UKC

At the Conference Momentum are going to try and get rid of Tom Watson. In Hull North the local party is trying to deselect Diana Johnson; back bencher of the year. Corbyn has recently polled as least popular opposition leader since 1977 but Momentum are determined that no voice is allowed to disagree with him. Are they so Stupid to think they have any chance of winning an election this way by winning over swing voters in swing seats? Momentum and Corbyn’s zeal is condemning the country to a hard Brexit and 5 more years of Boris’ tyranny 

Haven't they just dissolved their student arm as well?

At a time of great national need Her Majesty's Opposition has been found wanting.

iirc the Labour lords were due to call a motion of no confidence in Corbyn just before summer recess, but pulled it at the last minute

That's right, it's all Corbyn's fault. It's not ours, all we did was keep voting Tory, while they dug us deeper and deeper into the mire...

... I mean, how could we vote for anything else, when we would be forced to accept a public railway system and free education for our children?

Nooooooo

i just was made aware of this, what a shambles from the Labour Party if this plays out 

More disappointing than the Tories voting for Boris as PM

I despair 

Blaming the voters instead of the candidate may make you feel better about losing but your attitude is the root of the problem in my OP

As I understand it, this organisation was tiny and not affiliated to the party or something. I don't think there was a great deal of controversy about replacing it with something better.

As for Lansman's attempt to stab the deputy leader in the back the day before the annual conference. He really needs to pull his head out of his arse but at the same time, Tom Watson could have gone about things a bit more gently IMO.

Purge of Blairite student organisation I heard. A handy way of reducing Labour's appeal to the 99% of voters who are not momentum members.

Again a nice way of demonstrating Labour are looking for ideologue supporters rather than broad support to form a government.

things seem to be moving a-pace. Sky reporter thinks labour party may split or corbyn out:

https://twitter.com/lewis_goodall/status/1175175337900171268

It is depressing. But labour can't make a serious stand on brexit because I suspect their voters are divided on the issue. So they will fall back onto something they think they're sure about.

Closing private schools, distraction technique. 

I think you have answered your own question. The fact that someone so flawed, inept, morally bankrupt and self obsessed such as Boris could be voted for by anyone shows the contempt many people have for Corbyn. 

I will never forgive the shambles the Tories have made of Brexit, but their p*ss poor leadership has only been made possible by the total absence of opposition.

Corbyn should hang his head in shame, that's if he can ever extract it from his own arse. 

This is all a timely reminder as to why we should never let the hard left or hard right near government.

You’d have to cut a few puppet strings first…

As a country, we are continuously choosing a right wing path, offered to us by the right wing parties.

We can't blame the left for offering an alternative that we don't want to take, if we keep choosing the right.

The brexiteers will rally behind Boris, because they'll take anything that's their best chance of leaving Europe.

The remainers will continue to bicker, because stopping Corbyn getting a few years in power is more important to many than stopping a hard brexit causing decades of chaos and a race to the bottom in food standards, workers rights, and all the rest with the US. 

Everyone on here was wailing and gnashing their teeth that Corbyn had to go because he wouldn't back a way out of hard brexit. Now that he is offering a way out, via a negotiated soft brexit agreement followed by a second referendum, instead of campaigning for it, it's all Corbyn's fault, he's useless he'll never win an election.

So Boris will win the next GE, and all those who campaigned against the alternative will pat themselves on the back and say "see, we knew this would happen, if only the left had offered my perfect vision of policy, they could have won", like they weren't involved in ensuring the only candidate who could make a change wasn't voted in.

Nope, nothing like as complicated as all that. I simply want a credible leader of the main opposition party. I won't need like all their policies, life is never that straightforward. I don't think I am alone in wanting that. 

Until the London centric cronies of Corbyn lose their grip he will hang on in there and continue to make Boris look the least worst choice. Bet the Tories can't believe their luck. 

So your lot are much happier being ideologically pure than able to improve matters . I think the electorate now know this very well 

You don't get it do you?

If Corbyn went and the party re-grouped around Watson, Starmer, Thornberry etc Labour would win in a walkover.  Labour is putting ideological purity above pragmatism, that applies to winning and election and governing the country

Nonsense. A great many people think Boris is doing a great job, and would vote for him regardless of who was leader of the opposition. They want a hard brexit and they think he will deliver it. Hardly anybody is going to vote Tory in the upcoming election mainly because they dislike Corbyn - those voters will largely vote for another party, splitting the remain vote.

Would a change of leadership help consolidate the remain vote? Maybe. Is it going to happen? No. Will the other parties form a coalition with labour to stop brexit? Who knows, but by campaigning against the leader of the opposition we'll certainly make it less likely.

I'd say it's been made possible because leavers care more about leaving than remainers care about remaining. Even now, when he's offering us a way out, we refuse to back him.

I won't be voting labour, I'll be voting SNP, but I'll be asking my party to put aside it's differences with Corbyn to stop a no deal brexit, and I think we should all be doing the same. People should be encouraged to vote for whoever might help put a stop to hard brexit in their constituency. We can get neck to arguing over whether the railways should be public or private, and whether our children should pay tuition fees later.

Yay for the United front against brexit.

I'm not a labour voter, never mind a momentum member.

Soubrey???

Maybe they would. After the whole Blair/Tory light/Iraq experiment I can see why some don't want to shift again. If you think that's a reason not to get behind stopping a hard brexit that's up to you. But you can't really blame those who would change the course if you voted them in for not changing the course if you don't vote them in.

I know what you want, what I'm asking is, at this time of crisis what are you going to do with what you've got?

Unfortunately, the dire state of the UK's main political parties has meant the electorate continually being forced to ascertain what's the lesser evil, rather than what's the best option.

You can't keep blaming the electorate if they don't like your policies and candidates.

Most people aren't that hardcore in their beliefs. To the majority, if the case is competently presented, they'll take pragmatism over ideology. Irrelevant anyway, as nobody who's been paying attention to JC are convinced he wants to stay in the EU.

So if you're convinced of how big a disaster Brexit will be isn't it worth JC stepping aside to ensure we avoid it. What's more important JC's ambition or the whole country's future?

Yeah, he offered a way out, but only if he gets to be PM.

Nobody expects perfect vision in UK politics anymore. We just don't want the Tory's biggest political asset leading the opposition.

Thanks, now corrected, it was early

Bot Corbyn's not against Brexit!!!!!

Do with what I have got...? 

Me, not much. Where I live labour would be better buying lottery tickets than just losing their deposit again. My only hope, as ever, is that enough of the true blue population here can be made brave enough to vote lib dem. Not that I think they are the natural opposition, they can at times just bring a bit of balance. 

The continued risk of Corbyn taking power will be enough for them to keep ticking that Tory box. 

Your views on this thread are an interesting slant on things, but just look at the news. Abolish the Labour Party dep leader. Absolutely the behaviour of someone fit to be our PM, really? 

I agree re Brexit. But this Landsman guy (is he a tory mole ffs?) reminds me, I had forgotten, that a vote for Labour is actually a vote for Momentum /Militant Tendancy or whatever it calls itself these days.

If they keep their Brexit policy I will hold my nose and vote for them. Do I trust them to deliver? Not at all.

Not my candidate, I'm an SNP member. The labour members elected JC, the Tory party members elected BJ.

The reality is that one of these two people and parties will form the next government.

JC as labour leader wants to drop May's red lines, renegotiate a soft brexit, and then offer the people a choice between that and remain. 

BJ as Tory leader wants to keep May's red lines, negotiate a hard brexit, and if that fails drag us out with the hardest possible brexit.

A soft brexit would not be as good as remain, but it would be better than the Tory offering, so as I see it there's no contest as to where we should be heading.

If I was registered to vote in England I'd vote tactically for whoever was likely to provide an anti-hard-brexit vote. Greens would be my closest ideological match, then maybe labour, then the lib Dems (I don't think the lib Dems have covered themselves in glory in recent years, to put it mildly, but it would be time to get behind them if it was going to make a difference)

I disagree with your assessment here. Confirmation bias is a powerful force. The case for remain had been competently presented by experts in their fields since the start, and yet the leave vote is still strong. I'm contracting in Newcastle at the moment and have had a great many in depth conversations about the pros and cons of brexit with leavers. There always seems to come a point where I'm "talking down Britain", "nobody knows what will happen after brexit", or "project fear!!" rather than acknowledge that the experts may have a point. Why would the labour leader presenting the same arguments as the experts be any different?

If you're a labour member, you'll get to vote on another leadership election down the line, right now we're probably weeks away from a GE. No point in worrying about that which you can't influence right now, worry about what you can. Is it not with getting behind JC to ensure we can avoid it?

It is quite hard to steer the UK in another direction without being PM...

If you're a member of the party, by all means campaign for a change of leadership internally, but think about whether this is really the time to do it publicly. If you're not a member you'll just have to make your choices from the options you've got.

He's offered a referendum between soft brexit and remain. Realistically, what better options are on offer?

I have my reservations about Corbyn, and I think it would be better if they could resolve this dispute in another manner, but it's not in the same league as shutting down parliament in the middle of a crisis to avoid oversight, so if it comes to who's the fitter if the two candidates I don't personally see that there any contest.

As far as this discussion goes, you've clearly positioned yourself in support of JC.

That's the reality? The next general election might not be until May 2022. Trump's in the White House, Boris is in number 10 and JC is the leader of the opposition. If these three facts alone don't convince you that anything is possible, then I don't know what will. 

You're entirely ignoring the obvious. The major obstacle to the Labour Party providing effective opposition to Brexit, is Corbyn himself... that isn't a radical point of view, that's just the reality.

It's a shame more SNP voters didn't share your enthusiasm for tactical voting. If everyone who voted SNP in the last election, had voted Labour, Conservative voters would have been in the minority. Come to think of it, if SNP voters threw their lot in with the rest of the UK perhaps they wouldn't have to continually bemoan the fact that England is dragging Scotland along a political path it has no wish to follow.

You might disagree with my assessment, but the fact remains that the electorate voted leave. If the public weren't swayed by the presentation of the various arguments then how do you think they decided, coin tossing? and before you shout 'media bias' most of the media were on the side of leave. That's the main reason the result came as such a shock.

You think we're weeks away from a GE. Again our assessments are at odds. I see that as very unlikely at this point.

It's quite hard to become PM if many of the people who'd naturally be inclined to vote for your party see you as a disaster in the making.

 I'm not a member of any party, I'm just a normal punter like the vast majority of the electorate. And I'm afraid it's muppets like me, with little faith in any party (far too little to pay subscription), who'll face a ballot paper and have to stick a cross somewhere amongst a sea of bad options. Currently JC is the number one reason I'd be disinclined to stick my cross in the box marked Labour.

Corbyn has intervened and quashed the motion. 

It's a myth promoted by the right wing media because it's the only weapon they have against Corbyns popular policies. 

Jeremy Corbyn has inflicted two of the heaviest defeats of a government in history which would have already seen the government fall if the Tories hadn't displayed their contempt for the conventions of our democracy. As it is we have a zombie government promising to deliver some of Labour's most popular policies if they are given the chance. Corbyn has successfully seen off two Conservative PM's so far. I don't know what more he could do to be counted as an effective opposition in your book?

