That’s quite Trumpian, however. So just you wait till he whips out the Lügenpresse I suppose ?
They didn’t hold a vote, as they don’t have a say in the decision, but they backed it in debate and in a statement by the President of the European parliament, David Sassoli.
I’m not “playing” anything. Those figures are an accurate reflection of the voting within those constituencies and that presents a very real conundrum for Labour MP’s especially when other parties are offering a clear policy.
depends what you mean by “many” but I haven’t seen overwhelming parliamentary support for any form of brexit, have you?
I’m not labelling them at all, their voting preference has labelled them.
OK, but seeing as the impasse has arisen over the last three years the comparison between how their constiuencies voted and how they themselves vote in parliament seems relevant. It’ll certainly be relevant on the hustings which is precisely my point.
Your post illustrates my point, it is a very difficult calculation for Labour to make. And don’t forget, they are not (as we are currently speaking) standing on a remain platform.
Is this based upon your opinion or do you have some definitive data to back up your assertion?
Also please account for Brexit voters who no longer support the Labour party. The reality is that some of those UKIP and Brexit party voters were former Labour voters because failing to do this would skew the figures to make Labours Remain vote seem higher than it truly is.
Don’t bother quoting YouGovs figures since that is pretty much a poisoned well with no credibility.
Any way you look at it, if there is a 37% figure for Brexit support they will almost certainly take seats from Labour and the Conservatives and it is highly likely they will hold the balance of power, unless you believe that Labour and Conservatives could form a coalition.
Projections based on current polls are that the Brexit Party will win zero seats, or possibly one seat (the UK electoral system is seriously weird) but by drawing off hard-Brexit-supporting votes will cost the Tories a significant number of seats. There is no realist prospect that the Brexit party will hold the balance of power.
Here are the latest poll results I see:
37% Conservative
22% Labour
19% Liberal Democrats
11% Brexit
7% Green
3% SNP
Very clearly the drawing off of the Remain vote by the Liberal Democrats, Greens, and Scottish Nationalist Party is of substantially greater impact than the Brexit Party effect on the Conservatives (those three parties have 29% of the vote, while the Brexit Party only has 11%)
Delta Poll has similar figures:
http://www.deltapoll.co.uk/polls/voting-intention-22oct
Here is a list of recent polls:
I’m open to correction here, but I don’t think any party has ever won a majority of seats on as little as 37% of the vote in a UK election. That is certainly a possible outcome this time round, but history suggest that it’s by no means a shoe-in.
I take your point that the remain-leaing parties have a much higher vote share than the Brexit party, but (a) this isnt’ all “bleed” from the major parties; the Remain parties all have their own established supporter bases, which BXP does not. And (b) The Remain parties are actually going to win significant numbers of seats, which BXP is not, and this is going to give them a degree of influence/control that BXP will never have - especially if the Tories fail to secure an absolute majority - which is, what, at least a 50% chance?
And of course their remains the point that, even if the Tories do win an absolute majority, the Tory party itself is deeply divided on Brexit-related questions. I think if they win a majority Brexit pretty certainly proceeds on the basis of the deal just negotiated by Johnson, but I don’t give much for the chances of the Tories being able to progress the next state of Brexit - the negotiation and settlement of the future EU/UK relationship by end 2020 - in a competent or coherent fashion.
It seems that both Tories and Labour are having second thoughts about an election…
Johnson’s cabinet split over gambling on pre-Christmas election
Jeremy Corbyn urged by MPs to resist calls for election
You’ll be surprised to hear that the last two times a party has secured a majority it was done with <37% of the vote:
Blair’s 35.2% in 2005
Our electoral system is broken, and although the post-referendum farce makes this clearer with every passing week, there is virtually no prospect of it getting fixed at any time in the foreseeable future. Whatever remains of the UK fifty years from now, you can safely bet that only the Tories and Labour will ever be in a position to lead its government, no matter how loathed they might be among the voting population.
