To think that Labour will not be able to win a General Election with Corbyn as leader

[Question1001]

Here we are, looking at a Boris post truth Trump style of premiership and a no deal Brexit, yet the opposition is sitting on the fence on the latter, and run by someone who, while he might have his own fan base, is never going to win the country (as in UK) IMO.

For the greater good he should stand down IMO, and let someone else take over. Or we risk being ruled by a much more right wing Tory party for years to come, and the consequences of that don’t bear thinking about.

Apology accepted Question1001. Thanks

it doesn’t matter how good some of Corbyn’s policies might be, if his communication style doesn’t get this message across

I think it should matter. I mean in a democracy where we want to live in a nice country with good values.

I really think you are being influenced by the press. And I don't mean that as a criticism - we are all influenced by the media.

I think Corbyn communicates perfectly normally and often very well when you take the time to listen to him. He's good at speaking to crowds, he good at PMQs, he's no better or worse a communicator than most of the party leaders we've had IMO.

I don't think he is often given a fair platform and is often quoted out of context in the media however.

He’s bloody rubbish at PMQs. I’m tired of watching two completely out of touch pensioners bitch at one another over the despatch box. In three years he’s barely landed a glove on the weakest, most incompetent prime minister of my life time.

I put the search "Jeremy Corbyn" into YouTube and clicked on the first video on the search. I didn't seek anything specific out.

I landed on the above video of Corbyn doing his job - clearly ctiticising the government's legacy whilst the Tories shout and jeer at him and the speaker has to call them to order and tell them to STFU.

Corbyn communicates his political points perfectly well despite the difficult circumstances. (personally I think it takes courage and skill to do PMQs even though I think the format is shameful and outdated)

We only hear the first sentence of Teresa May's rebuttal but it is a personal attack.

YANBU, Labour voter for 30 years (until recent local & euro elections). My Labour MP is very good but cannot and will not vote for a Corbyn led Labour party in the next GE.

Is it unfair to say that he has done absolutely nothing to oppose this government on Brexit?

Of course it's unfair

That's another gobsmacking success of the media. Apparently brexit is Corbyn’s fault!

You couldn't make it up.

Corbyn suffers from the same problem that John Smith suffered from. He doesn't talk in soundbites. He talks like a normal person and needs more than 6 words to give a useful opinion on complex issues. As do we all.

So when some journalist fires at Corbyn "are you pro the EU?" or some such over simplistic question he tries to give a proper answer. He doesn't parrot slogans and soundbites about "Britain being great again" or about "taking control back".
He answers clearly but with nuance (remember when that existed in our politics). He will say that he agrees with the work done in the EU to improve the standards of living for the most disadvantaged communities but that he feels that workers rights are not protected enough.

And because our current political climate does not give space for nuance and the development of ideas about complex things a lot of what Corbyn, and politicians like him, is never heard, cut short, quoted out of context, misrepresented and dismissed if not mocked.

It's a sad state of affairs.

Look @Beachcomber, nobody said or even implied Brexit was Corbyn’s fault.

Thing is he and his henchmen constantly reiterate that policy is democratically determined by the membership. Some 80% of that membership want to remain in the EU, the party conference voted for a second referendum. So why is Corbyn dragging his heels and refusing to deliver what the membership wants?

This thread is about Labour being electable, however much you argue about him being misunderstood and victimised by Tory propaganda, the fact is people won’t vote Labour with him at the helm. However much @Graphista might snipe at the Blairite element, Labour won’t get elected to power without their votes.

Alsohuman I know people haven't said it on this thread.

There is a common vein of thought however that I've seen in the media and many times on MN that Corbyn carries substantial blame for brexit.

It's extraordinary. Brexit is 100% a tory fuck up.

I don't understand why people say that they are Labour supporters yet they won't vote for their Labour candidate in the next election because of Corbyn. Britain is a multi party parliamentary democracy - we don't vote for a president.

Crazy.

remainers effectively have no representation.
On the contrary, remainers are disproportionately represented in Parliament. The problem from an electoral perspective is that it's not aligned with the parties (except for the Lib Dems who are tiny in Parliament).

Some 80% of that membership want to remain in the EU, the party conference voted for a second referendum. So why is Corbyn dragging his heels and refusing to deliver what the membership wants?

That inconvenient little matter of the electorate?

I'm not bashing Labour policies, bring them on. Corbyn has been relentlessly trashed by the usual suspects, it's unkind, it's unfair and is to be expected. But his job is to prove that wrong, loudly and publicly, in the House and out of it. He has failed badly and it IS personal, a personal failure. He needs to go.

Agree. I can't vote for him.
I'm so angry he's there tbh as he's taken away a viable opposition.

Yeah all the time Corbyn is in charge, labour will never get in which is a good thing imo.

Agree. So I say "Corbyn 4ever!"

