True.
UK General Election 2015 | Conservatives win with an overall majority
- Thread starter langster
- Start date
True.
Yeah there's no middle ground between labour and the green party. Its hard to see older working class voters in the north voting green even if they do become a bit more sensible, as we've seen, a lot of them would rather vote UKIP than labour! Am i wrong in thinking there's room for centre left party who are cautious about immigration? The total whitewash north of the border, while obviously under different circumstances, may be some encouragement.
And me .
Some lively exchanges between Janet Daley and Owen Jones.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05tzb6n
Labour and its supporters are in danger of repeating their mistakes of the 2000s; the tone in which Owen Jones talks about English nationalism is awfully reminiscent of how the party engaged with concerns over immigration and the EU.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05tzb6n
Labour and its supporters are in danger of repeating their mistakes of the 2000s; the tone in which Owen Jones talks about English nationalism is awfully reminiscent of how the party engaged with concerns over immigration and the EU.
I do like the Green Party and their ideals, but my feeling is that they're too middle class, in terms of their leadership to really grab the working-class left wing vote from Labour. Certainly in the north east where I'm from, people don't really like having socialism preached to them by middle-class southerners, when many of them were involved in the unions and suffered through the closing of the mines. The Labour Party's in a similar situation with regards to its leadership but the strong local Labour groups are deeply intertwined and headed by working class dyed-in-the-wool Labour-types, whereas the Greens don't have that network in place.
With regards to the bold, I think such a party would be ideologically very muddled. Whilst Old Labour was quite anti-Europe, the concept of solidarity is a pretty salient one in the modern-left and shutting the country to asylum seekers/immigrants in general would clash with that.
I don't think that'd really be a problem for a revitalised left-wing Labour though as I don't think that the people who've switched to UKIP have done so because they're racist or far-right in their general views. They're switching because the economy is bad and the party who they've always voted for hasn't really represented their interests in about two decades. UKIP have come along with a charismatic leader, given them a scapegoat (immigrants and Europe) and the prospect of a true change to the status quo in terms of a referendum on the EU and a lot of people have gone for it.
I've heard a few people highlight the Greens very liberal policy on immigration as the reason they wouldn't vote for them even as a protest vote, so when I say cautious, I only mean a lot more cautious than that. Reducing immigration controls as a policy just isnt gonna attract working class voters at all. What you said about them being too middle class is spot on. As was said earlier, their name doesn't help them at all either. People tend to see them as only being interested in environmental responsibility.
Labour had fairly sensible immigration policies this time around IMO, its just that people don't trust them with it because they're seen by many to have "opened the doors" and what not.
Plus I think voting reform is gonna be a much bigger issue than it has been from now on, and Labour are unlikely to show any appetite for that for obvious reasons. Like I said, it seems to me there is a vast chasm between Labour and the Green party to be filled. Kind of where the SNP are positioned, in fact.
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No so sure, the Tories this time round overtook as the party most efficient with its vote share thanks largely to the Lib Dem collapse nationally and Labour's collapse in Scotland, neither of which are hugely likely to revert, and if the Tories bring in the boundary review that will only get worse for Labour. Alan Johnson for instance is very much in favour of AV+, which is like the AMS system the Scots use but with the AV element for the constituencies, and he carries a lot of weight within the party now. Umunna briefly mentioned it in his article this morning as well (then again, Blair did before he got in too).
It seems odd that an environmental party is happy to allow more immigrants into the kingdom. More people = more pressure on the environment.
"Too much smoke too much gas, too little green and it's going fast"
"Too much smoke too much gas, too little green and it's going fast"
Where people are being environmentally unfriendly has a negligible effect to the overall health of the planet, probably.
But not a negligible effect on the environment in the UK, which is what the voters are more interested in. The green party might have good reasons for their immigration policy but it seems superficially incompatible with environmental concerns.
The Greens should have policies on how to reduce the world's population, but they don't have the balls.
I don't think a policy of population control or immigration control would work unless that policy is to kill the baby boomers. Who probably wouldn't vote for a party that wants to kill them.
Labour lost their Balls on Thursday too.
Sure, but 12% admitting to being openly racist?
Also I have no way of finding this
Hmm. The wording is odd.
Q1: Are you racist?
A1: Yes.
