Is there any hope for Starmer’s Labour?

Welcome to openDemocracy's weekly reader comments round-up. We receive so many carefully considered messages about our work that it seems a shame to keep them to ourselves. Send us your thoughts for next week's round-up by replying directly to any of our emails or commenting on our articles or Instagram posts.

 

These comments are edited for clarity, accuracy and length, and aren't necessarily a reflection of openDemocracy's editorial position.

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Re: Inside Labour's pro-business push to 'defang' competition watchdog

When your ruling elite, including the government and the City, relies heavily on or sells off most of your country's essential assets, infrastructure projects, major industries and services to foreign investors, you lose control of your country's destiny, self-respect and sovereignty. This leaves you open to blackmail, compromising your moral imperative, your duty of care to and the prosperity of those working people who gave you power. You become a vassal state.

This is the reality Wales is facing. But, having recently seen the demise of the last of our heavy industries here in south Wales, I believe that Wales, as a self-governing region, now has a unique opportunity to make a strong and realistic argument for developing our own Welsh industrial strategy based on greater autonomy and creating new opportunities for growth. This could be done through establishing a substantial Welsh Government Sovereign Wealth Fund using an increase in the Welsh Barnet formula and the Welsh Development Bank. I understand that loans taken out by this bank, which was launched in 2017 to provide various types of financing and investments to Welsh businesses, do not appear on the UK national debt.

The UK now owns very little of its major essential manufacturing and trading companies (water, electricity and steel, for example), which have been sold off to international corporations by the City of London Financiers since Margaret Thatcher was in power. 

For example, the Associated British Ports owns the Port of Port Talbot, in south Wales, and is a key driver of the Cardiff and Newport Investment Zone. But its majority shares are owned by international pension and sovereign wealth funds in Canada and Kuwait, which means that the majority of all profits as dividends will leave our country, and our industry will become servants to whatever employment and working practices they impose. –Terry W Scales via our website

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Re: Weekly Poll: Can the rising energy on the left force Labour to stand up to big business and return to its progressive roots?

I hope not. Labour needs to fill the vacuum left by the collapsing Tories or risk letting Reform UK do it. As someone who grew up in a Tory-voting family, I know there are plenty of people who would vote for Nigel Farage's brand of fascism over a left-wing party because they see it as the 'lesser of two evils'.

I'm hoping the MPs and others who have been removed from the Labour Party will successfully set up a new left-wing party that will gain traction and be a suitable candidate for a coalition if Labour doesn't manage a majority in 2029.

The only thing that matters in this country at the moment is keeping Reform out of government. Everything else – and I say this as a disabled trans person who has felt the negative impact of some of the current government's actions – is window dressing. –Lou via email

Keir Starmer reportedly joined the Trilateral Commission, a global membership organisation that is closely linked to US and UK intelligence, between 2017-18, while he was Jeremy Corbyn's shadow Brexit secretary. Trilateral Commission rules say a member must resign if they are elected to government. This allows the group to claim it is non-governmental, but I believe this could not be further from the truth – the group's aim, I think, is to have a global corporate governance, not subject to sovereign laws. Starmer, in his own little way, is doing his best to achieve this aim. He has lied and lied about policies. He has done so many U-turns, he should be spinning like a top. It is beyond time that all unions, and indeed the Cooperative Party, abandon Starmer's Labour, as it is no longer representative of working people. –Donald via email

Labour is an absolute lost cause. I did not trust Starmer from the word go and gave up my Labour membership after what he and his cronies did to Jeremy Corbyn. They robbed us of a better country to live in, and they can never be forgiven. –David via email

Re: Keir Starmer's Labour is a lost cause. But there's still hope for the left

Keir Starmer did very well at PMQs today, and I did not sense any lack of support from the government benches. Why not lobby for affordable housing on brownfield sites, re-nationalisation of water, as is supported by Labour MP Clive Lewis, and enhancement of the UK's alignment with the EU? –Michael via email

Oh, the Cult of Corbyn again. Did you not note how dismal he was when he lost an unlosable election? Badly. You write that Corbyn and Sultana's Your Party "appeared likely to provide a serious challenge to Starmer's Labour". It will. It'll guarantee a likely massive Tory/Reform coalition victory. First Past the Post, remember. Split that vote! –Paul via Bluesky

Utterly ridiculous to suggest those populist clowns offer any sort of hope. –Graham via Bluesky

How many times do I have to say this? Populism on either side is bad. Look at the policies, not the person. –Talkie via Bluesky

It's not Keir Starmer's Labour, in the same way as another party was not Jo Swinson's Liberal Democrats, even though she arrogantly had that painted on a bus. The Labour Party is the members, not the rich lawyers who big industries pay to do what they want. The sooner 'ordinary' party members get back control of their parties from rich people, the sooner we can get on with running things for the benefit of us all. –Walrus via Mastodon

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