c-a-r-f-r-e-w
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 18:37:30 GMT
I wonder how much that kind of thinking still pertains? Has the impact of Covid and furlough, and how govt. Funding enabled a quick rebound... Did it? Lets imagine there had been no furlough scheme. Would lockdown have been obeyed? I doubt it! Rioting more likely. Did the subsidy enable a rebound, or did it enable lockdown? Lockdown of course was a massive drag on the economy, so we could have simply not had both. To what extent would the rebound have happened automatically, because people had pent up demand which needed to be satisfied? Well if you’re right, and furlough was necessary for lockdown, then that doesn’t really change the point. Because people still saw the ability of the state to intervene so heavily. You might argue lockdown was a bad idea overall, but people still saw how much the state could intervene. This may have changed expectations of how much the state should be intervening more generally. Maybe. |
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steve
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Post by steve on Dec 16, 2023 18:47:44 GMT
Sunakered finds his soul mate. Shame it's Giorgia Meloni leader of the fascist lite Brothers of Italy. I wonder what the " one nation " wing of the party thinks of their leader cozying up with the Euroland Mussolini? Still the gutless bastards will no doubt display their standard profiles in courage and do sweet f.a. I see Sunakered got into the swing of it claiming that 30,000 refugees in dinghies will " overwhelm " a nation of nearly 70 million. It's bad enough when he's a national embarrassment he doesn't have to go for a bigger audience to display his pig ignorance and xenophobia. youtu.be/vSgCHHwghiU?si=EoaDwOcHUQ7-yZEz |
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Post by jib on Dec 16, 2023 19:07:51 GMT
Sunakered finds his soul mate. Shame it's Giorgia Meloni leader of the fascist lite Brothers of Italy. She's a lot better looking than Liz Truss (apologies in advance if that's in any way sexist). |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 16, 2023 19:21:39 GMT
I think the philosophical point about Labours' positioning is that whilst the electorate seem ready for a less austere approach from Government sadly the 'maxed out credit card' kind of rhetoric still has traction. I thought a telling comment in the US from Mitt Romney was, to paraphrase, that Biden did not really have a normal mandate as his win was in essence due to Trump. In this context I don't think a more left wing Labour program really has a mandate with the general public yet, even should Labour secure a comfortable win. Thatcher waited until post 83 to introduce her more radical supply side reforms; restricting the directional change policies to macro-economics, especially the 1981 budget. It was a source of disappointment to me that Blair tacked right rather than left after 2001. Maybe I am naive but I believe a post 2028/9 Labour Government; having shown the roof has not fallen in and demonstrated competence in Government, will have more scope for meaningful change. Colin - this is what I mean about Starmer ratchetting, not pivoting to uber Corbynite type policies post election. In fact, I expect some more radical measures will be possible in the second half of the first term; and they probably need to do somethings to keep a greater part of the reluctant element of their support on board ahead of the GE in 28/9. NB) I know some will disagree but imo 2017 was imo very much a Brexit dominated election and the high Labour vote was not an endorsement of the manifesto in the main Hi jimjam . Thanks-Yes I recall your ratchet idea. The first thing to say is that I don't really know what is meant by "more meaningful change". If its a ratchet to more distributional taxation/welfare effects, or more liberal societal norms then I understand those I think. I suppose they will always be lurking somewhere under a Labour bonnet. I can't really comment on how attractive those things will be to a future UK electorate. I'm more understanding on the economic front where I assume "more meaningful change " means more direct State involvement in the productive capacity of the country-either by outright nationalisation or public investment in a variety of key economic sectors. Either way this boils down to more spending. If the funding mode is more tax ( either rates or tax base adjustments) then again-the voters will make their judgements at that time. If the funding source is debt then I suggest that there are risks in this post QE world. USA is the model of this sort of approach under Biden with his IRA. USA deficit doubled to $1.7 trillion in 2023.The federal government is forecast to spend more paying down the interest on the debt than on all programs serving U.S. children, including early childhood education and public health insurance programs that have been shown to yield large social returns.