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.

This, with knobs on. Gordon Brown SAVED the banking system from collapse, yet gets hardly any credit for it at all. At the height of the 2008 crisis, Alistair Darling took a call from RBS who told him they were haemorrhaging money. When he asked how long they’d got, he was told they’d run out of money that afternoon.

I can't agree with the second half of this. I don't have children, work in the public sector or rely on benefits.

But for me, it was still a much better place. There was a sense of being a cohesive society. That politicians actually had some idea of what ordinary people's lives were like, and cared about trying to make them better. There wasn't the sheer amount of desperation that you've seen grow and grow over the last decade. And, crucially, there was a feeling that it was possible to improve things.

All that seems to have been beaten out of us now by the band of corrupt, lying, selfish sociopaths that constitute the current government. They have systematically broken the country to enrich themselves and their class.

I've been swearing at the news all day, with Cameron being bigged up as a moderate just because he doesn't reach the operatic heights of vileness of Braverman et al. There's a story in a memoir by someone who worked with him about him and Osborne batting around the idea that they might build social/council housing, and crowing "Why would we do that? It's just a breeding ground for Labour voters!"

And if you've followed the Covid enquiry, you may remember Lee Cain (director of comms in no 10) saying that it was a huge mistake to try to hold out against Marcus Rashford's campaign for free school meals in the holidays, and that it happened because nobody involved in those conversations had ever had, or known anyone who had had, free school meals. The lack of empathy disgusts me every day.

Keir Starmer said last year that Wales which is my home was the blueprint for labour.

I've only ever known a labour government but I can tell you we are in such a bad way money wise these days. NHS, transport etc. I don't know if England has any more money to spend than Wales and Scotland have at present.

@user6776 bottom line was that the rich got seriously richer. Forget the headlines these days about Tory Cronyism, the absolute ‘jobs for the boys’ culture prevailed at Westminster.

Spin and the invention of ‘good day to bury bad news’ was entirely a new labour creation.

It was still a society of haves and have nots. It was no nirvana.

Liam Byrne was an absolute idiot to leave the "sorry there's no money left" note. The Tories have been using that against them ever since. As a matter of fact, Labour governments have consistently borrowed less and increased national debt less than Conservative ones over the past century.

Also remember jobs being advertised as low as £1 an hour and people working 100 hours weeks to survive before minimum wage was introduced.......People with families would have been in better positions as they'd have been entitled to family credit as it was called then but obviously single people got nothing. So to suggest that Labour did nothing for single people without children is poppycock.

Public Sector debt:

And yes, if you spend waaaay over the odds for PPE from a company that didn't exist three weeks ago but just so happens to owned by a friend of the Conservative Party, then when it eventually arrives it is unusable so you pay another friend of the Tories to store it and another to eventually burn it...

Then yes you will have a very expensive pandemic.

But as you can see debt was already much higher than it had been from 1997-2010 long before the pandemic.

(P.S David Cameron outsourced the storage of the Strategic Reserve of PPE to a Tory donor who promptly lost it and when it was eventually found during the pandemic it was out of date, wet and rat infested.

In case you were wondering why we didn't have stores of PPE ready prepared for the pandemic)

I’m genuinely interested in how life was better for you - I didn’t get that sense of cohesion at all. I felt as though I was working long hours, not able to afford to move out as house prices had climbed out of reach, low wages but seeing people in different circumstances having a much easier time of it financially…

Before Labour got in I knew people earning 98p/hr. I think they benefited from Labour bringing in a minimum wage.

There was actually work done to improve the area where I lived (former mining village), including an annexe for the local college offering courses and training (closed now).

Not saying Labour were perfect, but they did do something to try and help people on lower incomes and in disadvantaged areas.

But if you were single and earning (just) over the minimum wage they did nothing for you. It was all focused on families.

I live in a town and saw the same thing happen here. It didn’t happen immediately once Labour were in charge - it took a few years, but rough sleepers became a rare sight. For a long time, I only ever saw one, and he was a well-known character with several issues. He went through the system several times before finally being housed somewhere that could meet his needs.

Under the Tory government, rough sleepers gradually appeared again. They were typically seen in the doorways of shops and banks, in their sleeping bags. Signs appeared in some of these places warning that items left there would be removed. More recently, shops and banks fenced off their doorways/alcoves with steel shutters. Now, people living in tents in small urban green spaces are a common sight here.

PFI is off government books

My wider family had more money, mostly through benefits.
But I can't really say this was a good thing. It bred a second generation with no example of work.
It really only changed with top up benefits. They are all now in jobs. Still topped up with benefits but at least structured days and a very different experience for the kids in the family (several now late primary started school early at 4 as part of the scheme to ensure they weren't disadvantaged and are doing well).

Top up benefits have their drawbacks too but I would hate to see us go back to the poverty trap of just popping out babies. It was utterly depressing to grow up in.
I hope half my daughter's class haven't left to have babies before 16 like mine did (this was at the beginning of labour government so they weren't the only factor but didn't do much to turn it round).

I did like sure start centres though but it was often the mums from the better areas who came to the groups and not always those they were really aimed at.

I do worry how labour are going to deliver on the expectation beginning to grow. I hope they can but I do think the demand for SEN provision has massively increased, there are different pressures on the housing system to the 90s. It's not an easy fix.

Exactly. I was on a low wage just out of uni and got no support. Housing was out of reach due to prices.

Hard working families is all they talked about... did they want my vote or not. They didn't get it. Those adults made a choice to have children.

I don’t know why he’d say Wales would be a good blueprint. It’s seems to be struggling even more

It was like a normal, functioning society.

It wasn’t. I was 43 when they came into power and my son was 22. So no children. My career in a private company was on an upward trajectory so definitely no benefits.

My life improved exponentially. Better public services because money was invested where it was needed and a sense that society was improving. We would have gone to war in Iraq whichever party was in power. There was huge support from the Tories.

I think New Labour were very disappointing as they could have done more with large majorities but pretty much kept much of what Thatcher started (privatisation, PFI, the acceleration of house prices, lack of new social housing built, little interest in restoring manufacturing, London-centric, contempt for the working class which all helped lead to Brexit).

However, compared to the Tories they were brilliant. They did do some good.

I was a young single mum in 2006 of a tiny baby, I fled an abusive relationship and was very quickly sorted out with a private rental and benefits.

I used to go to a weekly sure start group which was a godsend as I made friends

When my son was 1, I started training as a nurse and I got a decent bursary plus my childcare paid and top up benefits such as housing benefit

In 2009 I had a new partner and a baby, and we were served a section 21 and we were offered a council house.

I found it easy to get drs appointments and actually felt safe and looked after by the nhs

Food and utilities were relatively affordable

10/10. No notes.

There was a great documentary on iPlayer - Blair/Brown.

@Brexile

Gb did a lot of good with tax credits, they were a life line for us esp after cc we needed them for just over a year.

However they admitted they failed on child poverty and I remember very harrowing program on child poverty under 10 years of labour.

Sure start centres were amazing and it's criminal that they went.

Unfortunately Tony Blair started the ball rolling to remove legal aid for many and lots of pro bono support around law courts etc.

PFI isn’t responsible for these debt levels.

Perhaps it’s an age-related thing? I was just starting out in 2000/2001 and it was very, very difficult as a single relatively low earner. Housing costs more than anything else, which went wildly out of control.

And also I can’t forgive Gordon Brown for the pensions changes.

You would be wise to do some actual real
life research on this if you want non bias and factual explanations as opposed to opinions.

You are asking an incredibly left wing site…so of course you’ll hear nothing but positivity annd glee about Labour on here.

Rising house prices fuel rent rises: