I must confess my support for the Socially Liberal, Fiscally Conservative but not banging on about Europe party is wavering this morning. If I was confident it still existed I might even be thinking about defecting from it. The Letterbox Party is just so much more focused on real problems.
Bloody right we are. We also have more related policies - transportation to the colonies for anyone who has a gate secured with a rusty bolt thats a bugger to shift without scratching yourself only to have a letterbox that is jammed up and you can't push anything through.
I just need some clarification on who the leader of the new party is? Having suggested it I assume I am. If challenged and I lose, just to warn you, I might set up a rival 'Party of the Letterboxes'.
Can we have a Party For People Who Want Political Leaflets Put Straight Into The Bin, please?
No.
In that case too bad about your fingers. Wear gloves.
Labour have been a woeful opposition, even under Starmer.
But there is, dare I say it, a touch of hubris in the air this morning. Remember May won Copeland - a Labour seat since forever. Stunning victory etc etc. Trudi Harrison, my MP now, is now Boris's PPS. She has been conspicuously silent on the problems facing farmers and hospitality in the constituency. It is Tim Farron in the neighbouring constituency who has made all the running on this and the plight of outdoor centres. The one big jobs development in the area - the mine - has been put on hold.
Husband takes the cynical view that better to have a Tory MP as there is a chance that an area which has largely been neglected might get something. Daughter sees an MP who has said and done little and has yet to have the meeting with her to discuss the issues around hospitality and small businesses she was promised since before Xmas.
Anyway, a few months after Copeland the Tories lost their majority. Now of course the PM is a better campaigner than May, he won't call a GE etc etc. But still - a touch of humility might not go amiss. The Tories are in danger of taking their new voters just as much for granted as Labour have done, unless there are real and visible improvements.
Improving the roads would be something - round where I live the potholes are something that would disgrace a poor African village.
If there were a by-election in Chingford or Kensington, or Wycombe, Labour would probably win it by a country mile. That article on the Blue Wall was interesting.
And, in a way, that's the key thing that some commentators have forgotten here this morning.
If today's poll is even half-right, Hartlepool is a goner. Well, duh. Without Tice's intervention, it would have fallen easily in December 2019.
But if yesterday's polls are right, the national picture is that the government, despite all its triumphs, is barely ahead of this terrible Labour party led by terrible old Starmer.
Both things can be true at once.
Are Labour terrible? Not really - dull with no message (same for SKS) but they are not disastrous nor have they swung into looney tunes territory.
The big structural threat is that it is quite easy to see Labour's voters easily absorbed by other parties - the WWC going to the Tories, the urban professional classes going to the Greens with the ethnic vote (which is increasingly focused on Bangladeshi / Caribbean / Pakistani communities) going to a Respect-style outfit.
This rather ignores that this seat (or its predecessor) last returned a Tory in 1959. The Red Wall seems to be continuing to crumble.
Yet, what about elsewhere in the country? In my rather leafy Bucks village I have yet to see a single Tory banner. A few Labour but many Green signs. Locally the Greens have done quite well before and I would expect that to continue. Locally they don't have to worry about some of their more bonkers national policies. As a traditional Tory I am tempted to give them my vote in the locals which I would never do in a general election.
The farmers who used to plaster rural areas with big Tory posters seem strangely less keen this time around. Has anything happened recently?
I saw several labour posters in fields in 2019, I almost crashed my car in surprise.
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Farage not kicking up a fuss about the exit deal was genuinely shocking.
Not to me, he could see the writing on the wall. For him, his time in politics is over. He could either go down swinging as the DUP style rejectionist who opposed everything and people moved on without him - or he could be a man who goes down in history as the consumate outsider who got what he wanted delivered from challenging outside of Parliament.
People give Farage far more credit than he deserves, he always preyed on pre-existing splits especially in the Tory Party. Once that split was healed, he had no future. Better for his legacy to finally claim victory than to continue kicking up a fuss. He can retire gracefully now, cashing in on his legacy in the USA etc now.
If you, but more importantly Labour, don't get this then there is no way they are returning to power anytime soon.
This is lazy analysis. Just because there's been some big political shifts in one area doesn't mean they cant be some in another.
If the Tories win Hartlepool by the amount suggested and IF (big if) the national polling is actually in the region of a 2% lead, rather than 10%, that suggests some big swings to Labour elsewhere...
I agree. What has made the Tories so successful over the last decade is the increased efficiency of their vote compared to the days when they got within 3% of Blair and he got a very comfortable majority. This has happened so far because the very considerable ebbing of their strength in the south of England has merely reduced their majorities whilst they have suddenly become much more competitive in the midlands, the east and now the north.
But as Labour is finding in reverse there is a tipping point in these things. The seats Labour took for granted whilst it went fishing in the suburbs and university towns of the south have bitten back and it is all too possible that southern seats which were much more remainer, much more liberal and much more dominated by professional classes will in turn get fed up being taken for granted.
Overall this is a good thing. It was not healthy that the Tories were content to get a majority with only the odd rural seat north of Birmingham and the inability of Labour to relate to our most economically successful areas outside of the actual cities meant that they had little to say in that area. A situation where both our major parties have a fair degree of representation from most of our country improves the chances of the government being aware of the needs of all of the country.
Most of the problems there arise from the voting system, which directs all the political attention to those areas considered marginal, and neglects the safer areas for any party.
Whilst that is undoubtedly true it seems to me that Labour is going through an identity crises where they will become more potent in seats that are more like them, that is middle class, professional, well educated, dominated by the public sector and frankly rather more interested in the privileges of such people than those who have very little.
Those with little have caught on. They may come to realise that Boris doesn't really give a toss about them either but at least he pretends to listen and he is amusing rather than patronising.
"pretends to listen"? He delivered them their verdict on Brexit. Labour were set against doing so.
Yes, pretends to listen. Do the people of Hartlepool want Brexit because it is Brexit, or because what they hope it will bring them? Pools is a classic post industrial left behind backwater. People want back the jobs and prosperity and pride and hope that was taken from them. Brexit was the silver bullet to cure these ills which is why they were so enthusiastic for it.
Where the Tories will struggle is that they can't deliver what was promised. I have no doubt that Hartlepool will be thrown a few scraps once it goes Tory but it won't change the fundamental problems with the town and the region. One prime example - local Tories very excited by the prospect of a free port and how it will restore industry. Except that a free port makes it easier to IMPORT, it will do nothing but harm for local industry. But as nothing but harm has been on the menu for 40 years people are desperate and will try anything.
When salvation fails to arrive? Thats when the Tories are screwed. Not to Labour's benefit you understand, we're going to see a rise of the hard right. Think UKIP/Brexit with paramilitary activists...
I guess that they aren’t going to work in the new GE factory then?
A perfect example. Can you show me where in the Mayor's remit he has had anything to do with GE coming to Teesside? Its got literally fuck all to do with him and the same would have been true if (shudder) Jessie Joe Jacobs becomes mayor. She also claims all kinds of crap that are absolutely miles outside the remit of this non-job.
That’s changing the question. You said that the Freeport would do nothing for residents. GE is opening a factory there because it. That will do something for residents.
I don’t care whether it was the mayor, the monkey or a giraffe from London Zoo that achieved it. But from what he has said - and he may be lying of course - the major has been advocating strongly for the Freeport so he had a role and deserves a share of the credit
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Well, your sense of giving it to the voters is the more subjective one. What we can say for certain is that it was the cornerstone of the BXP's manifesto demands. On the LDs and Greens, PR is what Labour needs to give their leadership, once again.
It was the cornerstone of what the voters wanted, which is why they abandoned May and went to the BXP - and why when Johnson repositioned the party the voters abandoned the BXP and switched to Johnson's Party. Whether you call it populism or democracy, appealling to the voters works.
On the LDs and the Greens, asking yourself why their voters are backing those Parties instead of Labour is the question that needs addressing. If the answer to that question is that the voters want PR then giving it to them may make the voters switch, without a need for a pact - and thus potentially seeing the other parties standing down as a result.
But if the answer is that the voters want something else, that's not why the voters aren't backing Labour, then the voters will likely continue to not back Labour and vote for something else instead. Or not vote at all.
You are trying to short-circuit the voters, rather than learning the lesson of what Johnson did which is appeal over the top of the other parties directly to their voters.
You're propounding here an extremely rosy account of the entire Brexit process as from-the-ground-up, organic democracy, as Spiked et al also tend to do.
The only reason Cameron agreed to a referendum in the very first place was solely two forms of party-political calculation. Firstly, that the right of his party was beginning to pose a threat to his position internally, but more importantly, because UKIP was beginning to threaten him at local and european elections, and before most voters even much cared about the european topic at all, according to all the surveys of the time.
You're completely trying to rewrite history.
The reason Cameron agreed to the referendum in the first place was because over 100 MPs of his own Party rebelled against the whip to demand one. He had no alternative, he couldn't cover up the cracks in his party anymore. This predated the subsequent rise of UKIP.
Voters did care about the European topic and more importantly they cared about topics related to Europe, it was a myth by Remainers that the voters didn't care.
How can Labour be 2% behind nationally but 17% behind in Hartlepool? Either one poll is wrong, the other poll is wrong, or the Tories are losing ground much quicker in other areas than people realise.
Labour have been a woeful opposition, even under Starmer.
But there is, dare I say it, a touch of hubris in the air this morning. Remember May won Copeland - a Labour seat since forever. Stunning victory etc etc. Trudi Harrison, my MP now, is now Boris's PPS. She has been conspicuously silent on the problems facing farmers and hospitality in the constituency. It is Tim Farron in the neighbouring constituency who has made all the running on this and the plight of outdoor centres. The one big jobs development in the area - the mine - has been put on hold.
Husband takes the cynical view that better to have a Tory MP as there is a chance that an area which has largely been neglected might get something. Daughter sees an MP who has said and done little and has yet to have the meeting with her to discuss the issues around hospitality and small businesses she was promised since before Xmas.
Anyway, a few months after Copeland the Tories lost their majority. Now of course the PM is a better campaigner than May, he won't call a GE etc etc. But still - a touch of humility might not go amiss. The Tories are in danger of taking their new voters just as much for granted as Labour have done, unless there are real and visible improvements.
Improving the roads would be something - round where I live the potholes are something that would disgrace a poor African village.
If there were a by-election in Chingford or Kensington, or Wycombe, Labour would probably win it by a country mile. That article on the Blue Wall was interesting.
And, in a way, that's the key thing that some commentators have forgotten here this morning.
If today's poll is even half-right, Hartlepool is a goner. Well, duh. Without Tice's intervention, it would have fallen easily in December 2019.
But if yesterday's polls are right, the national picture is that the government, despite all its triumphs, is barely ahead of this terrible Labour party led by terrible old Starmer.
Both things can be true at once.
And the more interesting other side of the polling is that if Con are -3 since 2019, Lab +6, but in the Mids and North the Conservatives are flat or slightly up, and London is essentially maxed out, where are those gains? It's not in Wales, or really in Scotland.
If the answer is the one that jumps out, then the Tory heartlands are under threat.
Labour have been a woeful opposition, even under Starmer.
But there is, dare I say it, a touch of hubris in the air this morning. Remember May won Copeland - a Labour seat since forever. Stunning victory etc etc. Trudi Harrison, my MP now, is now Boris's PPS. She has been conspicuously silent on the problems facing farmers and hospitality in the constituency. It is Tim Farron in the neighbouring constituency who has made all the running on this and the plight of outdoor centres. The one big jobs development in the area - the mine - has been put on hold.
Husband takes the cynical view that better to have a Tory MP as there is a chance that an area which has largely been neglected might get something. Daughter sees an MP who has said and done little and has yet to have the meeting with her to discuss the issues around hospitality and small businesses she was promised since before Xmas.
Anyway, a few months after Copeland the Tories lost their majority. Now of course the PM is a better campaigner than May, he won't call a GE etc etc. But still - a touch of humility might not go amiss. The Tories are in danger of taking their new voters just as much for granted as Labour have done, unless there are real and visible improvements.
Improving the roads would be something - round where I live the potholes are something that would disgrace a poor African village.
If there were a by-election in Chingford or Kensington, or Wycombe, Labour would probably win it by a country mile. That article on the Blue Wall was interesting.
And, in a way, that's the key thing that some commentators have forgotten here this morning.
If today's poll is even half-right, Hartlepool is a goner. Well, duh. Without Tice's intervention, it would have fallen easily in December 2019.
But if yesterday's polls are right, the national picture is that the government, despite all its triumphs, is barely ahead of this terrible Labour party led by terrible old Starmer.
Both things can be true at once.
And the more interesting other side of the polling is that if Con are -3 since 2019, Lab +6, but in the Mids and North the Conservatives are flat or slightly up, and London is essentially maxed out, where are those gains? It's not in Wales, or really in Scotland.
