If there was a GE today who would you vote for?

I would love to vote joyfully and with confidence. However, sometimes the least worst will have to do. And that's Labour. I know that people vote Tory for many reasons, including conviction. But currently it seems to me to be largely tribalism and media induced fear among the less well off and unenlightened self interest among the better off. Anyone who can look at the destruction of public services and still vote for the party that will maintain charitable status for elite institutions needs, in my opinion to consider their moral compass.

@meditrina Even a collapsed Tory vote i still a huge number of people, and as constituency boundaries mean that Tories need more votes to get same number of seats as Labour (but they have won far more elections), I think the country is, generally, right leaning (Blair was of course centre-right heir of Thatcher)

Not disagreeing with your general point but our constituency boundaries mean the opposite of that. The Tories need fewer votes than Labour to get the same number of seats because their support tends to be more spread out, whereas Labour's is more concentrated in cities. So with X number of votes, the Tories might win 10 seats with 40% of votes to Labour's 30%, whereas Labour would win 7 or 8 seats with 60% of votes to the Tories' 20%.

What is true is that there is a certain, quite large, portion of the British population that will ALWAYS vote Tory no matter what - it literally doesn't matter how bad they are or how bad things get. They see socialism as the worst possible disaster, Labour (even under Fuhrer Starmer) as irredeemably socialist, and the Tories as the only way of preventing it. That's as far as any thinking about the subject goes and there's little point digging for anything else.

This election will be interesting because with thinking Tories deserting the party in droves (and a Labour "alternative" available that is practically identical) we'll see exactly how large that demographic is.

Because people who post topics on discussion boards (particularly Mumsnet) don't normally start from the conviction that they're right?

@Howpo
@jgw1

I understand and agree with you that the current situation of the UK on various metrics whether that be the economy or migration or public services are worse now than they were 13 years ago.

But I am interested to hear what you think that Labour or any other party could or should have done that would have made it better.?

@hattie43

"I cannot believe all the people thinking labour are the wholly grail (sic). The country is broke , no party has any money to do anything with ."

+++

Yep - this is good summary. Yet people will still vote for Labour on the basis of "I'm going to vote for Labour because they are not Conservatives and they can't do any worse than the current Government".

Well what if they do? Scroll forward 5 years and posts about how Labour got it so wrong, had so much hope now feel let down etc etc.

The reality is that to recover the economy from the current debt spiral we need to see higher taxes and cuts to Government spending. However no party is ever going to get elected on a policy of "I'm going to charge you more in order to give you less".

Yeh they’re not. The U.K. isn’t the centre of everyone’s thoughts for a start. As Starmer recently found out from EU response. Eg You’re deluded we’ve got our own issues.

And the whole world is starting to face up to reality of climate pressure and what it means for their citizens

Hence the shift to the right already in countries seeing strain.

What?

Income tax thresholds have been frozen for far more years than they ve been increased, currently frozen until 2025.

Do you also believe Rishi scrapped the 7 bins laws too?

I'll look at 14 years of Tory rule and what they ve done to improve the country and atm its nothing, nothing at all, everything is worse than what they inherited in 2010.

Honestly? You hold your nose and vote for whoever gets rid of the party with a 13 yr proven record of utterly destroying our country and exponentially increasing the wealth of the richest within our society. A vote for no one is a vote for the status quo. With people literally starving in this country- I'm seeing it first hand- and our public services in ruins, we need change.

So you are happy with a proven 13 year record of failure? Actual facts and evidence of a catalogue of disasters that have ruined the country vs a theory of what someone else might be like? Look around you at the mess the country is in. The whole world is talking about us and the disaster we have become.

So you are happy with hopeless, untrustworthy Sir Starmer. He is grovelling to the EU who are laughing at him and is cosying up to Sir Blair, multi millionaire, who sent our forces to fight in US wars and be killed maimed. Sign up to every fringe policy, trans for example. No thanks

I've never ever had right-leanings. I'm a socialist to my core. But I don't think Labour even remotely represent my beliefs any longer, Starmer appears to be tory-lite, can't say what a woman is. I don't think I can, in all conscience, vote for a party that puts men's ladyfeelz over the physical reality and safety of my daughter and me.

The greens are captured too. And are bonkers where I live.

I've always been so sure and now I have no idea who represents me and my core beliefs, who actually deserves my vote.

So it's either spoil my ballot or...well I don't know. Do I hold my nose or my nerve? I simply don't know. It makes me nauseous to think of.

Also with regards to Sadiq Khan. As a previous poster has explained- ULEZ was a Tory policy and it was also a Tory Policy to extend the Congestion charging zone across London. Something which Labour stopped. Also- the reason for ULEZ is to fix a gaping hole in the finances of TFL caused by government underfunding and Covid.
The hypocrisy of the Tories trying to use ULEZ against Labour is staggering. They will lie and say anything.

www.onlondon.co.uk/letter-from-grant-shapps-shows-that-government-proposed-enlarging-london-congestion-charge-zone/amp/

The only reason the Tories wrought less destruction in 2010 was due to Nick Clegg stopping their march of asset stripping the country for the first term and putting a stop to their nasty policies designed to benefit the rich, squeeze the middle and ruin the poor.

