Labour is finished for at least the next two elections

[IC1967]

I'm so happy. Even though I am a Ukipper and we got nowhere near enough seats that our vote share deserved I'm still deliriously happy.

I wanted Labour to win and form a minority government as this would have finished them off for a generation but am quite happy that the prediction I made and stuck to years ago came to pass.

What went wrong for Labour? Many things. However the fundamental reason they failed so miserably is that they had lurched to the left. Now there are many on this forum that are left wing in various shades. I've got news for you. You are the problem. While ever you support Labour they will not change enough to become electable.

To become electable again they need to become more right wing. They need to dump the lefties and crack on with coming into the real world. What about us lefties I hear you ask. There is a party already there waiting for you. It's called the Greens.

So I implore all you lefties. Leave the Labour Party and let them crack on with becoming an effective opposition and alternative to the Tories. Go and join the Greens and consign yourself to the political wilderness. It's where you belong.

https://my.greenparty.org.uk/civicrm/membership/joining

[RobTheRover]

Can I be the first yo YAWN my head off?

[Donnywolf]

Yes - be my guest

[jonrover]

That's why people on here think you're such a clueless dick because if you did have any clue you would conclude Labour will never get elected again once the boundary changes cynically designed to favour the Tories are implemented and 50 constituencies are lost. So go and enjoy your imaginary £18k you didn't win in the election result. Knob jockey.

[IC1967]

That's why people on here think you're such a clueless dick because if you did have any clue you would conclude Labour will never get elected again once the boundary changes cynically designed to favour the Tories are implemented and 50 constituencies are lost. So go and enjoy your imaginary £18k you didn't win in the election result. Knob jockey.

Excuse me. Who was the only person predicting a Tory majority for the last few years? Yes. It was me. I'd hardly say that shows me as clueless. The £18,000 was just a small part of my winnings. I've been having several hefty bets over the last few years. I won't brag about how much I've actually made as I'm far too modest.

You appear to be well balanced. You have a chip on each shoulder.

For your information the boundary change commission is independent and comes up with proposals based on strict rules. You just don't like it that Labour would lose out.

It was unfair that Labour got more seats for less votes than the Tories.

Get over it and join the Greens. You'll be very happy there living in la la land.

[hoolahoop]

YAWN, UKIP you say,  then you clearly aren't looking to the future. Lol

[The Red Baron]

Nonsense to say that Labour, or for that matter the Lib Dems, are finished for two elections. The 1992 defeat, when Labour fully expected to will, was a shattering blow for them. Five years later they were in power with a landslide. A lot will depend on them choosing the right leader and adopting policies that appeal to more than their core vote, but they can win in 5 years time.

As for the Lib Dems, I think they will gradually resume their role as a party of opposition to the main parties. Also, if the Conservative government becomes unpopular by moving too far to the right, the benefits of what they achieved in coalition might be more demonstrable.

[BillyStubbsTears]

TRB

I fully agree that Labour can return if they can widen their appeal. Although in practice, I think Labour's chances in 2020 are more connected with how well/badly the Tories govern, there is enough space on the centre-left for Labour to be able to carve out a far better position than they did this time. And, crucially, I think there's a desire to do that too. I'd expect a polished centrist like Umunna or Jarvis to be the next leader.

But as I've been saying for 5 years, this IS an existential challenge for the LDs. They spent a generation building up this image that they were leftist to left-leaning people, rightist to right-leaning people and different to the people who simply hate the other parties. It was obvious that once they had to make a choice, that illusion would evaporate. The evidence from Thursday is that right-of-centre previous LD supporters voted Tory, left-of-centre ones voted Labour or Green and the "bugger them all" supporters voted UKIP.

What is left is the tiny, original core of people who genuinely believe in centrist Liberalism. That will always be there, but I genuinely don't see a credible way back as a major party. At least not one that reaches out to the disaffected with a vaguely reassuring myth, like they've done for the last generation.

