David Miliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour’s grassroots

@DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader via @leftfootfwd

RT @leftfootfwd: @DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader <#DM4Leader

RT @leftfootfwd: @DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader

RT @Jessica_Asato: RT @leftfootfwd: @DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader <#DM4 …

Putting the heart back into labour but giving the head the knowhow to do it. I’ll drink to that !

[...] More… [...]

@DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader via @leftfootfwd

we do not need a leader to rejuvenate labour’s grassroots.we need a leader that will win the next election.this person must win over tory voters in the south east and midlands or we are consigned to oblivion, as a talking shop like the libdems used to be.clegg grasped that point, and his vision is to replace labour as the largest centre left party, and then win an election outright.did somebody notice that it was brown, a socialist, who proposed the abolition of the 10p tax rate, and clegg, a libdem. who easily persuaded a tory chancellor to increase tax thresholds. we are on thin ice here. we,the labour movement made poor people relatively poorer. we set up a system,the FSA, that unleashed an uncontrolled explosion in property prices that made it impossible for our own to be able to afford to buy their house.on immigration, just go and talk to a working class voter. and all brown’s central command and control has been absolutely rejected by voters for either the libdems or the tories. on this point, they are coming from different angles, but the majority of the electorate clearly want a society a million miles from the control freakery of the big clunking fist, which did not even deliver economic competence.above all, our party needs to disown the debacle of brown, and espouse a programme that relates to the aspirations of the private sector out side of wales ,scotland, and the north. they decide who is chosen to serve our country,a fact we cannot ignore.

with all respect David is just following on with New Labour

Great at winning elections

but no core values

nor re nationalisation of the NHS or rail

I am sick of being a member that is increasingly defined as just anti Tory anti Lib Dem
and just not so quick to cut or privatise

take social enterprise – Iam actually sympathetic

but in reality they are in localgovernment just management “buy outs”

RT @leftfootfwd: David Miliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots http://bit.ly/bW4rhp

"answer to rejuvenation of grassroots is not to adopt other organisations’ campaigns & turn them into Labour campaigns" http://bit.ly/bW4rhp

"If we are to be a Movement for Change we have to be able to understand & relate to fellow members in our constituency" http://bit.ly/bW4rhp

RT @sowadally: "answer to rejuvenation of grassroots is not to adopt other organisations’ campaigns & turn them into Labour campaigns" http://bit.ly/bW4rhp

RT @sowadally: RT @leftfootfwd: David Miliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots http://bit.ly/bW4rhp

@DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader via @leftfootfwd

William -

“clegg, a libdem. who easily persuaded a tory chancellor to increase tax thresholds”

Yes, but how difficult could it be to persuade a Tory chancellor to cut direct taxes – then fund that cut (along with cuts to corporation tax etc.) by raising VAT? That’s a regressive, Tory package of tax measures through and through.

And I think we need to be cautious about what we mean when we talk about winning over Tory voters. As Ed M has been arguing, what we really need to do is win back mostly working-class ex-Labour voters who’ve either stopped voting altogether or gone over to the Tories or Lib Dems, and win over left-leaning Lib Dems who are disillusioned with the coalition. Going all-out to woo affluent, naturally right-of-centre Tory voters could easily do more harm than good by reinforcing the impression that we are not on the side of ordinary people.

“Then paid to train them in community organising”
And with whose ugly money? Anthony Bailey, royalist anti-abortion arms trade lobbyist; David Blaydon, once of Morgan Stanley, now UBS, both deeply involved in the financial crisis, both losing hundreds of millions of pounds thanks to overextended loans. UBS is also one of the government’s advisers trying to privatise Royal Mail; David Sainsbury, bankroller of the SDP and Parry Mitchell, co-founder of the SDP.

http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/94241

Lighting: David Miliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots | Left … http://bit.ly/ah0Acq

Old Labour new Tory, New Labour old Tory, the simple fact Labour has broken the allegiance people had with the party. I’ve been voting Labour since 1966 no questions asked I voted Labour as my father my grand father and my great grand father uncles aunties all Labour all Miners and steel worker and farming.

at the last election I went to a wedding within the family talking about politics as one does over a pint, we had gone through the local football teams bad season. I found not one was interested in voting Labour, mind you they did not vote Tory either, I was shocked at how many had said they were voting BNP, mainly they said to show Labour, but in the end talking to them again none bothered voting.

