• News
  • Sport
  • TV
  • Radio
  • Education
  • TV Licences
  • Contact Us
  • SOUTH AFRICA
  • POLITICS
  • BUSINESS
  • SPORT
  • AFRICA
  • WORLD
  • FEATURES
  • OPINION
No Result
View All Result
1
Home World

UK Labour Party blame game begins as crushing defeat looms

13 December 2019, 5:50 AM  |
Reuters Reuters |  @SABCNews
Labour lost seats it has held for decades like Blyth Valley in northern England.

Labour lost seats it has held for decades like Blyth Valley in northern England.

Image: Reuters

Labour lost seats it has held for decades like Blyth Valley in northern England.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn faced calls to quit on Friday, after equivocation over Brexit and his limited personal appeal contributed to a collapse in traditional strongholds and what looks like his party’s worst election defeat in 84 years.

An exit poll and early results showed Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party were set for a resounding victory in Britain’s election, allowing him to deliver Brexit on Jan. 31.

That leaves Labour, a 100-year-old party born out of the trade union movement, wrestling with what went wrong and what to do about it.

Asked whether she thought she would hold on to her seat in the northern city of Stoke-on-Trent, a traditional Labour stronghold, the party’s candidate Ruth Smeeth bluntly replied: “I’ve definitely lost.”

She placed the blame firmly on Corbyn’s shoulders.

“He should have gone many, many, many months ago.”

The exit poll showed voters had gone with Johnson’s “Get Brexit Done” promise and pro-market philosophy and rejected left-wing veteran Corbyn, who had promised a second Brexit referendum and a radical expansion of the state.

Corbyn, an avowed socialist who took control of the party after a bruising 2015 election defeat, has shifted Labour sharply away from the centre ground that underpinned three Labour majority governments led by Tony Blair.

During four years in charge, the 70-year-old has built an ultra-loyal support base, pushing centrist members to the fringes and creating an ideological schism that critics say has alienated many of its traditional working-class voters.

An ardent pro-Palestinian activist, he has also been accused of failing to address accusations of anti-Semitism among his supporters.

“Corbyn was a disaster on the doorstep … everyone knew he couldn’t lead the working class out of a paper bag,” said Alan Johnson, who served as a senior minister under Blair.

HEARTLANDS DECLINE

Underlining the likely looming battle for the future of the party, Corbyn-loyalist Richard Burgon said the party should not turn back toward the centre-ground.

“We need to fight back, not triangulate,” Burgon, Corbyn’s justice spokesman, said.

“People on the doorstep weren’t complaining about our policies, and we wouldn’t have had the policies … if it weren’t for Jeremy’s leadership,” he said, blaming the focus on Brexit and negative media coverage of Corbyn.

But early results showed that Labour’s heartlands in former industrial areas of central and northern England – areas that typically voted for Brexit – had swung towards Johnson’s Conservatives.

Labour lost seats it has held for decades like Blyth Valley in northern England, which had been Labour since it was formed in 1950 and Wrexham, the Welsh seat that had voted Labour each election since 1935.

Corbyn did not address the exit polls as he arrived to hear the results in his own north London electoral seat, but weary Labour candidates taking in the scale of their defeat made it clear that he would have to face eventually.

“I am devastated, I don’t know how you could have any other reaction other than being utterly heartbroken,” Labour’s Jess Phillips said. “This is not a time for easy answers as much as I wish it was.”

Share article
Tags: UKElectionBrexitLabour PartyJeremy CorbynConservative Party
Previous Post

Ajax coach says too early to talk about promotion

Next Post

Algerian protesters rally as vote goes ahead

Related Posts

A firefighter working to extinguish a blaze.

Death toll from fuel depot fire in Karabakh leaps to 125: Media

26 September 2023, 8:39 PM
Firefighters work near damaged trucks following a Russian strike.

Russia hits Ukrainian port and grain facilities in air strikes

26 September 2023, 12:15 PM
Former U.S. President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a 2024 presidential election campaign event at Sportsman Boats in Summerville, South Carolina, U.S. September 25, 2023.

Trump opposes US request to limit his comments on election case

26 September 2023, 11:06 AM
Residents sit inside a bus in central Stepanakert before leaving Nagorno-Karabakh, a region inhabited by ethnic Armenians, September 25, 2023.

Ethnic Armenians flee Karabakh after breakaway region’s defeat

25 September 2023, 9:36 PM
Strike signs await striking SAG-AFTRA actors and Writers Guild of America (WGA) outside Disney Studios in Burbank, California.

Big media rallies on signs of end to Hollywood writers’ strike

25 September 2023, 4:30 PM
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin III [L] with his Kenyan counterpart Aden Duale [R].

US to support Kenyan mission to restore security in Haiti

25 September 2023, 3:31 PM
Next Post
Demonstrators shout slogans during a protest to reject the presidential election in Algiers, Algeria December 12, 2019.

Algerian protesters rally as vote goes ahead

Most Viewed

  • 24hrs
  • Week
  • Month
  • Concern over exclusion of foreign nationals from Road Accident Fund
  • Cashless taxi service launched in Cape Town
  • Visitors planning to visit the Overberg region urged to postpone their trips
  • ANC building up in flames in Port St Johns
  • Western Cape on high alert following severe storm warning
  • High waves and rough water conditions force beach closures in the Western Cape
  • Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi to rest in the town he built and nurtured
  • NSPCA files criminal case against Julius Malema for alleged animal cruelty
  • Snow, heavy rainfall expected in parts of KZN: SAWS
  • Cold-front sweeps across SA bringing snow and chilly temperatures
  • Several roads closed in the Western Cape amid flooding
  • Residents resort to illegal water connections at Mpumalanga village
  • Six beaches in Durban flagged with high levels of E.coli
  • PODCAST | Consumers warned of expected poultry price hike
  • Zoleka’s passing on eve of Winnie Mandela’s birthday

LATEST

Logo of the 9th BRICS Parliamentary Forum ahead of a media briefing in this image captured on 26 September 2023.
  • Politics

BRICS Parliamentary Forum Assembly aims to foster stronger ties among member states


Inside a Magistrates' Court
  • South Africa

Trial of nine accused in university of Fort Hare murder case resumes


  • South Africa

Eskom to prioritise electricity restoration in flood-ravaged Western and Eastern Cape


Flooding in the Western Cape following heavy rains.
  • South Africa

Rescue efforts to resume on Wednesday for learners trapped at Oudtshoorn resort


The NMB metro
  • Politics

DA wants special inquiry into state capture in Nelson Mandela Bay


Actress Viola Davis at an event
  • Africa

Actress Viola Davis to join US African diaspora council


Weather

  • About the SABC
  • Contact Us
  • Jobs
  • Advertise
  • Disclaimer
  • Site Map

SABC © 2023

No Result
View All Result
  • SOUTH AFRICA
  • POLITICS
  • BUSINESS
  • SPORT
  • AFRICA
  • WORLD
  • FEATURES
  • OPINION

© 2023

Previous Ajax coach says too early to talk about promotion
Next Algerian protesters rally as vote goes ahead