politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The LDs overturn Zac’s 23k majority with a lead of 1,872

SquareRoot said:

Theuniondivvie said:

Poor, old, vapid Zac.

https://twitter.com/naebD/status/804589117149499393

Marvellous to see PB Tories who were defending Zac's dog whistle mayoral campaign and made excuses for his disgusting MoS front page have now decided they didn't like him all along. Verily, if a week is a long time in politics a six month is a positive aeon of forgetfulness.

very "tim" esque.. tarring everyone with the same brush. I never liked Zac, I thought him arrogant and I don't believe in this nonsense of resigning and refighting your seat... and he's now got his come uppance.. as I posted BEFORE you

HAahahahahahaha

Tim is never far from your thoughts, is he?
He always had the PB Tories down to a tee.

Blast. Woke up to this news. Another few quid lost.

Freggles said:

Casino_Royale said:

foxinsoxuk said:

AlastairMeeks said:

Casino_Royale said:

MP_SE said:

foxinsoxuk said:

@Black_Rook

This was an ideal site for an LD byelection, but far from unique. I think not so much shy LDs as downweighting in polls. We also see quite a lot of Council byelection victories. As an LD, I will have a spring in my step.

There are a good number of voters repelled by the intolerant, narrow mindedness of the Brexiteers, and alt. right, quite prepared to vote for a different sort of Britain. LDs are not fishing in a shallow pool.

Lessons clearly have not been learned. That sneering attitude from so many Europhiles almost certainly contributed to Remain losing the referendum.

Nope. It is self-evidently true that to oppose membership of the European Union membership means you are intolerant, narrow minded and bigoted.

Basically, a bad person. We have been told, and we should learn.

The nature of the Leave campaign is certainly something about which moral judgements can be made. It is a continuing and indelible stain on all that were involved in it.

Until Leave supporters recognise that pandering to xenophobia as a route to electoral victory has enduring consequences, Britain is condemned to remain divided and weakened indefinitely.

Not all Leavers were intolerant xenophobes, but all intolereant xenophobes were Leavers.

Leave contained several subsets, including those expecting £350m extra per week for the NHS. Good people, albeit gullible.

That's not true either.

How's that well planned, tolerant, soft Brexit thing working out for ya?

Speaking of tolerant..

https://twitter.com/Anna_Soubry/status/804591732847509504

By the way, May's constituency voted "Remain"...

Theuniondivvie said:

Freggles said:

Casino_Royale said:

foxinsoxuk said:

AlastairMeeks said:

Casino_Royale said:

MP_SE said:

foxinsoxuk said:

@Black_Rook

This was an ideal site for an LD byelection, but far from unique. I think not so much shy LDs as downweighting in polls. We also see quite a lot of Council byelection victories. As an LD, I will have a spring in my step.

There are a good number of voters repelled by the intolerant, narrow mindedness of the Brexiteers, and alt. right, quite prepared to vote for a different sort of Britain. LDs are not fishing in a shallow pool.

Lessons clearly have not been learned. That sneering attitude from so many Europhiles almost certainly contributed to Remain losing the referendum.

Nope. It is self-evidently true that to oppose membership of the European Union membership means you are intolerant, narrow minded and bigoted.

Basically, a bad person. We have been told, and we should learn.

The nature of the Leave campaign is certainly something about which moral judgements can be made. It is a continuing and indelible stain on all that were involved in it.

Until Leave supporters recognise that pandering to xenophobia as a route to electoral victory has enduring consequences, Britain is condemned to remain divided and weakened indefinitely.

Not all Leavers were intolerant xenophobes, but all intolereant xenophobes were Leavers.

Leave contained several subsets, including those expecting £350m extra per week for the NHS. Good people, albeit gullible.

That's not true either.

How's that well planned, tolerant, soft Brexit thing working out for ya?

Speaking of tolerant..

https://twitter.com/Anna_Soubry/status/804591732847509504

Twitter really does seem to stop some people's brains from working. How can anyone be stupid enough to think that's a clever or bright thing to publish?

Morris_Dancer said:

Mr. Divvie, that sort of thing is horrendous, but it's not confined to one side or the other. There are reasonable people and nutcases on both sides.

