What have New labour actually done right?

[jusali]

jusali are you a tory...And would rather people spent their OWN oney etc or a Socialist who thinks they have wasted too much money on parasites?

I honestly don't know anymore. I side on socialism but having experienced New Labour for the last few years have lost faith even in that.
My personal feelings are that I'm sick of the "we spent so many billions on......" yet services are still of sub-standard performance. I pay tax willingly and I want to see results not bullshit explanations, not think tanks but better schools, hospitals, roads, housing etc etc. Instead all I hear are excuses and a gross trend of economic division.
As a citizen I have to trust the government of the day to spend their revenues wisely and with authority unfortunately all I get is higher taxes and handwringing when it comes to justifying those (all to often grossly sub-standard) results.

 

[gosub]

This thread has been really enjoyable...It shows again just how shallow the politics of some people on urban is.
Lots of oooh aernt the govt bad....but no alternatives.....

I seem to recall one of motives the Major administration cited for the rail privatization was the 1947 Treasury Act (or something like that) which prohibited government expenditure on upgrading infrastructure.
Blair, with the good will and large majority he had, could have easily got that off the statute book, this would have allowed the schools and hospitals that have been built to have been constructed for as little as 20% of the money that has and will be spent on them. And the relevant authorities would have owned them as well.

 

[tbaldwin]

I seem to recall one of motives the Major administration cited for the rail privatization was the 1947 Treasury Act (or something like that) which prohibited government expenditure on upgrading infrastructure.
Blair, with the good will and large majority he had, could have easily got that off the statute book, this would have allowed the schools and hospitals that have been built to have been constructed for as little as 20% of the money that has and will be spent on them. And the relevant authorities would have owned them as well.

Good post gosub.Not sure about your figures though.

 

[gosub]

I'm going on the figures Bremner, Bird and Fortune used to attack PFI last month (that was repeated on More 4 this weekend

 

[tbaldwin]

I honestly don't know anymore. I side on socialism but having experienced New Labour for the last few years have lost faith even in that.
My personal feelings are that I'm sick of the "we spent so many billions on......" yet services are still of sub-standard performance. I pay tax willingly and I want to see results not bullshit explanations, not think tanks but better schools, hospitals, roads, housing etc etc. Instead all I hear are excuses and a gross trend of economic division.
As a citizen I have to trust the government of the day to spend their revenues wisely and with authority unfortunately all I get is higher taxes and handwringing when it comes to justifying those (all to often grossly sub-standard) results.

jusali i dont think any rational person could deny that money has been wasted under this and every other govt. But New Labour have poured billions extra into public services...When ever a Labour govt has tried to do this,there efforts have been rubbished by rich people who resent paying for it.
As those rich people control the media they are in a unique position to pick out the things that make it look like"all that money has been wasted" there are always going to be people who have had shit treatment on the NHS etc.
I think NLhave got quite a lot wrong but nowhere near as much as most of their critics.

 

[Fruitloop]

The rich paying for it? Pull the other one....

 

[Fruitloop]

Dp.

 

[Fisher_Gate]

97 posts and no-one has mentioned Educational Maintenance Allowances for 16-18 year olds?

This is the scheme whereby the poorest get paid an allowance of up to 30 pounds a week for staying on at College/School after 16.

I think most things this Labour government has been a disaster, particularly in Education and welfare. But this is one policy that was long overdue - and Labour has actually done it when previous governments only talked about it. Unfortunately because it doesn't affect the kids of the chattering classes or middle class lefties, it doesn't get talked about as much as (say) university fees.

Having said that it's a good thing, it doesn't make up for all the other crap things they've done though!

 

[tbaldwin]

Groucho your full of shit NL have poured loads more money into the health service the number of nurses has gone up massivelly..Just cos the media try to pretend all that money has been wasted or gone on PFI doesnt mean its true.
They have also put loads more into education and things like the EMA and minimum wage,minimum income guarantee,family tax credits etc etc.

WHAT HAVE THE SWP EVER DONE FOR US.....You Tory twat....

You must have missed this Fisher gate....

 

[Fisher_Gate]

You must have missed this Fisher gate....

Fair enough. Doesn't make up for the crap though.

 

[tbaldwin]

Fair enough. Doesn't make up for the crap though.

It indicates they might be a bit to the left of those chattering classes so concerned about tuition fees though doesnt it?.

 

[Fisher_Gate]

It indicates they might be a bit to the left of those chattering classes so concerned about tuition fees though doesnt it?.

No. Because although some people go on a lot about a tuition fees, all the evidence is they are a deterrent to working class participation in what was previously regarded as solely for the elite (full time study on a traditional university degree). Working Class traditional hostility to debt is not understood by New Labour policy wonks who generally come from the middle class and technocratic elite. In a 'perfect economic market', it's a 'no brainer' - borrow £30,000 now, to pay back slowly and in return get back up to half a million quid across your lifetime. But we don't live in a 'perfect economic market' - working class people fear debt, and young people's attitudes are influenced by the fact that £30,000 is more than their parents would have borrowed in an entire lifetime.

The EMA policy is diametrically the opposite of the tuition fee policy - one of the consequences of muddled New Labour thinking, because it does make it easier for working class people to participate in a certain type of post-compulsory education (ie 16-18 yr olds on courses of up to A level standard, though the majority of recipients are on vocational courses like hairdressing and catering).

Also contradictory is the policy of paying bursaries and not having fees for HE nursing students, and providing fee grants and study grants to HE part time students. If fees and loans are so popular and right for one type of student, why not apply it to all courses and types of student?

If you want to make the middle classes pay more for the state services they get, then there is much better mechanism. It's called "Income Tax". Labour is terrified of mentioning this for fear of being attacked by the likes of the Daily Mail. Rather than facing them head on, they divert into a series of irrational and misconceived manouvers, of which tuition fees is one. A Graduate Tax would have been much more sensible, but it has the 'T' word in it so is inconceivable for them.

 

[tbaldwin]

FISHER GATE

If it was true that Tuition fees were such a big deterent to working class participation then why are the student figures rising?
Do you support the way the govt has targetted grants at students from less privelleged backgrounds?

I think the arguements against a graduation tax are preety obvious..That people could get a heavily subsidised education and then go off and work abroad in the US or wherever and not pay anything...While people who never had the privellege of a H/E would have to pay for it?
Why on earth would someone like you who claims to be a Socialist support privelleged people getting more and more subsidies?
I wonder whats your position on inheritance tax etc?

 

[Azrael]

In a 'perfect economic market', it's a 'no brainer' - borrow £30,000 now, to pay back slowly and in return get back up to half a million quid across your lifetime. But we don't live in a 'perfect economic market' - working class people fear debt, and young people's attitudes are influenced by the fact that £30,000 is more than their parents would have borrowed in an entire lifetime.

Irrational fear is not a sound basis for policy. Income-capped debt is never going to have the bailiffs sent round. If people refuse to listen, it's not the taxpayer's job to save them from their own misapprehensions.

Labour's policy on university is a disaster for other reasons. It attempts to harness principles designed to achieve one end (meritocracy) for an entirely different end (egalitarianism). Incoherent "third way" policy at its worst. The entirely sensible notion that it isn't taxpayers' job to bump up their fellow citizens' earning power is undermined by the entirely stupid notion that 50% of people need to go to university (thus destroying the entire point of creating an elite and devaluing degrees for everyone).

The sanest policy would see only those genuinely suited for university going and funding the full cost of their degrees through income-capped loans, with a few exceptional candidates funded through scholarships.

Some hope of it happening any time soon.