Amongst the many false assumptions that Labour is working on would seem to be the one that suggests that it will sweep back to office on a wave of Scottish support. Latest polling from Ipsos Mori suggests otherwise:
NEW: The latest Ipsos Mori figures show the SNP would win 48 seats in a General Election while Labour would pick up seven.
Meanwhile, the Tories are expected to lose ALL their Scottish MPs.
Graphics collaboration with @LeftieStats pic.twitter.com/WzfhsXPQZi
— The National (@ScotNational) November 29, 2023
Let me, of course, get the caveat in. It is just a poll. They can be very wrong.
Let me also make clear that I am not necessarily celebrating an SNP victory. Its leadership still seems to be neoliberal with all the issues that gives rise to. It also lacks sufficient faith in Scotland, which is bizarre.
My point is a simple one: assumptions that Labour is unassailable are not necessarily true.
Those hoping for PR should take comfort from this. That is my point.
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Agreed. It would be nice to see green and reform getting several % of the seats in a pr system
I can honestly say I not only DON’T WANT SKS’S VILE FAUX-LABOUR PARTY TO SUCCEED AT THE NEXT GE, BUT I WANT IT HUMILIATED by failing to win as many votes (10.3m) or seats (202) as Labour did in 2019.
Preferably, I’d hope they’d win fewer seats than a Left Wing Socialist offshoot Party.
Only Labour’s death – that of Starmer’s VILE Faux-Labour – can allow Labour’s resurrection.
If Starmer’s VILE Faux-Labour wins, Labour will die the death of Pasokification, and will deserve to.
Hopefully, Labour’s loss of so many Councils by defecting ex-Labour Councillors (as happened at Norwich City Council yesterday, where I live) and this poll are bellwethers of the future.
I sincerely believe Starmer is a “clear and present danger ” to decency and democracy.
To quote Peter Oborne, for Starmer’s untrustworthiness (see https://www.doubledown.news/watch/2023/september/25/exposed-keir-starmer-liar-murdochs-man-candidate-mi5-peter-oborne)
And Starmer’s authoritarian instincts and behaviour (see https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/uk-labour-starmer-authoritarianism-alarm-bells-ringing )
On this latter point, you only have to consider his evisceration of Internal Labour democracy, and his blatant disregard for Conference decisions.
What I hope for will be dismissed by many as a mere pipedream, but nothing was ever achieved with hopes and dreams.
Many of my former Party colleagues assume Starmer is unassailable. I counsel them that a year is a very long time in politics, and the poll lead they crow about may not translate into Labour votes. The HQ orders not to cooperate with other non Tory parties (denying council control in my own area) may also bite, let alone the outbreak of independent councillors in the wake of Gaza. Starmer has lost the Muslim vote, too.
The best outcome for the next General Election would be one where Labour benefit from the unpopularity of the Tories, but not to the point that they can form a majority government. They would then rely on support smaller parties to limp into office. The price for that support being, at minimum, PR. No referendum – just do it. Preferably something like the NZ or German system. Breaking the stranglehold of the 2 party FPTP electoral system on UK politics is a prerequisite for dealing with all the most important issues.
The Labour Party as it is currently makes me despair, and the Lib Dems have a lot to answer for – still – for their enabling of Tory misrule over the last 13 years. But this kind of outcome is the only hope for sanity in the medium to long-term.
..and the Lib Dems have a lot to answer for – still –
I’m mainly going from memory here, but at the time the Lib Dems did talk to Lab before the Tories. It didn’t get very far. Lab were talking of a minority Govt – them, where they would put forward their policies and expect the Lib Dems and SNP (?) to essentially support them. The alternative was another election, which given the economic and financial background wasn’t going to happen. So, Labour also have their hands dirty if you ask me. They were stuck in the me,me,me thinking that FPTP fosters.
I can see why the Lib Dems went into coalition, simply because it is so difficult in the undemocratic system of FPTP for the third party to make a breakthrough. Case in point, the 1983 gen election. Labour, full on socialist with Michael Foot as leader had a disaster, got 27.6% of the vote. The SDPLib Alliance got 25.4%, around 2% of the vote less – the result? Lab 209 seats, Alliance 23. FPTP saved Labour’s bacon to fight another day. Totally undemocratic.
