Labour Party (UK) Leadership Election, 2016

[Phony Moderate]

Very likely to take place following a VONC in Corbyn. Rumour is that either Watson or (Angela) Eagle will challenge Corbyn.

This is the first formal challenge to an incumbent Labour leader since Kinnock vs. Benn in 1988.

[Phony Moderate]

Cooper and Jarvis are rumoured to be showing interest also.

[Phony Moderate]

Does Corbyn require 30 signatures from MPs to get his name back on the ballot?

There's a row going on about whether or not the incumbent is automatically on the ballot or not. If not, then he would need 50 MPs/MEPs according to a rule change put in place last year.

[Phony Moderate]

Does Corbyn require 30 signatures from MPs to get his name back on the ballot?

There's a row going on about whether or not the incumbent is automatically on the ballot or not. If not, then he would need 50 MPs/MEPs according to a rule change put in place last year.

Who gets to make that decision?

The party's Constitution, but it's rather ambiguous about what happens in this event apparently. The Corbynites are citing a barrister who is advising that Corbyn can be on automatically.

[Phony Moderate]

Being reported that Angela Eagle will announce tomorrow that she's challenging (that's if Corbyn does not resign in the coming hours).

[Phony Moderate]

Does Corbyn require 30 signatures from MPs to get his name back on the ballot?

There's a row going on about whether or not the incumbent is automatically on the ballot or not. If not, then he would need 50 MPs/MEPs according to a rule change put in place last year.

Who gets to make that decision?

The party's Constitution, but it's rather ambiguous about what happens in this event apparently. The Corbynites are citing a barrister who is advising that Corbyn can be on automatically.

So who get's to make the decision in cases of constitutional ambiguity?

Not sure tbh.

[Phony Moderate]

Pretty sure that last year's leadership election showed that the Blairites are to this era what the Socialist Campaign Group was to the Blair era. And also that the accepted challenger to Corbyn is someone who, in policy terms, is hardly to Corbyn's right.

[Phony Moderate]

Now I always liked Brown more but to win a GE you need a Blair image, you need to sway LibDem, swing voters, and soft working class tories.

Pretty sure you can delete 'LibDem' nowadays.

[Phony Moderate]

At this point, is it fair to say that the Labour base is about as out of touch with the British public than the GOP base is to the American one?

Yes- I've been meaning to write a very long blog post on it for Labourlist. We share the 5 big problems...

+ Needing to run to the far left to win the leadership- namely being anti-war (No air strikes in Syria, Iraq and deffo not supporting 2003 Iraq),
+ A dedicated and loud online media presence of people outside the party calling people 'Blairites' in the same way that RINO was a spitting barb about 8 years ago
+Picking a leader who no-one sees as actually being able to be PM
+ Being convinced that if we just pick a more left wing person then everyone will come out and vote for us
+Being deluded

Regardless of whether that assessment is right or wrong, you need to appeal to the centre ground of the Labour membership to win a Labour leadership election. Liz Kendall didn't even attempt to do that, despite her constant ramblings about the need to appeal to the centre ground of the general electorate. Blair, to be fair to him, did make an effort to do that (at least in 1994) and so did GOP relative moderates such as McCain and Romney to the GOP primary electorate.

[Phony Moderate]

https://twitter.com/Owen4Labour

interesting?

Well at least he waited until after the Benn sacking.

[Phony Moderate]

Eagle has a history of, er, hawkishness (ho ho ho); she was also in the minority of Labour MPs who voted for action in Syria last year. What's her position on Trident btw?

[Phony Moderate]

An announcement of an announcement. Have the plotters been reading the BDO's playbook?

[Phony Moderate]

Umunna is probably toast politically...unless he decides to re-invent himself yet again.

[Phony Moderate]

I see Dennis Skinner is out in full force for Corbyn; he gave a passionate speech in his favour at the Durham Miners' Gala. Interestingly he voted for D Miliband in 2010 and when interviewed after the leadership election result last year he didn't seem entirely over the moon.

Full list of how each MP/MEP voted here by the way: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_Party_(UK)_leadership_election,_2010#Labour_MPs_and_MEPs

Lots of amusement and interest, such as the LINOs Field and Hoey preferencing EdM above David, John Cryer putting Abbott as fifth, McDonnell only preferencing Abbott whereas Corbyn gave a second preference (EdM)...perhaps suggesting that Jezza is a bit more pragmatic than John?

[Phony Moderate]

Can somebody explain to me what wing of the Labour Party Eagle belongs to? Burnham's?

Soft left, as are Owen Smith and Lisa Nandy. Burnham and Watson are on the traditional right.

[Phony Moderate]

Smith is in, supposedly.

Far more appealing to the centre ground of the Labour selectorate than Eagle, surely.

[Phony Moderate]

If Angela Eagle won the the labour leadership, she would be the first leader from LGBT community in the labour party and second in the UK after Ruth Davidson.

And almost no one has made anything of that fact. How times have changed since Bermondsey.

[Phony Moderate]

Several crates of sandwiches have been taken in within the past hour. Probably not something that would happen if they were on the verge of wrapping up. But they'll now probably get into a bickering game about which side gets the tuna mayo ones and which side gets the cheese and tomato ones.

[Phony Moderate]

It's fairly late in the morning on PM changeover day and Smith's announcement is currently the lead story on the BBC News website. Quite impressive for him I suppose.

[Phony Moderate]

Owen Smith does a Leadsom - http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/owen-smith-labour-leadership-election-angela-eagle-jeremy-corbyn-candidates-vote-a7143221.html

[Phony Moderate]

How each Labour MP voted on Trident renewal. Two key names on the 'Aye' list and one or two surprises on the 'No' list.

[Phony Moderate]

Whichever one has less nominations is going to drop out later today apparently.

[Phony Moderate]

A candidate whose campaign was managed by Caroline Flint wasn't going to win the Labour leadership in 2016.

[Phony Moderate]

Corbyn is still the overwhelming favorite in the race:

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jul/23/labour-leadership-jeremy-corbyn-more-double-support-owen-smith

What is wrong with Labour voters? Seriously.

Well most of them are working-class. That fact may have little to do with the leadership situation, but from the POV of, say, Chuka Umunna it would indicate that something is wrong with them.

On that point, I wonder if Chuka has been managing to avoid the 'trash' as of late?

[Phony Moderate]

Corbyn is still the overwhelming favorite in the race:

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jul/23/labour-leadership-jeremy-corbyn-more-double-support-owen-smith

What is wrong with Labour voters? Seriously.

A decent proportion of respondents in that poll (which, note, is a subsample of Labour supporters in a national poll) have probably never heard of Owen Smith or at least know very little about him.

Plus he's got the most generic and forgettable name in the universe.