UK General Election

[MikeG]

......Corbyn was well known within the party. It's not just media taint.....

Yeah, this is the funny thing. All of those who are making excuses for Corbyn whinge about a biased press coverage, when the fact is that this bloke has a 20 year voting record to look at (he rebelled against the party over 500 times), has hundreds of speeches in Hansard to read, has written numerous items in all sorts of publications over the years, has been interviewed live (where the press can't spin your words) countless times, and can be seen on PMQs live every week. Any negative press is utterly irrelevant in the context of all that stuff. We knew what we were getting when he started his campaign for the leadership (which is why I said at the time that he would make Labour unelectable for a decade), long before the negative press coverage got going.

Frankly, if you elect a wongo as your leader, you shouldn't whinge if the press then call him a wongo.

 

[Aber]

Do you believe Theresa May has these qualities? If so what do you base that assessment on?

Longest serving Home Secretary since the Attlee government?

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

Longest serving Home Secretary since the Attlee government?

And?

You are going to have to join the dots for me on that one.

Her record in the role seems to be promising to do fairly extreme things and then failing to do them very well.

 

[The Don]

And?

You are going to have to join the dots for me on that one.

Her record in the role seems to be promising to do fairly extreme things and then failing to do them very well.

I'm not going to defend Theresa May's performance as Home Secretary but the mere fact that she managed to stay in post so long indicates basic competency to hold a senior cabinet position, the ability to inspire loyalty from the Prime Minister (by whatever means) or a combination of the two.

The fact that she held the position for so long means that there's also a long list of achievements and failures, a wealth of spoken and written material and a library of political analysis to enable someone to come to a conclusion about her qualities (or otherwise) to be Prime Minister.

 

[Darat]

I'm not going to defend Theresa May's performance as Home Secretary but the mere fact that she managed to stay in post so long indicates basic competency to hold a senior cabinet position, the ability to inspire loyalty from the Prime Minister (by whatever means) or a combination of the two. The fact that she held the position for so long means that there's also a long list of achievements and failures, a wealth of spoken and written material and a library of political analysis to enable someone to come to a conclusion about her qualities (or otherwise) to be Prime Minister.

Or be considered a threat to the PM so wanted to keep her occupied. Given that she became PM I would say that is probably a reasonable explanation.

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

I'm not going to defend Theresa May's performance as Home Secretary but the mere fact that she managed to stay in post so long indicates basic competency to hold a senior cabinet position, the ability to inspire loyalty from the Prime Minister (by whatever means) or a combination of the two.

The fact that she held the position for so long means that there's also a long list of achievements and failures, a wealth of spoken and written material and a library of political analysis to enable someone to come to a conclusion about her qualities (or otherwise) to be Prime Minister.

This seems a bit of a side step. Could you address the attributes that you said Corbyn lacked specifically?

That David Cameron liked her is no indication of competency.

 

[The Don]

Or be considered a threat to the PM so wanted to keep her occupied. Given that she became PM I would say that is probably a reasonable explanation.

Which means that enough people within the parliamentary party thought she had what it took to be PM - that's in stark contrast to Corbyn where the majority of the PLP have a different view.

This seems a bit of a side step.

It's only a sidestep because you asked for clarification about why Theresa May being home secretary was pertinent to coming to an independent conclusion about whether she would be suitable to be PM

Could you address the attributes that you said Corbyn lacked specifically?

Sure, he's not that bright. Despite receiving a good education he under-performed academically and as leader of the opposition has demonstrated an inability to grasp the issues or learn from his mistakes.

He's not a team player. Throughout his career as a backbencher he consistently opposed the party - a trait that has continued as leader.

He's not a leader. His inability to manage the PLP, his failure to generate support in by elections and local council elections, his singular failure to land a blow against May in PMQs are all indications of this (and no doubt there are far more)

He exhibits poor judgement. His description of the death of OBL as a tragedy indicates to me that he fails to understand how something which may be self evident to him (that the death of anyone is a tragedy, especially if it prevents them being brought to trial) is interpreted by pretty much everyone else.

His political beliefs are mired in the 1970's. Despite the fact that the world has moved on immensely since time. IMO this means he is either unwilling to change his beliefs, unable to so do or a combination of the two. Neither is a good trait in a leader.

The list goes on, and on and on

Now you can say that this isn't to to with individuals and instead we should look at party policy but Corbyn has a long history of going against party policy as a backbencher and as leader of the opposition and there's no reason to assume that will change if he were to become PM which is why his personal political beliefs are unusually relevant.

That David Cameron liked her is no indication of competency.

