The Conservatives and Labour are neck and neck for the first time since the general election. The Tories have risen by one point since last month, while Labour has dropped two points, to put both parties on 41%.
Leader Approval Ratings Theresa May’s personal ratings continue to slowly improve while Jeremy Corbyn’s steadily decline. Theresa May’s approval rating may still be in negative territory (-11%), but it has improved by six points since last month when she was on -17%. Conversely, Jeremy Corbyn’s net ratings have slipped from -5 to -7%.
There does seem to be a remarkable consistency in them recently and I do think we may be near or even at peak Corbyn.
The government are moving onto his agenda with the abolition of the public sector pay cap and now adjustments to tuition fees which Corbyn can lay credit for but the difference is that the government are far more trusted on the economy and you will hear this reasoning often
'We want to be fair to public sector workers/ students but fair to the tax payer'
The country is split between anti-Tory and anti-Labour. Opinion is divorced from events. All polls are consistent in showing almost no shifts since the election. It's hard to see how that changes.
Let the tories try to elect Boris, that should do it.
He is roundly disliked by other Foreign Secretaries. I wonder how other PMs would view him as UK PM? Personally I do not think he would be any better liked but I am fairly certain that his election to PM would precipitate a crisis in Brussels given his apparently total incoherence on Europe.
But if, and it is a big if, he is elected we will be out of the EU so Brussels would not really be a concern
You seem to think Brexit leads to some sort of rosy future, I think it leads to an economic shambles staring about Sept 2018.
I do see it as a positive but I respect your alternative view. We will see in time
Indeed. Let us hope that I am wrong and you are right because the other way round ....
I like Starbucks coffee. I'm a big fan of their caramel macchiato and toffee nut latte that they do during the Christmas period. Starbucks' tea is pretty terrible though. Costa is streets ahead of them in that regard.
Pret-A-Manager appears to be the go place for middle-class city workers. I'm not into the food offered there at all, so I don't go there.
They appear to have very, very little practical experience in areas where they should have some. Almost none of them seem to have any disciplined approach to coding, software development or problem analysis. "Agile" is the rage and seems to mean (to them) "keep running it until it works then stick it live".
We tried retraining a couple in-house but they lacked fundamental basics and just programmed themselves into holes that they they spent days digging themselves out of to deliver poor, unreliable solutions. When we showed them what they should have done they were baffled.
Oddly enough, the very best trainee we had through the door was a 17 year old that we took on a A-level placement scheme, but he did not want to work in IT, he wanted to go to do a Business degree. He was streets ahead of the graduates.
I was seeing this as long ago as 20-25 years back. I was fairly convinced that some of the 'good' universities were teaching all the wrong things to prospective software engineers.
Starbucks is diabolical. Their coffee is disgusting. Burnt gerbil stuff. The food is even worse.
Surprised no-one has mentioned Pret A Manger. Coffee is very good, much better than the other chains, and the bigger ones are great for business meetings.
Shout out to Angel Espresso, on the Pentonville Road. Used to be my local, and great for chemistry interviews with job candidates.
Edit: Yes, McDonald's is not half bad for coffee.
I think Pret a Manger has the best choice of food of any coffee chain. Not sure about the coffee as I always have the Peach Green Tea.
Who is driving the car to Brexit and what type of car is it ? It looks to me the car has L plates on and dual controls and about to go on the motorway for the first time.
Surprised you didn't suggest it was driverless !!!!!!!!!!
I like that big g.No it is been driven but they are fighting over the steering wheel.
The Conservatives and Labour are neck and neck for the first time since the general election. The Tories have risen by one point since last month, while Labour has dropped two points, to put both parties on 41%.
Leader Approval Ratings Theresa May’s ly, Jeremy Corbyn’s net ratings have slipped from -5 to -7%.
There does seem to be a remarkable consistency in them recently
The country is split between anti-Tory and anti-Labour. Opinion is divorced from events. All polls are consistent in showing almost no shifts since the election. It's hard to see how that changes.
It will change as we get closer to March 2019 but at present I think there is a possibilty that TM may recover her position but not sufficient to lead into the 2022 GE
I suspect there'll be bigger shifts post-Brexit. A cliff-edge, no surrender departure departure might give the Tories a brief poll boost, but as the smart ones clearly know that will not be sustainable.
The new Tory leader would call ast a Corbyn defeat
If the Tories win the next election on the back Prime Minister and govern for a very long time as the Tories will be finished as a serious political force for a generation at least.
If the Tories win the next general election Corbyn would probably resign though and a more moderate leader may then replace him, Umunna, Cooper etc. You are right that the last time the Tories won most seats 4 general elections in a row they were out for 13 years after losing the next general election
It's hard to see Corbyn staying if Labour doesn't win next time, but even harder to see who would succeed him. I doubt it will be Chuka. My guess is that it will be someone from the softish left as there does not seem to be any genuine, electable Corbynite out there to take the flame forward. So much of Corbyn's support is linked to him personally, rather than to a slavish devotion to his beliefs. That makes his position very strong, but the far-left's generally quite weak - hence their obsession with gaining control of internal levers of power.
