The demise of the labour party

[Chortlepuss]

I thought Milliband came up with good policy suggestions but a little too late. Cameron came up with a load of nonsense (right to buy etc...) but got in nonetheless. No party apart from the greens seems to have any sensible policies around curbing house prices, containing 'growth' (rampant borrowing/consumerism) and addressing inequality. Denmark is portrayed as a happy state but the fact is that many of its policies (high taxation to address inequality, free higher education - but only for those clever enough to attain grades etc etc) are unpalatable for most in the UK. I'd vote for a Danish style economy (and I have always earned a high salary and never claimed benefits) but that's because I truly believe inequality is the biggest threat to UK stability and I'm not the entrepreneurial type that may be constrained by this kind of regime(most of us aren't). Not only are the Tories not addressing the key problems of inequality and poverty, they are promoting and prolonging it as a fruitless way of getting the country back on track. I haven't seen any evidence that austerity is working (quite the contrary) but it makes people feel good that someone's going for the 'dole bludgers' and the Daily Mail etc doesn't help. I also suspect people voted Conservative because of immigration and the fact that they perceived Ed was being too soft on immigrants benefits.

[caramac]

Well i hope it works out for her but the the nhs pension scheme has been made less generous and more costly to the employee in just the last 12 months by the tories so hopefully they don't think it would be a good way to cheapen the nhs by doing another restructure of the pensions.

And unfortunately 65 doesn't seem like hard graft from 50 but it's a different story when you get there and that is from hard worn experience.

 

 

Definitely a lot of people in this bracket. We've been lucky and mostly escaped the changes except that now my husband has to make higher contributions to his pension to get less out, but nothing else. He can still retire at the same age and will still get a final salary pension.

 

However, most, younger employees (and those who don't have a specialist status who are the same age as my husband) are making higher contributions for a lower pension, can't retire until they're 67 and will expect a career average pension rather than a final salary one.

For someone in Bungo's sister's position who is currently 45 and wants to retire at 60 this will mean around £11k pa, plus a lump sum of £29k. If she's older, say 52 planning on working to 67, she will receive a lump sum of around £45k and £15k pa, depending on total number of years in service - I used 25 and 40 years.

Im guessing that, in 15 years time that might be below the tax threshold, but who knows.

[Thom]

Good luck to you but there are a huge number of people whose lives revolve around low paid manual jobs and who typically have between 15k and 30k in their pension fund and for whom retirement means accessing their state pension.

Tell that to bricklayer or a truck driver or even a nurse that at 67 they are still going to be doing shifts and standing on their feet for 8 hours a day and that the tories might even force the age up another year in the next era of 'we're all in it together' austerity and so they can maintain the fairy story of no tax increases..

 

You exemplify the reason Labour lost. For you lot it's all about bringing people down to the level of the lowest, rather than raising them up to the level of the highest.

 

Fact of the matter is the population saw through Miliband and his psuedo working class mantras. We all knew that if Labour got in, the money raised by increasing our taxes would be spent on looking after, not the average British working man and woman, but on every minority group that Miliband and his middle class, privately educated, metrosexual, chattering class mates were patronising at that point.

 

Labour ceased being the party of the working classes with Bliar, it's now and will remain the party for supporting disabled, Somali, lesbian, single parent, immigrants. We're well shot of Labour

[Bungo]

I thought Milliband came up with good policy suggestions but a little too late. Cameron came up with a load of nonsense (right to buy etc...) but got in nonetheless. No party apart from the greens seems to have any sensible policies around curbing house prices, containing 'growth' (rampant borrowing/consumerism) and addressing inequality. Denmark is portrayed as a happy state but the fact is that many of its policies (high taxation to address inequality, free higher education - but only for those clever enough to attain grades etc etc) are unpalatable for most in the UK. I'd vote for a Danish style economy (and I have always earned a high salary and never claimed benefits) but that's because I truly believe inequality is the biggest threat to UK stability and I'm not the entrepreneurial type that may be constrained by this kind of regime(most of us aren't). Not only are the Tories not addressing the key problems of inequality and poverty, they are promoting and prolonging it as a fruitless way of getting the country back on track. I haven't seen any evidence that austerity is working (quite the contrary) but it makes people feel good that someone's going for the 'dole bludgers' and the Daily Mail etc doesn't help. I also suspect people voted Conservative because of immigration and the fact that they perceived Ed was being too soft on immigrants benefits.

