UKC

Can we all stop it please?

I'm a socialist. The day I vote Tory is when the Overton window has shifted so far that the Tories are the left wing option (shudder to think). I blame Tory policies for the misery of the poor in this country, and I am profoundly depressed at the thought of how bad things will be in 5 years time. But, hurling abuse is not going to help. I know some Conservative voters. Probably not amongst my good friends, but they are decent people. I think they are wrong, but they are not scum. They are not all self centered money grabbing bastards who don't give  a shit about anyone else. Really, they're not. They do believe in a decent society, but they have different ideas about how it should work. 

It's far more pleasant and productive to have a reasoned discussion with a moderate Tory than listen to a rant from an idealogue. We have a few of those on here from all the extremes of the political compass, and I've been guilty of ranting at some of them myself. I don't think there's a lot you can do with a fundamentalist of any persuasion, but if we treat moderates that we disagree with decently then we might get somewhere.

I'd like to make an appeal to everyone to stop and think before posting a knee-jerk "scum" reply to a comment. If you can't come up with anything to say, just dislike it and move on. Or even have a think about why you can't come up with anything to refute it?

Thanks

Red Tory, are you? May as well go and kick a homeless person, you transphobic narc.

Sorry, I've been on Twitter too much during the election.

It is very kind of you to be so charitable.

Indeed, I'm sure there are some very nice misguided people that vote Tory.

(And some real shits that vote Labour.)

That said however, I can't reconcile the lying, underhand tactics of Boris Johnson et al with anything like someone with a calling to public service and with the best wishes of ALL the nation at heart. I think they have earned my contempt.

Yeah, I booted a few on the way in this morning. I figure if you can't beat the scum you might as well join them. 

Please note. Smiley means I'm being ironic. Just in case, you know...

By all means call BJ scum. I think he's earned it. Although, I don't think it's very productive. Just don't tar all Tory voters with the same brush.

I’m doing my bit to help bridge the gap by opening a hairdressers exclusively for conservative voters. 
 

it’s called Tory Cuts 

You could run a brothel on the side, with a similar name.

I clicked on this expecting it to be an exhortation to hunt down and kill the lot of them.

That's why I chose that title.

I don't think it is us 'all' but I get your general sentiment and agree.

It also applies to the majority of the population who didn't vote Tory. Some of them are hurling insults at each other when the politically interested in the various camps need to listen to each other and cooperate if there is going to be a functioning opposition. 

Is it OK to describe Bozo accurately (I'm thinking "self centred lying spunkflute", rather than "artfully dishevelled joker in chief")?

Very much agreed. We only have to look at the US political shite-show to see where those sort things might take us on both sides of the political spectrum.

There is an interesting study on fraternal and identical twins wrt whether political proclivities may be nature or nurture and it concluded that around 50% of the likelihood of leaning towards conservative or liberal values may be genetically predispositioned. You'll have to read about the study to see how they came to that conclusion but it relates to different results between fraternal and identical twins. The study sample was quite large but limited to one state in the US.

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/12/09/study-on-twins-suggests-ou...

An additional hypothesis I heard (by author Sebastian Unger who wrote a book called Tribe) is that therefore this points to an evolutionary advantage given to a group of humans of having both members with conservative and liberal leanings. Put simply one group will be overly cautious, distrusting and fearful and the other overly trusting but adventurous.

The thinking being that the combination of the two in small societies will result in a combination of competing ideologies that result in a middle way where both caution and lack of caution lead to competitive advantage for the whole group. Too much caution and you spend your whole time killing the group next door, too little caution you end up getting killed by stuff, somewhere in the middle and the group survives better.

Therefore, one conclusion may be that we *need* both types of political leanings and both are equally valid. But it doesn't work so well in very large societies and then we get the partisan shite-show we have now.

Understanding of other political views and compromise must be the only way.

It also turns cyclical - One type gets in to power with a majority and carries out what they want until it all goes pear shaped (either due to the actions taken or external global trends) and then the electorate swings over to the other party;

All the commentators are suggesting that the government will now need to tone down their right leaning policies if they wish to keep all the former labour / now tory voters next election,

But i'm sure at some point they'll just say we've got a massive majority so we're going to do as we please and implement all our core conservative policies which at some point will become too much for the swing voters to take - and will swing back the other way.

Yep. Understanding and compromise; the only way large democratic societies can actually function. Truly incredible how many people seem oblivious to this.

Saw your title and thought there'd been a miracle

Yes absolutely and characterising the other side as the devil results in more of what you don't want as positions become even more entrenched. The extreme partisanship in the States is where we are heading if we carry on as we are and oh how well that works for them.

This was my favourite ever placard seen on the news at an anti austerity protest a few years back.

"Tories: Putting the 'N' in 'Cuts!'"

Indeed. Also, what’s the obsession with changing other people’s minds all the time? People have different views. There’s no wrong and right, just let it lie. No one has a monopoly on their ideology being the way to go. It’s all just opinions. Dressing things up as fact just makes those doing it look desperate.

This predisposes you are dealing with not reasonable people and ideas.

History suggest that some very unsavory people are attracted to politics and power. There are some people with whom you should never compromise.

How much are you charging for a blue rinse ?

Well as we have a conservative government for at least the next five years I sincerely hope they will display some understanding and compromise with those of us who feel so uncomfortable in our own country.

Socialism, that failed idea that never dies...

Which would work well with proportional representation (FPTP is too easily manipulated) and, inevitably, coalition governments (i.e. grownups who work together for the good of society) representative of the population.

That's not what I'm commenting on and it's not what this threads about. I'm talking about the 10 million that voted Labour and the 14 million that voted Tory, finding common ground and displaying a little understanding and ability to compromise. You disagree?

Those people have no power. What compromise can they deliver? It comes back to the leaders we chose and there ability to be magnanimous in victory. I can't see Boris being magnanimous. I'll be happy to eat my hat if he is but I expect the deeds that follow the usual post victory fine words will not demonstrate much in the way of compromise.

They had the power to deliver us into the hands of another 5 years of Tory government.

You did read the OP? The compromise under discussion is taking a step back from the totally uncompromising stance that all Tory voters are scum, c*nts, tw*ts, etc

...or is it simply the case that you don't want that discussion. You want to discuss something completely different?

There are good and bad arguments. If you think you've got a good argument, then it's fun and stimulating to have it challenged, and to defend it. If it's a really good challenge, you have to shift your position a bit to defend it, which means you've learned something and you have a stronger argument than when you started. If it's a crap challenge then it can be fun to explain why it's crap.

