Labour Leadership Contest

hibeejim21 · 23-02-2021, 04:19

Starmer's problem is he doesn't have anything that defines him politically. He's had a year now just about and I cant think of one thing he remotely stands for.

I think the press are getting a bit twitchy as well because he's really dull, they must be wondering what they are going to spend the next 3 years writing about after the relentless pile on with Corbyn (and that man is obviously a lot stronger than given credit for) . Don't get me wrong a bit of dull could be not a bad thing, but for political journalists its a No No.

Observation from the last week. He looks to me like he would crack if he got some sustained pressure from the hacks.

**spireitematt** · 23-02-2021, 19:31

They seem to be changing the colours from Red to Purple.

Labour have annoyed Liverpool. The Mayoral elections are coming up and Labour members in Liverpool chose 3 candidates to stand, all women but Labour reviewed the selection process and it's come out today the 3 candidates have been barred from standing and Labour have opened up the applications with 2 days left till the deadline. The three candidates in question were left wing and one of them Anna Rothery the favourite was endorsed by Jeremy Corbyn.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-me...e-56168822

0762 · (This post was last modified: 23-02-2021, 23:04 by 0762.)

No unity with their grassroots membership TBF. Same goes re their relationship with their whittled down membership (and certain senior officials) in Scotland and certain trade unions who don't share Starmer's future vision of Scotland and the current LP stance re Scot politics/interests.

**spireitematt** · 24-02-2021, 00:21

(23-02-2021, 22:59)0762 Wrote: No unity with their grassroots membership TBF. Same goes re their relationship with their whittled down membership (and certain senior officials) in Scotland and certain trade unions who don't share Starmer's future vision of Scotland and the current LP stance re Scot politics/interests.

In May I will have been a member for 11 years (that's if I don't cancel my membership before then) and I feel so disillusioned by the party, I don't even know what Labour stand for and neither does a lot of the membership or voters and if I/they don't know then how are the voters who are not members or Labour voters meant to know. People may not have agreed with or have liked Corbyn but at least you knew what he stood for. Labour seem to be alienating the members, volunteers and traditional voters to try and win votes from the Tories but at the same time they will lose the votes that they have taken for granted for far too long.

Starmer said throughout the leadership election that he would be the unity candidate and bring the party together yet he's done the exact opposite.

hibeejim21 · 24-02-2021, 01:18

I honestly didn't realise he was so politically inexperienced. Those advising him can be the only explanation for some of the decisions being made.

By giving the tories a free run with covid just like on Brexit he is left with nothing to offer the electorate. Corbyn always had a solid base of support from the young left, from minorities and from the membership whereas he just looks like a puppet for the likes of mandelson. He's also coming across more and more arrogant as well.

I expect the next couple of years to be little more than him removing the left of the party from the political debate and the parties public face. It might be enough to keep him in the game but its looking more and more like he's proper fucked it.

0762 · (This post was last modified: 27-02-2021, 00:42 by 0762.)

I'm sure one of his prime objectives was to win back all the "red wall" areas of England that Johnson and his spin doctor(s) duped in 2019 using the bogus Brexit argument to "win them over". But IMO he is "stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea" with lotsa members positioned to the left of the party and opposing Brexit. The LP is effectively a political party with two different political ideologies within it and, as you say, Starmer is not the unifier that many people perceived him to be. He is not even close to emulating a smarmy piece of a previous Labour PM named Tony Blair who was a real sleekit beastie with a unifying plan all these years ago before he finally became the Brit PM. Perhaps the Labour Party should naturally fragment into two different political entities? Even up here in Scotland I think there is no senior SLP official of any kinda high standing who is strong enough to propose breaking away from their "ruling party" in London and going it alone in a Scotland with a totally different political landscape and with a new young generation of Scots, age group 17-45 (about 75%) fast coming to the fore in backing Scot independence and with a common extreme response to anyone actually asking why - lotsa them seriously regarding it as a stupid question.

**spireitematt** · 27-02-2021, 20:14

Scottish Labour have elected Anas Sarwar as Scottish Labour leader. He's a multi-millionaire who is anti-independence, pro-union. His family firm got in trouble for paying less than the living wage to employees.

https://www.glasgowtimes.co.uk/news/1552...ving-wage/

0762 · (This post was last modified: 01-03-2021, 20:33 by 0762.)

An ex-Blairite as well - just what Scottish Labour don't need! At least he told that little weasel of a Scot Tory leader, DROSS, where to go after being asked to join up in a unionist "better together" collaboration to supposedly bring down the SNP. That's where we are currently at up here in Scotland - not a shred of real opposition or true political leader of any kinda proper standing up here and certainly not any "govt in waiting". God help us if that miraculously materialised but it won't!

hibeejim21 · (This post was last modified: 28-02-2021, 03:32 by hibeejim21.)

The irony is that Richard Leonard was actually starting to get small improvements in labours polling (I know I know) and then he gets binned for this blairite has been. Leonard beat this muppet in the previous leadership election as well.

It's all part of labours blind sleepwalk towards apeing the Blair years in the hope that it all will come true for them again. They will get xxxx annihilated in May. The Labour Party has only got about 13k members in Scotland now...its a dead party walking.

Starmer will blame Corbyn and the left for the tanking they are going to get in May, but eventually he is going to have to take some responsibility.

**spireitematt** · 01-03-2021, 20:19

(28-02-2021, 03:31)hibeejim21 Wrote: The irony is that Richard Leonard was actually starting to get small improvements in labours polling (I know I know) and then he gets binned for this blairite has been. Leonard beat this muppet in the previous leadership election as well.

It's all part of labours blind sleepwalk towards apeing the Blair years in the hope that it all will come true for them again. They will get xxxx annihilated in May. The Labour Party has only got about 13k members in Scotland now...its a dead party walking.

Starmer will blame Corbyn and the left for the tanking they are going to get in May, but eventually he is going to have to take some responsibility.

Labour are finished in Scotland. 1 seat in 2019, 6 seats in 2017, 1 seat in 2015. You have to go back to 2010 when Labour had a lot of seats in Scotland. 2010 and before was mainly a mixture of Lib Dem, SNP and Labour. As it stands you've got 1 Labour seat, 3 Tory seats, 3 Lib Dem and the rest is SNP.