( Time mag). Time opines :- " rising debt makes it much more expensive to raise the funds that would stimulate the economy when the next recession inevitably arrives, or to allocate necessary spending in the face of unforeseen setbacks and geopolitical shocks." And we are staring down the barrel of the mother of all "geopolitical shocks" in UKraine -if USA cannot/will not sustain its debt financed support for Ukraine. The effects on Global economies and European Defence & Security are incalculable. In his Buckinghamshire speech , Starmer said he needs two term for what he outlined in that speech. I presume that didn't include what you think of as "more meaningful". So on that basis your ratchet doesnt start to click for 10 years-unless Starmer is lying and thinks that he can do a Johnson and "borrow" votes before the GE and renege on the deal after it. But voters are apt to react badly to that sort of thing. I get that the OPs , and the state of the Tory Party must be encouraging for KS. And I can understand a perception that quiet , competent government and some economic growth as inflation falls can be a platform to leading the electorate by the hand into a more radical socialist country. But evidence elsewhere does indicate that voters can turn and are turning to the radical right when they become disillusioned. The EP elections ( yet another 2024 event of significance) are forecast to see Right-wing and Eurosceptic parties surge at the expense of centrist parties. This pattern is also evident in EU national parliaments-you dont need me to list them. If KS is "last man standing" on LOC ,in a Continent under stress , does a radical leftward movement seem a logical move to stay in power ? Anyway-enough of my prattle. What do I know ? |
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Post by graham on Dec 16, 2023 19:38:44 GMT
History tells us that Labour only win when the social democrats are in charge though. As pjw1961 argues, 1983, 2017 and 2019 were pretty bad defeats for the party when an overtly left wing prospectus was offered to the electorate. 2017 was hardly a 'pretty bad defeat' when Labour managed to destroy the Tory majority. The Tories only clung on to office courtesy of the DUP. Were the social democrats in charge in 1945? Following Gaitskell's death in January 1963 , Wilson was not the preferred candidate of the social democrats.
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pjw1961
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Post by pjw1961 on Dec 16, 2023 19:48:16 GMT
"abandon Labour via SDP, may then have preferred the Tories, but that does not mean they ALL would have. That’s a pretty crazy leap." Nowhere dd I say they all would, just that more favoured the Tories than Labour. Or perhaps a better way of saying it is they were less appalled by the idea of a Thatcher government than a Foot one. As to the rest of what you say, it was clearly the left wing policies and leadership that put people off Labour in 1983. For example unilateral nuclear disarmament (p282 of the book previously mentioned) - 77% of the public disagreed with this, only 16% agreed. Even Labour supporters were 59% to 33% opposed. Leaving the EU was equally unpopular. Labour only led the Conservatives by small margins on even their strong areas (7% on the NHS, 3% on unemployment). Inflation was rated as the most important topic for 'you and your family' and the Conservatives led Labour by 7% on it. Nor were Labour regarded as credible (p281) - only 17% thought they would keep their promises compared to 31% for the Conservatives. The BBC election day survey (p283) found only 25% claimed confidence in Labour politicians ability to deal wisely with Britain's problems; the figure for the Conservatives was 75%. Essentially Labour were in a massive hole in 1983 and the idea that had the SDP not been formed Labour would have won that election is frankly delusional. You are arguing a different point to the one I made. I said they acted against the leadership. I have accepted other factors were involved in deciding the electoral outcome. And in particular the rise in Thatcher’s polling due to the better economic conditions due to oil price etc. that helped many economies at the time. The study posted earlier also put her recovery down to economic improvement. But to try and ignore that the hiving off of a load of the party into a separate entity might well have had a negative polling impact, is something else, esp. when polling fell in step with the Limehouse declaration. And in any event my main point was that the right opposed Foot while he was polling well compared to Tories. Corbyn’s policies polled better than expected circa 2017 too, which didn’t make the right very happy either. Here’s Kinnock with his son, finding 2017 “perplexing” m.youtube.com/watch?v=bv0OepoPzhkSo just to check: your thesis is that unilateral nuclear disarmament was supported by 16% of the British population and Michael Foot was the least popular Labour opposition leader since WWII was due to a small faction of the Labour right creating the SDP (don't forget most stayed in Labour and Denis Healey was a notably loyal deputy to Foot) and nothing to do with left wing policies being unpopular with the actual electorate - despite the clear polling and electoral analysis evidence to that effect previously quoted. blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/post-war-leaders-of-the-opposition/As I said at the beginning of this exchange, this is delusional stuff. If Labour had wanted to give themselves a chance of winning in 1983 they would have elected Healey as leader, ditched the left-wing policies and expelled Tony Benn. I think they would probably still have lost given the Falklands and the economic upturn, but not by a 144 majority. |
