02-10-2004 21:40									#31
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Drogue,

quote: George Galloway's party, a breakaway Labour MP. Very much against the war on Iraq, had deals with Saddam for large quantities of oil. Supported in some inner city areas, mostly by Muslims who's main issues is being against thw war. I'm sure EiF, were he here, would tell you about their corruption, but I'm not yet convinced.

RESPECT are a "coalition" of three main groups.

Firstly, George Galloway, maverick former Labour MP. Galloway is an intriguing character. He's said he regrets the downfall of the Soviet Union, refuses to criticise Stalin, and lunched with Saddam Hussein. He's also a social conservative (vehemently anti-abortion, for example).

Secondly, the Socialist Workers' Party (SWP). They're a shouty populist revolutionary socialist party and are very much on the fringes of the extreme.

Thirdly - although they've backed away from RESPECT to an extent - the Muslim Association of Britain. The MAB doesn't appear to be a mainstream organisation and was described by AWL (another far-left group, but who oppose RESPECT) as "on the fringes of Islamic fundamentalism, but fundamentalist nonetheless".

	02-10-2004 21:46									#32
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Zulu,

quote: The Lib Dems will certainly pick up a lot of seats from the Tories at the next election, but they won't become the main opposition in the next 20 years.

In 1997 and 2001 the Liberal Democrats pushed the "tactical voting against Conservatives" bandwagon as far as it could go. Except in specific by-elections where Labour is the "enemy", Conservative voters are not defecting to the Liberal Democrats any more, and in Tory/LibDem marginals they've already squeezed the Labour vote until the pips squeak.

If the LibDems gain votes from the Conservatives at the next election, it will be but a handful, and if you look objectively at the evidence, you'd see the Conservative vote more than holding up to the point where seats like Guildford and Richmond Park may well turn blue again.

I think the Liberal Democrats will make some headway in Labour seats, but the demographics are stacked against them - there aren't that many Lab/Lib marginals. Expect Birmingham Yardley and Cardiff Central to turn yellow, and possibly Rochdale, but beyond that it gets a bit patchy...

	02-10-2004 21:47									#33
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EiF:
Your pretty much right on Hartlepool. It was bad for the Tories (well, bad for all three major parties) and it is impossible to draw any predictions about the general election from it. LD votes will come back to Labour and UKIP votes will go back to the Conservatives.

Overall though, things dont look good for the Tories at the General election with a Conservative win all but mathematically impossible. A hung parliament is unlikely but possible - however, I think that the Conservatives can only hope for a (reletively) small net gain in seats if the Liberals are able to take marginals off them.

	02-10-2004 21:59									#34
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It will be difficult to win, yes. We will make progress, though, and I think we will surprise a few people with how much progress.

One thing that is certain is that a lot less people will vote Labour than did in 1997 and 2001. This will be enough to hand back a chunk of marginal seats to the Conservatives even if not one of those voters turns to the Conservatives.

Secondly, and I know this first hand, Conservative activists are far more motivated, are working harder and are better organised than the previous election. I've done a lot of work in marginal Selby (which is 13th on the Tory target list) and I can guarantee that even if the opinion polls are the same in May 2005 as they were in June 2001 that seat will come back to the Conservatives. I know a few people who work for John Grogan MP and even they privately concede he's very likely to lose.

Thirdly, with the Conservatives being out of Government for so long, will people still be as prepared to vote tactically? I imagine in the Liberal Democrat marginals, possibly so, but will LibDem voters in places like Dorset South stomach voting Labour?

I think the Conservatives will pick up 30 or 40 seats even without any noticeable change in the opinion polls...

	02-10-2004 22:11									#35
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I think your probably right to some extent but if the Tories pick up 40 Labour seats (too early to tell but not impossible) and the Liberals take 20-30 seats (mostly from the Tories), that leaves Labour with a good majority

	02-10-2004 22:13									#36
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Doomed to success, that is.

