Harry’s Place

I’m tempted to say,Ben that you should address this to those Labour MPs who thought that replacing Blair with Brown was a good idea.
To do exactly what the Tory front bench wanted them to do was the biggest self inflicted wound by the Labour party since 49.5% of us voted for the infantilism of Tony Benn.

I think now we know what Tories felt like under Major and stuff like this
http://www.conservatives.com/tile.do?def=webcameron.davidsdiary.page&obj_id=144136

makes it far worse.
I suspect Cameron may not have tried that if Blair was his opponent.
Open goal now.

From my side (of the Pond, of the politcal spectrum) a can’t quite figure out what Labour is losing to.

I wouldn’t get too worked up about it, old boy. Oh hang on, that’s what Benji would say. But I really wouldn’t get too worked up about it, old boy. This Government has come close to the end of its natural life. It happens to Governments. It doesn’t mean they’re destroyed as a political force.

What is Labour losing to?

I think actually it’s more a cyclic thing - the growing desire to throw out the incumbent regime - more or less regardless as to whether they’ve done anything wrong - a big vicious press campaign - Brown was villified so much for not calling a general election last year (but why should he have…there was certainly no constitutional necessity or expectation?).

And don’t forget that the Tories really were in the wilderness for years - a succession of leaders who either were too young & inexperienced for the task, just not up to the task, and just plain hideous - who had no idea whatsoever of how to connect with the electorate. Although there are still good reasons to be concerned about what the party stands for, and the competency of some of those associated with its senior leadership, it’s no longer the complete basket case that it was - if we are honest - from the mid-1990s or earlier. Or at least it is not generally percieved as such.

And now, disastrously for Labour, some of the knives seem to be coming out in public - - - Prescott, Levy, bloody Cherie Blair —-

In short they’ve lost their appeal.

(Oh, today’s Catholic Herald has not one, but two, columnists suggesting that Boris Johnson would make a great PM in the future. Hmmm…I’ll say, diplomatically)

I think this is largely about perceptions, not policy. The government are still, mostly, doing a fairly decent job (although all of the things that were objectionable about NuLab from the start - and if we are honest OldLab as well - - - the authoritarianism, the hectoring, the self-righteousness - are still there - - but they were there when the party was popular and shiny and the media’s and Middle England’s darling too). Depressing as it is to say, it’s almost as if they need another Alastair Campbell to massage the media (if they are willing to be massaged by the Labour party, which is less certain than was the case 12 or 13 years ago), and another Mandelson to create order, and call the shots in determining a sense of direction.

So (and acknowledging my position as a non-partisan type), I’m really not sure what Labour can do - - playing up the inexperience of the opposition can only go so far. Demonstrating party unity would probably be a good start. And getting Brown to lighten up in public and give the impression of being an inspirational - rather than merely competent - leader. Would it that were not necessary, but unfortunately in this TV-driven age I fear it is.

“NuLab” Oh Ven! Actually, I know you don’t mean it in “that way”, but blogs are increasingly infected by this sort of phraseology. And I can only assume, given I just don’t see it in the real world, that this is a bloggertarian construct. It is dreadful.

Yes, it sort of is a cyclical thing. And I’m not too worked up about it. In fact, I’m quite resigned to it.

But that doesn’t mean that the outcome of the next election will be anything other than a disaster for vulnerable people in our society. I suppose I shall be taxed less. Whoo-fucking-pee.

And that is why I’m not too worked up about it. Because I’m going to be insulated from the results of having the Tories back. For anyone who relies on the government to provide them with fairer life chances, well, then they will be fucked. It’s time that this was acknowledged, rather than having a bunch of middle class people (yes yes I am one blah blah) bollocking on a rather rareified manner. I’ve got to be honest here, and I know you will tell me I’m being overwrought (sp?) - and there really are much worse things to be ffs - but it is basically obscene to see the lack of commitment here on a supposedly left-wing blog. You will now tell me that “Liberty, if it means anything etc etc”

Yes, we are going to witness a change of government. But unless a bunch of “ooh well I don’t like this bit of the Labour Party” people pull their fingers out, then we are in my view about to witness a massive defeat, the like of which will result in a generational change of political values. And that is a frankly appalling concept.

So, yeah, it’s a partisan piece. And it’s a partisan piece talking to people who are “Decent”, and it’s asking them to consider why that is, what that actually means, and which party best represents that view.

And it is also very personal. And it is nakedly pro Labour. No shit sherlock.

Not so very long ago it would not have been remotely surprising to see such a piece here.

