Friday 8th May 2015

[AngryAsWell]

And so it begins ......

Generation Rent, if you didn't vote Labour you've scuppered yourself.
And the same goes for public sector workers, the low paid,...

I am so pissed. All those Tweets from the Police. Fire Service. Lifeboats. Armed services. NHS. Disabled organisations, the young, those on ZH, low paid, self employed, high rents, foodbank users, teachers. The list is endless.
The sheer numbers of disaffected should have swept Ed into power.

Excuse the language. So where the fuck were they?

There a lot who deserve our sympathy but an awful lot that don't and right at this moment I'm not prepared to take up the cudgels on their behalf.

You forgot The Law Society and Probation Services who also tweeted for Labour.
This election has been filthy

[ohsocynical]

Now that the election is over, can we expect Carney to justify keeping interest rates low?

Presumably the AAA rating will be returning soon too.

I hope he raises them to the roof and all those that got cheap mortgages and over extended themselves and voted Tory because they're all right Jack, bloody well end up homeless.

If the housing market crashes, it'll affect me and Mr Ohso, but I really don't care. If that's what it takes to wake some of them up, then bring it on.

I remember well off people having to resort to council housing because they'd lost their grand homes due to the Lloyds scandal...They won't be so lucky this time.

[PorFavor]

Generation Rent, if you didn't vote Labour you've scuppered yourself.
And the same goes for public sector workers, the low paid,...

I am so pissed. All those Tweets from the Police. Fire Service. Lifeboats. Armed services. NHS. Disabled organisations, the young, those on ZH, low paid, self employed, high rents, foodbank users, teachers. The list is endless.
The sheer numbers of disaffected should have swept Ed into power.

Excuse the language. So where the fuck were they?

There a lot who deserve our sympathy but an awful lot that don't and right at this moment I'm not prepared to take up the cudgels on their behalf.

You forgot The Law Society and Probation Services who also tweeted for Labour.
This election has been filthy

Yes. The choice is between being a conspiracy theorist or accepting that a great number of our fellow citizens are stupid (or badly educated - as I alluded to much earlier on today, and I thank Tony Blair for that), selfish and in many cases, both.

[daydreamer]

66% turn out? I don't understand
The polling booths have never been busier, had to queue at ours (unheard of in the 25 years I've lived here) and not far from us they had to bring in an extra booths to cope. A look at yesterdays AS blog shows the same queuing all over the country.

That's odd. They were reporting 73% turnout as average last night and 80% in many Tory areas.

Someone posted a photo of queues last night at a local polling station and said nearly everyone was voting Labour. My constituency, which I haven't yet checked out but supposedly very safe. It hasn't been on the pages I've read so far.

I haven't been able to read this stuff away from online voices. It's hard for me to have any physical emotion response, but I have a huge intellectual emotional response. Dared not show it when my youngest was around, we'd been hoping so much, for my needs and his, both of which are becoming urgent. If I could get him out of England I would, he was much better when we were away, even in a strange situation, and people loved him, instead of categorising him. I'll admit to feeling very scared.

Me too seeingclearly. I'm terrified. Something is very wrong when citizens live in fear of their own government.

[ohsocynical]

Generation Rent, if you didn't vote Labour you've scuppered yourself.
And the same goes for public sector workers, the low paid,...

I am so pissed. All those Tweets from the Police. Fire Service. Lifeboats. Armed services. NHS. Disabled organisations, the young, those on ZH, low paid, self employed, high rents, foodbank users, teachers. The list is endless.
The sheer numbers of disaffected should have swept Ed into power.

Excuse the language. So where the fuck were they?

There a lot who deserve our sympathy but an awful lot that don't and right at this moment I'm not prepared to take up the cudgels on their behalf.

You forgot The Law Society and Probation Services who also tweeted for Labour.
This election has been filthy

Yep. I am still unable to take in what's happened.

[yahyah]

Irvine Welsh making it clear he hates Labour on Twitter.

Hope he doesn't dare complain about the Tories after the way his leader played the fiddle to Murdoch's tune.

[SpinningHugo]

Apart from 2010 (29.1%) Labour's vote share in this election (30.5%) was the lowest since 1922.

We needed a bigger tent people.

We need to realise that the entire Miliband project was a disastrous mistake.

[55DegreesNorth]

I am so pissed. All those Tweets from the Police. Fire Service. Lifeboats. Armed services. NHS. Disabled organisations, the young, those on ZH, low paid, self employed, high rents, foodbank users, teachers. The list is endless.
The sheer numbers of disaffected should have swept Ed into power.

Excuse the language. So where the fuck were they?

There a lot who deserve our sympathy but an awful lot that don't and right at this moment I'm not prepared to take up the cudgels on their behalf.

Labour will have to wait until they realise. Help them gently and be there when they do.

