[youngian]

As one of the replies points out; man sits in front of a flag of the state he’s aspiring to lead.

[Tubby Isaacs]

You never see proper leftists with national flags, do you?

[Malcolm Armsteen]

Where has his little finger been?

Pity Abers is on a sabbatical, that would be right up his street.

Fnaar.

[davidjay]

And as I've said many a time, Denis Healey got it spot on when he said the left can never understand that The Workers are more loyal to their flag than to their class.

[youngian]

You never see proper leftists with national flags, do you?

George Galloway gets this kind of left populist patriotism. Scottish socialists who huddle the Union flag are a very small niche though.

[youngian]

And as I've said many a time, Denis Healey got it spot on when he said the left can never understand that The Workers are more loyal to their flag than to their class.

Not quite which is why the dockers wrangled triple time for lowering their cranes for Churchill’s coffin on a Saturday afternoon. They didn’t vote for Enoch to run their union but Communist Party veteran Jack Dash.

[crabcakes_windermere]

It does seem to have been oddly quiet the last few days, as if there's something else going on that's a distraction.

Dunno if it's just me, but there seems to have been a notable upswing in Starmer's output - tweets and video clips and the like, and also in theme. Much more direct Tory attacks, callbacks to when labour made demands, and also notably tweets of support for strikers at British Gas, pay rises for NHS staff and the like.

All good stuff, and makes the period of quiet before it all the more noticeable. It might just be coincidence, but it's almost like someone was off sick and the stuff just wasn't getting sent, or there's been a sudden policy decision.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

There wasn't much point in doing that stuff over Christmas and New Year, too much background noise.

Also, events. So possibly a policy change, or more likely a new place on the grid.

[mattomac]

Let Boris have his day with the deal, though to be fair he had to self isolate again at some point.

[Tubby Isaacs]

He's scrapped EU freedom of movement, having said that he wouldn't. Had Jez won and renegotiated his Brexit, it would have doubtless been chucked anyway, and it's probably necessary electorally. But these U turns all mount up and feed into the "slippery lawyer" stuff.

I wonder if it'll be necessary for Starmer to step aside and Rayner to take over to get over the line.

[Cyclist]

Who scrapped EU Freedom of Movement after saying they wouldn't?

I don't recall Johnson promising to retain FoM, and Starmer has had no input because Brexit has been regarded by the Tories as Tory party property since 2016.

[crabcakes_windermere]

He's scrapped EU freedom of movement, having said that he wouldn't. Had Jez won and renegotiated his Brexit, it would have doubtless been chucked anyway, and it's probably necessary electorally. But these U turns all mount up and feed into the "slippery lawyer" stuff.

I wonder if it'll be necessary for Starmer to step aside and Rayner to take over to get over the line.

I'm starting to suspect the plan is to build up, but (for now) to not appear to be the party who'll wade in and reverse everything immediately, because that could push away people sick of brexit (in the legislative sense). What's needed now is for people to become furious with brexit because they were mis-sold it. THEN will be the best time to capitalise and make a point that we can have many of the benefits back *without* rejoining the EU, and the only reason we don't have them is the Tories decided we couldn't.

In 4 years time, there might be appetite for free movement returning. Or certainly something to build on to make regaining free movement a 2028 election goal. I suspect we'll eventually end up in a Norway-like position, but until the headbangers have been forced back into their boxes by the very people they made promises to having to defend empty shelves, lost jobs and higher prices for everything there's a risk it won't stick.

[AOB]

Covid-19: Drop 'absurd' 5% council tax increase - Starmer

He said families had been treated as an "afterthought" by the government during the pandemic, adding that Labour would become the "party of the family" under his leadership.

Disappointing. Is paying the bills a worry only for "families"?

"Party of the family" seems a bit exclusive to me. He probably does not intend it that way but he needs to be careful how he projects himself and his party. He didn't say he wasn't interested in non-family people but Council Tax is paid by everyone, so in this instance he shouldn't have worded it to imply families being affected is more important than anyone else.

[Andy McDandy]

Customs union and EFTA would be enough for most people. Even the immigration headbangers would be mollified if the government started using the powers they've always had. The problem there was that while anyone with half a brain knows that immigration is a natural and useful thing, and that being a racist shitbag isn't much of a life goal, they had to sell the image that they totally understood the thick cunts and sympathised with them, but couldn't do anything about it because of the nasty EU, see? And if people pointed to other EU states enforcing borders, well, that was those sneaky forrins not playing by the rules. Not like us Brits, straight bat and all that.

It's not really what the rules are that's important, but where people think they're coming from.

[Andy McDandy]

Covid-19: Drop 'absurd' 5% council tax increase - Starmer


Disappointing. Is paying the bills a worry only for "families"?

"Party of the family" seems a bit exclusive to me.

Law of the ridiculous reverse. Is any party "anti-family", not counting according to its opponents?