Posts Tagged ‘Clacton’

Labour now has a northern discomfort to add to its southern discomfort

22/10/2014, 12:13:01 PM

by Rob Marchant

For some time, people have spoken about Labour’s “southern discomfort”: its seeming difficulty in making any headway in the critical marginals of the South-East.

As the dust settled after the by-elections two weeks ago, it became clear that the net results were as bad, if not worse, for Labour as they were for the Tories, who had never really expected to hold onto Clacton anyway. But in Heywood and Middleton, Labour only narrowly held on to a seat in its northern, industrial heartlands.

Labour’s conclusion seems to have been a vague realisation that “we need to do something about immigration”. We might be thankful that, so far at least, it has not turned into a sop to the dumb, emotional argument of the populist right, that migration is generally is some kind of social and economic bad, when the reverse is true.

But it is also tempting to apply a nationally-uniform explanation for UKIP’s electoral success, where it does not fit. That is, it is important to look at the North and the South separately.

The caricature of UKIP is that it is gaining votes from Little Englanders, who traditionally have a mistrust of foreigners and Europe dating back, quite probably, to 1066. And there is a lot of truth in that: in the South.

In Clacton, where UKIP won its first by-election, the percentage of the population which is 92.8% “White British”. While one imagines that enough of its voters might have sufficient mistrust of immigrants from outside Europe, as well as inside it, to vote UKIP, the “outside Europe” part signals a mistrust largely born of ignorance. By definition: there is clearly not a great variety of skin colour to be seen on Clacton’s Victorian sea-front.

However, in the old mill, steel and coal towns of the M62 corridor, the story is different, many have large Asian populations. Voters in different communities form opinions of others not through ignorance, but through the knowledge of living side-by-side, in what have sometimes become parallel, rather than integrated, societies.

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Where will we be in May 2015?

13/10/2014, 07:07:21 AM

by Jonathan Todd

Amid the fierce urgency of now, I look at possibilities beyond next May.

Labour majority

“Politics in Britain today,” according to a statement from Neal Lawson, Compass chair, “is not really about UKIP but about the failure of Labour in particular to present a coherent, desirable and feasible alternative to the Tories.” This was broadly the argument made by Atul Hatwal after the European elections and Ranjit Sidhu after the recent by-elections. As Sidhu was writing, John McTernan was bemoaning our politics’ lack of “lift, hope, ambition and above all life”. After the European election results, he told us that they meant Ed Miliband would be prime minister, while after recent by-elections, he laments that Labour is “in deep, deep trouble”.

McTernan’s seeming evolving view might denote the diminishing possibility of a Labour majority, while the repeated references to a lack of hope – straddling all from Compass to Progress – reminds us that many see little prospect of their lives improving. The major parties also suffer deficits of authenticity – widely presumed to be insincere and ineffectual – and public money – the fiscal position constrains resources to build hope where it is most lacking.

To secure a Labour majority, the deficits in hope, authenticity and public money must be overcome to not lose traditional supporters in Scotland to the SNP and in the north of England to UKIP, while gaining Conservative inclined voters in marginal seats in the south. Labour majority depends upon sufficient numbers of these disparate groups seeing the party as the bridge to a better tomorrow.

Reading Luke Akehurst suggests we seem reluctant to even sketch this bridge in Rochester and Strood, and does little to dispel Mark Wallace’s charge that Labour is “soft-pedalling” there. “Our mentality this close to general election ought to be that we are an unstoppable force,” Akehurst correctly notes, “not a party too scared of Nigel Farage to take him on in a seat we held until the last election”. As dispiriting as Labour appear in Rochester and Strood, Wallace is right that this by-election and Heywood and Middleton prompt resource challenges.

Does Labour have the capacity to successfully defend northern seats that UKIP will target and to robustly challenge for marginal seats in the south?

A recent article in the New York Times suggests that Labour fundraising may be improved by learning from ActBlue, an organisation raising funds for Democratic candidates. Whether this advance and others that Labour require comes quickly enough to secure a majority remains to be seen.

