politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » An SDP Mark 2 is now a real possibility within 4 months

PeterC said:

There is no evidence that he is mentally ill. It is necessary to understand where the hard left is coming from. To them "the party" means the grassroots. Parliamentary representatives are no more than a couple of hundred party members who merit no special consideration. In this sense his actions are logical: he will not resign because he has not lost the confidence of the party as he sees it.

Good summary of his view. Equally, if he loses the leadership election he will go without fuss and resume his previous role of championing the minority view.

logical_song said:

OldKingCole said:

Wanderer said:

Jobabob said:

SouthamObserver said:

Ha, ha ...
https://twitter.com/chrismcsh/status/748035604441600000

Starting to think the party is actually better off, splitting. Become the Progressive Party/Democratic Party with a Chuka/Luciana centrist leader and woo Tory Europhile left wingers and Liberals. Short term pain for potential long term gain. The Labour Party is screwed. Corbyn will go down in history as the man who wantonly destroyed one of Britain's great parties of state through his gross narcissism.

I don't think there is any choice.

I also think people are underestimating the chances of such a party. The SDP was a breakaway of 4, this would be a breakaway of what? 150+? It would take the soft left with it, which is critical. Plus the political landscape is in flux now, everything is up for grabs. Better still, the Tory Party is weak and stumbling. This isn't the 80s.

I think that to succeed it does need to be a centre-left party though. And I say that as a centrist. You can still win centrist votes from a centre-left position.

The SDP had 4 leaders, but they were supported by 30 or so (IIRC) Labour MP’s.

If 150 Labour MPs split, how many of them would tale their constituency parties with them? Then who would benefit from the official vs real Labour candidates at the election?

Maybe 10 i would guess.

Angela Eagle wouldnt for example

bigjohnowls said:

stodge said:

OldKingCole said:

My impression ...... like Stodge I was a Liberal activist in the 80’s ...... was that the SDP were a top-down organisation. The consituency I knew best ..... Castle Point ....... only rarely elected Liberal councillors and so was given to the SDP. Yes people did come out of the woodwork to join but much of the on the ground stuff was done by Liberals.

I’m sure I’m not relying on False Memory Syndrome when I say that had it not been for the Falklands the Tories would have experienced disaster in 1983. Stodge’s experience reported in his earlier post was not unusual.

Oh Lord, I might have seen you at an Assembly at Harrogate or Llandudno or Eastbourne or somewhere in a bar....

Yes, SDP was very top down - it needed to be as it had no ground infrastructure. The first SDP people I met were not atypical - a ex-Labour activist, an ex-Tory member and someone who had never been in a political party. The ex-Labour man was initially suspicious of the Liberals while the other two were much friendlier.

We put out a newsletter called Alliance Briefing (no Focus there). The ex-Labour man was a professional typesetter and the non party man knew a printer. By today's standards it was awful - in 1981 it was state of the art.

As I was in the weakest of the then four Bromley constituencies from a Liberal point of view, I was part of the liaison between the SDP and the Liberals across Bromley. The SDP stayed out of Orpington which still had a strong Liberal branch even though the late Lord Avebury had lost the seat back in 1970. Instead, the SDP focussed on Chislehurst which had always had a Labour presence in the Crays and Ravensbourne.

I have to say even though we were two separate parties, we worked together almost from minute one as the Alliance.

And failed miserably to prevent 15 years of Tory Government?

The debt the Tories owe to General Galteri is immense and rarely, if ever, acknowledged.

david_herdson said:

<
1997 was a strategic disaster for the Lib Dems (or more accurately, the decisions that led to it were).

An SDP2 cannot tear any more chunks out of the Tories than blair did, for the same reason: 25-30% of the electorate is moderate centre-right and will not vote for a left-of-centre party. I'd be more worried about UKIP there, except that (1) their ground game and leadership are poor and (2) it makes more sense for them to go left and exploit the socially conservative voters neither Corbyn nor Eagle would appeal to.