 

The trouble is Labour's view on equality comes across as looking to punish those that show enterprise and work hard by taking off them to give to the feckless and lazy. Business is demonised like it is a bad thing. I don't believe in that kind of equality no. I believe in fairness though and if one person works harder than another then why should they not accumulate and better themselves. We are all educated in the UK and we all have the opportunity to work as hard or as little as we choose to.

 

I think worrying about whether we are all equal is a waste of time too. It just looks like envy to me, what is the point in that, why concern yourself with whether anyone else is doing better, it will always be the case.

 

As to tackling poverty, the best way to tackle it is to improve the economy. We are all better off with a strong economy, there are more people in work now and the lower paid are keeping more of their own money. That seems to be a much better way of tackling poverty to me versus than increasing benefits for some through spiteful taxes on others which seems to be Labours answer to everything.

 

And what is wrong with right to buy? My husband was brought up in a council house, which his father now owns and although an ardent Labour supporter but I don't see him complaining about that. Like my husband, I am also from a fairly deprived background, in fact someone Ed Miliband would probably expect to never achieve, never own a house, to be forever benefits dependent. It is Tory policies of aspiration and enterprise that break the cycle of dependency.

 

Class wars are out of date and out of touch and that is why a left wing Labour was beaten and they will not recover until they stop demonising ordinary people for wanting to do well.

[Bungo]

Well i hope it works out for her but the the nhs pension scheme has been made less generous and more costly to the employee in just the last 12 months by the tories so hopefully they don't think it would be a good way to cheapen the nhs by doing another restructure of the pensions.

And unfortunately 65 doesn't seem like hard graft from 50 but it's a different story when you get there and that is from hard worn experience.

 

Good. It needed restructuring because it was financially crippling the country and goes what, money does not grow on trees. Yes it is about time and at least my sister has the grace to admit that she is on a ridiculously cushy number. Private sector workers had their pension pots utterly decimated by Gordon Brown and not a peep about that from Labourites which comes back to demonising ordinary people, those bad people "capitalists", how dare they work in business and expect a pension. But in the meantime they must continue paying for gold plated pensions for public sector workers, that many have not a hope in hell of achieving for themselves.

Edited May 21, 2015 by Bungo

[BacktoDemocracy]

You exemplify the reason Labour lost. For you lot it's all about bringing people down to the level of the lowest, rather than raising them up to the level of the highest.

 

Fact of the matter is the population saw through Miliband and his psuedo working class mantras. We all knew that if Labour got in, the money raised by increasing our taxes would be spent on looking after, not the average British working man and woman, but on every minority group that Miliband and his middle class, privately educated, metrosexual, chattering class mates were patronising at that point.

 

Labour ceased being the party of the working classes with Bliar, it's now and will remain the party for supporting disabled, Somali, lesbian, single parent, immigrants. We're well shot of Labour

 

Thanks for the view from the right there, unfortunately I don't believe that Cameron is interested in anybody but his own privileged class so I think unless you are in his class you might find yourself lumped in with all the disadvantaged classes you identified, but lovely to hear a full on right wing rant straight out of UKIP'S handbook, sounds very similar to the Nuremberg speeches of the 1930's.

[BacktoDemocracy]

The trouble is Labour's view on equality comes across as looking to punish those that show enterprise and work hard by taking off them to give to the feckless and lazy. Business is demonised like it is a bad thing. I don't believe in that kind of equality no. I believe in fairness though and if one person works harder than another then why should they not accumulate and better themselves. We are all educated in the UK and we all have the opportunity to work as hard or as little as we choose to.

