UK Post-Election Analysis

[ChrisDR68]

Quite a shocking general election overall really.

The SNP now owns Scotland which is a major strategic problem for Labour as fear of SNP influence over a minority Labour government without doubt helped the Conservatives. That will continue to be a problem for Labour moving forward.

Labour support is still solid in the north, south Wales and London. In the midlands and the south of England outside of London the party's appeal is desperately weak. Only the very singular personality of Tony Blair has been anything approaching popular in this part of the UK over the past 40 years. Another strategic issue for the party that isn't going away anytime soon.

The crushing of the Liberal Democrats will take decades for them to recover from. Weirdly blamed for the policies the Conservatives pushed through during the coalition while given little to no credit for the policies they championed and help implement. Clegg was right imo when he said the election results were crushing and unkind to his party.

It looks to me that the break up of the UK is probably inevitable after this election. Possibly within the next 10 years.

[ChrisDR68]

Looking at this general election with a little perspective it's clear to me that voting UKIP is in effect voting Conservative in all practical senses.

The voters who switched from Lib Dem to UKIP were decisive in sweeping away all but 2 Lib Dems MP's in southern England which gave the Tories their majority in this election.

If the Lib Dems are to make a comeback in the near future they need to drum into UKIP voters that they're voting Conservative by proxy. Some may be happy with that but I suspect a good many will not like to hear it.

They'll have to say it again and again and again until the message hits home. It's classic and clever divide and rule tactics from the cynical Tories.

The other thing the Libs need to do is reconsider their all encompassing love affair with the EU. It's toxic for them with the public. Be moderately in favour of remaining in the EU but adamantly and stridently against the setting up of a federal European superstate and the UK's absorption within it.

[ChrisDR68]

Been reading some of the comments under articles in the Guardian today about the election. A lot of lefties really putting the boot into the Lib Dems about their role in the coalition.

I wonder if any of them realise it's in Labour's interests to have a sizeable number of Liberal Democrat MP's in the House Of Commons as this generally lessens the number of Conservatives there?

Probably not as these are likely to be the same sort of people who criticized the Blair/Brown governments to the ends of the earth too

This is quite a good article though...

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/may/11/nick-clegg-liberal-democrats-disaster-coalition  

[ChrisDR68]

The usual north-south divide in England is alive and well:

___________Conservative________________Labour

South..........6,233,647........45.5%.........3,500,888........25.5%
Midlands.....2,067,492........42.5%.........1,570,834........32.3%
North..........2,147,799........30.7%.........3,015,984........43.1%

Total.........10,448,938........40.9%.........8,087,706........31.6%


Votes cast in England represent 85.3% of all votes cast in Great Britain (excluding Northern Ireland).

Note that Labour's "south" figures include London. If you exclude London their vote is below 20% in southern England.

[ChrisDR68]

Thought this was quite funny although I suppose it's born of frustration with how the south of England votes:


"Allow the north of England to secede from the UK and join Scotland"





Living on the Wirral I'd just about be inside this New Scotland


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/manchester-set-to-become-part-of-scotland-10250453.html

[ChrisDR68]

Good thoughtful article by Martin Kettle in the Guardian today about why people voted Tory in this election and the persistent problem of the Conservative's support being underrepresented in the opinion polls over a long period in UK general elections.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/may/14/vital-know-why-labour-lost-more-so-why-tories-won

[ChrisDR68]

John Rentoul nails it in this article about why Labour lost.

A couple of things I slightly disagree with though. It wasn't being too left wing that was the main reason for the defeat. It was the lack of credibilty due to the wrong Miliband brother winning Labour's leadership 5 years ago.

It should be noted that Labour won both general elections in 1974 on a left wing ticket. They won those elections because Harold Wilson had credibilty with the electorate (or at least more credibilty than the incompetent Ted Heath).

You don't get anywhere in UK General Elections without having a credible leader who looks and sounds like a prime minister in waiting. David Miliband had that credibility in my view. Ed did not.

