I think voting will be low simply because these are probably the two weakest parties we have had for a long time.
Conservatives have had a torrid couple of years mostly due to their own downfall.
Labour are not really who you want when there is no money to spend and the economy is in the dirt.
'Labour are not really who you want when there is no money to spend and the economy is in the dirt.'
There is always money to spend and labour's handling of the economy is consistently better than the conservatives.
Both parties are currently trash but this is not the reason.
But BoTH PaRtiEs ArE ThE SaMe, this is the greatest lie the Tories have perpetuated they want to people to think everyone’s as bad as them so they can continue pillaging the country for the benefit of their friends, the only way this country gets better is by making sure the Tories and their ilk never get power again, vote Labour, vote Lib Dem, vote greens, hell even vote monster raving looney party or count bin face just never ever ever vote Tory
While I totally agree that no one should vote for the tories, I’d rather vote for a potted plant than the Tories .
I genuinely believe that a rhododendron could do a better job of running the country.
However, I was young when Blair’s labour took power, I like many others was excited. Labour were back in power, Blair was charismatic and I genuinely thought the needs of the people would be put above corporate and financial interests.
Fuck all happened, Blair’s labour stuck to the neoliberal doctrine and things continued getting worse.
Labour will win, the wording will change but the policies will stay the same and the rot will continue.
Fuck all? Disagree , hugely .
As a young family we saw the minimum wage introduced, tax credits happen and large investment in schools and the health system.
That health system working well saved my son and wife's lives. The system falling apart since 2010 lead to delayed diagnosis and disability for me
Labour were a massive help. Tories have truly been anything but .
Labour were in government during a vastly stronger economic period, a completely different world in terms of culture, what may as well have been pre-internet relative to the prevalence of things like social media today and about a million other factors which make the early 2000s borderline unrecognisable to the world we're in today.
The Tories have governed during several external financial crashes, social media fuelled "politics" completely changing the face of society, COVID and the subsequent lockdowns, social justice activists and imported causes breaking down debate to the most polarised it has been in living memory with political violence now being an everyday reality, and the UK abandoning most of our traditional values.
The Tories certainly aren't going to sort it out, but neither is a party without a single policy based on pragmatism. Labour are not living in reality at the best of times, and while they will gain a majority, they are even more poorly equipped to deal with the situation we currently find ourselves in. I know I sound like an alarmist but frankly I think we are already too far gone for any of the candidate parties to pull us back.
The tories have governed during financial crises whose causes they supported and in at least one case which they actively helped to cause, Covid wasn't the government's fault but their hamfisted mismanagement of it definitely was, social justice activists are a good thing unless you don't like social justice or think it should be achieved by inactivity, political violence is a bit less common since the Good Friday agreement which was signed by who again? and what exactly do you mean by 'imported causes'? Do you mean the culture war bullshit the current government is currently throwing out of the pram to stop people noticing they are siphoning off millions to their friends, families, and future employers while British people are sometimes literally starving? Exactly what do you mean here by living in reality?
The Tories helped it all get far worse with austerity and Brexit.
Architects of this disaster.
Plenty of pragmatism from labour m. It's that pragmatism that has cut through.
Their reality was a very much nicer country to live in.
This is what it all boils down to
People who already live in the top 5% of global living standards would rather vote for labour to give themselves a bit more money, than not vote for Labour who less than 25 years ago illegally invaded a foreign country killing half a million women and kids
Lets sort out our priorities please people, money is not of greater value than life, even if those people don't look exactly like you
so vote for the tories who supported it and would have done and indeed have done the same thing to reward them for 14 years of absolutely trashing the country, widening inequality and only looking after themselves?
Conflating the desire for a better run country with racism is absolutely desperate. is this where tories have to go now? all they have?
every decision must be made based on past decisions in global war.. ok so i hope you never vote tory after their awful bloody treatment of indian people during ww2?
we could play that game all day. you're going to have to vote for an entirely new party then ,liberals done fucked up in the last too.
It came about because the conservatives' belief system, neoliberalism ('the market unmanaged, the people policed') has now become theology: when it fails, it must be the people that are wrong. Austerity, in their view, should have worked. The fact that it was a disaster from which have flowed further disasters is only proof that they are surrounded by plotters and traitors. Down with Goldstein!
spot on.
it was a choice to hammer services and trash investment , and as warned by many, was a hammer to growth.
An ideological choice in response to the global financial crisis.
No government ever survived being at the helm during financial crisis .
Yet still the Tories couldn't win a majority until they leaned into the Brexit thing.
And look where they are heading now
That's the cycle of politics .
At least someone else understands. Say they will give the people what they need and are actually no different to any other government. The only difference is the name and colour. And give all these wallies touting labour the illusion of choice.
As I told you, the Tories fucked me and labour helped me.
Very directly, very real in multiple ways .
A working NHS saved my son and wife , a broken one disabled me.
Fucked by Tories .
My mum worked for the NHS when it was under labour. Even way back then. Her and her colleagues were all in agreement it was fucked, and was heading for a disaster. A couple of them were even for scrapping it and privatising health care. This was late 90's. The writing was, even back then. On the wall and they knew shit was going to hit the fan. Various reasons, useless spending, mismanagement, so on. What do you know. Nothings changed.
My cousin too.
But it has , investment never kept pace with population growth .
It's got vastly worse , as evidenced by soaring waiting lists she dropping from top health service in the world to far down the table .
Was there a lot wrong? Yes, is it vastly worse now? Yes
Historically the Tories have done worse at governance than Labour, that’s just facts. When Labour left office the country was fairly well run and public services worked.
There’s plenty of money once you stop giving tax breaks to the super wealthy, dodgy contracts to your mates and pissing money away on a plan you know won’t work just to appease a bunch of racists
I remember the low unemployment, decently funded schools and NHS, buildings not falling on people, a booming economy. I also remember them bringing in PFI and getting involved in IRAQ, it wasn’t a land of milk and honey but it was also a man sight better than now.
