Labour lost out to the SNP - and if we had Proportional Representation - the SNP would not have had all of those MP’s as UKIP did so much better if you count the actual votes.
i am so .so wound up by Camerons smug attitude grrrrrrrrrr …god help us all…hes all for people WILLING to work…thats fine if you are ABLE to work…maybe he should just give the disabled a pill to finish us off…i have never been as angry as i am now.
3 Likes
It will soon be time for that favourite Old Etonian game of persecute the poor and disadvantaged, and that’s when the fun really starts. The prospect of 12 billion worth of cuts will be truly savage, which is exactly why we were not given details before voting.
6 Likes
… and lest we forget, there are now laws governing demonstrations taking place when the greater proportion of the electorate eventually realise that you’re totally stuffed unless you live in a mansion, take home a 5 figure salary, have private healthcare and can afford private schooling.
i completely feel the anger and fear that is present, and lament the stupidity of the turkeys who have indeed voted for christmas.
god help the sick and low paid
5 Likes
Labour never lost out to the SNP. If they had taken every seat in Scotland they would still have been about 50 seats shy of the Tories. Labour lost in England.
3 Likes
Of course they lost out to the SNP - what else can you call losing 56 seats?
In a nutshell, it was Indiana Murphy and the Party of Doom.
England is another problem that they have - how is it that no-one wanted to see the Tories back in, but it happened?
Geoff
geoff
if labour had won every SNP seat they would be on 288 against the Tories 331. They may still have lost. Looking at the votes it seems more people wanted the Tories than labour. Rioting at Downing Street seems to be certain peoples answer. That always seems the answer for some.
regards
neil (didn’t vote Tory or labour)
Let’s get this right, labour lost out to the Tories in England, that’s what brought them down. The other anti Tory parties, SNP, Plaid and the greens got 60 seats between them so they did their bit. The whole drive to replace the Tories with something else was only let down by Labour. Even they are not blaming anyone else. They admit they do not appeal to their grass roots any more as they have lost focus on their core voters. They are still pandering to a narrow section of society, the same section they appealed to in 1997 and they are producing watered down versions of Tory policy, only they are still too close to the original. They need to identify what they stand for and stop taking some of their voters for granted. A lot of voters in a Scotland were amazed by Millibands increasing rhetoric re dealing with Scotland if they did not vote Labour. That helped a lot of undecided voters decide and illustrated how little he understood the Scottish psyche. If he had bothered to spend some time here other than at referendum or general election time he may have been able to get some of that understanding. And I speak as a long term Labour supporter who watched the party sliding slowly farther right which prompted my move to the SNP.
2 Likes
The liberals voted Tactically for conservatives to avoid the union between Labour and the SNP. That is why they lost so many seats. Apparently even some Labour voters moved also to avoid the potential union. Many people in Britain dont want to see it broken up and therefore fear the SNP. In summary it is the rise of the SNP that has snookered both labour and the Liberals.
Moyna xxx
i always wanted to live in scotland.
what if i actually made the move?
hmm tempted still x
oh god, first thatcherism, then ‘new’ labour, then TORYlibs, now this god-awful shambles in FULL power, i’m feeling every one of my 51 years right now. the only tiny plus was farage losing his seat… can we put him in the stocks now, preferably for the new govts. full term?!
flamin’ ukip had only around 3.000 fewer votes than the returning labour mp, where i am… god i’m feeling miserable.
I think there was a fine political dance going on between Saint Nicola and Dave, which was mutually beneficial. With the SNP boasting of keeping Labour honest and Dave prepared to sacrifice the Union by constantly warning of ravaging hoards of disgruntled Scots pouring over Hadrian’s Wall, it was calculated to stoke up fear in middle England. The fact remains that nothing will improve the chances of independence like another five years of Tory rule. It is certainly not the whole reason why Labour lost so comprehensively, but probably a contributory factor.
The SNP brought down the Labour Government in 1979 (hence the comment by Jim Callaghan about turkeys voting for Christmas) and that ushered in Thatcher, which didn’t work out terribly well for Scotland.
1 Like
It doesn’t make any sense, if you want to keep a Tory government out, to vote Tory. So, if the idea was to keep a Labour government out which would have been supported on an issue by issue basis by the other anti austerity, anti Tory parties then best of luck with that one. It is a decision the vast majority of the people who voted Tory will regret over the decades to come. And if your fear of the SNP was fuelled by the right wing press then all I can say is that you have been badly misled. There was no plan to vote on English only matters, no plan for a referendum, no plan to bring down a labour budget. There was however, a plan to halt the roll out of pip, halt the abolition of DLA, make a commitment not to tax DLA or any benefit, abolish the bedroom tax, raise the top rate of tax whilst raising the lower thresholds, vote against the renewal of trident and many other progressive policies. They wouldn’t have been able to force anything through that labour produced and that the Tories etc agreed with. The SNP wanted labour to go back towards their roots and think of their grass roots before their banker friends as they have done in the past. If the Tories are in because the English electorate wanted a Tory programme well that’s democracy. If, however, you did it through fear of SNP involvement then you reap what you sow. The silly thing is that anyone who voted Tory through fear of the union being broken up has just pushed that possibility a lot closer. Scottish voters reject the Tories with a passion and although the majority of us voted against separation last year I fear that Thursdays result will be enough to change that.
I think the Saint Nicola comment was a bit below you, have always enjoyed reading your posts. As for the Thatcher vote scenario, Scotland had just been screwed over by the Labour government re devolution so abstained at the vote of no confidence. In retrospect a mistake, as will Thursdays decision to instal a Tory government prove to be in the months and years ahead.
I thought the Labour manifesto pledges were the most left wing since Michael Foot and a fat lot of good it did them. Mind you, London have another seven MP’s and clearly cut through in this Labour city. Incidentally, I haven’t met anyone that has a fear of the democratically elected SNP, but my friends don’t tend to read the Daily Mail.
For the record, I consider Nicola to be a very shrewd political operator and only a fool would argue with the SNP’s overwhelming story of success. I probably would have described Clegg as Saint Nick in 2010, when he was the media darling, so that’s nothing to fuss about.
I suspect our basic political beliefs are quite closely aligned and just have a different views on how they can be best achieved.
I suspect they are. What swayed a lot of Scots happened the day after the referendum when Cameron immediately aligned the “Vow” with EVEL. Now, I have no problem with EVEL but 24 hours earlier the vow had no caveats, just a cast iron guarantee. I suspect he lost the Union in that moment. Not, I would suspect, in the very hear future, but certainly in the not too distant future. It’s sad to think that two elections in the space of a few months have been fought on a platform of fear as opposed to aspiration. I think that’s what made Sturgeon popular, she had a positive vision. Ok she had the aim of kicking the Tories out but she had a positive message re what she wanted replacing it. The Daily Mail is daily bog roll to the vast majority of people the length of the country but I was amazed at the amount if different publications who prophesied Armageddon if the SNP got any say. As you say a Sturgeon is a shrewd politician, I don’t think she will press the referendum button until she is certain of victory. But, she will press it, that’s what she is there to do after all. Her politics demand it. At least we know what she stands for, which makes her somewhat unique. I suspect the referendum would have been won with her in charge, Salmond is a divisive figure, even up here.