The public mood for the first time in my memory is moving leftwards. You might be right, the Tories might find a way of riding it. But it won't fall into their lap.
Yep. The Tories ceding ground to Labour on certain issues just gives Labour's message more credence and Corbyn more credibility - making it harder for them to critique his overall agenda and depict him as extreme. Corbyn has unbelievably managed to move much of the debate onto Labour's territory in a way someone like Tony Blair did not to be quite frank. Blair instead moved to the Tories territory on many issues.
Corbyn will always come under attack for his hard left policies and moderating Corbyn's extremes is good politics and will be recognized as fair to the tax payer
Corbyn has been relentlessly attacked by the media and the Tories for a good while now, and it didn't stop what happened in June. The voters who the Tories need to win over don't pay attention to the Tory Press and the Conservatives are undermining their image with their incompetence now. Why would any of Corbyn's 2017 voters listen to what an incompetence government has to say?
I doubt that those who didn't vote Tory in 2017 will see the government as 'moderating' Corbyn's extremes. Many of those who voted for Corbyn are tax payers - and it is them which voted for Corbyn's manifesto promising to scrap tuition fees and it is many of them who don't want their kids coming out of uni with debt.
So they want the 60% who do not go to Uni and end up earning less pay more tax for those who do go.
Starbucks is diabolical. Their coffee is disgusting. Burnt gerbil stuff. The food is even worse.
Surprised no-one has mentioned Pret A Manger. Coffee is very good, much better than the other chains, and the bigger ones are great for business meetings.
Shout out to Angel Espresso, on the Pentonville Road. Used to be my local, and great for chemistry interviews with job candidates.
Edit: Yes, McDonald's is not half bad for coffee.
I think Pret a Manger has the best choice of food of any coffee chain. Not sure about the coffee as I always have the Peach Green Tea.
Their filter coffee is also a bargain. Got me through many an early morning and long night when I was working in consulting.....
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
Who is driving the car to Brexit and what type of car is it ? It looks to me the car has L plates on and dual controls and about to go on the motorway for the first time.
It's a P reg Rover 200 with an odd coloured door. The creature trying to drive it is a human centipede formed from Boris, DD and Fox. (In that order). Cheering leave voters line the road and paw at their genitals through their grubby tracksuits.
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
You are entitled to your view but I genuinely believe we are at or near peak Corbyn
The public mood for the first time in my memory is moving leftwards. You might be right, the Tories might find a way of riding it. But it won't fall into their lap.
Yep. The Tories ceding ground to Labour on certain issues just gives Labour's message more credence and Corbyn more credibility - making it harder for them to critique his overall agenda and depict him as extreme. Corbyn has unbelievably managed to move much of the debate onto Labour's territory in a way someone like Tony Blair did not to be quite frank. Blair instead moved to the Tories territory on many issues.
Corbyn will always come under attack for his hard left policies and moderating Corbyn's extremes is good politics and will be recognized as fair to the tax payer
Corbyn has been relentlessly attacked by the media and the Tories for a good while now, and it didn't stop what happened in June. The voters who the Tories need to win over don't pay attention to the Tory Press and the Conservatives are undermining their image with their incompetence now. Why would any of Corbyn's 2017 voters listen to what an incompetence government has to say?
I doubt that those who didn't vote Tory in 2017 will see the government as 'moderating' Corbyn's extremes. Many of those who voted for Corbyn are tax payers - and it is them which voted for Corbyn's manifesto promising to scrap tuition fees and it is many of them who don't want their kids coming out of uni with debt.
The Tories don't need to win over any voters, just hold all those who voted for them in June as they currently have a majority with DUP support. It is Corbyn who needs to win Tory voters to get Labour as largest party let alone win a majority.
You make it sound as if June represented the Tories' glass floor. Although it clearly didn't fool everyone, I suspect many were impressed by 'Strong and Stable' and felt that Theresa was an optimal pre-Brexit solution. But if the Tories decide to go cliff-edge (as seems likely) then any obligation for the electorate to endorse nuance, caution and steadiness vanishes. Many will just say 'what the hell' and give Jezza a run.
They appear to have very, very little practical experience in areas where they should have some. Almost none of them seem to have any disciplined approach to coding, software development or problem analysis. "Agile" is the rage and seems to mean (to them) "keep running it until it works then stick it live".
We tried retraining a couple in-house but they lacked fundamental basics and just programmed themselves into holes that they they spent days digging themselves out of to deliver poor, unreliable solutions. When we showed them what they should have done they were baffled.
Oddly enough, the very best trainee we had through the door was a 17 year old that we took on a A-level placement scheme, but he did not want to work in IT, he wanted to go to do a Business degree. He was streets ahead of the graduates.
I was seeing this as long ago as 20-25 years back. I was fairly convinced that some of the 'good' universities were teaching all the wrong things to prospective software engineers.
