What now for Labour? (Part 1)

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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.

Redflag. The Tories and their media poodles will attack whoever becomes Labour leader; when casting our votes, we shouldn’t consider how they will react. I’ve thought about this very much over the last two months, and although initially I thought Andy Burnham was the man for the job, I decided about ten days ago that Jeremy Corbyn is the best candidate – because he offers hope and clear policies and seems to be able to motivate people. Whenever he holds a meeting, the hall is full and there is often an overflow. When the robotic Yvette Cooper launched her attack on him the other day, only 58 people turned up. And far from the media cry of being "unelectable" (something which was also said of Thatcher in 1975), Corbyn’s policies are actually popular with people:-

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/aug/14/jeremy-corbyn-labour-leadership-most-popular-candidate-voters-all-parties

When Labour won the 1997 election, neither Tony Blair nor Gordon Brown had any ministerial experience. The same can be said of Cameron and Osborne in 2010, and more importantly, Osborne hadn’t even passed his GCSE Maths! It could count in Jeremy Corbyn’s favour that he wasn’t a part of the government which was so unfairly blamed for causing a global financial meltdown, but whose members did little to challenge that whopping lie which was embedded in the nation’s psyche by the Tories and that ginger rodent who has just been knighted.

QUOTE: "So far though the media has been fairly hostile to Corbyn (even the Labour media) he's had a pretty easy ride. If he wins he'll find his policies under close scrutiny."

Indeed, biglin. On the front page of The Sunday Times, Political Editor Tim Shipman writes: "Downing Street will hold a vote on tough new strike laws as soon as the Labour Leader is elected .... ensuring the party's first "loony left" move is embracing its trade union paymasters."

Mr Shipman (@shippersunbound) likes that story so much, it's repeated in more detail on page 25. "Cameron wants to place his foot quickly on the throat of whoever becomes Labour leader. There will be divisive votes on the unions and plans for a budget surplus next month, with the goal of presenting Labour's new leader, whether it's Jeremy Corbin or not, as a loony leftie before they even get out of the starting blocks. "We've just got to kill this new leader in the first month," an aide explained."

Nice people to deal with.

Although how the new leader will be ' killed ' by adopting or signalling policies which are - apparently - so popular with a public clamouring to have Corbyn and his left-leaning agenda, is hard to see.

I'm not saying it's essential to have ministerial experience but it probably helps.

And I agree whoever was the new Labour leader would face a tough ride - I'm just not sure that any of the four runners are much cop to be honest.

Corbyn at least offers a bit of freshness but Burnham seems like a wet dish cloth waiting to be told what his policies should be. Cooper has a lot of good qualities and IMO is far and away the most intelligent of the bunch but she's got too much baggage (not least from her husband). Kendall just seems to smile and hope that will win people over.

I wish Chuka had stood; he would have been easily in a different class from any of the declared runners.

Phil Hornby. Okay, you’ve made it abundantly clear with your repeated sarcastic comments that you’ve swallowed – hook, line and sinker – the Tory media narrative that Labour must continually follow the Tories further and further to the right if it wants to be elected. Fortunately, some of us don’t buy into that Murdoch and Dacre claptrap.

Had Jeremy Corbyn been active in politics in the 1960s, his views would mostly have been considered as ‘centre ground’. Public ownership of the railways, gas and electricity? Who questioned that then? Nobody in the mainstream of the Tory Party! Then along came Thatcher, a disciple of Milton Friedman, who with her friends Reagan and the evil butcher Pinochet, wanted to turn the clock back to the days before the Wall Street Crash and Roosevelt’s New Deal, and we’re all supposed to accept her claim that “there is no alternative”. Thatcher considered your friend Tony Blair and New Labour to be “her greatest achievement”, which is one good reason why we should be turning our backs once and for all on the man who followed an extreme right-wing and cerebrally challenged US president into a totally unnecessary war which cost the lives of 179 British soldiers. Would Jeremy Corbyn have done that? Most certainly not, but then he’s an “extremist” according to the media.

Corbyn’s policies are geared to returning us to the post-war consensus from 1945 to 1979 – an NHS which isn’t being insidiously destroyed by right-wing ideologues, a welfare state supporting people from the cradle to the grave when they need it, and far less inequality. If anyone wants to say that isn’t possible, just roll over and accept that the Tories have won in perpetuity, that’s up to them. But if the Labour Party is to mean anything it won’t do so, and maybe that’s why Corbyn is attracting so much support.

