I did, even though it was raining and everything. Do I get a cookie?
I was going to make a wild-assed prediction, but honestly I think it’s too all over the place to judge anything. Will younger voters turn out b/c of Brexit? Will the UKIP vote sink back into the Tories, or just stay home? Will Labour and LDs eat each others breakfast in the wrong places?
I do think the only two really decisive results – Tories lose their majority/Tories get a stonking majority – are highly unlikely at this point. The most likely seems to be some mild Tory increase that leaves everyone wondering what the heck the point was, and Theresa May looking like a poor strategist.
I’ve become more pessimistic over the last couple of days and now think that the Tory majority will be around the 70 mark. They’ll likely pick up a number of seats in Scotland (and possibly Wales), but the critical thing is that they will hold on to, and probably win seats in the English Midlands, because UKIP supporters have decided that they aren’t actually anti-establishment at all (as the Brexit vote pretended they were.) And the fuss over the “dementia tax”, which could have devastated the Tories, was overshadowed by terrorism – and somehow May has dodged that one, despite being Home Secretary for seven years.
Labour will increase their vote a lot, but it will be in Tory safe seats and urban areas, so they won’t pick any actual seats up at all – I’m guessing they’ll reclaim a couple of seats in London. The LibDems are screwed as usual; they will get a couple of seats back but may lose a couple as well. There’s a very outside chance the Greens will win a second seat but it will be from Labour.
In the end it’s all about the turnout. And I am genuinely unsure what that will be. If it’s over 66% then Labour should benefit, but I honestly don’t think it will get there. What we do face the prospect of, however, is the second party increasing its vote but losing seats. That’s not healthy for democracy in any way. And we haven’t even had our boundary changes imposed yet.
The Tories get first crack at assembling a government – technically speaking, not having a majority is no bar to taking power, right up until you need to take a vote on something. Realistically they won’t be invited to form a government until they’ve had a chance to try and put something together.
The first obvious thing for the Tories to try is a deal with the Northern Irish DUP, who are broadly analogous to the Republicans – socially conservative, religious – except they have some very specific regional issues, and aren’t happy about Hard Brexit. Any deal with them will be fraught, but probably requires the least concessions.
There are different levels of deals available, which could come into play.
If the Tories can’t come up with something then Labour can have a go….and so on.
Basically too complex to call right now, the next day or so will probably see options narrowed down quickly.
The most likely outcome is a minority Conservative government supported by their traditional allies in Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party on a “confidence and supply” basis – that is, the DUP won’t formally be part of the government but will vote with the Conservatives on issues where they absolutely must get a parliamentary majority.
I expect Teresa May to hang on for as long as she possibly can as PM, but that might not be very long – this result is clearly going to be seen as her fault, and I expect her to be sprouting a set of Tory knife handles between her shoulder blades very soon now. The possibility of another election can’t be ruled out, and what happens then is anybody’s guess. Certainly, the Conservatives are going to have to change strategy drastically – which does not bode well for Mrs May.
(Dunno who’s going to take over from her, though. The prominent Brexiteers like Boris Johnson must be hopelessly tainted by now…. Has anybody seen Philip Hammond?)
…and apparently the fix is in with the DUP already! That was ridiculously fast.
So, forming a “strong and stable” government at high speed may have been May’s only path to survival? I wonder what deal she gave them.
Well, I’m rarely delighted to be wrong, but this time….
Me too. She’s even decided to undermine her own position even further by actually directly going straight to a party who are about as closely tied to terrorists as Sinn Fein are, having based an entire campaign strategy on villifying Corbyn for just talking to SF… So that tactic has gone for a future election. (Oh, and I’m sure the Scottish Conservatives will be really happy with her for doing that, clearly without consulting them for a second.)
(For USians, Davidson is the leader of the Scottish Conservatives, and gay. The DUP have blocked same-sex marriage in NI and a number of individual members have a record of making homophobic comments. The Davidson tweet would be headline news for heralding a serious split on some other day)
To be fair to her, she did warn us of the prospect of terrorist sympathisers getting into government as part of a coalition of chaos; she just didn’t say that she would be leading the coalition.
