It's odd, I see these MRP results and I simply don't believe the result will be anything like this. But I can't really say why. And what if that's because it's just unlike results we've seen before? What if this time really is different? I forecast for a living, and the hardest thing to know is when the paradigm has genuinely shifted, when your data are being drawn from a different distribution from before. In this case it's complicated by emotional involvement, too. So I continue to say no, the result will not look like this. But if it is, we can't say we weren't warned.
Even if the exit poll comes out with similar numbers many of us - me included - won't believe it.
I'm trying to remember my reaction to the SNP 58/59 in 2015. I probably didn't believe it then. They got 56 in the end.
I always believe Sir John Curtice.
He knows precisely what he's doing, and his exit polls are as accurate as they can be.
Be careful. SJC's exit polls had the advantage of unchanged boundaries for 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019. The new boundaries are going to fudge things up a bit. ☹️
2010 was on new boundaries. He was still pretty close.
Just going through the MRP in electoral calculus and some of the result seem non-sensical: whopping leads for Labour in Portsmouth North, but next door in Fareham the Tories cling on.
They're also using 23% for the Conservatives, 45% for Labour and 11% for Reform - so that skews it a fair bit - and a low figure of 9% for the LDs.
Again, Epsom and Ewell still looks like value for the LDs at 9/1 - that's two MRPs that have had them leading it closely, after tactical voting now - and it seems just the sort of seat in Surrey that could swing heavily to them.
I've topped up.
I don't think it right on Romsey and Southampton North either. I think the LDs will do well there.
Also dodgy for Didcot and Wantage, where Labour leads on the national figures but EC has inserted a shift based on 2019 voting which actually makes Tories an implausible poor 3rd with LDs 1st and Lab 2nd and the virtually invisible Reform on 11%. Local estimates suggests s 3-way marginal with Labour narrownly ahead.
Perhaps, like the 1920’s Liberals, a party just stops representing any significant element of the population. The Conservatives’ strategy of talking right, acting left, and lining their own pockets seems to have reached the end of the road.
Centre right politics is probably pointless now, in the UK.
That's excoriating. And possible.
My analysis back post-Brexit was that there was an opportunity for a broader N-S voting coalition around right of centre.
But that opportunity is now gone with the coming tumbling of the red wall, the self-consignment of the Tories to the 'place of gnashing and grinding of teeth' by their leadership, and the imagined rise of the latest version of the more radical right.
So now I'm looking for something anchored more around the centre-left core of Labour.
There is definitely a place for a strong centre right party in the UK. What it looks like is the issue. The Boomer generation is passing into history. All that generation's assumptions, ways of seeing the world and experiences are therefore doing the same. The Tories need to win over the under-50s. If Labour wins this general election, the under-50s becomes the under-55s. That is the challenge. Right now, they are talking to the generation PB posters like myself and Leon belong to. And we are part of a dying demographic.
I think that the challenge for a right wing party in Britain is that the issues driving right wing populism with the young in mainland Europe don't play particularly well here. The antiimmigrant culture war stuff worked with older white men here, the Reform demographic, but plays very poorly with the young here, who are much more culturally liberal.
The younger generations are not natural socialists though. They are less wedded to national institutions like the BBC, political parties, military, Monarchy or NHS, and naturally consumerist. While they want housing, they do not want social housing. No one aspires to that.
So if the Tories are to have a future they need to align themselves better with socially liberal people with economic aspirations. This needs to extend way beyond the top few percent. You cannot win an election with those.
The next 5 years are going to be dominated by cheeseparing austerity because of the policies chosen on tax and spending by Hunt, and implicitly endorsed by Reeves. Interest rates will restore a bit of sense to the housing market and make saving worthwhile. This will be grim, but is necessary medicine.
In 2028-9 there will be a desire for an alternative, but it needs to be a socially liberal one that merges freedom of lifestyle with economic freedom and opportunity. Starmer reinvented Blairism, to which the successful political response was Cameronism. That is the direction that would work.
The oddest thing about Aaron’s resignation letter was the pop at the Environment Agency re: Walley’s Quarry.
Regulation is at the heart of the issue. You cannot moan about the failure of a regulator to deliver effective regulation when you and your party routinely denigrate regulation as evil red tape that ties honest businesses in knots. The Tory Government that Aaron supports has promoted a culture of ineffective regulation. The Environment Agency and other environmental regulators are not encouraged to do their jobs effectively.
This failure to recognise the appropriate balance between enterprise and regulation has consequences, such as the shit in rivers crisis. Which has cost them many votes.
And it’s one of the main reasons I will never vote Tory.
I'm still of the belief that the 'shit in the rivers crisis' is mostly invented. Yes, there's too much pollution being sent in, but is it really much more than before, given the way that reporting the incidents has changed?
(Not that I'm calling for progress on stopping this shit from happening.)
That's not quite the same thing, as it ignores the last clause in my comment.
Sewage has routinely been released into water for years, especially during high-rainfall events. AIUI reporting of these was manually done - or at least, was *supposed* to be manually done. The accusation was that many releases wre not reported, or the amounts dramatically under-reported.
The argument is that the figures do not show a massive real increase in the amount released; just that the amount released is not being properly reported for the first time. The increase occurring whilst the program is being implemented in the mid-2010s may well point to this, and the fact decreases occur towards the end of the program.
But yes, we need to dump less shit in the water.
I deal with waste regulators. They are underfunded. When the Environment Agency came about in 1996 I would get a regulatory visit once a week. At that same site they get a regulatory visit on average once a year. Is there any wonder if there is no scrutiny things turn bad.
A regulatory visit every week sounds like a whole bunch of red tape waiting to be cut.
The red tape was cut.
And here we are with rivers and streams full of sewerage and "stop the stink" campaigns in Stoke and Haverfordwest.
The Lib Dem campaign features water quite heavily. It is just the sort of light green issue that works well in target seats.
Emblematic too as to how the Tories have been running down the country, feeding bungs to shareholders and literally shit service to customers.
OFWATs plan for Thames Water is a scandal that we will hear more of.
So what is OFWAT’s plan given that it hasn’t been announced to the market?
The leak (!) is that Thames Water is not going to be fined for 5 years, and allowed overflows in order to keep the company viable, rather than go insolvent.
Good morning fellow opinion poll watchers! Would it not be be better for the Government to compulsorily purchase Thames Water for a nominal amount and use the present staff, who must be sick of the whole thing, to make it a functional water supplier again.
That would require a government who wasn't terrified of nationalisation. But I agree, any rational analysis would suggest that this new plan is a daft idea virtually guaranteed to be bad value for money for taxpayers/customers.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
He has a point on some of the schemes, but it isn't totally ludicrous (and isn't likely to change under Labour) for there to be a degree of competition between local authorities for funding of projects (as opposed to ongoing services). Say central government is funding flood mitigation schemes, in a sense why not have a competition to see which project is the best use of funds.
The money spent developing projects isn't necessarily wasted even if the funding bid is unsuccessful. Plans aren't just binned - they can be implemented in other (often more modest) forms with existing funds, improved upon, or used as the basis for future bids.
I'm not sure why Chris Bryant is getting that wound-up about this - unless he had a relevant Shadow Cabinet role.
The Towns Fund is England only aiui; his attention should be on the Welsh Government, surely?
He's right about it being used as a smokescreen / sticky plaster wrt local authority funding cuts, however.
It's odd, I see these MRP results and I simply don't believe the result will be anything like this. But I can't really say why. And what if that's because it's just unlike results we've seen before? What if this time really is different? I forecast for a living, and the hardest thing to know is when the paradigm has genuinely shifted, when your data are being drawn from a different distribution from before. In this case it's complicated by emotional involvement, too. So I continue to say no, the result will not look like this. But if it is, we can't say we weren't warned.
Even if the exit poll comes out with similar numbers many of us - me included - won't believe it.
I'm trying to remember my reaction to the SNP 58/59 in 2015. I probably didn't believe it then. They got 56 in the end.
