Will Labour’s final push work?
May 19th, 2008
How much of this is approved by Gordon?
With just over two days of the Crewe and Nantwich this is the latest from the Labour in its increasingly desperate bid to hold on to the seat.
For after the controversy over the Toff campaign there is a new theme for the final period which is going to make a lot of people associated with the party feel quite uncomfortable. Its attitude to human rights and its view of how the criminal justice system should work is hardly in line with Labour’s traditional liberal approach
The copy on Dunwoody website reads “Tamsin Dunwoody wants the police to harass yobs, and get in their faces. She said: “There’s a lot of talk about human rights, for me the most important human right is to feel safe in your home and community.”
Is it going to work? Will it get wavering Labour voters to the polling stations on Thursday. Is this the way the Labour wants it social justice agenda to be portrayed?
Win or lose I wonder whether Labour is storing up some hostages to fortune with this which is not the kind of approach that in a general election is going to make the party attractive to voters in the centre ground - the key battle-ground for the general election.
It reminds me of the “dog whistle” campaign used by Michael Howard for the Tories in 2005. That probably alienated many more voters than it attracted.
In the betting the Labour price is now out to 7.2/1 with Betfair.
Mike Smithson
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I thought Howard was offically supposed to have done well for the Tories. Although IMO Ken Clarke would have won that election.
The telephone canvassing I did last week suggested yobbish behaviour to be a huge issue in the local area; with lots of older residents making it their No1 issue; so the topic is right, but is their approach?
In my view probably not, it’s got to the point where people just don’t believe Labour sloganising anymore.
“Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime…. ” and here we are twelve years on and it’s got worse.
This kind of garbage MIGHT work over a longish period with repetition and something to put some beef in the sandwich. With four days to go to a by-election it is hopeless desperation.
Tamsin is toast.
… and I don’t think this leaflet is ‘dog whistle’ politics; it’s smack-in-the-gob politics.
Almost identical to the Labour Double Whammy stuff.
“Is it going to work?”
No. They’re having to run against their own record.
Awfulness beyond belief. What is the image supposed to convey? A “soft” fist punching its way through and leaving liquid (blood?) oozing out? Is that a soft Tory fist or a well ‘ard Labour one? Is it punching a yob? Perhaps Roger could offer his professional interpretation on message and medium.
If you see a copy of that leaflet, keep it. In years to come it will be a collectors item for the politically morbid.
6 “No. They’re having to run against their own record.”
Exactly. You could understand if they were campaigning against the Government record…
7. Is the black blood significant ? Looks like a BNP leaflet.
Do all those Labour people on here who criticised Michael Howard’s ‘dog whistle’ campaign in 2005 feel slightly embarrassed that Labour is putting this stuff out?
‘Dog-whistle’? This is a bull-horn.
“There’s a lot of talk about human rights…”
It’s this bare-faced hypocrisy that will do for them if Labour keep up this sort of campaign. It was Labour who brought in the human rights act. Do they really think the electorate is stupid?
Moyra Tamsin may be a Dunwoody-Keafsey, but her mother clearly failed to pass on basic political skills.
What is their evidence for the tories being soft? Are the tories in local government in Crewe? Have they a “soft on yobs” policy I am not aware of? This is just weird.
2. “Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime…. ” and here we are twelve years on and it’s got worse.
That is all the next Tory leaflet needs to say. Everyone remembers the Labour sound-bite. Everyone knows Labour hasn’t delivered on it.
There do seem to be very strangely mixed messages coming from Labour. OTOH, the Conservatives are bigoted hangers and floggers, who want to crucify unmarried mothers. OTOH, they’re soft on crime, and soft on immigrants.
I don’t see how both can be true.
- “Will Labour’s final push work?”
No.
- “How much of this is approved by Gordon?”
100% - he is a control freak after all.
According to the Scottish sub-sample from yesterday’s YouGov/Sunday Times voting intention poll, the Scottish Tories are in the process of overtaking Labour to become the 2nd largest party in Scotland. I await new data with keen interest, but I did say a couple of weeks ago (at the height of the WendyRendum fiasco) that I expected the Scottish Tories to push up towards the 24%-25% mark in the foreseeable future. Maybe this is the first concrete(ish) straw in that wind?
Usual caveats regarding sub-samples of GB-wide polls apply (eg. SNP not given as named party).
YouGov/Sunday Times
Westminster voting intention - Scotland
sub-sample size = 148
fieldwork: 15-16 May 2008
1. SNP 30% (+12%)
2. Con 28% (+12%)
3. Lab 25% (-14%)
4. LD 14% (-9%)
5. Grn 1% (n/c)
oth 2%
… giving, according to Baxter’s UNS model, seat distribution:
1. Lab 21 seats (-19 seats)
2. Con 15 seats (+14 seats)
3. SNP 14 seats (+8 seats)
4. LD 8 seats (-3 seats)
5. Speaker (Martin) 1 seats (n/c)
Tory gains from Labour:
- Aberdeen South - Ayr, Carrick & Cumnock - Ayrshire Central - Ayrshire North & Arran - Dumfries & Galloway - East Lothian - Edinburgh North & Leith - Edinburgh South - Edinburgh South West (Alistair Darling) - Renfrewshire East - Stirling
Tory gains from Labour Lite:
- Aberdeenshire West & Kincardine - Argyll and Bute - Berwickshire, Roxburgh & Selkirk
SNP gains from Labour:
- Aberdeen North - Dundee West - Edinburgh East - Glasgow Northm - Kilmarnock & Loudoun (Des Browne) - Linlithgow & East Falkirk - Ochil & South Perthshire - Paisley & Renfrewshire North
In addition, on a result like that, the Lib-Labs would be losing several deposits:
- Lab: 9 lost deposits (and below 10% in 13 seats)
- LD: 3 lost deposits (and below 10% in an astonishing 38 seats!)
