Is it wise for Darling to tell lies about the result?
May 5th, 2007
Why spin something that’s so easy to check?
I’ve just heard cabinet minister Alistair Darling talking about the Scottish results on Radio 4’s Today Programme and at least six times he claimed that Labour and the SNP ended up with the same number of votes. If that’s the line that the spinners are taking then it’s a lie and, I would suggest very dangerous.
He was not challenged on the programme about the numbers.
It annoys me intensely when politicians of all parties tell porkies about things which are so simple to check and I would suggest that this spin on what happened is highly dangerous. In my book Darling’s reputation has moved down a couple of notches.
Maybe he’s getting in training to be Brown’s successor as Chancellor which he is second favourite in the betting to get!
Mike Smithson
MessageSpace Advertising
Maybe he knows what was on the rejected ballot papers?
Well, they’re desperate.
This will be a replay of last spring as Tory gains percolate into the public’s mind over the next few days.
With gains in the North, South west and East Midlands we are the national party now.
The Telegraph and the Times today both say that Shirley Bowes (Conservative, Oop North somewhere) is the first candidate to get zero votes since 1918 and 1860 respectively. Don’t their election journalists do blogging and webbing and forumchatting like the rest of us normal people? They obviously haven’t heard about the “Liberal” Party in Liverpool a year ago.
Dr. Goebbels: Well Hugh, its been a mixed bag of results. A lot of hard working Germans have lost their seats in the south but the Democrats have made absolutely no progress, no breakthrough in the north. Yes, its disappointing to learn we have just lost Berlin (Central) but it is not a reflection on the leadership of Adolf, nor on Karl. We will listen and learn and use this as a springboard for the next contest.
What happened in Bedford Mike? BBC says still NOC but doesn’t give the seats. Cant find anything about your Mayor.
Missing Jack’s sideways look on all of this!!
‘He was not challenged on the programme about the numbers’
On the Today programme? what a surprise.
re 5. What happened in Bedford indeed? We had those new fangled electronic counting machines and the story that was going round was that “ballot papers did not quite fit and each had to be trimmed manually to get them through”. I have no idea whether that is true or not.
With the mayoral result on AV and the council election on FPTP we have all the makings here of a Scottish fiasco.
From the results I’ve got we held onto my ward which was Tory in 2004 and 2005 and gained one other with no losses.
We await the mayoral result.
Chancellor will be Straw. Brown can’t have Scots in three of 4 positions even less so after Thursday. And Straw will have exacted his own price for not challenging Brown.
Exact shares of votes in Wales.
Any sign of Valley Boy, has he been dragged awawy by the men in white coats still screaminr, “But Tamsin has won!”
Reminds you of Saddams spin doctor who claimed they were winning the war as you could see the yanks advancing in the background…
Or George Bush when he said ‘Mission Accomplished’.
Or Alistair Campbell whenever he opened his bilge filled trap.
Labour got battered last night, moreover they deserved to get battered. You’d like to hope that the new administration will bring something different, but Darlings utterance doesn’t bode well.
When R&T produced their Newsnight prediction - based on by-elections in the last 6 months in a three way fight - I was highly suspect of the results they achieved. Not because of the maths but the political geography and local circumstances. Over that period the weekly by-election results had been relatively poor for the Conservativess compared to the previous period. But they were repeatedly in the wrong place for us. Often caused by resignations - people dont like uneccsary election - or in places where the Conservatioves have aweak loacal organisation. On top of that our people dont travel as well as LDs for by-elections. Of course you doubt it yourself - there can not be an explanation for each poor result can there? That is why I was convinced that May 3 would be a good night and that R&T were wrong. Maths is one thing - knowing the local strenghts and factors makes it a whole lot easier.
Re: Scotland. This comment from Darling could well be redundant anyway. It is designed to argue that a Lib/Lab Govt would be legitimate. The problem: Lib/Lab don’t have a combined majority of the seats.
Anyone think the Tories will offer to support Salmond in the First Minister vote, but will not join a Govt that advocates independence? (and, possibly, the local income tax). So an SNP govt, but no independence referendum.
Or would they prefer a hugely unpopular, and getting more so, Lib/Lab govt seen as ignoring the message of the electorate, but at the risk of dramatically increasing SNP support as a by-product?
By the way, the French Prediction competition thread (Round 2) has closed to new posts, although the competition deadline is 9pm tonight.
If it’s possible to add my prediction:
Sarkozy: 53.32%
Royale: 48.68%
Highest score: 68.85%
Andy try again. That’s over 100%. This is not Scotland!
The truth is that a large section of the public are easily duped by politicians. If this wasn’t the case how would Labour have got into power in the first place?
The worst politicians for telling porkies are the Libdems. In Edinburgh North their campaign was based on a poll chart that they said showed that only the Libdems could beat Labour. (What they failed to do was use the right election as comparison.) The result suggests that enough of the electorate were influenced by this to stop the SNP winning the seat from Labour.
Still Tone thought it a good base to build from. I’m sure Adolf said the same after Stalingrad I think.
re 8. I should add that “Big Tall Tim” - who was the first person ever to post a comment on this site won his contest. Tim, it will be recalled, got badly beaten up a couple of weeks ago while out campaigning and ended up in hospital.
12 An SNP led minority government potentially more stable than a minority Lab/Lib Dem one - I can see Conservatives, SNP & Greens voting against more that Lab/Lib Dem administration proposed than a SNP one because with SNP there’s more “give them a chance” than a failed Lab/Lib Dem administration would have.
Greens and Conservatives are the Kingmakers and both would be better served out of government with option on vetoing, in concert with one of Labour or SNP, anything proposed by either option.
Assumes that Margot takes presiding officer role!
Darling does have the right name to carry the title Comical Ali.
An election again in Scotland within 6 months?
I cannot see a deal without ministerial cars (do they have them in Scotland?) for the smaller coalition partners will hold.
After Darling Cancelled all the English tram schemes while he was minister of Transport despite tens of millions already being spent on preparatory works (Edinburghs Tram Schemes are of course going ahead) his stock could not sink any lower among the many many supporters of these vital public transport solutions.
This will not be forgotten at the next election and Cameron was very wise to unequivically support Trams as an environmentally sound form of transportation. (It as of course the Conservatives, not Labour, who authorised and built the current English Tram systems in Manchester, Sheffield and Croydon and took Nottingham beyond the point of no return.)
This Liverpool/Manchester/Tories comment repeated ad nauseam in all parts of the media to-day seems to me a pretty vacuous one if you interpret it in practical terms (I know it’s just a soundbite really). The Tories lost their last parliamentary seats in these cities 20 years ago,winning that election by 102. They won the following election as well. If the point is that they have n’t got any councillors ie footsoldiers in these cities to try to win seats at general elections , there are loads of other places where they stand a realistic chance of winning seats where it would be worthwhile putting the effort in.
Gotta go out - my daughter’s showing off the flat she’s just bought - but I did see on the BBC website that those Councils, of whatever party, which had introduced fortnightly refuse collections, were the most likely to change hands. As the much-missed one might say, it was a rubbish election
Darling was about right. Not the biggest sin of a politician to make a ’rounding error’ in favour of his own side.
The big stories are whether grandpa Ming can be forced out (probably not). In the interests of his party should he resign? If the answer is not obvious, you are not trying….
Similarly, should GB allow his name to go forward as leader of his party? The interests oh his own party and his own are different. Which will he choose? Another tough one.
14,
D’oh!
Meant “Royale, 46.68%”
Oops.
In summary:
Sarkozy: 53.32%
Royale: 46.68%
Highest score: 68.85%
3
She got zero votes in Tony Blair’s ward in Sedgfield - this was the real story and was well covered in last night’s Look north programme.
Listening to Radio Scotland’s Newsweek programme this morning the reporter at the Highland’s count at Inverness was giving his report on the campaign from ‘The reporter’s notebook’ a feature of the programme. What he said was interesting in that when the List vote was finally tallied for Highlands and Island the initial seat allocation given by the Returning Officer was Labour 4 SNP Nil. It does help to have a Mathematic Professor as one of your agents at the count, who said ‘rubbish’ or words to that effect and suggest they re-calculate. They did, apologised for their mistake and it was 3 Labour and 2 SNP. So if it had not been challanged things may have not turned out they way they did.
26 Presumably as a paper candidate she didn’t live in the war and neither did her proposers. Better to have left it uncontested as Labour did in thousands of seats.
11 - “On top of that our people dont travel as well as LDs for by-elections.”
That’s because they’re all pensioners
28
She might have been a paper candidate, but she was NOT a happy person….
wasn’t “darling” a character in blackadder? he was an arsehole in that too!!
Strange line in the Sun today. They want to choose the winner but dare not take the plunge?
“Cameron has two years to build on Thursday night’s success and prove he is up to being Prime Minister.
He will be fighting Gordon Brown, a brilliant and experienced operator who knows he must pull rabbits out of his own hat to persuade voters to give Labour a fourth chance.
Brown remains a formidable force. He emerged as the moral victor in Scotland despite the narrow Nationalist win.”
How, I wonder is Brown a ‘moral victor’ and where is the evidence of his being and ‘brilliant operator’? After two election disasters in a row in his own back yard? If he can’t do the business in Scotland how will he manage in Middle England?
And as for the Daily mirror, it more like the Beano today with this first line of its elections story:
“DAVID Cameron tried to put a brave face on Tory election results yesterday …..”
26 if you think that was the real story, I won’t stop you enjoying your moment. Maybe it helps in soothing the pain of a thrashing at the polls.
28 - don’t proposers have to live in the actual ward? You do get a few results where candidates get fewer votes than their 10 nominations. (I know candidates themselves just have to live or work in the council area as a whole.)
Mike, it annoys me too, doubly so when they can spin lies that cost good people seats, that are not so easy to check.
10 Jez- of course Labour deserve to get battered- 10 years of economic prosperity, low unemployment and inflation, extra investment in schools, police and hospitals, total crime down. They deserve to be punished.
And with economic growth expected to continue, people in the UK getting more prosporous, low unemployment and inflation, with continued investment in our public services, and standards rising, and the architect of our stable economic growth due to be PM, they are surely facing electoral meltdown. The public have had enough of this sheer incompetence.
You Tories are all getting sillier and more exciteable by the day. The British public collectively have far more common sense than the Tories . They do like to give governments mandates during electoral cycles, but during general elections will vote in their own interests, and unless the economy declines into doom and gloom (much hoped by partisan wealthy Tories) will probably stick with Labour.
8&27.Mike & Marcia, these stories do not surprise me as much as they should. Is there a record for the longest it has taken to declare a result?
