Brexit

Quoted from chaos33

You probably post more messages on the fishy than anyone else!

My excuse is I am retired and stuck at home most of the time.

From The Economist (the only newspaper left worth reading) this week. Labour Party central have fecked over Gy and Clee as bad as the Tories in the past (Prescott funneling the cash into Hull). But only the deluded can really think Bullshit Boris and sidekick hovering in the shadows gives a flying bit of old Etonian feck-rse about NE Lincs - its just the seat they want to help ram through their Tory hard Brexit.

The labour party has held Great Grimsby for 74 years. The Lincolnshire constituency’s past mps include Anthony Crosland, who wrote one of the party’s most important post-war texts, “The Future of Socialism”, and Austin Mitchell, who once claimed that Grimsby would vote Labour even if the party put up a “raving alcoholic sex paedophile”.

Yet the seat may be about to fall. A poll for The Economist by Survation suggests that the Conservatives lead Labour by fully 13 points (see chart). The usual caveats apply: local polling is tricky, the sample small and there are three weeks to go. But the big lead of the Tory candidate, Lia Nici (pictured), implies not only that Labour is in danger of losing one of its most dependable seats. It also suggests that Boris Johnson’s targeting of working-class, pro-Brexit towns in the north and the Midlands could well succeed. A realignment in British politics may be in the making.




Labour’s decades in charge of Grimsby have seen steep decline. In the 1950s the town was home to the biggest fishing fleet on earth. The docks were a thriving community of small factories making nets and fishing gear, busy shops and smokehouses. Trawlers packed the harbour, as the world’s biggest ice factory, built to provide crushed ice for ships, loomed over everything. Now many of Grimsby’s fine buildings are crumbling and its streets quiet.


The gutting of the fishing industry has devastated related trades (there were once eight jobs onshore for every one at sea). At 5.3%, Grimsby has one of Britain’s highest unemployment rates, and the social problems that go with it. Ex-fishermen can be found drinking in pubs at 9am. Drug gangs have set up in the homes of vulnerable people, a practice known as “cuckooing”.

Such decline has created a powerful feeling of being ignored by Westminster and taken for granted by Labour. Locals complain that “London” is more interested in wasting billions on white elephants like hs2, a railway connecting the capital to big northern cities, than in improving the dire local rail links. In so far as “they” notice the east coast at all, they spray money at Hull, on the Yorkshire side of the Humber (Grimbarians’ dislike of Londoners is as nothing compared with their disdain for “Yorkies”).

All this helped to persuade Grimsby to vote by more than 70% to leave the European Union, one of the highest shares in the country. Of the 70-odd constituencies that backed Brexit by more than 65%, the Tories already control 38; they now have their eye on the Labour-held remainder in the north and Midlands (see map).


Mr Johnson’s pro-Brexit message seems to resonate. Grimbarians blame the eu for destroying their fishing industry with its regime of quotas, and regard Brussels as the embodiment of faraway and out-of-touch power. There is also unease about immigration. Grimsby had almost none until an influx of eastern Europeans after 2004 to work in the one remaining bit of the fish industry, processing imported fish.

Locals have no time for Jeremy Corbyn, Labour’s leader. Three complaints are loudest: he is not a patriot; he is more interested in minorities than “people like us”; and he represents the hijacking of the Labour Party by London. Mr Mitchell expressed the sentiments of many locals when he recently urged people not to vote for Mr Corbyn and his “mob of cosmopolitan meritocrats who love the [eu] more than those at the bottom of society’s top-heavy heap”.

This has caused acute problems for Grimsby’s Labour mp, Melanie Onn. She has agonised over Brexit, backing Remain and repeatedly opposing Theresa May’s deal, before voting for Mr Johnson’s version. She was conveniently out of town for Mr Corbyn’s two visits to Grimsby. Christopher Barker, the local Brexit Party candidate, says he has searched the internet for pictures of her with her party leader, only to come up blank.