I have not expressed myself anywhere near as adequately here as I do above.

Once upon a time there was a tavern..

As Wardy and someone else nearly said, its the cycle dear boy, the cycle. We haven’t worked out a better way without democracy stultifying and becoming corrupt. Only question is whether Labour has entrenched enough of its programme to be as irreversible as Thatcher’s was.

Altogether now:

Lai lai lai lai la la

What *is* it that makes you a “Decent”?

Well I don’t really think I am a very decent “decent”. But yes of course Ben is right (and he is the future) a Tory government (of any stripe) is a return to the past and something which will not matter to 90% of people whoc comment on blogs for whom it all it will amount to is “we don’t like the government but at least Nigella is still getting the best schooling available…”

But then some of us will remember our own (superflous) youths when, under Thatcher, we sat and listened to John Peel playing the Nightingales

>> It seems almost certain that we are to lose the next general election by a landslide to a party run by the historically privileged elite of this nation. <<

The Liberal Democrats (Whigs, as was)??? Never!!!

(Whoops pressed “submit” to early)

Anyway carry on:

We sat(without electricity but only a battery operated radio) and listened to the Nightinglales singing about “Urban Ospreys” whilst outside kids with no hope stabbed each other in the heads with screwdrivers and realised that there were two kinds of people in the world: those with hope and those without it and that to be decent was to aspire to give hope where there was none and to tell those who want to fob us off with some kind of cyclical version of history to stick it in their osprey nest because you either believe in progress or you beleive in your own comfort.

Altogether now:

Lai lai lai lai la la

My sharia law, lovely as a summer day
My sharia law, distant as the milky way
My sharia law, pretty little one that I adore
You’re the only girl my heart beats for
How I wish that you were mine

I’m not really trying to make a point about anything here.

Sorry Ben, that did sound smug and flippant- you are right- it is all very well for people like me/us to take the long view, as we are insulated, and you have brought home that apathy could result in a long time in the wilderness beyond the natural cycle.

I thought the whole Les Dobrovolski incident was made up?

“We are about to let go of the finest government with the best anti-poverty track record in history.”

The first thing they did was raid the pension funds, now this will cause poverty for the next 3-5 decades.
Then they looked at the facts on spending on health, social security and education. They realized that what they were doing was wrong, they knew the course they were stearing was wrong, they knew they were causing long term damage, so what to do? Sack Frank Field and hide the data.
We are now in the position were the government does not know how much debt it has, nor how many people it must provide pensions for, given there are an extra 12 million NI numbers in the system than there are people paying tax.

What is this “progressive” label?

We hear it bandied about a lot but what does it mean.

Look around Western Europe and you can see that historically there have been parties of the left and right in power. But when you get down to it living standards are more or less the same, working hours are pretty standard, individual human rights are similar and the structure of society is pretty similar.

One has to query whether it really does make that much difference having a “progressive” party in power.

Seems to me that a really progressive party would get to grips with issues of political and economic power. Only the Swiss people in Western Europe actually have any real political power on a day to day basis - otherwise oligarchies rule in all of Western Europe. Other countries have done better also in getting workforce representation on boardrooms and on common ownership.

However our wonderfully “progressive” party is completely scared of both referenda and common ownership.

I think any progressive party should be committed to:-

(a) Redistribution of economic and political power through common ownership and referenda.

(b) Reducing the working week to three days over 20 years, so that people can begin to lead civilised lives with a proper work-life balance.

(c) Ensuring everyone has access to decent housing rather than the rabbit hutch accommodation that passes for acceptable in the UK.

This Government has come close to the end of its natural life. It happens to Governments. It doesn’t mean they’re destroyed as a political force.

Isn’t it rather that Brown has all the charisma of a turbot?

And that he does that really annoying open mouth thing at the end of every sentence?

Not to get all superficial or anything.

I agree with Tim that getting rid of Tony Blair in favour of Gordon Brown was the worst thing the Labour Party has done other than (a) tolerating Galloway as long as it did and (b) embracing Livingstone and welcoming him back into the party, and continuing to embrace him when he was clearly following more or less the Respect agenda.

The electorate never loved old Labour, however much they felt disillusioned with Tony Blair, and so many of the old Labour brigade (plus both the radical and the rustbelt trade unions) clearly deluded themselves that replacing Blair with Brown would firmly put the clock back.

