[Politics] Next leader of the Labour party

[Couldn't Be Hyypia]

Corbyn should remain as leader and launch a struggle within the party to remove the Blairites who remain in control of the LP bureaucracy.

Labour lost this election because Corbyn attempted to accommodate the Blairites by caving in on his previous Leave position (coupled with the fact that he refused to take action against LP councilllors who imposed Tory cuts on local services).

The Blairites have been sabotaging Corbyn's leadership since he was elected - and the time has come now to make the public representatives of the LP more representative of the vast majority of the membership.

Where's that ignore button. You just can't help yourself. "Look at me! Look at me!!"

 

[Sirnormangall]

Again - what evidence do you have to claim that half of Labour's traditional support is socially conservative - it is a massively sweeping statement that requires evidence to back it up. If it were true then the working class would be incapable of having any influence on anything - political or otherwise.

Are we only allowed to form an opinion if we have evidence to back it up?

 

[Jolly Red Giant]

All very fine in theory, and doubtless that will satisfy you, but as we both know the membership is only likely to come to one conclusion. It is blatant nonsense to claim that the membership will decide, as if there would be some sort of open discussion, with the membership amenable to everyone's views, when you know full well, what their decision will be, when it comes to de-selection.

Sorry - but I don't understand what you are getting at here.

It’s not about 2024. It’s about rebuilding a Labour Party whose core support is disappearing. To do that it will need to stop opposing Brexit. Not much chance of that if the next leader is a London/Brighton type politician.

The question is not about how to 'rebuild' the LP - it is about what type of LP you want to 'rebuild' - one based on Blairite polices that benefit the rich elites - or one based on socialist policies that benefit the working class.

I can't see much point in opposing Brexit - it would be tilting at windmills. I can't see whoever was leader wasting his/her time on this. It's over.

I agree - the Brexit debate is over - now the task is how do you confront the type of Britain that the Tories will attempt to impose on the mass of the population.

I have never ever heard of this and quite frankly, would put far more credence on this if it came form anyone but you. Right-wingers attending Union meetings trying to keep left wingers out - that really would be a first.

I was at a meeting of my trade union branch last night where two right-wing national full-time officials turned up and attempted to browbeat the membership who attended into nominating a right-wing candidate for national VP over a left-wing candidate. The branch had previously nominated the left candidate and they had ruled the nomination out on procedural grounds. They made all kinds of threats (backed up by their cronies in the branch) about what would befall the members of the branch if they failed to make the nomination - but a majority of the members of the branch resisted and we decided to hold another meeting next week, where the bureaucrats would not be in attendance. We will mobilise the membership to attend (about 20% of the branch membership were at them meeting - we will get at least 80% next week) and we will then make the decision based on what policies are being put forward by both candidates.

 

[Chicken Run]

Sorry - but I don't understand what you are getting at here.



The question is not about how to 'rebuild' the LP - it is about what type of LP you want to 'rebuild' - one based on Blairite polices that benefit the rich elites - or one based on socialist policies that benefit the working class.


I agree - the Brexit debate is over - now the task is how do you confront the type of Britain that the Tories will attempt to impose on the mass of the population.


I was at a meeting of my trade union branch last night where two right-wing national full-time officials turned up and attempted to browbeat the membership who attended into nominating a right-wing candidate for national VP over a left-wing candidate. The branch had previously nominated the left candidate and they had ruled the nomination out on procedural grounds. They made all kinds of threats (backed up by their cronies in the branch) about what would befall the members of the branch if they failed to make the nomination - but a majority of the members of the branch resisted and we decided to hold another meeting next week, where the bureaucrats would not be in attendance, we would mobilise the membership to attend (about 20% of the branch membership were at them meeting - we will get at least 80% next week) and we will then make the decision based on what policies are being put forward by both candidates.

You love a hyphen so does Ben Garfield

 

[Jolly Red Giant]

Are we only allowed to form an opinion if we have evidence to back it up?

Anyone can express an opinion - but when you make a claim (that half of the working class Labour support is socially conservative) you really should be able to back it up with some evidence.

 

[Jolly Red Giant]

Like I say I don't have any evidence. When I say half I am talking statistically. Some people will tend towards social conservatism some people social liberalism, IMO there would be a typical distribution between the two traits generally amongst everyone, and therfore within a specific group. Note, I am not making any value judgement in thinking this, there is nothing necessarily good or bad about either.

On this token what is your evidence

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/working-class-right-left-wing-lse-research-ukip-brexit-labour-a9025731.html

 

[Sirnormangall]

Great - another delusional ideologist.

GB - and in particular England - is not a socialist Country, and a centre left Labour Leader would have a chance of winning. What (apart from the illegal war) was so bad about Blair?

Otherwise it's the wilderness forever for Labour.

The majority of the UK electorate don’t like anything that feels like extreme politics - right or left. If you ignore that you won’t get elected.

 

[pb21]

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/working-class-right-left-wing-lse-research-ukip-brexit-labour-a9025731.html

It seems that research is looking at how experience affects attitudes.

I don't think that article backs up what I am saying or what you are saying?

Are you saying that there aren't socially conservative working class people?

