Tiverton and Honiton

[ricmk]

Jun 24, 2022 9:41:28 GMT andrewp said:

Jun 24, 2022 9:30:24 GMT The Bishop said:

Apart from anything else the LibDems will now surely now be concentrating resources in this seat (or its successor) at the next GE.

Thus leaving Labour more of a free hand in the above seat (or its successor)

On the same grounds if I was the Conservative MP for North Devon or Taunton I might have a silver lining to my dark cloud that there will be some Lib Dem effort diverted to Tiverton and Honiton now.

I think there is a lot of truth in this - the Lib Dems will have to make a lot of effort in a seat that would normally be a 'sending' seat to several strong targets nearby.  I'd include Somerton & Frome and Glastonbury & Wells as well (or whatever comes out of the boundary commission in the end.)  Maybe the wave is strong enough that they all fall - but experiences of 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019 suggest that targetting too thinly just results in near misses everywhere and this will muddy the waters. Heck of a job for Richard Foord to build up campaign team within the constituency when his win has been based on so much outside help.  Let's see if he's up to it.

[woollyliberal]

Jun 24, 2022 8:10:23 GMT yellowperil said:

Most people will look at the seismic shift in the votes here in terms of percentages, and that is right of course, but sometimes looking at the raw numbers can be amusing. The Conservatives had a lead over the LDs from 2019 of 27,086, and turned that into a deficit of 6144, so a shift of 33,230.

I am now wondering just how many parliamentary seats the Lib Dem deficit behind the Conservatives is more than 33,020. 

Prof Curtice was on TV this morning. I'm told he said that T&H repeated nationally would give the Lib Dems 333 MPs. While that won't happen at a general election, we don't need it to. Boris will never resign, so we'll keep picking them off at by-elections.

[East Anglian Lefty]

Jun 24, 2022 9:40:48 GMT The Bishop said:

Jun 24, 2022 9:38:56 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

There is no 'Mid Devon' seat. Mid Devon district is mostly in this constituency. If you're talking about Central Devon, it was already the case that there are nearby seats where the Lib Dems will be concentrating more effort (North Devon, Newton Abbott etc). Labour's overperformance in Central Devon at the last couple of general elections has been remarked upon here, but the notion they might actually win there is for the birds

Insert the words "next time" there, and I would agree.

And it was originally cogload's mistake, not mine

What's the theory of change here? It's an overwhelmingly rural constituency with very little territory you could reasonably call Exeter overspill. Neither Okehampton nor Crediton is exactly a proletarian stronghold. Demographically, it just doesn't look like anywhere Labour have ever won.

If there was a long-term sleeper target for Labour in Devon, it'd be East Devon. The Exeter wards there are getting increasingly good for Labour, it's much more suitable commuter territory, Exmouth is somewhere where we ought to have potential to improve and with Clare Wright not standing again there's an opportunity to become the presumptive anti-Tory option.

[YL]

Jun 24, 2022 10:04:14 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

Jun 24, 2022 9:40:48 GMT The Bishop said:

Insert the words "next time" there, and I would agree.

And it was originally cogload's mistake, not mine

What's the theory of change here? It's an overwhelmingly rural constituency with very little territory you could reasonably call Exeter overspill. Neither Okehampton nor Crediton is exactly a proletarian stronghold. Demographically, it just doesn't look like anywhere Labour have ever won.

If there was a long-term sleeper target for Labour in Devon, it'd be East Devon. The Exeter wards there are getting increasingly good for Labour, it's much more suitable commuter territory, Exmouth is somewhere where we ought to have potential to improve and with Clare Wright not standing again there's an opportunity to become the presumptive anti-Tory option.

Well, if you want some entertainment you could look at principalfish.co.uk/electionmaps/. I'm not sure, though, what reason there is for thinking there's Labour potential in Central Devon other than the fact that their vote is already surprisingly high there.

I agree on East Devon, or rather the new Exmouth (gaining another Exeter ward and losing Sidmouth and Ottery St Mary), especially after this result which means the Lib Dems are less likely to be interested.

[sirnorfolkpassmore]

Jun 24, 2022 9:41:28 GMT andrewp said:

Jun 24, 2022 9:30:24 GMT The Bishop said:

Apart from anything else the LibDems will now surely now be concentrating resources in this seat (or its successor) at the next GE.

Thus leaving Labour more of a free hand in the above seat (or its successor)

On the same grounds if I was the Conservative MP for North Devon or Taunton I might have a silver lining to my dark cloud that there will be some Lib Dem effort diverted to Tiverton and Honiton now.

