Current Affairs The Labour Party

[LouReedwalkonthewildside]

Genuinely curious. I know she's shadow business secretary, and doesn't appear to have any business pedigree, so it's not immediately obvious why she's even the best person for her current role, much less that of leading the government..

To tell you the truth Bruce as a Labour supporter I don't really know what she would offer as a leader, and the thought of her as Labour leader is worrying.

 

[LouReedwalkonthewildside]

....a politician with values and decency. The Labour membership selecting Corbyn over Burnham says it all. Bit like being offered Lineker or Brett Angel and taking Angel.

Burnham saw the direction this Labour Party was going and got out.

A rare commodity in politics this day and age Eggs.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

To tell you the truth Bruce as a Labour supporter I don't really know what she would offer as a leader, and the thought of her as Labour leader is worrying.

To be fair though, Corbyn's credentials are no better, having been an officer in some small trade unions, flunking out of university and then becoming a Councillor and MP. It's not the kind of CV that would get you many senior positions.

 

[LouReedwalkonthewildside]

To be fair though, Corbyn's credentials are no better, having been an officer in some small trade unions, flunking out of university and then becoming a Councillor and MP. It's not the kind of CV that would get you many senior positions.

I don't rate Corbyn either Bruce. It's okay your membership singing your name and giving you standing ovations, but he has too appeal to the country as a whole to get the votes to put Labour in power, and IMO he's not capable of that.

 

[abelard]

....the Party is now run by a left-wing membership who select union officials to be MPs and even elect the Party leader. i’m a Labour voter, but I recognise the Party alienate many traditional Labour voters. i’m frustrated because to win, this Labour Party needs appeal to people who voted Tory in previous elections.

The number of people who used to vote but no longer do because is far, far greater than the number of people who vote Tory but might some day vote Labour.

Labour spent at least a decade before Corbyn contorting itself in an attempt to win over the latter, which is the main reason why there are now so many of the former.

The result was almost 4 million fewer votes in 2015 than in 2017, and exactly the same sort of hysterical shrieking in the media about deficits and national security that we see today. And the now likely permanent loss of Scotland.

The only serious way to court swing Tory voters would be to out remain the Liberal Democrats, at a cost of huge numbers of seats to the Tories across the North; or to outright embrace Leave (which is the last thing Labour voters who whinge about Corbyn want), at a cost of swing constituencies like Kensington or Canterbury, and the likely permanent disaffection of anyone under 55 who went to university.

Labour is boxed in because of the loss of Scotland, and because of Brexit. This, far, far, far more than Corbyn's poor polling figures, explains why the party is struggling, and I have still yet to hear a single plausible explanation of how a moderate non-Corbynite would solve either.

It is a far more plausible path to victory to champion economic policies which the rich but woke abhor, in order to win back the much larger bloc of voters who left Labour not for the Tories, but because of Blair-induced apathy.

It was precisely these voters who fueled Labour's dramatic improvement in 2017, who conventional polls do not pick up, and who by many accounts will determine the 2017 election as well: https://www.theguardian.com/politic...ssing-million-voters-return-leave-swing-seats

They are already suspicious of Labour's support for the second referendum, and can only be won back by bold and deliberately taboo-breaking and tabloid-alarming economic reforms.

Whereas the opposite strategy of watered-down disingenuous economic and social reforms to woo Tories and placate the rabid media will achieve neither.

 

[abelard]

To be fair though, Corbyn's credentials are no better, having been an officer in some small trade unions, flunking out of university and then becoming a Councillor and MP. It's not the kind of CV that would get you many senior positions.

Um... last I checked, you're voting for 39-year-old career politician Jo Swinson to lead the country? Is it her work placement doing marketing for a regional radio station at age 21 that persuades you?

At least make a better show of practicing what you preach..

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Um... last I checked, you're voting for 39-year-old career politician Jo Swinson to lead the country? Is it her work placement doing marketing for a regional radio station at age 21 that persuades you?

At least make a better show of practicing what you preach..

No, her credentials aren't great either, and I've said previously that ordinarily she should scarcely have progressed beyond the junior ministerial post she had in the coalition. Rest assured, nice though I believe Jo to be, should I vote for the LibDems, I'm not doing so because of her leadership or her capabilities as a leader, but rather for my fundamental belief in the virtues of liberalism.

Maybe for some their party of choice fit their values like a glove, and the leader lives and breaths their ideals to a tee, but I suspect for many more, it's a case of choosing those you identify the most with (or indeed choosing the lesser of various evils).

 

[abelard]

I suspect for many more, it's a case of choosing those you identify the most with (or indeed choosing the lesser of various evils).

Yes, that is certainly the case for me as well... though I at least try to avoid taking the piss out of what others do and then doing the exact same thing.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Yes, that is certainly the case for me as well... though I at least try to avoid taking the piss out of what others do and then doing the exact same thing.

I don't recall ever championing Jo's virtues as a leader on here? Indeed...