The South, though some of those gains have gone to the LDs rather than Labour
Labour aren't going to get anywhere because Starmer is utterly shit. It doesn't matter if you're shit and the incumbent because well better the devil you know and all that. The Tories are talking jobs, Labour is banging on about some wallpaper or other. Burnham is going to smash G Manchester because he does actually have a bit about him unlike the frankly dire Starmer. Greater Manchester was once not that much more Labour than the West Midsor North East. It probably still isn't but they'll do well there because Burnham is believed in.
Labour made a huge mistake picking Corbyn over Burnham in 2017, had they chosen Burnham they would probably have won most seats ahead of May's Tories in 2017. Starmer ironically backed Burnham for leader then
Yeah there are structural changes going on but Labour should really have won stuff like Northfield in 2019. If Labour can't more or less sweep major city seats they'll never, ever win.
I think one thing that fools Labour is the political changes within their social and professional circles.
There's been a huge change in graduate and upper-middle class support since the noughties, particularly amongst educated graduate women. I can think of three friends who supported the Tories even during the Blair years and went for Cameron in GE2010 who are now solidly centre-left. Educated graduate males have also slipped to Lib Dem, or Green, or "alternative" - usually not Labour, funnily enough - as they've sensed the Conservatives no longer speak to their values.
I occupy a lonely place politically within my friendship group, now, and largely don't mention politics - except to a handful on a 1:1 basis who I know are sympathetic (male professionals who keep it under the radar).
I struggle to understand anyone supporting the Conservatives from 1997-2010, now supporting left wing parties, but you are right, it is a real phenomenon. Brexit is obviously part of the story, but only part of it.
It is class politics played out in a different way. I live in Highgate. In 2019, the bigger the house, the greater chance they would show a Labour poster. The terraces (the Muswell Hill side obviously) tended to have Lib Dem ones.
But even if every single owner of every huge house in Highgate had voted Labour in 2019 it would not have been close to enough for Labour to win the majority it did in Holborn and St Pancras. Like it or not, in London Labour wins because it gets the votes of ordinary Londoners on average or below average wages living in rented private or council accommodation. Labour's problem is that most of the rest of England is not like London.
'It's housing, stupid.'
It's not a problem that the rest of the country can afford their own homes, it's a problem that Londoners can't.
A problem Saddiq has done the square root of zero to fix, which is why he is going to be handsomely rewarded by the electorate.
Housing is not only a London issue and housing is not the only issue - which is why Labour also does well in other big English cities, securing the votes of people on average and below average wages.
Labour have been a woeful opposition, even under Starmer.
But there is, dare I say it, a touch of hubris in the air this morning. Remember May won Copeland - a Labour seat since forever. Stunning victory etc etc. Trudi Harrison, my MP now, is now Boris's PPS. She has been conspicuously silent on the problems facing farmers and hospitality in the constituency. It is Tim Farron in the neighbouring constituency who has made all the running on this and the plight of outdoor centres. The one big jobs development in the area - the mine - has been put on hold.
Husband takes the cynical view that better to have a Tory MP as there is a chance that an area which has largely been neglected might get something. Daughter sees an MP who has said and done little and has yet to have the meeting with her to discuss the issues around hospitality and small businesses she was promised since before Xmas.
Anyway, a few months after Copeland the Tories lost their majority. Now of course the PM is a better campaigner than May, he won't call a GE etc etc. But still - a touch of humility might not go amiss. The Tories are in danger of taking their new voters just as much for granted as Labour have done, unless there are real and visible improvements.
Improving the roads would be something - round where I live the potholes are something that would disgrace a poor African village.
If there were a by-election in Chingford or Kensington, or Wycombe, Labour would probably win it by a country mile. That article on the Blue Wall was interesting.
And, in a way, that's the key thing that some commentators have forgotten here this morning.
If today's poll is even half-right, Hartlepool is a goner. Well, duh. Without Tice's intervention, it would have fallen easily in December 2019.
But if yesterday's polls are right, the national picture is that the government, despite all its triumphs, is barely ahead of this terrible Labour party led by terrible old Starmer.
Both things can be true at once.
Yeah but 11 years into government and they're ahead in every poll - comfortably ahead in most. Has this ever happened before? In 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992 the opposition lead the majority of polls in each of those years, and again in 2008 and 2009.
We are in unchartered territory. Labour being closer in the polls is a crumb of comfort but equally Sunak is waiting in the wings for when the appeal of Boris starts to wear off. Sunak will lose ground in the red wall but you'd think he's got more than enough about him to hold off Labour in the home counties.
How can Labour be 2% behind nationally but 17% behind in Hartlepool? Either one poll is wrong, the other poll is wrong, or the Tories are losing ground much quicker in other areas than people realise.
Because the Tories would have been 20% up in the 2019 election if Farage hadn't stood and cost the Tories 15 or so seats that went to Labour due to the Brexit vote being split between Farage and Boris.
If Farage had completely stood down 80% of the Brexit Party votes would have gone to the Tory party.
The only thing this byelection is actually doing is showing the scale of the problem Labour needs to fix. Their core working class Northern seats have finally been lost after 70 years of being taken for granted.
This rather ignores that this seat (or its predecessor) last returned a Tory in 1959. The Red Wall seems to be continuing to crumble.
Yet, what about elsewhere in the country? In my rather leafy Bucks village I have yet to see a single Tory banner. A few Labour but many Green signs. Locally the Greens have done quite well before and I would expect that to continue. Locally they don't have to worry about some of their more bonkers national policies. As a traditional Tory I am tempted to give them my vote in the locals which I would never do in a general election.
Here in leafy Jeremy Hunt-land SWS Surrey (Godalming, Fasrnham, Haslemere) the Tory campaign is bizarrely lacklustre. I've had 2 A4 leaflets from them, both closely-typed screeds saying things like "[If the other parties win] we could be faced with higher council tax bills to fund grand visions that have no detailed plan for implementation." Even though I'm heavily involved I have no idea what they're talking about - the only major "vision" I've seen lately is the Tory plan to merge councils into a unitary. It's all perfecvtly unobjectionable stuff, but...?
The LibDem campaign is a bit dull too - lots of A3 leaflets (six, I think) with pictures of the candidates, sayinbg they have a record of success and Labour can't win here, but not many proposals. Labour is focusing on two seats and has put out a lot of leaflets (4) there, but starting from a low base - from zero in one case, as we stood down last time. I've seen a few posters for each party but it's all very quiet. Greens have endorsed LibDems in the towns and are only standing in some villages. Oddly, voters seem quite interested - in phone canvassing, I'm only rarely getting a "won't bother" response, and quite a few warmly endorsing each of the three parties. Prediction - LibDems may be either +1 or -1 vis-a-vis Tories, otherwise no change.
As a fellow Surrey resident what I would say is...'it's surrey', I'll probably be voting Lib dem, but only out of a general 'lets not keep the tories too safe and keep them on their toes' way.
Ditto esp in Horsham where the Tories have had it all their own way for far too long
Labour aren't going to get anywhere because Starmer is utterly shit. It doesn't matter if you're shit and the incumbent because well better the devil you know and all that. The Tories are talking jobs, Labour is banging on about some wallpaper or other. Burnham is going to smash G Manchester because he does actually have a bit about him unlike the frankly dire Starmer. Greater Manchester was once not that much more Labour than the West Midsor North East. It probably still isn't but they'll do well there because Burnham is believed in.
Labour made a huge mistake picking Corbyn over Burnham in 2017, had they chosen Burnham they would probably have won most seats ahead of May's Tories in 2017. Starmer ironically backed Burnham for leader then
Yeah there are structural changes going on but Labour should really have won stuff like Northfield in 2019. If Labour can't more or less sweep major city seats they'll never, ever win.
I think one thing that fools Labour is the political changes within their social and professional circles.
There's been a huge change in graduate and upper-middle class support since the noughties, particularly amongst educated graduate women. I can think of three friends who supported the Tories even during the Blair years and went for Cameron in GE2010 who are now solidly centre-left. Educated graduate males have also slipped to Lib Dem, or Green, or "alternative" - usually not Labour, funnily enough - as they've sensed the Conservatives no longer speak to their values.
I occupy a lonely place politically within my friendship group, now, and largely don't mention politics - except to a handful on a 1:1 basis who I know are sympathetic (male professionals who keep it under the radar).
I struggle to understand anyone supporting the Conservatives from 1997-2010, now supporting left wing parties, but you are right, it is a real phenomenon. Brexit is obviously part of the story, but only part of it.
It is class politics played out in a different way. I live in Highgate. In 2019, the bigger the house, the greater chance they would show a Labour poster. The terraces (the Muswell Hill side obviously) tended to have Lib Dem ones.
But even if every single owner of every huge house in Highgate had voted Labour in 2019 it would not have been close to enough for Labour to win the majority it did in Holborn and St Pancras. Like it or not, in London Labour wins because it gets the votes of ordinary Londoners on average or below average wages living in rented private or council accommodation. Labour's problem is that most of the rest of England is not like London.
Inner city working class people are the wrong kind of working class.
Very droll. Still doesn't sort out Labour's (and the left's) main issue. Most people view the party as irrelevant and the only people who vote for Labour are (1) smug urban professionals who think everyone is on Twitter or watching GoT when actually they are in front of the TV watching Corrie and (2) most (but not all) of the ethnic minority vote who will be off if Galloway, or a similar figure, gets their act together
How can Labour be 2% behind nationally but 17% behind in Hartlepool? Either one poll is wrong, the other poll is wrong, or the Tories are losing ground much quicker in other areas than people realise.
Or, the Tories aren’t losing ground when it comes to actual elections
Polls are an expression of theoretical interest. A Tinder swipe. Elections, by contrast, are actual sex
I don't know if anybody else heard the Starmer interview on R4 Today this morning, but it was quite interesting. He wasn't very good, actually (see, I am objective). But he did take the opportunity to set out briefly the 5 current top priorities for Labour at the next GE, whenever that is.
His 5 priorities had echoes of Blair's 1997 pledge card. Interestingly, the fifth priority was about bringing an end to the divisions caused by the 'culture war' (although he didn't use that expression, of course). Anyway, signs of an emerging Labour policy platform to fill the current policy vacuum.
5 top priorities = 5 yr plan = Edstone
Ending culture wars is not in the gift of politicians, and most of the people whose votes he needs take no interest in university social science department and metro rubbish anyway.
I don't know if anybody else heard the Starmer interview on R4 Today this morning, but it was quite interesting. He wasn't very good, actually (see, I am objective). But he did take the opportunity to set out briefly the 5 current top priorities for Labour at the next GE, whenever that is.
His 5 priorities had echoes of Blair's 1997 pledge card. Interestingly, the fifth priority was about bringing an end to the divisions caused by the 'culture war' (although he didn't use that expression, of course). Anyway, signs of an emerging Labour policy platform to fill the current policy vacuum.
What does it mean. According to this article it means "Insiders suggested that levelling up could include four aspects — a regional economic policy; spreading opportunity across the country; improving the outputs and outcomes from public services; and non-economic outcomes of improving “quality of life” and “pride in place”."
Sounds like empty vacuous slogans to me. In Copeland, one issue that lots of the locals mention is the state of the roads. They are awful. As for public services, the local councils are appalling at emptying their recycling centres. One centre - located next to a children's play area and SSI on the beach - is so bad that rubbish is blown about all over the place. The local waste authority is responsible for a statutory nuisance and this in an area dependant on tourism for its living.
I have raised this with the local council, the Tory Mayor and the local Tory councillor. Neither of the latter two even bothered to reply.
The problem Labour has, is there are not nearly enough Southern seats to counter those lost in the Red Wall. Anyone run the numbers on that, isn't it something like they need to win JRM's seat to undo the Red Wall
Labour need to be threatening (not necessarily winning) JRM's seat to win an OM, but of course need to do much less to deny the Tories an OM. A Labour OM is, unless a Blair shaped Black Swan arrives, completely impossible - and the current odds are ludicrous (7/2).
Among their target seats in terms of crude numbers (swing required) are completely different backgrounds, in particular compare 'marginal' seats where the Labour tide is going out (the old red wall etc) and the ones where the Labour tide is coming in (urban, BAME and posh/educated/Toynbee territory), I think there are fewer of the latter than the former mostly because they already hold that ground and because there aren't so many to start with.
Think squirrels. If you want an exciting and exotic one, search for a red one. They exist in enclaves in different parts and are wonderful. But if you want to win a squirrel election look for the greys. They are boring and everywhere. Tories hold almost all the boring seats - the ones the chattering classes visit every 20 years to write about, like The Economist mentioned mine recently (BTW we still have red squirrels).
One thing Biden was good at when he won in 2020 was forgetting San Francisco and LA and New York where Hillary spent so much time fundraising in 2016 and where he knew he would win by miles anyway and focusing on the most boring bits of America in rustbelt Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin which are full of white bluecollar voters much like those Labour need to win back now and campaigning on an economic inequality message without being socialist and not being too woke. Indeed despite the fact he won the EC Biden actually won California by less than Hillary did and New York by the same margin as Hillary did, he won where it mattered.
