Copeland

[carlton43]

Feb 14, 2017 0:13:39 GMT Foggy said:

Feb 14, 2017 0:04:52 GMT carlton43 said:

Like so many of our threads this is now mainly quite surreal.

Ceci n'est pas un thread... 

No not sewing but reaping!

The Magritte effect?  We discover a new political mode.

[neilm]

Feb 13, 2017 16:55:59 GMT @benjl said:

I think we will scrape it because of the NHS crisis

Local issues notwithstanding (The Bishop has mentioned them on here a few times and Tories active in the area have hinted at it), the NHS really isn't the trump card that many in Labour seem to think: the last election was a disaster for Labour with constant banging on about the health service. I notice that Labour's leaflets in Stoke refer to 'our NHS.'

Far be it for me to lecture Labour on election strategy- indeed, I hope this tactic continues for many years to come- but, really, a serious political party needs to have something else. It is demonstrable that the 'our NHS' shtick doesn't work.

[johnr]

Feb 14, 2017 0:41:14 GMT neilm said:

Feb 13, 2017 16:55:59 GMT @benjl said:

I think we will scrape it because of the NHS crisis

Local issues notwithstanding (The Bishop has mentioned them on here a few times and Tories active in the area have hinted at it), the NHS really isn't the trump card that many in Labour seem to think: the last election was a disaster for Labour with constant banging on about the health service. I notice that Labour's leaflets in Stoke refer to 'our NHS.'

Far be it for me to lecture Labour on election strategy- indeed, I hope this tactic continues for many years to come- but, really, a serious political party needs to have something else. It is demonstrable that the 'our NHS' shtick doesn't work.

I think in Copeland, where there is a real (not imagined) threat to the local NHS provision, it can work. 

[right]

Feb 14, 2017 0:41:14 GMT neilm said:

Feb 13, 2017 16:55:59 GMT @benjl said:

I think we will scrape it because of the NHS crisis

Local issues notwithstanding (The Bishop has mentioned them on here a few times and Tories active in the area have hinted at it), the NHS really isn't the trump card that many in Labour seem to think: the last election was a disaster for Labour with constant banging on about the health service. I notice that Labour's leaflets in Stoke refer to 'our NHS.'

Far be it for me to lecture Labour on election strategy- indeed, I hope this tactic continues for many years to come- but, really, a serious political party needs to have something else. It is demonstrable that the 'our NHS' shtick doesn't work.

Are there now two NHS debates? The urban NHS debate about closures and immigration where resources are an excuse for doing nothing and a more old fashioned deep rural NHS debate about resources? In the rural debate Labour's campaign would still do well, in the urban debate it would be seen as simply an excuse to dodge hard decisions.

[Adam in Stroud]

Feb 14, 2017 6:09:40 GMT johnr said:

I think in Copeland, where there is a real (not imagined) threat to the local NHS provision, it can work. 

There are real (not imagined) threats to NHS provision in quite a number of places.  I have reason to think it will be a fairly big issue in Glos in the next few years.

[neilm]

Feb 14, 2017 1:55:54 GMT @benjl said:

Feb 14, 2017 0:41:14 GMT neilm said:

Local issues notwithstanding (The Bishop has mentioned them on here a few times and Tories active in the area have hinted at it), the NHS really isn't the trump card that many in Labour seem to think: the last election was a disaster for Labour with constant banging on about the health service. I notice that Labour's leaflets in Stoke refer to 'our NHS.'

Far be it for me to lecture Labour on election strategy- indeed, I hope this tactic continues for many years to come- but, really, a serious political party needs to have something else. It is demonstrable that the 'our NHS' shtick doesn't work.

we shall see whether you have your finger on the pulse soon enough...

As johnr says, it can work locally, hence my comment about notwithstanding local issues. As a national tactic, or even a coordinated wave of tactics across multiple seats, it's rubbish.

