Archives for November 2019

I got about fifteen minutes into the BBC “leaders” debate last night before I couldn’t take any more. The whole thing was just too depressing. The Labour Party sent out Rebecca Long-Bailey to fill the slot. I realise she is the heir apparent to the Labour leadership, but she’s shadow BEIS – not even one […]

Remainer Twitterland has been filled with “vote tactically for the person best placed to get rid of the Tory in your area” sentiment since the election was called. I have found this depressing – almost oppressive – yet I couldn’t understand why. Something about it seemed off to me. Part of it was that many […]

Last night’s release of the MRP poll from YouGov gave us our first concrete sense of where the voters are at the moment. Not just a poll but a country-wide prediction of seats. It put the Tories on 359, Labour on 211, SNP 43, and the poor Lib Dems on 13, technically seven down on […]

There are endless theories about why the 2017 general election, which had been assumed throughout to be heading for a large Tory majority, ended in a hung parliament. The main factors that are usually cited are: the Tories’ bad campaign, in particular May’s poor performance; Remain voters gathering behind Labour in order to try and […]

The polls look dire for anyone but the Conservative party. Labour are floundering, as they were always going to, and the Lib Dems have been effectively squeezed. The latter has come about due to a combination of the fact that both the Tories and Labour have an interest in seeing the Lib Dems crushed, the […]

The Lib Dem campaign is in trouble. At least, this is becoming the narrative, which during a general election campaign means it is reality. Political pundits are looking at all elements of the Lib Dem campaign and finding fault in every corner. This is standard: in successful campaigns, every element is seen to be genius, […]

A couple of years ago, in the wake of the 2017 general election, I wrote a book called “Apocalypse Delayed: Why the Left are Still in Trouble” which advanced a theory about the Labour Party that is about to be tested, namely that they would lose, again. I also wrote about the woes of the […]

For those of you who didn’t watch the leader’s debate on ITV, which hopefully was most of you, it was as dire as expected. Johnson just barked campaign lines in a chaotic, sometimes random way; he had nothing new whatsoever to say for himself. Corbyn looked tired and fed up and though he was a […]

Here’s my main problem with the People’s Vote argument: it seems to be taken for granted in Remain circles that the 2016 EU referendum was a bad idea (which is was) but that the fix to this problem is to do it all over again. It’s like thinking the best way to treat someone whose […]

I can already feel it: I will regret writing this article. Partly because I was so wrong last time, being sure right up until the reveal of the exit poll that the Tories had won a huge majority. I’ll also regret it partly because making any sort of prediction on how this election is going […]