To think we won't see a Labour Government again for many years?

[Rosehip10]

Even discounting the changes in the ex-industrial former "red-wall" seats, no Labour leader has ever become Prime Minister without winning at least half the seats in Scotland. Even if Scotland does not vote for independence in the next few years, Labour is never going to recover there. If independence comes then it is academic anyway.

Combine that with the changes in the former Labour seats in the north (which I think will only continue) then a Government cannot be formed of London MPs, a few larger cities and some seats in university towns/cities.

I don't think Starmer is the most charismatic leader but I think any ppolitican would struggle to solve this. Very hard to try and appeal to ex-industrial seats AND young, metropolitan, middle class voters in London etc.

One of the best comments I saw yesterday was Labour trying to make traction of the conservatives being corrupt and stuffing money into places that voted for them, was people thinking "well all politicians are corrupt anyway, so we may as well vote for Boris to get some of that too!"

I think if they can find another leader like John Smith, they might have more of a fighting chance.

A huge change is in the past, working people voted Labour through family tradition and the Labour party was a huge part of working class life through things like working men's social clubs etc, also in the work place (pit/steel works/factory/transport) your union shop stewards organised hard (and hence there was often Labour MPs actually from working backgrounds). All this has gone or changed and is never coming back.

Labour obviously has huge issues getting enough votes to be in government again, but most people in the UK are extremely politically illiterate. And when they hear their preferred media source tell them that Labour has zero policies on housing and the economy and is only fixated on gender pronouns, millions of people lap it up and don’t question the narrative at all. I support people turning their backs on Labour, but this notion that Labour is not concerned with solving real problems while the Tories are (the party that wasted incredible time/resources on a pointless Brexit that may well soon break the Union, that got in a fury about statues, that is obsessed with killing the BBC ...). I just can’t take it seriously. Please someone tell me ONE real issue - housing, NHS, education, etc - that they have made better - through their own targeted actions/policies - than it was under the last Labour government

Sorry, that should say * I support people turning their backs on Labour for real faults and weaknesses of the party/their proposals - not for fantasy woke narratives made up by right wing press barons.

When a party loses a vote they need to accept either a) they were wrong or b) they were right
but were unable to effectively convince their voters of this. Both of these responses are challenging to face up to and hard work to overcome.
What Labour seems to be doing at the moment is assuming they lost because their electorate is morally and intellectually inferior. Until they accept the fault is theirs not ours, they will be unelectable.
Hoping to win votes by pointing to sleaze is an example - have they such short memories and do they think we all do?
It’s tragic really. There is no one to offer a proper opposition and positive alternative vision.

The trouble is things like Climate Change, minority rights and foreign good causes seem to be at the fore-front of Labour's manifesto, but they're of little concern to the majority of working class voters

I think it's worth remembering that the people voting Conservative in these areas aren't working class. They tend to be home owners and more often than not retired. The problem for Labour in places like Hartlepool is thata large majority of young people leave for college or university and then stay in cities afterwards. Consequently there's been a huge demographic shift.

@Rosehip10
I think you’re right. The Tories have a natural base of say 25% of households that will always be there’s, or at least strongly lean Tory. The comfortably off, say 50k+ household income, who (rightly or wrongly) don’t want to ever pay more tax than the top rate they already pay.

25% in FPTP system is a hell of a starting point.

Labour just doesn’t have a natural equivalent base anymore. The working class has broken up into smaller and extremely diverse demographic subcategories.

AND pro- independence support in old strongholds in Wales and Scotland is making Labour’s job even more difficult, which, say, Blair didn’t have to face. To be honest I think Labour is screwed. Perhaps it will outlast the Union though.

@supermoonrising

Sorry, that should say * I support people turning their backs on Labour for real faults and weaknesses of the party/their proposals - not for fantasy woke narratives made up by right wing press barons.

It's not a fantasy woke narrative though.

When the SHTF with this pandemic, and people were losing their jobs, scared for their lives, worried about lockdowns and the future, Keir Starmer and his deputy were all over the papers on their knees showing support for a criminal murdered by a policeman in America. They jumped on the wrong bandwagon yet again. BLM was a left wing political movement that supported defunding the police. Your average working class voter has absolutely nothing to do with these movements. It is right that injustice is highlighted and supported, but that isn't what Labour did.

