The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away

[Elwood Blues]

Labour retain Stoke albeit with a reduced majority and shortly afterwards get thumped by the tories in Copeland.

Whether 'Blessed be the name of the Lord' then applies really depends on your point of view!!

[Pearcey3]

Dreadful night for Labour. A triumph for the Tories. I suspect there will be another challenge to Corbyn's leadership but this time from bigger player. Unless Labour get their act together they face a disaster in 2020.

[the other bob wilson]

Dreadful night for Labour. A triumph for the Tories. I suspect there will be another challenge to Corbyn's leadership but this time from bigger player. Unless Labour get their act together they face a disaster in 2020.

Think they would have lost Stoke as well if the UKIP campaign hadn't imploded.

[Rjk]

UKIP look finished, not sure where they go from here.
Labour need a change of leadership, fortunately for them the electorate only votes on things in the 12-18 months before an election.but they seriously need to get their shit together.
I like Corbyn, but the media have done such a number on him that his public perception is unrescuable. I know people who have a seriously negative view of him but could not tell you why or what any of his policies are. You cannot come back from that.

[Eric Cartman]

Think they would have lost Stoke as well if the UKIP campaign hadn't imploded.

Yeah Nutter lost that himself.

I haven't paid much attention to these but isn't Copeland result mostly about Corbyn's stance on nuclear?

[the other bob wilson]

Yeah Nutter lost that himself.

I haven't paid much attention to these but isn't Copeland result mostly about Corbyn's stance on nuclear?

That's what Labour are saying.

[Rjk]

That's what half of Labour are saying.

Fyp

[Wales-Bales]

It's all very predictable, the anti-Corbyn media protecting the establishment, and the Labour Party full of Globalists who don't care about local UK policies. I agree UKIP are finished. So does Arron Banks, who is waiting in the wings to form a new Trump inspired populist party.

[Pearcey3]

So who is the answer to this energised Labour party under a charismatic leader as it seems to me that the left are highly principled whcih doesn't sit with charisma and energy , forward looking, new principles is not looking back at resurrecting old social attitudes ,its about being bold a new a setting an agenda that challenges the norm putting pressure on a Tory government that is ploughing the same furrow without being challenged ,like it or not to get elected as a government your words are critical " energised Labour party under a charismatic leader, I would add new thoughts , direction, acceptance that some parts of the NHS can no longer be fully be funded from the pubic purse ,stop using it as a political football , be strong on the benefits systems so it rewards workers and avoids them choice of doing nothing , put up taxes to fund social care ,front up defense on moral grounds, agree too many immigrants find it easy to land on our shares not to seek benefits but earn our generous minimum wage ,and fix it .

Possibly Dan Jarvis. If not him maybe Clive Lewis. I wouldn't rule out Keir Starmer although he is more solid than charismatic. Some of your comments above are fair enough but not in regard to immigrants. We are already hearing of sectors worried that there will be a shortage of labour because of Brexit.

[life on mars]

Possibly Dan Jarvis. If not him maybe Clive Lewis. I wouldn't rule out Keir Starmer although he is more solid than charismatic. Some of your comments above are fair enough but not in regard to immigrants. We are already hearing of sectors worried that there will be a shortage of labour because of Brexit.

I'm not saying no immigration , I am purely pointing out what Labour voters generally think and see , hence their steer towards UKIP, the mood music form the current Labour administration does not appear to be about any control ,regulation, quotas,or even forward discussion , as it crosses those highly held principles , that were fine 20 years ago , not any longer, you only have to see the impact in the poorest northern towns or run down coastal areas ,the big cities are in need of this labour , and its absorbed and hidden .

I think regional quotas may be the answer as places like London would grind to a halt with our migration labour

[Pearcey3]

Corbyn is uncharasmatic and uninspiring. He needs to find some passion fast.

Yes I accept this. I don't think he will change and his focus on getting his message across via social meeting is not working.

[Pearcey3]

This is like an old record - it wont be a lack immigrants that will be a problem. Immigration will always be needed - but what is needed is the control of immigration. Just like it was pre Maastricht - you want to move to another country - you get a job, you get approved or rejected - simple as that.

