To feel like I'm not sure where I sit politically anymore, and to worry about it.

[Lookuptotheskies]

I've always been a staunch Labour voter. Always been pro refugees. Always given people the benefit of the doubt. Always felt okay that I've brought innocent kids into the world.

Labour are making cuts to disability benefits (and in turn, carer benefits). They are looking to slash sen support in schools.

My town is being overtaken with overt criminal activity. Illegal cigarettes, money laundering business, violent crime on the increase, known drug dealers, fly tipping, etc. Nothing is done. It's just a never ending thing, they bust one and another pops up.

I've always fought against the tide of racist idiots, using politics as an excuse for violent riots. I live in a multi-cutural town, chose a very multicultural school for my kids. But I can't continue to argue with the people pointing out the rise in crimes, drugs, exploitation etc which is very visibily linked to immigration. I feel so uneasy about acknowledging how I feel about this! Guilty and a bit embarrassed. I've always been live and let live, whereas now I feel more protective, more cynical, less tolerant.

I am also gender critical and very much in favour of single sex spaces, based on biological sex. This has been a slow thing too. I've witnessed the language around women changing (cervix owner, pregnant person, chest feeding etc). I've witnessed our spaces and groups being invaded by biological men (I don't want a man on the other side of the curtain to me in a women's hospital ward, or a bra changing cubicle, or a swimming changing room.

Does anyone else feel like they are completely re-evaluating what they accept/don't accept, and what they stand for politically?

I don't currently feel there is any one political party that aligns with my ideals.

I may or may not get completely flamed, but I'm curious on other's thoughts. I will check back intermittently but I don't live on my phone/mumsnet.

This is not a troll post. I've been a mn user for over 18 years.

I do think it’s good that people are now questioning this level of immigration and benefits, however I wonder if it’s too late to actually stop the decline.

I think it’s too late. What’s the answer though? Stop all benefits and start again? Whatever is needed, will have to be quite radical to solve the deterioration of UK society rather than tinkering around the edges by making changes to PIP for example. But how else do you fix the issues for the masses?

I’d guess you’re speaking for thousands if not millions of people. Certainly I agree 💯.

The tories may have been bad at times, but this Labour government is atrocious. Ruining the country and many people’s lives. No jobs, no grad jobs, no summer jobs, no school places, no sen provision, stopping people that try for more, hurting disabled people, old people, children. Business owners. Who aren’t they hurting? Train drivers and government workers by the look of it. They disgust me. 🤢 😢

Oh and yes of course most people are sex realists. Most people don’t think women have penises or that men should be in women’s sports / changing rooms / toilets. Fck off Labour. Even my ex staunch lefty guardian reading brothers hate Labour now. That’s a feat.

Just look at the way you described the immigrant crime and 'white' crime in your post that I quoted. If you really believe you have this nuanced view it would be a good idea to dissect your own posts a bit.

The issue is cultural, but its not brown people bringing a different culture into our country and ruining things, its the culture of blaming the poor for poverty that is directly caused by the 1%. The culture of belief in 'the worthy poor', which you have demonstrated with your knife wielding immigrants/ poor white drug addicts comment. The culture of assuming that anyone living in poverty must deserve to live in poverty, because they didn't work hard enough. That's the culture that is destroying the country.

The OP never said that. Stop reaching to try and ‘prove’ your assumed narrative that doesn’t exist in OPs posts. You’re judging OP by your standards / thought processes, that much is crystal clear.

Yes. I do wonder about this and the ethical dilemma of it a lot. My cash-strapped council which has no money for so many services they would make our city a better place have made the news for approving a contract worth more than a million a year which covers the care of just one young person.

But in general, yes, I'm historically Labour-supporting and feel like many others on this thread. I know they have inherited a mess and that the Tories have caused so many of these issues, but I have the same concerns as many. More people than ever unable to work and living off the state, towns and cities with huge populations of people who will not integrate and have imported values we simply do not want here, everywhere looking an absolute state...

@LivingDeadGirlUK Poverty is not caused by the better off! Who are the 1%? The people who own businesses and employ people? Those paying the most tax so others get the NHS and befits? Have a go at them and you get less and less money via taxation as business moves elsewhere. And it will.

Most people have access to decent enough education to be productive. Too many do not want to be productive. We’ve relied on imported labour and now we are cross about it. As for blaming all our woes on the 14 years of a conservative government! I’d grow up a bit politically and economically. Labour encouraged a foreign workforce. Labour encouraged the city of London to be a major powerhouse of money and tax generation. Labour borrowed a lot of money and did PFI contracts. Governments of all stripes make mistakes - you cannot blame just one party for everything. It’s politically illiterate.

The problem is, even if you are productive, you can end up earning a pittance, and it can't just be solved by working harder or getting a better education because there simply are not enough decent-paying jobs to be had.

