Starmer Must Go

[BisiBodi]

I made a lengthy post yesterday (on this thread: www.mumsnet.com/talk/politics/5333405-changes-to-immigration-rules-announced-by-starmer?page=2 @ 17:43 if you want to read it) regarding the horrendous "island of strangers" speech by Starmer
Today, Kier Starmer has decided to say that immigration has done "incalculable damage" to the country. My despair and fury over this, and the general direction of labour, warrants its own thread.

Starmer claimed in writing that immigrants have put too much pressure on housing and public services (they don't, and he previously said they don't). He added that the immigration system is “almost designed to permit abuse” and that it risks “pulling the country apart”. He said that he wanted to close a “squalid chapter” in our country’s history (of too much immigration in the last few years), and then he seemed to quote the Rivers of Blood speech and said that without significantly reducing immigration the UK risks becoming “an island of strangers".

He's doing this because he's proposing new laws to make immigration harder and bring net migration down (except they definitely won't). Stuff like increasing it to 10 years before you can apply for indefinite leave to remain (10 years!!), introducing English language tests (in a post that suggests Welsh doesn't exist), reducing social care visas (the system would collapse in a day), being tougher on overseas students and reducing the time they can stay after graduation (if you reduce their numbers at all then Universities will be bankrupt immediately), new ID cards, reduce (oh sorry, "clarify") the amount ECHR article 8 can be used to justify people staying on human rights grounds, etc.

When someone pointed out that high migration helps economies and low hurts them, and that this is true in the EU right now and all over the world, Starmer didn't think so. He said that immigration has been high in the UK but the economy has been stagnant, so there can't be any link. Yes Keir, but the economy was stagnant during A PANDEMIC AND ENERGY CRISIS AND COST OF LIVING CRISIS AND EXPENSIVE NEW WARS AND GLOBAL MARKET TRUMP TURMOIL. If the immigrants hadn't kept us level, your "stagnant" economy would have plummeted like a rock. You cannot possibly be presenting that as X=Y in a total vacuum.

This kind of xenophobia doesn't need explaining, but it's worth saying why it won't work and will lose Labour a lot of votes:

• Conservative and Reform voters do NOT change their vote to Labour ever, so this pandering is worthless. But Labour can lose votes to the Greens and LDs at a high rate. Nearly ALL the Reform votes come from former Conservatives.
• Public concern about immigration is low and goes up and down exactly with how much the press is currently going on about it (see the graph) so is not worth alienating your voter base about
• And it is alienating voters, because you've heard this kind of rhetoric before but it was from the actual NF and BNP
• The Mail's headline today was still attacking Labour because it is impossible to ever go far enough for them, or for Reform voters. Nothing is ever enough.

So, Labour saying "Reform are right actually" won't bring a single voter over to Labour, but it sure will lose you a few. Or, er, a lot. People are resigning their Labour membership and sounding furious. I haven't seen a single event trigger this much outrage from the public (and Labour MPs) in quite a while. Starmer has hugely damaged himself. Germany's far-right AfD are praising him, that's the level it's at.

I already left for the Greens, but today has me going even further. I think it's now worth the potential chaos to get rid of Starmer's version of Labour. In a timely article today, Nesrine Malik called our current elections "hostage politics". You MUST vote Labour or the Tories will get in. Now you MUST vote Labour or Reform will get in.

I don't respond well to threats. Never have. I tend to escalate. And I'm bored of their crap: more cuts, keeping first-past-the-post even though Labour members want PR, refusing to talk about rejoining the EU even though Labour members (and the majority of the country) want full rejoin, this xenophobic shit which goes against everything Starmer said about immigration when he was running for leader (but then he's broken every pledge from that time), the anti-trans bollocks, coming for the disabled PIP and saying all benefits are too high and that people are taking advantage of handouts and all the rest.

Fuck these guys. There's pragmatic politics where you compromise, and then there's this literal far-right shit that means you personally HAVE to be comfortable with saying it in public. It's about the soul of the PM and the party. Today is way over the line of sensible cross-party anything.

And I'm done with hostage politics. What, so we keep Labour in for 8 more years of... this? Of the same or more cuts? I'm rapidly approaching the point where smashing this Labour party so that they never try to be centre- / far-right again would do more good than the short-term harm.

Voters didn't show unwavering support for Labour at the last election, they showed that they will be extremely flexible and vote for whoever can win in their area. If Labour become unpopular in the polls, that will be someone else and not them. Labour's lead is incredibly fragile and changeable and today's performance is EXACTLY how they lose it and deserve to lose it. Yes, some young men went to Reform before the election... and twice as many young women went to the Greens. Labour's share fell 21% in 18-24 year olds. You cannot gain a single Reform vote by going right. It will never be far-right enough.
Saying that Reform are correct and using their rhetoric in speeches and changing your policies to theirs is NOT how you defeat them, or run a country.

Replace Starmer, quickly. At the very least.

And so what is the purpose of this thread, other than to vent into an online echo-chamber? I think it's a request to a call to action. It's a call out to everyone who currently resides - whether you like it or not - in a Labour controlled constituency and has a labour MP.