And do the Lib Dems have that much of a councillor base? Isn't it now highly concentrated in a small number of authorities? The price of all that targetting in the 1990s/2000s was writing off enormous parts of the country.

Come on, David, this is unadulterated nonsense and you know it.

In 1997, the "disaster" you claim saw the LDs go from 20 to 46 MPs. It didn't seem like a disaster at the time for anyone other than the Conservatives who then spent their longest period in opposition under universal suffrage.

It took thirteen years and the biggest financial crash since the 1930s plus Gordon Brown to haul the Conservatives back to the brink of power. At that point, the LDs came in with their disastrous 57 MPs and formed the Coalition which now looks like a paragon of stability and good governance compared to the current shambles.

I think you're appallingly complacent as to the effect of a potential non-socialist party of the centre or centre-left on Conservative voters. Millions deserted the Conservative Party in 1997 for Blair and halved your Parliamentary representation overnight. The LDs benefitted from the tactical desire of millions to be rid of your party.

Could the same happen in 2020 ? Possibly.

As for Councillors, the LDs has always had concentrations of power just like the Conservatives. How many Tory Councillors are there in Newham - here's a clue, the same number as there are Lib Dem councillors. There are still, I believe, around 2,000 LD councillors, in 1979 there were 150. Next year the County Council elections offer some opportunities to increase that number further - perhaps it will be another 1993, we can but hope. That year, the Conservatives lost control of Surrey.

You're running scared of a new centre party and rightly so. The Conservatives are all over the place on Europe - you can't decide whether to respect the national vote or ignore it. Your best electoral asset has walked off the stage and looking at the field of selling platers on offer, the fact Stephen Crabb is being considered speaks volumes.

Scott_P said:

This is the problem for Boris

@RobDotHutton: Call it Clegg's Law Of Politics: even if you didn't actually promise it, if voters think you did, you're stuffed. https://t.co/PkgHxh7G20

Boris the ‘Brexiter’ looked genuinely frightened, not triumphant, on the Friday morning of the referendum result.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/professor-damien-ridge/we-can-resist-the-brexit-_b_10699998.html?utm_hp_ref=uk-politics&ir=UK+Politics

tyson said:

The Corbyn cult is quite interesting. I can't help but think that for years this man has been ignored, an old school firebrand, isolated, making his own meetings with his comradely chums equally despised, laughed and sneered at by his Parliamentary colleagues, voted Parliamentary beard of the year as a piss take.
Drip, drip, drip. It just accumulates, and the hatred builds up. He is the Thomas Hamilton equivalent. Last year the membership bought him an AK47 through the vote, this year he has trained how to use it and bought a shed load of ammo, and in the next weeks he is going to go out and slaughter his loathed Parliamentary colleagues.

I do honestly think that Corbyn has some kind of mental health condition. He is a sociopath who believes his own righteousness, and is surrounded by an inner clique that feeds this madness for their own ends. He has the same affliction that warped Mair the other week.

That's over-analysis (to put it mildly - there is actually nobody in politics who I'd compare with an alleged murderer, not even a BNP leader). He doesn't loathe anyone (less than most people here, I'd think) - it's one of his attractive qualities, and widely reciprocated, as acknowledged in many of the resignation letters. Rebelling colleagues generally think he's ineffective and inflexible, not evil or mad. He merely sees himself as the representative of a strand of political thinking, obliged to do his best by it.

stodge said:

david_herdson said:

<
1997 was a strategic disaster for the Lib Dems (or more accurately, the decisions that led to it were).

An SDP2 cannot tear any more chunks out of the Tories than blair did, for the same reason: 25-30% of the electorate is moderate centre-right and will not vote for a left-of-centre party. I'd be more worried about UKIP there, except that (1) their ground game and leadership are poor and (2) it makes more sense for them to go left and exploit the socially conservative voters neither Corbyn nor Eagle would appeal to.

