Exilian

Here we go, the thread to dominate the run-up to the GENERAL ELECTION 2015!

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As of right now, here's where we stand;

THE BACKSTORY

• Since 2010, the UK has been run by a coalition of the Conservatives and the smaller Liberal Democrat party, with Labour as the main opposition
• The government's programme has involved very significant cuts to public services to bring down the deficit in the budget. Opinions differ significantly as to how effective this austerity programme has been; its supporters claim it has delivered fair but difficult cuts, its opponents claim it has strangled the possibility of stronger growth whilst hurting many of the poorest members of society.
• The worst casualties have been the Liberals, whose support has dropped from around 20% to under 10% of the vote. In particular, they have been derided for going back on 2010 manifesto pledges, and most crucially their pledge to abolish tuition fees - all Lib Dem MPs signed a personal pledge against raising fees, but half of them went back on that in order to vote with the government on raising the cap to £9000 per year in 2010.
• The Conservatives have also lost support since 2010, and also face an electoral system that tends to favour Labour - Labour's support is more evenly distributed, which means that for the same number of votes their opponents tend to get more seats. They hold a reasonably steady percentage of the vote at just under a third, but this may well be insufficient to remain as the largest party, let alone form a majority.
• Labour, meanwhile, have their own problems. Poor opinion ratings for their leader, Ed Miliband, may have dragged them down significantly in the polls. Whilst they have managed to hold narrow polling leads over the Conservatives, sitting at around a third of the vote, their lead has been slipping away over the last two years, and it looks increasingly unlikely that they'll manage to win a majority either, not least thanks to...
• ...the SNP, one of the big winners at the moment in the polls. Whilst they failed to win their referendum on Scots independence, they are now riding high at over 40% of the vote in Westminster polling in Scotland - the 45% who voted for independence have fallen heavily behind the SNP since the referendum. This could hand them as many as forty new seats, on an average swing, giving them a large majority of seats north of the border and making them potentially the third largest party in Parliament.
• UKIP are also looking stronger than ever, having surged into third place in the polls since 2010. They've taken voters from both Labour and the Conservatives across the country, with two Tory defectors having given them their first real sitting MPs. Whilst their vote share is impressive, though, they may struggle to take significant numbers of seats as a result of its relatively even distribution. Their best bets are mainly poorer, socially conservative coastal seats in the south and east - where their mainly white, working class vote feels socially marginalised and alienated from the "metropolitan" leadership of Labour and the Conservatives. Whilst their most likely wins are against the Conservatives in the south, they are also looking to make gains in the North, replacing the Conservatives as the main challenger to Labour in many areas and putting themselves in position for more wins in 2020.
• The Greens are the other major party to look at. Whilst sluggish for most of this parliament, in 2014 the European elections caused a real upward trend in their membership and support, giving them some of their best opinion polling numbers in years and putting them ahead of the Lib Dems in the polls at times. They will mainly be looking to hold their single parliamentary seat, Brighton Pavilion, in the election - though they will push forward to target other Labour and Liberal seats including Norwich South, Bristol West, and Sheffield Central.
• A brief run-down of the rest of the playing field. Plaid Cymru, the welsh nationalists, have made few advances in recent years and are likely to be relatively stable in their support, concentrated in the Welsh-speaking regions of west Wales. The speaker, John Bercow, is likely to be unopposed in his seat of Buckingham.
• Northern Ireland contributes MPs from its own, different, parties. On the Republican side Sinn Fein, the larger party, traditionally refuse to take their seats at Westminster, whereas the smaller SDLP tend to vote with Labour, adding two or three to their total. On the Unionist side, the Ulster Unionists are close to the Conservatives but failed to win any seats in 2010; the more extreme DUP tend to lean to the right too and contribute most of Northern Ireland's presence in Parliament. The small Alliance Party is affiliated with the Liberals; it is likely to be a tough fight against the DUP for their single MP to hold her seat in Belfast.

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WHERE WE STAND: JANUARY 2015

These tables exclude Northern Irish seats. Note that 326 seats is an official majority in the UK Parliament, though around five Sinn Fein members will not take their seats lowering the actual total needed to closer to 320.

