If you're not voting Labour because of Palestine or gender nonsense ...

[CheesyJacketPotato]

Are you really ok with having another Tory government? Because in all honesty that is what you'll get.

You really do live in an alternative universe.

I live in a world where avoidable dependency is frowned upon. Many people don’t hence why we’ll end up with Labour for a period of time.

Anyone who thinks that’s a good outcome for the country is either selfish and wants to benefit from the dependency culture or is totally deluded.

Define “avoidable dependency”. It’s hardly selfish to want functional public services.

Anyone not maximising their output.

Most people are dependent on higher tax payers.The ONS calculated that anyone earning under 70k receives more in benefits and/or services than their taxes fund.

Clearly this is an average however the point is that if everyone did the best they could without recourse to any public funds it would make everyone better off. Economic output would increase dramatically and higher amounts of public funds would be available to support a smaller number of people who are genuinely in need.

The situation you are describing may well be correct BUT who is responsible for this state of affairs?

Yes you guessed it, the party you want to stay in power for another 5 or 10 years, if as you say, they ve wrecked the country, why do you want more???

ime People do try their best but are held back by v poor management & they are simply not rewarded, people are reliant on in work benefits because employers, inc the Govt, have consistently given either zero or very low wage rises to the vast majority of people, hence now many cannot afford to live without benefits.
They are still doing it, Nurses got a 5% pay rise, inflation over the course of the year has been 10%, food inflation @ 30% and energy prices are around double that of 2 years ago.

On Thatcher, she would have been kicked out of the Conservative party at the same time as Clarke, Heseltine, Grieves, Soubry etc, during her time in office, she was pro EU and that in itself would have been enough to get her the boot.

The Autumn statement is out. I am not sure that it is going to benefit the Tories politically - too many people don’t think of NI as a tax and won’t see how the plant / machinery business rate tax break will benefit them.

Surely that is only valuing people’s contributions to society in purely monetary terms. What about people who do jobs that are essential to the running of society but will never be higher taxpayers.

Some people vote on the basis of particular issues that mean a lot to them and others lok at a range of issues. I want everyone on Mumsnet to vote next year (ideally vote Conservative including in the 2024 election for Mayor in London).

We have teh highest tax burden in 70 years even after basic rate tax NI came down to a total of 30% (20% tax 10% NI). I have absolutely no pleasure in the current high spending Tories with their huge state and massive taxes but they are the best of a bad job. Higher earners are taxed very highly indeed. Even those who don't pay income tax nor NI are paying 20% VAT, insurance premium tax, taxes on fuel, power and all sorts never mind council tax which is far too high too.

Yes, highest tax for 70 years and highest deficit since 1945 and you want us to vote for the incompetents who presided over fiscal catastrophe @Xenia? Not a chance.

Yes @Xenia. All the complaints about higher earners being taxed more are actually just disguised bollocks from greedy people being overpaid. For a start find out what topslicing is because it just means there’s a law of diminishing returns as you earn more. You don’t suddenly earn less after tax after your base salary increases. The terrible state of public provision - healthcare most prominently but also schools etc - means that is a bigger problem. All that wasn’t 100% ideal under Labour but has deteriorated under tories due to their privatisation fetish among other things. There are other problems like a failure to put rent ceilings in place and so on, making life more difficult. It’s really difficult for me to point out a single thing Khan has done wrong as London mayor, can you?

I guess I will have to vote Labour then. I could never vote Tory, that's for sure and I do like the local Labour MP. Sometimes I just haven't voted and then felt very guilty that the suffragettes did all that to try to get the vote and I did not bother.

It's a better option than someone who thinks one in a thousand women can have a penis and a party which thinks it represents Gaza.

This is NOT true, it was NOT the Tories who did this. It was Labour who caused the shit show by introducing the GRA in the first place in 2004 It was the Labour Party that insisted that it could change the legal sex and made it so that the birth certificate can be falsified to include the lie. If they get in they will make it yet worse by bringing in self Id.

How long have the Tories been in? has reform of the GRA ever been in a Tory manifesto?

Bad law can be got rid off but as i read elsewhere, the Govt is happy with the GRA and have no plans to change it.

The Cons have presided over the Trans shitshow, they done nothing about it, in fact have encouraged its growth with more clinics and easier and cheaper GRC's.

Still can’t get away from the fact that it was Labour who caused this by bringing in the GRA in the first place. At least the Tories have woken up and have started to turn it around, Labour for the most part are either hedging or in some cases, especially in Scotland, they are doubling down and planning full steam ahead.

