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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Labour’s fan club is far too confident: 10 reasons why 2019 may not be 2017-part-2
This is not a prediction as such. There are plenty of counter-arguments to the points I’m about to make, some of which will almost certainly turn out to be true. It would be equally possible to write an article with 10 reasons why the Tory lead may well slide again. All the same, to keep things simple, let’s keep the focus on this side of the equation (not least because that provides a consistent baseline against which we can later argue).
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Brexit is the definitive issues of our times, and their answer of "umm, yeah, sort of, maybe...." isn't going to appeal to anyone. They needed to actually come out for something and have a position, there is no more road to kick the can down.
Squeezed from all sides, it could go very badly and frankly it deserves to.
(I consistently voted labour between 1987 and 2005)
If Ken Clarke and Matthew Parris are not voting Conservative at this election maybe in all the focus on Tory, Labour, Brexit Party in northern towns we are missing the real sea change of the 2019 election?
One downside of over promising to get an election is under delivering the other side of it. Where is all the money coming from to pay for all of this whilst smoothing brexit change at same time?
This is my point, do all this to prevent a corbynista government? It could guarantee a corbynista government definitely happens, next time.
Basically no one is my opinion.
Only this evening I came across an extraordinary thread from a Labour member in an old stamping ground explaining why he wouldn't campaign for the Labour PPC in his hyper marginal. The background of the candidate on both antisemitism and the far left was jaw dropping yet now sadly normal. Ditto this week's extraordinary interventions from the JLM and Rabbi Jonathan Romaine.
It's a deeply bleak moment that both governing parties are in this state.
And talking of complacent - those quarter who are undecideds will probably not decide. They'll end up not voting at all. There's a reason you have sub-75% turnouts....
Oh, and Ken Clarke is voting for his Tory successor.
I'll not be surprised if the Tories poll close to their 2017 number in the end. The sea-change will be how far Labour have fallen from theirs.
If the Survation figures for Workington are remotely correct you'd expect the Tories to hold neighbouring Copeland comfortably ( won in the 2017 By-election for the first time in 80 years ) and the third Cumbrian coastal seat of Barrow-in-Furness which they haven't won since 1983.
We'll see of course, just one poll, early days, single seats are difficult to poll etc etc. But they are really grim numbers.
Strategy wise I think Labour focusing on inequality is their best bet. Corbyn isn't going to do well from talking about Brexit.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-50272171
The LibDems, more than the Conservatives, surprisingly, seem to be up for a single-issue election. This might be a mistake. Irrespective of that, they might lose seats however well they poll, simply because, of their 21 MPs, only 12 were elected as Liberal Democrats.
For those of us in the betting fraternity, it would be good if pearls of wisdom such as these could be highlighted in bold with a Bet of the Day caption or suchlike so that attractive opportunities are not overlooked.
HS2 has not been cancelled.
I reckon reverse S will be what we end up with, the Manchester to Leeds section being part of NPR budget so HS2 costs come right down and the government can claim (rightly) to be investing in the North
That's my ill-informed guess anyway.
250-259 .... 32
260-269 .... 32
270-279 .... 20
289-289 .... 17
290-299 .... 12.5
Back all five of the above tranches so as to equalise one's returns and the resulting winning odds, net of Betfair's 5% commission, is 3.83 ... way, way behind Ladbrokes' 5.75, as above, for the same bet.
If Tories win a stonking majority does the importance of the ERG diminish leaving Johnson more opportunity to agree a much closer relationship with Europe long term than with a small majority?
However, it is difficult for a very large number of reasons to see anything major being changed. The Leeds route might be delayed, but ultimately the situation from Birmingham to London is (a) at crisis point in terms of capacity and (b) the new lines are already under construction, and the lines into Curzon Street and Euston pretty much have to go ahead whether high speed or not. In which case, why not build the rest (which is a minority of the actual cost) too?
But there are for some reason a lot of people - weirdly, many of them totally unaffected either way - who have made this totemic, so it isn’t something either Johnson or Corbyn will want to discuss while grubbing, oops, campaigning for votes.
Corbyn's Labour has been pathetic over Brexit and has alienated a lot of Remainers, and he personally is to blame for this. A fair number of the PLP were more sound on the subject, but Corbyn has never backed them. Labour simply cannot be trusted on the issue of the day.
On the other hand, while May didn't appeal to me, her rather dull and dutiful personality and integrity were quite major pluses with a lot of voters.
Johnson is a different kettle of fish. No one can defend his low character, serial adultery, proven mendaciousness, disloyalty and poor judgement in choice of advisor. Fun to have a boozy dinner in a restaurant with, but the sort who dodges his share of the bill when settling up.
