To call for a general strike to force a snap general election?

[TheDCDeserveBetter]

I think the state of our country is getting really serious, and I wonder - if we called a general strike, could we force a general election before Christmas?

For context, my GP surgery and local hospital is in struggling badly, so that my own health is now in big trouble.

My DS's secondary school is so short-staffed that my DS, who is super-smart, but has a dual diagnosis, has been having panic attacks and has dropped out. I'm not well enough to home school him, and there are not enough special school places to get him help.

We have had endless trouble with low grade criminal activity in volunteer organisations over the years and no help, because the police are under-funded. This means that our community involvement has dwindled to nothing and he has no social support outside school and our house.

We have enough money, but I have started posting our spare food on freecycle and I get desperate people coming to collect it and asking if we have anything else surplus. I know that at least one of my DS's friends is short of food.

Nothing much is being done about climate change.

Now they're making it illegal to give tents to homeless people?!

Can't we just force a general election now?

The conservatives could organise a snap general election easily enough if they thought it would get them a bigger majority,

I think they should do the morally right thing and call one now to get us a better government.

Posting this in trepidation, because I know AIBU is fierce. What do you think though?

Why will they “clearly have to raise tax”? Public services can be massively improved by changing where and how the existing tax take is spent. You say “who knows what Labour will do?” and then predict they won’t have the money to do it, which is an odd logic.

It was the only election result in the last eight they’ve got wrong.

Public services can be massively improved by changing where and how the existing tax take is spent.

So what will be cut for this to happen? What will stop being paid so they can improve public services?

Bungs to their mates will be a good start.

So no actual answer.

You’ve got an answer. You just don’t like it because you can’t pick holes in it.

Labour are not even telling the truth here! They keep saying they are going to abolish non-dom tax status - what they really mean is they are going to replace non-dom tax status with a similar scheme by a different name (albeit a less generous one).

Agree. Those two things will do very little for funding

BIossomtoes
It was the only election result in the last eight they’ve got wrong

Oh really -

Track Record: 2017

The headline prediction for the June 2017 election was not accurate. The final prediction was for a Conservative majority government with a majority of 66. The actual result was that the Conservatives were short eight seats of a majority.

https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/trackrecord_17errors.html

‘Stop bungs to their mates’ is a serious answer to the question of how Labour will fund changes to improve all decimated public services?

I’m out, this is pointless conversation. All these threads end the same way, the same posters hectoring everyone else.

Thank you very much for all the discussion. I'm learning a huge amount from all these comments, and the discussion and company is making me feel much better.

General strikes in favour of specific policy change are something I could get behind. It’s not as simple as regime change, not when Labour is reneging on policy every week, and ignoring their own conference calling for nationalisation. I’m in favour of a move away from globalism towards more local sustainable resourcing, and nationalisation of resources like energy and water, and less public money disappearing into private hands as profit. Really we need a party that can take these views to parliament and government, but the problem is we don’t have one. Who are they listening to, because it’s no one I know.

If you think the Labour govn will make things better, you will be in for an unpleasant surprise. They have no strong policies and no backbone. They will spend the next four years blaming the tories for their shortcomings

I think high expectations will be their biggest problem but blaming previous governments is what they all do. I'm pretty sure I've read that they've said they'll need two terms to turn things round from the Torys - so that 8-10 years.

It not exactly unfair - housing, aging population and tax implications, NHS have had decades to build up into problems under Labour and conversative governments - there aren't nice easy popular solutions. It's like tax the rich - everyone fine with that till many find that includes them or it doesn't raise the amounts needed so taxes on other are needed and there are limits - tax too much the economy suffers.

It can not be later than 17 December 2024 - as if one not called by then it's 5 years and parliamnet dissolves anyway and general election would be in January and it's likely to be sooner than that.

https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/explainer/next-general-election

BIossomtoes
It was the only election result in the last eight they’ve got wrong

1992 as well!

^Electoral Calculus got 1992 spectacularly wrong. We predicted a Labour victory, but with a hung parliament. In fact the Conservatives were returned to office with a reduced majority. The principal cause of the error was that the opinion polls mis-estimated the relative support of the two parties.^

https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/trackrecord.html

OP i agree with your sentiment.
The Tories want to delay the election for as long as possible - they know they will lose.
We desperately need a change of government.

@TripleDaisySummer The election has to be called by 17 December 2024 - that would give an election date of 28 Jan 2025 - many political correspondents reckon it will be called some time in early December 2024 for a Thursday 23/01/25 election day.

A November 24 UK election is very unlikely due to security issues (cyber, intelligence, continuity of gov) relating to a clash with the US presidential elections.

I didn't vote Labour in the last election as in my constituency it was a wasted vote, I voted for the Green party as Caroline Lucas is our MP but I'm not sure how you can argue that this is what is happening. Sunak is on his own, doesn't really let his Cabinet ministers get a look in, did any of them take the stand at the Conservative conference, it was really apparent how he is trying to distance himself from all the controversies, all the past leadership problems of which there are many, to pretend he represents a new Conservative party but it is not strong if it is based on his Character and his alone!

In contrast, the plans on housing, on workers’ rights and on the green economy by the Labour party do look substantial. They look energised, the Tories look worn down. It is clear that all sections of society except the very rich have had enough and I think the polls are going to reflect that. Hell, even my parents' generation (70s) are not to be relied upon for the Tory vote anymore, especially after this week's 'nature's way' revelations during COVID!

I just said this and posted a link with more detailed information on it for anyone who wanted more details.

Till recently I was hearing May - but that seems to have been dropped then September.

I've never heard anything like that about avoid November elections - though do know all parties traditionally try to avoid winter elections if possible as they get lower turn outs and they aren't popular with electorate.

The number of posters on here attempting to claim labour will be just as bad because 'we don't even know what they stand for / have no firm stance on xyz issues' - shows a spectacular ignorance of election strategy. They are so far ahead in the polls it is almost inconceivable they don't win by a sizable amount - they should continue being neutral and avoid offering any sniff of ammo to the tories until they need to. They have nothing to gain and a lot to lose doubling down on any issue right now.

The excuse people are using to try and discredit them is simply good election strategy

Anyway we have a while to see the outcome anyway given I'm sure everyone will be patient and give them 10 years to reverse the rot before asking questions

Whilst the current government have killed the country, Labour chose to have Jeremy Corbyn, they have now chosen Keir Starmer who is very unlikeable, so the Tories have had no credible opposition. The Tories would probably be glad to lose the election as it's a poison chalice now, it is going to take a long long long time to fix all these problems.

Is he? As opposed to the character of Rishi who you think the population thinks is really dynamic?

So amongst my friends and family my age so early to mid 40's earning good money way above the national average, professional jobs in Architecture, legal services and Finance, not one of them will be voting for Sunak in the next election.

Goldenbear
So amongst my friends and family my age so early to mid 40's earning good money way above the national average, professional jobs in Architecture, legal services and Finance, not one of them will be voting for Sunak in the next election.

How many of them voted Conservative in 2019? Which professions?

Golden Bear I don't like Rishi either, I have been a life long Labour supporter and have found it incredibly difficult given we were first given Corbyn then Keir. Somehow people in the country seem to have a fetish for baffoons.

Somehow people in the country seem to have a fetish for baffoons.

We’d have to be going it some to get a bigger buffoon than Johnson. There’s no way that adjective could be applied to either Corbyn or Starmer.

Capitalism collapsed in 2008 when the markets crashed and it's still limping on.

It collapsed in 2029 and the depression followed. Roosevelt and the post war consensus saved it..Thatcher and Reagan ripped it up to build a society for the wealthy.