What now for Labour? (Part 1)

First topic message reminder :

A post mortem

We lost. I feared the worst a few days ago when walking my dog. I met a left-wing man I’ve known for years who said that he was voting for the Peace Party. Someone of his persuasion was going to throw his vote down the drain instead of opting for the only party which could replace the Tories. That made me apprehensive about whether millions of anti-Tory voters would use their votes effectively. (The Peace Party came seventh in my constituency.) Worse was to follow when I logged in here. To read that a serious Tory hater couldn’t “become enthused by any party on offer” and chose not to vote for the only viable alternative to Cameron’s evil regime, was further evidence, albeit anecdotal, that the Labour campaign, despite having so many troops on the ground, was failing to motivate enough people to secure a victory.

About eleven million people in the UK (about 37% of those who voted) chose the Tories, and it resulted in them winning 331 of the 650 seats in Parliament, 12 more than all the other parties combined. In our so-called democracy, we have to respect their choice, even if it’s difficult to understand it. I’ve never come to terms with how anyone of modest means, or anyone with a social conscience, could ever vote Tory. I have a brief encounter with OCD whenever I go into a polling booth, checking what I’ve done on the ballot paper several times before I put it in the box.

What makes it even more difficult to understand now is that many people believed Cameron in 2010, he lied to them and has since broken a string of promises (which have been recorded elsewhere on this forum any number of times). He’s presided over the cruellest government in living memory, and yet so many people don’t seem to care. He’s stuffed the House of Lords with cronies, often after the Tories have received generous donations from them, and he's sold off state assets at knockdown prices, in the case of the Royal Mail enabling Osborne’s best man to make a fortune. He and his government have even been reprimanded several times for falsifying statistics.

The Tories often complain that the BBC is ‘left-wing’, which it isn’t, as a thread on this forum fully demonstrates; if anything it leans to the right these days, and it has always fawned over so-called ‘royalty’. But the Tories never complain about the rabid right-wing nature of most of the press, with even ‘The Independent’ giving them a tepid endorsement this week. That press, and programmes such as ‘HIGN4Y’ and ‘News Quiz’, have participated in the character assassination of Ed Miliband over a long period of time, gradually corroding his credibility, and dismissing him as “not being prime ministerial”. Whether he is we will never find out now, but does Cameron fit the bill? So often he’s shown himself to be an arrogant, bad-tempered, out-of-touch bully with a sense of entitlement. His behaviour on the day after the Scottish independence referendum incited the Scots and drove many of them from Labour into the arms of the SNP. In this campaign, he created fear of the SNP to scare many English voters towards the Tories. Had he been alive today, Machiavelli could have learned lessons from Cameron.

Ed Miliband sometimes looks awkward on television and isn’t very good at eating a bacon sandwich (who is?). But what does it say when the issue of choosing a potential prime minister is reduced to the level of a vote for ‘Britain’s Got Talent’ or ‘The X Factor’? Would Clement Attlee - in my opinion the greatest PM we’ve ever had - have won many votes for his celebrity status? Shouldn’t it be more important to choose between the bedroom tax and a mansion tax, and between democratically managed public services or private ones controlled by unaccountable corporations? Did those who voted Tory really want the ultimate destruction of the welfare state? Are they really so blasé about the possibility of becoming sick, unemployed or disabled one day? Instead of thinking about such issues, so many were distracted by the Tory charge that Miliband was ‘weak’, even though Cameron was too scared to debate head-to-head with him.

So it was rather like 1992 after all. No triumphalist Sheffield rally this time, just a silly stone monument, but the polls telling us that it was neck-and-neck and then the Tories winning easily. Three party leaders have resigned, but so should the pollsters. Electoral Calculus was claiming only yesterday that the chance of a Tory majority was just 4%. I don’t think I’ll ever bother to look at an opinion poll again; studying tea leaves is probably a more reliable guide to election outcomes.

