Corbyn's days (very) numbered?

[The Don]

All that tells me is that you've pre-judged him based on your own perceptions; and that when you talk about the "stated views of Corbyn" you mean those stated by others, not by the man himself - unless misrepresented and/or seriously out of context.

Not at all.

I've had the "pleasure" of listening to the leadership debate on the radio. Corbyn got to speak for himself. Heck, his voting record is there for all to see.

So you agree with Blair's New Labour and not with traditional Labour, and not with the newcomers. You're entitled to your opinion, of course; but you're not entitled to state it as fact and expect others automatically to accept it as "authoritative".

For all Corbyn's alleged "hard-left" politics, we now have the paradox that his challenger as leader is espousing very much the same, and the duck-and-dive strategy of the anti-Corbyn faction has shifted to attacking his personal qualities. It doesn't inspire confidence in their objectivity.

Let's remember that Corbyn was right about apartheid; he was right about holding talks with the IRA; he was right about the Iraq invasion. Yet security policy is somehow made out to be one of his "weaknesses".

The only Labour governments to have been elected in the last 40 years have been under the "New Labour" banner.

Support for the Labour Party has dropped to new lows under his watch.

The opinion polls have little to do with Corbyn and everything to do with the dishonest campaign against him conducted by the elitist faction among Labour MPs. Yet despite all of that Labour has passed all of the electoral tests it has faced under his leadership - and, yes, I include the local elections in May, when Labour was defending an exceptionally strong result from 2012 with little scope for making further gains.

Your view is certainly consistent with Momentum.

Calling Labour's performance in 2012 exceptionally strong is quite frankly astonishing.

 

[GlennB]

Calling Labour's [local election] performance in 2012 exceptionally strong is quite frankly astonishing.

afaics 184 councils were up for election and Labour gained a net 32. That's quite a lot.

 

[Antony]

Not at all.

I've had the "pleasure" of listening to the leadership debate on the radio. Corbyn got to speak for himself. Heck, his voting record is there for all to see.




The only Labour governments to have been elected in the last 40 years have been under the "New Labour" banner.

Support for the Labour Party has dropped to new lows under his watch.




Your view is certainly consistent with Momentum.

Calling Labour's performance in 2012 exceptionally strong is quite frankly astonishing.

That's a pretty vacuous reply, really. The only response needed is mostly: "And your point is ... ?"

As for New Labour claiming the only election victories in 40 years, we have to say that was an opportunity wasted. A 13-year pause in Tory rule, with depressingly little to show for it. Minimum wage? Tax credits? Some contradiction here, if minimum wage legislation still means that the state has to subsidise low-paying employers. Meanwhile international law is trashed, and conflagration set off in the Middle East that threatens security throughout the western world - just so that our former PM can scoop up $100,000 a time giving after-dinner speeches to US war profiteers. We have lost publicly-owned public services; we have lost free further education; we are facing loss of universal healthcare.

3 election "victories" at a time when acting the Tory B-team was a winning strategy, followed by 2 defeats when the strategy had run its course. It doesn't work any more and harking back to the time when Blair face 3 lightweights as Tory leader in successive elections is really living in the past. That is why the changes represented by Corbyn are so essential. He is the start of the process - not the end product.

You, and the people you are supporting, have nothing to offer other than the dead-end that Labour was in after the 2015 election defeat. This is testified by the fact of the complete non-entities who have been served up by the elitist faction in the PLP as alternatives to Corbyn. Going on repeating the same strategy that has failed the last 2 times is not rational behaviour.

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

To be honest, it depends on the leader.

Quite possible. Once Labour come up with a better alternative leader things may well improve. They haven't found one yet though.

Under Corbyn's leadership Labour party support has sagged from an already low level to something frankly embarrassing. Polling less than 30% when there's a comparatively unpopular Conservative government smarting from a damaging Brexit vote is very poor.

I don't think the government is particularly unpopular or damaged by Brexit to be honest. They seem to be doing just fine.

IMO regardless of his policies, Corbyn lacks the charisma to build a support base. Someone with some star quality, charisma and a vision could, again IMO, get the Labour Party back to the mid to low 30's percent.

I pretty much agree but I think its only fair to allow the man to demonstrate this to be true rather than boot him out based on your suspicion and also re-iterate that there is NO alternative with star quality, charisma or vision to take his place.

If there was I'd probably be more receptive to the calls for change.

 

[CapelDodger]

You, and the people you are supporting, have nothing to offer other than the dead-end that Labour was in after the 2015 election defeat. This is testified by the fact of the complete non-entities who have been served up by the elitist faction in the PLP as alternatives to Corbyn. Going on repeating the same strategy that has failed the last 2 times is not rational behaviour.

The Blairites who know how to win elections lost the leadership election. On that point I heard one Blairite say it was because they were distracted by the General Election defeat. So the reason the proper professional election winners lost the leadership was their disastrous performance in the General Election.

A bit more than re-arranging the deckchairs is obviously called for.