Or even Thatcher’s 35.8% in 1979.
It’s even more worrying that, what with the levels of support for other parties and lower turnouts, the proportion of the total electorate that an incoming government can claim to have got out to vote for them can be below 30%, particularly since the 1974 elections.
Found the piece I read this in
This is what makes the most recent anti-trade union legislation all the more galling. If a union wishes to engage in industrial action leading to withdrawal of labour they must first get an absolute majority of their membership to vote in favour instead of a majority of those casting votes on the strike ballot.
It seems political parties can gain all controlling power on minority votes of the population and this can result in far more intimate and dramatic effects upon UK policy - how many folk actually voted for a 10+ years of austerity instead of the promised 3 years that we have got from the Tories? The cutbacks have affected the criminal justice system so much that prison population is set to expand dramatically and violent crime has increased by percentages not seen for decades.
“I think it is advisable” and “he would recommend” don’t sound too definitive to me.
Brexit PM says he will try for 12 December election.
Let’s see if the opposition keep running scared or actually agree to one. There’s hopefully still time for a new Labour leader, otherwise there’s 5 more years of Johnson.
The other option, of course, is that Parliament could refuse him the election consistently, in which case we have no functional Government for the forseeable future, and no-deal happens whenever the EU decides - assuming Macron changes his mind, which is far from certain.
You misread that, I’m afraid.
35.8% was the Tory count at the previous election (the second GE of 1974).
In '79, Thatcher took 43.9%.
You’re absolutely right about this, though.
In what I believe is the most egregious example, 2005 saw Labour win a majority of 68 based on less than 23% of the total electorate.
I stand corrected.
It looks like Labour won’t be agreeing to an election; and that in turn the Tories will be pulling the WAB and bringing no business to Parliament.
In the light of the fact that Parliament has just passed a Queen’s Speech which lists a programme for government that Johnson has been swearing since August was vital for the country, the government’s so-called “strike” is ridiculous.
As for Labour ducking the election: while I personally think an election is needed, I don’t see why Labour would agree to one right now. Their chances of winning are limited; Johnson has a greater prospect of a majority than they do. Johnson has publicly committed to Oct 31st leave date - it is at least possible that when this passes without either Brexit happening or him being dead in a ditch then he and his party will take a hit in the polls. And while I agree it looks bad that Labour are ducking an election, if there isn’t an election they can’t be punished for it. Whether they can get it across is another question, but the line of “the PM is weak and unstrustworthy - we will continue to fight in Parliament to ensure that we don’t rush into a bad deal for Britain just because he made a promise he could never keep.” is probably worth pushing for a while longer.
If Johnson wants an election, all he needs to do is rule out a no-deal Brexit.
If he is not prepared to do that, even though he now has a deal, it means that he is still intent on getting a no-deal Brexit one way or another. The ERG were promised that if they supported his deal, they would get their no-deal Brexit at the end of 2020.
He doesn’t want the deal to be subject to amendments to prevent that happening. He’s hoping that if he gets a reasonable majority in an election he will be able to streamroller the deal through with no amendments, let the subsequent negotiations fail, refuse to extend the negotiations, and leave with no-deal at the end of next year.
I’ve a fairly eclectic mix of voters in the office I’m currently in and certainly there is a very vocal majority that see Corbyn as (amongst other things) useless, cowardly and dithering. Abbot was on the TV this morning as a stark reminder of quite what labour has on offer. Not impressive. Three Labour voters said there was not a hope in hell of them voting Corbyn in and a good chunk of that antipathy is due his inaction and incompetence in Brexit. It still remains unclear to people exactly what labour policy is and would be. Another round of negotiation and a few further years of uncertainty and followed by another referendum? That appeals to precisely no-one.
So yes, I understand why Labour don’t want an election, it is pragmatic for them but they are cowards for not agreeing to it and hypocritical in their reasoning behind it and it is obvious to much of the voting public.