Am I deluded to think the blue wall might crumble if there were a GE ?

[Katharinablum]

Appreciate there's not going to be a GE for at least 3 years. Also appreciate that the british electorate seems to have a short memory regarding tory governments...
I'm on twitter and a regular comment from certain elements is that longstanding Labour leave constituencies turned tory in the last GE. Usually associated with crowing about how labour is finished. Back in dec 2019 I would have struggled to disagree, but with a new leader at the helm things are looking up, that and the absolute ineptitude of the government's management of the pandemic, plus their sheer dishonesty over brexit, I'm daring to wonder whether those resolutely blue constituencies in the home counties and shires might turn a little pinker ? What's the tipping point to make life long tories desert them ?
People up here in the north are more politically fickle, there's alot of w/c dislike and distrust of labour, far more than they deserve, whereas the tories have escaped it relatively speaking, despite years of ideological austerity that hurt the north far more than the EU ever did..Just wondered if people thought there would be a realignment in the way huge areas of the country voted, what with a chaotic brexit pretty inevitable as well as the fall out from covid.. .

I think the govt will be let off the hook, if there's a no deal Brexit and dire economic consequences of that, as it will be impossible to tell whether the recession we're going to experience next year is due to Brexit or due to Covid (probably both).

It's depressing. I don't think many people really get how bad the economy is going to be. The furlough scheme alone has cost £14 BILLION per month.

Funnily though, even though he's a nasty Tory, in the short time between being elected and the Covid crisis, I seem to remember Boris announcing quite a few large public spending plans. It seemed like he was out to rival Corbyn in his largesse. That won't be able to continue. www.thetimes.co.uk/article/election-2019-warning-over-tories-100bn-of-public-spending-plans-rmnm0h7z3

Don't the public tend to be more likely to vote left-leaning when the economy is doing well, and right-leaning when their wallets are threatened?

I mentioned 'dido' Diane Harding and her latest contract to my dyed in the wall Tory friend to gage a reaction and she had no idea who she was.
(Would still vote for the conservatives because ' Corbyn was a communist and Blair a war monger slimy so and so)
One of the reasons labour lost the last GE. Things like nepotism and telling lies have no impact on their thinking. We have to agree to disagree.
The Labour Party let a lot of their core supporters down over the years and getting those people back is an uphill task.thats how I see it.
My late dad was a lifelong member of the L P and had morals and values that are sadly lacking today with people in general not just politicians.
Sunak as new leader scares me a bit as he would appeal to the floating voters. Seen a one of the 'good guys! ' 🤔

Keir Starmer and labour in general are too silent at the moment.

They need to be saying more than they are - how would they get Covid things done differently?

And if they say they can't come up with it quickly, then that rather shows they would do no better if they were in office, for no-one has had the time to do otherwise.

People might be fed up w th incompetent governments, but they aren't anywhere near ready for a policy-free one

Keir Starmer is a really plausible leader, but the problem is that there are a lot of very hard-left oddballs in Labour and that puts off a lot of voters.

Three years is a long time op. By then brexit and Covid will be a distant memory, we will have moved on, it will all be resolved.

Trying to predict what the landscape will be like in three years and then who would win an election is as pointless as it gets.

Kier Starmer is a reluctant leader in my book. I've never voted for the tories but I would also hesitate to vote for him ( I also live in a Tory safe seat so my vote doesnt make much difference anyway )
Probably have to be Lib dems? It's a long way off so who knows what will happen in four years time!
The L P need policies and clarity. I've not seen either from any of them lately but covid hasn't helped on that score I guess.

They need to be saying more than they are - how would they get Covid things done differently?

There is no winning answer to this, none whatsoever, that’s why they aren’t going there.

Keir Starmer has impressed me with how professional he has been. I’ve been impressed with the zero tolerance on RLB and I’ve been impressed with his unwavering stance that schools need to go back.
The only thing is, I don’t really know what differently Labour would do now about the pandemic? I’d like the know.

