This "Labour is finished" argument is just the last desperate attack of a Conservative party that can see defeat looming.



The same thing happened in the US with Obama. Republicans had been saying for most of 2011 and 2012 that Obama was finished, no President could ever win with the economy in the state it was, he was a disappointment and the US electorate wouldn't be fooled again. Because there are a lot of right wing voices in the media they think that if they shout it loud enough thats what everyone will think. The sad thing is I think some of them believed it too.



But the only people that ever said it were Republicans. Just like if you hear someone saying the Labour party is finished, it will be a Conservative.



Then after the election happens they will be thrashing around not understanding what happened like the Republicans that said it was just because Obama was black that he won.



My guess is after the election these people that are saying Labour are finished now, will say stuff like:

- the electoral system favours Labour

- the BBC and establishment are left wing and biased to Labour

- Labour filled the country with so many immigrants that of course they are going to win elections

- the Conservatives weren't right wing enough

Thats always a strange one and it works for both left and right wing parties - when they fail at an election (and lets face it, they ALL failed at the last election) the party faithful always point to the leadership not having policies that conform to some imagined position more extreme to the one that they presented to the electorate.



Truth is that the ones doing the criticising are always the party faithful who would vote for the party anyway, what they never seem to understand is that its not just them that the leadership have to sell the party to - its the vast majority of floating voters who make a judgement call on what each party offers at the time, or who looks and sounds the nicest on TV.



Truth is that a party can go to the extreme right or left and they will never be elected again - no floating voter would have voted for the Conservatives in 2010 if they had wheeled out policies of the type that they are enforcing now, it would have been the best selling job of the century if they had, the coalition gave them a new mandate to enforce policies that they had never presented under the pretence that they "have to" with a compliant LibDem partnership drifting along with it.

Isn't that considered an option for NI employees?

But I have never heard any senior Labour figure make a case for anything that doersn't conform with Thatcherspeak in the last 20 years. They are simply pathetic.

Who would your favoured leader be me old spunksack?

Chuka Umunna perhaps?

That's definitely the way I see it as well - agree with all of that.



I briefly remember Wilson, but Kinnock had a massive job on and effectively sacrificed himself to re-write the Party. The internal opposition he faced and the overwhelming animosity of the entire popular press bar the Mirror meant he was never going to be PM. Smith was a real honest, solid, electable leader but Blair took the Tories apart - he didn't just defeat them he destroyed them for a decade. Ed Milliband is the biggest mistake the party has made since electing Micheal Foot leader to take on the spin machine of Thatcher.

I was devastated when I saw him beat his brother - everything I feared would happen has come to pass. Humiliation after humiliation at the hands of the Public School bully on the other side of the House, a constant need to "define what he stands for" without ever actually managing to define what he stands for and an almost "Thick of It" style inability to decide if he's in opposition of not.

Cameron and his bunch of clueless clowns should be buried in the polls by now and every day at PMQ's the Leader of the Opposition should be ripping them all numerous new holes to talk out of. Blair would have made Cameron feel like it was back to his fagging days for the big boys at Eton. By now he would simply be turning up to the House of Commons, dropping his pants and bending over for his daily thrashing at the hands of his betters.



But is Labour finished? No. There are still good people in the party and they are still more popular than the Tories.

Not even mentioning Eddie Izzard.

If Labour loses in 2015, I'd put my money on him.

I still maintain that the major problem with the Labour party is not Ed Miliband or the unions. The problem is Douglas Alexander, Jim Murphy and other Blairites who cannot accept that Blair has left them (and Labour) behind to persue his own selfish agenda. They also forget that is was Blair's continuation of Thatcherism that contributed to unfettered markets and manipulators, leading to the global banking crisis.



Blair was an opportunist who saw an opening for his "3rd way", a way of presenting a facade of social conscience while ensuring that the rich got ever richer and the powerful gained even more power. Of course patients, medical staff, pupils and teachers benefitted from improvments in hospitals and schools but the main beneficiaries were those engaged in PFI and PPP. Michael Ashcroft, the tories single biggest contributor, gained massively. Some 3rd way that was.



Murphy and Alexander are the ones who were briefing against Tom Watson and now the rozzers have been handed the report, I reckon they'll be bricking it when their preferred candidate for Falkirk comes under the spotlight.



The best thing Miliband could do is to rid his shadow cabinet of Blairites and present a manifesto that reflects the real need for social change in this country.

Let me guess a few things about you cod'ead:



- you're a lifelong Labour voter

- you consider yourself a socialist of some form

- you hate Tories with a vitriolic passion

- you are generally favourable towards nationalisation and trade unions



The problem is the majority of the electorate are not those four things (although there is probably a larger proportion of the third one than there used to be). Tony Blair reached out to them.



I expect (if you are old enough) you voted for Labour under Foot, Kinnock and Brown in general elections too, but it was just people like you who ticked those boxes above who voted for them, which is why Labour lost. When Blair was leader, the electorate voted for Labour en masse.



If Ed Milliband does his purge of the Blairites then again, it will be you and people like you that vote for them. But they won't win an election.

Have many people actually said Labour is 'finished'? Apart from the OP obviously, is he a tory?



Cameron's attack at PMQ's was beautifully executed. Then he just sat back and watched the implosion.

I'm a socialist and never voted for Kinnock or Blair.

That's why I can sleep on a night.