What will Miliband offer, he is a Blairite he loved the Blair way, he is new Labour, call it by another name if you like but he will re brand it, but in the end it will be newer or super newer Labour, I shall be voting for a smaller party in my area. how sad after voting Labour since 1966

@DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader via @leftfootfwd

RT @leftfootfwd: David Miliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots http://bit.ly/bW4rhp exactly – we're doing it already! #M4C

@DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader via @leftfootfwd

Ash – I agree with your initial points but your final remark is the problem.

Labour isn’t on the side of ordinary people. It is too right wing and loves big business and big control freak government. The Lib Dem’s offer the chance of left of centre policies actually being implemented in the next five years – Labour don’t.

New Labour understood that to win elections one has to capture the middle or centre ground in Britain and they did that – I was moved by some of Blair’s early speeches having initially wanted a left winger, like another John Smith as leader.

(Brown is a useless politician – always was a nasty piece of work regardless of his political leanings which is why his ratings were so low)

Once those voters were on side they were then dumped on by their government – taxed to the hilt by stealth then lectured and lied to to by a bunch of lying hypocrites. The Tories were changing leaders too often and were unelectable and that was why Labour kept winning elections but their vote was falling every time.

Labour needs a reason to exist and I’m afraid that if that is to perpetuate the myth that the public want the kind of government they have just thrown out then their voters are deluded.

By not constantly complaining about the continuation of the very policies that got the party to where it is today will allow the useless Labour MP’s we are burdened with to continue their slide to political oblivion.

Tell me the point of Labour without just seeing it as an anti-government collection of middle class public schoolboys who have never done a real job.

I’m not holding my breath.

[...] am Jonathan Cox, one of the organisers of David Miliband’s “Movement for Change”, argued yesterday: To build a movement you have to put the development of people before policies. So the answer to [...]

Anon E Mouse

dam sight better said then I could have done, and totally one hundred percent corect. well said….

Robert – As an ex Labour voter myself I associate with all your remarks as well dude.

Thanks for the comment – I think someone agreeing with my views – a voter the party needs to win back to get elected is unusual here.

Lose the group-think people and you may become electable again…

Anon -

Not sure what you’re saying is that much at odds with what I’m saying, really – that Labour has come across (and partly with good reason) as too much in love with big business and too out of touch with ordinary people.

I say ‘*partly* with good reason’ because I think that, in many respects, Labour *were* on the side of ordinary people. Certainly I could list plenty of ways in which they made life better for my own pretty ordinary family: lifting us out of poverty with tax credits, building my kids’ new school, cutting hospital waiting lists (I had a fairly major op recently), funding postgraduate qualifications for myself & my wife, etc.

I’m not trying to be smug or ‘I’m all right Jack’ here, and I know there are people Labour didn’t do enough to help. But when it comes to assessing what Labour did & didn’t do for ordinary people, it’s ludicrous to just ignore things like tax credits & all the investment in public services.

This is where the rabidly anti-New Labour crowd are going to have to learn to take a more balanced view, I think. They can’t spend the next five years going: ‘Cutting Sure Start and Tax Credits? That’s wrong. Scrapping the RDAs, the BSF programme and the Child Trust Fund? That’s wrong.’ etc. etc., while simultaneously refusing to acknowledge that maybe New Labour was on the right lines when it introduced those things in the first place.

@DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader from @leftfootfwd

Ash – Agreed. I think a lot of what Labour did is good, particularly on big things like diversity – people’s colour, creed and sexuality don’t seem to matter any more which is to be applauded.

Overall I personally think there will be a lurch to the left – especially without the Lib Dem’s grabbing those sympathetic to that view. It’s OK for Labour to be pleased at an increase in membership but if it’s the lefties from the Lib Dem’s it won’t get them back into government.

