UK General Election - May 7th 2015

[ChrisDR68]

My suspicion at this point - and it's too early to have anything other than suspicions - is that results in Scotland will look not entirely unlike those of October 1974. Maybe not in terms of details, admittedly.

The SNP got 11 seats in October 1974. Winning around that number in May 2015 sounds reasonable.

Given the essentially conservative way people tend to vote in UK general elections the chances of them winning anything like 35 seats is extremely low imo.

The Tories are still hated north of the border and removing them from office will be most Scots' top priority even if Ed Miliband's Labour Party doesn't inspire them.

[ChrisDR68]

I don't normally hold with obsessing with polls this far out from an election*, but a YouGov done at the same time as the Survation poll shows Labour 34, Con 32, UKIP 16, LDem 9. For what that's worth.

_{*You'd never think it from the way the media covers politics, but the British electorate typically only emerges from its perfectly rational boredom with the political process once the Great Electoral Carnival gets rolling.}

Perfectly rational boredom... that made me laugh!

Given that even experienced political commentators such as Peter Kellner and Andrew Rawnsley have both stated recently in the newspapers they write for that they have no idea what the result of the GE will be the campaign itself could actually be very interesting indeed...

[ChrisDR68]

If each debate is 2 hours that's too long.

They should be an hour each and I wouldn't mind the more relaxed Question Time format with them all sitting behind an arched table with the host sitting in the middle inviting the audience to ask questions of the party leaders.

[ChrisDR68]

Very unlikely that the Tories will go below 30% in the May 2015 GE.

The three Tony Blair GE's were unusual in that the Tories got 31%, 32% and 32% respectively. Historically those numbers were very low for them.

Other than that the lowest they've been since 1900 was 36% in October 1974 under Ted Heath and also under David Cameron in 2010.

36% is still what I think they'll get next year too despite UKIP's strong opinion poll numbers (who's voters are not all ex-Conservatives by any means).

[ChrisDR68]

Could members weigh in on the following point (which was raised in a question I answered on All Experts.com)?

Ed Milliband currently has 258 MP's, in order to govern with a majority he only needs 321 MP's (a net gain of 63) or no less than 306 MP's (working in coalition with the Liberal Democrats or the SNP) (a net gain of 48)

Both of those numbers should be easy to achieve given Labour's advantages in the electoral system at the moment. Ed Miliband's deep unpopularity with the public could be the one thing that stops it happening though.

If Labour end up as the largest party I somehow doubt they will enter into a coalition. They and the SNP loathe each other (party over what happened in 1979) and they have a tetchy relationship with the Lib Dems (which is probably an understatement) despite considerable overlap in philosophical outlook.

Depending on the arithmetic I'd expect a supply and confidence arrangement with one or two of the smaller parties if they end up as the largest party in a hung parliament.

[ChrisDR68]

A lot of negativity on here towards UKIP. However their central policy (withdrawal from the EU as the EU is on an irrevocable course towards a federal superstate which is not in the UK's interests to be a part of) has widespread support among the British public.

[ChrisDR68]

A lot of negativity on here towards UKIP. However their central policy (withdrawal from the EU as the EU is on an irrevocable course towards a federal superstate which is not in the UK's interests to be a part of) has widespread support among the British public.

Your point being?

My point being is that there would not be such a thing as the UK Independence Party if it were not for this central issue. They may have policies that cover most other stuff but they are essentially a single issue party.

Put it another way, is everyone here comfortable with the United Kingdom becoming part of a federal European superstate at some point in the future and if so why?

[ChrisDR68]

Of course the Lib Dems stubbornly defending all things EU just makes their plight worse. Listening to their spokespeople on tv it's as if the Euro crisis never happened and everything in the EU garden is currently all beautiful and rosy.

Their pro-EUness is slightly ironic as their voters (and currently ex-voters) in the West Country tend to be quite Eurosceptic.

Incidentally Iain Dale who predicted 35 Lib Dem seats at the next election in March is now predicting they'll win 28.