And all opinions are not equally valid. There's nothing valid about racism, for example. 

Yeah, I hate the NHS too. 

I've obviously come to the wrong debate.

I apologise, thank you for being so compromising and understanding at my time of befuddlement.

Paid holidays! What c#nt thought that one up? Day light bloody robbery that is!

I suppose you'll be wanting Christmas Day off again or at the very least a day in leu?

The OP did opine that there's not a lot you can do to reach compromise with extreme views, of which your example of thinking all Tory voters are whatever is a good case.

So, care to take a step back yourself?

After the trouble caused by Conservative Party in the last 4 years and the suffering, erosion of liberty, undermining of our economy, racism and general divisiveness of their approach, if a Conservative voter is called scum then they can consider themselves to have got off lightly. They have driven the performance and reputation of this country to new deep lows.

He said in the OP " I don't think there's a lot you can do with a fundamentalist of any persuasion" but his plea wasn't to the tiny minority of fundamentalists, it was to the rest of us and as I was using phrases like "large democratic societies" and "the 10 million that voted Labour and the 14 million that voted Tory", it's pretty obvious that I wasn't talking about that tiny minority of fundamentalists.

So, no. Not sure what I should be stepping back from?

Ok then Jim. We can just write off 14 million people as scum and that's the least of what they deserve? And I suppose you see yourself as speaking for the tolerant, forward thinking, enlightened portion of our society?

Your straw man that “the totally uncompromising stance that all Tory voters are scum, c*nts, tw*ts, etc” is anything other than quite an extreme view. I’m part of ‘the rest of us’ I hope, in spite of the occasional angry outburst, most of which I regret. So I’d like some reassurances from the government and those that voted it in that compromise is possible. Because let’s face it, there doesn’t have to be any compromise with such a handsome majority and an opposition that could stay in a wilderness of backstabbing for another few years.

And in the process each time the two parties are pushed further apart and to further extremes and less likely to come to an agreement. Can’t you see that’s exactly how we have arrived in the situation we are in. 

What seems like fun to you, is dividing the country. Nice. 

personally speaking it is the Party as it stands now, (ie not people like Grive and Stewart) and in particular the leaders and interests who finance and advice them that I regard as crooks and scum

Britons never never never shall be slaves except to mrCummings

So, no political discussion any more. That's a great idea.

We're adults, we can choose if, where and how to engage in political debate. I get the impression that Facebook and twitter are pretty awful, so I don't bother with that. But UKC is a good balance of having intelligent posters with a variety of viewpoints, but lively enough to tolerate my bad language and sarcasm, especially after I've had a couple of ales. It's good debate, and isn't responsible for dividing the country - David Cameron can take all the credit for that.

I agree with the OP that insults like "tory scum" are just stupid and unhelpful. But, in my opinion "I've never heard anyone come out with such a tottering stack of hairy bollocks" is perfectly acceptable, if you can explain why what's been said is indeed bollocks.

Personal insults are detrimental to debate, but a strongly worded attack on someone's position *is* debate. And long may it continue! 

I think you’re missing a fundamental point here. Argument doesn’t have to mean angry slanging matches it can mean wot Jon said. That sort of activity has a long history of bringing people closer together as they discover something shared in their viewpoints.

Your preferred option seems to be to dive into silos.

"Because let’s face it, there doesn’t have to be any compromise with such a handsome majority and an opposition that could stay in a wilderness of backstabbing for another few years."

There does if they want to keep the votes they won last week. Failure to recognise that would be a monumental mistake.  The only thing that could go wrong is that the Labour party manage to elect a new leader as bad as the last one and Momentum keep control. That would give the Tories more wiggle room, but I fully expect the Tories won't look this gift horse in the mouth, they should be in power for the next decade if they get this right.

If people are engaging in reasonable debate rather than chucking around hand grenades then there’s no need for a silo. 
 

Unfortunately in the main people here are trying to change other people’s minds by looking for cracks in any part of the argument, seemingly for their own entertainment, rather than actually listening to the valid points.     

Comments in the left leaning press seem to indicate that Corbyn is drawing out his exit to try and influence the next appointment. The NEC are also closing ranks. 
 

For those of us looking for a more central party, I’m not holding out for Labour to do it. 

There has been, up until now, generations of families indoctrinated to hate the Tories and to vote Labour. 

Sounds an interesting book might have to get it. The thing about the current Tories is they aren't being very conservative/cautious at the moment. I never thought I would hear a Tory say, 'f*ck business' for instance.  

From the tone of your posts you seem to think the gulf is unbridgeable. Are you old enough to remember the Labour election win under Tony Blair in 1997? People crossed the line then as they did a week ago, nothing to do with tribalism.

Also with the generational thing don't you think the hating Labour and voting Tory is also true?

I’m old enough to remember the ‘79 Thatcher election. 

The gap is bridgeable if the politicians want to.

The problem is none of the seem to recognise what the real problem is. Not the NHS, police numbers, too many rich people, or too many poor people. There’s a much deeper issue.

Until they see what it is,  they’ll continue their faulty policies. 

We have also undergone a technological revolution never seen before. News, real and fake, and the following arguments spread so quickly it’s very difficult to get a handle on it. 

Yes Blair won in ‘97, but that was because he stole the Tories clothes. 2019 Labour under Corbyn were, as we saw, unelectable and as long as they solely blame BREXIT. it will never change. 43% of Labour voters blame Corbyn for the loss. Excluding Blair, Labour have not won an election in 45 years. It could have been worse, as it’s been calculated that if the BREXIT Party hadn’t stood, Tories would have taken a further 20 seats.

Ok, I didn't mean to challenge you on your age by the way🙂. I was 14 when Thatcher won that election.

So what is the real issue?

I have my own one word answer to that question - inequality.

You can't steal someone's clothes unless they take them off first.

And in the event from a social policy perspective New Labour were dead centre.

Inequality isn’t a problem. The idea of wealth being bad is part of the problem. The idea that wealth on paper is real, is part of the problem. Allowing people to leverage ‘wealth’ to create more wealth is part of the problem. 
 

