All things Labour Party

[buctootim]

Just heard that famous red tory right winger Neil Kinnock say that Corbyn should go on Five Live.

 

Can't see how giving an interview would help.

[CB Fry]

Can't see how giving an interview would help.

I think Jeremy doing the Sausage Sandwich Game might just make all the difference.

[buctootim]

I think Jeremy doing the Sausage Sandwich Game might just make all the difference.

 

Its got to be better than having his balls in a vice.

[buctootim]

All this talk of terminal decline is nonsense, in Milliband and Corbyn they have just had two unelectable leaders. There is still a future for a centre left party, I don't think Blair got a lot wrong except for his criminal decision to invade Iraq which I hope he goes down for.

 

Is it? Blair is the only Labour leader to win an election since Harold Wilson in 1974 - and he only did that by being 'Tory lite scum'. Callaghan, Foot, Kinnock, Brown and Miliband all failed - and the more left they were the worse the results.

 

If we had PR Labour could occupy the mainstream left position and get into government regularly in coalition with the LDs, Greens or SNP. Their problem now is that they need to appeal to the middle to get elected under first past the post, and much of the shrinking traditional vote see that as selling out.

Edited 2 July, 2016 by buctootim

[Wade Garrett]

Corbyn hides behind a 'democratic mandate', but all he did was mobilise Trotskyites and members of the Socialist Workers Party to pay £3 and join the voting process. The whole process is not democratic, it's a sham.

 

Meanwhile, the union leaders are playing a very strange game. Support for Corbyn will ultimately lead to them being marginalised and losing even more influence. Their support for the government in the EU referendum has made a lot of dyed in the wool union members at my place of work question their memberships.

 

Corbyn's Labour Party, and the Trade Unions are so disconnected from the people they purport to represent, and those whose support they need. If this continues, both bodies will die the Labour Party will split. Labour will become nothing more than a hobby plaything for the London metropolitan elite, scoffing at the needs of the working class. The unions membership will continue to decline.

 

I don't recognise the Labour Party that I have voted for all my life. But there's no sentiment from me, they won't get my vote as they are, out of some expectation of loyalty.

[Lord Duckhunter]

Corbyn hides behind a 'democratic mandate', but all he did was mobilise Trotskyites and members of the Socialist Workers Party to pay £3 and join the voting process. The whole process is not democratic, it's a sham.

 

y.

 

The biggest joke is that even with these pathetic £3 rules that Ed brought in , he still shouldn't have made the ballot . It was people like Beckett , trying to get rid of him that lent him their nomination . I believe the saintly Jo Cox did so as well . The Tories always make sure head bangers are kept away from the membership vote

[buctootim]

...

Edited 3 July, 2016 by buctootim
misread post

[hutch]

Nothing to worry about. McCluskey is going to sort it out.

[Batman]

Jeremy Corbyn wasn't sure if the Hamas charter was antisemitic. Until Keith Vaz read him the bit about killing Jews. Then he conceded it is.

Must be part of the new, nicer, fairer politics he was going to bring to the party.

[CHAPEL END CHARLIE]

Angela Eagle finally set to press the button on a new Labour leadership race:

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36753769

[Verbal]

Angela Eagle finally set to press the button on a new Labour leadership race:

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36753769

 

She doesn't stand a chance. The Corbyn cultists now infect the party like an untreatable virus. I know Neil Kinnock is keen to wage a fight within the party, but when he did so in the 1980s it took him over a decade to drive the entryists out, and there were far fewer of them then. Yet Corbyn remains enfeebled. He has the support of fewer MPs than the SNP, and should by rights give way to the SNP as the main party of Opposition in the House of Commons. We'd all be better off for that.

 

I think the only - and now best - option is to form a new centre-left party. It's the only way to create an effective opposition in the time available. Political and economic crises will be piling up in the next few weeks and months, and the only people in a position to take advantage of the chaos are likely to the right wing of the Tory party. We don't have time for a Kinnock long march.

 

Viva la New New Labour! (I don't expect it'll be called that...)

[aintforever]

Eagle, seriously! Just when the country desperately needs a decent opposition this is the best the Labour party can do. **** me what a mess. I know appearance are not everything but it does count and that ugly ***** won't ever get elected as PM. labour need too sort their **** out because if they can't even sort out an decent leader how the hell are the country supposed to trust them to run the country.

