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Has Labour ever won on the far left?

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Other than the coalition (whether one agrees with them or not you can't argue they were'nt effective), which governments do you think lived up to their majorities.

I don't really buy the argument that we could have such a relationship between government and unions.

Our unions are more like the French than the Germans, militant and resistant of change.

Look at Scargill for example.. you can't really defend him can you?

I agree. Attlle would be spitting in his grave at the thought of somebody with Corbyn's foreign policy views leading the Labour Party.

In fairness to Corbyn i suspect that most of his political views were formed before the decimation of the left by Thatcher and hence he is a politician of the time he grew up in, just lucky enough to be leader now.

My parents was gutted John Smith died, they really liked Smith- I wasn't born at the time- they said he left the foundations for the Blair 100+ majorities

Reply 41

Rakas21

Original post by DPW1

My parents was gutted John Smith died, they really liked Smith- I wasn't born at the time- they said he left the foundations for the Blair 100+ majorities

I get the impression that he was Kinnock's third term in that unlike Blair, he was an instinctual lefty who had accepted the Thatcherite consensus. Smith for example had already promoted Brown and gone smoozing the city and had given Blair a senior role (viewed by the old guard already as a red Tory).

I suspect he would have lost many of the personality points Blair had over Major (Major was liked and good on the soap box) but would have still won and probably not have kept things the same to the degree Blair did (he and Brown were terrified of being a one term government). The Tories did lose more than 1000 council seats in 94 which is when Smith died afterward (though bear in mind those seats were last fought in 1990).

So yeah, i agree with your parents somewhat.

Reply 42

username878267

Original post by Rakas21

Atlee and Thatcher. The two most influential prime ministers.

Blair had such a huge majority though and should have made some more significant, permanent changes in the way that Atlee and Thatcher did.

I always say that the mark of a great leader is not one that changes theje own party but one that changes the opposition. Blair seemed to be more about fine tuning the consensus rather than changing it. You could argue that he dragged the Tories to the left on social issues.

One of Blair's big things was huge funding for public services but that was easily reversed. With the majority he had, I wish he was more radical.

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 43

Llamageddon

Original post by MagicNMedicine

Do you think Corbyn's restoration of trade union powers was aimed at the wealthy Islington metropolitans....

I know this isn't the point you're making but I live in finsbury park (Islington North) and it's still a **** hole. The gentrification of North London is grossly exaggerated and ends at Caledonian Road.

(slightly irrelevant segue that doesn't take on any of your points)

Reply 44

susanneblonde

yep, 1945, 1950, 1964, 1966, 1974 (twice). whether it could work now though is moot. i think it could. Blairism worked for the 1990s, but times now are different.

Reply 45

3121

Original post by susanneblonde

yep, 1945, 1950, 1964, 1966, 1974 (twice). whether it could work now though is moot. i think it could. Blairism worked for the 1990s, but times now are different.

It’s never actually won on a socialist dream, it’s only won when it’s stood for social democracy - working within the capitalist framework. Blairism still works, compare the country in 2017 to 2007, most our issues could be fixed with those principals, instead of ditching the idea the left should’ve worked on it and improved it. Instead the conservatives stole the idea *cough* David Cameron *cough* and now they appeal to the working class.

I would never class Clement Attlee as a socialist, for all the right reasons #1 being, his policies worked.

Reply 46

susanneblonde

labour was always and still is officially democratic socialist. that is socialism within a capitalist framework. Just New LAbour was Thatcherism-lite but with core Labour principles (what the evil **** called "the Third Way"). But then I see no reason why a similar platform to the Wilson or even Attlee times couldn't work now. I wouldn't vote for it, since i don't believe in nationalisation, however but it's different now.

Reply 47

George32

Original post by Bornblue

Corbyn is not far left.

Ideologically, like McDonnell, Corbyn is probably far-left tbh. He probably just accepts that few people in the Labour Party and public today would actually support the fullest extent of his ideas; and so he focuses on the more populist areas of his politics to drum up support from the public.

This frames the "modern/moderate socialist" narrative. I think his true views are very left; he's just boxed by the reality of politics and how much we've moved on since the 60s, 70s etc.

