What is the point of Labour ?

[pandarilla]

Yes that was outlined in their manifesto along with other private companies they had targeted, so why did they suffer that overwhelming embarrassing. defeat if it was attractive to, in your words, the majority of the people.

Because most voters don't care and detailed policies.

Corbyn was seen as the bogey man by many, and get brexit done had a good ring to it.

If you think folk didn't vote for labour to protect private companies them I'd suggest you need to listen to people a bit more, and pay attention to political shit in the media (as biased as that is).

[zidane's child]

Nationalising rail was also on Labour’s 2017 manifesto and they done quite well if I remember correctly. Plus 30 seats and the Tories lost their majority.

[Granny Danger]

1 hour ago, SandyCromarty said:

Labour are a party of the past.

Their 2019 GE manifesto was full of left wing promises, have a read, which incurred them their biggest election defeat since 1935. 

If it’s so obvious which ‘left wing’ policies were rejected why are you finding it so difficult to identify them?

[pandarilla]

How do you know why people didn’t vote for Labour?

I spoke to them all.

[pawpar]

22 hours ago, SandyCromarty said:

Long Bailey = Mrs Merton.

That and the fact she looks like Jeremy Corbyn's ba$tard grandaughter. Even has the same wonky glasses.

Edited January 24, 2020 by pawpar

[DeeTillEhDeh]

The biggest thing I saw used against Corbyn was the IRA/terrorist sympathiser attacks.

No matter what he did he was never going to get rid of that label.

It didn't help either that he sat on the fence on Brexit.

[JamieThomas]

2 minutes ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

The biggest thing I saw used against Corbyn was the IRA/terrorist sympathiser attacks.

Yup, the much beloved attack line of uber-fans of *actual* IRA sympathiser Margaret Thatcher.

[pandarilla]

You think Boris has been smeared more in the press than Corbyn? Come on now.

I get the indecision over brexit. He was caught between two unbelievably bad options but not making a decision was arguably worse.

I'd still defend the manifesto. I think people in Britain would vote in large numbers for a radical change to the British economy (which was on offer) - but a combination of brexit and Corbyn was too much to cut through.

[sophia]

Just now, MixuFixit said:

Tarmo Kink had strong opinions about railways, just as a thing to say.

Pity he went off the rails

[pandarilla]

The press and social media especially have smeared Boris Johnson just as much as they have Corbyn. Corbyn only really had the Anti-Semite and IRA things thrown at him, as big as they are. Johnson had his entire personal life raided and personal accusations such as how many children he had etc. The Corbyn fans just choose to ignore that, but Boris is not favourably reported by the media as a whole.

Corbyn said following the Leave vote that there’s no point getting all worked up and having a second vote, we just have go ahead with it. Then he said second referendum. Then he said no Brexit. Then he said second referendum with his ‘deal’ against it. Then he proceeded to reject every deal no matter what it was going to contain. Then he used no-deal as a stick to try and avoid his impending doom at the GE, which Boris called his bluff on and Corbyn went into an election knowing he was going to catastrophically fail. What Corbyn was proposing was quite frankly an insult to democracy, so it’s no surprise the public overwhelmingly voted for the Conservatives.

Nationilising the railway would be bonkers considering the governments horrific record of controlling the parts they do own. We’d go back to Victorian rolling stock and even more shoddy services the further north you went. I’m open to a new style of economy but Corbyn’s was just overly radical and barking mad.

HAHA.

Do you work in the rail industry?

[Theroadlesstravelled]

The UK’s infrastructure like railways, telecoms, water, power plants should be state controlled. 

Only a feeble Tory gimp would think otherwise.

[Bully Wee Villa]

15 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

As regards people voting in large numbers for a radical change to the British economy, decades of defeats at the polls for a whole raft of Labour leaders offering just that, would suggest otherwise.

Loads of people just voted for a party that is going fo take us into the economic abyss of Brexit. That's a more radical change than any nationalisation or forcing rich people to pay 5p in the pound more tax.

Edited January 24, 2020 by Bully Wee Villa

[Detournement]

26 minutes ago, SandyCromarty said:

You stated however that the re -nationalisation of the railways etc was attractive to the majority of the people which indicates that the general public were aware of Labour's manifesto policies.

