UK Politics

[steviewevie]

Houchen says the alternative of a Tory government will be absolutely armageddon.

[Kurosagi]

52 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

What is worrying is the normalisation of the far right, as the centre right try to absorb their ideas and support.

 

This in spades.

 

As a traditional left winger it summarises my disappointment in Starmer and his race to win the election at all costs. Farage has been successful in shifting the centre ground in this country. Populists of any colours are problematic I'd argue, but there is no voice that I'm aware of from the left that is having similar success by countering the centre ground shifting further to the right.

 

I suppose Andy Burnham has tried a bit, Mick Lynch was a refreshing voice early on in the strikes, everyone associated with the mainstream left as headed up by Corbyn has been demonised, purged or silenced.

[steviewevie]

11 minutes ago, Kurosagi said:

 

This in spades.

 

As a traditional left winger it summarises my disappointment in Starmer and his race to win the election at all costs. Farage has been successful in shifting the centre ground in this country. Populists of any colours are problematic I'd argue, but there is no voice that I'm aware of from the left that is having similar success by countering the centre ground shifting further to the right.

 

I suppose Andy Burnham has tried a bit, Mick Lynch was a refreshing voice early on in the strikes, everyone associated with the mainstream left as headed up by Corbyn has been demonised, purged or silenced.

 

you mean in terms of social/cultural stuff? Or economics?

[Kurosagi]

I mean living in a country where Farage has dusted down this manifesto from the '70s and has successfully got all the main parties singing from the same sheet:

 

[steviewevie]

14 minutes ago, Kurosagi said:

 

This in spades.

 

As a traditional left winger it summarises my disappointment in Starmer and his race to win the election at all costs. Farage has been successful in shifting the centre ground in this country. Populists of any colours are problematic I'd argue, but there is no voice that I'm aware of from the left that is having similar success by countering the centre ground shifting further to the right.

 

I suppose Andy Burnham has tried a bit, Mick Lynch was a refreshing voice early on in the strikes, everyone associated with the mainstream left as headed up by Corbyn has been demonised, purged or silenced.

 

and there are voices from the left, but it's a mixed bag, right? Burnham has changed depending on circumstance. He was Blairite/Brownite, then appeared more left when took on the Manchester job, because overall Manchester is more left wing than the rest of the country, and also Manchester is a fairly successful city but like other northern cities is still way behind London and relies on govt investment,

Mick Lynch is old school left in many ways, but still has some views that many on liberal/left would find a bit uncomfortable..brexit/Ukraine/China etc.

 

In the end Starmer (and actually more importantly McSweeney) has shifted Labour a bit to the right because that is probably where the sweet spot is for winning an election in the country. Labour can lose votes on the left because they mostly live in areas with already large labour majorities, but to win an election after 2019 he needs to win seats all over the place..places that voted towy in 2019 for whatever reason. What he does in power is the important thing, but with the state of everything it's a tough call.

[steviewevie]

3 minutes ago, Kurosagi said:

I mean living in a country where Farage has dusted down this manifesto from the '70s and has successfully got all the main parties singing from the same sheet:

 

and that was from the days when net immigration was negative.

Now it is above 600,000. Whichever way you look at it, that is pretty high. Does our economy need it? Probably. Does it cause issues for some public services or housing? Probably. Most people don't want to stop immigration completely, no parties except Reform want to stop immigration, but they can see that these high numbers might not be sustainable unless we invest a lot more in housing and other things.

They are due to come down anyway, think there was a spike for multiple reasons...ukraine, covid, Unis needing cash.

 

[Kurosagi]

6 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

In the end Starmer (and actually more importantly McSweeney) has shifted Labour a bit to the right

 

Changed it for you.

 

6 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

because that is probably where the sweet spot is for winning an election in the country

 

...the sweet spot that has successfully been created by Farage.

 

I don't know what the answer is, all I know is that I'm pretty tired of seeing NF talking points from the 1970s being normalised as the centre ground in two thousand and f**king twenty four.

 

What does that say about us as a country, that the National Front and Knights of St George were visionaries ahead of their time?!

[steviewevie]

6 minutes ago, Kurosagi said:

 

Changed it for you.

 

 

...the sweet spot that has successfully been created by Farage.

 

I don't know what the answer is, all I know is that I'm pretty tired of seeing NF talking points from the 1970s being normalised as the centre ground in two thousand and f**king twenty four.

 

What does that say about us as a country, that the National Front and Knights of St George were visionaries ahead of their time?!

yes, but look at the migration numbers. Anti immigration stuff has become more main stream as immigration numbers have gone up. It dropped after brexit, but now is on the rise again. And it isn't just happening here, also across europe and US.

