UK local elections, May 2012

[Sibboleth]

The Island will have its local elections next year, yeah.

[Sibboleth]

So, then. A few cursory predictions, of sorts? Why ever not. I never get very far with this sort of thing, but the general plan is to do all of Wales, and then go through England starting in the North East. Scotland would be last (and so not done at all, probably) because of STV and my inability to count to three.

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Isle of Anglesey (Ynys Môn)

There are no elections on Anglesey as its councillors have been naughty. Call back this time next year, probably.

Gwynedd

Current Composition: Plaid 38, Independent 21, Llais Gwynedd 9, Labour 4, LDem 3. Or something like that; it can be hard to keep up with things. Just for the record, the figures after the 2008 elections were Plaid 35, Independent 18, Llais Gwynedd 12, LDem 5, Labour 4.

Current Administration: Plaid regained their lost majority via defections and by-elections, but the council is still run according to a very strange committee model. This will not be the case after May when the council switches to the (now) usual Leader and Cabinet structure.

Prediction: Almost certain to be a Plaid majority, unless something goes serious wrong under the surface. Making further predictions more detailed than that would be an error because local elections in Gwynedd can be quite strange and don't always follow wider patterns, but its clear that the main contest is between Plaid and Llais, with Plaid aiming avenge 2008 and to come as close to wiping out Llais as is possible. There are also a couple of spectacularly unpredictable contests in Bangor.

Conwy

Current Composition: Con 18, Ind 15, Plaid 14, Labour 7, LDem 5

Current Administration: A coalition made up of all groups but the Tories.

Prediction: Most likely another hung council with the Tories as the largest party. They have underperformed badly here in local elections for a long time (there are quite a few affluent coastal wards that 'ought' to have Tory councillors but don't), but recent Westminster and Assembly elections have been quite encouraging. Significant gains against the grain (possibly taking them to a narrow majority) are not that likely, but can't be ruled out.

Denbighshire

Current Composition: Con 18, Independent 15, Plaid 8, Labour 6

Current Administration: an All Party coalition, apparently.

Prediction: It's fairly obvious that no party will win a majority. Beyond that, Labour will be looking to make significant gains in and around Rhyl and ought to do so.

More whenever.

[You kip if you want to...]

Pointless bit of trivia for any internationals reading this, but the last time Labour made gains on this cycle of seats was in 1995 when they secured 48% of the English vote.

[joevsimp]

Pointless bit of trivia for any internationals reading this, but the last time Labour made gains on this cycle of seats was in 1995 when they secured 48% of the English vote.

even with a moderately favourable set of councils up, that is a ridiculous result for labour, they'll probably not get that again for another 15 years I reckon

[You kip if you want to...]

Pointless bit of trivia for any internationals reading this, but the last time Labour made gains on this cycle of seats was in 1995 when they secured 48% of the English vote.

even with a moderately favourable set of councils up, that is a ridiculous result for labour, they'll probably not get that again for another 15 years I reckon

Of course Labour (or even the Tories for that matter) won't see that for a good, long time. It was Blair's first locals and Tony Blair was unhumanly popular right from 1994 until Iraq.

[You kip if you want to...]

Liberals only fighting 70% of seats, the lowest since 2000.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9200703/Three-in-10-council-seats-not-contested-by-Liberal-Democrats-at-local-elections.html

[Leftbehind]

I'd be interested to see party contesting rates through the years. It says at least 12 years, which opens the door for it being a much longer record (certainly the '00/'04/'08 figures it quotes all hover around 80%, whereas these are at 70%).   

[You kip if you want to...]

I'd be interested to see party contesting rates through the years. It says at least 12 years, which opens the door for it being a much longer record (certainly the '00/'04/'08 figures it quotes all hover around 80%, whereas these are at 70%).   

If you go by election results alone, we could be looking at 1989/1990.

[You kip if you want to...]

Just looking at the raw figures we have from the past few years, I can only really see the LibDems holding on in Eastleigh and that council which is basically the Westmoreland seat. They'll get 3, if they're lucky, down from 7.

If we're to take the most recent ICM (38-37-13 to Labour) as gospel (which, of course, we shouldn't for many reasons), we'll be seeing a Con>Lab swing of 10.5% and a Lib>Lab swing of 18%, if we work from the projected national swing in 2008.

[Leftbehind]

Rallings & Thrasher had them at their lowest since 1980, IIRC.

[Senator MaxQue]

2012 and 2013 locals will be very good for Labour, given how 2008 and 2009 were bad.

[You kip if you want to...]

2012 and 2013 locals will be very good for Labour, given how 2008 and 2009 were bad.

2012, on paper, should be excellent. But them again, 2011 was meant to be, but we under performed and the Tories did much better than expected.

2013 should be good, but it's not like many of the seats are in the heartlands.

[afleitch]

A few words on Glasgow

Glasgow is being touted as the biggest municipal battle in Scotland and in the Scottish press as ‘second to London.’ Labour will 'loose' Glasgow in the sense that the party will loose it's majority. However the UK press not being intersted in such things will ignore the complexities of STV and instead have people on the 6 O'Clock news believe that something really phenomenal will have happened. Of course, it will have but just not in the way that people will be led to think.