I always believe Sir John Curtice.
He knows precisely what he's doing, and his exit polls are as accurate as they can be.
Even the 1992 exit polling debacle was more to do with post-hoc massaging of the model, to keep it in line with pre-elevction polling, IIRC.
Perhaps, like the 1920’s Liberals, a party just stops representing any significant element of the population. The Conservatives’ strategy of talking right, acting left, and lining their own pockets seems to have reached the end of the road.
Centre right politics is probably pointless now, in the UK.
That's excoriating. And possible.
My analysis back post-Brexit was that there was an opportunity for a broader N-S voting coalition around right of centre.
But that opportunity is now gone with the coming tumbling of the red wall, the self-consignment of the Tories to the 'place of gnashing and grinding of teeth' by their leadership, and the imagined rise of the latest version of the more radical right.
So now I'm looking for something anchored more around the centre-left core of Labour.
There is definitely a place for a strong centre right party in the UK. What it looks like is the issue. The Boomer generation is passing into history. All that generation's assumptions, ways of seeing the world and experiences are therefore doing the same. The Tories need to win over the under-50s. If Labour wins this general election, the under-50s becomes the under-55s. That is the challenge. Right now, they are talking to the generation PB posters like myself and Leon belong to. And we are part of a dying demographic.
I think that the challenge for a right wing party in Britain is that the issues driving right wing populism with the young in mainland Europe don't play particularly well here. The antiimmigrant culture war stuff worked with older white men here, the Reform demographic, but plays very poorly with the young here, who are much more culturally liberal.
The younger generations are not natural socialists though. They are less wedded to national institutions like the BBC, political parties, military, Monarchy or NHS, and naturally consumerist. While they want housing, they do not want social housing. No one aspires to that.
So if the Tories are to have a future they need to align themselves better with socially liberal people with economic aspirations. This needs to extend way beyond the top few percent. You cannot win an election with those.
The next 5 years are going to be dominated by cheeseparing austerity because of the policies chosen on tax and spending by Hunt, and implicitly endorsed by Reeves. Interest rates will restore a bit of sense to the housing market and make saving worthwhile. This will be grim, but is necessary medicine.
In 2028-9 there will be a desire for an alternative, but it needs to be a socially liberal one that merges freedom of lifestyle with economic freedom and opportunity. Starmer reinvented Blairism, to which the successful political response was Cameronism. That is the direction that would work.
I suspect that what Reeves says now won't be what we see come the budget in October - simply put the forthcoming cuts that the NI cuts were based on cannot be achieved...
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
...of election bribes to a bunch of Tory constituencies. The policy is wrong, morally and economically. Gove says it’s like an unfinished cathedral. It’s much worse than that.
A far better principle would be ‘from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs’.
No, it would not.
Would you care to explain why it is wrong?
Because what's the point of having the ability if the benefits are taken from you?
A slice of your pie is given to someone with no pie. You still have plenty to fill your plate. And in many cases, still way more than enough.
We aren't advocating 99% income tax rates.
But isn't that what that quote implies? I live with my parents. I don't have a mortgage. Take that principle to it's logical conclusion and my tax rate should be through the roof.
Well no. You may not have major outgoings at present, but you may be saving up for a deposit on your own home, for example.
Ability to pay is gauged on a macro rather than micro level. Hence you end up with highly paid people claiming that they are virtually on the bread line, due to their lifestyle choices.
"Lifestyle choices" like needing to pay rent or mortgages?
"Lifestyle choices" like bringing up children?
One of the biggest differences in living expenses is simply if you're paying for the roof over your head or not. If you live rent or mortgage free then costs are completely different to if you need to spend a grand or more a month on rent/mortgage.
Earning £500 a month extra doesn't make up for spending £1000 a month extra.
No. Lifestyle choices like driving a flash car. Wearing high fashion and a bling watch. Taking expensive holidays. And yes, paying for private education. All discretionary spend.
Just going through the MRP in electoral calculus and some of the result seem non-sensical: whopping leads for Labour in Portsmouth North, but next door in Fareham the Tories cling on.
They're also using 23% for the Conservatives, 45% for Labour and 11% for Reform - so that skews it a fair bit - and a low figure of 9% for the LDs.
Again, Epsom and Ewell still looks like value for the LDs at 9/1 - that's two MRPs that have had them leading it closely, after tactical voting now - and it seems just the sort of seat in Surrey that could swing heavily to them.
I've topped up.
I don't think it right on Romsey and Southampton North either. I think the LDs will do well there.
Also dodgy for Didcot and Wantage, where Labour leads on the national figures but EC has inserted a shift based on 2019 voting which actually makes Tories an implausible poor 3rd with LDs 1st and Lab 2nd and the virtually invisible Reform on 11%. Local estimates suggests s 3-way marginal with Labour narrownly ahead.
In England, we discovered that Reform voters were the least likely to vote tactically with only 34% saying they would vote for another party. This bodes poorly for Rishi Sunak, especially given recent policy announcements that are designed to cajole Reform voters into lending him their support. Fewer than a quarter of Reform supporters would consider voting Conservative tactically.
On the other hand, we found that many Liberal Democrat, Labour and Green voters were minded to vote tactically with 45%-50% of them saying they would. This tactical voting is almost entirely anti-Conservative.
In Scotland, the group most likely to behave tactically were Labour and Liberal Democrat voters who appeared to be willing to lend support to one another in a likely bid to boost unionist candidates. On the pro-independence side, SNP and Green voters were quite inclined to switch between each other's parties.
People in Wales are less inclined to vote tactically, although the sample size is fairly small.
Another key finding is that voters are confused about which party to vote tactically for. This is partly due to the new constituency boundaries, and partly due to the big changes in public opinion since 2019.
It's much easier to see for those who spend timen in other EU countries where it hasn't changed and see that it's so much more joyous and cosmopolitan.
Greetings from joyous and cosmopolitan Ireland where the happy population is fighting with the gardaí to prevent any building works they suspect is intended to house asylum seekers.
You wouldn't notice as half the population seem to have second -or in many cases first-homes on the Cote d'Azur. My neighbours there are irish. just had their place renovated by Rumanian builders.
Roger. It's not exactly a surprise that the small minority of people who can afford to live on the Cote d'Azur are we happy as Larry. It's not representative of a huge difference between Europe and Britain created by Brexit.
Don't you notice the absence of bright young Europeans working in your town and city centres? Do you think Americans would be happy if you were restricted to living in the State of Georgia and to live or work elsewhere was made difficult? Don't you see how it would slowly become a backwater?
Roger. I live in Ireland.
You're a lucky person. You can travel and work as freely as I used to be able to.
No. I still have 17 months until I qualify for Irish citizenship. Until then I am only as free to travel and work as anyone else with a British passport.
My other half and daughter have their Irish citizenship because my partner was a "registered foreign birth". I'm very pleased for them and not at all gnashing my teeth.
Perhaps, like the 1920’s Liberals, a party just stops representing any significant element of the population. The Conservatives’ strategy of talking right, acting left, and lining their own pockets seems to have reached the end of the road.
Centre right politics is probably pointless now, in the UK.
That's excoriating. And possible.
My analysis back post-Brexit was that there was an opportunity for a broader N-S voting coalition around right of centre.
But that opportunity is now gone with the coming tumbling of the red wall, the self-consignment of the Tories to the 'place of gnashing and grinding of teeth' by their leadership, and the imagined rise of the latest version of the more radical right.
So now I'm looking for something anchored more around the centre-left core of Labour.
There is definitely a place for a strong centre right party in the UK. What it looks like is the issue. The Boomer generation is passing into history. All that generation's assumptions, ways of seeing the world and experiences are therefore doing the same. The Tories need to win over the under-50s. If Labour wins this general election, the under-50s becomes the under-55s. That is the challenge. Right now, they are talking to the generation PB posters like myself and Leon belong to. And we are part of a dying demographic.
