Bradford West By election

[Pete Whitehead]

Mar 30, 2012 1:10:14 GMT The Bishop said:

Mar 30, 2012 1:01:55 GMT @richardclemerson said:

I rarely have any idea what Ian will say (unless it is a diatribe against anything Tory).

I was rather curious what his views on or perhaps excuses for Labours performance in Bradford W might be

I think the explanations are rather depressingly obvious - the one crumb of comfort, maybe, being that they have b***er all to do with the wider political picture......

Anybody (especially on my "own" side) who pretends this is in any way a judgement on EM, in particular, is beyond contemptible.

I wonder though Bish, if Labour had done as many expected and won with a vastly increased majority and share of the vote, would you be making the same point?

[Deleted]

We saw this with Galloway before he is a leech, takes advantage of a situation, gets elected then like in Bethnal ran as soon as Labour wakes up in a particular area.

This is an embarassment and especially for the local party but no impact in the long term at all

[Crimson King]

Mar 30, 2012 7:39:47 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Mar 30, 2012 6:50:34 GMT A Brown said:

What share of the postal votes did Galloway get then?

I saw various tweets last night suggesting it was about 75% - don't know what proportion of the total votes were postal, but we know the kind of things that have gone on in areas with certain demographics. Still the results were such that the white voters must have voted for him in reasonable numbers, even allowing for a large differential in turnout

I heard those sort of figures which surprised me. The table I was looking at seemed to have about 30% Galloway on the PV - I'll accept it was a pretty small sample though.

One might expect the PV to be worse for Galloway than the ballots on the day - it is partly a product of longerstanding parties signing up known supporters and also earlier so less subject to any "bandwagon"

I'll be able to respond to your second point when I see the box counts. I am not sure you are right

[Crimson King]

Mar 25, 2012 22:47:40 GMT Crimson King said:

Clearly everybody thinks this is a really boring shoe-in for Labour, so what do we need to liven things up - step forward Mr Galloway. I can report that there are a large number of Respect/Galloway posters in prominent positions aronfd the place, most notably on the back of a building overlooking the city park and so prominently visible from the opening off said splendid construction. They appear to be mainly on inhabited buildings, which is not the position in more cases for the large labour posters - though labour appear to have more garden stakeboards.

All this may mean little, but it does seem the assumption that the Pakistani community were solidly united behind Labour (as appeared to be the case in the Locals) is not enterely to be relied on

Any chance of a honorable mention on the prediction thread for this

[Pete Whitehead]

Mar 30, 2012 7:44:23 GMT @ianrobo said:

We saw this with Galloway before he is a leech, takes advantage of a situation, gets elected then like in Bethnal ran as soon as Labour wakes up in a particular area.

This is an embarassment and especially for the local party but no impact in the long term at all

I don't think you could say no impact. Respect looked to be dead in the water - the Bishop referreed to this by-election as being their last hurrah. Now it looks like they have the potential again to corner the muslim vote. There are some marginal Labour seats where the Labour majoriuty rests entirely on this demographic - Walsall South for example. I'm not saying muslim voters are going to move oveer en masse to Respect nationally, but it has to be a worry for Labour

[Pete Whitehead]

Mar 30, 2012 7:55:31 GMT Crimson King said:

Mar 30, 2012 7:39:47 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

I saw various tweets last night suggesting it was about 75% - don't know what proportion of the total votes were postal, but we know the kind of things that have gone on in areas with certain demographics. Still the results were such that the white voters must have voted for him in reasonable numbers, even allowing for a large differential in turnout

I heard those sort of figures which surprised me. The table I was looking at seemed to have about 30% Galloway on the PV - I'll accept it was a pretty small sample though.

One might expect the PV to be worse for Galloway than the ballots on the day - it is partly a product of longerstanding parties signing up known supporters and also earlier so less subject to any "bandwagon"

I'll be able to respond to your second point when I see the box counts. I am not sure you are right

Which part are you unsure about? are you suggesting the white vote for Galloway was neglible? That being the case he would have been needing to get 80%+ of the Muslim vote and with a big differential in turnout to boot

[Harry Hayfield]

Mar 30, 2012 7:30:31 GMT doktorb🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️ said:

Harry - can you put your recording on line?

I fell asleep last night so missed the declaration

I am sorry to say that I deleted it, but I dare say that it will crop up on YouTube before too long either under Respect's account or anyone who supports him.

[Crimson King]

Mar 30, 2012 8:06:12 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Mar 30, 2012 7:55:31 GMT Crimson King said:

I heard those sort of figures which surprised me. The table I was looking at seemed to have about 30% Galloway on the PV - I'll accept it was a pretty small sample though.

One might expect the PV to be worse for Galloway than the ballots on the day - it is partly a product of longerstanding parties signing up known supporters and also earlier so less subject to any "bandwagon"

I'll be able to respond to your second point when I see the box counts. I am not sure you are right

Which part are you unsure about? are you suggesting the white vote for Galloway was neglible? That being the case he would have been needing to get 80%+ of the Muslim vote and with a big differential in turnout to boot

Yes, possibly - the chit chat did suggest a big t/o difference between 'white' and 'asian' wards but I can't say if that is really the case, neither does that mean there was differential t/o within wards. But I'm not pinning my reputation, such as it is, on that hunch - I'll await more info

[Tony Otim]

What a shocker

Can't believe that result, let alone the size of the majority.

