Mrs May strikes again!

[ahinton]

Yes, but surely this happened to all 3 main parties? It became obvious that, for the simple matter of getting votes from the public, the annual party conference was no place for creative thinking, free and frank exchange of views, and certainly not a place where the rank-and-file could express dissatisfaction with the leadership.

Going back to the Labour Party of yesteryear, Kinnock (the best prime minister we never had IMO) knew perfectly well that the inherently conservative (small 'c') British public would never elect a radical left party into government. Short of a revolution, we'll never have one.....and a revolution would throw up its own Joe Stalin in due course. It's the way of things.

That's true. I also think that the fact that the main parties are less distinguishable from one another than was the case in the days before Kinnock is a further pertinent factor although, in so saying, I am not seeking to accord to Margaret Thatcher full credit for what she claimed to want to do when asked if she wanted to pull the conservative Party to the right, namely "I want to pull all parties to the right"; the fact that Margaret Thatcher's desires might have been met since she expressed them is not the same as claiming that this occurred because of them, but I do think that it's nonetheless proved to be one symptom of the kind of thing to which you draw attention here.

To return to the topic more directly, there are some, I suspect, who wish that "Mrs May" would indeed "strike"...

[amateur51]

Yes, I agree, but the modern Labour Party Conferences are even worse, imv.

I mean Ed Moribund 'forgetting' all about the small detail of the huge National Debt in his speech.

Pathetic.

Almost as pathetic as pretending to forget your past identity, scotty.

At least Ed was just succumbing to nerves. You in contrast just have a nerve.

However all has been revealed in the upstairs forum :smileything:

[amateur51]

Yes, but surely this happened to all 3 main parties? It became obvious that, for the simple matter of getting votes from the public, the annual party conference was no place for creative thinking, free and frank exchange of views, and certainly not a place where the rank-and-file could express dissatisfaction with the leadership.

Going back to the Labour Party of yesteryear, Kinnock (the best prime minister we never had IMO) knew perfectly well that the inherently conservative (small 'c') British public would never elect a radical left party into government. Short of a revolution, we'll never have one.....and a revolution would throw up its own Joe Stalin in due course. It's the way of things.

You having a go at Mrs May? or ... Chris Grayling :gulpthingo:

[P. G. Tipps]

Almost as pathetic as pretending to forget your past identity, scotty.

At least Ed was just succumbing to nerves. You in contrast just have a nerve.

However all has been revealed in the upstairs form :smileything:

You really must cease your obsession with myself and 'scotty', amateur51.

This thread (your own) is supposed to be about the current Home Secretary of the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland, The Right Honourable Mrs Teresa May.

[Serial_Apologist]

Yes, but surely this happened to all 3 main parties?

The point is that it was allowed to happen in the Labour Party - the others could go hang!

It became obvious that, for the simple matter of getting votes from the public, the annual party conference was no place for creative thinking, free and frank exchange of views, and certainly not a place where the rank-and-file could express dissatisfaction with the leadership.

Somehow the creative thinking, free and frank exchanges and rang-and-file dissatisfaction with the leadership needed getting across at Annual Conference, both to the leadership and the general public. The left in general (and I include myself here) missed a golden opportunity to explain to the public what was going on, the complicity of the media in misrepresentation (including by the BBC) and the reasons behind. If it had been one of the E Bloc communist parties that such challenges to unaccountable leaderships was taking place it would have been given coverage and just enough suggestive explanation to avoid the same thing happening over here, of course.

Going back to the Labour Party of yesteryear, Kinnock (the best prime minister we never had IMO) knew perfectly well that the inherently conservative (small 'c') British public would never elect a radical left party into government. Short of a revolution, we'll never have one.....and a revolution would throw up its own Joe Stalin in due course. It's the way of things.

Attlee???

[ahinton]

the current Home Secretary of the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland, The Right Honourable Mrs Teresa May.

Theresa, actually, if you must be so pedantic as to give her full name and title...

[P. G. Tipps]

Theresa, actually, if you must be so pedantic as to give her full name and title...

I stand suitably corrected, ahinton ... well spotted!

However, factual accuracy must never be confused with petty pedantry ...

[ardcarp]

SA. I don't quite get the point about

Attlee???

Can you explain?

[Serial_Apologist]

SA. I don't quite get the point about

Can you explain?

Self-explanatory, I would have thought: the British electorate did once elect a radical left government - the one led by Clement Attlee.

[P. G. Tipps]

Neil Kinnock was much more to the left than Clement Attlee, though it's the first time I've heard poor Neil mentioned in the same breath as 'Uncle Joe' Stalin, one of the most horrendous mass-murderers of the 20th Century!

Atlee was a Keynesian as many on the right of the Labour Party are/have been and indeed some on the left of the Tory Party have been in the past, including MacMillan and, most obviously, Ted Heath, who also did his share of nationalising.

In foreign affairs the Attlee Government was as right-wing as any Tony administration and Ernest Bevin, as Foreign Secretary, could be as jingoistic as any other. In fact, William Hague, no less, has been compared with him though that seems to me to be rather over-estimating Mr Hague's position as a notable political figure!

The successful government of Clem Attlee was largely 'centrist' like so many that followed (and still exist) in Western Europe, rather than 'radical left', though clearly a large element of welcome radical change resulted after its election.

[ahinton]

I stand suitably corrected, ahinton ... well spotted!

However, factual accuracy must never be confused with petty pedantry ...

...any more than mutual exclusivity be presumed where it is inappropriate...

[ahinton]

[deleted]

[ardcarp]

Well, SA, P.G. Tipps has more or less said what I was going to say. The Attllee government gave the nation so many of the good things in the post-war period. I would only disagree in his saying 'Kinnock was far to the left of Attlee'. I think in many ways we children of the immediate post-war period lived in a golden age, even if it began in material austerity....health, education, and a sense the country being run for the people and their common good. We have Attlee and his ministers to thank for that. It is often forgotten how much of that ethos was wrecked by Thatcher. The greed of companies and the selfishness of the me-generation could never have been imagined before her time, not even during the many years of Tory rule.