Does the UK need a 'true leftist' party?

First topic message reminder :

(Not sure if this has been brought up before, apologies if it has but I couldn't see anything like it on the list)

I just read an article on the Guardian website (I retweeted it on Twitter) that discusses the ongoing problems on the left of politics in the UK. It asks whether the left need a leftist version of UKIP to effectively challenge Labour's dominance of the left. Reading the article and the interviews they took for the article it seems that the writer thinks it is possible due to the fragmentation of the relationship between the unions and the Labour Party, however, it is unlikely to happen any time soon.

so what do we all think? Is it needed? Is it indeed possible?

Personally I think it is needed but I'm not sure how likely it is to happen or indeed if it would be successful.

Tash

Mel wrote:... why you and many others have got the wrong end of the stick when it comes to Brown and indeed Blair....

Can you now?   I judge by performance and when it comes to that well, when you say

Mel wrote:IMO Brown was the best Chancellor this country has ever seen.

I have to . His 'light touch' supervision of the financial industry was the reason (Oh and he was repeatedly warned about this by those 'outsiders' not in his clique) that we had the housing boom, the excesses of the financial industry, the miss-selling scandals etc. In a time of world growth we still managed to fall behind. As for being PM, I would say it was a close run thing for his being voted the worst ever.

Mel wrote:On this forum in the past we have debated the Iraq war and Blair to the nth degree. There were WOMD because as I was advised by a high ranking RAF friend of mine who was out there in Iraq, confirmed that these weapons were taken over the border into Syria before the inspectors arrived. Now with Syria at the height of a weapons inspection, this only adds credence to what I had been told.

We all have friends. After a few bevvies they tend to be expansive and big up their roles and knowledge. Where were the satellite photos? In fact where was any evidence? Had any such been in existence then it would have been on the front page of the newspapers. Of course he had some chemical weapons. We already knew that. It was the 45 minutes and the 'immediate' threat that was total ballcocks.

I think the quote from [url=Iraq and weapons of mass destruction]Wiki[/url]

"Bush later said that the biggest regret of his presidency was "the intelligence failure" in Iraq, while the Senate Intelligence Committee found in 2008 that his administration "misrepresented the intelligence and the threat from Iraq". A key CIA informant in Iraq admitted that he lied about his allegations, "then watched in shock as it was used to justify the war""
... rather says it all.

Mel wrote:Finally, by refusing to vote at the next election, those that do not vote are more or less putting Cameron back in to power. Is that really what you desire my friend?

I always vote. But now it seems I can vote Tory, the other Tories and the other other Tories. A majority Labour government has the potential to be worse even than this coalition. A minority Labour government might just be tolerable. Any such government then has to look for consensus.


It is very eeay to get all dewey eyed over 'newsh but slightly tarnished' Labour but in the end like all politicians they look to their mates and not the big picture.

Belatori ; There is a few points on which I agree with Mel on, first is the WMDs I remember at the time hearing that Sadam had moved his WMDs over the border and because my geography is not that good I did not know which border they where talking about I would imagine that Irac has borders with other countries besides Syria.

I also agree with Mel that Brown was the best Chancellor of Exchequer ( not like the Chancer we now have)  we have had but as a PM he failed badly that Talent was not in his make-up, the reason he missed the warning signs could be down to the fact every body that wanted work could get it, our livng standards where never better and perhaps he did not expect that well educated people that worked in the banks would not behave in such a GREEDY & Irresponsible way, classing everyone by the standards that he himself used.

Mel is also correct about people refusing to vote at all at the next general election, the only thing there would be Cameron & Cleggy getting back into power, and that is something I do not want to see, in fact I would bail out from the UK NOW if I thought that England would vote Tory in 2015.

I live in Scotland and I am worried sick that Cameron will force the hand of Scots to vote YES in our referendum in September 2014, at the moment its 59% say NO 32% say YES the other 9% are do not knows, I want Scots to say NO but if I thought for one minute that England would put the Tories back into power I would campaign for a resounding YES vote.:yeahthat: 

Very cynical Bell. How you can possibly assume that a Labour Party in power could be worse than the tyrants we have with the Tories at present beats me. I can only assume that you have been and are still a Tory at heart.
 
