UK General Discussion: Rishecession

[afleitch]

The news really is a parody of the 1990s lately. Surprised Sunak hasn’t done a back me or sack yet.

The press have stopped defending them. Which is what you do when you want access to the next government. Not a healthy parasitic relationship for the press to have, but a long standing one.

[Blair]

Another weekend and another breathless article in the Times about how Sunak will finally get tough and turn things around.

My favourite line was citing Uxbridge as a sign they’ll do well, before a ‘Tory source’ says ‘mid term blues’ means they’ll lose the upcoming by elections but it doesn’t matter?l?

[CumbrianLefty]

Are they *really* this Panglossian?

I still see the "Sunak more popular than Starmer" canard being deployed by some diehards.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It does strike me as very telling that they still haven't thought up any credible explanation for whey they lost a rural constituency with a monstrous majority (and which they would have held in 1997) to Labour in a by-election.

[Blair]

The claim is that the Labour lead is soft- which in itself says something about the Conservative operation seeing as they’ve failed to dent it.

The other claim is that Starmer isn’t beloved enough or popular enough to win and this will stop him winning; as Prime Ministers Cameron, Thatcher, Heath, Wilson and Attlee all prove it doesn’t actually matter!

[Blair]

A fun legacy of Mr Tony terrifying the Conservative party and Gordon imploding in 2007 is that the Conservatives believe that only Mr Blair (or someone performing a weird cosplay) cam beat them.

[TheTide]

A fun legacy of Mr Tony terrifying the Conservative party and Gordon imploding in 2007 is that the Conservatives believe that only Mr Blair (or someone performing a weird cosplay) cam beat them.

I've sometimes wondered whether or not a similar point was made about Mr Wilson in the mid-1990s or so (at which point no Labour leader other than Wilson had won a general election in almost half a century).   

[Mike88]

The claim is that the Labour lead is soft- which in itself says something about the Conservative operation seeing as they’ve failed to deny it.

The other claim is that Starmer isn’t beloved enough or popular enough to win and this will stop him winning; as Prime Ministers Cameron, Thatcher, Heath, Wilson and Attlee all prove it doesn’t actually matter!

Yeah, Starmer may have issues in personal popularity, but in the end, it's incumbency fatigue that is the main and only factor. However, I wouldn't be surprised if the Conservatives poll higher than the high 20's of current polling, as many Reform voters could "return home" thus putting the Conservatives in the 30's.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Somehow, the metaphors can get even more on-the-nose:
https://twitter.com/alexwickham/status/1699097385262100678

This would be mostly shocking as it would suggest they have bothered to renovate the place at all since ww2.

[Cassius]

The claim is that the Labour lead is soft- which in itself says something about the Conservative operation seeing as they’ve failed to deny it.

The other claim is that Starmer isn’t beloved enough or popular enough to win and this will stop him winning; as Prime Ministers Cameron, Thatcher, Heath, Wilson and Attlee all prove it doesn’t actually matter!

Yeah, Starmer may have issues in personal popularity, but in the end, it's incumbency fatigue that is the main and only factor. However, I wouldn't be surprised if the Conservatives poll higher than the high 20's of current polling, as many Reform voters could "return home" thus putting the Conservatives in the 30's.

I fully expect the final vote figures for Labour and the Conservatives to look approximately like those of 1997 (with Labour maybe a tad lower and the Tories a tad higher).

[Mike88]

The claim is that the Labour lead is soft- which in itself says something about the Conservative operation seeing as they’ve failed to deny it.

The other claim is that Starmer isn’t beloved enough or popular enough to win and this will stop him winning; as Prime Ministers Cameron, Thatcher, Heath, Wilson and Attlee all prove it doesn’t actually matter!

Yeah, Starmer may have issues in personal popularity, but in the end, it's incumbency fatigue that is the main and only factor. However, I wouldn't be surprised if the Conservatives poll higher than the high 20's of current polling, as many Reform voters could "return home" thus putting the Conservatives in the 30's.

I fully expect the final vote figures for Labour and the Conservatives to look approximately like those of 1997 (with Labour maybe a tad lower and the Tories a tad higher).

