And the latter was completely necessary.
Westminster Politics
- Thread starter altodevil
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And the latter was completely necessary.
Even the Daily Mail was calling the government out for its shithousery on this, it’s a completely different milieu now than it was in 2014 for obvious reasons. Starmer deserves some credit for the climbdown but he was opposing a universally derided government policy, the tougher tests will be when he has to bring the public onside too.
He just won't bother. Easiest thing in the world today would have been to point out that migrants shouldn't have to rely on saving the Prime Minister's life before their taxes were equal to non-migrants and he still couldn't risk upsetting the focus groups.
Yes.
He is nothing if not very astute. And he will be well aware of the need to gradually erode public confidence in the government by chipping away at them and their policies.
He has time on his side. Which is a rare luxury.
To be fair, the quandary that Milibands's Labour found itself in back then on austerity turned out very similar to the quandary that Corbyn's Labour found itself in on Brexit. In both cases they were caught between a core base that wanted one thing and a wider electorate that wanted the opposite, and both used policy fudges, ambiguous messaging and abstentions in the House to try and keep that balance at key moments. In both cases it looked like it was working so they stuck with it - Milband rode high in the polls for most of that Parliament and Corbyn had the relative success of the 2017 election - but both ended up as neither fish nor fowl to the electorate and paid the price in the end. From a details perspective of course austerity and Brexit were very different political journeys, but they were each clearly the dominant issue over Miliband and Corbyn's tenures and both made similar mistakes.
Keep 3 fridges apart
3 fridges is way more than 2 meters the mental bastards
Guess which fridge Boris is hiding in and you win a Covid-19 test.
Boris has certainly done his job for the Tories winning them an 80 seat majority, they can now go on and do in the next five years almost anything they want to do. Boris has already shown he can 'change tack', when either he wants to, or is force to do so and what is more this willingness to adapt is not hurting him with the public, especially during a time of national crisis as with Covid-19, when the public realize the government is walking a tight-rope.
Starmer is obviously a different opponent for Boris than Corbyn was , especially in the House of Commons; his training as a barrister will allow him to be more analytical and precise with his questioning. However there is a danger that if Starmer keeps referring back to 'mistakes' etc. he will be seen by the public as being a hindsight-jockey and support will ebb away. Starmer and Labour now have to get on the front foot, as he started to do earlier, pushing for a published strategy on getting out of lockdown, asking how existing publish plans already in play by the Government may need to be altered.
The British public will support almost anyone in office when they are seen to be doing their best and Boris has projected that view, they will not take kindly to opposition that is perceived to be just sniping from behind cover and raising issues which have now been overtaken by events. The time for recrimination is when the pandemic is under control and Labour would do well not to mount and/ or attempt to ride this horse just yet.
The reality is that the Government has handled a lot of things badly during this pandemic, and despite what you say, well meaning incompetence (real or perceived) isn't that popular among the electorate. Witness Gordon Brown in 2008. While its fair to say that its difficult to assess the death rate accurately halfway through the crisis, it also seems very likely that when international comparisons can be fairly made in the future, Britain will come off extremely badly. If that happens the Government will be vulnerable.
With that in mind, I think Labour are approaching this in a strategic way. They're focusing on all the obvious areas of failure of the Government now, so that in 6 months time they can't be accused of being, as you put it, hindsight jockeys. The aborted herd immunity approach, the delayed lockdown, the number of deaths in care homes, the lack of PPE and the terrible communication from Government are all obvious issues. As the Tories managed so skilfully in 2008, Labour are trying to set the narrative while its still there to be set. In this case that ten years of Tory cuts undermined our ability to respond quickly and Tory incompetence meant we handled it badly in the moment. If Labour manage it (far from certain) that could be a potent combination.
Yes, but now is the wrong time, the electorate is worried about becoming ill, about not being able to bury relatives properly, worried about children in school, about shielding vulnerable members of their family, about returning to their jobs, losing their income, their holidays, travel issues, markets, etc. they are not interested in what didn't happen six months ago.
In my opinion if Labour doesn't get ahead of the curve on this and stop worrying about the recriminations and havoc they can cause later, they will remain in the wilderness for a generation.
They should be focusing on what strategy they can use to persuade an 80 strong majority Government to do the right thing going forward. Anything they can do to relieve the pressure on people going forward will help their cause.