How about you tearing Cameron and Osborne apart as you have Brown and Blair? Perhaps you are one of the few fortunates that have NOT been affected by this low life shower in power.
 
By the way, Brown had to rely totally upon invisible earnings as Thatcher had decimated all else. From day one as Chancellor, Brown tried time and time again to achieve international banking regulation but was twarted because all international banks and in particular the American ones were and still are too strong for governments to be able to get them to agree proper regulation.
 
Brown was fully aware of the dangers that lay ahead and attempted to make the UK as strong as possible before the inevitable crunch. He was nearing his goal when unfortunately Bush allowed Lehmans to go bust.
 
"politicians they look to their mates and not the big picture.."
 
How true, particularly with Cameron and Gideon. I think you will find that Ed's "mates" are the general public and not the rich overseas tax haven buddies of big business that the Tories singularly support and nobody else.
 
People do not realise the real truth of these matters and unfortunately rely upon hearsay and the Labour bias media/press.
Most Tory owned naturally.
 
I think you let the cat out of the bag a few posts back when you stated "I have never voted Labour".

I've got very little time for the current government and the Conservatives in general but do you not think it stifles debate when you try to make out the Tories are evil and Labour are all good, honest blokes. A quick look at the expenses scandal gives you a quick reminder of how many self-serving types there are in both the major parties. There was the case of Tony Blair's expenses being shredded "by mistake" when there was a call for them to be made public. In many ways they're all as bad as each other.

Of course Dan there are those in all walks of life that take advantage of situations that benefit themselves. Isn't that sort of thing rife in this country since Thatcher's doctrine?

One has to trust in governmrnt either the devil you know or the one you don't. Having had a taste of this devil of devils I will take a chance this time upon ED. There are still a few good people around, not many I know but we must hope surely rather than sit on the fence as it were?

I disagreed with just about everything Thatcher said, did and stood for but are you seriously trying to make out that political corruption in this country started with her administration?
Anyhoo, I would agree that Labour are a better option and I do have a bit of time for Ed Milliband, not least because he isn't your archetypal slick politician. He is a bit short of actual policies though, to my mind. I think there is something to be said for Bellatori's notion of a coalition headed by Labour being a better option. That's mostly because I don't like what I consider to be an undemocratic process in this country, i.e. first-past-the-post. Where I live my vote is effectively worthless as it's a safe Labour seat. Votes in marginal seats are worth much more. I find this to be profoundly unfair but it suits the agendas on both Labour and the Conservatives as it more or less gives them a monopoly on government.

Bellatori wrote:-
An article by Chote in Prospect magazine 9 months after the labour landslide, in 1998 described him as cliquey, thin-skinned and did not trust anybody

 
Are you referring to Robert Chote, former editor of ‘The Financial Times’, who was appointed chairman of the OBR by the Tories in 2010? Hardly an independent source, is he? Why are you trying to pass off his opinions as facts?
 
In any case, if Brown was “cliquey, thin-skinned and did not trust anybody", it pales into insignificance when compared with invading Iraq, or sinking the Belgrano when it was sailing away from the Falklands outside the 200-mile exclusion zone on the night before the UN was due to publish a plan for peace. It doesn’t compare to throwing the disabled people out of their homes because they can’t pay the bedroom tax, and forcing half a million people to rely on foodbanks in the seventh richest country in the world.
 

His 'light touch' supervision of the financial industry was the reason (Oh and he was repeatedly warned about this by those 'outsiders' not in his clique) that we had the housing boom, the excesses of the financial industry, the miss-selling scandals etc.

 
So are we to assume that there wasn’t a world crisis after all? Was Gordon Brown solely responsible for the bankruptcy of Greece, along with the failure of Lehman Brothers, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae? Powerful chap, wasn’t he? Who warned about a global crash – Vince Cable maybe? If you keep predicting something, eventually it may happen. The Tories predicted that the introduction of the minimum wage would cause a recession in 1998. Had they been correct they would no doubt have been lauded, but as they were wrong few people remember. Maybe you recall what Cameron had to say in March 2008: “Labour’s economic failure was the excessive bureaucratic interventionism of the past decade, too much regulation.”
 