[Chris Whiteside]

I have been keeping fairly quiet on this forum because of the fear that I may be too close to the campaign to judge it objectively (and because it's kept me busy).

Last night saw the second of three hustings sessions, and you can watch both the first two online: I've posted last night's on my blog at
chris4copeland.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/copeland-by-election-hustings_13.html or you can find it on the Whitehaven News Facebook page.

And yes, it is true that Michael Crick of Channel 4 News was not given an interview with the Labour candidate so he ambushed her: you can watch the Channel 4 news report concerned at

www.channel4.com/news/copeland-by-election-could-labour-lose


My wholly partisan impression of the campaign with nine days to go:-

The Conservative and Labour campaigns have been working flat out in Copeland since early January. Both have had vastly more resources than the seat has ever seen before, with support flooding in from the rest of the country in general and the rest of Cumbria in particular. Labour usually have more people on the ground than the Conservatives, but I don't think that has been true this time.

My route to and from the Conservative campaign centre in Egremont Conservative club takes me past the office which UKIP have opened in Egremont main street. As I drive past I have often seen signs of life there, but it's my impression that UKIP do not have as many activists available to them as either Labour or the Conservatives.

In 2015 UKIP came third in Copeland, some way behind Labour and the Conservatives but well ahead of anyone else. They would have to do very well indeed or very badly to finish anywhere other than third again.

The Lib/Dems lost their deposit in Copeland in 2015. If they can take some votes from one or both of the main parties because of Brexit or Labour's Corbyn problem they may make a modest recovery from their very disappointing 2015 vote share, or they may be subject to a tactical squeeze as the perception is that this contest is very close indeed between the Conservatives and Labour. My impression is that the latter is more likely.

The Greens usually come last and lose their deposit in parliamentary elections in Copeland. Their candidate this time is a charming young software engineer from Keswick who is standing courageously on principles which are total anathema to the great majority of the local electorate, and it would take a miracle for him to get anywhere.

There are two independent candidates, Michael Guest who is a Whitehaven councillor and was the first chairman of the recently created Whitehaven Town Council, and Roy Ivinson, a farmer from Allerdale. Both have added to the debate, but I don't think either has got the sort of bandwagon going that they would need to have any chance of victory. Michael Guest took his seat on Copeland Council from Labour and defeated a very prominent member of Copeland Labour party to do so, which suggests that his candidacy might take some votes from Labour.

Labour's campaign has been based almost entirely on the threat posed by the local NHS "success regime" to Maternity and Paediatric services at West Cumberland hospital, and on misleading claims that it is proposed to scrap A&E at that hospital and remove hospital beds from the cottage hospital at Keswick. (Actually the success regime "preferred options" would keep 24 hour A&E at WCH and increase the number of inpatient beds at Keswick from 12 to 16.) This Labour scare campaign is shoring up their support among many of those who would normally vote for them anyway and reducing the number of votes they might otherwise have lost to abstention or other parties because of the Corbyn factor and Brexit. However, Labour have used this sort of attack so often before, and have so blatantly overstated their case, that the impact on voters other than their core support may be less than they hope. But if Labour do win it will be entirely because of the hospital issue.

Prior to picking a candidate the Conservative message had been to highlight Jeremy Corbyn's opposition to the nuclear industry but as soon as we had a candidate, Trudy Harrison, in place the Conservative campaign switched to positive messages promoting the candidate and her plan to support jobs and services in the area. My impression is that Trudy has been going down very well.

People who have not previously personally taken part in an election campaign in Copeland rarely realise how very resilient both the Labour and Conservative votes in the constituency are. It is not quite impossible for someone else to break through in the right circumstances - Independent Mike Starkie became the first directly-elected Mayor of Copeland Borough in 2015 - but to do so while the national Conservative and Labour parties are throwing everything at the seat would be very difficult and there are no signs of it happening.

