I have blogged many times about the Labour Party. An important topic, in that the UK has a basically binary system which was Liberal Party v. Conservative and Unionist Party until just after the First World War, then Labour Party v. Conservative Party. A situation which still pertains, and which, from the psychological point of view, emerges from the typical British mindset of “rivalry”, which also results in the British love of sporting rivalry, paticularly in team sports.
“Lewis joined the Army and toured in Afghanistan“. Very naive. Clive Lewis, a person of mixed race, joined the Territorial Army as commissioned officer, then did three months in Afghanistan, as far as publicly known not seeing any action, after which he had a breakdown or meltdown on return to the UK. More of a gap year misadventure than Bravo Two Zero…
Goodwin’s main point is that Labour must show itself “patriotic”, which apparently means waving a flag or wearing a red poppy once a year. Hard advice to follow when the voters know that Labour under Blair and Brown uined Britain by deliberately importing millions of blacks and browns, who have since been breeding prolifically.
True, the “Conservative” Party record on mass immigration is almost as bad, and now is getting worse, part-Jew Boris-idiot having now decided to allow entry to as may as 6 million Hong Kong Chinese, 300,000 of whom are expected to arrive within a few months! That however, will not help Labour much.
As Goodwin correctly says, though, Labour is now a party of “London progressives” (in terms of members and supporters); its voting base among English and Welsh voters (meaning white people) has all but collapsed, making Labour reliant on “the blacks and browns” and/or those employed by the State and its offshoots such as the NHS.
The 2019 General Election made plain that the Labour vote is only about a third of the total vote. Core vote? Maybe 25%.
There is a ray of hope for Labour, in that persons under 30, maybe more under 24, seem better disposed towards Labour (that may also have an ethnic dimension, because the proportion of blacks and browns is increasing in that part of the age demographic as those populations breed). However, the under-24s are notoriously non-voting.
I wonder how many SNP supporters know, accept, or care about that prediction? Few, probably.
The belated rise of the long-struggling SNP has been remarkable. The SNP was founded in 1934, yet took 33 years to get its first MP (Winnie Ewing, in a 1967 by-election). Between 1967 and 2015, the SNP representation at Westminster swung between 1 and 7; on the eve of the 2015 General Election, the SNP still had only 6 MPs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_National_Party#House_of_Commons_2.
In a sense, the most remarkable thing about the SNP is how its post-2014 rise at Westminster shows up the absurdity of FPTP voting. In 2015, the SNP landslide —56 out of 59 Scottish Westminster seats— was achieved on the back of only 50% of the actual popular vote in Scotland.
At Holyrood (the Scottish Parliament), elected under a fairer —proportional representation— system, the SNP has never won more than about half of the MSP seats: 69 out of 129 in 2011, and 63 out of 129 in 2016: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_National_Party#Scottish_Parliament_2. It will be interesting to see what happens later this year. The SNP representation at Holyrood broadly equates to the support for Scottish Independence. Somewhere around 50-50, so far.
I do not hold myself out as any kind of expert on Scottish politics, and in fact have never been North of Hadrian’s Wall, but it seems to me that SNP support comes from two main directions: voters committed to “Independence”, and voters disgusted by the other major parties, and so voting by default. An overlapping Venn diagram.
At any rate, as I have recently and previously blogged, if the SNP manage to wrest Scotland away from the UK, that pretty much sinks Labour in England and Wales, at least in terms of being a party of government.
Tweets seen today
If #KeirStarmer is serious about Labour pretending to think & feel like normal Brits, he'd better stop kneeling for Blacks Love Marxism and ditch the 'gender' lunacy for starters. Nah, don't think so!#allredunionjackhttps://t.co/czXY0SOLZn
Germany is a dustbin now, ruled and/or strongly influenced by Jews, full of Central European and Eastern European (ethnically non-European) Gypsies. I noticed the decline in standards, from when it was mostly West Germany, when I returned for the first time in 13 years in 2001. Huge numbers of non-Europeans in Munich (which city looked quite scruffy as well).
While a succession of proper winters has pushed the 1% elite to switch from CO2 to Covid as their excuse for World Government, the global warming cult remains a danger to us all. Ridiculing the Virgin High Priestess is therefore not mean, it's legitimate self-defence. pic.twitter.com/22EQ3h4l7O
No @adamgarriereal, they have no idea of the forces they are playing with. Those who know no history are condemned for ever to be children.. https://t.co/EJBIwS2cyd
That minor msm radio drone, “@adamgarriereal”, has no conception of the evil wrought by the “holocaust” mythus and the connected quasi-heresy laws extant in several countries (not in the UK, but the System politicians, msm etc operate a kind of unwritten “holocaust” “denial” law). Once you start to criminalize or demonize truth by mandating “official truth”, Pandora’s Box is open, and out fly not only “holocaust” “denial” laws or quasi-laws, but the description of other dissenting views as “denial”…
@eldram_artworks. How very sad. I do hope that you will soon overcome whatever has gone so wrong with your life. Spite of this kind is not a sign of strength or confidence.. https://t.co/ANRenvRXQw
I was once trolled (on Twitter, some years ago) by a whole group of idiots grouped around one very stupid woman who thought herself terribly clever, a nurse (oh, yes, one of those supposedly caring, sharing people…) from the North West of England. I had to block about 15, and they had no choice but to FO. Such people are very tiny minds (as can be seen in the tweets of some of the “antifascist” and allied Jew-Zionist crowds).
I will be fun, if it becomes mandatory to use your own name on social media, to see who exactly trolled me in the past (some still comment about me). Then we’ll see what happens. What fun!
I just read a few of the tweets of “@eldram_artwork”. Two minutes of my life wasted, minutes that I shall never get back.
God I really have no love for social media anymore. Kinda think I should keep using it for work/PA purposes but I just think it’s so toxic.
The wicked flourish like the green bay tree, indeed…That bitch should be really grateful to her inept and stupid (and, arguende, over-sentenced) husband. Not only has she got shot of a husband with whom she was probably bored anyway, but she managed to take over his position as MP and now, it appears, sold her story to the Press for £25,000! As good as the plot of a cheap novel by one or another disgraced Conservative MP…
As to why I think that Elphicke was over-sentenced (probably the only thing with which I might agree with Natalie Elphicke), when you look at what Elphicke actually did, it amounted to making very inept attempts to seduce three women. His actions make “cringeworthy” reading, but being a complete idiot and rather unpleasant is not a crime. If it were, there would be few MPs left (yay! ha ha!).
More seriously, a sentence of a month, or a couple of months, would have been enough to mark the badness of his actions. He would still have lost his seat: while that would not have been automatic —the sentence has to be a year or more for that— there is no doubt that he would have gone, and probably within a few months.
There is much too much leniency in some sentencing, but also a great deal of over-sentencing. For example, we see daily in the tabloid or local Press, “she (and it is often a woman) was spared prison” (often but not always because the woman has a child). There are many male thugs too who are let off lightly.
I saw a report about how a gang of “people” attacked two policemen trying to arrest a motor thief, and poured petrol on them, but failed to find matches or a lighter. Sentence for the main perpetrator? 3 years, 9 months, so that one will be out in less than two years. Another got a short sentence, while a third was given a “community penalty”!
Jez Turner of the London Forum got a year for making a short speech! More than a quarter of what he would have got for trying to murder two policemen! (note: those criminals with the petrol were not actually charged with attempted murder; why not?).
The video itself is nice; I could do without the repetitive and noisy musical sountrack, though.
It's a strange time when the former Marxists at #spiked have far more sense and resist the abuse of state power more than the mainstream right wing press.#Sweden#lockdownhttps://t.co/2p1EZ2f7Yx
But @Drchrisparry, we are not strong at sea. Our fleet of destroyers and frigates, much better suited to our real needs rather than these fantasies of world power, has been savagely reduced to pay for these enormous floating car parks. https://t.co/CepnH8ZlKo
A curious article @NavyLookout as it seems to think that the RN is still a 'first-tier navy'. The purpose and nature of your fleet is plainly important in your choice of ship. But by what definition is the RN not already a second (if not a third) tier navy? https://t.co/3MEumHgHG5
2/2 @johndstats The real naval race of the 20th century was the one with the USA, which we lost. https://t.co/lroUDyVKkE But we did not need to go this far in self-abasement. Turning our Navy into a sort of sub-contractor for the USN is just wrong. https://t.co/DVWtQMUasF
Again exactly right. From Roman times to our own, the position of an ally can quickly become that of a vassal. The two world wars, and particularly the unnecessary world struggle with the German Reich, killed Britain as a world power. Britain gave many of its bases overseas to the USA, and now many “British” bases (RAF bases) in Britain are really American bases. Britain is still America’s “unsinkable aircraft carrier“, in the words of Roosevelt.
Don't encourage the Muzzle Zealots . So many people seem actively to enjoy being muzzled and depersonalised that you really shouldn't give them any more excuses, or this will go on to the end of time, and an exposed human face will become a rare and shocking sight. https://t.co/g3OfhdzlII
I believe there now such severe shortages of some skills that the RN is borrowing people from the US Coastguard. Overstretch always destroys the experienced backbone of a military organisation. Decent home life becomes impossible. @Dan_Gaskinhttps://t.co/0rr7z5kHsB
I believe similar things happened to civil servants who were against the Iraq invasion. The old pillars of liberty and good government are all rotted and crumbled away. @dan_gaskin . I thought Boyce was quite good. https://t.co/VQtMBIgEjr
A good parallel @Dan_Gaskin . These things survive, against all sense and reason, because they swell the vanity of the politcians who propose them. Meanwhile the proper effective Navy melts away, and normal trains are starved of funds. https://t.co/oGGMm3wRMj
He who has not the mark of the Beast cannot buy or sell…
This video from Laura Towler and Mark Collett is worth seeing. Laura’s account [from about 8 minutes in] of how her bank account was frozen (without right of access, appeal or much information), frozen because of her political views, is chilling.
That is the future that awaits. Dissidents will have their bank accounts closed and/or stolen, and you will be stuffed then even if you have cash for immediate necessities, because almost everything will require a debit or credit card. In the UK, it is halfway there already.
For a number of years, and until about 11 years ago, I used to stay in hotels (mainly in the UK) about 10 days per month, usually arranging things via Internet and paying by debit card. Once, I wanted to pay by cash when I was somewhere in England unexpectedly, and was told that I not only had to get permission to pay cash but also pay a deposit (about the same amount as, or maybe slightly less than, the cost of one night’s stay)!
I once went to Hong Kong without more than a small amount of cash, only a debit card and a credit card. The organization operating the debit card (a major bank) had a serious technical problem that affected much of East Asia. I was unable to use that card. Fortunately, I had the credit card too, and my suite at the Sheraton in Kowloon was paid for in advance, but under other circumstances I might have been stuck for days, without shelter or food.
Imagine a future where there is no cash. You are then entirely dependent on the centralized money power. You can become an unperson overnight, unable to pay utility bills, get fuel for your car, food for yourself, and so on.
More tweets seen
That was my attempt at sarcasm Martin. This is a very interesting article. Masks from a surgeon’s point of view. Well worth a read imo https://t.co/uqGXmfBFlZ
War criminals, like B-liar & Bush, roam freely our streets, whilst innocent people, like Assange & Manning, languish in prison and are persecuted. Isn’t this the topsy turvy world we live in today? Where is justice? #FreeAssange#FreeAssangeNOWhttps://t.co/xy94ZmEpot
All very true, but the eternal bleat of the self-describing “Left” is a function of weakness. No programme, no policy, no power, just a continual “it’s unfair” bleat.
Why does the far-right blame homelessness on immigrants instead of the government?
The above idiot tweeter (a teacher…wouldn’t you know? Almost a guarantee of ignorance) thinks that the importation of millions of immigrants, and their having bred for decades now, resulting in a population of over 70 million, compared to 56 million in the 1990s, has nothing to do with homelessness! Oh, no, nothing at all! It’s all the fault of government! Didn’t you know? It is the fault of government, failing to wave a magic wand to solve the (homelessness and housing) problem(s).
Well, when government has waved a magic wand to solve the terrible and increasing housing problems in the UK, perhaps tweeter “@JamieKay22” can get government to wave that wand for a second time, and thus magically transform the migrant-invaders of all sorts (and their UK-born offspring), almost all of whom are totally useless, and totally unemployable, into the brain surgeons, nurses, entrepreneurs and public service staff that we are always being told that they are…
Here’s another gem from “@JamieKay22”:
Why are so many of this generation’s armed forces Brexit-voting racists…
Yet those veterans who fought in the Second World War tend to be Remainers who don’t have a racist nor xenophobic bone in their bodies?
Well, my grandfather fought in WW2 (France/Dunkirk and, later, Burma). He was older than average, having been born in 1901. Even someone who was 18 in 1944 and so might just have served in, or even actually “fought” in, WW2 by the time it ended (Spring 1945), would have to have been born no later than 1926. In other words, such a person would now be at least 94 years old.
What evidence is there that the few surviving “veterans” of WW2, 94+ years old, are “anti-racists”, let alone “Remainers”? None. Typical pseudo-socialist drivel. Yet note how many similar types have “liked” that last tweet. Hundreds…
Incidentally, that tweeter has no less than 37,000 Twitter followers (over 10x more than I had when the Jewish lobby had me expelled from Twitter in 2018). Another indication of how pointless Twitter is as a tool of real influence.
Seems that “@JamieKay22” does not like the truth being said; see below:
Here’s today’s Brexit-voting, supposedly patriotic, racist of the day! https://t.co/mOYO809mqD
A reminder about the existence of Jud Suss [The Jew Suss], a German film of 1940 (remake of a 1934 one), which is now banned by the BBC, other TV channels, and even YouTube, despite it having been based on real historical events in the Germany of the 18th Century: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jud_S%C3%BC%C3%9F.
I once had a copy of a booklet which listed all the “antisemitic” famous composers, writers, artists, scientists, inventors etc of Europe. Hundreds. Most people who are educated and intelligent enough to think for themselves see the problem.
