UK and Europe World • Page 35

John Major on the Tories doing a deal with the DUP

 

I think the Tories are trying to push for a new election as a means to get rid of May.

 

I see what you're saying.

I think the problem with any perspective at the moment is that there are a lot of 'ifs'!

I'm cautious with polls. A second election could work or it might be awful. I'm still concerned that places like Mansfield went to the Conservatives. Ashfield which is next door in Nottinghamshire and where I grew up was only just saved by Labour. Yes, there are lots of constituencies where Labour stole or nearly stole Conservative seats but that just shows that it's an unpredictable time.

Incidentally, Scotland would be key for me. It's crazy that those Scottish seats basically gave May a second chance. Without them we'd be looking at some kind of progressive alliance.

 

I was thinking that Scotland would definitely be a huge thing for the next election. How crazy would it be if all those SNP-cum-Conservative seats immediately swung back to SNP or even labour after the conservatives embarassed themselves and the Blairites are no longer telling people to vote conservative to stop Corbyn

 

It's fair to say that the momentum is with Labour. They took massive steps forward during this election, while the Tories took several steps back. That didn't just happen because it's an unpredictable time, it happened because Corbyn offered a real alternative. This article is worth a read:

I think it's worth fighting for a Labour government, rather than just giving in to a minority Tory government propped up by the DUP. I don't want to see cross party talks. Labour needs to oppose the Tories and everything they stand for. If Labour work with the Tories on Brexit, what message does that send to the electorate? That all the parties are just the same? Cos that's what happened when Labour shared a platform with the Tories during the Scottish referendum in 2014. Labour were then promptly wiped out in Scotland in the 2015 general election. It's also the reason why Corbyn and John McDonnell distanced themselves from the official Remain campaign during the EU referendum. As McDonnell said when Sadiq Khan shared a platform with David Cameron during that campaign: "Sharing a platform with them discredits us. It demotivates the very people we are trying to mobilise." Labour are in a really strong position atm, and they need to do everything they can to destroy the Tories, not join forces with them.

 

The momentum was with the Tories/May seven weeks ago. Things change quickly. But Labour definitely have the momentum now and I agree that they're in a strong position. I also agree that they should oppose the minority government in every single way possible.

That article is great and it's great that they're in a position where a small swing would result in victory. Yes, Corbyn offered a real and credible alternative - that shouldn't be ignored. However, it also shouldn't be overplayed. The swing in this election could easily be argued as a swing back to two party politics as much as a swing to Corbyn. (The reality is it's a bit of both. Both played a part.)

I know I keep coming back to it but it's so fascinating to me growing up in a poor, post-mining community that a seat like Mansfield could go blue. People NEVER vote Conservative in these areas. The fact that they are so pro-Brexit and were completely convinced that the Conservatives were the only party that could deliver that for them is a significant undercurrent to our political situation. It's that kind of sentiment that I'm talking about when I use the word unpredictable. It is crazy! It is absorbing and interesting too for the political enthusiast.

Politics has changed: the fact that lifetime working class people voted Conservative indicates that Brexit was more important than a lifetime commitment to Labour. The fact that Scottish people voted Conservative indicates that a second independence referendum was less appealing than all the rubbish stuff that Conservative policy has caused to Scotland. It is fascinating. Will this carry on to the next election? I haven't a clue. But I have to come back to these factors because they're so unexpected. I've never seen a chunk of blue in Scotland in my political lifetime. And if you'd said Mansfield would vote Conservative in 2017 when I was growing up we wouldn't have believed you!

I appreciate what you are saying about sharing a platform and that discredits and diminishes people. I can understand that fear and I think your example of Scotland after the Scottish referendum is a good one. It could work both ways though - particularly with May looking weak. No doubt, if she is forced to go for any kind of Brexit different to the hard Brexit that she was championing last week then she looks weak and she is discredited in many people's eyes.

Anyhow, if that's what the Labour perspective is at the top then, of course, there's no real chance of anyone working together on Brexit. But working together on this issue is still my preference and I'm happy to throw that out there because I want to believe in humanity, as hard as that it is politics, and I want to believe that people coming together, listening, learning and acting in humility will always result in something better. Will that happen in politics? Can it even happen in politics? Probably not, but I still want to hope.

Thanks for debating and coming back with some really good points and articles. I have enjoyed being part of this thread in the last two weeks and listening to several different opinions. In this case I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, just trying to offer a different perspective.

 

Strong & stable... wind

 

My biggest worry in the event of a general election is that it's timed for university holiday times- around Christmas or next Easter. This would result in areas like Canterbury and Lancaster where the majority is modest at best being brought into question because the student vote that pushed these results in Labour's favour would be gone and it'd just leave more rural areas having more uneven Tory majorities. Seems like a typical tactic from the Tories and would make grassroots campaigning much harder.

 

Would be very interested to see which seats these would be. Chippenham had Labour in 3rd behind the Lib Dems but I could imagine solid campaigning there could steal a sufficient number of the 45,000 other seats in the area given that turnout was so high there.

 

Christ she's an embarrassment.

 

Oh my lord.

 

Yeah that's horrific, I hope everyone got/gets out ok.

 

What a horrible situation.

 

Thought this was one of those satire articles from The Daily Mash or something, but uhhh...

Theresa May rolls out new unemployment benefits, but only for Tory MPs who lost their seats | The Canary

 

Fantastic article jointly written by Clive Lewis (Labour MP) and Caroline Lucas (Green MP). Sums up my thoughts quite well.

A true progressive alliance would have made Jeremy Corbyn prime minister.