"we'll change the things that need changing and that's all we'll change": the paSUKification of post-brexit politics 2021

But its politics are totally alien to Perthshire.

Uh right. North Perthshire voted Liberal, then Tory for 70 years, and now it votes SNP - because Tories in the area have decided they quite like the idea of an independent Scotland, they're still Tories though.

Just catching up on this by-election discourse and there is surely no way the Lib Dems are taking this seat.

lol that bullshit... it's happening again. The Labour candidate is the most Tory looking motherfucker with a red rosette I've seen in long time.

the Guardian reporting that the Libdems are the bookies favs when they finished a remote third in '19, with 12% less of the vote than Labour.

as the betting currently stands it's 8/15 for a Tory hold, that 11/8 on the Libdems seems ridiculous.. lol Labour 66/1.

Bookies know.

They just do.

Having said that - if the Guardian are saying they are fav, then they are misreading those odds.

it was two days ago tbf on them and the odds might have changed since. But also possibly not.

On the night of the Batley + Spen byelection the last hour betting market moves for Labour suggested they might do better than expected. But that was a tight marginal, it will take a hell of dissatisfied Tory voters swing to overturn a 22k+ majority.

if Labour do finish 3rd with a lower vote share than 2019 what feeble excuses shall be used?

meanwhile that open democracy piece on north shropshire isn't very focused at all

i: the author is from perthshire which he can describe easily w/o resource to careful research, so first we get a lot abt perthshire, which we are then asked for set aside bcz actually shropshire isn't very like perthshire (correct but you see the problem)
ii: the author can wield some highly general and somewhat stereotypical research abt the english countryside, but makes a poor fist IMO of establishing why how and when shropshire (and north shropshire in in particular) might have diverged
iii: there's a fair amount on recent changes in farming (fair enough) but very little indeed on the history of other industries (ironbridge in in shropshire = the birthplace of the industrial revolution, which yes of course mainly moved elswhere but… )
iv: there's a breif and typically handwavy bit on the english revolution as failing to disperse aristocracy and how landowning works as a result -- again i'd like to see how typical or untypical shropshire was/is here…
v: there's a little on the county's recent conversion to more or less a network of small dormitory towns and villages (likely very true but again the dots are only very vaguely joined up)
vi: and finally as a treat there's some funny knockabout material re the antiques roadshow, which fails to to distinguish between defensive anti-woke hoarding and flogging everything off lol and prefers to lean into the take: "why the great british bake-off proves we're all fascists now" (there's genuinely an interesting story to these secondary rings of the economy of course -- you could write an excellent explainer for the marxist term "value" using the antiques roadshow as a lens -- but this aint it sorry)

these are all then patchworked together into a diagnosis but it feels extremely unconcrete to me, a poster who grew up in this mysterious land -- not unfamiliar exactly but much more fuzzy than it needs to be

caveat: i haven't visited my birthtown since 2010 or been in close contact w/someone keeping track of local matter since probabgly 2000 (when my parents' world began to dwindle courtesy diverse illnesses), so my own actual factual spideysense is at best anecdotal HOWEVER as an editor i protest

Antiques Roadshow, etc, are doing well as a percentage of viewers, because most of the old people aren't watching sky/netflix/whatever, they are sticking to the old channels.

I was hoping you would comment on this mark

xpost obv

One of the biggest Hail Mary requests I've done on here, but - would anyone in North Shropshire (Owestry ideally, can travel from Shrewsbury) be willing to help me cover the by-election tomorrow?

Would be compensated of course - please RT/fire at some locals if poss

— William Kedjanyi (@KeejayOV3) December 15, 2021

this could have been a good opportunity for you to mix a homecoming with a bit of work, mark

i do actually have friends still in oswestry lol HOWEVER

She got the sack

I have a Fever, a Cough and a team member has tested positive for COVID yet my boss wishes to force me to come into work when I’m not only physically unwell but could be carrying a disease which is highly transmissible.

Hospitality eh? pic.twitter.com/bl1ldgaYeb

— Rachael (@baylis_rachael) December 15, 2021

Was this bit of genius posted?

Whoever added Sir David Attenborough’s voice over to this is simply genius! A must watch & share clip! pic.twitter.com/AL7jB32Jk0

— The Political Rants (@vinod_d007) December 14, 2021

Lib Dems North Shropshire internal polling:
CON: 40%
LDEM: 39%
LAB: 12%
REF: 4%
GRN: 4%
DO NOT VOTE Labour or Green.
There is only one party to vote for.

