Starmer set for a big election win, but allies may lose their seats.

Right, so Keir Starmer’s Labour are still taking a lot of flak for essentially pulling their candidate out of Clacton, out of the election race against Nigel Farage and effectively giving him a free run at it and when I covered this the other day I covered an angle whereby there were reports that Starmer did this because the campaign for his candidate there, Jovan Owusu-Nepaul, had gone viral due in part to the young man’s dapper dress sense that saw him written up about in GQ magazine, but also because pictures of him meeting Farage at a food truck went viral on social media, but actually there might be another more worrying reason for it and this is something that I’ve covered before and was certainly reflected in local election results over the past couple years, where Starmer might be making gains and winning seats come this Thursday, but he might face losing others too and where Labour’s Clacton candidate got sent, his seat also deemed unwinnable, does imply that that fear is very real.
Right, so Keir Starmer’s Labour are still taking a lot of flak for effectively giving Nigel Farage a free run at the Tories in Clacton, the optics of that being the only seat Labour have done this with, very much playing into the reported belief that Starmer was jealous of the attention and social media reaction Jovan Owusu-Nepaul was getting, stealing his thunder so to speak and therefore packed him off elsewhere. Ultimately though, however Labour have abandoned their campaign in Clacton, to the disgust of local members that hey don’t matter and actually this entire campaign and the tactics thereof are more about delivering Keir Starmer into power than serving this country, something you’d be daft to believe otherwise over, Owuso-Nepaul’s name will still be on the ballot and people in Clacton can still vote for him, even if Labour HQ have seemingly given up on the area. Surely there are other grossly unwinnable seats they could have taken their candidate from? Why just that one? Have you had your Labour candidate seconded away, I’d like to know, because otherwise this really does look like classic Starmer petulance.
However, it is where Labour have sent Owusu-Nepaul since, that belies some significant electoral woes as far as holding onto seats Labour won at the last election. For as much as polling puts Labour on track to win a substantial majority and assume the reins of government, it doesn’t look like it is going to come without some bloody noses on the night too, with established Labour MPs looking set to lose their seats as Starmer celebrates victory – assuming he doesn’t lose his own seat to Andrew Feinstein of course, that would be a coup.
Upon being ordered out of Clacton, allegedly being told not to come back at that, wonderful optics saying such things to a young black man, especially in light of Labour’s all too obvious right now hierarchy of racism, Owusu-Nepaul was apparently sent to Birmingham and this is an area where Labour traditionally does very well, but has several MP’s in real trouble as far as getting re-elected goes and these are supposedly safe seats and actually with Labour’s issues amongst the Muslim community especially right now, having Muslim MPs in these areas you would imagine would be an advantage, but apparently not, so I’m going to take a look at some of those in trouble here and elsewhere too.
Now first off yesterday I covered an incident involving one such Muslim MP, Birmingham Perry Barr’s Labour candidate Khalid Mahmood, literally abusing fellow Muslims in their mosque for being illiterate and to shut up and listen to him, because clearly they can’t read and need to be educated. Not the way to win votes, but having been the MP since 2001, it appears the sense of entitlement is overriding common sense. I won’t go further into his case though, go and watch that other video for that.
But another Muslim Labour candidate, in one of Labour’s historically safest seats is in trouble and she’s got quite the high profile as Starmer’s Shadow Secretary of State for Justice, Shabana Mahmood.
Now Mahmood stood out for many Labour members as the seconder to Keir Starmer’s NEC motion to block Jeremy Corbyn from being able to stand as a Labour candidate, forcing him as we’ve seen to stand as an Independent. Mahmood has a majority of 28,582 and yet is still apparently in danger, her main opposition in the seat, is also an Independent, Akhmed Yakoob, standing on a pro Palestine platform and who took 70,000 votes in the Midlands mayor contest last month, the rise of Independent campaigns a significant feature of this General Election, with communities and voters sick of being failed by party politics, throwing their lot in with an Independent who they help raise funds for to get them on the ballot and get a campaign underway, with lots of boots on the ground to a lesser or greater extent.
