Thurrock was one of the Essex constituencies that went very Reform not long ago.
Now, with Reform councillors quitting, the swing against them has begun.
These aare two council by-election results from yesterday. I take comfort where I can:
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National polling is currently putting Labour, Conservative and Reform pretty close together, with one (admittedly Labour-favouring) pollster putting Labour a couple of points ahead, a couple showing Reform tied with either Labour or Conservative, and others showing a 1 or 2 point lead.
Given how votes are spread, that could easily mean if there was a General Election right now that Reform might not win the most seats, although it would very likely suggest a hung parliament.
Tice supporting nationalisation of Thames Water shows that the government moving even modestly to the left may force Reform to shift, too – it otherwise seems a rather un-Reform-like stance to take.
Reform has shown its inability to select decent candidates, its inability to run councils, and its inability to avoid serious association with corruption or looking increasingly like part of the establishment.
A key part seems to be ‘hope’. Burnham may not be breaking the paradigm, but he is presenting an optimism about where things are heading. People sided with Reform because the status quo was unacceptable to them, buying into the negative rhetoric in the absence of seeing a positive vision for how things improve. Burnham stating improving the cost of living is possibly the most important thing he’s done. It’s not the small changes he’s made so far, it’s creating hope that there’s better to come. That’s what’s needed to combat Reform, and hopefully all on the left can both build that sense of better times to come if we support each other while also pushing to do more, faster.
Ultimately, optimism may be even more key, too, because optimistic businesses and households tend to spend more, so it can be self-fulfilling.
Well, what can one take from this?
Maybe people know crap when they see it after all.
Maybe we should have have more faith in our neighbours?
And maybe Burnt Ham had better think about this too. Because the message might just be ‘OK – you’ve got a chance, but if you don’t deliver…bye bye…………’ and ‘we’ll go through as many PMs as we want until we find one prepared to do the right thing’? Maybe it is that that is staring our politicians in the face.
Of ourse I’m delighted to se Reform UK Ltd. taking a well deserved hammering. Of course, congratulations to those who knew grifting nasty racist fascists when they saw them, and congratulations to Byline Times et al, who have slogged away for years exposing fraud, lies, incompetence and corruption on Fa***e’s gravy train.
But I would love to know why Murdoch & Mail tabloid rags finally decided to take aim at him and posh George and their merry little band of anti-democratic dodgy geezers. There is a reason why they are suddenly gunning for him, after >10yrs of supporting his grift and lies, and it isn’t to benefit you or me.
Much to agree with
For the first time ever that I am aware of a presenter on BBC Radio 4 spoke the word “neoliberalism “ this morning. Perhaps a weather vane moving.
We can live in hope.
The drop in the vote share of Greens and Lib Dems in Grays Town looks to me like tactical voting for Labour. And note that the combined drop is greater than Labour’s margin of victory.
I hope the Labour Party prove to be grateful.
You won’t see any epiphanies in the current Labour party Timothy – they think we are all too thick to think tactically and will take us for granted and see their vote as an affirmation of their Neo-liberalism.
Locally true as well. No cooperation from Labour before to beat Reform, definitely not now they’ll be salivating at a ‘Burnham Bounce’. This despite cooperation at Town Council level with LibDems.
Reform still has a thumping majority on Thurrock Council, which scrapped its commitment to net zero last night, so perhaps a case of one step forward with the by-election results and two steps back.
Agreed