Labour leadership

[brogdale]

Doesn't really matter tbh, what Corbyn's doing is setting himself up as the means by which people enunciate the problems they're facing - "Maria and XXX thousand people say you're doing this wrong" followed by "blah blah economy." He's the avatar of righteous anger over very real problems (and everyone has them), Cameron's the excuse maker.

Yes. That's the strength of the strategy...probably taken from the way that leaders have had to react to the public (named) questioning in the televised debates. Corbyn has put Cameron in a position where he will have to account...however ineffectively. As I said, a clever opening gambit. tbh, if I were him, I'd stick with it, but make sure that he had 'named' follow-ups to the inevitable bluster response from ham-head.

 

[Lord Camomile]

"Outrage as Corbyn ignores thousands of questions from party members"

 

[brogdale]

Maybe not terribly well, but Corbyn bossed the encounter. Cameron does not like 'fact'.

 

[brogdale]

"Outrage as Corbyn ignores thousands of questions from party members"

 

[The Octagon]

Did they really have the Corby MP ask a question just so they could make that joke?

 

[SpookyFrank]

Using questions from frontline staff in mental health and housing associations is also a good tactic. It's impossible for Cameron to dismiss their concerns without looking like a twat. And frontline mental health staff in particular and the services they work for have been kneecapped by funding cuts and technocrat wankers in the last five years.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Did they really have the Corby MP ask a question just so they could make that joke?

I'm more concerned about the fact that the people of Corby appear to have elected a foetus to parliament.

 

[Lord Camomile]

That was an interesting attack from the flanks, wonder if there was any discussion with the Tories about it or it was purely independent.

 

[kabbes]

Polly Filla makes an interesting point that 80% of the votes Corbinladen will need for a majority in 2020 have to come from CON to LAB switchers.

I pulled some data and did an actual analysis.

Data is here: Election Resources on the Internet: Parliamentary Elections in the U.K. - 2015 General Election Constituency Results

I'd like to upload my analysis but it is 391kb zipped and that seems to be too large for this site, unfortunately.

All I did was take each of the 330 Conservative victory seats in 2015 and considered what would happen if x% of the non-voters instead decided to vote Labour, with everything else remaining constant.

• At a 0.3% rate of non-voters becoming engaged with Labour, you start to get a swing. It starts to pick up rapidly from there.
• At a 5% rate of non-voters becoming engaged with Labour, you get enough of a swing for the Tories to drop to 316 seats, which would be enough to deny them victory.
• At 10%, Tory seats drop to 312. By 15% it drops to 303. By 20% it is 290. This is in the range of Labour largest party, I would have thought.
• At 25%, the Tories only have 272 seats, which (depending what happens in Scotland) is likely to see a Labour majority.

So there it is. Don't know where Polly Nonsense gets her information from but it is certainly possible for Corbyn to win purely on engaging non-voters. A 15% engagement rate would be an overall turnout of 71%, a 25% engagement takes it up to 75%. These are high turnouts but not impossible.

That doesn't even start to consider the effect of winning over LibDems, Greens and UKIP (and SNP of course, but that's another issue). If Corbyn can engage the 4 million UKIP and 1 million Green voters, that would also see him move a long way forward.

 

[Jeff Robinson]

just tuned in to PMQs. Con Party and DUP have already had a pop at JC in relation to the IRA, nuclear weapons and the national anthem. edit - oh I guess I tuned in late - i missed Corbyn!

 

[treelover]

That was an interesting attack from the flanks, wonder if there was any discussion with the Tories about it or it was purely independent.

What attack?

 

[andysays]

I pulled some data and did an actual analysis...

Thanks for that, certainly refutes the idea that the only way for Labour to win is to win over last times Tory voters. As I said before, I don't think Polly deals in anything as esoteric as actual substancial information or analysis of data.

 

[treelover]

SNPs Mhairi Black tweets -
"Tories sniggering every time Corbyn mentions a member of the public's name. At least they are real people, unlike those the DWP made up."

 

[Lord Camomile]

What attack?