A very significant cultural figure, influential in his day and later. I once had a lease of a house in Cornwall with (originally) 26 bedrooms. In the entrance hall or Outer Hall, there was panelling to head height, and above that original William Morris wallpaper, though sadly decayed thanks to over a century of the damp Cornish climate, and neglect.
More tweets seen
What an irony that you believe you're the know it all expert yet even the Labour Party rejected you. You're middle aged with absolutely nothing to show for your life not even the dubious degree that no one's ever seen any evidence of. Loser
This “Femi Sorry” person is a UK-born Nigerian who has been pushed and puffed by the System merely because he can string a few words together, and because there is now a campaign for more blacks in the msm and politics (despite the proportion on TV and in the Commons being in fact at least as great as that in the population).
“Femi” has parents who both have well-paid positions in the NHS, his father being a surgeon, his mother a paediatrician.
“Femi” [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Femi_Oluwole] apparently “worked in non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and human rights agencies” for a few years, presumably as a “gopher”. He “gave up his job” (whatever that was; teaboy?) at age 27 in order to campaign against Brexit. His Wikipedia entry does not point out that his organization, “Our Future Our Choice”, was bankrolled by an EU-funded entity.
Wikipedia: “Oluwole regularly appeared in the media during the process of the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union.[16][17] Oluwole has written for The Independent,[18]The Guardian,[19] and the Metro,[20] and is a regular guest on Talkradio.” “Femi” has also attacked “antisemitism”, apparently. Ah, I think we can see who or what is pulling the strings of this puppet…
In fact, the tweet from “@CentralReserva9” is slightly unfair. “Femi” is still only 30. Perhaps he hopes that Keir Starmer Labour will eventually ask him to become a Labour Party MP. Alternatively, that he can build on his now-weekly appearance on the Sky News talking head show, which features such as Nick Ferrari and Rachel Johnson.
“Femi” tweets fairly often (as I write, several times in one hour) and has about a quarter of a million “followers” on Twitter. I should imagine that his real political influence is close to zero, but it says a lot about the naivety of so many self-describing “Left” people on Twitter that they see him as some sort of, so to speak, “great white hope”. After all, what has he ever done, really? Blagged a fairly soft degree (from Nottingham) in French and Law, worked in very minor jobs for about 3-4 years, then —thanks to the support of the EU and his own parents (in whose home he was and maybe still is living)— presented himself as anti-Brexit “youth” figurehead.
I should add that the financial support for “Our Future Our Choice” must have been considerable. During the Referendum campaign, it had offices in a Westminster building that also housed departments of the Labour and Conservative parties, and offices of major transnational enterprises and organizations. Someone laid out quite a bit of money for this puppet.
The above says something about more than just one System-approved talking head. It goes to the way in which what is on TV and radio is presented to the general public. Put “Femi” with Nick Ferrari, maybe Rachel Johnson and a few others, and you have the semblance of a “diverse” discussion, whereas in reality it is as controlled as a Punch and Judy show.
ps. Seems that I am not the only person who wants to tell irrelevant little “Femi” to shut up and get lost (preferably out of both the UK and the rest of Europe):
Poor wee Femi. Is he still howling in the wind? I muted him weeks ago to block out the din. So much more peaceful. https://t.co/FADOVIhUuU
As we approach 2021 and our total freedom from the cess pit called EU. Femi is feeling more and more redundant. Lashing out at all and sundry in a fit of childish anger.
An israeli drives his car though a herd of Palestinian-owned sheep near the town of Al-Samou, killing 10 of them & injuring several others #BDShttps://t.co/O5G6zpKJDw
Hitchens is quite wrong. Abstention, even organized abstention, does not affect the System, because it will then just be said that “people have a right to vote; if they fail to exercise that right, then they cannot complain”. Already only about two-thirds bother to vote in general elections in the UK; in by-elections, sometimes as few as a fifth vote. In local elections, so few vote that a handful of voters (a few dozen) can change the outcome.
It might be the case that if 90% or more were to boycott general elections, there would be enough pressure to change the electoral system etc, but such an event is unlikely to happen.
Yeah @knittedkittie , silence dissent , deny airtime to sceptics! Always the civilised solution eh? Is this country slowly turning into The People’s Republic of China? Feels increasingly like it. https://t.co/UPiqHLn1Zn
Lord Sumption warns that new rules can only be enforced through ‘a Stasi-style surveillance state with a poisonous network of informers’https://t.co/SL8eLlU8hN
This vague subjective claim ( not based on hard experiment) cannot possibly justify either state compulsion or individual self-righteousness. Please wear a mask if you wish @jostucke . I won’t try to stop you. Do me the same favour. https://t.co/rRzJVhgEZg
I’ve sent you a link to the story about Blair’s confession that he was a Trotskyist at Oxford @markseddon1962 . A story that would have led every bulletin and front page in 1997, was not even picked up 20 years later. Except by me. https://t.co/iru5fWUiIX
…and even Peter Hitchens has never alleged (as others have) that Tony Blair, as a student, was actually arrested, charged and convicted (on a guilty plea) on a charge of gross indecency in a public loo, but (allegedly again) gave a false name, and so escaped any negative career consequences.
I think that those allegations say that Blair came up before the “beak” at Great Marlborough Street Mags (Magistrates) in London, where I appeared a couple of times as Counsel when I was still a “second-six” Bar pupil, i.e. a pretty green recent-trainee barrister. I think that both of my appearances related to theft charges, though.
Mike claims to be against 'fascism' but cheers when people have their bank accounts shut down for having the wrong opinion. Almost as if he's full of shit.
I have blogged on previous occasions [https://ianrmillard.wordpress.com/2019/10/23/a-few-words-about-mike-stuchbery/] about Mike Stuchbery, who keeps making empty threats about suing me in libel. Hardy ha ha…Even less chance of that than of his suing Tommy Robinson (in respect of which Stuchbery, his cohort Roanna Carleton-Taylor of Derbyshire —“@AntiFashWitch” on Twitter— and a Pakistani back-room solicitor extracted over £11,000 from mugs via GoFundMe…https://www.gofundme.com/f/sue-tommy-robinson.
-no fever since Fri am -no shortness of breath today – had 2nd dip of oxygen yesterday to 93% -walking w/o limitation -2nd dose remdisivir – 1st dose of dexamethasone – hoping for discharge tomorrow if all continues as is
So there it is. Trump is 74, unfit, very overweight, has had “the virus”, yet has only been in hospital a couple of days and is likely to be discharged tomorrow. He personifies the opposition to the “panicdemic”. His wife, Melania, has not even been hospitalized. Yet the fearmongers have had societies and economies across the world shut down because of this virus which, worldwide, has killed only 1 out of every 8,000 people. Madness.
Covid-19 “Coronavirus”
Beware of official statistics, cause-of-death statistics in particular…
Nice…
Also nice…
A beautiful moment when these elephants got reunited with their former caretaker Darrick from the Elephant nature park in Thailand.. 🐘
There’s a whole bunch of people on Twitter, normally hugely critical of Boris Johnson, the Tories and the government, but 100% behind every government lockdown measure and even the now clearly unlikely Whitty-Vallance 50,000 cases graph. Who can explain this strange phenomenon?
Andew Neil should read my previous blog posts in which I examine the phenomenon. It comes down to political infantilism.
The people who are usually Twitter pseudo-socialists are basically politically naive. They think that mass immigration can be combined with high pay, high State benefits, a decent NHS and a viable national future. They think that they support “freedom” yet want to remove the free speech rights of those whom they deem “Nazi”, “fascist”, “racist” etc etc. They think that the “lockdown” and facemask nonsense is essential, should be stricter, and will have little effect on the economy (or all those high salaries and State benefits they also want…). They love being told what to do, love the restrictions on liberty; they also (quelle surprise) love the EU.
Sadly, I am no longer on Twitter (thaks to the Jew lobby that Andrew Neil usually seems to support). Maybe someone else can tweet my views to him…
That Harry and Meghan barrel on regardless, to the applause of the metropolitan set and the supreme irritation of almost everyone else, speaks to their own vanity, writes Tom Slater https://t.co/8r9CKRmppJ
Claire Fox tells Andrew Neil that the Prime Minister should stop making 'glib' comments and address the nation about the culture wars@afneil | @Fox_Claire
Boris now rules by decree, says Petronella Wyatt, forgetting that it is parliament that is supreme in this country. Either that, or he has splinters in the windmills of his mindhttps://t.co/0vNZWk3lJ9
I happened to see the tweet below by Nick Griffin:
I had a long discussion with Jayda and others a couple of days ago. She's head & shoulders above anyone else on the UK scene. Some exciting plans shaping up.#Resistancehttps://t.co/PkdiV7nASc
I hate to criticize any British nationalists unless they are obviously either controlled opposition or completely degenerate, but what on Earth is Griffin talking about?!
I have never met Jayda Fransen, and have never had any contact with her, but if Griffin is correct that she is “head and shoulders above anyone else on the UK scene“, then I despair…
I am just watching the video in that tweet. Based on that video, Jayda Fransen is no less articulate than many System party MPs, but that is, frankly, not saying much.
I looked up Jayda Fransen on Wikipedia, but the entry about her is not very enlightening: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayda_Fransen. Wikipedia is (((infested))) and that comes out in its more “political” articles.
Jayda Fransen’s Wikipedia entry contains little about her as a person. No date or place of birth, no educational details, no family details.
I have now attempted to discover a few facts about her. If any readers have any further or better information, preferably verifiable, to add to what I have discovered, it can be left in the Comments section below.
It seems that Jayda Fransen was born in 1986, making her about 34.
In the video which I am now watching, Jayda Fransen refers to a time when she “practised law for many years“, presumably as a solicitor. Certainly I (who was a practising barrister) have never heard of any Jayda Fransen who was a barrister. I have just looked at the Bar Registry: no trace.
There is no trace of Jayda Fransen as a solicitor either, whether on the present roll of solicitors or on the record of struck-off former solicitors (see: Solicitors’ Regulation Authority website).
I did see this, https://www.allinlondon.co.uk/directory/solicitors/67054-martin-wilkinson, which indicates that at some point many years ago, Jayda Fransen was working for a “one-man band” solicitor, based in Forest Hill, South London and/or at Thamesmead in South East London. At that time she was apparently doing a correspondence course for a degree in law (LLB).
It is unarguable that merely working in a solicitor’s office is not “practising law” in normal English usage.
That Martin Wilkinson solicitor’s office is now, it seems, closed.
Conclusion: Jayda Fransen is not and never was a solicitor or barrister. Indeed, it is an open question whether she even has a law degree.
Jayda Fransen herself has only stood for election once, at the 2014 Rochester and Strood by-election, where she represented the Britain First party.
At the Rochester and Strood by-election, Jayda Fransen/Britain First came 9th out of 13 candidates. She received 56 votes out of 40,065. In percentage terms, very roughly 0.1% or slightly more. About 1 vote out of every 765; by any standard, a pathetic result. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Rochester_and_Strood_by-election#Result
Jayda Fransen’s new party is online https://www.britishfreedomparty.com/news but as far as I have been able to discover is as yet unregistered with the Electoral Commission.
I have not been very impressed by the Jayda Fransen video which I have just seen. Muslims mentioned but no mention at all of the Jew-Zionist influence in the msm, or in politics, legal system, finance etc.
There was no attempt in the video to address the serious problems facing the UK and Europe, whether the problems are economic, racial, or cultural.
I could also do without the references to “Lefties”. That is Daily Mail or Sun-speak from the 1980s, and says nothing, really. I myself never use such meaningless terms as “Right”, “Left” etc. As for the frequent use of “Marxist”, that will convey little to most people, certainly to the bulk of the people.
Trump: why support that idiot? He is a parrot in a gilded cage, guarded by a troop of Jews. Even his son-in-law is a Jew!
She seems to have tattoos on her arms.
Jayda Fransen seems to be a pleasant enough person, not completely unintelligent either. I could agree with some of what she said in her video. However, speaking politically, she is a non-starter in my view, though I am not “opposed” to her as such, and at least she seems to have the energy to get out and do things, which itself distinguishes her.
I have read the “manifesto” of the new party; again, I can agree with much of it.
This is not the new movement that Britain needs.
[Update, same day: I have been sent the video below since I published the above assessment of Jayda Fransen:
Jayda Fransen when she was a leading member of the Britain First party, in Golders Green (North London) with Paul Golding, who is still its leader and, as I understand, Ms. Fransen’s ex-boyfriend.
Spouting nonsense about how wonderful the Jews are…
Absolutely naive, ridiculous and stupid. To choose between Islamists and the Jewish lobby is a false choice, for one thing. Apart from that, Ms. Fransen either is unaware of the effects of the negative influence of the Jew-Zionist element on race and culture in the UK, in Europe, in the world, or thinks it acceptable.
I was willing to be favourable, in principle, to this new British Freedom Party, or at least even-handed, but I have seen and heard enough now. In the formula of Dragons’ Den, “I’m out“!
Is the ‘centre’ beginning to grasp that the National Panic Strategy is a vast disproportionate mistake? @iainmartin1, anxiously reassuring us that he is not a ‘libertarian’ or a ‘Covid denier’, manages to squeeze some sense into a paper that has until now been Johnson’s ‘Pravda’. https://t.co/jQ2cBuopr1
The UK Govt is broken. @Conservatives MP going crazy on WhatsApp groups, Emails ex… over @BorisJohnson & Dominic Cummings dictating laws & breaking treaties. They wanted Boris because they knew how he would behave, they didn't expect it aimed at them though.
The Israeli company Steadicopter says it has updated its existing Black Eagle 50 platform to two new models: the Black Eagle 25E and Black Eagle 50E. https://t.co/RLavsMQX2Bpic.twitter.com/E2nVK9VEwi
I have seen nothing about Katie Hopkins in the msm since she was expelled from Twitter, though she is still on YouTube and Facebook. At present she herself is in the USA.
As I have blogged previously, the “alt-Right” put all its lucrative eggs in one basket— social media. Take that away (at the clamour of “antifa” idiots and the Jews behind them) and they have nothing on which to fall back; no political parties, no street armies, no armed cadres. Without social media, they just fade away.
