Great for Ming - Terrible for Tony and Dave
June 30th, 2006
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But will Blaenau and Bromley be dismissed as just by-elections?
By the tests set in my article just as the polls were closing the overnight by-elections brought terrible news for both Brown/Blair’s Labour and David Cameron’s Tories. They also showed that the Lib Dems are able to pack a huge punch in a Westminster by-election whichever party is defending.
The straight politics make Labour’s results marginally, but only marginally, worse than the Tory performance in Bromley.
For Brown-Blair’s party threw everything into winning back what was its biggest stronghold in Wales and had the benefit of two by-elections at the same time which meant it could spend massively. It will be interesting to see the expenses figure but the party campaign budget could have gone up to £200,000.
Failing to win back Peter Laws’s Welsh Assembly seat has big implications for who has control in Cardiff.
There’s no excuse for the Tory performance in Bromley. The only consolation on the evening is that they held on against a huge Lib Dem challenge but to see the majority reduced to a few hundred should light up panic signs throughout the party.
Everything about the Tory campaign was pathetic. All the polls showed that their biggest asset is David Cameron yet the local Tory party made only passing reference to their leader in the campaign literature. This followed the selection mess-up and you had a recipe for disaster which is indeed what happened.
In the Guardian a couple of days ago Ed Vaizey, one of Cameron’s inner circle, complained about Lib Dem tactics. What did he expect - Mary Poppins?
Campaigns like this are a dirty, bruising, business. The Lib Dem strategy of finding a defect in their opponent and then repeat it time and time and time again is well known. That is how you achieve success. To deal with campaigns like this you cannot leave the fight in the hands of a local party. Maybe one of the consequences of Bromley will be a change in Tory rules?
So what about the Lib Dems? A great performance but the party has an enormous amount to live up to when it comes to by-elections and the danger is that Bromley will be dismissed by the Tory-Labour big party duopoly as just Ming’s party doing what they are expected to do.
And the betting? - well, as I suggested, betting against Labour in Blaenau proved profitable and it’s clear why Tories did not rush to take the apparently free money on Bromley.
And the pollsters? Less than two weeks ago NOP had Labour as clear winners for the Westminster seat at Blaenau. Polls have not got a good record at by-elections and this reinforced it. The poll also carried on that wonderful UK polling tradition of over-estimating Labour.
New YouGov poll. I’ve just noticed that there’s a new survey in the Telegraph which I’ll cover later in the day.
Mike Smithson
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An accurate assessment, but what seems odd to me is that the Conservatives seem to have unlearned the lessons of Cheadle, where they nearly won and gave the LibDems a real fright. The Tory campaign there went a little bit ott, but overall it was a convincing pastiche of LibDem byelection campaigns in recent years, even down to virtually identical layouts and headlines in campaign tabloids. And relentlessly banging on about how unlocal the LibDem candidate was when he lived all of two miles away at the other end of Stockport borough! Did all this go out the window in B&C? But importing an alien A lister, as some here seem to think was necessary, would have guaranteed defeat.
But the most surprising failure for me was in Blaenau Gwent, just what did the Labour team spend their money on? Was their canvassing really so poor?
Does this mean, that there will soon be a “rerun” in Bromley: http://www.flickr.com/photos/robfenwick/177186978/
It seems to me that the problem in Bromley was precisely the way Cameron has been running the Tory Party. How is it possible to go into a byelection fight without any clear policies? With a second-rate support team? With a duffer who does not even know what he is signing as a candidate?
It is small wonder that the Lib Dems ran rings round the Conservatives.
And the problem now is that Cameron has been the mainspring of the Tory advance over recent months. And now in Bromley, his strategy has fallen to pieces. The Tories are seen as insubstantial incompetents.
This is very sad, since they are supposed to be the Loyal Oppposition.
The only comfort is that Labour fared even worse.
Changes on General Election 2005 / Assembly 2003
Bromley and Chislehurst: Con 40% (-11%), Lib Dem 38% (+18%), UKIP 8% (+5%), Lab 7% (-15%). Con hold, swing from Con to Lib Dem of 14.5%
Blaenau Gwent (Westminster): BGPV 46% (-12%), Lab 37% (+5%), PC 6% (+4%), Lib Dem 5% (+1%), Con 4% (+2%). BGPV hold, swing from BGPV to Lab of 8.5%
Blaenau Gwent (Assembly): Ind 50%, Lab 34% (Total 84% +14% on Lab 2003), Lib Dem 7% (-4%), PC 4% (-6%), Con 3% (-3%). Ind GAIN / Ind Lab hold. Swing from Lib Dem to Lab 9%.
It seems amazing that, at the height of Labour´s unpopularity (or can it sink lower?), the principal alternative party - Her Majesty´s Loyal Opposition, the Tory Party - has a swing against it in Bromley, of all places?
Something is going very clearly wrong with their strategy. Being opposed to Labour is clearly not enough. The Tories need to ATTRACT - and their problem is that there is nothing attractive about them.
Perhaps they nead to change their leader?
I see that Lord Rawlinson has died. Better known as Sir Peter Rawlinson, Tory MP and minister, I found this comment in his obituary - perhaps - still relevant in today´s turmoil in the Labour Party….
“In 1970, he also demanded that the Labour prime minister Harold Wilson arrest (the then Young Liberal) Peter Hain and others for demonstrating against the apartheid South African cricket tour.”
I wonder how many readers here remember the principled stand by Peter Hain over South African Apartheid, the damage it did to the then Liberal Party, and his subsequent betrayal of Liberalism…
A very poor result for the Tories and quite shocking really in view of the situation in the country generally - but those last words are probably the key. I suspect that this has little to do with the country generally ( or DC ) and everything to do with local factors. Mr Neill seemed a very uninspiring choice in what, like it or not, is a very media-conscious age and I wonder what the local activists’ campaign was like on the ground?
No doubt a poor result for the Conservatives but I think complacency is to blame as much as anything.
Posts and predictions here made it clear people thought B&C was in the bag from the off. Goodish polling results, positive Cameron coverage and a big sittting majority meant most people couldn’t imagine the Tories would lose. And they were right . . . just.
A good kick in the pants for a party which seems to have permanent amnesia about the tactics the Lib Dems use at by elections and the commitment and intensity they bring.
As for Labour’s night. It couldn’t really have been much worse could it?
Incidentally, does anyone know the turnout in B&C?
I think it was a bout 40% (vs. 65%) which also suggests that a lot of GE 2005 Tory voters stayed at home thinking a. it was a sure thing. or b. they didn’t give a monkey’s about the by election.
Tory vote up 24% in Blaenau Gwent. There’s something for everyone, as usual.
The results from Bromley prove, that the Lib Dems’ shift to the direction of market liberalism pays off.
Not sure about that last one (even though I generally support that shift). What really is striking as that we now surprise even ourselves at by-elections. I thought we might not even get second.
10. PC vote up substantially there as well. Strange that bit part players (in that seat) are increasing their vote in the face of a heated and close campaign between two major candidates.
