Jeremy Corbyn suspended from Labour Party

Iam64

MayBee70 - I'll join you in the corner of those of us who are getting tired of it all.

The Corbyn/Momentum gang have been threatening to go and take their Union cash with them since Corbyn lost the last election so spectacularly. Discussion, listening to the views of those who don't entirely follow their belief systems, this, they can't or won't do.

The discussion only began on the formation of a fresh left wing party when it became clear how the right within central office and other parts of the Labour party had acted against Jeremy Corbyn to the extent of even trying to prevent a Labour win in a General Election. That "formation debate" then sharpened when McCluskey then announced the cut in the Unite union funding of the Labour Party which came about after the General Executive of that union came under great pressure from their activists to end the funding altogether.

The rail unions are also now considering their funding of the party I believe and a special TUC conference has outline planning to take place early in the new year to consider its future charter obligations regarding the Labour Party.

So, the debate on funding and the role of the trade unions in the Labour Party has only begun in recent months, triggered by the totally unacceptable actions of the right within the party.

It has been said on this forum for ages that the unions have been discussing it

Nanfer5g - there won't be much that is fresh about your new left wing party. We know what to expect because so many of its policies were set out in the disastrous Labour Manifesto from the last election - you know, the one Corbyn said was "fantastic". Unfortunately the voters didn't share his enthusiasm, did they?

And that is precisely what will happen again and again with such policies, regardless of how much the trade unions stuff your party coffers with money.

But hey ho - the members of your new party will be so ideologically pure that winning an election will not really matter. Nor will it matter if the new party allows the Tories to remain in power for ever because the "pure ones" (a great name for the new party, don't you think?) are so full of hate for the more "moderate" members of the original Labour Party that they'd rather hand power to the Tories anyway.

Anniebach

It has been said on this forum for ages that the unions have been discussing it

My above posts are the position now I believe Anniebach. However, in line with my desire, you also wish to see the left depart the party Annie. So, for very different reasons we are in complete agreement there.

Ramblingrose22 it is, without doubt, the "hate" that the right has shown towards the left in the Labour Party and all the associated trade union members that has brought the entire Labour movement to the cavernous divisions it faces now.

The far left Nanfer5G

Ah, I get it.

It will be all the fault of the "moderates" for having split the Labour Party even though it is the far left who will be leaving.

More victim hood! I don't think the poorest members of UK society will see it that way when you will be blocking any hope of them improving their life chances by blocking the chances of another Labour Government.

Only "far left" if you are Tory-lite Annie.
I was quite prepared to let Starmer sort out the party. I had no real feelings about him when he was elected leader. However his actions since he was elected have shown something I find utterly unacceptable. He paid off people who had worked against the party whilst employed by that party. He used the Labour whip to allow a Bill to pass through Parliament which should at least have been something MPs could vote against should their consciences require it (and many think should have been opposed on human rights issues). He has pretended to be disinterested in what happened to Corbyn whilst plainly exerting influence. He is in short devious and unreliable. It's not something the LP really needs and I don't think it's something the public will accept unless it comes with a huge public persona like Boris.

If someone could post any far left olicies which were in the last LP manifesto I would appreciate it. Until then I shall regard it as just name calling and you say "tomahto" I say "tomaeto".

Ramblingrose22

Ah, I get it.

It will be all the fault of the "moderates" for having split the Labour Party even though it is the far left who will be leaving.

More victim hood! I don't think the poorest members of UK society will see it that way when you will be blocking any hope of them improving their life chances by blocking the chances of another Labour Government.

I take it you mean in the way that Blair improved the life chances of the poorest in society by allowing Zero Hours employment contracts and Gig Economy terms of working to come about and flourish under his administration???

Ah, Tony Blair. One of the far left's bogey men! All the voters in 4 years' time will of course be fully au fait with everything he did!

I think he should have done something about ending them when he was in power but Gordon Brown didn't do anything about them either!

