|
|
Post by michaelarden on Mar 27, 2024 21:23:58 GMT
That would be the lowest number of non-Labour MPs in Wales in living memory, although the number of seats will be greatly reduced, and thus it isn't necessarily a fair comparison. In 1966, Labour in Wales lost only Barry, West Flint & Denbigh, all to the Tories, and Montgomeryshire to the Liberals. (They lost Carmarthen to Plaid Cymru in a by-election only a few months later.) And you can add Brecon and Radnor to their total too. The Lib Dems aren't winning anywhere on 4%. |
|
|
|
Post by batman on Mar 28, 2024 6:53:54 GMT
No Labour will not win Brecon & Radnor.
|
|
johng
Labour
Posts: 4,850 
|
Post by johng on Mar 28, 2024 9:41:32 GMT
No Labour will not win Brecon & Radnor.
Electoral Calculus gives Labour a 25% chance of winning the new Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe seat.
Though I am not sure I would say there is a 0% chance, you're right that it's incredibly unlikely. The coming election would need to be a notably stronger Labour landslide than 1997 to make a it a reasonable possibility. Plus the Lib Dems are going to put in a lot of ground work in this seat and we aren't. They will focus heavily on the new Cwm Tawe bit to squeeze the Labour vote.
|
|
graham
Non-Aligned
Posts: 1,350
|
Post by graham on Mar 28, 2024 10:08:38 GMT
No Labour will not win Brecon & Radnor. Labour did come very close to winning at the July 1985 by election and had held the seat - albeit on more favourable boundaries - 1939 - 1979. In recent years the Labour vote has been artificially depressed by massive tactical voting for the LDs. Now that the LDs have lost the seat by a clear majority that tactical voting might unwind - and the boundary changes now favour Labour. |
|
|
|
Post by johnloony on Mar 28, 2024 10:45:13 GMT
No Labour will not win Brecon & Radnor. I agree that Labour won’t win Brecon & Radnor, but there is a slight possibility that it might win Brecon, Radnor & Cwm Tawe. |
|
|
|
Post by batman on Mar 28, 2024 11:25:10 GMT
No Labour will not win Brecon & Radnor. Labour did come very close to winning at the July 1985 by election and had held the seat - albeit on more favourable boundaries - 1939 - 1979. In recent years the Labour vote has been artificially depressed by massive tactical voting for the LDs. Now that the LDs have lost the seat by a clear majority that tactical voting might unwind - and the boundary changes now favour Labour. that's mostly true but there is no reason whatsoever to suppose that tactical voting will unwind. The LDs are still the clear challengers & will put in much more work than Labour. Furthermore, it's their most major target in the whole of Wales, whereas Labour has loads of targets. |
|
graham
Non-Aligned
Posts: 1,350
|
Post by graham on Mar 28, 2024 11:51:52 GMT
Labour did come very close to winning at the July 1985 by election and had held the seat - albeit on more favourable boundaries - 1939 - 1979. In recent years the Labour vote has been artificially depressed by massive tactical voting for the LDs. Now that the LDs have lost the seat by a clear majority that tactical voting might unwind - and the boundary changes now favour Labour. that's mostly true but there is no reason whatsoever to suppose that tactical voting will unwind. The LDs are still the clear challengers & will put in much more work than Labour. Furthermore, it's their most major target in the whole of Wales, whereas Labour has loads of targets. I would suggest that on the new boundaries Labour would have won the July 1985 by election and again in 1997 & 2001. |
|
|
|
Post by batman on Mar 28, 2024 12:01:06 GMT
Yes but as always you're overusing history. Labour's vote has gone down a very great deal since those times and it isn't just the national swing; it's been progressively squeezed further & further out of contention. (Interesting to note : of all the target seats officially designated by Labour in 1997, that is front-line targets needing modest swings as opposed to more distant ones like Wimbledon or Castle Point, etc. etc., Brecon & Radnorshire was the only seat in Britain on that list that was not won by Labour.) It's present-day realities which make me say, Labour will not win the seat.
|
|
graham
Non-Aligned
Posts: 1,350
|
Post by graham on Mar 28, 2024 12:22:08 GMT
Yes but as always you're overusing history. Labour's vote has gone down a very great deal since those times and it isn't just the national swing; it's been progressively squeezed further & further out of contention. (Interesting to note : of all the target seats officially designated by Labour in 1997, that is front-line targets needing modest swings as opposed to more distant ones like Wimbledon or Castle Point, etc. etc., Brecon & Radnorshire was the only seat in Britain on that list that was not won by Labour.) It's present-day realities which make me say, Labour will not win the seat. I suspect that under old boundaries the 2015 and 2017 results provide a reasonable indication of Labour's underlying vote there even with significant tactical voting taking place. Under new boundaries Labour would likely have exceeded 25% in 2017. The LDs lost by over 7,000 in 2019 so in no sense was it close - unlike the narrow defeat of Richard Livesey in 1992. The justification for tactical voting is much weakened. Labour's failure in 1997 probably owed a great deal to LD claims that Labour votes had handed the seat to the Tories in 1992 , but the margin is now much greater so such a point has far less force. |
|
Sibboleth
Labour
'Sit on my finger, sing in my ear, O littleblood.'
Posts: 16,044
|
Post by Sibboleth on Mar 28, 2024 13:36:31 GMT
Both of the grossly extended Mid Wales constituencies will be complete messes. The LibDems are a lot weaker than they used to be and don't really have a Personality to rally around (which is historically unusual in the region), but are still not dead, while there's really no reason for the various local Labour parties to not give it a go: it isn't as if there are, under present circumstances, many marginals likely to be found near Pontardawe.
|
|
The Bishop
Labour
Down With Factionalism!