Well, the Lib Dems are much weaker now than in 97, plus the SNP is not in a good moment, so all of this benefits Labour's share. I would say that the result could be more "2019 in reverse".

[Silent Hunter]

Somehow, the metaphors can get even more on-the-nose:
https://twitter.com/alexwickham/status/1699097385262100678

This would be mostly shocking as it would suggest they have bothered to renovate the place at all since ww2.

Portcullis House would be the more likely candidate. Or the Norman Shaw Buildings, which were renovated in the 1970s.

[CumbrianLefty]

A fun legacy of Mr Tony terrifying the Conservative party and Gordon imploding in 2007 is that the Conservatives believe that only Mr Blair (or someone performing a weird cosplay) cam beat them.

I've sometimes wondered whether or not a similar point was made about Mr Wilson in the mid-1990s or so (at which point no Labour leader other than Wilson had won a general election in almost half a century).  

Actually no, Wilson's reputation was very low in the 1980s and 90s. He was widely seen - throughout the political spectrum - as an unprincipled schemer who had squandered the electoral opportunities presented to him and allowed his party to be invaded by extremists. Of course his getting dementia, apart from being a personal tragedy, meant he was unable to put his own case as past PMs often are - so when he died in 1995, Blair's "tribute" was lukewarm to the point of actual embarrassment (and I also recall the late Hugo Young writing an absolute excoriation for the ages in the Guardian)

It was sometime in that decade that things began to turn, however. There had already been the first signs with sympathetic "revisionist" biographies by Ben Pimlott and Philip Ziegler, but it took seeing Labour back in power for things to really change. Blair's trauma over Iraq made his keeping us out of Vietnam look much more impressive, for instance - and some current Labour "modernisers" see him as a kindred spirit, in marked contrast to a generation ago.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Yes, broadly speaking Pimlott's position has won out. Wilson is now usually seen as a successful reforming Prime Minister who made some serious errors but who, on balance, made the country a better place in which to live. Mary Wilson lived to see her husband's rehabilitation, which was nice.

[TheTide]

A fun legacy of Mr Tony terrifying the Conservative party and Gordon imploding in 2007 is that the Conservatives believe that only Mr Blair (or someone performing a weird cosplay) cam beat them.

I've sometimes wondered whether or not a similar point was made about Mr Wilson in the mid-1990s or so (at which point no Labour leader other than Wilson had won a general election in almost half a century).  

Actually no, Wilson's reputation was very low in the 1980s and 90s. He was widely seen - throughout the political spectrum - as an unprincipled schemer who had squandered the electoral opportunities presented to him and allowed his party to be invaded by extremists. Of course his getting dementia, apart from being a personal tragedy, meant he was unable to put his own case as past PMs often are - so when he died in 1995, Blair's "tribute" was lukewarm to the point of actual embarrassment (and I also recall the late Hugo Young writing an absolute excoriation for the ages in the Guardian)

It was sometime in that decade that things began to turn, however. There had already been the first signs with sympathetic "revisionist" biographies by Ben Pimlott and Philip Ziegler, but it took seeing Labour back in power for things to really change. Blair's trauma over Iraq made his keeping us out of Vietnam look much more impressive, for instance - and some current Labour "modernisers" see him as a kindred spirit, in marked contrast to a generation ago.

I mostly know about his reputation until those biographies, but it's not as if Blair's reputation is all that great either. Maybe it's improved a bit recently, but I seem to remember the "only Labour leader to win a general election in so and so amount of time" point being made during the leadership of Ed Miliband. I'm sure this is just a wild theory on my part, but I'd say the reason why that bit of electoral trivia wasn't brought up about Wilson and is brought up about Blair is because of some rather misguided interpretations of both of them (i.e. Wilson was as per the description above and Blair was a Tory-In-All-But-Name). 

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Blair's reputation is on the same distinctive upwards curve as Wilson's was thirty years ago. The past couple of years, in particular, have had an understandable impact there, by way of contrast.

