What the fuck is the ‘radical centre ground’? The whole fucking point of the fucking ‘centre ground’ is how un-fucking radical it fucking is. Quite frankly, if fucking Balls is so fucking concerned about this fucking mediocre ‘centre ground’ (so fucking beloved of those with expensive fucking educations and fucking cheap imaginations), he can fuck right off into the fucking bosom of the fucking Lib fucking Dems.

Fucks sake. The fucker.

“We’ve ridden that tiger before and it didn’t get us very far.”

Other than to three election victories.

Hi Sunny, which candidate are you supporting? I’d be genuinely interested to hear your views on the strengths and weaknesses of each, because frankly, I see nothing in the 5 candidates that could prevent Labour getting pasted at the next election – not because they’re so terrible, but because most people will not want a change of government in 2015.

New policy to cut the deficit – a swear box for comments on blogs. Another few months of cheesy monkey commenting on these threads and we’ll be able to afford scandanvian services on US taxation!

“Neither should we fall for the myth that our biggest challenge is to “win back” middle-income voters. They largely stuck with us at the election while we lost the support of too many people on lower incomes who felt we were no longer on their side.”

I fear this is balls code word for “we weren’t tough enough on teh immigrants and dole scroungers”

It’s also total bollocks (balls even). Labour started to lose its support in 2003, and much of it went to the lib dems and smaller parties. Now even the stupidest political analyst can see that winning back this group of supporters isn’t going to be done with increased authoritarianism, being nasty to immigrants and starving the unemployed. I’d also wager that this group of voters, whilst not free market thatcherites, are not going to return to labour automatically over cuts and may well even be more economically liberal than people think.

What Cheesy Monkey said (with fewer “fucks”).

If Labour cannot win power as a party of the moderate Left then what is the point of it?

Point 1

The public are very well aware this a tory govt. That is why their support has gone up, and the Lie Dems has gone down. The tories have no mandate for all this, they failed to get an overall majority. They are only getting their way because of the Lie Dems. So we should continue to attack the Lie Dems as much as possible. It is also worth remembering that the whining of the far right is only done to keep the Lie Dems from moving to the left. The right hopes that if they keep moaning it will convince the stupid Lie Dmes they are keeping the far right out of power.

Point 2
Until the effects of the so called bullshit austerity measures hit home it is not worth saying too much. When people start losing their jobs and VAT goes up, we will not see how bad it will get. The simple point is that the tories have decided that the debt must be paid back quickly. So if it all goes tits up then it is their fault.

Point 3

The media situation is always going to be a huge problem for the centre left, but Blair’s tactic was short term and did more damage than good in the end. But you have to have some ideas of what you want before you can take on the media.

I love point 2, where Mr Balls seems to be still trying to draw comparisons with the Great Depression (not exactly smart, considering who was in the government when this recession started).

He seems to have missed the key point that government reaction in the 1930s was to cut international trade through tariffs and protectionism, thus deepening the problem (and in my view at least, undermining any benefits from lower state spending). Haven’t noticed that happening at the moment, so his comparison could do with a bit of work.

I think you guys are reading this wrong.

Ed Balls says we must be on the radical centre ground, but what he’s doing is advocating left-wing policies. The reasoning is simple: to say you’re in the centre while being lefty enough not to scare away centre-right voters.

It’s the political counterpart to what Cameron is doing: claiming to be centrist while advocating and pushing a radical right-wing agenda.

What he says on the economy, for example, isn’t centrist at all.

but because most people will not want a change of government in 2015.

blanco – I fear my powers of predictions five years from now aren’t as strong as yours. So I wouldn’t be as sure if I was you.

he can fuck right off into the fucking bosom of the fucking Lib fucking Dems.

He’s not advocating Libdem policies.

But I completely agree that the fire should be on the Tories not the Libdems.

I agree with all of this, especially point 1 (we on the left do need reminding that it is to all intents and purposes a Conservative government), I just can’t see Balls as leader let alone PM. Although I wonder if Labour need a potential PM right now when the priority is fighting the cuts not preparing for government. Saying that even I can’t see Balls being up to the job, he’s too tainted by association with Brown and the gang – unfair, perhaps, but so is politics.

Unfair?
Well he was #2 in the gang!

@10

Y’reckon? I’d put Mandelson above him for starters… (but I did say “perhaps” as a handy get-out clause!)

Maybe not in the govt, but in the “gang” – the dysfunctional, anti-Blair gang – a certain #2.

@12

Ah, point taken then. I was using “gang” to mean the whole new Labour elite (which would include authoritarian nutjobs like Blunket who have a weird sway on the Party still).

Sunny

Ed Balls says we must be on the radical centre ground, but what he’s doing is advocating left-wing policies. The reasoning is simple: to say you’re in the centre while being lefty enough not to scare away centre-right voters.

