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The Davey-Starmer “pact” is bad news for the Tories – politicalbetting.com
The Davey-Starmer “pact” is bad news for the Tories – politicalbetting.com
This makes another CON majority even less likely. LAB and LDs in informal ‘non-aggression’ pact ahead of next UK election https://t.co/6cWc9orS7W
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I don't think this will make any difference. People vote tactically anyway.
Labour 'most seats' at 2.4 looks quite attractive - laying the Con majority ties up quite a bit of cash at those odds.
The four most dangerous words in punting are "this time is different".
Maybe a Rainbow coalition could work? But would a new Scottish vote be the price for SNP support?
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/14789299211027423 is the source for this by the way, referenced in this article https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/oct/30/if-opposition-parties-abroad-can-put-aside-differences-why-cant-ed-davey-keir-starmer
Voters pay attention more during election campaigns than otherwise. Indeed quote a lot of polling shows large numbers can't accurately recall who they voted for last time, but that doesn't stop them voting for their choice when the time comes.
This is at least partly to do with the financial situation in the Labour party, I think.
Ed Davey has an version of the problem that Starmer had - that he appears to be a steady pair of hands, but what else?
This is compounded by the Lib Dems not getting the oxygen of publicity. Quite simply, they are invisible in the national discourse at the moment. This is where a Charles Kennedy can really, really help a small party.
Voters don't like being manipulated like this. I suspect a lot of Tory voters who would not normally be inimical to the idea of lending the LDs their vote might resist if they feel pressured in this way.
It can work, but is probably a better deal for Labour than the LDs and it has to handled very delicately.
But if Labour runs in places like Guildford, they'll get at least 5%. That won't be changing.
If he fails to get those 82 seats or the LDs fail to take all 30 target seats, then Starmer would still need the SNP to get legislation through the Commons even if he likely ends up PM. He would not be able to solely rely on the LDs as Cameron did when he became PM in the hung parliament of 2010
It’s very simple and quick for me two answer both these posts.
What if he doesn’t confess?
The simple answer is the investigator doesn’t need him to confess in order to convict.
However, not being straight with the investigator is even more politically damaging. To put on his form different to what the investigator knows and can prove is toxic to all the people receiving forms. To receive a simple fine, yet still be protesting innocence equates to about between 11 and 21 votes of support in the VONC.
All I am saying is, he broke the law, he lied to parliament. Everybody knows this. All his friends know this. Babies speaking their first words are coming out with Boris is a liar. Dogs know it, are barking about it all the time. And the period of kicking can down road ends this week. Because just as he is about to get up at PMQs and say wait for process to finish, it might just have been published by the media and on everyone’s phones - the moment he hands it in he’s lost control.
And when the process does complete/or leaked early, there is no way back, he cannot prevent the 54 letters or loss in VONC.
...If Labour had joined the Unite to Remain pact, it would most likely have contributed around eight extra seats to the Liberal Democrats, with Labour gaining perhaps two or three additional seats....
Not a massive effect, but an effect nonetheless.
And in any prospective general election, it would be a simple anti-Tory agreement, so the confounding effects of the 'overturning the Brexit vote' issue would be absent.
The DUP are highly unlikely to win more than 10 seats, so the Conservatives can't fall below 312.
I seriously doubt any other party would consider a coalition with the Conservatives, certainly none would consider it under a Johnson-led Conservative party.
The Lib Dems clearly have history, but I can't see them picking the Conservatives. In 2010, the momentum was behind the Conservatives consigning Labour to the dustbin. If the situation is such that the Conservatives lose enough seats to be unable to form a majority even with the DUP, the momentum will be against them and I think the LDs will support Labour.
Of course, this could, depending on the seats total and vote total, result in the Conservatives being the largest party both in terms of seats and votes, but losing power.
But that's the system.
Incidently, depending on the results, if Labour + LD aren't enough either, I can't see a Lab/LD/SNP alliance lasting long. We'd have to have another election within a couple of years (hurrah!).