Can the Conservatives turn all this angst into victory? There are plenty of straws in the wind other than our poll. The Tories took control of the local council in May. They have found a good candidate in Ms Nici, who was brought up in Grimsby and worked in local television. She puts a positive spin on the town’s plight, admitting that it is “a bit rough around the edges” but pointing out that it has a legacy of mansions and parks from its glory days, and that it is embracing new technologies. The world’s biggest offshore wind farm, Dogger Bank, is being constructed off the coast. The Tories nevertheless face two hurdles.

The first is that the Brexit Party has a clear message and a dynamic candidate. Mr Barker is an outsider—he has a posh accent and Yorkshire roots—but he is battle-hardened from recent European elections and is eloquent (if wrong) in arguing that a no-deal Brexit would not only honour democracy but revive the fishing industry. The decision of his party to stand down in Tory-held seats has blunted its insurgent message—the 17% it scores in our poll is lower than the 25% notched up by its forerunner, the uk Independence Party, in 2015. But there is no doubt the Conservatives would rather the Brexit Party wasn’t there.


Their second hurdle is that, after three-quarters of a century, Labour has a powerful local machine. The Tories operate from a broom cupboard of an office, smaller even than the Brexit Party’s headquarters. Labour can call on the support of trade unions like Unite, which has an office in town. It can also remind voters that the party of Old Etonian Mr Johnson is even more culturally alien than the party of Islingtonian Mr Corbyn.

But the signs are that the Labour Party will need an extraordinarily successful campaign to retain this deepest-red of constituencies. Perhaps Ms Onn could do as her predecessor, Mr Mitchell, once did, and change her surname to Haddock. ■

Quoted from Limerick Mariner

From The Economist (the only newspaper left worth reading) this week. Labour Party central have fecked over Gy and Clee as bad as the Tories in the past (Prescott funneling the cash into Hull). But only the deluded can really think Bullshit Boris and sidekick hovering in the shadows gives a flying bit of old Etonian feck-rse about NE Lincs - its just the seat they want to help ram through their Tory hard Brexit.

The labour party has held Great Grimsby for 74 years. The Lincolnshire constituency’s past mps include Anthony Crosland, who wrote one of the party’s most important post-war texts, “The Future of Socialism”, and Austin Mitchell, who once claimed that Grimsby would vote Labour even if the party put up a “raving alcoholic sex paedophile”.

Yet the seat may be about to fall. A poll for The Economist by Survation suggests that the Conservatives lead Labour by fully 13 points (see chart). The usual caveats apply: local polling is tricky, the sample small and there are three weeks to go. But the big lead of the Tory candidate, Lia Nici (pictured), implies not only that Labour is in danger of losing one of its most dependable seats. It also suggests that Boris Johnson’s targeting of working-class, pro-Brexit towns in the north and the Midlands could well succeed. A realignment in British politics may be in the making.




Labour’s decades in charge of Grimsby have seen steep decline. In the 1950s the town was home to the biggest fishing fleet on earth. The docks were a thriving community of small factories making nets and fishing gear, busy shops and smokehouses. Trawlers packed the harbour, as the world’s biggest ice factory, built to provide crushed ice for ships, loomed over everything. Now many of Grimsby’s fine buildings are crumbling and its streets quiet.


The gutting of the fishing industry has devastated related trades (there were once eight jobs onshore for every one at sea). At 5.3%, Grimsby has one of Britain’s highest unemployment rates, and the social problems that go with it. Ex-fishermen can be found drinking in pubs at 9am. Drug gangs have set up in the homes of vulnerable people, a practice known as “cuckooing”.

Such decline has created a powerful feeling of being ignored by Westminster and taken for granted by Labour. Locals complain that “London” is more interested in wasting billions on white elephants like hs2, a railway connecting the capital to big northern cities, than in improving the dire local rail links. In so far as “they” notice the east coast at all, they spray money at Hull, on the Yorkshire side of the Humber (Grimbarians’ dislike of Londoners is as nothing compared with their disdain for “Yorkies”).

All this helped to persuade Grimsby to vote by more than 70% to leave the European Union, one of the highest shares in the country. Of the 70-odd constituencies that backed Brexit by more than 65%, the Tories already control 38; they now have their eye on the Labour-held remainder in the north and Midlands (see map).