Again note that I'm am not saying social conservative attitudes are necessarily right or wrong.

 

[BenGarfield]

Here’s what the poster known as Ben Garfield told us about himself in the Alistair Campbell expelled thread in May, sounds familiar wouldn’t you say?

My god thats eery do you think we are the same person - although probably not - I suspect JRG may not know about Gulls Eye, what the original Chicken Run was or who Lenny Rider was/is.

 

[Jolly Red Giant]

Are you saying that there aren't socially conservative working class people?

No - I am saying that the number of working class people that are socially conservative is not 'half' - it is actually quite small.

At its height the total number of people who considered themselves as working class and voted Tory was 31% - and voting Tory does not mean that you are socially conservative.

Approx 50% of self-described working class vote LP - that in part is the result of 30 years of Blairism and continuing attacks on council services by Blairite LP councils.

There are also many working class people who regard themselves (mistakenly) as middle-class - as a result of years of tory propaganda - and they are almost exclusively socially liberal.

However, there is a large swathe of the working class who don't vote because they have been beaten down by the tweedledum and tweedledee of Blairism and Toryism. There is a 23% gap between in turnout between the richest and poorest groups within the electorate - the rich know that the system is structured to protect their interests - the poor are utterly alienated from it (these are the people constantly denigrated by both Tories and Blairites). Few, if any, of this group are socially conservative because these are the very people directly affected by such policies.

 

[Jolly Red Giant]

My god thats eery do you think we are the same person - although probably not - I suspect JRG may not know about Gulls Eye, what the original Chicken Run was or who Lenny Rider was/is.

Haven't a clue

 

[Jolly Red Giant]

 

[Machiavelli]

I can't see much point in opposing Brexit - it would be tilting at windmills. I can't see whoever was leader wasting his/her time on this. It's over.

I do agree that the next leader has to be northern though - that's why I can't believe Starmer is odds-on.

I agree with most of what you're saying. Jess Phillips for me. What I'm not quite following is what you're saying on Brexit. Of course, it will now get done (to coin a phrase) by the end of next month, but the public will soon realise that only the first stage has been completed. The rest of it will still be with us or 'remain' with us (to coin a phrase), as will the multiple trade deals that will need to 'get done' although in reality they'll drag on and on. Then there's the issue of whether Brexit actually delivers positive outcomes, especially in relation to the economy. From now on, Brexit will be indelibly associated with Johnson and the Tories.
It'd be a dereliction of duty for an opposition party not to continue to point out that Johnson et al campaigned for Brexit, made numerous promises about what it would bring, and if things depart from this, then the public need to be made keenly aware that he owns all of it.

 

[Questions]

Yes, that is true, and a more centrist approach will surely pay dividends for them in the future, if that is the outcome. I think on this occasion it is the sheer scale of the reversal of Labour's fortunes which has prompted such claims, though you are right, in that all the parties have in the past recovered with time, though I did read earlier that with such a deficit, no party in history has recovered sufficiently to win the next election.

I think you have to factor in the Brexit factor though but I agree it could take two terms now unless going it alone in Europe comes back to bite BJ hard.

 

[BenGarfield]

The majority of the UK electorate don’t like anything that feels like extreme politics - right or left. If you ignore that you won’t get elected.

So who is doing the defining of what is the centre ,right and left. The Overton window has shifted so much to the right since Thatcher that what was once mainstream Labour and Tory policy is now regarded as hard left, so a person like me was taunted for being on the soft liberal centre left is now being accused of being on the hard left. Its crazy.

 

[Uh_huh_him]

10 years in power and the arguments and soundbites are still exactly the same...
"labour would be a disaster" "You can't trust them with the economy"

This view is based on the Wilson/Callaghan governments.
It isn't relevant today and yet it is still the stick used to beat the party.

Tory economic party has been an absolute disaster.
They have strangled the economy with austerity.
It didn't work, they knew it wouldn't and frankly they don't care.
In any other environment they would rightly be out on their arse.

The next Labour leader needs to somehow make the british electorate care about how badly run the country is right now, not what happened 50 years ago.

 

[Sirnormangall]

Anyone can express an opinion - but when you make a claim (that half of the working class Labour support is socially conservative) you really should be able to back it up with some evidence.

I get that - but you seem to ask others for evidence yet you provide none to support your own assertions.

 

[jakarta]

I think you have to factor in the Brexit factor though but I agree it could take two terms now unless going it alone in Europe comes back to bite BJ hard.

And the next two terms is what the Tories are going to get unless Labour gets its arse in gear very quickly.

Just how shit are Labour if a Boris Johnson led Tory Party can wipe the floor with them so comprehensively?

 

[BensGrandad]

What was the difference in numbers of people eligible to vote at each of those? What % is that for each?

 

[drew]

I guarantee you that the Tories would much prefer a Blairite leading the LP than Corbyn - they could keep banging on about Brexit and not have to worry about being criticised for their attacks on the NHS and public services.

You are living in cloud cuckoo land.

You can't change bugger all for the working class unless you are in power. Just to remind you that only a Blairite (indeed, Tony himself), has won an election for Labour in the last 45 years.