Party	Conservatives	Labour	Lib Dems	UKIP	Greens	SNP	Other
2010 Seats	306	258	57	0	1	6	4
Current Seats	303	257	56	2	1	6	8
Current polls range*	28-34	31-36	5-14	12-19	-	-	-
Current polls average*	31	34	8	15	5	-	-
UNS Result**	247	315	21	0	0	45	4
Jubal's Estimated Result***	275	291	30	5	1	27	3

* The lack of polling figures for the SNP and Greens is because I'd need to actually mine them out of the tables - they're often not specifically prompted for in topline figures.
** This includes a recent separate poll for Scotland that gave Scots opinion figures at CON 13%, LAB 26%, LDEM 6%, SNP 43%, UKIP 7%, GRN 4%.
*** Much of this is off-the-cuff conjecture on my part, but I am including a lot of more detailed information, eg from local polls showing that the Lib Dems will hold up a bit better where they have MPs than would be predicted from the national picture (the flip side of which is they're doing even worse elsewhere, creating large "Liberal Deserts" in areas of the country.

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So, what do y'all think will happen? Who are you backing?

I'm not even sure where I should vote.

Well, if you vote in Norfolk you'll just be wasting your ballot, if that helps. :P

Aberdeen could be quite a tight Lab/SNP fight if current polls are anything to go by.

Pretty much as expected, I'd say UKIP might do a little better than forecast, but not much. SNP I think will lose it's popularity over the course of the next year in favour of Labour which could mean a strong Labour in 2016.

Yeah. My estimate has UKIP winning Thurrock, Rochester & Strood, Clacton, Thanet South, and Boston & Skegness. They have a few other chances - I don't think Rochester & Strood or Thurrock are at all certain, but Yarmouth, Grimsby, or Castle Point might also throw up a less expected win. I'm partly assuming they'll be hit a bit in the next few months; Labour and the Conservatives will try and make the election as binary as possible, and that combined with their larger funds & electoral machines could well squeeze a few points off UKIP.

As to the SNP, hell only knows. We've only had national polls since the referendum; when we have Lord Ashcroft's constituency polls for Scotland we'll have a far better idea of the state of play. Labour only need to peg them back to about 35% to be returning a good majority of Scotland's seats, but that's still around a 10% swing to achieve in the space of only a few months. There's also the question of whether SNP voters will actually vote differently in their constituencies - incumbency might narrowly save quite a few Labour and Lib Dem MPs and slow down the SNP advance somewhat. If Labour can really break back in Scotland, they have a slim but workable chance of a majority, but attacking Lab/SNP votes (often very leftwing Scots) and Lab/Con votes (centrist Middle Englanders) in the same campaign is a hell of a balancing act.

I've looked up my current seats results from 2010, Norwich North. Con gain from lab with only about 10% of the vote going to the lib dems. So although I agree most with the Lib Dems it seems like I'd be better off aiming for a Labour candidate to attempt to stop the tories.

As for what I actually expect to happen, I think Jub's potentially over-estimated the Lib Dem seats at the expense of the greens. I wouldn't be surprised if they manage to gain some more seats, young left wing people seem to be moving to them when they previously would have gone lib dem.

As for who'll be in power, not a clue, the SNP have said they'll never do a deal with the Tories, though I suspect if they promise another referendum as part of a coalition agreement they might take it. If Jub is right then a lib:lab coalition could be a majority, which I'd be a fan of.

The question, if the Greens were going to make more gains, is "where?"

Two of their possibilities are Bristol West and Norwich South, both currently LD held with large student bodies. But Bristol W is held by a very popular Liberal incumbent with a staggeringly large majority and a strong Labour challenge to compete with, and Norwich South we have a poll from that shows Labour absolutely streets ahead, having narrowly missed out to the Lib Dems last time and taking a large chunk of their vote now. In Cambridge, the only other LD held Green target, the Greens have fallen back locally since 2010 at Labour's expense. So if I've underestimated the Greens, I don't think it was at the Liberals' expense in terms of seats; certainly the LDs will lose a lot of votes to the Greens, but in most Lib Dem seats either the LDs are too entrenched and the Greens are just tussling to take off disaffected votes that would otherwise help mount a Labour challenge, or Labour have managed to anchor themselves as challengers, or most importantly in many cases they're not actually studenty seats at all.