I expect he will win and prove to be a disastrous PM. The polls will turn very quickly against him, but losing over 50 opposition seats via Scottish independence will be an additional hill for the English and Welsh opposition to climb.
If I had to put money on it there will be timetable changes, elements moved to NPR but yes, ultimately I cannot imagine it won't eventually get built in full, no doubt one day continuing onwards to Scotland.
But they are also true of Corbyn, except he probably wouldn’t be much fun as a dinner guest because he would drone on about the evils of factory farming in the 1960s.
So unfortunately unless Swinson has a result that makes 1931 look routine, we’re screwed.
Secondly, you are unfortunately wrong. I once thought the same thing but there are two very good arguments against it. First of all, double decker trains are incredibly slow to load and unload because of the huge number of people on them. That reduces capacity because it means longer station stops. Also, such trains tend to be slow and bulky and unlike the proposed HS2 units, would be unable to operate on non-HS lines (the current idea is that north of Manchester, where capacity is less of a problem, the expresses will run on the old metals to Scotland).
Secondly, the whole raison d’etre for HS2 is that it does NOT make sense for there to be fast and slow trains on the same tracks. Think about how long a fast train takes to stop, how many stations it misses, how many other slower trains it will therefore be passing. And if it can’t pass a slower train it is, by definition, not high speed.
Taking non-stop expresses off the WCML will have a huge effect on the number of local and freight trains that can use it instead. I believe it’s three pathways for these for every one express. That’s why the line is designed to be high speed. That’s what makes sense.
So I don’t expect Oakervee to recommend either of those changes.
But yes, ultimately I think the intention is for it to get to Scotland when the demand is shown to be there.
Edit - apologies, ignore point two, I misread your comment. Too early in the morning!
Boris pulled right-wingers like Priti and ERG gurus like JRM and (sort of) Raab into the Cabinet, which was enough to convince the average backbench Eurobore.
The new recruits might have more informed views on Europe, or they might not. Probably people with more capacity for hard work will no doubt already be compiling and analysing candidates in likely constituencies.
I think HS2 will be delivered as a high speed network, yes with European loading gauge, I do not expect any slower trains as it would take away from the capacity in a very negative manner.
The point about double deckers was more about the capacity that trains such as the TGV Duplex (320km/h capable) can add on such a line in terms of number of seats.
I agree, make the WCML (along with the ECML and MML) slower lines for stopper and freight, make HS2 purely for fast, inter city connectivity.
The rest is easy to figure.
I think the intended interchangeability of units probably scuppers double deckers for the moment, however.
Btw, Betfair has a 2% commission option now. Well worth switching.
Yes, the Workington poll does look credible. It suggests strongly that Labour Leave voters are prepared to abandon Labour over Brexit.
The only crumb of comfort for opponents of Brexit is that the poll implies equal and opposite movements elsewhere but that's pretty cold comfort.
Being serious, there will always be an ant-Tory majority in the electorate. Ironically, I reckon May came close to delivering the Tory ceiling last time. It was why the argument about keeping her majority under control proved so effective for Labour - even though Labour was led by Corbyn.
There is still an anti-Tory majority in the electorate. For the Tories to be 30 points head would require something like Con 48 Labour 18 LibDems 16 Brexit 8 others 10.
Unlikely.
18/1 LDs on less than 10% (this is where we were last time)
11/2 on LDs 20-29 seats (I expect a lot of strong second places)
13/1 on Con vote share 20-30% (the BXP may take off and BoZo flop)
13/1 on turnout less than 60% (the combination of Christmas and Bored of Brexit)
I am not making these as predictions, but rather as value bets.
Is there any chance of tidying up the links? Maybe getting rid of the casino site links (no mention of the insurance links!). It is hard to believe pb readers are looking to play fruit machines in their underwear, and easy to believe some firms' censors will block pb because of these links.
I'd be inclined to add a link to this curated list of MPs' twitter accounts.
https://www.mpsontwitter.co.uk/list
If you're a moderate Labour MP, desperately hanging on to the party in the hope that the next leader will start the long journey away from the failings of the Corbyn era, then the optimum result you may be hoping for is a weak minority Conservative government where the opposition is just a couple of seats short of forcing Johnson out of Number 10. Something like 312 Conservative MPs (net 5 down on GE2017).
If the SNP are +15 and the Liberal Democrats are +20, then Labour could be down 30 MPs and still have in some sense achieved the same result as GE2017 - denying the Conservatives a majority and a free hand.
An optimistic anti-Tory can envisage a scenario where Labour can finish with fewer seats than in 1983, but the Liberal Democrats and SNP do well enough between them to deny Johnson a majority. 50 SNP MPs and 65 Liberal Democrat MPs would do it.
