Jump to content

General Erection 2019


Gus Mears

Who are you voting for?  

213 members have voted

You do not have permission to vote in this poll, or see the poll results. Please sign in or register to vote in this poll.

Recommended Posts

  • Paid Members

Sorry, by "vote the same way you do", I meant more "in your general direction", rather than the same party - i.e. 2nd Ref, GTTO, etc. Surely a Green would be more likely to vote tactically this election on this basis and therefore not need that incentive? And would they want a vote for Green in a constituency they know it would have almost no effect?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members

What constituencies are Green going to have an effect in, other than Brighton? They're not close in many places. What matters most to the Greens in this election is overall vote share.

That Green voters (or, indeed, Lib Dems) are more likely to vote tactically is exactly why they're on there. They want to vote tactically, but ideally in a way that can avoid losing them the support they want to give them. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members
3 minutes ago, Chris B said:

What constituencies are Green going to have an effect in, other than Brighton? They're not close in many places. What matters most to the Greens in this election is overall vote share.

That Green voters (or, indeed, Lib Dems) are more likely to vote tactically is exactly why they're on there. They want to vote tactically, but ideally in a way that can avoid losing them the support they want to give them. 

Plaid and the Lib Dems have officially stood down to help the Greens in the Vale of Glamorgan (nudge, nudge). But everyone knows its really to help Labour try and oust the Welsh Secretary, Alun Cairns. 

Edited by garynysmon
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members

True, the vote share is something I hadn't considered.

For me, though, it's still the trust factor I can't get past. Not just that someone might renege on the deal, as there's nothing to stop them or even prove that they have, but also that they could be a Tory purporting to be a Labour/Green/progressive voter to pull a fast one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members
4 minutes ago, garynysmon said:

Plaid and the Lib Dems have officially stood down to help the Greens in the Vale of Glamorgan (nudge, nudge). But everyone knows its really to help Labour try and oust Welsh Secretary, Alun Cairns. 

I clearly meant somewhere that matters.

No, joking aside, that's interesting to know. Thanks.


EDIT - how come they're not doing so more openly? Just to toe the party lines?

Edited by Chris B
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members

This tactical voting lark is an interesting one though.

Around here we have Labour furiously campaigning in Arfon (a Plaid Cymru held seat)  including a Corbyn visit on Sunday, despite all polls suggesting they have a tough fight on their hands to defend their seats in north east Wales from the Tories. 

Yes, without a hint of irony, this week we see Labour figures urging Plaid to stop campaigning in Wrexham or else they'll let the Tories in.

Its all a bit of a mess tbh.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think Labour should have stood down in marginals where they're out of the race, not only does it help potential tory-ousters, it would have put pressure on lib dems to stand down in the real crunch lab/con marginals where the libs serve only to shit things up. 

Two reasons why they didn't (IMO): 1), I imagine the tories and MSM would have pasted them for doing so, they would have been accused of abandoning places, not being a truly national party, etc. The tories have already been complaining about the idea of tactical voting this week, so I can't imagine the screeching if there'd been an actual agreement. You know, like the Brexit party stepping aside for the tories. 2) Neither Corbyn nor Swinson wanted to make the first move. They didn't trust each other to reciprocate, whether officially or unofficially.

Lib Dems standing aside would have meant admitting that all the misleading bar chart leaflets saying how well they did "last time" they sent out were misleading.

Current Lib dem economic policy of austerity forever would be more suited to a tory coalition, though Corbyn is obviously far more suited to liberal values generally, regardless of how much Ian Dunt weeps about him. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members

The worth of my vote tomorrow amounts to the grand total of fuck all. I live in a constituency where first and second generally split 92% of the vote between them, with usually three other candidates left to fight over the rest. 

If I was to vote for Sinn Fein or the UUP, then every vote counts in this area as it tends to come right down to the wire. If you don't vote for one of them though, then it's really only a token protest vote. 

I tend to vote Alliance but if there is an alternative independent then I consider them an option too. This election there happens to be a lady, Caroline Wheeler, running as an independent, and I believe she is a member of the UK Labour party. So that's pretty much my choice for tomorrow. Despite being from a unionist background and having voted for Tom Elliott of the UUP in a past election, I usually find the SDLP to be a party whose concerns seem fairly sensible and normal and I have often considered voting for them too. However it's still orange Vs green politics, and the further the country can get away from that, the better, so I'll lend my vote to a differently decorated poster. 

