Ken Loach on the state of the Labour Party

[reohn2]

Worth a listen:- https://youtu.be/PVP6PlX_UUA

In case anyone's interested,I agree with him 100%.

[Hellhound]

I'm with you and KL 110%!

[661-Pete]

I watched the first few minutes. Same old, same old....

I'd respond in just two words. "Red Wall". As on 12 December 2019.

Labour are toast anyway, so does any of this matter? Voters will have to find another way to oust the Tories. If there is one...

As to Loach, he did very well with Cathy Come Home and Kes. No more needs saying...

[Hellhound]

Labour are toast anyway, so does any of this matter? Voters will have to find another way to oust the Tories. If there is one...

Well,maybe if you'd watched it all......

[[XAP]Bob]

Voters will have to find another way to oust the Tories. If there is one...

My hope, and it's more hope than basically anything else is:
- BoJo and his clowns know that Brexit related shortages are only going to get worse
- They also know that various important discussions and decisions have been kicked to 2026
- They want to be in power then
- So they call an early election whilst they still think they're not quite deeply unpopular enough to lose
- Then the various leading opposition parties form a true alliance (and it has to be done *after* the election is called, or they won't call it).
- The thieving scum can then be kicked out of office and a short list of truly progressive policies can be implemented:

- Rejoin the common market with all haste
- Overhaul the electoral system, with STV or PR being implemented for Westminster
- Set up a devolved English parliament

With those in place further elections should allow for more representative results, which is likely to improve turnout, and then make results even more representative.

One can but hope.

[Tangled Metal]

Ken Loach seen through the eyes of a true believer!

I thought that he could have simply replaced the name of kier starmer with Jeremy Corbyn when he was talking about gaining control of the party, power, dishonesty and lack of democracy. The corbyn lurch to the left, the purging of those centre left in the leadership positions, etc, etc, etc.

I think this view is outdated and stuck in the past. Every new leader of a party comes in and changes things. Corbyn, McClusky, McConnell and momentum certainly did that. Or do your redtinted glasses not see that? I think that's a good thing, a renewal of a failing party's politics from something that did not work to perhaps something that might. Something that might reconnect with voters and get the tories out. I never thought I'd say this but we need a Blair that believes in the rule of law. Starmer might be that or the one replacing him might be the one. Can't keep losing the battle in the same old Corbyn way, they need a purge like Corbyn's lot had but one that moves back to the centre left.

[reohn2]

I watched the first few minutes. Same old, same old....

I'd respond in just two words. "Red Wall". As on 12 December 2019.

Labour are toast anyway, so does any of this matter? Voters will have to find another way to oust the Tories. If there is one...

As to Loach, he did very well with Cathy Come Home and Kes. No more needs saying...

If you'd listened to the end you'd realise how wrong you are about how KL now feels about the Labour Party,which has currently sold out to the right wing again as it did when it was New labour under Blair the war criminal.

You may have forgotten that a Corbyn led Labour Party very nearly won the 2017 GE,or that the Tories got in in 2019 on one three word slogan 'Get Brexit Done' after it and the anti EU parties demonished immigration unmercifully,whilst it's charachter assassination of Jeremy Corbyn was even more unmerciful.
The redwall collapsed right enough,but just look where it got the fools who voted Tory in those constituencies!

Now the Labour party has another rightwing Blairalike in charge who,should he gain power at the next GE will change nothing for t's needed is a completely different direction in UK politics,which Corbyn and Labour very efforts to pour millions more £££'s into the Tory party retain power.

One thing's for sure,though I admire your green credentials and support for the Green party it will never be a force too reckoned with in the corrupt system that is UK politricks

The enemy for the vast majority of UK people is the Tories and needs a people's party for the good of the country which is the people,to destroy them.
The Labour Party is no longer that party IMHO,if that's not clear to the UK populous then we as a country will bump along the bottom and the Tories will keep on filling their pockets at the country's expense!

[reohn2]

Ken Loach seen through the eyes of a true believer!

I thought that he could have simply replaced the name of kier starmer with Jeremy Corbyn when he was talking about gaining control of the party, power, dishonesty and lack of democracy. The corbyn lurch to the left, the purging of those centre left in the leadership positions, etc, etc, etc.

I think this view is outdated and stuck in the past. Every new leader of a party comes in and changes things. Corbyn, McClusky, McConnell and momentum certainly did that. Or do your redtinted glasses not see that? I think that's a good thing, a renewal of a failing party's politics from something that did not work to perhaps something that might. Something that might reconnect with voters and get the tories out. I never thought I'd say this but we need a Blair that believes in the rule of law. Starmer might be that or the one replacing him might be the one. Can't keep losing the battle in the same old Corbyn way, they need a purge like Corbyn's lot had but one that moves back to the centre left.

Corbyn was centre left!

[thirdcrank]

I wouldn't be sure that Boris Johnson is too worried about the result of the next GE: he's had a go at the top job and he may not be bothered about a second term.

[reohn2]

.........One can but hope.

We live in such hope!

[Ben@Forest]

Loach is nothing if not a hypocrite - he's made a great deal of criticising artists who perform in Israel whilst having his own films released there - and he has also criticised McDonalds despite having taken their shilling before.

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/201 ... -of-israel
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/j ... onalds-job

I personally see Loach as an anti-Semite. It's astonishing that people defend him, and this is these type of people Starmer has to deal with, I wish him all the best with it.

[DevonDamo]

I personally see Loach as an anti-Semite.

Are you able to back that up with anything Loach has actually said about disliking people of Jewish ethnicity? Or are you getting confused by the determined campaign to use 'antisemitism' as a smear against anyone who doesn't share their view on world politics:

[reohn2]

Loach is nothing if not a hypocrite - he's made a great deal of criticising artists who perform in Israel whilst having his own films released there - and he has also criticised McDonalds despite having taken their shilling before.

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/201 ... -of-israel
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/j ... onalds-job

I personally see Loach as an anti-Semite. It's astonishing that people defend him, and this is these type of people Starmer has to deal with, I wish him all the best with it.

My bold
You're wrong.

Did it not occur to you that having his films shown in Israel might be an attempt at putting a message across?
So someone who makes an advert for McD's can't criticise them?
I see someone clutching at straws.

[simonineaston]

What Labour are so very good at is internice squabbles that keep them too busy to develop into a credible alternative.

[PH]

What Labour are so very good at is internice squabbles that keep them too busy to develop into a credible alternative.

What the Tories are good at is getting their chums in the media to keep churning out the above message till people believe it.
If internal struggles were enough to keep a party out of power, Heath would have been the last Tory PM and lets not forget it was only to quell a few squabbling backbenchers that led us to Brexit.
I don't disagree with anything Ken Loach says in that piece, but there's no answers there and even if there were who's listening? I think the Labour Party as I see it, the political wing of the Labour Movement, is finished. Corbyn was the last gasp attempt at the membership having control, Starmer is right now attempting to marginalise them on leadership selection. In an election or two and several leaders down the road, we will end up with a new New Labour, they will be better than the Tories, but not radically so.