The claim by Mel that “Brown was the best chancellor this country has ever seen” can be supported by the fact that he presided over the longest period of uninterrupted growth in our economy for at least 200 years. Your claim that he might be “the worst PM ever” is supported by what exactly? Are you an historian who has carried out a detailed study of every PM in our history before reaching that conclusion based on reliable evidence?
 
You stated that “a majority Labour government has the potential to be worse even than this coalition”. That would take some doing, yet you added nothing to support such a wild assertion. How would you envisage your preferred minority Labour government ruling by consensus? In a coalition with the rump of the Lib Dems after the next election, undoing many of the things that the Lib Dems had allowed the Tories to do to us?
 
As for Iraq, my understanding is that part of the evidence for Saddam Hussein having WMDs was because, with Tory government connivance, Matrix Churchill sold them to him.

Contemporary voters seem to prefer MPs to have the characteristics and charisma of a filmstar. Gordon Brown rarely appeared "attractive" in the fanclub sense, so did not enjoy a friendly Press.

It's a hell of a way to choose your government.

oftenwrong wrote:Contemporary voters seem to prefer MPs to have the characteristics and charisma of a filmstar.  Gordon Brown rarely appeared "attractive" in the fanclub sense, so did not enjoy a friendly Press.

It's a hell of a way to choose your government.

Howay man. Name one UK MP that has the characteristics and charisma of a film star. Also, if what you say is true, how come (according to recent polls) if an election were to be held now, Brad Pitt or as he's sometimes known Ed Milliband, would be made Prime Minister? He's even less charismatic than Cameron (not that it bothers me, I'm just making a point).

Not sure if I'd agree about the 'film star' bit, but I do think people often vote for people on quite irrelevant grounds, including personal attractiveness, appearing to be 'fun' or to have the 'common touch' appearing to have 'gravitas' - all characteristics that we know how to recognise because we see them on the silver screen, and which maybe have little enough to do with a person's integrity, talent for government, willingness to serve the electorate.

In Airforce One, Harrison Ford was quite believable as President of the USA - in the real world I'm not sure he'd be all that good at the job.

I think OW's point may be that voting for people on the basis of appearance can lead to mistakes (at least that's what I'd say)

Mel wrote:Very cynical Bell. How you can possibly assume that a Labour Party in power could be worse than the tyrants we have with the Tories at present beats me.

Easy... firstly I am old enough to remember Wilson and Callaghan and Michael Foot and Neil Kinnock. The first two were a complete disaster and fortunately we never found out how bad things could get with the other two.

I have generally voted Liberal as they always came across as somewhere left of Blair and to the right of Foot. Again I am old enough to remember the triumph of the liberals at Orpington and then Sutton - the latter where I lived. I had high hopes of Clegg and was not surprised when he went with Cameron rather than Brown. Had Labour ditched Brown things might have been different but I doubt anyone could conceive of going into government with the ex-chancellor/PM who had overseen just about the biggest financial disaster this country had ever seen. What I did not expect ( and here my cynicism let me down) was that Clegg would so get into bed with Cameron that he would essentially abandon everything the old Lib-Dems stood for.

Mel wrote: I can only assume that you have been and are still a Tory at heart.

I just view that as a fatuous bit of ad hominem.
 

Mel wrote:How about you tearing Cameron and Osborne apart as you have Brown and Blair?

Elsewhere I have done exactly that. I have no time for Cleggs capitulation on fees at £9k. He should have stood up to Osborne also on the 50p rate of tax. It was never about the money it raised but is all about fairness. I wrote a significant chunk about fairness in governing. That is really what people want. Most do not care which party is in power but they do care about fairness. That means a working NHS properly funded and administered. The old cared for and the young with prospects not simply ripped off to the tune of £27k for going to University (by the way have you noted that Oxford wants £16k a student per year?) Not a problem for the Tory front bench who all got an Osborne £30k bonus to help with their expenses.

