UKC

It seems as if Boris is leading Ken Livingston by some margin in the polls for the second preferences, so if Ken can't win in London, can Labour win in the General Election? (yes I know a week is a long time etc)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/apr/10/london-mayor-johnson-ahead-p...

In reply to KTT:

Boris could even be the next Tory Leader when David's star fades.

In reply to The Lemming: Yes, and he'd do a far better job.

In reply to KTT:


And that is indeed a scary prospect.

But I do think that Boris would do well in the post.

In reply to KTT:

I don't know why, but England is taking a real step to the right. It's becoming apparent almost on a daily basis now that Scotland and England are moving away from each other, certainly in the political tone.

In reply to KTT: I have a wee soft spot for Boris...

In reply to Saor Alba:

I don't see that. Scotland & England have a vast amount in common

Of course the Nats, motivated by their desire for partition, love repeating this sort of stuff.

In reply to The Lemming:



As long as you post him to somewhere a long way away, and don't put a Return to Sender address on it, in case they don't want him...

In reply to KTT:

Not living in London I don't check the Mayoral polls every day, but I did happen to check the national polls today, shows a 9/10 point lead to Labour.

As you say, a week is a long time in politics, three years is even longer, but why does no one ever check the polls on these threads.

In reply to Saor Alba:

I disagree; i actually think it's a more caring society and centrist than I can recall in my adult life. The current financial malaise is distorting some aspects but overall I think it's very far from being right wing.

In reply to Saor Alba:

I think you are concentrating on the wrong things, I certainly don't see what you are suggesting in the mainstream. A few political points aside in some key areas (politically speaking) in southern England have traditionally been conservative in their outlook. England as a whole and Scotland are very similar in more than just politics.

England being a population of 50million is always going to have a larger and more vocal opposite to Scotland but look at the entire picture and I personally don't see many significant differences.

In reply to peterd:

I'm simply talking about attitudes to stuff like the NHS, water supplies, PFI, roads, social care, foreign policy, immigrants, the EU etc.

On all of those issues there is quite a big difference evidence b the death of the tories in Scotland but not down south.

to Jon, I'm not talking about the individual who I think are just as caring etc down south, more how people behave in mass voting patterns.

...and of course, Peter, the tories, motivated by their love for the Union, keep repeating the same stuff. Unfortunately though they are dead in Scotland.

Anyway, carry on discussion.

In reply to KTT:

I am no conservative voter and will always be Labour at heart. However back to the point I do think Boris would be good as Prime minister in a no nonsense forward looking way. I do have to admit that what he has done and is proposing for London is nothing short of revolutionary. His green environmental movement is areas of greening the built environment, transport etc has laid a great foundation for who ever follows.

On can labour win the next election? YES, and I fully expect them too the changes to the NHS in England have consigned the ConDems to history. At the minimum a hung parliament but I fully expect labour possibly a landslide win in the next election. The average guy on the street including the floating voters/ no voters will be well and truely pissed off by the time the election comes around. Never again shall we see 18 years of conservative/conservative led government.

In reply to Anonymous:

You were going quite well until then. So what makes you so sure of that, other than lack of experience and being a believer?

In reply to JonC:

The Conservatives will get in again, provided they don't make any more c0ck-ups like the Fuel Fiasco and can pin all their woes onto the Lib Dems.

In reply to KTT:

I suspect hat Boris is leading by default. For every hard left or immigrant vote livingstone chases he is sacrificing a soft or middle ground left vote. Boris has smartened up his game and dropped the buffoon act but he has a long way to go to be PM material, unless we are going down US route of actors and body builders etc

In reply to JonC:

Ok I'll admit you can never say never....but... I think a number of things stand in the way of seeing consecutive conservative led or conservative majority governments. The average person on the street doesn't give two hoots about politics until 1) general election or 2) the decisions hit them hard in the face. The average person won't remember the mess Labour got the economy in before the 2010 election which led to our current government set up. By the time the next election rolls around the average person will be just seeing the crap i.e strikes, pay cuts, pensions, NHS, unemployment, slack economy and blame the governing party for the problems regardless of their role in the mess.

