So Dave, why are you still a member of the Labour Party?

Remember when making war on the third world was electorally popular?

Maybe Labour should try making war on countries that invade British territory rather than the other way round? Just a thought.

Labour trailed the Lib Dems in a poll earlier this year.

And yesterday’s YouGov poll had Tory 39 Lab 30 Lib Dem 20. Not great, but 10% up on the Libs and on the edge of depriving the Tories an overall majority.

Do you suppose the Labour boost is down to sympathy for Brown after the Marr question? I ask because the only thing I’ve actually heard coming out of conference is yet more youth criminalisation talk from the stage. It seems odd that a conference boost should result from a conference with no actual announcements or debate.

Do you suppose the Labour boost is down to sympathy for Brown after the Marr question?

Is anyone who isn’t a follower of the blogosphere even aware that this question has been asked?

4 – I suspect it’s at least partly because Labour are dominating the headlines again, and Cameron and the Tories are temporarily invisible. Conference season does funny things to polls.

The CONservative party is too right wing it is moving to extreme right wing values. They want to limit university and education from working and middle class people.
They want to limit what ordinary people can achieve in society.
They want to cut taxes for rich elites, and cut benefits and public services for ordinary working and middle class people.
It seems ordinary people must suffer for the greed of the rich bankers.
Who must pay for the greed and luxury yacht of a rich elite banker
You prole! Say the tories.
Who must have their health, education and public services cut to pay for tax CUTS for the rich.
You prole! say the tories.
Why would any working or middle class person vote for them? Why? Tell me, someone! why? Why would a working or middle class person vote tory other than a hatred of immigrants, gays and a support for extreme out dated nationalism, that causes war and division.
Some British version of a red neck moron who wants to get shafted by the rich, cos he would rather see gays and immigrants suffer, even if it meant himself suffering.
TORY NEW SLOAGN
Vote for the party that hates gays and immigrants even if it hates you..

@5: Was within the first 5 pages of the Express and Mail, though in support for asking the question.

I do wonder about how misty eyed some have become about 1983. How many more times should it be tried? Say (fantasy time) Jon Cruddas became leader of the Labour Party next week, and ran on the fundamentals of the 1983 manifesto. Now, we could argue over how successful he’d be, but for the sake of argument let’s say he got hammered as badly as in ’83, and the Conservatives held on to power until 2024. I’d guess the same teenagers of the ’80s who now cling to that ideal would be the OAPs demanding a return to it in ’24. Third time lucky?

4 – “… the only thing I’ve actually heard coming out of conference is yet more youth criminalisation talk from the stage. It seems odd that a conference boost should result from a conference with no actual announcements or debate.”

I am frankly horrified by the conference thus far – style (lack of) and substance (abuse; quite necessary after enduring Mandy yesterday).

Talk of a “crackdown” on “problem families” and the “lawless minority”, etc.; extending ASBOs and intervention – this is so tired and reactionary; it’s as if Labour isn’t even trying any more.

If Dave is still a member of the Labour Party (@1), he is one of a handful – it is hardly surprising to me (as a fierce leftist) that hundreds of thousands have surrendered since 1997.

Whilst I have not even considered voting Tory, I will certainly not be voting Labour.

9 – you mean you aren’t in favour of corralling teenage parents in fortified camps? What sort of liberal are you?

From now on all 16 and 17 year old parents who get support from the taxpayer will be placed in a network of supervised homes. These shared homes will offer not just a roof over their heads, but a new start in life where they learn responsibility and how to raise their children properly. That’s better for them, better for their babies and better for us all in the long run.

Internment for all!

Fortified internment camps? Steady on!

11 – Oh, I see, you’re a do-nothing Tory then. Unlike the Tories, who would do nothing, we are pledged to lock up all single mothers and put them in a box under a flyover on the M25.

Your hyperbole is amusing. Are you going to complain about forcing all 17 and 18 year olds to be interned in (undoubtedly-fortified) education and training centres?

Alix @ 4, Jay @ 9

The problem being that Labour’s core voters are most vulnerable to attacks and harassment from these ‘problem’ families and ‘feral’ (if you allow for tabloid short hand) youth. When you see stories like the one regarding the murder suicide of the young girl with learning difficulties being ignored and left to their fate by the council and police, that strikes a cord with many people on housing estates throughout the Country.

