UK Election 2015

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UK Election 2015

Post by Redirect Left »

It is upon us, untll the 7th May and a little beyond, the only thing on the news is Election talk, party election broadcasts and MPs making idiots of themselves.
I'm sure I can't be the only person here that is into the boring world of Politics, so see if we can get a thread going!

Like 5 year ago, it seems we'll be having another hung parliament, which may lead to more strange bedfellows. I'll be up all night on the 7th May watching the results come in as I did last year. Will anyone else be sacrificing their evening to dedicate to this cause?

So, does anyone have anything they'd like to input in regards to the upcoming Election? Personally I am hoping the Conversatives are out, and if we do indeed have a hung parliament, they do not team up with UKIP or SNP. I feel SNP may try taking the other party for a rather long drawn out ride.

You can view opinion polls here, and the Wikipedia article relating to the upcoming election is here.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Kevo00 »

I used to love elections, but I have to admit that I find this one hard to get into, even if it is alleged to be the 'most exciting for a long time'.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Dave »

Since the last election I've lived in Dudley South, Stourbridge, Finchley, and Hornsey and Wood Green.

All four are marginals where my vote would have counted for a lot.

Ive just moved to South Tottenham (the constituency, not the rough singular area). David Lammy is about as safe a Labour vote as you can get.

So I'm devastated because my vote now hardly matters!

But I will still be awake for all of Election night.

I am still of the opinion that we could see a majority, but it won't become clear til the final few days.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by JamieLei »

Dave wrote:I am still of the opinion that we could see a majority, but it won't become clear til the final few days.
I doubt it would be a red one!

Also, my area is an even safer Labour seat!

Tottenham: Labour 59.3% (2010)
West Ham: 62.7% (2010)
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by orudge »

My constituency may be interesting. The Lib Dems hold the seat, but the sitting MP has retired and they're getting somebody new in to fight the seat. But the projections are all that the Lib Dems are going to lose a chunk of their vote. At the last election, the Conservatives came in second place (until 1997, this used to be a solid Tory seat - yes, in Scotland!). The SNP came first in the European and Scottish Parliament elections last time round though, so it'll be interesting to see what happens. If people are deserting the Lib Dems because they teamed up with the Tories, they're unlikely to vote Tory. Labour does pretty poorly here (4th place, and they came 5th in the European election!), so I don't expect them to see much of a rise. There seems to be fair chance the SNP will get the seat, but there is a possibility the Conservatives would. We'll know for sure in 3 weeks!
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by EXTspotter »

I've moved from a Conservative/Lib Dem marginal (Newton Abbot) to a permanent safe conservative seat (Salisbury). Tempted to vote for the king of the Druids who is standing as an independent...
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Dave »

orudge wrote:My constituency may be interesting. The Lib Dems hold the seat, but the sitting MP has retired and they're getting somebody new in to fight the seat. But the projections are all that the Lib Dems are going to lose a chunk of their vote. At the last election, the Conservatives came in second place (until 1997, this used to be a solid Tory seat - yes, in Scotland!). The SNP came first in the European and Scottish Parliament elections last time round though, so it'll be interesting to see what happens. If people are deserting the Lib Dems because they teamed up with the Tories, they're unlikely to vote Tory. Labour does pretty poorly here (4th place, and they came 5th in the European election!), so I don't expect them to see much of a rise. There seems to be fair chance the SNP will get the seat, but there is a possibility the Conservatives would. We'll know for sure in 3 weeks!
Your constituency will be extremely interesting.

But your MP standing down? That's not the info I have Owen. I understand Robert Smith intends to continue to stand despite the onset of Parkinson's... Unless of course your location is incorrect!

In any case, apart from three or four Labour seats in the Glasgow area and the 1 Tory in Dumfriesshire, I can't see anything except an SNP whitewash. Maybe as many as 55 MPs. Scottish people are bothered by the referendum campaign and I think it'll show here. They haven't got any Tories to take it out on (although it'll be tight in Dumfriesshire), but they've plenty of Lib Dems to rid themselves of.

Opinion polls suggest a huge swing to the SNP/Tories in your place - they'll be first and second.

As for all of Scotland, the current predictions based on the latest opinion polls suggest:

SNP 54 (+48)
LAB 4 (-37)
CON 1 (NC)
LD 0 (-11)

That's a Lib Dem wipe out - which might well be expected because a lot of the areas where they are strong were very close in the referendum and feel the most isolated from Westminster.

The five non-SNP seats are (with the predicted margin at this election in brackets):

LAB
Glasgow North (7%)
Rutherglen and Hamilton West (5.27%)
Glenrothes (5%)
Renfrewshire East (1%)

CON
Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (0%)

The opinion polls lists the Tory seat as the tightest at the election. Renfrewshire East is extremely close too. The other 3 Labour seats are safe now, and a >5% margin after the election will be a good result.

There's an element of exaggeration in this potentially. Gordon Brown's seat Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath has an overall majority of 23,009 (50.2%) - the opinion polls suggest there will be a 28% swing(!!!) to ensure a 6% SNP majority.

The biggest ever swing at a general election (rather than a by-election) is 20.83%, at Merthyr Tydfil in 1970 (CON gain from LAB), so a 28% swing is extremely unusual.

Even at a by-election, where huge changes in voting are more likely (to signal disapproval of the government), the biggest ever swing was the notorious 1983 Bermondsey by-election where Peter Tatchell stood for Labour and saw a swqing away of 44.2% (although the homophobic nature of the election certainly didn't help). The next biggest was the 44.1% swing we saw at Clacton after Carswell defected to UKIP. He took all of the Tory votes with him though...

