Labour created the monster of harvesting Muslim community bloc votes and yesterday that monster came back to bite them. As I've said many times before, we are a multiracial country, not a multicultural country.
If you stir up grievance politics between groups based on religion or race, as Labour have done for decades, as Reform are seeking to do, and as the Greens have done successfully in this by-election, you are pitting neighbours against each other and you start to unravel the culture of tolerance that makes Britain great.
Our country is not broken, but this by-election showed that Labour, Reform and the Greens are trying very hard to break it. Labour trying to buy people off with more and more benefits spending. Reform telling people you can't be British if you aren't white. The Greens running a nasty, sectarian campaign while simultaneously wanting to legalise crack-cocaine.
Wow. That's actually quite good from Kemi. Did she write it? Thumping Labour while also not giving Reform any satisfaction. If she can continue on that line, with a bit of fleshing out, she may just have found a political sweet spot.
As a black woman with Conservative views, who has described herself as a first generation immigrant, she has already got the political sweet spot, the Tories need to continue to be patient with her. She is perfectly placed to be the non divisive option at the next GE. Badenoch’s ratings are on the up, and that should drag the Conservatives with them.
I am a Kemi defender, mostly, and I agree she needs time, but I think the more the party delivers results like it did last night and cedes the ground of opposition to Reform, the more chance there is that voters simply give up on the party*. The problem isn’t really of Badenoch’s making, but I have made the point that results like last night give Farage much more ammunition to present Reform as some kind of bulwark against a left wing coalition, as opposed to the Tories.
* I fully acknowledge that G&D is never going to be on the Tory target list.
I quite like the various quotes from Kemi discussed downthread. And I think if the Conservative Party decide this result shows they need someone else they are absolutely insane. Which potential leader would have done better? I know HYUFD often suggests that James Cleverly would appeal to LD voters, but squeezing the LD vote in G&D doesn't bring more, and these things are never one way - gains are always netted off with losses.
Labour lost their deposit and even more vote share in Chesham, Somerton and Tiverton and went on to a 400 plus seat landslide. All talk of the negatives of the Tory performance last night is irrelevant nonsense frankly
A Black, Conservative, female PM who pays no mind to tokenism, refuses to hide behind identity politics and has no time for multiculturalism is the left’s worst nightmare, hence their constant dismissal of her.
Hardly.
And I don't think she is PM, but rather LOTR, albeit on borrowed time.
Having got shot of Jenrick and Braverman, she then spurned the One Nation Tories.
So she seems to be aiming at a 10% strategy. There are a whole load of things she is against, but what actually is she for?
There are no obvious alternatives to supplant her so she probably gets to keep the job a bit longer, but what is her strategy? She is polling worse than the worst Tory election result in 2 centuries? How does she reverse that?
Kemi needs a good performance in May, if the Conservatives fail to beat even a very unpopular Labour Party in the local and devolved elections then Tory MPs will start to consider replacing her. At the bare minimum the Tories need second behind Reform.
If Labour move left to stop more leakage to the Greens, there would be a gap in the centre to win back centrist swing voters who don't want Labour, the Greens or Reform and for whom the LDs are too pro EU which say Cleverly could fill. Cleverly could also win more anti Reform tactical votes in Tory held seats from Labour, the LDs and Greens than Kemi
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
That strikes me as an overestimate. A lot of the 7% are going to be contrarians, idiots, people who really like one niche aspect of him, like that he was in Home Alone 2 (ask Nick Palmer about that sort of thing), or people who didn't read the question properly. I'd say 3% at most. But even if it was 7%, I'd say you could easily get enough Sunday afternoon pub grumblers (this is an archetype of course, they don't physically have to be in the pub on a Sunday afternoon) who might be interested in a 'common sense says...' argument but who are currently turned off by the less attractive aspects of Reform.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
Question: if you do care about the environment, passionately, from global warming to cleaner rivers, but you’re somewhat less keen on supporting Hamas or hating Hindus, exactly who are you meant to vote for now?
The Greens are entirely vacating the traditional “green” sector of British politics
It’s quite peculiar. Presumably some other party will seize that ground. Indeed it might be a useful way for Labour to recover. Eventually
Curiously, early Dave enjoyed considerable success with that very ruse. It was only when he ventured into the horror show of Tory EU politics that everything exploded.
"Vote Blue, Go Green!"
Not any more. Badenoch has told centrist Conservatives to piss off. The party for centrist environmentally concerned voters is the Lib Dems. Indeed there is a strong official Green Lib Dems group.
(These ads do that 80s thing of having somewhat edgy images of bikinied women and lots of cleavage, with a few oiled up men thrown in for balance, and a bit of role reversal.)
An horrific case from ICE / Police in NY that is going to take a hell of a lot of untangling.
Briefly, an elderly refugee Shah Alam in the USA legally (from the Rohingya Genocide in Myanmar - there are some refugees from that in the closest Mosque to me, in Mansfield), who is functionally blind and not an English speaker, was walking using a curtain rod as a walking stick.
He ended up in private property. Police were called. Then he was stunned (I assume Tased), tackled and handcuffed, and arrested by Police for not doing what they shouted when they told him to drop the rods, and biting 2 officers in the struggle. This is Feb 2025. He was then held in custody for a year.
It was settled as a minor charge, and he was to be released this Feb on bond (complicated reasons why not done before). Then he was collected by Border Control, who later determined he was a refugee and could not be detained.
So he was released by Border Control at a closed coffee shop (allegedly he requested to be released there) at mid-evening in sub-zero temperatures.
His body was found in the snow 4 miles away, days later.
I really don't know what to make of it. I suspect it will be "we did what our systems say so this is not our problem".
Sounds like homicide to me.
The release of detainees, late at night, in freezing conditions, away from refuge, and without notifying family is happening regularly enough to appear deliberate policy. Usually they are rescued by volunteers.
Something like this happeninghas been predicted for a while.
There’s previous history in the US (and some parts of Canada) for abandoning people the police don’t like in the middle of nowhere, in weather conditions that are lethal (cold) very rapidly.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
You mean there's no racism on the Asian side? Only white people can be racist?
One point is that once again we see similar practices desired at both ends of the spectrum, to give us our horse shoe.
Stereotypically - modest women, circumscribed by men, having lots of babies and staying at home as they are told, being the symbolic heart of their community.
Labour created the monster of harvesting Muslim community bloc votes and yesterday that monster came back to bite them. As I've said many times before, we are a multiracial country, not a multicultural country.
If you stir up grievance politics between groups based on religion or race, as Labour have done for decades, as Reform are seeking to do, and as the Greens have done successfully in this by-election, you are pitting neighbours against each other and you start to unravel the culture of tolerance that makes Britain great.
Our country is not broken, but this by-election showed that Labour, Reform and the Greens are trying very hard to break it. Labour trying to buy people off with more and more benefits spending. Reform telling people you can't be British if you aren't white. The Greens running a nasty, sectarian campaign while simultaneously wanting to legalise crack-cocaine.
Wow. That's actually quite good from Kemi. Did she write it? Thumping Labour while also not giving Reform any satisfaction. If she can continue on that line, with a bit of fleshing out, she may just have found a political sweet spot.
As a black woman with Conservative views, who has described herself as a first generation immigrant, she has already got the political sweet spot, the Tories need to continue to be patient with her. She is perfectly placed to be the non divisive option at the next GE. Badenoch’s ratings are on the up, and that should drag the Conservatives with them.
I am a Kemi defender, mostly, and I agree she needs time, but I think the more the party delivers results like it did last night and cedes the ground of opposition to Reform, the more chance there is that voters simply give up on the party*. The problem isn’t really of Badenoch’s making, but I have made the point that results like last night give Farage much more ammunition to present Reform as some kind of bulwark against a left wing coalition, as opposed to the Tories.
* I fully acknowledge that G&D is never going to be on the Tory target list.
I quite like the various quotes from Kemi discussed downthread. And I think if the Conservative Party decide this result shows they need someone else they are absolutely insane. Which potential leader would have done better? I know HYUFD often suggests that James Cleverly would appeal to LD voters, but squeezing the LD vote in G&D doesn't bring more, and these things are never one way - gains are always netted off with losses.
Labour lost their deposit and even more vote share in Chesham, Somerton and Tiverton and went on to a 400 plus seat landslide. All talk of the negatives of the Tory performance last night is irrelevant nonsense frankly
A Black, Conservative, female PM who pays no mind to tokenism, refuses to hide behind identity politics and has no time for multiculturalism is the left’s worst nightmare, hence their constant dismissal of her.
Hardly.
And I don't think she is PM, but rather LOTR, albeit on borrowed time.
Having got shot of Jenrick and Braverman, she then spurned the One Nation Tories.
So she seems to be aiming at a 10% strategy. There are a whole load of things she is against, but what actually is she for?
There are no obvious alternatives to supplant her so she probably gets to keep the job a bit longer, but what is her strategy? She is polling worse than the worst Tory election result in 2 centuries? How does she reverse that?
Her personal ratings are neck and neck for the best of the current leaders. The Conservatives have lost a load of votes to Reform, after losing hundreds of seats in a disastrous election. Getting those people to come back is an obvious way of reversing the current party VI, and Reform have a decent chance of implosion.
An horrific case from ICE / Police in NY that is going to take a hell of a lot of untangling.
Briefly, an elderly refugee Shah Alam in the USA legally (from the Rohingya Genocide in Myanmar - there are some refugees from that in the closest Mosque to me, in Mansfield), who is functionally blind and not an English speaker, was walking using a curtain rod as a walking stick.
He ended up in private property. Police were called. Then he was stunned (I assume Tased), tackled and handcuffed, and arrested by Police for not doing what they shouted when they told him to drop the rods, and biting 2 officers in the struggle. This is Feb 2025. He was then held in custody for a year.
It was settled as a minor charge, and he was to be released this Feb on bond (complicated reasons why not done before). Then he was collected by Border Control, who later determined he was a refugee and could not be detained.
So he was released by Border Control at a closed coffee shop (allegedly he requested to be released there) at mid-evening in sub-zero temperatures.
His body was found in the snow 4 miles away, days later.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
Spot on in my opiniin
Lad 200 Green 100 LD 100
15 to 20 years if coalition. O And S centre left progressive Government IF all 3 are sensible. Give Greens Environment, give LD social care straight away to get buy in
Labour created the monster of harvesting Muslim community bloc votes and yesterday that monster came back to bite them. As I've said many times before, we are a multiracial country, not a multicultural country.
If you stir up grievance politics between groups based on religion or race, as Labour have done for decades, as Reform are seeking to do, and as the Greens have done successfully in this by-election, you are pitting neighbours against each other and you start to unravel the culture of tolerance that makes Britain great.