 

I think worrying about whether we are all equal is a waste of time too. It just looks like envy to me, what is the point in that, why concern yourself with whether anyone else is doing better, it will always be the case.

 

As to tackling poverty, the best way to tackle it is to improve the economy. We are all better off with a strong economy, there are more people in work now and the lower paid are keeping more of their own money. That seems to be a much better way of tackling poverty to me versus than increasing benefits for some through spiteful taxes on others which seems to be Labours answer to everything.

 

And what is wrong with right to buy? My husband was brought up in a council house, which his father now owns and although an ardent Labour supporter but I don't see him complaining about that. Like my husband, I am also from a fairly deprived background, in fact someone Ed Miliband would probably expect to never achieve, never own a house, to be forever benefits dependent. It is Tory policies of aspiration and enterprise that break the cycle of dependency.

 

Class wars are out of date and out of touch and that is why a left wing Labour was beaten and they will not recover until they stop demonising ordinary people for wanting to do well.

 

Well my concern is that many leading economists are equating inequality with poor and unstable economic growth, and with productivity in the uk 30% below Germany and France it will be interesting to see where it is in 5 years time.

[BacktoDemocracy]

Good. It needed restructuring because it was financially crippling the country and goes what, money does not grow on trees. Yes it is about time and at least my sister has the grace to admit that she is on a ridiculously cushy number. Private sector workers had their pension pots utterly decimated by Gordon Brown and not a peep about that from Labourites which comes back to demonising ordinary people, those bad people "capitalists", how dare they work in business and expect a pension. But in the meantime they must continue paying for gold plated pensions for public sector workers, that many have not a hope in hell of achieving for themselves.

 

Perhaps you are equating capitalist with private sector , I was referring to the Capitalist class who make their living from investing capital into companies and then live off the dividends earnt by the workers in the company and by reducing the costs of production in order to maximise profit.

And just consider where all those hard working private sector workers would be without clean water, sewage provision , rubbish removal and the other myriad things simply taken for granted by them, and tell me it could all be done so much better by the private sector because you only have to go to that temple of Capitalism , the USA to realise that is figment of the imagination.

Edited May 21, 2015 by BacktoDemocracy

[gee13]

Thanks for the view from the right there, unfortunately I don't believe that Cameron is interested in anybody but his own privileged class so I think unless you are in his class you might find yourself lumped in with all the disadvantaged classes you identified, but lovely to hear a full on right wing rant straight out of UKIP'S handbook, sounds very similar to the Nuremberg speeches of the 1930's.

 

Yes I agree...that take is straight out of a post 3rd reich manifesto.. xenophobic and rooted in fixation on blame toward minorities. Its a typical rightarded ideology.

Edited May 21, 2015 by gee13

[Gbye grey sky]

Perhaps you are equating capitalist with private sector , I was referring to the Capitalist class who make their living from investing capital into companies and then live off the dividends earnt by the workers in the company and by reducing the costs of production in order to maximise profit.

And just consider where all those hard working private sector workers would be without clean water, sewage provision , rubbish removal and the other myriad things simply taken for granted by them, and tell me it could all be done so much better by the private sector because you only have to go to that temple of Capitalism , the USA to realise that is figment of the imagination.

 

Not very good examples to illustrate your point as most of these jobs are undertaken by private sector workers in the UK. The country needs a thriving public sector and private sector but, like a business really, a country needs to be able to pay it's way.

 

Many of us struggle with the concept of budgeting to spend more than you can ever achieve in tax receipts every year but Labour apparently does not. Paradoxically a future return to stability and surplus is always good for Labour as then their policy of spending rather than frugality looks much more appealing. Hence the cycle repeats ad infinitum.

[BacktoDemocracy]

Not very good examples to illustrate your point as most of these jobs are undertaken by private sector workers in the UK. The country needs a thriving public sector and private sector but, like a business really, a country needs to be able to pay it's way.

 

Many of us struggle with the concept of budgeting to spend more than you can ever achieve in tax receipts every year but Labour apparently does not. Paradoxically a future return to stability and surplus is always good for Labour as then their policy of spending rather than frugality looks much more appealing. Hence the cycle repeats ad infinitum.

