14 point Tory lead - Disastrous polling for Labour

[HolgateCorner]

I dont accept this "infighting" argument - its a red herring.
Starmer is not a socialist or even a social - democrat.
He supports austerity.
He supports a racist apartheid state - his recruitment of a former Israeli Spy does nothing to question his loyalty to a foreign power: https://dorseteye.com/former-israeli-army-spy/
He describes the movement against racism as a "moment" - marginalising a major movement in our time. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politic...ing-trend-wriggling-show-support-black-lives/
His lack of policies and shallowness is epitomised by wrapping himself in the Union Flag and appealing to nationalist and racist sentiment. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/...een-new-flag-waving-Keir-Starmer-kidding.html
He backs without question the descriminatory expulsion of members on trumped - up charges - including Jews who have been members longer than he has been born. https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/
His silence on all major issues shows his complicity with the status quo and fundamental acceptance of the values of the establishment.
His record as DPP is appalling. https://www.independent.co.uk/voice...-cps-ian-tomlinson-john-worboys-a9276321.html
What this mans politics and policies say about working class people, trades unions, poverty, homelessness, racism, disability, discrimination and life outside the elite bubble can be written on the side of a matchstick.
Hes in the party to do a hatchet job along with his apparatchik`s and fellow travelers.
His "10 pledges" he trumpeted have vanished. https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.or...-jvl-blog-newsletter-total-articles-for-you_1
I couldnt care if he was a post-box as a leader - but there are no policies and his stance is like a police road - block against legal democratic protesters - waiting with their batons drawn to repel all borders and anyone who supports progress.

I think you follow it a lot closer than me, I’m not a member or an activist, I just like Labours general direction of travel even if I don’t agree with everything that they do.

I‘m not making excuses up for Starmer, a bit like a Boro manager, he will over time either prove himself or otherwise.

So I‘m not arguing against you, I’m maybe just offering a less informed observation on the state of things at the moment and a personal opinion that unity is important for Labour particularly against the evil deception of the Tory Party.

 

[r00fie1]

I think you follow it a lot closer than me, I’m not a member or an activist, I just like Labours general direction of travel even if I don’t agree with everything that they do.

I‘m not making excuses up for Starmer, a bit like a Boro manager, he will over time either prove himself or otherwise.

So I‘m not arguing against you, I’m maybe just offering a less informed observation on the state of things at the moment and a personal opinion that unity is important for Labour particularly against the evil deception of the Tory Party.

Its about opinions and like most things connected to politics it fires debate.
There is no right or wrong - you are right - its like being Boro Manager.
I think we are both pushing in the same direction.
UTMB

 

[SuperStu]

a personal opinion that unity is important for Labour particularly against the evil deception of the Tory Party.

I don't disagree unity is an important thing for the Labour party. I just think when Starmer says he doesn't want the left anywhere near the party, and subsequently the left start to drift away, that's something that should be seen as Starmer's error rather than the drifting voters.

 

[HolgateCorner]

I don't disagree unity is an important thing for the Labour party. I just think when Starmer says he doesn't want the left anywhere near the party, and subsequently the left start to drift away, that's something that should be seen as Starmer's error rather than the drifting voters.

I don’t like the way you have picked a specific sentence out of my post to force your anti Starmer agenda at the expense of my pro Labour stance.

It might or might not be the fault of Starmer but at some point you will have to face up to it being irrelevant if Labour voters want to see their party have a chance of being in power again.

How many millions of low income people hold their noses and vote for the elitist Old Etonian Tory Party?

 

[Scrote]

If you don't win the middle ground, you just don't win.

This is the problem though. The votes of the left for Labour are expected, so the 'centre' becomes the battle-ground.

Starmer's crusade against the left has created a situation that hasn't really arisen before. In the past it's always been the right of Labour that has split (SDP, ChangeUK). Now we have the left looking elsewhere and Labour haven't got a clue how to handle it.

I did a picture:



The numbers don't actually matter. The point is that Starmer can no longer rely on the left to vote blindly for Labour. Corbyn did enough to get things like nationalisation back on the agenda and the vast majority of the populace back those ideas. The media managed to scare them away from Corbyn but the ideas are still popular.

