This Once Great Movement Of Ours

[CumbrianLefty]

They could actually lose control at this rate, having won all but a single seat in 2019.

[YL]

They could actually lose control at this rate, having won all but a single seat in 2019.

It turns out that 11 out of 16 sitting Labour councillors within the Leicester East constituency have been deselected.

I suspect this is one of those things where you have to know the areas and the people involved to know exactly what's going on and what the agenda is, though it looks like one of the factors is disloyalty to the elected Mayor, Sir Peter Soulsby, or at least supporting the abolition of his position.

[Torrain]

I know Leicester East ended up being pretty marginal (compared to baseline expectations) last time round, and that was partially/largely attributed to Claudia Webbe being parachuted in from London, and then being... well, Claudia Webbe.

Given the rightward shift amongst Hindu voters, is there a risk that the seat could be in play at the next election, especially if the polls tighten, or a localist candidate runs (a bit like Ashfield in 2019)? Or is this one of those ripples that has major implications for local government, but stays Labour *for now* (like Tower Hamlets).

[YL]

I know Leicester East ended up being pretty marginal (compared to baseline expectations) last time round, and that was partially/largely attributed to Claudia Webbe being parachuted in from London, and then being... well, Claudia Webbe.

Given the rightward shift amongst Hindu voters, is there a risk that the seat could be in play at the next election, especially if the polls tighten, or a localist candidate runs (a bit like Ashfield in 2019)? Or is this one of those ripples that has major implications for local government, but stays Labour *for now* (like Tower Hamlets).

I suspect it is sufficiently decoupled from national politics to be a relatively plausible (perhaps the most plausible) Tory gain against the trend, but my guess would be that Labour should be OK if they make a competent selection of candidate.  Note that for the most high profile by-election loss (North Evington, where the Greens beat them into third) they did not do this.

[YL]

Two of the Leicester deselectees have joined the Conservative Party.

(Which makes me think that the decision to deselect those two at least was the right one.)

[Coldstream]

Not really a surprise at this point, but formal confirmation that Corbyn will be blocked (assuming the NEC ratifies this and there’s no reason to think they won’t afaik).

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/mar/27/jeremy-corbyn-not-stand-labour-next-election-keir-starmer

[All Along The Watchtower]

Its all gone a bit quiet on the Sue Grey front, maybe it really was a non-story after all?

Just the way she wants it I imagine.

[Property Representative of the Harold Holt Swimming Centre]

Its all gone a bit quiet on the Sue Grey front, maybe it really was a non-story after all?

Just the way she wants it I imagine.

A Google search on her states that she (clearly a person of some power and influence) was born in either 1957 or 1958. Meanwhile the exact dates of birth of various Sunday League footballers are easily obtained.

[CumbrianLefty]

Wikipedia is like that (there are some well known TV/film actors without a full DOB, for example)

[Torrain]

https://twitter.com/REWearmouth/status/1640691576677515269

[Blair]

And now it begins.

No, now it ends.

[CumbrianLefty]

Who knows, "Paul Mason for Islington North" may actually be a thing.

Get the popcorn out!

[Estrella]

Who knows, "Paul Mason for Islington North" may actually be a thing.

Get the popcorn out!

Bermondsey 1983 if Twitter existed *shudders*. Though if Luciana Berger were the candidate, by the end of the campaign there'd be Nuremberg rallies at the Emirates Stadium, so I guess it's still an improvement.

[Blair]

It has been an interesting week for the Labour left; as someone who can't claim to be an expert or a member I'm not sure what I can offer other than thoughts on what it's like to be in their position; e.g an ideological minority in your own party.

I think the key split has been those people who have been in the Labour Party for either 30+ years or their whole lives; e.g John McDonnell, Jon Lansman, Dianne Abbott, several of the affiliated unions etc. The expectation that they would leave or campaign for JC was extremely misguided; especially as they would have seen what happened to the TIGs (they all largely got replaced by campaign group MPs!)

It would leave the SCG with about 5-6 members and would ruin the left for a generation in the PLP; while there's various quibbles about the strategy for the SCG (I mean all the options have been tried and they've all broadly been sh**t!?) it's clear that staying in has obvious strengths if they stay in and see what happens. Who knows they might be able to tip the scales of a nomination of someone to challenge Rachel Reeves in 2028...

