The next leader of the Labour Party?

[Loz]

Louisa Wrote:

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> The man has principles, it should count for something.

So does Nigel Farage. No use having principles if they are stupid, though.

[Louisa]

Loz that's your opinion. Lots of people within the party and the wider Labour movement will think he speaks a lot of sense. It's their job to encourage everyone else to believe that too.

Louisa.

[miga]

Otta Wrote:

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> You think the Tories are supportive of the welfare

> state?

>

> I honestly believe a lot of them would scrap it

> tomorrow if they could.

We've gone over this stuff in some of the other threads, but my flippant answer would be not much less supportive than the other lot. The evidence for the Tories being rabidly anti-welfare types (in comparison to Labour, anyway) isn't there since they've been in government, when you look at e.g. pre-2010 election spending plans on both sides. There's also a pragmatic aspect - if they attack welfare too viciously they'll make themselves unelectable in 5 years. What they say and what they do diverges - both sides.

[miga]

Corbyn is no Farage, and neither is the caricature they're made out to be.

[Otta]

miga Wrote:

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> Otta Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > You think the Tories are supportive of the

> welfare

> > state?

> >

> > I honestly believe a lot of them would scrap it

> > tomorrow if they could.

>

> We've gone over this stuff in some of the other

> threads, but my flippant answer would be not much

> less supportive than the other lot. The evidence

> for the Tories being rabidly anti-welfare types

> (in comparison to Labour, anyway) isn't there

> since they've been in government, when you look at

> e.g. pre-2010 election spending plans on both

> sides. There's also a pragmatic aspect - if they

> attack welfare too viciously they'll make

> themselves unelectable in 5 years. What they say

> and what they do diverges - both sides.

That's why I said "if they could".

[uncleglen]

Yes the Tories listen...they have just put the cap of ?72,000 on Social care on hold until 2020...if that isn't listening to the people I don't know what is.

[edcam]

We need a Corbyn, most definitely.

[miga]

Otta Wrote:

> That's why I said "if they could".

Sure, they have their share of nutters.

[david_carnell]

Why is Corbyn seen as such a joke, yet Maihri Black's maiden speech which echoes much of his own standpoint, has become one of the most widely shared videos on YouTube?

Why is Labour moving to the left seen as political suicide when the SNP have just been swept into parliament on a socialist mandate with the biggest landslide since Sinn Fein in 1916?

If Corbyn went for designer stubble instead of a beard, brogues rather than sandals and decent suit instead of his current bargain-bin look, the Blairitea would be falling over themselves to push him forward.

He's gone from 100/1 to 5/1. I'd start taking him seriously.

I've yet to see a specific policy criticised on here that he's talked about. But much like the tabloid press, we'd rather play the man than the ball.

[Otta]

Totally agree David. I confess I haven't seen enough of him to reach a personal conclusion, but I am really disliking this whole "he's the left, what a joke" thing.

The anti Labour brigade (I say that rather than just saying tories) are feeling very emboldened at the moment, and the "loony left" thing is seeling rags.

I think if Labour find someone (not saying him, but someone) that doesn't appear just like all the others, and says the right things, then all those UKIP voters and possibly a fair portion of recent SNP voters could come flooding back to Labour.

And as for economics, I've always said I'm not really that up on it, but frankly I'm feeling more and more that even economists haven't actually got a f**king clue what they're on about, so I don't think I'll listen when people tell me that austerity is the only way.

[Blah Blah]

uncleglen Wrote:

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> Yes the Tories listen...they have just put the cap

> of ?72,000 on Social care on hold until 2020...if

> that isn't listening to the people I don't know

> what is.

No, they listen to the people who vote for them. The tories have completely shunted young people on the other hand (having given up on gaining their votes no doubt).

I'm torn on Corbyn. I think many of the points made about a viable opposition are true. I think he may be able to regain some of the ground in Scotland, and some of the core vote lost to UKIP. But I think Andy Burnham would probably be able to do that. But I also think those two would (depending on what happens with the economy) keep Labour out of government for 10 years. Left wing core values were alive during the Thatcher years (and the attack on the public sector was far worse then) but it didn't make Labour electable.

For a swing away from the market economy we have now would take the same kind of disaster we saw in the 70s that led to the rise of the right. It's not going to happen.

I think it was ???? who said that the right kind of government is one that believes in the free market economy but has some liberal and social values at it's core too. I think that's right.

What I also think is right is that Labour in their poor opposition through Miliband, allowed the Tories to seize the popular debate and mislead the public on the extent of the 2008 crisis being Labours fault (it reminds me of Bush confusing Iraq with 9/11 funnily enough).