Considering the problems that they had getting some of the ballot boxes to the Highland count how can Mike’s Mayoral election result still not be in?
Mike though the Bedford web site doesn’t seem to give results - their link doesn’t work, results now on the BBC. Conservatives gain 2 and Lib Dem gain 1 - both from others. Mayor re-elected but no figures that I can find.
Mike- have to say your lead today shows a bit of OCD anti Labour traits. A bit of rounding- that is all.
Look at Andy Cooke- his Sego and Sarkozy predictions somehow do not tally. Easily done comrade Smithson.
36.Considering the leaked memo from Labour on how to spin the election results some of the suggestions are sounding hilarious now when you look at the political landscape. It has not stopped them from trotting out the line though.
Listening to sky news paper review last night was the worst example, the editor of the New Statesman seemed to imply that the tories only did well in the South and that the Conservatives could win a GE with just that part of the country!
Labour lost twice as many seats in England as the Lib Dems - both had similar numbers at the start. Labour lost seats in Wales and Scotland. Labour have had a bad election -perhaps they should change their leader!
One silver lining in the electoral chaos clouds, at least they’ll have to go back to trusted methods rather than have the postal voting/electronic counting farce. having seen them bring the whole system into disrepute and put the whole result in question that idea of ‘progress’ is as dead as a very dead dodo.
It is, isn’t it? They aren’t aren’t so arrogant and out of touch to try it again?
Are they?
So we’re arguing about deciimal points! This is taking nerdery beyond the call of duty!
Incidentally I just got a very funny email from Scotland. The mood seems to be that those too stupid to read the voting papers-which I understand were simple enough for most ten year old-have called into question Scottish education!! They’re saying it’s brought shame on the nation!!
It would be good to have Jack back. We need his humour badly
Re 17, Mike,thanks for the info and well done Tim.
Witan listen carefully to the Daily Mirror. Kevin Maguire, their political editor, looks destined for Downing Street as Gordon Brown’s spin doctor.
Re 29, Stonch, our activists are getting younger as our voters in Mid Sussex, what is more the LD’s councilors are all getting old! (Well, most are anyway)
44 - Perhaps you should speek to a few more people before deciding what the public mood in Scotland is. I can’t speak for other Scottish posters but a number of people I’ve spoken to are really pissed off and not one of them has patronised those who got it wrong by blaming it on stupidity.
The system was made needlesly complex, not enough information was given before hand and they should never have held council and parliament elections on the same day.
46 - Judging by his regular comments on Radio 5 you would have thought he’d started allready.
46 blue moon Maguire has said he does not want the job…….. Apparently Brown wants a Frank Luntz rater than a Campbell.
44.”I understand were simple enough for most ten year old-have called into question Scottish education!!”
That is right Roger, you bring all these voting changes in at once. Put a cross here, a number there and then throw a new counting system into the mix. One observer yesterday noted that they were giving training on the job during the night as to how to interpret rejected papers.
As for blaming the education system, well I can’t say that I am impressed with standards these days but Labours “statistics” are impressive.
As I pointed out on an earlier thread just to get 100,000 spoilt ballot papers into perspective. “Wonder what would happen if the UK GE result ever came down to 100,000 votes in a bunch of key marginals, nay could not happen could it??????”
BBC says total Cons gain 882 now. Any chance of 900? Who is yet to declare?
Incedently the Conservative party now has more councils in the North of England than Labour, more councilors in the North West than Labour and more MSP’s than the Liberal Democrats, twice as many AM’s as the LD’s.
We are the largest group in Birmingham and Brighton and Hove, we have taken Plymouth Labour and Torbay (well done Marcus and team).
No doubt some fools will still spin the lie that the Conservatives are the party of the south or south east!
48.Max, I have to say that all anyone can talk about is the voting fiasco.
Phone yesterday in Scotland was interesting. First person stopped on the street in Aberdeen said they had already realised that they voted incorrectly, and the 2nd did not receive their postal ballot but had to help a neighbour fill their one in because it was confusing!!
Re 51, Test, there can’t be any more left can there? I left the count at Mid Sussex at 9.45 PM after what I thought was the longest count in the country!
Isn’t it true that something like 98% of voters got it right? Wouldn’t this suggest that it wasn’t the complexity? Any time anyone has to fill in any kind of a form some will get it wrong. Maybe some don’t speak the language so anything that needs a written explanation will cause problems?
were the Scottish mistakes on the second vote, on the first or on both?
Labour are just simply liars - the SNP win the popular vote in Scotland they are the party the Scots want. In the 2005 GE the Tories narrowly won the popular vote in England but got a Labour government and Labour think this is a mandate for government? Please give England her Parmiament back even if that means independence.
PS who would benefit if the 100000 Scots votes were not spoilt - my gut feeling is the SNP.
53 - Apparently one elderly man filled in his voting paper in front of the officials in the polling station to ensure he was doing it correctly. The whole thing was shambolic.
The worst thing is that it was recommended by the Arbuthnot commission that local elections be held on a seperate day but this wasn’t listened to for purely selfish reasons.
49 On reflection ‘rater’ is probably more accurate than ‘rather’.
The more I hear and read about the Labour operation the more I wonder why this spin about Brown-the-Brilliant-Operator comes from.
Blair won elections: he used Brown as a human shield while the latter’s reputation was high to win an election in 2005 but was Brown really in charge of the campaign after ousting Milburn or did he just think he was?
Brown’s petulance in the Scottish election about forbidding extra powers to the Scottish Parliament if the SNP won also shows a lack of judgement and sensitivity, and the inevitable conceit of someone who now believes his own spin about his powers and skill?
Wasn’t the count stopped in Scotland somewhere.
Well after all the adrenaline - when are the next opinion polls out?
Not sure where Breckland is but from their website:
“Notice regarding Breckland District and Town and Parish Elections
The Council will continue the count for the above elections on Tuesday 8th May at 11am. All ballot papers will be securely stored over the Bank Holiday period. The count will take place at Elizabeth House, Walpole Loke, Dereham, Norfolk NR19 1EE.
The Council apologises for any inconvenience caused to our residents. We would like to thank all of our staff who were involved today for their hard work and support. We would also like to thank the candidates and agents for their patience and support today.
Keith Davis
Chief Executive and Returning Officer
Breckland Council”
re 40 & 44. In the past I have attacked both Tory and Lib Dem politicians for mis-representing numbers. Charles Kennedy, Ming Campbell, David Davis and IDS are all culprits who have been attacked in the same terms on this site. If Cameron does it he will incur my wrath as well.
55 - About 5% of votes were spoiled compared to 0.8% in 2003 and in 1 in 6 constituencies the majority was less than the number of spoiled votes.
Imagine if that was to happen in the next Westminster elections and one party beat the other by 1 seat!
56.Andrea as I understand it the STV system for the locals did not have the same problems as the Holyrood system, but then I think that who ever took the decision to introduce so many changes at once is the culprit.
Although Roger might not think that 2% of the people who actually made the effort to vote not getting their voice heard is a small price to pay and their own fault, me I think it is a bloody shame for democracy. And the concerns and warning about what actually developed on the night were well documented before hand and so those in charge can’t even say use the defence “on hindsight” these problems should have been addressed.
Breckland council had 42 Conservative Councillors and no Lib Dems!
37. Tyson, an impressive list. Don’t forget the minimum wage, tax credits and gay rights reform. A necessary counter-balance to the Conservative euphoria today.
I think that you would agree with me, when I say that the country would be in worse shape now if the Conservatives had been in power these last 10 years. The problem for me is that IMHO the Labour government have been very poor in ABSOLUTE terms. They really are only the “lesser of two evils.”
Don’t be shy to admit to the failures of this administration: Iraq and the mythical “War on Terror”, Europe, Devolution (incredibly badly handled), Pensions, wastage of taxpayers money on consultants/ domes/ olympics /other white elephants, timidity of reform in public services, letting the Right-wingers control the Immigration debate, Sleaze from the “whiter than white” party etc. etc
OK - so John Major’s government was worse, and would probably have carried on being worse. But don’t you find it just a little dispiriting having to defend a party on the basis of “We not very good, but at least we are not as bad as the others”? I do, and I find it very difficult to vote on that negative basis.
As a Labour activist, I think it’s time to go back to giving postal ballots only for those who are away, or infirm. Without the secrecy of the polling booth, there’s just too much scope for pressure or intimidation. I know someone who voted one way when her parents wanted her to vote the other way. In the secrecy of the polling booth (even with her father looking from across the room) she was able to do so. It would have been a different story with a postal vote.
Apart from the stories of imams telling people how to vote in inner cities, what about all those parents in the Home Counties who’ve probably threatened to disinherit their offspring if they don’t vote Conservative?
I would be interested to know what the combined spoilt ballots and figures for those who did not receive their ballot papers in time were?
Oh for the good old days when you just wandered into a polling station and put your cross in one of the boxes, it was old fashioned and simple but it meant that everyone got their say and mistakes were kept to a minimum. You have to hand it to Labour in just 10 years they have managed to undermine and break our confidence in the voting system with their continued meddling of something that was never broken.
Re 61, Icarus, what a c*ck up! I thought 13 hours was long, but two days! What a shambles!
58
‘The worst thing is that it was recommended by the Arbuthnot commission that local elections be held on a seperate day but this wasn’t listened to for purely selfish reasons’.
Presumably the reason for ignoring this advice was Labour thought their were advantages for them with the new shambolic system.
Last year widespread postal vote fraud,this year 100,000 discarded ballots in Scotland,the banana republic is becoming a reality.
Hopefully one of GB’s new eye catching initiatives will be to book UN election monitors to supervise next year’s elections in the UK.
64. Chris, I was looking at Glasgow council results and there were mpre than 200 rejected papers per ward. and the majority was for “Voting for More Than One Candidate”.
Re 65, Icarus, a Lib Dem free zone, fantastic!
Re 67, Richard what about those who have socialist leaning parents who would disown them if they voted Conservative? It works both ways!
Either way it is wrong, and my LD opponents and I agree that postal votes for all is a bad idea!
71.Thanks Andrea, I did not see the figures but was listening to the BBC Scotland coverage of the story which implied there were less problems. Why am I not surprised at the figures you give, remember we could not find any figures for the spoilt ballots in the 2003 locals to compare them after the result on Thursday.
In Craigton ward in Glasgow, once the tories were eliminated (stage 7), just 3 candidates were left in the game: 2 Lab and 1 Solidarity. The Solidarity woman got more transfers from the Tory’s elimination than the Lab candidates
(ok, the majority were not transferable votes)
what annoys me more is interviewers who are so ill prepared that they encourage the politicians to lie.