Mel wrote:"politicians they look to their mates and not the big picture.." How true, particularly with Cameron and Gideon. I think you will find that Ed's "mates" are the general public and not the rich overseas tax haven buddies of big business that the Tories singularly support and nobody else. People do not realise the real truth of these matters and unfortunately rely upon hearsay and the Labour bias media/press.

I think you are particularly wrong here. Most people DO have a pretty good grasp of these matters. Even if you eschew a free press and then claim the BBC is right wing (but the press think it is left wing so who is right?) then there is the internet with its conspiracy theory web sites BUT also a wide range of opinions and blogs. Maybe UKIP will split the Tories and Labour get in with a majority. Anyone who thinks they or any government will do better is deluding themselves. The best we can hope for is that they do no harm and the British people can dig themselves out of the recurrent mess all politicians seem to get us into..

Mel wrote:I think you let the cat out of the bag a few posts back when you stated "I have never voted Labour".

A similarly vacuous comment. In the nine or ten elections since I was 18 I have voted Tory once - infamously for Ted Heath who it turns out was really not a nice man but look what the alternative was and how much harm they did. The other elections were all Lib(/Dems) except once when I was so disgusted with the lot that I voted Monster Raving Looney Party failing a none of the above box..

At the moment the Tory extreme right is quiet because they cannot afford to torpedo the coalition, as much as they might like to. The slaughter of Tory MPs would only be matched by the demise of the Liberals. The unions are Ed's paymasters. Their block vote got him in in preference to his brother. Why should anyone trust him, tarred with the union and Brown brush, any more than say, Boris Johnston? That last is IMHO the most terrifying of all.

I am very cynical about all politicians. To qualify as an MP you have to like the sound of your own voice and be basically a smug self satisfied and self opinionated git. In fact all the qualities that should be used to disqualify anyone from standing as an MP.

That's it... my turn to cook dinner so please excuse me.

Blair was charismatic and charming. The laidies liked him and he had an even temper. Cameron can talk the talk. That's about it as the rest of it is nothing more than a rude aggressive pompous ranting attitude shown at any and every encounter. Now he has been undoubtably the worst PM ever so far and Gideon the worst Chancellor after Lamont IMO.

"I have generally voted Liberal"

Well Bell, your being "old enough" did you nor the country any favours by taking a risky chance with Clegg. I agree with what you have said about the man.

" I doubt anyone could conceive of going into government with the ex-chancellor/PM who had overseen just about the biggest financial disaster this country had ever seen."

There you go and yet with all your experience of age, you jump to blame Brown for the "biggest financial disaster this country has ever seen" You fail to observe that this disaster was in fact a global crisis and this country was not alone in that crisis.

Your condemnation of Brown in that context is born out of Tory manipulation and Tory media/press propaganda.
I am afraid people only too readily take note of what is written in the press without question.

You obviously have not read my post thoroughly re Brown above at 20.5pm on his efforts to regulate the banks internationally.
Remember, Thatcher followed Reagan and de-regulated the banking sector to make up for lost revenue from her closure and sell offs of our industrial base.

Dan Fante wrote:I've got very little time for the current government and the Conservatives in general but do you not think it stifles debate when you try to make out the Tories are evil and Labour are all good, honest blokes. A quick look at the expenses scandal gives you a quick reminder of how many self-serving types there are in both the major parties. There was the case of Tony Blair's expenses being shredded "by mistake" when there was a call for them to be made public. In many ways they're all as bad as each other.

 
 
The expenses scandal is STILL GOING ON. Out of the top 5 claiming, the top claimer is Ian Paisley Jnr DUP = £232,042.33 2ND  Jim Shannon DUP £220,198.15 3rd Malcolm Bruce Lib/Dem £201,308.3. 4th Karen Bradley Tory £198,866.16 5th Simon Danczuk Labour £198,770.05 the rest are 2 Lib/Dems and 3 Labour.
 
So you see the expenses scandal is still going on even under Scam..er..ons watch, the same place that I got the above info Cleggy claimed £145.50 for his TV Licence when he is paid a lot more than the rest of the MPs who do not have cabinet jobs.:yeahthat:

Bellatori wrote:-
I am old enough to remember Wilson and Callaghan and Michael Foot and Neil Kinnock. The first two were a complete disaster and fortunately we never found out how bad things could get with the other two.