 

[CapelDodger]

Quite possible. Once Labour come up with a better alternative leader things may well improve. They haven't found one yet though.

There doesn't seem to be one amongst the MP's, so many of whose careers are rooted in the Blair years and, theoretically, have some time to run.

De-selection is the obvious solution. What could be contentious about that?

I don't think the government is particularly unpopular or damaged by Brexit to be honest. They seem to be doing just fine.

I'm picking up fairly positive reactions to May and the new regime, from people not of the Tory disposition by a long way. After the Eton boys it looks fresh and attractive. In touch with reality.

 

[CapelDodger]

The only Labour governments to have been elected in the last 40 years have been under the "New Labour" banner.

It was more than a banner. These were New Labour governments.

Anybody could have won in '97, it didn't take Blair's vacuous grin. But by '97 the damage was done : Blair was in charge, so the win was his to claim. The rest, of course, is history, most of it very sad.

 

[CapelDodger]

afaics 184 councils were up for election and Labour gained a net 32. That's quite a lot.

Wasn't that down to the Lib-Dem evaporation?

 

[MCel58]

It depends. If in order to attract the 300,000 new members, the Labour Party takes a lurch to the left and in the process loses 3 million potential voters then there is no gain.

It gives me no pleasure to say this, I was an active Labour Party member for over 20 years, but the party is a mess and Corbyn, through a combination of his political dogma and deficit of personal charisma, is making it worse. Here in comfortably off rural South East Wales there aren't too many Labour voters but I number about a dozen or so among friends and acquaintances. Most will not vote Labour at the next election unless there is a fundamental change in party direction and leadership.

The real issue/challenge is to appeal again to Scottish voters - I don't see Corbyn doing that either.

The problem is that what the majority of UK voters want is not what Scottish voters want.

So a manifesto that plays well in England is not one that will work in Scotland where the majority of people are looking for a centre left manifesto with social policies like free prescriptions, free education, council and social house building, free transport for the elderly and disabled, a strong third sector, support for small businesses, community development policies, immigration placed in the context of it being a positive for the economy, clean energy, no nuclear energy, attracting inward investment and jobs, and a more Keynesian economics approach.

It used to be the Labour Party pre Blair that supplied that manifesto but the SNP have now taken over all of that ground and have delivered a large percentage of it as the Labour Party and the other UK parties struggle with trying to meet the Scottish electorate aspirations whilst trying to also meet the aspirations of the rest of the U.K.

That is the impossible situation which all the UK parties face. The idea of any move to the left is seen as incredible and impossible in England and perhaps elsewhere in the UK whereas it is welcomed in Scotland and at present the Labour Party has lost all credibility in that centre left position.

 

[MikeG]

Wasn't that down to the Lib-Dem evaporation?

A fact conveniently overlooked by all who applauded Labour's "success" in increasing its vote slightly at the last general election.

 

[MikeG]

The problem is that what the majority of UK voters want is not what Scottish voters want.........

I agree with your entire assessment, which I snipped for brevity. It seems to me that voting for parties which offer stuff "free" happens most often when someone else (often our children and grandchildren, but also other tax payers) has to pay for it. I learned to dislike the Labour Party when in Leicester they used to get repeatedly voted in to power in local council elections by council house tenants who didn't bother paying their rates, and the Labour manifesto, every time, was to increase the rates massively for those of us who did bother to pay them: the private home owners. Labour had no incentive to be fair to all, when taxing people who didn't vote for them worked so well in enabling them to make life cushy for those that did vote for them.

 

[Craig B]

I pcouncil house tenants who didn't bother paying their rates, and the Labour manifesto, every time, was to increase the rates massively for those of us who did bother to pay them: the private home owners.

I really need some background data on this. Here at least the Council is insistent on collecting local taxation both in the owner occupied and in the social rented sector.

Do you have data from Leicester suggesting that payment of rates was voluntary for Counil tenants and compulsory for owner occupiers?

 

[Darat]

I really need some background data on this. Here at least the Council is insistent on collecting local taxation both in the owner occupied and in the social rented sector.

Do you have data from Leicester suggesting that payment of rates was voluntary for Counil tenants and compulsory for owner occupiers?

Rates were set on the rateable value of a home. I suspect council houses were simply valued (accurately) as cheaper than Mike's house. Council renters could have the rates paid as part of their weekly rent, granted if they fell behind with their rent it was difficult to evict them if such an eviction would result in them being made homeless.

ETA: Also I'm pretty sure low income and lower "social" groups are less likely to vote.

 

[MikeG]

I wouldn't know where to begin to look for 1970s & 80s rates collection data and eviction data, Craig. Maybe a search through microfiche records of the Leicester Mercury, which often carried stories along those lines. We could also see if Rat has any memories of the era, which was characterised by some scandalous local government mismanagement and corruption. Given this, feel free to take it as an unsupported assertion.