I will be amazed if we see the LDs get 20% in a general election this side of 2040.

[IC1967]

TRB

I fully agree that Labour can return if they can widen their appeal. Although in practice, I think Labour's chances in 2020 are more connected with how well/badly the Tories govern, there is enough space on the centre-left for Labour to be able to carve out a far better position than they did this time. And, crucially, I think there's a desire to do that too. I'd expect a polished centrist like Umunna or Jarvis to be the next leader.

But as I've been saying for 5 years, this IS an existential challenge for the LDs. They spent a generation building up this image that they were leftist to left-leaning people, rightist to right-leaning people and different to the people who simply hate the other parties. It was obvious that once they had to make a choice, that illusion would evaporate. The evidence from Thursday is that right-of-centre previous LD supporters voted Tory, left-of-centre ones voted Labour or Green and the "bugger them all" supporters voted UKIP.

What is left is the tiny, original core of people who genuinely believe in centrist Liberalism. That will always be there, but I genuinely don't see a credible way back as a major party. At least not one that reaches out to the disaffected with a vaguely reassuring myth, like they've done for the last generation.

I will be amazed if we see the LDs get 20% in a general election this side of 2040.

You talk some right crap. I've highlighted the worst case of drivel in your post. What do you think Labour were offering this time? They were offering a centre-left alternative to the Tories. It failed abysmally.

So what do you lefties say? They should offer the same again but next time be a bit more left wing. Unbelievable crass stupidity.

Let me spell it out. The majority of people in England do not like socialism. They want to aspire to a good life not lead one in a culture of dependency.

You lefties need to either join the Green party or emigrate to Scotland. Socialism is finished in England and it's about time you lefties realised it.

It is music to my ears that you, the biggest proponent of socialism on this forum still thinks it's the way forward after what has just happened. If someone like you that is reasonably intelligent still thinks this way then there will still be plenty of unintelligent lefties that will not change their minds either. This spells doom for Labour because the likes of you combined with the trade unions will stop them ever changing enough to become electable again.

Get in.

[The Red Baron]

IC. You forget that Labour won three elections in a row by moving away from old -style left wing rhetoric and appealing to aspirational voters. They failed to do that this time, believing that their core vote would win them the election. They paid the price. Who is to say that they won't broaden their appeal next time round?

[Glyn_Wigley]

I think Labour's chances in 2020 are more connected with how well/badly the Tories govern

The suppression of demand that they are going for, combined with the inevitable deflation that he predicts, and Mick still thinks they're going to be popular in five years.

[IC1967]

IC. You forget that Labour won three elections in a row by moving away from old -style left wing rhetoric and appealing to aspirational voters. They failed to do that this time, believing that their core vote would win them the election. They paid the price. Who is to say that they won't broaden their appeal next time round?

Yes and Billy thought the 35% core vote strategy was a masterstroke by Milliband. Just shows what he knows. He predicted Labour would be the largest party. Wrong again. In fact he's wrong about most things but people like him have far too much influence on impressionable lefties. Well not on my watch. The Votings Itentions poll showed that I've dismantled his arguments comprehensively.

Labour need to appeal to aspirational voters. The fact that they couldn't work that one out beggars belief. Given the success that Blair had it should have been obvious to them that this was the way forward. Unfortunately for Labour they have too many lefties like Billy that make it virtually impossible to change in the way they should.

They need someone like me to become leader. First job would be to kick the lefties and trade unions out. It won't happen though because they rely far too much on the trade unions for money and we all know how left wing they are.

[BillyStubbsTears]

TRB

I'm not sure they moved very far from that position in reality. But they certainly were appalling at telling a consistent message on the economy, and this allowed them to be painted as a party that had no idea how to help produce wealth, only how to redistribute it.

I've watched in horror over the last 4 years as Labour have been politically wrong-footed on the big macro-economic issues, despite having made the right calls all along. The disaster was the navel-gazing after the last election, allowing the Coalition to have 6 months of free hits, blaming Labour spending for the recession. That was brilliant politics, even though it had nothing to do with reality. The fact that Labour didn't counter it allowed it to become "fact".

