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How would a “progressive alliance” work? – politicalbetting.com
How would a “progressive alliance” work? – politicalbetting.com
The recent by-elections have prompted a rash of discussions about whether and how the non-Tory parties can work together. It’s something I’ve thought about a lot over the years, with experience of both seats where Labour was the leading non-Tory party (Broxtowe, Islington North) and seats where it wasn’t (Chelsea, SW Surrey). A few facts to start off with: Historical comparisons make it implausible that Labour will win an absolute majority at the next election. In our volatile climate, you can’t rule anything out, but the wall to be climbed is staggeringly steep. Relations between the Labour and LibDem parties at national level are reasonably cordial.
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The problem with alliances is that they alienate as many as they attract.
What does ex-MP Nick “Historical comparisons make it implausible that Labour will win an absolute majority at the next election” Palmer say?
and once it's done locally, you can then do it again nationally once it's obvious that it works.
The biggest downside I expect would not be Lib Dem gains at Labour's expense (which seem doubtful anyway, more likely the Lib Dems would benefit from a lot more representation in multi-member constituencies in Southern Tory shires). It's that they ship vast amounts of votes and seats to the Greens, driven by young urban voters. Labour would need to sharpen up its act to keep hold of these. I think I agree that it's the Labour centrists with the most to fear. On the other hand, if the goal isn't tribal success but policies that are good for the country, then I imagine Labour centrists would be pretty happy with the likely outcome of a post-PR election.
I don't think the Greens can gain any seats apart from Bristol West and would be wise not to stand in Tory-LD marginals like they did last time and at least soft pedal in Con-Lab marginals.
It is bad enough having to defend anything daft said by LD candidates in elections, without having to defend things said by Green and Labour candidates. As a last resort we can deselect/disown our own candidates, but not those of other parties.
You also assume that the EU would have the UK back. It is far safer to shunt the UK into the EEA
Look at Sweden’s parliamentary parties:
2 Labour parties - a Left one and a Social Democrat one
2 Liberal parties - an agrarian one and an urban one
2 centre-right parties - a Moderate one (think Tory Wet) and a Christian Democrat one
1 Green party
1 anti-immigration party
So yes, Scottish Labour would shift tons of votes to the Scottish Greens, but they would also probably split into Red and Blairite varieties.
An informal arrangement for Lab not to compete hard in the top ?50 LD seats (and vice versa) is a necessity.
Greens are tactically irrelevant, and their voters are harder to redirect anyway. Lab needs a “big offer” to students to attract younger voters away from them.
Lab and LD can’t afford to touch SNP with a barge-pole, indeed they need to take them head on in Scotland by portraying them as the Tory’s secret weapon.
In short, it won't work, for the same reason that it didn't work last time, or the time before, or the time before that, which is that if it was going to work then there wouldn't be lots of separate left wing parties in the first bloody place.
But we’ll be seeing a lot more of this type of Marginals/Red Wall polling. Until we do, keep a close eye on the Midlands and North splits: truly terrifying for many Con MPs.
It's gone from fringe lunacy to absolute mainstream in about a year
Everyone I know, bar a few die-hards, and some old or fearful types, is saying Fuck it I won't do it again
Whether they will walk the talk, who knows, but this is yet more dangerous territory for HMG. The public is not behind the lockdown ultras, this time
It shouldn’t be too difficult for Laura to stump up the money, given her family previously sold a Picasso portrait for £50 million in 2013 – they must be able to find £10,000 down the back of the sofa…
https://order-order.com/2021/12/20/rachel-riley-wins-10000-pay-out-from-former-corbyn-aide-laura-murray/
What is it with these Corbynistas being filthy rich....Also its of course its all a very small world, Laura is Andrew Murray's daughter, who was married to Susan Michie.
There won't be electoral reform
Neither the Tory party or the Labour Party are going to sit in the electric chair and turn the switch on.
They are stupid, but not that stupid ...
(It so happens that I support electoral reform, but I can see that it won't happen).
