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The betting money goes on 4 CON by-election losses – politicalbetting.com
The betting money goes on 4 CON by-election losses – politicalbetting.com
There’s now only a fortnight’s campaigning left in the three July 20th by-elections where the Tories are defending all the seats. Mid Beds might have a betting market but so far Nadine Dorries is not resigning although nearly a month ago she said she was going with immediate effect.
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Also first, I guess.
This betting is remarkable really. If the tories do lose all 4 (3) then it's going to create the media meme going into the election home straight. These are no longer mid-terms. There are two GE election options: Spring (May/June) or Autumn (October). So we're either 10 months away from the election or 15 months away.
Somerton & Frome I totally get, but would still be a stellar LibDem result. It's Selby & Ainsty that would really send shockwaves through the Conservative Party.
I predict the Party will have one more lurch to the nasty right, embracing someone like Badenoch, who will then lose the next General Election comprehensively.
Only then will the Party come to its senses and realise that (barring the one exception of the Brexit election), ALL General Elections in the UK are won by winning the centre. A factional party, be it of Left or Right, loses.
From the point of view of the country, the problems we face are pretty daunting even for an A team government, and it could be that Starmer gets overwhelmed by "events". This is why I could see some kind of National Unity administration as a none zero chance in a timeline of 2 Parliaments.
However, the Brexit crisis is, like the Reform bill or the Corn Laws, the kind of thing that triggers a fundamental political realignment, so the Tories, who get the blame for the Brexit fiasco may find that they toil for a very long time before the voters take a second look.
It is why I am pretty bullish on the Lib Dems in the medium term. They benefit more from Tory weakness and the Tories might be weak for quite a while and indeed may never recover
The current one is, by necessity, tactical.
I'll probably vote for them this time if only to give encouragement.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jul/04/rish-finds-the-liaison-committee-forgiving-under-bernards-watch
One reason Bryant sounded quite so rude (and I applaud him for being one of the few to present serious questions) is that Jenkin truncated proceedings significantly.
Interesting developments overnight, each seemingly as a consequence of the war against cars meeting political reality.
No 1
Cambridge City Council elects a Conservative for the first time since 2012! The Conservative's fought this by-election on a platform of scrapping the city's proposed congestion charge - Labour, LDs & Greens all said they would reform, not scrap it.
King's Hedges (Cambridge) Council By-Election Result:
CON: 34.9% (+3.0) LAB: 33.6% (-5.6) LDM: 23.5% (+8.5) GRN: 8.0% (-6.0)
Conservative GAIN from Labour. Changes w/ 2023.
No 2
The labour candidate in Uxbridge, Danny Beales, openly attacks Khan’s ULEZ as an indication that this could be having an effect on his campaign.
https://news.sky.com/story/labour-split-as-partys-candidate-in-uxbridge-by-election-speaks-out-against-london-mayors-ulez-expansion-12915004
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12262955/Sadiq-Khan-lacks-legal-power-order-ULEZ-expansion-High-Court-hears.html
Tories in London really need to get everyone running on this as a single issue campaign. Who’s their Londoner version of Andy Street?
There’s also a civil liberties group trying to sue the mayor, on the basis of the increased surveillance and ANPR cameras resulting from the scheme.
The expansion of ULEZ in London has been turned into what you describe as a "war against cars" by Conservative media shills like Nick Ferrari who considers it to be an erosion of personal freedom and an expansion of the nanny state. He goes on about it every day.
The percentage of vehicles that don't comply is now minimal. I keyed in my son's 2003 Mini Cooper S and an old 53 plate Fiesta we once owned and both were compliant. Fairly recent diesels are a different story but it wouldn't be too much trouble to exchange your ten year old diesel for an identical petrol equivalent with the scrappage allowance.
An SNP MP has accused the party’s chief whip at Westminster of bullying in a fresh sign of major division within the party.
Angus Brendan MacNeil made the allegation against Brendan O’Hara after a public bust-up last night in the Commons division lobbies, in which documents were allegedly thrown over parliament’s floor.
