Ealing Southall and Sedgefield by-elections thread

[afleitch]

What really gets me is the slightly "saintly" air that the LibDems seem to assume while they engaged in distortions, lies and character assassinations... i suppose in the short term its very effective politics and wins you by elections against the two major parties but in the wider scheme of things it just drags the whole process further into disrepute.     

True.

However my personal preference is for Labour to loose in both seats to whoever is the strongest challenger (as in all cases parties like the BNP are the obvious exception!) That may end up being the Liberal Democrats. When it comes down to it, I would rather have the Liberal Democrats pick up than for Labour to hold from now right through to the next GE. Sorry Dave. I tend to support the use of more heavy political fire against Brown than I did against Blair.

Besides Mingthuselah will be up for the chop should they perform poorly on the night and I'd rather he stayed put as leader for as long as possible

[afleitch]

The Liberal Democrats are running Greg Stone in Sedgefield.

Was that the bloke who ran in Newcastle Central at the general election... or am i getting him confused with someone else? 

Yes.

From what I've heard from Dave it appears to be the norm in County Durham for the Lib Dems to parachute in an urban 'outsider' into a rural ward or seat, so it was to be expected.

[afleitch]

Yep. I look forward to seeing him lose. Again.

Bear in mind, fluke of flukes, that phrase could come back and haunt you Of course theres a higher chance of Elvis dancing on the moon.

[afleitch]

Every party takes advantage of a candidates religious/community/personal standing in seats like these and defections seem ten a penny. It's unscrupulous and has to stop.

[afleitch]

How diverse is Southall's Asian community?

Dave

This data is either for the old or the new seat

Hindu: 12.4%
Muslim: 13.3%
Sikh: 23.2%

That is a % of the total population.

[afleitch]

Unfortunately, as I said earlier, there is a 'tribalism' in these sort of seats (which often mirrors family politics in the subcontinent) which all three main parties, instead of trying to end, are instead complicit in. They know that if you can secure the 'personal' vote of a community representative (one of the most famous examples is in Slough for example) you either have the seat in the bag or you increase it's competitiveness.

[afleitch]

Well it's been a 25 year wait for a by-election gain from Labour. If we don't do it this time I can wait a little longer

The IDS report and it's recomendations might help the Tories a bit on the street. A significant chunk of my own vote in May, I've been told, came form working class areas. To go in there and be honest and engage them when everyone else (Labour included) gives them a miss because they 'always vote Labour' can reap dividends. As long as the economy ticks over, a large number of ex-Tories will vote Labour. It's our job to appeal to the working poor , the dispossed and the young left behind by Labour to make up for the shortfall.

Regardless of what happens and how it happened, it's been a good campaign so far.

[afleitch]

Full list of candidates for both elections:

Ealing Southall
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6283832.stm

What's this David Cameron's Conservatives lark ? He's not Indira Gandhi

Dave

He's not Indira Gandhi
But he can endear can't he?

[afleitch]

Noori did, apparently confirm she would defect but changed her mind. Labours campaign manager Tom Watson said 'no she didn't' and is threatening a form of legal action. Iain Dale said, 'yes she did' and apparently has the statement to prove it.

Getting strange....

[afleitch]

It's safe to say that, as least as far as Southall politics go, Labour and the Tories are really one party, not two. Which is throwing away what should be a safe seat by running two candidates.

Hey, don't akin my party in with them lot .

Dave

^^^^^^

[afleitch]

Make of that what thou will and so on.

I'm tempted to copy it into a Word file, print it and then scrunch it up. But I wouldn't want to waste the ink

[afleitch]

If the Conservatives win this, its their first Labour scalp since Mitcham and Morden 1982 (which was a change of allegiance by-election)

You were right to point out Hamilton South Harry; it was a very strange election during where Labour were only saved by a 'Save the Accies' candidate

[afleitch]

Polls have of course closed.

[afleitch]

I think you're right Ben. To be the third party and not be 'squeezed' is not a bad result. The problem was Ealing was 'talked up', not by the party itself I may add, but by the blogs, particularly ConHome and this spilled onto PB.com too.

[afleitch]

one thing was very interesting, that while Labour ran a campaign that was often very negative (as did the LibDems) the Tories remained positive for the entire campaign... was that wise?     

If you play at the sort of politics that the Tories did in Southall, then you deserve everything that comes your way as a result.

What 'sort of politics'? A positive campaign? Or if you're referring to the fact they parachuted in a candidate and blatantly courted bloc community votes well they learned from the Lib Dems and Labour on that one respectively.

[afleitch]

Bear in mind that between 2001 and last weeks results, the Conservatives have only increased their vote in the Blaenau Gwent (nothing more than statistical) and Cheadle by-elections. The by-election result really wasn't that bad in context, however out of context and shortly after Brown's premiership bounce they didn't look so rosy.

[afleitch]

That's the report! In that case, how about we split the task eh? I do Wales (as that's the area I know best), you do the part of the UK that you know best and we'll divide the rest between us, okay?

Sounds like a plan, I'll do London and the South East. If we make the colour keys distinctive enough we can decide on a "unified" (one if that makes sense).

Can you send me a link to the constituency but, I can't seem to find it in the "full report".

bump

Anyone have a link to the file? If we select a colour code and break it down region by region it should be easier to do. I now the JR report has maps of the urban regions which appear to be broken down by town/community. They may be worth replicating as they are a bit blurred.

[afleitch]

The posting about Wales is here https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=60337.0 but I can't do much about sending them without an e-mail address.

Nice maps but we really need the link if you know where to find it. Helps put things in context

EDIT: Found it

http://www.sasi.group.shef.ac.uk/research/transformation/

[afleitch]

http://www.sasi.group.shef.ac.uk/research/transformation/

Interesting stuff. Very interesting. A lot of potential for all sorts of maps and so on there...

I threw this together - https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?action=gallery;sa=view;id=81

Just to test out the best way to display data. Thank goodness its in Excel, it's easer to work with.