Islington North Goes to the Polls! Which Way are You Going to Go

Patso

Just seen the ballot paper for 12 December - where's the Socialist Party of Great Britain?

Patso

On limited turnout looks like aa close run thing for JC

Ali

I am wondering how much of a marginal seat Hornsey and Wood green may have become. Lots of remainders around here although I wonder how much free broadband might swing it

grenners

.......there's more than one Conservative voter on this forum which is a surprise to me. I thought this area was completely comprised of anti democrats and communists.

vetski

There are some Kippers in the neighbourhood, I discovered at the last election. That was a surprise!

rikki

I'm very happy I just brought the vote neck and neck between 'Fuck this' and the Tories. I'll say no more.

LukeG

Corbyn is likely to win in Stroud green and Hornsey, but it's not necessarily a glowing endorsement, more an anti Boris vote. I don't know how anyone can defend his policies, they are completely hairbrained. For me it's the Lib Dems or Cons, no other sensible choice on Brexit.

Scruffy

The conservatives were vehemently against the creation of the NHS from the outset, and ever since have been determined to fuck it up so we all have to pay for private medicine.

LukeG

I think you'll find that neu Labour started that. Anyway, if you look across the EU, especially France and Germany, they've got a mix of public / private provisions, and you can't say they're in a bad spot healthcare wise.

cmo

@LukeG Labour will win in Wood Green and Hornsey because the majority of voters back Labour, Boris or no Boris.

Ali

Boris hasn't got traction around here.. I think the seat will move very much back into the LibDems direction taking it back to being a marginal.

Patso

As a lifelong labour supporter it pains me to admit I just cannot vote for JC since he became party leader. This has only been amplified since the Brexit poll as I am an unabashed remoaner. It is a bit of a surprise that Green and Lib Dem are on the ballot - I thought they had a remoan pact going on?!

LukeG

@cmo yes, I wasn't disagreeing with you there, I was only stating the fact that it's a Brexit election. In Stroud Green and Hornsey (as well as in Islington North) it's likely that Labour will win, as you're right Cons or Libs don't have traction in big numbers. However, doesn't mean that the picture is different elsewhere in the country where people are much less blinkered and are likely to ditch labour, hold their noses, and vote in favour of Libs and Cons.

I mean, the biggest question on the table is Brexit and Labour are fannying around with abolishing private schools and nationalising BT; you've got to admit it's a bit naff.

LukeG

@Ali are there more marginal lab/lib seats outside of Stroud Green and Hornsey? (in the rest of Haringey)

Ali

I think I am agreeing with Patso and probably lots of other folks will feel the same.

miss annie

How anyone could vote for Corbyn is beyond me. The borough with almost 100% Remain vote voting for a committed - as much as he is committed to anything but knocking about with people whose faces were on student's t-shirts in the 80s - Leaver is utterly mad. If you didn't think he was away with the fairies before then surely the broadband debacle has revealed his woeful inadequacies at even trying to put forward policies based in the real world.
I actually don't think he wants to be Prime Minister. He is seemingly purposely scuppering his, and therefore Labour's, chances by pulling any old bunny out of the hat and chucking it into the crowd. He seems to enjoy being leader of a mob of chanting believers rather than having to make sensible decisions and rational policies. He reminds me very much of Trump.
Nothing in this world would make me vote for Boris and by default the odious Mogg.
Green for me.

Patso

JC gets a kicking on www.stroudgreen.org - I assume he was a better constituency MP than a leader of his party? I think on a national level it's going to pretty much unchanged which is depressing.

marko

In many North London constituencies, the Labour party could stick a red rosette on a multi-orifice blow-up sheep sex-doll and still stand a good chance of winning. In Islington South, however, Emily Thornberry is clearly rattled.

Scruffy

It's very simple why anyone would vote for Corbyn: The Labour Party is supposed to be a socialist party. Corbyn is the first socialist leading it since Michael Foot! For those who believe in socialism, this is the chance of a lifetime.

Patso

As they say history has a habit of repeating itself. Whilst JC may appeal to a section of the British public, its not a big enough section to wrest power from the Tories. As mentioned I think save for the odd seat + or - parliament is going to be as hung as before.

grenners

The bookies are favouring a Tory majority. I think labour is going to lose votes to Libs, Tories and Brexit. This is the end of Corbyn.

HolbornFox

I know lots of people that believe in Corbyn and essentially see him as a way of improving just about everything, the problem of course is getting anything through parliament and the Lords anyway.

What would happen if the PM or a front bench member lost their seat, can you be in an opposition seat and still be the PM?

LukeG

I don't think that Labour will lose many of it's London seats - there are a lot of staunch supporters (same for cons)... I don't think the cons or the libs can take a majority away from Labour in places like Islington North. However, I feel like there will be much smaller margins than before.