Look at “Prison Planet” Watson. His quite popular rants against the migration invasion, the “virus” fear propaganda etc, are fine as far as they go, but (like Ms. Hopkins) he puts forward no political programme. A megaphone with little behind it. Also like Ms. Hopkins, he never defended —as far as I have seen— those who have actually been suffering for years in the cause of free speech in the UK, meaning, inter alia, me, Alison Chabloz, Jez Turner etc.
Both Katie Hopkins and Paul Joseph Watson make a big song and dance about being pro-Jew and pro-Israel. That puts them in the “useless” category as far as I am concerned. You can add Breitbart, “Milo”, “Sargon of Akkad”, Tommy Robinson and many others to the same list, then chuck it in the bin.
More tweets seen
"Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire."
"Beauty matters. It is not just a subjective thing but a universal need of human beings. If we ignore this need we find ourselves in a spiritual desert."
Again, I sympathize with the statement, but for me the earlier building is almost as unaesthetic as the newer one (which Prince Charles criticized when it was in the planning stage).
— Western Traditionalist (@Western_Trad) July 21, 2020
‘Nuff said…
Yes , it's everywhere @leoniedelt I am currently in the midst of a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority about this advertisement. The pictured person has no experimental basis for her suppsoed claim that her wearing of a mask protects anyone else. https://t.co/zcDfNM15Iz
The poster shown above is symptomatic of the “new Britain” which is not worth defending but eminently worth replacing: a mixed-race woman, of child-bearing age, wearing a mask-muzzle, and both propagandizing and socially-intimidating the public, all under the “caring-sharing” NHS banner…
Nor do I claim to be such @jeffvahue. But why don't you also observe that you don't see 'virologist' in the bios of Alexander 'Boris' Johnson or Matt Hancock. Prof Ferguson is a physicist. But Prof Sucharit Bhakdi of Mainz, who shares my view, is a virologist. Your point? https://t.co/U2yqmHalqK
Ah, Commissar Fogarty @shelaghfogarty, like Wee Willie Winkie running through the town making sure everyone's in bed, rushes around the rail network trying to get people to muzzle themselves. Isn't there something a bit Freudian about this preoccupation? https://t.co/X7SldQ6KzB
Quite @iainmartin1 . We are being ruled by decree, and it is probably ultra vires. But constututions are only as good as their defenders. Media, MPs and courts have so far *all* failed to defend the rule of law. So you're stuck with me. https://t.co/WfsNttttwb
If the UK is now acceptedly not a democracy (even a Parliamentary one), not under valid law, not even under competent administration, then anything is justified by way of resistance.
We live in a time where the globalist/Marxist agenda is so advanced, even The Telegraph – a formerly conservative newspaper – is ridiculing people for not wanting to sexualise children. I hope you're ready for what's coming. pic.twitter.com/HQhlkCyI4I
A cultural revolution, indeed at first a cultural purge, is the most necessary revolutionary action in the UK. The mass media is sick and rotten to the core, the worst of all being the BBC. There has to be a wholesale purge of mass media personnel. Press, online outlets, TV, radio etc. TV is the worst. Harsh measures are necessary.
‘In the last 10 years, we see an average of 500,000 acres burn in an entire year. We've seen that nearly double in the past three days,’ said Oregon Governor Kate Brown as wind-driven wildfires burned through forests and towns in U.S. West Coast states https://t.co/66vMxeXuo5pic.twitter.com/1I3aY0BSbb
The planet is showing signs it’s in peril. Recently, the world has seen ferocious wildfires in the U.S., torrential rains in Africa, weirdly warm temperatures on the surface of tropical oceans and record heat waves from California to the Siberian Arctic https://t.co/YfTHPuXE1bpic.twitter.com/WIMa1mkjZB
While I do not accept the mainstream narrative re. the overall causation of climate change, a change is in some form happening. The major problem that the world has is that there are too many people, and that really means too many black, brown and yellow people: persons of African and Asian descent, mainly. Numbers. Percentages too.
The above tweet refers to events in the USA, but applies to the UK and mainland Europe to an equal extent.
It is clear that, for social nationalists, online activism, though good and useful, is not enough. Do not be dependent on it, or on funds from it. As for those enemies intent on taking away your rights, you cannot oppose them effectively just by tweeting, leaving messages on Facebook or, for that matter, writing a blog.
Late music
The most brilliant staging of it that I have ever seen.
This has of course been a farce for a very long time. At least in the mediaeval period, there was no hypocrisy involved. You were a crony of the King, or helped him out in battle or otherwise, you got a title, and maybe the lands (and so, income) with which to support your new-found estate (status).
Later, absurdity (such as the creation of the “baronet” class, the earliest example of the “sale of honours”) went alongside honours given for real achievement in the arts, sciences and commerce.
There were scandals along the way. The sale of honours under Lloyd George was egregious not in quality (it happened before, it still happens in 2019) but in quantity. Few “average citizens” realize that hardly any of the still extant hereditary titles predate 1900. And that is before we even consider the “life peers”, which rival the baronetage is risibility.
A woman starts a bra company. Turns out that it is a house of cards that eventually collapses, but not before Michelle Mone is “elevated” to the House of Lords as a “baroness”, having convinced idiotic David Cameron-Levita that she is a great role-model. A West Indian woman’s son is killed by some white ruffians in a scuffle at a bus stop. What?! Oh my God! Make her a “baroness” too! And bung her family a hundred grand at the same time.
The “House of Lords” was badly “reformed” by Blair; a poorly-thought-out reform, like so much of his legislation. It is time to get rid of it.
As to the new honours list: I have not read it in detail but, for one thing, is it not incredible that Iain Dunce Duncan Smith, a proven liar and fraudster, should be “knighted”? His record:
A part-Japanese, who attended a secondary modern State school near Birmingham and then went to a substandard merchant navy school on Anglesey, later fraudulently inventing a university background (was found out, but sadly too late);
Poses as a kind of “upper class” Englishman by reason of having been a Scots Guards officer (never got beyond Lieutenant in 6 years, and was considered a deadhead even in Guards circles);
Married a wealthy wife but still, for a while, fraudulently claimed State benefits;
Has always sponged off his father-in-law, even —and to this day— living for free in a house on the latter’s estate in Swanbourne, Buckinghamshire;
Has wasted literally billions of State funds in trying to make his misconceived “welfare” “reforms” work, while subjecting the sick, disabled, unemployed etc to a regime characterized by an Oriental cruelty and vindictiveness;
Has, in effect, killed tens of thousands of people;
Fraudulently claimed hundreds of thousands of pounds on his MP expenses for “employing” his wife; she never did any work at all; Dunce was, however, never tried for what was a plain fraud on public monies;
Claimed that he could easily live on a few pounds a day; meanwhile he claimed on his MP expenses for underwear and also for a £39 breakfast at the Waldorf in London (among a huge number of other doubtful claims);
Has shown himself incapable of properly holding high office;
Time and again proven to be a liar.
Dunce is the most obviously unmeritorious recipient of an honour this time, but what about the degenerate singer-songwriter, Elton John? I should like to have him removed from the airwaves and from sight. There again, a black woman has apparently been given a minor honour for baking cakes. Also, there is the now-usual plethora of sports people etc. Win a cricket match or rugby game on the other side of the world? Knighthood. Bloody joke.
At the other end, there are the people who get honours for years of “service” (work). OK, and many may be meritorious; many may not be. I was slightly acquainted once (1980s) with a woman who later (2006 or 2007) got an honour (MBE, I think) “for fostering relations with Russia”. From what I heard on good authority, mainly carnal ones…
I think that this whole business needs a reboot, especially the higher honours, the “peerages”, “knighthoods” etc.
The LibDems won fairly decisively, but with a smaller majority than the betting might have been suggesting. I have posted several informative links below.
Why did the LibDems win, why did the Conservative Party not win?
For me, the most important aspect beyond the headline result is the fact that the Conservative ex-MP, Christopher Davies, would have won, perhaps even handsomely, were it not for the candidature of Brexit Party, which received 3,331 votes.
The LibDem majority over the Conservatives was only 1,425. In other words, had Brexit Party not been standing, the Conservatives would almost certainly have won, and probably by nearly 2,000 votes. The Brexit Party received a vote-share of only 10.5% (LibDems 43.5%, Conservatives 39%), but that was more than enough to sink the Conservative candidate.
The Labour vote has suffered a general decline in the constituency over the years (all-time high was 57.69% in 1964), but this was its lowest-ever vote-share (5.3%). I attribute that partly and perhaps mainly to tactical voting: Labour supporters voting against the Conservatives (mainly) in a situation where Labour had no real chance anyway (the Labour vote here has not exceeded 20% since 2001 (21.4%). However, the 5.3%, barely enough to retain the deposit, does tend to support my view that Labour is now the party of the blacks and browns, the public service workers and those mainly dependent on State benefits.
The Sky News Political Correspondent tweeted something interesting about the Labour vote in Brecon and Radnorshire, which had been in the 10%-18% range since 2005 and until this by-election’s collapse to 5.3%:
Lib Dem source tells me Labour vote is in freefall: “Lab vote in deposit losing territory. We will have been massive beneficiaries of that. Lots bringing up Corbyn as a reason for switching to us on the doorsteps – more than just a tactical squeeze.” #BreconByelection
Brecon and Radnorshire is almost entirely white British in demographic terms (Powys, the county in which is situated the constituency, is said to be 99.3% white British). In white British areas, Labour increasingly has no chance. Labour scarcely speaks to or for white British people now. This has implications that go far beyond Brecon and Radnorshire.
The Conservatives and Brexit Party down the line
Brexit Party is one of two parties that emerged in 2019 despite having no real policies (the other being the pro-EU, pro-Remain, pro-Jewish lobby party, Change UK, which sputtered to a halt almost immediately and now scarcely exists).
There is no doubt that the early promise of Brexit Party has somewhat blunted since its great 2019 EU elections success. The recent Peterborough by-election was nearly won, but not quite, Brexit Party losing to Labour by a mere 683 votes. Now we have another, though less unexpected, disappointment. Nigel Farage and his large meetings held before both the EU elections and the Peterborough by-election built up a head of steam and a head of expectation, but so far that pressure has just tooted into the void, at least as far as Westminster is concerned.
The political landscape has just suffered an earthquake. Boris Johnson (aka, to me, “Boris-idiot”) is now, incredibly, Prime Minister (or Fool posing as “King for a Day”), having been put there by about 92,000 Conservative Party members (out of about 50 MILLION voters, in other words by about 1 out of every 500 or so eligible voters). He has “pledged” (for what little his pledges are worth) to leave the EU “deal or no deal” by 31 October 2019. If that seems about to happen, I am assuming that the anti-“no deal”/WTO MPs will block it and/or vote for a no-confidence motion. That might in turn cause Boris Johnson to trigger a general election.
Alternatively, the EU might offer Johnson a form of words that he can present to the Commons as a workable “deal” (in the now familiar vulgar terminology). The UK can then pretend to leave the EU but in reality stay in, or kick the can down the road by means of an extension, which Johnson himself seemed to find acceptable recently. The Commons might block the former, but probably not the latter.
An extension (as mooted) might last until 2021 or even 2022. In 2022, new electoral boundaries will be in place in the UK. MP numbers are set to be reduced from 650 to 600. Those changes will hit both Labour and the LibDems hard.
If the Conservatives can hang on until 2022, their chances of survival (as individual MPs and as a party of government) look better. In the meantime, Boris-idiot can go on posing as Prime Minister, and his Cabinet of Conservative Friends of Israel, enemies of the people, can (with the help of their Labour Friends of Israel accomplices) pass more repressive laws to destroy (real) “democracy” and (real) civil rights in the UK…
That, at least, could have been the scenario had the Conservatives a majority or at least a working majority (reduced by Brecon and Radnorshire to 1 MP vote) and so able to continue as a government. As it is, whatever happens on 31 October, it cannot be long now before Labour moves a no-confidence motion. If not in November, then surely in December or early next year.
Brexit Party has not yet proven that it can win Westminster seats, but it has proven that it can prevent the Conservative Party winning. In Peterborough, the successful Labour Party candidate got 10,484 votes (30.9%). The Brexit Party got 9,801 votes (28.9%). The Conservative got 7,243 votes (21.4%). While it may be that not all of those who voted Brexit Party would, in lieu of that, have voted Conservative, most would have done; hardly any would have voted Labour, in my opinion anyway. It is clear that, without Brexit Party, the Conservatives would have won Peterborough. The same is true in Brecon and Radnorshire.
Boris Johnson may have shot Brexit Party’s fox by going all-out (supposedly) for a “no deal”/WTO Brexit if the EU does not play ball, but he has not killed that fox, just wounded it. If the UK leaves on a “no deal”/WTO basis, then Brexit Party probably will deflate to nothing, though it may reinvent itself even then. However, it seems unlikely that the majority of MPs of all parties will not block such a departure. If that happens, then Boris Johnson, however much he tries to play the Leave “tribune of the people”, will be seen by Leavers as a waste of space, “all hat and no cattle”. In that scenario, the anger of the Leave-preferring voters will devolve upon both Remain MPs and Boris-idiot. Brexit Party will then, like Antaeus treading on his native earth, be revived and take on new strength.
What Boris Johnson and the Conservatives would like is for Brexit Party to just disappear, thus leaving the Conservatives to trample all over the hopelessly-split Labour Party and the LibDems. What is more likely is that the UK will not leave the EU on any real basis by the beginning of November. Brexit Party will thus put up 650 MPs and the Conservative Party will be slaughtered. Most hard-core Leavers will vote Brexit Party, most hard-core Remainers (especially in the South) will switch to the LibDems. For Boris Johnson and the Conservatives, a two-front war. Apart from Brexit issues, anyone who believes in the Welfare State, in decent public services, in animal welfare, will not vote Conservative. Anyone hostile to Jewish Zionism, likewise.