I know one of these children. Non verbal autistic male teen who has violent meltdowns. He goes to school in a taxi with a driver and carer to try to stop him getting out of the car while it's moving or attacking the driver. He is very, very carefully and skilfully managed to reduce meltdowns but his carers still get beaten up sometimes.
In the past people like him would live in big institutions and be heavily drugged to keep them manageable. Now they have a team of carers, 50k a year special school, taxis the 20 miles to and from, neither parent work because they can't because he takes all their time (they have no other children). The alternative for him is the institution/drugging of the past though. An option that no longer exists anyway.

Oh I should add, the parents are doing fine money wise because of all the benefits they get and have more money than a lot of people.
I wouldn't swap my life for theirs though.

They got rid of “institutions” in favour of “community care” to reduce costs, not for the benefit of the people being cared for. Whether or not they require sedation (and many challenging children do at times to keep their caregivers safe) will depend on their behaviour. It’s not automatic that you’re sedated in a group home setting.

There's immigration and there's immigration though. In the affluent south manchester suburbs, its lovely and diverse with people from lots of backgrounds, countries and cultures who are educated and positive contributors to society. I work in pharma and its the same. Educated/trained migrants are generally a positive influence, they tend to speak good English too and integrate well. This is why a lot of left wing people, middle class people (including myself) feel like migration is positive.

The migrants who cause an issue are the uneducated migrants, working either in low paid jobs or illegally for cash. Tends to be lots of men with cultures that clash with our own. They don't integrate and do cause social issues. They tend to be in more working class or poor areas, which is why we have the issue of the old school working class voting reform.

It's a difficult challenge. The government absolutely need to get on top of illegal immigration/overstaying visas/dodgy education visas. While leaving well alone the positive contribution lots of immigrants make to the UK.

No me neither - but if he’s in school as much as he is you have to question why neither parent can work.

Re: TMay cutting police force -apparently you can’t just sack police persons - so the ones who were sacked to reduce the numbers were auxiliary staff, admin etc.
So the upshot was a lot of police people taking over these nice 9-5 office jobs and not doing the frontline policing. And they are still there cos why would you give up a 9-5 for night duties etc

It is REALLY hard to get jobs now, for young people as well as everyone else, and like a PP I wish the government would address that sensibly before wading into cutting disability benefits. We are sicker as a country than we used to be, but I DONT think it’s that people, in the main, don’t want to work. They just give up as it’s so difficult to get on the 1st and 2nd rungs and even when they do they can’t afford a basic life. People are beaten down.
I feel like we just need some hope. I remember when things like Sure Start and Children’s centres were around. My children’s centre was an absolute lifeline when mine were small. These types of services help to integrate communities - starting from pre- birth.
There is absolutely such a thing as society but the corrupt, self serving politicians have decimated our faith in it. Ultimately it is going to have to be down to the people to try and re- build communities bit by bit.

I should also point out that the impact of AI on jobs- it’s happening now, not in some far off future. It’s really impacted the young in terms of jobs and this needs to be taken seriously.

"All the benefits they get" are probably still cheaper than keeping a person with such high needs in residential care though.

When a bog standard care home for the elderly is £1k a week, I dread to think what the cost of caring for a physically fit teen or young adult with such high needs would be.

I feel exactly the same as you. In the last general election I simply couldn’t vote for any party and spoiled my ballot paper.

I feel politically homeless.

Eliminating waste, fraud and abuse in the disability benefits system isn't "slashing benefits." It's protecting disability benefits for valid recipients. Starmer was wrong to U turn.

White middle-class liberals want cheap immigrant labour but they don’t want to live near them. Hence ghettos which piss off the white working classes.

The men coming on boats are not doctors, engineers, maths teachers who support values like equality for women. Those illegal sailings support drugs cartels and human traffickers, whilst lives are lost. The last government didn’t get to grips with the problem and this gov failed so far.

So no one should be surprised that Reform are at 30% in the polls. They could win in Wales next May.

I'd vote for anyone who would sort out immigration

The country is at a tipping point.

I think the parents are exhausted. He's often up screaming in the night.

Traitorous politicians have no idea what they've done to working class areas with their open borders madness.

It's the type of immigration that has been so irresponsible as well as the scale. Mostly unskilled and people here for crime or benefits.

I live in an inner city area that is a mix of students and third world migrants. You see the liberalism dripping away from the students. Particularly the girls with all the sexual harassment and safety risks.

Labour have to go.

Thing is, the Reform lot promised they'd reduce immigration with Brexit. As predicted at the time, we just replaced young single people from Europe (often only here for a few years) with families from Africa and Asia.
Why would anyone trust a single thing they say?

Women being more liberal and voting left has led to our own demise (in more recent times). Turkeys voting for Christmas.