Half the country seems to be anti Starmer, anti Rayner, anti Labour, so…

[Lenelovich]

If they’re so bad, who’d genuinely do a better job and why has the honeymoon been so short ?
Most of the Tory leadership candidates are guilty of much worse plus the UK is in an absolute state unless you live in Tunbridge Wells or Guildford so logically they really should not be having another turn.
Farage hasn’t got a clue and most of his plans, although popular, in reality are economically unviable and would bankrupt the country.
Leaves Ed Davey and the Lib Dems who like Labour are on the whole untried and untested but relatively untainted.
Any ideas ? Or is this criticism just a SM thing and most folk are willing to give them a chance ?

Okay I confess, I'm a bit of a bot.

You caught me...

Of course it may be just possible a lot of the labour voters voted to get Tory's out, and don't agree with labours policies. They are just the only other party who can get in.

And because of that we are now stuck with the other, lighter Tory party under the labour name... so thanks for that.

Wait, how did they get in then?

I'm disappointed in Starmer for sure but they aren't bribes!

They aren't in exchange for Contracts, they aren't to get someone in the House of Lords ( he's already there) .

They are over many years & have all been declared & in total are less than the money Johnson was gifted for the decoration of the Downing St flat that he didn't declare!

It is still rubbish, and tone deaf but let's not let a good story get in the way of the truth!

This is what I was going to say but you put it far more eloquently than I could.
Politics attracts far too many people who just love the sound of their own voice and the glory of being elected. They are in it for themselves, nothing more. This swirling cesspit puts off decent people who don't want to be associated with such characters.

The short termism/lack of foresight and planning/us versus them mentality prevents anything valuable being accomplished.

100%

Starmer was beyond stupid to have slashed WFA, thats whats given the Labour hating media an open goal, contrasting against him accepting suits etc etc

I think the Labour Cabinet is just too lightweight and doesn't have the talent to bring major change. I don't see Rachel Reeves in the same league as previous chancellors like Lamont, Dawson, Kenneth Clarke or Darling. Lammy is totally out his depth and will need to be replaced in the next reshuffle. Other than that, the rest of the cabinet are instantly forgettable. I don't think the government have the experience in business, politics, international relations or economics to garner much confidence.
Saying that, there is no viable alternative currently.

We'll just have to ask David Davis and Diana Johnson to take up the reins of all the jobs and do their best, hoping to mistrust them the least.

Your team has had its chance and so has he. How on earth would he become PM ?
And hardly been elected with a wave of positivity. Sure you’re in the right country 😂

You keep going on about the Guardian. It’s not been left wing for years. More liberal leaning. And your description of the BBCs presumably bad headline is puzzling. Why would you want it so ?

And you and other posters keep going on about right wing press The Guardian is not that is it

Which media is politically left enough for you anyway?

I have never been able to understand why there wasn't an option to pay back the WFP to the government, for those people who felt they just didn't need it. I suppose there are very good reasons which I just don't see or understand.

What if Rachel Reeves had reduced the WFP to £100, from £200, except for the people who are on Pension Credit? I wonder if a reduction in it would have annoyed fewer people and still brought in a bit of money.

Edit to say I'm sorry if it's a de-rail, but not very sorry as it's about the current administration.

Back in the 1970s, when I first voted, people often lived where they grew up with lifelong, stable family groups and friends. Those groups had allegiances, they lived the same lifestyle, read the same newspapers and people, largely, stuck with the party they always voted for.
Now life has moved on, people are more mobile, not many of us live in those stable, lifelong groups, society is far more fragmented and we all have social media bubbles assuring us that our thinking is right.

Instead of Labour stand for A, B and C, Tories stand for X, Y and Z so vote accordingly we now have a much wider range of views, A to Z if you will, and the main parties are scrabbling to try to cover as many as possible which is simply not achievable in practice. This means that any party coming into power will have allegiance from far fewer people than in the past with media and social media constantly stirring up other groups against them so, whereas in the 70s, you'd have a large group for Labour and a large group against, now you'll have such a range of views that it looks like only a very small group support them.
Add to that reduced attention spans and need for instant gratification to make just what we have here - an expectation that if the evil Tories were removed everything would be hunkydory within weeks of the election. There were quite a few of us oldies warning against this in the run-up to the election.

Ultimately I don't think any political party can satisfy the wants and needs of people nowadays. This country, and many others, are becoming ungovernable

'Starmer was beyond stupid to have slashed WFA, thats whats given the Labour hating media an open goal, contrasting against him accepting suits etc etc'

And the fact they did it on it's own, ahead of the budget was also pretty stupid!

We've got to wait for the budget but it wouldn't surprise me if they left the limit for pension credit to a more acceptable limit!