The Brexit Party may only get 10%-20%, so say 15%, nationwide, but that alone all but destroys any hope for a majority Conservative government. My own efforts at working it out using Electoral Calculus [see Notes, below] indicate Conservative Party as largest party in Commons, but without a majority and quite possibly worse off than now.
Much depends on the LibDem vote. At present, the opinion polls show intended LibDem vote somewhere in the 15%-25% range, with latest educated guess (via Ipsos/MORI) at 20%.
That might give a Conservative majority of as much as 74. However, even if that poll is accurate, it is unlikely that the Conservatives will actually maintain a lead of 10 points over Labour. If Labour were able to achieve 30% instead of 24%, which is well within the parameters of reasonable possibility, then the Conservative Party would be 20 MPs short of a majority, i.e. worse off than now.
There again, even if Labour were still on 24%, but if Brexit Party could reach to 15% at the expense of the Conservatives on 29%, the Conservatives would be no less than 57 MPs short of a majority.
On the other hand, If Brexit Party can get 20%, LibDems 20%, Labour 25% and Conservatives 30%, the Conservatives would be about 35 MPs short of a majority.
It is a game one can play for hours.
Conclusions
The LibDems are back in the game, if only by default. They have much of the Remain vote, they have a (notionally) fresh and energetic leader, they have the votes of those disliking the other two main System parties as well as those of persons wishing to vote tactically. They have at least the possibility of a 50-seat bloc (again) in the Commons.
Brexit Party is not looking good as a potential party of government but it is looking effective as a way of blocking Conservative Party ambitions. A general election resulting in 30% Con, 30% Lab, 20% LibDem, 15% Brexit Party and 5% Green comes out with Labour as largest party, but 46 MPs short of majority, the Conservatives not far behind and the LibDems with perhaps about 50 MPs. On that basis, the LibDems could, as in 2010, be once again the kingmakers. Plus ca change…
Andrew Rawnsley predicting the demise, quite soon, of both Boris-idiot and the Conservative government (and party):
“As he [Boris-idiot] points the country at the cliff edge and depresses the accelerator, does prime minister Johnson have any idea where this will end? It is a mistake to think that he does. No one knows what he is really up to, including himself. In one breath, he tells us that this is “do or die”; in another, he sets the odds on a no-deal Brexit at “a million to one”;
“He [Boris-idiot] has to know that there is a strong possibility that it will mean an autumn general election. The least credible message from Number 10 is that it is not contemplating this outcome”;
“Tory strategy for winning an election makes some very big and risky assumptions. One is that the gains harvested by the Conservatives at the expense of Labour among Leave-supporting voters will outweigh Tory losses in Remain-supporting constituencies. Nearly every top Lib Dem target is a Conservative seat, while Scottish Nationalists are hoping to scalp Tory MPs north of the border. The other perilous assumption is that Nigel Farage’s party will fade away or fold up. The leader of the Brexit party is enjoying being the object of renewed attention and displays no signs of wanting to retire again. He declares that he does not trust the prime minister and he has a bitter history of mutual loathing with Number 10’s chief strategist, Dominic Cummings.”
“One lesson from the Brecon & Radnorshire by-election is that the Brexit party doesn’t have to do all that well – it polled barely a double-digit share on Thursday – to hurt the Tories. If the Conservatives could have added the Brexit party vote and that of Ukip to their tally, they would have held the seat with just over half the vote, rather than narrowly lose it to the Lib Dems. They’d hope to put a harder squeeze on the Brexit party in a general election, but couldn’t be absolutely confident. All the hazards of this strategy will be multiplied many times over if an election takes place after 31 October. In one scenario, we would still be in the EU, breaking the Tory leader’s “absolute commitment” to his party that Britain will be out “under any circumstances” and hugely boosting the Faragists.”
“In the alternative scenario, Britain has tumbled out of the EU without an agreement. That is no longer a threat or a promise. The countdown has reached zero and no deal is a reality. Even in the less chilling versions of a crash-out Brexit – the ones that don’t involve supermarket shelves being stripped bare by panic-buying and children dying for lack of life-critical medicines – I wouldn’t want to be a prime minister trying to make a case for his re-election when the country has just suffered a big economic shock and the currency is collapsing.”
“My suspicion is that the Armageddon Clock isn’t really there to count down the seconds to Brexit day. It is there to remind Boris Johnson how long he has left before it becomes too late to avoid his own doomsday.“
Of course, I myself have made, in the above and previous blog posts, similar points to those now made by Andrew Rawnsley. He, however, has the inside contacts (and public profile) which I do not have. I, perforce, have to use simply my own knowledge and powers of reason (also, I am doing this unpaid, pro bono publico!)
I should say that there is little incentive for the Brexit Party to form a pact with the Conservatives unless the Conservatives in effect gift Brexit Party at least 50 winnable seats in return for Brexit Party standing down in the other 600. Such a pact might backfire for the Conservatives in that it would
deprive the Conservatives of a number of seats which, even with Brexit Party standing, the Conservatives themselves might win; and
create a bloc of up to 50 “fourth party” Westminster MPs for the first time, so
making Brexit Party far more electorally credible in subsequent elections.
If Brexit Party candidates give up their candidature in seats where the Conservative candidates might lose if there is a Brexit Party candidate, then not only has the Brexit Party given up what might be good chances of winning in those seats, but it has restricted itself to standing only in seats where it has, arguably, little chance of winning.
In other words, a one-way electoral pact with the Conservatives almost wipes out Brexit Party’s reason for existing. It might confirm as MPs a few Conservative Eurosceptics, but no political earthquake is going to happen just because of that. The better strategy is to fight all 650 seats and see what happens. If it should be that 200+ Conservative MPs lose their seats, then good.
Update, 23 June 2020
My analysis was not too bad (as good that of Andrew Rawnsley, anyway), but nexpected events happened, as they often do: as we now know, duing the General Election campaign of December 2019, Nigel Farage, for whatever reason, decided to stand down all his Brexit Party candidates standing in Conservative-held seats. That killed Brexit Party stone dead and ensured a Conservative Party victory by default. 2017 Labour voters did not, most of them, vote Conservative, but some did, in some seats. A relative few defected to the LibDems or what was left of Brexit Party, but almost as many as all of those simply decided not to vote.
Result: a Conservative Party majority of about 80.
Nearly eight years ago, when I still had a Twitter account (read “before the Jew-Zionists prevailed upon Twitter to expel me”), I tweeted that the LibDems were finished. At that time, around 2011, the height of the Con Coalition, the LibDem careerists were signing up to pretty much everything required of them by the misnamed “Conservatives”. In fact, even now in 2019, new tales come to light about how totally supine the LibDems in coalition were: recently, for example, it was revealed that the LibDems agreed to screw down harder on the sick and disabled in return for a 5p tax on plastic shopping bags.
The public were so disgusted by the LibDems 2010-2015 that the LibDem support and vote in the country hit almost rock-bottom in 2015. The 2010 general election had seen so-called “Cleggmania” and a popular vote of 23%, resulting in 57 House of Commons seats. In fact, that 23% was only 1 point above the level achieved in 2005 under the LibDems’ former (1999-2006) leader, Charles Kennedy; the LibDems in 2010 had 5 fewer seats than they had in 2005.
Naturally, the UK’s unfair First Past The Post [FPTP] political system left the LibDems with far fewer Commons seats than they “deserved” by reference to their popular vote. 23% of the 2010 popular vote “should” have given the LibDems about 150 MPs, not 57.
The 2010 hung Parliament result gave the LibDems their chance to demand proportional representation, instead of which their leadership (Nick Clegg, Danny Alexander and David Laws, mainly) accepted from the Conservative Party leader, David Cameron-Levita, the mere promise of a referendum on Alternative Vote [AV], a halfway house between FPTP voting and proportional representation [PR].
Gordon Brown, on behalf of Labour, the then Prime Minister, was willing to offer the LibDems immediate AV, via a new law to be passed by Labour and LibDem MPs, but the LibDems instead (and to my mind inexplicably) chose the Conservative offer of a mere referendum on AV over the Labour offer of immediate AV. When they did that, it was already clear that the LibDems (so called “Orange Book” LibDems, meaning pro-finance capitalist LibDems) much preferred to make common cause with the Conservatives.
This “Orange Book” “liberalism” underpinned what the LibDems did in coalition with the Conservatives from 2010 to 2015. The “Orange Book” itself took the LibDems far from the positions of the old Liberal Party and even from those of the LibDem party itself during the time when it was in the hands of Paddy Ashdown and Charles Kennedy.
The authors of the Orange Book favoured socio-political positions not far from those of leading members of the Conservative Party post-2000: effectively anti-Welfare State, pro-business, socially-judgmental, favouring so-called “choice” etc.
It is striking how many of the Orange Book authors have, in the years since its publication, been hit by scandal:
David Laws: found to have cheated on his Parliamentary expenses to the tune of about £40,000; many thought him fortunate not to have been prosecuted for fraud;
Chris Huhne: prosecuted and imprisoned for the very silly crime of perversion of the course of justice relating to a speeding offence [cf. Fiona Onasanya];
Mark Oaten, exposed as a coprophiliac and user of “rent boys”; since when Oaten has represented the International Fur Trade Federation, a largely Jewish body despised by animal-lovers worldwide. Oaten was also a supporter of fox-hunting.
“Only” three, but three out of only nine LibDems who wrote the Orange Book (Oaten admitted that in fact his research assistant had written his, Oaten’s, designated chapter, and that he, Oaten, had not even read that chapter, let alone the rest of the book). Of the other LibDems involved, Danny Alexander and Nick Clegg both lost their Commons seats in 2015 and 2017 respectively, gratefully then accepting lucrative directorships from transnational finance-capitalist companies.
The LibDem fortunes since the days of the Con Coalition
The LibDem popular vote crashed in 2015, sliding from its 2010 level of 23% to only 7.9%. MP numbers were slashed from 57 to 8.
In 2017, the LibDem popular vote slumped further, to 7.4%, though by the quirk of the FPTP voting system combined with the way boundaries are drawn, the LibDems actually managed to increase the number of LibDem MPs from 8 in 2015 to 12 in 2017.
The present situation
Nick Clegg took the Zuckerberg shilling (or should that be million?) and became an apologist for Facebook. He was replaced by Tim Farron, someone who was from an earlier, Nonconformist tradition within the LibDems and their ancestor-party, the Liberals. For example, “Farron was one of only two Liberal Democrat MPs to vote against the under-occupancy penalty (also known as the bedroom tax) in 2012.” [Wikipedia]. Farron was in the anti-Orange Book Beveridge Group [see Notes, below].
In 2017, Farron in turn was replaced by another Orange Book author, Vince Cable. Then, in 2019, Jo Swinson took the reins. She, though very much of the Orange Book persuasion, is more identified publicly with “socially liberal” than with “fiscally conservative” positions. Jo Swinson held the positions of PPS, and then Business Minister, during the Con Coalition period, but has managed to escape too great an identification with the social policies of the Coalition. Surprising, really, in that she
“Almost always voted for reducing housing benefit for social tenants deemed to have excess bedrooms (which Labour describe as the “bedroom tax”)”;
“Consistently voted against raising welfare benefits at least in line with prices”;
“Consistently voted against paying higher benefits over longer periods for those unable to work due to illness or disability”;
“Consistently voted for making local councils responsible for helping those in financial need afford their council tax and reducing the amount spent on such support”;
“Almost always voted for a reduction in spending on welfare benefits“;
“Almost always voted for reducing the rate of corporation tax“
I have to say that I have always seen Jo Swinson as a ghastly bitch, who, like her husband (Duncan Hames, also a LibDem MP from, in his case only, 2010 to 2015) has been mainly a careerist type in politics; in Jo Swinson’s case, her brief period in provincial commerce before 2005 can only be seen as underwhelming, at best.
My view of Jo Swinson is, admittedly, mainly a personal impression based on what I have seen on TV etc. Her voting record on domestic UK issues must give pause, though, to those who see her as enlightened, socially compassionate etc.
Jo Swinson is a LibDem leader who does not frighten the Conservative horses. That could be key. In 2017, there were, if memory serves, 35 seats where the LibDems were in close 2nd place; there were many others where the LibDem was in close 3rd place. Most of those are Conservative-held seats. The implication is clear: if Brexit Party weakens an already-flagging Conservative vote, scores of (mainly) Conservative seats could fall, many to the LibDems. The Brexit Party is a major factor here.
Then we have the Remain vote. About 48% of the UK, famously, voted Remain. All three System parties were split in the 2016 Referendum, but the LibDems less so than the other two. As a party, the Conservative Party is now seen as basically Leave; the Labour Party is seen as sitting on the fence. That leaves the LibDems as the sole unalloyed Remain party. How that translates into votes and then into seats is another question. For one thing, people are likely to vote in any 2019/2020 general election on various issues, not only Brexit. However, Brexit is probably the one leading issue at time of writing.
The British electoral system is a bad joke. We know that a simple matter such as how the boundaries are drawn can alter everything:
In 2022, new boundaries will come into effect, along with the reduction of MP numbers to 600 (from the present 650). The Conservatives will be far less affected than Labour and the LibDems. It has been suggested that the LibDems will be all but wiped out by those changes. Perhaps, but any 2022 or later general election is still at least 2-3 years away. We are looking at the very strong likelihood of a general election within maybe only 2-3 months or so. The Conservatives would like to wait longer, but how can they, when they have a majority of one or none?
Boundaries and other factors make the popular vote indeterminative. In 2005, Labour’s popular vote was 35.2%, and the Conservative vote was not far behind (32.4%), yet Labour ended up with 355 MPs, while the Conservatives won only 198!
If the LibDems can gather to their banner the bulk of the votes of those for whom the number one issue is Brexit and for whom Remain is the only way to go, and then add those votes to the LibDem core support (which may be as low as 7%), then it is not impossible to conceive of the idea of the LibDems under Jo Swinson getting a vote at least as high as Charles Kennedy’s 22% or Nick Clegg’s 23%, and possibly even higher. As against that, many voters will not support the LibDems under any circumstances, either because the party is pro-EU Remain, or because it is seen as weak on immigration (but are the other two System parties any better?) or because most voters remember the LibDems as doormats for the Conservatives during 2010-2015.