Labour has to grab back the centre right, a group that gave it power but if Clegg is canny enough he may be able to move the Lib Dem’s into the void left by Labour (assuming I’m correct and they do lurch to the left and don’t grab the centre / right).

What is telling is that many of the contributors to this fine blog don’t seem to realise they are still justifying and excusing the very things they were chucked out of power for – the very things the general public do not like.

Interesting times lie ahead…

Read @wdjstraw's exclusive interview with #LabourLeader candidate @edballsmp on @leftfootfwd: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp

RT #grassroots @DMiliband is the man to rejuvenate Labour's grassroots: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp #LabourLeader from @lef… http://ow.ly/18JpPK

RT @shamikdas Read @wdjstraw's exclusive interview with #LabourLeader candidate @edballsmp on @leftfootfwd: http://bit.ly/bW4rhp

London Citizens? Community Organising? London citizens coordinate action from faith groups, union branches and community organisations = pockets of pre-existing social capital. Why didn’t D Mil talk to Organising Unions about organising the unorganised?
Consider the role of a trade union organiser: Getting ‘ordinary’ people (often in vulnerable employment) to join a union, motivating them to volunteer to take up an active (unpaid) role, to equip them with key skills in negotiating, leadership, advocacy and to get them to participate fully in the decision making processes of the organisation and to move it in a more progressive, inclusive, and democratic direction.
Silly me, I think I’ve just answered my own question with the last point about the role of a trade union organiser.
Calling all you MFC evangelicals… nrol now the TUC organising assessment centres:

http://www.tuc.org.uk/organisation/index.cfm?mins=58

….and make sure to vote for Ed Miliband!

Can’t wait to see him at the dispatch box being dispatched!

@Mouse

You back so soon? I thought you’d gone elsewhere? Have you brought sock puppets this time?

“Labour isn’t on the side of ordinary people. It is too right wing and loves big business and big control freak government. The Lib Dem’s offer the chance of left of centre policies actually being implemented in the next five years – Labour don’t.”

“Labour has to grab back the centre right, a group that gave it power but if Clegg is canny enough he may be able to move the Lib Dem’s into the void left by Labour (assuming I’m correct and they do lurch to the left and don’t grab the centre / right).”

So, yet again inconsistency is the main feature of your posts, arguing in one post that Labour is too right wing then in the next post that Labour should move further to the right? Could you explain that one without resorting to foaming at the mouth anti-Labour ranting?

“Tell me the point of Labour without just seeing it as an anti-government collection of middle class public schoolboys who have never done a real job.”

Care to explain that one as well?

Anon

“The Lib Dem’s offer the chance of left of centre policies actually being implemented in the next five years – Labour don’t”.

Do you still really believe this after The IFS have officially stated that the recent budget is ‘regressive’ and hits the poorest hardest? A budget that was fully endorsed by your Lib Dem mates and now Clegg has the cheek to criticise the IFS’ findings saying you can’t measure poverty with numbers…?

What drug is the man on?

@Liz

“What drug is the man on?”

I’ve been wondering the very same thing for a while now.

Liz – The report from the IFS took selective parts of the budget instead of considering it as a whole – it’s called “Lies, damned lies and statistics” and I agree with Clegg – poverty shouldn’t just be measured by the amount of money someone has…

Chris – I assumed you’d headed off to look in a mirror dude – nice to see you back!

Can I ask (again) that you please keep a grip on the compulsive and obsessive side of your nature and REREAD what I’ve said and then come back and ask your question – no one else here seems to have a problem in understanding it.

Remember what you’ve been told Chris; “Always READ the question before answering”

While you’re there you forgot to explain why you thought the OPINION of “Alien from Zog” was more valid as an OPINION than those others I linked to from YOUR own link, you know the ones from The Guardian etc

http://www.leftfootforward.org/2010/08/george-osborne-leading-economists-intergenerational-fairness/#comments

Don’t forget Chris, Labour lost the election for a reason…

Liz – My point was that irrespective of the policies or the influence of those policies on the coalition government, the Lib Dem’s are in a position to AFFECT peoples lives. For the next five years, in a direct capacity Labour are certainly not.

