Labour Party after the General Election

I cannot begin to express how upset I am about the current state of the Labour Party. I am not impressed with any of them standing for leadership of the Labour Party. 

Quite frankly I can the imagine the Tories are loving every minute of this debacle. None of them in my opinion has any realistic chance of becoming Prime Minister. 

What's more concerning is that Labour becoming more left wing than ever which seriously reduces any realistic chance they have of becoming elected to into power. 

So right now I am boycotting all UK political news because when I read about the Labour leadership battle does not really seemed to be going well. 

Once the Labour leader is selected we can look that person realistic chances of becoming Prime Minister. 

UK General Election - 6th May

So it's been a while since I have blogged but I have been following the political campaigns pretty closely. It goes without saying that all the parties of fighting of each vote. 

It has been fasincating to see what the parties have been doing to try and get people to vote for them. 

I think Labour led by Ed Miliband have done well to be so close in the polls. Ed has had a strong message about making the UK a fairer society and get people who are not paying tax to pay tax. 

However his message may not be getting through due to the backlash from the right winger media. 

They are doing everything in their power for Ed to come across as incompetent. What they don't realise is that they coming accross as bullies which is why is not helping the Tory campaign.

The Tory campaign has been an unmitigated disaster, after they had spent the last year telling the British people how well the economy is doing we find out the economy is going backwards and there has only been 0.3 growth in April. 

Yet David Cameron is at pains to stress how the UK is thriving but the reality is the ones at the top have benefited whilst rest of the UK keeping it's head above water. 

Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats is trying to cling to power by stating that if there is a hung party then they will be the kingmakers which is unlikely as the polls are suggesting they will lose half there seats. 

UKIP have been making a lot of noise but they have gone quiet about there determination to leave Europe as they know it's not a vote a winner. They will be lucky to get three MPs.

So it's there is still all to play for but I am hoping that Ed and his wife Justine will be standing on the doorsteps of No10 as he is elected Prime Minister. 

General Elections - Manifestos

This week each of the parties vying office launched there manifesto and the first party to launch there manifesto were the Labour Party. 

I would say that in all the years that I have watched and followed politics I have never taken such a keen interest in the manifestos. 

I was very impressed with Labour and Ed Miliband as they did not make any unrealistic promises they know cannot be achieved and it seems like they had spent time to cost every pledge out. 

I would say that they did not provide us with specific details as to what areas they will cut and how much of the cuts the UK public should expect. 

However it was somewhat a of good manifesto and it was presented very well by Ed Miliband. 

The next day it was the  Conversatives and David Cameron turn and their manifesto was a complete contrast to Labour's.  

The Conservatives were promising to spend money left, right and centre. This after spending three years telling us that there was no money. 

David Cameron presentation of this manifesto was weak. He seemed very red face and came across like he was not comfortable with what he was saying. 

He also seemed to gloss over the manifesto and did not  go over the weekend announcements of more spending in the NHS. 

Liberal Democrats were equally woeful as their leader Nick Clegg only selected one journalist in the question and answer session. 

Overall a good manifesto launch for Labour and now they really need to capitalise on this launch and build up a lead in the opinion polls.  

Week One - General Election campaign

Last week was an excellent week for Ed Miliband and the Labour and it is clear now that the British people are now listening and maybe prepared to give Ed Miliband go. 

Ed Miliband announcement on going after UK citizens with "non dom status" has played really well the voting public and he has laid some solid foundations for the next three weeks of campaigning. 

However the biggest problem that the Labour Party is a potential loss of votes and seats to the Scottish National Party. These loss of seats could be the reason the Labour Party do not get a majority. 

 

For me it is deeply troubling and I am not seeing real signs as to what the plan to do about it. I hope the Labour put more resources and time into keeping their Scottish seats and also enlist the help of Gordon Brown. 

I believe the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown really help to turn it around but they need to ask him now and not three days before polling day. If the Labour Party are serious about getting a majority. 

For the Tories the first official ended on a bad note with George Osborne giving a "car crash" interview and he simply could not answer where the Tories where going to get 8 billions pounds to fund the NHS. 

The Tories are about 2 percent down the polls and Labour really need to capitalise on this and even try to extend their lead if  they are to get a majority in the May elections. 

I suspect the Tories will now throw the kitchen sink at the election and I hope Labour are willing and ready to respond in a dignified manner that can help them get the keys to number ten. 

Autumn political conferences

The political conferences have now taken place and Labour Party took place few a weeks ago. I was a little disappointed with Ed Miliband. 

I did not expect him to say that he will continue with the same destructive Tory policies. 

I really hope Ed can up his game in the next eight months because this is his election to lose.