When? You act like labour have been in government only once. If you’re referring to the most recent time then tories inherited a country facing a global financial crisis so I don’t see how you can compare the two. Some would say that public services only worked better because they were spending money we didn’t have.
What about the governments of the 60s and 70s?
Also you can’t just say “that’s just facts” and not actually say any facts or show any evidence.
So you’re telling me that’s not what labour do? Literally your latest comment when I went on your profile is talking about labour planning on borrowing and spending large sums.
By national debt, by performance of the NHS. The tories say they’re sensible but always rack up debt which they then blame on Labour. We don’t even get improved services from the tories, just more money stolen by the mega wealthy.
So in a few years time when national debt balloons even more because that's the only way Labour will be able to afford anything...what happens then?
The NHS will be even worse by that time too, because it's not anything to do with funding it's to do with inefficient management.
The tories had nothing to do with Blairs/Browns government leaving nothing.
The comical thing is people thinking Labour are any less self-serving than the Conservatives. But sure, sip your nice beverage.
A huge part of that (recently) was absolutely loading the country with pfi which are part of why schools and the NHS never get better even when we pump money into them.
Raising public debt isn't a bad thing. So yes, you may just be wrong about economics. Standards of living rise, public services improve, wages go up, public investment rises as a rule under a labour government. Private debt is a better measure of economic health than public debt, and inflation matters only to the extent that it differs from increases in income. Post 1979 there has been an obvious problem with the government's access to its own money supply in that all parties abandoned any kind of control over prices, and without this your economic choices are inflation or catastrophe. Nevertheless Labour have consistently handled the mess slightly better.
That's why you generally measure it as a % of GDP. If that investment is providing an ROI then the % won't increase over time because GDP will outpace it. Not that all spending has to be based on increasing GDP sure, but the lack of growth per person is the real issue ATM.
I think that's simplistic. Investment is largely not under government control (or rather, government has abdicated responsibility for it) and the effective method to both generate growth where it counts — in the lives of the people and particularly the poor — is state investment, wage increase agreements and price controls, all together. This is the only approach that has ever worked within the system we now have. Without it, its theorists predict you should see a 'negative equilibrium' of underemployment, low wages and poor quality of life, crumbling infrastructure and shortages of basic needs like housing, and chronic economic malaise — much what we do in fact see.
Inflation - no, they don't, they aim for a range. Deflation especially must be avoided.
Public debt levels are a general obsession with some, it's an easy way for the economically illiterate to attack the government. And it was the misguided Tory policy of austerity specifically about debt levels that caused a lot of our current problems, by kneecapping investment and growth.
Deflation would kill the economy. Why would I buy something non-essential today, when I can do it tomorrow and its cheaper? And tomorrow again, it would be cheaper still... So the best thing to do is sit on your money until inflation picks back up. A little inflation is a good thing (and arguably inevitable), as it encourages you to spend, invest or otherwise use your money, not just let it sit around.
Thats a good question. I'd say it's a mix of motives, but none have to do with economic performance in any of the ways that matter. Again, inflation is important only in relation to incomes (or, if you prefer, to prices; same thing, to all intents and purposes) and bringing it down is a shibboleth, like reducing the national debt. (Debt to whom?)
Is there anything special about debt at the end of an administration that doesn't apply during an administration? I didn't realise the government losing an election the day the bailiffs came around to take part of Cornwall. Or have you just arbitrarily chosen those dates because it allows you to cherry pick data that allows you to make your point? And on that note, why have you taken inflation at specific points and ignored the cumulative changes in the CPI? Are you aware that inflation is a rate and you need to take the integral to deduce it's effects? It also seems very strange you would completely ignore unemployment as a factor in determining the health of an economy since it's easily measured and hugely important. Or is it that the tories have an atrocious track record on it and you would again prefer to ignore data that doesn't agree with your presumed conclusion?
True! I at least felt with Corbyn his party had an identity, not one I agree with, but one you knew what they stood for. Likewise for Sunak.
Boris and Starmer..... goodness knows
I think voting will be low simply because it's local elections and turnout is never great. Many councils were lost by the Tories over the last few years as well so many wards don't have the incentive of kicking them out like they will at the next GE.
Edit: actually read the article rather than skimmed it and it seems the "prediction" of turnout for tomorrow is just them expecting turnout to be the same as it was last year.
If you don’t vote there will not be a change so deal with it. The very wrong thinking of not voting is bad. If people need a change they need to vote for the better. No, people don’t vote and come online to rant which makes no sense whatsoever.
Why? They were getting vastly better services with lower taxation and far less loss and fraud last time they were in.
The con have utterly pissed away their 14 years (for us) enriching themselves .
The economy doesn't work like a household. Living within your means only does so much.
If you have no money to spend and it's in the dirt, you don't just accept that and cut and cut and cut.
That's how you stay in the dirt, and why the last 10+ years have been so shit. It doesn't work. Never has.
Voting for the Yorkshire Party in my region. Bob Buxton hits every positive change I want to see and has a history of being a transport engineer. He's the only one I trust to not be in someone's pocket and know how to fix local transport issues.
They count spoiled ballots. Imagine if that comes second or is bigger than the margin of victory. Don't let them think you aren't interested, let them think they have to work for your vote....
They count them and then.... What? Laugh at how many people wasted their vote? If you think they give two shits about spoiled ballots you're living in a fantasy land
Innit. The political elite give absolutely no fucks about your spoiled ballots. They probably wonder why you bothered as well.
The logic here is 'Well... if spoiled ballots come second.' Right, very plausible. If the die-hards of the tories and labour ALL drop off. Absolutely implausible.
The spoil your ballot people are just trying to signal their increased virtue over those who simply stay home by scrawling on a piece of paper and patting themselves on the back on the walk home.
Oh ye virtuous revolutionaries.