I just realised first thing this morning that, because of broadcasting restrictions, for the first time in months the TV and radio won’t be going on about Brexit.
Now the first two results declared are quite contradictory. I suspect that the move away from UKIP to mostly Con could well be disguising the underlying Labour improvement – or the exit poll could be badly wrong!
I think we need some results from places that were pro-remain and have plenty of students, to get a sense of what’s happening in that type of constituency.
Incidentally, you can spot Nicholas Whyte on BBC NI doing his punditry thing tonight.
I’ve attempted to correct Chuck’s use of “ass” rather than “arse” but he’s been fighting off angry comments that it should be Britain rather than England. He has since explained that in the timeline Scotland Wales left…
I don’t think man name of Chuck is really a stickler for accuracy….
(Hey, does that link put in a big Amazon imbed for you as well? I didn’t mean to inflict actual bare torso on the comment section, it must be automatic by wordpress)
Scotland and Wales left? But what about Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Channel Islands?… All will be revealed in Dr. Tingle’s next epic, “Pounded in the Butt by the Constitutional Status of the British Crown Dependencies”.
(I suppose I shouldn’t say that, it might give him ideas.)
Camestros Felapton
34 responses to “VOOOOOOTTTTTTEEEEE”
I did, even though it was raining and everything. Do I get a cookie?
I was going to make a wild-assed prediction, but honestly I think it’s too all over the place to judge anything. Will younger voters turn out b/c of Brexit? Will the UKIP vote sink back into the Tories, or just stay home? Will Labour and LDs eat each others breakfast in the wrong places?
I do think the only two really decisive results – Tories lose their majority/Tories get a stonking majority – are highly unlikely at this point. The most likely seems to be some mild Tory increase that leaves everyone wondering what the heck the point was, and Theresa May looking like a poor strategist.
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Have a psychic cookie and luck
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I’ve become more pessimistic over the last couple of days and now think that the Tory majority will be around the 70 mark. They’ll likely pick up a number of seats in Scotland (and possibly Wales), but the critical thing is that they will hold on to, and probably win seats in the English Midlands, because UKIP supporters have decided that they aren’t actually anti-establishment at all (as the Brexit vote pretended they were.) And the fuss over the “dementia tax”, which could have devastated the Tories, was overshadowed by terrorism – and somehow May has dodged that one, despite being Home Secretary for seven years.
Labour will increase their vote a lot, but it will be in Tory safe seats and urban areas, so they won’t pick any actual seats up at all – I’m guessing they’ll reclaim a couple of seats in London. The LibDems are screwed as usual; they will get a couple of seats back but may lose a couple as well. There’s a very outside chance the Greens will win a second seat but it will be from Labour.
In the end it’s all about the turnout. And I am genuinely unsure what that will be. If it’s over 66% then Labour should benefit, but I honestly don’t think it will get there. What we do face the prospect of, however, is the second party increasing its vote but losing seats. That’s not healthy for democracy in any way. And we haven’t even had our boundary changes imposed yet.
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Well, I’m rarely delighted to be wrong, but this time….
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So for someone who doesn’t really understand UK politics well, what are the implications of this result?
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Big unknown implications basically – could be another election soon
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Yup, many unknowns.
The Tories get first crack at assembling a government – technically speaking, not having a majority is no bar to taking power, right up until you need to take a vote on something. Realistically they won’t be invited to form a government until they’ve had a chance to try and put something together.
The first obvious thing for the Tories to try is a deal with the Northern Irish DUP, who are broadly analogous to the Republicans – socially conservative, religious – except they have some very specific regional issues, and aren’t happy about Hard Brexit. Any deal with them will be fraught, but probably requires the least concessions.
There are different levels of deals available, which could come into play.
If the Tories can’t come up with something then Labour can have a go….and so on.
Basically too complex to call right now, the next day or so will probably see options narrowed down quickly.
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The most likely outcome is a minority Conservative government supported by their traditional allies in Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party on a “confidence and supply” basis – that is, the DUP won’t formally be part of the government but will vote with the Conservatives on issues where they absolutely must get a parliamentary majority.
