The Labour Party has shafted us all

[MinisterofCucumber]

"There's a parasite called Toxoplasma gondii that colonises the brains of rats, altering their behaviour to attract them to the scent of their predators. The rats seek out cats and get eaten, allowing the parasite to keep circulating. This is New Labour. It has colonised a movement that fought for social justice, distribution and decency, rewired its brain and delivered it to the fat cats who were once its enemies.

I understand the hazards of voting for the smaller parties and allowing the right-hand glove puppet to replace the left-hand glove puppet. I know that the Tories are even worse than this government. But by voting for the candidates on the list compiled by the democracy campaign Hang 'em – not all of whom are Liberal Democrats, but all of whom are reformers with a good chance of taking or keeping seats – we can break this rotten system while remaining true to our beliefs."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... -fear-hope" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[mdm]

"There's a parasite called Toxoplasma gondii that colonises the brains of rats, altering their behaviour to attract them to the scent of their predators. The rats seek out cats and get eaten, allowing the parasite to keep circulating. This is New Labour. It has colonised a movement that fought for social justice, distribution and decency, rewired its brain and delivered it to the fat cats who were once its enemies.

I understand the hazards of voting for the smaller parties and allowing the right-hand glove puppet to replace the left-hand glove puppet. I know that the Tories are even worse than this government. But by voting for the candidates on the list compiled by the democracy campaign Hang 'em – not all of whom are Liberal Democrats, but all of whom are reformers with a good chance of taking or keeping seats – we can break this rotten system while remaining true to our beliefs."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... -fear-hope" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

nothing can be worse than this lying, incompetent, fraudulent, arrogant out of touch party. I'm hope this is the death knell of labour, serves them right!

[pcb]

The New Labour project was middle class and has now run its course. I believe that the Labour Party is better than the rest of the other parties for the working class. a few things you should remember:
National Minimum Wage
50 new employment rights since 1997
Equal pay and conditions for part time wqual pro rata pay/pension/holiday entitlement
28 days paid holiday
free nbursey places for 3 to 4 year olds
PROTECTION FROM DISMISSAL FOR STRIKERS RAISED FROM 8 WEEKS TO !2 WEEKS
Child trust funds of £250 to every baby and £500 to low income families
Cut income tax for the 22 million basic rate tax payers
Winter fuel payments for over 60s of at least £130 and rising up to £400
NHS 39,000 more doctors and 72,000 more nurses than when the Tories were last in power!

There are many other things which they have done but I also recognise that they have not done enough.
Labour is the old working class party which has always been reformist so by definition it will never do enough but without a viable working class alternative you should support the Labour Party whilst pointing out its contradictions until a new working class party forms!On Thursday this country and our workplaces will change forever if the Tories get in!

[clashcityrocker]

Minister - just imagine New Labour on Viagra!

[mdm]

some desperate labour supporters on here, look nobody gives a f**k about the working classes, nobody. no matter what good labour does it is always outweighed by the s**t they do. I'm old enough to remember when we had a socialist government in the 70's and what a mess they made then, so nothing changes and just reinforced my opinion that socialism doesn't work. as for the election let's face it it couldn't get any worse, this country is in deep s**t and whomever wins it - torys or lib dems - have got one hell of a job on there hands. thanks labour!

[savo]

Labour party bankrupts country, Tories come in and sort the mess ( understatement of the century ) having to take difficult and sometimes unpopular decisions, this pisses voters off, Labour re-elected, run out of (our) money again, Tories back in, and so the cycle continues.....

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Labour party bankrupts country, Tories come in and sort the mess ( understatement of the century ) having to take difficult and sometimes unpopular decisions, this pisses voters off, Labour re-elected, run out of (our) money again, Tories back in, and so the cycle continues.....

Hmm

Run on the Pound - Conservatives
3,000,000 unemployed officially - Conservatives
15% BofE lending Rate - Conservatives
Black Wednesday shares collapse - Conservatives
Withdrawal from EMF - Conservatives

Neither Labour or Conservatives have that good a record when it comes to financial propriety.