(Did you notice my use of the AFFECT word? I remember someone in April this year telling me how importing affecting peoples lives was…)

Anon – Yes AFFECT – they are ie by hitting the poorest with their regressive Con Dem policies. It might not seem like that right now, but let’s see what you say circa May 11.

One minute you are criticising Labour for being too right wing & not working class enough and the next minute you are saying or at least inferring the opposite.

I can’t keep up with you!

Anon – just out of sheer curiosity, does your political mood/compass depend on which day of the week it is or what the weather is like…?

Liz – I’ve just been reading over some of our correspondence over the months and I have been absolutely consistent about the Labour Party. I so wish they were different but hey.

I do admit, despite not voting Lib Dem at the GE, I do like Clegg. That makes me a non partisan, non tribal, open minded floating voter. Yourself?

Chris – Just noticed this; “Tell me the point of Labour without just seeing it as an anti-government collection of middle class public schoolboys who have never done a real job.” Care to explain that one as well?

Well what if I want to vote for someone from the working class who has done a factory job, seen how his colleagues are being treated and vows to run for office to better the lot of others in his position. Who do I vote for? It should be Labour. It’s not though.

Whenever Labour criticised the Tories for being toffs I post this list I compiled of the last Labour government and their educational backgrounds.

(The most important is currently the leader Harriet Harman being educated at the same school as the Tory chancellor)

Posted to LFF on 11/12/09:

Ed Balls (Morley and Outwood) Hugh Bayley (City of York) Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) Bob Blizzard (Waveney) Chris Bryant (Rhondda) Stephen Byers (North Tyneside) Charles Clarke (Norwich South) Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley) Jim Cousins (Newcastle-upon-Tyne Central) Alistair Darling (Edinburgh South West) Quentin Davies (Grantham and Stamford) Louise Ellman (Liverpool Riverside) Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) Mark Fisher (Stoke-on-Trent Central) Barry Gardiner (Brent North) Linda Gilroy (Plymouth Sutton) Paul Goggins (Wythenshawe and Sale East) Peter Hain (Neath) Patrick Hall (Bedford and Kempston) Fabian Hamilton (Leeds North East) Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham) John Healey (Wentworth) Margaret Hodge (Barking) Geoff Hoon (Ashfield) Lindsay Hoyle (Chorley) Tessa Jowell (Dulwich and West Norwood) Sally Keeble (Northampton North) Ruth Kelly (Bolton West) Jim Knight (South Dorset) Ivan Lewis (South Bury) Martin Linton (Battersea) Ian Lucas (Wrexham) Denis MacShane (Rotherham) Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) Judy Mallaber (Amber Valley) John Mann (Bassetlaw) Rob Marris (Wolverhampton South West) Gordon Marsden (Blackpool South) Bob Marshall-Andrews (Medway) Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) Chris Mole (Ipswich) Julie Morgan (Cardiff North) Doug Naysmith (Bristol North West) Nick Palmer (Broxtowe) Gordon Prentice (Pendle) James Purnell (Stalybridge and Hyde) Nick Raynsford (Greenwich and Woolwich) Geoffrey Robinson (Coventry North West) Andrew Slaughter (Ealing, Acton and Shepherd’s Bush) John Spellar (Warley) Phyllis Starkey (Milton Keynes South West) Howard Stoate (Dartford) Gavin Strang (Edinburgh East) Mark Todd (South Derbyshire) Kitty Ussher (Burnley) Keith Vaz (Leicester East) Malcolm Wicks (Croydon North) Michael Wills (Swindon North) Rosie Winterton (Doncaster Central) Shaun Woodward (St Helens South)

And another 105 who went to the grammar schools that Labour hate so much.

Is that a suitable explanation for you Chris?

Remember Labour lost the election for a reason…

Anon – surely it’s where these MPs send their kids. I don’t think they probably had a choice or debate with their parents about which school they were sent to. Things may be different today…!

The one that probably does come under the spotlight is Diane Abbot.

Anon – I have some good & long standing Lib Dem friends who are frankly shocked and disgusted by their party going in to coalition with the Tories and see Clegg & Cameron as one and the same.

You know that I am a Labour loyalist through & through and still keep the faith!