 

I find it difficult to understand the obsession with running a country like someone's household budget, I think that every company at some stage borrows money to finace either a new product or to expand production and that seems to be readily accepted business practice and it's my understanding that the banks would not exist if was not for that demand for financing.

The point of the state taking responsibility for financing infrastructure projects is that the country retains control of its infrastructure rather than being at the mercy of monopolistic private enterprise which runs them simply to make a profit without any reinvestment in them, which I believe we are seeing with the railways, privatised water, and the gas and electricity industries at the present in the uk and was the reason that these were brought under public control in the 40's along with medicine and the capitalists have been trying to wrest control of these back ever since because they are such gigantic milk cows.

[Gbye grey sky]

When in government Labour did not borrow to fund infrastructure projects; they used PPI just like the Tories. Borrowing every month to fund your day to day expenditure is just illogical.

 

Businesses borrow money for sure but with a view to making profits and paying it back but that is not a great analogy. That is different from borrowing money to fund losses. The bank would pull the plug on that eventually.

[Bungo]

I find it difficult to understand the obsession with running a country like someone's household budget, I think that every company at some stage borrows money to finace either a new product or to expand production and that seems to be readily accepted business practice and it's my understanding that the banks would not exist if was not for that demand for financing.

The point of the state taking responsibility for financing infrastructure projects is that the country retains control of its infrastructure rather than being at the mercy of monopolistic private enterprise which runs them simply to make a profit without any reinvestment in them, which I believe we are seeing with the railways, privatised water, and the gas and electricity industries at the present in the uk and was the reason that these were brought under public control in the 40's along with medicine and the capitalists have been trying to wrest control of these back ever since because they are such gigantic milk cows.

 

And that ... that sentence right there ... is at the root of Ed Miliband's and Labour's problems.

 

That you cannot grasp even the most basic economic fact. That you cannot hope to spend, spend and spend some more regardless of income. You cannot spend indefinitely and hope to stay afloat. Most people running a household budget do understand this.

[Chortlepuss]

Well my concern is that many leading economists are equating inequality with poor and unstable economic growth, and with productivity in the uk 30% below Germany and France it will be interesting to see where it is in 5 years time.

 

I do urge anyone interested in why rising inequality is a poor idea for everyone to read this book http://www.amazon.com/The-Spirit-Level-Equality-Societies/dp/1608193411 - it's a real education! Lots of leading economists back the link between rising inequality and poor growth - but the Tories just aren't listening.

No, we're not all equal and there has to be capacity for innovators to thrive in any society - but although I disagree with the ethics of continually squeezing the poorest in society - my major objection is that it's a waste of time, and effort, it doesn't work and we'd be better off making everyone pay a fair contribution. I dread to think where all the cuts in Adult Social Care are going to fall - they were squeezed to the bone when I last worked there years ago. Hard working council colleagues are just despairing.

 

Re: right to buy - I still remember as a youngster scraping together a deposit for an $80K ex council house. The neighbours (each side more wealthy than me) boasted about how their council discount meant they only paid $25K. Subsidised by the tax payer. They thought I was a right mug paying full price! (I'm from a working class background but would never have made it on to the council housing list) Now a lot of these council houses in Lewes are nice little earners for the buy to let brigade. Council pays over the odds to private landlords and the good old taxpayer subsidizes them again.... Council housing is for people who can't afford to buy. There are enough people in need waiting for these houses, and if you can afford to buy you shouldn't be in them. Housing Associations have built houses to try and meet the resultant need, but then we hear Cameron bleating on about how people should be able to cash in on these! Scotland has already banned this practice - lets hope the SNP can provide some education!

[MARYROSE02]

Perhaps you are equating capitalist with private sector , I was referring to the Capitalist class who make their living from investing capital into companies and then live off the dividends earnt by the workers in the company and by reducing the costs of production in order to maximise profit.