And then, after weakly trying to address this issue for a few months, Labour just gave up and accepted it. Political suicide! They should, in 2011, have accepted the fact (fact!) that Labour was spending slightly more than was absolutely desirable (Simon Wren-Lewis accurately calls it "mild imprudence rather than reckless over-spending.") And then, Labour should have remorselessly hammered the line that Austerity would flatten grow and result in making it harder to shrink the deficit. They should have said this morning, noon and night in 2011-13. They should have hammered the message that the deficit was a secondary issue and should have stood up strongly to explain why. And if they had, they could have claimed vindication.

Instead they flunked the issue. They tried to ignore it. And in doing so, they have the press ion that they didn't have any idea what to do. Utter political incompetence.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Glyn

The British Chambers of Commerce know the score. They've pleaded today for the Govt to put growth ahead of the deficit. We'll see...

http://www.freshbusinessthinking.com/news.php?NID=25923&Title=British+Chambers+of+Commerce+calls+for+David+Cameron+to+take+'bold+action'#.VVCO-Hi9LCR

[The Red Baron]

BST. Just shows how important "the message" is. Labour came over to me at this election as being significantly more left-wing than they did in 2010. They also seemed focused on issues that might matter a lot to those affected, but not to the majority of the population. A key example - the Bedroom Tax.

I also felt they came across as being hostile to business. Labour would argue that they were talking about banks and multinationals, but I can understand people who run SMEs feeling nervous about them. There was none of the effort that was made to woo business people that Labour undertook before 1997.

[GazLaz]

Labour win three elections on the bounce because people bought into Blair.

[IC1967]

The myth that silly Billy continually perpetuates that Labour didn't massively overspend needs to be dispelled. He is talking complete b*llocks. Here's what the highly respected IFS had to say about it:

Summary 

Total public spending is forecast to be 48.1% of national income in 2010−11, up by 8.2% of national income from the 39.9% Labour inherited from the Conservatives. This would be the highest level of public spending as a share of national income since 1982−83.

Most industrial countries have increased public spending as a share of national income since 1997. But between 1997 and 2007 – prior to the financial crisis – the UK had the 2nd largest increase in spending as a share of national income out of 28 industrial countries for which we have comparable data. Over the period from 1997 to 2010 – including the crisis – the UK had the largest increase. This moved the UK from having the 22nd largest proportion of national income spent publicly in 1997to having the 6th largest proportion spent publically in 2010.

Spending on public services has increased by an average of 4.4% a year in real terms under Labour, significantly faster than the 0.7% a year average seen under the Conservatives from 1979 to 1997. This is largely due to increases in spending on the NHS, education and transport. Since 2000–01 public investment spending has increased particularly sharply and is now at levels not seen since the mid to late 1970s. Despite large increases in the generosity of benefits for lower income families with children and lower income pensioners social security spending has grown less quickly than it did under the Conservatives.

Estimates from the Office for National Statistics suggest that public services have improved considerably over the period from 1997 to 2007 with measured outputs suggesting a one-third increase in the quantity and quality of public services. But this increase in measured public service outputs is less than the increase in inputs over the same period; in other words productivity has fallen. The relative price of these inputs has also risen, so we find that the “bang for each buck” that we get from spending on public services (output per pound spent, adjusted for whole economy inflation) has fallen more than productivity.

If the Government had managed to maintain the “bang for each buck” at the level it inherited in 1997, it would have been able to deliver the quantity and quality of public services it delivered in 2007 for £42.5 billion less. Alternatively, it could have improved the quality and quantity of public services by a further 16% for the same cost. But perhaps service quality has improved in ways not captured by the ONS’s measures. Or perhaps we were to bound to see diminishing returns to additional spending when it was increasing so rapidly. To the extent that additional spending boosts output fully only with a lag, we may not yet have seen the full
benefit.