[steviewevie]

Personally I don't have a problem with it. I like living in a multi cultural city. But for people who think numbers are too high I'm not just going to write them off as bigots and racists, it's more complicated than that (even though in many cases it is racism!). Farage just taps into it and adds his own particular poison, more moderate parties need to address these concerns without just telling these people they're wrong/racist...this is how we ended up with brexit, this is how we end up with far right parties succeeding. Language matters I guess. 

I hope to god the Tories don't go the way of Farage/Braverman/Patel.

[Kurosagi]

Not my area of expertise, but giving it a go then I guess you have:

 

- open borders, except for people they don't like (far left)

- closed borders, except for rich white people (far right)

- managed/humane immigration (centre left)

- points based immigration/Rwanda (centre right)

 

Maybe I'll wait for Labour's manifesto to drop to see what they have to say about it before talking bollox on something that I'm largely ignorant about, maybe they'll surprise me with some nuanced genius.

[steviewevie]

 

[steviewevie]

2 minutes ago, Kurosagi said:

Not my area of expertise, but giving it a go then I guess you have:

 

- open borders, except for people they don't like (far left)

- closed borders, except for rich white people (far right)

- managed/humane immigration (centre left)

- points based immigration/Rwanda (centre right)

 

Maybe I'll wait for Labour's manifesto to drop to see what they have to say about it before talking bollox on something that I'm largely ignorant about, maybe they'll surprise me with some nuanced genius.

Not even sure the far left on the whole is for open border, what about the lexit lot?

I would say it depends on how liberal and pro globalisation you are...and you get liberals on the left and right (maybe not far left/right though)

[steviewevie]

 

[stuie]

24 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

 

 

That image is stuff nightmares are made of. 

[Nobody Interesting]

6 minutes ago, stuie said:

 

That image is stuff nightmares are made of. 

 

I just thought the Human League had released a new record.

[Nobody Interesting]

Imagine  a party that threw toys out the pram over someone changing a flag of the nation changing the flag of the nation on the cover of it's manifesto.

[steviewevie]

Orange surge

[steviewevie]

[Nobody Interesting]

3 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

Orange surge

 

That would likely have Lib Dems as official opposition!

[steviewevie]

Tories getting squeezed by Reform, but Labour's polling has been dropping too recently. Maybe because of more scrutiny, maybe because they look like a shoe in. Still going with a 100 seat majority for Labour.

[steviewevie]

and Ed Davey having a pretty good campaign. Lib Dems don't get the same level of scrutiny, and his doing silly stunts may actually be working, along with him talking about his family. It's a distraction from boring stuff like tax and spend and the sh*t state of everything. He seems more human than Sunak or Starmer no matter how hard they try.

Plus, their manifesto was pretty good for anyone who cares about that sort of thing.

[steviewevie]

29 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

Tories getting squeezed by Reform, but Labour's polling has been dropping too recently. Maybe because of more scrutiny, maybe because they look like a shoe in. Still going with a 100 seat majority for Labour.

and that majority could be real soft by the following election if Labour in power disappoint which is very possible and the Tories sort themselves out which is maybe less possible, but like in 2019 to now all those voters spread across everywhere in various marginals could switch back and we're looking at a Tory landslide.

[steviewevie]

the only poll that matters

 

[lazyred]

6 hours ago, Kurosagi said:

 

This in spades.

 

As a traditional left winger it summarises my disappointment in Starmer and his race to win the election at all costs. Farage has been successful in shifting the centre ground in this country. Populists of any colours are problematic I'd argue, but there is no voice that I'm aware of from the left that is having similar success by countering the centre ground shifting further to the right.

 

I suppose Andy Burnham has tried a bit, Mick Lynch was a refreshing voice early on in the strikes, everyone associated with the mainstream left as headed up by Corbyn has been demonised, purged or silenced.

On the general point about moving right to win, when Labour don't do this then they lose. I don't really see much difference in policy between Starmer and Milliband. I see these people as mainstream soft left Labour.

As for Farage and Reform, 20 years ago my local council and others had BNP members. It isn't as bad as that now. Labour haven't followed the Tories on immigration, they are going to allow illegal immigrants to claim asylum and process the backlog. Most of them will be granted asylum. What they need to do is deliver on housing and improved services so the far right can't exploit those grievances.

 

[Neil]

11 hours ago, Nobody Interesting said:

Labour seem to think everyone has spare time and is happy to just work longer....... receptionists, dental nurses, hygenists and the dentists themselves................................ perhaps they don't want to work evenings and weekends.

 

Labour has promised to create 100,000 extra dental appointments for children, in a bid to clear backlogs in England.

The new appointments will be for urgent and emergency care and on evenings and weekends, according to Labour's plan if they win the general election.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crgglpvze3no

from what i see of Bristol the number of nhs dentists is improving quite quickly