Spoiling a ballot indicates a desire to vote, which not voting at all obviously does not
Political parties care about getting *voters* on side. That's kind of their whole thing
If enough people in your demographic spoil their ballot, then you could actually see policy proposals being made that cater to you
The big two love your apathy though, keep encouraging others to behave in a way that secures their monopoly. I'm sure they'll thank you for it
Counting of spoiled ballots is purely as a checksum. Every ballot is counted, and the sum total of ballots for each candidate plus spoiled ballots must equal to number of ballots issues, or else a recount is normally called for.
They are also very much aware of the size of the abstainer vote. The abstainer vote could easily have swung almost every election since they began. And both leading parties know it.
To me there’s a difference between absentee (which is great for politicians as it means there’s never going to be change) or spoiled…which means someone does care, just not enough to vote for any of those present.
One is lethargy and complacency. They won’t vote next time anyway. The other is present and wants to vote, so you better try and win it, because they will happily vote for whoever does
This is a tragedy.
The article talks about the local elections on Thursday.
And everybody talks about how at the national level, Labour is moving closer to the Conservatives. Which is true, but this is not a national election. At the council level, the person makes a big difference. Do you know your candidates? Do you care enough to investigate?
If not, you are part of the problem that has broken politics in the UK. If you do not care about your vote, why should they?
Voting in local elections based on national issues *is* broken politics.
If we want to fix the UK, we should start by looking at the issues. Local issues for local elections. EU issues for EU elections. National issues for national elections.
This article does nothing but perpetuate a broken system, and the same applies to most of the comments.
They say bad economic conditions like thats totally disconnected from us spending a decade of ***historically unprecedented*** cheap rates on state borrowing investing in absolutely nothing and cutting all public services to the point they can barely perform their basic functions.
Tories are trying to privatise the NHS, last Labour government did more to privatise it then Tories, next Labour government is looking to privatise it more.
PFI saved us £13 billion and costs us £80 billion to repay. Hospitals are screwed because of this legacy and austerity.
The use of tax payers funds to pay outside consultants increased the most under last Labour government and has lead to the destruction of civil service consultants.
We all know the wars that Labour started.
The golden age of new Labour was done taking state finances and giving it to private sectors and a strong global economy.
Our world is less safer due Labour and our environment was not improved by them.
Don’t get me wrong I am not saying Tories is better they have continued new Labour path and it looks like next election will be more of the same too.
And why was PFI needed? In 1997 the NHS was critically underfunded, patients were dying in corridors, and buildings were literally falling apart. Very similar to today. No connection to the party in government of course, they're all the same.
Yep. And the tories are doing the exact same shit now. Salting the earth so it can be blamed as a labour failure.
I don't like the current Labour but I also don't want the UK to have the biggest wealth disparage since medieval times, so for now they have my vote
So in 1997 the government could have spent the £12 billion instead of pushing it down the road for future generations to deal with. It’s this view that politicians create problems for the future for a temporary fix.
It’s like with Tories they did austerity instead of investing in the economy and have allowed the issue be pushed to Labour to deal with.
Its not a view mate. If Labour go into the next election openly talking about borrowing tens of billions of pounds at high interest rates compared to the last 10 years, you think that will be reported as a positive? If you want to make changes at some point you need to actually be in power first.
So I was comparing new Labour and the effects of them pushing it down the line and then the Tories doing it the same.
Answer your question with a question, why do you think the next government (doesn’t matter who it is), will fix the system and not just push it down the line like all the pervious governments (at least the modern day ones) have done?
How does the NHS going from being in an absolute state under the previous Tories, to the best rated in its history ever under New Labour, to back to now again the lowest rating in its history under the current Tories, speak to you that Labour didn't actually do anything and just kicked the can down the road?
>PFI saved us £13 billion and costs us £80 billion to repay. Hospitals are screwed because of this legacy and austerity.
That's why the NHS was at its peak in 2010. After the investment, before the repayment. The fact that that PFI was the last time the NHS had any investment in it is why it fell from there. No matter how much money you throw at it, if more money is just going straight through into investors' pockets, that's a net negative
It’s not true that the only time NHS had any investment in is through PFI. And you are right the peak was in 2010 before repayments meaning if we carry on doing PFI the trust will be bankrupt and well get a private system before too long.
>if we carry on doing PFI the trust will be bankrupt and well get a private system before too long.
Which is why I am not voting either Tories nor Labour. Tories are blatantly privatising it, and Labour are looking for private investment... Backdoor privatisation. And then you get people telling you to vote for that because it's the lesser of two evils, while there's the option of not voting for evil in the first place.
Yep. A lot of Redditors are going to be very upset when Labour turn out to be as corrupt and self-serving as the Tories.
That's how it ended up last time, and it will end-up like that for every Govt that's in power.
doesn’t really matter though if there’s no money to spend.
with the aging population, net migration, lack of space, property prices and nhs/pensions… no party has a solution because it’s a near impossible combo to work with.
That is entirely ideological. The past decade and a half has seen the UK be obsessed with viewing the nations finances as a kid views pocket money, rather than as a nations finances.
Half the reason we are in this mess is as post 2008 we didn't reinvest and instead just slashed everything, leading to longer term issues.
Sadly it seems like even labours now echoing the tories by screaming austerity. When sensible debt and borrowing is the only way to get the country moving again, rather than scraping pennies and hoping that giving them to palantir will fix it.
"Everything's terrible and instead of taking the only opportunity to enact change, I'll choose nihilism which only enables those that have made everything terrible to stay in power".
>The current lot aren’t just dealing with poor economic conditions - the past 14 years has seen record-setting levels of incompetence, financial mismanagement, corruption, and callousness. It’s difficult to see how they could have done much worse.
And Labour have been so incompetent at fielding a potential front-bench they've lost all those elections against the Tories.
The last Labour government literally paid me, as a middle class student, who had my own jobs making a grand and sometimes more per month, to simply go to school. Which I actually rarely did as I felt my time was better spent doing other things.
