CWU support of Jeremy Corbyn

[jetblack]

Do you know, I think that some of you guys are actually highlighting the true problem here. And its not Jeremy Corbyn at all, its the electoral system. A system whereby seats in middle England hold the balance of power, and a disproportionate sway in party politics.

Look at the experience of UKIP - wether you like them or not it simply cannot be right and proper that when a party that gains 13% of the vote it only translates into 1 seat (out of 650 in the Commons - thats 0.15% of the seats !!).

First past the post is archaic and anachronistic - Single Transferable Vote is a system way more fitting for a 21st century advanced democracy. That way, you lot could vote for Peter Mandelson, I could vote for Jeremy Corbyn - we'd all find representation in Parliament, where we could form a left wing coalition to oust the Tories (as with Syriza in Greece).

But under the current system the only chance the left has of forming a Government is to become the Tory party.

This isn't working. And it won't end well unless someone, somewhere starts looking at the real issues in this country. And we all start pulling together to work for our common interests - not joining in the personality politics backstabbing treachoury of the last week or so.

[fishtank]

Labour's leadership election process is flawed.
If a leader loses the support of almost every MP under him he cannot lead, in such circumstances there needs to be a process for removing him. It's basic leadership 101 Teebs

It must be a high threshold to stop Machiavellian plots but I think if you can only scrape together 40 votes out of over 200 you've easily passed that test. How long does the Labour party have to be without an effective leader in order to protect a flawed democratic process?

[jetblack]

Labour's leadership election process is flawed.
If a leader loses the support of almost every MP under him he cannot lead, in such circumstances there needs to be a process for removing him. It's basic leadership 101 Teebs

It must be a high threshold to stop Machiavellian plots but I think if you can only scrape together 40 votes out of over 200 you've easily passed that test. How long does the Labour party have to be without an effective leader in order to protect a flawed democratic process?

The flawed part is in the Labour Party not being able to effectively deselect and remove traitors working in the interests of themselves and no-one else. Len MacCluskey says it might now be on the table that deselection could be a lot more swift and effective. Gone are the days (or they should be at least) that Labour Mps are a law unto themselves.

[dvbuk55]

jb, Just how many labour MPs do you think would be in parliament if they went into a general election with Corbyn as the leader. Remember the Liberals at the last election, they were slaughtered.

So its all right to ignore a democratic vote in some circumstances

Is that only if you disagree with the outcome. Remainers are wrong to want to overturn a democratic decision (I think they are), but anti-Corbyn MPs are right to try and depose a Leader which an absolute majority of the party voted for.

It's the right of MPs to call for a vote of no confidence in the leader tbt, providing they can muster 50 in favour - they had 172 with only 40 against. These are people well versed in the political arena, many of them with cabinet experience,(something Corbyn hasn't got) in fact the entire cabinet, almost, resigned. Even some of those newly appointed later resigned. I mean there is an element of self preservation they wouldn't want to put their position on the line to support someone who has no charisma or leadership abilities. You're talking about the constituency party support tbt, the flat cap and roll up brigade who love the rhetoric he spouts - I just wonder how supportive they would be with a Tory government for the next 20 years.

In truth I don't think Corbyn thought he would win and when he did he was like a fish out of water.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Labour's leadership election process is flawed.
If a leader loses the support of almost every MP under him he cannot lead, in such circumstances there needs to be a process for removing him. It's basic leadership 101 Teebs

It must be a high threshold to stop Machiavellian plots but I think if you can only scrape together 40 votes out of over 200 you've easily passed that test. How long does the Labour party have to be without an effective leader in order to protect a flawed democratic process?

There is, they get someone to stand against him and we have a vote. The PLP so far haven't found someone willing to stand though. The one thing that the coup has shown though is how far out of touch with their normal membership they are, a cry often heard about the CWU

Perhaps we do need a change in voting procedures overall FPTP isn't fair for small parties, and the current method of selecting a leader for Labour has failed the Parliamentary Party.

[fishtank]

The flawed part is in the Labour Party not being able to effectively deselect and remove traitors working in the interests of themselves and no-one else. Len MacCluskey says it might now be on the table that deselection could be a lot more swift and effective. Gone are the days (or they should be at least) that Labour Mps are a law unto themselves.

Deselecting "traitors" or anyone who doesn't agree with you sounds like a dictatorship to me.
If Thatcher had the ability to deselect "traitors" she would probably been in power for another 20 years.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

They had their vote of no confidence and won it, so why is no one putting themselves forward so that the Labour Party members can choose. Because they want Corbyn to resign so they can ignore the democratic decision of their members, and put forward their own career candidates, of which none will be "socialists"

My core question is not about who is leader, and whether he is good enough to be one or not. But is it right to overturn a Democratic decision just because you disagree with it.

However, I think (and you can call me a conspiracy nutter if you want), but this Coup is nothing to do with Corbyn's electability. Its more of a Blairite wing attempt to protect Tony from the fall out of the Chilcott enquiry. With a "loyal" Blairite in charge they can "control" the fall out more easily than they will be able to with Corbyn in charge. This is why they want Corbyn to resign now, so they can replace him with a loyalist until after the election. If he stays..........

[fishtank]

This is the blunt truth.
The Labour party has around 400,000 members.
In 2015....... 9,400,000 people voted Labour.
Who is listening to the other 9,000,000?

The Labour membership does not reflect Labour voters, never mind anyone else.
It has been hijacked by activists who are prepared to put their own agenda before the good of the country, the student union experiment is over. This isn't a Blairite coup, 172 MPs ffs, the reason they don't want another election is because the validity of the membership has been compromised, 60, 000 new members in the space of a couple of days, if that doesn't set off alarm bells for someone who believes in democracy nothing will.

