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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The new election reality: The Tories need the SNP to impede LAB’s revival in Scotland
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Hopefully Labour will sweep the SNP away at the next GE.
As for the SNP - SNIP - its future looks dire. Will it be a phoenix that disappears post GE2022?
Perhaps part of a wider spread desire for change and make capitalism work for people. I suspect she shares more with her old boss Tony Blair than Corbyn though
"Winston Peters’ perverse marriage with Labour and the Greens threatens countless groups: taxpayers, Auckland infrastructure users, millennials, immigrants and the businesses relying on them, and more.
If this coalition governs as it campaigned, then New Zealanders face a big-spending, tax-everything-that-moves, 1970s-protectionist, red-tape-loving government."
Personally I think it's unwise to fling doomsday rhetoric at a new government after it's formed. If it's a disaster, voters will turn away soon enough. If it's not, they'll remember your hysteria.
Mr. Nashe, if the UK leaving the EU goes badly, then Scotland deliberately leaving a country with which it, and its trade, is far more intertwined would be a strange response.
"This is terrible! Let's repeat it, but in a much more dramatic fashion!"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-41652707
Much political drama in Wellington and Winston Peters played his part on the stage to the very end. I don't know why anyone is surprised he chose Labour - Peters has history with National in general and Bill English in particular who seconded the motion to have Peters thrown out of National.
This is revenge - served cold (or perhaps fairly warm). Peters had run against National in Northland in the last Parliament. Perhaps he will be Foreign Secretary as he was under Helen Clark after 2005. It won't be easy for the Greens who hate Peters with a healthy passion but I suspect they'll sign up to the Coalition with a C&S agreement to keep National out.
This is probably the end of the line for Bill English who, rather like Theresa May, looked at the start of the election to be cruising to a big win but found himself confronted by the telegenic and untested Jacinda Ardern.
She is now NZ Prime Minister at the age of 37. After the election of a new Austrian Chancellor at the age of 31 it seems the cult of youth still stands strong in many parts of the world.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11933629
There was also the perception that the more rural-based National Party wasn't that bothered with the concerns of Aucklanders.
Since the SCons look like being relegated to their habitual third, I guess we can put them down as worse than dementia or cancer.
He said there will be no queues at Dover, because there are not usually custom checks, with a FTA...
Ummm.
Voters despise artificial attempts to look like them (e.g. being photographed eating fast food, etc., unless it's known that's what you usually like), but respond well to someone quite different taking an apparently genuine interest.
Although Labour won fewer seats and votes than the Nationals and New Zealand First might have been expected to go with the National Party Peters has been a minister in both Labour and National governments before so his decision is perhaps not as surprising as first appears.
Though the fact Labour will need Green and NZ First support to get anything through Parliament means a delicate balancing act for her.
Oh, and to be fair it’s lunchtime where I am, I’ll admit I was possibly a little over the top for 7am, but bored waiting for a meeting. Reading back it was a little bit SeanT.
I'm still astonished by the "tactics" used by the Tory whips in the UC debate. 'We can't win the debate, we can't be seen to vote against this motion, so lets abstain and claim that our absence means we didn't lose'
Are they the government of the UK, or a group of stoppy toddlers? Foot stamping, arms folded and "shan't" is supposed to be behaviour that ends with the onset of puberty. With the non-appearance of the "now we're leaving the EU to reclaim parliamentary sovereignty lets take sovereignty away from parliament" bill perhaps this will also be the tactic - abstain or better still not hold a vote and claim not to have lost.
My formative political years as a young adult were watching the desperate manoeuvrings of Major's government, in minority with a significant rebel cadre on their own benches. I don't recall that government - with David Davis as chief whip - hiding away from votes. They made their case, they worked the argument, and they kept going.
Compare and contrast Major's government with ZombieMay's cowards, too scared of being seen to lose on a vote where they've already lost the argument to even turn up and vote AND then claim they won. These are the people going on air claiming they are defending parliamentary sovereignty. Have we ever seen as inept a group of immoral cowards as this government?
As I said yesterday, you can be seen as nasty and competent and be ok. Be nice but slightly ineffective and be ok. But nasty and incompetent? That's the political death spiral. Various people have said this government and this PM especially have a sense of death about them. I'd go further - they had to abstain to lose. They can't bring their time-critical Henry VIII bill back due to the huge weight of substantial amendments.
This government has died in office. It has ceased to be. It no longer functions as a government. Someone call the undertaker.
"Mishal Hussein is doing a cracking job of showing Starmer's position up for naked oppositionism."