I think that the challenge for a right wing party in Britain is that the issues driving right wing populism with the young in mainland Europe don't play particularly well here. The antiimmigrant culture war stuff worked with older white men here, the Reform demographic, but plays very poorly with the young here, who are much more culturally liberal.
The younger generations are not natural socialists though. They are less wedded to national institutions like the BBC, political parties, military, Monarchy or NHS, and naturally consumerist. While they want housing, they do not want social housing. No one aspires to that.
So if the Tories are to have a future they need to align themselves better with socially liberal people with economic aspirations. This needs to extend way beyond the top few percent. You cannot win an election with those.
The next 5 years are going to be dominated by cheeseparing austerity because of the policies chosen on tax and spending by Hunt, and implicitly endorsed by Reeves. Interest rates will restore a bit of sense to the housing market and make saving worthwhile. This will be grim, but is necessary medicine.
In 2028-9 there will be a desire for an alternative, but it needs to be a socially liberal one that merges freedom of lifestyle with economic freedom and opportunity. Starmer reinvented Blairism, to which the successful political response was Cameronism. That is the direction that would work.
Agree that the young aren't naturally socialist.
But your vision of the economic future is far too bleak imo.
Competent govt will give us all kinds of dividends. If Reeves and Starmer realise they need to invest for growth, I think in 5 years time we will be in a much better place.
I am surprised that some of the smaller parties, particularly Reform, are not making more of these types of polls. Sunak is going round the country saying that any non Tory vote is a vote for Starmer. But that logic only works if there is a serious chance of a Tory majority after the election. If the Tories cannot win a Tory vote is, by the logic of their own campaign, a ‘wasted’ vote. It will not prevent a Labour victory. If that becomes widely accepted then the scare tactics of the conservative campaign cease to have a purpose and the millions being spent on internet adds attacking Labour are wasted. Then the choice becomes who do people actually believe better represents their views. I have been looking at Ed Davey with a sense of slight bafflement up until now, but maybe it’s not so strange after all. Who is closer to the views of the people of the U.K. a billionaire trying to bully them into voting for him, even though it’s obvious he cannot win, or the bloke doing normal stuff with normal people, and listening to what they have to say. If I were running any of the campaigns of the smaller parties this poll would be on the front of every leaflet. It says this election is different, Labour have won, it’s the chance of the electorate to vote for what they actually believe in for once. By all means vote Tory if they stand for what you believe in. But don’t allow yourself to be bullied out of fear, as the result is a formality.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
...of election bribes to a bunch of Tory constituencies. The policy is wrong, morally and economically. Gove says it’s like an unfinished cathedral. It’s much worse than that.
A far better principle would be ‘from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs’.
No, it would not.
Would you care to explain why it is wrong?
Because what's the point of having the ability if the benefits are taken from you?
A slice of your pie is given to someone with no pie. You still have plenty to fill your plate. And in many cases, still way more than enough.
We aren't advocating 99% income tax rates.
But isn't that what that quote implies? I live with my parents. I don't have a mortgage. Take that principle to it's logical conclusion and my tax rate should be through the roof.
Well no. You may not have major outgoings at present, but you may be saving up for a deposit on your own home, for example.
Ability to pay is gauged on a macro rather than micro level. Hence you end up with highly paid people claiming that they are virtually on the bread line, due to their lifestyle choices.
"Lifestyle choices" like needing to pay rent or mortgages?
"Lifestyle choices" like bringing up children?
One of the biggest differences in living expenses is simply if you're paying for the roof over your head or not. If you live rent or mortgage free then costs are completely different to if you need to spend a grand or more a month on rent/mortgage.
Earning £500 a month extra doesn't make up for spending £1000 a month extra.
No. Lifestyle choices like driving a flash car. Wearing high fashion and a bling watch. Taking expensive holidays. And yes, paying for private education. All discretionary spend.
Excuse my butting in, but surely having children is a lifestyle choice?
Interesting. Maurice Saatchi on how he lost the election for Michael Howard twenty odd years ago.
" I did not dispel the illusion of research, which said that, as immigration was the number one issue in deciding how people vote, it should be the number one topic."
It's the old problem of talking to people about a subject on which they have already made up their mind rather than addressing a subject which can sway votes.
Just going through the MRP in electoral calculus and some of the result seem non-sensical: whopping leads for Labour in Portsmouth North, but next door in Fareham the Tories cling on.
They're also using 23% for the Conservatives, 45% for Labour and 11% for Reform - so that skews it a fair bit - and a low figure of 9% for the LDs.
Again, Epsom and Ewell still looks like value for the LDs at 9/1 - that's two MRPs that have had them leading it closely, after tactical voting now - and it seems just the sort of seat in Surrey that could swing heavily to them.
I've topped up.
I don't think it right on Romsey and Southampton North either. I think the LDs will do well there.
Also dodgy for Didcot and Wantage, where Labour leads on the national figures but EC has inserted a shift based on 2019 voting which actually makes Tories an implausible poor 3rd with LDs 1st and Lab 2nd and the virtually invisible Reform on 11%. Local estimates suggests s 3-way marginal with Labour narrownly ahead.
In England, we discovered that Reform voters were the least likely to vote tactically with only 34% saying they would vote for another party. This bodes poorly for Rishi Sunak, especially given recent policy announcements that are designed to cajole Reform voters into lending him their support. Fewer than a quarter of Reform supporters would consider voting Conservative tactically.
On the other hand, we found that many Liberal Democrat, Labour and Green voters were minded to vote tactically with 45%-50% of them saying they would. This tactical voting is almost entirely anti-Conservative.
In Scotland, the group most likely to behave tactically were Labour and Liberal Democrat voters who appeared to be willing to lend support to one another in a likely bid to boost unionist candidates. On the pro-independence side, SNP and Green voters were quite inclined to switch between each other's parties.
People in Wales are less inclined to vote tactically, although the sample size is fairly small.
Another key finding is that voters are confused about which party to vote tactically for. This is partly due to the new constituency boundaries, and partly due to the big changes in public opinion since 2019.
There is a difference between tactical voting based on where each party came in 2019, adjusted for new boundaries, and that based on current 2024 voting.
Labour does better in the latter scenario whilst the Lib Dems do better in the former. There is a 20 seat difference for Labour between the two.
It would seem that Nick's seat in Wantage and Didcot could be one of those seats.
Local campaigning with appropriate bar charts are the order of the day to get the "right" message across.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
...of election bribes to a bunch of Tory constituencies. The policy is wrong, morally and economically. Gove says it’s like an unfinished cathedral. It’s much worse than that.
A far better principle would be ‘from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs’.
No, it would not.
Would you care to explain why it is wrong?
Because what's the point of having the ability if the benefits are taken from you?
A slice of your pie is given to someone with no pie. You still have plenty to fill your plate. And in many cases, still way more than enough.
We aren't advocating 99% income tax rates.
But isn't that what that quote implies? I live with my parents. I don't have a mortgage. Take that principle to it's logical conclusion and my tax rate should be through the roof.
Well no. You may not have major outgoings at present, but you may be saving up for a deposit on your own home, for example.
Ability to pay is gauged on a macro rather than micro level. Hence you end up with highly paid people claiming that they are virtually on the bread line, due to their lifestyle choices.
"Lifestyle choices" like needing to pay rent or mortgages?
"Lifestyle choices" like bringing up children?
One of the biggest differences in living expenses is simply if you're paying for the roof over your head or not. If you live rent or mortgage free then costs are completely different to if you need to spend a grand or more a month on rent/mortgage.
Earning £500 a month extra doesn't make up for spending £1000 a month extra.
No. Lifestyle choices like driving a flash car. Wearing high fashion and a bling watch. Taking expensive holidays. And yes, paying for private education. All discretionary spend.
