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?

It's a simple lie that Tories have been told to keep repeating to say there is no plan. There are in fact numerous detailed plans, all of which will be in the manifesto.

Oh don’t be ridiculous. Neil came across awful
last night. I was embarrassed for him.

• Kier even!!

No idea who the fudge Neil is!!

😂

@Nat6999

I"t isn't just VAT on public schools, they are going to close all the loopholes that were left open on Non Dom tax rules, a bigger windfall tax on utility companies & banks plus the NHS spending will be from efficiency savings, he said that last night"

Any party that claims they can raise money by closing tax loopholes and cutting wasteful Government spending is lying and relying on gullible voters to believe them.

Remember..

• Party A has just had a 14 year run where things have got consistently worse.
• Last time Party B was elected things got a lot better.

But some people are talking about needing finely detailed plans budgeted to the penny from Party B. Is the fine detail of the evidence of the last 14 years just making Whoosh! noises as it passes over their heads?

Last time Party B was elected things got a lot better.

They did. But the economy was growing then. Now it is stagnating.

"So you voting rational is entirely based on "I want to vote for Party B because I really want to get rid of Party A"
And not because Party B has any credible plans to improve things / keep them the same or potentially make them worse. It's just that they are not Party A."

That's not exactly what people are saying.

I'm not voting for Party A - because they have broken the social contract that presumes that if I pay my taxes and obey the laws of the country, the government will provide (or facilitate) things that I can't personally afford, like infrastructure, healthcare, education, policing and defense, and at all times will act in the best interests of all of the country and not just in the best interests of their sponsors.

This government has broken this contract by selling off the vital public services and allowing their chums to run off with the assets, or by underfunding these vital services to the point where people who can afford to pay are forced to go to the private providers where they are fleeced, and everyone else has to make do with sub-standard service or join the end of a very, very long waiting list. All this while they themselves break the law, lie and misrepresent the facts.

At the same time, they have tried to silence my opposition to their antics - by banning strikes and protests and attempting to define anyone who disagrees with them as "terrorists" or at the least as being "unpatriotic." I've been pejoritively labelled by one PM as a "Remoaner" for pointing out that Brexit would be, and has turned out to be, a catastrophe. I've been called a "Citizen of Nowhere" by another PM for daring to have lived abroad and to openly state that not everything that the UK does is "world-beating." I've been told to "fuck off back where you came from" by a man in a smart suit for daring to speak to my daughter and a friend in a foreign language on a train in England (I'm English, which then seemed to enrage him even more).

So no - I'm not voting for Party A. Which leads to the question - who do I vote for?
Not C, D or E because my vote would be wasted in a constituency that is really a two-party fight. So under FPTP I'm left to choose between Party B or abstaining. I don't want to abstain, particularly if that means that Party A sneaks in because not enough people voted for the only viable alternative. So despite some misgivings, it has to be Party B, which more closely aligns with my views than Party A, even if I'm not 100% in favour of everything that they propose (and I'm pragmatic enough to know that they won't be able to clear up the mess they inherit in just 5 years).

ffs, the apologists for Sunak and the Tories are out in force in this forum. Why is it that change can only be to perfection, no matter how imperfect the current situation is? Do you really expect that after 14 years there's a rabbit in the fucking hat that the Torys can pull out and make everything better with?

fwiw the current Labour party wouldn't be my first choice, but they're a long way from being my last choice.

Indeed. Why would labour show their hand when Tories have not.

I just hope they have more of a plan for their other aims than they do for the education one. It's absolutely bloody laughable to say that they're going to 'make sure there's a qualified subject teacher in every classroom' or trumpet their proposal of recruiting 6,500 new teachers unless they have some way of actually achieving it. 40,000 teachers quit teaching last year, and the targets for numbers of trainees has been missed for years. Even offering hefty grants doesn't work. Where are they going to get these teachers from?

Not even at the debate? There’s not many.

