Very good article. That's why party politics is directionless when it needs to do the right thing as opposed to saying what it thinks is the right thing to get elected.

:lol: Well that one poll certainly overrides the countless other polls showing the majority of people oppose further spending cuts!

:lol: Well that one poll certainly overrides the countless other polls showing the majority of people oppose further spending cuts!

One of the issues you've named consistently for people not voting Labour is that they're not sure if they'd make a difference - it shows pretty clearly that concerns over spending is far more of a concern for Labour than that.

 

In any case, it's pretty well documented by now that people can still have concerns over a party's systematic approach even if they agree with the individual policies that go with that approach - just take the whole thing that plagued the Tories in the early 00s where people would agree with lists of their policies and then recoil from them the second they found out they were Tory policy!

One of the issues you've named consistently for people not voting Labour is that they're not sure if they'd make a difference - it shows pretty clearly that concerns over spending is far more of a concern for Labour than that.

 

In any case, it's pretty well documented by now that people can still have concerns over a party's systematic approach even if they agree with the individual policies that go with that approach - just take the whole thing that plagued the Tories in the early 00s where people would agree with lists of their policies and then recoil from them the second they found out they were Tory policy!

 

No it doesn't - the complaint of how they wouldn't make things different/any better is on 61% in that very poll!

Edited February 2, 201510 yr by Danny

I meant for them personally - the one on 46%.

So you think people are flocking from Labour to Green, UKIP and SNP because they're worried about Labour overspending?

Edited February 2, 201510 yr by Danny

i think the last category is the telling one - people generally think Labour are on the side of people like them (presumably not rich people) but have issues with their record and policy presentation, with doubts about Ed. UKIP voters appear to be in a world of their own in any category. Presumably Ed could conjure up pots of gold with a magic genie for everyone in the country and they'd still moan about said Mr Genie being an illegal immigrant.

So you think people are flocking from Labour to Green, UKIP and SNP because they're worried about Labour overspending?

I don't think anyone's making that argument.

So you think people are flocking from Labour to Green, UKIP and SNP because they're worried about Labour overspending?

No. I think the reason we're at a stage where those converts are fatal is because people are worried Labour will overspend. If that weren't a worry, I doubt a few people going off to file with the Greens would be bringing us to existential crisis.

No. I think the reason we're at a stage where those converts are fatal is because people are worried Labour will overspend. If that weren't a worry, I doubt a few people going off to file with the Greens would be bringing us to existential crisis.

 

So who are these "centrist" people who you'd expect to be coming over to Labour if they weren't worried about 'overspending' then? Bearing in mind that the Tories are down at core vote levels and made up mostly of people who never even voted for Blair.

 

As an aside, I love how so many Progress Tendency people (not just you) have always been the ones who always claim that Labour can't "write off" certain types of voters, yet are now writing off whole swathes of the electorate as impossible for Labour to gain and undesirable even if they were possible. There's no point pandering to Green voters because they're too flighty and unwilling to "engage with the real world". UKIP voters are too racist and too far gone with their hatred of the establishment to ever vote for them. SNP voters are too bitter and too unwilling to listen to reason. That's a whole quarter of the voting public between them -- where exactly are the votes supposed to come from to boost Labour from their current pitiful standing if a quarter of voters are being declared off-limits?

Edited February 3, 201510 yr by Danny

Not belittling the danger of those parties to the Labour vote, but in the last few polls we've been edging back up towards 35% again. That's the kind of figure where a while back it was thought that the Tories would have to win more votes than us just to prevent a majority. Probably not the case now, but definitely conceivable that a Labour-SNP agreement would be over that threshold.

 

Assuming that story a while back about their potential candidate is a red herring and they're not just going to do a Clegg.

Not belittling the danger of those parties to the Labour vote, but in the last few polls we've been edging back up towards 35% again. That's the kind of figure where a while back it was thought that the Tories would have to win more votes than us just to prevent a majority. Probably not the case now, but definitely conceivable that a Labour-SNP agreement would be over that threshold.

 

Assuming that story a while back about their potential candidate is a red herring and they're not just going to do a Clegg.