And just consider where all those hard working private sector workers would be without clean water, sewage provision , rubbish removal and the other myriad things simply taken for granted by them, and tell me it could all be done so much better by the private sector because you only have to go to that temple of Capitalism , the USA to realise that is figment of the imagination.

 

There is nothing to stop 'the workers' from investing in the companies for whom they are employed. Many companies do have employee shareholder schemes, and I imagine there are plenty of 'workers' who also invest directly into stock market, and of course EVERY worker in a superannuation scheme is investing indirectly into the stockmarket. I would have thought it makes good sense for workers to have shares in their own companies, giving them extra incentive to want their company to do well. We are all members of the 'Capitalist class' when you get right down to it.

 

And why can't private companies run some or all of those public services you mention? Plenty of governments and councils contract the work out to private companies. I think it may well be a private company who collects my garbage, which I pay for via my rates to Sydney Council.

[newjez]

You exemplify the reason Labour lost. For you lot it's all about bringing people down to the level of the lowest, rather than raising them up to the level of the highest.

 

Fact of the matter is the population saw through Miliband and his psuedo working class mantras. We all knew that if Labour got in, the money raised by increasing our taxes would be spent on looking after, not the average British working man and woman, but on every minority group that Miliband and his middle class, privately educated, metrosexual, chattering class mates were patronising at that point.

 

Labour ceased being the party of the working classes with Bliar, it's now and will remain the party for supporting disabled, Somali, lesbian, single parent, immigrants. We're well shot of Labour

 

I do hope that we reach a stage where we chose a govt for things other than whether they are pro/against disabled, Somali, lesbian, single parent, immigrants.

[BacktoDemocracy]

I do urge anyone interested in why rising inequality is a poor idea for everyone to read this book http://www.amazon.com/The-Spirit-Level-Equality-Societies/dp/1608193411 - it's a real education! Lots of leading economists back the link between rising inequality and poor growth - but the Tories just aren't listening.

No, we're not all equal and there has to be capacity for innovators to thrive in any society - but although I disagree with the ethics of continually squeezing the poorest in society - my major objection is that it's a waste of time, and effort, it doesn't work and we'd be better off making everyone pay a fair contribution. I dread to think where all the cuts in Adult Social Care are going to fall - they were squeezed to the bone when I last worked there years ago. Hard working council colleagues are just despairing.

 

Re: right to buy - I still remember as a youngster scraping together a deposit for an $80K ex council house. The neighbours (each side more wealthy than me) boasted about how their council discount meant they only paid $25K. Subsidised by the tax payer. They thought I was a right mug paying full price! (I'm from a working class background but would never have made it on to the council housing list) Now a lot of these council houses in Lewes are nice little earners for the buy to let brigade. Council pays over the odds to private landlords and the good old taxpayer subsidizes them again.... Council housing is for people who can't afford to buy. There are enough people in need waiting for these houses, and if you can afford to buy you shouldn't be in them. Housing Associations have built houses to try and meet the resultant need, but then we hear Cameron bleating on about how people should be able to cash in on these! Scotland has already banned this practice - lets hope the SNP can provide some education!

 

You should try to get a look at Thomas Picketty's book on the effects of inequality, it demolishes the Rights arguments with precise statistics.

The aim of the tories is to re establish the economy to the pre 2nd WW position, where the only functions of the state are the bare minimum provision and those will be in the main administered by the private sector and charities, charities are already becoming corporatised, Macmillan are already getting themselves embedded into the NHS and as we go along more of them will start to undertake statutory duties, aged care will become a charity provision because not even the private sector can make it work on the allowance per occupant, it's either that or reduce standards and return to wards for elderly care,aka, the workhouse.

 

And so it goes on, the police, the access to legal representation, overcrowding in the prisons, the privatisation of the welfare state, reductions in services by Councils, how long before we see a return to philanthropic libraries and privatised swimming pools, more sub standard private multi occupancy rented housing, where does the list end with parallels to 1930.