Foinavon

Win the last GE against the most incompetent government (at that point) in living memory?

I'd like to think I've simply positioned myself as not "anyone but Corbyn"

Haha, you've got a point. Anything can happen, but if there's no election before 2022 I'll eat my hat.

Is it obvious? If labour had dropped Corbyn and come out strongly against brexit they'd have have gained some remainers but lost some labour voting brexiteers. Have you analysed the polls and done the sums or are you just being your assertion that this would have been a net gain on faith?

Personally, i'd have liked to have seen a strong remain position, and I was angry with the labor leadership for a while for that, but I can also see the dilemma they were facing. Keeping both sides in board until they could rule out a hard brexit, negotiate a soft one, and then put it back to the people may well have been the best option they had.

It did result in the Tories weakening their majority at the next GE. If labour brexiteers had jumped ship to the Tories at that point we'd have been in a very different position with a large Tory majority in the parliament.

By staying ambiguous, they've since allowed the Tories the rope to hang themselves. They have no working majority, can't pass legislation and have been forced to close down parliament to survive.

It's starting to look like it could work, but it's only going to do so if the rest of us get in board to form a coalition, and keep pressure on the labor party to make the deal soft and the option to remain on the table.

I'm in my mid 40s, and the last election was the second time in my life when Scotland voting, en-masse, for *any* party could have affected who formed the government.

When labour moved right under Blair, no party in England moved to fill the void on the left. The SNP did in Scotland. And you want to blame the Scottish left for voting for them?

They decided for varying reasons, but a lot did so because leave offered a change, and they believed it would be for the better.

The leave campaign was led by Tory MPs, and the remain campaign was led by the Tory government.

To blame Corbyn for how people voted in the referendum is forgetting who ran the campaigns at best.

The Tories have no working majority, they've asked for a GE, parliament has said "no, not until hard brexit is off the table", the parliamentary arithmetic has to change soon or the government won't be able to govern.

If you're not prepared to get involved in picking the leader of a party, why are you upset by the choices of those who were prepared to do so? 

If your level of commitment to the process of democracy is voting in elections, that's your choice, but it's then a bit rich to complain about who you get to choose from...

Not actually quashed, the BBC headline is misleading. The debate will now be “to review the deputy leader position “ once again Corbyn shows his fence sitting ability 

quote: 

And Mr Lansman said he fully supported Mr Corbyn's proposal to review the deputy leader post.

"We need to make sure the role is properly accountable to the membership while also unifying the party at conference. In my view, this review is absolutely the best way of doing that," he said.

Most of this post I'd broadly agree with. All the political 'experts' have been revealed to be running on guesswork for the last decade and I'm far from an expert.

You may so Labour members shouldn't get upset at the choice of Boris and vice versa?

Not how I see it. If I don't find any of the parties inspiring enough to spend my time and my money on, isn't it my own choice if I want to donate my cash and my efforts improving my community in other ways? Not all of us are inspired by the promises of politicians, some of us would prefer to try and effect change on our own terms.

I think the original motion has indeed been ditched.

That's a rewriting of history isn't it because at that point Theresa May thought she could hang her election campaign on strong and stable. 

That her governments incompetence was exposed, and is now widely recognized, is a testament to Corbyn's effectiveness as leader of the opposition (despite what the media gatekeepers of the establishment narrative would have you believe).

PMSL

Where have I heard that before?

English nationalists/Scottish nationalists?

Two sides of the same coin.

It has.

I suspect Jeremy had nothing to do with it and it was John Lansman's brilliant idea.

However the damage has been done now. Thanks John.

Absolutely. Both stridently campaigning to remain in Europe, and increase immigration. Heartening to see. Not sure why we're leaving though, who's voting for that?

What's tickling you?

Pretty much. There's no point in getting upset about who others pick to champion their way forward, concentrate on doing your best to champion your way forward.

Of course it's your choice - I said that above. We are all free to engage in the democratic process (or not) at whatever level we wish. But not attempting to select a leader, and then complaining that the leader the others select isn't who you would select, send a rather futile protest.

If you want to help shape the party you can join and help shape it. If you don't, it's kinda tough sh*t.

It’s Ok, the vast majority of us may not get a say in who runs the parties, but we certainly get a say in who runs the country and left or right, it’s a small minority that want JC in the job.

To Labour members I’d say, If you want to shape the country don’t set Corbyn at the head of your party, cos when you lose yet another general election, it’s kinda tough shit.

Yep, and if enough people care more about keeping JC out of power than preventing a hard brexit so be it. A hard brexit it will be. 

If state owned public transport, NHS, and free university tuition are that hard to swallow, we deserve what's coming.

But it's shaped in a direction of travel that means they aren't even an effective opposition. Deserter MPs and even Tories like John major or ken clarke are doing more to hold the government to account than the entire opposition. 

The Tories are massively divided, they have lost loads of votes to UKIP and the Brexit party, they are on their 3rd party leader in under 5 years and still Labour isn't winning in the polls and wouldn't likely win an election either.

The momentum/Corbyn experiment hasn't worked. 

No. If the Labour Party were that concerned about state owned public transport, NHS, and free university tuition (they've gone to the extent of joining the party so I'd expect they'd be more concerned than most)....then they'd ditch Corbyn. You can scream it aint so until you're blue in the face, you can blame it all on us stupid, pig headed voters, but the simple fact remains. The Man Is Unelectable. If you don't believe me look at the top of the thread. UKC is massively left of centre and the OP is currently running at 40:1 on likes.

  Let's hope they stick at it then

Well perhaps, the trouble is that the JC fan club in the Labour party think he is electable. It is important to bear in mind that sections of the party membership have the mindset of teenyboppers in a fan club rather members of an organisation that aspires to run the country. Who knows? They might just be right, labour came close in 2017. Then again, I expect they won't and the best outcome for anyone not on the right is that the next election returns enough Labour/LibDem/SNP/Plaid/Green MPs to keep the Brexit party/Tories out of power.

Alternatively we're looking at a coalition between the DUP, BP and Tories that will be the most right wing in the history of Britain, that will screw over most of its people and probably lead to the end of the UK as Scotland and NI decide they can stomach things no longer. A tragedy for all of us and something to bear in mind when we are next asked to put a cross on a ballot paper.

https://lordashcroftpolls.com/2019/09/my-northern-ireland-survey-finds-the-...

I'm not screaming. He's won two party elective by a landslide, and presided over the biggest swing to labour in a general election since 1945. But he's unelectable? 

Is it? Why then is there so much support for centrist politics? 

The biggest swing to labour in the face of the Tory vote being decimated by A. The Brexit party and B. Being responsible for Brexit. Did you bother reading the OP? JC was recently polled as the least popular opposition leader since 1977.

I suppose it depends on your frame of reference. If you’re a Corbyn fan boy or Pefa then UKC is centrist. If you’re considering UKC in the context of the UK electorate (and why wouldn’t you? It’s called UKC for God’s sake), then it’s decidedly left of centre.

Edit: I note the OP is now running at 42 to 1 yet you’re still screaming it ain’t so.

I suppose I'm thinking from a Scottish perspective. From a UK perspective you are probably right, sadly.

Sorry, I thought I was having a discussion. Kinda what forums are for, no? As for 42 to 1, I didn't realise this was a popularity contest?

It's pretty similar to a fptp election format. 

Elections certainly are popularity contests and as the now 43 to 1 indicates, and you still refuse to acknowledge, Corbyn is deeply unpopular with the electorate.

I caught this nonsense on the radio, what the actual fu*k are Labour playing at. If they can't ditch Corbyn by normal means or rein in the lunatics behind him they need to cut momentum loose as a party. I'm all for a Labour party of the left but this is so painfully inept it has to be stopped, useless useless c***s!

Jk

I’d vote for Corbyn before I’d vote for Johnson.

They can't because so many of them are members of the Labour party, add in the Tories who joined, Corbyn is going to become a permanent fixture, until the next messiah arrives. 

Professional polling companies couldn't predict the labour surge last time round, but we're supposed to take a poll of 44 UKC members as indicative of the mood of the electorate?

We're not holding an election.

So what is the point of the Labour party. They don't want to oppose in parliament, they don't want an election to gain power?

What is their point? Day care for old mps? 

You're right, you've convinced me. All the polls, all the opinion pieces, all the news stories, at least 90% of the people I come across in daily life and the majority of posters on UKC are all wrong. Jeremy Corbyn is in fact wildly popular. 

Wow. Who runs the Labour party? Jon Lansman.

Who runs the Tory party? MIchael Spicer.

Who will we vote for? None of the above.

Steve Baker is a much better apologist for Leave than JRM though. I have no opinion about the Labour party. Ms Swinson seems to be providing an interesting backdrop

Correct, this propaganda originates in the right wing opinion pieces and news stories, and to a certain extent in polling designed to give a certain answer, and the other times you've heard it is people lazily trotting out what they've been taught to think drip by drip every day for the last few years.

Do you think another leader offering a similar range policies, which are popular but disliked by the establishment, would be given an easier ride by the establishment media?

UKC is very liberal but it's raving Lib Dem not left. I may be proved wrong but I think it's out of step with the electorate and you are reading a great deal into a small number of likes.

They we trying to get rid of the post of deputy. Corbyn knocked this on the head anyway!

Tom hasn't been the most loyal of deputies either, one could even say he's been downright Machiavellian.

She's not being deselected, they're voting on who they want for their candidate, and it might well be her.

Is this the same poll that told us Labour were going to be wiped out in the last GE, and the one before that?

Labour have played the Brexit "game" the only way they could, you seem to be convinced there are no Labour voters who want Brexit.

They're the only party who have stuck to what they said they'd do all along, namely; find out what the deal is and then vote on that, no deal isn't an option.

If you keep believing what the media are saying then yes we're f*cked, but the media aren't the truth are they?

The LibDems are simply denying democracy, and ignoring the referendum, they not promising a people vote, what are they going to say to LibDem voters who aren't remainers?

Weird. Most of my 'propaganda and right wing opinion pieces' seem to have been picked up from The Guardian.

Yes. The bloke comes across as a humourless borderline weirdo, who's skipped from Manor House to public school to trade union activist, directly into politics. On the way he's picked up no serious qualifications, no trade, no non-ideological work experiences, but he has picked up a talent for hypocrisy; the eternal rebel when on the back benches, turned leader loathe to brook dissent.

Yes, you're right. I overstated it saying UKC is 'massively left of centre'.  UKC is pretty well informed as a group though and as a group there's not a whole lot of love for JC, much of this stemming from his attitude to Brexit. Despite Ciro's repeated attempts to frame Corbyn as the UK's best chance to derail Brexit, the reality is somewhat different. JC's statement to the NEC today signals yet more prevarication and muddle.

As to Corbyn's popularity? Latest Observer poll puts Labour on 22% and Tories on 37%. Absolutely shocking given the state of the government.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/sep/21/labour-plunges-into-brexit...

Pretty much sums up our current PM.

Lovely bit of selective editing...

Thanks.

Do stop with this nonsense.  The Lib Dems have presented a manifesto on which they apparently will fight the next GE.  If enough people vote for it, it happens.  That’s democracy.  It’s the way we used to do it before People’s Votes ; people’s votes.

Or do you think we should permanently stick with stupid ideas from two votes ago?

