To wonder what could Starmer do, to turn things around?

The things he needs to do to turn the economy around will be political suicide for him from those that voted Labour. So the choice is focus on the economy but very quickly lose political support or focus on giving voters what they want but face continued economic decline (which will lose voter support in the long run).

I agree with several posters (that will boost the economy) namely:

Reform planning rules to build more houses
Cut taxes funded through cutting spending (I would except education as it's needed to create a more productive workforce).
Biggest savings to be made by increasing the retirement age quicker but this is definitely political suicide.
Join the single market asap
Cut energy costs especially for industry which pays double the price for electricity compared to the EU average- this can be done by having the renewable subsidies paid out of general taxation rather than being put on energy bills.
Tariffs- which if you want green credentials could be linked to the CO2 output of the other countries. It's ridiculous that industries are being closed in the UK due to tax and energy costs only to reopen in more polluting countries like China. But this will increase inflation.
Council's get a proportion of the value uplift in granting planning permission for everything but especially housing.
Make sure that it doesn't pay more in benefits to be long term sick than unemployed.
Whatever you do - don't increase national debt anymore.

Most controversial reduce the population by cutting legal immigration, birth rates already below replacement etc (less people = less pressure on infrastructure, services and resources). Again this will have an inflationary consequence.

I agree with this.

OK. 🙄

It’s probably a good idea for a few things, off the top of my head energy and food security for example

Don’t hit the farmers with taxes though, that won’t help

Proper change takes time and the right wing media wants us to believe Labour are awful.

Of course the media wants the Tories back, it's better for them plus they're all mates aren't they.

People with money have more influence.

I would love to see the following;

Rejoin the EU.

Bring essential public services back under Government control.

i.e. why is the government paying up to £17,500 per week to private companies to look after some of the most vulnerable children in these so called Solo Units. They should build more.

And why are local authorities paying £700 + per week for 1 elderly person in a care home on average.

All care home and fostering should be undertaken by not for profit charities. Or the government in house.

Looking after children and the elderly should not be done for profit, it's unsustainable.

Invade France. People love a bit of jingoistic flag waving. The Falklands did wonders for Thatch

It’s impossible. All the infrastructure has gone. It seems pretty insane to me that we now import so many things that we used to make but what do I know?

Good points here I think there’s a tendency on mn to talk about manufacturing but bashing out stuff isn’t high value add anyway

Tech is, or advancing

I recall a bit on China saying they were a bit fed up of being the world's factory and they too want wealth from ideas and concepts

We have ingenuity what we lack is scaling up. Here’s looking at onerous and non growth tax policies for that one.

Far more attractive elsewhere

Depends what you mean by "re-industrialising".

A lot of people bemoan the fact that "Britain doesn't make anything anymore".

What they don't realise is that there is really very little money to be made out of bashing stuff with hammers. We cannot compete with other countries for cheap labour.

What we can do is make more value added stuff. But that means more investment in high tech, robot laden facilities for mass produced goods. We already do quite well at specialist goods production as people would expect.

I also think the idea that we don't make anything anymore is a bit of a fallacy. We may not make many cars but we do have armies of IT people for example all creating stuff. Its not as if this stuff has zero value.

Britain does lag quite a bit in high tech production and manufacturing investment. Part of the reason for that is EU membership, where it has been easier to import cheap labour to do jobs rather than leverage technology to make production more efficient. We do seem to have a bit of a problem with anything that requires long term investment, or an attention span of more than about 5 minutes.

I mean, probably not because we don't currently have a source of cheap energy or any natural advantage in a manufacturing niche.

This with bells on. I’m a farmer with a fairly big business and kids at private school. I don’t actually object to paying more tax, VAT or the IHT. But the way they’ve done it is so detrimental to business. Tax profit not employees. Tax rollover money at 40%. Bring in VAT in September not January.

I think there is far worse to come in the economy. A lot of farming contracts with the supermarkets are now driven by what’s an effective guaranteed margin. They know our (minimum wage) cost, feed and electric costs. When they go up it’s written into our contracts that our price goes up. With fertiliser tax added in I think you will be seeing way more food inflation from April onwards. I’m not worried about the increases as I’ll get paid more. I am worried about people putting shopping in their basket from April that will be going up and up.