I'm sad that the situation may not have improved.
They seem to think that if you follow a methodology and implement via a framework then success is guaranteed. Like you I used to see the same problems 20 odd years ago except back then it was SSADM and OOP... everyone babbled on about singleton instances or polymorphic coding or role/function matrices but actually finding people who could turn out workable, maintainable code was difficult.
Getting anyone to use abstraction or refinement of the problem as a basis for the structure of the solution was an anathema to most of them. They seemed to prefer sitting at the keyboard and bashing out lines of code without any clear idea of the problem they were trying to solve.
1) Starbucks have the worst coffee and the best seating. Bloody annoying to be asked my name, especially when they then need me to say it three times. Useful for meetings. Drink the green tea or water.
2) Caffé Nero probably have the best coffee out of the chains. They need better seating though.
3) Costa are halfway between on both fronts.
4) Taylor St Baristas have much better coffee, but boy are they up themselves.
You'd do much better saving your money anyway. £2 a day soon mounts up (most of us could find something useful to do with £500 a year, which is what you're probably paying if you buy a coffee from one of the chains every working day). Take your own equipment into work.
I'm not a coffee drinker (can't stand the stuff) but a friend of mine who is recommends McDonalds. Can that be right?
I don't think I've been in McDonalds in five years, so I can't comment. I have heard others say that the coffee in McDonalds is surprisingly good though.
At McDonald's and Burger King in Edinburgh they charged 5p for paper bags (as opposed to plastic). Is that just within the city or Scotland-wide?
They appear to have very, very little practical experience in areas where they should have some. Almost none of them seem to have any disciplined approach to coding, software development or problem analysis. "Agile" is the rage and seems to mean (to them) "keep running it until it works then stick it live".
We tried retraining a couple in-house but they lacked fundamental basics and just programmed themselves into holes that they they spent days digging themselves out of to deliver poor, unreliable solutions. When we showed them what they should have done they were baffled.
Oddly enough, the very best trainee we had through the door was a 17 year old that we took on a A-level placement scheme, but he did not want to work in IT, he wanted to go to do a Business degree. He was streets ahead of the graduates.
I was seeing this as long ago as 20-25 years back. I was fairly convinced that some of the 'good' universities were teaching all the wrong things to prospective software engineers.
I'm sad that the situation may not have improved.
They seem to think that if you follow a methodology and implement via a framework then success is guaranteed. Like you I used to see the same problems 20 odd years ago except back then it was SSADM and OOP... everyone babbled on about singleton instances or polymorphic coding or role/function matrices but actually finding people who could turn out workable, maintainable code was difficult.
Getting anyone to use abstraction or refinement of the problem as a basis for the structure of the solution was an anathema to most of them. They seemed to prefer sitting at the keyboard and bashing out lines of code without any clear idea of the problem they were trying to solve.
They seemed to prefer sitting at the keyboard and bashing out lines of code without any clear idea of the problem they were trying to solve.
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
You are entitled to your view but I genuinely believe we are at or near peak Corbyn
Sadly not. As it stands, all things being equal, Corbyn will win the next election.
The Tories have no economic policy, nothing to offer anyone under the age of 45 (not just 25), and are not even united on the crisis of the day, Brexit.
Even moderates are reluctantly concluding that Corbynism is the only way to disrupt what looks to be an exhausted economic and political settlement.
This is a great article and sets up a question that no one really knows the answer to. Here is the perspective from my small technology business with about 50 employees. There are few skilled brits available for hire and almost no men. Our two recent skilled hires were from Greece and Brazil. The skill base of school leavers is dire as they don't even have basic knowledge like how to clean or cook. Their work effort is weak but they need jobs to survive.
Implementing computer systems to get the productivity gains we need is hard. Computer staff are expensive and many of our managers struggle to use computers correctly.
In our industry we compete with 2 large global multinationals. They soak up the uk talent but often send them abroad. They are not however investing in uk production.
Overall we have a very fluid economy that blows with the wind. This is both a strength and a potential weakness. Political input will have unintended consequences which no one can predict. My problem with brexit is not I love Europe or where rules are made but my lack of trust with our politicians not to mess it up.
There is a massive shortage of programmers and other skilled IT people, even with free movement. Once that ends, it will put a lot of tech-based UK businesses in very serious trouble - especially the smaller ones.
It is already happening. We have moved some of our work abroad because of it. Being in database design it is easy to export the work using a development server in our own offices.
The quality of recent UK Comp.Sci graduates we interviewed is dire
I don't know anything about computers, so can't comment on the quality of graduates, but what I do know is that even now demand far outstrips supply. Our IT team is increasingly non-British and very fluid. We're outsourcing a lot more than we used to because it's the only way we can manage. And we're not sending work to UK-based businesses. Brexit is clearly going to intensify that process.
I agree and IT is a fairly universal discipline with the same tools and frameworks available anywhere in the world. There are no geographic boundaries to the supply of IT skills.