Our country is not broken, but this by-election showed that Labour, Reform and the Greens are trying very hard to break it. Labour trying to buy people off with more and more benefits spending. Reform telling people you can't be British if you aren't white. The Greens running a nasty, sectarian campaign while simultaneously wanting to legalise crack-cocaine.
The Greens ran a sectarian campaign? Did they?
Lots of focus on Gaza says yes
That a UK jury won't convict for criminal damage of an Israeli-owned arms factory is a better indication of public opinion specifically on Gaza than this by-election. There are many more factors to the Green win
There is going to be a retrial
An appeal by the government, not a retrial I think.
Different thing. Government appealing the decision about banning Palestine Action, A retrial about the assault during the raid on the factory.
Don’t worry, the retrial will follow the appeal.
Maybe the government will hold it in front of a panel of judges. No pesky juries.
Did you know that one reason for the abolition of Grand Juries was concerns that juries might might not indict popular (socialist/communist) agitators?
Goodwin's whinging comes across as pathetic. Did he expect Muslims to vote for a party that demonises them? The only thing that would have happened if more people had stayed with Labour is his party would have been pushed to third place.
I am a bit suspicious of these "family voting" allegations. If they were not drawn to the attention of the polling station staff (who meticululously apply the rules in my experience) then how are these allegations to be investigated or substantiated?
The role of the observers is to observe, not to interfere.
In practice when you are touring polling stations it might not feel safe to report concerns to the staff there and then but you would report it back to your agent, with evidence who would then instantly report the concern to the Returning Officer or his staff.
Dead people voting and personation is generally not obvious to tellers outside polling stations but only reveals itself when you check the polling numbers against the marked register. The phenomenon of three dead people voting in Kirkby Lonsdale of all places shows this is much more rife that those not used to electioneering imagine. "Well what did you do about it ?" Well nothing because we didn't know they were dead when the numbers were collected. Obviously we MIGHT well have challenged a result where it mattered, and there is a mechanism for searching the polls against the counterfoils but I don't think it has actually been done in 50 years.
I could rewrite electoral law with my experience, not in any partisan way but to make it absolutely clear what could and couldn't be done.
Well the actual code of practice from the Electoral Commission for electoral observers states:
3.14 Observers may bring irregularities, fraud or significant problems to the attention of electoral officials on the spot
and
3.22 Accredited observers are encouraged to provide feedback on their observations.....to the election staff where you observe.
A strange move in the betting on most seats next GE; Green into 7.2 and Tories out to 8.4
I don’t see why the Greens shortening should cause the Conservatives to drift, in fact I think the Greens shortening should mean the Tories should as well
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
Spot on in my opiniin
Lad 200 Green 100 LD 100
15 to 20 years if coalition. O And S centre left progressive Government IF all 3 are sensible. Give Greens Environment, give LD social care straight away to get buy in
If Reform are on 28% or so nationally, and they got 28% in such a seat, either their vote is very even, or they are going to pick up a lot of seats.
1. Left wing voters will vote for the best candidate to stop Reform. Conservative voters will switch completely behind Reform, in seats the Conservatives cannot win.
Conservatives who will vote left to stop Reform should be called unicorns, they are so rare.
2. By-elections confirm polling, showing the overall right wing vote share is up about 10% on 2024.
3. Advance, and other right wing rivals to Reform, are trivial nuisances.
There seem to be plenty of Conservative never Reformers on here. I spoke with Mum Rata the other day and, given some of the things she has said over the years, was surprised by her vehemence of never Reformer.
I didn't ask who, theoretically, she'd have voted for yesterday, or even whether she'd have turned out, but the Con never Reformers, who I think are more numerous than 1.9%, did go somewhere.
Other parties got nothing, so the Con-never-Reformers can only have gone Green, Labour, Reform UK or not voting.
It would be overstating things to say I'm a Con-never-reformer - I'm an often Con-Not-Reform-as-they-are-right-nower. But I'm in the bracket that Pro-Rata is talking about. And if I were in the constituency, I'd have probably voted Labour. Not as a rebuke to Kemi or an expression of admiration for SKS, but as (for my tastes) by far the sanest of the three parties with a realistic chance of winning and also the best candidate. I'm sure among the 70,000 voters of G&D there may have been some like me.
Labour created the monster of harvesting Muslim community bloc votes and yesterday that monster came back to bite them. As I've said many times before, we are a multiracial country, not a multicultural country.
If you stir up grievance politics between groups based on religion or race, as Labour have done for decades, as Reform are seeking to do, and as the Greens have done successfully in this by-election, you are pitting neighbours against each other and you start to unravel the culture of tolerance that makes Britain great.
Our country is not broken, but this by-election showed that Labour, Reform and the Greens are trying very hard to break it. Labour trying to buy people off with more and more benefits spending. Reform telling people you can't be British if you aren't white. The Greens running a nasty, sectarian campaign while simultaneously wanting to legalise crack-cocaine.
Wow. That's actually quite good from Kemi. Did she write it? Thumping Labour while also not giving Reform any satisfaction. If she can continue on that line, with a bit of fleshing out, she may just have found a political sweet spot.
As a black woman with Conservative views, who has described herself as a first generation immigrant, she has already got the political sweet spot, the Tories need to continue to be patient with her. She is perfectly placed to be the non divisive option at the next GE. Badenoch’s ratings are on the up, and that should drag the Conservatives with them.
I am a Kemi defender, mostly, and I agree she needs time, but I think the more the party delivers results like it did last night and cedes the ground of opposition to Reform, the more chance there is that voters simply give up on the party*. The problem isn’t really of Badenoch’s making, but I have made the point that results like last night give Farage much more ammunition to present Reform as some kind of bulwark against a left wing coalition, as opposed to the Tories.
* I fully acknowledge that G&D is never going to be on the Tory target list.
I quite like the various quotes from Kemi discussed downthread. And I think if the Conservative Party decide this result shows they need someone else they are absolutely insane. Which potential leader would have done better? I know HYUFD often suggests that James Cleverly would appeal to LD voters, but squeezing the LD vote in G&D doesn't bring more, and these things are never one way - gains are always netted off with losses.
Labour lost their deposit and even more vote share in Chesham, Somerton and Tiverton and went on to a 400 plus seat landslide. All talk of the negatives of the Tory performance last night is irrelevant nonsense frankly
For parties that were never in the running, that's usually the case. A possible exception is that by-election when David Owen's attempt to continue the SDP outside of the alliance polled so badly that it effectively packed up shop as a serious proposition.
Labour created the monster of harvesting Muslim community bloc votes and yesterday that monster came back to bite them. As I've said many times before, we are a multiracial country, not a multicultural country.
If you stir up grievance politics between groups based on religion or race, as Labour have done for decades, as Reform are seeking to do, and as the Greens have done successfully in this by-election, you are pitting neighbours against each other and you start to unravel the culture of tolerance that makes Britain great.
Our country is not broken, but this by-election showed that Labour, Reform and the Greens are trying very hard to break it. Labour trying to buy people off with more and more benefits spending. Reform telling people you can't be British if you aren't white. The Greens running a nasty, sectarian campaign while simultaneously wanting to legalise crack-cocaine.
Wow. That's actually quite good from Kemi. Did she write it? Thumping Labour while also not giving Reform any satisfaction. If she can continue on that line, with a bit of fleshing out, she may just have found a political sweet spot.
As a black woman with Conservative views, who has described herself as a first generation immigrant, she has already got the political sweet spot, the Tories need to continue to be patient with her. She is perfectly placed to be the non divisive option at the next GE. Badenoch’s ratings are on the up, and that should drag the Conservatives with them.
I am a Kemi defender, mostly, and I agree she needs time, but I think the more the party delivers results like it did last night and cedes the ground of opposition to Reform, the more chance there is that voters simply give up on the party*. The problem isn’t really of Badenoch’s making, but I have made the point that results like last night give Farage much more ammunition to present Reform as some kind of bulwark against a left wing coalition, as opposed to the Tories.
* I fully acknowledge that G&D is never going to be on the Tory target list.
I quite like the various quotes from Kemi discussed downthread. And I think if the Conservative Party decide this result shows they need someone else they are absolutely insane. Which potential leader would have done better? I know HYUFD often suggests that James Cleverly would appeal to LD voters, but squeezing the LD vote in G&D doesn't bring more, and these things are never one way - gains are always netted off with losses.
Labour lost their deposit and even more vote share in Chesham, Somerton and Tiverton and went on to a 400 plus seat landslide. All talk of the negatives of the Tory performance last night is irrelevant nonsense frankly
A Black, Conservative, female PM who pays no mind to tokenism, refuses to hide behind identity politics and has no time for multiculturalism is the left’s worst nightmare, hence their constant dismissal of her.
Hardly.
And I don't think she is PM, but rather LOTR, albeit on borrowed time.
Having got shot of Jenrick and Braverman, she then spurned the One Nation Tories.
So she seems to be aiming at a 10% strategy. There are a whole load of things she is against, but what actually is she for?
There are no obvious alternatives to supplant her so she probably gets to keep the job a bit longer, but what is her strategy? She is polling worse than the worst Tory election result in 2 centuries? How does she reverse that?
Kemi needs a good performance in May, if the Conservatives fail to beat even a very unpopular Labour Party in the local and devolved elections then Tory MPs will start to consider replacing her. At the bare minimum the Tories need second behind Reform.
If Labour move left to stop more leakage to the Greens, there would be a gap in the centre to win back centrist swing voters who don't want Labour, the Greens or Reform and for whom the LDs are too pro EU which say Cleverly could fill. Cleverly could also win more anti Reform tactical votes in Tory held seats from Labour, the LDs and Greens than Kemi
Cleverly or Mordsunt who would need a different leader to get a seat chance, would be far more likely to rescue Tories. Not for 2028 or 2029 but for the future and from oblivion.
Labour created the monster of harvesting Muslim community bloc votes and yesterday that monster came back to bite them. As I've said many times before, we are a multiracial country, not a multicultural country.
If you stir up grievance politics between groups based on religion or race, as Labour have done for decades, as Reform are seeking to do, and as the Greens have done successfully in this by-election, you are pitting neighbours against each other and you start to unravel the culture of tolerance that makes Britain great.
Our country is not broken, but this by-election showed that Labour, Reform and the Greens are trying very hard to break it. Labour trying to buy people off with more and more benefits spending. Reform telling people you can't be British if you aren't white. The Greens running a nasty, sectarian campaign while simultaneously wanting to legalise crack-cocaine.
Wow. That's actually quite good from Kemi. Did she write it? Thumping Labour while also not giving Reform any satisfaction. If she can continue on that line, with a bit of fleshing out, she may just have found a political sweet spot.