About time someone did. It's a wonder he can keep a straight face when he spouts his drivel. I know all politicians do it in opposition, but surely they do feel some embarrassment at the contradictions.
His position can be summarised as follows ...
1. The EU negotiators want to help us.
2. We're making it difficult by not knowing what we want.
3. By not paying a massively inflated fee to discuss trade, we are being deliberately awkward.
4a. We accept the referendum result but ...
4b Able negotiators will allow us to stay in the single market and leave the EU.
4c.. The sun shines out of Barnier's and Juncker's arse.
4d. We need EU oversight to prevent us descending into anarchy.
4e. The four freedoms and all the EU rules must remain.
4f. All hail the mighty EU.
5. We accept the Referendum result.
That would be this bank Peter? http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/gangster-bankers-too-big-to-jail-20130214
Oh and an update: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/too-smug-to-jail-w447825
Hard to imagine isn't it?
Once again, it's worth remembering this is about history and revenge for Peters. While I imagine a number in his NZ First Caucus would have much preferred going in with National, Peters has history with National and Bill English and he has screwed them over big time in what is probably his last big political act.
Bill English is done - he may not resign today but I can't see him having a future. They need to quickly find a new leader who can challenge the new Government on its record in 2020.
Ardern is not Corbyn - her hero is Helen Clark but it's fair to say she has played to the gallery on immigration and we may yet see a referendum on whether NZ becomes a republic but not any time soon.
It's not about winning a vote, it's about party unity. That's my guess, anyway.
Mr. Recidivist, the EU is a significantly larger market than the UK. And yet Scotland does far, far more trade with the rest of the UK.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2017/oct/19/new-zealand-election-winston-peters-prime-minister-bill-english-jacinda-ardern-live
I wonder if there is, in a sense, some wisdom in not answering some questions for a governing party.
"When did you stop beating your wife?"
An opposition can try to find ways to ask that question in as many different circumstances as possible. Like the £350m issue that Cummings exploited - by attempting to set the record straight you simply achieve what your opponent wants.
I also note that "DD of the SS" wasn't chief whip
If they did that, then it would be easier for May to give them more, and that's what they want after all.
@RochdalePioneers as poster of the year for me.
(Don't let that be a curse and all of a sudden switch to analysing AV at length from here on in.)
Ardern as you say has balanced an agenda for more affordable housing, less inequality etc with an acceptance of concerns about immigration much as Corbyn did by agreeing to leave the single market to end free movement so even on that they are similar.
I cannot see a referendum on a republic while the Queen is alive, Peters as a Prrivy Councillor would likely block it anyway but when Charles becomes King maybe.
Or that of Blair ?
http://news.sky.com/story/sky-views-could-universal-credit-become-pms-poll-tax-11087508
Does New Zealand have a forest of magic money trees ?
Doesn't mean it doesn't have the capacity to become seriously unpopular though.
Even bigger shock - despite the biggest giveaway manifesto in history and the entire party going full SJW, your man didn't win.
Mortimer implies that I don't understand what an opposition day debate is - I do. Doe he understand politics? When you get an endless wall of stories about how awful something is, with even your own media supporters piling in, does he really think you can ignore it and blindly insist all is well and the policy stands?
Worked for Thatcher...
The bigger point, though, is that harm is Brexit failure. Surely Leavers, and Remainers now the decision has been made, would insist on success?
Edit. Maybe the population don't get a say. The Brexit ultras in the Conservative Party will subject the country to harm willy-nilly.
If the UK cannot buy anything with the money, there won't be a deal and they won't pay. So either this article is nonsense, or it just shows a total lack of reality on the EU side.
It then comes back to the politics. If Universal Credit turns out sour, Labour can rightly and effectively pin the blame on the Conservative government for riding roughshod over democracy. That was the point I was making yesterday about the Poll Tax in Scotland that saw the Conservatives reduced to irrelevance for decades.
I have both Remainer friends and Leaver friends, and it probably reflects how the nation voted. There is only a small proportion of the Remainers who don't accept the referendum result; few have changed their vote but they accept we are going.
Most Remainers just want us to get on with it, and few have any regard for Barnier or Juncker. They seem to be an embarrassment.
I do occasionally encounter a 'bitter' Remainer who is stewing in their bitterness. A rare event, but even they go quiet if these two are mentioned.
I could be totally wrong here because, to be honest, it seldom crops up in normal conversation anymore.
Are there any fans of these two on here? Just curious.
I was only making the point that the mechanics are different with the result that the recipients have fewer options.
The sanction regime of the last several years was a disgrace. If UC leads people into serious hardship in the way that happened in the pilots then the government will properly face obloquy. A government for all the people must prioritise the delivery of assistance to those in the greatest need.
