Current Affairs The Labour Party

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davek said:
It's not personality it's policies.

Compare the objective of the manifestos of the Callaghan Government with Blair's.

1979:
A generation has now grown up in a welfare state which remains the envy of the world in health care and education. We have demonstrated a capacity for skill and inventiveness which keeps us at the forefront of world technology. Those are no mean achievements. A Tory Government would put all this at risk. At work, they would substitute confrontation for cooperation. The free market forces they support would mean soaring inflation, rising prices and growing unemployment. Their uncaring meanness would mean misery for millions of the most vulnerable in our community, for their policy of cutting public expenditure can only mean a drastic reduction in all our social services.

Against this reactionary prospect, Labour sets its vision for the future. We seek to bring about a fundamental change in the balance of power and wealth in favour of working people and their families. We reject the concept that there is a choice to be made between a prosperous and efficient Britain and a caring and compassionate society. As democratic socialists, we believe they complement each other.

1997:
I want to renew faith in politics by being honest about the last 18 years. Some things the Conservatives got right. We will not change them. It is where they got things wrong that we will make change. We have no intention or desire to replace one set of dogmas by another. I want to renew faith in politics through a government that will govern in the interest of the many, the broad majority of people who work hard, play by the rules, pay their dues and feel let down by a political system that gives the breaks to the few, to an elite at the top increasingly out of touch with the rest of us.

The purpose of new Labour is to give Britain a different political choice: the choice between a failed Conservative government, exhausted and divided in everything other than its desire to cling on to power, and a new and revitalised Labour Party that has been resolute in transforming itself into a party of the future. We have rewritten our constitution, the new Clause IV, to put a commitment to enterprise alongside the commitment to justice. We have changed the way we make policy, and put our relations with the trade unions on a modern footing where they accept they can get fairness but no favours from a Labour government.
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That second sentence from the 1979 manifesto is interesting in hindsight because it is very true. We now have one of the least research-intensive economies of any advanced nation (well known how distorted and un-balanced our economy is in favour of financial services, which does not produce genuine innovation). But in 1979 we had one of the most.

We had a sustained period of growth up to 1979 in real GDP per person which then deteriorated and has actually never recovered to those levels (and has gotten absolutely knocked bandy by the 2008 crisis). This is not what is typically presented as the economic picture of the UK post 1970s.

It shows what a serious problem it is to prioritise non-innovative economic activity, and how it weighs a gigantic anchor on the economy. Despite market-led reforms in the 80s, and us all living through a once-in-a-century economic revolution of the WWW in 90s / 00s it still wasn't enough to generate the same growth in GDP per person as pre-1979.
 
Black Belt Jones said:
That second sentence from the 1979 manifesto is interesting in hindsight because it is very true. We now have one of the least research-intensive economies of any advanced nation (well known how distorted and un-balanced our economy is in favour of financial services, which does not produce genuine innovation). But in 1979 we had one of the most.

We had a sustained period of growth up to 1979 in real GDP per person which then deteriorated and has actually never recovered to those levels (and has gotten absolutely knocked bandy by the 2008 crisis). This is not what is typically presented as the economic picture of the UK post 1970s.

It shows what a serious problem it is to prioritise non-innovative economic activity, and how it weighs a gigantic anchor on the economy. Despite market-led reforms in the 80s, and us all living through a once-in-a-century economic revolution of the WWW in 90s / 00s it still wasn't enough to generate the same growth in GDP per person as pre-1979.
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We're consumers, not makers. And you'll see that in spades today of all days: "Independence Day...get down to the High Street and do your economic patriotic duty...get pissed, eat pasties, get haircuts, go to Primark and Sports Direct for some gear"

This also feeds into how we've become a nation that are sitting ducks for a second wave.

This country is finished as a nation of any importance in what really matters: decency, compassion, disciplined as a community.

