Current Affairs The Labour Party

[Rita_Poon]

Oh dear, it's in here crowing about Starmer again. someone slide it a piece of cake and shut it up...

 

[Harryflashman]

Oh dear, it's in here crowing about Starmer again. someone slide it a piece of cake and shut it up...

The country is actually in the toilet , it’s costing you about £20 to fill a bath all they’ve got is people in boats and phoney culture wars . If the population fall for it , again , then I’ll be honest I might be off as it’s pointless.

 

[NilSatisOptimum]

The country is actually in the toilet , it’s costing you about £20 to fill a bath all they’ve got is people in boats and phoney culture wars . If the population fall for it , again , then I’ll be honest I might be off as it’s pointless.

Got Gambia Cape Verde in our sites.

 

[Charlie Sweet]

I think that Starmer’s adoption of the Tory “Take Back Control” bilge is a huge horrible mistake.

I can’t imagine how they came out of that brainstorming session thinking, wowsers that’s brilliant Kier.

The whole 3 word, meaningless Tory soundbite tripe, should have been swerved and replaced with substance.

Embarrassing.

Not sure. I think it could end up being quite clever. On the basis that the Tories very definitely aren't in control.

 

[NilSatisOptimum]

I think that Starmer’s adoption of the Tory “Take Back Control” bilge is a huge horrible mistake.

I can’t imagine how they came out of that brainstorming session thinking, wowsers that’s brilliant Kier.

The whole 3 word, meaningless Tory soundbite tripe, should have been swerved and replaced with substance.

Embarrassing.

All that matters now.

UK’s Starmer Sends Clear Message at Davos: Britain Is ‘Open to Business’

(Bloomberg) -- Labour edged closer to becoming the government-in-waiting that the polls imply after the party leadership’s successful first day out at Davos. British business figures and bankers said Labour leader Keir Starmer and his shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves had impressed in their...

www.swissinfo.ch

And even Polly is reviewing her stance with some hindsight i might say.

Sir Keir Starmer would be the best PM since Tony Blair, says columnist Polly Toynbee

Columnist Polly Toynbee says Sir Keir Starmer would be the best Prime Minister since Tony Blair.

www.lbc.co.uk

 

[spectateur]

Oh dear, it's in here crowing about Starmer again. someone slide it a piece of cake and shut it up...

Starmer should come clean and say that Brexit is a disaster and we need to do whatever needed to rectify this mistake.
Also come out and back some form of PR in elections, as agreed at his party conference.
Otherwise my suspicions continue that he is tory lite.

 

[NilSatisOptimum]

Starmer should come clean and say that Brexit is a disaster and we need to do whatever needed to rectify this mistake.
Also come out and back some form of PR in elections, as agreed at his party conference.
Otherwise my suspicions continue that he is tory lite.

Think that is going to be a process we move to over time. Too many and including family have swallowed Mail Scum Express line, buried an uncle the other week, even on his death bed, "wonderful people but they all foreigners". It s all to prevalent still. At this point any move towards EU membership would be a gift to the right wing libertarians.

 

[tsubaki]

Starmer should come clean and say that Brexit is a disaster and we need to do whatever needed to rectify this mistake.
Also come out and back some form of PR in elections, as agreed at his party conference.
Otherwise my suspicions continue that he is tory lite.

TBF he has to get into office first, so I can accept not scaring the horses by saying anything scary to them.

However once he is in office he absolutely has to take on immediate reform of almost everything, which is not going to happen with the shower he has surrounded himself with.

I hope PR isn't one of the things adopted though - it is a terrible idea that confuses a symptom for a cause. The problem with British politics is political parties, so making parties stronger (which would happen in PR, especially list based PR like you have) is never going to make things better. I'd much rather see a complete ban on any out of constituency funding, and a requirement that prospective MPs have either lived or worked in their constituency for a minimum of ten years prior to standing.

 

[Harryflashman]

Oh dear, it's in here crowing about Starmer again. someone slide it a piece of cake and shut it up...

Let’s just add to my previous post , it seems we are mired in corruption more suited to a third world dictatorship than a western democracy and yet the world keeps turning and the real issues avoided .

 

[Rita_Poon]

There's a typical tory toss-tin on bbc currently that's tried to skewer Starmer for an interview on camera in the back of a taxi with no seat belt on.

From 1996.

You've had a lot of years to catch up with him, whats the sudden rush boyo's?

 

[Rita_Poon]

Let’s just add to my previous post , it seems we are mired in corruption more suited to a third world dictatorship than a western democracy and yet the world keeps turning and the real issues avoided .

hussein, gaddafi, pot, pinochet, didn't hide their character, there were no airs and graces, they were murderers and thieves and owned it. So by comparison much more honest than the thatcherite shysters masquerading as good, honest, leadership currently infecting the nation. Their sycophants and stooges are as guilty via association.

but but but, Corbyn, but but but, Starmer, but but but...

 

[tsubaki]

Let’s just add to my previous post , it seems we are mired in corruption more suited to a third world dictatorship than a western democracy and yet the world keeps turning and the real issues avoided .

