Two Years of Keir Starmer. What do we think?

trisher

So did he not promise to "unite" the party? I've yet to see any definition of unite which means just getting rid of one lot of people.
Isn't it controlling to decide what people are allowed to think or say?
Even Tony Blair didn't try to rid the LP of its left wing supporters and some of those were far to the left of today's people

Hadn't Neil Kinnock done that before Blair won the leadership of the LP? Militant Tendency?

No. I will never vote labour again after the Tony Blair years. People have very short memories. All parties will make promises that they have no intention of keeping, just to get votes. Keir Starmer reminds me of those hecklers on the Muppet show, whatever Boris does, he will criticise. I think they should all grow up and stop picking at the same old sores, we are all very tired of it now. Wouldn't it be nice if there was some sort of unity and patriotism for the good of the people and for the country and forget all of these personal vendettas.

So did he not promise to "unite" the party? I've yet to see any definition of unite which means just getting rid of one lot of people.
Isn't it controlling to decide what people are allowed to think or say?
Even Tony Blair didn't try to rid the LP of its left wing supporters and some of those were far to the left of today's people

The media does it’s best to make every Labour leader toxic. Corbyn aided and abetted that by his past and present behaviour. In addition, his habit of snapping at journalists did nothing to help the party.

I don’t agree that Starmer us a hypocritical, controlling liar so feel no need to explain that away.

Not supporting Starmer is not "Corbyn forever". It's simply realising that there was a good product there which many people supported and the fact that the media made the CEO toxic is no reason to ditch the product. Starmer made promises he hasn't kept. How can that be justified?
Let's stop harking back to Corbyn (which seems to be the only real comment about the awful things happening in theLabour party just now). How can Starmer be the honouurable person some of you imagine when he has behaved so badly? By all means support him but do so by eother explaining or denying the allegations I have made. Not by saying there's no reasoning or by resurrecting someone irrelevant.
Starmer is a hypocrite, a liar and wants to control people. Explain that away.

For some it’s Corbyn forever

As I said, there’s no reasoning with some people.

How can it be wrong to think that someone who has lied, is controlling, has punished people for things they said 8 years ago, is excluding people because of their views, has consistently acted undemocratically, is willing to chuck some people under a bus and reward others for bad behaviour would run a worse government than the Tories. Even the Tories allow some disagreement in their party.
You also have to ask who is pulling Starmer's strings. I wouldn't be surprised if he is negogiating selling the party to anyone willing to fund him.

There’s no reasoning with some people Iam64. What beats me is why they stay in the Labour Party, because Starmer or no Starmer, this is the only way forward.

Don’t be ridiculous. The idea a labour govt could be worse than the tories Is daft

Starmer doesn’t deny being a socialist

There are millions of people in poverty heating or eating, cut to universal credit uplift, food banks proliferating. No one is speaking for these people. '

'Fleecing people' ?by having fair taxes for higher earners above £80,000 a year I think? Is right and the proper thing to do.

trisher is not bitter she talks a lot of sense

Starmer is no different to Tories a pale imitation

Gone back on pledges

Doesn't want to unite the party only getting rid of left members who support Palestinians against Isreal's apartheid state.
Why doesn't Starmer is he in the pay of the Isreal Lobby

Doesn't want to renationalise

I think Starmer would be worse than Tories

Kali2

trisher- then it is time to unite, and bring in new members who truly feel KS is the future of the Party. I can truly see how someone who was born and bred in mining communities, shipyards and steel- would feel that a left of Centre Party is a betrayal of their traditional Labour heritage. Totally. But your bitterness is so so sharp, and so negative and harking for a past that is gone and buried. And I say this with respect.

But the fact is, the world has changed, people's aspirations and ambitions have changed- and the Party and its Leader have to reflect this. A hard Left Party will not be electable again in the UK- that is abundantly clear. Because people want to have a decent safety net, good education for all, and an NHS fit for purpose for all - they do not want this to be achieved by fleecing anyone who has had the courage and the determination and sheer hard work to put their head above the parapet and make a better life for themselves. And be made to feel like 'scum' for doing so.

KS will also work positively for intelligent alliances too- and a more cooperative way of Governing.

Kali2 there is no "hard left". There are people who believe in socialist principles. The same socialist principles that Corbyn almost won the 2017 election standing on.
Even Tony Blair never dumped the left wing because he realised that the Labour party needed its socialist members to remind it of what it really stands for and to run campaigns. They are the people who go out canvassing in elections. They are the unpaid supporters who work because they believe a better society is possible. If you dump them you not only lose their membership fees you lose their ideals and their work.
This idea that Starmer will somehow just persuade Conservative supporters to come over to Labour by saying he isn't a socialist is so insupportable. No matter how bad Boris is he isn't the Conservative party, just one man, and many will continue to support the party. Of those who choose to change most will move to the Lib Dems because the Labour party is a step too far.