Certainly a poor night for Cameron - this should just reinforce the message that local constituency parties need at least close supervision when running by-election campaigns. The Lib Dems seem to have their machinery set up for by-elections - and their membership accepts that; the CCHQ machinery still appears to be in General Election mode (which possibly means it’s in the garage for servicing at the moment as well).
However, a win is still a win; the MP is still the MP, and his majority will no doubt return to 5 figures come 2009/10. For Labour this truly was a terrible night: losing their once safest seat twice on the same night and dropping to fourth in B&C (I know the Tory was fifth in BG, but that’s not really a change). If anything, the B&C result was worse; presumably there was a degree of anti-Tory tactical voting but as Labour finished second last time what impelled this except the collective knowledge that Labour was out of the running yet the Lib Dems weren’t?
The Tories shouldn’t panic over Bromley: although I don’t know Bob Neill at all, it is clear their candidate choice was abysmal (I had at least 20 leaflets though my door slagging off “three jobs Bob”). The Lib Dems’ stunning by-election record, the prospect of a re-run and a strong UKIP campaign all provide plenty of short-term excuses and I’d expect a 5,000+ majority at the next GE. That said, if there’s an autumn re-run…
13. Forgot to post - this was also a pretty poor night for those of us who entered the predictions competition. Admittedly, I guess most of us were devoid of first-hand information which is often the key to these things, but the average scores were still a long way out on the BG parliamentary and B&C top two parties. I accept my share of responsibility in that.
The doubts about Cameron’s leadership are now going to move from mutters to murmurs. He does not appear to have arrracted an shift of voters from Labour to the Conservatives. They have come within a whisker of losing safe seat while in opposition.
A sensational result for Ben Abbotts, Ming Campbell and the Liberal Democrats.
Still trying to come to terms with Bromley - why were so many posters on here predicting it was free money at 1.1 - surely Dunfermerline should have showed the folly of that call - the wager still came home but it was hardly a `steering job`
It now seems pretty clear that Ed Vaizey’s bizarrely one-eyed comments in the Guardian were a desperate attempt to shift the blame from Tory incompetence to alleged Lib Dem dirty tricks.
This is undoubtedly a poor showing for the Tories and no amount of spinning about “Lib Dems being good a t by-elections” can disguise it. We have been hearing for some time now about our imminent demise and the “return of two-part politics” ((c) DC earlier this week
). It seems the voters have other ideas.
13 and 14 - yes, confirmed my view that it was to do with local campaigning and candidate choice.
And just 633 votes of another 3-figure profit
20 - “of” - off
Although I said a win is a win, this was disappointing. However, it will only emphasise what DC is trying to do with the A-list. The candidates were carefully selected by CCHQ and the two rejected were perhaps better suited to this particular seat - both very Eurosceptic - take away 2000 UKIP votes. I don’t understand why the Association would put a europhile into Eric Forth’s seat.
Mistakes were made that slimmed the majority, but in the end, we have our seat still and no doubt Bob Neill will now be able to give the lie to what the LDs were saying about him (move in, give up the health job, etc). I have no doubt at all that after proving himself his majority will rise to ten thousand again at the General.
We’ll see on press coverage. That’s what counts here, and I expect the press coverage will focus on candidate selection by the Association rather than interpret this as a blow against Cameron. In which case it will end up a double positive - Bob has the seat, and the party has good coverage of its reforms.
Labour, as I posted earlier, are finished. By their own admission they threw everything at this seat. Even our own Nick Palmer was working it. Lost Westminster, lost Assembly, and fourth in Bromley.
Any news of UKIP’s legitimacy challenge?
22. Since when was this by-election ever to do with Labour ?
And it`s somewhat presumptous of you to think that the press will spin it as a local candidate issue - Cameron has too many detractors in the Tory press for that to happen and I expect the likes of Simon Hefer to increase the intensity of the attacks on Camerons style of leadership …
Let’s see what the fall-out is Graham. Cameron was hardly mentioned in the campaign and a pin-striped middle aged man was selected - with a very public rejection of “Cameron’s style” by the Assn which made all the news and every paper - at least, that is how it was spun. B&C did put through a woman and an ethnic minority candidate. But it’s spin that counts. I bet candidates will be the story the analysis articles focus on, but we’ll see.
The FACT is that the Tories win and Labour crashes out and the LDs had another very good result indeed at a BY-election.
But LD by-elections, even spectacular ones like Dunfermline, unfortunately for them just don’t translate.
I predict now that in a week or so we will be back to the polling picture we’ve been at since May.
Mike is right very poor night for both Labour and Conservatives.
The suggestion that it suggests the Tories are in deep trouble nationally is simply unsustainable, what it does suggest is that the Conservative Party’s whole approach to by-election campaigns needs to be rethought and it can be officered as more proof that the LibDems are the masters at these sort of intense campaigns from scratch.
The results for Labour are very poor as well, though, and much as it pains me to mention it, Blaenau Gwent was a very particular sort of contest, despite that the weakness of Labour in such a traditionally strong area was striking.
All in all an interesting night, Ming Campbell can probably continue to potter on, Labour look ever more listless and the question remains over how this can be addressed, as for the Conservative Party why don’t we “do” by-elections.
Bob Neil will IMHO make an excellent local MP and be a credit to the seat, however I do wonder if wasn’t perhaps the best choice for such a contest, so susceptible as he was to being negatively defined by the Liberal Democrats and UKIP in highly aggressive and unsparing campaign, the intensity of which, however unpalatable, should not have surprised anyone and should have been anticipated and met by the Conservatives, and I fear was not
24 huh?
You do realise I refer to Labour’s double loss in B&G?
Ben,
I agree with you that Bob will make a very good MP, and most of the negative about him was desperate spin. But that can and does work!
Our candidates need to be very careful not to give the LDs anything. I think a safe seat candidate, and I speak in general terms, has an obligation to move to the constituency on selection. You can rent a flat right away, especially if you are a single person.
B&G = BG. Sorry
What will be the fall out to the these results, Tony going earlier, UKIP challenging the result, DC making yet more, what he feels are populist statements and annoying Ken Clarke?
Bromley will certainly boost Lib Dem party morale.
For me the most significant part of this result is the enormous fall in the Conservatives actual vote, many obviously staying at home on a bright sunny day. For a party, allegedly on the march it suprised me. Look foward to hearing Rik’s inside view on this.
There has to be more to it, than just moaning about somebody elses campaign.
Interesting how the Lib Dems did much better, by not making great alleged claims as to what was happening, unlike Moray.
Another by election there in September will be quite a campaign.
Probably a Con A List candidate from Bromley, is there one?
“no doubt Bob Neill will now be able to give the lie to what the LDs were saying about him (move in, give up the health job, etc)”
And if he had romped home, do you think he would bother to make any changes? Or just carry on with the GLA job?
This was, indeed, all about Conservative complacency and arrogance - as the only lucid Conservative poster on here last night said, they took the voters for granted, chiefly because their candidate was unwilling to give up his other commitments. When that was pointed out to them, they whinged.
