UK Politics

[steviewevie]

4 minutes ago, Ozanne said:

More risk of Farage under PR though?

Yes, or even worse Corbyn.

😉

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, Nobody Interesting said:

Yeh, cos FPTP never gives any nasty nutters does it FFS

That’s true, it does mainly give Tory governments. 

[Guest]

8 minutes ago, Nobody Interesting said:

Maybe you ought to study political history as there have been plenty of them under Labour and other parties too all elected under FPTP.

PR will give consensus and working together for the good of the nation - not for the good of the party and it's electoral future as FPTP gives under both Labour and the Tories.................... and the  ore scared of PR people who blindly support one of those parties are the more I know PR is the best for all apart from those parties.

It is fact that FPTP in this country brings about more Tory governments so when I say it gives mainly Tory governments I am correct. 

[steviewevie]

befits of fptp are it's simple, keeps out the extremists.

(unless you think every leader of Tory or Labour is an extremist which I'm sure some well read expert on everything will come along to state any minute now).

[steviewevie]

May is back on!

(like I always said it was etc etc)

 

[Guest]

23 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

May is back on!

(like I always said it was etc etc)

 

You will owe me £1k 😉

[pink_triangle]

3 hours ago, kaosmark2 said:

Nationalising rail and "the green new deal" or however they're framing it now, along with a windfall tax on energy companies. I think with re-nationalising public services, no the electorate aren't really willing to pay for that, but I have a great sense that Labour have backtracked so much that they're no longer offering anything positive to the electorate, not just to me. 

I would like more left wing policies. The calculation they are making is that we can’t afford them and the electorate won’t vote for them. It would be naive to think they are definitely wrong. I think being the leader of the greens or Lib Dem’s is easy knowing you can promise the world and never have to deliver. 
 

It’s much harder being the leader of a Labour Party with a chance of power knowing compromise is needed to build that coalition to win power, decisions you make will let people down and you have to sacrifice some people to win over others.

I think Starmers heart is in the right place and that’s a good start. I also trust him (compared to the other options) to make things better than they are now. I won’t get everything I want, but something is better than nothing.

[kaosmark2]

3 hours ago, Ozanne said:

I don’t think you can completely trust the Lib Dem’s, at the moment they say they want to get the Tories out if they feel they can get something out of it then they’ll get into bed with the Tories as seen in 2010.

Except I don't "completely trust" Starmer either? Or trust him much at all, therefore I'd prefer two groups I don't trust tempering each other instead of one I don't trust with a lot of power.

[kaosmark2]

13 minutes ago, pink_triangle said:

I would like more left wing policies. The calculation they are making is that we can’t afford them and the electorate won’t vote for them. It would be naive to think they are definitely wrong. I think being the leader of the greens or Lib Dem’s is easy knowing you can promise the world and never have to deliver. 
 

It’s much harder being the leader of a Labour Party with a chance of power knowing compromise is needed to build that coalition to win power, decisions you make will let people down and you have to sacrifice some people to win over others.

I think Starmers heart is in the right place and that’s a good start. I also trust him (compared to the other options) to make things better than they are now. I won’t get everything I want, but something is better than nothing.

I agree with your first two paragraphs however...

I don't trust Starmer at all. As far as I'm concerned he's enabled abuse against:

Chinese people, Muslims, immigrants, unions, protestors, asylum-seekers, trans people, gay people, lawyers.

A Labour leader who won't stand up for "minorities" is not one I trust or value - quote marks because the people he won't stand up for outnumber those who do.

[Guest]

15 minutes ago, kaosmark2 said:

Except I don't "completely trust" Starmer either? Or trust him much at all, therefore I'd prefer two groups I don't trust tempering each other instead of one I don't trust with a lot of power.

That doesn’t really make much sense. Starmer has said from the start his first priority was getting Labour into government and that’s what he’s doing. You don’t need to completely trust him beside you cant completely trust anyone

I honestly think that Starmer is a good man and wants the best for this country that’s why I support him so much. 

[steviewevie]

10 minutes ago, kaosmark2 said:

I agree with your first two paragraphs however...

I don't trust Starmer at all. As far as I'm concerned he's enabled abuse against:

Chinese people, Muslims, immigrants, unions, protestors, asylum-seekers, trans people, gay people, lawyers.

A Labour leader who won't stand up for "minorities" is not one I trust or value - quote marks because the people he won't stand up for outnumber those who do.

For the many, not the few.

[kaosmark2]

1 minute ago, Ozanne said:

That doesn’t really make much sense. Starmer has said from the start his first priority was getting Labour into government and that’s what he’s doing. You don’t need to completely trust him beside you cant completely trust anyone

I honestly think that Starmer is a good man and wants the best for this country that’s why I support him so much. 

4 years ago I thought he was a good man. Now I have a lot of doubts. I think he'll be less positive for the country than Blair.

[steviewevie]

1 minute ago, kaosmark2 said:

4 years ago I thought he was a good man. Now I have a lot of doubts. I think he'll be less positive for the country than Blair.

Hopefully better for Iraqis though.

[steviewevie]

I much prefer Starmer to Blair... although Blair a much better politician and better at media. Starmer just seems more decent imo, but is leader in a much more volatile, fragile and polarised world. Starmer does seem naive in many ways though, and is just following whatever part of party is advising him more, Blair was a wiser politician who'd been an MP a lot longer.

