Sleaford & North Hykeham

[Sibboleth]

Oh and LOL at the idea that Brexit is the problem for Labour r/n. I mean it is insofar as its cost us (temporarily?) the votes of a fair clichéd Guardian reading types (whether they buy said paper or not) and that's shaved a few points off the already unimpressive poll ratings, but otherwise no. The problem is that Labour is entirely inward looking at present. For instance, too many people seem to care more about the internal troubles of Momentum (an actually pretty irrelevant organisation that we can probably already write off as a failure when all is said and done) than on holding the government to account let alone (ahahaha) proposing alternatives to said government.

[Sibboleth]

Dec 10, 2016 17:09:12 GMT Sibboleth said:

Oh and LOL at the idea that Brexit is the problem for Labour r/n. I mean it is insofar as its cost us (temporarily?) the votes of a fair clichéd Guardian reading types (whether they buy said paper or not) and that's shaved a few points off the already unimpressive poll ratings, but otherwise no.

Of course this doesn't fit in with #thenarrative, but such is life.

[Davıd Boothroyd]

Dec 10, 2016 17:04:17 GMT Sibboleth said:

Dec 10, 2016 10:03:04 GMT Davıd Boothroyd said:

Sleaford and North Hykeham is the sort of seat where the Labour Party should have a very solid substantial vote. Labour should not be polling at 10%.

Eh, no more so than where I live to be honest. Though Labour really ought to be stronger in most rural constituencies and that we aren't reflects (above all else) dire organisation and messed up priorities. But that's unrelated to this by-election, mostly.

Sleaford and North Hykeham isn't predominantly a rural constituency. It has a rural element but the majority of the electorate are in Sleaford (rather depressed small town) or North Hykeham (suburb of Lincoln).

[Merseymike]

If Sleaford doesn't count as rural I don't know what is - there are hardly any truly 'rural' seats with no small towns included

[Sibboleth]

Dec 10, 2016 17:19:53 GMT Davıd Boothroyd said:

Sleaford and North Hykeham isn't predominantly a rural constituency. It has a rural element but the majority of the electorate are in Sleaford (rather depressed small town) or North Hykeham (suburb of Lincoln).

I'd call a country town like Sleaford 'rural' in this sort of context, even if not at a more local level.

[tonygreaves]

This by-election is more evidence that where we are strong on the ground, retain local credibility and fight a good campaign we can now do well. Where we are not strong and lost credibility during the last few years it is still very hard work. This is the clear story of Council by-elections in the past 6 months and it's confirmed by these two parliamentary by-elections. As a Liberal Democrat it feels much better than it did.

[greatkingrat]

Dec 10, 2016 17:19:53 GMT Davıd Boothroyd said:

Dec 10, 2016 17:04:17 GMT Sibboleth said:

Eh, no more so than where I live to be honest. Though Labour really ought to be stronger in most rural constituencies and that we aren't reflects (above all else) dire organisation and messed up priorities. But that's unrelated to this by-election, mostly.

Sleaford and North Hykeham isn't predominantly a rural constituency. It has a rural element but the majority of the electorate are in Sleaford (rather depressed small town) or North Hykeham (suburb of Lincoln).

The five Sleaford wards have an electorate of 12624, and the five North Hykeham wards come to 11479, so that still leaves a very substantial majority of the constituency living in neither.

[gwynthegriff]

Dec 10, 2016 17:35:42 GMT greatkingrat said:

Dec 10, 2016 17:19:53 GMT Davıd Boothroyd said:

Sleaford and North Hykeham isn't predominantly a rural constituency. It has a rural element but the majority of the electorate are in Sleaford (rather depressed small town) or North Hykeham (suburb of Lincoln).

The five Sleaford wards have an electorate of 12624, and the five North Hykeham wards come to 11479, so that still leaves a very substantial majority of the constituency living in neither.

On the other hand 24,000 urban voters should provide a decent core vote for Labour.

[Sibboleth]

There are more wards that are functionally Lincoln suburbs than just those defined officially as North Hykeham. Which actually reinforces my point in some respects; why does organisation seem to halt dramatically at the borough boundary?

[Adam in Stroud]

Dec 10, 2016 17:34:08 GMT tonygreaves said:

This by-election is more evidence that where we are strong on the ground, retain local credibility and fight a good campaign we can now do well. Where we are not strong and lost credibility during the last few years it is still very hard work. This is the clear story of Council by-elections in the past 6 months and it's confirmed by these two parliamentary by-elections. As a Liberal Democrat it feels much better than it did.

Exactly right.

[froome]

Dec 10, 2016 17:40:49 GMT gwynthegriff said:

Dec 10, 2016 17:35:42 GMT greatkingrat said:

The five Sleaford wards have an electorate of 12624, and the five North Hykeham wards come to 11479, so that still leaves a very substantial majority of the constituency living in neither.

On the other hand 24,000 urban voters should provide a decent core vote for Labour.

There is urban and urban. North Hykeham is the sort of drab, waealthy suburbia that Labour normally poll very poorly in. I suspect that if it is moved out of the constituency that move would marginally help Labour rather than hinder them. But the demographics of that area are that many of the rural villages around North Hykeham are becoming more commuter dormitories for Lincoln and Newark and are probably becoming more Conservative.

[Khunanup]

Dec 10, 2016 18:51:11 GMT froome said:

Dec 10, 2016 17:40:49 GMT gwynthegriff said:

On the other hand 24,000 urban voters should provide a decent core vote for Labour.