Ouch!
http://www.yougov.com/archives/pdf/STresults080516.pdf
http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/userpoll_scot.html
7. It would make more sense to have the word yobs written on the fist. As it is you could mistake the message as being a Tory fist coming down hard on yobs.
9. I agree. There is a brutality to it which I would have expect from a party at the more ‘extreme’ ends of the spectrum but this, amazingly, is the governing party.
8. I’ve said it before - Labour are psychologically in opposition already. Really they should just resign and call a GE, they’d be much happier.
6.Sean, you are on the money with that point.
I spotted this quote from Tamsin Dunwoody this morning when I posted the link to the sky online debate between the by election candidates. Needless to say I nearly choked on my coffee, it is indeed beyond parody!
Anyway the Coffee House blog has spotted it too.
“I am just a single, unemployed mother of five fighting hard for a job” Her responses during that debate did not impress!
Why put ’soft’ on the fingers of a fist? Who would actually do that? Anyhow, that ad is an insult to my intelligence. I certainly wouldn’t feel inclined to vote for its makers.
9 “Looks like a BNP leaflet.”
And we all thought they weren’t standing….
Dog Whistles vs Wolf Whistles.
Is this poster what Cherie describes in her memoirs as Gordon’s clunky fisting?
The point is the Police ARE tough on yobs and always have been; it’s the courts that let them off; again and again and again.
22. Is Mandelson’s blood black? Possible, I suppose…
24. Does Mandelson have blood? I doubt it.
When it’s your campaign tactics that is being talked about more than the outcome, you know things are bad.
So far the issue in the media has been about Labours campaign - the toff thing was all over the media today; with Ladyman doing the worst defence of it I have ever heard (It’s a good campaign. Would it work in my constituency? er, no. Should we do it at eh next GE? No.)
Now this.
And everyone is lining up to blame the whole thing on Gordon directly with leaks everywhere that the campaign was sanctioned by No 10 or managed by No10.
I suppose if they don’t lose it on Thursday he will be able to take all the credit….
I am still laughing at the “I am just a single, unemployed mother of five fighting hard for a job” line Tamsin Dunwoody gave on TV this lunchtime.
She will be able to use that line at Haverfordwest Job Centre on Friday.
23. Why don’t the police turn up half the time to disperse gangs of hoodies who are makeing a nuisance of themselves intimidating people? Why don’t they bother coming to investigate burglaries? Why don’t they deal with threats of violence?
24. He does, but it’s very, very cold.
23
Often due to sentencing policy dictated by jails being full.
The poster would go down well in Putin’s Rusia… all it needs is a hammer and chain…
14.Stuart, all the usual caveats because of sample size blah, blah, blah. But two points that I have banged on about for months, Cameron is attracting the support of voters outside of the Labour heartlands, where as Brown has been a complete turn off. Remember Aberdeen South was the only Conservative gain in the 92 GE (last time I voted Tory and got a Tory MP!)
If the Conservative vote is steadily moving upwards in Scotland as Brown and his government implodes and a GE looms, it does not surprise me. Its exactly what happened with the SNP before last years elections, the voters very cannily/ruthlessly tactically voted for the party they perceived them as the vehicle with which to removed Labour from Holyrood.
Now, I am not saying the Tory are going to sweep to victory in Scotland, but expectations are so low…. it will not take a big jump to set the narrative that they are on their way back from the wilderness.
The other day I predicted
Con 26,737
Lab 3,220
LD 3,179
etc.
and I also predicted
Con 13,753
LD 13,194
Lab 10,631
etc.
Either nobody noticed, or nobody thought it significant or noteworthy to comment, that I was cleverly and spoofily taking the figures from the results of the by-elections in Brecon & Radnor and Bootle (I).
It’s a big clunking fist! It looks like BNP electioneering.
If they are coming out with posters as crap as this they might lose by 7-8,000.
31
Cheshire police have a long history of failure to deal with yobs.. resulting in a recent high profile death case..
Now to whom does the Cheshire Chiedf Constable report?
David Davis?
I belive it’s to a certain J Smith….
23 - I had my hair cut on Saturday morning at 11.45am. My barber is at Old Street which is, so I am repeatedly told, now a very trendy area with Hoxton and Shoreditch and lots of achingly trendy people walking up and down in unfeasibly horrible clothes and eye-wateringly bad haircuts.
As I sat in the barber’s chair, four very drunk young men start scrapping, and one slams another up against the glass of the window, grasping him by the throat. The barber and I both freeze, but before we can go to do anything, another man (a small scale hero) intervenes, calms them down enough at least to stop them throttling each other. They wander off, and the barber and I talk about what we just saw.
The barber tells me that these four are regular sights around Old Street during the daytime. They spend the day drinking quarter sized bottles of bacardi and vodka. They fight, they abuse passers-by, they urinate in the middle of the road (a dual carriageway) in broad daylight. The barber told me that whenever he called the police, they told him “we can’t do anything because they haven’t done anything yet”. The police station is not more than 1/4 mile from the barber’s shop.