Mr Johnson’s pro-Brexit message seems to resonate. Grimbarians blame the eu for destroying their fishing industry with its regime of quotas, and regard Brussels as the embodiment of faraway and out-of-touch power. There is also unease about immigration. Grimsby had almost none until an influx of eastern Europeans after 2004 to work in the one remaining bit of the fish industry, processing imported fish.

Locals have no time for Jeremy Corbyn, Labour’s leader. Three complaints are loudest: he is not a patriot; he is more interested in minorities than “people like us”; and he represents the hijacking of the Labour Party by London. Mr Mitchell expressed the sentiments of many locals when he recently urged people not to vote for Mr Corbyn and his “mob of cosmopolitan meritocrats who love the [eu] more than those at the bottom of society’s top-heavy heap”.

This has caused acute problems for Grimsby’s Labour mp, Melanie Onn. She has agonised over Brexit, backing Remain and repeatedly opposing Theresa May’s deal, before voting for Mr Johnson’s version. She was conveniently out of town for Mr Corbyn’s two visits to Grimsby. Christopher Barker, the local Brexit Party candidate, says he has searched the internet for pictures of her with her party leader, only to come up blank.

Can the Conservatives turn all this angst into victory? There are plenty of straws in the wind other than our poll. The Tories took control of the local council in May. They have found a good candidate in Ms Nici, who was brought up in Grimsby and worked in local television. She puts a positive spin on the town’s plight, admitting that it is “a bit rough around the edges” but pointing out that it has a legacy of mansions and parks from its glory days, and that it is embracing new technologies. The world’s biggest offshore wind farm, Dogger Bank, is being constructed off the coast. The Tories nevertheless face two hurdles.

The first is that the Brexit Party has a clear message and a dynamic candidate. Mr Barker is an outsider—he has a posh accent and Yorkshire roots—but he is battle-hardened from recent European elections and is eloquent (if wrong) in arguing that a no-deal Brexit would not only honour democracy but revive the fishing industry. The decision of his party to stand down in Tory-held seats has blunted its insurgent message—the 17% it scores in our poll is lower than the 25% notched up by its forerunner, the uk Independence Party, in 2015. But there is no doubt the Conservatives would rather the Brexit Party wasn’t there.


Their second hurdle is that, after three-quarters of a century, Labour has a powerful local machine. The Tories operate from a broom cupboard of an office, smaller even than the Brexit Party’s headquarters. Labour can call on the support of trade unions like Unite, which has an office in town. It can also remind voters that the party of Old Etonian Mr Johnson is even more culturally alien than the party of Islingtonian Mr Corbyn.

But the signs are that the Labour Party will need an extraordinarily successful campaign to retain this deepest-red of constituencies. Perhaps Ms Onn could do as her predecessor, Mr Mitchell, once did, and change her surname to Haddock. ■

Well Grimsby voted 70% for Brexit, hard or otherwise.

That being the case, why shouldn't the majority of voters vote Conservative? As the Economist piece points out, Labour have not done Grimsby any favours even after all these years.

I don't suppose Boris does give a flying f**k about the area, but neither does Labour so the majority of voters who want Brexit will vote for the Conservatives, and good luck to them.  

Quoted from lew chaterleys lover

Well Grimsby voted 70% for Brexit, hard or otherwise.

That being the case, why shouldn't the majority of voters vote Conservative? As the Economist piece points out, Labour have not done Grimsby any favours even after all these years.

I don't suppose Boris does give a flying f**k about the area, but neither does Labour so the majority of voters who want Brexit will vote for the Conservatives, and good luck to them.  

I see what you are saying but think too many Grimbarians are die hard labour voters that will never vote for the conservatives, especially the older members of the electorate, will either not vote or vote Brexit party, I see Conservative win Cleethorpes as usual and Brexit Party will win in Grimsby. Onns dilly dallying early on will cost her, she isn't as out and about as she should be or is this because she thinks she doesn't have to put the effort in as Grimsby has been labour for the last 70+ years. This election could be the lowest turnout for decades.

