The Labour Party

Are you alright?

Seriously, I’m worried
Are you?
If someone just can't reconcile that when elections/football games etc; are lost, and you're on the losing side, and someone
may infer that you're not 'Winners' and you start screaming at them, then maybe counselling may help.
 
The 2016 referendum is not the last election data point. The last election data point is the 2017 GE in which Labour benefited by picking up Remain voters. The Labour vote in that election was predominantly Remain. Labour’s concern is about losing votes through being soft on a second vote or being seen to facilitate a hard Tory Brexit. It’s second concern is to appear Brexity enough so as not to scare off its minority Leave voters especially as they are concentrated in specific areas.

As with the 2017 GE I am not convinced Brexit will play that big a role in the next election. Either we will be in transition or operating under an A50 extension and people will have tuned Brexit out. There was little sign that it played a part in last nights election. People are not frothing over ‘betrayal’ or turning out to ‘punish’ either or both main parties. UKIP got a bounce. Second ref parties got a bounce. But not on a scale that will worry the two main parties. The biggest winner last night was the ‘can’t be arsed’ party.

I agree with some of this.

It is hard to read much into this.
Very low turnout. Nearly half of the GE turnout. The messaging you hear is voters did not want to engage with either main party.
Labour lost 12% of there vote share. We are well past peak Corbyn.
Tories lost 8% of there share. They are also heading backwards.
All other small parties gained but UKIP whilst 3rd still didnt break double figures. The renew party (a new tory light pro EU party) got nearly 4% making the LibDems performance pretty piss poor.

I think the key fact we learned was RE the turnout. People just dont see an option worth voting for. More people, who voted in 2017, failed to turn up than voted for both main parties.
 
By elections have never offered any insight into potential general election patterns, and I see little reason to start wondering if this one does.
 
Are you?
If someone just can't reconcile that when elections/football games etc; are lost, and you're on the losing side, and someone
may infer that you're not 'Winners' and you start screaming at them, then maybe counselling may help.

If the country does better as a result of an election, I win, if it does badly, I lose... regardless of which way I voted.

It’s entirely possible that if there is a negative economic impact of Brexit, you could lose your job and I may keep mine.

I don’t want that, it’s just something that could happen.
 
I know you're a remainer, fair enough, but Wales, including Newport, was overwhelmingly a leave area, I have
said on the other thread that Labour would suffer by its current actions, and it will, most Labour constituencies
voted leave, and although they held this strong seat, in other marginals they'll suffer. What we don't know yet,
is what will happen to Conservative seats, for the same reasons, but if the Labour vote has lost ground to the Tories
in this strong Labour area it doesn't auger well for them.
I'm convinced that despite all this though, even without the Brexit situation, Corbyn at the helm won't result
in a Labour govt, if you can't make gains after a muppet like May, it's time to jack it in.
Pretty good summary in my view.

There's obviously lots of unknowns here with Brexit effects masking things. But the core fact is that May ran the worse election campaign ever, and still won. Corbyn supporters (Fumble) put this down to his starting position but that excuse is starting to look a bit thin, even assuming it had legs in the first place.

It's not so much that voters want a Tory government (very understandable given the shambles they are in and the abjectly awful PM leading the party). It's just that they can't abide the prospect of a Corbyn/McDonnell government. This should come as no surprise. Not only are the two of them complete tossers, the UK has never has a majority for hard left policies. All Labour leaders espousing such in recent memory, have failed to become PM.
 
By elections have never offered any insight into potential general election patterns, and I see little reason to start wondering if this one does.
OK, Labour voter clutching at straws.

No opposition party in the last 37 years has managed to actually LOSE a by election to the government, but that's a feat Jerry managed in 2017 in Copeland. And that was in the depths of the 7th year of austerity and an unpopular government in it's second term.

Not significant of course??!!
 
I agree with some of this.

