To ask what the country was like under a Labour government?

[user6776]

I'm too young to remember a proper Labour government. I was 12 when the Tories got voted in back in 2010 so that's all I've ever really known.

How much better was it than it is now? Why did Labour lose the election back then anyway?

Interested to hear people's opinions.

I remember the Blair years:

-No tuition fees which allowed me to do a part-time BTEC course then go to university and study for another degree for a change of career
-cheaper bills, council tax and rents/house prices
-a sense of optimism. It was the 'Cool Britannia' times and the UK music and art scene was extremely vibrant
-Labour was not perfect but there was never the level of corruption at government level and inequalities that the Tories have given us
-more funding for support/services that benefited the less well off
-protest was not criminalised
-better relationships with Europe
-no issue with seeing an NHS dentist and getting good treatment.

Also managed to buy my first home in London when Brown was in charge.

I don't understand...

There were no tuition fees for university until labour got in - which was 1997. They got in and then students starting at university in 1998 got whacked with tuition fees. I remember clearly as my brother was one of them. I got away with no fees as I went in 1996 just before labour got in.

I have done that many times @Papyrophile living for many years in a true blue, massive Tory majority constituency and often having no Labour candidate to vote for at local elections. I refuse to not vote.

Exactly. The hours of work required to claim large amounts of top ups of tax credits were very low ( and still are for those still on them now). A lone parent could work just 16 hours a week even when their youngest kids was in their teens and get topped up and a couple just 24 hours between them. Absolute madness and as you say has just created a culture of dependency which now is very hard to remove. Even now that UC has been brought in to replace tax credits. the earnings thresholds are still very low although have risen recently. On tax credits people have also been allowed to have unlimited savings and second homes. What kind of batshit government allowed that and still allows it now for those on tax credits ? No government can now reduce these benefits without being seen as a nasty party and without ensuring wages are higher. No wonder the country is well and truly broke. I appreciate other major factors also like the pandemic. I have no idea who I will vote for, I have no confidence in any of them and feel the mess is too much for anyone to sort. I really fear for my kids futures- massive student loans, no chance of getting on the housing ladder, massive rents.

I would have had to pay tuition fees in 2003, under Labour, had I not been a mature student so not sure how you got your degree for free.

Also let's not forget the hundreds if not thousands of innocent lives lost because Blair took us to war on a lie and the say so of his pal Bush. So if you think they weren't corrupt you're naive.

Tuition fees were introduced in 1998 at the start of the Blair years. I remember my father’s fury very clearly.

I would have had to pay tuition fees in 2003, under Labour, had I not been a mature student

How did you manage that? I know a mature student who’s about to graduate with about £60k debt.

I did my degree 1992-1995 and tuition fees all free. i still had to take some maintenance loan but as I worked at the same time it was only about 1k in total !

Sorry but the mistreating of children/stepchildren is as old as time

To those who asked about why I mentioned not having to pay tuition fees:

It was possible for me to be a mature student between 2001 and 2008 and study part-time to gain a BTEC, then a degree and work part-time.

I paid next to nothing for my BTEC and did my degree part time over 5 years and I think I paid about £200 or so for it...

It all depended on your financial and personal situation.

I could never do this now.

There were no tuition fees for university until labour got in - which was 1997. They got in and then students starting at university in 1998 got whacked with tuition fees. I remember clearly as my brother was one of them. I got away with no fees as I went in 1996 just before labour got in.

I remember this as well - same reason difference between me and younger sibling.

It was also the coalition government - Con and Lib dem -that brought in the rises in fees.

Problem now is it's an awful system for everyone - University are underfunded and some are facing serious financial problems, many students aren't topped as expect by parents - many parenst struggle with the expected top up and students start life in huge debts - and government find many student never pay back full amount borrowed. I have kids uni age or coming up to uni age and out main wage earner in this sector I'm paying close attention to what's being said.

Sector was better in Blair years - but they had decades before being good as well to build on.

The coalition government cuts are when I think many areas took massive down turns. DH and I lived in areas badly hit in Thatcher years yet I think many services were better then than now.

Totally. The Murder of Baby P was after 10 years of a Labour govt so well within these supposed ‘golden years’ of funding for social services and that poor child (and others) were missed.

@jasflowers The Tory party manifesto had the referendum as one of its key points. Labour did not commit to having one. Then knowing it would be a shit show if we were to leave, they joined in with the ‘project fear’ narrative which only accurately predicted the outcome if we did leave. Absolutely we needed a dedicated referendum without the partisan connotations of a GE to establish what the nation wanted. I didn’t agree with it, but in the same vein that Labour is on the wrong side of history following the cass report by not speaking up, we are where we are. On the point on dentist fees, the issue wasn’t and isn’t just inflation it is the fact that all procedures were a fixed cost. So whether you spent 2 hours as a dentist doing a root canal or simply extracted the tooth you got the same fee. Absolutely not in the interests of either the dentist or the patient.

Regarding the narrative of corruption, I think readers need to go back into the midst of time and look up what happened with Peter Mandelson, David Blunkett and party donations from the Mittal Family and Bernie Ecclestone. Oh, and the issue of Cherie Blair using a well-known con man to ‘help’ secure a discount on some flats for their kids. Same shit, just different flag colour to wave.