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c-a-r-f-r-e-w
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 19:55:57 GMT
You are arguing a different point to the one I made. I said they acted against the leadership. I have accepted other factors were involved in deciding the electoral outcome. And in particular the rise in Thatcher’s polling due to the better economic conditions due to oil price etc. that helped many economies at the time. The study posted earlier also put her recovery down to economic improvement. But to try and ignore that the hiving off of a load of the party into a separate entity might well have had a negative polling impact, is something else, esp. when polling fell in step with the Limehouse declaration. And in any event my main point was that the right opposed Foot while he was polling well compared to Tories. Corbyn’s policies polled better than expected circa 2017 too, which didn’t make the right very happy either. Here’s Kinnock with his son, finding 2017 “perplexing” m.youtube.com/watch?v=bv0OepoPzhkSo just to check: your thesis is that unilateral nuclear disarmament was supported by 16% of the British population and Michael Foot was the least popular Labour opposition leader since WWII was due to a small faction of the Labour right creating the SDP (don't forget most stayed in Labour and Denis Healey was a notably loyal deputy to Foot) and nothing to do with left wing policies being unpopular with the actual electorate - despite the clear polling and electoral analysis evidence to that effect previously quoted. blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/post-war-leaders-of-the-opposition/As I said at the beginning of this exchange, this is delusional stuff. If Labour had wanted to give themselves a chance of winning in 1983 they would have elected Healey as leader, ditched the left-wing policies and expelled Tony Benn. I think they would probably still have lost given the Falklands and the economic upturn, but not by a 144 majority. No, that is a misrepresentation of my position, as I have pointed out several times now. The outcome of the GE in 1983 was a result of numerous factors, with the Tory revival mainly due to economic recovery. You can keep inventing views you would prefer to argue against, but it’s just wasting time. Once again, my point concerns the way the right split away from the party a couple of years before, while Foot was actually polling rather well, with an associated negative effect on polling once they split. Even if as you suggest this had been due to a dislike of Foot or what he stood for, it did not negatively affect polling until the Limehouse declaration, and the split allowed an alternative. (And the advent of Foot didn’t lift Tory polling at the time). The idea that a split of that nature would have no deleterious effect on polling at all is quite something. |
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Post by Rafwan on Dec 16, 2023 20:06:33 GMT
pjw1961 Hypothetical questions (e.g. how would you have voted if … ?) yield notoriously unreliable data (see any reputable Social Research Methods book). Similarly ex poste facto questions (why did you … ?) yield highly dubious data because validity cannot be assessed. They are conducted by academics who will be fully aware of that. The British post election studies are well established and often produce evidence that slays popular myths. For example, it was this that showed the the relatively better performance of Labour in 2017 than expected was not the result of a 'youth quake' as journalists had guessed. Another myth, I'm afraid, is that the Liberal/SDP alliance cost Labour the 1983 election. www.britishelectionstudy.com/bes-impact/the-myth-of-the-2017-youthquake-election/Being aware of something doesn’t make it go away. These are profoundly tricky methodological questions, and whilst these studies do excellent work the articles written based on them tend to be speculative. An important dimension is their newsworthiness, which is not necessarily the same as their accuracy. Without seeing their actual evidence and their analysis and interpretation, it is difficult to say. Your example of a good myth buster is instructive. The source gives clear graphical evidence to show that 2017 was not just youthful predisposition (as the news hacks had it) but was much more deeply rooted. That in itself is a highly newsworthy story. Your final sentence does not remotely follow from the rest of the paragraph. |
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hireton
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Post by hireton on Dec 16, 2023 20:17:58 GMT
Latest Opininium
Labour lead sits at 13 points.