Why shouldn’t people be unequal? If you were 14 in 1979 you are now close to 55 and like me have been probably working for close on 40 years. All the wealth you and I have, all our experience, all our pay rises, have mainly been down to decisions we have made. I have friends who have spent all that money on holiday and beer and have nothing to show. They had exactly the same opportunities but made different decisions. Apparently now they’re unequal and need to be bailed out. The people leaving school are also now apparently at a disadvantage. In 45 years time they’ll be the wealthy ones. 

The socialists have an ideology that makes assumptions. Bad assumptions which leads to bad ideology. Uncontrolled capitalism is also bad. The idea that everyone has the same opportunity and just needs to work hard is obviously flawed if you think about it. 
 

Somewhere in the middle you have to stop rampant consumerism and uncontrolled capitalism while you support the weakest in in society. And remember we are in a global market place. 
 

The party that cracks that will get my vote. 

There has been up till now,generations of families indoctrinated to hate Labour and to vote Tory.

Tit for tat nonsense?

Please read 'The Spirit Level' by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett.

Inequality can be baked in to a society or not.

It's not the existence of inequality that's a problem, it's it's degree and perhaps it's direction of motion.

Efforts to reduce it have measurable effects on everybody. Poor and rich. It doesn't have to be the way you describe.

You're missing the point here that the social policies the baby boomers grew up through were, by chance, by far the most advantageous in our history, and the direction of travel has reversed.

The word "socialist" is vague. Corbyn's Labour is really social democracy with a relatively radical edge, and certainly isn't socialism or communism. I think you're right that socialism (as in, a different economic system to capitalism) makes bad assumptions and simply doesn't concord with human nature. But a lot of people voting in the election likely believed that Labour actually wanted to enact a socialist society, which of course they didn't (or at any rate couldn't!).

It's easy to use the word socialism to one's advantage - I did this above by saying that the NHS is socialist - which it is, by one definition; while you're using a different definition to say that socialism is bad. We're not really having a very meaningful discussion when we don't agree on what key terms mean!

The centre-left and centre-right all agree on exactly this: it's the details that make up the meaningful debate. Yes, we all want redistributive taxation to fund schools and the NHS - but exactly how much and with what pattern of contribution? Unfortunately, while you can have this kind of debate with politically engaged, sensible people, it's certainly not what elections are about. This election was all "Get Brexit Done" and "Terrorist Sympathiser" - just beneath the level of worthwhile debate.

Jimmy Carr (of all people!) had some great words to say on this on election night: there is something, somewhere in the centre that most people want. But we don't have a system that brings about this kind of constructive dialogue. 

youtube.com/watch?v=VMqlfgs-z1Q&

Maybe for internal UK stuff, but most of what I hear about his foreign policy ideas, I'd put directly in the socialism box.

A striking thing in Germany was that Corbyn's relation with die Linke was always much closer than his relationship with the social democratic sister party.

I don't really know what "socialist foreign policy" is. Socialism is *defined by* domestic economic policy. Can you give an example? 

support for dubious regimes that are socialist/close to being socialist. Corbyn on Venezuela being a case in point

support for Russia. Corbyn on the Skripal investigation

Lack of support for NATO. Corbyn on Kosovo

Most of this comes from a rejection of America's capitalism which leads the socialists to supports lots of dubious regimes only because those regimes criticise the USA.

As a comic example, half a year ago I was discussing politics with a Spanish socialist who claimed that the quality of life in the Soviet Union was better in the 80s than in the west. The Russians at the table couldn't stop laughing...

This is what the former foreign minister of Kosovo wrote answering Corbyn's "Our time will come" statement from dec 15:

"Your time will never, ever come. Nor it should. If the world listened to you in 1999, my family and million other Kosovars would have been refugees scattered across refugee camps. For the sake of Brits, Europeans, good people across the political spectrum - quit now."

I don't think we have the same understanding of the word "socialism".

How does this contribute to this topic?

Yeah, sorry, forgot which of the political topics this was.

In reply to Everyone:

It's heartening to see that I have some agreement on this, judging by the number of likes. Of course there were one or two on both sides who saw what they thought was a political thread and copy pasted their standard response, demonstrating my point perfectly, but on the whole it seems we are up for some decent reasoned debate on here. 

For those who can't say the word Tory without an insult attached, I suggest you take some of Sun Tzu's advice: There are millions of Tory voters, we will not beat them unless we know them. If you think they are all just scum, you really don't know them.

In my opinion the baby boomers have about 10 years left. Then all that wealth will be split up between 16 great grandchildren or more. 
 

As I alluded to above. Wealth has accumulated in that generation purely because they have lived a long time in a very stable economy. One that they contributed to and are right to benefit from. Most of them want the next generation to benefit not don’t want to hand it to them on a plate as they know what happens when you do that. 

As a piece of advice, that's pretty polarising to start with. BEAT THEM is not what you are trying to do to the voters.

Yes. It might all calm down a bit for a while. I think a lot of the division is driven from the behaviour in Westminster which has been pretty shoddy over the last few years. 

So you don't think that policies like funding university education, low universal pension, NHS provision actually working, etc gave the boomers something the millenials are missing out on? I'm just talking about facts here - do these things make no difference?

That comment was clearly aimed at people who think all Tories are scum - I phrased it to appeal to them.

But even so, it's standard in politics to talk about beating the opposition, do you really have a problem with that?

Not to mention affordable housing. Working in London this is a massive weight holding back all the younger people I know.

Elections are lost in the U.K., not won, and it should have been an easy win for Labour, patting the metaphorical ball into an unattended net after the shambles of the last eight Tory years. We are where we are because of Labours complex Brexit stance (read by the electorate as shifty) some scepticism over their massively ambitious programme ( which issue by issue remains popular with voters and actually only rectifies most of the damage done by eight years of austerity.), a bit about press hostility, and a big slice of Corbyn being the wrong leader. 
The party knew a couple of years ago how big a problem he was for the electorate but they did nothing about it, the issue got caught up in the problem of what to do with the Blair Tory-lite faction.

So the majority of Tory voters did so not out of madness or badness, but because they were not offered a believable choice. And now that the Brexit boil has been lanced, the opposition task has to become credible again. They won’t do that against a backdrop of personal abuse.

Free university education:  yes, previous generations had that, but only for 8% of the cohort compared to the 40% that go to university now.  So, previously, most of those (80%) who would currently go to uni were not told "yes you can go and we'll fund it all", they were told "no you can't go".     Was that better?

