About Labour's next leader

[OxfordCat]

So there'll be a battle between Momentum and the social democrats / centrists. I am totally against Long-Bailey who's been groomed as Corbyn mark 2 for a while now. I think she's awful. As much as I personally agree with the majority of views on MN and favour Kier Starmer, if I try to take myself out of my remain bubble for a minute and think about those northern leave voting 'wall' constituencies / Workington man etc etc, would they really go for Starmer? I'm not sure if they'd see him as another Westminster elite. (As they would Thornberry / Benn).

So thinking about how Labour can win back their 'heartlands' could Lisa Nandy be a goer? She voted remain but strongly sided with leave after the referendum (soft Brexit) and is from Wigan, popular with her constituents. A genuine human being, in it for the right reasons, articulate with quick intellect.

However she is a woman! Which the gammon might not like...

This is interesting from Neil Coyle MP, on Twitter:

Neil Coyle
@neilcoyle

"Shadow Cabinet all knew too. Any standing to be next leader must explain lack of political nous in backing early election; ignoring evidence of voters' views on Corbyn; & failure to tackle antisemitism at top table. More of the same would let down the people who need us in Govt."

Those are incredibly relevant questions.
To be honest, those questions alone should actually finish off Rebecca Long-Bailey and Keir Starmer.

It was verging on somewhere between delusion and duping the membership to go into the GE knowing what they knew. And the EHRC report is going to be bad.

@thecatfromjapan I'm not sure how Lisa Nandy can be described as elite? Her grandfather was a liberal MP who went into the Lords, but she herself grew up in Manchester, went to state schools, and worked in the charity sector, and she's mixed race.

It depends what you call elite. Having a grandfather who was an MP and went into the Lords is the political elite! It’s not starting from scratch.

However I don’t think it matters that she’s not got s whippet and worked in a mine! People from all sectors of society should be welcome and even ones who come from London!

There are reports of a dream ticket being forged between Long-Bailey and Raynor. If so, labour won’t be winning elections any time soon as it’s Momentum and groomed for stardom politicians and more of the same but just without Jezza and MacD.

I agree with you, BubblesBuddy. On all your points.

I'm actually despairing right now.

A key point in all this is just how awfully, incredibly incompetent the current group in charge of Labour are.

Incompetent at anything beyond seizing power within Labour, that is.

It's as though they have spent 20 years doing very little except studying 'How to seize power in the Labour Party' as a special interest / and nothing else.

So they now have power - and are hit with the very real-world problem of how to win an election against a Hard Right coalition.

And look what happened: Murphy and co. Having all the polling and research telling them a GE was a disastrous idea - but in they go, anyway; Murphy & Butler shouting down MPs who give feedback from their constituencies that a GE will be a disaster / but see above; Murphy having polling showing the unpopularity of Corbyn & responding with it don't read the polls; a GE strategy that focuses on winning seats from Cons & ignores all reports of trouble in 'heartlands' ...

I could go on, but what's the point?

It's not just that this group is wedded to an ideology that appears not to be backed by the electorate, it's also that there are extraordinary levels of incompetence.

Bear in mind, we went out to fight an election knowing antisemitism was an issue, knowing that the EHRC report was coming, knowing how unpopular Corbyn was, knowing that there were aspects of Corbyn's history that would not play well with the general public.

But there was no serious attempt to manage that, message-wise. We were left with, 'Don't trust MSM.'

That isn't good enough.

I know it was Gove who said, 'we've had enough of experts' - but it is the Labour Party executive who seem to be completely anti-expert.

It's a massive, massive problem to keep going with this team when it comes to the next a Leader.

It's a problem that isn't just about ideology - it's also about competence (which appears to now be an ideologically suspect word) & a bit of praxis and pragmatism.

Since when did being competent become ideologically impure?

It's just crazy.

pmk

Being anti expert is a problem if you have an economic (and other) credibility deficit - rubbishing the media and experts is only going to get you so far and only with some voters. The SNP is smarter in this regard, most economists think Scotland’s deficit is a huge problem (and the structural issues causing the deficit) but the SNP wheel out their own growth commission experts to control their message when they have to talk about the pesky deficit.

I’m not convinced the media is any worse these days than under Blair.

Yes my momentum supporting friends are posting charts showing they were over 50 percent for people under 45, and saying they’ll win someday just based on these people ageing.

I didn’t reply as you can’t debate with that level of idiocy - as if people never change their vote over the course of their lives!

😳😯😮@reallychristmasaaagain

I ... I have no words.

Brighter note:

Seems some of the unions are fighting back on the coronation of Rebecca Long-Bailey:

From Twitter:

RachelWearmouth (HuffPost)
@REWearmouth

"Union source: "The thing with RLB is she isn’t even the best leadership candidate in her own flat, never mind among the PLP."

I wonder if that's Unison or Someone fighting back against (the dead hand of) Unite?

Anyway, good luck to them.

Angela Rayner is far, far preferable to R L-B.
By a million country miles, frankly.

