LGBT News The UK's new PM - the options (gay perspective)

Nice post.

The far right in England/Wales were given a huge mandate last week. It's natural that it's the more extreme parts of the Tory party who have been boosted.

It should be made clear that curtailing LGBT rights is very much outside the UK's Overton window, even post-Brexit. I'm not too worried. Social attitudes might take some time to undo and LGBT people of all shapes and sizes still aren't fully integrated into the mainstream, but at least we're not scapegoated by the media and establishment.

 

Johnson is a blustering, buffoonish man with relatively few governing principles and a very low chance of leading a stable, good government. Gove and Hunt are opportunists with very little sense of good policy or Britain's place in the world.

I'd be willing to see May in power, despite some of her fairly unpleasant opinions held in the past and certain qualms I have about some of the choices she's made as Home Secretary.

 

Somehow I can't see a civilised country like Britain killing LGBT people because its Prime Minister voted against gay marriage a couple of times (she has a mixed voting record on this, it's a little unclear). Assuming that's what you're suggesting.

 

Boris Johnson has dropped out to be prime minister, and the candidates selected to run are:
Theresa May
Michael Gove
Stephen Crabb
Liam Fox
Andrea Leadsom

 

In my mind Teresa May is the best candidate and the others pose little resistance.

 

Boris pulling out doesn't actually surprise me that much. I'm sure he's now despised by half the tory party after basically stabbing DC in the back and I wouldn't be at all surprised if there was some/ a lot of manoeuvring from DC + Osborne + loyalists to mobilise the party against him and make sure he didn't get the support he needed. I guess a lot of the brexiters will now swing behind Gove but I don't think it will be enough to carry him

I think Theresa May is by far the best shout for the tories from here. It's impressive how long she's been home sec without a serious disaster and she did do well getting gay marriage through which is almost enough to forgive her for being homophobic in the past. She's certainly more of the one nation and relatively socially liberal DC mould so it's hard to see the uk moving backward on social issues with her in charge

I also think it makes a lot of sense for tory unity to have a remainer in charge, as long as it's one who honours the result of the referendum properly, and with Theresa May being quite anti free movement its hard to see that she'd back away from restricting free movement to/from the EU

Next question, how long will Corbyn try to cling on to labour leadership for? Everyone's scared of challenging him because they feel they'd probably lose an election against him and they're probably right, but what is the point of Corbyn still being there. He says he doesn't want to betray the labour members who put him there but if he ends up being the one who's responsible not only for being part of the reason we leave the eu but also for potentially tearing the labour party apart or at best leading them into a general election where they get decimated, then that's surely a much greater betrayal not just of the few thousand who voted for him but for the millions of labour voters and actually the population at large. Just gooo

 

Now Boris has pulled out I'll be backing May.

 

It'll be either Gove or May, no?

 

Andrea Leadsom must win - the Conservatives often elect an underdog, so I hope this plays out for her.

 

I almost spilled my coffee when I read the bolded. Hopefully British politics is wiser than American politics. When I was a teenager I heard the exact same type comment in the US about a candidate for president called George Bush. Now we've got one of the candidates that makes Bush appear wise in comparison.

 

Corbyn has got to go now. The country is facing as big a crisis as I have known (arguably the biggest crisis since WW2) and we need a strong and united opposition that will play a full part in getting us through this, rather than a political circus.

 

My money (and hope) is on May now. Someone that can put Nicola Sturgeon back in her box and likely negotiate a stronger position with the EU and the world beyond. The next few years of politics across the globe look to be very female driven, which is likely a good thing.

I think Crabb has a good chance though due to his traditional Christian conservative views that will impress many in the party. He definitely has the Tony Blair appeal, young and charming. Agreeing he is reasonably attractive as far as politicians go.

Gove has blown his chances. As a self portrayed underdog lacking in charisma he is probably the least likely to successfully represent the country on the global stage or unite the party and the country. The fact that he apparently reaches out to the 'underdog northern council estate lad' like myself makes me feel a bit sick inside.

