Last week saw a renewed wave of attacks on Labour and its leadership by supporters of the arrogantly-titled “people’s vote” (PV) – also known as “FBPE-ers” because of the “follow-back pro-Europe” #FBPE hashtag used by many of them on social media.
Those attacks culminated, at least for the moment, in a splash of near-identical articles quoting almost rote – and completely uncritically – from a PV press release as if it was news, which appeared within twenty minutes across a number of mainstream ‘news’ outlets.
The attacks consist, in large part, of PV supporters claiming that the ‘news’ of Corbyn’s intentions regarding Brexit mean they won’t ‘now’ vote Labour as long as its position remains unchanged.
Of course, it’s not ‘news’. Labour’s 2017 general election manifesto – on which it surged to destroy Theresa May’s parliamentary majority – stated that Labour would honour the referendum result and in fact the policy goes back well before that.
But that’s not the only misleading aspect of the latest attacks. Even a slight scratching of the surface of this wave of ‘outrage’ shows that not all is as it seems – as case studies, including one ‘celebrity’ example, show.
Emma Kennedy
Emma Kennedy is an author, voice actor and TV writer who is unmistakably passionate about stopping Brexit. When the ‘news’ about Labour’s position was published – it’s not accurate to say it ‘broke’ – last weekend, she quickly tweeted that she would not vote Labour ‘now’:
The clear suggestion is that this voting intention arose out of the ‘news’. However, Ms Kennedy is a prominent anti-Corbyn commentator of long standing – and a browse of her social media history shows that this is anything but a new decision.
As recently as September, Ms Kennedy was commenting on Labour’s policy not to try to stop Brexit via a new referendum – showing that Labour’s continued position this weekend was not news to her:
Going back to April this year, she tweeted about an abundance of reasons she felt existed not to vote Labour:
But Ms Kennedy’s resolution not to vote Labour dates back further. In spring of this year and the preceding autumn, she was advocating for another party – or even one that doesn’t yet exist:
And at the general election in June 2017, she voted LibDem:
And as early as 2016, as Corbyn contested Owen Smith’s ill-judged challenge for the Labour leadership following the EU referendum, Ms Kennedy was already indicating she wouldn’t vote Labour with Corbyn as its leader:
This 2016 tweet raised the question of how she had not voted Labour ‘twice in my life‘ in 2016, but then had still ‘only not voted Labour twice‘ after not voting Labour again in last year’s general election. In a statement to the SKWAWKBOX, she said that this was because one of the occasions was a local election:
I regard myself a Labour voter. My natural home is the centre of the Labour Party. I have voted Labour at every general and local and E.U. MEP election. Until I moved two years ago, I lived in a marginal ward where every vote counted. Immediately after the Iraq War my conscience would not allow me to vote Labour. I voted Liberal Democrat. I returned to voting Labour. At the last general election I voted tactically because I now live in a very safe Tory seat. I voted Lib Dem because they were second at the last GE in this seat. I continue to vote Labour in locals. I’m not sure how much clearer I can be. My home is Labour. I want to vote Labour.
Emma Kennedy
The single most important matter for the nation at the moment is Brexit. I want to vote for a party that will promise a second referendum. I believe Jeremy wants Brexit and I think his lack of leadership has been woeful. I will vote for any party or coalition that stands on a Stop Brexit platform.
And that’s my position.
On the tweets, if memory serves right, the Green vote was for locals and Lib Dem’s was for General.
In any event, it’s clear that Ms Kennedy’s aversion to voting Labour under Corbyn goes back long before last weekend, in spite of her tweet that she ‘now’ couldn’t do it.
You’ve lost my vote – that you didn’t have anyway
The phenomenon is widespread, with a host of claims of ‘lost’ support that don’t stand up to scrutiny.
For example, during a discussion of the ‘MSM’ articles and the PV response to it, one Twitter user claimed that Labour had now ‘lost’ her vote and those of her family because of Labour’s position.