I see Jo Swinson is favourite to become the next leader. I must say, having spoken to her a few times, she's a nice enough person but I wouldn't have put her down as a future prime minister in a million years.

I haven't decided who to vote for, not least because there is so little to actually vote for. Even in the European elections I couldn't tell you what any local candidates (of any stripe) actually plan on doing. I wouldn't say that the political class as a whole have painted themselves especially well in the last few years.

I wouldn't regard either the Lib Dems or CUK as competent. I've spoken to Jo Swinson a number of times, and she's genuinely lovely, but not someone I'd ever regard as prime minister material, although as the likes of Arden has shown, being a reasonably nice human being is not a bad start point, albeit it's perhaps not a start point that many of our leaders have not begun from over the years.

You might recognise that last one from an exchange you and I had at the time.

 

[Black Belt Jones]

Genuinely curious. I know she's shadow business secretary, and doesn't appear to have any business pedigree, so it's not immediately obvious why she's even the best person for her current role, much less that of leading the government..

Margaret Thatcher was the first primeminister with a science degree, and had a very mixed track record in in that department - took her years to address the basic research funding that drives innovation, and at the other end was slow to respond to shocking missed opportunites like monoclonal antibody production (developed at the MRC and now foundational to the entire biotechnology industry, zero commercialisation in the UK at that time).

OTOH you have great football coaches like Mourinho, Silva, Wenger who have no football pedigree at all as players, who nevertheless go on to great success as managers. Angela Rayner never even when to school, and is doing OK as shadow education secretary. So you often can't draw conclusions about someone's leadership potential just based on their direct experiences of the field.

 

[neil999]

The number of people who used to vote but no longer do because is far, far greater than the number of people who vote Tory but might some day vote Labour.

Labour spent at least a decade before Corbyn contorting itself in an attempt to win over the latter, which is the main reason why there are now so many of the former.

The result was almost 4 million fewer votes in 2015 than in 2017, and exactly the same sort of hysterical shrieking in the media about deficits and national security that we see today. And the now likely permanent loss of Scotland.

The only serious way to court swing Tory voters would be to out remain the Liberal Democrats, at a cost of huge numbers of seats to the Tories across the North; or to outright embrace Leave (which is the last thing Labour voters who whinge about Corbyn want), at a cost of swing constituencies like Kensington or Canterbury, and the likely permanent disaffection of anyone under 55 who went to university.

Labour is boxed in because of the loss of Scotland, and because of Brexit. This, far, far, far more than Corbyn's poor polling figures, explains why the party is struggling, and I have still yet to hear a single plausible explanation of how a moderate non-Corbynite would solve either.

It is a far more plausible path to victory to champion economic policies which the rich but woke abhor, in order to win back the much larger bloc of voters who left Labour not for the Tories, but because of Blair-induced apathy.

It was precisely these voters who fueled Labour's dramatic improvement in 2017, who conventional polls do not pick up, and who by many accounts will determine the 2017 election as well: https://www.theguardian.com/politic...ssing-million-voters-return-leave-swing-seats

They are already suspicious of Labour's support for the second referendum, and can only be won back by bold and deliberately taboo-breaking and tabloid-alarming economic reforms.

Whereas the opposite strategy of watered-down disingenuous economic and social reforms to woo Tories and placate the rabid media will achieve neither.

disagree, i think alot of people who arent generally interested in politics would vote labour with a different leader and policies when up against johnson

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Margaret Thatcher was the first primeminister with a science degree, and had a very mixed track record in in that department - took her years to address the basic research funding that drives innovation, and at the other end was slow to respond to shocking missed opportunites like monoclonal antibody production (developed at the MRC and now foundational to the entire biotechnology industry, zero commercialisation in the UK at that time).

OTOH you have great football coaches like Mourinho, Silva, Wenger who have no football pedigree at all as players, who nevertheless go on to great success as managers. Angela Rayner never even when to school, and is doing OK as shadow education secretary. So you often can't draw conclusions about someone's leadership potential just based on their direct experiences of the field.

No, that's very true, hence why I asked folk who probably know more about her than me what marks her out as prime minister material. Her CV doesn't scream future PM, so I wondered what her supporters were seeing.

 

[catcherintherye]

No, that's very true, hence why I asked folk who probably know more about her than me what marks her out as prime minister material. Her CV doesn't scream future PM, so I wondered what her supporters were seeing.

I'm not a massive fan but she seems quite competent, has gained good experience being on the shadow cabinet, is young and female (there is a desire to have a woman leader). She's also been working very closely to John Mcdonnell and there is some thought he'll be an influential figure in the next leadership race.

I think it's too soon for her.

 

[dwightschrute]

Not bad numbers at all compared to what Labour were polling this time in the election cycle in 2017 for Survation

 

[Charro]

Not bad numbers at all compared to what Labour were polling this time in the election cycle in 2017 for Survation

I feel like survation always poll labour higher than all the other polls for some reason.

Are they tapping into a part of the population the others aren’t?