Anyone in Hartlepool - what on earth is going on

[Purplecatshopaholic]

Genuine question. (Apologies if this is in the wrong place, I don’t post much). I’m Scottish and in Scotland, and I am constantly aware these days of how different the views are of Westminster up here, to across the border sometimes. We also have our own Labour Party leader up here. But really? Is Keir Starmer that bad? Are other parties not available? Who on earth is still voting for Boris…? Any WHY?

Things people in hartlepool may believe the Tories get right

1. Brexit this at present seems to have been proved right, it may not be long term but at present with vaccines it looks like it is doing good
2. Furlough, being paid to stay at home during lockdown 80% of salary was probably enough it is certainly better than JSA even 80% of NMW is a lot better than JSA
3. wallpapergate is a distant thing happening miles away in London, local labour council giving jobs to mates at extortionate prices is local and known about wallpaper is a tiny irrelevant drop in ocean compartively
4. They feel the Tories are not sneering at them

5 The Labour leader is just a champagne socialist given the choice a real toff is better than a pretend one; calling yourself Sir is not as apporachable as Boris

1. There has been some investment nearby by Tories and some new jobs, years of labour MP's and councils did not achieve this

They maybe didn't vote Labour as many WOKE policies and TWAW are just not seen as relevant
Number of people in Hartlepool offended by getting a present of pink unicorn t shirt for their daughter 3, people grateful for the present 15,000 ( ok I exaggerate ) but this is not an issue
Calling people thick racist plebs for asking questions about either brexit or immigration

Most people whether Smiths, Jones, MacDonalds, Singhs or Hussains just want a house for their family a job and a decent school for their kids and a doctor's appointment when they need one and a police officer to turn up if they are burgled assaulted etc
They do not want to be sneered at as uneducated, thick or any type of phobic
People may vote for someone they dislike but they will never vote for someone that they believe dislikes them

I agree with RedToothBrush’s post. There’s been a similar result at local council level in Nuneaton & Bedworth, traditional labour area and conservatives now have overall control of the Council. If you know the local politics this wasn’t really a surprise result, labour councillors were, in my opinion, poor, unprofessional and complacent. I’ve always voted labour but I come into contact with local politicians a lot through work and (as a generalisation) I’ve found labour politicians poor (not all of course, some are great) but overall I’d say the quality of labour people in local government just isn’t good enough.

I totally understand why people in Hartlepool have turned away from Labour.
The bit I don't get is why or how they've been propelled to vote for Johnson's Conservative party.
To my mind these are separate questions.
(I did hear on the radio that the numbers were consistent with the possibility that the Brexit party vote from the last election had "transferred over" to the conservatives - could this be it? )

@CervixSampler

Labour don't know what a woman is. Neither do LibDems. Or the Greens. It's a problem. I suspect the brexit effect is the driver though.

Exactly this. Labour do not represent the working class anymore. Anything but.

[quote supermoonrising]@AllTheUsernamesAreAlreadyTaken
Sorry, I'm not confused. You said "Labour is fuelled by hatred". Clearly implying that is not the case for other major parties. I just pointed out that your statement about Labour, when taken in context of British voters and the UK party political landscape, has very little to back it up.[/quote]
I think the problem is that while the Tories might be “fuelled by hatred” towards the EU, public sector etc. Labour is fuelled by hatred towards its own voters. It would be masochistic to vote for a party whose members appear all over Twitter, Mumsnet etc to tell you how terrible you are for voting Leave or whose canvassers shout abuse at you on the doorstep.

@Hellocatshome

Because the Labour our Grandfathers voted for no longer exists

Because people like our grandfathers, and the jobs our grandfathers did no longer exist.

Another win for the Party that wanted to stop free meals for the poorest children during a pandemic. Welcome to England 2021. What a lovely, enlightened place.

@Peregrina

They could not give a stuff about wallpaper, small to medium lies, and jobs to cronies (well, if they run a small business - corner shop, chippy, taxi, they'd give their brother/sister/mate a job too and do).

But this is the sort of thing I don't understand. £820 for a roll of wallpaper, which is more than I spend on food in a month. How on earth is that representative of ordinary working people?

They think if you've earned the money then fair play to you, they'd do the same. I know middle class commentators don't think Boris has earned it but convoluted stories about how a loan might have happened and whether it was in the rules don't cut through especially when the only reason people are interested in arcane procedure (was someone later declaring a interest etc) is as far as the working class northerner is concerned to dis their man Boris who they really do believe wants to level up the north. Labour can't prove Boris won't level up (to be fair to Starmer) because Boris has not had a chance to act yet (Brexit/Covid) but Boris promised on Brexit and delivered so they believed him on this and sod middle class types fussing about wallpaper.

At first I thought Teacupdrama had the quote of the day
"People may vote for someone they dislike but they will never vote for someone that they believe dislikes them"
But.... I think Boris is using people to make the rich richer in this country. Would people prefer to vote for someone who is so indifferent to you he doesn't really consider you human and is happy to use you to profit from?

Totally agree Handsoff

The problem with today's Labour party and the majority of the metropolitan elites who support it, is that, deep down, this is the very essence of how they feel.

@supermoonrising

Another win for the Party that wanted to stop free meals for the poorest children during a pandemic. Welcome to England 2021. What a lovely, enlightened place.

Do you get those ear muffs free with your Labour Party membership?