The other thing he mentions is that he thinks UKIP is finished. They pretty much exist for an in-out EU referendum and we're now going to get one. That could see their popularity shoot up like it has for the SNP in Scotland during and after one has taken place so they're definitely not finished in my opinion.

Obviously this was written before Umunna withdrew from the leadership contest so his final paragraph is now redundant.

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/election-2015-david-miliband-could-have-won-it-for-labour-10234473.html

[ChrisDR68]

John Rentoul nails it in this article about why Labour lost.

A couple of things I slightly disagree with though. It wasn't being too left wing that was the main reason for the defeat. It was the lack of credibilty due to the wrong Miliband brother winning Labour's leadership 5 years ago.

It should be noted that Labour won both general elections in 1974 on a left wing ticket. They won those elections because Harold Wilson had credibilty with the electorate (or at least more credibilty than the incompetent Ted Heath).

You don't get anywhere in UK General Elections without having a credible leader who looks and sounds like a prime minister in waiting. David Miliband had that credibility in my view. Ed did not.

David Miliband is basically not that different from his brother but politically more bland.  [See also banana photo.]  Why do you find that more credible?

Would he have stopped the Scottish disaster?
Would he have attracted back former Labour voters now supporting UKIP?  [The size of this phenomenon is exaggerated by some, but it is there.]
Would he have stopped left of centre voters voting Green?
Would he have encouraged more people to actually vote?
Would he have encouraged centre to centre-right voters basically happy with Cameron to consider Labour?

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Not just that, but they fill niches in British politics which don't actually have that much to do with Europe.

I'm sure the Labour Party's internal polling would back up my opinion of David Miliband. Labour MP John Mann told the Sunday Politics programme last week that he was told again and again and again on the doorstep that Ed was not of prime ministerial quality and that David was superior. 

Statistically Labour don't need Scotland to win a general election. They won more seats in England in 2005 despite the Conservatives winning more votes there. They wouldn't win a majority for sure (unless it's a landslide like in 1997 and 2001) but the Labour leader would end up as prime minister all the same.

With a credible leader yes fewer people would have voted Green and a lot of swing voters would have directly switched from Conservative to Labour (something that was completely lacking with Ed Miliband's leadership).

UKIP's threat in Labour seats isn't important (in terms of them still being miles behind the winning Labour candidate in second place in many seats) and would in any case have been less of an issue had Labour had a credible leader.

[ChrisDR68]

I'm sure the Labour Party's internal polling would back up my opinion of David Miliband. Labour MP John Mann told the Sunday Politics programme last week that he was told again and again and again on the doorstep that Ed was not of prime ministerial quality and that David was superior.

Yes, but people saying that probably don't remember that clearly what he was actually like as a politician, they're just saying that because he's the person most often mentioned as an alternative leader in the media.  It has very little to do with how he'd actually have performed if elected leader.

I guess this is a matter of opinion and judgment but I remember thinking at the time in 2010 that Labour made a nutty decision in that leadership election and the general election result would seem to vindicate that feeling.

What you seem to be saying is that regardless of who led the Labour Party in this election they were always going to lose it. I'm not sure that's really the case. There's certainly no great love for the Conservative Party out there in the country right now.

Labour lost the popular vote by 37% to 30% UK wide. All they needed to get was a score draw (say 34% to 34%) or close to it for their leader to end up in Downing Street.

In my judgement David Miliband would have achieved at least that and probably done better on top.

Labour have now lost 4 general elections out of 5 from a position of opposition since losing power in 1979. All of them can be explained above all else by the fact that they didn't have a credible potential prime minister as leader in the eyes of the voting public:

Michael Foot
Neil Kinnock (twice)
Ed Miliband

The one and only time they've had a credible leader since Big Jim resigned in October 1980 at general election time while in opposition they ended up with a massive landslide. John Smith was also a credible leader and would also have won in 1997 but I think with a much smaller majority.

