UK Election - Results Thread

[angus]

Does anyone know the curious custom of having the returning officer physically announce the results accompanied by the candidates, wearing those party colours?

I think it may just seem weird because of the strict rules in Canada, where you can be denied entry or booted out of the polling station for wearing candidate buttons or party colors.  But the actual announcement by the official of the results, with candidates in attendance, is an old custom.  Here in the United States it is done that way.  Think of Florida election official Katherine Harris reading the results for the presidential election of 2000 (and of the bizarre legal posturing that followed.)  

What I find curious is the misuse of the word "majority" by the British press.  You'll see a candidate getting, say, 17 thousand votes of maybe 40 thousand cast, and another candidate getting 14 thousand votes.  Clearly in this case no one got a majority, and in the US the reporting would be that one candidate received a plurality and therefore won the contest.  (Except in Louisiana U.S. senatorial races where a majority is required, so a run-off would be held between the top two popular candidates.  Like the French presidential election does.  Maybe that's where Louisiana got the idea anyway.)  But in the scenario described above, you'll hear the BBC announce that one candidate got a "Majority of 3000 votes."  This is incorrect, technically, but probably the result of a long-standing vernacular use of the term in the UK.

Well, I got up a little late today, about 9 o'clock.  Good to sleep late.  Bonding with the boy again.  He's watch Sesame Street.  Michelle Obama is the featured guest.   She's telling the boys and girls to eat vegetables so that they can grow up to be big and strong like her.  I went to the BBC website and found that the result thus far is 306/258/57, with others getting about 22 votes.  I guess it was a little disappointing for the LD, but the Conservative/Labour breakdown was *exactly" as the BBC, the Guardian, and others had been predicting, although some particular district results were surprising.  Actually, it was not a good year for third parties, with third parties netting a loss of six seats.  I wonder if the talk on the street among certain Conservatives about the LD candidates is like the talk among Republicans of Ross Perot in the US presidential election of 1992.  I know it's not the same, since in the UK all politics really is local, but I can imagine the sniping.  Of course, they'd be wise to bite their lips--keep the upper one stiff, I guess the saying goes over there--if they want to try to cajole the LD into making a coalition government.

Frankly, I think it's all very refreshing.  Hung parliament?  Good for them!  I'm with John Dibble on this point:  we Yankees need to throw votes to the third parties whenever possible. This might have the effect of forcing rule changes in our own congress by denying either major party a majority in one or both houses would force some changes, hopefully for the better.  And gridlock isn't a bad thing.  In my opinion, if they're not passing new laws, then they're not screwing anything up.  I assume it works like that in the UK as well.

[The Man From G.O.P.]

By the way, perhaps I can get an opinion on one thing tonight (though my points and questions end up getting hashed out a page or two later, without anyone addressing ME )


Do you PR junkies REALLY want to let a few BNP and a decent dash of UKIP MP's in?

[angus]

By the way, perhaps I can get an opinion on one thing tonight (though my points and questions end up getting hashed out a page or two later, without anyone addressing ME )

Don't you love that?  Every time there's an election in the US (or UK, lately) then someone puts up a "results" thread, with the posts coming about three per second all night.  You notice something bizarre, like a guy in a white cowboy hat and a huge, garish ribbon, reminiscent of the best-hog-in-class award at a Midwestern state fair, and you go post a comment, and when you post, you get "19 replies since you started, do you want to reconsider your post?" or something like that.

75 pages!  Ha.  I skipped pages 53 through 74, since I went to bed at midnight and did't get up till about 9AM, so I guess the rate started slowing down after about page 53, given the time span.  Still, 75 pages over a 24-hour period is impressive. 

[Hash]

What the  is going on in Devon West? This isn't Afghanistan, you lazy sh**ts.

[Јas]

Cameron and Clegg have been speaking to each other in the last half hour, so sayeth William Hague.

[Јas]

Con Hold Devon West & Torridge


Election Result

305 Tories
258 Labour
  57 LDem
    8 DUP
    6 SNP
    5 SF
    3 Plaid
    3 SDLP
    1 Green
    1 Alliance
    1 Hermon
    1 Speaker
    1 Vacant (Thirsk & Malton)

Noting 5 SF abstentionists, 323 required for a majority.
Tories 18 seats short.

