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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » If LAB is pinning its hopes on by-elections in CON held seats
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » If LAB is pinning its hopes on by-elections in CON held seats then history is not on its side
There is a lot of hope on the Labour side that the small CON working majority with the DUP could be cut as result of a by-election loss.
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/06/30/thoughts-complex-journalists-says-emmanuel-macron/
It's almost as though an attempt is being made to start a false narrative.
FPT
Some of the Right on here are just weird today, for several reasons. Some PBers are obsessed with Trump visiting France for Bastille Day. I didn't like Trump's state visit here, but even I wasn't mentioning it with the frequency some on this site are in regard to the Bastille Day visit. If you really, really don't like Leftie thoughts on Trump you don't have to read them
As for Merkel, anyone who knows a bit about her has known her views on gay marriage - she's never made a secret of it, so I wasn't surprised to see how she voted, but I simply don't agree with her. I never thought TMay was some sort of terrible homophobe (though I know a few who think she is judging by her voting record previously). There are many things to be critical of May on, but it's not on her recent voting record on LGBT rights - Lynne Feathersone has spoken of the importance of TMay's backing in regard to gay marriage becoming a reality. In this regard she is better than Hammond, although I think he would be better suited to deal with Brexit than her.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/bernie-and-jane-sanders-under-fbi-investigation-for-bank-fraud-hire-lawyers/
It's an interesting bit of trivia that only one by-election since 2001 has been caused by a Conservative's death whereas there have been 15 for Labour. But it is just that - trivia. It has no bearing on likelihood over the next five years.
I'm also not wholly sure why Mike has excluded Jo Cox. Particularly tragic though her death was due to the awful circumstances, an actuarial calculation of the likelihood of deaths occurring would include deaths not related to existing ill health (murder, suicide, vehicle accidents, auto-erotic asphyxiation etc). That isn't to wish it on anyone - any more than it would be to wish cancer or heart disease on people - but it's a fact that people do die in such ways.
Oldest MPs are as follows (by year of birth)
1932 Skinner (Lab)
1935 Flynn (Lab)
1937 Clwyd (Lab)
1938 Robinson (Lab)
1940 Cash (Con), Clarke (Con), Sheerman (Lab)
1941 Cunningham (Lab), Hopkins (Lab)
1942 Field (Lab)
1943 Beckett (Lab), Cable (LD), Campbell (Lab), Gale (Con)
1944 G. Davies (Con), Bottomley (Con), Hodge (Lab)
1945 Ellman (Lab), Bailey (Lab)
1946 - 5 Lab, 1 Con
1947 - 4 Lab, 1 Con
So of the 30 oldest MPs, 22 are Lab, 7 Con, 1 LD
SJWLabour territory.@DanielJHannan: Only if @jonsnowC4 joins us! https://twitter.com/libdempress/status/880758877813448704
I suspect the numbers Mike has posted primarily reflect the fact that a very large number of crusty old Tory MPs either lost their seats or stood down in 1997 and that the majority of their current parliamentary party was first elected in 2010 or later. The Tories had below 200 MPs between 1997 and 2010, and much less than half Labour's total from 1997 to 2005, so that is also a factor.
Mike and I are pretty ancient too, despite all appearances to the contrary.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josias_Jessop
A sample of a few dozen MPs over a few years is nowhere near as good as an actuarial sample of many thousands of people of comparable people over a longer period.
I'd also just say go through the lists of MPs who have died and the circumstances. A handful were over 70 where the risk is higher regardless of state of health. Most were in their 40s, 50s and 60s, however, where to die is (bluntly) very unlucky. Some were smokers, some were drinkers (one a very heavy drinker) but most were just unlucky. And, while it may or may not be true that Tory MPs on average have healthy lifestyles, that's hardly a universal truth, while there are plenty of ways to die which are either not influenced by lifestyle or influenced only to a small degree.
"Most were just unlucky" is begging the question in spades redoubled.
So when will the next GE be? I think it will be either 2019 or 2022.