What the EU seems want is access to cheap labour for big business. I would have thought that is something the left wing would not be in favour of

Why do you assume its big business?.A lot of immigrants work for small caterers, farmers,hotels etc.
The EU don't dictate what employers decice to pay. Thats entirely the employers responsibility. Yet you chose to blame the EU and not the employers

[life on mars]

Why do you assume its big business?.A lot of immigrants work for small caterers, farmers,hotels etc.
The EU don't dictate what employers decice to pay. Thats entirely the employers responsibility. Yet you chose to blame the EU and not the employers

Here's an idea , we pay £1 above the migrants originating countries minimum wage , with another £1 for big city employment. Benefits paid after one of continued work for more than a year , if no work has been found by year two, a free passage return to their originating country and town .

[Eric Cartman]

Here's an idea , we pay £1 above the migrants originating countries minimum wage , with another £1 for big city employment. Benefits paid after one of continued work for more than a year , if no work has been found by year two, a free passage return to their originating country and town .

That is a terrible idea.

[Pearcey3]

The EU don't dictate what employers 'decice' to pay - I know that , the market decides, and mostly it's minimum wage - there is no incentive for an employer to pay more - as there is a ready supply of cheap labour out there. You dont like it - no problem there are plenty of others that will do the job. It's a glass ceiling for the low paid.

I used to work in Europe - pre maastricht , I had to apply for the job, the employer had to prove there was no other person in the country that was being over looked etc , when I got the job I had to sign a document saying that after my contract had ended I would not make a claim for social security in the country etc.

Good for you on pointing out my typo. Maastricht is a capital M by the way. I would add overlooked is one word.I understand your comments but ultimately its down to the employer what they pay and I suspect its often below the minimum wage. Thats not the fault of the EU nor the immigrant. Its not the market either. Its the specific individual employer.To blame others is an abrogation of ths employer's responsibility.

[Pearcey3]

I'm not saying no immigration , I am purely pointing out what Labour voters generally think and see , hence their steer towards UKIP, the mood music form the current Labour administration does not appear to be about any control ,regulation, quotas,or even forward discussion , as it crosses those highly held principles , that were fine 20 years ago , not any longer, you only have to see the impact in the poorest northern towns or run down coastal areas ,the big cities are in need of this labour , and its absorbed and hidden .

I think regional quotas may be the answer as places like London would grind to a halt with our migration labour

Yep I think thats a sensible way to go.

[life on mars]

Yep I think thats a sensible way to go.

The tough question for die hard socialist ,would they. would they support charges for minor GP visits/care fort those who can afford it , charges at A&E for drunken injuries , to ease the burden, stop child benefit for the £100k per annum families , stand up to pointless greedy strikes, like train drivers , instead of saying nothing , all radical but in another direction ,for me to keep voting Labour I'd like new ideas that carry some pain , and risk , its too easy to say nationalise this , let more people in we have plenty , tax the rich,its so old hat ?

[Eric Cartman]

The tough question for die hard socialist ,would they. would they support charges for minor GP visits/care fort those who can afford it , charges at A&E for drunken injuries , to ease the burden, stop child benefit for the £100k per annum families , stand up to pointless greedy strikes, like train drivers , instead of saying nothing , all radical but in another direction ,for me to keep voting Labour I'd like new ideas that carry some pain , and risk , its too easy to say nationalise this , let more people in we have plenty , tax the rich,its so old hat ?

Why not just fund it properly in the first place? The idea of a progressive taxation system is that rich people pay a bit more for the same service.

The striking thing is a myth. Someone on here at Christmas said 'striking is for middle/high earners now, I would support strikes if they were by low earners' - that week there were 3 massive strikes by groups earning minimum wage. They chose not to see them because they had made their mind up about strikes already

I would like to stop train drivers striking. But I value the right to strike more than that. In the same way that I would like to tape Nigel Farage's mouth shut but I wouldn't want to live in a country where he couldn't say whatever nonsense he was thinking. The Southern strikes have been billed as 'Drivers don't want to open and close the doors' but really they are about taking responsibility away from the guards so that they can pay them minimum wage.

