Rotherham By-election Result: good for UKIP, better for Labour

The Labour candidate Sarah champion romped home in first place in Rotherham, increasing the Labour share of the vote by 1.62% since the 2010 General Election, despite the disgrace of the former MP Denis MacShane, the Muslim grooming scandal and most recently the furore surrounding the local social services’ decision to remove three foster children from a couple simply because they were members of UKIP. UKIP nonetheless did manage to provide their best ever performance in an election for a Westminster seat, coming second and securing 21.79% of the vote, up 15.87% since 2010. It thus seems that Nigel Farage’s assertion during the count that UKIP were running “a close second” was the product of a liberal dose of wishful thinking. Still, the fostering scandal does appear to have imparted a significant boost to UKIP in the seat, but this marks their likely high watermark in Rotherham, given that the party represents the Atlanticist Thatcherite wing of the Conservative Party in exile, and Rotherham is most certainly not natural Tory territory.

The Conservatives polled a miserable fifth place, taking only 5.42% of the vote, down from 16.7% in 2010 when they were the second party in the seat. This switch of allegiance appears to underscore the recent fears voiced by a number of Conservative MPs with respect to the potential for a stronger UKIP to dent their vote in many marginal seats and thereby let Labour win, prompting calls for an ‘electoral pact’ involving the promise of an EU referendum that Nigel Farage has declined to entertain.

However, if last night’s result in Rotherham was adjudged to be a bad one for the senior partner in the Coalition Government, it was a catastrophic one for the Liberal Democrats, who were pushed into eighth place in Rotherham, taking only 2.11% of the vote, down from 16% in 2010 when they came third. This meltdown in the party’s support was paralleled in yesterday’s two other by-elections, most notably in Croydon North where they came fourth with 3.5% of the vote compared to the 14% and third place that they secured in 2010, and in Middlesbrough, where although they came third, their share slumped from 19.9% to 9.9%. Just how ‘sorry’ must Nick Clegg be feeling now? Following on from the three dire results in the crop of parliamentary by-elections earlier this month the Liberal Democrats are currently set firmly on course for electoral annihilation at the next General Election. What, if anything, could the Liberal Democrats do to reverse this precipitous decline in their fortunes?

Having noted the electoral failure of the two parties of government in Rotherham, who benefited other than UKIP? Although the BNP took third place with 8.46% of the vote, this was down from 10.4% in 2010, with this respectable placing in the table being to a considerable extent attributable to the visibility and relative popularity of local candidate Marlene Guest. She certainly fared better than fellow BNP political hopeful Peter Foreman who stood in Middlesbrough, who took only 1.9% of the vote, compared to the party’s 5.8% in 2010. The fall in the BNP’s share displayed in Middlesbrough is more typical of the results achieved by the BNP over the past couple of years, which has seen the party in headlong decline. It is not an exaggeration to state that the BNP is on a terminal trajectory, having lost most of its membership as well as the majority of its more competent organisers.

Coming in fourth place behind the BNP was Muslim convert and apparent Stockholm Syndrome sufferer Yvonne Ridley who stood for Respect and took an 8.34% share. This was the first time that the party had stood in Rotherham, and the share of the vote obtained suggests that Respect bagged the Muslim bloc vote in the borough and little else, for it is said that the original Labour candidate mooted for the by-election had been a Muslim, but following the recent Muslim paedophile grooming scandal in the borough, Labour had decided that it would be impolitic to field a Muslim. According to the UK Polling Report blog, Rotherham’s Muslim population stood at 5.4% in 2001, and it has certainly increased since then and would thus easily have been able to furnish Respect with the share of the vote that it obtained. Respect also fielded a reasonably high-profile candidate in Croydon North – Lee Jasper – a former confederate of Ken Livingstone and Director for Policing and Equalities for the GLA in 2004-2008. However, this professional race hustler managed to secure only sixth place with a 2.9% share of the vote, this poor showing most likely being a reflection of the fact that Croydon North is not natural Respect territory (i.e. it does not possess a large Muslim population that can be electorally mobilised) and allegations of cronyism have also previously been levelled against Jasper.

