current situation has led us to ruin, isolation, gross inequality, institutional racism and people (often the mentally ill) freezing to death in shop doorways. It clearly has not worked. In fact it is so absurdly unbalanced it did not ever deserve to work. Even more so now the failure is so obvious that the right-wing minority rule are ramping up powers and removing our rights to enable their power via force and violence.

 

[Sue Pertwee-Tyr]

I think most agree that "something needs to be done".

Tories are in power for ever; Labour can do nothing; LibDems do whatever they do; people here and elsewhere wring their hands and demand things must change.

OK: what is the realistic and practical way to change it and how will it be brought about?

I don’t see a ‘new’ political party as the solution. We’ve had a fair few of those, including a couple in the last handful of years. They usually start as a breakaway faction, like the Gang of Four that gave birth to the SDP, which went nowhere and eventually blended in with the Liberals; and more recently CHUCKTIG, or whatever it was known as. They don’t seem able to gain traction. Politics is broken, so we need a new and better politics, not just a warmed over rehash of the tired old recipe.

 

[Darmok]

I think most agree that "something needs to be done".

Tories are in power for ever; Labour can do nothing; LibDems do whatever they do; people here and elsewhere wring their hands and demand things must change.

OK: what is the realistic and practical way to change it and how will it be brought about?

Compulsory voting and Political Education for all.

 

[Enfield boy]

Given how skewed the history taught at school tends to be I'm not convinced that would be a force for change.

 

[ks.234]

Compulsory voting and Political Education for all.

Who will educate the educators?

 

[ks.234]

To my mind it has to happen in stages. The first stage is to recognise the problem is one of systemic failure, and our political classes are not there yet by a long way. The second is to grasp that the existing system is the way it is to return absolute power to a wealthy elite with only a fraction of the electorate behind them. It is what it is. It is doing what it was designed to do. The third can only really be achieved a shared manifesto pledge between all non-Tory parties to implement a proportional and accountable democracy. This would ensure there will never again be a Tory majority as they have never once in history had a mandate to rule. That is phase one done.

Phase two is a gradual rebalancing and rebuilding into a consensus form of government. It will be whatever we vote it to be, stale old powers will wither as new views and perspectives emerge. I’m sure there will be some very wrong turns along the way, but we have to trust in people’s ability to make the choices that define their own lives. The current situation has led us to ruin, isolation, gross inequality, institutional racism and people (often the mentally ill) freezing to death in shop doorways. It clearly has not worked. In fact it is so absurdly unbalanced it did not ever deserve to work. Even more so now the failure is so obvious that the right-wing minority rule are ramping up powers and removing our rights to enable their power via force and violence.

Step Three will never happen. The Lib Dems will f*ck it up like they always do.

 

[Tony L]

Step Three will never happen. The Lib Dems will f*ck it up like they always do.

I suspect they’d sign up immediately, as would the Greens, PC and the SNP. Labour are the stumbling block here as they have sold-out their founding principles to such an absurd extent. They are now just the other half of the Tory establishment; an alternative political career organisation with all the same perks and corporate trappings. Even Corbyn, who some here seem to view as a radical, had zero interest in electoral reform. The rest are even worse.

 

[Seeker_UK]

Who will educate the educators?

We could outsource reeducation, like a lot of things, to the Chinese.

 

[Brian]

Just to remind people, Cav said...

what is the realistic and practical way to change it and how will it be brought about?

I don’t see a ‘new’ political party as the solution. We’ve had a fair few of those, including a couple in the last handful of years. They usually start as a breakaway faction, like the Gang of Four that gave birth to the SDP, which went nowhere and eventually blended in with the Liberals; and more recently CHUCKTIG, or whatever it was known as. They don’t seem able to gain traction. Politics is broken, so we need a new and better politics, not just a warmed over rehash of the tired old recipe.

If there is to be a significant change it can only be a ‘new’ party created by current MPs from the centre left, it is the only realistic change. Anything else is the usual sunlit upland, utopia stuff and is not realistic.

I suspect they’d sign up immediately, as would the Greens, PC and the SNP. Labour are the stumbling block here as they have sold-out their founding principles to such an absurd extent. They are now just the other half of the Tory establishment; an alternative political career organisation with all the same perks and corporate trappings. Even Corbyn, who some here seem to view as a radical, had zero interest in electoral reform. The rest are even worse.

As someone else said, the LibDems would screw it up and the SNP can’t be involved in such a reform given their only interest is independence. They don’t think they belong as a mainstream UK party. The Greens and Plaid are fringe and will remain so. This is also realistic.

 

[Tony L]

A new party will change nothing. If anything it will only splinter and dilute the anti-Tory majority even further. The core problem is Labour as they are anti-democratic and prop up the failed system whilst offering nothing of value as a counterpoint.