But when challenged about it after a search of her Twitter feed, she admitted that she had not voted Labour at the last general election either, so the vote was not ‘lost’ relative to Labour’s previous electoral performance – and certainly not as a result of the recent ‘news’ about Labour’s Brexit position:
How it looks
The reaction of people without a PV-axe to grind tells a harsh truth to the leaders of the PV campaign and the ‘stop Brexit’-obsessed activists, bots, astroturfers and sock-puppets making claims on social media that don’t stand up – it looks like a big tantrum to those outside it.
This tweet from Ed Poole sums up very well the impression it creates:
This tongue-in-cheek comment from media activist Aaron Bastani sums up how transparent the tactic is:
While this from Twitter user Ben Jolly captures the dark side of the PV-obsession and its human cost:
SKWAWKBOX comment:
Some of the sudden escalation of such nonsense appears to be from people with genuine motivations – if a questionable grasp of their own voting history. Other parts look like a deliberate campaign to try to create a false impression of voters deserting Labour because it won’t back the so-called – and utterly arrogantly-titled – “people’s vote”.
But the scale of the nonsense, all supposedly triggered by a transparently-coordinated and dishonest campaign of mainstream media ‘news’, when the second-referendum ship has already sailed, makes the motives of those whipping it up all too clear.
And as usual, it’s got more to do with trying to attack Corbyn’s electoral strength than about its purported reason.
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These “Labour supporters” all allegedly voted for Labour in the 2017 election. Therefore, they voted for Jeremy Corbyn as leader and Labour’s unchanged policy of respecting the referendum result….if they failed to read the manifesto, tough, they should have voted LibDem. We are not deceived.
Don’t forget Maureen Lipmann will no longer be voting Labour because of Corbyn:
http://standpointmag.co.uk/node/5798/full
Again. You will find, I’m sure that many of those doing a flounce have done it more than once. Lipman has, for sure.
Another neo-liberal masquerading as a socialist;. Labour movement is well rid of her “sympathies”
The British mainstream Tory controlled media are doing their upmost to try and divide and destroy the Labour party membership. We must not let this happen as we need to overthrow this government as a matter of urgency.
We cannot turn back the hands of time and have to move forward and unite behind the labour policy no matter which way everyone voted in the original referendum.
If the question in the original referendum was/were more detailed than no doubt the result would have differed and we would not be in the sorry mess. The question set by Cameron was what it was and we cannot change that and have to live with it.
The Labour policy is clear in that we voted to leave and the original referendum must be respected and we must push for some form of customs union with the EU. The customs union is the only way to keep the United Kingdom union together.
The Tory party is and remains divided on whether to have a customs union and does not know what any of its own policies are. The implications of the Tory infighting and lack of any direction means that any hope of agreeing a new future arrangement before or just after we leave have now turned to dust. This has also resulted in that totally unacceptable deal Mrs May is wasting our money trying to sell while people struggle to survive under her terrible policies.
Merry Christmas everyone. Lets hope 2019 brings the Labour government this country desperately needs.
Of course it is correct that the right wing media are trying to split our Party but it is going against a ‘peoples vote’ which is doing the greatest harm. There are obviously those in the PV campaign who want to damage Corbyn but it is ridiculous to say that the campaign is wrong and all those who support it are anti-Corbyn.
Another vote is the obvious democratic choice where voters had a chance to confirm or change their original choice and if Jeremy had proposed it from the start he would now have universal support.
The campaign IS wrong because once you have a referendum you have to IMPLEMENT its result. It is a vile abuse of democracy to force the electorate to vote again merely because the people have had the temerity to disagree with the ruling class, the politico-economic elite.
The PV campaign is led by and dominated by anti-Corbyn people and its effect would be to destroy Labour in the target seats, so it is in effect an anti-Corbyn campaign.
How many referenda do you want? Best of how many? You want us to be like the Irish and be forced to vote until we give the “correct” result the neo-lib elites want?
