Labour Party leadership election 2015

[Famous Mortimer]

Let's hope the tories don't see this

I always thought he just wanted to talk to Hamas, but calling them a force for 'social justice' takes it a bit too far in my view

Though he actually tells a half-joke at one point in the video; one of the criticisms so far has been that he is humourless.

Not sure if he's calling Hamas itself a force for social justice or the group of parlimentarians present instead.

Haha. Justify much?

The group of parlimentarians present weren't part of Hamas, according to the video.

Besides I don't think it's entirely inaccurate to call Hezbollah a force for social justice, in that, as an organization, it exists to empower Lebanese Shiites. I think in this context it's important to distinguish the military and political wings of the two organizations.

Yeah, this is stupid and no one is buying it. The Nazis had social welfare programs too. Would it be fine to call members of the Nazi party "friends" as long as they weren't military officials? "It's okay, they only SUPPORT killing civilians, they don't actually kill the civilians themselves!"

[Filuwaúrdjan]

There's a case for the railways and utilities being in the public sector but by the late 1970's there was a lot more of the British economy that was nationalised. A lot of it was very badly run (British Leyland, British Steel, British Telecom, Sealink) and lost a lot taxpayers money year after year.

Most of the nationalised companies were indeed very badly run, but it isn't certain whether that was because they were nationalised companies or because they were British companies. Mismanagement 'was' serious to the point of chronic across British industry, after all...

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Hmm...? Rather a lot - particular at the industrial end: I grew up in the Midlands and remember well what happened to Longbridge - continued to be terribly managed in the private sector with dire consequences for their workers and ultimately for any hope of a 'balanced' economy.

[ChrisDR68]

Any truth to this?

Meanwhile, among Labour MPs, it is becoming clear that there would be neither the political mechanism nor momentum for an early move against him in the event of his victory. His camp are also reportedly planning construction of a Corbynite “Atlantic Wall” to repel any such assaults on his leadership. By exerting control on Labour’s ruling executive, they plan to push through changes to membership rules, policy development, and – crucially – selections. This will include the reselection of sitting MPs.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/11781068/The-only-way-to-stop-the-Corbyn-juggernaut-is-for-Liz-Kendall-to-pull-out.html

Echoes of the early 1980's if there is. 

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Its Dan Hodges. Maybe some of what he says he's heard is true. Certainly much will have been made up to entertain the people who pay his wages. Probably some of it is made up for the purpose of pure mischief. Maybe some of it is also made up to pursue whatever factional agenda he has these days (if he still has one). Who knows what the true balance is.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Hodges has about as much stock in the Labour Party as George Galloway does.

Anyway the real damage of the 80's was via block voting, which is thankfully gone.

[StateBoiler]

There's a case for the railways and utilities being in the public sector but by the late 1970's there was a lot more of the British economy that was nationalised. A lot of it was very badly run (British Leyland, British Steel, British Telecom, Sealink) and lost a lot taxpayers money year after year.

Most of the nationalised companies were indeed very badly run, but it isn't certain whether that was because they were nationalised companies or because they were British companies. Mismanagement 'was' serious to the point of chronic across British industry, after all...

British Leyland was a monument to the unions.

[StateBoiler]

It's about democracy (and I imagine one of his first movements will to be reinstate a lot of that within the party), and the Labour movement, not President Corbyn's thoughts.

Splendid. So he's going to make the party go back to one member, one vote instead of the situation now where some people's vote counts 4 times?

[Blair]

Why can't people understand AV voting ffs. Kendall withdrawing would make no difference because the votes transfer. If she comes 4th her votes will most likely go to Cooper pushing her to 2nd. All it would do it make it look more and more like the establishment v Corbyn.

And the point about Hamas, and door knocking is a good example of why politics isn't always about winning the argument. If you're having to argue that Hamas are good then you've clearly lost the plot. The thing that angers me is that people like Owen Jones scream about Saudi Arabia but support Corbyn

[StateBoiler]

Why can't people understand AV voting ffs. Kendall withdrawing would make no difference because the votes transfer. If she comes 4th her votes will most likely go to Cooper pushing her to 2nd. All it would do it make it look more and more like the establishment v Corbyn.

