Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Sun Jun 26, 2016 12:34 pm  

And now Labour start a civil war amongst themselves, lovely.

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Sun Jun 26, 2016 1:06 pm  

It's a strange if not interesting time in politics the Lib Dems committed political suicide and the two main parties have completely imploded.

Quite bizarre

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Sun Jun 26, 2016 1:38 pm  

A Ten Point Plan For Labour To Regain The Workers Vote

1) Stop supporting the free movement of Labour! At one time Labour fought to save jobs in local communities whilst the capitalists told workers to ‘get on their bikes and find work’. Studies have proven that immigration has small impact on average wages but more significant impacts along the wage distribution, low-waged workers lose while medium and high-paid workers gain.
2) Guarantee that all legitimate asylum seekers and refugees will be welcome to find safety in our country.
3) Put Blair and Cameron on trial for their war crimes.
4) Nationalise the Banking system.
5) Use newly created public money to start building the infrastructure needed, new houses, new schools etc.
6) Pledge the British forces will never set foot on foreign soil unless working under a U.N mandate.
7) Pledge to help workers and unions in other countries in their struggle against global capitalism
8 Repeal all anti union laws enacted since the days of Thatcher.
9) Pledge to introduce proportional representation into U.K politics.
10) Pledge to ban fracking in the U.K and to promote a ‘Green’ energy bill.

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Sun Jun 26, 2016 5:32 pm  

I'd agree with most of that. I'm not against free movement of labour, however it's clear the majority of the electorate are, and both major parties have dismissed this group of voters as bigots. To be fair some of them are, but that doesn't mean the politicians who are meant to represent their constituents should ignore them. It alienates them, and as a result are gravitated to the likes of UKIP.

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Sun Jun 26, 2016 6:51 pm  

LeighGionaire wrote:

A Ten Point Plan For Labour To Regain The Workers Vote

1) Stop supporting the free movement of Labour! At one time Labour fought to save jobs in local communities whilst the capitalists told workers to ‘get on their bikes and find work’. Studies have proven that immigration has small impact on average wages but more significant impacts along the wage distribution, low-waged workers lose while medium and high-paid workers gain.
2) Guarantee that all legitimate asylum seekers and refugees will be welcome to find safety in our country.
3) Put Blair and Cameron on trial for their war crimes.
4) Nationalise the Banking system.
5) Use newly created public money to start building the infrastructure needed, new houses, new schools etc.
6) Pledge the British forces will never set foot on foreign soil unless working under a U.N mandate.
7) Pledge to help workers and unions in other countries in their struggle against global capitalism
8 Repeal all anti union laws enacted since the days of Thatcher.
9) Pledge to introduce proportional representation into U.K politics.
10) Pledge to ban fracking in the U.K and to promote a ‘Green’ energy bill.

I agree with that list. However, the decision to leave the EU is only even vaguely relevant to number (1). Yet unless we accept (1), we will have tariffs on all our trade, which will essentially bankrupt us and thus prevent us from spending money on anything from the rest of the list.

The real answer to free movement of people is not to erect a fence to keep them out, but to impose and enforce a national minimum wage which allows British workers to live with dignity and comfort, and prevents unscrupulous companies from undercutting those workers using cheap imported Labour. After all, if everyone who wants a decent job has one, then nobody really gives a stuff if some guys from Warsaw are working alongside them.

That's at the heart of this - firms who deliberately import and recruit workers on pay and conditions which would be below a level of decency for British workers trying to live a normal family life. And that's not going to be affected in any way by the EU exit. Indeed, the EU should be part of the solution, because by imposing common standards for workers (holidays, maternity leave, minimum pay) across the continent, it makes it much harder for firms to play the "You'll accept low wages, or I'm off to Slovakia" card.

The EU was part of the solution, not part of the problem. The marginalised working class should have been campaigning for the UK government to take a lead in strengthening EU employment legislation in order to prevent such exploitation by greedy firms.

Instead, we've voted for a group of charlatans who have already confirmed that free movement of Labour will continue outside the EU, and they will take this opportunity to remove the employment protections which the EU did actually impose (they call it "red-tape", and a few more people should have asked what it was before they merrily voted to cut it).

This was a decision of monumental self-defeating stupidity. I'm sorry if that gets people's backs up, but it was. In every way, this vote will make conditions for British workers worse. Our employment protections will be cut by the extreme right-wingers who are about to take over, free movement of Labour will remain, as it does with any country which wants to trade with the EU without tariffs, and there'll be fewer jobs and higher prices as firms pull out of the UK to relocate inside the EU, and imports become more expensive due to the devalued pound.

So yes, I support your list. But we just voted against every single item on it. This is the biggest facepalm in British political history.

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Sun Jun 26, 2016 10:01 pm  

Labour will never learn. The Blairites who have more or less destroyed the party are now destroying the remnants.

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Mon Jun 27, 2016 9:26 am  

Roy Haggerty wrote:

I agree with that list. However, the decision to leave the EU is only even vaguely relevant to number (1). Yet unless we accept (1), we will have tariffs on all our trade, which will essentially bankrupt us and thus prevent us from spending money on anything from the rest of the list.

The real answer to free movement of people is not to erect a fence to keep them out, but to impose and enforce a national minimum wage which allows British workers to live with dignity and comfort, and prevents unscrupulous companies from undercutting those workers using cheap imported Labour. After all, if everyone who wants a decent job has one, then nobody really gives a stuff if some guys from Warsaw are working alongside them.