@TeacupDrama

Things people in hartlepool may believe the Tories get right

1. Brexit this at present seems to have been proved right, it may not be long term but at present with vaccines it looks like it is doing good
2. Furlough, being paid to stay at home during lockdown 80% of salary was probably enough it is certainly better than JSA even 80% of NMW is a lot better than JSA
3. wallpapergate is a distant thing happening miles away in London, local labour council giving jobs to mates at extortionate prices is local and known about wallpaper is a tiny irrelevant drop in ocean compartively
4. They feel the Tories are not sneering at them

5 The Labour leader is just a champagne socialist given the choice a real toff is better than a pretend one; calling yourself Sir is not as apporachable as Boris

1. There has been some investment nearby by Tories and some new jobs, years of labour MP's and councils did not achieve this

They maybe didn't vote Labour as many WOKE policies and TWAW are just not seen as relevant
Number of people in Hartlepool offended by getting a present of pink unicorn t shirt for their daughter 3, people grateful for the present 15,000 ( ok I exaggerate ) but this is not an issue
Calling people thick racist plebs for asking questions about either brexit or immigration

Most people whether Smiths, Jones, MacDonalds, Singhs or Hussains just want a house for their family a job and a decent school for their kids and a doctor's appointment when they need one and a police officer to turn up if they are burgled assaulted etc
They do not want to be sneered at as uneducated, thick or any type of phobic
People may vote for someone they dislike but they will never vote for someone that they believe dislikes them

This is a very well-considered post that lays out possible reasons why people arrived at a decision to vote Tory/vote anything but Labour, as opposed to 'this side = good / this side = evil' polarism.

The Labour party should apply a similar form of analysis to uncover exactly why they're losing voters in formerly safe seats, instead of resorting to cringe-inducing publicity stunts.

@supermoonrising

Another win for the Party that wanted to stop free meals for the poorest children during a pandemic. Welcome to England 2021. What a lovely, enlightened place.

What does it say about the current state of the Labour Party then?

Life long Labour supporter living in the South, I've this thread interesting and useful in determining why a party led by an unfaithful liar won in Hartlepool. Labour expected it, Starmer should resign.

@RunHobbitRun

Not in Hartlepool but we had Labour canvassing for last minute Senedd votes yesterday. I asked them politely to leave because the incumbent candidate doesn't listen to people like me and won't change their stance on the issues I see as key (some environmental, some safe guarding, some economic). I saw little point in discussing it at the 11th hour.

Their response was to try shouting at me on my own doorstep that people like me would mean the Tories would win the seat.

Zero acknowledgment that I had concerns, just straight into the attack

If this is the approach Labour are taking with their campaigns there's no wonder they're losing ground to the Conservatives.

It's not necessarily that Labour voters are voting blue instead of red, I think it's more likely they're spoiling ballots and splitting votes (I was a vote splitter giving mine to an independent therefore reducing Labour's strength).

There's no acknowledgment that the bulk of natural Labour supporters can't support the current direction, instead it's "We'd be better than Conservatives" and "We pay most attention to the vocal minority".

Labour really need to do something if they don't want to lose more MPs in the next general election. It'll be interesting to see how yesterday's votes pan out over the country.

Yes I’ve had similar from labour canvassers until 6’3” dh loomed into view.

Truth be told I’d tell them all to bugger off when their going door to door.

@LEnferCestLesAutres

I totally understand why people in Hartlepool have turned away from Labour. The bit I don't get is why or how they've been propelled to vote for Johnson's Conservative party. To my mind these are separate questions. (I did hear on the radio that the numbers were consistent with the possibility that the Brexit party vote from the last election had "transferred over" to the conservatives - could this be it? )

I saw a tweet this morning that suggested the 'footballisation' of English politics. Huge numbers of traditionally non-voting people were mobilised to vote Leave for Brexit so now they're part of a team and they want their Brexit Party/socially conservative/Tory team to win.

It's almost impressive how many of these people say they're voting for a change, or voting against the Establishment, and they do this by voting for the party who've been in power for the past 11 years.

Some people are missing the point about the wallpaper too! I do t care who has £820 wallpaper in their walls. However I do care if that wallpaper has bought someone a favour which is potentially not in the best interests of the country ... for all we know that wallpaper has been an excellent investment for some other **hole who also doesn't give a toss about the average person, when it results in them being awarded a massive NHS contract or similar, or tax rules being updated to benefit them.... it's not about disliking the man in charge just because he has fancy wallpaper

@Pinchoftums

90% of the media is right wing controlled. The right are much better at managing social media People do believe what they read. Labour spent so much time infighting they forgot the real enemies.

Again, I don’t think that’s helpful. Maybe it’s me seeing emotive language where there’s not (apologies if so), but talking about “enemies” and “media is right wing controlled” is not a good look to me.

The bit I don't get is why or how they've been propelled to vote for Johnson's Conservative party.

Perhaps because the other parties feel like even less of a viable option than Labour? The Lib Dems are a political wraith that is hanging on by its fingernails, and the Green Party have an appalling track record in terms of in-party safeguarding.

The sneers of people like @supermoonrising are a big part of why people don’t want to vote for Labour.

Sorry I've quickly rushed through thread while at work so may be repeating. To me it seems as simple as all Brexit voters automatically go to Tory, all Remainers fill up the other parties combined, which would suggest it would make sense for them to join forces while FPTP is still a thing. PR makes a lot more sense but I don't think it will ever become a reality. Why would the current government ever want that. They've moved to the right to capture the mood of those who once hid their prejudices and are massively playing up to that. Added to this, it's very hard for Labour to come back from the Corbyn disaster, I think it will take years. The whole balance has changed ends - Tories now represent working class (or so they make out) and Labour are for the 'loony left.' Me and DH are so utterly opposite in our politics, I'm exhausted with the whole thing. When the Hartlepool result was declared he said, with a worryingly weird over-excited sigh, "Wonderful..." He loves them. I can't stand it.

@supermoonrising

Another win for the Party that wanted to stop free meals for the poorest children during a pandemic. Welcome to England 2021. What a lovely, enlightened place.

You need to do better than that if you want to get out of the political wilderness.

Try a more positive agenda