Will we ever know what Labour’s policies are?

[MaryMaryVeryContrary]

Just that really, that debate was a shocker.

Are we just up shit creek without a paddle and he doesn’t have the heart to break it to us?

To blame interest rates solely on one individual’s 49 days in office is ridiculous. UK interest rates were below US levels and not dissimilar to the ECB rates. There were worldwide issues causing high inflation and increasing interest rates.

I agree. Just saying - it's not the same thing as 'crashing the economy'.

They can’t. The VAT will be small and will be lucky to cover the extra teachers. The other one tiny

Then look at cost of doing up houses to make them heat pump compliant etc, let alone building however many they pledge. Then the rest on top

Do you think we’ll not have any trafficking related costs as we smash the gangs?

Can you say how that will work and how much it will be to both process extra numbers and to deal with the endless supply of criminal networking activity worldwide

Starmer was clear that he will raise money from private school fees, windfall taxes on energy companies, closing non-DOB loopholes, and taxing private equity bonuses. He also has all the rest of the existing tax-take to allocate as the party see fit (which may be quite different to how the Tories spend it, eg. public services rather than national service scheme). Plus he won’t be cutting NI so has that ‘fiscal headroom’ to use. He’s not hiding anything.

He’s also said he’s rather overdeliver than promise the world and not be able to deliver it in Labour’s first term because he thinks broken promises makes us all sceptical of politicians and he wants to rebuild faith in politicians.

@Summerfreezemakesmedrinkwine makes a good point on trades. It's a well known fact that there are nowhere near enough skilled tradespeople to implement the green agenda.

I saw some guy on TV last night talking about heat pumps saying 'rich people will be made to pay for one, middle earners will get an interest free loan and poor people <his words, not mine> will get them for free'.

Actually no politician wants to be honest with the voters on how to get us out of this mess.

And even if they were honest with the voters then the voters wouldn't vote for them because they don't want to hear the truth.

The Tories love to say repeatedly that Labour have no plan and spend the rest of the time criticising Labours plans. Does anyone actually know what the Tory plan is apart from (failed) stop the boats and national service?

There already is a windfall tax until 2029

Labour want to raise it again

Businesses think it’s a bad idea. I recall Labour saying they cared about businesses so maybe they should hear them out

The Confederation of British Industry has warned against Labour's plan to increase the windfall tax on North Sea oil and gas firms.

The interest group, which represents 190,000 businesses, claims such a move could hurt investor confidence in Britain.

I don't disagree. Whoever forms the next government will inherit a huge range of difficult issues, none of which can be resolved overnight and many of which will involve some difficult, and I dare say unpopular, decisions.

But unlike certain other posters who seem to think that the Conservatives have been a huge success and that the likely alternative present a great danger to the country, I cannot see how any alternative government (Labour, or possibly a coalition) can possibly be worse than the current government.

It is not just that the Conservatives seem to have managed to assemble a collection of incompetent Ministers, and are wedded to an economic theory (Free Market and "Trickle Down") that has never worked and that cannot work, as much as the lies, the appalling attitude towards immigrants, the poor, the disabled, the mentally and physically ill, and "others" in general, and the distain shown towards people who would dare to protest or challange their view that they are right (when they clearly are very often wrong) and that everyone else has to shut up.

If the last 14 years of Conservative government have been so fantastic, why are they not shouting from the rooftops about it? Because it has been a shit show, and people know it has been a shit show. Sunak was jeered last night when he tried to claim that waiting lists are the fault of the doctors and nurses. People have seen through them.

Instead the only thing they have left is to attack Labour. Sunak is doing it. Other ministers are doing it. There seems to be a cohort of people on social media whose job for the next 4 weeks is to carpet-bomb social media with "Labour will steal your house / pension / wages / inheritence etc" messages and ad hom attacks on Starmer, Rayner and of course Corbyn.

Those things are not enough to fund his plans. They raise a relatively tiny amount of money.

VAT on school fees will raise around 1% of the state education budget, and that’s using optimistic figures.

They say “Labour will also raise £2.6 billion over the course of the next Parliament – including £1 billion initially – by closing the loopholes in Rishi Sunak’s non-dom plan.” So that’s, on average, around £500m per year over the course of the parliament. That’s around 0.7% of just the annual NHS wage bill.

Those two things are their flagship tax raising policies (in the absence of any manifesto). They are hardly transformational figures. Where is the rest coming from?

@Happyher

"Does anyone actually know what the Tory plan is apart from (failed) stop the boats and national service?"

