Ironically it was the sworn enemy of the tories, SNP, who were the single biggest factor in their success. Plenty of people 'wanted" to vote ukip, they were the undecideds, but fear of a labour/SNP stitch up made them vote tory. In a very negative election in so many respects, people voted along lines of what they didn't want rather than what they did want. I see no great scenes of jubilation outside Downing Street.
I had been reporting back here for a couple of weeks prior to Thursday that there was a sizeable Kipper-favourable vote that was struggling - hating the idea of being ruled by Scotland even more than being ruled by Brussels. As suggested, many were prepared to split their vote in the national and locals.
It was Jim Messina what won it, as Conservative/Ukip waverers could be targeted with SNP-pwns-Labour attacks.
Look at the number of views for what are mainly US-style attack ads on the Conservative Party Youtube channel (numbers from a day or two ago when I first posted them).
14,856 views Salmond Alert 0:25 53,402 views Alex Salmond: "I'm writing the Labour Party budget" 0:29 61,966 views David Cameron: Vote Conservative on Thursday 1:58 67,014 views David Cameron: Vote Conservative today 0:49 84,380 views Our note to you: let's keep going (Labour left "no more money") 1:45 88,876 views Don't risk it with Ed Miliband and the SNP 0:14 89,097 views The SNP propping up Ed Miliband: you'll pay for it 0:19 174,548 views What type of country do we want to be? 2:41 420,080 views It's working - don't let them wreck it. Vote Conservative on Thursday. 2:46
Most of those ad views are tiny relative to the electorate. The proportion of swing voters they got, minuscule.
It was Liam Byrne wot won it. The week before polling, the attack had been SNP. That softened up a lot of voters. The final week was delivery of a glossy leaflet - comparing where we were 5 years ago - "there is no money" - versus where we are today, one of the strongest economies in the world. It was the PERFECT encapsulation of Labour's weakness.
Liam Byrne may have cost Labour 20 seats. Maybe more.
Am I alone in feeling a bit sorry for Liam Byrne? A little joke has destroyed his career and, in Cameron's hands, done terrible damage to his party. It's a bit unfair and demonstrates what a rough trade politics is.
Another example of that is that the idea that the next Labour leader would want Ed in his next shadow cabinet or indeed anywhere near him is patently absurd.
The man's a smirking shyster whose attempt at humour betrayed the truth of his party's economically ruinous incompetence.
I feel sorry for Bercow because actions which were not his but affect him in a personal way have become a story. I don't feel sorry for Byrne because the action he took was in his professional sphere, and was damned foolish.
You may be wrong on Miliband. Labour tends to be forgiving of its failed leaders.
Ironically it was the sworn enemy of the tories, SNP, who were the single biggest factor in their success. Plenty of people 'wanted" to vote ukip, they were the undecideds, but fear of a labour/SNP stitch up made them vote tory. In a very negative election in so many respects, people voted along lines of what they didn't want rather than what they did want. I see no great scenes of jubilation outside Downing Street.
Not entirely sure that can be true. UKIP got a great result with 13% of the vote. AND the Tories slightly increased their vote. The 'right' got over 50% of the UK vote and over 55% of the England vote.
I expect the "right" got up to two-thirds of the vote in the shires.
I suspect most of the UKIP vote is ex-Lab. You shouldn't assume UKIP voters are all right wing.
Is there not a possibility that a proportion of Labour voters are more right wing than the labour party?
Yes - I think there are a lot of working class voters who are more socially conservative (ie.right wing) than the Labour Party when it comes to immigration, gay marriage, a law against "islamophobia",etc. But more left wing than the Labour Party on economic policy e.g. anti-austerity, anti-business, pro more redistribution.
The label "right-wing" is very fuzzy and can be downright misleading.
The dog whistle about the SNP was a major factor. I heard two women who had voted postally talking about how terrified of the SNP having influence... Can say exactly when it was but it was a good week before the GE.
How helpful of Salmond to be taking about writing the Labour party budget.
Ironically it was the sworn enemy of the tories, SNP, who .
I had been reporting back here for a couple of weeks prior to Thursday that there was a sizeable Kipper-favourable vote that was struggling - hating the idea of being ruled by Scotland even more than being ruled by Brussels. As suggested, many were prepared to split their vote in the national and locals.
It was Jim Messina what won it, as Conservative/Ukip waverers could be targeted with SNP-pwns-Labour attacks.
Look at the number of views for what are mainly US-style attack ads on the Conservative Party Youtube channel (numbers from a day or two ago when I first posted them).
14,856 views Salmond Alert 0:25 53,402 views Alex Salmond: "I'm writing the Labour Party budget" 0:29 61,966 views David Cameron: Vote Conservative on Thursday 1:58 67,014 views David Cameron: Vote Conservative today 0:49 84,380 views Our note to you: let's keep going (Labour left "no more money") 1:45 88,876 views Don't risk it with Ed Miliband and the SNP 0:14 89,097 views The SNP propping up Ed Miliband: you'll pay for it 0:19 174,548 views What type of country do we want to be? 2:41 420,080 views It's working - don't let them wreck it. Vote Conservative on Thursday. 2:46
Most of those ad views are tiny relative to the electorate. The proportion of swing voters they got, minuscule.
It was Liam Byrne wot won it. The week before polling, the attack had been SNP. That softened up a lot of voters. The final week was delivery of a glossy leaflet - comparing where we were 5 years ago - "there is no money" - versus where we are today, one of the strongest economies in the world. It was the PERFECT encapsulation of Labour's weakness.
Liam Byrne may have cost Labour 20 seats. Maybe more.
Am I alone in feeling a bit sorry for Liam Byrne? A little joke has destroyed his career and, in Cameron's hands, done terrible damage to his party. It's a bit unfair and demonstrates what a rough trade politics is.
Another example of that is that the idea that the next Labour leader would want Ed in his next shadow cabinet or indeed anywhere near him is patently absurd.
Do you feel sorry for Theresa May ?
I think one phrase rather taken out of context and seeking to crystallise and address a problem that her party undoubtedly had means she will not be leader or PM. By the time Cameron goes she will probably be too old anyway.
Labour’s leadership of former special advisers does not look like the people it wants to represent and does not look as if it likes the look of them either. In this, it is typical of the wider educated left in England, which almost alone in the world, makes a virtue of denigrating its own people.
The universities, left press, and the arts characterise the English middle-class as Mail-reading misers, who are sexist, racist and homophobic to boot. Meanwhile, they characterise the white working class as lardy Sun-reading slobs, who are, since you asked, also sexist, racist and homophobic. The national history is reduced to one long imperial crime, and the notion that the English are not such a bad bunch with many strong radical traditions worth preserving is rejected as risibly complacent. So tainted and untrustworthy are they that they must be told what they can say and how they should behave.
In précis form .......
"The English are a race not worth saving"
Jack Straw , Labour Party
Well, if people aren't like that, why do they read those newspapers?
But what do I know. I would no more live in suburban England than I would put out my own eyes. (I can't live in the countryside - I have grand mal and so am not allowed to drive.
And everyone I know is either a graduate or a member of an ethnic minority - except my son.
Simples. Gossip and sport. The politics is just background noise to many people.
Chuka first of the contenders to get a TV interview, in the soft hands of Andrew Marr at 9
Nicola is also on, presumably to explain why she failed to lock the Tories out of Downing Street and how she won't win votes against a majority government. Or not.
Liz Kendal has to wait until 1:30...
...and gets Andrew Neil.
Liz Kendall on Neill will be interesting. See how she gets on with the toughest interviewer. Neill knows how to deliver tough questions, much more so than Paxo.
The man's a smirking shyster whose attempt at humour betrayed the truth of his party's economically ruinous incompetence.
I feel sorry for Bercow because actions which were not his but affect him in a personal way have become a story. I don't feel sorry for Byrne because the action he took was in his professional sphere, and was damned foolish.
You may be wrong on Miliband. Labour tends to be forgiving of its failed leaders.
Miliband shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the shadow cabinet..
