So many mean spirited posters here. It's nothing to do with what party anyone supports. If anyone watched the elegance and generosity of politicians of all parties who lost their livelihoods last night and learnt from it they might sound a bit more classy.
I agree that we've seen many graceful resignation speeches. Perhaps politicians could channel those instincts more often when they are giving speeches in more congenial circumstances. The public would think better of them.
Cambridge 1.2% Burnley 8.2% Bermondsey & Old Southwark 8.7% Cardiff Central 12.9% Yardley 16% Bristol West 16.9% (*in third position) Bradford East 17.1% Hornsey 19.1% Redcar 25.4% Norwich South 25.7% (*in 4th position) Withington 29.8% Brent Central 53.7% (* in third position)
vs Con
Eastbourne 1.4% Lewes 2.1% Thornbury 3.1% Twickenham 3.3% Kingston 4.8% Torbay 6.8% Sutton and Cheam 7.9% Bath 8.1% Yeovil 9.3% Colchester 11.5% Cheltenham 12.1% Berwick 12.2% Cheadle 12.2% Portsmouth South 12.5% Brecon 12.7% Devon North 13.3% Wells 13.3% Cornwall North 13.7% Hazel Grove 15.2% St Austell 16.2% Eastleigh 16.5% Chippenahm 18.2% Mid Dorset 22.6% Solihull 23.6% Taunton Deane 26.8% Somerton and Frome 33.6%
vs SNP (unlike SLAB they held up better and they maintained themselves within decent distance in some of them)
East Dunbartonshire 3.9% Edinburgh West 5.9% Fife NE 9.6% Caithness 11.2% Ross 12.3% Gordon 14,9% Argyll and Bute 16.3% West Aberdeenshire 20.2% /*in third position)
That's interesting, but it would be better if the colours were fainter where the second place is more distant. Then it picks out where the marginals are, and which parties are involved in them, more clearly.
Yeah there's so much data visualisation I want to do on this election. It's frustrating at the moment that no one source has all the info I want to see.
So many mean spirited posters here. It's nothing to do with what party anyone supports. If anyone watched the elegance and generosity of politicians of all parties who lost their livelihoods last night and learnt from it they might sound a bit more classy.
The Survation story is interesting in itself, and because it produced a very different resyult to their previous poll using the same method - confirming that there was a late shift rather than an undetected long-term lead.
Incidentally, I won some money by a long-forgotten bet laying a hung Parliament - though I don't think it was a Tory majority I had in mind! I just thought that the general assumption that we'd hit the hung balance was over-promoted. It'll pay for my Lupus donation for Squareroot's bet.
Hard luck Nick.
Was it a genuine surprise when you lost? Or had you detected something was going wrong before polling day?
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
I mean really ?
If the Conservatives think they can keep living on majorities of twelve they're nuts. They got just over one third of the vote.
The Tories need to do what they have needed to do for the last five years and that is broaden their church, then elections become less the nail biters of 2015 and fairly predictable events 12 months out.
Agree wholeheartedly.
And their next leader is not Boris. He does not have the ability to do that and will be too old and second-hand by the time the choice has to be made.
The Tories - like all the other parties - need to be thinking about who can lead in the 2020's and beyond. And in what sort of UK/ world they would be doing that leading.
Completely correct. And with the Lib Dems on 8% and Labour on 30%, the most opportune group to win over are the 13% of the electorate that voted for UKIP. Their concerns are crime, welfare exploitation and - especially - immigration. If we don't meet or come close to our immigration pledge, we're in trouble.
...... And finally UKIP. Actually I thought they did very well in terms of vote share. 1% better than I predicted and some great results against Labour. I am not going to harp on too much about the 1 seat for 3,861,457 votes nor the fact that it only took 1/112th of that number to each Tory seat. In spite of that I still don't agree with PR nor the way it cements the parties into the electoral system and basically think UKIP need to learn how the game is played and do it better. I would not want to see the electoral system changed simply to make thing better for the party I happen to support.
1 seat was disappointing, not because a few more would have made much difference to the way things happened in Parliament or the country but because it would have sent out a message to those who today mistakenly believe UKIP and what they stand for is finished. I was delighted to see Carswell back, not too bothered about Reckless losing and very sorry about people like Bill Etheridge in Dudley North and Tim Ackers in Thurrock both of whom would have made great MPs for UKIP. I hope they will in the future.
As I am sure you know I have not been a great fan of Farage. Again my feelings over him going are mixed. I think he is a decent man and so am sorry for the vilification and crowing that he has been subjected to along with the huge amount of misrepresentation that has been made about what he stands for. On that level it would have been nice to see him win. But I do believe that Robert S and others here have been right to say that his marmite politics have not helped UKIP win arguments and would have made the EU exit much harder. So as far as the future of the party and of Euroscepticism goes I am glad he didn't win. Hopefully whoever takes his place (and I have no thoughts yet on who that should be) will present a more coherent and logical position for a Euro exit than has been presented so far by UKIP.
So a mixed bag. I hope UKIP do well in the locals today. I hope Farage is not stupid enough to try and stand again for leadership of the party and I hope (I believe in vain) that Cameron will be forced to accept that we cannot stay in the EU. But I do think that Cameron winning has probably set back Euroscepticism by a generation and, barring the whole thing collapsing, we will not now leave the EU in the foreseeable future.
I'd just like to repeat my thanks and congratulations to everyone involved with PB. I followed events throughout the night on here and on Sky and the combination was perfect. This is a great site and was both informative and entertaining last night. Well done guys.
Agreed Steve.
Btw, a quick thank you to you, Mr Dancer and all the other guys and girls that worked so hard in M & O. Outstanding work!
Listened to Ms Jenkyns on the radio earlier, she sounds like a lovely person.
The Survation story is interesting in itself, and because it produced a very different resyult to their previous poll using the same method - confirming that there was a late shift rather than an undetected long-term lead.
Incidentally, I won some money by a long-forgotten bet laying a hung Parliament - though I don't think it was a Tory majority I had in mind! I just thought that the general assumption that we'd hit the hung balance was over-promoted. It'll pay for my Lupus donation for Squareroot's bet.
Afternoon Nick. Really sorry you didn't win mate. Hope you are okay.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
I mean really ?
If the Conservatives think they can keep living on majorities of twelve they're nuts. They got just over one third of the vote.
The Tories need to do what they have needed to do for the last five years and that is broaden their church, then elections become less the nail biters of 2015 and fairly predictable events 12 months out.
