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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » This week’s PB/Polling Matters podcast featuring Margaret Thatcher’s authorised biographer & how Labour can re-engage with disaffected working class voters
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Or maybe the Lib Dems. Or possibly the Tories.
I guess we'll know by this time tomorrow.
http://tinyurl.com/c3r3d8c
This Century Is Broken https://nyti.ms/2m36XUj
SCOTTISH Labour suffered a catastrophic drop in donations last year, hamstringing its ability to fight the Holyrood election, its accounts have revealed. Published ahead of this weekend’s conference in Perth, the figures show Kezia Dugdale’s first full year as leader was the party’s worst for donations since 2009. In 2015, the party had donations of just under £600,00; in 2016 it was just over £100,000. And after a £98,000 surplus in 2015, Scottish Labour ended 2016 with a deficit of £104,000.
The party’s reserves also slumped below £160,000, their lowest level since 2003.
A Labour source admitted: "Donations to the party across the entire UK have dried up since Jeremy Corbyn became leader. Scottish Labour is no different. People are not donating while Jeremy is leader."
http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/15109123.Scottish_Labour_donations_collapse_in_Dugdale_s_first_year_as_leader/?ref=mr&lp=12
The National Front head would win 27.5 percent of the vote in the April 23 first round, up 2.5 percentage points from the last time the poll was conducted on Feb 4.
Independent centrist Emmanuel Macron was seen coming in second in the first round with 21 percent of the vote, down one percentage point, followed by conservative Francois Fillon at 19 percent, also down one percentage point.
http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN16208I?utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&utm_content=58ae5f7104d301549ae11730&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=twitter
http://www.itv.com/news/border/2017-02-22/copeland-a-by-election-which-has-further-damaged-peoples-faith-in-politics/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27uIF5q9POM
I just saw your PM, shall reply later.
The Big Two have both failed. The Tories are in government and could have offered pork barrel and hard promises on the big issues. Neither have materialised. It's startling that *nothing* has been promised to seat. Labour could have framed it's campaign around trying to achieve change. Demanded the government do X. But they didn't want to government to do X. Where would they be without Hospital downgrades.
Those are just the headlines. The number of other major and middle ranking local issues that have never been mentioned is staggering. It's been a pure culture war of Corbyn is Crap/Brexit vs The Tories will kill your baby.
The independent group behind the Mayoral Referendum and then election of an independent mayor has fizzled. The two independent candidates are fringe cranks.
The Greens have at least pushed renewables and the Tidal Lagoon but seem obsessed by justifying standing in the first place.
Of course Stoke being called, which is vastly easier for journalists and activists to get to, being called on the same day was going to dilute impact. But it's been a colossal missed oppertunity to debate the areas real challenges and extract policy and cash from the government.
My sources are not jumping up and down with bravado, so I am sure they are telling me the truth. But, as ew know, favourites sometimes lose!
Excellent podcast this week Mr Pedley, will try and listen to the second half as time permits.
More Americans die from opiate addiction (majority prescription) than from either guns or vehicles. America is a very sick society, with social and geographic mobility declining, drugged up on prescription, obese and staring at screens all day. Or at least part of it is, while the other part works multiple jobs to make ends meet.
Many parts of Britain are similar. I see a bit too much of it in my clinics. As individual patients, I sympathise and treat, but as a culture it worries me.
Most Copeland voters don't want to face hard truths. It's the Jurrassc Park of Brexit. Whisper it but large sections of the population actually don't want change at all. They are furious a historically fleeting post war settlement they think is normative is gone and want it back as a birthright. But creating a dynamic mixed 21st Century economy to sustain their community ? Too much effort.
This is where Sellafield comes in. For practical purposes it's always been there. It's big enough to prevent socio economic collapse but not big ( or correctly structured ) enough to generate popular prosperity. It's a jealous lover and advocating anything else gets you labelled anti Sellafield. It strangles local politics via it's patronage.
Broadly if you have decades of appalling local government ( persistently re-elected ) , are satisfied with an economic monoculture and appalling NIMBYISM then Copeland is what you get.
The legacy of social capital from heavy industry then Labour's big social spending kept the show on the road. Now both have stopped the roof has fallen in.