Ironically it was the sworn enemy of the tories, SNP, who were the single biggest factor in their success. Plenty of people 'wanted" to vote ukip, they were the undecideds, but fear of a labour/SNP stitch up made them vote tory. In a very negative election in so many respects, people voted along lines of what they didn't want rather than what they did want. I see no great scenes of jubilation outside Downing Street.
I had been reporting back here for a couple of weeks prior to Thursday that there was a sizeable Kipper-favourable vote that was struggling - hating the idea of being ruled by Scotland even more than being ruled by Brussels. As suggested, many were prepared to split their vote in the national and locals.
It was Jim Messina what won it, as Conservative/Ukip waverers could be targeted with SNP-pwns-Labour attacks.
Look at the number of views for what are mainly US-style attack ads on the Conservative Party Youtube channel (numbers from a day or two ago when I first posted them).
14,856 views Salmond Alert 0:25 53,402 views Alex Salmond: "I'm writing the Labour Party budget" 0:29 61,966 views David Cameron: Vote Conservative on Thursday 1:58 67,014 views David Cameron: Vote Conservative today 0:49 84,380 views Our note to you: let's keep going (Labour left "no more money") 1:45 88,876 views Don't risk it with Ed Miliband and the SNP 0:14 89,097 views The SNP propping up Ed Miliband: you'll pay for it 0:19 174,548 views What type of country do we want to be? 2:41 420,080 views It's working - don't let them wreck it. Vote Conservative on Thursday. 2:46
Most of those ad views are tiny relative to the electorate. The proportion of swing voters they got, minuscule.
It was Liam Byrne wot won it. The week before polling, the attack had been SNP. That softened up a lot of voters. The final week was delivery of a glossy leaflet - comparing where we were 5 years ago - "there is no money" - versus where we are today, one of the strongest economies in the world. It was the PERFECT encapsulation of Labour's weakness.
Liam Byrne may have cost Labour 20 seats. Maybe more.
Am I alone in feeling a bit sorry for Liam Byrne? A little joke has destroyed his career and, in Cameron's hands, done terrible damage to his party. It's a bit unfair and demonstrates what a rough trade politics is.
Another example of that is that the idea that the next Labour leader would want Ed in his next shadow cabinet or indeed anywhere near him is patently absurd.
I don't feel sorry for Byrne one iota. His idiotic message gave the Tories a piece of propaganda that has been absolute gold dust. What on earth did he think he was doing?
Another question, (when) do we get the data tables for the exit poll? It will be a very, very interesting read, especially as the only halfway accurate poll of the entire bloody campaign.
I would be very interested to see if it was UKIP > Con/Lab > UKIP or Lab > Con that did it, and how many LD > Lab there really were.
My switching model had two fundamentally wrong assumptions:
a) it assumed that 90% of 2010 LD voters would continue to vote LD in LD seats (but only 25% would stick with the LDs in none LD seats). b) it assumed that UKIP would get 16% of 2010 Con voters and 8% of 2010 Lab voters.
If I change the assumptions to
a) only 70% of 2010 LD voters continued to vote LD in LD seats (i.e. a much bigger "leakage") b) UKIP gets only 8% of 2010 Con voters but 16% of 2010 voters (i.e. a reversal of the makeup of UKIP's vote so that it is mainly ex Lab) then the model is almost spot on: Con 228 Lab 230 LD 11 SNP 57.
If this is right, then the Tories managed to get many blue Kippers to vote Tory, but Lab totally failed to attract back the red kippers who were also larger in number.
The data tables should shed some light on this hypothesis.
PS My model still doesn't totally explain some London seats e.g. Twickenham where it is clear that many ex-LDs voted Tory. Could this be the mansion tax effect?
Assume that should be Con 328?
My rule of thumb, set out on here many times over the months, was that the LibDems would lose 25% of their vote where they had an incumbent, 33% where it was a new candidate. That seemed about the only way to square the LibDems losing 60% of their 2010 vote. I haven't checked the maths, but I'm guessing it wasn't too far off overall.
I was also of the view (again set out on here) that with Ed Miliband as leader, the Blue-kip vote would return to the fold come election day - the Red Kippers would not.
There has not been a failure of polling so much as a failure of political nous. The 34-34 polling looked wrong, when you stood back from it. I repeatedly said that YouGov was broken. To some derision, it has to be said. But one thing the polling did get right was the large number of undecideds. Like 1992, decisions were made late. But when you knew that, political nous dictated that Ed Miliband Would Never Be Prime Minister.
Question: What are the Conservatives going to do about boundary changes? Was the reduction to 600 in their manifesto? I can't believe they're too keen to press ahead with the introduction of the revised constituencies as per the 2013 Act - could cause some serious rebellions from their own party. But there should probably be some sort of a more traditional boundary review due anyway?
According to below, they will go ahead with a boundary review, but with 650 seats.
Ironically it was the sworn enemy of the tories, SNP, who were the single biggest factor in their success. Plenty of people 'wanted" to vote ukip, they were the undecideds, but fear of a labour/SNP stitch up made them vote tory. In a very negative election in so many respects, people voted along lines of what they didn't want rather than what they did want. I see no great scenes of jubilation outside Downing Street.
I had been reporting back here for a couple of weeks prior to Thursday that there was a sizeable Kipper-favourable vote that was struggling - hating the idea of being ruled by Scotland even more than being ruled by Brussels. As suggested, many were prepared to split their vote in the national and locals.
It was Jim Messina what won it, as Conservative/Ukip waverers could be targeted with SNP-pwns-Labour attacks.
Look at the number of views for what are mainly US-style attack ads on the Conservative Party Youtube channel (numbers from a day or two ago when I first posted them).
14,856 views Salmond Alert 0:25 53,402 views Alex Salmond: "I'm writing the Labour Party budget" 0:29 61,966 views David Cameron: Vote Conservative on Thursday 1:58 67,014 views David Cameron: Vote Conservative today 0:49 84,380 views Our note to you: let's keep going (Labour left "no more money") 1:45 88,876 views Don't risk it with Ed Miliband and the SNP 0:14 89,097 views The SNP propping up Ed Miliband: you'll pay for it 0:19 174,548 views What type of country do we want to be? 2:41 420,080 views It's working - don't let them wreck it. Vote Conservative on Thursday. 2:46
Most of those ad views are tiny relative to the electorate. The proportion of swing voters they got, minuscule.
It was Liam Byrne wot won it. The week before polling, the attack had been SNP. That softened up a lot of voters. The final week was delivery of a glossy leaflet - comparing where we were 5 years ago - "there is no money" - versus where we are today, one of the strongest economies in the world. It was the PERFECT encapsulation of Labour's weakness.
Liam Byrne may have cost Labour 20 seats. Maybe more.
And there is a Youtube video on that subject in the list as well. What Messina's work identifying clusters of voters and their concerns meant was that Conservatives could target the right voters with the right material.
There was no groundswell of Conservative support: the party's aggregate vote increased by a mere 0.8 per cent. Victory was due to careful targeting which was only possible due to Messina's work.
Are pollsterd able to go back to the exacr people they polled to ask whobthey voted for and if different from what they said, then why did they switch? I,d have thought this is the obvious course to take to see why they were " wrong". There were moments ( Ed QT) and themes (SNP controlling Labour) that i'm sure must have changed minds but don't get why someone might state otherwise in a poll.
I was shocked by the Cons gains fromLibdem. If u voted libdem and are angry they betrayed u by siding with the Tories, changing your vote so the Tories get the seat anyway and you end up with no influence at all seems like cutting off your nose to spite your face.
all this talk of right v left is very outdated. In Dover the lib dem vote collapsed, the UKIP vote rose from 1700 to 10000 and the labour and tory scores barely changed. I'm convinced the Libs went to labour in their thousands and a similar number left labour for ukip. Tories who really wanted to vote UKIP were terrified by SNP. If you go to a UKIP branch meeting in the SE it is predominately the White working class, very few consider themselves to be right wingers.
Are pollsterd able to go back to the exacr people they polled to ask whobthey voted for and if different from what they said, then why did they switch? I,d have thought this is the obvious course to take to see why they were " wrong". .
YouGov simply need to ask their panel how they voted and see how representative of the outcome it is, once they have done the weighting they do for opinion polls.