• Labour 40% (-3)
• Conservatives 27% (+1)
• Lib Dems 11% (n/c)
• SNP 3% (n/c)
• Greens 7% (+1)
• Reform 9% (n/c)
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pjw1961
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Post by pjw1961 on Dec 16, 2023 20:26:16 GMT
So just to check: your thesis is that unilateral nuclear disarmament was supported by 16% of the British population and Michael Foot was the least popular Labour opposition leader since WWII was due to a small faction of the Labour right creating the SDP (don't forget most stayed in Labour and Denis Healey was a notably loyal deputy to Foot) and nothing to do with left wing policies being unpopular with the actual electorate - despite the clear polling and electoral analysis evidence to that effect previously quoted. blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/post-war-leaders-of-the-opposition/As I said at the beginning of this exchange, this is delusional stuff. If Labour had wanted to give themselves a chance of winning in 1983 they would have elected Healey as leader, ditched the left-wing policies and expelled Tony Benn. I think they would probably still have lost given the Falklands and the economic upturn, but not by a 144 majority. No, that is a misrepresentation of my position, as I have pointed out several times now. The outcome of the GE in 1983 was a result of numerous factors, with the Tory revival mainly due to economic recovery. You can keep inventing views you would prefer to argue against, but it’s just wasting time. Once again, my point concerns the way the right split away from the party a couple of years before, while Foot was actually polling rather well, with an associated negative effect on polling once they split. Even if as you suggest this had been due to a dislike of Foot or what he stood for, it did not negatively affect polling until the Limehouse declaration, and the split allowed an alternative. (And the advent of Foot didn’t lift Tory polling at the time). The idea that a split of that nature would have no deleterious effect on polling at all is quite something. That was about 18 months into the 1979-83 parliament. 18 months into this parliament the Conservatives had a 10 point lead over Labour, which gives some clue as to the relevance of that fact. |
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c-a-r-f-r-e-w
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 20:31:09 GMT
No, that is a misrepresentation of my position, as I have pointed out several times now. The outcome of the GE in 1983 was a result of numerous factors, with the Tory revival mainly due to economic recovery. You can keep inventing views you would prefer to argue against, but it’s just wasting time. Once again, my point concerns the way the right split away from the party a couple of years before, while Foot was actually polling rather well, with an associated negative effect on polling once they split. Even if as you suggest this had been due to a dislike of Foot or what he stood for, it did not negatively affect polling until the Limehouse declaration, and the split allowed an alternative. (And the advent of Foot didn’t lift Tory polling at the time). The idea that a split of that nature would have no deleterious effect on polling at all is quite something. That was about 18 months into the 1979-83 parliament. 18 months into this parliament the Conservatives had a 10 point lead over Labour, which gives some clue as to the relevance of that fact. No, leading up to the Limehouse declaration Labour were significantly ahead of Tories overall. |
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pjw1961
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Post by pjw1961 on Dec 16, 2023 20:36:06 GMT
They are conducted by academics who will be fully aware of that. The British post election studies are well established and often produce evidence that slays popular myths. For example, it was this that showed the the relatively better performance of Labour in 2017 than expected was not the result of a 'youth quake' as journalists had guessed. Another myth, I'm afraid, is that the Liberal/SDP alliance cost Labour the 1983 election. www.britishelectionstudy.com/bes-impact/the-myth-of-the-2017-youthquake-election/Being aware of something doesn’t make it go away. These are profoundly tricky methodological questions, and whilst these studies do excellent work the articles written based on them tend to be speculative. An important dimension is their newsworthiness, which is not necessarily the same as their accuracy. Without seeing their actual evidence and their analysis and interpretation, it is difficult to say. Your example of a good myth buster is instructive. The source gives clear graphical evidence to show that 2017 was not just youthful predisposition (as the news hacks had it) but was much more deeply rooted. That in itself is a highly newsworthy story. Your final sentence does not remotely follow from the rest of the paragraph. The British Election Study is a long term academic exercise. It is not written to be newsworthy and has no interest in that. It was founded (in part) by David Butler and has involved some of the most distinguished psephologists of the past 60 years. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Election_StudyAs to 1983 I would absolutely love to post a link to the 1983 study, but to the best of my knowledge it is not readily available on line, although if you set up an account with an academic publisher you can probably get hold of it. |
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 20:43:12 GMT
Labour slid down once the split happened. They actually rose a bit once Foot was elected. these are the polls leading up to the declaration Labour - 47, 47, 47.7, 47.5, 56, 51.2, 47, 45 Tory — 38, 36.5, 37.2, 35, 32, 35.4, 33, 35 |
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Post by crossbat11 on Dec 16, 2023 20:46:00 GMT
History tells us that Labour only win when the social democrats are in charge though. As pjw1961 argues, 1983, 2017 and 2019 were pretty bad defeats for the party when an overtly left wing prospectus was offered to the electorate. 2017 was hardly a 'pretty bad defeat' when Labour managed to destroy the Tory majority. The Tories only clung on to office courtesy of the DUP. Were the social democrats in charge in 1945? Following Gaitskell's death in January 1963 , Wilson was not the preferred candidate of the social democrats.
I think the 2017 Labour defeat looks better than it was because of the marked improvement in the party's support during the campaign from a very low base. Opinion polls and local election results pointed to a catastrophe for Labour but there was a surge during the campaign when May's complete ineptitude as a campaigner almost derailed the Tories. Pratfall after pratfall and Corbyn had an Andy Warhol fifteen days of fame in the spotlight. The boy went down to a noble defeat. Not with all hands but with quite a few. The figures don't lie. Yes, May lost the wafer thin majority she went into the election with but it was hardly "destroyed" by Labour. Labour's rise in VI was accompanied by a substantial rise for the Tories too that largely neutralised the potential seat-winning effects for Labour. Labour's gains were modest. 30 seats and the overall seat tally was less than Callaghan achieved when Labour were ejected from office office in 1979. The Tories won 55 more and outpolled Labour by 800,000 votes. Their net seat loss was a mere 13. This is a reasonably dispassionate and objective psephological and political analysis of the much mythologised 2017 election:- ukandeu.ac.uk/the-2017-general-election-not-that-close-after-all/ |
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pjw1961
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Post by pjw1961 on Dec 16, 2023 20:47:16 GMT
That was about 18 months into the 1979-83 parliament. 18 months into this parliament the Conservatives had a 10 point lead over Labour, which gives some clue as to the relevance of that fact. No, leading up to the Limehouse declaration Labour were significantly ahead of Tories overall. December 1980 is 18 months into the parliament. My comparison above stands. Opposition leads early in parliaments don't mean much unless sustained. |
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c-a-r-f-r-e-w
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 20:48:44 GMT
No, leading up to the Limehouse declaration Labour were significantly ahead of Tories overall. December 1980 is 18 months into the parliament. My comparison above stands. Opposition leads early in parliaments don't mean much unless sustained. It really doesn’t stand, if you actually look at the polling. Again: Labour - 47, 47, 47.7, 47.5, 56, 51.2, 47, 45 Tory — 38, 36.5, 37.2, 35, 32, 35.4, 33, 35. |
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pjw1961
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Post by pjw1961 on Dec 16, 2023 20:49:41 GMT
Labour slid down once the split happened. They actually rose a bit once Foot was elected. these are the polls leading up to the declaration Labour - 47, 47, 47.7, 47.5, 56, 51.2, 47, 45 Tory — 38, 36.5, 37.2, 35, 32, 35.4, 33, 35 I deleted that post because I got the timing of the Limehouse declaration wrong. See my later reply instead. |