It's over for the Britain I knew. Gone.
 
davek said:
We're consumers, not makers. And you'll see that in spades today of all days: "Independence Day...get down to the High Street and do your economic patriotic duty...get pissed, eat pasties, get haircuts, go to Primark and Sports Direct for some gear"

This also feeds into how we've become a nation that are sitting ducks for a second wave.

This country is finished as a nation of any importance in what really matters: decency, compassion, disciplined as a community.

It's over for the Britain I knew. Gone.
Click to expand...

That's a choice that has been made since the 80s we have been in a process of managed decline...
 
tsubaki said:
That is certainly how its advertised, but that really is not how representative democracy should (or even can) work.

As a citizen, where its not possible to take part in the legislative process yourself you have to have a representative do that on your behalf. That representative has to have your (and the rest of their) constituents as their only concern, and honestly present their views at election time so that everyone can make an informed decision. If that happens, you get real consensus, real scrutiny and effective government. The cost of politics would also come down massively.

What we have now is party concerns being clearly more important to most MPs than the welfare of their constituents (or even representing them honestly). As we repeatedly see, MPs vote along party lines far too often for this to be healthy and there is abundant evidence this has been wrecking our country and killing our population for the past hundred years.

STV, or any PR that I've seen proposed in my lifetime, would (as we see in Europe) entrench parties even more in the system, causing even more damage.
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Change has got to start somehow somewhere. All well and good just protesting... I personally see this a move for the best and hopefully a torch paper. Of course I reserve the right to lambast Starmer, however, in the absence of manifesto and in light of his promises on this when contender to be leader. Starmer has the democratic mandate and pretty convincing one at that.
 
davek said:
It's not personality it's policies.

Compare the objective of the manifestos of the Callaghan Government with Blair's.

1979:
A generation has now grown up in a welfare state which remains the envy of the world in health care and education. We have demonstrated a capacity for skill and inventiveness which keeps us at the forefront of world technology. Those are no mean achievements. A Tory Government would put all this at risk. At work, they would substitute confrontation for cooperation. The free market forces they support would mean soaring inflation, rising prices and growing unemployment. Their uncaring meanness would mean misery for millions of the most vulnerable in our community, for their policy of cutting public expenditure can only mean a drastic reduction in all our social services.

Against this reactionary prospect, Labour sets its vision for the future. We seek to bring about a fundamental change in the balance of power and wealth in favour of working people and their families. We reject the concept that there is a choice to be made between a prosperous and efficient Britain and a caring and compassionate society. As democratic socialists, we believe they complement each other.

1997:
I want to renew faith in politics by being honest about the last 18 years. Some things the Conservatives got right. We will not change them. It is where they got things wrong that we will make change. We have no intention or desire to replace one set of dogmas by another. I want to renew faith in politics through a government that will govern in the interest of the many, the broad majority of people who work hard, play by the rules, pay their dues and feel let down by a political system that gives the breaks to the few, to an elite at the top increasingly out of touch with the rest of us.

The purpose of new Labour is to give Britain a different political choice: the choice between a failed Conservative government, exhausted and divided in everything other than its desire to cling on to power, and a new and revitalised Labour Party that has been resolute in transforming itself into a party of the future. We have rewritten our constitution, the new Clause IV, to put a commitment to enterprise alongside the commitment to justice. We have changed the way we make policy, and put our relations with the trade unions on a modern footing where they accept they can get fairness but no favours from a Labour government.
Click to expand...

I particularly liked this bit by Blair “to an elite at the top increasingly out of touch with the rest of us”. I’m sure at the time that he really did believe he was ‘one of us’. I wonder when his conversion to ’the elite’ took place......
 
Tories moving toward a 'Green Deal' vision for the future of the economy. We'll see how real that is, but it underlines again the sea change that Corbyn heralded in British political economy: the first to call for an end to austerity (adopted by all parties), the first to call for a reconfiguration of the economy that addresses climate change (now accepted across the board).
 
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