Labour Party retake Wakefield!!

[Chippy_Tea]

he sounds more of a stupid dweeb than an oblivious toff

He has good points at PMQ's but Boris always seems to turn it back on him.

 

[foxy]

I give you the latest UK Government figures …

“One in 304 active companies (at a rate of 32.9 per 10,000 active companies) entered liquidation in 2021. This was an increase from the 29.4 per 10,000 active companies that entered liquidation in 2020, but remained lower than the 41.9 per 10,000 in 2019.”

Not included in this figure is “Safe Hands”, a Company that held Funeral Plans for my wife and I.

“Safe Hands” called in the Receivers in March of this year. As Plan Holders we apparently can expect either nothing or “1p in the £” and:

1. The Mangers of the Company failed to put our money “in a safe place”!
2. We won’t be cremated as planned.

I’ll bet the Shareholders got their Dividends though!

I rest my case!
:hat:

There is a big difference between public companies and private companies, we are discussing PUBLIC companies with share holders. There wouldn't be 10,000 public companies in the UK!

 

[foxy]

Does anyone really give a ?
I honestly couldn't care less which party has the seat in Wakefield, it doesn't really make a blind bit of difference to anything. I'm fairly confident Starmer will be no better than Boris, the only difference is he sounds more of a stupid dweeb than an oblivious toff

Spot on doesn't make a blind bit of difference apart the economy suffering under a labour government. In 2007 Australia under a conservative government handed over the reigns to a labor government the economy was in the black to the tune of $15.6 billion 7 years later the reigns were handed back to the liberals $226 billion in the red!
Labor is supposedly there to represent the working class. Electricity in 2009 was about 12 cents/kWh rumors were rife then that electricity prices were going to rocket. Labor government offered a deal to pay anyone who installed solar on their roof would be paid a tariff off 66 cents for electricity fed into the grid for the next 15 years! A deal to good to miss, never occurred to the labor party the only ones who could afford the solar (between $20- $25,000) were the well off, and who were the ones who couldn't afford the solar, the ones who voted labor are left to pay more on the electric bills to subsidies those with solar!
To add insult to injury the state labor party is offering batteries to those with solar panels at a subsidised rate of 50% off!

 

[moto748]

Does anyone really give a ?
I honestly couldn't care less which party has the seat in Wakefield, it doesn't really make a blind bit of difference to anything. I'm fairly confident Starmer will be no better than Boris, the only difference is he sounds more of a stupid dweeb than an oblivious toff

I think not being a crook who siphons public money to his mates, and doesn't even take the job in hand seriously, is enough?

I've no enthusiasm for Starmer at all, but he's no crook at least.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

I've no enthusiasm for Starmer at all, but he's no crook at least.

He is so dull his own party members call him boring, if that's his best asset, labour are doomed.

 

[foxy]

Why it’s time for Labour to back proportional representation​

Andy Burnham

Our rotten political system must change – inequality has been hard-wired into our country by first-past-the-post

This is a deeply dysfunctional government and the good news coming out of Thursday’s byelections is that we now have a route to removing it. That might be more likely to happen if we also start talking about reforming Britain’s deeply dysfunctional system of government.

Today’s crises have been building for a long time.

The poorest parts of our country were not ready for the pandemic. Decades of deregulation, under all governments, stripped them of resilience and left people without the basics: in jobs where they can’t go home if unwell; in homes that are unsafe; in communities with no affordable public transport.

This inequality is no accident. It is the product of a political system that places too much power in the hands of too few. Britain is hard-wired to perpetuate it.

If our political system was a computer, we would have long since taken steps to prevent it being hacked

First-past-the-post, combined with the whip system, takes the votes of millions and turns them into inordinate power for a small Whitehall elite. Government MPs troop through the lobbies rubber-stamping their decisions. Any ability to mitigate the worst of them has long since been removed from local government.

This over-concentration of power in one London postcode makes it far too easy for vested interests to manipulate political decision-making. What else explains the extent to which the political elite have been captured by the mantra that the market solves everything?

In the rare moments when backbench MPs have power, such as in the recent no-confidence vote, the inner workings of this corrupt system are momentarily revealed. When Nadine Dorries warned rebel MPs that the Tory donors weren’t happy and might withdraw cash from their constituencies, she wasn’t setting out to provide the perfect diagnosis of our political malaise – but that is what she spectacularly did.

Some of these donors are hostile to the notion of Britain as a fairer, more equitable country. Others, as the Ukraine crisis revealed, are potentially hostile to Britain. If our political system was a computer, we would have long since taken steps to prevent it being hacked.