Students will swing to the Greens, I don't doubt, but with FPTP that won't be enough to gain them seats unless they can take a lot of local city votes as well as galvanising students. Students have notoriously low turnout and the Greens just haven't got the publicity, voter base, and traction to take the city voters they need in sufficient quantities in any one seat, most of whom they need to take from Labour.

Norwich N is certainly a Con/Lab marginal - well worth voting Labour if you want to remove the Tory. The city areas are solid Labour and form a lot of the less university-based and some of the less well heeled bits of Norwich, but the seat also spreads out into some rural wards that are rock solid Tory. UKIP might make a small dent but it'd be an equal dent in both sides, and there's none of the more leafy, educated, or touristy areas that tend to be naturally more liberal.

Greens don't, won't and shouldn't get anywhere because they're as laughable as the BNP. They'd bring any country to absolute ruin.

Traditionally Lib voters will be reminded closer to the election that the Libs in coalition went back on this that or the other, though whether that makes much difference I don't want to guess. Lab might do better than expected due to people looking past Ed being rubbish.

Will vote for anyone that uses this in their election speech. Twice. One of the most profound and heartfelt speeches ever made. Starts 28 seconds in.

I disagree on the Greens, as you'd expect - I wouldn't mind if they had 20 odd MPs, whereas I just want the BNP to be smashed and pulped into total oblivion. I do think a Green government would be pretty bad, and their policies are very ill conceived, but they're not fundamentally evil and they're a reasonable voice for a few specific issues.

I actually suspect that the Liberals will claw some votes back towards the election in their defended seats, as their local MPs will be massively turning on the taps and if there's one thing the Lib Dems are bloody good at, it's local campaigning (affectionately known as "dogarmadillo politics" by some psephologists). There's another factor to consider, though: Labour want to take seats off the Lib Dems, but damaging them *too much* will hurt Labour too. Labour are already likely to win most Lib Dem facing seats; if they push the LD vote down further, all that happens is that Labour defections lose the LDs seats in areas Labour could never challenge for anyway. Result, the Tories get a boost towards being the largest party. Far more LD seats are Tory-facing than Labour-facing.

portugal I hate our voting system, I don't want to vote for anyone who actually has a chance of winning seats in the constituencies I can vote in. Guess I'll probably vote SNP up here, although I'm disinclined to do so since I don't want Scotland to become independent or to gain additional powers. Bluuurgh.

Is there any chance of another referendum on independence? Or is the focus now on more devolved powers?

Are you in Aberdeen N or S? Voting LD in South might not be too bad a waste long term, though they won't win this time certainly.

DD: The current SNP plan is to call another referendum as soon as they get an excuse to, with an EU exit being seen as their best chance of a good excuse.

Quote from: Jubal on January 05, 2015, 03:25:25 PM
DD: The current SNP plan is to call another referendum as soon as they get an excuse to, with an EU exit being seen as their best chance of a good excuse.

Yeah it's being referred to as the neverendum by some commentators. They went on and on about how they'd respect the result, but clearly campaigning to do it again is respecting it somehow.

I'm in the north of aberdeen. Well actually I haven't checked the constituency but since I live very much donside rather than deeside I'm certain it'l be North.

Here's another BBC commentary article (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-30902524). They've come up with four different (but similar) compositions of the House of Commons after the next election, and asked four political commentators to work out what happens next, one scenario per commentator. No party gets a majority; every scenario results in a coalition government, and most of them look unstable and unlikely to last very long.

The next election looks like being the most unpredictable one for many years.

On a related note, I would encourage any Exilian member who will have the right to vote in this year's UK general election to ensure that they are registered to do so. To a first approximation, this means any UK citizen aged 18 or over on 7 May, the day of the election. You can register on-line (https://www.gov.uk/register-to-vote) or by post.

New yougov polling suggests 75% of voters don't actually know what the Greens policies are. https://yougov.co.uk/news/2015/01/23/little-awareness-green-policy/

I'm entirely unsurprised.