Edited 10 July, 2016 by aintforever

[CHAPEL END CHARLIE]

She doesn't stand a chance. The Corbyn cultists now infect the party like an untreatable virus. I know Neil Kinnock is keen to wage a fight within the party, but when he did so in the 1980s it took him over a decade to drive the entryists out, and there were far fewer of them then. Yet Corbyn remains enfeebled. He has the support of fewer MPs than the SNP, and should by rights give way to the SNP as the main party of Opposition in the House of Commons. We'd all be better off for that.

 

I think the only - and now best - option is to form a new centre-left party. It's the only way to create an effective opposition in the time available. Political and economic crises will be piling up in the next few weeks and months, and the only people in a position to take advantage of the chaos are likely to the right wing of the Tory party. We don't have time for a Kinnock long march.

 

Viva la New New Labour! (I don't expect it'll be called that...)

 

I can only agree with all of the above. The Labour Party finds itself in a Hell of a mess just at a time when the British people need an effective opposition in Parliment the most. If this impass situation between the party's increasing left wing and ideological membership, and most of its more centerist and pragmatic MP's persists, then the only outcome I can see is that the party will split again - in a broadly similiar way perhaps to how it did before with moderates departing to form the short lived SDP.

 

You will not need me to remind you that the SDP would eventualy merge with the Liberals to become the Liberal Democrate Party of course. The British people need their centre-left politicans to coalesce together far more quickly and effectivly this time I think. However, the lack of any apparent strong leader for this future grouping to unite under is a real problem - the likes of Nick Clegg and Angela Eagle really won't do I think. Step forward Chuka Umunna?

 

I started this thread with the prediction that Jeremy Corbyn would be the death of the Labour Party as we now know it. I see no reason to rethink that opinion now - far from it.

[Verbal]

I can only agree with all of the above. The Labour Party finds itself in a Hell of a mess just at a time when the British people need an effective opposition in Parliment the most. If this impass situation between the party's increasing left wing and ideological membership, and most of its more centerist and pragmatic MP's persists, then the only outcome I can see is that the party will split again - in a broadly similiar way perhaps to how it did before with moderates departing to form the short lived SDP.

 

You will not need me to remind you that the SDP would eventualy merge with the Liberals to become the Liberal Democrate Party of course. The British people need their centre-left politicans to coalesce together far more quickly and effectivly this time I think. However, the lack of any apparent strong leader for this future grouping to unite under is a real problem - the likes of Nick Clegg and Angela Eagle really won't do I think. Step forward Chuka Umunna?

 

I started this thread with the prediction that Jeremy Corbyn would be the death of the Labour Party as we now know it. I see no reason to rethink that opinion now - far from it.

 

When this thread began almost a year ago I didn’t think it was possible the party would split. Now it’s inevitable, even if Corbyn loses a legal challenge to be on the ballot. The party as a parliamentary force has been marginalised, and Labour is now predominantly an extra-parliamentary foreign-affairs protest organisation with strong alliances with the Trotskyist far-left – something that Corbyn has always wanted.

 

As such, the party has abandoned being what it’s been since its inception – a party campaigning for social justice through parliamentary representation.

 

Going to the country in a general election with Corbynism, whether it’s in 2016 or 2020, would be a disaster. Corbyn’s couldn’t-care-less performance in the referendum campaign wasn’t because he didn’t care about the EU; it was because he was incapable of being other than he is – a campaigner against the evils of Westernism. His natural instinct was to side with Putin in the view that the EU was a vehicle for western menace (this freakishly bizarre view is commonplace among the worst of the Corbyn fanatics).

 

With the Labour party infested with Corbynisim, they should be left to it – and, stripped of the bulk of its parliamentary party, the Corbynist iteration of the party will rot from the head down.

 

What’s needed now is for the centre-left’s energies to be focused positively on the immediate and long-term future, not embroiled in interminable existential battles with the Corbyn fanatics and their weird Jew-hating tics. That means the parliamentary Labour party (or almost all of it) forming a new party. It should seek alliances with other centre-left parties, including the SNP, to form an electoral coalition.

