Should Gordon call an election this year?

[Christmas themed thank]

Much more self inflicted this time around.

If anything this thread serves as a reminder that the Labour Party were probably on the right track on where to go next in 2010. In retrospect they also did a good job of mitigating the worst of the immediate risks posed by the financial crisis.

The austerity years flowed by Brexit were petrol on the fire.

I’m hard pushed to think of any period over the last 14 years where you could say the Tory party did a good job.

Absolute shambles

Brown was advised to regulate the banks against his own instinct. So if he'd listened to his gut we'd have done fine.

Brown also the last PM to actually achieve any semblance of economic growth. Which Osborne then killed off.

 

[Christmas themed thank]

Austerity is morally, economically, politically disastrous. I cannot think of a policy that has done more damage than that.

Absolutely spending needed to be reigned in - but the way the Tories did it gave us the worst of all worlds. Brown's plan would have left us in a much stronger position. The Tories of course nicked Balls' plan after 2010 when their own ideological nonsense failed.

They were gifted 2% growth (consistent), Osborne killed it. When did we last have consistent growth anything like that?

 

[Christmas themed thank]

And if you want to argue against me, then we have the counterfactual. The US implemented Brown's plan almost verbatim. The US outgrew the UK every year since.

The Tories are economically incompetent. If what you care about is economic stability, Labour is the better option, evidenced. Only Truss has really destroyed that notion with the public but the Tories did that long before.

 

[Uther]

People think the Cons have done a terrible job over the last 14 years, but haven't they all personally become much, much wealthier? So, they no doubt think they've set out to do what they wanted to do...

 

[Christmas themed thank]

You can see almost perfectly when Osborne's ideological nonsense started to destroy the economy.

 

[arknor]

Whos Gordon?

oh nm its an ancient thread

 

[Pawnless Endgame]

1997 was the 1st time I voted as I had just turned 18. The Tories had been in power for like 20 years. I voted Lib Dem. Labour got in. 1997 overall though was a crap year for me because nothing happened in my life in 1997, but I was later told that there was a great sense of optimism back then. Hindsight, funny thing that. I don't think there will be the same sense of optimism though if Labour gets in this time round.