Embed from Getty Images Labour probably has one last chance to return to relevancy, writes Joff Wild. Who members choose as the party’s next leader will make or break it. The death of social democracy in Europe, it turns out, has been greatly exaggerated. A look at opinion polls in three of the continent’s four G8 economies shows that the centre-left is competitive and could be governing by the end of the year. That the Democrat party in Italy,…
Embed from Getty Images Most of Labour’s lost voters are Leavers This has not been the best week for Jeremy Corbyn. He lost another Shadow Cabinet member and two other frontbench spokesmen, suffered a sizable rebellion on Europe (whereas, unlike one upon a time, the Tories presented an almost united front), prompting several thousand members to resign; yesterday’s YouGov poll confirmed that the Conservatives’ lead remains in the mid-teens, and Labour suffered a devastating local by-election loss in Rotherham, which…
How long will it take to restore internal discipline in the post-Corbyn era? “Damn your principles; stick to your party!” With such lofty dismissiveness did Disraeli once berate a colleague thinking of rebelling. It is not just hard but impossible to think of Jeremy Corbyn using like words, yet they are the currency of every successful parliamentary leader, if not always put so bluntly. Not just the leader either. For all the myths of party whips terrorising and bribing MPs…
Labour’s Don Brind says the LD leader has a soft spot for the PM. The Lib Dem leader told Politics Home “In a really peculiar way I felt slightly proud of her when she became prime minister.” A very odd thing to say, isn’t it? Since you’re asking, Tim – Yes it is a bit odd. Not only is she a Tory. She is the Remainer who failed to campaign in the EU referendum and now, with all the zeal…
With the youngsters LAB’s just fine: pity they’re less likely to vote Watching the TV news it’s clear that Corbyn Mark 2 hasn’t quite had the impact that his team would have liked. There’s a terrible lack of consistency and no real clear plan about what the message was going to be. A problem is that the audience for TV news bulletins tend to be the very people that Corbyn and LAB are most struggling with – the oldies. Today’s…
Embed from Getty Images I can’t quite believe I placed this bet Two of my underlying assumptions about politics in this country are 1) Jeremy Corbyn will be Labour leader at the next general election and 2) Were a Jeremy Corbyn led Labour party to lose a general election (especially if it is a comprehensive defeat) Labour will return to political sanity and appoint someone more centrist and electable, but what if those assumptions are wrong, cui bono? I’ve decided…
LAB – too weak to win too strong to die. Excellent Fabian Soc report in Guardianhttps://t.co/kqq033vWHk — Mike Smithson (@MSmithsonPB) January 2, 2017 More good news for Theresa in Fabian society report The first working day of 2017 opens with a gloomy report on Labour’s prospects from the Fabian Society covered in the Guardian. The overall conclusion is that the party could drop to fewer than 150 MPs, driven by difficulties articulating a BREXIT policy, the ongoing Scottish disaster and…
Their position continues to get worse, gradually Lincolnshire has a habit of producing earthquakes. One in 1185 was powerful enough to badly damage Lincoln Cathedral. A more recent example, centred near Market Rasen at about 1am on 27 Feb 2008, was strong enough to wake people across large parts of the North and Midlands. To go by the reporting, the Sleaford & North Hykeham by-election didn’t generate similar tremors. The reporting is wrong; politics’ tectonic plates continue to move. The…