Here's the full report.

http://www.ifs.org.uk/bns/bn92.pdf

They say a picture paints a thousand words. Take a look at the graphs on page 4. That says it all.

So when lefties tell you that Labour did not massively overspend just ignore them. They are lying.

[Mike_F]

Although the Lib Dems will take some time to re-establish themselves as a significant third party I reckon the light is well and clearly showing at the end of the tunnel.

Last week was the first time I didn't give them my vote but I joined the party on Friday morning along with 7000 others over the course of the weekend.

The party needed to have its nose bloodied in the wake of the last five years' cosying up to the Tories but there are plenty of liberal-thinking people who subscribe to the values of fairness and equality that they always stood for. It's taken a painful election and a factory reset but I think the resurrection will take place over the next ten years rather than the "several decades" mooted by David Steele.

Similarly to Billy's point about Labour failing to shout about the economy, I reckon the LD's and in particular Nick Clegg could've done themselves a lot more favours over the last five years had they made a point of publicising everysmall battle they won in curtailing Tory policies but they were shit scared of upsetting the apple cart.

The raising of the PAYE entry level is one of the best things to happen for low-paid workers since the introduction of the minimum wage but it's disappeared in the noise around zero hours contracts.

The final nail in the coffin was Clegg proclaiming that despite the catastrophe on tuition fees, the nation had got "the next best thing". Any credibility he still had was washed away in those four words.

A far better response to that challenge would've been to state some of the successes the party had achieved whilst acknowledging that as a junior partner in the coalition they didn't have the critical mass to veto the tuition fees piece hence the need to maker them a bigger, stronger part of future governments.

[hoolahoop]

Look I realise that both parties have received a severe battering but it can be resolved by co-operation between the two .
To do that both parties have to take a more centrist stance ; Labour by dropping their ridiculous far left wing policies and proponents of them ; the Liberals must also move once again to the centre left and again get rid of the "orange book" and return to their traditional ideals.
Both parties must address the pressing issue of where they can find common ground .

Some may laugh at this but both parties will be at a severe disadvantage running elections on a single ticket.
They both have national networks and have strengths in different parts of the country. The splitting of the electorate currently does neither party any favours.

I offer you the new LSD ( Labour & Social democrat party ) who will go under the new " Orange" banner and will be fit for purpose for the 21st century.

New , fresh and inclusive ; gone has gone the soft L/Dem 'yellow' and the harsh 'red' more associated with the Soviet Union.
Those loonies on the far left can swing and the wets in the current L/Dem party can join up with the greens.

It has nearly worked in the past but this would mean a radical overhaul of both policies and membership.
The combined party can be a fair and progressive party ready for the next generation of youngsters who currently are looking for a centre left party.

This is the only way to beat the Conservatives and yes it will be almost Blairite.
Positions should be filled by those with the  ability to carry out the positions of government without outside interference from the Unions.

[hoolahoop]

Although the Lib Dems will take some time to re-establish themselves as a significant third party I reckon the light is well and clearly showing at the end of the tunnel.

Last week was the first time I didn't give them my vote but I joined the party on Friday morning along with 7000 others over the course of the weekend.

The party needed to have its nose bloodied in the wake of the last five years' cosying up to the Tories but there are plenty of liberal-thinking people who subscribe to the values of fairness and equality that they always stood for. It's taken a painful election and a factory reset but I think the resurrection will take place over the next ten years rather than the "several decades" mooted by David Steele.

Similarly to Billy's point about Labour failing to shout about the economy, I reckon the LD's and in particular Nick Clegg could've done themselves a lot more favours over the last five years had they made a point of publicising everysmall battle they won in curtailing Tory policies but they were shit scared of upsetting the apple cart.

The raising of the PAYE entry level is one of the best things to happen for low-paid workers since the introduction of the minimum wage but it's disappeared in the noise around zero hours contracts.

The final nail in the coffin was Clegg proclaiming that despite the catastrophe on tuition fees, the nation had got "the next best thing". Any credibility he still had was washed away in those four words.