I’d like a cooling of the rhetoric (no more killing Granny, no more snitching on your neighbours) and a cooling of a few of the more onerous restrictions. Is that the kind of thing they’d be offering? What would they offer?

This is all to say, by the way, that I’m glad the conservatives won. If they hadn’t won Starmer would not be leader, we’d have Corbyn.

We live in a very blue area, a lot of the due hard Tories think anyone moaning about how the pandemic has been handled are just trying to score points politically. They also think that if Corbyn had been in charge things would be worse. They don't like Kier either and are raring to go for a no deal brexit.

It's baffling.

There is no winning answer to this, none whatsoever, that’s why they aren’t going there.

I get that but it makes me less willing to criticise the Government’s handling of it tbh because there is no alternative scenario that we can point to. If someone was saying a and someone else b then we know where stand.

Sushi,
you must live near me! Similar around here too. A bit of moaning but their loyalty is always there , under the surface. The more wealthy working class tories are such a boom for them in the votes stakes and you only have to look back at the 80s to see why that is of course.

I'm surprised at the posts - I thought everyone hated Boris etc and believed they were doing a terrible job from what is said in the media.
I feel Labour could certainly gain some seats but they need to do something. Annelise Dodds was interviewed by Nick Robinson and spent the time apologising for her privilege, having been to a private school, apart from wanting a good education for everyone (yes, that's so easy to achieve) she didn't seem to have any ideas about anything. Does Keir Starma?
I think the electorate are better informed now and realise there is no magic wand for equality, industry etc so expect some real propositions which so far aren't forthcoming form Tories or Labour.

I think they will pull the women’s rights card out just in the nic of time which will drive women voters who left Lib Dem and labour because of their very poor policies- to them

Sir Keir Starmer should have stayed a barrister. I've nothing against him at all , but his much more suited to that role in my humble opinion.

Every government across the world is being criticised for the handling of the pandemic.

Fact is that this is so much the unknown that there was never going to be a right way to handle it, and had labour been in charge the criticisms would have been just the same, but perhaps over different issues. But given labour aren’t saying how they would handle things I suspect that they would have handled them the same, much as most other governments have.

People uphold the likes of New Zealand as a way to handle things, but a country which is thousands of miles away from anywhere with a population of only five million was never going to be as badly hit as one which is so densely populated. And they have COVID back now and large parts of their economy are screwed because of border closures, so even NZ aren’t being upheld by their citizens.

Brexit will be diluted by the pandemic because there are going to be economic changes anyway because of the pandemic. Worldwide changes in fact.

Opinion is something which is largely created by the media. The press say that opinion is x, and then the electorate vote y, meaning that opinion was what the media printed.

It’s the same in the US. Trump is practically out, but talk to Americans on the ground and a huge proportion of them are going to vote for him.

IMO trump will be in power for another four years, and the conservatives will win the next election. You’re not going to undo such a massive landslide in one election period.

I think it is too early to tell to be honest. A lot could happen in the 3 years before the next GE. The press can sway people to a certain extent but they also rely on revenue from people buying their product, so they tend to be a good barometer of what they think people want to hear and people generally want to hear that they are right and other people think the same

There's a huge psychological aspect to this too. For those people who switched their typical vote and helped to elect this Government, there is a need for that to have been the "right" choice. This means that they are more likely to defend their chosen candidates even when they can see that they are fucking things up.

It's the same thing we saw with Brexit and the shifting arguments there after the vote. The need to have been right and in the winning side often superseeds the ability to critically analyse the reality.