There is urban and urban. North Hykeham is the sort of drab, waealthy suburbia that Labour normally poll very poorly in. I suspect that if it is moved out of the constituency that move would marginally help Labour rather than hinder them. But the demographics of that area are that many of the rural villages around North Hykeham are becoming more commuter dormitories for Lincoln and Newark and are probably becoming more Conservative.

That's right, it's indicative that even when Labour have been sweeping the Tories aside in just about the rest of Lincoln, it's the areas of the city proper that abut North Hykeham which are pretty similar (but not quite as wealthy) that still vote Tory.

This is a problem that is going to affect a lot of seats like Lincoln where Labour have been competitive or even hold under the boundary changes. They are going to have to expand outwards into other authority areas where either they have no organisation or the demographics are terrible. In Lincoln Labour's case both of those situations apply no matter what direction the seat expands in. If anything, North Hykeham is probably the least bad for the latter consideration which only goes to show how bad the situation is.

This is often pointed out for Lib Dem seats/seats where we are competitive when the are boundary changes. We can mitigate that to some extent because as a centrist party the demographic we can appeal to is somewhat broad. Labour has an existential crisis in that it has lost the ability to attract vast swathes of voters it quite simply needs to win elections which their leadership has zero interest in acknowledging or doing anything about. Boundary changes will just bring that home to roost to a far greater extent when their share of the vote decreases further and further in seats like Lincoln.

[East Anglian Lefty]

There are problems in seats like Lincoln relating to expanded boundaries. But it's not about lack of appeal in places like North Hykeham - our appeal was fairly limited there even when we were riding high in the polls, and realistically that's because the sort of policies we've always had and are always going to have to have don't have much traction in places like that. The problem is our inability to compensate for that by running up the score elsewhere. We can get the votes we always get, and the votes we get from ideological commitment, but we're failing catastrophically at getting votes because people think we've got the best answers to their problems.

[Merseymike]

Because, frankly, we probably haven't if that means them getting more for paying less
Unless there is a genuine shift away from 'me-first', and thats nowhere in sight, any party which aims to redistribute is going to find it hard to create a majority on its own.
Maybe this will finally get Labour's advocates of FPTP to realise that it isn't likely to benefit us in the future if parliamentary majorities are expected.

[East Anglian Lefty]

Of course FPTP isn't going to benefit us if our ambitions are limited to wishing that magic unicorns will carry us to victory. Perhaps if we want a change away from a 'me-first' attitude (which plenty of people who don't vote for us don't have anyway), it might make sense for us to actually argue for it.

[Merseymike]

Dec 11, 2016 21:39:53 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

Of course FPTP isn't going to benefit us if our ambitions are limited to wishing that magic unicorns will carry us to victory. Perhaps if we want a change away from a 'me-first' attitude (which plenty of people who don't vote for us don't have anyway), it might make sense for us to actually argue for it.

I don't think that it is likely that we will be able to gain enough votes to create a parliamentary majority anyway - and neither should we. Its high time we stopped defending a system which gives parties on 36-37% of the vote, on 62% turnouts, parliamentary majorities - us in 2005, the Tories in 2015.

[East Anglian Lefty]

This is the problem. You don't want to try.

Which is your prerogative, but if you don't want to be in a centre-left broad tent party, maybe you shouldn't be. There are plenty of more important things Labour could be doing that having the same old endlessly circular arguments about electoral reform which nobody else cares about.

[Sibboleth]

Dec 11, 2016 21:34:01 GMT Merseymike said:

any party which aims to redistribute is going to find it hard to create a majority on its own.

The way round this is to propose redistributive policies that benefit the majority of the population, often even the overwhelming majority of the population. Which is where anti-austerity politics - even of the mildest Milibandian hue - falls down electorally; a lot of people have been hurt badly by government cutbacks but most people haven't. There are also alternative populist approaches that haven't been tried; why not run strongly against managerialism and jobsworths generally? I guess that would upset the PCS, but they aren't affiliated and their members aren't exactly a hotbed of support so that's acceptable collateral damage...

[Merseymike]

Dec 11, 2016 21:59:36 GMT Sibboleth said:

Dec 11, 2016 21:34:01 GMT Merseymike said:

any party which aims to redistribute is going to find it hard to create a majority on its own.

The way round this is to propose redistributive policies that benefit the majority of the population, often even the overwhelming majority of the population. Which is where anti-austerity politics - even of the mildest Milibandian hue - falls down electorally; a lot of people have been hurt badly by government cutbacks but most people haven't. There are also alternative populist approaches that haven't been tried; why not run strongly against managerialism and jobsworths generally? I guess that would upset the PCS, but they aren't affiliated and their members aren't exactly a hotbed of support so that's acceptable collateral damage...

See, I think ultimately socialism has to be altruistic - and with the social divides which exist now, the situation is slearly different from the 40's when most people clearly benefitted from the welfare state

The problem with your suggestion is that like Blair's policies it may give some help to those at the bottom, but will do nothing to create a more equal society

And if we are to do something about employment that means more public sector jobs, noit less, as its perfectly understandable why profit making small organisations won't wish to employ long term unemployed people with mental health problems which may prevent them working full time, or who have a disrupted employment record - so i don;t think an all out attack on public servants will do anything to promote the idea of the 'public good'

[Merseymike]

Dec 11, 2016 21:49:29 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

This is the problem. You don't want to try.

Which is your prerogative, but if you don't want to be in a centre-left broad tent party, maybe you shouldn't be. There are plenty of more important things Labour could be doing that having the same old endlessly circular arguments about electoral reform which nobody else cares about.

It may take another two electoral defeats, but in time the party will come to realise that big-tent politics only works, electorally, for the Conservatives at the moment.