Agree wholeheartedly.
And their next leader is not Boris. He does not have the ability to do that and will be too old and second-hand by the time the choice has to be made.
The Tories - like all the other parties - need to be thinking about who can lead in the 2020's and beyond. And in what sort of UK/ world they would be doing that leading.
I would hope that Cameron and Osborne might start to tackle the issues from 2010 - reforming tax, rebalancing the economy, tackling vested inetrests etc, Scotland
But I suspect Cameron will get distracted by gimmicks and Osborne will dabble. I hope I'm just being over cynical but only time will tell. I'm not setting my expectations too high
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
No data to back up your assertions though. Funny for someone who reckons he's such an empiricist. Where's your evidence that the centre right is the biggest block?
Outside of pb what I find strange is just how muted the public response feels. The Tories got by despite 63% of people voting for someone else. I'm not saying the 'shy' Tories are really ashamed Tories, but there just seems to be a grudging 'we don't trust the other lot to run the country'. You might say that's the typical bitter leftie but this whole election just seems to have been another wasted opportunity to reconnect voters with our sovereign parliament. Compare it to the enthusiasm which greeted Obama or even George W when they won. And the right should be more worried than you know. If you can't summon interest in our sovereign parliament why should people be that bothered about power being handed over to international institutions like the EU? I notice the recent polls on Britain staying in have been quite favourable.
- They need to understand what liberal and progressive mean, really mean.
Has Labour ever been liberal? It seems their idea of being liberal is limited to asserting additional rights for minority groups. Otherwise they seem a fundamentally illiberal party.
Ever since New Labour they have become fundamentally illiberal: ID cards and 90-day detention are what destroyed any chance of my voting Labour. They have also been too willing (some of them anyway) to tolerate the intolerable.
But if they want to describe themselves as liberal and progressive then they might start by understanding what those concepts mean. If not, they can simply market themselves as the authoritarian, collectivist and statist alternative. And see where that gets them.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
Actually I think you are wrong, in part at least. I think the Tories won because UKIP hollowed out the Labour vote in many seats either preventing them from beating Tory incumbents or in the more extreme cases allowing the Tories to reverse the game and take seats from them. I also believe this is why the polls got it wrong. They didn't under or over estimate the UKIP vote, they just failed to understand where it was coming from.
Amazing results, just amazing. The really remarkable thing is that the EIC meme didn't get anywhere close to the man's total ineptness and unsuitability for the role he stole from his brother. I mean, he has proved to be electorally more toxic than McMental. How was that even possible?
What on earth were the Labour Party thinking? They now have so many cracks appearing in the edifice it raises a serious question of whether it can be repaired, or whether it should be.
In Scotland, they need to go back to the council elections and start building from there, and while they are, they risk ceding further ground to both the SNP and the Tories at Holyrood. Their only saving grace will be that they can significantly improve the quality of their PPCs by getting the newly unemployed into the home team. But they will be fire fighting for some time.
As for the blessed St. Urgeon, she is about to find out that she can have as many MPs as she likes, but it don't mean diddly if you're not part of the winning team. And she will now spend the next year defending her record in Holyrood, which will take some doing, given that her government has spent the last two years politicking and not governing. The SNP cult may have reached its zenith.
Nick Clegg and most of the LibDems will feel hard done by but as has already been said, you can't pitch to be elected as the opposition from a position in government. This is an existential threat for them. Amalgamation with the Greens may yet not be wholly ridiculous.
And as for Cammo, he's either very clever or very lucky or possibly both. Did he deserve to win? No. Is the country better off that he did? Probably.
Finally, I logged on at 10pm last night and have to say that this site is unrivalled for the quality of observation, humour, political analysis and downright entertainment when it comes to election night. If OGH has any sense, he'll try to earn back some of his losses by negotiating a tie-up with Channel 4 to run their alternative election show in five years. Theirs was shite.
The Survation story is interesting in itself, and because it produced a very different resyult to their previous poll using the same method - confirming that there was a late shift rather than an undetected long-term lead.
Incidentally, I won some money by a long-forgotten bet laying a hung Parliament - though I don't think it was a Tory majority I had in mind! I just thought that the general assumption that we'd hit the hung balance was over-promoted. It'll pay for my Lupus donation for Squareroot's bet.
Very sorry that you didn't manage to win, but the tide was surely against you this time. Had everything crossed as you appeared on my telly box.
To be fair to BJO and Sunil - they got garbage data to work with.
Well I only had the Tories on 296 in my final prediction, have to say I got antsy with the final poll shift to Labour.
Online pollsters seriously need to look at how they refresh their panels. The lack of movement was clearly suspect. I also wonder how ICM went from a 6 point Tory lead to a 1 point Labour lead as well!
Not so Richard, UKIP will now regroup and become more professional and savvy, learn lessons of organisation and I hope, move it's main HQ from Devon to a place near or in London. It will now start a recruiting drive and try to get some of their 4 million voters to join the purples, make their political philosophy more coherent, and take a deep breath.
That in a way is my point. If UKIP goes in that direction (and I think you are right that they will try to do so), it is almost by definition going to be self-identifying as something other than the leadership of the Out campaign at the referendum.
Theresa May stays as Home Sec - good stuff. I like stability here and in the Treasury.
Totally agree. After the QS, DC needs to address the nation and tell it like it is and has to be in order to eliminate the deficit and reduce the debt, as well as other subsidiary objectives. Then he needs to do regular progress reports in the same way, as of course events will happen that will upset plans.
Having had five years of austerity (even though 50% have not noticed it YG) if the Cons want to win in 2020, then we need to seeing some prosperity by then.
The Survation story is interesting in itself, and because it produced a very different resyult to their previous poll using the same method - confirming that there was a late shift rather than an undetected long-term lead.
Incidentally, I won some money by a long-forgotten bet laying a hung Parliament - though I don't think it was a Tory majority I had in mind! I just thought that the general assumption that we'd hit the hung balance was over-promoted. It'll pay for my Lupus donation for Squareroot's bet.
Hi Nick - thanks for fighting a decent campaign and standing up for progressive values. I'm just so sorry you couldn't win!
The electorate certainly vindicated your point of view.....
Yes I think they have - 63% of them didn't vote GO. Cameron should have been crusing comfortably to victory about 6 months out and somewhere above 40% on the day.
