Election cont. What to do for the best?

[jonrover]

After developments in Doncaster during the past few weeks I am completely torn on who will get my vote on April 6th. In fact the real story started back in November when I was on strike.

As a complete novice at industrial action and indeed one of those people who would \"pin the tail on a red donkey\" in elections because it was the right thing to do, the support shown by other unions and various far left groups was brilliant and really surprised me. To be honest I took an interest in what these groups (particularly the Socialist Workers Party) had to say with regard to their politics and ideals. Some of it makes real sense to me, an equal society, re-nationalising business, making the bosses pay for the financial mass and not the workers. Some of it was absolute bobbins - for example the opening of the UK borders in it's entirety, so despite being initially sucked in a bit, I stopped short of joining them, but I still take an active role in helping them out leafleting and stuff.

But there was one fact which really stuck with me, the fact that Labour are funded by trade unions, particularly my union Unite, and in turn piss on the people providing those funds, the members or if you like the workers, from a bloody great height. Now this does not seem right. Labour have done practically sod all to repeal the anti trade union laws imposed by Thatcher, apart from you get a bit more immunity from the sack if you strike and you have the right to be recognised by your employer. The question I have found myself asking is do Labour really serve my interests any more? Do the workers need an alternative on the left? For me Labour have moved right under Blair and there is a real opportunity for someone to realistically fill the void on the left. In January that void was filled by The Trade Union and Socialist Coalition - TUSC. All well and good, but without a candidate in my constituency, it still left me with no alternative and a vote for Labour again was a no brainer.

But in the last few weeks TUSC have funded a sacked Jarvis rail worker, Bob Rawcliffe, to stand against Ed Miliband in North Doncaster after Labour refused to intervene in the Jarvis affair, a company chaired by Tory minister Steven Norris. Lord Adonis said Labour cannot meddle in the affairs of private business, but they can plunder billions into banks, some of which are still paying out massive bonuses to its bosses. The whole affair f**king stinks in my opinion. These jobs should be nationalised and the highly skilled workforce re employed and their T&C's TUPE-ed over. Instead they are being asked to travel 6 hours to Livingstone do a 12 hour shift and travel back for the sum of £6 an hour on some crappy agency. That is what Labour does for workers in a nutshell.

I spoke at length yesterday with Bob Rawcliffe who tells me Miliband phoned him earlier in the week basically mocking his credentials and chances to get elected. Of course he is under no illusions, and all Bob wants to do is have his job back and ensure we have a safe rail network, but this phone call made him think. Is Ed that unsure of his support that these lost Labour votes in North Doncaster possess a threat to his seat? I get the impression he is babbing himself!

But I am not stupid enough to realise that a Tory government would be the end for this country as we know it. Cameron and Osbourne will bring cuts like never seen before and strengthen the anti trade union laws. We've already seen high court intervention to stop workers taking democratically agreed strikes in BA and rail signal workers disputes, which for me is not that far of infringing on human rights. That will become the norm under the Tories. I am fearful at this time that a vote for anyone other than Labour is as good as a vote for the Tories.

It's going to be a torrid few weeks for me. Do I vote with my head and throw away my principles? Or follow my principles and risk the Tories getting in? It might have to be the flip of a coin!

[The Red Baron]

With Labour taking 51% in the 2005 Election and the Tories a poor second on 19%, I think you can afford the luxury of a protest vote. It might make Miliband sit up and take notice if his majority was reduced by several thousand. Go for it!

[Boomstick]

There's only one thing that I would like to happen, and that is for the people of this country to vote Labour OUT.
I'm sick of this country turning into a socialist republic, im sick of going to work grafting my balls off so immigrants, (some)single mums, and the general lazy underbelly of society can have a free ride. Paid for of course by the people who bother to have jobs, only to lose a large chunk of earnings to pay for the lazy freeloaders.
Now I havent decided who i'm voting for yet, I need to have a look at the manifesto's again.

A future fair for all? not if you have worked hard and earned your money.

Labour OUT.

[Filo]

jonrover wrote:

After developments in Doncaster during the past few weeks I am completely torn on who will get my vote on April 6th. In fact the real story started back in November when I was on strike.

I think you`ve missed the boat mate, it`s 18th April now!