While B&C was disappointing for the Tories I think it’s easy to see why. With all the comments in the media of “ultra-safe Tory seat” and “a place where Tory votes are weighed not counted”, it’s no surprise that many would have stayed at home and those that did are most likely to be the weak tories.
Meanwhile, BG - superb result against Labour. Doesn’t really surprise me (the poor Labour showing in both seats) but still great to see general feeling expressed in actual solid figures.
22 - Cameron will try to shift blame onto the local association but that’s pretty low politics. Bob Neill came in for criticism but no more or less than any other candidate - an A-lister would have been condemned for being parachuted in or whatever.
The fact is that by-elections are big national events where the national organisations and national messages all play a huge role in the campaign.
The Blaenau Gwent by-election is harder to read with the independent but the fact Labour cannot roll in and take back a heartland seat has a very clear and worrying message for them. This site often turns into a Lib Dem/Tory battle, but clearly the Labour drubbing in Wales is a big story.
It seems to me that Bromley has some interesting messages though. It calls into serious doubt several items of conventional wisdom:
1. “The Lib Dems can’t win votes from the Tories any more so Tory marginals are safe” - wrong, the fall in the Tory vote appears to have gone pretty much equally to Lib Dems and UKIP - this is much better even than Romsey which was actually almost entirely tactical and where the Tory vote held up much better than in Bromley.
2. “There is no danger in right-wing Tories going to UKIP if they are suspicious of Cameron” - wrong, a reasonably large number did just that.
3. “Labour voters won’t vote tactically as much as they used to” - wrong, their vote collapsed and much of that was tactical.
4. “Cameron goes down very well amongst professionals and is winning back the capital” - not proven, you would have thought that Bromley was not just an ultra-safe seat but matched the profile for the sort of people the Conservatives are going for.
5. “Ming lacks voter appeal” - let’s face it, he did well.
Good morning all. First I think we should acknowledge that the LibDems are the clear winners of the night. I don’t think that Labour should lose sleep over being 4th in Bromley or the Tories over being 5th in BG - in both cases it was perfectly plain what to do if you wanted a shot at keeping the main opponent out. But the limited Labour recovery after a heavy campaign in BG (+5%) and the Tory slump in Bromley (-12%) are both bad results, and it’s a waste of breath to try to spin anything else. Conversely the LDs really deserve credit for their by-election machine - almost none of us thought they would come anywhere near. Well done, guys.
I think that the YouGov poll today showing a steady Tory 6% lead is plausible as far as it goes. However, what the by-elections are telling us is that Labour is currently unpopular and the Tories are seen as unconvincing. We knew the first already; the second was obscured by the local elections. Cameron may feel it’s necessary to avoid disclosing policies too soon, and he may be right, but the first two policy launches (the EPP and the idea of ‘additional but British’ Human Rights legislation which they forgot to tell their spokesman about) both have a shambolic flavour which makes the Tory project look amateurish. Unless this changes soon they risk losing the fed-up-with-Labour vote to the LDs or abstention or a fringe party.
Mike will I suspect be highlighting the ‘bad news for Brown’ aspects of the YouGov poll. Given the lengthy warm coverage of Cameron and sustained criticism of Brown in the media over recent months, I don’t think this is surprising, and I’m glad to see that half the sample are essentially reserving judgment on Brown. I think he’ll get his honeymoon period: how far this will balance the bored-with-Labour feeling remains to be seen, but I remain hopeful on this count.
As I said a few days ago, I never thought we had a very good chance in BG and I’m surprised by the slight recovery of the Plaid/LD vote. There is really a common factor in the two seats. People in both normally have the prospect of the same party representing them forever. Those who are less committed than most of us think that’s a bit boring. When a plausible challenger comes along, lots of people think ‘yeah, why not?’ So both by-elections are of limited general significance, but if I were a Tory I’d feel ‘we are not yet doing nearly well enough to win next time’ and as a Labour MP I simply note that we are continuing the generally poor level of support that we saw in May.
30. Probably an attempt by DC to play to the party base. A lot depends whether the Tories who stayed at home were disenchanted or complacent about the result.
Hain’s betrayal of Liberalism? I remember his betrayal of Euroscepticism.
Good night for DC, bad news for local Cons assns that want to choose their own candidate. Good night for MC - he will stay in his job for a while now.
Good night for me : 3/3 results collected at betfair
On 23 June, I said -
“Although I visit PB on a daily basis, I am rarely moved to comment. I find the idea, though, that the Conservatives are going to get 60% of the vote in Bromley laughable.”
Permit me a moment’s gloating (my private prediction about 10 days ago was 42%).
Why has this happened?
1. The Bromley and Chislehurst Conservatives picked a weak candidate, and fought a remarkably inept campaign.
2. The “Cameron recovery” is, in truth, a feeble thing, and the Conservative vote remains very friable. The party’s upward movement in the polls is more a function of public boredom and disgust with the Government than anything the Conservatives have done.
35. Alternatively (as Alan maybe suggested at 32?) the stay-at-home Tories may not have all been from the ‘disenchanted right’ but some more centrist ones who didn’t think much of Bob Neill/don’t particularly like Cameron but weren’t going to vote Lib Dem (yet).
Commentator at 22: just on the factual point - as I said last week, neither I nor any other non-local MPs that I know of did anything to do with the BG by-election: we felt it would be counter-productive to have people from Nottingham or elsewhere telling voters in BG what to do.
I appreciate that you’d like to feel that Labour is finished, but the results don’t go that far. I’ve given what I felt was a fair summary, but if you want a pro-Labour spin to balance yours, it’s that we had a significant swing to us in BG since the General Election and the BC result is sipmly tactical voting. The reality is that we hoped to do better in BG but more than halving the Indie majority is not the disaster that you suggest.
B&C was one of the nastiest and dirtiest campaigns in years. This was an opportunity for the Lib Dems to reveal their policies on Human Rights, Europe, the Economy and Local Finance and development plans. Instead it was cheap and personal abuse from beginning to end.
Bob Neill will be the local MP and prove to be hard working and dilligent. Can one imagine leaflets full of stories about Kennedy/Oaten/ the full client list of the controversial political consultancy which pays (handsomely) the Lib Dem. That is before the smearing of some of the more colourful and exotic local Lib Dems.
However, for the silent Lib Dem (starngely little was heard about his jobs and he sat silently through his one and only council meeting, abstaining on votes), there are now baskets full of leaflets about his being “the strong local choice”, just as he was “the strong local choice” in Sevenoaks last year. He can be assured that if he ever stands in another constituency his opponents wil be inundated with copies of his commitments/loyalty/devotion to Bromley and Chislehurst.
Perhaps the best solution to Lib Dem “campaigning” is the Harlepool/Hodge Hill option, making sure their candidates are treated in the same way they attack the candidates of other parties.
