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UK politics general discussion

One thing I would say about electoral pacts is that I think even if the left wing parties don't make any formal electoral pacts, some sort of informal tactical voting may well take place anyway that negates the need for them.

This has very much been the case at recent by-elections in Tory seats. When Labour won Wakefield, the Liberal Democrats' vote share was next to zero as everyone left wing united behind Labour. When the Liberal Democrats won Tiverton and Honiton, Labour's vote share was next to zero as everyone left wing united behind the Liberal Democrats.

If we see a similar dynamic play out in the next general election, I think Labour could do a lot better than many expect.
 
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Matt N said:
One thing I would say about electoral pacts is that I think even if the left wing parties don't make any formal electoral pacts, some sort of informal tactical voting may well take place anyway that negates the need for them.

This has very much been the case at recent by-elections in Tory seats. When Labour won Wakefield, the Liberal Democrats' vote share was next to zero as everyone left wing united behind Labour. When the Liberal Democrats won Tiverton and Honiton, Labour's vote share was next to zero as everyone left wing united behind the Liberal Democrats.

If we see a similar dynamic play out in the next general election, I think Labour could do a lot better than many expect.
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Indeed, throughout the 90's and 2000's our family, lifelong Labour supporters, would always vote LD tactically. The local Labour candidate knocked in the door in 1997, they told him they were Labour supporters but intended to vote LD tactically and even he agreed with why they were doing it. The constituency I grew up in, North Avon (now Thornbury and Yate) has never been Labour and it ended up being a safe seat for the future LD pensions minister Steve Webb who was actually a very good MP.

I voted LD for similar reasons when I moved to WSM constituency, which was held by them at the time I moved here. It all changed in 2015 though as it made many of us sick to our stomachs that, after years of voting to keep Tories out, by voting LD we'd actually voted to give them the keys to number 10. It's not too strong to describe this as an utter betrayal and is a massive factor in them getting destroyed after the coalition. For decades they'd stuffed leaflets through our doors claiming "keep the Tories out" and "Labour can't win here" with graphs showing how much they supress the Tory vote.

It's a shame because I've always been quite fond of the SDP wing of the Lib Dems and they had some good policies under Paddy Ashdown and Charles Kennedy. Some of the MP's like Steve Webb were also actually very good as well.

This is a good website here. Put your postcode in and it tells you exactly who to vote for for the best chance of beating Tories if you're that way inclined. https://tactical.vote/
 
I must admit, I’m a bit confused as to why the Liberal Democrats ever teamed up with the Conservatives. The party in its present form looks as though it couldn’t be more different from the Conservatives in ideology; the way Ed Davey and Liberal Democrat MPs talk, they almost seem like “Labour lite”, if you like, sharing very similar opinions to Keir Starmer and Labour MPs on most topics.

Was it more right wing under Nick Clegg?

Tactical voting is an interesting one, but I think I live in a constituency where any vote aside from a Conservative vote is borderline useless. We’re a pretty safe Tory stronghold here in the Forest of Dean; the Tories got 60% of the vote here in 2019, with the next closest competition being Labour at 29% of the vote, and if I’m remembering correctly, our seat even voted Tory during the Blair years. The seat might have turned red at the height of New Labour’s popularity (I did read the FOD’s general election voting history somewhere, but I can’t really remember it off the top of my head), but it certainly went blue again while Labour was still in power if it did; Mark Harper (Tory) has been our local MP for many, many years now. Our constituency is also more inclined towards the Tories’ point of view on the pivotal issue of Brexit; the Forest of Dean’s result was 60% Brexit, if I’m remembering correctly, and UKIP/The Brexit Party always did fairly well around here.

Interestingly, my immediate family goes quite substantially against the general political leaning of our constituency. We don’t really have any strong alliance to a particular political party, but my parents both voted Remain in the EU referendum, and all of us generally seem to agree with a more centrist, possibly centre-left in more recent years, attitude to policy. My mum was saying to me once that her and my dad have voted for a wide array of political parties, and that we as a family don’t have any strong alliance; she said they voted Labour under Blair, voted Liberal Democrats in 2010 because they were inspired by Nick Clegg and his policies, voted Conservative in 2015 because they felt betrayed by Nick Clegg and quite liked David Cameron, but voted Labour in both 2017 and 2019 because they lost all respect for Cameron after he jumped ship following the Brexit referendum, didn’t like the Tories heavily pursuing Brexit, and I know for a fact that neither of my parents would have voted for Boris Johnson if he were the last politician on Earth (they both absolutely despised him even before he became PM).
 
Matt N said:
I must admit, I’m a bit confused as to why the Liberal Democrats ever teamed up with the Conservatives. The party in its present form looks as though it couldn’t be more different from the Conservatives in ideology; the way Ed Davey and Liberal Democrat MPs talk, they almost seem like “Labour lite”, if you like, sharing very similar opinions to Keir Starmer and Labour MPs on most topics.

Was it more right wing under Nick Clegg?