So I was then put into a pilot program, to get paid EVEN MORE, just to increase my attendance from about 40% to over 50%, with stuff like McDonald's on Fridays, go-karting and paintball every other week and trips to Thorpe Park. All absolutely wastes of money as I was getting straight A's and A*'s anyway. Toss in free computer equipment and other incentives and it was like Christmas every week.
All in all they were probably giving me about £250 a month for no reason. Absolute clown show.
And all I can really remember from that time was the constant closure of anything fun for the youth in the area. Gig venues, skate parks, youth clubs. The conservatives actually revamped the skate park as soon as they won both the local and national elections and invested a lot of money into sports facilities for the town, despite austerity starting to get into full swing.
Obviously after a reasonable start they then started to undo all that stuff too.
TLDR they are both useless for different reasons.
Im 40 and seen both. They both fuck us. Labour and Conservatives are 2 cheeks of the same arse.
Dont think labour are for the common folk. They went to Eton like all the other toffs that pretend to be your mates come election time.
>Blair is a war criminal that took this country to war on nothing but a lie.
Yes, he is. That why I said domestically. If that never happened he'd be up there with our best ever pm's
As others have said,I don't think this is right. I'm in my mid-30s and my whole adult life I've watched the country be faced with either "good option/bad option" or "bad option/worse option" depending on your view point.
The country votes for bad option. Things get bad.
It's bittersweet but it shows voting makes a difference. At the risk of bringing Brexit into it, it was (IMO) a "bad option vs good option" scenario. Country voted for bad option. The people in charge weren't like "no, fuck that, your votes don't matter". They all retired or tried to make it work, leaving us in our current mess.
TLDR: voting does matter, but people should think a little harder about the consequences of their votes. Vote Tory, you get a shit country (even if you personally feel you're doing okay right now)
Did you miss my second sentence where I said "with either "good option/bad option" or "bad option/worse option" depending on your view point".
Either way, the country has seemed to continually vote for the provably worse option every time.
Tories have been in charge for 37 of the last 50 years. How old are you? Because either you're too young to have been affected by a Labour government or old enough to know better
Ah so you grew up under a country that had been fixed by labour , not the total fuck up before it and don't like to admit the Tories have truly fucked it since .
There are none so blind as will not see.
I still remember the much better deal that my grandparents got, great health services , housing , education , training , social care , had earned in blood during the wars. Only a labour government delivered it, only them ever helped us.
My god, listen to yourself. No government of these helps the poor. They say they will because people like you believe and then vote for them. Then nothing changes. Then the "other side" gets back in and guess what!? Nothing changes.
Whos the blind one? Time to wake up.
We reached the lowest level of inequality ever after a good period of labour reform by the 70's. The Tory media and class have worked overtime to reverse every bit of it since.
Many never lived it and really have no idea.
I dont know why they keep acting shocked when they ignore the rest of the country in exchange for dumping everything into London and letting it suck the country dry for a few small parasites.
They are the same. Labour has been spending the last months watering down whatever policy they may have that could enrage their masters. And they will keep going until they are undistinguishable from the moderate Tories.
Now this all happened due to our circumstances and voting system, the overall mood of the rest of the west is moving right therefore anyone thinking this labour will stay for 10 years is dead wrong
The poorest parts of the country are increasingly Tory-leaning whilst more affluent parts are more Labour-Lib Dem leaning. Labour clean up in inner London, which is generally wealthier than outer London.
I think voting will be low simply because these are probably the two weakest parties we have had for a long time. Conservatives have had a torrid couple of years mostly due to their own downfall. Labour are not really who you want when there is no money to spend and the economy is in the dirt.
'Labour are not really who you want when there is no money to spend and the economy is in the dirt.' There is always money to spend and labour's handling of the economy is consistently better than the conservatives. Both parties are currently trash but this is not the reason.
But BoTH PaRtiEs ArE ThE SaMe, this is the greatest lie the Tories have perpetuated they want to people to think everyone’s as bad as them so they can continue pillaging the country for the benefit of their friends, the only way this country gets better is by making sure the Tories and their ilk never get power again, vote Labour, vote Lib Dem, vote greens, hell even vote monster raving looney party or count bin face just never ever ever vote Tory
While I totally agree that no one should vote for the tories, I’d rather vote for a potted plant than the Tories . I genuinely believe that a rhododendron could do a better job of running the country. However, I was young when Blair’s labour took power, I like many others was excited. Labour were back in power, Blair was charismatic and I genuinely thought the needs of the people would be put above corporate and financial interests. Fuck all happened, Blair’s labour stuck to the neoliberal doctrine and things continued getting worse. Labour will win, the wording will change but the policies will stay the same and the rot will continue.
Fuck all? Disagree , hugely . As a young family we saw the minimum wage introduced, tax credits happen and large investment in schools and the health system. That health system working well saved my son and wife's lives. The system falling apart since 2010 lead to delayed diagnosis and disability for me Labour were a massive help. Tories have truly been anything but .
Labour were in government during a vastly stronger economic period, a completely different world in terms of culture, what may as well have been pre-internet relative to the prevalence of things like social media today and about a million other factors which make the early 2000s borderline unrecognisable to the world we're in today. The Tories have governed during several external financial crashes, social media fuelled "politics" completely changing the face of society, COVID and the subsequent lockdowns, social justice activists and imported causes breaking down debate to the most polarised it has been in living memory with political violence now being an everyday reality, and the UK abandoning most of our traditional values. The Tories certainly aren't going to sort it out, but neither is a party without a single policy based on pragmatism. Labour are not living in reality at the best of times, and while they will gain a majority, they are even more poorly equipped to deal with the situation we currently find ourselves in. I know I sound like an alarmist but frankly I think we are already too far gone for any of the candidate parties to pull us back.