As a black woman with Conservative views, who has described herself as a first generation immigrant, she has already got the political sweet spot, the Tories need to continue to be patient with her. She is perfectly placed to be the non divisive option at the next GE. Badenoch’s ratings are on the up, and that should drag the Conservatives with them.
I am a Kemi defender, mostly, and I agree she needs time, but I think the more the party delivers results like it did last night and cedes the ground of opposition to Reform, the more chance there is that voters simply give up on the party*. The problem isn’t really of Badenoch’s making, but I have made the point that results like last night give Farage much more ammunition to present Reform as some kind of bulwark against a left wing coalition, as opposed to the Tories.
* I fully acknowledge that G&D is never going to be on the Tory target list.
I quite like the various quotes from Kemi discussed downthread. And I think if the Conservative Party decide this result shows they need someone else they are absolutely insane. Which potential leader would have done better? I know HYUFD often suggests that James Cleverly would appeal to LD voters, but squeezing the LD vote in G&D doesn't bring more, and these things are never one way - gains are always netted off with losses.
Labour lost their deposit and even more vote share in Chesham, Somerton and Tiverton and went on to a 400 plus seat landslide. All talk of the negatives of the Tory performance last night is irrelevant nonsense frankly
A Black, Conservative, female PM who pays no mind to tokenism, refuses to hide behind identity politics and has no time for multiculturalism is the left’s worst nightmare, hence their constant dismissal of her.
Hardly.
And I don't think she is PM, but rather LOTR, albeit on borrowed time.
Having got shot of Jenrick and Braverman, she then spurned the One Nation Tories.
So she seems to be aiming at a 10% strategy. There are a whole load of things she is against, but what actually is she for?
There are no obvious alternatives to supplant her so she probably gets to keep the job a bit longer, but what is her strategy? She is polling worse than the worst Tory election result in 2 centuries? How does she reverse that?
Her personal ratings are neck and neck for the best of the current leaders. The Conservatives have lost a load of votes to Reform, after losing hundreds of seats in a disastrous election. Getting those people to come back is an obvious way of reversing the current party VI, and Reform have a decent chance of implosion.
I certainly don't see last night's result making Reform implosion-proof.
Farage must be looking over the Atlantic and seeing a chance to make umpty million from grifting - a chance with a short shelf-life.
A few overblown things in the post-by-election commentary:
- “Greens on the March”. Yes they done well but this was perfect context and timing for them, combined with an efficient anti-Reform squeeze - Tories buried: no, they just got squeezed in a Reform-Green fight, because it’s a by-election and that’s what happens - Lib Dems nowhere: the least surprising result of the night, they were never going to be anywhere in this constituency - Labour in dire straits: it wasn’t actually that bad or humiliating a defeat by modern by-election standards. Not great, but fairly par - Reform have peaked and should be worried: this by-election doesn’t really point to that. It wasn’t particularly fertile territory.
So on reflection, pretty much all the reactions have been overblown.
All true, except that:
- it does figure in Labour's ten worst losses of vote share, and even if that becomes unimportant in terms of how people come to vote when 2029 arrives, it is important in the political and media narrative, and within the ongoing psychodrama that is our national politics.
- Reform started as the potential NOTA insurgent, yet the Greens managed to steal pole position, as did Plaid in Caerphilly, in both cases suggesting both a ceiling to Reform's appeal and a willingness among non-Reform voters to seek out an alternative winning horse
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
Spot on in my opiniin
Lad 200 Green 100 LD 100
15 to 20 years if coalition. O And S centre left progressive Government IF all 3 are sensible. Give Greens Environment, give LD social care straight away to get buy in
Whose going to form this new high-polling 'Lad' party? Someone off of Top Gear?
More seriously, it is surely beyond high time that meaningful electoral reform got back up towards the top of the political agenda, particularly for this most blinkered of governments?
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
A few overblown things in the post-by-election commentary:
- “Greens on the March”. Yes they done well but this was perfect context and timing for them, combined with an efficient anti-Reform squeeze - Tories buried: no, they just got squeezed in a Reform-Green fight, because it’s a by-election and that’s what happens - Lib Dems nowhere: the least surprising result of the night, they were never going to be anywhere in this constituency - Labour in dire straits: it wasn’t actually that bad or humiliating a defeat by modern by-election standards. Not great, but fairly par - Reform have peaked and should be worried: this by-election doesn’t really point to that. It wasn’t particularly fertile territory.
So on reflection, pretty much all the reactions have been overblown.
All true, except that:
- it does figure in Labour's ten worst losses of vote share, and even if that becomes unimportant in terms of how people come to vote when 2029 arrives, it is important in the political and media narrative, and within the ongoing psychodrama that is our national politics.
- Reform started as the potential NOTA insurgent, yet the Greens managed to steal pole position, as did Plaid in Caerphilly, in both cases suggesting both a ceiling to Reform's appeal and a willingness among non-Reform voters to seek out an alternative winning horse
On your second point - also a willingness among NOTA voters to seek out an alternative horse.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
Spot on in my opiniin
Lad 200 Green 100 LD 100
15 to 20 years if coalition. O And S centre left progressive Government IF all 3 are sensible. Give Greens Environment, give LD social care straight away to get buy in
If Reform are on 28% or so nationally, and they got 28% in such a seat, either their vote is very even, or they are going to pick up a lot of seats.
The Tories aren't going to be driven down to 2% of the national vote, or anywhere close, in a GE
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
That strikes me as an overestimate. A lot of the 7% are going to be contrarians, idiots, people who really like one niche aspect of him, like that he was in Home Alone 2 (ask Nick Palmer about that sort of thing), or people who didn't read the question properly. I'd say 3% at most. But even if it was 7%, I'd say you could easily get enough Sunday afternoon pub grumblers (this is an archetype of course, they don't physically have to be in the pub on a Sunday afternoon) who might be interested in a 'common sense says...' argument but who are currently turned off by the less attractive aspects of Reform.
Well let's see how they go from here. A prominent theme in their messaging is "we want our country back" which has strong racist appeal and it's no accident that it does. Farage is no fool and he'll drop this aspect if he judges it's repelling more voters than it's attracting.
An horrific case from ICE / Police in NY that is going to take a hell of a lot of untangling.
Briefly, an elderly refugee Shah Alam in the USA legally (from the Rohingya Genocide in Myanmar - there are some refugees from that in the closest Mosque to me, in Mansfield), who is functionally blind and not an English speaker, was walking using a curtain rod as a walking stick.
He ended up in private property. Police were called. Then he was stunned (I assume Tased), tackled and handcuffed, and arrested by Police for not doing what they shouted when they told him to drop the rods, and biting 2 officers in the struggle. This is Feb 2025. He was then held in custody for a year.
It was settled as a minor charge, and he was to be released this Feb on bond (complicated reasons why not done before). Then he was collected by Border Control, who later determined he was a refugee and could not be detained.
So he was released by Border Control at a closed coffee shop (allegedly he requested to be released there) at mid-evening in sub-zero temperatures.
His body was found in the snow 4 miles away, days later.
I think there are a lot of causes in US policing that feed such possible situations, and inappropriate violence on vulnerable people because they do not have standard abilities is known *, including imo under training, 18,000 often tiny police departments, police not held to account for ms#istakes, a bias to violence, and the increased risk in a society buried under 400 million guns.
* I sometimes follow a Youtube civil liberties channel. Here's a "cockup" one - a man, who is a paraplegic using a wheel chair, arrested for an offence which involved kicking a door down: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4D5V19zqFc
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
A few overblown things in the post-by-election commentary:
- “Greens on the March”. Yes they done well but this was perfect context and timing for them, combined with an efficient anti-Reform squeeze - Tories buried: no, they just got squeezed in a Reform-Green fight, because it’s a by-election and that’s what happens - Lib Dems nowhere: the least surprising result of the night, they were never going to be anywhere in this constituency - Labour in dire straits: it wasn’t actually that bad or humiliating a defeat by modern by-election standards. Not great, but fairly par - Reform have peaked and should be worried: this by-election doesn’t really point to that. It wasn’t particularly fertile territory.
So on reflection, pretty much all the reactions have been overblown.
All true, except that:
- it does figure in Labour's ten worst losses of vote share, and even if that becomes unimportant in terms of how people come to vote when 2029 arrives, it is important in the political and media narrative, and within the ongoing psychodrama that is our national politics.
- Reform started as the potential NOTA insurgent, yet the Greens managed to steal pole position, as did Plaid in Caerphilly, in both cases suggesting both a ceiling to Reform's appeal and a willingness among non-Reform voters to seek out an alternative winning horse
On your second point - also a willingness among NOTA voters to seek out an alternative horse.
Yep. Which is the real bad news for Labour, as it plays directly into the votes (council votes being seen as just protest votes by many voters) that many of us have to cast in a couple of months' time. The Greens have the best possible launchpad and will surely pick up yet more members and helpers on the back of their historic first by-election win, as the Liberals did post-Orpington.
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
It's too early to say, as Labour appears doomed because in midterm it's the only one being rated as an actual government. The others are simply being rated as to how effective and appropriate they are for whatever each voter wishes to protest about. When people start to think about Prime Minister Kemi or Nigel or Zack or Ed, things might look rather different.
London and Paris say they’re ready to lead a peacekeeping mission.
Why would you take the risk of paratroopers?
They won't be parachuting in. Is it not just that they are the best trained for rapid deployment in a variety of conditions ?
What? Special training to sit in the back of an A400M? They can't just deploy the Para Reg, there is a whole comms and logisitics apparatus that has to go with them as part of 16 Air Assault.
The whole thing sounds fantastically stupid, real July 1914 stuff.
Which bunch of squaddies would you send ?
None of them. It's none of our business which gang of criminals runs the arse crack of Eastern Europe.
Sure, it's none of our business which psycho is in the Kremlin. Ukraine is a democracy, and represents a far better future for the rest of Europe if it remains so, rather than being part of Putin's military empire.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Why might this Tory disaster be good for them? (Though it probably won't be).
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
Spot on in my opiniin
Lad 200 Green 100 LD 100
15 to 20 years if coalition. O And S centre left progressive Government IF all 3 are sensible. Give Greens Environment, give LD social care straight away to get buy in
If Reform are on 28% or so nationally, and they got 28% in such a seat, either their vote is very even, or they are going to pick up a lot of seats.
The Tories aren't going to be driven down to 2% of the national vote, or anywhere close, in a GE
I think Starmer looked rather broken this morning. I don't think it'll ever get to a leadership challenge, he'll resign at some point of his choosing (long before the next election).
I think so too. But MPs will have to know and believe that to hold off until he does.
Just after the May local elections is the most obvious time.