Remind me, how many Leave supporting MPs have been murdered by people who tell the courts their name is 'death to traitors'?

IanB2 said:

If a party winning a by-election from a government whilst on just 7% in the polls some kind of record? It feels like it probably is.

SNP must have done it a few times ;-)

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving. LOL

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving. LOL

That is serious trolling. And also serious confirmation bias. Thing is that virtually all the Brits that Verhofstadht will talk to (apart from DeExEU) will be Remainers reinforcing the EU view that Brexit is stupid/disastrous and the narrow victory Leave achieved was by deception.

That is going to heavily influence the EU negotiating strategy because they won't think we're serious, and will want to offer an awful deal with an escape route back to staying as a member with David Cameron's deal perhaps thrown in again as a sweetener.

Which tells me this has the potential to go quite wrong.

Was amusing to hear our Diane on This Week last night trying to warn LibDems about the perils of going around attracting voters...

Casino_Royale said:

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving. LOL

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving. LOL

That is serious trolling. And also serious confirmation bias. Thing is that virtually all the Brits that Verhofstadht will talk to (apart from DeExEU) will be Remainers reinforcing the EU view that Brexit is stupid/disastrous and the narrow victory Leave achieved was by deception.

That is going to heavily influence the EU negotiating strategy because they won't think we're serious, and will want to offer an awful deal with an escape route back to staying as a member with David Cameron's deal perhaps thrown in again as a sweetener.

Which tells me this has the potential to go quite wrong.

Agree with that.

The EU's response to our vote does not fill me with confidence. There seems to be no acknowledgement that the product they're selling is undesirable to many people.

That's a shame for them, as I doubt it's saleable in the long term to populations of some other EU countries.

They need to start listening.

rottenborough said:

TOPPING said:

Oh and btw, not to blow my own trumpet (blowing my own trumpet):

Nov 2 TOPPING:
off topic I think the 6/4 LDs in Richmond is good value

Nov 2 TOPPING:
LDs throwing a lot, and I mean a lot at it.

Not quite @Morris_Dancer F1 status but, modestly, not dreadful.

Well done. Wish I had listened. I knew LibDems would run it close, but was persuaded that a residual Zac personal vote would see him home.

Exactly the same, my on the night trading was poor too - managed to turn a +150 Zac/+30 Lib Dem into a +25 Lib Dem win.

Big change from POTUS count style !

JosiasJessop said:

Casino_Royale said:

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving. LOL

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving. LOL

That is serious trolling. And also serious confirmation bias. Thing is that virtually all the Brits that Verhofstadht will talk to (apart from DeExEU) will be Remainers reinforcing the EU view that Brexit is stupid/disastrous and the narrow victory Leave achieved was by deception.

That is going to heavily influence the EU negotiating strategy because they won't think we're serious, and will want to offer an awful deal with an escape route back to staying as a member with David Cameron's deal perhaps thrown in again as a sweetener.

Which tells me this has the potential to go quite wrong.

Agree with that.

The EU's response to our vote does not fill me with confidence. There seems to be no acknowledgement that the product they're selling is undesirable to many people.

That's a shame for them, as I doubt it's saleable in the long term to populations of some other EU countries.

They need to start listening.

Agreed. The conclusion I reached that the EU could not and would not listen to democratic votes for reform was one of my key reasons for leaving. The pull was the long-term economic opportunities i saw for an independent UK as well as the political renewal.

I am frustrated that the debate got so out-of-hand (and I didn't exactly help at times) but I don't think I could have brought myself to vote to Remain in this organisation under any circumstances, even if it were overwhelmingly in my immediate economic interests.

rural_voter said:

rottenborough said:

TOPPING said:

Oh and btw, not to blow my own trumpet (blowing my own trumpet):

Nov 2 TOPPING:
off topic I think the 6/4 LDs in Richmond is good value

Nov 2 TOPPING:
LDs throwing a lot, and I mean a lot at it.

Not quite @Morris_Dancer F1 status but, modestly, not dreadful.

