The BBC 1 'Prime Minister' debate

[Joseph K]

Not at all
I happen to think that rasing the minimum wage and support for child care are good ideas
BUT throwing away our right to travel and work in the rest of the EU along with walking away from our collaborations in Science, Culture and Education is a terrible idea.
It's also interesting to see that most of the places I work where mr Corbyn appears to have concern for have this symbol on the signs outside community centres, schools, libraries and other public facilities



i'm sure in the Socialist Unicorn Farming paradise that MrC believes in we will continue to support these things
BUT I really don't trust the Labour party to be able to do anything of the sort

Making the likes of JRM richer isn't going to help the folks in Middlesborough I was working with earlier in the year, neither is bulding a huge factory to destroy more of the planet....

Labour's policy is basically a Norway-style deal isn't it? Where we'd still have many of the benefits of staying in the EU, and certainly not making JRM richer.

[french frank]

So - we should believe that:

austerity = difficult, complex adult decision based in reality

anti-austerity = simple-minded and childishly naïve

Right so far

And TINA... (There Is No Alternative)?

No, I didn't even suggest that: as you stated above, it's difficult. Simply saying 'austerity is a bad thing' - let's abolish it (along with tuition fees)' is the easy bit.

But you have already twisted the discussion: I was responding to your comment which simply mentioned minimum wage increase and free child care. Who, in their right minds, would think those were, inherently, bad ideas?

[MrGongGong]

Labour's policy is basically a Norway-style deal isn't it? Where we'd still have many of the benefits of staying in the EU, and certainly not making JRM richer.

Labours "policy" includes abandoning freedom of movement
which means that we lose the right to travel and work AND you can't have a "Norway-style" deal without FoM.


It's easy for people to play fantasy politics BUT (as the Dutch PM said on R4 yesterday) that's not what is on offer.

When I work on EU projects that include Norway it's often Norway that contributes the most. There is no way that JC would be able to sell the idea of paying MORE to the EU for less of a say in what happens AND having FoM for those from the rest of the EU.

[Tony Halstead]

Labours "policy" includes abandoning freedom of movement
which means that we lose the right to travel and work

[Joseph K]

Right so far



No, I didn't even suggest that: as you stated above, it's difficult. Simply saying 'austerity is a bad thing' - let's abolish it (along with tuition fees)' is the easy bit.

But you have already twisted the discussion: I was responding to your comment which simply mentioned minimum wage increase and free child care. Who, in their right minds, would think those were, inherently, bad ideas?

Tories and Lib Dems would think they were inherently bad ideas.

Austerity is a bad thing that ought to be abolished. The ethics are simple. It necessitates telling people where and how you're going to collect more tax to pay for it - that's the complex difficult bit.

The Tory method is to claim any kind of socialist redistribution is from a 'magic money tree', but tax cuts for the rich or spending more money on taking away disabled people's benefits than they would have done simply giving it to them (redistribution to lawyers) is sensible and achievable.

[Joseph K]

When I work on EU projects that include Norway it's often Norway that contributes the most. There is no way that JC would be able to sell the idea of paying MORE to the EU for less of a say in what happens AND having FoM for those from the rest of the EU.

Well, it's difficult to know what he could sell. Every option is not without problems to say the least.

[MrGongGong]

Well, it's difficult to know what he could sell. Every option is not without problems to say the least.

Just a bit

When I have talked to people about how the UK takes part in EU funded and faciliated projects I often get the reply of
"but we could still do that outside the EU" ..... which has a kind of simple logic about it
BUT the reality is that the other 27 countries HAVE mechanisms and ways of working and they are quite happy for countries like Norway to pay in and take part
And, sadly, the whole thing has been "sold" to the folks in the UK as a way of not giving ANY money to the EU.
The remaining 27 EU countries aren't going to set up a special set of projects for US when they already have established ways of doing things.
I've heard NOTHING from the Labour party which suggests that they are going to make cultural collaboration a priority OR even think it's worthwhile.

Our runner beans aren't doing too well this year, I'm sure mr Corbyn has some young plants I would happily buy.

[Richard Barrett]

Isn't it strange (although actually it's become really very familiar through the news media) that a discussion of a TV debate between candidates for the Tory leadership eventually inevitably becomes a discussion of what's wrong with Jeremy Corbyn. There must be some modified version of Godwin's Law to account for this.

[french frank]

Isn't it strange (although actually it's become really very familiar through the news media) that a discussion of a TV debate between candidates for the Tory leadership eventually inevitably becomes a discussion of what's wrong with Jeremy Corbyn. There must be some modified version of Godwin's Law to account for this.

Yes, I wonder who first mentioned him?

[MrGongGong]

Isn't it strange (although actually it's become really very familiar through the news media) that a discussion of a TV debate between candidates for the Tory leadership eventually inevitably becomes a discussion of what's wrong with Jeremy Corbyn. There must be some modified version of Godwin's Law to account for this.

Media studies innit

[Serial_Apologist]

Labours "policy" includes abandoning freedom of movement
which means that we lose the right to travel and work AND you can't have a "Norway-style" deal without FoM.