A few overblown things in the post-by-election commentary:
- “Greens on the March”. Yes they done well but this was perfect context and timing for them, combined with an efficient anti-Reform squeeze - Tories buried: no, they just got squeezed in a Reform-Green fight, because it’s a by-election and that’s what happens - Lib Dems nowhere: the least surprising result of the night, they were never going to be anywhere in this constituency - Labour in dire straits: it wasn’t actually that bad or humiliating a defeat by modern by-election standards. Not great, but fairly par - Reform have peaked and should be worried: this by-election doesn’t really point to that. It wasn’t particularly fertile territory.
So on reflection, pretty much all the reactions have been overblown.
Agree, pretty much, but I think you underplay the Green success. They won easily when the consensus was 'tight' and there wasn't really a high efficiency anti-Ref squeeze in that Labour's vote didn't collapse, it held up to around national VI poll changes since GE24.
A few overblown things in the post-by-election commentary:
- “Greens on the March”. Yes they done well but this was perfect context and timing for them, combined with an efficient anti-Reform squeeze - Tories buried: no, they just got squeezed in a Reform-Green fight, because it’s a by-election and that’s what happens - Lib Dems nowhere: the least surprising result of the night, they were never going to be anywhere in this constituency - Labour in dire straits: it wasn’t actually that bad or humiliating a defeat by modern by-election standards. Not great, but fairly par - Reform have peaked and should be worried: this by-election doesn’t really point to that. It wasn’t particularly fertile territory.
So on reflection, pretty much all the reactions have been overblown.
Yes, except for your second point. That the Tories weren’t even a contender here is a problem for a party that’s meant to be the Official Opposition.
Yes and no. We don't have PR. In every election each seat is separate. Here the Tory candidate was never going to get anywhere. Same applies to the Lib Dem candidate. But there are hundreds of other seats where they will.
An horrific case from ICE / Police in NY that is going to take a hell of a lot of untangling.
Briefly, an elderly refugee Shah Alam in the USA legally (from the Rohingya Genocide in Myanmar - there are some refugees from that in the closest Mosque to me, in Mansfield), who is functionally blind and not an English speaker, was walking using a curtain rod as a walking stick.
He ended up in private property. Police were called. Then he was stunned (I assume Tased), tackled and handcuffed, and arrested by Police for not doing what they shouted when they told him to drop the rods, and biting 2 officers in the struggle. This is Feb 2025. He was then held in custody for a year.
It was settled as a minor charge, and he was to be released this Feb on bond (complicated reasons why not done before). Then he was collected by Border Control, who later determined he was a refugee and could not be detained.
So he was released by Border Control at a closed coffee shop (allegedly he requested to be released there) at mid-evening in sub-zero temperatures.
His body was found in the snow 4 miles away, days later.
I think there are a lot of causes in US policing that feed such possible situations, and inappropriate violence on vulnerable people because they do not have standard abilities is known *, including imo under training, 18,000 often tiny police departments, police not held to account for ms#istakes, a bias to violence, and the increased risk in a society buried under 400 million guns.
* I sometimes follow a Youtube civil liberties channel. Here's a "cockup" one - a man, who is a paraplegic using a wheel chair, arrested for an offence which involved kicking a door down: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4D5V19zqFc
Much of it is the absurd exaggeration of danger. The stats show that relatively few elderly homeless people are actually trained terrorists with full automatic weapons looking for police officers to kill. For example.
Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, who joined the police, have commented on the ridiculous hyping of the “threat”
There are something like 750,000 law enforcement officers in the US. Criminals kill about 50 per year.
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
Labour still have control of the ball. What they choose to do with it determines whether they survive or die. I know Gorton and Denton isn't fertile Tory territory these days but 1.9% and a lost deposit doesn't look as good as some on here are suggesting.
Labour's survival rested on being the only party that can see off Reform. Today that is no longer true. I am expecting polling to get an awful lot worse before it gets better for Labour. On the positive side the brand is not as unpopular as that of the Prime Minister.
Goodwin's whinging comes across as pathetic. Did he expect Muslims to vote for a party that demonises them? The only thing that would have happened if more people had stayed with Labour is his party would have been pushed to third place.
I am a bit suspicious of these "family voting" allegations. If they were not drawn to the attention of the polling station staff (who meticululously apply the rules in my experience) then how are these allegations to be investigated or substantiated?
Apparently they were reporting to polling station staff, at the time. And were observed reporting them by members of the media.
I understand from Manchester Concil that no reports were made to polling staff nor police.
Someone said on Today that they believed they couldn’t report it as can only observe but not intervene. Not sure if this is true but I’m sure that whatever people already feel/believe will find the answer/excuse they want and nothing will happen further.
If they failed to report it to the authorities, and obviously didn't film or record it then how on earth do they expect it to be investigated?
I have no idea however if they are “independent observers” I guess their role is to observe and then report what they see. If it happened and the people running the polling station didn’t do anything to stop it then that is an observation and the electoral commission will need to react and ensure that polling staff prevent it in the future.
When independent observers go to elections around the world they don’t step in at polling and intervene, they observe and report. Dangerous ground if independent observers start intervening as next thing all the parties have “independent observers” at polling stations stepping in and causing chaos.
Democracy Volunteers appear to form a significant and important part of the electoral observer corps in UK elections. They represent about 25% of the total neutral voting observers accredited by the Electoral Commission.
Lets be honest, this is just about a further drift to voter supression in the UK
1) A comparativlely difficult voter regsitration process by European standard.
2) Spurious requirement for photo ID that blatantly discriminated against the young & BME population.
3) Largely bogus suspicion over postal voting the use of which might be summed up as 'White pensioners good' / 'South Asian women bad'.
4) 'Independent' monitoring that is statistically dubious, targetting polling stations in predominantly asian area, exaggerating the issue and fanning the flames of look what "they" are doing now.
The state of this post. Quite easy to see how the thing we can't mention that rhymes with 'booming bangs' was swept under the carpet for 20 years.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Why might this Tory disaster be good for them? (Though it probably won't be).
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
I don’t follow this. I don’t think the average voter’s main takeaway from this result is that Reform can’t win the GE - it shows them as the main challenger in an inner-city seat.
There are many reasons why Reform may not win the next GE, but I’m not sure a by election result in a constituency with a 65%+ left wing vote profile tells us much.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Why might this Tory disaster be good for them? (Though it probably won't be).
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Who is saying it was a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch?
Goodwin's whinging comes across as pathetic. Did he expect Muslims to vote for a party that demonises them? The only thing that would have happened if more people had stayed with Labour is his party would have been pushed to third place.
I am a bit suspicious of these "family voting" allegations. If they were not drawn to the attention of the polling station staff (who meticululously apply the rules in my experience) then how are these allegations to be investigated or substantiated?
Apparently they were reporting to polling station staff, at the time. And were observed reporting them by members of the media.
I understand from Manchester Concil that no reports were made to polling staff nor police.
Someone said on Today that they believed they couldn’t report it as can only observe but not intervene. Not sure if this is true but I’m sure that whatever people already feel/believe will find the answer/excuse they want and nothing will happen further.
If they failed to report it to the authorities, and obviously didn't film or record it then how on earth do they expect it to be investigated?
I have no idea however if they are “independent observers” I guess their role is to observe and then report what they see. If it happened and the people running the polling station didn’t do anything to stop it then that is an observation and the electoral commission will need to react and ensure that polling staff prevent it in the future.
When independent observers go to elections around the world they don’t step in at polling and intervene, they observe and report. Dangerous ground if independent observers start intervening as next thing all the parties have “independent observers” at polling stations stepping in and causing chaos.
Democracy Volunteers appear to form a significant and important part of the electoral observer corps in UK elections. They represent about 25% of the total neutral voting observers accredited by the Electoral Commission.
Lets be honest, this is just about a further drift to voter supression in the UK
1) A comparativlely difficult voter regsitration process by European standard.
2) Spurious requirement for photo ID that blatantly discriminated against the young & BME population.
3) Largely bogus suspicion over postal voting the use of which might be summed up as 'White pensioners good' / 'South Asian women bad'.
4) 'Independent' monitoring that is statistically dubious, targetting polling stations in predominantly asian area, exaggerating the issue and fanning the flames of look what "they" are doing now.
The state of this post. Quite easy to see how the thing we can't mention that rhymes with 'booming bangs' was swept under the carpet for 20 years.
Goodwin's whinging comes across as pathetic. Did he expect Muslims to vote for a party that demonises them? The only thing that would have happened if more people had stayed with Labour is his party would have been pushed to third place.
I am a bit suspicious of these "family voting" allegations. If they were not drawn to the attention of the polling station staff (who meticululously apply the rules in my experience) then how are these allegations to be investigated or substantiated?
Apparently they were reporting to polling station staff, at the time. And were observed reporting them by members of the media.
I understand from Manchester Concil that no reports were made to polling staff nor police.
Someone said on Today that they believed they couldn’t report it as can only observe but not intervene. Not sure if this is true but I’m sure that whatever people already feel/believe will find the answer/excuse they want and nothing will happen further.
If they failed to report it to the authorities, and obviously didn't film or record it then how on earth do they expect it to be investigated?
I have no idea however if they are “independent observers” I guess their role is to observe and then report what they see. If it happened and the people running the polling station didn’t do anything to stop it then that is an observation and the electoral commission will need to react and ensure that polling staff prevent it in the future.
When independent observers go to elections around the world they don’t step in at polling and intervene, they observe and report. Dangerous ground if independent observers start intervening as next thing all the parties have “independent observers” at polling stations stepping in and causing chaos.
Democracy Volunteers appear to form a significant and important part of the electoral observer corps in UK elections. They represent about 25% of the total neutral voting observers accredited by the Electoral Commission.
Lets be honest, this is just about a further drift to voter supression in the UK
1) A comparativlely difficult voter regsitration process by European standard.
2) Spurious requirement for photo ID that blatantly discriminated against the young & BME population.
3) Largely bogus suspicion over postal voting the use of which might be summed up as 'White pensioners good' / 'South Asian women bad'.
4) 'Independent' monitoring that is statistically dubious, targetting polling stations in predominantly asian area, exaggerating the issue and fanning the flames of look what "they" are doing now.
The state of this post. Quite easy to see how the thing we can't mention that rhymes with 'booming bangs' was swept under the carpet for 20 years.
4) is exactly the reaction of MAGA to election observers, incidentally.
I am quite sure that harassing and barring observers from polling stations will be seen at the US mid terms.
Round the world, people who object to election observers - well, it tells you a lot about them.
