Would hate to have him as leader (like most of the so-called "hard left" he seems obsessed with what happened during Thatcher's time), but since that's obviously not going to happen, I can safely vote for him just to send a message.

Edited June 3, 201510 yr by Danny

Corbyn would be a dreadful leader. That said, there should be a hard-left candidate so that their views get an airing.

 

Meanwhile, as expected, the Lib Dem contest is between Tim Farron (who paid a very emotional tribute to Charles Kennedy in the Commons today) and Norman Lamb (who's tribute was rather dull).

Given that the Lib Dems have a 10% quota for MP endorsements to get onto the ballot, I can't imagine it was very difficult for either of them to manage.

Because the focus at the moment isn't on appealing to the public - it's on gathering nominations. The candidates are doing requisite public appearances to set out outlines of their stall, but pretty much none of them are doing anything beyond Newsnight/Marr appearances (no high profile speeches etc). There was basically zero public awareness of who David Cameron was at this stage in the Tory leadership contest in 2005, so it's a bit disingenuous to act like Liz Kendall is obviously a failure because name recognition for someone unknown a month ago is at 7%.

 

It's also a bit of a fallacy - people pay more attention to a leader by virtue of them being leader. At the moment they're all just candidates - the public isn't really especially inclined to pay attention to what any of them are saying, regardless of what their platforms are.

 

Someone on Politicalbetting just unearthed these figures actually. By October 2005, two months before the end of the contest, Cameron had shot to a comfortable lead in the public polls. This despite the fact he'd only entered the shadow cabinet earlier that year (whereas Kendall's been there for nearly 4 years already).

 

http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Poli.../OctICMpoll.pdf

Edited June 3, 201510 yr by Danny

Given that the Lib Dems have a 10% quota for MP endorsements to get onto the ballot, I can't imagine it was very difficult for either of them to manage.

They also need to get a minimum number of nominations from a minimum number of constituency parties.

Someone on Politicalbetting just unearthed these figures actually. By October 2005, two months before the end of the contest, Cameron had shot to a comfortable lead in the public polls. This despite the fact he'd only entered the shadow cabinet earlier that year (whereas Kendall's been there for nearly 4 years already).

 

http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Poli.../OctICMpoll.pdf

Cameron was being hyped massively after his hustings speech at the party conference. I'm sure a poll in, say, July 2005 would have shown that he was almost totally unknown.

Someone on Politicalbetting just unearthed these figures actually. By October 2005, two months before the end of the contest, Cameron had shot to a comfortable lead in the public polls. This despite the fact he'd only entered the shadow cabinet earlier that year (whereas Kendall's been there for nearly 4 years already).

 

http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Poli.../OctICMpoll.pdf

Liz Kendall isn't in the Shadow Cabinet - she's a shadow minister (which is roughly comparable in terms of being a spokesperson to the party roles Cameron had before he was appointed Shadow Education). Cameron had also had the high profile Tory conference speech at that stage which had shot him to favourite. It's a useful comparison for, say, in two months' time, but not really for a month into the contest.

 

(Incidentally I'm still annoyed we didn't choose to emulate the Tory 2005 leadership timetable. We could definitely have got the deputy one out of the way first.)

They also need to get a minimum number of nominations from a minimum number of constituency parties.

I know, but it's still funny.

 

The fact that the deputy contest is at the same time is really frustrating. I'm torn between two candidates for leader and deputy but I wouldn't be if I knew the winner of one in advance.

I'd like Stella but the rumours are she won't get the nominations. Out of the big lot who'll probably make it to the ballot I'd like Caroline or John Healey - it'll be totally for naught media-wise if we elect Yvette or Liz and then get TOM BLOODY WATSON as the deputy (though he'd be good at the campaigning side of it).

I'd like Stella but the rumours are she won't get the nominations. Out of the big lot who'll probably make it to the ballot I'd like Caroline or John Healey - it'll be totally for naught media-wise if we elect Yvette or Liz and then get TOM BLOODY WATSON as the deputy (though he'd be good at the campaigning side of it).

