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Corbyn takes fight to yet more Tory turf

Labour leader in Harlow and Stevenage

Largely ignored by the corporate media, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has been on a ‘parking tanks’ tour of Tory-held constituencies in preparation for this autumn’s predicted general election, packing out venues to lay out Labour’s vision and policies and to stake Labour’s claim as the government-in-waiting.

Today, Corbyn was in Stevenage – 2017 Tory majority 6,109 – where he met with a warm welcome from Labour members in two constituencies Labour will be targeting in the next general election:

Jeremy Corbyn meets supporters in Stevenage

The Tory majority in Stevenage was cut by more than half in 2017 as the ‘Corbyn surge’ saw Labour make the biggest gain in vote-share since 1945.

Corbyn also visited Harlow, which the Tories won by 7,031 votes in the last general election, where he talked to a packed room of Labour activists before meeting young and older supporters:

In spite of the gruelling schedule he has maintained throughout the summer – his tour has seen him criss-cross the UK almost non-stop, including Tory-held Powys in Wales – Corbyn looked fit and relaxed, also finding time to talk to several media outlets to take on Boris Johnson’s ‘nonsense’, threat-tactics and ‘hostile environment on steroids’ in Johnson’s amateurish attempts to manipulate EU leaders.

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28 comments

  1. Not sure you get it – the defining issue of our time is EU membership. On this the otherwise estimable Jeremy Corbyn is unclear to say the least. On that basis the Labour party will sadly never win a general election. As a life long Labour voter it saddens me to have to say that my vote can only be for a remain party. But, there it is. Declare outright as a European party, and I’ll be back.

    1. the defining issue is the general election and a socialist government anyone that misses that point doesnt understand what has happened to our country over the past 40 years and is rapidly getting worse with a carpet bagger government in power now!

      the brexit shambles has a solution and that is the referendum the party has proposed, because everyone now understands the issues with much more clarity. (or should do) and can chose

      so to recap ..brexit will be dealt one way or the other with but a labour government is a crucial and important need.

      do i need to explain the suffering and the misery and the lack of hope that will occur should people fail to support the party and assist in its success?

      no other party would care or make changes except to make worse ones that eat the country and the people up …so unless people start to understand that the the poor, vulnerable and helpless along with the rest of the country need this labour government all you will get is more years like the last ones ..miserable filled with lies about how good we have it!

      im not a fan of brexit coming before the country and the people mentality, does it show?

      and now bring on the trolls.

      1. marti, anyone who thinks leave/remain is the defining issue of our age is an idiot – a dupe – a tool of the 1%.
        The defining issue of our age is AI and its effect on whether they win or we win.
        They need us defenceless before it becomes obvious to us that ALL the jobs will go and we decide killing them is the only choice left to us.
        Their problem is that AI can enable a perfect socialist command economy as easily as it can make the 1% all-powerful.

      2. You’ve got it right marti,brexit is not the only show in town! People who are suffering come first

      3. Sorry – you can’t just dismiss the importance of Brexit as a key electoral issue – particularly if you had had an argument like the one I got into yesterday with a long-time Labour member threatening to put the cross elsewhere.

        You can rail against this sort of voting intention – but it’s a real issue.

        Of course, the latest statement about Brexit has clarified things to a degree – but, the long period of ambiguity has done damage.

        It is also naive to think that the desire for progressive social policies is unconnected with views on Brexit. The ambiguity has posed a dilemma among Party members where there need have been none. Above all, members were really pissed off with the argument that they supported ‘Leave’ by virtue of the last manifesto. Nothing like alienating a core of supporters as a means of garnering votes!

      4. Further to the AI thing – imagine when the jobs are almost gone.
        If you doubt that, watch this:
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

        We’d want to take militant action, right?
        To do that we’d need to organise and we’d need to travel.
        Phones/internet to organise and cars to travel.
        Shutting down networks is easy already if they want to stop us organising – we all know that – I wrote a long while ago on the likelihood of our needing to use CB/ham/MF/HF radio.

        New tech will be able to target known activists without resorting to drone strikes.
        AI software is being written with ‘back doors’ – Mercedes and other manufacturers can already remotely update individual vehicles at will – AND LOCATE AND DISABLE THEM FOR REPOSSESSION IF PAYMENTS ARE MISSED.

        When 5G comes on stream even fridge-freezers will be capable of being remotely disabled – or informing anyone with the right software that the number of pizzas/beers removed indicates a meeting is under way.
        Transport and communication – and food – are essential to even minor civil disobedience – in ‘AI world’ revolution will be next to impossible.
        Our masters are about to become invincible if we don’t take control first – and do it worldwide.

        Sorry for banging on about this so much but it’s close and it’s going unreported and unnoticed.

