As someone who gives a somewhat greater credibility to polls than many, I was not among those of the true faith who never doubted that Labour would do well, and indeed was, until late April, in despair as polls had consistently for about five months indicated a Tory landslide, for which the poor local election […]
Posts under ‘Westminster’
Election campaigning resumes today and tomorrow
May 25th, 2017 by James Elliott.General Election campaigning to resume today After the horrific attacks in Manchester on Monday evening, in which 22 people tragically lost their lives, Theresa May announced that General Election campaigning would be suspended. Campaigning will now resume, starting with local campaigning today followed by national campaigning tomorrow. Momentum have organised a series of campaigning sessions, including […]
Labour announces National Education Service to fund schools, colleges and university grants
May 11th, 2017 by James Elliott.Yesterday Labour announced a raft of pledges related to education, from primary schools to adult learning and covering just about everything in-between. Stating his intention to deliver a National Education Service, Jeremy Corbyn unveiled a set of policies that would begin to restore much of the funding lost under the Conservatives over the last seven years. Jeremy […]
Labour, the elections, and the polls
May 2nd, 2017 by Peter Rowlands.There is a tendency on the left to dismiss opinion polls, partly, and fairly, because they have proved to be significantly inaccurate in the two most important votes of the last two years, the 2015 election and the 2016 EU Referendum, and partly, and usually misguidedly, that what they tell us can always be overcome. […]
On the doors in Stoke Central
Feb 14th, 2017 by Phil Burton-Cartledge.Hoping for another sunny, balmy Saturday was too much to ask for. As Labour’s canvassing teams went door-to-door in the Stoke-on-Trent Central by-election last week, it was under clear skies and dry weather. Those same teams today went out in biting cold and a snow so desultory it couldn’t be arsed to leave even a light sprinkling. […]
Labour, Corbyn and the polls
Feb 6th, 2017 by Peter Rowlands.Pollsters in the UK do not have a very good standing, having got the two most important voting tests of the last two years, the 2015 election and the 2016 EU referendum, wrong by significant margins. Nevertheless, they are collectively not completely at variance with the results, and an average of the results of polls […]
How not to win an election
Jan 17th, 2017 by David Pavett.The only way for a divided party to win an election is if the other main contender for government is even more divided. Banking on that would clearly be the strategy of an idiot. Given that, the events of Tuesday 10th January are a cause for concern. We all know that the media is ever […]
The Richmond by-election and what it means
Dec 6th, 2016 by Peter Rowlands.Last week’s by-election in Richmond was the second resounding success for the Lib-Dems, after Witney, in using a by-election to demonstrate the breadth of opposition to Brexit, and it places them in a strong position to lead and promote such a campaign, despite having few MPs, and limited resources, certainly compared to Labour. I don’t […]
Jeremy Corbyn delivers another strong performance at PMQs
Oct 13th, 2016 by Newsdesk.Following on from his grilling of Theresa May on grammar schools, Jeremy Corbyn won a further round of plaudits for his performance yesterday at Prime Minister’s Questions. Corbyn’s opening salvo against Amber Rudd’s policy to “name and shame” workers received a flat denial from May, who claimed that public lists of which companies hire large amounts of […]
How Corbyn has changed Labour
Sep 20th, 2016 by Andy Newman.It is surely a remarkable illustration of how political parties change over time that the current Presidential candidate for the political party of Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant is Donald Trump. Whereas, during the Reconstruction period after the Civil War, white supremacist terrorists hunted down and killed members of the Republican Party across the Southern […]