Well done. Wish I had listened. I knew LibDems would run it close, but was persuaded that a residual Zac personal vote would see him home.

As was I, but I was also persuaded HRC and Remain would win. So unless the Sleaford byelection offers juicy odds (result = *much* easier to predict, IMO), I'll pass for the moment ...

Luckily my big win on Leave winning the referendum is sustaining me through POTUS and by-elections. I'm staying out of Sleaford, nothing to see here, move along.

Mr. Royale, I think Juncker has since said that there should be another referendum (in other countries) because they might also vote to leave.

Well, quite.

rottenborough said:

rural_voter said:

rottenborough said:

TOPPING said:

Oh and btw, not to blow my own trumpet (blowing my own trumpet):

Nov 2 TOPPING:
off topic I think the 6/4 LDs in Richmond is good value

Nov 2 TOPPING:
LDs throwing a lot, and I mean a lot at it.

Not quite @Morris_Dancer F1 status but, modestly, not dreadful.

Well done. Wish I had listened. I knew LibDems would run it close, but was persuaded that a residual Zac personal vote would see him home.

As was I, but I was also persuaded HRC and Remain would win. So unless the Sleaford byelection offers juicy odds (result = *much* easier to predict, IMO), I'll pass for the moment ...

Luckily my big win on Leave winning the referendum is sustaining me through POTUS and by-elections. I'm staying out of Sleaford, nothing to see here, move along.

I have bet on Sleaford but am taking no chances lol:

Against Conservatives
£152.57
£16.78
1.11
£152.57
For Conservatives
£152.57
1.1632
£152.57

GIN1138 said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

A great result for the Lib Dems and a damning indictment on Mrs May.

Actually this whole situation is due to Dave's failures:

1. The self indulgent Zac Goldsmith himself is a throw-back to Cameron filling the party with metropolitan posh boys!

2. Cameron holding and blowing the referendum.

3. Cameron dithering for six years over Heathrow.

Mrs May is just trying to resolve Cameron's very many failures.

Under Dave's watch the Tories gain and hold Richmond Park by 23k.

On Mrs May's watch the Tories don't get a single vote in Richmond Park

Morris_Dancer said:

And this does cut both ways. The Polish chap who was murdered shortly after the vote immediately had his tragic death portrayed by an eager media as related to the referendum, only for it to emerge it was, allegedly, a gang of mixed race youths who did it.

I haven't seen any news reports on the racial mix of the gang that murdered the Pole, but I'm not sure how them being 'mixed race' automatically disqualifies the incident from being related to the referendum.

Morris_Dancer said:

If we end up staying in the EU or having a departure in name only, that will foster more bitterness and resentment, and things will get worse, rather than better. If we leave, then things will gradually improve.

By that rather facile token, you'll be expecting more bitterness and resentment to be fostered in Scotland (and NI) if a definitive departure from the EU is forced through?

Morris_Dancer said:

Mr. Royale, I think Juncker has since said that there should be another referendum (in other countries) because they might also vote to leave.

Well, quite.

Ultimately, if the EU cannot command the democratic consent of its populace, and respond to its concerns, it will fall. It's not exactly stable at the moment, albeit opinion polls show most Europeans still favour it, but it is also rather dicey.

I see no evidence the EU has shown any capability to reform or listen, so, right now, I think the EU will fail. Certainly in its current form.

This could take anything from 5-20 years. Unless things change.

Mr. Divvie, no. Because bitterness would be fostered by ignoring a democratic vote, not respecting it.

Amended - removed reference to the case, see below.

Mr. Jessop, I tried to be deliberately vague on that point, but if a mod would like to amend that post to remove the reference that might be best (just to be on the safe side).

Pulpstar said:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-38178625

Trump names Gen James 'Mad Dog' Mattis as defence secretary

I like him. He commanded I MEF superbly during the Iraq War.

Excellently chronicled in the book by Ray Smith and Bing West

A brilliant night for George Osborne.

His "I told you so" campaign looking better every day...

Casino_Royale said:

Morris_Dancer said:

Mr. Royale, I think Juncker has since said that there should be another referendum (in other countries) because they might also vote to leave.

