Jeremy Corbyn confronted the Tories with the poverty they're creating at PMQs - and all they could do was laugh

[blacksunday]

The Tories seem to forget that they were the last government - at some point they will have to take responsibility for their handling of the nation

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As Jeremy Corbyn stood for his second PMQs today, the mocking Tory laughs told us everything we need to know about their enduring Bullingdon Club-style politics. Old habits die hard, it seems. But Corbyn opened strongly, with an issue that unites the Labour party: the cuts to working tax credits which penalise the lowest earners, known colloquially as the Tory work penalty.

Again, the Tories laughed at the name ‘Kelly’, so apparently unbelievable do they find the first names of Corbyn’s constituents; they soon fell silent, however, as they heard of her struggle as the mother of a disabled child earning minimum wage in a 40.5-hour-per-week job. Corbyn tackled the bullyboys by pausing at their laughter this time. ‘Some may find this funny,’ he said, as he continued to talk about mass inequality and the housing problem in London. It was a subtle highlight of something glaringly obvious: for millionaires protected by Tory policies, inequality bolstered by unfair taxes and buy-to-let properties really is hilarious.

Cameron’s reply to the work penalty issue was the same old line: apparently a £20-a-week increase in wages will magically solve the problem. This is not true, of course, as Corbyn promptly replied: working families are set to be £1,300 a year worse off as the Conservative government hammers the working and middle classes so as to give to the super rich.

Cameron claimed that Corbyn’s figures on poverty were wrong, but perhaps that is something to do with the fact that the Work and Pensions Secretary fixed the definition of ‘poverty’ recently. You don’t feed and clothe homeless children by changing a definition, and the government should be ashamed. The fact that 50 per cent of wealth is in 1 per cent of hands globally is shambolic, and reports today that inequality is growing in the UK even as our country now has the third most ‘ultra-high net worth individuals’ in the world put paid to Cameron’s claims to have driven opportunity. There could be no bigger proof that his policies continue to squeeze the middle and punish the poor.

cont'd

www.independent.co.uk/voices/jeremy-corbyn-confronted-the-tories-with-the-poverty-theyre-creating-at-pmqs-and-all-they-could-do-a6693756.html

Sorry, very slow to update so hit Submit twice.

Isitmebut is definitely a bit hmmmm . Anybody read her or his links or any of it? Seems like she has an alarm that goes pingy ping ping whenever a politics thread is started.

EVENING ALL

This is not 1997 this is 2015 and I am fed up with the Conservative mole's incessant underlining, bolding and never ceasing links.

Give it a bloody rest!

Please submit a complaint to Mumsnet asking for a personal filter for posters, so that spammers like isitmebut can be filtered out of your newsfeed.

Mumsnet, please note: This is not censorship. We are not asking for said spammer to be banned or prevented from posting. We are asking for personal filters where individual posters can choose whom they set to ignore from their newsfeed.

At last!

I'm with you black, your thread has been derailed by a horrible poster. That poster has done a number here. I'm sorry because your original post is very relevant.

No, it is not derailing for the majority Tories, i.e. most people, most mumsnetters to assert their support for this Government. This is democracy. Everyone knows what a mess Corbyn would make were he to get in in 5 years' time so Corbun in effect means 10 yrears of Tory rule and that is what will assure the less fortunate a viable welfare state, not pie in the sky unsustainable left with politics.

..left wing...

Oh, here we go again....

I wondered when you would appear, I'm only surprised you have taken so long .......

black
I think Olivia has intervened there because I reported a certain someone for being unmumsnetty
I recognise some words

Grazia must have a cpy-paste-repeat button for the phrase "10 more years of Tory rule" whenever Corbyn is mentioned. I've read the same comment from the same poster a million times now.

m.huffpost.com/uk/entry/8339208

Another Tory laughing about wtc cuts! They can't help themselves. Why is slamming the poor always sooo funny to the Tories!!

Grazia = we're all left wing narrative.....again....dull...,dull....

Those of us (most of the country) who voted Tory, many many of whom are mumsnetters might also say those posting Labour or socialists posts are a Corbyn-bot but we don't need to go to that level because we have the upper hand in being right in our argument that the Tories do best for the country and the less fortunate.

24% of the electorate isn't most of the country.

The Tories would have got in whether under proportional representation or as we have it first past the post. They got in fair and square in the same way Labour has often got in. The system works. UKIP got as many votes as SNP and got one seat and SNP 50 so if you are going to look at unfairness that is probably the biggest. The Tories got in even without the boundary changes which should have happened before now. It was a great victory and perfectly fair.

blogs.channel4.com/factcheck/factcheck-parliament-proportional-representation/20893

Useful BBC stats on www.bbc.co.uk/news/election/2015/results

Yeah but, 76% of the population still didn't vote Tory though.
Because the Tory laugh at poor people and other peoples misery.

Including certain posters here.

Grazia-

1. Most of the country aren't Tory scum.

1. Only 24% of the public voted for them.

1. The Tories won a slender majority on the fact that Labour were shit.

1. Labout votes were lost of the SNP in Scotland, and LD marginal seats to the Tories in England.

1. Despite the well-deserved disastrous result for Labour (being neo-liberal lackeys), they gained a greater vote share than the Tory scum compared with 2010

1. Get over yourselves.

1. The Tories have consistently lied and gone back on their manifesto pledges, and therefore have no mandate for the policies they are implementing.

1. The only way the Tories help the poor, disabled, vulnerable and disadvantaged is by killing them.

Hope this information helps.

Grazia-

The Tories would have got in whether under proportional representation or as we have it first past the post. They got in fair and square in the same way Labour has often got in. The system works. UKIP got as many votes as SNP and got one seat and SNP 50 so if you are going to look at unfairness that is probably the biggest.

That the Tories won in accordance with the current voting system is not what is in question. It doesn't follow that 'the system works', if we define 'works' as having political representation of the public in Parliament.

The FPTP system is an oddity on world democracies. Very few countries run such an extreme electoral system.

And the example you give of UKIP is correct, and shows how unrepresentative and unfair the voting system is.

The Tories got in even without the boundary changes which should have happened before now. It was a great victory and perfectly fair.

It was a minor victory, on the back of a minority of the population. Mostly consisting of rich, elderly white people who tend to vote more.

Get over yourself.

Labour were perfectly happy with our electoral system when they got in using it. I am never sure what the phrase get over yourself means. We have 5 year s of Tory rule which will be very good news for everyone rich and poor in the country and that is democracy.