Yabu. The various shitshows the Tories have spearheaded (take your pick) has resulted in barely a dent in voting intentions. I agree that Starmer is Labour's best chance in a long time, but people despise intelligence like Starmer's and experts are no longer necessary. I also think you are massively underestimating the collective memory failure of the electorate. They will swallow the lies that the Brexshit shambles is the EU's fault. And they'll feel sorry for dear old Boris, who has been tested more than any other pm in recent history. He'll emerge a hero thanks to that absolute wankpuffin Cummings. And the Russians will keep up their information warfare to skew election results. This is something straight out of an Orwellian dystopia. I can honestly say I have never hated a government as much as this one - and I include Thatcher in that. There are still many, many people who believe "the alternative would have been worse". We are living in times where a dance routine by a black dance troupe received 24,000 complaints to Ofcom. The rise of the right will march on. I wish that were not the case.

If held now I think the Tories would again win quite comfortably

Labour has a lot of ground to make up with voters and with convincing people they are up to being a worthy opposition before a general election.

The next election well if Labour move more to the centre because the Tories will to keep hold of those votes that they gained and KS proves himself to be a good party leader (I think he is doing ok so far) then I think they are in with a chance to win

Thankfully Labour have shoved the left Of the party back to the back benches, they have a place in British politics but it is not leading the country as voters informed them

So really the tories have done a blinder. They've already got their solid blue voters in the home counties and shires, who will never waiver, but because of the of the way the brexit debate has been framed, they've now attracted some of the leave voting labour northern and midlands constituencies now. I say some because the red wall hasn't completely crumbled, but is certainly dented yes, 11 million still voted for the labour party, and only a minority of seats were lost but nevertheless inroads have been made into their vote share.
I had a discussion on twitter with a lad in his 20s, admitted he wasn't well educated but had set up himself up as a tradesman, lived at home but was saving up to buy his own home just outside manchester, couldn't fathom why others would struggle, saw himself as aspirational (which he was) and regarded labour as the party of scroungers. He'd actually joined the tory party. I suspect there are plenty more like him but I don't know how labour can attract their votes.
One other point is that the debate about other things rather than brexit/covid like school funding, state of prisons, nhs seems to have been forgotten completely. Maybe once these things are back on the agenda we'll see a change in opinions.

I also live in a Tory safe seat so my vote doesnt make much difference anyway

I wonder if Labour would adopt a policy of voting reform. We live in a country where you can get a large majority even if you don't have large support in the country.

Especially where only certain constituencies matter as many are either overwhelmingly Labour or overwhelmingly Conservative.

@Whatafustercluck sadly I absolutely agree with you. Much of the Brexit debate was about a perceived loss of identity, that's now turned into the stupid woke debate, anti pc stuff, middle class lefty hangwringing liberal elites, it's become a real culture war which the tories have exploited, there's a distinct conservative streak in some w/c communities and this jingoistic stuff appeals to them.

It depends on Scotland. If they gain independence in the meantime, Labour won't win another GE.

Scotland was never a deciding factor to be fair. They waste their votes on snp who will never be in power and only harp on about one topic, not caring that they've destroyed everything else in scotland. And then they complain they never get a say, well you wouldn't because you voted in a majority snp government and there's only 50+ of them at most against 600. They would have more of a say if they picked either tory or labour. Plus something might actually get done then up here about our crappy standards for schools, hospitals, police etc.

Are there any parallels with what happened to the UK in the 1970s and a dissolusioned country under Ted Heath? I grew up in the Thatcher era of the 80s but am too young to remember the 3 day week, but I wondered if there was that same level as anger as today with the current state of affairs?
Can anybody summarise what happened re politics in that era and public feeling?

Much of the Brexit debate was about a perceived loss of identity, that's now turned into the stupid woke debate, anti pc stuff, middle class lefty hangwringing liberal elites

The thing is - the Tories are making issues that don't exist.

For example - the BBC and the Proms, stirring up issues about 'white authors being banned from universities - when it was just a suggestion that black authors being included etc

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/aug/31/the-rights-culture-war-politics-rightwing-fantasy-elections

It's working though. Culture wars. Exploit people's fears.

Still - if they want to be fucked up, to not get housing for their kids, to have crap education and a crap standard of living compared to other modern European countries, then I am past caring.

The Tories won't make their lives better. But they think they will.