UK General Discussion:The Rt. Hon Alex Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, Populist Hero

[CumbrianLefty]

You think it has to happen sooner or later........but no, still no sign yet.

One can only conclude that being able to blame literally any failing on something else ("Westminster" of course) is a big advantage for them.

[IceAgeComing]

There's one other thing about the Boris thing that really ought to be mentioned.  He was in hospital for a serious respiratory illness not that long ago: they can have massive, life-long impacts on your health.  While they denied it he was probably on a ventilator (they don't move you to A+E for a lark) and that suggests he was very seriously ill.  If his health is bad he might either resign because of it or be pushed to quit if people think that he can't handle the work anymore.  We don't know any of this but its worth talking about.

Come to think about it and given the current Scottish polling numbers, an interesting scenario is what happens if the SNP loses its majority and the Greens do not make it in.

Do they lead a minority government regardless? Do they seek confidence and supply from Labour? Or do they go with the Lib Dems?

In any case those all kill Indyref 2 of course.

Greens will almost certainly make it in: they're pretty much guaranteed a seat in Glasgow and Lothians unless their vote collapses below 3% which isn't likely.  They could lose seats but that depends on the constituency results as much as the Greens vote share.

It also must be said that the election is in nearly a year's time, there's no telling what state the economy or the job market will be in and how much of that is perceived to be Holyrood's fault, never mind the fact that a strong campaign by either of Labour or the Tories could change things within weeks. There's also the fact that the only time since 2015 Labour have done well in Scotland was 2017, was when they were seen as credibly and seriously challenging for power nationwide. If Labour have a healthy lead in the national polls by then, who knows what could happen.

Also, am I the only one who thinks its really pathetic for Yes that despite everything that's happened, Brexit, Corbyn, Boris, etc. that they can only manage a 4-point lead? I think if indyref2 did happen it would have serious potential to backfire quite significantly on the SNP. We can only hope.

That first point is valid: but it would not surprise me if the economic impact is seen as a UK-wide problem; and that Westminster therefore gets a bit of the blame.  I could certainly see it being a thing where each side blames each other and it entrenches the vote more than causing a massive swing away.

And that's the thing with the independence numbers as well: 2014 very much entrenched those feelings in people and while you are seeing people a small number of people switching (and its not all in one direction: Banff and Buchan voted for Independence in 2014, I think it'd vote against now) the fact is that both sides are probably guaranteed to get 45% in a referendum and the fight is over that middle group.  Its unlike any other issue really: its one of identity as much as policy and identity issues tend to be entrenched very deeply into people and are much harder to swing people against.

The SNP has been in government for 13 YEARS, are they showing any drop in support as almost all governments that outstay their welcome do?

Remember that we're talking about a devolved administration and not a national government: there are plenty of examples of single party domination in those.  To use some examples from Canada as one of the better examples (Westminster system country etc): look at the Alberta PCs and the Ontario PCs dominating their provincial politics for 40+ years each.

There have been signs of a fall but no one was able to capitalise: had Lamont not done that interview in 2014 (when she reigned as Scottish Labour leader and instantly did an interview calling Scottish Labour a 'branch office' and effectively saying that the SNP were right about them) 2015 would have been competitive and they'd be in a much better place to be an alternative government: in 2017 the Tories clearly had momentum but it'd be a coup for them to compete in the Central Belt (not that you need to win constituencies there to govern: look at 2007) but losing Davidson really hurt and Boris being PM has killed their support in a lot of places.  Meanwhile the SNP has a popular leader in Nicola Sturgeon and broadly by being incredibly uncontroversial they haven't angered that many people - well, those that would actually vote SNP anyway.

That Lamont interview is actually a massive turning point in Scottish politics and no one really talks about it anymore: it killed the credibility of Labour eight months before the 2015 general election and they've never recovered: and based on the quality of talent in the Scottish Labour Party I doubt they will for a while.  They might benefit from a Starmer bump but that's only ever going to push them so far: perhaps into second place ahead of the Tories.  Realistically to try and pull back a lot of their lost support they'd need to de-emphasise the union a lot in their campaigning but that isn't what they want to do - a lot of old Labour voters backed Independence in 2014.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Was polled for the first time in my life by Ipso. Mused about giving meme answers, but decided to go for the boring truth.

[CumbrianLefty]

Yes, very good reminder of what Johann Lamont did there - if you are ultra-cynical you can see her as a proto-Tom Watson, but far more successful in her destructive aims than he ever was.

(though I still wonder if knowing *just* what would happen to SLab might have made her reconsider)

[IceAgeComing]

It was an impressive bit of political wrecking - would be interesting to have been a fly in the wall on SNP offices when that stuff came out; just have felt like Christmas had come early.  Labour didn't exactly help by elected Jim Murphy as their leader and running an incredibly bad campaign - if Labour's 2015 campaign was bad nationally it was catastrophic in Scotland.  Trying to run entirely on the union wasn't exactly a bright idea when the pro-independence places were the ones that were Labour heartlands.