[afleitch]

Blair's reputation is on the same distinctive upwards curve as Wilson's was thirty years ago. The past couple of years, in particular, have had an understandable impact there, by way of contrast.

Blair's reputation is being bouyed in part by the comparison to Starmer. In the sense it was clear, several years before the 1997 GE what Labour's programme was. Which was pretty successfully delivered and both constitutionally and socially, is very much still with us.

[Coldstream]

Blair was a good Prime Minister even if you’re hung up on Iraq. The chaos of the last few years have highlighted his strengths - but they were always there.

Tbh I never bought the idea that he was particularly unpopular - aside from in 2016 around Chilcot. Outside of the Labour Party he seemed to have little presence in the public consciousness. And whenever he came up on the doors it was usually positive.

[Torrain]

The Westminster aide spying for China has been unmasked in the Times. It’s Chris Cash, the Director of the China Research Group.

The CRG is a working group set up by Security Minister Tom Tugendhat and spearheaded by Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Alicia Kearns. It’s supposed to provide policy insights to “tackle the rise of China”.

He’s also Kearns’ parliamentary researcher.

Which all seems… unfortunate.

[Cassius]

Apparently a “long-suffering Scottish rugby follower” too, according to his Twitter handle.

Today really hasn’t been his day.

[Torrain]

I thought this was a safe space where I wouldn’t have to address that particular development./s

At least the UEFA qualifiers are going ok…

[Coldstream]

The Westminster aide spying for China has been unmasked in the Times. It’s Chris Cash, the Director of the China Research Group.

The CRG is a working group set up by Security Minister Tom Tugendhat and spearheaded by Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Alicia Kearns. It’s supposed to provide policy insights to “tackle the rise of China”.

He’s also Kearns’ parliamentary researcher.

Which all seems… unfortunate.

The question is whether he got hired for the job & then turned/sold out for the money - in which case it’s just a story about how Tories have no principles.

Or, if he was already a CCP asset before he got hired for a job that involves contact with dissidents from Tibet, Hong Kong, Uyghurs etc - in which case Tugendhat is guilty of appalling failures of vetting that should be disqualifying from serving as security minister.

[Zinneke]

Blair was a good Prime Minister even if you’re hung up on Iraq. The chaos of the last few years have highlighted his strengths - but they were always there.

Tbh I never bought the idea that he was particularly unpopular - aside from in 2016 around Chilcot. Outside of the Labour Party he seemed to have little presence in the public consciousness. And whenever he came up on the doors it was usually positive.

Listening to Rob Ford, i think you underestimate how Blair is an immensely polarising figure amongst pretty much any remotely politically engaged figure. I'm not sure if it is because of education or generation, I have to relisten to the podcast about it, but Ford says Blair is still massively polarising among swathes of the electorate.

I really think Starmer is making a mistake trying to recapture the Blairite milquetoastiness. It's quite clear Starmer is nostalgic of the times when Mr Darcy was more considered and less ridiculed, so he's playing the 90s hits.

[Coldstream]

Blair was a good Prime Minister even if you’re hung up on Iraq. The chaos of the last few years have highlighted his strengths - but they were always there.

Tbh I never bought the idea that he was particularly unpopular - aside from in 2016 around Chilcot. Outside of the Labour Party he seemed to have little presence in the public consciousness. And whenever he came up on the doors it was usually positive.

Listening to Rob Ford, i think you underestimate how Blair is an immensely polarising figure amongst pretty much any remotely politically engaged figure. I'm not sure if it is because of education or generation, I have to relisten to the podcast about it, but Ford says Blair is still massively polarising among swathes of the electorate.

I really think Starmer is making a mistake trying to recapture the Blairite milquetoastiness. It's quite clear Starmer is nostalgic of the times when Mr Darcy was more considered and less ridiculed, so he's playing the 90s hits.

All I can go on is my experience on the doors, where I’ve had him come up twice in my life.

I’m sure amongst politically engaged people he’s more controversial, but most people aren’t engaged at all.

[CumbrianLefty]

Blair is undoubtedly still polarising, but I do detect a definite drop off since the last GE.