ska invita
back on the other side
yeah there has been a rumour for a while that he might run for that - he absolutely could run
Jeremy Corbyn's time is up
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Brainaddict
slight system overdrive
Ken Livingstone managed it so it is possible - and probably a better path to choose than trying to hang onto his seat. But he is such a reviled figure now that I don't think he would be able to pull it out the bag - you have to appeal to an array of people, not just self-described socialists.
Idris2002
Stay Alive in '25
Heard her on R4 this morning. Is there a good account of the Case Against Hodge that doesn't have the Mark of the Loonspuds upon it, by the way?
marty21
One on one? You're crazy.
Ken had a bigger London base , he was leader of the GLC until Thatcher cancelled it , Corbyn's power base is Islington/Hackney basically , not sure he could swing the Mayorship , particularly if he ran against Khan.
And he'd have been in with a better chance a few years ago too I reckon.
also Livingston won under a different voting system.
it's FPTP now which favours the main two party candidates.
his hobby horses are in foreign policy areas. the limited remit of the mayor's office seems a bad fit. what would he do with it?
surely it's more likely he turns his full attention to his own Peace And Justice Project and campaigning those causes?
it's FPTP now which favours the main two party candidates.
his hobby horses are in foreign policy areas. the limited remit of the mayor's office seems a bad fit. what would he do with it?
surely it's more likely he turns his full attention to his own Peace And Justice Project and campaigning those causes?
ska invita
back on the other side
most likely he'll run as an independent IMO - a constituency MP is what he is all about
MickiQ
In My Defence I was left Unsupervised
My own guess is that Corbyn just won't run, he'll be 75 come the next election and win or lose the result will cause a kerfuffle in the Labour Party and the broader Labour movement that will end up with what little is left of the Labour Left (the puns come so naturally) getting a bit of a kicking. Corbyn has always struck me as someone smart enough to figure out which way the wind is blowing and to know when to not bother pissing into it.
I don't think he would win myself (though I would definitely expect him to come second), The Labour vote was 64% of the vote last time (73% in 2017) so any Corbyn votes will have to come entirely from the Labour pool of voters, he isn't going to pick up any votes from the non-Labour pool though the official Labour candidate might.
He might very well be popular locally but I find it hard to believe that 35% of Islington North's total voters are Corbyn's personal vote share. Especially at a GE when folks won't really be voting for the local candidate but who gets the keys to No 10. Besides that if you're not a Corbyn fanboy why would you vote for him? His Parliamentary career is over and all he is going to do is sit on the backbenches for maybe another five years.
He may or may not be a great constituency MP but why would that factor into your voting if you weren't expecting to need to speak to him (and most people don't)
However even if he does run and he does win then Starmer hasn't really lost the seat anyway. Corbyn is going to vote (or abstain at most) with a Labour Govt on most votes anyway isn't he? The sort of votes where he probably would vote against a Labour Govt are going to be the sort of votes where he would have not to-ed the company line even if he was in the Party.
I don't think he would win myself (though I would definitely expect him to come second), The Labour vote was 64% of the vote last time (73% in 2017) so any Corbyn votes will have to come entirely from the Labour pool of voters, he isn't going to pick up any votes from the non-Labour pool though the official Labour candidate might.
He might very well be popular locally but I find it hard to believe that 35% of Islington North's total voters are Corbyn's personal vote share. Especially at a GE when folks won't really be voting for the local candidate but who gets the keys to No 10. Besides that if you're not a Corbyn fanboy why would you vote for him? His Parliamentary career is over and all he is going to do is sit on the backbenches for maybe another five years.
He may or may not be a great constituency MP but why would that factor into your voting if you weren't expecting to need to speak to him (and most people don't)
However even if he does run and he does win then Starmer hasn't really lost the seat anyway. Corbyn is going to vote (or abstain at most) with a Labour Govt on most votes anyway isn't he? The sort of votes where he probably would vote against a Labour Govt are going to be the sort of votes where he would have not to-ed the company line even if he was in the Party.
AnnO'Neemus
Is so vanilla
I know a fair few people who joined the party in the run up to Corbyn becoming leader and after he was voted in. Many of them were very active, going to meetings, leafleting, canvassing on foot and by phone, many going to campaign/canvas in marginal areas too.
Most of them have now left the party.
It's all very well expelling people from the party or pushing them out, effectively making the party so hostile that they resign themselves, but come the next election they will struggle to get enough foot soldiers to do that kind of thing.
