To think that Turkeys Voted for Christmas?

[StormzysHat]

NC. This could appear goady but honestly it's a genuine confusion to me.

According to what we are led to believe by the media / some people on MN, "northerners" (as a generic group) voted for Conservatives because they are disadvantaged and fed up with the north south divide among other reasons.

How come disadvantaged Londoners voted Labour? I work in support sector and many people in my care will be in shelters this Christmas, and others rely on food banks. They were saddened and disheartened by Labour's loss and felt the Conservatives in no way represent them. This is on top of the Tory devised hostile environment and Windrush scandal making peoples' lives hell.

I understand that people are / have been pissed off and wanted to have their voices heard. But WHY would the very communities ravaged by the Tories in the 80's vote for them?

Why is it that Corbyn who lives in a very modest way, in Upper Holloway and who went to grammar school is seen as less acceptable than an old Etonian millionaire proven liar? How can Boris Jonson be seen as someone who can help the north south divide or to champion the working class FFS??

I completely accept Corbyn's leadership has been poor and don't get me wrong, I'm not a fan. BUT, given the alternative, I can't understand HOW working class people could vote for Johnson?

AIBU to think the turkeys just voted for Christmas?

@loginsaredicks Oh and FYI constantly calling people racist just because we don't agree with mass uncontrolled gimme-gration

Maybe people wouldn't constantly call those like yourself racist if you didn't use such loaded, inflammatory and racist-like phrases as 'gimme-gration'. Maybe have a look at your own attitude and how that contributes, you aren't doing yourself any favours by carrying on like that. Besides, neither major party wanted "mass uncontrolled" immigration. So it seems you are inventing something that is basically, fake news.

As to why people voted labour, I would recommend the Janice Turner column, which is excellent.

My personal views on this are as me speaking as a southerner, as to why I couldn't vote Labour (I spoiled my ballot but mine is a Tory stronghold so wouldn't matter anyway). These are just my impressions.

1. JC and JM have some very poor taste in their vocal support for some regimes who have done some very poor things (Venezuela etc), Hamas. I really couldn't trust them to do the best thing on security and I don't think they have any respect for our armed forces, the Queen (even a republican can appreciate and respect her - JC doesn't seem to be anything other than disdainful), sporting competitions or any of the things that they would call nationalism but most normal people would see as simple patriotism.

1. JC and people like Emily Thornberry don't actually like working class British people, they feel sorry for them and want to make their lives better, sure, but they look down on them and don't want to understand or share any of their views or passions. See Emily Thornberry's tweet about the English flag. That is my perception anyway.

1. All of JC's inner circle (including him) have been privately educated or privately educate their kids - they are all doing very well for themselves, so their hatred for people who might want to use private education just looks like hypocrisy. British people hate that.

1. I couldn't trust them on the economy. I work in a sector where it is very clear to me that a lot of companies would move their head offices out of the uk (and a decent portion of their high paid management functions to support this) if JC's Labour Party got in and implemented the forced share ownership rules. I would personally be happy to pay more tax to fund services, but expropriation of assets is not the same. I don't think their manifesto stacked up in terms of the numbers and I think there were some terrible pledges (the WASPI women one for example - why give out money to affluent women that could be directed elsewhere).

1. Lack of clarity as to what labour really stand for - lack of clarity on Brexit, lack of clarity on self ID etc - just not clear what the party position is. A whole lot of fudge. Really, Labour could have engaged with the May government and had social protections written in to the withdrawal agreement and voted for it if they wanted to back brexit, but they didn't. But they also didn't want to be a proper remain party either. They just wanted to sneer at the Brexit supporters and kick the can down the road. I am a remainer BTW, but that is really how it came across to me.

1. Looks at where the new northern tory MPs elected came from. The north. You can't say the same for some of the labour MPs they deposed. Or Jo swinson, who lives in Devon. Maybe people want real representative democracy, not just a person in a red rosette who says "I love Sedgefield, Redcar and want to help the poor etc etc" but has never really lived there.