But it's been there as a policy on its own for absolutely weeks!

They are going to have to get much smarter at managing their messaging!

This is such a good idea. The reduction would have been so much more sensible as a first headline policy. THEN the chat about how the triple lock will cover stuff. Moaning would have had much less effect.

Because the remaining vote was split into the other parties.

@Dbank oops, my bad

The labour government in 1997 came in with a landslide and inherited a healthy budget to spend, so they were able to play disney dad to the country. This time they came in with a landslide with no money, so they have to play skint dad to the country.

I know they won the election with a massive majority of seats. My point is this:

I am commenting on the OP's title, which says half the country is anti Starmer etc. Specifically, I said that based on the numbers (the 1 in 5 stat that has riled you) that it is clear why half the country could be anti Starmer despite him just having won with a big majority.

I'm stating facts. Nothing for me to suck up.

I left the UK two decades ago so I'm on the outside looking in, and I think attitudes towards Starmer and this government are unbelievable.

The UK has had two massive jolts in the last two decades. Brexit - and the GFC (which everyone forgets about.) They've blown a massive hole in the UK's public finances that can't just be wished away yet that's what the British public expects. The attitude seems to be that all these problems are easily fixable and anyone half-competent can do it. Watching Theresa May take office was excruciating. People were acting like she was the next Thatcher, riding to the rescue. She obviously wasn't. And then Magic Grandpa Corbyn as an alternative. Seriously??? And then Johnson, heading up perhaps the most incompetent and corrupt government since before the Reform Acts, and he left public finances in an even worse state.

And Labour are supposed to fix this shitshow in a few months and make everything right like Mum? It will take years and years. At least two parliamentary terms I reckon.

As for the winter fuel allowance? What a joke. Rich pensioners don't need the State to pay for their heating. Those who need it can get it anyway. Seems like the government has to deal with some excitable and very dim backbenchers.

As for these gifts Starmer has received: just a total beat-up. Politicians receive gifts. Not bribes - but anything given to people who happen to be in a public office, such as the use of an apartment for one's son, or.an executive box to keep public costs down. Starmer isn't the first, though I suspect he's much much better than at least one of his predecessors at declaring them. He's not hidden anything.

With Starmer the adults are back in the room. I trust he has the good sense and responsibility to keep on making the tough choices, even if ultimately he's forced from office and hated.

Or I guess the alternative is that the Corbynistas get in, hike taxes, print money, melt down the economy with inflation, Tory/Reform replace them, mismanage everything and the UK becomes the first country to drop out of the G20 and then the OECD.

The same thing that fuel Brexit is filing this, people want change, but they don't really know what change.

They can see towns and cities disintegrating, knife crime, rising costs and are desperate to change something. But the truth is this is not going to change, and desperate people do stupid things.

It will continue getting worse, it doesn't matter who is in charge or what colour tie they wear. It's too late, debt is too high.

Make the best of what you have now, because tomorrow will be worse.

@TomPinch agree. Brexit is the elephant in the room and proof that actions do have consequences. Massive black hole in the economy before we even discuss the pandemic. And yes as a nation we are actual paying for the energy bills of a section of the population, some of whom don’t need it, on top of a £900 increase in the state pension.

People thought Starmer would be ‘different’ and anti-corruption- so people feel they’ve been tricked when it turns out that he’s a hypocrite. People hate hypocrites! He also hasn’t been in parliament long enough to hone his political skills - he’s naive in some regards and overly convinced in the righteousness of his cause. Setting policy for short-term political reasons rather than well thought through economic or strategic reasons. This comes across as spiteful. Cutting wfp while giving well paid train drivers a pay raise shows a worrying lack of political nous and very odd priorities.

IMO politicians aren’t paid enough. We need the best people to do this massively important, responsible job and those people can earn a lot more doing something else. Or we need people who’ve experience of the world coming into politics (they currently need to be independently wealthy to do this - which seems to be dissolved of by the electorate). Career politicians haven’t generally shown themselves to be any good at running the country.

@Sandysoles just a question, how has KS been corrupt ? Very big thing to accuse someone of that. The whole giving freebies to those in power thing isn’t a good look but has happened for years. And yes he should have read the room.

Ha ha Pls have some consistency!

One minute KS hasn't been in Parliament long enough and the next we don't need more career politicians!

Starmer was a Lawyer, he is far from a career politician, same goes for Sunak or even Bojo - has worked out well!!

Also, pretty much all the gifts he has taken were well known about prior to the GE, all declared but only now, shock horror do we get to hear about them..... now why do you think that is?

I think the main problem here is that the Tories cannot accept they lost & they lost because of people like Badenoch and that crook Jenrik.