Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
To be fair, it's not a LabourList poll, it's a report of what the party claims its internal polling is showing, reported without endorsement (https://labourlist.org/2021/12/tory-lead-in-north-shropshire-narrowed-to-seven-points-internal-polling-suggests/). It would be odd if they refused to report it. I very much doubt if this is more than canvass returns, though, as I presume are the LibDem claims. So I'm not sure they are putting credibility on the line any more than we do when we highlight the LibDem statements (the LibDems do have some credibility in this from previous efforts). It's what parties tend to do in the absence of a formal pact, and what was striking until now was its absence.
Nonetheless, it's evident that Labour is now making an effort, with various senior Labour people (interestingly on the centrist wing of the party who you might have thought would be keenest on a tacit alliance) talking up the campaign. My guess is that up to Bexley they were totally focused there, and have now shifted attention.
Anyone pick up on the claim about the Downing Street Christmas..... "unParties"?
Namely that members of the media were involved, hence the story getting quietly pushed to the back....
Not all of them, surely?
The collegiate nature of the Press mirrors that of the politicians. Remember that many (perhaps most) hacks work as professionals, and are not ideologically connected to their papers output. There are plenty of people who have moved between the Telegraph and the Guardian, for example.
This means that everyone knows each others dirty secrets.
Sometimes they don’t even keep their secrets secret.
Doing some time at the Priory is practically part of the CV, for a certain class...
"Mmmm... 1st Oxford, PPE, Masters in literature... Sorbonne.. good, good. *That* think tank... excellent. Stint at the Pirory? The X branch? Did you meet Dr James there? How is he? Yes, excellent background...."
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
The Tory-LD Coalition was the only viable option in 2010; Labour was no longer in a fit state to govern, and anyway the maths were wrong. While I completely agree that the LD's did some bad things.... tuition fees..... and let some bad things happen..... cuts to police and justice system ...... the old Liberal party assisted Labour four times in the 20thC. Labour activists should bear that in mind. Labour wouldn't have got into Parliament at all at first without Liberal assistance.
Indeed and the danger for Labour of soft-pedalling is that Lib Dem gains might dent or even strip the Tory majority while leaving a position where a Tory-led government is still the only viable outcome.
Something similar to 2017 is entirely possible.
This post definitely brought to you by Tory HQ.
LOL no.
The 17 thousand votes Labour achieved here in the very recent past is considerably more than the Tories achieved in either Bexley or Chesham and Amersham.
Blair would have been here repeatedly seeking to win this seat, he wouldn't have spurned the opportunity to claim a scalp.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
Good-ish data is starting to come in. Confirms the very early anecdotal stuff I used to make my prediction over a week ago. "Eight per cent of Covid-positive hospital patients [in Gauteng] are being treated in intensive care units, down from 23 per cent throughout the Delta wave. And just 2 per cent are on ventilators, down from 11 per cent."
Yes, it's quite encouraging, but it doesn't necessarily mean what people think it means. There are three main reasons why there might be lower rates of serious illness in the Omicron wave:
1. It might just be too early to tell, i.e. the cases haven't yet had time to get to the hospitalisation/death stage; 2. Omicron might intrinsically be milder than previous variants (i.e. milder in populations which have not previously been infected or vaccinated); 3. It might be showing up as milder because those being infected now in SA (and increasingly elsewhere) already have some immunity to severe disease through previous infections and vaccination.
Although we can't quite be sure yet, we probably have a long enough period of data now to conclude that 1 is unlikely, i.e. that it's not just a timing issue.
However, we don't have enough data to distinguish between 2 and 3. Lots of people seem to be assuming 2, but 3 is more likely. (It could have course be a bit of both).
The difference between 2 and 3 is very important for the 25% or so of under-50s in the UK who still (incredibly) are unjabbed, and even more important for those countries where vaccination rates are much lower.
Anyone pick up on the claim about the Downing Street Christmas..... "unParties"?
Namely that members of the media were involved, hence the story getting quietly pushed to the back....
Not all of them, surely?
The collegiate nature of the Press mirrors that of the politicians. Remember that many (perhaps most) hacks work as professionals, and are not ideologically connected to their papers output. There are plenty of people who have moved between the Telegraph and the Guardian, for example.
This means that everyone knows each others dirty secrets.
The politico-media nexus (via Oxbridge) in this country is corrosive to our democracy.
It is very similar in many countries. The French version, for example, is even more rigid and exclusionary.
Makes me wonder if what I'd previously presumed to be corrosive to democracy in the US - the legions of lobbyists and the politically-engaged corporations behind them - is such a bad thing after all. It does increase the pool and modes of entry into the political elites.
Agree that the US is more pluralistic in its ruling class(es). But lobbying ain’t the answer.
Devolution of both politics and media is required. It should be possible (and desirable) to go:
Provincial uni > local politics > national leadership.
Previous thread someone was complaining about our "slow booster roll out" - we're (very) comfortably ahead of our large European peers - and still ahead of the small ones too:
Using ONS 2020 and England data....
The interesting lines to watch are 40-44 and 45-49 - given what we know of COVID, theses are lowest groups in the higher risk zone for hospitalisation etc.
Interesting that the 90+ age group has levelled off some way behind the others, at a guess, this might be because a significate proportion of that age group has died since receiving there second does? if that's not the reason what might be?
Doctors not doing house calls to vaccinate the housebound?
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
English voters will already be pricing in another large SNP victory. If (if!) a few Conservative seats switch SNP, English voters won't know about that until after polls have closed.
Good-ish data is starting to come in. Confirms the very early anecdotal stuff I used to make my prediction over a week ago. "Eight per cent of Covid-positive hospital patients [in Gauteng] are being treated in intensive care units, down from 23 per cent throughout the Delta wave. And just 2 per cent are on ventilators, down from 11 per cent."
Yes, it's quite encouraging, but it doesn't necessarily mean what people think it means. There are three main reasons why there might be lower rates of serious illness in the Omicron wave:
1. It might just be too early to tell, i.e. the cases haven't yet had time to get to the hospitalisation/death stage; 2. Omicron might intrinsically be milder than previous variants (i.e. milder in populations which have not previously been infected or vaccinated); 3. It might be showing up as milder because those being infected now in SA (and increasingly elsewhere) already have some immunity to severe disease through previous infections and vaccination.
Although we can't quite be sure yet, we probably have a long enough period of data now to conclude that 1 is unlikely, i.e. that it's not just a timing issue.
However, we don't have enough data to distinguish between 2 and 3. Lots of people seem to be assuming 2, but 3 is more likely. (It could have course be a bit of both).
The difference between 2 and 3 is very important for the 25% or so of under-50s in the UK who still (incredibly) are unjabbed, and even more important for those countries where vaccination rates are much lower.
and
4. the low hanging fruit argument: the most vulnerable can no longer die of omicron because they have already died of delta.
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
Previous thread someone was complaining about our "slow booster roll out" - we're (very) comfortably ahead of our large European peers - and still ahead of the small ones too:
Using ONS 2020 and England data....
The interesting lines to watch are 40-44 and 45-49 - given what we know of COVID, theses are lowest groups in the higher risk zone for hospitalisation etc.
Interesting that the 90+ age group has levelled off some way behind the others, at a guess, this might be because a significate proportion of that age group has died since receiving there second does? if that's not the reason what might be?
Doctors not doing house calls to vaccinate the housebound?
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
Anyone pick up on the claim about the Downing Street Christmas..... "unParties"?
Namely that members of the media were involved, hence the story getting quietly pushed to the back....
Not all of them, surely?
The collegiate nature of the Press mirrors that of the politicians. Remember that many (perhaps most) hacks work as professionals, and are not ideologically connected to their papers output. There are plenty of people who have moved between the Telegraph and the Guardian, for example.
This means that everyone knows each others dirty secrets.
The politico-media nexus (via Oxbridge) in this country is corrosive to our democracy.
It is very similar in many countries. The French version, for example, is even more rigid and exclusionary.
Makes me wonder if what I'd previously presumed to be corrosive to democracy in the US - the legions of lobbyists and the politically-engaged corporations behind them - is such a bad thing after all. It does increase the pool of and modes of entry into the political elites.
Some American relatives, years ago, regarded with horror the following prospect...
One of the Silicon Valley billionaires, because they had access to real billions, could retire and fund candidates for Congress and the Senate. Completely. So they wouldn't have to spend 50% of their lives raising money form special interests. Then run on the "I'm not corrupt - look at my opponent. All my money comes from a pile of US government bonds via X"
Having taken over the Senate and Congress in short order, X could then run for president, again not taking any money.
Such an individual would then have completely control of the machinery of US government, without any control from the usual power brokers.
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
If people aren't expecting the Opposition to win seats they're second-placed in, when the government is mired in scandal, when the by-election was created by scandal, and where the Opposition has achieved 17 thousand votes in the very recent past . . . then I think expectations management has already been achieved but not by me.
Truly pathetic if Labour don't even try and win this seat.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
"the protection of animals was not a UK war aim in Afghanistan"
1 PARA shot anything with four legs on sight in Basra. They once raided a compound based on shit intel, found no weapons and shot all the animals as a consolation prize. An act of goodwill which somewhat incensed the ungrateful Basrans and the incident eventually led to the battle of Majar al Kabir where 6 RMP were killed.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
This is absolutely right.