I have to say I am beginning to understand why some militant leftists actually want shit to happen to radicalise people.

But how people haven't become radicalised with this lot is strange.

Us more mature folk understand the direct link between the Labour movement, social change and public services. Our parents knew what happened before the NHS.

A lot of today's generation see Labour as the party of 'F****ing Tony Blair' & Iraq.
They don't relate things they benefit from to a Labour history.
And often seem more interested in tweeting pics of their cleavage or genitals than politics.

I guarantee one way of starting a revolution tomorrow is if you told people their porn access was going to be stopped. But when it comes to public services and help for unemployed, sick or disabled people they don't give a toss.

Nah, if you want people to organise and rebel, take away some parking places and put a cycle lane instead of an extra carriageway. That really gets people worked up. Oh yes, and try to build some new houses nearby while you're at it.

I feel like a stranger in a strange land. Labour MPs here increased their vote (a bit) and there are no marginals for miles. No Libdems, a couple of Tories out in the countryside, but otherwise all Labour. We are sandwiched between the SNP up the road (a bike ride away) and the Tory South. I can't see the future being anything but bleak for the North East. Mind you, it's been bleak for a while. Part of me wants the mugs who voted Tory to be shafted over the next 5 years, even though a lot of them don't know any better.

[ohsocynical]

At present I really don't blame the politicians...We are the ones with the power to elevate or remove them...To believe them or not. The fault lies entirely with us.

[daydreamer]

And so it begins ......

Generation Rent, if you didn't vote Labour you've scuppered yourself.
And the same goes for public sector workers, the low paid,...

I am so pissed. All those Tweets from the Police. Fire Service. Lifeboats. Armed services. NHS. Disabled organisations, the young, those on ZH, low paid, self employed, high rents, foodbank users, teachers. The list is endless.
The sheer numbers of disaffected should have swept Ed into power.

Excuse the language. So where the fuck were they?

There a lot who deserve our sympathy but an awful lot that don't and right at this moment I'm not prepared to take up the cudgels on their behalf.

Yes, where were they? Did they actually come out and vote against the Tories? Or did they stay at home? Or something...

[LadyCentauria]

Someone earlier/last night posted a tweet from Neil from Clean Bandit and asked who they were. Sorry I forgot to respond at the time but they're one of my favourite recent/current bands and I'm delighted they're Labour supporters:

[youtube]RLDmIBdOiLI[/youtube]
https://youtu.be/RLDmIBdOiLI

[ohsocynical]

I think I am a militant leftist.

[yahyah]

Apart from 2010 (29.1%) Labour's vote share in this election (30.5%) was the lowest since 1922.

We needed a bigger tent people.

We need to realise that the entire Miliband project was a disastrous mistake.

are you sure you aren't Dan Hodges Hugo ?

To be fair, it was pretty clear my local Labour chap was no Ed fan so you are not alone.
When I asked him who he'd supported in the leadership he claimed he couldn't remember 'Harriet I think ?' . Most odd, you'd think you'd remember something like that and Harman didn't stand.
Probably didn't want to admit he voted for David.

[ohsocynical]

Generation Rent, if you didn't vote Labour you've scuppered yourself.
And the same goes for public sector workers, the low paid,...

I am so pissed. All those Tweets from the Police. Fire Service. Lifeboats. Armed services. NHS. Disabled organisations, the young, those on ZH, low paid, self employed, high rents, foodbank users, teachers. The list is endless.
The sheer numbers of disaffected should have swept Ed into power.

Excuse the language. So where the fuck were they?

There a lot who deserve our sympathy but an awful lot that don't and right at this moment I'm not prepared to take up the cudgels on their behalf.

Yes, where were they? Did they actually come out and vote against the Tories? Or did they stay at home? Or something...

They stayed at home. It'll be a long time before I forgive if ever.

[PorFavor]

I think I am a militant leftist.

It's times like these that the soft edges get rubbed off, isn't it? Militant were quite hard and unsentimental. I can kind of understand why.

[daydreamer]

I'm running on empty right now, so probably won't post much more today. But this worries me. Everyone seems to have their own interpretation of why Labour failed - the media is filling up with ideas and sage statements about where they went wrong and what they need to do next. Labour needs space to make an accurate assessment but has precious little time and there will be a great deal of noise telling the temporary leadership what to do. I only hope they are able to cut through the vast amounts of rubbish to see what about this incarnation of Labour was good and should be kept, and what needs to change.

It feels like the electorate has rejected Labour wholesale (again) but I can't help feeling that Labour actually had more popular policies than the Tories and was closer to public opinion than was given credit (assuming the opinion polling wasn't wrong about that, too). It seems that there may have been a significant disparity in Tory voters and Labour voters actually getting out there to vote, and if so, this Labour might be more popular than the result suggests - certainly no less than Cameron's triumphant Tories.

