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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Even if Labour secures an early election it is hard to see how the party wins It
The main objective of Labour, we are told, during this period of extreme uncertainty over Brexit is to secure an early General Election. To do that it will need to win enough backing for a confidence motion that defeats the government that is not rescinded within two weeks.
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Re the Golden Globes - it seems bizarre to me that Bohemian Rhapsody was in the Drama category while The Favourite was in the Comedy/Musical section.
But given their vehemence in opposing it to date it is going to take a major climbdown for them to officially abstain now.
As things stand, there's no way for Labour to go up from here: Corbyn is merrily trashing his appeal to centrist-Remainers and showing no sign of winning over former Tory voters.
But who knows what will happen after March 29th. If the whole of Kent becomes one big Operation Stack, or the newspapers find just one child death in hospital as a result of medicine shortages, all bets are off.
Maybe Magic Grandpa isn't so stupid after all.
Talk of "national interest" falls down when the entire Tory Party disagrees about what that constitutes.
There has been plenty of speculation and anonymous quotes from 'sources' to the effect that Jezza's closest aides think a massively messy Brexit, owned by the Tories, and the resulting chaos, is the perfect opportunity for them to win.
Serving Brit soldier 'attacked by 15 men' and hit by car in New Year's Day horror
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/serving-brit-soldier-attacked-15-13802646
BTW a big thanks to @Corporeal for his interesting thread headers yesterday.
I think the excitement will build and build, reach a crescendo, and then the following:
The deal will pass.
No early general election.
May survives as PM.
Stands down in 2021.
With heartfelt apologies.
The sooner the election the better Corbyn's chances. Though there are huge reservations about his leadership they are just about trumped by the madness of the Tories.
If the election arrives after brexit has resolved itself and the Tories have regrouped (and Corbyn is still leader) I wouldn't give them a snowball in Hell's chance
https://twitter.com/Andrew_Adonis/status/1081990825922449409
But as Cyclefree asks how does the Deal pass?
Also, how does the government survive with a pissed-off DUP?
My first blog of 2019 is up. It is a lengthy ramble containing no tips.
http://enormo-haddock.blogspot.com/2019/01/an-early-look-at-how-2019-f1-titles.html
So net, the more disruption/upheaval the worse it is for the Tories.
https://twitter.com/TiernanDouieb/status/1082204960203378688
No Deal. Surely even the House of Commons couldn't be so stupid.
Revocation without a referendum. Surely politically impossible.
A referendum. I don't believe the EU will extend for a referendum offering No Deal. Just maybe May will go for a Deal v Remain referendum, but surely that would break the Tory party.
An extension of the timetable in the absence of any suggested resolution. Maybe it could happen as an emergency measure to avert No Deal, but apart from that how does it improve things.
Not only are Tories making a Labour government more likely with their behaviour. They are making a Corbyn-led Labour government with an overall majority likely. They are, however, too stupid or obsessed with Brexit to realise this.
Interesting to note that it’s not just Corbyn on the Labour side. At the weekend, Madleson had adopted the rhetoric of the ERG on May’s deal, talking about being ‘slaves’ to Brussels. Clearly he’s getting there from a quite different perspective, but it demonstrates that what might be thought of as the reasonable centre is appealing to unreason in their pursuit of Remain.
I don’t see much hope at all for May’s deal outside of a referendum. I suspect the wider public are perhaps less uncompromising than their elected representatives.
A policy of abstention looks like a surefire way to split Labour too, and on this occasion the rebel MPs could expect support from a large part of the membership.
If they get one before April, questions will be asked about their stance on it so far, what they'll do if elected - and that scrutiny means they will start to 'own' the issues arising.
Leaving TMay to deliver what they believe will be a messy Brexit draws a line under 'what's to be done about the WA?', leaves her holding the baby, dodges scrutiny for Corbyn's fence-sitting thus far etc etc.
I take Alistair's point that the Tories may implode and let JC through, but I'd say he has everything to gain from bringing down the government after six weeks of queues at Dover, when, for the first time and somewhat unexpectedly, he will be on a no-score draw in the "can run a competent government" column.
It's also possible that despite the piss and wind, Brexit will pass peacefully and successfully, and TM will emerge as the saviour of the UK, sail peacefully into retirement and leave to trounce Corbyn in the ensuing bounce-fuelled election. (Though, if I were a betting man etc etc)
He came uncomfortably close in 2017 and I think his 40% vote share only happened because lots of voters didn't really think he had a chance and slung him a vote to hedge against a potential (and undesirable) large Tory majority.
I base this on zero science but I just don't see much serious appetite for a Corbyn premiership outside of around 500,000 hard core, anti-capitalist zealots.
