Paul Waugh@paulwaugh·45 mins45 minutes ago Farage on Sky:"there's 1 person in Ukip agitating for change + he hasn't had the courage to come out in public" Dig at @DouglasCarswell?
Pedant alert. Hong Kong Phooeys name was Penry, not Henry :-)
As most of us said in the day's after the election, Labour is very, very unlikely to be get back into power in one election.
2020 will be about trying to reverse enough of the damage to be able to make a proper push to power in 2025 but there's no quick way back to Number 10 now.
Probably explains the Jarvis decision... Why waste ten years as LOTO?
But that's simply not true. Labour has a colossal task ahead if it is to get an overall majority and would need an unusually large swing even to get most seats. But it doesn't need most seats to get back into power. It probably needs something like 270 seats to have a decent shot of power, and that's a much less demanding challenge.
Agreed- labour doesn't need to look at a majority. It needs to go for circa 250 seats in England and hope the LD's pick up a few blue seats- not the most demanding electoral challenge ever. By 2020 the mantra of vote Ed get SNP will be irrelevant- Labour will have built a convincing narrative alongside the SNP.
The biggest threat to Labour doing this isn't the Tories, it's UKIP, and why I increasingly think Andy Burnham maybe the best candidate.
But surely unless Labour are heading for a 97/2001 style landslide, the Tories are always going to be able to recycle the 'propped up by the SNP' attack line?
Looking for a book on a successful leader, political or non political, who had constant success without any rough times or criticism. Any recommendations?
As most of us said in the day's after the election, Labour is very, very unlikely to be get back into power in one election.
2020 will be about trying to reverse enough of the damage to be able to make a proper push to power in 2025 but there's no quick way back to Number 10 now.
Probably explains the Jarvis decision... Why waste ten years as LOTO?
Exactly one week ago today the balance of forecasts on here was EICIPM and a fury of bloodletting in the Tory party post-election, whilst Boris prepared his bid.
Now we're talking about 2020 being "nailed on" for the Tories.
Labour have a formidable task, but it really isn't. Under EVEL they will need a majority of seats in England to govern, and prob with the SNP acquiescing UK-wide.
270 English seats would do it. If the new boundaries pass, I make that about 75-80 gains from the Tories in England.
If the Tories have a mare in the next few years, and swing voters desert them with tactical voting against them, that is perfectly possible.
TA Dodge's biography of him is excellent but make sure you buy the full version (there are abridged editions cropping up which are not marked as abridged).
[I am aware that was not a serious question, although my recommendation is well worth reading].
"The Boundary Commission will be interesting. If the terms of reference stays the same, it should actually help Labour."
If that's true, will Labour still call it gerrymandering?
I don't see how the boundary review could help Lab. Firstly Wales loses its over-representation (10 seats). Lab still has more Welsh seats than the Cons.
Secondly a lot of the northern cities (except Manchester) are losing electorate.
For example let's look at Humberside
Hull E - 66k Hull N - 64k Hull W & Hessle - 59k Yorkshire E - 81k Beverley - 80k Haltemprice 71k Brigg - 68k Scunthorpe -64k Grimsby - 58k Cleethorpes - 70k TOTAL - 681k Divided by the 600 seat electoral quota of 75774 =9 seats
Now Humberside currently has 5 Tory and 5 Lab seats but it's clear the seat disappearing will be a Labour one. Hull will only get 2 whole seats and part of a 3rd will likely be overwhelmed by Tory territory. Cleethorpes will have to gain some of Grimsby and might be more marginal but Scunthorpe will have to expand into Tory countryside and could be "flipped"
Another example is Stoke and Newcastle-Under-Lyme
Central -62k North - 73k South - 69k Newcastle-U-Lyme - 67k
So Stoke and Newcastle are only entitled to 3.6 seats and one seat will likely have to take in some Tory countryside and could be flipped
Now compare with Cambridgeshire
Cambridge -83k Cambs NE - 83k Cambs NW - 92k Cambs S - 84k Cambs SE - 85k Hunts - 82k Peterborough - 73k
So Cambs is entitled to 7.7 MPs and could gain a seat (or part of) even as the number of MPs is being cut
What makes it worse for Lab is that the second part of individual registration is happening, removing people who cannot be matched to government databases. Now bearing in mind some of these people may not even exist (alleged vote fraud) this could make it even worse for Lab.
