The tories may be shit but Labour seem to excel at tearing themselves apart lol. For those wondering why they never lead in the polls the fact they can’t organise a bloody conference without squabbles says it all
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Corbyn loyalists are driven purely by ideological purity rather than pragmatism. The fact there are people out chanting for Corbyn before the current leader is about to speak says alot about who the antagonists within the Party are.
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I think there are a lot of members of the Labour party who liked the policies, but not the man. The dishonest people will claim it was a rejection of the policies.
Hard to believe you’re saying this with a straight face after Starmer’s first year, him and his acolytes have done little but antagonise and try to purge the left lol.
Which you, or anyone else, might think is justified, I won’t even argue that point. But the reality is that Starmer and his set have absolutely antagonised those on the left, very very obviously. Despite saying he’d be the unity candidate when trying to get elected, something a lot of us were stupid enough to give some credence to.
To now label people snapping back at conference as the antagonists in the situation beggars belief for me.
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Q: Do you think it’s appropriate to heckle the leader before and during his major speech at the Party conference before a national audience?
Even left leaning commentators are saying the heckling was an huge own goal that worked in KS favour in the end.
Why should they snap back anyway? They had their guy in charge already who contested two GEs and presided over one of Labour’s worse defeats, these hard left folks have already lost the argument in terms of optics and policy. Starmer’s mandate to direct the party and Labour policy is very clear and isn’t in dispute here.
People not getting with the program are the issue.
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Sure, just like Corbyn’s was but that didn’t stop MPs and those on the right from repeatedly undermining him and launching several failed coups. Or even going as far as to openly state at election time that they’d vote for other parties before Labour.
I don’t remember you bringing any “Corbyn’s mandate must be respected” energy at any point, though maybe I’m wrong and you did.
Take this, and couple it with Starmer making efforts to marginalise those on the left of the party, and you’d have to be a fool to expect them to respect his mandate.
Whether it is a huge own goal is a different matter entirely. I’m not arguing that I would have booed, that it was beneficial to the left to heckle him, or even that is was a good thing.
I’m taking issue with you saying its clear who the antagonists in the party are when we had literally five fucking years of agitating against Corbyn’s leadership and now a year of Starmer antagonising and marginalising figures on the left, having said he’d be a unity candidate and trying to posture as a candidate who believed many of the same things that Corbyn and the membership do. Looking at the wider context of the past 5 odd years its incredibly biased to state like you did that it’s the left who are antagonists here, as if other wings if the party haven’t been more antagonistic to a leader that they fundamentally disagreed with.
The same Labour membership and same rules elected Starmer as Corbyn, demonstrating that plenty were willing to give him a fair shot at first based on his initial rhetoric when running for leader, which isn’t the behaviour of people who were dead set on being antagonistic towards him.
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I think what you say is fair but it’s somewhat subjective tbh
It’s true I am biased but I do think it accurate to characterise Corbyn supporters as generally antagonistic under Starmer leadership regardless of what’s happened before. There’s clearly a feeling of bitterness towards how they perceived JC was treated by elements within the party and now it’s carried over to a new regime, that’s clearly a problem for the Party.
I think these are the type of people who wouldn’t swallow anything other than Corbyn’s platform being lead by someone like him, I think they don’t have any consideration for political strategy or optics which is an issue ahead of 2024. I think they’re a load minority and that’s it
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I agree, the issue is that they still have good reason to take issue with this, as he’s still being treated in a way that encourages them because Starmer won’t restore restore whip. We’re in a situation where he is a sitting MP and an official member of the Labour Party,
but not a Labour MP. As long as the whip isn’t restored people will go on about how Corbun is treated. Restoring the whip would go some way to helping, though I agree with you that an element are implacably opposed to Starmer no matter what. Which, to be fair, is part and parcel for a party that has always contained a fairly wide spectrum of views. There were people who were as trenchant in their opposition to Corbyn, who no matter would would never be swayed from speaking out against him.