State pensions: Yes, they used to be more generous.  But in the past, people usually had very few years of retirement. People retired at 65 and life expectancy has about 70.   The state could afford relatively generous pensions because people only claimed them for an average of about 3 years.  With life expectancy at 80 and rising, that immediately triples the cost.  

And, in the past, people started work (and paying taxes) typically at 16.  Now it is more like 22.  So while the number of years spent in retirement is rapidly growing, the number of years we spend working has decreased.  Does that make us worse off?

NHS provision: Yes, the NHS is less than perfect (all health systems will always be under strain and needing more money owing to the ageing population, the increased number of long-term ill (diabetes, dementia, etc), and the increased capability of health care).

But, for all that, the health care we get today is better than previous generations got!  The reason? Because we have got much better at health care and looking after ill people.  So getting treated by today's NHS is still much better than being treated by previous generations' NHS. 

No. Because the pressure on the NHS was less. Fewer people went to university. Because people lived shorter lives, they were working for a greater proportion of them and so final scheme pensions worked.

They’re not ‘facts’ because you’re not looking at the whole environment. Cherry picking. Let’s have a fully funded university system but make it a meritocracy where only the brightest 3% attend. Let’s have a great pension system but people need to work until they are 75. Let’s have a great NHS system but only for the under 75s and only include free treatment for treatments that were available in the 80s. 

Edit: What Coel said  

No I'm with you on this, I agree.... we all need to pick on the 3.7m that voted Lib Dem!

Did LibDem increase their share of the votes everywhere or just in areas where Labour weren’t strong enough to beat the Conservatives and LibDem had a better chance being the second party. 

I'm not arguing with any generation's work ethic, but 'boomers' have had many advantages in the UK; free higher education, huge property inflation from an affordable base, less means testing in state benefits and long periods of unbroken wage growth.

edit - didn't refresh page before posting so sorry for repetition.

Yes, I think it probably was. We should have far fewer university places and far better vocational training. Ripping people off with crap degrees with diluted value in the labour market is a shit policy.

I'm not saying we can afford the pensions, just saying that they were a benefit the millenials won't see.

I think it'll make our later years worse, for sure.

That's a good point, but to expand on my point about healthcare, the problems we're starting to face are that while you pay your taxes in, for all the routine ops that haven't improved particularly (cataracts, knees, hips, etc) the waiting lists are so long you can either suffer for over a year being unnecessarily blind (I see this every working day) or you can pay for it your yourself. So if you've got an illness where the treatment's improved then yes today's NHS is a better deal. But if you're average and just need a couple of lenses whipped out and a new knee, you'll end up either suffering or out of pocket.

What I replied to Coel.

And, you're misinterpreting my post.

I'm not saying the boomers got x so millenials deserve the same and somehow that's possible because we can just pull trillions of pounds out of thin air. I fully appreciate that policies have got to change, I just don't justify that by denying the reality of the comparatively poor deal the young'uns are getting.

That's an incredibly regressive set of policies and more or less gives up on any idea of social (or indeed medical) progress.

And do you really think any opportunity that's only available to 3% could ever be assigned on merit alone?

It's hard to see how this can work when as a nation we've already demonstrated our inability to work with the realities of coalition governement.

The grass is always greener alsewhere. I look at my daughters and think of the opportunities they have now.1 has had uni eductaion and 1 going through it,both very driven, both females ( gosh the opportunites they have had compared with my wife). Both have potential to travel all over the place etc etc. Their connections with the world are far greater than I and my wife ever had.

I left school in a period of increadibly high unemployment. The graduates I knew struggled to get good jobs decent jobs. The Uk was deindustrialising, strikes and a feel of gloom everywhere.The Yorkshire Ripper causing rampant fear on the streets if you were a woman .Smoking in offices was rife, pub life was restrictive.Food-- well the less said the better.

I am incredibly jealous of the current generation.

I think we just demonstrated what a shit idea having a referendum on EU membership was!

I agree that the world is generally better, but we're talking about government spending policy here, not whether society has improved (and certainly not about the threat of serial killers, which is quite possibly the least relevant piece of evidence I've ever seen be brought into a political debate about tax and spend!).

Here we are likely agreed.  I don't think that people in the 25% to 40% ability range get that much value-for-money from going to university (as oppose to going straight into the workforce), I don't think that employers benefit much from them having gone (they ask for degrees simply because they can), and I don't think society really benefits sufficiently to justify the quite-large cost of three years of "finishing school".

I think we need to be more generous in supporting kids who are (1) in the top 15% of the cohort, and (2) from less-wealthy backgrounds, and (3) studying sensible subjects, but otherwise cap the number of students we fund. 

I'm not quite sure what that has to do with coalition government.

However, if voters had stuck with the Lib Dems and given them more MPs to take into a coalition then the referendum would probably never have happened. If voters are so quick  to desert a party that was a minority in a coalition then there is little incentive for any party to form a coalition.

Damn right. We should also be getting big business to pay for training their own staff.

Lol.Just trying to put it in context of what it was like when I was in my early 20’s. Especially when people compare generations. You have to give a flavour of what society was like as well.

We tend to gloss over these things when we say it was better then than now. Looking back it was pretty “cr#p” and I would not wish it on anybody. 

So when people say the boomers had a great time, I think...do me a favour 

Ah I see. I thought you meant that without a majority we end in Parliamentary paralysis because the parties can't cooperate. I agree with what you say about LD voters not getting so pissy about the coalition - but perhaps that's more a consequence of the policies of Tories at that time being so abhorrent (the "scroungers" narrative justifying the attack on the most vulnerable in society to pay for the gambling-gone-wrong by their mates in the banks) than relating to coalition government per se?

It's not that you necessarily had a great time. It's that you eventually benefited enormously financially, in pensions and housing.

I think that regardless of the policies of the majority party in a coalition there is still an advantage for us all in having a party that is closer on the centre in coalition with them.  If coalition is ever going to work I think that we probably all have to accept this reality, if we don't we are just likely to get ever more divided with 2 deeply entrenched factions on either side of a left/right divide.

I don't believe PR will alter this, it's a red herring from parties that merely want to increase their own power rather than a real answer for the benefit of the  whole population.

Your are being too narrow in your view, you have to look at the wider context.

The world has moved on and you have to deal with whats in front of you.Housings changed and will change again for the next generation ( because of Climate Change) and the current generation will get loads of grief because they did not tackle it. Pensions changed because of lie expectancy, medical advances and so on. It will change agian for the next generation.And that new generation will look back and complain about your generation.

