That Starmer fella...

Genuine question as I don't know the answer, are there enough constituencies in this bracket to win a majority?

Short answer, no. But there's also no majority in failing to appeal to anyone outside that bracket too. I think Labour's decline is terminal and they need to arrest it fast by changing the way the party is run. Bin off the member democracy. Bin off the unions. Bin off the Corbynites. Bin off the flag chat.

Start talking about meritocracy. Start talking about roads / crime / antisocial behaviour / housing / the damage of Brexit. Openly argue for social justice. Make electoral pacts with the Greens, Lib Dems, SNP. Create a progressive alliance.

I do appreciate that I'm speaking a bit fast and loose and from frustration but I do think this weekend's results show that a significant change in approach is required. Blairism won't work. Corbynism won't work. And the first attempt at Starmerism hasn't worked.

Thing is Labour briefly mobilised the hopes of the younger generation, who swelled the membership.

Then everyone called them entryists / cultists / idealists / antisemites / etc.

I wonder exactly what the process was - that group join, bring some different priorities (probably more of a focus on social issues as well as traditional left / right politics) and then the vote ebbs away again by 2 years later.

Is that those young people leaving feeling disillusioned, or the voters who had stuck with lab until then being put off?

If the latter, then isn't there a real risk the same happens (for different policy changes) to the Tories, who are merrily changing policies to get the so called red wall?

Problem was that they wanted real change and it started to look like it might actually happen.

That's not quite true though is it? The anti-semitism problem was not brought in by younger/new labour members.

Bin off the member democracy. Bin off the Corbynites.

Who's gonna knock doors/pay their subs?

Bin off the unions.

Who's gonna fund the party?? People seem to forget that the Labour party was founded to represent organised labour, not the other way round

Bin off the flag chat.

This I agree with, and potentially the progressive alliance, although that isn't exactly going to be a silver bullet

Seems like people think the solution is either becoming the Lib Dems or Corbyn's Labour

Also, in spite of declaring that Blairism won't work, what you describe in terms of severing the ties with the unions, diminishing member democracy, talking about meritocracy, crime and antisocial behaviour is absolutely straight out of the Blairite textbook!

Make electoral pacts with the Greens, Lib Dems, SNP. Create a progressive alliance.

The big plus with this is that it is the best hope we would probably ever have of getting meaningful electoral reform through and rebalancing the system

The antisemitism came from a vanishingly small subsection of the membership, yes. But if you think that Corbyn supporters across the board weren’t gleefully tarred with that brush by the Labour Right (who fucking loathe the membership btw, check out Luke “I just lost my council seat but I’m going to lecture the party on how to win elections” Akehurst’s column in the Telegraph from this weekend if you want insight into this phenomenon) then we are living in very different worlds.

https://mobile.twitter.com/mpc_1968/status/1390966470146994178

John Curtis views on where labour should aim are interesting - he seems to support the views above.

Also, in spite of declaring that Blairism won't work, what you describe in terms of severing the ties with the unions, diminishing member democracy, talking about meritocracy, crime and antisocial behaviour is absolutely straight out of the Blairite textbook!

It is. And the commitment to social justice is straight out of Corbyn's. Zero tolerance for antisemitism (which I didn't put in but feel strongly about) would be out of Starmer's. There's zero point going backwards, any future Labour party is going to need to take elements of previous successful administrations and some original ideas to create something new.

Mandleson's point (that our last ten elections went lose lose lose lose blair blair blair lose lose lose) is crude but effective. Labour cannot win by going backwards but we'd be stupid to ignore history altogether.

Zero tolerance

he literally just promoted an MP who publically praised a nazi sympathiser

Labour cannot win by going backwards but we'd be stupid to ignore history altogether.

An examination of 2017 by Starmers team might help.

The Unions should be fucked off. What place do they really have in society now?

Union membership has been in steady decline since 1981 yet they continue to wield significant power in the only viable political opposition the country has. It makes no sense, it's just not representative.

There are better ways to think about the protection of worker's rights.

There are better ways to think about the protection of worker's rights.

More unions

Bin off the member democracy

I've said this somewhere on this thread (or a similar one). I think, as nice as it is, the member democracy is a hurdle to being elected. Their concerns often don't seem to match the general electorate's and it sometimes pushes the party in difficult directions.

For instance I'd say it was clear pretty early that Corbyn needed to go but with the members as they were this didn't happen.

That's a strong statement from a Labour supporter. Pretty much all the rights workers have in the UK are a result of union activity. A tertiary reason for Thatcher's smash in the 80s.

This is the point though isn't it? The workforce, the working classes, the man in the street, the tradesmen, the whatever... They're voting Tory now.

And listening to LBC

Labour needs to cozy up to them Radio 4 bods

Get Seamus Milne in to replace Sarah Sands on the Today programme.

UNISON has more than twice as many members as the Labour Party, and that's without Unite, GMB and the rest...

UNISON has 6x as many members as the Conservative Party and that's without Unite, GMB and the rest...

The Unions should be fucked off. What place do they really have in society now?

Are you saying that there are no longer any working people? Are you saying that labour exploitation is no longer a reality?

Union membership has fallen as the national industrial complex has shifted shape dramatically since the 80's. The lack of unions in the largest industries within the UK is down to a culture of anti-unionism and increasingly informal relationships to low grade employment means it's harder for workers to organise.

The 10 Biggest Industries by Employment in the UK

>Supermarkets in the UK. 1,220,923.
>Hospitals in the UK. 838,617.
>Charities in the UK. 812,020.
>Temporary-Employment Placement Agencies in the UK. 701,613.
>General Secondary Education in the UK. 695,038.
>Direct Selling & Marketing in the UK. 694,519.
>Construction Contractors in the UK. 548,498.
>Full-Service Restaurants in the UK.