[kaosmark2]

5 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

Hopefully better for Iraqis though.

The Iraq war was a horrendous decision, but I don't know if I trust Starmer to make a better one? I don't think his messaging around the Israel-Palestine mess has been great, and I'd also say that for all the valid "warmonger" criticism of Blair, I think the intervention in Kosovo was very important and it shouldn't be forgotten that Britain going in then did stop a genocide.

[kaosmark2]

2 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

I much prefer Starmer to Blair... although Blair a much better politician and better at media. Starmer just seems more decent imo, but is leader in a much more volatile, fragile and polarised world. Starmer does seem naive in many ways though, and is just following whatever part of party is advising him more, Blair was a wiser politician who'd been an MP a lot longer.

It's gonna be impossible to make a fair judgement until after Starmer has been PM and no longer is. Blair did huge amounts to reduce child poverty in this country, including a lot of positive schemes and methods, he lifted up the average quality of life for people in this country. The problem is that ways he did these things perpetuated inequality, and made it fairly easy for the Tories to gut the positive schemes and grow the inequality even more afterwards. Blair was also coming into power in an easier situation. I do think Starmer will do less for child poverty and QoL for British citizens, but I'm hoping that what he will do will be as permanent as the minimum wage, not as permanent as Sure Start etc.

[steviewevie]

Just now, kaosmark2 said:

It's gonna be impossible to make a fair judgement until after Starmer has been PM and no longer is. Blair did huge amounts to reduce child poverty in this country, including a lot of positive schemes and methods, he lifted up the average quality of life for people in this country. The problem is that ways he did these things perpetuated inequality, and made it fairly easy for the Tories to gut the positive schemes and grow the inequality even more afterwards. Blair was also coming into power in an easier situation. I do think Starmer will do less for child poverty and QoL for British citizens, but I'm hoping that what he will do will be as permanent as the minimum wage, not as permanent as Sure Start etc.

yes agreed...so maybe don't write off Starmer when he's still just leader of opposition. At moment he is just trying to win. Blair was offering f**k all before the 97 election...it was all 3rd way mush stick to tory spending plans....and then eventually this...

Imagine if that happened to Starmer now...people would go megashit.

[kaosmark2]

10 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

yes agreed...so maybe don't write off Starmer when he's still just leader of opposition. At moment he is just trying to win. Blair was offering f**k all before the 97 election...it was all 3rd way mush stick to tory spending plans....and then eventually this...

Imagine if that happened to Starmer now...people would go megashit.

I haven't written off Starmer doing good. I'm just sceptical.

I'm too young to remember Blair's campaign, only the wave of excitement running up to the election. I'd also say that wrt The Sun, the influence:toxicity ratio has definitely shifted since then. Probably mostly on its influence declining, but it isn't the same as back then.

[steviewevie]

I guess big difference back then was Blair had followed a brief John Smith and then Kinnock...all of whom had been shifting Labour towards the centre...whereas Starmer comes after Corbyn, and also after promising to continue with some of Corbyn's policies....so is much more of a hate figure on the left already.

[steviewevie]

28 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

 

 

Imagine if that happened to Starmer now...people would go megashit.

sh*t didn't get bleeped out in megashit (test)

[Guest]

1 hour ago, steviewevie said:

yes agreed...so maybe don't write off Starmer when he's still just leader of opposition. At moment he is just trying to win. Blair was offering f**k all before the 97 election...it was all 3rd way mush stick to tory spending plans....and then eventually this...

Imagine if that happened to Starmer now...people would go megashit.

Tony Blair is very sexy.  If that happened to Starmer I would die. 

[fraybentos1]

4 hours ago, Ozanne said:

It is fact that FPTP in this country brings about more Tory governments so when I say it gives mainly Tory governments I am correct. 

FPTP gives mainly Labour OR Tory Govs as the 2 largest parties. Within that, of the 2 there are more Tory govs cause they usually get more votes than labour and win more seats, not cause FPTP generally benefits them more.

[Neil]

13 minutes ago, fraybentos1 said:

FPTP gives mainly Labour OR Tory Govs as the 2 largest parties. Within that, of the 2 there are more Tory govs cause they usually get more votes than labour and win more seats, not cause FPTP generally benefits them more.

its not the voting system that bring about  tory govt, its the voters, it'll be  the same voters wanting the same outcome if a different voting system is used.

interesting take on the by-elections by laura K

changing the voting system to try to gerrymander a different result, makes that different result less likely.

[kaosmark2]

2 hours ago, Neil said:

its not the voting system that bring about  tory govt, its the voters, it'll be  the same voters wanting the same outcome if a different voting system is used.

interesting take on the by-elections by laura K

changing the voting system to try to gerrymander a different result, makes that different result less likely.

I'm not entirely sure Laura K is exactly providing an unbiased political reasoning. I don't agree with gerrymandering but the Tories tried to adjust the upcoming boundary reforms in their favour, over that of what the electoral commission recommended. I don't think it's anywhere near the state of what the American parties do (and I would say both the major US parties do it), but I think you can point fingers.

[steviewevie]