A far better response to that challenge would've been to state some of the successes the party had achieved whilst acknowledging that as a junior partner in the coalition they didn't have the critical mass to veto the tuition fees piece hence the need to maker them a bigger, stronger part of future governments.

Good post Mike , I too joined the L/Dems over the weekend.
I was appalled at the inane way that Clegg refused to shout from the rooftops the actual achievements whilst in the Coalition.
Like you , I think the party was wary of pissing off the Tories as they anticipated another hung parliament. History will be kinder to the L/Dems than they were to themselves.
They will recover, they do have areas of the country where they can once again take seats. These areas will once again return to the L/Dems once the " Scottish" question has been resolved. They would not have lost that many seats had there not been a rush of English nationalism. The Tories were lucky, Labour went to sleep in Scotland and the biggest victims were the only one's keeping the Tories in check.

[hoolahoop]

Ralph millibands books were recommended reading for me in the eighties so his kids were really were the spawn of the devil. I can see basic human rights like redundancy payments becoming things of the past now with unlimited third world labour imported to fill the gaps for anyone who doesnt like it. Its up to labour whether its them or ukip who gets the votes from folk kicked in the nuts.

Are you serious NorthNorfolk who did that to you ? These days you would be able to contact Childline. Lol

Seriously people have moved on from that surely . What really worried me about this campaign was the constant use of the word "poor" - many of our poor can still afford fags, ale and sky . I know there are a few exceptions and those people should be receiving the help so often squandered by the former. Assistance needs to go to the right people and I'm concerned that there will be many that will genuinely be or become "victims" of the anticipated cuts in the Welfare system.

We must remember that this is a relatively wealthy country and we have our obligations whatever the current circumstances.
A Tory Government that loses sight of that is going to be a "dead duck"  because as aspirational we may be  ; we are a decent society.

[hoolahoop]

You are too stupid to understand what i am saying hoolahoop. I just hope you have a job that gives you enough cash to insulate you from the future or perhaps you are on the political payroll in which case you should declare it. Either way you are a very stupid human being.

Whoa there Northnorfok where did all that come from. I was only jesting in the first paragraph as I had visions of you ploughing through what is a very serious book . Please apologise or at the very least develop a sense of humour.
These are dark days, I think the rest of my post should have told you what my feelings about society are.
I have little cash, am semi- disabled after recovering from spinal surgery and have neither public sector pension nor income from the Tory party to insulate me.
BTW most folk that know me would never consider me to be stupid !

[hoolahoop]

Looking again at my post and forgetting how stupid you are hoolahoop. I had a lot of time for ralph milliband. Its not a dfficult question . Are you a member of a political party?

Why the attitude ? Now either you are joking or you have a serious attitude problem. Do you actually read threads, you have the temerity to call me stupid and ask that question ... Feck off. 

[wilts rover]

I was a student of Raphael Samuel, a close friend & colleague of Miliband Snr, and I can imagine his response to last week's result. He would have been saddened for a few minutes, looked up, rubbed his hands and said 'Well comrades, we have just become relevant again....'

I wonder who tomorrow's visionaries might be?

[hoolahoop]

I was a student of Raphael Samuel, a close friend & colleague of Miliband Snr, and I can imagine his response to last week's result. He would have been saddened for a few minutes, looked up, rubbed his hands and said 'Well comrades, we have just become relevant again....'

I wonder who tomorrow's visionaries might be?

Unfortunately they aren't in the current form that much is obvious. "Comrades" , I thought that went out with the Ark ?

I am aware that Ralph Miliband never once suggested that we reverted to the Collective Farms etc and economic structures of the old Soviet Union before someone jumps on my windpipe :(0

[Sandy Lane]

It's not just the UK that has elected a right leaning government, it's happening throughout the world.  Here's an interesting article from the NY Times on it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/12/opinion/david-brooks-the-center-right-moment.html?_r=0