Politicians and commentators often get bogged down in issues about policy but if you don't get the right person in as leader everything else matters little.

[ChrisDR68]

You still haven't explained why you find him more "credible" than Ed.

In the same way that everyone makes a judgement about someone when seeing that person on tv or in person. Based on personality, communication skills and that person's judgement on a range of issues.

Labour had a chance after Jim Callaghan resigned to now be regarded as the natural party of government in the UK.

They should have elected Denis Healey who was a heavyweight and credible leader. If he wins the leadership I don't believe the Gang Of Four leave the party and form the SDP which means the next leader in line could have been either David Owen or Shirley Williams (more likely David Owen).

That would probably have taken us all the way to Tony Blair's time followed then by David Miliband.

Had Labour followed this leadership succession I think they would have been in government the majority of the time since 1980 rather than just the 13 years of Blair/Brown.

Labour tends to obsess about idealogy (left versus right) when selecting a leader rather than consider who the voting public regards as a realistic potential prime minister who they would have confidence voting for.

Regarding Ed Miliband, here's an article from Peter Kellner the pollster from 2014 about how much more popular David's leadership would have been for Labour:

http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/features/the-trouble-with-ed-miliband 

[ChrisDR68]

If David Milibrand, we would be having a discussion on how Labour choose the wrong brother.

No matter who had won, it would have been the "wrong" brother.

As I've said before it's a matter of personal judgement.

David Miliband is no Tony Blair for sure. Political geniuses like him don't come around very often but David had an aura of competence that Ed signally lacked which made him electable in the eyes of the public.

In my view the result of the Labour leadership election of 2010 is a strategic error of enormous importance because I don't see a realistic potential prime minister in the current contenders for the job.

That means Labour are very, very likely to lose the next general election in 2020.

[ChrisDR68]

His competence is largely a mixed bag-he was a good thinker (like Ed) but his constant differing from 2007-2010 about the leadership and his awful coup attempt in summer '08 showed he lacked the political skills. As I said above David may have looked like a PM in waiting but that didn't cover up his wooden detachment

Absolutely agree that David Miliband came across as wooden.

He would though in my view have had a reassuring effect on the naturally cautious UK electorate. The voters of this country are generally anxious and suspicious about potentially electing a Labour government.

Even though Labour has won 9 general elections since the war only 3 of it's leaders have managed to win an overall majority in the house of commons - Attlee, Wilson and Blair. All three were very reassuring characters in their different ways.

There are two big what if's of recent UK political history:

1. Could Labour have held onto those extra 20-30 seats in the 2010 general election to have been able to stay in power had David Miliband challenged and beaten Gordon Brown in 2008?

2. Could the party have gained another 40+ seats from the Conservatives in 2015 (despite concerns about possible SNP influence) had David Miliband won the leadership in 2010 that would have enabled either a Labour led minority government or a centre left coalition from taking office?

[ChrisDR68]

I should remind people that it was David who was seen as the weird brother and it was Ed who 'spoke human', this time 5 years ago...

Do you mean David was seen as the weird brother within the Labour Party?

I don't think the evidence is there that the public thought that way.

Here's an excerpt from this article:

Barnard and Braggins, who now run a company, BBM Campaigns, which conducts political and business campaigns, held 90-minute focus group sessions in May and June with separate groups of men and women chosen because of their previous loyalty to Labour. In all five seats – Halesowen and Rowley Regis, Croydon Central, Southampton Itchen, Watford and Pudsey – the Tories won, as the surges in support Labour had anticipated failed to materialise. The focus groups gave savage assessments of Labour, which they said lacked economic credibility, and Ed Miliband, who they saw as unfit to lead the country – so much so they believed he had permanently damaged the party’s brand.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/jul/18/labour-party-voters-desertion-election 

The rest of this article is also an interesting read although I think it's tone is generally overly pessimistic.