 

every party entering into a coalition is "going to do a Clegg" or there's no chance of a coalition. The only way that is avoidable is if they both have identical policies. Which of course, never happens or there's no point one of the parties existing.

 

I'm still looking forward to Ed's announcement on student fees of course, and seeing how students react to that....

So who are these "centrist" people who you'd expect to be coming over to Labour if they weren't worried about 'overspending' then? Bearing in mind that the Tories are down at core vote levels and made up mostly of people who never even voted for Blair.

 

As an aside, I love how so many Progress Tendency people (not just you) have always been the ones who always claim that Labour can't "write off" certain types of voters, yet are now writing off whole swathes of the electorate as impossible for Labour to gain and undesirable even if they were possible. There's no point pandering to Green voters because they're too flighty and unwilling to "engage with the real world". UKIP voters are too racist and too far gone with their hatred of the establishment to ever vote for them. SNP voters are too bitter and too unwilling to listen to reason. That's a whole quarter of the voting public between them -- where exactly are the votes supposed to come from to boost Labour from their current pitiful standing if a quarter of voters are being declared off-limits?

When did anybody write them off? Jim Murphy's whole remit is to win voters back from the SNP. You're literally just making up straw men at this point!

 

Genuinely, the only one of those that has had much of an argument to be 'ruled out' is UKIP, and I think even if you disagree with the argument for that you can see why people are worried about a bidding war on immigration. And I find it funny that people who insist eternally that you don't win Tory voters by meeting them halfway/taking their positions seem to think you win back all voters by doing the same thing with their respective parties!

When did anybody write them off? Jim Murphy's whole remit is to win voters back from the SNP. You're literally just making up straw men at this point!

 

Genuinely, the only one of those that has had much of an argument to be 'ruled out' is UKIP, and I think even if you disagree with the argument for that you can see why people are worried about a bidding war on immigration. And I find it funny that people who insist eternally that you don't win Tory voters by meeting them halfway/taking their positions seem to think you win back all voters by doing the same thing with their respective parties!

 

I don't think Labour should echo UKIP on immigration, or echo some of the Greens' more crackpot ideas about purposely killing off economic growth (not least because I don't actually think a lot of people who are voting UKIP/Green are really doing so for those reasons). But my argument is that there's no alternative to Labour trying to win over those voters, even if the way to win them is open to debate -- would you agree that there are practically no votes left to be won from the Tories since they're literally bumping along the bottom?

Edited February 3, 201510 yr by Danny

Not really - numerically they're bumping along the bottom, but a lot of the votes they've lost are votes they had in 1997 or during their really bad years, while now having voters that voted Labour in 2005 but don't trust Ed.

every party entering into a coalition is "going to do a Clegg" or there's no chance of a coalition. The only way that is avoidable is if they both have identical policies. Which of course, never happens or there's no point one of the parties existing.

 

I'm still looking forward to Ed's announcement on student fees of course, and seeing how students react to that....

Every party has to make compromises in a coalition, I was referring to the idea of the SNP propping up the Tories as they've insisted time and again that they won't.

New Scottish constituency polls confirm Labour currently set for a slaughter. Some of Labour's safest seats in Scotland (even the whole of the UK) set to go, with the only likely survivor being Glasgow North East where they're currently projected to have a 7% majority (down from 54% last time).

 

Meanwhile, Danny Alexander also looks gone: poll for his seat puts the SNP on 50% and the Lib Dems on 21%.

 

Ironically, one of the SNP's more mediocre results in this set of polling is in Gordon where Alex Salmond is standing, where he "only" has a 16% lead.

 

http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2015/02/scott...ound/#more-7456

Edited February 4, 201510 yr by Danny

I was quite surprised Ashcroft only polled in the indy-leaning areas - the interesting thing about the surge would be if it was also happening in areas where No won by a bigger margin. As it stands, with the SNP having the lead they currently have, those are the seats you'd expect them to be having the biggest swings in - the answer of whether we're in for a 40+ seat wipe-out would come from how they're doing in the No-leaning areas.

I don't actually think the correlation between referendum vote and 2015 election voting intention is too high. I imagine there are loads of No voters voting SNP and many Yes voters who will continue to vote Labour.

 

My gut feeling is that the wipe-out is gonna happen but we'll see.