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
In an overlooked decision this week, the Supreme Court ruled that the post office can refuse to deliver your mail, which is KIND OF SIGNIFICANT if you choose to mail your ballot. https://x.com/ElieNYC/status/2027068827595387310
A few overblown things in the post-by-election commentary:
- “Greens on the March”. Yes they done well but this was perfect context and timing for them, combined with an efficient anti-Reform squeeze - Tories buried: no, they just got squeezed in a Reform-Green fight, because it’s a by-election and that’s what happens - Lib Dems nowhere: the least surprising result of the night, they were never going to be anywhere in this constituency - Labour in dire straits: it wasn’t actually that bad or humiliating a defeat by modern by-election standards. Not great, but fairly par - Reform have peaked and should be worried: this by-election doesn’t really point to that. It wasn’t particularly fertile territory.
So on reflection, pretty much all the reactions have been overblown.
Agree, pretty much, but I think you underplay the Green success. They won easily when the consensus was 'tight' and there wasn't really a high efficiency anti-Ref squeeze in that Labour's vote didn't collapse, it held up to around national VI poll changes since GE24.
I don't believe this is anything other than a potential existential crisis for Labour, certainly while the notion of them being a continuity Sunak administration remains.
I must be stupid because I really can't see the Tory win some on here are alluding to.
I don’t think the Tory result is anything but disastrous by the way. Yes, it’s not a target seat for them, yes the usual by election squeeze has hurt them as an also-ran, but they are supposed to be the main standard bearer of centre-right politics in this country, so ending up with 1.9% is dismal, really. A large proportion of that vote has gone to Reform, exactly what they don’t need. The more people start seeing Reform as the leading party of the right, the worse it will get for them.
I still think the only thing they can do tactically is what they’re doing at the moment and hope a Reform decline will allow them back into the game as a more “sensible” option, but let’s not downplay the problems they are in.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Why might this Tory disaster be good for them? (Though it probably won't be).
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
Exactly. When Reform were on the up, we were told constantly, with all sort of graphics to illustrate the point, that their voters were not coming from Labour, but the Tories. Are we now expected to believe that Reform imploding would not mean a boost for the Conservatives?
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
I agree. We’re like the Tories after Truss.
Lettuce hope not. Reform or Greens gettingtheir hands on power is to be avoided at all cost.
Needs Starmer to go sooner rather than later. If he still there for the locals, it is going to be bloody.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Who is saying it was a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch?
"I need to go away "... heard that one before!
Have I done you the discourtesy of engaging with you since our spat in November? No, so please don't bother to engage with me.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Waking up and catching up on the overnight thread Hodges called the result right and was mocked on here. This morning I’ve seen him called a clown and generally disparaged. For someone so useless I’m assuming his critics called the result as early and as correctly as he did?
* never been a fan of his from when he first came on my radar around 2007 but I wonder how many people dislike him now for his shift from being a Blairite back in the day to perhaps edging rightwards today.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
That strikes me as an overestimate. A lot of the 7% are going to be contrarians, idiots, people who really like one niche aspect of him, like that he was in Home Alone 2 (ask Nick Palmer about that sort of thing), or people who didn't read the question properly. I'd say 3% at most. But even if it was 7%, I'd say you could easily get enough Sunday afternoon pub grumblers (this is an archetype of course, they don't physically have to be in the pub on a Sunday afternoon) who might be interested in a 'common sense says...' argument but who are currently turned off by the less attractive aspects of Reform.
I don’t think Reform UK activists are appealing to American-style conservative Christianity because they think it’s popular and will win them elections. They are appealing to it to get lucrative US speaking tours and donations.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Why might this Tory disaster be good for them? (Though it probably won't be).
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
I don’t follow this. I don’t think the average voter’s main takeaway from this result is that Reform can’t win the GE - it shows them as the main challenger in an inner-city seat.
There are many reasons why Reform may not win the next GE, but I’m not sure a by election result in a constituency with a 65%+ left wing vote profile tells us much.
I’m with numbertwelve on this. A by-election in a seat with a 65%+ left profile doesn’t tell you Reform “can’t win a GE”. It tells you something narrower: where there’s a credible Stop Reform vehicle that isn’t Labour, Reform can be held at ~30% and still lose.
The Tory “lesson” isn’t Burkean renewal, it’s that where the Tory candidate is non-viable, the right consolidates into Reform. That makes Reform more efficient, not less.
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
I agree. We’re like the Tories after Truss.
The Tories after Truss ticked up in the polls a bit. They then gradually slid to Truss lows because Sunak was rubbish. Granted he wasn't as rubbish as Starmer, but you only come across a gift like that once in a generation.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
I don’t think the by-election shows that people will vote for anyone to block Farage. That underestimates the popularity of Spencer and the Greens in their own right.
What happens post-2029? Presumably Jenrick’s game plan is that he becomes leader of Reform and takes them into a merger with whatever’s left of the Tories.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
That strikes me as an overestimate. A lot of the 7% are going to be contrarians, idiots, people who really like one niche aspect of him, like that he was in Home Alone 2 (ask Nick Palmer about that sort of thing), or people who didn't read the question properly. I'd say 3% at most. But even if it was 7%, I'd say you could easily get enough Sunday afternoon pub grumblers (this is an archetype of course, they don't physically have to be in the pub on a Sunday afternoon) who might be interested in a 'common sense says...' argument but who are currently turned off by the less attractive aspects of Reform.
I don’t think Reform UK activists are appealing to American-style conservative Christianity because they think it’s popular and will win them elections. They are appealing to it to get lucrative US speaking tours and donations.
That, and they are mesmerised by the whole conspircy fuelled MAGA cult of personality. There's always a few suck ups around a bully.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Who is saying it was a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch?
"I need to go away "... heard that one before!
Have I done you the discourtesy of engaging with you since our spat in November? No, so please don't bother to engage with me.
Aw diddums.
You do implicitly reference me though, so I will respond even if it makes you cry
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Waking up and catching up on the overnight thread Hodges called the result right and was mocked on here. This morning I’ve seen him called a clown and generally disparaged. For someone so useless I’m assuming his critics called the result as early and as correctly as he did?
* never been a fan of his from when he first came on my radar around 2007 but I wonder how many people dislike him now for his shift from being a Blairite back in the day to perhaps edging rightwards today.
London and Paris say they’re ready to lead a peacekeeping mission.
Why would you take the risk of paratroopers?
They won't be parachuting in. Is it not just that they are the best trained for rapid deployment in a variety of conditions ?
What? Special training to sit in the back of an A400M? They can't just deploy the Para Reg, there is a whole comms and logisitics apparatus that has to go with them as part of 16 Air Assault.
The whole thing sounds fantastically stupid, real July 1914 stuff.
Which bunch of squaddies would you send ?
None of them. It's none of our business which gang of criminals runs the arse crack of Eastern Europe.
Sure, it's none of our business which psycho is in the Kremlin. Ukraine is a democracy, and represents a far better future for the rest of Europe if it remains so, rather than being part of Putin's military empire.
We are constantly having to learn the lessons of getting involved in European land conflicts. We should be a largely naval power.
News from Manchester that entirely independent volunteers funded by a Con Peer have claimed that brown people, young people and female people were identified voting in the byelection. They were outraged!
Meanwhile congrats to the Communist League for once more finishing last with under 100 votes. A level of consistency rare in today's politics.
Reform UK need to learn that candidate selection matters. Standing a toffee-nosed elitist that you have to hide from contact with real voters may not be the way forward.
Question: if you do care about the environment, passionately, from global warming to cleaner rivers, but you’re somewhat less keen on supporting Hamas or hating Hindus, exactly who are you meant to vote for now?
The Greens are entirely vacating the traditional “green” sector of British politics
It’s quite peculiar. Presumably some other party will seize that ground. Indeed it might be a useful way for Labour to recover. Eventually
Curiously, early Dave enjoyed considerable success with that very ruse. It was only when he ventured into the horror show of Tory EU politics that everything exploded.
"Vote Blue, Go Green!"
Not any more. Badenoch has told centrist Conservatives to piss off. The party for centrist environmentally concerned voters is the Lib Dems. Indeed there is a strong official Green Lib Dems group.
(These ads do that 80s thing of having somewhat edgy images of bikinied women and lots of cleavage, with a few oiled up men thrown in for balance, and a bit of role reversal.)
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
I agree. We’re like the Tories after Truss.
The Tories after Truss ticked up in the polls a bit. They then gradually slid to Truss lows because Sunak was rubbish. Granted he wasn't as rubbish as Starmer, but you only come across a gift like that once in a generation.
You’re one of the smarter posters here. Do you really think in Labour they have better options than the hapless Starmer ? Rayner, Streeting, Ed M (heaven forbid), Burnham ?
News from Manchester that entirely independent volunteers funded by a Con Peer have claimed that brown people, young people and female people were identified voting in the byelection. They were outraged!
Meanwhile congrats to the Communist League for once more finishing last with under 100 votes. A level of consistency rare in today's politics.
Reform UK need to learn that candidate selection matters. Standing a toffee-nosed elitist that you have to hide from contact with real voters may not be the way forward.
Surely its better for us if the Refukkers don't learn?
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Who is saying it was a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch?
"I need to go away "... heard that one before!
Have I done you the discourtesy of engaging with you since our spat in November? No, so please don't bother to engage with me.
"Guys! Guys! Look at us! Squabbling! Bickering, like children! What's happening to us? We never used to be like this
Goodwin's whinging comes across as pathetic. Did he expect Muslims to vote for a party that demonises them? The only thing that would have happened if more people had stayed with Labour is his party would have been pushed to third place.
I am a bit suspicious of these "family voting" allegations. If they were not drawn to the attention of the polling station staff (who meticululously apply the rules in my experience) then how are these allegations to be investigated or substantiated?
Apparently they were reporting to polling station staff, at the time. And were observed reporting them by members of the media.
I understand from Manchester Concil that no reports were made to polling staff nor police.
Someone said on Today that they believed they couldn’t report it as can only observe but not intervene. Not sure if this is true but I’m sure that whatever people already feel/believe will find the answer/excuse they want and nothing will happen further.
If they failed to report it to the authorities, and obviously didn't film or record it then how on earth do they expect it to be investigated?
I have no idea however if they are “independent observers” I guess their role is to observe and then report what they see. If it happened and the people running the polling station didn’t do anything to stop it then that is an observation and the electoral commission will need to react and ensure that polling staff prevent it in the future.
When independent observers go to elections around the world they don’t step in at polling and intervene, they observe and report. Dangerous ground if independent observers start intervening as next thing all the parties have “independent observers” at polling stations stepping in and causing chaos.
Democracy Volunteers appear to form a significant and important part of the electoral observer corps in UK elections. They represent about 25% of the total neutral voting observers accredited by the Electoral Commission.
Lets be honest, this is just about a further drift to voter supression in the UK
1) A comparativlely difficult voter regsitration process by European standard.