You are confusing a close run thing with an easy victory.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
If the electoral system is bust, the idea of a left-right political spectrum is broken beyond repair. Your argument does not tally with the clear evidence of large numbers of Labour voters going straight to UKIP. Both Labour and the Liberal Democrats collapsed due to the populist rise of UKIP, while we fended it off thanks to Lyndon Crosby and his strengthening of the right flank with things like English votes for English laws.
If you consider how the south of England is almost entirely held by Conservatives, this map shows how irrelevant Labour are in southern England. South of the Bristol Channel and the Thames, they aren't even second in many places.
It is a very interesting map. Does anyone yet have a spreadsheet of what these second places were like in percentage terms. Being second but miles off is quite a different matter to a close second.
Kippers seem to have done well in Fenland ans similar areas, and also in industrial Northern cities. Not an easy pair of horses to ride at once.
If Nuttall becomes UKIP leader he will be very attractive (as a scouser) to voters in the north.
If Tories can learn to vote tactically where UKIP are hitting strong 2nds behind the reds then Labour could have problems in 2020 in the midlands/north.
Hard luck Nick. It wasn't Labour's night. Nothing anyone could do. The Lib Dems fared even worse.
Andrea
Extraordinary figures from some iconic seats
Cambridge 1.2% Burnley 8.2% Bermondsey & Old Southwark 8.7% Cardiff Central 12.9% Yardley 16% Bristol West 16.9% (*in third position) Bradford East 17.1% Hornsey 19.1% Redcar 25.4% Norwich South 25.7% (*in 4th position) Withington 29.8% Brent Central 53.7% (* in third position)
On a side note, from now on i'm going to pay even less attention to headline voting intentions and more attention to the underlying numbers. Leader ratings anyone?
The electorate certainly vindicated your point of view.....
Yes I think they have - 63% of them didn't vote GO. Cameron should have been crusing comfortably to victory about 6 months out and somewhere above 40% on the day.
You are confusing a close run thing with an easy victory.
On the face of it this is not really a close run thing. The Tories have a higher share of the vote and have the same lead over Labour and have a much, much larger seat lead over Labour. The polls created a false narrative of this election being much closer than it is.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
I think that's too mono dimensional "left<>right" - there remain a spot for a socially liberal economically 'soft left' position - while Cameron has confounded the left criticism of Tories on social liberalism (they (choose to?) ignore that Thatcher as a young MP voted for the decriminalisation of homosexuality and as PM ran the 'model' anti-HIV campaign), there is only so far Cameron can carry his party. And outside its London membership, Labour's traditional WWC support has always been socially small'c' conservative - so if they want to regain that they are going to have to bite a few tongues in Hampstead.
On the economic front, goodness knows where Ed's replacement will take Labour - but clearly the electorate still buys the Thatcher settlement - which given the challenges of global wage competition must come under further strain.
As Tim Farron observed, in not possibly the happiest of metaphors....the Lib Dems are like cockroaches.....impossible to eradicate....
Finally, I logged on at 10pm last night and have to say that this site is unrivalled for the quality of observation, humour, political analysis and downright entertainment when it comes to election night. If OGH has any sense, he'll try to earn back some of his losses by negotiating a tie-up with Channel 4 to run their alternative election show in five years. Theirs was shite.
The BBC must have had someone monitoring this site last night. Several times I read something on here and a few minutes later a pundit made much the same point.
If Nuttall becomes UKIP leader he will be very attractive (as a scouser) to voters in the north.
If Tories can learn to vote tactically where UKIP are hitting strong 2nds behind the reds then Labour could have problems in 2020 in the midlands/north.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
If the electoral system is bust, the idea of a left-right political spectrum is broken beyond repair. Your argument does not tally with the clear evidence of large numbers of Labour voters going straight to UKIP. Both Labour and the Liberal Democrats collapsed due to the populist rise of UKIP, while we fended it off thanks to Lyndon Crosby and his strengthening of the right flank with things like English votes for English laws.
In 2010, Lib Dems sacrificed the party to save the country. In 2015, dare I suggest that EVEL and the whole strategy of tension with Scotland was converse to the behaviour of your former partners? Though I don't blame you; after all, they did it and you guys efficiently crucified them.
If you consider how the south of England is almost entirely held by Conservatives, this map shows how irrelevant Labour are in southern England. South of the Bristol Channel and the Thames, they aren't even second in many places.
It is a very interesting map. Does anyone yet have a spreadsheet of what these second places were like in percentage terms. Being second but miles off is quite a different matter to a close second.
Kippers seem to have done well in Fenland ans similar areas, and also in industrial Northern cities. Not an easy pair of horses to ride at once.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
If the electoral system is bust, the idea of a left-right political spectrum is broken beyond repair. Your argument does not tally with the clear evidence of large numbers of Labour voters going straight to UKIP. Both Labour and the Liberal Democrats collapsed due to the populist rise of UKIP, while we fended it off thanks to Lyndon Crosby and his strengthening of the right flank with things like English votes for English laws.
Hit the nail on the head. UKIP cost Labour dozens of seats but hardly hurt the Tories. Labour strategists took their eye of this ball and the ramifications of this have been devastating. It's not as if there weren't warned about this (the Heywood and Middleton by-election).
The electorate certainly vindicated your point of view.....
Yes I think they have - 63% of them didn't vote GO. Cameron should have been crusing comfortably to victory about 6 months out and somewhere above 40% on the day.
You are confusing a close run thing with an easy victory.
The electorate voted out his Labour alternative.....
You are confusing real life with hypothetical 'what might have beens'
You've got another ±5 years of George, take your porridge like a soldier!
The Survation story is interesting in itself, and because it produced a very different resyult to their previous poll using the same method - confirming that there was a late shift rather than an undetected long-term lead.
Incidentally, I won some money by a long-forgotten bet laying a hung Parliament - though I don't think it was a Tory majority I had in mind! I just thought that the general assumption that we'd hit the hung balance was over-promoted. It'll pay for my Lupus donation for Squareroot's bet.
Don't take defeat too personally. Ultimately it is hard to defy UNS, as my party has found out too. I hope that you continue on this board- and perhaps even more so, now that you are freer from party discipline.
I'm starting to think that George Osborne is going to be the next leader. He seems to have morphed from a sour faced posh boy who everybody hated to quite a popular jovial type figure.
He is quite popular these days too IIRC.
Osborne has the vision to take the Conservatives and the country on, expanding the small business base is key, Labour HAVE to find a leader who encourages business enterprise and wealth creation, become the party of small business. If they appoint another Union stooge like Burnham they will lose even more emphatically next time.