The party spent most of the last parliament trying to rebuild and I can't accept that all that work is now wasted. Another lengthy period of navel gazing would just hand the initiative to the Tories again.

My fear is that if the party seizes on the wrong interpretation of why things went wrong, we'll just end up back here in five years.

Someone mentioned community-level stuff earlier - was it Tem? - and this triggered memory of something that happened earlier in the parliament. Just after I left the party, someone contacted me about the community activism that the party was trying to establish. I explained that I was no longer a member, but they didn't seem to mind that and asked if I'd like to meet to talk about ideas for getting involved in the community. We had a cup of tea in a local cafe, I whittered at length about the NHS and he told me about some local campaigns that I might like to get involved in. I said I would. He promised to pass me the details. I never heard from him or anyone else connected with that enterprise again. Got the feeling it started well then just fizzled out. Anyone else know anything about it?

My fear too, Rob. That the party will go the wrong way, convinced that the public are to the right, and make no mistake the MSM will run with this narrative, putting pressure on Labour to move back further right too. How can we get the message to Labour that they must resist that siren call? That they have to reach out to the Lib Dems, reach out to others, start the grass-roots build up. Contact people like Jamie Reed etc and tell them this?

[RogerOThornhill]

are you sure you aren't Dan Hodges Hugo ?

You may well laugh but that thought occurred to me a few weeks ago...it might well account for the number of times that he gets thrown out of CiF.

[yahyah]

Just to prove that nothing ever changes, here are some frescoes that I saw many years ago in Sienna. It was when Thatcher was in power and we sent a postcard to friends back home.

They are called 'Allegory of Good & Bad Government', by Lorenzetti.

Here is bad government.
Ring any bells ?



Allegory of Bad Government

The central figure is Tyranny, his feet on a goat which represents luxury.
Below the tyrant a captive Justice is bound, surrounded by Cruelty, Deceit, Fraud, Fury, Division, and War. Above him float Avarice, Pride, and Vainglory. They are considered to be the enemies of human life, and it is painted to make the viewer feel out of kilter

[AnatolyKasparov]

Apart from 2010 (29.1%) Labour's vote share in this election (30.5%) was the lowest since 1922.

We needed a bigger tent people.

We need to realise that the entire Miliband project was a disastrous mistake.

You are forgetting 1983 - and quoting UK not GB figures (something that always bugs me)

The "project" was far from a disastrous mistake - its analysis of things was basically entirely correct, tragically Ed was not - in the final analysis - the right person to deliver it. Yes we need a bigger tent, but warmed over 1990s Blairism is not going to achieve that.

(least of all in Scotland, of course)

The posts earlier on that Labour needs to become a *movement* again are basically correct - my feelings on the SNP are well known, but others can learn from their astonishing membership growth in the past year which helped deliver yesterday's landslide.

"build it, and they will come".......

[daydreamer]

Generation Rent, if you didn't vote Labour you've scuppered yourself.
And the same goes for public sector workers, the low paid,...

I am so pissed. All those Tweets from the Police. Fire Service. Lifeboats. Armed services. NHS. Disabled organisations, the young, those on ZH, low paid, self employed, high rents, foodbank users, teachers. The list is endless.
The sheer numbers of disaffected should have swept Ed into power.

Excuse the language. So where the fuck were they?

There a lot who deserve our sympathy but an awful lot that don't and right at this moment I'm not prepared to take up the cudgels on their behalf.

You forgot The Law Society and Probation Services who also tweeted for Labour.
This election has been filthy

Yeah, so many people seemed pissed by the government, but it doesn't seem to have translated into votes. If they'd all voted, then maybe the Tories would still have scrapped a win, but surely not a f**king majority!

[PorFavor]

@ohsocynical

The Conservatives (particularly this lot) fight dirty. They have a thin veneer of manners and decency which they exploit. We have, to a great degree, been persuaded to behave "decently" to them as a result. We play by the rules - which are entirely their rules which shift about as it suits them. It's time for us to play dirty.

[RogerOThornhill]

I doubt if anyone who was Labour leader would have got away from the "still clearing up Labour's mess" and "there is no money" lines that clearly resonated. The fact that public spending from a period up to 2008 still seemed to be relevant and what was to come was being ignored was also a thing.

It will take a further 5 years to get that out of the system.

I'm guessing we might get Osborne as PM in 2020 saying "We've cut three-quarters of the deficit"...if they haven't cut the dead wood out of departmental budgets by now they never will.

[AngryAsWell]

are you sure you aren't Dan Hodges Hugo ?

You may well laugh but that thought occurred to me a few weeks ago...it might well account for the number of times that he gets thrown out of CiF.

