Harringay online

Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

We no longer buy the print edition of The Guardian. My wife's cousin came over today with a copy. Somehow the newsprint yersion is more shocking.

‘The stakes could not be higher’: world is on edge of climate abyss, UN warns

Top climate figures respond to Guardian survey of scientists who expect temperatures to soar, saying leaders must act radically

Climate scientists expect global heating to blast past 1.5C target

Story on The Guardian website.

I wonder if other peole are rethinking their political affiliation? And if so how?

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It’s terrifying. But as we’ve seen with the angry opposition to the local LTNs, if an environmental policy inconveniences people even slightly, or impacts their individual liberty, they’d rather watch the world burn. 

Ditto,  Rory. That's the sad truth.

Dear Anne and Rory,

When I was young, back in the last century, there were no English motorways. Our dad owned a little van. It had two front seats. And this was before the era of seat belts. Occasionally our parents put me and my younger brother into the back with a large pile of cushions and blankets  on the metal floor.  We went to the coast and came home with dirty feet. Fast asleep dreaming of shells and sand.

Another sad truth is that onwards from those reckless perilous journeys there was steady progress. Roads and vehicles did slowly get safer despite impacting drivers' individual liberty.

Can we also discern a deeper truth? That once there were reformers in many political parties?  A large majority of whom were committed to the health, welfare, education, decent homes and flourishing environment for all their fellow country-women and men. Committed more in particular  than to their own hollow titles.

Though since it's May time in Haringey let's not forget those who are partial to the lure of gold chains and funny tricorn hats.

Rethinking one's political affiliation is hardly necessary for the prgamatist who judges each case on its merits.

I asked whether others are rethinking their political affiliation?

Tribune - a publication / website I don't regularly read - appears to be travelling some of the same route. Prompted a few days ago by the very warm welcome given to Natalie Elphicke MP into the capacious arms of Keir Starmer.
https://tribunemag.co.uk/2024/05/the-tory-dustbin-elphicke-defects-...

I wonder whether the sharply truthful words of Mhairi Black had slipped Keir Starmer's mind?  Remember them?
"She hadn’t left the Labour party. The Labour party had left her."
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/oct/09/mhairi-black-inter...

Keir, there's a lot of us about who feel like this. And complicity in the Gaza Genocide is one of many issues.

Regular people don't have party affiliations, Alan. They vote based on habit and what they see. Fewer than 2% belong to any party. 

I think of the younger generations watching people as vastly experienced in politics as you still struggling to determine your lines in the sand. Little wonder they have no faith in the process.

"Sure, he's supported genocide, but he's in my club. It just wouldn't be right to be disloyal".

As the kids like to say, this is very much a 'you' problem. 

Hi JamesN
Your point about Political Party membership is a fair one.

Though in the days when I used to go out knocking on doors before elections, I and other party "canvassers" didn't expect our neighbours [aka local electors ] to join a party. The aim was to ask how they intended to vote.

As for your suggestion that I'm "vastly experienced in politics". I confess that's untrue. As a local ward councillor working with other residents I helped stop some stupid, wasteful and damaging things from happening.  Again working with others I helped to expose some gross wastes of public money - such as £20 million on dubious property deals.
Maybe JamesN you were also part of those campaigns? 

About "lines in the sand"  JamesN, you don't say what you have in mind. In broad terms I can't tell the difference between Starmer and Sunac. Which of  the various main Party Leaders are genuinely Green? Or anti-genocide?
Fourteen years ago David Cameron said the Israeli blockade had "turned the Gaza Strip into a Prison Camp",  Now his line in the sand appears to run down the centre of £50k garden shed,  https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2010/jul/27/david-cameron-gaza...

All this equivocating and evasion misses some fundamental points.

You have zero influence over the outcome of the coming election. Keir Starmer will lead and form the next government (See Sir John Curtice's 99% assessment). The question of who you prefer or trust more is just not relevant. We're getting another liar, and another leader who bows to the highest bidder. 

There is also a near zero chance of Lammy losing his seat as MP for Tottenham. 

You've suggested in a previous thread that we ought to support Catherine West and Lammy with our votes, if they voice their concerns over the unchecked slaughter in Gaza. So some performative sad face on the telly and all is good. David has done plenty of that in recent weeks, wailing in several interviews that having adopted a child, he is in a unique position to feel the pain of the Gazans. Appalling.

The litany of betrayals the current leadership of Labour has already committed looks to be just the start. Streeting, Lammy, Cooper et al are making no secret of what they want to do.

It's not one party or the other. It's whether you can live with lending your support to these people. Any vote against is merely a protest vote, until such time as a credible alternative turns up in Tottenham, or the electoral process changes. But given that a vote for is so completely worthless, it's remarkable to me that you seem so troubled by the decision. 

You're at least engaging with the argument and issues. Perhaps you will share with members on this site something about your own actions and projects. I'm assuming that you are not simply waiting: "until such time as a credible alternative turns up in Tottenham, or the electoral process changes."

You and I may not agree about all (or any) political projects. Can I assume that at least we may agree that groups of people can and should come together to try to co-operate to make change. 

I don't think I've said that "it's one party or the other." The fact that tweedle-Rich and Tweedle-Keir is presented as the option does suggest significant numbers of people might be thinking that change is needed.

Years ago we visited friends in Scotland. Purely by chance we met the last Tory MP. A few years later wasn't Labour down to the same number?

More deflection. Why do you struggle to talk about David Lammy, or Catherine West? Each time a post brings things back to the local realities in Harringay you offer some broader abstraction. 

The issues are stark and obvious, and so don't warrant much argument. As such, my planned 'actions' are clear. I wont vote for Lammy. I'll have to wait to see who stands against him, but the local Conservatives and Lib Dems have a track record of putting up underwhelming candidates, so I doubt they'll get my vote. As for 'projects', the frame around the front door needs a coat of paint and the weeds will have to be pulled up at some point.  

And you? It feels like you're trapped in a toxic relationship. Your abuser has shown time and again that they have no regard for your ideas or your vote. But you insist there's good in them. They can change and if only they were to say sorry, it would be different this time. 

I hope you manage to find a way out... you'll be far more content when you no longer have to compromise your values.

So your planned action is not  voting for David Lammy.  And you doubt you'll be voting for any other  candidate. 

Thanks for your hopes about my future contentment.

Politically though, I don't need "a way out".  I resigned from the Labour Party in October 2020. This was after Labour apparatchicks  suspended me for "liking" someone else's satirical photo including a background painting of Karl Marx.

Yes, Alan. He threw you out of the house. Quite why you continue to sit on the front steps telling passersby that 'he's actually very kind' is the mystery.

Choosing to vote for someone other than an MP who actively supported war crimes and genocidal intent is a tiny gesture. Yet remains something you feel the need to debate. Again, this is a 'you' problem. 

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