# Things Can’t Only Get Better - By Jonn Elledge  ## Metadata - Author: [[Substack]] - Full Title: Things Can’t Only Get Better - By Jonn Elledge - Category: #articles - Summary: insert summary - My notes: - Summary: Jonn Elledge expresses frustration with the Labour party's current strategy, arguing that it risks losing more voters to other parties while failing to address key issues. He compares modern information access to historical reading challenges, highlighting how technology has changed the way we consume knowledge. Elledge also reflects on creating maps and the evolution of mapping technology, noting its relevance in today's discussions. - URL: https://substack.com/inbox/post/163544387 - Source File: web-only ## LLM Chats ## NotebookLM ## LLM Audio ## Highlights > Struggling as I am to formulate any thought longer than a sentence, I’m just going to list all the reasons this is awful. > • The government has made clear on a number of occasions now that, if the choice is to stand with vulnerable people, or to side against them to impress a bunch of Labour-voting bigots who may exist only in its head, then it’ll choose the latter every time. > • This is as strategically idiotic as it is morally abhorrent. > • Although the Reform surge is real and terrifying, it is not clear that many of the people voting for Farage and co have voted Labour in a long time, if at all. > • The party is actually losing far more voters to the [LibDems and Greens](https://labourlist.org/2025/01/yougov-labour-greens-liberal-democrats-reform-nigel-farage/?amp). > • There are also far more of those voters [left to lose](https://bsky.app/profile/dylandifford.bsky.social/post/3loejqs7cds2t). > • Trying to impress the right by telling voters on the left to f*ck off , as if they have nowhere else to go when they very obviously do, might possibly pose some electoral risk. > • It’s also possible that many of the voters that the Labour party is trying desperately to keep onside will be dead by the time of the next election, [if they aren’t already](https://www.economist.com/britain/2025/04/09/zombie-politics-how-dead-man-dominates-british-politics). > • This speech might actually be worse than Theresa May’s infamous “citizens of nowhere” one[2](https://substack.com/inbox/post/163544387#footnote-2-163544387) because, even if that did communicate to a huge swathe of Britons that the Tories didn’t want their vote, “community is important” is at least a coherent and defensible intellectual proposition in the way phrases like “island of strangers”, “incalculable damage”, or “a squalid chapter of our politics” are not. > • It’s all very well to “ask why parts of our economy seem almost addicted to importing cheap labour”, but when big parts of the answer are “many NHS and essentially all social care workers are underpaid”, the obvious follow up question is, “What plans does the government have to address that?” (During the weekend broadcast round, home secretary Yvette Cooper alas couldn’t point to any.) > • In fact it’s possible that the horrendous rhetoric is being used to cover for the fact that the [actual policy changes](https://bsky.app/profile/samfr.bsky.social/post/3loyinjtx2p2k) are relatively small. > • They’re also more likely to get smaller than bigger, as the health and care sectors, universities, and business get their act in gear to lobby for changes. > • Promising an authoritarian immigration crackdown and then delivering not very much might also possibly pose some electoral risk in the future. > • Not to mention some potential PR risks in the *present*, as witnessed by a series of front pages in which the liberal press scream at the government for being shitty to immigrants, while the right-wing press complain they’re not being shitty *enough*. > [ > ](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F70959ac3-6099-453b-9fea-12813efa40fb_736x646.png) ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01jv9mgy3m0gnx8f9gs4je8mst)) > • Just once it would be nice to hear a senior British politician say “immigration is good actually”. > • Winning support from [Robert Jenrick](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/keir-starmer-island-strangers-migration-jenrick-b2749817.html) is never a good sign. > • Whichever geniuses came up with this strategy should be fired because they’re not up to the job. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01jv9mk4trsbad074tfr4yqmg2))