Labour have been a woeful opposition, even under Starmer.
But there is, dare I say it, a touch of hubris in the air this morning. Remember May won Copeland - a Labour seat since forever. Stunning victory etc etc. Trudi Harrison, my MP now, is now Boris's PPS. She has been conspicuously silent on the problems facing farmers and hospitality in the constituency. It is Tim Farron in the neighbouring constituency who has made all the running on this and the plight of outdoor centres. The one big jobs development in the area - the mine - has been put on hold.
Husband takes the cynical view that better to have a Tory MP as there is a chance that an area which has largely been neglected might get something. Daughter sees an MP who has said and done little and has yet to have the meeting with her to discuss the issues around hospitality and small businesses she was promised since before Xmas.
Anyway, a few months after Copeland the Tories lost their majority. Now of course the PM is a better campaigner than May, he won't call a GE etc etc. But still - a touch of humility might not go amiss. The Tories are in danger of taking their new voters just as much for granted as Labour have done, unless there are real and visible improvements.
Improving the roads would be something - round where I live the potholes are something that would disgrace a poor African village.
If there were a by-election in Chingford or Kensington, or Wycombe, Labour would probably win it by a country mile. That article on the Blue Wall was interesting.
And, in a way, that's the key thing that some commentators have forgotten here this morning.
If today's poll is even half-right, Hartlepool is a goner. Well, duh. Without Tice's intervention, it would have fallen easily in December 2019.
But if yesterday's polls are right, the national picture is that the government, despite all its triumphs, is barely ahead of this terrible Labour party led by terrible old Starmer.
Both things can be true at once.
Are Labour terrible? Not really - dull with no message (same for SKS) but they are not disastrous nor have they swung into looney tunes territory.
The big structural threat is that it is quite easy to see Labour's voters easily absorbed by other parties - the WWC going to the Tories, the urban professional classes going to the Greens with the ethnic vote (which is increasingly focused on Bangladeshi / Caribbean / Pakistani communities) going to a Respect-style outfit.
Looks like Tice's Reform are having a shocker judging by the polls,. but he said something interesting yesterday.
The better labour do in London and the cities, the worse they do elsewhere. Whatever the reality, Khan's opponents have done a great job selling London as a identity politics hellhole where focus groups pontificate on pronouns whilst young men slaughter each other with knives in the streets.
Labour should get rid of Khan if they want to do well elsewhere and run an Andy Burnham style uniter instead. Khan is killing their brand in middle England, and not because of race, but because of politics.
If you, but more importantly Labour, don't get this then there is no way they are returning to power anytime soon.
This is lazy analysis. Just because there's been some big political shifts in one area doesn't mean they cant be some in another.
If the Tories win Hartlepool by the amount suggested and IF (big if) the national polling is actually in the region of a 2% lead, rather than 10%, that suggests some big swings to Labour elsewhere...
Tanya Gold has Labour sympathies if anything. She doesn't even interview the Tory candidate. She is a brilliant writer though - her restaurant reviews in the Spectator are hilarious.
If you think ElectionMapsUk is a neutral arbiter then I have a bridge for sale.
Election Maps is some left leaning teenager who tried to steal Britain Elects' thunder and plays for likes and retweets. Britain Elects is the original trustworthy twitter polling source, and even though its partnered with the New Statesman it remains neutral.
In fairness, the comments in that tweet aren't really partisan. He's just pointing out that the local polls are completely at odds with the recent national polls and this needs explaining. And he's right.
The most obvious explanation is that the clown’s dissing John Lewis, and by extension positioning himself as upper class sneering at the values of the wider middle class, has upset the Waitrose demographic rather more than the solid folk of Hartlepool.
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
One could see that Labour was potentially in trouble in a number of Red Wall constituencies after 2001. Even where majorities remained large in percentage terms, turnout had fallen away very sharply. After 2005, sizeable votes were going to UKIP, BNP, various independents and local parties.
Labour aren't going to get anywhere because Starmer is utterly shit. It doesn't matter if you're shit and the incumbent because well better the devil you know and all that. The Tories are talking jobs, Labour is banging on about some wallpaper or other. Burnham is going to smash G Manchester because he does actually have a bit about him unlike the frankly dire Starmer. Greater Manchester was once not that much more Labour than the West Midsor North East. It probably still isn't but they'll do well there because Burnham is believed in.
Labour made a huge mistake picking Corbyn over Burnham in 2017, had they chosen Burnham they would probably have won most seats ahead of May's Tories in 2017. Starmer ironically backed Burnham for leader then
Yeah there are structural changes going on but Labour should really have won stuff like Northfield in 2019. If Labour can't more or less sweep major city seats they'll never, ever win.
I think one thing that fools Labour is the political changes within their social and professional circles.
There's been a huge change in graduate and upper-middle class support since the noughties, particularly amongst educated graduate women. I can think of three friends who supported the Tories even during the Blair years and went for Cameron in GE2010 who are now solidly centre-left. Educated graduate males have also slipped to Lib Dem, or Green, or "alternative" - usually not Labour, funnily enough - as they've sensed the Conservatives no longer speak to their values.
I occupy a lonely place politically within my friendship group, now, and largely don't mention politics - except to a handful on a 1:1 basis who I know are sympathetic (male professionals who keep it under the radar).
I struggle to understand anyone supporting the Conservatives from 1997-2010, now supporting left wing parties, but you are right, it is a real phenomenon. Brexit is obviously part of the story, but only part of it.
It is class politics played out in a different way. I live in Highgate. In 2019, the bigger the house, the greater chance they would show a Labour poster. The terraces (the Muswell Hill side obviously) tended to have Lib Dem ones.
But even if every single owner of every huge house in Highgate had voted Labour in 2019 it would not have been close to enough for Labour to win the majority it did in Holborn and St Pancras. Like it or not, in London Labour wins because it gets the votes of ordinary Londoners on average or below average wages living in rented private or council accommodation. Labour's problem is that most of the rest of England is not like London.
Inner city working class people are the wrong kind of working class.
Very droll. Still doesn't sort out Labour's (and the left's) main issue. Most people view the party as irrelevant and the only people who vote for Labour are (1) smug urban professionals who think everyone is on Twitter or watching GoT when actually they are in front of the TV watching Corrie and (2) most (but not all) of the ethnic minority vote who will be off if Galloway, or a similar figure, gets their act together
Hmmm - just a touch of projection there, I suspect! Essentially, it seems, people you do not like vote Labour. Fancy hating 10 million people so much!
How can Labour be 2% behind nationally but 17% behind in Hartlepool? Either one poll is wrong, the other poll is wrong, or the Tories are losing ground much quicker in other areas than people realise.
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Well, your sense of giving it to the voters is the more subjective one. What we can say for certain is that it was the cornerstone of the BXP's manifesto demands. On the LDs and Greens, PR is what Labour needs to give their leadership, once again.
It was the cornerstone of what the voters wanted, which is why they abandoned May and went to the BXP - and why when Johnson repositioned the party the voters abandoned the BXP and switched to Johnson's Party. Whether you call it populism or democracy, appealling to the voters works.
On the LDs and the Greens, asking yourself why their voters are backing those Parties instead of Labour is the question that needs addressing. If the answer to that question is that the voters want PR then giving it to them may make the voters switch, without a need for a pact - and thus potentially seeing the other parties standing down as a result.
But if the answer is that the voters want something else, that's not why the voters aren't backing Labour, then the voters will likely continue to not back Labour and vote for something else instead. Or not vote at all.
You are trying to short-circuit the voters, rather than learning the lesson of what Johnson did which is appeal over the top of the other parties directly to their voters.
You're propounding here an extremely rosy account of the entire Brexit process as from-the-ground-up, organic democracy, as Spiked et al also tend to do.
The only reason Cameron agreed to a referendum in the very first place was solely two forms of party-political calculation. Firstly, that the right of his party was beginning to pose a threat to his position internally, but more importantly, because UKIP was beginning to threaten him at local and european elections, and before most voters even much cared about the european topic at all, according to all the surveys of the time.
You're completely trying to rewrite history.
The reason Cameron agreed to the referendum in the first place was because over 100 MPs of his own Party rebelled against the whip to demand one. He had no alternative, he couldn't cover up the cracks in his party anymore. This predated the subsequent rise of UKIP.
Voters did care about the European topic and more importantly they cared about topics related to Europe, it was a myth by Remainers that the voters didn't care.
I'm afraid Europe, as has been covered ad infinitum here, was near the bottom of voters' concerns until the 2015 refugee crisis, which postdated the referendum decision. UKIP, though, was building a populist brand also based on anti-immigration rhetoric, and not solely confined to Europe. Cameron thought he could shore up his position internally and neutralise the UKIP brand, but simultaneously avoid alienating metropolitan voters with immigration and law'n'order rhetoric, with a European referendum. The rest is unfortunate history, as they say.
Labour have been a woeful opposition, even under Starmer.
But there is, dare I say it, a touch of hubris in the air this morning. Remember May won Copeland - a Labour seat since forever. Stunning victory etc etc. Trudi Harrison, my MP now, is now Boris's PPS. She has been conspicuously silent on the problems facing farmers and hospitality in the constituency. It is Tim Farron in the neighbouring constituency who has made all the running on this and the plight of outdoor centres. The one big jobs development in the area - the mine - has been put on hold.
Husband takes the cynical view that better to have a Tory MP as there is a chance that an area which has largely been neglected might get something. Daughter sees an MP who has said and done little and has yet to have the meeting with her to discuss the issues around hospitality and small businesses she was promised since before Xmas.
Anyway, a few months after Copeland the Tories lost their majority. Now of course the PM is a better campaigner than May, he won't call a GE etc etc. But still - a touch of humility might not go amiss. The Tories are in danger of taking their new voters just as much for granted as Labour have done, unless there are real and visible improvements.
Improving the roads would be something - round where I live the potholes are something that would disgrace a poor African village.
If there were a by-election in Chingford or Kensington, or Wycombe, Labour would probably win it by a country mile. That article on the Blue Wall was interesting.
And, in a way, that's the key thing that some commentators have forgotten here this morning.
If today's poll is even half-right, Hartlepool is a goner. Well, duh. Without Tice's intervention, it would have fallen easily in December 2019.
But if yesterday's polls are right, the national picture is that the government, despite all its triumphs, is barely ahead of this terrible Labour party led by terrible old Starmer.
Both things can be true at once.
And the more interesting other side of the polling is that if Con are -3 since 2019, Lab +6, but in the Mids and North the Conservatives are flat or slightly up, and London is essentially maxed out, where are those gains? It's not in Wales, or really in Scotland.
If the answer is the one that jumps out, then the Tory heartlands are under threat.
Problem is like the red wall it might take a few elections to really hit home. They could lose a lot of support in the south without losing all that many seats.
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Well, your sense of giving it to the voters is the more subjective one. What we can say for certain is that it was the cornerstone of the BXP's manifesto demands. On the LDs and Greens, PR is what Labour needs to give their leadership, once again.
It was the cornerstone of what the voters wanted, which is why they abandoned May and went to the BXP - and why when Johnson repositioned the party the voters abandoned the BXP and switched to Johnson's Party. Whether you call it populism or democracy, appealling to the voters works.
On the LDs and the Greens, asking yourself why their voters are backing those Parties instead of Labour is the question that needs addressing. If the answer to that question is that the voters want PR then giving it to them may make the voters switch, without a need for a pact - and thus potentially seeing the other parties standing down as a result.
But if the answer is that the voters want something else, that's not why the voters aren't backing Labour, then the voters will likely continue to not back Labour and vote for something else instead. Or not vote at all.
You are trying to short-circuit the voters, rather than learning the lesson of what Johnson did which is appeal over the top of the other parties directly to their voters.
You're propounding here an extremely rosy account of the entire Brexit process as from-the-ground-up, organic democracy, as Spiked et al also tend to do.
The only reason Cameron agreed to a referendum in the very first place was solely two forms of party-political calculation. Firstly, that the right of his party was beginning to pose a threat to his position internally, but more importantly, because UKIP was beginning to threaten him at local and european elections, and before most voters even much cared about the european topic at all, according to all the surveys of the time.
You're completely trying to rewrite history.
The reason Cameron agreed to the referendum in the first place was because over 100 MPs of his own Party rebelled against the whip to demand one. He had no alternative, he couldn't cover up the cracks in his party anymore. This predated the subsequent rise of UKIP.
Voters did care about the European topic and more importantly they cared about topics related to Europe, it was a myth by Remainers that the voters didn't care.
Surveys that it was not something people brought up dont change that people did care, as they proved when they were asked.
Labour aren't going to get anywhere because Starmer is utterly shit. It doesn't matter if you're shit and the incumbent because well better the devil you know and all that. The Tories are talking jobs, Labour is banging on about some wallpaper or other. Burnham is going to smash G Manchester because he does actually have a bit about him unlike the frankly dire Starmer. Greater Manchester was once not that much more Labour than the West Midsor North East. It probably still isn't but they'll do well there because Burnham is believed in.