 

The UK had its greatest period of sustained economic growth after the 2nd WW when inequality reduced significantly and now we have swung back to a them and us scenario with an awful lot of people being convinced that their best interests are protected by joining 'us', in the short term it may but significant numbers of academics are forecasting that yet more austerity and greater inequality will slow the economy significantly and without investment into infrastructure and encouragement of R&D by the government then we will continue to be the sick man of Europe

Edited May 22, 2015 by BacktoDemocracy

[BacktoDemocracy]

There is nothing to stop 'the workers' from investing in the companies for whom they are employed. Many companies do have employee shareholder schemes, and I imagine there are plenty of 'workers' who also invest directly into stock market, and of course EVERY worker in a superannuation scheme is investing indirectly into the stockmarket. I would have thought it makes good sense for workers to have shares in their own companies, giving them extra incentive to want their company to do well. We are all members of the 'Capitalist class' when you get right down to it.

 

And why can't private companies run some or all of those public services you mention? Plenty of governments and councils contract the work out to private companies. I think it may well be a private company who collects my garbage, which I pay for via my rates to Sydney Council.

 

The reason for having social provision administered by the State is the concern that the private sector is only interested in profit and will seek to maximise profit by creating monopolies, reducing investment back into improving provision and facilities, indulge in price fixing and reduce overheads by reducing staffing levels and employing unqualified staff, which I think we have all seen happen with every public facility that has so far been privatised, oh, and i didn't mention reduced customer care.

Edited May 22, 2015 by BacktoDemocracy

[BacktoDemocracy]

Not very good examples to illustrate your point as most of these jobs are undertaken by private sector workers in the UK. The country needs a thriving public sector and private sector but, like a business really, a country needs to be able to pay it's way.

 

Many of us struggle with the concept of budgeting to spend more than you can ever achieve in tax receipts every year but Labour apparently does not. Paradoxically a future return to stability and surplus is always good for Labour as then their policy of spending rather than frugality looks much more appealing. Hence the cycle repeats ad infinitum.

 

Just, maybe, if Thatcher had not invented the 'right to buy', what pretentious twaddle that title was, as a vote winner ,maybe, just maybe, we would not be in the fix we are in now with social dislocation and immobile workforces and the poor unable to work because of the cost of housing, so I think that it may be slightly disingenuous to pile the blame for the past 6 years onto Labour and where do the doyens of the Tories, the banks fit into this being all Labour's fault, I seem to remember that they had been trading worthless financial packages between themselves until finally the game was up and they had to be bailed out by the tax payer or go bankrupt and the borrowings of the labour party looked like corner shop tick in comparison to the banks ineptitude.

[MARYROSE02]

The reason for having social provision administered by the State is the concern that the private sector is only interested in profit and will seek to maximise profit by creating monopolies, reducing investment back into improving provision and facilities, indulge in price fixing and reduce overheads by reducing staffing levels and employing unqualified staff, which I think we have all seen happen with every public facility that has so far been privatised, oh, and i didn't mention reduced customer care.

 

There is nothing wrong with the right mixture of private and public administration. The USA probably goes too far to the right for 'our' (i.e. British/Australian) tastes, but then again, if we go too far to the left, that will be far worse. (and 'far worse' would have been Miliband as PM.)

[Gbye grey sky]

Just, maybe, if Thatcher had not invented the 'right to buy', what pretentious twaddle that title was, as a vote winner ,maybe, just maybe, we would not be in the fix we are in now with social dislocation and immobile workforces and the poor unable to work because of the cost of housing, so I think that it may be slightly disingenuous to pile the blame for the past 6 years onto Labour and where do the doyens of the Tories, the banks fit into this being all Labour's fault, I seem to remember that they had been trading worthless financial packages between themselves until finally the game was up and they had to be bailed out by the tax payer or go bankrupt and the borrowings of the labour party looked like corner shop tick in comparison to the banks ineptitude.

 

I don't think anyone blames the last Labour government for the GFC, that would be stupid. But the Tories made a good point when they said that Labour failed to fix the roof while the sun was shining. Putting something by for a rainy day is a message which resonates with voters and Labour's steadfast refusal to admit that they made mistakes last time around and have learned from them is costly in my view. If Labour cannot accept it made mistakes then it will make the same ones again. And, btw, I don't vote Tory.

