Batley and Spen by-election

[Rimbaud]

This is the relevant quote from the article posted by Jeff Robinson which took the discussion in this direction.

“My brother was a miner, my dad was a builder, my mam was a barmaid who worked in mills, I was a nurse – you’re not going to vote anybody but Labour, are you?”

Cheryl Rowan, 62, is just the type of voter that the Labour party is desperately trying to hold on to in next week’s byelection in Batley and Spen, and in their former northern heartlands more generally.

She lives in one of a small row of council houses in Heckmondwike, a town formerly known for manufacturing blankets as part of West Yorkshire’s heavy woollen district. That industry is long gone.

“There’s no shoe factories, no textiles, we were a northern powerhouse but now we ain’t got anything but restaurants and a new swimming pool that’s getting built that you can work at, and care … there’s no other jobs,” Rowan says.

She appears to be a council tenant and not yet to have reached retirement age.

(I realise that one example isn't evidence of a wider trend)

Being a 62 year old council tenant also means she has been insulated from the problems facing younger workers today; in particular access to housing. Young people struggling with exploitative rents and insecure low wage contracts don't get access to council houses these days.

Ime, most of those voting Tory are older people who are insulated or out of touch with problems around access to housing and secure work. Issues that Corbyn's Labour mobilised voters around, but older voters who already had their own homes - or secure council tenancies - did not really relate to how bad problems with housing and wages are now.

 

[kenny g]

Interesting that in response to one of the most decisive and poisonous by-elections of recent years this thread appears to be entering the realms of poisonous division...

 

[Sasaferrato]

Being a 62 year old council tenant also means she has been insulated from the problems facing younger workers today; in particular access to housing. Young people struggling with exploitative rents and insecure low wage contracts don't get access to council houses these days.

Ime, most of those voting Tory are older people who are insulated or out of touch with problems around access to housing and secure work. Issues that Corbyn's Labour mobilised voters around, but older voters who already had their own homes - or secure council tenancies - did not really relate to how bad problems with housing and wages are now.

Could older people being more likely to vote than young people also be a skewing factor?

My grandson voted in the last Scottish election because his mother more or less made him, but none of his mates voted.

 

[killer b]

Interesting that in response to one of the most decisive and poisonous by-elections of recent years this thread appears to be entering the realms of poisonous division...

have you never been here before or something? this is a good-natured exchange of views.

 

[oryx]

Could older people being more likely to vote than young people also be a skewing factor?

I would say yes, definitely.

 

[belboid]

plus it tends to be better off folk who live longer

 

[Sasaferrato]

plus it tends to be better off folk who live longer

Yep, statistically undeniable.

 

[tim]

Being a 62 year old council tenant also means she has been insulated from the problems facing younger workers today; in particular access to housing. Young people struggling with exploitative rents and insecure low wage contracts don't get access to council houses these days.

Ime, most of those voting Tory are older people who are insulated or out of touch with problems around access to housing and secure work. Issues that Corbyn's Labour mobilised voters around, but older voters who already had their own homes - or secure council tenancies - did not really relate to how bad problems with housing and wages are now.

Except she clearly isn't isolated or out of touch. She makes it clear that the biggest problem is that there are no longer any decently-paid secure jobs.

“There’s no shoe factories, no textiles, we were a northern powerhouse but now we ain’t got anything but restaurants and a new swimming pool that’s getting built that you can work at, and care … there’s no other jobs,” Rowan says.

As to housing she lives in a town where the average price of a terrace house is £118,500 which is affordable for anyone with the aforementioned decent wage.
House Prices in Heckmondwike

 

[Rimbaud]

Except she clearly isn't isolated or out of touch. She makes it clear that the biggest problem is that there are no longer any decently-paid secure jobs.



As to housing she lives in a town where the average price of a terrace house is £118,500 which is affordable for anyone with the aforementioned decent wage.
House Prices in Heckmondwike

120,000 is not easily affordable if you don't have the money for a deposit and if you have to rent.

To say nothing of people working zero hours or temporary contracts who are not eligible for a mortgage.

