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Denzil_DC

(7,233 posts)
5. "By contrast, the PLP are, for obvious reasons, representative of the much larger group ...
Sat Nov 28, 2015, 03:23 PM
Nov 2015

of people who ... vote Labour in general elections."

As a point of fact, the PLP, like all MPs, are supposed to represent their constituents (whatever way they voted) and those who voted for them at the last election. At that point, what was on offer was so inspiring that many people didn't bother to vote at all, or held their nose and voted for them because of distaste at the alternatives.

There is no doubt a rump who will vote on party lines (if they vote at all) for Labour no matter who stands. That is evidently diminishing, and diminishing fast, for various reasons, not least of which are the paucity of choices on offer and spectacles like the current one, where principles and consistency are sacrificed for what the PLP (always craven before a hostile press) considers to represent electability. Those are your "people who vote Labour in general elections".

Others are looking for more. The party has the option of incorporating their views and reflecting them, or treating them with contempt and going on as before. In which case somebody else may fill the gap and pinch those voters, or we'll see even more people giving up on the idea that their vote matters and letting the more motivated but retrograde parties who do manage to drive people to the polls take power.

We've seen this happen over many years in Scotland (by poaching votes from the left and displaying general competence rather than a predilection for constant in-fighting). There's a lesson to be learnt there.

Some folks are living in the past. I don't think it's (just) the dreaded Corbynites.

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