Tell me who to Vote for as if I'm a Child.

[LemonzandLimez]

Exactly that, with the Election Looming I need to understand Politics more! My Socials are full of Rishi out and Kier in.. Are Labour really going to make a difference? If so, How?

I have read bits and pieces of the thread but not the whole thing.

I think the best reason why I might vote Tory in a general election for the first time is that it seems really quite likely that we will be in a war in the next 5 years, and the Tories are the party most likely to increase funding to the military, which I think needs to be done. (lots more could be said about that).

Also, they seem to be able to say that a woman is an adult human female.

And we have a very decent, intelligent and honest Tory MP locally, there are some.

Reasons why I voted for other parties in the past were around wanting more funds to be directed towards NHS and education. But I think we need to look at the threats to our nation and focus on those right now, it is all a bit 1930s style imminent danger out there.

I am not impressed with the performance overall of the Tories in recent years, but neither am I at all inspired by Labour.

One problem I have with the TWAW gang left and centre gang is that it makes them all look so very stupid. If they don't know what a woman is, do they have any common sense at all?

If they can be bullied into thinking that a 6 foot 4 trans individual should be knocking females off elite sports teams, then do they have the slightest balls or moral compass when it comes to other issues.

I am in fact what you might call a floating voter, but I seem to be floating against the stream.

The argument against this being that private companies rarely deliver better value for money and other countries with more privatised systems than ours often spend more money on healthcare which may account for better outcomes/ services. They also tend to spend more on admin management iirc.

There are pros and cons to both sides of the argument and it may well be that it isn’t the idea of the NHS that is the problem but what the Tories tend to do to it when in power because they seem to be ideologically opposed to it. The largest problem for healthcare in this country is social care or the lack of investment in it.

Fair enough but if one party has not done what they’ve promised over the last 14 years and parts of the country are a bloomin’ mess why would you listen to them ?
It’s like the tories always have a clean slate whatever they do 😉 simply teflon coated…

The Tories have spent the last 14 years years doing hideous things to the defence budget, leaving us woefully unprepared for any current danger. Taking us out of the EU didn’t help national security nor did cutting the foreign aid budget either.
They also have a lot of somewhat questionable ties with Russia.

Not sure what the other parties’ stance on security threats will be yet but there are lots of reasons not to vote Tory on that issue.

On paper, yes, the quality of your local candidates is what matters. In reality MPs have a lot less influence over local affairs than councillors or mayors (if you have one of those). Just to counter the argument that often gets trotted out that you should vote for the candidate you think has the best credentials at the constitutency level. That's how the system might have been intended to work but it doesn't really function that way. MPs are primarily party delegates and your vote's contribution to the makeup of Parliament is the most important thing to consider.

In my opinion you should either vote for the Tories or for whichever non-Tory candidate is most likely to win in your constituency. That's what this election really boils down to. Some feel differently about tactical voting but I'm a firm supporter, given that we're working with a hideously broken FPTP system. You have to figure out whether you want more of this or the chance of something better.

I'm stuck what to do. One of the safest Tory seats there is. Lib dems are 2nd but last election labour werent far behind, so more of a split vote againt the Tories(so it's almost certainly still going to be blue. I really hate the Tories with passion too. We really do need a better voting system

@RafaistheKingofClay I think defence took a hammering in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis and covid crisis.

I actually think Gordon Brown's actions seemed defensible in view of the situation he faced. I thought furlough looked hugely expensive at the time but could kind of understand why it was brought in.

Where we are now, we need to beef up defence. Which party, going forward, has got the best plans for that? From the little I have read, it might be the Ts?

Alwaysalwayscold · Today 08:37
**
Please look into Reform UK as an option”

No. Just, no.

Read manifestos, consider what matters to you, what you think needs to be important to the country.

I would say newspapers are the WORST source of political info in this country they are heavily biased.

It can be useful to look at news reports from outside the uk about the uk too.

Follow politicians and commentators across the spectrum on social media don't put yourself in an echo chamber, plus, know thine enemy.

They conserve nothing, and they’re corrupt to boot.

THIS!!

the Tories are the party most likely to increase funding to the military,

I'm a forces brat and ex wife of - historically tories have treated military appallingly while trying to appear supportive. Military is a MESS at the moment for this reason.

it isn’t the idea of the NHS that is the problem but what the Tories tend to do to it when in power because they seem to be ideologically opposed to it.

Spot on!

@LemonzandLimez , the first thing to understand and this massively concerns me is that it really isn’t about Rishi out and Keir in. As evidenced by the shenanigans in the Conservative Party we do not vote for a prime minister because they can so easily be ousted by their party.
Secondly all politicians will lie through their back teeth to secure your vote.
Thirdly because of the way our voting system works very few people’s votes make any difference. 😔
Finally you will get lots of advice in the coming six weeks, most of it will be very biased.
Good luck!