This is everyday reality of policing in London. I accept it might be different elsewhere. But your line that the police are tough on yobs is hard for me to take.
NO! It will not work! Labour have been in power for 11 years, so how does it then work out that the Tories are soft on crime? It doesn’t make sense. Labour are coming out with these slogans, but they don’t mean anything. They are just meaningless slogans.
Perhaps Comrade Nick Delves should have a leaflet “Tough on Gravity! Tough on the Causes of Gravity!”
[35] Drunk and Disorderly would seem to cover it, also Threatening Behaviour, or Behaviour likely to cause a Breach of the Peace- all offences thaat carry custodial sanction. The Police are talking mince- the laws already exist to deal with this.
34 No he/she would report to the Chesire Police authority.
38 - I absolutely agree, but my point is not so much that there aren’t laws to deal with it, but that the police don’t use them.
The problem for Labour is that these tactics to shore up their core vote are designed to appeal only to a subset (white working class) of a subset (C&N voters) but, due to the national exposure afforded this election, are going to damage the party nationally. They will (have?) become known as the ‘nasty party’. Even if it picks up a few votes for them in Crewe (not Nantwich) it won’t take them to victory in C&N yet will have damaged them across most of Britain.
38
But Police targets mean they are not yet recorded crimes. If they go to investigate, it adds to recorded crime.. and so to their targets.
Denial of lawbreaking occurring means fewer targets to hit.
So it is in the police interest NOT to reply.
31. ChrisD - “… expectations are so low…. it will not take a big jump to set the narrative that [the Scottish Conservatives] are on their way back from the wilderness.”
Absolutely correct there! And the Scottish Tories have a big advantage over the SNP in that I strongly suspect that The Scotsman is going to dump Labour before the UK GE 2010 and switch to the Tories (to join the P&J and Courier), leaving the SNP as the only major party without a newspaper backing them (ok, ok, I’ll accept that the Scottish Daily Express has been mildly supportive).
However, a caveat, elections are not won on the ‘air war’ alone: the Tories and Labour will dominate that, even to an extent in Scotland. But the 2 other big parties excel at the ‘ground war’: expect to see both the SNP and Lib Dems making some surprising gains and holds respectively, often strongly counter to Uniform National Swing. And I very much dounbt that the Tories would make a lot of UNS-predicted gains, purely because their local organisation/membership is often in a dire state and pretty clueless on modern campaigning tools.
Will be sure to post my £10 donation to the Tories on my way home from work…
40. Well writing up their latest diversity awareness course notes and making sure TV programmes don’t damage ‘community cohesion’ is far more important, I would have thought.
35. In some cases the Police have become afraid to act because of politically correct considerations; in other cases I think some forces (especially the Met) have just become demoralised.
If they spend the hours necessary to bring a conviction the time is all too often just wasted because the accused gets off - on a technciality, or because the CPS don’t think they will win. And even if they do get a conviction odds are the felon will be out and about and at it again pronto.
But in Devon we are seeing a much lower tolerance of things like street drinking, shouting and abuse and low level disorder by Police and it works well; reducing the feeling of general chaos; and in fact bringing down general crime rates.
Having lived in a very safe Labour seat for over twenty years I’ve come to the conclusion that Labour have a built-in interest in maintaining high levels of social and economic deprivation in these areas. The reason is obvious - by forcibly keeping people in the “core Labour” categories of “working class” or BME or unemployed and hopefully, under-educated (the latter is managed by denying access to “classics” in the local libraries and schools), stereotyping of black youngsters into typically black performance or sports activities whilst denying access to musical and artistic forms which differ from “soul, reggae, hiphop, rap, etc” - in this way you can guarantee that the electorate will always vote Labour and forever keep this and other similar seats rock-solid safe for Labour. The “toff” campaign and the “soft on crime” slogan are an inevitable consequence of this strategy.
I can’t help feeling, however, that it would be in the Labour Party’s interest to seriously debate if it any longer has a reason for existence and if it has a future in British society. After Thatcher’s demolition of union power and Blair’s engineered divorce between Party and unions and actively seeking a “toff” electoral base for NuLabour, any attempts to roll back almost 30 years of alienation of a rapidly decreasing “working class” have very little chance of success.
35 Was just about to reply to your post, but 42 says everything I was going to. A lot of police work now involves massaging figures to hit detection rates.
Sorry Labour but stealing Howard type slogans is not the way to win back your voters. If we found this sort of thuggish approach to crime attractive we’d be Tories.
Stop this nonsense now! There has never been a better time for a gentle Lib/Dem Party to show itself. ‘Lets be ‘aving you’ as Delia might say!
47. el windy - “… I’ve come to the conclusion that Labour have a built-in interest in maintaining high levels of social and economic deprivation in these areas.”
Of course they do! Just take a look at most of Glasgow, Lanarkshire and Ayrshire: Labour have absolutely ruined those local economies. All for narrow party gain. Fortunately the electorate are cottoning on.
49 - This isnt new stuff Roger, Labour has been campaigning along these lines for years. They clearly have research that shows that, while unattractive to some, it has a positive effect for them overall.
Now updated, of course, to “Toff on crime, Toff on the causes of crime.”
El Windy. Great post. You’re barking mad!