[Yamor]

17 actually, because two deputy speakers will come from Labour, and only one Conservative. That's the reasoning why the BBC count the speaker as a Conservative - it makes the maths add up.

[Hash]

Where is Devon West's declaration?

[Јas]

Where is Devon West's declaration?

Reported on Sky News. I haven't seen the figures yet.

[afleitch]

Quick word on 'changes to the voting system'; there is the assumption that if Labour give that concession to the Lib Dems then it will pass. There are potentially (if they all tow the party line) more members against changes to the system than in favour. Remember, Labour have had a recent conversion to electoral reform...don't expect them all to back it.

I think what the Tories could offer is STV in the locals and possibly complete reform and PR in the House of Lords (given that the Lords is quite Labour heavy now ) while retaining FPTP in the Commons.

[CJK]

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

[Verily]

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

Margaret Thatcher.

[Јas]

I think what the Tories could offer is STV in the locals and possibly complete reform and PR in the House of Lords (given that the Lords is quite Labour heavy now ) while retaining FPTP in the Commons.

Presumably at the point the LibDems lol and walk out, no?

[Јas]

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

Margaret Thatcher.

And yet she did better than Mr Cameron there.
He at least won't have to think too long about who to have as his Scottish Secretary.

[angus]

CSPAN2 just played a David Cameron speech.  Predictably vague, and he didn't take questions.  Clearly he's very busy trying to forge a working parliament.  Then it cut to a 30-minute segment on the oil slick, and CSPAN's doing US senate stuff.  Al Franken's on just now.  Easy, stomach.

The snippets I got on FOX, MSNBC, and CNN, when they're not talking about the New Hampshire bus bomb plot or Sandra Bullock's baby, they showed several tabloid and a few broadsheet headlines from the UK.  Apparently it's being reported as a "Conservative party victory" over there.  A quick perusal of the Guardian's website confirm's this, more or less, with "LIVE:  Cameron reaches out to Clegg" as the top feature.  In US on-line newspaper reporting "Confusion reigns" seems to be the spin, mostly. 

It'll be interesting to see whether Howard Kurtz' Media Notes column shows up in today's WaPo on-line.  (I always prefer US sources so I'm not distracted by the weird spellings of certain nouns that you have to put up with when you look at UK news sources, but unfortunately our own press seems little concerned with what goes on outside our borders.  You wouldn't know we were currently involved in two wars, for example, by watching today's reporting on FOX, CNN, or MSNBC.  Hopefully, we'll get some tidbits later.) 

For now, I'll continue reading the BBC's website for news of the UK election.  There is an interesting analysis piece there about the choices facing Cameron.  (Note again that the choices are apparently facing Cameron, not Brown, despite the formal rule that Brown is the PM till he decides not to be.  Clearly it is being spun as a Conservative "almost victory" there, while it is being spun as general confusion in US media outlets.  I suspect that this is due to our own unfamiliarity with a strong third-party showing.  However weak you Brits think the combined strength of the LD, Greens, gaelic nationalists, etc, might be, the "ten percent other" factor seems pretty interesting from my Yankee perspective.  I'd be like having 45 or so Libertarians, Socialists, and Constitutionalists in the House of Representatives giving the GOP and the Democrats hell.  Gotta love that.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

I just caught the end of Clegg's speech - are the Liberal Democrats going to form a coalition with the Conservatives or just allow them to govern as a minority party?

[Torie]

The Tories win their 306th seat (Torridge and West Devon; why on earth did it take so long?), and will pick up another seat in a couple of weeks where a death delayed the election. So 307 seats, exactly what the exit poll projected. Amazing!

[Franzl]

So 307 seats, exactly what the exit poll projected. Amazing!

Same as in 2005 then...where it was also spot on.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Ha, even the Tory beat Galloway. What an embarrassment for that joke.

[bullmoose88]

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?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Supposedly no party than the Tories has the money for a new election this year, so the Lib Dems wouldn't have it in their best interest to topple the government so soon after all.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Coalition speculation should really go somewhere else

[RIP Robert H Bork]

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

Margaret Thatcher.

What did she do to tick them off?

[Torie]

I am not sure, but Thatcher did adamantly oppose Scottish devolution, and perhaps that was the deal breaker.

[Silent Hunter]

I am not sure, but Thatcher did adamantly oppose Scottish devolution, and perhaps that was the deal breaker.

Scotland was also used as the testing ground for the poll tax.