Andrea as I understand it voters didn’t seem to have trouble ranking the voters in the local elections. The trouble came in the Parliamentary ballots because voters were stupidly given one ballot paper for both votes. There was one side for each vote with the FPTP vote on the left and the list vote on the right. The voter was reminded that he/she had two votes with two arrows pointing to the different sides of the ballot. Then underneath that there was in smaller letters on each side a reminder that it was only one vote on either side. It appears that voters saw the two votes advice and typically voted twice for FPTP candidates without differentiating the order of preference and not at all for the list vote. One of the two votes could have counted if the voter had put 1 or 2 in the box to indicate preference because counting officers were supposed to try to ‘determine the intent of the voter’ but if, for the sake of example, you put a cross against the SNP candidate and one also against the LD candidate both would have to be disregarded because no one could tell which was your preference. Of course any undervote was lost because the list vote side was blank! Some may also have voted twice on both sides and fallen foul of the same problem. There were also complaints that counting staff were inconsistent in allowing or disallowing particular marks in the box. Although you were instructed to put a cross other marks could count if your intention was clear enough. In the old pencil and paper days returning officers would gather together the election agents and go through the dubious ballot papers with them. Usually people were pretty reasonable about it. This time I guess there were so many that all the decisions were being taken arbitrarily by counting staff leading to accusations of bias by some Party supporters.
Aberdeen Central had a re-count (according BBC). Was it the only seat with a recount?
May I take a stab in the dark on the matter of vote share that I freely admit I am no expert on.
The Conservatives have fielded a greater % of candidates than the other 2 parties and relative to their councillor base the LDs have fielded a greater % than Labour.
If the vote share is calculated only in wards where all 3 field a candidate then if Labour retreat to their core areas would they not be artificially inflating their vote share? Likewise the Conservatives maybe diluting their vote share and the LDs vote share is actually slightly better than Labour’s not 1% worse?
Could the real picture be C 42%, Labour 24% and LD 27%?
I agree with what most others say about postal voting, different voting systems, and electronic counting.
Why do some people believe that making something more complex makes it more efficient? Prior to 2000, you needed a good reason to have a postal vote, electoral fraud was miniscule, spoilt ballots were miniscule, and manual counting was quick and efficient. Why change something which is simple, effective, and honest?
As to Scotland, it is obvious that the council elections should have been held on a different day.
77.blue moon, excellent summary of the actual problems. I knew how the system would work on the day, had a look to see how adequate the instructions were in the polling booth and thought them woeful considering the changes and the confusion which could arise.
“There were also complaints that counting staff were inconsistent in allowing or disallowing particular marks in the box.”
Afleitch also tried to point out this inconsistency yesterday and one or two other posters were quick to condemn him for mentioning his concerns!!!!
79 What makes the projected vote share exercise so artificial in this round of elections is that only a minority of the seats actually see contests between all three main parties. Many contests in the Shires are just between two parties, or one party and a minor party, or independent.
Overall figures for gains and losses give a much better picture.
As far as our activist not travelling as much to campaign it is little to do with age and more do with being involved in their local community and not just seeing their political activity as a mission. It is something that they mostly do as part of where they live - not the thing that defines them.
79 very interesting analysis
Take Northamptonshire the LibDems did well but only where they stood - 44 in Northampton, only 15 elsewhere in the whole county. So what gains they had were at the expense of not fighting at all elsewhere and targetting. Tories fought across the county and Labour over most towns at least.
I am sure that our real vote share was above 40%.
Perhaps a cchq boffin is crunching the numbers even now to get actual vote share that can then be translated to notional national.
82.”What makes the projected vote share exercise so artificial in this round of elections is that only a minority of the seats actually see contests between all three main parties”
but the projected figures are made using a sample of wards. I suppose they tried to make it as much representative as possible.
Even if Labour has not contested many wards in Con heartlands, there should be enough Con safe seats with Lab present to use them in a sample.
Some weeks ago Sean Fear asked Lab and LD posters, what would they have voted in straight Con/UKIP contests as there were some of them in areas where Lab (and LD) were weak. Sean, do you know who won them?
Bedford: Mayoral election
Despite what Mike S previously described as “the best leaflet he has ever seen” and an enormous (and expensive) campaign, the LDs lost (again) to an independent. Not for the first time, the good people of the town have shown their spirit of independence. I am sure they will do the same at the next general election. Get your bets on now.
ChrisD I’m not taking sides on whether counting staff were fair or unfair, simply making the point that if there are a lot of dubious ballots the stakes get higher and, almost inevitably, counting agents are under great scrutiny as a result. In a sense every time they made a decision they were casting votes just as much as voters coming to the polls. Even if inconsistent treatment of different papers was inadvertent Party supporters are not necessarily going to give them the benefit of the doubt.
I’ve just checked the BBC website. With 310 councils counted, the tories have more councillors that ALL the other parties plus independents/RA added together:
ie Conservatives: 5215
Everyone Else: 5100
(Libdem 2159, Labour 1857, other 1084)
Since one of the two remaining councils is Warwick where there were boundary changes so all seats were up for election and last time had 14 labour 9 libdems and 6 others I reckon the tories have a chance of 900 gains.
88, fingers crossed!
88. But the Tories don’t have councillors in Liverpool and Manchester and therefore had a terrible night…. *yawn*
Re 40, 62. I also heard this on the Today programme this morning and was suprised that it wasn’t challenged. Mike is right. The SNP won on the share of the vote, no matter how you round the results. And although I’m no fan of the SNP, there is an important symbolism in gaining the greatest share of the vote.
I do agree with Nick Palmer’s earlier comments that the PR system did its job relatively well of the seats reflecting the the share of the vote. However, in terms of the system, that there were so many ’spoilt’ ballot papers is truly appalling. Whether it changed the outcome of the election - perhaps the smaller parties were hurt slightly? perhaps not - is arguable. What is definitely relevent is that a) it will impact of people’s trust in the electoral system and b) that the practicalities of the vote - ie should the region and constituency votes be on the same ballot paper etc. etc. - are important to get right.
If people are confused by the act of voting, and find it hard to cast their ballot, in the long run this can only have a negative effect on turnout. There is a lot to be said by keeping the act of voting as simple as possible - even if this means that the administration of the election, the counting etc, is more complex. I may be alone in this, but I do think the “polling station experience” is important. Did anyone else in Scotland find such small things as being told not to fold your ballot papers, not using ‘traditional’ ballot boxes, somehow symbolically grating?
People shouldn’t be arguing about such things as electoral cock-ups - they should be debating the toss about real issues, pros and cons of local income tax, energy policy etc. etc. etc.
85 in our district council where it was Conservative v UKIP the Cons won 6:1 against UKIP ( candidate also stood for Parish Council and didn’t make it there either - think UKIP against her name on DC election damaged her chances as PC is non-political).
Benedict - Conservatives in charge of the council - count cock up - probably just a coincidence but …..
Just wanted to say thanks very much to Mike and Robert Smithson for all their hard work on this site over the last few days. It has been a tremendously exciting election, particularly in Scotland, enhanced greatly by the betting opportunities and the articles and threads on PBC. I gain far more insights from PBC than BBC nowadays. Uncle Smithson has supplanted Auntie in my book. I’ve no idea how much hard work does go into running this site but I imagine its considerable.
94 Agreed - I have had a great two days - shame we did not get to the recent bash - 2 of us bought tickets but work stopped us going - Great Fun - thanks.
85 It would be handy if the indicatd how they come up with this projection. My understanding (which may be completely wrong) is that they have always based the projection on a sample of wards contested by all three of the big parties.
Dont wait for Warwick. It appears they were another pilot for electronic counting of some sort and it appears to be another grade 1 fiasco.
The count has been suspened until may 8th
See:
http://www.warwickdc.gov.uk/WDC/Council_x2c_+government+and+democracy/Elections/Elections+2007.htm
My take on Mid Sussex has this headline, “Labour keep their head whilst all about them lose their’s!”
You can find it here:
http://aconservatives.blogspot.com/
Wow elections are hard work. Turnout in Mid Sussex was up. What about else where?
(It was down earlier in the day but picked up as the day went on!
94 ditto, the BBC is so left wing,I end up turning off the Telly, they just spout New Labour spin IMHO.
One can imagine a scenario with David Cameron winning the 2010 election with say a majority of 25, the BBC will still be telling us that it’s hardly a sweeping endorsement………
96.”My understanding (which may be completely wrong) is that they have always based the projection on a sample of wards contested by all three of the big parties. ”
That was my assumption too. And that’s why the number of uncontested wards shouldn’t have a great impact (if a safe Con ward hasn’t Lab this time, they can simply pick another safe Con ward with Lab present in its place in the sample)
87.Blue moon, I agree but as I pointed out in an earlier thread one observer felt that the counting staff were being trained on the job. I think that different interpretations of the rejected ballots in different counts would cause party political interpretations to occur.
97. From the Warwick Council website:
“The councils used electronic scanning technology to count ballot papers for their elections, and shared counting venues.
The Department of Constitutional Affairs (DCA) will be looking to the councils to provide further evidence about the benefits of automating the counting process”
Hmm. This is why I say keep voting simple and don’t mess around with it. We’re having postal voting fiascos, electronic counting fiascos, 100,000 ballot papers rejected in Scotland…
Why oh why has this government presided over such chaos, yet taken so little notice? It is damaging democracy in a nation where the simple polling booth and cross on a piece of paper worked fine for generations.
Thanks New Labour.
90. of course this has absolutely nothing to do with conservative voters voting tactically for Libdem to keep out labour. Its well known that Manchester and Salford between them elect enough Labour MPs to form a majority..shurely shome mishtake
Of course the tories winning a record 10 seats in Salford is not worth mentioning.
However, the problem with the BBC’s projections is that, because of the high number of uncontested seats, those where there were three-party battles might well be unrepresentative of the wards as a whole. All in all, I’m not convinced by them.
Breckland District Council
Breckland council will use electronic scanning technology to count ballot papers for its elections.
The use of electronic counting will provide further evidence about the benefits of automating the counting process.
South Bucks council will pilot remote Internet and telephone voting, during the week before polling day and on polling day itself. South Bucks council will also use electronic scanning technology to count ballot papers for its elections, specifically using commercially available scanning hardware.
Stratford and Warwick councils will use electronic scanning technology to count ballot papers for its elections, and will work together to utilise shared counting venues covering the combined area of the two authorities.
The use of electronic counting will provide further evidence about the benefits of automating the counting process, and in particular this pilot scheme will enable us to assess the processes and potential economies of scale available where authorities combine to carry out the counting of ballot papers.
