Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Sheilbh]

Not sure about safe - Labour went from 46 seats to 42 with a Lib Dem, Green, Reform divide. I think that this is Newcastle, we're seeing Reform do very well in the North-West, the collapse in London - it's an indictment of their whole project:


No update on my borough as they don't count the council votes until tomorrow. Really dragging out the discomfort for Labour

Watching Southwark closely because I know it well and there's good Labour people there but even aside from Starmer their councillors deserve being voted out. Also very, very pleased to see Carlotta Allum win for the Greens in Brixton. She was subject to an absolutely disgraceful attack by Labour because she had, 30 years ago, a conviction fo drug smuggling. She'd basically been a mule, done her time spent the last 30 years of her life working with rehabilitation and ex-offender charities and frankly is someone I'd far rather be a councillor than someone in their KPMG gilet nominated by the Labour Party. Very pleased that attack didn't work.

Still results to come from London, but interesting comparison of London v non-London results. Everywhere bad for Labour, London a (relative) bright spot for the Tories and slightly better for the Greens and signficantly worse for Reform:


Separately on quite how catastrophically bad the Welsh results are. As one of the Labour MPs noted if the Labour Party started under a Keir it may well end under a Keir as it's tough to see that Senedd result as anything but existential for Labour in the history of the Labour movement (I think Labour did win one seat of three in the former constituency of Nye Bevan and Michael Foot)


Edit: Total side but as someone who particularly disliked Angus Robertson (former SNP leader in Westminster) I quite enjoyed this:

Tom Gordon
@DMScotPol
Angus Robertson's third place thumping in Edinburgh Central not made any easier to bear by presence of giant gannet

[garbon]

I see Labour got trounced in Lewisham

[Sheilbh]

I see Labour got trounced in Lewisham

Yeah - really, really bad results here and across the board too. Honestly they've held up a little better in London than I'd expected.

There was a line in Sadiq's statement in response that I think rings true. That across Wales, the North, London what's happening to Labour might be what happened to Labour in Scotland after 2007 and the party still hasn't recovered. In Scotland the Scottish Labour Party had basically atrophied - they stopped functioining as a campaigning organisation so when they were challenged by the SNP there was nothing there. I think that may also be a thing in Wales and the North.

I wonder with London if it's a little different with the local party infrastructure getting hollowed out as it's been that talent pipeline, so an awful lot of its activity is not really connected to the actual area. So instead of local activists and community if it has served the purpose of recruiting Oxbridve graduates from around the country now working in employable sectors (nothing too profit-generating - NGOs, unions, lobbying, and Labour HQ) who can be parachuted into the Welsh/Northern hometown they fled at the first opportunity.

[Sheilbh]

Incidentally still fairly febrile on Labour.

I don't think Starmer's helped himself - but he kind of can't. The plan was apparently to do a re-shuffle and a "reset" (I think that would be his fourth reset since becoming PM). But he's too politically weak to do a re-shuffle. Instead he's invited Gordon Brown and Baroness Harman to act as unpaid panjandrums across broad but kind of meaningless areas. In reality they're sort of Labour grandee human shields. But it is rather a recapitulation of all of the problems with Keir Starmer. Because he doesn't know what he wants to do or how to do it he relied heavily on Labour figures who've previously done it - whether it's Jonathan Powell, Alan Milburn, George Robertson, Peter Mandelson. All that's changed is he's pivoted to slightly different factions of New Labour. I also think it's wildly Labour-brained - Labour people really like Gordon Brown and Harriet Harman, I'm not sure it's universal adoration in the rest of the country. I also don't think reaching back for ministers from the 2000s necessarily gives a message of "urgent change".

Separately a backbench MP has announced she'll launch a stalking horse leadership candidacy if the big beasts in the cabinet don't act. I think the backbenches are probably a bit frustrated at the cabinets inaction/desire to save their own job and this slightly reflects this. Labour's rule book is very, very unclear on what triggers a leadership election when there's a sitting leader - so I know some people in Labour who have been suggesting this as a route for a while. Basically a backbencher could trigger nominations opening at which case everyone else who wants the job would crowd in. To put my Labour factional hat on I think this would probably favour the Labour right/Wes Streeting who needs to move before Andy Burnham can find a seat and the Burnham backers are very dismissive of it and emphasising again that they need an "orderly" transition (i.e. enough time for Burnham to become an MP).

Separately Starmer has given an interview to the Observer saying he wants to be in Downing Street for another decade - which suggests he's reached the level of madness that normally happens after two successful terms and three election victories (the mad Thatch/Blair eras planning to "go on and on" for example). I think that's probably pretty lethal to him and has brought the moment he's removed forward. I think to Toni's question earlier in the thread it looks more likely that he will need to be dragged kicking and screaming from Downing Street - and possibly by way of a humiliation if he runs in the leadership race.

[garbon]

I don't think Starmer's helped himself - but he kind of can't. The plan was apparently to do a re-shuffle and a "reset" (I think that would be his fourth reset since becoming PM). But he's too politically weak to do a re-shuffle. Instead he's invited Gordon Brown and Baroness Harman to act as unpaid panjandrums across broad but kind of meaningless areas. In reality they're sort of Labour grandee human shields. But it is rather a recapitulation of all of the problems with Keir Starmer. Because he doesn't know what he wants to do or how to do it he relied heavily on Labour figures who've previously done it - whether it's Jonathan Powell, Alan Milburn, George Robertson, Peter Mandelson. All that's changed is he's pivoted to slightly different factions of New Labour. I also think it's wildly Labour-brained - Labour people really like Gordon Brown and Harriet Harman, I'm not sure it's universal adoration in the rest of the country. I also don't think reaching back for ministers from the 2000s necessarily gives a message of "urgent change".

I saw this and was like let's take comfort in the past. That's the change we need?

Separately a backbench MP has announced she'll launch a stalking horse leadership candidacy if the big beasts in the cabinet don't act. I think the backbenches are probably a bit frustrated at the cabinets inaction/desire to save their own job and this slightly reflects this. Labour's rule book is very, very unclear on what triggers a leadership election when there's a sitting leader - so I know some people in Labour who have been suggesting this as a route for a while. Basically a backbencher could trigger nominations opening at which case everyone else who wants the job would crowd in. To put my Labour factional hat on I think this would probably favour the Labour right/Wes Streeting who needs to move before Andy Burnham can find a seat and the Burnham backers are very dismissive of it and emphasising again that they need an "orderly" transition (i.e. enough time for Burnham to become an MP).

I'm glad someone is doing something to at least attempt to bring events to a head.

Separately Starmer has given an interview to the Observer saying he wants to be in Downing Street for another decade - which suggests he's reached the level of madness that normally happens after two successful terms and three election victories (the mad Thatch/Blair eras planning to "go on and on" for example). I think that's probably pretty lethal to him and has brought the moment he's removed forward. I think to Toni's question earlier in the thread it looks more likely that he will need to be dragged kicking and screaming from Downing Street - and possibly by way of a humiliation if he runs in the leadership race.

That makes him sound like an arrogant loon.