2020 Labour Leadership Election

[CumbrianLefty]

I really, really, really hope that what Labour members and supporters take away from this debacle isn't that the party needs to go back to neoliberal fiscal policies and embrace hard-Remainer identity politics. We'll see.

There is genuinely not the faintest chance of Labour members/supporters deciding that.

The media, on the other hand......

[CumbrianLefty]

Lisa Nandy.

but whoever is the nominee the press will destroy on day 1.

Yes.

Its often forgotten now, but a lot of the press was even quite Blair-hostile *before* the 1997 GE (his backing from the Sun was actually a bit of an exception - have a guess who wrote a lot of the Torygraph's knocking copy then?)

[CumbrianLefty]

He did.

As would John Smith have, had he lived.

Tories were in such a dire state by 1997 that not even the most friendly press could save them.

[CumbrianLefty]

Jarvis had a terrible result in his own seat, partly through local stick for now having "two jobs". He has a good political "life story", but hasn't shown that much sign of a decent strategy to go with it.

(sorry to mention her yet again, but Rayner scores well on the "life story" thing, and actually has the political skills to match - the more I think about it the more I am liking the cut of her jib)

[CumbrianLefty]

Anyway, who wants to be Neil Kinnock here? After a thumping like this, Labour is very unlikely to get back in one go.

Depends to a large degree on how Brexit turns out. Things could get very ugly in the next few years, and that creates opportunities as well as grief.

[CumbrianLefty]

Jarvis had a terrible result in his own seat, partly through local stick for now having "two jobs". He has a good political "life story", but hasn't shown that much sign of a decent strategy to go with it.

(sorry to mention her yet again, but Rayner scores well on the "life story" thing, and actually has the political skills to go with it - the more I think about it the more I am liking the cut of her jib)

How strong is the "time for a female leader" sentiment within the party?

Pretty strong I would say. Though they will have to be on at least of the centre-left of the party as well (so Thornberry has at least a plausible chance of it, long time pundits favourite Cooper does not)

[CumbrianLefty]

Saw this elsewhere, the only 2 Labour leaders in the past 60 years to win a general election were Harold Wilson and Tony Blair.

One is dead, and the other the current party hates.

Good luck.

The sort of "killer stat" that simultaneously means everything and nothing.

For a start, would Labour have won in 1997 had John Smith lived? Of course they would, easily.

That alone makes the "only Blair can win elections for Labour in modern Britain" meme so beloved by some centrists meaningless - it is simply an accident of history, little more.

Though if you want to take things further - only four Labour people have become PM through elections *ever*. And guess what, one of those is even more reviled in party folk memory than Mr Tony is

[CumbrianLefty]

Would Labour have won three terms with John Smith though?

Merely because of his age, maybe not.

If you take the view that most of NL's good stuff was done by 2003 at any rate, tho......

[CumbrianLefty]

Phillips is NOT the front runner, because not enough of the membership will vote for her - no matter how often she gets adoring profiles in the right wing press*. It really is that simple.

(*of course, how they would treat her if she *did* become leader is an entirely different matter - and I genuinely find it hard to comprehend how she doesn't seem to get that)

[CumbrianLefty]

Saw this elsewhere, the only 2 Labour leaders in the past 60 years to win a general election were Harold Wilson and Tony Blair.

One is dead, and the other the current party hates.

Good luck.

The sort of "killer stat" that simultaneously means everything and nothing.

For a start, would Labour have won in 1997 had John Smith lived? Of course they would, easily.

That alone makes the "only Blair can win elections for Labour in modern Britain" meme so beloved by some centrists meaningless - it is simply an accident of history, little more.

Though if you want to take things further - only four Labour people have become PM through elections *ever*. And guess what, one of those is even more reviled in party folk memory than Mr Tony is

I remember when some on the left claimed Blair only won 1997 because of the sh**t opposition- as both 2017 & 2019 shows you need a very very strong operation in place to win.

I don't believe Blairism is at all the future of Labour; but it's a mistake to ignore the organisational strength we had in the 1990s.

Well that at least is a claim that I have never made, he was beyond doubt an outstandingly skilled politician who grasped the "zeitgeist" of that time extremely well (after all, I voted for him as leader myself - was it really a quarter century ago?! - and barely had to even think about it) What I *may* have pointed out, however, was that the state of the Tories by the mid-1990s (*much* worse than recent years in many respects, however much some like to claim otherwise) made a Labour win all but inevitable under any even half-credible figurehead. Labour emphatically did not *need* Blair to win then, even though he did an outstanding job of it.

[CumbrianLefty]

Nobody is realistically talking about Corbyn staying on for a few years anyway (FWIW I agree with Al about that being totally impractical) Just a couple of months; IMO letting him "own" both ECHR and our exit from the EU, allowing a new leader to start with a fresh slate, is a sensible idea.

Besides, the party doesn't have a deputy at the moment - if he *did* resign today who would take over?