Meanwhile, in the sane parts of Her Maj’s disunited realm, folk like to look after one another.
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/3704172#Comment_3704172
There was period of party fragmentation and instability which lasted about 10 years or so.
We used to have 2.5 parties (sound familiar?)
We now have 2 big ones and 3 or 4 small ones.
In the U.K., we could confidently expect permanent and much fuller representation in Parliament for the Greens, RefUK, and various nationalists.
It would show the various factions just how popular they are, or aren't. Which is sort of the point of democracy.
Tory lead?
1. It won't lead to decisions being made, so they don't do it.
2. They say it would halt it, but other models non-SAGE and non-UK disagree and say Omicron takes to well to the nasal pathways to avoid infections even with very low social interaction.
3. Interesting exercise, not carried out
4. They say it will be a disaster, but they also threw out the evidence that Omicron requires less intense use of healthcare services due to having a big disadvantage in lung tissue compared to delta, so who knows whether it actually will. Experiences in SA vs the SA delta wave are quite favourable, average length of stay is down, use of mechanical ventilation is down, need for oxygen is down and survival rates are up. That could be explained by lots of factors though.
5. The big one I guess, the Bank is no longer going to simply print Rishi £40bn per month of restrictions so the money will need to be raised through tax. Can the UK really afford an additional £40bn in tax for COVID measures to continue indefinitely?
The reason I'm unconvinced by the models is because we have two key observations from Omicron, vaccine efficacy is between 93% and 95% with three doses against severe disease and a UK study showing that it has a disadvantage in the lower respiratory tract and a big advantage in the upper respiratory tract. The SAGE models used modelled vaccine efficacy of 85% rather than the observed VE of 93-95% and as I said above they also gave Omicron identical disease characteristics to Delta, which we now know not to be true.
To me it feels like the scientists (or at least whoever has asked for these specific scenarios to be modelled) are trying to bounce the UK into a lockdown. Using modelled rather than observed VE is weird and throwing out favourable data and replacing it with unfavourable data is also weird. It also helps them get to the conclusion that we need to lockdown yesterday. Changing those inputs would result in a very large decrease all of their scary numbers, I wonder whether any of the Cabinet will force the issue and ask for the models to be redone with the correct inputs.
Coffins for Votes.
https://comresglobal.com/polls/lockdown-snap-poll-december-2021/
They can block us from rejoining - DeGaulle did it before, so we either have a CU&SM special on their terms (because it is their market) or join the EEA and become rule takers.
People in both parties make the mistake of looking for a deal that looks symmetrical, whereas the reality is that an effective deal will be intrinsically asymmetrical:
- in terms of seats, the minor parties and especially the LibDems will be the principal beneficiaries, both because they have the greater disadvantage from the electoral system to overcome and because votes will transfer more effectively to them than to Labour.
- in terms of power, Labour is the principal beneficiary, since they get to choose the PM and have the lion's share of influence and almost all of the credit; as the LibDems have already demonstrated, being the junior partner is a poisoned chalice.
The other point is that Labour is a party that has already promised national PR, when previously in opposition, and took it as far as a formal commission with a firm recommendation, before abandoning it. "Looking at it again in four years" isn't going to cut it (both because it's not enough and because Labour faces the issue of trust). PR for local elections is what Clegg should have demanded from the Tories, instead of AV, but that was then and was negotiating with reform's historical opponents. Negotiating now and with reform's at least part-time supporters should be expected to deliver much more.
Especially since - given the few policy differences - there is relatively little else the LibDems have to ask for. They'll be interested to curb Labour's instinctive centralism and authoritarianism, with more focus on localism and civil liberties, and they'll want to move quicker toward re-aligning with the EU than Labour. But that's about it.
I honestly have no idea on this. If I had to guess, the public will see scary big numbers and graphs and again be onboard with a lockdown, again blaming the government for being too late and too relaxed.
Be careful what you wish for, a "progressive alliance" under proportional representation might very well mean a "reactionary alliance" where the Tories bring people much further to the right into government in order to win.