The public mood for the first time in my memory is moving leftwards. You might be right, the Tories might find a way of riding it. But it won't fall into their lap.
Yep. The Tories ceding ground to Labour on certain issues just gives Labour's message more credence and Corbyn more credibility - making it harder for them to critique his overall agenda and depict him as extreme. Corbyn has unbelievably managed to move much of the debate onto Labour's territory in a way someone like Tony Blair did not to be quite frank. Blair instead moved to the Tories territory on many issues.
Corbyn will always come under attack for his hard left policies and moderating Corbyn's extremes is good politics and will be recognized as fair to the tax payer
Corbyn has been relentlessly attacked by the media and the Tories for a good while now, and it didn't stop what happened in June. The voters who the Tories need to win over don't pay attention to the Tory Press and the Conservatives are undermining their image with their incompetence now. Why would any of Corbyn's 2017 voters listen to what an incompetence government has to say?
I doubt that those who didn't vote Tory in 2017 will see the government as 'moderating' Corbyn's extremes. Many of those who voted for Corbyn are tax payers - and it is them which voted for Corbyn's manifesto promising to scrap tuition fees and it is many of them who don't want their kids coming out of uni with debt.
The Tories don't need to win over any voters, just hold all those who voted for them in June as they currently have a majority with DUP support. It is Corbyn who needs to win Tory voters to get Labour as largest party let alone win a majority.
You make it sound as if June represented the Tories' glass floor. Although it clearly didn't fool everyone, I suspect many were impressed by 'Strong and Stable' and felt that Theresa was an optimal pre-Brexit solution. But if the Tories decide to go cliff-edge (as seems likely) then any obligation for the electorate to endorse nuance, caution and steadiness vanishes. Many will just say 'what the hell' and give Jezza a run.
41% are still voting Tory with Opinium today barely unchanged from June.
43% with ORB last week put immigration control over free trade as the priority for the Brexit talks, so 41 to 43% would vote for a hard Brexit strategy in 2019/20 in a general election soon after Brexit talks at least in the short term
They appear to have very, very little practical experience in areas where they should have some. Almost none of them seem to have any disciplined approach to coding, software development or problem analysis. "Agile" is the rage and seems to mean (to them) "keep running it until it works then stick it live".
We tried retraining a couple in-house but they lacked fundamental basics and just programmed themselves into holes that they they spent days digging themselves out of to deliver poor, unreliable solutions. When we showed them what they should have done they were baffled.
Oddly enough, the very best trainee we had through the door was a 17 year old that we took on a A-level placement scheme, but he did not want to work in IT, he wanted to go to do a Business degree. He was streets ahead of the graduates.
I was seeing this as long ago as 20-25 years back. I was fairly convinced that some of the 'good' universities were teaching all the wrong things to prospective software engineers.
I'm sad that the situation may not have improved.
They seem to think that if you follow a methodology and implement via a framework then success is guaranteed. Like you I used to see the same problems 20 odd years ago except back then it was SSADM and OOP... everyone babbled on about singleton instances or polymorphic coding or role/function matrices but actually finding people who could turn out workable, maintainable code was difficult.
Getting anyone to use abstraction or refinement of the problem as a basis for the structure of the solution was an anathema to most of them. They seemed to prefer sitting at the keyboard and bashing out lines of code without any clear idea of the problem they were trying to solve.
They seemed to prefer sitting at the keyboard and bashing out lines of code without any clear idea of the problem they were trying to solve.
If you paid by results instead of by the hour...
We DO pay "by results". If you consistently fail to produce working code we fire you.
Also, an hour spent understanding what you are supposed to be doing often shortens and simplifies the work to be done
The Conservatives and Labour are neck and neck for the first time since the general election. The Tories have risen by one point since last month, while Labour has dropped two points, to put both parties on 41%.
Leader Approval Ratings Theresa May’s ly, Jeremy Corbyn’s net ratings have slipped from -5 to -7%.
There does seem to be a remarkable consistency in them recently
The country is split between anti-Tory and anti-Labour. Opinion is divorced from events. All polls are consistent in showing almost no shifts since the election. It's hard to see how that changes.
It will change as we get closer to March 2019 but at present I think there is a possibilty that TM may recover her position but not sufficient to lead into the 2022 GE
I suspect there'll be bigger shifts post-Brexit. A cliff-edge, no surrender departure departure might give the Tories a brief poll boost, but as the smart ones clearly know that will not be sustainable.
The new Tory leader would call ast a Corbyn defeat
If the Tories win the next election on the back Prime Minister and govern for a very long time as the Tories will be finished as a serious political force for a generation at least.
If the Tories win the next general election Corbyn would probably resign though and
It's hard to see Corbyn staying if Labour doesn't win next time, but even harder to see who would succeed him. I doubt it will be Chuka. My guess is that it will be someone from the softish left as there does not seem to be any genuine, electable Corbynite out there to take the flame forward. So much of Corbyn's support is linked to him personally, rather than to a slavish devotion to his beliefs. That makes his position very strong, but the far-left's generally quite weak - hence their obsession with gaining control of internal levers of power.