Surely that’s where you show your hand, and try and put across what you’ll do

I'm not a Tory apologist. I merely note facts.

Look up the figures for the UK economy between, say 1994 and 2024, for yourself if you don't believe me

You mean facts like these?

Well you said yourself there’s a pool of 40,000 to fish in. More if you include all those who will allegedly be made redundant by VAT on school fees. If they’ve got any sense they’ll have been quietly researching with those people to find out what might persuade them to return so they can offer it.

"If they’ve got any sense they’ll have been quietly researching with those people to find out what might persuade them to return so they can offer it."

While this comment is about the 40,000 teachers who have quit teaching last year, the same could equally apply to nurses.

Unfortunately, these people are not returning to the professions that they've left, no matter how much you pay them.

A large cohort of teachers and nurses have recently left their professions because they are the 1950s and 1960s "boom" generation that have reached retirement.

Others have left because working conditions have become intolerable. E.g too few staff for too few pupils/patients. A lack of respect from parents/patients who are rightly frustrated about the services being provided but who are wrongly taking their frustration out on the staff. A lack of respect for their professional qualifications - poor pay and conditions, the replacement of qualified staff by less qualified and lower-paid "assistents" and the reduction of the time spent delivering what they have been trained to deliver and instead spending time filling in forms and complying with ever-expanding and invasive bureaucracy. A lack of respect from government, ministers and other politicians who, like Sunak last night, attempt to blame their failings on the front-line staff rather than admit to their own incompetence and poor decision-making.

Or this one straight from the Revolution Foundation

I think Sunak and Starmer both have the same policy: go with what polls well. Very uninspiring.

Though the Labour period in government 1997 to 2010 included 2009, when GDP fell by 5%.

But in 1997 it grew by 4.9% and in 2000 by 4.3%, so there was money in the economy to be spent on public services such as the NHS, which did improve hugely.

GDP growth in 2023 is estimated at 0.1%, so stagnating.

At one time Labour had the aims if "getting the economy growing again". Now one of the "five steps" is "deliver economic stability" - not the same thing.

Eh? Are you saying they should have some "inspiring" stuff that no-one votes for? Politicians in shock attempt to get people to vote for them.

Keir didn't! He hardly got the chance to speak fully. Sunak was bullying, nasty, interrupting when he was speaking all the time, vile, and rude.

The presenter was useless

Unfortunately, these people are not returning to the professions that they've left, no matter how much you pay them.

Exactly. More money won’t be on the table anyway because this time there really isn’t any. Other things that are deliverable might induce some of them to return. A smart government in waiting would be researching what those things are.

@DogInATent it's not about perfection. People are entitled to hold Labour to a high bar even though the Tories have set it so low. Why are we being told we must vote for an alternative just because it isn't as shit as what we've got now. It's so depressing. This should be a walk in the park for Labour? Why isn't it? Surely it's ok to ask that question without being accused of being a Tory apologist?

To be honest Labour should of smashed it out the park by making Wales the real life example of how good things could be under Labour.....that alone would have ensured their win...what another wasted opportunity.

Labour's poll ratings are suggesting a walk in the park is exactly what it is.

I can't see one post on here that acknowledges that in many constituencies there is actually an alternative to "Dumb and Dumber"

Obviously Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales have local parties that can offer an alternative, but many parts of England are a two-way fight between the incumbant (usually Conservative) and LibDem - particularly rural constituencies and some affluent places in the South East of England where the majority would probably never vote Labour.

The UK is not one homogeneous mass. As we are seeing, what might appeal to voters in Clacton might be an anathema to voters in Clapham, Coventry or Cardiff. The issues facing Northern Ireland are very different to those facing Northampton or North Shields.

One unfortunate feature of the election campaign so far is that the media have focussed almost entirely on just two parties, with Farage as a noisy but vacuous self-promoting sideshow. A visitor from outer space would be hard-pressed to notice that there are any other parties standing in the election, never mind what the manifesto of these parties might be.