The Conservative party conference got off to a bad start with the resigniation of MP Mark Reckless. 

The Tories did not say anything new but instead doubled down on their destructive policies that many have suffered from. 

UKIP where the next to hold there conference and Nigel Farage was buoyant from the defection of Mark Reckless from the Tories to them. 

Farage was again promising to cause an earthquake in British politics. Sadly he is probably right and his brand of extreme right wing politics will probably succeed. 

Liberal Democrats held there conference last week and Nick Clegg is a man in deep trouble experts have predicted that the Lib Dems will lose almost half there MPs in the next General Election. 

There really wasn't much Nick Clegg could say that would change what the experts are predicting. I suspect he has lined himself with a nice job in Europe. 

So none of the parties had a game changer of a conference party so there is still lots for each of the parties to do. 

Countdown to the UK General Election

We are now fifteen months to the next General Election and things are beginning to hot up. 

The right wing media mainly the Daily Mail published articles about three senior Labour politicians Harriet Harman, Jack Dromey and Patricia Hewitt. 

It was mainly do with the roles in they had in the National Council of Civil Liberties and what they did or did do to get rid of affiliates the Paedophile Information Exchange. 

The Daily Mail run this story for about six days before Harriet Harman and her husband Jack Dromey responded. 

 

Although there response confirmed that they had nothing but contempt for this group. The Daily Mail have been determined to get some political capital out of this. 

I have to say that the Labour Party response was fairly late and it was somewhat a weak response. 

Ultimately if Labour want to get back in power they need up their game and be prepared for the mud slinging contest.

As the Tories aided and betted by the right wing media are ready sling some mud to get them reelected. 

If Labour want to get relected then they have to be prepared to fire back at the smears or sling some mud of their own.

The politics of the floods - The blame game

Britain is currently experiencing the worst flooding in over two hundred years and the politics of the blame game is in full swing. 

I have to say that these floods have been ongoing for about two and half months. 

However it is only now it has become a political problem for David Cameron. 

It really came to the top of David Cameron's attention when Prince Charles  went to visit one of the flooded areas and then called David Cameron. 

However the Tories are already trying to pin the blame on the Environment Agency which is headed by the former Labour Minister Chris Smith. 

However Labour party have claimed that this government reduced the budget on floods defence system. 

David Cameron has been trying to claim that " dredging" is the answer. However this has been dismissed by science experts who claim this method is ineffective. 

There is more rain is expected this week and it is expected to get worse so David Cameron will need to show real leadership or will start losing valuable support from regions that normally support the Tories. 

UK Politics in 2014

We are now a few weeks into the New Year and it's about sixteen months before the next general election. 

Both the Tories and the a Labour party have a lot to do to convince the electorate that they are the right party to govern the UK.

The Labour Party need to prove to the electorate they can be trusted with the economy. 

They also need to be able to show how they would do things differently and be more successful than the current coliation government. 

Ed Miliband has been focusing on the cost of living and various policy areas such as energy and housing.

 He is hoping that this will continue to resonate with the electorate and they will elect him as Prime Minister. 

David Cameron has to be able to prove that the Tories can be the majority government. 

David Cameron has restle votes away from the UK Independence Party to have any realistic chance of leading  a majority government. 

For both Ed Miliband and David Cameron the big test will be how well the fare in the local and European elections this May. 

Countdown to the 2015 UK General election

It is now seventeen months to the next UK General Election and the main parties are preparing their election manifesto. 

The Labour Party will probably campaign on improving living standards. 

Yesterday Ed Miliband went to the Tory heartland of Stevenage to promise that the next Labour government  will build more houses. 

I think this will resonate with voters up and down the country, many of whom are feeling the affects of the housing shortage 

Tories are also going to focus on a cost of living but from a different prespective. The Tories recently leaked their child benefit proposals to the Daily Mail. 

In this proposals, child benefit will no longer be given to parents with more than two children. 

I think this is disaster of a policy which in my opinion is unworkable. What will end up happening is that more children will end up on the poverty line. 

The Tories would also like to restrict free  movement of labour between certain countries and the UK. 

This is also an unworkable policy as the key principle of the European Union is the freedom of labour movement. 

So this would be very difficult for the Tories implement without contravening EU policy. 

18 months to the next general election

Countdown to the next general election has started and it seems that all of the political parties are setting the stage.

The Tories are focusing on Labour's relationship with unions and plus any scandals they can throw Labour's way.

The Labour Party are focusing on reminding people that the Tory policies have failed and they offer a better alternative. 

The Liberal Democrats are in deep trouble they are struggling in the polls and could have suffer very bad losses at the general election.