Labour made a huge mistake picking Corbyn over Burnham in 2017, had they chosen Burnham they would probably have won most seats ahead of May's Tories in 2017. Starmer ironically backed Burnham for leader then
Yeah there are structural changes going on but Labour should really have won stuff like Northfield in 2019. If Labour can't more or less sweep major city seats they'll never, ever win.
I think one thing that fools Labour is the political changes within their social and professional circles.
There's been a huge change in graduate and upper-middle class support since the noughties, particularly amongst educated graduate women. I can think of three friends who supported the Tories even during the Blair years and went for Cameron in GE2010 who are now solidly centre-left. Educated graduate males have also slipped to Lib Dem, or Green, or "alternative" - usually not Labour, funnily enough - as they've sensed the Conservatives no longer speak to their values.
I occupy a lonely place politically within my friendship group, now, and largely don't mention politics - except to a handful on a 1:1 basis who I know are sympathetic (male professionals who keep it under the radar).
I struggle to understand anyone supporting the Conservatives from 1997-2010, now supporting left wing parties, but you are right, it is a real phenomenon. Brexit is obviously part of the story, but only part of it.
It is class politics played out in a different way. I live in Highgate. In 2019, the bigger the house, the greater chance they would show a Labour poster. The terraces (the Muswell Hill side obviously) tended to have Lib Dem ones.
But even if every single owner of every huge house in Highgate had voted Labour in 2019 it would not have been close to enough for Labour to win the majority it did in Holborn and St Pancras. Like it or not, in London Labour wins because it gets the votes of ordinary Londoners on average or below average wages living in rented private or council accommodation. Labour's problem is that most of the rest of England is not like London.
'It's housing, stupid.'
It's not a problem that the rest of the country can afford their own homes, it's a problem that Londoners can't.
A problem Saddiq has done the square root of zero to fix, which is why he is going to be handsomely rewarded by the electorate.
Housing is not only a London issue and housing is not the only issue - which is why Labour also does well in other big English cities, securing the votes of people on average and below average wages.
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This rather ignores that this seat (or its predecessor) last returned a Tory in 1959. The Red Wall seems to be continuing to crumble.
Yet, what about elsewhere in the country? In my rather leafy Bucks village I have yet to see a single Tory banner. A few Labour but many Green signs. Locally the Greens have done quite well before and I would expect that to continue. Locally they don't have to worry about some of their more bonkers national policies. As a traditional Tory I am tempted to give them my vote in the locals which I would never do in a general election.
The farmers who used to plaster rural areas with big Tory posters seem strangely less keen this time around. Has anything happened recently?
Tories have got used to just shutting up and quietly getting on with voting. Ask any Tory teacher, academic or NHS worker.
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
An argument that will be helped when it dawns on Labour that they need PR themselves, to get anywhere in future.
Which taking a longer term view may be an upside of a Tory win in the by-election.
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Well, your sense of giving it to the voters is the more subjective one. What we can say for certain is that it was the cornerstone of the BXP's manifesto demands. On the LDs and Greens, PR is what Labour needs to give their leadership, once again.
It was the cornerstone of what the voters wanted, which is why they abandoned May and went to the BXP - and why when Johnson repositioned the party the voters abandoned the BXP and switched to Johnson's Party. Whether you call it populism or democracy, appealling to the voters works.
On the LDs and the Greens, asking yourself why their voters are backing those Parties instead of Labour is the question that needs addressing. If the answer to that question is that the voters want PR then giving it to them may make the voters switch, without a need for a pact - and thus potentially seeing the other parties standing down as a result.
But if the answer is that the voters want something else, that's not why the voters aren't backing Labour, then the voters will likely continue to not back Labour and vote for something else instead. Or not vote at all.
You are trying to short-circuit the voters, rather than learning the lesson of what Johnson did which is appeal over the top of the other parties directly to their voters.
You're propounding here an extremely rosy account of the entire Brexit process as from-the-ground-up, organic democracy, as Spiked et al also tend to do.
The only reason Cameron agreed to a referendum in the very first place was solely two forms of party-political calculation. Firstly, that the right of his party was beginning to pose a threat to his position internally, but more importantly, because UKIP was beginning to threaten him at local and european elections, and before most voters even much cared about the european topic at all, according to all the surveys of the time.
You're completely trying to rewrite history.
The reason Cameron agreed to the referendum in the first place was because over 100 MPs of his own Party rebelled against the whip to demand one. He had no alternative, he couldn't cover up the cracks in his party anymore. This predated the subsequent rise of UKIP.
Voters did care about the European topic and more importantly they cared about topics related to Europe, it was a myth by Remainers that the voters didn't care.
I'm afraid Europe, as has been covered ad infinitum here, was near the bottom of voters' concerns until the 2015 refugee crisis, which postdated the referendum decision. UKIP, though, was building a populist brand also based on anti-immigration rhetoric, and not solely confined to Europe. Cameron thought he could neutralise the UKIP brand, but simultaneously avoid alienating metropolitan voters by focusing on immigration and law'n'order rhetoric, with a European referendum. The rest is unfortunate history, as they say.
Except that Cameron pledged his referendum before the rise of UKIP.
The voters were bothered and they voted accordingly, there is nothing unfortunate about it, the voters got what they wanted.
That you think the voters getting what they wanted is unfortunate, and that all Labour's problems can magically vanish if they embrace PR, just shows how entirely out of touch you are.
Labour aren't going to get anywhere because Starmer is utterly shit. It doesn't matter if you're shit and the incumbent because well better the devil you know and all that. The Tories are talking jobs, Labour is banging on about some wallpaper or other. Burnham is going to smash G Manchester because he does actually have a bit about him unlike the frankly dire Starmer. Greater Manchester was once not that much more Labour than the West Midsor North East. It probably still isn't but they'll do well there because Burnham is believed in.
Labour made a huge mistake picking Corbyn over Burnham in 2017, had they chosen Burnham they would probably have won most seats ahead of May's Tories in 2017. Starmer ironically backed Burnham for leader then
Yeah there are structural changes going on but Labour should really have won stuff like Northfield in 2019. If Labour can't more or less sweep major city seats they'll never, ever win.
I think one thing that fools Labour is the political changes within their social and professional circles.
There's been a huge change in graduate and upper-middle class support since the noughties, particularly amongst educated graduate women. I can think of three friends who supported the Tories even during the Blair years and went for Cameron in GE2010 who are now solidly centre-left. Educated graduate males have also slipped to Lib Dem, or Green, or "alternative" - usually not Labour, funnily enough - as they've sensed the Conservatives no longer speak to their values.
I occupy a lonely place politically within my friendship group, now, and largely don't mention politics - except to a handful on a 1:1 basis who I know are sympathetic (male professionals who keep it under the radar).
I struggle to understand anyone supporting the Conservatives from 1997-2010, now supporting left wing parties, but you are right, it is a real phenomenon. Brexit is obviously part of the story, but only part of it.
It is class politics played out in a different way. I live in Highgate. In 2019, the bigger the house, the greater chance they would show a Labour poster. The terraces (the Muswell Hill side obviously) tended to have Lib Dem ones.
But even if every single owner of every huge house in Highgate had voted Labour in 2019 it would not have been close to enough for Labour to win the majority it did in Holborn and St Pancras. Like it or not, in London Labour wins because it gets the votes of ordinary Londoners on average or below average wages living in rented private or council accommodation. Labour's problem is that most of the rest of England is not like London.
'It's housing, stupid.'
It's not a problem that the rest of the country can afford their own homes, it's a problem that Londoners can't.
A problem Saddiq has done the square root of zero to fix, which is why he is going to be handsomely rewarded by the electorate.
Housing is not only a London issue and housing is not the only issue - which is why Labour also does well in other big English cities, securing the votes of people on average and below average wages.
NEW Sky News/Opinium polling - Seat projections: SNP on for outright majority with 67 seats. Con on 29, Lab on 20 - Scots tied 50-50 on support for indy referendum - 28% want #indyref within 2 yrs (SNP pledged to hold ref by end 2024) Via @SamCoatesSky
With that Indy ref timing, I do not think Sturgeon is in for smooth sailing post election...
Dogecoin USD (DOGE-USD) CCC - CoinMarketCap. Currency in USD Add to watchlist 0.4849
Warning. Talking about cryptocurrency puts you in the realms of conspiracy theorist on here. Even if you urge people to invest small amounts and use this market as a hedge and a hedge only.
I'm trying to trade it, just sold my DOGE for Euro. Will buy back when it dips again, playing with a thousand doge...
NEW Sky News/Opinium polling - Seat projections: SNP on for outright majority with 67 seats. Con on 29, Lab on 20 - Scots tied 50-50 on support for indy referendum - 28% want #indyref within 2 yrs (SNP pledged to hold ref by end 2024) Via @SamCoatesSky
With that Indy ref timing, I do not think Sturgeon is in for smooth sailing post election...
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
The Labour Party is the most repellent organisation I have come across in my lifetime, and despite sharing many of its aspirations, I have seen too much of its dirty politics and organised hypocrisy to ever consider voting for it. You mention Sam Tarry - the story of how he got his seat and how the most credible candidate - being the leader of the council - was nobbled to clear the way for a corbynite MP is a case in point. Truly dirty goings on.
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Well, your sense of giving it to the voters is the more subjective one. What we can say for certain is that it was the cornerstone of the BXP's manifesto demands. On the LDs and Greens, PR is what Labour needs to give their leadership, once again.
It was the cornerstone of what the voters wanted, which is why they abandoned May and went to the BXP - and why when Johnson repositioned the party the voters abandoned the BXP and switched to Johnson's Party. Whether you call it populism or democracy, appealling to the voters works.
On the LDs and the Greens, asking yourself why their voters are backing those Parties instead of Labour is the question that needs addressing. If the answer to that question is that the voters want PR then giving it to them may make the voters switch, without a need for a pact - and thus potentially seeing the other parties standing down as a result.
But if the answer is that the voters want something else, that's not why the voters aren't backing Labour, then the voters will likely continue to not back Labour and vote for something else instead. Or not vote at all.
You are trying to short-circuit the voters, rather than learning the lesson of what Johnson did which is appeal over the top of the other parties directly to their voters.
You're propounding here an extremely rosy account of the entire Brexit process as from-the-ground-up, organic democracy, as Spiked et al also tend to do.
The only reason Cameron agreed to a referendum in the very first place was solely two forms of party-political calculation. Firstly, that the right of his party was beginning to pose a threat to his position internally, but more importantly, because UKIP was beginning to threaten him at local and european elections, and before most voters even much cared about the european topic at all, according to all the surveys of the time.
You're completely trying to rewrite history.
The reason Cameron agreed to the referendum in the first place was because over 100 MPs of his own Party rebelled against the whip to demand one. He had no alternative, he couldn't cover up the cracks in his party anymore. This predated the subsequent rise of UKIP.
Voters did care about the European topic and more importantly they cared about topics related to Europe, it was a myth by Remainers that the voters didn't care.
I'm afraid Europe, as has been covered ad infinitum here, was near the bottom of voters' concerns until the 2015 refugee crisis, which postdated the referendum decision. UKIP, though, was building a populist brand also based on anti-immigration rhetoric, and not solely confined to Europe. Cameron thought he could neutralise the UKIP brand, but simultaneously avoid alienating metropolitan voters by focusing on immigration and law'n'order rhetoric, with a European referendum. The rest is unfortunate history, as they say.
Except that Cameron pledged his referendum before the rise of UKIP.
The voters were bothered and they voted accordingly, there is nothing unfortunate about it, the voters got what they wanted.
That you think the voters getting what they wanted is unfortunate, and that all Labour's problems can magically vanish if they embrace PR, just shows how entirely out of touch you are.
UKIP were increasingly alarming the Tories in late 2012, by then already starting to breaking through the ten per cent barrier in polls. Cameron announced the referendum in early 2013, as UKIP were getting ready to announce a record number of candidates in the upcoming elections.
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
I voted for Nandy but thanks for calling me a tosspot.
You are endlessly banging the Corbyn drum - that is what makes you a tosspot. Believing that a solid defeat in 2017 was a victory, and that a massive defeat in 2019 can just be ignored because look what a great result we got losing in 2017!
I can't see how a Labour Party you would support would be a Labour Party that sufficient voters would support. Starmer hasn't gone remotely far enough in rebuilding the party but your position is to slide further backwards. Starmer can't make the changes needed because (a) he doesn't believe in it, (b) has half the party full of Corbynite idiots and (c) has the other half of the party still believing they are the natural party of local government because aren't the Tories evil!
Ironically Paul Williams would be a great MP for Hartlepool - as a local doctor who literally created and led a GP's co-op to Take Back Control of diminshed healthcare provision from Virgin he actually know the town and its issues.
But because he doesn't sound authentic for there and isn't willing to face into why people voted for self-harm he will be defeated by a posh farmer from miles away who like the other new Tory MPs in the area with no constituency link will treat the town and its people with disdain and be invisible.