Well, quite.

Ultimately, if the EU cannot command the democratic consent of its populace, and respond to its concerns, it will fall. It's not exactly stable at the moment, albeit opinion polls show most Europeans still favour it, but it is also rather dicey.

I see no evidence the EU has shown any capability to reform or listen, so, right now, I think the EU will fail. Certainly in its current form.

This could take anything from 5-20 years. Unless things change.

Personally, I think the Euro will eat the Europe Union.

rottenborough said:

rural_voter said:

rottenborough said:

TOPPING said:

Oh and btw, not to blow my own trumpet (blowing my own trumpet):

Nov 2 TOPPING:
off topic I think the 6/4 LDs in Richmond is good value

Nov 2 TOPPING:
LDs throwing a lot, and I mean a lot at it.

Not quite @Morris_Dancer F1 status but, modestly, not dreadful.

Well done. Wish I had listened. I knew LibDems would run it close, but was persuaded that a residual Zac personal vote would see him home.

As was I, but I was also persuaded HRC and Remain would win. So unless the Sleaford byelection offers juicy odds (result = *much* easier to predict, IMO), I'll pass for the moment ...

Luckily my big win on Leave winning the referendum is sustaining me through POTUS and by-elections. I'm staying out of Sleaford, nothing to see here, move along.

By 'juicy' odds I mean seriously wrong, up to 1.5; e.g., Tory seats in General Election 2015.

But maybe I should stick to betting my GE-2015 winnings on local seats that I know in GE-2020, not on faraway Lincs.!

Razedabode said:

So Farron is deeming this result as "the fight back of the 48%".

I'm amazed politicians haven't yet grasped that results in London are rarely indicative of the wider country.

I'm sure they have grasped that. But they need to inspire the troops as they work on the rest.

GIN1138 said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

GIN1138 said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

A great result for the Lib Dems and a damning indictment on Mrs May.

Actually this whole situation is due to Dave's failures:

1. The self indulgent Zac Goldsmith himself is a throw-back to Cameron filling the party with metropolitan posh boys!

2. Cameron holding and blowing the referendum.

3. Cameron dithering for six years over Heathrow.

Mrs May is just trying to resolve Cameron's very many failures.

Under Dave's watch the Tories gain and hold Richmond Park by 23k.

On Mrs May's watch the Tories don't get a single vote in Richmond Park

It was a poor decision for thje Tories not to stand a candidate. They should have thrown Zac to the wolves the moment he did his flounce.

You can see why they didn't, they would have come third.

If we could get rid of the utterly useless Corbyn and his band on idiot followers, Olney's victory could be the start of a very wise realignment. Labour members were campaigning for the Liberals yesterday – the utterly pathetic Corbyn has no control over the sensible wing of his party.

So Open vs Closed:

Open gets the brightest and best of Britain, from the Cameroons to the old Tory Left to the Blairites to the Orange Bookers to the Greens to the Brownites to the Beveridge Group, the City, big business and the TUC.

Closed gets the Red BNP knuckledraggers (Speedy, Sandy and their acolytes), the actual BNP, the Far Left, Ukip and the three clowns of the apocalypse.

Bring on the good fight.

Credit where credit is due - well done to the LibDems. Especially well done in squeezing the Labour vote until the pips squeaked.

Oh, and adding to my nonsense of last night on PC tube stations:

Hummusmith
BAME Multi-faith prayer room

MaxPB said:

Jobabob said:

I wonder if the Leavers are underplaying this victory for Open Europe a mite too much? Tory Remainia is wealthy, powerful – and angry. The Leavers are starting to look like ideologues without a care for the economy. Much can change in a year. This is just the beginning.

Great victory for Open last night. Bravo.

Glad to see you back Bobajob. Spent your Trump winnings yet?

Cheers sir. Yes, I have lavished them some new clothing for Lady Ajob. I very nearly sloshed some more on Olney last night but didn't think I could possibly win another longshot bet this year. More fool me. Looking forward to 2017, bizarrely.