Ermm, how exactly would that work? Most people can see the difference between left and right, especially if your opponents go round pointing it out (as they would). Plus, you seem to be advocating either dishonesty or disception here, which were surely problems already associated with Mr Balls through his time working with Gordon Brown?

To be honest, I think chasing the centre is probably over now – despite the narrative of opposing the cuts; as the opposition Labour has to offer something new at the next general election. Just positioning yourself centrally is not going to do that (although as far as I can see it is what David Milliband offers – perhaps a reason to vote for Ed Balls then…).

I am not entirely convinced that there will be a middle ground, radical or not, from which to fight the next election, anyway. It is now pretty clear that Cameron and Clegg are being driven by ideology rather than any need to reduce the deficit. Most of the targets of coalition cuts and tax increases have been the Right Wing whipping boys for some time. The welfare State, the NHS, schools, the BBC, public services, employment laws including the minimum wage and tax credits, progressive/regressive taxation, the boundaries commission etc.

The coalition will set about their merciless attacks on these services and the most vulnerable in our society, there will be no middle ground. Where is the middle ground in ‘fully privatising’ the NHS, for example? Or scrapping welfare? You either support it or you don’t, there is no middle way. The only place you can oppose that from is the Left.

Attempting to find the ‘middle way’ is what ultimately took labour out of power. When things started to go tits up, all the pandering to ‘big business’ is what killed them on the doorstep. Most complaints about ‘immigration’ (and the proxies it represents, low wages, low employment rights, unemployment) where driven by a need to appease big business. Of course a complete lack of regulation in banking sector didn’t do Labour any good either, did it?

I think we should keep our fire trained on the Lib Dems. This is a tory govt without the votes or the mandate. It is only because of the Lie Dems that this stuff is being pushed trough.

The public know this a tory govt, which is why the Lie Dems are sinking like a stone.

Most people can see the difference between left and right,

Can they? Tell me about clear differences between the left and the centre.

Mr S Pill – your first mistake is to listen to wingnuts on how to view Labour MPs. cjcjc only a few months ago was adamant Labour would tear itself apart after election. See how that worked out.

I think we should keep our fire trained on the Lib Dems.

Labour will need to ally with them soon enough.

@17

Not really, I’m going by what I’ve seen of the leadership candidates before and since the election. I don’t find Ball’s personality to be leadership quality – never have done, to be honest – although I think he has good ideas and fights a good fight (in the same way I think about Diane Abbot although for different reasons – she comes across as a lightweight on TV for example). I also think he’ll be an easy target for the right-wing press/cheerleaders because of his high standing in the last Government (admittedly the same could be said for at least three of the others).
But yes, the right made lots of strange predictions pre-election that haven’t come to fruition – hell most of them were predicting a huge Con majority.

“Labour will need to ally with them soon enough.”

As long as CLEggy and his mates run the party there will be no deal with them.

Keep the fire on them, and then watch them split to pieces. Although Lie Dems are good at talking out of both sides of their mouths.

“we dominated the radical centre ground of British politics”

Well if you call illegal wars and authoritarianism “radical” then he’s certainly correct.

“hell most of them were predicting a huge Con majority”

That’s simply not true, since most understood the size of the swing required for them to get a majority at all.

Where did I “predict” that Labour would tear itself apart?

Though of course there’s still time and we can only hope!

/me withers away and becomes a humble Labour supporter following Sally’s brutal, unforgiving attacks.

Oh, wait. That’s just blood on the hands on mindless labour supporters wiping off on me. An hour in the bath’ll sort me out fine.

Can’t we all just get along?

@15 Jim

“Attempting to find the ‘middle way’ is what ultimately took labour out of power.”

Well, no…not really. What took them out of power was a combination of the fact that they had become (and were widely perceived as) deeply illiberal and authoritarian in their policies, and dysfunctional in terms of the leadership and obsession with media spin, infighting and pushing through policies nobody really wanted except the NuLabour ravers.

@13 Mr S Pill

“Ah, point taken then. I was using “gang” to mean the whole new Labour elite (which would include authoritarian nutjobs like Blunket who have a weird sway on the Party still).”

This is the elephant in the room that much of the discussion above, and Balls’ musings about the traps to avoid, simply fails to address. The Labour party has still not cleansed itself of the stain of Blairite and Brownite authoritarianism. Until it has done so, it is neither electable nor capable of providing a convincing opposition.

None of the existing candidates have a convincing vision about how to reforge a progressive left of centre alternative to the current administration, because… guess what….that’s right, none of them have a clue! They are about as far away from radical and progressive as Robert Mugabe is from winning the Nobel Peace Prize.