I’ve just read the papers on-line. The Guardian spins it exactly as I said, the Times too - disaster for Labour, much less on the Tories and that concentrates on candidate mistakes. The Indy goes hard on Labour, only the Telegraph does not mention candidate errors in its article, but that is ‘breaking news’ and a fuller one will likely follow tomorrow.
Tomorrow we will get the analyses - and I predict that this will not be listed as any kind of DC rejection.
In fact another cheering general poll result in the Telegraph.
There is now an anyone-but-Labour mood in the country. They are finished. Lab HQ will be feeling demoralised today. The Times has an interesting report on the resources thrown at the seat - 9 pieces of literature per household in some cases. The Ind candidate had no resources.
I have predicted since the start of the year the Tories would win the next GE. I am now revising that prediction to, boundaries notwithstanding, a Tory landslide and 50-60 seat majority (given the boundaries, that would be a landslide). This is against the run of the opinion polls which predict only a hung parliament or wafer thin majority.
40 Nick, apologies - I must have mis-read a comment of yours on another thread - I thought you had gone and knocked up there.
Anyone been paid by Betfair yet ?
I was 3/3 on the night (just !)
I think a lot of people are getting rather carried away by the Bromley result. Although, at present, I doubt that the Tories will gain an overall majority in the next GE, this sort of result is pretty irrelevant. We all know the LDs do an excellent job of by-elections, but it’s a totally different story when they’re campaigning throughout the country, and I’m sure Bromley will be safe again at the GE.
34. “I don’t think that Labour should lose sleep over being 4th in Bromley or the Tories over being 5th in BG - in both cases it was perfectly plain what to do if you wanted a shot at keeping the main opponent out”.
Except that the Tories started as an also-ran in BG, Labour started in second in B&C. Why should people switch tactically from a party in second to a party in third to defeat the party in first place?
I think the real wake up call for Cameron and the Tories in Bromley is the assumption that the europhobe vote has no real alternative home. Maybe we’re seeing a bit of by-election boost for UKIP, much of which would return to the Conversatives at a general election. But this can’t be countd on.
Cameron’s wooing of the beardy vote may have impacted polling data but has NOT translated into actual votes. The sandal wearing crowd will vote Lib Dem when push comes to shove. Meanwhile the core Tory electorate are feeling abandoned and many have floated off to UKIP. Expect more europhobe noises from DC (and William Hague) in the future.
It used to be only the Lib Dems who had an unresolvable conflict between their greeny nutjob wing and the libertarian / orange book / economically literate wing. Now it appears that DC has created a similar internal conflict for the Tories. How can he square the circle of advice from Zac Goldsmith / Bob Geldof and the traditional ‘reduce the state’ core? Major policy conundrum and something spectacular will have to give before the general election. It will be fun!
I have never understood how a party whose ‘core vote’ worshipped Michael Howard would slip easily into following his antithesis David Cameron. Last nights by-election shows they havent. His core vote is losing interest fast. Blind followers on this site explain their political volte face as just “wanting to win”. But regular voters have values and ideals.
41. Pot & Kettle, for goodness’ sake. That wasn’t ‘nasty and dirty’, it was pointing out the truth. All it needed was for your candidate to take his responsibilities seriously, which he didn’t.
There seem to be too many Tories rolling around on the grass crying foul like primadonna footballers just because they tripped themselves up.
If we ever try to imply the Tory candidate is a rapist, you might be justified in having a go. Not until.
Very interesting result from BG and npot what I was expecting. I thought Trish Law would win and Labour win the parliamentary seat. It shows just how unpopular Labour are in Wales at present and I suspect they are heading for an almighty pasting next year.
Its very good news Labour have not got a majority in the assembly and it will be very ahrd for Labour to win that seat back now.
Mike Smithson’s view:
“Campaigns like this are a dirty, bruising, business. The Lib Dem strategy of finding a defect in their opponent and then repeat it time and time and time again is well known. That is how you achieve success. To deal with campaigns like this you cannot leave the fight in the hands of a local party. Maybe one of the consequences of Bromley will be a change in Tory rules?”
has been absolutely vindicated by last night: no warm positive endorsement of the LibDems new policies on tax, no glowing approbation of Campbell’s gravitas and maturity. Fight mean, play the man; gutter campaigning really does work and sometimes spectacularly so.
The trivial point is that this merely underscores my own visceral loathing of the LibDems as a party. The substantive point is that this has been a shocking wake-up call for the Tories for future by-elections, and, as Mike says, our only option is ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, you’d better join them’ like Labour did in Hartlepool so effectively.
The Labour vote in Blaeau Gwent increased by 4.7% compared with the 2005 General Election. This is the first rise in the ruling party’s share of the vote in a Parliamentary byelection compared with the previous General Election since the Eddisbury byelection of July 1999.
22, 40 I think Commentator may be partly remembering a disgraceful bit of ramping from Nick Palmer on the earlier Blaenau Gwent thread.
Nick Palmer had announced a newspaper “report” in which the Independents at Blaneau Gwent had complained that “Labour is bringing a large number of volunteers in neighbouring seats and that this is giving them the edge in leaflet delivery and canvassing”
As Nick opined then, “this sounds like an advance excuse [by the Independents] in anticipation of Labour regaining the seat”
Curiously, when I asked for a reference to the report, Nick was unable to provide one.
51. And Bob Neill’s refusal to give up his GLA job wasn’t a glaring defect?
Did many of your leaflets feature glowing approbations of Cameron? Thought not.
Did they feature Cameron’s economic policies? Ditto.
Patric
“Cameron’s wooing of the beardy vote may have impacted polling data but has NOT translated into actual votes. The sandal wearing crowd will vote Lib Dem when push comes to shove. Meanwhile the core Tory electorate are feeling abandoned and many have floated off to UKIP.”
I think the point is that Cameron offered B&C some core-Tory values A listers - Syed Kamall is an out and out Eurosceptic MEP, Julia Manning IIRC a Eurosceptic outspoken Christian/family values mother. Instead the Association chose a non a list Europhile, as a result, maybe some core votes were lost.
But many of those lost votes were as a result of complacency, uor voters thinking they did not need to show up.
Is there a LibDem on the site who thinks they have the remotest chance of taking the seat in the GE? Valerie?
Bob’s majority will be ten thousand or more again.
42: Commentator: You write: “The Guardian spins it exactly as I said, the Times too - disaster for Labour, much less on the Tories and that concentrates on candidate mistakes. The Indy goes hard on Labour…”
You have to delve into the detailed articles to draw those conclusions. The Indie headline is “By-election blows for Blair and Cameron”. The Times headline is “Blair and Cameron suffer in double by-election rebellion”. I think this is the general line people will take in, and apart from the tiresome habit of using leaders as shorthand for parties, it seems for once a fair assessment.
john O: I tend to agree that all by-elections are nasty but LD campaigns tend to be nastier than most: some LD campaigners seem to have a positively Trotskyist approach of “the end justifies the means” and “the worse the better”. But I’m not sure how you are able to read the mind of all LD voters. “No warm positive endorsement of the LibDems new policies on tax, no glowing approbation of Campbell’s gravitas and maturity” - how do you know? The LDs generally do high road and low road at the same time, and they don’t get media challenges anywhere nearly as much as the big parties so they get away with it.