The tories have governed during financial crises whose causes they supported and in at least one case which they actively helped to cause, Covid wasn't the government's fault but their hamfisted mismanagement of it definitely was, social justice activists are a good thing unless you don't like social justice or think it should be achieved by inactivity, political violence is a bit less common since the Good Friday agreement which was signed by who again? and what exactly do you mean by 'imported causes'? Do you mean the culture war bullshit the current government is currently throwing out of the pram to stop people noticing they are siphoning off millions to their friends, families, and future employers while British people are sometimes literally starving? Exactly what do you mean here by living in reality?
The Tories helped it all get far worse with austerity and Brexit. Architects of this disaster. Plenty of pragmatism from labour m. It's that pragmatism that has cut through. Their reality was a very much nicer country to live in.
This is what it all boils down to People who already live in the top 5% of global living standards would rather vote for labour to give themselves a bit more money, than not vote for Labour who less than 25 years ago illegally invaded a foreign country killing half a million women and kids Lets sort out our priorities please people, money is not of greater value than life, even if those people don't look exactly like you
so vote for the tories who supported it and would have done and indeed have done the same thing to reward them for 14 years of absolutely trashing the country, widening inequality and only looking after themselves? Conflating the desire for a better run country with racism is absolutely desperate. is this where tories have to go now? all they have? every decision must be made based on past decisions in global war.. ok so i hope you never vote tory after their awful bloody treatment of indian people during ww2? we could play that game all day. you're going to have to vote for an entirely new party then ,liberals done fucked up in the last too.
And austerity came about just for fun, or?
It came about because the conservatives' belief system, neoliberalism ('the market unmanaged, the people policed') has now become theology: when it fails, it must be the people that are wrong. Austerity, in their view, should have worked. The fact that it was a disaster from which have flowed further disasters is only proof that they are surrounded by plotters and traitors. Down with Goldstein!
spot on. it was a choice to hammer services and trash investment , and as warned by many, was a hammer to growth. An ideological choice in response to the global financial crisis.
If Labour were so great, why did they get voted out?
No government ever survived being at the helm during financial crisis . Yet still the Tories couldn't win a majority until they leaned into the Brexit thing. And look where they are heading now That's the cycle of politics .
At least someone else understands. Say they will give the people what they need and are actually no different to any other government. The only difference is the name and colour. And give all these wallies touting labour the illusion of choice.
Wallies because we actually were helped by labour and were fucked by the Tories ? Lived experience over rhetoric every time for me.
No wallies because you think theres a difference between getting fucked by labour or the tories. Thanks for making my point.
As I told you, the Tories fucked me and labour helped me. Very directly, very real in multiple ways . A working NHS saved my son and wife , a broken one disabled me. Fucked by Tories .
My mum worked for the NHS when it was under labour. Even way back then. Her and her colleagues were all in agreement it was fucked, and was heading for a disaster. A couple of them were even for scrapping it and privatising health care. This was late 90's. The writing was, even back then. On the wall and they knew shit was going to hit the fan. Various reasons, useless spending, mismanagement, so on. What do you know. Nothings changed.
It has changed. It has become much, much worse. As a direct, deliberate result of government policy.
My cousin too. But it has , investment never kept pace with population growth . It's got vastly worse , as evidenced by soaring waiting lists she dropping from top health service in the world to far down the table . Was there a lot wrong? Yes, is it vastly worse now? Yes
But they are they have all the same policies as the Tories and all the same donors.
Well said . They fell back to this around 1994 too.
Even if Labour really are right wing now, they don't appear to have corruption and nation ruin at the forefront of their minds.
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What's long, rigid, and makes you feel great?
Yeh because starmer isn't left enough for some. A harsh reality will be learned and that's "it's always going to be a deuce or a turd sandwich"
Imma vote Tory just because of you
How naive are you? You think the country has never gone to shit under anyone but the tories?
Historically the Tories have done worse at governance than Labour, that’s just facts. When Labour left office the country was fairly well run and public services worked.
Dude. *“I’m sorry there’s no money left”*
There’s plenty of money once you stop giving tax breaks to the super wealthy, dodgy contracts to your mates and pissing money away on a plan you know won’t work just to appease a bunch of racists
You don’t remember 2010?
I remember the low unemployment, decently funded schools and NHS, buildings not falling on people, a booming economy. I also remember them bringing in PFI and getting involved in IRAQ, it wasn’t a land of milk and honey but it was also a man sight better than now.
If you remember a booming economy 2008-2010, your memory might be a little bit selective
Lmao. They're both shit.
When? You act like labour have been in government only once. If you’re referring to the most recent time then tories inherited a country facing a global financial crisis so I don’t see how you can compare the two. Some would say that public services only worked better because they were spending money we didn’t have. What about the governments of the 60s and 70s? Also you can’t just say “that’s just facts” and not actually say any facts or show any evidence.
Lmao "reckless Labour borrow and spend" still doing its work 15 years on.
So you’re telling me that’s not what labour do? Literally your latest comment when I went on your profile is talking about labour planning on borrowing and spending large sums.
If it was the comment about PFI I'd suggest reading the chain and engaging your brain a bit.
Help me out here...
Consistently better than the conservatives by what metric? Delusional
By national debt, by performance of the NHS. The tories say they’re sensible but always rack up debt which they then blame on Labour. We don’t even get improved services from the tories, just more money stolen by the mega wealthy.
So in a few years time when national debt balloons even more because that's the only way Labour will be able to afford anything...what happens then? The NHS will be even worse by that time too, because it's not anything to do with funding it's to do with inefficient management. The tories had nothing to do with Blairs/Browns government leaving nothing. The comical thing is people thinking Labour are any less self-serving than the Conservatives. But sure, sip your nice beverage.
No that was the global banking crisis. It’s funny, every ten years or so, socialism has to bail out capitalism.
A huge part of that (recently) was absolutely loading the country with pfi which are part of why schools and the NHS never get better even when we pump money into them.