Starmer thought he could roll back to a soft-Tory position but the left won't stand for that any longer.

For Starmer to have any chance he needs to woo the left. Something a Labour leader hasn't really had to do for decades.

The threat of another Tory government is no longer enough. What's the point of compromising your beliefs for something slightly less worse than the alternative?

It's now up to the PLP to find a way to get Labour elected and that means building bridges with the left. They are responsible for the current situation. They need to fix it.

 

[r00fie1]

This is the problem though. The votes of the left for Labour are expected, so the 'centre' becomes the battle-ground.

Starmer's crusade against the left has created a situation that hasn't really arisen before. In the past it's always been the right of Labour that has split (SDP, ChangeUK). Now we have the left looking elsewhere and Labour haven't got a clue how to handle it.

I did a picture:

View attachment 17045

The numbers don't actually matter. The point is that Starmer can no longer rely on the left to vote blindly for Labour. Corbyn did enough to get things like nationalisation back on the agenda and the vast majority of the populace back those ideas. The media managed to scare them away from Corbyn but the ideas are still popular.

Starmer thought he could roll back to a soft-Tory position but the left won't stand for that any longer.

For Starmer to have any chance he needs to woo the left. Something a Labour leader hasn't really had to do for decades.

The threat of another Tory government is no longer enough. What's the point of compromising your beliefs for something slightly less worse than the alternative?

It's now up to the PLP to find a way to get Labour elected and that means building bridges with the left. They are responsible for the current situation. They need to fix it.

Interesting.
Il get back to you on that.

 

[Andy_W]

Of course it wasn't. Starmer had already had Corbyn go through the party's disciplinary procedure. A committee of Starmer's choosing had resolved the issue. It could easily have been left at that.

Not sure what you're getting at here. Carrie Symonds?

Well they've lost a bunch of voters by kicking him out and if the polls are anything to go by they don't seem to have gained any in the "centre".

This is the cultism the left were accused of the last 5 years. You've decided that Rudy Gestede up front is gonna work and now you're just gonna pick him week in week out and ignore what you see on the pitch.

Those procedures were not adequate, just like JC's handling of antisemitism was inadequate. Sometimes going further than the bare minimum sets good precedence that things are going to change.

Nick Thomas-Symonds, shadow home secretary, who replaced Dianne Abbot. He seems to make a lot fewer gaffs, so much so that barely anything gets written about him (which is good for Labour), and he's a lot less of an easy target than who he replaced (Dianne Abbott).

They might lose one from the far left of the party, by replacing corbyn, but they will gain three from the right of the party by also doing it.

They're +7 up over the year, and like I've said previously, this is just about the best it will get for the Tories. I'll bet my hat that Labour get a better vote share, win more seats and get closer to being electable at the next election, whenever it is held. I say whenever as no matter when it is taken, it would still be better than the 2019 election.

I've not decided anything, but the polls will. Whatever wins for labour is better than having the Tories in, and with JC it was impossible to win, as he's too far left for the vast majority of the UK, and even more so England (which is going to be critical is Scotland leaves).

 

[Andy_W]

That statement just doesn't match the figures. In England Corbyn won many votes that had been lost previously. If Scotland wasn't already lost to Labour we would now be in our 4th year of a Corbyn lead Labour government. Instead of waiting to compare Corbyn's performance against Starmer's let's compare him against Blair, Brown and Miliband.

Labour's popular vote in England

1997 - 11,347,882
2001 - 9,056,824
2005 - 8,043,461
2010 - 7,042,398
2015 - 8,087,706
2017 - 11,390,099

Wow, that's a poor attempt at trying to win an argument with the use of numbers.

Why didn't you post who won those elections, post the Tory votes, use the whole UK (instead of just England), post percentages, and also post 2019 too? Adding all/ any of that data would provide more accuracy and relevance, albeit it would work against your basic statistics of course.

Here, I'll help, and post the full UK, along with the percentages, I'll just summarise the first 4, seeing as they're a while back.