2010 had a few elements - a dire need for a stable government in the context of failing bond auctions and economic meltdown, electoral maths that meant no stable coalition was possible without the Conservatives (from recollection, Labour + Lib Dem + SNP + Green + Plaid would have had a low single figure majority), a pretty progressive Tory leader in Cameron (who had decent personal chemistry with Clegg), and a very tired Labour administration (it was hard to say it hadn't been rejected by the electorate).
None of those are likely to be in play if there's a hung parliament in 2024 (or whenever) and Johnson is leader. If it happens, the Conservatives will be the ones falling back, there is very little common ground or chemistry between Davey and Johnson (but is with Starmer), and the Tories just aren't Cameroons any more. And if the electoral maths doesn't work for a stable progressive coalition, there's no economic disaster in the background - the likely outcome would be a leader of the largest party forms a caretaker administration, with a fairly swift second election to follow.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
Good-ish data is starting to come in. Confirms the very early anecdotal stuff I used to make my prediction over a week ago. "Eight per cent of Covid-positive hospital patients [in Gauteng] are being treated in intensive care units, down from 23 per cent throughout the Delta wave. And just 2 per cent are on ventilators, down from 11 per cent."
Yes, it's quite encouraging, but it doesn't necessarily mean what people think it means. There are three main reasons why there might be lower rates of serious illness in the Omicron wave:
1. It might just be too early to tell, i.e. the cases haven't yet had time to get to the hospitalisation/death stage; 2. Omicron might intrinsically be milder than previous variants (i.e. milder in populations which have not previously been infected or vaccinated); 3. It might be showing up as milder because those being infected now in SA (and increasingly elsewhere) already have some immunity to severe disease through previous infections and vaccination.
Although we can't quite be sure yet, we probably have a long enough period of data now to conclude that 1 is unlikely, i.e. that it's not just a timing issue.
However, we don't have enough data to distinguish between 2 and 3. Lots of people seem to be assuming 2, but 3 is more likely. (It could have course be a bit of both).
The difference between 2 and 3 is very important for the 25% or so of under-50s in the UK who still (incredibly) are unjabbed, and even more important for those countries where vaccination rates are much lower.
Given our relative vaccination and previous infection rate vs RSA, I'm not sure how much we should care about the distinction between 2 and 3. We have comparatively few people in vulnerable groups not vaccinated, and I'm pretty skeptical many of them have avoided prior infection up to this point.
2010 had a few elements - a dire need for a stable government in the context of failing bond auctions and economic meltdown, electoral maths that meant no stable coalition was possible without the Conservatives (from recollection, Labour + Lib Dem + SNP + Green + Plaid would have had a low single figure majority), a pretty progressive Tory leader in Cameron (who had decent personal chemistry with Clegg), and a very tired Labour administration (it was hard to say it hadn't been rejected by the electorate).
Yes. Plus the party was at peak "Orange Book" at that point and a lot of the MPs, such as the loathsome gerbil that is Danny Alexander, were ideologically sympathetic to centrist Tories. Today's party, both in activist base and the MP cohort, is mercifully very different.
I was coming onto PB to highlight the Labour List story and say I had topped up my position on a Conservative hold in NS but see that OGH has his finger on the pulse as usual.
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
Instinctively, I'm with Philip here. I started paying attention to politics in the late 80s - by-elections back then equated with Conservative losses. However, we're not in the 80s/90s now, as Hartlepool and OBS showed. The government is unpopular but so, in leave-leaning seats at least, are the main English opposition parties. We can't assume that Lab or LD will benefit from anger at the government. My assessment therefore is that a Con hold is most likely, and that odds of 1.5 are about right.
I am, however, surprised that LDs are the favoured challengers. LDs were third at the GE and it isn't obvious why the electorate of NS should be suddenly rallying to them.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
No chance, this isn't 1979. Time has moved on.
The SNP will have one rock solid demand and that is an independence referendum. Deny that, and they'd vote down any Queen's Speech without it being agreed, by anyone.
The SNP quite simply 'hold all the cards', there very reason for existence is to get that referendum and if they fail to do so while holding the balance of power then that will tear them asunder more than voting down "London Labour" would.
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
Perhaps Starmer has realised that the optics of his party going from a strong second to losing its deposit in NS will not produce good headlines and would in fact be ridiculed?
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
You understand "once bitten, twice shy?"
There is zero prospect of Ed Davey even providing succour to the Tories if they attempted to cling to power having just lost the election. Pretty much everyone in politics barring you and the other remaining Peppa fanbois see the Tories as a Clear and Present Danger to the UK.
As you want to scrap the UK I understand why you like them, but the din from people disgusted by the government and their machinations is starting to sound like a Boney M ode to Rasputin.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
Just noticed that small village just outside the North of the constituency.
Quite a famous window there. Which of the parties will be able to shift it in this election?
Seems to me it's not so much shifting as closing. On policy the differences between Cons and Lab are small. The choice is stark imo but it's on ethics and competence.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
This is absolutely right.
2010 had a few elements - a dire need for a stable government in the context of failing bond auctions and economic meltdown, electoral maths that meant no stable coalition was possible without the Conservatives (from recollection, Labour + Lib Dem + SNP + Green + Plaid would have had a low single figure majority), a pretty progressive Tory leader in Cameron (who had decent personal chemistry with Clegg), and a very tired Labour administration (it was hard to say it hadn't been rejected by the electorate).
None of those are likely to be in play if there's a hung parliament in 2024 (or whenever) and Johnson is leader. If it happens, the Conservatives will be the ones falling back, there is very little common ground or chemistry between Davey and Johnson (but is with Starmer), and the Tories just aren't Cameroons any more. And if the electoral maths doesn't work for a stable progressive coalition, there's no economic disaster in the background - the likely outcome would be a leader of the largest party forms a caretaker administration, with a fairly swift second election to follow.
TL/DR - 2024 is not 2010.
2010 was like Feb 1974. Whoever had 'won' the election it was demonstrably NOT the outgoing PM and his party.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
There seems to be a gap between the Lib Dems like or dislike of other parties, and other parties' like or dislike of the Lib Dems.
Lib Dem activists' positive or negative vibes towards other parties:
1. Greens 2. Labour 3. SNP 4. Tories 5. REFUK / UKIP etc
(3 and 4 possibly swapped North of the Border)
Other party activists' positive or negative vibes towards Lib Dems:
1. Greens 2. Tories 3. REFUK/UKIP etc 4. SNP 5. Labour
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
If people aren't expecting the Opposition to win seats they're second-placed in, when the government is mired in scandal, when the by-election was created by scandal, and where the Opposition has achieved 17 thousand votes in the very recent past . . . then I think expectations management has already been achieved but not by me.
Truly pathetic if Labour don't even try and win this seat.
I'm not expecting Labour to win because the current iteration of the Labour Party is rubbish at presenting an attractive offer to non-Metropolitan Britain. I'd have expected 90s Labour to win, of course. I do agree with your last para.
2010 had a few elements - a dire need for a stable government in the context of failing bond auctions and economic meltdown, electoral maths that meant no stable coalition was possible without the Conservatives (from recollection, Labour + Lib Dem + SNP + Green + Plaid would have had a low single figure majority), a pretty progressive Tory leader in Cameron (who had decent personal chemistry with Clegg), and a very tired Labour administration (it was hard to say it hadn't been rejected by the electorate).
Yes. Plus the party was at peak "Orange Book" at that point and a lot of the MPs, such as the loathsome gerbil that is Danny Alexander, were ideologically sympathetic to centrist Tories. Today's party, both in activist base and the MP cohort, is mercifully very different.
Davey was even in Cameron's Cabinet. LD voters today are also mainly ex Tory Remainers and arguably more fiscally Conservative than LD voters in 2010, many of whom went to Ed Miliband's Labour after the Coalition.
However LD voters are anti hard Brexit so the LDs will back Starmer in return for closer alignment to the SM and CU
They can, as above, abstain. I am not sure whether their asking price would be devomax (HYUFD) or another referendum (PhilipT) but it will be something along those lines.
I am not sure if Keir would or should accept either of those conditions. He’s going to need to work out a route through or around this, of course.
Keir’s hand is stronger if Lab/LD outperform the Con tally.
Again, this is why North Shrops is important. I accept your mileage may vary if you are a keen scottish nationalist.
Good-ish data is starting to come in. Confirms the very early anecdotal stuff I used to make my prediction over a week ago. "Eight per cent of Covid-positive hospital patients [in Gauteng] are being treated in intensive care units, down from 23 per cent throughout the Delta wave. And just 2 per cent are on ventilators, down from 11 per cent."
Yes, it's quite encouraging, but it doesn't necessarily mean what people think it means. There are three main reasons why there might be lower rates of serious illness in the Omicron wave:
1. It might just be too early to tell, i.e. the cases haven't yet had time to get to the hospitalisation/death stage; 2. Omicron might intrinsically be milder than previous variants (i.e. milder in populations which have not previously been infected or vaccinated); 3. It might be showing up as milder because those being infected now in SA (and increasingly elsewhere) already have some immunity to severe disease through previous infections and vaccination.