Posts: 39,015
Member is Online
|
Post by The Bishop on Mar 28, 2024 14:07:30 GMT
Yes, it doesn't happen that often but I am if anything slightly more with graham than batman here. I agree Labour aren't *likely* to win it, but the new seat boundaries *are* significantly better for them than the outgoing B&R - and for that reason alone it might be slightly remiss of them not to at least give it a go. |
|
|
|
Post by johnloony on Mar 28, 2024 14:18:26 GMT
Yes, it doesn't happen that often but I am if anything slightly more with graham than batman here. I agree Labour aren't *likely* to win it, but the new seat boundaries *are* significantly better for them than the outgoing B&R - and for that reason alone it might be slightly remiss of them not to at least give it a go. Also bear in mind that in 1997 Labour did much better (in seats, not necessarily in vote share) than most people had expected, and gained quite a few very unlikely seats. The new boundaries of BR&CT make it at least a slightly three-way contest, so it would be a bit silly if Labour didn’t make an effort and then lost by 500 votes. |
|
|
|
Post by nobodyimportant on Mar 28, 2024 18:34:46 GMT
Labour are not going to lose Brecon etc. by 500 votes if they do not make an effort.
|
|
|
|
Post by michaelarden on Mar 28, 2024 20:41:59 GMT
Labour are not going to lose Brecon etc. by 500 votes if they do not make an effort. The issue for Labour at the moment is that all boats rise with the tide. (And for the the Lib Dems the opposite). Like in 1997 they could win almost anywhere with not much effort - they leapfrogged the Lib Dems in several places on the back of some not very robust Observer constituency polls the Sunday before polling day. The Lib Dems seem to be once again in the middle of a Swinsonesque overreach believing swathes of the south east is going to fall into their lap because the Tory vote has collapsed - forgetting their vote is barely above the collapsed level of 2015. If their national share is 9% they aren't going to win 45% in 50+ constituencies (it means under normal distribution c100 seats at 25% etc, c 200 at 15% etc). They need to get 15-20% - like 1997 - to make huge numbers of gains from the Tories (or making huge numbers of gains from the Tories will drive their national vote share. The Lib Dems membership and councillor base is still very much lower than 1997 (and 2010) - so their campaigning activities are going to be weaker than then. |
|
|
|
Post by nobodyimportant on Mar 28, 2024 20:55:33 GMT
Not disagreeing that the labour vote could go up, but when the seat is both one of the more likely for the Tories to hold and the obvious top target for the Lib Dems in the whole of Wales (this seat is not in the South East of England and people campaigning here are not likely to be affected by any goings on there), Labour are not going to come close to winning without even running a campaign.
The Lib Dem vote distribution has never been remotely close to a normal distribution. What makes you think it will become one now? For the record I also don't think that we are going to win 45% in 50 plus constituencies and have not seen anyone suggest that we will.
|
|
|
|
Post by mattbewilson on Mar 28, 2024 21:02:39 GMT
Labour did come very close to winning at the July 1985 by election and had held the seat - albeit on more favourable boundaries - 1939 - 1979. In recent years the Labour vote has been artificially depressed by massive tactical voting for the LDs. Now that the LDs have lost the seat by a clear majority that tactical voting might unwind - and the boundary changes now favour Labour. that's mostly true but there is no reason whatsoever to suppose that tactical voting will unwind. The LDs are still the clear challengers & will put in much more work than Labour. Furthermore, it's their most major target in the whole of Wales, whereas Labour has loads of targets. though the unwind in Southport and Portsmouth South happened very quickly |
|
|
|
Post by batman on Mar 28, 2024 21:08:12 GMT
In Southport the incumbent retired, almost certainly too early, and in Portsmouth South Hancock made life very difficult for his party. But yes, unwind can & does happen; I just don't see it happening in this particular seat, although the boundary changes do add a bit of uncertainty.
|
|
graham
Non-Aligned
Posts: 1,350
|
Post by graham on Mar 28, 2024 21:28:26 GMT
In Southport the incumbent retired, almost certainly too early, and in Portsmouth South Hancock made life very difficult for his party. But yes, unwind can & does happen; I just don't see it happening in this particular seat, although the boundary changes do add a bit of uncertainty. Under the new boundaries a fair chunk of the electorate was formerly in the Neath Constituency. Perhaps people are focussing too much on the previous results in Brecon & Radnor and not enough on the results from Neath. |
|
maxque
Non-Aligned
Posts: 9,312
|
Post by maxque on Mar 28, 2024 23:08:59 GMT
In Southport the incumbent retired, almost certainly too early, and in Portsmouth South Hancock made life very difficult for his party. But yes, unwind can & does happen; I just don't see it happening in this particular seat, although the boundary changes do add a bit of uncertainty. Under the new boundaries a fair chunk of the electorate was formerly in the Neath Constituency. Perhaps people are focussing too much on the previous results in Brecon & Radnor and not enough on the results from Neath. In the last local election, the Liberal Democrats got 0 votes in the part transferred from Neath (so did Conservatives). This is a Labour/Plaid Cymru swing area, it seems. |
|
graham
Non-Aligned
Posts: 1,350
|
Post by graham on Mar 28, 2024 23:33:57 GMT
Under the new boundaries a fair chunk of the electorate was formerly in the Neath Constituency. Perhaps people are focussing too much on the previous results in Brecon & Radnor and not enough on the results from Neath. In the last local election, the Liberal Democrats got 0 votes in the part transferred from Neath (so did Conservatives). This is a Labour/Plaid Cymru swing area, it seems. That must be an exaggeration - there will have been some LD and Tory votes in those wards! |
|
