UK Election - Results Thread

[rob in cal]

Does anyone have a list of "Tory near misses".  I'm trying to figure out how much more of a national swing the Tories needed for a majority of seats and I can't find that many near misses.  Most of their targeted seats that they failed to take were LD seats and they didn't come close in most of these.  They did win most of the Labour seats on their top 116 target seats, but those they failed at, most were not that close.  Seems to me they are a few points off from winning another 20 seats or so.

[Silent Hunter]

This should help a little.

[Chancellor of the Duchy of Little Lever and Darcy Lever]

First map of many:



High-resolution PDF version of the map here - zoom in on the crowded areas for the full effect.

[Silent Hunter]

Al, now that all the results are in, can we lock this thread and start a new analysis thread please?

[Хahar 🤔]

What happened in Blaenau Gwent?

Read the hints in all recent posts of mine on the subject

As I recall, your "hints" were that you had no more idea than the rest of us.

[cinyc]

I am having some trouble seeing how there could be a Con-Lib coalition.  Couldn't Cameron face a revolt here?  How on earth does he placate his shadow cabinet, especially those members who'd get squeezed out by the oranges?

There doesn't HAVE to be a formal coalition government.  Canada's Conservative Party has been governing as a minority without one for almost 4 years.  Confidence is kept vote-to-vote.

[k-onmmunist]

So can anyone here explain exactly why Scotland hates the Tories?

Margaret Thatcher.

What did she do to tick them off?

Destroyed their livelihoods and imposed a poll tax.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

I am having some trouble seeing how there could be a Con-Lib coalition.  Couldn't Cameron face a revolt here?  How on earth does he placate his shadow cabinet, especially those members who'd get squeezed out by the oranges?

From the speeches I've seen - he wants to focus on what they have in common.  Basically, "We're not Labour."

[Torie]

That map is so cool. Thanks andrewteale. 

[minionofmidas]

What does St. Silver know about British elections and that stuff?

He knows math, which is all you really need to know to project elections, whether they be in the UK, US or Uzbekistan.  I'm willing to wager Silver will be right and the British models wrong.

Well well well... (sorry if this has been pointed out before.)

And, btw. Nope. The US has no elections that rival Britain's in complexity. It'll be a cold day in hell when an American, on his first attempt, doesn't do worse than the British way of doing these things. They know their math too, you know.

[Hash]

Maps!

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

What does St. Silver know about British elections and that stuff?

He knows math, which is all you really need to know to project elections, whether they be in the UK, US or Uzbekistan.  I'm willing to wager Silver will be right and the British models wrong.

Well well well... (sorry if this has been pointed out before.)

And, btw. Nope. The US has no elections that rival Britain's in complexity. It'll be a cold day in hell when an American, on his first attempt, doesn't do worse than the British way of doing these things. They know their math too, you know.

The British don't know their math, they know their maths.  No wonder Nate got it wrong!

[minionofmidas]

Labour: 3.9 million votes, 121 seats
Liberal Democrats: 3.1 million votes, 23 seats

Awesome

England Results:
LD 24.8%, 15 Seats
Lab 24.1%, 59 Seats

An absolute tragedy for any democratic system.

Please, maybe the LibDems should work harder at building a base- other than yuppies.

How does that have any relevance? Why should one party get a built in advantage simply because of the type of supporters they have?

They cant seal the deal. If they were more popular they would be able to win these close seats they are continually losing.  My cheap insult aside- they have to look inward and broaden their appeal or get a core group of supporters.

That doesn't make any sense logically. Why should Labour and the Conservatives get more seats just because their supporters happen to live geographically closer together?

Because it's a first past the post system with more than two parties in it, and that is what first past the post does in that situation.

[Torie]

What does St. Silver know about British elections and that stuff?

He knows math, which is all you really need to know to project elections, whether they be in the UK, US or Uzbekistan.  I'm willing to wager Silver will be right and the British models wrong.

Well well well... (sorry if this has been pointed out before.)

And, btw. Nope. The US has no elections that rival Britain's in complexity. It'll be a cold day in hell when an American, on his first attempt, doesn't do worse than the British way of doing these things. They know their math too, you know.

Nate baby has this to say about his UK black box: "6:24 AM [Nate]. To be frank, while the results are a long way from uniform, our model also doesn't seem to have demonstrated any particular skill!"

[minionofmidas]

There will be another election before Obama runs for reelection. Bank on it. The Lib Dems need to learn from this time and regroup.

I don't get what they did wrong during the campaign

Pretended they had a chance to win nationally. Besides sounding delusional (no one with any sort of a clue considers it even remotely possible that Labour can be displaced from the top two), that just is not their role, and it's not what their own voters want them to be.
They've made the same mistake before. With the same consequences.

[minionofmidas]

What exactly is this Labour and Co-operative deal?

The Co-operative Party are a group of self-important lefties who endorse some Labour candidates who grovel a lot. They're totally irrelevant these days.