I think the idea this helps any Westcountry Tory MPs is complete fantasy.

The Lib Dems had been completely eradicated in the area - their nearest MP was way up in Bath, which is well out of the TV/media area and may as well be in Birmingham if you're from the Westcountry proper. The absolute last thing you need as a Tory is a visible revival - a yellow MP running around getting on the gogglebox; renewed self-confidence amongst their activists; a sharpened tactical squeeze message ("look, Labour voter, at how they kicked the Tories out in Tiverton - wouldn't you like a bit of that in Taunton?"

It's like saying that you're delighted to see a mouse back in the house having thought you'd got rid of them, as at least it'll keep the cat on its toes. It's over-thought nonsense.

It's a little more mixed for Labour, but I tend to think it's bad for them in the Westcountry overall (although not nationally). On the one hand, they get some positive tactical message out of it. On the other they were the sole opposition voice in the Westcountry with MPs in Exeter and Plymouth (again, Bristol is out of the media area) and this feeds into a "the way to beat the Tories in this region is with the Lib Dems" which was true to 2010 but had been dying out as a concept.

[Merseymike]

Jun 24, 2022 10:26:09 GMT sirnorfolkpassmore said:

Jun 24, 2022 9:41:28 GMT andrewp said:

On the same grounds if I was the Conservative MP for North Devon or Taunton I might have a silver lining to my dark cloud that there will be some Lib Dem effort diverted to Tiverton and Honiton now.

I think the idea this helps any Westcountry Tory MPs is complete fantasy.

The Lib Dems had been completely eradicated in the area - their nearest MP was way up in Bath, which is well out of the TV/media area and may as well be in Birmingham if you're from the Westcountry proper. The absolute last thing you need as a Tory is a visible revival - a yellow MP running around getting on the gogglebox; renewed self-confidence amongst their activists; a sharpened tactical squeeze message ("look, Labour voter, at how they kicked the Tories out in Tiverton - wouldn't you like a bit of that in Taunton?"

It's like saying that you're delighted to see a mouse back in the house having thought you'd got rid of them, as at least it'll keep the cat on its toes. It's over-thought nonsense.

It's a little more mixed for Labour, but I tend to think it's bad for them in the Westcountry overall (although not nationally). On the one hand, they get some positive tactical message out of it. On the other they were the sole opposition voice in the Westcountry with MPs in Exeter and Plymouth (again, Bristol is out of the media area) and this feeds into a "the way to beat the Tories in this region is with the Lib Dems" which was true to 2010 but had been dying out as a concept.

I think you are right with regard to the LibDems.
However, I think that what has become clear is that different parts of the West Country will have different challengers to the Tories. Take Cornwall. Its obvious that in Truro and Falmouth, and Camborne and Redruth, it will be Labour. In St Ives, North Cornwall and Cornwall SE, the LibDems.
Labour can only win Johnny Mercer's Plymouth seat, where he has a significant personal vote, in Devon, other than the seats they already hold. They are simply not in contention anywhere else, and they are out of the picture in Somerset altogether. And have been for a long time. The decline of the LibDems did largely nothing to boost Labour other than put them in a very poor second in some unwinnable seats such as Tiverton and Honiton.

[yellowperil]

Jun 24, 2022 9:57:20 GMT ricmk said:

Jun 24, 2022 9:41:28 GMT andrewp said:

On the same grounds if I was the Conservative MP for North Devon or Taunton I might have a silver lining to my dark cloud that there will be some Lib Dem effort diverted to Tiverton and Honiton now.

I think there is a lot of truth in this - the Lib Dems will have to make a lot of effort in a seat that would normally be a 'sending' seat to several strong targets nearby.  I'd include Somerton & Frome and Glastonbury & Wells as well (or whatever comes out of the boundary commission in the end.)  Maybe the wave is strong enough that they all fall - but experiences of 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019 suggest that targetting too thinly just results in near misses everywhere and this will muddy the waters. Heck of a job for Richard Foord to build up campaign team within the constituency when his win has been based on so much outside help.  Let's see if he's up to it.

While all that is true, the general impact, in upping the  credibility of the LibDems across the region, more than offsets that. Also, I suspect Richard may well prove to be more than capable of taking up that challenge- maybe more so than the other two by election winners, not that they aren't capable in their own ways. I guess I also believe this rural Devon constituency, whatever its final form, may well prove more adaptable than many expect ( and I do have family connections in rural East Devon). It could be significant that some of the political transformation is farmer-led.