TBF this has been the case for years though - Private Eye had a particularly bad example from the 2000s where (IIRC) an NHS consultant warned that the plans for a new PFI hospital for Norwich were medically dangerous (I think it was something about the operating theatre sharing air conditioning with the isolation wards) and kept raising it when they were trying to push PFI through. He was told by a senior NHS financial consultant that if he kept his complaints up he might end up like David Kelly, which they admitted saying but claimed it was in some other context than being found dead.

Also the introduction of LLPs is really hard to understand except as always having been about facilitating massive scams, frauds, general filching etc

 

[Rita_Poon]

TBF this has been the case for years though - Private Eye had a particularly bad example from the 2000s where (IIRC) an NHS consultant warned that the plans for a new PFI hospital for Norwich were medically dangerous (I think it was something about the operating theatre sharing air conditioning with the isolation wards) and kept raising it when they were trying to push PFI through. He was told by a senior NHS financial consultant that if he kept his complaints up he might end up like David Kelly, which they admitted saying but claimed it was in some other context than being found dead.

Also the introduction of LLPs is really hard to understand except as always having been about facilitating massive scams, frauds, general filching etc

Someone admitted this (probably recorded) and kept their job?

 

[tsubaki]

Someone admitted this (probably recorded) and kept their job?

yes, yes they did - below is the link to the article, I got some of the roles wrong mind:

PFI at all costs….


In 2003 Dr Peter Brambleby, then director of public health for Norwich Primary Care Trust (PCT), received requests from senior clinicians at the PFI flagship Norfolk and Norwich Hospital hospital (Eyes passim) to look into their concerns about changes to the design and build that they believed put patients at risk. The ventilation system and isolation facilities were top of their list, but so were a lack of management response and a culture of secrecy.


When his preliminary inquiries confirmed cause for concern, evidence of covering up and a lack of proper supervision by Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire Strategic Health Authority (SHA), Brambleby put the matter in the hands of the National Audit Office (NAO) on 31 March 2004. The NAO, led by Sir John Bourn [Eyes passim], referred it straight back to the SHA and hospital to investigate.


External scrutiny did at least prompt some remedial building work (at the NHS’s expense), a belated clinical risk assessment (from which Dr Brambleby was barred), an internal inquiry (which omitted key witness testimony and declined to track down critical records on changes to design specification), and a flurry of press interest. Much was at stake. Not just safety of patients and staff using the hospital, but the reputation and value of this scheme to its financial backers and the credibility of the whole multi-billion pound NHS PFI programme to follow.


On 4 May 2004, the PCT asked Dr Brambleby to give a statement to the media but to check with the SHA press officer, who was briefed and ready for the call. He said he had read all the “libellous” correspondence, had briefed the Secretary of State (John Reid), and warned Dr Brambleby that unless he dropped the whole matter he would end up “like Dr David Kelly who was found dead in the woods with his wrist slashed.” Complaints about that threat to NAO and SHA fell on deaf ears.


Documents recently released on the instruction of the Information Commissioner’s Office show that Norwich PCT chief executive Dr Chris Price took up the complaint in a letter to SHA chief executive Peter Houghton on 11 June 2004: “… the unacceptable behaviour of Mr Davies … was an orchestrated and deliberate attempt to bring pressure to bear … to intimidate me into making public statements which would discredit Dr Brambleby … (the press officer) made wholly inappropriate referral to the death of the late David Kelly as an illustration of what happens to whistleblowers … I know he said these things because he had a very similar conversation with me … I would hate to think that he might subject some other less robust individual to the same sort of treatment in the future and I guess that is the real reason I feel compelled to make this complaint.”


And the response? Nothing. It was months before the SHA looked into it, and years before the findings were released, albeit in redacted form, and through the intervention of North Norfolk MP Norman Lamb. In it, the press officer claimed his advice was: “… wholly appropriate given the circumstances … talked through the advice with colleagues … the recent case of David Kelly was a perfect illustration of someone who ended up caught in the crossfire between politics and the media … Peter Brambleby, as a public servant, had no democratic legitimacy … it was advice I would give to others in similar situations.”


This latest example of top-down bullying of those who raise legitimate concerns in the NHS reveals Labour’s desperation to make PFI work at all costs. While safety concerns were suppressed, former health secretary Alan Milburn was paid handsomely to speak at a ‘strategy seminar’ in the south of France, as guest of Financial Securities Assurance, the bankers who remortgaged the Norfolk and Norwich PFI.

Dr Phil’s Private Eye Column, Issue 1271 September 15 | drphilhammond.com

PFI at all costs.... In 2003 Dr Peter Brambleby, then director of public health for Norwich Primary Care Trust (PCT), received requests from senior clinicians at the PFI flagship Norfolk and Norwich Hospital hospital (Eyes passim) to look into their concerns about changes to the design and build...

www.drphilhammond.com

 

[Mikey_Fitzgerald]

Watched some clips of the 97 GE recently

Tories getting booted out everywhere

If only...