2) Spurious requirement for photo ID that blatantly discriminated against the young & BME population.
3) Largely bogus suspicion over postal voting the use of which might be summed up as 'White pensioners good' / 'South Asian women bad'.
4) 'Independent' monitoring that is statistically dubious, targetting polling stations in predominantly asian area, exaggerating the issue and fanning the flames of look what "they" are doing now.
The state of this post. Quite easy to see how the thing we can't mention that rhymes with 'booming bangs' was swept under the carpet for 20 years.
Goodwin's whinging comes across as pathetic. Did he expect Muslims to vote for a party that demonises them? The only thing that would have happened if more people had stayed with Labour is his party would have been pushed to third place.
I am a bit suspicious of these "family voting" allegations. If they were not drawn to the attention of the polling station staff (who meticululously apply the rules in my experience) then how are these allegations to be investigated or substantiated?
Apparently they were reporting to polling station staff, at the time. And were observed reporting them by members of the media.
I understand from Manchester Concil that no reports were made to polling staff nor police.
Someone said on Today that they believed they couldn’t report it as can only observe but not intervene. Not sure if this is true but I’m sure that whatever people already feel/believe will find the answer/excuse they want and nothing will happen further.
If they failed to report it to the authorities, and obviously didn't film or record it then how on earth do they expect it to be investigated?
I have no idea however if they are “independent observers” I guess their role is to observe and then report what they see. If it happened and the people running the polling station didn’t do anything to stop it then that is an observation and the electoral commission will need to react and ensure that polling staff prevent it in the future.
When independent observers go to elections around the world they don’t step in at polling and intervene, they observe and report. Dangerous ground if independent observers start intervening as next thing all the parties have “independent observers” at polling stations stepping in and causing chaos.
Democracy Volunteers appear to form a significant and important part of the electoral observer corps in UK elections. They represent about 25% of the total neutral voting observers accredited by the Electoral Commission.
Lets be honest, this is just about a further drift to voter supression in the UK
1) A comparativlely difficult voter regsitration process by European standard.
2) Spurious requirement for photo ID that blatantly discriminated against the young & BME population.
3) Largely bogus suspicion over postal voting the use of which might be summed up as 'White pensioners good' / 'South Asian women bad'.
4) 'Independent' monitoring that is statistically dubious, targetting polling stations in predominantly asian area, exaggerating the issue and fanning the flames of look what "they" are doing now.
The state of this post. Quite easy to see how the thing we can't mention that rhymes with 'booming bangs' was swept under the carpet for 20 years.
4) is exactly the reaction of MAGA to election observers, incidentally.
I am quite sure that harassing and barring observers from polling stations will be seen at the US mid terms.
Round the world, people who object to election observers - well, it tells you a lot about them.
Putin, Trump, Orban…
Notable that the individual chose to use an alias to post their 'views'.
I think it was mentioned briefly earlier, but I wonder what impact this will have here given our large population of Afghan and Pakistan heritage citizens and immigrants.
Pakistan has declared “open war” against Afghanistan, bombing the capital and other major cities and claiming to have killed more than 270 Taliban soldiers.
Afghanistan had made its own cross-border attack on Thursday against Pakistan in retaliation for deadly airstrikes on border areas over the weekend, which were reported to have killed a dozen people.
In response, Pakistan carried out airstrikes early on Friday, including in Kabul, hitting a weapons depot and destroying the ammunition stored inside. Kandahar in the south, where the Taliban’s supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada is based, was targeted, as was the province of Paktia in the east.
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
I agree. We’re like the Tories after Truss.
The Tories after Truss ticked up in the polls a bit. They then gradually slid to Truss lows because Sunak was rubbish. Granted he wasn't as rubbish as Starmer, but you only come across a gift like that once in a generation.
You’re one of the smarter posters here. Do you really think in Labour they have better options than the hapless Starmer ? Rayner, Streeting, Ed M (heaven forbid), Burnham ?
I can’t see it.
What I find amusing is that Burnham is being regarded by some as the saviour. I seem to recall he stood for leader before and failed? His reputation seems the greater now he is not in parliament and has effectively the cheerleader for Manchester job (I know its more than that, but not much more).
For sure Starmer is not great and is now paying the price for (a) not having a plan beyond "not being the Tories" and (b) having no courage in his convictions and not being prepared to be unpopular (U-turns after U-turns).
For a model of unpopularity and hard decisions that then came good he could do worse than study 1979 - 1983.
You've got to wonder if Reform support will actually fully materialise at the ballot box given this vox pop on WATO:
Interviewer: "What's your opinion on the election result?" Member of public: "I dunno, who won?" I: "Hannah Spencer, the Green Party candidate." M: "Oh, noo, I wanted t'Refom chap to win." I: "So you voted for him then?" M: "Oh noo, I didn't vote."
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Why might this Tory disaster be good for them? (Though it probably won't be).
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
Exactly. When Reform were on the up, we were told constantly, with all sort of graphics to illustrate the point, that their voters were not coming from Labour, but the Tories. Are we now expected to believe that Reform imploding would not mean a boost for the Conservatives?
It would. But they aren't yet imploding. They did ok here given they lumbered themselves with Goodwin as a candidate.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Who is saying it was a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch?
"I need to go away "... heard that one before!
Have I done you the discourtesy of engaging with you since our spat in November? No, so please don't bother to engage with me.
"Guys! Guys! Look at us! Squabbling! Bickering, like children! What's happening to us? We never used to be like this
I don’t think the Tory result is anything but disastrous by the way. Yes, it’s not a target seat for them, yes the usual by election squeeze has hurt them as an also-ran, but they are supposed to be the main standard bearer of centre-right politics in this country, so ending up with 1.9% is dismal, really. A large proportion of that vote has gone to Reform, exactly what they don’t need. The more people start seeing Reform as the leading party of the right, the worse it will get for them.
I still think the only thing they can do tactically is what they’re doing at the moment and hope a Reform decline will allow them back into the game as a more “sensible” option, but let’s not downplay the problems they are in.
The polling looks broadly correct doesn't it? Lab and Con are in the gutter. Lib-Dem treading water. Ref/Green/SNP/Plaid benefit depending on the demographic of the seat.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Who is saying it was a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch?
"I need to go away "... heard that one before!
Have I done you the discourtesy of engaging with you since our spat in November? No, so please don't bother to engage with me.
"Guys! Guys! Look at us! Squabbling! Bickering, like children! What's happening to us? We never used to be like this
There’s a fair chance she’ll win the seat back for Labour at the general election, surely.
If she stands,
Standing can be a helpful first step to winning, yes.
Stogia remains a Labour councillor. I don’t think she’s going to retire from politics. Likewise, I expect Goodwin will stand again, as will Pearcey, Buckley and A-Lot probably.
"We’ve seen the true colours of Zack Polanski’s Greens in this campaign. The Greens were able to capitalise on an endorsement from George Galloway to win over enough voters to push them over the line. Their willingness to welcome Galloway's divisive, sectarian politics is a sign that the Greens are not the harmless environmentalists they pretend to be, and their position on legalising all drugs shows how unstable this electoral coalition is. It cannot survive a general election campaign."
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
This is such total shite. Hopecasting of the first water
Labour won a huge landslide with 33% of the vote
If the field is badly split (and it looks like it will be) under FPTP Reform could win a majority with 30%, and they got 29% in a very unfriendly constituency last night
We are in a new world, where wild things happen. Saying “this is impossible just because I don’t like it” is the statement of a fearful dimwit
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
I agree. We’re like the Tories after Truss.
The Tories after Truss ticked up in the polls a bit. They then gradually slid to Truss lows because Sunak was rubbish. Granted he wasn't as rubbish as Starmer, but you only come across a gift like that once in a generation.
You’re one of the smarter posters here. Do you really think in Labour they have better options than the hapless Starmer ? Rayner, Streeting, Ed M (heaven forbid), Burnham ?
I can’t see it.
Yes, but neither are in parliament.
Burnham I mentioned here a looooooong time before it was mentioned as a serious prospect. My other one is Sharon Graham of Unite (I think it's Unite). Neither share my views, but they are impressive people, especially Graham.
But not in the Commons. In parliament, they look stuffed.
"We’ve seen the true colours of Zack Polanski’s Greens in this campaign. The Greens were able to capitalise on an endorsement from George Galloway to win over enough voters to push them over the line. Their willingness to welcome Galloway's divisive, sectarian politics is a sign that the Greens are not the harmless environmentalists they pretend to be, and their position on legalising all drugs shows how unstable this electoral coalition is. It cannot survive a general election campaign."
Its a rubbish response as one might expect. Why on earth mention drugs? Over half the country want drugs laws relaxed.
If Labour wants votes, then as the party in power, Starmer needs to tell us what he is doing for us now, not his opinion on other parties.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Why might this Tory disaster be good for them? (Though it probably won't be).
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
Exactly. When Reform were on the up, we were told constantly, with all sort of graphics to illustrate the point, that their voters were not coming from Labour, but the Tories. Are we now expected to believe that Reform imploding would not mean a boost for the Conservatives?
It would. But they aren't yet imploding. They did ok here given they lumbered themselves with Goodwin as a candidate.
No, they aren't imploding, and they might not, and yesterday's result was not at all positive for the Tories. But there is a plausible scenario whereby people are fed up with the two extremes currently en vogue, and would prefer a less chaotic and divisive party in charge, whilst disliking the incumbent. If Kemi continues to slowly but surely build her brand, it will leave her in a good place to present herself as the one to be the sensible choice
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
This is such total shite. Hopecasting of the first water
Labour won a huge landslide with 33% of the vote
If the field is badly split (and it looks like it will be) under FPTP Reform could win a majority with 30%, and they got 29% in a very unfriendly constituency last night
We are in a new world, where wild things happen. Saying “this is impossible just because I don’t like it” is the statement of a fearful dimwit
I think two things can be true here.
Firstly, it is clearly incorrect that Reform can’t win a GE. It’s perfectly plausible.
It’s also true that it’s pretty unlikely that on current polling, Reform would win a majority IMHO. There’s just too much going against them tactically, and too many inefficiencies in their vote, for FPTP to spit out 320+ seats for them.
Reform’s path to a majority looks much steadier if they can push their polling to 35%+ of the vote. To do that, they need more momentum (May will likely help), they need a compelling economic message (jury very much out on that one), and they need to squeeze the Tory vote further. On the latter, Kemi has managed to stem the bleeding for now but we cannot guarantee that will continue, particularly if they have a bad set of elections in May.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
That strikes me as an overestimate. A lot of the 7% are going to be contrarians, idiots, people who really like one niche aspect of him, like that he was in Home Alone 2 (ask Nick Palmer about that sort of thing), or people who didn't read the question properly. I'd say 3% at most. But even if it was 7%, I'd say you could easily get enough Sunday afternoon pub grumblers (this is an archetype of course, they don't physically have to be in the pub on a Sunday afternoon) who might be interested in a 'common sense says...' argument but who are currently turned off by the less attractive aspects of Reform.
