Talk:Sheffield Rally

Source for rally's inspiration
The rally was modelled partly on United States presidential campaign conventions, partly on the German political rallies of the 1930s

The reference used to justify the above quote does nothing of the sort. The reference says some commentators thought the rally reminded them of Nuremberg, which is totally different to saying that the rally was deliberately modelled (by implication, by the Labour party) to resemble a Nazi party rally. The comparison is specious and should be removed or altered. Yorkshiresky 20:49, 17 October 2006 (UTC.)

Why has Wikipedia ignored the fact that the whole thing was organised by Peter Mandelson?


 * Is this true, and can you provide a source to back it up? -Ashley Pomeroy (talk) 18:32, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

We're alright
The claim in the article that Kinnock was actually shouting 'well, alright' is incorrect (and an apparent attempt to rewrite history to make the incident seem slightly less embarrassing) - I just saw the clip shown on TV for the nth time and he's clearing shouting 'we're alright'. So I've changed this. 93.96.236.8 (talk) 21:49, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Total Rubbish
"Some accounts suggest the event only receiving widespread attention after the election,[5] an opinion Kinnock shared in April 2010: "It wasn't until about ten days after the election that people started writing about the 'hubristic Sheffield rally' and all the rest of it."

The above paragraph, currently in this article, is complete myth. The BBC election night footage (available online) clearly shows multiple discussions of this calamitous rally on the night of the election. 70.172.198.185 (talk) 17:50, 18 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Totally agree. At 3:55:45 of the BBC's coverage, David Dimbleby asks John Smith about the "triumphalism of the Sheffield rally which looked as though it was already in the bag for Labour". The idea that no one noticed the rally until after the election is a myth.--Britannicus (talk) 19:02, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

Note : Kinnock not entirely contradicted by the above comments - "election night TV coverage" is after the actual election. (TV discussions do not start until the polls have closed at 10pm - on Polling Day itself until 10pm there are just very short TV reports that it is Polling Day and there are no predictions until 10pm).

The article should mention the Bradley Effect, as the mass citing of the Sheffield Rally often does seem to be attempting to hide that embarrassing situation, which many believe was the actual cause of the Labour defeat, re what many voters said about being ok with Tax rises by Labour compared to what they then voted for (a Tax cutting party the Tories).

5 years later in the 1997 election, just before giving the Exit Poll prediction at 10pm, BBC TV host David Dimbleby sarcastically said - "Assuming that voters have been telling us the truth, here is the Exit Poll prediction ........ ".

So that doesn't fit with the Sheffield Rally explanation for 1992 at all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect