British Politics

Interesting to see most posters struggling to identify with a party so close to a general election.

I gave you the workers party a few weeks ago - and got short shrift - but if you want progressive policies like nationalisation, green energy, anti-war, UBI in England then you know what to do.

Another thing that I have noticed in the last few weeks is that the tory narrative is being framed as "Sunak is out of touch" when it should be "all tories are cu*ts"

This will allow them to rebuild more quickly after the inevitable defeat.

You forgot the anti-Semitism and anti-abortion - among other things.

From a friend in France:

He now thinks the chances of macron just being a fool are rising.

French powers-that-be collaborating with fascists? That could never happen.

What's wrong with voting Lib Dem? Especially in a constituency where they came second to the Tories last time?

Asking for a friend.

I still don't think they're over getting in bed with the tories and rolling over about student fees tbh

In what way are they not over it? It was over a decade ago, the current government drops a bollock like that at least once a week.

A lot of people that were students at the time are now a significant part of the voting public.

I could be wrong though. I just never even consider the LibDems as a force because of their being the poodle for the tories when they got a bit of power.

You might be interested in this.

This perfectly shows the ambient political situation in France - an armed fascist militia attacks a demonstration, then hides behind the police who come to their aid:

Haven't looked at their policies but probably not much different from voting Labour and if they're in second probably a good idea imo.

Yes, though LD leaders do vary quite a bit and Clegg, another expensively-educated fool, was always clearly on the right of the party and looking after his own interests.

If not being a force is your reason not to vote for someone then why vote Green?

Tories falling apart by the looks of it. Jenkyns (her of the two-fingers to the public) seems to want a foot in both camps.

"I haven't seen it"

Labour's manifesto spending plans:

You can see how they're capped spending so low. Nothing even about energy and water companies.

Cos I consider environment and climate change to be easily the most important factor facing humanity now. I am really only concerned about a party that is properly addressing this. The green is currently all there is that's even close, but they don't have any real plans, only aspirations so what ya gonna do.

They aren't addressing anything with zero or close to zero seats. They're the opposite of a force, whatever that is. And they seem to be a home for a lot of the crank left that have fled Labour.

You can make those arguments about Reform, but it's hard to argue they are not moving the needle right on Tory policy.

That's true, but the Greens don't appear to be moving the needle on anything.

If enough people actually vote for them, then the needle has to move.

We cant just give up on green policies just because they are not currently polling well.

That's totally wrong

Farage has been probably the most influential politician of recent times and he didn't do it by winning seats.

He did it by winning votes. The pressure comes from those votes. Huge pressure.

Our votes really matter. We have to stop giving them away so easily.

Starmer lies a lot but his biggest whopper is that he is putting country before party.

He has abandoned all the radical policies he once supported as necessary for the country purely to ensure his party wins.

It's all about him and his party being in power. The country be damned

He sold his soul. Tragically he didn't even need to.

No politician wants to tell you about the necessary capital costs of nuclear, tidal and wind power to keep the lights on and the hospitals working without damaging emissions. And no politician in the last 30 years even seems to have thought about or planned for our energy security, any more than they've thought about or planned for our food security, perhaps because these long-term things don't matter in the short-term electoral cycle (i.e. as an issue as to whether MPs keep their flash jobs or not for the time being), so nobody can be arsed. Though it has to be said that voters don't really think much better than politicians do. If we did, we'd have forced them to act more wisely before now.

Unless we wanted to get all 1789 about it there's no mechanism for people forcing politicians to plan beyond the electoral cycle, which was adopted in a very different age and will probably be replaced sooner or later with something more Chinese-like that allows for long-term centralised planning, like it or not.

These flaws in the electoral system have been apparent for decades. It was that long ago that we first read about the pensions timebomb stoked by an ageing population and falling birthrates, and of course governments kept kicking the ball into the long grass. No one ever wants to campaign on a platform of "Vote for me, I'll make you work longer".