I accept I lost. I accept we all did.

aintnothinbutagstring I agree with every word of your post. My red wall constituency stayed red by the skin of its teeth, which I think is down to the sitting Labour MP having done a lot of work for the local area - which is what the campaign material emphasised, rather than Corbyn's plans.

@StormzysHat Until we stop trotting our these negative simplistic stereotypes on both sides we are not going to move forward. Ffs I don't know any Londoners who haven't travelled further than Watford apart from a couple of immigrants who have only lived here a year or so.

It is overly simplified but Londoners usually only visit the ‘nice’ bits of the north. The Lake District, York, a night out in Leeds or Newcastle. What southerners (with no northern family) aren’t doing is going into the working men’s club and listening to working class locals. They aren’t going round Asda in one of the most deprived areas of the country. They aren’t trying to find a job in an area with no industries. They aren’t living with the day to day lives, most of which are run by labour councils, and struggling to find any investment in their area. Just because you’ve visited the north, doesn’t mean you understand the issues of the north. As evidenced throughout this thread.

It’s more than why did people vote Tory, it’s why they didn’t vote Labour. Politic is usually a cycle and Labour should be at is most powerful. Labour underestimated its own supporters, Boris and probably more importantly Dominic Cummings and they definitely under estimated Brexit.

majority of workers pay a third of their wages to benefit those that do not work

For clarity, the majority of taxes goes towards

Welfare some of which is supporting people who don't work, but most of which is supporting people who are actually in work. 24%

Closely followed by

Healthcare 20%, so cancer sufferers and disabled people and those pensioners again may not be in work

state pensions, 13%, so paying for people who already paid a third of their wages in the previous decades to support other pensioners, so yes they don't work but they already paid for other people pensions in the expectation that each generation would support the next

And then education. 12%: So yes, supporting children before they go to work.

But do people really begrudge their taxes going on those things? when you say supporting people who don't work it does sound like you mean feckless wasters, not the very young, the ill, the old and the working poor

To surmise Caroline Flint's 2 main reasons for Labour's failure:

1. Leadership - already extensively debated here

1. Brexit - it really was a very important issue to the Northern Labour Voters. Far too many brain cells have been expended on why the UK should remain in the EU and etc, etc and if half as many brain cells had scrolled down to the end of all the studies in the Economic Impacts of EU - FOM (UK style) and not relied on other's interpretations they would have seen that there has been a negative impact on the low-paid.

This is often explained as 'small'. Small to who?

@crispysausagerolls Apart from Breitbart, the Daily Mail is the worst. It is most definitely ultra-far right, not just merely 'right-leaning'.

@thetoddleratemyhomework

A very interesting post. I'm clearly not going to agree with all of it but that's not the point. It is helpful and interesting to note that in some people's eyes JC 'despised' the working class. I totally get that about Thornberry (and her tweet) but don't at all see that in JC myself.

Tony Blair and Mo Mowlam broke bread with similar types. It's what you have to do if you want to broker peace.
They were in government. They had the power to broker peace with both sides. JC was a backbench MP who pandered to one side only, consistently . I do find it distasteful that Momentum rewrote history to diminish the achievements of a brave, principled Labour female politician and hand it to Jeremy Corbyn.

You are presumably very affluent and never use public services, come from a traditional English white middle class background and all your friends are the same

Judge yourself if I am affluent: My annual tax bill last year was 300 ish on my OAP and tiny private pension.

By public services, if you are referring to the NHS, I use it a lot as I have been severely physically disabled for many years. I was refused a much needed operation on cost grounds while Labour were in power, which I subsequently had when the Conservatives were in Government.

I was brought up in the late 1940s/50s in a working class family and both parents worked.

I have friends of varying political leanings. I do have Tory friends. Also, my best friend of 55 years votes Labour as do a couple of other friends/family. Another friend is more Liberal leaning. None of us call each other vile names; we pretty much agree to disagree. Those who voted Labour are obviously disappointed and also mad at Corbyn not making way for an electable leader but I've neither seen nor heard anything from them approaching any of the hysteria on here.