I've no more to say on this.

Any time a pollster does a poll on renationilising the railways it's always 60-70% in favour.

However we have a situation caused by media saturation where millions of people don't vote based on policy positions or even on the economic outcomes for themselves or their families. We have a US style culture war now which is the primary motivator for large enough sections of the population to make nationalist politics dominant. 

[Bully Wee Villa]

23 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

The problem is that voters just dont buy this narrative.

Labour have no compelling story. With Thatcher we had the quite brilliant "own your own home", Boris had "Get Brexit done". Blair had the fantastic "lifting millions out of poverty with tax credits" which he absolutely did before fucking his legacy in Iraq.  What is Labour's exciting story now? Everything about them is stale.

The fact that trade unions need to approve candidates screams out loud that this is a party rooted and trapped in the past.

BTW, We haven't had Brexit yet so we have no idea whether we are facing an economic abyss or not.

I don't disagree that Labour's message lacked clarity. They seemed to be making a new promise every day, it was like the election caught them by surprise, even though they had spent the previous two years going on about how they wanted one.

A more streamlined message which really connects with voters is required, next time. I don't think it's impossible that a Socialist message could do that job.

I'd say the Labour electoral system is pretty democratic. You allow hundreds of thousands of people votes on all the candidates who meet a minimum threshold. As opposed to the Tory system which only trusts its members with a choice of two. Still a lot more democratic that it was a few years ago, admittedly. While I generally sneer at American politics, I wouldn't be completely averse to something like their Primaries system. Allow millions the chance to vote on who is Labour/Tory leader. Not quite sure how it would work in practice, though.

As for your last sentence well, no, we don't know for certain what Brexit will hold. Just as you don't know whether Corbyn winning the election would have had a positive or negative impact on the economy. Democracy requires you to make educated guesses based on the evidence available.

And the vast majority of evidence suggests that Brexit will be bad, especially for those who are already not well off. I'll be happy to be proven wrong and wake up in a Brexity Utopia in 2025 or so, but I don't think it's very likely.

Edited January 25, 2020 by Bully Wee Villa

[Fullerene]

16 hours ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

The biggest thing I saw used against Corbyn was the IRA/terrorist sympathiser attacks.

No matter what he did he was never going to get rid of that label.

It didn't help either that he sat on the fence on Brexit.

The issue with IRA was perceived to be part of an anti-British and anti-Western world view.  "We should never have had a British presence in Ireland,  we should never have allowed the state of Israel to be created and we should not be friends with America".  At the same time he appears less critical of countries like Russia or China or Iran whenever they are being criticised.

Some people saw this as unpatriotic.

[Detournement]

3 hours ago, Blinky said:

 

Simply because the majority of railways in the country aren’t great, and people think the way to sort it is through renationalisation. That really isn’t the case, as around 70% of the rail industry is nationalised, and those parts are doing the worst - Network Rail projects such as Crossrail, Thameslink improvements. The vast majority of people voting on this issue won’t have the slightest clue what they are voting for - renationalisation of the railway would be suicide. HAHA.

 

Crossrail is largely a Siemens project staffed by "self employed" contractors who have been doing the same job for years. 

[Detournement]

2 hours ago, oaksoft said:

Oh FFS stop bloody whining about the media.

The only media which matters now is social media and Labour should have been all over that with their own narrative.

I'm not moaning about the media. We live in a society which is completely dominated by the media, that is just a fact. Facebook is the only social media which is electorally relevant and is structured in a way that favours corporate interests. 

 

 

[Detournement]

10 minutes ago, Blinky said:

 

Crossrail is a TfL and Network Rail project. Sub-contracting some parts out to private companies doesn’t make it private.

 

It's not some parts of it. It's literally every single physical part of the project. 

Edited January 25, 2020 by Detournement

[Suspect Device]

1 hour ago, MixuFixit said:

Scotland is a more educated population, they're less susceptible to Facebook influence etc.

I wish that were true but I don't believe it.

[Malky3]

2 hours ago, MixuFixit said:

Scotland is a more educated population, they're less susceptible to Facebook influence etc.

Not on the evidence of the Nationalists on this forum.......