These councils, who have not managed to produce results, were amongst 12 trial councils - sounds like the trial was complete failure - back to the drawing board.
Baxter gives the conservatives a 96 majority on 41/27/26 which seems a little low given that similar figures were obtained in the ‘83 election where they got a 140 majority.
70 john you are not alone in this thought. See this cartoon today.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/index.jhtml;jsessionid=GXOAPSA3RVRXNQFIQMGSFGGAVCBQWIV0
Breckland are also not resuming counting until may 8th
Re my 94. I was referring to the astute political insights and betting opportunities found in Mike’s articles and from some contributors in the threads. I didn’t mean to suggest for a moment that the many “barking” views expressed here by some were more representative of the real world than as reported by Auntie.
Re 96 Sean Fear ”My understanding (which may be completely wrong) is that they have always based the projection on a sample of wards contested by all three of the big parties. ”
Re Andrea “That was my assumption too. And that’s why the number of uncontested wards shouldn’t have a great impact (if a safe Con ward hasn’t Lab this time, they can simply pick another safe Con ward with Lab present in its place in the sample).
Thanks Sean and Andrea for the response.
But if in all the results there are more 3 party contests where the Conservatives are standing paper candidates then the chances of those paper candidates appearing in the sample must increase. Hence why the vote share result is diluted. 10% more candidates could easily dilute vote share by 1%.
“Richard what about those who have socialist leaning parents who would disown them if they voted Conservative?”
Exactly! You hope that their upbringing will lead them to make the right choices……..but before you know it they start going to gymkhanas and getting in with the wrong crowd….and you notice them wearing pleated skirts with blue cardigans and carrying burberry handbags………and going out with boys called Robin…
It’s at this point that the ugly word disinheritance first gets mentioned……..
re 93 & n94. Thanks to all for their supportive comments. elections are when this site comes into its own. I am only sorry that I did not “slim down” the site earlier enough overnight Thursday-Friday. The demand was massive and I had real problems getting in myself to create new threads.
On the next big election night I’m planning to have automated new threads ready to be published at critical times throughout the night.
A big problem on Thursday was that I took some pictures at a polling station in Bedford and published a couple of them. I liked the one of the presiding officer trying to put up his polling station sign in a high wind. Alas the pictures took up a mass of memory which was loaded and being re-loaded time and time again as users were refreshing the pages.
I have not seen the precise figures yet but I’m pretty certain that this was our busiest period ever.
Thanks to everybody for their contributions.
Re 111, Roger,
Oops. Accidentally posted this next door.
BTW, I haven’t seen it mentioned on here, but apparently the man who attacked ballot boxes in Edinburgh with a golf club was John Swinburne, outgoing and unsuccessfully re-elected MSP for the Senior Citizens’ Unity Party…
Puts Afleitch’s hissy fit into perspective…
by Chrisco May 5th, 2007 at 2:05 pm
I find national vote share projections, let alone the spin industry that grows up around them, very suspect.
The basic methodology is more alchemy than statistical science. What is a typical ward in even the very recent past may not be so typical now. So is it really more valid than an uncorrected opinion poll? Surely that is why the pre-election predictions from Plymouth have been wrong in the last two sets of locals?
Additionally, any projection from these local elections would be difficult to validate as it would be almost impossible to account for the influence of really local factors: swimming pool sales for example.
Local elections, even for the Scottish and Welsh parliaments, are environments where people may allow themselves the luxury of voting very differently than they would for the UK parliament. How many Scottish Tories and Trots voted SNP to get Labour out. Would they vote the same way in a GE? Will the swimming poll be as important in a GE?
I doubt very much that the actual as opposed to notional Conservative vote share was much higher than 38% The number of gains masks the disparity in the smaller rural more Conservative areas/wards and the much larger urban wards . For example in the corresponding 2003 elections . in the district councils 5.5 million votes elected nearly 8,000 councillors the actual Conservative vote share was 39.4% .
In the Unitary councils 1.9 million votes elected 1.625 councillors the Conservative vote share being 32.5% and in the Mets 2.6 million votes elected only 836 councillors with a Conservative vote share of 26.0%
The overall Conservative vote share in England was 34.6% in 2003 , I expect it will be 3-4% higher when all the calculations are done this year but not hitting 40% .
107. Witan I believe that there were monitors from other countries observing the new system up here. I am just imagining their reports about how the mighty have fallen when it comes to being able to preside over safe, simple and honest elections.
116. Stellar performance by your lot in Newport East a real one for the future now. Provided MG resists the lure of ministerial cars. How did Mont majority compare to previous occasion.
Tom Watson has announced he is supporting Jon Cruddas for Deputy Leader. I wonder how many people he’ll bring with him. As a Brownite, it will send signal out to the party that Gordon can work with Cruddas and that there’s interest in his ideas on rebuilding the party (if from self-interesed position if nothing else). Did anyone see the piece contrasting Blears with Cruddas on Newsnight last night? I thought it was a little cruel of them to have a woman with a ridiculous north-western accent read out Blears’ letter to the FT.
This weeks Tribune also reported that Johnson, Cruddas and Harman have enough MPs to be assured of being on the ballot paper, but Hain, Benn and Harman are still canvassing for support.
Yesterday The Sun reported that Harriet Harman was taking out a 10k loan to finance her campaign. Not a good sign really and slightly ironic considering her husband’s criticism of the Labour Party’s dependency on loans during the cash for peerage row.
119.”Yesterday The Sun reported that Harriet Harman was taking out a 10k loan to finance her campaign. ”
well, she had just Ken Follett giving her money.
Oh and Guido has laid his hands on Peter Hain’s campaign budget and expenditure and published it. Goodness knows where he gets this stuff from Hain’s team on - they really should sort out the leaks. Looks like Hain has a fair bit of cash though.
Interesting to read the comments about postal voting and electronic counting. I imagine there were some mutterings among all parties about the lateness of the results as well. Picture the next general election if nothing is changed before then, particularly if it’s combined with the Euros. So the polls have closed…what..no election night programme? No, it’s next week.
Just found the election results pages from the Guardian in May 1995.
The Conservatives lost 1,750 seats, Labour gained 1,200, the Lib Dems 300 and the others the rest.
Now that’s what I call a general election winning performance…
123. If you want a majority of 180+ yes. I think Cameron might settle for 25-50 don’t you think.
There’s only a limited amount comparisons with Labour in the 1992 Parliament can tell you. The Conservative collapse of those years, like the Conservative landslides of 1967 and 1968, were highly unusual shifts which can’t be expected every time an Opposition is putting on real steam. The worst news for the Tories is that it’s simply taken ten long years to get to this point.
Remembering that we had discussed the losses that Labour would sustain in Scotland due to the STV system (which would be not reflected in the numbers we’ve been bandying about for the English councils), I’ve had a wander through the results for the Scottish councils - and it’s not as bad as feared for Scottish Labour.
I seem to recall about 150-200 seats loss being mooted as the correct loss for Labour merely moving to STV. Actual figures for Scotland (assuming my arithmetic holds up this afternoon - no-one look at my earlier Seg prediction, please
):
Con: +26
Lab: -135
LD: -11
SNP: +181
Giving overall GB councillor changes (Wales did not have local elections, I believe) of:
Con: +911
Lab: -627
LD: -254
(Awaiting 2 councils results)
Assuming no change to overall councillor numbers (which would probably not be the case, but will give an accurate close-order-of-magnitude estimate) and assuming the two remaining councils were “no change”, total GB councillor numbers (and percentage of all councillors) should be:
Con: 9,393 (43%)
Lab: 5,478 (25%)
LD: 4,454 (20%)
SNP/PC: 549 (3%)
Others: 2,018 (9%)
That’s the largest percentage of GB councillors for the Tories since 1980, the lowest percentage of GB councillors for Labour since before the earliest date on the research paper I’ve got (goes back to 1973) - even worse than 1978 - and the highest PC/SNP percentage ever (albeit rather fortunately rounded up). For the Lib Dems, it’s actually nothing particularly dramatic - still above pre-1995 days and Labour can take some satisfaction that they are still not as low as the lowest Tory shares of 1995/6/7/8 (In 1996, they dipped down to 19% of GB councillors).
Institutional bias might not be the main problem with the BBC. Laziness and inefficiency also play their part.
1. Under-prepared interviewers (see 76, above)
2. Sticking doggedly to predictions throughout the night when it
is obvious they are not working.
3. Using a film clip and commentary, recorded early in the
morning, when Tory gains seem average, in late evening news
without any alteration. All this despite the wealth and
resources of the BBC.
We have final vote shares yet.
123 and 124, The Conservatives went into the 1995 elections, starting from a much higher base than Labour were starting from on May 3rd.
Can’t do in England, until Breckland, Warwick and Stratford are in - which won’t be until Tuesday.
Re. 73, I agree, it’s always wrong, no matter which party is the beneficiary.
What impact will all the chaos have on suggestions by some of Brown’s plan to bring in Alternative Vote for the next General Election? (!)
126. Any idea of the council 1st pref vote shares?
Mark Senior May I ask if you have reviewed your methodology of forecasting local elections from the previous year’s by elections as you forecast 100 LD gains Vs the 300 LD losses that Sky report for the UK.
It does seem that my view stated on here shortly before this election was more correct, that because the LDs were defending half their seats, they just did not have the advantage they have at by elections of concentrating their resources.
But I was wrong on the scale of the LD losses and forecast only -100. I realise I did pay some attention to your writings on the subject.
Part of the problem with this list system is that unless, as the SNP did, you advertise the list vote as being some kind of vote for First Minister, voters tend to view it as of secondary importance. People are always going to consider the ‘x’ they put in the box for the constituency to be their first vote when, in reality, it is their second.
It is early days, but the fairly successful implementation of STV at the council level is a good indicator of its potential for use at Holyrood.
132
Kick it into the long grass where it belongs.
130. Why.
Alan Johnson’s team have issued a letter in the Guardian with 52 peers supporting his bid for deputy.
‘We believe Alan Johnson is that person. Alan is the ideal complement to Gordon Brown. He has significant cabinet-level experience and has proved himself in parliament. From a genuine working-class background, Alan has broad electoral appeal and a strong vision for the future of the party.’
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/labour/story/0,,2073061,00.html
Peers have the same weighting of votes as any other members so this is of limited signifcance. That said some will carry more influence than others. Among the peers is Andrew Adonis one of the most reviled ministers within the party. Not sure that’s a big help to Alan but we’ll see.
135
‘It is early days, but the fairly successful implementation of STV at the council level is a good indicator of its potential for use at Holyrood.’