[Big Daz]

The first part of the article, really makes you wonder why there is support for Labour still from within the union movement


Cling on to nurse for fear of something worse. Though she has become crabbed and vicious, though she has usurped our parents, swiped our inheritance, binned our toys and sold the nursery, we must cower behind her skirts for fear of the beasts that prowl beyond. This, in essence, is what Polly Toynbee, Jonathan Freedland, Seumas Milne and Nick Cohen are now telling us to do.

By instructing us, over the years, to heed fears, not hopes, such voices have allowed Labour to abandon everything it once stood for, and hand us, trussed and oven-ready, to big business and the Daily Mail. We'll be trapped like this for ever, in New Labour's Bermuda triangulation, unless we vote for what we believe in rather than just against what we don't.

This paralysing fear has licensed four tragic developments. It has allowed a parliamentary consensus to form that is well to the right of public feeling, alienating voters. It has created space for ideas – such as the creeping privatisation of almost everything – which were unacceptable to previous generations. It has allowed the Conservatives to appeal to moderate swing voters: if there is so little that divides the two parties, such voters figure, can the Tories really be so bad? And it has permitted a once progressive party to form the most rightwing government this country has suffered since 1945.

Let us begin where my colleagues claim the party's record is strongest: poverty and inequality. During the first seven years of the Labour government there was real progress on poverty. But from 2004 onwards the trend went into reverse. In the three years to 2007-08 the number of people in households living on less than 60% of median income rose by 1.3 million – producing a total better than in 1997, but worse than in 1989. This was before the recession hit, so God knows what the next set of figures will show.

The number of people in extreme poverty (living on less than 40% of median income) never substantially fell: it held steady through the first eight years of Labour government, then rose. There are now 700,000 more people in this condition than when Labour took office, and more than at any point since records began. The average real incomes of the poorest tenth declined by 2% in the 10 years to 2007-08. These figures, again, predate the recession.

The rich, on the other hand, have seldom done better. Of the extra income enjoyed by British households over the Labour years, 40% has accrued to the richest 10% (all references are on my website). The richest 1%, according to Injustice, Danny Dorling's new book, have captured a higher share of national income than at any time since the early 1930s. Inequality in the United Kingdom is now higher than at any point since consistent records began, in 1979. I feel that needs repeating. After 13 years of Labour government, the UK has higher levels of inequality than after 18 years of Tory government.

Why has this happened? Partly because Labour has shifted taxation from the rich to the poor. It cut corporation tax from 33% to 28% and capital gains tax from 40% to 18%. It introduced an entrepreneurs' relief scheme, taxing the first £2m of capital gains at only 10%. It raised the inheritance tax threshold for couples from £300,000 to £600,000.

Yes, the government has introduced and strengthened the minimum wage, and this is real progress. But it has also blocked employment rights for temporary and agency workers and preserved the opt-out clause in the EU's working time directive. The old workers' party has switched allegiance to the bosses, handing key positions to corporate executives and private equity tycoons, even appointing Digby Jones, the neanderthal former head of the CBI, a minister of the crown. It reduced workplace inspections (causing a rise in the number of deaths at work), dropped the requirement that meetings between ministers and corporate lobbyists must be recorded, and stopped the corruption case against BAE.

Having promised to scrap it when in opposition, it has extended the private finance initiative into sectors the Tories didn't dare to touch. Labour left sweeteners in PFI contracts for corporations to find, rigged the figures to make it look as if the scheme delivered value for money, then had to bail out the private operators when it began to collapse. The party also broke its promises to renationalise the railways and take private prisons back into public ownership: the UK now has a higher proportion of its prisoners in corporate jails than the United States.

While Labour has liberated billionaires, it has trussed up the rest of us with 3,500 new criminal offences, including provisions that allow the police to declare any demonstration illegal. It has introduced control orders that place people under permanent house arrest without charge or trial. It has allowed the US to extradite our citizens without producing evidence of an offence. It has colluded in kidnapping and torture. Britain now has more CCTV cameras than any other nation, and a DNA database that is five times the size of its nearest competitor. The number of prisoners in the UK has risen by 41% since Labour took office.