Noooo! you are John Rentoul, aren't you Hugo ? (only kidding)

[LadyCentauria]

Jon Stone ‏@joncstone 40m40 minutes ago
Hours after the election, the DWP says is looking to cut a disabled access to work scheme http://ind.pn/1cvBTUW

Thanks, rr2. Have posted that link on Google+. People have already been finding their funding either suddenly stopped or cut, over the past few years, and especially in the past few months. People who need a signing or lip-reading interpreter being told to get one for fewer hours and find a cheaper one. Same for other support-workers. It's bad enough already and clearly about to get worse. And this is 'guaranteeing not to touch disability benefits'...

[seeingclearly]

I'm running on empty right now, so probably won't post much more today. But this worries me. Everyone seems to have their own interpretation of why Labour failed - the media is filling up with ideas and sage statements about where they went wrong and what they need to do next. Labour needs space to make an accurate assessment but has precious little time and there will be a great deal of noise telling the temporary leadership what to do. I only hope they are able to cut through the vast amounts of rubbish to see what about this incarnation of Labour was good and should be kept, and what needs to change.

It feels like the electorate has rejected Labour wholesale (again) but I can't help feeling that Labour actually had more popular policies than the Tories and was closer to public opinion than was given credit (assuming the opinion polling wasn't wrong about that, too). It seems that there may have been a significant disparity in Tory voters and Labour voters actually getting out there to vote, and if so, this Labour might be more popular than the result suggests - certainly no less than Cameron's triumphant Tories.

The party spent most of the last parliament trying to rebuild and I can't accept that all that work is now wasted. Another lengthy period of navel gazing would just hand the initiative to the Tories again.

My fear is that if the party seizes on the wrong interpretation of why things went wrong, we'll just end up back here in five years.

Someone mentioned community-level stuff earlier - was it Tem? - and this triggered memory of something that happened earlier in the parliament. Just after I left the party, someone contacted me about the community activism that the party was trying to establish. I explained that I was no longer a member, but they didn't seem to mind that and asked if I'd like to meet to talk about ideas for getting involved in the community. We had a cup of tea in a local cafe, I whittered at length about the NHS and he told me about some local campaigns that I might like to get involved in. I said I would. He promised to pass me the details. I never heard from him or anyone else connected with that enterprise again. Got the feeling it started well then just fizzled out. Anyone else know anything about it?

You are describing a very British disease, RS. That fizzle out factor, a kind of ennui. I went through many years when my statemented son had his accommodations discussed in the last week of the summer term. I shouldn't need to explain the rest, it's easy to gues. I think there are very bright people who do know what to do, but as things get passed down the ideas lose their vigour. Perhaps it's that bit that needs addressing, how do you actually keep the inspiration, and what should it be about. The thing that always brings me back are social justice and equality, and I suppose human rights are embedded in them. But put like that it's all very abstract, there's nothing like engaging img with the real problems as they happen in real life and seeing how people start thriving when given what are often thing that are taken for granted. Anything from participation and being included to just being asked what you think. Some people never have.

In these terms everything IS political, but getting together for a chat often becomes a moan, while doing something often has unexpected results, insights whatever. It's why I love reading some of the posts here, because it's what I used to do and cat anymore. The people who've been doing this know who they are, and how it brings people together.

[PorFavor]

All right, after suggesting that we have more than enough analysis, I see there are people who want to completely trash everything and either start again or go back to 1994, so I'm chipping in to set out my particular stall.

Here's where I think Labour could have done something different/better:

1) communicated a more cohesive economic vision - both in terms of an assessment of where things were where they were and a model for fixing it. 'Cost of living crisis' didn't really do it. Labour needed to articulate the massive loss of tax revenue from the financial sector causing the bulk of the deficit post 2008, and drive relentlessly at the failure in productivity and extent of underemployment behind the coalition's 'jobs miracle'. Above all they needed to get this clear and fight the Tories and LibDems relentlessly. By April 2015 it was far, far too late
2) Developed some of the woolier ideas into a framework that people could understand. Predistribution, predators vs producers, etc - these were good analyses and led to good ideas but they never got honed into a comprehensible vision. Even the Big Society was easier to get. Above all, formulate a vision for what Britain looks like under Labour much earlier than they did.
3) Got off the fence on immigration and social security. For too long the party dithered. It got there on immigration (where the ideas could still have been better communicated) but they needed to fight the xenophobic Tory and Ukip line. They were never going to agree with it, so they needed to stop pussyfooting. Ditto social security. There were no votes in being a slightly more efficient version of the Tories. Again, they sort of got there with the Bedroom Tax but it was too little, too late.
4) Emphasised that the energy price freeze was to enable the separation of producers and suppliers. The freeze in itself was popular but too easy to criticise and spokespeople didn't try hard enough to set out why the bit about the whole market was important


And where I think Team Miliband was spot on.

