tinker Posted February 21 VT Supporter Share Posted February 21 Farage is my worry Tory members would choose me as leader, says Nigel Farage Quote Nigel Farage has said Conservative members would choose him as their leader over Rishi Sunak, after Reform UK had its best ever by-elections. Mr Farage, Reform's honorary president, said he would "have to" eventually end up in the same party as Conservative MPs like Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg. Reform scored double-digit vote shares for the first time in both Kingswood and Wellingborough by-elections. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
choffer Posted February 21 VT Supporter Share Posted February 21 2 minutes ago, Davkaus said: Yeah, I think the tories need a complete reset and bunch of fresh faces. It's going to take them a decade to distance themselves from this shower, but step 1 is realising they have a problem, and they seem a long way from that. I mean, that would be the sensible thing to do but I do think they’ve jumped the shark now. There are seemingly few sensible voices in the party and they’ve spent so long lying and confecting unnecessary culture wars that I’m dubious they have it in them. Their path is set and they appear to genuinely think their actions are supported by vast swathes of the country. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 4 minutes ago, tinker said: Farage is my worry Tory members would choose me as leader, says Nigel Farage And the public would then reject him like that last few leaders the Tory members have picked. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Albrighton Posted February 21 VT Supporter Share Posted February 21 11 minutes ago, tinker said: The danger for labour is if the tories change leader and direction, it could leave Labour flat footed. Problem for the tories is they have no viable candidates. Do you mean for this election? If so, I don’t think the tories can do anything to win. I think Farage would hurt them just as much as help them (if anything it would hurt them more). Labour can lose it. But it would be through their own failings rather than anything the tories do. So for me, the danger for Labour would be a complacent “meh” attitude in potential voters. As it happens, I think there is a significant proportion of the country looking forward to giving the tories a severe kicking. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 2 minutes ago, Genie said: And the public would then reject him like that last few leaders the Tory members have picked. Saying that, I guess it would recover some votes from leaking out to Reform but then I think some of the remaining Tory voters would feel uncomfortable with just how unapologetically racist they would now be with him as leader. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Fun Factory Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 11 minutes ago, tinker said: Farage is my worry Tory members would choose me as leader, says Nigel Farage Great. He has never won an election for a position he wanted in his entire life. They would become a fringe party. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tinker Posted February 21 VT Supporter Share Posted February 21 1 minute ago, The Fun Factory said: Great. He has never won an election for a position he wanted in his entire life. They would become a fringe party. They are heading that way anyway. If they timed it well they could grab some votes (as close to the election as they can) he could blame the present tories as being hopeless, not implementing Brexit correctly and win some votes back from the brexit brigade who would like to be proven right. I don't think the tories are clever enough or brave enough to do it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wainy316 Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 I think Penny Mordor would be the most dangerous. I don't think she'd be be particularly competent but I think she'd resonate with a lot of traditional Tories and thick people. We all know it's thick people that swing elections. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wainy316 Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 (edited) If Farage somehow became Tory leader then Labour would need to quickly replace Starmer with a man dressed as a dolphin. Edited February 21 by Wainy316 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ml1dch Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 1 minute ago, tinker said: They are heading that way anyway. If they timed it well they could grab some votes (as close to the election as they can) he could blame the present tories as being hopeless, not implementing Brexit correctly and win some votes back from the brexit brigade who would like to be proven right. I don't think the tories are clever enough or brave enough to do it It's plausible if you're talking about a five / ten year scenario. Any sooner than that, I'd be curious as to the mechanism you think would be play out that sees Farage go from owner of another political party --> Tory party member --> prospective Tory party parliamentary candidate --> Tory MP --> Tory leader. Isn't it quite likely that (a) a lot of people in charge in the Tory party might try to stop the first two of those happening, and (b) doesn't the third one rather depend on the Tories being able to win a seat? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meregreen Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 11 hours ago, Marka Ragnos said: "There's nothing left to cut." And yet, millions of Britons voted against their own interests and for the interests of multi-billionaires -- over and over and over again. Why? How does that work? Why isn't Labour's message winning against this? According to recent polling….it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevo985 Posted February 21 VT Supporter Share Posted February 21 1 hour ago, Davkaus said: Both these things are true though. Labour's winning by doing and saying basically nothing. Stay as still as possible and watch the tories continue to implode. Meanwhile the tories keep promising tax cuts and cuts to publish services, and Labour are pressed "how are you going to pay for it?!", leading to them canning policy after policy. I think it's a fair point that Labour aren't cutting through and offering a different message to the austerity mindset. I agree. But the question was "Why isn't Labour's message winning?" What ever Labour's message is, it's finally winning Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Fun Factory Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 35 minutes ago, Wainy316 said: If Farage somehow becamce Tory leader then Labour would need to quickly replace Starmer with a man dressed as a dolphin. The talk of Farage becoming the tory leader without actually being conservative party member is about as valid as us talking about a new stadium when the owners have ruled out the north stand redevelopment due to costs. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 2 minutes ago, The Fun Factory said: The talk of Farage becoming the tory leader without actually being conservative party member is about as valid as us talking about a new stadium when the owners have ruled out the north stand redevelopment due to costs. Slightly different really, the business case for an all new stadium is probably stronger than just redeveloping 1 stand. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xann Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 Should Labour gain office, Tory Brexit stock may continue to fall? How we signed contracts with Huawei for our national infrastructure, AFTER the Australians found them to be spying? How did we get a faulty Chinese nuclear power station? Russia all over Tories and Brexit ringleaders. MI6's angry response to Tory peer Lebedev in the Lords. The Brexit PM slipping his own security to attend a party at KGB Towers. How a Russian company obtained the contract for the Downing St media suite? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jonesy7211 Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 34 minutes ago, Stevo985 said: I agree. But the question was "Why isn't Labour's message winning?" What ever Labour's message is, it's finally winning I don't think Labour's message is winning though. There have been some fantastic swings towards Labour in the by-elections, however when I look at the actual figures all I see is apathy from the Tory voters. The actual vote for Labour hasn't been significantly higher in any of the recent by-elections, it's more those that normally vote Tory are staying away. I don't blame Labour for this, in my opinion the Tories have been so woeful, so corrupt, that many, many, people have lost faith and trust in the political system overall. It's not like we're seeing record number of voters come out in huge numbers to kick the Tories out. Turnout has been low, and the concern for me is that we won't get a good turn out until we get a "none of the above" vote. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevo985 Posted February 21 VT Supporter Share Posted February 21 59 minutes ago, Jonesy7211 said: I don't think Labour's message is winning though. There have been some fantastic swings towards Labour in the by-elections, however when I look at the actual figures all I see is apathy from the Tory voters. The actual vote for Labour hasn't been significantly higher in any of the recent by-elections, it's more those that normally vote Tory are staying away. I don't blame Labour for this, in my opinion the Tories have been so woeful, so corrupt, that many, many, people have lost faith and trust in the political system overall. It's not like we're seeing record number of voters come out in huge numbers to kick the Tories out. Turnout has been low, and the concern for me is that we won't get a good turn out until we get a "none of the above" vote. Every poll suggests labour will gain a huge amount of votes vs the last election 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted February 21 Share Posted February 21 1 minute ago, Stevo985 said: Every poll suggests labour will gain a huge amount of votes vs the last election The last couple of by elections which Labour have won, they’ve actually aggregated less votes than when they lost. It was the collapse of the tory vote wot won it. Now, they are by elections. But for all the scandal, nobody switched to Labour (in crude terms). That doesn’t mean Labour won’t have a massive majority in Westminster, it’s just not quite the ringing endorsement it might first appear to be. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Genie Posted February 21 Popular Post Share Posted February 21 1 minute ago, chrisp65 said: The last couple of by elections which Labour have won, they’ve actually aggregated less votes than when they lost. It was the collapse of the tory vote wot won it. Now, they are by elections. But for all the scandal, nobody switched to Labour (in crude terms). That is based on the assumption that all those that stayed away in the by elections were Tory voters and every Labour voter from last time came out again. I don’t think we can extrapolate that from those election votes. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted February 21 Moderator Share Posted February 21 1 hour ago, Jonesy7211 said: I don't think Labour's message is winning though. There have been some fantastic swings towards Labour in the by-elections, however when I look at the actual figures all I see is apathy from the Tory voters. The actual vote for Labour hasn't been significantly higher in any of the recent by-elections, it's more those that normally vote Tory are staying away. I don't blame Labour for this, in my opinion the Tories have been so woeful, so corrupt, that many, many, people have lost faith and trust in the political system overall. It's not like we're seeing record number of voters come out in huge numbers to kick the Tories out. Turnout has been low, and the concern for me is that we won't get a good turn out until we get a "none of the above" vote. End term by-elections turnouts for constituencies that will not exist in their current form at the next election and for the most unpopular government since polling began is not a guide to Tory apathy, that's the narrative the Tories themselves put about Tory apathy is rarely a thing, the Tories are the ones that traditionally do vote, its the Labour vote that is more likely apathetic (historically) hence the old idea that Labour needed good weather to have a bumper vote etc. Hardcore nutters clearly voted, if any party got the most of their voters out it was Reform. Former Tory voters may well have been apathetic, possibly because they didn't know which way to go, come the general election, I don't think the percentages for Tory and Labour in those seats will change much 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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