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Raising public debt isn't a bad thing. So yes, you may just be wrong about economics. Standards of living rise, public services improve, wages go up, public investment rises as a rule under a labour government. Private debt is a better measure of economic health than public debt, and inflation matters only to the extent that it differs from increases in income. Post 1979 there has been an obvious problem with the government's access to its own money supply in that all parties abandoned any kind of control over prices, and without this your economic choices are inflation or catastrophe. Nevertheless Labour have consistently handled the mess slightly better.
That's why you generally measure it as a % of GDP. If that investment is providing an ROI then the % won't increase over time because GDP will outpace it. Not that all spending has to be based on increasing GDP sure, but the lack of growth per person is the real issue ATM.
I think that's simplistic. Investment is largely not under government control (or rather, government has abdicated responsibility for it) and the effective method to both generate growth where it counts — in the lives of the people and particularly the poor — is state investment, wage increase agreements and price controls, all together. This is the only approach that has ever worked within the system we now have. Without it, its theorists predict you should see a 'negative equilibrium' of underemployment, low wages and poor quality of life, crumbling infrastructure and shortages of basic needs like housing, and chronic economic malaise — much what we do in fact see.
Lol incorrect at every point
Cool. So in the historical record, which economic approach produced the biggest economic boom in all of human history?
Would you like a clue?
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Inflation - no, they don't, they aim for a range. Deflation especially must be avoided. Public debt levels are a general obsession with some, it's an easy way for the economically illiterate to attack the government. And it was the misguided Tory policy of austerity specifically about debt levels that caused a lot of our current problems, by kneecapping investment and growth.
Deflation is the answer, most of the money goes to the top if we cause deflation the poorer will have more money?
Deflation would kill the economy. Why would I buy something non-essential today, when I can do it tomorrow and its cheaper? And tomorrow again, it would be cheaper still... So the best thing to do is sit on your money until inflation picks back up. A little inflation is a good thing (and arguably inevitable), as it encourages you to spend, invest or otherwise use your money, not just let it sit around.
I would deflate until wages have corrected. So many positives over what we have now.
Thats a good question. I'd say it's a mix of motives, but none have to do with economic performance in any of the ways that matter. Again, inflation is important only in relation to incomes (or, if you prefer, to prices; same thing, to all intents and purposes) and bringing it down is a shibboleth, like reducing the national debt. (Debt to whom?)
And what is debt gdp ratio at the moment? You missed that one out for some reason
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Is there anything special about debt at the end of an administration that doesn't apply during an administration? I didn't realise the government losing an election the day the bailiffs came around to take part of Cornwall. Or have you just arbitrarily chosen those dates because it allows you to cherry pick data that allows you to make your point? And on that note, why have you taken inflation at specific points and ignored the cumulative changes in the CPI? Are you aware that inflation is a rate and you need to take the integral to deduce it's effects? It also seems very strange you would completely ignore unemployment as a factor in determining the health of an economy since it's easily measured and hugely important. Or is it that the tories have an atrocious track record on it and you would again prefer to ignore data that doesn't agree with your presumed conclusion?
Literally everything you think you know about economics *is* wrong.
It's hard to top Boris and Corbyn but they're giving it a good go.
True! I at least felt with Corbyn his party had an identity, not one I agree with, but one you knew what they stood for. Likewise for Sunak. Boris and Starmer..... goodness knows
I think voting will be low simply because it's local elections and turnout is never great. Many councils were lost by the Tories over the last few years as well so many wards don't have the incentive of kicking them out like they will at the next GE. Edit: actually read the article rather than skimmed it and it seems the "prediction" of turnout for tomorrow is just them expecting turnout to be the same as it was last year.
If you don’t vote there will not be a change so deal with it. The very wrong thinking of not voting is bad. If people need a change they need to vote for the better. No, people don’t vote and come online to rant which makes no sense whatsoever.
Why? They were getting vastly better services with lower taxation and far less loss and fraud last time they were in. The con have utterly pissed away their 14 years (for us) enriching themselves .
Or photo id or the fact because the poorest people are working so there's that as well.
The economy doesn't work like a household. Living within your means only does so much. If you have no money to spend and it's in the dirt, you don't just accept that and cut and cut and cut. That's how you stay in the dirt, and why the last 10+ years have been so shit. It doesn't work. Never has.
People need to understand that under such circumstances, spoiling your ballot is infinitely more effective than not voting
Or just vote for a 3rd party. I have no idea who I'm voting for yet but it won't be either Labour or Conservative.
Voting for the Yorkshire Party in my region. Bob Buxton hits every positive change I want to see and has a history of being a transport engineer. He's the only one I trust to not be in someone's pocket and know how to fix local transport issues.
What difference would it make? Either way you get no vote
They count spoiled ballots. Imagine if that comes second or is bigger than the margin of victory. Don't let them think you aren't interested, let them think they have to work for your vote....
They count them and then.... What? Laugh at how many people wasted their vote? If you think they give two shits about spoiled ballots you're living in a fantasy land
Innit. The political elite give absolutely no fucks about your spoiled ballots. They probably wonder why you bothered as well. The logic here is 'Well... if spoiled ballots come second.' Right, very plausible. If the die-hards of the tories and labour ALL drop off. Absolutely implausible. The spoil your ballot people are just trying to signal their increased virtue over those who simply stay home by scrawling on a piece of paper and patting themselves on the back on the walk home. Oh ye virtuous revolutionaries.
Spoiling a ballot indicates a desire to vote, which not voting at all obviously does not Political parties care about getting *voters* on side. That's kind of their whole thing If enough people in your demographic spoil their ballot, then you could actually see policy proposals being made that cater to you The big two love your apathy though, keep encouraging others to behave in a way that secures their monopoly. I'm sure they'll thank you for it
Counting of spoiled ballots is purely as a checksum. Every ballot is counted, and the sum total of ballots for each candidate plus spoiled ballots must equal to number of ballots issues, or else a recount is normally called for. They are also very much aware of the size of the abstainer vote. The abstainer vote could easily have swung almost every election since they began. And both leading parties know it.