Hope all good in your world.

david_herdson said:

DavidL said:

My younger daughter has recently announced that she has switched her loyalty from the Tories to the Lib Dems. She was a great fan of Cameron but has little time for May and finds Farron normal and likeable (something I was teasing her about only at tea time yesterday). Clearly she was ahead of the trend.

For the Tories this is a risk. Cameron and Osborne built their majority on the back of the bodies of their erstwhile coalition partners. They did so by repositioning the Tories as a centre party with a liberal social agenda and it played very well in Lib Dem seats.

In contrast May is much more of a traditional Conservative. This has allowed her to pick up some of the support that Cameron had lost to UKIP boosting her standing in the polls to remarkable levels. But are the Tories in danger of swopping the votes they needed to win a majority for ever larger majorities in already safe seats? I think they are and that this result, albeit helped by Zac's stupidity, is a good example of that.

I may not be following my daughter yet but I am massively less enthusiastic about May than I was about Cameron and Osborne. If it wasn't for Ruth...

If that is what's happening (a Con-LD swing, offset by a UKIP-Con one), it'd depend on the numbers but my gut instinct is that it'd see some losses to LDs in SW England and SW London, offset by gains from Labour in Mids, NW and Yorks. But with the majority so slim, which factor would be bigger is critical and would obviously depend on the numbers.

A sensible view I think.

FF43 said:

Casino_Royale said:

JosiasJessop said:

Casino_Royale said:

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving. LOL

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving.

That is serious trolling. And also serious confirmation bias. Thing is that virtually all the Brits that Verhofstadht will talk to (apart from DeExEU) will be Remainers reinforcing the EU view that Brexit is stupid/disastrous and the narrow victory Leave achieved was by deception.

That is going to heavily influence the EU negotiating strategy because they won't think we're serious, and will want to offer an awful deal with an escape route back to staying as a member with David Cameron's deal perhaps thrown in again as a sweetener.

Which tells me this has the potential to go quite wrong.

Agree with that.

The EU's response to our vote does not fill me with confidence. There seems to be no acknowledgement that the product they're selling is undesirable to many people.

That's a shame for them, as I doubt it's saleable in the long term to populations of some other EU countries.

They need to start listening.

Agreed. The conclusion I reached that the EU could not and would not listen to democratic votes for reform was one of my key reasons for leaving. The pull was the long-term economic opportunities i saw for an independent UK as well as the political renewal.

I am frustrated that the debate got so out-of-hand (and I didn't exactly help at times) but I don't think I could have brought myself to vote to Remain in this organisation under any circumstances, even if it were overwhelmingly in my immediate economic interests.

Fair enough. But people need to understand there's an equivalent group who support staying in the EU because it's the right thing to do. It sounds like David L's daughter is in this group. The assumption that Remainers are more reluctant than Leavers is a false one, I think. They're still pretty angry with Brexit. (Personally I am motivated by what's in the country's interest LOL and don't really take an ideological position one way or the other)

Mr Verhofstadt's comments are inappropriate for an elected official of an organisation that still contains Britain but they don't actually matter. They can only offend us but we're leaving anyway. Nobody else cares. The EU can hardly trash the negotiations and the relationship when it we've already done it ourselves.

Understood- fair post.

dogbasket said:

"Under Dave's watch the Tories gain and hold Richmond Park by 23k.

On Mrs May's watch the Tories don't get a single vote in Richmond Park"

By-election, not comparable.

The Tories can hope to gain swathes of Labour seats at the next election for Labour being a disaster including Brexit areas such as Wolverhampton SW, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Barrow & Furness, Dewsbury, Wrexham, NE Derbyshire, and others.

What do you reckon to Pennsylvania suddenly "finding" 18,000 Hillary NET votes in Philadelphia ?

For POTUS 2020 time to start compiling a list of states that report dodgily late results in case its close again.

kle4 said:

Razedabode said:

So Farron is deeming this result as "the fight back of the 48%".

I'm amazed politicians haven't yet grasped that results in London are rarely indicative of the wider country.

I'm sure they have grasped that. But they need to inspire the troops as they work on the rest.

Quite right. Plus the Red BNP brigade bizarrely quite like Corbyn (or some of them do) so Labour Leave seats up north are still safe-ish and would never vote Tory in any case.