Doing Radio Nottingham’s guest MP slot at 10 this morning, so this is all good practice.
50 Truly wonderful result from Blaenau. I too had thought that Trish would win, but not Dai.
Everything we’ve seen this year from Scotland and Wales suggests that the Scottish/Welsh elections next year will be truly disastrous for New Labour.
Great night for the Conservatives and DC. The Bromley result means Old Man Ming is now firmly entrenched in the top job, despite being an electoral liability nationwide, and that can only be good news for everyone. Can’t see them breaking out of the high teens at the next GE. Deep down beneath the surface, I bet many LDs are in despair this morning. In reality, Tory voters faced with a poor choice of candidate and local incompetence, and a large amount of mudslinging and threats of legal challenges, plus the other distractions of the good weather, summer holidays and the World Cup, simply didn’t come out and vote. They will do at the GE.
Meanwhile, Cameron can take comfort that one of his A-listers may have performed more strongly. No doubt other associations will take note. At the same time, the Labour disasters in Wales will take the headlines, and nobody’s really interested in politics at the minute anyway so it will soon be forgotten.
If this result means that LDs are starting to think they are on a roll, well that’s fine by me…
Just watched Bob’s victory speech. Interesting that while he has a go at the LDs dirty tricks, the UKIP candidate is nodding and saying “That’s right, that’s right”.
54 - Why are you being so defensive? I’m only agreeing with your fellow Lib Dem, Mike, that fighting dirty and shamelessly actually wins votes if orchestrated ’skilfully’. You should be revelling in your triumph not pretending it away.
(Since you ask, I think one of the many errors of the B&C campaign was indeed its failure to feature Cameron: again I defer to Mike S on this)
58. Spot on analysis Bob Sykes. What keeps Ming in the top job is great long-term for the Tories.
I wonder if Mike Smithson agrees?
55. I think what can be said is that it’s no longer a safe seat. How are you going to get 10,000 voters back if you couldn’t get them out yesterday with a by-election team? (What sort of knocking-up operation did the Conservatives run?).
58. So Ming may well be an electoral asset in Bromley but a liability nationwide?
Well that was certainly a far better night for the Lib Dems than I was expecting, and many congratulations to Ben, Shaun and the team for turning Bromley and Chislehurst into a marginal!
My 2 cents on it all: the Tories have never quite hit the nail on the head with by-elections over the past few years. Whereas the Lib Dems being able to concentrate their efforts really pays off. Imagine if we could target each seat the same way in a general election?
I just watched Bob Neill’s acceptance speech, and if you’ll allow me a break from playing nicely for a second, what a twerp. Worth campaigning against. I concur with the posters above that this should have been comfortable for the Tories, and had they put David Cameron and Eric Forth on all their literature, they would surely have had a more solid performance. Can’t help thinking that had cameron been campaign organiser, they’d have romped home.
Turnout very low - perhaps to be expected on a summer’s day, but I also wonder if the long and negative campaigns put people off. I suspect it would have been more comfortable for the Tories on a higher turnout.
Here comes the unspun bit: I agree the LD campaign was too negative. And in many ways, I’m disappointed that it’s the negative campaign which has worked so well. Yes, the Tory candidate had serious weaknesses, which we were right to point out, but rather than repeating them 10 times, there was very little policy going out on the leaflets. The main positive message seemed to be ‘Ben is a local candidate who will work very hard for Bromley and Chislehurst, and who takes crime seriously.’
Good stuff, but surely some big policy statements would have been good given that voters were electing their national representative. I also felt that in the locals, there was almost no policy in what we were delivering. Is it really only anoraks and wonks who choose how they will vote based on what they stand for? Or is it all ‘candidate mood music’ at the end of the day?
Clearly a bad night for Labour, and for the first time I almost feel sorry for them-am I going soft in my old age? Kudos to Dai Davies, in his acceptance speech he said that the country would be improved if we stood on Christian values; not an easy thing to say (and I even work for a church!) Good on him and I wish him well.
May I chip in a couple of quid to Rik’s new hat appeal by the way? Always happy to help those in need
62. although obviously the Lib Dems won’t have the same resources - but at least we got out our vote and more. Why couldn’t you get the Tory voters out?
62 - Valerie look at Christchurch it’s safe as houses after a by-election set back.
Obviously a crap result for the Tories. But the idea this is to do with anything other than local factors is rather far fetched. How much did national results and national leaders play in the campaign?
I’m sure the Lib’s will try to spin this as the beginning of the end for Cameron and the start of something great for Ming but I’m sure deep down they know it’s not the case.
63. I agree - I’d like to see more policy in literature as well.
62: why do you think Bromley had anything to do with Ming?
By the way, I’ve no idea why Maude is spinning a “still much to do, many changes to make” line on this. You’d think the Tories had lost, and by a mile. Surely he could be a bit more positive - isn’t that what spin’s all about?
It’s so dull reading Commentator, Bob sykes and Gwnfa’s feeble and pointless attempts to manfacture a success from last nights failure. For what it’s worth it was a dreadful night for both Labour and the Tories and requires a serious rethink from both of them.
Labour have the chance of a revamp with their new leader. The Tories badly need one before they mistake an unpopular government with a popular opposition.
62. Clearly we can’t measure the influence Ming had, but it’s pretty clear that it wasn’t negative, so I couldn’t see why you described him as a liability.
Well having spent most of the day campaigning in Bromley, I’m astonished. The mood was so positive and the people I called on were universally supportive - and were going out to vote.
Clearly a lot of people lied to us about their voting intentions …
68 - I totally agree it is a bad result for us Roger. But people will forget about it very quickly and I don’t forsee any long term effect. As with Ming’s re-launch it will go largely unnoticed. Is anyone in anyone office actually talking about it. In mine it’s all the World Cup and Wimbledon.
The lessons we need to learn are about campaigning, particularly in by-elections, but I’m not sure if any wider conclusions can be drawn.
As far as I could see from their literature, Bob Neill was the only issue for the Lib Dems in this campaign. And, relentless negative campaigning very nearly paid off the Lib Dems in this seat.
That said, what does it matter in the long run? The Lib Dems have had forty years of by-election triumphs, and where has it got them?
As I said last night, we need to learn from Labour’s success at Hartlepool, and run that sort of campaign whenever we face a Lib Dem challenge in a by-election.
I went to bed last night with Tories promising to ‘eat their hats’ if there was a recount and accusing ‘Limp Dems’ of spin for suggesting B&C was going to be close.
Whither DC & Rik now? Anyway, gloat over (teehee).
This is a great result for the LibDems, very poor for the Tories and BG was just plain abysmal for Labour. However, this result does not really change the fundamentals of the current political situation.
The Tories are doing well under Cameron but not well enough to be confident of winning the next election. Bromley has exposed the fragility of his message.