So in your world the polls are totally wrong, Labour has no credibility gap with the public and they are going to win the next general election? I think it’s you who are being spun by very selective media whereas I and many on UKC gain our experience directly from working in a wide range industries, public services and societies around the country and elsewhere.

The Guardian is another propaganda rag like the rest of them. It's aligned with the Labour right who want to follow Tory politics but with a few more hugs thrown in.

A feature of the 2017 campaign was that, under election conditions without the usual media filter, Theresa May was seen to be unable to interact with an actual human being without it appearing a bit wierd and awkward wheras Corbyn could happily interact among crowds with ease and humanity. The media are normally able to filter what gets through and shape perceptions of people to fit their narrative and you are naive if you think they wouldn't have found an attack line for Owen Smith, or Tom Watson, or whoever, if similar policies were on offer.

If derailing Brexit is the goal then Labour is indeed the UK's best chance but the establishment media is busy carefully constructing a narrative against Labour, either because they support Brexit or prefer it to a Corbyn led government delivering popular policies.

And still Labour did not win.

Give the electorate a centrist communicator and they will. 

By doing this you're simply sweeping away the result of the referendum.

You didn't answer the question of what LibDem Leavers are supposed to do?

Why not simply say we'll have another vote?

So let just think this through for a minute, if in the next election the LibDems manage to gain power by the narrowest of margins, that could mean roughly 1/3 of the people who vote get to decide that 52% of the people who voted previously are wrong and will be discounted. Not only is it a shit idea, but it's worse than the Tories no deal.

I'm a remainer, but I can see the reason for putting it back to the people and stopping a no deal, I couldn't vote for simply saying f*ck it, that's not going to be a resolution to the issue, and it's going to make the disillusionment of the current political system even worse.

The reason we're in this position in the first place, was people voting against Cameron and Westminster, it wasn't all about leaving the EU.

And let's not forget the LibDems have 18 MPs, 18!!!

You keep saying centrist as if you talking about Lenin, the party had swung so far right, it wasn't the Labour party any more. For a lot of people this "reset" is what they've been looking for for decades.

If it wasn't for the constant sniping and the people within Labour who liked the status quo, battling against Corbyn, and the media attacks, we wouldn't be where we are now.

Who is the “you” that is being referred to?

By voting for a party with a stated manifesto of doing something, the people (not your ambiguous “you”) are giving a direct, democratic mandate to the government they elect, to do that thing.  This is as strong a mandate as I can conceive in our system.

As it happens, the potential mandate of the Lib Dems is a lot stronger than the one the current government have given themselves off the back of a non binding referendum that said “should” not “must”...

They've never been wrong before though have they? Ask Stephen Kinnock, who had to eat his hat, because he believed the polls, during the last election. He was almost disappointed Labour did as well as they did.

Are you suggesting I don't work in industry? I quite possibly work in more different industries than most people on UKC. I don't know what you think I do, but your statement is a bit elitist and dismissive, based on what you do for a  living.

  Sorry to intrude on your private grief but why on earth are you remotely surprised or confused by this? It's what the hard left do. It's in their DNA and was predicted by many on here (offwidth was particularly articulate on the subject) when Corbyn was elected leader. Entryism, deselection, packing of committees etc etc. It's all in the handbook.

  The far left usually spends more time fighting other leftists than the real opposition so it is situation normal. Presumably the logic is that the party becomes more powerful if it is  all toeing the ideological line. "Democracy" is promoted as long as it is restricted to the ideologically pure.

  As an anti-socialist one's fear and expectation is that, if they ever got into power, this authoritarian modus operandi would be employed on a national scale, culling anyone not ideologically pure and restricting the freedom to voice "unacceptable" views.

OK, so if The Guardian is also part of the right wing propaganda machine, where should people be getting their news from?

I have no idea what news sources you engage with, but Theresa May was widely regarded as the most socially awkward PM in living memory. Didn't matter what rag you read, they were all saying the same.

The Observer poll puts Labour at 22% and Lib Dems at 17%. Whatever news source you engage with, only one of those parties has a clear policy to stop Brexit and a 5% spread isn't an unbridgeable chasm.

It's a feature of politics left and right worldwide. It's straight out the right wing handbook to claim this behaviour is a sinister feature of left wing politics, while applauding it as strong leadership when their own politicians do it.

By that logic you should be terrified of a full fat Bojo and Cummings government.

That right-wing media mouthpiece 'The Morning Star' is pretty clear in its support for Brexit last time I read it ( a couple of months ago). Labour are in a bind because many of the people in charge would prefer Brexit (in some flavour) but the majority of the labour-voting population does not.

Although presumably not for quite a lot of people who voted Labour giving them massive majorities in 97 and 01 and a much reduced but healthy majority in 05.

What some people in the party, and in the case of Corbyn, many more who weren't previously in the party, want isn't necessarily what the electorate want. 

Does anyone else think it's bizarre how with a former RCP member as  an MEP for the Brexit Party and another as a senior policy advisors in No. 10, and then former SWP and other hard left people now in positions of power in Labour, we have people who started out as proper doctrinaire communists at the top of UK politics at both extremes? I don't think this is some elaborate DPRK run plot or anything, but it is really odd.

Labour would never be able to 'out-remain' the Lib Dems, and would just lose more support if they tried.

Labour's current problems are twofold, the eternal left/centrist argument, and now the Brexit split amongst traditional supporters, and those two issues don't neatly overlap.

  It's true of the far right, but it's not been true of the the centre right.. Thatcher didn't want wets in her cabinet, but that is entirely different to trying to get them deselected. The Tory party has shifted policies back and forth for two centuries but it has always remained a broad church. The right has felt the need set up it's own parties:UKIP, brexit etc.

  Having prefaced this with the UKC politically correct "Boris is a lying turd blah blah" I think this is nonsense

  I would agree that Cummings is a revolutionary and wants to undermine the whole system of government. But he is short dated. He is being used by Johnson to get brexit over the line and will be gone soon after that.

  It's possible that the bad taste left by current ructions will eventually lead to a split in the party. But, despite the hysteria of the hard core remainers about fascism etc, there is precious little  indication that Johnson or his cabinet (who themselves don't agree on very much beyond brexit) have a plan to narrow the base of the party. If Johnson believes in anything beyond his entitlement to be PM it is a sort of centre right liberalism. Moreover, he knows that he will need to appeal to a broad base to get reelected.

Still did not beat May though.

There is absolutely nothing wrong in going back and resetting the policies. 

But it is still not winning through and therein lies the core issue.

Those parties are really just pressure groups to influence Tory policy, and of course it happens on the left too...... if Labour moves to the centre some left wingers join smaller socialist parties, some stay. 

The Tory party is no longer a broad church.... the former chancellor has been expelled from the party.

Like I said, 'by your logic'.

I don't think he does believe in anything other his entitlement to be PM. I'm sure it's tempting for conservatives such as yourself to hope for the best from Boris, assume the best case scenario from your point of view is the actual plan. I'm not convinced though. Brexit and the aftermath will dominate UK politics for years, no matter what happens over the next few months. He'll be stuck with the right wingers he aligned himself with over the last few years.

   Bur there is a massive and obvious difference between external parties that outflank and pressurise, and third parties that enter and take over the main party. The Labour party influences Tory policy but it's not trying to take it over! The ERG is not an entryist group, it is a segment of the main party which is currently in the ascendant.

  The Labour party has along tradition of entryism from the left which the Tories don't have an equivalent for.

  He maybe stuck with them but, unlike the hard left, neither he nor most of his cabinet are natural or obsessive rebels. They want power, and to do that they will have to reach out to the rest of the party with whom, apart from the brexit division, they mainly share enough to stay in the same party. Their rational instinct will therefore be to bring people back (as they have reportedly already hinted at doing) rather than to cull them.

  It's not impossible, as you say, that the bitter blood is so deep that there will be no reconciliation. But that is very different from a deliberate attempt to divide and cull the party along the lines of macro political and economic philosophies.

   Genuine question, because I don't know the answer, what philosophies do think the members of the current cabinet share apart from brexit?

But it's possible ( in theory at least) for the LibDems to get in power on a very poor turn out of the electorate, this could well be from less people who vote for Brexit. So how is that democratic.

Since we had the referendum, the very least we should do is have another, based on the likely options and outcomes, and a bit of honesty.

The only party offering this is Labour, and it's been their position from day one, "well vote on the deal we get from the EU".

Anything else is disingenuous to the people who voted last time.

The main problem is many people voted against Cameron and the "system" if you like, there were many people who voted against what was perceived as what the "government" was tell which way to vote, also, a massive amount of lies from Leave.

Like I said, I'm a remainer, but I don't think we can simply f*ck the 52% off by simply ignoring them, or by one party vowing to do this. They're never going to win anyhow, but it's ashit statement.

And still no one here or in the LibDems have addresses, what do you do for a LibDem supporter, who want Brexit?

You are either suggesting the LibDems are a one issue party, or that everyone who supports the LibDems are.

And to all of that, the shit system of FPTP, and it makes no odds anyhow, I'm in a true blue Tory safe seat, that was majority Leave, so I have no influence either way

Only the good people of UKC in other areas, who will be swayed by my rantings can save us from imminent doom.

What is the problem with JC getting into No10? I don't see one.

And Watson needed a little kick up the bum so he got one and that is all it was as the vote was never going to pass it but cue all manner of rabid lib dems and Tories screaming -

' Look!!!! Stalin has purged Watson!!!! Wauaeagh!!!! ', when it never happened and the vote crushed it comprehensively. The British Labour Party under JC are not ' hard left', or JC would not be a member, he is a run of the mill social democrat. I suggest you step away from your Tory media and their poisonous lies. 

If we call the vote a “referendum” it is democratic. If we call it a general election, it is undemocratic.

A very odd position.

Your argument is it a general election is undemocratic because people may not vote is daft.  If people care enough they can vote in the general election. If they don’t care enough to vote then frankly I don’t give a rats ass if they think it is disingenuous to their lazy approach to democracy and the welfare of the nation and its people.

I very strongly think that the first referendum was a massive mistake, and I don’t see how another one is going to improve things.  Complicated matters like a detailed relationship with the EU just can’t be sorted by a binary vote.

I think the Lib Dem position is pretty reasonable.

Same thing the Tories do for a Tory supporter who wants more redistributive taxation: say "you're not going to get that here, see you later" or that Labour do for a Labour supporter who wants to see a return to traditional family values and an end to all these gays getting married. The Lib Dem policy on Brexit is quite simply "bollocks to it". That's a simple, clear policy, and there's nothing I can see that's wrong with it. If you want to leave the EU, then I suggest not voting Lib Dem.

It would be "undemocratic" if the LDs put e-coli in the water supply so everyone had to stay at home with the shits rather than go out and vote. As long as it's a choice to vote or not vote, then the level of turnout is in itself an expression of "democracy".

What I'm puzzled about is why so many people think that that stupid referendum in 2016 is somehow the trump card of all democratic exercises, and everything else in the governance of the UK - a parliamentary democracy - has to revolve around it. 

If the Lib Dems said they're 100% anti-brexit, but then said they'd put it to a vote, then what would be on the ballet? They can't negotiate with the EU! And then if the vote came back to leave, there'd have to be another GE immediately, which is hardly a sensible policy to campaign on. If your policy is remain, it's perfectly sensible to just say it how it is: vote for us, and we will remain, "no ifs, no buts".