1) The press, Leveson, facing up to Murdoch. Not a foot wrong. The only thing was that they could have reminded people a bit more later on that pressure from Ed led to the Leveson enquiry, which Cameron then ducked
2) The NHS
3) Modernising the party's relationship with the trade unions in a way that didn't alienate them
4) Focusing on the problems of Generation Rent in a constructive way. By and large this was communicated well and clearly. It would have made a good plank in that overall vision that never quite felt as if it got there

Thing is, if Labour bows to big business, the super-rich and forgoes any kind of leftwing policy because it might upset the financial markets, then it doesn't really matter if they win, because we've just told unelected elites and speculators that this democracy thing is a bit of a sham and they're the ones who really run Britain.

Thank you.

[pk1]

Been & finally collected my car. Eaten dinner. Read all the posts here & still feel like crap so I'm shutting my laptop down for the night but before I go I want to leave you with this gorgeous photo of Ed & Justine taken on the campaign bus.

I will miss Ed dreadfully & the candidates being mentioned thus far make me recoil in horror. When did our front bench team become so bloody useless ?! I am proud to have shaken his hand & helped raise the roof wit cheers in Hove where we succeeded in getting Peter Kyle elected.

Get some sleep folks, see you tomorrow x

[AngryAsWell]

All right, after suggesting that we have more than enough analysis, I see there are people who want to completely trash everything and either start again or go back to 1994, so I'm chipping in to set out my particular stall.

Here's where I think Labour could have done something different/better:

1) communicated a more cohesive economic vision - both in terms of an assessment of where things were where they were and a model for fixing it. 'Cost of living crisis' didn't really do it. Labour needed to articulate the massive loss of tax revenue from the financial sector causing the bulk of the deficit post 2008, and drive relentlessly at the failure in productivity and extent of underemployment behind the coalition's 'jobs miracle'. Above all they needed to get this clear and fight the Tories and LibDems relentlessly. By April 2015 it was far, far too late
2) Developed some of the woolier ideas into a framework that people could understand. Predistribution, predators vs producers, etc - these were good analyses and led to good ideas but they never got honed into a comprehensible vision. Even the Big Society was easier to get. Above all, formulate a vision for what Britain looks like under Labour much earlier than they did.
3) Got off the fence on immigration and social security. For too long the party dithered. It got there on immigration (where the ideas could still have been better communicated) but they needed to fight the xenophobic Tory and Ukip line. They were never going to agree with it, so they needed to stop pussyfooting. Ditto social security. There were no votes in being a slightly more efficient version of the Tories. Again, they sort of got there with the Bedroom Tax but it was too little, too late.
4) Emphasised that the energy price freeze was to enable the separation of producers and suppliers. The freeze in itself was popular but too easy to criticise and spokespeople didn't try hard enough to set out why the bit about the whole market was important


And where I think Team Miliband was spot on.

1) The press, Leveson, facing up to Murdoch. Not a foot wrong. The only thing was that they could have reminded people a bit more later on that pressure from Ed led to the Leveson enquiry, which Cameron then ducked
2) The NHS
3) Modernising the party's relationship with the trade unions in a way that didn't alienate them
4) Focusing on the problems of Generation Rent in a constructive way. By and large this was communicated well and clearly. It would have made a good plank in that overall vision that never quite felt as if it got there

Thing is, if Labour bows to big business, the super-rich and forgoes any kind of leftwing policy because it might upset the financial markets, then it doesn't really matter if they win, because we've just told unelected elites and speculators that this democracy thing is a bit of a sham and they're the ones who really run Britain.

Missing the thanks button! Fully agree, well said

[AngryAsWell]

Been & finally collected my car. Eaten dinner. Read all the posts here & still feel like crap so I'm shutting my laptop down for the night but before I go I want to leave you with this gorgeous photo of Ed & Justine taken on the campaign bus.

I will miss Ed dreadfully & the candidates being mentioned thus far make me recoil in horror. When did our front bench team become so bloody useless ?! I am proud to have shaken his hand & helped raise the roof wit cheers in Hove where we succeeded in getting Peter Kyle elected.

Get some sleep folks, see you tomorrow x

Thank you

[daydreamer]

I am so pissed. All those Tweets from the Police. Fire Service. Lifeboats. Armed services. NHS. Disabled organisations, the young, those on ZH, low paid, self employed, high rents, foodbank users, teachers. The list is endless.
The sheer numbers of disaffected should have swept Ed into power.

Excuse the language. So where the fuck were they?

There a lot who deserve our sympathy but an awful lot that don't and right at this moment I'm not prepared to take up the cudgels on their behalf.

Yes, where were they? Did they actually come out and vote against the Tories? Or did they stay at home? Or something...

They stayed at home. It'll be a long time before I forgive if ever.

Unfortunately yes. WTF! Who did they think was going to vote on their behalf, to get the Tories out, if they weren't prepared to make the short trip to the polling station? The invisible vote fairies?

