If UKIP survives another year, then between them, it and Labour should
be able to ensure that neither Con Dem party returns any MEPs from any
of the three Northern regions. So UKIP is not without its uses. But it needs to forget about televised debates in 2015. Simply because there should never have been any last time. There are certainly never going to be any again. Not after what happened in 2010.
Nick Clegg might see himself as permanently in Government. But Labour would never touch him or his party, even if it needed to do so. A position in which it is not going to find itself in 2015. Labour is going to win, anyway. But probably without making very much of an effort in, say, the West Country, or the North of Scotland. That is a mistake.
Those are areas suffering greatly under the Coalition (there are several more, especially in the traditionally Tory countryside and in certain historic centres of the industrial working class in the South East, in East Anglia and along the South Coast), and there is only one way of voting against the Coalition.
Labour's biggest ever number of raw votes was in 1951, when almost every result concluded that, "The Liberal candidate lost his deposit." However, there were still National Liberals to put Churchill back into Downing Street despite his party's having polled fewer votes than Attlee's. In 2015, there will be no National Liberals.
The key to an even greater triumph will be the selection of the right candidates. For example, take the definition of marriage. That free vote which saw at least one Shadow Minister, who has not lost his position, go into the Division Lobby to retain the traditional definition. Another made a strong speech to that effect, before abstaining for tactical reasons. And that is before we start about PPSes.
Sir Alan Beith's Labour opponent needs to be as old-school Methodist as he is, or else a farming Anglican of the same view, not only on this but also on pro-life issues, on which Sir Alan has been a parliamentary stalwart for 40 years. John Pugh's Labour opponent needs to be another staunch Northern Catholic, with whom the Labour Party is replete at local level in the North West, and most especially on Merseyside. Gordon Birtwistle's Labour opponent needs to be the same. And Sarah Teather? She probably fears an intervention by one of the mighty black pastors of Brent. Let her fear be proved well-founded.
Nick Clegg might see himself as permanently in Government. But Labour would never touch him or his party, even if it needed to do so. A position in which it is not going to find itself in 2015. Labour is going to win, anyway. But probably without making very much of an effort in, say, the West Country, or the North of Scotland. That is a mistake.
Those are areas suffering greatly under the Coalition (there are several more, especially in the traditionally Tory countryside and in certain historic centres of the industrial working class in the South East, in East Anglia and along the South Coast), and there is only one way of voting against the Coalition.
Labour's biggest ever number of raw votes was in 1951, when almost every result concluded that, "The Liberal candidate lost his deposit." However, there were still National Liberals to put Churchill back into Downing Street despite his party's having polled fewer votes than Attlee's. In 2015, there will be no National Liberals.
The key to an even greater triumph will be the selection of the right candidates. For example, take the definition of marriage. That free vote which saw at least one Shadow Minister, who has not lost his position, go into the Division Lobby to retain the traditional definition. Another made a strong speech to that effect, before abstaining for tactical reasons. And that is before we start about PPSes.
Sir Alan Beith's Labour opponent needs to be as old-school Methodist as he is, or else a farming Anglican of the same view, not only on this but also on pro-life issues, on which Sir Alan has been a parliamentary stalwart for 40 years. John Pugh's Labour opponent needs to be another staunch Northern Catholic, with whom the Labour Party is replete at local level in the North West, and most especially on Merseyside. Gordon Birtwistle's Labour opponent needs to be the same. And Sarah Teather? She probably fears an intervention by one of the mighty black pastors of Brent. Let her fear be proved well-founded.
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