What do the Labour party need to do to stop their slow death?

[flashbac]

I'll start:

Starmer needs to stop acting like a rabbit in the headlights and actually stand for something. He has no charisma or gravitas. We want someone with a personality. Stand for something Starmer!

Stop pandering to the 'red wall'. Inspire people to vote for the party with some good policies instead of flip flopping about.

Have some inspiring and uplifting policies like:

• Free childcare for working parents
• making public transport normal and affordable
• subsidised green energy initiatives to help householders lower energy bills eg solar panels etc

And they NEED to distance themselves from that anti science TWAW stance. I'm all for being kind but a blanket dilution of what 'woman' means is regressive.

[ceilingsand]

And Keir Starmer needs to get off his arse and actually put up an opposition. That's his job now.

[MayYouLiveInInterestingTimes]

The thing is, I do often wonder what it is in the wider world that is making Labour so unappealing right now.

It is interesting, in an academic sense. Fucking frustrating in any real sense. I agree about women’s sex based rights, and the lack of acknowledgement of the real impact of increasing the population while outsourcing most of our production needs, except the damned financial markets which imo cause far more damage than they’re worth. Money making money, with no reality behind it, is corrupt as all hell. I do not like landlords and allowing inequalities to grow by helping the rich to become richer.

But people don’t seem to think about the ways out of it. The only way is to redistribute, by rebuilding a public sector, one built from the bottom up with a basic concept of public v private interest communicated and ironing out the modern version of Old Corruption. Many of - not all - the policies Corbyn and McDonnell were espousing would have started that. Yet the same people, or so they would have us believe, scream against both. I’m not sure I see a way forward now tbh. Too much is corrupted, too many people don’t step outside their bubbles, too few want to.

[Andante57]

They all make far too much money in this country to carry out any of their threats of pulling services, and I think most people whatever party they support, think Amazon Google etc etc should pay much more tax on their obscene earnings

Lifeaintalways yes I agree Amazon & Google etc should pay more tax and I agree that most people think that.
However is there any country in the world where they do pay fair tax? I guess governments all over have looked to find a way to make them pay more but for some reason these huge companies have found a way round.

[MayYouLiveInInterestingTimes]

Biden was talking about a global floor for tax recently, wasn’t he? I thought the EU might go with it as there was talk and concern about that before. The esteemed Sunak, who wants freeports, kept shtum.

[stackthecats]

@dubyalass

For those of you who previously voted Labour but now vote or are considering voting Tory - why? Genuine question, not intended to be inflammatory or goady. I can't see myself voting Labour again (despite coming from staunch Labour background) but I would never vote Tory in a million years, I find them reprehensible.

This is my position too, tbh I can't see myself voting Tory BUT if it really was the only way to preserve women's sex-based rights I might well do so.

I was saying on another thread today how surprised I was to find that over the past few years, I've realised that my existence as a woman comes before political allegiance by a long way. I'd compromise on my politics in order to preserve my basic rights as a woman, no question.

[Backstreetsbackalrightdadada]

Leaders, any leaders. It was weird seeing Keir starmer taken aback by that man in the pub... weren’t you a barrister, don’t you have a calm approach to debate? Was expecting a cool response (in both senses) but he looked just as silly as the man attacking him.

Oh and drop the “sir”, seriously...

[Backstreetsbackalrightdadada]

I’m voting WEP just as an issues party, makes sense for me. Weird that we’re half the population but I don’t feel represented at all by the lobbying Tories or useless labour. Sure lots are nice but they’re not at the forefront.

[MayYouLiveInInterestingTimes]

I can understand that, stack. This is the basic problem imo - you don’t vote for just the set of policies you agree with, you have to accept the package. We have so few packages on offer anyway: a binary choice one every 5 years for a nation this size is ridiculous. And when that package contains deal breakers, crazy ideologies that will deny and negate your very existence, what do you do?

[Oblahdeeoblahdoe]

@highlandcoo

I don't feel like I'm welcome as someone that has passed a certain point of financial success.

Both me and my DH come from a family of labour supporters, working class, state educated, had jobs from 16. We know what it's like to have very little and to need government help

We have managed to work our way into the top 1%, and I am more than happy to pay high taxes and contribute more because of this

But the the Labour Party demonise us for being successful. Their narrative seems to label us as selfish and to put it bluntly I'm sick of being labelled as part of the problem, rather than part of the solution. Therefore I can no longer vote labour

That said I don't vote conservative either cos I feel they swing too far in the opposite direction

This really resonated with me zzebra. DH grew up in a council flat, his dad cycled to work at an unskilled factory job and his mum at the local Bingo hall. He remembers having very little to eat on a Wednesday night before the next paypacket on a Thursday and - although his mum and dad were great parents - as a clever teenager he wanted a different future for himself. He has worked so hard, got to university on a bit of a grant and a lot of hard work over the summer holidays, as his parents couldn't help him at all financially, and finally reached a senior position in an international firm.