I have got absolutely no idea what would poses a remainer, if they see that as the biggest issue of the day, to vote for Labour.

Good point, the establishment narrative against Corbyn and the left is everywhere so it's not a case of trusting a particular source over another. I don't suppose it's possible to just report the news without introducing some bias into it. Ideally need to look at a wide spectrum of sources with a healthy dose of scepticism and be aware of who is spinning what and why.

After the election campaign they were. Beforehand they thought she was the darling of the people.

The brexit above all else narrative is establishment spin which is succeeding in splitting the left. In or out of Europe it's win-win for the establishment under the Tories whereas the many will benefit from Labour either way. With a 22/17 split neither party will form a government which can stop Brexit.

I don't agree that is the case. Corbyn turned out the biggest vote share since 2001 not by appealing to centrists but by inspiring people to vote who were sick of the establishment consensus and had previously stayed at home.

Some serious head in the sand stuff from a couple of Corbyn fans on here...

If Labour can't win a majority against the worst Tory government in living memory when will they again if they keep on the same path? 

But that vote was mainly in Labour heartlands not in enough of the swing constituencies needed to win a general election. The same seems likely to happen this time too

Trouble is he inspired even more people to vote Tory.

Re perceived bias. Looking at today's Guardian coverage of Labour and the conference could you give an example of what you consider bias?

But a very close (and earlier) referendum, based on misleading and downright dishonest campaigning, has greater legitimacy? 

It's one option, and maybe it's the best one.  I'm not sure how smart the LibDem policy is given their position.  But to say it's undemocratic implies you believe that only direct plebiscites are 'democratic'.  

By that argument, no newly-elected government could reverse the policy of a previous one for fear of offending the majority who voted in the previous election. 

The closest I get to Tory media is UKC

When the Guardian comes under the heading of Tory media and their poisonous lies you have definitely lost the plot!

Yes, by democratically electing a party whose top stated aim is to do so. In principal that's entirely reasonable. My concern with using a GE result to resolve the brexit impasse in either direction is that governments typically don't require majority popular support, in this environment I think that is necessary to tackle brexit. If they achieved that I'd be 100% comfortable with them revoking A50, if they didn't they'd be unwise to press on on that basis. Anyway, it's academic, the LibDems have near as damnit zero chance of majority government, they'll do well to better their 2010 numbers. They're just clearly staking out the ground on which they plan to fight, fine by me. 

Vote for another party or hold their noses. I doubt you could fill a bus with them at this point in the game so again, it's fairly academic.

Jk

Agreed but he still did not get a majority to get into power. 

On the upside, if they are going to f*ck themselves it is best if they do it as comprehensively as they did in Scotland a few years ago so that their entire vote moves to the LibDems.   The worst outcome is if they are only semi-f*cked and the anti-Brexit vote is split.

I disagree. Another referendum ought to be needed reverse a referendum and a GE can reverse the policy of a previous government.

OK, that sounds reasonable, although perhaps this might have been made a bit clearer at the time.

No, hang on, this is utter nonsense. 

1. There is absolutely no basis for implying that this form of vote has priority over an election, especially since it was explicitly advisory, not binding.  To establish this principle would fatally undermine the whole point of general elections and the functioning of parliament - as is abundantly clear right now.
2. If we were to adopt this principle, then at the very least such referendums should require a supermajority.  If they are to have greater standing than an election then they should require greater evidence of overwhelming support - like a 67% majority.  I still think it would be a terrible idea.  
3. Any relevant embodiment of previous governmental policy that has been enacted by parliament would require another act of parliament to change the law.  Therefore the actions and policies of any elected government clearly have precendence over the result of any referendum.  Even if there were a commitment that the referendum would be binding, acting on its result would still be a political decision, not a legal one.    
4. It is possible that a referendum might pose an unanswerable or, at least, unactionable, question.  You'd hope a bit more care might be put into the drafting than to allow this to happen, but you never know.

Looks like all the Labour MPs will need to remove their kids from private schools, otherwise they'll look a bit hypocritical of their manifesto pledge. 

I think Labour did pick up a fair few unexpected southern seats. They did increase the share more in seats they already held like you say though and this has been attributed to the party machine which didn't back Corbyn and operated a defensive strategy. If only they'd thrown their resources into the seats they needed to gain rather than defend we might be living in a fairer, forward looking, country with properly funded public services by now.

Media propaganda probably did but this is my main point, if Owen Smith, Tom Watson, or any of the others were offering a similar set of popular policies then the media would find a stick to relentlessly attack them with as well.

Haven't got time sorry but I've had a quick look at the headlines and I'm detecting a negative tone there. Meanwhile the Telegraph are promoting the same stories but with a few more negative opinion pieces, whereas the left leaning blogs are promoting the policies. All are putting their own spin on events, even in just choosing what to cover and what to ignore, you just need to be wise to it.

No, he fell just short but with a vote share that would ordinarily achieve a large majority. I don't agree that a Centrist would do better.

If it's just to communicate the same popular policies then the Centrist would be attacked by the media just the same as Corbyn is. If it's to offer a Centrist suite of policies then there's no change towards a fairer society so no point.

The headlines certainly weren't good this morning, still covering the drive by shooting, reporting on the resignation of a key aide and the controversy over Brexit policy but to be honest I don't see what else of note is worth reporting and I am following the conference via Labourlist.

I think in these specific circumstances what the LibDems are doing is turning the GE into a Brexit referendum.  If the GE gives a clear mandate to a party that wants to revoke Article 50 they should just go ahead and do it as fast as possible and get the economy back to normal.   If the election results in a situation like now where there's no clear majority in parliament for anything then that's time for a second referendum.   

Brexit wasn't a policy of any party when it was voted for, was it?

The only thing that was policy was a referendum on Brexit!

Fell short is the key word.

They're 'semi-fu*ked' whatever policies they settle on. Their voter base is split on brexit, not clean in half but enough to be a problem. That said they won't just vanish as a force no matter how bad any given manifesto is (neither option they're voting on is bad per se though delaying the referendum risks the collapse of a government before it can be delivered and renegotiating brexit leaves them sure to disappoint which will be branded incompetence by the right), there will be plenty who 'vote Labour because me mam and pa did', it's a cultural thing it's just what they do. I don't mean that to be derogatory, a lot of people just really aren't that engaged, red or blue, leave or remain.

jk

Nightmare. Of course we have created our own hell, in this situation, by voting in a whole load of Remainers at the last GE, which didn't really focus on Brexit except in a negative sense, having voted to Leave in the referendum. Is it surprising it's a shambles?

Also, we are rewriting the constitutional rule-book, although of course we don't have one.

Currently the perceived basis of our democracy is that the Parliament (and therefore the electorate) are supreme. This belief is trying to subvert the actual basis of our democracy, replacing the existing system where Government thinks it's supreme.

Also we are trying to get shot of the EU, such that the existing basis of law (that EU law has primacy) is also changed in Parliament's favour. Cue a massive unnecessary effort to incorporate the necessary EU law into the UK law book.

And again, we are deliberately destroying our party political system by allowing it to elect populist leaders using unrepresentative electoral colleges, resulting in leaders who have little or no ability to deal with these difficult questions.

Where are the eagles and the trumpets?

I'm finding Eliot's darker writings almost comforting at the moment.
 

Magna Carter

Bill of rights

Petition of rights

Parliaments acts

Representation of people's acts

There are a lot of historical documents the unwritten constitution is supported or based upon. There just isn't one overarching document. 

The right has it's equivalents, from the League of Empire Loyalists to the Brexit party, both set up by former Tories, and both with the aim of influencing Tory party. There will have been traffic the other way, especially during the 80s when lifelong hard right wingers like Farage were happy to stay in the Tory party.

A left wing equivalent of Mark Francois would be labelled an 'entryist'. The ERG will certainly have informal links with the Brexit party, just as far left parties would have links to those on the left of the Labour party. It just has a different flavour to it on the right, and we have a predominantly right wing media who would rather concentrate on Labour's problems.

It's not really that, more the fact that Brexit, or the debate over EU-UK relationship, is not going to end anytime soon. There is the deep divide in the Tory party, and Bojo will be constantly under pressure from those who like sticking 2 fingers up at continentals. This idea that a  line can be drawn under Brexit, then this grand reconciliation would take place just isn't realistic.

I think the very anti EU pro Brexit bunch do have an agenda to generally shift the Tory party rightwards. The Tories have just had a cull..... there may be more.

I don't know them that well either. They don't seem like a particularly competent bunch, and there does seem to have been a shift to the right. It's hardly reassuring.

Edit: I take it you have heard of the group Moggmentum?

It can realistically be moved back out of parliament and onto the streets for a while. From there it'll be a long slog to demonstrate value and undo decades of EU scapegoating if it's even possible but in the meantime we at least have the opportunity to address some of the social drivers of the revolt that became brexit, that way when it comes back it has less traction and does less harm.

jk

They are apples and oranges in the UK, Switzerland seems to manage alright by having plenty of referenda.

I think this is exactly what is required this gets rid of the close-shave, people who can be bothered to vote against the one's that can't be arsed. I've advocated this for a long time, even before the Brexit ref.

Isn't that why we have parliament?  There's no reason why the ref. result shouldn't be both legal and and act of parliament.

I think most people would want that, more truth and honesty wouldn't go amiss either.

Like I said I'm a remainer too, but what do you,and I mean you personally, say to the 52% that voted leave, if you're not keen on given them another vote?

What do you do about blokes like this FFS!!

https://www.irishpost.com/news/diabetic-brexiteer-wants-to-leave-without-in...

It's unbelievable how entrenched people are, if parliament is going to take way "what we voted for" instead of the people doing it, then where is the relevance of parliament to these people?

  You don't seem to understand the meaning of "entryism". 

The brexit is a separate party so by definition not "entryist". Farage was not an entryist. He was the opposite; an "exitist". Which is just my point: the extremists in the Tory party tend to leave. The extremists on the left "enter" from outside, from more extreme groups,  in order to take over the party.

   Mark Francois would not be regarded as an "entryist" any more than Corbyn is an entryist. They have both been in their parties for decades. They maybe on the fringes, or "cuckoos in the nest" but they are NOT entryists.

  That maybe true.

  Aside from the brexit issue what do you regard as the deep divide-as opposed to a spectrum of opinions? Like you, I don't think some of them are competent and I am not clear what their "political vision" is. Hence I am suspicious of peoples' habit of grouping them together as "right wing". I don't know what people mean by the term or  whether the MPs share perspectives that make them so.

Yes, what is your point?

Where do Leave.UK fit in?

"We are building a network of Tory Party Members agitating to get their Remainer MP booted out."

https://leave.eu/deselect-your-remainer-tory-mp/

They don't have a tradition of entryism but it seems that some on the right are adopting it:

https://www.ft.com/content/303283ae-b1f2-11e8-87e0-d84e0d934341

Yep. Given the Conservatives made a monumental cock up with the referendum and have continued to do so since I think the Labour part should be hanging its head in shame for being so totally inept in capitalising on the Tory mess.