Birmingham is pretty much as multicultural and multi faith as you can get in the UK, and in Mahmood’s patch of Birmingham Ladywood, significant numbers of Muslim constituents live and therefore the matter of Labour’s chronic pro Israel positioning on the genocide in Gaza is an issue, 43% of the constituency on 2019 figures is Muslim and with boundary changes affecting things this time around, with the very multiculturally diverse area of Alum Rock becoming part of Ladywood, this is an issue that is hurting Labour particularly, very much playing into the campaign of Yakoob – but not exclusively though obviously, every constituency will have Labour voters disgusted by Starmer’s Gaza stance and be taking their votes elsewhere, of that I’m certain – but as a Guardian article has proven, it isn’t the only issue that local people have with Labour, now seen as too much like the Tories, as healthcare locally fails, child poverty is significant and Starmer’s refusal to abolish the two child benefit cap comes up on the doorstep and it is on matters such as these that Labour are going to struggle as well.
Outside of Birmingham Ladywood, you have Jess Phillips in Birmingham Yardley in danger according to Labour’s own website, her biggest competition being the Workers Party candidate Jody McIntyre. In Birmingham Hodge Hill, the most Muslim constituency in Britain, we saw video of their Labour MP Liam Byrne fleeing from questions on Gaza to his car on social media this week, but this is not of course an exclusively Birmingham issue, the problems for Labour extend much wider than that amongst areas they are already representing and you have to bear in mind this isn’t just me poring over electoral and polling data, these are all seats that the Labour Party is looking at at the highest levels with genuine concern.
The Party giving Labour grief in at least a couple of places are the Green Party. One of the most high profile casualties for Labour could well be Thangham Debbonaire, Labour’s Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Digital, Media and Sport. Depending on which poll you look at depends on how much she’s expected to lose by, though the Greens are cautious, indicating things are neck and neck between Debbonaire and one of their party co-leaders Carla Denyer, but given Debbonaire is defending, albeit with boundary changes a factor this time around, a majority of over 28,000, the fact Labour are faced with losing ostensibly safe seats should rightly bother them, especially if their government majority ends up built heavily on seats they’ve newly won, because that could be a majority without strong foundations going forward.
The Greens are also giving Labour grief in Brighton Kempstown & Peacehaven, where Lloyd Russell Moyle was conveniently binned off following a complaint over an historic incident conveniently coming right before candidate selections were cut off, and one of Starmer’s aide’s Chris Ward got installed. Moyle had an 8,000 vote majority and although it is not a seat that the Greens were expected to take, but such is the disgust at this Starmer advisor being imposed on the local party, that an upset could happen and it would be truly symbolic of the nonsense Starmer has tried to pull with his candidate impositions if they do lose here.
Other losses which will hurt Starmer will be losing Islington North to Jeremy Corbyn, such an occurrence would be so deserved, given that again it was so avoidable if Starmer wasn’t so desperate to rid himself of anyone who might question him.
Wes Streeting in Ilford North, Starmer’s pro privatisation of the NHS Health Secretary in waiting could be dumped out of his seat by Independent British Palestinian Leanne Mohamad and there are more besides.
Labour is in real trouble on home turf. It might do well at winning former Tory seats, but with their traditional bases crumbling, and to what extent we won’t have long to wait and see.
Meanwhile Labour’s fallout over Bangladesh comments is so recent as to not be particularly reflected in the polls right now, yet there is evidence that this might actually have been a perverse plan to win votes, to appeal to the right wing whilst expecting their traditional base to stay, despite, as this video has shown, that base is fracturing and taking their votes elsewhere already. Find out more about this appalling alleged plan to scapegoat Bengali’s for political gain and I’ll hopefully catch you on the next vid. Cheers folks.