Under Labour I was considerably richer. I had child benefit (that I didn’t need) and I could use free nursery hours to offset against school fees. My mum and dad when they got elderly rightly had to pay for their care so that those with less than they had did not have to. But my parents were first generation economic migrants and that wasn’t easy for them. However even when tax was insane and later on, interest rates went through the roof we didn’t lose our mortgaged house because we didn’t have loads of other stuff on the never-never as well. And this influenced the next generation not to take credit on stuff we don’t actually need. This isn’t ‘cost of living’ for many, it’s a cost of debt. None of us had any problem with benefits not truly intended for us being taken away because it made no sense. It wasn’t’the nasty party’ more the common sense party. We had benefited from free university tuition and right to buy in our area completely transformed the local economy (for the better) and as we had a woman in charge as prime minister many of us young women felt genuinely like anything was possible. What we have now is one party in disarray and the other telling us that anything we read in o level biology is a figment of our imaginations. That’s the issue. Whilst Labour tries to claim they are any different than before whilst Lady Emily Thornberry sneers at anyone flying an English flag or driving a white van, and Keir pretends he supported his own MP on the issue of defining what a woman is instead of just apologising, they won’t get my vote. And like a pp, I’ll probably spoil my ballot.

I think you will find that it was Blair ,s government thar brought in tuition fees.

@x2boys

see my additional post above...

As a mature student I paid no fees between 2001 and 2008 while I was studying part-time.

People were richer because it was Before the 2008 crisis.

Schools improved because Labour was enthusiastic about education and paid for it. However, there were a far lower number of special needs students diagnosed in that time, so it isn't a straightforward comparison.

My dd is doing a foundation course this year and has developed a lovely group of close friends ( 5 of them ). The other four are all leaving/ changing courses to move back to their home town in Sept as they can no longer afford to stay living at a Uni away from home. My dd can only do it because we help her but those other four girls have parents living in the SE and they cannot afford to help them.

Schools improved because Labour was enthusiastic about education and paid for it. However, there were a far lower number of special needs students diagnosed in that time, so it isn't a straightforward comparison.

I remember the Slogan Education, Education and Education - the Sure start program was also a good idea.

Many schools were re-built under PFI as were hospitals which cause a few problem later but at least there was rebuilding - many school with RAAC just seem to have been left to rot and it was again the collation government that canceled the rebuilding program.

My dd is doing a foundation course this year and has developed a lovely group of close friends ( 5 of them ). The other four are all leaving/ changing courses to move back to their home town in Sept as they can no longer afford to stay living at a Uni away from home.
DH says there are starting to be more students who drop out due to costs - usually it's one who for some reason have to repeat a year and get hit with more fees and accommodation costs or mature students who circumstances change but it's happening more than it ever has.

Tuition fees were £3k per year, totally affordable.

what about the rest of the posters list?

What was your alternative to the Iraq war? Sadam had already invaded Kuwait, had a WW1 style war with Iran, gassed thousands of Kurds and killed 10s of 1000s of Marsh Arabs (so we knew he had WMDs & wasn't afraid to use them)

No one knew for certain if he still had WMD 's or should we waited until he used them again to find out?

Cameron on the other hand, decided to attack Libya, which had no justification whatsoever and has indirectly led to the migration crisis we see in the Med now and hence the x channel boats.

Gaddafi was a tyrant but so is Xi, should we attack China? Gaddafi would not have allowed his country to become a refuge for trafficking gangs & the misery & death they have caused.

Not only that but Howard admitted we’d have taken exactly the same course of action if he’d been PM. That war was inevitable.

https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/howard-under-fire-over-iraq-7247839.html

Tuition fees were £3k per year, totally affordable.

It opened the door to charging and they were always going to go up.

Blair Labour did good things and some bad.

Labour Government after second world war did amazing things despite a wreck bankrupt government but I too young to remember them.

Both seemed to have long term plans and got on with them - visions for UK as it were - currently it feels like message is will probably suck less and be bit more competent which isn't nothing but hardly inspiring.

Labour are an electionist party and so tread a very difficult path of appeasing the already rich whilst not massively oppressing the already poor.

The tories don't give a shit. So tax cuts for the wealthy/benefits cuts for the disabled are fine with them.

People vote labour so that the worse does not happen because they have a conscience or are personally affected.

If capitalism is so great for the masses why do we have so many billionaires with so many in poverty, why are both increasing, why are there wars by rich first world nations that break war crime conventions?

Things can only get better for the already rich. What about the rest of us?

Yes increases with inflation NOT what the Tories did and trebled them!!!

What positive long term plans have the Tories ever had???

They sold off our utilities, rail, royal mail, wrecked our roads, trebled national debt, ran down the NHS, ruined education, allowed the water companies to pay huge dividends, whilst they pour shit into the rivers and sea, preceded over worst housing crisis in Europe.....

They are a fucking disaster!

And for all those saying it was easier to find an NHS dentist when Blair was in power - it was him that caused a lot of dentists to leave the NHS.

I live In Wales - under a Labour gov for 20 + years - I 'd agree Toy government is bad - current one being pretty fucking dire but I can point to Labour caused problems as well as successes.

The whole if you don't talk about Labour like the second coming you must be a Tory supporter is just annoying at this stage and make me even more cynical about some posters on here.

Undoubtedly, Labour have screwed up too BUT for the most part i think Labour try to improve things for the ordinary person, do they always succeed? no of course not.

However, i think the current Labour shadow front bench are far too timid for me.
Maybe they'll be more adventurous in Government?

Wales is too hamstrung by Westminster, they aren't a separate country.

btw i'm not a Lab member, never have been, zero connection to the party, its just that i think the Tories are a party of the rich, always have been, hence the original meaning of the word Tory.