Webchat with John McDonnell, Shadow Chancellor, Friday 6 December at 12 midday

[AnnaCMumsnet]

We’re very pleased to announce a webchat with the Shadow Chancellor, John McDonnell, this Friday 6 December at 12 midday.

John has been Labour MP for Hayes and Harlington since 1997. Born in Liverpool, he studied at night school while working before going to university. He went on to work as a union official and in local government at the GLC and at Camden Council. He campaigned for Jeremy Corbyn to win the Labour leadership in 2015 and has been Shadow Chancellor since then.

Labour’s economic plans have proved a talking point during this election; the manifesto includes plans for free nationalised broadband services, increases in NHS spending, an increase in the minimum wage, freezing the state pension age at 66, and a ‘Green New Deal’. John has said the plans will tackle rising living costs; the IFS has said that Labour’s spending plans don’t add up (it says the same about the Conservatives).

Labour’s pledge to compensate WASPI women with an average £15k payout has caused a huge amount of conversation on our sister site Gransnet, so we’ll be taking questions from GN on that (and other topics) too.

Please do join the chat on Friday at midday, or if you can’t make it, leave a question here in advance. Please note John won’t be able to do the full hour because his time is pretty over-committed but we will detain him as long as we can!

As always, please remember our webchat guidelines - one question per user, follow-ups only if there’s time and most questions have been answered, and please keep it civil. Also if one topic is overwhelmingly dominating a discussion with a guest, mods might request that people don't continue to post what's effectively the same question or point. (We will be taking action on this, including suspending the accounts of MNers who continue to heckle after we've posted to ask people to stop, so please take note.) Rest assured we will ALWAYS let the guest know that it's an area of concern to multiple users and will encourage them to engage with those questions.

Thanks

Hi John,
My question relates to your interview in the Sunday Times recently. You said that you didn't have any friends who vote for other parties. Why is this? Do you not think that having wide ranging political discussions might enhance your own understanding of other people's positions?

Also, why are Labour talking about re-nationalisation and banning private schools when the priorities are NHS reform and education?

The phrase about deckchairs and the Titanic springs to mind.

Incidentally I'm another of the #LabourLosingWomen labour party resignees due to loss of sex based rights, BREXIT non-position and anti-semitism. Once you've sorted these I'll think about voting Labour again.

Hello

Thanks for coming on

I’m really worried about labour’s policy on free schools. My son has been lucky enough to get a place at a specialist sixth form free school. It’s an astonishingly good school with excellent teaching and pastoral care. It’s run by a university and its sole motivation seems to be to give really excellent education. It goes to great lengths to recruit children from all backgrounds - it’s above national average on the free school meals measure.

It’s a brilliant school and it would be vandalism to force it into local authority control, rather than leadership by subject specialists and academics as at present. I understand some of the objections to big academy chains, but not all free schools are vanity projects for bureaucrats. Some of them are just flat-out brilliant, and we should learn from them and aim to extend the model to more children and young people.

Lots of Labour’s manifesto is about innovation and change - why is under-18 education the only thing that must never benefit from innovation?

I'm in my 50s and have always voted Labour. This time I will not unless I have assurance that women's sex-based rights will be preserved.

Can you provide that assurance in unequivocal language please.

Hello John,

What do you think of the ongoing Maya Forstater and Harry Miller cases? Do you support free speech?

Thank you for coming onto Mumsnet.

Hi John,

Is the cost of Trident renewal included in the Labour Party's "fully-costed" manifesto?

If not, why not? And where would you find the money from?

Why is Dawn Butler still in position as your Women’s and Equalities shadow minister when she was recently briefing in the media and on Twitter AGAINST the Labour Party 2019 manifesto, did not appear to be aware of the relevant parts of the 2019 manifesto relating to women, does not understand the Equality Act 2010 (surely an essential part of her job) especially in relation to women's rights with single-sex exemptions, and was quoting from the 2017 manifesto? In short she is a liability and an embarrassment to the Labour Party, and does more to single-handedly undermine trust from women voters than any other shadow minister. She should be sacked for briefing against the manifesto alone.

Hi John

My primary school child was recently taught in a lesson that transgender people are people who turn into the opposite sex and that Sam Smith, the singer, is neither male or female. Another child said in the lesson that he knew that all babies start out as girls and then some turn into boys and that all boys are transgender. The teacher said that this might be true. So before my son has begin to understand fertilisation, chromosomes, that biological sex is immutable or other important scientific facts, he is being given incorrect and confusing information regarding human biology. Therefore my question is:

Do you commit to addressing both public and professional concerns about the teaching of gender identity in schools - particularly the harmful notion that controversial medical interventions should be considered for children and teenagers who are confused about their gender?