Q2: Do you like to parade your racism openly in public?
A2: Sure. Why not? In fact I enjoy doing so. I also publicly bemoan not being able to use terms like "Gollywogs" any more. It is after all just a stuffed toy with no racists connotations whatsoever. It's political correctness gone mad I tell you. Rant gibber and drool.
That sounds distinctly racist to me. There are of course degrees of racism and you don't have to list "lynching darkies" as a hobby to be a racist. I'm sure the majority of people are prone to a bit or racial/ethnic based stereotyping which is a mild form of racism.
How does regionalism compare? As a northerner, when I first moved down to London, the grief I got used to wind me up something rotten. Thankfully I've long since learnt to let this stuff wash over me. Regionalism seems to be second tier abuse along with fattism or whatever, I guess.
I grew up in Haltemprice & Howden. David Davis upped his majority to 16k on Thursday!Is that like Alderley Edge?
Not quite. The rural bit outside Hull. Villages and hamlets with quaint old names like Swanland and Cherry Burton. We talk about London being cheek by jowl, but the whole country is tbf.
Last of the Summer Wine sort of thing?
I think you are right.
Aussie cnut.
Don't oppress me.
We shouldn't judge. It is understandable that inbred folk will fear the prospect of genetic diversity.
jks
We've got to reserve our racial purity.
For all those moaning about FPTP, check out how distorted it can get:
(all parties except the BJP and INC are regional, so that explains, to a degree, how 3% vote share meant ~40 seats for some while 4% yielded 0 for another)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_general_election,_2014#Results
Past elections too there has been a big gap between votes and seats but India has not seen an outright majority for 30 years, so this result was a political earthquake.
(all parties except the BJP and INC are regional, so that explains, to a degree, how 3% vote share meant ~40 seats for some while 4% yielded 0 for another)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_general_election,_2014#Results
Past elections too there has been a big gap between votes and seats but India has not seen an outright majority for 30 years, so this result was a political earthquake.
The split isn't north/south but town/country. 'The area was placed as 10th most affluent in the country in the 2003 Barclays Private Clients survey'.
Am surprised by that, but they are very out of date figures. The area has not seen the rampant house price inflation of the Southeast. My mother's three bed semi with front and back garden is worth about £75k. Not sure that would buy my tiny spare bedroom in London.
David Miliband reportedly going to be "addressing his future" later on today. Probably giving Chuka palpitations. I imagine it'll be to declare no interest though.
I cant see the labour party electing a leader who is not an MP and therefore cant engage in PMQ's with Cameron... there is nothing to stop them but it just seems unlikely to me.
D Milliband could of course stand in a by-election to become and MP but nobody knows how long it might be before one of those crops up - especially one in a seat that Labour can win (e.g. I couldn't see him winning in Scotland or some of the Conservative safe seats)
If he comes out to back a candidate that would of course give them a big boost and as he and Chuka are both seen as Blairite in policys perhaps Chuka is the most likely to benefit from that?
There's probably some old Labour MP in a safe seat that could stand down if it meant the return of Him, but I agree it's very unlikely. He'll probably just say he's gutted at the result, sucks to be Ed, is willing to play a part in helping Labour rebuild for 2020 whatever that may entail.
Chuka is definitely a leader for the future but could this be too soon for him? Wouldnt he be better off getting a bit more experience under his belt first?
possibly but he will only be 4 years younger than Cameron I think when Cameron became conservative leader and he will have 3 years shadow secretary experience compared to about 6 months experience that Cameron had.
If they want a fresh face to wipe the slate clean then that probably rules out cooper / burnham and out of the remaining likely candidates he is possibly a bit younger but to counter that probably has more experience on front line / shadow cabinet politics and is almost certainly more experienced on the TV and better known than the others (with the possible exception of Tristram who will never win a vote because his name is Tristram)
Perhaps his brother could step down for him... that would be interesting (though unlikely)
Probably, he's very ambitious though and sees himself as "Britain's Obama" so doesn't seem to agree. Which is my main concern over him.
Ed wants to stick around, doesn't he?
Personally I think they should both be shadow cabinet, which would give David plenty of time for an appropriate by election to come up.
That report about Ed returning to the shadow cabinet was dismissed by one of his aides yesterday for whatever it's worth. I didn't think it was a good idea at all either.