Labour should have selected someone local. Problem is that the local party are bonkers - the then Labour council leader defected to Scargill's Socialist Labour Party after a hate campaign by local Corbynite entryists that he was too right wing.
NEW Sky News/Opinium polling - Seat projections: SNP on for outright majority with 67 seats. Con on 29, Lab on 20 - Scots tied 50-50 on support for indy referendum - 28% want #indyref within 2 yrs (SNP pledged to hold ref by end 2024) Via @SamCoatesSky
With that Indy ref timing, I do not think Sturgeon is in for smooth sailing post election...
She’s fucked, medium term
Depends - if Boris was sane he would allow the SNP to call the referendum now which would crash any post COVID boom in Scotland before it begun.
Relevant to those of us who go electioneering, I will join ANY party who pledge to make letter boxes at the bottom of a front door illegal. Especially ones where they are behind two gates.
How about ones with a strong spring that closes on your fingers… just after the yappy nippy dog gets there
Or the ones with so much baffling behind them that your leaflet ends up a screwed up rag before the said yappy dog even gets a hold of it.
I think we should start 'The Letterbox Party'.
To add to the list:
a) Silent dogs (many and 1 hospital trip as a consequence)
b) Dogs that crash into the door at 100mph (many)
c) Those people who have considerately put a box at the front so you don't have to walk down the 100 metre drive but is now hidden in a hedge so you do walk down a 100 metre drive and waste 10 minutes looking for a letterbox that doesn't exist (several)
d) People who are ungrateful when you return their door keys which are still in the lock.
e) People who don't close their door properly so you land in their hall while putting the leaflet through the door (once)
e) has embarassed me more than once.
A worse variation on c) is when you have climbed up steps to said house, had a good look around for any way to insert the leaflet into the house and decided to leave it under a stone or stuck in the door jamb, then when you get back to the street you notice the hidden box and have to go back and retrieve the leaflet so they don’t conclude you’re an unobservant idiot.
Yep done the latter a few times (so frustrating). Re the not properly closed door, yes quite a few times, but only once have I made a spectacular entrance. Only thing missing was the fanfare.
I haven’t entered the house either, but I have had the door swing open on an embarrassing scene.
Interesting to note that the idea of splitting votes and that voting SNP on the list is a waste seems to have got through to people.
Which means the Independence votes seem to have worked out how to game the system and are likely to maximise the seats they will win.
That isn't supported by the more professional polling or indeed by the SNP herself where Nicola wants "both votes" so no one else gets to play with her ball.
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Farage not kicking up a fuss about the exit deal was genuinely shocking.
Not to me, he could see the writing on the wall. For him, his time in politics is over. He could either go down swinging as the DUP style rejectionist who opposed everything and people moved on without him - or he could be a man who goes down in history as the consumate outsider who got what he wanted delivered from challenging outside of Parliament.
People give Farage far more credit than he deserves, he always preyed on pre-existing splits especially in the Tory Party. Once that split was healed, he had no future. Better for his legacy to finally claim victory than to continue kicking up a fuss. He can retire gracefully now, cashing in on his legacy in the USA etc now.
If a crack is wide enough, a blunt instrument will suffuce.
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Now that we’re down to low single figure percentages, they probably are!
Interesting to note that the idea of splitting votes and that voting SNP on the list is a waste seems to have got through to people.
Which means the Independence votes seem to have worked out how to game the system and are likely to maximise the seats they will win.
No SNP majority as in 2011, no indyref2 and of course this UK Tory government will correctly only look at voteshares for the independence parties when it refuses indyref2 anyway and on the constituency vote at least most polls show the SNP vote will be under 50% and even on the list vote the Nationalist parties are unlikely to be much above 50% combined either.
Only 42% of Scots want indyref2 now within the next 5 years, most do not want one until at least over five years time or never. Thus Boris will easily refuse indyref2 for the rest of this Parliament
I don't know if anybody else heard the Starmer interview on R4 Today this morning, but it was quite interesting. He wasn't very good, actually (see, I am objective). But he did take the opportunity to set out briefly the 5 current top priorities for Labour at the next GE, whenever that is.
His 5 priorities had echoes of Blair's 1997 pledge card. Interestingly, the fifth priority was about bringing an end to the divisions caused by the 'culture war' (although he didn't use that expression, of course). Anyway, signs of an emerging Labour policy platform to fill the current policy vacuum.
I was struck by how relaxed he sounded - like a man who knows he is going to lead the party into the next GE. A nice betting play is coming up imo. The loss of Hartlepool is expected but will be splashed as a shock with all sorts of connotations it doesn't have. The markets might overreact and there could be some value betting into it.
Dogecoin USD (DOGE-USD) CCC - CoinMarketCap. Currency in USD Add to watchlist 0.4849
Warning. Talking about cryptocurrency puts you in the realms of conspiracy theorist on here. Even if you urge people to invest small amounts and use this market as a hedge and a hedge only.
I'm trying to trade it, just sold my DOGE for Euro. Will buy back when it dips again, playing with a thousand doge...
I'm more of a long term guy. Where the price will rocket I think is if it looks like inflation is starting to bubble up again, particularly in the US.
That makes it a good hedge again the weakening purchasing power of normal currencies. And the Western Central banks have printed a lot of money. But I only invest small amounts
“I don’t think anyone realistically thought it would be possible to turn Labour round from worst election result since 1935 to a position to win the next election within a period of one year"
Just seen the Hartlepool poll - bloody hell if accurate that is grim for Labour and Starmer.
What’s interesting is what this sort of polling means for the medium to long term for the state of the parties. I know I’ve said Labour can’t complacently rely on events leading to a swing back. BUT at some point there will be a non Tory government. If the old northern strongholds become the new Tory safe seats, what are the new Labour targets that form their new base in a future majority government?
In lots of the Home Counties the Tories are weakening substantially, Labour's issue is that it's usually the LDs in the best place to capitalise.
This is the second issue for the left-of-centre, as well as Labour remaining stubbornly more left-right factional than the US Democrats. Unless they learn to co-operate with the Lib Dems and Greens, as the Tories did with the Brexit Party, and get over their factional hatred of them, they may never get back into power.
Did the Tories really cooperate with The Brexit Party? What did the Tories give them, electorally? It seems to me the Tories ate The Brexit Party in terms of policy and voters, and while Labour would be very happy for all the LD/Green voters to abandon those parties they aren't willing (not entirely unreasonably) to adopt their central policies to do so. Besides, Labour has adopted a lot of Green policies and it hasn't helped.
The Tories and Brexit Party formed official and unofficial pacts in various constituencies, IIRC.
You recall wrong then.
The Tories ruled out a pact and just absorbed BXP voters to the point even BXP candidates were choosing to stand down and endorse the Tories. At which point their leader faced facts and chose to stand down in most of the nation rather than be stood down, so he could act like he had influence.
If Labour wishes to start appealling to Liberal Democrat voters perhaps they should start with asking those voters why they support the Liberal Democrats and not Labour in the first place?
It was a pact, sanctioned from the top by Farage and Johnson, and whichever way it's described. Until it was confirmed, the BXP was the fastest-growing political force , and would have damaged the Tories at the election.
Of course it was sanctioned by Johnson, it involved a rival party standing down in over 300 seats! But I don't think it is a pact or co-operation for the simple reason that the Tories didn't give anything up to get it. A deal, pact, whatever, involves something being given by both sides in return for what the other side is giving. But the Tories didn't give anything, Farage just accepted he had to stand down or risk splitting the vote.
The Tories gave Hard Brexit, with as few qualifications as possible, to the BXP. Likewise, Labour need to give PR to the Lib Dems and Greens, if they want to get anywhere in the future.
The Tories didn't give that to the BXP, they gave it to the voters. That's why the voters switched. Thats why the voters abandoned the BXP leaving Farage powerless to avoid humiliation so having no choice but to stand down.
Do you really think LD or Green voters (as opposed to LD or Green candidates) are obsessed by PR?
Farage not kicking up a fuss about the exit deal was genuinely shocking.
Not to me, he could see the writing on the wall. For him, his time in politics is over. He could either go down swinging as the DUP style rejectionist who opposed everything and people moved on without him - or he could be a man who goes down in history as the consumate outsider who got what he wanted delivered from challenging outside of Parliament.
People give Farage far more credit than he deserves, he always preyed on pre-existing splits especially in the Tory Party. Once that split was healed, he had no future. Better for his legacy to finally claim victory than to continue kicking up a fuss. He can retire gracefully now, cashing in on his legacy in the USA etc now.
If a crack is wide enough, a blunt instrument will suffuce.
This is not an appropriate place for @Leon's adverts thank you very much.
Interesting to note that the idea of splitting votes and that voting SNP on the list is a waste seems to have got through to people.
Which means the Independence votes seem to have worked out how to game the system and are likely to maximise the seats they will win.
No SNP majority as in 2011, no indyref2 and of course this UK Tory government will correctly only look at voteshares for the independence parties when it refuses indyref2 anyway and on the constituency vote at least the SNP vote will be under 50% and even on the list vote the Nationalist parties are unlikely to be much above 50% combined either
@HYUFD when he's away from his computer but senses there has been a post about IndyRef2:
On the BBC quiz show "Pointless" last week there was a round where contestants had to identify politicians from their photos. The aim was to identify the MP that scored the lowest in terms of members of the public surveyed recognising them. The programme was filmed since Covid regulations came in. Keir Starmer had 46 per cent recognition with the public, Anneliese Dodds 3 and Angela Rayner 4. The opposition doesn't seem to be cutting through with members of the public.
If you, but more importantly Labour, don't get this then there is no way they are returning to power anytime soon.
This is lazy analysis. Just because there's been some big political shifts in one area doesn't mean they cant be some in another.
If the Tories win Hartlepool by the amount suggested and IF (big if) the national polling is actually in the region of a 2% lead, rather than 10%, that suggests some big swings to Labour elsewhere...
I agree. What has made the Tories so successful over the last decade is the increased efficiency of their vote compared to the days when they got within 3% of Blair and he got a very comfortable majority. This has happened so far because the very considerable ebbing of their strength in the south of England has merely reduced their majorities whilst they have suddenly become much more competitive in the midlands, the east and now the north.
But as Labour is finding in reverse there is a tipping point in these things. The seats Labour took for granted whilst it went fishing in the suburbs and university towns of the south have bitten back and it is all too possible that southern seats which were much more remainer, much more liberal and much more dominated by professional classes will in turn get fed up being taken for granted.
Overall this is a good thing. It was not healthy that the Tories were content to get a majority with only the odd rural seat north of Birmingham and the inability of Labour to relate to our most economically successful areas outside of the actual cities meant that they had little to say in that area. A situation where both our major parties have a fair degree of representation from most of our country improves the chances of the government being aware of the needs of all of the country.
Most of the problems there arise from the voting system, which directs all the political attention to those areas considered marginal, and neglects the safer areas for any party.
Whilst that is undoubtedly true it seems to me that Labour is going through an identity crises where they will become more potent in seats that are more like them, that is middle class, professional, well educated, dominated by the public sector and frankly rather more interested in the privileges of such people than those who have very little.
Those with little have caught on. They may come to realise that Boris doesn't really give a toss about them either but at least he pretends to listen and he is amusing rather than patronising.
"pretends to listen"? He delivered them their verdict on Brexit. Labour were set against doing so.
Yes, pretends to listen. Do the people of Hartlepool want Brexit because it is Brexit, or because what they hope it will bring them? Pools is a classic post industrial left behind backwater. People want back the jobs and prosperity and pride and hope that was taken from them. Brexit was the silver bullet to cure these ills which is why they were so enthusiastic for it.
Where the Tories will struggle is that they can't deliver what was promised. I have no doubt that Hartlepool will be thrown a few scraps once it goes Tory but it won't change the fundamental problems with the town and the region. One prime example - local Tories very excited by the prospect of a free port and how it will restore industry. Except that a free port makes it easier to IMPORT, it will do nothing but harm for local industry. But as nothing but harm has been on the menu for 40 years people are desperate and will try anything.
When salvation fails to arrive? Thats when the Tories are screwed. Not to Labour's benefit you understand, we're going to see a rise of the hard right. Think UKIP/Brexit with paramilitary activists...
I guess that they aren’t going to work in the new GE factory then?
A perfect example. Can you show me where in the Mayor's remit he has had anything to do with GE coming to Teesside? Its got literally fuck all to do with him and the same would have been true if (shudder) Jessie Joe Jacobs becomes mayor. She also claims all kinds of crap that are absolutely miles outside the remit of this non-job.
That’s changing the question. You said that the Freeport would do nothing for residents. GE is opening a factory there because it. That will do something for residents.