You can easily find out the details, together with links to their speeches and/or voting records, from service such as They Work For You.
Check the details of your MP, and especially their stance on immigration and other matters important to you, then email them.

Whether it's because they're scared of being called racists, scared of the lefties, or just don't give a shit, I really don't know.

All those reasons you mentioned, and maybe also the scale is now so vast that it’s beyond the of capabilities of government and local authorities to deal with it.

Then they need to at least make a start. Just ignoring the problem won't solve it. The "authorities" manage to waste inordinate amounts of time and money on minor and irrelevant things in comparison.

How many police to arrest someone for comments made on a school's social media? How many police to arrest and search someone's house for "thoughts"? They can find the manpower for some things, but not others. Strange that!

I've just had to spend an inordinate amount of time dealing with a brain dead tax inspector re one of my clients. Literally dozens of hours of my time and her time, in dealing with an irrelevant "non issue" were we were arguing about a few hundred pounds of tax, not due to fraud nor hidden income, but whether a particular one off expense was allowable or not, i.e. a point of law. Complete waste of everyone's time. By the way, I won in the end as I knew I was right, but she was like a bloody dog with a bone.

Yet when I have made a "suspicious activity report" for a different client, whom I know with certainty that they're fiddling their accounts, claiming for non legitimate expenses, not declaring all their income, leading to thousands of pounds in unpaid tax every year, they do nothing about it - despite me laying out chapter and verse, transaction amounts and dates, etc., as I'm required to do by law on punishment of imprisonment or large fines myself if I don't! HMRC don't have time to look into that, but someone there had time on their hands to argue about a one-off point of law!

They need to get a grip.

I don't think people want Farage and Reform particularly, they've just got nowhere left to turn because they've been badly let down over immigration.

Maybe it's too late for Labour but it's never too late to do the right thing.

Exactly, it's not just immigration either - it's the way huge areas and entire regions have been left to rot whilst the economy has been centralised around London. Uncontrolled immigration is the final nail in the coffin for the run down and crime ridden towns and cities.

How many police to arrest and search someone's house for "thoughts"? They can find the manpower for some things, but not others. Strange that!

Do you mean Julian Foulkes being arrested and the police officers rifling through his things and expressing concern about ‘Brexity things’?
That was unbelievable and I’m pleased that the Free Speech Union are supporting him in a court case against the Kent police force.
However it’s a lot easier to arrest one elderly man than deal with armed phone snatchers and muggers I suppose.

Laziness shouldn't come into it. They should also remember the old oath of "without fear or favour". It seems that the police only choose to target and prosecute who they want to, which is often the easy targets - that's not complying with "without fear" but then again, we know that they avoid dealing with law infringements from various sections of society because they're afraid of the repercussions, whether directly from the perpetrators (i.e. physically fighting back) or frightened of the political fall out if they choose to target the "wrong" sections of society making them untouchable except for the most serious crimes that can't be avoided!

Is Farage advocating for a Police state then, I didn't think that was the British way, I thought he was in touch with the Common Man, the Common Man who wants a simple life, having a pint at the pub paying with cash, as is the Common Man's preogative! The Police state seems at odds with what he said on a GB News special in 2023 on the topic of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) and the Bank of England's proposal to introduce a “Britcoin” by 2030. He argued that the technology was a potential danger to personal freedom and financial autonomy as the government would have total control over the British Public's lives.

I thought Farage was the ultimate small stateist.

Yes, it is very confusing and difficult to understand what exactly Reform does represent.

The economy since ww2 has been driven by London. It’s where people pay most tax.

Well yes, if you intentionally shift your higher paid workforce and businesses/head offices to London, and close down entire industries in the regions, then yes, London will pay the most tax. Obvious really.

But how much "wealth" in London is actually generated from customers outside London? Quite a high proportion actually. Because these "London" firms have customers all over the UK, and have workers doing work all over the UK.

"London" wouldn't look anywhere near as good on paper if customers in all the other regions stopped buying their products, stopped using their services, etc., and bought goods/services from organisations based elsewhere instead.

Australia & US have done due to Geography and power.

No one else, nor in Europe.

If it were easy, it would be done, we don't have the muscle to bully France nor a location to send 100k too, something you seem to deliberately ignore.

Decades?? ha ha! no, the response quite soon will be extreme, tow out to sea and leave them to their own devices, look what the Greeks did? 800 drowned in one go, hardly an eyelid was batted.

The money lost to HMRC via the black economy, isn't entirely lost, it goes back into local shops businesses etc etc, i'm defending it at all but it is the case that this money will be spent in the UK, international fraudsters aside.

A bigger issue, is off shoring and monies lost that is never spent in the UK.

@BadbadbunnySince when was it not there? Even the Romans were there! Yes industry was near raw materials etc but the money we need is mostly generated in and around London. I don’t see how this can change or indeed should change in any large way. Many regional centres are doing very well and are buoyant. We are no longer in a position to expect every area to be rich.