YANBU OP. I don't know how the Labour Party can recover from their awful lack of judgement in allowing Corbyn to stay as leader. It really irritates me when the MSM crap comes out, when they're only reporting what he does and did in the past.

PS - he really is an awful public speaker. His speeches consist of aggressively shouting the same meaningless guff no matter how irrelevant they are to the topic on hand. I haven't forgotten the time I saw him on the so-called Referendum campaign when he wittered on about Thatcher and didn't mention the EU once. His carefully edited YouTube videos of him at PMQs poorly delivering a staffer's script aren't the best advertisement anyway but are 1000x better than him in real life.

PPS - he is ALWAYS late!

The problem is that Labour is split over Brexit as much as the Tories are. It may be true that 80% of Labour membership voted remain (I don’t actually know) but the crucial question is what did the majority of their traditional voters vote in the Referendum?

Have a look at the map showing where Leave and Remain won. Looking at England and Wales only, Labour may be strong in London and a few other university cities, but the Labour heartlands are in the Midlands and the North and in Wales. Scotland was once strongly labour but independence is the major issue there now.

Some who vote remain argue that Brexit is a right wing movement, indeed a Fascist movement. They are spectacularly missing the point. It is the working classes who have been hit hardest by uncontrolled immigration and they see leaving the EU as the only solution. They are not fascists - they are traditional socialists. Some people who vote remain do not want to acknowledge that simple fact.

It seemed clear to me in the days before the Referendum that Corbyn and those closest to him were Leave supporters. They couldn’t say that out loud due to the flip side of Labour. Because Corbyn has tried to play both hands at the same time, he is now losing on all sides.

I suspect most of the posters here are supporters of Remain, but if you want to understand what is happening in the very heart of the working class Labour vote, take a look at what happened in Mansfield in Nottinghamshire at the last election. This is a former mining / industrial town which has always been strongly Labour. It returned a Tory which is nothing short of astonishing. Those who jumped to Conservative were punishing Labour for not moving forward and assisting in the delivery of Brexit. People on here are punishing him for not preventing Brexit.

In my view, Labour needs to work out what it believes in, quite apart from deciding whether they have the right leader or not.

Motheroffourdragons

We had a referendum. We had that referendum under a tory government, right?
The public voted for brexit, right?

What is Corbyn supposed to do about that?
He will be criticised no matter what he says and does.

The Tories offered the British public a chance to choose brexit and the public chose brexit. Trying to scapegoat Corbyn and or the Labour party is outrageous.

I agree that Labour are not all on the same page all the time when it comes to brexit. Neither are the Tories. Presumably because it's an incredibly complicated issue which has thrown the country into political crisis.

The way these discussions always go is like there is a spectrum from inherently evil, eats babies for breakfast sainted being beyond reproach.

Conservatives are always lumped in the former; and Labour (well, JC particularly) at the other end.

There's no recognition that maybe XYZ party fucked up one thing, but they are trying to do good stuff with another. OR that good people are trying to get the best out of a bad lot and are trying to vote accordingly.

It's always (for example) "Conservatives want to personally murder sick people and dance on their graves; while Corbyn has a plan that is affordable, costed and will save the entire country from everything that ails it, if only we'd let him" (or something similar vice versa).

Never voted in my life until last time and voted for Corbyn.

He should stand his ground and once the bollocks that is Brexit is over we can then focus on arguing that another way is possible. We do not have to have such a cruel society - no matter how much money is in the country it can be a fairer place then we have now.

He was supposed to fulfil the role of an effective opposition, that's his job, he didn't do it over Brexit. He didn't do it because he supports leaving the EU, that's the way he voted in the 1970 s referendum and his behaviour towards Europe hasn't changed since. Telling people that they have been misled by the media is beyond patronising what people really mean when they say that is I have a much deeper understanding of this than you, how silly of you. What this perspective ignores is that many of us who are against corbyn have been involved in the Labour party all our lives and have an inside view so to speak on what is going on. Nothing to do with the media.

And I agree with ButtinginBadly.

A lot of people who voted for brexit are people Labour represents. Corbyn often says that he is a staunch supporter of democracy. What do you want him to do? Ignore his electorate?

Plus Corbyn is, and always has been, somewhat euro sceptic. However he is not at all in the same camp as the tory eurosceptics. From what I understand, he considers Europe to be too much of a neo-liberal corporate project and responsible for austerity politics in Europe. Many would say that he is right.

Well said Butting, that is what has happened, you summed it up beautifully. Labour was for the working class it doesn’t seem to have those values anymore. Always lecturing people but being complete hypocrites themselves. Conservatives have always been for middle and upper class, they haven’t changed so at least you know what your voting for.

I agree

Labour all my life but wouldn’t vote for him. Wouldn’t ever vote conservative though. Hate that bunch of self serving twats.
I don’t like the Union influence at Labour that got him in the first place.

I want to back someone with less right/left wing views and adopting a middle ground.