Maybe the similarities with 1992 (which turned out to be a good election to lose) won’t end there. Five months after John Major lied his way back into office with scaremongering and promises of “tax cuts year on year”, Tory economic incompetence was there for all to see on ‘Black Wednesday’. His hapless government, riddled with sleaze and tearing itself apart over Europe, limped through five unhappy years, and we all know what happened next. So maybe 2020 will be like 1997, but five years is a long while to wait to find out, and sadly a lot of vulnerable people are going to suffer in the meantime.

A blanket automatic opposition to anything and everything proposed by this Tory government will not win friends and influence people.

Labour has to begin work now on a socialist manifesto which answers voters' concerns about immigration and "benefits for scroungers".  There are also the important problems to be resolved arising from a changed Scottish environment.  Five years spent trimming the edges of existing policy won't be sufficient.

Arguments and squabbling within the Labour Party and amongst those who care for it is quite natural after a defeat of the nature it suffered in May.

Fundamental questions do need to be asked : answers to those questions will tease out whether the party wants to be a feisty left-wing outfit which will be rich pickings for a hostile media, or whether it needs to be socially democratic and pragmatic with a chance to be elected in 2020 or 2025 ( assuming the Tories haven't done away with elections by then.)

If the majority of Labour fans want to try a dose of Corbyn-type socialism then all well and good, but they shouldn't be surprised if they lose in 2020 as a result. If the likes of Harriet Harman are demonised for seeking to demonstrate the value of not opposing everything for the sake of it, then a lengthy period on the wrong side of the Commons benches may be the outcome.

An interim step towards removing the Tories from power might be the development of an anti-Tory alliance with a common understanding and agreement of the role each component ( presumably the Labour Party as the biggest player and lead 'coalition' partner , the Greens , Plaid Cymru, the LibDems ( dare I say?!) and the SNP ) might most usefully play.

The purists might argue that such parties should not contemplate surrender of any of their individual pet policies, even in the greater national interest. If so , fair enough - welcome , in that case, to a permanent Tory government...

sickchip. Well said, sir. I'm just as incensed as you are about Harriet Harman's remarks. The idea that it's okay for tax credits to be limited to two children - regardless of what harm that might do to families with more than two children (is it really a child's fault if it is born into a larger family?) - is incomprehensible and unacceptable from a Labour politician.

Little more than a decade ago, a Labour government recognised that a birth rate of 1.6 children per couple was disastrous for the long-term future of this country. If it continued, there wouldn't be enough people to care for the ageing population, and not enough people to work and pay taxes to provide for their pensions. Since then the birth rate has increased, and whether it's because of immigrants or the indigenous population, it certainly isn't right that children should be penalised in such a way.

oftenwrong wrote:A blanket automatic opposition to anything and everything proposed by this Tory government will not win friends and influence people.

Labour has to begin work now on a socialist manifesto which answers voters' concerns about immigration and "benefits for scroungers".  There are also the important problems to be resolved arising from a changed Scottish environment.  Five years spent trimming the edges of existing policy won't be sufficient.

So capitulation TO the tory agenda is the answer to opposing the tory agenda?

My god listen to yourself.

Labour won't be working on a socialist manifesto; do you think Harriet is an aberration? She is saying what the party thinks. THis is Labour! What more bloody evidence do you need?

I suspect that, even many of those people in Britain who might benefit from good old-fashioned socialism don't want to vote for it.

Accordingly, the Labour Party has a problem : how does it get elected if it doesn't want to be a form of 'respectable' centre Party and which of the traditional Labour policies dare it espouse?

They have about 5 years to get it right. I don't think they will achieve it and I believe we shall not see a Labour victory in 2020. Sorry!

The socialist option is never presented to them.

The Greek electorate recently accepted the socialist option ("No to Austerity") which was presented to them.

We shall all be interested to see how that turns out.

Phil Hornby wrote:-
If the likes of Harriet Harman are demonised for seeking to demonstrate the value of not opposing everything for the sake of it……

Of course we shouldn’t oppose everything for the sake of it, but Harriet Harman’s support for limiting tax credits to just two children is what has incensed many Labour supporters today.