[jonrover]

Filo wrote:

jonrover wrote:

After developments in Doncaster during the past few weeks I am completely torn on who will get my vote on April 6th. In fact the real story started back in November when I was on strike.

I think you`ve missed the boat mate, it`s 18th April now!

HAHA! Sorry, May 6th innit! Perhaps its a sign that I shouldn't even bother!

[RTID75]

As annoyed as I might be I have never and will never let that get in the way of principles. I voted Labour last year in the local/council (whatever it was!) election even though I considered a protest vote due to all the crap going on at the time in the expenses saga - I couldn't do it though - I couldn't bear the thought that I'd sold out, no matter how insignificant the election.

[CusworthRovers]

I could never imagine this country turning into a Socialist Republic in my lifetime and I believe it's as far off one of those as it can be.


As for Ed Milliband, he was canvassing round Cusworth on Saturday morning. Now due to the boundary changes, (as it was Jeff Ennis before) he finds himself inheriting new areas this time round, that could be deemed as not necessarily a 'gimme Labour Vote'. Sprotboro, Scawsby, Harlington, Cadeby, Barnburgh, Adwick on Dearne, Cusworth.

I even asked Ed how he was finding it canvassing round these parts, and his aide responded before he could open his mouth, that they had found some difficult electors.

Whilst I don't think for one minute the Londoner and son of Jewish Immigrants will lose Doncaster North, he may not have a large majority akin to Alan B'Stard

[jonrover]

CusworthRovers wrote:

I could never imagine this country turning into a Socialist Republic in my lifetime and I believe it's as far off one of those as it can be.


As for Ed Milliband, he was canvassing round Cusworth on Saturday morning. Now due to the boundary changes, (as it was Jeff Ennis before) he finds himself inheriting new areas this time round, that could be deemed as not necessarily a 'gimme Labour Vote'. Sprotboro, Scawsby, Harlington, Cadeby, Barnburgh, Adwick on Dearne, Cusworth.

I even asked Ed how he was finding it canvassing round these parts, and his aide responded before he could open his mouth, that they had found some difficult electors.

Whilst I don't think for one minute the Londoner and son of Jewish Immigrants will lose Doncaster North, he may not have a large majority akin to Alan B'Stard

Not forgetting son of Ralph Miliband, one of the most forthright Marxist theorists in the 20th century. I like to think he's doing somersaults in his grave considering Ed and David are about as left wing as Boris Johnson.

[BillyStubbsTears]

And therin lies the problem that Labour will always have.

Over thirteen years...

You can provide the lowest unemployment for two generations.

You can provide economic policies that give us a better standard of living than Germany for the first time in half a century.

You can provide policies that ride the country through a vicious world recession with nothing like the horrific unemployment and social dislocations that we saw in lesser recessions under the Tories.

You can preside over big reductions in crime, especially those that affect working class people.

You can bring the NHS up to date after 20 years of neglect.

You can have a train system that actually works after 20 years of it being left to rot.

You can have the kids of ordinary people taught in decent conditions, after 20 years of obscene under-investment in school buildings.

You can give millions of ordinary kids the possibility of going to University when it would have been denied them a decade ago.

You can take unpopular but correct decisions on things like smoking in public places - a decision that will save millions of unnecessarily early deaths over the next century.

You can lead the world in helping reduce Third World debt and give the poorest and most unfortunate nations in the world a ray of hope.




You can do all these things, and still be castigated from the Left for not being more orthodox Socialist, for making Capitalism work for ordinary folk instead of bringing it down*. And be criticised from the Right for being a pestillent Socialist curse.

You can leave the country an inestimably better place than it was a decade and half ago, but you will still be deemed by both sides to have failed. Strange eh?


* My missus's late step-father was a Socialist Workers' Party Member. He voted for Maggie in the 1980s, on the theory that only when things got unbearable for the working class would they unite in a revolutionary fervour. Give me Blair and Brown any time over ideologically pure t**ts like that. I want my Left politicians to improve the lot of the lower classes, not use them as a political tool.

[jonrover]

I totally agree with all that Billy. But that is beside the point for me.