Liz – Agreed on Diane Abbott but I have to say I do like her! (I was answering that young lad Chris above with the post, not making a statement)

There is something refreshing about a female who looks fun instead of serious 40 something middle class public school educated (sorry Andy, you’re just not credible) sycophants from the last useless Labour cabinet vying to be leader.

I have some good & long standing Lib Dem friends (well 1 actually) who is frankly shocked and pleased by their party going in to coalition with the Tories and she sees Clegg & Cameron as one and the same.

My constant barracking on this blog is because the very types of policies that make Labour an unattractive proposition to the general public are still being pursued and excused by people on this blog.

I don’t expect a New Labour moment but I do expect something different.

And I know you are a Labour loyalist through and through Liz, which is why we are constantly arguing! But that’s OK, you are always polite. Keep the faith!

Anon – as well as a party loyalist I am & have been critical (as in a critical friend) of some decisions but as a movement for social good & progress and fighting for justice & equality – for me at least, there’s only one party.

Anon – Which is why I don’t criticise you personally Liz but I’m afraid that words are just that and Labour in the last few years was anything but progressive, despite the rhetoric…

Yes I do agree that it wasn’t 100% perfect or progressive and think people realise that. But also think about the bigger picture & what’s happened since 1997 & how society is generally more liberal & progressive. It didn’t happen by itself!!!

Liz – Agreed. Even Cameron had concede that on the steps of Downing Street. Now go and get some work done woman ;-}

Anon – you will be please to know that now I am officially on holidays (and when I am not I am pretty good at multi-tasking!.

Thanks for the constructive comments – good to see the interest in community organising and the Movement for Change.

LC Prestes – community organising honours and respects trade union organising, but it is substantively different. Come to the training and find out. Anyone can come – you don’t have to be a David supporter and we even welcome Ed supporters!).

Many Labour members are not members of trade unions, but everyone is a member of a community and their local CLP – so community organising is more inclusive and can reach more people.

For anyone who wants to experience community organising in action, you can register for the Movement for Change National Assembly (16:00-18:30 on Bank Holiday Monday) in Westminster by emailing movementforchange@davidmiliband.net.

@Mental Mouse

“Chris – I assumed you’d headed off to look in a mirror dude – nice to see you back!”

I didn’t go anywhere, your the one who picked up his ball and said you were going “elsewhere”. I thought for a brief moment you would but then I remembered you wouldn’t get your money if you didn’t hang around leftie blogs trashing Labour.

“Can I ask (again) that you please keep a grip on the compulsive and obsessive side of your nature and REREAD what I’ve said and then come back and ask your question – no one else here seems to have a problem in understanding it.”

Yawn, the quotes I picked out show the total inconsistency in your arguments and opinions. Obviously, suffering as you do from NPD; you can’t admit that and thus can only resort to bluster and crying to teacher. As Liz said, your position seems to change with the direction the wind blows; I wouldn’t quite agree with that as I believe your suffering from an acute mental illness. Your changes in opinion represents the different personalities that inhabit your drug addled brain; for example, you’ve stated on previously your a LibDem, then you refuted that and stated your a trade unionist. Now your back to LibDem again. As I’ve said before, a lobotomy is the best treatment option your’ll be far happier soiling yourself than overworking your brain cell on politics.

“I have some good & long standing Lib Dem friends (well 1 actually) who is frankly shocked and pleased by their party going in to coalition with the Tories and she sees Clegg & Cameron as one and the same.”

Yawn, this really backs up your argument mouse; makes it fucking irrefutable… What about your dead uncle, have you contacted him recently, what does he make of Clegg?

“Now go and get some work done woman”

Ah, your an unreconstructed misogynist as well, okay, one your personalities is; another is probably a feminist.

Chris – You are the gift that just keeps on giving!!!

Ok once again you are telling lies about things that I haven’t said please READ what I have said.

Even though you know I don’t – you claim I get paid for “trashing Labour” in blogs. Chris if by blogging about Labour’s faults I got paid I could have retired by now.

Labour lost the election for a reason Chris – that’s why I told you to look in a mirror.