All this helped to divert the Labour Party from continuing to develop as a party with wide appeal to the whole country (as it was in 1997) and nothing was done to counter the series of individual scandals and downfalls that hit the various Labour grandees like Blunkett over the last seven years by promoting the development of young and fresh thinking new blood. It seems the Tory Party has done some of this– I always thought they would go to any lengths to get back into power– after all, they even made a woman PM when Labour has never come anywhere near it.

Gordon Brown was allowed to make the fight to get his feet under the PM’s desk the core ongoing story of where the Labour Party was going for years; the whole phalanx of people helping him to do that such as Ed Balls are now in key positions of power, and are almost as intensely disliked as Brown himself.

And Labour has taken its eye off the ball of feelgood stuff which people need in all sorts of ways…so it’s appeared to have been obsessed with promoting forms of organization (trusts, foundation hospitals, academies) as opposed to finding out and delivering what people most want–for example, medical appointments when you want them, the right to choose your doctor and your child’s school, and to get the treatment you need before it’s too late. It’s still far too wedded to local authority oligarchies and power structures– which have done a huge part in undermining so many educational and health reforms. And it’s given a very clear vision of an old age which no one can look forward to: inadequate care, and having to use up any savings plus turn in your house to pay for it into the bargain. Armed forces? Whatever your view on the Iraq war and Afghanistan (and I support both) it seems rather obvious that there’s a catalogue of poor resourcing and limited leadership which seems to make us rather less successful than the US forces even in the quite limited roles that we’ve taken on.

You wouldn’t think that the UK has some of the most imaginative and lively media, internet, arts and music industries-Tony Blair seemed to devote quite some energy when he first became PM to associating their achievements with those of the Labour Party. Over the last few years, it all seems to have been allowed to dissolve into a series of associations with at best dull and embarrassing funders and at worst with dodgy loan sources.

What got categorized and sneered at as spin was in my view a shift to the sort of relationship a modern government has to have with a modern electorate. Labour seems to me to have retreated into shame and old style political discourse, when it should have retained the courage of its convictions. Ironically, it’s the Tories who now seem to be reaping the rewards of relentless spin and control of what its politicians put out.

The number of really dire analyses of why Livingstone lost (especially the ones about the ignoble voters of outer London) makes me feel that as Ben says, the chances are that Labour is in one of its many historical watch-me-lose moods.

Oh Ami, really don’t worry. I didn’t take your first comment in a bad way (and of course it wouldn’t matter if I did). I am quite sure the world would be a much better place if it had more people like you in it! However, I do much more agree with your second comment…

“you either believe in progress or you beleive in your own comfort” Yep. Succint. Accurate. Beautiful.

“I thought the whole Les Dobrovolski incident was made up?” Heh. Sue me Herman. But check out the news reports first. And then talk to him. And then maybe don’t sue me. Twat. (Actually, if that was a genuine question, then you’re not at all and you can have a copious apology from me later. Otherwise, yes. Twat.)

Actually, to be honest (and I suppose I ought to be), I know people talk about “cycles”, and that’s the received wisdom, isn’t it? But I’d rather have fifty years of moderate government than 18 years of vicious red-in-tooth-and-claw Thatcherism.

And I’d even more prefer 50 years of progressive government.

50 years of Labour would be great. If only you could avoid the likely corruption and patronage. But it would really stick it to the Arabellas of this world, wouldn’t it? Smoking? Fuck that. It’s all about banning the ownership of ponies in an indoor space. (Actually, my younger sister had a pony for a brief while - perhaps I should reconsider…)

the worst “progressive” defeat

A fairly typical example of the hijacking of a self-evidently positive sentiment by the Left. Progressivism is merely the latest term that Marxism/Socialism has assumed as its previous euphemisms have been caught up with and debunked - one thinks of Structuralism, Post-structuralism, Post-modermism, etc. Now you will have to invent a new term, one that does not have the stink of failure about it. Just as the rarely defined term “social justice” was appropriated by ZanuLabor as a portmanteau word for what must be an unbridled good - after all we are all “social” and in favour of “justice”, aren’t we? The trouble comes when social justice becomes stealing from those who actually earn their living and giving it to those who don’t. Then it becomes a travesty of justice, and those who have lost their pensions, are in danger of losing their homes, have seen council tax double in this administration have worked that out, and have worked out that Brown is very definitely not on their side.

Look at your snide “a party run by the historically privileged elite”. What the hell does it matter what their background is, if they can actually make things better, without clobbering those they despise? Can you even honestly say that Tories “despise” anybody? Labour has far too often been populated by the vindictive, whose primary motivation is hatred of your … historically privileged elite. The country should be run by an elite - who the hell else should run it, a bunch of Neets from Sunderland or hacks from the Graun? Who should run Amstrad: Alan Sugar or a dunce like John Prescott, who would take it down the tubes in no time flat?