[cogload]

Jun 24, 2022 9:40:48 GMT The Bishop said:

Jun 24, 2022 9:38:56 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

There is no 'Mid Devon' seat. Mid Devon district is mostly in this constituency. If you're talking about Central Devon, it was already the case that there are nearby seats where the Lib Dems will be concentrating more effort (North Devon, Newton Abbott etc). Labour's overperformance in Central Devon at the last couple of general elections has been remarked upon here, but the notion they might actually win there is for the birds

Insert the words "next time" there, and I would agree.

And it was originally cogload's mistake, not mine

It was. Mea Culpa.

[sirnorfolkpassmore]

Jun 24, 2022 10:04:14 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

Jun 24, 2022 9:40:48 GMT The Bishop said:

Insert the words "next time" there, and I would agree.

And it was originally cogload 's mistake, not mine

What's the theory of change here? It's an overwhelmingly rural constituency with very little territory you could reasonably call Exeter overspill. Neither Okehampton nor Crediton is exactly a proletarian stronghold. Demographically, it just doesn't look like anywhere Labour have ever won.

If there was a long-term sleeper target for Labour in Devon, it'd be East Devon. The Exeter wards there are getting increasingly good for Labour, it's much more suitable commuter territory, Exmouth is somewhere where we ought to have potential to improve and with Clare Wright not standing again there's an opportunity to become the presumptive anti-Tory option.

No chance.

I agree it was a rather striking result that they picked up Topsham, one of the two wards in the Exeter City Council area, in May. But they were some way off in the other, St Loyes. So the Exeter wards are alright for them but no more than that. They won not a single ward in East Devon District in the last round there in 2019. They've won one since... but ironically that's in Honiton rather than this seat.

This is a seat including Budleigh Salterton, Sidmouth, and a lot of other deep blue areas. In areas of more potential like Exmouth, the Lib Dems retain a reasonably strong presence (not what it once was, but they've not melted away).

Look, Claire Wright is a force of nature and did phenomenally well to hoover up the anti-Tory vote AND appeal to enough Tories to be genuinely competitive. But in the end she came up short by a bit of a distance - 7k last time, 8k in 2017. She and her team can be enormously proud, but unless she does a volte face and returns to the front-line (or there's another by-election at some stage), East Devon isn't going anywhere, and certainly not into the Labour column, in the foreseeable future.

[sirnorfolkpassmore]

Jun 24, 2022 10:39:51 GMT @boogieeck said:

With regard to both results, I have to say I am underwhelmed. From the off I had both down as Conservative losses. Whatever the circumstances I would have expected Wakefield to go Labour in a midterm by-election and whatever the circumstances I would expect the LDs to at least run the Conservatives close in a safe tory seat in a mid-term by-election. Having both on the same day created a narrative across both seats of giving the government a bloody nose. Then you factor in that both by-elections were caused by resignation in disgrace.

Then you factor in the economy, which actually all parties are culpable on, but only one of them is the government. And 12 years of ennui. So before I even get to Boris must go (and I agree, he must) I would have regarded Tiverton as eminently winnable and wakefield as a certainty.

All of that considered, I think the Conservative vote in both held up surprisingly well, the low turnouts meant that juicy 10k majorities were impossible, the anti-Conservative vote coalesced as one would expect, but most of that will unwind in a proper election.

Then for both Labour and LDs we have the nagging doubt of lost deposits. The electorate are not voting for them, they are voting against someone, at best the Conservatives, at worst only the PM, who can be disposed of six months out from a GE. And Tory MP who has a majority of less than Tiverton and sees this as a threat to him is as stupid as I expect many of them are. It's a by-election result and it foretells nothing.

I see them both as fairly nothing results. I would expect the Tories to regain Tiverton and would expect Labour to hold Wakefield, but then I always did.

Firstly, predictably bad is still bad. I mean, well done to you for predicting it, have a sugar lump and so on, but these are losses on a 12.5% swing to Labour and 30% swing to the Lib Dems - saying "yeah, I called it" doesn't mask the fact those are poor results, in line with recent spectacular Lib Dem gains, and rather better for Labour than anemic recent performances.

Secondly, it simply isn't true that the Tory vote held up well. In relative terms, they lost more than a third of their vote share in both Wakefield (from 47.3% to 30%)  and T&H (from 60.2% to 38.4%). In terms of sheer numbers of votes (and accepting this is significantly affected by turnout) it was horrific - well, well under half the Tory voters in December 2019 cast a vote for them yesterday.