[Pearcey3]

Here's an idea , we pay £1 above the migrants originating countries minimum wage , with another £1 for big city employment. Benefits paid after one of continued work for more than a year , if no work has been found by year two, a free passage return to their originating country and town .

I don't see that as practical as living costs are likely to be much higher in the UK than the country from which the migrant originates.

[Pearcey3]

The tough question for die hard socialist ,would they. would they support charges for minor GP visits/care fort those who can afford it , charges at A&E for drunken injuries , to ease the burden, stop child benefit for the £100k per annum families , stand up to pointless greedy strikes, like train drivers , instead of saying nothing , all radical but in another direction ,for me to keep voting Labour I'd like new ideas that carry some pain , and risk , its too easy to say nationalise this , let more people in we have plenty , tax the rich,its so old hat ?

I don't see why not as long as it isn't the start something sinister. Any legislation would need to make clear that the NHS would otherwise remain free at the point of delivery. Labour have been lacking ideas for well over a decade. They desperately need to come up with ideas to regenerate working class areas where their core vote is slowly but surely ebbing away.

[life on mars]

No it wasn't.

The reasoning behind the formation of the NHS - and to slay the "five giants" identified by Beveridge (want, disease, squalor, ignorance, idleness) - was based on idealism and disgust at the way the private health system worked. It wasn't the result of cynicism and chasing a more efficient way of exploiting labour.

There was also an opportunity that wasn't there before the Second World War:

- The emergence of a view that health care was a right, not something bestowed erratically by charity
- Bipartisan agreement that the existing services were in a mess and had to be sorted out
- Financial difficulties for the voluntary hospitals
- The Second World War that ensured the creation of an emergency medical service as part of the war effort
- The cataclysmic effects of the war that made it possible to have a massive change of system, rather than incremental modification
- An increasing view among the younger members of the medical profession that there was a better way of doing things

And a small contribution by A J Cronin through his very influential novel The Citadel - about a doctor in a small Welsh mining village - that exposed the evils of private health care to those who had never experienced it in poverty.

Let's be bluntly honest we cannot afford it , its the fifth largest organisation in the world, that should stimulate thoughts of how difficult that is to fund from the public purse , never mind the drugs, equipment, building estates costs.
Madness , we have moved on from Beveridge / Bevan , I'd like to hear thier viewpoint now.

[the other bob wilson]

Let's be bluntly honest we cannot afford it , its the fifth largest organisation in the world, that should stimulate thoughts of how difficult that is to fund from the public purse , never mind the drugs, equipment, building estates costs.
Madness , we have moved on from Beveridge / Bevan , I'd like to hear thier viewpoint now.

Jon was dealing with, very well I thought, a sweeping generalisation from Feedback about what and why the NHS was set up for.

You're right in saying that the NHS offers a much different, and more difficult, set of challenges than it did in Beveridge and Bevan's day, but I'd like to think that both gentleman would be able to offer more than "oh, it's too expensive, so let's wrap the whole thing up and let the private sector deal with it" if they were around now. For a start, one of them may think what has become the unthinkable in this day and age and propose that the taxes we pay should go up a bit to help finance what I for one still think of as a national treasure.

[Pearcey3]

Yep Jon eloquently dealt with Mr Feedback. It hss taken me too long to notice Feedback had returned.

[Eric Cartman]

Let's be bluntly honest we cannot afford it , its the fifth largest organisation in the world, that should stimulate thoughts of how difficult that is to fund from the public purse , never mind the drugs, equipment, building estates costs.
Madness , we have moved on from Beveridge / Bevan , I'd like to hear thier viewpoint now.

What is the alternative?

[Bluebird since 1948]

The Labour party may "save" the NHS but the NHS will not save Labour.

Prattling on about the NHS being in crisis all the time is so one dimensional and the voters are seeing through it. Throughout my lifetime the NHS has always been in crisis, it's how it cons more money out of government.