Tories win Copeland by-election as Labour holds Stoke

[hrmjustin]

Source: BBC

The Conservatives have won the Copeland by-election, beating Labour in an area it represented for more than 80 years.

Trudy Harrison won with 13,748 votes to Labour's Gillian Troughton's 11,601.

Ms Harrison hailed the victory - the first by-election gain by a governing party since 1982 - as "a truly historic event".

Labour's Gareth Snell held Stoke-on-Trent Central with 7,853 votes, seeing off a challenge from UKIP leader Paul Nuttall who got 5,233.



Read more: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-39064149

[C Moon]

1. I can't help but wonder if Putin is speading his disease.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. No, this is pretty standard internal British politics

The one party that has been linked with Putin, UKIP (the party of Nigel Farage, Trump's crony), failed to take Stoke, despite there being a huge 'Leave' vote there last year.

They weren't helped by the candidate, Paul Nuttall, who now leads the party, being reveled as a serial liar and fantasist about how close he was to the Hillsborough disaster (96 died in a football stadium in 1989. He claimed he lost close friends in it, but didn't, claims to have been there, but was a child at the time, and his school has said they had no record of him as the pupils there, and they offered counselling to them all at the time. Abusing Hillsborough for your own publicity does not go down well in Liverpool where the victims came from, and Stoke wouldn't think much of it either).

In Copeland, where the Tories took the seat from Labour (1st time a sitting government has taken a seat in a by election since 1982), it seems to have been a general feeling that Labour just aren't very good. But the Tories don't look in the least influenced by Putin - they are very pro-NATO, and their anti-EU feelings date back to the 70s and 80s. They align with someone like John McCain in US politics.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

12. Corbyn is too orthodox to be under Putin's spell

[T_i_B]

19. Corbyn has also been known to be quite pro-Russian

Although he can't be as blatant about it as UKIP.

[Blue_Tires]

3. Why does Jeremy Corbyn still have a job?

seriously...

[BannonsLiver]

4. He's radioactive at this point

Labour is completely fucked in Britain for a generation. At least.

[hrmjustin]

5. I don't get it. The party is looking at major loses in 2020 with Corbyn.

[Blue Idaho]

8. I think that's a very good question...

From my perspective Labour seems to be at war with itself. The Labour MPs detest the man but they have tried twice (I think?) unsuccessfully to get rid of him. Has he really attracted so many new party members that the party base is changing or what?

The Conservative party is making a real hash of the country with serious problems everywhere thanks to underfunding and understaffing. The U.K. Needs a viable alternative to those Torres that would privatize virtually every part of their social services - from the NHS to their prison system.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

13. Just replace Trump with Corbyn in this cartoon

Corbyn basically brought all the miscellaneous green and communist riff-raff into the Labour Party, he is their God.

Meanwhile the traditional Labour voter is looking at Nick Clegg and thinking maybe he isn't such an asshole after-all.

[Blue Idaho]

15. Thanks for This!

That's what I suspected. I was in the U.K. last year - pre Brexit. It was a madhouse there. From my conversations with locals up and down the length of Britain I could have told anyone Brexit was going to pass.

Post Brexit Labour under Corbin is a rudderless ship while the Torries have hired right wing campaign operatives from the US to keep control as they go about gutting social programs. It's a mess and Labour offers no clear and reasonable alternative.

At least that's how I see it.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

16. I don't think May is going to do anything all that radical

But on the Brexit portfolio the absence of any effective opposition is terrifying.

I don't think things have transpired how May would have liked, nor do I don't think her rise to leadership transpired how she would have liked. She was overtaken by events and there was never a real debate within the Conservative leadership race as to just what Brexit was going to mean she just woke up one morning as Prime Minister.

I spend a lot of time in London and only London. My father used to tell me he didn't know a single son of a bitch who voted for Nixon. In London none of the British who work for us were proponents of Brexit, none of our clients who are British businesses and financial institutions were proponents of Brexit. One woman banker crudely referred to the referendum as David Cameron giving the anti-European and anti-immigrant elements of the Conservative Party a "lazy handjob" and not to worry our pretty little American heads about it.

These people were really blindsided by it. I didn't think it would pass but I wrongly believed people would be turned off by the open xenophobia and the charlatans who were most stridently championing it.

[Blue Idaho]

18. When we are in the U.K.

We spend a lot of time in Villages and smaller communities - that may account for the differences in attitudes on Brexit between what you experienced and my experience.

[muriel_volestrangler]

17. No, not really. His supporters have been in the Labour party all the time

but they went along with the Blair years, toning down their dissent. This meant they party had enough support to win elections.

What's really happened is that the centrist side ran out of candidates who could enthuse their supporters, let alone those on the left - or floating voters. That's how Corbyn got elected by the existing members, not just new ones. I really can't think of anyone of whom you could say "if they were in charge, Labour would be looking good".

[T_i_B]

20. That's how he first got elected leader

A lot of people have joined Labour since the last general election, inspired by Corbyn. And those people have joined in enough numbers to ensure that Corbyn stayed as leader despite numerous clear failings in his leadership.

Labour can't get rid of Corbyn now, which leads me to wonder how long it will be before the party breaks in two.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

21. There is a re-alignment coming

I suspect there will be a new centrist party that is first and foremost pro-European that will attract a lot of support from disaffected Conservatives, white-collar Labour supporters and whatever is left of the Liberal Democrats.

[Denzil_DC]

22. "Corbyn basically brought all the miscellaneous green and communist riff-raff into the Labour Party"

That's just utter generalistic BS. How many do you know personally?

"Traditional Labour voters" are thinner and thinner on the ground, and that's been a trend for many years. That's the problem.

And I'm not a Corbyn fan, BTW. Just a Brit who knows a bit about that's been going on.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

23. So what do you call "Momentum"?

[Denzil_DC]

24. So you ARE just generalizing wildly out of ignorance. OK, then. n/t

[geek tragedy]

9. He reflects the views of Labour's voters.

As a group they prefer purity to winning.

[nycbos]

10. Indeed

Last edited Fri Feb 24, 2017, 05:11 PM - Edit history (1)

We have that problem here as well with some of the Bernie or busters. With "friends" like that who needs enemies?

[Blue Idaho]

14. No doubt...

I am fortunate enough to visit the U.K. once a year and talk to Labour reps whenever I can. It's so damn frustrating to watch the Torries gut long standing and effective social programs in a desire to replicate the corporatist American political scene and have no effective opposition for people to turn to.

I hope Labour can get past Corbin and find leadership that can offer a clear and effective alternative to the disaster that is Theresa May and her cronies.

[leftynyc]

6. Corbyn needs to go

He's toxic and Labor will keep losing as long as he's the face of them.

[hrmjustin]

7. Agreed!

[nycbos]

11. Yup absolutely.