So, Ben, you know where you can stick your “progressive” politics, because it does not look like progress to those who booted “us” (include me out) out. Get ready for a generation in the wilderness, as yet another period of class politics; meddling with institutions; brainless and pervasive targets; persistent intervention; driving a horse and cart through our Constitution; riding over political regulators; building a massive client state and populating it with bureaucrats who have no incentive to succeed; creating a Byzantine and confusing tax system; wrecking our schools and stopping social mobility in its tracks: is consigned to the vast landfill of failed Socialist ideas.

Labour had the best chance to make a difference it is ever likely to get in 1997 - an economy that worked, thanks to Thatcher, a country of pride and confidence - and what has it done? Blown it, comprehensively, and the country knows it.

Love it.

“Can you even honestly say that Tories “despise” anybody?”

Yep. Women. Gays. Ethnics. The working class. All of whom have been shat on by the Tories at some point in the last 50 years. You don’t even have to go pre-War.

“ZanuLabor”

Hahahahaha! You loony cunt. I guess you are the face of disgusting reaction that that nice Mr Cameron is trying to keep hidden away.

If you were at all cognisant of the views of you beloved business-class, Alcuin, you would know that there was a debate about whether Alan Sugar is a good businessman or not. It is suggested by some that, though he is certainly a canny celebrity, he has failed over his career to create shareholder value. Amstrad is not a world-class company, is it? Capitalisation is down from the 90s onwards. But I’ve worked in areas where I would be expected to be aware of those kind of views. But perhaps you haven’t. So fuck off. Really. And then don’t come back. :)

(Note to others - apologies for the distinctly 1950s terminolgy in my first para, but it was succinct, and I think it helped Alcuin to get what I was saying.)

The number of really dire analyses of why Livingstone lost (especially the ones about the ignoble voters of outer London)

Ah yes - otherwise known as ” the inconvenient truth”

This is plain scare mongering. None of us know what a future Tory government will look like, just as few if any people knew what a labour government was going to look like before 1997.

This labour government has in many ways acted the way you would have historically expected a Tory government to act - certainly the financial sector, the major driver of the UK economy today, are happy with the status quo and the amount of influence they have with the government (non-dom debacle). Think of think of the implementation of Tory proposals on IHT, labour’s aggressive international interventionism, the effective privatization of parts of the health service, ASBOs (not a Tory policy per se but who would have been surprised if Margaret Thatcher had introduced them?) and so on.

A number of things that Labour have done and continue to do hurt lower income people. Apart from the obvious 10p tax debacle, there was the raids on the pension funds (it wasn’t just rich peoples pensions that were raided), increases in petrol duty (gone up what? 30%+ since 1997), vehicle tax (completely regressive tax that the government keep increasing), below inflation pay rises for large parts of the public sector etc. Now I’m not saying that any of these policies are wrong. It’s just that I’m not sure they will be any worse under a Tory government. Does anyone really think that Cameron will suddenly change things if he became PM? He is a pragmatist, not an ideologist.

ag. Your view is the classic “don’t vote for Livingstone because look at how not left wing he is” gambit.

But we can see that, as with some who took the above view, you are a charlatan.

I am quite sure that your heart bleeds for the masses and you yearn to lead them in the ultimate uprising which will doom capitalism and put all the heads of horrid Blairites like me on spikes outside the People’s Court of Justice.

Or not. Vehicle excise duty. Poor people don’t own cars (nor do I - it’s not some kind of stigma). Petrol taxes?!?! This is exactly the sort of Daily Mail nonsense that talks about people like those who read their disgusting rag being victimised. No. These are the middle classes. I am not saying they are comfortable, because times are difficult. And I would never seek to belittle the problems of middle class people, who have helped keep us in office. But they are not the salt of the earth, as it were.

ASBOs. ASBOs are an example of the state intervening where it previously didn’t in order to protect working class people. And that is why Liberals are scum. Because they think everything can be solved by inviting the neighbours around for tea and crumpets. No.

Public sector workers have done really well out of Labour in the last 11 years. Really well. One of my dear, dear friends is a teacher. She struck (because she is not a scab), but is very much of the view that the NUT is being selfish and reckless and putting at risk the future of the govt which has done so much to make teaching a “profession” again. Public sector pay, and public sector levels of employment, are both massively up under Labour.

