And another thing…

Of course, the ultimate point of the alleged Lab-Lib negotiations in 1997 was that the Libs would support Labour if they didn’t get the comfortable working majority. I can’t believe the Libs honestly believed a party that could support itself would really turn to them. Seems like the same will happen again, Libs hopeful the Tories will turn to them and disappointed when the Tories don’t need them.

I have to question why one would jump a sinking ship in the middle of an ocean for a dinghy that won’t get them back to shore.

Bunch of trough-snuffling bloaters considering moves to increase their political longevity and pension packets.

In other news, Pope rumoured to be Catholic and Ursa Major believed to defecate in woods.

The truly hilarious thing is that they think the LibDems offer them a better chance of survival — just goes to show how badly they think Labour is going to be wiped out in the coming election.

Alternatively, as I’ve already pointed out, the story is complete BS.

Maybe it’s pure blase. I love a good old defection, me, but generally to the blue side.

The basic premise of your argument (the bit before you begin trying to discredit Ashdown himself) is utterly flawed for the following reason.

The story concerns 12 or more Labour MP’s. There is a huge difference between a single defector leaving secretly, and a sizeable group. Are you seriously telling us that Brown and his cronies would not welcome them staying? What kind of ‘punishment’ should they be fearing from Gordon Brown for this “treachery” – as you put it? Is it worse than the pain of remaining associated with such a discredited and unpopular leadership? Or worse than the likely election drubbing?

It says everything that for you, once again, party loyalty trumps public duty. You say that it is the “party” which put them in Westminster, and it may have been, but where does that leave the people they are supposed to represent? I would suggest that it is the voters who put politicians in Westminster, and that if Labour had managed to keep that at the front of their minds they would not have selected Gordon Brown as their leader and they would not be where they find themselves today.

Good piece in The Times by Matthew Parris.

“The more interesting question is about the nature of the Labour ranks through which a talentless bully appears to have risen with so little resistance, to the very top; and stayed there without challenge.”

Perhaps they want to leave Labour for the LIB/Dems as, they like the Tories will get rid of leaders the dont like.

Read the whole piece.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/matthew_parris/article6207111.ece

Paddy is no doubt still bitter about his dashed hopes for a Cabinet post back in 1997 when Tony Blair allegedly considered a grand Labour-LibDem coalition.

Paddy made it clear on Andrew Marr recently how he felt about that, and he blamed Brown, not Blair. In light of that, one can’t help feeling if this is a bit of mischief making by Paddy at a time when Brown’s authority much diminished.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/andrew_marr_show/8006762.stm

Perhaps we’re missing the point.

The real defection will be from new labour to old labour, and that will be happening to the party as a whole.

Those who leave will have correctly deduced that a reconstructed lib-dem party in the image of new labour is, by comparison,infinity preferable to that crass, horny-minded hangover from the early twentieth century which is old labour.

I have blogged about this here.

http://keeptonyblairforpm.wordpress.com/2009/05/02/help-tony-yell-labour-defectors-to-the-lib-dems-the-return-of-the-blair/

Fanciful probably, but this is politics, guys. SOMEthing is going on behind the scenes. Wonder if Guido will work it out?

As to the Ashdown/Blair business – which went on for four years, Tom, even after 1997, so it was serious – I understand that Blair was aiming to stop the Tories being elected most of the time and thus thought “the natural party of government” (though the majority always voted against them.) A kind of PR without PR. Both Labour & the Lib Dems normally (high-profile populist cases such as the Gurkhas notwithstanding) are anti-Conservative, rather than anti-each other. So it seemed more representative to Blair (and he was right as usual) to get the majority anti-Tory vote to operate as one. Didn’t happen because of Brown/Prescott opposition, according to Paddy’s Dairies, NOT because Blair got cold feet.

Not sure what would have happened over Iraq had a merger/coalition happened of course. Paddy might well have supported Blair on hearing his case, the rest wouldn’t – thus a break-up of the coalition anyway.