In opposition under Thatcher in the late 70’s the Tories were winning seats of Labour like workington & Birmingham stechford with massive swings. They held their own seats like Saffron Walden with increased majorities, indeed the Liberals fell below the National Front in that by-election despite starting in second place! In comparison to that the Tory performance last night was woeful.
This result exposes a vulnerability to their right in certain places - if UKIP can get its act together it could play an important spolier role in some areas running on a nationalist, anti-immigration ticket, denying the Tories seats they need to win at the next GE.
It also shows that Big Dave is not invincible. Yes it was a local campaign & an unsuitable candidate - but if Cameron were really creating a wave of popular dissent in the suburbs then that shouldn’t have mattered - like the Tories in the 70’s he should have swept all before him on the strength of a national swing. The comparison to make is not with the Tories under Thatcher in the 70’s but Labour under Kinnock in the 80’s.
Once again Cameron’s luck has come through. He should actually be thankful that Labour’s treadful own goal and the local Bromley association’s stupidity will allow him to avoid answering some tough questions about his electoral prowess.
Blanau Gwent is just horrendous for Labour. Yes they made a tiny recovery but it shows two things.
First, where the habit of revolting against Labour takes root it very hard to shift. That doesn’t bode well for seats where there was a big swing to the LibDems at the last general election. There a many Labour people in the Labour party who believe that when Blair goes, memories of Iraq will fade and things will return to normal. This result chimes with the opinion polls that show that isn’t necessarily the case at all - Labour is likely struggle to recover lost ground.
Secondly, Blair has to go and go soon. While some iin the party may round on Charles Clarke, the turth is that the spectacle of this Govt eating itself alive has to stop. As I’ve just said Labour will struggle to reconnect with its lost support anyway, however if it carries on like this much longer - it will have no chance of doing so - and will evetually reach a Major Govt-like condition. The only way for them to lance the boil now is for Blair to go before it is too late to rewrite a winning narrative for the govt.
For the LibDems this simply shows yet again, for those who continually write them off, that to paraphrase Mark Twain ‘reports of their death are greatly exagerated’.
The party still packs a punch - and this is not just about by-elections. Yes, the locals in may were disappointing, but they still came second in the popular vote with 27% and consolidate their seat tally. This result, as with Dunfirmline and Cheadle should demonstrate to both Labour & Tories that they will be far harder to shift at the next election than many currently expect.
The Bromley result re-inforces my view that the LibDems support is not about the popularity of its Leader. The party is I believe reaching the critical mass of solid support that implies yet again that we are in an area of 2 1/2 party politics for some time to come.
Bob Sykes wrote: “Deep down beneath the surface, I bet many LDs are in despair this morning”. Yes, I’m absolutely bawling my eyes out
As to whether we can win it at the General Election, well I’d have said no - but then again I thought we had no chance of even getting close yesterday.
Looking forward to that footage of Rik W eating his hat!
See UKIP are not challenging, will cost too much, they say.
I just read Bob Sykes post @ 58. Hysterical, I only hope that Central Office are as complacent as you. Sadly though I doubt it.
At the risk of appearing like I’m spinning and being a sore loser. The campaign in Bromely is surely down to the fact that the Liberals have pulled everything they had into the seat. Which they previously didn’t surely this will go thesame as the other byelections the Lib dems narrowly missed when all the activists go back to the consituency and higher turnouts return who is going to manage the constituency and Borough associations as before who did so terrible on there own.
That said, although I detest any Lib Dem byelection tactics it was a good campaign run by them.
I am frustrated and diappointed about Bromley last night, reluctantly have to agree that the Lib dems single minded focus on slagging off Bob Neill had the desired effect - it turned most voters off completely and in an opponents safe seat that is all you have to do.
I just don’t want politics to go down this route. Sure, if we ran a ‘Cheadle’ we might have done better in Bromley but what would that have said about us as a Party?
Unlike the Lib dems we really do aspire to run the country and voters need to hear a positive message from the main political parties.
I really, really hope this doesn’t deter Cameron from his central policy plank of promoting positive campaigning.
In the end a negative campaign like this often brings short term success, but in the long term all it does is reduce turnout and disengage ever more voters from the democratic process.
I expected UKIP to do a bit better than they did - anyone else?
What puzzles me about the Tory comments that “the Lib Dem result in Bromley doesn’t really count as they didn’t talk about their policies” is that the Tory leaflets that I saw were exceptionally light on policy.
For example, all the ‘vote Blue, go Green’ emphasis on the environment was absent from the ones I saw. It was the same story in Dunfermline, where again the Tory leaflets were very, very light on policy (even by the standard of modern campaigns from all parties).
The interesting question is whether cooler heads in the Tories will take a lesson from that about needing to start having more substantive policies nationally and talking about them more? Or is saying, “we’re different, we’re nice, we’re not Labour” going to be enough?
My contest calculations:
Blaenau Gwent (Westminster)
Labour 40% (3) Independent 35% (11) Liberal Democrats 15% (10) Plaid Cymru 10% (4) Conservatives 5% (1)
Blaenau Gwent (Assembly)
Independent 35% (15) Labour 30% (4) Liberal Democrats 20% (13) Plaid Cymru 10% (6) Conservatives 5% (2)
Bromley and Chislehurst (Westminster)
Conservatives 45% (5) Labour 10% (3) Liberal Democrats 32% (6) UKIP 8% (0)
Blaenau Gwent (Westminster): 29
Blaenau Gwent (Assembly): 40
Bromley and Chislehurst (Westminster): 14
Grand Total: 83
80 - Mark I think what people are arguing was that the election as a whole (for all parties) wasn’t about policy. Would anyone seriously dispute that?
No one is saying it wasn’t a great result for the Libs their just questioning it’s significance in the wider political picture. The latest poll has us on 39% so it would seem an odd time to change tack now.
I´d like more policy on leaflets too. But I´d like the Tories to have a policy as well.
Two policy factors certainly played for the Lib Dems in this by-election though. One was the new stance on tax. Some Tories were complaining that this was done specifically to attract votes in the Bromley by-election. It wasn´t - but it certainly helped, and will go on helping.
The second was Cameron´s half-baked British Bill of Rights speech (and the scathing response from his elders and betters - Ken Clarke to the fore). The policy wasn´t much good and this strengthened coubts that Cameron was just a lightweight.
S Penketh @ 77: when I joined the Lib Dems earlier this year, I looked at the stats for the seats around me (Balham) where we were first or strong second. And there’s not a lot in South London. Richmond Park to the West, Sutton to the South, Southwark to the North, and not a lot to the east. All of a sudden, Bromley becomes an attractive place to campaign in, and I think they might now draw in some outside activists they would never have had before.
david (s) could you drop me a line
peter@liberalreview.com
[77] S Penketh said I detest any Lib Dem byelection tactics - including, presumably, their insolence in standing in elections in the first place
We have NuLab and CamCons - how about adding the Dirty Dems ?
aka DLD ?
The spectacle of Tories slagging off the LibDem campaign (They threw everything at it! 77 above) on here is hilarious. Only a week or so ago, various contributors were ramping to the effect that the LibDems were only putting in a token campaign - little LibDem presence visible on the ground etc. IIRC of course.