Although we can't quite be sure yet, we probably have a long enough period of data now to conclude that 1 is unlikely, i.e. that it's not just a timing issue.
However, we don't have enough data to distinguish between 2 and 3. Lots of people seem to be assuming 2, but 3 is more likely. (It could have course be a bit of both).
The difference between 2 and 3 is very important for the 25% or so of under-50s in the UK who still (incredibly) are unjabbed, and even more important for those countries where vaccination rates are much lower.
Interesting question or point.
My thought are that is may be a bit of both 2 and 3 (and 1 even) but it is unlikely to be mostly 3, I say this because we can look at the ratio of known infections to known Hospitalizations, in SA there was an ongoing tradition of Delta, with low and steady numbers, and we know how many of those where hospitalised, and there are probably a simmiler number getting delta every day now. Most/all the growth over the last 2 weeks or so in SA has been Omicron, and its growing in the same population with the same amount of vaccination/natural immunity but does not appear to have the same ratio of infection to hospitalisation.
Unless we are hypnotising that Delta is only(mostly) being infected in unwaxed/no prior-infection people, but that Omicron is escaping the vaccine and natural immunity enough to transmit well in those people, but then to not harm them enough to give bad outcomes.
To be fair, it's not a LabourList poll, it's a report of what the party claims its internal polling is showing, reported without endorsement (https://labourlist.org/2021/12/tory-lead-in-north-shropshire-narrowed-to-seven-points-internal-polling-suggests/). It would be odd if they refused to report it. I very much doubt if this is more than canvass returns, though, as I presume are the LibDem claims. So I'm not sure they are putting credibility on the line any more than we do when we highlight the LibDem statements (the LibDems do have some credibility in this from previous efforts). It's what parties tend to do in the absence of a formal pact, and what was striking until now was its absence.
Nonetheless, it's evident that Labour is now making an effort, with various senior Labour people (interestingly on the centrist wing of the party who you might have thought would be keenest on a tacit alliance) talking up the campaign. My guess is that up to Bexley they were totally focused there, and have now shifted attention.
We need a proper pact is my conclusion FWIW.
Might also have been different had Lab won (or even made good progress) in OB&S? That would be fruits of the alliance, good press, reasons to soft-pedal on NS to strengthen the good feeling for future pacts. As it is, Labour could do with a good result in NS.
Bit torn here, too. As Philip points out, a Labour party serious about winning should be challenging in NS. However, I think we (or most, anyway) believe that a next GE Labour majority is as likely as the discovery of rocking horse poop. So, perhaps there's also a need to keep the LDs sweet. Or is there? In how many seats is tacit LD support important to Labour chances at the next GE? Labour can piss off the LDs as much as they like but still unilaterally soft-pedal themselves in the LD targets that are Con-held at the next election.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
You understand "once bitten, twice shy?"
There is zero prospect of Ed Davey even providing succour to the Tories if they attempted to cling to power having just lost the election. Pretty much everyone in politics barring you and the other remaining Peppa fanbois see the Tories as a Clear and Present Danger to the UK.
As you want to scrap the UK I understand why you like them, but the din from people disgusted by the government and their machinations is starting to sound like a Boney M ode to Rasputin.
I'm a bigger believer in mathematics than I am trying to understand what Ed Davey is thinking. If the mathematics means the Conservatives are the only plausible government then your coalition of chaos can go whistle.
If the Conservatives are on 310-315 seats after the election then the Opposition parties will go into talks with each other but all it takes is any party to make what the other parties consider an "unreasonable" demand and the whole thing will fall apart and the Conservatives will continue as a minority government.
The SNP would obviously demand an independence referendum, the Lib Dems would demand electoral reform, the Labour left and right will make their own demands and without an agreement the Conservatives will remain in Downing Street just as Brown did until an alternative was agreed.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Your lack of knowledge and self-fulfilled gibberish on full display.
If its a key vote where their abstention brings about an early GE and a Tory government, that does them no favours. Keeping a weak rainbow coalition in power is massively more beneficial to them.
So of course they would vote confidence. Or else put nobbers into power who say "we're not going to listen to you Scotch no matter how you vote so there".
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Forgive my possible oversimplification, but:
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W - Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category - A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
Just noticed that small village just outside the North of the constituency.
Quite a famous window there. Which of the parties will be able to shift it in this election?
Seems to me it's not so much shifting as closing. On policy the differences between Cons and Lab are small. The choice is stark imo but it's on ethics and competence.
The key difference for me is that the government has been bloody awful on civil liberties this last 2 years, and Labour have been clamouring at every opportunity to be worse. That's why Labour won't be picking up my vote.
And then I expect the same in reverse up here. Alex Cole-Hamilton is a bit of a nobber foaming on about the evils of the SNP when the enemy is and remains the Tories. You can't stop the nippie juggernaut, but we can stop the Tories from wrecking places like Banff and Buchan then wanting support for doing so.
I find it hard to include Nationalists in a progressive alliance. What's progressive about dividing people with more borders?
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
It is utterly damning of the leadership provided at the FO - ie Raab. Certainly the senior civil servants might also share some responsibility, but many of the decisions unmade, which ought to have been made, were political rather than administrative matters.
They can, as above, abstain. I am not sure whether their asking price would be devomax (HYUFD) or another referendum (PhilipT) but it will be something along those lines.
I am not sure if Keir would or should accept either of those conditions. He’s going to need to work out a route through or around this, of course.
Keir’s hand is stronger if Lab/LD outperform the Con tally.
Again, this is why North Shrops is important. I accept your mileage may vary if you are a keen scottish nationalist.
SKS needs to have an answer to those questions well before the election, or the posters of him in the pocket of the SNP leader will be all over the Lab/Con marginals in England, just as they were in 2015.
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
Perhaps Starmer has realised that the optics of his party going from a strong second to losing its deposit in NS will not produce good headlines and would in fact be ridiculed?
It's a tricky one. Lab and LD simply must team up for the GE in order to GTTO. But Lab don't want to allow the LDs even a sniff at becoming the main non-Tory party in large tracts of the country. Which is one of the prime short to medium term goals of the LDs. It's why they went with giving Johnson his Dec 2019 gift of a GE. So, they have to work together, and I desperately hope they find a way to work together, since years and years of Johnson truly doesn't bear thinking about, but I don't know how they'll manage it. Perhaps Nick P has a view on this.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
It should finish Raab. In truth it should finish Johnson too, but don't hold your breath.
And where is bloody Starmer in all this? This is the one thing he is meant to be any good at is holding people to account for criminal and quasi criminal conduct. And not a peep.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Forgive my possible oversimplification, but:
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W - Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category - A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
None. All Starmer has to do is put together a reasonable budget and then dare the SNP to vote with the Tories.
Anti-Tory voters in Scotland might not be best pleased to see their "anti-Tory" SNP MPs vote with the Tories to bring down a Labour government.
This is why a Tory majority at Westminster is imperative for the SNP.
Just noticed that small village just outside the North of the constituency.
Quite a famous window there. Which of the parties will be able to shift it in this election?
Seems to me it's not so much shifting as closing. On policy the differences between Cons and Lab are small. The choice is stark imo but it's on ethics and competence.
The key difference for me is that the government has been bloody awful on civil liberties this last 2 years, and Labour have been clamouring at every opportunity to be worse. That's why Labour won't be picking up my vote.
I'm not ruling out voting Labour on the basis they are the "next best" challenger in my constituency, albeit it likely is safe Tory and the conservatives don't deserve to be rewarded with another term based on the obvious malfeance in office. I'd certainly vote Tory if I lived at my parents to try and get Sultana out. Starmer looks competent enough, he's not really on my side but I'm aware I'm too niche a voter for anyone to tailor themselves to. He won't win.
And then I expect the same in reverse up here. Alex Cole-Hamilton is a bit of a nobber foaming on about the evils of the SNP when the enemy is and remains the Tories. You can't stop the nippie juggernaut, but we can stop the Tories from wrecking places like Banff and Buchan then wanting support for doing so.
I find it hard to include Nationalists in a progressive alliance. What's progressive about dividing people with more borders?
I agree with you, but:
1. SNP are centre left, and Sturgeon has pushed them leftward.
2. The peculiar nature of Scottish politics is that there is mental firewall between Tory and non-Tory in the minds of swing voters.
Thus, Lab/LD are punished more for potentially allying with the Tories than they are with the SNP.
In Scotland, Lab/LD can (outside some tactical instances) only grow their vote by reaching current SNP voters. In turn, Unionism can only grow its vote by Lab/LD doing this.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
This is absolutely right.
2010 had a few elements - a dire need for a stable government in the context of failing bond auctions and economic meltdown, electoral maths that meant no stable coalition was possible without the Conservatives (from recollection, Labour + Lib Dem + SNP + Green + Plaid would have had a low single figure majority), a pretty progressive Tory leader in Cameron (who had decent personal chemistry with Clegg), and a very tired Labour administration (it was hard to say it hadn't been rejected by the electorate).
None of those are likely to be in play if there's a hung parliament in 2024 (or whenever) and Johnson is leader. If it happens, the Conservatives will be the ones falling back, there is very little common ground or chemistry between Davey and Johnson (but is with Starmer), and the Tories just aren't Cameroons any more. And if the electoral maths doesn't work for a stable progressive coalition, there's no economic disaster in the background - the likely outcome would be a leader of the largest party forms a caretaker administration, with a fairly swift second election to follow.