In order to form the largest bloc in the House of Commons, the LibDems would have to get a popular vote in the region of 35% or 34%, both Lab and Con getting below 30%. Even then, the LibDems would be or might be at least 100 seats short of a majority.
As I have blogged previously, I do not think in terms of a LibDem surge, but more a concatenation of circumstances —LibDems as sole Remain party, weakening of Conservative vote because of Brexit Party, disenchantment with Labour— drawing votes away from the other parties and so to the LibDems. LibDems as largest Commons bloc? Unlikely but, now, not totally impossible.
So there it is: Jo Swinson could never work with (be in coalition with? proffer “confidence and supply” to?) Jeremy Corbyn and Labour under Jeremy Corbyn.
It’s against her “principles” to support any criticism of Jews or Israel, it seems. Pity that her principles did not extend to refusing to work with evil part-Jew manipulators such as George Osborne and David Cameron-Levita. She and most of the LibDem MPs voted for all or most of the measures which for a decade have demonized, impoverished and actually killed sick, disabled and poor people in the UK via the “welfare” “reforms” of evil part-Jap Iain Dunce Duncan Smith and the Jew “lord” Freud (etc).
I was right about Jo Swinson. My instinct told me that she is an evil bitch. I was right.
Women bore 86% of the burden of austerity that she voted through Parliament. She’s as compassionate as Ted Bundy. https://t.co/orW7WOgOVe
Some LibDems are actually saying that the LDs could get hundreds of MPs in the upcoming general election! Proof positive of their disconnection from reality. People are mostly going to vote LibDem (if at all) only as a way of hitting out at the more major parties. There is no “LibDem surge” as such, but (as I have repeatedly blogged) there is a desire on the part of many Remain partisans to vote against the Conservative Party (mainly).
I imagine that the LibDems will pick up some seats, maybe even 50, but what will prevent Jo Swinson getting 200 or becoming PM is that no-one really wants a LibDem government (well, about a tenth of the voters might…), but many more will vote LibDem negatively, to block other parties or to signal pro-EU Remain support.
Well, my prediction that the LibDems want another “Con Coalition” becomes firmer daily; the Labour reaction is scalding (or should that be “scalded?):
You’re a minority party of middle class white people, and your entitlement is showing. You’re willing to imperil everyone else for the sake of another chance at coalition government. Fuck right off. https://t.co/zBKnoYUa75
Well, my analysis in the above article was right, but the basic facts changed in that Brexit Party candidates standing in Conservative Party-held seats were ordered by their duplicitous leader, Farage, to stand down. That order applied to all Conservative-held seats, even those held by the most committed pro-EU MPs!
That decision by Farage, which betrayed his own candidates and supporters, meant that dozens of pre-election Conservative Party MPs kept their seats when, had Brexit Party stood candidates, they would have lost them to the LibDems.
The LibDems were on track to win several dozen MPs until Brexit Party self-destructed.
Jo Swinson’s decision to push for a General Election, and Corbyn’s silly willingness to be shamed into going along with that, led directly to the victory of the Conservative Party at the 2019 General Election. It led directly to Boris Johnson, a part-Jew, part-Turk public entertainer, as Prime Minister. Disastrous.
My more recent pre-General Election blogging guessed the LibDem result almost exactly. I predicted that the LibDems would get fewer than 10 seats. They got 11. So nearly right, anyway.
As for Jo Swinson, her doormatting for the Jewish lobby paid off, in that she was made a fake “baroness” and elevated to the House of Lords once she lost her Commons seat.
My conclusion was that the Conservatives are unlikely to “win” a general election in the sense of achieving a House of Commons majority, but that it is not unlikely that the Conservative Party might, after a general election in late 2019 or early 2020, still be the largest party, i.e. the party with the largest number of MPs.
Until recently, I thought that Labour would probably be the largest party in the Commons after a 2019/2020 general election; now I am unsure. I still think that Labour might beat the Conservatives in terms of numbers of MPs, but the chances must now be close to 50-50.
I now want to lay out my thoughts about Labour’s chances
Just as the Conservative Party has been running out of rank and file members and also (good) ideas for several decades, the Labour Party, though in recent years, under Corbyn, increasing its membership and activist support base, has at the same time been —-what would be the correct term?–laagering or hunkering-down or being concentrated in ever-fewer loyal constituencies. The membership of the Conservatives is still getting older on average (the majority now being over 51, and almost 50% being 65+ years old), whereas the Labour membership is more evenly-aged and far greater in numbers. The Conservatives can muster, at least on paper, about 160,000, whereas Labour has over 500,000 members or registered supporters. All the same, Labour now has 247 MPs, while the Conservative Party has 311.
It is a truth universally acknowledged…that it is better to win 2 constituencies barely than it is to win 1 constituency by a huge majority. That in a nutshell is the problem faced by both major System parties but particularly Labour:
“Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party now has the 10 of safest seats [sic] in the UK, according to a new House of Commons analysis of marginal constituencies…The briefing adds that the number of very safe seats – those won by a margin of over 50 per cent – increased by 21 in 2015 to 37 in June’s election. Labour have all of the top 28.” [The Independent]
Piling up votes in safe seats does nothing, or very little, for a political party under the British “First Past The Post” [FPTP] electoral system. Labour is piling up empty votes. The problem is exacerbated by the fact that Labour is now, to a large extent “the party of the blacks and browns” and other ethnic minorities (except Jews). The tendency of the ethnic minorities to huddle in concentrations, whether for historical, economic, cultural or other reasons, has resulted in concentrations of the Labour vote in areas already historically Labour-voting.
Another aspect to the above is the flight of white English people out of areas becoming “diverse” (in reality, changing from white non-diverse to non-white non-diverse), thus concentrating in those “ghetto” constituencies (or particular wards within constituencies) the “ethnic” vote.
Coming to Brexit, Corbyn has managed to sit on the fence so far. More Labour voters voted Remain than voted Leave, but more Labour constituencies voted Leave than voted Remain, another proof of the concentration of the Labour vote.
In one sense, Corbyn’s fence-sitting means that Labour can in theory appeal to both Leave and Remain voters; in practice, it may make Corbyn and so Labour seem undecided and indeed the victim of events, rather than the setter of the agenda.
Beyond all that, though, Labour has a policy message which might appeal to many, if it can be heard: nationalization or more regulation of public utilities and rail transport, curtailment of the excesses in the private-rental housing sector, an end to the demonization, bullying and even quiet killing by neglect of the disabled, sick, unemployed etc.
Even if Labour is the party of “blacks and browns”, that voter bloc, when combined with the votes of public service workers and those dependent on State benefits, must in theory add up to a vote of something like 30%.
Many commentators have said that, after a period of fragmentation, voters are returning to the main two parties. They say that because, in 2017, the main two parties got 89.1% of the popular vote (Conservative Party 48.8%, Labour Party 40.3%). This consolidation, however, was the result of specific factors which no longer apply.
In 2017, the LibDem popular vote slumped further from its post-Con Coalition collapse in 2015: from 7.9% in 2015 to 7.4% in 2017. Likewise, UKIP, having attained 12.6% in 2015, fell back to 1.8% (UKIP contested only 378 seats). In other words, Con and Lab were really the only two games in town in 2017.
The situation today is very different. The LibDems can appeal on several fronts: to Remainers, because the Liberal Democrat Party is the only unalloyed Remain party of any importance; to those who dislike both main System parties; to the “socially liberal” in London and the South of England (mainly). The LibDems are therefore in theory able to draw from the dissatisfied of both Labour and Conservative. It is important to understand that this is not a “LibDem surge”, more a negative vote against the two main System parties and Brexit Party, though also a vote for a clearly pro-EU party, the only one left [in England].
Then we have Brexit Party. Its mere existence, even on 10% or 15% of the nationwide popular vote, means that the Conservative Party can almost certainly not get a Commons majority. If Brexit Party stands (as promised) in 650 seats and gets an average 20%, then Conservative MPs will die like flies as their seats are taken by the LibDems, by Labour and, in a few cases, by Brexit Party itself.
Labour is fighting against the Jewish-Zionist contrived “antisemitism” protest or faked “storm”. That is not too interesting to the general public, but may support a wider narrative about “Corbyn the extremist”, someone supposedly not patriotic, a supporter of radical and in some cases very unpopular causes in the past. There again, there is the public scepticism about whether Corbyn can do the job of Prime Minister. However, it might be said in response that if Boris-idiot can do it, why can Corbyn not do it? That does rather beg the question, though…
Looking at the electoral picture in the round, I think that Labour will be able to mobilize its core vote of maybe 25%, maybe beyond that to 30%. The Conservative vote is tied to Brexit Party. If BP stands in 650 seats and if BP can get 15%, then I cannot see the Conservative Party getting more than about 30%. The LibDems will siphon off quite a few Remainer votes from both Lab and Con; overall that LibDem vote might amount to 15% or even 20%. “Socially-liberal” Jo Swinson is very pro-capitalist and her party might be an option for pro-EU former Conservative voters as well as some pro-EU and anti-Corbyn Labour ones.
The upshot seems to be that any 2019 or early 2020 general election might produce a Commons with Labour as largest party but as many as 60 MPs short of a majority; alternatively, a Conservative bloc far larger than that of Labour but still about 10 short of a majority. In other words, about where things are now.
My conclusion is that Labour might “win” in the sense of becoming the largest party in the Commons, but cannot at present get a majority.
This, below, is all too typical of the sort of person now prominent in “Labour” and what is left of the trade unions:
“Riccardo La Torre, firefighter and Eastern Region Secretary of the Fire Brigade Union, branded the coast patrol “despicable” and said: “These have-a-go, racist vigilantes have no place in any kind of enforcement or emergency activities and will only serve to make conditions and tensions worse.”
So “Riccardo La Torre” (que?), a regional secretary of the Fire Brigade Union, thinks that migrant invaders from Africa and the Middle East are “working class people, trying to get to safety”?!
From, er, France? There you have in a nutshell, the craziness that is much of “Labour” now. Alien migrant-invaders are “working class people” who should be allowed to occupy the UK at will (and be subsidized too)! Note the fag-end “Marxism”, trying to shoehorn the facts into some 1980s polytechnic back-of-postcard Marxism-Leninism.
Update, 23 September 2019
This creature might well be Home Secretary under a Labour government…
I start this examination of the new Boris Johnson government by posting part of an interview with Nicholas Soames MP [Con, Mid Sussex] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Soames
"He has got great qualities… They're just not the qualities that I want to see, personally, as prime minister of this country.
"These are not the times when we need someone who is a bit of a chancer, you know, and Boris is a chancer"
Any brief perusal of my above blogs about Boris Johnson will show that I am unremittingly hostile to him, despite the fact that I have always favoured Brexit (which he also now does, though only or mainly because it suits his narcissistic ambitions). What I want to do in this blog article is to examine those he has chosen to be in and around his Cabinet. I cannot examine every one for reasons of space and length, so I have chosen to focus on a few key players, as well as on the overall thrust of this new Cabinet.
Priti Patel
Thick as two short planks, Priti Patel is now a “British” Cabinet minister, having been saved from spending her life serving customers behind the counter of a Kampala grocery shop by her parents having immigrated to the UK, “several years” before Idi Amin became Ugandan leader in 1971.
Priti Patel is a member of Conservative Friends of Israel, and was exposed as being effectively an agent of Israel only 2 years ago. This daughter of Indian immigrants, this Israeli agent, this expenses-freeloader (she “employed” her husband part-time, on expenses, from 2014-2017) and supporter of harsh and cruel policies is now going to rule over British people as Home Secretary.
I do not trust #BorisJohnsonPM or #Priti Patel and they have 2 of the top jobs in the government. I’m wondering if the @Conservatives party is the party for me anymore.
Priti Patel is pro death penalty and voted against same-sex marriage. Not to mention they both helped write "Britannia Unchanged" which advocated the type of total free market capitalism with little to no regulation that led to the 2008 financial crash. What fresh hell is this?
– did backdoor deals with Israel as a cabinet minister – want the death penalty – threatened Ireland with food shortages over Brexit – oppose gay marriage – lobby for the tobacco & alcohol industry
priti patel being made home secretary is really scraping the fuckin' barrel, if rogue meetings with israel doesn't make you unfit for office then wtf does?
Both Boris Johnson and Priti Patel act as agents supporting the interests of the State of Israel. They cannot be expected to be loyal to the British people whilst defending an Apartheid State that has been proven to infiltrate and influence the UK and US political systems https://t.co/yjT1eVxRnj
Priti Patel is a known supporter and promoter of Apartheid Israel. UK politics is riddled with supporters of a regime that has committed incremental genocide for 70+ years https://t.co/D5ZoVoSMKn
Hard to believe that an MP, let alone a Cabinet minister, could be as plainly thick as Priti Patel really is, but the fact that she is has been proven time and again. Example:
Priti Patel is set to be in Boris Johnson's cabinet as Home Secretary so here's Ian Hislop tearing her a new one on the issue of Capital Punishment pic.twitter.com/MWSWW8Gfc7
Now Minister of State for Housing, not normally a Cabinet post, but it seems that she is either being treated as a member of the Cabinet or is at least attending. It will be recalled that she was partly responsible for implementation of the ghastly “bedroom tax” created by [Conservative Friends of Israel] Iain Dunce Duncan Smith and jew “lord” Freud.
McVey is someone who was willing to accept and promote the attacks on the poor, disabled and unemployed (and the elderly) during her previous time in government. She is also a member of Conservative Friends of Israel. She is yet another one who is as thick as two short planks, her cartoon view of the world being expressed in a Liverpudlian accent almost impossible to understand.
Half-Jew, though supposedly not brought up culturally Jewish. Hard-faced careerist. As far as I know, another member of Conservative Friends of Israel. Has visited and worked in Israel/Palestine.
