Labour's biggest failures

Wookster

Really2 wrote: »

1) Running a budget deficit from 2002 onward.

(I wont do more than one as I get enough flack on here of Labour supporters as it is. )

I always pictured you as a Labour supporter oddly enough.

nickmason

ninky wrote: »

do you oppose military action there nick?

funny because i didn't see / meet any conservatives on the various highly attended stop the war marches i went on.

At the time of Iraq, I was "involved with" an ascendant star of the Labour party. We had pretty serious rows about Iraq; her view was that the war was wrong - full stop - and as such she took part in the marches.

My view, probably influenced by the fact that both my parents were in the forces, was that defence, as the one area where parliament can't hold government to account (the get-out clause of national security seems to trump parliamentary scrutiny), is therefore an area where the government has an even greater duty to be honest. Naively, it turns out, I thought this meant that the government would not - could not - lie on such a matter as 48hrs. So I didn't take part in the marches, as I assumed the government was doing the right thing.

This remains one of - in my eyes - the greatest failures of the Labour government; the erosion of trust on those military matters which preclude public debate. The WMD, 48hrs, etc, etc - it ruined the confidence that the soldiers, sailors, airmen, people of the UK had that they were doing the right thing.That is a damning thing to be said of any government.

elaina79

ninky wrote: »

oh come on. even if you don't support labour it's hard not to applaud...

minimum wage
civil partnerships
shorter nhs waiting times
banning fox hunting
more teachers
the right to 4 weeks paid holiday
paternity leave
more doctors and nurses
written off poor countries debts
free nursery places for 3-4 year olds

to name a few

If my memory serves me right, most of these were opposed by the tories. I'm looking forward to having this discussion again in 5 years time but replacing the word Labour with Con Dem.

gallygirl

hallmark wrote: »

Far too many to list.

Introduction of HIPs.

Allowing Mandelson back into a position of power.

Iraq.

Allowing the loathesome Alister Campbell back into a position of power.

Allowing Brown to effectively reduce our Government to himself & a tiny clique of handpicked lackeys, mainly from the treasury.

Announcing the sale of gold before selling it thus ensuring rock-bottom prices.

Raiding pensions.

Not sacking Jacqui Smith after her husband rented !!!!!! & claimed it on expenses. What has the world come to when someone in those circumstances doesn't even get sacked?

Hideous over-complication of the tax system.

Tax by stealth over & over again.

Encouraging the housing boom in order to fund Brown's incompetence, then when it bust endlessly blaming the US.

Brown's fake smile.

Spin, spin & yet more spin. A party that valued news management ten thousand times as much as it cared about good Government.

Terrible immigration (non) policy & encouraging the view that anyone who questions it it closet BNP.

Happily taking the support of the Sun etc for 12 years then without a trace of shame blaming everything on the "Tory Press" when they finally got booted out.

Refusing to honour their promise of an EU referendum.

Changing the timeframes that applied to Brown's "Golden Rules" in order to claim they hadn't broken them.

Continually refusing to include personal debt as part of Britain's debt mountain.

Bankrupting the country.

Yes, but apart from that.......;)

Not sorting out Iraq properly the 1st time.

Fiddling & fudging. E.g. WFTC - started off being paid by cheque, then into bank account, then via employer. HIPS - starts off as a grand scheme, gets watered down, same with ID cards. Either have enough convinction to follow through policies or do nothing.

10p tax - implementation & removal. All a load of b*ll*cks & spin. Same effect could have been done by raising threshold & removing people from tax altogether, much cheaper to adminster.

Not convinced Tories would have been / will be any better. How many times were they arguing for less legislation on banks etc (as was the saintly Vince Cable). And the danger with the coalition is all will turn to fudge.

I watched an episode of Yes Minister last night, about making spending cuts. Thought I was watching a live feed from Whitehall :rotfl:. Some things never change.

wigglebeena

Waging an illegal war for utterly cynical motives, resulting in a lot of dead and mutilated people and huge amounts of our money down the drain. Lying about it. Personally benefiting from it. (Blair seems to be doing pretty well for himself. He's going to be having an interesting chat with St. Peter in a few decades though. If he even gets as far as the pearly gates, and the elevator doesn't just head down to the basement.)

ninky_2

nickmason wrote: »

At the time of Iraq, I was "involved with" an ascendant star of the Labour party. We had pretty serious rows about Iraq; her view was that the war was wrong - full stop - and as such she took part in the marches.