    2. I am suprised Chris Lovett you would actually vote for another party…..surely you are better than that?

      1. Joseph, there are still plenty of those diehards willing to cut off their noses to spite faces. Those who would throw out the baby, but keep the bathwater

        A socialist labour govermnment is NOT their priority, no matter how much they would like to kid on that that’s what they would like to see. Essentially, they are all swinsons.

    3. Sadly , Chris Lovett, Labour’s key heartland constituencies (with well over 50 seats at stake) are overwhelmingly Leave areas, as are most of the Tory marginals we need to win to take power. So if Labour declares itself outright as a pro Remain Party (by the way Labour will always be a “European Party” – the EU is merely a neoliberalism-enforcing political and economic entity, not “Europe”) , we will lose a lot more Leave voters in electorally important seats than Remain EU enthusiasts like yourself. Though I would have thought that Labour’s latest position on Brexit is so clearly , beyond the bluster, a Remain position , as to fit your requirement ? John McDonnell, has now clearly stated that even if Labour in government negotiated it’s own Brexit Deal with the EU, he would personally vote Remain ! Jeremy is apparently now one of the few remaining old “Bennite” Labour MPs who still understands that few of Labour’s 2017 popular Manifesto promises are possible inside the EU Single Market Rules.

      Presumably you have no interest in our renationalisation proposals , or our policies to support key industries to rebuild our manufacturing sector and our abandoned regions , Chris Lovett ? One wonders why you don’t just join the Lib Dems if EU membership is your sole interest ?

  2. As Socialists, above all else we want a Corbyn Labour government, so how do we achieve it?

    The most pressing issue at the moment is Brexit and this will be a defining issue. Assuming we get the chance of an election before 31st Oct. do we go into it supporting Leave or Remain? There is no halfway house we have to make a clear and unamiguous choice.

    Knowing what we know now since the referendum, that choice is beyond doubt, we have to support Remain or give up any hope of winning an election.

      1. Constituencies don’t vote.

        *Labour supporters* in such constituencies voted ‘Remain’. The phantom vote that the Party has focused on is a Tory vote – whilst supporters exited by the back door.

        It’s not rocket science.

        … and , yes – it was three years ago when there was some excuse for not knowing about Brexit.

      2. Quite correct, John. The constant troll, JH, pushing again that bogus small-sample-based polling nonsense , much propagated by the Guardian, that even in the most Leave-supporting Labour heartland working class constituencies, with Leave winning in the 65 to 70% range, mysteriously, we are asked to believe that Labour’s voters were nevertheless nearly all Remainers ! Strange that so many Labour MPs in these constituencies, like that rabid Right Winger, and personally a Remainer, Stephen Kinnock , are warning the Party that a Remain position will lose us over 50 solidly traditional Labour seats. But then they are doing regular detail local private polling in their constituencies, not depending on bogus “weaponised” small sample polling that produced the ludicrous Guardianista claim that RH is parroting. Make no mistake , in the real world, Labour’s current, in all but name, Remain, position, has lost us the next election.
        https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48694223

        And as for that dodgy (Zionism-obsessed) other troll, Jack T, and his “three years ago !” daft post. Yep, and the latest European Parliament elections, with those astonishing wins for the brand new Brexit Party in traditional Labour heartland areas, show clearly those areas are still solidly for Leave !

      3. I think, Ha’Penny, that you need to get a basic grasp of simple arithmetic before you get into the mathematics of polling.

        Meanwhile – working class Labour supporters voted in the majority for Remain’. They didn’t conform to your Toytown version of reality – which, followed to its conclusion would end up with massively more ‘Leave’ voters than the 37% that actually came out of the woodwork.

        Never mind – you continue consoling yourself with fantasies about ‘trolling’ and the virtue of the Israel Lobby.

      4. bad penney, “as for that dodgy (Zionism-obsessed) other troll, Jack T”

        It’s certainly not an obsession I have with the Zionists in the Party who are doing their best to destroy Corbyn politically. It’s more a profound disgust.

        Now that at last we have a true Socialist leading the Party the Zionists, because of Corbyn’s criticisms of Israel’s barbaric treatment of the Palestinians, seek to undermine not only him but Jews who support him and are brave enough to face up to the Zionists.

        With ‘friends’ like Mike Katz from the Zionist JLM who needs enemies?

        https://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/mike-katz-jewish-labour-movement-will-not-campaign-for-labour-candidates-who-back-corbyn-over-antis-1.482894

      5. Jack T, RH – can’t help but think that the v close 52/48 national vote is clouding your judgment. As you know really, national proportion and FPTP across 650 constituencies tell very different stories. Hence, to reiterate, 406 vs 242 (yes, only 648 and it’s an estimate) looks trickie to say the least for any party supporting remain.