[ChrisDR68]

I think this is an exaggerated simplification of Ukip.

There has been British hostility to the EEC and EU since the beginning, at first as anti-Common Market factions in both main parties back when they really were the be-all and end-all of English and Welsh politics, later dissipated all across the British political spectrum in a more broad and shallow manner, but strongly localised among the Thatcherite Conservatives and a few straggler Labour members. It is not a new phenomenon that explains why Ukip is now a meaningful entity.

Ukip itself has existed for over two decades. Yet European integration didn't give it even a shadow of its current position. The UK hasn't subscribed to a major article of European integration since the Treaty of Lisbon in 2009. The next year, Ukip won just 3% at a general election and made a material difference to results in a handful of seats. The UK has agreed to practically no integration in the interim, nor has it been pushed to do so by a European Commission focused on economic, euro-based topics intensely controversial in the euro area but irrelevant in the UK.

So what changed? Ukip has been catapulted to current success by a few factors: the proportional, list-based European Parliament electoral law, almost uniquely designed to favour small anti-EU parties; an ability to attract former Conservative donors to fund its activities; above all, rapid EU immigration since 2004. They know it. And any interested observer of UK politics should know it, too. Like any political party, it is an avatar of its current voters rather that the issues that brought it into existence, otherwise the Corn Laws would be more relevant than they are today. And every study I know of suggests that Ukip voters' priority is to extract foreigners from their fields of vision.

Well that explains why UKIP are relatively popular at the moment but doesn't explain why there is a UKIP in the first place.

From their Wikipedia entry:

UKIP was founded in 1993 by Alan Sked and other members of the cross-party Anti-Federalist League, a political party set up in November 1991 with the aim of fielding candidates opposed to the Maastricht Treaty. The nascent party's primary objective was withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union.

The crucial part there was mention of the Maastricht Treaty. That was the treaty that set the seal on the introduction of the Euro and changed the name of the European project from the EEC to the EU.

The reason John Major had such trouble getting that treaty ratified was because it was clearly a major step in the direction towards a European superstate. Something that was and continues to be an anathema to many (and not just to Eurosceptic Conservatives).

[ChrisDR68]

I will remind everyone again that the people who vote - or at least voted - LibDem are not necessarily the people that you all seem to be assuming do/did. Surveys used to show that the most popular newspaper amongst regular LibDem voters was the Daily Mail...

Would I be correct in thinking millions of Labour voters buy The Sun despite the fact it's a Tory supporting newspaper?

The correlation between party affiliation and which party people's newspapers support isn't always obvious or straight forward.

[ChrisDR68]

Even with those unlikely percentages the two major parties will still win between 85-90% of the seats with the first passed the post voting system though.

Amazing huh?

It's no wonder they want to cling to that system like grim death...

[ChrisDR68]

The two main parties got 87% of the seats in the 2010 general election (565 out of 650 seats) on 65% of their combined popular vote.

The smaller parties totalled 85 seats (13% of the total) on 35% of the popular vote.

Taking account of your three scenarios in 2015 I've given the Lib Dems 28 seats (-29), the SNP 25 seats (+19) and UKIP 10 seats (+10). Add the 18 MP's from Northern Ireland, 3 Plain Cymru and 1 Green and you again get 85 seats for the smaller parties.

In other words the SNP and UKIP doing well is cancelled out by the Lib Dems doing badly leaving the two main parties unscathed.

To really hurt the two party system the Lib Dems would probably need to hold around 40 of their seats, the SNP to win 30 and UKIP 20 seats. That would give the smaller parties 112 MP's (27 more than in 2010).

 

[ChrisDR68]

The SNP as the kingmakers in a hung parliament.

Imagine.

Given that the SNP would not support a Tory led government in almost any circumstances (for fear of being as unpopular as the Lib Dems currently are as well as for general ideological issues) what concessions would they want in return for supporting and sustaining a Labour government?

[ChrisDR68]

Roll on the ongoing weakening of the unrepresentative two party system

Unfortunately it's likely both parties ratings will pick up once the actual campaign starts in March next year.

