Can Sir Keir Starmer revive the Labour Party? (Vol. 2)

Can Sir Keir Starmer revive the Labour Party? (Vol. 2)

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Discussion

crankedup5

9,692 posts

36 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
BOR said:
There are plenty of us lefty scum who think the same as Owen Jones.

We will wake up to an election landslide that we have dreamed of, but instead of opening the champagne(the only thing our sort drink) we will just shrug and go back to sleep.

What will change?

Unless our wet-dream comes true, and Starmer is just presenting a New Tory face to mop up more of the electorate, then he is just a Continuation Rishi but with longer trousers.

Maybe not as inept and venal, but are there any signs, any signs at all that we can latch onto, that might give us a slight hope that there will be any attempts to rebalance the country economically and socially?

Any more hospitals? Any investment in schools ? Any pot-holes being filled in, even just some of the small ones?

It all looks about a real as the latest photos of Princess Kate.
Unfortunately your observations and comments are spot on, vote for Labour for a continuation of Conservative performance.

Earthdweller

13,627 posts

127 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
crankedup5 said:
BOR said:
There are plenty of us lefty scum who think the same as Owen Jones.

We will wake up to an election landslide that we have dreamed of, but instead of opening the champagne(the only thing our sort drink) we will just shrug and go back to sleep.

What will change?

Unless our wet-dream comes true, and Starmer is just presenting a New Tory face to mop up more of the electorate, then he is just a Continuation Rishi but with longer trousers.

Maybe not as inept and venal, but are there any signs, any signs at all that we can latch onto, that might give us a slight hope that there will be any attempts to rebalance the country economically and socially?

Any more hospitals? Any investment in schools ? Any pot-holes being filled in, even just some of the small ones?

It all looks about a real as the latest photos of Princess Kate.
Unfortunately your observations and comments are spot on, vote for Labour for a continuation of Conservative performance.
Pretty much

Two sides of the same coin both with their loony fringes

Do I expect Labour to be any less inept … No, nor do I expect strong decisive leadership from Starmer

The country will continue to drift towards the abyss and many who see an incoming Labour government as the solver of all their problems and meeter of all their demands are going to be very disappointed

Who knows what will happen but I don’t think starmer will be the second coming somehow


Timothy Bucktu

15,278 posts

201 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
Earthdweller said:
crankedup5 said:
BOR said:
There are plenty of us lefty scum who think the same as Owen Jones.

We will wake up to an election landslide that we have dreamed of, but instead of opening the champagne(the only thing our sort drink) we will just shrug and go back to sleep.

What will change?

Unless our wet-dream comes true, and Starmer is just presenting a New Tory face to mop up more of the electorate, then he is just a Continuation Rishi but with longer trousers.

Maybe not as inept and venal, but are there any signs, any signs at all that we can latch onto, that might give us a slight hope that there will be any attempts to rebalance the country economically and socially?

Any more hospitals? Any investment in schools ? Any pot-holes being filled in, even just some of the small ones?

It all looks about a real as the latest photos of Princess Kate.
Unfortunately your observations and comments are spot on, vote for Labour for a continuation of Conservative performance.
Pretty much

Two sides of the same coin both with their loony fringes

Do I expect Labour to be any less inept … No, nor do I expect strong decisive leadership from Starmer

The country will continue to drift towards the abyss and many who see an incoming Labour government as the solver of all their problems and meeter of all their demands are going to be very disappointed

Who knows what will happen but I don’t think starmer will be the second coming somehow
Can't disagree with any of that. It's a shame there's no answer, other than 'more of the same please'.
I thought Reform might be worth a two fingers to the establishment vote, but I'm not so sure now. I guess we'll have to evaluate nearer the time.

hidetheelephants

24,633 posts

194 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
JagLover said:
768 said:
Richard Burgon stands ready.
His time has come biggrin

(anyone got THAT picture)
Make way for the Burgon, his time will come; a Home Secretary in waiting. If Suella Braverman can do the job imagine what Richard could do?!