I'd be flabbergasted if either the independent or alliance candidate got third though, as the SDLP usually have that mopped up with a whopping five percent. The best case scenario here that I can see is that the vote share for first and second were to drop below 90%, with SDLP gaining a little from moderate Sinn Fein voters, and Alliance gaining a crumb from a few fed up unionists.

Edited by WeeAl
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members

I was under the impression that the SDLP were basically Sinn Fein but with the difference that they'd take their seats in parliament. Are there any other significant differences between them now? I know their other main difference was the rejection of violence, but with the GFA I'd have thought that had become a lot less relevant.

Also, why's it not such a positive outlook for the Alliance? I would have thought that it would've been the preferred choice of any Protestant or Unionist who wants to Remain, which would give them the majority vote in Norn Iron?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members

It's time for the third bi-ennial JNLister What Happens On Election Day Post!

 

As we've got a few first-time voters (and maybe even first-time election viewers) here, I thought I'd cobble together a guide to the next couple of days:

 

Election Day:

 

You can vote between 7am and 10pm. If you've got a polling card in the post, it will tell you where to vote (you have to do it at a specific "polling station" near your home.) If you haven't got a card or aren't sure, you can find out from your Electoral Registration Office -- check for details at https://www.gov.uk/get-on-electoral-register.

 

You don't need your polling card to vote, but having it saves time. Either way, all you actually need is to give your name and address. If you don't have a polling card, ID of some kind isn't necessary but may be useful. The exception is Northern Ireland where you need photo ID such as passport or driving license. (You can get a dedicated ID card for voting there as well, but it takes 10 days to get.)

 

On your way into the polling station, people outside the building may ask for your polling card number. You don't have to give it. These are political party workers with no authority over you. The reason they ask is to check who has and hasn't voted and then chase up people who've previously said they'll support them.

 

When you vote, the standard method is to put a cross in the box of the candidate you support. If you're feeling creative, you can do whatever you like but remember the key rule: you must clearly indicate one candidate, and one candidate only. If you feel like drawing a spunking cock, make sure that the shaft and balls are outside of any box and that the spunk drops are in one box only.

 

If your ballot paper appears to either indicate nobody at all, or indicate more than one person, it's counted as an invalid vote. The number of invalid votes is announced for each seat, but isn't part of any official total or any national vote figures. There's no official distinguishment between 'spoilt' ballots (where people deliberately don't cast a valid vote) and those where people just screw it up.

If you sign your ballot paper or write anything that identifies you, it's classed as an invalid vote.

The ballot paper has a number on it, and the election staff make a note of the number on the paper they issue you. Technically that means somebody could trace how you voted. Officially that never happens and it's only done so people can check for bogus ballot papers (eg same number appearing multiple times). Unofficially, even the worst conspiracy theory is that MI5 used to try to find out who'd voted Communist.

If you mess it up or have a last second change of mind, you can ask to have the ballot paper destroyed and get a new one. Once you've actually put it in the ballot box, it's too late to change.

When you leave the polling station, there's a possibility you'll be asked to take part in an exit poll organised by the media. This does not involve saying who you voted for, but instead secretly filling in an identical ballot and putting it in a box. If you agree to take part in this, you're being a bit of a dick if you don't 'vote' the same way as you did in reality.

If you have a ballot paper in hand and are still waiting to get into the booth and cast it at 10pm, you can definitely still vote. If you are in the queue waiting to get a ballot paper at 10pm you are legally allowed to vote, but it might be a hassle if the staff aren't aware the law changed in 2013.

 

Election Night:

 

During the day, broadcast media have an agreement that they don’t report or discuss anything to do with party issues. Instead they solely report on the fact that people are voting. This time they might mention snow but not if/how it would affect the results.

 

At 10pm when the polls close, the major broadcasters unveil the results of the exit poll. They don't give the voting figures but rather predict the number of seats, this time round for Conservative, Labour, Lib Dem, SNP, UKIP, Green and Plaid. Since 1992 the exit poll has generally been pretty accurate and the rule of thumb is that if nothing’s gone wrong, it should have the biggest party within 20 seats of the real result. 

 

 The exit poll involves going to around 140 polling stations around the country and getting about 140 people at each to secretly fill in a mock ballot paper on their way out after voting. That’s an improvement on normal polling as you know they’ve definitely voted, they know which way they’ve voted (even if they were undecided till late), and there’s no reason for them to lie out of embarrassment.)

Though that’s a total of 20,000 or so people nationwide, the counts aren’t totalled. Instead they compare the figures at each place with the exit poll from the same place from last time and look at the changes.

