tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post4884018023085745280..comments2024-03-04T17:54:32.559+00:00Comments on Iain Dale's Diary: Labour's Greatest FailuresIain Dalehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03270146219458384372noreply@blogger.comBlogger42125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-25017919233973537832007-02-16T11:25:00.000+00:002007-02-16T11:25:00.000+00:00Ian, I appreciate you asked for Labour's Failures,...Ian, I appreciate you asked for Labour's Failures, but I think their one Big Success needs highlighting.<BR/><BR/>It took the Old Conservative party at least 18 years to become something we didn't like and be found out accordingly.<BR/><BR/>Labour have been found out far sooner. Well done them I say...Infuriatihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09630475476666920908noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-69684448751116289682007-02-16T11:14:00.000+00:002007-02-16T11:14:00.000+00:00once blair and bush are out hopefully things will ...once blair and bush are out hopefully things will become better.thatcherhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14525786256756431512noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-54386185796960598822007-02-16T11:12:00.000+00:002007-02-16T11:12:00.000+00:00"Brumbino lists the saving of the 'wrong pound' in..."Brumbino lists the saving of the 'wrong pound' in the NHS. An easy target." <BR/><BR/>Response to David Kendrick: <BR/><BR/>David, at the risk of sounding like a screaming socialist or worse a Old-Labourite- trust me I'm neither - it's not as easy target if you have very little money in the first place. <BR/><BR/>Both of my parents are proud 'old-school' people who have plodded on for years without complaint paying into a system that now stabs them in the back. <BR/><BR/>My father's condition was life-threatening. (Fantastic) Medical care aside, the NHS's response? <BR/><BR/>Legal extortion on a massive scale. I was once employed by a private organisation who was involved in PFI as well as taking over contracts for the running of services on behalf of the public sector. The money we paid out probably didn't even go into the NHS - they went into the private Car Park company and private multi-media company. These companies are already probably making a profit for being paid to run these services by the NHS. <BR/><BR/>I cannot see how this situation can improve the lot of the NHS and it's primary reason for existing, us the Great British Public.Infuriatihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09630475476666920908noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-60065186607105854722007-02-16T11:03:00.000+00:002007-02-16T11:03:00.000+00:00Cor, tough one!I think this hasn't been mentioned:...Cor, tough one!<BR/><BR/>I <I>think</I> this hasn't been mentioned: flogging off our gold reserves at ridiculously low prices.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-19563122993361992772007-02-16T09:15:00.000+00:002007-02-16T09:15:00.000+00:00For a Labour Government, it has to be the failure ...For a Labour Government, it has to be the failure to reduce inequality. That's what Labour Governments are supposed to be for, aren't they?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-253950658830478322007-02-16T08:14:00.000+00:002007-02-16T08:14:00.000+00:00Iraq. Anyone with any idea about anything could se...Iraq. Anyone with any idea about anything could see how it was going to work out. I'm all for military intervention, but Iraq was a fatal mistake that stemmed directly from Labours huge majority and propagandistic tendencies.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-27768704684267666762007-02-16T06:24:00.000+00:002007-02-16T06:24:00.000+00:00The greatest failure/success of NuLabour has been ...The greatest failure/success of NuLabour has been to show the lunacy of political correctness and the victim culture that stands at the the very heart of socialist thinking.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-15639868297079595382007-02-16T02:43:00.000+00:002007-02-16T02:43:00.000+00:00Corrupted the Magistrates' Courts by encouraging t...Corrupted the Magistrates' Courts by encouraging them to become members of speed camera partnerships and get <B>paid</B> by those partnerships. Bye bye fair trial, the courts are in hock to the prosecution.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-10205915651144127532007-02-15T23:12:00.000+00:002007-02-15T23:12:00.000+00:00Never mind Labour. I can't be bothered to watch "Q...Never mind Labour. I can't be bothered to watch "Question Time" any more. I have been a loyal fan since the days of Robin Day. I have seen it become a festival of political correctness, where the audience claps wildly when the speaker says the "right thing", and hisses at the vacuous politicians who may as well be mute for all the substance they consist of.<BR/><BR/>No one is daring, nobody speaks outside of the bubble and nobody creates embarrassment or awkwardness.<BR/><BR/>Question Time has, in the last ten years of a Labour government become a reflection of the paucity of thought and intellectual rigour in that same government.