BJ and DC plainly think they can win an election

are they right? 

I just don't see it

they will hold most of their Brexit constituencies and Labour will lose some of its, perhaps to the Brexit Party, perhaps to the Tories

but they will lose some of their London constituencies and, I expect, many of their Scottish MPs

I don't see how they build a majority even if they enter an alliance with the Brexit Party (which has to be really quite unlikely)

There is also the argument the Tories made quite significant gains in the Northern Brexit seats already under May and it would it be a hard push to do more.

Davidson standing down has not helped Cummings plan.

it's weird because everything feels like gearing to an election but I wouldn't take the risk on this. 

a lib dem resurgence will take votes from (I guess) mostly labour but also the tories in those areas where people don't want No Deal. It seems some brexiteers have woken up to the impact of brexit on their business too. 

Brexit party might take some votes from the tories but probably in areas where the tories are not going to lose anyway. 

Tories are boosted by Boris personal brand which I think appeals more than Corbyn's but I think it is risky to rely on that because Tories don't do well on camera (the mis management of leadership debates shafted cameron twice and killed the Maybot) 

DC is good at appealing to people and controlling the agenda, or at least he was 3 years ago but people get wise to any new political strategy (arguably the rise of populism owes as much to everyone adopting the Clinton election strategy from the 90s as anything else). You look at the SNP who laughed in the face of Cambridge Analytica when they offered them services because the SNP machine was 5 years ahead (and DC's brexit strategy ran into a wall in Scotland)

I think the Conservatives will win the most seats.  The interesting thing would be whether LibLab would be able to command a majority, in which case I think the Libs would demand Corbyn step down as their price for a coalition / confidence&supply agreement.

If brexit party stands aside I think Johnson will get 40 percent - unless lib and lab have a pact this will be enough for a majority - I reckon this is his plan - hello foreign secretary Farage

I think there will be an informal liblab agreement.  There are plenty of Con Lib marginals where Lab have no change of winning.  Same with Con Lab marginals.

Be interesting to see whether places like St Albans go Lib Dem.

Maybe they can, if the Remainer vote fails to unite. If the Remain vote gets solidly behind one party or coalition, they probably can’t. V hard to call which way the cards will fall.

I dont think the Brexit Party will stand aside completely. There are a lot of egos in that party (more than most). Farage is desperate to be an MP.

Not sure realistically whether Boris could lose his own seat, but there I think Lab stands the best chance of taking him out. Would be interesting trying to negotiate a new deal and defeat a vulnerable seat. A decapitation strategy.

I guess Labour and Lib Dems may have local deals but I can't see much more than that

Corbyn is too unreliable a bed fellow for anything more

I would LOVE it if Boris lost his seat. Got to be possible. 

I think Farage getting a safe seat would be part of the deal Amber - lots of the party will go back to UKIP but frankly who cares?

as I say hope I am wrong but just don’t think Johnson would be so obviously rushing to an election if he was going to have his vote split by BP

also bear in mind if they do de-select some of the well established Tory Europhiles, and they choose to stand again as independents or lib dems, the tories may find some of those seats at risk too

and how likely is Amber Rudd to survive given her disgraceful flip flopping?

Isn't Rudd in a leave area? Really would like her gone.  Her move to the Brexit camp may help her, but I hope not! 

I still do not think BJ has the BP in the bag. I think he just looks at Corbyn and thinks I must be able to beat that. Just like May :-)

This coup chant is important.  I think Johnson's public persona would carry an election if he could appear somewhat Churchillian - but too many people see him as a despot now, and that is the sort of thing that eclipses Brexit and kills him in an election.  He went in too hard and will pay for it.

Need to see some softening of the Supersocialist Labour lines tho - the FT splash on Labour killing business is unhelpful for teetering Tories.

"The English colloquialisms such as turn out to be a pig in a poke or buy a pig in a poke mean that something is sold or bought without the buyer knowing its true nature or value, especially when buying without inspecting the item beforehand. The phrase can also be applied to accepting an idea or plan without a full understanding of its basis.

