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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » If TMay and Corbyn are still there at the next election then W
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » If TMay and Corbyn are still there at the next election then Windrush & antisemitism could still be dogging them
What a dramatic few days for both the prime minister and the leader of the opposition. Two huge issues continue to dominate the news which are big negatives for each of them respectively.
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However politically in brute terms the Jewish vote is solidly Tory and the Afro-Caribbean vote solidly Labour so I doubt it will impact much on the next general election
From Red Box
Even those who know her well insist they do not know what her plans are. "Let's be honest, she is not a big sharer," says one person who has worked closely with the PM. It is possible that she hasn't decided. It's certainly true that her closest aides want to keep open the possibility of fighting another election.
Tory MPs have other ideas: "We are putting up with it now, but if there is any sign of trying to 'go on and on' after next year, there will be insurrection," one MP only elected last year said.
And
To say the last year has been a bit bumpy is the sort of understatement the prime minister would enjoy. Each time May has looked like she has got on to the front foot – seeing off a leadership challenge, slapping down rivals, securing a transition deal, ordering successful airstrikes in Syria – something happens to trip her up – handling of the Grenfell Tower fire, the cough, the reshuffle and now Windrush.
Each triggers passionate defence from Team May in No10, and not all of it was her fault, but if sometimes you make your own luck, you can also lose it. "Give them some credit," one senior minister tells me. "Just when you think things are going well, they will find whole new, imaginative ways to f*** it up."
That pay deal looking better.
There is a good deal of mythology punted over New Zealand's climate, mostly by New Zealanders who are generally overly promotional about their own country, but also by Brits who have spent a few months there and got lucky. Even the East Coast is darned wet. It boasts more sunshine hours than, say, London, but at the cost of almost twice the annual rainfall.
Friends have just moved there, and it's not been a resounding success so far. Everything is very spread out; the pubs are crap or nonexistent; and even the cities require driving everywhere. It is not conducive to a good social life.
Regarding the economy, and opportunities, there are not many.
No-one can deny it has beautiful landscapes, but so does Britain, so does France, yet the downsides are manifold in NZ compared to those similar sized nations.
@RCS1000 is not far off when he calls NZ isolated. It is. It has the land area the size of the UK, with a population smaller than Scotland.
May's instincts are quite clearly on the illiberal side of the party on this issue.
Antisemitism on the other hand may very well.
I think Corbyn's anaemic response to anti-semitism is pretty much priced in as it was last year.
Unfortunately there's an unpleasant rump of Tories who don't like to be led by a woman. We had the same nonsense with some grandees preferring the manifestly unsuitable Heath over Maggie. TM has many of the resilient qualities of Maggie who, let it be remembered, was in deep deep deep doggy-do up until when the Argentinians gifted her a way out.
Theresa has proved remarkably strong and I fully expect her to lead the Conservatives into the next election, which I'm 90%+ certain she will win convincingly.
It certainly felt very isolated in the pre internet era. Economically patchy and a surprising amount of drugs and violent gang crime.
But if we assume she is still in post, I still don't think it'll be a problem: it's relatively easily sorted just by easing off on the documentation demanded. Whether there might be some similar problem relating to EU citizens' registrations is a whole different matter. Even so, that's still a question of policy and process and, as such, resolvable, even if the cost is jettisoning the purpose of the policy.
Corbyn's problems, however, run deeper. The anti-Jewish racism is embedded into the worldview of large parts of his core support and that's not going to go away because he's not going to challenge it and because their assumptions aren't going to change. It won't, however, be a first-order issue for voters - they'll carry on voting on the economy, housing, the NHS, security, Brexit, and so on.
It will, however, cause all sorts of internal problems for Labour and might yet, if some case become sufficiently totemic, be the trigger for a formal split: it's always easier to split on a nominal point of principle that makes your opponents look like prize sh*ts.
The context will be a BINO Brexit combined with a cyclical recession and the finger of blame. Windrush and antisemitism will not feature at all.
Labour majority.
The Tories are staid and old - even some of the long standing big Tory posters on here have implied as much.
Since I know how keen PBers are to arbitrate on this matter, could a judgment be made as to whether the 9% of voters who think the Windrush children should be kicked out are racists & xenophobes?
Thornberry is Ed Miliband in a skirt. Let us also not forget Major won in the midst of a recession in 1992 given Kinnock was the alternative
They couldn't have come up with a worse picture! She looks totally unhinged!
Frankly a lot of people don't mind a bit of racism.
The mail and others are going after Amber Rudd as this was ignored by her when the problem was first passed on to her department..
However, the utterly shocking debate in the HOC yesterday was just the most abject demonstration of Corbyn's lack of desire to address the problem
On the point about TM she has apologised publicly and on camera and has determined to right the wrongs. Corbyn has done neither and doubt he will.
Sky are saying that there are 49 cases being investigated re Windrush and not the 50,000 suggested.
Sky now dealing with last nights debate with clips and an interview with John Mann
Dementia tax? Theresa's appalling personality on show? Jezza surprising people? Jessa offering milk and honey without anyone except "the rich" having to pay for it?
But my main point wasn't who will be leaders but that the context will be a BINO Brexit combined with a cyclical recession and the finger of blame.