Labour says they want poor kids to do well, but as soon as you do you are perceived as having moved out of the working class and almost regarded as one of the oppressors. We are similarly happy to pay high taxes as we are very fortunate.

We do still both vote Labour at the moment, and I'm liking their new leader in Scotland, so far but I'm not feeling hopeful just now and their TWAW stance is just wrong.

I was never a huge TB fan and wish that John Smith hadn't died

I'm genuinely baffled by these statements - who has told you that the Labour Party don't want people to succeed? Neither of you are unhappy to pay higher taxes, I'm the same but I've never felt that the LP 'demonise' me. I could understand what you mean if you were landed gentry. Lots of LP members are middle class and well paid. I think it's the press that have made you feel this way.

[BronwenFrideswide]

@Backstreetsbackalrightdadada

I’m voting WEP just as an issues party, makes sense for me. Weird that we’re half the population but I don’t feel represented at all by the lobbying Tories or useless labour. Sure lots are nice but they’re not at the forefront.

If you are voting for WEP in hope that they are for Women's Rights you will be sorely disappointed as they don't know what a woman is either.

[ginandbearit]

I know this is trivial but in a way it's not ...listening to Starmer and Johnson in Parliament, whatever bollocks and dissembling Johnson said he sounded authoratative , while Starmer just sounded weak ..I know policies are what matter but fire and conviction and charisma matter too , and sadly Kier doesnt deliver his points with any of those . .

[stackthecats]

@MayYouLiveInInterestingTimes

The thing is, I do often wonder what it is in the wider world that is making Labour so unappealing right now.

It is interesting, in an academic sense. Fucking frustrating in any real sense. I agree about women’s sex based rights, and the lack of acknowledgement of the real impact of increasing the population while outsourcing most of our production needs, except the damned financial markets which imo cause far more damage than they’re worth. Money making money, with no reality behind it, is corrupt as all hell. I do not like landlords and allowing inequalities to grow by helping the rich to become richer.

But people don’t seem to think about the ways out of it. The only way is to redistribute, by rebuilding a public sector, one built from the bottom up with a basic concept of public v private interest communicated and ironing out the modern version of Old Corruption. Many of - not all - the policies Corbyn and McDonnell were espousing would have started that. Yet the same people, or so they would have us believe, scream against both. I’m not sure I see a way forward now tbh. Too much is corrupted, too many people don’t step outside their bubbles, too few want to.

I agree totally with this apart from the part about Corbyn and McDonnell - whatever it was they were espousing about corruption, they were at the same time talking about how there ought to be "civilised" forms of legalised prostitution (which is an ideology as steeped in the corruption of the person by market interests and capitalism as any Tory). Anyone who claims to be an old school Marxist, but thinks that buying women should be a nice market transaction hasn't got the first clue about money and inequality. And if they were reflecting their woke advisers on the issue of the terfs and swerfs, they needed to think more carefully about what they were signing up to.

For me, it wasn't Brexit or even the TWAW stuff that eventually made me ring up and cancel my membership: it was the pure disinterest in women so clearly visible in the attitudes to sex trafficking, prostitution and the sex industry on the Momentum left. That's not genuine Marxism or socialism, ithinking that a progressive attitude to the sex industry is to turn it into yet another nice market for men.

[ginandbearit]

What simple slogan or three word acronym would you design for Labour to at least sound electable ? What one or two killer policies that everyone understands would you devise ?
I'd nationalise the National Lottery for five years to bring the massive amounts of money into health , child care and small business opportunities to help the self employed , and have many more half or one million prizes..bread and circuses I know but if people see their chances of winning reasonable amounts and helping the country too , I think as a secondary policy it has attrctions .
Any one elsewant a go ?

[MarshaBradyo]

I wanted Starmer to be better but Labour feels a bit lost.

[noblegiraffe]

What simple slogan or three word acronym would you design for Labour to at least sound electable

'No tax rates for mates'
'No contracts for chums'
'End the corruption'

[Watermelon1234]

1. Stop the politics of envy
   
2. Stop throwing money at people to keep them dependent on the state and instead allow them to move up the ladder.
   
3. Stop alienating large swathes of their voters, typically northern white working people by patronising their very valid concerns about their jobs, homes, towns etc.
   
4. Listen to concerns about immigration and take them seriously.
   
5. Realise that most of the population aren’t interested in woke or associated issues.
   
6. Treat women better in their party and society in general.

[Ariannah]

I’m afraid I’ll never vote for them until they support women’s sex based rights. Their other policies are irrelevant - that’s a deal breaker.

[Hospitalexpert]

I’m not sure what the LP currently stands for. I notice how charismatic (or not) the leader of a political party is, look at policies on the economy, health and education. Europe would have been in before.