49. Are you going to switch to the Lib’s roger?
Of course you are right about this slogan. Its complete nonsense. At least when Howard did it, you could see what he was doing. Its a complete Opposition slogan/strategy (not a very good one, mind) But how can the party thats been in government for 11 years attack the party thats been out of government for 11 years, of being soft on crime? It makes absolutely no sense what so ever and anyone with a modicum of common sense (95% of people, at least) can see this nonsense for what it is.
El Windy, you know you are on to something when Roger calls you barking mad!
Roger, are you now a LibDem??????
55 come on, roger. We could use some help with those internet videos!
Deep down, of course, Labour campaigners have always envied ‘Labour isn’t working’ and ‘Labours Tax Bombshell’.
Here were two campaigns that were aggressively negative and worked.
Ever since they have been dying to deploy something similar; but they have never managed to.
Can anyone remember any of the Labour ads from ‘97?
43.”And I very much dounbt that the Tories would make a lot of UNS-predicted gains, purely because their local organisation/membership is often in a dire state and pretty clueless on modern campaigning tools.”
Unfortunately I cannot argue with that point, its a sad fact that the years in the wilderness did untold damage to our grass roots operation. BUT, equally I saw your party come through the middle to give the Libdems a fright last year in the Holyrood FPTP seat in my constituency. Now, the only party that was active on the ground in my area was the Conservatives, and it did not take a genius to work out that the SNP candidate was just a paper one….
If the voters are happy to keep the present government, or are not particularly bothered about who wins the keys to No10, then it will hurt us. But I genuinely believe there are a handful of seats which might throw up a surprise big swing to the Conservatives rather than the SNP or the Libdems.
But I still keep to my prediction that all 4 parties will see some real surprises when it comes to holding and losing seats on the night.
27 Pat and the Tamsin Dunwoody “I am just a single, unemployed mother of five fighting hard for a job,”
A classic.
By the way what happened to husband Mark? 4 years ago they were running a glass company together.
52. Did you come up with that yourself?
I can actually imagine a labour activist using it in the by-election. It definitely seems similar to what Howard did in 2005, but with one difference. Howard was actually quite popular with the grassroots, I can imagin eplenty of Labour activists getting completely demoralised by this.
John Harris’s column on Labour being the least progressive party summed it up.
43 Stuart, in the third paragraph of post 43, you come dangerously close to saying something mildly complimentary about the Scottish Liberal Democrats.
Are you feeling OK? Maybe you need a lie down…….
57. Being memorable and being effective are not the same thing Marcus. ‘Are you thinking what we’re thinking’ being the perfect illustration.
57 - “Can anyone remember any of the Labour ads from ‘97?”
Cant say that I do but I remember them winning a stonking majority which I’m sure they still consider as some consolation for the comparative lack of memorability of their ads.
59 just found that they separated two years ago.
http://tinyurl.com/6hlzxa
57 And the Blair “Demon Eyes” campaign was about ten years ahead of its time….
57. Negavtive campaigns can only work, if they resonate with the public. There has to be that element of truth. Labour isn’t working and the tax bombshell had that authenticity with the public through their previous experiances.
In 1997, one of Labours slogans was; 24 Hours to Save the NHS. This slogan resonted with the public, because the NHS was in a terrible state in 1997. By contrast, the Tories NEW LABOUR NEW DANGER slogan didn’t work, because the public (rightly) didn’t believe it.
You can’t just come up with any old slogan and expect the public to buy into it. It has to have a ring of truth.
58. ChrisD
Well, if there is one thing which surely we can all agree on: UK GE 2010 in Scotland is going to be an absolute stoater
I am really looking forward to it. Scottish elections have been so BORING up until May 2007. Now the whole political landscape is shifting before our very eyes. Things will never be the same again. I wonder when that stark fact will sink in to the Scottish Labour Party? Lord preserve us when they realise what is happening, because that bunch will employ every dirty trick in the book to keep their snouts in the trough.
Can anyone remember any of the Labour ads from ‘97?
I always thought that their first PEB (the “Land of Hope and Glory”, featuring unflattering speeded up shots of the Conservative party conference interspersed with various claims) was an effective example of negative campaigning.
57. No, but I was reminded when someone on here posted that cringeworthy “Things Can Only Get Better” one where a messianic Blair was mobbed by smiling, beautiful young Britons on the way to the polling station.
… urgh… just goes to show how much of a sea change 1997 was. Anyone using an advert like that in the normal political climate would get lambasted…
62. “[adverts] being memorable and being effective are not the same thing” only an ad man could ever say this!
You could arge that anything Labour spent on advertising in 1997 was a waste of money, I agree; since they were going to win whatever they did.
But politics is a long game and we have had hits like the ‘demon eyes’ campaign (and Labour isn’t working, which pre-dated the 1979 election) which resonate over time.
“Are You Thinking What We’re Thinking” was a very interesting slogan. On one level I thought it was good, but ultimately, I think it was a bit too clever. It was a bit too abstract to really resonate with the general public, becuase of course, everyone was thinking differant things. It didn’t actually say anything about the state of the country.
It’s a very unsettling authoritarian image, I would argue that goes well with the Government’s record, others will disagree on that of course. That is irrelevant to if this will work however. It does not deserve to work in my view, but it just might. Maybe it’s just me and I’m having trouble coming to terms with the concept of the Tories gaining somewhere like Crewe after years of bye election defeats in seats better sutied to Tory victories than this for those of us with Tory sentiments, but I still have a feeling Labour may just get away with this one against the apparent odds.