Year / Lab/ Tor
1997 - Labour won - Blair
2001 - Labour won - Blair
2005 - Labour won - Blair
2010 - Labor lost, Brown, largely (wrongly) blamed for the financial crash
2015 - 36.9 30.4 = -6.5 (Labor lost, Ed)
2017 42.4 40 = -2.4 (4.1% up on 2015, going against May, who was weak at best, and this election was more of a Tory own goal than a gain for JC)
2019 43.6 32.1 = -11.5 (whoops, 5% down on 2015 and 9.1% down on 2017, this isn't going in the right direction, at time when the Tories were not exactly doing a great job, with loads if in fighting)

The only gain was 2017, when JC was new, going up against May (who was weak) in an election purely timed to lock in another 5 years. Once JC became more well known, and went up against a perceived stronger candidate he got absolutely battered, at a time when the Tories were in a mess.

 

[Andy_W]

This is the problem though. The votes of the left for Labour are expected, so the 'centre' becomes the battle-ground.

Starmer's crusade against the left has created a situation that hasn't really arisen before. In the past it's always been the right of Labour that has split (SDP, ChangeUK). Now we have the left looking elsewhere and Labour haven't got a clue how to handle it.

I did a picture:

The numbers don't actually matter. The point is that Starmer can no longer rely on the left to vote blindly for Labour. Corbyn did enough to get things like nationalisation back on the agenda and the vast majority of the populace back those ideas. The media managed to scare them away from Corbyn but the ideas are still popular.

Starmer thought he could roll back to a soft-Tory position but the left won't stand for that any longer.

For Starmer to have any chance he needs to woo the left. Something a Labour leader hasn't really had to do for decades.

The threat of another Tory government is no longer enough. What's the point of compromising your beliefs for something slightly less worse than the alternative?

It's now up to the PLP to find a way to get Labour elected and that means building bridges with the left. They are responsible for the current situation. They need to fix it.

It's not a crusade against the left, it's trying to not appear further left, and it's trying to show that JC is gone (which loses a ton of centre votes).

That simple chart doesn't show where the UK voters are weighted, and even more importantly where the "winnable" voters are positioned.

Also, the point is, if you lose the left, they won't go and vote Tory or UKIP (or whatever they're called now) and work against you, but if you lose the centre they almost certainly will. There's also alot more to gain in the centre, than there is to lose than on the far left.

People should be aware by now that in most instances, not voting Labour (as they're slightly right of you) is effectively allowing a percentage shift further right, which allows the tory's to get a stronger grip. Voting greens, not voting or voting lib dems, is basically a vote against labour rather than a vote against the tories, it's not being left, it's not being clever, it's being exceptionally nieve to where the rest of the voters are and what is needed to win.

The UK just isn't as far left as a lot of us want, I would love it if it was, but it just isn't and won't be, albeit I think there will be a slow change over time.

The problem is, that under JC, some of Labour went further left, yet most of the voters in the centre/ the middle ground did not move with them, so the party became more split. Meanwhile, the other side retained the centre, stole some labour votes and then went even further right and stole some from UKIP etc. The "moment" of the political compass shifted right, and the Tories were well-positioned to gobble that up. Labour were all over the place, and staying left or going further left would never result in any sort of win. Labour need to move to get some votes, and make slow changes when in power, they can't change the world when they're not even in the room, and don't even know where the door is, which is why JC had to go.

 

[SuperStu]

They might lose one from the far left of the party, by replacing corbyn, but they will gain three from the right of the party by also doing it.

BBGs already shown this is a fantasy. If the centre's such a massive block of votes you'd think the Lib Dems would have done better in the last couple of elections, no?

I'll bet my hat that Labour get a better vote share, win more seats and get closer to being electable at the next election, whenever it is held. I say whenever as no matter when it is taken, it would still be better than the 2019 election.

We'll have to wait and see. I suspect they'll end up getting a similar return to the Miliband years. See a lot of similarities between Starmer's leadership and Eds.

 

[SuperStu]

The only gain was 2017, when JC was new, going up against May (who was weak)

Bit of re-writing history going on there. JC had been in the job 2 years by then, was all over the news, had fended off a leadership challenge within the party. He was plenty well known. And going in to the election May had been polling really well. The perception of her as being weak comes from after that election. The centrists in Labour on election day were briefing about Labour losing 200 seats and had another leadership challenge ready to go!

