Labour Party discussion: "Shouting Starmer Starmer Starmer mega mega white man!"

[Zetetic]

Quite simply, the clear position should be that the welfare state is for all of us if and when we need it

So... means-testing or not?

[Pink Gregory]

Nothing is an easy sell for the left in this fucking deranged country.

Especially when 'I worked all my life and never got a penny in benefits' is generally said with pride and not gratitude for good fortune.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

It's worth bearing in mind all these extended protections came into being as a consequence of clear and dire need.

As they are rolled back incrementally they affect a relatively small (but still too many) number of people each time, meaning it is difficult to drum up serious resistance to it, though I think a majority of the public felt the cuts and benefits reforms 2010-now were harsh and went too far.

It will be interesting to see if Covid produces the dire need that governments cannot avoid to respond to with anything other than socialism. The furlough scheme, and other grants seem to suggest that even the neoliberals concede that the government's job is to basically underwrite the prosperity of the country and to an extent stop people from starving, even if they appear willing to single out and marginalise minorities within it.

[Paul Calf]

Or, they're doing it because they can't get away with doing nothing. Yet.

[olliebean]

So... means-testing or not?

God, it's a minefield, isn't it? Obviously the dream is UBI, which is by definition not means-tested.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

God, it's a minefield, isn't it? Obviously the dream is UBI, which is by definition not means-tested.

You'd think that but at Prof Guy Standings event in Leeds in January one of the panel was challenged about how housing benefit would work and mentioned means testing, the one thing I have always been told was something UBI would discard. Since then I haven't had clear answers from UBI Labs social media crew. For starters the exchequer benefits through unclaimed benefits every year as a result of means testing being prohibitive and seemingly purposefully opaque and difficult.

Some forms of ubi are intended to be bare bones, an income floor essentially and that's the form getting pushed as it's the easiest sell, rather than the principle I hold that if a minimum wage is intended for social reasons to mark out a minimum standard for survival then ubi should be nearer to that, perhaps subtracting commuting costs.

[NoSleep]

Housing benefit would have to be a separate issue from UBI.

Regarding the debate about means testing, it would be better to give people the benefit of the doubt when claiming, so that there is immediate, sometimes urgently required, and non-returnable money made available to a claimant at the earliest possible time. So what if they get a little too much to start with even if you penny pinch later down the line, it all amounts to very little opposite the distress the lack of a little cash can cause in the lives of people.

[Zetetic]

I think housing benefit has to be anomalous for all sorts of reasons. State should be providing the underlying service (housing), but instead it's propping up a grossly distorted market and encouraging all sorts of weird scarcity.

Most services and situational (e.g unemployment) or needs-led (e.g. disability) cash benefits shouldn't be means-tested.

[NoSleep]

Most services and situational (e.g unemployment) or needs-led (e.g. disability) cash benefits shouldn't be means-tested.

Totally agree. The saving in nitpicking bureaucracy would pay for the extra outlay I'm sure.

[Johnny Yesno]

You don't get more NHS hospital treatment the more you've 'put in'.

[Johnny Yesno]

Or more schooling.

[olliebean]

You don't get more NHS hospital treatment the more you've 'put in'.

Or more schooling.

Won't be long now if the Tories keep winning.

[greencalx]

I have tried once or twice to determine whether the administrative cost of means testing is significantly less than the money saved. Usually to no avail...

For some reason I find the words "benefit" and "welfare" really jarring - even more so "welfare state" - and much prefer "social security" as that's what it is. Also "housing benefit" should be renamed "landlord subsidy". 

[Zetetic]

The administrative cost of means-testing is fairly low for many benefits, I suspect, because much of the labour of proof is transferred to the applicant (or third parties, in the case of prescriptions in England for example) and the marginal cost of fraud detection on top of other types of fraud is going to be fairly low. The savings of means-testing are also compounded with the savings of putting off eligible applicants as well.

I fear that people are attracted to means-testing on the basis of sense of fairness as much as they are by any supposed efficiency, depressing though that thought is.

[Johnny Yesno]

Oh, for fuck's sake.

Nandy on #Marr: "I have no idea whether Donald Trymp is a racist or not a racist. What I do know is that in the run-up to the US elections, this is one of the ways that politicians try to activate their base."

9:50 AM · Jun 7, 2020

https://twitter.com/siennamarla/status/1269552370415022089

[NoSleep]

We really are back to 2015.

[Johnny Yesno]

It's just so utterly tone deaf, given the strength of feeling over here, which I note has recently seen the Colston statue in Bristol going in the drink.

