More Politics (sorry): NIP

what centrists won’t acknowledge is that the people will not vote for a mildly racist centrist Labour. Only 1 centrist Labour leader has ever won office. By the inclusion of Clause 4 all pre Blair leaders were further to the left than Corbyn. Corbyn offered a middle of the road version of Scandi socialism run in most European countries.

Blair’s main long term legacy was losing Scotland by his brand of pro war pro business version of Labour which makes it virtually impossible for Labour to win.

The last bit is right. Centre left parties need to form coalitions. Make pre electoral pacts and agree a change in the electoral system. Whoever is in charge of Labour if they don’t do that they need replacing. Corbyn failed from the left and Starmer is failing from the right. It’s no point entering a fight you can’t win. Labour need to engage and cooperate. If they don’t then voting for them is pointless

 

Nearly 13,000,000 people voted for Labour in 2017. Their best performance for 20 years. I still think there is a real appetite for socialism and for left leaning politics. They just need a better person to front it.

Starmer might as well be in the Tory cabinet as minister of the opposition. He’s proper useless.

 

I'm not an expert on the Labour party Jimmy so I probably can't debate that well on the point. I'd, from memory, hardly call Wilson or Callaghan hard left though. The major Unions' leadership certainly seemed to be and had a heavy influence on the Labour party.It was, in my opinion, the militancy of those Unions that led to a backlash and the election of Thatcher.
Personally I'm more of a mixed economy type but I certainly do believe certain industries should be nationalised and run for the public good. Foot and Kinnock were perceived as left wing and got trounced. Left wing or centrist I don't see a successful challenge to the Tories unless it's a concerted coalition of Labour, Liberal, Greens, SNP etc.

 

You’re aware it’s a joke party right? I know there’s a place in the world for satire and that it tricks a lot of people but this is like saying you’re voting for Lord Bucket Head and not in the knowledge that it’s a wasted, funny, protest vote but actually donating to him (e.g. signing up as a member) and campaigning for him on social media. It’s the West Stand Bogs of politics.

 

Update: they didn’t fill in the registration to be a political party properly so the EC have rejected their application and so they’ve spend the last few hours on Twitter mouthing off at everyone. Off to a good start.

 

So she's now standing as an Independent?

 

Tbf I do agree with what you say about change of leader after 2 defeats. Thought they were too quick off the mark to get rid of Miliband though., straight after an election never seems a good time.

 

Totally agree, and given how much more the electorate had moved ‘left’ by 2017 I think Milliband would have had a chance.

So we’d have had a progressive socialist government negotiating towards a soft Brexit remaining in the Customs Union.

Totally nuts that we’ve landed in this hell instead.

 

This is the problem. Blaming 'the other lot'. Monty Python nailed the left years ago.

I'm not a massive fan of Corbyn but I still voted for him. Now it's the turn of momentum to vote for starmer, because there's no other realistic option.

There's no point in ideals under a broken system when you're up against a status quo party whose sole aim is consolidating and exploiting power, who know they can gain a significant majority with 40%.

 

I was a huge fan of Corbyn and feel let down by Starmer but you better believe I’d be voting for him if it worked like that. In reality, you vote for your MP anyway and I really like how much mine has done for my area. Why on earth would I vote against them and get them deselected because I’m not a fan of Starmer? It makes zero sense, especially as he might get replaced after the next election anyway and then I’d be stuck with a crappy MP from a different party I didn’t even want. If I hated him that much, joining Labour and trying to vote him out as leader would make more sense.

 

This is so true
Years ago we started the Miners Campaign Group to keep pressure on NUM officials and MPs against the pit closure programme.
It was a pressure group set up to Allie with the above not against them and anyone sympathetic to the campaign against pit closures was welcome.
Mainly our meetings were set up in the old Junction pub between Doncaster and Cemetery Roads , but we did move about to try and tie in the other mining regions in Wakey Rotherham etc.
Among the audience were members of certain left wing party’s and some were trying to steer the agenda to their ideals .
Don’t know if some of these are still in existence but they used to introduce themselves and their organisations before speaking .
There was the Communist Party, The Revolutionary Communist Party, The Socialist Workers Party, The Revoulutionary Socialists party. Militant , and one or two more that I’d forgot.
We used to have guest speakers at a lot of these events some famous names such as Paul Foot ( mirror columnist ) and MPs etc .
It got embarrassing when we opened the floor for questions when each candidate from these party’s stood up mainly to condemn or disagree with candidates from the other party’s and the agenda of anti pit closures used to get lost almost to the point of threats of violence.
In the end we had to move from letting anyone speak other than about the agenda we had set .
We had lots of cancellations and refusals from top guest speakers because of this .

