UK election open thread

Britain, it’s time. Time for change. The Conservatives need a fresh start with a new leader after the election. A new, more moderate leader. A leader who can appeal to both the city and the country, to all of the UK and to all Britons in all countries, counties, constituencies and overseas territories. No conscription. No internal civil wars. No bullshit. Just policies that can appeal to everyone. For this to happen, the party needs a clean out.

For the first time ever, I have decided to endorse the Tories to LOSE the election, but I still hope that the exceptionally good Conservative MPs retain their seats so one of them becomes leader and helps rebuild the party. But the UK still can’t risk Labour, the Greens, the Workers Party (George Galloway) or Reform (Nigel Farage). The Liberal Democrats may be the only sensibly centrist or moderate option in many constituencies.

Interestingly Sportsbet predicts that it is more likely for Reform UK to win the election than the Conservatives, though Labor are obviously still the heavy favourites by a long way.

Also upcoming is the French election. The first round is on 30 June and the second round is on 7 July.

For that election, based on policies I back the centrist Renaissance (formerly La République en Marche; yellow) party of Emmanuel Macron, but particularly I back its centre-right, liberal conservative ally Horizons (blue) which is close to the moderate/centre-right Liberals in Australia. Renaissance, Horizons and MoDem (the Democratic Movement (Mouvement démocrate), another centre to centre-right party; orange) form a liberal political alliance called Together (Ensemble in French).

The other major alliances/parties are the centre-left to far-left New Popular Front (essentially a broad left bloc, the main parties being La France Insouminese (left-wing, democratic socialism; purple), The Ecologists (left-wing, green politics; green), Socialist Party (Parti socialiste; centre-left, social democracy; red) and the Communist Party (Parti communiste; far-left, communism; red)), National Rally (Rassemblement National (RN); Marine Le Pen’s right-wing party, like One Nation in Australia or the Trumpist Republicans in the US; navy blue) and The Republicans (Les Républicains; liberal conservatism, centre-right to right-wing; blue).

Unfortunately I couldn’t make it to France this time though nor could I make it to Europe in general for the European Parliament elections. (One of my friends in France is working in Horizons’ campaign.)

@Nether Portal nah. I’m generally to the right but I agree that only Starmer can save the UK. Plus, unlike Albo, it’s clear that Starmer doesn’t just masquerade as a centrist, he’s genuinely pragmatic.

@ Scart/Nether Portal
The best hope to ensure that Starmer remains centrist/pragmatic in government is if Labor wins back as many of the traditional Red Wall seats as possible and does not soley depend on young renters, university towns and poorer ethnic communities. I do agree with NP that the best hope long term for the Tories is a clean out and have fresh leadership not shackled by the last 14 years of chaos.

@Nimalan they’ll win back every red wall seat, and then some.

@ Scart
Yes that is the best hope for a Centrist Labor government and that is what the projections currently say as well.

Tories are even at risk of losing to the Lib Dems for Opposition.

I would also add Rishi Sunak IMV is a bit of a Nanny state proponent with the smoking ban. This is something the New Centre Right Government scrapped. It goes against the belief in individual freedom

Starmer is almost just as bad as Sunak. he will be bad for britain. what they need is a Farage Prime ministership

@ John
Farage agrees with me on the smoking ban being stupid see below. He also opposes Conscription.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/j85JKcWQNGc

* new Centre Right Government in NZ i mean.

The smoking ban is stupid. Saying that someone born in 2009 can’t buy tobacco products but someone born in 2008 can is ridiculous. But I still don’t think Farage should become PM, he’s too extreme from what I know.

Farage is to the right of the conservatives…. suspect he is standing to stuff up things for them. He will only take votes off them… under fpp…. there is a big winner bonus.

@mick that speaks volumes how the tories have abandoned their base.

@NP i hear starmer is the same but to the left. we all know that reducing the voting age to 16 is desgined to incresae votes for the left. they claim its because if you pay taxes you should vote, well why not extend the logic to smokng and drinking, gambling etc. young people would overwhelmgly increase his base and thats what its designed for not some selfless act

Farage claims his motive is to eventually merge Reform and Conservative Party by citing the Canada case which is obviously a false equivalence as The Conservative merge in Canada was just remerging the split in 1990s between Progressive Conservatives and Reform Party of Canada but Farage’s Reform was split for UKIP (due to Tommy Robinson joining) and British Conservatives never splitted