 

[SuperStu]

Also, the point is, if you lose the left, they won't go and vote Tory or UKIP (or whatever they're called now) and work against you, but if you lose the centre they almost certainly will. There's also alot more to gain in the centre, than there is to lose than on the far left.

worked well in Scotland.

If the centrists can't learn from their history we'll all just have to live through it being repeated I guess. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Labour suddenly lose all representatives in another area over the next few years. Maybe to Plaid in Wales, or NIP if that party takes off in the North West.

The UK just isn't as far left as a lot of us want, I would love it if it was, but it just isn't and won't be

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politic...r-economic-policies-are-popular-so-why-arent-

Plainly false. People support higher taxes for big businesses and the wealthy, and nationalisation of utilities and trains.

It's not pragmatism to ignore the polling these policies get, ignore the massive increase in Labour's membership when they moved left, ignore the increase in votes in 2017. It's ideological.

Labour need to move to get some votes, and make slow changes when in power

I understand the logic behind this instinct for incrementalism but it just doesn't work in reality. IF Labour do get back in at some point (which certainly isn't inevitable) they'll have maybe 10 years to do what they're going to do before we embark on another 15-20 years of tory governments. That's the pattern we're in. If it happens they need to throw caution to the wind and achieve as much as possible as quickly as possible. The tories certainly don't hesitate to roll progress back when they're in.

 

[HolgateCorner]

Wow, that's a poor attempt at trying to win an argument with the use of numbers.

Why didn't you post who won those elections, post the Tory votes, use the whole UK (instead of just England), post percentages, and also post 2019 too? Adding all/ any of that data would provide more accuracy and relevance, albeit it would work against your basic statistics of course.

Here, I'll help, and post the full UK, along with the percentages, I'll just summarise the first 4, seeing as they're a while back.

Year / Lab/ Tor
1997 - Labour won - Blair
2001 - Labour won - Blair
2005 - Labour won - Blair
2010 - Labor lost, Brown, largely (wrongly) blamed for the financial crash
2015 - 36.9 30.4 = -6.5 (Labor lost, Ed)
2017 42.4 40 = -2.4 (4.1% up on 2015, going against May, who was weak at best, and this election was more of a Tory own goal than a gain for JC)
2019 43.6 32.1 = -11.5 (whoops, 5% down on 2015 and 9.1% down on 2017, this isn't going in the right direction, at time when the Tories were not exactly doing a great job, with loads if in fighting)

The only gain was 2017, when JC was new, going up against May (who was weak) in an election purely timed to lock in another 5 years. Once JC became more well known, and went up against a perceived stronger candidate he got absolutely battered, at a time when the Tories were in a mess.

Disagree about 2017, Labour fought a very good focussed campaign and pulled back a 20% you gov poll deficit in 5 weeks.

I think 2019 was a rogue result heavily skewed by Johnson offering a clear way forward on Brexit, Labours campaign was convoluted.

It will be much closer going forward.

The Tories with their first solid majority for 30 years are giving everybody a good impression that they will be in power for ever just now, disappointingly aided and abetted seemingly by a number of Labour supporters.

 

[BlindBoyGrunt]

Wow, that's a poor attempt at trying to win an argument with the use of numbers.

Why didn't you post who won those elections, post the Tory votes, use the whole UK (instead of just England), post percentages, and also post 2019 too? Adding all/ any of that data would provide more accuracy and relevance, albeit it would work against your basic statistics of course.

Here, I'll help, and post the full UK, along with the percentages, I'll just summarise the first 4, seeing as they're a while back.