Because they have a range of different locations, they can then come up with patterns, for example Scottish seats are going more SNP that before; places with a lot of older voters are going a bit more conservative; places with students are going less for the Lib Dems etc, Northern Leave seats are going towards the Tories, etc.)

Based on that they draw up a list of overall patterns and apply them to each individual constituency, eg Chumlington West will get the effects of older people going Tory, won’t be affected by the SNP surge, and will get a mild drop in Lib Dems because there aren’t many students etc.

The numbercrunchers then combine these changes to the result from last time, estimate the votes for each party this time, then turn it into a percentage chance that each candidate will win based on how close it is. For example, the Conservatives have an 85% chance of winning in Chumlington West. 

They then simply add up the figures across the country so, for example, Chumlington West counts as 0.85 seats for the Conservatives. The total for each party is then rounded to the nearest whole figure to give the forecast.

Results:

 

The first actual results usually come a little before 11, usually Sunderland or Newcastle. That's partly because they have small, densely populated constituencies so don't have to move the ballot boxes as far, partly because they deliberately do a very efficient count to try to be first, and (unofficially) partly because everyone knows the Labour candidate will win by a mile so if they fuck up the count by a few votes here or there there's no chance of it mattering.

Labour will win these seats. Normally their lead being bigger or smaller than last time is a big clue as to how the overall results might change, though it’s harder to generalise now there’s such a Leave/Remain divide across seats in the country.

 

The bulk of the results will be between 1 and 4am, a little earlier than usual this time as there are no council elections to delay things. One thing that's key to remember is that more of the early seats will likely be Labour as they are in cities where the constituencies are smaller and it's quicker to gather together the ballot boxes. Don't just look at Labour appearing to be way ahead and think they are "winning."

 

Similarly, if you see a straightforward map of seats, don't be thrown by it being overwhelmingly blue for Conservative. That's because they tend to win more rural constituencies which tend to be much larger because they are sparsely populated.

You'll be able to get a sense of who is winning based on which seats change hands and how much "swing" there is (change compared to the last election), but it's likely to be quite messy and inconsistent.

Somewhere between 1 and 2, the people who do the exit poll will have enough real results to compare it to and will – if necessary – revise their forecast.

At some point, most likely in the 3-4am region, the broadcasters stop quoting the exit poll and instead make individual predictions of the final figures based on the actual results that have come through so far. There may be a little variation between the channels, but really these projections should be close to bang on.

 

What’s The Result Going To Be/What Do The Polls Say:

Well.

Recent polls have anything between Conservatives 6 and 14 percentage points ahead, which likely covers everything from a hung parliament to a landslide win.

The actual results each polling company is getting – in other words what 1-2,000 people selected to represent the country as a whole (eg right balance of men/women, old/young, rich/poor, white/non-white etc) tell you – are generally the same: only a few more people saying Labour than Conservative. The differences are down to how they adjust the figures to account for the fact that different age groups are more or less likely to vote, which has an impact as young people are much more likely to support Labour and old people much more likely to support the Tories. There’s also the problem that people who agree to take part in polls are not normal and are more likely to be interested in politics, which usually means more likely to support Labour.

Unless there’s a fundamental, widespread problem shared by all pollsters (like 2015), a lot of people changing/making up their minds at the last minute, or if the votes translate to seats inefficiently for the Conservatives, I’d estimate it’s about a two-in-three chance of a Conservative majority. A good analogy I’ve seen is Stephen Bush who said at the start of the campaign that it’s like one team being up 2-0 with 10 minutes left in a football match they need to win outright: you’d favour them, but the other team pulling two back is not an outlandish prospect. On the latest polling, he’s updated that to the losing team making it 2-1 with two minutes left.

 

After The Results:

2015: “I’ll do a long piece about hung parliaments as it’ll definitely be useful.”

2017: “Probably shouldn’t waste too much time talking about hung parliaments.

Anyhow, the key points to remember are that:

 

* Neither the public nor MPs elect the government.

* The timetable and process for one government being replaced by another is not inherently tied to general elections.

 

Boris Johnson is Prime Minister (and thus appoints all government positions) and remains so until he resigns. That traditionally happens in three main ways:

 

* He decides to go for non-election related reasons (like Thatcher, Blair, Cameron and May did.)

* He concludes he has lost the ability to command the confidence of the House of Commons and somebody else is better placed.

* He actually loses a confidence vote in the Commons. (Though that’s got a big asterisk this time.)

 

When she resigns, the Queen invites the person best placed to command the confidence of the Commons. In the first scenario that's usually the new leader of the party. In the second and third cases, it's usually the leader of the opposition.

