Lewes Forum thread

I see Tony Blair, estimated wealth accrued since leaving office £45 million, in advertising for an intern. 'The internship is not paid, however you will be reimbursed for your lunch and travel expenses.'

Sighs and walks off shaking head.

He must have left the Labour party then or he is not 'on message'
During the Labour Leadership campaign Miliband signed Intern Aware’s pledge promising that:
“If I am elected leader of the Labour Party I will campaign for Labour’s Minimum Wage Act to be fully enforced so that employers must pay their interns what they are due.”
In response to calls from Intern Aware this January for Ed Miliband to keep his pledge, he has written that:“[The prevalence of unpaid internships] prevents young people with modest means from getting on and achieving their aspirations. It is unfair and unrepresentative, and it must change. I have not taken on unpaid interns to work in my office. I have also encouraged other colleagues in the Labour Party, including members of the shadow cabinet, to do the same – and we will look closely at this issue in our policy review”.

Where is this, Clifford? Is it a current ad? There was some very negative publicity in the summer - is this the same thing?

Blair was never a socialist, or even real Labour. He doesn't have the interests or ordinary working class folk at heart and neither, I'm afraid, does EM. Disgusting that he doesn't even offer the minimum wage.

Blair and his ghastly wife have always seemed greedy to me. Nothing surprises me about anything they do in pursuit of money or freebies. No principles, either of them.

I do indeed, but fail to see its relevance to this thread.

Aaron do you understand, dick,brained,idiot?Because what you are in danger of becoming.Try engaging what little grey matter you have left before switching on your lap top eh mate!

And you wonder why Webbo blocks your posts Aaron, you poor sod!

I wouldn`t put my balls anywhere near your ugly face Aaron ,you perverted Neanderthal.

Southover Queen - here's the ad.

Read the ad, quite frankly unbelievable but no doubt a number of young politically ambitious potential high-flyers will be lining up to get on board. Good chance they will never even get the chance to shake the Blair hand, much less actually work with.
God only knows what my deceased father, a committed Labour party man of some years ago, must be thinking of them over the last 20yrs or so.

I agree, JR. They'll insist that it doesn't contravene the NMW legislation because it's a charity, but it goes very much against the spirit of the law even if it scrapes by legally. For instance, my godson would be a shoe-in for that job, but he couldn't possibly afford to spend three months working unpaid and living in London. So as usual the opportunity will go to someone with a rich mummy and daddy - and probably a lot less life experience which my godson would be bringing to the role. It's a disgrace.

I am trying to fathom why Blair has become so hated, when he was so loved. All the Labourites that cheered him on that now despise him, and all those that voted for him that now hate him. of course many did not they voted for the Tories or the lovable Libs or the now divided Greens.
A bit like their being no Nazis in Germany post 1945, everyone bleating how that nasty Hitler had led them astray.
Take Norman Baker (in fact please take him) mr Honest and full of integrity, vote for me and keep the Tory out or in or whatever. Or Merlin Milner, lovely guy etc, but they are all politicians, standing for something or other a bit blurred round the edges. That they will turn to their own advantage at some point, its what politicians do. The problem here is no body else wants to do it, run the country or the council or the park. So the they step in and give you their crocodile smile.
What we hate is we were so easily taken in, and in the good (ish) years said nothing.
Whats that quote that evil happens when good people say nothing.

I speak as a Labour party member. Why did we love Blair? I'm not entirely sure I did, but I was certainly relieved that our party was finally voted in on a massive landslide after many years in the wilderness. We have a largely Tory press which is generally hostile to anything they regard as "socialist", and Blair didn't frighten the horses.

Why did we fall out of love with him? For me it was being taken into a totally spurious war in Iraq, in spite of the fact that 2 million marched (me included) in protest.

There are many things I'm proud of: the Minimum Wage, Working Time Regulations, recognition of human rights, a huge improvement in the NHS. Some of this was only partly followed through, and some of it would have taken a long time to bed down - the NHS is a case in point. I believe that PCTs are actually a powerful model but there was always likely to be a long period while the changes worked their way through the system. I also believe that their potential has been sacrificed to Tory ideology and we will regret it profoundly in the future.

The moral? It's much easier to assess politicians in hindsight than at the time. The sad thing is that we don't seem to learn the lessons of history.

2 million? I was on that march and it was definitely only 1 million! However, It was still the largest ever protest march (or public gathering) in the UK ever, bar none. And still the unprincipled excuse for a man sided with the yanks and slaughtered thousands of innocent Iraquis.

Million schmillion: you're right Deelite. I couldn't remember the exact number, I just knew it was vast.

And yes, still he did.

I remember a bigger march that CND organised in the early 1980s, and as with that the process takes years to work through. No march ever made anything happen at the time. Even the poll tax riots, it was actually the middle class mail bag to her MPs that forced Thatcher to rethink. People forget that letters and email to your MP have the bigger impact.
The problem is that politicians are no longer on the ground, they are out of touch and always will be.
Back in the 1980s I remember writing an article on Government expenditure and finding the NHS the biggest cost and totally unsustainable. PCTs might be a good model, thats like me saying Champagne is a good wine, but no good if I can only afford beer.
On the left it might be said the people deserve champagne, perhaps they do but how is the bill paid. We all attack the financial sector, but their taxes supported the recent boom, its financial collapse that has put a massive hole in public spending.
So with that all previous models no longer apply.
As to the NHS it has become a monolith, a sacred cow and that is the road to corruption and incompetence. No doubt at the local level there are fine people working on the wards, and I have met them and received excellent service. Knowing many people in the wider spectrum of the NHS there is also horrendous problems with management, corruption and investment in personal empire and self interest groups. It is really an Augean stable that needs washing through, I am no Tory but at least they have had the guts to take it on.
What does not happen under the Tory led government is a proper concentration on how to cushion the less well off or the most vulnerable from the effects of this catastrophic financial collapse. And so back to Blair, a one nation Tory at best, even the Queen is quoted as saying he was in the wrong party, same was said of John Major I think.

I don't disagree with you that the NHS needs firm management and it is a voracious consumer. I part company with you on how best to apply that.

What I think is failing is a clear strategic vision - a way of balancing the demands of its users against the constraints of its finances. As it happens, I think PCTs were the right thing to do: previously the system had effectively been driven by hospitals with surprisingly little regard for what the local population actually needed. PCTs addressed that by making them the accountable source for commissioning based on local and regional need, and that, I'm sure, was the right thing to do. I also believe that such a radical change in the commissioning chain was always going to take a long time to bed down and certainly incur extra cost initially, and that in fact ten years on PCTs were beginning to deliver on their promise. Careless and ideological reform has already undone most of those benefits.

Also, don't forget that in terms of the per capita cost vs community benefit the NHS is still a considerable bargain. We manage to deliver generally good quality care to pretty well everyone - compare that to the US with its vast inequities, or the per capita costs of the French and German systems.

Reporting on the NHS in the media is - probably uniquely - subject to emotionally driven "human interest". I know: I've spent a large part of my career working in the field. Until our press learn to differentiate between "local trust won't let me have life saving treatment" and "local trust cannot afford £100k unproven drug which might extend a life by two or three months" we as consumers will remain pretty clueless.