	02-10-2004 22:46									#37
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10 seats will go from liberal to tory, that is fairly certain. The question is reall who takes the 50 or so seats that labour will loose?

	02-10-2004 23:00									#38
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Labour cannot continue to Keep popularity forever, as soon as the dissalussioned (sp) Fringe voters realise a Liberal vote is a wasted one, they'll start voting for us again.
Cheers

	03-10-2004 04:58									#39
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The Tories at the moment seem to be retreating to their heartland and so further to the right. While this might be popular with their core voters i can't see it picking up many new voters. As Labour seems to occupy the position of caring conservatism (pre Thatcher) their options do look limited.

With PR i think the LIb Dems would become a major force but at the moment most people i know whose natural inclination if left of centre won't vote for them as there's little point so they vote labour by default. As was mentioned earlier too many people of my age group remember Thatcher, the Poll Tax and MIners strike to ever vote Tory regardless of their actual policies.

	03-10-2004 05:47									#40
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quote: Originally posted by Worthingtons Labour cannot continue to Keep popularity forever, as soon as the dissalussioned (sp) Fringe voters realise a Liberal vote is a wasted one, they'll start voting for us again. Cheers

	03-10-2004 05:48									#41
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quote: Originally posted by *End Is Forever* Good god, where to start on this thread...

How about addressing the fact that the Tories will *NEVER* get 'working class' people aged between 30 and 50 to vote for them in a General Election?

	03-10-2004 06:09									#42
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quote: The voters Labour lost in Hartlepool were core Labour voters - they'll never vote Conservative, but they will consider (in a by-election at least) the Liberal Democrats and (to an extent) UKIP.

So what you're saying is that all the voters that Labour is losing is basically the left? What does that mean for the middle-class areas that Labour picked up from the Tories in 1997? Will those all stay Labour then? If so its hard to see how the Tories aren't ****ed.

quote: Yes, Hartlepool is a bad result for the Tories, but in the greater scheme of things it's about as relevent for us as Labour losing their deposits in the Christchurch and Romsey by-elections was for them.

Well its mighty embarrasing to go from second place (with the socialists in third) to forth. I'm not saying that the results in Hartlepool will be in any way mirrored across the country but 2nd to 4th does look damn bad. It also shows that the Tories can't grab people who're leaving Labour, and if the Tories can't do that how the hell are they ever going to get back in power?

quote: Firstly, George Galloway, maverick former Labour MP. Galloway is an intriguing character. He's said he regrets the downfall of the Soviet Union, refuses to criticise Stalin, and lunched with Saddam Hussein. He's also a social conservative (vehemently anti-abortion, for example).

Sounds lovely. I'm sure all sane Labourites are happy to have him in the opposition.

quote: Conservative voters are not defecting to the Liberal Democrats any more, and in Tory/LibDem marginals they've already squeezed the Labour vote until the pips squeak.

Looks like they might have in this last by election. Lib Dems went from nowhere to a very close second.

quote: If the LibDems gain votes from the Conservatives at the next election, it will be but a handful

Didn't you just say that a whole lot of Conservatives voted Lib Dem in this last by-election to tactically get Labour out?

quote: 10 seats will go from liberal to tory, that is fairly certain.

How

	03-10-2004 06:13									#43
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r4e,

You'd be surprised, actually. I'll try to keep this to pure demographics - disagree if you want, but this isn't meant to be a party political broadcast.

You're right, regardless of what people think about Thatcher there is - as you point out - a significant demographic that has been turned off the Conservative Party by memories of her.

"Never", however, is too strong a word. By the end of the seventies, plenty of people were saying they'd "never" vote for Labour again. It took a while, but they pledged to post-1992 and they did in 1997 and again in 2001. The last Conservative in Walkden before I won my election in June was defeated in 1979. Conservatives have a councillor in Tower Hamlets for the first time in a century.