I don’t care whether it was the mayor, the monkey or a giraffe from London Zoo that achieved it. But from what he has said - and he may be lying of course - the major has been advocating strongly for the Freeport so he had a role and deserves a share of the credit
Oh give over. GE want a tax break to set up in the free port so that they can use imported parts to assemble products to be exported. Local industry doesn't get a boost from a freeport it gets demolished by them. We know freeports don't work, we have shut them all down - specifically the *Tories* shut them down in 2012.
Mayor Houchen has presided over a net loss of jobs and despite the new GE factory the loss will only accelerate with the freeport completely sinking anything that isn't in the free zone. And what does this freeport zone do? Allow busines to function as if it was still in the EU. Yay...
“I don’t think anyone realistically thought it would be possible to turn Labour round from worst election result since 1935 to a position to win the next election within a period of one year"
But I will go down with this ship And I won't put my hands up and surrender There will be no white flag* above my door I'm in love and always will be
Dogecoin USD (DOGE-USD) CCC - CoinMarketCap. Currency in USD Add to watchlist 0.4849
Warning. Talking about cryptocurrency puts you in the realms of conspiracy theorist on here. Even if you urge people to invest small amounts and use this market as a hedge and a hedge only.
I'm trying to trade it, just sold my DOGE for Euro. Will buy back when it dips again, playing with a thousand doge...
I'm more of a long term guy. Where the price will rocket I think is if it looks like inflation is starting to bubble up again, particularly in the US.
That makes it a good hedge again the weakening purchasing power of normal currencies. And the Western Central banks have printed a lot of money. But I only invest small amounts
Since you're on, can you provide a link to your comment from last night which said
'More manna from heaven for the Trump tendency comes in the form of the new US census. The census apparently shows 5 million more votes were counted in 2020 than people recorded as voting.
Its going to run and run with repub voters, this.'
As this is a betting site quite a lot of us are interested in seeing the basis for that, including @rcs1000
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
I voted for Nandy but thanks for calling me a tosspot.
This should be the slogan of her leadership campaign when Starmer gets hoofed out.
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
Labour reject who jumped in the sack to fight like a ferret in 2015 against Corbyn and fought like a ferret every day for 3 years criticises sack fighting.
Said ex Labour hypocrite after quitting sack fighting applies to rejoin Labour in order to fight like a ferret against people like "Laura Pillock"
Rejected for being a divisive nasty name calling piece of work so sad ex sack fighting poster is now politically homeless
If you, but more importantly Labour, don't get this then there is no way they are returning to power anytime soon.
This is lazy analysis. Just because there's been some big political shifts in one area doesn't mean they cant be some in another.
If the Tories win Hartlepool by the amount suggested and IF (big if) the national polling is actually in the region of a 2% lead, rather than 10%, that suggests some big swings to Labour elsewhere...
I agree. What has made the Tories so successful over the last decade is the increased efficiency of their vote compared to the days when they got within 3% of Blair and he got a very comfortable majority. This has happened so far because the very considerable ebbing of their strength in the south of England has merely reduced their majorities whilst they have suddenly become much more competitive in the midlands, the east and now the north.
But as Labour is finding in reverse there is a tipping point in these things. The seats Labour took for granted whilst it went fishing in the suburbs and university towns of the south have bitten back and it is all too possible that southern seats which were much more remainer, much more liberal and much more dominated by professional classes will in turn get fed up being taken for granted.
Overall this is a good thing. It was not healthy that the Tories were content to get a majority with only the odd rural seat north of Birmingham and the inability of Labour to relate to our most economically successful areas outside of the actual cities meant that they had little to say in that area. A situation where both our major parties have a fair degree of representation from most of our country improves the chances of the government being aware of the needs of all of the country.
Most of the problems there arise from the voting system, which directs all the political attention to those areas considered marginal, and neglects the safer areas for any party.
Whilst that is undoubtedly true it seems to me that Labour is going through an identity crises where they will become more potent in seats that are more like them, that is middle class, professional, well educated, dominated by the public sector and frankly rather more interested in the privileges of such people than those who have very little.
Those with little have caught on. They may come to realise that Boris doesn't really give a toss about them either but at least he pretends to listen and he is amusing rather than patronising.
"pretends to listen"? He delivered them their verdict on Brexit. Labour were set against doing so.
Yes, pretends to listen. Do the people of Hartlepool want Brexit because it is Brexit, or because what they hope it will bring them? Pools is a classic post industrial left behind backwater. People want back the jobs and prosperity and pride and hope that was taken from them. Brexit was the silver bullet to cure these ills which is why they were so enthusiastic for it.
Where the Tories will struggle is that they can't deliver what was promised. I have no doubt that Hartlepool will be thrown a few scraps once it goes Tory but it won't change the fundamental problems with the town and the region. One prime example - local Tories very excited by the prospect of a free port and how it will restore industry. Except that a free port makes it easier to IMPORT, it will do nothing but harm for local industry. But as nothing but harm has been on the menu for 40 years people are desperate and will try anything.
When salvation fails to arrive? Thats when the Tories are screwed. Not to Labour's benefit you understand, we're going to see a rise of the hard right. Think UKIP/Brexit with paramilitary activists...
I guess that they aren’t going to work in the new GE factory then?
A perfect example. Can you show me where in the Mayor's remit he has had anything to do with GE coming to Teesside? Its got literally fuck all to do with him and the same would have been true if (shudder) Jessie Joe Jacobs becomes mayor. She also claims all kinds of crap that are absolutely miles outside the remit of this non-job.
That’s changing the question. You said that the Freeport would do nothing for residents. GE is opening a factory there because it. That will do something for residents.
I don’t care whether it was the mayor, the monkey or a giraffe from London Zoo that achieved it. But from what he has said - and he may be lying of course - the major has been advocating strongly for the Freeport so he had a role and deserves a share of the credit
Oh give over. GE want a tax break to set up in the free port so that they can use imported parts to assemble products to be exported. Local industry doesn't get a boost from a freeport it gets demolished by them. We know freeports don't work, we have shut them all down - specifically the *Tories* shut them down in 2012.
Mayor Houchen has presided over a net loss of jobs and despite the new GE factory the loss will only accelerate with the freeport completely sinking anything that isn't in the free zone. And what does this freeport zone do? Allow busines to function as if it was still in the EU. Yay...
"Assemble products to be exported" is another description of . . . manufacturing. It is industry.
On the BBC quiz show "Pointless" last week there was a round where contestants had to identify politicians from their photos. The aim was to identify the MP that scored the lowest in terms of members of the public surveyed recognising them. The programme was filmed since Covid regulations came in. Keir Starmer had 46 per cent recognition with the public, Anneliese Dodds 3 and Angela Rayner 4. The opposition doesn't seem to be cutting through with members of the public.
That has always been the case. I completed a research study on the topic around 2011. Only three politicians really cut through with the public at the time. William Hague, David Cameron and Ed Miliband. That was it. According to our measure of online public interest Nick Clegg had the same public profile in the UK as Kim Jong Il.
If you really wanted to become anonymous, and I am talking FBI witness protection, the best strategy was to take a minor government job. Total career suicide as far as the public are concerned.
One thing Biden was good at when he won in 2020 was forgetting San Francisco and LA and New York where Hillary spent so much time fundraising in 2016 and where he knew he would win by miles anyway and focusing on the most boring bits of America in rustbelt Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin which are full of white bluecollar voters much like those Labour need to win back now and campaigning on an economic inequality message without being socialist and not being too woke. Indeed despite the fact he won the EC Biden actually won California by less than Hillary did and New York by the same margin as Hillary did, he won where it mattered.
Starmer should have been taking notes
Its a reverse Blair. Offer the rustbelt the policies that appeal to them and challenge the chattering cosmopolitans to dare vote for someone else. The problem is that I don't think the chattering classes would give up their totems like that - its support this AND this AND this remember.
If you, but more importantly Labour, don't get this then there is no way they are returning to power anytime soon.
This is lazy analysis. Just because there's been some big political shifts in one area doesn't mean they cant be some in another.
If the Tories win Hartlepool by the amount suggested and IF (big if) the national polling is actually in the region of a 2% lead, rather than 10%, that suggests some big swings to Labour elsewhere...
I agree. What has made the Tories so successful over the last decade is the increased efficiency of their vote compared to the days when they got within 3% of Blair and he got a very comfortable majority. This has happened so far because the very considerable ebbing of their strength in the south of England has merely reduced their majorities whilst they have suddenly become much more competitive in the midlands, the east and now the north.
But as Labour is finding in reverse there is a tipping point in these things. The seats Labour took for granted whilst it went fishing in the suburbs and university towns of the south have bitten back and it is all too possible that southern seats which were much more remainer, much more liberal and much more dominated by professional classes will in turn get fed up being taken for granted.
Overall this is a good thing. It was not healthy that the Tories were content to get a majority with only the odd rural seat north of Birmingham and the inability of Labour to relate to our most economically successful areas outside of the actual cities meant that they had little to say in that area. A situation where both our major parties have a fair degree of representation from most of our country improves the chances of the government being aware of the needs of all of the country.
Most of the problems there arise from the voting system, which directs all the political attention to those areas considered marginal, and neglects the safer areas for any party.
Whilst that is undoubtedly true it seems to me that Labour is going through an identity crises where they will become more potent in seats that are more like them, that is middle class, professional, well educated, dominated by the public sector and frankly rather more interested in the privileges of such people than those who have very little.
Those with little have caught on. They may come to realise that Boris doesn't really give a toss about them either but at least he pretends to listen and he is amusing rather than patronising.
"pretends to listen"? He delivered them their verdict on Brexit. Labour were set against doing so.
Yes, pretends to listen. Do the people of Hartlepool want Brexit because it is Brexit, or because what they hope it will bring them? Pools is a classic post industrial left behind backwater. People want back the jobs and prosperity and pride and hope that was taken from them. Brexit was the silver bullet to cure these ills which is why they were so enthusiastic for it.
Where the Tories will struggle is that they can't deliver what was promised. I have no doubt that Hartlepool will be thrown a few scraps once it goes Tory but it won't change the fundamental problems with the town and the region. One prime example - local Tories very excited by the prospect of a free port and how it will restore industry. Except that a free port makes it easier to IMPORT, it will do nothing but harm for local industry. But as nothing but harm has been on the menu for 40 years people are desperate and will try anything.
When salvation fails to arrive? Thats when the Tories are screwed. Not to Labour's benefit you understand, we're going to see a rise of the hard right. Think UKIP/Brexit with paramilitary activists...
I guess that they aren’t going to work in the new GE factory then?
A perfect example. Can you show me where in the Mayor's remit he has had anything to do with GE coming to Teesside? Its got literally fuck all to do with him and the same would have been true if (shudder) Jessie Joe Jacobs becomes mayor. She also claims all kinds of crap that are absolutely miles outside the remit of this non-job.
That’s changing the question. You said that the Freeport would do nothing for residents. GE is opening a factory there because it. That will do something for residents.
I don’t care whether it was the mayor, the monkey or a giraffe from London Zoo that achieved it. But from what he has said - and he may be lying of course - the major has been advocating strongly for the Freeport so he had a role and deserves a share of the credit
Oh give over. GE want a tax break to set up in the free port so that they can use imported parts to assemble products to be exported. Local industry doesn't get a boost from a freeport it gets demolished by them. We know freeports don't work, we have shut them all down - specifically the *Tories* shut them down in 2012.
Mayor Houchen has presided over a net loss of jobs and despite the new GE factory the loss will only accelerate with the freeport completely sinking anything that isn't in the free zone. And what does this freeport zone do? Allow busines to function as if it was still in the EU. Yay...
Not a huge fan of Freeports as a concept, however, special economic zones tend to have a positive overall multiplier as the jobs created spill over into the wider area and national supply chains over time. What usually happens is that local companies begin to bid for smaller supply contracts with the big assembler in the SEZ and becuase they have zero cost of shipping it can be fairly competitive for the smaller contracts.
I'm not sure it's more than a zero sum game, however, and there's a fair bit of evidence that SEZs eventually turn into a net zero unless they are wound down by which time you just have to hope the companies who have been brought in stick around.
Labour’s woes boil down to the fact that their traditional heartlands are big fans of Brexit. They think Brexit will bring back the glory days. They are willing to give the Tories a try, ‘cos Brexit.
So if Brexit is a success the Red Wall will continue to crumble and Labour are fucked. If Brexit is shit, and there’s no discernible improvement in these areas, then the Tories won’t be trusted again for a long time.
That’s it. Everything else is froth.
The Tories need to get money flowing to the left behind areas. I’m sceptical that will happen. Time will tell.
On the BBC quiz show "Pointless" last week there was a round where contestants had to identify politicians from their photos. The aim was to identify the MP that scored the lowest in terms of members of the public surveyed recognising them. The programme was filmed since Covid regulations came in. Keir Starmer had 46 per cent recognition with the public, Anneliese Dodds 3 and Angela Rayner 4. The opposition doesn't seem to be cutting through with members of the public.
Not the opposition, everyone but the PM. Rishi Sunak joined Keir Starmer in the 40s, for example. And Ed Davey...well...