We have had Corbyn doing just about anything other than saying what his(and therefore presumably Labour's) position is on most things including Brexit.

Then recently we had an announcement that if he was elected he would take what he thought was the best deal to the EU but would not recommend it and now a senior member of the party is challenged because he doesn't agree with everything the party says.

The Monster Raving Loonies couldn't have come up with this.

Dave

Yup, I acknowledge that there are efforts to initiate deselections of Tory MPs and regard it as an unhealthy development.

I think the difference is that it is being done by long term members of the party, not by entryists, and on the basis of the single issue, brexit, not their broader political stance. So it maybe reversible, but it's not good.

My FT sub has lapsed so I cannot read the link but my analysis would be that this is part of a broader problem. Memberships have always tended to be more "hard core" than either the electorate or most MPs. As parties shrink then only the more radical elements remain (or in the case of Labour, new entryists take the opportunity to takeover) and so the parties get forced to extremes. It's very unhealthy but it basically reflects the slow decline of the electoral system and party system that has failed the electorate for many decades. It is not, to use Rees-Mogg's least least favourite phrase, "fit for purpose".

Yes I do, don't be silly.

The picture you are trying to paint just isn't true, Tory hard right wingers don't necessarily leave, take the Monday Club

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Monday_Club

Member Norman Tebitt later making it into government. These groups will have links with the other smaller right wing parties, same as what happens on the left.

The fact that you are trying to make a clear distinction between 'entryists' and 'cuckoos in the nest' speaks volumes.....is a cuckoo no an infiltrating intruder? Entryism tends to be an accusation most activists deny, or they have a short lived political careers. The only self identifying 'entryists' of late were Tories who joined Labour to vote for JC.

I'm sure there has been seem clear cases of entryism from the UKIP/Brexit Party, and I'm not sure the Tory party did much to discourage it

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/brexit-party-conservatives-join-torie...

I think many of the Brexiteers want a full 'Americanisation' of the UK economy, as opposed to the 'One Nation Tories'

Should have added a smiley..... but yes a point, when it comes to the fringes, both main parties have similar issues, they are bound too. I think moderate Tories have been in denial more than their Labour counterparts, and forgotten some not too distant history.

I am inclined to agree with you about the system being not fit for purpose. 

Re the article, I don't have an FT sub but I managed to read it because I found it via Google. Sometimes that works, but not always. 

https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk/foreign-affairs/brexit/news/101244/jac...

   I'm not arguing that parties that are broad churches don't have internal, sometimes organised factions, that have influence and sometime representation in government. This is completely different  from such factions which encourage entry by extreme elements from outside to swamp the party and then use all means, fair or foul, to narrow the parties down to the "true believers". Militant and Momentum are both examples of the latter. The Monday Club etc are not.

  If you don't agree, so be it.

   That's the thing. People attribute all sorts of things to them, and maybe some do believe that, but I am not clear that as a group they share either that goal or any goal (except brexit) let alone that post brexit they want to exclude other elements of the party.

Yes they should. There was a stunned panic after the referendum result with the media actually prepared to point out that this was a huge Tory disaster. The PM resigned and there was a huge mandate for a change in direction, ripe for the Labour party to capitalise on. Instead, the strategically inept centrists in the PLP decided that this was the right time to give the Tories a get out of jail free card and launch a coup to topple Corbyn.

If they had any political sense they would have made capital out of laying the blame at the opposition (from their perspective both the Tories and Corbyn would be the opposition) with a sympathetic media prepared to listen to them, until their point of view was firmly set as the narrative and then they could have launched their coup.

The Labour right threw away the biggest political advantage Labour will ever have without even achieving their short sighted aim and these political morons are the people many on here think could steer a better course for Labour than Jeremy Corbyn?

Jon Lansmann, founder and chairman of Momentum, has been a member of the Labour Party probably as long as Mark Francois has been a Tory. Make you mind up!

Yes Millitant were true entryist but were ultimately defeated. The Tories didn't have a problem with right wing extremists in the 80s as most of them admired Thatcher, and with characters like Tebbitt in the government they probably felt represented.

We'll see.

Thankyou for making my point

"such factions which encourage entry by extreme elements from outside to swamp the party and then use all means, fair or foul, to narrow the parties down to the "true believers" "

No, thankyou

Yup, that's what JRM and pals are trying to do, and in part have succeeded.

One party has just had a cull, and it ain't Labour! I really don't think you have taken stock of the current situation.

  See my posts above. I acknowledged that but believe that it is a short term measure (albeit one I disagree with ) to drive through brexit, not to change and narrow the whole party down to "true believers". It's a tactic, not a strategy.

  We'll see. If you are right it'll be the end of the Tory party.

Switzerland got itself into almost exactly this mess with the EU by this route just a few years back! They eventually found a way to climb down as we must too.

Arguably they'll have had another vote and lost it if the LibDems get to form a majority government (which they won't). Anyway, I think the phrase is 'you lost, get over it!' if I recall correctly

Personally I think a GE is a terrible way to sort this mess, the danger is that a UK GE typically returns a government without majority support which would be considered by most insufficient mandate for action on brexit whichever way it went.

Treat him like everyone else facing life threatening shortages whether they're daft macho pricks or suffering at the hands of them... Waiting lists and rationing. Triage. Body bag. Wait 10+ years. Public enquiry.

jk

That is the reason some on the left voted for Brexit.... they may yet be vindicated, but at what cost!?!

Some much depends on what happens over the next month or so. We will have to wait and see.

But it's not the same and you know it.

Are you lowering yourself to their standards?

Me too, which is why I'm staggered at the LibDems going for this, as a remainer, I'm still not sure I could vote LibDem, even if it would make a difference where I live, because I don't agree wit the majority of their policies.

And if it's your mam, daughter, wife, husband, you'd be just as blasé?

The question wasn't really what do you do with him afterwards, it was more about how do you change this blokes mind or how can anyone expect to reason with someone like this?

It's how we decide most policy, in ordinary times it would be fine but we've talked ourselves into a right mess. Caution would be advised we're they to win a shock majority especially without >50% vote share. 

Just having a little fun. If it is eventually overturned we're going to have to be magnanimous so I might as well get it all out of my system now especially since we're still losing badly. 

I'm not blasé, I'm being realistic and I am concerned. Anyway, my point is as tempting as it might be to consider morons like him more deserving of their bleak future than others who didn't choose it we will just have to treat everyone according to need, not their political ideology. 

How do you change his mind? Wait 30 years or for the insulin to stop coming. More humanely people like him could be talked down gradually if the brexity press were interested but they're not so in reality without a press clampdown nobody should be wishing for, we can't.

Jk

I never thought I had anything in common with Corbyn. But it looks more certain than ever we both voted for Brexit. I'd be happy with a deal though, I think he'd prefer no deal to help set up his socialist nirvana. 

That would go against anything he's ever said about Brexit, he's not a Tory!!

"Ask the members if they support your Brexit plan, Jeremy." said Tom Watson

"The members are on Watson's side." said Laura Kuenssberg

"This will be humiliating for Corbyn." said Robert Peston

So Jeremy Corbyn asked the members. And the members said...

Another example of polls getting it right?

I can't remember seeing a public opinion poll predicting the result of the conference vote today, could you post a link?  

Political pundits' opinions are just that, maybe influenced by deliberate misinformation or they just mis read it

FWIW I can understand Jeremy on this one, but I fear it's a doomed attempt to re-unite the nation.  Brexiters now seem so hard line they will see any sort of a deal as a betrayal, and its hard to see how a Corbyn deal could be significantly different to May's 

On this morning's R4 today programme she said it was impossible to predict; especially as the committee had refused to sit first thing this morning to formulate or discuss any specific policy or Brexit stance. 

All they've done is jump from one fence to another. 

And the members said: “too close to call, can we have a proper count please?” but the leaders said: “no, we’ll decide - oh good, we won both votes.”

The unions backed Jeremy, that's why he won.

Absolute shambles of a conference from Labour.... Boris must be laughing his tits off that this set of clowns are in opposition. 

Apparently not.....maybe

https://www.itv.com/news/2019-09-23/how-jeremy-corbyn-stitched-up-labours-b...

Not all unions. Unison wanted a remain policy. But unite pays the most into Labour, so McCluskey gets to be puppet master. 

They've been saying the same thing since the election, "we'll decide when we know what the deal is"

Just the one fence then.

I say that I think Remain would now win a second referendum (depending on how binary the question was) but that it would probably be close enough for many Leavers to consider it inconclusive, now that particular genie is out of the bottle.  I don't think we should changing our constitution on the basis of an inconclusive vote and I'd invite them to vote in an election for the party that most closely reflects their view. 

But you are then setting up parties to be a single issue party, is that what you really want? what about all the rest of policy and aspirations?

It's not a fence is it? It's a valid position to hold, if you need a car and your choices were my Skoda or no car, which would you take?

Or do you find out what condition my Skoda is in and how much I want for it, first?

If, instead of blindly blurting out media sound bites, you'd listened to what Labour have been saying since the last GE, you'd know that's what they've been advocating all along. I don't understand what people don't "get" about this.

Isn't Labour just a single issue party now anyway, anti anybody who has more money, qualifications or assets than them? 

It will be interesting to see if there will be any significant difference between Corbyn’s negotiated soft Brexit option and May’s Brexit deal

  It was Boris’s cunning plan to prorogue parliament to ensure that the Labour party conference happened 😀

Apparently the deputy leader of the Labour Party doesn't agree with you. From the BBC yesterday:

 Tom Watson, said "ambiguity" over the party's Brexit policy had cost it votes at the European elections in May. 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-45640548

I'm not blurting soundbites. And I pay close attention to all sides of the political spectrum. My living depends on it. Labour's position has nothing to do with waiting to see what the deal looks like. It's about getting over the line of a general election before disappointing at least one or other side of the Brexit/Remain axis that makes up its electorate. I'm bewildered that either you can't see that or that you imagine any well-informed rational observer would not be capable of seeing that.

It's depressing how much such starkly simplistic views have come to the fore recently, on both sides. Either you must hate anyone richer than you or you must hate the idea of sharing with anyone. Where's the nuance? Where's the pragmatism? Where's the acknowledgement that this is a real world we're trying to make the best of and not some idealistic sixth form common room concept?

I thought it was depressing that the vote was done on a show of hands.What a con.

I find it unbelievable. How archaic and open to abuse.

Forgot to add " brother".

Crikey and everybody goes on about democracy.

For those who missed it:

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/sep/23/labour-elite-wins-a-battle...

I agree. That's why or at least part of the reason I'm happy living where I do. I don't mind high tax if it's spent relatively fairly. But you have to leave enough of a reward so people bother generating the taxable income in the first place.

It seems Labour just want to throw out uncosted promises to buy voters, whilst penalizing anyone they consider to be doing well. They haven't figured that somebody needs to generate the revenue to fund those promises.  

This morning on the today programme; Labour will fund new wind farms (taxpayers money) but they'll be fantastic and generate a profit.. only she forgot to mention that profit is from the electric bills of taxpayers though. I'm sure they'll lap it up though, with lots of applause, as green sentiment easily wins a crowd at present. 

Isn't the problem that many of their policies are very 6th form common room and are easily seen through by anyone who has done a days work outside of a political party. UK carbon neutral by 2030 with no impact on people..  really!? 