 

[Craig B]

Rates were set on the rateable value of a home. I suspect council houses were simply valued (accurately) as cheaper than Mike's house. Council renters could have the rates paid as part of their weekly rent, granted if they fell behind with their rent it was difficult to evict them if such an eviction would result in them being made homeless.

ETA: Also I'm pretty sure low income and lower "social" groups are less likely to vote.

Yes, the rates would have been paid together with the rent, as a matter of convenience, and therefore arrears of rates and rent would probably be incurred together, if at all.

Also, people in receipt of social benefits covering rent and rates would much more probably be tenants of the council (or of a private landlord) than be home owners.

This was in fact a rational complaint of the latter group, though it was not well founded. "The council doesn't care about putting up the rates because Labour voters don't pay them anyway; they're all on benefits."

The reason why this was not a powerful argument is that the class most severely hit by such a policy was the council (or housing association) tenant in lower paid work, or the unemployed person seeking employment. This was (and is) the mainstay of the Labour Party's social base.

 

[MikeG]

......This was in fact a rational complaint of the latter group, though it was not well founded. "The council doesn't care about putting up the rates because Labour voters don't pay them anyway; they're all on benefits."

The reason why this was not a powerful argument is that the class most severely hit by such a policy was the council (or housing association) tenant in lower paid work, or the unemployed person seeking employment. This was (and is) the mainstay of the Labour Party's social base.

I don't follow your logic, Craig. Could you explain why these people would suffer from a rates rise, or from non-collection of rates & (subsidised) rent, given that there was no great downside to simply not paying either? Private house owners didn't have the luxury of not paying.

 

[Craig B]

I don't follow your logic, Craig. Could you explain why these people would suffer from a rates rise, or from non-collection of rates & (subsidised) rent, given that there was no great downside to simply not paying either? Private house owners didn't have the luxury of not paying.

Previously I asked

Do you have data from Leicester suggesting that payment of rates was voluntary for Council tenants and compulsory for owner occupiers?​

and you responded

... feel free to take it as an unsupported assertion.​

But if you're going to repeat it in even more vigorous terms, can we please have some justification of this statement? Maybe Rat can help us, as you proposed.

 

[MikeG]

Well, as I was an owner occupier at the time, I can tell you that failure to pay rates would lead to a court appearance and ultimately to a possible gaol sentence if you ignored the court's orders. Do you accept that, or find it controversial?

At the same time, those in council houses, as Darat has said, could not be evicted if that would make them homeless (that was council policy), and those receiving benefits could face no other meaningful sanction. I can understand you not accepting what Darat and I are saying, but you can also understand, as I said, that pre-internet, these things aren't immediately quotable chapter and verse.

But never mind that, I was simply asking you to expand on the logic of your comment, which I simply didn't understand.

 

[Darat]

Well, as I was an owner occupier at the time, I can tell you that failure to pay rates would lead to a court appearance and ultimately to a possible gaol sentence if you ignored the court's orders. Do you accept that, or find it controversial?

At the same time, those in council houses, as Darat has said, could not be evicted if that would make them homeless (that was council policy), and those receiving benefits could face no other meaningful sanction. I can understand you not accepting what Darat and I are saying, but you can also understand, as I said, that pre-internet, these things aren't immediately quotable chapter and verse.

But never mind that, I was simply asking you to expand on the logic of your comment, which I simply didn't understand.

Whether people were working or on benefits (or as is the case for many people in receipt of benefits and working) they could be taken to court just like any home owner. Not sure why you think they couldn't?

 

[Craig B]

Well, as I was an owner occupier at the time, I can tell you that failure to pay rates would lead to a court appearance and ultimately to a possible gaol sentence if you ignored the court's orders. Do you accept that, or find it controversial?

What I find controversial is that these sanctions were not ever applied, but were flagrantly and publicly ignored, in the case of council tenants. Can you sustain that with any data? For example, was the council applying provisions like this only to one section of the population, determined by tenure, and not collecting any revenue in the social sector? If so, what on earth prevented representatives of home owners from drawing Parliament's attention to this outrageous maladministration.

At the same time, those in council houses, as Darat has said, could not be evicted if that would make them homeless (that was council policy), and those receiving benefits could face no other meaningful sanction. I can understand you not accepting what Darat and I are saying, but you can also understand, as I said, that pre-internet, these things aren't immediately quotable chapter and verse.

But never mind that, I was simply asking you to expand on the logic of your comment, which I simply didn't understand.

My logic was simple. But if you are saying that social tenants simply binned rates assessments with impunity, then of course my logic fails. If traders were simply to ignore VAT, for example, then there would be no logic in any argument about the appropriate level of VAT, I agree.

By the way, the sanctions to which you note that homeowners were subject don't include eviction, but

court appearance and ultimately to a possible gaol sentence if you ignored the court's orders​

Are you saying this was never applied in the case of Council tenants? I remember court-enforced arrangements being imposed to clear rates arrears of social tenants in Glasgow. Did Leicester not follow government-imposed procedures in these cases, but simply ignore non-payment without any sanction?