Right wingers are less intelligent than left wingers, says Daily Mail article...

[Mr Smokes Blunts.]

Good heavens! We'll gloss over that one for the sake of people's sanity, eh?



No, and last time I checked, nor did you!

And as if by magic, the post above you contains that information They are historically Labour voters, who have made the switch for whatever reason.

 

[Myshkin]

No, all it shows us is that support for the BNP is strong in traditional Labour strongholds (i.e. deprived communities). As you say yourself, it's up for debate exactly where those gains have come from.

 

[badandwicked]

I would be dishonest if I said that none of the BNP gains came from the Conservative's, but that is quite easily explained by the fact that the Cons have historically been unable to take that seat - so the individual voters are probably switching preferences in order to stand a higher chance of getting someone they like in.

So basically, you're saying cons = BNP. Glad we agree at last

 

[Marmalade]

BNP ready to fill Labour vacuum in Stoke

 

[Mr Smokes Blunts.]

So basically, you're saying cons = BNP. Glad we agree at last

No, a small amount are and the majority are from Labour. I presume that you agree with this, because you didn't take issue with me sayin it. Glad we agree at last

 

[Mr Smokes Blunts.]

No, all it shows us is that support for the BNP is strong in traditional Labour strongholds (i.e. deprived communities). As you say yourself, it's up for debate exactly where those gains have come from.

You can see where most of the gains come from by looking at the election records for that area on wiki, that I conviniently posted for you.

 

[badandwicked]

lest we forget

 

[Myshkin]

You can see where most of the gains come from by looking at the election records for that area on wiki, that I conviniently posted for you.

That's what I'm looking at. I can see more evidence of a dramatically plummeting turnout than I can of a huge swing from Labour to the BNP.

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

If you take Dags as an example, you can clearly see that when the BNP does well the majority of the votes come from Labour. You can also see that historically it is Labour heartland. I would be dishonest if I said that none of the BNP gains came from the Conservative's, but that is quite easily explained by the fact that the Cons have historically been unable to take that seat - so the individual voters are probably switching preferences in order to stand a higher chance of getting someone they like in.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barking_and_Dagenham_local_elections#By-election_results

Er...your link is for local elections. Not General. Local elections are notorious for protest votes. More so than the Euros for which you used the same excuse earlier.

Maybe you need to check your own links more thoroughly.

Here's one for General Elections for Dagenham.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagenham_(UK_Parliament_constituency)#Elections_in_the_2000s

And here's the result for when John Tyndall (middle-class) first stood there for the BNP in 1994.

Turnout 36,162 62.1
Dagenham by-election, 1994
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Labour Judith Church 15,474 72.0 +19.74
Conservative James Fairrie 2,130 9.91 -26.38
Liberal Democrat Peter Dunphy 1,804 8.39 -3.06
BNP John Tyndall 1,511 7.03 N/A
UKIP Peter Compobassi 457 2.13 N/A
Natural Law Mark Leighton 116 0.54 N/A
Majority 13,344
Turnout 21,492

Notes

BNP gain 7% of the vote.
Lab gain a positive swing of 19%
Tories have a swing against them of 26%

BNP votes from Labour you say? These were their original Dagenham 'base'. Tory voters.

EDIT In fact, if you go back through those results you'll see the Tories had a firm vote of around 12-15000 until the BNP started standing. And the Tory vote collapsed.

 

[Mr Smokes Blunts.]

Er...your link is for local elections. Not General. Local elections are notorious for protest votes. More so than the Euros for which you used the same excuse earlier.

Maybe you need to check your own links more thoroughly.

Here's one for General Elections for Dagenham.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagenham_(UK_Parliament_constituency)#Elections_in_the_2000s

And here's the result for when John Tyndall (middle-class) first stood there for the BNP in 1994.



Notes

BNP gain 7% of the vote.
Lab gain a positive swing of 19%
Tories have a swing against them of 26%

BNP votes from Labour you say? These were their original Dagenham 'base'. Tory voters.

That proves nothing. The voter turnout between 91 and 94 was less than half. If you look at the 2000s elections, when the turn out is stable, you can see Labour's votes declining whilst the conservatives stayed stable or increased and the BNP increased. Look at 2005:
General Election 2005: Dagenham
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Labour Jon Cruddas 15,446 50.1 -7.1
Conservative Michael White 7,841 25.4 -0.3
Liberal Democrat James Kempton 3,106 10.1 -0.1
BNP Lawrence Rustem 2,870 9.3 +4.3
UKIP Gerard Batten 1,578 5.1 N/A
Majority 7,605 24.7
Turnout 51.3
Labour hold Swing -3.4

Labour lost 7.1%, BNP gained 4.3%, and Conservatives lost 0.3%.

Also, check out when the National Front came on the scene, Labours votes declined, Tories increased and so did the NF...

 

[ponch]

2 pages and no one has wished death upon Thatcher yet. EADD is slow today.

 

[badandwicked]

We're building up to it.

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

You really just don't want to know do you?

I've provided you with figures that absolutely show the BNP standing in Dagenham coinciding with the collapse of the Tory vote from double figure thousands (where it had been for years) to single figure thousands.

You respond by bringing up one single election result at the height of mid-term pissed-offness with Labour and some rubbish about the National Front who stood in 1979 polling 1500 votes - when Labour and Liberal both lost thousands of votes (not 1500)

What bigger correlation do you want than

BNP gain 7% of the vote.
Lab gain a positive swing of 19%
Tories have a swing against them of 26%

?