0/4

Leavers looked on the referendum result like some sort of competition and they wanted their prize no matter the cost. “You lost her over it” “remain are sore losers” etc. It was a competition. Winning it was more important than the consequences.
All those still saying get over it, move on, the people have spoken etc. They too will feel the horrors of their choice in the years to come. The nhs is absolutely going to be slowly privatised and sold off. Homelessness is going to continue to rise, food banks will be the norm for many more. We had a chance to change this but the leavers were blinded by their frothing excitement and victory, played by a right wing media and handed over what’s left of the U.K. to the elite. We are all screwed.

@CakeAndGin It is overly simplified but Londoners usually only visit the ‘nice’ bits of the north. The Lake District, York, a night out in Leeds or Newcastle. What southerners (with no northern family) aren’t doing is going into the working men’s club and listening to working class locals. They aren’t going round Asda in one of the most deprived areas of the country. They aren’t trying to find a job in an area with no industries. They aren’t living with the day to day lives, most of which are run by labour councils, and struggling to find any investment in their area. Just because you’ve visited the north, doesn’t mean you understand the issues of the north. As evidenced throughout this thread.

Yes you could be right about that in some cases. But surely "Workington man" isn't visiting a night shelter in Newham or a young people's project in Tower Hamlets to find out their views either? I mean do we blame them? Surely our media is at fault here.

I voted Tory and I live in a northern town “ravaged by the Tories in the 80’s”. I grew up amongst men that would rather die than vote Tory and would even hold back a couple of A/L days just in case Margaret Thatcher died so they could party (not even kidding). Then I later learned how the unions actually held the country to ransom and the lights would go out regularly when they didn’t get their way not to mention the piss taking that was going off amongst the miners (my own grandad would throw sickies when he’d been on a bender). So my point is, that anti-Tory Northern embedded mindset may be dying out a bit and we’re not all sheep.

Fatasfooook - and you are not at all one of those people who are looking forward to it all being a disaster so that you can be proved right are you? How is your comment remotely helpful to the OP who is so desperately trying to understand? Jeez!

Silverysurfer - you know there's a comfy chair, log fire and a warm welcome for you in The Arms. Thanks for keeping the fire burning - everyone else is welcome too, if you want to pop in. Great snacks and beverages too.

@MellowBird85 That's what unions exist for. To get better pay and conditions for their workers, who clearly weren't getting appropriate pay and conditions. You seem to be blaming the victims who only wanted decent pay and living standards, and not the elite who forced them to strike.

BrainAcheRemedy

With a disabled family member which relies heavily on the nhs and a modest income, I really want to be proved very very wrong.

Many heavy leave areas voted Tory as they want the winning referendum result acted on

Because under the last Labour government for many there wasn’t the improvement that so many of us experienced

London and cities are different there will always nearly be work

The areas that turned Tory rejected Corbyn’s labour they didn’t believe the promises as they are too good to be true

There are quite a few people on this thread I wish I knew in real life and could go for a drink with

@brainache it is quite interesting though, and not from a schadenfreude perspective since we would ALL be affected. If Brexit does all turn to shit, Yellowhammer turns out to be true and page 48 of the Tory manifesto implemented, who will they blame I wonder?

Well, I'm sorry about your family member Fatasfooook , but others voted for what they thought was best for them too, so why not try to understand rather than simply go on the attack?

I agree with a previous poster, in that this was all about Brexit. People that voted leave wanted it over and done with so they felt they had no choice but to vote Tory. That, and that some of Jeremy Corbyn's policies were too far left for some to stomach. I look forward to labour electing a more moderate leader and giving the Tories a real fight and competition.

Forgot this bit: not to mention the piss taking that was going off amongst the miners (my own grandad would throw sickies when he’d been on a bender). This seems like unnecessary nit-picking and grasping at something for fault. Do you honestly think that there is not any other industry that doesn't have people who throw a sickie when hung over? I don't thing is a single industry, public or private, that doesn't. So I'm not sure what your point was there, @MellowBird85 except to say that miners acted no different from any other person.