The papers were said to be disciplinary notices sent by O’Hara to MacNeil, who represents the Western Isles, about his attendance record in parliament. In a tweet that directly referenced the confrontation, MacNeil said: “General advice — Always stand up to bullies, — esp any abusing their positions — particularly those who scurry around shouting to anyone listening, ‘I’ll get him, I’ll get him, I WILL get him! — mark my words’.
“These are people, who from school, we should get taught to face down.”
Guido Fawkes, the online blog, reported that MacNeil shouted: “You’re a small wee man!” several times at O’Hara before tossing the letters at him and storming off.
Tensions run deep in the SNP about MacNeil’s overall behaviour because he has often criticised party policy and is seen as a close ally of Alex Salmond, the former SNP first minister who formed the Alba Party.
However, the latest dispute is said to revolve almost entirely around MacNeil’s presence in the Commons. MacNeil’s defenders point to the difficult and often unpredictable commute from his constituency to London and the fact he is a single father as reasons for his absences.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/snps-angus-brendan-macneil-accuses-chief-whip-brendan-ohara-of-bullying-p9cn0wt7l
Seems fair. 😊
It hits the low and middle paid workers hardest, who are the ones who are shafted continuously by various govt policies.
Middle paid workers are often not eligible for the scrappage scheme. The scrappage scheme pays £2,000. The AA has 23710 second hand cars for sale in London, of those 167 are less than £2,000 (a lot of which won't be compliant either).
It is actually a good scheme, but badly introduced, unnecessarily losing support by not acknowledging and being blase about the real costs imposed during a cost of living crisis.
It is also a fact that very many ordinary workers depend on their cars and despite the idea there is a limited scrapage scheme available they simply do not have the means to change their car to avoid a £12.50 a day charge
Indeed it is not only conservative councils who are objecting, we are now seeing Labour ones as well
If only a handful of vehicles are actually affected, then why implement the scheme in the first place, at such huge cost?
The suggestion is that the rules will tighten in the future, bringing many more cars into it. The councils want to get ahead of that, as part of their case.
I agree on LTNs, they are a real mess. The concept of “15-minute cities” is a good one, but it needs to be for new cities, not done by bringing arbitrary restrictions on existing cities - many of which were originally implemented as part of the pandemic emergency legislation, and haven’t been removed afterwards.
There appears to be little understanding from politicians that, outside the very dense city centres, people have cars and will use them, often because there is no reasonable alternative.
You could easily identify other similar 'outliers'.
I really do think an extraordinary result could be on the cards.
What do we want? OUR KIDS WITH ASTHMA! When do we want it! NOW!
Some morons are upset about having to upgrade their ancient car. More people are upset by the reality that you can taste the particulates spewed out of exhaust pipes and it is having a truly detrimental effect on people's health.
If the Russians blow Zaporizhia they might well make large parts of their own country and Belarus uninhabitable, but self-harm has never stopped them before.
It depends of course on what exactly they do. Blowing up the whole plant would be disastrous for them too. An attempt at a controlled radiation leak rather less so.
I support the scheme but comments such as yours make it hard to do so. Morons = ordinary working people really struggling who have been continually shafted by the Tories.
Usually one might expect Labour to stand up for these people, no? Instead with get this reactionary hyperbole that makes no sense.
On your actual point, no, paying £12.50 to the mayor doesn’t reduce pollution. It does raise money though. Big bonus for all the out-of-towners without a vote, who get caught up and unwittingly fined. Great for the car plate closers too, not so much for the millions of innocents dragged into court for that over the years.
https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1676440987021762560?t=k8e22fKuYZmsyoXcVYL80g&s=19
@RochdalePioneers rather shouty comment does not alter the fact it is the ordinary person who is trapped in a cost of living crisis and cannot afford to change their car while having to pay a £12.50 daily tax as they go about their lawful business
And this is becoming quite a political issue and not just by the conservatives
My conclusion has been "slip further" for a while, and slipping they are on both measures. I struggle to see how they will arrest this slippage, and the longer they leave it to an election the worse it will get. Their 5 priorities don't line up with the electorate and are being grossly and incompetently missed. The cost of living crisis is getting a lot worse even from today's hellish level, and the level of malicious grift seems to find new depths to sink to.