I love the fact that boundaries weren't redrawn - so easy to compare 2010 to 2015
That's the other problem for Labour, the Tories will surely get boundary reforms through this time. Maybe not the reduction in numbers but they will definitely implement a no size variation rule which will add another 10 seats to the Tories from Labour.
I love the fact that boundaries weren't redrawn - so easy to compare 2010 to 2015
That's the other problem for Labour, the Tories will surely get boundary reforms through this time. Maybe not the reduction in numbers but they will definitely implement a no size variation rule which will add another 10 seats to the Tories from Labour.
And, ironically, THIS boundary reform shaking up incumbents could be good news for the Lib Dems.
The electorate certainly vindicated your point of view.....
Yes I think they have - 63% of them didn't vote GO. Cameron should have been crusing comfortably to victory about 6 months out and somewhere above 40% on the day.
You are confusing a close run thing with an easy victory.
The electorate voted out his Labour alternative.....
You are confusing real life with hypothetical 'what might have beens'
You've got another ±5 years of George, take your porridge like a soldier!
I'm not confusing real life with might have beens, it's pretty obvious there have been more votes if the conservatives co=uld manage the broader church.
You are perhaps confusing getting a lucky break - since none of the Conservative high command was expecting victory - with the natural order of things.
In terms of the SNP, I think there will be a second membership surge as many of the 50% who voted SNP seek to become more politically engaged. As there is now no risk of the SNP being seen as a wrecking ball in Westminster, the SNP will effectively be starting on the Holyrood 2016 election preparations, without the worry of trying to prop up Labour.
I think SLAB and SLID, have joined SCUP as zombie parties with core votes below the level required for the FPTP system. I think they will struggle to secure Holyrood constituency seats, so will be looking to the regional list as the main source of seats, unfortunately they will be at risk of being caught in a pincer movement by the SNP, Greens and bizarrely UKIP.
On a serious note, I really hope Nick Clegg can get over last night as a person. He looked a totally broken man.
It will be five years of torture. Unable to resign as the seat will be lost to Labour and forced to struggle on as a party a shadow of its former self.
Is it possible that if the polls had shown cameron heading for 300 seats hed have got 300. But the thought ed might get in with a minoriry gov helped up the cons by another 3pc? So the bad polls actually gave us the majority we have now.
For the benefit of PBers who haven't the time to trawl the threads :
FPT :
I'll try and rationalize these momentous events
ARSE & the "JackW Dozen"
From the moment Ed was elected as LotO it was patently clear that EWNBPM was the order of the day. Ed never had the look, almost literally, of a Prime Minister in waiting and the voters will never elect an individual who cannot appear to command the duties of the Queen's First Minister.
The economic, social and demographic factors fell into place in my ARSE with ease. Importantly unemployment and growth both fell within a whisker of my projections as did most of the other element central to the forecast.
PBers will recall I repeatedly advised that my ARSE was not a nowcast but forecast for 7th May but clearly as the day loomed the polls would play a more important part. Despite my ARSE filter allowing for shy Tories and differential turnout that regularly topped the Conservatives above 300 the failure of the polls, even ICM, notched down the blue seats and overestimated the yellow peril. Essentially the ARSE filter required another turn.
The same is true in Scotland where my ARSE expected a higher differential turnout for the SNP but clearly by not enough.
In late 2013 I started, some said very unwisely, to choose 13 difficult seats that I believed would shape the contest and they certainly did.
Of those "JackW Dozen" 10 were hits but Nick Palmer, and losses in Cambridge (very unexpected) and Cornwall North (less so) bucked the trend.
So overall perhaps a B+ .... I hope adherents of the ARSE punted well, you really should have and now PBers for one final time may I express the view, much derided by many, that :
In terms of the SNP, I think there will be a second membership surge as many of the 50% who voted SNP seek to become more politically engaged. As there is now no risk of the SNP being seen as a wrecking ball in Westminster, the SNP will effectively be starting on the Holyrood 2016 election preparations, without the worry of trying to prop up Labour.
I think SLAB and SLID, have joined SCUP as zombie parties with core votes below the level required for the FPTP system. I think they will struggle to secure Holyrood constituency seats, so will be looking to the regional list as the main source of seats, unfortunately they will be at risk of being caught in a pincer movement by the SNP, Greens and bizarrely UKIP.
Of course the Slibs are toasted - finished. So the vote splitting and Holyrood isn't FPTP.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
Actually I think you are wrong, in part at least. I think the Tories won because UKIP hollowed out the Labour vote in many seats either preventing them from beating Tory incumbents or in the more extreme cases allowing the Tories to reverse the game and take seats from them. I also believe this is why the polls got it wrong. They didn't under or over estimate the UKIP vote, they just failed to understand where it was coming from.
While that's true to an extent, I think you just have to look down the list of LibDem losses to see dramatic numbers of LibDem -> Conservative switchers.
On a serious note, I really hope Nick Clegg can get over last night as a person. He looked a totally broken man.
It will be five years of torture. Unable to resign as the seat will be lost to Labour and forced to struggle on as a party a shadow of its former self.
He seems a fairly resilient sort, but must be fairly bruised at present.
He has achieved high office for himself and his colleagues at a level unseen for nearly a century. It will not be long before it is seen by the electorate in a different light.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
If the electoral system is bust, the idea of a left-right political spectrum is broken beyond repair. Your argument does not tally with the clear evidence of large numbers of Labour voters going straight to UKIP. Both Labour and the Liberal Democrats collapsed due to the populist rise of UKIP, while we fended it off thanks to Lyndon Crosby and his strengthening of the right flank with things like English votes for English laws.
Yes: Labour -> UKIP, LibDem -> Con, Lab ->SNP are the three monumental shift of the evening.
On a serious note, I really hope Nick Clegg can get over last night as a person. He looked a totally broken man.
It will be five years of torture. Unable to resign as the seat will be lost to Labour and forced to struggle on as a party a shadow of its former self.
There's no obligation for Clegg to turn up at the HoC - Brown rarely did. He has the luxury of family wealth, a successful wife, a large and no doubt comfortable London home and plenty to occupy his time outside politics. Life won't be that bad.
the SNP demands full fiscal autonomy, and David Cameron should hurry to meet that demand. Partly because linking taxation to expenditure north of the border might allow a revival, over time, of Right-of-Centre politics in Scotland. Partly because the measure will also be popular with English taxpayers. Partly, too, because, without such a reform, separatism will revive. And partly because greater autonomy for Scotland could bring about a new, devolved settlement for the entire United Kingdom, something that is long overdue. Mainly, though, because most Scots say they want it, and the SNP has won an unarguable mandate. What are we waiting for?