The one thing that really narks me about Labour is those anti trade union laws which creates barriers to prevent workers taking more effective action when their conditions are attacked to improve the capitalists lot, as happened in our dispute. The company I work for was and is a profitable company, just not profitable enough to please the 16th richest man in the world who chairs the venture capitalist conglomerate who own the company. So they attacked T&C's company wide, and the only ones to force concessions was the only unionised workforce in the company, which should be a lesson to all with the cuts that are in the pipeline, regardless who gets it. Anyone who isn't a member of a union in these times really are playing a dangerous game. Its a fact that unionised companies are better paid and have better T&C's anyway so it aught to be a no brainer. Period.

The thing is, if we were allowed to secondary picked the other distribution centre and the \"scab\" warehouse set up to undermine our action (which I thought was illegal?), the dispute would have been over before it began as we would have effectively shut down the distribution network.

The first thing Labour should have done 13 years ago was to remove Thatcher's laws from the statute book and look after its historical electorate. Let's get it right here, the way Labour is currently funded is like me buying my mate a pint then him glassing me with the pint pot when he's finished it. Labour have done next to f**k all for trade unionists in 13 years and to be honest, if by some miracle Labour do get in all the unions should demand that the laws are repealed or the funding stops. I doubt Labour would be left with any choice then would it? Unless Alan Sugar fancies sticking another £20 million into the coffers.

[Filo]

This country is f**ked, at the moment we have a Labour government in name only, they are Conservatives wearing a red coat. They haven`t done anything about the anti trade union laws because secretly, over the years Labour wanted these laws just as much as the Tories did only they didn`t have the bottle to carry it out for fear of losing it`s traditional working class vote. When Labour became \"New Labour\" they ditched the working class and embraced \"Middle England\" the only way this country will get a true Labour party back is through united(take note Notts) industrial action, the trade union movement will not do this for fear of losing their assets and spoiling the payday of the union leaders, the only way it will happen is by the spontaneous actions of the working man, and that means revolution comrades!  

[jonrover]

Filo wrote:

This country is fcuked, at the moment we have a Labour government in name only, they are Conservatives wearing a red coat. They haven`t done anything about the anti trade union laws because secretly, over the years Labour wanted these laws just as much as the Tories did only they didn`t have the bottle to carry it out for fear of losing it`s traditional working class vote. When Labour became \"New Labour\" they ditched the working class and embraced \"Middle England\" the only way this country will get a true Labour party back is through united(take note Notts) industrial action, the trade union movement will not do this for fear of losing their assets and spoiling the payday of the union leaders, the only way it will happen is by the spontaneous actions of the working man, and that means revolution comrades!  

Actually Labour or to be specific Barbara Castle wanted to stifle union power as early as 1969 with the white paper \"In Place Of Strife\", but the unions fought back and made an agreement which meant the paper was practically useless. And she was meant to be \"the darling of the left\"! So what hope do trade unionists hold now. Oh and you can also thank her for the breathalyser and 70mph speed limits on motorways so I have just learned...if Wikipedia is to be believed of course!

[The Red Baron]

Filo wrote:

This country is fcuked, at the moment we have a Labour government in name only, they are Conservatives wearing a red coat. They haven`t done anything about the anti trade union laws because secretly, over the years Labour wanted these laws just as much as the Tories did only they didn`t have the bottle to carry it out for fear of losing it`s traditional working class vote. When Labour became \"New Labour\" they ditched the working class and embraced \"Middle England\" the only way this country will get a true Labour party back is through united(take note Notts) industrial action, the trade union movement will not do this for fear of losing their assets and spoiling the payday of the union leaders, the only way it will happen is by the spontaneous actions of the working man, and that means revolution comrades!  

Realise that we're veering off topic here, but even the stalwarts of the left no longer believe in workers' revolution. Think Gramsci and Frankfurt School now. It is about taking gradual control of the institutions and levers of power, while convincing those who do not own capital that they have no stake or interest in the capitalist system. Will it work? Who knows, but it is probably a stategy more likely to bear fruit for the left than hoping for the workers to rise up.

Still doesn't mean that you shouldn't vote for a candidate who wants to fire a shot across the bows of a sitting MP.

[BobG]

I feel utterly disenfranchised I'm afraid. Just who the devil do I vote for? Conservative? Not likely. The people who would plunge the world into the 1930's again and who's policies are simply vacuous. LibDem? Possibly, I suppose. But what's the point? Labour? I agree with BST. More, I would say that baling out the banks was the single bravest and far sighted thing any UK politician has done in the last 50 years. But I can't vote for them even so: this database & surveillance state with its 1,000 new crimes is as big an affront as the bank bail out was a triumph. I'm voting for no party that views its citizens as animals to be controlled at all costs.