@DMcCaffreySKY: 'Gobby' Paul Lambert now on leave from @UKIP. I believe no decision been made about his contract. He wants to stay #AreyougoingtoresignGobby
Paul Waugh@paulwaugh·45 mins45 minutes ago Farage on Sky:"there's 1 person in Ukip agitating for change + he hasn't had the courage to come out in public" Dig at @DouglasCarswell?
@mattholehouse: Raheem Kassam says he will become a journalist. “If O’Flynn thinks that he has seen aggressive tactics before, he ain’t seen nothing yet."
* Even before his birth, the future leader of North Korea was triggering miracles. Official biographers say his birth in a cabin on the slopes of Baekdu Mountain in February 1942 was foretold by a swallow and heralded by a double rainbow. When he was born, a new star appeared in the night sky.
Looking for a book on a successful leader, political or non political, who had constant success without any rough times or criticism. Any recommendations?
Coulson's perjury trial in Edinburgh starts today and a triumphant Bwana Dave up to tell us what's what. Poor old Andy, he must be wondering what might have been.
It's interesting reading all the pbTories predicting the thousand year Tory Riech. I think the unexpected nature of the majority has clouded your thinking.
This was a perfect storm for the Tories- a very unpopular Labour leader, combined with the LD's tanking, and the SNP wipeout and UKIP taking votes off the Labour base against the backdrop of Tory hubris on the economy and a popular Tory leader. A seventh factor is that the Tories managed to successfully pin the whole narrative of the deficit on Labour spending opposed to the collapse in tax receipts and the bank bailout.
The Tories needed these seven variables all working in their favour to win a wafer thin majority. That is the scale of the task that the Tories need to have to stay in power. To quote Ed, "It ain't going to happen."
One of Labour's quickest routes back would be for the Tories to believe that they won the election because a majority of voters wanted a Tory government. If the hubris and complacency we see on PB every day is mirrored within the party organisation then Labour have a real chance. Sadly, I fear it is not.
SO, for 5 years the PBTories said that Ed was crap, and that EMWNBPM.
We were right.
Where in that did anyone ever say "a majority of voters wanted a Tory Government", although of course that is ultimately what happened...?
Slightly less than 25% of voters wanted a Tory government; around 38% of those who voted.
How the 75%/62% coalesce next time is one of the key issues.
You no idea how many voters wanted a Tory government. Absolutely none whatsoever. In an FPTP voting setup, nothing can be inferred from votes cast.
I hate Labour yet in the past have voted for them tactically. I hate little Englanders yet have voted for a loony Little Englander party. Any conclusion that either rabble's vote tally reflected their actual support is nonsense.
..As for the Labour leadership, there isn't an obvious left-right split between the candidates - nobody is saying anything that either Tony Blair or Jeremy Corbyn would describe as repellent. ...
NickMP you are trying to paste over some very fundamental splits. Maybe you are trying to put a brave face on it as Labour head towards a major decision point that will either drive out its largest backers or drive out the New Labour folk. Just look at one issue. Tony will find repellent that Yvette thinks that the last Lab Govt did not spend too much. Jeremy will find repellent that Liz thinks that the last Lab Govt did spend too much. Burnham will be repellent to Tony and Chuka and Tristam repellent to Jeremy.
As most of us said in the day's after the election, Labour is very, very unlikely to be get back into power in one election.
2020 will be about trying to reverse enough of the damage to be able to make a proper push to power in 2025 but there's no quick way back to Number 10 now.
Probably explains the Jarvis decision... Why waste ten years as LOTO?
