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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Scottish independence: The electoral mathematics would look less dautnting for the Tories
At GE2010 Labour won 41 of the 59 Scottish seats while the Tories came away with one. So if Scotland gets stripped out of the equation then achieving an overall majority because a much easier task for the blues.
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Edit: Not really relevant but wanted to see if it still sets off the spam-trap.
On topic: It would make LAB's job harder but it wouldn't be the cataclysm certain thriller writers would have you believe. Still don't understand why neither CON nor LAB have grabbed the role of championing England - there could be serious votes up for someone who seriously addressed the English question
However, Conservative MPs and activists are well aware that losing the vote would help their party, so they're not exactly going to be whole-heartedly committed to the No campaign. Whether this will actually help the Yes campaign is unclear, since visible conservative support for No might alienate many Scottish voters.
Whoever actually wins, we can probably expect some political conspiracy theorists to spend the next few decades claiming Cameron was trying to lose. If the No campaign suffers any major accidents, they'll blame him for them.
I think the tory leadership support for the Union is strong and genuine. The fact that it is despite the outcome being so much to their tactical advantage is to their credit and makes it all the more admirable.
Of course there is no point in pretending that only Scotland would be diminished into parochial irrelevance by independence. The UK might only lose 8% of its population but it would lose 1/3 of its land. Not how any PM would want to be remembered I would think.
Here are the details within each election's electoral history
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/British_Electoral_History_1832.htm
Better graphs here
http://internationalsocialist.org.uk/index.php/2013/05/will-scotland-leave-england-to-generations-of-tory-rule/
The North London street where billionaires can buy homes, never live in them, let them rot and still make millions":
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/jan/31/inside-london-billionaires-row-derelict-mansions-hampstead
CON 31.1
LAB 33.4
LD 15.8
UKIP 11.7
With Scotland so heavily anti-tory and pro-labour pretty much assures that the Tories cannot get a majority in Westminster even when they dominate all suburban and rural areas of England (as they did in 2010). Not only that but as the 2011 census statistic (32 million consider themselves English only) demonstrates many English no longer consider themselves British either whereas many naturalised immigrants do. For Labour to ideologically "wave the English flag" would cause noteable consternation within their ranks and in BME communities. To a lesser extent I suspect that is also true of the Libdems
This is highlighted quite well by that dubious piece of left-wing propaganda British Future whose questionably named State Of The Nation Poll demonstrated Labour's predicament by asking these two questions.
Which of the following if any is closest to how you would feel if you saw an England flag (the St. Georges Cross) on someone home, car shop or pub while England is playing /(on a normal day in brackets) in the World Cup
An expression of English National Pride:
Con 68% (66%)
Lab 50% (42%)
LD 61% (42%)
UKIP 80% (80%)
A worrying expression of English Nationalism
Con 4% (6%)
Lab 16% (21%)
LD 8% (24%)
UKIP 3% (3%)
Very few Tory or UKIP supporters are concerned by the presence of the St George's Flag whereas Labour and Libdems have a considerable group who could be concerned,
As to why Dave has not wrapped himself in the flag well firstly they are the Unionist Party so clearly that wouldn't fit well. Not only that but it would encourage Scottish Independence and there is no question that independence does have a considerable overhead (e.g. National Security)for the UK if they leave. Beyond that it would attract all the hackneyed smears from the left which would go completely against what Cameron has attempted with the modernisation project. It would also encourage further Euroscepticism (given that the impression is Scotland is less Euroscpetic than other parts of the country) and we know what the EU does to the Tories.
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/Assets/Docs/Polls/british-future-state-of-the-nation-tables-2014.pdf
If Scotland decides to separate both countries will continue to make their way in the world - Labour's recession caused nearly as big a fall in UK GDP as the secession of Scotland would, yet mysteriously we are still here.....
There is certainly an element of cognitive dissonance somewhere, methinks. I wonder how much of this is due to perception and the fact that London is on the extreme fringes of the UK, geographically speaking - it's (more or less) no further from Beachy Head than Lerwick in the Shetlands is from Muckle Flugga (and far closer to the edge of the exclusive economic zone).
If we could somehow get the PB Tories inept spin for 'better together' to a large scottish audience that would do almost as well.
LOL
However, even that isn't enough, as the perverse 2005 general election result showed, where Labour "won" England with fewer votes than the Conservatives. This sort of thinking would encourage the Tories to subdivide England, abandoning the further reaches of the north to Labour, fighting a long-term war of insurgency in Yorkshire and battling in Mercia from the redoubt of Greater Middlesex...