I thought the concensus was anything but successful.
HF My forecast was not based on council byelection results but on what I thought the Parties would poll in the actual result . I had thought as did many that Labour would poll worse and LibDems better , even so with the actual notional figures given by the BBC for Thursday I would not have forecast 250ish losses . I believe the bulk of those were in a relatively small number of councils which masked what would have been expected to happen from the actual swings that occurred but I am working on analysing the results to find out .
71. Not 200 spoiled in every ward Andrea.
1.5%-2% spoiled ballots on the first run-out of a new and admittedly more complicated voting system is acceptable I would have thought.
141. Chrisco, I said “more than 200 rejected papers per ward”, not in every ward. The Glasgow average should be 214.52 rejected papers per ward. Naturally some have just 130 whilst others have 290 rejected papers
77. blue moon, I am led to believe that most of the double votes went in the list section, which was on the left.
142. But as you always like to remind us Andrea, it is all about the percentages.
The luddites are out in force today
“Technology not properly tested before use by overzealous local government officers” is the story. We are in the learning phase with this technology and not managing it very well. It is a human issue, not the technology.
Personally I hope I never have to go to a voting booth again, as I don’t go to the bank, supermarket,post office for my road tax, travel agent, car and house insurance broker etc etc. All of which require a high level of security. I can use the time for more pleasurable things.
Does anybody think we will not be doing it all electronically in 20 years time. The positive thing to do is get in there and make it work, so that we can gbet voting levels up
139. On the contrary John - the problems were with the Holyrood ballots.
144. Oh, yeah, Chrico, but I was too lazy to work out Glasgow spoiled papers %
In Glasgow in the majority of wards the first 4 (or 3 in 3 members wards) after first preferences were also the ones elected in the end. In very few occasions someone managed to come from the behind.
In Baillieston, I guess SNP told to vote Mason as number 1
Ok thanks Chrisco.
66, Gladstone.
Yes, John Major’s government was a disaster compared to New Labour. I mean, the cones hotline, how could they? Thank God we now have a government whose worst error is just invading a foreign country, illegally, and helping to kill 600,000 people.
Phew!
That’s normally the case in a 3-seater, but the difference with multi-member FPTP is that they are now not all Labour!
Another one talking **** is John Curtice saying the Tories made no progress in Wales since last time, I think he’s mixing GE with WA. Any case no way are the Welsh press saying that, not with the performance they had in seats like Gower and Vale of Clwyd. I think his personal politics are incresingly colouring his psephologicalk viewpoint.
147. I was going to, but my connection is a bit slow and it was taking too long to download and unzip all the full data sets.
141.”1.5%-2% spoiled ballots on the first run-out of a new and admittedly more complicated voting system is acceptable I would have thought.”
I will try that argument out on some of the various people who have expressed anger at the joke our democratic process became on Thursday.
Benedict: I tried to post to your blog unsuccessfully (probably stupidity on my part). It was actually a long waffle, but in summary it was:
From a LD - hard luck, I think we could have put up with just more loss, but I’m not sure what your LD opponent would think of my treachery!
150. Chrisco, have you analyzed in details the Glasgow results? If so, do you think SNP could have got more seats if they had stood more candidates?
153. But that had nothing to do with STV ChrisD.
155. Browsed them rather than analysed them.
153. Are you trying to argue that it is more democratic that 8 non-Labour councillors get elected in Glasgow under FPTP (2003) than that 2% of voters didn’t fully understand how STV works on its first outing?
Oh no! Three posts in a row. Officially time to go and do something else…
I guess the Greens are satisfied with their Glasgow council performance. But are the Libdems and Tory totals there in line with expectations or not?
Having a look now…
156. Chrisco, on Thursday we had the well highlighted perfect voting “fiasco” And while the powers that be sat up in Holyrood pontificating and planning new innovative or interesting ways to play around with proportional representation or counting methods what did the voter want on Thursday?
They just wanted either their postal ballot to turn up on time, or to go into a polling booth and know that a simple cross on their ballot paper would end up going in the pile of the candidate of their choice.
Some might argue that 1.5-2% spoilt ballots is acceptable while their preferred voting system is implemented, but I think the erosion of trust in our voting system is too high a price to pay.
After the mess that was made of building a simple functional parliament within an acceptable budget why am I surprised at this level of incompetence and lack of ability to heed the warnings.
114 - I saw that in the Guardian, but the BBC reported it was a 36-year-old man…
this from the BBC looks like the beginning of the end. Its only when its denied that you can be sure it is true.
“Sir Menzies Campbell’s future as Liberal Democrat leader is not under threat following Thursday’s election results, frontbench colleagues insist.”
Labour crack me up - It has been mentioned on here before by me that in England the Tories outpolled Labour in 2005 in England yet got many less seats. I was told indirectly that i was one of the tories moaning about the result - What does this make the Labour party? Whilst not saying that the tories should form the UK govt, this seems a very stange strategy the Labour party have adopted.
The Labour Lib Dem coalition were defeated full stop!!! Now the SNP may try and do a deal with the Lib Dem’s but i doubt it will work. I think Labour are showing there arrogance and lack of strategy - If they carry on like this they will end up with a total mess. It has GB’s fingerprints all over this!!!
162. You are eliding two things Chris. If there had been no fiasco with the Holyrood vote, 2% spoiled votes in the local elections would not have been given an inch of newspaper space.
134,140 Mark Senior’s methodology would seem to need review, given his inappropriate, inaccurate and unhelpful predictions.
Mark is also quick to accuse others of ramping and exaggerating their party’s chances on pb.
So, after Mark has had his refresher course on basic numeracy, I’d suggest a course on inter-personal skills or negiotiating that allows him to see matters from more than one side.
Being a list candidates with chances of success depending on FPTP results must be hard for someone. I mean, on one hand being elected probably is pleasant for anyone; on the other hand many of them have their party’s best interests at hearth too.
In some cases candidates have just to “hope” that their party will lose some constituencies to get them elected.
I feel that there is an awful lot more to look at in these elections before we go predicting anything at all in terms of the General Election.
Of course the biggest imponderable is the likely level of real tactical voting at the next GE, and there is also the extent to which Tory performances at local elections always outplays their support at General Elections in the same areas (percentage not totals).
Thus 40:26:27 could produce a large majority for the Tories without targeting and tactical voting or the massive incumbent effect which is building up in the UK (with the help of state money unfortunately). But the reality is that the projection of those percentages onto a General Election will give Tories significantly less, Labour more and who knows about the Lib Dems. Using Baxter with these percentages and the geographical polarisation both within and between regions is a lunatic idea.
On the constituency front, here in the northwest the Lib Dems are more than well on track for adding Warrington South to the present six seats held - they are absolutely massacring the opposition there. A Liverpool gain, an Oldham gain (or two - the Lib Dems won the aggregate vote in Oldham across three constituencies) and a Pendle gain are all seriously on the cards, though all will require work. Tories are on line for a few gains off Labour, but also a few near-misses on these figures in my view. They even went backwards in big chunks of the new Sefton Central, being up-ended over some silly lies about the bin-emptying system - while doing very well in nearby South Ribble.
In the other six seats presently held by themselves, Lib Dems made FURTHER gains this year off the Tories in each of Southport, Westmoreland/Lonsdale, Rochdale and Cheadle. In both Hazel Grove and Withington there are no Tory seats left to win, but the Lib Dems did take the former (long ago!) Tory stronghold of Chorlton from a Labour councillor.
How hypocritical Dave can have too much joy based on these reults is beyond me. Yes, there were huge tidal surges such as Bornemouth. But why are Lib Dems in the heart of England (Hinkley, Northampton, Oadby) able to cut through the Tories like butter this year? Why the Eastbourne Tory near-wipe-out? How come lib dems are still moving forward in Birmingham? Didn’t some Tories here once say that Chris Huhne’s seat would be heading down the plughole -wheras this year there are further Tory losses to the Lib Dems there?
We live in interesting times.
167 SEe previous thread I think.
156. Sorry Chrisco, but I just saw your post, the point I am trying to make is that introducing yet another system of proportional representation next to the changes in the Holyrood system was a mistake. The % of spoilt ballots in STV vs those in the Holyrood vote is immaterial to the many voters who now see the whole voting system in Scotland as a shambles.
In trying to make the system more representative the opposite effect has occurred with many now feeling more disenfranchised.
I think that what happened will actually end up weakening the case for PR across the UK.
On a personal note regarding STV, it might work in urban environments, but in my area I think that it has removed the “local” from councillors and made it much more easy for a “paper” candidate not even local to be elected.
Re 126, Andy Cooke, thanks for that summary! Interesting numbers.
169. “A Liverpool gain,”
Not a good set of local elections in Liverpool for the Libdems.
The PPC for Riverside lost his seat (his ward was in Wavertree constituency though)
Re 145, John Wheately, I could not disagree more. I also know that most of the LD’s I spoke to yesterday agree with me.
166 How does 100,000 spolied papers on 2 million votes become 2% - looks like 5% to me? 1 in 20 votes.
Just been watching the Army v. Navy at Twickenham. Who would have thought there were so many Fijians in the British armed forces !
Re 154, Kjh, many thanks for your support, but I doubt your party colleague would have shared your magnanimity!
I have to say we made the b*ggers work for every vote, dragging their people out all over the place!
151 Punter, I agree. The Conservatives have very clearly gone forward in Wales, much more so than their single net gain (list and constituencies) would seem to suggest.
Though it’s difficult comparing WA and GE, I’d say it was a better performance than in the 1992 GE, when they lost Pembrokeshire.
And the Vale of Clwyd and Gwyr results are particularly good. I was also surprised at how close both Tories and Lib Dems got in the two Newport Seats.
169.”How come lib dems are still moving forward in Birmingham?”
because they aren’t. Overall they were static even if there were more movements looking at wards in more details.
They gained Hodge Hill from Labour, but they lost Sparkbrook to Respect. They held Springfield (won by Labour last year when Lab was defending it. It was a 2 LD/1 Lab split ward in 2004). Labour held Bordesley Green (one of the postal fraud wards. 2 People’s Justice Party, 1 Lab; then the PJP merged with LDs and LDs held it last year. Labour up for election this time and they held it). Labour won Aston (the defending councillor was elected as LD, then became Indy and then Respect. Aston was the other “postal vote fraud” ward)
178. Gwynfa. As the Vale of Clywd was among the first seats to be declared and reports of good Con and LDs showing in Newport were immediately mentioned by BBC, at the beginning of the night, I thouhgt Labour was going to suffer a total meltdown. Then they saved themself thanks to a couple of very close finishing holds.