I admit I expected low understanding, but the actual scale of it surprised me. Especially 48% not knowing their policies on the environment, or even saying they had a general idea of what they'd say about the environment. It does make me wonder just what people base their voting choice on.

New Scots polls are out this week that suggest 25 point swings to the SNP in Glasgow - enough to knock down some of the very safest Labour seats in the UK. It looks like Scotland is undergoing an utterly massive political shift.

E-voting, pros and cons, discuss. The main ones I see are susceptibility to hacking and not being able to guarantee a secret vote if it's being cast in someone's bedroom.

I think the hacking thing is important and worrying. And the fact that it'd mean some voting stuff had to go via the private sector, etc.

I am deeply suspicious of electronic voting, because of the near impossibility of ensuring that it's not hacked in any way - and that's just with machines set up in polling stations, let alone any system of voting over the 'Net. Paper votes may be labour-intensive and (slightly) error-prone, but they're much safer from any form of malicious manipulation.

The problem with electronic votes being subject to interference by someone looking over the voter's shoulder, as it were, already exists with postal votes, as witness various trials for electoral fraud over the last few years.

Don't think I mentioned this on here yet but found it hilarious:

I got a Tory leaflet recently - well, for starters it wasn't a leaflet. It was, I kid you not, a foldup desk calendar. How is that a piece of campaign literature? Who on earth thinks people will use a mini Tory desk calendar? But that wasn't all: it had on it a famous quote, namely "If you're not a liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you're not a conservative at forty you have no brain."

I am 20. They put this through my door, in the most student-heavy ward in Cambridge. They put these through all the other doors too. Their main challenger for votes? Yep, the Liberal incumbent. Most stupid piece of political marketing ever.

(Also they misattributed it to Churchill, who probably didn't actually say it.)

I had another piece of labour election material through, trying to look like a newspaper as they sometimes do. Essentially said they were the only non-tory party that could win in my seat and then wheeled out their favourite election soundbytes (NHS, cost of living etc.)

It ended up in recycling and I only found it because I was throwing something out, I'm not sure why they continue doing this, does it work for anyone?

I think some material works better than others - Labour's never seems to be terribly well targeted IMO, the Green and LD stuff has been much more locally focussed.

Just discovered that my new flat will be in Norwich South, much more interesting, currently a LD incumbent with a 300 vote majority over lab, with the tories 3000 votes behind and the greens 6000 votes behind. Maybe I'll get more gems of campaign material there than here!

Are you moving in time to register for the GE?

And yes, Norwich S is more interesting, though it seems fairly clear now that Labour are on course to win it with a pretty hefty majority. The Lib Dem vote will likely collapse horribly and could leave them in fifth.

Yeah it means I'm actually having to think about how to vote! I believe so, I have potential move in dates of 20th/23rd of March. When I registered here in Jan it only took about a week, though I can't find a deadline anywhere. It can get lumped in with all the bureaucracy.

In any case though, the rhetoric is ramping up in general.

Got doorknocked by Labour.

I really want to know how candidates get this preternatural ability to knock at my door precisely when I'm in my pyjamas at midday or otherwise in an inadequate state to open it. It's really annoying. :P

Quote from: Jubal on March 01, 2015, 11:59:23 PM
I really want to know how candidates get this preternatural ability to knock at my door precisely when I'm in my pyjamas at midday or otherwise in an inadequate state to open it. It's really annoying. :P

Please tell me you answered, I've always been tempted to creep out any door knockers, but I've never had one show up

New Scots polls are out. More grim reading for everyone who isn't the SNP.

The LDs are set to potentially lose Charles Kennedy's ultra-safe seat of Ross, Skye, and Lochaber, and could drop to third in their seat of West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine. The news is if anything even worse for Labour, with Kircaldy and Cowdenbeath apparently going to be lost to them (Gordon Brown's old seat). The Tories are on a knife edge in their only remaining Scots seat, and Jim Murphy, the Labour leader in Scotland, looks set to hold on to his East Renfrewshire seat by a mere 1% of the vote.