This government blocked a ceasefire in the Lebanon; sacked Britain's ambassador to Uzbekistan after he complained that the regime was boiling its prisoners to death; gave aid to a Colombian military that collaborates with fascist death squads; announced a policy of pre-emptive nuclear war; and decided to waste our money on replacing Trident. But worse, far worse than any of this, it launched an illegal war in which hundreds of thousands have died. This is the government that colleagues of mine on the Guardian want to save.

[solcat]

Labour party bankrupts country, Tories come in and sort the mess ( understatement of the century ) having to take difficult and sometimes unpopular decisions, this pisses voters off, Labour re-elected, run out of (our) money again, Tories back in, and so the cycle continues.....

Hmm

Run on the Pound - Conservatives
3,000,000 unemployed officially - Conservatives
15% BofE lending Rate - Conservatives
Black Wednesday shares collapse run on the pound - Conservatives
Withdrawal from EMF - Conservatives

Neither Labour or Conservatives have that good a record when it comes to financial propriety.

[savo]

Black Wednesday's cost was £3.3Bn - under Gordon our debt grows by £3.6Bn per month.

So we're having worse than a black wednesday once a month.

[savo]

Forgive me, my figures are out of date ( from 2008 )

The debt is actually growing at £14 billion a month, sort of puts Black Wednesday into perspective, dosnt it ?

[pcb]

Savo: where did the debt come from and how much is it against GDP? What is the ratio with other big 5 economies? There is a WORLDWIDE RECESSION going on!

So lets see what Cameron and Osborne (Tories) said when Brown asked for more regulation for the banking sector back in 2002 NO! it will stop free trade. Who said not to help the banks and let them fall (with our money) Cameron and Osborne. Who has said that there is too much protection for workers, who will repeal employment law which protects workers? Cameron and Osborne ps LIB Dems think exactly the same. Just look at their reactions when we were on strike!

[k979aaa]

For they have and how?. Well i started in RM when the Tories were in power and our job the service we provided was first class nothing less!. Now however RM is third rate in delivery of service and the way it treats its staff is their a coloration in this yes NEW LABOUR set out its vision of privatising the public sector and yes we were the Guinea pigs in all this RM was its first project!. FOR IT WAS NEW LABOUR WHO OPENED US TO THE EU POSTAL MARKET AND INSTALLED :lfo & :cfo AND NOT FORGETTING HIM :mfo WHILE NO OTHER MAJOR EU COUNTRY DID SO GAMBLE SO MUCH FOR SO LITTLE BENEFIT FOR ALL ONLY THE FEW!.

[savo]

If Cameron has any sense, he should get the IMF in straight away to go through the books and lay bare the scale of the debts and economic mismanagement that has taken place, including the MAHOOOSIVE amount of PFI Debt that Gay Gordie has hidden off the official balance sheet. That way everyone then knows the true scale of the problems we face, as all 3 parties seriously downplayed the extent of the current crisis pre-election ( they all know that turkeys dont vote for Christmas )

[smokerjim]

If Cameron has any sense, he should get the IMF in straight away to go through the books and lay bare the scale of the debts and economic mismanagement that has taken place, including the MAHOOOSIVE amount of PFI Debt that Gay Gordie has hidden off the official balance sheet. That way everyone then knows the true scale of the problems we face, as all 3 parties seriously downplayed the extent of the current crisis pre-election ( they all know that turkeys dont vote for Christmas )

No they won't because PFI / PPP / any other scheme where private sector hoovers up all the funds with SFA to show for it, is a TORY invention, and what Cameron et al all secret applaud and praise Brown for is for having the chutzpah and brass neck to expand it into areas the Tories would never have dared to ( not even with a 100 seat majority )

If the Tories were clear winners on Friday, it would be all their Xmas' and birthdays at once....now it's going to be a bit harder to do, but they will still give it a bloody good go.