If Sunak called a snap election today I expect Labour would win a comfortable majority. If we drag on through another winter of discontent, and he goes to the country next May, it could be a landslide. And next autumn and beyond? A punishment beating the likes we haven't seen for a century.
It isn't the people at the bottom objecting. Its ponces like Ferrari, snarling about civil liberties. What about the liberties of the people being polluted into an early grave, or at least into having chronic breathing issues? The Tories don't care about the cost to change car for the little people - not when they are piling on increased costs of everything else they spend money on.
Someone who suggests that people currently just scraping by, can suddenly buy another car, is very much guilty of the same offence.
And again, if everyone buys a new car, then no-one will be paying the tax, and Khan will instead have wasted millions on the survelliance infrastructure the scheme requires.
At the banger end of the market there is a healthy trade going on - selling ULEZ compliant cars into London, clearing non-compliant cars out of London. So I don't buy the claim that this impacts the lowest paid - and I certainly don't buy the supposition that Tories care about these people. Because its patently clear they don't. This is just crayon politics for morons.
Nothing suggests to me that that basic rule will be altered in the run up to the next election.
The problem with Greater London is the way the boundaries were drawn in the 1960s. There are one or two places in Bromley and Havering which are really just country villages and I can understand why they might not think pollution is a problem.
And you ignore the real concern of the labour candidate in Uxbridge who I am certain is more aware of the position in his constituency than you are to be fair
It was a very poor performance to turn up to the committee and claim not to have read a 3 page report from the privileges committee. Just insulting to the Liaison Committee and to the British public.
And "how dare you want to cost poor people money". Please. The same Tories foaming on about this one support every other measure which had brought so many of the poorest - in London and elsewhere - into absolute penury, and now they're working very hard to drag the squeezed middle down as well.
If Tories are so concerned about the budgets of the poorest, why are all of their policies designed to cripple the budgets of the poorest?
We have to raise tax money somehow - better do it in a way that nudges people towards reducing pollution.
Mr. F, sadly, many idiots try and judge the past morally by modern day standards. It's as delinquent as considering 14th century homes dirty because they didn't have vacuum cleaners, or Roman wars as illegal because they contravened the Geneva Convention when dealing with prisoners.
The comment was: "If Ukraine retake Mariupol, who will refund the Russians who have bought property there?"
The SNP's interesting to consider. If Labour makes big gains in Scotland that will help massively because it'll help neutralise the 'in the SNP's pocket' attack by the Conservatives in the future.
Again, if the Tories are genuinely concerned about the budgets of the poorest, why are they so unconcerned on every other measure?
This isn't about the poor. Its about the rich. Because if a 20 year old Mini is compliant then practically any old banger which could be used as a daily driver is. Note - Daily Driver. I keep being told the poor will be taxed £2k a day to go to work. Driving what? Do you know how much it costs to keep something truly ancient in use as a daily driver?
This is NOT about them. Because once a car gets past a tipping point it is cheaper to change it. This is about the people who have some cherished old classic they take out on a Sunday. The ones on car forums talking about it. The ones who can afford that kind of hobby vehicle and the cost of keeping it running. Not the poor.
Once most cars meet the standard, what will big cities do next to make up the short fall?
As you say, all elections are won from the centre. The only way Labour can now lose in 2024 is by voters losing faith in their competence (ie not as bad as the Tories) and believing that voting Labour is to vote for the broad left/Jezza alliance rather than for social democrats.
Edited extra bit: *cities. Bit sleepy.
When your standard of living is two or three times subsistence, the balance of risk and reward in wars of conquest is very different. Seizing good farmland from weaker powers is the sensible thing to do.
Starmer is a bit shit - we can all see that. A managerial lets be less corrupt and stupid and uncaring than the Tories government which can't fix so many of the huge issues they inherit. There is no Tony Blair optimistic future mirage to draw people in like in 1997. An election now would see Labour win, but not by a large amount.
My point is that the drag factors on the Tory vote are already back to the Truss pit level and still sinking. With the economy showing all signs of getting far worse and the pain of that drawing in far more people in demographics and locations who would previously have voted Tory as an act of muscle memory.