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It's a fair comparison in terms of the problem with the electorate it presented and the outcome of failing to adequately grapple with the challenge but the main point was that Labour's capitulation to right-wing arguments on austerity, and in this example immigration too, was a fundamental betrayal of what the party should stand for. I don't think Corbyn's failed strategy on Brexit can be considered a transgression of Labour principle in the same way that yielding to Tory arguments on austerity or immigration can be. Leave/Remain is more complex than that.
Polling shows a clear majority of people currently think the government was too slow and hasn't done enough, so I don't think it works to say people aren't interesting in hearing this.
They went into the 2017 election pledging to end free movement, which was a clear concession on the immigration argument.
That is a consequence of honouring the referendum result, it’s incomparable to capitulating on arguments about austerity. And freedom of movement with the EU is just one aspect of immigration policy, the world is bigger than Europe and you can have a progressive and open approach to migration without the EU’s FoM - and Labour’s plans for retaining strong ties with the EU e.g. close alignment with SM, would have meant a migration system that was not far off FoM would almost certainly have been unavoidable.
I mean you're literally using the terms of the debate set by Farage and hard brexit Tories to say that "honouring the referendum" meant leaving the single market because of immigration/freedom of movement. That was the whole reason for Labour pledging to leave the single market - because of immigration. How is that defensible, but abstaining on a bill that was passing easily anyway something the party "can never be allowed to return to"?
It's far more straightforward and honest to just say that immigration policy and the differing attitudes on it from separate parts of Labour's base vote has caused massive headaches for pretty much every previous leader and led to both of the above examples.
Valid point re the framing. But this then boils down to your views on the EU and its compatibility with what Labour does/should stand for. It’s complex and I don’t think either a Remain/Leave position is a betrayal of that in the same way that austerity or a surcharge on all migrants to use the NHS is, then we have to take into account the fact we had a referendum which constrained Labour’s manoeuvrability on the matter in a manner that Tory framing with a compliant press re austerity does not.
The Daily Mirror break an exclusive story on Cummings breaking lockdown rules and the BBC Political Editor is transparently acting as a mouthpiece to try and dismiss it.
Note - the story did not say the police spoke directly to Cummings, but Laura suggests that was the claim because she knows that can be refuted. She also cited the source as refuting it broke guidelines when the details, which are not denied, are clearly against the guidelines - journalists are supposed to point these things out. Beyond belief how brazen she can be in clearly acting on behalf on the government/Cummings directly.
Note - the story did not say the police spoke directly to Cummings, but Laura suggests that was the claim because she knows that can be refuted. She also cited the source as refuting it broke guidelines when the details, which are not denied, are clearly against the guidelines - journalists are supposed to point these things out. Beyond belief how brazen she can be in clearly acting on behalf on the government/Cummings directly.
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Makes your blood boil doesn’t it?
The police should be investigating claims that Kuenssberg is a fecking journalist.
hopefully now that corbyn is gone, others will see her bias for what it is. (remembering the reaction here to the "pretty grim encounter")
She’s realised she can act with impunity, taken the mask off and just become an open and unashamed government propagandist now. Actively replying to a fellow journalists’s scoop within 8 minutes of it breaking citing anonymous sources to refute it
and the taxpayer is funding her to do this. I know exactly what she’s like and even I’m in shock at the brazenness of this latest attempt to protect CummingsGod if this story brings down both Cummings and Kuenssberg I'll spunk myself dry.
Pathetic from Kuenssberg. It’s embarrassing.
Wild prediction: they’ll both emerge unscathed.
Almost certainly.
BBC: 'Police charge lockdown-breaker Dominic Cummings with possession of terrible tracksuit bottoms. Laura Kuenssberg promoted to Director General'.
Even he was fired or resigned, he'd carry on being what he supposedly is: an 'unofficial' adviser'.
Haven't we heard enough from Laura tonight?
It shouldn't matter if he 'isn't remotely bothered'.
I'm going to complain to the BBC about Laura K.
Equally as important as the above though, is that Cummings gets the boot.
Equally as important as the above though, is that Cummings gets the boot.
Of course he isn't worried, Boris wont dare give him the push and he sure as feck won't walk himself.
It's fake news yet they've admitted to doing it and have tried to excuse it. Are we just following the Trump/Post Truth playbook from now on?