TL/DR - 2024 is not 2010.
2010 was like Feb 1974. Whoever had 'won' the election it was demonstrably NOT the outgoing PM and his party.
Yes. Although an important difference is that neither a Con/Lib nor Lab/Lib coalition was particularly feasible long term in Feb 1974. There was some courting of Thorpe, particularly by Heath to try to hang on to the Premiership, but it was all in the knowledge that a second election would follow quite promptly.
In 2010, not only was there only one credible coalition, but a pressing economic need to make it happen and a pretty sizeable majority when it was formed (as I say, the 2010-15 Government, whatever one thinks of it in policy terms, was quite exceptionally stable - it never once seriously looked like falling).
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Forgive my possible oversimplification, but:
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W - Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category - A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
None. All Starmer has to do is put together a reasonable budget and then dare the SNP to vote with the Tories.
Anti-Tory voters in Scotland might not be best pleased to see their "anti-Tory" SNP MPs vote with the Tories to bring down a Labour government.
This is why a Tory majority at Westminster is imperative for the SNP.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
Where is the jump? I read 170 and then 205-221, and it jumps from the Minister for Europe's MP request for consideration in 205, to declaring them ineligble for evacuation in 216 to, suddenly, it happening in 217. Are there any paragraphs that relate to the understanding of the intervention that made it happen?
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Forgive my possible oversimplification, but:
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W - Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category - A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
None. All Starmer has to do is put together a reasonable budget and then dare the SNP to vote with the Tories.
Anti-Tory voters in Scotland might not be best pleased to see their "anti-Tory" SNP MPs vote with the Tories to bring down a Labour government.
This is why a Tory majority at Westminster is imperative for the SNP.
That's not all Starmer has to do. Starmer can't even go to see the King or Queen without an agreement first. The precedent is already set that until the Opposition has the votes to take power, the government continues in office.
Its a very English Left way of thinking to think that SNP voters are "anti-Tory". They're "anti-UK" and "anti-London" more now.
No way Sturgeon could survive holding the balance of power and not getting her referendum, its simply implausible. Her critics in the SNP and wider independence movement would destroy her.
They can, as above, abstain. I am not sure whether their asking price would be devomax (HYUFD) or another referendum (PhilipT) but it will be something along those lines.
I am not sure if Keir would or should accept either of those conditions. He’s going to need to work out a route through or around this, of course.
Keir’s hand is stronger if Lab/LD outperform the Con tally.
Again, this is why North Shrops is important. I accept your mileage may vary if you are a keen scottish nationalist.
SKS needs to have an answer to those questions well before the election, or the posters of him in the pocket of the SNP leader will be all over the Lab/Con marginals in England, just as they were in 2015.
Yes, and I have been telling my Labour friends this since 12 December 2019.
Some of the other pre-conditions I set have now been met, however.
+ Getting rid of Corbyn + Getting rid of Leonard + A tacit alliance with the LDs (maybe?)
I think Starmer would grant a ref and then campaign against it. It's what Cameron did with the EU, and it ended badly for him - but it's the only way out for Labour if they need the SNP. If they're close enough they'd look to deal and much prefer to deal with* the Lib Dems first (This stuff in NS will be forgotten by then).
* Likely a confidence and supply/vote by vote arrangement as per the DUP than a formal coalition with either the SNP or Lib Dems
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
Yes, if we were talking about a seat that might actually be in play in 2024. But, since everyone agrees that even Tony Blair would be struggling to win (let alone hold) a seat as naturally Conservative as North Shropshire, it's an irrelevant argument. So the only thing that matters next Thursday is the short-term momentum resulting from the immediate headlines following the result. Which, if you're Starmer, are be far more likely to be favourable in the medium term if the LDs outright win the seat, than if Labour finish a strong second behind the Conservatives.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
"A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price"
They can demand what they like but they won't get IndyRef2 from Starmer. The SNP have no option but to put Sir Keir into number 10 - what else would they do, put the Tories in?
The most they'll get will be some kind of devo offer, along the lines of what Gordon Brown has been talking about.
A hung parliament is actually a pretty ticklish issue for Sturgeon/Blackford to manage. If they deliberately sponsor chaos it would likely backfire as that is not what most Scots want their politicians to do.
And then I expect the same in reverse up here. Alex Cole-Hamilton is a bit of a nobber foaming on about the evils of the SNP when the enemy is and remains the Tories. You can't stop the nippie juggernaut, but we can stop the Tories from wrecking places like Banff and Buchan then wanting support for doing so.
I find it hard to include Nationalists in a progressive alliance. What's progressive about dividing people with more borders?
The English left give the SNP a free pass because Nicole is a socialist and because of their general self loathing tendency towards their own country. Imagine Labour voters reaction to a socialist flavoured English Nationalist Party that wanted to break away from the Uk. “Racist!!!”
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
Perhaps Starmer has realised that the optics of his party going from a strong second to losing its deposit in NS will not produce good headlines and would in fact be ridiculed?
It's a tricky one. Lab and LD simply must team up for the GE in order to GTTO. But Lab don't want to allow the LDs even a sniff at becoming the main non-Tory party in large tracts of the country. Which is one of the prime short to medium term goals of the LDs. It's why they went with giving Johnson his Dec 2019 gift of a GE. So, they have to work together, and I desperately hope they find a way to work together, since years and years of Johnson truly doesn't bear thinking about, but I don't know how they'll manage it. Perhaps Nick P has a view on this.
I hear you on Johnson but what makes you think that liberals want to Get The Collectivists In any more than they want to Get The Tories Out?
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
It should finish Raab. In truth it should finish Johnson too, but don't hold your breath.
And where is bloody Starmer in all this? This is the one thing he is meant to be any good at is holding people to account for criminal and quasi criminal conduct. And not a peep.
Someone needs to join the dots between Raab's slow responses and when he was on holiday....
I have zilch inside info, but this makes me feel that a Tory hold is the most likely prospect.
Looks that way. Sorry but the two parties need to actually start co-operating. I was an active part of trying to get co-operation in place during 2019 - we had our LD candidate in Stockton South openly endorse the Labour candidate as being best placed to keep the Tory out. The reciprocal backing out (in Lewes I think) was pulled by Labour HQ.
Labour had a base in OB, LibDems the same in NS. Whilst I disagree with withdrawing candidates, there needs to be the tacit agreement about which seats are winnable. The problem with some of the Labour activists is they are stupid enough to think all seats are Labour's by rights.
And then I expect the same in reverse up here. Alex Cole-Hamilton is a bit of a nobber foaming on about the evils of the SNP when the enemy is and remains the Tories. You can't stop the nippie juggernaut, but we can stop the Tories from wrecking places like Banff and Buchan then wanting support for doing so.
ACH must be an idiot if he thinks, in the Scottish context, that the enemy is the SNP.
He is.
He’s the Johann Lamont/Iain Gray/Richard Leonard of the SLDs: a nadir.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
The flaw in your argument there is what makes a Labour/Lib Dem/SNP coalition difficult is (and I agree with you on this) the SNP, not the Lib Dems. Indeed, it isn't really any more difficult than a Labour/SNP coalition without the Lib Dems.
So I agree Starmer should take a hard line on the SNP to minimise their leverage - but Lib Dems picking up in places like North Shropshire or Chesham & Amersham really isn't an issue for him. Starmer and Davey are very, very much cut from the same cloth in the way Cameron and Clegg were (or indeed Blair and Ashdown - Blair didn't need him but very clearly saw Paddy as his insurance policy in terms of pre-1997 tactics).
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
It should finish Raab. In truth it should finish Johnson too, but don't hold your breath.
And where is bloody Starmer in all this? This is the one thing he is meant to be any good at is holding people to account for criminal and quasi criminal conduct. And not a peep.
Someone needs to join the dots between Raab's slow responses and when he was on holiday....
Not really. If he had been on holiday someone else might have actually got things done when they needed doing.
My thought are that is may be a bit of both 2 and 3 (and 1 even) but it is unlikely to be mostly 3, I say this because we can look at the ratio of known infections to known Hospitalizations, in SA there was an ongoing tradition of Delta, with low and steady numbers, and we know how many of those where hospitalised, and there are probably a simmiler number getting delta every day now. Most/all the growth over the last 2 weeks or so in SA has been Omicron, and its growing in the same population with the same amount of vaccination/natural immunity but does not appear to have the same ratio of infection to hospitalisation.
Unless we are hypnotising that Delta is only(mostly) being infected in unwaxed/no prior-infection people, but that Omicron is escaping the vaccine and natural immunity enough to transmit well in those people, but then to not harm them enough to give bad outcomes.
Yes, you might be right. I think we'll have to wait for the UK data, once there's a large enough number of cases who have been infected long enough to potentially show up in the hospitalisation figures.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
"A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price"
They can demand what they like but they won't get IndyRef2 from Starmer. The SNP have no option but to put Sir Keir into number 10 - what else would they do, put the Tories in?
The most they'll get will be some kind of devo offer, along the lines of what Gordon Brown has been talking about.