If this is such a major issue for you and the "Pure Ones", why do you want to take votes from Labour at future elections, facilitating Tory Governments for years to come?

Surely this will guarantee that the zero hours contracts you abhor will simply continue.

Well done!

Blair made mistakes - wow, Corbyn of course has never made a mistake in his pure life.
Blair's government had to pick up the pieces of school/hospital buildings that had been neglected for years with the tories in power.
I was working in a very deprived former mining area when Blair was elected. Families devastated by poverty, unemployment and heroin addiction. So many young men who had been proud miners lost to their families. Without the grannies, the aunties many more children would have been taken into care because their parents drug addiction meant they couldn't meet the needs of their children.
1997 - a new community school, with a library, rooms for the midwives, the health visitors, the school nurses, the area social work/drug/alchol teams to be based in the community where they were needed.
But hey, let's rubbish everything the last Labour government did because it wasn't pure enough.

Iam64 2020 major drug problems in ex-mining villages- no employment for young people- shop lifting a way of life as is being arrested and incarcerated for a short period. Parents struggling on zero hours contracts, children going hungry. Nothing has changed.
But I'm stll waiting for someone to explain to me what the far left policies they don't approve of are. Because if all you are doing is saying I am wrong to question Starmer I fail to see how that is far left. He hasn't done anything which shows he is committed to any LP policies not the least of which is a belief in human rights which he says he supports but has acted against. If you want me to believe in your right wing LP explain it to me.

trisher, things have changed significantly since 1997. They've become much much worse in our former mining and mill towns.
There is no point attempting to explain anything other than to repeat my belief that we need a Labour government. I voted Labour last time, despite the fact I had no respect regard for Corbyn. Are you saying you'd rather not vote Labour with Starmer in charge.

Are you saying you'd rather not vote Labour with Starmer in charge.
That's a question I am struggling with Iam64. I think I probably will vote for the Green Party if I can. I have been a LP voter all my life, the only time I ever voted for anyone else was after the Iraq war. I still regret voting for Blair. My only consolation is that we never knew how duplicitous Blair was. I can't say the same about Starmer his failings are becoming more and more obvious. If I let him keep my vote I would be ignoring the lesson I learned, and the thousands of lives it cost.

Labour civil war: unions weigh in, former MP signs out, and Margaret Hodge contradicts herself

For a leader who said he wanted to bring unity to the Labour Party, Keir Starmer has certainly caused a lot of division.

Unite’s Len McCluskey condemned Starmer’s ‘vindictive and vengeful decision which despoils Party democracy and due process‘ – and for acting in ‘bad faith’ in his ‘continued persecution’ of Corbyn – and accused him of destroying ‘party unity and integrity’ while undermining the EHRC report he has pledged to implement in full.

CWU general secretary Dave Ward went even further, describing Starmer’s action as ‘shocking’ – because it gives Boris Johnson a free ride over the serious issues of the day. Millions face redundancy, hundreds are dying every day and the government gets away with it. But Starmer wants a civil war.

Meanwhile a well-respected former Labour MP has quit the party in disgust at Starmer’s behaviour.

Former Colne Valley MP – and PPS to John McDonnell, meaning she worked as part of his shadow Treasury team – Thelma Walker has resigned her membership of the Labour Party, while expressing solidarity with former party leader Jermey Corbyn.

“Labour MPs used [the PLP] as a vehicle for self-aggrandisement and personal attacks on those they didn’t agree with.”

“[I] witnessed the toxic atmosphere [in the Parliamentary Labour Party] every Monday evening. My stomach used to turn over before I went in the room. The same people would leave the meeting and report to journalists.”

But I'm stll waiting for someone to explain to me what the far left policies they don't approve of are.

It's not the policies as laid out in the 2019 manifesto, they were fine. I don't even consider them to be 'far left'. It's the belief that a new 'socialist' party under Corbyn would attract voters that I feel is naive.

Also, as I and others have already said, this condemns the UK (or what's left of it if Scotland and Wales leave ) to tory rule for what could be decades.