As a minimum it's an indicator that she could work with her colleagues. Corbyn has a long and inglorious history of doing the opposite.

 

[angrysoba]

For those who feel that the real Jeremy Corbyn has been unfairly obscured by the press, could they post a video or an article by him that puts forward his best opinions and show his best attributes?

 

[MikeG]

Labour Deputy Leader, Tom Watson, is warning that his party faces a "Thatcher-style landslide" at this election. Thatcher had a 140+ seat majority at her first election in 1983. If the polls stay the way they are, I reckon they'd be grateful for such a result, because at the moment the Conservatives appear to be heading for a 170 to 190 seat majority.

There's a 24 year old in Norwich who has waaaaaaaaaaay too much money. He's just bet £10,000 on Corbyn winning.

At the moment, any Labour MP with a majority of less than 10,000 is very nervous indeed.

 

[McHrozni]

Labour Deputy Leader, Tom Watson, is warning that his party faces a "Thatcher-style landslide" at this election. Thatcher had a 140+ seat majority at her first election in 1983. If the polls stay the way they are, I reckon they'd be grateful for such a result, because at the moment the Conservatives appear to be heading for a 170 to 190 seat majority.

There's a 24 year old in Norwich who has waaaaaaaaaaay too much money. He's just bet £10,000 on Corbyn winning.

At the moment, any Labour MP with a majority of less than 10,000 is very nervous indeed.

This could be the seed of their downfall come next election. Such large majorities aren't usually popular for long and they will have to deal with the fallout from Brexit they won't be able to easily blame on someone else. Scapegoating the EU can backfire in a rather spectacular way.

On the less optimistic side, such large majorities with these people in charge could lead to Turkey-style reforms...

McHrozni

 

[angrysoba]

Labour Deputy Leader, Tom Watson, is warning that his party faces a "Thatcher-style landslide" at this election. Thatcher had a 140+ seat majority at her first election in 1983. If the polls stay the way they are, I reckon they'd be grateful for such a result, because at the moment the Conservatives appear to be heading for a 170 to 190 seat majority.

There's a 24 year old in Norwich who has waaaaaaaaaaay too much money. He's just bet £10,000 on Corbyn winning.

At the moment, any Labour MP with a majority of less than 10,000 is very nervous indeed.

That's not right. Thatcher won her first election in 1979. Her second election was in 1983, when she won more seats on a reduced vote.

 

[MikeG]

True. Apologies. The point stands, though.

 

[Darat]

I'd be quite happy to see the back of the shambles that is the current Labour party forever.

There's a brave new world out there, automation is going to wipe out a lot of manual jobs in the next couple of decades, we are unpicking our country from the EU, that's going to take a decade to sort out properly there's all sorts of challenges up ahead and we need a coherent opposition to the government to hold them to task to make sure they act in the best interests of the country and not the Conservative party.

the current Labour 'led' opposition might as well not exist.

Previously when political parties run things for long periods of time they upset enough of the electorate to vote in 'the other lot' (see 1997) so I doubt we'll be under Tory rule for the next 20 years.

I expect Corbyn to lose so badly that Labour finally rejects the more extreme left wing nonsense and Labour trends back towards centre left and is actually electable the next time we all go to the polls.

Such as?

 

[Information Analyst]

So earlier today the BBC News Channel had a programme where Nick Robinson was sat, supposedly scoffing a takeaway with a bunch of "ordinary voters." At one point, one of the latter said words to the effect that, "currently we're paying all this VAT that's going to Europe, and in future we can spend it on what we want."

Wait... what?!

OK, so the amount of VAT collected is part of the equation for determining the country's EU contributions, but this guy made it sound like all VAT receipts in the UK go to the EU. The only thing worse than that was that nobody - least of all Robinson - called him out on it.

 

[McHrozni]

So earlier today the BBC News Channel had a programme where Nick Robinson was sat, supposedly scoffing a takeaway with a bunch of "ordinary voters." At one point, one of the latter said words to the effect that, "currently we're paying all this VAT that's going to Europe, and in future we can spend it on what we want."

Wait... what?!

OK, so the amount of VAT collected is part of the equation for determining the country's EU contributions, but this guy made it sound like all VAT receipts in the UK go to the EU. The only thing worse than that was that nobody - least of all Robinson - called him out on it.

A typical supporter of Brexit is misinformed on all key issues about the upsides and downsides of being a part of the EU. It's hard to find someone whose knowledge on the matter is not severely lacking in one or more areas and still support Brexit.

It really makes you wonder how on Earth is Brexit going to be a success.