        OK, it’s more than 3 years ago but does that mean there are ‘not sure remainers’ who now favour ‘get the thing done’. FWIW (remoaners look away now) I voted leave to get rid of Cameron and Giddiot and would vote leave again as the EU would stop a socialist government (again, you all know really this is the case but not when in ‘hands over ears la, la, la’ mode).

  3. JC doing a great job in visiting Tory marginals.
    Hopefully Labour will win, offer a Better Brexit Deal but with a Remain option.
    I would vote for the former.

    1. That would suit me fine too. If the chips are down I’d rather have a socialist labour govt and to me that’s more important than either leave or remain. But a Tory no deal scares the bejeezus out of me, so I hope Jez’s latest scheme works out.

  4. AAV lives up-to his name in this long and sustained attack on the LibDems.
    https://voxpoliticalonline.com/2019/08/21/want-to-know-why-the-liberal-democrats-are-trying-to-block-corbyn-its-selfishness/

    Another Angry Voice
    There’s been plenty of understandable anger at the Lib-Dems for their ridiculous threats to hand No Deal Brexit to Boris Johnson on a silver platter out of their spiteful, tribalistic, petulant refusal to work with Jeremy Corbyn, but there’s not been very much analysis on why they’ve taken up such an extraordinary stance.

    1. Stevenson thanks for the link very good article which.also leads me to conclude that the selfish reasons and survival are the very same reasons we have so much trouble from our own right wing.Corbyn has proven that their support of tory welfare and economic policy was not only unnecessary but disastrous and treacherous….

    2. Zuckerberg & Facebook boil my piss. And Twitter.
      Why the fuck would anyone think it was a great idea and a great user experience to have to keep clicking on ‘three more comments’ and ‘one more comment’ to carry on reading the bloody comments.
      And then Twitter hiding comments by nasty people using nasty words behind a lace curtain. Jeezus that is so pathetic.
      Like the “Won’t somebody PLEEESE think of the CHILDREN?” Tories insisting on teenage mutant HERO fucking turtles.

      What have we let these mediocrities turn us into that we accept this shit as normal?

  5. Ps spellchecker again stevedavidh,,meant before my computer decided for.me

  6. Lovely upbeat account of Jeremy’s campaigning in Tory seats. Sadly, that ain’t in itself going to be nearly enough to reverse the looming Labour electoral disaster. An important new poll, and news item ignored by Skwawkbox, out over the last few days is surely the one from Kantar:

    Latest Kantar Opinion Poll
    Conservatives: 42%
    Labour: 28%
    Lib Dem : 15%
    Brexit Party: 5%
    Greens: 3%
    Change UK: 1%

    I very much hope this is a wild “outlier” poll – with the Tories re-buoyed up by all those bogus bullshit Boris Johnson spending promises, and constant MSM publicity of him “standing up to the perfidious Brussels EU Johnny Foreigners” to implement the 2016 Referendum democratic decision. Nevertheless (and accepting that current polls are remarkably febrile and ever-shifting) , if the Kantar poll is even in the general ballpark of reality, it demonstrates that under the lying bullshitter, Johnson, the Tories are winning back the Tory vote from the Brexit Party – but Labour are still losing significant portions of our Labour Leave supporters to the Brexit Party. This is of course indicative that those of us who have constantly warned of the consequences of Labour becoming a Remain and Second Vote Party .

    Yep, I know we made up nearly all of a 20 point Tory lead during the 2017 General election once our excellent Manifesto was offered to voters. But this time ? With Labour not promising to “respect the Referendum result” as we did in 2017, but instead betraying our heartland Labour Leave supporters with a Remain and Second Vote position ? And all our promises to re-nationalise the railways, operate regional investment banks, support key industries with state aids, etc, impossible within the Single Market Rules ?

    No doubt all the posters on here, from the Right Wing pro EU trolls to the few actual socialist Lefties will continue to deny the disaster that is fast approaching. And berate the likes of myself and Danny for being “negative” . Dream on. Not long now though before harsh reality bites .

    1. jpenney 23/08/2019 at 3:33 pm

      FFS – You don’t half proselytise some crap.

      Why did you and your ‘Citizen Smith Comrades’ rejoin the Labour party after decades of pissing about playing at being a lefty.

      1. Yeah, a pox on all disaster-monkeys claiming Oracle status.
        I couldn’t be arsed myself but I think we know someone with the patience to look back at what result inkypinkie was predicting before the 2017 GE.
        Keep it short though Allan, there’s a good chap?

  7. Breaking News

    BBC R4 News
    Jarad O’Mara and his assistant arrested for fraud and released on bail

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