Year / Lab/ Tor
1997 - Labour won - Blair
2001 - Labour won - Blair
2005 - Labour won - Blair
2010 - Labor lost, Brown, largely (wrongly) blamed for the financial crash
2015 - 36.9 30.4 = -6.5 (Labor lost, Ed)
2017 42.4 40 = -2.4 (4.1% up on 2015, going against May, who was weak at best, and this election was more of a Tory own goal than a gain for JC)
2019 43.6 32.1 = -11.5 (whoops, 5% down on 2015 and 9.1% down on 2017, this isn't going in the right direction, at time when the Tories were not exactly doing a great job, with loads if in fighting)

The only gain was 2017, when JC was new, going up against May (who was weak) in an election purely timed to lock in another 5 years. Once JC became more well known, and went up against a perceived stronger candidate he got absolutely battered, at a time when the Tories were in a mess.

The point was to address your claim - By every one they took from further left, they lost three in the centre. - and question where the added votes came from, if not from the right of Corbyn.
There is very little difference if the figures for Scotland are included other than in 1997 Blair got a slightly higher number of votes than Corbyn did in 2017 and this was after 17 years of Thatcher/Major tory governments and the momentum of Blair's New Labour/Third Way campaign, and before labour lost it's Scottish seats. This suggests that there was quite an appetite for Corbyn's politics despite the flack thrown his way.

 

[Andy_W]

BBGs already shown this is a fantasy. If the centre's such a massive block of votes you'd think the Lib Dems would have done better in the last couple of elections, no?



We'll have to wait and see. I suspect they'll end up getting a similar return to the Miliband years. See a lot of similarities between Starmer's leadership and Eds.

People don't vote lib dems as the centre alone cannot win enough seats, and they also of history of selling out to the Tories. A lib dem vote is wasted vote.

I think the gap will close, this is as good as it's going to get for BJ, and Starmer knows it. There will end up being more Tory in fighting and Starmer will just wait to time the attack, which is the correct thing to do if you want to achieve the objective. The only objective at this moment is to take power from he tories, the rest of the policies are effectively irrelevant/ meaningless if you get absolutely battered in the GE, like happened with Corbyn's last.

 

[Andy_W]

worked well in Scotland.

If the centrists can't learn from their history we'll all just have to live through it being repeated I guess. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Labour suddenly lose all representatives in another area over the next few years. Maybe to Plaid in Wales, or NIP if that party takes off in the North West.



https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politic...r-economic-policies-are-popular-so-why-arent-

Plainly false. People support higher taxes for big businesses and the wealthy, and nationalisation of utilities and trains.

It's not pragmatism to ignore the polling these policies get, ignore the massive increase in Labour's membership when they moved left, ignore the increase in votes in 2017. It's ideological.



I understand the logic behind this instinct for incrementalism but it just doesn't work in reality. IF Labour do get back in at some point (which certainly isn't inevitable) they'll have maybe 10 years to do what they're going to do before we embark on another 15-20 years of tory governments. That's the pattern we're in. If it happens they need to throw caution to the wind and achieve as much as possible as quickly as possible. The tories certainly don't hesitate to roll progress back when they're in.

Scotland went because of Brexit, and labour/ Corbyn had no position on brexit, as he was too week.

Cobyn sailed the Scotland ship out of the harbour, and then the Tories sunk it. There's no way of getting that back now, all Labour can do is align with the SNP and take vote share from the tory's collectively.

Nationalisation is supported because that is a common goal of some of the far-right, but for differing reasons. Nationalising utilities would be bad news, very bad.

Most people support higher taxes on the wealthy, or at least they should. But even some idiots on 50k vote against tax increases, because it will
do them out of £500, not realising that they're not as "high up" as they think they are, so in turn end up losing out from £2,000 from those who earn more than they do, who are actually tax/ life efficient with their vote choices. It's the same as when people move from earning 25k to 35k, they then think they're a tory, but in reality, they're still about 100k a year short.

Labours membership is not representative of the voters required to actually win seats, the funny thing is labours membership realise this least. The further left the membership goes, the less chance they have of winning, they need a reality check.

Labour needed a reset and to get a foot back in the door, because under Corby they were not even in the same town. It's going to take some unravelling.

 

[Andy_W]

Disagree about 2017, Labour fought a very good focussed campaign and pulled back a 20% you gov poll deficit in 5 weeks.

I think 2019 was a rogue result heavily skewed by Johnson offering a clear way forward on Brexit, Labours campaign was convoluted.

It will be much closer going forward.