Knowsley is only 78.1% this year. Twigg 75%, Bootle 74.5%, Berger 69%, Maria Eagle 69%, Field 67.6%, Riverside 67% In London West Ham 68.4%, East Ham 77%, Tottenham 67%, Ilford South 64%, Hackney South 64%, Abbott 63% Bethnal Green 61%, Edmonton 61%, Corbyn 60%-
Many are celebrating UKIP being kept to a single seat even as third-largest vote getters in the UK, but they may be around a very long time continuing to siphon off protest votes mainly from the Tories, harming them indefinitely. A more sure way to kill them off as a serious political force would seem to be sending dozens of them to Westminster and cajoling them into a coalition with the Tories.
If I was Cameron, I'd stand up and publicly invite Carswell back. Offer no preferment or inducement, but no recriminations either - and extend the offer to anyone who chose to vote UKIP yesterday as well. You're welcome back, any time.
"The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes."
It never felt like Labour were running away with it. There was no narrative and no obvious enthusiasm even from Labour supporters on here. We were all left bemused by the polls but joyfully accepted that the pollsters knew more than we did.
There never seemed a good enough reason to vote Labour which was always a pig in a poke. I hadn't the faintest idea what an Ed government would do or look like. The Tories in all honesty seemed like the safe option.
So overall perhaps a B+ .... I hope adherents of the ARSE punted well, you really should have and now PBers for one final time may I express the view, much derided by many, that :
Ed Miliband Will Never Be Prime Minister
Obviously you turned out to be right, but out of interest, why did you keep trotting out the line? It has been quite annoying. Was that the point? Or did you have other motives?
Would have loved to have engaged you discussion, but you seemed to have the certainty of a religious zealot. So what's the point.
Hopefully somebody will have that hat for him to eat.
And Bad Al for Labour...there really need to get him as far away from being such a high profile media figure for Labour....he does so much damage for their image.
It will be five years of torture. Unable to resign as the seat will be lost to Labour and forced to struggle on as a party a shadow of its former self.
Wouldn't be surprising if Cameron gives him some plum international job.
Is this result going to be another massive boost for the "betting markets are a more accurate predictor of election results than the pollsters"?
I personally did my conkers laying Tory most seats on the assumption that the betting market was influenced by emotional punters who were ignoring polling evidence; in fact the money talked - it pointed to the notion that the betting markets distill all information and assess it more accurately than the pollsters.
I am also staggered that Survation have admitted to burying a poll that would left them out on their own. It is factual evidence to support the idea that pollsters are risk-adverse to making a mistake and tend to cluster to protect themselves. This is no longer a conspiracy theory - we have at least one dramatic piece of evidence to back up this thesis.
In a future election, if there was a big discrepancy between betting markets and the polls, which indicator would you now consider more reliable?
I am eating some very humble pie and reassessing my approach to political betting in the future. I was particularly taken in by the accuracy of the polls in #GE2010. I assumed this meant the bias problem had been solved. But ncpnumbercrucncher pointed out - and I ignored - there was in fact ample evidence of a continuing problem with overstating Labour share.
I cannot believe in hindsight I was so blinkered and slavish in my faith in the polls - I ignored class 101 in Political betting, which we all should have taken to heart after 1992 and never forgotten; you cannot win when trailing badly on leadership and economy ratings.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
Actually I think you are wrong, in part at least. I think the Tories won because UKIP hollowed out the Labour vote in many seats either preventing them from beating Tory incumbents or in the more extreme cases allowing the Tories to reverse the game and take seats from them. I also believe this is why the polls got it wrong. They didn't under or over estimate the UKIP vote, they just failed to understand where it was coming from.
While that's true to an extent, I think you just have to look down the list of LibDem losses to see dramatic numbers of LibDem -> Conservative switchers.
I find that the most bewildering thing over the last 5 years. Why exactly would people who voted for the soft left Lib Dems in 2010 have switched to the Tories this time, not least since Cameron abandoned his modernisation and the one nation Tories have been finally culled.
In terms of the SNP, I think there will be a second membership surge as many of the 50% who voted SNP seek to become more politically engaged. As there is now no risk of the SNP being seen as a wrecking ball in Westminster, the SNP will effectively be starting on the Holyrood 2016 election preparations, without the worry of trying to prop up Labour.
I think SLAB and SLID, have joined SCUP as zombie parties with core votes below the level required for the FPTP system. I think they will struggle to secure Holyrood constituency seats, so will be looking to the regional list as the main source of seats, unfortunately they will be at risk of being caught in a pincer movement by the SNP, Greens and bizarrely UKIP.
Hmm, Mr Murphy is reportedly expressing the belief that he will lead SLAB to Holyrood victory next year.
"Murphy said it would be wrong for him to resign as he had not yet had enough time to transform the party. However, if the results of last night show anything, it is that Murphy has undoubtedly transformed the party."
I'm starting to think that George Osborne is going to be the next leader. He seems to have morphed from a sour faced posh boy who everybody hated to quite a popular jovial type figure.
He is quite popular these days too IIRC.
Osborne has the vision to take the Conservatives and the country on, expanding the small business base is key, Labour HAVE to find a leader who encourages business enterprise and wealth creation, become the party of small business. If they appoint another Union stooge like Burnham they will lose even more emphatically next time.
One thing to bear in mind tho about Osborne is that he is a desperately shy person. I'm not sure he really wants the top job. His current role of Chancellor and strategic maestro seems to suit him very well.
For the benefit of PBers who haven't the time to trawl the threads :
FPT :
I'll try and rationalize these momentous events
ARSE & the "JackW Dozen"
From the moment Ed was elected as LotO it was patently clear that EWNBPM was the order of the day. Ed never had the look, almost literally, of a Prime Minister in waiting and the voters will never elect an individual who cannot appear to command the duties of the Queen's First Minister.
The economic, social and demographic factors fell into place in my ARSE with ease. Importantly unemployment and growth both fell within a whisker of my projections as did most of the other element central to the forecast.
PBers will recall I repeatedly advised that my ARSE was not a nowcast but forecast for 7th May but clearly as the day loomed the polls would play a more important part. Despite my ARSE filter allowing for shy Tories and differential turnout that regularly topped the Conservatives above 300 the failure of the polls, even ICM, notched down the blue seats and overestimated the yellow peril. Essentially the ARSE filter required another turn.