-

So what people like Guy seem to want is for Gove to have said: "Well I've not read the Bill as it hasn't been written yet, so I can't make any fair assessment of whether or not it would work at all, but regardless of that I commit HM Government to following whatever is in it."

Bizarre.

He was asked in terms if he would follow the law.  You don’t need any further understanding to answer that in the affirmative he could caveat with ”if possible” if he wanted  but that is a truism

Swinson can do what ever she like post election. The fact there was no formal alliance before the election doesn't mean she could not enter a coalition post election (highly unlikely at the Libs have been burnt with Cameron and politically bigger differences with Corbyn beyond Brexit), but doesn't mean Swinson could not support a minority Labour government or just support it on certain issues e.,g. a second ref.

anonymous: no, the question pre-supposes the bill had become an act

and asking a secretary of state to confirm the government will comply with an act should be a bit of a no brainer

No one is suggesting Gove should have committed to following a Bill.

That isn't the question he was asked.  He was asked whether the Government would obey such a Bill if it became an Act of Parliament.

The only correct answer to that is "yes".

If the Government can elect not to obey an Act of Parliament, then why can I not take the view that income tax was intended as a temporary measure, which has gone on for too long, so I think it is inappropriate?  Or Road Safety legislation if I'm in a hurry?  Or minimum wage legislation?

This is beginning to be about more than Brexit.  A government which refuses to commit to following the law is a government which needs to go.

If it is a straight choice between no-deal Brexit and Corbyn then I will take the former every single time. 

Why?  The former will trash the country for decades to come.  The latter can be booted out after 5 years max. 

A GE is a huge risk for them imo. All the polls and shit at the moment are basically Brexit polls. But as they found out last time, GEs don't stay confined to Brexit.

The focus will very quickly turn to Britain's crumbling public services and the utterly appalling record of the Tories in domestic government for the last decade. And once you get the subject off Brexit people remember they like a lot of what Corbyn has to say.

I don't understand why people keep saying that there will be a conservative majority, there hasn't been a decent conservative majority for almost 30 years. 

The Brexit vote was putting Crobyn's 40 year anti capitalist campaign into effect and even then that a was almost a 50/50 with every lie and bullshit scare story immaginable thrown at it. I think brexiteers might be counting on there being a mythical 80% brexit support that will magically gravitate to them just like it didn't at the last GE. 

LMAO at the idea that 5 years of Corbyn would be worse than no deal Brexit from a business perspective. And as outlined above he'd most likely only lead a coalition, and that would be infinitely better for business than no deal just as "chaos with Ed Milliband" would have been infinitely better than the presently unfolding shitshow.

BJ and DC have won before against the odds, they probably think they can do it again. Better for BJ to deal the cards again than carry on with no majority. Just like May, eh!

I am now past caring.

Look few people seem to have noticed that in the event of a GE there is almost bound to be a hung parliament, More so because the lunatic BJ will have sacked 30 or so MPs that voted against him.

and in the event of a Hung parliament how is that going to help resolve the brexit impasse it will just mean more chaos

I think the election will have to fought as no deal v referendum and on that basis there must be a majority for one or the other - labour mps not signing up to 2nd ref need to  be de-selected

 

Coming out without a deal is not a line - we still have to negotiate a future arrangement but with no ammunition whatsoever as we will have lost it all That is what is so effin stupid about this even if you accept brexit is in theory a good idea

If they have an electoral pact with Farage, they'll boss it obviously.

Otherwise, yes I agree there's a danger they won't. We could even have a Liberal government.

Re DC's and BJ's presumption about elections, it is likely that they will portray themselves as the underdog or the victims of vicious EU and "their luvvies". 

It is also likely that Tories will lose more votes from moderates than they will win from fringe labour brexiteers. I have a feeling that it will again be a hung parliament but with Corbyn having higher seats / coalition to form a government. 

Also to be noted BJ has been PM now for six weeks , and he has STILL not made any proposal WHATSOEVER regarding the backstop , none, nada, zero, zilch. Says exactly what his intention is

Whilst I think Tories would win with a small overall majority any GE would be really tricky to call (though less so if there is some sort of Tory/Brexit party pact).

