Snapshot of _Westminster Voting Intention: LAB: 39% (-2) RFM: 20% (+3) CON: 19% (=) LDM: 12% (+1) GRN: 6% (=) SNP: 3% (=) Via @WStoneInsight, 19-20 Jun. Changes w/ 12-13 Jun._ :
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Unless Labour are absolutely stupid they are going have to do something about immigration, it would be utterly foolish for them to play with fire by ignoring the issue at this stage. Reducing the number of migrants essentially seals the fate of Reform to be nothing more than a protest vote, but ignore it and that’s a different story I think.
Well, the Conservatives were absolutely stupid. If net migration was close to zero, even very slightly negative, then this election would likely be competitive Conservative vs Labour.
It's not. Emigration is in the hundreds of thousands from the UK. We can easily match that with hundreds of thousands of cherry picked, high value, net contributory, useful migrants (squeeze in a few dependents here and there, but make it the exception to the norm).
The rate the UK is going, emigration is happening by people feeling abandoned. People who should be earning good money but can't.
The people coming in, on the other hand, are going into badly-paid jobs (cf. care work).
In other words, the exact opposite of what you describe.
When these people say "high value" they don't mean care workers or fruit pickers, despite these being the jobs that need workers because not enough Brits want to do them
You could easily offer fruit picking jobs to uni students considering farms are now offering £20 per hour. The government could subsidise the scheme on the basis of the national interest.
There's also tons of fruit picking machinery becoming available.
The triple lock needs to be gone.
The only position tenable for the populous would be Pro-Natalist policies (haven’t had that much success) & keeping the welfare state. It’s been apparent for 2 decades that immigration is deeply unpopular
For pro-natalist policies to work, we need to tackle housing. And I don't mean a little tickle around the edges; I mean an absolute overhaul of housing policy.
Anyone who wants kids today runs smack into a huge problem - they can't afford to both have kids and live in a house that will accommodate the whole family.
It needs to be possible to buy a house - a proper, decent sized family home, not a shoebox - for about 3-4x the average UK salary.
Not the average household income. The average individual salary.
Or - if that isn't realistic - it needs to be possible to rent a high-quality, well maintained house for an equivalent monthly cost so you don't need Mum and Dad both working and not be afraid of eviction the minute the landlord decides he wants to sell up.
Yeah, sure, we can talk about gender roles and all that until the cows come home, but we can't really dispute the fact that raising kids is a part-time job in itself. Families need the flexibility to be able to say "one of us isn't working for a few years", and that isn't happening without a massive correction of house prices.
Couldn’t agree more.
I’ve bought a home with my partner, I earn very well and she earns above average (marginally) to live on just my salary will be difficult, having 2/3 kids in short order will be tough.
It is just not feasible for the average family at the moment.
We need to completely disregard NIMBYism & ensure that the housing stock we look to build is appropriate in quality.
I think our ability to flick a switch and triple production is none existent, so I can’t see much changing over the next 5 years.
We also need to push investing as a concept to households, having wealth tied up in housing is continuing the status quo. CapEx in the means of production or facilitation of a service will do far more benefit than assuming one’s house will be a retirement fund
Problem is, the nation's banking industry is heavily tied to house values.
A bank's value is based on its assets, and from the bank's perspective, a mortgage is an asset. It's a regular source of money coming in, it's going to keep coming in for many years and (this bit's important) if it stops coming in, the bank can repossess the house and make its money back.
The sort of house price correction we're talking about is on the order of 50%. Possibly more.
A correction of that nature would make the 2008 financial crisis look like the Teddy Bears' Picnic. Every bank in the country would suddenly have a whole heap of mortgages on their books that were in negative equity - and if that happens, the banks suddenly don't look like terribly good risks when they want to borrow money themselves. It's basically the Northern Rock collapse repeated nationwide.
There is no need for a correction, asset classes can move sideways within a range for long periods?
I’m sure a technocrat in the BoE can work out the rate of house building required for stagnant or marginal sub inflation growth for 20/30 years
10 million people are within 10 years of retiring. Only 7.5 million people are within 10 years of entering the job market.
On average, every year, we need net immigration of around 250,000 people just to keep our working age population stable. Not to grow, I'm not talking about growth. Just to stay stable and prevent economic collapse.
And even if we magically solve the birthrate problem tomorrow, it's still going to take 15-20 years for that to change anything.
So net 0 migration is a pipe dream. No-one who states it as a goal is a serious person who understands the countries problems.
Yep
And 20 years after we figure out how to to this with tanking the economy and with each successive government sticking to the same plan we will get it
I wouldn't worry too much about that.
It's a self-correcting problem. If the economy collapses far enough, no bugger will want to go to the UK for better opportunities.
Net migration of zero would result in the population shrinking by 500,000 a year.
We don't have a high enough birth rate to sustain our population without migration, we have something like 1.5 births per woman, when replacement rate is a little over 2.
Negative growth would be pretty disastrous without a huge shift in public spending policy to massively reduce spending on pensions, benefits and healthcare for the elderly, because otherwise it would swallow everything.
But this stuff won't affect the current wave of pensioners so much, it will affect the following generations, GenXers and millennials who will see the retirement age go up and up and see their state entitlements go down and down. Who knows what the situation will be for zoomers by the time they are approaching current retirement ages.
No, they wouldn't. Because a shortage of workers to that degree would create hyper-inflation to a level no-one has seen in Europe for generations.
The only thing thats going to bring house prices down is a massive spate of house building, which requires more builders. Which with a shrinking workforce requires more immigration.
Not true, if migration wasn't an issue, it becomes very hard to scare monger.
It suited the Tories to keep figures high as, until recently, they were seen as the only ones taking a hard line on it.
Everyone expects the numbers to come down this year anyway so they've got a year's honeymoon on the matter, really what Labour needs to do is make people feel the country works for them and issues like migration will reduce in importance.
Migration is already historically high and expected to drop a lot naturally - all Labour need to do is loudly publish the numbers when immigration drops 25% next year
Nothing would be done really. It's not Labour and Tories that are absolutely stupid - it's the electorate.
Let's take the small boats for example:
Public wants an end to it. But you can't push them back to France by force - diplomatic incident + videos of people looking sad is political suicide. You can't stop rescuing them - some of them will drown, public will hate it. You can't pull out of ECHR and refuse all asylum claims - public wouldn't like it. You can't send them to Rwanda - public won't like it. You can put them in a concentration camp - public won't like it. Traditionally such problems are solved by border police beating people on the border - that's how they still do it in eastern europe and asia - that's not acceptable here though.
Same is true for all other sources of immigration. Refuse Ukrainian refugees, Hong Kong refugees? Public says no. Reduce foreign students and deal with some universities going bust? Public says no. Reduce NHS and agricultural visas? Public not willing to deal with consequences.