Britain’s antiquated political system is never going to solve our problems; rather, it is a root cause of them.

The time has come for a complete rewiring of Britain – and for my own party to talk openly and seriously with others who feel the same.

Given the seriousness of the country’s situation, the next general election needs to bring a change of direction. The risk is, if our political parties carry on with business-as-usual, it may not happen. The Tories are masters at making first-past-the-post work for them. However, if the other parties are open to a new approach, Thursday’s results suggest a change of government becomes not just achievable but highly likely.

Full article - Proportional representation can save Britain from its multiple crises | Andy Burnham

What a load of crap!

 

[Brianbrewed]

What a load of crap!

Care to explain?

 

[Brianbrewed]

Guess not.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Care to explain?

I would also like to see an explanation as it would make the current bent system fair.

 

[pilgrimhudd]

He is so dull his own party members call him boring, if that's his best asset, labour are doomed.

Possibly, but it was always going to take time to heal the division in the parliamentary Labour Party which at least outwardly he seems to be doing.

 

[Brianbrewed]

I would also like to see an explanation as it would make the current bent system fair.

The advantages of Proportional Representation over First past the post?
It's the system used in the Republic of Ireland & I believe, Scotland.

It normally means that smaller parties (eg The Greens) have a better chance of getting into parliament.
Hence you have a wider spectrum of views represented in Parliament. This leads to higher voter engagement in the electoral process and prevents one or two parties dominating the political system.

The main disadvantage is getting overall majorities is harder so coalition governments are more likely (Ireland has had a series of coalition governments).

 

[moto748]

He is so dull his own party members call him boring, if that's his best asset, labour are doomed.

But actually, there's nothing wrong with 'dull'! Is Macron dull? Biden? Politics is a grown-up and serious business, it is not show-business. whatever Johnson and his antics may suggest.

"Oh, he's a character!" (even if true) is no recommendation for high office.

 

[Brianbrewed]

But actually, there's nothing wrong with 'dull'! Is Macron dull? Biden? Politics is a grown-up and serious business, it is not show-business. whatever Johnson and his antics may suggest.

"Oh, he's a character!" (even if true) is no recommendation for high office.

I can't remember a time I ever voted for someone because they were 'exciting'. Neither do I remember been put off by a politician because they were dull (politics should be dull, if it's exciting something has gone seriously wrong).

I wonder how many Germans voted for Hitler said;
"You can say what you want about Adolph, at least he's not dull."

 

[moto748]

Possibly, but it was always going to take time to heal the division in the parliamentary Labour Party which at least outwardly he seems to be doing.

Couldn't agree less!

I don't think Starmer (and certainly not Blair/Campbell etc) wants to 'heal the divisions' in the Labour Party. I think they want Jeremy Corbyn, and anyone who thinks anything like him, to take a long walk off a short pier, and generally get the hell out of the Labour Party.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

But actually, there's nothing wrong with 'dull'! Is Macron dull? Biden? Politics is a grown-up and serious business, it is not show-business. whatever Johnson and his antics may suggest

Whether you like it or not people do vote for the party leader not just the party and where as Andy Burnham is all over social media telling everyone what he is doing I don't know anything about Starmer and what he wants for the Labour party, I know I am repeating myself I think they picked the wrong person and if they had the vote again today with the same candidates I am sure he wouldn't win.

 

[pilgrimhudd]

Couldn't agree less!

I don't think Starmer (and certainly not Blair/Campbell etc) wants to 'heal the divisions' in the Labour Party. I think they want Jeremy Corbyn, and anyone who thinks anything like him, to take a long walk off a short pier, and generally get the hell out of the Labour Party.

That's probably what I meant. Either way would make them more electable.

 

[moto748]

Not with me!

 

[Dutto]

Couldn't agree less!

I don't think Starmer (and certainly not Blair/Campbell etc) wants to 'heal the divisions' in the Labour Party. I think they want Jeremy Corbyn, and anyone who thinks anything like him, to take a long walk off a short pier, and generally get the hell out of the Labour Party.

The problem is that we ARE the Labour Party and WE can remember what the Labour Party did to improve things in the UK!
:hat:

 

[Chippy_Tea]

I am a labour voter and i can remember back in the day when they were last in power things were not perfect here is just one example -



Liam Byrne, chief secretary to the Treasury under Gordon Brown, left a note for his successor that proved to be a gift for the Conservatives

‘I’m afraid there is no money.’ The letter I will regret for ever

I am so sorry. David Cameron’s daily flourish of my leaving note at the Treasury helped hurt the party I love. And offered sheer offence to so many of the people we want the chance to serve. Party members ask me: “What on earth were you thinking?” But members of the public ask: “How could you do something so crass? And so bloody offensive?”