I am surprised that some of the smaller parties, particularly Reform, are not making more of these types of polls. Sunak is going round the country saying that any non Tory vote is a vote for Starmer. But that logic only works if there is a serious chance of a Tory majority after the election. If the Tories cannot win a Tory vote is, by the logic of their own campaign, a ‘wasted’ vote. It will not prevent a Labour victory. If that becomes widely accepted then the scare tactics of the conservative campaign cease to have a purpose and the millions being spent on internet adds attacking Labour are wasted. Then the choice becomes who do people actually believe better represents their views. I have been looking at Ed Davey with a sense of slight bafflement up until now, but maybe it’s not so strange after all. Who is closer to the views of the people of the U.K. a billionaire trying to bully them into voting for him, even though it’s obvious he cannot win, or the bloke doing normal stuff with normal people, and listening to what they have to say. If I were running any of the campaigns of the smaller parties this poll would be on the front of every leaflet. It says this election is different, Labour have won, it’s the chance of the electorate to vote for what they actually believe in for once. By all means vote Tory if they stand for what you believe in. But don’t allow yourself to be bullied out of fear, as the result is a formality.
They are left with the "one-party state" line, which is what they used to use in Scotland about the SNP.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
...of election bribes to a bunch of Tory constituencies. The policy is wrong, morally and economically. Gove says it’s like an unfinished cathedral. It’s much worse than that.
A far better principle would be ‘from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs’.
No, it would not.
Would you care to explain why it is wrong?
Because what's the point of having the ability if the benefits are taken from you?
A slice of your pie is given to someone with no pie. You still have plenty to fill your plate. And in many cases, still way more than enough.
We aren't advocating 99% income tax rates.
But isn't that what that quote implies? I live with my parents. I don't have a mortgage. Take that principle to it's logical conclusion and my tax rate should be through the roof.
Well no. You may not have major outgoings at present, but you may be saving up for a deposit on your own home, for example.
Ability to pay is gauged on a macro rather than micro level. Hence you end up with highly paid people claiming that they are virtually on the bread line, due to their lifestyle choices.
"Lifestyle choices" like needing to pay rent or mortgages?
"Lifestyle choices" like bringing up children?
One of the biggest differences in living expenses is simply if you're paying for the roof over your head or not. If you live rent or mortgage free then costs are completely different to if you need to spend a grand or more a month on rent/mortgage.
Earning £500 a month extra doesn't make up for spending £1000 a month extra.
No. Lifestyle choices like driving a flash car. Wearing high fashion and a bling watch. Taking expensive holidays. And yes, paying for private education. All discretionary spend.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
...of election bribes to a bunch of Tory constituencies. The policy is wrong, morally and economically. Gove says it’s like an unfinished cathedral. It’s much worse than that.
A far better principle would be ‘from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs’.
No, it would not.
Would you care to explain why it is wrong?
Because what's the point of having the ability if the benefits are taken from you?
A slice of your pie is given to someone with no pie. You still have plenty to fill your plate. And in many cases, still way more than enough.
We aren't advocating 99% income tax rates.
But isn't that what that quote implies? I live with my parents. I don't have a mortgage. Take that principle to it's logical conclusion and my tax rate should be through the roof.
Well no. You may not have major outgoings at present, but you may be saving up for a deposit on your own home, for example.
Ability to pay is gauged on a macro rather than micro level. Hence you end up with highly paid people claiming that they are virtually on the bread line, due to their lifestyle choices.
"Lifestyle choices" like needing to pay rent or mortgages?
"Lifestyle choices" like bringing up children?
One of the biggest differences in living expenses is simply if you're paying for the roof over your head or not. If you live rent or mortgage free then costs are completely different to if you need to spend a grand or more a month on rent/mortgage.
Earning £500 a month extra doesn't make up for spending £1000 a month extra.
No. Lifestyle choices like driving a flash car. Wearing high fashion and a bling watch. Taking expensive holidays. And yes, paying for private education. All discretionary spend.
Is it? I think the point is sks looks comfortably middle class and ok to Tory waverers whereas Rayner is scarily working class and northern and an obvious Trotskyist
They really are running the most desperate, and terrible, campaign.
I can’t imagine any of the remaining tories on here can possibly think that one is funny or clever.
And it just reiterates what many people think: that they are a thoroughly nasty party who have lost touch with the country and lost touch with reality.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
...of election bribes to a bunch of Tory constituencies. The policy is wrong, morally and economically. Gove says it’s like an unfinished cathedral. It’s much worse than that.
A far better principle would be ‘from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs’.
No, it would not.
Would you care to explain why it is wrong?
Because what's the point of having the ability if the benefits are taken from you?
A slice of your pie is given to someone with no pie. You still have plenty to fill your plate. And in many cases, still way more than enough.
We aren't advocating 99% income tax rates.
But isn't that what that quote implies? I live with my parents. I don't have a mortgage. Take that principle to it's logical conclusion and my tax rate should be through the roof.
Well no. You may not have major outgoings at present, but you may be saving up for a deposit on your own home, for example.
Ability to pay is gauged on a macro rather than micro level. Hence you end up with highly paid people claiming that they are virtually on the bread line, due to their lifestyle choices.
"Lifestyle choices" like needing to pay rent or mortgages?
"Lifestyle choices" like bringing up children?
One of the biggest differences in living expenses is simply if you're paying for the roof over your head or not. If you live rent or mortgage free then costs are completely different to if you need to spend a grand or more a month on rent/mortgage.
Earning £500 a month extra doesn't make up for spending £1000 a month extra.
No. Lifestyle choices like driving a flash car. Wearing high fashion and a bling watch. Taking expensive holidays. And yes, paying for private education. All discretionary spend.
What about living in London?
Or where and in what type of property you choose to live more generally.
We could fit into a smaller home. We could live in a cheaper area. We chose not to. As a result, we have greater outgoings. But we aren't asking for a tax break on the back of this.
I can’t spend a lot of time on here as I’m busy but could we possibly pull together from the wide range of brilliance on here the top 10 constituency betting tips?
I’m struggling to get betting traction in this election. I don’t find the general markets currently offering me anything very much attractive.
I’ve seen Richmond and Northallerton offered at 4/1 Labour which might ‘just’ be worth a wee flutter although the odds are not exactly spectacular.
But where else is looking attractive? What are the top tips?
Please NO partisan party guff. This is a betting request.
Those are odd results. How on earth do the SNP do better with tactical voting? Isn’t the entire anti-SNP voting pattern in Scotland driven by unionist tactical voting?
Labour did so badly in 2019, and the swings to them this time are so large, that anyone looking to vote tactically by looking at the result last time, or the notional result last time on the new boundaries, will be seriously misled, and so attempts to tactical vote could actually save a lot of incumbents from the Labour wave.
I'm not really sure how I should vote.
I've always lived in a safe Tory seat, it (or its predecessor seat) have been Tory since 1924 (auspicious!). So I don't tend to worry about whether my vote would or would not make a difference, it typically would not. In 2017 I voted Tory in it, because even though my vote would not be needed for the Tory to win, I felt my antipathy to Corbyn was such I should my vote where my mouth was, and to share in the culpability if things then all went pear shaped.
So on a similar basis I should perhaps vote Labour, as I do think it's time the Tories lose and nationally they are the game in town. They are also second in the seat, and I don't think I've actually voted Labour before in an election. But the LDs are much stronger locally. I voted for them in 2010 and 2015 hoping for a Lib-Con coalition. So on a tactical level it might be better to vote for them, unless the national tide is so strong that even without much local influence Labour retain the main anti-Tory vote.
I'll go with my gut on the day.
In your position I think I would look to find out as much as I could about the respective Labour and Lib Dem candidates, and see if that helped me to make the decision.
I like this culpability view on voting. It doesn’t get the credit/ acknowledgment it deserves.
We have responsibilities and those that stand away, claiming superiority to the selection of state are shirkers.
Is it? I think the point is sks looks comfortably middle class and ok to Tory waverers whereas Rayner is scarily working class and northern and an obvious Trotskyist
it's very catty and snipey, which just about sums up the tory campaign.
It's much easier to see for those who spend timen in other EU countries where it hasn't changed and see that it's so much more joyous and cosmopolitan.
Greetings from joyous and cosmopolitan Ireland where the happy population is fighting with the gardaí to prevent any building works they suspect is intended to house asylum seekers.
