emanymton
A cat politely sat on the flaming gardener.
I think it is just being used as a excuse to vote tory by some.
But maybe people are just so think they think Johnson is the true voice of the working class and I don't want to accept it.
Batley and Spen by-election
- Thread starter PR1Berske
- Start date
But maybe people are just so think they think Johnson is the true voice of the working class and I don't want to accept it.
ItWillNeverWork
Messy Crimbobs, fellow humans.
hang on a minute
i know his politics are a bit flexible, but he's going for the muslim vote and the far right vote at the same time?
A novel, although not unpredictable, intersectional positioning.
Smokeandsteam
Working Class First
There is undoubtedly a need for more work to be done on this. Let’s face it, until now there hasn’t been a lot of work done on the psephological impact of 45 years of neo-liberal hegemony in the field of both the economy and culture on working class communities. That’s it’s the dominant culture is beyond question, what is up for debate is the extent to which the residual culture of working class communities in ‘the red wall’ remains and the extent to which it periodically intervenes .
My starting point, which seems to have been overlooked in some of the comments above, is that this vote feels contingent. It is lent. That doesn’t mean that it’s coming back if Labour replace Starmer with Dawn Butler. It means it’s up for grabs is my guess
andysays
Love and solidarity
I don't particularly want to look for explanations on the level of individuals being thick or whatever.
It's a significant issue, had been for while, and is likely to remain so, so I think it's worth considering in ways which might allow us to counter it (which doesn't mean persuading people to vote Labour).
I agree with Smokeandsteam 's suggestion that Brexit may be a factor in this case, but it's an issue even when Brexit isn't a factor.
brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
In a sense all voting behaviour is contingent on the specific context, forces and drivers acting at any particular electoral event, and all voting is a process of lending sovereignty. I'm sure that the LP is hanging on to the belief that the present circumstances driving the working class Labour -> Con swings will pass and 'normal service' can be resumed, but I think you last point is the pertinent one.
Maybe we're witnessing a different form of Pasokification?
TopCat
Putin fanboy
Some people currently think working class people will be better served by the tories than labour.
Jeff Robinson
Marxist-Lentilist: Jackboots and Jackfruit
Yeah, the data I've seen shows that all demographics of the working population vote Labour more than Tory still, but the retired overwhelmingly vote tory, as to many home owners. As soon as people get any sort of material benefit, 'fuck everyone else' is sadly all to often the mindset.
Guineveretoo
Mostly bewildered
Does that mean they are less likely to vote Labour?
Correlation does not necessarily imply causation, but home owners are much more likely to vote Tory, yeah.
Jeff Robinson
Marxist-Lentilist: Jackboots and Jackfruit
Good graph in this article, it shows that, excluding retirees, all categories of workers earning less than £100,000 per annum are more likely to vote labour than tory. By contrast, when retirees are included, all categories earning more than £5000 per annum are more likely to vote tory:
Labour, not the Conservatives, was the largest party among low-income workers in 2019
The Tories owe their large majority to support from retired voters, not working-age ones.
www.newstatesman.com
PR1Berske
Alligator in chains by the park gates.
Home ownership, and persuading your children about home ownership, does funny things to voting intentions.
chilango
Hypothetical Wanker
Sure...and we're 20 years on from when the BNP grabbed a bunch of these votes.
My question is more about how much of this is:
w/c voters (as opposed to, say, m/c voters "with accents")
transferred from Labour to Tory (rather than previous Labour voters not voting, and the Tories picking up additional votes from elsewhere)
Indeed, is the Tory vote significantly increasing or are they just better placed to win with a small increase on their existing support?
Some of this might be easier to answer than others, but I do think caution and care is required when trying to unpick all of this.
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
Sharing a platform with a Hindu!
Jeff Robinson
Marxist-Lentilist: Jackboots and Jackfruit
Hindu fascist, Jewish fascist, Christian fascist, Islamic fascist. We are truly blessed to have a leader who has transcended the sectarian divide and is welcoming and open to fascists of all colours and creeds!
Guineveretoo
Mostly bewildered
The implication was that, once we have paid off our mortgages (being of the generation which was able to take out mortgages in the 90s when houses were a tad more affordable, and/or people who bought their council house in the 90s), we suddenly start voting Tory. Is there any evidence of that?