And do the Lib Dems have that much of a councillor base? Isn't it now highly concentrated in a small number of authorities? The price of all that targetting in the 1990s/2000s was writing off enormous parts of the country.

Come on, David, this is unadulterated nonsense and you know it.

In 1997, the "disaster" you claim saw the LDs go from 20 to 46 MPs. It didn't seem like a disaster at the time for anyone other than the Conservatives who then spent their longest period in opposition under universal suffrage.

It took thirteen years and the biggest financial crash since the 1930s plus Gordon Brown to haul the Conservatives back to the brink of power. At that point, the LDs came in with their disastrous 57 MPs and formed the Coalition which now looks like a paragon of stability and good governance compared to the current shambles.

I think you're appallingly complacent as to the effect of a potential non-socialist party of the centre or centre-left on Conservative voters. Millions deserted the Conservative Party in 1997 for Blair and halved your Parliamentary representation overnight. The LDs benefitted from the tactical desire of millions to be rid of your party.

Could the same happen in 2020 ? Possibly.

As for Councillors, the LDs has always had concentrations of power just like the Conservatives. How many Tory Councillors are there in Newham - here's a clue, the same number as there are Lib Dem councillors. There are still, I believe, around 2,000 LD councillors, in 1979 there were 150. Next year the County Council elections offer some opportunities to increase that number further - perhaps it will be another 1993, we can but hope. That year, the Conservatives lost control of Surrey.

You're running scared of a new centre party and rightly so. The Conservatives are all over the place on Europe - you can't decide whether to respect the national vote or ignore it. Your best electoral asset has walked off the stage and looking at the field of selling platers on offer, the fact Stephen Crabb is being considered speaks volumes.

Mr S, you are cheering me up immensely. And, for reasons which are only partly to do with the Referendum, I need cheering up.

Mr. Song, I agree. Boris was posturing, he didn't actually want us to Leave.

Mr. Urquhart, Machiavelli in Discourses on Livy advocates a maximum confederacy size of 4-6 countries, for that sort of reason.

Miss Plato, unsurprised the non-founding countries are peeved.

Indigo said:

logical_song said:

dugarbandier said:

Indigo said:

dugarbandier said:

blackburn63 said:

last week the electorate stated it wanted to control immigration,

that's not what it said on the ballot

Stop playing games. There is what the ballot said, what the campaign promoted, and what the voters want, they are not even remotely the same. Even if VoteLeave was full to the eyeballs of positive Gisela Stuart types, a large chunk of the country would have seen it as an opportunity to reduce immigration, either directly, or as a necessarily first step.

not playing games at all. just think that you can't really make the claim that "the electorate" want what you say. Sure, a goodly number of them probably did vote for primarily that reason, but not necessarily a majority of those that voted leave.

... and remember Leave only just won, by 3.8%.
Considering the enormity of the lies used (£350m/wk and reduced immigration) and which have since been renounced, you can't claim "the electorate" wanted to do anything in particular.

Donnez moi un break. If we are talking about enormous lies we better not consider World War 3, the economic apocalypse appears to be fizzling after getting just below where we were in February and about triple where we were in 2008, the French have said there borders are not moving so no refugee camps in Kent, the former governor of the Bank Of England told us yesterday the the economic case was bullshit, etc etc. Both sides lied massively, neither has any case to try and take the moral high ground over the other, get over it.

Just factually incorrect.
You are clutching at straws, Britain is worse off.
I see that you concede that Leave 'lied massively'.

FrancisUrquhart said:

MaxPB said:

PlatoSaid said:

Poland and Hungary aren't happy being sidelined by the founding clique.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/poland-and-hungary-lead-angry-rebellion-against-the-old-guard-8fddw7wtg

Yes the gang of six met to try and shaft the Eastern European nations and keep the UK in the EU by restrictions on free movement. Apparently the meeting ended up with mixed feelings. I heard that France and Belgium were the most reticent in offering us anything, the rest were generally on board. The problem is that there would be no mechanism for them to push through the reforms necessary against Eastern European interests, they have more than enough to block a decision taken by QMV.

