I regret voting Labour - they've let women down

[IwantToRetire]

Polling shows that women are falling out of love with Labour - thanks to economic policies that will hit them the hardest and 'unforgivable' aid cuts

The latest polling from YouGov shows that women are falling out of love with Labour fast. In the first month of Starmer’s government, only a third (32 per cent) of women said they “disapproved of the Government’s record so far”; by mid-February that figure had more than doubled to 68 per cent.

Part-time and low-income jobs, which are disproportionately held by women, are predicted to be hardest hit by the rise in employers’ NI contributions. In the childcare and social care sectors the impact is expected to be particularly tough, with the effects of those changes being felt primarily by women too. Both sectors are major employers of female labour, and when costs rise or their services are shut down, it is women’s lives that are affected too.

High-net-worth women are also disappointed. The Saltus Wealth Index polls people holding more than £250,000 in investable assets. It revealed that women in this group were slightly more likely than men to have voted Labour in last summer’s election, and that Labour was still the most popular party for wealthy women – but of the 38 per cent who voted Labour in July, 68 per cent now regretted their decision.

From an article in the "i" https://inews.co.uk/inews-lifestyle/regret-voting-labour-women-3580582

Can also be read at https://archive.is/zXtxe

Sorry, which vital services have they cut?

And what have they done which is evil?

I didn't vote Labour, but I'm ever so gutted for all women...and the whole country tbh at the utter shait show that's happened so far.

Absolute joke of a party with a clown at the head of the table.

This government is totally incoherent. They want growth, so they tax businesses. Bonkers decision. They also want people off benefits into work, so they tax businesses which puts the brakes on business investment and employment opportunities. Another bonkers decision.

They want AI but they also want Net Zero. They can't have both, easily.

So what do they want? I wish I knew.

At the moment the TBI is pushing the idea that AI will unlock growth and make the NHS efficient. To which I say, big if true.

I've seen Rory Stewart say same with no details.

I read about US hospital that did try it around treatment plans and found it exacerbate poor ethnic minoirty threatment and outcomes - it amplified an existing problem and left them open to lawsuits so they dropped it pretty fast.

I do think it could have a role in my family half battle is getting to and then getting past GP - to diagnostic tests or consultant waiting lists. Also witness some speclar inbuilt inefficiencies and shockingly poor commincation and data sharing as patient of NHS.

I've seen little in how they think it could be used - which make me wonder if it's just the latest buzz word and they have no idea what they are talking about.

There are twitter accounts dedicated to reporting on tony blair speeches then timing when a government minister repeats his key points.

One of the lastest ones was wes streeting talking about self diagnosis of mental health issues.

I dont know if its because he refuses to leave, or that labour havent any good people, but blair seems to have a lot of sway from someone who isnt elected.

New benefit rules, heating subsidies, just for starters. You haven't been paying attention?

Yes, I have thanks.

The Winter Fuel Payment was a huge waste of money, paid to a lot of people who didn't need it. The poorest pensioners will still get it. Personally, I think the threshold for getting pensioners credit is too low, maybe it can be increased once the country is in a better state.

The benefits cuts are more of a mixed bag, some things I very much support, some that worry me more.Any party would be doing the same though.

Wiping out £9bn to claw back £6bn isn’t helping.

If they had avoided the former we’d likely not see the latter, not yet anyway.

That's down to anti growth policies.

I'm ashamed to say I voted for them. I dithered about spoiling my ballot paper, but in the end decided they might be the least worst option and hoped they'd prove to be better than I'd thought. I was wrong, unfortunately.

Just a response to various points.

Labour didn't "win". Starmer got fewer votes to become PM than Corbyn did each time he didn't win.

ie the Tories were such a shit show that traditional voters just didn turn out. (Just as Trump didn't "win", but nearly 8 million who had previously voted Democrate just didn't bother.)

I actually dont think the slant of the newspaper article is that good, as I think is trying to play even the middle class are suffering.