FT is reporting that both Juncker and Theresa May consider it an issue of secondary importance. For Juncker it is a negotiation strategy, for the present and likely future PM of UK it is incompetence at the level where issues are worthy of naming continents after.

https://www.ft.com/content/42d7427e-3647-11e7-bce4-9023f8c0fd2e

McHrozni

 

[The Don]

I may have to eat humble pie

I have insisted that, following their successful election, the Conservative Party will launch a wholesale attack on workers' rights. As well as being consistent with their policy since Victorian times, it was the only way I could see the UK trying to be more competitive in a post-Brexit world.

The BBC is reporting that Theresa May has now announced a significant expansion in workers' rights.

Theresa May is promising what she says would be the biggest expansion of workers' rights by any Conservative government, if the party retains power.

Its manifesto will promise to keep all workers' rights currently guaranteed by EU law, put worker representation on company boards and protect pensions.

There would also be a statutory right to a year's unpaid leave to care for a relative, under the election plans.

Now I'm confused

I thought one of the reasons why we absolutely had to leave the EU was that their employment protections were costing British industry too much and were making us uncompetitive on the world stage. Now it seems that the Conservatives are willing to go far beyond what those horrible people from Brussels were "forcing" us to do just over a year ago.

So were they lying then about how EU workers laws were making us uncompetitve, are they lying now about what they intend to do or is this some kind of bait-and-switch where there are some headline-grabbing new rights to carers' leave are added but some more fundamental rights - like the right to strike - are removed.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-39917472

Taken at face value this is a remarkable volte-face for the Conservative Party back towards the light and seems to throw a spanner in the works for the hardest of hard Brexits. Of course taking election promises at face value is a very silly thing to do

 

[McHrozni]

I may have to eat humble pie

I have insisted that, following their successful election, the Conservative Party will launch a wholesale attack on workers' rights. As well as being consistent with their policy since Victorian times, it was the only way I could see the UK trying to be more competitive in a post-Brexit world.

The BBC is reporting that Theresa May has now announced a significant expansion in workers' rights.

Now I'm confused

I thought one of the reasons why we absolutely had to leave the EU was that their employment protections were costing British industry too much and were making us uncompetitive on the world stage. Now it seems that the Conservatives are willing to go far beyond what those horrible people from Brussels were "forcing" us to do just over a year ago.

So were they lying then about how EU workers laws were making us uncompetitve, are they lying now about what they intend to do or is this some kind of bait-and-switch where there are some headline-grabbing new rights to carers' leave are added but some more fundamental rights - like the right to strike - are removed.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-39917472

Taken at face value this is a remarkable volte-face for the Conservative Party back towards the light and seems to throw a spanner in the works for the hardest of hard Brexits. Of course taking election promises at face value is a very silly thing to do

Could it be that BBC fell for the Onion or a similar report?

You don't engage in vote buying when you're 20 points ahead, especially in FPTP.

Then again:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...ral-election-2017-jeremy-corbyn-a7734866.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_United_Kingdom_general_election,_2017

Labour seems to be gaining steam. It's still 15 points behind, but it gained five points in the past couple of weeks. With the election still some time to go if the momentum holds, Tories could be in for a lovely backfiring. This could be an attempt to preempt it. It just requires them to claim everything they said in the past 18 months to had been a lie and hope no one notices. Nothing to it, I think.

McHrozni

 

[MikeG]

.........Labour seems to be gaining steam. It's still 15 points behind, but it gained five points in the past couple of weeks. With the election still some time to go if the momentum holds, Tories could be in for a lovely backfiring............

Wow, they're rose tinted goggles you're wearing. Poll of poll from The Guradina:

Seems to me that you're ignoring the fact that the Conservatives are going upwards at the same or higher rate as Labour. Labour is some way short of being even at the same position it was at the last election, and the Conservative vote is looking like being about 11% higher than last time out. Ho hum..........you'll see what you want to see, I guess, until the result is a 150+ majority for the Conservatives.

 

[MikeG]

Electoral Calculus Poll of Polls:

And their current (today) prediction of the result:

That's a 5% chance of Labour winning. Remember that the Conservative vote has been underrepresented in the opinion polls for decades now. A little jump in Labour's rating when they've had all the publicity this week with their manifesto.........and the Conservatives haven't even launched theirs yet. I really don't think you understand what is happening in the country electorally right now.

 

[MikeG]

........
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-39917472

Taken at face value this is a remarkable volte-face for the Conservative Party back towards the light and seems to throw a spanner in the works for the hardest of hard Brexits. Of course taking election promises at face value is a very silly thing to do

I really don't know why you are surprised by this. TM said this stuff when she stood at the podium in front of 10 Downing St last year. Did you think she was joking?