The Labour Party at the top are in complete denial about the reasons they failed.

BBC bias against them......looked far more biased again the Tories to me
Corbyn being a lovely man but slated by the media........of course IRA connections etc were invented
The print media being against them.....7 million newspapers sold daily vs 100 million or so voters
And so on with the excuses.

The truth is the policies of renationalisation, higher taxes, unrealistic, impossible promises and Marxoid style government was a big turn off.

Looks to me they are going to repeat the above with their new leader

I left it alone but the lack of grace in abject defeat amongst the current labour team has been striking.

It's ... 🤷‍♀️

Really interesting discussion. Published today is a survey of Labour Party members conducted by LabourList. Gives an idea of who the respondents want to be leader and deputy leader. How representative this is of the wider party/movement I can't say, but here it is anyhow:

labourlist.org/2019/12/long-bailey-and-rayner-picked-for-top-jobs-by-labourlist-readers/

Talking to a Labour friend today, I was shocked that she blamed the whole defeat on the media. Plus (lowered voice) ' the Labour-voting areas had more graduates and were therefore more intelligent'. No awareness whatsoever of why they lost

OK, this is serious:

From Twitter:

Kevin Scofield
@kevinschofield

"

Strong rumour doing the rounds in Labour that Karie Murphy is planning to quit her party post to help run Becky Long-Bailey's leadership campaign. Would further boost her credentials as the continuity Corbyn candidate."

Now - Katie Murphy was in charge of the election campaign, she was one of the '4Ms' around Corbyn - so I'm sure that will elicit an immediate response of 'Of Course' or 'Oh dear'

But there's more.

Murphy's campaign was 'people power', and that involved £5 million spent on 'community organisers' and their campaign.

In reality, it involved mobilising masses of activists (big Momentum cross-over) to go out canvassing.

Lots of co-ordination by digital means (whatsapps, spreadsheets).

That's a lot of data.

Obviously, it would be illegal to use/access that data when Murphy resigns from her current role & becomes campaign co-ordinaries for the announced one.

But she is currently still in her former role.

And I wonder what is going on with all that data and those digital tools right now?

And more, 'Of course':

From Twitter:

Jim Packard (Financial Times)
@PickardJE

"a similar rumour out there is that both Karie Murphy and Seumas Milne would keep their jobs under a RLB leadership"

What about Andy Burnham?

Please not! He's doing a good job as Manchester Mayor and knocking lots of heads together to get improvements made in the North, taking no hostages at times.

Whilst I think he'd make a good Labour leader, he's far too valuable for Manchester to lose.

If you’ve read much about how McCluskey runs unite, this R L-B and KM news doesn’t seem that surprising, albeit worrying.

Stephen Kinnock impressed me in interviews.

I think it's a shame Andy Burnham can't stand, he would be a good leader. He understands both the different factions within the party and also the electorate, and I think he could unify them.

I very much hope it won't be Rebecca Long Bailey, she's too closely associated with Corbyn, and, frankly, she's not very likeable. I know personality shouldn't be a factor but sadly it is, and she doesn't seem to have what it takes to appeal to people.

I'm really not sure the membership will vote for RLB just because she is the chosen candidate by Corbyn/Mcdonnell. I joined the Labour Party because of Corbyn, because I like his anti austerity stance, his anti nuclear weapons stance and because I think he genuinely wants a fairer society. I think many others also joined for these reasons rather than because they were hardcore left or Momentum. The anti semitism crisis and lack of popularity amongst the wider public can not be ignored and I think many who supported Corbyn have had enough of this and know RLB would be associated with it. After wanting Corbyn to do well I now think it's time for him and his team to step down, it clearly hasn't worked and it's time to start afresh. I'll be voting for Kier Starmer or Lisa Nandy.

Robert Peston is reporting that Kier Starmer is by far the most popular candidate amongst Labour Party members according to recent polling.

Of course he'll be the most popular. He's a man. Momentum and all the other incarnations of left-wing groups have always been anti-women. Well, unless the women are making the tea, stroking their egos or shagging them.

ACouchofOnesOwn Momentum are likely to be supporting Rebecca Long Bailey.

I live in one of the Labour heartlands that just turned Tory. One thing men up here are totally used to, is the women being in charge. Yvette Cooper is the MP in the next constituency, Andrea Jenkins also nearby.

Northern working class men won't give a shit if a leader is female or not. They will give a shit if they think the leader talks sense and listens to them.

RL-B and Angela Raynor have no chance. Kier Starmer is largely thought of as a good bloke. Jess Phillips comes across as being a huge fan of Jess Phillips. Yvette Cooper would be supported and probably Lisa Mandy too. Anyone who isn't pretentious.

The Labour Party and membership may have been taken over by Momentum, but the electorate haven't. I honestly don't think that's why Labour lost out up here. Corbyn's fence sitting over Brexit, when so many voted leave, was a huge issue. I voted remain, but even I think the referendum should be respected. Until there is someone in charge who gets that, then Labour will be out for a very long time.