Pension funds? That hit (and yes it did, I accept) the better off in the middle classes. Not the poor.

IHT - Labour didn’t do what the Tories wanted. It’s a little bit complicated, but basically what they did is make a tax loophole available to those married couples who could employ a professional (ie the waelthy) avaiable to everyone. Disgusting, I know.

Interventionism? Really right wing. Yeah. Talk to the IFTU.

Basically, I can take anything you throw at me, because, judging from your comment, you are either a Tory or a Trot (interesting they can sound so similar, isn’t it?), and both are especially bovine species.

Interesting Post Ben, though I would say that the challenge in making a national economy based on the tericery sector work ‘harmoniously’ that New Labour attempted is being subsumed by larger factors, i.e. resource scacity, environment, the ‘rise’ of India/China etc. It seemed to me that much of the new Labour project as well as much of the left stopped thinking in May 1997 (the hard left having stopped in November 1917). New concepts are required and i have now doubt that the traditions of the left, be it Painite Liberalism or Social Democracy contain many fertile seams to mine. Get thinking

As for Alcuin, his parroting of Pareto elite nonsense is no surprise, I hazard a guess the fella is a big fan of Heidigger and Junger. Meh

The brave new democratic Iraq and the “flowering of trade unions” - this is worthy of Private Eye. But do sleep easy, Ben. I really wouldn’t worry to much about being “forever tarred” by going on an anti-war march; you’re unlikely to be lynched in the street by outraged passers-by. I would worry about your evident hysteria though. Have you considered valium?

Well, that was sickening to read. If it will cheer you up the people in Iraq are probably not as cut up about the departure of Blair and your Decent crowd as you are.

Ben, I don’t live in London and have no real position on Livingstone. I don’t know why you think I have.

Poor people do own cars. Not very expensive ones possibly but many, many of them do own cars. If you live in a city and one you work in maybe you can live without a car. Live in the country or love somewhere 10 miles from where you work and there’s no suitable public transport, guess what? You own a car.

Go talk to factory workers whose pensions are a fraction of what they expected. Their funds got raided too.

The point about IHT was that the government only did it to prevent the Tories getting on the front foot. I do understand it by the way. It’s not complicated at all. It’s a lot simpler than having to set up trusts, dividing ownership of property etc. I have kids so IHT is something I’ve planned for for several years now.

I wasn’t criticising the policies. I think some of them were necessary. All I was saying is that they aren’t ones you’d necessarily expect from the Labour party. Of course if you went to Oxford in 1999 I imagine that you won’t actually have much experience of the old Labour party, the one from the pre-Blair days so maybe my expectations are different from yours.

Yes some public sector workers have done quite well (particularly Doctors:-) ). Although they’ve possibly done better than previously that’s a) a low bar and b) largely irrelevant. If they’ve done better than before but their pay rises are less than the rise in their cost of living they’re losing out. My wife is a nurse and I see what goes into her bank account each month. I also know colleages of hers who are single/divorced and I know how hard they find it and how little help they feel (rightly or wrongly) they get from this government. By the way, most of them own cars. I work in the private sector and my pay has done a sight better than hers over the last 10 years. That is true of most private sector workers I know, though I accept that this is only anecdotal evidence and there may be all sorts and kinds of stats that show how poorly the private sector has done in comparison to the public.

Decent (boom boom) post, Ben, plus with Zin - the Thatcherite headhunter - and Robertus effortlessly proving at least one of your points.

So you are not only ‘progressive’ but ‘decent’ too? What a pity you have committed yourself to a mob of chancers motivated by spite, envy and class hatred.

“decents” & “stoppers”

Tempted to write ‘cheeks of the same arse. Wait up . . .just did.

“I was not a Stopper in the “We are all Hezbollah” sense”

See, for Harry’s Place, there is no other kind of “Stopper”, as you call them. In the Decentoverse, there is only Glorious pro-liberationists - who don’t mind a few depleted uranium and white phosphorous rough edges, the total destruction of the fabric of a society (as bad as it was before), a price tag of anywhere between 200,000 to a million dead, precipitation of ethnic cleansing and a few more rough edges - and then there are FASCISTS! In the Decentoverse, the fascists are anyone who strays from the party line and anyone who questions the glorious war.

Oh, it gets better! Thank you Robertus, for drowning out the remaining whimpers of the Black Dog which visited me in the wee hours.

I was not a Stopper in the “We are all Hezbollah” sense, but I was a Stopper in that I had a very strong sense of the wrongness of the Iraq War. I had watched the first bombardments of Baghdad in the early hours of that morning in March 2003 and had been terribly upset.

