Voters think the new generations look old and tired

Tim W

Spot on about the Child-benefit issue benefitting the Tories.

I would expect the Tories's poll rating to plummet at some point though. A lot will depend on the public reaction to the strikes which will inevitably happen. And when people get unemployed, the Coalition had better hope they can easily find a job in the private sector. If they can then it'll be fine. If they can't then things will get messy.

Cottage Pie

Labour should be miles ahead in the opinion polls - a Conservative party propped up by the Lib Dems, a very fragile economy, the threat of industrial unrest, the biggest cuts for 60 years. If Red Ed is struggling now, what will he do when the economy is back in full swing?

Woody

Labour's problem is too many of the old guard got re-elected. and have found themselves back on the shadow front bench.

Too many of the new ones have picked up the same old nasty, spiteful, sneering attitude of the previous lot.

They have got nothing new to say, it's just the same negative opposition, for oppositions sake.

Younger people have probably never seen Labour in opposition and could be 'unplesantly' surprised.

Verity

I hate to be personal - well, not really - but have we ever had such a weird-looking bunch of leaders before? Milliband especially has a freakish look about him.

Cameron looks like a prematurely aged 12-year old.

toco

With names like Miliband,Balls,Cooper Johnson,Harman and Byrne in the Shadow Cabinet it is hardly surprising people see the Opposition as representing a Government which failed the electorate and wrecked the economy.It represents negativity personified.To have any credibility the whole team needs to go and this will not happen so Labour must pin its hopes on the BBC to persuade a few of the electorate that they deserve another chance.

cmp

The coalition are taking decisive action, they appear daring and positive. Labour, despite its youthful leader, has the whiff of a grumpy old man in the corner muttering into his pint.

ollie

I disagree entirely that Labour should somehow be in a poll lead. I think it's a very lazy assumption, and the assertion suggests the voting public have no ability to think for themselves.

I think even die-hard Labour voters would have a hard time imagining the shrill, high pitched nasal lisp of Ed Miliband giving a Prime Ministerial acceptance speech.

I don't think Labour are even viewed as a credible opposition yet, let alone an alternative government.

The public are smarter than they are given credit for.

Edward McLaughlin

'Old and tired' doesn't capture these people.

'Sackless' is a word we used to use, which I cannot find in my dictionary but which, to me, seems to conjure what they are.

lescam

The two Milibands have not been around for all that long, D since 2001 and E since 2005,(ie since they first entered the Commons) but the rest, particularly Harman, who seems to have been around since the Old Stone Age, need to retire immediately. With a new shadow front bench Labour would gain some credibility; as it is, the present bunch will always be blamed for the hash they made under Brown.

However with Labour's idiotic system of electing shadown cabinets when in opposition, all that happens is the Old Guard get back in, however useless they may be, and the new leader has to do his best to sort them out. If the leader was free to select his or her own cabinet with some new faces, things would be better for Labour.

All Ed Miliband can do is get rid of the dead wood at the first opportunity and make sure they never reappear. This is what Blair did after 1997.

laverda

Woody
Totally agree. Labour have nothing positive to say about anything proposed by the coalition. People in this country want the coalition to succeed, Labour don't, so it is not surprising that people have nothing positive to say about Labour.
Too many shadow cabinet ministers who were heavily involved with the last government, and as nasty a lot you would find hard to find. Listen to Cooper, Balls, Burnham, Bryant, Murphy, Denham and dopey Eagle etc. almost hatred, allways lies and spin spilling from their mouths every time they speak.

Boudicca

It isn't a new generation, though. A very large proportion of the Shadow Cabinet are the very same people who served in the last Government and are responsible for wrecking the economy and getting the country into the state it is, generally.

They look old and tired because they are. And with Miliplonker, they have a leader who is going to be a dead weight. (Thanks Whelen - you did the country a great service there!)

Peter From Maidstone

Why on earth would any reasonable person think that Labour should be in front. Every person I know agrees that people should not get HB that far exceeds what ordinary people have to struggle to pay each month. Every person I know believes that there are people in the Public Sector being paid to do nothing worthwhile. Every person I know thinks that the country has been living on credit for a decade and we must now face the consequences.

I suggest that Spectator staff get out a bit and meet some real people.

toni

@toco. get a grip - Pickles, Spelman, Maude, Letwin, Gove, Lansley, May, Fox, Clarke, Young, IDS, Gillan, not one of them exactly fridgidaire fresh! and backed up with the same old same old, Grayling, Willitts and Green....should think most of them have been knocking about for the last 25 years.
You'll be presenting little list Lilley and and CSA Burt as young bloods next!
What the public will shortly be reminded of with this line up, is the same old nasty team and with their own quotes spouted back to damn them.

TrevorsDen

I am sure you look like a dogs breakfast verity.

Paddy

"The youthful vigorous optimism that Miliband is trying to promote hasn't cut through yet".

And it never will.

What a "rabble" they are!

Miliband in his "drain- pipe" trousers looks as though he's just left school. Balls and his dear wife - firmly pushed to the sidelines and planning who they can "set-up" next. Johnson - the laughing postman and now we have the two new Eagle girls- droning on.

To think we have got to put up with this for the next five years.

Chuck Unsworth

Why is 'freshness' important? In my book 'fresh' = lacking in experience, knowledge and - probably - ability. Is that what's needed?