And this is really the problem with the EU. Trying to get reform with 27-28 countries with differing interests & economic positions means at the very very best you get a terrible fudge. With 6-8 of similar sized economies you can probably find common ground.

Yes, if I were to reshape Europe I would have an Eastern bloc, a northern bloc and a southern bloc, France would have to decide at that point whether they want to be in the northern outward looking bloc or in the inward looking southern one. Free trade between all of them, and free movement within the groups but not between the groups. As the economies align and they become similarly sized in terms of per capita income we could merge them into a single free trading and free movement zone.

Scott_P said:

Indigo said:

Donnez moi un break. If we are talking about enormous lies we better not consider World War 3, the economic apocalypse appears to be fizzling after getting just below where we were in February and about triple where we were in 2008

Nobody on the Remain side said World War 3

The Prime Minister may not have spoken the words, "World War 3," but he did suggest Brexit would endanger European security and lead to another in the sequence: Blenheim, Trafalgar, Waterloo, our country’s heroism in the Great War and, most of all, our lone stand in 1940

Next time Corbyn acts as leader of the opposition in the Commons, would it be possible for some MP to raise a point of order challenging his position, presumably forcing a ruling from the speaker?

That would be a pretty daring thing for any MP to do, and the speaker wouldn't be happy about being put in that position, but it's possible some MP might see this as a way to bypass the Labour party rules.

I don't want to appear to be an extremist but I must say that the problem with modern cushions is that they do not possess the mass needed to perform the function implicit in their name. They are all about appearance, surface and clever design but inside have virtually nothing. A metaphor for modern politicians.

Indigo said:

Jobabob said:

They actually said that a third of people are putting off buying lots of things, including soft furnishings. But hey, it's only jobs in interiors that will be affected right?

Did they say putting off until next year, or putting off for a week or two. Or don't you know and you just like talking your country down ?

I was quoting from Sky News, it's not me saying it. Plus what anyone says on PB makes sod all difference to anything

Oh for pity's sake:

https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/748083515720404993

I feel sorry for the ordinary Labour voters who deserve better.

MaxPB said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

MaxPB said:

PlatoSaid said:

Poland and Hungary aren't happy being sidelined by the founding clique.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/poland-and-hungary-lead-angry-rebellion-against-the-old-guard-8fddw7wtg

Yes the gang of six met to try and shaft the Eastern European nations and keep the UK in the EU by restrictions on free movement. Apparently the meeting ended up with mixed feelings. I heard that France and Belgium were the most reticent in offering us anything, the rest were generally on board. The problem is that there would be no mechanism for them to push through the reforms necessary against Eastern European interests, they have more than enough to block a decision taken by QMV.

And this is really the problem with the EU. Trying to get reform with 27-28 countries with differing interests & economic positions means at the very very best you get a terrible fudge. With 6-8 of similar sized economies you can probably find common ground.

Yes, if I were to reshape Europe I would have an Eastern bloc, a northern bloc and a southern bloc, France would have to decide at that point whether they want to be in the northern outward looking bloc or in the inward looking southern one. Free trade between all of them, and free movement within the groups but not between the groups. As the economies align and they become similarly sized in terms of per capita income we could merge them into a single free trading and free movement zone.

Something like that could solve a lot of problems not just migration. Basically the more you pay in & more important you are the bigger say you have.

At the moment, eu has the same problem as fifa. A massive corrupt organisation where nobody can reform it, as Fiji has all the same voting rights as Germany, and have wildly different needs and objectives from being in fifa.

AlastairMeeks said:

Oh for pity's sake:

https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/748083515720404993

I feel sorry for the ordinary Labour voters who deserve better.