Either the game of Brexit poker will go the wire and will end up with the UK folding. This will mean continued large contributions, ECJ jurisdiction and with a long transitional period of free movement and no independent free trade. This will split the Tory party.
Or the game of Brexit poker will go the wire and will end up with the UK tumbling out to WTO rules and massive economic disruption. This will also split the Tory party.
So could the Tory party struggle on to 2022 or is it inevitable that it will fall in 2019?
I agree nothing is impossible in the wacky world of by-elections, but the Tories would obviously start such a contest as the heaviest of favourites (and I wish Bill Cash nothing but decades of good health of course).
Imagine hailing Corbyn as the messiah and having Nigel Farage and Dan Hannan praise him. Oh dear.
Corbyn is leading Labour well over Brexit.
Having got this close to the prize, I think Remainers are vastly overestimating the likelihood that Brexiteer Tory MPs will rebel if it endangers Brexit itself.
Corbyn's position on Brexit has split the party. He's as much an architect of the project as Hannan and Farage were. He knew what he as doing during EUref. I find it hard to understand how you can dislike Vince so much but like Corbyn so much. Vince is much more closer to an liberal, internationalist, open Britain world view than Corbyn is, that's for sure.
What was Chuka Umunna’s quelled backbench rebellion all about? It wasn’t, certainly, about a principled position on single market membership, as he suggested in these pages. He had previously argued that Britain should be prepared to leave the single market in order to have a populist crackdown on immigration.
But like many on the Labour Right, Umunna is skewered between conflicting opportunisms.
https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/the-chuka-amendment-would-have-hindered-labour-on-brexit
I understand why Fox feels he needs to make a show about starting talks with the US next month, but it's a high-risk approach.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/2017/07/jeremy-corbyn-represents-change-and-for-many-thats-enough/
The dust will be settling on Brexit, and there will be three new Party leaders. Trump will have gone and Warren will be President and we'll all be five years older and probably none the wiser. It will be a brave new world.
Or just kids rebelling?
Talking of being morbid, we know some MPs are currently being treated for, or in remission from, cancer - some of which are more amenable to treatment than others.....
Analogously, Labour has never elected a female leader. So is this is a good indicator that they never will? It may be. If women Labour MPs are in the HoC mainly because they are women rather than because they are competent, first there will be few of them who will be impressive MPs, because they don't have to look so to become one. Second, men have had to do more to get a seat because quotas operate against rather than for them, so they would tend to be better than otherwise.
In leadership contests you thus end up with poor female candidates who always lose to more plausible men. Diane Abbott could only become an MP with quotas in her favour.
When Andy Burnham said Labour would have a female leader "when the time is right", he spoke truth. The "right" time is when Labour MPs are selected meritocratically, so that talented women get through and ahead on merit. That is some way in the future for Labour.
I don't know what mechanism might operate within Labour to ensure that ageing and ill MPs keep their seats into their decrepitude. But if there is one then unless there's evidence it has fallen by the wayside we should probably assume the chart above to be a reasonably accurate guide to the future, recognising the small sample size.
Now, how much do you trust this person?!
Ah, Liddle. Say no more. Hackwork.
I was born the same year as the NHS. I have a nasty feeling I might die in the same year as it too.
Not being in either the Single Market or the Customs Union.
@ThreeQuidder Linking to Guido? I may as well start linking to the Canary then.
Majorca 'MASSACRE plot': Terror suspect arrested in Spain 'planned stabbing murder spree on holiday island just like London Borough Market carnage'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4654510/Terror-suspect-planned-stabbing-spree-Majorca.html
Remainers and their media allies need to be honest about what they mean when they talk about “soft Brexit”. If “soft Brexit” means staying inside the single market (not taking back control of borders), staying inside the customs union (not taking back control of trade), and staying inside the ECJ (not taking back control of laws), then that is not Brexit. Hammond and other Remainers in the Cabinet have accepted this. Only hardcore Remainers don’t.