AstonZagato

12,725 posts

211 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
BOR said:
There are plenty of us lefty scum who think the same as Owen Jones.

We will wake up to an election landslide that we have dreamed of, but instead of opening the champagne(the only thing our sort drink) we will just shrug and go back to sleep.

What will change?

Unless our wet-dream comes true, and Starmer is just presenting a New Tory face to mop up more of the electorate, then he is just a Continuation Rishi but with longer trousers.

Maybe not as inept and venal, but are there any signs, any signs at all that we can latch onto, that might give us a slight hope that there will be any attempts to rebalance the country economically and socially?

Any more hospitals? Any investment in schools ? Any pot-holes being filled in, even just some of the small ones?

It all looks about a real as the latest photos of Princess Kate.
Agree with your analysis except that it will be equally inept and venal - just in a different way. God help us!

bobbo89

5,248 posts

146 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
Baroque attacks said:
I think a fair amount of the grumpiness from OJ is that he’s fading into irrelevance now, everyone’s favourite grandpa was his ticket to more exposure, things have changed.
It's not grumpiness, it's what he does. He sells the idea of utopia to the lower classes and minorities by telling them all their problems are the governments fault.

He's realised that there's a good chance the party he's backed and been telling us all to vote for years to solve all our problems are likely to win the next election and knowing that utopia does and never will exist, he's changed his colours.

Grifter of the highest order, he never wanted labour to win as that never suited him and his bank balance.

2xChevrons

3,249 posts

81 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
BOR said:
There are plenty of us lefty scum who think the same as Owen Jones.

We will wake up to an election landslide that we have dreamed of, but instead of opening the champagne(the only thing our sort drink) we will just shrug and go back to sleep.

What will change?

Unless our wet-dream comes true, and Starmer is just presenting a New Tory face to mop up more of the electorate, then he is just a Continuation Rishi but with longer trousers.

Maybe not as inept and venal, but are there any signs, any signs at all that we can latch onto, that might give us a slight hope that there will be any attempts to rebalance the country economically and socially?

Any more hospitals? Any investment in schools ? Any pot-holes being filled in, even just some of the small ones?

It all looks about a real as the latest photos of Princess Kate.
Well said.

My long-term concern (in terms of politics, at least) is that Labour will land a gargantuan majority - a poll projection published today shows a 398-seat Labour majority - and will effectively do nothing with it out of a combination of genuinely not wanting to do anything due to ideological barrenness and paralytic fear of seemingly remotely tangibly progressive.

New Labour suffered from this and it sowed a lot of the discontent and disengagement that has driven a lot of modern British politics. Blair had a 179-seat majority in 1997 and while there were some reforms, institutional reshaping and programmes in the first term, they did not meet the appetite for real material change that drove a lot of that 1997 landslide, especially in the Labour heartlands still smarting from the economic ruin and social degradation of the Thatcher years.

What modernising, reformist drive New Labour had largely ran out of steam post-2001 as Blair became more concerned with foreign affairs and global liberalism and New Labour as a party kept running scared of Rupert Murdoch.

Labour shed millions of votes between 1997 and 2001 and kept shedding them through to 2010. Those voters who had felt that Labour had not used its landslide majority to deliver for them were ripe for picking up by other parties (UKIP, BNP, Greens) or, in most cases, simply disengaging. A lot of them didn't return to the voting booth until the EU Referendum, seen as the one unequivocal chance to deliver their verdict on how the 21st century had treated them thus far.

There is much less positivity and hope around Labour in 2024 than there was in 1997, and a majority (whether it's 100, 200 or 400 seats) will be mostly a sign of Conservative failure rather than a huge groundswell of Labourite feeling.

But I do worry that a 'more of the same' neoliberal Labour government under Starmer will be seen in many quarters to waste a majority and mandate, especially among those who either haven't really voted since 1997 or have not been able to elect a Labour government in the past. If Starmer carries on on the familiar course, inequalities will continue to widen, living costs will continue to pace ahead of wages, opportunities will continue to shrink, services will continue to degrade, living standards and quality of life will continue to slip and more and more people will get the feeling that they are being taken for everything they've got by the system that then broadcasts how things have never been better.