I don't this reflects at all on Lab/Con. It's just the nature of opposition.
Interesting to note that the idea of splitting votes and that voting SNP on the list is a waste seems to have got through to people.
Which means the Independence votes seem to have worked out how to game the system and are likely to maximise the seats they will win.
No SNP majority as in 2011, no indyref2 and of course this UK Tory government will correctly only look at voteshares for the independence parties when it refuses indyref2 anyway and on the constituency vote at least the SNP vote will be under 50% and even on the list vote the Nationalist parties are unlikely to be much above 50% combined either
@HYUFD when he's away from his computer but senses there has been a post about IndyRef2:
“I don’t think anyone realistically thought it would be possible to turn Labour round from worst election result since 1935 to a position to win the next election within a period of one year"
Sounds like getting excuses in early to me. Midterm elections he really ought to be ahead, even if not winning the next GE.
The problem with Starmer is he's been challenged and found wanting in the past year. He's had plenty of opportunities while the government have been struggling to deal with a pandemic to find issues with what the government is doing and oppose them, to suggest better alternatives.
On the BBC quiz show "Pointless" last week there was a round where contestants had to identify politicians from their photos. The aim was to identify the MP that scored the lowest in terms of members of the public surveyed recognising them. The programme was filmed since Covid regulations came in. Keir Starmer had 46 per cent recognition with the public, Anneliese Dodds 3 and Angela Rayner 4. The opposition doesn't seem to be cutting through with members of the public.
Not the opposition, everyone but the PM. Rishi Sunak joined Keir Starmer in the 40s, for example. And Ed Davey...well...
I find those results amazing. Has all of Blackford's campaigning for smuggest, most objectionable oaf in the Commons truly been in vain? Surely he has irritated more people than that.
I don't know if anybody else heard the Starmer interview on R4 Today this morning, but it was quite interesting. He wasn't very good, actually (see, I am objective). But he did take the opportunity to set out briefly the 5 current top priorities for Labour at the next GE, whenever that is.
His 5 priorities had echoes of Blair's 1997 pledge card. Interestingly, the fifth priority was about bringing an end to the divisions caused by the 'culture war' (although he didn't use that expression, of course). Anyway, signs of an emerging Labour policy platform to fill the current policy vacuum.
What does it mean. According to this article it means "Insiders suggested that levelling up could include four aspects — a regional economic policy; spreading opportunity across the country; improving the outputs and outcomes from public services; and non-economic outcomes of improving “quality of life” and “pride in place”."
Sounds like empty vacuous slogans to me. In Copeland, one issue that lots of the locals mention is the state of the roads. They are awful. As for public services, the local councils are appalling at emptying their recycling centres. One centre - located next to a children's play area and SSI on the beach - is so bad that rubbish is blown about all over the place. The local waste authority is responsible for a statutory nuisance and this in an area dependant on tourism for its living.
I have raised this with the local council, the Tory Mayor and the local Tory councillor. Neither of the latter two even bothered to reply.
"Quality of life" and "pride in place" my arse!
You seem disappointed that reality is different to the political promises of all parties. To be truly cynical, wait to you are 60ish...
On the BBC quiz show "Pointless" last week there was a round where contestants had to identify politicians from their photos. The aim was to identify the MP that scored the lowest in terms of members of the public surveyed recognising them. The programme was filmed since Covid regulations came in. Keir Starmer had 46 per cent recognition with the public, Anneliese Dodds 3 and Angela Rayner 4. The opposition doesn't seem to be cutting through with members of the public.
Not the opposition, everyone but the PM. Rishi Sunak joined Keir Starmer in the 40s, for example. And Ed Davey...well...
I find those results amazing. Has all of Blackford's campaigning for smuggest, most objectionable oaf in the Commons truly been in vain? Surely he has irritated more people than that.
It depends when this was filmed but I find it remarkable after a global pandemic, when he's barely been off the screens, that two-thirds of the country can't name the Health Secretary from his picture.
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
I voted for Nandy but thanks for calling me a tosspot.
This should be the slogan of her leadership campaign when Starmer gets hoofed out.
SKS was the "Unity" Candidate or as i said at the time the Useless Candidate
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
The Labour Party is the most repellent organisation I have come across in my lifetime, and despite sharing many of its aspirations, I have seen too much of its dirty politics and organised hypocrisy to ever consider voting for it. You mention Sam Tarry - the story of how he got his seat and how the most credible candidate - being the leader of the council - was nobbled to clear the way for a corbynite MP is a case in point. Truly dirty goings on.
Teesside: 1. Unite select Jessie Jessie Jessie Joe Jacobs as the golden girl. Unite then mobilise to lie to the more inexperienced CLP members / officers to demand that an incorrect process be followed which would create a shortlist of only JJJJJJJJ. When this failed the loony left simply barred Dan Smith (her principle opponent) for his crime of tweeting support for an independent mayor before he was a Labour member. JJJJJJJJJJ responds to her anointing by tweeting her support for an independent mayor... 2. Paul Williams was selected by Keir Starmer. His office then contacted the Hartlepool CLP senior officers via region to tell them the plan. That email is then written to explain the plan to the other CLP exec officers and explains how they will manage the forthcoming Executive Committee meeting and after the members meeting to ensure IDStarmer's candidate is the only candidate
Two candidates - one egregiously shit, the other very good but utterly wrong for the seat in question.
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
Labour reject who jumped in the sack to fight like a ferret in 2015 against Corbyn and fought like a ferret every day for 3 years criticises sack fighting.
Said ex Labour hypocrite after quitting sack fighting applies to rejoin Labour in order to fight like a ferret against people like "Laura Pillock"
Rejected for being a divisive nasty name calling piece of work so sad ex sack fighting poster is now politically homeless
Sad tale really
Hey you have to be fair to Rochdale, remember having fun and saying I told you so to centrists who thought some centrist anti-left Labour leader was the solution to Labour getting elected only to find out it is even less electable than a left wing Labour leader isn't fun for the person who was wrong...
Just us left wingers who were right are feeling incredibly smug, which can come across badly to others.
In fairness I think some of them were knowingly lying rather than politically incompetent, it is important to be cynical when it comes to politics.
If you, but more importantly Labour, don't get this then there is no way they are returning to power anytime soon.
This is lazy analysis. Just because there's been some big political shifts in one area doesn't mean they cant be some in another.
If the Tories win Hartlepool by the amount suggested and IF (big if) the national polling is actually in the region of a 2% lead, rather than 10%, that suggests some big swings to Labour elsewhere...
I agree. What has made the Tories so successful over the last decade is the increased efficiency of their vote compared to the days when they got within 3% of Blair and he got a very comfortable majority. This has happened so far because the very considerable ebbing of their strength in the south of England has merely reduced their majorities whilst they have suddenly become much more competitive in the midlands, the east and now the north.
But as Labour is finding in reverse there is a tipping point in these things. The seats Labour took for granted whilst it went fishing in the suburbs and university towns of the south have bitten back and it is all too possible that southern seats which were much more remainer, much more liberal and much more dominated by professional classes will in turn get fed up being taken for granted.
Overall this is a good thing. It was not healthy that the Tories were content to get a majority with only the odd rural seat north of Birmingham and the inability of Labour to relate to our most economically successful areas outside of the actual cities meant that they had little to say in that area. A situation where both our major parties have a fair degree of representation from most of our country improves the chances of the government being aware of the needs of all of the country.
Most of the problems there arise from the voting system, which directs all the political attention to those areas considered marginal, and neglects the safer areas for any party.
Whilst that is undoubtedly true it seems to me that Labour is going through an identity crises where they will become more potent in seats that are more like them, that is middle class, professional, well educated, dominated by the public sector and frankly rather more interested in the privileges of such people than those who have very little.
Those with little have caught on. They may come to realise that Boris doesn't really give a toss about them either but at least he pretends to listen and he is amusing rather than patronising.
"pretends to listen"? He delivered them their verdict on Brexit. Labour were set against doing so.
Yes, pretends to listen. Do the people of Hartlepool want Brexit because it is Brexit, or because what they hope it will bring them? Pools is a classic post industrial left behind backwater. People want back the jobs and prosperity and pride and hope that was taken from them. Brexit was the silver bullet to cure these ills which is why they were so enthusiastic for it.
Where the Tories will struggle is that they can't deliver what was promised. I have no doubt that Hartlepool will be thrown a few scraps once it goes Tory but it won't change the fundamental problems with the town and the region. One prime example - local Tories very excited by the prospect of a free port and how it will restore industry. Except that a free port makes it easier to IMPORT, it will do nothing but harm for local industry. But as nothing but harm has been on the menu for 40 years people are desperate and will try anything.
When salvation fails to arrive? Thats when the Tories are screwed. Not to Labour's benefit you understand, we're going to see a rise of the hard right. Think UKIP/Brexit with paramilitary activists...
I guess that they aren’t going to work in the new GE factory then?
A perfect example. Can you show me where in the Mayor's remit he has had anything to do with GE coming to Teesside? Its got literally fuck all to do with him and the same would have been true if (shudder) Jessie Joe Jacobs becomes mayor. She also claims all kinds of crap that are absolutely miles outside the remit of this non-job.
That’s changing the question. You said that the Freeport would do nothing for residents. GE is opening a factory there because it. That will do something for residents.
I don’t care whether it was the mayor, the monkey or a giraffe from London Zoo that achieved it. But from what he has said - and he may be lying of course - the major has been advocating strongly for the Freeport so he had a role and deserves a share of the credit
Oh give over. GE want a tax break to set up in the free port so that they can use imported parts to assemble products to be exported. Local industry doesn't get a boost from a freeport it gets demolished by them. We know freeports don't work, we have shut them all down - specifically the *Tories* shut them down in 2012.
Mayor Houchen has presided over a net loss of jobs and despite the new GE factory the loss will only accelerate with the freeport completely sinking anything that isn't in the free zone. And what does this freeport zone do? Allow busines to function as if it was still in the EU. Yay...
Not a huge fan of Freeports as a concept, however, special economic zones tend to have a positive overall multiplier as the jobs created spill over into the wider area and national supply chains over time. What usually happens is that local companies begin to bid for smaller supply contracts with the big assembler in the SEZ and becuase they have zero cost of shipping it can be fairly competitive for the smaller contracts.
I'm not sure it's more than a zero sum game, however, and there's a fair bit of evidence that SEZs eventually turn into a net zero unless they are wound down by which time you just have to hope the companies who have been brought in stick around.
Certainly worked in Docklands. Canary Wharf says Hi
I remember in about 1989 it was fashionable for Labour types to sneer at all development in East London, especially the Wharf. ‘A Thatcherite toy-town doomed to failure’ was the common refrain
On the BBC quiz show "Pointless" last week there was a round where contestants had to identify politicians from their photos. The aim was to identify the MP that scored the lowest in terms of members of the public surveyed recognising them. The programme was filmed since Covid regulations came in. Keir Starmer had 46 per cent recognition with the public, Anneliese Dodds 3 and Angela Rayner 4. The opposition doesn't seem to be cutting through with members of the public.
Not the opposition, everyone but the PM. Rishi Sunak joined Keir Starmer in the 40s, for example. And Ed Davey...well...
I find those results amazing. Has all of Blackford's campaigning for smuggest, most objectionable oaf in the Commons truly been in vain? Surely he has irritated more people than that.
I was surprised David Lammy was so low, given he does loads of LBC and other media stuff.
Hartlepool 2015 Iain Wright Lab 14,076 35.6 -6.9 Philip Broughton UKIP11,052 28.0 21.0 Richard Royal Con 8,256 20.9 -7.2
Hartlepool 2017 Mike Hill Lab 21,969 52.5 16.9 Carl Jackson Con14,319 34.2 13.3 P Broughton UKIP4,801 11.5 -16.5
Hartlepool 2019 Mike Hill Lab 15,464 37.7 -14.8 S Houghton Con 11,869 28.9 -5.3 Richard Tice BXP 10,603 25.8 25.8
Hartlepool 2021 CON GAIN first time not Labour since 1959
SKS fans please explain how SKS has managed this
You really are stupid enough to go there? Then again why not - Corbyn won Hartlepool 9 times after his election to Parliament. You see that Peter Mandelson - they only voted for him knowing that the Beard of the Year was in parliament as their true representative. Now that Corbyn has been booted out of the Labour Party Pools is going Tory - nuff said.
If they remove IDStarmer and reinstate the Jeremy, all the people who were LLLLL across the contact sheet who said "I'm not voting for him" will vote for him.
Your really so stupid to try the its Corbyns fault despite the facts.
First Labour loss since 1959
Fairy Nuff we know your obsessed you should move on.
No no no, the loss of the red wall predates Corbyn so it isn't his fault. The dam has been eroded over time, with no maintenance done by an arrogant local Labour hierarchy who think they are born to rule because its all the Tories fault.