Big mistake. His resignation speech used some of the right words but the tone was unrepentant - he will be a thorn in the side of any sensible leader they might choose and if he has any influence in the eventual winner it would not be good for Labour.
@surbiton was asking about the London result and advocating regional polls excluding London. The London results were very variable for Labour - some big swings for in the East and of course in Ilford north but also swings against Labour in the 3 north London marginals they missed. In south London the swing was also much more variable and they only won Ealing and Brentford by whiskers. I think London wide polling for a GE would be nigh on impossible to be reliable - last Thursday it was a city of many paces - which actually is no surprise for anyone who has lived there. Overall they did far less well there than the polls suggested although it was their best result overall., but I think that in part was down to demographic changes rather than a successful campaign.
Ironically it was the sworn enemy of the tories, SNP, who were the single biggest factor in their success. Plenty of people 'wanted" to vote ukip, they were the undecideds, but fear of a labour/SNP stitch up made them vote tory. In a very negative election in so many respects, people voted along lines of what they didn't want rather than what they did want. I see no great scenes of jubilation outside Downing Street.
It was Liam Byrne wot won it. The week before polling, the attack had been SNP. That softened up a lot of voters. The final week was delivery of a glossy leaflet - comparing where we were 5 years ago - "there is no money" - versus where we are today, one of the strongest economies in the world. It was the PERFECT encapsulation of Labour's weakness.
Liam Byrne may have cost Labour 20 seats. Maybe more.
Am I alone in feeling a bit sorry for Liam Byrne? A little joke has destroyed his career and, in Cameron's hands, done terrible damage to his party. It's a bit unfair and demonstrates what a rough trade politics is.
Another example of that is that the idea that the next Labour leader would want Ed in his next shadow cabinet or indeed anywhere near him is patently absurd.
I don't feel sorry for Byrne one iota. His idiotic message gave the Tories a piece of propaganda that has been absolute gold dust. What on earth did he think he was doing?
He thought he was observing a tradition in which an outgoing minister leaves a private, jokey message for the person succeeding him. But all is fair in love, war and politics. The person he left it to and who made it public was David Laws, I believe. Whatever became of him?
@Monksfield - I don't feel sorry for Byrne one iota. His idiotic message gave the Tories a piece of propaganda that has been absolute gold dust. What on earth did he think he was doing?
He thought he was observing a tradition in which an outgoing minister leaves a private, jokey message for the person succeeding him. But all is fair in love, war and politics. The person he left it to and who made it public was David Laws, I believe. Whatever became of him?
Another question, (when) do we get the data tables for the exit poll? It will be a very, very interesting read, especially as the only halfway accurate poll of the entire bloody campaign.
I would be very interested to see if it was UKIP > Con/Lab > UKIP or Lab > Con that did it, and how many LD > Lab there really were.
My switching model had two fundamentally wrong assumptions:
a) it assumed that 90% of 2010 LD voters would continue to vote LD in LD seats (but only 25% would stick with the LDs in none LD seats). b) it assumed that UKIP would get 16% of 2010 Con voters and 8% of 2010 Lab voters.
If I change the assumptions to
a) only 70% of 2010 LD voters continued to vote LD in LD seats (i.e. a much bigger "leakage") b) UKIP gets only 8% of 2010 Con voters but 16% of 2010 voters (i.e. a reversal of the makeup of UKIP's vote so that it is mainly ex Lab) then the model is almost spot on: Con 228 Lab 230 LD 11 SNP 57.
If this is right, then the Tories managed to get many blue Kippers to vote Tory, but Lab totally failed to attract back the red kippers who were also larger in number.
The data tables should shed some light on this hypothesis.
PS My model still doesn't totally explain some London seats e.g. Twickenham where it is clear that many ex-LDs voted Tory. Could this be the mansion tax effect?
Assume that should be Con 328?
My rule of thumb, set out on here many times over the months, was that the LibDems would lose 25% of their vote where they had an incumbent, 33% where it was a new candidate. That seemed about the only way to square the LibDems losing 60% of their 2010 vote. I haven't checked the maths, but I'm guessing it wasn't too far off overall.
I was also of the view (again set out on here) that with Ed Miliband as leader, the Blue-kip vote would return to the fold come election day - the Red Kippers would not.
There has not been a failure of polling so much as a failure of political nous. The 34-34 polling looked wrong, when you stood back from it. I repeatedly said that YouGov was broken. To some derision, it has to be said. But one thing the polling did get right was the large number of undecideds. Like 1992, decisions were made late. But when you knew that, political nous dictated that Ed Miliband Would Never Be Prime Minister.
Big mistake. His resignation speech used some of the right words but the tone was unrepentant - he will be a thorn in the side of any sensible leader they might choose and if he has any influence in the eventual winner it would not be good for Labour.
@surbiton was asking about the London result and advocating regional polls excluding London. The London results were very variable for Labour - some big swings for in the East and of course in Ilford north but also swings against Labour in the 3 north London marginals they missed. In south London the swing was also much more variable and they only won Ealing and Brentford by whiskers. I think London wide polling for a GE would be nigh on impossible to be reliable - last Thursday it was a city of many paces - which actually is no surprise for anyone who has lived there. Overall they did far less well there than the polls suggested although it was their best result overall., but I think that in part was down to demographic changes rather than a successful campaign.
If EdM decides to return he needs to do an IDS, take some time out, go away on a journey and come back with a different viewpoint.
The dog whistle about the SNP was a major factor. I heard two women who had voted postally talking about how terrified of the SNP having influence... Can say exactly when it was but it was a good week before the GE.
How helpful of Salmond to be taking about writing the Labour party budget.
You can see why the SNP ditched Eck as leader - useless numpty - the Nat Gordon Brown.
Apparently boundary review will go through, but on 650 seats, not 600
I don't think this can be objected to. Suddenly 650 becomes acceptable. Saving money on 50 MPs not so important anymore. Wonder why ?
This policy (boundary reviews and seat reductions) always looked like it was dreamt up in the dark days of opposition, and owed much to a failure to realise most of the apparent bias to Labour was due to differential turnout.
It is mainly in Wales there are smaller seats, but now Conservatives hold 11 of the Welsh seats, up from 8 last time and 3 in 2005, so suddenly this does not look so bad either. The real danger for the Conservatives now is that if they are painted as anti-Welsh, they may be locked out again: this is basically what happened in Scotland, and you can bet that Plaid Cymru, Labour and the LibDems would do their best to portray any seat reduction as anti-Welsh. Since independence for Wales is not viable, it might be decided that a small Welsh over-representation at Westminster is still justified.
No it isn't justified, they have their own Parlt. Same rule applied to NI up to 1972, they had their own form of devolution and were actually underrepresented. Why should Wales be over except for it gives Labour a few safe seats ?
Wales have much less control over their affairs than either Scotland or pre-1972 NI.
but more than England
Wales is the most over-represented part of the UK at Westminster. From memory England and NI return one MP per 100k population in Wales it's 86k.
Any justifiable reason why this should be ?
Apart from Labour gerrymandering.
No there isn't a reason, unless they might get a benefit from having lots of rural constituencies. But then I would like to see all constituencies the same size and just give rural MPs more expenses so they can appoint someone to help them with constituency work.
Big mistake. His resignation speech used some of the right words but the tone was unrepentant - he will be a thorn in the side of any sensible leader they might choose and if he has any influence in the eventual winner it would not be good for Labour.
@surbiton was asking about the London result and advocating regional polls excluding London. The London results were very variable for Labour - some big swings for in the East and of course in Ilford north but also swings against Labour in the 3 north London marginals they missed. In south London the swing was also much more variable and they only won Ealing and Brentford by whiskers. I think London wide polling for a GE would be nigh on impossible to be reliable - last Thursday it was a city of many paces - which actually is no surprise for anyone who has lived there. Overall they did far less well there than the polls suggested although it was their best result overall., but I think that in part was down to demographic changes rather than a successful campaign.