The Labour members poll from June on who they want to succeed Corbyn had Cooper tied with McDonnell on 27% with Umunna and Starmer just a point behind on 26%
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
You are entitled to your view but I genuinely believe we are at or near peak Corbyn
Sadly not. As it stands, all things being equal, Corbyn will win the next election.
The Tories have no economic policy, nothing to offer anyone under the age of 45 (not just 25), and are not even united on the crisis of the day, Brexit.
Even moderates are reluctantly concluding that Corbynism is the only way to disrupt what looks to be an exhausted economic and political settlement.
Not evidenced in any of the recent polling. There are far too many imponderables to come to any conclusion about the next GE but I am far from convinced Corbyn is labour's answer
The Conservatives and Labour are neck and neck for the first time since the general election. The Tories have risen by one point since last month, while Labour has dropped two points, to put both parties on 41%.
Leader Approval Ratings Theresa May’s ly, Jeremy Corbyn’s net ratings have slipped from -5 to -7%.
There does seem to be a remarkable consistency in them recently
The country is split between anti-Tory and anti-Labour. Opinion is divorced from events. All polls are consistent in showing almost no shifts since the election. It's hard to see how that changes.
It will change as we get closer to March 2019 but at present I think there is a possibilty that TM may recover her position but not sufficient to lead into the 2022 GE
I suspect there'll be bigger shifts post-Brexit. A cliff-edge, no surrender departure departure might give the Tories a brief poll boost, but as the smart ones clearly know that will not be sustainable.
The new Tory leader would call ast a Corbyn defeat
If the Tories win the next election on the back Prime Minister and govern for a very long time as the Tories will be finished as a serious political force for a generation at least.
If the Tories win the next general election Corbyn would probably resign though and
It's hard to see Corbyn staying if Labour doesn't win next time, but even harder to see whorather than to a slavish devotion to his beliefs. That makes his position very strong, but the far-left's generally quite weak - hence their obsession with gaining control of internal levers of power.
The Labour members poll from June on who they want to succeed Corbyn had Cooper tied with McDonnell on 27% with Umunna and Starmer just a point behind on 26%
A lot will depend on who Momentum goes for. Their candidates now win all party-wide, balloted Labour elections. They won't go for Chuka. Of those you name, only Starmer is likely to stand.
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
Actually Corbyn doing better than expected last time may well have given the Tories one more term in power.
As Corbyn sympathisers like you are now going for the 'one more heave' strategy you are making no effort to appeal to the 42% who voted Tory just consolidating the 40% you got and the current polls reflect that. If the Tories had got a majority last time and Labour replaced Corbyn with a more electable and moderate leader the Tories would probably be in a more precarious position
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
Actually Corbyn doing better than expected last time may well have given the Tories one more term in power.
As Corbyn sympathisers like you are now going for the 'one more heave' strategy you are making no effort to appeal to the 42% who voted Tory just consolidating the 40% you got and the current polls reflect that. If the Tories had got a majority last time and Labour replaced Corbyn with a more electable and moderate leader the Tories would probably be in a more precarious position
The Conservatives and Labour are neck and neck for the first time since the general election. The Tories have risen by one point since last month, while Labour has dropped two points, to put both parties on 41%.
Leader Approval Ratings Theresa May’s ly, Jeremy Corbyn’s net ratings have slipped from -5 to -7%.
There does seem to be a remarkable consistency in them recently
The country is split between anti-Tory and anti-Labour. Opinion is divorced from events. All polls are consistent in showing almost no shifts since the election. It's hard to see how that changes.
It will change as we get closer to March 2019 but at present
I suspect there'll be bigger shifts post-Brexit. A cliff-edable.
The new Tory leader would call ast a Corbyn defeat
If the Tories win the next election on the back Prime Minister and govern for a very long time as the Tories will be finished as a serious political force for a generation at least.
If the Tories win the next general election Corbyn would probably resign though and
It's hard to see Corbyn staying if Labour doesn't win next time, but even harder to see whorather than to a slavish devotion to his beliefs. That makes his position very strong, but the far-left's generally quite weak - hence their obsession with gaining control of internal levers of power.
The Labour members poll from June on who they want to succeed Corbyn had Cooper tied with McDonnell on 27% with Umunna and Starmer just a point behind on 26%
A lot will depend on who Momentum goes for. Their candidates now win all party-wide, balloted Labour elections. They won't go for Chuka. Of those you name, only Starmer is likely to stand.
The Momentum candidate got only a quarter of the votes in that poll and if Corbyn loses and resigns Momentum's energy and raison d'etre goes with him.
Once Corbyn has gone both Umunna and Cooper would probably stand as well as Starmer
1) Starbucks have the worst coffee and the best seating. Bloody annoying to be asked my name, especially when they then need me to say it three times. Useful for meetings. Drink the green tea or water.
2) Caffé Nero probably have the best coffee out of the chains. They need better seating though.