[ChrisDR68]

I've read about the possibility of a Lab / SNP coalition after the next election with Salmond as deputy prime minister.

Considering he's about as popular in England as Howard Webb was when he refereed a game at Anfield that sounds like electoral suicide for Labour in the years following May 2015.

[ChrisDR68]

Guardian/ICM poll out today:

Labour 32%
Conservatives 31%
UK Independence Party 14%
Liberal Democrats 11%
Greens 6%
SNP / Plaid Cymru 4%
Others 2%

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/nov/10/icm-guardian-poll-support-labour-drops-criticism-ed-miliband

That sort of result in May 2015 could leave both main parties on between 280-290 seats and the Lib Dems on 30-35 seats.

Not enough for the Lib Dems plus one of the others to get to the magic 326 figure needed for a majority in the house of commons.

A three party coalition or a two party coalition plus a confidence and supply agreement with a third looks distinctly possible right now.

[ChrisDR68]

Apparently the gov are eying up 30th March as the start of the campaign. 6 weeks.

Just like John Major in 1997. Much good it did him though

[ChrisDR68]

If I were in UKIP (stretching my imagination for a few minutes) I wouldn't touch Hamilton with a bargepole in a winnable seat.  OK, a lot of voters won't remember the scandal, but you can bet that the local Tories (and/or Labour) would remind them of it at every opportunity.  I might let him stand somewhere like Hampstead & Kilburn, or he could try to get his old seat back from Osborne...

Anyway, this weeks' YouGov polls, featuring lots of ties for first place and the Lib Dems in fifth more often than not:

5 Dec: Lab 32 Con 31 UKIP 15 Green 8 LD 7 SNP/Plaid 6
7 Dec: Con 32 Lab 32 UKIP 17 Green 7 LD 6 SNP/Plaid 5
9 Dec: Con 34 Lab 33 UKIP 15 LD 6 Green 6 SNP/Plaid 5
10 Dec: Lab 32 Con 32 UKIP 15 LD 8 Green 7 SNP/Plaid 4
11 Dec: Con 33 Lab 33 UKIP 15 Green 7 LD 6 SNP/Plaid 4

The tendency in previous general elections (although not all - 1979 and 2005 spring to mind) is for the Tories to strengthen in the opinion polls in the final 6 months before polling day (or to do better when all the votes are counted compared to the polls). Going by these polls both main parties are neck and neck. Bearing that in mind my current prediction is Conservatives 35% and Labour 31% of the popular vote.

That gap of 4% could leave both parties on about the same number of seats. Labour needs to fend off the SNP in Scotland for that to be the case though. 

[ChrisDR68]

Stephen Fisher's model currently has a slightly less dysfunctional Lab 299, Con 291, Lib Dem 29, Others 31 as its best guess (though I think he's not handling Scotland separately).

Probably the most interesting result would be where the Lib Dem total plus either of the main parties total equal a majority in the house of commons. You would need both main parties on about 298 with the Libs on about 30 for that scenario to happen.

Which way would the negotiating go? How much longer than the 5 days it took last time to form a government would be needed? Would Nick Clegg survive as Lib Dem leader during the negotiating process? 

Of course if 3 parties or more are needed for a majority in 2015 it could take weeks and weeks to sort out a coalition agreement. 

[ChrisDR68]

Which makes things difficult. I actually expect the Lib Dems to poll between 15 and 20%; something a bit like 1992/1997 but with a seat spread falling somewhere in the middle (I don't expect the Lib Dems to lose seats to the Tories in London for example).

That would mean you're expecting the Libs to get around 17% nationally. That's probably a little optimistic imo. My expectations for them is in the 13-14% range with them winning between 28-36 of the seats they currently hold.

With all the bile directed towards them over the last 4 years there may well be a shy Lib Dem voter effect going on right now. That would explain why they haven't budged in the opinion polls for the last 3 1/2 years.

Whatever happens next May though it's going to be a long and fraught night for the Libs. Something they haven't experienced since their awful 1970 election result.