 

This isn’t a rerun of the gang-of-four split from Labour in 1981, both because the numbers are so much bigger (such a massive vote of no confidence against its leader is unprecedented in Labour’s history) and because the party is in such worse shape even than under Foot. It’s also not like the SDP split because such a move now would restore Labour as a parliamentary party, with MPs answerable to their constituents rather than the pitchfork wavers at Corbyn’s disposal.

 

I honestly don’t think there’s an alternative – unless that alternative is decades of a vastly unpopular Tory government taking advantage of a hopelessly split non-Tory majority.

[buctootim]

This isn’t a rerun of the gang-of-four split from Labour in 1981, both because the numbers are so much bigger

 

It would be a rerun though - we've been there before. I don't remember the exact stats but the SDP had big media support, got 25% or so in the election and won just a handful of seats. As a result they faded away and ending up merging with the Liberals - another party which suffered from first past the post.

 

I would love to see a multi party democracy so that everyone truly had a party to represent their views in Parliament - but its only viable when you have proportional representation, otherwise the large majority of the population might as well not vote. PR would enable creation of new parties which truly represent their supporters. Probably a third of the Tory party should be in UKIP and half the Labour party in the LDs. The fact you have 'entryists' in both major parties is because they know with the present voting system they'd gradually disappear or become irrelevant.

[Nolan]

It would be a rerun though - we've been there before. I don't remember the exact stats but the SDP had big media support, got 25% or so in the election and won just a handful of seats. As a result they faded away and ending up merging with the Liberals - another party which suffered from first past the post.

 

I would love to see a multi party democracy so that everyone truly had a party to represent their views in Parliament - but its only viable when you have proportional representation, otherwise the large majority of the population might as well not vote. PR would enable creation of new parties which truly represent their supporters. Probably a third of the Tory party should be in UKIP and half the Labour party in the LDs. The fact you have 'entryists' in both major parties is because they know with the present voting system they'd gradually disappear or become irrelevant.

 

And end up like Spain? No thanks.

 

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

[buctootim]

And end up like Spain? No thanks.

 

Awesome analysis. Insight, cogent argument, killer facts. You've proved indisputably there is no other possible result from PR than to end up like Spain.

 

Germany uses PR, as do many / most of the rich stable democracies.

[Jonnyboy]

Awesome analysis. Insight, cogent argument, killer facts. You've proved indisputably there is no other possible result from PR than to end up like Spain.

 

Germany uses PR, as do many / most of the rich stable democracies.

 

...

[Nolan]

Awesome analysis. Insight, cogent argument, killer facts. You've proved indisputably there is no other possible result from PR than to end up like Spain.

 

Germany uses PR, as do many / most of the rich stable democracies.

How are Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal doing financially? And look at how well this MEPs make decisions

 

PR parliaments can never agree on anything.

 

FPTP is the best way to get decisions made.

[Lord Duckhunter]

Didn't Tim lose the FPTP referendum as well?

[moonraker]

Didn't Tim lose the FPTP referendum as well?

 

The PR referendum was a stitch up by the 2 largest parties, FPTP is out of date, the UK is not a 2 party democracy and denying parties fair representation based on the proportion of the vote they receive is undemocratic, surely one who continually tells us that the EU is undemocratic can acknowledge that. Oh wait perhaps not because you are not actually interested in true democracy as your continual belittling of any thing that does not come from the right wing of the Tory party demonstrates. The party of robbers or brigands has never been more appropriate to the Tory party than it is today. I am not and never have been a member of any political party, I am a UK voter, and I am fed up of our political parties failure to represent the vast majority of my fellow voters and having to listen to the verbiage spouted by those who blindly follow them.

[moonraker]

How are Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal doing financially? And look at how well this MEPs make decisions

 

PR parliaments can never agree on anything.

 

FPTP is the best way to get decisions made.

 

What a load of baloney! What PR does is prevent extremism and encourage collaboration and consensus, something desperately needed in our modern world. Our current system results in a government, not elected by or representative of the majority, but one that represents the largest minority, and who said the EU was undemocratic!

[buctootim]

Didn't Tim lose the FPTP referendum as well?

 

Pretty sure you lost it too. UKIP would have had 82 seats instead of 1 if we had PR at the 2015 election and your friends the SNP would have got 31 instead of 52.

