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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Game over. What should the Labour right do now that it has lost?
As Leonard Cohen once crooned, everybody knows the war is over, everybody knows the good guys lost. With Labour’s surprisingly good performance in the recent election round, even the faint hope of a challenge to Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership this year has evaporated. This will give him the time and space to effect the necessary reforms of the party to ensure that he cannot be ousted by a…
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Labour rightwingers can also present this to themselves as the Mr Micawber option. In practice, however, there is no particular reason why anything should turn up.
I suspect quite a few things will turn up.
None of us know the state of the Conservative Party, or the government not much over a month from now. 'Weakened' and 'Divided' are both dead certs, but 'badly' or 'disastrously'?
Who will be the PM three months from now?
What will be the state of the economy six months from now?
So, lots of 'events, dear boy, events'.......
3 hours 3 minutes 3 seconds
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0pwXLtvt2w&feature=youtu.be
PIFFLE piffle PIFFLE piffle PIFFLE PIFFLE
Seriously, you want yesterday's embarrassment repeated today?
Oh, and piffle
No, but as we saw in SINDYRef, those possessed of the most adamantine certainty in the run up to the vote disappeared in puffs of embarrassment after it.....
A leaked letter suggests the Prime Minister was plotting with a multinational firm on how to hammer home the Remain case while still claiming he was prepared to campaign to leave.
He had been telling the Commons that he ‘ruled nothing out’ unless he won concessions from the EU.
The secret ‘mobilisation’ plan involved asking FTSE 500 companies to put in their annual reports warnings about the dangers of Brexit.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3593784/David-Cameron-s-EU-sham-exposed-Leaked-letter-reveals-PM-hatched-anti-Brexit-plot-telling-voters-campaign-leave.html
I really must watch this - and the longer one. I'm voting Leave, and ought to catch up with the campaigning.
Who exactly are the Tories about to lose power to
The Jezzbollah .... Firing blanks with gun and ballot box
The Kippers .... Sounds fishy to me
Yellow Peril .... Not Winning Here any time soon
Finchley Road Lizards .... (Y)Icke(s)
Bringing down Cameron is much more important to them than whether we are in the EU or not.
What still puzzles me about Labour is how they cannot see that this makes achieving any goals they may have impossible. Worse, if Corbyn does succeed in forcing through constitutional reform they will stand a very real risk of losing all their support and becoming as relevant as the Liberal Democrats. I know some people talk about a crisis of capitalism, or the threat from the Greens, that make Corbyn a potential winner, but even if that were true neither could be exploited by the current Labour Party. Socialism is failing far more disastrously than capitalism at the moment (cf. Venezuela, Greece) and Labour are in any case blamed for the extent of our problems (rightly, in fact, and their state of denial about this was their major stumbling-block to being credible last year).
If I were a member of the Labour right, I would take the Charge of the Light Brigade option to at least show willing. I agree with Alastair though that Labour's right has neither the courage nor the integrity to do the 'right' thing.
PS - it's faintly amusing that Corbyn, who has sucked up to numerous fascist (Galtieri, Saddam, Gaddafi, Eisen) and paramilitary (IRA) organisations, is described as being on the left. Self awareness isn't his long suit, is it? But then Chavez had the same problem.
I wouldn’t think that, if that happens, Farron will be likely to give much support to a Cameron (or any other Tory) Government.
Now run along, Piffle......
It might not be popular, but conservative economics has done more to combat world poverty than socialism ever will. It is not out of community interest that the baker rises at 5am each morning....
Dave should be implementing a reshuffle of his Cabinet, moving on the likes of Osborne, etc, but he won't ...... Dave doesn't do re-shuffles.
1) I didn't quote from anything.
2) that link isnt 'the Lisbon Treaty'.
That apart, good post!
Other Tories.
The thread header has considered Labour in too much isolation. What they do is in part dictated by what the Tories do.
Post referendum the right of Labour and left of the Tories could have a very happy union. I still think there is a likleyhood of both parties splitting after the referendum.