 

I think I saw something that suggested Boris Johnson wouldn't take the role? Theresa May would be a terrible choice, but seeing as this country seems to do everything I don't want it to do I'm sure she'll end up replacing Cameron... I don't know much about the others really. I'm sure they're all awful too.

 

I am very skeptical about all of these candidates (as I am about the Tory party.) While Teresa May has gone back on her earlier belief to be against the repeal of Section 28 and has recently dropped her plans to scrap the European Convention of Human Rights, it isn't the best track record. I do hope she is an ally now, but these last few weeks have left me incredibly skeptical with what politicians say and what they really think and what they really do once they get the vote - as with Farage and Boris's thinly veiled ideas about how leave would go, and where it has actually gone and what they've actually done.

Gove's track record with Education is appalling, but he's always been LGBT friendly. His recent behaviour hasn't been great and I don't see him winning many votes. Crabb and Fox's are anti-LGBT (though Crabb is now going back on some of his earlier beliefs), and Leadsom abstained on equal rights, which says a lot about her position. Frankly I think they're a terrible bunch, and it is ironic that a lot of leave voters didn't want someone they didn't vote for making decisions for them, and here we have these people possibly running our country in a few months time and we don't get a say.

The political situation is dire, and it is rather telling that Farage and Boris who were pushing the leave campaign have both dropped out the race. With Cameron quitting, the Labour party being pulled apart, and now these exits, we are in a ridiculous situation and it doesn't seem like anyone has a way forward for the leave campaign. Farage and Boris have quit so they don't get the blame when it all falls apart, so whoever gets the role of PM isn't in a good position.

As for Labour, I hope Corbyn holds in there. The PLP have been against him from the start, and I think their behaviour to hold a coup when the country is in crisis is very low and appalling. They're played their hand but they won't be able to challenge his leadership because Eagle's constituency party support Corbyn, yet they're still calling on him to resign, we're having ridiculous attacks from the media, but Corbyn is doing well to stand against it. As far as I can see, Corbyn is a decent person with good values and he is someone who I would happily vote for, unlike many of the other candidates, so they do need to pull together and focus on being a stable opposition. I am really concerned about where the country is heading and the state we're in at the moment.

 

If by doing well you mean tearing the plp apart, giving labour absolutely zero chance of taking even the handful of seats they need to stop a tory majority next general election, and making sure labour are a completely useless opposition at possibly the most critical time for our country post ww2 then yes he's doing superr

The labour party's basically been hijacked by socialists and the hard left and they can get away with it because of the party's stupid leadership process. Corbyn is technically leader but only in name he's not actually leading the plp is he, so what's the point. I wouldn't dream of voting labour right now, nationally or locally.. they have real problems

 

Labour is still a democratic socialist party, so the idea of it being hijacked from the hard left and socialists seems silly (especially as Corbyn is not hard left). Labour as it was lost my vote with the Iraq war, and I did not vote for them for years. Someone with good values to act as opposition to the Tories was what was needed, and it is what Corbyn has solidly provided. I don't think Corbyn's unelectable as the media claim, as a lot of people do stand by Corbyn when they get the opportunity to hear him speak. In fact there has been a huge surge in membership of the Labour party since Corbyn, and Labour did fairly solidly in the May elections. But I can only really speak for myself and where my vote lies. I would never be able to vote with my conscience for a party like Conservative or a ghastly party like UKIP as I fundamentally believe their politics are unjust and morally corrupt. Corbyn's beliefs and values are the same as a lot of my own, and I do believe he has a strong message which is not being heard, because of the ridiculous infighting in the party. When we needed to hear about the leave campaign going back on their promises, to hear criticism of Cameron, Boris and Farage, instead we're hearing about this infighting (though that could be because the media are against Corbyn too and are keen to portray him in as bad a light as possible.)