Tactical voting is an interesting one, but I think I live in a constituency where any vote aside from a Conservative vote is borderline useless. We’re a pretty safe Tory stronghold here in the Forest of Dean; the Tories got 60% of the vote here in 2019, with the next closest competition being Labour at 29% of the vote, and if I’m remembering correctly, our seat even voted Tory during the Blair years. The seat might have turned red at the height of New Labour’s popularity (I did read the FOD’s general election voting history somewhere, but I can’t really remember it off the top of my head), but it certainly went blue again while Labour was still in power if it did; Mark Harper (Tory) has been our local MP for many, many years now. Our constituency is also more inclined towards the Tories’ point of view on the pivotal issue of Brexit; the Forest of Dean’s result was 60% Brexit, if I’m remembering correctly, and UKIP/The Brexit Party always did fairly well around here.

Interestingly, my immediate family goes quite substantially against the general political leaning of our constituency. We don’t really have any strong alliance to a particular political party, but my parents both voted Remain in the EU referendum, and all of us generally seem to agree with a more centrist, possibly centre-left in more recent years, attitude to policy. My mum was saying to me once that her and my dad have voted for a wide array of political parties, and that we as a family don’t have any strong alliance; she said they voted Labour under Blair, voted Liberal Democrats in 2010 because they were inspired by Nick Clegg and his policies, voted Conservative in 2015 because they felt betrayed by Nick Clegg and quite liked David Cameron, but voted Labour in both 2017 and 2019 because they lost all respect for Cameron after he jumped ship following the Brexit referendum, didn’t like the Tories heavily pursuing Brexit, and I know for a fact that neither of my parents would have voted for Boris Johnson if he were the last politician on Earth (they both absolutely despised him even before he became PM).
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There is some cross over. The Liberal Democrat party is a merger of 2 parties The Liberal Party and the SDP. The liberal side of the party has some similarities to the liberal wing of the conservatives (although many Tories are not liberal) and these similarities were laid bare in much of the coalition agreement. The SDP was a breakaway of more centerist Labour MP's and is where the LD's get their social democratic tendencies from.

The LD's did veer away from the left under Clegg compared to Paddy Ashdown and particularly Charles Kennedy who's leadership saw the party as being to the left of Blair's Labour party at the time. He led an excellent election campaign in 2010 until he sold his sole for a ministerial car. Suddenly, he was in favour of savage cuts to public services all of a sudden, despite what he'd said weeks earlier.
 
I was a Lib Dem. Paid up member, with a card. I even put leaflets out in student areas boasting of the flagship policy of abolishing tuition fees, something I truly and passionately believed in. It was humiliating. And student fees was just the beginning of the awfulness - they also supported the bedroom tax and, perhaps most short-sighted given their relative strength in local government, supported huge real terms cuts to council services.

My old nana kept telling me "vote Liberal, get the Tories". She was absolutely right.

What really galls me is that Clegg could have played the whole situation so much better - they could have offered a confidence supply arrangement which would have basically forced the Tories to act like they had all the power but actually could only do a relatively narrow set of things, then the moment they decided to do the real awful unpopular Tory stuff they'd have pulled the plug and could have legitimately played the hero card in doing so. Who knows how such an election would have gone but it certainly would have resulted in a considerably better result for them than the 2015 Election eventually did.
 
I think Clegg got a cushy very well paid job at Facebook afterwards though, so it turned out pretty well. For him, anyway.
 
What is super depressing is that the people voting in the next prime minister are the people who lap up xenophobic rubbish like this.
 
She got lots of cheers when she said it, which would suggest that it’s clearly not that much of an uncommon view at very least among Tory members…
 
Matt N said:
She got lots of cheers when she said it, which would suggest that it’s clearly not that much of an uncommon view at very least among Tory members…
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Tory party members don’t even make up 2% of the UK population, just because some right wing bigots cheer in a hustings doesn’t mean the opinion is popular.
 
There have been encampments of prospective migrants on the north French coast since the nineteen seventies.
Saw them myself.
Ferry terminal camps, they used to travel hidden in trucks, not small boats.
Disgusting, disgraceful scenes, no sanitation or health support...neither government gave a damn then or now.
 
AstroDan said:
She's at it again.

France always to blame!

www.bbc.co.uk

Tory leadership: Truss criticised for Macron 'jury is out' remark - BBC News

Labour accuses foreign secretary of a "woeful lack of judgement" and insulting a close ally.
www.bbc.co.uk www.bbc.co.uk

Sent from my SM-G991B using Tapatalk
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It's that creeping smile that'll do her. You can see it on that Lib Dem conference video; the uncomfortable levels of delight she gets from impressing the audience immediately in front of her as she spouts whatever nonsense they want to hear.

She's a complete goon, perhaps more of a goon than the present incumbent. Somehow they keep getting worse!
 
In Liz We Truss… Liz Truss is our new PM, winning a 21,000 vote majority over Rishi Sunak!
 
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