You wouldn't notice as half the population seem to have second -or in many cases first-homes on the Cote d'Azur. My neighbours there are irish. just had their place renovated by Rumanian builders.
Roger. It's not exactly a surprise that the small minority of people who can afford to live on the Cote d'Azur are we happy as Larry. It's not representative of a huge difference between Europe and Britain created by Brexit.
Just back from work visit to Germany. 2nd visit in a year. Country feels like it's unravelling to at least the same degree as the UK. Doesn't mean Brexit was a good idea, far from it, but that other countries are facing other pressures which cause similar damage.
Is it? I think the point is sks looks comfortably middle class and ok to Tory waverers whereas Rayner is scarily working class and northern and an obvious Trotskyist
Yes Rayner is more working class and left wing, but if she were some Machiavellian puppet master wouldn’t the Labour plan be less cautious? Most voters are not as credulous as that Tory messaging assumes.
I can’t spend a lot of time on here as I’m busy but could we possibly pull together from the wide range of brilliance on here the top 10 constituency betting tips?
I’m struggling to get betting traction in this election. I don’t find the general markets currently offering me anything very much attractive.
I’ve seen Richmond and Northallerton offered at 4/1 Labour which might ‘just’ be worth a wee flutter although the odds are not exactly spectacular.
But where else is looking attractive? What are the top tips?
Please NO partisan party guff. This is a betting request.
I would suggest looking for seats where Labour losing votes over Gaza might let the Tories in through the back door.
It's increasingly hard to rule out the possibility that those at the top of the Conservative Party are insane.
The incoming doom will do that to people.
Yes, but this stuff is coming from the people at the bottom of the party. The only person they could find to run the twitter account spends their time emailing memes to their younger relatives, none of which are ever responded to.
They really are running the most desperate, and terrible, campaign.
I can’t imagine any of the remaining tories on here can possibly think that one is funny or clever.
And it just reiterates what many people think: that they are a thoroughly nasty party who have lost touch with the country and lost touch with reality.
Sorry but it needs to be said.
Their problem is that they are a bunch of spotty public school boys and girls who are so far up themselves in the Westminster bubble that they have no idea what resonates outside. The vast majority of people do not hate Angela Rayner - they do not know who she is. Most people were not outraged by Diane Abbott's treatment - most people didn't care if they even heard about it and the details registered.
Its a media campaign when they needed to address popular concerns. They are so obsessed with 'winning the air war' that they don't understand that doing so without addressing the real issues just wastes the days as we count down.
FON tend to be at the Lab end of polling and this MRP looks based on an outlier but the basic picture of probable results is not getting brighter for Mr Sunak and all his clever boys and girls.
What's the market on Levido defecting to Lab before polling day?
Perhaps, like the 1920’s Liberals, a party just stops representing any significant element of the population. The Conservatives’ strategy of talking right, acting left, and lining their own pockets seems to have reached the end of the road.
Centre right politics is probably pointless now, in the UK.
That's excoriating. And possible.
My analysis back post-Brexit was that there was an opportunity for a broader N-S voting coalition around right of centre.
But that opportunity is now gone with the coming tumbling of the red wall, the self-consignment of the Tories to the 'place of gnashing and grinding of teeth' by their leadership, and the imagined rise of the latest version of the more radical right.
So now I'm looking for something anchored more around the centre-left core of Labour.
There is definitely a place for a strong centre right party in the UK. What it looks like is the issue. The Boomer generation is passing into history. All that generation's assumptions, ways of seeing the world and experiences are therefore doing the same. The Tories need to win over the under-50s. If Labour wins this general election, the under-50s becomes the under-55s. That is the challenge. Right now, they are talking to the generation PB posters like myself and Leon belong to. And we are part of a dying demographic.
I think that the challenge for a right wing party in Britain is that the issues driving right wing populism with the young in mainland Europe don't play particularly well here. The antiimmigrant culture war stuff worked with older white men here, the Reform demographic, but plays very poorly with the young here, who are much more culturally liberal.
The younger generations are not natural socialists though. They are less wedded to national institutions like the BBC, political parties, military, Monarchy or NHS, and naturally consumerist. While they want housing, they do not want social housing. No one aspires to that.
[…]
I’ve clipped your post to respond to this bit as I’m not sure you’re correct about this Foxy.
You’ve equated socialism with national institutions and I’m not sure that’s a very contemporary definition?
I think young people are incredibly strong on society and social conscience, extending not just across human interaction but with nature and our planet. That social-ism is one of the defining messages of younger people today.
But equating that to an old school 1945 Attlee Big State nationalisation or indeed nationalism? No. There I agree.
Socialism as Statism is dead to the young. Socialism as a mycelial supra-network is absolutely alive.
It's odd, I see these MRP results and I simply don't believe the result will be anything like this. But I can't really say why. And what if that's because it's just unlike results we've seen before? What if this time really is different? I forecast for a living, and the hardest thing to know is when the paradigm has genuinely shifted, when your data are being drawn from a different distribution from before. In this case it's complicated by emotional involvement, too. So I continue to say no, the result will not look like this. But if it is, we can't say we weren't warned.
Even if the exit poll comes out with similar numbers many of us - me included - won't believe it.
I'm trying to remember my reaction to the SNP 58/59 in 2015. I probably didn't believe it then. They got 56 in the end.
I always believe Sir John Curtice.
He knows precisely what he's doing, and his exit polls are as accurate as they can be.
I wonder if the exit poll is set up to take account of potentially huge swings like this. They will have to poll a much larger number of constituencies, including some of the very safest seats.
An article on the details of how the exit poll works would be interesting, to answer questions like this. Would take a bit of research.
They also have to take into account the boundary changes and how they go about working that out is way beyond me? They won’t be comparing like for like.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
He has a point on some of the schemes, but it isn't totally ludicrous (and isn't likely to change under Labour) for there to be a degree of competition between local authorities for funding of projects (as opposed to ongoing services). Say central government is funding flood mitigation schemes, in a sense why not have a competition to see which project is the best use of funds.
The money spent developing projects isn't necessarily wasted even if the funding bid is unsuccessful. Plans aren't just binned - they can be implemented in other (often more modest) forms with existing funds, improved upon, or used as the basis for future bids.
Your assuming that the competition system produces the right answer. This is rarely the case. It's a lot of time wasted for a system that ends up picking no better.
Competition is fine as a principle - but in this particular case it was indeed a waste of a lot of time and money for most of the losers. And as a transformative scheme, 'levelling up‘ was a complete failure.
No it bloody isn’t. The idea Starmer is weak, and in pocket of Rayner and The Left is extremely powerful spin to get out there. The Conservative campaign should double down on this, over and over.
Labour will bomb, when Rayner succeeds Starmer as leader.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
He has a point on some of the schemes, but it isn't totally ludicrous (and isn't likely to change under Labour) for there to be a degree of competition between local authorities for funding of projects (as opposed to ongoing services). Say central government is funding flood mitigation schemes, in a sense why not have a competition to see which project is the best use of funds.
The money spent developing projects isn't necessarily wasted even if the funding bid is unsuccessful. Plans aren't just binned - they can be implemented in other (often more modest) forms with existing funds, improved upon, or used as the basis for future bids.
I'm not sure why Chris Bryant is getting that wound-up about this - unless he had a relevant Shadow Cabinet role.
The Towns Fund is England only aiui; his attention should be on the Welsh Government, surely?
He's right about it being used as a smokescreen / sticky plaster wrt local authority funding cuts, however.
Because he's an MP and shadow minister, not a member of the Welsh Assembly ?
Is it? I think the point is sks looks comfortably middle class and ok to Tory waverers whereas Rayner is scarily working class and northern and an obvious Trotskyist
Yes Rayner is more working class and left wing, but if she were some Machiavellian puppet master wouldn’t the Labour plan be less cautious? Most voters are not as credulous as that Tory messaging assumes.