Sajid Javid, a member of Conservative Friends of Israel, is so pro-Israel that he even spent his honeymoon there, despite he and his wife both being non-Jewish. As Home Secretary (2018-2019), he made the astonishing assertion that he supports the violent “antifa” thugs [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifa_(United_States)
and he has been seen at Scotland Yard events alongside Jewish Zionist “activists” such as Stephen Silverman of the malicious “Campaign Against Antisemitism” or “CAA” cabal (Silverman being someone who has been exposed in open court as a serial troll and harasser, and who used pseudonyms to disguise his identity while doing that). Silverman and the CAA attempt to influence government and police policy in favour of Zionism and Israel, working with groups such as “UK Lawyers for Israel” etc, the memberships of which often overlap.
Javid, unsurprisingly in view of his background, thinks that mass immigration has benefited the UK!
Javid became a director of Deutsche Bank in 2000, leaving in 2009, by which time that bank had become one of the main “drivers” (causes) of the worldwide banking crisis:
This person, Sajid Javid, is now the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Cabinet minister in charge of government finances, tax, overall financial strategy etc. Very worrying…
Grant Shapps
Jew and member of Conservative Friends of Israel. Exposed in 2012 as having used two pseudonyms in order to basically cheat members of the public by selling them dodgy business and self-improvement courses! He even got into the Palace of Westminster using those false IDs! In fact the Jew has a history of dodgy business dealings, tax dodging and cheating the public.
Now Shapps has been appointed to the Cabinet as Transport Secretary! You really could not make it up. Speaking of transport, when will my train arrive?
This “government” is, in the immortal words of Johnny Mercer MP (applied to Theresa May’s tenure) a “shitshow”. In fact, if the Theresa May government was a “shitshow”, Boris-idiot’s one is going to be a total shitshow!
Not a Cabinet minister, but the new Government Chief Whip, who attends Cabinet and is a key figure, especially in a government with no majority and even with Democratic Unionist Party [DUP] support only a majority of 3 or 4, which will probably soon be 1 or 2, depending on the result of the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election and whether Charlie Elphicke MP [Con, Dover] is allowed to remain on bail (and so vote in the Commons), having been charged with three sexual assaults against two women:
The Guardian journalist and Chief Political Correspondent, Jessica Elgot (a Jewish Zionist who, if memory serves, blocked me on Twitter before I was expelled), has penned this cheerful piece about Spencer:
Jessica Elgot’s Guardian piece somehow neglects to mention that “Spencer attracted criticism in early 2015 after suggesting that a man with learning difficulties who had been left without food or power after being sanctioned for arriving four minutes late at the benefit office should “learn the discipline of timekeeping“” [Wikipedia]; or that
“In January 2016, Spencer was one of 72 MPs who voted down an amendment in Parliament on rental homes being “fit for human habitation” who were themselves landlords who derived an income from a property.” [Wikipedia]
This is a disaster of a Cabinet, a disaster of a government, led by a part-Jew public entertainer who probably should never have been even a backbench MP, certainly never have become even a junior minister, let alone a Cabinet minister. That such a person is now Prime Minister of the UK, and leader of one of the two main System parties, is an indictment of that same political system. The political and electoral systems are broken. The House of Commons is full of trash.
What else? Well, as we have seen, all those examined (including Boris-idiot) are Conservative Friends of Israel, with at least one (I think maybe three) being in effect Israeli agent(s) of influence (if not more). The same will be true of the rest of the Cabinet.
This is not only the most pro-Jewish Lobby, pro-Israel Cabinet ever, but the least truly British (in any real sense; yes, they have British passports; actually, some have or had others, like Boris-idiot, who actually was a US citizen with a US passport until quite recently!); Sajid Javid— Pakistani; Dominic Raab— part-Jew, Priti Patel— Indian.
“Johnson’s maternal great-grandfather was a Russian Jewish immigrant named Elias Avery Lowe.” [Breaking Israel News]
““I feel Jewish when I feel the Jewish people are threatened or under attack, that’s when it sort of comes out. When I suddenly get a whiff of antisemitism, it’s then that you feel angry and protective.” [Boris Johnson]
“In addition to his Jewish ancestry, Johnson has even stronger ties to Israel through his Jewish stepmother, Jennifer Kidd Johnson, who married his father Stanley in 1981.
In 1984, Johnson, age 20, and his sister Rachel spent six weeks in Israel, volunteering on Kibbutz Kfar Hanasi, approximately 22 miles north of the Sea of Galilee in northern Israel.
The visit was coordinated by Michael Comay, a career Israeli diplomat and close family friend of Johnson’s stepmother. Comay and his wife Joan connected the Johnson siblings with the overseas volunteer program at Kibbutz Kfar Hanassi.” [Breaking Israel News]
Several of those appointed to Cabinet, including Raab, Priti Patel and Liz Truss, were co-authors of the notorious booklet Britannia Unchained, their credo being unrestrained finance capitalism and the British people as slaves to usurers and employers:
“Britain needs to adopt a far-reaching form of free market economics, with fewer employment laws”;
“The British are among the worst idlers in the world. We work among the lowest hours, we retire early and our productivity is poor. Whereas Indian children aspire to be doctors or businessmen, the British are more interested in football and pop music.” [Wikipedia]
Well, I agree about the football and pop music etc, but the rest postulates as an ideal a dystopian economic slave-society (is that surprising, when you see that the booklet was written mostly by those from non-British, non-European backgrounds, societies where slavery and serfdom are still ubiquitous: India, Pakistan etc?)
What now?
So unfree is the UK already, that if I were to print what I really believe should be done to remove this government of evil, I should probably have the police at my door.
In terms of what might happen politically or electorally to remove this unelected System dictatorship led by Boris-idiot, it is a grace from God that its Commons majority is almost non-existent even with its bought (by Theresa May) DUP support. Soon it will have no majority in the Commons even with those bought DUP votes.
The Brexit dilemma is the first matter. It is suggested that Boris-idiot will try to leave the EU either without agreement with the EU, or with an agreement not much different than that Theresa May agreed, but which was rejected by the Commons. The probability must be that the same will happen again. If so, Johnson will before long face a no-confidence vote, which probably but not necessarily will lead to a general election. Johnson thinks that he can win such an election. Not if Brexit Party stands 650 candidates as promised. Brexit Party may sink the Conservative Party even if it itself fails to win a single seat.
On the other hand, if Boris Johnson makes an electoral pact with Nigel Farage, eg guaranteeing Brexit Party a free run in say 50 seats in return for the reverse in the remaining 600, that is a gamble which threatens to destroy the Conservative party as a main national party contesting all seats. It also risks creating a far more powerful because far more credible Brexit Party.
What if Johnson in effect caves in, accepting a poor “deal” with the EU (assuming that the Commons approve it)? That would be the end of Johnson as Prime Minister even if he were able to cling on for a while. At the next general election, he would probably lose his own seat, as would 100 or even 200 of his MPs.
What about other matters unconnected directly with Brexit? The Conservative majority is now effectively gone already, with quite a few anti-Boris MPs likely to abstain on critical votes. This “government” scarcely has the strength to be called “lame duck”.
It is worth noting that the Conservative Party has not managed to win a really substantial majority at a general election since the 1980s, though in 1992 and 2015 it had enough MPs to rule (leaving aside Brexit) without serious interruption (which is why Mrs May’s decision to hold a snap election in 2017 was such a great error).
In the end, Britain needs social nationalism. This weak and stupid government of aliens is the opposite, a would-be tyranny of non-Brits, non-Europeans, and pro-Israel dystopians. It is evil and must go.
EU27 diplomats have received a note from @MichelBarnier saying that @BorisJohnson’s demand to eliminate the backstop is unacceptable, that his speech today was “combative” and that the UK’s increased preps for No Deal are designed to crack unity of the EU.
[above, Boris-idiot with some (full) Jews, including notorious paedophile, now deceased, Greville Janner]
[above, Boris-idiot, one of whose great-grandfathers was an Orthodox Jew rabbi in Lithuania, puts on his “ancestral” skull-cap at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. Looks now as if Jehovah granted his wish! Still, be careful what you wish for…]
I was musing on exactly why Boris-idiot has appointed so many of what Ronnie Reagan might have described as “misfits, looney tunes and squalid criminals” to his Cabinet. Yes, they are mostly Leave supporters; yes, they are mostly those who supported Johnson in the Conservative Party leadership contest; but I think that there is another reason.
In my view, Boris-idiot was limited in his choice because so many potential ministers and Cabinet ministers simply would not and will not serve under Johnson. In fact many who served under Theresa May did not wait to see whether they might be reappointed or given other jobs. They ruled themselves out.
There are two or three aspects to this:
Many MPs and most former ministers despise Boris-idiot and simply cannot see him as a real Prime Minister of this country. They know that he was out of his depth as Foreign Secretary and that he is even more out of his depth as Prime Minister;
MPs mostly know very well that this government of crazies cannot last long, firstly because of its crazy and/or plain thick Cabinet ministers. When it falls, they do not want to be contaminated by association with it;
also, this government cannot last long because the Parliamentary arithmetic scarcely adds up even now. Once the Brecon and Radnorshire seat is lost (1 August 2019, this coming Thursday) and if Charlie Elphicke is convicted, later this year or early next year, of the sexual assault of two different women, the Government will have no majority at all, even with the DUP support bought by Theresa May. There is every chance that this government will be gone by Christmas. When that happens, the Conservative Party will probably either lose to Labour (i.e. get fewer seats), or at any rate get fewer seats than it now has. Either way, Boris will be gone as Prime Minister, his ignominious parody PM act having lasted only a few months.
Look at those who are now in Cabinet and in other ministerial posts! I have blogged already about some: Priti Patel as Home Secretary! This is a bad dream! Sajid Javid; Esther McVey!…; Grant Shapps…; Dominic Raab; Liz Truss (!); GAVIN WILLIAMSON…WHAT?!…the idiot who plays with his pet spider and wanted our troops to face the Russian Armed Forces with guns mounted on tractors or in the back of furniture lorries!…; even bloody Nadine Dorries is a minister of state now! Nadine Dorries, who was one of the biggest expenses freeloaders in the Commons, “employing” her recently-graduated daughters at the highest pay level permitted [in 2019, that level is £50,000 p.a.], and allowing one of them at least to occupy the taxpayer-funded flat in Central London meant to be for the MP’s own use, whereas Nadine Dorries actually commuted back daily to Bedfordshire (by rail, First Class, and of course again on expenses)! She also got all three (herself + 2 daughters) expensive new laptops and telephones etc on expenses! This is like a TV sketch writer’s joke!
I have little doubt that, just as his shambolic term as Mayor of London spawned the political comedy show The Thick of It, Boris Johnson’s term as Prime Minister will generate another political sit-com. The British people may not see the joke.
Well, enough for today, but anyone who saw Boris-idiot making promises of rail lines in Northern England when he was speaking in Manchester today saw a person well out of his depth, putting on a “prime ministerial” act and failing to raise to even a decent am-dram level. As a speaker, Johnson is poor (though his ad-lib humorous style might be OK for after-dinner speechifying). Content? Very poor. Delivery? Amateur and unconvincing.
Finally, one must ask why so many Conservative MPs voted for this clown to be their leader. I think that the answer is that most of the other candidates were also very poor, and even the few with potential to do the job of PM (leaving aside my firm ideological opposition to them) had impediments, such as that they were Remain supporters (eg Rory Stewart) or unconvincing recent Leave convertees (Jeremy Hunt and maybe Stewart), or with a negative public image (Michael Gove, a one-time cocaine abuser, as well as a flagrant expenses cheat in the 2005-2010 Parliament and possibly later).
The vote for Johnson, by most Conservative MPs, was a gamble, the gamble that the public entertainer and bullshitter can “reach the voters other MPs cannot reach”. I think that the Conservative Party is about to lose its shirt.
Update, 28 September 2019
Michael Gove, seen intoxicated through drink or drugs in the Chamber of the House of Commons recently! This is becoming just bizarre! (ignore the silly “Nazi newspapers” comment by the tweeter. “Nazi newspapers”? If only…!)
Diane Abbott Mojito on the Tube: All hell breaks loose in Nazi Newspapers
Michael Gove coked up & pissed out of his mind in Parliament: Silence 🤫 I can even hear pins dropping#bbcqtpic.twitter.com/AsbG53ySE1
Jared O’Mara [Lab, Sheffield Hallam] finds his way to these pages not, as have previous MPs so honoured, merely by being stupid or ignorant (sometimes and in fact usually combined with arrogance and dishonesty) but by expressing his mental and physical afflictions through his behaviour.
I suppose that most people feel, or feel that they should feel, sorry for those born with or otherwise suffering from physical or mental disabilities. However, my view is that, notwithstanding those feelings, I do not want such people entrusted with, inter alia, flying passenger aircraft, carrying out the duties of a surgeon, or helping to rule the United Kingdom.
O’Mara graduated from Staffordshire University, one of the least convincing of the new wave of “universities” in the UK. I have no idea what a degree in journalism involves or consists of, but I do know that since the proliferation of courses in that subject, thousands of semi-literates have been let loose in the msm, with the result that one now sees egregious errors in spelling and grammar everywhere, but especially in the online versions of the old print newspapers. The Daily Mail and the Daily Mirror are among the worst offenders, replete with sentences including “he was stood at the back” and “she was sat at the back of the bus”. As for real knowledge of history, geography etc, forget it.
These new “journalists” often have no idea how to report accurately, either. Often, one has to scan a newspaper report several times before locating the salient facts. That is especially true of the court reports.
Enough of my discontent. Suffice to say that Jared O’Mara graduated in journalism, with a “first-class” degree, whatever that now signifies (my opinion: not much). He did not attempt to do any actual work as a journalist, however; he started, with friends, a bar with music, in Sheffield. He was engaged in that activity, it seems, for more than a decade until the 2017 General Election. At any rate, there is no other work or activity known, except for attempts at local elections and a stint as a local school governor.
At the General Election of 2017, O’Mara, with 38.4% of the vote, unseated Nick Clegg, the then LibDem leader (and 2010-2015 Deputy Prime Minister), who received a 34.7% vote share. The Conservative came in a moderately-strong third, with 23.8%.
