Jeremy Corbyn

Nuttall (shouty scouse bloke) for UKIP leader too.

That should make things interesting for the Labour heartlands

He’s just said he wants to replace the labour party as the party of the working man. Nuttall is a much bigger threat to them than Farage. I know little of his past but a shouty scouse bloke talking ‘comon sense’ (that’s how they see it unfortunately) is everything Corbyn isn’t. Labour are screwed quite frankly, the libdems will hoover up the centrist middle class anti-brexit votes, UKIP the pro-brexit working class vote. That doens’t leave a lot for labour.

I’m going to nip to the bookies and see what odds I can get on Corbyns labour failing to keep more than 100 seats at the next election. The odds must be shortening by the hour at the moment. constituancies that have been labour since the dawn of time are going to go either UKIP or Libdem

In fact, I doubt they’d take the bet

The Labour Party… RIP

Nuttall (shouty scouse bloke) for UKIP leader too.

That should make things interesting for the Labour heartlands

Sky broadcast his acceptance speech. His focus was clearly on the Labour heartlands and turning those 100 second place finishes into wins.

If UKIP go into the general election with that pitch, which they clearly intend to do, they’ll absolutely decimate the labour party in its working class ‘heartlands’. As somewhat unbelievably Corbyn has managed to make them even less relevant in these places than even Ed Milliband managed. The writing has been on the wall for a while now.

And with all the middle class remainers scarpering to the Lib Dems, that just leaves the Momentum sixth formers. And most of them aren’t old enough to vote

If UKIP go into the general election with that pitch, which they clearly intend to do, they’ll absolutely decimate the labour party in its working class ‘heartlands’.

Yeah, unless UKIP are deemed irrelevant now they’ve got what they’ve been campaigning for.

Mind you, you’d think losing the referendum would have killed the SNP and it didn’t so maybe single issue parties can morph into normal political parties.

Who exactly does Corbyn’s labour party represent at the moment?

Theres no particular group that springs to mind.

So thats an awful lot of votes that are there for the taking, and all you need to do is be less shit than Jezza.

Hardly a big ask. I’ve met items of furniture with sharper political instincts

Yeah, unless UKIP are deemed irrelevant now they’ve got what they’ve been campaigning for.

Farage, chairman and Nutall tried to address that, UKIP to

Ensure Brexit delivered and not watered down
Represent patriotic working class people
Deliver for veterans and those who have served their country

Farage said UKIP polling remains steady as their voters now identify as UKIP and not Labour or Tory

Let me return to Middlesborough and the Newsnight video I posted in the EU thread, does anyone at the top end of Labour really think praising Castro endears them to the people of the North East ? Corbyn’s office trying to limit damage of Castro story by saying he hasn’t had an invite YET. Surely he will have enough sense to not attend a Castro funeral along with Jerry Adams, even Putin has declined, in the midst of Brexit – priorities Jezza priorities ?

Who exactly does Corbyn’s labour party represent at the moment?
Theres no particular group that springs to mind.
So thats an awful lot of votes that are there for the taking, and all you need to do is be less shit than Jezza.
Hardly a big ask. I’ve met items of furniture with sharper political instincts

I’d agree and I’d agree with the ‘open goal’ assessment.

I just find it hard to believe that a single issue party can get many votes once they’ve achieved what they set out to do. Having said that, I can’t see the Liberal party picking up much support in the North either.

Either way, someone will get the votes Labour walked away from.

Who exactly does Corbyn’s labour party represent at the moment?

Educated middle class socialists and left of centre under 40s. The pressure to water down their policies to make them seem more centrist (when it wasn’t necessary, as they were already pretty centrist) has alienated the working class people who are far more radical in their political opinions than everyone thinks. The working class need very little encouragement to point the finger of blame at the rich elite who have put them in the position they are now. Yet ironically when the labour party started doing just that, they’ve come under huge pressure from within to water down that message, leaving space for UKIP to capture those votes with their ‘blame it on the immigrants’ message. Labour had a chance to capture the populist working class vote but squandered it. They won’t get another chance.

Corbyn represents Socialist Worker types, he’s really in the wrong party.

With Nuttall winning the UKIP leadership we have now entered a time of Post-Labour politics.

Wasnt nuttall on that pub landlord comedy show a few years ago – burgundy jacket and spilling a pint?

Who exactly does Corbyn’s labour party represent at the moment?