:(

Ha Miliband got caught porking the wrong person. Can not see that going well for him at all. Labour might get a new leader though which couldn't hurt them.

EDIT: Also F Scotland. Wish they had their independence, would have been so much better for us.

Link?

In other news, it looks like Captain Fluffbeard AKA Julian Huppert MP will hold on to Cambridge for the Lib Dems, though it still looks like Clegg might well lose his seat. Labour seem to be nudging ahead of the Tories again, despite totally failing at the whole Scotland thing. Nobody yet appears to have noticed that, having confirmed they won't vote with the Tories, the SNP won't have any leverage with Labour if Labour are the largest party (because they can then never vote with the Tories to bring Labour down, so Labour can just tell them to shut up and play ball and they don't have many options).

I just saw it on fb, it'll be buried by now.

OK, I've checked the story, which was (predictably) in the Mail. Actually there was no impropriety alleged at all: the Mail were "exposing" the fact that he'd met his wife initially at a party hosted by his then-girlfriend. And then a while later when he was single again they got together. And he'd dated other people before that too.

I don't think this will make a lot of difference to the election campaign.  :P

There seems to be a lot of furore about this, I've since read the paper and it was there too.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-32234567

Good job my grandma never ran for office then, she fed us portugal loads of sausage rolls.

There does, but I've not seen any report of anything which ought to cause furore, and most of the vaguely respectable press sources seem to have passed over it as a non-story.

Welp that was wholly disappointing. Story may as well have read: Ed had sex. Where are the days of hookers and nazi themed orgies? After long thought I've also concluded that British politics is rubbish.

My biggest political bugbear is people using the words "they're all the same". It really annoys me. Coupling this with accusing me of being basically Hitler for voting Liberal which is apparently exactly the same thing as voting Tory is a good way to really, really get to me (in case you guys ever want pissed off Jubal to happen).

This has happened.

I am not happy.

Why are you Hitler?

(http://i2.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/564/146/74f.png)

Dunno. Hitler I guess must've been a well known supporter of digital rights, improved mental health provision, evidence based policy, European collaboration, and rehabilitative justice. :P

Anyway, in relevant news for the Exilian, the Lib Dems have pledged a digital rights bill in their manifesto - it should give better legal protection to people signing up for things online, and impose stricter sentences on illegally selling private information, as well as obliging the government to protect press freedom online. Not that they'll likely be in a position to implement it...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32264843

Quote from: Jubal on April 11, 2015, 03:43:52 PM
impose stricter sentences on illegally selling private information

We're boned.

Quote from: Jubal on April 11, 2015, 03:43:52 PM
Not that they'll likely be in a position to implement it...

Oh. :)

In the best piece of election news so far, a Polish aristocrat has challenged Nigel Farage to a duel with swords over immigration.  :P

Go Poland!

The campaign seems to be pretty much static, at the moment.

The SNP seem to be if anything advancing in Scotland though; a recent poll showed them ahead in one of the few seats Labour looked likely to hold, and with a fairly hefty majority in Ross, Skye, and Lochaber.  :(

Some interesting thoughts (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32382328) from the BBC's deputy political editor on issues of constitutionality and legitimacy that might arise after the election.

No polling movement, and the day draws ever closer... looks like Lib Dems in the low to mid twenties, the SNP around fifty, and Labour and the Tories... somewhere around 270 apiece, but where is anyone's guess.

We may well end up with another election later this year!

That's a distinct possibility. The trouble is that it might well produce more or less the same result again. The opinion polls haven't changed significantly for several months at least, despite all the campaigning - I doubt that another six months will change things much either, unless whoever forms a government makes a serious mess of it.

I think another election would end up producing a result - the turbulence resulting from a disintegrating hung parliament would surely shift things enough one way or another to get us somewhere.

Maybe. I guess the closest precedent we have is 1974 - the second general election did produce a majority, but it was a tiny one, and I'm not sure that the resulting government was very effective.

Yes, I don't suppose the interim period would produce a huge majority, but it would probably produce a government of some sort.

Is it not looking likely to be a minority labour government backed up by SNP and other lefty parties? IIRC Ed ruled out a formal coalition with them but not any form of alliance.

