United Kingdom General Election: July 4, 2024

[Oryxslayer]

Tania Mathias, who won Twickenham off of Vince Cable in the Lib Dem apocalypse of 2015 only to lose it back to him in the snap 2017 general election, now T-May's favored Maidenhead successor:

Which would make things a little ironic if the Lib-Dems do win the seat like I suspect. Though perhaps I'm overstating them here cause their complete sweep of the seats local parts in 2023 may have been facilitated by negative polarization against a prominently disgraced MP. It certainly was the case in certain other areas like Stratford-upon-Avon.

[Oryxslayer]

https://twitter.com/tomorrowsmps/status/1794314995771306394?t=HLhOK5V5eS7sJz6OMR...

Just a reminder of how things operate in the no-hope seats. While Labour's list (and Tories in equivalent situations) probably goes a bit beyond the generalized 200, the truth is that if the parties win a no hope-seat its "on accident " through voters operating on their own account. 

[Steve from Lambeth]

According to Wikipedia, the Tories are going into this election with 346 seats, down nearly 20 from the 365 they won in 2019. Has any British government lost more seats over the duration of a single term?

The early-stage BoJo Tories were infamously reduced to 282 MPs at one stage, down from 318 after the 2017 election, due to a spate of Brexit-related whip suspensions. I have no idea how many of them were allowed back into the party by the time the election was called, however.

[Oryxslayer]

Also, it got lost in the mess of news over national service,  but Andy Street is reportedly actually looking at standing for Solihull. This was only speculation when he lost the mayoralty, but now the talk is serious.

[Steve from Lambeth]

https://x.com/Peston/status/1794488768277123563

So presumably Onward's Director, Sebastian Early Anthony Payne, holds some credit/blame for this latest masterstroke.

I read Great British National Service a few weeks after it came out, as part of my semi-regular scan of the Onward website. My main impression was that it was a somewhat desperate copycat of the new French national service programme. (I also thought that the dark orange colour scheme was unusally energy-sapping, even for a think tank report.)

Sunak's proposal bears no resemblance to Great British National Service beyond the name and the existence of non-military volunteering opportunities. Largely the same rationale - young people are falling behind and missing out on opportunities - is offered for the two programs.

Everyone studying my subject at my university - it isn't history or anthropology - was emailed a link to the website of An Unknown Soldier a few months ago (presumably from the good of his own heart; not related to National Service). His website is mostly arguing that his discoveries will make the entire academic record of human history obsolete, but I do have some sympathy for the arguments About the Army - with the caveat that veterans of the US receive better post-service care, pound-for-pound, than almost any other's.

My line of thinking has always been that should I have any children, I'd like them to get their fitness up to a consistent level such that they can permanently join the armed forces upon finishing school, if they are interested in a substantial tour of duty. At worst, they'll care more about it than I ever did. At best, they will decide to finish university instead, complete officer training, do a generally good job and head up the ranks.

But I suppose the most likely reason for their enlistment would be if they ended up like Amelia from Derbyshire Staffordshire. (Jesus, that case study is two years old and was a fraction of a BBC live blog entry and I still remember it better than literally any A-Level results coverage other than the dreaded algorithm of 2020. For some reason, I had to remind myself that there was a sequel - a characteristic this saga rather inexplicably shares with The Princess Diaries and Gangnam Style.)

Ironically I would probably ask them to look at clearing instead as a first resort; you'd be surprised what you can bank with 112 UCAS tariff points, never mind 144, although I don't remember and I'll have to jog my memory once clearing returns around Election Day. Right, now if you'll excuse the fact that I've done this thread a rather international disservice...

[Joe Republic]

https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1793975180143775920

Those numbers. Can't breach 10% amongst under 40's (they got 24% amongst that age group in 1997)

It's extinction level.

"Sir, we seem to be polling only 8% among 18-24 year olds."

"Good lord, that's awful.  What policy ideas do we have to change that…?"

*quiet voice from the back of the room* "Ahem.  I may have an idea…"

[Blair]

It was quite fun to come back from the pub to see the reaction after missing the actual news…

Haven’t seen a policy go down so badly with the commentariat and activists in a while- the biggest flaw is that if it was such a good idea why haven’t they tried it in Government?

I suspect they will get journalists laughing at them soon when they ask about this- it is a terrible policy! The best example I saw was someone who said their daughter had become a prison officer at 18 and asked why on earth should she be expected to volunteer at weekends when she is already doing a very terrible job.

