Voting for Reform.the north/south

[Jollyjupiter]

As a proud Northerner i can say 80 per cent of my peer group will vote for Reform in May. Do you think it will be a North v South split?

Another Northern poster here who will definitely never vote Reform
I don't think local elections reflect what will happen in a General Election either, people will vote tactically to keep Reform out in the next general election, but may vote differently in the locals. I am voting for my independent candidate in May but not in the general election.

You’ve just answered the question anyway. You can answer without the insults, they’re not necessary.

There’s no limit. They can’t resolve all the war and famine globally to reduce migration by much and their criteria is broad, they will be overwhelmed by applications.

It all sounds nice but realistically the numbers will prove impossible.

I don't know OP. I'm in SW London and I think a lot of people here may be "secret" Reform voters. Don't want to admit it. I read on local Next Door that most at fed up of all the main parties.

Will be interesting. I hope they do well.

Yes ok, it can be but I think focusing on that obscures the wider point of how we became an increasingly more equal society post WW2, thanks in no small part to our strong welfare state (not necessarily just benefits but health, housing, education). And then something happened in, oh, around 1979 🤔 to throw that into reverse. So who was in power at that time, who was voting for those policies if not the generation born just before and after the war? I know that it's considerably more complex than that and has to be set into context around the cold war and changing world order but I guess what I'm trying to say is that today's 60-80 odd year olds benefited greatly from the welfare state and yet consistently voted for neo liberal policies which sought to destroy that very thing.

I'm a child of Thatcher so I got the tail end of the benefits - free university education for example - and also get to watch my children trying to get on without them.

I wonder of the “Reform / Non-Reform” voting split will be similar to the Brexit / Remain split.

Education funding hasn't been destroyed. Labour is actually working on finding out what the big issues are in education and trying to solve them long term. They have identified that SEND spending is out of control, that children are sat on waiting lists for neurodiversity assessment for years whilst waiting for proper support, and that some independent specialist settings are profiteering. They have understood that school attendance is a huge issue and that this is linked with youth mental health and the curriculum review of the Tories from 2017. They are undertaking a curriculum review, have a new send white paper and LAs have just been told what their new funding is to support getting specialist help into schools quickly.

What makes you think funding is destroyed? I understand that if you send your kids private you will be pissed off that it's costing more now.

You are confusing asylum with immigration.

There are no safe asylum routes for non-Ukrainians. Legal migrants aren’t seeking asylum so the lack of safe asylum routes are irrelevant. They use other, non-asylum, immigration channels.

As for the 70s. We are in 2026. What safe routes existed in the 70s are irrelevant to the lack of safe routes now.

I think the root of the economic performance compared to G7, rising cost of living (and some of the consequent rise in taxes) has been proven to result from Brexit and its economic impact. Not to mention the inheritance of years of underfunding (under Conservative and coalition governments) of public services.

To brand Labour the ‘worse ever’ probably demands some context. I’m not entirely enamored of them but the idea that Reform is a legitimate alternative is very problematic in my opinion - for reasons very clearly laid out by other posters previously (but of course not responded to)

Just because people are fed up with the main parties though, doesn't mean they necessarily would go anywhere near Reform.

Maybe. Mn was very pro Labour at the time of the GE.

What was a “proper Brexit” and how was that frustrated.

Our “young men” did not flee war because the UK was fighting an oppressive regime, it was not one. Plenty of “young men” fled (or attempted to flee) Germany and Nazi occupied European countries however.

Not pro Labour, it was a case of getting the Tories out.

Be glad that didn't mean being pro Reform.

That may well be returned with get Labour out next time.

I rest my case.

Ridiculous. Stop trying to put the blame for Brexit at the feet of people who voted AGAINST it and start taking responsibility for having voted FOR it. You've only got yourself to blame for your own choices. And don't try to deny voting for Brexit. With a post like yours no one will believe you

Will you vote Reform to get Labour out then?

I'm south
My group of friends are all in their 70s 80s
They are all voting reform.thats about 14 people
My own group of friends who are my age 50 s 6 are voting reform
One is being cagey,but probably will ,and one will vote who her husband will vote for.
I'm undecided,my husband votes green and I did to ,untill this recent Muppet took over ..
I'm undecided probably decide in the ballot box

Agree.few of my peers are daft enough to fall for this.

@DaisyDooley how does scrapping and leaving the EUROPEAN court of human rights do any of us any favours?
Surely it protects us from if we suddenly found ourselves in a UK with a government that wanted to strip us of our rights, make life harder for many of us- being reliant just on ourselves and not having anywhere else to go and appeal to our treatment is not a good thing.
Edited to say I shouted EUROPEAN too to match the tone - we clearly see things differently but leaving an outside court of human rights isn't a good thing in my book, it's a safety net for if things go tits up rights wise for us all in the UK.
I don't hear the word EUROPEAN and automatically think "bad" as I think it's important to see the bigger picture.

That’s a bit counterintuitive when the Reform supporting demographic is overwhelmingly pension age.

As a school governor, the funding situation is dire and much worse than the last Parliament. My oldest is in year 5. Through her time in infants she had classes of 20 ish, with a teacher, 2 TA per class, lots of extra activities. My youngest is 3 years behind her and her experience has been very different in the same school, much fewer staff, a mainstream school being forced to take children whose needs they cannot meet so all TA'sare diverted to a seperate class which has been set up for these children who cannot cope in mainstream classes. From having a healthy budget surplus they are likely to end this year in deficit for the first time in 15 years, as the wait times in our area for EHCPS are double what they were 3 years ago so the schools aren't getting the funding through. The money promised from VAT on private fees has never materialised. The universal free breakfast clubs promised by Labour have never materialised.

My best friend is a social worker and reports huge budget cuts over the past few years, staff are stretched to breaking point, with several off long term with stress.

I have worked in commuinity paediatrics for nearly 20 years. Everyone in our team will confidently say the last 2-3 years are the worst in history. Our speech therapy team have had to close their wait lists as too long, and if those who are seen get 1 appt, advice abd then discharge. My daughter was under the same team 6 years ago and was seen weekly for a year.

And yet our national debt is higher than ever.

Yes, some of the issues are linked to external factors like wars abroad. And there may be policy work going on in the background. But your average person doesn't care about the background. They care about their life right now.

• how long they and their family wait for nhs care
• the quality of their child's education right now
• how much money they have left after paying essential bills
• how their commuinity looks and feels, is it clean and safe

And for many people things are much worse.

Tbf many western countries outside Europe do rely on human rights established and kept well, and citizens are happy with that (and they top human rights tables).

Farage might talk the talk but make no mistake he’s there to maintain the status quo which is to keep the working class in their place.

In fact I think with the proposed removal of the EHCR he wants a working class with less rights, willing to work for lower wages and less employment rights. You only have to look at his voting record for proof.

If you want to be paid the same as a man for doing the same job, be entitled to maternity leave and pay, have provisions be made if you are disabled in your workplace then you would never vote for a party that would remove all these things.

All the things people enjoy today, voting, equality in pay and the NHS was given to us by left wing supporting people and unions.

In my opinion the ultra rich need to be taxed more. We need to tax wealth not work as highly. The ultra rich are able to buy up more of the resources and the rest of us have less access to them.

Seven noble prize winning economists have said that taxing wealth will work. Will try and find a link later. This will not happen under a Reform (Tory rejects) government.

@ justmeandthedogs -

So you think it’s OK to deny people elections, no matter how bad the local council, because it suits the incumbent councillors to have a couple of extra years in office? There, we must agree to differ.