UKIP could steal votes from all the main political parties and get MPs for the first time. 

UKIP will be reminding voters that European Union interference is damaging the UK socially, politically, legally and economically.

 

It promises to be a very nasty election campaign with lots of muck racking. However I think social media will have a huge influence votes and voters!

I will be giving a monthly update on what each of the parties are doing so for a different perspective on the general election don't forget to subscribe to my blog:)

Prime Minister's Questions

Wednesday's Prime Minister's Questions was entertaining to say the least. Ed Miliband tried to focus on the cost of living crises. 

However David Cameron was more interested in bringing up the conduct of Reverend Flowers and link him to the current Labour Party.   

In the end this weeks PMQ's was a bit of a farce and it looked and sounded like a bit of electioneering was going on from both sides. 

But I did find it particularly galling that David Cameron was constantly trying to link Ed Miliband to Reverend Flowers without a shred of evidence. 

I also noted that yougov's daily tracker still puts Labour Party at least seven points ahead of the Tories.

Therefore the whole right wing strategy of linking  Reverend Flowers is having little impact. 

However if they did find some damming evidence of a genuine link that would change everything.

At the moment it is just a lot of hear say which is not moving the polls in any significant direction. 

Prime Minister's Questions - 6th November 2013- Podcast

VR Online Service: 2013-11-11 08_32_26

Labour Party Conference

Day one of the Labour Party autumn conference and it is clear that the Tories and their right wing media friends are trying to influence the narrative.

They are now taking Ed Miliband serious and by doing so are trying to link him to the negative side of Gordon Brown's time in office. 

They are being aided and abetted by Gordon Brown 's former Special Adviser Damian McBride. Who has recently written a book describing his time as a Special Adviser.

This book has been perfectly timed to be serialised in the Daily Mail and make the Labour Party  look like a party that were not united. 

The media attacks on Ed Miliband has included the left wing paper The Guardian. Who are constantly trying to build a particular negative narrative about Ed Miliband. 

It remains to be seen in two years time whether these attacks will have any impact on voters. 

In the meantime Ed Miliband and the Labour Party need to convince floating voters in those marginal seats that they are a credible alternative. 

Ed Milliband Union Reform

Ed Milliband made a historic speech yesterday on the Labour Party links with the unions. I applaud Ed for taking this initiative especially as it could have some serious financial implications. It shows that Ed is not afraid to take on challenges no matter how serious they are.

If Ed wants to be the next PM he has to be seen as a man that has no fear when it comes to taking on challenges. The fact that Ed's speech was applauded by both Tony Blair and Len McCLuskey goes to show that Ed is working hard to unite the different factions of the Labour Party.

As Ed is aware that if he did not take the initiative then David Cameron would have seized on this opportunity and would have described him as weak and an ineffective leader. Now I hope that  Ed will take the real argument about party donations to David Cameron.

Prime Minister's Questions review 03/07/13

Today PMQ's started off fairly nicely with Ed Milliband asking about the UK government responses to the clashes in Egypt. David Cameron provided a nice considered response about how the government was liaising with the Egyptian government and how President Obama had spoken to President Morsi.

However when Ed Milliband asked David Cameron about primary school places that's when Cameron became defensive and started his usual "its all Labour's fault". Today Cameron went a step further and most of his responses to the Labour MPs was embedded with "they are all here because of Len McCluskey"

Cameron responses were a little interesting at first but then just got repetitive and boring and he came across to me as quite desperate as well. Cameron is clearly gearing up for the next election and he thinks that it can be fought on painting Ed Milliband as a die had trade unionist.

Cameron was asked various questions ranging from food banks to bedroom tax and his standard response was either it is all Labour's fault or the Unite union is pulling the strings of the Labour party.

I thought Ed Milliband did quite well today in raising issues that are affecting families up and down the country. Whilst David Cameron does not come across as a man who understand the daily struggles of families in the UK.

Prime Minister's Questions

In this weeks PMQ's Ed Milliband mainly focused his attack on the lack of banking regulation. Whilst David Cameron claimed that Labour had done nothing to regulate the banks when in power.

However the most interesting point of this weeks PMQ was when a Labour  MP asked David Cameron what he was going to do about the rise in child poverty.

Mr Cameron responded that he was trying to reduce the national debt. At this point Speaker Bercow interrupted and told Cameron that he was going to move on to the next question as he (the Speaker) not responsible for the national debt.

It's the first time I have seen the Speaker tell off David Cameron and Cameron looked very embarrassed. 

So PMQ's this week was not a classic but Speaker Bercow telling off David Cameron made it a little more interesting.