The turnout in Rotherham was low, a mere 33.89% compared to 59% in 2010. Likewise, the turnouts in Middlesbrough and Croydon North were poor: 26% and 26.53% respectively. So, although these by-elections each provided Labour with a secure victory, the imaginations of voters were certainly not set aflame; they do not seem to have kindled any real enthusiasm. Ed Miliband must be hoping that his party can continue to ride the wave not so much of popularity, but of disillusion with the Condem Government, until May 2015. However, it is striking that he and leading Labour light Ed Balls were cabinet members in the last Labour Government, the administration that helped to plunge us so deeply into the economic, social and constitutional mess that we currently find ourselves. Automatic tribal party loyalty evidently played the greatest role in ensuring that Labour won by a large margin in all three seats, and it is this sort of loyalty that has thus far militated against the emergence of any new electorally successful parliamentary parties in England in recent decades. If real political change is to be brought about, this species of party tribalism - particularly of the Labour variety - needs to be challenged and broken down.

UKIP will soar no higher in Rotherham, for its globalist Thatcherite economic policies preclude a wide appeal to the electorate, and this observation applies to the country at large. UKIP did also manage to take second place in Middlesbrough with 11.8% of the vote, up from 3.7% in 2010, and third place in Croydon North with its share increasing from 1.7% in 2010 to 5.7%, but what these results suggest is in line with national opinion polls that have recently seen UKIP vying for the position of third party with the Liberal Democrats. What was witnessed yesterday therefore, may lead Nigel Farage to issue a call akin to David Steel’s infamous “Go back to your constituencies and prepare for government!” but in reality, this will most likely amount to “Go back to your constituencies and prepare to take third or fourth place in a few Westminster seats in the West Country in 2015!” Yes, we do need to leave the EU, but UKIP is a single-issue exiled rump of the Conservative Party, and exiting the EU is not at the top of the average voter’s list of policy priorities. What we require is a new non-globalist party capable of breaking through in seats such as Rotherham, which whilst including departure from the EU as a policy pledge, concentrates instead on the matters of greatest concern to the electorate: the economy, health, education, transport, law and order and immigration.

UKIP's Rotherham Candidate: Jane Collins

UKIP to come close second in Rotherham?

According to a tweet by Guardian journalist Helen Pidd from the Rotherham by-election count, Nigel Farage is claiming that UKIP will come a close second to Labour - "a massive second" - with the Conservatives nowhere to be seen.

UPDATE: The results are in, and although UKIP did come second, it could hardly be described as "a massive second". Click here for results and analysis.

Middlesbrough by-election result: a foregone conclusion?

Middlesbrough is but one of three seats in which parliamentary by-elections are being contested today, the other two being Rotherham and Croydon North, each of them possessing what would seem to be an unassailable Labour majority. Only in Rotherham is anything other than a straightforward Labour triumph anticipated, but even though UKIP are expected to poll very well there, quite possibly displaying their best Westminster result to date, it would be astonishing if they were to seize the seat from Labour. However, Bradford West earlier this year demonstrated that the unexpected could happen.

The Middlesbrough by-election was precipitated by the death of the Labour incumbent Sir Stuart Bell, and one former Labour Party member who would have liked to have stood on the party ticket but was unable to do so was Bradford-based Imdad Hussain who was suspended from the Labour Party in September for his failure to disclose having been banned as a company director. Nonetheless, the latter has decided to run in the by-election under a different flag – that of ‘The Peace Party’! Given his lack of local roots and the fact that he was dismissed from the Labour Party, his prospects do not look healthy.

The Labour candidate this time around is Andy McDonald, who can look forward to the unthinking support of Labour tribalists who’d vote for a mollusc if a Labour rosette could be successfully attached to its body, although it is likely that his primary foe will be voter apathy, as was displayed in the remarkably low turnouts at the most recent crop of by-elections earlier this month. This could, to a certain extent, give a fillip to some of the candidates from the smaller parties, but whereas UKIP is enjoying some of its best ratings in national opinion polls since the height of the parliamentary expenses scandal, it is not likely to do nearly as well as in Rotherham.

In 2010 Labour managed to grab 45.9% of the vote with the Liberal Democrats trailing in second place on a distant 19.9% and the Tories third with 18.8%. If recent trends are repeated here, we should expect to see a significant slump in the Liberal Democrat share of the vote, possibly in the region of 5-10%. As this is not natural Conservative territory and the Government is not currently overly popular, it is likely that the Tory share will also shrink, but probably hold up better than that of their coalition partners.