The fact the one big new piece of information of this campaign, that Moorside is now under threat and what the government could do about it, hasn't been the define issue is deeply telling.
We can't reap what we don't sow.
Anyway polls have opened so I'm off to vote !
Not a gritter in sight of course.
sloppy work
I sympathise with the voters of Copeland.
It's not as if this happened overnight, it's the cumulation of pretty much the same policies for the last 20 years or so, irrespective of which party was in government.
now get back to work, you have taxes to pay
It was particularly under Mrs Thatcher that Britons were shunted from unemployment to disability benefits.
the one feeble effort by IDS to get people off disability got a stream of abuse and was promptly cannned.
The political parties since 1997 have all had a similar agenda, bar a bit of mucking about on tax they have had broadly the same economic policies. So while you might not have voted for Dave he was Continuity Blair and followed the same policies and gave you the results you dont like.
I am really not sure what we can do about this. It is easy to say that we need to improve education and training (and we undoubtedly do) but the reality is that many of our fellow citizens will never be adequately trained or educated to be useful for the better paid jobs our society now provides.
We are edging towards the sort of Society that SF writers write about, where too many of our citizens can no longer make useful contributions and live on subsistence all too frequently on the edge of the law with drugs, petty criminality and cheating the system the only way ahead. It is a brutal place and the lack of planning, willingness to recognise and address the cause of the problems let alone find any answers is inflicting a heavy toll.
It puts the problems our politicians witter about into a stark perspective. Is it any wonder that a charlatan like Trump promising to bring those well paid, semi-skilled jobs back gets elected?
Rain and wind in England in February. Who'd have thought?
Which 10 years, incidentally? 1997-2007?
I wonder if that was because pressure was bought to bear from head office about the Progressive Alliance and standing aside?
Probably listen to the podcast later (as I've done for the last few) when I've woken up a bit more.
Intriguing day ahead. I was unlikely to stay up late anyway, but given the results might be delayed until the middle of tomorrow, I'll just see how things are in the morning.
Only four days until the first (of two) F1 test.
http://uk.businessinsider.com/trump-vote-results-drug-overdose-deaths-2016-11?r=US&IR=T
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bill-maher-donald-trump-drug-abuse_us_588308dfe4b096b4a231e6c0
http://www.npr.org/2016/12/17/505965420/study-communities-most-affected-by-opioid-epidemic-also-voted-for-trump
It is jobs in tech and financial services next on the globalisation hit list.
It sounds like you're a sort of Frank Field type of voter, Incidentally, a man I have a lot of time for. Old-fashioned Labour, now long-gone.
Jwzza may accidentally bring it back.
Copeland - "Don’t let Copeland be ignored and forgotten. VOTE TODAY for Trudy Harrison."
Stoke - "Support the Prime Minister's plan to make a success of Brexit. Vote Jack Brereton today."
“If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.”
That's where we are, and where we have been for as long as I can remember. For me, that's why Brexit and Trump have happened, and why voters are starting to think "Feck it, I'll vote for someone else". Those semi skilled jobs are never coming back though, are they? That makes me think that we'll see ever more extreme politicians gaining prominence, and civil unrest around Europe and the US as things unravel. It's going to be a tough time for our children.
I think you make a fair point about country dwellers - I generally don't get too upset when they get flooding in the idyllic places, I'm more concerned about people in Carlisle, for example, who probably have little choice over where they live. But it seems to me that the bigger issue is that somewhere like Whitehaven is remote. Stoke may have lost a lot of its industry, but at least you're not all that far from two very big cities and have decent rail connections. If you live in Whitehaven, there is Sellafield and that's about all.
Edited to change author - confused writer with chef
Joe Rich
Will Labour leader Jeremy Corby give Gareth Snell, their candidate in Stoke Central, an answer to this question during their meeting today? https://t.co/C9IABtQuYF
I don't have any immediate answers. We're doing the first by default, badly, and satisfying no one.
The thing is, that if the Met doint warn, then they get criticised, its a no win situation for the met post Nov ?1987.
Vaguely on topic, "there will always be the proles" as someone said in 1984. Some of the language used by those talking about the "disaffected working class" reminds me of the language of 1984 used by the Outer Party members looking at the rest of Oceania.