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pjw1961
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Post by pjw1961 on Dec 16, 2023 20:52:38 GMT
December 1980 is 18 months into the parliament. My comparison above stands. Opposition leads early in parliaments don't mean much unless sustained. It really doesn’t stand, if you actually look at the polling. Again: Labour - 47, 47, 47.7, 47.5, 56, 51.2, 47, 45 Tory — 38, 36.5, 37.2, 35, 32, 35.4, 33, 35. You seem to be missing the point. Labour led 18 months into the 1979 parliament and lost badly in 1983. The Tories led 18 months into the 2019 parliament and look like they will lose badly in 2024. The fact Labour led in 1980 means nothing in the context of a 5 year parliament. Margaret Thatcher wasn't going to call an election in 1980! |
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 20:54:54 GMT
No, leading up to the Limehouse declaration Labour were significantly ahead of Tories overall. December 1980 is 18 months into the parliament. My comparison above stands. Opposition leads early in parliaments don't mean much unless sustained. they had a lead throughout the six months prior, which was about a year after the election. (And it fell once the split happened. Unsurprisingly the alliance gained at the same time). |
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Post by graham on Dec 16, 2023 21:02:27 GMT
2017 was hardly a 'pretty bad defeat' when Labour managed to destroy the Tory majority. The Tories only clung on to office courtesy of the DUP. Were the social democrats in charge in 1945? Following Gaitskell's death in January 1963 , Wilson was not the preferred candidate of the social democrats.
I think the 2017 Labour defeat looks better than it was because of the marked improvement in the party's support during the campaign from a very low base. Opinion polls and local election results pointed to a catastrophe for Labour but there was a surge during the campaign when May's complete ineptitude as a campaigner almost derailed the Tories. Pratfall after pratfall and Corbyn had an Andy Warhol fifteen days of fame in the spotlight. The boy went down to a noble defeat. Not with all hands but with quite a few. The figures don't lie. Yes, May lost the wafer thin majority she went into the election with but it was hardly "destroyed" by Labour. Labour's rise in VI was accompanied by a substantial rise for the Tories too that largely neutralised the potential seat-winning effects for Labour. Labour's gains were modest. 30 seats and the overall seat tally was less than Callaghan achieved when Labour were ejected from office office in 1979. The Tories won 55 more and outpolled Labour by 800,000 votes. Their net seat loss was a mere 13. This is a reasonably dispassionate and objective psephological and political analysis of the much mythologised 2017 election:- ukandeu.ac.uk/the-2017-general-election-not-that-close-after-all/But Labour's 2017 total of 262 seats was seriously depressed by the collapse in Scotland which had already taken place in 2015 under Milliband.Without that, Corbyn would have been close to 300 seats in 2017. In England & Wales Corbyn performed a fair bit better than Callaghan in 1979, Foot in 1983, Kinnock in both 1987 and 1992 - and Milliband in 2015. It was also a better result than Gaitskell had managed in 1959. |
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 21:04:19 GMT
It really doesn’t stand, if you actually look at the polling. Again: Labour - 47, 47, 47.7, 47.5, 56, 51.2, 47, 45 Tory — 38, 36.5, 37.2, 35, 32, 35.4, 33, 35. You seem to be missing the point. Labour led 18 months into the 1979 parliament and lost badly in 1983. The Tories led 18 months into the 2019 parliament and look like they will lose badly in 2024. The fact Labour led in 1980 means nothing in the context of a 5 year parliament. Margaret Thatcher wasn't going to call an election in 1980! No, you keep changing the argument as I post more data in response. You have now just “decided” that if a split happens mid-term followed by a catastrophic loss of VI to the splitters, that this is of no consequence. |
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Post by graham on Dec 16, 2023 21:07:04 GMT
In 2017 Scotland indirectly kept the Tories in office.Had it not been for Ruth Davidson's 'Tory surge' and the gains from the SNP the Tories would have been unable to continue even with DUP support.