“Labour whip suspension over offensive online comments
O’Mara became a member of the Women and EqualitiesSelect Committee in September 2017.[3] Following revelations of offensive comments he had made before becoming an MP, he resigned from the committee the following month.[34]
A series of derogatory comments about women and gay men posted by O’Mara on websites over a decade before he became an MP were revealed by the Guido Fawkes blog on 23 October 2017.[35][36] He commented about the Girls Aloud pop group: “I advise you to sack Sarah and the remaining four members (Nicola, Cheryl, Nadine and Kimberley) come have an orgy with me”; and he said that the 2003 winner of Pop Idol, Michelle McManus, had “only won because she was fat”.[6][35][37]
He has also been accused of making homophobic comments including referring to gay men as “poofters” and “fudge packers” and referring to jazz musician Jamie Cullum as a “conceited cunt” who should be “sodomised with his own piano”.[6][38][39] O’Mara apologised “if his comments caused offence” and resigned from the Women and Equalities Select Committee.[6][39] In a later speech, O’Mara said that the homophobic words he used were part of an Eminem record he listened to at the time.[40]
The following day, O’Mara was accused by Sophie Evans, a Sheffield bar worker whom he had met through an online dating app, on BBC Two‘s Daily Politics of having “made transphobic slurs” towards her in March 2017, and of saying in the same incident that she was an “ugly bitch”.[41][42] O’Mara denied the allegation.[43] On the same day, it also emerged that he had been posting derogatory comments about children in Sheffield and appeared to advocate corporal punishment to deal with delinquent youth.[44] Following the emergence of the comments to Evans, the Labour Party announced an investigation into O’Mara’s conduct, but stopped short of suspending him from the party.[45]
Further revelations were made public on 25 October 2017. On a Morrissey fan site in 2002, he was found to have made xenophobic insults, saying that Danes were “pig shaggers” who “practised bestiality” and referring to Spaniards as “dagos“.[46] O’Mara, when reviewing the Arctic Monkeys in November 2004, made several sexual comments including how “sexy little slags” danced to the band’s songs.[47] These revelations resulted in O’Mara being suspended from the Labour Party and therefore having the party whip withdrawn.” [Wikipedia]
Recently, it has emerged that the now “Independent” MP has completely abandoned any constituency work, does not bother to answer enquiries from his constituents, and has no staff, having sacked some, while others quit, unable to bear O’Mara and his behaviour. The most recent (and last?) staff member, the “chief of staff”, left very publicly, tweeting that O’Mara was “the most disgustingly morally bankrupt person I have ever had the displeasure of working with“, and “a selfish, degenerate prick“. The employee had only worked for O’Mara for 8 weeks! He added:
“We’re left with a situation where there’s people in Sheffield Hallam who are not being represented, there are people who are waiting on their immigration status, there are people who are not getting houses, there are people having their benefits stopped and all these things stopped just because he’s not prepared to do his job properly.”
O’Mara is also, it seems, some kind of alcoholic, downing a bottle of vodka in the mornings (even before breakfast) on some days. It just gets better…
Below, the tweets the “chief of staff” sent out under O’Mara’s own Twitter account:
If you haven't seen the (now deleted) tweets from the Jared O'Mara MP whistle blower, here they are.
O'Mara was a Labour/Momentum MP who turned out to be seriously dodgy. He never seems to vote or go near the Commons but is pulling £90k a year or so – for what? pic.twitter.com/SZ9sE5Lt3M
Despite the above, O’Mara has stated that he intends to stand again at the next general election. Some idiots have been defending him. The tweet below is typical of modern Britain, not just because the tweeter is non-white and painfully politically-correct, but because she seems to have no understanding of the fact that an MP is supposed to be there to serve his constituents, not use his status as a well-paid holiday or mental and physical therapy opportunity:
Pathetic. At least most people (see below) seem to understand why MPs even exist…
Irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the actions of Gareth Arnold, the focus should be on whether Jared O'Mara is carrying out his duties as MP for Sheffield Hallam, earning his £75k salary and, if not, perhaps he could step down to enable a by-election to be held.
So there we have it. For me, the most important part of this story is how it has somehow come to be expected that, if an MP is disabled or mentally unwell, then the House of Commons should change to accommodate that, or if a woman has a small child, then the procedures of the Commons should be interfered with in order to make her daily life easier. Maybe mentally-ill, addicted or incapable people should simply not be MPs? Same with woman MPs who have small children. They serve the country better by dealing with them, not by grandstanding in the House of Commons.
What about Sheffield Hallam, the unfortunate constituents of which now have even less help from their MP than is the norm? They must await a general election. There is no prospect of Jared O’Mara standing down, not while he can get about £80,000 a year plus expenses (London flat, utilities etc) paid.
Obviously when there is an election, O’Mara is gone, even if he makes some quixotic attempt to stand as Independent. The LibDems are probably in a good position to recapture the seat now. The Conservatives will be weakened by their national situation and by the Brexit Party (which threatens to stand in every English and maybe every UK constituency). Labour has little chance. O’Mara was the first and may be the last Labour MP elected for Sheffield Hallam (the seat was created in 1885). The Conservatives held the seat until 1997.
The present House of Commons; look upon its members, ye confounded…and despair.
“Statement regarding my mental health and recent events
In a few weeks, I will be making a follow-up statement regarding my position, until then I will be taking time out to receive professional help to deal with my mental health and personal issues regarding self-medication. During this time I would appreciate you could give myself and family privacy.
This is what I would like to say in the meantime:
I would like to start by apologising to my family, my friends and my constituents. I have not been honest with you about the depths of my depression and self-loathing. When I started this job in 2017 I was a different man: a confident and passionate man that wanted to help others. Sadly, I was unable to do that because very quickly I was bullied and mistreated in a harsh and unforgiving environment and that led me to be weak.
I wasn’t even meant to win the election. I stood because I wanted to give my time to support the democratic process and because I was inspired by Jeremy Corbyn and everything he had to say. Particularly about “Equality and Fairness”. I voted for him twice, was a member of his group ‘Momentum’ and practically idolised him.
But I got no support from him or the National Labour Party during the campaign. The previous Labour candidate Oliver Coppard (who I think should be the MP for Sheffield Hallam and I think is a top bloke) got funding and support nationally but I did not. The efforts of a small group of dedicated grassroots activists working to help me with the campaign I lead won that election for us. I will always be grateful to those amazing volunteers and all who voted for me. I don’t get many people backing me, helping me and supporting me in my life so it means so much when you do.
One person who constantly snubbed me and treated me less favourably than other people was Jeremy. He was the biggest shock of that election; not my victory. He has not been the man I thought he was nor that he appears to be. To the point that he and his team lied to you all last year. I was never let back in the Labour Party as they said. Nor was I ever ordered to go on training or “warned”.
They wanted me to act like I was when I was not provided with any details in writing about anything and they wanted me to act like I was guilty of those allegations from the two women from the pub when I had submitted hard evidence and witness details that showed I was not. So I had no choice but to leave the party I loved.
Within months of my appointment as MP for Sheffield Hallam the smears happened and I fell into a self-destructive nosedive. During my suspension Sam Matthews his team were consummate professionals but then Jeremy’s office took over the case and I had to get a solicitor involved because of disability discrimination in order to get it back on track.
The discrimination made things even worse. My mental health deteriorated further and I isolated myself from family, friends and constituents. My actions became erratic and my thoughts became incoherent to the point where most recently I suffered a delusional episode.
In May this year, I sent an email to Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn asking them for help with getting Equality in parliament. Some MPs were parents who were not getting support and Maternity/Paternity cover and I wasn’t entitled to my rights under the Equality Act for adequate support for my disabilities and as such was not provided with the safe and necessary environment for me to speak in the chamber. This was to serve as my olive branch to Jeremy for the bullying he and his staff had put me through which caused me to leave the party in July last year.
Jeremy and his office then offered me a meeting by letter and by my parents’ observations I was visibly excited. Jeremy’s office then promised to get in touch with me and offer a selection of dates on a certain day but did not fulfil their promise, so I emailed the next day and let my disgust at their disrespect be known. Jeremy’s response was to make false reports about me being a mental health danger around parliament with a delegation of Labour safeguarding representatives and his staff. I know this because I have it in writing from the parliamentary doctor.
I was not then a mental health risk at that point but such gaslighting ultimately made me one.
About two weeks ago I told a staff member I was in love with her during the aforementioned delusional episode. I’d been paranoid for weeks that if I was mad like Jeremy and his team said I was then I’d do something like that. The messages I said that were not of a sober or rational mind and felt like an out of body experience when I sent them but I know that does not excuse my actions because I should not have been self-medicating with a drink to get into that state. It was my lowest point and I will be apologising personally to her and her family.
I want to become a better person again; like I was. I feel I’ve become unrecognisable and I want to make amends. I need treatment for my mental health and rest first though. I will make a further statement about my future in a few weeks.
Lastly, to my dear, old friend – the Noel to my Liam – Gareth: Thank you for sticking with me like I am sticking with you. How anyone put up with for this long is a mystery! That’s what mates should do. I wish you a good break, you have earned it.
I am so sorry to everybody for everything. You have put up with so much; all of you all my staff, my family, friends and constituents.
Well, only a day or two after I blogged, another twist in this story: O’Mara has now indicated that he will stand down as MP for Sheffield Hallam when the Parliamentary Summer Recess is over (3 September 2019).
So I was wrong in assuming that O’Mara would cling on as MP for financial reasons. He has done the right thing, or promised to do it. Credit where due. He has made the honourable decision to fall on his sword.
If only other MPs who have lost all legitimacy would follow O’Mara’s lead: Anna Soubry, Fathead Chuka Umunna and the other “Change UK” defectors, sex pest Israel lobbyist John Woodcock etc.
As to the by-election which will now occur in Sheffield Hallam (and which the LibDems must, even speaking so far in advance, have a good chance of winning), that will probably be held in October. I shall blog about it once the candidates are announced, which will probably not be until some time in September.
Update, 23 August 2019
Seems that my general suspicion might not have been quite so wide of the mark after all…
Now O’Mara wants to “postpone” his standing down until the next general election! He may be a “fuck-up” mentally and physically, but he is cunning about money…
So now, O’Mara is going to keep getting the pay, “expenses” (inc. free London housing or hotel costs, utilities, food, taxis etc) for further weeks or even months. He has already said that he will not be doing any further actual MP work (not that he has ever done much), so all the money he gets will have been extracted on a basis of total dishonesty (regardless of whether he is ever charged with fraud as such).
* Lab majority in 2019 was 712; O’Mara’s majority in 2017 was 2,125. LibDem leader Nick Clegg’s 2015 majority was 2,353; his 2010 majority had been rather better— 15,284!
A by-election is to be held in Brecon and Radnorshire constituency (formerly Brecon and Radnor, 1918-1997). Unusually, this by-election has been triggered by the conviction for (what amounts to) fraud relating to the Parliamentary expenses of the sitting MP. Christopher Davies, who had held the seat since 2015, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 50 hours of community service and a fine of £1,500.
The relative leniency of the sentence may reflect the fact that the £700 wrongfully claimed by way of expenses by Davies could have been claimed legitimately (whether approved or not); the way in which he went about it (creating two false invoices amounting to the sum in question) made it unlawful. On a kind interpretation, Davies was stupid or incompetent more than (very) dishonest. Still not very good for him, I would have thought.
The position of the MP and the calling of the by-election
The events around this by-election raise interesting issues.
The news reports say that the seat “has been vacated”, but I have seen nothing about the Speaker declaring it so, a problem which previously arose during the Fiona Onasanya case, when that MP, despite having been sentenced for perversion of the course of justice, and despite a recall petition having been approved by more than the requisite 10% of eligible voters, still sat and voted as MP for Peterborough (including, crucially, in a significant Brexit debate and vote), also getting paid for months.
Davies may or may not, at time of writing, still be an MP. Even the more serious newspapers and the specialized websites (eg Politics Home) have not clarified the position. The Wikipedia entry for Davies says that his removal as MP was “automatic” once the results of the petition were known, but such is not the case. Wikipedia also says that “the seat was declared vacant on 21 June 2019” (today). Perhaps.
The Conservatives must “move a writ” to start the by-election process. In Britain’s unwritten or (more accurately) uncodified Constitution, this is supposed to happen within (usually) 3 months of the seat being declared vacant. After that, the by-election usually happens within 27 days (of the writ having been moved).
In other words, while in theory this by-election could happen by the end of July 2019, it might not happen until late October or, if the Conservatives really stretched the Constitutional proprieties to the limit, even later. Parliament rises for its Summer Recess on 25 July, so if the writ is not moved by then, the very earliest date on which the writ could be moved would be 3 September, after the Commons return, making the earliest by-election date one in late September.
If Davies is still nominally the MP, then he is entitled to his salary and expenses until such time as he is declared (by the Speaker) not the MP.
Christopher Davies, remarkably (bearing in mind that he pleaded guilty to the charges), seems to be breezy about the matter, and has invited his constituents to his local office, in the small Welsh town of Builth Wells, to view and enjoy the 9 landscape photographs which were the subject-matter of the expenses claims in question! I daresay that many of his constituents might wonder why Parliamentary expenses cover such purchases anyway (surely he or the local Conservative Association should have paid?).
Even more remarkably, Davies says that he intends to stand again! The local Conservatives, meanwhile, have not pronounced on whether Davies will be allowed to stand as a Conservative Party candidate! One can see their difficulty: if Davies stands as Conservative candidate, their chance of success is weakened, contaminated by his candidature, but if Davies stands as Independent Conservative or some such, he may draw off at least a few hundred, maybe even a thousand or more otherwise “Conservative” votes. None dare call it blackmail?
Still, one would have thought that simple ethical standards might have come into play, but in the contemporary Conservative Party, it seems not.
Another strange aspect: one would have thought that the two contenders for the Conservative Party leadership would have condemned Davies for his offences, or at least mumbled something neutral, but it seems that both have been “very supportive”.