"This is a moment of opportunity for the Labour Party and the country. A new movement is emerging in British politics; party membership is growing rapidly, particularly among young people who had increasingly given up on politics and politicians. There is a possibility that academics who have always felt that their research – whether on social policy, public health, economics, sociology or other disciplines – was ignored by policymakers may now be more in tune with the leadership of the Labour Party. And rather than a backward-looking 'old Labour' approach to politics, this is about recognising the inspiring possibilities for a fairer and more equal society offered by an information economy in an interdependent world. We endorse Jeremy Corbyn’s candidature for leadership of the Labour Party."

Richard Wilkinson, Emeritus professor, University of Nottingham
Kate Pickett, Professor, University of York
Steve Keen, Professor, Kingston University
Elizabeth Dore, Emeritus professor, University of Southampton
John Weeks, Emeritus professor, Soas, University of London
Prem Sikka, Professor, University of Essex
Alfredo Saad Filho, Professor, Soas, University of London
Guy Standing, Professor, Soas, University of London
Ozlem Onaran, Professor, University of Greenwich
Christopher Cramer, Professor, Soas, University of London
Jeff Powell, Senior lecturer, University of Greenwich
Christine Cooper, Professor, University of Strathclyde
Lawrence King, Professor, University of Cambridge
Marjorie Mayo, Emeritus professor, Goldsmiths, University of London
Hugo Radice, Life fellow, University of Leeds
Susan Newman, Senior lecturer, University of the West of England
Elizabeth Wilson, Professor emeritus, London Metropolitan University
Malcolm Sawyer, Emeritus professor, University of Leeds
Jo Michell, Senior lecturer, University of the West of England
Susan Himmelweit, Emeritus professor, Open University
Simon Mohun, Emeritus professor, Queen Mary, University of London
Diane Reay, Professor, University of Cambridge
Andrew Cumbers, Professor, Glasgow University
Simon Deakin, Professor, University of Cambridge
Roger Seifert, Professor, University of Wolverhampton
George Irvin, Professor, Soas, University of London
Engelbert Stockhammer, Professor of economics, Kingston University

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/aug/14/the-labour-party-stands-at-a-crossroads

biglin wrote:I'm not saying it's essential to have ministerial experience but it probably helps.

And I agree whoever was the new Labour leader would face a tough ride - I'm just not sure that any of the four runners are much cop to be honest.

Corbyn at least offers a bit of freshness but Burnham seems like a wet dish cloth waiting to be told what his policies should be. Cooper has a lot of good qualities and IMO is far and away the most intelligent of the bunch but she's got too much baggage (not least from her husband). Kendall just seems to smile and hope that will win people over.

I wish Chuka had stood; he would have been easily in a different class from any of the declared runners.

I think whoever is the next Labour leader is needs to get off to good start by giving the Tories a taste of there own medicine biglin, they will need to speak plain as most people do not understand political chat to let the people of the UK JUST what the Tories intend to do with all of our public services including the NHS & Welfare.

When I see what the Tories & the Lib-Dems did to Ed Miliband with the Insults & smears with the right wing media repeating it, whoever gets the job of leader will have to leave his/her niceness at the door of the HOC allowing them to use some of the Tories own NASTINESS in the chamber.

I am a mere spectator who knows nothing about the finer points of the game.

Time will tell whether a differently -led Labour Party will adopt policies and a position which will find favour with the British electorate.

If it doesn't get elected, no doubt it will be the fault of those who were uninformed enough to express doubts from the outset...

As to Labour winning the next G.E it will depend on those just joining to vote JC for leader PH, if they all vote Labour in May 2020 but will they vote for Labour or will they believe the Tory LIES which they did in May 2015.

According to a Com-Res poll those voting for JC for leader will not be voting for him to become the next PM, his score of -10 on him making it to No10

I do believe that the Tory charlatans will become exposed by 2020, but will there be an alternative for which it is worth voting?

Some are convinced that a fiery left-wing agenda ( formerly known as moderate centre politics) is the answer. I have my doubts, but seem to be wrong on all counts.

I would dearly love Labour to unseat the Tories , but getting elected would be a useful prerequisite - and that means attracting voters who are convinced by the message and the likely realities of it. At present Labour looks as far from being a worthy party of government as I do as a prospective Pope...

We have, essentially, a choice between working people and Murdoch and Co. 'Getting the tories out' by destroying the working people to please Murdoch is, surely, a pointless activity. No matter how long it takes, we either get back to fighting for socialism or learn to eat grass, and that is all the real choice we have.

" No matter how long it takes..."

Fair enough - if that is the price you are prepared to pay.

It could be that there are some Liberals out there who are saying the same thing - or even Whigs.