Interestingly the tories performed very well in ultra-marginals (Cardiff North being won by landslide) and some “outside” chanches (Newport West, VoC, Gower). They didn’t the same very good swings in VoG, Delyn and Bridgend. The VoG and Delyn results were still goodish (the Bridgend one wasn’t good at all for the tories), but not as good as others.
175. Because the 100k figure was in the Holyrood election and we are talking about STV.
171. If that is the case Chris then the Scottish experience is completely at odds with the Irish one, where elected officials have to do serious spadework since they are looking over their shoulder at not just opposition parties but also rivals within their own party. Under STV you need to be a hard worker, and not just a party hack.
Done some number crunching for Glasgow:
Labour SNP LD Con Sol SSP Other Green
81393 46185 15717 14217 9307 4161 5606 12183
43.12% 24.47% 8.33% 7.53% 4.93% 2.20% 2.97% 6.45%
45 22 5 1 1 0 1 5
Labour SNP LD Con Sol SSP Other Green
81393 46185 15717 14217 9307 4161 5606 12183
43.12% 24.47% 8.33% 7.53% 4.93% 2.20% 2.97% 6.45%
45 22 5 1 1 0 1 5
Andrea, if you speak to them who know in Birmingham, gaining Hodge Hill from Labour is far more significant than losing Sparkbrook to (lack of) ‘Respect’. When the real truth comes out about postal vote fraud some of these seats may also vote very differently.
Your comments about Liverpool also miss the main point - The ‘new’ Wavertree is much closer to the old Mossley Hill (Liberal held) and now that the ppc for Garston has also lost her seat, the Lib Dems will concentrate their effort against the weakest and most unpopular Labour MP whereas they divided their efforts previously.
But my posting was reflecting genuine opportunities, not trying to spin certainty, and was mainly an antidote to Tory triumphalism. I could have listed places where lib dems have underperformed this year - or I could have added these to where tories are not even treading water:
Why are Lib Dems on course to take Chelmsford next year, wht are they gaining from tories too in Spelthorne and North Herts? Why are Tories retreating further to Lib Dems in Solihull, Harrogate Berwick? Why are the Lib Dems holding up well in Guildford, wiping out Labour completely and preparing for a more effective third party squeeze there at the GE?
Why are Tories going nowhere in (margina-filled) Calderdale and Kirklees? Why can’t they even make a serious dent in North Norfolk, or gain a single seat in Cambridge? My point is that the Tories are winning by bucketloads this year in places where they already have the MP. if they cannot take Bury MBC (where nearly every council seat is a marginal) then what hope have they got of anything serious at a General Election? Their performance in the ‘battleground’ seats is more than a little patchy against the Lib Dems,and in some places against Labour too.
The Tories must be disappointed not to have done better, but their vote is too thinly spread and they can’t pick up transfers.
Yes Andrea, I think the SNP could have picked up a couple more seats by running two candidates in some wards such as Govan, as there was a reasonably high % transfer from Green, SSP and Solidarity in their direction.
177. Sadly Benedict it is the system.
With the exception of very few (Yellow Peril comes to mind!) I find that although I disagree with some of the views of the Tories who post on this site you all seem like intelligent, freindly, nice, decent people whom I could work with and be friends with. However my view of my local Tories is they are stupid, corrupt, devious, nasty people (with the possible exception of their agent who I have to say comes over as a decent guy). Basicly we hate them and they hate us.
Now that just doesn’t make any sense does it and from your post you experience the same sort of thing. It is the system that makes it happen and it is very sad.
As a consequence also some cracking good councillors (of all parties) lose their seats because they are in marginals and unfortuately party politcs blinds the voters and duffers who do b*gger all in safe seats hold their (of all parties). Unfortuately the personal vote only comes into effect when it is neck and neck.
Amongst our loses we lost a fantastic councillor. She got in last time because of her work for the community regardless of political allegience. It is really a Tory seat and the Tories kept 2, but she took one place on her personal vote. Because of the swing to the Tories this time she just lost out to complete unknowns. This isn’t a party political point as we will have done the same to good Tories in previous years and rejoiced. Hopefully the Tory replacement will be good, but he has one hell of an act to follow.
It get the impression you would have made a good councillor (and probably will in the future).
I think that Zebidee has it right (at 169). But it is not only in the North West that the Lib Dem vote has held up - or even improved - in seats which are crucial for further Lib Dem advances at the Parliamentary level.
With the possibly sole exception of Torbay, the results for the Lib Dems have been significantly better where they hold the Parliamentary seat. And they have also been very encouraging in key seats which they need to take from Labour and the Tories next time.
Cameron cannot count on taking a single Lib Dem seat. He is a loser.
181 Ok understand though I’d argue 2% is far too high when elections are so aften decided on a few votes here and there whther FPTP or STV. I’ve previously been willing to consider it but after 10 years of initiatives for modernising the electoral system through postal, electronic, new systems and general disruption I think that polling stations, simple ballots, a pencil and a cross win hands down.
(in Glasgow I mean)
184. “if you speak to them who know in Birmingham, gaining Hodge Hill from Labour is far more significant than losing Sparkbrook to (lack of) ‘Respect’”
Zebidee, Sparkbrook is in your main Birmingham target (Hall Green constituency).
I suppose you can always get some of the Respect voters in the GE vote though
“When the real truth comes out about postal vote fraud some of these seats may also vote very differently”
Tory? Because they seem the only ones not getting arrested in that ward. Maybe because even if they rigg the postal vote, they would still lose there
“Your comments about Liverpool also miss the main point.
The ‘new’ Wavertree is much closer to the old Mossley Hill (Liberal held)”
yes, I know.
“the Lib Dems will concentrate their effort against the weakest and most unpopular Labour MP whereas they divided their efforts previously”
which wasn’t very clever in first place. As in the 1997-2005 period all Liverpool seats had huge majority at Westminster level, you should have concentrate in just one to try and transform local wins in GE success. Then after achieving it in one, you could have moved to others (by that point with reduced majorities because of the national trend)
188 - “I think that polling stations, simple ballots, a pencil and a cross win hands down.”
I totally agree, I don’t feel as though I’ve voted unless I visit the polling station myself. 3 years ago I had to vote by post in the Euro elections (postal-only trial region). It just didn’t feel right (or secure).
180 Of the natural Conservative-leaning seats (say, the ones they won at the 1992 General Election), they only missed the VoG — and that by a whisker.
The Tories last won the old Pembrokeshire seat at a GE in 1987 — Nick Ainger took it in 1992. The Tories last held seats like Bridgend in the landslide years, and seats like the Gwyr not even then.
They didn’t overtake Plaid — which I guess they will be disappointed about.
But, the Tories did ample to suggest at the GE, they could take enough seats in Wales to be consistent with a winning majority of 20 or 30 overall.
185.”Yes Andrea, I think the SNP could have picked up a couple more seats by running two candidates in some wards such as Govan”
Thanks Chrisco
192.”they only missed the VoG — and that by a whisker. ”
4 bloody recounts!!!
154.There are no good Tories.
My point is that the Tories are winning by bucketloads this year in places where they already have the MP”
That really isn’t so. Places like South Ribble, Chester, Dartford, Hyndburn, West Lancs., Edgbaston, Blackpool North, Torbay, North Devon, High Peak, Erewash, Gedling, are exactly the sort of places the Conservatives need to regain at the next election.
195,Well,I would’nt go that far-the most middle of the road,One Nation wing I can at least listen to (as a centrist Labourite)
197 But you’re not eaten up by spite and hate.
192. Gwynfa from previous thread I think.
54. Yes but…… they leapt from one constituency seat to five. As IC Wales said who on Thursday morning thought the Tories wopulds come within spitting distance in the Gower, Bridgend, Vale of Clwyd and Newport West! Looking towards Westminster the Tories are looking good, the vagaries of thwe list system don’t apply there. Plaid did well but could really have done with a Valley’s seat like Islwyn. Can’t help but feel a HMJ or DW would have delivered. For me looking at GE the big question can PC take Llanelli at Westminster as well. That is a key sign of how much cement there is in their position.
49. Thank you. I agree that is the lethal threat to Labour. I think Tories in wales as with other party supporters in other seats are piling and will do so more in behind the Labour alternative. They fight where they can win hard, and let others go elsewhere. Look at Newport, Labour came amazingly close to being hit from the Tories in West and Lib Dems east. Labour got their lowest share of their vote since 1918, and their bacon was saved in numerous places by unclear opposition. Now it is clear, so unless they revive there could be a real pulverising coming. Do you have the vote shares nationally.
by Punter May 5th, 2007 at 1:32 pm
187. Entertaining to see the assorted Yellow Peril parroting this nonsense line about how well they have done in marginal seats - which of course ignores (inter alia) Torbay, Herefordshire, South Gloucs, Lewes, N Devon, Bath, N Cornwall, York, West Berks, N Somerset, E Riding of Yorks, West Devon, N Wilts, St Albans, Malvern, E Hants, Broadland…where they lost seats.
Max/Chris/Marcia/Stuart/Scots pb.comers in general. Is McConnell going to resign as Labour Scottish Leader? If so (in any case, even if he doesn’t stand down immediately, I doubt he would lead Labour into 2011 election), who will succeed him?
Andy Kerr? Wendy Alexander? Lord Foulkes?
199.”Now it is clear, so unless they revive there could be a real pulverising coming.”
By next Assembly Election, Labour can be out of power at Westminster level.
199 Plaid now seem eager to join a Labour led coalition putting LDs out in opposition. Except for the leadership the LDs don’t seem keen on Lab/LD government so maybe Labour’s only chance to regain power but IMHO Plaid will be damaged if it does to benefit of Tories who will then become the real opposition and have all advantages that brings.
“Yellow Peril” (Con) - Boring spin.
Would you like a list of all the seats where the Tories had a net loss of seats? It would probably be quite a long one.
Re previous discussions of the Tory Sedegfield candidate who polled 0 votes and her nominations.
From local paper:
“Mrs Bowes fought such a low key campaign that she didn’t even tell her farmer son Graham. She said: “He’d have thought I was daft, so I kept it to myself.”
“Paul Wilson, of Trimdon, said a Tory canvasser had approached on the verge of tears to ask him to nominate Mrs Bowes. “I never would’ve voted for her - I’ve always voted Labour - but I agreed to help him out.”
I hope it will be Lord Foulkes :-). Why Labour have let this man into Holyrood is beyond my understanding.
