The local election results – what the mainstream media don’t tell us
JVL Introduction
Another Angry Voice blogger, Thomas G Clark, takes a perceptive look at the local election results in England.
A dreadful outcome for the Tories, no doubt, but not the result Labour was hoping for or the success it has tried to claim.
It was, for course, an extremely good result for the Greens and for the Lib Dems who picked up over half the seats the Tories lost between them.
As Clark suggests, “The Greens have demonstrated that it’s possible to take on the Tories in their own backyard and win, not by imitating them, but by offering a genuine alternative.”
And, of course, Labour did appallingly against candidates it had recently purged, particularly in Liverpool and Leicester but also elsewhere – something the mainstream media conveniently fail to report.
This article was originally published by Another Angry Voice on Sun 7 May 2023. Read the original here.
As usual there's been a lot of drivel talked about the local election results...
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Accuracy Correction.please Alison Carpenter was not previously a councillor. Labour did not have any seats in Windsor
Much too vague in almost every direction, the characterisation of what Starmer is mainly attempting is misdirected and finally the thrust of the argument, green shoots for soft left whatever is a triumph of hope over reality. Yes some nice little local results like in Liverpool but significant, not nearly. Fundamentally Starmer’s is expecting/hoping to win on the back of Tory toxcity tories continuing to stay home, The thrust is to ensure that those who drifted to Johnson don’t have reason to cease to be alienated from the Tories. Fundamental to this is Labour presenting as a brexiteer party. If you are looking for straws in the wind. Take Leicester City. Starmer intervened heavily to disrupt opposition to the Labour Mayor. Net effect is the Mayor vote fell from 51.4k to 35k every body picked up a bit in the wreckage but the ‘left’ least and the main consequence was that Tory vote revived quite a bit from 14.5k to 26.4k. Reflect in associated votes. If this proves anything it is that Starmer’s strategy of laying low was better for him.
A few corrections are needed, not least the belief that the Greens are a radical alternative party. In Brighton where they ran the Council for the past 4 years they were heavily defeated, going from 20 to 7 seats. In power they were anything but radical, supporting e.g. the IHRA.
Internationally we have the German Green Party as the most pro-NATO and Ireland the GP props up 2 conservative parties – Fine Gael and Fine Fail keeping out Sinn Fein.
I welcome the victory of Jo Bird but that does not deflect from the fact that when in power the Greens always move to the Right.
The victory of socialist independents in Liverpool and elsewhere it welcome and the key question is now we can use this to build an alternative to Starmer and his reactionary Labour Party
OPINION PIECE
There’s an obvious confusion
Between online pornography and bourgeois democracy
Both deal in stereotypes and reach predictable conclusions
Oppression and submission are depressingly fundamental
But one is sometimes capable of releasing inhibitions
The other is Keir Starmer
Comparing local to general elections demands caution but this does not look good for Labour’ s leadership. The claim of final victory over Corbynism does not stand up. The vote share of 35% in 2023 was higher than the 32.1% in 2019 but still well behind the 40% in 2017.
The Conservative vote is more interesting, falling from 43.6% in 2019 to 26% now. This suggests that about 4 in 10 people who voted Conservative in 2019 are no longer prepared to do so. Where did these votes go? The initial appearance is that they did not go mostly to Labour, despite Starmer’s desperate attempts to attract them. The Conservative losses were much greater than the Labour gains.
The reality is more complex. Labour probably is gaining votes on the right but losing almost as many on the left. One may question whether the Greens and the Liberal Democrats really are left wing parties but if people are voting for them because they are perceived to be left of Labour this is significant in itself.
The big problem for Labour is that its losses are likely to be more permanent than its gains. It is hard to believe that the Conservatives will not recover at least some support before the next General Election. There is no reason however why people who have abandoned Labour because of its move to the right should return now, particularly since Starmer has made it absolutely clear that he does not actually want their votes. His message ‘The door is open. If you do not like it you can leave’ may look bold and challenging when addressed to party members but it will also be seen by voters and in that context it is simply stupid.
Concerning Tory Losses vs Labour Gains – there is a theory that
many Tory voters stayed at home.
Of those stay-at-home Tories, of those who vote in the next GE
some will return to voting Tory and some will vote for other parties.
I agree with Rory O’Kelly. I cannot see undecided voters deciding to vote Labour for why should they bother to vote for a Party which does not welcome their votes?
Policy-wise, Green or Eco-socialists are influential in the Green Party England and Wales, even if electoral strategies at local level concentrate on ‘bread & butter’ issues, naturally, where councillors can make a difference. And not being very “tribal”, unlike Labour.
When reading the above comments, I’m always cautious of folks rhetoric, making claims without citation of any verifiable evidence to back them up. One should never conflate opinion with an assertion of fact. By all means assert facts, if one can support with a clear citation of evidence, but for goodness sakes, please identify one’s own view, as merely one’s own “opinion”, otherwise.