In fact, is there evidence that working class people who own their own home, even with a mortgage, are more likely to vote Tory?
Guineveretoo
Mostly bewildered
I took out my mortgage in 1993. I didn't stop voting Labour. My daughter took out a mortgage about 10 years ago, with her partner. They are both still voting Labour.
So, doesn't always follow....
Guineveretoo
Mostly bewildered
Is this about paying off mortgages?Good graph in this article, it shows that, excluding retirees, all categories of workers earning less than £100,000 per annum are more likely to vote labour than tory. By contrast, when retirees are included, all categories earning more than £5000 per annum are more likely to vote tory:
Labour, not the Conservatives, was the largest party among low-income workers in 2019
The Tories owe their large majority to support from retired voters, not working-age ones.
I don't think it's a personal dig against you, it's just what every bit of analysis on voting behaviour ever has shown - that properly owners and older people are more likely to vote tory. It's why the tories are keen on right to buy schemes and the like - it's about creating voters who're more likely to vote for them.
brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
There's another variable in the voter churn of the 'red wall' seats; that of the post-2010 collapse of LD support going to Tory. Even with the LP's 'red-wall' vote share holding up (relatively well) the FPTP implications of the LD -> Con swings have taken their toll.
Off course such 'analysis' predates the disastrous Starmer incumbency.
Guineveretoo
Mostly bewildered
I didn't think it was. It just seemed odd to suggest that paying off our mortgages and failing to get our state pension (because of the bastard Tories moving the pension age for women by 6 years) would cause people to vote Tory when they had not done so before.
Perhaps I just misunderstood what was meant.
Kevbad the Bad
Amiable Bowel Syndrome
Surely the message to take away from that is that pensioners, rather than property owners, are the ones more likely to vote Tory. The Tories introduced the triple lock pension, and so far have yet to change track on that. If poor pensioners vote in a purely selfish way (not saying they all do) then they might well decide to vote Tory just to keep their state pension going.
I'm not sure what the mechanism is that results in older property owners being more likely to vote tory, but you can't argue with the data.
Loose meat
Well-Known Member
You see it in Lambeth Labour all the time - the quintesential Tory policy of annual residential property inflation making owner-occupiers incrementally comfortably numb.
They drop out of activism, they start to rely on Newsnight, they became less engaged with others less fortunate in their own communities (remind me, what did Sure Start do, was it that woman with the long name and headress?), they start to create their own hero narratives around life success (made it against the odds ... despite being a Woman!!). Obv. got on the property ladder with parental help or other good fortune but that gets pushed aside in the heroism of their self-narrated life story.
The Labour Party ends up as a social group for them, something that gets them out the house for an evening a month: Lambeth Labour.
They drop out of activism, they start to rely on Newsnight, they became less engaged with others less fortunate in their own communities (remind me, what did Sure Start do, was it that woman with the long name and headress?), they start to create their own hero narratives around life success (made it against the odds ... despite being a Woman!!). Obv. got on the property ladder with parental help or other good fortune but that gets pushed aside in the heroism of their self-narrated life story.
The Labour Party ends up as a social group for them, something that gets them out the house for an evening a month: Lambeth Labour.
Raheem
Well-Known Member
It's not really and either/or question though. Pensioners are more likely to vote Tory. Home owners are more likely to vote Tory. IMO pensioners are currently a bigger problem for Labour, though.
Guineveretoo
Mostly bewildered
Can you link to the data that shows former Labour voters becoming Tory voters as they pay off their mortgages? That is what is concerning me.
Guineveretoo
Mostly bewildered
Sure Start was a Labour Government initiative providing childcare support and children's centres which was ended by the Bastard Tories. Not what you are thinking of, I suspect.
I'm not sure the data is granular enough to show that. Rather it's a theory that explains the data that shows older property owners favour the tories - ie, that owning a property outright and living off a pension changes your relationship with the means of production etc, and therefore which party is most aligned with your interests (this doesn't mean all older property owners vote tory - obviously there's plenty who don't, including you and your daughter). There may be other theories that explain this, but it makes reasonable sense to me.
