Henley result adds to Brown's woes
Peter Hoskin 9:01am
After the drama of Crewe & Nantwich, yesterday's by-election in Henley looked as though it would be a forgettable affair. After all, Boris's old constituency is as safe a Tory seat as they come. It was absolutely no surprise when the Tory candidate, John Howell, this morning sailed home to a 10,116 majority over the Lib Dems, on a 50.5 percent turnout.
But the Henley by-election will stick in the memory. Not for the vote's winner, but for its major loser. Languishing in fifth place – with 1,066 votes – were Labour. That put them behind both the Greens (1,321 votes) and the BNP (1,243 votes).
Of course, no one expected Labour to perform particularly well. But – coming on the day of his first anniversary as Prime Minister – this is hugely embarrassing for Brown. Combine it a poll from earlier this week – showing the smallest ever gap between Labour and Lib Dem support – and I expect some Labour MPs will be having nightmares about being the third-placed party after the next general election.
P.S. Having said that, a YouGov poll for today's Times has Labour climbing 5 points from last month, to 28 percent. Whilst the Lib Dems have dropped 3 points to 15 percent. The Tories still have a hefty lead, stading as they are on 46 percent (down 1). The poll also contains some poor personal rating for Brown: for instance, 61 percent of respondents think he is a liability to the Labour party.
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Adam McNestrie
June 27th, 2008 9:20am Report this commentPolitical parties go crazy for by-elections. They throw time and money and big name politicians at the poor unfortunate electors, already abandoned (in one way or another) by their MP. Why? Because a by-election is an over-sized poll, the sort of poll that is so big that no can help but listen to. But it is a poll with one other crucial difference: the politicians can cheat. The politicians know who the sample is and there is nothing – no laws, no conventions, no scruples – stopping them from using all available means to change their minds. So: armies of button-men, volunteer fodder and big beasts descend on the electors of the constituency and bully, wheedle, bore and pulverize them into submission. The prize if you do it well? A boost in this quasi-opinion poll even if you’re not performing better, even if you haven’t gotten more popular. The by-election is a chance to win just by being dirtier, meaner and more resourceful than your opponents. The Lib Dems have been doing it for years…
Read more at my blog, Just who the hell are we? on wordpress.com, at:
http://adammcnestrie.wordpress.com/
mark c
June 27th, 2008 9:28am Report this commentam i alone in thinking that 12 months ago it would be remarkable if not inconceivable for the BNP to beat labour into fifth in any constituency in the land ?? wow... go brown
Nicholas
June 27th, 2008 9:49am Report this commentGood! If Labour were relegated to 3rd place in a GE or wiped out completely so much the better. If that party were never to darken the doors of Westminster again I should be a happy man.
They are a menace. A menace to the economy. A menace to the environment. A menace to the countryside. A menace to community. A menace to freedom. A menace to the cultural and constitutional heritage of Britain.
The poll also reveals the country is waiting for a GE and wanting a GE. Are you listening now Brown?
Positive discrimination is what we need. Positive discrimination for any candidate but a Labour one being elected to parliament.
Chuck Unsworth
June 27th, 2008 9:51am Report this commentAdam McNestrie
So your position is that the electorate has lost all free will? Does it not occur, even to you that, that no matter how much effort political parties put into their campaigns, sometimes the electorate is way ahead of them?
It's not an Opinion Poll, it's a Verdict.
Pam
June 27th, 2008 10:13am Report this comment22 months and counting now till a general election!
Carol-Ann
June 27th, 2008 10:16am Report this commentStill Labour ministers on the media this morning are insisting they can win the next election. They just don't get it. As if in two year's time people are gonna say 'what we want, what we really really want is five more year's of Brown and Labour.'
DM Davies
June 27th, 2008 10:26am Report this commentI don't think that Labour can put forward the "Third Party Squeeze" argument at Ben Bradshaw tried to do this morning. It was obvious from the start that the Conservatives were going to win substantially and so there was no point in Labour party supporters tactically voting for the Liberal in the hope of unseating them. The votes cast seem to reflect the electors real first choice party prefences.
Paul B
June 27th, 2008 10:34am Report this commentWith zigger zig ah
Oscar
June 27th, 2008 11:18am Report this commentLabour are 3% higher in the YouGov poll not 5%. Looks like a straight move from LibDem to Labour. Iain Dale has the same error on his blog. Still not as bad as last night's News at 10 which had a huge backdrop with Gordon on 46% and Dave on 28%! The evidence is on BBC Bias who managed to grab the image. I hope the BBC is forced into a grovelling apology.
Pete Hoskin
June 27th, 2008 11:30am Report this commentOscar: Since the last YouGov / Telegraph poll (on 30 May), Labour have risen by 5%.
That's how the Telegraph are reporting it, and that's what the YouGov data shows:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/labour/2200400/Gordon-Brown-is-%27electoral-liability%27-says-anniversary-poll.html
http://www.yougov.com/extranets/ygarchives/content/archivesPolitical.asp?rID=2
John
June 27th, 2008 11:33am Report this commentAdam, what on earth are you going on about? Once you are in the booth, nobody can 'pulverise' you to do anything.
You seem to have the same contempt for voters' intelligence as McPinnochio has. Maybe you are really Mrs McPinnochio.
David C
June 27th, 2008 12:32pm Report this commentOscar, the spin being applied by the BBC to the Henley result this morning was shameful. I think it is a deliberate strategy to 'talk away the problem'.
I believe the reason Brown fell so far and so fast in the Public's estimation was because 'all his incompetences came at once'.
I also believe that the reason he has a 5 point poll rise is because people are getting use to the idea that we have a **** PM leading a **** government.
People can get used to anything in time.
God help us all.
GEG
June 27th, 2008 1:01pm Report this comment"New" Labour's constant panic-policies and increasingly power-grabbing movements are moving them ever closer to the Tories in terms of party lines and beliefs. This is unwittingly doing themselves not only out of a job but out of existence.
The essence of the Labour Party is democratic socialism - the trade union movement and the lower paid working classes. Public opinion, coupled with the (not entirely irrelevant) by-election losses shows that they are not only alienating these strands of society but turning their back on them altogether (e.g. the 10p tax debacle).
It is a serious possibility that the party could fall just as quickly out of the mainstream as it's rise from relative obscurity in the early part of the last century.
Year 2060... Labour who?
David Lindsay
June 27th, 2008 5:48pm Report this commentYes, Labour coming fifth is a story, although Labour losing its deposit there is not.
But there are rather bigger stories here: the low turnout (aren't people itching to come out and vote for Cameron?), the failure of the Lib Dems to make any headway, the hopeless failure of Cameron's Blue-Greenery, the rise of the Greens (also strikingly apparent in nearby Oxford and elsewhere) among the ever-leftish section of the bourgeoisie, the total collapse of UKIP, and the success of the BNP among people who might be white but are certainly not working-class.
Those are the real ones to watch.
J H Holloway
June 27th, 2008 6:31pm Report this commentYes, Mr Lindsay.
The Green vote may well rise as the double-think middle class liberals - who strive to get the best jobs, houses and school places, while preaching social justice for all - leave New Labour and latch on to the next face-both-ways-at-once political creed.
Christ, I despise the Harriet Harpie tendency....
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