I suggest that a lot of ‘comfortably off’ people have a sneaking regard for Rayner. Pulled herself up by her own bootstraps and all that. Not like the gilded youth in that famous picture of Cameron and Johnson in the Bullingdon Club at Oxford!
We need some sort of moderation of poll ramping. The pollsters have worked out that it drives traffic and it's just going to get worse.
(Not your fault Scott)
Totally agree.
I wish we could also strip out the partisan stuff from people who have openly admitted to campaigning for a particular party, or at least politely ask them to tone it down a few notches.
More serious is when we start to get postal returns and into the count when people clearly attempt to influence the markets for personal gain with misleading posts.
There were some iffy examples during the London mayoral elections including, I’m sorry to say, on here.
No it bloody isn’t. The idea Starmer is weak, and in pocket of Rayner and The Left is extremely powerful spin to get out there. The Conservative campaign should double down on this, over and over.
Labour will bomb, when Rayner succeeds Starmer as leader.
I think that we are more likely to get the Social Democrat Rachel succeeding the Socialist Sir Keir.
I am surprised that some of the smaller parties, particularly Reform, are not making more of these types of polls. Sunak is going round the country saying that any non Tory vote is a vote for Starmer. But that logic only works if there is a serious chance of a Tory majority after the election. If the Tories cannot win a Tory vote is, by the logic of their own campaign, a ‘wasted’ vote. It will not prevent a Labour victory. If that becomes widely accepted then the scare tactics of the conservative campaign cease to have a purpose and the millions being spent on internet adds attacking Labour are wasted. Then the choice becomes who do people actually believe better represents their views. I have been looking at Ed Davey with a sense of slight bafflement up until now, but maybe it’s not so strange after all. Who is closer to the views of the people of the U.K. a billionaire trying to bully them into voting for him, even though it’s obvious he cannot win, or the bloke doing normal stuff with normal people, and listening to what they have to say. If I were running any of the campaigns of the smaller parties this poll would be on the front of every leaflet. It says this election is different, Labour have won, it’s the chance of the electorate to vote for what they actually believe in for once. By all means vote Tory if they stand for what you believe in. But don’t allow yourself to be bullied out of fear, as the result is a formality.
They are left with the "one-party state" line, which is what they used to use in Scotland about the SNP.
I hated that nonsense. It's a democracy with proportional representation, for fuck's sake. Just because for a few years the SNP blew all their opposition away by being Not Shit, doesn't mean there was a problem. Now that the SNP have finally joined everyone else in being Actually Quite Shit the other parties are getting a look in again. That doesn't happen in a one party state. a one party state is where you get the same people all the time because there's no opposition allowed.
And so it will be with Westminster, no matter how big Labour win if they do indeed win. Democracy will be fine. The Tories will be back. There will be no extinction. It'll be (temporary) exile at worst.
Tbf, I think it has a little bit more legitimacy in a FPTP system.
No it bloody isn’t. The idea Starmer is weak, and in pocket of Rayner and The Left is extremely powerful spin to get out there. The Conservative campaign should double down on this, over and over.
Labour will bomb, when Rayner succeeds Starmer as leader.
I think that we are more likely to get the Social Democrat Rachel succeeding the Socialist Sir Keir.
Yeah.
I’m sorry but that Rayner line is the most desperate thing I’ve seen probably from any mainstream electioneering party in my lifetime.
Tells me the tories are just on a different planet at the moment to the rest of us.
The Lib Dems might be Winning Here, outside their candidate's house, but they've just sent him (well, "Dear Friend") a card asking him to help campaign in Winchester!
They really are running the most desperate, and terrible, campaign.
I can’t imagine any of the remaining tories on here can possibly think that one is funny or clever.
And it just reiterates what many people think: that they are a thoroughly nasty party who have lost touch with the country and lost touch with reality.
Sorry but it needs to be said.
Their problem is that they are a bunch of spotty public school boys and girls who are so far up themselves in the Westminster bubble that they have no idea what resonates outside. The vast majority of people do not hate Angela Rayner - they do not know who she is. Most people were not outraged by Diane Abbott's treatment - most people didn't care if they even heard about it and the details registered.
Its a media campaign when they needed to address popular concerns. They are so obsessed with 'winning the air war' that they don't understand that doing so without addressing the real issues just wastes the days as we count down.
FON tend to be at the Lab end of polling and this MRP looks based on an outlier but the basic picture of probable results is not getting brighter for Mr Sunak and all his clever boys and girls.
What's the market on Levido defecting to Lab before polling day?
I can’t spend a lot of time on here as I’m busy but could we possibly pull together from the wide range of brilliance on here the top 10 constituency betting tips?
I’m struggling to get betting traction in this election. I don’t find the general markets currently offering me anything very much attractive.
I’ve seen Richmond and Northallerton offered at 4/1 Labour which might ‘just’ be worth a wee flutter although the odds are not exactly spectacular.
But where else is looking attractive? What are the top tips?
Please NO partisan party guff. This is a betting request.
I would suggest looking for seats where Labour losing votes over Gaza might let the Tories in through the back door.
The oddest thing about Aaron’s resignation letter was the pop at the Environment Agency re: Walley’s Quarry.
Regulation is at the heart of the issue. You cannot moan about the failure of a regulator to deliver effective regulation when you and your party routinely denigrate regulation as evil red tape that ties honest businesses in knots. The Tory Government that Aaron supports has promoted a culture of ineffective regulation. The Environment Agency and other environmental regulators are not encouraged to do their jobs effectively.
This failure to recognise the appropriate balance between enterprise and regulation has consequences, such as the shit in rivers crisis. Which has cost them many votes.
And it’s one of the main reasons I will never vote Tory.
I'm still of the belief that the 'shit in the rivers crisis' is mostly invented. Yes, there's too much pollution being sent in, but is it really much more than before, given the way that reporting the incidents has changed?
(Not that I'm calling for progress on stopping this shit from happening.)
That's not quite the same thing, as it ignores the last clause in my comment.
Sewage has routinely been released into water for years, especially during high-rainfall events. AIUI reporting of these was manually done - or at least, was *supposed* to be manually done. The accusation was that many releases wre not reported, or the amounts dramatically under-reported.
The argument is that the figures do not show a massive real increase in the amount released; just that the amount released is not being properly reported for the first time. The increase occurring whilst the program is being implemented in the mid-2010s may well point to this, and the fact decreases occur towards the end of the program.
But yes, we need to dump less shit in the water.
One of the predicted consequences of global warming for Britain is more intense rainfall events. So all other things being equal you would expect an increase in the rainfall events that lead to sewage release.
This would be compounded by new housing developments which, if poorly planned, would increase the surface runoff, and so also increase the frequency of sewage release events.
Both of these can be anticipated, and so investment should have been planned to deal with them, but it means that, a priori, we shouldn't be surprised by an increase in these events.
The watersports people certainly seem to think there is a lot more shite bobbing around than there used to be. And that they are getting the runs more often. Anecdata, though, to some extent.
Anglers who are obsessive about our waterways would be my canary in the coal mine, and they seem absolutely convinced of the enshittification. Most of them have been pursuing their craft since childhood so would be in a good position to see change. My Scottish fisher pals are much more concerned with agricultural run off and fish farms north of the border.
Son of a successful man but with no actual job, he spends his time on an extended gap year to find himself whilst hanging round with prostitutes. Probably has an article in the Spectator.
Just linking the MRP to the discussion on the last thread, I see that it has Bicester and Woodstock as a narrow Lab win before the tactical voting model is applied. After the "anti-Con" tactical voting adjustment, it becomes a Con win. Make of that what you will...
The oddest thing about Aaron’s resignation letter was the pop at the Environment Agency re: Walley’s Quarry.
Regulation is at the heart of the issue. You cannot moan about the failure of a regulator to deliver effective regulation when you and your party routinely denigrate regulation as evil red tape that ties honest businesses in knots. The Tory Government that Aaron supports has promoted a culture of ineffective regulation. The Environment Agency and other environmental regulators are not encouraged to do their jobs effectively.
