So who are you rootin' for at Makersfield?

[NEGUY82]

Just wondering who everyone hopes will win??

I'm hoping for a Burnham win but as long as it's not Kenyon I can live with it.

Would love to hear somebody try to defend the lettuce and her chancellor who now has a plum job on GMB.

@Paravion011 So you can a pp that she is her statement is completely false but can't offer an explanation as to why. Just more Labour bashing. Sounds about right.

‘Labour bashing’ . You’re in the minority these days.

I think even many Labour voters are 'Labour bashing' as they are so useless

@EasternStandard I'm not a cheerleader for Labour, I'm just waiting for an explanation about Truss and Kwarteng

I've changed my mind after reading this thread OP. I would like Burnham to win as it increases the chance of an early election. He can't govern for three years without a mandate. Perhaps Reform have made the same calculation.

Vote Burnham in Makerfield (there is no S in Makerfield) to get rid of Labour.

The Tories changed leader every couple of month and never called an early election, Labour won’t either.

The mandate to govern isn’t for the party leader, it’s for the party. The last government went through three PMs without calling a GE, what’s sauce for the goose and all that.

You keep telling yourself that. He can't govern for three years without a mandate. Unless he simply continues with Starmer's manifesto, which has worked so well thus far.

Where were your calls for Sunak to call a GE in 2022 @Nuthatch26? Were you insisting that he had no mandate?

I wouldn't call it juvenile or an insult.
I just think if you are going to tell someone they are completely wrong in their assertions, you should tell them why. Looks like we differ on that. Likely not the only thing.

No they won’t. Mandate is American. We have an elective dictatorship in the UK, and all parties of all wings exploit it. Plus Labour MPs do not like committing electoral suicide at 17 percent in the polls. Vote Burnham, get an election? His leadership would be stuffed from the start.

The implications of no election are about the same as they were for the Tories who also did not go to the country when the numbers were poor. Unless your government does a better job, and the voters recognize this (and it’s what Burnham must promise and deliver), the Labour Party will be absolutely tanned in 2029’s election. Voters judge it harshly.

You can assume this will exclude tribal Tories and a lot of Reform voters. They will go on about mandate (so American) because it part of the personality politics they want. But there is an edge to this too. Andy Burnham is more popular than with Badenoch or Farage. That tells you something which if he is clever he can use. The voters want to like him. They are already placing some hope in him which in politics is not nothing. In fact I would say it is quality that is missing in Starmer, Badenoch and Farage who make for depressing politics. That is the thing that is genuinely interesting about Burnham if you are a floating voter, left or centrist.

But he mandate given at a GE is for the government, not the PM?

I dislike Burnham and what he is doing. But Labour would be insane to call a GE when there is no need.

Count Binface

So if Burnham takes over, which is clearly his intention, he then gets a big poll bounce, and he's under pressure from the rabid lefties who put him there to make huge changes. You don't think he'll be tempted to go to the public? His ego will make that irresistible.

Indeed. You vote for a party. The PM is a figure who leads. This stuff about mandate is US style presidential politics.

Andy Burnham is not as green as he is cabbage looking. Look at the parliamentary majority he would inherit. The numbers you speak of would have to be in order of a democratic state like Zimbabwe

Absolutely not Burnham, anyone else but him

Recognise this?

Paravion011 · Today 04:53
BIossomtoes · Yesterday 22:36
I’ve been paying taxes since before you were born and will continue to do so until I die. We have an ageing population and a falling birth rate. If you want your pension in 27 years time there’s going to have to be a bigger working population than there could possibly be without immigration.
Show quote history
I am guessing the total amount you have paid is comparatively small, versus your peers.
Call it a hunch.