Of course you know that ULEZ was a boris policy. Trumpeted by him as a necessity when he was mayor of London in 2015. But you knew that didn’t you @crew2022 ?

https://www.london.gov.uk/press-releases/mayoral/ultra-low-emission-zone

I would spoil my ballot

However it sounds like most of my colleagues would vote Conservative.

I live on a street where I'm the youngest and everyone else is 75+ years old and all my neighbours are Conservative voters too. Posters in the windows etc

☹️

I'll be voting Labour. I'm not excited or particularly enthusiastic to do so; they're not inspiring me. I'm not voting for them because I believe they'll usher in some sort of utopia. But the last 13 years have seen the country sink to depths I could never have imagined. It's been year after year of self-interested, arrogant, venal incompetence that has seen us become a laughing stock on the world stage and meant that we are struggling more with eg: CoL than other similar countries.

The Tory party used to be made up of people with whom I vehemently disagreed but could (usually) understand or even (sometimes) respect. It's now just a party of sociopathic wreckers gleefully intent on making every bad situation worse. I know Labour will be far from perfect but I genuinely don't understand how anyone who gives even the tiniest of fucks about this country and its people could vote Tory after the shitshow of the last 13 years.

@Philandbill love your dh’s attitude. Though he may want to consider my lovely dad’s advice. As a staunch labour supporter, member and campaigner, he advocated always inviting the Tory canvassers in for an in-depth chat. To hold them up! 😂

I usually put a sign up “Tories (and other parties of their ilk), do not knock, do not put your flyers through. I would not vote for you with a gun to my head”.

at the next election I’ll be out canvassing (I haven’t done so since the 90s).

You've lost me at 2015. Given the Tories have been in power since 2010 you have no idea what you are talking about.
Let me spell out their failure-

(This was their pre-covid and Ukrainian war record as I know how Tory voters love to blame their failures on that.)

1,000 sure start centres closed.
780 libraries closed.
700 football pitches closed.
Food bank use up 2,400%.
Homelessness up 1,000%.
Rough sleeping up 1,200%
Bedroom tax caused mass evictions.
Evictions are running at record highs.
35% of U.K. kids live in poverty.
Student fees up 300%.
Student debt has risen 150%.
Eradication of EMA (education maintenance allowance).
National debt has risen from £850billion to £2.25trillion.
Emergency Brexit styimulus from BoE in June 2016 of £175b.
Brexit related fall in national revenue £500b.
GDP fallen to -0.1%.
GBP fallen by circa 15% versus EUR and USD.
Manufacturing in recession.
Construction in recession.
Services close to recession.
25-30% cuts to all govt departments.
25-30% cuts to all councils, mainly centred on Labour councils.
Half of councils facing effective bankruptcy.
185k extra deaths attached to the political ideology of austerity.
25,000 less police.
20,000 less prison officers.
10,000 less border officials.
10,000 less firefighters.
10,000 less medical professionals.
25,000 less bed spaces for mental illness.
OECD calculate 3 million hidden unemployed, rate is really 13%.
Creation of 1.3m jobs, mainly temporary, self employed, gig economy and ZHC.
Only 30k full time work positions created.
Close on 50% of workers are self employed, ZHC, or part time precariat.
80% of the 5.3 million self employed live below the poverty line.
35% of self employed only earn £100 a month.
25% cuts for our disabled community.
80% cuts to Mobility allowance.
Closing Remploy.
40% of working households have practically no savings.
70% of households have less than 10k savings.
60% of households can only survive 2 months without a wage.
Household debt reaches new peak, despite emergency base rates.
Increase of 50% in hate crimes.
Increase of knife crime by 150% to 22,000 per year.
Increase in teenage suicide by 70%.
Suicide up 12% in the year 2018.
Self harm among young women up 70%.
Life expectancy down 3 years.
NHS satisfaction level at lowest recorded rate.
Council home building down 90%.
200k social homes lost since 2010.
Zero starter homes built, despite Tory flagship programme.
Council home building down 90%.
200k social homes lost since 2010.
One million families on council home waiting list.
100,000 increase on the council home waiting list since 2010.

I'd be delighted to see a list of their successes. I've asked countless times for Tory voters to post one. Funnily enough I've still never seen it. I can happily post a list of these similar statistics from the end of the last Labour government. The contrast is stark.

This

Conservative. But I think MN is fairly left wing so I'd expect 90% of posters to say they'd vote Labour.

Where will you go?

Looking at general views we’ve got a back up but still nice life here.

Unlike the tories ??

@LyndaLaHughes I am quite sure that if Labour had remained in power from 2015 until now, the country would be in a worse mess. Just look at Wales and the mess Sadique Khan has made in London.

I'm sorry you think your personal anecdotes outweigh data and evidence. I am incredibly angry that this government have utterly destroyed the country over the past 13 years and seeing first hand every day the impact that austerity and their policies are having on people allows me to have empathy beyond my own situation- something most Tory voters lack.

Probably Labour, never Tory. Would consider Green if it wasn't going to make any difference, since I favour their policies over Labour. Really I'd like to see a broad left alliance to get the sham of a government out.