In one of the most ethnically diverse constituencies in London (Harrow East) the Tories increased their majority because of Indians turning out in huge numbers. Labour's pandering to Muslims with their blasphemy laws has hurt them in at least three constituencies, but helped them pick up Ilford North and strengthen their hold on other parts of East London. If we get results down to the ward level I can imagine Ponders End, Enfield Wash and Enfield Lock were all a very deep shade of red. It is the Islamic vote which drove Labour's "recovery" in London. Divisive politics from Labour.
Ironically it was the sworn enemy of the tories, SNP, who were the single biggest factor in their success. Plenty of people 'wanted" to vote ukip, they were the undecideds, but fear of a labour/SNP stitch up made them vote tory. In a very negative election in so many respects, people voted along lines of what they didn't want rather than what they did want. I see no great scenes of jubilation outside Downing Street.
locals.
It was Jim Messina what won it, as Conservative/Ukip waverers could be targeted with SNP-pwns-Labour attacks.
Look at the number of views for what are mainly US-style attack ads on the Conservative Party Youtube channel (numbers from a day or two ago when I first posted them).
Most of those ad views are tiny relative to the electorate. The proportion of swing voters they got, minuscule.
It was Liam Byrne wot won it. The week before polling, the attack had been SNP. That softened up a lot of voters. The final week was delivery of a glossy leaflet - comparing where we were 5 years ago - "there is no money" - versus where we are today, one of the strongest economies in the world. It was the PERFECT encapsulation of Labour's weakness.
Liam Byrne may have cost Labour 20 seats. Maybe more.
Am I alone in feeling a bit sorry for Liam Byrne? A little joke has destroyed his career and, in Cameron's hands, done terrible damage to his party. It's a bit unfair and demonstrates what a rough trade politics is.
Another example of that is that the idea that the next Labour leader would want Ed in his next shadow cabinet or indeed anywhere near him is patently absurd.
I don't feel sorry for Byrne one iota. His idiotic message gave the Tories a piece of propaganda that has been absolute gold dust. What on earth did he think he was doing?
The more you stand back, the more incredibly twattish that note looks. Memo to all politicians: never, EVER engage in nur-nur-na-nur-nurrr politics.
Labour’s leadership of former special advisers does not look like the people it wants to represent and does not look as if it likes the look of them either. In this, it is typical of the wider educated left in England, which almost alone in the world, makes a virtue of denigrating its own people.
The universities, left press, and the arts characterise the English middle-class as Mail-reading misers, who are sexist, racist and homophobic to boot. Meanwhile, they characterise the white working class as lardy Sun-reading slobs, who are, since you asked, also sexist, racist and homophobic. The national history is reduced to one long imperial crime, and the notion that the English are not such a bad bunch with many strong radical traditions worth preserving is rejected as risibly complacent. So tainted and untrustworthy are they that they must be told what they can say and how they should behave.
Yes - Labour needs to become comfortable with aspiration, the profit motive and the idea of Englishness.
EdM failed on all three. The last one because he really did not get it. Not because he hated England, but because anyone with a Marxist background - if not Marxist beliefs - will tend to see things in terms of class rather than nationality. This is another reason why Dan Jarvis would be such a good choice for Labour, of course.
I am not convinced it was shy anyone but the reverse problem, people who claimed to be certain or near certain to vote who in the end didn't. This could explain why Scotland was more accurate with a higher turnout
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
They have to start again. It may be time to drop the Democrat bit.
It's always been said that the lib dems haven't decided if they're liberals or social democrats and pulled both ways.
I can't see a place for a social demo aspect anymore, as it's covered by labour these days.
I can see a place for a proper Liberal party, how they then each beyond 10-15% of the electorate is another matter, but then maybe they shouldn't be bothered with that.
I am not convinced it was shy anyone but the reverse problem, people who claimed to be certain or near certain to vote who in the end didn't. This could explain why Scotland was more accurate with a higher turnout
Spot on. What the polls got wrong very badly was Labour's vote share.
Labour’s leadership of former special advisers does not look like the people it wants to represent and does not look as if it likes the look of them either. In this, it is typical of the wider educated left in England, which almost alone in the world, makes a virtue of denigrating its own people.
The universities, left press, and the arts characterise the English middle-class as Mail-reading misers, who are sexist, racist and homophobic to boot. Meanwhile, they characterise the white working class as lardy Sun-reading slobs, who are, since you asked, also sexist, racist and homophobic. The national history is reduced to one long imperial crime, and the notion that the English are not such a bad bunch with many strong radical traditions worth preserving is rejected as risibly complacent. So tainted and untrustworthy are they that they must be told what they can say and how they should behave.
Yes - Labour needs to become comfortable with aspiration, the profit motive and the idea of Englishness.
"Er, hello, is that Tony? Are you doing anything for the next decade or so? You're not? Splendid. I've had a word with Peter and Al too...."
The dog whistle about the SNP was a major factor. I heard two women who had voted postally talking about how terrified of the SNP having influence... Can say exactly when it was but it was a good week before the GE.
How helpful of Salmond to be taking about writing the Labour party budget.
You can see why the SNP ditched Eck as leader - useless numpty - the Nat Gordon Brown.
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
Or Labour!
The LibDems are now toast and an irrelevance. Seeing a Labour route back to power is much more interesting. FWIW I think Scotland is a lost cause to all UK-wide parties now. Labour needs to be thinking about middle England.
@Monksfield - I don't feel sorry for Byrne one iota. His idiotic message gave the Tories a piece of propaganda that has been absolute gold dust. What on earth did he think he was doing?
He thought he was observing a tradition in which an outgoing minister leaves a private, jokey message for the person succeeding him. But all is fair in love, war and politics. The person he left it to and who made it public was David Laws, I believe. Whatever became of him?
Big mistake. His resignation speech used some of the right words but the tone was unrepentant - he will be a thorn in the side of any sensible leader they might choose and if he has any influence in the eventual winner it would not be good for Labour.
@surbiton was asking about the London result and advocating regional polls excluding London. The London results were very variable for Labour - some big swings for in the East and of course in Ilford north but also swings against Labour in the 3 north London marginals they missed. In south London the swing was also much more variable and they only won Ealing and Brentford by whiskers. I think London wide polling for a GE would be nigh on impossible to be reliable - last Thursday it was a city of many paces - which actually is no surprise for anyone who has lived there. Overall they did far less well there than the polls suggested although it was their best result overall., but I think that in part was down to demographic changes rather than a successful campaign.
In one of the most ethnically diverse constituencies in London (Harrow East) the Tories increased their majority because of Indians turning out in huge numbers. Labour's pandering to Muslims with their blasphemy laws has hurt them in at least three constituencies, but helped them pick up Ilford North and strengthen their hold on other parts of East London. If we get results down to the ward level I can imagine Ponders End, Enfield Wash and Enfield Lock were all a very deep shade of red. It is the Islamic vote which drove Labour's "recovery" in London. Divisive politics from Labour.
The Labour MP for Tower Hamlets is secular and is a woman. That has to be the future. Likewise, the woman who defeated Galloway in Bradford.
On the personal level I am sorry things didn't work out for you Nick. You're a good egg personally and this must be very disappointing. Politically....let's not go there, I'll only say something I would come to regret...
I am not convinced it was shy anyone but the reverse problem, people who claimed to be certain or near certain to vote who in the end didn't. This could explain why Scotland was more accurate with a higher turnout
Spot on. What the polls got wrong very badly was Labour's vote share.
No, they also got the Tory vote share badly wrong, from the BPC table:
Average: C 33.6, L 33.6, LD 9, UKIP 13, GRN 4.8, OTH 6.1 Result: C 37.8, L 31.2, LD 8.1, UKIP 12.9, GRN 3.8, OTH 6.3
Variance : C -4.2, L +2.4, LD +0.9, UKIP -0.1, GRN +1.0, OTH -0.2
I honestly believe YouGov skewed the polls very badly this time and other pollsters lost their nerve and adjusted their own models to fit YouGov's garbage daily polls.
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
They have to start again. It may be time to drop the Democrat bit.
I don't see how that helps when they have become so illiberal -their statism has put paid to that. Their leftward shifts to try and make up for being in coalition with the Tories have left them in total no mans land. I think they'd best bequeath the orange bookers to the Tories, the sandal wearers to the greens and the statists, obviously to Labour. Ahsdown on the other hand they should put out to grass - he's been a complete embarassment in the news studios since Thursday.