So, Anarchist it is for me then. Now, where's the Cotswold Anarchist Group based I wonder?

Cheers

BobG

[BillyStubbsTears]

BobG wrote:

I'm voting for no party that views its citizens as animals to be controlled at all costs.

A tad harsh Bob. Are you coralled with an electric cattle prod when you're queueing to vote? Do you fear the jackboot on the door at 3am? Do you fear that your kid will grow up an orphan after you are \"disappeared\"?

That said, I guess I've always had vaguely authoritarian leanings. I'm not sufficiently optimistic to assume that people in general (including me) toe the line if there's not the threat of a kick in the knackers as a penalty for transgressing. A bit of the benign dictator is what I want from my Government. Theoretical Libertarianism is all very well, but it doesn't mesh with looking after people - Government has a duty to give people freedoms, sure, but also to give people security and clampdown on those who abuse freedoms. It's a tough balance to strike, but we do have something of a balance in this country.  

Here's an interesting thought experiment. Nick Clegg has a stormer in Thursday's debate. The Liberals go up to 40% in the polls. They win the Election and he's PM in May. True to their promises, they rein in the power of the police to hold terror suspects. 12 months later, a bomb destroys a EuroStar train as it pulls into a packed St Pancras with 600 people aboard. The Police say they had the suspects in their sights but were reluctant to arrest them as they didn't think they'd get charges to stick with the time they'd have had to interview them. You think we'd all be lauding the Government for upholding some high ideal?

Me, I usually go looking for quotes from intellectual giants when there are hard decisions to be made. And as a great man once said, \"Liberty is precious. So precious that it must be rationed.\"

[BobG]

Hmm.... It could be paranoia on my part Billy. You're right that the example you offer would be a total nightmare - for everybody, especially those who were killed. On that basis, of prevention at all costs, then clearly the Govt are right. But like the rest of your post suggests, I rather think that there should be a balance. We have witnessed the suspension of habeus corpus for pretty well the first time in 800 years (or however long it is). That's a serious matter - for everybody. It might be ok with a rational and reasonable Govt. in power. But we all saw the dirty tricks that MI5 got up to with regard to the miners at Maggie Thatchers' behest. With tools like todays within her grasp, who knows how far she would have gone? Or some future Prime Minister will go. Once a tool is invented, created, it will inevitably be used. And that's the fear. I imagine, though of course I don't know, that well meaning folk in 1930's Germany thought exactly as you suggest. But the time and the opportunity led to all those things we know so well. It's a total myth that Nazi Germany couldn't happen here - or anywhere else. Of course it could. If my job, the well being of myself, my son, is at stake, I'll pipe down and keep quiet. I'll inform with the best of them. I'll kick the chosen sacrificial scapegoats. As would 99% of folk everywhere. We all would. Survival dictates that we would. Those that didn't would die. There's not that many volunteers for matrydom.

So I think we are creating the tools of a future terror. It's hypothetical now. Of course it is. But even today I dislike, intensely, the immense and continuing pressure to only think in one way; to only behave in one way; to only live in one way. It's Fahrenheit 451. Where are the student rebels? It should be a delight of being young. To play with ideas. To explore alternatives. It's never done harm. Instead it honed the abilities of men, and women, of action. There aren't even any skinheads for God's sake! We have become a nation of unthinking, conformist, safety at all costs cowards. And I don't like it.

Cheers

BobG

[grayx]

I'm voting purely to stop those awful TORIES getting in. Because of this,although not over-impressed with what they have done so far, I'll be voting Labour.

[RobTheRover]

grayx wrote:

I'm voting purely to stop those awful TORIES getting in. Because of this,although not over-impressed with what they have done so far, I'll be voting Labour.

Hear hear.  Anyone who thinks we need a change cannot begin to imagine how appalling that change could be.  I actually have some sympathy for Noo Labour - on reflection, they have done a decent job to steady HMS Great Britain during a very difficult period.  The Tories would no doubt have had us commoners bankrupt and begging the French for handouts whilst their core voters (not the poor, misguided working class voters who think the Tories are for them - try voting them in and see how hard the shafting comes) sip their bubbly in their ivory towers and watch their wealth accumulate.