It is hard to read much into this.
Very low turnout. Nearly half of the GE turnout. The messaging you hear is voters did not want to engage with either main party.
Labour lost 12% of there vote share. We are well past peak Corbyn.
Tories lost 8% of there share. They are also heading backwards.
All other small parties gained but UKIP whilst 3rd still didnt break double figures. The renew party (a new tory light pro EU party) got nearly 4% making the LibDems performance pretty piss poor.

I think the key fact we learned was RE the turnout. People just dont see an option worth voting for. More people, who voted in 2017, failed to turn up than voted for both main parties.
Yep, Labour and the Torys both Tanked.
 
Excellent. I've now been accused of being both Tory and Labour.

I would point you to psephological history to see the limited relevance of by-elections to anything wider.
And I'd point you to my edited post above ;-)

"No opposition party in the last 37 years has managed to actually LOSE a by election to the government, but that's a feat Jerry managed in 2017 in Copeland. And that was in the depths of the 7th year of austerity and an unpopular government in it's second term."

The bizarre dynamics brought about by Brexit give him a prayer of a chance, I will give you that. Were it not for Brexit he'd have 0.000000000% chance of becoming PM.
 
And I'd point you to my edited post above ;-)

"No opposition party in the last 37 years has managed to actually LOSE a by election to the government, but that's a feat Jerry managed in 2017 in Copeland. And that was in the depths of the 7th year of austerity and an unpopular government in it's second term."

The bizarre dynamics brought about by Brexit give him a prayer of a chance, I will give you that. Were it not for Brexit he'd have 0.000000000% chance of becoming PM.

I didn't see the edited post until just now - forgive me or I would have answered it.

I'd say that rather highlights the point. That it happened, and then when we had a general election it was all very different. By-elections just don't tell us much, turnouts are always low, there are local issues at play when people don't feel they're electing a government and there's the obvious potential for protest votes.
 
OK, Labour voter clutching at straws.

No opposition party in the last 37 years has managed to actually LOSE a by election to the government, but that's a feat Jerry managed in 2017 in Copeland. And that was in the depths of the 7th year of austerity and an unpopular government in it's second term.

Not significant of course??!!

There is very little evidence that Corbyn/Labour are a government in waiting.

I'd say the next GE is wide open. Main parties are entrenched in there respective brexit holes and they aren't coming out any time soon.
 
OK, Labour voter clutching at straws.

No opposition party in the last 37 years has managed to actually LOSE a by election to the government, but that's a feat Jerry managed in 2017 in Copeland. And that was in the depths of the 7th year of austerity and an unpopular government in it's second term.

Not significant of course??!!

Not really. I’m no fan of his but, IF he gets a customs union tagged on to May’s ‘deal’ and ‘breaks’ the logjam and some sort of Brexit gets delivered, the Tory party would completely implode. In that respect, he’s played a blinder.
 
There is very little evidence that Corbyn/Labour are a government in waiting.

I'd say the next GE is wide open. Main parties are entrenched in there respective brexit holes and they aren't coming out any time soon.

McDonnell recently said that if he became Chancellor he would send Treasury civil servants on training courses to study alternative economic theories. I dont have a problem with him doing that, it might be a good idea.

But the fact that he is saying that now, thinking it now, when he might be on the brink of being thrown into a national Brexit crisis, when himself and every civil servant would be working round the clock sorting out Brexit, suggests he isnt expecting a GE anytime soon.
 
McDonnell recently said that if he became Chancellor he would send Treasury civil servants on training courses to study alternative economic theories. I dont have a problem with him doing that, it might be a good idea.

But the fact that he is saying that now, thinking it now, when he might be on the brink of being thrown into a national Brexit crisis, when himself and every civil servant would be working round the clock sorting out Brexit, suggests he isnt expecting a GE anytime soon.

He has said various similar things over recent years - talked about managing a massive devaluation of the pound as one. The implication there is that he would borrow so much money that it would be inevitable. Not sure that goes down well with anyone other than the hardest of left thinking voters.
 
You do realise that in that age group it's always been overwhelmingly Labour support, and that as people get older their views change, right?
 

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