[BlodwynPig]

It's just so utterly tone deaf, given the strength of feeling over here, which I note has recently seen the Colston statue in Bristol going in the drink.

"tone deaf", beige to say the least.

[holyzombiejesus]

Been doing a couple of those Twitter 'world cup' things. The Labour Mps on just seems to illustrate what a load of horrible cunts are in the party.

one of 5 Labour MPs to vote against the extension of abortion rights to Northern Ireland.[23] During votes on the same bill, she also abstained [24] on extending same-sex marriage to Northern Ireland

In January 2016, ... resigned from Labour's policy review on child poverty and combating inequality, as a protest against Progress being described by shadow Chancellor John McDonnell as having "a hard right agenda". She commented that she had been "backed into a corner". A Labour Party spokesperson stated "She is resigning from something that doesn't exist", as the initiative had not been confirmed or launched yet.

They're the last two I looked at. Jess Phillips is currently beating (the fucking ace) Charlotte 'fascists should get their heads kicked in' Nichols 45% to 23% (it's a group of 4). Zarah Sultana has 52% to Stella ' the first woman in history to have a baby' Creasy's 38%.

[idunnosomename]

all i can ever think of with stella creasy is there was a bot that did "it's-a me! <MP>io!" and she retweeted "it's-a me! Stella Creasy-io!"

[jobotic]

Labour Party cunts #2

https://twitter.com/BrendanChilton/status/1269699157620592640?fbclid=IwAR3Gb4gCEfKI7YIXZ_EsJGHKG46XKRDyIm_E6QEXRXAz0Rz1mOi79SWgHMU

[chveik]

wow this guy is a piece of work

[idunnosomename]

oh fuck off. what a cunt

[thugler]

Labour Party cunts #2

https://twitter.com/BrendanChilton/status/1269699157620592640?fbclid=IwAR3Gb4gCEfKI7YIXZ_EsJGHKG46XKRDyIm_E6QEXRXAz0Rz1mOi79SWgHMU

Also retweeting Darren Grimes.

Just a total cunt.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Kier's been on lbc saying what a baddie Colston was and made a case for why it's good the statue has been removed.

But like, days of silence to jump on a bandwagon. He'll be courting the more bigoted side of middle class voters in a way that'll make black lives harder in a few days.

[Jockice]

I'm cancelling my direct debit next time I log into my bank account unless someone on here can give me a very good reason why I should continue funding them. Because I really can't think of one I'm afraid.

[honeychile]

Labour Party cunts #2

https://twitter.com/BrendanChilton/status/1269699157620592640?fbclid=IwAR3Gb4gCEfKI7YIXZ_EsJGHKG46XKRDyIm_E6QEXRXAz0Rz1mOi79SWgHMU

Worth it for this though:

Dr Elaine Cox 🍃 💚 🍃🇬🇧
@ElaineCox11

We need our memorials to the past as reminders of that past. Destroy them and the collective memory goes and history repeats itself.

HMKingFrancisII
@HMKingFrancisII

Totally agree doctor, that's why I've been petitioning to build a statue of Osama bin Laden in downtown New York so we can properly memorialise and remember the events of 9/11.

[BlodwynPig]

Labour Party cunts #2

https://twitter.com/BrendanChilton/status/1269699157620592640?fbclid=IwAR3Gb4gCEfKI7YIXZ_EsJGHKG46XKRDyIm_E6QEXRXAz0Rz1mOi79SWgHMU

Dr Elaine Cox Leaf fluttering in wind Green heart Leaf fluttering in windFlag of United Kingdom
@ElaineCox11
·
14h
Wrong location, buddy. Bin Laden needs his statue in Baghdad.

[NoSleep]

I'm cancelling my direct debit next time I log into my bank account unless someone on here can give me a very good reason why I should continue funding them. Because I really can't think of one I'm afraid.

Aside from what others have said about waiting to vote at the forthcoming NEC elections, I'd add that these cunts are only too happy for you to leave and make it easier to destroy what's happened to the Labour party in the last 5 years; the cunts win outright. Hold on for a little longer.

[holyzombiejesus]

I'm cancelling my direct debit next time I log into my bank account unless someone on here can give me a very good reason why I should continue funding them. Because I really can't think of one I'm afraid.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Campaign_Group#Current_members

These little bobby dazzlers, they need you to stay. There are NEC elections coming up and if you don't want to see the left ostracised, we need to stick together and ensure we get a majority on there. At least wait until after that.