New Labour LEADER

Paul Gambaccini isn't a fan

Anyone here know if its true that Starmer was the CP who threw out the case against Jimmy Saville because there "wasn't enough evidence" ? Did the people who elected him know it ,IF its true?

I think many who normally vote Labour may be hoping that Momentum and their somewhat malevolent web will be kicked into the long grass.

Whitewave Dan Jarvis?

I was struck by the Momentum response to Keir Starmer as leader. They plan to hold him to account to keep his election pledges.
Yes, let’s all focus on that rather than hold the government to account for the problems we face with the current crisis and the impact of nine years of austerity on all public services, including the nhs.
Our CLP voted KS - I’m in the so called northern heartlands. What we heard on the doorstep was “I’ll never vote Labour with that man as leader”. Jeremy was a liability.

The Labour Party survived Foot, took 14 years,

i hope it can survive the harm Corbyn-McDonald- Momentum have done

Whitewavemark2
'You two pogs and grandad could be talking about the Tory party.'
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Yes we could be if we were doing ' whatabouterry' or discussing the Tory Party but this thread is about Labour, I will leave the ' whatabouterry' to others.
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' Both parties are broad churches there will always be division. But the trick of a good leader is to unite. Starmer is aware of this.-

Any Political Party Leader is aware of' this', any individual with a brain is aware a good leader unites his/her party.

Being ' aware ' is the easy part, getting it to happen is another kettle of fish altogether. The division within the Labour Party since Corbyn/Momentum took over the party has been corrosive.

So easy to dismiss what the Blair government achieved

Whitewavemark2 the Tory Party is not an offshoot of a much larger organisation such as the Parliamentary Labour Party are.

Sadly there are many in that Parliamentary Party that forget they are part of such and that is leading to the slow but inevitable destruction of the Labour Party at this point in time.

However, we are in unprecedented times of crisis and that may change the views and attitudes of very many over the coming years. For this crisis will not end when the virus is beaten.

You two pogs and grandad could be talking about the Tory party.

Both parties are broad churches there will always be division. But the trick of a good leader is to unite. Starmer is aware of this.

If Jeremy Corbyn was a great asset to the Tories, I think Keir Starmer will give them a mighty headache!

Actually the more you think about it the more you realise the talent he has to draw on. What’s the chap called a northern MP was a major or something I always think he’s good even a potential leader.

POGS, there is much in your above post I can agree with. However, I believe that within the Parliamentary Labour Party there is the Straight forward left-right division that you describe above, and I do not see that abating in the face of a newly elected leader.

The position is different in the broader Labour movement for in that there is more pragmatism born out of the everyday requirements of trade union activists and their leadership to act in that way.

However, those activists and leadership hold policies such as abolishing anti-trade union legislation, the ending of Zero Hours Contracts and Gig Economy Working conditions as sacrosanct first policies of any leadership of the Labour Parliamentary Party.

The Blair years of leadership never gave the broader movement the abolition of trade union legislation. It brought forward the minimum wage, but at the same time allowed Zero Hours Contracts to come about and the beginnings of Gig Economy working. The foregoing actually made for worse conditions of employment for a great many in our society and made it virtually impossible for the unions to intervene to improve those conditions for workers trapped in such circumstance.

Therefore any move by the new Labour leadership to return back to the so-called centre-left stance of the Blair era will simply not be tolerated by the Broader Labour Movement.

However, within the Parliamentary Labour Party there are many on the right who wish for a nothing else but a staunch return to Blair era policies and style of leadership.

POGS in the above I fear the gulf between the Parliamentary party and the wider Labour movement is unbridgable. In that, I hope I am wrong but at this point in time I cannot see a way through the morass.

My MP Kylie is good I’d like to see him get a junior post of some sort, maybe related to health? Or foreign as he spent quite a few years VSO

I have seen Rachel Reeves mentioned a fair bit.

Philips - shadow home

He has a lot of strong women to choose from.