If you have all of the Tories, Labour, Lib Dems and Brexit Party (plus of course the Nationalists in Scotland and less so in Wales) polling at say 15% plus you could get a lot of very strange and split results and constituencies being won with say 30-35% of the popular vote rather than the usual 40% plus.

I strongly suspect a GE will NOT unlock the Brexit conundrum because (a) no party will get an overall majority and (b) the Tory and Labour positions will remain cake like.

I had lunch today with a colleague of mine who is as tory as they come. He is disgusted by Boris' behaviour and will not vote tory whilst he remains leader. Interesting times. 

Anyone else think that the threat to deselect might be with half a mind on enabling Brexshitters in seats like Uxbridge (Johnson) and Esher (Raab) to do a chicken run to a more defensible seat?

 

 

I'm surprised by the recent polling.

 

I would hope for an upset.  I've spoken to two true blue Home Counties Tories in the past two days who are talking about voting LD if there is an election, having never voted anything other than Con in a General Election in their lives.

You have to question the sanity of someone who evidently believes that Theresa May lost her majority because her Brexit policy was not mental enough and that he can get it back by promising to crash us out of the EU with no deal. 

They really can win an election, and their advantages include the following:

1. All the advantages of incumbency 

2. Opposition not united

3. Corbyn - he is the number one reason why strategically, from a Brexit Tory perspective, you’d want to settle this via a GE not a referendum (although all of these are reasons).

Alistair Heath is wrong when he says that ensuring Brexit is “the public's priority”. It isn’t. The numbers, I think, break down as follows although we’d need an election to be sure:

A. Want any form of Brexit at all - a little over 40% probably

B. want a better deal than the WA and repared to tolerate risk of a hard brexit to get it - perhaps 30% of which maybe 20% actively want a hard brexit.

But still, the opposition parties will need to play, if not quite a blinder, then very well indeed to be in a position to form a government after a GE. They’ll need to (1) keep the Tories positioned as the party of hard brexit and (2) collaborate to avoid splitting the Remain and soft brexit votes. 

(2) is the difficult part. What platform will they offer? Another referendum presumably. They’ll need to overcome the facts that (a) Labour will want to be in the driving seat and is in a position to demand that but (b) Corbyn is an electoral liability, with 44% of voters saying they regard a Corbyn premiership as a worse outcome than hard brexit (this lunacy on its own is enough to justify moving to Ireland).

Cummings and Johnson are not geniuses, but they know the above. Best thing for Corbyn to do might be to refuse an election full stop and push straight for the caretaker government route, with second referendum to follow immediately.

 

not sure I agree with your (2)(a) bit Laz

Obv Corbyn is a massive liability

but if say the SNP and Lib Dems hold the balance of power they may be able to say to labour: we will support your administration, but the price of our support is that Corbyn is not PM. (I guess he could remain Labour leader...) and it lasts only long enough to tide us over a referendum

eg: the sort of arrangement the now defunct Italian LN/5* coalition had with a technocrat interim PM

"On 29 Mar 2019: Boris Johnson voted to leave the EU with a [withdrawal] agreement as soon as possible and to approve the negotiated withdrawal agreement and associated documents. "

The more one looks at this, from an anti-hard Brexit perspective, the clearer it looks that a GE is something for the opposition to avoid at all costs.

If the aim is to resolve Brexit and discern the current will of the people (as between the available options), then a GE is a very blunt instrument. There are many things that cloud the issue, not least Corbyn, and there’s a real danger that you end up with a hard brexit majority in parliament without one existing in the country.

The plan has to be to VONC Boris and form an anti-hard-brexit government which agrees an extension and holds a referendum. The opposition seem slow in coming to this - I suspect they are hoping to wait until Johnson’s position is untenable before they act.