The same is true in Scotland where my ARSE expected a higher differential turnout for the SNP but clearly by not enough.
In late 2013 I started, some said very unwisely, to choose 13 difficult seats that I believed would shape the contest and they certainly did.
Of those "JackW Dozen" 10 were hits but Nick Palmer, and losses in Cambridge (very unexpected) and Cornwall North (less so) bucked the trend.
So overall perhaps a B+ .... I hope adherents of the ARSE punted well, you really should have and now PBers for one final time may I express the view, much derided by many, that :
Ed Miliband Will Never Be Prime Minister
Out of interest Jack I know you said regularly on here that you thought Farage would win fairly easily. Although it wasn't part of your ARSE I was wondering why you thought that and what you think caused it to be wrong?
In terms of the SNP, I think there will be a second membership surge as many of the 50% who voted SNP seek to become more politically engaged. As there is now no risk of the SNP being seen as a wrecking ball in Westminster, the SNP will effectively be starting on the Holyrood 2016 election preparations, without the worry of trying to prop up Labour.
I think SLAB and SLID, have joined SCUP as zombie parties with core votes below the level required for the FPTP system. I think they will struggle to secure Holyrood constituency seats, so will be looking to the regional list as the main source of seats, unfortunately they will be at risk of being caught in a pincer movement by the SNP, Greens and bizarrely UKIP.
Of course the Slibs are toasted - finished. So the vote splitting and Holyrood isn't FPTP.
I am not so sure. Quite a few of the SNP gains from the SLD were smaller majorities than over SLAB. Ditto for SNP over SCUP. There is room for revival there.
If it all goes wrong for Salmond in Westminster then we may have seen peak SNP. Hubris can be a terrible thing.
Many are celebrating UKIP being kept to a single seat even as third-largest vote getters in the UK, but they may be around a very long time continuing to siphon off protest votes mainly from the Tories, harming them indefinitely. A more sure way to kill them off as a serious political force would seem to be sending dozens of them to Westminster and cajoling them into a coalition with the Tories.
If I was Cameron, I'd stand up and publicly invite Carswell back. Offer no preferment or inducement, but no recriminations either - and extend the offer to anyone who chose to vote UKIP yesterday as well. You're welcome back, any time.
I can't see many UKIPpers taking up such an offer. They left because of Cameron and I can't see their view of him changing at least until after any EU referendum. If he does as we expect and fudges the whole thing to ensure an IN win then they would have been fooled twice.
The question now is who the hell takes over the Lib Dem leadership? Tom Brake seems to be the only real candidate of any quality but Tim Farron may appeal to the leftist voter they need to get back into their fold.
The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes. This wasn't (much) about Red Liberals going home, it was because the rise of UKIP and the coalition with the LibDems detoxified the Conservative brand for a lot of centre right voters.
If the LibDems are to survive - and I think it's too early to tell if they will - then they need either the Conservatives to veer right under Cameron, or the Labour Party to veer left under A N Other. Otherwise, UKIP is right, Conservatives are centre right, Labour is centre left, and the SNP/Greens are left. And centre right is the biggest block, and is owned almost entirely now by the Conservatives.
Actually I think you are wrong, in part at least. I think the Tories won because UKIP hollowed out the Labour vote in many seats either preventing them from beating Tory incumbents or in the more extreme cases allowing the Tories to reverse the game and take seats from them. I also believe this is why the polls got it wrong. They didn't under or over estimate the UKIP vote, they just failed to understand where it was coming from.
While that's true to an extent, I think you just have to look down the list of LibDem losses to see dramatic numbers of LibDem -> Conservative switchers.
I find that the most bewildering thing over the last 5 years. Why exactly would people who voted for the soft left Lib Dems in 2010 have switched to the Tories this time, not least since Cameron abandoned his modernisation and the one nation Tories have been finally culled.
Perversely the moderation applied by the Lib dems made the Tories safe to vote for. I'd have joined a coalition party.
I'm starting to think that George Osborne is going to be the next leader. He seems to have morphed from a sour faced posh boy who everybody hated to quite a popular jovial type figure.
He is quite popular these days too IIRC.
Osborne has the vision to take the Conservatives and the country on, expanding the small business base is key, Labour HAVE to find a leader who encourages business enterprise and wealth creation, become the party of small business. If they appoint another Union stooge like Burnham they will lose even more emphatically next time.
One thing to bear in mind tho about Osborne is that he is a desperately shy person. I'm not sure he really wants the top job. His current role of Chancellor and strategic maestro seems to suit him very well.
I agree - I think he recognises his strengths - and limitations - unlike Brown or Miliband.
Many are celebrating UKIP being kept to a single seat even as third-largest vote getters in the UK, but they may be around a very long time continuing to siphon off protest votes mainly from the Tories, harming them indefinitely. A more sure way to kill them off as a serious political force would seem to be sending dozens of them to Westminster and cajoling them into a coalition with the Tories.
If I was Cameron, I'd stand up and publicly invite Carswell back. Offer no preferment or inducement, but no recriminations either - and extend the offer to anyone who chose to vote UKIP yesterday as well. You're welcome back, any time.
For me personally I could never return to a party whose leader has called me a racist. There are a significant number of Tory MPs who have very similar views to my own but I cannot support them after having been insulted.
The question now is who the hell takes over the Lib Dem leadership? Tom Brake seems to be the only real candidate of any quality but Tim Farron may appeal to the leftist voter they need to get back into their fold.
Norman Lamb is a really shrewd operator but Farron has pressed the flesh with the membership
Comments
vs Labour
Cambridge 1.2%
Burnley 8.2%
Bermondsey & Old Southwark 8.7%
Cardiff Central 12.9%
Yardley 16%
Bristol West 16.9% (*in third position)
Bradford East 17.1%
Hornsey 19.1%
Redcar 25.4%
Norwich South 25.7% (*in 4th position)
Withington 29.8%
Brent Central 53.7% (* in third position)
vs Con
Eastbourne 1.4%
Lewes 2.1%
Thornbury 3.1%
Twickenham 3.3%
Kingston 4.8%
Torbay 6.8%
Sutton and Cheam 7.9%
Bath 8.1%
Yeovil 9.3%
Colchester 11.5%
Cheltenham 12.1%
Berwick 12.2%
Cheadle 12.2%
Portsmouth South 12.5%
Brecon 12.7%
Devon North 13.3%
Wells 13.3%
Cornwall North 13.7%
Hazel Grove 15.2%
St Austell 16.2%
Eastleigh 16.5%
Chippenahm 18.2%
Mid Dorset 22.6%
Solihull 23.6%
Taunton Deane 26.8%
Somerton and Frome 33.6%
vs SNP (unlike SLAB they held up better and they maintained themselves within decent distance in some of them)
East Dunbartonshire 3.9%
Edinburgh West 5.9%
Fife NE 9.6%
Caithness 11.2%
Ross 12.3%
Gordon 14,9%
Argyll and Bute 16.3%
West Aberdeenshire 20.2% /*in third position)
compouter as well.