3) Costa are halfway between on both fronts.
4) Taylor St Baristas have much better coffee, but boy are they up themselves.
You'd do much better saving your money anyway. £2 a day soon mounts up (most of us could find something useful to do with £500 a year, which is what you're probably paying if you buy a coffee from one of the chains every working day). Take your own equipment into work.
I'm not a coffee drinker (can't stand the stuff) but a friend of mine who is recommends McDonalds. Can that be right?
Yes, it is good. far better than most takeaways and cheaper too.
I always drink it black, but they will put in a couple of icecubes to cool it if you ask.
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
Actually Corbyn doing better than expected last time may well have given the Tories one more term in power.
As Corbyn sympathisers like you are now going for the 'one more heave' strategy you are making no effort to appeal to the 42% who voted Tory just consolidating the 40% you got and the current polls reflect that. If the Tories had got a majority last time and Labour replaced Corbyn with a more electable and moderate leader the Tories would probably be in a more precarious position
A lot will depend on who Momentum goes for. Their candidates now win all party-wide, balloted Labour elections. They won't go for Chuka. Of those you name, only Starmer is likely to stand.
I have had a punt on Jon Ashworth .Seems one of the best in the shadow cabinet.However my main bet is Emily Thornberry who had a good GE campaign as it is about time they had a permanent female leader.
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
Actually Corbyn doing better than expected last time may well have given the Tories one more term in power.
As Corbyn sympathisers like you are now going for the 'one more heave' strategy you are making no effort to appeal to the 42% who voted Tory just consolidating the 40% you got and the current polls reflect that. If the Tories had got a majority last time and Labour replaced Corbyn with a more electable and moderate leader the Tories would probably be in a more precarious position
LOL I'm not a Corbyn sympathiser. I've been pretty critical of him on here for the most part.
Your first point runs on the line that people voted Labour only because they thought the party weren't going to win. Given the degree of support for many of Corbyn's policies and the rise in his personal ratings, this is doubtful.
I'm not going one for one heave strategy. It's Momentum and Corbyn that are doing that. And it's not true they are making no effort to appeal to Tories - Momentum/Labour activists are already campaigning in Tory areas now trying to build up support. They were recently in Grant Shapps' constituency.
This idea that a Blair style Labour leader would have done better than Corbyn at this stage is foolhardy. There is deep dissatisfaction with the current economic status quo, a Blairite centrist who supports that status quo isn't going to gain as much support as someone who challenges it. That is why Corbyn did so well among under 45s.
The polls also told us a few months before the GE that May was going to win a big/significant majority. Opinium and many other polls with the exception of Survation and YouGov also told us the Tories were on course to win a majority and look how that turned out.
The Conservatives and Labour are neck and neck for the first time since the general election. The Tories have risen by one point since last month, while Labour has dropped two points, to put both parties on 41%.
Leader Approval Ratings Theresa May’s ly, Jeremy Corbyn’s net ratings have slipped from -5 to -7%.
There does seem to be a remarkable consistency in them recently
The country is split between anti-Tory and anti-Labour. Opinion is divorced from events. All polls are consistent in showing almost no shifts since the election. It's hard to see how that changes.
It will change as we get closer to March 2019 but at present
I suspect there'll be bigger shifts post-Brexit. A cliff-edable.
The new Tory leader would call ast a Corbyn defeat
If the Tories win the next election on the back Prime Minister and govern for a very long time as the Tories will be finished as a serious political force for a generation at least.
If the Tories win the next general election Corbyn would probably resign though and
It's hard to see Corbynosition very strong, but the far-left's generally quite weak - hence their obsession with gaining control of internal levers of power.
The Labour members poll from June on who they want to succeed Corbyn had Cooper tied with McDonnell on 27% with Umunna and Starmer just a point behind on 26%
A lot will depend on who Momentum goes for. Their candidates now win all party-wide, balloted Labour elections. They won't go for Chuka. Of those you name, only Starmer is likely to stand.
The Momentum candidate got only a quarter of the votes in that poll and if Corbyn loses and resigns Momentum's energy and raison d'etre goes with him.
Once Corbyn has gone both Umunna and Cooper would probably stand as well as Starmer
In actual Labour-wide ballots candidates endorsed by Momentum always win.
This is a great article and sets up a question that no one really knows the answer to. Here is the perspective from my small technology business with about 50 employees. There are few skilled brits available for hire and almost no men. Our two recent skilled hires were from Greece and Brazil. The skill base of school leavers is dire as they don't even have basic knowledge like how to clean or cook. Their work effort is weak but they need jobs to survive.
Implementing computer systems to get the productivity gains we need is hard. Computer staff are expensive and many of our managers struggle to use computers correctly.
In our industry we compete with 2 large global multinationals. They soak up the uk talent but often send them abroad. They are not however investing in uk production.
Overall we have a very fluid economy that blows with the wind. This is both a strength and a potential weakness. Political input will have unintended consequences which no one can predict. My problem with brexit is not I love Europe or where rules are made but my lack of trust with our politicians not to mess it up.