Thirdly, the lost deposits of the third place party in both seats is a worry for the Tories, not their opponents. Widespread anti-Tory tactical voting is a threat to the blues not a boon. In simple terms, if the third party (Labour or Lib Dem) in a seat is picking up 20% of the vote, the Tories require at most 40% to hold the seat (half of the remaining 80%). If they are picking up 5%, the Tories require 47.5% (half the remaining 95%). If the goalposts are shifting in that way for the Tories, it means they'll do worse than UNS would predict - that's just maths.

[Pete Whitehead]

Jun 24, 2022 10:47:26 GMT sirnorfolkpassmore said:

Jun 24, 2022 10:04:14 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

What's the theory of change here? It's an overwhelmingly rural constituency with very little territory you could reasonably call Exeter overspill. Neither Okehampton nor Crediton is exactly a proletarian stronghold. Demographically, it just doesn't look like anywhere Labour have ever won.

If there was a long-term sleeper target for Labour in Devon, it'd be East Devon. The Exeter wards there are getting increasingly good for Labour, it's much more suitable commuter territory, Exmouth is somewhere where we ought to have potential to improve and with Clare Wright not standing again there's an opportunity to become the presumptive anti-Tory option.

No chance.

I agree it was a rather striking result that they picked up Topsham, one of the two wards in the Exeter City Council area, in May. But they were some way off in the other, St Loyes. So the Exeter wards are alright for them but no more than that. They won not a single ward in East Devon District in the last round there in 2019. They've won one since... but ironically that's in Honiton rather than this seat.

This is a seat including Budleigh Salterton, Sidmouth, and a lot of other deep blue areas. In areas of more potential like Exmouth, the Lib Dems retain a reasonably strong presence (not what it once was, but they've not melted away).

Look, Claire Wright is a force of nature and did phenomenally well to hoover up the anti-Tory vote AND appeal to enough Tories to be genuinely competitive. But in the end she came up short by a bit of a distance - 7k last time, 8k in 2017. She and her team can be enormously proud, but unless she does a volte face and returns to the front-line (or there's another by-election at some stage), East Devon isn't going anywhere, and certainly not into the Labour column, in the foreseeable future.

They do have a councillor in Exmouth now but through defection (elected as Independent). If the boundary changes go ahead as planned, the seat loses Sidmouth and gains the Priory ward of Exeter so that shifts the blanace a fair bit. I don't think its winnable for Labour either but agree it looks a better prospect than Central Devon

[Delighted Of Tunbridge Wells]

Jun 24, 2022 10:21:45 GMT YL said:

Jun 24, 2022 10:04:14 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

What's the theory of change here? It's an overwhelmingly rural constituency with very little territory you could reasonably call Exeter overspill. Neither Okehampton nor Crediton is exactly a proletarian stronghold. Demographically, it just doesn't look like anywhere Labour have ever won.

If there was a long-term sleeper target for Labour in Devon, it'd be East Devon. The Exeter wards there are getting increasingly good for Labour, it's much more suitable commuter territory, Exmouth is somewhere where we ought to have potential to improve and with Clare Wright not standing again there's an opportunity to become the presumptive anti-Tory option.

Well, if you want some entertainment you could look at principalfish.co.uk/electionmaps/. I'm not sure, though, what reason there is for thinking there's Labour potential in Central Devon other than the fact that their vote is already surprisingly high there.

I agree on East Devon, or rather the new Exmouth (gaining another Exeter ward and losing Sidmouth and Ottery St Mary), especially after this result which means the Lib Dems are less likely to be interested.

The Labour bastions of Aylesbury and, errrrr, Banbury going red, while Hazel Grove stays Tory!

[aargauer]

Jun 24, 2022 11:10:26 GMT Delighted Of Tunbridge Wells said:

Jun 24, 2022 10:21:45 GMT YL said:

Well, if you want some entertainment you could look at principalfish.co.uk/electionmaps/. I'm not sure, though, what reason there is for thinking there's Labour potential in Central Devon other than the fact that their vote is already surprisingly high there.

I agree on East Devon, or rather the new Exmouth (gaining another Exeter ward and losing Sidmouth and Ottery St Mary), especially after this result which means the Lib Dems are less likely to be interested.

The Labour bastions of Aylesbury and, errrrr, Banbury going red, while Hazel Grove stays Tory!

South Norfolk is another fun one!

[Merseymike]

Jun 24, 2022 11:10:26 GMT Delighted Of Tunbridge Wells said:

Jun 24, 2022 10:21:45 GMT YL said:

Well, if you want some entertainment you could look at principalfish.co.uk/electionmaps/. I'm not sure, though, what reason there is for thinking there's Labour potential in Central Devon other than the fact that their vote is already surprisingly high there.

