If there was a GE today who would you vote for?

[87SPD]

Bit cheeky but I’m curious to see if there are genuinely any Tory voters out there at all following another disastrous week for Rishi Sunak.

So who would get your vote?

I‘ll go first, I would vote Labour. As much as I would love to hear more on policy and a firm grittiness from them, I do understand that Keir Starmer is doing the best he can, in that he can’t alienate a large proportion of the electorate so needs to toe the line.

Yes. And the roots of our democracy go back to at least the 13th century and some would argue they began even before 1066. We have an evolved system which has many good thing to recommend it. Changing it risks inadvertently removing some of the elements that have made it last. I’m not saying we don’t need any change. What I am saying is that we had better beware of what we wish for - we might get it.

That really does show your ignorance. Magna Carta forms the basis of all democratic constitutions around the world. It was the beginning of awareness of human rights and freedoms.

🤣🤣🤣

Gosh that all sounds absolutely wonderful. What will be tax rate be? 150% of all earnings + 75% VAT.

Nah, the usual Labour "back of a fag packet" number crunching means it's all funded by charging VAT on private school fees!!!

@GrannyRose15 It's amazing what you can afford when your government actually governs rather than just funneling our country's money into the bank accounts of their friends families and donors as fast as they can.

They’ve promised spending the same small amount so many times now.

Ah, yes. How are Boris' 40 new hospitals and 350million a week for the NHS getting on?

That old chestnut, labour are profligate with public money. If you look at when public debt started increasing, it was to avoid a global meltdown of the financial system and a global recession after 2006. Labour increased spending but not by a massive amount and it was spent on education and the NHS. Whereas under the conservative spending increased but there was a substantial decrease in the quality of public services.

Our uncodified constitution has evolved constantly as it has been unwritten. The only thing of any significance in the constitution is that parliament shall not bind parliament. This means that Parliament can do anything it wants and ignore anything that has gone before and.cannot tie the hand of a future Parliament to do what they want. This literally means that “things can constantly change if it is the will of parliament”. What part of “things can constantly change” do you want to stay the same? It is by being dynamic that this democracy has continued.

We do need things to stop the “presidential like” overreach of someone like Johnson, rigorous clauses to stop lying in parliament, defined checks and balances to an unbridled misuse of power, job descriptions for MPs and defined roles and punishment for outside interests, limits to lobbying and MPs taking outside jobs and a limit to MPs taking roles in companies that they have privatised or have helped in some way for at least 5 years, the abolishment of the ludicrously h democratic House of Lords, the outdated unrepresentative voting system and I could go on.

Fuck me I can't beleive there are people on here, still, despite everything they've done to the country, going to vote Tory!!! WTF would they have to do to stop people voting for them? The mind boggles!

@MadeleineMummy

This means that Parliament can do anything it wants and ignore anything that has gone before and.cannot tie the hand of a future Parliament to do what they want.

Not really, a govt can sign contracts that bind subsequent govts, such as PFI contracts!

How about an opposition party with sensible, properly costed/financed, proposals?

Labour would be in power today if it hadn't been for the idiots such as Corbyn and Abbot.

How can any opposition, Tory or Lab, come out with costed proposals when they don't have the current numbers nor know what the countries finances will be in a year or more?

They'll be manifesto's, independent organisations will go through the numbers & we'll be able to make a more informed choice but the Tories have a 13 year track record, name ONE public service that has improved, just one!!

No, this is against the governing principle of our unwritten constitution

Literally page 1 of any UK politics undergrad textbook.

This is not the point of opposition, it is the hold government to account. The opposition do not have access to the civil service, the figures and the resources that are allocated to such things that the various bodies of the civil service provide. You are expecting the opposition to do something virtually impossible and no opposition has ever done this. They provide a manifesto and this can have an outline calculation, but it is the business of the civil service to implement this manifesto in an economic and viable manner.

Good luck. You’ll need it.

”The point of the opposition is to hold government to account” What a pity we haven’t had an effective one for so many years. In-fighting, anti-semitism, pro-lockdown fervour have meant that no-one has asked the questions that should have been asked. A party that can’t oppose can surely not be trusted with government.

But a government that has killed over 230k, presided over corruption, lying, sexual assault by its members, an increase in homelessness and destitution, the destruction of our services and infrastructure, deregulation that has led to inefficient and dangerous housing, the loss of business growth, rampant pillaging of the state and destruction of the NHS and the safety net as a policy choice is your better choice for government?

It does shock me as to all these people who say “I am alright Jack”, why should I bother voting any differently because I am doing fine. What about the million children without homes, what about the working single mothers struggling with the onslaught of benefit cuts and childcare costs, what about the homeless that are facing sanctions and laws against the fact that they are poor, what about the old people living in destitution, what about the 2 million children going to school hungry but cannot get free meals because their parents earn just over the threshold for free meals, what about the millions living in feudal leasehold properties that are of such poor quality that they cannot remortgage or sell and are held prisoner to the whims of the freeholder and management agent’s exorbitant fees in order to remediate a mess, not of their creation, because of the years of deregulation by the Tories, facilitated by the Tory donating building industry, what about the small exporting businesses that were lied to so that can not longer export to their biggest market, what about the NHS, childcare, care home and other business struggling to get staff and declining, what about old people who were told to, “accept their fate” by an incompetent, uncaring and venal government. Who shall speak out for them?

We have an obligation to the most vulnerable to give them a voice, those who are struggling and are barely surviving to speak up, those who do not have access, to voice their helplessness, those who are most destitute who cannot have a say.

We are a rich country but the riches are spread unfairly and it is to each according to their want rather than their need. The right wing press can villainise and divide us and make us fight for the mere crumbs that have dropped from the top table by stating, “If you give your crumb away to the undeserving you will starve”. But in actual fact this inequality is a political choice and these is a small cabal who are being enriched at the expense of the rest of the country, we have the money, the knowledge and the ability to forge real change but not the political will to fight against vested interests.

I can't believe that the threshold for for school meals is o Ly about £7k.

How do people manage?!

No you are wrong. It was an inspiration for some constitutions, not the basis of all democratic constitutions. It essentially protected Barons against the abuses of power by the King and was signed under duress and recinded very soon afterwards.

It is amazing that some people who swim in shit call out anyone who tries to climb out.

They don't.

Even the UN has commented on British levels of poverty. I can only conclude, we really do hate the poor. We even want to take tents away from homeless people because a flimsy piece of fabric sheltering them from the weather is more than they deserve.

www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/society/2023/nov/05/uk-poverty-levels-simply-not-acceptable-says-un-envoy-olivier-de-schutter