 >Isn't the problem that many of their policies are very 6th form common room and are easily seen through by anyone who has done a days work outside of a political party. UK carbon neutral by 2030 with no impact on people..  really!? 

Yeah, like all those people who easily saw through the Leave campaign's NHS bus slogan?

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/vote-leave-brexit-lies-eu-pa...

Unfortunately political parties are filled with people with strong opinions but little idea of what nuance, pragmatism or compromise really are. I think every party is like this. You fill in a form, pay your dues dues and suddenly you get to vote on party policies on which you have no tea clue past what you've read about in the Telegraph, the Daily Mail, The Guardian or even worse, political fanzines like the Canary. It then gets worse because you get to decide who will lead your party and perhaps the country.

Democracy is a great thing but when it leads to the tyranny of the stupid one must consider carefully how it should be implemented.

Well, I can't say what people do or don't "get" about this, but I can see that Labour's position is getting widespread support:

https://twitter.com/Jacob_Rees_Mogg/status/1176100287217582082?s=20

Well done Jeremy and co.!

My theory is that it's recently become a whole lot worse as a direct result of the referendum. Not anything to do with who voted for what or which side can claim to have 'won', but due to people voting directly on issues rather than voting for parties or representatives. To do so, people vote according to their perception of the issues and their consequences, so justifying your vote means being confident that you were aware enough of the issues to have formed a worthwhile opinion.

So far so good but that's very unusual in the UK. While parties campaign on issues and manifestos, a great many people don't get involved in the policy detail and simply vote for either the party or the local MP they think will represent them best (which is how the system works.) All of a sudden now people have become confident that they know enough about policy and political science to have a valuable personal opinion and they're often not shy about expressing it, when a great many people's understanding of such things is still a long way short of 'mature'.

That's not to claim any notable expertise personally. I'm very aware that there are many who are very much better informed than I about many issues, and I generally choose either to keep quiet or just to ask questions about those issues rather than seeking to pontificate from a position of ignorance.

Your Swedish government is very happy to invest heavily in UK off shore wind farms. Why on earth shouldn’t the UK government do so too? 

At a time when governments can borrow at almost zero, why on earth shouldn’t the government be investing in infrastructure projects? 

You seem to have totally different expectations of how the UK government and your own government should build their infrastructure 

Unreal.

I'm not against investment or green energy at all. 

But if that investment into a structure that will supply electricity to UK households makes a profit, who is actually paying the bills that generate the profit? So selling it to voters as a profit making enterprise is some what odd. 

In sweden I pay a monthly electrical connection fee of £60, before paying for units, a green energy tax on top and then finally 25% vat, that's the price of a supply which is 80% from non fossil fuels. 

Labour are just pedalling a lie. Going carbon neutral by 2030 will be hugely expensive for all households.

Going carbon-neutral is likely to be less expensive in the long run for us all than the alternative.

Most web comparisons say that Sweden has a cheaper electricity supply than the U.K. both in terms of kWh and household (household is compared for all power bills - since gas is more widespread in UK). 

And a government owned wind farm built with low cost loans and modern designs should have the ability to make a profit while  costing less than existing generators with high strike prices. The government might even be able to strike a deal to give less money to queenie for the Royal sea. 

Personally i think the wind industry is mature  enough, and the government should be concentrating on the backups that the private sector won’t provide at a good price - nuclear, tidal, waste and bio waste, maybe storage. But I have no problem with them entering the market. The private sector is not making the investments required. 

I wasn't suggesting we shouldn't spend money it on. It was Labour's suggestion on r4 this morning that going carbon neutral by 2030 would be pain free. 

Just used a UK comparison site and compared bills. Monthly charge would be half what it is here, unit price was less, less taxes on top after that too. The cheapest was with eon, who we are also with here. UK like for like was around half what we pay here. 

But as you say and I acknowledge, you get what you pay for. Lots of green energy and there is a rolling programme nationally to bury all lower voltage power lines so no power outages from storms etc. 

My gripe is Labour saying it can all be done at no cost to the consumer. 

This happens a lot, usually with the most vociferous anti-nationalisation proponents, yet they are perfectly happy for foreign nations to own, run and sell our infrastructure.

I understand some people don't know our water industry is mostly German, Us or Chinese, etc. but some people do know and still kick up about the UK owning their own stuff!

So what, compare the price of a pint? What does that mean?

I can't find anything where they've said there would be no cost to the consumer. In fact I can't see anything that tells us how it would be funded, although I did find a mention of some of the money coming out of the proposed 'National Transformation Fund'. Which of course raises the question of where the money's coming from for that.

Pint... are you Farage? It's 500ml, litres etc.. 

So electricity; Labour thinks according to the person they put on r4 this morning, they can build lots of wind farms, the government will make a profit, the consumers won't pay more. I disagree. Our normal electricity is 80% non fossil fuels, once you factor in the £60 month connection fee, useage, green tax, 25% vat it's way more expensive than the UK. Which is fine, as you generally get what you pay for. 

Why aren't you comparing the UK to China, or the US, or Ulan Bator? It makes no sense the comparisons you're making because they are two very different places.

For example, why is your about $7 a bottle? even with 25% added tax it's still way more than here. So what's the point? You live where you live, and you've made that choice.

It still doesn't change the fact our major utilities are owned by foreign governments.

Because the debate is how much green energy will cost the uk consumer under Labour's drive to be carbon neutral by 2030.

I don't think those countries which aren't in Europe are good benchmarks. It does make sense to compare in Europe because electricity is traded between countries.

No and the debate was never about that.

Do you honestly believe Labour in 10 years and 4months can replace every power source, every non electric car, every gas boiler in every house.....? 

Do you genuinely believe that to become carbon neutral we must replace every gas boiler in every house, or are you deliberately trying to discredit the idea of carbon neutrality by inventing a fantasy of what it might mean?

Yes I do. Individual household boilers are an outdated concept. Communal heating is way cheaper in the long run, easier to capture emmissions and has been incorporated in new home construction in many countries for decades. 

Planting a few trees to offset, a mathmatical fudge is not really carbon neutral is it. 

What carbon production can we have, whilst being carbon neutral in ten years? 

What's the problem with that though?A Labour government is needed to sort out the Tory destruction of our economy, society and democracy. In order to achieve this Labour need to get over the line of a GE appealing to a coalition of Leave and Remain voters. Everyone from both sides of the Brexit divide can choose Labour in order to build a brighter future.

So you endorse your leader's blatant obfuscation in the face of an electorate desperate for clarity on the leading question of our generation. I'll take it that you also approve of the packing of the conference hall with union votes to crowd out, on the key Brexit motion, what would have been a majority of remain supporting grassroots members. New kind of politics my arse. https://www.itv.com/news/2019-09-23/how-jeremy-corbyn-stitched-up-labours-b...

If that's what the Labour leadership looks like it's no less devious, dictatorial or fanatical than the arseholes in no. 10 today. In the face of that choice, I'll be voting Lib Dem despite their slim chance of overall victory. You'd do well to mull over over how Labour looks to swing voters like me. People who could put Labour in power but won't touch it with a bargepole until Corbyn and Lansman go.

Corbyns been around a while, can you point me towards anything in the past 50 years of his life that would indicate he is capable delivering or leading anyone towards a brighter future? 

There's a huge propaganda spin machine aimed at Jeremy Corbyn and Labour and I have no faith that that article or any of the other Tory attack lines parroted all over the media are a fair description.

Part of the spin is the positioning of Brexit above all else which suits the establishment because it splits the progressive vote and lessens the risk to them of a transformative government and it seems to be succeeding in causing voters like yourself to vote against their own best interests.

If Labour looks bad to swing voters like you that's because you are prepared to swallow Tory propaganda parroted relentlessly every day throughout an uncritical media.

The majority benefit from a Labour government. Preventing the further trashing of our economy, society, and democracy is the most important issue of the day. You can fight the Brexit battle after Labour have stopped the continuing disaster of this Tory government.

Why not pick Spain then?

It looks bad when I lsee an at the out of date practise of votes by hand. I do not need the media to tell me what is blatantly obvious .

Swing voters tend to observe these things and say not in my name.

How much non fossil fuel electricity do they produce as a percentage? 

I have no idea, maybe this would help you.

https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Electricity_pr...

Private energy suppliers make a profit from voters. We need the capacity. The only difference here is Labour propose the state owning half the asset, taking half the profit and they are clear in what they will do with it, reinvest in decarbonisation and faded seaside communities. The only difference between what we have now and what they propose is that clarity. Odd thing to describe as odd.

Which bit of that do you think looks unfamiliar to a UK energy user apart from the renewable fraction?

It'll be impossible but we need ambitious goals.

jk

Profit. Exactly. Where does the profit come from, the prices people pay. Plus Labour will need to purchase half the shares first, who pays for that?

How many uk users pay £60 monthly, 30 or less is normal. 5% more vat, too. I only know because I've obviously paid lecky bills at some point in both countries.

My point is if you want investment, the consumer pays regardless. Be it taxation, electricity prices etc. Doesn't matter how you dress it up, it's not free. 

If you have a goal 90% think is achievable more folk get on board. 

Do you think with some coaching you could reach 8c on sight by 2025... for most mortals we know the odds are low. What about 7 c .. set a goal that's at least within grasp folk will work for it. 

There isn't even a faint chance a country could be carbon neutral by 2030. Sweden is arguably a little further down the road and has a goal of fossil fuel transport reduced by 70% by 2030. Carbon neutral or fossil fuel free in all aspects by 2045-2050. Considering electricity is already at 80% that last 20% is much harder to eliminate, as each measure reduces it by progressively smaller amounts.  

Purchase whose share's, they're talking about new capacity which they'll borrow cheaply to build as a joint venture with private investors. Reinvesting profit from state owned clean energy in 'green' projects is just another way of describing a ring fenced tax. We'll see if that's popular. You're always claiming you like paying tax for good services (while bemoaning the price of tax and services) so if you're anything to go by it should be a winner (or not).

No idea, I don't. Your (mostly renewable) electricity costs a bit more than mine (all renewable). So what? The bill structure and the order of magnitude is the same.

Most have no idea what's possible one way or the other, as a population we're neither sufficiently engaged nor sufficiently educated to form a meaningful opinion beyond parroting what we imbibe from our chosen media.

You see excessively ambitious goals as demotivating, I see them as beacons of hope which can create a new reality in which progress accelerates. We're probably both right and wrong. We've tried meaningless 'manana manana' 30-50 year 'goals' for years with bugger all success while the crisis keeps intensifying. Time to try something different IMO.

jk

Also the UKs electricity generation needs updating.   What do you suggest they build? And yes, eventually the public pays for it one way or another.  Why do you imagine these things are free?

These weird, cost based analyses  of electricity generation  and how it will be done are quite repetitive and just a bit weird.  Are there any coal based plants still running.  You think the gas for gas powered is free?   What are you going to do as old ones need replacing? 

From the man who regularly pushes the impossibility of installing sufficient on-street charging infrastructure to electrify our cars we hear communal heating is 'cheaper'. So we can't pull wires and install parking meters but we can build boilers and install hot water pipes more cheaply than say swapping out dead combi-boilers for air source heat pumps. The challenges of retrofit are very different to those of new build.

