How long till everybody forgets how venal the Tories are?

[dropoutin]

...and vote them back in to screw us all over again? Five years, or ten?

The Tory party are masters of image re-invention and manipulation of public discourse, and clearly a lot of people are stupid. But are they really REALLY stupid (5) or just really stupid (10)?

I mean they pretty much barefaced lied, made a bunch of spending commitments which make a big black hole and then blamed the tories (who by the way I think were a shit show). There were always going to have to be cuts or tax rises and they should have said so. But no they lied during the election (which was literally a few weeks ago).

@taxguru it’s not an easy job to take on. At the end of the day Keir Starmer and his govt have stated that they are public servants, working for the nation. That in itself says more to me than anything the conservatives said. The fact that the City has supported them also says a lot. I don’t believe there has been lying . I do believe there have been many things deliberately not talked about. But fundamentally I feel more hope for the future of this country. We all know there will be hard days to come.

Lying by omission (i.e. not talking about it) is STILL lying!

It doesn’t mean anything. People back who they think about to get into power. They want influence.
The public servant line is a nothing I mean it’s easy to say platitudes. It comes down to pre GE rhetoric to post GE

“The (insert party name) are masters of image re-invention and manipulation of public discourse, and clearly a lot of people are stupid. But are they really REALLY stupid (5) or just really stupid (10)?

Could be said about any political party.

What is truly refreshing about this thread and having a Labour government is the “Fuck the Tories” rhetoric has lost all of its support, and there is now a much more reasoned debate to be had without Labour voters making out that Tory voters are the scum of the earth in the way they have been for the last 5 years. The OP even tried to be inflammatory to the Tories and hasn’t been successful in rallying the unanimous pro-Labour troops.

I hope now more people realise that politics is a thankless and impossible job and it’s far more nuanced than “Fuck the Tories”.

I get you re sore you lot lost and by some margin too but Starmer hasn't lied, he said no increases on NI, Income tax and VAT so leaving the door open on CGT etc etc.

People presumably knew that those two NI cuts, done solely to bribe the electorate, have to be paid for?

Or do you want them reversed?

But their recent policy changes shows they are not working for the whole nation. They are working for the public sector, by caving in to their demands in full immediately, despite there not being the money to do so. After saying they were a government of service and wouldn't make unfunded spending commitments. They have taken the winter fuel allowance away from all pensioners with an income of more than £11k, despite saying they wouldn't. That's around 12 million pensioners they are not working for. They have cancelled new hospital building plans, while they are proposing to transfer huge amounts of profit to private sector housebuilders by relaxing planning rules.

All politicians lie - but few do it quite so soon after winning power!!

Yep

Nail on the head there! True to form only looking after benefit claimants and public sector workers, i.e. those dependant upon the state who are their core voters (and in the case of the heavily unionised public sector, Labour are dependant on their funding!). Nothing new here!

I’m not sore. The Tories were worn out and needed to go. I’d have preferred a smaller majority, but it was certainly Labour’s time.

But if Labour tell lies - as they have done, by the bucketload - they should be called out. I did worry that this government would be dishonest. I’m sorry to have had that concern confirmed.

Pay review body recommendations you mean? the parameters set by the previous Govt who presumably would have funded them too? but didn't set aside any money to do so.

Pensioners on 11k will be able to claim benefits, so will still get the WFP.

Hospital build program? we should have already had 40 new hospitals by now but again, Tories never set aside enough money, so it has to be cut.

Tory plan was 300k houses per year, Labours is 370k, either way, unless you want the state to build them, the private sector will & they made huge profit under the previous rules.... remember too, few will be built unless the economy is doing well and house builders can sell at a profit.

What exactly are you really complaining about?

If Labour increase NI, Income tax or VAT, then yes they would have lied but i followed their promises and statements and so far do not believe they have lied, they specifically refused to rule out other tax changes.

I also understand Reeves opinion that not funding the PR recommendations has a cost too.