The constituency
Before 1939, the constituency, under its Brecon and Radnor name, had as MPs persons from the Labour, Liberal, Conservative, Unionist, National and National Liberal parties (the latter three effectively Conservative coalition candidates).
Labour held the seat between 1939 and 1979. From 1979 to 2019, the Conservatives won 3 times, the Liberals/Liberal Democrats 3 times.
The post-WW2 Labour vote peaked in 1964 at just under 58%; its lowest was 10% in 2010. In general, the Labour vote has declined over the years, having not exceeded 20% of votes cast since the General Election of 2001.
The LibDem vote peaked in 2010 at 44.8% (1st placed), since when it declined to about 28% in 2015 and about 29% in 2017; however in both 2015 and 2017, the LibDems were placed 2nd.
In 2017, the Conservative candidate, Davies, achieved a vote of 48.6%, a post-WW2 record for Conservatives in the seat.
The only other (slightly) significant party contending over the years has been Plaid Cymru, which however has rarely retained its deposit in recent decades. Its typical vote share in recent years has been 2%-3%, though it reached 4.4% in 2015 (3.1% in 2017).
A few other parties have stood over the years. UKIP got 8.3% in 2015 (its best in the seat), but slumped to 1.4% in 2017.
The joker in the pack is Brexit Party.
Conclusion
There are some uncertain factors here: will Christopher Davies really stand again, and if so will it be as Conservative Party candidate or as some type of Independent? Will Brexit Party put up a strong candidate? Whatever happens, the Conservatives must be toast here. If Davies stands as Independent, and with Brexit Party now standing, then the Conservative vote will (probably though not necessarily) be even lower than if Davies brazenly stands again as Conservative. Davies does seem to be quite embedded locally, as a former livestock auctioneer, Royal Welsh Show ring commentator and manager of a veterinary practice.
The LibDems are currently strong favourites. The only thing that would or might upset the applecart would be the Brexit Party, now (announced today) entering the fray. Looking at 2015/2017, the LibDem core vote in the seat is below 30%. Even so, the LibDems must be in pole position here. It’s their election to lose.
Further factors
It is plainly in the Conservative interest to delay this by-election as long as possible. Their notional working Commons majority, even with DUP support, is now only four. If Brecon and Radnorshire goes LibDem or Brexit Party, that will reduce to three. Some Conservative MPs are ready to abandon support if Brexit no-deal looks likely. Boris Johnson may be a very short-lived Prime Minister.
The Brecon and Radnorshire Conservatives have reselected Christopher Davies as their candidate.
Davies faces an uphill struggle. While his offence was only marginally dishonest, it was still dishonest. It also showed Davies as both lacking in judgment and as simply inept. Apart from that, there is the point that the Conservatives have rarely if ever been lower in public estimation. Also, this is a by-election and the Conservative Party is in government.
The position has now been clarified. Davies is no longer the MP and the writ is expected to be moved today, Thursday 27 June, having failed two days ago. The by-election is now or soon will be set for 1 August 2019.
In a sense, I am surprised that the Conservatives did not play this more tactically, in view of their situation re. the numbers in the Commons, but there it is.
Now that Brexit Party is standing, the chance of the Conservatives actually winning (especially with a rather discredited candidate) has shrunk accordingly. If Brexit Party gets half of the 2017 Conservative vote, that would give them about 24%. The LibDems are unlikely to get less than the c.29% they got in 2017. Labour got over 17% in 2017.
If Labour does better than it did in 2017, and if Brexit Party does well too, and the LibDems do at least as well as they did in 2017, then all four serious contenders might well get vote shares in the 20%-35% range. If the Conservative vote were to collapse to, say, 10% or 15%, then the other three parties in serious contention might well end up getting about the same vote shares as each other.
This might turn out to be quite close among LibDems, Brexit Party, Labour, and maybe Conservatives too, with the likelihood of placings in that order.
Meanwhile, minor Remain-friendly parties look like not contesting the seat, in order to give the LibDems a clear run. Green Party, Renew, Change UK (probably, if they even bother to make a statement, they are already so marginal), Plaid Cymru (maybe).
Renew has never contested this seat, though it scored about 4% in Newport West recently; Change UK is already a “dead parrot” party, marginal, negligible in support (below 1%); the Greens last contested this seat in 2015, scoring 3.1%; Plaid got 3.1% in the seat in 2017.
If Plaid get on board the non-contest train, the boost to the LibDems must be worth several points, maybe as much as 7%, though more realistically about 5%. Worth having, anyway.
There are so far 4 candidates standing (LibDems, Conservatives, Brexit Party, Labour), with less than 48 hours until nominations close. Plaid Cymru has “indicated” that it will not be standing, in order to give the pro-Remain LibDems their best possible chance. The other pro-Remain parties, meaning Greens and Renew, are both not standing and for the same reason. Any late entries are likely to be vanity or joke candidates and will not at all change the outcome of the by-election.
The LibDems must be in an even stronger position to take the seat now that the smaller parties are not standing. In the last few elections, minor parties accounted for between 5% and 10% of the total vote.
Update, 4 July 2019
My eye was caught by the latest YouGov national opinion poll, as reported by Britain Elects.
If this poll is in any way accurate (and Ipsos Mori put out a very different result only a week ago, which shows how volatile UK politics is becoming), then Brexit Party would actually be the largest party in the Commons after a general election:
Brexit Party 196 seats (130 short of Commons majority), Labour 148, Conservative 169, LibDem 66. That would mean a Brexit Party government with, almost inevitably, Conservative support; possibly a coalition government. Large numbers of both Conservative and Labour MPs would be gone, including half of those recently vying for Conservative leadership.
Thinking about how that might apply to the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election, it may be that most of the 2017 Conservative votes in the seat will go to Brexit Party, but they might not. There is uncertainty. Personality often means more in rural constituencies than in urban and suburban ones. Much depends on whether voters regard the Conservative, Christopher Davies, as an “expenses cheat” and/or “fraudster” after his criminal conviction, or whether they will “forgive and forget” his sin/error because they (do they?) regard him otherwise as OK and his offence a technical one.
My view is obviously no more than an educated guess, but I should think that many locals will think that £700 is a ridiculous sum to pay out for 9 photographs anyway. Others will see the dishonesty aspect; yet others may think that the former MP should be given a second chance. Much depends on his personal vote, on his local popularity.
I find this by-election hard to call. However, it must be done. On present facts, I think that Labour has no chance, realistically. It is seen as the party of the blacks and browns now, for one thing. They are few in number in that part of the world, unless it has changed hugely since I was last there. Also, Remain voters will go LibDem here, not Labour, whereas committed Leave/Brexit voters will go Brexit Party or maybe Con.
I think that it is quite possible that at least half the 2017 Conservative vote will defect to Brexit Party. The LibDem vote will be solid now that the party is bouncing in the polls; also, in this seat, the LibDems are not seen as a wasted vote, Brecon and Radnorshire having had LibDem MPs from 1997 until 2015.
If the LibDems can build on the 29% they got in 2017, and I think that they will, then they are in with a very good chance. They might get a vote between 30% and 40%.
I doubt whether Labour will get more than 10% or so.
The Conservative vote may collapse, though I remain unconvinced that it will go much lower than 20%.
Brexit Party, if it can capture disaffected Conservative votes, might go as high as 30%. There is another point, which is whether people who prefer Conservative or Labour will vote tactically for Brexit Party. Hard to say. The LibDems must get at least 30% and may get 40%, so Brexit Party has to get around 40% to have a chance of winning.
Provisional Conclusion (with nearly 4 weeks left to run):
LibDems
Brexit Party
Conservatives
Labour
Update, 5 July 2019
With weeks left to run, the online betting market shows the LibDems as heavily odds-on (about 1/5), Labour (oddly, but the market is thin) on 2/1, Conservatives on 9/1, Brexit Party at 12/1. Political betting is a minefield. The favourites often go down. Labour on 2/1 looks like exceptionally poor value! Brexit Party, however, looks like fairly good value at 12/1. My own valuation of the odds would be nearer to: LibDems 1/2, Brexit Party 2/1, Conservatives 3/1, Labour 10/1, but we shall see.
The confirmed final list of candidates shows the four expected parties (Con, Lab, LibDem, Brexit Party) and two late entrants, namely UKIP and Monster Raving Loony. The UKIP entry will obviously eat into Brexit Party’s chances; to what extent we shall see, though even 500 or 1,000 votes might be enough to sink Brexit Party in the by-election. Looks more like a spoiler than a serious candidature.
The Guardian interviews locals. One part stands out:
“Given that 19% of the local electorate signed the recall petition, almost double the 10% threshold, a surprising number of locals of different party allegiances express sympathy for Davies’s plight. Yet there are some who are adamant that he should have stood down. One council worker tells me that, owing to her job, she’s in electoral purdah and can only speak off the record. “I signed the petition against Chris Davies because he tried to shaft a friend of mine who works in his office, by blaming the expenses mistake on her,” she says. As far as this council worker is concerned, Davies, whom she voted for in 2017, was given a second chance for cynical reasons. “Everyone knows that they didn’t want to put any promising new candidate in,” she says, “because they know they’re going to lose the seat.””
Had a look at Oddschecker betting array. LibDems are hugely odds-on (1/9), Conservatives second at aroung 7/1, Brexit Party about 12/1, Labour 100/1. Not noted were UKIP and Monster Raving Loony. I expect that anyone wanting to throw away a few pounds could ask for and get 500/1 against either of those.
Betting is not always a sure indicator of a election or referendum result, but the LibDems have, as previously said, a lot going for them here: a fairly recent history of providing the local MP, the fact that the Conservative candidate is damaged goods, the fact that those who would have voted for the parties that have voluntarily withdrawn (Green, Plaid Cymru, Renew) will vote LibDem in a contest where Labour is anyway a wasted vote.
Well, “the moment of truth”, meaning that the by-election will be held tomorrow, Thursday 1 August 2019. This blog post has so far had, in about 5-6 weeks, 600+ views, far above the norm for my blog. Brecon and Radnorshire is having its 15 minutes of fame…
The LibDems are in pole position, hugely odds-on with the bookmakers (1/20 in some quarters), with the Conservatives in 2nd place (about 9/1) and (perhaps surprisingly) Brexit Party in 3rd position (as high as 50/1, which may be, at those odds, a value bet); Labour seems out of it at odds of 150-1.
A month ago, I was predicting, provisionally, LibDems to win, followed by Brexit Party, Conservatives, Labour, UKIP (a pure spoiler candidature, it seems) and the inevitable joke candidate, a Monster Raving Loony calling herself Lily the Pink (presumably after the comic song of 1968).
I see no reason to think that the LibDems will not win Brecon and Radnorshire. They have all the Remain votes and so many of the votes of the highly-subsidized local farmers, though no doubt some of the latter will remain loyal to the Conservative Party and its recently-convicted candidate. I do not know what sort of campaign Brexit Party put up in the constituency, but I should imagine that BP might still come second, notwithstanding the bookmakers. If it does not, Brexit Party’s balloon deflates a little more, but many will be looking at the result of the by-election to see whether the Conservative might have won were there no Brexit Party candidate. If the Brexit Party candidature alone meant that the Conservative could not win, alarm bells will sound at CCHQ.
Update, 1 August 2019
Polling day. The betting odds, for what they are worth are (best odds) LibDems 1/18 odds-on; Conservatives 7/1, Brexit Party 100/1, Labour 150/1. The bookmakers, at least, think that Brexit Party is heading for 3rd place. Perhaps.
It may well be that tactical voting is taking place, in particular that Labour supporters, recognizing that Labour has no chance here, are going with the LibDems in order to ensure defeat for the Conservatives (and Brexit Party).
The only significant changes in the betting are the Conservatives taking closer order (yesterday 8/1 or 9/1, today 6/1 or 7/1, and Brexit Party sliding from 50/1 to 100/1.
Looks as if the LibDems have probably nailed it and that the Government’s majority, even with DUP support, is now 1 MP vote.
The LibDems won fairly decisively, but with a smaller majority than the betting might have been suggesting. I have posted links here below.
For me, the most important aspect beyond the headline result is the fact that the Conservative ex-MP would have won, even handsomely, were it not for the candidature of Brexit Party, which received 3,331 votes.
The LibDem majority over the Conservatives was only 1,425. In other words, had Brexit Party not been standing, the Conservatives would almost certainly have won by nearly 2,000 votes. I shall be blogging separately later about the by-election and the implications of that Brexit Party aspect for the national political picture.
The Labour vote had suffered a general decline in the constituency over the years (all-time high was 57.69% in 1964), but this was its lowest-ever vote-share (5.3%). I attribute that partly and perhaps mainly to tactical voting: Labour supporters voting against the Conservatives (mainly) in a situation where Labour had no real chance anyway: the Labour vote here has not exceeded 20% since 2001 (21.4%).
The Monster Raving Loony Party got 1% (334 votes), the UKIP spoiler candidate (or was she just irredeemably stupid?) only 0.8% (242 votes).
There is not much sunshine for the Conservatives in this result. Still, ex-MP Christopher Davies can always return to auctioning cattle; and he has some lovely landscape photographs (the subject-matter of his criminal case) for his Builth Wells office. Something to think about as he endures his community service serf-labour…
Ynys Mon, a constituency which (sub nom Anglesey) goes back to 1545, was won by the Conservative Party at the 2019 General Election, only the third time a Conservative Party MP had been elected there, and only the second Conservative MP (the first having been the multikulti supporter, Keith Best [MP 1979-1987], who was convicted, while MP, on charges of having made fraudulent share applications).
As to Brecon and Radnorshire, the Conservative Party won easily, with a vote-share of over 53%, at the General Election. Brexit Party had not stood (rather, withdrawn) a candidate after Nigel Farage stabbed his own supporters in the back.
The present MP for Brecon and Radnorshire is Fay Jones, a rather obscure and youngish woman (34/35 y-o) whose father was also once a Conservative Party MP (and is a prominent freemason in Wales).