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
Or Labour!
The LibDems are now toast and an irrelevance. Seeing a Labour route back to power is much more interesting. FWIW I think Scotland is a lost cause to all UK-wide parties now. Labour needs to be thinking about middle England.
Labour's route back to power is easy and straightforward: hire its own Jim Messina. See my posts earlier today.
A friend who worked in the Tory campaign team in Morecambe has written up her thoughts on how it went... A politics academic she has a keen eye for what was happening on the ground... Six weeks out she predicted c. 320 seats to me and had a pretty good rationale for how... In the write-up she talks about good canvass returns and how they firmed up in the last week or so...
Worth a read for anyone interested in how it looked on the ground...
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
Or Labour!
The LibDems are now toast and an irrelevance. Seeing a Labour route back to power is much more interesting. FWIW I think Scotland is a lost cause to all UK-wide parties now. Labour needs to be thinking about middle England.
Labour's route back to power is easy and straightforward: hire its own Jim Messina. See my posts earlier today.
Or hire Jim Messina. He works for money, presumably.
I am not convinced it was shy anyone but the reverse problem, people who claimed to be certain or near certain to vote who in the end didn't. This could explain why Scotland was more accurate with a higher turnout
Spot on. What the polls got wrong very badly was Labour's vote share.
No, they also got the Tory vote share badly wrong, from the BPC table:
Average: C 33.6, L 33.6, LD 9, UKIP 13, GRN 4.8, OTH 6.1 Result: C 37.8, L 31.2, LD 8.1, UKIP 12.9, GRN 3.8, OTH 6.3
Variance : C -4.2, L +2.4, LD +0.9, UKIP -0.1, GRN +1.0, OTH -0.2
I honestly believe YouGov skewed the polls very badly this time and other pollsters lost their nerve and adjusted their own models to fit YouGov's garbage daily polls.
Fair enough. I seem to remember a few of the final polls giving the Tories 35%/36% and Labour around the same, but it looks like false memory syndrome - lack of sleep I guess.
Big mistake. His resignation speech used some of the right words but the tone was unrepentant - he will be a thorn in the side of any sensible leader they might choose and if he has any influence in the eventual winner it would not be good for Labour.
@surbiton was asking about the London result and advocating regional polls excluding London. The London results were very variable for Labour - some big swings for in the East and of course in Ilford north but also swings against Labour in the 3 north London marginals they missed. In south London the swing was also much more variable and they only won Ealing and Brentford by whiskers. I think London wide polling for a GE would be nigh on impossible to be reliable - last Thursday it was a city of many paces - which actually is no surprise for anyone who has lived there. Overall they did far less well there than the polls suggested although it was their best result overall., but I think that in part was down to demographic changes rather than a successful campaign.
In one of the most ethnically diverse constituencies in London (Harrow East) the Tories increased their majority because of Indians turning out in huge numbers. Labour's pandering to Muslims with their blasphemy laws has hurt them in at least three constituencies, but helped them pick up Ilford North and strengthen their hold on other parts of East London. If we get results down to the ward level I can imagine Ponders End, Enfield Wash and Enfield Lock were all a very deep shade of red. It is the Islamic vote which drove Labour's "recovery" in London. Divisive politics from Labour.
The Labour MP for Tower Hamlets is secular and is a woman. That has to be the future. Likewise, the woman who defeated Galloway in Bradford.
It's amazing that at least one Labourite is willing to see that Labour's divisive politics has no future. I was constantly getting told by Surby and others that I was wrong and non-Muslims wouldn't care about Labour's pandering policies. I really, really hope that the next Labour leader can eliminate these elements of the party, either Muslims vote for the Labour agenda or they don't. No special treatment, and definitely no laws that infringe on our basic freedoms to try and get them to turn out.
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
They have to start again. It may be time to drop the Democrat bit.
I don't see how that helps when they have become so illiberal -their statism has put paid to that. Their leftward shifts to try and make up for being in coalition with the Tories have left them in total no mans land. I think they'd best bequeath the orange bookers to the Tories, the sandal wearers to the greens and the statists, obviously to Labour. Ahsdown on the other hand they should put out to grass - he's been a complete embarassment in the news studios since Thursday.
Yes the statist/socialist theme running through many of the Lib Dem members is so strong that they should change their brand name and either call themselves Social Democrats or just Democrats. They now have very few advocates of classic Liberalism.
I am not convinced it was shy anyone but the reverse problem, people who claimed to be certain or near certain to vote who in the end didn't. This could explain why Scotland was more accurate with a higher turnout
Spot on. What the polls got wrong very badly was Labour's vote share.
As they did in the euros and the local council elections. When I and others pointed this out on here it was rubbished on the grounds that Labour voters turn out in GEs. Hell err no It's a bit like that myth about the extraordinary resilience of the incumbent LD - just look at what happened to David Rendell.
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
Or Labour!
The LibDems are now toast and an irrelevance. Seeing a Labour route back to power is much more interesting. FWIW I think Scotland is a lost cause to all UK-wide parties now. Labour needs to be thinking about middle England.
Labour's route back to power is easy and straightforward: hire its own Jim Messina. See my posts earlier today.
Or hire Jim Messina. He works for money, presumably.
The Tories probably have him and Crosby on retainer for 2020.
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
They have to start again. It may be time to drop the Democrat bit.
I don't see how that helps when they have become so illiberal -their statism has put paid to that. Their leftward shifts to try and make up for being in coalition with the Tories have left them in total no mans land. I think they'd best bequeath the orange bookers to the Tories, the sandal wearers to the greens and the statists, obviously to Labour. Ahsdown on the other hand they should put out to grass - he's been a complete embarassment in the news studios since Thursday.
Yes the statist/socialist theme running through many of the Lib Dem members is so strong that they should change their brand name and either call themselves Social Democrats or just Democrats. They now have very few advocates of classic Liberalism.
Free Trade vs the Protectionist EC?
But they're not big on democracy either if their attitude to the EU is anything to go by. I suggest they rebrand as the Illiberal Superstatist Party.
I am not convinced it was shy anyone but the reverse problem, people who claimed to be certain or near certain to vote who in the end didn't. This could explain why Scotland was more accurate with a higher turnout
Spot on. What the polls got wrong very badly was Labour's vote share.
No, they also got the Tory vote share badly wrong, from the BPC table:
Average: C 33.6, L 33.6, LD 9, UKIP 13, GRN 4.8, OTH 6.1 Result: C 37.8, L 31.2, LD 8.1, UKIP 12.9, GRN 3.8, OTH 6.3
Variance : C -4.2, L +2.4, LD +0.9, UKIP -0.1, GRN +1.0, OTH -0.2
I honestly believe YouGov skewed the polls very badly this time and other pollsters lost their nerve and adjusted their own models to fit YouGov's garbage daily polls.
Fair enough. I seem to remember a few of the final polls giving the Tories 35%/36% and Labour around the same, but it looks like false memory syndrome - lack of sleep I guess.
what would you gov have shown if the methodology had not been changed?
Can labour really square the circle with New Labour and plenty of people in labour circles for which Blair is a dirty word?
I can't see them doing it easily at all
I think so - they don't need to say New Labour, they just need to repeat the same basic moves.
Two problems, though: 1) That doesn't help them in Scotland, where those moves are part of their problem. 2) It's not clear that Blairism would have worked without Tony Blair, so who's their new Tony Blair?
Big mistake. His resignation speech used some of the right words but the tone was unrepentant - he will be a thorn in the side of any sensible leader they might choose and if he has any influence in the eventual winner it would not be good for Labour.
@surbiton was asking about the London result and advocating regional polls excluding London. The London results were very variable for Labour - some big swings for in the East and of course in Ilford north but also swings against Labour in the 3 north London marginals they missed. In south London the swing was also much more variable and they only won Ealing and Brentford by whiskers. I think London wide polling for a GE would be nigh on impossible to be reliable - last Thursday it was a city of many paces - which actually is no surprise for anyone who has lived there. Overall they did far less well there than the polls suggested although it was their best result overall., but I think that in part was down to demographic changes rather than a successful campaign.