Hi John

1. Do you think women are oppressed as a class on the basis of our sex?

2. Do you think a rich owner of the means of production becomes working class if they self identify as such?

Hi John. Do you sometimes wish you were leader instead of Jeremy Corbyn? You come across pretty well on TV, and I say that as a New Labour Tony Blair fan.

Hi John,
I was a teenager in the 70s when the Birmingham pub bombs killed 21 people and injured 180 more. I used to vote Labour, but how can I vote for a party whose chancellor said this:
"It's about time we started honouring those people involved in the armed struggle. It was the bombs and bullets and sacrifice made by the likes of Bobby Sands that brought Britain to the negotiating table. The peace we have now is due to the action of the IRA. Because of the bravery of the IRA and people like Bobby Sands, we now have a peace process."
You were not a naive student when you said this, John. You were in your 50s. So my question is, how could I possibly vote Labour next week when you and other like-minded people hold all the top positions?

Hello - no more questions on gender/self-ID/trans/GRA/single-sex spaces etc now please - we've got a good spread already and we don't want it to overwhelm the webchat.

Thanks
MNHQ

Hi John,
In your opinion has anti semitism taken hold in the Labour party, or are these repeated claims that it has, just an attempt to smear Corbyn for giving a voice to the Palestinians?

Question from Gransnet user Molly10

Is the delayed suggestion of Waspi compensation an act of desperation by Labour to win a chunk of votes?

Why is there such a huge variation in quotes on the Labour Waspi calculator eg:

Born 1958 £12,800 approx
Born 1952 £10,500 approx
Born 1953 £19,300 approx

The person born in 1958 is missing out the most nearing the £50k of pension mark. Not only is this compensation a fraction of their loss it is also disproportionate in comparison to a 1953 quote who loses less years pension.

Is the compensation offered a definite or will Labour renege on this?

What about the disparity in other regional losses due to these pension changes eg bus passes. All in London get Oyster cards at 60 years, as do some other cities give bus passes but others have to wait till pension age thereby incurring further losses. Would Labour equalize this?

Question from Gransnet user petitpois

Hello John,
I think the main thing everyone wants to know is where the WASPI payback money is coming from?

Question from Gransnet user granoffour

I want to know why the WASPI pledge wasn't important enough for your manifesto? It's not in there, is it?

Why the ongoing focus on income as the main target for taxation? I was interested in your Land Tax idea and was disappointed that seems to have been shelved. Surely it makes more sense to start taxing some assets esp as huge unearned increases in property wealth, and various loopholes for wealthy to reduce income tax
. I'd rather unearned wealth was taxed more eg assets risen in value, inheritances, rather than income from work. We should be encouraging work (including high earners) and discouraging sitting on assets. I feel manifesto tax plans are more of the same rather than representing a real change.

Question from Gransnet user Peppermint

Is it fair that younger generations will have to make up for Waspi compensation, with the money being borrowed, when they won't be able to retire themselves until they're probably 75+?

Will you pay current market prices for shares when renationalising companies?

What will you do when companies threatened with renationalisation move offshore?

Hello John!
Do you really think that Labour is NOT anti-Semitic? Do you honestly believe that the whole palaver is a massive smear campaign? Do you seriously think that Jews can't spot anti-Semitism and are just misguided about this?

I'm not Jewish, BTW, and I'm bloody horrified at what has been going on.

Hi,
In the past, you have said you would like to see a tax rate of 60 per cent for those earning over $100,000. Is that still an ambition? At what point does increasing the top tax rate become counter productive?

Hi John. What are your views on IPP prisoners? I have a friend whose son is an IPP prisoner and not knowing when he will be free is having a devastating on his mental wellbeing and that of his family. I also echo other posters concerns on self-id.

Hi,

With regard to the proposed 2nd EU referendum (citing the belief that we weren't informed sufficiently of what Leave will actually mean) and offering Labour's version of Leave versus Remain....so that the same scenario doesn't arise again and in the interests of balance, will we now also be truthfully and fully informed of what the future will look like if we Remain - warts and all?

Or do you believe it's enough to just offer us a Labour Leave Deal versus simply 'Remain'?

Hi John,
A Brexit one .....
Why should the EU spend time negotiating a deal with a Labour Government if the Labour party will then campaign against said deal (for Remain) ?

Did you realise that mural was antisemitic as soon as you saw it or did you need to think about it a bit?

@GrumpyMiddleAgedWoman As a Jewish ex-Labour member whose life is being destroyed by the resurgence of antisemitism led and encouraged by Corbyn, thank you from the bottom of my heart for being a decent person and caring about minorities, including mine.