Nice to hear the veteran Heseltine giving the fresh-faced Evan Davis a thorough kicking on Today this morning. So much for 'fresh', then.

dorothy wilson

If the incoherent rant by Johnson on the World at One, is anything to go by the Labour front bench has lost its marbles never mind any youthfulness it may have wished for.

toni

@PM+Chuckie. Every person I know believe that the Beeb run two ‘Today’ progs for two separate audiences in tandem, and every person I know believes one’s for whining Tories to listen to, and the other is for the rest of us.
Every person I know thinks Tories are a paranoid bunch who resent their chosen leaders being questioned on behalf of the public, because every person I know knows that Tories don’t have any policies nailed down sufficiently well enough to stand examination, and are unable to explain them to a listening but perplexed audience, so every person I know thinks every trumpeted announcement, idea or policy was scribbled down on the back of a fag packet the night before, and every person I know isn’t surprised when the said announcements quickly crumble to dust.
Every person I know likes a young, fresh, vigorous and intelligent leader, think Blair.
Every person I know thought Cameron, hard as he tried, was an unlikely heir, and now as everything he touches unravels, every person I know knows he’s just a blagger and not up to the job…next?

paulg

Yes it is indeed hilarious, Miliband minor (who wrote Labours election manifesto) paints himself as the new generation. Whilst accompanied on stage by geriatrics and dinosaurs.
As a supporting cast we saw Kinnock, Scargill and Michael Foots donkey jacket, join the new generation, but what the hell, Miliband minor has lived in an ideological bubble all his life, seen everything he belives in disproved, reinvention is a coping mechanism that the left must adopt.

His next trick will be speaking in tongues, which won't be to enjoyable for an audience as it appears his tongue is too big for his mouth. Hence, the constant stream of spittal to accompany the drivel, that seems to eminate from that particular orifice.

Holly ......

Youthful,vigorous,optimism hasn't cut
though to the public yet?
What the hell are you on about?
What youth?
What optimism?
All I've heard so far is doom,gloom and scare stories,aided & abetted by the likes of you.
Admittedly it's early days?
EARLY DAYS????
Good god man,UMPTEEN YEARS some of these old duffers have been spreading their misery.

Clear Memories

Given the suport Labour has from the MSM and the Biased Bollox Corp, they shouldn't just be ahead in the polls, they should be out of sight and over the horizon.

The fact that they are not proves the greater part of the British public have seen through socialism at last. They've suffered 13 years of being lied to and Millipede is continuing that tradition, eg his Scottish speech this week.

There are three main areas where the coalition will win every time with the full support of the electorate:-

1 Cut the State back, get rid of the little Hitlers and jobsworth's and scrap Labours oppressive nanny state rules.

2 Call a once-and-for-all referendum on Europe with a simple in or out question.

3 Address the immigration issue - sweep out the unwanted dross, shut the door and clamp down hard on fundamentalism.

The left and the civil liberties mob will howl and scream, ably supported by Marr, Dumblebore and all the other media wankers but they'll forever have the gratitude and, more importantly, the votes of the nation.

Holly ......

Clear Memories.12.30am.
They are squealing as we post.
Tee hee.

Chuck Unsworth

@ Tonie

Every person you know? What, all two of them? Wow!

And does that include your reflection in the mirror?

So all these people think this garbage? Hardly surprising that there's a barking hard core NuLab vote, is it? Meanwhile the caravan has moved on.

Fergus Pickering

Every person you know thinks Blair was a good leader, Toni? Please tell him where you live and he can go there. Everywhere else he scuttles about like a rat looking for a rathole. And what, Toni, does everybody you know think about Brown? Or Hoon? Or those Labour chaps who will shortly go to prison? In short, Toni my sweet, does anybody you know actually think at all? But I know the answer to that one. How could they? Oh, and how many of them have got a job? Have you got one?

toni

@Chuckie. And the caravan has moved on to.."It is difficult to imagine how such a strong negotiating hand could have been played more badly" and with even more withering comment in the normally acquiescent press and blogs.
You’ve not read the papers this morning then?

Chuck Unsworth

@ tonee

One of the signs of maturity is the ability to form and debate one's own views. You have clearly failed disastrously.

'Everyone I know' says tonee. The 'press and blogs' says tonee. So what? Were the blogs and newspapers in love with Blair and NuLab fifteen years ago? Perhaps they were - perhaps you and your astoundingly gullible 'friends' still are. But maybe you hadn't reached school age then.

toni

FP. “Or those Labour chaps who will shortly go to prison?”
Or those Tory chaps who actually did?

CU “One of the signs of maturity is the ability to form and debate one's own views.
You have clearly failed disastrously.”

As opposed to spouting vitriol disguised as ‘robust expression”
Read your own comments, think hoist and petard, then consider who “failed disastrously”

Major Plonquer 1

What do you expect? In truth we have on one hand the 'Heir to Heseltine' and on the other the 'Heir to Kinnock'.

They're not only 'old' they're positively deceased, dug up, hosed down, polished up and laid out for show.

Chuck Unsworth

@ Toneee

Don't like people expressing themselves as they wish to? Sad, but so typically NuLab. Attack the argument, not the style - if you want any credibility, that is.

Vitriol? Garbage. I can be really vitriolic, but on these pages I am certainly not - and the Spectator would moderate me to hell and back if it were necessary. I'm utterly content with that. Those are the rules of the game - which apparently you are unable to accept. How childish. This is not your playground.

Never mind what 'everybody' you 'know' says, eh? Just look a little further than your own self-imposed and remarkably limited horizons.

Youth and beauty are no substitute for wisdom and competence. Does the Miliband boy have either? Indeed, does he have anything substantial to offer at all? Or is he just a puppet muppet, a ventriloquist's dummy?

As for his spent and exhausted colleagues - well, who actually cares? Their time has come and gone. They are barking dogs - in every sense.