 

http://indy100.independent.co.uk/article/heres-how-the-election-results-would-look-under-a-proportional-voting-system--gJenQmaW2gW

[derry]

It looks like the Labour party have royally ****ed themselves for the foreseeable future. Can't say I'm sorry, they've been a rabble for too long. probably a couple of parties will come out of this with predictable results. Ukip could do well in the north out of this. Having voted out once, those Labour voters from the last GE might well do the same next time.

[Verbal]

How it's stacking up, direction-of-travel-wise:

 

1. The Cabinet Office remains hopeful of having a 'multidimensional" options paper by a September deadline.

 

2. Remaina May becomes Prime Minister, with her timetable for Brexit negotiations starting in the New Year. So no Article 50 notification this year

 

3. The earliest possible time for any Article 50 notification is in early 2017. So no Article 50 notification this year

 

4. With the two-year timetable after any A50 negotiation, the earliest any government could take Britain out of the EU would be 2019, shortly before the next General Election.

[Whitey Grandad]

How it's stacking up, direction-of-travel-wise:

 

1. The Cabinet Office remains hopeful of having a 'multidimensional" options paper by a September deadline.

 

2. Remaina May becomes Prime Minister, with her timetable for Brexit negotiations starting in the New Year. So no Article 50 notification this year

 

3. The earliest possible time for any Article 50 notification is in early 2017. So no Article 50 notification this year

 

4. With the two-year timetable after any A50 negotiation, the earliest any government could take Britain out of the EU would be 2019, shortly before the next General Election.

 

From that I would assume that no General Election is likely in the immediate future, barring an unbelivable offer from the EU.

[buctootim]

From that I would assume that no General Election is likely in the immediate future, barring an unbelivable offer from the EU.

 

My thoughts too. Presumably the General Election will be held after the draft deal has been struck but before its been formally agreed .

[Lord Duckhunter]

Pretty sure you lost it too. UKIP would have had 82 seats instead of 1 if we had PR at the 2015 election and your friends the SNP would have got 31 instead of 52.

 

http://indy100.independent.co.uk/article/heres-how-the-election-results-would-look-under-a-proportional-voting-system--gJenQmaW2gW

 

Nope , I voted against . I believe the best system of government is people voting for a representative in Parliament. That way every area in the nation is represented in the same way . With PR you would only need to look after certain areas of the country. Look at the EU vote , Scotland and London nearly got them over the line , in PR terms it was very close. Therefore policies that enhance London and Scotland to the detriment of low population areas could end up winning a party a GE.IMO I prefer that the people of Dorset & Devon have representation which carries the same weight as people from Manchester & London .

[Batman]

http://order-order.com/2016/07/11/angela-all-alone/

[badgerx16]

Nope , I voted against . I believe the best system of government is people voting for a representative in Parliament. That way every area in the nation is represented in the same way . With PR you would only need to look after certain areas of the country. Look at the EU vote , Scotland and London nearly got them over the line , in PR terms it was very close. Therefore policies that enhance London and Scotland to the detriment of low population areas could end up winning a party a GE.IMO I prefer that the people of Dorset & Devon have representation which carries the same weight as people from Manchester & London .

How many current MPs were elected with a majority of the votes cast in their constituency ? Hardly democracy. All FPTP is about is the swing voters in the marginal seats, probably no more than half of the total at best - voters in safe seats who do not support the nailed on winner are disenfranchised.

[badgerx16]

http://order-order.com/2016/07/11/angela-all-alone/

 

What an open minded and intelligent discussion there is beneath that video.

[Wade Garrett]

We had a vote on PR, just like we had one on the EU.

 

We voted to keep FPTP, we voted to leave the EU. Why people can't respect a democratic vote is beyond me.

[Whitey Grandad]

We had a vote on PR, just like we had one on the EU.

 

We voted to keep FPTP, we voted to leave the EU. Why people can't respect a democratic vote is beyond me.

 

One was mandatory, the other advisory as was written into the respective Acts.

[CB Fry]

We had a vote on PR, just like we had one on the EU.

 

We voted to keep FPTP, we voted to leave the EU. Why people can't respect a democratic vote is beyond me.

When did this vote on PR happen then?

[aintforever]

One was mandatory, the other advisory as was written into the respective Acts.

 

More like one was advisory and one never happened.

 

The sooner we get PR and get rid of this red v blue ****** the sooner we might sort out the mess we are in. The refurendum just turned into a internal squabble between a bunch of ****** tories, Labour is a complete mess, hopefully this current crisis will be the end of both.