What i don't get is why the Civil service signed off Hunts plans but also signed off Reeves too, they both cannot be right!!!

Never. Just like I didn't after the last time. Hopefully I have also raised my children not to empower such nepotistic, self serving, unethical, morally defunct, lying cunts either. I will never not look badly upon anyone who did. The state this country is in is on them and their voters unilaterally and without exception.

I'm not complaining...I'm just stating some facts about what the Labour government said before and after the election :)

Pay review body recommendations don't have to be accepted, or can be accepted as they have been in the past but tied t changes in working practice and/or efficiencies. Not in this case though

WHP is now explicitly tied to Pension Credit, which tops out at £218 a week. If you are not entitled to that (and with the new state pension £220 a week, that's a lot of people) you won't get it.

I had hoped that Labours planning reform would involve the government taking a share of the uplift in land value resulting from the granting of planning permission, raising funds to spend on infrastructure and capital projects. They chose not to do this either I do not know why you refer to the Tory plan as I am not a Tory and they are not in government.

On the hospital front, as shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves had access via the civil service to the same information as Hunt and Sunak. If she chose not to ask, that's lax. If she asked but didn't get, that's poor. If she had the information but didn't read or understand it that's negligent

What exactly is the point you are trying to make?

Well said.

@Tryingtokeepgoing So, reading through your reply, Labour haven't lied at all.

They just haven't done what you want them to do, which isn't the same thing at all.

On PayR the so called changes to working practices effciencies etc were just another way of cutting dept budgets, leading to more staff leaving, lower moral and so on.

I think the Winter fuel payment threshold is too low but as pensioners have had some hefty increases, it was enivitable but at least they didn't increase student loan repayments, which Sunak did.

Cynically, i guess cuts fall on the demographic less likely to vote for you....

Of course they’ve lied. And it’s not a good look to try and justify it.

The truth to any thinking person is that what Labour’s announced so far are in essence decent Tory policies, with the exception of the bungs to the public sector workers (which may have unwelcome consequences down the line).

I don’t much care if tax goes up so long as the increases are sensible and help to service debt.

But all of this could have been done without a campaign of lies. Rachel Reeves’s statement was shamefacedly dishonest.

Well they have lied, because they directly said that they wouldn’t cut the winter heating allowance, and that they wouldn’t make in funded spending commitments. And they’ve done both…

I do wonder why the default response for a Labour supporter when faced with someone questioning the Labour parties actions is to assume they’re a conservative. A complete unwillingness to accept questioning at all. It’s alll so tribal. Any successful organisation or person knows that you have to be open to challenge, listen others and and learn from them…

Any successful organisation or person knows that you have to be open to challenge, listen others and and learn from them…

Indeed, Reeves now has full access to the 'books and is making the choices required to fund the Tories NI cuts.

If you don't want WFP cuts and don't want the NI cuts reversed, how should the NI cuts be funded?

I haven't found any pre election promise from Labour on WFP's, only that a treasury official has said they didn't plan on doing this.

i think its fair to question the motives of anyone who judges Labour so harshly after just 4 weeks in power.

& its only fair Labour are given the opportunity to run the country first, especially after inheriting such a mess in the public finances.

Fwiw i voted Labour, as a tactical vote but i'm far more Green/LD, def not a natural Lab supporter.

The Labour Party will be
hammered at the next local election and the next general election. People are disgusted already.

How long? Probably once the realisation sets in that Labour are worse. After all, it's been a long-time since we've experienced a Labour government. Memory a bit fuzzy, but i know they were bad.

Yes, it was all scaremongering and that mocking thread about KS had the last Rollo. I have been in this world long enough to know who would suffer more in the end.

Hope so

@Livelovebehappy - but things weren’t bad! The NHS was a thousand times better if you remember; we had surestart centres throughout the country. Things became difficult when there was a global recession caused by the problems in the US as you will recall