I think Ed's ruled out Confidence & Supply now as well, or at least ruled out giving any concessions in order to get C&S.

I've lost track of which parties have ruled working with which other parties and with what level of commitment. It wouldn't surprise me at all if we see some fairly rapid eating of words after the election, once we know what the viable combinations are.

A couple of interesting BBC articles I found this morning:

One (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-32513478) is from Nick Bryant, the BBC's "man in New York", on the state of democracy in the UK and other 'first world' countries. He identifies an increasing disconnect between politicians and the electorate, and considers some reasons for this: the development of the stage-managed career politician, and the growth of non-party pressure groups.

The other (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32534591) comes out of an interview with Gus O'Donnell, Cabinet Secretary (i.e. the top civil servant) at the time of the last election. He expressed his concern that the UK electoral system is unfit for purpose, because of the "unparalleled divergence between votes cast and seats received", where a likely outcome is "the Conservatives will win England, the SNP will win in Scotland, and we will end up, quite possibly with Ed Miliband and Labour running the UK."

Go home, Labour. You are drunk.

This is the news that Miliband, who has apparently confused himself with Moses, has carved Labour's headline election pledges into an eight foot high stone slab.

Yes, you read that right.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/emilyashton/ed-miliband-has-carved-his-election-pledges-into-an-eight-fo

As much as I feel this is unnecessary, I can kind of see his logic. I mean his pledges are now literally written in stone, I think he's just trying to avoid becoming Clegg.

Something else that might be of interest: a BBC Q&A article (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32235317), setting out the process and possible outcomes after the election (assuming no party has an overall majority in the House of Commons), and explaining a lot of the relevant jargon.

Does the Queen vote? Or does she just say "portugal this I'm the Queen!"?

I believe the royals abstain from voting, but they could technically if they wanted.

I think the Queen is banned by convention, other royals could but don't.

As I understand it (and with more waffle than Jubal) ...

In the UK, the reigning monarch doesn't vote in elections. This is based on the constitutional principle that the monarch is neutral and does not intervene in any part of the political process. Also, from a theoretical perspective, the election is called and the MPs are summoned so that they can speak on behalf of the people to the monarch, so it would kind of inconsistent for the monarch to be involved in the selection of an MP.

Other members of the royal family are not restricted in the same way as the monarch, so I think they can vote, but I suspect they don't, on the grounds that they too should be seen to be politically neutral.

Seems we'll be having another tory gubment, I expect many of my scottish friends to be delightfully furious. Voted lib dem in the end, might as well have pissed in the ballot box though.

Quote from: Pentagathus on May 08, 2015, 10:24:13 AM
Seems we'll be having another tory gubment,

And this one, alas, will not be restrained by the LibDems.

Quote from: Pentagathus on May 08, 2015, 10:24:13 AM
I expect many of my scottish friends to be delightfully furious.

Along with about half the electorate south of the border.

Quote from: Pentagathus on May 08, 2015, 10:24:13 AM
Voted lib dem in the end, might as well have pissed in the ballot box though.

Isn't first-past-the-post wonderful?

The fact that SNP are doing as well as they are is garnering a fair amount of anti-Scottish sentiment, at least around here. Then again there is anti-most-things sentiment around here, apart from gays we don't mind those, even have a gay-friendly rubgy team...whatever that means.

On Queenie voting; http://www.royal.gov.uk/MonarchUK/QueenandGovernment/Queenandvoting.aspx. It basically says she can vote as Queen but not as head of state (which she also is, so therefore can't vote), other Royals can but don't.

Results thoughts:

Oh portugal oh portugal oh portugal.

Which is to say: Tory majority for the first time since the 1990s, but a fragile one so it won't even have the advantage of stability, whilst the Scots Nats have totally swept the board up North, Labour have been flattened, except in the few cases where Labour were fighting really good long-serving progressive candidates from other parties where they seem to have done wonderfully. It's not even a good result for the independent right, with UKIP probably reduced to just Clacton.

Eight liberals. Eight.

Good luck to all of us trying to keep our net neutrality and encrypted communications over the next 5 years, we're really, really going to need it.