Murphy tried to stay as leader for a week after as well which was just comical

[Oryxslayer]

RE Scotland: Another problem when it comes to challenging the SNP local dominance comes from the parties who are contesting it. A Tory surge would lead to an obvious unionist government, but a Tory surge would just be towards around 25% and nationalists around 46-48%, leaving them open to true 'coalition of chaos' attacks. If Labour surge then the SNp are going to dog the local party with the question of what govt they would prefer: a unionist coalition or a left-leaning SNP-Lab govt. There are no good answers, including silence and defection, when it comes to that question.

[afleitch]

Yes, very good reminder of what Johann Lamont did there - if you are ultra-cynical you can see her as a proto-Tom Watson, but far more successful in her destructive aims than he ever was.

(though I still wonder if knowing *just* what would happen to SLab might have made her reconsider)

Her interview wasn't that pivotal to the long term trends: SLab had got a pasting in 2011, three years before and had a huge pro-indy base that simply migrated to the SNP after September 2014 and will probably stay there until Labour changes it's position.

In short; Scotland has a Labour Party; it's just not Labour.

[DaWN]

Such a Labour party that it colluded with the Tories in 2015 to prevent the actual Labour party from winning! Give me a break.

[IceAgeComing]

Colluded by... standing for election?  Labour don't have the right to win a majority of seats in Scotland you know

[Former President tack50]

RE Scotland: Another problem when it comes to challenging the SNP local dominance comes from the parties who are contesting it. A Tory surge would lead to an obvious unionist government, but a Tory surge would just be towards around 25% and nationalists around 46-48%, leaving them open to true 'coalition of chaos' attacks. If Labour surge then the SNp are going to dog the local party with the question of what govt they would prefer: a unionist coalition or a left-leaning SNP-Lab govt. There are no good answers, including silence and defection, when it comes to that question.

Joke: Scottish Tory surge
Woke: Scottish Labour surge
Bespoke: Scottish Lib Dems surge

[Blair]

While in government the Conservative Party is about as ruthless as it gets when it comes to retaining office by any means, and that absolutely means ditching (the brutality and willingness of it varies) any Prime Minister that is eventually percieved to be an electoral liability, regardless of how successful the PM in question has been, and certainly regardless of whether they won a landslide or not.

They did it to Thatcher after three victories when she became a liability, missed doing the same to Major by three votes (plus the alternatives were likely to do worse, not better), would have done it to Cameron had he not resigned (no matter how much some pretended to lament his resignation), and they only failed to do it to May much earlier out of a combination of A. plotter incompetence; B. May being so incredibly stubborn; C. a number of "lucky" coincidences preventing May from being ejected right after 2017.

Long story short, the moment Boris is percieved to be a permanent electoral liability - and he seems to be doing an excellent work in that area - they'll ditch him about three seconds with no remorse and no regret whatsoever. Whether they get away with it this time is probably going to depend on whether the Tory brand becomes tainted "Black Wednesday" style by the pandemic response, since from the looks of it they won't have an incompetent opposition to work with.

The interesting thing is that the Tories success comes not from the ability to ditch leaders (which as Lumine rightly says is remarkably brutal compared to Labour) but from the ability to pick the next leader & remodel the party correctly- the transition from Cameron, to May and then to Boris saw each leader jettison parts of the previous leader that was seen as harmful to winning an election.

May ditched Camerons more liberal approach to immigration & Johnson ditched May's emotional attachment to police cuts; both moves allowled them to move to a voter coalition that was much more suited to winning a majority. I take the view that May had the ability to win a Bojo shaped landslide in 2017 if the election had been both shorter & more effectively ran.

The challenge will be the next leadership race when people like Raab, Gove, Hunt and Javid see it as the last chance to get the crown... but I'm letting my mind wonder!

[Blair]

I always feel that Scottish Labour's biggest problem is that people like me within Labour (born in London & visited Scotland a grand total of 9-10 times on holiday) naturally now feel the need to defer politically in how the operation is ran up there to people in Scottish Labour- yet the only people left in Scottish Labour are the die-hard fanatics who didn't quit out of frustration/ideological anger/insanity.

I say this as someone who voted for Ian Murray!

Actually thinking about Labour's approach up there feels much like how it does thinking about the Liberal Democrats approach to politics; the events are out of your control, there's a much bigger & more powerful party on your territory, your brand is ruined over a generational event, you have absolutely no bench or talent and you lack any actual importance in the political debate.

[EastAnglianLefty]

I always feel that Scottish Labour's biggest problem is that people like me within Laboru (born in London & visited Scotland a grand total of 9-10 times on holiday) naturally now feel the need to defer politically in how the operation is ran up there to people in Scottish Labour- yet the only people left in Scottish Labour are the die-hard fanatics who didn't quit out of frustration/ideological anger/insanity.