And if the thinking goes that a Labour government with a massive majority can't/won't change things, that leaves people ripe to turn to more dangerous and alluring fring parties with temptingly simple solutions. And if there isn't a progressive or radical left-wing organisation to receive them (as there usually isn't in British politics and which Starmer has put a great deal of effort into ensuring cannot exist in Labour) then they'll go to the fringe that is more prominent - the Reforms, NatCons, PopCons and others. Maybe even a fruitloopy populist Conservative Party if that's how they shake out after a defeat.

KarlMac

4,480 posts

142 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
Timothy Bucktu said:
Earthdweller said:
crankedup5 said:
BOR said:
There are plenty of us lefty scum who think the same as Owen Jones.

We will wake up to an election landslide that we have dreamed of, but instead of opening the champagne(the only thing our sort drink) we will just shrug and go back to sleep.

What will change?

Unless our wet-dream comes true, and Starmer is just presenting a New Tory face to mop up more of the electorate, then he is just a Continuation Rishi but with longer trousers.

Maybe not as inept and venal, but are there any signs, any signs at all that we can latch onto, that might give us a slight hope that there will be any attempts to rebalance the country economically and socially?

Any more hospitals? Any investment in schools ? Any pot-holes being filled in, even just some of the small ones?

It all looks about a real as the latest photos of Princess Kate.
Unfortunately your observations and comments are spot on, vote for Labour for a continuation of Conservative performance.
Pretty much

Two sides of the same coin both with their loony fringes

Do I expect Labour to be any less inept … No, nor do I expect strong decisive leadership from Starmer

The country will continue to drift towards the abyss and many who see an incoming Labour government as the solver of all their problems and meeter of all their demands are going to be very disappointed

Who knows what will happen but I don’t think starmer will be the second coming somehow
Can't disagree with any of that. It's a shame there's no answer, other than 'more of the same please'.
I thought Reform might be worth a two fingers to the establishment vote, but I'm not so sure now. I guess we'll have to evaluate nearer the time.
We have over a decade of evidence that the current government can’t deliver any of their promises. Every single aspect of life that interacts with the state is objectively worse. Schools, hospitals, doctors, roads, infrastructure, they’ve even closed the bloody HMRC phone line. The only thing they have achieved in power is funnel huge sums of money to their donors.

Most people agree with traditional Tory policies, levelling up, strong border controls, fiscal responsibility etc… that’s why they were voted in. The problem is the current party has proven it’s completely unable to deliver any of it and that’s why people aren’t going to vote for them.

Even if it’s more of the same under Starmer at least things won’t get any worse than it would keeping this zombie government in place.

Earthdweller

13,627 posts

127 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
2xChevrons said:
Well said.

My long-term concern (in terms of politics, at least) is that Labour will land a gargantuan majority - a poll projection published today shows a 398-seat Labour majority - and will effectively do nothing with it out of a combination of genuinely not wanting to do anything due to ideological barrenness and paralytic fear of seemingly remotely tangibly progressive.

New Labour suffered from this and it sowed a lot of the discontent and disengagement that has driven a lot of modern British politics. Blair had a 179-seat majority in 1997 and while there were some reforms, institutional reshaping and programmes in the first term, they did not meet the appetite for real material change that drove a lot of that 1997 landslide, especially in the Labour heartlands still smarting from the economic ruin and social degradation of the Thatcher years.

What modernising, reformist drive New Labour had largely ran out of steam post-2001 as Blair became more concerned with foreign affairs and global liberalism and New Labour as a party kept running scared of Rupert Murdoch.

Labour shed millions of votes between 1997 and 2001 and kept shedding them through to 2010. Those voters who had felt that Labour had not used its landslide majority to deliver for them were ripe for picking up by other parties (UKIP, BNP, Greens) or, in most cases, simply disengaging. A lot of them didn't return to the voting booth until the EU Referendum, seen as the one unequivocal chance to deliver their verdict on how the 21st century had treated them thus far.