And I am not a Labour Party member, nor did I vote Labour, but would expect they would have a better idea about raising money needed from those who have more money to spare. But all they have done is go after those with the least.

It is despicable. And as for farcical comments like WFA was a waste of money is just the sort of tripe that the media misinformation machine pumps out about how boomers had it easy. eg everyone went to university for free. which is just bollocks as less the 20% went to university. And even if some rich pensioners didn't need the WFA it could have been deal with through taxes. The idea that anyone thinks because a few rich people might benefit therefore they should stop it in the cliff edge way is just the sort of reactionary lets squeese the little people so that the big fish can go on getting bigger.

And also given that there were long threads about this, and how it is biased in favour of letting the rich continue to opt out seems amazing anyone would come up with that dead duck explanation.

The issue is, why is this Government not making those who can afford to pay more tax, pay more tax. Why aren't they going after the multinational tax avoiders.

Its inexplicable.

But worse, shows that what politicians do know is that in the UK it seems you can get voters to believe it is their next door neighbour, or foreigner who are making their life harder, never that it is the decisions that politicans take.

And as someone who is happy to poke fun at young people, it is scandalous that they are cutting their benefit.

If there is a problem with too many people of whatever age being signed off for mental health issues, then look at those who are signing them off.

And I know I am repeating myself, but it is a stupid as saying there are too many people entering the country illegally (who it later turns out had a right to come here) when the problem is the UK seems unable or unwilling to do something as basic as having application centres in different countries.

Obvioulsy a big part of the problem is the type of people who go into politics, but also the media that turns everything into some silly pantomime or reality tv, and never deal with reality.

My comment was not farcical, nor does my opinion relate to a view that 'boomers' had it easy.

Boomers are now paying more tax than Gen Z because pensioners have better incomes than ever. Whilst not rich, lots of pensioners have reasonable incomes and whilst £300 might be missed we can't afford to dole cash out to households on average, ordinary or comfortable incomes in that way anymore. Particularly if they are sitting on huge amounts of wealth - 25% of pensioners are millionaires. Most of my pensioner friends agree.

I do think it has hit pensioners who only earn a few thousand more than the basic pension though and indicated as much.

Conclusion of longer statement:

“These benefit cuts could disproportionately impact disabled victim-survivors of domestic abuse by making it even more difficult for them to access the benefits necessary to work and be financially independent from the abuser. Disabled victim-survivors are nearly twice as likely to experience economic abuse compared to non-disabled women, and are nearly four times more likely to have a partner or ex-partner stop them, or try to stop them, accessing benefits that they or their children are entitled to .

“We recognise the financial challenges the Government faces, but scaling back existential support to Disabled people is not the answer. In fact, it directly contradicts the Government’s commitments to ensure that “those with the broadest shoulders will bear the heaviest burden”.
“As other organisations have suggested, there are feasible and fairer options for reform available to the Government that would help increase revenue to pay for the services and welfare desperately needed to address the cumulative impact of austerity, the Covid-19 pandemic, and the cost-of-living crisis on our public services and the most vulnerable in society.

“Oxfam’s latest inequality report showed that the total wealth of UK billionaires increased by £35m per day in 2024. Increasing taxes on the super-rich through a modest wealth tax – such as a 2% levy on assets over £10m – could generate an estimated £24bn a year, to invest in our public services and infrastructure and protect the wellbeing of our communities."

https://www.wbg.org.uk/article/wbg-response-to-government-changes-to-disability-benefit/

Men and women and my elderly mum, they are utterly fucking up this country’s and still wittering on about the last government.

I cant wrap my head around them cutting benefits, telling everyone to get jobs… but then they have screwed the employers who are now closing business.

Are they missing some brain cells, what jobs exactly are these people supposed to get.

Who was it who said that you judge a society by how it treats it's most vulnerable?

I'm ashamed to have been a trade unionist and Labour supporter when I look at the calibre of the majority of their activists and policies these days.