Furthermore, two key points. Firstly, how many of those people who were turned off by Thatcher live in Conservative target seats? Sure, Thatcher's legacy is partly the architect for our poor results in the recent by-elections, but does it make a difference in marginals? Secondly, how many of these Tory-haters would ever have considered voting Conservative anyway? Not many.

	03-10-2004 06:24									#44
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quote: Originally posted by *End Is Forever* r4e, You'd be surprised, actually. I'll try to keep this to pure demographics - disagree if you want, but this isn't meant to be a party political broadcast. .

No, you 'fire away' I was just voicing how I, and most of my peers, think.

To me, and I'm not trying to bait you here, Tower Hamlets was a result of poor, white people who arn't happy with immigrants (sp) getting more benefits then they are.

	03-10-2004 06:31									#45
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Dave,

quote: So what you're saying is that all the voters that Labour is losing is basically the left? What does that mean for the middle-class areas that Labour picked up from the Tories in 1997? Will those all stay Labour then? If so its hard to see how the Tories aren't ****ed.

I'm saying that in these particular by-elections the vote Labour is losing is the left vote. The middle-class vote is all to play for - and you won't get any sort of indication of where the "stereotypical middle class vote" is going with a ballot in Hartlepool.

quote: Well its mighty embarrasing to go from second place (with the socialists in third) to forth. I'm not saying that the results in Hartlepool will be in any way mirrored across the country but 2nd to 4th does look damn bad. It also shows that the Tories can't grab people who're leaving Labour, and if the Tories can't do that how the hell are they ever going to get back in power?

Let me try to give a (slightly convoluted) American equivalent to what happened in Hartlepool.

Let's take a solidly Democratic area in the forthcoming Presidential election - Washington DC.

John Kerry would be expected to carry DC comfortably. I assume that Bush would come a distant second.

Now, imagine for a second that a significant chunk of the voters in DC are pissed off with Kerry, for whatever reason. They decide to vote for someone else - but that someone else isn't going to be Bush, is it? So 25% of "Kerry's vote" instead goes to Ralph Nader (for example), and Bush is pushed down into third place. Meanwhile, some Bush voters sense that they could deprive Kerry of victory and - knowing Bush can't win in DC - also vote for Nader, reducing the Bush vote as well.

In this situation Bush would score very lowly - but does this make him any less or more well positioned in somewhere like Ohio or Florida? Of course not. It's pretty much irrevelent - as is the Hartlepool election to the prospects of the Conservative Party.

quote: Looks like they might have in this last by election. Lib Dems went from nowhere to a very close second.

Yes - in a constituency where neither the Liberal Democrats or Conservatives had ever bothered to campaign before, and everyone realised at the start that the Conservatives weren't going to win.

Conservative voters aren't going to vote tactically for the Liberal Democrats in the huge swathes of seats where Conservatives are clear challengers and the Liberal Democrats are nowhere. Likewise, in LibDem/Tory marginals every Labour voter who might consider tactically voting for the LibDem, probably already has...

quote: Didn't you just say that a whole lot of Conservatives voted Lib Dem in this last by-election to tactically get Labour out?

Yes in this particular instance. The seats in which the next election will be decided won't have this problem. A LibDem surge at the expense of the Conservatives in Hartlepool is rather like a Libertarian surge at the expense of the Republicans in California - irrelevent.

	03-10-2004 06:32									#46
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quote: o what you're saying is that all the voters that Labour is losing is basically the left?

Most of the disaffected Labour voters i know are to the left of centre and so are looking to the lib dems, greens etc. Scotland is good example of what's happening with Greens and Tommy Sheriden's party (Scottish Socialists ?) as well as LIb Dems picking up MSPs and votes.

quote: I'm not saying that the results in Hartlepool will be in any way mirrored across the country but 2nd to 4th does look damn bad.

UK by elections are often protests and not always useful indicators of General Election voting intentions. The Lib Dems always do well as voters 'punish' the two main parties. Most voters return at General Elections though.

quote: Firstly, how many of those people who were turned off by Thatcher live in Conservative target seats?