[BacktoDemocracy]

I don't think anyone blames the last Labour government for the GFC, that would be stupid. But the Tories made a good point when they said that Labour failed to fix the roof while the sun was shining. Putting something by for a rainy day is a message which resonates with voters and Labour's steadfast refusal to admit that they made mistakes last time around and have learned from them is costly in my view. If Labour cannot accept it made mistakes then it will make the same ones again. And, btw, I don't vote Tory.

 

I can agree that Labour lost its way, I always thought that Brown was way too entranced by the USA and its financiers, but I do not see how Millaband can be expected to admit that Labour was wrong in the past, that would have been electoral suicide with the virulent right wing press.

I thought that the whole election degenerated into pure personalities without any real in depth analysis of policy or rigorous examination of the promises made or of the commitments made to maintain social institutions, I feet that the only way that these institutions can be maintained is either by increasing taxation, which again is electoral death in the uk, or there would,will have to be, massive cuts in every other sphere of social provision and increases in the cost of those to fulfil the Tories promises on the NHS and education, on that basis alone the only party that seemed to offer an inclusive option was the Labour party.

People have been convinced that the present labour party is some red in tooth and claw socialist party which is going to take away all their hard earned goodies when in actual fact they are a pale imitation of anything remotely socialist, just to get some idea of the power of the misrepresentations of the press, a recent survey of young people found that on average they wildly overestimated the percentages of Muslims, immigrants from the EU and immigrants from the commonwealth not by just a 10% but by the order of 20-30%., That I find very worrying when a relentless right wing vendetta builds that image in peoples minds, because then any persecutory measures become acceptable when people fear that a minority can affect them out of all proportion to the actual power they can assert.

So again I feel that the labour party are the only ones who will fight this rising tide of nationalism and misinformation and this gives the Right a huge stick to beat them with called nationalism, patriotism, and prejudice, which have been the precursors to so many wars in the past and very spectacularly the 2nd WW, so on that basis I cannot see that Labour's mistakes in the past mean that it is unelectable.

Edited May 25, 2015 by BacktoDemocracy

[Thom]

I do hope that we reach a stage where we chose a govt for things other than whether they are pro/against disabled, Somali, lesbian, single parent, immigrants.

 

But if a party offers nothing to the working man and woman of Britain, (no matter what their ethnic origin, sexuality, marital status, ability etc,) then we should not vote them in.

 

I voted Labour all my adult life, I watched Bliar and Brown wreck the party. I did hope they had learned a thing or two by them being voted out, they chose Millibean, yet another metrosexual, right-on, middle-class, cause-driven, oaf..

[Paul1Perth]

Labours time will come again. First off they have to get themselves a decent leader. That's critical.

The public has a short memory and if things don't pick up, house prices seem like they are becoming realistic, young people can get real jobs, not zero hour contracts, on decent money, the NHS gets any worse, the costs of health and public services spiral, like you would expect with a Tory government, then Labour will be back in next time.

 

Unless UKIP can put a realistic party together and have a few good policies. If that happens it could well be the demise of the Labour party.

[newjez]

But if a party offers nothing to the working man and woman of Britain, (no matter what their ethnic origin, sexuality, marital status, ability etc,) then we should not vote them in.

 

I voted Labour all my adult life, I watched Bliar and Brown wreck the party. I did hope they had learned a thing or two by them being voted out, they chose Millibean, yet another metrosexual, right-on, middle-class, cause-driven, oaf..

 

Blair and brown had the right pitch, I'll give them that. They could have sold used cars for a living. Even with the economy, they made the fatal mistake of mistaking assets price inflation as growth, and couldn't see the cliff. It was bad, but it could have been worse. Much worse. But I can never forgive them for Iraq, and Afghanistan may have been well intentioned, but it was ultimately flawed.

 

But this is the ground labour need to cover if they are to be elected again.