I've argued since 23/6/16 the decision to LEAVE the EU was the start of an opportunity to have the substantive debate about the kind of country, society, economy and people we want to be in the 2020s and beyond. Understandably, given the content and tone of the Referendum debate itself, it's now the case most people would rather do almost anything else than think about the big national questions but they haven't gone away and A50 will throw them again into sharp focus.
Immigration is where all these questions meet - the economic requirement for a growing labour force has collided with the cultural and societal consequences. There are people who frankly don't want to live with people of different skin colours and creeds who in their eyes make no effort to integrate. There are others who fear the large-scale influx of economic migrants has turned their neighbourhood into a Little Warsaw or a Little Bucharest.
A more relevant concern could be the impact on existing infrastructure, whether it be schools, transport, housing or health care of tens, if not hundreds of thousands of people arriving in a short period of time which meant there was no planning to improve and extend that infrastructure. Building new schools, improving transport, providing extra homes and GP surgeries are all possible, indeed desirable, but can't happen overnight.
That sense of Governmental and planning failure has accentuated alienation among the indigenous population, many of whom might themselves have been migrants. "How 'Bout Us ?" (note the 1980s pop reference for TSE) might be their battle cry. Parties who recognise the symptoms but have no plausible remedy are attracting support while those trying to offer a more tolerant line are ignored and ridiculed.
Yet it's not just about immigration - it's deeper than that. It's almost as though belief in the capitalist ideal of prosperity and improvement through hard work has been damaged perhaps by the events of 2008 as much as by anything else. The sense many have of running hard to simply stand still is debilitating and worse when there seems no prospect of improvement. The political and economic crises are interlinked but as for a solution - I've none to offer.
I live in the Wye Valley AONB. I moved here of my own free will, gave up a successful commercial career (modulo I'm in exalted company here, many of you could buy and sell me manifold) to be with the woman I loved.
I accept that I pay a price for that decision. Culturally it's quite poor. The Internet is worse. My travel costs are far higher. Services aren't great. I could go on.
However, on what basis might I expect to have the equivalent services, infrastructure and job opportunities of one of the large conurbations? Country mice have to accept that sacrifices have to be made.
I could easily imagine a future where areas of the country are re-wilded and the overwhelming bulk of the populace are urbanites.
http://uk.businessinsider.com/britain-does-not-need-to-trigger-article-50-to-leave-the-eu-2016-11?r=US&IR=T
Off topic.
So is this a looming a constitutional crisis or social conservatism rearing its head?
Prince Charles wants a Queen Camilla. He’s still wrong. Here’s why
The campaign has been waged with skill and discretion, but its success would be a reward for adultery
http://www.spectator.co.uk/2017/02/prince-charles-wants-a-queen-camilla-hes-still-wrong-heres-why/
But, yes, your question is one that we've been asking for a long time. I think we go through fits and starts as to whether we actually want to address the issue. I'm currently reading a book on Beeching and it's very much of the view that the cuts had to be made. Some of the statistics were remarkable. For example, 36% of the route miles operated by BR carried just 1% of passengers and 42% carried 3% of freight ton miles.
Of course, while people got very upset about Beeching, they'd actually voted for it themselves by buying cars. BR had to ensure that there were sufficient buses etc. before a line could be closed.
The issue with the hospital in Copeland is that the alternative is not particularly appealing. I say this as a single man who doesn't know much about the issue, but would I wonder if we could set up a system whereby expectant mothers can move into a house in the Carlisle area in the weeks leading up to their due date? I don't know what the numbers are, or how much it would cost, but maybe we need some people to think outside the box.
It just feels wrong to basically say, "if you don't like the level of service provided in Copeland, move somewhere else."
Edit: ah, annulled, so not the same. The question still stands though.
Sure, they have the flat in London, where this high-paid "work" is done, but then they also have the cottage in the country, or even countries.
In fact, one of the reasons why the country has to be subsidised is the empty homes for most of the year.
This will be a problem that affects rural Copeland where it becomes the Western Lakes.
The current 8s and 10s seem about right, but with a very low turnout and rubbish weather on the day anything's possible