Tomás Ó Flatharta

Looking at Things from the Left

Posts Tagged ‘labour-party

“Vote Left” Transfer Pact in June 2024 Irish Elections? – A Positive People Before Profit Initiative

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People Before Profit is proposing a “Vote Left” transfer pact to operate in the June 2024 Local and European Elections, 26 Counties

Presenting this positive initiative Paul Murphy TD said

He was fully aware that there would be different perspectives and, but People Before Profit “sees this as just the start of a process to form a left alternative.”

Paul Murphy TD
PBP TD’s Richard Boyd-Barrett, Paul Murphy, and Brid Smith

Link :

PBP Vote Left Transfer Pact Proposal

A useful detailed discussion is taking place on the Cedar Lounge Revolution Blog

(Link : The Cedar Lounge Revolution)

A correspondent, IrishElectionLiterature, opened the discussion on a positive note :

Link :

Vote left, Transfer left, Then What?

In the article below, important points from the discussion are highlighted.

This is a serious matter, especially in a context where it is necessary to confront and defeat the extreme racist right.


Colm Breathnach offers a very good template :

Just a personal thing, but here’s my own general set of rules when it comes to voting where a Proportional Representation system is in operation (obviously First Pat The Post system is much more challenging in terms of decisions):

  1. Start with the furthest left and keep voting until you reach the border of what you consider to be the left (for me, that’s social democratic or social liberal parties). Of course that border can shift – the Irish Greens were once inside my border of “left”, now they are definitely outside.
  2. Exclude candidates who consistently hold reactionary positions regardless of their ostensible politics – favour genocide, homophobic etc etc. So the Daly’s of the world don’t feature or let’s say a centre left candidate who justified Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
  3. Adjust to take account of specific concerns which one might deem important for progress to radical transformation of society. So for example you may alter your ranking to the take into account the candidates position on climate change or Irish unity etc.

Colm continues :

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Is Independence the “Settled Will” of the Scottish People in the 2020’s?

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Recent political events in England and Wales suggest chaos : Support for Rishi Sunak’s Tories is dive bombing. The excellent Stats for Lefties site regularly updates numbers, and they are startling :

Startling Predictions

At the same time Keir Starmer’s Labour Party seems to be busting a gut : Is it desperately snatching general election defeat from the jaws of victory? Readers are probably aware of Starmer’s deeply unpopular refusal to oppose Israeli genocide in Palestine. Did Sir Keir Starmer say Israel has the right to cut off food water and electricity to 2 million people in Gaza?

Starmer might be scoring an own-goal in Scotland. This Bella Caledonia article reviews the latest developments. Source : The Settled Will About the Author Mike Small : Mike Small

The Settled Will

How do you understand the latest polling from IPSOS which puts the SNP ahead of Labour by seven points and predicts they would pick up 40 seats in the next General Election?

At the last general election IPSOS predicted the SNP would win 48 seats (and were the most accurate pollster to predict the result). The SNP would indeed later win 48 seats. If the ‘extinction event’ that is predicted for the Conservatives this would mean the SNP taking 70% of available seats in Scotland. If Labour annihilate the Tories in England as looks very likely, there’s a possibility of the SNP becoming the official opposition.

The wider party prediction seat prediction is:
SNP 40
Labour 13
Conservatives 2
Lib Dems 2

Emily Gray from IPSOS Scotland said: “The SNP lead by 7 points on General Election voting intention, but Labour are narrowing the gap. There’s a Rise in public trust in Scottish Labour, including on the NHS and the economy – though SNP still the most trusted party.”

What’s going on?

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Did British Labour Leader Sir Keir Starmer say “Israel has the right” to cut off food water and electricity to 2 million people in Gaza?

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A resident of Great Britain advises these posters are appearing in an English city. The correspondent observes “Someone is sailing very close to the wind with electoral law even if it is an accurate account of what he said. This is the latest and biggest of a series of these that have popped up locally.”

Has anyone seen these posters in other parts of the British state, including the bit styled “Northern Ireland”. I am guessing the posters would be popular in Scotland and Wales. They could catch on!

A correspondent wondered “And of course it’s not what he said!” – so the blog team looked it up.

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