Corbynism/Momentum was more of a mass movement.
Starmer doesn't inspire that kind of effort and activity.
I think that coupled with women's rights* will impact results in the next election, loss of seats and/or low turnout.
*I know a fair few lefty gender critical feminists who feel politically homeless and won't be voting Labour.
He's spent pretty much his entire career doing just that.
I suspect he'd pick some up from the Greens. I also suspect turnout might go up. And I wouldn't be at all surprised if a lot of Labour members voted for him.
I think you might be surprised.
You might have to take my word for this but I'm often astonished by the number of people locally who've met him. (I live in the constituency next door and i think everyone I know who lives in Islington N has met him at least once. And these aren't generally political people either.) He's been an MP for a long time, attends a lot of local stuff. I guess we'll seen if he does decide to stand.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Whatever you think of Corbyn, he is a very hard-working constituency MP. Over time, some MPs do build up a sizeable personal vote, and he's definitely one of those. Why would you vote for someone else when you know the sitting MP is a good MP?
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
His constituency definitely. The mayoralty is much harder, though, and as pointed out, they've made the voting system less democratic, so quite probably not. There would be a real danger of the tory winning if Corbyn stood.
MickiQ
In My Defence I was left Unsupervised
I'm sure he has but I don't think it's more than HALF the entire Labour vote which is what he would need.
ska invita
back on the other side
I like the idea of him standing as mayor, i think it would be a very lively campaign
Nylock
I hate 'these days'...
If by 'lively' you mean insufferable amounts of red-baiting, the usual political ghouls getting vast amounts of airtime on why him even participating in the race is a Bad Thing And Should Be Stopped and the more frothy of our right-wing rags going into full-on "END OF DAYS!" mode then, yeah, it'll certainly be 'lively'.
ska invita
back on the other side
vastly preferable to the general government of national unity we have right now
Monkeygrinder's Organ
Dodgy geezer swilling vapid lager
I think there's also a very significant potential left of Labour (which lets face it isn't particularly left at all) vote there that isn't particularly tied to Corbyn, beyond the fact that he'd be a candidate with a chance not some tiny sect no-hoper. And the more Starmer makes it clear that he thinks his target audience is some furious northern small business owner who happens to have an accent, the more that will be there.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Why not? Livingstone did it with a personal vote at the level of the entire city. Why wouldn't Corbyn do it at the constituency level? If I were a betting person, I'd be wagering that Corbyn would win easily. Might even shunt the Labour candidate into third behind the Tories, which is what Livingstone did to Dobson.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
In fact, I'd frame it the other way. The Labour candidate would have to take more than HALF of the entire Corbyn vote to win.
not a trot
Well-Known Member
Surely potential Corbyn voters are beyond all that shit.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
I would agree if they hadn't changed the voting system. (How the fuck was that even allowed? ) Khan is an ineffectual centrist fuck, but he's still better than a tory.
Corbyn as London mayor would be a fantastic result. Is it worth the risk? Dunno.
MickiQ
In My Defence I was left Unsupervised
Because voting for Mayor and voting a Govt are 2 different things. It could very well turn out that Islington North turns out to be also a completely different contest fought against the backdrop of a larger contest. I'm doubtful but we will see come the day.
This alas is nonsense there is no way of knowing what the 'Corbyn' vote as distinct from the 'Labour' vote is without him running as a candidate. It is clearly a subset of the 34,000 some votes that he got last time, it might only be 10 or it might be 10,000 (which wouldn't be enough) but I very much doubt it is all 34,000+
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
There would be quite a few who would vote for him but not Labour. He'd Get some votes from the Greens, a fe libs even, tho mostly people who wouldn't otherwise vote.
Larry O'Hara
Well-Known Member
I heard that vile creature Hodge.Hodge was on the radio this morning twisting the knife again. So Corbyn's Labour time is up.
BBC News - Jeremy Corbyn won't be Labour candidate at next election, says Starmer
Jeremy Corbyn won't be Labour candidate at next election, says Starmer
Sir Keir Starmer says the party has changed permanently under his leadership and "we are not going back".www.bbc.co.uk
A few points
1) despicable no mention of Forde Report showing anti-Senitism slur vs JC regime untrue
2) Highly telling that when asked whether anti-Zionist Jews should leave Labour she basically said yes. Showing again the anti-Semitism slurs were/are just a smokescreen
Larry O'Hara
Well-Known Member
Your articulacy is exceeded only by your stupidity
YouSir
Retired from Urban
Whatever it is now is more or less irrelevant. Chances are the media would be daft enough to fixate on the seat as a battle between Corbyn and Labour to the point where it becomes a national story. Locally - on past form - that won't necessarily have much of an impact but a month or two of the Right Wing press hammering him again might galvanize his support on the principle of 'fuck 'em'. People like an underdog and the old attack lines have lost a lot of their shine, especially in his seat where they weren't that effective to start with.