In one of the most ethnically diverse constituencies in London (Harrow East) the Tories increased their majority because of Indians turning out in huge numbers. Labour's pandering to Muslims with their blasphemy laws has hurt them in at least three constituencies, but helped them pick up Ilford North and strengthen their hold on other parts of East London. If we get results down to the ward level I can imagine Ponders End, Enfield Wash and Enfield Lock were all a very deep shade of red. It is the Islamic vote which drove Labour's "recovery" in London. Divisive politics from Labour.
I think that identity politics is toxic for Labour, outside of parts of London, Birmingham, and some core cities. It goes down very well in seats with big Muslim populations, lots of students, university workers, public sector professionals, people in professions like arts, fashion etc. But Labour already had those seats (apart from those won by the Lib Dems in 2010). Identity politics is voter-repellent in seats like Worcester, Swindon South, Stevenage, Halesowen etc.
Proposing a law against Islamophobia, two days after the Tower Hamlets judgement, showed a remarkable tin ear for public opinion. Ditto, proposals for ethnic minority quotas in the civil service, or boardroom quotas for women. There is broad public support for anti- discrimination legislation (though people disagree about specifics). There is little public support for affirmative action, and radical enforcement of equality and diversity, outside of left wing intellectual circles or favoured client groups.
A friend who worked in the Tory campaign team in Morecambe has written up her thoughts on how it went... A politics academic she has a keen eye for what was happening on the ground... Six weeks out she predicted c. 320 seats to me and had a pretty good rationale for how... In the write-up she talks about good canvass returns and how they firmed up in the last week or so...
Worth a read for anyone interested in how it looked on the ground...
@MaxPB - It's amazing that at least one Labourite is willing to see that Labour's divisive politics has no future. I was constantly getting told by Surby and others that I was wrong and non-Muslims wouldn't care about Labour's pandering policies. I really, really hope that the next Labour leader can eliminate these elements of the party, either Muslims vote for the Labour agenda or they don't. No special treatment, and definitely no laws that infringe on our basic freedoms to try and get them to turn out.
I have always got it. Labour was a forced choice for me - Ed's Labour anyway. You get nowhere in England with a party that fails to accept Englishness, aspiration and the profit motive. All three should be celebrated and none of them are a barrier to an agenda built around social justice and solidarity. I also think that the vast majority of all our ethnic communities have absolutely no problem with them either. The votes in Tower Hamlets and Bradford surely show that pandering to a particular notion of "the Moslem community" is ridiculous.
Labour did not lose votes to UKIP because the switchers wanted Thatcherite economic policies. They switched because they believed that Labour did not respect or value their identity.
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
Or Labour!
The LibDems are now toast and an irrelevance. Seeing a Labour route back to power is much more interesting. FWIW I think Scotland is a lost cause to all UK-wide parties now. Labour needs to be thinking about middle England.
Labour's route back to power is easy and straightforward: hire its own Jim Messina. See my posts earlier today.
Or hire Jim Messina. He works for money, presumably.
Heck, they could hire me. Axelrod and the twerps around Miliband confirmed Decrepit's first law: most political consultants know damn all about politics.
But yes, hire Messina. Wasn't it rumoured they'd intended to do just that but the blue team was quicker off the mark?
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
Or Labour!
The LibDems are now toast and an irrelevance. Seeing a Labour route back to power is much more interesting. FWIW I think Scotland is a lost cause to all UK-wide parties now. Labour needs to be thinking about middle England.
Labour's route back to power is easy and straightforward: hire its own Jim Messina. See my posts earlier today.
Or hire Jim Messina. He works for money, presumably.
Heck, they could hire me. Axelrod and the twerps around Miliband confirmed Decrepit's first law: most political consultants know damn all about politics.
But yes, hire Messina. Wasn't it rumoured they'd intended to do just that but the blue team was quicker off the mark?
Labour clearly has not got the hang of the first past the post system in which it is fighting 650 individual battles that matters. I guess they have only had a century to work it out, so maybe they need a bit more time :-)
There's a lot of bollocks being written about what Labour has done wrong and how it needs to become a pale imitation of the Tory party to succeed. Why would people vote for that before 2030, when they might be tired of twenty years of the Conservative party in government?
@MaxPB - It's amazing that at least one Labourite is willing to see that Labour's divisive politics has no future. I was constantly getting told by Surby and others that I was wrong and non-Muslims wouldn't care about Labour's pandering policies. I really, really hope that the next Labour leader can eliminate these elements of the party, either Muslims vote for the Labour agenda or they don't. No special treatment, and definitely no laws that infringe on our basic freedoms to try and get them to turn out.
I have always got it. Labour was a forced choice for me - Ed's Labour anyway. You get nowhere in England with a party that fails to accept Englishness, aspiration and the profit motive. All three should be celebrated and none of them are a barrier to an agenda built around social justice and solidarity. I also think that the vast majority of all our ethnic communities have absolutely no problem with them either. The votes in Tower Hamlets and Bradford surely show that pandering to a particular notion of "the Moslem community" is ridiculous.
Labour did not lose votes to UKIP because the switchers wanted Thatcherite economic policies. They switched because they believed that Labour did not respect or value their identity.
My problem with Labour is the sheer hypocrisy. Now we know that most politicians are hypocrites, but I am struggling to think of one Labour policy that in practice they are not doing or have done the complete opposite.
When they make so much about those policies, such as zero hour contracts and privatising the NHS, they cannot be surprised when the tables are turned on them.
For me they are the real nasty party, full of two faced hypocrites.
Are we going to have a piece on what the LD's do next?
They have to start again. It may be time to drop the Democrat bit.
I don't see how that helps when they have become so illiberal -their statism has put paid to that. Their leftward shifts to try and make up for being in coalition with the Tories have left them in total no mans land. I think they'd best bequeath the orange bookers to the Tories, the sandal wearers to the greens and the statists, obviously to Labour. Ahsdown on the other hand they should put out to grass - he's been a complete embarassment in the news studios since Thursday.
Yes the statist/socialist theme running through many of the Lib Dem members is so strong that they should change their brand name and either call themselves Social Democrats or just Democrats. They now have very few advocates of classic Liberalism.
Free Trade vs the Protectionist EC?
The Liberal Party, which still exists, is actually anti-EU as the EU is currently constituted. It’s Cornish Branch actually recommended voting UKIP. The LibDems, as I undestood it as a supporter, accept the EU as a move forward. The benefit of the EU, certainly to the Western members, has surely been the development of a European identity. Personally I want to vote for a Party which believes in European integration, but which devolves power downward as far as possible, which lets business get on with it, but in a socially responsible fashion (and that means regulation in which the regulated have a share), which recognises the need for Trade Unions but isn’t in hock to them.
Mandy worried about union influence over the leadership vote
Mandy spot on, union influence and funding has to be Labour's no1 priority to reform, without that they will go nowhere.
The unions are a millstone around the centre-left's neck in the UK generally - even Scotland. They are there to look after their members. That's what they should do.
Yes TSE, on the kipper vote you are largely right, as I wrote early yesterday somewhere on PB. I really thought that the polls were suppressing UKIP, whereas they were they were downgrading the Tories.
However the Kipper vote was much more damaging to the northern Labour seats than any to the southern Tories. Just think. if the UKIP vote had reached, say 17%/18% instead of 13% the Tories might have had a landslide of perhaps a comfortable 60 seat majority instead of a miserable 12 seats which is always bound to be a problem.
One other fact that PB tories dismissed as false, was the UKIP notion that they were picking up more votes from Labour than Tories, which has been born out by the results.
I am not convinced it was shy anyone but the reverse problem, people who claimed to be certain or near certain to vote who in the end didn't. This could explain why Scotland was more accurate with a higher turnout
Spot on. What the polls got wrong very badly was Labour's vote share.
