I Don't Think Things Are So Bad

Weirdly I feel very optimistic.  I was expecting the Tories to win big.  Well they won a lot bigger than I expected.  Their losses in the south were basically Putney and failing to retake Canterbury.  And they cleaned up northern seats to an extent that nobody I know of foresaw.  Johnson looked home and dry as soon as the Brexit Party threw the towel in, but this was a victory beyond any reasonable expectations.

Make my mind up time

Well it’s got to that stage where I have to decide which party I’m going to vote for in this election. There never really was any chance that I would vote Conservative. I’m not a great fan of them at the best of times. And this is certainly not the best of times for that party. I don’t like Brexit.  I don't like Johnson.  And, remarkably, I am not even sure I trust him to behave in a constitutional way.   Could he declare a state of emergency and become an effective dictator?  I am not sure I would put it past him.

The Liberal Democrat Manifesto

Realistically any government formed after the election in 2019 is going to be either Conservative, Labour, or some kind of coalition where one of them is the senior partner.  I have been consciously ignoring the election campaign so I don't know what the media narrative is about the likely outcome, but last time I checked in the Tories were on course to win big and the odd snippet I've been unable to avoid suggests that this is still the case.  I haven't seen anything on the ground that suggests much different either, but the Lib Dems do seem to be doing better in the poster stakes than they did in 2017.  From where I am in the heart of Tory country this suggests that there might be some majorities that will be a bit lower than usual, but it doesn't feel like a revolution yet.

The Parties Manifestos Compared

The manifestos this year were surprisingly similar.  I'll come back to why that might be.  Both wasted a chunk of time slagging off the other side - which is irritating, insulting and ultimately shows a lack of confidence in the messages being put forward.  Both are written on the assumption of the existance of a fairly well operating magic money tree.   There is of course no such thing.  Everything has a price and somebody somewhere has to pay it.   This doesn't mean that public spending is bad.  It doesn't even mean public spending is a necessary evil.  It means that public spending needs the same care and thought as any decision about money made by an individual, a family or a company.  If anything it needs more, because if public spending is not done well the results for the economy as a whole are not going to be good.  If there isn't enough of it in the first place, the results for the economy will be very bad.  Our current political crisis is the result of this error.

The Tories Support Working People

Lots of working class people regularly vote Conservative.   They always have, ever since they got the vote.  It was in fact Disraeli, a Conservative, who first pushed the franchise down to give them the chance.  It is a rare election where somebody on the right doesn't find an individual who conforms to all the stereotypes of a Labour voter and yet is voting blue.  This is inevitably portrayed as evidence that Labour is now out of touch with its base.  Coming from a working class background myself I don't find it particularly surprising.  Most of my family are from the south east and working class Tories are fairly common around there.   But as it happens I also have relations in the welsh valleys.  One of them used to operate the Conservative Party committee rooms.  So non-Labour supporting people who live by their labour doesn't really phase me much.

The Tories, The NHS and Education

The Tory Party manifesto is very positive about the NHS, its staff and its future. The party is proud of it, and has some good plans for improving it.

Opinion Polls - Why We Should All Ignore Them

"Something Will Turn Up"

I get very interested in opinion polls sometimes.   Over the summer I found them particularly interesting.  Neither Labour nor the Conservatives were doing very well.  The Conservatives were losing votes to the Brexit Party and as a consequence weren't doing very well.  Labour were losing votes to the Brexit Party, the Conservatives, the Lib Dems, the  Greens and the Scots and Welsh Nationalists.  It all seemed quite exciting and maybe indicated a big turnaround in British politics.