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PR man Owen Smith's rebranding.

On 20 Jul 2016 at 3:19pm Mark2 wrote:

Even the Guardian says that Owen Smith the Labour MP contesting Jeremy Corbyn's leadership 'plans to pitch himself as the soft left option'.
Owen Smith according to Channel 4 news has previously given interviews supporting PFI and privatisation within the NHS. As chief lobbyist for the big pharma Pfizer Smith he actively pushed for privatisation of the NHS - 'the focus group actively explored areas of choice that do not yet exist in the NHS, the use of direct payment and the ability to go directly to a specialist without first seeing a GP'. As part of his job at Pfizer he would have been directly involved in his firm's funding of the Blairite right wing Progress group. It's worth remembering too that Smith joined Pfizer as their Head of policy and government relations straight from a Labour party job while Labour were in government. He could be seen to be another New Labour careerist.
Smith is a strong supporter of Trident and it seems 'assiduously courts the arms industry'.
Crucially he abstained on the Tory welfare cuts.
Is he undertaking a major PR attempt at 'rebranding'?

On 21 Jul 2016 at 12:12am You're so right! wrote:

More importantly, who cares outside the Labour party? Labour are engaged in an obscene, navel gazing act of self-destruction while the country falls apart and the Tories do whatever they want. It is everything that is wrong with politics and the perfect demonstration of careers over principle.
Labour are a joke of a party that the majority have lost interest in. Locally they seem to have no voice and be largely pointless. In Brighton, a Labour group that sided with the Tories just to undermine a proper socialist agenda has been over-ruled by the NEC which just about sums up the debacle of their unelectability. Who are Labour? What do they stand for? They aren't socialists.
Nationally they are so far from being taken seriously these days that they should give up and let a proper opposition take hold.
Labour need to realise no-one really cares about their in-fighting. What the country needs is an opposition from the Left. Labour have demonstrated they aren't it locally and nationally. Time for something new.

On 21 Jul 2016 at 1:01am Sussex Dim wrote:

Labour must be in a state of jealous awe when they see the stability and unity of the Tory party.

On 21 Jul 2016 at 1:06pm JMMM wrote:

All started by Hilary Benn. His father must be turning in his grave. We need a proper left - not some apologies for more Tories. Not sure there's any more unity in the Tory Party than there was, but they do look better given the fiasco on the Left. Why do we have to wait till September?

On 21 Jul 2016 at 5:45pm ar10642 wrote:

Yeah, because epic failure Ed Miliband was just *not left enough* was he? They clearly need to go proper Soviet style hard-left to get middle England marginals to vote for them, how could I not see this?
Meanwhile, the Tories will be in power until the end of time...

On 21 Jul 2016 at 7:07pm Fair Meadow wrote:

An excellent example of the use of social media by Momentum/Militant Tendency to subvert the Labour Party into their own creature. I have no idea whether Owen Smith is or is not a credible Labour leader, but it is 100% clear that Jeremy Corbyn is an un-electable disaster.
Two ways forward for Labour. One is to get rid of Corbyn and reconnect with real Labour voters, which I have to say doesn't look likely. The other is to re-elect Corbyn, condemn the Labour Party to ILP-like irrelevance, and cede government to the Tories for the next decade or so. That currently looks much more likely. The latest opinion poll shows majority support from C2/D/E voters for the Conservatives. Well done Jeremy - a quite astonishing achievement. Only a completely exceptional Labour leader could have achieved that. Exceptional - but not in a good way. For God's sake Jeremy, just go.