I thought you'd be happy that UKIP lost so badly? At least the economy won't get any worse, may even get a bit better.

I'm glad I have citizenship elsewhere.

The UKIP comment was me attempting neutrality. :P

I'm happy to see UKIP not make gains, but I'd happily have swapped any of the main UKIP against for another 5-6 Lib Dem holds. Cambridge was only 600 votes away from returning Julian Huppert, but Labour got in instead. I honestly think this cock up is mostly Labour's fault, instead of attacking the Tories and making an alternative case they seemed to focus campaigning on LD and PC and so on. End result, Labour screw over their potential allies, who lose leads seats they were defending versus the Tories.

Quote from: Colossus on May 08, 2015, 12:02:34 PM
The fact that SNP are doing as well as they are is garnering a fair amount of anti-Scottish sentiment, at least around here. Then again there is anti-most-things sentiment around here, apart from gays we don't mind those, even have a gay-friendly rubgy team...whatever that means.

Maybe it just means they really enjoy team showers.
I'm not sure why there's so much anti-SNP feeling in england, maybe because people think of BNP when they hear nationalist party? IIRC the SNP got less than 50% of the total votes in scotland so they are significantly overrepresented in westminster. Nationally they have less votes than UKIP. So yes indeed Glaurung, what a wonderful voting system  :-\
Will be quite interesting to see where this government leads though since I've not actually experienced a Tory majority government (well not since I was 3 or 4 or whatever.)
Also I guess we might be needing a thread debating the merits of EU membership sometime soonish.

Fair enough Jub. I was actually quite surprised at how many UKIP switched straight back to tory, I would have thought a few more would stay on. Our local guy is great though, might be one of the few tories even you might not outright hate :P He got 58% and deservedly so imo, he's done a lot of stuff for disabled kids, pensioners and the like. Voting went exactly as I guessed it would with Lab on 18%, UKIP on 16% LD on 4% and Green on 3%. Yes that makes 99%.

Anti-SNP feeling in England is more along the lines of, paraphrasing here, "Why the portugal should Scotland hold any sort of power when they're 8.3% of the population with a party that wants what's best for that 8.3% and sod the rest?" Personally I'd rather they leave the UK.

EDIT: There's this if you feel it'll do anything Penty. https://secure.avaaz.org/en/uk_electoral_reform_11/?bTFLcab&v=58011

Well they wouldn't have held much power even if labour had needed them to pass legislation as a minority, they would have been too worried about losing support if they caused instability in an anti tory government. Also they could and would easily be outvoted on any policies that affect scotland alone. I know plenty of people voted SNP as they see them as a viable socialist party rather than because of nationalist tendencies.
Still I didn't vote for them because they're going to continue to push for independence and because I would have rather had another Tory-lib dem coalition than labour I think. Was still making my mind up on my way the polling station tbh.
Edit:
Signed the petition, not sure it will have any effect considering that we had a referendum on FPTP after the last general election anyway. Also am rather disappointed about Huppert losing his seat, he sounded like a genuinely very decent MP.

I don't support UKIP, but 4 million votes, 12.5% of the electorate, for one seat is a disgrace to the name of democracy.

On another note Theresa May has already said:

Quote"A conservative government would be giving the security agencies and law enforcement agencies the powers that they need to ensure they're keeping up to date as people communicate with communications data. We were prevented from bringing in that legislation into the last government because of the coalitions with the Lib Dems and we are determined to bring that through because we believe that is necessary to maintain the capabilities of our law enforcement agencies so they can continue to do the excellent job day in day out of keeping us safe and secure"

God help us all...

I'm not particularly worried about a law 'banning encryption', it would be a complete waste of time to attempt.

To be honest, I kinda like the SNP. As long as they are willing to accept the result of the referendum and work within the UK, they could be a fabulous counter to the Conservative agenda. I mean, setting aside the threat to the union, which has played a crucial role in balancing the right wing over the last 100 years, their policies are pretty decent...

I feel the same, the problem is that they are clearly not willing to accept the referendum results.