This year saw a slew of resignations from the Labour group after a long running schism. In 2011 long standing (and to their defenders, hard working) councillors were deselected. Alleged ‘bullying’ during the budget debate began a series of resignations from the deselected councillors resulting in Labour loosing control of the council shortly before shutdown. A new party ‘Glasgow First’ (chosen after Labour registered their preferred name of ‘Glasgow Labour’) is standing in a number of wards including of a number of the deselected councillors. Whether or not they will be a success depends highly on the mood of the electorate. 

After under nominating in 2007, the SNP are fielding more candidates with the aim of becoming the largest party (talk of winning outright control has receded somewhat). The Greens who capitalised on transfers last time, winning 5 seats despite getting a smaller share of the vote than the Tories are targeting Lib Dem voters directly in literature. The Greens may fall back given that they won seats on the back of SNP underrepresentation. While Lib Dems are in serious trouble as there is no where in the city where they can win the most first preferences or get above quota prior to the second stage, given that they will survive on the back of transfers to them they may still win 2-3 seats. The Tories underperformed in 2007 (where they won 1 seat despite proportionally being entitled to around 6) and are privately hoping to simply return popular councillor David Meickle in Pollockshields, they also have a shot of winning a seat in Newlands/Auldburn

Prediction?

Had the locals been fought in 2011 during the SNP wave, they would probably have won control of the city knocking Labour out of power for the first time since 1980. Under the old FPTP system, it would have probably won outright.

How Glasgow First will fare is unknown; they may take scalps in every ward or fizzle without trace and it's very difficult to determine what will happen. In most of these seats, the opposing. Labour candidates are unknown so this may help Glasgow First get elected if name recognition means anything. On a good night, I could see them ending up with 3 or 4 councillors getting returned.

I expect Labour to loose overall control, however I have a feeling they will be close to level with the SNP on seats. The problem with STV in a city like Glasgow is that if you have the same two competitive parties in every ward, they will mop up most of the seats leaving the smaller parties the chance of winning only in the 4 seat wards. So you may find results like LAB LAB SNP, SNP SNP LAB and SNP, SNP, LAB, LAB being the order of the day particularly as Labour and SNP voters are interchangable. This could end up squeezing the smaller parties out of contention.

The Lib Dem collapse won’t help. Of course, if the Lib Dems get preferences way down the ballot they might still get candidates over the line. I have the feeling that Tory candidates with a good breathing space between them and the Lib Dems will still end up getting leapfrogged. I

Just to note that the last by-election was in Hillhead in November 2011. Hillhead is the most untypical of Glasgow wards and here the SNP were up 12%, Labour up 5%, the Tories up 2%, the Greens down 5% and the Lib Dems down 9%.

[Leftbehind]

Lose.

[joevsimp]

2012 and 2013 locals will be very good for Labour, given how 2008 and 2009 were bad.

2012, on paper, should be excellent. But them again, 2011 was meant to be, but we under performed and the Tories did much better than expected.

2013 should be good, but it's not like many of the seats are in the heartlands.

there's the county councils, I'm fairly sure Labour will want to regain Lancs, Notts, Derbyshire and Staffs, could also do with overtaking the Lib Dems and winning back some of the BNP vote in places like Norhants,  Leicestershire and  Essex

[You kip if you want to...]

And the award for Cheesiest Party Political Broadcast of the Year goes to Arrogant Alex and the Balamory Party:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01dd1mt/Party_Election_Broadcasts_Scottish_Local_Elections_2012_Scottish_National_Party_16_03_2012/

[You kip if you want to...]

Glasgow SNP leader has an interesting moment at the hustings.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRkyugSQeh4

[afleitch]

How I'll be voting

Black (CON) 1
Thompson (SNP) 2
Mullen (SNP) 3
Watson (Lib Dem) 4

Not marked: 2 Labour candidates, Indepedent, Christian oddball.

[Leftbehind]

No elections here until 2015.

[joevsimp]

No elections here until 2015.

me neither, county council next year though, and all the fun of the police and crime commissioner elections in november

[You kip if you want to...]

It's happened...
http://cdn.yougov.com/cumulus_uploads/document/4v1i2t5nh2/YG-Archives-Pol-Sun-results-160412.pdf

So, are the LibDems now technically an "Other"?

[Leftbehind]

No elections here until 2015.

me neither, county council next year though, and all the fun of the police and crime commissioner elections in november

Argh, don't remind me!

*nosuchthingaselectedpolicecommissionersnosuchthingaselectedpolicecommissionersnosuchthingasel
ectedpolicecommissioners*

[Sibboleth]

No elections here until 2015.

me neither, county council next year though, and all the fun of the police and crime commissioner elections in november

Argh, don't remind me!

*nosuchthingaselectedpolicecommissionersnosuchthingaselectedpolicecommissionersnosuchthingasel
ectedpolicecommissioners*

Talking of which, I got a leaflet/letter from Tal Michael today: his effort to get the Labour nomination here seems to be pretty organised.

[Leftbehind]

But have you told him there's no such thing as one?

[afleitch]

Quick summary

Labour 2011 - 'The SNP are only focused on independence, this election is about the Tory cuts'
SNP 2011 - 'This is an election to elect members of the Scottish Parliament'

Labour 2012 - 'The SNP are only focused on independence, this election is about the Tory/SNP cuts'
SNP 2012 - 'This is an election to elect councillors for your local area'

Thoughts on how that might work out for them?