There is a massive shortage of programmers and other skilled IT people, even with free movement. Once that ends, it will put a lot of tech-based UK businesses in very serious trouble - especially the smaller ones.
It is already happening. We have moved some of our work abroad because of it. Being in database design it is easy to export the work using a development server in our own offices.
The quality of recent UK Comp.Sci graduates we interviewed is dire
I don't know anything about computers, so can't comment on the quality of graduates, but what I do know is that even now demand far outstrips supply. Our IT team is increasingly non-British and very fluid. We're outsourcing a lot more than we used to because it's the only way we can manage. And we're not sending work to UK-based businesses. Brexit is clearly going to intensify that process.
I agree and IT is a fairly universal discipline with the same tools and frameworks available anywhere in the world. There are no geographic boundaries to the supply of IT skills.
Yet British IT graduates are paying £30k for a university education which is failing them.
The Conservatives and Labour are neck and neck for the first time since the general election. The Tories have risen by one point since last month, while Labour has dropped two points, to put both parties on 41%.
Leader Approval Ratings Theresa May’s ly, Jeremy Corbyn’s net ratings have slipped from -5 to -7%.
There does seem to be a remarkable consistency in them recently
The country is split between anti-Tory and anti-Labour. Opinion is divorced from events. All polls are consistent in showing almost no shifts since the election. It's hard to see how that changes.
It will change as we get closer to March 2019 but at present
I suspect there'll be bigger shifts post-Brexit. A cliff-edable.
The new Tory leader would call ast a Corbyn defeat
If the Tories win the next election on the back Prime Minister and govern for a very long time as the Tories will be finished as a serious political force for a generation at least.
If the Tories win the next general election Corbyn would probably resign though and
It's hard to see Corbynosition very strong, but the far-left's generally quite weak - hence their obsession with gaining control of internal levers of power.
The Labour members poll from June on who they want to succeed Corbyn had Cooper tied with McDonnell on 27% with Umunna and Starmer just a point behind on 26%
A lot will depend on who Momentum goes for. Their candidates now win all party-wide, balloted Labour elections. They won't go for Chuka. Of those you name, only Starmer is likely to stand.
The Momentum candidate got only a quarter of the votes
In actual Labour-wide ballots candidates endorsed by Momentum always win.
As Corbyn is leader and the same poll put Corbyn clearly in front of all potential rivals, once Corbyn goes Momentum's power and influence goes too
The Conservatives and Labour are neck and neck for the first time since the general election. The Tories have risen by one point since last month, while Labour has dropped two points, to put both parties on 41%.
Leader Approval Ratings Theresa May’s ly, Jeremy Corbyn’s net ratings have slipped from -5 to -7%.
There does seem to be a remarkable consistency in them recently
The country is split between anti-Tory and anti-Labour. Opinion is divorced from events. All polls are consistent in showing almost no shifts since the election. It's hard to see how that changes.
It will change as we get closer to March 2019 but at present
I suspect there'll be bigger shifts post-Brexit. A cliff-edable.
The new Tory leader would call ast a Corbyn defeat
If the Tories win the next election on the back Prime Minister and govern for a very long time as the Tories will be finished as a serious political force for a generation at least.
If the Tories win the next general election Corbyn would probably resign though and
It's hard to see Corbynosition very strong, but the far-left's generally quite weak - hence their obsession with gaining control of internal levers of power.
The Labour members poll from June on who they want to succeed Corbyn had Cooper tied with McDonnell on 27% with Umunna and Starmer just a point behind on 26%
A lot will depend on who Momentum goes for. Their candidates now win all party-wide, balloted Labour elections. They won't go for Chuka. Of those you name, only Starmer is likely to stand.
The Momentum candidate got only a quarter of the votes
In actual Labour-wide ballots candidates endorsed by Momentum always win.
As Corbyn is leader and the same poll put Corbyn clearly in front of all potential rivals, once Corbyn goes Momentum's power and influence goes too
@HYUFD If Tory party members are really thinking like you are, then the Tories really are doomed.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely .
Actually Corbyn doing better than us position
LOL I'm not a Corbyn sympathiser. I've been pretty critical of him on here for the most part.
Your first point runs on the line that people voted Labour only because they thought the party weren't going to win. Given the degree of support for many of Corbyn's policies and the rise in his personal ratings, this is doubtful.
I'm not going one for one heave strategy. It's Momentum and Corbyn that are doing that. And it's not true they are making no effort to appeal to Tories - Momentum/Labour activists are already campaigning in Tory areas now trying to build up support. They were recently in Grant Shapps' constituency.
This idea that a Blair style Labour leader would have done better than Corbyn at this stage is foolhardy. There is deep dissatisfaction with the current economic status quo, a Blairite centrist who supports that status quo isn't going to gain as much support as someone who challenges it. That is why Corbyn did so well among under 45s.
