Blue-collar exodus lost Labour election
LABOUR has haemorrhaged support among pensioners and traditional “blue-collar” voters, according to a damning study of Ed Miliband’s defeat by the shadow minister Liam Byrne. Miliband’s “35% strategy” to win power by wooing former Liberal Democrat voters was also a disaster, with Labour picking up just one in 13 of their votes in key seats where the party lost.
In a withering assessment, Byrne said the former Labour leader had “almost nothing to say” to older people, while David Cameron offered “free gold” in the form of the triple pensions lock and freedom to spend retirement nest eggs. As a result 2m more pensioners voted Tory than Labour. Writing in The Sunday Times, Byrne warned that ageing baby boomers meant there would be 1.5m more voters aged 65 and over at the 2020 election and “Labour is facing a demographic timebomb” unless the next leader can win them over. “We must never again fail to be the party that speaks for older Britain. And the conclusion for our leadership debate is quite simple. If the next Labour leader does not connect with older people — especially older women — then we will lose again.”
Labour was backed by 50% of skilled working-class voters in 1997 but just 32% in May and it was a weakness Cameron was seeking to exploit by playing up blue-collar Conservatism, Byrne warned. The devastating election defeat had also shattered the “myth” that a so-called “progressive alliance” between Labour and Lib Dem voters could put a centre-left government in power. Miliband was banking on former Lib Dem supporters but, while they deserted Nick Clegg, that barely benefited Labour in 74 target seats where the party lost. Instead, Ukip and the Conservatives saw their vote soar. “The Lib Dems quite simply were not and are not a reservoir of closet lefties,” Byrne said.
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/article1568686.ece
Interesting analysis from Byrne which also exposes gaps in the Labour manifesto for 2015. I wonder if any of the new leadership contenders will have a message for those millions of voters that Labour need to appeal to in 2020.
In a withering assessment, Byrne said the former Labour leader had “almost nothing to say” to older people, while David Cameron offered “free gold” in the form of the triple pensions lock and freedom to spend retirement nest eggs. As a result 2m more pensioners voted Tory than Labour. Writing in The Sunday Times, Byrne warned that ageing baby boomers meant there would be 1.5m more voters aged 65 and over at the 2020 election and “Labour is facing a demographic timebomb” unless the next leader can win them over. “We must never again fail to be the party that speaks for older Britain. And the conclusion for our leadership debate is quite simple. If the next Labour leader does not connect with older people — especially older women — then we will lose again.”
Labour was backed by 50% of skilled working-class voters in 1997 but just 32% in May and it was a weakness Cameron was seeking to exploit by playing up blue-collar Conservatism, Byrne warned. The devastating election defeat had also shattered the “myth” that a so-called “progressive alliance” between Labour and Lib Dem voters could put a centre-left government in power. Miliband was banking on former Lib Dem supporters but, while they deserted Nick Clegg, that barely benefited Labour in 74 target seats where the party lost. Instead, Ukip and the Conservatives saw their vote soar. “The Lib Dems quite simply were not and are not a reservoir of closet lefties,” Byrne said.
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/article1568686.ece
Interesting analysis from Byrne which also exposes gaps in the Labour manifesto for 2015. I wonder if any of the new leadership contenders will have a message for those millions of voters that Labour need to appeal to in 2020.
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I am now a Green Party voter in the main. They have their flaws and some policies that are unworkable in the modern world but they have a heart that I can respond to.
With Labour I see a lot of well dressed media types with polished TV accents and it fills me with sadness. Everything is passed through a committee and focus group to decide what resonates best with potential voters in the short term rather than what is best for the country in the long term.
They have lost their heart and drive to help us blue-collar workers. They are just middle-management corporate drones without any solutions as to how to make our lives any better.
I trust the Usual Suspects will shortly tear into the ST article and point out that we have "moved on" (copyright) from a class society and that such divisions go back to the 19th century, not now, proved by the fact that most now regularly holiday on the Costa del Florida and work in an office.......:D
Never in the tide of human history has false consciousness been foisted on so many by so few ;-)
A message like the "no money left" note he left that Cameron was able to use to the Tories advantage.
https://home.bt.com/news/news-extra/heres-a-little-more-detail-about-that-letter-david-cameron-keeps-waving-around-11363978899522
Maybe the reason he's pointing the finger at Miliband is to take the focus off himself, and his part in Labours downfall ;-)
In England it basically comes down to allowing to let the Conservatives set the agenda in 2010, rather than Labour showing that unemployment was dropping and the country was back in growth. They seemed to accept the distortion that their policies had caused the recession and banking crisis, rather than stressing how they had addressed it and things had already improved, so all the Tories were doing was building on their good work.