Totally agree with all of this.

Labour can't kickstart the economy without kickstarting trade and get investment flowing again. Where are all those amazing trade deals that were only possible with the hardest version of Brexit ?? Nowhere to be seen... Labour need to stop being such cowards and expose the lies for what they were. Rejoin the single market and customs union NOW! But I suspect Starmer is too beholden to the more leftist elements in the party who have always considered the EU to be an evil capitalist organisation - whilst the great irony will be that we'll get sold off for parts to the US, China etc.
They're all idiots, the lot of them and I despair of reason ever returning to these shores...

"Tax Amazon"

Thing is everyone says this but Amazon are not evading tax (illegal), they are avoiding it. This is a gross simplification of how tax works across boundaries but basically Amazon isn't one company (legal entity), it's hundreds of connected legal entities in different countries across the world, which are owned by each other. Profits are taxed in the legal entity in which they fall, so companies will arrange transactions and intracompany pricing so that most profits get lodged in companies in countries with lower rates of corporation tax or no corporation tax. There are rules around Interco pricing to prevent this getting ridiculous but it's extremely difficult to stop them doing this at all unless all the countries get together and agree a global rate of CT (this will never ever happen). Even then countries will give companies tax breaks on CT if they think the benefit of an investment will be more than the tax loss.

Basically, I'd love Amazon to pay all their taxes in the UK but sadly, it's not even slightly within Keir's gift to make it happen.

Fuck off and quit

i think they're doing some excellent things. it's been 6 months, you can't reverse the legacy they inherited overnight.

People who are perfectly happy with Starmer will likely always vote Labour and it doesn’t matter what he does they’ll vote for them anyway

The harder part is those who have been turned off already. He’s managed to alienate a lot of people.

You forgot the bits where they declared war on the middle class by putting VAT on private schools and now concreting over village fields to build houses - take that you NIMBYS.

I agree. The private landlords raking in benefits to fund their multiple properties are a disgrace.

BTW, quite a few benefits are taxable.

Be seen publicly to be coming down hard on the profiteers who hold our essential services by the short and curlies. Bring essential service back into at least UK, if not public ownership. Some of the highest train fares in Europe are paying French pensions.

Tax Amazon.

Vigorously pursue the Michelle Mones, and those who permit such apparent corruption.

Get serious with adult social care. Lean on the unearned wealth of the wealthier pensioners. Make the idea of selling the 'family home' to pay for elderly care normalised.

Double the apprenticeship levy for all companies that do not spend it on young apprentices. Make companies train their own trainees, not expect the kids to shell out £45k debts to be, say, a graphic designer. Cease funding stupid degrees, turn those failing 'unis' into training hubs for the academic provision, via block release, for young trainees, so they get quality teaching AND a 'living away from home' experience. Invest in our young, even at the expense of our old.

Overhaul 4-18 education so it is more fit for the C21. Accept that not everyone needs or wants Shakespeare and quadratic equations. At 13-14, we know who they are. Enforce discipline.

Invest heavily in healthcare training. Limit healthcare visas to 5 years and no dependents.

Move towards rejoining the EU in some form.

Force the abandoning parent to pay up and properly for their kids.

Make work pay. If you're only £100pw better off after a 40 hour week (I guess) than you would be on benefits, why would you bother?

Stop selling council houses and tighten the rules for those who have. A percentage of the profit as you sell on should be repaid to the council. People want to see fairness, not profiteering.

Strongly encourage integration, deport criminals, dismantle any alternative justice systems, demand English proficiency. Go 'Swedish'. Heavily punish county lines operators.

Legalise and control cannabis.

ID cards. I was strongly opposed to them- we KNOW our governments will misuse our data- but I can't see any other way of containing our dark economy and misuse of our public services.

Provide carrots and sticks.

I'm perfectly happy with what he is doing OP.
Stop believing everything you read in the newspapers and on-line.