Same video, new defence?
It was piffle yesterday, it's piffle today.....
Sounds about right to me.
But for our entertainment, can you provide links that support we will have to:
- replace the pound with the Euro
- replace common law & jury trial with bench trials
- join Schengen.
In your own time.
The claim: We will not join the euro
Reality Check verdict: This is true - the UK secured an opt-out, which is written into EU law. The UK cannot be forced to adopt the single currency.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35990076
If it directly contradicts, you'll have no difficulty quoting it again, will you?
I haven't decided what I think about Cameron's continuance in office yet. I certainly want Osborne to go.
No matter what the result.
Its not going well for you is it?
It's possible that after the Referendum the Tories split and unpredictable opportunities open up. Vacuums usually get filled and there's a large one on the centre left but what fills it is beyond my imagination.
I keep hearing David Miliband and wishing Ralph and Marion had stopped at one.....
If you take someone like Yvette Cooper what does she want that is different from current government policy? Recently, she has wanted us to be more compassionate and more open to refugees in Europe. I think she has been quite effective in this and the fact that Government policy changed quite significantly in her direction shows a lot of Tories think the same. Would she go further than current government policy? I am not sure, it may be that she would simply want to get on with it faster.
There is still a somewhat banal mantra right across the Labour party that Tory cuts must be opposed. The critique of IDS, of all people, is probably shared across the Labour right. How can it be right to be cutting the welfare bill and CGT at the same time? I think that Corbyn would agree but the difference is that he seems minded to reinstate these cuts regardless of the state of public finances. Would the Labour right go that far? I think they are more pragmatic and know full well the electoral consequences of "unfunded" spending commitments but is pragmatism something to die in a ditch for?
For me the break point for the Labour right is likely to be defence. The Labour right has always wanted an independent nuclear deterrent. Corbyn does not. With Ken currently in the dog house he may have to move a little more slowly but he still has overwhelming advantages and is likely to prevail. At that stage they have to take one of Alastair's options. I suspect option 5 will look the most attractive. Or becoming Mayor of Manchester or something.
Let's see this 'exposure' then..
That's certainly an argument - but not one thats in the Piffle video which has the bare-faced lie that we'd have to replace the pound with the euro - among other lies.....which piffle2, curiously is too shy to support.....
Nevermind, if I flag, I shall think of 'Carlotta'.
That'll see me through.
Carthago delenda est.
A friend of mine who was standing for the Scottish Parliament had the main objective of getting to the 6th of May so that the madness of being a candidate and dealing with hundreds of e-mails (mainly the same generated by websites), face book, twitter and other rubbish might end. There was one flaw in his plan. He is now an MSP.
I'll be donating again too. Have to do all we can.
Put simply, they cannot take their party back until their party is ready for them to take it back - and it won't be ready until Corbyn and his kind are discredited. That might happen before 2020; chances are it will be afterwards. The Labour right also need a figure they can rally around. Blair had already proved himself under Kinnock and Smith. At present, there is no such figure. Unfortunately, the difficulty is that it'll be almost impossible for anyone on Labour's right to distinguish themselves at present: either they'll be tied to Corbyn or they'll be disloyal to him. How do you square that circle?
What isn't an option is breaking away. There might be a large block in parliament who'd follow given the right conditions but those conditions won't be there. The unions won't defect, not all that many members would (going on both the experience of the SDP and the 2015 leadership vote). Would voters? There's no love for Corbyn, for the Lib Dems, for UKIP or the Tories among centrist floating voters, so there is a pool to fish in but again, we go back to the questions of what the positive vision of an SDP2 would be, and who would front its message.
One point that Alastair doesn't address is whether the Labour left will give the right space to wait. New boundaries and reselections might force the right's hands if it looks like there's a purge by stealth. Then - but only then - might there be a case for starting again. But while there's hope, they simply have to hunker down and wait their chance.
BBC, fingers on the pulse.
