An Epitaph for the Labour Party?

In the 1970's Union strike votes were by show of hand and prone to the rule of the mob. It also succumbed to it. Labour in the 1980's were stuggling with this but the fourth Conservative victory forced their hand. They embraced (without question) the market, and took no responsibility for it. New Labour offered a 'stakeholder,' an entity with or without shares had somehow a relevance to it all, the new Post Offices were a measure of this. They just shut them all down. Now that the system that is Labour v2.0 has failed, where do they go? Brown is only in charge because everyone fears him. What tradition does he want to set?
Will New Labour's final achievement be accepting Thatcher, but selling out the Stakeholder?

I'll put this question another way:

What has New Labour achieved that was a principle of Old Labour? (or if it helps, Green).

reply to post by redled


Well im not a labour supporter, and im assuming you are so will no doubt take exception to some of this, but I can certainly see alot of hallmarks of classic labour in todays 'New Labour' - after all it was essentially only a re-branding excercise to attract middle england wasnt it?

The impression was given that when Blair dropped clause 4 it created some form of pivotal change in labours ethos, certainly among the grass roots anyway, but i dont think it did really, it was just a continuation of the rebranding process and, other than signalling a much more business friendly attitude, the party still pretty much seemed to stand for the same thing.

Its all crumbling now tho isnt it, the party seems to be destroying itself again, and like the Tories and Old Labour before them could spend some years in the wilderness, then i suppose they will have to rebrand again... maybe to 'The All-New Labour Party'?

Heres where i see the main continuity between the two periods/parties, just off the top of meh heed:

Increased investment in public services --- Large tax increases --- Large increase in regulation and legislation --- Large increase of bureaucratic and public sector jobs --- An active social engineering programme --- Increased immigration --- Legislatory curtailment of individual rights and freedoms (nanny state) --- Opposition to selection by academic ability

Im sure il think of a few more.