In that case Ben, you were no different to the large majority of us who opposed the war, including those of us who attended the “vile and reactionary counter-revolutionary demonstration” and have no regrets about it. Of course it was no such thing, and it was mostly made up of normal, decent (but not “Decent”) people. Really, that kind of language (and it’s not the only example) does your argument no favours at all.

What seems odd to me is that as far as I can tell you changed your views the war not because you decided your position was wrong in principle but because you discovered that certain people who you didn’t like opposed it for what you considered unprincipled reasons. Or have I got that wrong?

you loony cunt

And I am supposed to be the one who despises others. Such erudition, such scholarly wit, such pathetically bankrupt bile - surely you can do better than these pathetic smears, old chap? The Left have come to believe all the smears that they and their ilk have thrown at the hated Tories since you were in short trousers. That Hezbollabor hates Tories like Hezbollah hates Jews is a weakness that will always misinform any serious strategy for winning.

Meanwhile the Tories just continue to win all the intellectual arguments, like they did in the 1980s: Council house sales - Labour would have preferred to have kept these people’s aspirations down by keeping them imprisoned tenants to Socialism; Nuclear weapons - remember Michael Foot’s longest suicide note in history, which would have left us open to nuclear blackmail; privatisation - whatever happened to clause 4 and the rusty unions; Tax levels - remember 33% basic, 83% higher under Jenkins? You, Ben, would have been arguing against all these 20 years ago. What will you be saying 20 years hence?

Women: a few examples would be nice, though if you speak of Tessa Jowell, Yvette Cooper and Claire Short, I get your point. Perhaps you believe Maggie was really a cross-dresser, eh? Gays, Ethnics. Well if you had watched Rageh Omaar’s series on Powell’s speech, you would find few who seriously considered Powell’s history and his actual words thought him to be a racist - even Omaar himself. It was always just a convenient word to shut down serious debate, and Ken thinks it still works.

As for my “beloved business-class”, who the hell do you think NuLabor is in thrall to - teachers? Blair and Brown have bent over for the City of London, and its wad wielding, million bonus high rollers. While these guys bring in a third of Britain’s income through their high class casino, I think NuLabor has become far too mesmerised by them, and now that taxes are rising and the high rollers are muttering about taking their circus elsewhere, the whole flawed and surely for a Socialist, immoral, strategy is unravelling, like the rest of Blair’s carefully constructed hologram.

Now that the Pied Piper has moved on to be replaced by Mr Punch, we can all see the whole enterprise of the last 11 years for what it always was - a cynical exercise in spin, and the crocodile is not far away - watch out for the baby. Laugh it up while you can, Ben, because soon you will be sucking it up.

“No regrets at all”, Andrew? A: we were unsuccessful. B: we, and I’m assuming you weren’t one of those vile and reactionary counter-revolutionaries either, then retired and allowed said vile and reactionary counter-revolutionaries to take over. Nothing necessarily reprehensible about B as most of us had our own lives to lead, but to be proud of it?

certain people who you didn’t like opposed it for what you considered [love the ambiguity!] unprincipled reasons.

IHT - Labour didn’t do what the Tories wanted. It’s a little bit complicated, but basically what they did is make a tax loophole available to those married couples who could employ a professional (ie the waelthy) avaiable to everyone. Disgusting, I know.

Ben, there had been an ongoing campaign against IHT by sections of the media and the Tories. Any progressive government worthy of the name should have been able to make a principled defence of IHT and countered the bogus arguments used against it. Instead they gave in and came out with this measure specifically intended to “wrong foot” the Tories and win favourable headlines and it made them look cynical, weak and unprincipled. Which they were.

Alec,

“No regrets at all”, Andrew? A: we were unsuccessful. B: we, and I’m assuming you weren’t one of those vile and reactionary counter-revolutionaries either, then retired and allowed said vile and reactionary counter-revolutionaries to take over. Nothing necessarily reprehensible about B as most of us had our own lives to lead, but to be proud of it?

I said I don’t regret going on the march and no, I still don’t. It was always likely (and with hindsight absolutely certain) to be unsuccessful but I don’t see why that is an argument against it - should we only ever support causes which are likely to succeed? As for your point B, once the war went ahead anyway most of saw no point in continuing to demonstrate against something which had already happened, and I wasn’t going to campaign for troops to be immediately withdrawn because I didn’t think that was neccessarily the best course of action. If others wanted to do so that was up to them, I’m not responsible for their actions.

poor people don’t own cars

This demonstrates just how far removed the left is from reality.