Tory majority is another tough one; the leave seats that the cons are targeting in the North will have split votes between cons and brexit party, enough for labour to hold. Then there's the phenomenon of remain alliances, which can take con swing seats in remain areas - so it's going to be an exciting election!

If anything, I'm actually happy that this is all happening. It's been a while since there have been earthquakes like this, and it's healthy to keep MPs on their toes, their duty is to us, not their careers!

cmo

For what it's worth, I will vote Labour, but not with the same gusto as in previous years. Labour are in a no-win situation in terms of brexit, the vast majority of their seats voted leave (the inverse being true for the Lib Dems, thus their aggressive remain position).

The Labour Party has multiple sides, to generalise - traditional working class voters in the north, new labour in the south and the momentum group in the younger vote. All with relatively opposing opinions on most subjects. Going in on leave would alienate one group, going in on remain would alienate another - both resulting in a Tory landslide.

Aside from the puzzle Corbyn finds himself in, he's also a bad politician in the literal sense that he's bad at politics. He uses nuance, shades of grey - all great aspects needed in 2019, but unfortunately the political landscape being as polarised as it is, nuance fails against somebody shouting 'get brexit done' or 'stop brexit'.

They want to win, of course, but in my opinion, they're fucked any which way. If Corbyn loses, and I like the guy, I hope he resigns and Kier Starmer comes in, somebody who can appeal to the 'broad church' of the party.

All said and done, the election may throw up some interesting results, but none of it really makes any difference if you vote in this area - due to a lack of proportional representation, which is the icing on the cake of a miserable situation.

Happy Tuesday!

cmo

...and sorry, not to bang on, but the reason Labour are desperately trying to change the argument away from brexit - with broadband and whatever else they come up with today, is for the reason above, if they can't change the subject over Brexit, we'll have Boris for four more years, with a majority, with Rees-Mogg, Gove and Cummings shaping policy.

Vote whatever way you want in this area, Labour will win but be careful of pushing the Lib Dem/Green vote elsewhere, the next Tory government will make Cameron and Osbourne look like softy liberals. In my opinion..

LukeG

That's fair enough and I agree with most of your points. But at the end of the day;

- Taking 10% of (big) business to give it to workers, sounds nice, actually theft.
- Nationalising BT to give internet to the masses, sounds ok, probably completely useless, and costs a disgusting amount of money for next to no gain.
- Abolishing private schools... who really gives a toss?

And that's not even going into details about the immigration policy, Breixt policy and the other £billions that come from no-where, including the green fund money.

I would be happy if Corbyn was honest and admitted that we'd ALL need to pay more taxes. I can deal with that. But when it's literally all BS economic policy, he's making BoJo, literally a walking joke, look reasonable.

I mean, BoJo made a reasonable concession about funding the NHS, by not reducing corporate tax - a day after 'nationalise the internet' announcement. Who sounds more reasonable?

I'm saying this as a lifelong lefty. It's a mess.

LukeG

I would add about nuance... Brexit is the key point right now, regardless of what we'd like it to be, or what we wish it to be. Labour has failed to make a stance on the vision they have for the country if we remain, or if we leave. That's a massive failure.

You're other point about Labour being split between different demographics, that's usually fine, but there's nothing actually uniting these groups, who have fundamental differences in the way they view the world. If you're going to be honest:

- Younger city voters, generally well off and middle class, might be renting, but are usually pretty 'woke' and widely pro identity politics, economic policy wise, don't really know, as they probably think £30k is breadline income, so any more taxation and they'll be fleeing to the Lib Dems.

- Traditional working class voters, in, or out of cities, tend to be socially conservative to some extent and generally not 'woke'. Want fairness in the system economically, but are still pretty sceptical of modern identity politics, EU, free movement & the green new deal.

- The minority vote, mostly city based, generally overlooked as Labour can pretty much exploit their loyalty, if you're going to be brutally honest. Also more socially conservative and definitely not woke.n a generation or so, will probably be voting conservatives (check out West London for Blue Labour) as their economic prospects improve and the conservatives improve their image amongst those groups.

N19lurker

I'm in Islington North and will happily be voting for Corbyn. Labour have some excellent policies - NHS in-house manufacture of drugs will save huge amount of money over the longer term, and free dental check-ups will also provide longer-term savings. Some v good stuff on investment in green infrastructure too and the lifelong learning (National Education Service concept) . The free fibre wifi announcement has had a mixed response. Whilst I wouldn't necessarily call it the biggest priority (the free element at least), there is a lot of sense in nationalising the Openreach arm of BT which is not fit for purpose and holding us back. This approach is one adopted in a number of other countries too, so its not as revolutionary as been reported. On the whole, and whilst the manifesto hasn't been released just yet, this policy platform is the best this country has seen for decades. Do I trust our electorate to actually look at what policies each party is proposing, or will they just go for 'get Brexit done'? Remains to be seen.