Seriously. Can they sort it out so I can lay the non runner ??

tyson said:

The Corbyn cult is quite interesting. I can't help but think that for years this man has been ignored, an old school firebrand, isolated, making his own meetings with his comradely chums equally despised, laughed and sneered at by his Parliamentary colleagues, voted Parliamentary beard of the year as a piss take.
Drip, drip, drip. It just accumulates, and the hatred builds up. He is the Thomas Hamilton equivalent. Last year the membership bought him an AK47 through the vote, this year he has trained how to use it and bought a shed load of ammo, and in the next weeks he is going to go out and slaughter his loathed Parliamentary colleagues.

I do honestly think that Corbyn has some kind of mental health condition. He is a sociopath who believes his own righteousness, and is surrounded by an inner clique that feeds this madness for their own ends. He has the same affliction that warped Mair the other week.

Corbyn is an innocent naïf. McDonnell is the string puller behind him.

FrancisUrquhart said:

MaxPB said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

MaxPB said:

PlatoSaid said:

Poland and Hungary aren't happy being sidelined by the founding clique.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/poland-and-hungary-lead-angry-rebellion-against-the-old-guard-8fddw7wtg

Yes the gang of six met to try and shaft the Eastern European nations and keep the UK in the EU by restrictions on free movement. Apparently the meeting ended up with mixed feelings. I heard that France and Belgium were the most reticent in offering us anything, the rest were generally on board. The problem is that there would be no mechanism for them to push through the reforms necessary against Eastern European interests, they have more than enough to block a decision taken by QMV.

And this is really the problem with the EU. Trying to get reform with 27-28 countries with differing interests & economic positions means at the very very best you get a terrible fudge. With 6-8 of similar sized economies you can probably find common ground.

Yes, if I were to reshape Europe I would have an Eastern bloc, a northern bloc and a southern bloc, France would have to decide at that point whether they want to be in the northern outward looking bloc or in the inward looking southern one. Free trade between all of them, and free movement within the groups but not between the groups. As the economies align and they become similarly sized in terms of per capita income we could merge them into a single free trading and free movement zone.

Something like that could solve a lot of problems not just migration. Basically the more you pay in & more important you are the bigger say you have.

At the moment, eu has the same problem as fifa. Fiji has all the same votes rights as Germany.

QMV is based on population, or have I had a colossal brain fart?

Mr. M, I think it's a combination of number of countries and population.

TGOHF said:

Perhaps Watson and Eagle's standoff is over who doesn't have to stand ?

One of them has to throw themselves onto the fire. Logically it should be Eagle so Watson can stay deputy.

Robert_Of_Sheffield said:

Next time Corbyn acts as leader of the opposition in the Commons, would it be possible for some MP to raise a point of order challenging his position, presumably forcing a ruling from the speaker?

That would be a pretty daring thing for any MP to do, and the speaker wouldn't be happy about being put in that position, but it's possible some MP might see this as a way to bypass the Labour party rules.

I thought that was precisely what the SNP were planning to do - saying that they are the Opposition and that Angus Roberson should have the LOTO questions at PMQ's

Is Eagle in tears again ?

Scott_P said:

@shattenstone: the great @BillBailey has sent me a Brexit joke. 'An Englishman, and Englishman and an Englishman go into a pub.' Thank you, Bill

he should stick to the comedy songs, they are actually funny.

bigjohnowls said:

A solution to Labours problems could be.

Jezza tells McDonnell or Lewis that if they got on the ballot he will stand down.

Will Labour MPs be prepared to nominate either?

If not Jezza wins the party vote and deselections results in SDP2

Tory reign for 15 years,

The current idea by the splitters is doomed

Eagle is Kendall level of support

Watson is Cooper level of support

Jezza is over 50% on first ballot

The splitters really hadn't thought this through had they

So then they will have to walk and either defect or set up their own party. What marks this rebellion out so far is the unity of purpose: the resignations and then the VoNC. Would that carry forward to the ultimate rebellion were Corbyn re-elected? It would have its own momentum. Providing that a critical mass went, then those who stayed would be ever more vulnerable to the increasing relative power of the left, so increasing the incentive to jump.