[jetblack]

This is the blunt truth.
The Labour party has around 400,000 members.
In 2015....... 9,400,000 people voted Labour.
Who is listening to the other 9,000,000?

The Labour membership does not reflect Labour voters, never mind anyone else.

I don't understand what you are calling for here.
Lets say Mrs. Jetblack is an individual with certain values,norms and beliefs (as we all are). And lets say that she joins the Labour Party tommorrow on the grounds that she believes that it is the party that most closely reflects and stands for her core values/norms/beliefs.
Are you suggesting that the day after she has joined Mrs.Jetblack should somehow abandon that which she believes in, in order to win over voters who may or may not have voted Labour anyhow ?

How is that democratic ? Its a kind of schizophrenic sell out. Join a political party and become someone else ?

No, what should happen - which is what actually did happen - is that someone like Mrs.Jb should join the party as described above - and then stick to her dearly held principles as a member of the party, voting accordingly in the democratic election for the party leader - ergo, Jeremy Corbyn.

The nation then decides at general election wether they are in agreement with the person so elected by its party.

What shouldn't happen is that an establishment elite (and we all know who I'm talking about here) have a stranglehold on the party - thereby securing the selection of their candidate. And when, 20 years down the line, said establishment elite have ruined the credibility of the party having taking us into illegal wars (and, yes, I am looking forward to Chilcott), sold out, abandoned those that they were meant to represent etc etc , they then work tirelessly to undermine the democratically elected party leader who has come to prominence largely as a direct result of said elites incompetence and duplicity.

[fishtank]

Corbyn was elected to lead the PLP.
He obviously isn't leading the PLP.
You want to wait another 4 years and another embarrassing election defeat before you do anything about that?
It is an impossible position to maintain.

Mrs jetblack needs to decide if she wants to see a credible opposition to government or a one party state opposed by an increasingly irrelevant protest movement. These are difficult grown up decisions we all have to make, idealism is a wonderful thing especially when you're young and free of complications like mortgages and children but it's not reality, Not to worry though, eventually the Labour voting base will shrink so much that not only will the membership reflect Labour voters, it will pretty much be Labour's only voters.

Is Jeremy Corbyn's position worth having UKIP as the official government opposition?
If I was a conspiracy theorist I would wonder how many of Labour's new members were called Farage.

[dvbuk55]

Well it's like this jb, we don't vote for the leader, we vote for the policies put forward as the mandate for election and if old jb puts forward his philosophy as the policy of the labour party it's good night Vienna, labour voters will shun the polling booth until such time as feasible electable policies are put forward. I've voted labour for as long as I've been able to vote but I will not vote for Corbyn, I'd rather vote UKIP.

I'm also a Man United supporter and was sick to death of hearing "this is the van Gaal philosophy" well it got him the sack because it was not the way the fans wanted them to play - not that I'm suggesting this guy is going to produce miracles but when it's time to change it's time to change. Corbyn is boasting he has the support of 200,000 supporters and Van Gaal used to say "we haf 62% possession" but they still lost 2-0.

The lesson is you can have a wonderful philosophy but it doesn't win you the game.

[jetblack]

I'm sorry but you are putting the cart before the horse, and getting cause and effect the wrong way round.

Ukip polled 13% of the vote in the last general election, yes - but that was prior to Jeremy Corbyn being elected, at a time when the party was essentailly still in the throes of Blairism.
Corbyn's election was a result of the turmoil the Labour Party was in post the last general election. Don't try to pin the Labour Party's shocking recent performances at the ballot box on Jeremy - those performances were achieved at a time, let it be said, when the naive populist approach that some people on this thread seem to still be espousing ie. that you have to appeal to the electorate (which is a truism of course) in order to win power, was in full swing. And even with all that bending over backwards to beat the Tories at their own game, the party was still hammered. Have you learned nothing ?
If you are going to get beat, at least get beat whilst being true to yourself, and maintaining some kind of dignity. At least you will have offered a true alternative - and maybe one day the people might see through the propoganda they are pushed and come round to your way of thinking. You are wanting to take us back to a time when the people had no choice.

Its time for a change - and whilst the mass media and the Tory establishment have and will, effectively, crucify Jeremy Corbyn, I think its time that some in the Labour movement woke up and smelled the coffee, grasped the nettle, and had a long hard look at why they are in this game at all.
And if they can't remember, go join the Lib Dems.

edit. van Gaal got sack cos he lost football matches. The analogy would be for Corbyn to plummet us into deep recession/riots on the street, whilst in Government.
Hey, wait a minute ...

Corbyn hasn't had the chance to do that yet - so its not a fair comparison.

[fishtank]

Corbyn was elected to lead the PLP.
He obviously isn't leading the PLP.

You constantly ignore this basic issue.

[Tman]

There's what's "right" and there's harsh reality, and just like the cyclist who's been run over by an artic feebly muttering "but I had right of way", sometimes reality is the only way to survive.
JC is another loser, appealing to no-one and losing ground in his own party.
If he had any personal pride, integrity or real affinity with the Labour Party movement he'd be gone by now.

[dvbuk55]

edit. van Gaal got sack cos he lost football matches. The analogy would be for Corbyn to plummet us into deep recession/riots on the street, whilst in Government.
Hey, wait a minute ...

Corbyn hasn't had the chance to do that yet - so its not a fair comparison.

Well that's never going to happen because Corbyn is never going to form a government, although they say you should never say never but I'm so confident that if Corbyn gets elected I'll show my ar5e on the town hall steps midday on a Saturday and post it on here