47. Indeed. Labour has a vested interest in keeping people down - social mobility breeds aspiration, which is the enemy of socialism.
The tragedy is, that once upon a time (i.e. a century or so ago) Labour really did want to improve the life chances of ordinary people. But then the party was taken over by middle class armchair revolutionaries inspired by warped notions such as ‘working class people must rise with their class, not out of their class’.
58 That may be so. However, remember how the Canadian Conservatives went from nowhere to winning a bunch of seats in Quebec. They must have had next to no organisation in the Province.
I’ve always felt that Blair’s “big clunking fist” line was the most back-handed of compliments - for me at least it conjures up images of an old fairground boxer, a bit on the heavy side now, hard of hand but not fleet of foot. I am not sure it works as a compliment in any other context, but particularly not in the political context - in my sphere one sometimes hear people described as “a blunt instrument” - it is faint praise at best.
I have always wondered whether Blair had this at the back of his mind when he said it. He could have chosen few better analogies to draw out the distinction between the personalities of Brown and Cameron - and I suspect he would have known which personality was more likely to resonate with voters.
Terrible ad - Labour deserve to lose big here.
70. Has the demon eyes thing ever worked? At the time, I thought it was stupid, OTT, crass and took the public for fool. Tony Blair wasn’t the devil incarnate and New Labour wasn’t a danger to the future of the nation.
I think the Labour campaign has been awful and i dearly hope it won’t work. I am not clear what the current sense is on the ground there as to just how close its gonna be. Anyone know anything???
The Tories have been caricatured by Labour and its left-wing allies as the “hang ‘em and flog ‘em” brigade for years. To suddenly switch tack like this won’t resonate with people.
It’s like the attack (only a couple of weeks ago) on Boris Johnson as an extremist right-winger beneath the veneer didn’t resonate because it blatantly wasn’t true.
In the last few weeks we’ve seen Labour chuck the kitchen sink at voters in an attempt to stay in power. It’s not working. If this really is (as some suggest) a test run for the Labour’s line against David Cameron at the general election then it bodes very badly for Labour.
I don’t really agree with that Marcus. For a non-political example, “You’re never alone with a Strand” was a massively memorable campaign and notoriously disasterous for the brand.
Similarly “demon eyes” was much talked about but at best ineffective and at worst counter-productive. It never delivered against Blair, who is now long gone and against whom your party never really laid many telling punches. “Labour isn’t working” was an advertising classic - effective at the time and memorable now. But although it is memorable now, its value to your brand ceased 20 years ago.
Clinton and Obama share six SD’s today so far. Dwight Pelz of Washington State declares for Obama and California has verified the add-on SD’s, allocated on the the basis of the popular vote - 3 Clinton, 2 Obama.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/19/obama-adds-to-superdelega_n_102410.html
31. and 43. My gut feel is we’re looking at 3 or 4 Tory seats in Scotland after the next election… Dumfries and Galloway, Stirling, and one of the Perth seats (Perth and North Perthshire / Ochil and South Perthshire). And expect a strong showing in Edinburgh South (Darling’s constituency). They might just nab that given a strong wind.
More thoughts on Scottish Conservative Targets here.
Holy cow!
Was Labour… crypto-fascistic?
Seems like Labour’s actual national-socialistic nature just revealed itself in this campaign…
You can so easily overdo it with an ad campaign, the ‘are you thinking’ ads were going down brilliantly until the one that said ‘how would you feel if your daughter was raped by someone on early release?’ I had a stack of complaints from the very kind of moderate wavering voters we were just beginning to attract.
Not tough enough and you don’t get people to listen to you, too hard hitting and you put them off.
81. I of course meant Edinburgh South West, although I’d be delighted if Nigel Griffiths was handed his P45 by the voters as well.
77
Whatever anyone tells you Scampi, someone else is bound to post something contrary. The closest anyone can be sure info wise is the NOTW poll latest showing 45/37/15 (an 8 pt Con lead over Labour) if I remember correctly, but I believe individual constituency polls are notoriously unreliable.
My gut instinct is that Labour will lose and badly at that, if only because the Tories are about 20% ahead nationally. That’s a hell of a trend to buck even with Ms Dunwoody. I am beginning to think her name and the dynasty angle is counting for less and less. In fact it might even be a hindrance comparison-wise
85 thank you.
Terrible. This sort of stuff makes me ashamed to be a labour party member. I hope we lose C&N, frankly.
67.Agreed Stuart, must admit that the mood has changed so much in the last year, especially when you consider where all the parties were back in 2005.
Back on topic.
That poster is horrible, no ifs, no buts. It screams BNP rather than a governing party! I was angry and depressed at the dog whistle nature of the Conservative campaign in 2005, I knew that it would play very badly in the North of Scotland. This type of campaign would be even more disastrous for Labour in the same area.
I cringed when I heard Tony Blair liken Gordon Brown to a clunking fist, it was a mistake, IMHO it was deliberate and calculating on Blair’s part. It really does not appeal to women voters as I am damn sure he knew!
But it certainly does play into the caricature of the Brownite political school of politics, instead of an intended perception of softness on the part of the Conservatives over the issue of crime. Colossal mistake as the nastiness of the campaign filters into the wider UK media.
71. The other thing is that it reinforced the negative image of the Tory party that then existed. “Are you thinking what we’re thinking?” basically led to the response: “I damn well hope not!”
