To think this young man represents so much of what is wrong with champagne socialism?

[Pissfarterleech]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2042623/Rory-Weal-Child-star-Labour-conference-truth-life-poverty.html

The kid's an embarrassment.

www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2042366/The-mantra-hate-finds-new-star.html

Very, very funny!

I wonder if someone will roll out the footage of William Hauge at the same age!

It was a mistake then. It is a mistake now!

Oh it's true alright, google the kid. He's an ex public school grammar boy who hates the, " viscious evil Tories" whilst enjoying the education labour destroyed everywhere else in the country.

He never claimed to be a Socialist, he spoke as a supporter of the Labour party and welfare state.

Labour is no longer a Socialist party.

He did experience poverty as he knew it, his world was turned upside down by repossession and unemployment, the effect may have been alot less on his family than some but it still happened.

Can you not speak out against cuts unless you are living on the streets, then?

If you live down South and are well educated does that mean that you cannot support Labour?

He is a good example of the safety net provided by the welfare state, as are many working families, it isn't only 'scum' that use it.

So well-off people who fall on hard times aren't allowed to be grateful to the welfare state and say so? Only the working class should use the welfare state? So you can call them benefit scroungers I guess.
And vicious is spelt with a c not an s.

He's disingenuous.

He owes most of what he has to his wealthy parenting, private education and grammar school.

It is the Evil Tory run Kent council that gives him that education.

I suspect he's just not bright enough to have worked that one out.

How can he be an ex public school grammar boy? Either one or the other.

Though, to be fair, the kid would qualify as one of Eddie's New Deserving poor

And no 'kid' who does what he did is an embarrassment.

He's an ex public school boy who now goes to a grammar school. Thought that was obvious

'We were surprised because we thought he wanted to go in to something like acting.'

I ahve been a Labour party supporter all my life until the last election when I felt we had seriously lost our way.

I was hoping that this conference would steer us back to some sanity...but this is an own goal. Spectacular.

I'd be embarrassed if he was mine. Making out he was impoverished whilst having been at private school and living in multi million pound houses. it's offensive to those how are genuinely poor.

wordfactory absolutely, I was too.

Attack the cynics who set him up then.

The leadership of Socialism and the Fabians always came from upper middle class and above. They were the only people who could make a difference, had the time and wasn't close to death because of malnurishment/disease.

Look up the Rowntree foundation.

The welfare state in it's infancy was started because the working class wasn't fit enough to fight in the army, and carried illnesses that shock! horror! the upper class could die of as well, try educating yourself.

Walk through the streets of Bangladesh and ask yourself if you want to be living like that, because thats what not having a safety net creates.

The party has become more and more based aroubd a small group of elite intelligensia, all from similar backgrounds, all went to the same colleges to study PPE, all career politicians, all absurdly bound up with Gordon Brown.

There is no fresh air. No discussion. No debate.

This lad is just more of the same...

If something is 'wrong' with Champagne Socialism, that would be somebody on fizzy water, surely? Anyway, champagne socialism is hardly the greatest ill affecting us right now, is it? That would be unfettered capitalism, global economic collapse, and unfeeling Tory cuts.

HTH.

Yes, absolutely wordfactory.

Champagne socialists who patronise the poor and the vulnerable by trapping them in welfare poverty rather than helping them out of it.

I didn't read it as him making out he was impoverished. He said what happened, his family were wealthy but fell on very hard times.

So they fell back to the welfare state - that's what it's there for and he's supporting that.

So what if he goes to a grammar school? That's what is available in the area he lives, why shouldn't he use it if he is intelligent enough to get in?

I think it's horrible to start a thread like this. He's 16, and he's sticking up for what he believes in ffs. How can that not be a good thing?

What does he believe in?

Old skool labour? he goes to a grammar school FFS!!!!

But birds that time has long gone.

We no longer need those clever rich boys to fight the cause and lead the way and tell the poor what it is they need.

We need a party that reflects what the vast majority of working people in this country want.

slave I think if he'd been 16 and spouting absurdities at the tory party conference MN would have skinned him alive.

The reality is that this lad should not have been given this platform. He was clearly enjoying himself very much, but he has opened up himself and the party to ridicule.

He portrayed himself very much as a lad whose family lost everything through the evils of capitalism and that is simply not true. His father was a millionaire property developer who made vast tracts of cash by surfing the property bubble. But in that game you pays your money and takes your chances.

His minders should have checked all this out before he made out that his family had been the victim of tory mismanagement.

I read this article this morning in disgust.

Disgust that a child is being judged for being brought up by wealthy parents.

Disgust that the DM have found it necessary to dig into his life and humiliate him in public, at 16.

Disgust at the nasty and vicious comments people have left on the article, about a teenager who is only just finding his own identity.

Disgust that people like you, OP, are criticising him for going to a grammar school. I went to a grammar school. It was the choice of my parents. And I am against selective education in principle. So pick on me, I'm probbaly more your own size.

What a nasty thread you have created OP. Why don't you admire him for all the things you'd admire someone from your own belief system doing. Standing up and talking about his beliefs and convictions. Giving a speech in front of hundreds and on TV at 16. Taking an interest in the way his country is run, when most kids that age couldn't name half the cabinet.

It is NOT offensive to those who are genuinely poor. He was backing up the welfare state, showing it is there for everyone. The Tories would like to destroy it, not realising that yes, anyone can need it, at any time.

And, again. He's sixteen. What had you achieved by that age? Would you have said the same about William Hague?

I hope that if your kid decides to do something like that you'd support him, instead of attacking him like this. I hope that if journalists ask you for quotes they won't twist your words like they twisted the words of this boy's grandmother.

Sad, bitter, jealous people.

Ugh. I'm disgusted.