DUP on "support" for terrorists. May well be heartfelt, but just wondering if there was any collusion with the Tories (and other parties) to take the swipes the Tories didn't want to take at this stage.

 

[Lord Camomile]

I have to say, I did think it was amusing, purely for its surrealness if nothing else. It reminded me of a kids TV show where kids write in questions for their favourite sports star.

 

[belboid]

I pulled some data and did an actual analysis.

Data is here: Election Resources on the Internet: Parliamentary Elections in the U.K. - 2015 General Election Constituency Results

I'd like to upload my analysis but it is 391kb zipped and that seems to be too large for this site, unfortunately.

All I did was take each of the 330 Conservative victory seats in 2015 and considered what would happen if x% of the non-voters instead decided to vote Labour, with everything else remaining constant.

• At a 20% rate of non-voters becoming engaged with Labour, you start to get a swing. It starts to pick up rapidly from there.
• At a 25% rate of non-voters becoming engaged with Labour, you get enough of a swing for the Tories to drop to 316 seats, which would be enough to deny them victory.
• At 30%, Tory seats drop to 306. By 33% it drops to 298. By 35% it is 288. This is in the range of Labour largest party, I would have thought.
• At 40%, the Tories only have 265 seats, which (depending what happens in Scotland) is likely to see a Labour majority.

So there it is. Don't know where Polly Nonsense gets her information from but it is certainly possible for Corbyn to win purely on engaging non-voters. A 30% engagement rate would be an overall turnout of 76%, a 40% engagement takes it up to 80%. These are high turnouts but not impossible.

That doesn't even start to consider the effect of winning over LibDems, Greens and UKIP (and SNP of course, but that's another issue). If Corbyn can engage the 4 million UKIP and 1 million Green voters, that would also see him move a long way forward.

are you assuming that all those pulled in would vote labour? If so, I think your projections are very optimistic. Around half non-voters would, probably, vote Labour, so getting the right 25% is quite an ask, its half the available cohort. It also doesn't take into account spread - lowest turnouts is (generally) in labour held seats where extra votes are (electorally) useless.

 

[SpookyFrank]

DUP on "support" for terrorists. May well be heartfelt, but just wondering if there was any collusion with the Tories (and other parties) to take the swipes the Tories didn't want to take at this stage.

Nobody mention that massive arms fair we just had where representatives from numerous countries that the UN has condemned for use of child soldiers and gross human rights abuses were invited to come along and fill their boots.

 

[belboid]

Yeah, maybe...but the newbie asserted himself and changed the agenda...a bit. He did not fall flat on his arse, did he?

Doesn't really matter tbh, what Corbyn's doing is setting himself up as the means by which people enunciate the difficulties they're facing - "Maria and XXX thousand people say you're doing this wrong" followed by "blah blah economy." He's the avatar of righteous anger over very real problems (and everyone has them), Cameron's the excuse maker. Today without ever having to make a policy point of his own he was the defender of people with housing problems, mental health issues etc against a man whose main response was "get a job."

both true statements. He certainly did okay, didn't give poshboy a chance to hammer him, and asked perfectly reasonable questions. Nothing killer in there tho. What he might well do is make PMQs even more boring, so thast no one pays it any attention.

 

[ViolentPanda]

What's her workings - or yours, as you're going to use them? I can't see any?

Ah, the prodigal son returneth, like a dog unto a bonio.

 

[Rob Ray]

both true statements. He certainly did okay, didn't give poshboy a chance to hammer him, and asked perfectly reasonable questions. Nothing killer in there tho. What he might well do is make PMQs even more boring, so thast no one pays it any attention.

Possibly, though tbh it's only been of interest to political wonks prepared to put up with half an hour of execrable public schoolboy shouting for most of my lifetime as it is.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Think Corbyn had a reasonable day today. the anti Corbyn establishment press were rather amusing as they sunk to new depths of ridiculous.

One of the ones that amused me was the claim that he never sang the national anthem today. FFS, he is republican, if he sang he would be called a hypocrite.