I say this as someone who voted for Ian Murray!

Actually thinking about Labour's approach up there feels much like how it does thinking about the Liberal Democrats approach to politics; the events are out of your control, there's a much bigger & more powerful party on your territory, your brand is ruined over a generational event, you have absolutely no bench or talent and you lack any actual importance in the political debate.

There's a lot to be said for this - I put Murray last precisely because he was the candidate of the Scottish party establishment and that's the last voice we need to hear more from.

I think the best thing for the Scottish Labour Party would be a sustained campaign of entryism to deselect a lot of the timeservers and get some fresh blood in. 2015 shouldn't have been a shock, because the Scottish party had been sclerotic for decades and its foundations were built on sand - we lost Glasgow East in a by-election in 2008 because we'd taken it for granted for decades, then people were surprised in 2015 to find that our voter ID there was so bad that (in the words of one staffer shipped up from London to Glasgow to the campaign) "there are parties that don't exist yet which have a better idea of where their vote is than Scottish Labour do."

I spent polling day 2012 getting the vote out in Aberdeen, which consisted entirely of going to sheltered housing towerblocks and checking the residents had sent their postal votes in. The local activists celebrated a surprisingly good result (2nd in votes, a narrow 1st in seats) like they'd won Enfield Southgate. If you gave me your average CLP in a hopeless rural English seat as a campaign team, we'd have won a majority with room to spare.

[Former President tack50]

Really as long as Scotland based mostly off independence the only thing Scottish Labour can do is sit, wait and try to somehow position themselves as the best unionist party. Given Scotland's left wing tilt, you'd expect this to be easier, though I guess the average Scottish secessionist leans left? (even if there are plenty of conservatives for independence I suppose)

As long as the SNP is united, and as long as Scots vote on independence first and policy second, expect decades of SNP rule in Scotland to come, and this includes the SNP winning a majority of seats in Scotland every time, though a 2017-like result could happen as well as opposed to a 2015 or 2019-like one.

[CumbrianLefty]

Back to virus news - government forced into a major retreat as primary/secondary schools will not now reopen until the autumn.

Maybe if they had focused on getting things right from the beginning, rather than plucking a date out of the air to grab short term headlines and then shamefully using their captive press to try and start a culture war with the teaching unions when the obvious difficulties became evident, who knows?

[jaymichaud]

https://twitter.com/pritipatel/status/1271075607955288064?s=21

Thoughts?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

That 'everyone' (i.e. in politics and the media) needs to get a few nights worth of sleep and calm down.

[Joe Republic]

Fun Fact: Prime Minister Milliband's first term would have ended only one month ago

That’s some truly terrible news for Ed Miliband.

[Silent Hunter]

There needs to be a term for prejudice against a group based on bad past experiences with some of their members. Patel is of Ugandan Asian heritage and much of that group ended up in the UK because of the racism of Idi Amin and others in Uganda post-independence.

In any event, I have heard comparatively little from prominent British Asians in all of this. They're subjected to a considerable amount of racism in this country as well.

[Cassius]

https://twitter.com/pritipatel/status/1271075607955288064?s=21

Thoughts?

‘Gaslighting’ is one of the most overused terms in politics today.

[CumbrianLefty]

The latest GDP figures are out - ouch.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

Still don't know what to make of these constant rumours and suggestions that the Tories dump Boris for Sunak (or A.N. Other). Like obviously Boris is a lazy incompetent not up to the job and who's just recovering from being hospitalised, but it would be unprecedented to dump a Prime Minister who won a bloody 80-seat majority (partly thanks to his personal brand with Tory-sceptical Leave voters) midway through his first term. I just can't see it happening, yet people keep talking about it. Is it just the bored Westminster rumour mill with nothing to talk about?

[Blair]

I can't help but feel that Priti Patel & her team enjoyed that letter coming in... leadership pitch.

[CumbrianLefty]

Field to replace Johnson is getting quite crowded, it appears.

[IceAgeComing]

The protests in London to "protect the statues" went as well as expected.  A load of EDL and other far right goons went down to London, were kettled around Westminster, drunk a lot of beer, tried to fight with the police, there were arguments between All Lives Matter and White Lives Matter people where the former perhaps realised the people they were allied with were dodgy; there was a literal river of urine running from a hidden corner where everyone went to relieve themselves, the Tesco by Parliament was closed by police to stop them from buying all of the booze in the shop etc.

The Black Lives Matter counterprotesters stood behind police lines and laughed at what, quite frankly, was a pretty sad group of people.  Seems to be most of the far right goons you see at things like this plus some new people who broadly seem to have not quite realised they were getting themselves in for and who didn't like the fascists.