In the spirit of the curious incident of the dog in the night-time, one of the more fascinating things about recent political history is that no Labour MP, intending to continue a political career, has crossed the floor to another party in five years. Some have gone Independent but at the end of their careers. The one relatively young MP to join another party since 1997 eventually ended up trying to get back to Labour.

Despite all the ‘modernization’ of David Cameron, the Conservatives have no senior Labour defectors even among ex-MPs; the only Labour MP post 1997 to have attempted to join the Conservatives was Helen Clark.

Agreed. Doesn’t even make logistical sense. Are big names hoping to switch before the election and get given a safe seat (where no doubt some hopeful LD PPC has already settled in)? I don’t think any hopeful could be a big enough ‘catch’ for the LibDems to see a guaranteed electoral reward. Q

Paddy Ashdown is your father, Tom. Search your feelings, you *know* it to be true…

“And even if protected by anonymity, the very suggestion of a so-called “mass exodus” of Labour MPs hitting the media would be more than enough to scupper any such negotiations and to send any prospective defector scurrying back to the party that put them into parliament in the first place.”

Why? Even assuming the premise, that only purges the weak-kneed from the genuinely kamikaze SDPers. Perhaps you need think about the proposition in terms of former LD PPCs rendered redundant by the sudden and unexpected emergence of an incumbent MP?

“We were all very grateful to Tony for leading us back into government after 18 years of opposition.”

Why Tom, you make it sound as if Labour politicians are ‘in it’ for career advancement rather than for the good of the public.
Surely not…

There is no one from Labour that the Tories want, only for political ends.

Ref: Joe K – “Paddy Ashdown is your father, Tom. Search your feelings, you *know* it to be true…”

Isn’t Tom related to Tony Blair like the rest of us Blair Supporters are? Allegedly.

May the Force be with you.

To Liberanos – could be.

“The real defection will be from new labour to old labour, and that will be happening to the party as a whole.

Those who leave will have correctly deduced that a reconstructed lib-dem party in the image of new labour is, by comparison,infinity preferable to that crass, horny-minded hangover from the early twentieth century which is old labour.”

If you are right I rest my case as to ongoing political machinations/positioning at my blog.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio … etc etc

Bt if OLD Labour really DO think it is time to go back to the future, they are madder than some of them seem.

Even Polly Toynbee is now in despair and admiting that such as us … well … me are gloating.

As if.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/may/02/gordon-brown-labour-gloom

Wonder when they’ll come to terms with the fact that it isn’t just Gordon who has lost it? ALL of the Left are hunting, but they will not find.

I think Gordon is torn asunder by confusion. He KNOWS his Old Labour heart says he should be with THEM, but he also knows that they will never attract more than 20-odd percent of the voters.

Socialism, as was, has no place post the recession. And not one of them can re-fashion it for today.

Are you the same BlairSuppository from the old days of Cif?

Can I claim my £5?

Hmm what happened to my comment at 1113hrs Tom?

The one where I pointed out that Labour might defect to the SNP up here and that the only reason others might go to the LibDems is so they can keep their noses in the trough?

Kate ‘Countryside Alliance’ Hoey defected to the Tories long ago…

I’m sure these “viciously nihilistic” rumours “began in America” and “spread around the globe”. Doubtless the MP in question will not defect because “it is the right thing to do” and will “get on with the job” of getting ready to be unemployed from early next year.

Blairsupporter: ‘Even Polly Toynbee is now in despair and admiting that such as us … well … me are gloating.’

Aye. I’ve had to face up to the fact that my memory is not what it was, but what I recall from way back in ‘97? was Toynbee saying ‘don’t worry about what Labour seem to be promising, they’re just doing that to win the election and when they’re in, they’ll do something else (that Toynbee approves of?) entirely.’ That and the scrapping of Clause 4 made me realise how cynical the leading left had become.

The alternative to promising what the people want in order to be elected, is the old labour approach of promising the people what they’ve demonstrated almost continuously they don’t want, in order to go into permanent opposition.

Tony Blair saved the labour party from socialism and itself.

The fact that he could be described as a self-serving slime ball by olden labour, horny-minded fantasists, yet still manage to rise triumphantly to the top and stay there, simply illustrates the state of the labour party when he took over.