The original referendum was in or out only. The vast majority of the people were unhappy with the direction the EU and the UK were heading and wanted change at the time of the original referendum was held. Many wanted different terms but had to decide between in or out only. Leave won and article 50 was triggered. We cannot change the past or the original question.
If we suddenly change our minds and decide that we wish to remain, the deal we had with the EU when the referendum took place will not last long. We have to agree a budget for each year that we are in the EU and any future governments efforts to change our arrangements for the better could be severely hampered by this whole fiasco. We could face ever spiralling contributions from a union that we and our future generations can never leave. All hopes of any changes for the better would be lost. A second referendum on the same issue will not bring about change for the better therefore turning back the clock is not an option.
The polls are misleading. What about those that originally voted remain who wanted a renegotiated deal? They would almost certainly vote leave now as it is the only chance to get an arrangement that suits the many and not the privileged few.
If you have an affair and decide later to beg to come back to your partner the relationship would never be as it was before. That is, of course, if they have you back.
I fail to understand what there is to vote on. I have read the whole EU withdrawal agreement and the proposed future relationship document. It is not worth wasting public money on a vote on that because it would be overwhelmingly rejected.
What exactly is the question the peoples vote wishes to vote on?
Never heard of this particular “celebrity”, but I well remember snooker star Steve Hendry announcing he would leave the UK if there were tax rises…..there were and he didn’t.
Great work from the Skwawkbox again exposing this barefaced liar. We now know, she wasn’t missed, before she thought she would be. lol
Great exposé of anti-Corbyn astroturf campaign, presumably masterminded from Auchtermuchty?
“Great work from the Skwawkbox”
Not really. It’d be nice to see something less repetitive and of more substance that addressed the question of gaining support for Labour in resolving this situation where the leadership is out of kilter with its base.
“…out of kilter with its base.” Or it’s voters? They are not the same.
‘Not really’ Would be your opinion, do feel free to post it without quoting me.
I see quite a bit of variety overall. We have our Manifesto and had our conference it’s now time to call the Tories out and put that to the country. You’re either onboard with that or you’re not.
‘People’s Vote’. What the hell did they think the last vote was?
I voted remain but think we have to respect the outcome.
David Cameron made the referendum pledge not realising he would win an overall majority in 2015 and be expected to honour it.
I suspect that if we ever got this Blairfest Loser’s Vote a lot of people who voted Remain would take the view that we have to respect the outcome of the referendum and they would vote accordingly.
Well Dan, there appears a lot of remainers on twitter that seem mightily fed-up with these untrustworthy Blairites they probably won’t have any choice.
Stop Brexit?
What? Stop the democracy that has asked and triumphed for Brexit at the ballot box?
Yer ‘avin a larf – ain’t yer?
Us Brexiteers know even more now than we did then as to be supremely confident and determined for a final ‘People’s Brexit’ to triumph. Us Brexiteers are not such cowards as to balk at another EU Referendum so long as the choice is a binary ‘IN’ or ‘OUT’ as previously listed on the ballot. None of yer nobbling three discombobulating choices as to be a manipulation to split Brexit’s options and see Remain sneak in with duplicitous guile.
I hope Skwawkbox has pointed this out to Clive Lewis MP, who has clearly been bounced into amplifying this campaign. That alone should make us wary of Mr. Lewis’ future political positions/ambitions.
This has Campbell’s fingerprints all over it. His MSM campaigns against his perceived enemies under Blair (including Brown) have a certain feel. It certainly has a willing MSM, who aren’t afraid to act openly in concert. That can only be “fixed” by an establishment insider.
If 60% of voters now want to stay in the EU, Labour would have to change their policy but as there is no election coming up yet they can wait and see. Although people are angry with them for not outwardly opposing Brexit Labour have no power to do anything and waiting is the best policy.
Good piece Skwawk on Emma Kennedy (whoever she is) and the ruse that she is taking her vote elsewhere which she was not going to give to Labour anyway.
Who is she? Is she a fan of Mr Robinson and Ms Hopkins? By the way she did a great song, Those were the days. Lovely. Regards