The PLP are tearing themselves apart by not accepting the vote which elected Corbyn as leader. Some members have been planning their coup for months (there were whispers and articles about this in the months leading up to the referendum), originally it was going to be after the elections in May, but Corbyn didn't do as badly as they thought, so they waited til after the EU referendum to strike. Corbyn is carrying on steadily and isn't being bullied into stepping down at a time when Labour needs to have a united front. Labour should have a continuing leader, especially when the Tories is in the current state it is in. To have a Labour leadership election alongside a Tory leadership election, when those in the leave campaign are resigning, it would just be chaos. I think Corbyn is doing the right thing by staying, and I hope he stays on until after the Chilcot report is published as I imagine that will shine a very negative light onto some of those who have been against Corbyn.

As a democratic party, Labour allowed members to vote on a leader and Corbyn very clearly won (a landslide victory) and he first created a shadow cabinet from all strands of the party to create unity. He has the backing of the trade unions and a lot of the membership, without whom the labour party would crumble. If Angela Eagle (who is not making a stand for leadership because she does not have her CLPs support, they support Corbyn, though she won't say that) became leader of the party then Labour would lose my vote. Without Labour as a possible opposition to the Tories I would see independence (as greatly flawed as it is) as the only option here in Scotland. The SNP have a strong hold on a lot of Scottish voters here, though for all the SNP's talk they have very little follow-through. Labour is the only party who I think have a credible voice, especially under Corbyn. I could not put my vote next to someone who has manipulated and schemed in the way that many in the PLP have. If Corbyn can remain steady, and pull the party together (I sadly doubt it will happen) then Labour could again become a credible opposition. But I do loathe the behaviour of those in the PLP who used this as an opportunity to stick it to Corbyn instead of doing what was best for the party and the country and presenting a united opposition to the Tories, and a clear voice to criticise what has happened (or not happened) over the last couple of weeks. I think Labour have failed in this front, but how much of this is down to Corbyn is unclear due to the ridiculous fighting in the Labour party.

 

I actually think this is the most appropriate time to hold a leadership spill. There is a crisis which Corbyn was either too lazy, too stubborn or too apathetic to properly address. His refusal to actively campaign with Cameron, his feeble media presence and then his appalling performances in the House in the days following Brexit are all bad marks on his character, no matter which explanation one uses.

I hardly see how the attacks are ridiculous, given the media are coming up with pretty much the same thing I wrote above. It doesn't matter how principled Corbyn is if he can't command the support of his colleagues, if he has sloppy work ethic (remember his laughable speech when he read out the cues his speechwriters left for him, showing he hadn't bothered practicing his first public speech as leader?), if he is a poor parliamentary performer, if he has a weak grasp of economics and instead relies on reviving Labour's puritanical and even then outdated '80s disaster.

For all these reasons, I think the electorate won't take a second look at him before giving just as resounding a beating at the polls as Miliband got.

I think it's the left's responsibility to present candidates who can win, not candidates who exist so hipsters in Camden can engage in virtue signalling. It cruelly raises the hopes of those who lost out in the past few decades of globalisation when promises are made which just won't deliver the results they once could.

Simply put, the old working class that Labour could rely on as a democratic socialist party no longer exists. Demographics have changed since the '70s when that approach last worked. In order to make progressive progress through winning power, Labour has to engage an aspirational public and return a revised form of the capitalism-friendly social democracy that turfed Major out of office. Obviously there were problems with Blair's government, ranging from the Iraq decision to the sometimes acrimonious relations with the unions. That was an experiment that showed there's only so much a centre-left government can compromise if it wants to retain its base.

In some sense Labour did lose its vision towards the end and let some core values fall to the wayside. But even in its less appealing moments, I think a progressive leftist who believes in the state as a tool of social change can prefer Blair's Britain to Cameron's vision.

This approach does require that Labour be closer to the progressive wing of the Tories than many on the hard left like. But it's more likely to deliver a consistently progressive government.

For that, I think Corbyn should vacate the leadership. He's not a viable alternative prime minister. He's almost like a protest candidate who went too far.