It encouraged people to ‘get into the heads’ of the Tories and, at that stage, considering the negative image, that *wasn’t* a good thing.
81 - What about Angus? The SNP are difficult to target, but its should be doable. It’s a long shot, but Michael Moore in Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk could be vulnerbale with the right candidate.
Call me negative, but I really believe a lot of Party activists prefer a nasty, negative campaign to a more positive one. I’m not referring to tactical advantage, just what they most enjoy.
64 “She found a smallholding in Haverfordwest…”
I have seen this phrase elsewhere, that Tamsin lives on a smallholding in West Wales. But, then, the Sunday papers/TV alleged that Tamsin lives in a mansion valued at 850 k.
So, does Tamsin live in a smallholding or a mansion?
One Ad not mentioned is the Tories’ “You paid the tax, now where are the nurses/teachers/police” which was tried in 2001 and simply did not fly. Mind you, back then nobody was listening to the Tories so they could have promised ferraris to every voter and still flatlined.
I think a derivation of that advert might work in the current climate - not focussing on absolute numbers but perception of declining standards. But then again the Tories might not want to invite the debate about their spending plans, so perhaps not.
How much of this is approved by Gordon?
All of it.
Though I’m sure that when it all backfires and Labour loose the seat, Brown again will blame it all his Tuffty Club, those ‘enthusiastic’ ‘younger’ ministers who get “a bit carried away” - just like The Election That Never Was
74.Sean, I agree with you on this. I was simple recognising that Stuart had a point about the state of the Tory grass roots operation in some area’s of Scotland over the last 10/15 years.
Which day is the Grauniad/ICM poll likely-Tuesday or Wednesday.Think we willsee Lib Dems on 20 or 21%.
rogerh
Most pointless ad campaign award *must* go to the BRUT33 1970’s style guff put out by Labour last time, what was all that about?
91 Noy Tories, most of them hate delivering ‘knocking copy’ and often they won’t do it; the “Blair Liar” one never got out in 2005 for that reason alone.
92 - 850k would buy you the smallholding OF Haverfordwest not IN.
90. The Conservatives are an interesting beast in Scotland, because there is still a very rich vein of voters who will never forget incidents like The Poll Tax, The Miners Strike and Thatcher in general. Having Cameron in power is going to be one of Salmond’s key strategies and I think that a full on battle in Angus would be tough. Conservative victories ill come with Labour voters switching, not SNP imo.
Is there any text on the back of this leaflet, or is it the same as the quote from the website?
97 - I’ve seen a remarkable amount of “knocking copy” out there from the Tories despite that! The Cheadle by-election was particularly unpleasant.
I think 91 has a point which has an element of truth for all parties. A lot of rank and file regular deliverers won’t do “knocking copy” because they are quite apolitical often. But the sort of nutters who go up to by-elections love the “politics as war” and “taking the fight to the enemy” nonsense.
69 i remember watching that one too. the thing is nearly everyone “felt it” and got swept up in it. what a horrible time it was to be a conservative. i felt like a total loser & a social leper and was treated like one by my friends who’s all jumped on the Nulab bandwagon.
i was passing the the cabinet office on may 2 and saw a crowd applauding when clare short and derry irvine came out. such hope and anticipation…
But now all my mates hate the government, are labouring under big mortages, rising living costs, shit schools and don’t have spare cash to save, and will be voting Tory in all likelyhood….
Let’s be honest though, most of the election campaigns of the 00’s have been pretty dire.
A PPB that has to go down as one of my all-time loathed is the Anthony Minghella (what was he thinking?) one in 2005 with Tony and Gordon in soft-focus discussing how brilliant the country is any how good buddies they are;
‘Gee, Gordon, don’t you think our child poverty record has been really good?’
‘Yes, Tony, I love sitting here late into the night discussing how successful Labour is with you. What about our economic stability record?’
‘I agree, Gordon, it really deserves a mention. And, of course, all we want to do is work together to make our country stronger.’
‘I couldn’t agree more, Tony.’
If any voter actually thought that was what Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were like in each other’s presence, they’re very dumb. I’ve seen more convincing acting on Crossroads.
Is Brown a Tory stooge trying to permanently destroy Labour? If so, he’s doing a damn fine job……
76. Demon eyes may not have worked, but by ‘eck it was certainly prescient given the crap he led this country into.
How is this a “final push”? I got this leaflet pushed through my door a week ago and it’s obvioulsy very old as it’s listed very low on there website. Tory spin.
102. This is the honest truth. On election night 1997, when it became pretty much known Labour were home and dry, comfortably, I remember the neighbours coming out onto the street to talk to each other about how brilliant it all was. Someone brought a bottle of champers out and everything.
Bizarre event. But just goes to show how much hope there was.
Senator Bryd of West Virginia endorses Obama :
http://wvgazette.com/latest/200805190255
O/T but of interest here
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/may/19/health.stemcells
Are the streets of C&N that dangerous?
“DID YOU KNOW THAT EDWARD TIMPSON’S TORIES HAVE:
Opposed tougher sentences for dangerous sex offenders.
Opposed 5 year minimum sentences for unauthorised possesion of a gun.
Opposed more powers to crack down on underage drinking.
Local residents are saying they want someone with a track record of action getting tough on yobs to represent them – not some Tory Boy who clearly isn’t up to the job.
It is not good enough to just talk about getting tough on crime, the people of Crewe and Nantwich deserve action.