Labour's problem is that the dam burst thanks to Brexit. What you propose is that Labour go back to the failed Corbyn experiment, have a slate of wazzocks like Sam Tarry, Zarah Sultana and Laura Pillock as MPs and double down on policy so that Labour only talk to the bottom 5% and blame everything on the top 1% and say fuck all to everyone else.
Labour's solution is not Starmer. Labour's solution is not Corbyn. It is not either / or you tosspot. As I tweeted earlier this morning the left and right in Labour fight like ferrets in a sack and neither side understand why you're in the sack in the first place.
I voted for Nandy but thanks for calling me a tosspot.
This should be the slogan of her leadership campaign when Starmer gets hoofed out.
SKS was the "Unity" Candidate or as i said at the time the Useless Candidate
Quite right, the Labour Party didn't need "unity" with the nutjobs that you supported, it needed to expel them like Kinnock did.
Morning! Thought I would give this a go after about a decade of lurking. Incidentally, it started when a teacher of mine suggested that checking the betting markets is a better predicter of election results than the polls. My feeling is the assertion has taken some hammering since then and I suspect the market has moved against it (no doubt very profitably).
Off Topic, I was really interested in a comment from a previous thread yesterday that linked to a thread from Ciaran Martin on the constitutionality of the IndyRef and what all this means for the future of the Union. Essentially, there's nothing left to devolve and Federalism means either; very unequal federal system, or the clawing of powers back from Holyrood and the dissolution of England as a political entity. Martin's point about federalism and devolution not being one and the same was very shrewd. My suggestion? Enter the third chamber!
Simply add a House of Nations to Parliament, 100 seats, elected by PR and equally distributed among the Nations. Any legislation requires majorities of 2/4 delegations to pass. So, 13 Seats in England, 13 seats in Wales would see a bill go through (having passed the representatives in the Commons in a majority, indicating broad support). This would limit nationalist parties from blocking, while giving equal representation to the Nations.
Now, I don't know if constitutional fanfiction is something we do here but I'm pretty proud of the idea!
I don't know if anybody else heard the Starmer interview on R4 Today this morning, but it was quite interesting. He wasn't very good, actually (see, I am objective). But he did take the opportunity to set out briefly the 5 current top priorities for Labour at the next GE, whenever that is.
His 5 priorities had echoes of Blair's 1997 pledge card. Interestingly, the fifth priority was about bringing an end to the divisions caused by the 'culture war' (although he didn't use that expression, of course). Anyway, signs of an emerging Labour policy platform to fill the current policy vacuum.
5 top priorities = 5 yr plan = Edstone
Ending culture wars is not in the gift of politicians, and most of the people whose votes he needs take no interest in university social science department and metro rubbish anyway.
Starmer has actively chosen to participate in them - his taking the knee photo is his bacon sandwich moment.
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The big structural threat is that it is quite easy to see Labour's voters easily absorbed by other parties - the WWC going to the Tories, the urban professional classes going to the Greens with the ethnic vote (which is increasingly focused on Bangladeshi / Caribbean / Pakistani communities) going to a Respect-style outfit.
People give Farage far more credit than he deserves, he always preyed on pre-existing splits especially in the Tory Party. Once that split was healed, he had no future. Better for his legacy to finally claim victory than to continue kicking up a fuss. He can retire gracefully now, cashing in on his legacy in the USA etc now.
I don’t care whether it was the mayor, the monkey or a giraffe from London Zoo that achieved it. But from what he has said - and he may be lying of course - the major has been advocating strongly for the Freeport so he had a role and deserves a share of the credit
The reason Cameron agreed to the referendum in the first place was because over 100 MPs of his own Party rebelled against the whip to demand one. He had no alternative, he couldn't cover up the cracks in his party anymore. This predated the subsequent rise of UKIP.
Voters did care about the European topic and more importantly they cared about topics related to Europe, it was a myth by Remainers that the voters didn't care.
If the answer is the one that jumps out, then the Tory heartlands are under threat.
We are in unchartered territory. Labour being closer in the polls is a crumb of comfort but equally Sunak is waiting in the wings for when the appeal of Boris starts to wear off. Sunak will lose ground in the red wall but you'd think he's got more than enough about him to hold off Labour in the home counties.
If Farage had completely stood down 80% of the Brexit Party votes would have gone to the Tory party.
The only thing this byelection is actually doing is showing the scale of the problem Labour needs to fix. Their core working class Northern seats have finally been lost after 70 years of being taken for granted.
Polls are an expression of theoretical interest. A Tinder swipe. Elections, by contrast, are actual sex
What does it mean. According to this article it means "Insiders suggested that levelling up could include four aspects — a regional economic policy; spreading opportunity across the country; improving the outputs and outcomes from public services; and non-economic outcomes of improving “quality of life” and “pride in place”."
Sounds like empty vacuous slogans to me. In Copeland, one issue that lots of the locals mention is the state of the roads. They are awful. As for public services, the local councils are appalling at emptying their recycling centres. One centre - located next to a children's play area and SSI on the beach - is so bad that rubbish is blown about all over the place. The local waste authority is responsible for a statutory nuisance and this in an area dependant on tourism for its living.
I have raised this with the local council, the Tory Mayor and the local Tory councillor. Neither of the latter two even bothered to reply.
"Quality of life" and "pride in place" my arse!
Starmer should have been taking notes
The better labour do in London and the cities, the worse they do elsewhere. Whatever the reality, Khan's opponents have done a great job selling London as a identity politics hellhole where focus groups pontificate on pronouns whilst young men slaughter each other with knives in the streets.
Labour should get rid of Khan if they want to do well elsewhere and run an Andy Burnham style uniter instead. Khan is killing their brand in middle England, and not because of race, but because of politics.
https://www.economist.com/britain/2021/04/03/the-truth-behind-the-tories-northern-strongholds
The Red Wall has the lowest house price to earnings ratio in the entire country.
https://twitter.com/markmcgeoghegan/status/1389525963667562496?s=20
Which taking a longer term view may be an upside of a Tory win in the by-election.
Snipped from the National a few minutes ago:
The voters were bothered and they voted accordingly, there is nothing unfortunate about it, the voters got what they wanted.
That you think the voters getting what they wanted is unfortunate, and that all Labour's problems can magically vanish if they embrace PR, just shows how entirely out of touch you are.
- Seat projections: SNP on for outright majority with 67 seats. Con on 29, Lab on 20
- Scots tied 50-50 on support for indy referendum
- 28% want #indyref within 2 yrs (SNP pledged to hold ref by end 2024)
Via @SamCoatesSky
With that Indy ref timing, I do not think Sturgeon is in for smooth sailing post election...
Father Lenin said the Labour Party was a party of the worst kind of bourgeoisie reactionary. He is as right now as he was then.
Which means the Independence votes seem to have worked out how to game the system and are likely to maximise the seats they will win.
I can't see how a Labour Party you would support would be a Labour Party that sufficient voters would support. Starmer hasn't gone remotely far enough in rebuilding the party but your position is to slide further backwards. Starmer can't make the changes needed because (a) he doesn't believe in it, (b) has half the party full of Corbynite idiots and (c) has the other half of the party still believing they are the natural party of local government because aren't the Tories evil!
Ironically Paul Williams would be a great MP for Hartlepool - as a local doctor who literally created and led a GP's co-op to Take Back Control of diminshed healthcare provision from Virgin he actually know the town and its issues.
But because he doesn't sound authentic for there and isn't willing to face into why people voted for self-harm he will be defeated by a posh farmer from miles away who like the other new Tory MPs in the area with no constituency link will treat the town and its people with disdain and be invisible.
Labour should have selected someone local. Problem is that the local party are bonkers - the then Labour council leader defected to Scargill's Socialist Labour Party after a hate campaign by local Corbynite entryists that he was too right wing.
I'm pretty sure it's just perspective distortion from a wide angle lens, but Jimmy Carter looks like a midget...
https://twitter.com/BeschlossDC/status/1389402795917430785
Only 42% of Scots want indyref2 now within the next 5 years, most do not want one until at least over five years time or never. Thus Boris will easily refuse indyref2 for the rest of this Parliament
https://news.sky.com/story/elections-2021-scottish-voters-less-enthusiastic-about-independence-referendum-in-next-5-years-sky-news-poll-12296485
That makes it a good hedge again the weakening purchasing power of normal currencies. And the Western Central banks have printed a lot of money. But I only invest small amounts
But it's the system we have, and though gaming it will be attacked that doesnt matter much I'd say.
“I don’t think anyone realistically thought it would be possible to turn Labour round from worst election result since 1935 to a position to win the next election within a period of one year"
Mayor Houchen has presided over a net loss of jobs and despite the new GE factory the loss will only accelerate with the freeport completely sinking anything that isn't in the free zone. And what does this freeport zone do? Allow busines to function as if it was still in the EU. Yay...
And I won't put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag* above my door
I'm in love and always will be
* well, maybe one.
'More manna from heaven for the Trump tendency comes in the form of the new US census. The census apparently shows 5 million more votes were counted in 2020 than people recorded as voting.
Its going to run and run with repub voters, this.'
As this is a betting site quite a lot of us are interested in seeing the basis for that, including @rcs1000
This should be the slogan of her leadership campaign when Starmer gets hoofed out.
Said ex Labour hypocrite after quitting sack fighting applies to rejoin Labour in order to fight like a ferret against people like "Laura Pillock"
Rejected for being a divisive nasty name calling piece of work so sad ex sack fighting poster is now politically homeless
Sad tale really
If you really wanted to become anonymous, and I am talking FBI witness protection, the best strategy was to take a minor government job. Total career suicide as far as the public are concerned.
Inject that beautiful potential result straight into my damn veins.
Corbyn held that easily over Con + UKIP in 2017, Starmer can't because he is an unelectable posh centrist, simple.
The Labour right won't care, their only goal is to rule the Labour party as they sink it into irrelevance.
I'm not sure it's more than a zero sum game, however, and there's a fair bit of evidence that SEZs eventually turn into a net zero unless they are wound down by which time you just have to hope the companies who have been brought in stick around.
So if Brexit is a success the Red Wall will continue to crumble and Labour are fucked. If Brexit is shit, and there’s no discernible improvement in these areas, then the Tories won’t be trusted again for a long time.
That’s it. Everything else is froth.
The Tories need to get money flowing to the left behind areas. I’m sceptical that will happen. Time will tell.
I don't this reflects at all on Lab/Con. It's just the nature of opposition.
The problem with Starmer is he's been challenged and found wanting in the past year. He's had plenty of opportunities while the government have been struggling to deal with a pandemic to find issues with what the government is doing and oppose them, to suggest better alternatives.
He has failed to do so.
https://twitter.com/randfish/status/1389279726305353730
1. Unite select Jessie Jessie Jessie Joe Jacobs as the golden girl. Unite then mobilise to lie to the more inexperienced CLP members / officers to demand that an incorrect process be followed which would create a shortlist of only JJJJJJJJ. When this failed the loony left simply barred Dan Smith (her principle opponent) for his crime of tweeting support for an independent mayor before he was a Labour member. JJJJJJJJJJ responds to her anointing by tweeting her support for an independent mayor...
2. Paul Williams was selected by Keir Starmer. His office then contacted the Hartlepool CLP senior officers via region to tell them the plan. That email is then written to explain the plan to the other CLP exec officers and explains how they will manage the forthcoming Executive Committee meeting and after the members meeting to ensure IDStarmer's candidate is the only candidate
Two candidates - one egregiously shit, the other very good but utterly wrong for the seat in question.
Just us left wingers who were right are feeling incredibly smug, which can come across badly to others.
In fairness I think some of them were knowingly lying rather than politically incompetent, it is important to be cynical when it comes to politics.
I remember in about 1989 it was fashionable for Labour types to sneer at all development in East London, especially the Wharf. ‘A Thatcherite toy-town doomed to failure’ was the common refrain
Thought I would give this a go after about a decade of lurking. Incidentally, it started when a teacher of mine suggested that checking the betting markets is a better predicter of election results than the polls. My feeling is the assertion has taken some hammering since then and I suspect the market has moved against it (no doubt very profitably).
Off Topic, I was really interested in a comment from a previous thread yesterday that linked to a thread from Ciaran Martin on the constitutionality of the IndyRef and what all this means for the future of the Union. Essentially, there's nothing left to devolve and Federalism means either; very unequal federal system, or the clawing of powers back from Holyrood and the dissolution of England as a political entity. Martin's point about federalism and devolution not being one and the same was very shrewd. My suggestion? Enter the third chamber!
Simply add a House of Nations to Parliament, 100 seats, elected by PR and equally distributed among the Nations. Any legislation requires majorities of 2/4 delegations to pass. So, 13 Seats in England, 13 seats in Wales would see a bill go through (having passed the representatives in the Commons in a majority, indicating broad support). This would limit nationalist parties from blocking, while giving equal representation to the Nations.
Now, I don't know if constitutional fanfiction is something we do here but I'm pretty proud of the idea!
over two days* compared to 33 last time.* Close the pubs !