Webchat with Labour leadership contender Sir Keir Starmer MP on Monday February 3 at 1.30pm

[AnnaCMumsnet]

Hello

We’re pleased to announce a webchat with Labour leadership contender Sir Keir Starmer MP on Monday 3 February at 1.30pm.

Keir Starmer is Labour MP for Holborn and St Pancras (and is thus, importantly, the MP for MNHQ) having been first elected in 2015. He served as Director of Public Prosecutions from 2008-13, focusing on increasing prosecutions for violence against women and girls (see our previous webchat with him for our We Believe You campaign back in 2012), and seeking justice for Stephen Lawrence and his family. He was also involved in controversial cases (including the prosecution of the former LibDem MP Chris Huhne and his ex-wife Vicky Pryce over their creative approach to speeding offences). Before that he was a barrister specialising in human rights law, working with the defendants in the ‘McLibel’ case and working on environmental protections, workers’ rights and challenging the death penalty.

Keir is named after the first Labour leader, Keir Hardie, and is regarded as the frontrunner in Labour’s leadership contest. He is currently Shadow Brexit Secretary.

Please do join the chat on Monday at 1.30pm or if you can’t make it, leave a question here in advance.

We've invited and are hoping to have all of the contenders on over the next few weeks.

As always, please remember our 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 dominating a thread, mods might request that people don't continue to post what's effectively the same question or point. (We may suspend the accounts of anyone who continues 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.

Many thanks,
MNHQ

Hi Keir,

Many people felt the Labour manifesto in the last GE was overloaded and the promises unbelievable. I read it and didn't actively disagree with much, but it did seem insanely overambitious - more of a manifesto for 20 years of government than 5.

If you had to produce a manifesto with, say, just five top priorities / pledges for a first term in government, what might they be?

Thanks!

Hello!

Why is misogyny not included as a hate crime characteristic?

After Nottingham’s successful pilot to include this factor in crime reporting, showing (as we already guessed) that misogyny is a huge problem and clearly identifiable as a driving factor in many crimes and prejudice against women and girls, would you support including misogyny as a hate crime characteristic nationally? If not, why not?

If you become the Labour Leader how would you convince me a life long Conservative supporter that I should I vote for your and your party? What do you offer that's different to all the other politicians out there today?

Hi Keir,
I voted labour for the first time ever last election. I'm going to ask the same question Jess Philips ignored.
I believe that a key contributing factor to a rise in sexual assaults and abuse is the widespread availability of porn that depicts the demeaning, degradation and abuse of women. I also think this causes it to be harder to convict rapists (as juries think some women like this treatment). There is starting to be evidence that porn use damages teenage boys sex drives leading to erectile dysfunction and unsatisfying "real life" encounters.
Porn can also be a gateway into normalising images of child sexual abuse.
What will you do as leader of the labour party to tackle this issue?

Hi again Keir
I know I've already submitted a question but I really want to ask this as well: do you think there is a real threat of the UK breaking up within the next decade or two and how do you think it could be prevented?

Will Labour ever have a woman as leader?

Um, Labour has already had two women as leader, Margaret Beckett and Harriet Harman.

Hi Keir

Thank you for doing this.

Do you believe that our overstretched police forces should be focusing resources on investigating non-crime hate incidents which do not break the law rather than tackling violent crimes and burglaries which obviously do? I was staggered to read recently that Scotland Yard alone has 900 hate crime officers, which seems extraordinary when knife attacks in London are escalating and muggings and burglaries are not always investigated because of a lack of police officers. What would you do to address this disparity?

Thank you.

Neither of them were elected as leader, Burney. They were keeping the seat warm for a man.

I'm aware of the first part of your post GC and would take issue with the second. The point is it's not accurate to say Labour has never had a woman leader. I don't think the number of Tory vs. Labour leaders since women became a significant presence in mainstream politics (what, 6 or so on each side?) is statistically significant enough to draw conclusions of sexism from. I'm sure as an academic you'll agree but this probably isn't the place for this debate. I'm sure Keir can handle it.

Hi Keir - I would really like to see politicians becoming less tit for tat with each other. Do you think politicians always have to be so critical of the opposition and that actually for many matters the middle ground or some compromise is perhaps in the best interests of the country and should be adopted? Coalitions are not necessarily the answer but there must be some models in other counties where the governments just get on with good policies/ responses to the issues ordinary people face.

