15 Years Hard Labour.....

[ToraToraTora]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-51413562
Looks like they're waiting for another St Tony!

[ynnafymmi]

They will be the opposition for a very long time,Spicerack,unless they get Blair(or somebody else equally competent) back to lead the Labour party into some commonsense.

[Old_Geezer]

At present I'm unconvinced the party could change sufficiently in a single term. The next GE is more likely to depend on the present government's actions than on any opposition offer. But we'll have to wait and see.

[Old_Geezer]

Oh and no. Blair was the start of their longer term problems. He was able to grab normally Tory votes when everyone was disillusioned and fed up with the Tories, but swinging the pendulum to the far right ensured it would eventually swing far left in response. They need to remain left to be a viable alternative to the Tory right, but a moderate left not an unpopular far left.

[Spicerack]

They'll be in opposition but I don't think they'll be the opposition, ynn.

[Spicerack]

The new deputy leader (i hope) says stop bullying er bullies. lol.

[ynnafymmi]

@11.29.You are talking riddles now,spicey.How can they be in opposition,but not in actual opposition?

[dannyk13]

I think what SR meams is that will be an opposition party but not an effective opposition.

[Spicerack]

I don't think it's a riddle. There's an official opposition, THE opposition, but it won't be the Labour Party in my opinion.

[dannyk13]

SR, Then who do you think the opposition will be in fifteen years?

[andy-hughes]

As I understand the term, 'bullying' means direct action or behaviour against another person or persons.

If Dawn Butler thinks that the government actually NOT doing something is, as she says, 'a form of bullying', I'd be interested to see her run it past her 'due process' of which is is rightly fond, as a union activist.

Does she think this absence of action would pass her 'due process' test?

[Spicerack]

Don't think she thought it through, andy.
Not sure, danny. Just don't think it will be Labour.

[andy-hughes]

Spicerack - // Don't think she thought it through, andy. //

I'm inclined to agree on that.

I think one of the prerequisites of being a politician with any hope of a long career is the ability not only to answer questions you are not expecting, but to be able to think quickly enough before you speak, that what you have just said will not collapse under the most rudimentary analysis - as has happened here.

[retrocop]

There are threats that up to 50 Labour MPs will quit Labour if Long-Bailey is elected the new Labour Leader. That's the death knell I hope.
http://htyahoo.com/news/mps-could-desert-labour-if-rebecca-long-bailey-wins-leadership-220000117.htmltps://uk.

[Spicerack]

They say lots of things, retro. The call of the trough is mighty strong.

[ynnafymmi]

If the electorate vote for the Labour Party in the future it will be for a Blairite,centre-left Labour Party,not for a faction led by old Steptoe and his left-wing fascist acolytes.

[10ClarionSt]

ynnafymmi, that's easy for you to say. Or anyone else for that matter! You don't have to get Hercules up every morning clean up after him do you?