UK opposition Labour Party unveils its pledges to voters in hopes of winning the next election

Not a lot of money to play with for Labour. The effects of the pandemic, Tory mismanagement and the Brexit disaster have left the cupboard close to empty.

The windfall tax and ending tax breaks for private schools are good moves. More aggressive measures to tackle tax avoidance and evasion would be welcomed .

Labour can benefit a little because Sterling went down 25% at Brexit. The consequent inflationary rise and the initial damage it caused has largely happened under the Tories. But it won't go back up again and the UK will now remain a much poorer country with fewer services and more poverty.

And there is still more decline to come. Brexit is going to have more aftershocks. The damage to the economics of UK universities is now starting to really bite, so there will be more trouble there. Some will become STEM incubators, some will go bust, a few will service the wealthy. Schools are a mess. Infrastructure is failing. Brexit may have caused existential damage to the NHS. There will be more of the brain drain ahead as qualified people flee to greener pastures. There is an element of 'after the Romans left' about the UK now. There is unlikely to be any real improvement for a decade or more, if ever. A lot has been broken beyond the point of repair.

You can't buy teachers and doctors and you can't train them quickly. Labour is unlikely to undo much of the structural damage the Tories did. The isolation will continue and so will the general decay.

But really, all he had to do was point out that Corbyn had been removed and that they were not the Tories. That would have been enough for a landslide victory. The Tories will be lucky to come second.

Accepting Elphicke was a bad idea and suggests a lack of core competency. I would expect Khan to challenge for the leadership when a chance presents itself.

If Labour cannot win this election - by plenty of seats - after the complete shambles of the UK in the past 4 or 5 years, they never will.

What a load of rubbish. Sterling did not depreciate by 25% after BREXIT, if fact FBP is stronger relative to the Euro that it was 5 years ago. Apart from the CoviD year Bristish GDP growth has exceed the EUR average in every year of the past 15 years. In Q1 2024 it had the strongest growth in the G7. Education levels are at their highest ever in the Pisa tables. France and Germany are facing strikes in their Health services and Germany is currently the economic basket case in Europe. The UK does have servere infrastructure problems. High levels of net immigration has resulted inn enormous pressure on housing, transportation and, hospitals and hige capital spending will be required to improve wellbeing, but no political party has an answer to that. The Labour party's envy tax on private education sets it apart from the rest of Europe where taxes of education are forbidden by EU Law and most countries actually subsidize private schools. General public dissatisfaction after the years of CoViD, global economic slowdown and concerns (justified or not) are causing a shift away from the Governing parties across the Western Worlds (witness Trump in the US, the far Right in Italy, France and Germany and the Socialists in the UK. Labour will win convincingly but cannot deliver any meaningful change and will be gone after 5 years when they can't deliver on the Nirvana everyone on the left is expecting.

National parliament voting intention

https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/united-kingdom/

Labour, UK main opposition party, since Rishi Sunak took office, has consistently polled a 20 plus point advantage over Sunak, I suggest his lame duck government.

Jeremy Hunts budget sealed Sunak fate.

The bland incompetence in office of a government that has run out of credibility, the confidence of an increasingly irritated electorate.

The shining star in Labours opposition government is Rachel Reeves, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer since 2021.

Sunak handling of the economy whilst Chancellor, in a devasting pandemic, in many respects created the cost-of-living crisis, the UK electorate is still suffering harshly.

The high interest rates, 5.25% are swingeing, RPI inflation rate 4.3% in (March 2024) is stubbornly high.

Keir Starmer politically is a charisma free zone, his pledge card political gimmickry a through back to the “Tony Blair” wonder years that “New Labour” could do no wrong, all a distant memory.

A new government needs policies that not only make sense, but are archivable, restructuring, reforming the NHS will take decades not pledge cards.

Harsh tax raising will cripple middle income owners, on mortgages that would make most weep.

Scotland will decide UK fate, a hung parliament is another worst case scenario, with everybody’s  favourite panto villain/clown Nigel Farage again threatening to make another comeback.

Brexit is a red herring.

My Dad laughs out load when I insist I am a socialist, his unplucked eyebrows bounce up and down off the ceiling.

Labour will win convincingly but cannot deliver any meaningful change and will be gone after 5 years when they can't deliver on the Nirvana everyone on the left is expecting

Who is expecting Nirvana? Who are you talking about here?

Less incompetence with a stable government would be an improvement.

On the Brexit point, is there any sentient and honest person left who thinks Brexit has benefited the UK economy?

Keir Starmer politically is a charisma free zone, his pledge card political gimmickry a through back to the “Tony Blair” wonder years that “New Labour” could do no wrong

I was a member of the Labour Party before and during the earlier part of the New Labour years.

I left because of the Iraq War although they’d pissed me and a lot of other people off before that disgrace.

New Labour could and did do a lot wrong.

Unless the electorate has a seismic change of heart inside the ballot box, Keir Starmer is on point to lead labour, a change of government, into number 10.

Jimizo, Starmer will not have it all his own way.

Tony Blair surrounded himself with a team that kept order.

John Smith unexpected tragic death, propelled Tony Blair and his pro-modernising team into “New Labour” attaining complete authority.

Gordon Brown stood aside so Tony Blair could run unopposed for the then Labour party leadership,

Blair assembled a formidable top team, Gordon Brown, Robin Cook, John Prescott, Jack Straw, David Blunkett, Margaret Beckett, Mo Mowlam, Alistair Darling, Donald Dewar, given the task of introducing the Devolution Bill, George Robertson, and Clare Short.

However, keeping all in check was a true headbanger, the Director of Communications and Strategy Alastair Campbell, plus the rather lizard like First Secretary of State Peter Mandelson.

Keir Starmer will not have anywhere close a team that will sing from his hymn sheet.

His cabinet, his back benches are a very broad political church.

The country, the electorate want change, a new start. Social justice.

Keir Starmer is a means to and end, a route to number 10, whether he can remain Prime Minster is another matter altogether.