Monday 11 November 2013

The Three Pillars Of… Err….

Arnie Graf and Jon Cruddas attempt to re-launch Labour. As expected, it hits the harbour wall, breaks in two, and sinks:
On the doorstep and in meetings around the country, people are telling us that what matters to them is their family, the work they do and the place they live in.
All of which Labour, when last in office, did their level best to change!
There is visceral anger towards the big six utility companies, and rising resentment over the price of transport. Many people are having to devote five days of working every month just to meet the cost of getting to work.
Yes, for people who forget that the companies that provide utilities and transport are businesses, and expect to turn a profit. They also invest in their chosen areas in order to do this. There’s no magic gas tree!
The cost of rent is becoming prohibitive for many people, taking up 50% or more of their monthly pay. Buying a home is getting beyond hope, especially for their children. Food costs are rising, and university fees are despairing for many.
More to the point, the university degrees they send you off with are worthless…
So family integrity is one pillar of a one-nation Britain, which is why in government Labour will cap energy prices and back up our campaigning against payday lenders with a levy on their profits and a cap on the cost of their loans.
And the companies will just absorb this, will they? They won’t pass it on to their customers, and so make the interest rates even higher?
Work to support our families is a second pillar. This is about self-respect and dignity: austerity without strategies for growth and work is dooming a whole generation who do not know about the importance of work in their development as full human beings.
Yes, we call that generation ‘Labour voters’. You expect to convince us you want to cut that pool?
In government we will support the living wage campaign with make-work-pay contracts to help businesses raise wages for millions of workers.
Which, again, will be passed on in higher prices for others. Really, can no-one see how this is going to affect things?
The third pillar is a place to belong. We see the empty shops, the potholes, the betting shops and the legal loan sharks in the high streets we campaign on. These places smell of decay. It is hard not to feel a sense of loss and concern for the future when we walk these streets. And we hear the anger about immigration. People are not anti-migrant, but to them immigration is the cause of rapid social and cultural changes that leaves them not knowing where they fit in. So Labour will make sure everyone in Britain can speak English, the language that binds us together as a national community.
And if, like Farhia, they don’t plan on learning it? Are you going to set up re-education camps?
One-nation Labour is for family, for getting Britain working again, and for community. It means doing politics in a new way. Not the old top-down transactional politics of doing things to and for people. But a bottom-up transformative politics of the common good that gives people the power and responsibility to take more control of their lives, their work and their communities.
Fine words, though they ring utterly hollow when set against the last Labour regime, which created exactly the conditions you now rail against..

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

Meanwhile......

'In January, the only thing left will be the goat': Romanian father-of-seven's boast as mayor says half the population of his villages are on their way to Britain for the higher salaries and generous benefits
Remus Neda, 37, is heading for the UK to take advantage of state handouts
He makes most of his money by begging on the streets of Paris


From today's WAIL. True dat !

Anonymous said...

Meanwhile....

Tory MP's claim for electricity to his stables is exposed by the Press: The same Press he wants to bring under state control
Nadhim Zahawi, 46, claimed money for electricity used to run a horse riding stables at his home in Upper Tyfoe, Warwickshire
Today MP for Stratford-Upon-Avon apologised, saying he made a 'mistake'
Follows calls for police and IPSA to investigate his £6,000-a-year claims
Last week it was revealed that 340 MPs claim for electricity bills in their second homes, including Labour leader Ed Miliband


I know it's from The Wail - doesn't make it any less true.

Anonymous said...

"So Labour will make sure everyone in Britain can speak English, the language that binds us together as a national community."
I know immigrants who don't speak English and ones who came here to live off benefits.

I am far more worried about the second than the first.

Fidel Cuntstruck said...

I think that Cruddas and the team are doing exactly what Blair did back in 1996/1997 - selling a dream .. of things being better, for all of us.

The frightening thing is that it will work as well as Blair's fairy story did back then, most people are not interested in the bigger issues, tell them you'll save them a tenner on their utility bills and you have them.

Bucko said...

""resentment over the price of transport
The cost of rent is becoming prohibitive
Food costs are rising, and university fees are despairing""

Sounds like someone moaning that wages have to be spent on life rather than kept aside for good things they don't mind paying out for.

That's why we go to work and earn a wage - To pay for all that stuff. It's not exclusively for shoe shopping.

Tatty said...

"take more control of their lives, their work and their communities.

...by handing over absolute control of how to speak, think and act, where you live, what you pay for utilities, what you are paid in wages and even what frickin' language you have to speak - and to a political party, at that.

Ok so things are a mess right now but, hey, at least it's a mess of individuals.

People really REALLY need to start thinking for themselves and solving their own problems.

Fast.

Anonymous said...

Talk about brass neck. They must sit in a room all day making this crap up, knowing that there are a fair few mugs that will buy it.

Anyone who knows a little about what is really going on can take this tosh apart.

Labour had there chance, and they blew it. They shafted their core voters and now there back and gagging for another go.

Utter vermin. No one should ever vote for this Socialist filth, or for that matter, the light blue Socialists of the Conservative Party.

Antisthenes said...

If anyone wants to see what these types of policies do for a country they can look no further than France who are rapidly going down the drain. Go a bit further to Venezuela who are already down the drain. Of course these are only two examples there are many more past and present.

Anonymous said...

Woman of the Year:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/defence/10441802/Former-Wren-to-ex-minister-You-Sir-are-a-disgrace.html

Furor Teutonicus said...

XX it hits the harbour wall, breaks in two, and sinks: XX

Ahhh, the ending I always WISHED was included in that bloody song,"Home lovin' man.

"The harbour lights were shining;
it hits the harbour wall, breaks in two, and sinks."

I am sure you could even fit that to the music.

Furor Teutonicus said...

XX Bucko The Moose said...

That's why we go to work and earn a wage - To pay for all that stuff. It's not exclusively for shoe shopping. XX

But the less shoes they can buy, the more the Bru seems like a better option?

Not that I would EVER agree with any commy shit politician, but....maybe....

JuliaM said...

"'In January, the only thing left will be the goat'"

Pity. The goat might raise our collective IQ, rather than lowering it...

"I know it's from The Wail - doesn't make it any less true."

Oh, indeed!

"...selling a dream .. of things being better, for all of us."

They might want to look to the US, where that tactic is currently unravelling for Obama!

"People really REALLY need to start thinking for themselves and solving their own problems. "

There's no sign whatsoever that they will - just look at yesterday's report about people getting into debt because they bought the latest smartphones!

JuliaM said...

"Labour had there chance, and they blew it. They shafted their core voters..."

And as Fidel points out, they will STILL vote for that donkey in the red rosette, regardless.

"...they can look no further than France who are rapidly going down the drain. "

Quite!

Woman on a Raft said...

So Labour will make sure everyone in Britain can speak English, the language that binds us together as a national community."

They are going to run in to trouble then with the EU requirement that if someone wants to conduct their life in Welsh, they can.

Furor Teutonicus said...

XX Woman on a Raft said...

They are going to run in to trouble then with the EU requirement that if someone wants to conduct their life in Welsh, they can. XX

Nothing stopping them. Just don't expect the one you are talking to, to return the favour, and DEFFINATELY expect no tax payer funded fucking translations for your hobby!