So, the Tories will win handily. But they will begin from a low base of active support. It will get worse from there as the reality of what Brexit entails becomes clearer. It all means the next few years will be grimly fascinating.
You might consider not needing to invest in that part of the bet at this stage. You can always go back (admitteldy at poorer odds) if that required Tory collapse starts to show through in the polls.
Still think Johnson agreeing to a head-to-head with Corbyn is a mistake.
F1: because qualifying's late and I have a busy Sunday there's an off-chance there won't be a pre-race ramble. Hopefully I'll manage to write one but it'll be a shade tight.
From what I am seeing on social media Jeremy has a problem a Tim Farron Bum Sex - style problem. The stench of anti-semitism is far stronger than it has been, with so many moderate Labour MPs on record being Shocked and Appalled by Corbyn and the 4Ms. Questions are already loudly being asked about why they are wanting to put Corbyn into office, and the Jewish community has openly refused to engage.
So I don't think Jeremy will have a smooth ride like last time. And when questions come in that he doesn't like he gets nasty and shouty and thats not what his handlers want people to see. Then again Johnson is capable of reacting badly to questions he can't/won't answer, the die in a ditch with Jennifer Arcuri stuff is still roaring hot so again, should be fun.
To repeat my point of last night, with regards to #debateher this is probably ideal for Swinson. Make the point. Let Corbyn vs Johnson turn into one of the most excrutiating hours of TV possible. Come out the other side saying "you want to vote for That?"
Granted that the other points are still problems.
Right now, polling suggests that the Conservatives are benefiting from a relative advantage on leader ratings and a far more evenly split Leave than Remain vote.
Emphasising Corbyn as The Alternative risks both of those advantages.
A larger debate, with almost every other leader being for Remain, reduces the time available for Johnson to cock up and reinforces him as someone trying to get a deal through whilst everyone else is either Super-Remainish or fence-sitting.
Where are these people when Crossrail was funded, when the Northern Line tube line is being extended?
It is not as if the railway has been starved of cash due to HS2.
Reading station alone was £1bn - where was the noise about that or do enough of the London elite use that line for it to be worthwhile?
There is vast sums of money invested in and around London that never ever gets any negative comment.
As soon as anyone suggests investing in the north, to start the decades and decades of none investment, all hell breaks loose.
If HS2 was built instead of the WCML upgrade 20 years ago it would have been cheaper, if we delay a further 20 years it will cost far more.
A half hour off the Oxenholme Euston journey would probably mean I could confidently go for the earlier EuroStar. But, that is not much of a benefit really. The reliability of HS2 really is needed and that is what it should always have been sold on. It will be really bad if HS2 is pruned in any way - for instance - slow train to Preston, stand on that delightful platform for 25 mins to take the rest of the journey in 25 mins less !
IIRC, the proportion of 2017 Conservatives who have switched to the Lib Dems is 9% overall. The proportion will be minuscule in a place like Mansfield, but far higher than 9% in a seat like Guildford.
Ticket prices will be significantly higher even than the inflated prices we pay already, the line passes through Leics without stopping, and I cannot see why I would ever take it.
High speed trains seem less environmentally sound from several perspectives. They also suck more of the country into being London commuter land. It looks a white elephant in the making to me.
It may be my sunny disposition but I see only upside from here.
Even the worst case scenario, Johnson wins big. Long term probably great for Labour, terrible for the country in the short term but the more people turn against the Tories the better things get in the longer term. Even in a worst case scenario Corbyn has secured Labour as a left wing party, got rid of some truly terrible MPs and made things far easier for his successor.
Tis always darkest before the dawn, with any luck that light will start breaking through before the 12th of December but even if it doesn't it will just shine all the brighter when it does break through. So just embrace the darkness.
For instance if that tweet HYUFD posted in the last thread is true and the Lib Dems are truly only 7 points behind Blackford IN Ross Skye and Lochabar then the Conservatives have lost West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine and you need to take a good hard look at Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk
As both of those seats, like in Ross, the Con vote was powered by Lib Dem switchers.
In actual fact it’s most fundamental impact will be to local and freight services on the WCML, which can be radically improved and increased as a result. That will affect a number of bottlenecks (e.g. New Street, Stafford) which if dealt with piecemeal would make matters worse.
But, there are potential gains for the Lib Dems in Stockbroker Belt constituencies, like Guildford, Cheadle, Winchester, and some new seats may come into play. The danger, as @Alistair Meeks pointed out, however, is winning lots of strong second places.
I’m really glad you’re not negotiating my next pay increase...
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-primaries/democratic/new-hampshire/
If Johnson wins a majority that's one of the major next arguments in the Brexit saga - others being the substance of any trade deal with the EU, or the US.