UK General Discussion: Rishecession

[afleitch]

If it’s an attempt to save her career, you’d have to imagine she’ll be looking for a new seat, though are there any plausible Tory prospects in Scotland which don’t have candidates in place?

Can’t see them parachuting her over to Aberdeenshire - there are only 3-4 seats under the nee boundaries that are winnable, and those all seem to have candidate (even Douglas Ross has a successor picked). Would have to be one of the Ayrshire seats. But those are going to be tough enough as it is. 2026 is shaping up to be a rough election for the Scottish Tories too - there’s not going to be spare list seats at Holyrood to go around.

I think the defection is a nice excuse for her not to follow through on her by-election threat (which she’s now officially walked back), before she goes back to the NHS, which she’s talked about for a while.

The defection is absolutely hilarious and despite 'oh this helps with anti SNP attack lines' etc, she's spiked herself more than the SNP by joining the Tories. Which makes me suspect Labour didn't want her...

[Blair]

There are usually two flavours of defections; the ideological and then then ‘someone hasn’t been nice to me…’

Christian Wakefords worked as he had shown ideological disagreements before and was a new MP- I what this shows, and what should never be forgotten, is just how stupid some honourable members are especially when they get their ears bent.

Is one of those things that is deeply funnily and I guess even the SNP will just shrug

[EastAnglianLefty]

If it’s an attempt to save her career, you’d have to imagine she’ll be looking for a new seat, though are there any plausible Tory prospects in Scotland which don’t have candidates in place?

Can’t see them parachuting her over to Aberdeenshire - there are only 3-4 seats under the nee boundaries that are winnable, and those all seem to have candidate (even Douglas Ross has a successor picked). Would have to be one of the Ayrshire seats. But those are going to be tough enough as it is. 2026 is shaping up to be a rough election for the Scottish Tories too - there’s not going to be spare list seats at Holyrood to go around.

I think the defection is a nice excuse for her not to follow through on her by-election threat (which she’s now officially walked back), before she goes back to the NHS, which she’s talked about for a while.

The defection is absolutely hilarious and despite 'oh this helps with anti SNP attack lines' etc, she's spiked herself more than the SNP by joining the Tories. Which makes me suspect Labour didn't want her...

I can't see why we'd have wanted her - there's no evidence she has a particularly large personal vote, we'd be favoured to take the seat anyway and to the extent she's outside the SNP mainstream, it's in terms of the sorts of social conservatism that don't play especially well with Labour members or voters.

[Torrain]

Britain’s newest Conservative and Unionist MP is still a Scottish nationalist:
https://twitter.com/andrewlearmonth/status/1712453198194020859
Somewhere in Moray, Douglas Ross has just realised the rhetoric backflips he’s going to have to do this week.

[CumbrianLefty]

The reports that Sunak was a major driver of this defection will become more credible if it turns out to be as messy as things currently suggest it might be.

Btw her husband is an SNP councillor and there are claims he has been caught quite unaware by this.

[Torrain]

Aye. The nationwide Tories are Conservatives first, Unionists second - while the Scottish Tories (particularly since Davidson) are pretty much the other way around. The warmest words came from English culture warriors like Brendan Clark-Smith, compared to the more businesslike responses from Scottish Tories.

Their MPs and MSPs will go along with it, but the membership and allied columnists won’t be best pleased. Moment of truth will come when a clip of her attacking the Tories at an independence rally or election hustings inevitably ends up shared by one of the papers - or if she tries to   

*

What it really makes me think of, though, is Rosie Duffield’s last appearance at PMQs.

Sunak’s interactions were positively cordial - better than with some of his own backbenchers. Is he’s on some sort of defection charm-offensive, seemingly aimed at gender-critical MPs on the opposition benches?

[afleitch]

Is he’s on some sort of defection charm-offensive, seemingly aimed at gender-critical MPs on the opposition benches?

I sort of hope so.

SNP heidbangers leaving of their own accord is, in the longer term, better for the party. Not many left now.

FWIW, East Kilbride's last Labour MP endorsed his Tory MP at the last GE.

[JimJamUK]

Which makes me suspect Labour didn't want her...

If they didn’t, I wonder if it would be leaked?

[Torrain]

FWIW, East Kilbride's last Labour MP endorsed his Tory MP at the last GE.

Aye, I saw some jokes about Cameron being the first Tory MP in East Kilbride since 2015 - guess that's the context. I can understand, given his closeness to the Israeli cause, why he'd be so opposed to Labour in 2019, under Corbyn.

But given his local MP was Chris Grayling of all people, (who has never been under threat at an election) it was an eccentric way to intervene.

[Torrain]

SNP conference starts tomorrow in Aberdeen, with delegates voting on an independence strategy on Sunday afternoon.  Yousaf and Stephen Flynn are running with Sturgeon's defacto referendum strategy - setting the independence mandate at a plurality of Westminster seats – but appear open to a majority (29 MPs) instead.

There are at least 10 notable party figures submitting amendments – including MPs Pete Wishart, Tommy Sheppard, Alyn Smith, and Joanna Cherry.