 

Aren`t we alreight when we have 2 main parties that really should be 4 parties all squabbling for their piece of the pie.

Labour cant win because society is made up of too many selfish I`m alright Jack and I`m considerably richer and better than you folk.

Only got to look at vaccinations and its like watching the Europa League, whose better than who, aren`t we all in this together like you know the human race.

Anyway back to being silly cos its too feckin depressing to think abart it, am off to read the jokes thread to cheer missen up.

 

Labour are unelectable at the moment. Not because of either Corbyn or Starmer but because of the electoral system. A vote for Labour may as well be one for the tories. They have no road map to win without Scotland. They need to draw one up sharpish. This will include. Pre electoral pacts with all other centre left parties, an agreement to stand only 1 centre left candidate in all constituencies and an agreement to change the voting system to a PR based one by the ensuing coalition. Without that as advocated by Clive Lewis for one there is zero chance of a Labour Govt. for that reason we all may as well vote with our principles. As it stands Labour are part of the problem not part of the solution.

 

To be fair, I broadly agree.

I wouldn't say Scotland is that heavily influential, someone mentioned earlier it's only made a difference once or twice post-war, and I think that's true. However, Scotland plus the heartlands of the north and they're lost.

Internal scrapping just doesn't help, it makes the party look bad and makes them less electable.

And you're right, it is a type of bloody-mindedness stopping anti-tory pacts from being agreed. The number of places where both Labour and the LD's split the vote but collectively would have beaten the Tory who won in 2019 is large.

 

Agree with you 100%. Nothing wrong with looking after number one but when its at the complete expense of what's best for the whole of society it pisses one off!!

 

Why would they be talking about pre election pacts 4 years from the election?

We have been in a pandemic throughout the current leadership and I think judgement should be reserved until we are past the worst and reopening the economy.

The idea that Labour would essentially concede at this point and start negotiating right now baffles me.

The new Leader in Scotland has started really well so who knows where we will be in 2024.

 

therein the problem lies. Clinging to the past. There is zero chance of Labour ‘winning’ Scotland back in fact they are far more likely to lose wales. Clinging to an electoral system that vastly favours the tories.

It isn’t ‘conceding’ to look to form left leaning coalitions with other parties. It’s the norm across most of the world where more functional electoral systems create more cohesive Govt.

It isn’t the sort of thing you put together on the back of a *** packet a couple of months before an election. You do it now. You make the arguments now for a changed politics where consensus politics and coalition is the norm. You advocate for a changed electoral system ( it will probably take 4 years to agree which form PR you will announce in your first 100 days of govt).

if they don’t do this and now then they are part of the problem in terms of removing the tories not part of the solution.

 

Why would Starmer take over The Labour Party to then jump straight into a pact its beyond ridiculous.

I feel at the next GE it would be beneficial to have agreements in place with other opposition parties but right now it would achieve nothing.

You claim it would be off the back of a cig packet a couple of months before which wouldn't be true Ed Davey has already expressed an opinion on this and I'm sure behind the scenes it is something that will be on the agenda nearer the time.

 

It’s made a difference 4 times. so that’s half of all Labour victories post war.

I wouldn’t describe that as ‘not influential’.

 

He would if he appreciated the reality of how he was going to win. Clive Lewis if elected would have done it from day 1. Clinging to the past is not an option. The language you use is to treat consensus and coalition as a defeat. It isn’t. It’s the future. It will stop parties like the tories elected on a tiny fraction of the vote getting massive majorities.

you don’t sell wholesale change to the way politics operates and an electoral system in a couple of months. The other parties are waiting for Labour. Labour need to lead. If Starmer can’t take that lead he needs to go for someone who can. Clinging to the old ways will just see more tories. As it stands a vote for Labour just enables this. I suspect the May elections will give them a strong message so hopefully either Starmer accepts change then or is changed.