Liz did not say my position changes, she asked a question – you are once again telling lies in a public forum over something I didn’t say. Next my Lib Dem remark was in response to Liz’s remark – do you not follow threads before you comment?

Lastly you have removed the smiley from my last comment to Liz to try to portray me as a misogynist. That isn’t true and your action there is pretty low Chris. Really.

Again in a public forum you are lying about things I haven’t said. Please stop it and be polite.

Third time of asking Chris: You linked to a person’s opinion who was called “Alien from Zog” claiming that was “evidence” to support your incorrect statements about PFI.

On that same page you linked to, three other people’s OPINIONS were linked including Allyson Pollock’s Guardian newspaper item.

Please tell me why your “Alien from Zog”s opinion is more valid than hers…

Liz – Have a nice holiday woman – get back to the home country I say – I didn’t doubt for a minute your ability at multi-tasking btw…

Anon – thanks! Will do my best. No plans to visit the home country just yet – i want some decent weather!!

Anon – I meant to say re:

“Now go and get some work done woman”…
You are not the metrosexual man that I thought you were!!!

Liz – :-}

@Mental mouse

Mouse said:
“Liz did not say my position changes”

Yes, the following quotes show Liz clearly thinks your the epitome of consistent and logical comment…

Liz said
“What drug is the man on?”

Liz said
“One minute you are criticising Labour for being too right wing & not working class enough and the next minute you are saying or at least inferring the opposite”

Liz said
“just out of sheer curiosity, does your political mood/compass depend on which day of the week it is or what the weather is like…?”

Mouse said:
“Please tell me why your “Alien from Zog”s opinion is more valid than hers”

I don’t why do you dismiss the alien’s opinion? Why are you dragging up questions from threads which you said were closed, shall I post a few of the points I’ve raised that you never countered as they’re not on central offices script.

PFI allowed Labour to build a lot more without increasing the national debt significantly, an extremely important point in today’s economic climate. But that goes beyond your central office supplied flow chart, doesn’t it, your brain cell can’t compute that your’ll go into the foaming at the mouth anti-Labour tirade.

Oh and

“Again in a public forum you are lying about things I haven’t said.”

Where have I lied?

Chris – Where to begin?

Liz said – “A budget that was fully endorsed by your Lib Dem mates and now Clegg has the cheek to criticise the IFS’ findings saying you can’t measure poverty with numbers…? What drug is the man on?”

She obviously means Clegg not me. So aside from lying time after time about what you THINK I’ve said regardless of my posts, you’re now saying I take drugs as well. Are you?

Liz said: “just out of sheer curiosity, does your political mood/compass depend on which day of the week it is or what the weather is like…?”

Chris if you look at the end of Liz’s sentence you’ll see a character that looks like this – £. That is called a Question Mark Chris and it makes the sentence a question rather than a statement.

I realise that the educational achievements under Labour have resulted in huge numbers leaving school without the ability to do the 3R’s to any degree but I, obviously incorrectly, assumed that as a university graduate you would at least have a basic grasp of English. (I don’t believe you there Chris. No one could be as comprehensively incorrect so often or so dogmatic in approach)

Finally I do not dismiss the Alien from Zog’s OPINION. You sited OPINION as EVIDENCE of your incorrect position on PFI.

This is an EVIDENCE based blog Chris. I hated PFI when the Tories invented it and even more when Labour implemented it. Still do.

Tell me why, from the very page you got me to look at, those other peoples OPINIONS aren’t equally as valid as yours?

You said; “PFI allowed Labour to build a lot more without increasing the national debt significantly, an extremely important point in today’s economic climate.”

That again is NOT TRUE. What it may have done was allow the government of the time to defer payment on buildings it didn’t want to finance immediately and the link you gave shows that is debatable but in any event they have cost us £BILLIONS – or is the BBC’s EVIDENCE of this wrong – has the Office of National Statistics (under Labour not the current government) got it wrong as well? Why are you right Chris and everyone else wrong?

And these PFI contracts were taken out in yesterdays economic climate – not todays – or are you now saying Gordon Brown in the early days of Labour was wrong and in fact the country wasn’t going through economic good times?

What is not an opinion is the fact you said I was paid to trash Labour in blogs. That is lying about me. Please stop it Chris.

