What is the point of Labour ?

[StellarHibee]

2 hours ago, Trogdor said:

It makes no fucking sense though.

The Labour strategy in gif form...

The Labour party should be better than this. 

It makes perfect sense when you realize that the UK is both morally and economically bankrupt. I don't think Labour wants to be in power after the next election anymore than the tories want to remain in power. It's going to suck whoever gets lumbered with this mess.

[Salt n Vinegar]

Labour will be closely watching tonight's local election results in England. 

It will give them some idea of how badly they have to eff things up to ensure that they don't win the next General Election. Cue Starmer u-turns on his leadership "pledges".

When Billy Bragg takes the piss out of Starmer/Labour on QT like he did last night, Labour being a shoe-in next year is far from a good bet yet.  

[Highlandmagar]

They can't even win in Bolton or Hartlepool. Lol. Next election will be closer than people think.

[RuMoore]

Looking like a good day for Labour and the Lib Dems. 

As predicted earlier in the thread this will just increase the pressure on the Tories.

People that are still sending hopes and prayers that Labour will mess up and the Tories will win again need to start reconciling their position, still some space on the Starmer train before it's too late bois. 

[Leith Green]

8 hours ago, Salt n Vinegar said:

Labour will be closely watching tonight's local election results in England. 

It will give them some idea of how badly they have to eff things up to ensure that they don't win the next General Election. Cue Starmer u-turns on his leadership "pledges".

When Billy Bragg takes the piss out of Starmer/Labour on QT like he did last night, Labour being a shoe-in next year is far from a good bet yet.  

 

 

[Donathan]

2 hours ago, Highlandmagar said:

They can't even win in Bolton or Hartlepool. Lol. Next election will be closer than people think.

They won exactly half of the seats on Hartlepool council and were 3 votes away from winning another seat that would have given them a majority. Remember this is the same Hartlepool where the Tories absolutely trounced them by nearly 7,000 votes in a by-election two years ago.

 

In Bolton, Labour were short of a majority but did become the largest party.

 

I think Starmer and co will be delighted with the results so far. They’re hoping to win at least a dozen Scottish seats if not 20 so that slightly reduces the magnitude of the earthquake needed to flip England, but I think huge parts of the red wall are going to go back to Labour and there will be southern home county areas that go Lib Dem too 

 

[Highlandmagar]

20 minutes ago, RuMoore said:

Looking like a good day for Labour and the Lib Dems. 

As predicted earlier in the thread this will just increase the pressure on the Tories.

People that are still sending hopes and prayers that Labour will mess up and the Tories will win again need to start reconciling their position, still some space on the Starmer train before it's too late bois. 

A train that will crash right through the buffers . No thanks.

[Highlandmagar]

9 minutes ago, Donathan said:

They won exactly half of the seats on Hartlepool council and were 3 votes away from winning another seat that would have given them a majority. Remember this is the same Hartlepool where the Tories absolutely trounced them by nearly 7,000 votes in a by-election two years ago.

 

In Bolton, Labour were short of a majority but did become the largest party.

 

I think Starmer and co will be delighted with the results so far. They’re hoping to win at least a dozen Scottish seats if not 20 so that slightly reduces the magnitude of the earthquake needed to flip England, but I think huge parts of the red wall are going to go back to Labour and there will be southern home county areas that go Lib Dem too 

 

For a part supposedly heading for government and a traditional Labour seat and the sheer chaos of the Tory party and the economy it really isn't a good enough performance. Showing only 40% , so far, in the actual voting is noy a great move forward with an election at most just under 2 years away.

[O'Kelly Isley III]

1 hour ago, RuMoore said:

Looking like a good day for Labour and the Lib Dems. 

As predicted earlier in the thread this will just increase the pressure on the Tories.

People that are still sending hopes and prayers that Labour will mess up and the Tories will win again need to start reconciling their position, still some space on the Starmer train before it's too late bois. 

Two words; John Major.

[Michael W]

4 hours ago, Highlandmagar said:

They can't even win in Bolton or Hartlepool. Lol. Next election will be closer than people think.

They'd have won Hartlepool with ease were the entire council up for election rather than only a third of them. 

[Soapy FFC]

 

[Salvo Montalbano]

Aye, I saw someone else on the BBC saying saying something about heading for a majority before adding almost sotto vote "if they make the expected gains in Scotland". And as much as I think they'll do better up here, I think some of the projections are on the high side of what they're likely to achieve. 

[scottsdad]

1 minute ago, Salvo Montalbano said:

Aye, I saw someone else on the BBC saying saying something about heading for a majority before adding almost sotto vote "if they make the expected gains in Scotland". And as much as I think they'll do better up here, I think some of the projections are on the high side of what they're likely to achieve. 

Yep - if they scrape together 5 seats that's about as much as I think they can realistically expect. 

[invergowrie arab]

Labour have done f**k all here. They have stood still whilst the Tories fell back and UKIP disappeared.

