paulry

Oh dear oh dear. So much for Labour's knight in shining armour.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/12...ollapse-latest

Jerseygirl

Do you wish to discuss or have an opinion on the above...or are you trolling again?

paulry

Looking at discussion. It's interesting that Labour has slid further in the polls despite the replacement of Corbyn as leader after such a long time of deciding who it would be. Where next for the Labour party on it's slide to irrelevance? And what about the need for the UK to have effective and viable opposition parties? At the moment they all seem to be drifting.

Lion in Winter

You'll have to excuse him, he's very excitable.

Maybe this will help.

https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/top...rage-1-6636103

paulry

So a pro-EU paper writes an article talking up pro-EU Sir Keir and a pro-Brexit paper talks him down. Given that Brexit is the present and the future, I know which one I find more credible AND is more consistent with the national mood.

But on another note, while I find it quite satisfying that Labour are deservedly on the ropes, Britain needs a strong opposition. The Il-liberal Dems are hopeless and the Greens are not really green - though I too find the Greens leader to be quite likeable. The SMP are a bunch of faux successionists and that pretty much covers all of them. Maybe the Brexit Party will relaunch as a Democratic Reformist Party or something like that once the transition period is over....

Red Eric

Ah … so that'll be the line for the next few elections, will it? Try to discredit any opposition party leader with an unsatisfactory score on the Brexit scale and then cry crocodile tears about not having "strong opposition" whilst making it perfectly clear that the opposition should only dare to operate within boundaries agreeable to the Conservative and Brexit Party.

macliam

No, you underestimate them. The line will be to lie, cheat, alter statistics and use the UK press to keep pressure on Labour to ensure they stay in their box. After all, that tactic has worked for Cummins since before the referendum, so why change the tune now?

paulry

No, they do it to themselves by their triple act of refusing to accept the democratic decision to leave the EU, insisting on following their woke, identity politics path of political correctness, and sneering at their "stupid" compatriots for daring to have different opinions to them. The same disease affects much of the USA's so called Democratic Party. Fortunately, here in Australia there are signs that the Labor party are waking up to and addressing their folly.

dave_j

None of that'll be necessary. The virus will ensure that nationalistic support of the government will trump any potential Labour resurgence in the near future.
Labour has this short period to get it's act together. It should realise that nothing it does to embarrass the government will stick at the moment. It should spend it's time rehearsing what it'll do when the shine wears off the country's defence against the virus.
If it's still squabbling when this happens then it deserves to stay in the political oubliette. It'll be Labour who'll have put itself in the box and firmly closed the lid and it'll be their political adversaries and some of their friends who'll be nailing it shut.

paulry

And we have several years ahead of de-globalisation and de-coupling from China to keep us busy. And you can be sure most of the political left as they are now will fight tooth and nail against that. Actually, I see a lot of political casualties in the so-called centre ground as well.

Red Eric

A two party system where both parties meet the exacting standards of paulry?

Sounds ideal.

You know, for a bloke who bangs on about independent thinking, you don't half sound like a recorded message. All the same phrases, time and again.

paulry

Nah, a two party, confrontation politics system is very much a part of the problem. A multi-party preferably proportionate representation model is the way to go. Direct Democracy also looks awesome. And power devolved as much as possible nearer to the people.

the troubadour

Never any likelihood of change in a time of crisis. Boris for his considerable faults has it nailed while this virus plays out, regardless of his tardy behaviour in the early days towards combating it. Nothing much Labour can do for now, but wrong to write them off. Proportionate representation can ensure weak government (at its worst) with deals between quite opposing parties in order to gain power Can be high ineffective to say the least.

MartynK

The British electorate are fickle, and most governments reach their sell by date sooner or later. Labour will be back in office at some point, either on their own or as part of a coalition.

As far as I'm concerned, major reforms of our outdated parliamentary system are far more important than the relatively trivial issue of which party takes its turn at trying to govern - whilst maintaining its primary purpose of self interest - next.

paulry

I agree. It'll be interesting to see how things unfold over the next couple of years - maintenance of self interest wise, because I reckon a lot of self interests are going to be rocked to the core with the combined independence from the EU and the likely global economic de-coupling from China that looks certain to occur at the same time.