Tamsin Dunwoody knows what is takes to make our streets safer. She has come forward with a plan of action to cut crime and crackdown on anti-social behaviour. Tamsin Dunwoody wants the police to harass yobs, and get in their faces.
She said: “There’s a lot of talk about human rights, for me the most important human right is to feel safe in your home and community.”
Crewe and Nantwich need a fighter who bangs heads together and gets things done.”
—-
Are the streets of C&N that dangerous?
“get in their faces”
“bang heads together”
“crack down”
Did Jade Goody write this?
clearly aimed at C2DE’s innit?
109. This is coming from NuLab?
Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous.
109 - NuLabour are obsessed with a Harry Enfield character from the early 1990s. Don’t they realise that after 11 years in power they are the evil empire now?
I agree that they are now behaving like the first ever opposition with a parliamentary majority. Bizarre stuff.
109. First rule of campaigning, never mention your opponents name - it only improves their name recognition at your expense.
Labour agent -clearly the B team.
109 - I think that leaflet could have been handed out by any party at any by-election in the past 20 years. It’s hard hitting sure, but nothing very exceptional.
I also disagree with Mike saying it is reminiscent of “dog whistle” campaigning. What was rather unpleasant about “dog whistle” politics is that it involves saying things in code words that you would not say directly - it was hard to combat (because nobody had directly accussed you of anything) and corrosive (because it made what parties knew was unacceptable more acceptable). That leaflet is direct and the Tories can make a direct response if they feel the need.
112, “they are now behaving like the first ever opposition with a parliamentary majority”
be a bloody good line to use in the Commons.
110 - Nothing wrong with the C2DEs. Backbone of Britain and their votes are as valuable as yours or mine.
112 - “they are now behaving like the first ever opposition with a parliamentary majority.” - If that is your own line, I am very impressed - it deserves to be heard further afield - CCHQ perhaps?
Latest Gallup Presidential and Primary Trackers :
McCain 44% .. Clinton 48%
McCain 45% .. Obama 46%
Clinton 39% .. Obama 55%
Note - Largest ever Obama lead over Clinton.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/107395/Gallup-Daily-Obama-Opens-16Point-Lead-Biggest-Yet.aspx
117 - Hmm, can’t control tone. That sounded like I was being mean, when I meant it to sound impressed.
What I meant was “It really is a good line, and if it’s yours to shill for, I’d make sure CCHQ heard it before Wednesday.”
115 - Beat me to it, Morris Dancer!
I’d missed that even the Mirror is attacking the Labour campaign:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/columnists/parsons/2008/05/19/labour-s-crude-crewe-campaign-89520-20422630/
109
Crewe is not far from Warrington where some yobs kicked a man to death when he complained about their yobbish behaviour.
120, us Morris Dancers are swift fellows:)
We’re right though, Cameron should use that line at PMQs. Along with the narrative of Labour enacting Tory policy a few months late, it’d be paint Labour as the Opposition in all but name.
Would Labour have been better to have delayed this by election by a month?
They could have had a couple of weeks celebrating the life of Gwyneth Dunwoody, in an outpouring of affection within C&N. Tamsin could have been high profile and a popular movement to “adopt Tamsin” could have been nurtured. In that period the Conservatives and LDs could not have done much campaigning.
Instead Labour chose to rush by election which is so close to the locals that the anti-Labour sentiment is rolled over from the council election into the by election.
Own goal?
I tell you what it is that makes it weird - the sneering, nasty tone of the whole thing “you don’t want some posh Tory boy, lives in a big house, you want one of us, your own working people “. its just not got the authority of a governing party ; its justlike a socialist worker pamphlet.
Why have they gone back to early 1970’s (or even earlier) class warfare?
Is this the attempt to shore up the base? If this is an insight into their thinking , and it rolled out for the general election Labour’s class war is going to undo all the progress they made since 1983 in a stroke.
97. I wouldnt deliver leaflets attacking a specific candidate unless i was absolutely sure the candidate deserved it, and had cast the first stone. In every campaign (most of them unsuccesful, i must say) I have ever managed, i have had a positive upbeat message.
I have had shamefully poor personal attacks put upon me by the otherside though (Labour).
123 - Followed by “Will he still be in his job to answer questions after losing C&N? If not, which of his Rt Hon colleagues does he think is best-placed to take over as Leader-of-the-Opposition-in-waiting?”
97.”most of them hate delivering ‘knocking copy’ and often they won’t do it”
I will always prefer to deliver a positive message that I feel I can chat happily about on the doorsteps in my area. I honestly nearly packed it in during the 2005 election campaign for that very reason. I give my party fair warning, I won’t deliver something I am unhappy about, and I will never deliver leaflets like the one above.
Dunwoody’s “I’m an unemployed single-mother of five” was actually worse than indicated above.
She was responding to the accusations that Timpson (a millionaire barrister from Kelsall) would find it difficult relating to the lives of many Crewe voters.
Dunwoody’s boast that she was “an . . . . . etc”, was both ill-judged and insulting. I have represented part of Crewe as a councillor for 25 years and the inference that being unemployed, and a single parent of five, is somehow characteristic of the population is very, very wide of the mark.
This is awful!
“Local residents are saying they want someone with a track record of action getting tough on yobs to represent them - although, in all fairness, my dear late mum was unable to do anything about it in the 34 years she represented you at Westminster”
For heaven’s sake, woman, your party is in Government, not opposition.
Get a grip.
