That Starmer fella...

Tory by another name innit?

Bit of a case of headline-itis, that.

Tarry wasn't sacked for appearing on a picket line. At least five of the shad cab have done so and have kept their jobs.

Tarry was sacked for:

• promoting himself to shadow secretary of state for transport (he isn't)
  
• making an unauthorised round of publicity for personal reasons
  
• making up policy on the fly - in this case saying that Labour supported the RMT's demands for above inflation pay rises when the actual shad cab position is that we would support anything the RTM would accept
  
  

Even though I wasn't a big Corbyn fan I always defended him when the media misrepresented him. Starmer's being misrepresented here. Here's how Labour announced it:

"This isn't about appearing on a picket line. Members of the front bench sign up to collective responsibility. That includes media appearances being approved and speaking to agreed frontbench positions.

"As a government in waiting, any breach of collective responsibility is taken extremely seriously and for these reasons Sam Tarry has been removed from the frontbench."

This is an eminently sensible position.

If Starmer hadn't sacked him, he would be taking flack for not having control of his MP's, so it's lose lose

I think people universally recognise that JC's leadership was poor, but more importantly he was hopeless at keeping his house in order.

No one is going to believe you can lead a country when you can't lead your own party. Unfortunately the sensible call for labour at the moment is to act swiftly and forcefully if people step out of line.

Hopefully at some point various labour MPs will figure that out too.

Nothing to do with the campaign to deselect Tarry in Ilford south in favour of Jas Athwal then?

Wasn't there something weird going on with that last time round? Tarry was selected as Jas Athwal was suspended the day before the selection or something?

I mean, you can come up with all kinds of guesses for justification.

He's just left his wife for Angela Rayner hasn't he?

Yup, Athwal was dropped at the last minute as it seemed that Tarry had a high-profile backer in the PLP. Now that he’s out of favour with the current Blairite leadership they’re looking to shoehorn Athwal back in cos he’s a nice friendly red Tory.

This is an eminently sensible position.

I'd put it to you, that to the majority of Labours 'natural constituency', it's an eminently esoteric position.

Whatever the reasoning behind it, the headline is factual, Kier Starmer did sack him, and he was clearly supporting striking rail workers.

What is the point of Labour being a government in waiting if they're not going to support the working class because of the 'optics'?

First and last bullet points in bleekrefs reply addresses that, no?

Now the choice is either full fat tory or tory light "Labour"!

Having just googled it it sounds a bit more than he was just dropped
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/oct/04/jas-athwal-labour-councillor-tells-of-darkest-time-in-suspension-row

Nothing to do with the campaign to deselect Tarry in Ilford south in favour of Jas Athwal then?

EVERYTHING to do with it. Sam would never have put himself in a position where he was making unauthorised TV interviews, announcing policy on the fly, breaking a moratorium on appearing on a picket line, promoting himself to shad secretary of state (etc) if he weren't trying to get himself fired. And he wouldn't be trying to get himself fired if he wasn't facing deselection after having benefited from the Jas Athwal stitchup.

But having done those things any leader would've fired him, irrespective of his reasoning, or been perceived as being utterly without authority.

Well that’s fine then, isn’t it?

The Party has become a fucking joke, I’m afraid. I’m out.

Indeed….

Sadly this is actually the opposite of a joke party. Getting everyone working in the same direction is one element of what you have to do to to win.

The question in my mind is what, is the unifying vision they plan to use to motivate people? (the carrot if you want). Blair was strong on creating a positive message to rally folk behind. What is Starmer's?

What is Starmer's?

I reckon he should go with "if everyone stops arguing with each other we might actually win".

I'd put it to you, that to the majority of Labours 'natural constituency

Urban professionals?

I'd put it to you, that to the majority of Labours 'natural constituency', it's an eminently esoteric position.

If you consider Labour's 'natural constituency' to be the trades union movement, you're absolutely right. But that's a reductionist view of Labour, which has always been an alliance between socialists (then later, democratic socialists), social democrats, the TU movement and the Liberal movement. Against those constituencies a blanket position of solidarity with one means rejecting the other.

Whatever the reasoning behind it, the headline is factual, Kier Starmer did sack him, and he was clearly supporting striking rail workers.

But he wasn't sacked for supporting striking rail workers. The headline implies causation when there's at best correlation.

What is the point of Labour being a government in waiting if they're not going to support the working class because of the 'optics'?

Here's the key, isn't it. The working class isn't just those striking - for the most part the working class is not unionised, reads The Sun, and gets less than ten seconds of domestic news a day. And if the Murdoch press uses that ten seconds to say 'its Starmers fault you couldn't get home from your zero hours contract in order to see your underfed kids for three minutes before you go to your night shift as an Uber driver' then you will not vote Labour.

Starmer is in a position where he needs to convince a decent chunk of people who voted Tory last time to vote Labour this time. That means convincing them that our role would not simply be to encourage strikes, but to do a better job of resolving disputes fairly. I think it is fairly obvious that in those negotiations he would be on the side of the workers, but it's catnip to rightwingers if he said it out loud.

You might think that's a cowardly position. You might even be right! But it's clearly a strategy and it's one designed to get us into power. I'm going to at least see if it works.

Hypothetical question - if it does get him into power, will he then discard it and actually introduce policies that will help people? Or will he be beholden to the newspaper proprietors who have allowed him to win and be forced to pursue policies that strengthen the status quo?

I think it is fairly obvious that in those negotiations he would be on the side of the workers

It's a nice idea but is there any available evidence for this?

The big problem is that socialism is regarded as dangerous dog shit by a large chunk of the electorate. It's Marxist this, socialist that. You'll all run out of money if the hard left take over! They'll take your houses! You'll be taxed to the eyeballs! You'll lose your rights!

I'd vote for a truly left party in a heartbeat but also know that no left wing party would have a chance in hell of winning an election. None.

Not right now anyway. Maybe the election after next.

Not to mention the fact that the media has successfully tarred the left with the terrorist sympathiser hypocrite dishonesty brush.

Seriously, go out and ask some daily mail readers why they would never have voted for Corbyn. You'll be shocked.

Just the first two that came up in a search. THIS is what the left are fighting against.

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A couple more for good measure.

The left of the labour party have still not managed to emerge from this slander.

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