Well my old home for one (Stirling). Strangely though most people saw Michael Forsythe as a good MP - his position allowed him to push through many positve things for the area - but still felt bound by party loyalties.

quote: "Never", however, is too strong a word.

It is but as the Conservatives continue to lurch towards the right to appease the 50 y.o. + Daily Telegraph readers they're not going to pick up my vote. The recent pro fox hunting demos only convinced me that they're heading up a cul de sac as this seemed to be pretty much their core constituency.

	03-10-2004 06:34									#47
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quote: Originally posted by Standup UK by elections are often protests and not always useful indicators of General Election voting intentions. The Lib Dems always do well as voters 'punish' the two main parties. Most voters return at General Elections though. .

	03-10-2004 06:37									#48
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quote: Yes - in a constituency where neither the Liberal Democrats or Conservatives had ever bothered to campaign before, and everyone realised at the start that the Conservatives weren't going to win.

So a seat that used to be safe as safe could be for Labour almost went Lib Dem. Isn't that very very good news for the Lib Dems?

quote: Conservative voters aren't going to vote tactically for the Liberal Democrats in the huge swathes of seats where Conservatives are clear challengers and the Liberal Democrats are nowhere.

But from the looks of this by-election there's going to be more Lib Dem/Labour marginal seats. Thus more Tories tactical voting for Lib Dems. Right?

	03-10-2004 06:38									#49
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quote: Originally posted by reds4ever No, you 'fire away' I was just voicing how I, and most of my peers, think. To me, and I'm not trying to bait you here, Tower Hamlets was a result of poor, white people who arn't happy with immigrants (sp) getting more benefits then they are.

Actually, I disagree. This probably doesn't help my overall case, but we won the Millwall by-election for two reasons.

Firstly, the Conservative campaign aggressively targeted as potential supporters the Canary Wharf workers who live in the new flats on the riverbank, who now form a substantial minority of the electorate there.

Secondly, Labour lost a lot of ground in their "traditional areas" to RESPECT.

The intriguing thing about that by-election was that the Liberal Democrats did terribly, which was a genuine surprise.

Tower Hamlets is a very interesting part of the world, politically. If George Galloway stands in Bethnal Green & Bow, then there could be a real surprise there. Oona King is Blairite, Jewish (in a predominantly Muslim area), and was imposed on the constituency party from above, and an aggressive campaign by RESPECT could wash her core vote away. The Conservative candidate is Bangladeshi, well-respected and has cut away chunks of King's majority the last two elections. If Labour's vote falls to Galloway then there's the possibility of a tight three-way battle.

	03-10-2004 06:42									#50
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standup,

quote: Well my old home for one (Stirling). Strangely though most people saw Michael Forsythe as a good MP - his position allowed him to push through many positve things for the area - but still felt bound by party loyalties.

Stirling voted for Thatcher though - it was only lost in 1997. Thatcher undoubtedly cost the Conservatives votes in places like Stirling (and indeed across Scotland) but she did not cost them the elections.

The effect of what r4e described was largely felt in areas that were rarely or never Conservative anyway. The Conservative vote has declined significantly in many inner-city seats since the mid-seventies, but there were only a handful they were ever in with a chance of winning anyway.

	03-10-2004 06:43									#51
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quote: But from the looks of this by-election there's going to be more Lib Dem/Labour marginal seats. Thus more Tories tactical voting for Lib Dems. Right?

Not sure about that. The only tactical voting i'm aware off is the 'anything but Conservative' type. So labour, LIb dem, SNP, PC voters will vote for the candidate most likely to defeat the Conservative. I'm not convinced the reverse is true. From what i've read core Tory voters are quite a large percentage of Conservative voters and tend to remain loyal regardless. The other main parties are a bit more fickle in their loyalties.

	03-10-2004 06:44									#52
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quote: Originally posted by *End Is Forever* Actually, I disagree. This probably doesn't help my overall case, but we won the Millwall by-election for two reasons.