How do you define “a racist”
I’m guessing someone like @kinabalu would say that anyone who believes “Islam is incompatible with British values” is a racist. According to YouGov, more than half of Brits believe this. So more than half of Brits are racist. Not “10%”
I am certain that @kinabalu would say that anyone who thinks “Muslim immigrants have had a negative impact on Britain” is racist. That’s 41% of Brits
And so on, and so forth
Like it or not Reform are fishing in a very large pool, probably comprising more than half the British people
I think it was mentioned briefly earlier, but I wonder what impact this will have here given our large population of Afghan and Pakistan heritage citizens and immigrants.
Pakistan has declared “open war” against Afghanistan, bombing the capital and other major cities and claiming to have killed more than 270 Taliban soldiers.
Afghanistan had made its own cross-border attack on Thursday against Pakistan in retaliation for deadly airstrikes on border areas over the weekend, which were reported to have killed a dozen people.
In response, Pakistan carried out airstrikes early on Friday, including in Kabul, hitting a weapons depot and destroying the ammunition stored inside. Kandahar in the south, where the Taliban’s supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada is based, was targeted, as was the province of Paktia in the east.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
That strikes me as an overestimate. A lot of the 7% are going to be contrarians, idiots, people who really like one niche aspect of him, like that he was in Home Alone 2 (ask Nick Palmer about that sort of thing), or people who didn't read the question properly. I'd say 3% at most. But even if it was 7%, I'd say you could easily get enough Sunday afternoon pub grumblers (this is an archetype of course, they don't physically have to be in the pub on a Sunday afternoon) who might be interested in a 'common sense says...' argument but who are currently turned off by the less attractive aspects of Reform.
How do you define “a racist”
I’m guessing someone like @kinabalu would say that anyone who believes “Islam is incompatible with British values” is a racist. According to YouGov, more than half of Brits believe this. So more than half of Brits are racist. Not “10%”
I am certain that @kinabalu would say that anyone who thinks “Muslim immigrants have had a negative impact on Britain” is racist. That’s 41% of Brits
And so on, and so forth
Like it or not Reform are fishing in a very large pool, probably comprising more than half the British people
A religion is an ideology. Believing it is incompatible with certain values is not racist. Hating and discriminating against its adherents quite possibly is, if they are predominately members of certain ethnicities
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
I agree. We’re like the Tories after Truss.
The Tories after Truss ticked up in the polls a bit. They then gradually slid to Truss lows because Sunak was rubbish. Granted he wasn't as rubbish as Starmer, but you only come across a gift like that once in a generation.
You’re one of the smarter posters here. Do you really think in Labour they have better options than the hapless Starmer ? Rayner, Streeting, Ed M (heaven forbid), Burnham ?
I can’t see it.
Streeting at least sounds far less robotic than Ace Starmer.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
That strikes me as an overestimate. A lot of the 7% are going to be contrarians, idiots, people who really like one niche aspect of him, like that he was in Home Alone 2 (ask Nick Palmer about that sort of thing), or people who didn't read the question properly. I'd say 3% at most. But even if it was 7%, I'd say you could easily get enough Sunday afternoon pub grumblers (this is an archetype of course, they don't physically have to be in the pub on a Sunday afternoon) who might be interested in a 'common sense says...' argument but who are currently turned off by the less attractive aspects of Reform.
How do you define “a racist”
I’m guessing someone like @kinabalu would say that anyone who believes “Islam is incompatible with British values” is a racist. According to YouGov, more than half of Brits believe this. So more than half of Brits are racist. Not “10%”
I am certain that @kinabalu would say that anyone who thinks “Muslim immigrants have had a negative impact on Britain” is racist. That’s 41% of Brits
And so on, and so forth
Like it or not Reform are fishing in a very large pool, probably comprising more than half the British people
It's fundamentalism that is fundamentally incompatible with British values. Applies whether Islamic, Christian, communist, fascist or environmentalist.
Those Labour MPs rushing out their new strategy proposals need to just stop. There's no point even beginning to map a new strategy for Labour until Starmer has gone. He's such a distorting prism. Everyone, everywhere hates him. It may not be fair, but it's the political reality.
If they replace Starmer without a strategy they will end up in the same doom loop.
So they have to work out what the new strategy needs to be, and then choose the person best-placed to implement it.
Edit: Like, I don't think this is an amazing piece of insight on my part. Why is Hodges so superficial and unable to see it? It's supposed to be his job.
Hodges is not just a drama queen he's a clown. Can you imagine a serious journalist coming out with cant like that after lthe loss of a byelection which they almost certainly would have lost whoever the leader?
Hodges used to be very astute. Once he took the Daily Mail shilling he had to dial down the common sense.
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
Why might this Tory disaster be good for them? (Though it probably won't be).
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
It’s like all the Centrist Dads ion PB are literally wanking each other to death while saying “Yep, that’s it, Reform are finished”, “Totally agree, they’ve peaked, it’s all over, please cup my balls, “Certainly, also Reform CANNOT win, ooooooh yes”
To me, it looks like we've clearly reached an "anybody but Labour" point, from which Labout will not recover this side of the general election. But it remains to be seen whether voters remain splintered between alternatives or manage to solidify behind one party or party leader.
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
I agree. We’re like the Tories after Truss.
The Tories after Truss ticked up in the polls a bit. They then gradually slid to Truss lows because Sunak was rubbish. Granted he wasn't as rubbish as Starmer, but you only come across a gift like that once in a generation.
You’re one of the smarter posters here. Do you really think in Labour they have better options than the hapless Starmer ? Rayner, Streeting, Ed M (heaven forbid), Burnham ?
I can’t see it.
Streeting at least sounds far less robotic than Ace Starmer.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
That strikes me as an overestimate. A lot of the 7% are going to be contrarians, idiots, people who really like one niche aspect of him, like that he was in Home Alone 2 (ask Nick Palmer about that sort of thing), or people who didn't read the question properly. I'd say 3% at most. But even if it was 7%, I'd say you could easily get enough Sunday afternoon pub grumblers (this is an archetype of course, they don't physically have to be in the pub on a Sunday afternoon) who might be interested in a 'common sense says...' argument but who are currently turned off by the less attractive aspects of Reform.
How do you define “a racist”
I’m guessing someone like @kinabalu would say that anyone who believes “Islam is incompatible with British values” is a racist. According to YouGov, more than half of Brits believe this. So more than half of Brits are racist. Not “10%”
I am certain that @kinabalu would say that anyone who thinks “Muslim immigrants have had a negative impact on Britain” is racist. That’s 41% of Brits
And so on, and so forth
Like it or not Reform are fishing in a very large pool, probably comprising more than half the British people
It's fundamentalism that is fundamentally incompatible with British values. Applies whether Islamic, Christian, communist, fascist or environmentalist.
But that’s not the question asked
The question was “Is Islam incompatible with British values” and more than half of Brits think it is, indeed, incompatible
I don’t think the Tory result is anything but disastrous by the way. Yes, it’s not a target seat for them, yes the usual by election squeeze has hurt them as an also-ran, but they are supposed to be the main standard bearer of centre-right politics in this country, so ending up with 1.9% is dismal, really. A large proportion of that vote has gone to Reform, exactly what they don’t need. The more people start seeing Reform as the leading party of the right, the worse it will get for them.
I still think the only thing they can do tactically is what they’re doing at the moment and hope a Reform decline will allow them back into the game as a more “sensible” option, but let’s not downplay the problems they are in.
According to electionmapsuk, the by-election result if replicated nationally would leave a Tory party in Parliament comprising solely of Bob Blackman. On his own. Except I believe he is stepping down next time around?
I don't know if Reform will win the next election but I don't think judging their success or failure based on a by-election where almost half of the constituency isn't white and ca. 30% are Muslim is a clever idea. It's probably one of their least likely pick ups based on demographics and they still got 28% of the vote which isn't bad. Reform probably got substantially over half of working class white votes in this constituency which means huge chunks of England and Wales are going to go light blue at the next election and if the Green strategy continues then I suspect that Reform will do even better as more WWC voters are put off by the left pandering to Muslim voters.
The lesson for Labour here is that they need to urgently start concentrating on splitting the Green unholy alliance of progressives and islamists. Labour can probably afford to lose one of those groups but certainly not both. We may go through a period of Labour really pushing LGBT stuff over the next year or so as they seek to force the Greens to either abandon the progressives or be forced to support these progressive policies and keep their fingers crossed that the "community leaders" slink away to whatever other islamist party pops up.
Reform certainly need to abandon this notion of forcing the Christianity of the British Empire down everyone's throat. The Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub secularist was probably peak Nigel.
When a core part of the coalition you're seeking to build is white racists it shouldn't come as a massive surprise that you get a great big two fingers from Muslim voters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
Well yes but I agree with Stark Dawning that Refrorm were more widely appealing when they were the Sunday-afternoon-down-the-pub-secularist party. White racists or those favouring American style conservative Christianity are a very narrow section of the electorate to go after. The only reasons I can see for doing so are either a) they have mistaken Britain for America, or b) they are personally keen on this stuff. And from what little I know of the individuals in charge, b seems unlikely. I inow I've developed this theme before, but I'm baffled by Reform's tactics. They appear to have missed the open goal - the Sunday afternoon diwn the pub grumblers, who, nevertheless, are no sort of zealots - of whom there are many - and are instead going for a weird coalition of furious Christians, white racists and Thatcherite free marketeers.
Courting the white racist vote puts a ceiling on Reform, you're right. But what is 'very narrow', that's a key question.
I think it's around 10% of the electorate. Or let's say it's far nearer 10% than 1%. You need a proxy since people don't answer 'yes' to 'would you consider yourself to be a racist?' For me the best proxy is having a *very* favourable opinion of Donald Trump. That's been polled a few times and it always gets about the 10% mark. So there, close enough for these purposes, is your white racist vote in this country. 10% if they all came out, but they won't so let's say 7%.
Now that's not huge but it is a non-trivial part of Reform's coalition. It's maybe a quarter of it. If they lose all or most of those voters to no-show and/or to Restore (who are most certainly fishing in that pond) it leaves them with an awful lot of 'Sunday pub grumblers' to win over to fill the gap.
I really don't think that Matt Goodwin would have stood if he thought that he would come 4,000 votes behind Hannah the Plumber. Although, objectively, 28% is not bad for Reform in this seat as with Caerphilly it shows that Reform really are loathed by an awful lot of people. They'll vote for anyone to block Farage.