I also reckon if Yvette Cooper or Hilary Benn were in charge of Labour they'd be 10% ahead in the polls.
* There is a bit of hoping mixed in with that 'thinking', I freely admit.
Yellow vests episode 8, France continues its descent in to farce. Former boxing heavyweight champion being sought after giving a gendarme a right hook
http://www.lefigaro.fr/politique/2019/01/06/01002-20190106ARTFIG00193-gilets-jaunes-le-boxeur-de-gendarme-activement-recherche-par-la-police.php
Manny Antoinette thinks about getting heavy with the protests and ordering a security clampdown
http://www.lefigaro.fr/politique/2019/01/06/01002-20190106ARTFIG00168-gilets-jaunes-macron-tente-par-une-reponse-securitaire.php
Revocation: the only thing within Britain's sole control. It has one big merit: it preserves the status quo and gives Britain time to decide what to do, something it is badly in need of at present.
A referendum. This needs an extension of Article 50 and therefore the agreement of all 27 other EU countries. They will exact a price for granting such an extension - namely the choices on offer at such a referendum.
An extension: see above re a referendum. What would it be for? And why would the rest of the EU agree?
One of the paradoxes though is that Jezza is not popular, but many of his policy ideas are. It seems the public quite like nationalisation, student fee changes, massive funding of public services by taxing bankers and corporate fat cats etc etc.
It is at least possible he will stagger over the line based on the manifesto rather than the man.
But May's tin-eared, pig-headed, stubborn, cackhanded approach is likely to find the worst possible option and somehow contrive to make it even dafter.
https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article186644262/Fluechtlingsretter-warnen-Lage-auf-blockierten-deutschen-Schiffen-zunehmend-kritisch.html
Take those banks which Labour will want to tax heavily to pay for its commitments. Very popular, no doubt. But will those banks stay here to be taxed heavily when (a) they need to have a base within the EU; (b) the EU will be doing everything possible to encourage them to move; and (c) being here would mean heavy corporate and personal taxes and a hostile environment?
Ditto with other sectors.
So to raise revenues others will need to be taxed, people who thought that others would be paying the taxes for all the nice promises Corbyn was making and who suddenly realise that those promises will be unfulfilled and/or that they will have to pay much more tax and/or that their job has now migrated to Bulgaria or Poland or the Netherlands or wherever.
Whoever is in charge, a messy Brexit is not likely to mean an easy life for anyone.
If the EU extract a price for a theoretical extension, such as determining the choices on offer, will that be portrayed as interfering in the affairs of a nation state? Could it be an action that backfires on the EU?
The polling is very clear that this would be electorally disastrous for them.
Corbyn wants an election above anything else, but even he is not that stupid.
this is what has been happening for the last 20 years irrespective of Corbyn
They are all idiots.
From the article:
"One interesting theory that was going round over the weekend was that LAB MPs would abstain when Theresa May’s EU deal finally gets put to the Commons thus ensuring that the UK leaves the EU on March 29th. Those developing the theory hope that this would encourage the DUP to back an early election move."
I know we currently live in a mad world and anything can happen, but how does that work? If there were a GE under these circumstances surely Lab would be torn to bits. Also for the DUP regardless of any GE result they would still be stuck with a Brexit they don't like.
Or of course something I just can't image would happen - Monster Raving majority.
Plus the EU will have its own concerns about a Corbyn government and will surely want to tie it down to minimise the harm it could do to EU interests so it will have a number of new red lines of its own to impose, I expect.
I would expect a Corbyn government to be in a Brexit swamp of its own pretty soon after taking power. There is a lot of wishful thinking going on amongst Labour supporters about how the EU would see a Labour government as some bright new dawn etc. I rather think the EU now sees a Britain which is in a complete mess about what it wants, utterly divided, and with two main parties also divided and more concerned with their own political ambitions than with finding a way through and coming to a workable realistic agreement with the EU. In those circumstances I would expect them to concentrate on doing what is best for the EU and sod Britain.
The reality is that the EU will be interfering in our affairs but that is a consequence not of its malign intent but on Britain's utter failure to order its own affairs. If Parliament cannot decide, literally cannot decide, and has to ask the EU for the time needed to get a referendum together then it can hardly complain (though doubtless the usual suspects will do so) that others take charge.
The SNP/Lib Dems would continue to push for a new referendum. The Tories would vote everything down...
Labour being in charge doesn't solve the issue, and a general election, unless it leads to a large majority for one of the main parties doesn't either...
But if No Deal happened in the former circumstances, they would bear responsibility for having enabled it, and being politicians I think they would find that possibility bery unattractive.
