Thread 49 Sunak: He Left them on the beaches

[DuncinToffee]

3 Weeks to go

Previous thread
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5090939-thread-48-sunak-capsized-on-the-ship-of-lies?page=40

Yeah, I totally understand that. We’ve had a similar situation for years. Labour never expected to win in this constituency so didn’t bother to field a candidate who could make even a dent in Tory MP’s majority.
From a couple of weeks ago on here, when I thought “hang on, I don’t even know which nonentity they are putting up this time” I discovered they have chosen a young, properly local, comprehensive educated (and a school that isn’t universally admired) woman whose career is in public service. She’s been everywhere since being selected and she is talking about the things that matter around here. They don’t particularly matter to me, but they matter to the families, businesses and older people.
So I guess there’s my inspiration.

Yes I like Johan too.

I'm not uninspired by Labour.

I think we are in a lot more trouble than people appreciate. Flat economy. Poor public services. High taxes. High energy/housing/childcare/transport costs. Nothing to show for it.

Sensible, practical policies that start with where we are now are necessary. And then offer me more in 5 years.

So no false promises thank you. Start by fixing the damn roof.

Someone on another thread recommended this bonkers but great musical about John Maynard Keynes and the Treaty of Versailles after the First World War in which he argues against the harsh reparations that Germany were forced to make and which led to the rise of Hitler.
There are a couple of moments in it which really resonated with me with regards to the rise of populism today.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0015l42

Jovan not Johan - damn you autocorrect.

Uninspiring is fine. Can’t build an ornate bell tower without laying the foundations for the church first. So let’s do that.

I love this @Saucery

@MrsMurphyIWish good point about Gen X influenced by growing up under Thatcher.

Your DS has some interesting views @user8800 - being politically aware doesn't always correspond with being correct. My DS has politics A level and all that - he's voting for the wrong party this election IMVHO 😂

I'm Gen X too, and definitely getting more left wing as I age.
I grew up in the Netherlands, and my parents were left wing too - they found out that at one point they had been on a government watch list because they had regularly gone to a communist bookshop while at uni. 😂

Glad to be amongst so many like minded peers ☺️

I've always been pretty left wing. As I've got older I'm happy to take any form of left wing I can get over the current mess.

I’m amazed how Thatcher was revered by many. My parents never worked, I grew up on benefits but they voted Conservatives all their life. Where I grew up (predominantly Indian and Pakistani), Tory MPs definitely tapped into “you can’t get a job because the non-whites have taken your jobs and your homes”.

My family and I were living in the UK when Thatcher was elected. My dad was on a year long secondment from his job, my mum was able to get a sabbatical from hers. My parents were actively considering staying in the UK and settling down; I'd passed the 11+ and would have gone to grammar school here.

Thatcher getting in made them decide to return to the Netherlands.

Very true.
But he's just finished a politics degree so when he talks about voting behaviour, trends and history I listen

I'd argue that - much as I loathed Thatcher and all she stood for - she understood that a lot of people want to feel they are inherently better than others.

The right to buy scheme - make homeowners of a larger proportion of the electorate and them scare them re: higher taxes/interest rates

"No such thing as society"

Her espousal of Reaganomics

The rot started with her

Agree. My parents - no qualifications, left school at 14 - thought they were “better” than our neighbours as simply they were born in England and thus have them more of a right to benefits and public services than an immigrant.

Ds graduated in Politics & International Relations 2 years ago and was fortunate enough to get a job in his niche field, Public Affairs

It's interesting talking to him: he's very angry at the damage that our generation has done to the planet, is moderately left wing can't stand either the Tories or current Labour , and very pro-LGBT rights (although doesn't think that trans women should compete in women's sports but still complains that Emily Bridges has been "banned" from cycling, even though he literally cycled in the same competition as her, when she was a he ).

He thinks that Scottish Independence is inevitable given the demographics of support - although he wants to be part of a new centre left party after it happens

That’s my take on her as well, she started the divide & conquer & people wanting services/resources but not paying higher taxes for them, I’ve always thought that’s what drove privatisation, raising money by selling the family silver rather than taxes (could well be wrong economics not my strong point)

My ds feels very let down by labour

He's angry, too

I'm not sure the SNP in its current form will ever gain independence (which is a bit weird as its their only avowed aim...)