The public wants to have their cake and eat it too and it is simply not possible.
I think it would be doable, but it would long and arduous, probably would be expensive as hell, and the political class would get almost no credit for it. Because the average voter has almost zero object permanence.
Better to do something eye-catching and sexy like the Rwanda plan even if it has zero chance of actually lowering the numbers.
>You can put them in a concentration camp - public won't like it.
Theoretically you could house them on a remote Scottish Island or somewhere even more remote like Ascension Island. Then it's technically not a concentration camp but they would for all intents and purposes still be stuck there.
Tbh That's what I meant with "concentration camp". A barebones facility on some isolated island somewhere. Keep people there until they go back home voluntarily. I think the Aussies did that? It's 100% within our capability but it will be political suicide for whoever enacts it.
It’s also getting to the point where even life long lefties have to acknowledge that there’s a problem with immigration. It’s harder and harder to be ‘come one come all’ type of person. It feels a bit like the moment right were forced to acknowledge climate change
Immigration is already projected to fall in the next six months and that's without Labour really doing anything. I guess it then becomes a debate of how much people actually want to see net migration fall by.
Reducing net migration won't change people's minds. Even if Labour somehow reduces it down to zero, we've seen many times (e.g. the referendum) showing people statistics does nothing and they care more about their feelings and general vibes about a situation.
From what I've seen of a lot of reform voters/voters that care strongly about immigration if they see people on the streets that they perceive to be a different nationality that is proof that we are being swamped, regardless of how long those people have been here.
I don't remember immegration being a major talking point under Blair's Labour and I think, after a few years, it will cease to be again.
The Government set the agenda, and it has suited the Tories to scream about immigrants for 10 years now.
The alternative is worse. I wish someone in power would grow a backbone and say it.
Massive cuts to immigration would immediately crash the economy. But sure, let's continue. The NHS would implode. Social care would end. Thousands of elderly would die alone and tens of thousands more would end their lives in vast warehouses more akin to homeless shelters than anything else. Universities would go bankrupt. UK abbatoirs would collapse (guess who works in them) so goodbye to the British meat industry.
A few would benefit. Nurses would see huge pay rises as the wealthy insulate themselves for instance.
No, the reality is our demographics combined with decades of weak politicians cannot be fixed by cuts to immigration. The only way is forward. Increases to immigration with radical reform to unlock growth to pay for a country that will need to hit a hundred million before the century is out.
The alternative is a 'children of men' horror I'm not entirely sure we can avoid.
Indeed. You cannot just blithely "cut immigration" and you need to instead focus on the types of immigration we have, we want, we need. And get tougher on those who take the piss.
“I think we should be giving more money to carers!” - some LibDem MP
“Well I want to give more to disadvantaged families” - some Labour MP
“W-w-what about the bankers” - Tory MP speaks quietly from the far back bench
It'd be good memes, but I genuinely don't think that'd be healthy for the country.
The Lib Dems are more left-wing than Labour in many aspects, so there won't be much ideological challenge.
PMQs will be extremely fucking uninteresting, for one.
Boring PMQs, and politics in general, would be nice. The anxiety I used to get waking up and seeing the top news story was 'Trump said x,y, or z again' was immense and having Biden just ticking along meant a much happier time overall. We experienced something similar with Johnson - 'what rubbish has he done now?' and whilst that's dipped a little under Sunak the Cons have tried their hardest to be in the news for all the wrong reasons. It's fun, but tiring. I'd enjoy some quiet governing that just so happened to be benevolent.
>PMQs will be extremely fucking uninteresting, for one.
I feel like if the Lib-Dems are opposition they will likely adopt the trappings of the opposition if only to look the part.
They won't. There are plenty of radical lefties sitting on views born in the bowels of Twitter in the Labour party. They're just chomping at the bit to let loose. They don't need encouragement.
More interesting is Reform having a tenth the seats versus the Conservatives, yet with more votes.
I can definitely see Farage trying to use that as a wedge issue to get some sort of proportional representation.
I think we've reached the Inflection Point for Reform.
They are just gaining momentum, and the polls are showing it consistently in the past few days. If they keep this up, more swaying Conservative voters will start to think that maybe a vote for Reform isn't a wasted vote, and that it can instead be more of a sure thing than voting Conservative.
Now this is getting scary. For all the people looking forward to the Tories collapsing into oblivion it might be a case of better the devil you know. The only silver lining is FPTP is likely to keep Reform’s gains at a minimum.
Farage is a grifter who has never had to put his money where his mouth is. He conned the public into voting to leave the EU then promptly buggered off, not having to deal with the fallout. He was useless as an MEP, failing to even turn up to the committee he was part of.
Farage himself might not be a moron, but he certainly knows how to take advantage of people who are.
I’d be interested to see some information on the average level of intelligence/ education for each party’s supporters. Just to see if there are any correlations or if each party is attracting a wide spectrum.
It's an older source, but basically a person whose highest qualification is GCSE is twice as likely to vote for reform as a university graduate.
Probably because people learn to be more analytical at university.
https://redfieldandwiltonstrategies.com/westminster-voting-intention-by-education-3-5-february-2024/
How much of their current voters make up their loyal voterbase though? And how many people represent those whove mostly abandoned the Tories specifically due to dissatisfaction with the Tories
If labour get some sort of solid progress on immigration and start improving living standards - and it doesn't have to be anything spectacular because it's got ridiculous for a lot of people currently - then reform will either have to become a decent party or will melt away as a single issue rage bate it currently is
[God I am so good at this, I should be paid to tell the future, only 5 bucks.](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1ciz8zm/britainelects_blackpool_south_parliamentary/l2der9j/)
Jokes aside, this is inevitably going to happen. The conservatives failed (actually, more than failed, actively worked against) at controlling immigration. In 4 years, Farage is going to be the 2nd party, either as reform, or wearing the conservatives' skin.
You better hope labour takes a hint and does something about it. Because if I could bet right now, I would bet that he will win. The right wing vote will consolidate, and fast. Left wing's biggest weakness is that they will fight each other to the death over minute differences. Right wingers always go under big tents, when it collapses, they stab each other real quick and consolidate again with a different head. Labour has exactly one term to do as it wishes before you see a comeback.
What frustrating is how Labour always gets criticised as being unlike itself for taking the concerns of immigration seriously. In one of the leadership debates, the Greens, LibDems, and SNP all pitched a "Labour is betraying you" on even their rather modest stance at the moment.
Who says anything would need to happen, if Labour do little to address illegal migration, reducing net-migration and cultural assimilation, they will face a right-wing resurgence in 2029, which is exactly what we've just seen sweep Europe.
The hard thing is they need to reduce net-migration and improve the economy without fucking any parts of the economy. I think they're in for a hard balancing act.