Labour and the conservatives are lucky in that they have similar numbers of core voters across England though I believe that the conservatives have a slight natural majority. so in simple terms the public will become restless blame the conservatives the core voters for each parties will vote regardless of merit, the winning votes will be from the floating voters/lib dems or independents. I think even the wrong brother ED will be able to put forward a strong enough message to vote Labour to topple the conservatives. We may see yo yo governments for a number or years though. Labour screwed up after 13 years, the condems were on to a hiding to nothing and have in the public's eyes messed it up the next government is also on a hiding to nothing as they will be screwed by consecutive f-ups!!

In reply to Anonymous:

That was 5 mins of your life you'll never get back.... Better things to be doing

In reply to JonC:

Nope, nowt better to be doing, if I am honest its either spout crap on the web or read and put a presentation together on the Management of Houses in Multiple Occupation (England) Regulations 2006, different statutory instruments and HHSRS.

So no, I don't have anything better to be doing at this moment in time lol.

In reply to Saor Alba:

You should have been around in the Thatcher years, but I agree, a tory is a tory is a tory, and in the end their extreme right wing will reassert itself more openly.

In reply to The Lemming:

There was no fuel fiasco, it was a rather contrived coverup of the revelation that the PM is charging money for meetings and by implication political sway for cash.

Boris for PM definitely. Cambridge might be able to win a rowing contest but you can't beat Oxford for a PM (currently leading 27-14 in the PM league).

In reply to Philip:

I do wonder if he would make the amazing PM you might think. The problem is that there are lots of charismatic politicians out there who talk a lot of sense. David Blunket, John Prescot, Gordon Brown, William Hague, Ann Widecomb and many more all come across as caring rational people. But as soon as they put a ministerial hat on and tow the party line, they become lying bar stewards you want to kill.

I fear that someone like Boris would have to constantly deal with snipers like John Redwood undermining him.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Good on defence, good on road safety, there's only one man for the job:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Prowse

In reply to KTT: A year ago I wouldn't have touched a tory with a 60' 9mm nylon rope. but I've been listening to the attacks that labour have against party policies "Playing Politics" just to score points on things which should have been brought through straight away in order to get the economy working. say for example this 50p tax. making more money is the best thing to encourage foreign investors and lets face it, we'd all rather be working than being spoon fed, any day and yet Labour assulted it with everything they had. As a working Married and healthy man, my money has gone up as a result of the CON-DEM changes and I've watched the number of scroungers from the government in my area go down. In my heart I don't want to vote for the Conservatives but I really don't feel that Labour is ready to inherit that sort of power yet. Not until I feel they have what it takes give people what they need rather than what they want.

In reply to kjdicken: I broadly agree with you. My problem is that where as the Tories are generally pretty good at running the country, they are unfortunately also brilliant at making a shash up of everything else. In their last stint at power they monumentally screwed up the railways, the water companies and power companies resulting in prices going up whilst service levels went down. We are only just coming through all that but things are still a long way from perfect.

And now they have the NHS in their sights. Heaven help us!

In reply to peterd:

Well the nats don't need to do much 'repeating', when the likes of Tory treasurer state that the Tories are just pretending to be pro Union to ensure they get the best deal out of the split with Scotland when it comes. Talk about shooting thenselves in the foot.

Of course, on the basis few in Scotland believe a word a Tory says, it may not have done too much damage, and they can go on 'claiming' to be pro union.

In reply to muppetfilter:

I'm confused, I thought the cover-up was Pastygate and the cock-up was the fuel 'crisis'
Was it the other way round ?

(either way the Tory Treasurer's big mouth was shut on both the cash for influence and the revelations of the Tory 'pretence' of being pro Union, just to cut a better deal with the Nats. So the usual smoke and mirrors were duly activated.

