Mastodawn

Hmmm.... I think we can safely say Labour are rattled by the surge in support for the Green Party of England & Wales.

They have accused the GPEW of 'cowardice' for not parachuting in Zak Polanski as candidate & rather choosing (although they don't say this) a popular local resident (who lives just outside the constituency).

A classic case of judging your opponent by your own (warped) standards.

#politics #GortonAndDenton
h/t Observer

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Claire McNab Feb 1

@ChrisMayLA6 I assume that the #Starmtroopers calculated they had a binary choice between two packages of outcomes:

A/ hold the GM mayoralty, lose Gorton, block #Burnham's coup

B/ lose the GM mayoralty, hold Gorton, get defenestrated by #Burnham.

Not being keen on defenestration, they chose package A. So they have selected a corporate lobbyist as #GortonAndDenton candidate to be eaten alive, but they keep their jobs in #Number10 for a bit longer.

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Emeritus Prof Christopher May Feb 1

@2legged

sounds about right - boosted

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ProjectFearlessness Feb 1

@ChrisMayLA6 @2legged
From Manchester, I would say the mistake a lot of people are making in their analysis of the Gorton by election is not realising the local Labour party is viewed separately to the national Labour party. We can see that in how popular Burnham still is. Remember that Stogia is a local Labour councillor selected by the local Labour party. If you don't factor that into your analysis, you're not going to get it right.

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Gareth Kitchen Feb 1

@ProjectFearlessness
So more like the Stroud set-up then, I guess. But most people just are not aware of local nuance. The national picture seems to drown out most things local in my humble experience. It's probably much tighter than the bookies have it.
@ChrisMayLA6 @2legged

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ProjectFearlessness

@gruff @2legged @ChrisMayLA6
Yes, it's much too close to make any confident predictions at this point. And we don't even know who the Workers Party candidate is yet. It's between Shahbaz Sharwar, who is a really popular local councillor, and George Galloway, who is, well, George Galloway.