Hello everyone. I’ve just got back from the battlefields of Gallipoli. Haunting place. You can find shrapnel everywhere - still!
Re the ad, I agree with David Roe. This poster is so bad it’s bizarre. Sort of thing a bunch of 13 year olds might come up with, if asked to devise a political campaign.
The amazing thing about Labour is their lack of self-awareness. Crime is not a good issue for them. People feel let down by Labour, on crime and disorder, and banging on about how the Tories are somehow “worse” is ludicrous. Which Tories are they referring to? The present Tories aren’t in power, and haven’t been for ten years. How can they be soft on yobs if they aren’t running the country?
Maybe the poster means the Tories who governed Britain in the mid 18th century, when the gin craze was at its height. If so, they should have been more specific:
Tories: Soft on Ginshops
Tories: Soft on Leprosy, the Ague, Swordsticks and Fleet Marriages
Can a party actually go mad? Labour must be close to clinical depression, at least.
On topic - yet another indication of how mindless Labour have become. Good of them to remind people of the ‘Great Flunking Cyst’ though.
Off topic interesting article from the times discussing what might be the most dangerous time for Gordon in terms of his survival as PM. 15th June 2009 (apologies if this has already been posted)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/tim_hames/article3957866.ece
131 - “The amazing thing about Labour is their lack of self-awareness. Crime is not a good issue for them.”
Sean - I suspect it’s your gut instinct versus hard Labour research on this point. If it was such a bad subject for them it wouldnt be a recurring theme in their campaigns. They’re not that thick.
And just because they are not in power doesnt mean the Tories dont have a voting record.
123/127 The Labour campaign has one objective and one objective only - and winning the seat is not it. Brown fears internal assassins far more than he does the Conservatives, or the loss of a byelection. He is hurling out red meat as fast as his abattoir can deliver, to feed his activists and appease the knife-wielders in his Party.
Brown will do anything to avoid being slung out on the streets by his own. These Toff and soft Tory campaigns are designed to appeal to his own Party for that reason. The centre ground is irrelevant. The game now is not Crewe but ’save Gordo’………blind panic at 10 Downing Street.
134 - if so, it’s a dreadful strategy to achieve that objective. The campaign is coming in for vilification from all sides and if the by-election is lost badly, the blame will be put at Gordon Brown’s door. But then, Gordon Brown has consistently shown dreadful strategic judgement.
131. People won’t bother about the Tories voting record when there are articles like this in the newspapers. Labour look like hypocrites and failures.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3953771.ece
Wahey! After the interregnum of the “toffs” campaign, we’re back to the 2004 by-election campaigns. Is it too late for Labour to start putting out leaflets about Tories being soft on wanting to starve asylum seekers and smashing up teenagers? Where are Watson and Byrne when you need them?
On another note, why do Labour keeping trusting these Birmingham MPs with their campaigns? It’s not as if they did much good in their home city this year.
I’ve sent the line to DC’s team, see what they make of it. It’s the first thing that comes to mind when you see that though.
As for Labour’s campaign objectives I can’t work them out. They surely can’t win like this and it must turn off any intelligent voter. Even if you were deeply respectful of the late Mrs Dunwoody you couldn’t vote for her daughter now.
I’m just baffled. It’s not dog whistle politics, it’s blind panic politics. More than that, it’s losing politics.
What are the latest odds on Labour winning? I hope not many people on here are red on the Tories.
135. As you say, since when has Gordon Brown shown himself capable of effectively carrying out any strategy, let alone selecting the right one? This is panic writ large.
Anyone else feel sorry for our resident Labour MP? He has to come on here and try defend this ridiculous campaign. It must be a thankless task for the poor man after a hard day’s work.
If Labour need reminding of what happens when you treat your voters like fools they only need reminding of Blaenau Gwent, December 2003. It might be years till they recover from that. Treating people like idiots is a long walk off a short pier in politics.
141 They have done the same in Durham. They chucked out Councillors and their majority for Blaenau Gwent style resistance to All women shortlists. That should help them in Blaydon and City of Durham or maybe not.
125 - Fundamentally, Labour want to have to have the luxury of getting their core energised without the drawback of giving them policy red meat. This is not going to work in here, and it’ll soon wear thin. In the near future, Labour are going to give way on policy and move leftwards: before the next GE, we’re going to see increasing pressure for things like railway nationalisation and 50p taxes rates for those on 100k+ incomes - and these will probably be in the manifesto for the election after next.
If it is any consolation for Nick I drove past his Roundabout today - Proudly labelled The Borough of Broxtowe - I think that is it. I have never been to a place called Broxtowe.
ICM - Guardian
Con: 41
Lab: 27
LD: 23
Oth: 9
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/may/19/polls.labour
141. Would Brown recognise an idiot if he met one? On the basis that it takes one to know one, yes he would.
New ICM Guardian Poll Con 41 Lab 27 LD 22
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/may/19/polls.labour
145, 147. At 22% that’s the best Lib Dem figure since the last election, I suspect.
145. It can’t be long before a national poll shows them in third place.
140 David R. As someone who has been extremely critical of Nick on a couple of specific topics I think he’s probably developed the skin of a rhino when he encounters the mindless cretins on here who dribble pointless attack on him and the government !!
149. The Tories? I’d give it about four years.
Isn’t ICM/Guardian the one that tends to show the Tories at their worst/Labour at their best?
Labour really have given up, haven’t they? Minister