Little more than a decade ago, the birth rate in this country had fallen to a level which could not sustain the population. We need an average of 2.1 children from every female to ‘break even’. Some women won’t have two children, while others will have more than that. The idea that any children might suffer hardship because they happen to find themselves in families with two or more siblings is anathema to most left-inclined people. If we’re going down that route, maybe we should start by taking away the lavish benefits which Andrew and Edward Windsor have received at the taxpayers’ expense over the last half century.

It may depend upon which newspaper you customarily read:

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/453766/REVEALED-The-60-000-families-with-5-plus-kids-living-on-benefits

oftenwrong wrote:The Greek electorate recently accepted the socialist option ("No to Austerity") which was presented to them.

We shall all be interested to see how that turns out.

Syriza weren't socialist, that much is obvious. Arguing sharing socialism, as you are doing, because the socialist option isn't is a bizarre argument.

Yer pays yer money an' yer takes yer choice:

http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/20090/11-02-2015/is-podemos-the-spanish-syriza

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2015/03/20/pode-m20.html

or

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2015/03/24/beyond-syriza-and-podemos-other-radical-left-parties-are-threatening-to-break-into-the-mainstream-of-european-politics/

Evidently "Socialism", like "Beauty", is in the eye of the beholder.

You are spot OW, it just proves what I have been thinking if your not a right wing gov't the EU will bring that gov't down and force people to vote for right wing parties.

oftenwrong wrote:Yer pays yer money an' yer takes yer choice:

http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/20090/11-02-2015/is-podemos-the-spanish-syriza

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2015/03/20/pode-m20.html

or

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2015/03/24/beyond-syriza-and-podemos-other-radical-left-parties-are-threatening-to-break-into-the-mainstream-of-european-politics/

Evidently "Socialism", like "Beauty", is in the eye of the beholder.

No it's in the policies and behavour of those who claim they are socialist to actually BE socialist. It's not complicated at all and just because people call them socialist or newspapers call them socialist or anyone anywhere calls them socialist doesn't automatically mean that Syriza are and given that they seem to want to sell the greeks down the river i would think it pretty obvious they aren't socialist.

Just as Labour are red tories because they support and adopt tory policy. Doesn't matter to me if they call themselves labour, they aren't worth the name.

oftenwrong wrote:It may depend upon which newspaper you customarily read:

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/453766/REVEALED-The-60-000-families-with-5-plus-kids-living-on-benefits

why on earth would you link to the Express? You aren't dumb enough to fall for that crap i hope?

if your not a right wing gov't the EU will bring that gov't down and force people to vote for right wing parties.
.

I'm beginning to think you may have a point, Red - can it be the battle has already been fought and lost?

ghost whistler wrote:The socialist option is never presented to them.

It would be if so many of us hadn't walked out.

ghost whistler wrote:
why on earth would you link to the Express?

As long as such newspapers are kind enough to announce Tory intentions in detail, opposition parties have a spy in the enemy camp.

On the other hand it is undeniable that many of the 11,334,576 voters who returned a Conservative government to Westminster (37% of votes cast) with 330 seats will have had their opinion formed by right-wing propaganda. The socialist purity or otherwise of the Labour Party was probably not a factor in their calculation in which self-interest took precedence.

One activity which the Labour Party could undertake more effectively than hitherto, is to highlight as many individual cases as possible where the Tory policies on welfare are disadvantaging obviously-deserving people - eg the dying who are found 'fit for work' and wounded service personnel whose benefits are woefully inadequate and who may face the threat of the Bedroom Tax penalties , for instance.

Such stories may at least start to make dents in the stereotypical belief of Joe Public that all receiving help from the State are 'scroungers'. The more the picture of worthy recipients denied proper help builds up, the more it will sink into the public psyche that there is an alternative narrative about welfare and benefits. A similar approach may make headway in relation to other pernicious Tory policies , too.

Clearly the drip, drip of propaganda serves Cameron well , and it is about time that Labour identified the means to create its own storyboard of true, but gruesome, tales. Hammering away relentlessly at themes representing genuine human tragedies which find a real resonance with the public may be time better spent than any number of pointless questions at PMQs which are all too easily drowned out...

boatlady wrote:
if your not a right wing gov't the EU will bring that gov't down and force people to vote for right wing parties.
.

I'm beginning to think you may have a point, Red - can it be the battle has already been fought and lost?

