If Labour came into power

[Rosewaterblossom]

If Labour were to come into power tomorrow, what is it people think they would do better?

Not what Labour governments of the past have done.. I mean Labour 2022. What would be new/better?

@Viviennemary

Weslth tax on anyone with income of £25000 plus. People on benefits get more than that.

Do they? Could you explain how because I'm disabled and on benefits and I certainly dont get anywhere near 25K

So far I haven't read anything which stands out that Labour would do any better.

At those rates, I'd be moving to a gentler tax environment. Do you really want to alienate everyone who can afford to pay tax? If all, or even a significant % of, the higher rate taxpayers go offshore then the burden falls even harder on the people (the poorest) who will be left behind.

Wealth tax on £25k? Lmao fuck that, who would vote for that?!

@Whingasaurus

I've given this some thought and the only clearly stated Labour policy I can remember I'd get rid of student loans and tbh I'm not sure that was Labour. It's shocking that all Labour seems to stand for us name calling and virtue signalling I genuinely don't know what they would do.

I think it was lib dems but might be wrong. Most people don't get near to paying their student loan off anyway and just my opinion, but I think it's fair enough to have what essentially is a 'graduate tax' due to the way they take repayments and the thresholds. I do think for degrees with a big placement portion such as nursing shouldn't have to pay anything as they essentially do many many hours on wards and other settings, but that's another debate I expect.

Momentum have clearly put the second team on this thread. No ideas offered yet. A link to Keir Starmer's page of policy (I looked at it) seemed a bit threadbare.

£25k wealth tax. Now I have heard everything! Are people so out of touch that they think £25k is wealthy??

@KeiRSTARMER, I quite like you and your version of soft labour, but you and your team need to engage much better on social media. This is where you win or lose now.

@Keirstarmer, get shot of the Momentum bots for starters. Everyone who works for a living can see them from miles off.

I think the OP has f*cked this thread bigtime. You may think a Labour government is the answer, but your failure to set out ideas and alternative theories has revealed the realiity. You don't have much policy to offer -- apart from not being the Tories.

I am still waiting for a refutation...

@Fujimora

Wealth taxes on anyone with an income of £25000 plus.

Eh? Jesus is the level of expectation so low that we class £25000 as wealthy??!

I think the £25k must be a typo?
Maybe she meant £250k.

weak.........

@InCahootswithOrwell

There’s be much better protection for households and businesses against rising energy prices and lower fuel bills for a start. They almost certainly wouldn’t break the ministerial code on a weekly basis. They wouldn’t lie to parliament on an almost weekly basis Less corruption - I’d imagine that fewer deals to mates would be red flagged against international standards to protect corruption There’s be less Russian interference in U.K. government They probably wouldn’t have illegally prorogued parliament They wouldn’t be restricting access to voting They wouldn’t be chipping away at the foundations of U.K. democracy using statutory instruments in bills

There’s probably more, but that seems like enough to start with.

This.

Currently I don't think it's "what would they do" but rather "what wouldn't they"

Where does this 25K wealth tax come from? Some bollox made up by the Mail? Can anybody link to Labour actually saying that?

Having been a Labour member and witnessing Starmer's deceit, ruthlessness and total lack of integrity first hand, I rank him personally lower than the shit on my shoe. Which puts him several rungs higher than Johnson. Truth is Labour, Lib Dems and Tories all occupy much the same space now in terms of economic policy.

That being said, there's a case for changing the guard simply because governments that have been in place for a long time with little opposition and a deep sense of entitlement tend to become lazy and corrupt and not govern very well, which is of course exactly what is happening. So even if you have several contenders for implementing broadly the same economic agenda, the one that has had to fight to get there and win people over is likely to do it more accountably than the one who has been taking the piss already and getting away with it.

PR would help a lot and nothing is likely to change much until more people acknowledge just how broken the system is and how rigged it is against the interests of ordinary people.