And the point about Hamas, and door knocking is a good example of why politics isn't always about winning the argument. If you're having to argue that Hamas are good then you've clearly lost the plot. The thing that angers me is that people like Owen Jones scream about Saudi Arabia but support Corbyn

That wasn't what I was talking about. It was what I found out in one of the recent Scottish leadership elections that people got extra votes if they were part of a union or whatever. Looking it up it looks like that's disappeared from the national and Scottish party elections.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

British Leyland was a monument to the unions.

The thing is, that isn't actually true even if it is widely believed. The problem was that the chronic mismanagement that plagued BMH a) carried over into the new mega-firm and b) that attempts to counter the toxic legacy of BMH mismanagement by former LMC figures were disastrously incompetent. Its well publicised industrial troubles - and it is always worth remembering that the issue here was shop steward militancy rather than anything directed from national union leaderships - were also largely a consequence of mismanagement and even if they doubtless contributed to the sense of chaos were not actually responsible for the firms structural failings (which were actually at there worst when it was still in private hands).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Why can't people understand AV voting ffs. Kendall withdrawing would make no difference because the votes transfer. If she comes 4th her votes will most likely go to Cooper pushing her to 2nd. All it would do it make it look more and more like the establishment v Corbyn.

Most people commenting don't understand the system being used because they don't understand any aspect of the election at all but are instead making a series of assumptions.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Alan Johnson has endorsed Cooper. Given that he's a well liked figure amongst ordinary Labour members this is decent news for her. He's also used his endorsement to take a pop at CWU General Secretary Dave Ward for the manner in which he issued the CWU endorsement of Corbyn. Johnson, of course, is a former CWU General Secretary.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Eric Shaw described the public boards as improving significantly in efficiency after their nationalisation. I think the drastic improvements in conditions in the mines also make Attlee's moves pretty wise, even in retrospect.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Eric Shaw described the public boards as improving significantly in efficiency after their nationalisation. I think the drastic improvements in conditions in the mines also make Attlee's moves pretty wise, even in retrospect.

Yes. It's worth noting that the Attlee government's nationalisations were largely pragmatic anyway; the coal industry (for instance) was nationalised because the private companies that ran it frankly sucked balls, which was a very bad thing considering that the industry was absolutely critical to the wider economy at the time.

[warandwar]

Let's hope the tories don't see this

I always thought he just wanted to talk to Hamas, but calling them a force for 'social justice' takes it a bit too far in my view

Though he actually tells a half-joke at one point in the video; one of the criticisms so far has been that he is humourless.

Not sure if he's calling Hamas itself a force for social justice or the group of parlimentarians present instead.

Haha. Justify much?

The group of parlimentarians present weren't part of Hamas, according to the video.

Besides I don't think it's entirely inaccurate to call Hezbollah a force for social justice, in that, as an organization, it exists to empower Lebanese Shiites. I think in this context it's important to distinguish the military and political wings of the two organizations.

Yeah, this is stupid and no one is buying it. The Nazis had social welfare programs too. Would it be fine to call members of the Nazi party "friends" as long as they weren't military officials? "It's okay, they only SUPPORT killing civilians, they don't actually kill the civilians themselves!"

You don't need to call me a Kapo. Believe or not, I have done some non-Wikipedia reading about Hezbollah! Hezbollah the organization (not that I support it) is more pragmatic than its stated ideology (and the West's reading of that ideology) would suggest. Inside of Lebanon, they govern on the local level with many of their sworn enemies, for example. The EU, after all, only calls the military wing of Hezbollah a terrorist organization.



A

[ViaActiva]

Alan Johnson has endorsed Cooper. Given that he's a well liked figure amongst ordinary Labour members this is decent news for her. He's also used his endorsement to take a pop at CWU General Secretary Dave Ward for the manner in which he issued the CWU endorsement of Corbyn. Johnson, of course, is a former CWU General Secretary.

Seems to support the narrative that Burnham is slipping into third place. I still I can't decide whether I'd prefer him to Yvette.

[ChrisDR68]

Seems to support the narrative that Burnham is slipping into third place. I still I can't decide whether I'd prefer him to Yvette.

Can you imagine Andy Burnham or Yvette Cooper as prime minister?

Personally I can't with Burnham but I can just about see Yvette standing in front of the door of number 10 at the head of a minority Labour government.

[Simfan34]

Merging Morris and Austin was probably not a good idea, no, but old Labour presiding over state-run corporations was a particularly extreme form of regulatory capture, at least that much be conceded.