[tinyclanger2]

I too will miss Ed Miliband. This is what is pissing me off most at this exact moment. John Smith never had his chance, and now Miliband will not either. Such a hideous waste. After all he has withstood, with the odd so stacked against him. It's stupid.

I hope he will continue to work on this, and that - as Robert urges - we do not start another period of review and intrspecition - which translates into inertia with respect to what's needed while the Tories just get on with trashing the country.

[daydreamer]

Apart from 2010 (29.1%) Labour's vote share in this election (30.5%) was the lowest since 1922.

We needed a bigger tent people.

We need to realise that the entire Miliband project was a disastrous mistake.

Tents don't get much bigger than One Nation.

The public preferred Labour's policy platform, even (or perhaps because) they didn't realise it was Labour's. The basic framework wasn't the problem. We MUST NOT throw out the baby with the bathwater.

Agreed, Rob

[ohsocynical]

It's not the politicians that need sorting it's the public who're supposed to vote for them...

The Cons have their apathetic/slavish work force and right wing press and media to keep them to heel.
Lower life expectancy eases the demand for pensions and medical care. A likely two tier health system will also play its part in seeing us off before we cost the State too much.

Win win.

[ohsocynical]

Yes, where were they? Did they actually come out and vote against the Tories? Or did they stay at home? Or something...

They stayed at home. It'll be a long time before I forgive if ever.

Unfortunately yes. WTF! Who did they think was going to vote on their behalf, to get the Tories out, if they weren't prepared to make the short trip to the polling station? The invisible vote fairies?

Exactly !!!! And I don't see how to do anything about it.
The politicians can organise themselves until they're blue in the face, but if the stupid public stay as stupid as they've been this time, then I doubt we'll ever turn things around enough to ease the lot of those who suffer but did try.

[PorFavor]

Well, being with you all here today has helped take the edge off what would have been a really horrible time. Thankyou all

I'm glad your coming here has eased your day somewhat. I know I should have been climbing the walls without everyone's company - but I have to confess that I don't feel any better.

[tinyclanger2]

Me neither.
But defnitely much better for being here than it would have been otherwise. Was going spare wehn the modem packed up last night (which now seems weeks ago).
Am knackered.

[daydreamer]

All right, after suggesting that we have more than enough analysis, I see there are people who want to completely trash everything and either start again or go back to 1994, so I'm chipping in to set out my particular stall.

Here's where I think Labour could have done something different/better:

1) communicated a more cohesive economic vision - both in terms of an assessment of where things were where they were and a model for fixing it. 'Cost of living crisis' didn't really do it. Labour needed to articulate the massive loss of tax revenue from the financial sector causing the bulk of the deficit post 2008, and drive relentlessly at the failure in productivity and extent of underemployment behind the coalition's 'jobs miracle'. Above all they needed to get this clear and fight the Tories and LibDems relentlessly. By April 2015 it was far, far too late
2) Developed some of the woolier ideas into a framework that people could understand. Predistribution, predators vs producers, etc - these were good analyses and led to good ideas but they never got honed into a comprehensible vision. Even the Big Society was easier to get. Above all, formulate a vision for what Britain looks like under Labour much earlier than they did.
3) Got off the fence on immigration and social security. For too long the party dithered. It got there on immigration (where the ideas could still have been better communicated) but they needed to fight the xenophobic Tory and Ukip line. They were never going to agree with it, so they needed to stop pussyfooting. Ditto social security. There were no votes in being a slightly more efficient version of the Tories. Again, they sort of got there with the Bedroom Tax but it was too little, too late.
4) Emphasised that the energy price freeze was to enable the separation of producers and suppliers. The freeze in itself was popular but too easy to criticise and spokespeople didn't try hard enough to set out why the bit about the whole market was important


And where I think Team Miliband was spot on.

1) The press, Leveson, facing up to Murdoch. Not a foot wrong. The only thing was that they could have reminded people a bit more later on that pressure from Ed led to the Leveson enquiry, which Cameron then ducked
2) The NHS
3) Modernising the party's relationship with the trade unions in a way that didn't alienate them
4) Focusing on the problems of Generation Rent in a constructive way. By and large this was communicated well and clearly. It would have made a good plank in that overall vision that never quite felt as if it got there

Thing is, if Labour bows to big business, the super-rich and forgoes any kind of leftwing policy because it might upset the financial markets, then it doesn't really matter if they win, because we've just told unelected elites and speculators that this democracy thing is a bit of a sham and they're the ones who really run Britain.

Agree with all of this. Thanks.

[AngryAsWell]

I too will miss Ed Miliband. This is what is pissing me off most at this exact moment. John Smith never had his chance, and now Miliband will not either. Such a hideous waste. After all he has withstood, with the odd so stacked against him. It's stupid.

