I see we've arrived at the bi-annual festival of claiming a Labour party led by anybody who isn't Jeremy is indistinguishable from the Tories.

So, a quick summary of what moderate Labour party did. You can just skip forward to Iraq if you like, but the facts still remain...

From 1997 to 2010 Labour:

Won 3 elections, giving us time to employ and train 85,000 nurses
Lifted 600,000 children out of poverty
Lifted 1,000,000 pensioners out of poverty
Doubled funding for every pupil under 18
Added 36,000 teachers
Added 274,000 teaching assistants

Cut NHS waiting times by 82%
Got NHS in-patient waiting lists down by 500,000
Introduced the UK's first ever minimum wage
Created 1.8 million new jobs
Cut long-term unemployment by 75%
Doubled the number of apprenticeships

Introduced the right to 24 days holiday
And the right to 2 weeks paternity leave
The longest period of low-inflation growth since 1960
Wrote of debt to the world's poorest nations
Added 14,000 police officers
Cut crime by 35%
Peace in Ireland

Increased criminal justice (court) budget by 21%
Opened 2,200 Sure Start centres
Brought record literacy
Brought record numeracy
Introduced free nursery places
Doubled overseas aid
Devolution for Wales and Scotland
Banned fur farming
Bought the Human Rights Act into UK law

26% increase in child benefit
Introduced Winter Fuel payments
Improvements to 1 million social homes
Introduced Child Tax Credits
3 million Child Trust Funds
Cleanest beaches, rivers and air since the industrial revolution
Scrapped Section 28
Introduced Civil Partnerships

Banned fox hunting
Free TV licences to over 75s
Free entry to art galleries and museums
Smoking ban, the biggest boon to health in a century
Free eye tests for over 60s
Free bus travel for over 60s
Cancer deaths down 50,000
Created NHS Direct

Free breast screening for 50-70 year olds
Heart disease deaths down 150,000
Created less debt than the Tory govt before them
Created less debt than the Tory govt after them

Was that period perfect? Christ no! Like all govts they made mistakes and missed chances

And of course, the big elephant in the room is Iraq, which I absolutely am not defending - I marched against it, lobbied my MP to stop it, and hated it.

But here's a link to Starmer warning Blair the war was illegal https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2003/mar/17/foreignpolicy.iraq1

And (then) centrist govts in France, Canada, Spain, Italy, Netherlands... none of them went to war.

If you think "centrists" cause wars, explain how no centrists in any other country joined in, and how centrist Starmer argued against it.

Blair caused Iraq. And Blair is gone.

The moderate, centre-left (or whatever you want to call them) still supports the kind of social, health and economic policies I list above. Not war.

And if you think those policies are basically Tory, how come Tories just spent a decade dismantling most of them?

I'm deeply ashamed of what the UK did in Iraq and Afghanistan. But I'm very proud of what Labour achieved in so many other areas, and if you're a Labour member, you should be too.

I'm sick of us pissing on our own achievements. Stop it. We did good, and can do again.