'Deadline to register England’s footpaths cancelled after public access campaign'
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/feb/17/deadline-to-register-englands-footpaths-cancelled-after-public-access-campaign
Also known as, standing aside in Lib Dem targets.
That isn't what's being discussed.
https://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2022/01/23/analysing-labour-lib-dem-tactical-voting-since-1983/
There's nothing new under the sun etc. etc.
Especially valuable if you're looking to convert former Conservative voters who might be minded to stay at home or might be minded to vote for another party. Knocking those doors in sufficient quantity could turn an election.
I'm not absolutely sure how many understand that they are voting for their local MP and not directly for their choice of PM.
I met people after the EU ref who did not vote because, they claimed, they were in a safe* constituency so it wouldn't matter. That does of course suggest those people understand how a GE works, but also that they don't pay a lot of attention when asked to vote.
*i.e. one that with a clear constituency majority for one of Leave or Remain
The thing is that the number of seriously partisan people (like me) is pretty small. Lots of voters toddle along to the voting booth thinking that they'd like to support or oppose the government, and will go by things like who sent them most leaflets and figured on their social media. If they're polled between elections, they give their general preference, but that's not necessarily how they vote.
Which isn't to say that people should only vote on tactical grounds. If you're really keen on showing support for a party's programme, you might prioritise that over beating a particular opponent. That's your democratic right and nobody should tell you off for it. But for a lot of voters, deciding who's in government really is the key issue.
But what is being talked about - potentially quite a long way before the next election - is of far more substance than any arrangement between the two parties in 2019.
Rather than a last minute cobbled together deal, it's (possibly at least) something quite significant, since the messaging and direction of resources has some time to take hold.
Truth is though, there are plenty ifs and buts to kick around on this thread. Here’s a good one. Support can come in different ways, at its basic level support defeating LOTO vonc and support to pass budget in return to for certain bit of legislation put to Parliament? So the Scot Nats give that basic support in return for an independence referendum they are not going to get from alternative government. Even that promise can come with sweeteners, like choose your own wording?
Actually refraining from standing a candidate is another matter though - if only one of Lab/Lib/Green stands, then sure, there will be some supporters of the non-standing party who will vote Con out of spite/anger at being manipulated. But for every one of those there will be lots more (2? 10? I don't know) who aren't very politically engaged who will just look at the ballot paper and think "funny, I normally vote Labour, but since they aren't here that Lib Dem looks OK".
A lie is only a lie if you knowingly mislead.
Lawbreaking is still law breaking even if you did so unknowingly.
It's possible to be wrong but not lie. Ignorance means you didn't lie, but is no defence on the law.
Furthermore parties isn't relevant to the law and never was. It's entirely possible that he attended illegal gatherings but no illegal parties. In which case he's broken the law, but not lied to Parliament.
So there's multiple ways to say he's broken the law without lying to Parliament. Which is why the former is what people should be concentrating on.
I can see any two party coalition lasting the full five years. I can't see any three party coalition doing the same.
So Lab/LD/SNP won't last, nor will Con/DUP/LD (if that was required).
NEW research from EuroStat has revealed that Scotland has the best-educated population in Europe, in a blow to opposition parties.
According to the body, which is the statistical office of the European Union but also compiles data for non-EU states, Scotland has been number one for the percentage of 25-61-year-olds educated up to degree level for every year between 2011 and 2019 (the last year for which data is available”.
A year later, he joined the Labour Party. It made me laugh as I don't take politics too fanatically (and who knows if his voters would really have voted for me?), but some of my supporters were rather less amused.
And it's not a dig but educational level doesn't help unless everything else is also in place.
Erdington will tell us if Starmer has a problem on his left, as well as whether Johnson has a problem on his right.
Purely as an indication, if in 2015 there were a lot of 50 year olds with degrees, and that is the metric we are looking for for success, that would appear to be to the credit of whoever was making the decisions in the eighties.
