This basically sums up how Andy Burnham has (most likely) thrown his chances of winning away:

 

https://twitter.com/CalumSPlath/status/629342216331370496

I love Calum dearly, but I don't get the sense most voters have been paying as much attention as he has. It'll be the Welfare Bill if anything that's done him in - it was a total Kerryesque 'I was for it before I was against it' moment.

This basically sums up how Andy Burnham has (most likely) thrown his chances of winning away:

 

https://twitter.com/CalumSPlath/status/629342216331370496

 

Oh all politicians shift with changing circumstances, those that don't one might argue prefer to lose rather than see another point of view. Not as if the Labour Party hasn't swayed with the wind since it found out to it's and the country's cost that standing firm also means you are unelectable.

 

Burnham could win Labour the election, as I see his moves and new policies, thanks to Corbyn, and as listed on the BBC website, infinitely preferable to New Labour, and including Miliband. I prefer seeing it as a new sense of realism to please both party members and the electorate, and he could do it. Corbyn is another Michael Foot figure in waiting. That's not to say they are bad people, they aren't, but Corbyn needs to serve Labour in a supporting role and reminding all and sundry of the moral high-ground, not sitting on the backbenches in a permanent irrelevant strop voting against his own party.

 

Just a thought...

Oh all politicians shift with changing circumstances, those that don't one might argue prefer to lose rather than see another point of view. Not as if the Labour Party hasn't swayed with the wind since it found out to it's and the country's cost that standing firm also means you are unelectable.

 

Burnham could win Labour the election, as I see his moves and new policies, thanks to Corbyn, and as listed on the BBC website, infinitely preferable to New Labour, and including Miliband. I prefer seeing it as a new sense of realism to please both party members and the electorate, and he could do it. Corbyn is another Michael Foot figure in waiting. That's not to say they are bad people, they aren't, but Corbyn needs to serve Labour in a supporting role and reminding all and sundry of the moral high-ground, not sitting on the backbenches in a permanent irrelevant strop voting against his own party.

 

Just a thought...

He's taken a series of new (and frankly welcome) policy stances because Corbyn is outflanking him on the left. Not three months ago he was on the charm offensive with big business.

 

The danger with all this flip-flopping is that there's a real danger he'll get tied into knots when placed under the spotlight for five years as Leader of the Opposition. As Shadow Health Secretary he basically had a free hit as it's natural territory for us and he knows it like the back of his hand.

Or as a friend of mine put it, 'It'll be embarrassing if Burnham doesn't win after five years of service as Shadow Secretary of Flirting flagrantly with the Labour membership'

Yeh Burnham is one of the James Purnell generation and don't believe for a moment he's a left winger!

Two Tory MPs have said they oppose tax credit cuts.

 

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politic...icle4522379.ece

 

And there in a nutshell you have the reason why Labour members want a leader who will do some Opposition and actually take the chances to stop cuts happening NOW.

Coal mines!

 

As much as I appreciate the widening of the debate that Corbyn has brought, I could do without him playing lefty bingo.

I like that phrase Lefty Bingo, he seems to be piling on some ridiculous claims he will bring forth to resolve all problems. Nothing about consequences of each policy (in that respect he's no different from all other politicians, seeing only the rose-tinted utopian future and ignoring the inconvenient results that don't fit in with the Big View) - as I've said on here a billion times there are always consequences to every action, the sensible person anticipates what they are going to be, good and bad. Corbyn certainly seems to be so in love with his own vision now in full flow he's talking about bringing in daft changes in his quest to turn back the clock instead of sticking with policies that are generally thought to be not a bad idea, like building housing, renationalising railways as the franchises expire, and so on.

 

 

Two Tory MPs have said they oppose tax credit cuts.

 

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politic...icle4522379.ece

 

And there in a nutshell you have the reason why Labour members want a leader who will do some Opposition and actually take the chances to stop cuts happening NOW.

Well given even Liz Kendall opposes the cuts to tax credits, it's not as if there's an option on the table that would disagree with that?

Well given even Liz Kendall opposes the cuts to tax credits, it's not as if there's an option on the table that would disagree with that?

 

That might be easier to believe if they hadn't all just abstained on these very cuts a few weeks ago.

 

Kendall in particular has said she "won't oppose any cuts unless they can show how they'd pay for it". Since she's said even the laughably timid tax rises in this year's manifesto were "anti-aspiration", that presumably means she wouldn't oppose any cuts atall.

That might be easier to believe if they hadn't all just abstained on these very cuts a few weeks ago.