It's where all the investment has gone. Cause and effect

But if it's spent in shops that don't declare it either, or tradesmen who don't declare it, the loss of tax/benefit fraud gets multiplied. It's no "too" bad I suppose if it's only a few people, but when it goes right through the "local" economy, from shops, to garage mechanics, to gardeners, to plumbers, to scaffolders, to roofers, back to shops, you're almost causing a "micro economy" where no one is paying the legally required tax, etc.

It also causes unfair "competition" because legitimate firms, like tradesmen, etc who have to charge VAT, can't compete with the tax evaders who aren't (but should be) effectively making the latter 20% cheaper. And of course, if the money isn't being declared to avoid the VAT, it's not being declared for income tax nor NIC either, and the workers probably aren't being paid through the books, so they're evading tax and NIC too (and increasing likelihood of them fraudulently claiming benefits).

When it's just the odd person doing a Saturday morning plumbing job for £20 or a mechanic doing a neighbour's car service for a couple of pints in the pub, it's not a problem. But when people are doing it on a larger scale, and when lots of people are doing it, then it does become a huge problem. And that's where we are now. We had our roof replaced and got a few quotes from what we thought were "reputable" local firms - most of them offered to knock off the VAT if we paid cash - that wasn't us asking, they were up front, and the quotes were all around £8k-£12k so the VAT evasion was a big deal! Same with the scaffolders - again local reputable firms, again, same with the VAT. Same with the skip hire firm! More recently we've had garden fences replaced and garden shed replaced - phoned up a few local firms for quotes for each - all basic/standard sizes so they could quote over the phone without needing to come and look - most openly offered to "knock off the VAT" if we didn't want a receipt and would pay cash!

And that's before we start examining the illegal activities like money laundering, modern slavery etc in Turkish barbers, nailbars, mobile phone accessory shops, hand car washes, ethnic speciality shops, dodgy takeaways, takeaway deliverers, etc.

I think there’s a good chance Rwanda will be rehashed. We can’t accommodate them at this rate they’ll be no hotels left to house them. They needs a deterrent. I predict they’ll be used. Lots of other countries like Denmark are happy to use Rwanda but some liberals just don’t understand we cannot flood the country of unskilled people from the third world.

I know people who work in housing and they’re sending them across the country in taxis
trying to find a space in a hotel.

Glasgow is full, so is Edinburgh, Newcastle full. I don’t know if Falkirk is full but they’re doing patrols of play parks as their behaviour towards children there has been questionable and Aberdeen has had two rapes. So the locals aren’t happy.

Im surprised Scotland reaction as Nicola sturgeon was a migrants welcome type. Daily Record were in Hamilton today filming everyone in their TikTok said they’d be voting Reform.

Investment should go where there’s greater return. Fairly obvious rule of investment.

You do realise that there are "Liberals" in Denmark that are still welcoming to immigrants don't you, not every there takes the same political line!

"Investment" isn't limited. We, as a country, can get as much finance as we want to "invest" in quality investments with high enough returns. Look at HS2 - tens of billions of investment secured on a very dodgy/doubtful return. Trains were privatised so that private investment could pay the tens of billions needed to improve the rolling stock to be compliant with new disability and health & safety and environmental laws. PFI extensively used in hospitals and schools for modern buildings to replace those falling down. Firms building accommodation blocks for university students aren't struggling to find investors!

What the problem is, going right back to Brown, is trying to categorise costs like nurses wages as an "investment" in the country's future health - Brown was rightly found out pretty quickly on that by the international financial community!

IF, say, we put a good plan together to build "holding" facilities for irregular immigrants, or new prisons for those committing crimes (whatever ethnicity), or to finance a massive "social" house building strategy, then finance WILL be forthcoming from investors if they can be assured of an adequate return on their investments. Far better doing it formally like that then just letting the national debt get bigger every year due to out of control spending and inadequate tax revenues due to fraud. Obviously the civil servants and politicians need to ensure they're not shafted in the way we've been shafted by the hospital PFI providers - but that was more down to shoddy contracts that the procurement depts didn't understand and could have been a lot better with proper negotiations!

@Badbadbunny Totally agree with you about HS2. It should have been east/west in the north. It’s a shit hole anywhere near it here! Dubious investment indeed.

However we need places for 100,000 immigrants I heard this morning. That’s the same as the prison population. The government pays. Not private companies. That’s the issue. Not enough growth and taxes being paid. Brexit has contributed to this and stuff the people who voted for it. They have got what they voted for. Austerity 2. Farage will be Austerity 3.

On investment in the UK, this is growing and positive story for us. Despite propaganda, we are a stable, rules based economy with a strong legal system. There is cause for optimism

Nobody wants this but middle class liberals who all live in nice suburbs full of people who look like them. This is the most of the political class as well.

Until it impacts on them nothing will be done.

There might be some lemmings still left but they're the types who live in nice areas and who benefit from house prices kept higher from pouring in infinity immigrants.

What a lot of rubbish.

It's well documented that those who are anti-immigration tend to live in areas with low immigration and those who are not anti-immigration tend to live in areas of high immigration.

I speak from experience as someone who moved from one of the most diverse boroughs in the UK to a mainly white area. People in the latter are much more anti-immigration than the former.