The polls also told us a few months before the GE that May was going to win a big/significant majority. Opinium and many other polls with the exception of Survation and YouGov also told us the Tories were on course to win a majority and look how that turned out.
You are an anti Tory so that is Corbyn sympathiser enough.
Even today Corbyn can do no more than the the Tories so my point holds, there is a big anti Corbyn vote.
Momentum and Corbyn run Labour at the moment and there were plenty of Momentum activists in Tory held seats last time too, it was failure to appeal to Tories in policy terms which kept most of those Tory seats Tory, hence the Tories won almost 60 more seats than Labour.
A Blair rehash is not needed, a more moderate leader who does not want to turn the UK into Venezuela is all that is required, the Tories got 42% (their highest voteshare since 1987) for a reason even if Corbyn United the left behind him
Yougov this week also had it tied, Survation has a Labour score similar to other pollsters just a slightly higher UKIP score at the expense of the Tories
Comments
Pret-A-Manager appears to be the go place for middle-class city workers. I'm not into the food offered there at all, so I don't go there.
I'm sad that the situation may not have improved.
Of course the Tories need to win over voters. The idea that this situation is remotely desirable for the party is hilarious. They did not call a GE to lose their majority and be put into a situation where they have to rely on the DUP to cobble together a knife-edge majority. This situation has meant that they've had to drop much of the agenda in that they wanted to go forward with in government and instead have to cede ground to Labour. Parties want to get into government so that they can implement their agenda - right now the Tories are a party in government but not in power.
And while Corbyn needs to win over voters, he's in much better situation to do so than the Tories are. The Conservatives at this stage have very little ace cards over Corbyn and that's situation looks set to get worse.
Getting anyone to use abstraction or refinement of the problem as a basis for the structure of the solution was an anathema to most of them. They seemed to prefer sitting at the keyboard and bashing out lines of code without any clear idea of the problem they were trying to solve.
If you paid by results instead of by the hour...
As it stands, all things being equal, Corbyn will win the next election.
The Tories have no economic policy, nothing to offer anyone under the age of 45 (not just 25), and are not even united on the crisis of the day, Brexit.
Even moderates are reluctantly concluding that Corbynism is the only way to disrupt what looks to be an exhausted economic and political settlement.
43% with ORB last week put immigration control over free trade as the priority for the Brexit talks, so 41 to 43% would vote for a hard Brexit strategy in 2019/20 in a general election soon after Brexit talks at least in the short term
Also, an hour spent understanding what you are supposed to be doing often shortens and simplifies the work to be done
It makes Starbucks seem drinkable.
Their sandwiches and other food are very good.
However, their coffee is a crime.
As Corbyn sympathisers like you are now going for the 'one more heave' strategy you are making no effort to appeal to the 42% who voted Tory just consolidating the 40% you got and the current polls reflect that. If the Tories had got a majority last time and Labour replaced Corbyn with a more electable and moderate leader the Tories would probably be in a more precarious position
NEW THREAD
Once Corbyn has gone both Umunna and Cooper would probably stand as well as Starmer
I always drink it black, but they will put in a couple of icecubes to cool it if you ask.
A lot will depend on who Momentum goes for. Their candidates now win all party-wide, balloted Labour elections. They won't go for Chuka. Of those you name, only Starmer is likely to stand.
I have had a punt on Jon Ashworth .Seems one of the best in the shadow cabinet.However my main bet is Emily Thornberry who had a good GE campaign as it is about time they had a permanent female leader.
Your first point runs on the line that people voted Labour only because they thought the party weren't going to win. Given the degree of support for many of Corbyn's policies and the rise in his personal ratings, this is doubtful.
I'm not going one for one heave strategy. It's Momentum and Corbyn that are doing that. And it's not true they are making no effort to appeal to Tories - Momentum/Labour activists are already campaigning in Tory areas now trying to build up support. They were recently in Grant Shapps' constituency.
This idea that a Blair style Labour leader would have done better than Corbyn at this stage is foolhardy. There is deep dissatisfaction with the current economic status quo, a Blairite centrist who supports that status quo isn't going to gain as much support as someone who challenges it. That is why Corbyn did so well among under 45s.
The polls also told us a few months before the GE that May was going to win a big/significant majority. Opinium and many other polls with the exception of Survation and YouGov also told us the Tories were on course to win a majority and look how that turned out.
Something is going very wrong somewhere.
Even today Corbyn can do no more than the the Tories so my point holds, there is a big anti Corbyn vote.
Momentum and Corbyn run Labour at the moment and there were plenty of Momentum activists in Tory held seats last time too, it was failure to appeal to Tories in policy terms which kept most of those Tory seats Tory, hence the Tories won almost 60 more seats than Labour.
A Blair rehash is not needed, a more moderate leader who does not want to turn the UK into Venezuela is all that is required, the Tories got 42% (their highest voteshare since 1987) for a reason even if Corbyn United the left behind him
Yougov this week also had it tied, Survation has a Labour score similar to other pollsters just a slightly higher UKIP score at the expense of the Tories