Educated middle class socialists and left of centre under 40s

Nah… he lost the vast majority of those the day after he referendum with his ridiculously ill-thought-through (unusual for him) call for article 50 to be triggered immediately.

And those voters are never coming back either. They all suspected, due to his disappearance during the referendum, that he was actually a leaver. This just confirmed it.

So he managed to lose the Leave working-class voters during the campaign (for alledgedly camapining to remain), then promptly lost the middle class remain voters the following morning for voicing an even more rabid ‘lets leave now!!!’ position than John Redwood

Pretty shrewd maneuverings there Jezza

What a ****-wit!

And those voters are never coming back either.

Not sure. I suspect a clear anti brexit line would see them come flooding back. They’ve basically become the liberal democrats of old, who can’t decide what they stand for so sit on the fence on the big issues whilst flirting with fringe radical stuff that no one cares about. It’s highly ironic that Corbyn the supposedly dangerous revolutionary has become just another out of touch representative of the elite. I guess that’s what the centrists wanted though wasn’t it?

Not sure. I suspect a clear anti brexit line would see them come flooding back.

After coming out on the day of the referendum result demanding Article 50 be triggered immediately?

Yeah…. thats a credible position

He’s already painted himself into a corner on that score

Its funny really but Corbyn the so called principled politician has flip flopped so much on Europe that no one on either side of the fence believes a word he says.

However, saying that the one thing the Labour top brass seem to agree on is that Brexit means Brexit, Corbyn, NcDonnell and Watson have all said so, but I’m not sure the message is very clear to those only with a passing interest in politics. If you want an anti-brexit party then your options are limited to Lib Dems, (Greens?) and in Scotland the SNP.

After coming out on the day of the referendum result demanding Article 50 be triggered immediately?

Well maybe if he’d stuck to his guns he’d have headed off the UKIP threat which now confronts him? In the end, like all leaders he sold out his principles to placate his critics. Integrity and honesty were the only things he had in his favour. It’s sad that he felt he had to abandon those in order to confront the blairites but there you go. In hindsight it would have been better for labour to have taken a clear pro-brexit stance against the wishes of people like me. They’d have cut off UKIP and re-established the connection with their traditional base. Of course they’d still have lost the next election, but they would at least have had a future.

Labour need to make it clear they are there for lower paid.
Lower paid need to be better off under labour, highly paid need to be worse off – bringing about better equality.

– So higher minimum wage
– Remove VAT on non luxury items
– Lower tax limit of £20K
– Various investments to increase decent jobs

The poorer in society would be happy with that but it would make sod all difference to Labour’s chances unless all the Scottish seats went back to Labour. No Labour policies will make enough of the current Tory seats ever swing to Labour, whoever their leader is.

Lower paid need to be better off under labour, highly paid need to be worse off – bringing about better equality.

This is where Blair/Brown where smart. They introduced the minimum wage and kept the top rate of tax at 40%. That saw them enjoy 13 years in Government

The whole “tax the rich” agenda has backfired on Labour so many times. People aren’t daft and the Middle / Upper-Middle class earners understand “rich” means them.

BTW removing VAT on anything is impossible whilst in the EU, you can onky add it to things.

– So higher minimum wage
– Remove VAT on non luxury items
– Lower tax limit of £20K
– Various investments to increase decent jobs

That’s May’s policies isn’t it?

Lower paid need to be better off under labour, highly paid need to be worse off – bringing about better equality.

Odd how all this has happened under a coalition and then a Tory government!!

Another nail in the Labour coffin then?

The whole “tax the rich” agenda has backfired on Labour so many times. People aren’t daft and the Middle / Upper-Middle class earners understand “rich” means them.

Of course they know it means them but they will always vote Tory anyway so nothing to lose.
The better off people who would never vote Tory (i.e. me) will be happier to vote for a party that taxes me more as long as the lower paid have a better standard of living.

Of course they know it means them but they will always vote Tory anyway so nothing to lose.
The better off people who would never vote Tory (i.e. me) will be happier to vote for a party that taxes me more as long as the lower paid have a better standard of living.

Figure out how much more you’d like to be taxed and give it to some poor people.

^^ what 5th says give the extra via Charitable giving.

@kerley I voted Labour or LibDem as a higher rate taxpayer. It’s far too simplistic to say middle/upper-middle just vote Tory and always will. Blair recognised that and won.