 

None of this has anything to do with "winning" the election, whether that be most votes or seats or whatever.

 

In 'normal' elections where one party wins a majority, it's straightforward. The governing party wins and the government continues in office; or the main opposition party wins, in which case it's obvious the PM has lost the confidence of the commons and she resigns almost immediately. If May wins she might go and say hi to the Queen, but there's no need to do so because it's just treated as the same government continuing.

 

In a hung parliament (no party gets a majority of seats) it's less clearcut. Because it's all based on principles and precedence rather than a written constitution, there's a lot of debate about which of three thresholds would/should trigger a resignation:

 

* Johnson has clearly lost the ability to win a confidence vote. (Eg Labour & SNP have more than half the seats together and both say they'll vote against him.)

 

* Johnson has clearly lost the ability to win a confidence vote and there's a clear alternative in the wider sense -- ie, Corbyn says he's ready to form a government of some form.

 

* Johnson has clearly lost the ability to win a confidence vote and there's a clear alternative in the narrower sense of Corbyn being able to *prove* he could win a confidence vote himself (which might require the specific approval of the SNP.)

 

Chances are Labour would push for the first, the Conservatives demanding the third, and the actual correct position is the second. (“Officially” you don’t need a majority to be appointed PM, you just need to have the backing of more MPs than anyone else, including through deals with other parties.) Corbyn doesn't necessarily have to win a vote in the Commons before being appointed PM.

 

Last time I had a series of predictions/assessments of what would trigger what result. This time round everyone’s made clear that there’ll be no formal deals such as coalition (where two parties form a government) or confidence and supply (where one party forms a government and another party or parties agree not to vote against them in a no-confidence motion or budget vote, so they’ll definitely stay in power.) Remember that whoever forms a government very quickly has to pass a Queen’s Speech, which is just a list of the laws you want to bring in, but effectively acts as an initial confidence vote to “prove” the government is viable. Conventionally, if you lose that you resign, though there’s not formal rule to say. If it got really silly and you lost the Budget vote, governing becomes practically impossible.

Most likely then, the outcomes of a hung parliament would be:

Conservatives on 313ish to 323ish: Johnson stays as PM and runs a minority government because between DUP not wanting Corbyn as PM, Sinn Fein not taking seats and the Speaker/deputies not voting, he wouldn’t lose a confidence vote. However, he’d struggle to get Brexit done. The precise numbers here could vary a couple either way depending on whether the DUP lose seats and whether any Northern Ireland parties such as SDLP, UUP or Alliance win. There's also a couple of independents in England with a realistic shot of becoming MPs, one for and one against Brexit.

Labour + SNP add up to 325: Corbyn forms government after the SNP agrees to vote for its Queens Speech, in return for control over when they get a second independent referendum. Possibly a coalition with the SNP running the Scottish office. A few votes short of this and the Greens/Plain Cymru/any independents/some friendly NI parties might have to get on board, but probably not as a formal deal.

Anything else: Most likely Corbyn would wind up as PM, though it could be a bit messy, partly because it depends on whether the Lib Dems would have to actively support him for him to win a confidence vote or if they could abstain. There’s a very long shot that this could wind up with Corbyn stepping down to make way for a Labour leader/PM more acceptable to the Lib Dems, though it’s hard to see how that would play out, particularly if the Lib Dems haven't gained a lot of seats.

It’s also possible that Johnson would sit it out and dare the Commons to force him out. To do that they’d have to vote no confidence in him and prove that Corbyn would win a confidence vote, for example by signing a letter or passing a motion to say they would do so (in which case Johnson has no option but to resign unless he wants to force the Queen to sack him.)

There is also the nightmare scenario where the MPs vote no-confidence in Johnson but then fail to vote confidence in anyone else within 14 days, in which case we’ll be back at the polls in February with the small matter of a Brexit deadline mid-campaign.

 

The Next Election

It’s currently scheduled for May 2024 under the Fixed Term Parliament Act, though the last two elections both showed ways round that. Both Conservatives and Labour say they’ll scrap the Act, in which case it would be whenever the PM chose up to December 2024.

Edited by JNLister
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Paid Members

Can't seem to edit my post without messing it up, so a quick addition: if the Conservatives win a decent majority, it'll probably be fairly clear around 3-4am. If it's in hung parliament territory, it could be a very long night as there's a few Scottish/rural/incompetentatcountingLondonboroughs that tend to declare very late and could be close calls with Tories in contention this time.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...