UK General Election 2015

[Dartzap]

Seeing as the Yanks have decided to start inflicting an election thread on us a year ahead of schedule, here's a thread for one that happens in six weeks time.

Last night saw a not-a-debate featuring David Cameron and Ed Miliband occur, both were interviewed by Jeremy Paxman, and then had a Q&A with an audience. It was like Question Time, but even less exciting, as neither actually debated the other.

Behold the horror!



Can someone shoot the idea of debates in the head, by the way? We've managed the last three hundred years without the bloody things.

[Iroscato]

First time I'll be old enough to vote. If I do bother, fuck these rich, entitled twits, the Greens are getting my tick.

[jwl]

One of the election seat predictions:
http://www.electionforecast.co.uk/
As of today:

Conservatives 285
Labour 279
SNP 37
Liberal Democrats 26
DUP 8
SDLP 3
Plaid Cymru 2
Greens 1
UKIP 1
Other 8

[madd0ct0r]

I really enjoy politics yet I find myself unable to care who wins.

[Simon_Jester]

One of the election seat predictions:
http://www.electionforecast.co.uk/
As of today:

Conservatives 285
Labour 279
SNP 37
Liberal Democrats 26
DUP 8
SDLP 3
Plaid Cymru 2
Greens 1
UKIP 1
Other 8

If such a prediction comes true, what coalitions are likely to form?

[Darth Tanner]

If such a prediction comes true, what coalitions are likely to form?

Unknown - forming a coalition destroyed much of the Lib Dems support so at present the SNP have stated they are unwilling to form one, the Lib Dems might stay in bed with the Tories or jump ship to Labour - assuming they have any seats left standing to bargain with.

Might just be left with a minority government with limited ability to carry out policy.

[jwl]

One of the election seat predictions:
http://www.electionforecast.co.uk/
As of today:

Conservatives 285
Labour 279
SNP 37
Liberal Democrats 26
DUP 8
SDLP 3
Plaid Cymru 2
Greens 1
UKIP 1
Other 8

If such a prediction comes true, what coalitions are likely to form?

Well if you click on the link, you can see that there is quite a large error given in the results. I also think they are underestimating UKIP.

However, if this prediction is exactly right, you need 323 seats in the commons for a majority (taking off five seats for sinn fein). This means that, considering a grand coalition or a Conservative/SNP agreement can't happen, there can be three main outcomes:
1) An agreement including Labour, SNP, and others, most likely the Lib Dems.
2) An agreement including everybody except Conservatives, SNP, and one more seat (probably UKIP or Respect).
3) An agreement including Conservatives, Lib Dems, DUP, and four more seats (BTW, everyone else is left-wing apart from one Alliance seat who doesn't like the DUP, one ex-UUP member who left the party because of their pact with the tories, and the UKIP seat).

Therefore, the most likely arrangement would be a Labour/SNP/Lib Dem alliance. Labour doesn't want to damage their english vote by forming a formal coalition with SNP, so a supply agreement is more likely, resulting in a minority government.

[Simon_Jester]

What is a supply agreement?

[Prannon]

I imagine that it's an agreement to not get in the way. SNP wouldn't get any ministries, but in exchange for assurances they would allow whichever government to form.

[Eternal_Freedom]

PRetty much. My understanding is that the SNP would "supply" the votes needed for a minority Labour government to rule, in exchange for a bunch of concessions. This way the SNP get the benefit of being in power without having to be publicly accountable if something goes wrong.

[bilateralrope]

What is a supply agreement?

Confidence and supply

Basically, for the governing party to be recognised as the government it needs at least half of MPs to vote in its favour any time a confidence vote comes up. If it can't, the government is dissolved and another election happens.

So when a party doesn't control half the MPs after an election, it needs to make deals with other parties to get enough support. These agreements often include agreeing to support each others legislation (or at least some of it), ministerial roles for the other parties, etc. A simple supply agreement means the smaller party will support the government in confidence votes, but that's all they have agreed to do. They haven't agreed to work together on anything else.

[Darth Nostril]

Can someone shoot the idea of debates in the head, by the way? We've managed the last three hundred years without the bloody things.