The Military will hate this; they were in favour of getting rid of NS as it was a waste of time and just meant that had to spend a lot of time babysitting people who wanted to leave. The only person I knew who did it said his time was spend mostly drinking in German while fixing vans

[Coldstream]

It’s a gift to Labour cos it’s something to threaten under-25 hippies flirting with the Greens over Gaza with. “Vote Green, you get Tory and conscription”.

[TheTide]

It’s a gift to Labour cos it’s something to threaten under-25 hippies flirting with the Greens over Gaza with. “Vote Green, you get Tory and conscription”.

It's fairly seat dependent.

[Blair]

The obsession with Brand Rishi and the excitement a lot of centre-right commentators have over him (he can do an excel sheet!) has really ignored the fact he is a lousy campaigner; he was pretty terrible in the 2022 Leadership race; forgotten now but he made a big pious point of saying 'we can't afford tax cuts' and then pivoted to tax cuts when he realised he was losing. He also kept doing a weird thing about 'protecting our women'... and well we all see how he was during the locals.

The thing that would worry me if I was a Tory MP is that this was planned; they have know for a month or so they were going for July and they decided one of there last big announcements as a Government would be around gender guidance to schools!

Is that so? It was widely reported the week after the local elections that Number 10 actually made a point of telling the party any summer election was OFF and they could make plans accordingly.

Ha yeah! Was briefed to the Times that Sunaks mini circle basically created a ‘July election’ as plan A a month ago I think even before the locals which makes all this a lot more hilarious

[Pericles]

To be fair, the Tories would have already written off the youth vote. It is a smart idea when they are down 20 points to take the hit of alienating that vote even more in order to win wavering elderly low-education voters who are considering Reform. They have to know who the target audience is.

It's not like one policy would ever have much of an impact or even that the Tories could change their image much with a lot of policies this late. So it's pretty pointless. It's also doesn't look like this one is thought through that well, they just went with a policy that in the abstract polls and focus groups well with their target vote. That doesn't mean it lands well in an election campaign with the desired impact.

[TheTide]

To be fair, the Tories would have already written off the youth vote. It is a smart idea when they are down 20 points to take the hit of alienating that vote even more in order to win wavering elderly low-education voters who are considering Reform. They have to know who the target audience is.

It's not like one policy would ever have much of an impact or even that the Tories could change their image much with a lot of policies this late. So it's pretty pointless. It's also doesn't look like this one is thought through that well, they just went with a policy that in the abstract polls and focus groups well with their target vote. That doesn't mean it lands well in an election campaign with the desired impact.

Sunak himself of course has a BA from Oxford and an MBA from Stanford. What a lot of good that did.

[JimJamUK]

As someone who works with a lot of volunteers, please God no. We get them once a week for a few weeks and they are a complete waste of time. There’s no point training them up so we just have them sit on reception, take a long lunch and go home early. We’ve tried getting them to do very basic customer service/admin tasks, and at times it has had disastrous results. If someone actively wants to be there and can commit, great. If they don’t, then don’t even bother. Furthermore, I’m not sure how many organisations could even manage volunteers who can only do weekends. Many organisations don’t open for weekends and have limited staffing if they do. I’m sure they’d jump at the chance of forcing more employees to give up their weekends to manage a bunch of Asbos.

[JimJamUK]

If you fancy another laugh, the Political Compass website has been updated to 2024. Apparently Reform are to the left of the Conservatives, George Galloway is more libertarian than Labour, and the SNP led by John Swinney and Kate Forbes is interchangeable on economics with the Greens.

www.politicalcompass.org/uk2024

[Torrain]

The Workers Party have somehow managed to find a candidate who’s too antisemitic to associate with George Galloway. They’re still running the guy who reposts rants from the literal KKK about Jewish people though.
https://twitter.com/whazell/status/1794429480628322800

[Alcibiades]

The Conservatives say the scheme would involve 30,000 selective military placements where "the brightest and best" would get involved in cyber security, logistics, or civil response operations full-time for a year.

Everyone else would do 25 days, or one weekend a month for a year, with non-military organisations including the fire service, the police, the NHS or charities.

From a BBC article on this.

So it seems no one would actually be forced to do assault courses and get yelled at by a corporal, but I think that’s exactly the picture most people will have in mind when they skim the headlines about ‘national service’. Presumably the Tories would not be too unhappy to cultivate that impression in the minds of the voters this policy is clearly supposed to be aimed at, but I suspect that, for the most part, it will just work against them even more for all the reasons already discussed here as to why this is a laughable electoral ploy.

[afleitch]

The Conservatives say the scheme would involve 30,000 selective military placements where "the brightest and best" would get involved in cyber security, logistics, or civil response operations full-time for a year.

Everyone else would do 25 days, or one weekend a month for a year, with non-military organisations including the fire service, the police, the NHS or charities.