And don't even mention the World Domination Party...

Alright, I won't.  But don't imagine you've heard the last of that sturdy band.  And it's "League", not Party - so although you said not to mention it, it hasn't been.  Mentioned, that is. By anyone.

'nuff said?

(Labour leadership contest starting to look like an episode of Dad's Army though, innit?)

I never heard a word.

But 'League' eh? It would certainly sound more sinister than 'Party' - if anyone were to say it.

Which they didn't, of course...

we either get back to fighting for socialism or learn to eat grass, and that is all the real choice we have.

So --- who will eligible voters be voting for?

I'm going Corbyn for leader
Angela Eagle for deputy - the full nine yards - because I think you're right, Penderyn

I have my voting papers in and I am jusabout to post them off Ivan, now its just a matter of waiting until the 12th Sept to see who has won.

The bookies appear to be paying out on Corbyn already, and they are rarely wrong.

Let the fun begin...!

If it's down to choosing between the psephologists or the bookmakers, I agree with you, Phil but that's only a question of who gets the punters' money.

Strategically, a Labour Party without fundamental concerns for the less advantaged in Society is like a pushmi-pullyu as in Doctor Dolittle.

Redflag. You could have saved the Labour Party money by voting online…..  

As the general election left the pollsters with egg on their faces, I wouldn’t pay too much attention to the finer details of a ComRes survey. However, when the lead is apparently so great (with Jeremy 37% ahead of his nearest rival), and when 2,000 people turned out to see him in Newcastle yesterday (while Yvette attracted 58 to a recent meeting), it’s not hard to see why Paddy Power has become the first bookie to pay out on bets for him to win.

In the mid 1980s, Cameron was a member of the Federation of Conservative Students, some of whose members wore 'Hang Mandela' badges and produced similar posters. The organisation was too right-wing even for Norman Tebbit (or maybe just too bad for the Tory image), so he shut it down. But of course the real ‘extremist’ at that time was Jeremy Corbyn, who got himself arrested for campaigning against apartheid…..

Meanwhile, 35 economists have backed Corbyn’s policies as “sensible”:-
https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/ourkingdom/35-economists-back-corbyn's-policies-as-'sensible'

My concern is what would happen to the Labour Party now if Corbyn doesn't win. The result would be disputed and most of the new and returning members would vanish as quickly as they arrived, taking with them the widespread enthusiasm for 'something different' which Corbyn has awakened. As well as the crowds inside the venue in Newcastle, here's the crowd listening outside in the rain:-


https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CMtmjmBWUAADEUN.jpg

The reason I did not vote online Ivan I was also sent raffle tickets which I had not asked for so they are going back along with my voting papers that is why it is going by post.

The envelope for returning ballot papers is addressed to the Electoral Reform Services, who will count the votes. I don't think they will appreciate unwanted raffle tickets! (I just tore mine up and threw them away.)

I would have thought raffle tickets to be more the province of the Pease Pottage contingent. First Prize, perhaps, an evening in the company of the Committee of the PPCC in the Eric Pickles Memorial Dining Room.

Interesting how many brainwashed tories favour this site.    It is Corbyn or nothing, let's face it, and posturing won't help.   Obviously, in a one-party state like this, you have to be prepared to fight or be a doormat.   What's in it for doormats?

As Labour leader, how I will unify MPs, rebuild the party and win in 2020

From an article by Jeremy Corbyn:-

“I know from travelling the country that we can win back lost voters. People want to discuss real issues. They don’t want an opposition party trapped in the Westminster bubble of yah-boo politics and personal rivalries. They want us to be a party of principle that stands with them in their communities, so that they have the faith to restore us to power. We can win back support from Conservative commuters in the south who are fed up with rip-off railways, and win back support from those who voted for parties that portrayed themselves as anti-establishment – the SNP, UKIP, the Greens – by showing that we are not afraid to debate difficult issues such as welfare and the economy and take on Tory myths.

The scurrilous nature of some of the tabloid-style attacks on me and other candidates, as well as on our families, has been painful. I have not engaged in any personal attacks or abuse; we should debate policies, not personalities. Personalised politics is partly a symptom of the more presidential style of governance that has become dominant. Party leaders are not presidents. They are primus inter pares – first among equals. Previous Labour leaders recognised this and appointed mixed cabinets to encourage debate and discussion. Harold Wilson’s cabinets reflected the diversity of politics on the Labour benches, with Tony Benn, Barbara Castle, Anthony Crosland and Roy Jenkins all serving together. The debate and exchange of views in cabinet were strengths, not weaknesses. We need to draw on all the talents and ideas, no matter which wing of the party they come from.”

