Rachel Reeves can’t win, can she?

[anothervoter]

After days and days of negative press and chatter about income tax going up, complaints on Mumsnet and across the media, today’s reports are that idea might be dropped and now she’s being accused of rattling the markets and making the cost of borrowing increase.

Honestly, genuine question- what can she do?

She needs a lot of help, because she comes across as clueless. She should listen to top business people and economists, take advice and then stick to the decisions. They keep chopping and changing, that is why the markets took a tumble. They simply don’t trust her judgement.
Let’s be honest, if you elect turkeys, you can’t expect Eagles. And the markets know it.

Seriously? The media, the markets, the analysts, Labour MPs, everyone, all said “she’s indicating there will be income tax increases”. But you’re in the dark, are you?

He would want two terms, wouldn’t he. But he’s making the economy worse, not better. He won’t last to the end of one term, thank god.

As for his international initiatives, what a farce. He’s achieved sweet FA. Coalition of the willing…

Yes i agree with this, i really don't know why she had that press conference, it raised expectations that she would take the tough decisions.

However, that got Labour nothing but criticism & now they are getting even more criticism.

So a lose lose!

You clearly hate Labour and whatever she did, you'd criticise, you even have your own thread 1000s of posts long where you express your hatred and anger.

You cannot even acknowledge the US tariff deal or the dropping of restrictions to the EU.

Yes buying weapons from the US to give to Ukraine, is imho quite important.

Its all rather unhealthy.

Labour wasn't my choice but we are where we are and have no chance to change until 2029.

Make the tough decisions and stick to them. Isn't that what they kept saying they'd do before the election? I've been behind them on everything they've announced to tackle this but they've backtracked on it all, running scared of the press and their own backbenchers. Unfortunately they've fucked it so badly now I don't think they can pull it back.

No. I was in favour of WFA cuts (even though Darren Jones in opposition lambasted the Tories for even considering it 🙄). I was in favour of Kendall’s downward pressure on welfare. Both were sunk by Labour MPs.

I’m in favour of prison reform.

I thought Starmer was right to take a hard line against anti-asylum seeker street violence.

But this government is generally incompetent. It’s also amazingly dishonest and hypocritical.

I don’t believe Starmer achieved anything with Trump that any PM couldn’t have done. I haven’t seen any tangible benefit from Starmer’s Euro reset. Though he does seem to have forged a good relationship with Meloni.

And you are now saying Labour isn’t your choice. Righty ho.

When the pledges achieved include things like introducing a supervised tooth brushing scheme for 3 or 5 year olds the phrase ‘fiddling while Rome burns’ springs to mind. Or, marking your own homework when you set the questions.

For example, of the others they mark as green, a disproportional number either involve spending money, or are simply meaningless without delivery.

They have marked themselves as green for updating the national planning policy and reintroduced mandatory housing targets. But the number of houses built since they’ve been in power is down by a third, and there is absolutely no way there are meeting their mandatory target of 1.5 million. It’s ludicrous to give yourself a target of setting a target, and mark that as green because you set a 1.5 million target, when that doesn’t actually result in any more houses. In fact, it’s resulted in less.

edited for repitition!

Totally agree, the media machine has been against Labour from the start....it's time for people to give labour the time and be patient.

They are making progress

Why?, she's completely incompetent at her job.

Couldn’t agree more.

Growth requires tax cuts and deregulation for business. Europe is traditionally not keen on either.

She can win. She can do what she truly believes is in the national interest and forget about being popular.

Didn't we have 14 years of that? or at least 10years leading into the pandemic.

Growth requires investment, both private and public.

Deregulation for business, usually means tougher times for employees, i can't see that being popular.

Does she know what that is? Not sure it’s the case, for Starmer too.

No, we haven’t had 14 years of that. We had austerity, low investment, Brexit and Covid.

Yes thats what i said, i voted Labour in 1997 but not since, i just think it would be better to at least give them a chance, they have only just got in.

Its a great pity the Tories allowed welfare to boom, keeping unemployment figures low and did nothing about prisons, which to be fair have been underfunded for many decades, its simply not a popular way to spend taxes on.

On Trump, the Tories achieved nothing with him during his first term, he despised May and i suspect he would Sunak too.

Trump and Starmer, surprisingly, seem to get on well, saying "oh but anyone could the same" is rather silly, there is no parallel universe.

We also adopted an economic model that relied heavily on high immigration and a large labour supply rather than investing in new capital and technology which has ultimately limited GDP per capita growth.

And encouraged the growth of a bloated welfare state.

As for why we're not rejoining- come on, you know this one, it would be like handing the keys to Downing Street to Farage on a plate.

@Fletchasketch
I’m sure I’ve read on here that nowadays polls are showing a desire to rejoin. if Brexit is now so unpopular do you think Starmer should have another referendum?

Agree she can’t win. When they got into office they said they’d inherited a big black hole and needed to tackle it. But no-one wants to pay for it, either disability cuts, or extra tax. Of course no-one wants to pay more, but you can’t then complain the country is still in a mess.

Sticking to a manifesto is like buying a business, and submitting your business plan to the bank. Then finding out all the crap equipment needs replacing, there’s a hole in the roof and none of the investors want to pay for it, but expect it to fixed yesterday.

My opinion, is savings can be found with in work benefits. I know multiple people who are working the minimum 16hrs and getting topped up, because they are not much better off working full time. Increase the minimum hours to 24 and save a fortune. Also no requirement for 2nd parent to work in a couple, meaning one parent can be a SAHM and topped up. My parents worked opposite shifts when I was growing up, mum nights, dad days, and sometimes they’d keep the car running whilst they swapped over. Had the Government been paying them just a bit less for one to stay at home, doubt they’d have worked their ass off in a factory job.

I think everyone should look at that before they complain tbh.

And this, from the last party in charge.. a whopping amount of money, gone.

https://www.bestforbritain.org/scandalous_spending_tracker

I just do not understand how short people's memories are, or actually remember that the mess that was left was huge, it takes time and money to sort it. The British press should be made to report on facts, no spin left or right, just plain facts.

YANBU. We are up shit creek without a paddle and the only thing that can save us, rather than robbing Peter to pay Paul or asking Wonga for a loan, are policies that will grow the economy which means tax cuts and therefore austerity mark 2. It needs to happen, Labour know it needs to happen, the Tories know it needs to happen, Reform know it needs to happen, the only party that doesn’t is the Greens because they think selling dreamcatchers and taxing billionaires who don’t even live here is an acceptable way to run an economy.

Labour don’t know this needs to happen?

They know alright they just can’t make it happen with their barmy backbenchers vetoing everything sensible they try to do.

They could employ some party discipline. Blair’s MPs wouldn’t have dared behave like this.

Austerity doesn't work very well.. it can stifle growth, cause excess deaths too.. it's just daft to carry on with something that has already played a part in the mess we are in now imo.