 

[andysays]

120,000 is not easily affordable if you don't have the money for a deposit and if you have to rent.

To say nothing of people working zero hours or temporary contracts who are not eligible for a mortgage.

It appears to me that the largest single factor here is the absence of decently-paid secure jobs, which she explicitly mentions. If you don't have a decently-paid secure job, you will struggle to get a mortgage.

That absence is likely to mean that local younger people who can find a job elsewhere are likely to leave, but older people, in general statistical terms, are less likely to do so. In other words, I don't think your argument is really that different from the point she's making, it just approaches it from a different perspective.

 

[andysays]

Some of the other stuff that same interviewee says is interesting, BTW

Rowan, however, has had enough. Despite her lifelong affiliation to the party, she has gradually grown detached from it over the years, and for the first time in her life she will vote Conservative.

The reasons are myriad and stretch back years. As a Brexit supporter, she describes with disgust an image during the referendum campaign of remain politicians and Bob Geldof “on a yacht, shouting down at fishermen while drinking champagne”. She says Jeremy Corbyn “put me off totally”, and she does not think the party represents working-class people. “They’re all lawyers or doctors,” she says. “Keir Starmer – he was a lawyer, wasn’t it? He’s not Harold Wilson, is he?”

The reference to Wilson intrigues me. As has been mentioned before, he was an Oxford don before he became a politician.

So what's she referring to here? Is it just his northern-ness (which I vaguely remember he used to emphasise) or is there something else?

The only positive reason to vote Conservative rather than not vote Labour appears to be Brexit related stuff

 

[tim]

120,000 is not easily affordable if you don't have the money for a deposit and if you have to rent.

To say nothing of people working zero hours or temporary contracts who are not eligible for a mortgage.

Did you only read half my post? You seem to have skipped over the bit about the major problem being the availability of decently-paid secure jobs (obviously that excludes temporary or zero-hours contracts) being the primary problem.

 

[tim]

It appears to me that the largest single factor here is the absence of decently-paid secure jobs, which she explicitly mentions. If you don't have a decently-paid secure job, you will struggle to get a mortgage.

That absence is likely to mean that local younger people who can find a job elsewhere are likely to leave, but older people, in general statistical terms, are less likely to do so. In other words, I don't think your argument is really that different from the point she's making, it just approaches it from a different perspective.

Yes, but she's old, so Rimbaud is convinced that she's a reactionary

 

[chilango]

Labour go full LibDem in their latest leaflet

 

[tim]

Some of the other stuff that same interviewee says is interesting, BTW

Rowan, however, has had enough. Despite her lifelong affiliation to the party, she has gradually grown detached from it over the years, and for the first time in her life she will vote Conservative.

The reasons are myriad and stretch back years. As a Brexit supporter, she describes with disgust an image during the referendum campaign of remain politicians and Bob Geldof “on a yacht, shouting down at fishermen while drinking champagne”. She says Jeremy Corbyn “put me off totally”, and she does not think the party represents working-class people. “They’re all lawyers or doctors,” she says. “Keir Starmer – he was a lawyer, wasn’t it? He’s not Harold Wilson, is he?”

The reference to Wilson intrigues me. As has been mentioned before, he was an Oxford don before he became a politician.

So what's she referring to here? Is it just his northern-ness (which I vaguely remember he used to emphasise) or is there something else?

The only positive reason to vote Conservative rather than not vote Labour appears to be Brexit related stuff

If she's 62 her memories will of Wilson will only be slightly less vague than mine. She'll have been 16 or 17 when he stood down and a primary school child when he was at his peak. All I remember is a down-to-earth pipe-smoking Yorkshireman, which was his very well-cultivated public image.

 

[Rimbaud]

Did you only read half my post? You seem to have skipped over the bit about the major problem being the availability of decently-paid secure jobs (obviously that excludes temporary or zero-hours contracts) being the primary problem.

Well the perspective I'm coming at is, if she recognises that these are a problem, then why was she put off by Corbyn who had policies which aimed to address it?

