22 June 2017
Election Diary of a Corbynista
Extracts
by Don Urquhart
18 April
Theresa May has announced a General Election on June 8th. I would be delighted to see a united Labour Party in Parliament. What’s the point of people like Alan Johnson?
19 April
Alan Johnson obviously agrees; he is standing down.
25 April
The media, led by the BBC, are savagely anti-Corbyn. They and ITV fill the airways with the likes of Liz Kendall.
26 April
BBC News chanced upon a couple of lifelong Labour voters who thought Theresa May was wonderful and Corbyn a no-hoper. It’s almost as if the populace has been conditioned by the media coverage.
30 April
Theresa May is committing to introduce measures to protect employees from people like Philip Green. It is a tactical mistake as she is straying away from Brexit and character assassination. In tackling workers’ rights she is on Corbyn’s home ground and will not see much of the ball. It is possibly an admission by Lynton Crosby that the stable and strong, coalition of chaos mantras are wearing thin.
1 May
Yesterday Theresa May had a Gillian Duffy moment on Andrew Marr when she commented that nurses attend food banks for many complex reasons.
Labour will address rogue landlords. Gavin Barwell warns that this will cause rents to go up. So there you have it – if you want people to have decent, safe housing they will have to pay too much for it.
2 May
Jean-Claude Juncker, the President of the European Commission visited Theresa May at 10 Downing Street and reported to the Frankfurter Allgemeine that he was very depressed about the coming negotiations. Theresa May was in a different galaxy. May dismisses this as Brussels gossip.
3 May
The Tories are attacking Labour on the basis that their promises are not deliverable. It is the old “who do you trust with the economy?” mantra. The Tories are likely to lose the argument but win the election.
4 May
Theresa May made an extraordinary attack on the people she is due to negotiate with in the EU. It looked like a cynical nod to the xenophobic wing of her party and UKIP voters.
6 May
I am astonished that Jeremy Hunt is being allowed on to television. Lynton Crosby must be very confident in Peston’s docility. Dinner with friends who repeat the mantra of Corbyn’s “weakness”. I think we have to rely on Theresa May shooting herself in the foot.
8 May
The BBC has been informed that the Tories will put an immigration limit in their manifesto. So they are pushing on with subsuming the UKIP agenda.
10 May
Labour has pledged huge increases in funding for education. David Gauke calls the plans nonsensical, but I think that Labour have a reasonable chance of winning this one.
11 May
The Labour manifesto is leaked and it appears that they are going for broke. The BBC quotes Labour MPs who say that Corbyn will have to take responsibility if it fails.
13 May
WannaCry seems to have caused carnage round the world. Microsoft tells us that patches were sent out 2 months ago and should have been applied.
14 May
Amber Rudd’s statement that only 4.7% of NHS computers run XP shows a lack of understanding of cyber-attacks. Any vulnerability of the network will mean the whole network is exposed. An ex-Chairman of NHS IT tells us there are hundreds of thousands of XP computers in the NHS. Either he or Amber is offering us fake alternative facts.
16 May
There was a working class woman in Middlesbrough who would vote for Theresa May because she would be strong enough to negotiate Brexit. What you are up against is an image formed by Theresa May’s statements and persona and the mantra “strong and stable leadership” parroted by her acolytes, the press and broadcasters. Corbyn is presented as chaotic and unreliable with the BBC never missing an opportunity to depict him as rubbishing NATO or colluding with the IRA and other terrorists back in the day.
17 May
Labour’s manifesto launch which they carried off in a positive manner with Tom Watson as Corbyn’s best mate and ranks of shadow ministers some of whom have impressed greatly. I had myself thinking “perhaps”.
20 May
On This Week Ed Balls’ unctuousness was nauseating. May he rot on the Blackpool dance floor.
21 May
Theresa May’s attack on pensioners has opened the door for Labour. The Conservative Manifesto tells you what wonderful things they have done, indeed what a grand country we live in, then moralises about things like social care and tells a little story about how we have to be bold in making old people pay directly for their medical treatment.
26 May
UKIP presented their manifesto. They want more police, more soldiers, less foreign aid, and next to no immigration. I am hoping they will win back some voters who had defected to the Tories.
27 May
Corbyn did quite well under interrogation from Andrew Neil. The latter chose the IRA, Trident and uncosted manifesto measures as the soft underbelly. But Jeremy is well practised in dealing with these.
28 May
The Tory campaign has been poor up until now. It started with Theresa telling us about Brexit and asking who we want fronting up to Brussels: her or Corbyn? We had that solid and stable nonsense which has now collapsed into U-Turns and pathetic claims that nothing has changed. Surely they will not go again on the IRA, Hezbollah and Hamas. Many will see it as nasty and off topic.
29 May
Fallon tried the “Corbyn soft on terrorism” mantra on Peston, who ended up banging his head on the desk in frustration.
30 May
Paxman’s rudeness conflicted with the desire of viewers for a sensible question and answer session. The one bright spot was his characterisation of May as a blowhard who crumbles at the first hint of challenge.
31 May
Tonight there is a 7 way leaders’ debate where Labour have still not announced their participant.
1 June
Corbyn turned up and did a pretty good job. Amber Rudd led for the Tories although her father had passed away only 2 days earlier.
3 June
Kuenssberg tried to make Question Time look like a pretty even contest. But Theresa May waffled and issued sound bites. At one point she told an underpaid nurse there was no magic money tree, Crosby’s current mantra of choice. Corbyn came under fire for refusing to say he would press the red button.
4 June
When campaigning resumes and we know a little more of the London Bridge murderers’ backgrounds it will be appropriate to raise the issue of community policing and in particular the very specific warnings made by the police to Theresa May when she was Home Secretary.
5 June
Black propaganda will abound with the Tories looking to ram home their “Soft on Terrorism” message. I suspect that the scope and evil of their output will be breath-taking.
6 June
Corbyn’s line is that May has contributed to the terrorist problem by reducing police numbers while accusing them of crying wolf. May’s argument is that Corbyn is a friend of terrorists. Voters will have to decide who to believe.
7 June
Theresa May wants to shred the European Human Rights Convention. It looks like a cynical attempt to bind in the racist right wing and finally blindside UKIP. It might work – she might just convince some who had not yet decided to forsake UKIP for the Tories.
8 June
It seems that it all depends on getting the young people out to vote.
9 June
At just after 10 pm the exit poll summary said “HUNG PARLIAMENT”, and so died what was left of Theresa May’s credibility.
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