To think if you vote Tory now…

[Joanna1988124]

You’re effectively propping up this absolute shit show of a government and have no empathy.

I’ll be honest, I’ve voted conservative before as a middle class family their (taxation) policies have suited me more than Labour. I honestly feel ashamed of this and I wish I could’ve seen that the conservatives agenda of ‘levelling up’ is BS.

Regardless of your personal situation, enough is enough now right? People are reliant on food banks, they’re choosing between heating and eating. Austerity has been a total nightmare for society causing the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer.

@Blossomtoes

Isn't it funny that Labour has now become a party dominated by middle and even upper middle class, university educated, urban people, and somehow the working classes increasingly are abandoning them because they don't recognize that the policies these people come up with are what's really good for them?

The “working class” started to abandon the left 40 years ago when the Tories pretended to share their toys with them. Home ownership through RTB, the offer to buy shares in nationalised industries, all those “aspirational” goodies in exchange for their votes.

Ironically it’s the university educated children of those new middle class people who are now turning left.

Labour's Red Wall didn't collapse until 2019. In Scotland, Labour collapsed because Jack McConnell's Scottish Labour made a mess and took voters for granted. SNP saw an opportunity and smacked Labour ever since.

Conservatives only became Scotland's second biggest party under Ruth Davidson precisely because Labour failed to present itself as a Unionist party.

You cannot keep blaming the working class population for Labour's failure to attract or hold voters.

That's down to Labour's mismanagement which was worsened by Corbyn and his Momentum group.

Labour should own their own mess and failures.

@Blossomtoes

Isn't it funny that Labour has now become a party dominated by middle and even upper middle class, university educated, urban people, and somehow the working classes increasingly are abandoning them because they don't recognize that the policies these people come up with are what's really good for them?

The “working class” started to abandon the left 40 years ago when the Tories pretended to share their toys with them. Home ownership through RTB, the offer to buy shares in nationalised industries, all those “aspirational” goodies in exchange for their votes.

Ironically it’s the university educated children of those new middle class people who are now turning left.

Do you think it might just be possible that the "left" now actually represents policies that are good for and represent the values of it's members, mc people, and this is why wc people are not so keen?

And this idea that somehow these mc individuals are representing the working classes is in fact the false consciousness here?

Because basically it sounds here like you think of them as children who should listen to their betters who know what is really best for them.

I mean, it's not "ironic" that university educated people are turning left when the policies of the left are now the policies of the middle classes. It's exactly what you would expect.

Do you think it might just be possible that the "left" now actually represents policies that are good for and represent the values of it's members, mc people, and this is why wc people are not so keen?

I think a lot of people for whom life is pretty hopeless have bought into the “levelling up” promise they were sold at the last election, somehow forgetting that the problems in many of the red wall towns were caused by austerity, ie a Tory government. Whether they’ll do so again remains to be seen since very little has changed there since 2019.

Because basically it sounds here like you think of them as children who should listen to their betters who know what is really best for them

I’m sorry that’s the impression I’ve given as it wasn’t my intention. I think that’s how the Tory government sees them. I do think a lot of people will be hurting financially over the coming months and the next election will be won or lost on the economy, this government has a poor record with the least well off. They’ll be looking at the free school meals debacle and the £20 UC cut and wondering why they would vote for a government that appears to be oblivious to their concerns.

@Blossomtoes

Do you think it might just be possible that the "left" now actually represents policies that are good for and represent the values of it's members, mc people, and this is why wc people are not so keen?

I think a lot of people for whom life is pretty hopeless have bought into the “levelling up” promise they were sold at the last election, somehow forgetting that the problems in many of the red wall towns were caused by austerity, ie a Tory government. Whether they’ll do so again remains to be seen since very little has changed there since 2019.

Because basically it sounds here like you think of them as children who should listen to their betters who know what is really best for them

I’m sorry that’s the impression I’ve given as it wasn’t my intention. I think that’s how the Tory government sees them. I do think a lot of people will be hurting financially over the coming months and the next election will be won or lost on the economy, this government has a poor record with the least well off. They’ll be looking at the free school meals debacle and the £20 UC cut and wondering why they would vote for a government that appears to be oblivious to their concerns.

Maybe I'm being a little unclear.

What I am suggesting is that maybe working class people have a better idea where their interests lie than a bunch of mc people do. And if they are voting Tory in large numbers, it's not because they are suffering from false consciousness or short-sightedness - and that is a paternalistic idea no matter how you cut it - it's because they do not see the Labour party as representing their interests or values.

Whatever the Tory party thinks of them as a group, they know what the LP thinks - that they are stupid racists.

Whatever the Tory party thinks of them as a group, they know what the LP thinks - that they are stupid racists

That appears to be the Tory party’s opinion of them, hence the Rwanda debacle which appears to be going down a storm.

The flag shagging, bungalow bigot blue collar idiots voted for them

Labour's project to win the hearts and minds of voters is still going well then...

Whoever said this:

"The flag shagging, bungalow bigot blue collar idiots voted for them"

Starmer has been trying to wrap Labour in the Union Jack for a while. He absolutely knows he needs to appear patriotic in England and Scotland.

Especially Scotland where Labour has been appallingly bad on the Constitutional debate and the Union.

If Starmer is serious about Labour being patriotic and Unionist, he needs to boot the Irish Nationalist SDLP away. Something he's failed to do.

Labour will continue to lose votes to the SNP and Conservatives on many issues, including patriotism, until it gets its act together.

As long as Labour and their activists take an England centric approach....they'll keep failing. Starmer, at least, recognises that.

It would do a few in this thread good to donthe same.