Remember Chris: Labour lost the election for a reason…

Chris – Not a £ I meant a ? !!!

@Mental Mouse

“She obviously means Clegg not me. So aside from lying time after time about what you THINK I’ve said regardless of my posts, you’re now saying I take drugs as well. Are you?”

No, she means you!!! ffs irony and sarcasm are well beyond the limits of you brain cell even when not chemically coshed.

“Chris if you look at the end of Liz’s sentence you’ll see a character that looks like this – £. That is called a Question Mark Chris and it makes the sentence a question rather than a statement.”

FFS! Mouse she is taking the piss out of you! Inferring that your political opinions vary from day-to-day or with changes in the weather! LOL, I thought Billy was the thick troll but I’ll have to revise my opinion, compared to this Billy Blofield is a fucking genius.

“I realise that the educational achievements under Labour have resulted in huge numbers leaving school without the ability to do the 3R’s to any degree but I, obviously incorrectly, assumed that as a university graduate you would at least have a basic grasp of English. (I don’t believe you there Chris. No one could be as comprehensively incorrect so often or so dogmatic in approach)”

wtf? You really are mental, you must be suffering from something! Do you not go out much or interact with people? You seem to totally misunderstand irony, sarcasm or when somebody is taking the piss.

“Finally I do not dismiss the Alien from Zog’s OPINION. You sited OPINION as EVIDENCE of your incorrect position on PFI.
This is an EVIDENCE based blog Chris. I hated PFI when the Tories invented it and even more when Labour implemented it. Still do.”

I’m no great fan of PFI but it allowed Labour to quickly set about rebuilding the countries decaying and broken infrastructure, Brown liked it because it didn’t put debt on the gov’s books – looks like a smart move at the moment! But I still don’t know what this has got to do with DM and whether he is the man to rejuvenate Labour.

“What is not an opinion is the fact you said I was paid to trash Labour in blogs. That is lying about me. Please stop it Chris.”

I’m taking the piss, ffs doesn’t the central office supplied flowchart deal with piss takers?

“Remember Chris: Labour lost the election for a reason…”

No, they didn’t lose for a reason. They lost for many reasons, one of those many reasons was the constant drip, drip of LibCon attack lines poisoning public opinion against some of Labour’s real achievements. Just look at central office’s script and flow chart, its just to the right of your computer:

Raising millions of children and pensioners out of poverty -> attack social mobility, 75p pension increase, etc.

Improving failing schools, increased exam attainment across the board -> grade inflation, state schools still not as good as public schools.

Dramatically reducing waiting times in the NHS -> bluster about money wasted on “managers”.

Now, go look up irony and sarcasm in the dictionary and discuss at the next therapy session with your caseworker. They can organise some day release in to the outside world with an appropriate adult to help you recognise the subtle social cues which signify them in everyday life.

[...] of which he was such a prominent part. With or without the support of Jon Cruddas, however, and laudable grassroots focus aside, can Labour afford to elect be led by another politician in favour of the Iraq War, or one [...]

Chris – If you’re correct about Liz meaning me in her comments on drugs then it is out of character for her. She and I have been disagreeing and agreeing on Labour since this blog started and unlike yourself she conducts herself without the need to be insulting, smearing or swearing in a public forum.

Labour lost for a reason Chris – it’s people like yourself who justified the things they were doing that were wrong by constantly excusing them.

You must have known how useless Brown was – you cannot be that naive not to have – yet still your sort kept telling everyone he was great and how he had lead the world out of recession.

Labour will spend years in opposition if their supporters keep ignoring the truth and coming up with excuses like “No one won the election” and so on.

In your world the truth is ignored and the same machine spins away, never answering questions just repeating the mantra while taxes go up and the gap between rich and poor increases.

And how do you respond Chris? Smear the messenger, never answer the question.

It seems to me Labour is clearly alive and well and with your attitude if the party doesn’t go bust I think it will just become the irrelevance it deserves to be. If excuse merchants like yourself stay active then the Lib Dem’s have no problem at the election – why would anyone vote for the Labour Party?

Labour lost the election for a reason Chris, oh yes.