Would you care to discuss? 

They have 5 years to prepare the ground on which the next election will be fought. His donors will be on the phone and banging at his office door already demanding results. He can only afford to betray one group today. Tough break, it's tory voters. Again.

jk

I agree.

I don't see how it can't be radically helpful in getting Lib Dems, Greens, UKIP/whatevers, into Parliament and vastly improving the quality of government by representing the population with some semblance of fairness.

I think free education. Affordable housing. Careers with progression and stability. Retirement.

jk

As I said,

I just think it's fair to acknowledge the benefits you've accrued, even if you had to put up with the 1970s, which I fully understand is something no human being should ever have been made to endure.

Is it worth considering that neilh's generation, on the whole accrued benefits over time, but inherited very little. Whereas neilh's daughters may inherit a lot, but only later in their lives. Ergo, over the lifespan there is little difference, just how it is distributed has changed?

And in my youth my parents had some benefits which I did not have. They had full employment and a booming economy in the 60’s.

And my grandparents had WW2.

And so on. 

It’s swings and roundabouts between generations. 

I think PR could have a massive impact, depending on the method used.

A whole lot of people didn't want to vote for a proven liar, but chose to because there were only 2 options, and they feared the second option even more. If there were 2 or 3 right of centre parties with a realistic chance of being part of the government, then Boris's approach would have split his support.

Jeez it wasn't that bad.

Yes. But Neilh's generation are going to live for bloody ages...

It is, but while you're talking about the state of the world, I'm talking about the tax and spend policies that we, as an electorate, should be taking a considered view on. Believe me, I'm all for a third world war or asteroid strike to shake things up a bit.

Well let us put a different spin on it. The current generation of oldies do not have the beneit of a social care system and dying young which the previous generation had.In days of yore you died young and social care and the cost of it was irrelevant.Now with improved medical care and so on you live longer even though we struggle to finance it. People cannot die quickly as we are now too good at keeping people going.Any assets we have which might have been passed on are now used to finance these dying years. Not exactly great.

Euthenisia is a possible answer and I suspect over the next generation will become irresistable.

At a glance, it looks like the Lib Dems had a pretty uniform increase of about 4%. I would speculate it didn't improve their seat tally much because even in Lib Dems/ s̷c̷u̷m̷ Tory marginals the  ̷s̷c̷u̷m̷ Tories also gained at UKIP/Brexit party expense.

Hoooo: see, I'm joining in the national group hug!

Is your 8% figure including students who went to polytechnics, many of which became Universities in 1992? I'm not sure but I presume students who went to polytechnics had access to grants and obviously they didn't pay tuition fees.

Well, maybe you've hit the sweet spot? You get to live a long time (if that's your bag), and you do at least have the assets to pay for the care, even if you would prefer to hand them down. Those following you will have to endure all those bloody years and years of life, but won't have a house to sell so they can get their arse wiped at the end of it.

Personally, I've put enough aside to ensure that I'll be able to afford the biggest bag of smack the world has ever seen.

So 4% moved from UKIP/Brexit to Cons. and 4% moved from Labour to LibDem. 
 

And there was some unprecedented swings from Labour to Cons. which seems to have had the biggest effect.  

My gut feeling is there will be another election before the 5 years fixed term is up. Possibly a vote of no confidence if the Conservatives fail to deliver on their social policies that everyone is convinced they’re lying about. 
 

Then the voters that swung from Labour to Cons to get Brexit over the line, and were put off by Corbyn will swing back to Labour assuming they get a better more central leader. 

Yes. Socialism as ideological concept is doomed to failure. Same as Capitalism. 

That’s what’s wrong with the situation before the election, causes polarisation, division and ultimately what we are discussing here.

Let's see if they repeal the fixed term parliament act as promised in the manifesto....

It's very difficult to imagine a no confidence vote or any other mechanism preventing this government from serving a full term. I'm trying to get used to the idea, but that's where we're at.

But not quite as long as they were going to before they settled into voting for 'austerity'.

jk

You need to explain why, especially considering we have some socialist institutions in place here anyway. France has many more, and, in spite of insinuations to the contrary, is not a basket case.

If there weren't varying points of view on how to run our society then what would that look like? I can't imagine it.

I don't think it's so much the positioning on the centre-hard left line. I could see someone like David Milliband or Chuka (if he'd stayed) not doing too well. Needs to be someone who appeals to areas other than metropolitan UK. Times have changed and Labour need to broaden their appeal in these modern times.

I was joking about the Lib Dems before, but I do think they need to think about what they are doing, and if there's any point to them.  I've now seen history repeat itself over 40 years so I've lost patience with this argument that we'll somehow get PR and the Libdems will prosper..... ain't going to happen.

How exactly? There is no meaningful recall mechanism. No meaningful (close to majority) parliamentary opposition. They'd literally have to throw themselves under the bus. Johnson gets 5 full years, very likely 10. Britain will be unrecognisable.

jk

I think you’ve answered your own question there “SOME socialist institutions”. 

France had a revolution a couple of hundred years ago and was invaded by Germany and pretty much destroyed. Their history is very much different.   

The party can split. Johnson has made some pretty bold statements about the NHS. As the thread title suggests - they’re not all the same and there are a fair few Conservative MPs who are keen on keeping the NHS as it is. 

I suspect there are only a few years difference between us and that you are no longer 18 years old.

LOL

You're right I'm no spring chicken but it seems we're both only just generation x. A lot changed in those 20 years.

jk

Bloody hell; id forgotten about that thing given the elections in 2017 and 2019..........it doesnt seem to have been very effective!

Brexit may well be such an unmitigated disaster for everyone except Jacob Rees Mogg and Nigel Farage that in 5 years the Tories are absolutely trounced by...I dunno, Tony Benn's rotting corpse or something, anything.

Yeah but if brexit has taught us anything it's that it's always someone else's fault. Moving somewhere better seems a safer bet right now that living through another decade of this.

jk

Also remember the Lib Dems did badly in 2015 and 2017, so their 4% increase still doesn't get them into significant seat winning territory. They were 15% down in 2015. 

by seeing all the pension benefits or schemes withdrawn just as you became eligible?

by being a student from a family unable to make up the minimum grant? by trying to get on the job ladder during Thatcher, by getting on the bike so many times after jobs or companies went bust that it eventually burnt you out?   Continually looking over your shoulder for redundancy and job sinsecurity?  Property crashes and booms at the wrong time leaving renting in later life the only option?

