Well now! Wasn't Call me Dave Cameron's new uberliberal Conservatism supposed to win over hearts and minds and herald in a new era for this once proud but now tatty Party? Mmm..obviously the electorate in Bromley and Chislehurst, in south-east England, didn't get the memo. The Conservative 2005 majority was slashed from 13,342 votes to 633 by the Lib Dems in the By Election caused by the sad death of the likeable Eric Forth.I see that Francis Maude, Conservative Chairman, has decided that what this REALLY means is that the Cameron reforms need to be even wider, deeper, faster.
Over the cliff the lemmings go --- faster, faster...
Even by Maude's poor standards - that's unbelievable.
And this happens when "Nu Labour" are well down in the polls and the pathetic Lib Dems are engaged in an internal "power" struggle.
Perhaps, if Maude he could get these "reforms" through quick enough - they could actually lose their deposit at the next By Election.
Posted by: Robert | June 30, 2006 at 11:08 AM
Morning David,
The result confirms both our suspicions, namely, that the electorate aren't quite as stupid or as biddable as Cameron likes to believe.
It proves, too, that traditional Tories (and few seats were as traditional as this one) have huge problems with "Dave".
Interesting, though, that the opinion polls continue to tell a totally different story. I think it's going to be a very interesting general election.
Best wishes,
Alex.
Posted by: Alex Kane | June 30, 2006 at 11:19 AM
Alex,
Thanks for that. It raises an issue regarding opinion polls. Fodder for the intelligentsia but nothing to do with reality? Call me Dave's leadership, I believe, is appalling, but the lemmings follow, as Julie Kirkbride demonstrated last night.
Posted by: David Vance | June 30, 2006 at 12:01 PM
The Liberal Democrat's sleazy tactics are very effective at by-elections are sadly rather effective, and have been for a long time before Cameron took over. I'm not pro-Cameron but I don't think the result was about hem.
The vile specimen the Lib Dems put up for this one seems to be a particularly fine example of Liberal Democrathood- http://5thnovember.blogspot.com/2006/06/gotcha-ben-abotts-fakes-it.html
Posted by: Ross | June 30, 2006 at 12:34 PM
I'm not pro-Cameron either Ross, but I don't think you can read very much into this by-election result.
The Lib Dems are excellent by-election campaigners and the Conservatives aren't.
Posted by: Sean Fear | June 30, 2006 at 12:37 PM
The way I'm reading it is that it wasn't that the Lib Dems vote rose dramatically, it's that the Tory vote collapsed. Why would any right-thinking rightist turn out to vote for a party where, for example, people flying England flags are denounced as being like Nazis ?
Posted by: Dumbjon | June 30, 2006 at 01:32 PM
Jon,
With due respect, that's nonsense. I write this from Tottenham North London and the trend here is that the guys with cars have twoo flags on one side (stating their birth country - Jamaica; Trinidad: Ghana) and two on the other side of the car with the cross of Saint George...
Posted by: Alexander Bowman | June 30, 2006 at 01:50 PM
I think Dumbjon is referring to a comment made recently by Brian Coleman, Conservative councillor and London Assembly member.
Posted by: Sean Fear | June 30, 2006 at 04:01 PM
Indeed, SF. In fact, it was the leader of the London Assembly his own useless self that made those comments.
http://news.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=923562006
Can't see why the Right won't turn out to vote, can you ?
Posted by: Dumbjon | June 30, 2006 at 07:05 PM
Don't like Sean being called SF! :o(
Posted by: aileen | June 30, 2006 at 08:36 PM