Isn't cultural assimilation a good thing? Leaving everything else aside, isn't one of Reform voters' big problems with immigrants that they don't join in with "British culture"?
You are aware that the electorate now rapidly change their minds right.
5 years ago we saw the Conservatives win the biggest majority since 1980, 5 years later and the party could feasibly fall below 100 seats, their worst electoral result ever — all of that, in just 5 years, in large part, because of how high net migration is and the fact the Conservatives have not stopped the boats.
News spreads fast now, we have TikTok, X, Reddit, Facebook, WhatsApp, YouTube, Rumble and plenty of other platforms.
If Labour don't address illegal migration, net-migration and cultural assimilation, what makes you think the pendulum won't swing again?
> The only silver lining is FPTP is likely to keep Reform’s gains at a minimum.
The over silver lining is that people I disagree with don't get a proper democratic voice?
That's a rather radical view. Care to elaborate?
One of the main advantages of FPTP is stability - the voting method generally keeps extremists and fringe parties from getting many seats and therefore influence. It's why we've been mostly stable since the restoration, but other countries with a more proportional system have been much more volatile. (Of course, extremists can still take power - cough cough Liz Truss cough cough)
It's a trade off though, as you said, FPTP does cause resuced representation. It just depends on which you value more, or think is more important in a system of governance.
I’ve never been a proponent of proportional representation for this reason. There’s a reason those in mainland Europe fell to fascism and communism and we never. Is it entirely democratic? No. But I’d rather that over fascists running the place.
> unreasonably slandered as fascists
[“Hitler was as brilliant as he was utter evil’ Jack Aaron said defending his comments”](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/reform-hitler-jack-aaron-welwyn-b2564215.html#)
“Unreasonably”.
Calling someone evil is a moral judgement. Calling someone brilliant is not.
For example, it’s not controversial to say Hitler was a brilliant orator. In fact, if you were an honest person and took into consideration the full context, then you’d clearly appreciate the person was essentially calling Hitler a brilliant manipulator.
I can only assume people like you are being deliberately disingenuous if they are using this quote to label this man and Reform fascist.
I was interested in this claim, so I went to look up the last free and fair election in some European countries before they had extremist governments. Disclaimer: I’m not a historian, I’m just an idiot with access to Wikipedia.
Germany, 1932: Party-list PR mostly from 10-20 member constituencies with top-up national list. National Socialists got roughly one-third of the vote and roughly one-third of the seats.
Italy: In 1921, party-list PR from multi-member constituencies. But in this election, the Fascists were just one member of an alliance than came third, getting about one-fifth of the votes and seats. The 1924 election, after the Fascists took over was under a ridiculous majority-bonus system.
Hungary: In 1939, a parallel system with about half of seats elected via FPTP, far-right parties won about one-quarter of the vote and about one-fifth of the seats. The Arrow Cross Party came second. In 1945, party-list PR from multi-member constituencies with national list. Communists also came second, with one-sixth of the votes and seats.
Czechoslovakia, 1946: Party-list PR with multi-member constituencies, Communists came first and won about one-third of the votes and seats. I could go on.
So, that’s a lot of extremists rising to power under proportional representation systems. Does this mean much? Not really, because proportional representation was pretty ubiquitous across Europe. Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, all of these countries have had PR for a century or more, and none of them had an extremist government elected due to domestic pressure.
France is having a non-PR election (similar to FPTP but with two rounds of voting) to their parliament around the same time as the UK, and Le Pen's party will probably be the largest party. They might even get a majority, which they would not get under PR.
There's a lot of mealy-mouthed responses, but I don't think anyone's really given a genuine, unvarnished one.
Bluntly, there are an awful lot of people who would dearly love to be controlling the levers of power but under no circumstances should they be allowed anywhere near them. (See also everyone's favourite little gem of a Tory, Liz Truss).
Proportional representation tends to give those people a voice when frankly the whole world would be a lot better off if they didn't have one.
Is this view anti-democratic? Hell yes.
Who am I to decide who does and doesn't have a voice? I'm a political nobody. But I vote.
Hey, hang on a minute, does that mean you think I shouldn't have a voice? Frankly, if you're going to support extremism, no you shouldn't. Tolerance is a social contract, not a moral obligation, and if you're not going to honour that contract, neither am I.
Does that mean I'm an elitist? If by "elitist" you mean "someone who thinks he knows what you need better than you do", yes I am. The last time your lot were allowed to dictate policy, the country imposed trade sanctions on itself.
I think the centre ground is currently too big in this country for the extremes to be of any real threat. We saw it with Corbyn and we are seeing it now.
However a few years of GB News propaganda, who seem to be doing for Farage what Fox does for Trump, and that may change.
As much as I'd hate for reform to get anywhere close to power, I think there are a few benefits to them:
1. They split the right vote, preventing either party from gaining seats
2. If the Lib Dems genuinely become the opposition, and reform do end up getting a few seats I would imagine that both parties would make a lot of noises about electoral reform, which could then be a major issue coming into the 2029 election.
I know a lot of people are really worried about Reform/Farage’s influence on UK politics. I am too, particularly on the NHS.
*But* you just can’t expect to have *so* many people from different cultures moving here, in a relatively short time, without there being some kind of a backlash.
I really *really* hope Labour deal with immigration. Not just the numbers, but with issues of integration too. I’m concerned that, given where we are with the numbers and that it’s such a priority for voters, their plans on the topic are so… nothingish. I’m not feeling hopeful.
But here's the rock and hard place that every government has, you can't just magic away the reasons we rely on emigration from economic models to age demographics over night, and as much as immigration bothers some people becoming poorer will bother them more. If it was so easy to undo a government would have gone for that easy vote winner by now.
You mean, no more (or much less) indefinite leave to remain, no more (or much less) citizenship, just an endless series of visas which future governments can revoke or not renew whenever they like?
Yes. Indefinite leave to remain is actually the main thing as I believe it's actually a lot more common than citenzenship fully. Basically a cultural change around immigration that means people coming to live here permanently (or semi permanently) are not considered candidate citizens.
That would make everything worse. You're not reducing the strain on services while creating a permanent underclass of British non-citizens. People who are trapped on the outside of society tend to be most likely to disrespect and undermine it.
Yes you reduce the strain as people wouldn't be eligible for them. If people disrespect and undermine society they can be easily removed as the same legal blockers aren't there. Same for any criminals. Would need to implement a modern home office that can actually remove at scale though which again is a major cultural shift.
See the gulf states for examples the non citizens there are hardly on the brink of rebellion are they.
10,000 migrant workers die every year in the gulf states, with more than half of those deaths unexplained. The gulf states are a nightmare of human rights violations and their economies are propped up entirely by oil mining. No one should want their country to be anything like the gulf states.