I think it now appears obvious there will be an independent run by JC; I think anyone claiming to know how it will go is errr being optimistic. The biggest factor against him I imagine will be the transitory nature of most london seats; I'm not sure if there's data but there is a good chance a block of his votes will only know him as Labour leader. The challenge will be whether he runs as an ideological leftist outcast from the machine, or as a diligent super-councillor constituency MP; you can ofc argue both & there are huge areas of cross-over but still it will be an interesting test case.

[Blair]

It’s quite funny seeing the early coverage about Starmers confession re ousting Richard Leonard- momentum put out an angry statement which errrr ignores the reason how Leonard got elected and equally the fact we knew this at the time- there was even a failed NEC coup before the second blow landed.

Is there a word for this weird THIGMO thing all factions do were they pretend to get angry at something everyone already knows about ? E.G the hissy fit when Owen Smith (who?) got sacked as shadow NI in 2019.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I always think of it as being essentially recreational outrage.

[CumbrianLefty]

Given that Scottish Labour are in a *much* better position now than then, who will actually care?

[Blair]

An interesting article mostly because Waugh is seen as having the ear of relatively senior people in the party.

It briefly discussed the reshuffle- there were suggestions Jim McMahon would get moved or sacked, which triggered some backlash (the reasons cited was that as he was an ally of Keir and left school at 16) but ofc it ignores the fact he should never have been given DEFRA to begin with (he's a former council leader from Oldham!) and him getting it saw Luke Pollard kicked out of a job he was doing very well.

He's been a bit better recently but was quite low-key for a while.

It possibly has the most pearl clutching background quote with an MP attacking Keir for criticising Parliament and has some overblown rubbish about it being the peoples house. Have these people ever spoken to a voter?


https://inews.co.uk/news/politics/keir-starmer-rescued-labour-doubts-remain-2262022

[CumbrianLefty]

It possibly has the most pearl clutching background quote with an MP attacking Keir for criticising Parliament and has some overblown rubbish about it being the peoples house. Have these people ever spoken to a voter?
https://inews.co.uk/news/politics/keir-starmer-rescued-labour-doubts-remain-2262022

You know that is a Labour Students turned Progress type who has never had a real job in their life.

[Blair]

The amount of hilarious briefing going on really does suggest that Labour MPs and their advisors should have their phones confiscated over long holidays.

[JimJamUK]

Speaking of which:

https://twitter.com/jaheale/status/1645077396436000780?s=61&t=I1DE8_cg7gmZrc...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Comrades, it's Easter Sunday. Log off, don't text or DM journalists, get a life.

[MaxQue]

Comrades, it's Easter Sunday. Log off, don't text or DM journalists, get a life.

They are probably staffers, not comrades and their whole life is to be parasites feeding from the political system while bringing nothing of value.

[CumbrianLefty]

Not totally wrong about Cooper though, are they.

Have always found the online centrist/media cult around her totally baffling.

[Blair]

Not totally wrong about Cooper though, are they.

Have always found the online centrist/media cult around her totally baffling.

Stolen the point from Stephen Bush but he made the good point that her appointment was basically fodder to the lobby & parts of the Labour Movement (the Brownite tendency I guess?) who kept briefing she needed to return- it was Starmer basically trading the chance for an alternative* Home Sec in exchange for an easy life.

There were early signs of annoyance around January I think and in a lot of the small boats debates it does seem the Labour Home Affairs response is to sigh and say 'get a grip' rather than offer some sort of alternative. I have always thought Yvette is much better at the tactics rather than strategy of it all (hence the belief that a withering put down of Braverman in Home Office Qs would win an election) & again as SB has said her previous tenure in 10-15 wasn't exactly a huge success.

Although tbh if the briefings are true it appears that people in LOTO somehow think that Yvette is too soft and 'playing to the members' so god knows who they're going to get as Shadow Home Sec.



*He could have gone with someone like Thornberry who is an extremely adept media performer & press operator (her chief adviser is Damian McBride), Lou Haigh or even David Lammy- this row seems to have been made by the fact that Steve Reed who is Shadow Justice isn't actually a lawyer and so will tend to view the brief in a different way to how someone with that background would.

I'm a broken record but Thornberry at Justice would be a way of squaring this circle.