Is Labour gearing up to go early?
Tom Griffin (London, OK): Mike Smithson believes that Labour's poor showing in today's Populus poll means a 2009 election is off the agenda, but not everyone is so convinced. One opposition source points to the Labour website, where the party is recruiting campaign assistants on 9-month contracts immediately. They suggest this is evidence that Labour is gearing up for a May or June election.
Given the state of the polls such a move would mean accepting the likelihood of a hung Parliament, which might explain the manouvreings described by Anthony Barnett and Peter Oborne.
This article is published by
Tom Griffin, and openDemocracy.net under a Creative Commons licence. You may republish it without needing further permission, with attribution for non-commercial purposes following
these guidelines. These rules apply to one-off or infrequent use. For all re-print, syndication and educational use please see read our
republishing guidelines or
contact us. Some articles on this site are published under different terms. No images on the site or in articles may be re-used without permission unless specifically licensed under Creative Commons.
Guy Aitchison said:
Tue, 2009-01-13 12:28Caustic as ever Sarah2...but in all honesty Ill be only too happy to see the back of New Labour.