[The Weeping Angel]

I blame Andy Burnham.

[The Weeping Angel]

This a BTL post on The Guardian by a rare good poster. The first bit is a quote from an article, the second is his response.

the days of Labour premiers attracting and holding on to large numbers of rightwing voters, as Tony Blair, Harold Wilson and Clement Attlee once did, are gone

True, but that's because of a different change.
The right-wing voters Blair attracted were middle-class, socially liberal, moderate Tories, and socially liberal but economically strict LibDems. They're the ones they're picking up now.

The ones they've lost, sadly, I suspect, for good, are working-class, socially illiberal voters who care about their own pocket but no-one else's, and who actively dislike a large section of society. Back in the day they'd have been staunch trade-unionists (think the Dagenham women's strike, and racial discrimination when the shop steward as well as the foreman had a hand in who got a job, and how the wife was expected to vote the same way as the husband), and voted Labour out of (what they saw as) necessity. In today's economy, that necessity has gone, and ain't coming back.

I think this is an interesting diagnosis. I would disagree slightly that all these Reform voters are lost forever. Why would the ones who voted Labour in 2024 be? I actually do think that some attempt to meet them on immigration control could work by the next election. They could have voted for Farage in 2024, but they didn't.

The logic of the original piece is doubtless that Burnham do what the author believes anyway- it was Andy Beckett, so no doubt it's Corbyn politics.

Not according to Blueksy Labour's core vote is now socially liberal professionals like them, and Labour should pander to them.

[Youngian]

Apart from punishing criminals and immigration is there any apetite for social conservatism in England? Even Farage stayed clear until lots of American money came his way and oddballs like Daniel Kruger joined his merry gang.
I see a divide between voters who respect and trust leaders who tell them there's tough times ahead like Starmer and May. And those who want optimism and splashing the cash like Johnson and to some extent Burnham. Its clear the latter and not the former are preferred. Not by me, though.