If she wants it, I would have thought Wendy Alexander would be favourite (I think she even managed a small swing in her favour in the constituency vote, thogh I haven’t double checked that). Andy Kerr and Iain Gray (re-entering the Parliament in East Lothian) if Jack does not go quickly are in the running
As a PS, how about this observtion from Mark Pack?
“A possibly interesting statistic: there were 21 councils in which the Liberal Democrats lost 7 or more seats on Thursday. The total loss across these seats was 255. In other words, across the rest of England the party made net gains (just).”
206. ” hope it will be Lord Foulkes . Why Labour have let this man into Holyrood is beyond my understanding.”
Maybe they were hoping not to lose Livington and Ed East. In that case I think he would have not won the list seat.
He looked very happy yesterday:
http://images.scotsman.com/2007/05/05/george.jpg
“I think she even managed a small swing in her favour in the constituency vote, thogh I haven’t double checked that”
yes, both Paisley seats showed Lab increased majorities
Tressage - that’s the spirit. I’m fully behind the LDs strategy of victory through defeat, those happy years of Jeremy Thorpe’s leadership can be yours again. Think opf rthe savings to be made - no more expensive Conference Centres as Party conferences could be in the back rooms of pubs, no more helicopters just a single London taxi battlebus.
Put simply Tories +38 councils, plus 885 councillors; Lib Dems - 4 councils, minus 243 councillors. Totals - Tories 138 councils, LDs 23. Yes Tories lost seats, cos that hapens but we are going forward and unfortunately for the LDs they are not.
If Gordo had any brains - and courage - he would say he was resigning for family reasons and take that nice fat job in the EU or World Bank.
It can’t be nice having Ian Hyslop mention your gay lover. This is akin to Charles Kennedy’s non-outing as an alcoholic
203. Like the Tories the Lib Dems had some better performances than the surface result suggests. On their M4 corridor they continue to have progress v Labour in both Swansea seats, Newport Eastr and Cardiff South. However they are making a serious mistake if they coalition with Labour. Most Lib Dems know this, and patience with MG is thin, if he sells them out for little in return the Lib Dems will probably quickly get to the sort of internal situation the Tories had in Oct-nOV 2003 and Kirsty Williams will be Leader fairly quickly.
202. To be clear I mean’t that GE. Although with the Assembly as the Tories found out being out of power in Westminster doesn’t necessarily help if the voters aren’t through with kicking you.
Labour’s real boast should be
‘WE LOST THE ELECTION BY 1% LESS THAN LAST TIME. WHEN THIS IS REPEATED AT THE GENERAL ELECTION WE WILL HAVE MORE THAN 195 SEATS! WE HAVE THE PERFECT SPINGBOARD’
The truth is this election was dominated by Labour heartlands. To score less than 26% is so bad that it will be impossible for them to win the next election.
206. Charlie Gordon is apparently also considering a run at the leadership.
213. Labour didn’t score 26% in their heartlands - that figure is an extrapolation from key wards to what a totally national figure might have produced.
207 - Why just stop with those 21 councils? If you don’t count any of the councils where the Lib Dems lost seats then they had a magificent night.
I never thought the Lib Dems could surprass the glorious one seat gain of 2006 but clearly a loss of over 200 is a triumph of even greater proportions.
I imagine there will be a lot of pressure on Jack McConnel to stand down and Wendy Alexander would be a far better alternative but I’m not sure she’ll get it. Charlie Gordon was a good leader of Glasgow City council and would probably do a decent job too.
George Foulkes will be a good addition to the parliament. He has a great sence of humour, he’s a reasonably good speaker and debater and has a bit of character. Which is more than can be said for most MSP’s.
196. Do you think the good Conservative performance in Wales strengthens your Party’s commitment to the Union and silences some of the more deranged voices.
214. Chrisco, maybe if there’ll be a lack of Lab UK leadership contest, we can always turn our attention on Scottish Lab Leadership
207 - That is just about the ultimate in denial. Never mind, after being out of Governemnt for nine decades and certain to continue for the next nine, denial is possibly preferable to the alternatives.
What about Tressage, ColinW and Zebedee for the next series of Big Brother, although white coats might end up in short supply.
Re 186, KJH, I agree!
Re 187, Tessage, “Cameron cannot count on taking a single Lib Dem seat. He is a loser.”
You don’t seriously believe that do you?
219. I think the Welsh Lib Dems will be next. See 211.
Oh yes, Benedict. You tell me one Lib Dem seat that he can currently COUNT ON falling into the Tory column.
Some may do. But on present form (these elections), all I can see is Torbay, and since the Tories are now taking full control of that and full responsibility, I don’t think that Cameron can even count on that.
Zebidee, and anyone else that’s interested.
You are wrong about Guildford, which makes me wonder about the veracity of your other claims.
I’d taken the time to see how Guildford had changed since 2003 and it’s very bad news for lib dems, any squeeze which could had happen, has happened and, lo and behold, a couple of percentage points off labour has been bettered by the tories gaining nearly an extra 10%, probably from labour as well as lib dem switchers.
Here are the figures, it took me a while but, as with Mr Darling, if you don’t have the figures you can’t prove/disprove what others are trying to say.
GUILDFORD BOROUGH COUNCIL
2003
CON 22954 43.2%
LD 18767 35.6%
LAB 6589 12.5%
OTH 4439 8.4%
% Lead 7.6%
2007
CON 22429 52.8%
LD 15875 37.4%
LAB 2182 5.1%
OTH 2008 4.7%
% Lead 15.4%
Swing 3.9% LD to CON
I see it’s been a touch quiet here over the past week ….
All this bonhommie and comeraderie …. makes me want to puke !!
I wonder just how involved John13/Tressage/Rosemary was in the excellent Lib Dem campaign in Windsor and Maidenhead, where he claims to live? Perhaps the local Tories should be thanking him for his help?
Welcome back Jack!
227 AHM. Back in your coffin Herbie …. it’s not near midnight yet !!
224
‘Oh yes, Benedict. You tell me one Lib Dem seat that he can currently COUNT ON falling into the Tory column.’
I think you should be asking the question in reverse,if there really is a mood for change in 2/3 years time ,the electorate are not going to let 60 odd bed blockers get in the way,as was made clear at Harrogate the Lib Dems are happy to prop up Labour.
My figures are averaging the votes in multi member wards by the way, also, in the ward where I live the swing against the lib dem candidates was higher at 5.8%.
Jack! Where’ve you been???
I thought you had one foot in the grace and the other on a banana skin, Jack?
232 Perth racecourse, if the reports I hear are true.
233 - Bugger. *Grave*, rather. I don’t know whether grace is reserved for old Jacobites like you….
Jack! Good to see you back. Any more percentages from these gloating Tories and we’ll all be in our sick beds!
225 Convincing, UKPaul. They confirm what, as an ex-resident, I would have thought intuitively.
236 - Now you have some idea what it is like for the rest of us to listen to you prattle on day in and day out, Roger.
228 Chrisco. Thank you … and indeed for all the kind wishes from PBers.
I admit to being somewhat tired, bruised, impatient but pleased to have survived to see the coronation of Councillor, Squadron leader Richard Willis RAF !!!
Am back to Harpenden tomorrow for further r&r ……. and perchance the odd musing on PB to aid my full recovery to 100% Jacobite efficiency !!!
226 - Good to hear from you Jack. Hope you’re feeling a bit more chipper!
227 - Alasdair surely any reasonable person can see that the paltry increase of 19 seats can only be interpreted as a fatal blow to David Camerons leadership.
re 210. That’s a very serious thing to raise. Did anybody else see Have I got News for You and hear the comments attributed to Hyslop?
Hereford looks a likely C gain from LibDem?
237 - PtP, the only potential light for lib dems is that the actual tory vote figure hasn’t increased, but going down that route also has to take into account where the thousands of lib dem votes have gone as well.
I’m more surprised by my old home of High Peak turning blue, now that really is a worry for labour, it’s the sort of area they need to win to retain a majority.
PS. George Foulkes was on TV the other night. Surely no one is talking seriously about him for leader? Incidentally all this talk about Tory progress in Scotland and Wales. -1 and 0 or have the Guardian got it wrong?
225 A useful exercise Paul , I have done a similar exercise on Guildford for the Parliamentary wards 12 only from Guildford Council and 6 from Waverley Council . The totals are much closer
Con 16055 LibDem 15848 Lab 1597 . All hinges on Ewhurst where an Independent topped the poll Ind 600 Con 293 LibDem 91 where would her votes have gone the 2003 result was LibDem 323 Con 369 in that ward .
244 - I don’t think anyone said we made progree in Scotland. And only a fool would think that the results in Wales do not bode well for the next election.
These Lib Dems seem pretty confident that Cameron cannot gain a single seat from them at the GE.
Is this an admission that they will try and prevent this by fraudulent means.
246 - Sorry anyone except the Guardian. There coverage of politics in Scotland is very poor if that is what they are reporting.
241 - Have I Got News For You is rereated tonight at 10pm, on BBC2.
I watched on Friday but I can’t remember exactly what Hislop’s joke was - other than that it was a joke (not an allegation).
241. Hislop mentioned loads of people including Jeremy Clarkson! It was a joke about the tabloid press.
245. Labour did not contest all the wards hence the derisory vote. Another factor at Guildford is the student vote which is more likely to vote in the GE and might split 3 or 4 way.
I would expect Ann Milton to hold it by more than 100, getting the vote out in the Waverly wards. Although Cranleigh did see the only LD gain in Waverly.
235 AHM. Your “grace” is reserved for Dukes and Archbishops !! …. mind you I met a rather odd Viscount recently !!
I notice Harpenden remained a “yellow peril” free zone in the elections !! ……. clearly my letter in the “Harpenden Observer” warning of the dangers of be-sandled Whigs rampaging in the village had the desired effect.
245 - I haven’t got a clue which are parliamentary wards, have you got a list of them? How much has changed in terms of wards from the current boundaries?
226. JackW your back!!!!!!!
Good to see you posting and wish you a speedy recovery. A young pretender has just nipped into Holyrood and taken control while you were away, a rear guard action from the doyen of the Jacobite party might be required.
Re 210, kinglear, when did Ian Hislop say that?
245 see 211 Views.
246 see 178.
251 - The few wards labour didn’t contest would have got another few hundred votes extra at best, their vote collapsed spectacularly.
The wards where students tend to be were also little different, the labour vote held up slightly betterm still terrible for them though.
Labour is effectively dead in the water in Guildford and lib dems haven’t been able to capitalise on it, their voters need to be wooed more and Cameron is doing a better job of that.
Jack W!
Welcome back!
I thought it was a joke about being momentarily gobsmacked by a headline about the chairman of BP.