Some want to set the bar at a majority of the popular vote instead. Others want the 2026 Holyrood election as the defacto referendum, rather than the 2024 general election. Cherry, and Fife MP Douglas Chapman have voiced support for Sinn Fein-style abstentionism, if Westminster ignores their negotiation demands – but that seems to be a fringe view. Stewart McDonald (Glasgow South) wants the party to ditch the defacto referendum policy altogether.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/23855311.lisa-cameron-said-independence-top-priority-defecting/

In a hustings between the two, on September 28, Dr Cameron said independence was “a work in progress” and had to be “the priority for people and has to be what we're doing the work on even when we're standing up in the parliament and speaking in debates on behalf of constituents.”

Asked what their number two priority was, Dr Cameron said it was dealing with the cost of living crisis.

“I have hundreds of people contacting me about that every single month,” she said, “They are really struggling because we're still in Westminster austerity situation really, where the people who are the most vulnerable including many, many disabled people across found that they have borne the brunt really of cuts and changes.”

In response to another question, Dr Cameron referred to the Internal Market Act - brought in by the Tories to enforce common trading rules across the four nations of the UK - as “another assault on devolution,” adding that “Brexit was pretty much the same.”

“People in Scotland voted to remain in the EU and we've been dragged out the EU with all of the benefits, particularly for young people and I think about my children, other people's children who will miss out on many programs and opportunities because of that,” she told party members.

It was a fractious hustings which was dominated by the deteriorating relationship between the MP and her local party members.

Dr Cameron told them: “We've had some ups and downs along the way in terms of various different elections and levels of support for the party, but I think the main thing that binds us together as a party is independence.”

She added later: “I'm a family person. I want to work for everybody's family. I want to work for Team SNP.”

--------------------------------------------------

However, in her interview announcing her defection on Thursday, Dr Cameron criticised the SNP’s commitment to independence, saying it had resulted in “significant division” for families like hers.

“This has taken its toll and I have come to the conclusion that it is more helpful to focus my energies upon constructive policies that benefit everyone across the four nations of the UK, and to move towards healing these divisions for the collective good."

[oldtimer]

Is he’s on some sort of defection charm-offensive, seemingly aimed at gender-critical MPs on the opposition benches?

I sort of hope so.

SNP heidbangers leaving of their own accord is, in the longer term, better for the party. Not many left now.

FWIW, East Kilbride's last Labour MP endorsed his Tory MP at the last GE.

In the longer term the SNP could be divided by the 3 parties just like it was made up by 3 parties.

I don't expect an SNP revival without a Conservative revival in England.

[oldtimer]

The reports that Sunak was a major driver of this defection will become more credible if it turns out to be as messy as things currently suggest it might be.

Btw her husband is an SNP councillor and there are claims he has been caught quite unaware by this.

It makes electoral sense:

The SNP is way down, Labour are the major beneficiaries but the Conservatives would probably retain their scottish seats if they are the incumbents.

[JimJamUK]

It makes electoral sense:

The SNP is way down, Labour are the major beneficiaries but the Conservatives would probably retain their scottish seats if they are the incumbents.

The Conservatives are not retaining East Kilbride, they’re going to be squeezed into irrelevance by Labour.

[Torrain]

Some polling from Opinium on the parties, pre-and-post conferences. Not much of a conference bounce for anyone in the topline this year (UK-wide polling seems to be largely static), but Labour's metrics seem to have improved - most notably on the competence question:

[Zinneke]

https://twitter.com/se_kip/status/1713610249653907534

[Silent Hunter]

Steve Bell has been sacked as the Guardian cartoonist over a Netanyahu cartoon that was rejected as possibly antisemitic and which he then tweeted anyway.

[CumbrianLefty]

The irony is (as is not infrequently the case) he got away with rather worse transgressions previously.

There is at least an argument the "offending" cartoon was inspired by a famous one regarding LBJ and Vietnam back in the 1960s, though it inevitably came across as fairly tasteless right now in any event.

[Silent Hunter]

The irony is (as is not infrequently the case) he got away with rather worse transgressions previously.

There is at least an argument the "offending" cartoon was inspired by a famous one regarding LBJ and Vietnam back in the 1960s, though it inevitably came across as fairly tasteless right now in any event.

Attempting to litigate a private decision in public didn't help him at all.

[Torrain]

It’s the PM’s first anniversary in office this week.

He’ll be fine. But - hell of a week for his immunity to confidence motions to run out.

[CumbrianLefty]

The least bad thing for him might be to face a confidence vote, and win it.

It might shut some people up, for a bit.

[Torrain]

This feels pretty irregular:
https://twitter.com/benrileysmith/status/1715355864364663172
Edit: apparently this *has* happened before - in 1982 when Tory backbenchers were unhappy with BBC coverage of the Falklands War.

[CumbrianLefty]

What on earth were they unhappy about *before* the war?

Given how the Beeb have notoriously done Number 10's bidding in recent years, the mind boggles.

[Zinneke]

They want total Orbanisation of independent British institutions. I don't think they even deny it at this point.

[CumbrianLefty]

As with Poland, we might vote the Orbanists out just in time.