MaizieD I don't think anyone has actually asked that Corbyn comes back. Just. that the direction of the LP should be clear and just now it isn't. It should have been simple to unite the party but Starmer hasn't done it.
If those policies remain LP policies then how can they be "far left"? They are LP policies if you don't believe in them then suggest changes, but stop calling those of us who do believe in them "far left". What alternatives do people who do believe in those policies have if the LP doesnt stick to them?

Trisha really: I have to say that it really aggrieves me that, much as I didn’t like Corbyn I would never have voted for any party other than Labour. And I certainly wouldn’t have wasted my vote on a party that was well meaning but had no chance of election. And although he wasn’t in my area Chris Williamson (apologies for going in about him so much but he is one of Corbyns greatest supporters) not only conveniently forgot about a second home that he owned but then stood as an independent and split the vote in what was a marginal seat. Which Labour have now lost. So when Labour left wingers complain that Keir Starmer is responsible for Labour losing the last election they need to look to their own.

trisher

MaizieD I don't think anyone has actually asked that Corbyn comes back. Just. that the direction of the LP should be clear and just now it isn't. It should have been simple to unite the party but Starmer hasn't done it.
If those policies remain LP policies then how can they be "far left"? They are LP policies if you don't believe in them then suggest changes, but stop calling those of us who do believe in them "far left". What alternatives do people who do believe in those policies have if the LP doesnt stick to them?

I don't actually know what you are talking about, trisher. I don't like labelling people and I would not call people who subscribe to the current manifesto 'far left'.

I'd be interested to know how it would have been simple to unite the Labour party. They've been fighting like rats in a sack for so long now that it's quite wearisome.

But I think that a great deal of pragmatism is called for in the current circumstances (as I posted much earlier), which neither 'side' seems willing to do.

I have to say that I speak as an outsider. I've never belonged to any political party. I don't know the full ins and outs of the present machinations. I didn't even know I was a 'leftie' until people on Gnet kept telling me I was. I just know what I would like the country's direction of travel to take, and it isn't the same road as that of the disgusting tories.

MayBee70 I assume then that you voted Labour after the Iraq war. I didn't. Much as I worry about the dire circumstances of the poor in this country I also feel a commitment to the world community. That I voted for Blair and believed in someone who acted in such a way contrary to all Labour ideals will alsways be on my conscience, but as I said he was a new creation a Labour leader who had no real commitment to anything except his own promotion. I am now wiser and I see in Starmer many of the same qualities. If I voted for him I would be ignoring a lesson that cost thousands of lives. Criticise my decision by all means but I think I have the right to make it.

I'd be interested to know how it would have been simple to unite the Labour party. They've been fighting like rats in a sack for so long now that it's quite wearisome.
Begin by takng action against those in the LP office who acted against the leadership. (Woops too late he's paid them extra instead!)
Don't use the Whip to stop opposition to Bills that permit human rights abuse
Include more left wing memers in the shadow cabinet
Reinstate Corbyn and stop using the PLP for your own political advancement.
These would show some degree of commitment.

trisher - we agree to disagree on Blair, Starmer and Corbyn. I did vote for Labour after Iraq, but I left the party and only re-joined to vote for Ed Miliband leader. He was impressive on paper and in a small hall, that didn't translate when he was on tv, sadly. I did not vote for David Miliband because of Iraq. My mistake, I now believe DM could have won an election and would have been a good leader.

We may not agree but yes, you have every right to make your decision, it is well considered and you stand by it.

MaizieD I'm constantly called "far left" I don't understand it either!
I thought if someone could post policies they found far left it mght help me.

trisher, I think if you go back over various discussions you'll find the last manifesto was supported until, every day, new ever more expensive policies were suggested without any prior discussion with activists door knocking/phoning constituents. That really supported the dislike and distrust of Corbyn in our area.
I think its unfair and inaccurate but the tories certainly dominated the agenda with the nonsense that Labour can't be trusted with the economy