As was pointed out above, you can look a long way down the targets list and get to somewhere like Tewksbury where the incumbent is making a mess of it and a non-Labour challenger looks doable.
Labour would not be blamed for saying 'We want water to be state owned but can't afford it yet. The tax payer will have to pay for Tory failure'.
Uxbridge and S Ruislip I still think could be a Tory hold with a high pro Rishi Hindu vote there, the Conservative candidate a South Ruislip councillor and the Labour candidate a Camden councillor and Hillingdon council still Tory held and the ULEZ issue
We're transitioning towards an EV future, and the carrot on offer (a charging/cost infrastructure fit for purpose) isn't big enough. So a big stick will also be needed.
Polls like that Mid Beds poll don't help as that will split the vote so I wouldn't be surprised in seeing Tories putting out misinformation about the Lab threat in these seats as per the Telegraph.
Currently I wouldn't be surprised if the LDs make just 10 gains, but could easily make 50 gains.
"Gaily into Ruislip Gardens
Runs the red electric train,
With a thousand Ta's and Pardon's
Daintily alights Elaine;
Hurries down the concrete station
With a frown of concentration,
Out into the outskirt's edges
Where a few surviving hedges
Keep alive our lost Elysium - rural Middlesex again."
Time to bring beloved Middlesex back, with its one or two remaining villages - where I was brought up.
The economic outlook in 2009 was far worse than it is now, but Labour still put on 9% between the local elections that year and the GE.
ETA if I were running London Tories, I might wonder what other London-wide issues could there be that do not involve taking on the Conservative government? It can't be water.
Cambridge, a city which voted for Corbyn and overwhelmingly Remain and has a Labour council and had 0 Tory councillors until yesterday has just elected a Tory councillor in a by election in 1 ward. What is more the Tory voteshare was actually up.
Clear the congestion charge as unpopular in Cambridge as outer London!
Estimates should be at the lower end of expectations.
Wilson was less centrist than Heath in 1966 or 1974 and won.
Attlee was less centrist than Churchill in 1945 and 1950 and won.
The Lab campaign has been, to my eyes, a bit narrow and limited and, while more visible on the ground than the Con campaign, similar in terms of leafletting etc. There is a constituency here for the Con culture war stuff and Brexit/sticking it to foreigners.
I suspect there are still more potential Con voters than Lab voters here, so it depends on whether the Con voters are motivated to actually vote and whether Lab can get out their vote plus tactical votes. It still feels to me a bit more evenly poised than the odds suggest.
Anecdotally, I know a number of Con-leaning people who won't vote Labour but who will either not vote or vote for minor parties/independents. If there's a widespread Con voter strike then they're toast, right enough.
"Hannah Ingram-Moore is the youngest of Capt Sir Tom's two daughters"
FFS.
YOUNGER of two.
You are relatively comfortably of, run a Tesla, and live in a lovely but sparsely populated area of the North East Scotland and it is easy for you to dismiss the problems of some car owners in the Greater London area but it does seem to be an issue and of course it is being challenged in the courts
I would also comment that it is labour councils who are also objecting to the plans
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-surrey-64496668
(BTW in hard times re-reading 'Emma' is either the greater or greatest of therapies.)
⚪️ Corbyn 30% (+11)
🔴 Starmer 29% (-2)
🔴 Brown 27% (-2)
🔴 Blair 24% (-4)
🔴 Miliband 21% (+2)
Via
@YouGov
, Apr-Jun 2023 (+/- vs Jan-Mar)
https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/cambridge-labour-councillor-quits-just-26917734
The Tory candidate actually got fewer votes than he did in May but the Labour vote was down a lot more of course.
BTW, a while back I said that I thought that Corbyn was an anti-Semite (a view which has not changed). You then warned me that Corbyn's legal team (*) would be having words with me about it.
I have not had any legal letters about it. Is it therefore fine to say that I think Corbyn's an anti-Semite?
Because I think Corbyn's an anti-Semite.
(*) All paid for by Corbyn himself, of course, and not 'donations'...
We don't see so much of you these days, but then if you will restrict yourself to only posting when Starmer's Labour get an adverse poll...