This failure to recognise the appropriate balance between enterprise and regulation has consequences, such as the shit in rivers crisis. Which has cost them many votes.
And it’s one of the main reasons I will never vote Tory.
I'm still of the belief that the 'shit in the rivers crisis' is mostly invented. Yes, there's too much pollution being sent in, but is it really much more than before, given the way that reporting the incidents has changed?
(Not that I'm calling for progress on stopping this shit from happening.)
That's not quite the same thing, as it ignores the last clause in my comment.
Sewage has routinely been released into water for years, especially during high-rainfall events. AIUI reporting of these was manually done - or at least, was *supposed* to be manually done. The accusation was that many releases wre not reported, or the amounts dramatically under-reported.
The argument is that the figures do not show a massive real increase in the amount released; just that the amount released is not being properly reported for the first time. The increase occurring whilst the program is being implemented in the mid-2010s may well point to this, and the fact decreases occur towards the end of the program.
But yes, we need to dump less shit in the water.
I deal with waste regulators. They are underfunded. When the Environment Agency came about in 1996 I would get a regulatory visit once a week. At that same site they get a regulatory visit on average once a year. Is there any wonder if there is no scrutiny things turn bad.
A regulatory visit every week sounds like a whole bunch of red tape waiting to be cut.
The red tape was cut.
And here we are with rivers and streams full of sewerage and "stop the stink" campaigns in Stoke and Haverfordwest.
The Lib Dem campaign features water quite heavily. It is just the sort of light green issue that works well in target seats.
Emblematic too as to how the Tories have been running down the country, feeding bungs to shareholders and literally shit service to customers.
OFWATs plan for Thames Water is a scandal that we will hear more of.
So what is OFWAT’s plan given that it hasn’t been announced to the market?
The leak (!) is that Thames Water is not going to be fined for 5 years, and allowed overflows in order to keep the company viable, rather than go insolvent.
That was speculation not a leak. Thames Water can’t be treated differently to the other companies.
Additional Thames Water is not going bankrupt. Just the shareholders are going to be wiped out and the debt providers will have to take a haircut. That’s their risk.
They are just playing politics to try and get more money. Probably will end up in the intray for the new government
I am surprised that some of the smaller parties, particularly Reform, are not making more of these types of polls. Sunak is going round the country saying that any non Tory vote is a vote for Starmer. But that logic only works if there is a serious chance of a Tory majority after the election. If the Tories cannot win a Tory vote is, by the logic of their own campaign, a ‘wasted’ vote. It will not prevent a Labour victory. If that becomes widely accepted then the scare tactics of the conservative campaign cease to have a purpose and the millions being spent on internet adds attacking Labour are wasted. Then the choice becomes who do people actually believe better represents their views. I have been looking at Ed Davey with a sense of slight bafflement up until now, but maybe it’s not so strange after all. Who is closer to the views of the people of the U.K. a billionaire trying to bully them into voting for him, even though it’s obvious he cannot win, or the bloke doing normal stuff with normal people, and listening to what they have to say. If I were running any of the campaigns of the smaller parties this poll would be on the front of every leaflet. It says this election is different, Labour have won, it’s the chance of the electorate to vote for what they actually believe in for once. By all means vote Tory if they stand for what you believe in. But don’t allow yourself to be bullied out of fear, as the result is a formality.
They are left with the "one-party state" line, which is what they used to use in Scotland about the SNP.
I hated that nonsense. It's a democracy with proportional representation, for fuck's sake. Just because for a few years the SNP blew all their opposition away by being Not Shit, doesn't mean there was a problem. Now that the SNP have finally joined everyone else in being Actually Quite Shit the other parties are getting a look in again. That doesn't happen in a one party state. a one party state is where you get the same people all the time because there's no opposition allowed.
And so it will be with Westminster, no matter how big Labour win if they do indeed win. Democracy will be fine. The Tories will be back. There will be no extinction. It'll be (temporary) exile at worst.
Holyrood was designed never to have a majority government.
If our Unionists are worried about one-party states, as opposed to lying through their teeth, they really need to sort out the FPTP at Westminster at once.
Bryant isn't always right, but this thread about levelling up is spot on. Can Labour do significantly better, though ? (They probably can't do worse.)
Few policies have made me so angry as the Tories’ ‘levelling up’. 🧵 They turned it into a competition between local authorities who wasted millions on developing plans that were going nowhere. They doled out taxpayers’ cash to the constituencies of their favourite MPs... https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1796798439650472044
He has a point on some of the schemes, but it isn't totally ludicrous (and isn't likely to change under Labour) for there to be a degree of competition between local authorities for funding of projects (as opposed to ongoing services). Say central government is funding flood mitigation schemes, in a sense why not have a competition to see which project is the best use of funds.
The money spent developing projects isn't necessarily wasted even if the funding bid is unsuccessful. Plans aren't just binned - they can be implemented in other (often more modest) forms with existing funds, improved upon, or used as the basis for future bids.
Your assuming that the competition system produces the right answer. This is rarely the case. It's a lot of time wasted for a system that ends up picking no better.
How would you allocate resources between different projects if you didn’t have a view of the benefits and costs?
It's odd, I see these MRP results and I simply don't believe the result will be anything like this. But I can't really say why. And what if that's because it's just unlike results we've seen before? What if this time really is different? I forecast for a living, and the hardest thing to know is when the paradigm has genuinely shifted, when your data are being drawn from a different distribution from before. In this case it's complicated by emotional involvement, too. So I continue to say no, the result will not look like this. But if it is, we can't say we weren't warned.
Even if the exit poll comes out with similar numbers many of us - me included - won't believe it.
I'm trying to remember my reaction to the SNP 58/59 in 2015. I probably didn't believe it then. They got 56 in the end.
I always believe Sir John Curtice.
He knows precisely what he's doing, and his exit polls are as accurate as they can be.
Be careful. SJC's exit polls had the advantage of unchanged boundaries for 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019. The new boundaries are going to fudge things up a bit. ☹️
2010 was on new boundaries. He was still pretty close.
Forgive me. Consider the sentence amended to "the boundaries for 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019 were the same, but in 2024 they will be different".
I am surprised that some of the smaller parties, particularly Reform, are not making more of these types of polls. Sunak is going round the country saying that any non Tory vote is a vote for Starmer. But that logic only works if there is a serious chance of a Tory majority after the election. If the Tories cannot win a Tory vote is, by the logic of their own campaign, a ‘wasted’ vote. It will not prevent a Labour victory. If that becomes widely accepted then the scare tactics of the conservative campaign cease to have a purpose and the millions being spent on internet adds attacking Labour are wasted. Then the choice becomes who do people actually believe better represents their views. I have been looking at Ed Davey with a sense of slight bafflement up until now, but maybe it’s not so strange after all. Who is closer to the views of the people of the U.K. a billionaire trying to bully them into voting for him, even though it’s obvious he cannot win, or the bloke doing normal stuff with normal people, and listening to what they have to say. If I were running any of the campaigns of the smaller parties this poll would be on the front of every leaflet. It says this election is different, Labour have won, it’s the chance of the electorate to vote for what they actually believe in for once. By all means vote Tory if they stand for what you believe in. But don’t allow yourself to be bullied out of fear, as the result is a formality.
They are left with the "one-party state" line, which is what they used to use in Scotland about the SNP.
I hated that nonsense. It's a democracy with proportional representation, for fuck's sake. Just because for a few years the SNP blew all their opposition away by being Not Shit, doesn't mean there was a problem. Now that the SNP have finally joined everyone else in being Actually Quite Shit the other parties are getting a look in again. That doesn't happen in a one party state. a one party state is where you get the same people all the time because there's no opposition allowed.
And so it will be with Westminster, no matter how big Labour win if they do indeed win. Democracy will be fine. The Tories will be back. There will be no extinction. It'll be (temporary) exile at worst.
Tbf, I think it has a little bit more legitimacy in a FPTP system.
But the Tories had 14 years to fix that, so....
