So, despite their tremendous efforts to achieve the contrary result, Labour is now in the lead. A clear sign of how utterly desperate we have all become.

I have noticed a bit last and this week that Ed Milliband is getting a bit more fire in his belly to attack the government. A good thing and especially a good thing to use it to fire at the Tories about the NHS. May the poll lead continue.

I would contend that Labour has never had an overall majority in the National Assembly for Wales. In 2003 Labour won precisely half the seats, which is not a majority; the election of a Plaid Cymru Presiding Officer and an Independent Deputy Presiding Officer meant that Labour had a working majority only. (The DPO can vote when not in the chair)

“If UKIP continues to grow in support, it has a realistic chance of overtaking the Lib Dems as Britain’s third largest national party.”

Is it just me, or do the conditions for perpetual Tory government seem to be falling into place? Whether or not we get AV, it seems likely that coalitions are going to be a more common occurrence from now on. And if the UK’s third and fourth largest parties are both more natural Tory coalition partners than Labour coalition partners, we’re pretty much fucked, aren’t we?

Until either a) grassroots/Beveridge Group Lib Dems get their party back or b) the Greens’ support reaches UKIP/Lib Dem levels, things do not look good for the ‘progressive majority’.

Unlikely, as IIRC UKIP don’t have a geographical base – their support is spread. They’ll do well on more proportional systems, but probably won’t get constuencies. They also lack the incumbancy advantage as well. Even under AV it’s going to be lab, tories, lib dems and the nationalist parties winning seats, with the greens competiting in Brighton and Norwich for a couple of seats. UKIP really need to be focusing on areas where they can get 12 000 votes if they want to look at taking seats from second preferences, and IIRC there is no constutency where they even come close to that.

OTOH – a UKIP getting 15-20% vote share that only translated into 4-5% seats (if that) would almost certainly kill off any remaining support for FPTP amongst the non-conservative party right wing. It would probably deprive the conservative party of so many seats that Labour would win by a landslide.

@ 4 G.O.

“And if the UK’s third and fourth largest parties are both more natural Tory coalition partners than Labour coalition partners, we’re pretty much fucked, aren’t we?”

What’s your basis for saying that the Lib Dems are “more natural” partners of the Tories than they are of Labour? I seem to remember that Clegg had to work quite hard before the election to convince people that he would even consider joining up with the Tories were he put in a position of being able to join either party to create a majority government. And if we had a Labour-Lib government now rather than a Tory one, I find it very unlikely that the Lib Dems would be finding themselves as demonised as they currently are. Labour and the Lib Dems even had a non-aggression pact going for a while ,didn’t they?

And if we had a Labour-Lib government now rather than a Tory one, I find it very unlikely that the Lib Dems would be finding themselves as demonised as they currently are.

They’d have been caught in precisely the same trap, with the added bonus of being portrayed as propping up a defeated Labour party. Plus, given that cuts of a more or less similar scale were proposed by all parties, they would probably have been seen as betraying their principles in the same way.

It’s probably true that their Guardian coverage would have been less childishly vindictive, but that’s about all you can say.

@ 7 Tim J

“They’d have been caught in precisely the same trap, with the added bonus of being portrayed as propping up a defeated Labour party. Plus, given that cuts of a more or less similar scale were proposed by all parties, they would probably have been seen as betraying their principles in the same way.”

Hmm. I reckon that a lot of Lib Dem supporters voted for them on the assumption that they’d deal with Labour if given the chance. I certainly don’t think we’d have seen the same horrified reaction from their own base in that situation. The right would have been pissed off, and no doubt we’d have had Sun headlines about the Lib-Lab coalition being an attack on democracy, but annoying the other side isn’t the same as losing support.

Also, I had the very strong feeling that the country as a whole wasn’t so much anti-Labour before the last election as it was anti-Brown. If the Lib Dems had propped up another Brown premiership, that would probably have been very damaging for both parties. Otherwise, I reckon they would have done quite well as the party that kept both the Tories and Gordon Brown out of power.

G.O.

… things do not look good for the ‘progressive majority’.

Is there a progress majority? (whatever ‘progressive’ means)

Also, I had the very strong feeling that the country as a whole wasn’t so much anti-Labour before the last election as it was anti-Brown.

I suspect that the country was even more anti-Brown than it was anti-Labour, but that’s not quite the same thing.