Emergency nationalisation is one thing, permanent ownership another completely.

[Phony Moderate]

Remember, Big Jim had a 50-31 lead over Thatcher as preferred PM on the day before the 1979 election.

[Simfan34]

British Leyland was a monument to the unions.

The thing is, that isn't actually true even if it is widely believed. The problem was that the chronic mismanagement that plagued BMH a) carried over into the new mega-firm and b) that attempts to counter the toxic legacy of BMH mismanagement by former LMC figures were disastrously incompetent. Its well publicised industrial troubles - and it is always worth remembering that the issue here was shop steward militancy rather than anything directed from national union leaderships - were also largely a consequence of mismanagement and even if they doubtless contributed to the sense of chaos were not actually responsible for the firms structural failings (which were actually at there worst when it was still in private hands).

I will not pretend to be an expert, but Vauxhall remains in business and is manufacturing cars, yes? That may suggest something as to the fate of non-state owned comparable firms.

There is also of course something of a chicken-and-egg problem with poor management in an industry. When your competitors are terribly run state-owned firms and you both operate behind protectionist barriers, there is little incentive to operate at any significantly higher standard.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Seems to support the narrative that Burnham is slipping into third place. I still I can't decide whether I'd prefer him to Yvette.

Can you imagine Andy Burnham or Yvette Cooper as prime minister?

Personally I can't with Burnham but I can just about see Yvette standing in front of the door of number 10 at the head of a minority Labour government.

Bah, no one could see Margret Thatcher as Prime Minister when she was elected leader either. The image of the leader is highly overrated as an explanation to electoral successes and losses. I don't say that it unimportant, or that it can't be a factor, but in the end Niel Kinnock didn't lose in '92 because Major looked more like a Prime Minister, he lost because the Tories succesfully convinced the public that Labour would hike their taxes, and the reason that Blair then defeated Major five years later had little to do with Blair being more ministerial than Kinnock, but more to do with a dire need for change, Torie sleeze, internal fighting among Conservatives about the EU, and the government losing trust in handeling the economy after black Wednesday.

The voters aren't as stupid as you make them out to be Chris. It's not all just about image.

[ViaActiva]

The image of politicians, whether justly or unjustly, does matter to voters - it certainly hindered Labour in 2015 with Miliband as leader, who was pilloried in the press and couldn't cut through to the public at all. Of course there were wider factors - the deficit of the last Labour government, credibility on the economy, immigration, the party becoming increasingly out-of-touch etc., but the fact that Miliband alienated so many people was very significant. Contrast this with Blair's connection with Middle England and swing voters - for all his faults this cannot be denied.

[Phony Moderate]

He only seriously connected with Middle England (or any other part of the country) in 1997; the 2001 and 2005 elections were won with less votes than in both 1992 and 1979.

[ChrisDR68]

Remember, Big Jim had a 50-31 lead over Thatcher as preferred PM on the day before the 1979 election.

Absolutely and it was a lead he thoroughly deserved imo.

Jim Callaghan, John Major and Gordon Brown all lost power for the same reason... there was a major event which undermined their credibility in the eyes of the public.

With Callaghan it was the Winter Of Discontent, with Major it was Black Wednesday and with Brown it was the Global Financial Crisis.

The resulting 1979, 1997 and 2010 general elections are also the last three times there has been a change of party in power.

Worryingly for Labour this seems to imply that there needs to be another major economic or industrial event before the current Conservative government are turfed out of office.

[Phony Moderate]

And in 1974

Remember, Big Jim had a 50-31 lead over Thatcher as preferred PM on the day before the 1979 election.

Absolutely and it was a lead he thoroughly deserved imo.

Jim Callaghan, John Major and Gordon Brown all lost power for the same reason... there was a major event which undermined their credibility in the eyes of the public.

With Callaghan it was the Winter Of Discontent, with Major it was Black Wednesday and with Brown it was the Global Financial Crisis.

The resulting 1979, 1997 and 2010 general elections are also the last three times there has been a change of party in power.

Worryingly for Labour this seems to imply that there needs to be another major economic or industrial event before the current Conservative government are turfed out of office.

And in 1974 it was the strikes and the oil crisis, in 1970 it was devaluation and its effects, in 1964 it was Profumo, in 1945 it was the War. 1951 is about the only occasion since the War in which a major event didn't obviously cause or strongly contribute to the government losing office.