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"A country where people who play by the rules get on and those who don't, don't.

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That really sounds like a Labour leader, doesn't it.

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The Guardian/ICM poll shows Labour's lead down by three points, with the party backed by 37% of the electorate, the Tories on 34% and the Liberal Democrats on 21%. Downing Street confirmed parliament would be dissolved on Monday next week.

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About the Lib Dems: I have persisted in believing that the real Labourites are still in the Labour party (at least in England), but they're not accomplishing much at the moment, are they. We need someone on the spot to tell us about the Lib Dems right now. I remember resenting them when they left Labour, way back, before Tony's ascendancy, although that history is now foggy in my mind. In a way, they were prematurely looking for a third way, I think. Do we say that Tony beat them at their own game (by staying in the party and taking it right with him)?

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*cheering for the Lib Dems*

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Are these Liberal Democrats a different animal all together, or do the coexist with the Liberal Party?

I'll disappear off again into the magic otherworld of lapsed and former babblers now. Toodles!

[ 05 April 2005: Message edited by: Screaming Lord Byron ]

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Suddenly, "Putting People First" doesn't sound so lame

The UK Tories launch their campaign with the slogan....wait for it...

"Are You Thinking What We're Thinking?"

Well, gee, I don't know. Are they thinking their adman must be on crack? Because if so, I'm thinking precisely what they're thinking!

Other highlights of the Tories' hallucinogenic website:

• The slogan is actually punctuated ARE YOU THINKING? WHAT WE'RE THINKING? And then it fades from the edges in flash animation, so for a second the Tory slogan appears to be HAT WE'RE THINKI. Which is funny, because that's precisely what I was thinking, you thinki hat. Way to get out the Finnish vote.

• The main Tory promise, when I loaded the page, appeared to be DIRTY HOSPITALS AND LONGER WAIT LISTS. But that turns out to be Michael Howard's dire prediction of life after a Labour re-election, not an actual Tory promise. Because if you're thinking what I'm thinking, dirty hospitals are pretty thinki.

Polls show Labour down to a three-point lead over the Tories. It is sporting of Howard to work so hard to let Blair break back out ahead.

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1. There has always been a Liberal Party in the UK, this was the party of Gladstone and of Lloyd George. The were the traditional party of the cities and of professionals etc... and before universal suffrage, they were the "leftwing" alternative to the Tories (the party of the insufferable aristocratic snobs). The Liberals were not able to appeal to the new urban proletariat and the newly formed Labour Party started to make major inroads.

2. After WW1, the Labour Party came in second to the Conservatives and the Liberals were crushed (reminiscent of how the NDP supplanted the Liberals in Manitoba and in BC in the 50s and 60s). There is a book called "The Strange Death of Liberal England" that explains how this happened.

3. For the next 50 years or so the Liberals stumbled along as a minute 3rd party usually winning 11-12% of the vote and with about a dozen seats and they mostly got votes in Celtic fringe areas of Scotland, Wales and Cornwall. They were classic small "l" Liberals and in the cities and in southeast England they were the party you would vote for if you were a "progressive" professional type (ie: teachers, lawyers, nurses etc...) who wanted to "Save the Whales" and ban the bomb - but you couldn't bring yourself to vote Labour because it was so totally associated with unions and miners and factory workers. Every so often the Liberals would win a flash in the pan byelection in some hitherto safe Tory seat in the London suburbs...and then lose it in the following general election.

4. The Liberals are not unlike the NDP in Canada in terms of being the traditional protest party and having a lot of senior parliamentarians with unshakeable ethics.

5. In 1980, after Labour lost to Thatcher, a major split developed in the party as a bunch lunatic fringe leftists called the Militant Tendency started to take over the party (they would make the socialist caucus of the NDP look like Red Tories!). There were big splits over defence policy and nationalization of industry ertc... In 1981, four leading Labour front benchers ("The Gang of Four") including David Owen, Shirley Williams, Roy Jenkins and some other guy bolted to form a new party called the Social Democratic Party (SDP)

6. They formed an electoral pact with the Liberals so as not to split the centre-left vote. Als, like the Liberals in canada, their vote was too spread out to win a lot of seats so in 1983, Labour ran on an extremely leftwing platform (described at the time as "the longest suicide note in history"). Thatcher won in a landslide and labour was reduced to just 28% of the vote and 209 seats. The SDP/Liberal Alliance got 26% of the vote and just 28 seats!!! (As an aside, Tony Blair was elected in 1983 for Labour and remained loyal to Labour through this whole period)

7. The SDP/Liberal Alliance eventually morphed into the Liberal Democrats and some might wonder in what way they differ from just being "Liberals" if no SDP had ever been created. As we all know, the Militant Tendency lunatics in the Labour Party were eventually purged and under Kinnock, Smith and finally Blair - Labour moved to the centre (ie: back to where it was under Wilson and Callaghan) and won in 1997.

8. So, the great irony is that Labour today is more like the SDP than the Liberal Democrats are, and it could be argued that the Labour Party is now to the right of the LDs. However, Labour still hasd formal ties to the labour unions and still wins all the really working class seats up north etc... The LDs do well in Celtic areas that are NOT industrialized and in a smattering on Tory held seats.

9. Thanks to rampant strategic voting, the LDs are starting to win more and more Tory seats. In 1997 and in 2001, while Labour was winning across the country in a huge landslide - in seats where the LDs were the traditional opposition to the Tories, the Labour vote actually FELL as peoiple vote strategically for the LDs to defeat as many Tory MPs as possible.

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
8. So, the great irony is that Labour today is more like the SDP than the Liberal Democrats are, and it could be argued that the Labour Party is now to the right of the LDs.