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Post by mercian on Dec 16, 2023 21:34:43 GMT
I can feel myself being inhabited by Harry Hill as I read the posts between c-a-r-f-r-e-w and pjw1961. "Fiiiiight!" |
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 21:39:14 GMT
I can feel myself being inhabited by Harry Hill as I read the posts between c-a-r-f-r-e-w and pjw1961 . "Fiiiiight!" “Stalagmite? Hmm, hmm? Stalactite! Gotta have a system!” |
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pjw1961
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Post by pjw1961 on Dec 16, 2023 22:00:34 GMT
You seem to be missing the point. Labour led 18 months into the 1979 parliament and lost badly in 1983. The Tories led 18 months into the 2019 parliament and look like they will lose badly in 2024. The fact Labour led in 1980 means nothing in the context of a 5 year parliament. Margaret Thatcher wasn't going to call an election in 1980! No, you keep changing the argument as I post more data in response. You have now just “decided” that if a split happens mid-term followed by a catastrophic loss of VI to the splitters, that this is of no consequence. Tosh. I have throughout been talking about what the situation was in June 1983 when the election actually happened. Which is the only thing that matters. |
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Post by pjw1961 on Dec 16, 2023 22:03:38 GMT
I can feel myself being inhabited by Harry Hill as I read the posts between c-a-r-f-r-e-w and pjw1961 . "Fiiiiight!" As carfrew doesn't participate in party politics, there is nothing to fight over. Those who refuse to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. |
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Dec 16, 2023 22:07:37 GMT
No, you keep changing the argument as I post more data in response. You have now just “decided” that if a split happens mid-term followed by a catastrophic loss of VI to the splitters, that this is of no consequence. Tosh. I have throughout been talking about what the situation was in June 1983 when the election actually happened. Which is the only thing that matters. Even if it were true that the election were the only thing that matters, AND that Tories would definitely have won anyway without the split because of the economic recovery, then there is still the problem that the loss of VI will have cost Labour rather more seats than would otherwise have been the case. Plus, it’s not like the split ended at the election. It continued to affect Labour after, as Graham pointed out. Meanwhile from the point of view of the time of the declaration though, which is what I began by talking about, the splitters didn’t know if Tories would have been bailed out by the oil price fall. It could have been a tighter election for all they knew. Their objective was to take VI from Labour, unsure at that point whether it would cost the election or not, and they succeeded in that sabotage. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 16, 2023 22:14:11 GMT
No, you keep changing the argument as I post more data in response. You have now just “decided” that if a split happens mid-term followed by a catastrophic loss of VI to the splitters, that this is of no consequence. Tosh. I have throughout been talking about what the situation was in June 1983 when the election actually happened. Which is the only thing that matters. Dunno why you bother. |
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Post by alec on Dec 16, 2023 22:22:56 GMT
Kent and Portsmouth latest hospital trusts to declare critical emergencies, along with Belfast children's hospital again. Again, it's worth stressing that apart from covid, which remains a new pressure, the traditional winter illnesses are at relatively low levels, yet the system is buckling.
Worth noting perhaps that in the US, the CDC is now warning that the rapid growth of JN.1 is likely to stress the US healthcare system, with rationing of emergency care likely in many areas by the end of the month. This is already happening in some states where JN.1 was a bit more advanced.
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Post by crossbat11 on Dec 16, 2023 22:24:12 GMT
In 2017 Scotland indirectly kept the Tories in office.Had it not been for Ruth Davidson's 'Tory surge' and the gains from the SNP the Tories would have been unable to continue even with DUP support. Well, if my auntie had a pair of wotsits she'd be my uncle. Corbyn's Labour made a similarly modest recovery in Scotland in 2017 to the one May/Davidson achieved in that election but in the English and Welsh battlefields Labour made only modest gains against the Tories. There were some headline grabbing captures like Canterbury but these tended to mask losses like Mansfield. These losses were early straws in the wind that signalled that Corbyn's Labour were losing support in the party's old heartlands. This development continued on steroids in 2019. 2017 was what I call a better than expected brave defeat. But still a defeat that resulted in the continuation of the Tory government. |
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