The WFA shenanigans was a disgrace with the pensioner income threshold set far too low. Still we get the ostriches trying to justify it. Labour's own analysis published in 2017 warned that Conservative plans to cut the fuel allowance for ten million pensioners would increase excess deaths that Winter.

We will see how that pans out for Labour in 2025.

I suppose the chronically sick, and disabled, will have the Assisted Dying Bill to look forward to. These benefit changes do not ensure that those who need help are all safeguarded - despite the hollow promises. Mostly, it will be women and child carers left trying to cope at the continued expense of their own health and futures.

Labour's Cunning Plan seems to be to fix their alleged Black Hole by clawing back a few billion in benefits and long term care, and in the longer term, making available the means of seeing off those in despair who genuinely can't work.

Boomers are anything from 61 to 79. The reason why lots of them pay a lot of tax is because many are working and at the top of their careers.

Once someone has been a pensioner for a while - say in their 80s, their private pension probably hadn't kept up with inflation, they have health problems, and are more likely to be house bound.

Lots of wealth in the elderly isnt necessarily spare cash - its tied up in pensions, savings when they are dependent on interest as income or houses. Just because a quarter of retired people are paper millionaires doesnt mean the majority of have much money on a month by month basis. There will be rich pensioners, just like there'll be rich twenty year olds, but the average working class women in her 80s?

For some WFA might well be the difference between staying in their home or moving into care. Thats why i think the way labour tackled this tòo bluntly.

Having said that, it didnt make sense that someone who has just retired, who is reasonable fit recieved WFA when a few months earlier they didnt. It would have made more sense to increase the age.

The government should be a bit more creative. Lots of old people are living in homes that are too large and expensive to heat and look after. Its daunting and stressful to move though, so perhaps the government could help with the process? It will give the elderly more cash and free up larger homes for families.

The government should be a bit more creative. Lots of old people are living in homes that are too large and expensive to heat and look after. Its daunting and stressful to move though, so perhaps the government could help with the process? It will give the elderly more cash and free up larger homes for families.

I think that is a reasonable idea, something that would be worth exploring.

I think it has been explored, and has often come up against old people who, not unreasonably, don't want to be shunted out their own homes at their time of life.

The only party whose actual policies were going to help women was LD (social care plans, giving unpaid carers help and noticing them at all, disability rights, etc) but a lot of people ignored those huge policies because they had their trans stance at the same time. I decided to go with policies over politicking but I also understand it was a touchy point for many and why. It came down to choice between a party who mentioned things I cared about and one that promised what everyone wanted to hear but I couldn't see the benefits - social care wasn't even mentioned by Labour despite us knowing it was a game changer for NHS for nearly a decade.

Which is fine if that's what they want- it's their house after all. I don't see why everyone should contribute to their heating bills if that's the case though.

It's a wrench when younger people can no longer afford their family home, have to move to a different area, move their DC from their friends. No-one suggests a special benefit to pay for their heating though.

Seriously, does no one understand the benefit system. They are paid based on weekly income etc., same as housing benefti.

Despite MSM hysteria, and apparently quite a few on FWR, in fact most "boomers" are not rich. Most boomers did not go to University. Most boomers do not own their own home.

It is exactly these sort of I'm alright / my family is alright and then extrapolating from a personal life style that everybody has the same level of life style.

And in fact older women are more likely not to have taken time out from worth and so will be on a lower income, or if single will have had a lower annual income.

And of course people shouldn't have to move out of what is their home is they dont want to.

But more bizarrely why are older people being made to shoulder the responsibility of the lack of housing when it is the Government who has done that, every since Thatcher asset stripped the country by selling of council housing (along with trains, water and gas companies).

Are you not aware that it is only because the UK that looked to the US housing model that we have this obsession with home ownership. And not forgetting that the US in trying to make everyone home owners caused the financial recession that impacted all of us.