<BR/><BR/>Question Time is no longer a drawn sword parting the darkness of ignorance. It is a confederacy of dunces.Wrinkled Weaselhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05291551539649118631noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-69268273106282196682007-02-15T23:07:00.000+00:002007-02-15T23:07:00.000+00:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.krishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01984620763250118501noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-87440835401663671912007-02-15T23:02:00.000+00:002007-02-15T23:02:00.000+00:001. Failure to match defence spending with increase...1. Failure to match defence spending with increased military commitments - whether or not people agree with the deployment surely they agree forces should be properly equipped to do the job once sent.<BR/><BR/>2. Failure to build more prisons, thus allowing criminals, including paedophiles, to roam the streets.<BR/><BR/>3. Failure to restore discipline in schools, thus ruining education even for those who still want to learn.<BR/><BR/>4. Failure to spend taxpayers' money on frontline services, instead wasting eyewatering amounts of cash on "five a day co-ordinators" and other made up jobs while hospitals close.<BR/><BR/>5. Failure to reduce police bureaucracy, meaning that officers are in the station filling in pointless forms instead of patrolling the streets and deterring and solving crimes.<BR/><BR/><BR/>That's the top 5, the global internet does not have enough storage space for the complete list.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-20166765383346362962007-02-15T21:59:00.000+00:002007-02-15T21:59:00.000+00:00Anonymous said...Sorry Iain, I've just turned 60. ...Anonymous said...<BR/>Sorry Iain, I've just turned 60. I don't have time to list all New Labour's disasters.<BR/>6:03 PM<BR/><BR/>I'm just 58 I've got the time but not the stamina.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-70590377064867665852007-02-15T21:45:00.000+00:002007-02-15T21:45:00.000+00:00That's it, I'm off. This blog used to be fun; it w...That's it, I'm off. This blog used to be fun; it was always right-leaning but it did it with a sense of humour, style and wickedness. It was scurrilous, opinionated, light-hearted - and not afraid to have a pop at the Tories if warranted.<BR/><BR/>Now it's just become another robotic, humourless, on-message exercise in partisan raspberry blowing. CCHQ have obviously got to you, Iain. Ta ra.Normal Mouthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07374935277497669293noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-24971492462694564242007-02-15T21:38:00.000+00:002007-02-15T21:38:00.000+00:00no longer anonymous... I can think of loads of thi...no longer anonymous... I can think of loads of things Labour has done that I don't like (and by the way, we seriously failed to win a general election) and one of them is excellently highlighted by Brumbino. The PFI and all of its vile manifestations were introduced by the last Conservative Government as an attempt by Major to reduce public sector borrowing in order to get us into firing line for the Euro. Continuing with this nonsensical Tory policy has most certainly been a big failure in my book, as demonstrated by Brumbino's experiences... but hardly one the Conservatives can start wetting themselves over.Bob Piperhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13792439016502695274noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-22619448549615291222007-02-15T21:23:00.000+00:002007-02-15T21:23:00.000+00:00Labour has failed to uphold a central tenet of dem...Labour has failed to uphold a central tenet of democracy, by shutting down free speech and freedom of expression.Wrinkled Weaselhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05291551539649118631noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-1340602997203333702007-02-15T21:20:00.000+00:002007-02-15T21:20:00.000+00:00On liberty: We have a Civil Contingencies Act that...<B>On liberty:</B> We have a <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Contingencies_Act" REL="nofollow">Civil Contingencies Act</A> that, once an emergency has been declared, gives the government the power to cancel existing laws. We have a succession of <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_Act_2006" REL="nofollow">Terrorism Acts</A> that give police officers enormous arbitrary authority they never had before, a power they have already begun to <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2_June_2006_Forest_Gate_raid" REL="nofollow">abuse</A>. Meanwhile a measure passed in 1986 to curb hooliganism at football matches, the <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Order_Act_1986" REL="nofollow">Public Order Act</A>, is increasingly being used to prosecute people whose public statements are thought by police officers to be likely to cause “offence.” Other measures include the <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legislative_and_Regulatory_Reform_Bill" REL="nofollow">2006 Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill</A> allowing governments to bypass Parliament altogether and to make and change many laws at will, without even the excuse of an emergency; in short, to act like a dictatorship. <BR/><BR/><B>On crime and culture:</B> Whilst these changes proceed, actual crime is <A HREF="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3669407.stm" REL="nofollow">out of control</A>, though citizens are <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Rights_Act_1998" REL="nofollow">legally prevented</A> from many actions of self-defence. That is why New Labour won’t address the real problem – “fear” – that so concerns the respectable working-class in this country, who have been abandoned by the police and cannot afford to buy their way out of the boarded-up, burned-out estates, with the pounding noise and yobbish harassment, the drug-dealers and needle-littered parks, the strewn garbage and broken glass, the shops with armoured doors and steel bars over their windows, the feral children, savage dogs and violent boozers. It is now clear, with the failure of <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asbos" REL="nofollow">ASBOS</A>, that none of New Labour’s extravagant initiatives have worked. A new generation, of inner-city lumpen proletariat, look downtrodden and stripped of culture. Manners are appalling, the language sounds coarse and debased to the older generation.