I've been taking a break from the politics forums. Gets a bit much after a while...

The Labour leadership election works like this. Candidates announce an intention to stand and have to secure a minimum number of nominations from sitting MPs in order to make it onto the ballot (Dan will be able to tell you how many, but I believe it's in the region of 15%). Those that pass the threshold then go into a vote among the party membership on a single transferrable vote basis. On this occasioin there are 4 candidates who got enough nominations. Interestingly, one of these is Jeremy Corbyn, who's a member of the hard left faction of the party and only got onto the ballot after a number of MPs who are not actually his supporters agreed to nominate him so as to ensure that the left was properly represented in the 'debate'. They're now regretting that decision because Corbyn has seen a surge in popularity that may even result in him winning the leadership. This would be potentially catastrophic for Labour because Corbyn is a completely unreconstructed socialist with views that would have been slightly out of date back in the early 80s. He also believes in unilateral nuclear disarmament and is a known supporter of Hezbollah and Hamas, as well as just about every other terrorist group going. It says a lot about how uninspiring the other candidates have been that Corbyn has shot to prominence like this, although in truth he almost certainly won't win. The Daily Telegraph has been running a campaign to persuade Tories to join the Labour party (which can be done for only £3) so they can vote for Corbyn and ruin Labour's chances at the next election.

The Tories operate their election in a slightly different way. They have a a vote among MPs which whittles the field down to two candidates, who then go forward to the wider electorate. In theory this should serve to weed out any hopeless candidates in advance, but it hasn't always worked out that way. The same system resulted in Iain Duncan Smith getting elected, only to be unceremoniously dumped a couple of years later when he proved he couldn't handle the job.

sounds like the Conservative Party method allows for more "intrigue" (like a palace coup, almost). If I'm reading that right.

Soo... thoughts on Corbyn ?

Sassenach wrote:Soo... thoughts on Corbyn ?

better that he won by a landslide than narrowly - the PLP need to see this as a wake up call.

Well I guess it's better that he also won with actual party members, not just the £3 brigade. It's still going to be a catastrophe though. Cooper would have been a far better choice. Corbyn will probably enjoy a brief bounce, which happens for all new leaders, and then the relentless focus on his foreign policy positions will start to sink in with the wider electorate. He might eventually drop his opposition to NATO membership, his kneejerk anti-Americanism and maybe even his commitment to unilateral nuclear disarmament, but I doubt it. Even if he does he can't shift his established track record of sharing platforms with terrorists and anti-semites. It's going to hurt Labour every day that he remains leader.

The Corbynistas who are currently dominating the Guardian blogs are sounding more like the cybernats with every passing day. Current talk is dominated by the desire for a grand purge of the Blairites (or the Red Tories, as they're more commonly known). I doubt that Corbyn himself would be too happy to sanction that kind of behaviour, but can he control his people ? The boundary changes that are coming up will mean that an awful lot of Labour MPs will have to face re-selection even if the wilder ideas of mandatory re-selection that some of the extremists are pushing get shelved. This could easily turn into a bloodbath.

So the Labour party leadership has gone from Labour centrist (Blair) to virulant socialist...nice.

And when you say "re-selection" you're actually talking about "nomination" to the general election ballot.

"virulant".

Sigh.

Sorry?

Sassenach wrote: He might eventually drop his opposition to NATO membership, his kneejerk anti-Americanism and maybe even his commitment to unilateral nuclear disarmament, but I doubt it. Even if he does he can't shift his established track record of sharing platforms with terrorists and anti-semites. It's going to hurt Labour every day that he remains leader.

Can he even do that. It is my understanding from what I am reading that if he does that, he will piss off his supporters to no end. Sort of like the way our ultra leftist faction feels that it has been abandoned by Obama.

I have also read that Corbyn may have a problem creating a shadow cabinet because a number of Labour MP's have publically announced a refusal to serve for/with him. What effect will that have on the Labour Party in general and governing the UK in particular?

Can he even do that. It is my understanding from what I am reading that if he does that, he will piss off his supporters to no end. Sort of like the way our ultra leftist faction feels that it has been abandoned by Obama.

That may potentially happen, but maybe not. Most of the people who voted for Corbyn so enthusiastically are not necessarily fellow hard leftists. Think of them as the left equivalent to the Donald Trump supporters and you'll get the idea. He somehow managed to tap into the anti-politics mood and rode a wave of twitter-driven enthusiasm all the way to the top job because he's 'authentic' and offers 'a new style of politics'. While it is inevitable that these voters will get disillusioned when they realise that the new style of politics is a figment of their imaginations, it doesn't necessarily follow that they're all so hung up on nuclear disarmament or leaving NATO that they'll actually care if Corbyn changes his position.

The Trump comparison is a good one I think.Both Trump and Corbyn have tapped into a sort of amorphous anger at the establishment and managed to ride it for a surprisingly long time, given what such massively flawed candidates they both are. Now just think what might have happened if the Republican primaries had all been done and dusted in only 6 weeks... Doesn't really bear thinking about does it ? That's essentially what just happened to Labour.

I have also read that Corbyn may have a problem creating a shadow cabinet because a number of Labour MP's have publically announced a refusal to serve for/with him. What effect will that have on the Labour Party in general and governing the UK in particular?

Yes, there were loads of them who refused to serve, but he still managed to scrape a team together. The problem he has is that there's only about a dozen Labour MPs who share his views, so even with all the Blairites who stepped aside he's still left with a shadow cabinet which largely disagrees with most of Corbyn's ideas and will no doubt seek to actively undermine him every chance they get. It didn't help either that he was so disorganised. He's known for at least 3 weeks that he was going to win the leadership election, which was enough time to have put a backroom team in place so he could hit the ground running. Instead he made no preparations whatsoever and his first week in the job was an utter shambles.

Well, two things.

Firstly he had always said he wanted a broad cabinet, not just one made up of Campaign Group members.

Secondly, I think a lot has been down to lack of preparation, and also some measure of wishing to "spoil" among the centre of the party (it takes a special kind of hard-nosed bastard to succeed as a paid party official, and if there is one thing they hate, it's when the members don't accept their place (which is to pay up, work for elections and back the professionals).

http://metro.co.uk/2015/09/24/new-vegan ... o-5406124/

Well that should go down well with the farmers... I realise that people in rural areas don't vote Labour anyway, but you'd still like to think that the job of the shadow farming minister is not to call for the destruction of the livestock industry.

I'm guessing she'll be told to keep her views on halal slaughterhouses to herself, there are actual votes to lose there.

If I may interject, what's the purpose of a "shadow cabinet"?

JimHackerMP wrote:If I may interject, what's the purpose of a "shadow cabinet"?

basically, the idea is that the main opposition has a set of spokespeople to "shadow" their government equivalents. All non-government parties will have spokespeole to cover the government department briefs, although usually only the largest opposition party or two have enough MPs to have a shadow for each Cabinet member.

The usual intention is that if there is an election and the opposition win, the shadow cabinet would then become the new cabinet (although not always as sometimes MPs lose seats even when their party wins, or there is a coalition which means having other party MPs put in positions, and sometimes a new PM could decide to shuffle things on election).

In the meantime, they tend to be the main foil to the Cabinet minister in debates etc.