Hi Keir, thank you for doing this. I'm Jewish, an ex-Labour member, and have never felt so terrified as during last December's election campaign. Me, my children and my local community were actively mocked and taunted by Labour activists on more than one occasion.

There is genuine fear among the Jewish community and those of us who are traditionally Labour voters are devastated and politically homeless.

How will you tackle antisemitism in the party and how vocal will you be in calling out the high-profile people within Labour who have stoked and encouraged it?

Hi Keir

I would be interested to know your views on the current policies concerning maternity/paternity/shared parental leave and funding for childcare for working parents, and whether you would propose any changes to it?

It seems to me that the current system reinforces outdated gender roles given the imbalance between the paid leave allowed to women over men, whether that be basic statutory or any enhanced allowance from employers (shared parental leave is a lovely idea but actually quite tricky in practice).

The lack of any funding for childcare until a child is at least 2, more commonly 3, also makes returning to work economically unviable for so many women, which puts them behind in their careers, and makes them financially dependant on their partners or the state. If we are to achieve better representation for women at higher levels within companies, on boards etc, surely the fundamental issues affecting women’s ability to participate in the workplace need to be properly addressed. The current system is, in my view, embarrassingly outdated and needs to be overhauled.

Hi. I'm a Scot who voted no in 2014. However, after the horror show of the last 3 years, and in particular the fact that 62% of Scots voted to remain in the EU, I am now in favour of independence for Scotland.

Is there anything you can say to an increasing number of Scots like me - I'd say reluctant indie supporters - to persuade us of the benefits of staying in a UK.

Thanks and good luck.

Hello Keir,

Theresa May for all her faults did a lot to advance criminalisation of coercive control, a long overdue change. Can you explain how labour will build on these policies to further protect women.

Given the desperately low rate of rape prosecutions and convictions if you become leader will you give an unequivocal pledge to make this a priority policy area for your time in opposition and into the next general election?
www.theguardian.com/law/2019/sep/12/prosecutions-in-england-and-wales-at-lowest-level-in-a-decade

I doubt I'm in time to get a question in but I'll give it a go.

I'm not a labour member but have voted Labour in the past, however I found Jeremy Corbyn and the whole Momentum group very troubling - cultivating an abusive atmosphere online to any decent whatsoever or even asking for discussion.

I've been told that Labour prefer to be 'pure and Socialist' than in Government, I've been told (as a centrist) that I'm worse than scum and my vote is not wanted.
Is this true?

Labour seemed to have attracted the worst conspiracy theorist types.
How can we begin to take Labour seriously again as a politician force?

One additional question if there’s time;

I spoke to a labour canvasser recently on my doorstep, about a subject of considerable interest to me and upon which my vote will decide in future. He agreed with me but felt powerless to do or say anything because of strong counter viewpoints held by momentum.

How will you address the obvious divisions in the party and how do you feel about the power dynamics at play here?

Hi,

Do you think statutory paternity leave should be longer?

Thank you.

Hi Keir - thanks for coming on to Mumsnet and very best wishes with your campaign. I was a bit alarmed earlier in the contest to hear Rebecca Long-Bailey's comments on abortion. Can you give us a categorical reassurance that if you are Leader of the Labour Party that you will absolutely defend a woman's right to choose?

Hi Keir,

I'm a lifelong labour voter and trade union member. What will the labour party be doing to ensure that employment rights are not further eroded in the coming years, given the loss of the EU legislation which protects so many of our employment rights?

To add to and reinforce what @BatleyTownswomensGuild has said, how will Labour strengthen (or, even, introduce) sanctions for schools and LEAs that act illegally with respect to children who have SEN?
LEAs can refuse to provide support and there is virtually no comeback; parents who take the LEA to tribunal over this almost always are successful, while the LEA spends huge amounts of education funding defending these unwinnable cases.

Schools can permanently exclude children who cannot cope without support, while the very school has failed to give them the support they need. There is no recourse for parents and no consequence for schools that do this; at most they must write a letter of apology. This does not put right the distress that a child feels nor does it restore their lost education, consequential losses to a parent or the effect on children's mental health as they lose their community of friends and the school they are familiar with.

I am interested in the ethics of organisations. I was fucked over by the organisation I worked for when I complained about wrongdoing, because they cared the most about protecting their reputation. What are your policies on this? Thanks.

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