^^ what 5th says give the extra via Charitable giving.

Charity is not a solution to poverty any more than driving your car less is a solution to climate change. Big issues such as these need to be confronted at a systemic macro level. The state can much better coordinate and organise the redistribution of wealth than random acts of kindness, and provides a level playing field. It also can set policy to gain extra indirect benefits which charity couldn’t provide. We should be trying to eliminate the need for charity, not encouraging it.

No they both play a role, the state can under pin a minimum standard but it will never be able to effectively target specific areas in the way a charity can.

It’s far too simplistic to say middle/upper-middle just vote Tory and always will. Blair recognised that and won.

Indeed. Politics is much more fluid than that. The old tribal loyalties just don’t apply any more. The Labour party is presently reaping the electoral ‘rewards’ of their decades-long, complacent assumption that everyone working class will just automatically vote labour.

They didn’t in Scotland, once presented with a non-Tory alternative. And UKIP are clearly aiming to do the same thing as the SNP did in Scotland, in what were formally nailed-on Labour seats. They very nearly managed it at the last election. You’d be a brave man to bet against them doing it next time, now that Corbyn has entrenched the politics of a metropolitan 6th form common room as labour policy, which is of little or no interest, or relevence, to what has always been their core vote

The old tribal loyalties just don’t apply any more. The Labour party is presently reaping the electoral ‘rewards’ of their decades-long, complacent assumption that everyone working class will just automatically vote labour.

I agree, but I’m a little confused. The people who spent the last 20 years saying labour needed to target middle class swing voters, and who stupidly turned it’s own traditional supporters against them, are now saying that the current leadership is too left wing and they should be following a more centrist platform. Is this not just the same as before?

You’d be a brave man to bet against them doing it next time, now that Corbyn has entrenched the politics of a metropolitan 6th form common room as labour policy, which is of little or no interest, or relevence, to what has always been their core vote

i though marxist trade unionists were the historical labour vote?

what corbyn is not doing is spitting enough fire and brimstone at the tories whos austerity and relentless neglect of the working classes has been channeled into scapegoating immigrants and the EU for what is essentially a neglected post industrialisation.

Presenting a coherent message to address that is needed

what corbyn is not doing is spitting enough fire and brimstone

But then he’d just be called a raving, ranting loony lefty a la Derek Hatton. He can’t win TBH. Too shouty and he’s a communist trot, to quiet and intellectual he’s an out of touch elitist intellectual. Somewhere in between he’s both. The answer is someone like Sanders. The labour party doesn’t have anyone like that though, and even if they did, he’d probably be called a trot by the blairites.

I’d settle for anything even slightly more engaging than the bored bystander he always seems to come across as.

He’s the leader of the opposition (apparently) at one of the most critical points in British post war history. And yet he always looks like he’s barely stifling a yawn, like its all a bit too much like hard work, and that he’d rather be anywhere else instead. Like Fidel Castro’s funeral, for example

The answer is someone like Sanders. The labour party doesn’t have anyone like that though, and even if they did, he’d probably be called a trot by the blairites

if sanders had gone against trump, hed have been destroyed as an evil commie!

Latest ICM opinion poll, 16% lead for Tories, lead every social group including DEs. Corbyn is achieving cut through (unfortunately it is his party’s throat)

@kerley I voted Labour or LibDem as a higher rate taxpayer. It’s far too simplistic to say middle/upper-middle just vote Tory and always will. Blair recognised that and won.

When the New Forest votes anything but Tory I will give you £10,000.

When Blair won he also had Scotland. Without Scotland they haven’t got a chance as there are a lot of New Forests out there and the gap caused by SNP takeover is not possible to fill, especially not with honest Labour policies.

Conservatives on brink of record polling lead as Theresa May trounces Labour on almost every measure

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/11/29/conservatives-riding-high-polls-theresa-may-leads-labour-almost/%5B/url%5D

Not a surprise about Labour but the Lib Dem vote is still going down as well!! Turns out Brexit has been blooming amazing for the Tories.

Lib Dems very pro-Remain stance post the Referendum is a vote loser imho. A recent PMQ’s the Speaker didn’t even call Farron even though he kept standing every time. I think the SNP had 2 or even 3 questions.

Ruth Davidson raising something which imo will be a major factor is any GE featuring Corbyn and McDonnell, their support for the IRA