[ChrisDR68]

Wirral South which was a slightly surprising Labour hold in 2010.

Currently marginal it's likely to be a bit safer for them after May next year.

Would like to see Esther McVey knocked out in Wirral West next door. Can't stand her lol

[ChrisDR68]

Tony Blair doubts Ed Miliband can win 2015 general election

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/dec/30/tony-blair-ed-miliband-general-election-labour

Although Blair seems to try to walk back his comments.  How he feels is clear.

I can see where Tony Blair is coming from though. The two times a genuinely left wing Labour Party won power were both unusual for different reasons.

In 1945 the British people had gone through 6 years of war. War naturally centralises power as government takes over most economic activity. For a party of big government like Labour this legitimised their general philosophical outlook to much of the population. Allied to this the public had bad memories of the 1930's and the high unemployment experienced in many parts of the UK throughout that period.

Seen in this light it's not surprising Labour won a stonking majority.

In February 1974 Harold Wilson won purely by default. Labour's vote declined by 6% over what they achieved in 1970 but the hopeless Ted Heath and the Tories' vote went down even further (by a whopping 8%). Wilson became PM purely because his vote went down less than the incumbent Conservative government!

Even if you include 1964 (and I'm not sure Labour in 1964 were particularly left wing in comparison to 1945 and Feb 1974) Wilson only achieved a standstill in the Labour Party's vote compared to 1959. He sneaked into power because the Tory vote declined by 7% directly due to a revival in the Liberal Party's fortunes.

[ChrisDR68]

But a monkey in a suit could have led Labour to victory in 1997 and 2001, while Blair was unpopular by 2005.

I think that understates the degree to which Blair put to sleep a lot of the British public's insecurities about voting in a Labour government.

It's very fashionable to come out with all sorts of bile about him these days (usually regarding the Iraq war but also about him being a closet Tory) but Michael Portillo described him on This Week while he was still PM as a political genius and in my view he was correct.

[ChrisDR68]

Blair basically did a whole bunch of cosmetic changes while the real legwork in ridding the party of trots was done by Kinnock and Smith. I mean sure, I give him credit in swinging a certain breed of urban middle-class constituency towards the party - but any notion that Blair single-handedly changed Labour from a socialist party to a bunch of sell-out liberals is silly. I mean was Blair's economic policy particularly different from say, the Wilson government?

Again that underestimates his broad appeal in my view.

The Tories found him so hard to campaign against that for three general elections in a row they were stuck at or near their core vote of around 31-32%... a full 4% less than their next worst performances (in Oct 1974 and 2010). The Conservatives had never experienced anything like it since the introduction of universal suffrage in 1928.

His government could arguably have been a little more left leaning in the policies it followed. He would have been likely to get away with it depending on the policies in question and how far they went, but one of his concerns was that Labour had never in their history won a second successive full term of office having already served a full term. When seen in this light you can understand his caution.

The other thing to bear in mind is that many (perhaps most) left leaning voters tend to have unrealistically high expectations of what a Labour government can and should do when in power so they tend towards disillusion and disappointment almost as a matter of course when those expectations are not met.

The British people are a cautious and conservative bunch overall and are easily spooked if they think a Labour government could put the economy in jeopardy. That's what I believe Blair always kept in mind while he was PM.     

[ChrisDR68]

Wrt the other debate, more on that later but for now... um... some people seem to be forgetting what political life was like in the 1990s. The Major government was a slow-motion trainwreck's slow-motion trainwreck...

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/04/tony-blair-vacuum-british-politics-centre-ground

As if right on cue Andrew Rawnsley has written this interesting piece about Tony Blair in the Guardian today. As usual with anything to do with Blair you get the usual snide and spiteful comments from Joe Public in the comments section underneath it.

On Labour disliking coalition as they don't want to share power with a bourgeois party Rawnsley neatly sums this up this type of thinking (although this time on who voted for Blair) in the same article by calling it a tribal ghetto mentality.