> Hollie Ridley, Labour’s general secretary, sent a note to No 10 at the end of January saying it was “clearly a two-horse race” with Reform UK, and only 3% of voters were saying they would stick with the Greens.
>Later in the contest, cabinet ministers were dispatched to tell journalists things were “looking good” with the data and it was Labour’s biggest ever “get out the vote” operation to ensure victory.
>This misplaced optimism…
‘Misplaced optimism’ is a polite way to describe outright lies to manipulate voters.
Funny how Labour are choosing to call the Greens extremists when Reform are right there spouting crazy stuff. Labour should be closer to the Greens on the political spectrum… should be.
peakedtooearly on
They didn’t have a majority because people loved them.
They had a majority because people were sick of the Tories.
Surely they must know this?
DukeSunday on
>Our own people
Tells you all you need to know about Labour taking some voters for granted, really. They’re not “your people”, they’re just people; they’ll vote for you if you’re closest to their positions and they won’t if you aren’t.
coffeewalnut08 on
I’m actually curious what would the Greens or Reform do that Labour isn’t? In government, I mean.
Which is a totally different game to campaigning, which Farage and Zack are more effective at.
Can’t believe I need to say this, but rallying a crowd requires a different skillset than running a country. That may be partly why Starmer seems less inspiring, but it doesn’t mean nothing is happening.
SebastianVanCartier on
I think this ‘our own people hate us’ framing lays bare an attitudinal problem in Westminster. Labour has it, but it’s not unique to them; the Tories have the same problem in other parts of the country and I’d argue Reform and the Greens are vulnerable to it as well. (Ditto the SNP in Scotland, up to a point.)
This concept of parties having ‘their own people’ (i.e. a batch of constituents who can be relied upon to vote for them time after time) is increasingly for the birds. Party loyalty is less of a thing now. Labour (and the Tories, and Reform, and indeed the Greens) can’t rely on ‘their’ people any more.
Spencer won in Manchester because she looked and sounded like a normal person and talked (mostly) about normal person stuff. Stogia was a reasonable candidate but she didn’t have much charisma, and she wasn’t talking the cost of living and community cohesion game like Spencer did.
So much of it is about relatability. I have a gut feeling Reform would have won if they’d fielded a candidate who looked and sounded like a normal human being (I know, I know, the jokes write themselves) instead of a Home Bargains Jordan Peterson.
Cynical_Classicist on
Turns out that trying to appeal to Reform voters and lickspittling to Trump and supporting Israel isn’t a vote winner to the Labour base.
IfYouRun on
They’ve attempted to be economically centre left and socially centre right. I guess they thought they could please everyone but actually they’ve just pissed everyone off by abandoning their roots.
LordWinnall on
Turns out that abandoning the working class in favour of relying on an immigrant ‘community’ to be your voter base is an inherently bad strategy.
GhostRiders on
Its not just old people, young people hate Labour as well.. so do middle aged people, working class..
Labour’s thinking that reducing the voting age will help them shows how detected from reality they are.
My daughter is 18 and my son is 14. Themselves and their friends have absolutely no intention of voting for Labour.
The Tories, Reform and all the other right wing partiers aren’t even in the picture.
They are completely baffled by the Greens stance on Nuclear Power and don’t consider them them to be anything other than a joke party.
Currently they all seem to be leaning towards the Lib Dems.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the Lib Dems do quite well in the next GE.
Diligent_Craft_1165 on
Labour went too far right to appease reform voters who won’t change their mind.
Now they’ll go too far left as they overreact to this, and they’ll trash the economy.
nerdylernin on
Possibly because they have been consistently ignoring “their people” for years? If you turn your back on your traditional voters it’s no great surprise that they turn their back on you.
WildWinterberry on
I really hope people think more carefully at the next election. Desperation votes are destroying us. Not that we have any good options, but I’m terrified of voters doing a 180 out of desperation and reform getting in
PiccoloFamous7217 on
Is no-one mentioning the Conservatives got 706 votes & lost their deposit?
BroodLord1962 on
LOL, ‘Our own people hate us’ People vote for whoever they want, we don’t belong to any one party
Psychological-Plum10 on
Shock horror people voted for an actual socialist party instead of the tory lite party.