So maybe the opinion polls are going over the top... But the strength of feeling in Scotland can NOT be ignored.

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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Redirect Left »

I am really struggling to understand Nigel Farages actions. He really needs to go to a specialist to instruct him on what is and is not acceptable to say. During a debate yesterday he actively turned on the audience and called them all too left, even for the BBC.

Twitter accepted the Greens to be the 'winners', shortly followed by Labour, based upon the ratio of negative to positive comments. Unsurprisingly UKIP came last, mainly sarcastic comments relating to his turning on the audience.

I'm currently awaiting a few polling results to see if there are any differences in public opinion since the debate. I'll wait until there's at least 3 differing ones out before i pass judgement.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by orudge »

Hm, you're not wrong, Dave - Sir Robert isn't standing down. I'm not sure where I picked that up from, I'm sure I heard that somewhere! He has been quite a popular MP locally so that might help him, but yes, the end result will be very interesting.

EDIT: Maybe I've got confused with Gordon, where the Lib Dem MP is standing down, and of course Alex Salmond wants to be elected! It's been reported extensively in the local paper here, of course.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Dave »

After my tirade the other day about Scotland, Lord Ashcroft has released his latest polling...
Last time... wrote:LAB
Glasgow North (7%)
Rutherglen and Hamilton West (5.27%)
Glenrothes (5%)
Renfrewshire East (1%)

CON
Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (0%)
Compare that with now:
On 19th April wrote:LAB
Glasgow North (7%)
Rutherglen and Hamilton West (5.27%)
Glenrothes (5%)

CON
Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (2%)
Renfrewshire East, in the latest polls, has gone from a 1% Lab majority to a 9% SNP one.

The Tories, who looked like they would just hold on to Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale, have lost that to a 2% SNP majority. However, they HAVE gained Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk - the polls suggest a 1% majority over the SNP. Berwickshire has been a Liberal seat for just about ever - David Steel (the former leader of the Liberal party) was MP until 1997.

Ashcroft's polls are good because they run to 2 decimal places... So now we know the majority for the SNP in Orkney and Shetland (another Lib Dem stronghold as I'm sure orudge will testify) could be as little as 0.05%! It seems the islands might just save the Lib Dems from disappearing off the Scottish agenda at Westminster...

As previously mentioned, the three Labour seats are fairly safe - but there's nothing to say the SNP couldn't end up with 56 seats out of 59 come the morning of May 8th...
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by orudge »

I could definitely see Orkney and Shetland being the last Lib Dem seat in Scotland - if anywhere will vote Lib Dem, it'd be there. If they lose to the SNP, the Lib Dems really have no hope!
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Chris »

Dave wrote:Ashcroft's polls are good because they run to 2 decimal places...
There's absolutely no way that the error in their polling is small enough to report a figure to two decimal places! The decimal places are most likely meaningless
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Dave »

Chris wrote:
Dave wrote:Ashcroft's polls are good because they run to 2 decimal places...
There's absolutely no way that the error in their polling is small enough to report a figure to two decimal places! The decimal places are most likely meaningless
Of course, but it's better than just putting "0" as with some non-Ashcroft seats.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Kevo00 »

If the Lib Dems really are going to lose in Berwickshire and in the north of Scotland you really have to fear for their future viability as a party. Those are their real heartlands. Their other heartland, SW England is already under siege in a series of four way contests. If this election is hard to follow, it's because a lot of the campaigning is taking place at a very local level.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Redirect Left »

Seems to be a lot of minor panic going around within partys on what if the SNP get a decent amount of votes. I see the Better Together campaign is firmly buried 6ft under now they voted to stay with us
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Dave »

Yep, a world where we would all work together in harmony has LONG gone.

The Scots have been done there - they should have got out whilst they had the chance.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Redirect Left »

I suspect it got buried the day after they voted to stay with us, eh.

Also, for what is thought to be the first time ever, a TV channel will go 'offline' during polling hours to encourage more people to vote. The channel E4, favoured by youths for its constant repeating of Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother and other mundane things. Less than half of youths voted last time around, not entirely sure shutting down E4 is going to make them go out and vote as Channel 4 is assuming, especially considering of they'd need to have registered to do so...
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-32419574
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Kevo00 »

How odd. But the Paxo/Mitchell election coverage sounds promising!

In the independence referendum, it was odd that the traditional SNP heartlands like Angus and the North East voted to stay in the union, while Glasgow, traditionally its weakest area, voted yes.
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by orudge »

It's also noticeable how the SNP have taken a lurch to the left lately, precisely to target these Labour heartlands. Traditionally the SNP have been known as "tartan Tories", but with Nicola Sturgeon in charge, it's hard to use that phrase these days!

The theory was, in the event of independence, the SNP would splinter into multiple parties - the more left-wing elements, the "tartan Tories", etc. Of course, in the event of independence, we'd probably all be in deep doo-doo given the fall in the oil price and the fact the SNP had been counting on $100/barrel oil!
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Re: UK Election 2015

Post by Kevo00 »

Absolutely. The SNP have been very clever to assume a social democrat spin so that most of their new supporters assume that independence and social democracy sit side by side.

But to look like going from 6 MPs to more than 40 in one election shows what can be done by mobilising the apathetic. It will be interesting to see what the turnout is in Scotland.

Round here meanwhile the election has been dead. The only people I've seen actually campaigning are UKIP. Very few posters and little election communication through the door except from Labour.
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