But it doesn't need most seats to get back into power. It probably needs something like 270 seats to have a decent shot of power, and that's a much less demanding challenge.
But in that scenario your bringing back the prospect of a Lab/SNP coalition or arrangement which we know England and Wales won't wear...
Labour's had it for a decade.
It didn't wear it this time. Next time it may be sicker of the Conservatives than it is fearful of a Labour/SNP tie-up.
In any case, my point stands. The maths potentially work for Labour at a much lower level than at present most Conservatives seem to have appreciated. Labour may have only remote hopes of gaining majority power by itself in 2020. It has perfectly sensible hopes of getting some power in 2020.
That's my view. I don't think there's huge amounts of enthusiasm for either main party, and both are capable of royally screwing it up.
The bad news for Labour is that England has swung quite clearly to the Right, so how do they respond to that?
That's more than the US - a slightly larger country - has in the HoR and Senate combined. As it is, we can't even fit all our MPs into the House of Commons
One reason is because most of the executive is drawn from members of the legislature. Therefore when you reduce the size of the legislature you will increase the proportion of the legislature that are members of the executive.
Do we need so many members of the Executive though?
I don't know. I also don't know whether they need to be [mostly] members of the legislature in order to be held accountable. How unusual is Francis Maude's position of being a minister but neither an MP or a Lord?
However, without setting a limit on the size of the executive that is smaller than at present, or otherwise dealing with the issue, it's a poor decision to reduce the size of the Commons.
It's interesting reading all the pbTories predicting the thousand year Tory Riech. I think the unexpected nature of the majority has clouded your thinking.
This was a perfect storm for the Tories- a very unpopular Labour leader, combined with the LD's tanking, and the SNP wipeout and UKIP taking votes off the Labour base against the backdrop of Tory hubris on the economy and a popular Tory leader. A seventh factor is that the Tories managed to successfully pin the whole narrative of the deficit on Labour spending opposed to the collapse in tax receipts and the bank bailout.
The Tories needed these seven variables all working in their favour to win a wafer thin majority. That is the scale of the task that the Tories need to have to stay in power. To quote Ed, "It ain't going to happen."
Nobody has said the Tories will remain in power forever just that 2020 looks very "difficult" for Labour given they are 100 seats behind the Tories (will be more than 100 seats notionally after boundary changes) and have been destroyed in their birth place...
...and SO accuses the PBTories of unbridled hubris...
There is no doubt that were Scotland to become independent Salmond and Sturgeon would very quickly become among the most hated politicians any country has ever known - the lies they have consistently told for years would be exposed for all to see. But they would not give a monkeys. All that matters to them is creating that frontier.
Mr. Tyson, whilst I agree hubris is perhaps unwise, that cuts both ways. There's no guarantee Labour will score more seats than the Conservatives next time and assuming it'll happen will not make it so.
That's more than the US - a slightly larger country - has in the HoR and Senate combined. As it is, we can't even fit all our MPs into the House of Commons
One reason is because most of the executive is drawn from members of the legislature. Therefore when you reduce the size of the legislature you will increase the proportion of the legislature that are members of the executive.
Do we need so many members of the Executive though?
Probably yes. There are maybe a couple of ministries we could in theory get rid of or merge. But government needs people. Its no use complaining about lack of talent if you restrict the pool from which you select. On the other hand if like America you can bring in an entire administration from outside of Congress then we can quite easily reduce the number of MPs. If you did that then we would get screams of ''accountability''. I can just about support the argument that we can get away with fewer MPs - however it will create its own problems - but the comparison with the USA which also has 50 other individual State governments each with its own House and Senate, is bogus.
..As for the Labour leadership, there isn't an obvious left-right split between the candidates - nobody is saying anything that either Tony Blair or Jeremy Corbyn would describe as repellent. ...