[CumbrianLefty]

Nobody is realistically talking about Corbyn staying on for a few years anyway (FWIW I agree with Al about that being totally impractical) Just a couple of months; IMO letting him "own" both ECHR and our exit from the EU, allowing a new leader to start with a fresh slate, is a sensible idea.

Besides, the party doesn't have a deputy at the moment - if he *did* resign today who would take over?

Shadow Cabinet and NEC would pick an interim leader pending a leadership election.

Ah right, I can see that being a totally smooth and stress-free process

[CumbrianLefty]

Burton rules out running for leader, but not deputy.

https://twitter.com/GuidoFawkes/status/1206142371773194241?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7...

Burgon isn't ever going to be elected to anything save his own seat.

And you can quote me on that.....I hope

[CumbrianLefty]

Cooper is totally and absolutely yesterday's politician - would not be surprised at all if this has turned out to be her last election. She had her big opportunity in 2015, and totally blew it in almost comically bad fashion.

[CumbrianLefty]

Thinking about the possible leader/deputy options, a Rayner/Lewis combo looks at least a bit appealing.

[CumbrianLefty]

Whoever gets in (and while I think speculating about possible candidates is reasonable, speculating about outcomes... too early for that, the World is changed and the Emperor has no clothes) will need to clean the stables. Will be very unpleasant. But it is urgent.

They're already allegedly facing these lawsuits after they tried to attack the Labour staffers on the Panorama program; along with the loss of short money (£1.2 million less due to seat loss), the cost of the various vanity projects implemented by Corbyns team (Labour Live cost £1 million & Karie's mysterious organisers cost £3 million) and the need to have a legal team to defend legal cases from it's own MPs it hasn't been the best 18 months for Labour HQ.

There are certain other disturbing signs that suggests that it would be a good idea to get some accountants in to look at the books and, if necessary (because it might all just be the sort of corruption that is perfectly legal combined with gross incompetence), to then have a little chat to Inspector Knacker.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-party-bankruptcy-antisemitism-investigation-corbyn-executive-a9153561.html

A real worry & danger (and perhaps a reason why JC enlarged the NEC!); although hopefully whoever comes in will ditch the cranks (even if they keep part of the movement) The thing that has always annoyed me the most is how so many unsuitable people used the Corbyn project (Livingstone, Lansman, Willsman, Lavery, Webbe and others) to either avoid scrutiny or climb up through the party. *

*something of course that happens in every era but this set of characters are worse than Charles Clarke, Clare Short or others

What's your beef with Lansman, he has at least been sound on AS you have to admit.

[CumbrianLefty]

And of course, Livingstone was once good (agree with his politics or not)

To have him wheeled out on the TV as a "comic turn" come election night verged on elder abuse.

[CumbrianLefty]

bring back Ed Balls!

A major reason for Labour's defeat in 2015.

No thanks.

[CumbrianLefty]

Its the sort of thing you can really imagine Thornberry saying, that's the thing.

(though she is denying it totally adamantly tbf)

[CumbrianLefty]

Hmm. I would very much caution against writing off Rebecca Long-Bailey as unelectable. It is not really arguable that the Leadership played a significant part in the defeat, and Polls do confirm that. The Question really is whether it was Corbyn himself or the Ideas behind him turned people off most. And it seems, from what people like Caroline Flint and other (former) Northern Labour MPs have been saying, that it was mostly the former. The victory of Boris was in many ways a cultural one, rather than one of economic ideology.

Long-Baily does not have the Baggage that the Inner Circle Corbynites have, people like Burgon, Abbott, McDonnell. There is no question about whether she may be an antisemite or not. She has not praised most of the worlds left-wing autocrats. People do not have to seriously ask themselves, whether there is an enemy of Britain she has not supported. And there is no question about her patriotism and whether she will stand up for the UKs interests and not some foreign power because of a romantic obsession with third-worldism.

This sort of tankieist student politics that Corbyn et al. have practiced their entire political lives is very much seen with distaste among many working class voters. Not only do many of them have families in the Armed Forces for instance, it is also seen as something completely champagne-socialistic, London-centric, it actually feeds into that perception, that was already building with the Labour decision to support a second referendum.

Long-Bailey does not have that. Being a woman from a working-class northern background, she cares about economic issues. The fact that she is not a highly outspoken and charismatic person is to her great credit. There is a reason why she is deployed as a safe pair of hands and deployed to PMQs and Interviews after the latest leaked Video of Jeremy Corbyn speaking at some "anti-imperialist" rally: There is not much that she can be attacked for personally.

It works both ways, of course. I have never heared Long-Bailey speak without glazing over after 5 seconds. And it may seem to many that her elevation is down to total loyalty to the regime that just collapsed. But Starmer and Thornberry are also too obviously citizens of nowhere, just like Corbyn, despite their seemingly different Ideologies.  

Lisa Nandy's the best one there. She was on the right side of the Brexit debate, Her disagreements with Corbynism are cultural and with Blairism ideological. And she speaks eloquently and seriously about the Labour Leavers in the north. I'd also like to see Rayner, Philips and Lewis on the top team.