Desperate_Caramel_10 on
We’re becoming a deeply divided society. It’s very hard to create policies which satisfy the wealthy incumbents who want to hold on to what they’ve got and the skint new entrants to society who have been forced to fight over the remaining scraps. These things self correct eventually but never in a pretty way.
16 Comments
> Hollie Ridley, Labour’s general secretary, sent a note to No 10 at the end of January saying it was “clearly a two-horse race” with Reform UK, and only 3% of voters were saying they would stick with the Greens.
>Later in the contest, cabinet ministers were dispatched to tell journalists things were “looking good” with the data and it was Labour’s biggest ever “get out the vote” operation to ensure victory.
>This misplaced optimism…
‘Misplaced optimism’ is a polite way to describe outright lies to manipulate voters.
Funny how Labour are choosing to call the Greens extremists when Reform are right there spouting crazy stuff. Labour should be closer to the Greens on the political spectrum… should be.
They didn’t have a majority because people loved them.
They had a majority because people were sick of the Tories.
Surely they must know this?
>Our own people
Tells you all you need to know about Labour taking some voters for granted, really. They’re not “your people”, they’re just people; they’ll vote for you if you’re closest to their positions and they won’t if you aren’t.
I’m actually curious what would the Greens or Reform do that Labour isn’t? In government, I mean.
Which is a totally different game to campaigning, which Farage and Zack are more effective at.
Can’t believe I need to say this, but rallying a crowd requires a different skillset than running a country. That may be partly why Starmer seems less inspiring, but it doesn’t mean nothing is happening.
I think this ‘our own people hate us’ framing lays bare an attitudinal problem in Westminster. Labour has it, but it’s not unique to them; the Tories have the same problem in other parts of the country and I’d argue Reform and the Greens are vulnerable to it as well. (Ditto the SNP in Scotland, up to a point.)
This concept of parties having ‘their own people’ (i.e. a batch of constituents who can be relied upon to vote for them time after time) is increasingly for the birds. Party loyalty is less of a thing now. Labour (and the Tories, and Reform, and indeed the Greens) can’t rely on ‘their’ people any more.
Spencer won in Manchester because she looked and sounded like a normal person and talked (mostly) about normal person stuff. Stogia was a reasonable candidate but she didn’t have much charisma, and she wasn’t talking the cost of living and community cohesion game like Spencer did.
So much of it is about relatability. I have a gut feeling Reform would have won if they’d fielded a candidate who looked and sounded like a normal human being (I know, I know, the jokes write themselves) instead of a Home Bargains Jordan Peterson.
Turns out that trying to appeal to Reform voters and lickspittling to Trump and supporting Israel isn’t a vote winner to the Labour base.
They’ve attempted to be economically centre left and socially centre right. I guess they thought they could please everyone but actually they’ve just pissed everyone off by abandoning their roots.
Turns out that abandoning the working class in favour of relying on an immigrant ‘community’ to be your voter base is an inherently bad strategy.
Its not just old people, young people hate Labour as well.. so do middle aged people, working class..
Labour’s thinking that reducing the voting age will help them shows how detected from reality they are.
My daughter is 18 and my son is 14. Themselves and their friends have absolutely no intention of voting for Labour.
The Tories, Reform and all the other right wing partiers aren’t even in the picture.
They are completely baffled by the Greens stance on Nuclear Power and don’t consider them them to be anything other than a joke party.
Currently they all seem to be leaning towards the Lib Dems.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the Lib Dems do quite well in the next GE.
Labour went too far right to appease reform voters who won’t change their mind.
Now they’ll go too far left as they overreact to this, and they’ll trash the economy.
Possibly because they have been consistently ignoring “their people” for years? If you turn your back on your traditional voters it’s no great surprise that they turn their back on you.
I really hope people think more carefully at the next election. Desperation votes are destroying us. Not that we have any good options, but I’m terrified of voters doing a 180 out of desperation and reform getting in
Is no-one mentioning the Conservatives got 706 votes & lost their deposit?
LOL, ‘Our own people hate us’ People vote for whoever they want, we don’t belong to any one party
Shock horror people voted for an actual socialist party instead of the tory lite party.
We’re becoming a deeply divided society. It’s very hard to create policies which satisfy the wealthy incumbents who want to hold on to what they’ve got and the skint new entrants to society who have been forced to fight over the remaining scraps. These things self correct eventually but never in a pretty way.