NickMP you are trying to paste over some very fundamental splits. Maybe you are trying to put a brave face on it as Labour head towards a major decision point that will either drive out its largest backers or drive out the New Labour folk. Just look at one issue. Tony will find repellent that Yvette thinks that the last Lab Govt did not spend too much. Jeremy will find repellent that Liz thinks that the last Lab Govt did spend too much. Burnham will be repellent to Tony and Chuka and Tristam repellent to Jeremy.
Looking at the Curtis numbers, maybe Labour need to think about someone who can put in two terms worth of haul to get back in. That surely means turning to a new generation.
Rather surprised Umunna's fled the field before the enemy even arrived. I wonder who he'll support. Probably Cooper. Older generation, so likelier to resign if she loses in 2020, whereas a younger person might do a Kinnock and stay on.
...and SO accuses the PBTories of unbridled hubris...
There is no doubt that were Scotland to become independent Salmond and Sturgeon would very quickly become among the most hated politicians any country has ever known - the lies they have consistently told for years would be exposed for all to see. But they would not give a monkeys. All that matters to them is creating that frontier.
Good old Loyalists, always talking about hate (never their own) and lies (never their own).
Given that almost everyone, experts and non-experts alike, didn't manage to get their predictions for the 2015 election anywhere near right even on the day of the election itself, it seems a bit premature to try to call the 2020 election.
This is so reminiscent of 1992: pundits before the election were convinced Kinnock would win a majority, and after the election the same pundits opined that Labour were finished and would never get a majority again.
Meanwhile, Labour's most immediate and serious problem is Holyrood 2016. They look well set for another catastrophic result there. In that context, these words should be chilling for them:
The first minister has dismissed newspaper reports which quote a "senior SNP source at Westminster" as saying the party could push ahead with a second independence referendum without the consent of Westminster.
Her representative said: "These claims are totally wrong - there are no such plans. The position is crystal clear: the general election was not a mandate for another referendum. And there will only be another referendum if and when the people of Scotland back such a proposal at a Scottish Parliament election."
They may have such a mandate in just a year's time.
"Tories managed to successfully pin the whole narrative of the deficit on Labour spending opposed to the collapse in tax receipts and the bank bailout."
I'm no economist so I think simply. You're were spending X and that was OK so long as your income was X minus a little bit. But the collapse in tax receipts meant that your income became X minus a bloody big bit. Something you were totally unprepared for because Gordon had abolished boom and bust.
"Oh, look ... it's started snowing in January, but we abolished the seasons last year!"
It may be simplistic but that's the way the voters look at things. And that's why Ed didn't want any discussion.
Chuka has always looked VERY temperamentally unsuited for a leadership role so doesn't surprise me he's fizzled out before even getting into the starters enclosure...
I'm assuming the LibDem pitch under Farron would be
"Like Labour, we care. Unlike Labour, we are competent"
I don't want politicians who care and emote and blub and tell me how virtuous they are and how they have their hearts in the right place etc. I want a government that is thoughtful and competent and professional, that makes sensible decisions and enacts them professionally. All this theatrical, narcissistic virtue signalling is both repellent and a distraction.
Some basic competence and not f*cking everything up all the time would be some achievement, frankly.
The emoting can be left to actors.
The caring can be left to the people who actually do the jobs: teachers, doctors, nurses etc. They should be left to get on with their job in the most professional way they can. A nurse needs time to care for an elderly dementia patient properly and the politician's job is to give her that time and the necessary resources not to blub his lip while talking about the vulnerable.
Given that almost everyone, experts and non-experts alike, didn't manage to get their predictions for the 2015 election anywhere near right even on the day of the election itself, it seems a bit premature to try to call the 2020 election.
This is so reminiscent of 1992: pundits before the election were convinced Kinnock would win a majority, and after the election the same pundits opined that Labour were finished and would never get a majority again.
Meanwhile, Labour's most immediate and serious problem is Holyrood 2016. They look well set for another catastrophic result there. In that context, these words should be chilling for them:
The first minister has dismissed newspaper reports which quote a "senior SNP source at Westminster" as saying the party could push ahead with a second independence referendum without the consent of Westminster.