Sorry - the boomer period spans a period of time and so many people you just can't generalise like the media and get away with it.   Many did not eventually benefit from it.

It is a very very harmful social stereotype and people should know better than to assert their religious faith in the wellness of the boomers

Austerity ended the only secure job I ever thought I had and in the run up long promised pension entitlement was taken away

That's an absolutely fair point - not everyone benefited. However, the shifts in policy in university education, welfare, housing and pensions have not gone in a direction to provide better security for younger generations.

It depends who you think the opponents are - the Conservative party or the Conservative voters (yours and my fellow citizens).

You appear to be looking at this from the perspective of the left. It's fine if you look at it from the beat Boris at any cost perpective, but in the long run how many parties do you wind up with?

2 or 3 right of centre parties, 2 or 3 left of centre parties to balance things up plus Plaid Cymru, SNP, DUP, Green etc you've got votes split all over the place. Would that really be an improvement?

I still think that it is the tribal system if party politics itself that is at fault, but if we must play that game I'm inclined to agree with the view that having too many parties can only cause mayhem.

Drip, drip, drip. Conservatives split - never.

I think pure socialism would be doomed to failure - the use of an exchange tally (money) seems most efficient - and from your comment I'm assuming you believe a mixed market (i.e. some social services, operating within, but preferably not directly affected by, a capitalist market place) would be a good idea? Maybe I'm inferring something wrong there, I'd love to know.

From my point of view, a problem with the discourse at the moment is that most people try to define and describe everything via a free-market model. I just doesn't work - mostly because the "free market" is a fantasy.

I think most people from centre-right, leftwards, aim for a supported community approach, albeit via different (and for far left, very different) methods.

A mixed market seems like the obvious solution to me. Many or most things would be stupid too nationalise.

Others, such as universal healthcare - where service provided, not profit, should be the driving force - should be nationalised. Only the government can afford to run large services in a non-profitable manner and can provide the efficiency through economies of scale.

I'll insert here that I am aware of not-for-profit co-operatives (coming from Lancaster), but because of how they operate (i.e. low cost to the customer; income used for salaries and necessary maintenance only) I don't see how such a model could expand beyond local service. Not that it would need to. I feel, although I'm willing to listen to counter views, that we must be close to peak-corporation, and that smaller, local, services should start to phase back in (or, should be encourage to phase back in).

Those right and righter, from my experience, generally don't seem to believe in "the community" as a thing, treating communities just as pluralities of people. I could be wrong on this, I'm just saying that's how I've read it from various interactions.

I'm not sure I get what you're saying here. Please elaborate.

FWIW, I think a large part the polarisation could well be that many "enlightened" individuals (and I'm referring to both sides of the spectrum here) just absorb whichever dogma they ascribe to, but don't do the thinking beyond that, preferring to simply regurgitate their point of view (thinking is hard work). 

I have a hell of a time talking with both left- and right-leaning individuals, despite obviously placing myself left of centre, because my (currently) heterodox economical thinking means that my take does not line up with how people understand government finance and such.

WTF has beat Boris at any cost got to do with this?

Is the perspective of the right to keep FPTP and retain hegemony?

Under PR, the number of parties is pretty irrelevant as it's almost a surety that coalitions would have to be formed. People would just have to learn to work with each other (shock, horror!)

Yes, compromise between parties would be essential. No insane policies could be enacted from either end of the spectrum because they would not garner enough support in parliament.

I don't understand your concern regarding more smaller parties.

Under PR, the term "split votes" doesn't really mean anything, does it? Every vote should count approximately equally toward a party whose policies each voter most supports. Which means the tactics of divide and conquer would hopefully die a death. Parties would have to present popular policies to gain votes (or at least that's how I hope it would go).

Yes

Why? We see now, even with 6+ parties on the ballot that the majority of votes go to the main two, as other votes are seen as wasted. I'd agree that progressives get stitched up much more because there is considerable vote splitting on that side. But I don't see mayhem.

Yeah, I think it probably would. 

I don't really understand this, it doesn't get much more tribal than the two party split we have now. With a more plural system of parties with stable policy platforms you could inform yourself better and vote for what you want rather than following the giveaways or voting against something. 

Jk

Not at all, I’m looking at it from the perspective of people right and left who get they had to vote for the lesser of two evils. 
Many traditional conservatives did not want to vote for Boris, many didn’t want to encourage dishonesty but either voted for him anyway, or voted for one of the small parties. This was forced by the essentially binary choice. 

Having more choices should reduce the extremism and tribalism. It gives more choices to the electorate and leads to consensus politics. Yes, it does have drawbacks - consensus isn’t always right, Parties may not be balanced, and you can end up without a government for a long time while coalitions are formed; but if we had PR, I think a lot of people would’ve gladly voted for someone other than Johnson and Corbyn. 

We had another option, how many people refuswed to vote for it?

People cannot pursue such damaging policies in a 21st C European society and expect to get away with it. More chance with the forelocking-tugging tame Brits I suppose than the French. Of course, the french have it in writing that its their republic. We have no idea what or who we are constitutionally. We have to accept what is handed down by our masters and it often looks as though the majority are still living in the 19th C and can be steered wherever is necessary. 

I appreciate the sentiment and I agree with you but if we’re making it ‘us and them’, I’d rather the ‘them’ are in Westminster and the ‘us’ is everybody else.

Indeed - or, rather, other options.  The list of candidates was rarely fewer than four, and often more.

Part of the reason is that in much of the country it feels like your vote doesn't matter if you go for a minority party.  For example:

Greens: 0.9m-ish votes; 1 seat (2.7% up; same seat)

SNP: 1.2m-ish votes; 48 seats (0.8% up; 13 more seats)

LibDems: 3.7m-ish votes; 11 seats (4.2% up; 1 fewer seats)

That's bollox.  And, yes, I thought it was bollox when UKIP polled 15% and got a single seat.  Yes, I loathe UKIP - but how is that democracy? 

I can see that Scotland, Wales and N.I. need some extra weighting for rurality.  But 36:1???  In any case the rurality argument seems increasingly spurious when local representation (which is the only justification) goes out of the window; which it has - don't try to tell me that MPs contribute constituency context to national policy any longer.

The main argument against a more fair allocation of influence with votes is that it tends towards hung parliaments and coalitions.  Well, if that's true (and I'm not conceding that it is), then fan-bloody-tastic because, in a world where everyone seems to be in a race to the extremes, I'd welcome some checks and balances.