Windrush and antisemitism will not feature at all.
In my view Corbyn has problems but the anti-semitism issue is overblown. As far as I know, Corbyn doesn't discriminate against Jews at a racial level. Views of Judaism are complicated by perceptions of Israel as a state and by the fact many Jews see Israel as part of their identity. You don't have to be anti-semitic to criticise Israel, but I do believe some of the criticism is anti-semitic. You have to decide which is what. Thirdly all parties have issues with discrimination that they have to deal with. This is focusing on one issue and one party. Fourthly I am not convinced the issue has huge salience with the public. Knowing older people who have lived in the UK since childhood might be thrown out of the country or denied health treatment for failing to meet some red tape requirement is callous and clearly wrong. Whether some MP gets censured for attending a meeting isn't something people will be bothered with.
The economy has done incredibly well over the past 10 or 15 years, and unemployment is very low. The only economic fly in the ointment (as an immigrant) is that house prices are too high. I believe it’s ranked the easiest country in the world to set up a business and also least corrupt.
NZers are very welcoming and non-judgemental. It easy to build a social network. It is true the pubs are crap though. We tend to do cafes, or BBQs by the pool.
As for the wet, it varies. But when it rains, it rains properly. Hence we actually have more sunny days, and none of this grey “non-weather” London is often afflicted with.
I do feel immensely privileged to have grown there. It’s great to be well off in the U.K. But upper working and lower middle classes would be much better off in NZ.
I’ll stop banging on now.
The cycle is moving on and moving onto yesterdays debate
I'm not sure that either issue will be that damaging in the long term, because few really think May really set out to deprive the Windrush immigrants of basic rights, and few really think Corbyn is anti-semitic. To have an enduring impact, a scandal needs to play to prior assumptions.
The tabloids have been telling them what to do, and they've done it, and now the tabloids are going to kill them for it.
So, regardless of what you may now think of Corbyn, at the time he was hugely popular as a protest politician breaking the cosy Handy Mandy (;) consensus on the soft left.
I think it's actually quite remarkable with hindsight that the Tories didn't lose. Your beloved George would have got taken to the cleaners. It was TM's grammar school non-Notting Hill background that almost certainly saved her bacon.
It is true that it has probably kiboshed what remained of Amber Rudd's chances to become next leader, but mainly because it will be used as an excuse by those who think she's insufficiently zealous on Brexit. It's ironic, because she's actually handled it very well and very decisively.
Jeremy Corbyn's problem with anti-semitism is a little different in that it will roll on, given that he clearly hasn't got the slightest interest in doing anything about it. Still, in electoral terms it's minor in the overall scheme of things, except inasmuch as it won't be forgotten by Jewish voters. Where it might have an effect is within the PLP: those speeches in the debate yesterday by Labour MPs were absolutely astonishing; I can't recall a case where MPs have been so heartfelt in laying in to their own leadership.
https://twitter.com/ScouseGirlMedia/status/986372508868890624
1. He's being told that he's the best thing since Christ (possibly since before Christ as JC1 was, you know, J*wish). Why would he stand down amid adulation without the job even being begun, never mind finished?
2. When he does hand over, I'd expect he'd prefer a true believer. Thornberry isn't out of Corbyn's Bennite left. He might tolerate handing over to her with no better option; he won't if one option is staying on.
3. He didn't quit in 2016 when everything was really going wrong; why should we expect him to go when he's turned things round - and it was to a large extent him?
4. He doesn't head a monarchy. Even if he wanted to hand over to Thornberry, there'd be an election and the outcome wouldn't be certain. Is it worth risking the reforms for a marginal potential benefit and possibly (from the point of view of the left) irretrievable cost?
He has in the last three years met and married a Canadian and is now living in Vancouver. However he has business connections and has been there over the last ten days and is due back in Christchurch for 3 weeks in May.
He absolutely loves NZ, has duel citizenship, and that love of the Country is shared by my wife and I. However we would not want to make the long flight there again so living in Vancouver makes it easier for us to visit him
We’re all stuck with him until the Tories beat him at the next election.
Unless the Tories stick with May or choose Johnson as her repacement. Then we’ll be stuck with Corbyn as PM!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-43808716
Despite Brexit, etc...
Presumably the working behind this is that whereas the Windrush issue has tangibly affected people (hospital treatment foregone?), recipients of anti-semitic related abuse should just suck it up.
https://twitter.com/jonkay01/status/854300093142511621
But it, and the fairly scandalous state of immigration appeals, are the result of May's direct lead. Her illiberality on immigration and lack of concern for the results of uncompromising policies is fairly clear, as is demonstrated by the link I posted earlier this morning:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-38165395
"...The measures were dropped from the Immigration Bill, with Mrs May understood to be furious."
We seem to be useless at deporting foreign criminals and terrorists, but go turbo charged on the Windrush generation.
You were one of the worst for screaming about how Sadiq Khan was "dangerous" a couple of years ago, based entirely on racist stereotypes.
You have to go down though.
The government are absolutely terrible at "selling" this economic story (not helped by the fact the Chancellor looks more like the Chief Mourner at the funeral UK PLC while the Prime Minister doesn't "do" speaking to the public....)