Between what they have e to Greece and the TTIP agreement plus they done the same thing to Southern Ireland a few years back, what I have heard about the TTIP on the RT channel even some of the german people are against it so I will be voting to come out of the EU when the referendum happens boatlady.

Thee EU actions have proved that it is run by huge Corporations I suggest that people should check out the TTIP agreement on the web, if it is all its is supposed to be WHY have the negoiations in secret ??

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/solomon-hughes-caroline-flint-labour-deputy-leadership-campaign-901

Another red tory.

How much more evidence do you need?

Well, of course you don't have to support them - you could go and find a pure socialist party that you and your conscience can feel happy with - then come back and tell us about them - who knows? you might convert us

boatlady wrote:Well, of course you don't have to support them....

and yet you do.

That is my choice - I don't try to force it on you - why do you try to force your opinions on me?

Now the tories want to smash the unions to attack labour.

Still against direct action?

The Tories would love direct action.

They and their media friends would immediately accuse Labour of fomenting and encouraging it and there would be no capital in that for the Left. In any event, there will inevitably be a number of professional banner-wavers and Police-baiters on the streets and that will do enough damage to the cause in the court of public opinion.

It would also provide Cameron and his clique with the excuse to bring out the water-cannon and act tough. Don't give them the excuse - make the compelling counter-arguments and let the public decide-after all, they are the ones who vote...

and who woudl the public vote for?

I believe the public would be inclined to feel that the Tories would be right to rough up people who acted violently on the streets ( and whatever good intentions major demonstrations might have, they always get hijacked by elements who enjoy a fight with the Police and a bit of window-smashing and looting).

The Tories have enough advantages in the propaganda war - don't give them any opportunity to portray themselves as brave martyrs, too - a position in which UKIP would willingly join them in the hope for some spin-off political benefits...

you haven';t answered my question.

all you are doing is playing into the hands of the tories.

if you're going to suggest people vote for labour given that labour are no different than the tories what would be the point?

Labour are different from the Tories - they may not be sufficiently different for your taste but there are obvious differences - eg Labour is not in favour of the currently proposed 'reforms' to trade union strike ballots.

I am not a true supporter of Labour and I feel they did a pretty poor job in opposition 2010 - 2015. I hope they do better this time round, but it is no good them simply adopting a stance which risks alienating people - who may be persuaded to vote for them if they oppose selectively on the right issues. My belief is that the sort of more extreme left-wing agenda you would like to see pursued will consign Labour to the wilderness. Who would that assist?

If people are patient and have a bit of faith, they may find that a Labour Party, which carefully reconstructs the confidence of the electorate by 'middle ground' policies and attitudes in opposition, will eventually become a government and can then seek gradually to persuade those who may have initially feared a left-leaning set of key policies that they are 'safe' with a Labour administration after all. Job done - or at least well underway...

Thank God somebody has told it like it really is, that is yourself PH, it would be wise for all on this forum especially you GW to listen to PH wise words or do you want the Labour party to stay out in the wilderness allowing the Tories to dismantle our entire public but maybe that is exactly what GW wants that is why Tory voters have paid there £3.00 so they can vote Jermy Corbyn as the Labour leader who would turn Labour voters off voting for the Labour party in 2020 & 2025 (God Forbid)

Labour are no different than the Tories as i have repeatedly demonstrated. All I see here is capitulation.

Redflag wrote:Thank God somebody has told it like it really is, that is yourself PH, it would be wise for all on this forum especially you GW to listen to PH wise words or do you want the Labour party to stay out in the wilderness allowing the Tories to dismantle our entire public but maybe that is exactly what GW wants that is why Tory voters have paid there £3.00 so they can vote Jermy Corbyn as the Labour leader who would turn Labour voters off voting for the Labour party in 2020 & 2025 (God Forbid)

I don't care if Labour are in the wilderness, they are where they deserve to be and they are not going to change. Tories can support whomever they like, Corbyn isn't going to win because the Labour leadership will not let him. He has no chance.