Her representative said: "These claims are totally wrong - there are no such plans. The position is crystal clear: the general election was not a mandate for another referendum. And there will only be another referendum if and when the people of Scotland back such a proposal at a Scottish Parliament election."
They may have such a mandate in just a year's time.
Labour did not hugely overspend by any historical or international comparison.
Yes, they did. The issue was that they puffed up a huge but temporary boom in tax revenues but then used that as a baseline for structural spending. When the mirage faded they refused to adjusted spending to the new baseline leaving an unsustainable structural deficit. And that's even before you tackle the question of whether it was productive spending they indulged in
Correct. It is absurd to say Labour did not overspend. How can you run deficits in a boom? Labour's taxes from banking turned out to be cyclical not structural and on top of that they still ran deficits. labour increased spending in real terms by 50% between 200 and 2010. And the crisis did not particularly affect the rate of increase. I have been pointing this out for years long before David Smith in the Times nailed it. http://www.economicsuk.com/blog/002073.html ''In inflation-adjusted terms, 2013-14 prices, there was a massive increase in total managed expenditure over the 2000-2010 period. Spending in real terms in 2009-10, £737.3bn, was 51% higher than it was in 1999-2000, £488.5bn. Think about that for a second. In a decade, the size of the state increased by just over a half. It was the biggest sustained increase in public spending in British history.'' ''The increase in spending in the last 2-3 years was not out of line with its average in the rest of the 2000s. The rise in spending was overwhelmingly deliberate.''
''Now, using those same OBR figures, updated following last month’s autumn statement, what is in prospect? This is what might surprise you. Osborne’s overall aim over the 10 years 2010-2020 is to reduce total managed expenditure from £737.3bn in 2009-10, again in real terms, to £703.7bn in 2019-20. That is a reduction of 4.6% over 10 years, less than a single year’s increase during the splurge years. How much of this has already been done? Slightly more than half. Total managed expenditure in 2013-14, £719.9bn, was 2.4% down on its 2009-10 level.''
We should remember the responsible sustained Tory approach when we listen to Sturgeon screaming ''austeriteeeee!''
He's not a Mary Creagh who throws her hat in the ring and could withdraw later because of lack of support...he was a high profile candidate, a serious candidate...you don't launch a leadership campaign and withdraw in less than 1 week...it is bizarre
If charities spent less money on providing ridiculous stuffed toys and gimmicks they might stand a better chance of making a difference. Of course, the trick is working out which ones want to change the world and which ones want to get rich in the name of a good cause.
All these gimmicky things that the charities do have a proven effect on response rate and funds raised.
Given that almost everyone, experts and non-experts alike, didn't manage to get their predictions for the 2015 election anywhere near right even on the day of the election itself, it seems a bit premature to try to call the 2020 election.
This is so reminiscent of 1992: pundits before the election were convinced Kinnock would win a majority, and after the election the same pundits opined that Labour were finished and would never get a majority again.
Meanwhile, Labour's most immediate and serious problem is Holyrood 2016. They look well set for another catastrophic result there. In that context, these words should be chilling for them:
The first minister has dismissed newspaper reports which quote a "senior SNP source at Westminster" as saying the party could push ahead with a second independence referendum without the consent of Westminster.
Her representative said: "These claims are totally wrong - there are no such plans. The position is crystal clear: the general election was not a mandate for another referendum. And there will only be another referendum if and when the people of Scotland back such a proposal at a Scottish Parliament election."
They may have such a mandate in just a year's time.
I don't think it's wise to speculate about exactly what someone might have done in the absence of any clear evidence at present that he's actually done anything wrong at all. I'm sure we'll hear soon enough if something is going to come out.
He's not a Mary Creagh who throws her hat in the ring and could withdraw later because of lack of support...he was a high profile candidate, a serious candidate...you don't launch a leadership campaign and withdraw in less than 1 week...it is bizarre
This is the guy who got up and walked out of a live TV interview because he didn't like the line of questioning...