 

Kendall in particular has said she "won't oppose any cuts unless they can show how they'd pay for it". Since she's said even the laughably timid tax rises in this year's manifesto were "anti-aspiration", that presumably means she wouldn't oppose any cuts atall.

If you're referring to the mansion tax, I don't think Liz has said anything on it (that would be Andy, and I can't see any times she directly referred to a tax rise in the manifesto as 'anti-aspiration' rather than our rhetoric in general) but there's pretty broad agreement that there's a better way of doing the policy without looking like you're anti-anyone having a house over that level - reforming the ridiculous council tax bands, for example. Not that direct tax rises are the only way of costing a policy - Liz has said she wants to crack down on the £100bn of tax subsidies we have (which even cover things as ludicrous as City workers getting free taxis after 10pm). Most of those aren't really a priority for spending when set against Working Tax Credits, which Liz has said she opposes any cuts to given it would make it even more difficult to get a living wage.

She said in the Andrew Neil hustings that she opposed both the mansion tax and the 50p tax band.

If you're referring to the mansion tax, I don't think Liz has said anything on it (that would be Andy, and I can't see any times she directly referred to a tax rise in the manifesto as 'anti-aspiration' rather than our rhetoric in general) but there's pretty broad agreement that there's a better way of doing the policy without looking like you're anti-anyone having a house over that level - reforming the ridiculous council tax bands, for example. Not that direct tax rises are the only way of costing a policy - Liz has said she wants to crack down on the £100bn of tax subsidies we have (which even cover things as ludicrous as City workers getting free taxis after 10pm). Most of those aren't really a priority for spending when set against Working Tax Credits, which Liz has said she opposes any cuts to given it would make it even more difficult to get a living wage.

 

Reforming tax bands in one fell swoop would be a guaranteed Big Job (valuers would be needed en masse only to be made unemployed soon after, there just aren't that many in the first place - the property-owners would all object instantly at the first whiff of rates increases, demand another valuation, and everyone would hate the government that brought it in, in a Poll Tax sort of way) - that's why no party wants to tackle it head on and so just leave it be..

 

 

The Council Tax revaluation should have happened years ago (a regular revaluation was built in to the initial legislation), but the Labour government of the day were frightened out of it by the Tory press. Labour didn't even try to get across the message that there would be gainers as well as losers, or that voters on "ordinary incomes" were more likely to gain than lose. The failure to have any revaluation in the nearly 25 years since Council Tax was introduced has just allowed the anomalies to get steadily worse.

 

Of course, a revaluation (along with the introduction of more bands at the top end) is an alternative to the mansion tax, although the money would end up in council coffers, rather than the Treasury.

That was the reason Ed didn't go with it. Which makes anything he said on devolution look like the lame posturing it was.

If he had gone with it, he would have avoided being accused of stealing Lib Dem policy.

New YouGov poll. First preferences:

 

53% Corbyn

21% Burnham

18% Cooper

8% Kendall

 

That is enough for Corbyn to win in the first round. On a two candidate run-off, Corbyn wins 60-40 against Burnham and 62-38 against Cooper.

The Council Tax revaluation should have happened years ago (a regular revaluation was built in to the initial legislation), but the Labour government of the day were frightened out of it by the Tory press. Labour didn't even try to get across the message that there would be gainers as well as losers, or that voters on "ordinary incomes" were more likely to gain than lose. The failure to have any revaluation in the nearly 25 years since Council Tax was introduced has just allowed the anomalies to get steadily worse.

 

Of course, a revaluation (along with the introduction of more bands at the top end) is an alternative to the mansion tax, although the money would end up in council coffers, rather than the Treasury.

 

Which is another reason the parties don't go for it - they are too busy hammering local government to allow it to have more funding that they can't use themselves, directly. In terms of regions it's ridiculous the variations in council tax - a home in parts of London, for instance, bigger and twice the value of a home in, say, Poole, pays far less Council tax. As long as there are going to be losers in any reorganisation though there are going to be a LOT of very unhappy potential voters. I won't be holding my breath on change.....

The interesting thing in that poll is that even among Labour members, Burnham is rated as the most likely to win in 2020 (Cooper is second on that measure, followed by Jezza with amusingly Kendall in a distant last place even on what is supposed to be her USP).

 

The question is whether when it comes to the crunch, members decide to go with the person they think is the most likely winner, or if they decide that the most important thing is a guarantee of proper opposition now and attempts to stop Tory policies now.

Edited August 11, 20159 yr by Danny