- Joined
- Feb 2, 2010
- Messages
- 27,101
- Reaction score
- 12,359
- Location
- Granada, España
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Libertarian - Left
He does appeal to Trots, SWP are Trots btw, but they are a, as they've always been, a very small number. I think the entire membership of the SWP is no more than 3,000 and not all of them will have signed up to Labour. Other Trotskyite and non-Trotskyite Communist groups number even fewer. If there are 10,000 in total that is on the high side. That makes them around 1.4% of the total membership of the Labour Party.I believe they're a mixed lot. He definitely appeals to Trots, Communist types, SWP and a lot of people who are pissed at the present shambles.
I'd say that a majority of the newly-joined membership comprises non-aligned but seriously pissed off and alienated younger voters. They are pissed off not just because of the widespread disaffection with the political establishment, although that's endemic across British society, but also they are pissed off with the older, more comfortable, middle class voters who they see as having sold their futures to demagogues and xenophobes.
He won't bring across Tories like IC, of course he won't, but he may well unite all those who share the disaffection that a vast number of British voters feel for the political class, and that doesn't just mean the Tories, it also means those anti-leadership Labour MPs. They offer no solutions to austerity, the lack of housing and real employment opportunities, the sucking of funds and resources towards the southeast, the inequitable burden of immigration and refugees placed on the poorest areas of the country and the massive democratic deficit that no one in Westminster seems to care about at all.Still, as you know full well Andy to run a country you need broad appeal. Has he got that? Will he bring across people like IC? I very much doubt it. Thus, he'll not win an election.
It might seem to you that the way in which the Labour Party is transforming itself into a nationwide mass movement rather than a fan club for Westminster élites makes it less electable. It may do, but I think there is a strong feeling that Westminster isn't the only way to apply pressure and achieve social change. I do think however, that when UKIP and Brexit voters realise that leaving the EU destroys their economic security and threatens their public services, contrary to what they were promised, they will look to vent their ire at that betrayal by voting for a party that doesn't mouth platitudes like 'Brexit means Brexit', and 'We're all in it together', and 'Let's take back our country'. Which other party offers them the prospect of change?
Corbyn is going to win the leadership contest by a country mile. The PLP may indeed trigger a split in the party and their neo-SDP breakaway may ensure another Tory GE victory, if May manages to call that election before the Brexit damage takes the country into major recession. She'd better be quick though, because the business and finance sector is already signalling a collapse in confidence in the economy.
How do you honestly think the electorate will react to May's failure to negotiate access to the single market and an end to free movement of labour, a new and deeper recession, and a failure to curb rising immigration rates? You might think that this would majorly benefit UKIP, but I'd argue that a Corbyn-led, real Labour Party will benefit more.