No one as far as I know has ever spoken of people who earn money and are succesful as "scum". The people most left wingers want to target are those who make enormous fortunes in this country but choose not to pay their taxes here.

Finally it is nothing to do with traditional Labour heritage. It is about building a proper economic and social system which provides care and support for those who need it. Which is why it advocates non-profit making companies for the supply of energy and water, a proper integrated publicly owned transport system and an end to privatisation of the NHS.
Unfortunately Starmer has failed to support any of these things . Which leaves the question "What exactly does he stand for?"

trisher- then it is time to unite, and bring in new members who truly feel KS is the future of the Party. I can truly see how someone who was born and bred in mining communities, shipyards and steel- would feel that a left of Centre Party is a betrayal of their traditional Labour heritage. Totally. But your bitterness is so so sharp, and so negative and harking for a past that is gone and buried. And I say this with respect.

But the fact is, the world has changed, people's aspirations and ambitions have changed- and the Party and its Leader have to reflect this. A hard Left Party will not be electable again in the UK- that is abundantly clear. Because people want to have a decent safety net, good education for all, and an NHS fit for purpose for all - they do not want this to be achieved by fleecing anyone who has had the courage and the determination and sheer hard work to put their head above the parapet and make a better life for themselves. And be made to feel like 'scum' for doing so.

KS will also work positively for intelligent alliances too- and a more cooperative way of Governing.

The way I see it at the moment is that Labour don’t have to do anything

The Government are self imploding with the drip drip of scandals, bad news stories coming out

Come the GE it will be a case of people voting for the perceived less worse party ?

KS will have to come up with some good policies that the public want to hear and not just beat the Government up

Even if the membership has stabilised almost 200.000 members have been lost. If they were paying about £40 a year on average that is a financial loss of £8000000.
Blair and Brown never lost the Union funding.
It's the combination of Union and membership money lost that is going to cause problems.
Then of course there are the high profile members he has lost, people like Ken Loach.
All this from a man who was elected to unite the party. Either he never intended to do so, or he has been influenced by the more right wing. So he is either duplicitous or easily influenced, neither of which are desirable character traits for a PM.

And then there’s the disgraceful case of David White. A Labour Party member and campaigner for FIFTY ONE years.

David has been booted out of the Labour Party, with no hearing, no appeal, based on some pro-Palestine tweets from eight years ago.

But compare that to the case of the Blairite Labour councillor, Philip Normal.

Councillor Normal put out some deeply racist and discriminatory comments on social media, comparing Muslim women to “penguins” and talking of “hairy Arabs” and “aggressive Muslim areas”.

Labour didn’t come for Normal, he had to refer himself to the Labour Party for investigation.

No, the membership has stabilised at about 400,000 which is still higher than it was in the Blair/Brown era.

The Party finances were quite healthy when Keir Starmer became leader. Mainly due to the increase in membership numbers which is now in reverse.

LP funding has been a big problem for a long time. When I was actively involved locally (E. Yorks David Davis) in the 70s the Tories had their own trendy house as a meeting place funded by local wealthy Tories. while we met in members' homes.
Lack of funds also affected cost of electioneering and thus number of votes.
Now membership here has been static in fact the party's policy of too often asking for renewal of membership fees is putting some people off including me and husband.
Always labour at heart though.

Apparently the Labour party’s reserves are now at their lowest level since 2014.

You suppose correctly trisher, my truths and yours aren’t the same.

Mollygo

So what was the truth about it? I never knew anything about it till it was raised on GN. Was KS involved? Did he apologise for anything he did it didn’t do in relation to the matter?

If you're talking about the CPS, Mollygo, have a look at the link I posted earlier.

There seems to be some weird idea in people's minds that Starmer personally made every single decision on whether or not to prosecute. Of course he didn't. The CPS must deal with hundred, if not thousands, of cases daily.

So what was the truth about it? I never knew anything about it till it was raised on GN. Was KS involved? Did he apologise for anything he did it didn’t do in relation to the matter?

Well I supposed you are entitled to believe whatever you wish Casdon although it would seem faily obvious to me that any organisation which lost substantial amounts of financial support (like that of the unions), at the same time had a huge reduction in membership and the fees paid, whilst simultaneously paying out millions in legal costs, was on a downward economic spiral. When the money runs out it doesn't matter who is the leader.

The misinformation about Starmer’s time at the CPS is spread by the left who want to ensure Labour never win an election and the right who share the same aim.