My view, probably influenced by the fact that both my parents were in the forces, was that defence, as the one area where parliament can't hold government to account (the get-out clause of national security seems to trump parliamentary scrutiny), is therefore an area where the government has an even greater duty to be honest. Naively, it turns out, I thought this meant that the government would not - could not - lie on such a matter as 48hrs. So I didn't take part in the marches, as I assumed the government was doing the right thing.

This remains one of - in my eyes - the greatest failures of the Labour government; the erosion of trust on those military matters which preclude public debate. The WMD, 48hrs, etc, etc - it ruined the confidence that the soldiers, sailors, airmen, people of the UK had that they were doing the right thing.That is a damning thing to be said of any government.

there were more marches after the 48 hrs thing came out. did you go on those?

and what about afghanistan?

Degenerate

gallygirl wrote: »

Not sorting out Iraq properly the 1st time.

That one you can blame on John Major and Bush Senior.

natman

I agree that some things were a little less positive, but I am quite worried about Pubic services under this government, particulary as my Wife and I are in public service and charity type jobs...... Labour did some great stuff -

free nursery places, sure start centres, capped uni tuition fees, no fox hunting guaranteed appts with cancer specialist within 2 weeks, NHS free at point of service, free bus passes and TV licences for elderly, winter fuel allowance, national minimum wage increasing at rate of inflation -

Emergency budget happening soon!!!

Pennywise

TAX...

Gordon constantly changed the tax laws, ignored legitimate concerns, then after the changes were proved wrong, either had to do u-turns or spin his way out of trouble. It was clear he hadn't the faintest idea of the behavioural aspects of tax.

1. Capital gains tax. Initially took away retirement relief and indexation allowance and replaced them with taper relief. But forget about capital gains in limited companies, so there is still indexation relief for limited company owned assets but no taper relief (where's the logic in that?). Then changed taper relief rules almost every year to get rid of the anomalies, but of course, people suffered in the meantime! Loads of businesses were sold or liquidated just before the retirement relief was axed otherwise the owners would have had to pay shed loads more tax because taper relief initially wasn't as generous. Then for no obvious reason after several years and just when taper relief had got about right, they scrapped it and introduced the 18% rate, forgetting about businesses, then they had to do a u-turn and bring in entreprenneurs relief. You couldn't make it up just what a fiasco the whole episode turned out to be under Gordon.

2. Small limited company taxation. He brought in 10% rate, then brought in 0% rate. Forgot that most small businesses weren't limited companies and did nothing for them. So, inevitably, sole traders turned themselves into limited companies (who could have seen that coming?? apparently Gordon didn't). Then new complicated rule that the 0% band didn't apply if profits paid out as dividends which was so complicated it could never have worked (Gordon was told but didn't listen), so eventually the 0% band was scrapped leaving thousands of small businesses "trapped" as limited companies, because there are tax reliefs to convert from sole trader to limited, but not vice versa - Gordon was told but didn't listen!

3. 10% basic rate - need I say more?

4. Tax relief for purchased goodwill - again, Gordon forget most small businesses aren't limited companies but only gave tax relief on goodwill to limited companies. He was told, but did he listen? No. So again, smallest businesses almost forced into being limited companies to get tax relief.

5. Temporary VAT reduction - an absolute nightmare for small businesses which cost them a lot of money for no benefit.

I could go on, but suffice to say that considering he was supposed to be so intelligent, he clearly had absolutely no understanding of small business taxation nor even the difference between sole traders and limited companies, and wouldn't listen when his failings were pointed out to him.

Degenerate

natman wrote: »

capped uni tuition fees

For the sake of fairness I have to point out that there were no tuition fees before Labour took power in 1997. OTOH, I think they were inevitable by then, whichever party was in power.