A hung parliament is actually a pretty ticklish issue for Sturgeon/Blackford to manage. If they deliberately sponsor chaos it would likely backfire as that is not what most Scots want their politicians to do.
A second election forced by the SNP being stupid would result in Labour picking up a lot of former SNP votes
Just noticed that small village just outside the North of the constituency.
Quite a famous window there. Which of the parties will be able to shift it in this election?
Seems to me it's not so much shifting as closing. On policy the differences between Cons and Lab are small. The choice is stark imo but it's on ethics and competence.
The key difference for me is that the government has been bloody awful on civil liberties this last 2 years, and Labour have been clamouring at every opportunity to be worse. That's why Labour won't be picking up my vote.
If your main beef is the Cons have been too lockdowny then, no, Lab make no sense for you since they have been even more so. Tice's party is the obvious one for you to consider, I'd say.
Or you could stick with Johnson, of course, but to do that you will have to remove ethics and competence from the list of things you are voting on.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Forgive my possible oversimplification, but:
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W - Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category - A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
They don't but Starmer would demand the SNP vote on English laws in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise Starmer would effectively only be PM in terms of defence and foreign affairs and some tax. The Tories would still have a majority on most English only legislation and it would be chaos.
A win for Leave at Sindyref2 would then mean the Tories returned to power automatically once Scottish MPs left the Commons unless Starmer could get the SNP to back PR first and then call a snap general election before they left
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
It should finish Raab. In truth it should finish Johnson too, but don't hold your breath.
And where is bloody Starmer in all this? This is the one thing he is meant to be any good at is holding people to account for criminal and quasi criminal conduct. And not a peep.
Someone needs to join the dots between Raab's slow responses and when he was on holiday....
When you look around at the generally crap performance of most ministries, one wonders who is more to blame? The ministers or the civil servants?
Seems clear to me the FCO is a shadow of its former self. Where were they in Oct 2019 when the virus first shut down Wuhan? Why was pb ahead of them in Jan/Feb on what was happening in China? How did they drop the ball so catastrophically in Afghanistan and have no inkling of what would unfold, when the French did?
I’ll tell you why. Because they’ve become obsessed with trade and terrorism. Concerning.
They can, as above, abstain. I am not sure whether their asking price would be devomax (HYUFD) or another referendum (PhilipT) but it will be something along those lines.
I am not sure if Keir would or should accept either of those conditions. He’s going to need to work out a route through or around this, of course.
Keir’s hand is stronger if Lab/LD outperform the Con tally.
Again, this is why North Shrops is important. I accept your mileage may vary if you are a keen scottish nationalist.
They have options! But some are significantly worse than others. Voting or abstaining to sink an unstable and desperate rainbow coalition in favour of a party of HYUFDist Tories hardly does them any favours. So they wouldn't./
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
"A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price"
They can demand what they like but they won't get IndyRef2 from Starmer. The SNP have no option but to put Sir Keir into number 10 - what else would they do, put the Tories in?
The most they'll get will be some kind of devo offer, along the lines of what Gordon Brown has been talking about.
A hung parliament is actually a pretty ticklish issue for Sturgeon/Blackford to manage. If they deliberately sponsor chaos it would likely backfire as that is not what most Scots want their politicians to do.
A second election forced by the SNP being stupid would result in Labour picking up a lot of former SNP votes
Hmm would it? Or would an election a couple of months later yield a similarly unstable parliament without the explicit support of the SNP, only strengthening their hand on the terms of the referendum?
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
He's talking like a Tory desperate to have the opposition vote split.
The Sunday papers were full of reports from journalists both on the ground and in London of "Tory jitters" in the runup to this by-election. It isn't any electoral threat from Labour that they are worrying about.
The Tories love having Labour as their opponents, since for very many of their held seats it keeps them safe: the balance between the two parties may rise and fall in line with national trends, but there are very many seats away from British towns that Labour can never win, even in the best realistically possible year.
My thought are that is may be a bit of both 2 and 3 (and 1 even) but it is unlikely to be mostly 3, I say this because we can look at the ratio of known infections to known Hospitalizations, in SA there was an ongoing tradition of Delta, with low and steady numbers, and we know how many of those where hospitalised, and there are probably a simmiler number getting delta every day now. Most/all the growth over the last 2 weeks or so in SA has been Omicron, and its growing in the same population with the same amount of vaccination/natural immunity but does not appear to have the same ratio of infection to hospitalisation.
Unless we are hypnotising that Delta is only(mostly) being infected in unwaxed/no prior-infection people, but that Omicron is escaping the vaccine and natural immunity enough to transmit well in those people, but then to not harm them enough to give bad outcomes.
Yes, you might be right. I think we'll have to wait for the UK data, once there's a large enough number of cases who have been infected long enough to potentially show up in the hospitalisation figures.
10 days ago we had 2 Omicron cases. We're not nearly far enough along to check hospitalisation, let alone death effects.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
It should finish Raab. In truth it should finish Johnson too, but don't hold your breath.
And where is bloody Starmer in all this? This is the one thing he is meant to be any good at is holding people to account for criminal and quasi criminal conduct. And not a peep.
Someone needs to join the dots between Raab's slow responses and when he was on holiday....
When you look around at the generally crap performance of most ministries, one wonders who is more to blame? The ministers or the civil servants?
Seems clear to me the FCO is a shadow of its former self. Where were they in Oct 2019 when the virus first shut down Wuhan? Why was pb ahead of them in Jan/Feb on what was happening in China? How did they drop the ball so catastrophically in Afghanistan and have no inkling of what would unfold, when the French did?
I’ll tell you why. Because they’ve become obsessed with trade and terrorism. Concerning.
I’m not sure the FCO have ever been good. Not in my living memory, anyway.
Also, their budget was gutted from 2010. William Hague wasn’t actually very good.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
You understand "once bitten, twice shy?"
There is zero prospect of Ed Davey even providing succour to the Tories if they attempted to cling to power having just lost the election. Pretty much everyone in politics barring you and the other remaining Peppa fanbois see the Tories as a Clear and Present Danger to the UK.
As you want to scrap the UK I understand why you like them, but the din from people disgusted by the government and their machinations is starting to sound like a Boney M ode to Rasputin.
I'm a bigger believer in mathematics than I am trying to understand what Ed Davey is thinking. If the mathematics means the Conservatives are the only plausible government then your coalition of chaos can go whistle.
If the Conservatives are on 310-315 seats after the election then the Opposition parties will go into talks with each other but all it takes is any party to make what the other parties consider an "unreasonable" demand and the whole thing will fall apart and the Conservatives will continue as a minority government.
The SNP would obviously demand an independence referendum, the Lib Dems would demand electoral reform, the Labour left and right will make their own demands and without an agreement the Conservatives will remain in Downing Street just as Brown did until an alternative was agreed.
Whilst I understand the scenario you are portraying, it just doesn't exist in the real world. In 2010 the Labour government was tired and unpopular, Cameron looked fresh faced and moderate. Compare and contrast to now and what a Johnson government would look like going into that election.
There is right and wrong in politics. Just because Peppa thinks he can do what he likes and has corrupted this intake of Tories to the same doesn't mean others will support it. If Peppa is gone and we have Sunak, then perhaps a deal could be done. With Johnson? Absolutely zero chance.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Forgive my possible oversimplification, but:
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W - Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category - A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
They don't but Starmer would demand the SNP vote on English laws in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise Starmer would effectively only be PM in terms of defence and foreign affairs and some tax. The Tories would still have a majority on most English only legislation and it would be chaos.
A win for Leave at Sindyref2 would then mean the Tories returned to power automatically once Scottish MPs left the Commons unless Starmer could get the SNP to back PR first and then call a snap general election before they left
Could Labour even manage to march all their own backbenchers through the lobbies in support of a Scottish referendum? It would only need a handful to be against it.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
"A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price"
They can demand what they like but they won't get IndyRef2 from Starmer. The SNP have no option but to put Sir Keir into number 10 - what else would they do, put the Tories in?
The most they'll get will be some kind of devo offer, along the lines of what Gordon Brown has been talking about.
A hung parliament is actually a pretty ticklish issue for Sturgeon/Blackford to manage. If they deliberately sponsor chaos it would likely backfire as that is not what most Scots want their politicians to do.
A second election forced by the SNP being stupid would result in Labour picking up a lot of former SNP votes
Even under Corbyn in 2017, SLAB took back 6 seats in the Central Belt and were very close in several more. More due to a decline in SNP turnout than a big uptick in Labour support, but it's a sign of what could happen if SNP misplay their hand in the event of NOC at Westminster.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
Yes, if we were talking about a seat that might actually be in play in 2024. But, since everyone agrees that even Tony Blair would be struggling to win (let alone hold) a seat as naturally Conservative as North Shropshire, it's an irrelevant argument. So the only thing that matters next Thursday is the short-term momentum resulting from the immediate headlines following the result. Which, if you're Starmer, are be far more likely to be favourable in the medium term if the LDs outright win the seat, than if Labour finish a strong second behind the Conservatives.
I don't agree that Tony Blair would struggle to win this seat in a by-election created by scandal. I think Tony Blair would have gone hell for leather to win this seat.
If the Leader of the Opposition could get 15,000 of the 17,000 voters who voted Labour four years ago to turnout to give the government a kicking they'd probably win this seat.