There is much less positivity and hope around Labour in 2024 than there was in 1997, and a majority (whether it's 100, 200 or 400 seats) will be mostly a sign of Conservative failure rather than a huge groundswell of Labourite feeling.

But I do worry that a 'more of the same' neoliberal Labour government under Starmer will be seen in many quarters to waste a majority and mandate, especially among those who either haven't really voted since 1997 or have not been able to elect a Labour government in the past. If Starmer carries on on the familiar course, inequalities will continue to widen, living costs will continue to pace ahead of wages, opportunities will continue to shrink, services will continue to degrade, living standards and quality of life will continue to slip and more and more people will get the feeling that they are being taken for everything they've got by the system that then broadcasts how things have never been better.

And if the thinking goes that a Labour government with a massive majority can't/won't change things, that leaves people ripe to turn to more dangerous and alluring fring parties with temptingly simple solutions. And if there isn't a progressive or radical left-wing organisation to receive them (as there usually isn't in British politics and which Starmer has put a great deal of effort into ensuring cannot exist in Labour) then they'll go to the fringe that is more prominent - the Reforms, NatCons, PopCons and others. Maybe even a fruitloopy populist Conservative Party if that's how they shake out after a defeat.
There’s no appetite for a radical left wing government, what we are seeing all over Europe is people sick of incumbent governments

This election isn’t about people wanting starmer or Labour it’s about them being sick of the Tories

It’s the Tories losing not Labour winning and I think that any honeymoon period starmer gets will be very short lived

Its not really a good time for any party to win an election as the next few years are going to be tough and raising taxes/borrowing huge amounts are going to cause loads of issues

It might be one election Labour rues winning, they are inheriting a very different legacy than in 97

Rufus Stone

6,332 posts

57 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
crankedup5 said:
Unfortunately your observations and comments are spot on, vote for Labour for a continuation of Conservative performance.
Is this your excuse to vote Tory?

Seasonal Hero

7,954 posts

53 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
If Labour is just Tory why are all the Tory voters here clutching their pearls?

Wombat3

12,267 posts

207 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
KarlMac said:
We have over a decade of evidence that the current government can’t deliver any of their promises. Every single aspect of life that interacts with the state is objectively worse. Schools, hospitals, doctors, roads, infrastructure, they’ve even closed the bloody HMRC phone line. The only thing they have achieved in power is funnel huge sums of money to their donors.

Most people agree with traditional Tory policies, levelling up, strong border controls, fiscal responsibility etc… that’s why they were voted in. The problem is the current party has proven it’s completely unable to deliver any of it and that’s why people aren’t going to vote for them.

Even if it’s more of the same under Starmer at least things won’t get any worse than it would keeping this zombie government in place.
TLDR the Tories haven't delivered despite record spending and a sizeable majority because they have given all the money to their mates.

Seems somewhat unlikely.

Maybe the question we should be asking / debating is what has stopped them delivering ? Or maybe, who is actually running the country?

crankedup5

9,692 posts

36 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
Rufus Stone said:
crankedup5 said:
Unfortunately your observations and comments are spot on, vote for Labour for a continuation of Conservative performance.
Is this your excuse to vote Tory?
Nobody needs an excuse to vote for the Party which best reflects ones political aspiration and ambition. smile

Rufus Stone

6,332 posts

57 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
crankedup5 said:
Nobody needs an excuse to vote for the Party which best reflects ones political aspiration and ambition. smile
Errrrr. They rather do if it's the current Tory Party. biggrin

hidetheelephants

24,633 posts

194 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
2xChevrons said:
Well said.