I agree on East Devon, or rather the new Exmouth (gaining another Exeter ward and losing Sidmouth and Ottery St Mary), especially after this result which means the Lib Dems are less likely to be interested.

The Labour bastions of Aylesbury and, errrrr, Banbury going red, while Hazel Grove stays Tory!

Well, at least Labour are a clear second in Banbury, and have councillors, whereas Aylesbury is typical of a seat where the LD's fell behind post-coalition at a national level, but retain local strength. The idea of Labour winning Aylesbury is fanciful even though they always do worse locally in the Bucks towns than their national position indicates

[bsjmcr]

I have a feeling if Parish had stood on this platform (see the second tweet - aka anti-Johnson) as an independent , he would have kept his deposit at the least, a bit like the guy in Wakefield, and would have further humiliated the Conservative candidate. Alas, he probably didn’t want to do an Ivan Lewis and alienate his friends in his local party.

[mrsir]

Demographic change will keep Labour ahead of the Lib Dems in Aylesbury.

[johnloony]

I’ve noticed that some people are pronouncing it “Hon-“ (as in “don”) rather than “Hun” (as in done). Is it a local dialect thing?

[minionofmidas]

Jun 24, 2022 12:13:54 GMT bsjmcr said:

I have a feeling if Parish had stood on this platform (see the second tweet - aka anti-Johnson) as an independent , he would have kept his deposit at the least, a bit like the guy in Wakefield, and would have further humiliated the Conservative candidate. Alas, he probably didn’t want to do an Ivan Lewis and alienate his friends in his local party.

Surely many of the people that would have won over voted LD irl?

[sirnorfolkpassmore]

Jun 24, 2022 12:13:54 GMT bsjmcr said:

I have a feeling if Parish had stood on this platform (see the second tweet - aka anti-Johnson) as an independent , he would have kept his deposit at the least, a bit like the guy in Wakefield, and would have further humiliated the Conservative candidate. Alas, he probably didn’t want to do an Ivan Lewis and alienate his friends in his local party.

Firstly, why would he want to further humiliate the Conservative candidate? Maybe you've heard differently, but she is a councillor in his constituency and I'm not sure there's any suggestion of bad blood between them. 

Secondly, he'd pretty clearly have further humiliated himself in the process. Whether or not he scraped his £500 back, he'd have lost, and faced a huge amount of sniggering and low level unpleasantness in the process. Part of his reason for resigning was to save himself and his family from further embarrassment caused by his moments of tractor madness. I know he dropped a bit of a teaser comment at one time, but honestly why would he have seriously entertained throwing himself into the circus?

These comments strike me as fairly genuine. The comment that the Tories lost because their vote fell, with some staying at home and some going to the other guy is true but anodyne (well, yes, that's what a defeat is). His comment that people voted against the PM personally, and that the PM needs to reflect pretty damned seriously on the fact he's dragging his party down with him (reading between the lines) isn't going to endear him to Johnson loyalists, but it's undeniably, uncontroversially true.

[John Chanin]

Jun 24, 2022 11:48:09 GMT Merseymike said:

Jun 24, 2022 11:10:26 GMT Delighted Of Tunbridge Wells said:

The Labour bastions of Aylesbury and, errrrr, Banbury going red, while Hazel Grove stays Tory!

Well, at least Labour are a clear second in Banbury, and have councillors, whereas Aylesbury is typical of a seat where the LD's fell behind post-coalition at a national level, but retain local strength. The idea of Labour winning Aylesbury is fanciful even though they always do worse locally in the Bucks towns than their national position indicates

Aylesbury town is quite rundown, and quite working class, and is the sort of place where Labour might do quite well if the Liberals hadn’t got a lock on politics locally.  It isn’t much different from Wycombe.

But as in many other seats the town has to be topped up by rural areas where there is no Labour base, and no time for Labour, but which might be tempted by the more cuddly Liberals when the Conservatives are unpopular.

If Liberals and Labour start coalescing behind the best placed challenger, as they did in 1997, the results could be as disastrous for the Conservatives as they were in 1997, with many bizarre losses.  I think I would be concerned if I was a Conservative right now.  The economic position looks uniformly gloomy for at least 18 months. The party itself has no political or ideological coherence.  The public is tired after 12 years of Conservative rule, and the Conservatives are equally tired and out of ideas as usually happens after a long period in power.  And Johnson has plainly become a liability, but the Conservatives are too divided to remove him.