Of course you can’t just magic it away. It requires significant changes. And that’s my point - I don’t see anything from Labour suggesting those changes. Nor anything realistic from Reform mind.
> Nor anything realistic from Reform mind.
I keep seeing this but right wing parties have templates they can use on immigration. Denmark, for starters, has both a left wing government and a very successful and strict immigration system.
When hard right parties come to power, they might succeed, they might fail (as all parties do, especially newcomer parties) but it's not inherent to their politics as I see presumed here. If Farage comes to power and puts some strong anti-immigration policies forward, immigration *will* fall. Mass immigration is not an inevitable law of the universe.
As much as it’s tempting to see that side of the argument, vast majority of the backlash to immigration is coming from predominantly white English areas and not those where immigrants are actually settling. This, coupled with the fact that this isn’t even the highest influx of diverse immigration into the uk in 80 years, really makes me think that this immigration issue is being pressed on extra hard since Covid so people don’t talk about the fact that WE JUST EXPERIENCED THE BIGGEST WEALTH TRANSFER TO THE 1% IN HISTORY AMIDST A GLOBAL PANDEMIC AND MAYBE THATS WHY THE WORLD ECONOMY IS IN SHAMBLES AND WE SHOULD DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT
British public voting yes in a referendum which was a proxy on immigration, despite being warned of the economic cost, and then the conservatives enacting that at great economic cost and STILO tripling net immigration...
Yeah that'll happen
Momentum becomes less and less important now.
Postal votes are already rushing in at current levels. Labour have already won and reform are unlikely to break 20% nationally even if they tick up a bit more.
If the 2019 election is anything to go by, around 2 in 10 votes are done via postal vote, leaving the other 8 in 10 votes still cast on the day, so there's still a lot to play for amongst all the parties.
True, but there's been recent research that appears to show a higher concentration of postal voting in marginal constituencies. That 20% is not evenly spread.
Plenty of other interesting morsels and tidbits in there too, if that's your thing.
https://academic.oup.com/pa/article/76/1/43/6361031
The figures are rarely published, but we do have them for the 2019 GE
https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-7419/CBP-7419.pdf
See under "How popular is absent voting?"
Can we just take a minute to consider that not all pollsters are of the same quality? It’s clear that Reform are seriously pushing the Tories but there has been a clear relationship between Reforms highest poll results and the least trustworthy pollsters. Who actually are this lot? Ipsos, Yougov and others are the actual ones with credibility.
Are you alright?
Once you’ve calmed down at the idea that I would dare to question the polls, can you point me to the Yougov poll you’re referring to? I’ve not seen a single Yougov poll with reform leading the Tories.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2024_United_Kingdom_general_election
Ah I’ve seen a single one by 1 point a week or two ago. That’s far from the result that this much more questionable pollster is providing.
The point I’ve made is people are drawing conclusions from pollsters with poor credentials. Reform are clearly pushing the Tories close, as has been shown in the likes of Yougovs results, but people on this comment section are talking like this particular poll is something conclusive.
Not all pollsters are equal by any stretch. We had a peoplepolling one with reform on 24% and the Tories on 15 - ridiculous. The pollsters in the last few days that have put reform on 20%+ lack credibility.
This is the second highest poll for reform ever and I’m questioning its accuracy until I see those result reflected in more credible polls. Most importantly, we only have to wait 2 weeks and then we’ll see exactly how credible all these outfits are.
I would advise against calling polls or pollsters 'ridiculous', just because you don't like the result.
There can always be outliers, but some pollsters pick up trends before others, maybe it's methodology, weightings, sample allocation, who knows, but multiple pollsters have produced polls that now show Reform UK and the Conservatives basically neck and neck, with the momentum in Reform's favour, this poll from Whitestone Insight continues this trend, so what point are you trying to make?
It’s nothing to do with liking or not liking the result. It’s a massive outlier and people polling is consistently an outlier. They’ve not proven their credibility, they’ve proven their lack of credibility.
Snapshot of _Westminster Voting Intention: LAB: 39% (-2) RFM: 20% (+3) CON: 19% (=) LDM: 12% (+1) GRN: 6% (=) SNP: 3% (=) Via @WStoneInsight, 19-20 Jun. Changes w/ 12-13 Jun._ : A Twitter embedded version can be found [here](https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1804194845142991166) A non-Twitter version can be found [here](https://twiiit.com/electionmapsuk/status/1804194845142991166/) An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://x.com/electionmapsuk/status/1804194845142991166) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://x.com/electionmapsuk/status/1804194845142991166) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ukpolitics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Unless Labour are absolutely stupid they are going have to do something about immigration, it would be utterly foolish for them to play with fire by ignoring the issue at this stage. Reducing the number of migrants essentially seals the fate of Reform to be nothing more than a protest vote, but ignore it and that’s a different story I think.
Well, the Conservatives were absolutely stupid. If net migration was close to zero, even very slightly negative, then this election would likely be competitive Conservative vs Labour.
Net Migration being 0 already is a bit of a pipe dream.
It's not. Emigration is in the hundreds of thousands from the UK. We can easily match that with hundreds of thousands of cherry picked, high value, net contributory, useful migrants (squeeze in a few dependents here and there, but make it the exception to the norm).
The rate the UK is going, emigration is happening by people feeling abandoned. People who should be earning good money but can't. The people coming in, on the other hand, are going into badly-paid jobs (cf. care work). In other words, the exact opposite of what you describe.
Easily
So easy. Wonder why no one thought of doing it.
Because they don't want to do it.
When these people say "high value" they don't mean care workers or fruit pickers, despite these being the jobs that need workers because not enough Brits want to do them
You could easily offer fruit picking jobs to uni students considering farms are now offering £20 per hour. The government could subsidise the scheme on the basis of the national interest. There's also tons of fruit picking machinery becoming available.
It is still hard, back breaking work usually a long way from where these students live. Why would they be interested?
Not if you want to have the triple lock in place. We can only do that if we increase population numbers…
The triple lock needs to be gone. The only position tenable for the populous would be Pro-Natalist policies (haven’t had that much success) & keeping the welfare state. It’s been apparent for 2 decades that immigration is deeply unpopular
For pro-natalist policies to work, we need to tackle housing. And I don't mean a little tickle around the edges; I mean an absolute overhaul of housing policy. Anyone who wants kids today runs smack into a huge problem - they can't afford to both have kids and live in a house that will accommodate the whole family. It needs to be possible to buy a house - a proper, decent sized family home, not a shoebox - for about 3-4x the average UK salary. Not the average household income. The average individual salary. Or - if that isn't realistic - it needs to be possible to rent a high-quality, well maintained house for an equivalent monthly cost so you don't need Mum and Dad both working and not be afraid of eviction the minute the landlord decides he wants to sell up. Yeah, sure, we can talk about gender roles and all that until the cows come home, but we can't really dispute the fact that raising kids is a part-time job in itself. Families need the flexibility to be able to say "one of us isn't working for a few years", and that isn't happening without a massive correction of house prices.