John_M said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

John_M said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

MaxPB said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

MaxPB said:

PlatoSaid said:

Poland and Hungary aren't happy being sidelined by the founding clique.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/poland-and-hungary-lead-angry-rebellion-against-the-old-guard-8fddw7wtg

Yes the gang of six met to try and shaft the Eastern European nations and keep the UK in the EU by restrictions on free movement. Apparently the meeting ended up with mixed feelings. I heard that France and Belgium were the most reticent in offering us anything, the rest were generally on board. The problem is that there would be no mechanism for them to push through the reforms necessary against Eastern European interests, they have more than enough to block a decision taken by QMV.

And this is really the problem with the EU. Trying to get reform with 27-28 countries with differing interests & economic positions means at the very very best you get a terrible fudge. With 6-8 of similar sized economies you can probably find common ground.

Yes, if I were to reshape Europe I would have an Eastern bloc, a northern bloc and a southern bloc, France would have to decide at that point whether they want to be in the northern outward looking bloc or in the inward looking southern one. Free trade between all of them, and free movement within the groups but not between the groups. As the economies align and they become similarly sized in terms of per capita income we could merge them into a single free trading and free movement zone.

Something like that could solve a lot of problems not just migration. Basically the more you pay in & more important you are the bigger say you have.

At the moment, eu has the same problem as fifa. Fiji has all the same votes rights as Germany.

QMV is based on population, or have I had a colossal brain fart?

But population isn't the correct metric. Imagine fifa being run like that, China & India having huge says.

For clarity, I'm not arguing it's the correct mechanic, I was just worried that I'd made a fundamental misapprehension about QMV and it was one-nation, one vote .

It's both.

tlg86 said:

AlastairMeeks said:

Oh for pity's sake:

https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/748083515720404993

I feel sorry for the ordinary Labour voters who deserve better.

Why don't they both run? Surely AV solves all their problems?

No has to be one candidate. Has to be a clear choice between Corbyn or no Corbyn.

DanSmith said:

tlg86 said:

AlastairMeeks said:

Oh for pity's sake:

https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/748083515720404993

I feel sorry for the ordinary Labour voters who deserve better.

Why don't they both run? Surely AV solves all their problems?

No has to be one candidate. Has to be a clear choice between Corbyn or no Corbyn.

Remember, Corbyn obliterated his opposition in the first round. More candidates just makes a repeat performance more likely.

Members of PLP should just refuse to attend PMQs. The site of Corbyn - and a few acolytes- isolated on the opposition benches should do the trick (other parties can cluster as usual).

david_herdson said:

" It didn't seem like a disaster at the time". No, indeed. But it was. 1906 has been described as a landslide from which the Liberals never recovered. It overstates things a bit (1916 was more important) but there's also a germ of truth. 1997 was not dissimilar.

I've no reason whatsoever to run scared of a centre-left party (and the Lib Dems and SDP2 would both be that). Another dreadful Lib Dem error was to believe that they could replace the Tories as the opposition to Labour during their Iraq high, while simultaneously positioning themselves to the left of Blair. For as long as the right-of-centre is broadly unchallenged, the Tories will be fine, if not always in government. By contrast, Labour is facing its worst existential crisis since at least 1981 and possibly since 1931, while the Lib Dems are almost wiped out as a party at national, European and regional level.

I think we're going to have to agree to disagree on 1997. I remember it as a disaster for the Conservatives. For the LDs and for Paddy, it was bad only inasmuch as the size of the Labour win meant the plan for comprehensive realignment of the centre and centre left (including perhaps electoral reform) was shoved off the table.

The events of September 11th 2001 dominated the second Labour term and were, as I hope you'd agree, unforeseeable in their scope and impact and the ramifications of which we live with to this day.

As Labour became more centralised and authoritarian in approach (aspects it has always had to e fair), there was a convergence between the Liberals (with the accession of the Orange Booker Nick Clegg) and the Conservatives under the One Nation Cameron on a number of issues and this strengthened with the financial crash of 2008 and the realisation the "Third Way" model which had run since 1992 had broadly collapsed.