You're right though about domestic gas boilers, they will mostly have to go and quite soon. Good thing they don't last forever and we're well used to periodically replacing and upgrading them.

Yes. If the nett effect of our actions as a nation is to absorb CO2 equal to that which we emit over a given reasonable timeframe then we could very reasonably be described as carbon neutral.

That which we can sequester, which is a choice, albeit one to be made within practical and political limits.

jk

I like to be the judge of my own best interests thanks. Do you not recognise an authoritarian voice in what you just wrote? And I'm not defending this shitshow of a Tory administration, nor May's. But when it comes to electing a government, it's important to marry social need with economic success. And that inevitably means, when I look at the parties, I end up picking the sensible one in the middle.

I do back myself to take a critical and discerning view, thank you. And that included listening to my brother, a former member of the SWP and Militant tendency, still a Labour party member, and today a university professor (sociology). Someone you might expect to have some sympathy with Corbyn and the brains and knowledge to justify his faith. He tells me that Corbyn is a clear and present danger to the UK.

Isn't that blindingly obvious?

Maybe not, perhaps the scale of changes required in the next few decades still isn't appreciated by most people. That's worrying because it's going to be a struggle to convince the electorate to vote for the measures necessary to avoid a climate catastrophe and the idea of radical change is going to take time to sink in.

Never said that ever. There are already on street power points. Lamp posts. It's the logistics of parking and a payment system that requires some creative thinking. 

Here it's even easier because of the number plug in points for engine warmers in winter.

The only limitation is the price of EVs. You don't get much or anything under £30k, nearer £40k for a Leaf here.

It is overall. One big boiler to service. One source to capture pollution etc. 

Horses for course. You fit communal hot water system in urban areas where you can link more properties per km of piping. Rural areas it's ground source, air source etc.

Countries have been doing this for at least 20 years. It's only a novelty in the UK. 

Planting trees isn't the solution to all carbon problems. Young trees absorb very little in the first decade or so. By which time it's too late. It's better to plant of course, but we really need to cut right back on emmisdions too. 

Carbon capture uses power too of course. There just needs to be a big push towards R&D in several sectors and they might find something amazing in a decade or two. 

It's not ambitious. It's impossible. Ambitious would be 2040. 

Yes I agree. But two days ago the Labour spokeswoman said these ventures wouldn't cost the public and they'd make a profit. 

Nothing is for free. 

My apologies, those conversations get frustrating as ours often do, I must have misremembered.

It's not the only limitation but cost is a big limitation on EV uptake for now.

I'm not arguing with that, it's the idea that it's a suitable or cheap retrofit solution to replace privately owned domestic gas combi boilers in the UK. I'm sure district heating will find increasing favour in new build developments.

Sure but you can't easily or in many cases practically retrofit district heating. Heat-pumps and their fitting are expensive options here, oddly in part because the government's subsidy scheme relies on a limited number of approved fitters and effectively sets the installed price at or around the lifetime subsidy earnings which is inflated above the market value of the parts and labour.

It's obviously not 'the' solution. It can be a part of 'a' solution, one with many and varied social, ecological and economic benefits beyond sinking carbon. Large trees start as small ones, the sooner they're planted, the sooner they're big.

Of course it does, in the context of a power plant that's energy derived from what is being burned, it effectively reduces the plant's efficiency driving up energy unit cost. Still, carbon sinking biomass stations are potentially sustainable while ever we have somewhere safe to dump compressed CO2.

jk

You could say our debate is pointless. Most here are arguing about how quickly something we all agree should actually happen. Speed and cost of implementation etc. 

The problem are the millions of people who think it shouldn't or doesn't need to happen at all. 

Can I suggest that's a rather metropolitan view of the world?  We have 4 neighbouring houses within a mile of ours.  On the plus side we don't have mains gas... but then we have an oil tank.  But then our fires burn wood, some of which we grow ourselves.  It's complicated.

Yes and no. In the posts after the one you referenced I said it's normal to have communal heating in urban areas where house density per km of piping is high. 

Rurally, you switch to solar, air source, ground etc. It's horses for courses. Or even wood chip or pellet boilers from sustainable sources etc.

We are the same as you, our nearest neighbour in any direction is a mile or so. We still have buried electric and fibre cable though. As long runs between houses are just as at risk of storm damage as anywhere else. 

All the above are infinitely better than millions of individual gas boilers. 

You can't just keep adding electrical loads to supplies without upgrading the supply cables.

But younger forests are better than older ones at sequestering CO2 than older ones.

https://psmag.com/environment/young-trees-suck-up-more-carbon-than-old-ones

Of course we need changes on a massive scale. It doesn't mean that the odd gas boiler here and there prevents us going carbon neutral.

It's much better to leave stuff in the ground that to offset it, but we can offset some of the CO2 that we produce while we continue to cut out the carbon producers. Otherwise we'd need to stop breathing.

Having watched JC's speech yesterday, I'll be voting Labour in the forthcoming Labour landslide.
Sounded pretty good to me!
I'm wondering though, why only the Grid, and not electric and gas as well, or am I missing something?

Of course. But it's not that complex to have some smart circuits to avoid overloading. There is potentially plenty capacity, lots of street lights have a 3 phase feed, as when there are power problems sometimes only a single phase is lost. But either way they were built for big power hungry sodium bulbs and we can fit led so there is spare power. 

Upto a point. Spruce slow markedly after 80 years, but don't stop. Pine 150+, oak, sycamore, beech and you are getting towards 200 years.

A spruce growing well might add 1-2mm to it's trunk radius, on a small young tree of say 10 years that is not much wood. On an older 70 year old with a 70 or 80cm diameter trunk that's a lot of wood and carbon. 

When it comes to trees young is relative to their age and maturity. 

Fair do's, I'm sure there is plenty of complexity to your thinking. However a component of your thinking that you chose to reveal to me is a blatantly one sided propaganda article which the author had to update with a clarification and apology.

No, it seems like more media framing that you have projected onto me.

Ok, and who has the sensible policy in the middle on Brexit? That's Labour who are offering the choice between a sensible Brexit and remain. A policy that could potentially unite and that the Lib Dems and centrists had all wanted until they decided to go all out extremist.

How about his popular 2017 manifesto policies and 13,000,000 votes.

You know we're deep in cloud cuckoo land when preserving a successful status quo can so readily, and without apparent irony, be dismissed as "all out extremist".

It did look bad but have you asked yourself why an obscure procedural issue was the most prominently reported aspect of the Labour Party conference?

That's not a sign that he is capable of delivering anything. Anyone can promise the world, delivering it is the problem. 

So far, carbon neutral by 2030, free prescriptions, free uni, 1 or 2 million new council houses, renatiomalisation of many industries etc. Etc. 

What makes you think a bloke who has achieved nothing in 50 years can achieve what no other country in world has? He is a serial complainer, not a doer or leader. He should have destroyed the Tories in the last 2 days. 

If Corbyn stood down, Labour could be in office by Christmas, Easter at the latest.  

Not when he's replaced by John McDonald

And all achieved with people working 4 days a week instead of 5! 

On the 5 days salary. Amazing. 

Maybe Monty Python could do a new sketch and call it the "Four Millennials"?

The status quo is not really credible given that somewhere around 50% of the population still want to leave and a large proportion of remainers are also dissatisfied with the EU but consider remain as the least worst option. Remain and reform could be a credible position. The Lib Dems have no interest in building a consensus though, they only want to polarise the debate like any other political extremist does.

I don't know what category of evidence you are looking for then? He has potential to become PM, if he does he will get to deliver his policies.

All my posts on this thread have been explaining that none of the centrist options will do better than Corbyn, both because they will receive just the same treatment from the media and because they have proven themselves to be political imbeciles. You've said nothing to counter any of that here. All you have done is lazily trot out the same establishment media spin.

It's impossible for the debate to be any more polarised than it already is.

Nobody wants to build a consensus around a compromise otherwise May's deal may have got through.  The parliamentary Meaningful Votes were meant to be a route to such a compromise but were manipulated by all sides to try and get their own preferred solution through, hence it failed.

Nobody in parliament or the voting public is prepared to adopt the Rolling Stones' Philiosophy:

You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, well, you might find you get what you need

Nobody apart from Labour and the people who will vote for them obviously.

Nope! In fact if and when Corbyn manages to negotiate his Labour Brexit to offer for a referendum there will be no significant differences compared to May’s deal that he voted against 

As Labour are the opposition they have already been in talks with the EU and have a different deal ready made. Not that the establishment media would allow you to see that Jeremy Corbyn is a better statesman than any Tory.

https://newsagog.com/brexit-live-donald-tusk-ignores-mays-demands-and-backs... 2

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/brexit-labour-welcome-leo-varadkars-... 1

And Corbyns letter to May shows what the Labour deal looks like.

https://labour.org.uk/press/jeremy-corbyn-lays-labours-five-brexit-demands-... 1

I think that electorally Labour would do better to sell the benefits of their deal more, especially its potential to heal the Brexit divide because the winner takes all path we are on now will continue to fracture our society for decades to come.

Really? He's had tea(herbal or fruit of course) and cake with them, that's hardly the same as having a deal. If his hand was so strong why won't he go to the polls? 

Corbyn must have the best cover possible, he's the Johnny English of aspirant PMs, beneath that divided Labour party, an inability to hold anyone to account, a complete unwillingness to engage with national media etc. There is a competent politician just waiting to burst out... he's 70 now, he shouldn't wait too much longer before showing us his true skills and talents. 

That dumb rhetoric may cut it for the Daily Mail readership but not on UKC

You know that there will be a VONC and General Election as soon as the no deal Brexit has been scuppered in less than 5 weeks time

Exactly how many hours has Corbyn been in Brussels to negotiate this fantastic deal? If he is such an amazing politician, to obtain such a great deal, why has he achieved pretty much nothing in the 40 years of being an MP just sitting on back benches complaining about pretty much anyone, in any party, who actually bothered themselves to try and improve something?  

That's a seperate issue on which I don't disagree with, however trotting out the "refusal to go to the polls" line is rather silly

Not really given how many times he's demand an election in the last 12months. 

Come off it, trooping to the polls now just because Boris wants called him names in parliament would be such a monumentally stupid tactical error the only surprising thing is that Corbyn *hasn't* done it. What possible advantage could there be in having an election before Boris has had to own one of the two inevitable disasters (for him) that are coming in October - either failing to exit the EU or actually achieving a No Deal exit.

Rule #1: Don't bother talking to summo about Corbyn. He's indistinguishable from a bot on that topic.

If Corbyn was remotely electable he would have beaten May in the last election? Why hang on to him, ever poll suggests Labour would do better without him? 

Which is exactly why Corbyn is still leader, rather than look at the Labour leader's incompetence, folk target those who mock their failing messiah. 

Not really sure what that has to do with what I said, but yes I entirely agree with you. Labour are going to get stamped in to the dirt with their current leadership and overly ambitious societal reforms portfolio. 

Conservatives obviously won’t vote for them  and most the moderate centrists hate Corybyn/don’t think he’s remotely competent to deliver such potentially dangerous reforms (or both).

Every post I have made in this thread is explaining why what you are saying is just a lazy recycling of establishment media spin. Yet you are still doing it without engaging on those points, even when replying directly to me, just like you might expect a bot to do.