I hope he will continue to work on this, and that - as Robert urges - we do not start another period of review and intrspecition - which translates into inertia with respect to what's needed while the Tories just get on with trashing the country.

Right with you Tiny, I feel cheated

[PorFavor]

There are people that you feel you can get behind and work with (and I would gladly do so when that person becomes evident). But there are people you find inspirational and with whom you have an affinity. Ed Miliband is, for me, one of the latter - so much so that he motivated me, a lapsed (actually, I resigned) member to rejoin the Labour Party. He will be a very hard act to follow. I await developments.

Edited to add -

@SpinningHugo

I appreciate that you and I have different views on the future of the Labour Party but I would suggest that your, frankly brutal, approach to people who are feeling bruised is not the way to build a cohesive Party and avoid destructive fractures in the future. I was prepared to give more space to the LibDems than you seem to be prepared to grant many of us here.

[seeingclearly]

Hours after election the DWP says it is looking to cut a disabled access to work scheme.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 37191.html

[daydreamer]

Been & finally collected my car. Eaten dinner. Read all the posts here & still feel like crap so I'm shutting my laptop down for the night but before I go I want to leave you with this gorgeous photo of Ed & Justine taken on the campaign bus.

I will miss Ed dreadfully & the candidates being mentioned thus far make me recoil in horror. When did our front bench team become so bloody useless ?! I am proud to have shaken his hand & helped raise the roof wit cheers in Hove where we succeeded in getting Peter Kyle elected.

Get some sleep folks, see you tomorrow x

I'll miss him too (agree re: the candidates too).

Good night, Pk

[Eric_WLothian]

The politicians can organise themselves until they're blue in the face, but if the stupid public stay as stupid as they've been this time, then I doubt we'll ever turn things around enough to ease the lot of those who suffer but did try.

Not so much stupid as gullible (not that there's much of a difference) imo. Seems some politicians are equally gullible. We've just had Sturgeon on 'Reporting Scotland' going on about the 'bigger voice in Westminster' and how they (the SNP) will pursue their anti-austerity, more power for Holyrood agenda.
Personally, I can't wait to see what happens when Cameron tells them to f*** off - or better, just ignores them. After all he has nothing to lose.

Cameron didn't win the election, Murdoch did.

[AngryAsWell]

Oliver Sidorczuk ‏@OliverSidorczuk · 1 hr1 hour ago
Biggest achievement of #GE2015? Record registration drives have inspired a leap in youth turnout (up from 52% to 58%)

[daydreamer]

There are people that you feel you can get behind and work with (and I would gladly do so when that person becomes evident). But there are people you find inspirational and with whom you have an affinity. Ed Miliband is, for me, one of the latter - so much so that he motivated me, a lapsed (actually, I resigned) member to rejoin the Labour Party. He will be a very hard act to follow. I await developments.

He was the latter for me too, so sad it's ended this way.

[PorFavor]

@pk1

Goodnight. Have a restful evening and night.

[TechnicalEphemera]

Oliver Sidorczuk ‏@OliverSidorczuk · 1 hr1 hour ago
Biggest achievement of #GE2015? Record registration drives have inspired a leap in youth turnout (up from 52% to 58%)

Great, but futile.

Any future Labour campaign should work continually with youth voting organisations to target young people in key constituencies and get them registered.

Similarly people in rental property. This will be resource intensive but it has to be done.

[LadyCentauria]

Apart from 2010 (29.1%) Labour's vote share in this election (30.5%) was the lowest since 1922.

We needed a bigger tent people.

We need to realise that the entire Miliband project was a disastrous mistake.

Tents don't get much bigger than One Nation.

The public preferred Labour's policy platform, even (or perhaps because) they didn't realise it was Labour's. The basic framework wasn't the problem. We MUST NOT throw out the baby with the bathwater.

Well said, Robert. Labour's vote share increased, not by enough and not in the right places, but it did increase. When Miliband was elected most people were saying it'd probably take two terms to rebuild and a great many said he should be given that time. At that time, the SNP were newly elected as a majority Government in Scotland and had only achieved a handful of Westminster MPs, and UKIP were a minor fringe party who 'only got EU seats because of proportional representation.' Then, Cameron gave the SNP a referendum which enthused and empowered many of Scotland's powerless and UKIP had a 'landslide' in the EU by reflecting the Nationalism they saw in Scotland, and enthusing and empowering a portion of England's and Wales' (predominantly) powerless.

Labour's new message was cutting through. Support was building. Perhaps we (all the party) mistook the long-run of high polling that oppositions benefit from for the way it was going to be. Perhaps we failed to consider that dropping down to level-pegging could not mean a landslide for Labour when the other opposition parties were increasing their percentages too. We weren't at all prepared for the not-winning in 2015 that we'd expected back in 2010. And so, when it happened, the leaders who hadn't won acted as though they'd lost and fell on their swords. Our leader was allowed to fall on his sword because everyone had forgotten that perhaps no-one could have turned defeat to success in one term. We were supposed to be beyond short-termism but it bloody happened again.

