Talk of Labour being perpetual opposition is misguided. They seem wholly incapable of acting as an opposition. There is such a paucity of credible people in the PLP, of creativity, of intellectual ability and coherence it is simply shocking. They have no hope until they get people who can frame a coherent, sensible and credible policy agenda. This government could be torn to shreds and wholly undermined if they could think beyond the outdated, tired old scripts. Times are right for an eloquent leader with fire in his belly. The trouble is the majority of Labour MPs are PC clones who have no concept of fighting to build something rather than just petty sniping. They are an utter disgrace.

The last credible Labour leader was Tony Blair; can we just forget all that illegal war stuff and have him back?

And it all came from being too pally with a blood thirsty, war mongering US leader ??

Exactly. Take that away and he was a half decent leader.

Needs someone who can appeal to more than just a bunch of Trots that’s for sure. Blair crossed over hugely, albeit with the help of the Murdoch press. Corbyn’s too hopeless to get the support of the Mirror and Guardian.

Not sure if we’ve even heard of the leader who will turn the ship around. Kinnock did a lot of the heavy lifting after the shambles of 1983. Smith made Labour electable. Blair got them into power. It’s going to need a similar job this time. Current names that spring to mind aren’t up to it (Jarvis – bit of an empty vessel), Harman (tainted by association with past failure), Ummuna (lacks passion and apparently not interested).

One wonders if they’d be in this mess had David Milliband been elected leader rather than his brother. I suspect not. He certainly wouldn’t have changed the membership rules so the rent-a-trot mob could effectively take over.

He did indeed - he was able to advocate a form of socialism, without coming across like an overgrown student who has never quite escaped the idealism of the refectory. I'm a lifelong Labour supporter - but like many people, I found my socialist leanings tempered with age and experience and possibly self interest; Blair got that completely, and made Labour policies palatable and acceptable to a broad cross section of society - including the Murdoch media, as someone else has pointed out.

The current Labour leadership is an embarrassing joke; the Tories are ripe for being ripped to shreds right now, but their worst excesses continue unchecked, because the opposition is too busy chewing its own leg off. I've no doubt that Corbyn will step aside at some point soon - but it will take years for the Labour Party to recover to anything like an effective political force.

The main thing that Blair realised was that, your ideas and policy's are worthless, unless you are in power.
Unfortunately, Corbyn is too much of an idealist to realise this and too stubborn to adjust his policies to make them appeal to anyone outside his group of ultra left wing buddies.
Michael Foot was similar bur, even he got closer to number 10 than Corbyn ever will.
He (Corbyn) is a bright bloke but, cant/ doesnt want to change and whilst Labour may be closer to his personal ideal, whilst he is at the helm, the party is screwed.

UKIP tearing itself apart will help labour, I can see carswell going back to the conservatives after the abuse heaped on him by farrage. If brexit does not work out as planned (I suspect it won't ) then boris Johnson and gove will be jostling to take the prime ministers job.
So the spotlight will be on the conservatives for a change. Our cousins north of the border will insist on a new referendum, coupled with the antics of trump will make for a rocky few years. So the outcome for the Labour Party may change for the better .We live in interesting times. I should rephrase that for extremely dangerous times.

You're possibly right about the Tories heading for some choppy waters but, with Scotland ruled by the SNP, even a Tory "meltdown" wont bring Labour into power.
They (Labour) always needed their Scottish MP's to swing the balance of power and IF The Scot's were to go for Independence again, which may not happen with their economy and oil revenues not exactly well placed to help, Labour would wave good bye to running the country for the foreseeable future, probably not in my lifetime (and I think that I may have 35/40 years left).
Although radical thinking was required, the Corbyn model is doomed to fail.

Corbyn can't even make comment on the budget without notes, complete pr@

Hammond can't even deliver the budget without notes, complete prat.

So what if he needed notes? It's the budget. It's complicated and covers a huge variety of subjects. I doubt a single leader of the opposition has done his response without notes.

Far more important things to criticise him for than this.

Bravo on raising NI for the self employed! About time!

Regards

King James

Why ?

The self employed dont tend to have time off work (they cant afford to) and subsequently take far less out of the pot, compared to "mere" employees and let's not forget that they tend to be very efficient tax collectors, in the form of vat contributions.
As long as it's made you feel better though, that's fine :CRAZY

The last time Labour talked about raising NI, Mrs May brayed about it being "Labour's jobs tax" and claimed it would slow the recovery...