Thread 19 Starmer - A Coalition of the Willing

[DuncinToffee]

.https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5276594-thread-18-starmer-all-sides-of-the-house-agree-apart-from-the-trump-bootlickers?page=40&reply=142583752

previous thread

He'd given the impression that it was his personal account. Threats to harm him (assuming they did happen) still aren't cool, though, no matter how much of an arsewipe he is.

Guardian reporting this morning that Labour are not backing down on major welfare reform.

so who knows where only came from, where the u turn story came from or where guardian are getting their info from.

They’re getting their information from the government.

The Guardian article just repeats the watered down message about PIP changes that all news outlets are running.

@Rummly I think you are wrong. I don't think Labour have been
briefing/leaking cuts they have no intention of making. Cutting disability benefits is a bad look, there is no way of making it a less bad look.

How do you know this? and what do you mean by Government? official? leaked? unofficial opinion.... ?

Interesting discussion on over diagnosis on R4 this morning.

The only element that is "watered down" is possibly not freezing PIP.

Anyway, we will find out the extent of the cuts tomorrow. It will not be pretty, but a few Mumsnetters will be gleeful.

It doesn't have to come from the Government - it can, of course, come from disaffected MPs, SpAds etc. Or it can be nudged along by MPs from other parties. The media have hours of time and pages to fill.

"It will not be pretty, but a few Mumsnetters will be gleeful."
Yup.
For some the cuts will never go far enough.

Do you think Labour hasn’t been briefing at all; or that they have been briefing, but truthfully about the government’s intentions?

Speculation & opinion, we'll find out soon enough.

Come on. If the whispering was coming from other parties, Labour would say so. If the briefing was all untrue the government would just deny it.

I find those possibilities very, very unlikely. This is government spin and briefing.

I don't think Labour has deliberately been feeding the media lies in the way you suggest. I think a lot of it is press speculation, especially given a lot of what has been published is muddled about how the disability benefits system works.

Anyway, whether Labour has or hasn't been briefing is immaterial and quite honestly I don't care about that and I am not sure why you are so fixated @Rummly .

What I do care about is what affect this speculation is having on disabled people and the anxiety tomorrow's green paper will cause, especially for those who have mental health difficulties.

I agree. It would be a profoundly stupid way to conduct government. Streeting said yesterday that the Cabinet have yet to see the detail and I believe him.

It may be that I’m wrong about Labour seeding lies in the press. Perhaps they really are briefing the truth of their plans. I was giving Labour the benefit of the doubt!

Whatever the reality of Labour’s media operation over these welfare cuts, what is being reported is not ‘speculation’.

You keep telling yourself that, you don’t seem to be convincing anyone else.

Sure.

It is speculation. Cuts are going to be made, but no one yet knows the exact detail of the cuts. The only concrete detail is from the rather spiteful DWP statement (which has Kendall's fingerprints all over it, you can tell from the way it is badly written) which indicates changes to the lcwra.

What do you think about the actual cuts @rummly? You have been a bit silent on that.

The areas - supposedly - to be cut or have changes made have been briefed by Labour. That’s what the papers are reporting.

Incidentally, I’m not saying that government always speaks to journalists with one voice. Reeves’s press people, No 10’s, the DWP’s etc may have different objectives and give different emphasis, but this is all obviously coming from government one way or the other.

In this case no part of government has appeared to contradict another.

Interesting choice of timeline.

Assisted dying first.
Then benefit cuts.

The conspiracy theories write themelves.

I think changes and cuts have to be made. The projections for the welfare bill by the time of the next GE are especially alarming. The dire state of the economy and the pressure to shift spending to defence have made it all the more urgent.

I don’t think Labour is wrong to try to push the welfare bill down. To be fair to Labour, the Tories didn’t do enough about it. But if this government doesn’t make meaningful welfare reduction quickly enough there’ll be a lot more pain down the road, given Labour’s economic strategy.

I certainly think that the most vulnerable should be protected. But not all claimants are the most vulnerable.

My prediction is the assisted dying bill won't make it through Parliament.

Just remember that MN is a bubble where everyone earns a 6 figure wage (whilst doing their best to still be eligble for funded childcare), PS VAT is armageddon and benefit bashing is a favourite pastime.

Well, at least thats a tacit admission the last 14 years of the Tories has been of failure.

The case for increased defence spend has been apparent since 2014, yet successive Tory Governments cut it.... even had planned cuts in their july 24 manifesto.

& the economy has been dire for at least a decade, remember we were in recession Q4 2023.... growth throughout the Tories tenure has been shocking, its nothing new but accepted as the norm when they were in power, its become a national emergency now Labour are in....