UKIP managed to take only 3.7% at the last General Election, coming last in sixth place behind the BNP who took 5.8%. However, since than UKIP’s fortunes have waxed to a certain extent, and the BNP has entered a death spiral, haemorrhaging the bulk of its national membership and most of its experienced senior personnel. Taking into account the remaining candidates – an Independent named Mark Heslehurst and John Malcolm running under the banner of Trade Unionist and Socialist – UKIP ought to expect to secure a better performance and position this time around, with it being a near certainty that the party will leapfrog the BNP. However, other than the electors of Middlesborough will many people other than political pundits be paying much attention when the result is announced? All eyes it seems will be turned to Rotherham.

UPDATE: More by-election news can be accessed here. 

Middlesbrough by-election hustings

A Rotherham Riddle: who will benefit in Thursday's By-election

Apparently, a narrative propagandised by the Labour Party and SWP and favoured by Rotherham Borough Council is that the latter’s social services were unable to tackle a Muslim paedophile gang (although they would not choose to describe it in such terms) in the town because of ‘understaffing’ and a lack of funding. However, a story taken up by the Telegraph today suggests that this ‘understaffing’ does not hinder the operations of its social services when it comes to overzealously applying politically correct strictures. In the case in question, a couple who have been foster carers for the past seven years have had three foster children removed from them following a ‘tip-off’ that they were UKIP members, with the insinuation being that they were ‘racists’. This ‘tip-off’ led to a visit from members of ‘the local safeguarding children team’ who decided upon the basis that the couple were UKIP members that they were ‘unsuitable’ to foster ethnic minority children.

This decision is quite astonishing, for it demonstrates that in Rotherham the social services have become so politicised and dominated by far-left precepts relating to race and ethnicity that decent people such as the couple in question – a former Royal Navy reservist who works with the disabled and a nursery nurse – may be demonised and denied the right to foster simply upon the grounds of their belonging to a legitimate political party. Fostering can be a tough job, and it is well known that those children who are fostered rather than left in residential care tend to benefit considerably from the experience, so the decision to remove these three children from carers who were plainly interested in their welfare and providing them with a loving environment can be viewed as nothing other than sinister. Contrary to the deformed dogma that would appear to be embedded within Rotherham’s Labour dominated Council, it is not ‘racist’ to wish to control our borders and to place limits upon immigration. Rotherham Borough Council has a lot of explaining to do in relation to this case.

The Telegraph has done all a service by running this story, but given that the Rotherham by-election will be taking place on Thursday 29 November, the timing of the article is quite interesting and suggests that perhaps the paper may be aiming to give UKIP something of an electoral boost following its decent showing in Corby. If it does well in Rotherham and the Conservative Party continues to be dominated by the Europhile Cameroon tendency, might not the Telegraph consider throwing its weight behind UKIP at some point in the future?

The by-election itself has been precipitated by the departure of former MP Denis MacShane, the latest to fall foul of the parliamentary expenses scandal. With his exit came something of a local row about who would be the next Labour candidate, with some claiming that the party decided not to run with a local Muslim because of the fear that this would go down badly with indigenous voters owing to the recent Muslim paedophile scandal. This seems to have prompted Respect to field a candidate, the well-known former journalist named Yvonne Ridley, who appears to still be suffering from Stockholm Syndrome having converted to Islam following her seizure a number of years ago in Afghanistan. As in Bradford West where George Galloway achieved his landslide earlier this year, Respect has revealed its brazen ethno-confessional bias by issuing a leaflet that includes the following text:

"Dear residents,

On Thursday the 29th November every voter and most importantly every Muslim and Asian family in Rotherham will have the opportunity to send a message to the sickening racism, Islamophobia and corruption of the Labour party here in this town."

Evidently, given the ethno-confessional composition of this seat, Respect will not win, but they could remove the Muslim bloc vote from Labour, which would in itself be noteworthy. The question that begs to be asked therefore is whether a significant protest vote will manifest itself in Rotherham following Denis MacShane’s disgrace, the Muslim paedophile cover-up and now the victimisation of a decent couple because of implied racism. If such a vote does take place, which party stands to benefit? It will not be the Conservatives, given Rotherham’s traditional deep red Labour allegiance, and it will certainly not be the Liberal Democrats. Given that the foster carers featured in the Telegraph story were themselves once longstanding Labour voters, it would not come as a surprise were UKIP to perform very strongly next Thursday. 

Joyce Thacker: embodying the spirit of the Stasi?