 
Why were Wilson and Callaghan “a complete disaster”? Check the facts for once in your life. The economy was in better shape in 1970 than when Maudling quit as chancellor in 1964 with the words: “Sorry about the books, old chap”. Wilson set up the Open University (from where I got my second degree), abolished the death penalty so that we stopped executing innocent people like Timothy Evans, and made both abortion and homosexuality legal.
 
Callaghan had to deal with the effects of the quadrupling of the price of oil and the justified concerns of trade unions about their members’ falling living standards. No, we never found out what Foot and Kinnock would have been like in power; instead we had Thatcher privatising our gas, electricity and water, followed by Major’s sleazy and incompetent regime, which resulted in the rout of the Tories in 1997.
 

I had high hopes of Clegg and was not surprised when he went with Cameron rather than Brown. Had Labour ditched Brown things might have been different

 
Kindly stop trying to rewrite history. Gordon Brown resigned as Labour leader on the Monday after the election for the express purpose of making a Lab/LD deal more feasible, something which Clegg, Laws and the ‘Orange Bookers’ clearly didn’t want.
 
I was very surprised by Clegg’s actions. The Lib Dems had campaigned on a manifesto which was to the left of the Labour programme, then decided to throw all their principles and policies away in order to create the most right-wing government in living memory.
 

50p rate of tax…it was never about the money it raised

 
It was to me. Despite Osborne’s lies, the 50% rate brought in an extra £2.7 billion. Anyone who goes out of their way to avoid tax at 50% will also do so if the rate is 45%; that sort of scumbag doesn’t intend to pay any tax.
 

Even if you eschew a free press and then claim the BBC is right wing (but the press think it is left wing so who is right?)

 
What do you call ‘a free press’? A handful of moguls like Murdoch, Rothermere and the Barclay brothers dictating what is spewed out to the politically illiterate masses? I call that a bought press.
 
The BBC is right-wing. It fawns over the monarchy and blacked out coverage of the NHS legislation. Its chairman still takes the Tory whip in the House of Lords. ‘Question Time’ is chaired by Bullingdon boy Dimbleby, who constantly interrupts Labour panellists, and an analysis shows a right-wing bias with regard to which journalists invited on the programme. Nigel Farage, not exactly a left-winger, has been on the programme more than any other panellist.
 
https://cuttingedge2.forumotion.co.uk/t193-the-gradual-destruction-and-right-wing-bias-of-the-bbc
 

I have voted Tory once - infamously for Ted Heath who it turns out was really not a nice man but look what the alternative was and how much harm they did.

 
Heath did so well, didn’t he? Having lied his way into power (as Tories have to do) by promising to “cut price increases at a stroke”, and not to take us into what was then the EEC “without the wholehearted consent of the British Parliament and people”, he left us with 13.4% inflation, a three-day working week, a miners’ strike and membership of the EEC after approval by just eight votes in the Commons. It was left to Wilson to ask the voters if they wanted to stay in the EEC, and they said yes in 1975.
 

The unions are Ed's paymasters. Their block vote got him in in preference to his brother.

 
LOL. Sorry to have to tell you, but the union block vote was abolished by John Smith in 1993. Do try to keep up. Tony Blair won the vote of the majority of union members in 1994, even though none of the big union leaders backed him. So there is no precedent for saying that union members blindly follow their leaders.
 
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/07/myth-trade-union-block-vote
 

To qualify as an MP you have to like the sound of your own voice and be basically a smug self satisfied and self opinionated git.

 
Have you ever thought of standing?

Sometimes you just have to be cruel to be kind.