I want Burnham/Creasy or Cooper/Watson. I wonder whether the lack of a DPM in this Parliament will free the Deputy up more.

I just have paroxysms of *.* imagining Liz/Stella (or even Yvette/Caroline), just for the sheer contrast.

Cameron wouldnt know who to answer at pmqs lol

From a non party viewpoint it's still Burnham to be in with a shot of recovering lost ground. In an alternative universe tho it would be hilarious seeing ed balls as Dennis Thatcher...

Cameron was being hyped massively after his hustings speech at the party conference. I'm sure a poll in, say, July 2005 would have shown that he was almost totally unknown.

 

Kendall has been getting hyped by the media too.

 

I guess I'm just finding it hard to understand how her "lack of name recognition" is supposed to be an excuse for her poor performance in the polls. If she / her message is not interesting enough to get the public to pay attention, isn't that kind of a problem for a potential leader?

Edited June 4, 201510 yr by Danny

Kendall has been getting hyped by the media too.

 

I guess I'm just finding it hard to understand how her "lack of name recognition" is supposed to be an excuse for her poor performance in the polls. If she / her message is not interesting enough to get the public to pay attention, isn't that kind of a problem for a potential leader?

In fairness, almost no one outside of those interested in politics is going to be paying attention regardless of who she is at this stage.

In fairness, almost no one outside of those interested in politics is going to be paying attention regardless of who she is at this stage.

 

But that's the point - most people don't ever pay attention to politics, but to be a successful politician these days you have to have a big enough personality (and/or interesting enough message) to force your way into people's minds regardless, and make a big enough impression in the 10-second snippets on the news that people might occasionally see or in the quotes people might occasionally glance at in the papers. I bet even Stella Creasy has higher name recognition than she does despite never holding a notionally big position.

 

Also worth bearing in mind that the YouGov internet panels are far more politically-interested than average (something like half of them had claimed to watch one of the debates) - yet she's still only scraping 7% support even with them.

Edited June 4, 201510 yr by Danny

But that's the point - most people don't ever pay attention to politics, but to be a successful politician these days you have to have a big enough personality (and/or interesting enough message) to force your way into people's minds regardless, and make a big enough impression in the 10-second snippets on the news that people might occasionally see or in the quotes people might occasionally glance at in the papers. I bet even Stella Creasy has higher name recognition than she does despite never holding a notionally big position.

 

Also worth bearing in mind that the YouGov internet panels are far more politically-interested than average (something like half of them had claimed to watch one of the debates) - yet she's still only scraping 7% support even with them.

She's got three months to get people to notice her, and possibly (hopefully not) another five years after that.

Kendall has been getting hyped by the media too.

 

I guess I'm just finding it hard to understand how her "lack of name recognition" is supposed to be an excuse for her poor performance in the polls. If she / her message is not interesting enough to get the public to pay attention, isn't that kind of a problem for a potential leader?

Because the point is that even the most successful of politicians wouldn't be getting that much a. attention and b. definite support coming from a position of being a total unknown and only doing a couple of appearances on shows like Marr and the Sunday Politics. Blair was in the Shadow Cabinet for years - he only got attention after Jamie Bulger. Cameron only got attention after running in a leadership election for three months and doing a speech at Conference. It's not a case of 'poor performance' in the polls - you'd have to be a pretty weird average member of the public to have made your mind up on being enthusiastic for someone after, uh, three appearances on programmes most ordinary people don't watch.

 

Barely any politician would have cracked through to the public at this stage unless they were already really well known. It would be pretty unfair to be claiming at this stage Andy Burnham was terrible because he's been in the Cabinet and Shadow Cabinet for 10 years and making statements for a month and 'only' had 22%, because it really overestimates how much the public pays attention to leadership races - let alone ones where proper speeches and public events haven't started happening yet. Most ordinary people couldn't care less and won't be paying the slightest bit of attention until a leader is selected.

There's a leadership debate on on bbc in mid June maybe that'll get people talking?

Liz Kendall giving off the air of a particularly patronising primary school teacher, especially when she starts going on about how outrageous it would be to possibly leave the EU:

 

 

#theelectablecandidate