Labour as largest party in hung parliament

Martin Kettle reports that Labour has “a hard core of backbenchers [who] would … regard a coalition [with the Liberal Democrats] as a betrayal and would work against it”. Equally, he quotes a senior Labour source, “we haven’t thought [minority government] through”. Even short of coalition, such a government would probably require a supply and confidence arrangement with the Liberal Democrats – an option which Uncut’s sources say the Liberal Democrats are disinclined toward, seeing it as carrying all the costs of coalition without the benefits, posing another headache for Miliband.

Conservative majority   (more…)

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Clacton is a warning: unless Labour gives hope to all of Britain, the politics of fear will grow unchecked

10/10/2014, 12:30:57 PM

by Ranjit Sidhu

Although Mr Carswell in victory this morning stated that UKIP must be “for all Britain and all Britons: first and second generation as much as every other,“ those who actually voted for Mr Carswell made it very clear their vote was not just a general protest vote; they voted UKIP because it had the “best policies on the particular issues they care about” and foremost amongst those was immigration.

“I like their policies of getting rid of all our immigrants. They’re coming over here and we’re keeping them,” says one

Mr Denham a supporter of the Mr Carswell and UKIP mentioned he moved to Clacton to get “out of the East End”, stating:

“There are lots of people like me here who moved to Clacton for that reason. I wouldn’t want to suggest we should eradicate everyone with brown skin, but this is our country.”

That the UKIP policy on migration control is centred around the “white” East European immigration shows that the UKIP rise is opening up a dormant, ugly wound in British society which many of us had hoped was ancient history.

“We’ve voted Labour before, then swayed towards the Tories, but immigration is becoming a problem in Clacton,” says Mr Slogget

In the 2011 census of the 85,359 who are residents of the Clacton constituency 97.4% (83,176) were white with 95.4% white and British (81,272), with 30 from Pakistani heritage and 35 from an Arabic  background.

The almost total homogenous nature of Clacton is even clearer when looking at the country of birth of the Clacton residents, with 95.7% born in the UK and 93.9% in England itself.  With 589, or 0.7 of one percent coming from the recently joined EU countries surely UKIP’s warning of unfettered immigration from these countries would seem like the least relevant policy for these residents?

So what is going on?

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Carswell’s defection is good for Ukip, bad for the Tories but could be best of all for Labour

29/08/2014, 09:30:05 AM

by Joe Coyne

I wonder if we’ll look back on Douglas Carswell’s resignation as the moment Labour won the general election.

His constituency is ripe Ukip territory. Old, white, not particularly well off.

If he gets in – and the bookies have made him odds on – it will show prospective Ukip voters that a vote for them is not necessarily a wasted vote. As a result we could be looking at a subtle but significant shift in the way  voters perceive Ukip.

While they’ve racked up plenty of support in recent local and European elections, the reality is that people tend to take their vote more seriously when they’re electing the next Prime Minister, rather than their local councillor.

But a breakthrough in Clacton could give them huge momentum and convince sympathisers that Ukip really are a serious option when it all gets serious next May and show a Ukip vote may well give you a Ukip MP.

Ukip have still got to win, and a lot can happen between now and polling day. Much will depend on Tory strategy but recent evidence suggests they’ll get it wrong and their tactics will make a Ukip victory more, rather than less likely.

What the Tories should do is position themselves as the anti-UKIP alliance; select a moderate, mildly Eurosceptic candidate and attack Ukip’s extremism and their competence by exposing the shallowness of their policies. That way they could draw in voters from other parties.

There’s no reason why the Tories can’t echo Labour’s warnings about the unfairness of a flat tax or the danger they pose to the NHS.

However, what I suspect they will do is foolishly play the game squarely on Ukip’s territory. Nigel Farage will want the by-election to be about Europe, immigration and welfare and the Tories will probably select a candidate and trumpet policies that they think will ‘appeal’ to Ukip voters, not realising that it’s a political dead end.

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