There I was looking up the discontent

[srb7677]

The disconnect from all those who have given up on voting is something I saw and heard with my own eyes and ears in the Labour party. Many of the new intake on the left like me tried to argue that we had to go after these potential voters who had given up on voting by trying to understand and address their concerns and offering solutions. The centrists and Blairites in the party said it was a waste of time going after those who didn't vote because...well...they didn't vote, and just accepted that as a reality without wanting to make any effort to understand why or change it. Better to win over Tory supporters they said, because at least they vote. And their votes are worth twice as much as any non voters' whom we persuade to support us, because it is not just one more vote for Labour but one less for the Tories.

This is their actual thinking. They have given up on the disenchanted in pursuit of Tory voters. I can remember at a party meeting, the Plymouth Sutton and Devonport MP for Labour - Luke Pollard - trying to spin that line to me personally when I was fairly new to the party. I pointed out that such an approach which might have worked well for Blair for a time is unlikely to work now,because the party cannot rely on it's former traditional supporters anymore, many of whom have joined the ranks of disenchanted non voters. And that the price of winning over significant numbers of Tories will be the driving away of many other potential supporters for Labour. Even now, Labour's poll lead is largely built upon a collapse in support for the Tories rather than any increase in support for Labour.

If the Tories only did what every Joe and his grandad can see is what they have to do, ditching Boris first and foremost, they might be able to bounce back. Because the only real risk of me being proven wrong is the Tories being so hated and distrusted that Starmer wins by default on a record low turnout.

[johnofgwent]

With the Mayor of Manchester bloody Burnham and his daft bike lanes and congestion charge proposal and this came up

Yes it's 13 years old and I don't agree with all it's conclusions but it's as relevant today as then,if not more so because if anything the disconnect is greater.

The fundamental requirement is for the mainstream to piss the electorate off to the point where 10% of the voters that DO vote are the 100% of the undesirables.

Thus is why it is SO important to cripple all the cardigan wearing tree huggers and burn their pistsl votes. Because if you don't, you get highway codes like the shit that just got published

[Good old]

With the Mayor of Manchester bloody Burnham and his daft bike lanes and congestion charge proposal and this came up

Yes it's 13 years old and I don't agree with all it's conclusions but it's as relevant today as then,if not more so because if anything the disconnect is greater.

Agree there is a greater and greater disconnect. But politicians can only try , they can never satisfy all of our ,prejudice, aspirations, needs, or wishes.  But as things stand that disconnect by Joe soap means the party of established money has greater and greater control. Even if the disconnect went the full course and what had been the electorate , abdicated. What then?  I think I know what then. But let's see if anyone, can tell us.

[cromwell]

With the Mayor of Manchester bloody Burnham and his daft bike lanes and congestion charge proposal and this came up

« Rational inattention to politics | Main | Why were Labour MPs wrong? »
June 08, 2009
Burnham misses the point

Politicians just don't get it, do they?:

Mainstream parties must "understand" why people had voted for the BNP, [Andy] Burnham said, and must "painstakingly" work to win back support.
The results showed voters were worried about immigration issues and that these concerns did need to be addressed, he added.

The results - as they stand now - show no such thing. Of the 40.3 million of us eligible to vote*, just 2.2% - one person in 45 - voted BNP.
For every person who voted BNP, 29 did not vote at all. It's probable, then, that BNP voters are swamped by the number of voters who chose to express their contempt for our political system in a non-racist fashion.
If Burnham really wants to "understand" voters, he'd be better off trying to understand why  six times as many people abstained as voted Labour. But this is to ask too much.
Another thing: what does Burnham mean by addressing concerns about immigration? You could address them by pointing out that they are simply, factually, incorrect. Does he mean this?
* I guess you could try to rescue Burnham's point by stressing "voters" as distinct from those eligible to vote. But only one in 15 who voted did so for the BNP. And fewer than one in four voters supported either the BNP or UKIP, whose campaign also seemed to focus heavily on immigration.

Yes it's 13 years old and I don't agree with all it's conclusions but it's as relevant today as then,if not more so because if anything the disconnect is greater.