Weird that nobody talking much about the Greens who at the time of counting are 100% up in seats. 

[Guest]

25 minutes ago, invergowrie arab said:

Labour have done f**k all here. They have stood still whilst the Tories fell back and UKIP disappeared.

Weird that nobody talking much about the Greens who at the time of counting are 100% up in seats. 

The Greens want to significantly alter society's economic arrangements therefore our media, owned and/or directed by the financial elite, are very careful about how much coverage they afford them. 

[KirkieRR]

Anybody see Labour leader Sir Peter Butterworth addressing the troops after wins in Medway? The council leader was Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons to a T.

[MazzyStar]

On 05/05/2023 at 15:57, FreedomFarter said:

The Greens want to significantly alter society's economic arrangements therefore our media, owned and/or directed by the financial elite, are very careful about how much coverage they afford them. 

No they don’t. Western European green/social Democratic parties are very rarely as radical as they purport to be.

Of course, the Greens are better than other parties in a number of areas but I don’t think they particularly want to “significantly alter society’s arrangements”, and abandoning their stance of opposition to NATO recently was one example of that. 

Edited May 6 by MazzyStar

[Guest]

59 minutes ago, MazzyStar said:

No they don’t. Western European green/social Democratic parties are very rarely as radical as they purport to be.

Of course, the Greens are better than other parties in a number of areas but I don’t think they particularly want to “significantly alter society’s arrangements”, and abandoning their stance of opposition to NATO recently was one example of that. 

"Significantly alter" is vague and open to interpretation so you're right to pull me up for using it. I agree that Green parties in western Europe don't actually advocate for anything solid regarding economic alternatives. They're not committed marxists, anarchists, or any other stripe of anti-capitalist. I don't mean they're not revolutionaries, something there's no appetite for this deep in the imperial core, I mean they're not even reformists like Corbyn. So we end up with a lot of very neoliberal rhetoric, where the individual is centred. The worst example are the Scottish Greens with things like their bottle scheme. Instead of demanding society stops subsidising plastics manufacturers, instead the responsibility is placed on individual consumers of plastic bottles. You already know this but a good summation of the problem:

The Green Party of England and Wales are better than their Scottish equivalent but still guilty of this. Your point on NATO is correct. This excuse of tying it to Ukrainian security is frustrating. Unfortunately the existence of NATO did not stop the mass murdering Russian invasion, as we have seen. What NATO has done, though, is kill civilians in Libya with its bombing campaign and affect a political change in that nation which has been disastrous for environmentalism. US oil and gas companies, the largest contributors to climate change, are now in Libya and having a field day.

Why I put my original comment, though, is that the Green Party of England and Wales do advocate for some significant (albeit not radical) economic change. Things like making social care free at the point of use, ending subsidies for fossil fuel companies, nationalising Royal Mail, UBI, supporting both Welsh and Scottish independence. That's at least enough to make most national media unwilling to cover or promote them, which was my point.

[MazzyStar]

2 hours ago, FreedomFarter said:

"Significantly alter" is vague and open to interpretation so you're right to pull me up for using it. I agree that Green parties in western Europe don't actually advocate for anything solid regarding economic alternatives. They're not committed marxists, anarchists, or any other stripe of anti-capitalist. I don't mean they're not revolutionaries, something there's no appetite for this deep in the imperial core, I mean they're not even reformists like Corbyn. So we end up with a lot of very neoliberal rhetoric, where the individual is centred. The worst example are the Scottish Greens with things like their bottle scheme. Instead of demanding society stops subsidising plastics manufacturers, instead the responsibility is placed on individual consumers of plastic bottles. You already know this but a good summation of the problem:

The Green Party of England and Wales are better than their Scottish equivalent but still guilty of this. Your point on NATO is correct. This excuse of tying it to Ukrainian security is frustrating. Unfortunately the existence of NATO did not stop the mass murdering Russian invasion, as we have seen. What NATO has done, though, is kill civilians in Libya with its bombing campaign and affect a political change in that nation which has been disastrous for environmentalism. US oil and gas companies, the largest contributors to climate change, are now in Libya and having a field day.

Why I put my original comment, though, is that the Green Party of England and Wales do advocate for some significant (albeit not radical) economic change. Things like making social care free at the point of use, ending subsidies for fossil fuel companies, nationalising Royal Mail, UBI, supporting both Welsh and Scottish independence. That's at least enough to make most national media unwilling to cover or promote them, which was my point.

Don’t disagree with any of that. You’re right that “significantly alter”  could be open to interpretation and I was probably too quick to assume the context of which it was being used. I’d agree that within the context of the UK, the greens would significantly alter a number of things, but in a wider context they offer very little in terms of real change, as you suggest in your post. 

Edited May 6 by MazzyStar

[DrewDon]

April 2022: 

Spoiler

April 2023:

Spoiler