UK - Politika i društvo

bemty wrote:meni su veceras laburisti pokucali na vrata, da pitaju kako cemo da glasamo i da nam daju 'vote labour' papirce da stavimo u prozor ako hocemo.

dr. Labrador Špegelj wrote:Slogan torijevaca za izbore je, pazi sad,
BRITAIN DESERVES BETTER

LOL

The second referendum campaign - or the People's Vote as they euphemistically call themselves - had a very bad day. The infighting that has been going on under the surface erupted into the open amid a classic power struggle. The so-call People's Vote is a coalition of nine organisations with different aims. One of the PV's ringleaders is Roland Rudd, the brother of Amber Rudd, and one of the leaders pro-Remain campaigners in 2016. He is the head of Open Britain, one of the organisations behind the PV campaign. He fired two people over the weekend: the head of communications and the campaign director. But they refused to go, challenging Rudd's right to dismiss them. They are backed by Alistair Campbell, Tony Blair's former enforcer. There was a staff walk-out yesterday as the whole thing descended into chaos.
So, what is this about?
The two men dismissed by Rudd wanted to keep the PV campaign on the straight and narrow by focusing on the second referendum. Others want the PV to become a vehicle to revoke Brexit by whichever means possible. The split in the PV campaign is the counterpart of what is happening on the opposition benches in the UK parliament. The LibDems no longer back a second referendum, and have switched their strategy to full-on support for Brexit revocation. Labour's official position is to hold a second referendum after it negotiates a customs union deal with the EU.
We noted a comment on Twitter yesterday that the PV is not really about Brexit but about its supporters' grip on power. It is the crowd that used to run the country. When they started to win their big political battles in the mid-to-late 1990s, they thought they had defeated the Thatcherite right forever. To them Brexit came as a complete shock for which they were ill-prepared in 2016. We noted at the time that they never reflected on the deep causes of their defeat, and moved on seamlessly to the second referendum campaign.

How Brexit splits tore apart the People’s Vote campaign

Conflicts over whether to campaign for Remain or focus on second referendum leave group in disarray

William Wallis in London October 28 2019

It had the trappings of a poorly executed coup. When simmering disputes over strategy and control within the People’s Vote campaign burst into the open on Monday, there were attempts first to prevent the ousted leadership from entering headquarters at Millbank Tower, on the Thames. Roland Rudd, who as chair of Open Britain holds some sway over the other main organisations behind the campaign for a second referendum on leaving the EU, had angered many staff after dismissing James McGrory, director of the campaign, and Tom Baldwin, head of communications, over the weekend.Mr Rudd failed to show for an address to staff at 9am because “he didn’t want to be ambushed and videoed being shouted at”, according to one ally. Instead he took to the airwaves consolidating what his opponents characterised as a “power grab”.

The 60 staff were offered a day off. But instead about half of them gathered with Mr McGrory and Mr Baldwin to plot resistance at a café around the corner.Just 10 days ago the People’s Vote movement brought hundreds of thousands of people on to the streets of London in what the organisers said was the biggest public demonstration yet of support for Britain remaining in the EU. In just 18 months, the campaign has moved from the margins of political debate to the mainstream, with a groundswell of support.

But as they have got closer to what remains an elusive prize — a chance to revisit the Brexit vote — campaign chiefs have fallen out, potentially dividing the financial, human and data resources needed to keep their fight afloat. “It looks terrible because it is terrible,” said Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair’s former spin-doctor who has been on board since the outset, of Monday’s events. Competing political agendas and clashing personalities have combined with a mood of weary resignation among many people who voted Remain to undermine the campaign’s hopes of reaching the finishing line.Splits between founding members have been compounded by leaks to the press, portraying a clash of egos and old friends. On the one side was Mr Rudd, the founder of city PR powerhouse, Finsbury, and on the other Peter Mandelson, Tony Blair’s former adviser and fellow founder of New Labour.The real battles have been over control of strategy and method. Some campaign chiefs, including Mr Rudd, have advocated full-throated support for remaining in the EU, lending weight towards a realignment in British politics.

The latter would reflect how traditional party loyalties are breaking down as Labour veers leftward and Tories to the right. Political identities are shaping around either side of the Brexit divide, providing opportunities for a new pro-EU centre ground.“A lot of us thought it was silly to dance on a pinhead. It’s obvious we want another vote and we want to reverse this madness,” said Mr Rudd.At Millbank, the campaign leadership argued instead for a more neutral approach. They have focused narrowly on presenting a second referendum as a democratic solution to the Brexit impasse that has left parliament deadlocked.First they have had to persuade MPs to join the second referendum bandwagon. Having started out with the support of about 20 in 2018, the campaign won backing from 280 MPs in indicative votes earlier this year, about 40 short of a majority. They believe they have narrowed that margin since. “You have to win that argument to open up the next,” said a senior campaign source, the “next” being to persuade the public to vote Remain.Some supporters of the neutral approach, feared that work in trying to win round MPs would be jeopardised by any stance that allows Brexiter opponents to present the campaign as disparaging of Leave voters and championing the status quo.

These tensions risk spilling over into a general election, with the pro-European Liberal Democrats eager to take advantage of the Labour leadership’s more ambivalent stance on Brexit by scooping up pro-EU voters. The campaign leadership instead favoured backing tactical voting that avoids splitting the Remain vote in marginal constituencies that would allow Brexiters to win.“Our job is not to help the Lib Dems get 25 per cent in the next election, create a new Remain party or to justify the Labour leadership. It is to secure a majority for a People’s Vote in parliament so that everyone who wants to stay in the EU has a chance to do so,” said Mr Baldwin. These differences exploded into a boardroom power struggle, with planned reforms to ramshackle governance structures stalled as a result. Mr Rudd’s move on Sunday was designed to break the impasse. He defended it, saying there had been “too many angry men shouting”, and that a “different approach is needed that is tolerant, inclusive and kind”. Brexit Briefing

Open Britain owns the campaign database and contracts the staff, so as chairman Mr Rudd might technically prevail. But his opponents say they have done all the recent fundraising, mostly through crowdfunding, and directed funds through Open Britain’s accounts on trust. Both sides lay claim to grassroots loyalties.Ironically, says Mr Rudd, just as the UK hovers on the verge of Brexit it now has “probably the biggest, most committed pro-European movement in all 28 EU countries”. With the campaign in disarray, and the Brexiter prime minister Boris Johnson pushing for early elections, its members could soon be without a home.

https://www.ft.com/content/96625ba6-f704-11e9-a79c-bc9acae3b654

UK, Panelbase poll:

CON-ECR: 40% (+4)
LAB-S&D: 29% (+2)
LDEM-RE: 14% (-3)
BREXIT-NI: 9% (-2)
GREENS-G/EFA: 3%

+/- vs.  17-18 Oct

Fieldwork: 29-30 October
Sample size: N/A
➤ https://t.co/7gcpMz8djk  #Brexit #BrexitDeal #BorisJohnson #GE2019 pic.twitter.com/jkdAy8piAE

— Europe Elects (@EuropeElects) November 1, 2019