And say what you like... the fact that ANYBODY apart from the super-rich could actually still vote for the Tories now just makes me feel like humanity is some foreign species I have no understanding of whatsoever. Certainly makes me give up on any hope of England reversing its steady decent into hell. I read report after each new nadir in their behaviour that the polls have seen their support drop from 40-something to 30-something percent, or whatever, and it's supposed to show how badly they're doing. But all I can think is "Jesus, there's a third of the electorate that are so fucking lobotomised the only response they can muster to their government laughing while beating them over the head with a club, is to ask for a bigger club".

If you're that comfortable with capitalism and the status quo (I'm not, but that's my problem) then just vote Liberal Democrat FFS. Anything - just someone who is actually a grown up and will take the business of governing you seriously.

I suspect they'd push some social economic policies in a different direction, which could be good. Infrastructure investment would be good. It would be good if they could revamp elements of the benefits system that don't work well.

I'm surprised some thing there would be less ministerial shenanigans. Maybe for a bit but after a time in power that seems to happen across the board.

On the other hand I wonder if their hand might be a little tied with the results of coming out of covid, they might not have that much room to maneuver. I worry that they would id politics type targeting for a lot of their economic programs which would be a bad way to implement them IMO and I would really not like to see them promote any of that agenda in their social policy.

I'd like to think they'd try and revive local trade and industry and local food security, supporting small farms, but I don't feel terribly confident about that possibility.

If you're that comfortable with capitalism and the status quo

Labour is hardly anti-capitalist though. They are pretty embarrassed about any real anti-globalists that have found their way into the party.

Oh sure, totally. I didn't mean to suggest Labour are a serious alternative to the status quo. But there are many Conservative voters (including some here) who still consider them far to red to consider even under KS, and give one the impression there is simply no way they will ever vote for them.

I accept that, particularly since Labour are unlikely to substantively change anything anyone so nothing much is being lost. I don't really understand the right, but my point was simply that surely you can be economically right wing without being Tory? I suppose there'd be the fear that by not voting Tory you might let a Labour government in. But at least anywhere remotely marginal, can't we just get enough Tory voters to vote Lib Dem and get some realignment towards a modern liberal capitalism without the vile, entitled post-feudalism?

Can you be economically right wing without being a Tory:

I think it's actually really difficult to decide what this means and it's not the same to all who see themselves as natural members of the same parties.

Under the Labour umbrella you could conceivably have people who economically believe in:

• global capitalism, international trade deals, etc, but with a little state socialism to make it all run smoothly and make it moral -high level state programs and redistribution through government programs and services, or -a more historically British type of labour economics that is more grass-roots and community oriented and focuses on local productivity in industry and agriculture and small business, as well as some form of union type activity. Likely to support some protectionism in industry and movement of labour.

Voting Tory you could have people who see the right economic approach as:
-More or less radically libertarian free market capitalism with a small state and lots of privatization
-Business oriented but seeing the state as having a real role to play in major projects and infrastructure that is required to make business viable.

• Strong regional productivity in industry and agriculture, lots of powers to lower level regions and communities, supports stable communities, likely to support some protectionism and concern over movement of labour.

There is a lot of overlap there on several levels, but the dominant leadership is only slightly different versions of globalism for both.

I don't think in the end what makes people change their vote is harder to pin down than just what policies will they enact during this term.

@WallaceinAnderland

I don't know. That shows how good their opposition is.

That's not Labour's fault. Go and read it.

So is there any evidence that the "25K wealth tax" is anything more than made up bollocks?

I’ll be voting Labour.
Detest the Tories - how could things possibly get any worse

Wealth tax on anything above £25k was proposed above by @Fujimora. I think that's setting the bar a bit low.

However, the tax burden falls most heavily on the decently-but-not-excessively-rewarded. Low-earners don't pay much tax and UC top ups make them beneficiaries; the ultra-highly-paid (those earning £1 million plus, plus similar-sized annual bonuses) are few in real numbers and global-mobile, so if the UK tax regime became effective punitive, they would relocate.

"Taxation is like plucking a goose: getting the most feathers for the least hissing."