I'm not really in favour of the idea of the debates - the 'presidential' tone jars with our parliamentary democracy. Nevertheless, tonight's debate ought to help Corbyn. When majority of mainstream media portrays you as an evil anti-semitic, communist, getting your point across to the public unfiltered without media spin is a valuable opportunity.

I've been frustrated by Labour's stance on Brexit, but the policy they have eventually adopted on a confirmatory referendum seems the most sensible route out of the current mess. Revoking Article 50 may get us out of the groundhog day of endless cliffedges and extensions but shouldn't be seen as the end - it really does have to be put back to the people in a referendum.

As for Swinson, I judge her on her voting record, which isn't pretty for someone leading a supposedly progressive party - check out 'They Work for you' website.

cmo

@LukeG not to go point by point but...

Big business not paying tax looks a lot like theft to me.

Sweden’s broadband scheme in the early 00’s has created viable links in business between rural communities and big cities.

Private schools, I give a toss. If you have children in a good primary, as I do and see the powerful effect of driven parents on the school, it seems shameful that a significant proportion of those children then go private for secondary and that parental force is taken away from the system. Not to mention the more lofty goals of equality, privilege and meritocracies.

Look, It’s all opinion and we’re agreeing over some of it and If you want to vote Boris, do it, it’s the joy of democracy. But maybe.. maybe have a look at what the conservatives have done over the last decade. Count the police in Stroud green (2), ask a teacher what they want for Christmas (supplies for their classes) and maybe you’ll come to a different conclusion. It ain’t all brexit.

LukeG

@cmo

Big business should obviously pay tax... not at all the same as literally taking 10% of their capital to give it to workers that's actually theft. Tax business how you want and stop tax evasion, that's different to state appropriation, you've got to see that?

Sweden's broadband rollout, from what I can see is a public/private partnership with debt financing, again that's completely different than literally spending £100bn to nationalise a company. Now, there are arguments that BT Openreach needs a kick up the proverbial to rollout better internet and faster, but why throw the baby out with the bathwater?

Again with the private schools, I went to an absolute shithole of a school where teachers got desks thrown at them. The problem wasn't with the local grammar. The problem is with the school itself being shite, managed badly, teachers underpaid, low expectations and crap parents. The state schools need to get better, you don't just abolish good schools and educational choice because the state schools are crap. The only thing that happens is more postcode lotteries where the rich parents buy a house near a good state school if they can't get into the 'better' ex private school down the road. I've lived in France, they mostly don't have private schools, because the state schools are generally top notch, but you know what happens in the poor areas? The rich/middle class kids just get bussed away from the neighbourhood and you have exactly the same situation as in the UK, poor kids in the shite school, rich kids in the good school. Practically it's also a bummer as where you going to find the extra £billions to pay for the new schools and assets you've just onboarded?

When we look at austerity (EU obligated after 2008 if you hadn't noticed) there have been losses to police and school funding, there's no denying that, but at the end of the day, you don't rectify that by ruining the economy with more and more and more borrowed money where the tax receipt gets handed to your kids.

Arkady

"Big business not paying tax looks a lot like theft to me"

Quite. There's a big appetite to remedy the massive structural failing of globalisation that allows these huge companies to off-shore their profits. It may be legal, but it's immoral, and a major factor behind the fact that despite being a richer country than ever we're unable to afford public services that we could adequately fund in the past. The failure to tackle this is an orthodoxy, a choice, and it's good to see it being challenged.

The idea that the broadband policy is insane or achievable is a great example of a gross failure to look beyond our own borders. South Korea did exactly the same thing, and they are hardly a socialist utopia. We need to ask why several countries on the continent have 80% fiber broadband and we only have 8%. The core reason being that the Tories vetoed the fiber roll-out plans in the 80s as they wanted to follow the (disastrous) US example of privatising AT&T and leaving it to the market. A classic example of market failure. Private broadband infrastructure is about as sensible as private road infrastructure - demonstrably more expensive and vastly less efficient than when undertaken by a state monopoly. And I say that as someone who doesn't think there are many areas where state monopolies work, and as someone who broadly despairs of the contemporary Labour Party.

Regardless, Corbyn isn't going to get a majority, and so we're unlikely to see any of these policies implemented. What is a *possibility* (given how local polling is showing much more volatility and tactical voting than the national swings are, and how far behind the Tories are compared to 2017 which didn't exactly go well for them) is that the Tories are denied a majority and can no longer reply on the DUP's help. At that point we might see Corbyn (or another Labour figure if he resigns, which I suspect he will do anyway due to health reasons, officially or otherwise) form a caretaker government to put a customs union & single market Brexit Vs remain back to the people. That's the best case scenario form my point of view, but all roads are fraught with danger.

And all of this is fiddling while the ecosystem burns. An insane distraction from the existential threats of climate change and ecosystem collapse now ramping up all around us. Suffice to say I'm despairing somewhat.

Someone should drop a giant squid on New York.