Arguing that Labour are being kept in the wilderness is utterly facile, you really don't seem to understand: they are where they put themslves. How much more evidence do you need? They have accepted lock stock and barrel the Tory position on welfare. So why would i want to support them? Do you think they are going to change if somehow they win in 2020? Do you honestly think this is some elaborate plan to fool the electorate into putting them in? People dpn't want red tories! The real tory supporters already have a party and the rest of us want an alternative. Labour don't want to provide that. Why you cannot see this I simply do not know. How much more evidence do you need?

Phil Hornby wrote:The Tories would love direct action.

They and their media friends would immediately accuse Labour of fomenting and encouraging it and there would be no capital in that for the Left. In any event, there will inevitably be a number of professional banner-wavers and Police-baiters on the streets and that will do enough damage to the cause in the court of public opinion.

It would also provide Cameron and his clique with the excuse to bring out the water-cannon and act tough. Don't give them the excuse - make the compelling counter-arguments and let the public decide-after all, they are the ones who vote...

the only way anything is going to change is through direct action. You seem to think that means going around and smashing things up.

Right now the Tories are enacting changes to the union laws that will choke off labour's funding. Yet instead of fighting that you want to sit back and do nothing? Do you realise you are acting against your own itnerests?

George Osborne has remarked: “When in opposition, occupy the centre ground. When in government, shift the centre ground”. Somebody on Twitter today claimed that that accounted for Blair’s success. Well Blair certainly occupied the centre ground, but did he shift it? No, he left everything where it was, just for the Tories to shift it ever more rightwards once they got their filthy hands on the levers of power once again with the help of Nick Clegg.

Too many well-meaning people seem to think that Labour has to be ‘moderate’ to get elected, but don’t seem to notice that the Tories can be ‘extreme’ and win elections, as they’ve just proved. The welfare state is being finished off; the Tories are now hinting that workers will have to get their own insurance against possible sickness. The full price of prescriptions is to be printed on the packets of any medicines you receive, and no doubt before long that will be the price you pay. Jeremy Hunt, who once wrote a pamphlet calling for the break-up of the NHS, is not averse to charges for visits to the GP. Initially, it will only be for those who don’t turn up for appointments – probably a popular decision – but it will be the thin end of the wedge again. The BBC is under attack from the Tories, along with Parliament itself; Westminster is a UK-wide assembly and attempting to restrict the voting rights of some of its members is an outrageous device for increasing the Tory majority from 12 to 105. If we need a separate English Parliament, that’s a different issue, but for the past ten weeks – as throughout the so-called ‘coalition’ – the Tories have demonstrated nothing but extremism.

This country already has some of the most anti-trade union laws in Europe, something with which Blair, on his centre ground, barely tinkered. Now, as part of its attempt to suppress all possible sources of opposition (unions, charities, Labour, the BBC), this quasi-fascist government is making strikes virtually impossible. Nobody wants to go on strike and lose much-needed pay. Strikes are the result of the breakdown of industrial relations. We used to have something called collective bargaining; now we just have a crack head announcing in Parliament that pay rises will be no more than 1% for the next four years, regardless of the rate of inflation.

The late Tony Benn used to argue that Parliament only used to make significant changes when it was forced to do so by pressure from outside. However, the validity or otherwise of direct action is a debatable issue. The Tories – like Mussolini before them – might like to provoke some of that as an excuse for ever more draconian laws. There will always be hotheads - and no shortage of agents provocateurs – to ensure a bad press for the most civilised of demonstrations. On the other hand, I can understand the frustrations of those who think we shouldn’t be sitting on our backsides for the next five years while the DWP murders a few thousand more of the sick and disabled. But I suspect that it is only when conditions have deteriorated for a large number of people, and mass demonstrations turn into a movement which threatens the Establishment, that direct action will achieve anything of significance.

I don’t think being a pale imitation of the Tories is the way forward for Labour. I think there needs to be a concerted campaign to rebut the Tory lies about Labour economic competence, privatisation, the 1970s, ‘the Right to Buy’, the Laffer curve etc. Too many people have had their brains addled from being reared on a diet of ‘The Daily Mail’ and ‘The Sun’, in effect they need re-educating. Play the Tory game – repeat a few choice sound bites over and over again for the next five years and trust that the message will eventually sink in.