[Nolan]

We had a vote to change to the av system in 2011. 68% of people favoured FPTP.

 

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

[aintforever]

We had a vote to change to the av system in 2011. 68% of people favoured FPTP.

 

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

 

Never had a vote for PR though. That vote was a joke anyway, it was just used as a stick to beat Nick Clegg with. All the red and blue sheep just followed their leaders. I guess the same might happen again but the current mess is purely down to infighting between two sets of weirdos who make up both parties. The Corbyn farce and Brexit thing just shows how extreme the views of party members are. If the tories ever had a massive brain fart and elected a leader Labour's way then you would end up with a right nazi in charge. What would the options be then?

[Nolan]

Never had a vote for PR though. That vote was a joke anyway, it was just used as a stick to beat Nick Clegg with. All the red and blue sheep just followed their leaders. I guess the same might happen again but the current mess is purely down to infighting between two sets of weirdos who make up both parties. The Corbyn farce and Brexit thing just shows how extreme the views of party members are. If the tories ever had a massive brain fart and elected a leader Labour's way then you would end up with a right nazi in charge. What would the options be then?

Yeah, because us Tories show extreme right wing tendencies

[buctootim]

Yeah, because us Tories show extreme right wing tendencies

 

As far to the right of where most of the electorate is as the Corbynites are to the left.

Edited 12 July, 2016 by buctootim

[badgerx16]

We had a vote to change to the av system in 2011. 68% of people favoured FPTP.

 

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

AV is not PR, and makes very little difference to the 2 party domination that exists in the UK;

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2010/may/10/alternative-vote-minimal-impact-general-election

[CHAPEL END CHARLIE]

I not sure that she is really made of the 'right stuff' - time will tell I suspose. However, I thought that Angela Eagle actualy came across quite well at her campaign launch yesterday.

[buctootim]

I not sure that she is really made of the 'right stuff' - time will tell I suspose. However, I thought that Angela Eagle actualy came across quite well at her campaign launch yesterday.

 

 

She's 'okay' I guess - but one of those people where you tend to think 'I could do better than that'. Thats not really ideal when you're talking about a potential leader of the country.

[CHAPEL END CHARLIE]

Apparently Theresa May taking over from Cameron was delayed by a day because the Queen is at Sandringham and she does not change her plans for anybody. Also Cameron wanted to have one last Question Time in the Commons - where MPs by tradition line up to say nice things about departing Prime Ministers - bless!

 

Given the opportunity my message to him might not be quite so nice ...

[ecuk268]

If the tories ever had a massive brain fart and elected a leader Labour's way then you would end up with a right nazi in charge. What would the options be then?

 

They very nearly did. Leadsom could have been elected by 150000 retired colonels from Tunbridge Wells.

[Fatboy40]

She's 'okay' I guess - but one of those people where you tend to think 'I could do better than that'. Thats not really ideal when you're talking about a potential leader of the country.

 

I won't rise to the click bait (but I so want to).

[CB Fry]

Apparently Theresa May taking over from Cameron was delayed by a day because the Queen is at Sandringham and she does not change her plans for anybody. Also Cameron wanted to have one last Question Time in the Commons - where MPs by tradition line up to say nice things about departing Prime Ministers - bless!

 

Given the opportunity my message to him might not be quite so nice ...

Well he would always have done one last PMQs whatever so where exactly is this days delay from the Queen coming from then?

[Saint-Armstrong]

They made Corbyn leave the room this evening - after his initial refusal - so they could hold a secret ballot on whether he's allowed to be in the leadership contest.

 

Result?

 

Corbyn on the ballot - 18

Corbyn not on the ballot - 14

[John B]

I dont think Corbyn is electable in a GE what do others think

[CB Fry]

They made Corbyn leave the room this evening - after his initial refusal - so they could hold a secret ballot on whether he's allowed to be in the leadership contest.

 

Result?

 

Corbyn on the ballot - 18

Corbyn not on the ballot - 14

 

They let him vote in it.

 

Absolute disaster. It's probably not sensible really but Theresa May could call an election tomorrow and wipe Labour out.

[badgerx16]

I dont think Corbyn is electable in a GE what do others think

 

Labour cannot win with Corbyn at the helm.