I had high hopes of Clegg and was not surprised when he went with Cameron rather than Brown. Had Labour ditched Brown things might have been different

Ivan I copied this from your post but do not know who posted it so sorry for the work I may be giving you, I had to reply to it I read Andrew Adonis book "5 Days in May" if I remember correctly the 2010 G.E. was on a Thursday which is normal on the Friday Clegg was round speaking to Cameron about coalition between the Tories and the Prostitute party (L/D) on the Monday following Gordon Brown resigned as leader of the Labour party, because Clegg had said that was the only way they would start talks with the Labour party, but he had LIED through his back teeth he had no intensions of talking to labour,   Did you know that Clegg is one of those "Orange Bookers" there more in tune with the Tories than any left wing parties more like the Tea party in the USA.:yeahthat: 

Bellatori wrote:Whilst I have never voted Labour (and only made the mistake of voting Tory once, Ted Heath, may the God I don't believe in forgive me  ) I would have voted for John Smith. There are some people whose integrity shines through - maybe we would have been disillusioned as one becomes with all politicians but I really felt he was an honest man.

It is clear that Gordon Brown is a nasty piece of work - his abuse of the woman voter was an eye opener and makes much of what has come out recently entirely believable, and Tony Blair - well let me put it this way, African Nations want to walk away from the  International court because they think Africa is being unfairly targeted. It does seem to me that a war criminal who incites and promulgates a war on the basis of clearly forged and false documents and information and is not prosecuted, is a very good reason why they should do so.

I used to view the Liberals as the slightly left of center last resort for fairness. Clegg has undermined all that. Now who do I vote for? Until there is a 'none of the above' box I suppose it will have to be the Monster Raving...

Anyone remember Screaming Lord Such?

""Whilst I have never voted Labour"".

I take it then, that out of principle, you never ever use the NHS ?

Ivanhoe

The discussion about Iraq has been moved to here:-

https://cuttingedge2.forumotion.co.uk/t712-what-was-the-invasion-of-iraq-in-2003-really-about#41713

Thank you Ivan. 

If the past is any guide to the future, Miliband's options remain firmly fixed in the political centre.

The Communist Party of Great Britain had a peak membership of 56,000 in 1945. Other groups have included the Socialist Workers Party, Workers' Revolutionary Party, the Alliance for Workers' Liberty, Socialist Party and Socialist Appeal.

Not many votes there, then.

Dan Fante wrote:-
The conversation progressed that way because you attempted to move the goalposts after your point had been countered.

 
Well spotted. In the ‘Handbook for Tory trolls: internet forum edition’, the recommended next move after losing an argument is to disappear for a few days until the discussion has moved on. Then at a later date you can return and, if it suits, post the same old garbage again (if necessary denying that night follows day), especially if it includes regurgitating one of those favourite Tory myths such as “the welfare dependency culture” or “it’s all Labour’s fault”.
 

oftenwrong wrote:If the past is any guide to the future, Miliband's options remain firmly fixed in the political centre.

The Communist Party of Great Britain had a peak membership of 56,000 in 1945. Other groups have included the Socialist Workers Party, Workers' Revolutionary Party, the Alliance for Workers' Liberty, Socialist Party and Socialist Appeal.

Not many votes there, then.

You are stuck in the fuhrer-politics mode. In the days when we had democracy, the work of a party was not to find out what people had already been brainwashed to 'believe' but to get out there and challenge it - which made the CP, whatever its membership, hugely influencial - as, with smaller numbers, has been the SWP. Jellyfish convert no-one, and are dependent on what the Noise Machine allows people to hear. That's why we need the unions, who VASTLY outnumber these pathetic little fuhrerparties.

Dan Fante wrote: Howay man. Name one UK MP that has the characteristics and charisma of a film star.

Glenda Jackson?

Norm Deplume wrote: Glenda Jackson?

 
Fair enough, I'll give you that one.

 

Hi Folks! I desperately wanted to be involved with a party of the left, but alas for me, the labour party left me feeling really frustrated and angry, so much so that I sent my card back last october and joined Left Unity. It's early days yet, but I like the look of the party that we're trying to forge. And I got to meet Ken Loach too!  lol

http://leftunity.org

Oh I'm not stupid enough to not vote labour, that'd be really daft as no one wants to see the back of these tory knob jobs more than me. But that said after the next GE I still can't see labour satisfying my lust for a fairer society, and the reigning in of rampant capitalism both in the uk and globally. So for now I'm sinking my energies into left unity. Labour has had enough of my time, money and energy, and it's still a party that's ashamed of the word socialist.