Talking of Thatcher by chance I was just reading thiss book review -

'Then Thatcher ruined everything. The Big Bang, the City, bankers, bonuses. The Conservatives took the leash off the private sector. This meant that the Good Chaps could make a ton of money working in skyscrapers for hedge funds rather than attending sleepy government training days in hotels in Buckinghamshire. “The Thatcherite ethos made the idea of serving the state for its own sake seem a bit silly,” Kuper argues. So a new gilded, transnational elite emerged.
After 2010 a concierge conservatism evolved to oil this elite’s gears, award it dodgy contracts and generally tickle its belly. Based in Mayfair and the City, the new elite “began to corrupt the Westminster one”. Both parties, but especially the Tories, “sold themselves to the super rich”. (Kuper is at his most interesting when he wonders whether the next Labour government will be any different.) They all mingled together at 5 Hertford Street, a Mayfair members’ club that one regular describes as “the Brexit sex dungeon”. Good Chaps became chancers.'

https://www.thetimes.com/culture/books/article/good-chaps-simon-kuper-review-rjlrh7jhp

Ds and I are very much looking forward to seeing just how few many votes our current mp gets on 4th 😁

Hehe hehe

Particularly liked this quote from the book review -
"The result? Just as in the 18th century, rackets and wheezes, quacks and mountebanks proliferate like summer flies. For them the state is not a machine to be improved but a carcass to be picked clean."

When did you notice your children becoming political? DD turns 13 the day after the election and thinks Sunak is a dick but has no other political views. She has been raised in a liberal household, we have many LGTBQ friends (her cousins were conceived due to IVF as my sister in law is gay) and I think she lives in a protected bubble of liberalism and views the works through that lens. I tell her about my past but I really don’t think she connects a neglected kid with her “middle class” mother.

Sorry for the diversion - the posts about your children studying politics has made me think.

I guess during A levels (17)

He's very politically aware/interested. He's done some limited research on voting views for his dissertation.

He's also done a lot of research on the 1975 and 2016 referendums

I've also told my dc about my upbringing under thatcher...my memories of going on cnd marches, collecting food for the striking miners...

They are interested, but I don't think they can really grasp just how bleak it was/felt, bearing in mind current issues.

I might be the youngest on the thread then, as a Millennial (had to check!). I feel my peers are perhaps more liberal in general but left leaning. I am at the older end though and think the younger end is more left. I don't know many if any who would be loudly conservatives. I do think a few are quiet conservatives who hate the way it has swung to the right and feel quite politically abandoned on the whole. I think they thought Brexit would give the Tories some golden opportunities and didn't read or care about the fine print and are quietly mortified at what they've allowed in. I am not sure they'd tell me which way they would vote as I was loudly pro-remain, went on marches with dd and haven't pulled any punches if they post things on social media. I'm off that all for about half a year or more now, but FB became less political after Brexit, I feel? It does make me wonder who the Reform bot tirade is really reaching...and if they are unaware of what happened last time. The trouble is blaming the Tories for Brexit makes it feasible that there is another world in which it would have been a success and more effort is all that is needed. I don't want anyone to waste another decade on that. Leave it as as Rwanda and work on reversing it.

My DS is very left wing too. He’s voting tactically but says many of his friends are voting green. He’s a bit anti Starmer as sees him as too centrist.

As for me, my DPs were very politically active and DF was a senior Trade Unionist in the steel works when Thatcher was smashing up industrial Wales. Both very pro Europe.
I remember DF taking me to the polling station when I was 6 and explaining ‘Labour are for the working people, the Tories are for the rich’.

Dd was asking Dh and I which election we first remembered.

Dh was 1974 (x2!!). I think I was probably 1979 and the lead up to it; winter of discontent etc.

I remember Wilson resigning and there's a picture of my dsis and I standing outside No. 10.

I share a birthday (date not the year 😉) with Harold Wilson. And my teddy was called Ted Heath; even though we were a Labour household!

@user8800 - you're conflating the SNP with support for independence The Greens also support it and during the Indyref there was even a group called Labour For Independence (not sure if they're still active but I'm sure they would re-constitute in the event of an Indyref2). There are even Conservatives who support it . That's why there are Indy-supporting groups like All Under One Banner and the Common Weal.

@MrsMurphyIWish Ds was brought up in a family that regularly talked politics at the dinner table - both at our place and my dad's. Because of my South African heritage, we took a keen interest in apartheid, Mandela and what was/is happening in South Africa - and minorities/injustices world wide. Ds even mentioned my heritage leading to his interest in Mandela in his personal statement when applying to Uni. Dh and ds have frequent discussions about American politics and the dangers of Trumpism (we're all West Wing fans if only that was real life ).

His long suffering girlfriend wasn't particularly into politics - but now has to thole our rants discussions when they come over for dinner She says she's learnt a lot . I don't think her parents were/are particularly politically engaged - but I've not met them both yet.