@8

Chaise is right, as evidenced by the huge slump in LD support since last May. A significant section of their support (if not membership) was centre-left, and was never going to be reconciled to a coalition with the Tories. Labour scuppered any chance of a centre-left coalition, both before the election by not strangling New Labour and booting Brown out, and in the immediate aftermath by being unwilling to take radical enough action to de-toxify their brand.

I don’t buy the theory that we are seeing the start of a semi-permanent centre-right domination. For starters, the LD’s aren’t going to be strong enough. The defection of such a large section of their support leaves them back in the territory of the old Liberals, hovering around 10% in the polls, with fewer seats, and strength in a few traditional Lib/LD regions.

Things look OK for Labour at present, because so many people feel they have nowhere else to go. It is quite possible however that many centre-left people who feel they can no longer support the LD’s, will refuse to support Labour too. It’s still a fair way off until 2015….but the AV referendum and elections in May will be interesting.

As the old curse says: “May you live in interesting times”!

@ 9

“Is there a progress majority? (whatever ‘progressive’ means)”

I think in this context people are using it in the sense of centre-left, socially liberal “progressive majority”, as distinct from cnetre-right, socially conservative (presumed) minority.

Obviously there is a debate to be had about whether it is true that there is a “natural” left of centre majority in the country as a whole (or even just amongst voters?)….. but I think the major issue is that even if you think the answer to that question is “yes”, it’s not as if they currently have a party that actually represents a radical, progressive platform. *sighs*

Chaise

“What’s your basis for saying that the Lib Dems are “more natural” partners of the Tories than they are of Labour? I seem to remember that Clegg had to work quite hard before the election to convince people that he would even consider joining up with the Tories were he put in a position of being able to join either party to create a majority government.”

Yes, I found it hard to believe at the time too; but then I was still naively thinking of the Lib Dems as a sort of liberal-leftie, social democratic party. I’d never heard of the Orange Book etc and didn’t realize how far the party had shifted towards a right wing, market liberal position. Bearing that shift in mind, though – as well as the Tories’ shift towards a more socially liberal position in some areas (gay rights, ID cards) – it’s not hard to see why the two parties have been able to work together. (Just compare David Laws’ proposals on the NHS in the Orange Book with Andrew Lansley’s proposals; the two parties are very much ‘on the same page’, ideologically speaking).

Caveat: when I talk about ‘the Lib Dems’ being more natural partners of the Tories, I mean the Lib Dems as presently constituted under Clegg. I don’t mean grassroots Lib Dems are natural Tory allies, or that the party has always been close to the Tories, or anything like that.

“Also, I had the very strong feeling that the country as a whole wasn’t so much anti-Labour before the last election as it was anti-Brown.”

No doubt about that. But, that only makes the actions of the fuckwit Labour back benchers even worse. Brown showed in his ranting’s as Chancellor that he was not suitable to be Prime Minister, and his huge sense of entitlement made it clear that another candidate needed to be found. Even when they had the chance to get rid of him they chickened out.

Maybe if the were not stuffing themselves with every expense they could dream up they would have realised what they were doing. They let down the people they should have been representing. Those are the people who now being screwed by the brown shirts. But then these clowns voted for the Iraq war as well. You might as well have got a load of sheep and a sheep dog to heard them through the lobbies.

I lost a lot of faith in the backbench MP. Morons.

I never thought I’d say this, but WELL SAID SALLY!!!!!

@13 G.O.

For non-members of the LD’s it does seem an odd transformation…. but possibly no more surprising than the hijacking of the Labour party by “New” Labour? It would be interesting to get the take of some current and/or past members of the LD’s.

I think the collapse in LD support is evidence enough that a large number of left of centre people have abandoned the party. These are the people who assumed that the LD’s were, as many within the party explicitly stated, a left of centre party.

I’d say that there has always been a tension within the LD’s between the classical Liberals who distrusted the centre left, and the former SDP people who threw in their lot with the LD’s. Whether the LD’s can emerge from the current Coalition as anything other than a smaller, unequivocally centre, or even centre-right party is another matter.

I think what many people who used to support the LD’s (and I think a fair number who are still members) find hard to accept is the fact that the Coalition appears to be such a love-in. Perhaps it would be naive to expect anything else, but I honestly think many people expected the relationship to be much more “arms length”. I don’t think this is just a matter of presentation either.