The Conservative vote appears to be holding steady and there is no sign of significant defections to the Lib/Dems by Tory remain voters or to UKIP from Tory brexit supporters.

Labour has definitely lost some support, mainly because of Jeremy Corbyn although divisions over Brexit have not helped them either. The biggest problem for Labour may be to get their vote our.

My gut instinct is that it is a close two-horse race, neck and neck between the Conservative and Labour candidates and too close to call. Whichever wins will probably do so by less than a thousand votes.

[The Bishop]

Thank you for your thoughts, Chris.

Of course there is stuff I could take issue with in there, but your final conclusion may not be too far off the mark.

[ricmk]

That's a really interesting perspective from Chris Whiteside. Just one nerdy comment - it is highly unlikely to be neck and neck.
We all fall into the temptation to replace our uncertainty about an outcome with an assumption that the outcome must be close.
For example if you look back on the Richmond Park thread people were sure that the margin would be less than a thousand when it was won by 1,800 votes or so in the end. Or in the weekly prediction competition where the outlying big wins are not generally picked up.

Of course it may be on a knife-edge, but we shouldn't assume that it is, just because we don't know who is ahead.

[johnr]

Feb 14, 2017 9:34:45 GMT neilm said:

Feb 14, 2017 1:55:54 GMT @benjl said:

we shall see whether you have your finger on the pulse soon enough...

As johnr says, it can work locally, hence my comment about notwithstanding local issues. As a national tactic, or even a coordinated wave of tactics across multiple seats, it's rubbish.

I agree. We (UK Labour) have had 3 (or is it 4?) "National Days of Action to Save the NHS!" since Jeremy was re-elected. The requirement from HQ seems to be that we stand in High Streets up and down the land, and hand out leaflets saying "the NHS is under threat and only Labour can save it".

[The Bishop]

I agree that Labour can't win just by banging on about the NHS.

But with certain Progress-y types, that has somehow transmuted into a demand that we shouldn't mention it *at all*.

(and the thing is, quite a few of these people seem to think we should bang on and on about immigration and nothing else instead)

[Deleted]

Feb 14, 2017 12:57:02 GMT The Bishop said:

I agree that Labour can't win just by banging on about the NHS.

But with certain Progress-y types, that has somehow transmuted into a demand that we shouldn't mention it *at all*.

(and the thing is, quite a few of these people seem to think we should bang on and on about immigration and nothing else instead)

It didn't work in 2015.

[The Bishop]

Yes, because we fell short in other areas. Anything else you want to tell us, Captain Obvious?

[thirdchill]

Feb 14, 2017 9:34:45 GMT neilm said:

Feb 14, 2017 1:55:54 GMT @benjl said:

we shall see whether you have your finger on the pulse soon enough...

As johnr says, it can work locally, hence my comment about notwithstanding local issues. As a national tactic, or even a coordinated wave of tactics across multiple seats, it's rubbish.

The problem is that for labour (or certain sections of it) the NHS is their 'comfort zone' when it comes to campaigning. Which they retreated to for the campaign in 2015, instead of expanding on the the 'cost of living crisis' theme, pushing this line further and developing alternative economic policies with this in mind.

The latter paid dividends for labour mid-term in the last parliament and a sensible campaign would have expanded on this as well as talking about the NHS.

[neilm]

Indeed so. I (and others) discussed that at length at the time. The cost of living crisis was a real winner for Labour and it's surprising they abandoned it.

Labour potentially has huge strengths in areas surrounding infrastructure spending and industrial strategy- in conversation on the previous forum I went into some detail about that with Rural Radical. I'm surprised they've not gone down that route.

[greenchristian]

Feb 14, 2017 9:34:45 GMT neilm said:

Feb 14, 2017 1:55:54 GMT @benjl said:

we shall see whether you have your finger on the pulse soon enough...

As johnr says, it can work locally, hence my comment about notwithstanding local issues. As a national tactic, or even a coordinated wave of tactics across multiple seats, it's rubbish.