So the Scot Nats give that basic support TO THE TORIES in return for an independence referendum they are not going to get from alternative government. Even that promise can come with sweeteners, like choose your own wording?
Until the 2019 election my MP was usually campaigning in local marginals rather than his own seat.
This is just red meat for the PrOgReSsIvE aLlIaNcE, Led By Donkeys, Centrist dad brigade.
Liz Truss put up a serious post about Russia and Ukraine, and the replies are nothing but jibes attack and stupid jokes...
I vote tactfully rather more often than I vote tactically.
If enough people are suitably motivated to be anti tory they will figure out the best approach. Lessened campaigning would impact that only a little, but small differences can have effect in tighter contests.
I think it's fashionable in come circles to talk about attracting and retaining the brightest and the best being a Good Thing, but it's not for me to say.
Another photo-op...
So basically either the Tories win another majority at the next general election, or if they fall just short they will have to become even more hardline on Brexit and with the EU to stay in power.
If even the DUP support would not be enough for the Tories to remain in power then the Tories will go into opposition and Starmer would become PM
New @spectator politics column 👇
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/no-one-has-done-more-to-save-boris-than-keir-starmer
I'd like to see a separation: if Liz Truss wants to post something, let her do so. On a website, perhaps.
If people want to comment or complain, let them have their own website for doing so, or else find their place on one of the internet's many other fora for discussing politics.
I don't see why everybody else's opinions - which are necessarily dominated by those who post without really thinking, since they can post more quickly - should form part of anything any minister (or indeed anyone else) has to say).
I am aware of the potential inconsistency with using a comments field in a blog post for making this point.
First of all he told the house there weren’t any parties. He was not aware of any. Then one emerged, and Johnson was furious in the commons it had happened, disgusted with everyone who attended it when rest of the country were following his lockdown rules. Then it emerged he was actually there itself.
It was at this moment all hell broke loose in every measure of opinion poll rating. Across the country dogs started barking, birds took to the sky squawking, pigs lifted their heads out the trough and blinked, whilst Boris tried to reclassify parties as work events (still illegal mind you) and totting up the minutes he claimed was at each one.
Out by Tuesday imo.
There's a separate argument that many habitual liars are capable of lying in the way they do because they can convince themselves that whatever they are saying at the time is the truth. It would be difficult to hold the position that it's OK to mislead Parliament as long as the PM misled himself about what he had previously known to be true.
60% of those of working age in inner London and 50% of those of working age across London as a whole are graduates compared to 41% of Scots of working age who have a degree.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-25002401
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/articles/graduatesintheuklabourmarket/2017
He's shameless. The Conservative Party is spineless.
It's a match made in Hell.
It is why we saw a much bigger Labour majority than predicted on a much smaller share and margin than foreseen.
That was on new boundaries too.
Scotland has long had a better record on education than England - for a long time it had 4 universities to England's 2. When I left school in 1993 I think at least half of my year went on to Uni, some after Highers the year before. This was from a comprehensive school well before Blair's drive to have 50% go to university. The attitude that education is a means of social progression is fairly commonplace among working class Scots, in my experience. Down here it is more unusual except among the children of immigrants.
Interesting that not everyone is as lazy and inattentive as me and that there is a significant amount of tactical voting going on.
I would be interested to know, for example Nick, how you can be sure or reasonably sure that that 22% - 8% gap is tactical voting rather than peoples' change of mind.
For government to just ignore that, would be stupid.
"a new day has dawned, has it not?" The next day the sun was shining and everyone had a smile on their faces, even with a hangover. What a time to be alive!
As that's pretty much what they both do anyway, I assume the only difference is that they are publicising the fact in order to encourage tactical voting?
By justified, they use the "only x died at" excuse for this -
Once you have done full genocide denial, a bit of Putin snuggling must come easy.
Currently if there is film of him dancing to a disco, stark naked, swigging from a bottle of bubbly with a paper hat on, he would still be at the despatch box saying he wasn't there, and it wasn't a party but a work event, and he didn't know it was happening, and he is furious if it was