No, Andrew, but we were responsible for letting them do those actions. If you were as committed to opposing the invasion as you say, you would have seen that day in February to be more important than saving and may, even, have worked to prevent it having *previously* been taken over by a bunch of political freaks, racists and generally vile and reactionary counter-revolutionaries.

Just a thought, it could have turned the tide.

If the poor owned cars, could they not have driven to the polling stations on 1 May?

“(a) Redistribution of economic and political power through common ownership and referenda.
(b) Reducing the working week to three days over 20 years, so that people can begin to lead civilised lives with a proper work-life balance.
(c) Ensuring everyone has access to decent housing rather than the rabbit hutch accommodation that passes for acceptable in the UK.”

This isn’t progressive at all, but age-old socialism.

Biggest gift to the Tories was the 10p tax band thing. What were they thinking?

OT: huge earthquake in China- no hard news yet- Is Benjamin out there?

If the poor owned cars, could they not have driven to the polling stations on 1 May?

I know one poor person who owns a car and who voted for Boris.

AID -

You quote me:

“(a) Redistribution of economic and political power through common ownership and referenda.
(b) Reducing the working week to three days over 20 years, so that people can begin to lead civilised lives with a proper work-life balance.
(c) Ensuring everyone has access to decent housing rather than the rabbit hutch accommodation that passes for acceptable in the UK.”

and say:

“This isn’t progressive at all, but age-old socialism.

Biggest gift to the Tories was the 10p tax band thing. What were they thinking?”

Not sure if you mean it’s age old socialism in a good way or a bad way.

I’m not sure I would necessarily call it socialism. Catholic democrats have pursued decent housing and reductions in the working week as have many conservatives in their own way. Referenda have never been much associated with socialist parties.

Wherever you put these policies on the left-right scale, they appear to me to be highly relevant and should be pursued more rigorously.

Since you mention tax, I would also like to see radical tax reform with a move away from so called progressive income tax. We need a simplification of the tax and benefits system. I’d certainly go with some sort of basic income plus flat rate income tax, allied to higher property taxes. This would cut out huge amounts of bureaucracy.

We also need to dismantle the welfare dependency system and ensure that nobody who can work receives benefit without working.

Anyway, I think the time is fast approaching when any party that can put forward a realistic quality of life agenda can make real progress with the electorate. A centrepiece of a the radical agenda should be the reduction in the working week. It is absurd that despite numerous technological innovations we have seen no reduction in the working week for about 30 years. We should proceed in stages until we can get down to a three day 27 hour week for most.

We also need to think in terms of restructuring people’s working to allow for full time parenting. (Of course a 3 day week would actually allow many couples to do that while remaining in full time work.)

How to pay for all this I hear you ask…

No. 1 priority is dismantling the welfare state and putting an end to irresponsible single parenthood.

God, no, Ami, they’re suffering enough.

Alec,

Sorry, I just don’t think the anti-war protests would have been any more successful if they had been organised by you and me.

They couldn’t have been any more ineffectual or obscene, Andrew. Yet, I was not referring to you and me a two individuals, but to “to the large majority of us who opposed the war”, many of whom, if your comments are anything to go by, saw the march as an outing on a brisk spring day and then back to the pub for a congratulatory drink. I know this is probably unfair on you as you have dedicated decades to your home-grown socialist-inclined politics, but you could show a glimmer of contrition.

poor people don’t own cars

They most certainly do, and they’ve just seen their car tax doubled or tripled in a typical sneaky-underhand Broon-tax-grab. That is why McBean et al are fucked at the next election.

Ben says:

“I was not a Stopper in the “We are all Hezbollah” sense”

Robertus replies (quoting Ben’s line above):

See, for Harry’s Place, there is no other kind of “Stopper”, as you call them.

You couldn’t write this stuff, but they do.

Labour opting for BNP tactics in Crewe and Nantwich

http://tonysharp.blogspot.com/2008/05/tamsin-dunwoody-new-bnp-candidate.html

many of whom, if your comments are anything to go by, saw the march as an outing on a brisk spring day and then back to the pub for a congratulatory drink.

Well exactly. It was akin to attending a music festival for many. My brother doesn’t have a political bone in his body and I’m not sure he’s ever voted in his puff. He and his hippy girlfriend went for a day out, simple as.

Blimey, I agree with a lot of what Field says. I think a true radical left wing agenda could easily include freeing people from dependancy on the Government by means of measures such as the basic income and a simplification of the tax system.