Off Topic, but for anybody who whats a change of subject:
In the US state of Georgia, there is a battle brewing to be the governor, that could have big implications for the mid-terms TRUMP and the next POTUS
The incumbent republican incumbent Governor Mr Kemp, has IMHO done a good job, the economy in Georgia is doing well and he was swift to reopen up last year after a short lockdown. he should in normal times be confidant of reselection as the Republican governor and then have a good prospects at re-election in 2022.
however another republican Mr Predue, is not happy that the Kemp did not support Trump enough in 2020, and is primarying him, and Mr Predue has a lot of his own money to spend, Predue has no other complaints and is supportive of all his other actions but that!
Meanwhile the Democrat who kame close last time Stacy Abrahams is likely to run again as the democrat.
What might happen: ether Mr Predue wins the Primary in which case he will have a tough time against Ms Abrhams as he will no doubt lose the support of the moderates/never trump swing voters, or Mr Kemp wins the primary in which case he will find it hard to get some of the Trump vote our in the main election.
That's not defiant there may be a big enough anti-Democrat swing anyway, for who ever the republicans nominate to get elected, maybe.
But this will IMHO reopen a big old woned and the battle will remind everybody of TRUMP.
I really hope Predue fails miserably because if he does it might put Trump of trying to get the Republican nomination for 2024.
And then I expect the same in reverse up here. Alex Cole-Hamilton is a bit of a nobber foaming on about the evils of the SNP when the enemy is and remains the Tories. You can't stop the nippie juggernaut, but we can stop the Tories from wrecking places like Banff and Buchan then wanting support for doing so.
I find it hard to include Nationalists in a progressive alliance. What's progressive about dividing people with more borders?
Hug your enemies closely. The more that Scotland is patronised by HYUFD and his wazzocks the greater the chance of Scotland doing something it might later regret. Or, bring about the SNP's worst fears - devomax. They can't whine on about how Scotland is shafted when its largely self-governing. Would kill any prospect of independence.
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
It should finish Raab. In truth it should finish Johnson too, but don't hold your breath.
And where is bloody Starmer in all this? This is the one thing he is meant to be any good at is holding people to account for criminal and quasi criminal conduct. And not a peep.
Someone needs to join the dots between Raab's slow responses and when he was on holiday....
When you look around at the generally crap performance of most ministries, one wonders who is more to blame? The ministers or the civil servants?
Seems clear to me the FCO is a shadow of its former self. Where were they in Oct 2019 when the virus first shut down Wuhan? Why was pb ahead of them in Jan/Feb on what was happening in China? How did they drop the ball so catastrophically in Afghanistan and have no inkling of what would unfold, when the French did?
I’ll tell you why. Because they’ve become obsessed with trade and terrorism. Concerning.
I’m not sure the FCO have ever been good. Not in my living memory, anyway.
Also, their budget was gutted from 2010. William Hague wasn’t actually very good.
I’d add that Boris has made it worse by merging FCO and DfID. DfID was considered a well run unit with high performance/morale.
The merger might have made sense on paper, but culture > accounting.
The best bet on this market is surely to Lay the Tories. Governments shouldn't win by-elections, especially in these circumstances.
Labour really should be picking up this seat. They need a smaller swing to gain this seat than other by-elections have seen before, they're the so-called Opposition, they're second-placed and they've regularly polled over 30% in this seat before.
If like in OBS they don't achieve a good swing then something is very, very wrong with Keir Starmer's leadership.
You're talking like a Tory Party operative doing expectations management.
If people aren't expecting the Opposition to win seats they're second-placed in, when the government is mired in scandal, when the by-election was created by scandal, and where the Opposition has achieved 17 thousand votes in the very recent past . . . then I think expectations management has already been achieved but not by me.
Truly pathetic if Labour don't even try and win this seat.
It's nice of you to be concerned about the reputation and welfare of the Labour Party, Philip, I must say. Surprising but nice.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
"A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price"
They can demand what they like but they won't get IndyRef2 from Starmer. The SNP have no option but to put Sir Keir into number 10 - what else would they do, put the Tories in?
The most they'll get will be some kind of devo offer, along the lines of what Gordon Brown has been talking about.
A hung parliament is actually a pretty ticklish issue for Sturgeon/Blackford to manage. If they deliberately sponsor chaos it would likely backfire as that is not what most Scots want their politicians to do.
They don't have to put anyone in. They can reject any agreement that doesn't contain Indyref2.
The Tories then remain in power by default, with Sturgeon and Blackford saying "agree to a referendum and the Tories are out".
They have no reason to let Starmer deny them their right to hold a referendum. Why would he buy the cow if they give the milk away for free?
I believe Downing Street denied at the time that rescue animals were airlifted from Kabul at the PM’s request.
The whistleblower says otherwise.
The whistleblower says the request came from Wendy Morton MP, Minister for Europe, not Downing street, and such ministerial interventions to highlight particular cases were routine and perfectly appropriate
Just noticed that small village just outside the North of the constituency.
Quite a famous window there. Which of the parties will be able to shift it in this election?
Seems to me it's not so much shifting as closing. On policy the differences between Cons and Lab are small. The choice is stark imo but it's on ethics and competence.
The key difference for me is that the government has been bloody awful on civil liberties this last 2 years, and Labour have been clamouring at every opportunity to be worse. That's why Labour won't be picking up my vote.
If your main beef is the Cons have been too lockdowny then, no, Lab make no sense for you since they have been even more so. Tice's party is the obvious one for you to consider, I'd say.
Or you could stick with Johnson, of course, but to do that you will have to remove ethics and competence from the list of things you are voting on.
Tice's Party is outright libertarian - much more so than run-of-the-Mill (geddit) liberals can stomach. Too right wing. So much to object to there.
Liberals like me and others on here, perhaps Cookie, are regretful that LibDems haven't supplied much, if any, opposition to the civil liberty side of things.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Forgive my possible oversimplification, but:
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W - Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category - A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
They don't but Starmer would demand the SNP vote on English laws in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise Starmer would effectively only be PM in terms of defence and foreign affairs and some tax. The Tories would still have a majority on most English only legislation and it would be chaos.
A win for Leave at Sindyref2 would then mean the Tories returned to power automatically once Scottish MPs left the Commons unless Starmer could get the SNP to back PR first and then call a snap general election before they left
Could Labour even manage to march all their own backbenchers through the lobbies in support of a Scottish referendum? It would only need a handful to be against it.
If I’m not mistaken, last time there was no vote in the UK Parliament with a Section 30 order passed by the executive, transferring the power to the Scottish Parliament.
And then I expect the same in reverse up here. Alex Cole-Hamilton is a bit of a nobber foaming on about the evils of the SNP when the enemy is and remains the Tories. You can't stop the nippie juggernaut, but we can stop the Tories from wrecking places like Banff and Buchan then wanting support for doing so.
I find it hard to include Nationalists in a progressive alliance. What's progressive about dividing people with more borders?
Hug your enemies closely. The more that Scotland is patronised by HYUFD and his wazzocks the greater the chance of Scotland doing something it might later regret. Or, bring about the SNP's worst fears - devomax. They can't whine on about how Scotland is shafted when its largely self-governing. Would kill any prospect of independence.
I’m philosophical in favour of devomax but I haven’t figured out how to make it work given the rapid shortfall in revenues available to a devomaxxed Scottish government.
Devil is in the detail. In some respects we have -actually devolved too much, but in most far too little.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
Of course it could be in play at the next election.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
That's just saying that RP's "Not Tories" block wouldn't have the numbers to form a stable government, isn't it? It's true in those circumstances that the largest party would supply the PM, Johnson would be very likely to go, and there would be a very shortlived caretaker administration followed by an election which Sunak (or whoever) would either win or not. It isn't at all like 2010 - Johnson's Tories are quite genuinely uncoalitionable.
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition was quite stable because there were a lot of similarities between Cameron's Conservatives and Clegg's Lib Dems. Its what made them such good coalition partners.
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
"A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price"
They can demand what they like but they won't get IndyRef2 from Starmer. The SNP have no option but to put Sir Keir into number 10 - what else would they do, put the Tories in?
The most they'll get will be some kind of devo offer, along the lines of what Gordon Brown has been talking about.
A hung parliament is actually a pretty ticklish issue for Sturgeon/Blackford to manage. If they deliberately sponsor chaos it would likely backfire as that is not what most Scots want their politicians to do.
They don't have to put anyone in. They can reject any agreement that doesn't contain Indyref2.
The Tories then remain in power by default, with Sturgeon and Blackford saying "agree to a referendum and the Tories are out".
They have no reason to let Starmer deny them their right to hold a referendum. Why would he buy the cow if they give the milk away for free?
You must be joking. If the SNP screw around and the result is continuing Tory rule they will be toast. Simples.
Its funny to see the desperation of Opposition supporters once again treating the Lib Dems as "not Tories" and thus Labour's baby sister.
The Lib Dems are not Tories, but they're not Labour either. They've been prepared to support the Tories in Downing Street in the past and the could again in the future. The Lib Dems winning seats isn't good enough for Labour to take Downing Street, they need to take some themselves.
Yes and no. Could the future LibDems work with a future Tory party? Of course. Is that in play at the next election? No.