At the time Miliband was elected leader I said to Labour party member friends of mine that he wasn't providing any opposition and couldn't understand why. They just gave me some vague answer about not revealing anything until the run up to the election (which was years away at the time). This is the kind of niaivity that seems to run through the Labour Party at the moment. The new leader needs to be able to effectively oppose from the off. They also need to be able to form policy and win the public debate. Corbyn perhaps has the best chance of doing that, but he might also divide the party and I suspect, election wise, he's preaching to the already converted, and that won't win a general election imo.

[Loz]

david_carnell Wrote:

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> If Corbyn went for designer stubble instead of a beard, brogues rather than sandals and decent suit

> instead of his current bargain-bin look, the Blairitea would be falling over themselves to push

> him forward.

You made a couple of good points, DC, but this is just wrong. Blairites wouldn't back Corbyn whatever his clothing. They wouldn't touch his old-school left viewpoint in a million years.

[david_carnell]

I think what I was trying to express, perhaps overly simplistically, is that yet again it's a presentational issue as much as a policy one. Yet for me, Kendall, Burnham and Cooper are at the other end of the scale. All hair gel and permatans and no idea about actually leading rather than just basing policy on the latest focus group finding.

[Earl Aelfheah]

There is no point in the Labour Party pursuing the same agenda as the consevatives. Yes, it would make them more electable (clearly, as the conservatives have been elected), but what would be the point? They shouldn't follow public opinion, they should attempt to lead it. An opposition, by definition, need to represent something distinct. If the electorate reject it, then fine, that's democracy... but at least people will have been given a genuine choice. The perception that political parties are all the same, is partly why so many don't engage.

[Otta]

EXACTLY!!!

And that is also why we don't want just another indentikit candidate. An awful lot of people have no respect or trust in politicians. We need something different.

[Blah Blah]

Very good point rahrah.

[PeckhamNicola]

It would be great to have a genuine alternative to the Tories. And principles to boot - who'd have imagined it? I think the argument that Labour need to be more like the Tories because that is what people want per the way the last election went is flawed. For one thing Labour slightly increased their share of the vote in the recent election vs the 2010 election, and by more than the Tories (although both changes were pretty marginal) but clearly the SNP had a massive impact on the number of Labour seats. Who knows what would have happened if they'd offered a real alternative? I agree with Rahrahrah that they should lead opinion.

[????]

So.....The Greens, standing in all (most) constituencies with a clear, widely publicised and very different manifesto to the Tories and Labour...got 1/6 of the vote of UKIP. Delusional, the lot of you. Tories will be in for years unless people get a bit real....but huge swathes of the left doesn't really want power they just want to wail.

And the SNP thing in Scotland is much miss understood by those who want to clutch at straws/keep their illusions and underplay the nationalist part and over play the anti-austerity/Socialist part.

[Blah Blah]

I agree with you ???? but that's not what people are saying (so they are not delusional). They are arguing for a clear alternative from the other major party (which Labour still are), that's all. Of course it risks leaving Labour out of power but they are never going to regain power anyway if they don't get those Scottish seats back.

[Otta]

Comparing to the Greens ignores the fact that a lot of people still vote either Tory or Labour and would view a green vote as wasted.

I suspect had Labour gone with an identical set of policies to the Greens it would have won WAY more.votes than it did with the Greens. Not saying it would have won, that's not the point.

Of course Labour need to be more realistic than the green manifesto (which is the manifesto of a party that aren't challenging for power), but there is plenty of ground between the Tory manifesto and the green one, Labour should look at that ground.

[numbers]

growing veg and making jam - a resounding yes

homeopathy and god - a resounding no (which cancels out the former)

Blahblah, Labour are dead in Scotland, dead I tell you!

As a general point, the SNP have privatised so much they are hardly the lefty socialist alternative they are portrayed to be on social meedia.

[Jah Lush]

numbers Wrote:

> As a general point, the SNP have privatised so

> much they are hardly the lefty socialist

> alternative they are portrayed to be on social

> meedia.

Indeed. Beware nationalists posing as socialists.

[Otta]

But it's not just social media, it's their own propaganda machine. That is how they've painted themselves.

They didn't get in because of the lefty thing though, they got in because after the referendum Cameron immediately started on about English votes for English laws, and just made it even more "us and them".

[Alan Medic]

How did the Greens win a seat in Brighton? Anyone?

[????]

Er, middle class Guardian Reading tossers by the Lane full. It's also the only Green LA in the country and...... in the bottom 10 for Recycling - you couldn't make up their incompetence but, you know, it's 'on brand' for them types and image is all; substance nothing.