While the Labour party is so enthralled to identity politics I doubt they have a clear enough head to make any positive improvements to the economy. With people like Dodds in the cabinet who appears to be openly proposing wealth redistribution based on race it looks like the journey to clown town will only accelerate under Labour.

Basically, Starmer wants us to be Germany, but without the bits that work.

“What matters now for Labour is not its rhetoric, but whether or not it does the heavy lifting of collective intellectual and political thinking, and policy development, necessary for breaking out of this interregnum.”
Party political puff piece. Labour is as dead as the Tory Party. It is only rigor mortis that keeps it upright.

Starmer is as slippery as an eel dipped in WD40

Someone who dodges questions on what a real woman is, I wouldn’t trust with a teabag let alone the reins of the country

It’s guaranteed that the result will be at least one extra layer of politicians feeding off the taxpayer. Probably more, and a host of quangos.

Hopeless. Local government officials are even less competent than central government officials, if my local Council is any guide. Good luck with your energy policy, Sir Keir: which local community is going to volunteer to have a power station or wind farm in its midst?

One of the points of this is to get rid of the House of Lords which would be replaced by an elected second chamber. I don’t understand how this would work but it seems like it would be a bit like the US where you have the house of representatives (house of commons) and a senate (which would be the new second chamber). The second chamber would consist of ‘senators’ from the various regional assemblies elected by proportional representation – I suppose, I’m just guessing. But with two elected chambers wouldn’t you end up with a kind of governmental paralysis? And wouldn’t everyone just blame everyone else when things go wrong. We already see that with the Wales and Scotland blaming Westminster for their ills.
I feel that devolution has been a bad thing and more devolution will be worse.

Starmer’s speech was full of vague platitudes. For example, he wants to hand over powers to local communities but says little regarding how this will be done. Local governments have been gradually starved of funds from both the Tories and Labour for over 30 years. Giving powers to health trusts seems unlikely to help if they haven’t got the funds to pay nurses a wage commensurate with the cost of living increases. Ultimately, the central government hands out the money. But both main parties oppose above-inflation pay rises and both parties support the Brexit settlement that is causing staff shortages and helping cause a crisis in the NHS.

He is right in saying that Westminster politics is broken but he is very much part of that Westminster machine and even opposes changes to the FPTP antiquated voting system. What we desperately need is fresh thinking in UK politics and we are not going to get much of that with the dysfunctional duopoly caused by FPTP. The Tories are failing us but I have little confidence in Starmer offering anything better from what has been said in this speech.

For devolution to work you need to devolve tax collection as well as administrative function, otherwise no-one will pay attention to what the local bureaucrats are up to until it’s too late. Local taxation will stimulate wider participation in local politics and enhance accountability.
It seems unlikely that this is what Starmer has in mind. He’s much more likely to be planning the next stage in the Blairite plan to colonise every public institution with Labour placemen.

Get elected this time,that is the goal and in my opinion the only goal.

Ahh… Starmer, please bring the port decanter, and make sure that the keeper has all the beaters ready for 9….