There are NO parties who will work with these Tories. None. Unless the Nigel returns to lead REFUK and they somehow actually win seats.
So the block is simple - Tories, Not Tories, and unaligned. I can see a few NI parties in the unaligned camp, the rest will all be Not Tories.
You shouldn’t be so eager to jump into bed with the SNP if you want to win English seats…
The non-Tory block will have to include the SNP - its just adding. As there is no way on this planet that the SNP would repeat the mistake of 1979 in voting down a Labour government for a Tory one, no formal deal is needed.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
The SNP will actually only give Starmer confidence and supply in return for devomax and indyref2. Otherwise they would abstain
Forgive my possible oversimplification, but:
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W - Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category - A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
None. All Starmer has to do is put together a reasonable budget and then dare the SNP to vote with the Tories.
Anti-Tory voters in Scotland might not be best pleased to see their "anti-Tory" SNP MPs vote with the Tories to bring down a Labour government.
This is why a Tory majority at Westminster is imperative for the SNP.
That's not all Starmer has to do. Starmer can't even go to see the King or Queen without an agreement first. The precedent is already set that until the Opposition has the votes to take power, the government continues in office.
Its a very English Left way of thinking to think that SNP voters are "anti-Tory". They're "anti-UK" and "anti-London" more now.
No way Sturgeon could survive holding the balance of power and not getting her referendum, its simply implausible. Her critics in the SNP and wider independence movement would destroy her.
The SNP have succeeded in creating the identity that English=Tory, so that to be anti-Tory is to be anti-English and vice versa. Presumably the non-Tory English are not truly English. A lot of what our RochdalePioneers writes reflects this view.
For the SNP to fail to support Labour to oust the Tories would test the question of how many of the supporters they gained during the referendum campaign are more anti-English than anti-Tory.
It worries me that Sturgeon is a more skilled politician than Starmer, and she might succeed in encouraging many people to take the final step of embracing anti-English Scottish Nationalism.
The Tories do seem to be making a complete hash of this by election in every respect so I'm pretty confident now in predicting that they'll drop to around 40% or barely over that so it's just a question of whether the Lib Dems can narrowly beat that or not.
I'm less confident in predicting the LD and Lab vote shares but I don't see how Labour gets more than 15% in the context of this by election TBH.
That said I don't think Labour running a low key campaign in places like Oswestry will hurt the Lib Dems very much overall. Some similarities with the Witney by election.
Ideal result would be Lib Dems narrowly winning and Lab still getting about 15%.
Comments
Nonetheless, it's evident that Labour is now making an effort, with various senior Labour people (interestingly on the centrist wing of the party who you might have thought would be keenest on a tacit alliance) talking up the campaign. My guess is that up to Bexley they were totally focused there, and have now shifted attention.
We need a proper pact is my conclusion FWIW.
"Mmmm... 1st Oxford, PPE, Masters in literature... Sorbonne.. good, good. *That* think tank... excellent. Stint at the Pirory? The X branch? Did you meet Dr James there? How is he? Yes, excellent background...."
The 17 thousand votes Labour achieved here in the very recent past is considerably more than the Tories achieved in either Bexley or Chesham and Amersham.
Blair would have been here repeatedly seeking to win this seat, he wouldn't have spurned the opportunity to claim a scalp.
1. It might just be too early to tell, i.e. the cases haven't yet had time to get to the hospitalisation/death stage;
2. Omicron might intrinsically be milder than previous variants (i.e. milder in populations which have not previously been infected or vaccinated);
3. It might be showing up as milder because those being infected now in SA (and increasingly elsewhere) already have some immunity to severe disease through previous infections and vaccination.
Although we can't quite be sure yet, we probably have a long enough period of data now to conclude that 1 is unlikely, i.e. that it's not just a timing issue.
However, we don't have enough data to distinguish between 2 and 3. Lots of people seem to be assuming 2, but 3 is more likely. (It could have course be a bit of both).
The difference between 2 and 3 is very important for the 25% or so of under-50s in the UK who still (incredibly) are unjabbed, and even more important for those countries where vaccination rates are much lower.
Devolution of both politics and media is required.
It should be possible (and desirable) to go:
Provincial uni > local politics > national leadership.
4. the low hanging fruit argument: the most vulnerable can no longer die of omicron because they have already died of delta.
Lets say we get a very similar tally to 2017 but the DUP are only just not enough. Then the Lib Dems would just need to not back a 'coalition of chaos' and abstain to allow the Tories to continue in office as a minority government, possibly with Johnson resigning and being replaced.
One of the Silicon Valley billionaires, because they had access to real billions, could retire and fund candidates for Congress and the Senate. Completely. So they wouldn't have to spend 50% of their lives raising money form special interests. Then run on the "I'm not corrupt - look at my opponent. All my money comes from a pile of US government bonds via X"
Having taken over the Senate and Congress in short order, X could then run for president, again not taking any money.
Such an individual would then have completely control of the machinery of US government, without any control from the usual power brokers.
Truly pathetic if Labour don't even try and win this seat.
2010 had a few elements - a dire need for a stable government in the context of failing bond auctions and economic meltdown, electoral maths that meant no stable coalition was possible without the Conservatives (from recollection, Labour + Lib Dem + SNP + Green + Plaid would have had a low single figure majority), a pretty progressive Tory leader in Cameron (who had decent personal chemistry with Clegg), and a very tired Labour administration (it was hard to say it hadn't been rejected by the electorate).
None of those are likely to be in play if there's a hung parliament in 2024 (or whenever) and Johnson is leader. If it happens, the Conservatives will be the ones falling back, there is very little common ground or chemistry between Davey and Johnson (but is with Starmer), and the Tories just aren't Cameroons any more. And if the electoral maths doesn't work for a stable progressive coalition, there's no economic disaster in the background - the likely outcome would be a leader of the largest party forms a caretaker administration, with a fairly swift second election to follow.
TL/DR - 2024 is not 2010.
In simple truth the SNP would give confidence and supply to any minority Labour government with no deal of any description offered. And that needs to be the message from the Labour front bench if it looks close in 2024.
You have the chance of a £3200 pick up and you have reduced this possible pickup to £3,000 for the sake of winning £2?
However, we're not in the 80s/90s now, as Hartlepool and OBS showed. The government is unpopular but so, in leave-leaning seats at least, are the main English opposition parties. We can't assume that Lab or LD will benefit from anger at the government.
My assessment therefore is that a Con hold is most likely, and that odds of 1.5 are about right.
I am, however, surprised that LDs are the favoured challengers. LDs were third at the GE and it isn't obvious why the electorate of NS should be suddenly rallying to them.
The SNP will have one rock solid demand and that is an independence referendum. Deny that, and they'd vote down any Queen's Speech without it being agreed, by anyone.
The SNP quite simply 'hold all the cards', there very reason for existence is to get that referendum and if they fail to do so while holding the balance of power then that will tear them asunder more than voting down "London Labour" would.
There is zero prospect of Ed Davey even providing succour to the Tories if they attempted to cling to power having just lost the election. Pretty much everyone in politics barring you and the other remaining Peppa fanbois see the Tories as a Clear and Present Danger to the UK.
As you want to scrap the UK I understand why you like them, but the din from people disgusted by the government and their machinations is starting to sound like a Boney M ode to Rasputin.
https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/41257/pdf/
Lib Dem activists' positive or negative vibes towards other parties:
1. Greens
2. Labour
3. SNP
4. Tories
5. REFUK / UKIP etc
(3 and 4 possibly swapped North of the Border)
Other party activists' positive or negative vibes towards Lib Dems:
1. Greens
2. Tories
3. REFUK/UKIP etc
4. SNP
5. Labour
I'd have expected 90s Labour to win, of course.
I do agree with your last para.
However LD voters are anti hard Brexit so the LDs will back Starmer in return for closer alignment to the SM and CU
They can, as above, abstain. I am not sure whether their asking price would be devomax (HYUFD) or another referendum (PhilipT) but it will be something along those lines.
I am not sure if Keir would or should accept either of those conditions. He’s going to need to work out a route through or around this, of course.
Keir’s hand is stronger if Lab/LD outperform the Con tally.
Again, this is why North Shrops is important.
I accept your mileage may vary if you are a keen scottish nationalist.
My thought are that is may be a bit of both 2 and 3 (and 1 even) but it is unlikely to be mostly 3, I say this because we can look at the ratio of known infections to known Hospitalizations, in SA there was an ongoing tradition of Delta, with low and steady numbers, and we know how many of those where hospitalised, and there are probably a simmiler number getting delta every day now. Most/all the growth over the last 2 weeks or so in SA has been Omicron, and its growing in the same population with the same amount of vaccination/natural immunity but does not appear to have the same ratio of infection to hospitalisation.
Unless we are hypnotising that Delta is only(mostly) being infected in unwaxed/no prior-infection people, but that Omicron is escaping the vaccine and natural immunity enough to transmit well in those people, but then to not harm them enough to give bad outcomes.
Bit torn here, too. As Philip points out, a Labour party serious about winning should be challenging in NS. However, I think we (or most, anyway) believe that a next GE Labour majority is as likely as the discovery of rocking horse poop. So, perhaps there's also a need to keep the LDs sweet. Or is there? In how many seats is tacit LD support important to Labour chances at the next GE? Labour can piss off the LDs as much as they like but still unilaterally soft-pedal themselves in the LD targets that are Con-held at the next election.