Some specific issues such as TWAW are important , but personally wouldn’t outweigh the main issues.
Have had leaflets from the main local election candidates, but none of them are specific- we will support the community to create new green jobs, we will improve schools. I saw somewhere that if you can change would/will or vice versa and it is an absurd idea then it’s a meaningless promise - we would not improve schools. Compare “we will rebuild the classrooms in Schools C and D”. At local level I would be impressed by small achievable goals.

[Watermelon1234]

Oh and stop treating wealth creators and people who are successful with disdain and understand that constantly attacking the higher earners will likely drive them away....

[emmylousings]

I agree that Labour need to understand the importance and prevalence of small 'c' conservatism in England, and have failed at that in the past. They are loosing the regions to such a degree I don't know if they can reverse it. Every time they loose they promise to 'listen' but I'm not sure what they have hear. Increasingly I conclude, that things just stay the same generally in the UK, because politically people are not that motivated, because it isn't quite shit enough (yet) - for enough people - to kick off about.

[notangelinajolie]

@flashbac

I'll start:

Starmer needs to stop acting like a rabbit in the headlights and actually stand for something. He has no charisma or gravitas. We want someone with a personality. Stand for something Starmer!

Stop pandering to the 'red wall'. Inspire people to vote for the party with some good policies instead of flip flopping about.

Have some inspiring and uplifting policies like:

• Free childcare for working parents
• making public transport normal and affordable
• subsidised green energy initiatives to help householders lower energy bills eg solar panels etc

And they NEED to distance themselves from that anti science TWAW stance. I'm all for being kind but a blanket dilution of what 'woman' means is regressive.

Sir Kier needs to go for a start.

[MercyBooth]

Last weeks fracas with the landlord of The Raven pub in Bath wont have helped.

[TooExtraImmatureCheddar]

Policies should support working people. Childcare. Social care. Minimum wage. Housing. Health. Education.

We need to get away from the idea that business comes first. People come first. Have policies to support a living wage, reduce/enforce the Working Time Directive, free childcare for working parents, proper paternity leave, increase maternity pay to minimum wage, invest in health so that folk can get dentist and GP appointments, invest in social care so that carers aren’t one of the lowest-paid jobs out there. Invest in well-being/leisure initiatives for everyone.

[SlipperyLizard]

I voted Labour in every election from when I was first eligible to vote, only lately lending my vote to the Lib Dem’s when I moved to a Lib Dem/Tory marginal. Labour got a tiny share of the vote here even at the height of Blair’s success.

Of course, I can no more vote LD now than I can Labour, because both parties are full TWAW. I will not vote for a party that doesn’t think sex is real and matters.

I will never vote Tory, so I’m probably going to spoil my ballot next election.

Generally I think Labour need to focus on policies that will make a material difference to people’s lives - better schools, healthcare, more police (tougher sentences mean nothing if criminals aren’t actually caught), properly funding the justice system.

I’m a higher earner and would like to see a fairer system for high earners to pay more tax. Give child benefit back to all, but (say) add a penny or two to higher rate tax. Scrap the withdrawal of the personal allowance over 100k and add, say, another penny or two above that level.

Scrap identity politics, and actually properly oppose the Tories.

[humansare]

If Labour actually wants to win an election any time soon, then they need to make several decisive moves that I don't think they have the balls to make.

Firstly, Labour needs to clean house. Everyone's currently banging on about Greensill and Dyson, etc, and how terribly corrupt the Tories are, but if the Keller report (Liverpool city council) and 'Red Len's Luxury Hotel spending spree' (Unite) has taught us anything, it has taught us that the big brown envelopes don't just feature in the Tory party. Labour wants to be seen to stand for something worthwhile? Then I suggest it gets rid of the parasites that infest the party as its first step.

I also think that Labour needs to sweep out all the social media loving self-styled 'firebrands' who spend half their lives wittering on Twitter about 'nasty Tories' and 'Maggie Thatcher' while achieving jack shit politically. I personally quite like robust debate, but screeching and name-calling and playing the blame game suggests you have no real argument (and not much sense). The clowns are currently running the circus, and people are tired of the noise they're making. It's a total turn-off.

Secondly, Labour needs to ditch Momentum and cut the Union apron strings. Nobody cares about 'revolution, Comrades'; they want their bins collected and half-decent public services. Labour needs to stop brown-nosing the 'special interest groups' like Stonewall, and focus on the ordinary, everyday concerns of British citizens, who care about education, immigration, crime rates, taxes, jobs, housing and the NHS.

Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, Labour needs to re-evaluate who, and what, Labour stands for. We don't need another version of the Marxist revolutionary party someone's already got that covered. We don't need another 'Green party', either we've got one of those, too. We don't need Labour to be 'an opposition party', if opposing merely consists of name-calling and blaming the 'other side' for the same shite tricks we're pulling ourselves: it just makes them sound like hypocrites and shysters and we've already got one of those, too. W need credible, realistic, useful, workable public policies that truly are for the many, not the few.

We need a good three word slogan, yeah? How about... Drain The Swamp... or has that already been done?