I expect Teresa May to hang on for as long as she possibly can as PM, but that might not be very long – this result is clearly going to be seen as her fault, and I expect her to be sprouting a set of Tory knife handles between her shoulder blades very soon now. The possibility of another election can’t be ruled out, and what happens then is anybody’s guess. Certainly, the Conservatives are going to have to change strategy drastically – which does not bode well for Mrs May.
(Dunno who’s going to take over from her, though. The prominent Brexiteers like Boris Johnson must be hopelessly tainted by now…. Has anybody seen Philip Hammond?)
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…. and I’ve typoed “Theresa May”. Forgive me, it’s been a long night.
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…and apparently the fix is in with the DUP already! That was ridiculously fast.
So, forming a “strong and stable” government at high speed may have been May’s only path to survival? I wonder what deal she gave them.
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She has to personally thump the pope
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Well, I’m rarely delighted to be wrong, but this time….
Me too. She’s even decided to undermine her own position even further by actually directly going straight to a party who are about as closely tied to terrorists as Sinn Fein are, having based an entire campaign strategy on villifying Corbyn for just talking to SF… So that tactic has gone for a future election. (Oh, and I’m sure the Scottish Conservatives will be really happy with her for doing that, clearly without consulting them for a second.)
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Yup on the Scottish Cons. Ruth Davidson already let go with a very pointed tweet.
(For USians, Davidson is the leader of the Scottish Conservatives, and gay. The DUP have blocked same-sex marriage in NI and a number of individual members have a record of making homophobic comments. The Davidson tweet would be headline news for heralding a serious split on some other day)
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To be fair to her, she did warn us of the prospect of terrorist sympathisers getting into government as part of a coalition of chaos; she just didn’t say that she would be leading the coalition.
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lol
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Done.
I just realised first thing this morning that, because of broadcasting restrictions, for the first time in months the TV and radio won’t be going on about Brexit.
Woo-Hoo!
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Voted. Limped out on my NHS walking stick, through the wind and the rain, and voted…. Was it uphill both ways? Why, of course it was!
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🙂
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Voted, walked dogs, got rained on. Now watching more rain come down and getting ready for a long night.
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BBC exit poll predicts 314 Conservative (326 needed for majority), 266 Labour …
It looks like being a late night
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Advantage of being in Australia 🙂
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Not the only one (see all the comments above about the rain)
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It was pouring here in Sydney as well, coincidentally
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Looks like someone will be out of a job by Christmas at the latest.
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Now I’m having the traditional election night dilemma: late night, or set a very early alarm?
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I wouldn’t count on much productive work happening on Friday either way!
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Well, today was the traditional “entire day lost to meetings” event, so frankly anything that gets done tomorrow will be an improvement.
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Now the first two results declared are quite contradictory. I suspect that the move away from UKIP to mostly Con could well be disguising the underlying Labour improvement – or the exit poll could be badly wrong!
I think we need some results from places that were pro-remain and have plenty of students, to get a sense of what’s happening in that type of constituency.
Incidentally, you can spot Nicholas Whyte on BBC NI doing his punditry thing tonight.
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Exit polls can be misleading when result is close
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Of course, the most incisive political commentary of the weekend is mostly about butts:
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I’ve attempted to correct Chuck’s use of “ass” rather than “arse” but he’s been fighting off angry comments that it should be Britain rather than England. He has since explained that in the timeline Scotland Wales left…
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I don’t think man name of Chuck is really a stickler for accuracy….
(Hey, does that link put in a big Amazon imbed for you as well? I didn’t mean to inflict actual bare torso on the comment section, it must be automatic by wordpress)
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Ha, yes it does. I don’t usually notice because I read the comments in a separate bit for managing comments.
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Scotland and Wales left? But what about Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Channel Islands?… All will be revealed in Dr. Tingle’s next epic, “Pounded in the Butt by the Constitutional Status of the British Crown Dependencies”.
(I suppose I shouldn’t say that, it might give him ideas.)
LikeLiked by 1 person