No, they also got the Tory vote share badly wrong, from the BPC table:
Average: C 33.6, L 33.6, LD 9, UKIP 13, GRN 4.8, OTH 6.1 Result: C 37.8, L 31.2, LD 8.1, UKIP 12.9, GRN 3.8, OTH 6.3
Variance : C -4.2, L +2.4, LD +0.9, UKIP -0.1, GRN +1.0, OTH -0.2
I honestly believe YouGov skewed the polls very badly this time and other pollsters lost their nerve and adjusted their own models to fit YouGov's garbage daily polls.
Fair enough. I seem to remember a few of the final polls giving the Tories 35%/36% and Labour around the same, but it looks like false memory syndrome - lack of sleep I guess.
Throughout the campaign, polls did crop up giving the Conservatives leads of 4, 5, 6%, and they cropped up with enough frequency to suggest they weren't outliers.
If the pollsters had enough confidence in their methods to stand out, rather than herding, I expect some would have got the result right.
Chuka first of the contenders to get a TV interview, in the soft hands of Andrew Marr at 9
Nicola is also on, presumably to explain why she failed to lock the Tories out of Downing Street and how she won't win votes against a majority government. Or not.
Liz Kendal has to wait until 1:30...
...and gets Andrew Neil.
Was Sturgeon on Marr and i missed it? Or was Mandy a late replacement?
Chuka first of the contenders to get a TV interview, in the soft hands of Andrew Marr at 9
Nicola is also on, presumably to explain why she failed to lock the Tories out of Downing Street and how she won't win votes against a majority government. Or not.
Liz Kendal has to wait until 1:30...
...and gets Andrew Neil.
Was Sturgeon on Marr and i missed it? Or was Mandy a late replacement?
Look//.. Labour's bigesst problem was Ed Miliband. Ed sounded terribly nasal , his voice grated, he didn't look good on tv... with some very strange mannerisms and twitches, and that before you even get near policy. The two kitchens lie was symptomatic of the poor portrayal, and the headstone was just laughable. Labour won't get anywhere till they find someone who looks good on tv and can dissemble with a smile.
There's a lot of bollocks being written about what Labour has done wrong and how it needs to become a pale imitation of the Tory party to succeed. Why would people vote for that before 2030, when they might be tired of twenty years of the Conservative party in government?
Labour have to stand for something different.
On the theory that governments lose elections rather than oppositions winning them, they need to wait for the Tories to fall over rather than hoping they can make a bold move that will push them. That won't necessarily take until 2030. At that point if they look like a plausible, competent, middle-of-the-road government-in-waiting they can win.
Things look good for the Tories right now, but there's a lot that can go wrong for them between now and 2020. To name a few: 1) They have a teensy majority, so divisions can immediately result in chaotic-looking lost votes. 2) The EU "renegotiation" provides a rich opportunity to disappoint, and whichever way it goes an EU referendum could do for UKIP what the Scottish referendum did for the SNP. 3) Cameron's pre-announced resignation makes him a lame duck as of about a week on Thursday, with trying to undermine each other and impress Tory activists instead of working together to impress swing voters. 4) The next person they pick may not be very good, especially if the party gets over-confident and feels it can indulge itself. 5) If the economy recovers enough that interest rates go up, a nation of leveraged home-owners is going to go ballistic.
Has any good person yet put together party seats in order of marginality or party targets in order of swing? Indeed, which database of results is easiest to navigate?
The boundary changes to 600 and 5% varience are enshrined in law, so to change them new legislation would need to be passed quickly.
The boundary commission will work off December 2015 electoral registers and report in 2018.
It's likely IMO that the 5% variance will be loosened a bit. I think everyone was horrified by the sort of ridiculous creations, like 'Mersey Banks", that came about as a result of that 5% limit.
Has any good person yet put together party seats in order of marginality or party targets in order of swing? Indeed, which database of results is easiest to navigate?
Labour's problem is not what but where. They are now largely confined to London, Wales and the Core Cities. That's nowhere near a majority. They need to extend their geographical reach dramatically. That means picking a leader who can reach into new areas.
For me that rules out Chuka Umunna and Tristram Hunt for starters.
Look//.. Labour's bigesst problem was Ed Miliband. Ed sounded terribly nasal , his voice grated, he didn't look good on tv... with some very strange mannerisms and twitches, and that before you even get near policy. The two kitchens lie was symptomatic of the poor portrayal, and the headstone was just laughable. Labour won't get anywhere till they find someone who looks good on tv and can dissemble with a smile.
Some suggested that the final nail in Ed's coffin was stumbling in the last debate, which resonated with the "weak Ed will be dominated by the SNP" meme.
One question that may have profound impact on the next five years: what is the state of the parties finances after this GE?
I'm expecting donations to all parties to reduce over the next year (the SNP in the run-up to 2016 perhaps being an exception). ISTR stories that the Conservatives had enough of a war chest to pay for a second GE in November, had there been one.
But what about Labour? Will the promise of large donations from the unions play a pivotal part in their leadership election?
There's a lot of bollocks being written about what Labour has done wrong and how it needs to become a pale imitation of the Tory party to succeed. Why would people vote for that before 2030, when they might be tired of twenty years of the Conservative party in government?
Labour have to stand for something different.
Different, yes, but it does also need to appeal to that proportion of the Tory vote that used to vote for them and currently chooses the Tories.
My switching model had two fundamentally wrong assumptions:
a) it assumed that 90% of 2010 LD voters would continue to vote LD in LD seats (but only 25% would stick with the LDs in none LD seats). b) it assumed that UKIP would get 16% of 2010 Con voters and 8% of 2010 Lab voters.
If I change the assumptions to
a) only 70% of 2010 LD voters continued to vote LD in LD seats (i.e. a much bigger "leakage") b) UKIP gets only 8% of 2010 Con voters but 16% of 2010 voters (i.e. a reversal of the makeup of UKIP's vote so that it is mainly ex Lab) then the model is almost spot on: Con 228 Lab 230 LD 11 SNP 57.
If this is right, then the Tories managed to get many blue Kippers to vote Tory, but Lab totally failed to attract back the red kippers who were also larger in number.
The data tables should shed some light on this hypothesis.
PS My model still doesn't totally explain some London seats e.g. Twickenham where it is clear that many ex-LDs voted Tory. Could this be the mansion tax effect?
Assume that should be Con 328?
My rule of thumb, set out on here many times over the months, was that the LibDems would lose 25% of their vote where they had an incumbent, 33% where it was a new candidate. That seemed about the only way to square the LibDems losing 60% of their 2010 vote. I haven't checked the maths, but I'm guessing it wasn't too far off overall.
I was also of the view (again set out on here) that with Ed Miliband as leader, the Blue-kip vote would return to the fold come election day - the Red Kippers would not.
There has not been a failure of polling so much as a failure of political nous. The 34-34 polling looked wrong, when you stood back from it. I repeatedly said that YouGov was broken. To some derision, it has to be said. But one thing the polling did get right was the large number of undecideds. Like 1992, decisions were made late. But when you knew that, political nous dictated that Ed Miliband Would Never Be Prime Minister.
You were right this time, but a lot of the same things were said about Brown and yet Cameron didn't win his majority in 2010, despite many people predicting he would do so.
Some people are saying this is a simple matter of the benefits of incumbency. Well, perhaps. I think that predicting the aggregate choices of a diverse electorate is a lot harder than people pretend, but we certainly like to create simple stories about it after the event so that we can feel reassured that we understand our world.
The boundary changes to 600 and 5% varience are enshrined in law, so to change them new legislation would need to be passed quickly.
The boundary commission will work off December 2015 electoral registers and report in 2018.
That's an interesting tactical call for Lib and Lab Lords. Do they accept the new law as an improvement on the status quo, or do they hold things up in the hope that Tory backbenchers will veto the new boundaries if they put enough of them out of a job?
Comments
The man's a smirking shyster whose attempt at humour betrayed the truth of his party's economically ruinous incompetence.
I feel sorry for Bercow because actions which were not his but affect him in a personal way have become a story. I don't feel sorry for Byrne because the action he took was in his professional sphere, and was damned foolish.
You may be wrong on Miliband. Labour tends to be forgiving of its failed leaders.
The label "right-wing" is very fuzzy and can be downright misleading.
How helpful of Salmond to be taking about writing the Labour party budget.
As I say, a rough old trade.
