Right but this is an easy win for Starmer. Something very unpopular you can scrap, that is costly, that even if you’re a bigot you can recognise isn’t working, etc. That’s something you can instantly do to create the impression you’re very different to the previous party. And the impression, per your comment, is impactful. It really doesn’t say much one way or the other about more important policies (e.g. like the Tory cuts that he said pre-election he would not axe).
And yet, even with all you say about the policy being true, the Tories still committed to it over multiple PMs and Home Secretaries, while Labour opposed it at every step and scrapped it at the first opportunity. This does constitute a difference between the two. And even if it’s (just) that Labour can tell when something’s unpopular, expensive, cruel and doesn’t work, that’s a positive difference.
They are not simply scrapping and unpopular policy, they’re scrapping a policy they criticized from the start, long before it was evident to anyone else whether it would work or not. At the very least does this not demonstrate greater political acumen on Labour’s part?
Right but this is an easy win for Starmer. Something very unpopular you can scrap, that is costly, that even if you’re a bigot you can recognise isn’t working, etc. That’s something you can instantly do to create the impression you’re very different to the previous party. And the impression, per your comment, is impactful. It really doesn’t say much one way or the other about more important policies (e.g. like the Tory cuts that he said pre-election he would not axe).
And yet, even with all you say about the policy being true, the Tories still committed to it over multiple PMs and Home Secretaries, while Labour opposed it at every step and scrapped it at the first opportunity. This does constitute a difference between the two. And even if it’s (just) that Labour can tell when something’s unpopular, expensive, cruel and doesn’t work, that’s a positive difference.
They are not simply scrapping and unpopular policy, they’re scrapping a policy they criticized from the start, long before it was evident to anyone else whether it would work or not. At the very least does this not demonstrate greater political acumen on Labour’s part?