Not sure if posted but Johnathen Pies take:

youtube.com/watch?v=G0nIhL4v6bY&

Can you (or anyone else) elaborate on that one? There has been a lot of negative commentary but I've not yet seen any quotes from him that I find objectionable and I am genuinely interested to see any that are. 

I have included a few from him below and one from Theresa May for comparison. For my money they fit his general pattern of caution towards foreign policy escalation rather than a specific weakness on Russia. Corbyn is hopeless in many ways and on many issues but having dovish foreign policy is no bad thing. 

"An appalling act of violence" 

"Nerve agents are abominable if used in any war. It is utterly reckless to use them in a civilian environment"

"I think the right approach is to seek the evidence; to follow international treaties, particularly in relation to prohibited chemical weapons, because this was a chemical weapons attack, carried out on British soil. There are procedures that need to be followed in relation to that."

"the evidence points towards Russia on this, therefore the responsibility must be borne by those that made the weapon, those that brought the weapon into the country and those that used the weapon"

TM: "the government have concluded that it is highly likely that Russia was responsible for the act against Sergei and Yulia Skripal. Either this was a direct act by the Russian state against our country; or the Russian government lost control of their potentially catastrophically damaging nerve agent and allowed it to get into the hands of others."

They have a lot of votes and this can be power if they use it well.

Seats in Westminster aren't the most important thing in the world. SNP has 48 and won't achieve anything with them. Farage had 0 and got the Tories to execute a hard brexit. (He is the only one to have gamed the FPTP system really well...)

I think the Lib Dems should make a coalition before an election instead of after an election so that the balance of power reflects their vote share instead of their seat share.

A possible scenario: Lib Dem vote share becomes large enough that Labour can never win an election again without those votes. Then they make a progressive alliance deal: a one-off merge of Labour, Lib Dem, Greens (and maybe SNP) that will get a massive majority. The price for Labour is a commitment to electoral reform such that a written constitution is installed that changes the voting system to PR and that is protected by some form of supermajority vote in parliament so that the next parliament cannot undo PR.

I do think this unlikely though, it requires parties working together and Labour accepting that they cannot go alone anymore.

https://www.politics.co.uk/comment-analysis/2018/09/20/skripal-poisoning-it...

https://capx.co/on-salisbury-and-syria-the-labour-leadership-got-off-lightl...

Thanks. The first one is long on smear and short on substance. The second one is better, in that it links to the relevant Hansard pages to substantiate points.

Have a look, see what you make of it; personally I don't see the fuss. 

https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2018-09-05/debates/DEBE4D29-C179-48A5...

"...the Russian Government must give a full account of how this nerve agent came to be used in the UK."

"Will the Prime Minister update the House on what contacts, if any, she has had with the Russian Government more recently to hold them to account?" 

"I want to assure the Prime Minister and the House that we will back any further reasonable and effective actions, whether against Russia as a state or the GRU as an organisation." 

Totally agree. 

I saw the current Labour Party as professional oppositionists. Anything the conservatives put forward was wrong and the conservatives had to be beaten. 

And Corbyn today said that they’d done a good job by managing to get the conservatives to moderate their policies towards the NHS. 
 

The lead up to the election was an all out assault (from both sides) and as I see it they were more interested in arguing than solving any problems. 

I'm a bit late to this thread but having just spent a while listening to some old blokes in the boozer eulogising about BoJo, following their having left the Lodge, I'd argue that the term 'Scum' is too gentle and that they are, in fact, utter c@nts.

Not really because the Labour Party weren't proposing socialism. 

The Labour Party were proposing common social democratic policies akin to most of Europe that feature in capitalist mixed economies not a socialised economy. 

This is where the indoctrination work of the capitalist media have excelled recently in fooling people into stating basic untruths that don't bear up to even a cursory glance of scrutiny.

However on a bigger picture your point is a good one although how you can reel in the psychopathic/greedy CEO's liberal freedom to earn $€£ gazillions or = 2 billion peoples wealth in a capitalist economic system I would love to know. 

Hey? We’re going round in circles now. At least in part, people didn’t vote for the third party BECAUSE of the electoral system. They saw a vote for the Lib Dem’s as wasted in most seats. The same would not have been true in a German type electoral system where any party getting over 5% of the vote in a region would get representation. 

Name one country in Europe that re-nationalised a utility by force buying of shares below market value?

I read the Labour manifesto and I listened to Corbyn. 

Even with the problems Labour have, Labour have a lot more votes. 

I'm sorry Hans but this is ridiculous. The most effective 'coalition before an election' is for all involved to join the largest party. Once in, their influence would be felt and the party would shift to reflect the broader membership. The largest party is obviously Labour. 

I'm sure some will be shocked at that suggestion, because of the recent history with Corbyn.... but it's not so long ago we had soft left Europhile Ed Milliband. Worth noting that if LibDems had dropped their quest for the purest centrism, and voted for Ed, Brexit would never have happened.

On electoral reform, Nick Clegg had a chance and blew it. Time to accept we are stuck with FPTP and build an opposition party that can take on the Tories. 

Or the LibDems can carry on as they are, and we'll effectively be a one party state.

We obviously disagree.

If Lib Dem were to decide to disband and try to influence one of the major parties, I'd suggest they join the Tories

With the green vote, I'd agree that most of them would vote for Labour if there were no other choice. But the Lib Dems? Maybe 50% to the Tories and 50% to Labour? I don't have numbers.... but when the Lib Dem support decreased after the coalition, it led to a Tory majority government.

Why? You think they have more in common with JRM and Steve Baker than the soft left pro-good EU relations MPs that make up most of the PLP? Fair enough enough you added a smiley, it is a crackers suggestion.

Yep, because a stubborn 8% Lib dem voters could not for some reason vote for  soft left Europhile Ed Milliband. And look where we are now.

We do disagree, but I can actually see a clear path to building an effective opposition. Your scenario is pie in the sky. If there was ever an election where this mythical rainbow alliance could form, it would have been the one we've just had... and of course it didn't happen.

Comparing the extreme idiots of the Tory party with the views of a moderate majority of Labour MPs that are not in power isn't entirely fair.

But why? I think it would be easier to reform CON. They are ideologically flexible and care mostly about being in power. If the Lib Dems were to provide a route to electoral succes based on moderate conservative views, they'd take it. Also, there are less members, so easier to take over the leadership.