My long-term concern (in terms of politics, at least) is that Labour will land a gargantuan majority - a poll projection published today shows a 398-seat Labour majority - and will effectively do nothing with it out of a combination of genuinely not wanting to do anything due to ideological barrenness and paralytic fear of seemingly remotely tangibly progressive.
A '97 level majority would be utterly wasted if it isn't used to address the chronic disfunctions of state; if they aren't prepared to attempt constitutional/electoral reform it will be as much a missed opportunity now as it was then. The housing crisis is simple to solve by comparison. None of these will have much short term economic impact so there's nothing to stop them other than timidity, although solving the housing crisis might well improve productivity.

valiant

10,326 posts

161 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
Wombat3 said:
TLDR the Tories haven't delivered despite record spending and a sizeable majority because they have given all the money to their mates.

Seems somewhat unlikely.

Maybe the question we should be asking / debating is what has stopped them delivering ? Or maybe, who is actually running the country?
Is that your excuse for 14 years of failure now? Blame the civil service ‘blob’?

So when Labour, in your opinion, fail to deliver you’ll be excusing them as well because of the same ‘blob’?

Look forward to that one.

Earthdweller

13,627 posts

127 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
hidetheelephants said:
A '97 level majority would be utterly wasted if it isn't used to address the chronic disfunctions of state; if they aren't prepared to attempt constitutional/electoral reform it will be as much a missed opportunity now as it was then. The housing crisis is simple to solve by comparison. None of these will have much short term economic impact so there's nothing to stop them other than timidity, although solving the housing crisis might well improve productivity.
Why would they have constitutional/electoral reform if they can win a majority without it ?

Their goal is power, they don’t want ( no party does ) a perpetual power sharing coalition

bitchstewie

51,552 posts

211 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
valiant said:
Is that your excuse for 14 years of failure now? Blame the civil service ‘blob’?

So when Labour, in your opinion, fail to deliver you’ll be excusing them as well because of the same ‘blob’?

Look forward to that one.
I swear to god there's some weird Stockholm Syndrome st going on with Wombat hehe

anonymoususer

5,884 posts

49 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
One of the issues that I think affects the Labour Party is that they don't have a musical movement.
Many years ago there was such a movement. It was called red Wedge and it had many excellent musicians. It also had Billy Bragg



Apart from Billy Bragg I have no idea who most of the people are in this photograph I can see Neil Kinnock, George Harrison and a cardboard cut out of a younger Michael Foot from the early 60s next to Kinnock and behind George Harrison.

Here is another picture which shows a young Ken Livingstone with Paul Weller late of The Jam then at the time with the Style Council and wishing he was somewhere else entirely



At some concerts Neil Kinnock would sing some traditional Welsh miner songs which the audience would politely listen to.

It was all a tremendous success and struck fear into the hearts of many a Conservative MP who feared their massive majorities might be cut by up to 10% if this sort of thing carried on. Kate Bush struck controversy when she dedicated a live Top Of The Pops performance of Running Up That Hill to the Labour Party. She said that resonated with her because Labour were both having to run up a hill to win an election whilst at the same time being over the hill in most voters minds.
It may have been of its time but its now time for Labour to start getting top pop acts to put on shows and tell all their supporters to vote Labour. It cannot all be left to Mick Hucknell to get the youngsters involved

Wombat3

12,267 posts

207 months

Thursday 21st March
quotequote all
valiant said:
Wombat3 said:
TLDR the Tories haven't delivered despite record spending and a sizeable majority because they have given all the money to their mates.

Seems somewhat unlikely.

Maybe the question we should be asking / debating is what has stopped them delivering ? Or maybe, who is actually running the country?
Is that your excuse for 14 years of failure now? Blame the civil service ‘blob’?

So when Labour, in your opinion, fail to deliver you’ll be excusing them as well because of the same ‘blob’?

Look forward to that one.
They are set up to fail. They are in hock to the unions (that run the blob) and devoid of the ideas, the people or the backbone to do anything about it.

Indeed, as long as they don't try & do stupid things (for which they will deserve no sympathy) you could almost feel sorry for them.

Lambs to the slaughter.

The problem for us (the tax payers) is that a Labour government is going to be a complete waste of 5 years where we will (at best) see no real positive change.



Edited by Wombat3 on Thursday 21st March 18:17