I am rational and unbiased, unlike many mumsnet posters. Like you, I am still to decide which way to vote. The way I see it is that what happens to the UK economy over a period of years is primarily driven by the World Economy, 99.9% of which is completely outside our control no matter which party is in power. Consider the devastation created by the Global Financial Crisis of 2008 and several years following that. And what about Covid, an unprecedented epidemic which caused massive economic and health damage from which every country in the world is still reeling. So please ignore half the comments on mumsnet, the ones that make sweeping statements such as: ‘look how terrible things are after 14 years of Tory Government’. Because, based on a 100 years of history, Labour’s track record with the UK economy is certainly not as good as the Conservatives. Please verify this for yourself.

My misgivings about the Conservative Party started way before Covid and Ukraine - both of which I do feel have been used as an excuse to a degree.

I am not daft enough to think that Labour are some sort of amazing alternative BUT I do think that we need change now, we need fresh blood and some different ways of thinking.

@Graphista The thing is, it is basically a 2 horse race.

And the key thing is, not how well or badly, say the Tories have done on an issue.

It is how they compare with Labour's record, and what indications are there for the future plans compared with Labour.

I also don't particularly feel the need for a change for change's sake. As I can imagine there could be a change for something worse, as there might possibly have been with Jeremy Corbyn.

I also think that Rishi Sunak has good things going for him. He seems intelligent and hard working etc. Though my husband thinks his personal situation makes him fatally out of touch now, even if he has an immigrant-family-made-good backstory.

I was really optimistic about Keir Starmer but have got fed up with all the years when he never seemed to say anything very interesting or striking and seemed so much to be toeing an opportunistic line when it came to policy. It makes him seem quite characterless, though I guess there is an element of how he might have had shade cast on him by right-wing media sources.

When we say “look how bad things are after 14 years of the conservatives” we are not only looking at the economy.

We are looking at what they DO with the budget they have
We are remembering how they partied during Covid when many people died alone because we were told we couldn’t visit sick relatives.
We are thinking of the the record number of children in poverty
We are thinking about the PPE scandal
We are concerned about the state of schools and hospitals and mental health services and the decline in policing along with the rise in crime rates.

If you can tell me anything that Labour has done that comes close to any of the above then I am all ears and open minded.

Labour did get involved in the Gulf War.

Mind you, the whole WMD issue seemed very unclear at the time. I can see that it was hard to know where the true danger lay.

Also, Gordon Brown paid a great amount of money to deal with the financial crisis, which many people blame him for. Though again, I thought he was acting in good faith there.

As regards covid, would Labour have done any better? They might not have partied to the same annoying extent, true. And Boris was an extraordinary choice of Prime Minister, what a buffoon. But it was a global emergency, and there were difficult decisions, and mistakes, being made all over the world.

It seems likely that we would have had lockdowns for longer, for example, under Labour. Would we have locked down sooner and saved lives? Would it have helped overall? Who knows.

Myself, I'm more interested in the parties' plans going forwards and how competent they appear to be, to take the country into a better place. And the jury is out on that one right now.

I just did this and it told me what I already knew thank god, was terrified it was gonna tell me I was a... never mind 🤫

A measured and sensible reply, which I appreciate.

I too am interested to see what the plans are going forward, but dismissing labour because “people remember how bad they were last time” seems to be the stock response from Tory voters and it just doesn’t wash anymore. I say that generally, not as a dig to you.

We need change, because the Tories have caused an inexcusable amount of damage and “but labour would have been worse” isn’t a good enough response. The conservatives are our elected government. THEY have been in power for a long time, THEY had a responsibility to us and they’ve failed.

Yes OP.

If you think “well, the last 14 years have been tough - what we really need is a very similar but more extreme version of the current government but with more whack job conspiracy nuts and for Nigel Farage to have total control over policy and who the leader is” then Reform is the right option for you.

(to expand, unlike normal political parties where members have at least a say in who the leader, the Reform Party is set up as a corporation, and Farage is the controlling shareholder - it’s the least democratic party the UK has seen in modern times)

It's more complex than that though, because Labour don't look like changing anything much.

It's more like we are in a one party system where we get to vote on changing the name of the party.

The manifestos haven’t been published yet, so how do you know that?

From everything the Labour party has done and said over the last several years.

Can you give an example?

Not being goady, I just don’t know what they have said that means they’ll be no different to the Conservatives?

Definitely if you’re a Tory voter that won’t vote Labour then please vote Reform! This will split the Tory vote and let Labour in anyway! 😄

Job done 🥰

Keir Starmer stood for the Labour leadership promising to maintain Labour's position in favour of renationalising the utility companies. Once elected, he abandoned it and it's now in the dustbin.

He also promised to increase tax on the wealthiest to pay for public services, a position which he has since abandoned. Labour have also said that they oppose raising corporation tax. Hence the (quite valid) protest from some quarter of "but where will the money come from!?".

I've no doubt there will be a thing or two in the manifesto to try and look like they mean something. But Starmer is an Establishment Man and his job is to keep the status quo safe for the establishment. No reasonable appraisal of his tenure as Labour leader can lead to any other conclusion.

If you want the tories out, go on a tactical voting website, but in your postcode and it will tell you who to vote for for the best chance of them losing. I’m voting Labour, not because I want to particularly, but because they are closest to pushing the Tories out of the seat.