Historically a reduction in the length of the working week should definitely be on the to do list of any left wing party, and would free up more time for things which are socially productive not just economically productive.

Of course, both the basic income and reduction of the working week would encourage exactly the kind of creativity and independance which are required in today’s economy of intellectual and cultural products.

I think if Labour gets trounced in the general election they could easily bounce back with this kind of radical agenda which really would change the political landscape forever.

Oh, gawd, Brownie’s citing me as an authority. And we all know what their colleagues did to the Stakhanovites.

Surely there isn’t anyone in the country who hasn’t claimed their free Mercedes from the jobcentre yet?

I think a true radical left wing agenda could easily include freeing people from dependancy on the Government by means of measures such as the basic income and a simplification of the tax system.

It wouldn’t be a “true left-wing agenda” it would be a whiggish/liberal agenda following the lead of Cobden and Bright. As such it wouldn’t be at all surprising if a lot of those supposed “left wingers” who have never met a working-class person in their lives signed up to it on their route to becoming one-nation Tories.

*Graham re-emphasises the need to maintain a class system in this country

Graham’s spotting what I’m spotting in the comment he’s citing, however, I do think a radical overhaul of the tax system would be a vote winner, including the introduction of local taxation to replace council tax.

And national service, of course.

We also need to think in terms of restructuring people’s working to allow for full time parenting. (Of course a 3 day week would actually allow many couples to do that while remaining in full time work.)

While I am not sure whether the 3 day week would work (surely it would have to be done multilaterally, across all of Europe at the very least, and you’ll never get the Americans to agree to it), we do need to move away from the notion that women must or should lose out financially because they look after children - there needs to be recognition that men benefit greatly from more time with their offspring. We still live in a society where female lawyers are explicitly informed that having children will scupper their chances of a partnership. A complete change in attitude and working practices needs to be made, because we are currently losing a huge and valuable chunk of our workforce while we refuse to accept that high achievers can work part-time.

Ben - to say that poor people in Britain don’t own cars is just surreally stupid. It reveals a mental universe of fable and fantasy in which the downtrodden urban poor are the perpetual victims of the evil Tory boss class. By your own admission, you got involved in socialism and Labour Party politics after being brought up in Jersey and winning a place at Oxford, which makes me think you were a naive young fresher with little experience of the real world on which to base your ideological assumptions. Sounds like you still are.

Why don’t you take a month off to travel around Britain and actually meet the people you’re simultaneously valourising, patronising and mythologising? They’re not who you think they are.

What Judy said really.

Trouble is Gordo has poured money into the public sector, and much of it has been mismanaged and misspent by the various trusts and governing bodies set up to monitor it. Look at all the money pinched from the public sector under the guise of pfi for hospitals, (there is even a building cartel if recent reports are to be believed). And we still have the worst record for MRSA in Europe.

Where did the money poured into the Health sector go? largely into the pockets of GPs, many of whom now seem to work part time. And you still can’t get a doctor’s appointment when you want one. Elsewhere in the NHS the recruitment of young doctors has been totally mismanaged.

Many of these potential problems were pointed out when the schemes were first mooted, and brushed aside, by Labour politicians who chose to believe that everything could be managed by targets. Well it can’t. If you don’t know the background to setting the targets in the first place, as the policy makers in Labour quangos and government departments clearly do not.

Brown for example apparently thought that petrol tanker drivers were employed by the oil companies who could order them back to work when they went on strike. Wrong. Defra as it then was, clearly had no idea how food was transported to the abbatoir and round the country when foot and mouth broke out. The Health Service employers had no idea what work GPs were doing and how much night work, so were bamboozled into a settlement which stunned even the doctors reps themselves at its generosity.

The Olympic bid budget did not include any provision for VAT. The Home office told us 13,000 Poles a year would come to the UK and then not stay very long. Gordo’s advisors “overlooked” all the people who would be hit by the 10p tax removal, like 500,000 women between 60-65, all the early retired, all those young people on low incomes. The list goes on. Often you think they are making it up as they go along.

Those public bodies set up to provide additional benefits either managed a hopelessly complex system (Income support) or mismanaged it (Child Tax Credits). Meanwhile old people have to sell their houses to get basic health care in many areas; our solidiers die overseas from lack of proper equipment.

This is why the public is fed up with New Labour.

“Where did the money poured into the Health sector go? largely into the pockets of GPs, many of whom now seem to work part time.”

Theres no need to be silly