The 'entire Miliband project' wasn't 'a disastrous mistake.' It was just partway through and needed some tweaking. It had made it from loser to runner up. And now it might not get a chance to become a winner next time unless it's built on and taken forward instead of destroyed. And that makes me sad.

(Not proof-reading, typos will have to stand.)

[rebeccariots2]

This is pretty excoriating stuff from Paul Mason.

Labour haven’t just failed to win – it’s worse than that - See more at: http://blogs.channel4.com/paul-mason-bl ... a5nUf.dpuf

In seat after seat that Labour held you get a Lib Dem collapse, a holdup of the Tory vote, and a 4-5,000 surge for Ukip.

My hunch is that the Lib Dem votes went mainly to the Tories – and that a lot of it was tactical in response to pleas by the Conservative press for tactical voting to avoid a de facto Labour/SNP majority.

The Ukip surge clearly came largely from Labour voters – as evidenced by the close shaves Labour had with Ukip in Hartlepool and Heywood and Middleton.

What does this tells us?

Labour in England was fighting a campaign about fairness, less austerity and the NHS. But the SNP surge made the debate exactly about what Cameron said it was: who can form a non-chaotic and legitimate government of the UK.

Having been told the SNP were akin to a Scottish Sinn Fein by the Labour leadership, once this became the salient issue, Labour’s heartland economic agenda had no traction.

And make no mistake, a significant section of working class labour voters are still not convinced on freedom of movement. That – not Euroscepticism – is what is driving the Ukip vote in the north and in Wales.

I think I agree with the first couple of points ... the observation about the voting patterns in many seats.

I don't think the Labour leadership are entirely culpable re making the SNP out to be 'akin to a Scottish Sinn Fein' though - I think the Tories and media had a lot to do with that and provoking a response - right or not - from Labour.

[PorFavor]

Apart from 2010 (29.1%) Labour's vote share in this election (30.5%) was the lowest since 1922.

We needed a bigger tent people.

We need to realise that the entire Miliband project was a disastrous mistake.

Tents don't get much bigger than One Nation.

The public preferred Labour's policy platform, even (or perhaps because) they didn't realise it was Labour's. The basic framework wasn't the problem. We MUST NOT throw out the baby with the bathwater.

Well said, Robert. Labour's vote share increased, not by enough and not in the right places, but it did increase. When Miliband was elected most people were saying it'd probably take two terms to rebuild and a great many said he should be given that time. At that time, the SNP were newly elected as a majority Government in Scotland and had only achieved a handful of Westminster MPs, and UKIP were a minor fringe party who 'only got EU seats because of proportional representation.' Then, Cameron gave the SNP a referendum which enthused and empowered many of Scotland's powerless and UKIP had a 'landslide' in the EU by reflecting the Nationalism they saw in Scotland, and enthusing and empowering a portion of England's and Wales' (predominantly) powerless.

Labour's new message was cutting through. Support was building. Perhaps we (all the party) mistook the long-run of high polling that oppositions benefit from for the way it was going to be. Perhaps we failed to consider that dropping down to level-pegging could not mean a landslide for Labour when the other opposition parties were increasing their percentages too. We weren't at all prepared for the not-winning in 2015 that we'd expected back in 2010. And so, when it happened, the leaders who hadn't won acted as though they'd lost and fell on their swords. Our leader was allowed to fall on his sword because everyone had forgotten that perhaps no-one could have turned defeat to success in one term. We were supposed to be beyond short-termism but it bloody happened again.

The 'entire Miliband project' wasn't 'a disastrous mistake.' It was just partway through and needed some tweaking. It had made it from loser to runner up. And now it might not get a chance to become a winner next time unless it's built on and taken forward instead of destroyed. And that makes me sad.

(Not proof-reading, typos will have to stand.)

I don't know if you saw my edit added to an earlier post (below). If so, I apologise for the repeat but I think it needed to be said. There's no hope if crowing and gloating are to be the tactics employed for shaping Labour's future.

[from me (PorFavor) to SpinningHugo]

I appreciate that you and I have different views on the future of the Labour Party but I would suggest that your, frankly brutal, approach to people who are feeling bruised is not the way to build a cohesive Party and avoid destructive fractures in the future. I was prepared to give more space to the LibDems than you seem to be prepared to grant many of us here.

[StephenDolan]

'Williams blames what he calls the Fifty Shades effect, insisting the public are either stupid or masochistic or both.

He added, “The last five years of coalition government can be compared to a badly-written sex scene, which the British public is gleefully consuming with one hand.” '
http://newsthump.com/2015/05/08/everyon ... -pig-shit/