Not a good step for British politics.

In terms of longer term impact, I'd guess that the boost and publicity for Respect could well have an impact in Sparkbrook this May, if nowhere else

[Pete Whitehead]

I think your party leader will probably welcome it. The Greens stood down for and endorsed Salma Yaqoob in 2010 and there was talk last night of Galloway and Lucas working together - no surprise really to those of us who recognise the Greens are basically a far left party (even if some members such as yourself are not)

[Tony Otim]

Point of Order. Caroline Lucas is not my party leader - the Scottish Green party is allied with but separate from the GPEW.

[Pete Whitehead]

That is a point of information not a point of order.
Apologies for wrongly associating you with odious Ms Lucas. You must feel like Bob Crow did being associated with Ken Livingstone

[iainbhx]

Mar 30, 2012 8:06:12 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Mar 30, 2012 7:55:31 GMT Crimson King said:

I heard those sort of figures which surprised me. The table I was looking at seemed to have about 30% Galloway on the PV - I'll accept it was a pretty small sample though.

One might expect the PV to be worse for Galloway than the ballots on the day - it is partly a product of longerstanding parties signing up known supporters and also earlier so less subject to any "bandwagon"

I'll be able to respond to your second point when I see the box counts. I am not sure you are right

Which part are you unsure about? are you suggesting the white vote for Galloway was neglible? That being the case he would have been needing to get 80%+ of the Muslim vote and with a big differential in turnout to boot

I think it may be less than that. There has probably been a fair amount of demographic change since the 2001 census, I wouldn't be surprised if the register wasn't 50%+ Muslim these days in that seat.

I wonder if this represents a late biraderi switch or (and I hope it does) the breakdown of biraderi.

[Richard Allen]

Mar 30, 2012 9:04:57 GMT iainbhx said:

Mar 30, 2012 8:06:12 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Which part are you unsure about? are you suggesting the white vote for Galloway was neglible? That being the case he would have been needing to get 80%+ of the Muslim vote and with a big differential in turnout to boot

I think it may be less than that. There has probably been a fair amount of demographic change since the 2001 census, I wouldn't be surprised if the register wasn't 50%+ Muslim these days in that seat.

I wonder if this represents a late biraderi switch or (and I hope it does) the breakdown of biraderi.

I would assume the former as I cannot conceive that Galloway could have pulled off this result without considerable biraderi support.

[Pete Whitehead]

Mar 30, 2012 8:23:53 GMT Crimson King said:

Mar 30, 2012 8:06:12 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Which part are you unsure about? are you suggesting the white vote for Galloway was neglible? That being the case he would have been needing to get 80%+ of the Muslim vote and with a big differential in turnout to boot

Yes, possibly - the chit chat did suggest a big t/o difference between 'white' and 'asian' wards but I can't say if that is really the case, neither does that mean there was differential t/o within wards. But I'm not pinning my reputation, such as it is, on that hunch - I'll await more info

Are the turnout figures by ward likely to be made available?

[iainbhx]

Mar 30, 2012 9:11:21 GMT Richard Allen said:

Mar 30, 2012 9:04:57 GMT iainbhx said:

I think it may be less than that. There has probably been a fair amount of demographic change since the 2001 census, I wouldn't be surprised if the register wasn't 50%+ Muslim these days in that seat.

I wonder if this represents a late biraderi switch or (and I hope it does) the breakdown of biraderi.

I would assume the former as I cannot conceive that Galloway could have pulled off this result without considerable biraderi support.

The mosques can act as an alternative to the biraderi system as they did in Sparkbrook for a while.

However, biraderi is a democratic centralist system and many of it's leaders are canny enough to spot the wind changing and change the direction quickly.

Whilst deeply regretting the result, I still hanker for it to be a breakdown in biraderi.

[The Bishop]

Mar 30, 2012 8:02:43 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Mar 30, 2012 7:44:23 GMT @ianrobo said:

We saw this with Galloway before he is a leech, takes advantage of a situation, gets elected then like in Bethnal ran as soon as Labour wakes up in a particular area.

This is an embarassment and especially for the local party but no impact in the long term at all

I don't think you could say no impact. Respect looked to be dead in the water - the Bishop referreed to this by-election as being their last hurrah. Now it looks like they have the potential again to corner the muslim vote. There are some marginal Labour seats where the Labour majoriuty rests entirely on this demographic - Walsall South for example. I'm not saying muslim voters are going to move oveer en masse to Respect nationally, but it has to be a worry for Labour

Except that it is not "Respect", but Galloway. He is, thankfully, non-replicable.

[slicesofjim]

I may be the only one on here, but it doesn't happen very often that I'm chuffed with a by-election result. Galloway's not our man (by any means) but this is a stunning victory against the three wings of the party of austerity and war.

[Deleted]

I'm neutral. It's always good to see Labour reminded that taking people for granted is never a good thing (especially those who are not Christian, who Labour always took for granted in Preston until the Socialist Alliance and, yes, Respect, reminded them how that often works out badly in the end)


Anyhoo, time for an Excel graph, don't you think?

[Pete Whitehead]

its worth noting that of all the seven parties who contested this seat at the last election and at this by-election, UKIP was the only one apart from Respect to increase their share of their vote and actually their numerical vote. IN 2010 UKIP won 6% of the number of Tory votes and in this byelection that rose to 40%