If you move to the left..........YOU LOSE I'm sad about the outcome of this election...........last thing we needed was an overall Tory majority.
It moved to the left when Tony Blair stepped down and Brown moved in and decided to scrap NEW Labour - Ed Miliband has just followed the same line of his old boss. I know I've said this before on here .but......Tony Blair spoke to the whole nation - hence 3 general election victories. Brown and Miliband 'seem to' only represent the people on minimum wages.
Surry Nudger but I really believe that Tony Blair was nothing other than a red Tory Will have to agree to disagree with you
Tony Blair sowed the seeds of these two defeats with his abandoning of Socialist principles and the illegal wars he saw as his Christian duty
Very easy to put blame onto the last management, it's done in business all the time but the truth is that Labour should have walked this election. But in reality even if they had won all the seats in Scotland they would still have fallen short. There has to be a post mortem now in the Labour camp. What went wrong? Partly the fear of a SNP run government, partly due to a weak leader and partly due to the general public being scared of Labour economic policy IMO. Now they have to re group, re think their policies, and elect a leader who is credible to the British people. V glad Ed Balls lost his seat btw as he was also a problem in the popularity of the party. But 5 years is a short time and people have short memories so next time may be different. The people have spoken and we must accept that.
agree about re-grouping, pretty much echoes my view on Labour's overall performance in another thread.
Sorry Nudge, but this has nothing to do with moving to the left. There's nothing remotely let-wing about the Labour Party. Them, the Lib Dems, and the Tories have spent so long pandering to a few thousand 'undecided' voters in swing marginals that they've all merged into one indistinct whole. That's why there's such a rise in marginal parties who have something different and specific to say.
Personal view is it has a lot to do with Labour electing the wrong Leader. Leaving Policies aside the majority of the British public could not see Milliband as a prime minister - he doesnt come over as a leader people would want to follow. Labour lost this election when they made the wrong Milliband leader - and that was due to the Union block vote In John Smith and Tony Blair Labour had Leaders - in Gordon Brown and Ed Milliband they didnt have the right person at the top. They have to get it right next time - I predict the Tories will struggle this time - a weak majority will give the right wing too much influence and there is a danger that we will see a repeat of the Major years - not as bad as Cameron is a better leader than Major was but if Labour get the leader wrong again they will lose again in 2020
Agreed mate. Milliband - who may well be a formidable politician - was little more than cannon fodder to Tory HQ and the right-wing press, simply because of how he came to power and how he was seen as 'the wrong brother to lead'. That said, I stand by the 'pandering to suburbia/fight for the centre' as a strong contributing factor.
Agreed with all that, personalities are important in politics, that there was none more popular than Blair with the women voters even tho he proved himself as a wolf in sheeps clothing is a good example. Most hated man in Britain now tho. Let's just hope that Labour learns from this and elect a leader with charisma otherwise as you say they are doomed for another loss next time. Averred also that the wrong Miliband was elected leader, but doubt whether David would be interested now. Also as I intimated earlier, Ball was a PR nightmare, you could have put a red blob on his nose and called him Co-Co the clown on the front bench who Cameron made to look like the clown he really is. Can't see any potential replacement tho unless it's Ed Balls wife who seems to have more savvy than her husband
The only thing they need to learn is to select a leader. This election was lost the day they selected Milliband. He could have had all the best policies but no one cared about that, they just didn't take to him. staunch labour followers couldn't take to him, so he was never gonna gain seats from other party's. Thing is this was very obvious early in his reign as labour leader
wrong leader and wrong stance on a euro referendum in my opinion,ukip even tho they only have the one seat still attracted millions of votes,the tories knew this was going to happen so attacked ukip with their own promise of a referendum,this stance has certainly worked for them south of the border.
Call it convention if you like but it probably helps if the leader is a member of parliament. You were joking of course.
I really hope not - true she has more savvy than her husband but I cant see her as leader I Dont really know who the next leader should be Fortunately Balls is out as he would be a disaster. Could be Alan Johnson but I hope not - need a new dynamic candidate I havent thought of