79. Valerie - No. UKIP only thrive when European issues are headline news, which they are not at present. Their new focus on immigration is, I think, evidence that they are struggling to attract much voter interest.
A very disapointing result for both main parties, however lets not forget that these were by-elections, and as many of you know, anything can happen in these type of events!
I dont think anyone should be making predictions for the next GE,based on these results, the Libdems are a By-Election machine, and are very difficult to figt.
Should this have been an election such as the locals or a general etc, their resources would be spread out far too much,therefore they would not be able to put up a decent fight.
Im sure the Libdems will be praising Ming to the heavens, along with brusihing aside any critism of his leadership, but will this will only be brushing the truth under the carpet.
41 “Perhaps the best solution to Lib Dem “campaigning” is the Harlepool/Hodge Hill option, making sure their candidates are treated in the same way they attack the candidates of other parties.”
Yes, that’s the way to do it - it’s not us, it’s the Lib Dems, and were only conducting a dirty campaign because they did it first. Otherwise we’d be pure as angels.
Commentator, always says the conservatives are going to win.
Now says the media, will predominately say it was a bad night for Labour.
However all the news media, which most people get their information from say its a bad result for Labour and Conservatives in equal measure.
Think he needs to get real, rather than the same mantra , I told you we were going to win.
O/T - Two very comfortable holds for Labour on Tameside MBC.
No idea how it compares to last time.
http://www.tameside.gov.uk/elections/bielect06.htm
26 - Ben you are quite right to say that the Tories by-election machine needs an over-haul - I said something along those lines on Conservative Home last night. I wonder though if Carol Forth had been the candidate whether this result would have happened?
Nonetheless, now that Bob has been elected, I’m fairly sure he we will prove to be an excellent MP and will hold the seat at ease in the next general election.
Not much to say really I certainly underestimated the Lib Dem vote but I cannot understand how Conservatives who were campaigning in B/C could not see it coming . A clue is in a post from Sean Fear yesterday when he said our pledges are firm and many people said that they had already voted postally . They were clearly not telling the truth and dtayed at home .
A couple of results from local elections last night .
Canterbury DC Sturry S CON 474 LDEM 318 LAB 89 IND 24 - 2003 CON 550 LAB 82 LDEM 89 - Big swing to LDEMS
East Staffs DC LAB 581 CON 441 BNP 291 LDEM 102 - 2003 2 seats LAB 1021/968 IND 527 CON 524/392 - Big fall in Labour vote
Lincoln DC was a Conservative hold with reduced majority compared to last month but website broken so full result not available .
The combined age of some of the Conservative posters on here must be about 20 (I’m not talking about Max etc) but the likes of DC And bob Sykes are just plain funny.
If you really think that
a) This is the fruition of a successful plan to keep Ming in office.
b) Most LDs are secretly disappointed.
you are basically so deluded I think your local associations need to keep you under lock and key for fear of damaging the Tory party needlessly.
93 - One of the seats was a Tory win in May. Looks like we lost a lot of votes for the BNP. Still a good result for Labour none the less
68 Roger, for the LAST time, I am not a Conservative. I am an ex-Labour voter, truly disgusted with the lies and deceit of New Labour.
I have not — anywhere in the thread — tried to “manufacture a success from last nigt’s failure”. In fact, I have not posted anything about B&C and am completely uninterested in it.
I have contented myself with congratulating Dai and Trish (I am very pleased for them and for the people of BG) and chiding Nick Palmer for trying to spin their campaign as “naive” on an earlier thread.
You seem to believe that anyone who cricitises New Labour is a Tory — please try and show some signs of intelligent life — perhaps you could start by reading posts rather more accurately.
Nick’s, as ever chivalrous, commentary at 7.33 is a good review of the situation but seems short on solutions for the Labour party. When I first read his second piece at 7.41 I thought he was spinning that B G was a good result for Labour because it showed progress. In fact he was providing a how to spin guide for dummies and said:
“I’ve given what I felt was a fair summary, but if you want a pro-Labour spin to balance yours, it’s that we had a significant swing to us in BG since the General Election and the BC result is sipmly tactical voting. The reality is that we hoped to do better in BG but more than halving the Indie majority is not the disaster that you suggest.”
It says something about Hazel Blears grasp of the situation that she actually used this line about progress at B G on the Today Prog. At least she was better than Frantic Maude who didn’t seem to have a clue what to do now.
Look this was just a couple of strange by-elections Labour and Conservatives should just ignor them and carry on as they have been doing.
After all as Eleanor says at 8.39:
“Clearly a lot of people lied to us about their voting intentions …”
The voters are obviously an unreliable lot, it makes you wonder why we let them vote at all.
I do find the whingeing about Lib Dem by-election tactics laughable and hypocritical. Bromley was a comparatively mild-mannered contest.
Cheadle, Hodge Hill, Hartlepool were all much tougher affairs.
Of the 4, only in Cheadle did any party go over the top: the Tory tactics there back-fired badly. I think otherwise they might have won.
The Tories held B and C. That is all that matters: they’ve only done badly in comparison with their own unrealistic expectations. Bromley has a history of Lib Dem insurgency. Not so long ago the Lib Dems were the largest party on the council. But the reality now is that the Lib Dems are unlikely to take either parliamentary seat - outside a by-election - or figure largely on the council.
So stop bleating, Tories and take heart.
86. The thing is, Innocent Abroad, what becomes so apparent on a day like today is the totally different reasons why people become motivated in their politics.
Lib dems, especially those who seem to post on here, are driven by a passion to attack and upset the status quo - I call some of my local Lib Dems the ‘awkward squad’ - professional complainers of the highest order. Your party do this very well.
Lib Dem activists revel in making the main parties, and especially the Conservatives, uncomfortable. This is mostly a good thing - our democracy benefits from having a loud third force pointing out complacency and bad practice wherever it exists; and it is more likely to exist in safe seat strongholds of one or other of the main parties.
Conservative and Labour activists *usually* come into politics to fight for/defend their ideology, which is why Bromley style campaign tactics based around the minutae of the candidates living arrangements make us so upset; whereas the potentially just as damaging (to us) UKIP campaign doesn’t because it is based on a passionatly held core belief.
It is also why many Conservatives struggle to find effective ways of campaigning against incumbent Lib Dem MP’s without resorting to the of very personalised attacks that you generally employ on us.
Interestingly, when we do employ tactics to highlight weakness in Lib dem MP’s or councils, as we did in Torbay and Cheadle, your lot complain even more loudly than we do!
IMHO the Tory candidate in B&C was a DUD. No class at all. An apalling speech.
Would they have done better with an A-lister?
Mike, I’m no friend of the Tories, but I think the results are not as bad for the Tories as you make out. The problems that you identify - a relatively low profile for Cameron, poor organisation - will be relatively easy to remedy. It would have been much worse for Cameron had this result occurred after he’d been spending every weekend walking around Bromley.