 

[badandwicked]

Here's one for you Mr SB, a bit old but in the interests of fairness.....

http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/politics/domestic_politics/who+voted+bnp+and+why/3200557.html

But perhaps the most startling finding came when we tested anecdotal reports that many BNP voters were old Labour sympathisers who felt that the party no longer speaks up for them. It turns out to be true. As many as 59 per cent of BNP voters think that Labour "used to care about the concerns of people like me but doesn’t nowadays".

What is more worrying for Labour is that this sentiment is shared by millions of voters, way beyond the ranks of BNP voters. Overall, 63 per cent of the British public think Labour used to care about their concerns – and only 19 per cent think it does today.

In contrast, just 29 per cent think the Conservatives used to care about their concerns; this figure has climbed to 37 per cent who think they care in the Cameron era.

Yes, Labour has a problem with voters deserting the party for the BNP. But its far bigger problem as it heads towards the next general election is to extinguish the overwhelming public view, reinforced by the scandal over MPs’ allowances, that today’s Labour Party is no longer on the side of ordinary voters. And that, more than anything else, is why its vote collapsed to just 16 per cent in the Euro election.

 

[Mr Smokes Blunts.]

You really just don't want to know do you?

I've provided you with figures that absolutely show the BNP standing in Dagenham coinciding with the collapse of the Tory vote from double figure thousands (where it had been for years) to single figure thousands.

You respond by bringing up one single election result at the height of mid-term pissed-offness with Labour and some rubbish about the National Front who stood in 1979 polling 1500 votes - when Labour and Liberal both lost thousands of votes (not 1500)

What bigger correlation do you want than



?

2005 wasn't a bad year for Labour really, Blair was still in power, and lest we forget they won. If you want to see the results of an election where the people are seriously pissed off at the party in power then look no further than your example... Post Thatcher, Northern Town etc. Could it really get any worse for the Conservatives? There have been dozens of articles in papers etc. Like the one above, like the one Marmz posted etc. that show that it is disenfranchisement with Labour that is leading to higher BNP votes. It's not really any surprise given that these towns are generally Labour strong holds - like almost all of the places the BNP has done well funnily enough!

Is it not logical that the BNP would do better in Conservative areas than Labour areas, if it was Con voters who held sympathies with them?

 

[Ismene]

Blair let in millions of migrant workers.

Which kept low wages, the minimum wage and benefits at pitiful levels the likes of which Thatcher could only have dreamed of.

Are you saying letting in millions of low-paid migrants was of benefit to the working poor? Who was it of benefit to? Yep - employers. Sounds pretty right-wing to me.


If you think that the current government is far right

Testing terminal cancer patients for "fitness to work" by a private company? The only place to the right of that is Belsen.

But hey, I did forget that far right is just a term used by some people on the left to try and slur anyone they don't like.

But you arn't arguing Tony Blair was of the left are you? Don't the tories always say Blair was the best tory prime minister they ever had?

 

[Mr Smokes Blunts.]

Which kept low wages, the minimum wage and benefits at pitiful levels the likes of which Thatcher could only have dreamed of.

Are you saying letting in millions of low-paid migrants was of benefit to the working poor? Who was it of benefit to? Yep - employers. Sounds pretty right-wing to me.


If you think that the current government is far right

Testing terminal cancer patients for "fitness to work" by a private company? The only place to the right of that is Belsen.

But hey, I did forget that far right is just a term used by some people on the left to try and slur anyone they don't like.

But you arn't arguing Tony Blair was of the left are you? Don't the tories always say Blair was the best tory prime minister they ever had?

Thatcher could only have dreamed of? LOL. And what about the minimum wage? Thatcher was totally against the minimum wage full stop, as were most of the rest of the Tory party when it was introduced. That is pretty leftist, and damages business and industry in the eyes of the right. I would say he is left of center in the same way that Cameron is right of center.

I have never heard of Tony Blair being called the best Tory prime minister ever, most think he was a total disaster for this country as far as I am aware. Seizing on stupidness like testing cancer patients ability to work seems a bit weak to me, given that the government didn't sit down and say let's get those cancer patients back to work (it would lose them too many votes). It is only happening because of a poor implementation of policy, not because of the policy itself.

 

[Myshkin]

I would say he is left of center in the same way that Cameron is right of center.

The whole concept of the political 'centre' was invented by the right. Ultimately it's a ridiculous notion because it's entirely relative.

The progressive element of Blair's Labour party was based on a watered-down pick and mix from the EU's social and economic development agenda at the time, rather than a reflection of any truly left wing sentiment within the hierarchy.

 

[Mr Smokes Blunts.]

The whole concept of the political 'centre' was invented by the right. Ultimately it's a ridiculous notion because it's entirely relative.

The social progressive element of Blair's Labour party was based on a watered-down pick and mix from the EU's agenda at the time, rather than a reflection of any truly left wing sentiment within the hierarchy.

I understand that Labour was 'new' or whatever and not what it was, and that center is really just dictated by the party who is in at the time, but without a doubt during Labours rule it implemented a lot more policies that can be seen as Left than a Tory government would have. I'm sure you'd agree? I also happen to think that Brown was actually quite Lefty, as were a lot of the cabinnet like Harman etc.

 

[Ismene]

Thatcher could only have dreamed of? LOL.

Under Thatcher the dole was 17% of the average working mans salary, now it's less than 10%.

as were most of the rest of the Tory party when it was introduced

But the minimum wage was introduced at such a pitiful level that it never had any impact on employers.

most think he was a total disaster for this country as far as I am aware.

I don't think the top bankers and executives thought Blair was a disaster. They grew richer under him than they could ever have dreamed of under Thatcher. Blair privatised industries that Thatcher wouldn't have dared touch in a million years.


let's get those cancer patients back to work (it would lose them too many votes).

Would it? With all the demonising they're doing of people on sickness benefits? I don't think most people give two hoots about the disabled.