Labour seems to dislike its traditional core voters and does not like their ideas eg ideas about who is a woman. Stamer pretending he is patriotic or supports the army or loves our country is not really going very well.

@Xenia

Labour seems to dislike its traditional core voters and does not like their ideas eg ideas about who is a woman. Stamer pretending he is patriotic or supports the army or loves our country is not really going very well.

It’s going well enough for Labour to be five points ahead in the polls.

Really that is good Labour are ahead by 5 points

That is a drop from a few months ago

And given the last year Labour should be a clear 10 points ahead Labour need to look at why this is

www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/united-kingdom/

This is good for following voting trends - the Tories and Boris are both on the way down which isn’t surprising when the NHS and post lockdown education difficulties haven’t been addressed, Boris’s ongoing lies regarding Partygate and now the Rwanda proposal.

@Xenia this old chestnut keeps on getting trotted out that labour doesn’t like its core voters. Where is the evidence for this ? Who are its core voters anyway ? Many W/C northern voters have gone down the culturally conservative road (anti immigration, patriotic ) but still want state interventionist policies (better public services, well funded NHS) which they will never get with the Tory party. If anything the Conservative party has an even bigger ideological bridge to cross if they want to retain those voters.

Many Labour voters have been saying for years that Labour is no longer the party that listens to them

It’s not new and started in the later years of Blair’s leadership

And this was said time and time again when Corbyn led the party.

Thinking that they switched purely out of being anti immigration and being patriotic is part of the problem

Thinking that they switched purely out of being anti immigration and being patriotic is part of the problem

If that isn’t true why did the Tories win so many red wall seats with the inane “Get Brexit Done” slogan?

Yet again a thread about Tory woes turns into a critique of labour. No one doubts they have issues but these hopefully will be ironed out over the next year or two. For all the insults often rightly lobbed at labour corruption and dishonesty are now more associated with the tories. As is poor management of the economy, the slow disintegration of the NHS, a catastrophic increase in the cost of living which will undoubtedly lead to civil unrest. These will be brought up in an election campaign and and cannot be nonchalantly brushed off by Johnson.

That if you believe that is the only reason people voted for Brexit

I don’t I believe many felt for years being let down by governments left and right that nothing changed and people were willing to gamble to make a change

Something had to shift.

Of course the opposition party shall be bought in because the discussion leads on to how changes can be made

Well the most simple solution is to make sure Labour win the next election. That isn’t looking as promising as it should be

There isn’t another party who stand a chance

@Xenia

Yes, I remember the campaign socialists under Blair as we used to call them. They seemed to be the richer people at work who could afford to vote labour as they had loads of spare money to spend on extra tax. They were not the traditional labour working class vote. I did my local council vote today (postal) and voted Conservative. One of my student sons did his - one green and 2 liberal democrat (we get 3 votes).

I assume you mean Champagne Socialists?

The Tories pretty much always put up tax so saying people who can afford more tax vote Labour is illogical.

Taxes as a percentage of GDP and real terms actually rose over the period Thatcher was in power.

@HRTQueen

That if you believe that is the only reason people voted for Brexit

I don’t I believe many felt for years being let down by governments left and right that nothing changed and people were willing to gamble to make a change

Something had to shift.

They’d already voted for Brexit. They voted Tory despite - at that point - nine years of austerity. Who did they think was responsible for it? They weren’t taking a gamble, they voted for more of the same.

@Joanna1988124

You’re effectively propping up this absolute shit show of a government and have no empathy.

I’ll be honest, I’ve voted conservative before as a middle class family their (taxation) policies have suited me more than Labour. I honestly feel ashamed of this and I wish I could’ve seen that the conservatives agenda of ‘levelling up’ is BS.

Regardless of your personal situation, enough is enough now right? People are reliant on food banks, they’re choosing between heating and eating. Austerity has been a total nightmare for society causing the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer.

I think they'll lose because of people like yourself. The poor vote Labour, the rich vote Tory.

Elections are decided on how the economy is working for those in the middle. If it's well enough then the governing party stays in, if it's bad then they're voted out.

@SherbetDips

I’m not ashamed to vote Conservative, I don’t need to justify myself to you so I’m not gonna.

The conservatives. What do they actually conserve?

They've done nothing but ruin the country for 12 years.

Vote who you want. Personally I struggle to vote for anyone and probably won't bother (it's a safe seat anyway).

People hadn’t had a pay rise long before the Tories came in to power in 2010. Have you forgotten about the 2008 crash and how banks and bankers were bailed out and just carried on as before, the mps finances scandal

Labour had lost trust. We should never ever of had a referendum MPs should have been more aware how desperate people were for change.

They voted for that change (and not suggesting that was the only reason) and wanted to stick by it so of course Get Brexit Done won. We were still in the EU in the last election. I can’t even remember what Labour’s policy was

"The poor vote Labour, the rich vote Tory."

I really don't think this is true anymore. Most of the most wealthy areas of the country - the cities, are where the Labour votes are, most everywhere else votes Tory.

Labour need to broaden their appeal beyond the university educated middle-class metropolitan latte drinking liberals. They need to appeal to working-class people in small towns. There's no point in them piling up more votes in constituencies where they already win. They can afford to piss off a few of the cosmopolitan types if that's what it takes to get ordinary everyday working people to vote Labour.

Apparently Boris is going to correct Partygate at PMQ’s tomorrow. Will be interesting to see what the polls show afterwards.
I can’t work out whether he is just not very bright and couldn’t understand the lockdown laws and now can’t understand why people are furious or whether he is just devious and thought he could get away with it