Paul Linford has drawn an interesting parallel* with the Darlington by-election from the early 1980s which, against the odds, Labour held – so saving Michael Foot’s leadership of the Labour Party.
A defeat in Darlington would have quite possibly led to a change in Labour leader, and so at the very least a less disastrous 1983 general election.
So if you were a Labour supporter in Crewe & Nantwich, would you want to vote for Labour and risk prolonging Gordon Brown’s agony? Or vote for someone else in the hope of ending Gordon Brown’s premiership and getting a new Prime Minister in place?
* But, tsk tsk, overlooks that the Liberal Democrats have been arguing for decentralisation – and putting it into practice in local government – long before it became trendy amongst Labour or Conservative politicians to talk about the topic.
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So if you were a Labour supporter in Crewe & Nantwich, would you want to vote for Labour and risk prolonging Gordon Brown’s agony? Or vote for someone else in the hope of ending Gordon Brown’s premiership and getting a new Prime Minister in place?
I don’t think the parallel necessarily stretches that far, Mark.
In 1983, Labour had, in Denis Healey, a clear alternative to Foot who would have commanded a greater following in the country. He would indeed have done better than Foot in ’83 – in fact it is possible that he would enjoyed such a “bounce” as Labour leader that Thatcher might have postponed the election until ’84, by which time some of the “Falklands Factor” might have worn off.
Unfortunately for Labour, this is not the case this time round. Recent surveys have shown that all of Brown’s potential successors, including David Miliband, would be even more unpopular. Hence tactical voting by Labour supporters to get Brown out and a new leader in is very likely to backfire.