From a left wing Remainer perspective, this is some kind of lollerskate dream scenario, because either (1) the People’s Vote yeah I said People’s Vote kills Brexit for good AND WE ALL GET TO LOL or (2) the leftish emergency government, not the tories, gets to take the credit of implementing the people’s desire for Brexit, and - you guessed it - WE ALL GET TO LOL. Please God let this happen. If there’s a GE I’d bet on the Tories to win it.

i agree there’s no guarantee that the tozzas would not win the next ge, but even then an overall majority looks pretty challenging

there’s absolutely no sense in corbyn agreeing to an election whilst the odds look like ever increasing in his favour though - his opponents cannot implement their own policies and he is persuading the other opposition parties to follow his lead, so he is more powerful than ever

that is only going to strengthen - bodge has refused to be the man asking for an extension, but the pm will have to do it. which means that in order to avoid doing it, he will have to resign one way or another

he doesn’t want that, nor a vonc, given how powerfully negative that would look, so he’s in a total bind. but the longer it goes on without him being able to call an election, the more he will have to consider those options

plus the economic situation is deteriorating

the “natural party of government” will not want to be fighting an election after early november, with a good chance of a technical recession having been announced by the ons

That’s right Wellington. If the government is VONC’d then it remains in situ for up to 2wks while the opposition tries to form a government. If it cannot, a GE is automatically triggered.

 

If Johnson really does refuse to obey the mandate he is given by law, then he provides the perfect pretext for the VONC, which will see a new PM installed almost immediately. Then there doesn’t need to be a GE until after there has been a new referendum and, finally, a resolution to brexit one way or the other.

What Heff said.

A growing group of people I've spoken to recently have said they could not countenance voting for Labour because of Corbyn (me included), but will vote LD on the hope that they hold the balance of power and that Corbyn will be ousted, or at least controlled.

For the fear of Corbyn not to dominate a GE and deliver power into the Tories’ hands, an understanding that’s Corbyn will not lead a post-election government would have to be agreed and publicised *BEFORE* the election. Is that likely? 

VONCing and getting in a neutral caretaker backed by all the opposition parties while an extension is agreed and referendum called is a much sounder plan. Unless you’re a hard brexiting Tory, a GE is a difficult idea.

the interesting, and slightly concerning, thing is that big business dogs are starting to say corbyn is less of a threat than no deal

see citi and deutsche 

cos corbyn would be temporary

at the moment, as a virulent opponent of both corbyn and no deal brexit, i am delighted by the balance of powerlessness between the two major parties

but if bodge continues with his madness, it feels like there’s a very real risk he’ll make corbyn look sane

and, what is more, their destructive approach to the country’s constitution will make things all the worse:

“A Tory opposition will find it hard to accuse Mr Corbyn of sacrificing the economy on the altar of ideology when it has done exactly that. By arguing that the “will of the people” matters more than the rights of minorities or the conventions of the constitution, the Tories have supplied Mr Corbyn with the weapons he needs to push through a radical hard-left programme. All he needs is a majority, which they are doing their best to provide.”

https://www.economist.com/britain/2019/09/05/british-politics-goes-into-the-upside-down

Also, Corbyn is not powerless. He holds the damp lean sword of VONC above Johnson’s head, and can drop it anytime. He is de facto leader of the opposition majority, facing a government with a minority of 22.

agreed, which is why i said “balance of powerlessness” 

really just to emphasise that while bodge is in power, he’s short of power, and, while corbyn is not in power, he’s probs the most powerful opposition leader in british political history

Corbyn is only not a threat to business when he hasn't got power.  Which is why there is no way remainers or even sensible leavers are going to unite under his banner.

He's also a deceitful slimebag backed by a group of fanatics who are as bad as DC, JRM et al in terms of being prepared to abuse proper process.

 

I don’t actually give a fook about business tbh, and think it is a way overrated political lobby given that companies don’t actually get to vote. So he could be a massive threat to business for all I care, it still wouldn’t stop me voting for him. But he isn’t. He stands for a cohesive and well tended society, a culture of skilled and intelligent labour, and that’s in the interests of everyone including the capitalists.

I lack your faith in the breed tbh. To me it’s all about voting in the bunch of self-serving fookwits whose brand of sociopathic self-promotion is least likely to deviate from one’s own values, Or, rather, is likely to deviate least.