The last paragraph is the crucial one in this context.
"Me, I expect a little of option 1 and a little of option 5"
I can only agree. But I still think Jezza is for one more Christmas and not forever. Once he's wrought the party in his own image, he will stand down with his job done. The revamped Labour/SWP Conglomerate will fight 2020 and lose.
Because they can.
The essential problem is that under FPTP we get broad coalitions. The Labour right is stuck in what they thought was the centre left one. There's no-one to defect to: whatever Corbynistas say, the Tories are anathema and, what's more, are at war with each other, the LDs are even less relevant than Labour. A new party would take years to build and would struggle to move beyond the seats held by a handful of well known MPs with large personal votes.
Being Labour matters a lot to Labour people. It's a very hard party to walk away from. I hate the fact I have been forced into doing it and it has been far less a part of my life than it has been for long-time members and serving MPs. They feel it is part of what they are. For better or worse, they are going to stick with it because that's what Labour people do. I'd call it an exercise in futility rather than cowardice. And, pragmatically, there is always the chance something will turn up.
For the country, all this is sub-optimal: the Tories are rudderless and at each others' throats, with a wafer thin majority given to them by 37% of the electorate; the Labour party is rudderless and at each others' throats with the support of around 30% of the electorate. Whichever way you look at it and whatever happens on 23rd June, it's no way to run a country.
And Irony meter bust:
"And we will not assume a monopoly of wisdom. Good ideas exist across the parliamentary chamber and I promise that we will always seek to judge them on merit, rather than on their party of origin.
To some degree a small majority also has the same effect but the restraining factor has tended to kick in after rather than before it leaves government departments.
http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2987663/in_the_corbyn_era_greens_must_move_from_socialism_to_ecologism.html
I suspect the forthcoming leadership election will involve some debate about the way ahead for the party.
We are the Folk Song Army.
Everyone of us cares.
We all hate poverty, war, and injustice,
Unlike the rest of you squares
Remember the war against Franco?
That's the kind where each of us belongs.
Though he may have won all the battles,
We had all the good songs.
So join in the Folk Song Army,
Guitars are the weapons we bring
To the fight against poverty, war, and injustice.
Ready! Aim! Sing!
The irony of electing Corbyn on that platform, who has never done anything in his life to improve the lot of the poor or vulnerable and owes his entire career to his father's connections and brown-nosing his way up the London Labour machine, was apparently lost on them.
No - they tried that last year and received 4.5% support.
The political centre of Labour is essentially soft left. If the right want to be pragmatic they should get behind a soft left leadership challenge as the best chance to move the party slightly in their direction.
I struggle to think of anything of significance this purely Conservative Government has achieved over the last year.
The Chancellor isn't the panto villain in all cases .... not quite ....
Of course, we probably wouldn't be having an In-Out referendum right now.
What they should do (from their pov) is wait and hope for Labour's disastrous defeat at the GE, and try to regain control of the party.
Good thread.
A second reason for an LD revival being that the extremists in both Labour and Tory will drive centrist voters elsewhere. Even if politicians remain in their current parties, the voters will not.
I think that the differences between the Corbynistas and the Labour right are actually not that major or fatal. The principle dislike of the left is its perceived unelectability rather than its policies. Both wings oppose austerity, support the NHS and want it revived, are pro-Remain and want redistribution of wealth. Trident renewal and Mid-East wars are the major differences of substance, but neither are very popular with the public. They are not issues worth splitting over, but ones on which to agree to differ.
If the Corbynistas were to become a little more professional at winning elections rather than internal contests then the Labour right would support them with gusto. Nothing appeals more to them than the prospect of forming a government. I see some signs of this happening already. If you can't beat them - join them. In practice the alternative in the short term is a Labour led coalition, so not the full juice of the grape.
We hear a lot of guff about anti-establishment parties on the rise, but the real anti-establishment party is the Labour Left, and that may well yet come to power. Ironically that could be brought about by an early election following a Leave vote.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36308593