Unfortunately, that taste of power for the Lib Dems – as the minority party in the coalition – with the Tories meant that they got the blame for everything! The Tory media, as expected, did a hatchet job on them and at the next election it was they, not the Tories that got the blame for austerity. Getting into bed with the Tories was clearly a mistake, one which they have been paying for ever since. I think the Lib Dem membership and some of their mp’s knew that at the time. Many recognize that now. The only good thing to come out of this is that I doubt the Lib Dems would ever prop up the Tories again. Fingers burnt so to speak.
Then there is Lab. They seem to love FPTP as much as the Tories do, although the membership has clearly changed on this. They support PR. They know it effectively kills off the Tories as other than the DUP (who the Tories later stabbed in the back as well) and Reform, who wants to work with them?
Unfortunately, only Lab can deliver PR. And if they do that Lab need to recognize that working with other progressive parties will have to happen. Are Lab ready to give up the privileged position that FPTP gives them? Albeit, a privilege which means that in order to gain power, they fight under a Tory lite banner. Clearly not yet with Starmer.
Essentially, FPTP results in a one party state, Tory neo-liberal. In effect, for years there has been a Tory/Lab pact which is at the heart of FPTP politics. Far more than the Lib Dems, I think Lab have a lot to answer for in propping up this sham democracy that we live in.
A point conveniently forgotten by Labour. They were first in discussions with LibDems about an arrangement, but as I understand it, Brown wasn’t having it.
As heard from someone who was in the room at the time. We happened to be in the same room…
Could have been so different. And a whole lot better.
“The price for that support being, at minimum, PR. No referendum
Have you seen what has happened in the Netherlands? Just imagine what Reform might do! Be careful what you wish for. A majority Labour Govt is just fine..
No it is not alright.
PR is not delivering a far-right government in the Netherlands
FPTP has delivered a far-right government here.
Oh stop talking rubbish. As Richard says, PR has not delivered a far right NL government. Wilders has got the largest share of the vote which is disturbing to be sure, but so far no other parties have agreed to form a government with him. So presumably if he is to form a coalition government which is what PR nearly always produces, he will have to water down a lot of his extremist nonsense.
Good. That is one of PR’s benefits. Meanwhile, here in the UK, FPTP has given us 13 years of increasingly right wing government, one that becomes more far right every day, in case you hadn’t noticed. Ever heard of Sue Ellen Braverman? As well as corruption, incompetence and widespread lying.
Please explain what labour will do if it gets a majority to sort out the tories’ mess. Because like Richard I don’t think a majority labour government will be just fine.
“…Have you seen what has happened in the Netherlands?…”
Since the election?
AFAIK, no government has yet been formed in the Netherlands; its extremely unlikely that Wilders’ party will be part of any that is. Are you still focused on Wilders’ party getting the greatest share of the vote, 23%? You’d have to be looking through an FPTP lens to view that as a “win”. His chances of getting the support he needs are extremely thin, if nonexistent.
If Reform got 23% of the seats, under PR, in a future election, it would likely be at the expense of the Tories; how would a combined Reform, Tory and, maybe, DUP bloc holding perhaps 40-45%, and failing to form a government, be any worse than the Tories currently having a free hand on 43% of the popular vote?
There’s also the de facto, if not de jure, element of effective disenfranchisement to consider. Some people, supporters of minor parties, would be more inclined to vote in a system where their vote actually counts. There would be less tactical voting, that skews the electorate’s wishes, too.
PR has allowed a “far right party” to have the largest vote. It could easily happen here. Then the question then posed is what far right mean?..When it reflects the thinking of the public then it will be not considered extreme. I think the same could happen here with Reform. And then political opinions this board might deem extreme would be deemed “normal” thereby attracting more support… so again i say be careful what you wish for.
Can yu spot the differnece between Reform and the Tories?
The sportsmen are back! In the guise of boxer this time!
I get bored of checking
The trolls have been out in force today
”political opinions this board might deem extreme would be deemed “normal” thereby attracting more support…”
…but this has already happened in the UK, under FPTP: the only view the Overton Window permits at the moment is of a very right-wing, neoliberal wasteland. PR would open up the possibility of other narratives entering the public consciousness.
Reform wouldn’t know what had hit them if they became “kingmakers” or worse.
Their job is to steer the political debate onto the right-wing extremes, to avoid the Tories’ manifesto being scrutinised. Talk about Migrants, Shirkers, woke-ism. Keep those obviously social economic topics alive, who’s going to wonder about the Tories’ austerity, or destruction of the environment?
Anyone else notice that the new boundary changes got the king’s assent yesterday.
My constituency disappears altogether. I go into a labour constituency. It will happen even if the next election is in the spring.
I don’t know if that makes any difference to polls.