So that’s something that can be manageable and basically a fact of life for any leader (to varying degrees), but something that you seek to minimise where possible, to avoid it becoming all consuming and creating a perception that your party is too busy fighting each other. Quietly reinstating the whip and moving past the factionalism should be the aim, but I think most of Starmer’s actions encourage the left of the party to feel marginalised.
This is why I mentioned above that it’s the same set of rules and members that elected him as Corbyn, I think there was a clear willingness in the membership to give him a chance. Not that I am or ever have been a member, but I accepted that we’d had our turn in charge (leaving aside old grudges I still bear about how it was internally and externally undermined from day one) and had suffered such a crushing defeat that it was inarguably time to try something new, Starmer pledged to seek unity and indicated that he held certain positions that fit with my own, and I was ready to five him a chance. Having seen him actively seek to marginalise the left and change election rules, and also be quite shit at opposing the Tories (obvs that’s imo, I know you feel differently), I am now opposed to him being leader.
Like I said, there’s unquestionably an element (a large one) that will be antagonistic towards him no matter what, but I think you slightly overstate the case. Or if that’s too strong, I felt the need to provide a slight counter point to offer a little balance.
Basically, I do agree with you that it’s not good to have that going on at conference. Personally, I wish he’d just restore the whip to Corbyn and I’d hope everyone will then let old Jezza fade into obscurity. It is so harmful to the party to still be warring over Corbyn, we’ve got to move on. I wish Starmer would stop acting in a way that it actively harming our hopes of burying all this shit.
If argue the Labour establishment were far more antagonistic against Corbyn then anyone is being here.
The things they did and the precedent they set, no wonder there is more infighting.
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Things get a little interesting here, If you asked most people when JC had the most power and support within the Party they would say it was post GE2017 right?
It’s reasonable to say JC Labour performed well in spite of internal opposition no? You can’t really blame infighting on the 2019 outcome in my mind, there were elements of it when it came to Brexit policy but there were bigger issues with the leader himself
It seems as if Starmer is trying to do what Blair did after the Tories had been in so long.
He shifted out the left wing of the party and brought in younger, more appealing MP’s who were more middle of the road and electable.
It doesn’t matter how many policies anyone agrees with Corbyn on, the fact is the Labour party has shifted too far to the left and is unpopular with the majority of voters.
If Corbyn couldn’t beat the shambles that Cameron, May and Johnson had made it proves they have clearly become unelectable and need to modernise.
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Labour the party full with people that find it hard to say only women have a cervix.
Fucking hell, sounds like a contestant on The Apprentice
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Cereal killer
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That is painful.
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She didn’t pop back to clarify exactly who should be arrested and what for…
I wonder if she sincerely believed people in the video deserve to be arrested, or if she just felt it was important to appear to have the right reaction.
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‘Proles getting too uppity! Arrest them!!!’
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Maybe it’s just the circles I run in but the “correct” reaction isn’t typically siding with a State legalizing apartheid under the guise of a religious movement.
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Seems like normal disarray for the party these days.
I enjoyed watching the recent documentaries on Blair and Brown.
Blair was very electable by the wider electorate (although I thought a disgrace on Iraq) but would never gain favour with the party grass roots to be selected under the current leadership rules. Starmer has been a reluctant attempt to move closer to the centre but he seems very insipid and too many of his team don’t come across as bright enough to run the country (not that Boris seems that bright either).
The sad state is that this allows Boris to be largely unopposed in the minds of many voters which can never be a good thing.
Definitely still most likely voting green at the next election if they run a candidate next time although Starmer may get my vote if he can create a convincing centre left policy agenda that looks like it’s realistically costed and not stuck in unfunded dogma between now and Election Day. Any politician who talks like billionaires (in fact most who are worth over 10m) aren’t internationally mobile is just not living in reality and getting a decent tax take on their wealth is easier said than done much as we’d all like to see it.
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