The last statement on the GRA by the Government:

The Government does not intend to change the criteria in the GRA for legal gender recognition, meaning a system based on self-declaration is not being introduced. Elizabeth Truss said: “it is the Government’s view that the balance struck in [the GRA] is correct, in that there are proper checks and balances in the system and also support for people who want to change their legal sex.”
The Minister acknowledged the need to improve the process and experience transgender people have when applying for a GRC, to make it: “kinder and more straightforward.” She said the Government’s proposed changes would address the main concerns transgender people had expressed. The GRC application process is to be moved online and the fee has been reduced from £140 to £5
Elizabeth Truss said the Government would improve access to healthcare for transgender people, who had reported that waiting lists at NHS gender clinics are too long

What have the Tories woken up too?

Labour aren't in power in Scotland.

will be holding my nose against Labour’s left-wing anti-Semitism and misogyny (funny how those align) and voting Labour. With clenched teeth.

This

ffs! The Cass Review would never have been done under a Labour government, so the medicalisation of children and vulnerable people would still be going gleefully full steam ahead, now it won’t. That has been pivotal, and Labour will look like the sleeziest of the sleezy if they try to reverse that, because the scientific evidence just isn’t there and never will be, but the evidence of harm is there and is growing. None of the other things would have happened either. We won’t stop pressing for the clarification of sex, so that’s not going to go away anytime soon, it will be a constant thorn in the side of every government till doomsday.

Do you people not realise that coming onto a feminist forum, gaslighting us with your condescending straw man arguments, is actually achieving the polar opposite effect to the one you desire? Mind you, the fact that so many Labour acolytes are fully on board the TWAW train, even to the extent of threatening the physical safety of women in their own party, shows that they are sadly lacking in the critical thinking skills department. Operation let them speak continues 😂

I'm not the one swearing! & in doing so trying to bully me and stifle debate.
I'm perfectly entitled to my opinion, as are you, the difference is i'm not name calling and belittling.

Whether you like it or not, most people including women, have very little interaction with Trans people and its its not in the top 20 of issues the general public want dealt with.

I ve pointed out that despite fine words, the Tories are doing the polar opposite & continuing to wreck womens services and spaces, you've read their statement on the GRA, they have zero intention of changing that.

Cass was commissioned by NHS England NOT the Govt & as you don't have a crystal ball, you have no idea what Labour would or wouldn't do.

i personally hope that Starmer and the Labour offer greater clarity as at the moment, they are too timid on a range of matters, not that its hurting them in the polls.

Incidentally, this is "Chat" not the feminist forum.

Thanks @jasflowers. When I saw that reference to a “feminist forum” I thought for an awful moment I’d wandered on to FWR by mistake.

Oops, almost replied to the wrong post 🤦‍♀️

This is an old thread but just ignore that stuff

Trying to catch up on too many chats. I got you mixed up with someone on another thread, but my point still stands. So many of Labour acolytes repeatedly patronise and gaslight, and if they are called out on it they immediately employ Darvo and play the victim, if you aren’t one of them then I apologise. But you did seem to be using the exact same tactics. The title of this post would suggest, at least partly, that it is a feminist interest by the way.

I’m pretty sure of the direction that Labour is likely to take as I am seeing it play out in Scotland, the intransigence is startling, and the party in England shows no sign of disagreeing with their Scottish counterparts. That coupled with the fact that Keir Starmer still hasn’t made his position clear enough or apologised to Rosie Duffield and the other women for the way that Labour have treated them. Labour women have once again been denied a stand at the conference, showing that Labour know that they won’t be welcome there.

Labour aren’t in power in Scotland anymore than they are in Westminster. And don’t call people ‘acolytes’ because they have a particular political preference.

Labour might not be in power but people are asking us to vote for them so their position is relevant, and all MPs and SNPs are involved in voting in laws, so how are they irrelevant because their not in power? The Hate Crime laws and The Gender Recognition Reforms were passed in Scotland because Scottish Labour voted for them with the SNP, the Greens and the Lib Dem’s. How is the fact that they are not in power relevant? The Scottish Labour Party are not as separate from the English version as they would have us believe, and many regard Scottish Labour, not as an independent party in it’s own right, but as a branch office. They usually follow the political agenda of the English office, so it follows that the English version won’t have different policies.

Don’t tell me what to do, if people are relentless in their attempts to persuade people to vote in favour of a particular party, to the extent that they will constantly go over the same points again and again, gaslighting and patronising, inferring that you are just too silly to grasp the points then yes, I would call them acolytes. There are people all over these boards doing just that, repeatedly. Then when they are called out on that they employ Darvo tactics, say that they are being bullied, and claim victimhood, it’s very tedious.