QT last night was revealing. Lots of anti-immigrant sentiment in an area where – guess what – there are very few immigrants. 96% of Wakefielders are white. Only 2.5% were born outside the UK. So what are they so scared of? This fear of an non-present outsider is common to many Labour Leave places.

Jobabob said:

MaxPB said:

Jobabob said:

I wonder if the Leavers are underplaying this victory for Open Europe a mite too much? Tory Remainia is wealthy, powerful – and angry. The Leavers are starting to look like ideologues without a care for the economy. Much can change in a year. This is just the beginning.

Great victory for Open last night. Bravo.

Glad to see you back Bobajob. Spent your Trump winnings yet?

Cheers sir. Yes, I have lavished them some new clothing for Lady Ajob. I very nearly sloshed some more on Olney last night but didn't think I could possibly win another longshot bet this year. More fool me. Looking forward to 2017, bizarrely.

Hope all good in your world.

Very nice, I hope she enjoys her new clothes!

The world is a strange place, but my little corner is looking up. Just completed the purchase of my Zurich house and sold my Shepherds Bush place for a pretty huge profit a couple of weeks back.

Well done to the Lib Dems. I think some people are getting a little bit carried with a LD revival though. There are very few of their target seats which were so strongly for remain. The seats I think they could win with a strongly anti-Brexit message are:

Twickenham (c maj - 2,000; 69% remain)
Kingston (c maj - 2,800; 62% remain)
Cheltenham (c maj - 6,500; 56% remain)
Bath (c maj - 3,800; 58% remain in BANES (probably higher in Bath city))
Winchester (c maj - 17,000; 59% remain in the district (probably higher in Winchester city))
OXWAB (c maj - 9,500; 72% Oxford; 57% Vale of White Horse)
Lewes (c maj - 1,100; 52% remain)
Cheadle (c maj - 6,500; Stockport borough 53% remain but likely higher here as Stockport town probably voted to leave)
Hazel Grove (c maj - 6,600; as above)
St Albans (c maj -12,700 over Lab, 15,300 over LD; 63% remain)
Cambridge (Lab maj -599; 74% remain)

I would also expect the LDs to get close in S Cambs and Guildford

However, on the other side of the ledger a strongly anti-Brexit message could cost them 2 seats:

Carshalton (LD maj 1,500; Sutton 54% leave)
North Norfolk (LD maj 4,000; 59% leave)

I can also see the LDs losing ground in a number of other target seats such as Eastbourne, Torbay, Burnley, Yeovil, Portsmouth S and North Devon, which all voted strongly for leave

Freggles said:

RobD said:

Freggles said:

RobD said:

Freggles said:

RobD said:

Freggles said:

old_labour said:

Daily Mail reader comment

Apparently it would seem that Zac Goldsmith lost.Can we now have another vote on this because it was not the result that some people wanted?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/reader-comments/p/comment/link/160541910

No, let's take the Leave approach. Lib Dems won, that's the end of it, no second election in 2020, the people have spoken you undemocratic traitor. Richmond Park is yellow until the end of time regardless of anything else

Except referendums aren't periodic, while elections to Parliament are.

Are you suggesting that in a democracy people can change their minds? Remoaner nonsense.

No, but can you imagine us having referendums on leaving/joining the EU every five years?

Fortunately we don't have to, just when we're at a critical juncture like being offered a specific deal, or a new Treaty. Outside that, regular elections will be just fine.

A vote on the deal is stupid. Either we vote yes to the deal, and leave, or we vote no to the deal, and leave on even worse terms.

That ship sailed when Cameron promised a referendum but only with two options

If we are going to leave, we should have some mechanism to gain a mandate for whether to take a softer deal, our go full WTO hard as nails Brexit. Lance the boil. Otherwise someone will shout betrayal.

There is one way. A ge. A month ago I'd have said in a ge the Tories woukd campaign for hard, UKIP for apocalyptically hard, labour soft, LDs and green reverse Brexit, and labour for soft.