I think that depends partly on the national media. If, as is happening at the moment, the national media keep running stories about the NHS being in crisis, an NHS-focused message is more likely to have an impact than if other issues are dominating the news.

[justin124]

A big shift to the Tories in the Betting today with some Bookies now making them 4/1 on! Is there an obvious reason for that? Private polls possibly?

[johnr]

Feb 14, 2017 17:19:31 GMT greenchristian said:

Feb 14, 2017 9:34:45 GMT neilm said:

As johnr says, it can work locally, hence my comment about notwithstanding local issues. As a national tactic, or even a coordinated wave of tactics across multiple seats, it's rubbish.

I think that depends partly on the national media. If, as is happening at the moment, the national media keep running stories about the NHS being in crisis, an NHS-focused message is more likely to have an impact than if other issues are dominating the news.

Yes but that will only work if we can say what we would do differently, that people will agree with us as the solution. 

[Adam in Stroud]

Feb 14, 2017 12:57:02 GMT The Bishop said:

I agree that Labour can't win just by banging on about the NHS.

But with certain Progress-y types, that has somehow transmuted into a demand that we shouldn't mention it *at all*.

(and the thing is, quite a few of these people seem to think we should bang on and on about immigration and nothing else instead)

The problem with "banging on about the NHS" is that to make sense as the main plank in a national political programme you have to have a credible strategy for significant improvement across the board. When Attlee was proposing to set the thing up,that obviously applied; on a smaller scale (but still I think significantly) Blair had it when he promised to raise health spending as a share of GDP to the European average.  It could be argued that the rise of immigration as a concern is to some extent a spin-off from the fear that public services, with the NHS well to the fore, were under threat from demand caused by immigration.  (To some extent, I think when politicians say "the NHS" subconsciously a lot of the electorate are hearing "all public services".)

So I think it is possible to win a GE on the issue, but the difficulty now is that most people are well aware of the increasing demand associated with an aging population and with an increasing range of possible treatments, the high cost of many treatments, and the other pressures on public finances.  So its quite hard to come up with a strategy that you think really will make things better, it's even harder to convince the public that it will, and harder still to avoid including massive tax increases as part of the prescription.

[andrew111]

Feb 14, 2017 19:23:34 GMT Adam in Stroud said:

Feb 14, 2017 12:57:02 GMT The Bishop said:

I agree that Labour can't win just by banging on about the NHS.

But with certain Progress-y types, that has somehow transmuted into a demand that we shouldn't mention it *at all*.

(and the thing is, quite a few of these people seem to think we should bang on and on about immigration and nothing else instead)

The problem with "banging on about the NHS" is that to make sense as the main plank in a national political programme you have to have a credible strategy for significant improvement across the board. When Attlee was proposing to set the thing up,that obviously applied; on a smaller scale (but still I think significantly) Blair had it when he promised to raise health spending as a share of GDP to the European average.  It could be argued that the rise of immigration as a concern is to some extent a spin-off from the fear that public services, with the NHS well to the fore, were under threat from demand caused by immigration.  (To some extent, I think when politicians say "the NHS" subconsciously a lot of the electorate are hearing "all public services".)

So I think it is possible to win a GE on the issue, but the difficulty now is that most people are well aware of the increasing demand associated with an aging population and with an increasing range of possible treatments, the high cost of many treatments, and the other pressures on public finances.  So its quite hard to come up with a strategy that you think really will make things better, it's even harder to convince the public that it will, and harder still to avoid including massive tax increases as part of the prescription.

I think people are a bit immune to the general drop of bad news about the NHS, but when their local hospital or A&E are faced with closure it is a different matter, and we have seen independents elected in General Elections in those circumstances. If one party can harness such an issue in a by-election it can make a big difference. The problem for Labour is that so many local problems can be traced to the disastrous PFI projects pursued so enthusiastically by New Labour...