Aside from headline grabbing statements on stop the boats or national service, then I am working on the basis that the Tory plan is to limp on through with the same shit as we've had for the last 12 months under Sunak.

But the question for me is I've seen no evidence that Labour would do any better and their entire pitch is "vote for us because we are not the Conservatives and the Conservatives screwed up ".

If you quoted the whole of my description of Sunak I go on to identify the career he went into. He could have chosen to help others after his private education and comfortable upbringing but instead he chose to help himself get even richer.
I make the comparison that one man got where he is solely on his own efforts and has always worked for the public good whilst the other had a huge advantage and has only helped himself.
You are wilfully missing my point to suit your own agenda.

Trafficking will increasingly be a divider. Not just between parties here but how we react in comparison to other countries eg EU countries, US and Aus

All attractive, all will use policies to shift movement

She crashed my economy. Fucked up my pension and my mortgage.

@Havanananana

"I cannot see how any alternative government (Labour, or possibly a coalition) can possibly be worse than the current government. "

It is entirely possible and on historic patterns likely that Labour will be worse than the current government.

The last 14 years under the Conservatives were worse than the preceding 13 years under Blair and Brown Labour Government which h in turn were worse than the precedent Conservative Governments under John Major.

Time and time again voters choose to vote for B over A because surely B can't be any worse. And yet each time B is indeed worse than A.

The economy is fucked, thanks to Brexit, the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. It really doesn't matter what Labour or the Tories or any other party say about transforming it, because it will be a long haul and there is no magic fix. Nothing that either party has said (or in the Tories' case, done), can turn things around in the kind of timely fashion that everyone wants. So Labour can witter on about how much better things will be under them, but it won't. It will be more of the same for the foreseeable future. The only way to raise more revenue is by raising taxes, which Labour has promised not to do, but they almost certainly will.

@cheezncrackers

Yep that's a fairly honest and accurate summary.

But no one would vote for a candidate who was honest and stated this.

@1dayatatime I've seen no evidence that Labour would do any better and their entire pitch is "vote for us because we are not the Conservatives and the Conservatives screwed up ".

Which is of course the real problem. No party wants to tell the truth. Decades of underinvestment in people, in education, in public services and the spaffing of the North Sea oil revenues, the money from the sale of council houses and the taxes that could have been raised when times were good have left the country in a sorry mess.

Successive governments have "failed to fix the roof while the sun was shining" - preferring instead to cut taxes and not invest while the tax money was there, while at the same time selling off the family silver (North Sea oil, Utilities and vital infrastructure and services etc.) whenever things got a bit tight.

The UK is supposed to be one of the wealthiest countries on the planet, but has failed to invest, failed to ensure that everyone has benefitted from this wealth, and compared with the other wealthy EU and OECD countries, the UK is in a sorry state in terms of health, poverty, poor housing, low education standards and falling life expectency.

Unless and until politicians own up to the mess they have made of the last 40 years, and are honest about what might need to be done, the UK is never going to recover. But telling the truth will not get any party elected. People seemingly prefer to vote for whichever party promises "untold prosperity and sunny uplands" or that promises to clamp down on the "others" who they blame for all the country's ills (the EU, immigrants, experts, scientists and cyclists etc).

@Havanananana

"But telling the truth will not get any party elected."

And that of course is the crux of the problem.

It reminds me of the quote by Alexander Tytler in 1780:

"A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy".

They have pledged to build 1.5 million homes.

Except that they won't be building homes at all. They intend to change planning rules, that's all, and haven't given any details on how exactly. They will be depending on developers to actually build the units.

There's a rather good article in here
https://www.politicshome.com/thehouse/article/building-blocks-labour-get-housebuilding-track

Which party is promising to clamp down on cyclists?

Absolutely, and this is it In a nutshell.

There are global geo political issues which are beyond our control, the pandemic was beyond our control, some of the economic problems we face have been beyond our control- all of which have far reaching consequences that no political party can save us from.

It is our self inflicted demise which has been breathtaking though, the current government has ruined the country with inept policy after inept policy, decimating the NHS, the environment, education and so on. Brexit squandered the futures of young people and reduced our standing on the world stage to being stage hands stood in the wings.

Short of a miracle, no party can change the utter catastrophic mess the country is in right now that is why there is no tangible Vision from Labour or the Conservatives.

This coming election is not going to suddenly change our fortunes because BOTH contenders are equally as mediocre.

Their line on building houses sounds misleading reading this