The Damp Squid says the deal passes, no GE, no Ref, no change of PM, no nothing.
The Black Swan says we crash out with no deal, then a GE, Corbyn landslide, negotiates to rejoin, holds rejoin vs remain outside Ref, expects to win it easily but doesn't, it's 50/50, a tie.
I think with Brexit there will be more squid than swan.
A referendum might be the only way to defeat No Deal - but to do so, it would have to be an option on the ballot.
Sortition is the answer. Who can believe that a hundred citizens chosen at random to handle this issue and appropriately advised would have made such an unholy mess of it as the House of Commons has?
The price of SNP acquiescence will be a deal/remain referendum and the government campaigning for remain.
Now about "Taking Back Control" .......
Sounds like a DVD an MP's spouse might claim on expenses.
How is it possible for the Brexit Buccaneers to know so little about so many things? These are educated people, many of them in government for a long time, that have access to vast stores of both knowledge and experts on every possible subject, and yet somehow they still contrive to be totally ignorant of pretty much any basic political or economic reality.
How does this happen?
I have been saying for a while that something like this could well happen. (And of course, the effect would be similar if Lab MPs split three ways, with some backing the deal as well in the aim of avoiding No Deal).
1. The country is still utterly divided
2. There is no time to organise a referendum
3. Another referendum is the gateway to a series of Never-end'ems
So we have our No-Deal default or Revoke. That is all the choice we have. Subsequent elections will be messy no matter what we choice because of point (1) above.
Tldr; Money. Lots of it.
He might also have Indy Ref two to organise if he is in a minority with the SNP !
Not, of course, that Labour is opposed to suicidial stupidity when the mood takes.
The Government has negotiated a treaty under which the UK will leave the European Union. Should parliament now ratify that treaty? YES / NO
Or,
Should the UK leave the European Union under the treaty negotiated by the government or should the UK remain a member of the European Union? LEAVE / REMAIN
There will not IMO be any of this 2 stage or 3 option preference monkey business.
(Betting PS: The top one settles on Betfair as No 2nd Referendum since it is not IN/OUT)
These voters
1) found the sweet spot for a coalition in 2010,
2) found a sweet spot to give the LibDems the heave-ho without letting Miliband get into power with SNP help in 2015 and
3) found the sweet spot to bugger up May's plans for world domination without giving the keys to Downing Street to Jeremy Corbyn in 2017.
Some might say these same voters are actually very, very canny.
Then there are others who think that because they have lots of degrees and high-paying jobs they know everything and are the bees knees and brilliant and entitled to everything they have when, as for pretty much all of us, luck and good fortune (our parents/where/when we were born etc) played a much bigger role than they will ever credit. Many of these are in Parliament.
Revocation will be seen as cancelling Brexit. And you know there is no way Parliament would ever reauthorise Article 50
Where I disagree with him is that it is at all likely that a goverment that crashes into a GE having lost a VonC can win. The only time I can remember a government falling that way was 1979. Callaghan was reasonably popular as @Corporeal showed us yesterday, Thatcher was every bit as divisive as Corbyn (if vastly more competent), but the government lost a VonC and was out of power for 18 years.
Those Tories who are voting against the deal and the transitional arrangements that it offers are really playing with fire. Their political careers may well be over before anyone is really interested in what they have to say about anything ever again. It's cold out there in opposition. I think that some of them have forgotten that.
As for Fat Pan's contribution on R4 this morning, as a former party Chairman he really should know better. He said the first priority is to put May's "miserable little deal out of its suffering." He hasn't come close to working through the implications of that either for the country or his party.
We do not spend anything like enough time in assessing the power of the EU (as a body or individual states) to control and guide the end result.
While our politicians run around like headless chickens (possibly an insult to headless chickens) preening themselves with their absent beaks, strutting their stuff with heartfelt statements of core beliefs that usually play well to the constituency they wish to appeal to, in the real world the power they have is subject to the agreement of the EU beyond the simple choices of agreeing the deal, revocation and crashing out.
There is no political position to bring us together, there is no referendum to heal the mess. Parliament should make a choice. That is what they are there for.
We voted in 2015, knowing a referendum was on offer.
We voted in 2016 in a referendum.
We voted in 2017 with some details of Brexit plans.
Non of those votes resulted in massive overwhelming majorities. It is the job of parliament to conclude Brexit in the way it feels is best for the country, and if they so wish in a way that reflects the peoples views.
I mean there's people like the honourable member for North West Bullshitshire and the Sage of Mid-Beds, who are clearly just unsalvageably dim.
And then you've got other Brexiteers, who really don't actually seem stupid to me at all, and therefore I have to conclude that their imperviousness to basic reality is deliberate. And that I don't understand.