There doesn’t seem to be much Labour can do about their difficulties.
I think this result is a real boost for the Lib Dems, though. It was beginning to look as though the Lib Dems were losing serious ground in the south against the Tories [in exchange for Labour ground up north], but perhaps things are not as bad as they seemed.
93/97 - No Max both seats were Labour wins last month in straight Lab/Con fights but they seem to have done a little better this time . Seems the North is the one region where Labour support is holding up .
Well… There was some money to be made after all! Gloat gloat.
B & C is probably worse for the Tories than BG is for Labour- it came out of a clear sky- “60% of the vote” anyone?
There were tactical mistakes- the local party issue,the A list issue, the “three jobs Bob” issue and so on. Given the very public rejection of camerons annointed, I don’t expect that DC will lose too much sleep on that.
However there is also the issue of strategy- if the “unconvincing” label sticks to Cameron then he is toast.
Ok, the day after!
Bromley: I’m actually surprised. I expected a Con hold with a reduced, but comfortable majority….but not so reduced!!!!
The Libdems have done very well, their by-election machine is still going very strong.
Abbott was a strong campaigner and they know how to run campaign.
The tories? well, there’re many critics against Neill this morning. I thought it was a “safe pair of hands”….in the end it seems he had more baggage than thought and he and the whole campaign weren’t able to address it well.
Watching from the outisde, I saw many things done by the Libdems, while the tory campaign seemed less active….but maybe it’s just an impression.
They certainly need to sort out how to campaign in a by-election, The swing against was almost like the Dunfermline one against Labour! The Indies in BG got a less swing against and they don’t have a bi party machine behind them.
An example of a campaign to hold a safe seat is the SNP in Moray (but again helped by the tories who made a mess and the campaign was not left to the local association).
I agree with Valerie that maybe I expected something a bit better for UKIP: maybe in low 10%.
I’m not putting much attention in Labour being 4th: they didn’t try. At least they saved the deposit.
Blaenau Gwent: I didn’t expect Dai Davies winnning. It wasn’t even that close. Labour trying to spinning the reduced majority is risking to sound ridiculous. No one was expecting a majority similar to Peter Law’s one. Maybe the also Labour has to rethink about their selection.
Owen Smith: former journalist and especially spin doctor and lobbyist
Dai Davies: electrician and former trade unionist.
It’s Blaenau Gwent, not Putney!
New Labour has always tried to appeal to a Middle England constituency. Traditional supporters continued to vote for it because there weren’t alternatives…but now it seems they leave it in presence of a serious alternative (I stress serious)
I didn’t expect the Plaid/LD/Con going up.
Who was the Plaid candidate who went on holiday during the campaign?!
DC is absolutely right to ignore pressure to publish policies. They were, are and will continue to be, irrelevant.
Where he is wrong is by appearing amateurish. It can’t be good enough anymore to, in effect, say ‘we tories don’t do bye-elections’. He has to look competent and professional. He doesn’t. And that is setting the bar pretty low.
The current govt’s incompetence and cluelessness is now obvious even to those with little/no political interest. Labour looks very likely to lose the next GE. But for the tories to win it, they don’t need policies. They need no more than to look organised and adequate. It doesn’t sound too tough, but for DC at the moment….
Innocent I’m not surely churlish to believe seats are mine by right. Just like in Cheadle when your followed around with a guy in a guy with full yellow rosset on filming you and the (at least) 60 year old woman I was leafleting with. Thats the tactics I hate. Still it was funny when they tried it with a young female friend of mine.
89. Yes, I think UKIP are failing to break out of their EU-focused mould (and moreover seem to disagree a bit as to how to do so?)
100 - Again I agree. It’s a by-election so you do whatever it takes to win. But this constant - it doesn’t matter what the Libs do or say it’s not as bad as Cheadle - is a bit waring. Of course it was a negative (and perhaps dishonest) campaign but good luck to them. Overall I think people would be more accepting of it if the Lib Dems didn’t then try to spin it as something more than a very well-run local campaign.
Marcus [101] - whatever makes you think I’m a Lib Dem? I’m actually against corruption in politics…
“whereas the potentially just as damaging (to us) UKIP campaign doesn’t because it is based on a passionatly held core belief.”
UKIP were attacking just as hard on the nomination paper issue - I think the reason they don’t upset you is because they only got 8%…
I get the feeling too many of you sympathise with UKIP’s passionately-held belief, but aren’t willing to go and put your money where your mouths are.
105 - And to illustrate my point at 100!
Incidently Cicero you still haven’t explained how you’ll be making the large donation to Torbay LIb Dems whilst remaining anonymous.
I just wan’t to say that the way we Conservatives have to deal with the Lib Dems is to watch all their candidates, and build up a picture of their lies in their leaflets. Then we we find we are standing against one we can play the game the same way they do.
Ans how dare the lib dems wonder why people are being turned off politics.
111. Sorry IA; I don’t assume you are a LD; but as I wrote the post I forgot I had addressed it to you.
Look, how can anyone talk about “swings against” when there is a third party involved. We experienced a good swing for us - from Labour. Comparisons with the Lib Dem vote is therefore not realistic. There are other lessons to be learnt, about by-election campaigning and so on; but lessons about the Tories’ or Cameron’s popularity are simply not there.
The same applies to all the nonsense being spouted over the previous days about by-election results leading up to 1979. Yes we were getting the necessary swings for us then - from an incumbent government. These swings though are completely irrelevant where the Lib Dems become a challenger, and expectations can and should be completely different. This is not to say that expectatations should be lowered - and I am not arguing that Bromley does not expose great dangers and is, overall, a Bad Result - but any hand-wringing about this ought to focus on the real issues, not artificial perceptions about swings needed and their extrapolation onto the national scene.
Tories relax. We held the seat. the IDS fanclub on Conservative home have seen what happens when we follow their agenda on the ground. We have a Leader bright enough not just to realise we need to build up a good by election unit but to actually do something about it. And finally, best of all Ming will survive.
Re 78: “Unlike the Lib dems we really do aspire to run the country and voters need to hear a positive message from the main political parties. I really, really hope this doesn’t deter Cameron from his central policy plank of promoting positive campaigning”
What utter twaddle. I was up in Bromley a few times and saw numerous Tory leaflets. They’ye were no policies and most of the content was either attacking the LD’s for - shame - pointing out that Neill had no intention of giving up his £47k job as a GLA member if he was elected or how the Liberals were soft on crime.
I’ve been on the receiving end of Tory attack leaflets (remember there disgraceful GE campaign?), and observed numerous times over the years their unfailing ability to play the race card as well as repeat ad-naurseum that LD’s would “let paedophiles out of prison early” so the high morla tone nonsense some of the Tory posters are coming out with today is risible.
For the record - it was the local paper who first ran the headline about him refusing to stand down over the GLA post. They called him 2 jobs Bob. Quelle surprise - we upped it to ‘three jobs’ and pounded away.
Onwards and upwards……
Benedict White 9.56 “Ans how