Wirral South

[rcronald]

Jan 1, 2023 11:59:30 GMT batman said:

Jan 1, 2023 11:32:32 GMT The Bishop said:

Well if it is 39%, its not so hard to see them waiving that rule if McGovern is really interested in going for that one. Plus the Wirral West incumbent Margaret Greenwood is over 20 years her senior and will be 65 in the event of a 2024 GE, its not impossible she may call it a day anyway.

And of course a smaller but still non-negligible part of the current Wirral South goes into the redrawn Birkenhead - Mick Whitley is even older than Greenwood despite being a first termer, and I expect party HQ would approve AM trying for that if he retires.

He won't want to retire in favour of her though, they're at completely opposite ends of the party

And so is Greenwood if I remember correctly.

[The Bishop]

Greenwood certainly isn't on the *extreme* left of the party, and nor is McGovern on the *extreme* right come to that - she is hardly Chris Leslie.

(indeed it can be argued that if Corbyn's leadership of Labour had one positive aspect, it was getting rid of people like him)

[Sibboleth]

It's really only during periods of civil war that factional lines are the factor of factors for most people in the Labour Party, and even then they can end up being rather more awkward in practice than you'd think they ought to be in theory.

[batman]

Margaret Greenwood is on the perhaps not-quite-so-soft part of the soft left, not a true Campaign Groupie or true Corbynite. Not properly unpopular on any wing of the party, whereas someone like Ian Byrne certainly would be, and also Alison McGovern to a fair extent.

[hengog]

Alison McGovern is quite well liked among my largely Conservative acquaintance. I knew her father a little who is/ was a likeable old Red ( not seen him since before Covid so I hope he’s still well). She has always struck me very much “ tribal Labour” , in the sense her support for her Party derives from family roots rather than from holding any perceptible strongly held opinions. She kept herself very apart from the internecine squabbles nearby. That certainly is in her favour here in Heswall. Nobody I know on the centre or centre right dislikes her- I can’t speak for those on the left. Despite the last council election result ( LibDems getting a huge protest vote) this is still basic Tory ground - but with a lot of disillusioned usual Tory voters. I don’t know how far that will still hold at the next GE, but my guess now is that any sensible Labour candidate would be favourite , and AM , if she is the candidate, strongly so. That said If Sunak were able to pull things back nationally- let’s say to a 5-7% Labour lead, I would say this would be still be a strong Conservative target.

[Khunanup]

McGovern's home patch is Brookhurst (she was in the year below me at the local primary school), which is the southernmost bit of Bromborough in Clatterbridge ward which goes into the new West. I believe she still lives in the ward but the Bebington/Spital area in the north east of it, so adjacent to Bebington ward that goes into Birkenhead (which crosses the railway line, unlike either Eastham and Bromborough wards) and across the railway line from those two wards that go into Bromborough & Ellesmere Port.

In other words, she's got a plausible relationship with all three constituencies, her home patch being where it is, but clearly the strongest link is to the new West.