Many of us live in areas where one or two families or children run amok with what seems like impunity. Irrespective of the figures, the perception is that such anti social behaviour is either rising or simply more visible.

Telling people that crime is falling or these attacks are occurring in a minority of areas is completely the wrong message; If you live in an area where such behaviour exists or you are unlucky enough to suffer directly at the hands of these thugs, there is little solace in knowing that your suffering is atypical.

Labour have failed in bringing effective* measures against these families.

*In both the sense of reducing actual incidents and reassuring the public that these measures are effective.

13 – do you really think making all teenage parents live in supervised shared housing is a) a good thing and b) a vote winner?

And actually I’m not in favour of compulsory education at 17 and 18. A lot of teenagers would benefit more from getting work experience than in sitting around at school for two years to take A-levels, when they couldn’t get the grades at GCSE.

It’s 6th form college or some form of training – so not necessarily forcing people to take A-levels.

You don’t know the details of the 16/17 year old parent plan – i.e. whether it’s compulsory or not – and neither do I. I will there reserve my overall judgment on a). However. I have little doubt that in terms of b) yes it would be a vote winner, as people get pissed off by the idea (whether true or not) that teenagers get themselves knocked up as early as possible to obtain priority in council housing allocation.

I’m not a liberal so I have no aversion in principle to state intervention. If greater supervision of teenage parents helps them in the bringing up of their children then I would support it wholeheartedly.

I agree that single parents who under 18 should be given secure homes with people to look after them and ensure they do not abuse or get abused. I have always thought it is insane you would put them on their own somewhere.
It is couldn’t give a fuck about anyone else liberalism (libertarianism) rather than tolerate people liberalism.

14 – I am well aware that it is “Labour’s core voters [that] are most vulnerable to attacks and harassment from these ‘problem’ families” – relatively few such instances in the leafy Surrey suburbs, perhaps – though I don’t like the phraseology, and indeed I do have a major problem with ‘feral youth’ as tabloid shorthand.

I also read about the murder-suicide to which you refer.

What I think is most telling about the Labour proposals this time around – and indeed, since halfway through their second term – is that instead of (at least pretending to be) focussing on the causes of violence and ‘anti-social behaviour’, such as a lack of services, generational poverty, social deprivation / dislocation, etc., they now demonise the expression.

In many ways, ‘thugs’ are also the victims of Labour’s failure to deal with the above issues.

I think it is interesting that you confuse ‘crime’ and ‘anti-social behaviour’, very much (deliberately?) blurring the boundaries. ASBOs criminalise a whole host of actions – from playing music too loudly, to wearing no clothes – that are not criminal offences.

(Incidentally, I live in Liverpool, so am well aware what Tory policies can do to a city.)

From now on all 16 and 17 year old parents who get support from the taxpayer will be placed in a network of supervised homes.

Hmmm…House of Tiny Tearaways or Baby Borstal? And does that mean if one or both of the parents have a part-time minimum wage job they’ll be left alone? And what does ‘support from the taxpayer’ mean anyway? Child benefit, or is this yet another attempt to kick dole-claiming scrotes where it hurts to shore up the seething class Daily Mail vote?

I noticed that once again the news accompanied the story of harrassment with entirely unrelated footage of young women pissed up after a night on the town without any attempt at linking word and image.

Women can’t have a night out without predatory cameramen following them home, hoping to catch them tripping on their heals or flashing their knickers.

These scopophilic perverts need a good punch to the cock.

19 – that’s a good point. After all, all parents get support from the taxpayer through child benefit…

Jay @ 18

“I think it is interesting that you confuse ‘crime’ and ‘anti-social behaviour’, very much (deliberately?) blurring the boundaries.”

No confusion, but a deliberate blurring of the two. I doubt throwing eggs at windows counts as ‘serious crime’ as such, but for the victims it is terrifying and comes with an implied threat of violence. People are intimidated by such behaviour, and rarely report these incidents for fear of reprisals even if no ‘crime’ has been committed, you have a frightened victim. Crime and anti social behaviour looks the same in these circumstances.

No doubt few of the attacks perpetrated against the woman and her daughter appear on crime statistics and perhaps that is the safest streets (in terms of recorded incidents) in Britain, but I bet there are attacks and threats every day that the ‘media’ never hear of.

False dichotomy. The choice is not between Bennite rehash or Blairite neo-liberlism lite. The labour party could always consider giving social democracy a go?