IOS probably still getting the ground vote out, or lost in his algorithnms.
https://twitter.com/GoodwinMJ/status/596706193868988416
Was it a genuine surprise when you lost? Or had you detected something was going wrong before polling day?
1 seat was disappointing, not because a few more would have made much difference to the way things happened in Parliament or the country but because it would have sent out a message to those who today mistakenly believe UKIP and what they stand for is finished. I was delighted to see Carswell back, not too bothered about Reckless losing and very sorry about people like Bill Etheridge in Dudley North and Tim Ackers in Thurrock both of whom would have made great MPs for UKIP. I hope they will in the future.
As I am sure you know I have not been a great fan of Farage. Again my feelings over him going are mixed. I think he is a decent man and so am sorry for the vilification and crowing that he has been subjected to along with the huge amount of misrepresentation that has been made about what he stands for. On that level it would have been nice to see him win. But I do believe that Robert S and others here have been right to say that his marmite politics have not helped UKIP win arguments and would have made the EU exit much harder. So as far as the future of the party and of Euroscepticism goes I am glad he didn't win. Hopefully whoever takes his place (and I have no thoughts yet on who that should be) will present a more coherent and logical position for a Euro exit than has been presented so far by UKIP.
So a mixed bag. I hope UKIP do well in the locals today. I hope Farage is not stupid enough to try and stand again for leadership of the party and I hope (I believe in vain) that Cameron will be forced to accept that we cannot stay in the EU. But I do think that Cameron winning has probably set back Euroscepticism by a generation and, barring the whole thing collapsing, we will not now leave the EU in the foreseeable future.
So hmm.
Btw, a quick thank you to you, Mr Dancer and all the other guys and girls that worked so hard in M & O. Outstanding work!
Listened to Ms Jenkyns on the radio earlier, she sounds like a lovely person.
But I suspect Cameron will get distracted by gimmicks and Osborne will dabble. I hope I'm just being over cynical but only time will tell. I'm not setting my expectations too high
Going for long term secretary of states. Jobs this big probably take five years to get used to. It makes sense to keep continuity.
Outside of pb what I find strange is just how muted the public response feels. The Tories got by despite 63% of people voting for someone else. I'm not saying the 'shy' Tories are really ashamed Tories, but there just seems to be a grudging 'we don't trust the other lot to run the country'. You might say that's the typical bitter leftie but this whole election just seems to have been another wasted opportunity to reconnect voters with our sovereign parliament. Compare it to the enthusiasm which greeted Obama or even George W when they won. And the right should be more worried than you know. If you can't summon interest in our sovereign parliament why should people be that bothered about power being handed over to international institutions like the EU? I notice the recent polls on Britain staying in have been quite favourable.
But if they want to describe themselves as liberal and progressive then they might start by understanding what those concepts mean. If not, they can simply market themselves as the authoritarian, collectivist and statist alternative. And see where that gets them.
What on earth were the Labour Party thinking? They now have so many cracks appearing in the edifice it raises a serious question of whether it can be repaired, or whether it should be.
In Scotland, they need to go back to the council elections and start building from there, and while they are, they risk ceding further ground to both the SNP and the Tories at Holyrood. Their only saving grace will be that they can significantly improve the quality of their PPCs by getting the newly unemployed into the home team. But they will be fire fighting for some time.
As for the blessed St. Urgeon, she is about to find out that she can have as many MPs as she likes, but it don't mean diddly if you're not part of the winning team. And she will now spend the next year defending her record in Holyrood, which will take some doing, given that her government has spent the last two years politicking and not governing. The SNP cult may have reached its zenith.
Nick Clegg and most of the LibDems will feel hard done by but as has already been said, you can't pitch to be elected as the opposition from a position in government. This is an existential threat for them. Amalgamation with the Greens may yet not be wholly ridiculous.
And as for Cammo, he's either very clever or very lucky or possibly both. Did he deserve to win? No. Is the country better off that he did? Probably.
Finally, I logged on at 10pm last night and have to say that this site is unrivalled for the quality of observation, humour, political analysis and downright entertainment when it comes to election night. If OGH has any sense, he'll try to earn back some of his losses by negotiating a tie-up with Channel 4 to run their alternative election show in five years. Theirs was shite.
Vale of Clwyd: 3.8% Lab to Con swing
Alyn/Deeside: 0.3% Lab to Con swing
Delyn: 0.8% Con to Lab swing
Clwyd South: 0.7% Lab to Con swing
Clwyd West: 0.4% Lab to Con swing
Online pollsters seriously need to look at how they refresh their panels. The lack of movement was clearly suspect. I also wonder how ICM went from a 6 point Tory lead to a 1 point Labour lead as well!
Having had five years of austerity (even though 50% have not noticed it YG) if the Cons want to win in 2020, then we need to seeing some prosperity by then.
You are confusing a close run thing with an easy victory.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/575852/Election-2015-Ed-Miliband-EdStone-promises-eBay-Labour-defeat
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/EdStone-8ft-Limestone-Obelisk-Unwanted-Present-/291457433121?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item43dc377e21
I hope I make more than that rubber band dress.
Kippers seem to have done well in Fenland ans similar areas, and also in industrial Northern cities. Not an easy pair of horses to ride at once.
Andrea
Extraordinary figures from some iconic seats
Cambridge 1.2%
Burnley 8.2%
Bermondsey & Old Southwark 8.7%
Cardiff Central 12.9%
Yardley 16%
Bristol West 16.9% (*in third position)
Bradford East 17.1%
Hornsey 19.1%
Redcar 25.4%
Norwich South 25.7% (*in 4th position)
Withington 29.8%
Brent Central 53.7% (* in third position)
On the economic front, goodness knows where Ed's replacement will take Labour - but clearly the electorate still buys the Thatcher settlement - which given the challenges of global wage competition must come under further strain.