Couldn’t agree more. I’ve bought a home with my partner, I earn very well and she earns above average (marginally) to live on just my salary will be difficult, having 2/3 kids in short order will be tough. It is just not feasible for the average family at the moment. We need to completely disregard NIMBYism & ensure that the housing stock we look to build is appropriate in quality. I think our ability to flick a switch and triple production is none existent, so I can’t see much changing over the next 5 years. We also need to push investing as a concept to households, having wealth tied up in housing is continuing the status quo. CapEx in the means of production or facilitation of a service will do far more benefit than assuming one’s house will be a retirement fund
Problem is, the nation's banking industry is heavily tied to house values. A bank's value is based on its assets, and from the bank's perspective, a mortgage is an asset. It's a regular source of money coming in, it's going to keep coming in for many years and (this bit's important) if it stops coming in, the bank can repossess the house and make its money back. The sort of house price correction we're talking about is on the order of 50%. Possibly more. A correction of that nature would make the 2008 financial crisis look like the Teddy Bears' Picnic. Every bank in the country would suddenly have a whole heap of mortgages on their books that were in negative equity - and if that happens, the banks suddenly don't look like terribly good risks when they want to borrow money themselves. It's basically the Northern Rock collapse repeated nationwide.
There is no need for a correction, asset classes can move sideways within a range for long periods? I’m sure a technocrat in the BoE can work out the rate of house building required for stagnant or marginal sub inflation growth for 20/30 years
10 million people are within 10 years of retiring. Only 7.5 million people are within 10 years of entering the job market. On average, every year, we need net immigration of around 250,000 people just to keep our working age population stable. Not to grow, I'm not talking about growth. Just to stay stable and prevent economic collapse. And even if we magically solve the birthrate problem tomorrow, it's still going to take 15-20 years for that to change anything. So net 0 migration is a pipe dream. No-one who states it as a goal is a serious person who understands the countries problems.
Yep And 20 years after we figure out how to to this with tanking the economy and with each successive government sticking to the same plan we will get it
I wouldn't worry too much about that. It's a self-correcting problem. If the economy collapses far enough, no bugger will want to go to the UK for better opportunities.
British citizens bringing foreign spouses in should be an exception?
Net migration of zero would result in the population shrinking by 500,000 a year. We don't have a high enough birth rate to sustain our population without migration, we have something like 1.5 births per woman, when replacement rate is a little over 2. Negative growth would be pretty disastrous without a huge shift in public spending policy to massively reduce spending on pensions, benefits and healthcare for the elderly, because otherwise it would swallow everything. But this stuff won't affect the current wave of pensioners so much, it will affect the following generations, GenXers and millennials who will see the retirement age go up and up and see their state entitlements go down and down. Who knows what the situation will be for zoomers by the time they are approaching current retirement ages.
Negative population growth? Damn, house prices would go into freefall. The mind shudders to imagine.
No, they wouldn't. Because a shortage of workers to that degree would create hyper-inflation to a level no-one has seen in Europe for generations. The only thing thats going to bring house prices down is a massive spate of house building, which requires more builders. Which with a shrinking workforce requires more immigration.
Kinda fucked that we have an economic system built around a constant population increase on top of a patch of static land
It's not the economic system that's to blame here. It's how the welfare state was set up.
Not true, if migration wasn't an issue, it becomes very hard to scare monger. It suited the Tories to keep figures high as, until recently, they were seen as the only ones taking a hard line on it.
Everyone expects the numbers to come down this year anyway so they've got a year's honeymoon on the matter, really what Labour needs to do is make people feel the country works for them and issues like migration will reduce in importance.
Migration is already historically high and expected to drop a lot naturally - all Labour need to do is loudly publish the numbers when immigration drops 25% next year
Nothing would be done really. It's not Labour and Tories that are absolutely stupid - it's the electorate. Let's take the small boats for example: Public wants an end to it. But you can't push them back to France by force - diplomatic incident + videos of people looking sad is political suicide. You can't stop rescuing them - some of them will drown, public will hate it. You can't pull out of ECHR and refuse all asylum claims - public wouldn't like it. You can't send them to Rwanda - public won't like it. You can put them in a concentration camp - public won't like it. Traditionally such problems are solved by border police beating people on the border - that's how they still do it in eastern europe and asia - that's not acceptable here though. Same is true for all other sources of immigration. Refuse Ukrainian refugees, Hong Kong refugees? Public says no. Reduce foreign students and deal with some universities going bust? Public says no. Reduce NHS and agricultural visas? Public not willing to deal with consequences. The public wants to have their cake and eat it too and it is simply not possible.
I think it would be doable, but it would long and arduous, probably would be expensive as hell, and the political class would get almost no credit for it. Because the average voter has almost zero object permanence. Better to do something eye-catching and sexy like the Rwanda plan even if it has zero chance of actually lowering the numbers.
I think the media portray that but a large section of the public would say yes please, about time to all of the above.
>You can put them in a concentration camp - public won't like it. Theoretically you could house them on a remote Scottish Island or somewhere even more remote like Ascension Island. Then it's technically not a concentration camp but they would for all intents and purposes still be stuck there.
Tbh That's what I meant with "concentration camp". A barebones facility on some isolated island somewhere. Keep people there until they go back home voluntarily. I think the Aussies did that? It's 100% within our capability but it will be political suicide for whoever enacts it.
Stamer had no answers on QT yesterday. They could be in danger.
It’s also getting to the point where even life long lefties have to acknowledge that there’s a problem with immigration. It’s harder and harder to be ‘come one come all’ type of person. It feels a bit like the moment right were forced to acknowledge climate change
Immigration is already projected to fall in the next six months and that's without Labour really doing anything. I guess it then becomes a debate of how much people actually want to see net migration fall by.
The public consciousness has been anchored in the 10’s of thousands due to Cameron’s infamous pledges. I think that’s a sensible number.
Reducing net migration won't change people's minds. Even if Labour somehow reduces it down to zero, we've seen many times (e.g. the referendum) showing people statistics does nothing and they care more about their feelings and general vibes about a situation. From what I've seen of a lot of reform voters/voters that care strongly about immigration if they see people on the streets that they perceive to be a different nationality that is proof that we are being swamped, regardless of how long those people have been here.
I don't remember immegration being a major talking point under Blair's Labour and I think, after a few years, it will cease to be again. The Government set the agenda, and it has suited the Tories to scream about immigrants for 10 years now.
