Jeremy Corbyn

Our Leader?

One of the most telling things from the referendum was the Remainers remark, 'they did not know what they were voting for'. But can this be so? Well yes and no! For example the Labour party manifesto for the last general election was over 40 pages long and who read all of that and the other ones? But for the Brexit referendum the basics, as opposed to detail, were not at all complicated by dint of the binary option. It's true the issues were complicated but they always are and you might have thought it was the responsibility of the voter to learn the rudiments. But many Remainers who over a year ago did not know their 'single market' from their 'customs union' and are still shaky continue to complain about the result. In the time since then there have been many changes. In Turkey Erdogan has elevated himself to a very lofty position that does not look good in a democracy but we did not hear, 'they did not know' then. In fact it does seem that the supporters of Erdogan wanted an Ottoman bully. While in France the people did not know who to vote for so there was a low turnout for Macron.

Here in the UK Jeremy Corbyn and Labour lost the General Election but like to behave as if they had won and there is help for them from the media to do this from the usual suspects.

Long ago and far away Corbyn gets arrested!
In May of this year Ed Miliband and the Labour Party lost the general election and Miliband resigned. It's not fair to pin all the blame on him but this has to be the starting point for looking at the win by Jeremy Corbyn of the Labour party leadership election. Miliband did however, and perhaps unintentionally, do both Corbyn and his party a favour by introducing the £3 membership idea.

Some estimates say membership is rising at a faster rate than at any time since the second world war when Clement Attlee came to power and now stands at 554,272 members and we know that 251,417 voted for Corbyn. Naturally the Corbynistas will say 'if only our man had been in charge in May'. But it's not that simple. Corbyn came in late to the contest with a bit of a fanfare from some in his party who wanted the election hustings to brighten up. They hoped he would swing the contest towards the other candidates but the opposite happened.

But the original idea at least showed a bit feeling for the public, if you look at the votes for the other three candidates they only total 171,247, without Corbyn the interest shown in the contest would have been reduced. Second placed Andy Burnham was simply revolting, being all that was wrong with not only Labour but also in UK politics generally.

Douglas Carswell

The general election result. Some seasoned political analysts, who had the benefit of experience got it right, so they tell us, and could see the result for David Cameron coming. On the other hand it might be like guessing the weight of the cake at a fund-raising event, someone gets the prize, always, even if it is a guess! Then there was the skewed system that gave the SNP all those seats but UKIP just one. This problem is admitted by the Electoral Commission but it remains to be seen what will follow. There is also the turmoil for the losers as new leaders are selected for the opposition parties. Let's start with the SNP 'victory', which like the result for Cameron is not quite what it seems.

Prior to the election Hugo Rifkind did a good job of explaining what he sees in the SNP approach. It's all very well constantly spoiling for a fight, as they do, but for the fact that you cannot win them all. Alex Salmond has gone from ex-leader to attack dog, his comments following the death of Charles Kennedy have done neither himself or his party any favours.