I want the tories and their narrow minded, inward looking, selfish views wiping from the political map forever...one can but dream!

The Tories were wiped from the political map for thirteen years after 1997, and were only given another foot-in-the-door opportunity by the quisling Lib-Dems in 2010.

The thoroughly unpleasant experience of the subsequent period of Right-wing ideology should have convinced electors in 2015 to make a real effort to eliminate the nasty party. Unless people believe what they read in the newspapers.

Bobby, Adele, OW, We are doing what the Tories want us to do arguing amongst ourselves, instead of arguing we should be telling the Labour party WHAT WE WANT from the Labour party.

Adele  I understand your anger at the Labour party I get angry when I see Labour not anwering the Tory LIES about the so called growth the only thing that is growing is the FatCat's wallets, I who went down to Eastleigh by-election in Feb 2013 which was my first time campaigning and I enjoyed it, the people I met where varied only one, I met I wanted to rip his throat out because he was spouting Thatcher Ideology and he said he wanted to punch John O'Farrell in the throat just because he had the courage of his convictions and wrote in his book of the 80s Exactly what he thought of Thatcher, John wrote what Millions where thinking but if that stupid Thatcher supporter had bothered to listen and watch to the protests he would have seen that for himself.

I am not happy with what Ed Miliband and the Labour party are doing, and I know if we get another term of a Tory gov't you will be able to pull the plug on the UK because it will be no more and that will lead too no more Labour party, and we will be back to the time before the Labour party was founded and the Tories ruled the roost continuelly.   So I wish people that are not happy with what the Labour party are doing, to get a hold of there Labour MP if your unfortunate to have a L/D or Tory MP just get a hold of a Labour MP and give him/her a EFFING good EAR BASHING.  

oftenwrong wrote:The Tories were wiped from the political map for thirteen years after 1997, and were only given another foot-in-the-door opportunity by the quisling Lib-Dems in 2010.

The thoroughly unpleasant experience of the subsequent period of Right-wing ideology should have convinced electors in 2015 to make a real effort to eliminate the nasty party.  Unless people believe what they read in the newspapers.

Sorry OW but your got part of your post wrong, the reason is England voted Tory even blinded Labour voters, the numbers in the H.O.C tell us all we need to know Tory seats = 305 Labour seats 258 FibDems 57 so put the Tory numbers together with F/Ds and you will get 362. That is the reason that the Labour party have not been able to stop the nasty Tory bills plus Davy boy has been stuffing the House of Lords full of Tory and Fib-Dem Lords so there bills are not too well scrutenized, only when it suits the Fib-Dems do they vote with the Labour lords.

Just to add on Scotland does not vote Tory we have ONE Tory MP and one Tory MSP (Scottish Parliament) this will be one of the reason that Scots may vote for Independence they will do anything to get rid of Tories, and that would be the wrong way to opt for Independence it would be like cutting your nose off to spite your face this is something that really worries me, and another reason I get angry at the Labour party as I do not think they are doing enough to put the Tories on the rack and to show the people of the UK there Blatant Lies about the Economy and the figures in Unemployment.  

Today's Sunday Times has a somewhat Oracular letter from a gentleman in Kent who wrote:

"The Labour Party was founded to represent workers' interests, but until it unshackles itself from a narrow and divisive commitment to only one of the four factors of production - land, labour, capital and enterprise - it will remain a party of the past ...."

Anybody know what he means?

This is an age old problem, and not just concerning politics. In the 16th century, Erasmus and Luther weren’t happy with the Catholic Church. So what did they do? In simple terms, Erasmus stayed and exposed what he thought was wrong, anticipating there would be reforms. Luther decided to leave and became one of the founding fathers of Protestantism.
 
The EU has issues which need reforming. Not because Cameron says so, in the hope of appeasing the rabid right of the Tory Party and stopping desertions to UKIP, but because the EU wastes money, is very bureaucratic and needs to be more democratic. Is the solution to stay, play a more positive role and press for reforms, or leave and take a leap into the unknown?  
 