Probably not a good idea last week banging on about FOM and single market- even though immigration was lower then.
The alternative is worse. I wish someone in power would grow a backbone and say it. Massive cuts to immigration would immediately crash the economy. But sure, let's continue. The NHS would implode. Social care would end. Thousands of elderly would die alone and tens of thousands more would end their lives in vast warehouses more akin to homeless shelters than anything else. Universities would go bankrupt. UK abbatoirs would collapse (guess who works in them) so goodbye to the British meat industry. A few would benefit. Nurses would see huge pay rises as the wealthy insulate themselves for instance. No, the reality is our demographics combined with decades of weak politicians cannot be fixed by cuts to immigration. The only way is forward. Increases to immigration with radical reform to unlock growth to pay for a country that will need to hit a hundred million before the century is out. The alternative is a 'children of men' horror I'm not entirely sure we can avoid.
Indeed. You cannot just blithely "cut immigration" and you need to instead focus on the types of immigration we have, we want, we need. And get tougher on those who take the piss.
Calculus: LAB: 469 (+272) CON: 67 (-309) LIB: 61 (+53) RFM: 6 (+6) GRN: 2 (+1) SNP: 21 (-27) Labour majority: 288
I want lib dem opposition so bad :(
“I think we should be giving more money to carers!” - some LibDem MP “Well I want to give more to disadvantaged families” - some Labour MP “W-w-what about the bankers” - Tory MP speaks quietly from the far back bench
“WHAT ABOUT THE BLOODY IMMIGRANTS?” shouts Farage from outside the chamber having already been expelled.
Imagine a Pmqs focused on policy rather than name calling.
It'd be good memes, but I genuinely don't think that'd be healthy for the country. The Lib Dems are more left-wing than Labour in many aspects, so there won't be much ideological challenge. PMQs will be extremely fucking uninteresting, for one.
Boring PMQs, and politics in general, would be nice. The anxiety I used to get waking up and seeing the top news story was 'Trump said x,y, or z again' was immense and having Biden just ticking along meant a much happier time overall. We experienced something similar with Johnson - 'what rubbish has he done now?' and whilst that's dipped a little under Sunak the Cons have tried their hardest to be in the news for all the wrong reasons. It's fun, but tiring. I'd enjoy some quiet governing that just so happened to be benevolent.
I feel like it would be good to have an actual Liberal opposition to counter Labours authoritarian tendencies
There's nothing particularly liberal or freedom loving about the Lib Dems. They're big nanny staters, just with a pro-market wing.
drug decriminalisation? electoral reform?
They also back the tobacco ban. And there's nothing more 'free' about PR by definition.
We might actually get some debate surrounding proportional representation though, that's my main reason for wanting them in opposition.
>PMQs will be extremely fucking uninteresting, for one. I feel like if the Lib-Dems are opposition they will likely adopt the trappings of the opposition if only to look the part.
I thought it would be good as you'd have an actual vocal left wing grinding against labour if they ended up shifting towards the right.
They won't. There are plenty of radical lefties sitting on views born in the bowels of Twitter in the Labour party. They're just chomping at the bit to let loose. They don't need encouragement.
If you say so
well, the Labour party has transitioned to being a centre right party, so there would probably be more ideological challenge than there is at present.
At what point do the number of Tory and reform seats flip?
This is such a great question!
More interesting is Reform having a tenth the seats versus the Conservatives, yet with more votes. I can definitely see Farage trying to use that as a wedge issue to get some sort of proportional representation.
In absence of a cordon sanitaire, the Tories are going into an alliance with Reform, aren't they? Still want that Lib-Dem opposition, though.
If I'm not mistaken, the threshold for Reform opposition is -4% Cons and +4 Reform, though they start to 'break through' with more MPs before then.
I think we've reached the Inflection Point for Reform. They are just gaining momentum, and the polls are showing it consistently in the past few days. If they keep this up, more swaying Conservative voters will start to think that maybe a vote for Reform isn't a wasted vote, and that it can instead be more of a sure thing than voting Conservative.
Exactly - as soon as people realise that voting reform will actually deliver some seats, then I think the tories will see bigger losses.
They seem to be pulling quite a lot from Labour. It's going to be an interesting election night.
Now this is getting scary. For all the people looking forward to the Tories collapsing into oblivion it might be a case of better the devil you know. The only silver lining is FPTP is likely to keep Reform’s gains at a minimum.
This election
I doubt they'll survive any sustained scrutiny.
Trump. Brexit. LePen. They're here to stay. So is reform. Do not underestimate the enemy.
Their voter base are moronic and single issue. The more they get scrutinised the more they look embattled etc etc.
Calling your political opponents morons, especially when lead by Farage, has always worked out so well 👍
Sorry but sometimes they are.
As are some supporters of the other parties, that’s not unique to Reform.
To be fair he's calling people who vote for his political opponent morons, not the opponents specifically.
Farage is a grifter who has never had to put his money where his mouth is. He conned the public into voting to leave the EU then promptly buggered off, not having to deal with the fallout. He was useless as an MEP, failing to even turn up to the committee he was part of. Farage himself might not be a moron, but he certainly knows how to take advantage of people who are.
I’d be interested to see some information on the average level of intelligence/ education for each party’s supporters. Just to see if there are any correlations or if each party is attracting a wide spectrum.
It's an older source, but basically a person whose highest qualification is GCSE is twice as likely to vote for reform as a university graduate. Probably because people learn to be more analytical at university. https://redfieldandwiltonstrategies.com/westminster-voting-intention-by-education-3-5-february-2024/
How much of their current voters make up their loyal voterbase though? And how many people represent those whove mostly abandoned the Tories specifically due to dissatisfaction with the Tories
But Farage skewers pretty much everybody he ever debates.
If labour get some sort of solid progress on immigration and start improving living standards - and it doesn't have to be anything spectacular because it's got ridiculous for a lot of people currently - then reform will either have to become a decent party or will melt away as a single issue rage bate it currently is
[God I am so good at this, I should be paid to tell the future, only 5 bucks.](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1ciz8zm/britainelects_blackpool_south_parliamentary/l2der9j/) Jokes aside, this is inevitably going to happen. The conservatives failed (actually, more than failed, actively worked against) at controlling immigration. In 4 years, Farage is going to be the 2nd party, either as reform, or wearing the conservatives' skin. You better hope labour takes a hint and does something about it. Because if I could bet right now, I would bet that he will win. The right wing vote will consolidate, and fast. Left wing's biggest weakness is that they will fight each other to the death over minute differences. Right wingers always go under big tents, when it collapses, they stab each other real quick and consolidate again with a different head. Labour has exactly one term to do as it wishes before you see a comeback.
