Reform winning big

[Keirawr]

Reform had a good night, winning county councils, probably will win a mayoral seat and won the parliamentary by election also.

You don’t have to be a Reform voter to acknowledge that they are taking votes off Labour. Or that they are being electorally effective.

No doubt the ‘basket of deplorables’ crowd will be along in a min with their usual quips calling reform voters names, having learned absolutely 0 from Brexit. Insult the voters at your peril.

These same people also totally miss the point that winning is winning. Feeling all moral and superior about ‘oh well, what will they actually do’ changes nothing.

Perhaps those who label everyone that wants immigration limiting as ‘racist’ Will think again. But likely not.

The issue is immigration is a complex issue that requires critical thinking and an understanding of the law and it’s obligations

but shouting let’s stop immigration seems to be enough for some people who don’t want to engage with the complexity

I can see why Reform are attractive but they don’t have the solutions either

The saddest thing is people believing a party that will run roughshod over workers rights is there best option

Labour and the other parties need to do better at getting their message across and explaining the issues- people don’t think they are listening or they care

Yep that’s the one. It was another candidate that was running but to be honest the damage was done.

Their!

I would genuinely love to know Redorm is waking people up to? "All politicians are rubbish" or " we must control our borders" are both innane and generalised views, so not exactly a revelation.

I know. Much though I’m not a fan of any of this, a bit of me keeps thinking how much more interesting A level politics is about to get.

Me too and I totally agree with you.

There's no denying that Reform attract the dregs a tad, in the same way that Trump does, but that racist element are in the minority.

Everyone wants an effective immigration policy and for the boats to stop.

What is annoying about them taking votes is that they really do not stand for working people. Check their voting records. The information is freely available. They routinely vote against scrapping zero hour contracts, against increases to minimum wage, against banning fire & rehire, against improvements to sick pay, against allowing bereavement leave etc. They are very much pro tax cuts for the rick, though! They're Tories with an unsettling Nationalist edge.

Them being 'hard' on immigration does not mean we would all have a better life under them.

Labour, as well as other major parties, need to vastly improve their social media game if they hope to take Reform on. SM smear campaigns WORK. It worked with Brexit, it got Boris in, it's got Trump 2 terms and if we're not careful it will get many more Reform MPs in.

The amount of misinformation spread online by political parties now is truly worrying.

Spend five minutes on a local facebook page and it's full of the reform lot.

They don't appear to read the news or understand democracy at all ("whY ARe oUR loCaL ELectioNS cANCELLEd thIs YeAR?!!"). But they still have a vote they can do damage with.

Labour and Conservate benefit from FPTP. It usually delivers a majority of seats to one of either party.
A PR system - whichever one - would support smaller parties and tends to lead to Coalitions. However, it does allow more extreme parties to get a toehold..

Your point is you are saying nobody's actually cares who they are voting for, it is just to get the other side out.
In my mind that's not very good if the party you are voting for has no actual policies to use once elected.

We are all (or those who voted Labour in the last election) currently reaping the consequences of that

Farage is promising DOGE style cuts across all councils that Reform take charge of. The narrative that local councils just piss money away when actually they are being crippled by social care and SEN budgets that aren’t properly funded by taxation is a strong one 😬

They're lemmings basically..utterly baffling.

Well, yes, I don't disagree that they are. I don't think Labour are covering themselves in glory at the moment. They inherited a shitshow from the Tories, of course, but they will need to turn things around before the next general election if they want to be taken seriously.

But it's a matter of degree. People might think Labour are doing badly right now, but this is nothing compared to the disaster that would be Reform.

I hold onto the hope that this is just a protest vote that will fizzle before the next election. The alternative doesn't bear thinking about.

Yep we'd have a more representative democracy, more coalitions, it works elsewhere.

Of course Reform/Farage would be part of this too but imho thats no bad thing.

Are they not able to use lower and upper case correctly?

I see the thread is going pretty much how OP predicted.

I live hopefully that the people who generously throw around accusations of stupidity will actually learn from experience but it seems that things really do have to get much worse before they stop the name calling and start listening.

It doesn't matter what you think of Reform, winning is winning.

If we end up with a parliament packed with Reform MP's at the next election I won't blame Reform or the people who voted for them I will blame the arrogant people who decided that the concerns of Reform voters could be ignored.

Reform would gain more seats. It would mean more extreme parties do benefit.

There is a tendency to punch "downwards" and the only class "lower" than them are the immigrants and those on benefits, so they hit out at them.
I actually had a patient the other day telling me how Farage was going to fix the NHS! You couldn't make this shit up.

I don’t think Reform have exceeded expectations. Had four people voted the other way, we’d be talking about a very different story.
It’s a notable by election win, but this set of circumstances (Lab getting criticism for unpopular early-term stuff, the former MP getting convicted of punching someone etc) is uniquely helpful to Reform. I think they will be disappointed not to have won more mayoral contests as well.

I also think that the OP is wrong to say that the voters are above reproach. They don’t deserve to be insulted (few people ever do in any circumstance). But I think it is reasonable to point out that all the racists vote Reform (even if many who vote Reform aren’t racist). Also fair to say that you are voting for a pro-Russia party that has a deeply contradictory economic policy, will sell us all out to the USA and Trump in a heartbeat, and wants to dismantle the NHS. They don’t have a coherent set of policies.

Reform are brilliant at pointing out what’s wrong, but shit at actually coming up with anything better (see Brexit). That’s not politics, that’s just moaning. It’s easy, and it’s not how to run a country.

I think Labour should make a much bigger discussion about things they have done - and what people would lose if they voted for Reform.

But it's getting that message out there to voters with a hostile media and social media that feeds algorithms.

How do you let people know what's changed and what would be lost if they voted Reform.

Get Farages views on worker's rights. Employment rights.

Does Farage want you to lose your right to 25 days annual leave?

It’s a fact that huge numbered of pensioners have lost the winter fuel payment, and also that huge cuts to disability benefits are on the way. And yet still the boats come with no effective solution in sight. So it’s not surprising that some people feel one vulnerable group is being sacrificed for the benefit of another.

Really?

Having to explain to someone that Don ald Trump wasn't on The Apprentice. Billionaire Donald Trump created The Apprentice.

Happy now I've wasted finger energy on that shite?
I should think so too.

Lots of us are already paying privately for social and health care. In addition to paying taxes and national insurance for nothing more than a wheelie bin being emptied thrice weekly!

The uncomfortable truth is that the UK can't afford the current model of health and social care. It's not about want, we all want everyone to have equal access. Cost of living has impacted worldwide, and it's forced people to revise their priorities.

@u3ername I was, of course, referring to the name-calling of those who have voted differently to the name-caller. Without the latter knowing anything about the former's motivation or character.

Starmer is demonstrably both useless (he hasn't done anything of note to benefit this country) and spineless (too cowardly to answer simple questions - 'What is a woman' being a good example). This is less name-calling than statements of fact and based very much on evidence of the individual rather than branding an entire group of people. I wouldn't call all labour voters selfish, for example, because the chances are many of them voted in good faith. It's the same for Reform voters.