That's at the heart of this - firms who deliberately import and recruit workers on pay and conditions which would be below a level of decency for British workers trying to live a normal family life. And that's not going to be affected in any way by the EU exit. Indeed, the EU should be part of the solution, because by imposing common standards for workers (holidays, maternity leave, minimum pay) across the continent, it makes it much harder for firms to play the "You'll accept low wages, or I'm off to Slovakia" card.

The EU was part of the solution, not part of the problem. The marginalised working class should have been campaigning for the UK government to take a lead in strengthening EU employment legislation in order to prevent such exploitation by greedy firms.

Instead, we've voted for a group of charlatans who have already confirmed that free movement of Labour will continue outside the EU, and they will take this opportunity to remove the employment protections which the EU did actually impose (they call it "red-tape", and a few more people should have asked what it was before they merrily voted to cut it).

This was a decision of monumental self-defeating stupidity. I'm sorry if that gets people's backs up, but it was. In every way, this vote will make conditions for British workers worse. Our employment protections will be cut by the extreme right-wingers who are about to take over, free movement of Labour will remain, as it does with any country which wants to trade with the EU without tariffs, and there'll be fewer jobs and higher prices as firms pull out of the UK to relocate inside the EU, and imports become more expensive due to the devalued pound.

So yes, I support your list. But we just voted against every single item on it. This is the biggest facepalm in British political history.

Absolutely spot on - the country has just been consigned to the economic doldrums off the back of a referendum that even its poster child didn't expect or want to win; Boris Johnson, make no mistake, would have campaigned just as vociferously for Remain, if it meant ousting his old Bullingdon rival and getting a crack at the PM job. His jolly jape has now gone disastrously wrong, and all the low paid, working class people who voted Out will face a future under the yoke of a right wing Tory rule that will erode their rights and freedoms far more egregiously than any made-up European legislation - most of which did more good than harm in terms of protecting workers rights and social justice.

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Mon Jun 27, 2016 10:29 am  

Thankfully the shadow politicians who were as much Labour as That woman have taken their bat and ball home and gone off to sulk. If they haven't the stones to fight their beliefs from within what chance outside? Well to me I wouldn't trust them at all nor should the current or future leader.
We live in interesting times and a great opportunity for change, the faux politicians will soon be found out, as some already have, and perhaps the future may be beneficial once these people from all parties have been found out.

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Mon Jun 27, 2016 4:48 pm  

A great opportunity for change.

Change without an opposition, or any parties that are willing to talk amongst themselves never mind each other.

If you voted against the establishment and the old politicians then be aware that you gave those exact same people two years to undertake the largest transformation in the country's history and pretty much gave them a two year deadline with which to do it. If you consider this a process by which "the worker" will win you are going to be disappointed.

Re: Will Labour Ever Learn? : Mon Jun 27, 2016 6:39 pm  

vbfg wrote:

A great opportunity for change.

Change without an opposition, or any parties that are willing to talk amongst themselves never mind each other.

If you voted against the establishment and the old politicians then be aware that you gave those exact same people two years to undertake the largest transformation in the country's history and pretty much gave them a two year deadline with which to do it. If you consider this a process by which "the worker" will win you are going to be disappointed.

Like a lot of Remain voters, I feel trapped in a bit of a nightmare not of my own making. All the economic experts said that if we vote Brexit, the consequences for the nation's economy would be catastrophic. Gove said "Pah, who needs experts?", and every Tom, Dick and Harry who hasn't looked at a graph since school decided that all the economists and institutions were wrong, and we voted Brexit.

Now, we have economic carnage. The markets are first to move, because they're the most reactive, and it's been unbelievable on there. It's now worse in the UK than when the entire world's economic system came close to collapse after Lehman Brothers. The pound has effectively devalued to the levels of thirty years ago, ratings agencies have downgraded the UK's credit ratings, and there are companies left, right and centre issuing notices about reducing/delaying investment, relocation, and profit warnings.

Yet mention this to some Brexiters, and they start talking about "Project Fear", as if you're conjecturing. But this isn't a prediction any more, it's fact. It's actually happening. This isn't academic either. Already I know people whose companies have had orders cancelled, housing chains which have collapsed as buyers have pulled out. Pension funds are losing value hand over fist, and today some bank shares had to be suspended. It's not Project Fear. It's reality. It's a self-inflicted reality. And it's not just going to go away. This is only Day 2 in trading terms. We haven't even given notice of Article 50 being invoked yet, so you'd have to conjecture that half the market is still holding on in the vague hope that our Government (whoever that turns out to be) won't actually go ahead and pull the lever to open the trapdoor we've chosen to stand on. When we pull that lever, the consequences are going to be truly horrible.

Yet what do we get from those dishonest clowns who ran the Leave campaign? "Oh, we always said there'd be a few bumps in the road." Jesus. If this sounds panic-stricken, then yes, it probably is. There are people reading their pro-Brexit tabloids who still think this stuff is made up. They're like Monty Python's Black Knight claiming having both arms cut off was just a flesh wound!

It's not, people. It's happening. We'd better pray that someone emerges from the political pygmies currently in charge, and finds a way to apply the brakes to this train, or we are going off the cliff, and it's a long drop.