I’ve asked myself that question every day for five years and believe me, every day I have burnt with the shame of it. Nowhere more than when standing on doorsteps with good comrades, listening to voters demanding to know what I thought I was playing at. It was always excruciating.

Some speculated that I’d written “the note” for my Tory opponent Philip Hammond who I’d often debated and saw as an honourable man.

In reality, it wasn’t like that. The final years of Gordon Brown’s government were tough.

His leadership of Britain and the G20 at the London summit stopped the collapse of Lehman Brothers triggering a global depression – an incredible achievement we should never have stopped shouting about. But the recession slashed Treasury tax receipts by over £40bn, forcing us to borrow to keep public services on the go and get Britain back on its feet. And because the deficit was big, the responsible thing to do was draw up a long-term plan to cut spending.

In government, it was my job to craft a plan. As chief secretary, I spent bruising months negotiating £32bn of annual savings to help halve the deficit in just four years and set out in huge detail in our 2010 budget. Of course, the Conservatives attacked us – though it was the timetable they eventually delivered.

Those negotiations were tough and bruising. And so in my final hours of office, I was writing thank-you notes to my incredible team of civil servants. And then I thought I’d write one letter more to my successor. Into my head came the phrase I’d used to negotiate all those massive savings with my colleagues: “I’m afraid there is no money.” I knew my successor’s job was tough. I guess I wanted to offer them a friendly word on their first day in one of government’s hardest jobs by honouring an old tradition that stretched back to Churchill in the 1930s and the Tory chancellor Reginald Maudling, who bounced down the steps of the Treasury in 1964 to tell Jim Callaghan: “Sorry to leave it in such a mess, old ****.”

Yet “the note” was not just stupid. It was offensive. That’s why it has made so many people so angry. And that why it was so wrong to write.

People’s anger – and my party’s anger – at me, will never ever match my anger with myself or my remorse at such a crass mistake. I made it easy for our opponents to bash our economic record by bashing me. And for millions of people and businesses who have had to make such sacrifices over the last five years, there was nothing funny about the national debt when the national task of cutting it has brought them such pain in their everyday life.

I left my career as a tech entrepreneur because my mum and dad, a teacher and council manager, taught me that politics is one of the best ways to live and serve the people around you, to help make our country better, greater, fairer. More ambitious. And more compassionate. It’s why I joined the party aged just 15. It’s why I’ve spent the last decade serving one of the poorest constituencies in Britain, week in, week out.

David Cameron may have carried that note around with him during the campaign. But I, too, have carried it every day – in my head. I always will. As a reminder of how much harder I will always have to work to repay the people I let down and to help rebuild Labour as a party of government determined to fight the injustices that scar our communities and the failures that hold us back from becoming the country we can be.

Liam Byrne is MP for Birmingham, Hodge Hill

https://www.theguardian.com/comment...ter-there-is-no-money-labour-general-election

 

[Chippy_Tea]

The rise and fall of New Labour​

A key basis of New Labour's electability - economic soundness - was undermined when the credit crunch hit.

This struck directly at Brown, who had been chancellor for a decade before entering 10 Downing Street and taken the plaudits for UK economic success.

As the financial contagion spread, the government acted to bail out the banks, nationalising and part-nationalising some of the biggest names on the High Street.

Brown gained praise for leading a global effort to stem the worst of the crisis, and he and Chancellor Alistair Darling raised the rate of income tax for top earners - something Labour had pledged not to do in their 2005 manifesto.

Despite earning considerable respect abroad for his role in apparently helping the world avoid financial collapse, his popularity domestically kept suffering hits - including from failed Blairite coups and revelations about his closest advisers' connection with a plot to smear Conservatives.

Electorally the party did disastrously in local and European elections, also losing the London mayoralty and being beaten by the SNP in Scotland.

In what could be seen as New Labour's last hurrah, Mandelson, the prime minister's perceived enemy, was brought back in late 2008 from his job as a European commissioner.

Lord Mandelson swiftly became the de-facto deputy prime minister and front man for the government. It was assumed the Blairites would be brought back onside by his return and he was seen as playing crucial roles in stopping coup attempts succeeding.

By the time the general election was called for May 2010 the economy was out of recession - just. But Labour seemed to know it was heading out of office.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-10518842