One of the best things about our current system is that it generally keeps the extremists on both sides out.
@Leon is wrong about London, too. That's the area most keen on lockdown in that polling.
One thing I am sure of is that the opposition has grown, both in number but also in determination. It may still be the minority view, but those opposed to lockdown are now much more vocal and bolshy
Which well illustrates one of the principal faults of the current system; parties take the opinions of their voters for granted.
In 2010 too had David Miliband been Labour leader not Brown a Labour-LD coalition not the Clegg-Cameron deal could have been the end result
"I know it's not ceteris paribus because people might have voted differently under a different electoral system. But it is a cautionary tale."
Also I’d much prefer it if rather than being cherry picked by the PM’s staff, the public’s questions were run on the same way as retail investor questions are on say.com: an online poll for publicly submitted questions ranked by votes.
If we lockdown for this and the reality matches the reduced hospitalisation that @MaxPB is talking about (which is exactly what I suspect is going to be the case) it would be very hard to issue a lockdown request if Omega arrived and it once again caused hospitalisations through attacking the lungs.
It's a fundamentally undemocratic argument.
The study was only reported on in the last day or so (following on from the HK study four or five days ago); it's a bit much to expect it to be factored into decision making immediately.
I think stating that scientists are trying to bounce the UK into a lockdown is unsubstantiated.
I guess the problem is say a STEM PhD from a top tier university is going to have a range of well paid opportunities, i doubt the civil service ranks very highly on that.
https://twitter.com/kateferguson4/status/1472921211797753857
Per the other night's discussion, I know we're not supposed to say "beyond the pale" any more but I do think one of the benefits of our current electoral system is that it keeps the far right and far left fringes far away from the levers of power.
You may see that as a flaw in the system - I see it as one of its virtues.
At the present moment I actually think parliament might be better and in fact healthier for a few Green and Reform Party MP's encouraging other MP's on the left of Labour and the right of the Tories in towards a broader alignment.
In a situation that we're in with decision making needing the best available data I'd say that plugging in the latest and most up to date information into models is absolutely necessary. If we lockdown for whatever period at a cost of £8bn per week to the economy and, yes, it turns out that Omicron hospitalises at a significantly lower rate because of the mechanism outlined in multiple studies that were known at the time then it's on whoever decided to throw those findings out and use assumed rather than observed data.
As for cliques, i am sure it was, the difference is now, it isn't hard to find this stuff out.
I'd suggest such a tack for the SLDs might be less than fruitful, insofar as anyone gives a fcuk what they think.
'I can work with Tories to save the Union, says Lib Dems’ next leader Alex Cole-Hamilton'
https://tinyurl.com/2yhz3mkk
Is Rishi even in the country at the moment as he isn't going to want to say Yes to a lockdown.
Predicted week 50 admissions: 8146 (massive fall from yesterday's projection. Now only +13% week on week)
Predicted week 50 deaths: 391 (slightly down from 400 yesterday. a +77% week on week so still a big rise)
Percentage Ventilated: 2.7%
Percentage Oxygenated: 14.5%
Basically it looks like other regions that are not Gauteng have not seen the steep rise in admissions that you would have been expecting.
On the modelling side, at the back of everyone's mind will be the inquiry. The judge will be reading the names of those who died before the start of each evidence session, not those of the businesses bankrupted or the children without qualifications.
That really is an issue that would need to be fixed (heck it may already be) were we to head in that direction.
However in terms of government we would generally have centrist coalition governments of Lab-LD or Tory-LD, maybe on occasion propped up by the Greens and Corbynites in terms of the former or RefUK in terms of the latter.
We would not have majority Labour or Tory governments again. As Germany and NZ and Spain and Italy and Sweden and Ireland and Israel have found, full PR generally means the government is determined after the election in the coalition negotiations more than it is in the election itself by the voters unless there is a huge swing.
A sample of 668 across 125 seats - 5 samples per seat on average - gives a result accurate to within a % or three.
What are the error margins here?