@Easfrith; Disagree. I can't see how they will be any sort of opposition, 56 vs 600? I doubt they have any friends south of the border after taking a lot of power from Lab and being opposed to everyone else. But we'll see I guess :)

Well they can mitigate the effects of cuts in scotland which I assumed is what eadfrith meant.
Edit:
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/may/11/alan-sugar-resigns-from-labour-party-over-shift-to-left
Well hopefully this might help to galvanise labour into moving into a direction that wouldn't make me want to armadillo on my ballot paper next election.

My point is that, while the SNP obviously don't have enough seats to vote down legislation, what they can do is add a heck of a lot of depth and value to debate. If they can argue compelling and constructively against the right hand side of the Tories, they could significantly sway the more centre-ist members, against the whips. But that will only work if they don't alienate non-scotts MPs at Westminster by focusing on devolution to much. We need the union to moderate the right...

If I try to express how I currently feel about the outcome and consequences of the election, it will turn into an extended rant which is at least probably better directed where it might have some effect. Suffice it to say I am horrified, utterly horrified.

@ pentys edit: I've been saying this will happen.

@Eadfrith: I understand. Fair points and I agree completely about the SNP, however I have a sneaking suspicion we'll likely disagree as to what is a compelling argument. In my opinion, the unions have had their day though. I agree wholeheartedly they were needed before, but not in 2015. Unless you're talking about something else. In which case the comment is irrelevant.

@G, go for a rant if you feel like it, likely my dumbass self will be your only opposition but hey if you don't take someones political affiliation personally I'm quite happy to argue. Or if you like I can shut up and you can have an echo chamber :P Think things over here to get your wording right or whatever for when you do write about it where it'll have an effect. Or don't, entirely up to you. Just saying you won't be judged here, at least not by me.

Quote from: Colossus on May 14, 2015, 10:32:44 PM@G, go for a rant if you feel like it,

It happened; it's on Facebook. I can repost it here if people don't mind a huge slab of text.

Quote from: Colossus on May 14, 2015, 10:32:44 PMif you like I can shut up and you can have an echo chamber :P

It would be hypocritical of me to ask you to shut up, given that one of the major concerns here is freedom of speech. I want a debating chamber, not an echo chamber. In any case, I would very much like to understand more about the position of Conservative voters. I have some questions, but they're probably best going in the Human Rights thread that's now in progress.

There's freedom of speech sure, you just as rightly have the freedom to ask me to not post as I have the freedom to either do as you ask or ignore it. And I'm quite happy to stay out of whatever anyone asks, I am well aware my personal politics are.... shall we say, abrasive? :P

Quote from: Colossus on May 15, 2015, 07:11:02 PM
you just as rightly have the freedom to ask me to not post

I have, but why should I use it? That wouldn't help either of us in understanding each other. I expect I disagree with you on quite a lot of things, but we should still be able to discuss them civilly.

We certainly can :)

Just found this. Well...Dodger made a vid and I got the link from there. Gamification, yay.
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/SeanOxspring/20150529/244659/Natural_Election_An_attempt_to_gameify_GE2015_in_7_days.php

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-32970337

Sad news today - former Lib Dem leader Charles Kennedy dies, just a few weeks after seeing his successor bugger up most of his life's work :(

http://www.libdems.org.uk/tim-farron-elected-leader-liberal-democrats

We have a Tim  :D

Corbyn fever is hitting the Labour leadership contest, with one poll apparently putting him on course to win in the first round without second preferences being needed. Which would be a huge, huge shock on the left of UK politics.

So Corbyn won. Thoughts?

I like him, though I won't be defecting any time soon as I still think the UK needs a liberal voice as well in politics.

I doubt he'll do very well, though I suspect he won't be as much of a castastrophe as he might be.

Socialist scumbag. I hate the guy.

The sound of nobody being surprised at this is deafening :P

We like to get a mix of opinions over here on the Exilian channel ;)

Indeed :D

Yeah thought I could probably guess your response Rob :p . I like him, and I'm very happy to see a conviction politician leading labour but unfortunately I am no socialist, at least not as far as he is. The new labour party might be able to sway my vote if they opt for supporting community and cooperative businesses and services rather than nationalising everything under central government.