My rule of thumb, set out on here many times over the months, was that the LibDems would lose 25% of their vote where they had an incumbent, 33% where it was a new candidate. That seemed about the only way to square the LibDems losing 60% of their 2010 vote. I haven't checked the maths, but I'm guessing it wasn't too far off overall.
I was also of the view (again set out on here) that with Ed Miliband as leader, the Blue-kip vote would return to the fold come election day - the Red Kippers would not.
There has not been a failure of polling so much as a failure of political nous. The 34-34 polling looked wrong, when you stood back from it. I repeatedly said that YouGov was broken. To some derision, it has to be said. But one thing the polling did get right was the large number of undecideds. Like 1992, decisions were made late. But when you knew that, political nous dictated that Ed Miliband Would Never Be Prime Minister.
There was no groundswell of Conservative support: the party's aggregate vote increased by a mere 0.8 per cent. Victory was due to careful targeting which was only possible due to Messina's work.
There were moments ( Ed QT) and themes (SNP controlling Labour) that i'm sure must have changed minds but don't get why someone might state otherwise in a poll.
I was shocked by the Cons gains fromLibdem. If u voted libdem and are angry they betrayed u by siding with the Tories, changing your vote so the Tories get the seat anyway and you end up with no influence at all seems like cutting off your nose to spite your face.
@surbiton was asking about the London result and advocating regional polls excluding London. The London results were very variable for Labour - some big swings for in the East and of course in Ilford north but also swings against Labour in the 3 north London marginals they missed. In south London the swing was also much more variable and they only won Ealing and Brentford by whiskers. I think London wide polling for a GE would be nigh on impossible to be reliable - last Thursday it was a city of many paces - which actually is no surprise for anyone who has lived there. Overall they did far less well there than the polls suggested although it was their best result overall., but I think that in part was down to demographic changes rather than a successful campaign.
He thought he was observing a tradition in which an outgoing minister leaves a private, jokey message for the person succeeding him. But all is fair in love, war and politics. The person he left it to and who made it public was David Laws, I believe. Whatever became of him?
EdM failed on all three. The last one because he really did not get it. Not because he hated England, but because anyone with a Marxist background - if not Marxist beliefs - will tend to see things in terms of class rather than nationality. This is another reason why Dan Jarvis would be such a good choice for Labour, of course.
I can't see a place for a social demo aspect anymore, as it's covered by labour these days.
I can see a place for a proper Liberal party, how they then each beyond 10-15% of the electorate is another matter, but then maybe they shouldn't be bothered with that.
The LibDems are now toast and an irrelevance. Seeing a Labour route back to power is much more interesting. FWIW I think Scotland is a lost cause to all UK-wide parties now. Labour needs to be thinking about middle England.
I suggest lord oakeshott
On the personal level I am sorry things didn't work out for you Nick. You're a good egg personally and this must be very disappointing. Politically....let's not go there, I'll only say something I would come to regret...
Average: C 33.6, L 33.6, LD 9, UKIP 13, GRN 4.8, OTH 6.1
Result: C 37.8, L 31.2, LD 8.1, UKIP 12.9, GRN 3.8, OTH 6.3
Variance : C -4.2, L +2.4, LD +0.9, UKIP -0.1, GRN +1.0, OTH -0.2
I honestly believe YouGov skewed the polls very badly this time and other pollsters lost their nerve and adjusted their own models to fit YouGov's garbage daily polls.
Worth a read for anyone interested in how it looked on the ground...
http://www.viewtoahill.com/?p=211
Anyone on Twitter who fancies a giggle follow @YvetteCooper_MP
An excellent parody account made awesome by the sheer numbers who think it's actually real. Up there with @IDS_MP
Free Trade vs the Protectionist EC?
I can't see them doing it easily at all
Two problems, though:
1) That doesn't help them in Scotland, where those moves are part of their problem.
2) It's not clear that Blairism would have worked without Tony Blair, so who's their new Tony Blair?
Proposing a law against Islamophobia, two days after the Tower Hamlets judgement, showed a remarkable tin ear for public opinion. Ditto, proposals for ethnic minority quotas in the civil service, or boardroom quotas for women. There is broad public support for anti- discrimination legislation (though people disagree about specifics). There is little public support for affirmative action, and radical enforcement of equality and diversity, outside of left wing intellectual circles or favoured client groups.
Astonishing that they didn't appear to know what the rules on the leadership election were when Miliband resigned.
I have always got it. Labour was a forced choice for me - Ed's Labour anyway. You get nowhere in England with a party that fails to accept Englishness, aspiration and the profit motive. All three should be celebrated and none of them are a barrier to an agenda built around social justice and solidarity. I also think that the vast majority of all our ethnic communities have absolutely no problem with them either. The votes in Tower Hamlets and Bradford surely show that pandering to a particular notion of "the Moslem community" is ridiculous.
Labour did not lose votes to UKIP because the switchers wanted Thatcherite economic policies. They switched because they believed that Labour did not respect or value their identity.
But yes, hire Messina. Wasn't it rumoured they'd intended to do just that but the blue team was quicker off the mark?
Labour have to stand for something different.
Labour did not lose votes to UKIP because the switchers wanted Thatcherite economic policies. They switched because they believed that Labour did not respect or value their identity.
My problem with Labour is the sheer hypocrisy. Now we know that most politicians are hypocrites, but I am struggling to think of one Labour policy that in practice they are not doing or have done the complete opposite.
When they make so much about those policies, such as zero hour contracts and privatising the NHS, they cannot be surprised when the tables are turned on them.
For me they are the real nasty party, full of two faced hypocrites.
The LibDems, as I undestood it as a supporter, accept the EU as a move forward. The benefit of the EU, certainly to the Western members, has surely been the development of a European identity.
Personally I want to vote for a Party which believes in European integration, but which devolves power downward as far as possible, which lets business get on with it, but in a socially responsible fashion (and that means regulation in which the regulated have a share), which recognises the need for Trade Unions but isn’t in hock to them.
I really thought that the polls were suppressing UKIP, whereas they were they were downgrading the Tories.
However the Kipper vote was much more damaging to the northern Labour seats than any to the southern Tories. Just think. if the UKIP vote had reached, say 17%/18% instead of 13% the Tories might have had a landslide of perhaps a comfortable 60 seat majority instead of a miserable 12 seats which is always bound to be a problem.
One other fact that PB tories dismissed as false, was the UKIP notion that they were picking up more votes from Labour than Tories, which has been born out by the results.
If the pollsters had enough confidence in their methods to stand out, rather than herding, I expect some would have got the result right.
The boundary commission will work off December 2015 electoral registers and report in 2018.
Labour won't get anywhere till they find someone who looks good on tv and can dissemble with a smile.
Things look good for the Tories right now, but there's a lot that can go wrong for them between now and 2020. To name a few:
1) They have a teensy majority, so divisions can immediately result in chaotic-looking lost votes.
2) The EU "renegotiation" provides a rich opportunity to disappoint, and whichever way it goes an EU referendum could do for UKIP what the Scottish referendum did for the SNP.
3) Cameron's pre-announced resignation makes him a lame duck as of about a week on Thursday, with trying to undermine each other and impress Tory activists instead of working together to impress swing voters.
4) The next person they pick may not be very good, especially if the party gets over-confident and feels it can indulge itself.
5) If the economy recovers enough that interest rates go up, a nation of leveraged home-owners is going to go ballistic.
For me that rules out Chuka Umunna and Tristram Hunt for starters.
I'm expecting donations to all parties to reduce over the next year (the SNP in the run-up to 2016 perhaps being an exception). ISTR stories that the Conservatives had enough of a war chest to pay for a second GE in November, had there been one.
But what about Labour? Will the promise of large donations from the unions play a pivotal part in their leadership election?
http://vote-2012.proboards.com/post/251972/thread
why does anybody join a political party? What do they 'get' out of it nowadays?
Some people are saying this is a simple matter of the benefits of incumbency. Well, perhaps. I think that predicting the aggregate choices of a diverse electorate is a lot harder than people pretend, but we certainly like to create simple stories about it after the event so that we can feel reassured that we understand our world.