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Incidentally, John Cleese is an outspoken Lib Dem. He put out a great ad in the 80s explaining PR in 10 minutes.

For the record, my Labour history isn't amazing, but parallels between the Militant Tendency and the Socialist Caucus aren't perfect. For one thing, the MT wasn't absolutely marginal. ex. they had many caucus members (i think). Also, for all the talk of a 'lunatic fringe', it was Jenkins and *his* crew that split the party. (ps. Michael Foot wasn't a lunatic. Wasn't a great leader, but wasn't a lunatic)

After using the BBC's election guide to compare parties, it is clear Labour in the UK no longer wants to stand up for the working class.

They adamantly reject any notion they were wrong on Iraq, they can't wait to fully increase tuition fees to 3000 quid a year (that's more than $6000 CDN) and they are fervently pro-business with no ramifications for the working class.

If I lived in the United Kingdom, my picks would be the Liberal Democrats in England, Plaid Cymru in Wales and the Scottish Socialist Party in Scotland (although I do reject the notion of an independent republic of Scotland...)

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Originally posted by Sharon:

Briguy? Why have you chosen the Lib Dems?

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Liberal Democrat webpage

Their policies are in alignment with my own. They criticise Labour for lacking a real plan to tackle climate change. They (eventually) want to eliminate tuition fees. They want to remove unfair residential fees from seniors requiring long-term care. They support improvements to public transport. Most importantly, they were critical of the Iraq debacle from day one.

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Originally posted by Stockholm:

5. In 1980, after Labour lost to Thatcher, a major split developed in the party as a bunch lunatic fringe leftists called the Militant Tendency started to take over the party (they would make the socialist caucus of the NDP look like Red Tories!). There were big splits over defence policy and nationalization of industry ertc... In 1981, four leading Labour front benchers ("The Gang of Four") including David Owen, Shirley Williams, Roy Jenkins and some other guy bolted to form a new party called the Social Democratic Party (SDP) .

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Originally posted by kingblake:
Yeah, gotta love the irony when a bunch of (relative) right-wingers left Labour, and now find themselves the left alternative to Labour.

Incidentally, John Cleese is an outspoken Lib Dem. He put out a great ad in the 80s explaining PR in 10 minutes.

For the record, my Labour history isn't amazing, but parallels between the Militant Tendency and the Socialist Caucus aren't perfect. For one thing, the MT wasn't absolutely marginal. ex. they had many caucus members (i think). Also, for all the talk of a 'lunatic fringe', it was Jenkins and *his* crew that split the party. (ps. Michael Foot wasn't a lunatic. Wasn't a great leader, but wasn't a lunatic)

Is RESPECT running candidates? Go Plaid Cymru!!!

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Militant had the support of two or three Labour MPs and it and its sympathisers controlled Liverpool city council for several years. Blaming Militant for Labour's defeats in the 1980s is absurd, if anyone is to blame it's the Gang of Four who bolted the party and formed the SDP and their sympathisers who remained within the Labour Party.

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Originally posted by Briguy:
*cheering for the Lib Dems*

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oh, and I did I forget to mention, Labour is in favour of civil unions and not same sex marriage? Talk about spineless.

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I would not hold this against them. From talking to gay people in the UK and from what I have read, it is clear that we cannot project the current Canadian political debate onto the UK. The topic of debate in the UK is CIVIL UNIONS, the idea of same sex MARRIAGE is not even on the radar screen and none of the gay rights groups are even talking about it. To them, civil unions give them all that they want. As a matter of fact some British gay guys I have talked to cannot understand why we are making such a big deal about marriage in Canada when civil unions would give us all the same rights!!

Anyways, I'm sure they will get to marriage at some point in the UK, but for now, I don't think you can fault Labour for only going as far as to bring in civil unions, when no one in the gay community is pressuring them to go any further than that.

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I think that Socialist International should reject the membership of the UK Labour party if they are unwilling to boot Blair.

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If the SI starts to expel members for not being "pure" enough, then all of the following parties will also have to be expelled:

Australian Labour party (against gay marriage and support draconian anti-immigrant policies and also cracked down on labour when in power)
New Zealand Labour Party (they were the original neo-cons in the early 90s)
German Social Democrats (Schroeder seems to be rolling back the welfare state and impose wage cuts on the civil service)
Chilean Socialists (they support NAFTA)

As far as the NZ Labour Party go, Stockholm hasn't got it quite right - what happened was this.

*happy snoopy dance!*

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Originally posted by kyall glennie:
I think that Socialist International should reject the membership of the UK Labour party if they are unwilling to boot Blair.

After using the BBC's election guide to compare parties, it is clear Labour in the UK no longer wants to stand up for the working class.

They adamantly reject any notion they were wrong on Iraq, they can't wait to fully increase tuition fees to 3000 quid a year (that's more than $6000 CDN) and they are fervently pro-business with no ramifications for the working class.

If I lived in the United Kingdom, my picks would be the Liberal Democrats in England, Plaid Cymru in Wales and the Scottish Socialist Party in Scotland (although I do reject the notion of an independent republic of Scotland...)

A great guide can be found on BBC.

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The "Socialist" International is a joke.

I'm not sure I'd call the LibDems social democrats though - Kennedy is, perhaps - he certainly was a member of the SDP, but really they are social liberals with some progressive economic policies.
As far as a breakthrough goes, this (sadly) argues against it.

UK 1983 General Election results
Conservatives 42.43% 397 seats
Labour 27.57% 209 seats
Liberal/SDP Alliance 25.37% 23 seats

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Originally posted by Screaming Lord Byron:
I'm not sure I'd call the LibDems social democrats though - Kennedy is, perhaps - he certainly was a member of the SDP, but really they are social liberals with some progressive economic policies.

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