No rush either. With the size of the Tory majority, Labour could comfortably take a year off to decide.

A good summary.

I said before the election that RLB had improved greatly as a front-bencher - she appeared genuinely out of her depth when first appointed, not recently. She is one of those who, when faced with having to sink or swim following the mass walkout of frontbenchers in mid-2016, ended up swimming.

Still not convinced by her as leader right now, but she has the chance to win me and others over.

A year is too long, though; there are likely to be major happenings in 2020 - and important elections - and Labour can't be hobbled with a caretaker leadership widely seen (fairly or otherwise) as discredited for that long a period. A handover in late March sounds about right.

I so wish Nandy had returned to the front bench when Corbyn won his second leadership election (as she reportedly seriously considered doing) Her time on the backbenches has seen a bit too much pandering to the worst instincts of Blue Labour tbh - but again, she has the chance to put that right now.

It will be a great shame if Rayner doesn't stand for leader, though - she would be my first choice tbh. And not sure about having her as deputy if her mate does get the top job - not only do you want people a *bit* different in the two posts (even if a pairing as incompatible as Corbyn/Watson was always ultimately doomed to fail) but it would enable our terrible gossip addicted media (one of the tragedies of the election result is that they have survived totally unscathed) to rehash the mindblowingly tedious "Blair/Brown wars" days again. I am surprised more haven't suggested Clive Lewis in that role tbh - not only ticks numerous boxes (non-white, ex-military) but his strongly pro-remain instincts might be a good foil to a RLB leadership (given her - and Rayner/Nandy's, for that matter - more sceptical and pragmatic instincts there) and help Labour hold onto those voters even if we, in all probability, aren't re-entering the EU any time soon. His mental health experiences are something that could be a positive used in the right way, too - it is something modern capitalist society badly needs to be more open about.

And yes, some of those who have sat out the last four years will and should return to the front bench under any new leadership - but let it be the younger ones who look to the future please (Alison McGovern is a good example) The old guard - Benn, Cooper etc - were key parts of Labour's overall failure in 2010-15 especially and really do belong to the past. I might even say the same about Ed Miliband, much though I do love him

[CumbrianLefty]

I don't think it would be a good idea to pick anyone close to the present (toxic) leadership, I don't think it would be a good idea to pick anyone who was responsible for that (disastrous) leadership taking control in the first place. I don't think you can trust anyone who demonstrated such poor judgment with leadership in a situation as serious as Labour now finds itself in.

If that is really true, then the party may as well disband in its present form. Seriously.

(amongst other things - that sort of "Year Zero" repudiation of *everything* that has happened since 2015 simply will not be accepted by most of the membership; rightly or wrongly they believe that the general political stance taken by the party since then has been broadly correct, even if some other things were not)

However, I'm not at all convinced that it is.

And there are always events.

[CumbrianLefty]

This Wrong-Daily shadow cabinet is going to be fun. I'm guessing Burgon will be her Shadow Chancellor. Now that would be a blast.



Seriously, she can't lose this membership election with Momentum, McCluskey and the machine working for her. It's Christmas already at 10 Downing Steet.

As was once said (or perhaps not) by Calvin Coolidge - "you lose".

Seriously, stop trolling us about Burgon.

He will have a minor front bench role, at best, with a new leader.

[CumbrianLefty]

This Wrong-Daily shadow cabinet is going to be fun. I'm guessing Burgon will be her Shadow Chancellor. Now that would be a blast.



Seriously, she can't lose this membership election with Momentum, McCluskey and the machine working for her. It's Christmas already at 10 Downing Steet.

As was once said (or perhaps not) by Calvin Coolidge - "you lose".

Seriously, stop trolling us about Burgon.

He will have a minor front bench role, at best, with a new leader.

Please don't shoot the messenger. Plus, it's not like the next leader will have a deep bench of MPs to build his/her shadow cabinet.

By your own admission, you "guessed" it. I'm just saying that it wasn't a very good guess

[CumbrianLefty]

Because she represents London-remainer tribe. The same can be said about Starmer. It would be a mistake for Labour to pander for this narrow segment of the electorate, but the media will certainly say they are the sane faction of the Labour party.

In the next election in 2023/24 one thing for sure is that it will not be another Brexit election. Unless you think that Brexit will be such a total catastrophe that the Brits are all clamouring for readmission to the EU!

Labour may end up with a new dilemma there with much of its base demanding rejoining the EU but no public consensus yet for that, second referendum dilemma 2.0.

Don't see that happening much in the *immediate* future, though it may a bit more with LibDems.

[CumbrianLefty]

No more stitch ups, please.

Well we still have the joy of seeing who UNISON & GMB support... in all fairness Rayner was the person most likely to get the nomination stitched up really quickly but yeah this could easily be filed under 'factional plot' gone awry part 100 in Labour History.

If Rayner was the most likely to have a clear path to an easy selection, why is she running for deputy? I understand she's friendly with RLB but it seems odd

Various things, but one is that she is not trusted by "hardcore" Corbynism.