The “voting public” aren’t that interested in anything much I’m afraid, and when they are their views can easily be manipulated (MAGA, Brexit etc, etc).
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I agree, can’t see beyond their noses.
No understanding of what it means to experience another culture when you are young.
Our daughter did a terms exchange with a school in Germany in her sixth form and a year working in Frankfurt for KPMG for her degree.
What a difference that made.
All this government is concerned about is immigration and they don’t want more numbers, never mind the loss to our own young people.
Idiots.
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The one comment id make on this is that often as people get older they drift right, so I wouldn’t expect a young mildly left leaning population to eventually become an old one.
Can I just say how pleasant it is to discuss Brexit without it turning into personal insults, despite have differing opinions. I avoid the discussing topic on places like Twitter because it became insufferable (people from both sides are guilty of this, btw).
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It has been just as bad here at times, but it’s so good to talk without one or another trying to take lumps out of their ‘opponent’.
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I’ll try to find it later but I did read some research that suggested this doesn’t really hold true for recent generations, with one suggestion being that the massive increase in the percentage going to university may have some relevance.
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Not us and our friends. We have stopped voting for the present Conservative party and its extreme rightwingers.
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ditto. posturing.
Though I’m still waiting to see an actual set of policies from Starmer’s end.
I’m curious how much time you’ve taken to look but here’s a starting point.
Thanks JohnH. Not that I would have sought it out. As I didn’t the Conservatives’ one 
, and won’t.
I think it will come down to credibility. I was there last time Labour was in and the country was then also rather fed up with Labour’s execution. At least it’s a start even if the dumbed-down statistics in the document (Yup, I downloaded and read the full version ) seem to ignore macroeconomic issues that are going on worldwide. And on one stat in education the stat appears to be a different number in two places.
I think removing tax breaks for private schools risks being the sort of own goal the Tories did when they removed Tax Free Shopping for non-residents.
Which has really backfired in losing other revenue and business activity that the scheme brought.
Though of course I’d like to reduce the dominance of the Eton Mess system/private schooling that has finally inbred almost total Tory leadership incompetence and left them with no new generation of leaders upcoming either. Rishi being an exception in UK terms! though he is not an exception in world terms to where unfortunately power has shifted to, these days.
Thanks again and I really hope this Labour document develops into a credible and executable Manifesto.
Yes that always used to be the case, but apparently it’s no longer happening - Phil Moorhouse mentioned this in one of his videos a while back - there has been a social change going on and the Conservatives are losing support not only because of their recent mismanagement but because their core supporters are dying off and not being replaced at the usual rate.
How accurate this is I don’t know, but it’s interesting if true.
I read it too and winced at the sloganising shite that they feel is necessary (but their advisors are probably right).
Especially didn’t like the ‘defend our borders’ because it used to mean something different and was such an obviously primary aspect of a government’s responsibilities that no party needed to state it.
TBH this could have been a Tory manifesto from back in the day.
The thing is though, they have (inevitably) failed at reducing immigration - the UK unquestionably needs overseas workers, especially in the care and hospitality sectors.
What’s happened since Brexit is that employers are recruiting from the Caribbean, Africa and Far East instead of Europe.
I have anecdotal evidence for this - a while ago I made a video of an induction course for new staff at a local care home - the staff delivering the course were from Romania, Latvia, Poland, and the UK; the inductees were from Zimbabwe, Jamaica, India, Nepal, and the Phillippines.
Today I shot a wedding at a hotel in Ascot - almost all the staff were from the Indian subcontinent or the Phillippines. The same at the hotel I was at a week ago.
The UK government is giving visas to badly needed staff, who are being imported at substantial expense from a long way away, whereas before the jobs often went to folks from elsewhere in the EU.
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There’s several critical differences between UK and US populism, but divergence on gun control and the minor significance of evangelical Christianity in the UK leaves me with some hope for the future.
OTOH as long as the exchange rate remains stable and the Triple Lock continues (presumably Starmer won’t want to lose OAPs’ vote) as far as I’m concerned, they can do what they like on their little islands
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Another sector that’s been hammered by immigration restrictions is that of low paid restaurant workers
Well Starmer hasn’t committed to Triple Lock though he has been asked so I think there are other plans afoot. In fact there is nothing for olds in the document.
He has set himself a number of very important things to do for young people and they are very important things to give the UK a future.
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Olds vote, youngs don’t!
Youngs will all vote now.
Starmer knows olds vote and yet so far that document has nothing addressed to them. Starmer is not a fool and seems a nice bloke. Maybe he’s just being honest about what he can achieve.
I’m torn over this as it’s just another transfer of wealth from the young to the old (much like housing and other asset pricing) and is an entirely uncontrolled method of managing pension provision. If pensions need to be improved it should be through an effective pension strategy rather than the vagaries of inflation, wages and a random minimum number.
At the moment he seems extremely cautious about anything that might alienate the wide spectrum of past and possible future labour voters. We won’t actually know what Labour’s ‘real’ policy is until they’re elected.
It’s also worth remembering that massive majorities can be problematic for the governing party…