The Tories with their first solid majority for 30 years are giving everybody a good impression that they will be in power for ever just now, disappointingly aided and abetted seemingly by a number of Labour supporters.

I think May was losing that, because she was weak. Corbyn was also weak but people didn't realise this as quick.

2019 was convoluted for Labour but not as convoluted as Corbyn, I don't think he ever even picked a side, or certainly didn't make it clear, and not until the end.

All of what I'm saying is from personal experience of being in the middle of the two, but voting about last few elections (albeit voting for JC was a losing vote and I knew it). I've voted for Labour, Lib Dem and Tory over the years, and have earned a range of salaries and had various roles to cover every party easily. A lot of the people in my circles are in similar positions and we all talk saying practically exactly the same things. We're nearly all labour voters now, but not one wanted JC to stay as leader. That wasn't because of his position on some things, it was because he couldn't win and if you can't win, there's no point.

 

[Andy_W]

The point was to address your claim - By every one they took from further left, they lost three in the centre. - and question where the added votes came from, if not from the right of Corbyn.
There is very little difference if the figures for Scotland are included other than in 1997 Blair got a slightly higher number of votes than Corbyn did in 2017 and this was after 17 years of Thatcher/Major tory governments and the momentum of Blair's New Labour/Third Way campaign, and before labour lost it's Scottish seats. This suggests that there was quite an appetite for Corbyn's politics despite the flack thrown his way.

It was an example, no point you gaining one vote if the other side gains 1.2, and if in doing that it also means you lose a load of marginal seats. Same as you might lose 1 vote which is bad, but if the other side loses 1.2 or the 1 on their side gets spilt between two parties then you win.

The vote numbers for the years are incomparable unless you list all the detail and analyse it, as they are dependent on what the other parties get, where the seats get split, who can get a majority and where can a coalition be found.

None of that has been possible for JC, as he can't win by being that far left.

Like I keep saying, I like most of the labour policies when he was there, but I realise my line of thinking isn't as far right as the rest of the UK is, so basically labours policies with JC were a complete fantasy. There's far too many old, centre and far-right people in the country, and unfortunately, a large chuck of these need to be swayed to win, and labour/JC were never going to do that.

 

[HolgateCorner]

I think May was losing that, because she was weak. Corbyn was also weak but people didn't realise this as quick.

2019 was convoluted for Labour but not as convoluted as Corbyn, I don't think he ever even picked a side, or certainly didn't make it clear, and not until the end.

All of what I'm saying is from personal experience of being in the middle of the two, but voting about last few elections (albeit voting for JC was a losing vote and I knew it). I've voted for Labour, Lib Dem and Tory over the years, and have earned a range of salaries and had various roles to cover every party easily. A lot of the people in my circles are in similar positions and we all talk saying practically exactly the same things. We're nearly all labour voters now, but not one wanted JC to stay as leader. That wasn't because of his position on some things, it was because he couldn't win and if you can't win, there's no point.

Theresa May pulled in a massive Tory vote to keep Corbyn out, the biggest since John Major 1992, she was far from weak but Labour ran a very focussed campaign and it was a hung Parliament.

The brutal way Johnson and the ERG undermined May and her team will come back to bite Bunter at some point before the next election in my opinion, he managed to get away with blaming the impasse in the Commons on Labour with his ‘Get Brexit Done’ mantra.

 

[HarryVegas]

This in-fighting - and it's not just on here - among our own ranks saddens me greatly. My own politics are probably more aligned with Corbyn than Starmer but I'm also a pragmatist. As a member, I voted for Corbyn as leader but he failed dismally at the ballot box. He just did. And it had little to do with brexit. The people on the doorsteps were more than vociferous in their "anyone but him" stance.

The voters of this nation - especially England - are never going to elect a proper socialist in a month of Sundays. Sadly since Corbyn's demise, all I've seen from his supporters is bile directed at Starmer from the very start of his leadership; and right now the general tone I'm seeing from them is one of utter delight that at last they're ahead in a battle - even if it is against their own leader.

Meanwhile the country's finances are being emptied out into the pockets of tories who look untouchable. What a deeply depressing state of affairs.