Street lights are usually single phase;

8.10.1 Unless stated in Appendix 2 lighting units shall, wherever possible, have individual phase supplies from the DNO. The supply service at nominal 230V, AC 50Hz, single – phase shall terminate at a cut-out which complies with Electricity Supply Industry Standard 12-19.

See?

The light or individual post is single phase. But you run a 3 phase cable underground and each respective live cable feeds every 3rd lamp post. 

Anyway.. It's not me who said the UK will be carbon neutral by 2030. Best ask JC where the charging points are going. 

Back on Topic

Another respected Labour MP to be deselected by entryist hard core left wingers

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/sep/28/margaret-hodge-to-face-res...

Belies the Labour Mantra "for the many"  Not the way to attract swing voters in swing seats

Unsurprisingly Labour still  12 points behind the worst Tory government ever

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/sep/28/tories-hold-12-point-lead-...

As for the SNP supporting JC as temporary PM, can't they count?  VONC needs some Tory rebels to win and none of them will vote for JC

Terrible news, especially given the historical contributions she  made to fight the BNP in her seat and holding government to account as a select committee chair and her stalwart fight against antisemitism. It will have needed  a bit more than entryists though to get to a third of the local party membership... it shows dangerous party echo chambers.... completly out of touch with swing votors... that if common elsewhere could do real electoral damage to any 'stop Boris' progressive cause. 

Where is your evidence that this was done by ' entryist hard core left wingers', thanks? 

And she didn't see off the BNP it was the Labour Party that seen them off so Katz is talking BS. 

My mistake! Of course it was the Blairites wot did it 

Obviously it isn't the Thatcherite Bliar followers but where is your evidence they are ' hard left' or are you just making things up or to you is anyone who is not a Bliar follower 'hard left'? 

Hodge didn't fight the BNP, she took her seat for granted ignoring local issues, which helped to give the BNP an opportunity. Then when she realised her seat was under threat she decided to agree with the BNP rather than fight them.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2007/may/27/thefarright.communities

It was Labour left activists and anti fascist groups who fought the BNP message and turned out the vote in Barking with a huge doorstep campaign. Hodge is one of the key figures in amplifying the media narrative against Jeremy Corbyn so why shouldn't the activists there prefer to support a candidate who better represents their views?

Margaret Hodge has been, at least twice,  found out telling lies about anti-Semitism within the party. She has accused people of being anti-Semitic only to be proved wrong about what was said and and the people involved reactions to it. She was caught on film saying someone said one thing and which was then  proven to be almost the complete opposite. She decided to stand by her remarks, even though the evidence contacted what she said had happened.

She then accused the Labour party about not doing anything about the alleged incident, calling Corbyn and anti-Semite because he didn't do anything about it, when in reality there was nothing to do about anything!! She's pissed an large number of Labour supporters off, with false accusations, and called the leader an anti-Semite, so she's not exactly ingratiated herself with the members.

Maybe if she'd stuck to the facts and not blamed Corbyn for something that DIDN'T happen she not have pissed people off so much. Most of this diddn't make the news of course, because they were only interested in the allegations, not the facts.

Well, that matters far more than the Labour Party presenting a unified front at a time of great need doesn't it? Well done!

Every time Labour nudge ahead in the polls Hodge and others on the Labour right choose that moment to launch another smear on Jeremy Corbyn. They haven't been willing to present a united front. They would rather see Labour fail than be part of a Corbyn government. A recurring theme of this thread is people asking why Labour aren't polling better against the worst Conservative government in history? Well Hodge and the Labour right smear campaign in collusion with the establishment media is the answer.

No, it really isn't! 

Yeah, because as we know it was the media and the establishment that launched a bid to remove the deputy leader of the party as the opener to the party conference, showing the world what a paragon on unity the party is.

Don’t get me wrong, the party is under attack by certain parts of the media, but it has been managing to provide them with ammunition non-stop. They NEARLY don’t have to make things up!

Corbyn is not a big fan of presenting a united Labour front though is he. During the last Labour government he managed to defy his party whips and vote against the Labour leadership an incredible 428 times. Seems he expects different standards now he's the boss.

Corbyn and is team have done an excellent job of taking over the control of the machinery of Labour Party which is a correct building block for anybody. He is also putting forward a range of policies such as nationalisation, 32 hour week, seeding 10 % of shares to workers for large companys, the establishment of a nationalised pharna company, removing tax breaks for private schools and so on.He will probably trash the economy with this ( I can imagine Asta Zeneca just upping and moving countrys to Europe- to make a point). But there you go.

His real issue is who does he pass the baton onto? At 70 he is probably 20 years too old to really be dealing with the day to day gruelling challenges of carrying on.He needs a younger self to pass it onto. He is in danger of hanging  on too long as it is questionable whether there is such a person in his eyes.. The obvious candidates ranging from Thornberry, Starmer, Phillips,Nandy etc do not tick the right box for him.

So where does the Corbyn project go?

I haven't seen any smears from Margaret Hodge. She protested about anti-Semitism, that's all I remember. And the idea that Corbyn isn't polling better is because of Labour right smears is frankly ridiculous. I am sure that media smears are part of the problem but Corbyn is quite capable of alienating large parts of the electorate through his own actions, or non-actions. 

She called Corbyn an anti-Semite, everyone knows he isn't, he supports Palestinian rights, but that's AS in the eyes of some. No one has said she should support the leader no matter what, but she should base her protestations on the truth, or face the consequences.

A lot of people are pissing and moaning about politicians not being truthful, and yet when party members try to ensure our MPs are at least honest, they get lambasted. She's not the only one to make accusations, which haven't stood up to scrutiny.

Make up your mind what do you want from our MPs?

Everyone doesn't know Corbyn isn't anti-Semitic. That's the problem. The way the Labour Party has handled this has been shoddy to say the least. They've created the opportunity for others to smear them. And Corbyn as leader has central responsibility. 

Hardly surprising  she is strong on this issue considering her parents ( Oppenheimer is her  family name)were refugees from Germany in the 30's.

You then look at why they left Egypt and you can understand her personal views.

It is hardly political rocket science with that sort of background.

Telling lies is " being strong on the issue"? no, that is attacking your own party even by telling lies to do so.

And the ageist smears against Corbyn (70 Yr old) spread by Tory media and especially its BBC come from these sources that don't say a word about H. Clinton being 71 yrs old or Biden being 77 years old or Trump being 73 yrs old.

Funny that. 

Well considering her parents left Egypt in the 40's due to antisemtism at that time I do not blame her for calling out the subject ( and if you were her what would you expect her to do with that sort of family background).

Strange that.

As I said hardly political rocket science.

I would add it shows the political niavety of some not to expect this, what on earth do you expect given her background.It would be haunt you every day.

It seems low turnout was a factor in this.

https://labourlist.org/2019/09/margaret-hodge-becomes-second-triggered-labo...

In that regard she wouldn't have done herself any favours with this

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/vote-for-a-pro-eu-party-not-mine-says-la...

That really does annoy members, volunteers don't get EU elections off, they shouldn't be undermined by their own MP.

I'm not happy about these trigger votes generally, it's awful timing for reselections as a GE could be much sooner rather later. The threshold should have been kept at 50%.

I don't think 'entryism' is a problem, we are in a very different time to the 80s. There have been some returning members but I don't think they are infiltrators, they just think the party has shifted back to them. I'd sincerely say the same about the 30,000 or so new Tory members... but then 'entryist' isn't a word used to describe Tories on the right of the party.

Corbyn has indulged himself for his entire career in politics by espousing popular (for the Left) causes, and advocating policies that were never practical but gained him support. He obviously enjoyed his status as 'rebel', 'outsider' and 'man of principle' - and was happy to leave the heavy lifting, the compromising, the dirty politicking that actually got things done to others.

 He - and we - are now paying for that career choice by having a leader of the opposition whose own party members don't trust him, let alone the blue rinse brigade who he has been happy enough to alienate for all of his career.

What that she can't tell the truth? Sounds a bit AS to me. There are plenty of other Jews, from similar backgrounds that still support Corbyn and the Labour party, we just don't hear about them.

It's in a similar vein to Naga Munchety calling out racism gets a reprimand from the BBC and yet the accusations against Corbyn and the Labour party go unchallenged.

The "Labour" party member who was arrested for bombarding Luciana Berger and who was eventually convicted, had no ties at all to the Labour party, so how is Corbyn supposed to act on that case? This case was one of the many, Hodge got her knickers in a twist about, telling all and sundry, it was Corbyn's fault and he should do something about it.

The greatest problem has been the almost total belief in every accusation and it's wide spread publication, while on the other hand when issues are investigated and found to be false, the almost blanket silence.

there are still many Jewish groups supporting Labour and Corbyn, are you calling these people, stupid or simply hoodwinked.

Usual caveat, AS exists in society so I doubt it doesn't exist in Labour, and we should all fight against it, wherever it is.

Hodge has been against Corbyn since 2016, since he was elected.

Typical response , no more than I would expect . Complete failure to understand her attitude to a devisive subject. 

It is why people shoot themselves in the foot on these issues. 

If you showed respect and understanding as to why she took this view you would win over  more voters. 

She has reasons to believe that what she is saying is the truth.  Strong ones, I would say

He attended a commemoration service for the Palestinian terrorists who killed the Israeli Olympic athletes. He was right next to the Palestinian leaders as they laid wreaths. That isn't the same as speaking out against land grabs, or wall constructions. He is physically endorsing terrorism and not for the first time. 

But her allegations were proved wrong, in front of her, on video, for one of them at least, she refused to accept what was shown to her, and stood by what she said had happened, even though the video evidence contradicted it. So she might well "believe" she's telling the truth, a bit like Trump, it doesn't mean it is the truth, just because she won't accept it.

I thought we were talking about her claim Corbyn is an antisemite?

Maybe it just not the response you wanted, a bit like Hodge.

What do you expect people to do kowtow to any allegation no matter how false it is, ignore the facts to placate some confused old woman, or worse ignore the facts to placate someone with an axe to grind?

I don't see how standing up for the truth is someone sort of failure, you're all for it when it suits your agenda. Shouldn't the truth be universal and for everyone?

I was talking about her accusations of Corbyn being an AS, only he knows what he is, and considering his lifelong fight against oppression and racism, it doesn't really fit the bill, unless as I've said before you want it to.

I had a look at the bio for Jon Lansman ( I am sure you will agree a well known Jewish JC supporter to see if his family had a similar experience to Hodge in the 30's/40s. Huge difference between the 2)

I expect her to stand up for what she believes in, like anybody else.

If you believe she is a failed member of the Labour Party that is fine with me. But it leaves alot of people scratching their heads and saying " do us a favour, get real".

You mean 'his lifelong fight against some oppression and racism' don't you? I'm still waiting for him to criticise Iran (and pay back the £20000 he got from them for his TV appearances on their propaganda channel). 

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/nazanin-zaghari-ratcliffe-boris-johnso...

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/nazanin-zaghari-ratcliffe-boris-johnso...

selective memory?

As for returning money, how about Blair or the US returning some of the Libyan money they were paid. It's ludicrous suggestion, that people return money, because it suits your bias, WTF is wrong with you?