A Longer School Day – But Why?

Boredom - is this the reason for Gangs? Image via Wikipedia

Stephen Twigg, Labour Shadow Education Secretary, has called for longer school hours.

But why would we need them?

True Finns – False Threat, False Claims

Image via Wikipedia

The right-wing, nationalist True Finns party has made sweeping gains in the Finnish Parliamentary elections, going from 4% to 19.4% of the vote. This places the party in third place, and feasibly within reach of coalition seats. This is worrying for the rest of Europe, as they have stated their opposition to the bailout fund, over which Finland would have a veto. Instability ahead? Let’s look at the new parliament make-up.

Goldie Lookin Chain move into Politics

Goldie Lookin Chain – of office? | Total Politics.

I love this video. It is my new favourite song.

But seriously, apparently Rhys Trantings/Xain from GLC is planning on standing as a Labour Councillor in Newport’s elections next year.

He can win. Easily. GLC are well known for being from Newport, specifically. He can easily beat off competition, if he’s serious.

Why not Plaid though? As he says in the song at the bottom of the linked-to article, Newport, “Big up to Plaid Cymru” – if they’re supportive of Plaid, and their general values, then why not stand as a Plaid councillor – they could do with the publicity, and the seat. Frankly, he’ll probably win – even just because Newport is a very Labourite area. I’d love to see him stand as a Tory, that would be hilarious. I wonder if  people would ignore him as a rightist, or embrace him as someone from Casnewydd…

Their other song “Newport (Ymerodraeth State of Mind)”, a parody of Empire State of Mind, talks about the Welsh Assembly saying “Thats in Cardiff so it don’t mean shit to me.” It actually reflects a sentiment, I would say, quite prevalent in Wales – Cardiff is not Wales. It is the main city, it has the Assembly, and most of the investment… but most of the rest of the country doesn’t seem to see this cash being circulated.  I need to look into this. Maybe move the capital to Caernarfon…

Liberal Democrats win an election! Well…

Image via Wikipedia

Clearly the Liberal Democrats are finished as a political force – that’s why they just won a by-election in Tunbridge Wells, for its Borough Council in Pembridge.

From LDV
LD Claire Brown 578 (43.3; +2.7)
Con 460 (34.5; -24.9)
UKIP 296 (22.2; +22.2)
Majority 118
Turnout 35.41%
LD gain from Con
Percentage change is since May 2010.

This also seems to prove my theory on the recent Burnley by-election, where the Liberal Democrats came sixth – Labour hasn’t had any major bad publicity recently and the Liberal Democrats have lost the anti-governmental protest vote. Also important to note is that Burnley is a traditionally leftist area, whereas Tunbridge would be more centre-right – just look at the candidates. This also seems to make sense with the Paisley by-election we’ve had as well, where Labour took a seat from the SNP, with Lib Dems falling from third to fifth.

Other perspectives might be that UKIP are stealing a substantial amount of the Tory vote, meaning what we lose from Labour in May, we might make up by taking from the Tories. Unfortunately, this means a further shift right-ward for the party, something I can’t be happy with.

Ok, so Labour and the Greens didn’t put any candidates into this election – but still, the Tory-UKIP contest wouldn’t be altered by the presence of the left-wing candidates, and the Lib Dem vote did hold strong, regardless of the lack of Labourites stealing Lib Dem votes.

The Liberal Democrats have suffered, doubtless, which just means that Farron needs to criticise the government more … and we need to wait for Labour to screw up. It’s Labour, they always do.

Related Articles

• Delighted of Tunbridge Wells: Lib Dems gain from Tories in by-election (libdemvoice.org)
• Lifeline for battered Lib Dems in Tunbridge Wells by-election (independent.co.uk)
• Blow for Cameron: Tories lose Tunbridge Wells (liberalconspiracy.org)
• “UKIP Beat Tories and Lib-Dems in Barnsley” and related posts (anenglishmanscastle.com)

This week’s by-election results: Burnley and Southwark

Burnley BC, Rosegrove with Lowerhouse:

Lab 521 (43.1; +11.8)
BNP 288 (23.8; +5.5)
LD Kate Mottershead 261 (21.6; -11.8)
Con 81 (6.7; -10.2)
Ind 58 (4.8; +4.8)
Majority 233
Turnout 25%
Lab gain from LD

Southwark LBC, Brunswick Park:

Lab 1981 (65.1; +13.3)

LD Kate Heywood 630 (20.7; -2.0)

Green 231 (7.6; -6.9)

Con 129 (4.2; -6.7)

Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition 70 (2.3; +2.3)

Majority 1351

Turnout 34.2%

Lab hold

Percentage change is since May 2010

via This week’s by-election results: Burnley and Southwark.

 

So, the Liberal Democrats have suffered yet again following their humiliating 6-th place in Barnsley. This time, a pair of councils – Burnley was lost to Labour, and Labour enlarged their lead in Southwark.

Clearly, this is a sign that the Lib Dems are finished, if they are even beaten by the BNP in Burnley.

So fed up am I of the constant stories of the Lib Dems placing poorly, thus naturally meaning that they’re going to lose out big in the next election, that I nearly did’t bother to look at the article on Liberal Democrat Voice.

But I’m glad I did. The actual figures from Burnley and Southwark paint a different picture.

The Lib Dems lost to the BNP…so, why not to the BNP and Tories? That’s my first question. Secondly, how badly did they do to stay in exactly the same place in Southwark.

Looking at Burnley’s results, we can see that the Tories did almost as poorly as the Liberal Democrats – losing 10.2% versus the LDs’ 11.8% Labour gained the same as the Liberal Democrats, 11.8%, the BNP went up by 5.5% and an Independent got 4.8%. But surely this points, not to the Liberal Democrats failing miserably, but the coalition suffering from being in government. The Liberal Democrat’s traditionally always relied on the protest vote, with that unavailable to them, of course they’ll sink in the polls. But this clearly shows, not that the Liberal Democrats are failing, but that Labour are succeeding. Mostly just by criticising, and saying how they’d have done things different.  They haven’t had a chance under Miliband to screw things up disastrously.

This is reinforced in Southwark – Labour gained a huge 13% of the vote, but the Liberal Democrats only lost 2%. The remainder was lost by the Greens (6.9%) and the Conservatives (6.7%). The addition of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition getting 2.3% just goes to show that this is a resurgence of the left, at the expense of the Tories, and more generally the Coalition, rather than the final nail in the coffin of the Liberal Democrat party.

Don’t write us off yet. Clearly, we’re holding on. Now, we have to start climbing.