Never watched it myself, never will unless someone holds a gun to my head, but the best comment I've heard from someone who did was "Paxman won that hands down, vote for him".

[Hillary]

I also think they are underestimating UKIP.

I don't - they may pick up a seat in Essex or Kent, but they've had their moment in the sun. Even at their height they were only picking up 10% of the electoral vote. Dilute that into the much higher turnout of a General Election (and take away the Euro-protest votes) and they'll sink back to where they were.

I think we do have every chance of a minority government forming - which will be....interesting.

[jwl]

I also think they are underestimating UKIP.

I don't - they may pick up a seat in Essex or Kent, but they've had their moment in the sun. Even at their height they were only picking up 10% of the electoral vote. Dilute that into the much higher turnout of a General Election (and take away the Euro-protest votes) and they'll sink back to where they were.

I think we do have every chance of a minority government forming - which will be....interesting.

I'm not saying they are going to get in the double digits, but they should get more than one seat. Most people who go through the seats systematically, rather than looking at a model, come to this conclusion. Also, look at their UKIP current polling vs their projected vote share. I can see their vote dropping, but not by that much, this is because the model can't cope with the unprecedented changes you see in this election.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Trouble is UKIP might have, say, 10% of the total electoral vote, but that doesn't translate to 10% of seats. From what I have seen their support is very broad but very shallow. They'll have supporters and candidatesall over the place, but they aren't concentrated enough to win more than one or two seats.

[jwl]

Seven-way leaders debate (you need a tv license to watch currently, but click on "live coverage").
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/election-2015-32137362
It's an ITV debate but ITV aren't putting it on their player currently.

And polls on who won:

The SNP results are particularly interesting, seeing as scotland only makes up 8% of the UK population.

[Prannon]

Bright green = Greens (?)
Orange = SNP (?)
Purple = UKIP (?)
Red = Labour
Green = Plaid Cymru (?)
Yellow = Liberal Democrats
Blue = Conservative

Did I get that right?

[jwl]

Bright green = Greens (?)
Orange = SNP (?)
Purple = UKIP (?)
Red = Labour
Green = Plaid Cymru (?)
Yellow = Liberal Democrats
Blue = Conservative

Did I get that right?

Yellow is SNP and orange is lib dems. Apart from that, yes.

[Crazedwraith]

Bright green = Greens (?)
Orange = SNP (?)
Purple = UKIP (?)
Red = Labour
Green = Plaid Cymru (?)
Yellow = Liberal Democrats
Blue = Conservative

Did I get that right?

Orange is LibDem that's Nick Clegg in the picture. I think the SNP leader is a lady currently, so she's the yellow maybe?

edit: crap, not so much instaposted as not paying attention.

Anyway the closest I've got to politically debate is arguing with a Tory on Fb yesterday... he was critising some labour policy about forcing companies to hire people who have been on zero hours contract for a length of time. (easily avoid and job destroying) So I pointed out the tories were no better with their 'force jobseekers to work jobs for free and still job seek at the same time' policy which actually discourages job creation with a steady flow of jobseeker slave labour.

Needless to say he was not convinced. Oh well.

[jwl]

By the way, the leader's debate has now moved to the ITV youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vc6YH4-IHME

[Crown]

Surgeon crushed it last night, shame I can't vote SNP.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

I have to agree, if I still lived in Scotland I'd vote SNP after that. And if I still lived in Wales I'd vote Plaid Cymru. I have to say I was disappointed by the Green Party, they didn't have much to say.

[madd0ct0r]

Meh, I thought Natalie Bennet came over better then what's her face from Plaid.
The wife was calling for the three of them (SNP, Green and Plaid) to form their own coalition of common sense

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Well the SNP just lost my vote- by affirming that they won't support updating Trident, what they're really saying is that they want to strip the UK of its nuclear arsenal. I don't want to live in a world where my country is no longer a nuclear power- IMO that's the worst thing you can do. I mean fuck, we're already facing cuts in our armed forces, this is going to result in us getting laughed at on the world stage.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Yeah that one worries me too.

On a lighter and less serious note, I really don't want to live in a world where the French have a nuclear aresenal and Britain does not. As Yes, Minister points out "they're our friends now, but they've been our enemies for most of the past 900 years."