The Coalition was formed out of that temporary convergence of ideas around a "sorting out the Labour mess" agenda but it was never more than temporary and soon diverged in Government.

Labour's problem (and I do accept the problem of the centre left) is that it has failed to come up with a coherent economic response to 2008. The Conservatives had austerity but that too has run its course and for the first time in decades, I get a sense of nobody really knowing which way to turn and the vote to LEAVE is symbolic of it.

If we were more mature individuals instead of partisan supporters of a team or rosette, we'd be thinking about how to shape our economy, society and communities for the next 20 years but the sniping, the sneering and the points scoring is so much more fun.

My question to you, David, is what are the Conservatives for now ? If it is simply about being in power, then it is nothing at all and does us all a disservice.

TheWhiteRabbit said:

Members of PLP should just refuse to attend PMQs. The site of Corbyn - and a few acolytes- isolated on the opposition benches should do the trick (other parties can cluster as usual).

Do what trick

Prove to constituents they have no questions to the PM

Good piece, David. But on:

an early election [...] There would be time neither for deselections

I specifically asked about this yesterday and Nick said that the selections would be NEC-controlled in the event of a snap election.

Splitsville is looking a pretty realistic destination. I have backed John McDonnell as leader of "The Labour Party" at 55.0 as a proxy for this.

TheWhiteRabbit said:

Members of PLP should just refuse to attend PMQs. The site of Corbyn - and a few acolytes- isolated on the opposition benches should do the trick (other parties can cluster as usual).

Trouble is, it will look like they are not doing their jobs. Also, Corbyn is clearly impervious to humiliation.

david_herdson said:

bigjohnowls said:

A solution to Labours problems could be.

Jezza tells McDonnell or Lewis that if they got on the ballot he will stand down.

Will Labour MPs be prepared to nominate either?

If not Jezza wins the party vote and deselections results in SDP2

Tory reign for 15 years,

The current idea by the splitters is doomed

Eagle is Kendall level of support

Watson is Cooper level of support

Jezza is over 50% on first ballot

The splitters really hadn't thought this through had they

So then they will have to walk and either defect or set up their own party. What marks this rebellion out so far is the unity of purpose: the resignations and then the VoNC. Would that carry forward to the ultimate rebellion were Corbyn re-elected? It would have its own momentum. Providing that a critical mass went, then those who stayed would be ever more vulnerable to the increasing relative power of the left, so increasing the incentive to jump.

Indeed. It really is quite something how the far left Corbynites are tried to brush off a rebellion of this scale as s wrinkle of history. There is no precedent for a leader staying in such circumstances

PlatoSaid said:

SandyRentool said:

May has spent 6 years at the Home Office failing to control immigration. What makes anyone think that if she becomes PM she will do anything whatsoever to control immigration?

UKIP will have a field day with May as PM.

Meanwhile everyone left of centre can just keep saying "Nasty Party" whatever policies she tries to implement.

She's also quite authoritarian. Her biggest blackmark for me is swapping sides to hedge her bets, then hid during the whole campaign. That's not leadership using any yardstick.

Looking at what she does rather than says speaks volumes.

When the leave campaign smashed Cameron
As every child can tell
Theresa May, throughout the war
Did nothing in particular
And did it very well.

(Iolanthe)

surbiton said:

Angela is not even the better politician in the family [ as some Corbynista is supposed to have said ].

@LOS_Fisher: Eagle sisters & Corbyn brothers https://t.co/4EzStxYDjS

Of McDonnell's economic advisory team, so far I'm aware that Richard Murphy, Thomas Piketty and Danny Blanchflower have quit so far. Are there any others that people know of?

All will henceforth be labelled "Blairites" by the Corbynites.

Watson matched at 12

On a scale from George Brown to Winston Churchill, how over tired was this MP?

https://twitter.com/DailyMailUK/status/748042843575488512