Oh and oh god, he is alleged to have stolen a sarnie from a war veteran, one that the increasing flapping Guido Faukes was pushing. now he is one establishment luvvie who is currently shaking like a shitting dog.

Corbo's speech at the TUC conference today was what so many wanted to hear. Delivery was ropey for parts, think he is shagged out after the last three month, but pushed all the right buttons for me.

I used to steal sandwiches from a blind war veteran all the time. Packets of 20 No. 6, too. I used to say to him "grandad, it's a harsh world, but I'm doing this for your own good, to teach you to trust no-one".
Old git used to twat me with his white cane! You just can't help some people!

 

[binka]

What he might well do is make PMQs even more boring, so thast no one pays it any attention.

has anyone really paid it any attention anyway? you might occasionally get a 10 second clip on the evening news but other than that it mostly goes unnoticed surely?

 

[DotCommunist]

ham head talking up the economic miracle in corby lol. I was there yesterday as I am most weeks. Its the same as it ever was.

 

[kabbes]

are you assuming that all those pulled in would vote labour? If so, I think your projections are very optimistic. Around half non-voters would, probably, vote Labour, so getting the right 25% is quite an ask, its half the available cohort. It also doesn't take into account spread - lowest turnouts is (generally) in labour held seats where extra votes are (electorally) useless.

Yes, it was just showing what is theoretically possible by persuading the disenfranchised and disengaged to vote for him.

Do I think he can get 40% of non voters to turn out for him whilst leaving Tory votes untouched? Probably not. Will he need to though? Hell no, he can persuade Lib Dem, Green, UKIP and even Tory voters to switch in addition.

If he pursuades just one in five non-voters to come out for him, he's already teetering on the edge of victory. At that point, a realistic proportion of swing votes would do it. Either way, the idea that 80% of his votes has to come from Tory swing is just ludicrous.

 

[brogdale]

are you assuming that all those pulled in would vote labour? If so, I think your projections are very optimistic. Around half non-voters would, probably, vote Labour, so getting the right 25% is quite an ask, its half the available cohort. It also doesn't take into account spread - lowest turnouts is (generally) in labour held seats where extra votes are (electorally) useless.

Yes, that's quite right. It's a good effort from Kabbes, but it appears to make some assumptions about the possibility of winning NVs over to Labour.

Like all GEs the 2020 contest will be won and lost in the key Con/Lab marginals which demographically tend towards higher levels of middle-class/socio-economic voters and lower levels of NV. Both of which make the likelihood of generating large numbers of 'new' Labour voters less tenable.

This sort of 'hope-cast' psephology also overlooks the fact that turning one single swing voter is, electorally, worth double that of any one additional, former NV that can be brought on board.

 

[ViolentPanda]

But, psephologically, it doesn't matter about their former motivations or inclinations; if they live in seats already held by Lab their re-engagement with the electoral process will have zero impact on the outcome.

Except in terms of size of majority.

 

[brogdale]

Except in terms of size of majority.

within the individual constituency, yes. Effect on the overall electoral outcome; zero.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Corbyn has always done this when he's speechifying, but it's a good tactic to use in the HoC - it personalises the issue and makes the sniggerers look childish/unprofessional/cuntish.

 

[kabbes]

Yes, that's quite right. It's a good effort from Kabbes, but it appears to make some assumptions about the possibility of winning NVs over to Labour.

Like all GEs the 2020 contest will be won and lost in the key Con/Lab marginals which demographically tend towards higher levels of middle-class/socio-economic voters and lower levels of NV. Both of which make the likelihood of generating large numbers of 'new' Labour voters less tenable.

This sort of 'hope-cast' psephology also overlooks the fact that turning one single swing voter is, electorally, worth double that of any one additional, former NV that can be brought on board.

It's a "what-if", not a forecast. It provides information about options, not assumptions.

One thing it does do, however, is use the actual voter turnout by constituency. So the demographics of non-voting are baked into the analysis. Check the data set.

 

[ViolentPanda]

I'm more concerned about the fact that the people of Corby appear to have elected a foetus to parliament.

TBF, a constituency that elected Louise Mensch are capable of electing anyone and anything.