Oh so the UK has their own version of NY's Working Families Party?

It's kind of annoying because the Telegraph's map that I'm looking at colors those seats in gray for "other parties" instead of red for Labour.

I guess. I think they have much less influence than the WFP, which does have clout in some elections. They're more comparable to the United Citizens Party, or whatever it's called, in South Carolina, in terms of sheer irrelevance. (Al might correct me here, but I think it's safe to say that the Co-op label means almost nothing these days.)

All of this is entirely false (the Telegraph being worst.)

The closest comparison within the American system would be one of those caucus thingies, this one for leftie intellectuals. It's not a party except in name.

[Torie]

There will be another election before Obama runs for reelection. Bank on it. The Lib Dems need to learn from this time and regroup.

I don't get what they did wrong during the campaign

Pretended they had a chance to win nationally. Besides sounding delusional (no one with any sort of a clue considers it even remotely possible that Labour can be displaced from the top two), that just is not their role, and it's not what their own voters want them to be.
They've made the same mistake before. With the same consequences.

The bolded bit is an interesting statement Lewis. Would you care to elaborate? Why don't LD voters want the LD's to take power, and what is it they do want from them?  In fact, what is the ideology in general of LD voters or is it all over the map. My vague impression is that in some ways the LD's are to the left of New Labor these days, but maybe that is because of my relative ignorance.

[minionofmidas]

Fermanagh and South Tyrone has been in recounts for hours. Apparently 8 votes separate the two candidates.

No. There have been 2 recounts, the latter has Gildernew ahead by 2 votes.
A 3rd recount will begin later this morning.
(See NI thread)

Two votes!

The LDs gained Winchester by two votes in 1997. After the millionth recount.

[minionofmidas]

I'm still reeling from East Belfast, to be honest.  I know that Robinson had that scandal, but how the hell did the Alliance go from third place with 11% in 2005 to a win now?

UCUNF is a bad joke. TUV is a vile joke. That left no alternative (Catholics don't count). Long is the Alliance's best known politician. She's also Lord Mayor of Belfast (a largely ceremonial position... I think... might be wrong...)
It's still a shock to me, but it has a logic.

[minionofmidas]

I'm hoping in the coming days someone can provide a logical explanation for the schizophrenic LibDem swings.

They are broadly like LD swings always are... the complete unpredictability of individual LD-Tory seats in the West Country has been stated over at the other thread, too... so maybe I'd better ask you to provide a logical explanation for your strange expectations.

[minionofmidas]

What's caused backlash against the Lib-Dems? Sure I never believed the Cleggmania hype but surely they were in a position to gain seats rather than lose them. I mean if Charles Kennedy can gain them seats, surely Clegg could too.

Uh, what? He's not a quarter the human being Charlie Kennedy is... and that's after he's absorbed his identical twins Cameron and Blair by osmosis.

[Torie]

I'm hoping in the coming days someone can provide a logical explanation for the schizophrenic LibDem swings.

They are broadly like LD swings always are... the complete unpredictability of individual LD-Tory seats in the West Country has been stated over at the other thread, too... so maybe I'd better ask you to provide a logical explanation for your strange expectations.

Maybe there isn't much ideological difference between the two parties' candidates down there, perhaps?

[minionofmidas]

because they'd stretched too thin. I think, ultimately, it was a series of tactical errors on the ground that did them in.

Yep. (A LibDem saying it in this thread. Finally. I'd almost given up. )

[minionofmidas]

btw, 2.2% for Labour in Westmorland and Lonsdale. Lowest Lab share?

WOW, lol.

[minionofmidas]

Why don't LD voters want the LD's to take power, and what is it they do want from them?  In fact, what is the ideology in general of LD voters or is it all over the map. My vague impression is that in some ways the LD's are to the left of New Labor these days, but maybe that is because of my relative ignorance.

It's broadly a protest party. It's broadly a collection of independent MPs. This is all coming out sounding wrong, but...

LDs (or the ones that matter - those who make a seat win or loss) tend to vote for someone they view as the better candidate locally while washing their hands off the two-horse race for power at Westminster.

Historically, of course, if Labour are the Workers' Movement, and the Tories are the Dominant Middle Class Tradition (including in their vote base also the people who're objectively workers but don't want to be), then the LDs are the Dissident Middle Class Tradition. Perma-opposition is sort of implied in that setup.
What kind of dissidence, of course, has changed over the years. Once upon a time it used to be religious nonconformist farmers (esp. ones who weren't English), and in some areas that still matters. Later you got not-as-traditional suburbanites (so, Kingston not Beckenham), college town people, and in 2005 (seems to have been a vote loss here in 2010) some Asians. Etc.

Of course, the unreasoning always-Lib-Dem, doesn't-care-what-constituency-he's-in exists (as does the fanboy who really thought Clegg could win. Not common though; most Brits understand a little bit about their political system), but he's a rarer beast than his Labour and Conservative counterparts. And he's more evenly spread over the country.