It's easy for people to play fantasy politics BUT (as the Dutch PM said on R4 yesterday) that's not what is on offer.

When I work on EU projects that include Norway it's often Norway that contributes the most. There is no way that JC would be able to sell the idea of paying MORE to the EU for less of a say in what happens AND having FoM for those from the rest of the EU.

Freedom of movement ends with Brexit - not because JC agrees with that but because it is a condition of Brexit. What yet isn't clear is how Labour will deal with the growing internal party pressure for a People's Vote, whose conditions (No Deal/Theresa's Deal/Remain) would have to be agreed by parliamentary majority, and the aftermath, were such a PV to result in a popular majority for Remain. Would Corbyn need to insist that the voting margin necessary to overturn the narrow 2016 margin should be more than 50%? How do people think that would look to erstwhile Labour voters who voted Bexit and turned to Farage's mob for the Euro election? Hence all the Catch-22s.

[MrGongGong]

Freedom of movement ends with Brexit - not because JC agrees with that but because it is a condition of Brexit. What yet isn't clear is how Labour will deal with the growing internal party pressure for a People's Vote, whose conditions (No Deal/Theresa's Deal/Remain) would have to be agreed by parliamentary majority, and the aftermath, were such a PV to result in a popular majority for Remain. Would Corbyn need to insist that the voting margin necessary to overturn the narrow 2016 margin should be more than 50%? How do people think that would look to erstwhile Labour voters who voted Bexit and turned to Farage's mob for the Euro election? Hence all the Catch-22s.

For those people working in music, culture, education and science ending FoM will be a disaster.

But who gives a toss about that when we can have blue passports ?
IMV the Labour party has completely failed to oppose something that will bring great hardship to those it claims to speak for and I don't mean people like ME but people like many of those whom I work with.

[Richard Tarleton]

Isn't it strange (although actually it's become really very familiar through the news media) that a discussion of a TV debate between candidates for the Tory leadership eventually inevitably becomes a discussion of what's wrong with Jeremy Corbyn. There must be some modified version of Godwin's Law to account for this.

Not so strange when you consider that, unlike Hitler, JC is alive and well and potential Prime Minister, and the alternative to the sorry bunch under discussion here. It would be odd if we didn't constantly remind ourselves of the alternatives on offer. (I had to look up Godwin's Law, so I'm grateful for that )

[Serial_Apologist]

For those people working in music, culture, education and science ending FoM will be a disaster.

Agreed.

But who gives a toss about that when we can have blue passports ?
IMV the Labour party has completely failed to oppose something that will bring great hardship to those it claims to speak for and I don't mean people like ME but people like many of those whom I work with.

While again agreeing, Teamsaint and I have both tried to point out the unavoidable double-bind Labour has been in since the Brexit result. Support Remain, or even a People's vote, and in all probability Labour forfeits the next general election. This, together with the tenuous choice between two versions of capitalism, globalism or back to populist nationism, both of them equally unpalatable, also, as I see it, accounts for Corbyn's hesitancy. In addition those on the left and in the centre laying claims to the gains enshrined in EU regulations allegely safeguarding environmental, consumer, gender and employment rights are facing a Europe that can only go backwards under contradictions of capitalism that will always render such gains tenuous. That EU policy direction is increasingly coming from the Right is symptomatic. I think this was what was really behind what the Dutch PM was telling us here yesterday. Morally it's very hard to sit this out on ones hands, because as a consequence Brexit goes ahead, with it and its political aftermath in the control of the far Right and its friends. Somewhere a lead has to begin to reverse the tide.

[MrGongGong]

While again agreeing, Teamsaint and I have both tried to point out the unavoidable double-bind Labour has been in since the Brexit result. Support Remain, or even a People's vote, and in all probability Labour forfeits the next general election. This, together with the tenuous choice between two versions of capitalism, globalism or back to populist nationism, both of them equally unpalatable, also, as I see it, accounts for Corbyn's hesitancy. In addition those on the left and in the centre laying claims to the gains enshrined in EU regulations allegely safeguarding environmental, consumer, gender and employment rights are facing a Europe that can only go backwards under contradictions of capitalism that will always render such gains tenuous. That EU policy direction is increasingly coming from the Right is symptomatic. [B]I think this was what was really behind what the Dutch PM was telling us here yesterday [/B}. Morally it's very hard to sit this out on ones hands, because as a consequence Brexit goes ahead, with it and its political aftermath in the control of the far Right and its friends. Somewhere a lead has to begin to reverse the tide.

I think he was saying that it isn't a time to walk away from ones partners thus handing more power and control to those who are more extreme. We should be standing alongside our neighbours against the likes of Orban and Le Pen NOT prenetding that we can somehow live in a different world.
The Labour party completely misjudged the whole thing IMV and seems more interested in it's own petty politics (hummm not unlike the Tories then ?) than acting in the best interests of the whole country. The endless "for the many, not the few" slogan has a very hollow ring to it IMV.