He has always been highly temperamental... Labour's probably had a lucky escape actually. He'd have been an utter disaster if he'd managed to become leader.
I don't see why Chuka Umunna leaving the field means that Andy Burnham's price should massively shorten. Andy Burnham should probably have been favourite anyway, but I would have thought that the prices that should be shortening are of other modernisers who may now collect his support.
It's more prosaic, I think he doesn't want to be Labour's William Hague, he's only 36, same age as Hague was when he became leader.
It has to be.
This clearly cannot be the reason:
He said in a statement that he was not comfortable with the level of pressure that came with being a leadership candidate
As anyone able to think well enough to form that sentence would be under no illusions about the level of pressure that a new leader would be under and so would have decided whether they were comfortable with it before they announced - for heaven's sake, he just saw what Ed M went through for 5 years, so that statement is obviously a lie or a cover for something else.
He'll pop up again in a few years I guess? Someone else has failed to turn things around enough, he's matured a little more, people recall how they had wanted him in the first place, and he walks in to save the day.
Given that almost everyone, experts and non-experts alike, didn't manage to get their predictions for the 2015 election anywhere near right even on the day of the election itself, it seems a bit premature to try to call the 2020 election.
This is so reminiscent of 1992: pundits before the election were convinced Kinnock would win a majority, and after the election the same pundits opined that Labour were finished and would never get a majority again.
Meanwhile, Labour's most immediate and serious problem is Holyrood 2016. They look well set for another catastrophic result there. In that context, these words should be chilling for them:
The first minister has dismissed newspaper reports which quote a "senior SNP source at Westminster" as saying the party could push ahead with a second independence referendum without the consent of Westminster.
Her representative said: "These claims are totally wrong - there are no such plans. The position is crystal clear: the general election was not a mandate for another referendum. And there will only be another referendum if and when the people of Scotland back such a proposal at a Scottish Parliament election."
They may have such a mandate in just a year's time.
It's more prosaic, I think he doesn't want to be Labour's William Hague, he's only 36, same age as Hague was when he became leader.
It has to be.
This clearly cannot be the reason:
He said in a statement that he was not comfortable with the level of pressure that came with being a leadership candidate
As anyone able to think well enough to form that sentence would be under no illusions about the level of pressure that a new leader would be under and so would have decided whether they were comfortable with it before they announced - for heaven's sake, he just saw what Ed M went through for 5 years, so that statement is obviously a lie or a cover for something else.
He'll pop up again in a few years I guess? Someone else has failed to turn things around enough, he's matured a little more, people recall how they had wanted him in the first place, and he walks in to save the day.
Erm. I can't see how he can ever run when he's made the statement that the pressure is effectively too much. It will still be too much in five years. Unless he's got a young family and they will be grown up by then or something along those lines.
Will he do a special "un-running" video from Swindon filmed on an iphone?
His trendy mates probably ripped the piss out of him all week for that ridiculous iPhone video and being seen w trash in Swindon. That's the scrutiny he couldn't deal with
Comments
@LabourList: Politicians: I'm the person you're talking about and I might have some useful information, writes @girlsteve http://labli.st/1JMuw5S
He says: "Two or three people need to make their minds up. Are their futures in UKIP or aren’t they?'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-32726516
Now we're talking about 2020 being "nailed on" for the Tories.
Labour have a formidable task, but it really isn't. Under EVEL they will need a majority of seats in England to govern, and prob with the SNP acquiescing UK-wide.
270 English seats would do it. If the new boundaries pass, I make that about 75-80 gains from the Tories in England.
If the Tories have a mare in the next few years, and swing voters desert them with tactical voting against them, that is perfectly possible.
TA Dodge's biography of him is excellent but make sure you buy the full version (there are abridged editions cropping up which are not marked as abridged).
[I am aware that was not a serious question, although my recommendation is well worth reading].
Secondly a lot of the northern cities (except Manchester) are losing electorate.