In my experience talking about this with Grandparents and so on, people of that generation do not relate to the existential angst and anxiety around housing and so on. Corbyn was popular with young people because he was the first leader to address issues around housing and wages, which therefore had a resonance amongst private tenants.

It is not necessarily to so with her being old, but it is to do with her material conditions. General complaints about industrial decline going back decades are one thing, but experiencing first hand the insecure conditions of the labour Market which have been created by this government is another thing, as is having to move to find work and getting trapped in exploitative rent agreements.

If she is a council tenant, she likely has had council housing for a long time as it is extremely hard to get these days. Therefore issues which drew younger people to Corbyn - rent controls, more public housing, secure tenancies, right of tenants to buy from landlords - these promises were like mana from heaven for people stuck renting on low wages, but have far less resonance for someone who isn't, whether they are a home owner or someone who has lived securely in a council house for decades.

 

[andysays]

If she's 62 her memories will of Wilson will only be slightly less vague than mine. She'll have been 16 or 17 when he stood down and a primary school child when he was at his peak. All I remember is a down-to-earth pipe-smoking Yorkshireman, which was his very well-cultivated public image.

Yeah, I'm 56 and my memories of him are pretty vague.

Thinking about it, they may be based more on the Mike Yarwood impressions than the man himself...

 

[Kevbad the Bad]

Yeah, I'm 56 and my memories of him are pretty vague.

Thinking about it, they may be based more on the Mike Yarwood impressions than the man himself...

Not much resemblance to the real person, then.

 

[andysays]

Well the perspective I'm coming at is, if she recognises that these are a problem, then why was she put off by Corbyn who had policies which aimed to address it?

In my experience talking about this with Grandparents and so on, people of that generation do not relate to the existential angst and anxiety around housing and so on. Corbyn was popular with young people because he was the first leader to address issues around housing and wages, which therefore had a resonance amongst private tenants.

It is not necessarily to so with her being old, but it is to do with her material conditions. General complaints about industrial decline going back decades are one thing, but experiencing first hand the insecure conditions of the labour Market which have been created by this government is another thing, as is having to move to find work and getting trapped in exploitative rent agreements.

If she is a council tenant, she likely has had council housing for a long time as it is extremely hard to get these days. Therefore issues which drew younger people to Corbyn - rent controls, more public housing, secure tenancies, right of tenants to buy from landlords - these promises were like mana from heaven for people stuck renting on low wages, but have far less resonance for someone who isn't, whether they are a home owner or someone who has lived securely in a council house for decades.

You have a point here, but I think you're over doing it.

She isn't just making "general complaints about industrial decline going back decades", she refers to particular experiences of herself and her family.

I don't know if she has children herself, and if so why their perspectives aren't mentioned, but it could just be that she also said a great deal about that, but that the author chose not to include that.

At least part of the reason she was put off Corbyn could be to do with the way he was absolutely slated, both by the media and by traditionalists within the Labour party.

 

[Guineveretoo]

I was elaborating a point about property owners becoming comfortable. If you missed that, I should have been clearer.

What has that got to do with Sure Start, or a woman with a long name and a headdress? It certainly wasn't clear to me.

 

[AmateurAgitator]

As I've said before, I don't think dismissing working class Tories as less intelligent is a great way to go about understanding the issue, far less winning them back.

It may not be a great way of going about things but I've yet to encounter an intelligent tory voter, wether working class or not. Personally I don't see much intelligence in voting for any of the parties, but tory voters are a particular kind of stupid.

As for age, the vast majority of over 60's voters vote tory. Young people not voting may make some difference, but surely not much.

 

[kebabking]

I think it's a (justifiable?) nostalgia, and I think it's quite widely held - and not just by Labour voters.

People like Attlee, Bevan, Castle, Heally, Foot, Smith, Blair, even Kinnock etc.. are seen as being Big Beasts: real political giants who demanded respect regardless of whether you agree with them if not.

That seam of labour talent is seen as somewhat petering out since the early/mid-80's. I'm a bit of a news/politics nerd, and I can name 3 members of the shadow cabinet. Nonentities doesn't cover it...