Those who think Corbyn cares about the working class need to look at him in the cold light of day, I wouldn't trust him to clear up after my dogs, he'd get excrement everywhere, and I have medium size and a small dogs.

No chance of Brexit party winning any seat anywhere in the country, fortunately what they will do though is split the Labour vote....disgrunted remain Tories will only switch to the Lib Dems, and that will be in small numbers, as Swinson has had a poor campaign. No change in what I predicted a couple of months ago, and that is for a landslide tory victory, as they're the only party that wants to honour the referendum result...Bravo!

Quoted from Marinerz93

I see what you are saying but think too many Grimbarians are die hard labour voters that will never vote for the conservatives, especially the older members of the electorate, will either not vote or vote Brexit party, I see Conservative win Cleethorpes as usual and Brexit Party will win in Grimsby. Onns dilly dallying early on will cost her, she isn't as out and about as she should be or is this because she thinks she doesn't have to put the effort in as Grimsby has been labour for the last 70+ years. This election could be the lowest turnout for decades.

Those who think Corbyn cares about the working class need to look at him in the cold light of day, I wouldn't trust him to clear up after my dogs, he'd get excrement everywhere, and I have medium size and a small dogs.

I would prefer the Brexit party to win in Grimsby, but that is not what the lastest polling indicates. It seems the Brexit party is decimating the labour vote, the Conservatives are remaining steady and holding their share so are likely to win.

Be interesting to see the actual result.

All this crap about the NHS is on the table under the Cons just shows how desperate the Labour party are of discussing their own manifesto ,

1, If we buy medicine from the yanks does not put the NHS on the table as we have to buy them from somewhere,

2, The labour says it will cost us billions more to buy from the yanks than what we pay at the moment,  WELL WE WONT BUY THEM THEN FFS.

3, Every time Corbyn does not answer a question he loses more votes.

Keep it up Corbyn you are the best thing to happen for the Cons.

Pete, that is the most inane thing I've ever seen you post.

IF WE DON'T BUY THE MEDICATION IN QUESTION FROM THE YANKS, WE CAN'T GET IT ANYWHERE ELSE AND PEOPLE WHO REQUIRE IT WILL DIE AND SUFFER.

If you seriously think that a leak of documentation noting that the Yanks are going to completely shaft us because they know we desperately need a free trade deal when we leave the EU is some sort of ploy, then I can't really do anything for you.

This stuff isn't made up, it comes from a leak of documentation revealing the progress of the negotiations (the stuff which the government wouldn't reveal to a freedom of information request) and it shows that everything is up for sale from our food standards to medicine prices to 'access' to the NHS by the massive American 'healthcare' firms.

As part of the world's wealthiest and most successful trading bloc, the EU, we have enormous bargaining power and you don't get deals any better than the ones negotiated by the EU. Once we're out, we're a rather less formidable prospect, especially when the government of the day will be desperate to sign off on deals to stop damage to the economy. I don't blame the Yanks for trying to shaft us - it's what we would do to them if the boot was on the other foot.

Quite how you have read this situation so completely incorrectly, I just don't know.

Quoted from grimsby pete

All this crap about the NHS is on the table under the Cons just shows how desperate the Labour party are of discussing their own manifesto ,

1, If we buy medicine from the yanks does not put the NHS on the table as we have to buy them from somewhere,

2, The labour says it will cost us billions more to buy from the yanks than what we pay at the moment,  WELL WE WONT BUY THEM THEN FFS.

3, Every time Corbyn does not answer a question he loses more votes.

Keep it up Corbyn you are the best thing to happen for the Cons.

Well said Pete. I can see the common sense points you are making.

Sadly some posters are so blinded by their hatred of the Tories they cannot see anything other than anti Tory rants.

They (the Conservatives) have said many times the NHS will not be on the table in trade deal talks; no government would do that as it means electoral oblivion. We will continue to buy drugs from all over the world, as cheaply as we can get them.

Quoted from grimsby pete

2, The labour says it will cost us billions more to buy from the yanks than what we pay at the moment,  WELL WE WONT BUY THEM THEN FFS.

This right here has to be one of the dumbest comments I've read on the fishy