In Scotland they were seen as pointless, joining with the Conservatives against independence, rather than having their own campaign, and not even asking their members what they thought, but having London impose the policies that did not suit Scotland.
Overall, a big part of the problem is that Labour tends to think of the party first, then policies and the people. If it's good for the party, the Labour will do it, even if it isn't good for the people. The SNP is in danger of falling into the same trap.
Actually, this part somewhat terrifies me - because parties that pander to older voters are going to have to take that resource from somewhere, and my grave fear is that the burden will fall squarely on a working-age taxpaying public that are at once penalised to benefit older voters, and disenfranchised because older voters outnumber them. I fear yet more of the pulling up of ladders.
Which ever way the new Labour leader goes, they will lose the votes of one of the two groups.
Funny thing is, it's every else who is paying for them. That's how economics works.
Oh Ed definitely lost Labour the election. He was on an ego trip and made it all about him, which was a mistake especially because the Tories and Media were making it about him anyway.
His other 2 mistakes were not allowing an EU referendum and attacking the SNP because he wanted to look hard to Tory voters.
I might set up a party in which the young are enslaved to provide the old with everything they could ever want. It's bound to gain votes among the old -- it's basically what they're after.
Of course they are, that's the trouble with us ' old blood-sucking vampires' we all want to sponge off the young (roll eyes).
BTW I have never voted Tory and I have no intention of ever doing so ;-)
abolish all Union Laws and strike restrictions - oh, and beer and sandwiches for the unions at No 10.
It might not get them elected but it will certainly increase their support on DS. ;-)
You might not accept it but it's true -- you paid for your parents, we're paying for you. That's how it works -- there is no "insurance system".
So a little more gratitude and a little less venom from your generation would not go unappreciated. By the time I'm of pensionable age there will likely be no benefits system left to fall back on once the current lot have sucked it dry -- so as someone who puts in massively more than I ever get out of the system, I deeply resent the endless demands made by pensioners at the expense of everyone else.
Re-nationalisation I would support, I would not support scrapping grammar schools ( if there any left) I would not support making the re purchase of all the sold off council houses, but I would back the scrapping of selling off any more council houses.
I would not support the abolition of all Union Laws and strike restrictions.
Beer and sandwiches is probably much cheaper for the tax payer than Caviar and champagne so I would probably support that as well ;-)
My post (if you have not realised it ) was meant to be sarcastic, the reason being that I have never sponged off the young and never will do.
I am and always have been grateful and appreciative of everything I have ever had.
Just for your information I receive just over £60 a week in state pension. I buy a monthly bus ticket which costs just over £50 so do not use a bus pass anymore.
Until very recently my husband who is 70 was still working so we have never claimed housing benefit or council tax or pension tax credit, even though we were probably entitled to them, I have never DEMANDED anything off anybody. I have two children who are still living at home and I also have grandchildren, so for you to claim that I am being venomous towards them or any other young person I find insulting in the extreme, and very nasty.
Because we applied for one as we were living in lodgings at the time and we wanted a house of our own to bring up our baby.
I will point out that ASKING for a council house is not the same as DEMANDING a council house.
I'm guessing the reason we are still in the same house is because we have been very good tenants.
Pretty much sums up the Greens. The irony is if you voted Green, you wasted a lot of paper!
But the young appear to have plenty of money to spend, everywhere you go they are spending money like no tomorrow. Just look in a games shop or I-phone shop they are crowded with young people all guying the latest "in" thing. Holidays abroad, new cars, plenty of money for gigs and clubs and pubs, latest designer trainers and jeans, no shortage of money there at all.
Before I retired I worked with many young people and they always had plenty of money to spare on luxuries and always moaning about the cost of living and then said they had just bought a new TV with some silly-sized screen for their bedroom
Many of them have that sort of money because a good number of those who live at home pay little or nothing for their keep. Even after they've moved out, the parents financially support them at the same time as clocking up on their credit cards.
What a negative attitude!