From a BBC article on this.

So it seems no one would actually be forced to do assault courses and get yelled at by a corporal, but I think that’s exactly the picture most people will have in mind when they skim the headlines about ‘national service’. Presumably the Tories would not be too unhappy to cultivate that impression in the minds of the voters this policy is clearly supposed to be aimed at, but I suspect that, for the most part, it will just work against them even more for all the reasons already discussed here as to why this is a laughable electoral ploy.

There's a genuine merit in having 'mandatory' voluntary work. If anything, retirees might get the most benefit in terms of wellbeing. It should fall on everyone to varying degrees.

Instead it's being used as a stick against the 'youth blob' with no payoff. You'll still have to pay student loans, you might have apprenticeships delayed etc. You get nothing from it.

[CumbrianLefty]

A certain "pollster" (*not* the world's worst PolProf this time) is screaming at anybody who will listen "you have all got this completely wrong - this is a masterstroke and an incredibly popular policy!"

[JimJamUK]

A certain "pollster" (*not* the world's worst PolProf this time) is screaming at anybody who will listen "you have all got this completely wrong - this is a masterstroke and an incredibly popular policy!"

He’s been doing this sort of thing for a while now. More in Common is also ran by a Tory, but at least they don’t act like the polling wing of the Conservative Party.

[Hnv1]

The Conservatives say the scheme would involve 30,000 selective military placements where "the brightest and best" would get involved in cyber security, logistics, or civil response operations full-time for a year.

Everyone else would do 25 days, or one weekend a month for a year, with non-military organisations including the fire service, the police, the NHS or charities.

From a BBC article on this.

So it seems no one would actually be forced to do assault courses and get yelled at by a corporal, but I think that’s exactly the picture most people will have in mind when they skim the headlines about ‘national service’. Presumably the Tories would not be too unhappy to cultivate that impression in the minds of the voters this policy is clearly supposed to be aimed at, but I suspect that, for the most part, it will just work against them even more for all the reasons already discussed here as to why this is a laughable electoral ploy.

are they trying to get their numbers with the 18-24 age group to 0%?

[Torrain]

Those who choose volunteering rather than the army aren’t going to be paid apparently. Despite being sent to do admin work in the NHS or frontline stuff with the fire service.

Combine that with the fact that Cleverly ruled out criminal sanctions for refusing to participate, and uptake would be tiny - mostly nerds like me who became fixated on the importance of the Duke of Edinburgh Scheme to getting into uni.

[Blair]

Some people are doing the whole 'well actually real people love this' but it's quite telling that the policy is already falling apart & Labour appear quite happy to let this take up an entire day of the campaign.

The latent blairite in me is coming out but it's telling that one of their first campaign announcements is being briefed as being about winning back reform voters rather than going for the people who will actually decide the election!

A certain "pollster" (*not* the world's worst PolProf this time) is screaming at anybody who will listen "you have all got this completely wrong - this is a masterstroke and an incredibly popular policy!"

I thought it was weird & then realised they were the outfit behind the polling that inwards or whatever that stupid Tory think tank is called included in their report on it; it has been pointed out the questions are actually very similar to the Yes Minister Sketch.

[bore]

As someone who works with a lot of volunteers, please God no. We get them once a week for a few weeks and they are a complete waste of time. There’s no point training them up so we just have them sit on reception, take a long lunch and go home early. We’ve tried getting them to do very basic customer service/admin tasks, and at times it has had disastrous results. If someone actively wants to be there and can commit, great. If they don’t, then don’t even bother. Furthermore, I’m not sure how many organisations could even manage volunteers who can only do weekends. Many organisations don’t open for weekends and have limited staffing if they do. I’m sure they’d jump at the chance of forcing more employees to give up their weekends to manage a bunch of Asbos.

We had a student teacher on their second placement in my department this year, which we were more than happy to support because someone did it for us and the whole future of the system relies on those with experience training the next generation. That said, there is no doubt that, because of the meetings, admin, supervisions and feedback they required for those weeks we all had to work significantly harder than normal - and this was with someone who was bright, conscientious, already reasonably competent in the classroom and - crucially - wanted to be there.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

'Bring Back National Service' is essentially the Conservative equivalent of 'we could... er... nationalize... *rolls dice*... the [insert here] industry'. It is an indicator that they are panicking and have irrationally decided that half-baked ideas that the stupidest members of their local associations and backbench like to trot out as solutions to every problem will strike a chord with the electorate.

[Lief 🗽]

You have to be so derangedly poll-brained to think that just because this gimmick has a plurality of support in the abstract that a single voter is going to actually change their vote over it.