No, not really. FPTP doesn't mean the end of elections. A comfortable majority is functionally the same as a huge majority, and it doesn't stop elections and reversal of electoral fortunes.
The thing that should give the Tories heart following a potential thumping is that 2019-2024 has shown us that big swings away from the government are really achievable. Labour could win 500 seats in July and be out of power completely in 2029. The electorate holds the whip hand. Everything that's happening is not only comfortably within the bounds of a well functioning democracy, but superb news for anyone who is depressed about an outcome and who hopes for something very different next time around. The potential for a large victory less than 5 years after a drubbing is objectively fantastic. It's a sign of democratic vigour.
We were fed a reductive neoliberal perspective of Environment Agency vs Householder and our Rivers are dying.
The Tories are toast.
Even if the real origin of the underlying corruption is Russian oil and US chemical money funded lobbying undermining democratic control I’m okay with the Tories taking the shit in the face for their intellectual laziness.
I expect more than idle grift from our MPs.
I am confident Sir K can do strategy. The first hope I’ve had for decades. Roll on a bloody landslide.
Climate Change is going to underpin our lives for generations. We need strategy.
Comments
The younger generations are not natural socialists though. They are less wedded to national institutions like the BBC, political parties, military, Monarchy or NHS, and naturally consumerist. While they want housing, they do not want social housing. No one aspires to that.
So if the Tories are to have a future they need to align themselves better with socially liberal people with economic aspirations. This needs to extend way beyond the top few percent. You cannot win an election with those.
The next 5 years are going to be dominated by cheeseparing austerity because of the policies chosen on tax and spending by Hunt, and implicitly endorsed by Reeves. Interest rates will restore a bit of sense to the housing market and make saving worthwhile. This will be grim, but is necessary medicine.
In 2028-9 there will be a desire for an alternative, but it needs to be a socially liberal one that merges freedom of lifestyle with economic freedom and opportunity. Starmer reinvented Blairism, to which the successful political response was Cameronism. That is the direction that would work.
ANC - 40%
DA - 22%
MK - 15%
EFF - 9%
IFP - 4%
These figures from the electoral commission have changed since we updated you last evening, when results from 75% of the voting districts were in.
Since then, ANC has fallen from 42% to 40%, the MK Party has edged up a little to 15% while EFF remains at 9% of the vote share."
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-africa-69076473
The Towns Fund is England only aiui; his attention should be on the Welsh Government, surely?
He's right about it being used as a smokescreen / sticky plaster wrt local authority funding cuts, however.
(Awaits barrage of correction...)
In England, we discovered that Reform voters were the least likely to vote tactically with only 34% saying they would vote for another party. This bodes poorly for Rishi Sunak, especially given recent policy announcements that are designed to cajole Reform voters into lending him their support. Fewer than a quarter of Reform supporters would consider voting Conservative tactically.
On the other hand, we found that many Liberal Democrat, Labour and Green voters were minded to vote tactically with 45%-50% of them saying they would. This tactical voting is almost entirely anti-Conservative.
In Scotland, the group most likely to behave tactically were Labour and Liberal Democrat voters who appeared to be willing to lend support to one another in a likely bid to boost unionist candidates. On the pro-independence side, SNP and Green voters were quite inclined to switch between each other's parties.
People in Wales are less inclined to vote tactically, although the sample size is fairly small.
Another key finding is that voters are confused about which party to vote tactically for. This is partly due to the new constituency boundaries, and partly due to the big changes in public opinion since 2019.
But your vision of the economic future is far too bleak imo.
Competent govt will give us all kinds of dividends. If Reeves and Starmer realise they need to invest for growth, I think in 5 years time we will be in a much better place.
https://x.com/cchqpress/status/1796823955807817900?s=61
Labour does better in the latter scenario whilst the Lib Dems do better in the former. There is a 20 seat difference for Labour between the two.
It would seem that Nick's seat in Wantage and Didcot could be one of those seats.
Local campaigning with appropriate bar charts are the order of the day to get the "right" message across.
I can’t imagine any of the remaining tories on here can possibly think that one is funny or clever.
And it just reiterates what many people think: that they are a thoroughly nasty party who have lost touch with the country and lost touch with reality.
Sorry but it needs to be said.
We could fit into a smaller home. We could live in a cheaper area. We chose not to. As a result, we have greater outgoings. But we aren't asking for a tax break on the back of this.
I can’t spend a lot of time on here as I’m busy but could we possibly pull together from the wide range of brilliance on here the top 10 constituency betting tips?
I’m struggling to get betting traction in this election. I don’t find the general markets currently offering me anything very much attractive.
I’ve seen Richmond and Northallerton offered at 4/1 Labour which might ‘just’ be worth a wee flutter although the odds are not exactly spectacular.
But where else is looking attractive? What are the top tips?
Please NO partisan party guff. This is a betting request.
We have responsibilities and those that stand away, claiming superiority to the selection of state are shirkers.
The incoming doom will do that to people.
Its a media campaign when they needed to address popular concerns. They are so obsessed with 'winning the air war' that they don't understand that doing so without addressing the real issues just wastes the days as we count down.
FON tend to be at the Lab end of polling and this MRP looks based on an outlier but the basic picture of probable results is not getting brighter for Mr Sunak and all his clever boys and girls.
What's the market on Levido defecting to Lab before polling day?
You’ve equated socialism with national institutions and I’m not sure that’s a very contemporary definition?
I think young people are incredibly strong on society and social conscience, extending not just across human interaction but with nature and our planet. That social-ism is one of the defining messages of younger people today.
But equating that to an old school 1945 Attlee Big State nationalisation or indeed nationalism? No. There I agree.
Socialism as Statism is dead to the young. Socialism as a mycelial supra-network is absolutely alive.
@CWP_Weir
Jesus wept
Just doing some double checks, but jesus wept
And as a transformative scheme, 'levelling up‘ was a complete failure.
(Which is not the same thing.)
Labour will bomb, when Rayner succeeds Starmer as leader.
(Not your fault Scott)
I’m sceptical about it tbh.
Unlikely as that is before November.
1) A new poll, sample 10,000
2) Pushed through a MRP model
3) Then through a tactical voting model
Not like the gilded youth in that famous picture of Cameron and Johnson in the Bullingdon Club at Oxford!
I wish we could also strip out the partisan stuff from people who have openly admitted to campaigning for a particular party, or at least politely ask them to tone it down a few notches.
More serious is when we start to get postal returns and into the count when people clearly attempt to influence the markets for personal gain with misleading posts.
There were some iffy examples during the London mayoral elections including, I’m sorry to say, on here.
But the Tories had 14 years to fix that, so....
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_election
I’m sorry but that Rayner line is the most desperate thing I’ve seen probably from any mainstream electioneering party in my lifetime.
Tells me the tories are just on a different planet at the moment to the rest of us.
My Scottish fisher pals are much more concerned with agricultural run off and fish farms north of the border.
NEW THREAD
Additional Thames Water is not going bankrupt. Just the shareholders are going to be wiped out and the debt providers will have to take a haircut. That’s their risk.
They are just playing politics to try and get more money. Probably will end up in the intray for the new government
If our Unionists are worried about one-party states, as opposed to lying through their teeth, they really need to sort out the FPTP at Westminster at once.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2024_United_Kingdom_general_election#Seat_predictions
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/conservatives-anti-immigration-reform-social-media-campaign-labour-pqb2btt28
If you've assumed that the cash the Tories and Labour are throwing at social media will make a difference, you're completely wrong.
The two skint parties, Reform and the SNP, are smashing it where it matters - Facebook.
The Tories are toast.
Even if the real origin of the underlying corruption is Russian oil and US chemical money funded lobbying undermining democratic control I’m okay with the Tories taking the shit in the face for their intellectual laziness.
I expect more than idle grift from our MPs.
I am confident Sir K can do strategy. The first hope I’ve had for decades. Roll on a bloody landslide.
Climate Change is going to underpin our lives for generations. We need strategy.