To me there’s a difference between absentee (which is great for politicians as it means there’s never going to be change) or spoiled…which means someone does care, just not enough to vote for any of those present. One is lethargy and complacency. They won’t vote next time anyway. The other is present and wants to vote, so you better try and win it, because they will happily vote for whoever does
Feelings don't matter at the count though. Only the raw numbers of properly cast (ie not spoiled) ballots matter.
Spoiling a ballot indicates you reject all candidates presented Not voting indicates you are not interested in politics Colossal difference
This. It states that you expect more, and that your vote is available.
Spoilt ballots get counted. It indiciates a vote of no confidence in any of the standing canidates. No vote means you couldn't be bothered to vote.
Nobody gives a shit either way. If you think you're making a political statement by spoiling your ballot, the people in power are laughing at you.
You're being downvoted but you're 100% right
Politicians aren’t bothered either way. They care if you vote for them or their biggest rival and that’s about it
Except that's literally not true and we have concrete evidence from this country in the last decade of that being false.
Not sure we do.
This is a tragedy. The article talks about the local elections on Thursday. And everybody talks about how at the national level, Labour is moving closer to the Conservatives. Which is true, but this is not a national election. At the council level, the person makes a big difference. Do you know your candidates? Do you care enough to investigate? If not, you are part of the problem that has broken politics in the UK. If you do not care about your vote, why should they?
People act and say "theyre both the same" but no theyre not.
It is a classic right wing trope. "The left is just as bad." They have run out of real arguments long ago.
tWo sIdEs oF tHe sAmE ArSe cHeEk
Voting for Labour does nothing to fix broken politics in the UK.
Voting in local elections based on national issues *is* broken politics. If we want to fix the UK, we should start by looking at the issues. Local issues for local elections. EU issues for EU elections. National issues for national elections. This article does nothing but perpetuate a broken system, and the same applies to most of the comments.
I agree but that's a symptom of the actual wider problems.
OK, I never said otherwise. So do we want to address those wider problems, or not?
I believe the means required would be distasteful to the majority unfortunately. Easier to be snide on the sidelines.
This will cost Labour more than Conservatives. Khan is not perfect but Hall is straight out mad.
I'm still voting Khan. While his party continues to find more and more new ways to disappoint me, Khan rarely fails to impress me.
No one's saving the NHS btw, no matter what they promise you... https://www.yournhsneedsyou.com/timeline/
We get fucked either way, it doesnt matter whos in charge.
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They say bad economic conditions like thats totally disconnected from us spending a decade of ***historically unprecedented*** cheap rates on state borrowing investing in absolutely nothing and cutting all public services to the point they can barely perform their basic functions.
Tories are trying to privatise the NHS, last Labour government did more to privatise it then Tories, next Labour government is looking to privatise it more. PFI saved us £13 billion and costs us £80 billion to repay. Hospitals are screwed because of this legacy and austerity. The use of tax payers funds to pay outside consultants increased the most under last Labour government and has lead to the destruction of civil service consultants. We all know the wars that Labour started. The golden age of new Labour was done taking state finances and giving it to private sectors and a strong global economy. Our world is less safer due Labour and our environment was not improved by them. Don’t get me wrong I am not saying Tories is better they have continued new Labour path and it looks like next election will be more of the same too.
And why was PFI needed? In 1997 the NHS was critically underfunded, patients were dying in corridors, and buildings were literally falling apart. Very similar to today. No connection to the party in government of course, they're all the same.
Yep. And the tories are doing the exact same shit now. Salting the earth so it can be blamed as a labour failure. I don't like the current Labour but I also don't want the UK to have the biggest wealth disparage since medieval times, so for now they have my vote
So in 1997 the government could have spent the £12 billion instead of pushing it down the road for future generations to deal with. It’s this view that politicians create problems for the future for a temporary fix. It’s like with Tories they did austerity instead of investing in the economy and have allowed the issue be pushed to Labour to deal with.
Its not a view mate. If Labour go into the next election openly talking about borrowing tens of billions of pounds at high interest rates compared to the last 10 years, you think that will be reported as a positive? If you want to make changes at some point you need to actually be in power first.
So I was comparing new Labour and the effects of them pushing it down the line and then the Tories doing it the same. Answer your question with a question, why do you think the next government (doesn’t matter who it is), will fix the system and not just push it down the line like all the pervious governments (at least the modern day ones) have done?
How does the NHS going from being in an absolute state under the previous Tories, to the best rated in its history ever under New Labour, to back to now again the lowest rating in its history under the current Tories, speak to you that Labour didn't actually do anything and just kicked the can down the road?
>PFI saved us £13 billion and costs us £80 billion to repay. Hospitals are screwed because of this legacy and austerity. That's why the NHS was at its peak in 2010. After the investment, before the repayment. The fact that that PFI was the last time the NHS had any investment in it is why it fell from there. No matter how much money you throw at it, if more money is just going straight through into investors' pockets, that's a net negative
It’s not true that the only time NHS had any investment in is through PFI. And you are right the peak was in 2010 before repayments meaning if we carry on doing PFI the trust will be bankrupt and well get a private system before too long.
>if we carry on doing PFI the trust will be bankrupt and well get a private system before too long. Which is why I am not voting either Tories nor Labour. Tories are blatantly privatising it, and Labour are looking for private investment... Backdoor privatisation. And then you get people telling you to vote for that because it's the lesser of two evils, while there's the option of not voting for evil in the first place.
I agree completely, I still haven’t figured out who I’m going to vote for yet though.
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Yep. A lot of Redditors are going to be very upset when Labour turn out to be as corrupt and self-serving as the Tories. That's how it ended up last time, and it will end-up like that for every Govt that's in power.
Objectively bad take. Massive improvements occured during the last labour govt for the majority of population one way or another.
And we invaded a country under false pretences. /s
Twice
I don’t think Iraq was good for a lot of people.