If the Conservatives are on 310-315 seats after the election then the Opposition parties will go into talks with each other but all it takes is any party to make what the other parties consider an "unreasonable" demand and the whole thing will fall apart and the Conservatives will continue as a minority government.
The SNP would obviously demand an independence referendum, the Lib Dems would demand electoral reform, the Labour left and right will make their own demands and without an agreement the Conservatives will remain in Downing Street just as Brown did until an alternative was agreed.
If its a key vote where their abstention brings about an early GE and a Tory government, that does them no favours. Keeping a weak rainbow coalition in power is massively more beneficial to them.
So of course they would vote confidence. Or else put nobbers into power who say "we're not going to listen to you Scotch no matter how you vote so there".
I do like the continued use of "coalition of chaos". I suspect it resonates with many, but I always enjoy the irony that the Coalition was easily the most stable, predictable Government of the UK this century. There are a hell of a lot of moderate Tories in Lib Dem seats lost in 2015 who would have secured a much, much better result in terms of their own political outlook had they held their noses and voted Lib Dem, but hindsight's 20/20 - it wasn't really predictable that the seeds of the death of Cameron's brand of Conservative Party were sown in what must have felt like a brilliant victory in 2015.
- MPs for Scottish seats don't (by convention) vote at Westminster on matters relating only to E&W
- Devomax means that, effectively, almost all possible votes fall into that category
- A win for Leave at SindyRef2 means all the SNP MPs leave Westinster at some point anyway
So what exactly is the long-term benefit to Starmer of C&S from the SNP?
You Boris-haters would attack them for *anything...
The problem for Labour now is that Labour/SNP/others is a chaotic coalition in the way that the Conservative/Lib Dem one wasn't. The SNP are agents of chaos so anything involving them is going to be chaotic.
A Labour/Lib Dem coalition is viable but extremely unlikely. A Labour/SNP one would be rough but viable, but the SNP would demand their referendum as a price. A Labour/SNP/Lib Dem one is just not plausible in my eyes. That's why Labour gaining the seats not the Lib Dems is in my view so important if Starmer were to become PM.
Certainly the senior civil servants might also share some responsibility, but many of the decisions unmade, which ought to have been made, were political rather than administrative matters.
And where is bloody Starmer in all this? This is the one thing he is meant to be any good at is holding people to account for criminal and quasi criminal conduct. And not a peep.
Anti-Tory voters in Scotland might not be best pleased to see their "anti-Tory" SNP MPs vote with the Tories to bring down a Labour government.
This is why a Tory majority at Westminster is imperative for the SNP.
I'd certainly vote Tory if I lived at my parents to try and get Sultana out.
Starmer looks competent enough, he's not really on my side but I'm aware I'm too niche a voter for anyone to tailor themselves to. He won't win.
1. SNP are centre left, and Sturgeon has pushed them leftward.
2. The peculiar nature of Scottish politics is that there is mental firewall between Tory and non-Tory in the minds of swing voters.
Thus, Lab/LD are punished more for potentially allying with the Tories than they are with the SNP.
In Scotland, Lab/LD can (outside some tactical instances) only grow their vote by reaching current SNP voters. In turn, Unionism can only grow its vote by Lab/LD doing this.
In 2010, not only was there only one credible coalition, but a pressing economic need to make it happen and a pretty sizeable majority when it was formed (as I say, the 2010-15 Government, whatever one thinks of it in policy terms, was quite exceptionally stable - it never once seriously looked like falling).
SNP are soft on the Tories.
Its a very English Left way of thinking to think that SNP voters are "anti-Tory". They're "anti-UK" and "anti-London" more now.
No way Sturgeon could survive holding the balance of power and not getting her referendum, its simply implausible. Her critics in the SNP and wider independence movement would destroy her.
Some of the other pre-conditions I set have now been met, however.
+ Getting rid of Corbyn
+ Getting rid of Leonard
+ A tacit alliance with the LDs (maybe?)
* Likely a confidence and supply/vote by vote arrangement as per the DUP than a formal coalition with either the SNP or Lib Dems
They can demand what they like but they won't get IndyRef2 from Starmer. The SNP have no option but to put Sir Keir into number 10 - what else would they do, put the Tories in?
The most they'll get will be some kind of devo offer, along the lines of what Gordon Brown has been talking about.
A hung parliament is actually a pretty ticklish issue for Sturgeon/Blackford to manage. If they deliberately sponsor chaos it would likely backfire as that is not what most Scots want their politicians to do.
He’s the Johann Lamont/Iain Gray/Richard Leonard of the SLDs: a nadir.
So I agree Starmer should take a hard line on the SNP to minimise their leverage - but Lib Dems picking up in places like North Shropshire or Chesham & Amersham really isn't an issue for him. Starmer and Davey are very, very much cut from the same cloth in the way Cameron and Clegg were (or indeed Blair and Ashdown - Blair didn't need him but very clearly saw Paddy as his insurance policy in terms of pre-1997 tactics).
Or you could stick with Johnson, of course, but to do that you will have to remove ethics and competence from the list of things you are voting on.
A win for Leave at Sindyref2 would then mean the Tories returned to power automatically once Scottish MPs left the Commons unless Starmer could get the SNP to back PR first and then call a snap general election before they left
Seems clear to me the FCO is a shadow of its former self. Where were they in Oct 2019 when the virus first shut down Wuhan? Why was pb ahead of them in Jan/Feb on what was happening in China? How did they drop the ball so catastrophically in Afghanistan and have no inkling of what would unfold, when the French did?
I’ll tell you why. Because they’ve become obsessed with trade and terrorism. Concerning.
Ben Wallace's call was correct.
The Sunday papers were full of reports from journalists both on the ground and in London of "Tory jitters" in the runup to this by-election. It isn't any electoral threat from Labour that they are worrying about.
The Tories love having Labour as their opponents, since for very many of their held seats it keeps them safe: the balance between the two parties may rise and fall in line with national trends, but there are very many seats away from British towns that Labour can never win, even in the best realistically possible year.
Also, their budget was gutted from 2010. William Hague wasn’t actually very good.
There is right and wrong in politics. Just because Peppa thinks he can do what he likes and has corrupted this intake of Tories to the same doesn't mean others will support it. If Peppa is gone and we have Sunak, then perhaps a deal could be done. With Johnson? Absolutely zero chance.
If the Leader of the Opposition could get 15,000 of the 17,000 voters who voted Labour four years ago to turnout to give the government a kicking they'd probably win this seat.
In the US state of Georgia, there is a battle brewing to be the governor, that could have big implications for the mid-terms TRUMP and the next POTUS
The incumbent republican incumbent Governor Mr Kemp, has IMHO done a good job, the economy in Georgia is doing well and he was swift to reopen up last year after a short lockdown. he should in normal times be confidant of reselection as the Republican governor and then have a good prospects at re-election in 2022.
however another republican Mr Predue, is not happy that the Kemp did not support Trump enough in 2020, and is primarying him, and Mr Predue has a lot of his own money to spend, Predue has no other complaints and is supportive of all his other actions but that!
Meanwhile the Democrat who kame close last time Stacy Abrahams is likely to run again as the democrat.
What might happen: ether Mr Predue wins the Primary in which case he will have a tough time against Ms Abrhams as he will no doubt lose the support of the moderates/never trump swing voters, or Mr Kemp wins the primary in which case he will find it hard to get some of the Trump vote our in the main election.
That's not defiant there may be a big enough anti-Democrat swing anyway, for who ever the republicans nominate to get elected, maybe.
But this will IMHO reopen a big old woned and the battle will remind everybody of TRUMP.
I really hope Predue fails miserably because if he does it might put Trump of trying to get the Republican nomination for 2024.
https://hotair.com/allahpundit/2021/12/06/trump-if-kemp-beats-perdue-in-the-georgia-primary-the-election-must-be-rigged-n433573
The merger might have made sense on paper, but culture > accounting.
Seems to be against general mood music - I had thought a more transmissible virus meant a less serious one in terms of health outcome..
The Tories then remain in power by default, with Sturgeon and Blackford saying "agree to a referendum and the Tories are out".
They have no reason to let Starmer deny them their right to hold a referendum. Why would he buy the cow if they give the milk away for free?
Can only play well.
Boris knows the voters.
Liberals like me and others on here, perhaps Cookie, are regretful that LibDems haven't supplied much, if any, opposition to the civil liberty side of things.
Devil is in the detail. In some respects we have -actually devolved too much, but in most far too little.
For the SNP to fail to support Labour to oust the Tories would test the question of how many of the supporters they gained during the referendum campaign are more anti-English than anti-Tory.
It worries me that Sturgeon is a more skilled politician than Starmer, and she might succeed in encouraging many people to take the final step of embracing anti-English Scottish Nationalism.
I'm less confident in predicting the LD and Lab vote shares but I don't see how Labour gets more than 15% in the context of this by election TBH.
That said I don't think Labour running a low key campaign in places like Oswestry will hurt the Lib Dems very much overall. Some similarities with the Witney by election.
Ideal result would be Lib Dems narrowly winning and Lab still getting about 15%.