If we hadn't been taken down this false path by sucessive Governments we could have adopted the housing pattern of sober, quite right wing European countries who have been able to provide good quality social housing, stopped people being wage slaves to mortgages, and allowed for both stability for those who are happy to make their home in one place, but also mobility for those who want to move. https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/jan/10/the-social-housing-secret-how-vienna-became-the-worlds-most-livable-city

It is extraordinary that yet again, those who are those most vulnerable are supposed to sacrifice what they have worked for before the Government of the UK over decades have failed.

Why would any of you think the Government shouldn't take responsibility for the mess they have created.

And linking it to benefit cuts, why not impose hefty fines on all those peopel who have bought property as an investment and left it empty. Why not impose fines on all those housing developers who contine to only provide "executive" homes, not the type of homes the community needs. (Not forgetting that most developers are now constructing houses that have an expect duration of 30 years.)

Does anyone seriously think that even if you forcibley moved older people out of their family homes this would solve the housing crisis.

As usual. The massive misdirect to focus on the group least able to help, instead of dealing with the source of the problem.

Given the level of tax money that goes on inappropriate temporary housing with over the market level rents, they could just start a massive housing building programme as happened after WWII.

But no everybody are like pavlov dogs looking to the market to solve the problem.

Pensioners aren't being asked to take up all the burden though are they. Pensioner poverty remains lower than working-age poverty and considerably lower than child poverty. https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN07096/SN07096.pdf

Unlike workers they are also guaranteed at least an inflation proof pay rise each year too, on their state pension anyway.

Of course Starmer won, as did Trump.

They are in power right now.

Pretending it didn't happen is as useless as those that did not turn up to vote.

Yep. It would have been the same shit show whoever got voted in. That’s something people don’t understand about Brexit, the government would have created a shambles whether we voted in or out. No one voted for any of this mess and yet we keep being encouraging to blame each other

I am one of the chronically disabled people.
Former Labour voter.
I have spoken to a few friends over the last few days who have said as old age approaches (we are all near to 60) they would consider assisted dying rather than trying to live. It sounds dramatic, but you want to try living in it.
Another lady I know is very, very poorly and was a victim of DV and coercive control. Through a range of miracles, she’s been able to move. But on her own she’s struggling in a different way.
When I think back to my young self with my ideals I want to cry - off to Uni, great career ahead of me. Bought my first home in the 90’s. Good pension already paid into. I worked so, so hard.
I never, ever thought I would be in this position.
And I never thought I’d say this but I was treated very kindly accessing PIP under the last government. I know many people didn’t, and I know the awful stories about people dying, but I was assessed at home three times. I did have to go to a tribunal once which was awful, but overall I was treated well.
But I do know during lockdown lots of people were claiming for the first time and assessments were done over Zoom. It’s not the same. When I got assessed they could see me and what state I was in.
I have lived like this since I was 31. And I have tried every solution offered. I don’t drink, some of take drugs. My other half makes sure I eat well.
I have been able to work during some periods. But the skill I have - writing - has been taken over by AI.
I have been treated really badly at times by employers. If they know or sense you are vulnerable then believe me they will underpay you or not pay you at all.
Last year I was on hospital ward trolley for 14 hours in A and E and while there as well as being so ill I just broke down.
I was able to tell the doctor that I had been doing 5 hours work a week for 6 months but hadn’t been paid for 5 months. I was so ashamed and hadn’t told anyone I hadn’t been paid, nor even my partner.
I am housebound, mostly bedbound, the person I was working for knew this. In fact they had once been a friend.
So I do try and have tried. But there is no way any conventional employer can give me a structured job now. And while being self employed was something I tried, it was awful. And people I approached now use chatGPT. The one person who said ‘yes’ then didn’t pay me.
If you have read until here, thank you.
And please know as you go about a very ordinary but stressful day, I would love to have one. Stuck in a traffic jam, a supermarket queue, anything, I would welcome it all back to be well.

Yes, they're getting away with things that the Tories would never have without people being really opposed and angry and it's just because they're Labour. It's very upsetting