Monday 7 April 2008

Place Your 10p Bet Here

Which previously Labour Council will pass from that party's control on 1st May because of the abolition of the 10p tax rate? Betting closed on "all of them".
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9 comments:

  1. Anonymous7 April 2008 at 18:15

    So you think that *every* Council that is currently Labour controlled and which has elections on 1st May will change hands? Can I take a bet that says "any number between none and [1 short of all of them]"?

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  2. David Lindsay7 April 2008 at 18:41

    I think that there are going to be some major upsets. Patience in the Labour heartlands has finally snapped with this. The working-class and middle-class Labour votes alike are now anybody's for the taking.

    Nobody in the Westminster Village will have noticed. But other parties' activists on the ground will have done. Indeed, they certainly have done.

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  3. Anonymous7 April 2008 at 18:47

    I remember Major's Tories being reduced overnight to one county council in the entire country (Bucks, I think). And they hadn't done anything as silly as this.

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  4. Anonymous7 April 2008 at 18:53

    Interesting how Jon wants to save New Labour. (Although doing it by saving lots of councillors' seats is actually saving Old Labour too.) He's supposed to be one of those Tories or Lib Dems depending on what they are trying to get, in the Whiggish tradition of the Southern upper middle class. So I suppose it's not surprising.

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  5. Anonymous7 April 2008 at 20:46

    I don't necessarily disagree with you. But you didn't say that in yor post. You said *all* of them will fall. Do you believe that, or not?

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  6. Anonymous7 April 2008 at 23:56

    I'd be very happy to save lots of Old Labour seats (all of them, in fact), despite being a New Labour supporter. Must I be lying?

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  7. David Lindsay7 April 2008 at 23:56

    I didn't say that. I just say that I wasn't taking bets on it. So, yes, I do think that it is more than possible.

    We now have Cabinet Ministers visiting even County Durham (the new unitary version of which is to be elected this time round), the first county that Labour ever won and which it has never lost since, in order to give noisy reassurances that Labour is going to keep control, it is, of course it is, yes it is, honestly IT IS, IT JUST F***ING IS!

    If they are worried about losing even here, then they have presumably given up hope pretty much everywhere else.

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  8. David Lindsay8 April 2008 at 00:12

    You'd have to ask PQ, Steve. But I can't see why any New Labour supporter would want lots of Old Labour councillors running about with independent electoral mandates and other power bases.

    Then again, I'm not sure about the term "New Labour" these days. It is half a generation old, and mostly concerns a largely forgotten politician who is no longer a member of either House of Parliament.

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  9. Anonymous11 April 2008 at 11:30

    Back on topic, I'm sitting here hoping that I'll get back with one hand (tax credits) what's been snatched by the other. How a Labour government can introduce a system so burdensome that the most needy families who are supposed to benefit couldn't possibly understand and use the system to claim accuratley I'll never know. A system which excludes the vulnerable single people and under 25's and discriminates against stay at home mums. They say the 10p rate was abolished for simplicity. Abolish Tax Credits then. Introduce a system of tax that is cheaply administered, universal and fair. If not, expect to be voted out.

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