? good lord no. I’ve see Rachel Reeves mentioned as well and Benn as shadow foreign.

All speculation

'Re-Dodds just a quick quote from twitter. Not to be taken seriously at the moment.'
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I thought you had some inside information Whitewave to have mentioned it.

pogs flip flopping. Could you give me some examples please?

He seems a much strong, personality with integrity if you compare him to Johnson, whose flip flopping is a sight to behold!

Re-Dodds just a quick quote from twitter. Not to be taken seriously at the moment.

Hope he chooses a strong shadow cabinet

The problem for Starmer will be if the Corbynite / Momentum faction of the NEC /Membership and Parliamentary Labour Party MP's which have shaped and controlled the Labour Party to the Far Left of politics can let go of their Corbyn adoration. Will they work with him?

There is an irony when those who stated emphatically they ' rejojned/returned ' to Labour when Corbyn became Leader now have had the table turned on them by new / returned members wanting to rid the party of Corbyns protégés.

I have asked for years of those who stated they were Corbyn/Momentum supporters because their politics were never Centrist or Blairite and stated they left the Labour Party through the Blair/Brown years what they would do if Corbyn ever left and there was a move back to a more centrist Labour Party and I never received a reply. It will take a lot of pragmatism on the part of many to let go of their overt belief Corbyn/McDonnell were the ' dream ticket'.

Not that I think Starmer/Rayner are Centrist as some may think but if they do prove to be shifting from the Far Left once again I can see the same old party divisions being maintained but hopefully with less venom than we have witnessed over the past few years since the Corbyn/Momentum Party took over Labour.

I reserve my judgement on Starmer as I believe him to be a flip-flopper who tells interviewers and the media what he thinks they want to hear rather than sticking to his guns but time will tell and I wish him well.

I have to say surely not Anneliese Dodds - shadow Chancellor as said up thread.

I believe that Starmer has become leader of a parliamentary Labour Party that is totally divided within itself.

The above I also believe has brought about within the broader Labour movement a total loss of confidence in the ability of the Parliamentary Party to ever deliver on any policy that would facilitate on even most basic needs of its grassroots membership.

In the above, I have always felt that the lay activists within the Labour Party affiliate membership are without doubt the most influential and powerful people in the whole Labour movement. Those activists are approximately ten to fifteen percent of the affiliate membership but are those which are on-site union representatives and formal companions at industrial hearings etc. Those persons also sit on the various union committees at district, reginal and national levels. Therefore in those roles, they are the backbone of the movement who make it run on a day to day basis.

It is those activists that have lost all confidence in the Parliamentary Labour Party with many feeling that those who sit on the right of the Parliamentary Party despise their very existence by way of the influence they hold within the Labour movement.

I believe that many of those affiliate activists would have no second thoughts if the Broader Labour Movement were to cut its ties with the fractious Parliamentary Party and carry out an appraisal and then a fresh start in regards to its political wing.

The major challenge for the new Labour Leader is to restore the respect and confidence of the Broader Labour Movement and especially it's lay activists.

The above must also be accomplished while bringing Unity to the Parliamentary Party which is something that has not been accomplished in well over a decade.

As I stated in an earlier post in this thread I wish Kier Starmer well as leader of the Parliamentary Party, but the task that will lie in front of that leadership I believe will take the power of the Greek gods to accomplish and is perhaps impossible.

Then he would have lived with the distress anti Semitism caused

Of course Starmer’s wife and children are Jewish.

Am pleased that Starmer won the leadership, he was the best option.?
Unsure about Angela Raynor though time will tell.
In a few years time a lot of people won’t be worried about the prospect of a Labour government getting into power.
I hope Starmer chooses a shadow cabinet that reflect more of his own thinking, and proves to be a strong leader , after the fiasco of the last one!

I was near to tears when he said he had seen the pain anti
semitism has caused in the Jewish Community and apologised
on behalf of the Labour Party .