This is pretty hypothetical, but so is the Lib Dems joining Labour.

I am sorry, but to me it seems that you assign blame for the inelectability of various Labour governments-in-waiting on the Lib Dems instead of on Labour.

I totally misjudged this election. I thought the relatively extreme positions of LAB and CON would lead to electoral succes for Lib Dem. The opposite seems closer to the truth, the extreme positions motivated people to vote for LAB and CON to do whatever it takes to prevent the other from winning. This election never had a chance for alliance, if it were possible there would have been a pro-remain government of unity and no election in the first place.

If Labour wants Lib Dem votes, maybe they should put PR in a manifesto. The country is only stuck with FPTP as long as the two main party think the system favours them.

Stop being so f*cking shit.

I completely agree and have stayed in the Labour party through a difficult period to work to that end. We need help though.

We are stuck with FPTP because people in this country prefer it. Last referendum overwhelmingly backed FPTP, and let's be honest, if PR was an obvious vote winner, the parties would back it. Once you accept that then it's a case of working with the system as best you can.

It won’t change because whichever party is in power is there because FPTP put them there. 

Ok, I see, you're actually arguing for the one party state I'm wanting to avoid. It's very unhealthy for democracy.

I certainly blame Labour as well, can't see how you could think otherwise from what I've said. I'm blaming the lack of an effective opposition in this country partly on the Lib Dems, and their exceptionalism.

And even if a coalition forces the dominant party to consider an alternative, the public seem to want to stick with FPTP

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_United_Kingdom_Alternative_Vote_referend...

That was for an Alternative Vote. It wasn’t for proportional voting. A very low turnout. 

He had to purge the moderates in the end because they didn't split. It's just not going to happen.

I'm sure there are Tory MPs keen on free at the point of use universal healthcare while we want it kept as is. The key is running it down gradually, always someone else's fault, foreign germs, health tourists, striking staff until we're on our knees begging for a solution, gaslit into believing we can't afford the tax to pay for it ourselves or that if we did foreigners or transgender millennials will abuse our generosity. Then it is up for sale. Just you wait for Johnson's second full term, there'll be hints of a 'rescue plan' in the 2024/5 manifesto for 'democracy' cover then it's gone.

jk

I respect you for that.

Not at all. Even ignoring the fact that I am here arguing pro PR, the hypothetical Lib Dem Tory merger does not have to be popular. Why shouldn't Labour be able to provide a vote-winning alternative to this?

I agree that the Lib Dems share a part of the blame as well.

I suspect we are stuck with it but I disagree about why. What was on offer in 2011 wasn't PR, it was a worthwhile but essentially feel-good rather than functional improvement on our existing winner takes all system. It was also poorly sold, heavily and influentially opposed and pushed to a public that weren't at that point actively seeking reform. A proper PR system in the aftermath of 2016 and all that is I think a different proposition.

No major party under FPTP in their right mind would push PR as a short term vote winner for one election given the existing system stood to return them again in the near future win or loose this cycle. All current elections are fought on short term promises, PR isn't one the Conservatives will ever countenance. It looks however with the coming boundary changes, the situation in Wales/Scotland and deliberate voter suppression that we're a de facto one party state for the foreseeable future. Powerlessness and with it irrelevance is a bitter pill to swallow but Labour's position on PR and an electoral alliance to deliver it deserves a serious re-think!

jk

You are probably right there.

Politics always involves positions a party takes up mainly because they are popular among the voters and positions they want ideologically. For me PR is in the latter group, I'd always argue for it whether it is popular or not. I would be willing to compromise on the position in an alliance/coalition though.

But to get back towards more realistic scenarios for the opposition. Hoping that the Lib Dems will simply disband themselves and roll out the carpet for Labour is unrealistic. For starters, they have an obligation to represent the interests of the people who voted for them. (Those voters could have voted for Labour, but freely chose otherwise). Do you think Labour should make the Lib Dems an offer for an alliance? And what do you think Labour should offer? NEC seats? Shadow cabinet positions?

It would be very difficult because of the numbers. The Tories are already the dominant political force, and with the EU membership issue resolve they are back in the mid forties percentage of the vote. It's logical for the other parties with much lower shares of the vote to look to each other.

And I wouldn't say that if history did not suggest it could work. It's not so long ago Tony Blairs New Labour seemed to be slightly to the right of Charles Kennedy's Lib dems.

That's only 11 seats out of 650.

I think Labour should make itself more attractive to Lib Dem members and voters, while making the arguments I've been making here. If there are talented Lib Dems members who wanted to switch to Labour I think Labour should exploit their talents which of course would mean they would get positions.

Ultimately, it's down to individuals to decide. Do I want to be part of a small party that represents my views to a tee, but ultimately has no chance of meaningful political power..... or do I want to be part of something bigger, makes some compromises, but actually have a shot at real power.

Ok, yep, I can agree with that.

I think Labour could back PR, there is support for it within the party, and there'd be more if people who wanted it joined! On 'electoral alliance'... my conclusion is that after seeing a roughly 40 years political cycle*, is that this alliance needs to be the Labour party, which is why I am urging people to join.

*Brexit this time, was Falklands, unpopular Labour leader with a too long manifesto ect 😞

I don't think the effective winding up of existing 'other' parties so Labour can absorb their voters to deliver a one party 'liberal-reform alliance' is the way to go (apologies if I'm misunderstanding). Firstly, without a healthy eco-system of 'other' parties what really is the point of PR. Secondly were that vote share surge to sweep Labour to power what is their ongoing motivation to actually deliver on the PR pledge? By offering it and taking power in that way they have effectively re-established two party politics so it is in their interest, or at least may appear to be, for them to dither and fall short like the LD's did in 2011 (for different reasons). An electoral alliance effectively created the Labour party as a force in parliament, it's time they considered it again.

jk

Pretty much, but I think the smaller parties should just go dormant for a few years, rather than wind up.

Don't buy that at all. The smaller parties would re-flourish as soon as we got PR. The Greens actually get this, I was talking to some who were campaigning for Labour. They're actually pragmatic when it comes to saving the Earth! 

I think you are right to be suspicious, but I think things are significantly different now. The loss of Scotland was a major blow for Labour.... Labour are no longer on of the big 2 (tbh they never were, Tories have dominated political power). There's an increasing number of Labour members who see the writing on the wall.

I think we agree on the principle but not the method.