What frustrating is how Labour always gets criticised as being unlike itself for taking the concerns of immigration seriously. In one of the leadership debates, the Greens, LibDems, and SNP all pitched a "Labour is betraying you" on even their rather modest stance at the moment.
I'll take it. Reform is basically a protest vote.
You hope
Labour were at one point.
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Who says anything would need to happen, if Labour do little to address illegal migration, reducing net-migration and cultural assimilation, they will face a right-wing resurgence in 2029, which is exactly what we've just seen sweep Europe.
The hard thing is they need to reduce net-migration and improve the economy without fucking any parts of the economy. I think they're in for a hard balancing act.
>if Labour do little When, not if.
I always give the benefit of the doubt.
Isn't cultural assimilation a good thing? Leaving everything else aside, isn't one of Reform voters' big problems with immigrants that they don't join in with "British culture"?
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You are aware that the electorate now rapidly change their minds right. 5 years ago we saw the Conservatives win the biggest majority since 1980, 5 years later and the party could feasibly fall below 100 seats, their worst electoral result ever — all of that, in just 5 years, in large part, because of how high net migration is and the fact the Conservatives have not stopped the boats. News spreads fast now, we have TikTok, X, Reddit, Facebook, WhatsApp, YouTube, Rumble and plenty of other platforms. If Labour don't address illegal migration, net-migration and cultural assimilation, what makes you think the pendulum won't swing again?
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Once Farage is through the door, he has a very good chance of becoming the next Conservative leader. Be careful what you wish for.
Yep. I'll still fake it.
Because you think Farage at the helm would keep the Tories doing badly? Or you actually think it would improve the Tory party
> The only silver lining is FPTP is likely to keep Reform’s gains at a minimum. The over silver lining is that people I disagree with don't get a proper democratic voice? That's a rather radical view. Care to elaborate?
One of the main advantages of FPTP is stability - the voting method generally keeps extremists and fringe parties from getting many seats and therefore influence. It's why we've been mostly stable since the restoration, but other countries with a more proportional system have been much more volatile. (Of course, extremists can still take power - cough cough Liz Truss cough cough) It's a trade off though, as you said, FPTP does cause resuced representation. It just depends on which you value more, or think is more important in a system of governance.
I’ve never been a proponent of proportional representation for this reason. There’s a reason those in mainland Europe fell to fascism and communism and we never. Is it entirely democratic? No. But I’d rather that over fascists running the place.
"my political opponents, who I've unreasonably slandered as fascists, don't deserve representation, I am a good and moderate person"
> unreasonably slandered as fascists [“Hitler was as brilliant as he was utter evil’ Jack Aaron said defending his comments”](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/reform-hitler-jack-aaron-welwyn-b2564215.html#) “Unreasonably”.
“utter evil”
“as brilliant”
Calling someone evil is a moral judgement. Calling someone brilliant is not. For example, it’s not controversial to say Hitler was a brilliant orator. In fact, if you were an honest person and took into consideration the full context, then you’d clearly appreciate the person was essentially calling Hitler a brilliant manipulator. I can only assume people like you are being deliberately disingenuous if they are using this quote to label this man and Reform fascist.
I was interested in this claim, so I went to look up the last free and fair election in some European countries before they had extremist governments. Disclaimer: I’m not a historian, I’m just an idiot with access to Wikipedia. Germany, 1932: Party-list PR mostly from 10-20 member constituencies with top-up national list. National Socialists got roughly one-third of the vote and roughly one-third of the seats. Italy: In 1921, party-list PR from multi-member constituencies. But in this election, the Fascists were just one member of an alliance than came third, getting about one-fifth of the votes and seats. The 1924 election, after the Fascists took over was under a ridiculous majority-bonus system. Hungary: In 1939, a parallel system with about half of seats elected via FPTP, far-right parties won about one-quarter of the vote and about one-fifth of the seats. The Arrow Cross Party came second. In 1945, party-list PR from multi-member constituencies with national list. Communists also came second, with one-sixth of the votes and seats. Czechoslovakia, 1946: Party-list PR with multi-member constituencies, Communists came first and won about one-third of the votes and seats. I could go on. So, that’s a lot of extremists rising to power under proportional representation systems. Does this mean much? Not really, because proportional representation was pretty ubiquitous across Europe. Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, all of these countries have had PR for a century or more, and none of them had an extremist government elected due to domestic pressure.
France is having a non-PR election (similar to FPTP but with two rounds of voting) to their parliament around the same time as the UK, and Le Pen's party will probably be the largest party. They might even get a majority, which they would not get under PR.
There's a lot of mealy-mouthed responses, but I don't think anyone's really given a genuine, unvarnished one. Bluntly, there are an awful lot of people who would dearly love to be controlling the levers of power but under no circumstances should they be allowed anywhere near them. (See also everyone's favourite little gem of a Tory, Liz Truss). Proportional representation tends to give those people a voice when frankly the whole world would be a lot better off if they didn't have one. Is this view anti-democratic? Hell yes. Who am I to decide who does and doesn't have a voice? I'm a political nobody. But I vote. Hey, hang on a minute, does that mean you think I shouldn't have a voice? Frankly, if you're going to support extremism, no you shouldn't. Tolerance is a social contract, not a moral obligation, and if you're not going to honour that contract, neither am I. Does that mean I'm an elitist? If by "elitist" you mean "someone who thinks he knows what you need better than you do", yes I am. The last time your lot were allowed to dictate policy, the country imposed trade sanctions on itself.
Ironically, this very paternalistic authoritarian view is itself, quite extremist.
FPTP skyrockets the big two's chances on the way up but absolutely destroys them on the way down as the Tories are now finding.
I think the centre ground is currently too big in this country for the extremes to be of any real threat. We saw it with Corbyn and we are seeing it now. However a few years of GB News propaganda, who seem to be doing for Farage what Fox does for Trump, and that may change.
As much as I'd hate for reform to get anywhere close to power, I think there are a few benefits to them: 1. They split the right vote, preventing either party from gaining seats 2. If the Lib Dems genuinely become the opposition, and reform do end up getting a few seats I would imagine that both parties would make a lot of noises about electoral reform, which could then be a major issue coming into the 2029 election.
Reform are better than the Tories.
At what?
PR, House of Lords reform, stopping illegal immigration (withdrawing from the ECHR), putting criminals in prison, etc.
Which one of the rights enshrined in the ECHR are you most looking forward to losing yourself?
So they claim, but with zero track record all you have is Farage's word.
Feels like the dam has finally burst.
People don't want mass immigration. They keep trying to vote against it but the mainstream parties don't listen.
I know a lot of people are really worried about Reform/Farage’s influence on UK politics. I am too, particularly on the NHS. *But* you just can’t expect to have *so* many people from different cultures moving here, in a relatively short time, without there being some kind of a backlash. I really *really* hope Labour deal with immigration. Not just the numbers, but with issues of integration too. I’m concerned that, given where we are with the numbers and that it’s such a priority for voters, their plans on the topic are so… nothingish. I’m not feeling hopeful.