In reply to Jim C:



The current issue of Private Eye also points out that Cruddas has now pretty much disqualified himself from his position as an "approved person" on the Financial Services Authority register, as he has very publicly resigned - or been asked to resign, or been sacked - from "a position of trust, fiduciary appointment or similar" ...

They also suggest that he is disqualified by trying to "mis-sell a financial product" ie an investment in the Conservative Party, by promising unrealistic returns.

They are slightly joking I think, about the knowingly mis-selling a financial product, but he did resign from the position as co-treasurer of the Tories, in pretty deep disgrace, so they seem to have a valid point there.



The other thing about the Cruddas affair is, of course, don't piss off Rupert Murdoch, because he will get you. And this is another point that Private Eye is making. The Sun famously supported Cameron and the Tories at the 2010 General Election, and now they are following Rupert's new line because Cameron set up the Leveson Inquiry, of which News International is bearing the main brunt.

Hopefully Cameron will stick by Leveson, and not cave in to Murdoch. This is an issue I am fully behind Cameron on, Murdoch is a powerful bully with an appalling amount of influence, and no qualms whatsoever about using his personal grudges to destroy political careers and governments (if he can) by influencing the editorial direction that his papers create and choose to pursue.

In reply to KTT: After listening to labour this last few years, I think I'll vote lib dem again, afterall, a CON-DEM'd government is better than Pure tory any day.

In reply to kjdicken:

how, exactly?

In reply to kjdicken:

The Lib Dems don't exist, they are just junior Tories.

In reply to Saor Alba:

I thought that was the accusation made against the SNP? Its quite hard for liberals to steal Mail reader votes from the torys.

In reply to Offwidth:

It was but without foundation as the SNP have implemented most of their policies and have not abandoned their core purpose.

The Lib Dems have so far supported tuition fees, support the government surveilance email stuff (simply by being part of the government), support NHS privitisation, support the reduction in tax for the richest, support arms sales (DC's visit aborad right now), have been destroyed on an alternative voting system and basically abandoned everything they supposedly stood for.

I know of no other party who has been so poor at implementing their programme.

In reply to The Lemming:

The condems have had nothing but cockups so far i cant really see the trend reversing over the next few years. I don't think labour are much better though they are just tory lite. The ideological gap between our main parties is so narrow now that we may as well be living in a consensual dictatorship. and it's not just the gap between the parties it's the social background of most politicians too. They are just not representative anymore, how long can the elite keep normal people out of top political positions? Average people are getting more and more frustrated with the self serving political classes. The very richest people have been getting richer year on year regardless of ecconomic conditions while everyone else gets poorer most of the people in power come from the same handfull of schools and are from the wealthiest type of background. We seem to be moving backwards.

In reply to doz generale: Gordon Brown reached the top. He was hardly from an elite or particularly wealthy background. He wasnt much good though..

In reply to billb: And John Major, and John Prescott etc. It's a myth that you have to be rich to succeed in politics.

In reply to billb:

Yes, so did Prescott but they are a dying breed. The social background of our political classes is starting to resemble that from before the 50s. They are consolidating it by making university education stupidly expensive. It's like someone has decided that the social experiment is over and they want the old class system back.

In reply to Saor Alba:

Socialist Scotland, voted in a banker, an oil banker at that, an oil banker who's main policy upon independence is to reduce the corporation tax paid by, among others, bankers and oil companies.

In reply to Ken Lewis:

Maybe in your world but I suggest a quick look at the voting system and a re-check of policy.

In reply to Postmanpat:

I read in a couple of rags that Ken is actually putting in a lot more effort to the middle class suburbs than last time and his support is higher there (though presumably starting from a pretty low base).

In reply to KTT:

Is it just me or do any of the other 50+ million folk who live outside London also get heartily bored by all the Boris and Ken stuff and the airtime and column inches inflicted on us by the Beeb and the so-called national papers? I couldn't tell you the name of our own mayor so I certainly don't care who is London's.

In reply to Saor Alba:

For someone who normally puts forward a well reasoned argument your reply amazes me by its weakness and irrelivance.

Last i checked SNP were going to reduce corp tax. Has that changed?