For the whole article:-
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/08/jeremy-corbyn-labour-leader-how-i-will-unify-mps-rebuild-party-and-win-2020

I confess that I'd never thought of myself as a 'brainwashed Tory' before!

They'll be telling me that I'm a defrocked vicar next...

Phil Hornby wrote: They'll be telling me that I'm a defrocked vicar next...

Might be more interesting.    What were you unfrocked for?

I couldn't possibly say, for fear of breaching the confidence of the 23 women involved.

Not to mention the camel...

One picture is worth a thousand words ....



(Please quote the source of all pics in future. Thanks. Ivan)

No prizes for guessing which of the Labour leadership contestants was holding a meeting in Nottingham this evening.....  


https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CM4B17pWcAA-T8_.jpg


https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CM3kCk9WEAAeW69.jpg

oftenwrong wrote:One picture is worth a thousand words ....

I hope Blair won't grow a beard just to hide the rope.

Photo-shopped picture comes courtesy of pbs.twimg.com/media
In this case a twitter image.

Just right-click on any picture and select Properties from the drop-down menu, for its URL

Just right-click on any picture and select Properties from the drop-down menu, for its URL

I’m using Mozilla Firefox these days, and it doesn’t work like that for me, but I can ‘copy image location’ with a right click. Anyway, that's beside the point. I didn’t want to make a big deal of this, and I’m sorry if it sounds like nit-picking, but we are supposed to acknowledge our sources. This is from the terms of service of Forumotion.com, to which we all had to agree when we became members:-

“If you post information which comes from another site, look first if the site in question doesn't forbid it. Show the address of the site in question in order to respect the work.”

https://cuttingedge2.forumotion.co.uk/t18-posting-rules

I see that some Tory newspapers have been advising Jeremy Corbyn to be more careful about who he associates with......  


https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CNAutA9WsAAB4ZC.jpg

IVAN if those newspapaers are right wing Tory dominated CRAP I would not believe a word they say, I think there scam to get everybody to vote for JC has turned around and Bit them on the butt and they are now scared of JC.

The trouble with Blairites is that, like the Tories, they are disconnected from the working classes and don't recognise that many people feel forced into corners struggling to survive week to week, banging their heads against the systems wall of insane bureaucracy, whilst being asked to suffer austerity as those responsible for causing it carry on thriving. Is it any wonder Labour's core voters have deserted them when all they see are middle class career politicians patronising them with empty platitudes and token gesture cliched speeches.

Ever since Labour lurched to the right and began supporting a neo liberal agenda under Blair they have lost Scotland, and working class England and Wales; and yet the Blairites are still trying to claim some sort of 'sensible' high ground whilst doing their utmost to belittle and trivialise any left wing ideas.

The Labour party lost the election not because they are left of centre, but because they are not radically enough left of centre. People who vote Tory will see little point in voting for a Labour version of Tory - and people who want an alternative to Tory will see little point in voting for a Labour version of Tory.

Corbyn is the only real option Labour have to get the party out of their smug rut and start connecting with core voters again.

- of course Blair and his disciples don't want that - they're quite happy moving in higher circles, and serving the interests of the few....much like the Tories.

Since Labour betrayed / alienated their core working class voters through becoming more Tory / neo liberal they have lost Scotland and working class England and Wales. Around 70& of the electorate didn't vote Tory at the last election. So for Blair, his foolish disciples, and those sitting smugly in the centre ground to pretend to have the answers for a modern age, whilst belittling the left with propaganda - as represented in the UK media, is laughable.

Corbyn is the only candidate on offer who might shake the Labour party out of their smug rut, and put an end to the endless parade of careerist middle class Labour mps with no integrity patronising the working class electorate with empty rhetoric and platitudes.......which is why you don't get votes - we know you're a bunch of self centred tossers.

Jimmy Savile and Thatcher were good friends by all accounts - on one anothers xmas card list, etc.. He was also close pals with our future king - Prince Charles.....who held Savile in high regard as an adviser and confidante, this extended to cosy times together at a Highland retreat.

....but who are we to judge our masters, betters, and rulers who make up the establishment?!!

An interesting comment from Paul Merton concerning Jimmy Saville, who had appeared on HIGNFY in those far-off times:

"I had of course heard the rumours, but thought it must be impossible for someone with such a high public profile to get away with any such allegations."

As did the rest of us in a simpler, more deferential, era.

The Labour party lost the election not because they are left of centre, but because they are not radically enough left of centre. - pretty much what I thought