 
Then we come to the Labour Party, which was set up in 1900 to unite various left-wing groups. A party which wants to gain power usually has to get the support of around 40% of the electorate, so it needs to have a big tent and be a compromise between various shades of opinion. Its members also need to accept that not everything they personally want to see happen will transpire, but then isn’t that what democracy is all about?
 
I don’t wish to sound patronising, but I have great respect for many people in the TUSC, the NHA Party, the Green Party and Plaid Cymru, some of whom are my online friends or Twitter followers. Then, just two months ago, Ken Loach founded Left Unity, with its grand ambition to eventually replace the Labour Party, which has been around for more than a century. These are all good people who detest what the Tories have been doing to this country, but what they’re actually creating is left disunity.
 
There is a natural left majority in this country, as there ought to be, because there are far far more ordinary folk than there are rich toffs. At the 2010 election, I’m quite sure that the 6 million plus people who voted for the Lib Dems thought they were voting for a left-wing party. Add those to the Labour votes, the votes of the smaller parties and the left-inclined people who didn’t bother to vote at all, and you get about a 60-40 left-right split. But with so much disunity (and Lib Dem treachery), what did we end up with? The most right-wing, most vicious and most ideological government in living memory.
 
Tony Benn once remarked: “The Labour Party is not a socialist party, it is a party with socialists in it”. Not a word that I ever heard Tony Blair use, but Ed Miliband has described himself as a socialist. Just because Cameron has lied through his back teeth ever since he became Tory leader (starting with his “end to Punch and Judy politics” and his “cast iron guarantee of a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty”), it’s no reason to think that the Labour leader might sink to his level, so please give Ed the benefit of any doubt.
 
The one thing on which we all agree – whether we are socialists or social democrats - is that we want to see an end to this nightmare of a government. What some of us don’t seem to understand is that there’s only one party which is in a position to replace it in May 2015. Without power, you can achieve nothing worthwhile, and if the Tories do happen to get elected next year, it’s goodbye to the NHS and the welfare state and hello to unaccountable corporate Britain. Do any of us really want to risk that?  

Some of the most irritating people one meets are those who are essentially working-class, but who have delusions of grandeur and like to 'be seen' in Tory circles because they mistakenly think that it gives them some sort of social cachet.

Indeed, I feel that their sort would gladly see their kids with no job and their elderly parents go short of social benefits, provided that they themselves still have the warm feeling of perceived 'approval' at the Conservative Club. How foolish they look with their ageing( but beautifully-polished) Ford Fiestas as they park up next to the Audis, BMWs and Bentleys!

What Britain needs is an electable and credible left-of-centre party which can capture all those who should be in 'the tent'. And, incidentally, but for Blair, we would not have rid the nation of that awful Major era.

Some of the most irritating people one meets are those who are essentially working-class, but who have delusions of grandeur and like to 'be seen' in Tory circles because they mistakenly think that it gives them some sort of social cachet.

Damn right - I always want to smack them on their smug noses - they sit with the 'self made men' and in fact cannot defend their position, which, far from encouraging them to rethink their ideas only solidifies their hatred of 'socialism' - I can only think their parents were cruel to them - either that, or they were once bitten by a socialist

See you at the Conservative Summer Fete, then, boatlady, where we can 'accidentally' poke a few of them in the eye, let down their near-side tyres in the car park and shout: ' how's that for a lean to the left...?'...    

Nice one PH and boatlady there are quite a few people in the UK I would love to POKE IN THE EYE   Plus there are quite a few in the Tory party that need a pin put in them to take the wind out of their sails. 

It's a date

  

'The 'Left' doesn't need anything, because it is an abstraction. Real working people desperately need a working-class, socialist party to defend their interests to the death, otherwise we are all buggered.

It is perfectly natural to aspire to greater things, and parents almost always hope, and even make sacrifices to ensure, that their children will have a better life.

There will also always be people like the television character Mrs. Bucket who insisted that her name be pronounced bouquet. Harmless until you realise that some of these folk are voting against their own interests by supporting a political party which represents the filthy rich. Anybody who has practised "Keeping up with the Joneses" knows how difficult it can be to emulate the swan - serenity on the surface with exhausting activity beneath.