Benjamin F
Lost my faith in Nihilism
It's possible that Corbyn as a personality might win his own seat or even London Mayor (as Livingstone managed), but there seems little chance that it will generate a new radical left social democratic party.
First, because of Corbyn's own personal failings and ineffectiveness.
Second, as a general weakness of the social democratic (and Leninist) left, any such movement quickly falls into leader-worship (see everything from Gerry 'rapist' Healy to Tommy 'grass' Sheridan). With the leadership-principle in place, improvements cannot be made and the organisation is quickly corrupt. Decisions are made on how far it forwards the ambitions of the Great Man. Thus, the new party is regarded, rightly, with the same suspicion as all the other political parties that act on the exact same principle.
Third, because if it had even the slightest chance of making headway it would attract all the left-wing parasites that have sucked the life of so many marginally-effectively oppositional movements in the past. From grifters to nutters. To deal with them you'd even need a tightly-disciplined organisation of control (like the SWP, WRP, CP) and hence limit support and participation and gain a reputation for authoritarianism or else if more democratic and open, it become tainted by the conspiracy nuts. Easy meat for the corporate media and standard parties to attack on.
Fourth, because even with Corbyn and one or two of his last few Labour MP supporters (who would have to defect), the new party would lack the most basic material resources to actively compete as an electoral force.
So even if Corbyn pulled off a few electoral heroics, there would be little to threaten the Starmer's Labour Party.
In my life time all semi-effective opposition in the UK has come from outside electoral politics: fighting unions, anti-poll tax campaigns, anti-roads direct action, anti-capitalist demos. They've certainly been more fun than my brief (but still too long) time in left-electoralism.
First, because of Corbyn's own personal failings and ineffectiveness.
Second, as a general weakness of the social democratic (and Leninist) left, any such movement quickly falls into leader-worship (see everything from Gerry 'rapist' Healy to Tommy 'grass' Sheridan). With the leadership-principle in place, improvements cannot be made and the organisation is quickly corrupt. Decisions are made on how far it forwards the ambitions of the Great Man. Thus, the new party is regarded, rightly, with the same suspicion as all the other political parties that act on the exact same principle.
Third, because if it had even the slightest chance of making headway it would attract all the left-wing parasites that have sucked the life of so many marginally-effectively oppositional movements in the past. From grifters to nutters. To deal with them you'd even need a tightly-disciplined organisation of control (like the SWP, WRP, CP) and hence limit support and participation and gain a reputation for authoritarianism or else if more democratic and open, it become tainted by the conspiracy nuts. Easy meat for the corporate media and standard parties to attack on.
Fourth, because even with Corbyn and one or two of his last few Labour MP supporters (who would have to defect), the new party would lack the most basic material resources to actively compete as an electoral force.
So even if Corbyn pulled off a few electoral heroics, there would be little to threaten the Starmer's Labour Party.
In my life time all semi-effective opposition in the UK has come from outside electoral politics: fighting unions, anti-poll tax campaigns, anti-roads direct action, anti-capitalist demos. They've certainly been more fun than my brief (but still too long) time in left-electoralism.
MickiQ
In My Defence I was left Unsupervised
Doesn't matter, in 2019 54,000 people voted 34,000 for him. He needs about 17-18,000 to win. Even if he could take EVERY Green vote he would lose by a landslide without taking about a third of the Labour vote off them.
It's not impossible if Labour offer a particularly shit candidate but I think the odds are against him.
YouSir
Retired from Urban
People are already assuming Labour will win nationally and the expectations are of a low turnout all over (at least the tea leaf reading over council elections suggests it), his support will mobilise though so numbers could be very different to last time. Plus I wouldn't be hugely surprised if he took a third of Labour's support, whatever the numbers, with relative ease. Be willing to bet that party membership is down by a third from his time locally at least and while that measures next to nothing those people will have friends/family/communities that they'll encourage to have a punt on Corbyn.
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