I think Labour needs someone with Jeremy Corbyn’s views and clarity of thought and Liz Kendall’s good looks (sadly appearance seems to matter to so many people) – but I won’t be voting for either of them. It would be too easy for the media to paint Corbyn as too old and too ‘extreme’ (here we go again), and Kendall wouldn’t inspire the ground troops and could provoke mass resignations from the party. I will vote for someone who is sufficiently different from the Tories but has a chance of winning, so that will be Andy Burnham (with Yvette Cooper as second preference).

" Do you realise you are acting against your own itnerests?"

The paradox is that I am probably 'better off' under a Tory government - at least in a financial sense. Where I am not 'better off' is in seeing people suffering who are less fortunate than me . That is why I believe that there must be an attempt by some grouping to beat the Tories - whoever it is and whatever it is called. Currently, Labour - for all its faults - may be best placed to do that, but it will require a stealthy approach.

What it will not need , in my view, is a full-frontal assault by a ruddy-cheeked army of left-wing extremists , out on the streets and displaying civil disobedience. That way lies more disappointment and defeat.

Don't imagine that I don't understand your argument - but don't imagine that I don't disagree with it...

Jeremy Corbyn "on course to come top" in the Labour leadership election  

Extracts from an article by Stephen Bush:-

Labour's preferential voting system - used both for the final contest and to nominate by local parties - is masking Corbyn's strength in the first round. One survey has Corbyn ahead by more than 15 points. Another puts him in what one campaign staffer called "a commanding position...he is on course to win".

It appears as if the Islington North MP's strength is largely coming from new and younger members. One CLP chair believes that "more than two thirds" of new recruits since the election are supporters of Corbyn, a finding mirrored by the leadership campaigns' experience of phoning new members. It also appears as if many members from the party's right have abandoned the party during the years of Ed Miliband, being replaced by what one staffer describes as "true believers".

http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/07/jeremy-corbyn-course-come-top-labour-leadership-election

So be it.

But is this the political equivalent of an own goal with a 40-yard back pass...?

Staying with that analogy, the overtly fascist tendency of a Tory administration, freed from any restraint after five years of coalition, may lead them to a succession of "own goals".

The British sense of fair play which disapproved of welfare scroungers will be equally mistrustful of overweening hubris. A Greek word.

Phil Hornby wrote:" Do you realise you are acting against your own itnerests?"

The paradox is that I am probably 'better off' under a Tory government - at least in a financial sense. Where I am not 'better off' is in seeing people suffering who are less fortunate than me . That is why I believe that there must be an attempt by some grouping to beat the Tories - whoever it is and whatever it is called. Currently, Labour - for all its faults - may be best placed to do that, but it will require a stealthy approach.

What it will not need , in my view, is a full-frontal assault by a ruddy-cheeked army of left-wing extremists , out on the streets and displaying civil disobedience. That way lies more disappointment  and defeat.

Don't imagine that I don't understand your argument - but don't imagine that I don't disagree with it...

and yet your alternative is to view for a party that's no different than the pay in power using a system that doesn't work.

In relation to answering previous posts, it's not necessary to quote the entire post - in fact it's counter-productive.
Why not just copy and paste the specific comment you want to respond to? Or you could just reference the member who made the post you are responding to

boatlady wrote:
if your not a right wing gov't the EU will bring that gov't down and force people to vote for right wing parties.
.

I'm beginning to think you may have a point, Red - can it be the battle has already been fought and lost?

Boatlady I am all in favour of the people of the UK taking direct action to bring this Tory gov't down before it does any more damage to our public sector, with a twist of course so that we can spoil the happiness of Davt boy and his SCUMBAGS. What I would suggest is a general strike or Civil Disobedience without the marches or the protest on the streets of the UK, then Davy boy would be unable to call out his storm troopers (police & army) that would really sicken davy boys happiness .

I am certain that people could stay at home and catch up with there DIY or something simular, but hang there banners & flags from windows of there homes or placards in there gardens that way it would fiol Davy boys plans to return the UK to Dickenzian time