For example let's look at Humberside
Hull E - 66k
Hull N - 64k
Hull W & Hessle - 59k
Yorkshire E - 81k
Beverley - 80k
Haltemprice 71k
Brigg - 68k
Scunthorpe -64k
Grimsby - 58k
Cleethorpes - 70k
TOTAL - 681k
Divided by the 600 seat electoral quota of 75774 =9 seats
Now Humberside currently has 5 Tory and 5 Lab seats but it's clear the seat disappearing will be a Labour one. Hull will only get 2 whole seats and part of a 3rd will likely be overwhelmed by Tory territory. Cleethorpes will have to gain some of Grimsby and might be more marginal but Scunthorpe will have to expand into Tory countryside and could be "flipped"
Another example is Stoke and Newcastle-Under-Lyme
Central -62k
North - 73k
South - 69k
Newcastle-U-Lyme - 67k
So Stoke and Newcastle are only entitled to 3.6 seats and one seat will likely have to take in some Tory countryside and could be flipped
Now compare with Cambridgeshire
Cambridge -83k
Cambs NE - 83k
Cambs NW - 92k
Cambs S - 84k
Cambs SE - 85k
Hunts - 82k
Peterborough - 73k
So Cambs is entitled to 7.7 MPs and could gain a seat (or part of) even as the number of MPs is being cut
What makes it worse for Lab is that the second part of individual registration is happening, removing people who cannot be matched to government databases. Now bearing in mind some of these people may not even exist (alleged vote fraud) this could make it even worse for Lab.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/8292848/The-Incredible-Kim-Jong-il-and-his-Amazing-Achievements.html
http://youtu.be/93bWZV3485I
Pictures coming in of SNP leader "locking out" and "not working with" the Tories. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CFCUhFuWgAA_r7h.jpg
This was a perfect storm for the Tories- a very unpopular Labour leader, combined with the LD's tanking, and the SNP wipeout and UKIP taking votes off the Labour base against the backdrop of Tory hubris on the economy and a popular Tory leader. A seventh factor is that the Tories managed to successfully pin the whole narrative of the deficit on Labour spending opposed to the collapse in tax receipts and the bank bailout.
The Tories needed these seven variables all working in their favour to win a wafer thin majority. That is the scale of the task that the Tories need to have to stay in power. To quote Ed, "It ain't going to happen."
I hate Labour yet in the past have voted for them tactically. I hate little Englanders yet have voted for a loony Little Englander party. Any conclusion that either rabble's vote tally reflected their actual support is nonsense.
Tony will find repellent that Yvette thinks that the last Lab Govt did not spend too much.
Jeremy will find repellent that Liz thinks that the last Lab Govt did spend too much.
Burnham will be repellent to Tony and Chuka and Tristam repellent to Jeremy.
The bad news for Labour is that England has swung quite clearly to the Right, so how do they respond to that?
However, without setting a limit on the size of the executive that is smaller than at present, or otherwise dealing with the issue, it's a poor decision to reduce the size of the Commons.
Which dead-beats are left in the race?
1) he clearly hasn't got the votes; or
2) the newspapers this evening will be interesting.
I can just about support the argument that we can get away with fewer MPs - however it will create its own problems - but the comparison with the USA which also has 50 other individual State governments each with its own House and Senate, is bogus.
Opens it up a little for one of the other riders... Hunt?
Either that or he's an unlikely good friend of Farage.
Chuka Umunna is saying he is not "comfortable" with the extra scrutiny he's been under since throwing his hat in the ring.
Awww bless.....skeletons in the closet?
"Chuka Can"
This is so reminiscent of 1992: pundits before the election were convinced Kinnock would win a majority, and after the election the same pundits opined that Labour were finished and would never get a majority again.
Meanwhile, Labour's most immediate and serious problem is Holyrood 2016. They look well set for another catastrophic result there. In that context, these words should be chilling for them:
The first minister has dismissed newspaper reports which quote a "senior SNP source at Westminster" as saying the party could push ahead with a second independence referendum without the consent of Westminster.