Then there are the statues, monuments of our heritage. Whether right or wrong that those statues exist, to have a political party supporting the destruction and removal of our cultural artifacts across the country is appalling. And hypocritical. And people see this hypocrisy.

These Labour politicians are standing up in parliament and ranting about the kind of things that have no affinity to ordinary working class people of any colour or background. They are niche issues that we have watched Labour throw their wholehearted support behind, whilst appearing to merely pay lip service to the actual issues on the ground in this country, which at the time was the pandemic.

And on the pandemic itself, just wow. What a failure of opposition.

It’s no more than labour and it’s supporters deserve. Let’s take a look at what labour supporters have become known for - Calling the electorate stupid, constantly comparing the country to the latest example of tyrannical regime in the news, beating the drum about the most marginal issues like toppling statues as opposed to the big problems, censoring people, and the age old economic stupidity.

Labour were finished as a viable voting choice the moment they decided to go woke whilst refusing to acknowledge the rampant sexism, racism and homophobia in the party.
How can any party truly expect anyone to vote for them when they loudly claim blm and then throw one of their black mps under the bus and allow them to suffer the sort of abuse that Rosie Duffield has?
Labour claims to be the party of the people yet won't listen to the very people they say they represent?
Lets be brutally honest here very few people outside of the media, universities and certain pro trans groups actually believe that someone can literally change their biological sex or that there are more than 2 sexs, yet unless you profess absolute adherence without question (even over the safeguarding of children) then your not welcome. Guess what people took them at there word.
Keir Stammer has had plenty of opportunities to take a stand and either admit that so called trans rights clash with womens sex based rights and child safeguarding and that a sensible calm discussion needs to be had or come out and explain why acceptance without question is justified, he can't keep sitting on the fence.
The Labour Party has there heads so far up there own backsides that they think calling people thick, ignorant and bigoted for not voting for them when in reality the Labour Party are the ones who are thick, ignorant and bigoted

@Audeca

The trouble is things like Climate Change, minority rights and foreign good causes seem to be at the fore-front of Labour's manifesto, but they're of little concern to the majority of working class voters

I think it's worth remembering that the people voting Conservative in these areas aren't working class. They tend to be home owners and more often than not retired. The problem for Labour in places like Hartlepool is thata large majority of young people leave for college or university and then stay in cities afterwards. Consequently there's been a huge demographic shift.

I think you underestimate the working class here. They are voting Tory, as hard as that is to swallow. Labour have no right to the working class vote, they have to earn it. And if you look at my post above you will see why Labour no longer appeal to the working class, even in ex-mining towns and cities.

I still know people that will vote Labour no matter what but that's just because they hate the tories so much due tot he ancient miner narrative. But that too is changing. And those who really hate the tories but can't bear Labour are voting Lib Dem. That has played out across the country yesterday.

@Rosehip10

A huge change is in the past, working people voted Labour through family tradition and the Labour party was a huge part of working class life through things like working men's social clubs etc, also in the work place (pit/steel works/factory/transport) your union shop stewards organised hard (and hence there was often Labour MPs actually from working backgrounds). All this has gone or changed and is never coming back.

What do you mean by working people? Since 1921, labour have been in power only 5 times. All the other times, who was voting Tory? Do the retired and landed gentry make up such a large % of population that Tories managed to win over and over again? Labour didn’t have some sort of monopoly over the working vote. It’s a myth.

@Cabinfever10 100% to your last sentence. None so blind as those who will not see.

It's hard. Of course blaming the voters is not the right thing to do and won't help, though I haven't got that sense from any LAbour MPs - all the 'officials' from the party I've heard speak over the last couple of days have said they acknowledge they've not done enough or got their message across.

As an observer rather than a member of the party, it's pretty hard not to criticise voters when you see them being interviewed saying stuff like they have voted Tory as Labour have let them down, their area hasn't got a court/enough police/a library/enough jobs/a decent hospital.... Tories have been in power for 11 years and most of what they are complaining about are the effects of austerity, not what Labour have done. Councils have been shafted by the Tories and people have been encouraged to scapegoat them for all their ills, and it's worked. It is a shame people couldn't see through it.

