Yoon Starmer confirms he’d rather a Tory government than an SNP deal
Labour leader and certified yoon Keir Starmer has once again confirmed his party would not do a deal with the Scottish National Party (SNP) if there was a hung parliament at the next general election. Even a right-wing LBC hack pointed out that it meant Starmer would rather see the Tories’ “limp on” in government.
Starmer: no SNP deal
As Holyrood reported last year, at the Labour Party conference Starmer said of a possible coalition government or deal with the SNP:
No deal under any circumstances.
The context to this is that the SNP hold the majority of Scottish parliamentary seats in Westminster. Meanwhile, whilst Labour currently lead in the opinion polls, there is a chance that the Tories could eat into this. As Chris Hopkins from pollster Sevanta told HuffPost:
if Rishi Sunak can keep narrowing that Labour lead, point-by-point, the actual results come 2024 could look very different
Sevanta’s most recent polling gave Labour a majority of 314 – leaving the Tories with just 69 seats. However, that’s a big prediction and a long-way off. So, you’d hope Starmer would be putting the good of the public first and making sure we knew all options were on the table to prevent the Tories regaining power in 2024. But no – that’s clearly too much to ask.
Yoon logic
A caller to LBC asked Starmer during an interview with Nick Ferrari if he’d changed his mind on a possible SNP deal if needed. Starmer said again:
Read on...
We are not doing a deal with the SNP. I say that in capitals, I say it in bold, I said it at my party conference…
Ferrari interrupted, saying:
you’d rather see, somehow, the Conservatives limp-on in some extraordinary hotchpotch deal than you borrowing five-to-ten seats from the SNP and getting over the line?
In short, Starmer said yes – spouting some unionist garbage about being ‘better together’:
Keir Starmer has confirmed he won't do a deal with the SNP even if it means the Tories remaining in power. In other words he'd rather have the Tories in power than do a deal with the SNP to keep them out. pic.twitter.com/0nnfMkP7Wu
— MSM Monitor (@msm_monitor) December 12, 2022
Unsurprisingly, people on social media were unimpressed by Starmer’s comments:
Red Tory stating he'd rather keep the Blue Tories in power is not news.
It's the Blairites all over again.
Red Tories have already thrown millions of us under the bus when they worked with the rest of the Establishment to block Corbyn, a caring & fair socialist getting into gov.— Ange #Organise #JoinAUnion (@Ange_Sandgrown) December 12, 2022
Starmer's centrist crew preferred a Boris Johnson Tory government to a Jeremy Corbyn Labour government and now they are going a step further – they prefer a Tory government to their own Labour government if it needs SNP support https://t.co/eZ4YCj3WRM
— troovus (@troovus) December 13, 2022
Show me you're a tory without actually telling me yer a tory #bewarethewolfinsheepsclothing https://t.co/vxsk245mL4
— Wally Doug 🇵🇸 🇵🇸🇵🇸🇵🇸🇵🇸🇵🇸🇵🇸 (@darrenjdouglas) December 13, 2022
Now, to be moderately fair on Starmer, former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn also ruled out a deal with the SNP at the 2019 general election – albeit in slightly less forthright terms. However, he seemed more open to ‘indy ref 2’ than Starmer does. So, while it looks like Labour could win the next general election, nothing is set in stone. And for Starmer to already be actively denying the people of Scotland autonomy – as well as saying he’d prefer to throw all of us under the bus than work with the SNP – is nothing short of petulant and arrogant.
Featured image via LBC – YouTube
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The SNP et al’s nationalism is a divisive agenda which goes against the unity of the international working class. As such, it is not to be supported. Even a brief examination of the SNP’s recent actions shows it not to be a party of workers but one of the ruling class, supporting NATO against Russia via funds for lethal weapons, austerity cuts to public services and the abandonment of the Scottish people to the Covid-19 virus.
What is the goal of the SNP? By its own words, it is to transform Scotland into a low tax, cheap labour platform for the benefit of the banks and corporations. The oppression of Scots is not because of their nationality but because they are working class, and the SNP will deepen that oppression in an independent Scotland.
You couldn’t be more wrong. We’re tired of getting a small proportion of the tax we pay back from Westminster. We’re tired of important government issues being “reserved ” to Westminster. We’re tired of being classified as “working class” by entitled English – Scotland is just as diverse in terms of personal wealth (or should I say, resources) as England. The English political parties are terrified of losing access to Scotland’s wealth and natural resources.
We know we’re not “too wee, too poor and too stupid” to govern ourselves. How many former English colonies do you see clamouring to come back?
Scotland was never a colony of England. Its ruling class was equal with that of England’s, and its people were equally enthusiastic colonisers around the world, taking part in some of the British empire’s worst atrocities. Just where did many of the Black and Tans come from?
KS is following the actions of his hero, the Rev Tony Blair, who stated openly (I know a bit of a change to his MO) that in the run-up to the 2015 election he “would prefer a Cameron government to a coalition govt led by Ed Miliband’.
The disgusting thing is that Miliband then crept back into the fold following this disgusting attack on him. He knew what had been done to him yet he still refused to back Corbyn who was being attacked in the same way but increased by a factor of 100.
Apart from Starmer’s stupidity in announcing “no deal with the SNP” when it could be the difference of Labour being in government or not, is that the time to take the decision to make any ‘deal’ is when the votes have been counted and the ‘state of the parties’ is known. There is no requirement to decide at this stage: it is counterproductive. However a Lab/SNP coalition would result in more socialist policies than would a Starmer led Lab government, and probably another reason why KS announced his decision.