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 48

ChaoticButterfly

Original post by hpcp

I saw somewhere that previous labour leaders who have won and formed a majority government have generally been more towards the centre of the spectrum (so more centre-left than corbyn is right now)
Is that true?
For example a lot of MPs who like Corbyn seem to like Tony Benn, and he is generally considered to be on the hard left of the labour party.

The Attlee government was arguably left wing, although the at the time it existed in was still moderate and centre left. Back then the hard left were generally actual communists or more left wing socialists.

The problem is the far left are actually proposing ideas that are really very moderate. They would not be out of place in the SDP party that formed when some of the right of the labour party split off in the 80s.

Corbyn et al are not proposing to nationalise the heights of industry like the trotskysits of old. Tonny Benn was not as left wing as that, he just didn't actively try and kick those elements out of the party and defended their right to exist in the party.

It's a testament to the stupidity of the times we live in that it is taking the left wing of the labour party to actually propose mild, sensible solutions that differ from Thatcherism and the New Labour third way.

Reply 49

ChaoticButterfly

Original post by zayn008

I'd argue the post was settlement was very much a socialist dream in the Bevanism sense.

How would Blairism still work? Blairism relied on the growth and tax produced by the financial sector. Ever since 2008 that has not been an option. The only thing New Labour were offering after 2008 was to follow the Tories down with their attack on welfare and public spending, essentially getting rid of the achievements of New Labour. Back when Harriet Harmon was the care taker leader she wanted Labour to vote in favour of attacking welfare, which is what arguably kick started the whole corbyn thing. The Labour membership generally went along with Blair and his third way when it was winning, apart from a small number of true believers it was only ever really backed out of desperation from more than a decade of loosing to the Tories. Once it stopped working and actively started to attack its achievements, people started wondering what is the point, of we can;t win with this we may as well try winning with something different and more in line with what we actually believe in.

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 50

3121

Original post by ChaoticButterfly

How would Blairism still work? Blairism relied on the growth produced buy the financial sector. Ever since 2008 that has not been an option. The only thing New Labour were offering after 2008 was to follow the Tories down with their attack on welfare and public spending, essentially getting rid of the achievements of New Labour. Back when Harriet Harmon was the care taker leader she wanted Labour to vote in favour of attacking welfare, which is what arguably kick started the whole corbyn thing.

Fair point, but New Labour also focused on the longer term of training people for manual labour to boost manufacturing, they also focused on technology. I do wonder what the next boom will be, it seems we’ve run out of economic drivers, I don’t think we’ll ever see growth in the 4%+ region

That’s because one of new labours biggest criticisms was its big spending on welfare, much of it was seen as unnecessary, show me anything indicating labour were going to make cuts harming people’s lives as the tories have done today, benefits were too high but now they’re too low, Labour was criticised for being far too generous but then again we had the resources to for that generosity in the early 2000s.

I remember the 2010 election briefly and all I remember is people complaining about benefits, I was in year 6 and people in my class would talk about benefits being too much (obviously over heard from their parents). So It was a big criticism of Labour and it lost them the Tory vote which was crucial for them to stay in power, labour hasn’t targeted the voice since hence it still remains far from power.

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 51

Arran90

A notable feature of the NuLab government was the rise of the BNP and UKIP from fringe parties in 1997 to serious political forces in 2010. The explanation was that since 1960ish Labour has been a unpatriotic party at heart regardless of whether it leans to the left or the right or stays in the middle of the road on economic issues.

The BNP and UKIP may have receded but they are not dead yet. In the light of the rise of the BNP and UKIP between 1997 and 2010 then Labour seriously needs to ask itself whether the party should be a social democratic party for the common folk from England or else risk history repeating itself if the party continues to be a 'safe' space liberal party run in the interests of the Guardian reading metropolitan elite working for fringe rights of largely undeserving minorities. This is far more important than the party's economic position or how much they spend on public services or even who the leader is.

Since the 1979 general election Labour stubbornly refused to accept that their core white English working class voters had a huge problem with mass immigration, and the resultant problems it caused for them such as housing, schools, access to public services, and the change in culture in their neighbourhoods. Labour got hammered by the voters for this in the 2010 and 2015 general elections as large numbers of people from their core demographic and potential floating voters voted BNP and UKIP. Despite these setbacks, and a change in leader, Labour still refuses to acknowledge this phenomenon but instead retreats further into their 'safe space' whilst trying to win an election on the back of abolishing tuition fees.

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Has Labour ever won on the far left?

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