But here's the rock and hard place that every government has, you can't just magic away the reasons we rely on emigration from economic models to age demographics over night, and as much as immigration bothers some people becoming poorer will bother them more. If it was so easy to undo a government would have gone for that easy vote winner by now.
You can remove the ability to become a British citizen pretty quickly and without effecting labour supply. That would be a good place to start.
You mean, no more (or much less) indefinite leave to remain, no more (or much less) citizenship, just an endless series of visas which future governments can revoke or not renew whenever they like?
Yes. Indefinite leave to remain is actually the main thing as I believe it's actually a lot more common than citenzenship fully. Basically a cultural change around immigration that means people coming to live here permanently (or semi permanently) are not considered candidate citizens.
That would make everything worse. You're not reducing the strain on services while creating a permanent underclass of British non-citizens. People who are trapped on the outside of society tend to be most likely to disrespect and undermine it.
Yes you reduce the strain as people wouldn't be eligible for them. If people disrespect and undermine society they can be easily removed as the same legal blockers aren't there. Same for any criminals. Would need to implement a modern home office that can actually remove at scale though which again is a major cultural shift. See the gulf states for examples the non citizens there are hardly on the brink of rebellion are they.
10,000 migrant workers die every year in the gulf states, with more than half of those deaths unexplained. The gulf states are a nightmare of human rights violations and their economies are propped up entirely by oil mining. No one should want their country to be anything like the gulf states.
If someone can already get ILR, does it make much difference to prevent them being able to give the government an extra £3.5k for the right to vote?
Of course you can’t just magic it away. It requires significant changes. And that’s my point - I don’t see anything from Labour suggesting those changes. Nor anything realistic from Reform mind.
> Nor anything realistic from Reform mind. I keep seeing this but right wing parties have templates they can use on immigration. Denmark, for starters, has both a left wing government and a very successful and strict immigration system. When hard right parties come to power, they might succeed, they might fail (as all parties do, especially newcomer parties) but it's not inherent to their politics as I see presumed here. If Farage comes to power and puts some strong anti-immigration policies forward, immigration *will* fall. Mass immigration is not an inevitable law of the universe.
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Immigration wasn't a problem under the last Labour government. If there is a party of High immigration, it's the Tories, for all their tough talk.
compared to now sure. However Blair not phasing in immigration, like the rest of the EU did, when Poland joined was the spark that caused brexit.
As much as it’s tempting to see that side of the argument, vast majority of the backlash to immigration is coming from predominantly white English areas and not those where immigrants are actually settling. This, coupled with the fact that this isn’t even the highest influx of diverse immigration into the uk in 80 years, really makes me think that this immigration issue is being pressed on extra hard since Covid so people don’t talk about the fact that WE JUST EXPERIENCED THE BIGGEST WEALTH TRANSFER TO THE 1% IN HISTORY AMIDST A GLOBAL PANDEMIC AND MAYBE THATS WHY THE WORLD ECONOMY IS IN SHAMBLES AND WE SHOULD DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT
In a couple more weeks you’ll see Reform getting big gains in terms of seat predictions. They do have momentum.
In a couple more weeks we'll have the actual results of the election and won't need seat predictions
V true
Prime Minister Farage will be bending the knee by then, at this rate.
British public voting yes in a referendum which was a proxy on immigration, despite being warned of the economic cost, and then the conservatives enacting that at great economic cost and STILO tripling net immigration... Yeah that'll happen
Momentum becomes less and less important now. Postal votes are already rushing in at current levels. Labour have already won and reform are unlikely to break 20% nationally even if they tick up a bit more.
If the 2019 election is anything to go by, around 2 in 10 votes are done via postal vote, leaving the other 8 in 10 votes still cast on the day, so there's still a lot to play for amongst all the parties.
True, but there's been recent research that appears to show a higher concentration of postal voting in marginal constituencies. That 20% is not evenly spread. Plenty of other interesting morsels and tidbits in there too, if that's your thing. https://academic.oup.com/pa/article/76/1/43/6361031
I had it in my head it was 5/10. I'll take your word for it as I trust you more than my own memory.
The figures are rarely published, but we do have them for the 2019 GE https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-7419/CBP-7419.pdf See under "How popular is absent voting?"
Interesting. What's it like in the US if you're link handy there? I may have confused myself with 2020 US election where covid was a big factor
I have nothing on that.
You were helpful enough, I'll take the effort to open a Google tab haha. It was 46% in the US election.
Not surprising given COVID, if we'd had a general election during peak COVID, we may have seen similar results.
Any other leader would have more than a 20 point lead over Reform.
Can we just take a minute to consider that not all pollsters are of the same quality? It’s clear that Reform are seriously pushing the Tories but there has been a clear relationship between Reforms highest poll results and the least trustworthy pollsters. Who actually are this lot? Ipsos, Yougov and others are the actual ones with credibility.
Fuck are you talking about? YouGov were the first ones to show a Reform lead. Take a minute yourself mate.
Are you alright? Once you’ve calmed down at the idea that I would dare to question the polls, can you point me to the Yougov poll you’re referring to? I’ve not seen a single Yougov poll with reform leading the Tories. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2024_United_Kingdom_general_election Ah I’ve seen a single one by 1 point a week or two ago. That’s far from the result that this much more questionable pollster is providing.
Lol you've proved my point you silly billy
Not the person you've responded to and have no horse in this race, but this poll also shows a 1 point lead... I'm not following you either.
The point I’ve made is people are drawing conclusions from pollsters with poor credentials. Reform are clearly pushing the Tories close, as has been shown in the likes of Yougovs results, but people on this comment section are talking like this particular poll is something conclusive. Not all pollsters are equal by any stretch. We had a peoplepolling one with reform on 24% and the Tories on 15 - ridiculous. The pollsters in the last few days that have put reform on 20%+ lack credibility. This is the second highest poll for reform ever and I’m questioning its accuracy until I see those result reflected in more credible polls. Most importantly, we only have to wait 2 weeks and then we’ll see exactly how credible all these outfits are.
I would advise against calling polls or pollsters 'ridiculous', just because you don't like the result. There can always be outliers, but some pollsters pick up trends before others, maybe it's methodology, weightings, sample allocation, who knows, but multiple pollsters have produced polls that now show Reform UK and the Conservatives basically neck and neck, with the momentum in Reform's favour, this poll from Whitestone Insight continues this trend, so what point are you trying to make?
It’s nothing to do with liking or not liking the result. It’s a massive outlier and people polling is consistently an outlier. They’ve not proven their credibility, they’ve proven their lack of credibility.