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-85303465358552248322007-02-15T21:18:00.000+00:002007-02-15T21:18:00.000+00:00"Tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime"...."Tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime". When do we get to see the results?jailhouselawyerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03795278184797990706noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-64698416188142227902007-02-15T20:04:00.000+00:002007-02-15T20:04:00.000+00:00Dentistry within NHS from bad (1997) to much worse...Dentistry within NHS from bad (1997) to much worse (2007, and it's costing taxpayers more - of course.<BR/>Ditto dental education in the UKAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-17007731892987900282007-02-15T19:59:00.000+00:002007-02-15T19:59:00.000+00:00Both the Dome and the current approach to privatis...Both the Dome and the current approach to privatisation in hospitals are surely Tory ideas?<BR/><BR/>Is your correspondent or Dave/id Cameron saying that they would wish tax to increase so that carparks at hospitals can go back to being free and so that hospitals were not minded to sign up to rip off deals for TV, tel etc?Chris Paulhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15679067503215414300noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-10266299460806245652007-02-15T19:49:00.000+00:002007-02-15T19:49:00.000+00:00cPlenty of ideas here (if you'll excuse the link-t...cPlenty of ideas <A HREF="http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2006/12/28/the-eighty-five-theses.html" REL="nofollow">here</A> (if you'll excuse the link-tarting).Bishop Hillhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14914977525290282450noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-86928672169686869102007-02-15T19:46:00.000+00:002007-02-15T19:46:00.000+00:00I don't think the Millenium Dome is a wise choice ...I don't think the Millenium Dome is a wise choice of picture, Iain.<BR/><BR/>Yes, the Labour party have screwed up the entire project, but the original idea and the initial funding both came from the Conservative Party - Blair just kept the ball rolling.<BR/><BR/>I wouldn't want to dampen your enthusiasm for some Labour-bashing, but please choose a different target!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-81548322104788003342007-02-15T19:42:00.000+00:002007-02-15T19:42:00.000+00:00Search for List of organisations associated with t...Search for <BR/>List of organisations associated with the British Labour Party. <BR/> <BR/> This is the electorate that Gordon Brown and his faction are insisting should choose the next prime minister of the United Kingdom.<BR/><BR/>How many of these do you belong to? How many would you want to?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-19596261424729287112007-02-15T19:41:00.000+00:002007-02-15T19:41:00.000+00:00It's hard to think of a bigger mess than transport...It's hard to think of a bigger mess than transport.<BR/><BR/>The roads are clogging up by the day. I remember commuting daily from Hertfordshire to Leicester in 2002 - it took me around an hour and ten minutes straight up the M1. That same journey in 2007 takes an hour and a half.<BR/><BR/>I love the way Labour trumpets how train punctuality has improved *slightly*. It's hardly proportionate to the extra cash they're throwing at it in subsidies. Or the thousands of shareholders who had their investments robbed. Or the ridiculous fare hikes. Bottom line is trains are horribly crowded, dirty and hot - and frequently cancelled (cancellations, of course, actually improving punctuality statistics - if it doesn't run, it can't run late). Oh, and train companies 're timing' services - a 30 minute journey is now timetabled for 35. Amazing what plate tectonics can do to a land mass.<BR/><BR/>It's the one thing I can think of that affects absolutely everybody that has genuinely got many, many times worse in the past ten years. I'm not sure why it doesn't get more exposure.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-88693965185246949962007-02-15T19:37:00.000+00:002007-02-15T19:37:00.000+00:00Allowing the Sea Harrier to be scrapped (including...Allowing the Sea Harrier to be scrapped (including those with new airframes) - leaving the Royal Navy with virtually no fighter cover for up to ten years. And the Falklands dependant on one military airfield just at the time the Argentine air forces has been re-equipped.Man in a Shedhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00990902055642035293noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6214838.post-60309188661950036922007-02-15T19:35:00.000+00:002007-02-15T19:35:00.000+00:00BrumbrinoHow is your father? What was the standar...Brumbrino<BR/><BR/>How is your father? What was the standard of care he received?peteblogginghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06212058699026559980noreply@blogger.com