Whether it’s a good idea is another matter.
It only recognises things such as law or democracy when they can be used to increase or impose its power, when they don't they are ignored.
Edit: lower than vermin!
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2017/oct/19/new-zealand-election-winston-peters-prime-minister-bill-english-jacinda-ardern-live
The money is pay to play. Or, if you will, the cost of Brexit. If you think Brexit is worth doing and making a relative success of, it's worth the money. The problem was that Leave was sold on a very slim margin on there being no cost to Brexit. The government is not willing to face reality or to present that reality to the electorate. The EU sees no benefit to making the cost less for the UK government. They want the money and they also want people throughout the EU to see the value of membership.
The main reason why it is only this week that the Jamaica parties are getting together is that each of the 4 parties (CSU and CDU are two different parties) were getting their own negotiating stance together, to agree red lines and preemt the demands of the others. The Greens vs CSU will be particularly difficult.
Look to GE 2010 to see what happens when a small party signs a coalition contract after just 4 days!
Legitimacy in democracy doesn't come just from winning more seats and votes than your opponents but it comes from the ability to form a Government and get legislation passed.
In October 1951 and February 1974 the party with most seats didn't get most votes so it doesn't always work.
The point is politics under any and every electoral system (FPTP, AV, MMP, STV or whatever) is about building a Government and passing legislation. That isn't necessarily related to simply having more votes and seats than anyone else if you are bereft of other sources of support while your opponent has or is able to create allies with enough support to get that majority.
There's no legitimacy in being the most popular if you aren't popular enough to govern. If those who are opposed to you can agree on enough to get a majority and you are unable to persuade enough to get a majority on your own, the fact of coming first makes no difference.
If the DUP had shunned May and gone with Corbyn in June (and I'm NOT saying they could, would or should), Corbyn might have been able to muster enough votes to create a majority and the Conservatives, like National, would have to go into Opposition even though by many measures they had "won" the election.
That may not be "fair" or "right" but it's how democracy functions in most plural systems.
To win power, Labour has to capture Tory held marginals -and this is something Corbyn has proved very bad at doing.
Betting PostF1: with very small stakes, given recent woe, I've backed both Verstappen (15) and Ricciardo (17) to win each way, with Ladbrokes. In the last three races they've had a couple of double podiums and one win. Red Bull's performance is improving as Bottas declines and Ferrari's reliability wanes.
I've also backed, again with a tiny sum, Vettel to not be classified at 8. He's had 2/3 DNFs recently. More importantly, he's had two reliability failures (one affected a qualifying session but had it occurred in-race it would've ended that for him).
1) I have never suggested ignoring the referendum vote. That is a completely incorrect assertion. And in fact I have regularly set out what I think Britain should be done, but I'm not expecting every word of mine to be read as holy writ, so I'll set out my views again.
2) Unlike most Leavers, I have warned at all stages, including well before the vote, that negotiations with the EU would be protracted, difficult and bureaucratic. For this observation I got a fusillade of abuse from many Leavers, none of whom have troubled to apologise for being both wrong and abusive.
3) What should Britain have done? Instead of starting by getting bogged down in the detail, it should have started by inviting the EU to consider the relationship that Britain and the EU should have in 2030 and working backwards from there. It should have painted a big picture - I have my own view of what that should look like but that's scarcely particularly relevant. It should then have made a general proposal based on that. Some gestures to show that Britain intended to remain a member of the decent European society - eg guaranteeing the rights of EU citizens resident on the date of the referendum - at the outset would have been smart too.
4) If the EU refused to respond in kind, Britain should have called them out on that, arguing that the detail could only be determined if the destination was agreed upon.
5) Theresa May half understood this. Britain has already acknowledged the EU's wish to keep structural coherence. But she has made no attempt to get out of the EU what it is trying to achieve. She should also have rejected at the outset the process that the EU put in place as both inconsistent with the terms of Article 50 and an inappropriate framework for a negotiation.
6) The government has through ineptitude and indecision managed to incinerate Britain's reputation with its negotiating partners. To get anywhere Britain now needs a fresh start. That means Mrs May retiring and her being replaced by a fresh face (almost anyone would do). That fresh face then needs to start again, asking the EU what it is trying to achieve and pointing out that what it is doing seems calculated not to achieve it.
7) I'm expecting no deal and have been for some time. Unlike the headbangers, I see this as catastrophic for the nation. Proper preparation needs to be made for that. This will have to be paid for. The fairest way would be to ensure that it falls on those who were most enthusiastic for Brexit in the first place. Freezing state pensions till future notice would be a good start.