As Tim Farron observed, in not possibly the happiest of metaphors....the Lib Dems are like cockroaches.....impossible to eradicate....
Several times I read something on here and a few minutes later a pundit made much the same point.
the Conservatives won because they moved to "competent".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Results_of_the_2010_United_Kingdom_general_election_by_parliamentary_constituency
I'll try to find the time to crunch the numbers.
You are confusing real life with hypothetical 'what might have beens'
You've got another ±5 years of George, take your porridge like a soldier!
Hope to see you at another PB drinkies sometime.
Hi - back in now. I make it £210 please.
11/10 £100 TPD to lose in Rochester
Evens £50 Lib Dems more than UKIP x4
Evens £50 Farage > Tories 6%
Don't think there was anything else.
Anyone topping that?
He led the Liberal Democrats into government, helped save the UK at a time of crises, and was deputy PM for five years.
I hope he doesn't forget that.
You are perhaps confusing getting a lucky break - since none of the Conservative high command was expecting victory - with the natural order of things.
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2015/05/today-britain-has-changed-changed-utterly-a-terrible-beauty-is-born/
In terms of the SNP, I think there will be a second membership surge as many of the 50% who voted SNP seek to become more politically engaged. As there is now no risk of the SNP being seen as a wrecking ball in Westminster, the SNP will effectively be starting on the Holyrood 2016 election preparations, without the worry of trying to prop up Labour.
I think SLAB and SLID, have joined SCUP as zombie parties with core votes below the level required for the FPTP system. I think they will struggle to secure Holyrood constituency seats, so will be looking to the regional list as the main source of seats, unfortunately they will be at risk of being caught in a pincer movement by the SNP, Greens and bizarrely UKIP.
FPT :
I'll try and rationalize these momentous events
ARSE & the "JackW Dozen"
From the moment Ed was elected as LotO it was patently clear that EWNBPM was the order of the day. Ed never had the look, almost literally, of a Prime Minister in waiting and the voters will never elect an individual who cannot appear to command the duties of the Queen's First Minister.
The economic, social and demographic factors fell into place in my ARSE with ease. Importantly unemployment and growth both fell within a whisker of my projections as did most of the other element central to the forecast.
PBers will recall I repeatedly advised that my ARSE was not a nowcast but forecast for 7th May but clearly as the day loomed the polls would play a more important part. Despite my ARSE filter allowing for shy Tories and differential turnout that regularly topped the Conservatives above 300 the failure of the polls, even ICM, notched down the blue seats and overestimated the yellow peril. Essentially the ARSE filter required another turn.
The same is true in Scotland where my ARSE expected a higher differential turnout for the SNP but clearly by not enough.
In late 2013 I started, some said very unwisely, to choose 13 difficult seats that I believed would shape the contest and they certainly did.
Of those "JackW Dozen" 10 were hits but Nick Palmer, and losses in Cambridge (very unexpected) and Cornwall North (less so) bucked the trend.
So overall perhaps a B+ .... I hope adherents of the ARSE punted well, you really should have and now PBers for one final time may I express the view, much derided by many, that :
Ed Miliband Will Never Be Prime Minister
He has achieved high office for himself and his colleagues at a level unseen for nearly a century. It will not be long before it is seen by the electorate in a different light.
https://twitter.com/bbcquestiontime/status/596706244326481921
the SNP demands full fiscal autonomy, and David Cameron should hurry to meet that demand. Partly because linking taxation to expenditure north of the border might allow a revival, over time, of Right-of-Centre politics in Scotland. Partly because the measure will also be popular with English taxpayers. Partly, too, because, without such a reform, separatism will revive. And partly because greater autonomy for Scotland could bring about a new, devolved settlement for the entire United Kingdom, something that is long overdue. Mainly, though, because most Scots say they want it, and the SNP has won an unarguable mandate. What are we waiting for?
http://www.capx.co/david-cameron-should-give-scotland-full-fiscal-autonomy-immediately/
In London West Ham 68.4%, East Ham 77%, Tottenham 67%, Ilford South 64%, Hackney South 64%, Abbott 63% Bethnal Green 61%, Edmonton 61%, Corbyn 60%-
where else can Labour approaching these figures?
"The Conservatives won because they moved to the centre, and they "stole" right wing Liberal Democrat votes."
It never felt like Labour were running away with it. There was no narrative and no obvious enthusiasm even from Labour supporters on here. We were all left bemused by the polls but joyfully accepted that the pollsters knew more than we did.
There never seemed a good enough reason to vote Labour which was always a pig in a poke. I hadn't the faintest idea what an Ed government would do or look like. The Tories in all honesty seemed like the safe option.
Would have loved to have engaged you discussion, but you seemed to have the certainty of a religious zealot. So what's the point.
And Bad Al for Labour...there really need to get him as far away from being such a high profile media figure for Labour....he does so much damage for their image.
I personally did my conkers laying Tory most seats on the assumption that the betting market was influenced by emotional punters who were ignoring polling evidence; in fact the money talked - it pointed to the notion that the betting markets distill all information and assess it more accurately than the pollsters.
I am also staggered that Survation have admitted to burying a poll that would left them out on their own. It is factual evidence to support the idea that pollsters are risk-adverse to making a mistake and tend to cluster to protect themselves. This is no longer a conspiracy theory - we have at least one dramatic piece of evidence to back up this thesis.
In a future election, if there was a big discrepancy between betting markets and the polls, which indicator would you now consider more reliable?
I am eating some very humble pie and reassessing my approach to political betting in the future. I was particularly taken in by the accuracy of the polls in #GE2010. I assumed this meant the bias problem had been solved. But ncpnumbercrucncher pointed out - and I ignored - there was in fact ample evidence of a continuing problem with overstating Labour share.
I cannot believe in hindsight I was so blinkered and slavish in my faith in the polls - I ignored class 101 in Political betting, which we all should have taken to heart after 1992 and never forgotten; you cannot win when trailing badly on leadership and economy ratings.
Very, very sloppy...
This has also appeared -
http://www.thenational.scot/politics/jim-murphy-scottish-labour-still-needs-me.2781
"Murphy said it would be wrong for him to resign as he had not yet had enough time to transform the party. However, if the results of last night show anything, it is that Murphy has undoubtedly transformed the party."
If it all goes wrong for Salmond in Westminster then we may have seen peak SNP. Hubris can be a terrible thing.
I didnt have that one down but I'll believe you, send your details and I will send it over
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-32601280
Labour are approaching 50:50 whereas the LDs now do not have a single woman in parliament.