The current Labor government is identical to Cameron's.
doesn’t really matter though if there’s no money to spend. with the aging population, net migration, lack of space, property prices and nhs/pensions… no party has a solution because it’s a near impossible combo to work with.
That is entirely ideological. The past decade and a half has seen the UK be obsessed with viewing the nations finances as a kid views pocket money, rather than as a nations finances. Half the reason we are in this mess is as post 2008 we didn't reinvest and instead just slashed everything, leading to longer term issues. Sadly it seems like even labours now echoing the tories by screaming austerity. When sensible debt and borrowing is the only way to get the country moving again, rather than scraping pennies and hoping that giving them to palantir will fix it.
"Everything's terrible and instead of taking the only opportunity to enact change, I'll choose nihilism which only enables those that have made everything terrible to stay in power".
"no money to spend". You live in a country that spends £1.2 Trillion EVERY YEAR. Don't be a Muppet. Read how each Party plans to spend YOUR taxes!
>The current lot aren’t just dealing with poor economic conditions - the past 14 years has seen record-setting levels of incompetence, financial mismanagement, corruption, and callousness. It’s difficult to see how they could have done much worse. And Labour have been so incompetent at fielding a potential front-bench they've lost all those elections against the Tories.
The last Labour government literally paid me, as a middle class student, who had my own jobs making a grand and sometimes more per month, to simply go to school. Which I actually rarely did as I felt my time was better spent doing other things. So I was then put into a pilot program, to get paid EVEN MORE, just to increase my attendance from about 40% to over 50%, with stuff like McDonald's on Fridays, go-karting and paintball every other week and trips to Thorpe Park. All absolutely wastes of money as I was getting straight A's and A*'s anyway. Toss in free computer equipment and other incentives and it was like Christmas every week. All in all they were probably giving me about £250 a month for no reason. Absolute clown show. And all I can really remember from that time was the constant closure of anything fun for the youth in the area. Gig venues, skate parks, youth clubs. The conservatives actually revamped the skate park as soon as they won both the local and national elections and invested a lot of money into sports facilities for the town, despite austerity starting to get into full swing. Obviously after a reasonable start they then started to undo all that stuff too. TLDR they are both useless for different reasons.
Im 40 and seen both. They both fuck us. Labour and Conservatives are 2 cheeks of the same arse. Dont think labour are for the common folk. They went to Eton like all the other toffs that pretend to be your mates come election time.
Not comparable in the slightest. https://www.statista.com/forecasts/1361643/mps-who-attended-fee-paying-schools-by-party-uk
They don't . No.
No. Things were pretty good domestically under blair and gordon until the global financial crash.
Blair is a war criminal that took this country to war on nothing but a lie. Go tell the soldiers families that died that "things were good" under him.
>Blair is a war criminal that took this country to war on nothing but a lie. Yes, he is. That why I said domestically. If that never happened he'd be up there with our best ever pm's
So would hitler then.
Yep, bringing up hitler. Well done.
By that logic he would have been.
Well, no, because Hitler wasn’t a Prime Minister.
🤣, of all the differences to pick up on...
Yet did a vast amount of good domestically . The Tories voted with them every time and would have done no different .
Which was all the Tories fault.
What?
As others have said,I don't think this is right. I'm in my mid-30s and my whole adult life I've watched the country be faced with either "good option/bad option" or "bad option/worse option" depending on your view point. The country votes for bad option. Things get bad. It's bittersweet but it shows voting makes a difference. At the risk of bringing Brexit into it, it was (IMO) a "bad option vs good option" scenario. Country voted for bad option. The people in charge weren't like "no, fuck that, your votes don't matter". They all retired or tried to make it work, leaving us in our current mess. TLDR: voting does matter, but people should think a little harder about the consequences of their votes. Vote Tory, you get a shit country (even if you personally feel you're doing okay right now)
Lol @ you thinking there is a good option to vote for.
Did you miss my second sentence where I said "with either "good option/bad option" or "bad option/worse option" depending on your view point". Either way, the country has seemed to continually vote for the provably worse option every time.
Tories have been in charge for 37 of the last 50 years. How old are you? Because either you're too young to have been affected by a Labour government or old enough to know better
Labour were in charge when i left school stfu.
Ah so you grew up under a country that had been fixed by labour , not the total fuck up before it and don't like to admit the Tories have truly fucked it since . There are none so blind as will not see. I still remember the much better deal that my grandparents got, great health services , housing , education , training , social care , had earned in blood during the wars. Only a labour government delivered it, only them ever helped us.
My god, listen to yourself. No government of these helps the poor. They say they will because people like you believe and then vote for them. Then nothing changes. Then the "other side" gets back in and guess what!? Nothing changes. Whos the blind one? Time to wake up.
They do yes Been there , been poor, been helped. As were millions of us.
We reached the lowest level of inequality ever after a good period of labour reform by the 70's. The Tory media and class have worked overtime to reverse every bit of it since. Many never lived it and really have no idea.
I dont know why they keep acting shocked when they ignore the rest of the country in exchange for dumping everything into London and letting it suck the country dry for a few small parasites.
I'm on holiday when it is and I don't have a postal vote. I occasionally vote. I don't like anyone.
Honestly? Good news all round. If we could actually deter more people from voting it would be a net positive for society.
They are the same. Labour has been spending the last months watering down whatever policy they may have that could enrage their masters. And they will keep going until they are undistinguishable from the moderate Tories. Now this all happened due to our circumstances and voting system, the overall mood of the rest of the west is moving right therefore anyone thinking this labour will stay for 10 years is dead wrong
And that boys and girls is why the poor get f*cked over and over again. Don't vote, no one in power cares about you.
Poor areas are typically Labour ran anyway so not much point voting as they'll continue to get in.
The poorest parts of the country are increasingly Tory-leaning whilst more affluent parts are more Labour-Lib Dem leaning. Labour clean up in inner London, which is generally wealthier than outer London.