But that's the situation we're in and, though I had high hopes for Starmer, I don't think he's been bold enough. It was hard during the pandemic and if he'd put more alternative ideas out there I think they would have been shouted down and he would have been presented as undermining the efforts. However, he has to do more and I think he should stop trying desperately to hold all factions of his party together and get tough on the left. He needs to take a firm stand on the woman 'issue' and stop trying to please everyone while pleasing no one. I must say, it's sickening that people like Abbott and McDonnell seem just as pleased as the Tories with the results...

I'm not a fan of Boris but his vaccination programme has been fantastic. The current government was well ahead of other countries in getting the vaccines ordered and rolled out.

@Newrumpus
That’s certainly the media narrative. I think it’s pretty simplistic. OK, let’s just look at one strand: Labour never thought Brexit was a good idea. It might have backed the Democratic vote. But it thought it was a stupid and damaging project. It still does, but hey, here we are. 70% of people in Hartlepool however thought Brexit was the bees knees. They didn’t like hearing Labour’s lack of enthusiasm and caution. Hence, at the recent byelection, the Tories hoovered up the substantial exBrexit vote (combined Tory+Brexit Party vote in 2019 was 8,000 more than Labour). Neither side was “wrong” here, just a clash of views. What you’d expect in any democracy. An anti EU town voting against a proEU party with the shadow of Brexit still looming large.

@flyingtartar two North East Labour councils are building themselves swanky, multimillion pound new headquarters on premium land. They are doing this despite making huge cuts to services, closing libraries, disability support and leisure things. They are blaming Tory austerity for the cuts they are making, whilst splurging many millions on themselves.

Now you can blame the Tories all you like, but people are not stupid and can see what's going on with their own eyes.

That meme posted upthread is spot on.

Telling the people that you want to vote for you, that they are thick/stupid/far right/fascist/bigoted/racist/transphobic etc, isn't the way to win elections. Funnily enough.

@flyingtartar
“I must say, it's sickening that people like Abbott and McDonnell seem just as pleased as the Tories with the results...”
I don’t think they were. But there were undeniably some in the Labour Party hoping for a Tory win in a general election just a year and half ago. Starmer has been as ineffective at reaching out to all views in the Party as was Corbyn , arguably worse which is some achievement.

We had the opportunity of a proper Labour government with Jeremy Corbyn.
Even when Labour finally get in again they'll be pale blue Tories, and not the Labour Party I want.

@Letsgetreadytocrumble
I think that’s a fun media narrative, eagerly digested by a small demographic of rightwing snowflakes, but i don’t think it’s actually what Labour has been doing. However, I’ll buy into it for a second ...dissing people may be a rubbish way to win elections - but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t a few million thick and bigoted Britons. There most certainly are. I’ve been abused by many of them over the years. But then there are thick racists in every country of course.

@btwwhichoneispink

I'm not from the area so wasn't aware of that but a quick Google reveals Robert Jenrick condemning the council for the new building and claiming it's the whole reason for the council tax rises. The rest of the article gives a more nuanced account of what's happening there and the reasons behind the decision for the build. That man (Jenrick) couldn't lie straight in bed so I'm not going to take his word for what's going on there.

However, local people are obviously convinced so that's that. It is a sad indictment of Labour that people believe the lies spun to them by someone who has been involved with corruption at least 3 times and wouldn't spit on them if they were on fire, rather than backing LAbour.

Apparently, Eddie Izard will be parachuted into a Labour safe seat at the next election.

And that, in just one sentence, explains why Labour won't win the next election.

Starmer has been as ineffective at reaching out to all views in the Party as was Corbyn , arguably worse which is some achievement.

But that was part of my post - he is bad at reaching out to all views because it's impossible to do so and, arguably, it does more harm than good anyway. He should stop trying to appease the left and tell them where to go if they don't like it. I think a split is inevitable really as I think there are two competing groups there who just can't create a coherent plan together.

I find myself less bothered about which party is actually in power than the fact there is no real opposition to that party. I can’t imagine a labour government soon if ever, and that is terrifying. Not because I’m a labour supporter (I’m not), but because any government needs credible opposition to keep it accountable. Democracy thrives on opposition - the threat of being unseated means competition, which in turn means at least trying to appeal to voters.

The tories have all their old core voters plus a swathe of new ones. These people’s interests are often diametrically opposed, and yet all seem utterly convinced that only the tories speak for them now. Where will the impetus come for trying to address these groups’ specific needs and aspirations?

Conservative voters ought to be worried by this too.

Agree with pps that if fptp is to remain a left-liberal coalition is badly needed.