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
This is such total shite. Hopecasting of the first water
Labour won a huge landslide with 33% of the vote
If the field is badly split (and it looks like it will be) under FPTP Reform could win a majority with 30%, and they got 29% in a very unfriendly constituency last night
We are in a new world, where wild things happen. Saying “this is impossible just because I don’t like it” is the statement of a fearful dimwit
Says a dimwit who’s made a career out of saying that just because it’s possible and you like it, so it will happen
Comments
If Labour move left to stop more leakage to the Greens, there would be a gap in the centre to win back centrist swing voters who don't want Labour, the Greens or Reform and for whom the LDs are too pro EU which say Cleverly could fill. Cleverly could also win more anti Reform tactical votes in Tory held seats from Labour, the LDs and Greens than Kemi
Reform CANNOT win a general election - their voter coalition is too narrow - even if they CAN do enough damage to the Tories and, to a lesser extent, Labour to prevent them winning, by removing parts of their voter coalitions. However, the LibDems and Greens are immune to Nige's charms.
The most likely result of the next GE is surely a left-of-centre Govt involving all or some of Labour, LibDems and Greens.
What happens after 2029 to the right will be of interest. Will Reform (minus, presumably, the retired 64 yr old Farage) be able to sustain its momentum even if its obvious they are too marmite to win an election? I suspect not. But it will require the Tories to keep their heads above water and return a credible number of MPs to re-emerge as the predominant right-of-centre option.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CH0ELNIXSpg
(These ads do that 80s thing of having somewhat edgy images of bikinied women and lots of cleavage, with a few oiled up men thrown in for balance, and a bit of role reversal.)
Guess what? Not white middle class people.
Stereotypically - modest women, circumscribed by men, having lots of babies and staying at home as they are told, being the symbolic heart of their community.
(Quotes may be borked)
It brings to mind the famous Gorsuch dissent:
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2017/mar/23/neil-gorsuch-supreme-court-frozen-trucker-alphonse-maddin
Lad 200
Green 100
LD 100
15 to 20 years if coalition. O And S centre left progressive Government IF all 3 are sensible. Give Greens Environment, give LD social care straight away to get buy in
Maybe the government will hold it in front of a panel of judges. No pesky juries.
Did you know that one reason for the abolition of Grand Juries was concerns that juries might might not indict popular (socialist/communist) agitators?
3.14 Observers may bring irregularities, fraud or significant problems to the attention of electoral officials on the spot
and
3.22 Accredited observers are encouraged to provide feedback on their observations.....to the election staff where you observe.
So, Sandpit, wrong again.
I don’t see why the Greens shortening should cause the Conservatives to drift, in fact I think the Greens shortening should mean the Tories should as well
Vance: ‘No chance’ any Iran strikes would lead to long war in Middle East
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5758310-vance-defends-iran-strikes/
Farage must be looking over the Atlantic and seeing a chance to make umpty million from grifting - a chance with a short shelf-life.
- it does figure in Labour's ten worst losses of vote share, and even if that becomes unimportant in terms of how people come to vote when 2029 arrives, it is important in the political and media narrative, and within the ongoing psychodrama that is our national politics.
- Reform started as the potential NOTA insurgent, yet the Greens managed to steal pole position, as did Plaid in Caerphilly, in both cases suggesting both a ceiling to Reform's appeal and a willingness among non-Reform voters to seek out an alternative winning horse
More seriously, it is surely beyond high time that meaningful electoral reform got back up towards the top of the political agenda, particularly for this most blinkered of governments?
Anyway, mainly here to say thanks to @TSE for the tip!
It was undoubtedly a great night for the Greens, a potentially existential threat to Labour under FPTP. Not a fantastic night for Goodwin and his bunch of clowns but a brilliant night for Kemi Badenoch's PB Tories, or so it would seem.
I need to go away and reanalyse as I still don't see that last bit.
* I sometimes follow a Youtube civil liberties channel. Here's a "cockup" one - a man, who is a paraplegic using a wheel chair, arrested for an offence which involved kicking a door down:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4D5V19zqFc
It's all to play for, except if you're Labour - Who look doomed whatever happens. Con probably doomed as well, but Kemi does seem to be getting some traction and is more popular than her party, which can be an encouraging sign at general elections.
Ukraine is a democracy, and represents a far better future for the rest of Europe if it remains so, rather than being part of Putin's military empire.
It shows that Reform can't win the next general election, they have peaked, and they are not the only populists in town. What follows is that the Tories can do the hard work of reoccupying their proper gap in the market: centre right, liberal democrat, Burkean, incremental, establishment, quiet, competent, dull.
https://www.theatlantic.com/national-security/2026/02/elon-musk-ukraine-russia-starlink/686155/
The SpaceX team behind it received clear instructions from its bosses: “‘No limits. Take off the gloves; use Starlink for anything to help Ukraine.’”
Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, who joined the police, have commented on the ridiculous hyping of the “threat”
There are something like 750,000 law enforcement officers in the US. Criminals kill about 50 per year.
Labour's survival rested on being the only party that can see off Reform. Today that is no longer true. I am expecting polling to get an awful lot worse before it gets better for Labour. On the positive side the brand is not as unpopular as that of the Prime Minister.
There are many reasons why Reform may not win the next GE, but I’m not sure a by election result in a constituency with a 65%+ left wing vote profile tells us much.
"I need to go away "... heard that one before!
😂😂
I am quite sure that harassing and barring observers from polling stations will be seen at the US mid terms.
Round the world, people who object to election observers - well, it tells you a lot about them.
Putin, Trump, Orban…
https://x.com/ElieNYC/status/2027068827595387310
I must be stupid because I really can't see the Tory win some on here are alluding to.
I still think the only thing they can do tactically is what they’re doing at the moment and hope a Reform decline will allow them back into the game as a more “sensible” option, but let’s not downplay the problems they are in.
Needs Starmer to go sooner rather than later. If he still there for the locals, it is going to be bloody.
Cost? £70. Not for the gin, for the SUITE. Per night
Would be 15 times that in London, minimum. Maybe 20 times that in NYC
BONKERS
* never been a fan of his from when he first came on my radar around 2007 but I wonder how many people dislike him now for his shift from being a Blairite back in the day to perhaps edging rightwards today.
The Tory “lesson” isn’t Burkean renewal, it’s that where the Tory candidate is non-viable, the right consolidates into Reform. That makes Reform more efficient, not less.
What happens post-2029? Presumably Jenrick’s game plan is that he becomes leader of Reform and takes them into a merger with whatever’s left of the Tories.
You do implicitly reference me though, so I will respond even if it makes you cry
I keep reading here how he’s pro Russian and a Russian supporter.
Meanwhile congrats to the Communist League for once more finishing last with under 100 votes. A level of consistency rare in today's politics.
Reform UK need to learn that candidate selection matters. Standing a toffee-nosed elitist that you have to hide from contact with real voters may not be the way forward.
I can’t see it.
😉
https://x.com/mcandidate/status/2027345437162910031?s=61
Pakistan declares ‘open war’ on Afghanistan amid strikes on Kabul
For sure Starmer is not great and is now paying the price for (a) not having a plan beyond "not being the Tories" and (b) having no courage in his convictions and not being prepared to be unpopular (U-turns after U-turns).
For a model of unpopularity and hard decisions that then came good he could do worse than study 1979 - 1983.
Interviewer: "What's your opinion on the election result?"
Member of public: "I dunno, who won?"
I: "Hannah Spencer, the Green Party candidate."
M: "Oh, noo, I wanted t'Refom chap to win."
I: "So you voted for him then?"
M: "Oh noo, I didn't vote."
Trust you to get it 😉
Stogia remains a Labour councillor. I don’t think she’s going to retire from politics. Likewise, I expect Goodwin will stand again, as will Pearcey, Buckley and A-Lot probably.
https://x.com/politlcsuk/status/2027365554256765104
"We’ve seen the true colours of Zack Polanski’s Greens in this campaign. The Greens were able to capitalise on an endorsement from George Galloway to win over enough voters to push them over the line. Their willingness to welcome Galloway's divisive, sectarian politics is a sign that the Greens are not the harmless environmentalists they pretend to be, and their position on legalising all drugs shows how unstable this electoral coalition is. It cannot survive a general election campaign."
Labour won a huge landslide with 33% of the vote
If the field is badly split (and it looks like it will be) under FPTP Reform could win a majority with 30%, and they got 29% in a very unfriendly constituency last night
We are in a new world, where wild things happen. Saying “this is impossible just because I don’t like it” is the statement of a fearful dimwit
Burnham I mentioned here a looooooong time before it was mentioned as a serious prospect. My other one is Sharon Graham of Unite (I think it's Unite). Neither share my views, but they are impressive people, especially Graham.
But not in the Commons. In parliament, they look stuffed.
If Labour wants votes, then as the party in power, Starmer needs to tell us what he is doing for us now, not his opinion on other parties.
Firstly, it is clearly incorrect that Reform can’t win a GE. It’s perfectly plausible.
It’s also true that it’s pretty unlikely that on current polling, Reform would win a majority IMHO. There’s just too much going against them tactically, and too many inefficiencies in their vote, for FPTP to spit out 320+ seats for them.
Reform’s path to a majority looks much steadier if they can push their polling to 35%+ of the vote. To do that, they need more momentum (May will likely help), they need a compelling economic message (jury very much out on that one), and they need to squeeze the Tory vote further. On the latter, Kemi has managed to stem the bleeding for now but we cannot guarantee that will continue, particularly if they have a bad set of elections in May.
I’m guessing someone like @kinabalu would say that anyone who believes “Islam is incompatible with British values” is a racist. According to YouGov, more than half of Brits believe this. So more than half of Brits are racist. Not “10%”
I am certain that @kinabalu would say that anyone who thinks “Muslim immigrants have had a negative impact on Britain” is racist. That’s 41% of Brits
And so on, and so forth
Like it or not Reform are fishing in a very large pool, probably comprising more than half the British people
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jul/25/islamaphobia-socially-acceptable-uk-muslim-values-britain-yougov-poll
The question was “Is Islam incompatible with British values” and more than half of Brits think it is, indeed, incompatible
The lesson for Labour here is that they need to urgently start concentrating on splitting the Green unholy alliance of progressives and islamists. Labour can probably afford to lose one of those groups but certainly not both. We may go through a period of Labour really pushing LGBT stuff over the next year or so as they seek to force the Greens to either abandon the progressives or be forced to support these progressive policies and keep their fingers crossed that the "community leaders" slink away to whatever other islamist party pops up.
https://x.com/i_ammukhtar/status/2027370790975336518?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q