I'm not suggesting some objective comparison, merely emotion, nostalgia, rose-tinted glasses or whatever - to a large extent it doesn't matter. All that matters is that people perceive it, and react to it.

 

[tim]

Not much resemblance to the real person, then.

Yarwood was probably at least as good at impersonating Harold Wilson as Harold Wilson was.
Both Healey and Wilson were certainly very happy to adopt some of the more endearing quirks that Yarwood's version of themselves endowed them with.

 

[tim]

Well the perspective I'm coming at is, if she recognises that these are a problem, then why was she put off by Corbyn who had policies which aimed to address it?

In my experience talking about this with Grandparents and so on, people of that generation do not relate to the existential angst and anxiety around housing and so on. Corbyn was popular with young people because he was the first leader to address issues around housing and wages, which therefore had a resonance amongst private tenants.

It is not necessarily to so with her being old, but it is to do with her material conditions. General complaints about industrial decline going back decades are one thing, but experiencing first hand the insecure conditions of the labour Market which have been created by this government is another thing, as is having to move to find work and getting trapped in exploitative rent agreements.

If she is a council tenant, she likely has had council housing for a long time as it is extremely hard to get these days. Therefore issues which drew younger people to Corbyn - rent controls, more public housing, secure tenancies, right of tenants to buy from landlords - these promises were like mana from heaven for people stuck renting on low wages, but have far less resonance for someone who isn't, whether they are a home owner or someone who has lived securely in a council house for decades.

Yes, well a lot of people of all ages didn't find Corbyn particularly impressive, often for quite good reasons. As to his policies, given that he couldn't get his own parliamentary party to agree with them, you can't really blame the electorate at large, as well as ageing Yorkshire folk for suspecting that, he would be able to introduce then even if there had been a Labour victory. Being old she is also probably remembers how little the last Labour Government actually did to bring back decent jobs, and their enthusiasm for low-paid jobs with fuck-all security.

Can I add, that whilst I' m sorry about your issues with your grandparents, it's probably a mistake to generalise based in those experiences?

 

[killer b]

I'm a bit of a news/politics nerd, and I can name 3 members of the shadow cabinet. Nonentities doesn't cover it...

How might the new big beasts of the modern Labour Party make themselves known as such? Looking at Kinnock's shadow cabinets, I wonder how many of those guys (it's all guys apart from Gwyneth Dunwoody and Jo Richardson) you'd have heard of if they hadn't been ministers in previous or future Labour governments?

 

[PR1Berske]

If anyone thinks that the Galloway entourage , complete with Toby Young and Lawrence Fox on this occasion, are walking around being showered with rose petals by the local electorate then check the security out here
View attachment 275374

I love this version of the photo with "Howling Laud Hope", the Monster Raving Loony Party candidate, standing to the side.

 

[Dogsauce]

120,000 is not easily affordable if you don't have the money for a deposit and if you have to rent.

To say nothing of people working zero hours or temporary contracts who are not eligible for a mortgage.

120 is an average, there will probably be small terraced houses or homes in less desirable areas for 80, flats for 50 or 60 if it’s anything like where I lived up that way.

People and the media commonly treat the average property price as ‘what it costs to buy a house‘ in any given area (the BBC used to have some calculator that showed you ‘where you could afford to live’ based on this) but it’s not a ‘typical’ cost and people start off on the lower rungs generally.

 

[Leighsw2]

I'm assuming that Labour have given up on Batley and are now banking on Galloway getting more votes than the Tory majority so they can blame him? All pretty desperate stuff!

There's a lot of focus on Muslim voters in this bye-election, but I wonder if white voters are abandoning Labour Hartlepool-style? And if they are, will we even hear about it?

 

[Leighsw2]

I was wondering about that as well....

 

[pbsmooth]

The right wing media have successfully made Labour = London while painting London as a city full of crime, illegal immigrants, trans rights, BLM, and lefties in million pound houses. No wonder people in Batley don't quite think they're the guys for them. Tories do tough on crime and go big on "traditional values" and it appeals to working class disillusioned just as well as the scared shitless by the Daily Mail middle class blue rinse brigade and the more militant Muslims.