VOTE LIB-DEM

A vote for Conservative, Labour or Green is a vote for Owen Paterson.

this "internal polling" reads like fanciful bs seeing as Labour have finished 2nd 5 out of the last 6. It's unfortunate for Kieth that most of the members/voters that wouldn't fall for this grift have been told to fuck off.

xp

if that's blown yr mind, god help us when you discover led by donkeys!

Work colleague is from Shropshire, his dad plays tennis with the chair of the Wem Conservative party who’s told him he’s voting Lib-Dem.

LibDem odds have gone as short as 10/11 now!

The North Shropshire betting has gone haywire in the last hour. pic.twitter.com/RnHi4OGFNq

— Elvis Buñuelo (@Mr_Considerate) December 16, 2021

and 4/7 now!

If you had a vote in that election, for whom would you vote?

Personally: I wouldn't wish to vote for KS's Labour. I don't like the LibDems but it seems a relatively logical alternative to the unpalatable act of a vote that gives support to KS.

If you'd like to vote against the government, but hate KS, as Calzino and I do - then why not vote LD?

Thus, KS's direness might be shedding votes in that direction?

The alternative would be to vote Green, Shropshire Socialist Front or whatever - fine, I respect that and might do it.

I’d stay home

There's a Shropshire Socialist Front?

I certainly hope so!

there may be but they're not standing

Labour coming 3rd would be very funny at least and an indication of how well Starmer's strategy is going down with so called swing voters in the Tory heartlands. I mean if 2019 was one of the worst electoral results for Labour, as he keeps saying - how does he excuse getting less votes and getting voted into third place by the very voters he has been trying to appeal to for the last year and a half.

the Shropshire CPGB- ML last updated on twitter in october 2015 and on facebook in july 2016

a sad hiatus in marxism-leninism mao-tse-tung-hoxha-bains thought

the Party Party candidate says he wants to engage with the youth of N Shropshire but he doesn't talk much about partying, more about dull stuff like the robust local economy of farmers, markets and towns being the strength of the area.

That's odd!
Surely he should just promote partying!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-shropshire-59289032

A BJ impersonator is standing.

There is no Shropshire Socialist Front candidate or similar.

I think if I had a vote I would vote LD to a) vote vs the government, b) vote vs KS in the way that Calzino describes.

I do not wish to suggest that I actually support the LDs.

A tactical vote for the opposition against another opposition!

if there is no option to vote for transformative politics the only other option is to vote for lols

at least I should have said it's another option, not voting is the other one!

The prospect of panicky scared shitless spineless Tory MPs turning on Boris is the only reason to vote Lib Dem - I wouldn't do it myself, of course. The Tories will win it back easily at the next election anyway.

I wouldn't vote Lib Dem that is!

i would simply write crude unhelpful abuse across my paper

"a buttery flavour with hints of burnt caramel, nuttiness and tangy blue"

this is Shropshire Blue, the early indications are Kieth is a going down more like a Kraft slice with the voters who tbf gave Corbyn two 2nd place results just as comparably respectable as what Blair achieved, but with a manifesto that was worth voting for.

why would you tell people nightclubs are going to close with 11 days notice. are you completely off your fucking noodle. https://t.co/sVzoQJSVNL

— 𝔐𝔞𝔤𝔫𝔢𝔱𝔰 🧲 (@PerthshireMags) December 16, 2021

Because it's "Save Christmas"

Save Xmas, destroy new year.

Quite

Robbing nicholas to pay stephen

awooga! https://t.co/TO6zFUIseY

— 𝔐𝔞𝔤𝔫𝔢𝔱𝔰 🧲 (@PerthshireMags) December 17, 2021

Labour Party Results in North Shropshire Constituency:

2010 (Gordon Brown) - 18.1%
2015 (Ed Miliband) - 19.9%
2017 (Jeremy Corbyn) - 31.1%
2019 (Jeremy Corbyn) - 22.1%
2021 (Keir Starmer) - 9.6%

— Evolve Politics (@evolvepolitics) December 17, 2021

Kieth's at the wheel

I don’t think we can really judge that considering there will be a lot of votes lent to the Lib Dem candidate. Considering they were always a very distant third.

Full steam ahead.

https://www.tvcream.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/71-03.jpg

was always going to be tough for labour with little recent opportunity to challenge boris and the relentless media overexposure of the libdems