As it is, we'll just have the phony period ongoing, with remoAners looking for opportunities and hardcore brexiteers using the word betrayal so much you'd think they have a verbal tic.

kle4 said:

edmundintokyo said:

david_herdson said:

edmundintokyo said:

david_herdson said:

The question Tim Farron wasn't asked this morning (because it wasn't relevant) is who do the Lib Dems support in a hung parliament. For any third party - but particularly one positioning themselves as 'centrist' - that is a question they must always be ready to answer. For those seats in SW London and the wider SE, how does he choose between Corbyn, who would go down like a bucket of cold sick with those voters, and May, upon whom he's directing all his firepower?

They've never answered it before, and I don't think they'll start. The practical answer most likely depends on the parliamentary arithmetic; The chances that they'll have kingmaker power are quite small. In the unlikely event that they do have kingmaker power, they'll want to keep their options open and negotiate the best deal they can.

Clegg answered it before 2010 i.e. 'we're prepared to talk to both but the party with most votes gets first chance'. That clearly indicated a willingness to support either Brown or Cameron. Farron will need to answer whether he would be prepared - given an acceptable policy deal to his party - to (1) put Corbyn in No 10; (2) keep May in No 10. Those are the only options as things stand.

No, Clegg answered it with a masterpiece of vagueness, namely that he made a commitment to talk to the parties. In practice it seemed like for a deal with Lab to be on the cards they'd have to get rid of Brown, but in any case they didn't have the numbers.

The vagueness was surely necessary. If you're not willing to talk to one side then in a hung parliament situation you're already in a form of alliance with the other, and while it was provably so that More of the LDs preferred a deal with labour, though the numbers in the end made that difficult, they woukd have lost votes ruling out working the Tories, i fir one voted LD and was very annoyed by the commentariat declaring the LDs had betrayed my vote by going into cialition.

. I doubt the situation will arise again anytime soon, but could they be so vague again, given last time, onkybtheyd say they'd be much stricter on what they'd give up for a deal? Woukd they explicitly say they'd prefer labour, but it depends on what they are offered as to what would be best for the country?

Well, they might conceivably be more explicit about red lines. Obviously this closes off options, but it also potentially strengthens them in negotiations when it comes to getting those things. I think they're generally better refusing to commit, though. The problem is that once they say No Deal Without X, people are then going to say, what about Y and Z?

MaxPB said:

Pulpstar said:

Back in the USA:

https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/804407177368715265 !

What does that make Johnson?

A Leppo.

Morris_Dancer said:

That said... I do think there's a danger that, as someone here wrote 'the centre cannot hold'. There's a wide spectrum of possible outcomes, many of which are entirely reasonable, but which may be deemed unacceptable by eurofederalists or backbench headbangers.

Excepting departing the customs union, I'm pretty flexible about what could work.

As an aside, there was an interesting BBC piece on the news last night about Ivory Coast and chocolate exports, though it did fail to point out we can only negotiate our own deal if we leave the customs union.

The only chocolate I remember seeing on sale in Africa generally came from Romania, the Romanians having apparently solved the problem of it melting before anyone bought it by putting hardly any chocolate into it in the first place.

logical_song said:

dogbasket said:

Although Lincolnshire is the most Brexit county in Britain, with three areas voting >70% to leave the federal superstate, Sleaford is one of the less Brexit supporting areas, at just over 60%.

However, the Lib Dems have never exceeded 20% of the vote, so the Remain vote should split between Labour and Lib Dem fairly evenly leaving it a safe Con hold.

At any rate a far cry from Richmond Park with 70% Remain and a long history of Liberal MPs and close challengers.

If anything the vote in Sleaford should be for UKIp to protest Brexit not happening fast enough.

UKIP were a close third to Labour last time, will they come second or even win?

Nope , they are struggling to keep 3rd place behind Con , Labour and Marianne Overton the Independent .

MarkHopkins said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

TRIGGER WARNING FOR THE BREXITEERS

twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/804606951011340288

Guy. We're still leaving. LOL

Yes, but some of us brexiteers get very sensitive. Christ, the loonies ones talk of betrayal and enemies of the people if you suggest it will be difficult, not destined to succeed or point out the law (as currently interpreted)