Her representative said: "These claims are totally wrong - there are no such plans. The position is crystal clear: the general election was not a mandate for another referendum. And there will only be another referendum if and when the people of Scotland back such a proposal at a Scottish Parliament election."
They may have such a mandate in just a year's time.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-32746049
"Tories managed to successfully pin the whole narrative of the deficit on Labour spending opposed to the collapse in tax receipts and the bank bailout."
I'm no economist so I think simply. You're were spending X and that was OK so long as your income was X minus a little bit. But the collapse in tax receipts meant that your income became X minus a bloody big bit. Something you were totally unprepared for because Gordon had abolished boom and bust.
"Oh, look ... it's started snowing in January, but we abolished the seasons last year!"
It may be simplistic but that's the way the voters look at things. And that's why Ed didn't want any discussion.
Some basic competence and not f*cking everything up all the time would be some achievement, frankly.
The emoting can be left to actors.
The caring can be left to the people who actually do the jobs: teachers, doctors, nurses etc. They should be left to get on with their job in the most professional way they can. A nurse needs time to care for an elderly dementia patient properly and the politician's job is to give her that time and the necessary resources not to blub his lip while talking about the vulnerable.
This election has seen the Tories improve their position versus 2010 whilst Labour has gone backwards.
1955 works much better as a parallel than 1992 in this context, IMO.
"I'm Every Woman"
labour increased spending in real terms by 50% between 200 and 2010. And the crisis did not particularly affect the rate of increase. I have been pointing this out for years long before David Smith in the Times nailed it.
http://www.economicsuk.com/blog/002073.html
''In inflation-adjusted terms, 2013-14 prices, there was a massive increase in total managed expenditure over the 2000-2010 period. Spending in real terms in 2009-10, £737.3bn, was 51% higher than it was in 1999-2000, £488.5bn.
Think about that for a second. In a decade, the size of the state increased by just over a half. It was the biggest sustained increase in public spending in British history.''
''The increase in spending in the last 2-3 years was not out of line with its average in the rest of the 2000s. The rise in spending was overwhelmingly deliberate.''
''Now, using those same OBR figures, updated following last month’s autumn statement, what is in prospect? This is what might surprise you. Osborne’s overall aim over the 10 years 2010-2020 is to reduce total managed expenditure from £737.3bn in 2009-10, again in real terms, to £703.7bn in 2019-20. That is a reduction of 4.6% over 10 years, less than a single year’s increase during the splurge years.
How much of this has already been done? Slightly more than half. Total managed expenditure in 2013-14, £719.9bn, was 2.4% down on its 2009-10 level.''
We should remember the responsible sustained Tory approach when we listen to Sturgeon screaming ''austeriteeeee!''
It'll be Burnham.
He's not a Mary Creagh who throws her hat in the ring and could withdraw later because of lack of support...he was a high profile candidate, a serious candidate...you don't launch a leadership campaign and withdraw in less than 1 week...it is bizarre
It can't be a lack of ambition.
He has always been highly temperamental... Labour's probably had a lucky escape actually. He'd have been an utter disaster if he'd managed to become leader.
haha
hahaha
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
that is all.
(oh and even the independent got it -
independent.co.uk/voices/comment/chuka-umunna-is-the-last-thing-labour-needs--a-proausterity-leader-who-calls-people-trash-10247245.html)
Kendall could well be the beneficiary. I can't see Burnham getting many of the votes Chuka would have got.
This clearly cannot be the reason:
He said in a statement that he was not comfortable with the level of pressure that came with being a leadership candidate
As anyone able to think well enough to form that sentence would be under no illusions about the level of pressure that a new leader would be under and so would have decided whether they were comfortable with it before they announced - for heaven's sake, he just saw what Ed M went through for 5 years, so that statement is obviously a lie or a cover for something else.
He'll pop up again in a few years I guess? Someone else has failed to turn things around enough, he's matured a little more, people recall how they had wanted him in the first place, and he walks in to save the day.