At least you can see the funny side

The Muslim vote is going to be a BIG factor in the future, I suppose its a balancing act, trying to appease the poor white racists and at the same time letting enough immigrants (sp again!) in to get the Muslim vote?

	03-10-2004 06:48									#53
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quote: Originally posted by Boshko So a seat that used to be safe as safe could be for Labour almost went Lib Dem. Isn't that very very good news for the Lib Dems?

Yes. That doesn't make it bad for the Tories however.

quote: But from the looks of this by-election there's going to be more Lib Dem/Labour marginal seats. Thus more Tories tactical voting for Lib Dems. Right?

It is quite possibly that Tory voters will turn to the Liberal Democrats to defeat Labour, but only in seats where the Conservatives would never win anyway. There's no evidence of Tory voters deserting for LibDems under "normal" circumstances.

Indeed, the opposite might well happen. The Liberal Democrats are picking votes up from Labour, and in a significant number of seats that alone is enough to turn them blue. Take Selby for example - if 5000 Labour voters desert them for the Liberal Democrats (or just don't vote at all), and the Tory vote stays absolutely static, then it's a comfortable Tory gain.

There are a couple of wildcard seats, three-way marginals like Bristol West. What happens there is anyone's guess!

	03-10-2004 06:51									#54
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quote: Originally posted by Standup Not sure about that. The only tactical voting i'm aware off is the 'anything but Conservative' type. So labour, LIb dem, SNP, PC voters will vote for the candidate most likely to defeat the Conservative. I'm not convinced the reverse is true. From what i've read core Tory voters are quite a large percentage of Conservative voters and tend to remain loyal regardless. The other main parties are a bit more fickle in their loyalties.

I think we've reached a point where people will consider tactically voting against Labour.

I think Labour voters will continue to tactically support the Liberal Democrats in certain seats against the Conservatives, however I doubt that LibDem voters will want to back Labour tactically any more. This spells bad news for Labour MPs like Jim Knight who are likely to be looking for work come May.

	03-10-2004 06:51									#55
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quote: Originally posted by *End Is Forever* What happens there is anyone's guess!

....errr, my money's on a third term for Labour wheres yours?

	03-10-2004 06:54									#56
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In Bristol West? I think Labour will lose it, and whether it is picked up by the LibDem candidate or the Conservative candidate depends on the local campaign.

I'd put the LibDem as favourite if only because being (by a whisker) in second place will allow him/her to put out leaflets saying that the LibDems are the "main challengers".

	03-10-2004 06:56									#57
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quote: It is quite possibly that Tory voters will turn to the Liberal Democrats to defeat Labour

My parents are an example of this - can't bring themselves to vote labour but are disillusioned with the Tories despite being Conservative voters for much of their lives. Pointing out that the LIb Dems are much more 'socialist' than Labour currently are just gets me funny looks. I'm sure there's many people who vote emotionally rather than according to actual policies. UKIP are a good example of this and the Greens. Both parties have very limited policies and are probably unrealistic.

	03-10-2004 06:57									#58
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quote: Originally posted by Standup From what i've read core Tory voters are quite a large percentage of Conservative voters and tend to remain loyal regardless. The other main parties are a bit more fickle in their loyalties.

I read somewhere that Labour used to do better when the weather was nice on election day, the support was that apathetic in some areas people would only drag themselves out of the house if the weather was nice.


Whereas Tory voters tend to be die hard Facists

	03-10-2004 07:00									#59
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quote: Whereas Tory voters tend to be die hard Facists

It's because they all have 4x4s to drive to the polling station and nannies to look after the kids when they go

	03-10-2004 07:08									#60
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I worked in a polling station in the 1992 (or 1988?) election, Giles Brandreth (slimey tw@t) got Chester. The parties went around picking people up to vote but they could n't ask (by law) who the person was going to vote for when they picked them up. It was funny to see the Labour minibus coming back from the council estates and the Tory bus dragging the old dears in from the suburbs, both playing the percentages I guess.