Re 224, Tressage, we took seats off you in 2005, and we will again, don’t you worry. Although you have done well in places like Solihul, you can bet we will be looking at that!
Re 226, JackW, welcome back, we missed you!
“All this bonhommie and comeraderie …. makes me want to puke !!!
Well, if it helps I can tell you to bugger off!
Great to see you back Jack W. Keep postponing the final election date.
253-245. Guildford Borough and constituency have never been coterminous. Alot of the Borough wards are in Mole Valley seat eg. Lovelace, Send, Clandon-Horsley, Effingham, Tillingborne.
Ash, Pirbright, Normandy in Gove’s Surrey Heath.
The Waverly wards along the A281 in the G’ford seat include Cranleigh, Ewhurst, Alfold,Bramley etc.
LDs would never have won the seat under the Borough boundaries.
254 Chris D. I was pleased to see the SNP get a drubbing at the polls ensuring that the Unionist parties took two thirds of the vote !!
However the numbers in Holyrood will make for interesting times.
W Jack W!
253 Paul , The Parliamentary boundary changes are very minor Anthony Wells calculates the notional majority reduced slightly to 77 . Yes I have a list of the wards that make up the Constituency . You can find them on the Boundary Commission website or Email me on markpsenior@msn.com and I will send you them .
260 Benedict you looked at Solihull at last year’s elections and lost a ward and did so again at this year’s and lost 2 wards .
261 Benedict. Hard luck at the election ……….. however my Jacobite Intelligence Service advice me that your electorate were concerned that if elected you wouldn’t be able to spend more time with your blog !!
Re 267, JackW, Thanks, and
Was there not a story about Brown being chased from a Soho restaurant recently by a bunch of homophobes lying in wait to taunt him? There seems no basis for various snide asides from people like Hyslop.
263 - Okay, I’ve taken all those wards out but am still left with thirteen, which one am I missing, I presume its Pilgrims as that’s out to the West? Is that right?
265 Andrea.
….. Do you think “Our Nicola’s” hair “style” will survive a Holyrood ministerial limo ??
225. Ukpaul, I am sure you are not doing it deliberately, but you are attacking something I did not say. I did not even suggest that Guildford Lib Dems are winning at the moment, just that they have wiped out Labour at council level, which is a very useful factor in making a squeeze on the third party REALLY stick.
in my previous postings, I was not even trying too hard to find examples of Tory failures-to-do-too-well, but I would suggest that the post-Oaten Winchester is a good place to start. Lib Dems GAINING seats there I see. Why haven’t Tories taken control of Portsmouth??
If Tories can’t capitalise in Oaten-dominated Winchester then who seriously believes they stand a burp in a gale’s chance of winning a General Election?
What I would like is someone to post up a list of parliamentary constitunecies which they genuinely think (on projection of this week’s results) the Tories can win. I have not done any such calculations myself, but even given the GROSSLY exaggerated expectation that the party would retain the vote share that they have at today’s local elections, I reckon that you would be struggling hard.
247. “Is this an admission that they will try and prevent this by fraudulent means.”
I thought that Cameron’s entire strategy was based upon such a fraud. The fraud that he either is (when he talks to younger people) or isn’t (when he talks to older people) Blair in Disguise. A recent study of the Scottish party manifestos on ‘green content’ by a NGO gave Lib Dems 8/10 and Tories 0/10.
And as for the biggest fraud of all, Cameron still thinks that a policy is an event where you look at parrots.
270. Pilgrims is in the constituency.
Guildford Borough Council Wards in the Guildford Constituency:
In the Guildford Borough Council area, the Guildford constituency covers Burpham, Christchurch, Friary and St Nicolas, Holy Trinity, Merrow, Onslow, The Pilgrims, Shalford, Stoke, Stoughton, Westborough and Worplesdon wards.
In the Waverley Borough Council area, the Guildford constituency covers Blackheath and Wonersh, Cranleigh East, Cranleigh West, Ewhurst and Shamley Green wards.
of these, Cranleigh E is now fully LD held and Ewhurst now Ind.
242 Hereford is certainly a possible Conservative gain from LibDems but the local election results don’t tell us a great deal because many of the wards are still dominated by Independents .
196. “Places like South Ribble, Chester, Dartford, Hyndburn, West Lancs., Edgbaston, Blackpool North, Torbay, North Devon, High Peak, Erewash, Gedling, are exactly the sort of places the Conservatives need to regain at the next election.”
Twelve seats do not a summer make. (and don’t count chickens on Torbay - Adrian Sanders has heard people claim to fry his giblets before based upon local lelection results)
Yes I know there are others, but I reckon you are still a very long way adrift.
Interestingly, Electoral Calculus, which DOES give a Tory overall majority on these figures, gives Lib Dems 78 seats. Garbage in - garbage out, the lot of it.
I would be interested in a realistic GE projection of percentage shares based upon this local election result to feed into Electoral Calculus BEFORE we start discounting for squeeze and constituency/incumbent effects.
272 - You’re right, labour have completely collapsed here, just checking the central wards their votes seeme to have disappeeaed and gone to nobody though, the outlying areas are where the lib dems have lost voted to the tories (but, as suggested they are in different parliamentary seats). What I’d guess is that the labour votes are just staying home at the moment in Guildford and they need to be fed some meat to make the think about switching to vote lib dem rather than reverting to type in a GE.
272. Its not about whether the Tories can win now, its about whether they can realistically win when the next GE comes around.
The short answer is, on current form and trends, yes they can.
On the various postings regarding Ian Hislop comments on Gordon Brown, I’ll say this once…
IF Gordon Brown has anything to be outed about, the people who will do the outing will likely be elements within the gay community itself. Gordon is not popular amongst many gay rights activists. If they wanted to do damage and actually had solid evidence, they would likely have done it.
274 - Thanks, I moved here four years ago and I’m still getting to grips with what fits where.
274 You missed Alfold , Cranleigh Rural & Ellen ward from the Waverley ones .
280 - Just checking out Waverley, what happened there? All those Farnham independents seemed to aid a bit of a wipeout.
Many thanks all …… I’m told I have to be a good lad and rest, else I’ll slip on Matlock’s banana skin, hit my head and forcast a Conservative gain in Bolsover and the termination of Benedict’s blog !!
274 Noted thanks - Alfold also missing from Guildford LDs website - is it coming in or was it always there?
Mark, you were right in your prediction my Borough, Elmbridge would still be NOC. C might just achieve their overall majority next year, but some RAs are very well dug in and the Libdems held all their wards too.
The ultra Nimby WaltonSociety is in near-terminal decline, C should gain 1 possibly 2 from them next year, with a good young candidate who is only 19 running well in Central ward, improving on last summer’s by-election showing.
278. “The short answer is, on current form and trends, yes they can.”
Are you really Bob the Builder?
The short answer is the wrong answer.
Perhaps it might help if posters stop being partisan and smell the coffee.
Just take a strip of the Dorset Coast for example.
Christchurch, Tory gains; Bournmouth Tories massacre Lib Dems; then Purbeck, Mid Dorset, West Dorset, all Lib Dems gaining from Tories.
The Poole and Mid Dorset seat held by Lib Dems has an increase in seats and votes. So a massive net-increase in Tory seats is highly-concentrated in an area that perhaps prevents a Lib Dem GAIN but does not win a single seat. A larger adjoining region sees the Tories going backwards.
277. you are qute right. The question is whether Guildford Lib Dems can give their Labour voters the Lonsdale treatment.
283 - Yes. Although not voiced here, the results were those I predicted (Andrea will hopefully verify ;). We were particularly pleased with the Walton results, and personally even more about Hersham. We’ll have to see whether we continue as a minority Administration: the voters appear to believe we should.
Those Lib/Dems like Zebedee and Tressage who are trying to spin these results as good for their side and bad for Cameron might take a lesson from Mark Senior who had the grace to admit he got it wrong and try to engage about why.
Every party has some “churn” each year where you win some council seats and lose others and the Lib/Dems tend to have a higher churn than the other two main parties. So it would always be even easier for them than for Conservatives and Labour to suggest that they have had a good result if you remove the councils where they lost most seats!
Similarly it a little misleading to suggest that the Conservatives are making no progress in cities in the North on the basis of comments like “the tories have no councillors in Manchester” based on the Manchester City Council results given that the Conservatives increased the number of councillors we have in Salford.
I remember what it was like between 1993 and 1997 when the Conservatives were losing everything in sight. We had to put a brave face on it then too, but I don’t remember us being half as brazen about it as some Lib/Dems are being here.
I also remember what it was like between 1998 and 2005 when we were slogging our guts out to crawl back into contention in council wards and parliamentary seats which we were doing badly ever to have lost. The Conservatives did make steady progress overall in council elections over that period but the sort of comment which some Lib/Dem and Labour people are making now to the effect that it wasn’t enough to win a GE would have been true.
Like all of the three parties we did better in some places than others this week. But anyone who has spent most of the last few weeks on the doorstep in most of the country, and anyone who looks at the overall picture, knows damn well that the performance of the Conservatives in the 2006 and 2007 elections was in a different league to the previous decade. Anyone in any party who really believes that Cameron’s leadership has not coincided with a significant improvement in the Conservatives’ ability to win votes and elections is delusional.
I wish those Labour and Lib/Dem spinners who think this was a good set of results for them many more election nights with that kind of victory.
Similarly if it was a poor night for the Conservatives when we have a net gain of nearly 900 seats, taking hundreds from both Labour and the Lib/Dems, I can live with a lot of that kind of disappointment.
284. You think I’m wrong I think you are wrong. End of. No amount of your choice of those snapshots to illustrate your case are going to change my mind at this moment and time. Thats all there is to it.
Whats with Labour considering taking legal action over the Scottish elections?
37 Tyson. I agree with almost everything you say. However, I would point out a few notable omissions. You left out the bit about lying to the British people to send the brave men and women of our armed forces into battle on a completely false premise.
If I were to produce a list of things Tony Blair and his Labour government did whilst in power, I’d probably start with a list of the servicemen who’ve died in Iraq fighting for his lie.
You could easily add the name of Dr David Kelly to that list (although that was more Campbell than anyone else) and whilst you’re at it stick cash for honours down for good measure.
For the sake of clarity I am not, nor can I ever see a set of circumstances where I would be a Tory. I am a social democrat who voted Labour until 3 years ago. I’ve shared my vote amongst other parties since then.
My hope was and is that a new post-Blair administration will bring about change. I remain sceptical, particularly if Mr Darlings utterances today are anything to go by.
286. JohnO
Some reports indicated you had 29 Elmbridge seats, but it is only 28 isn’t it?
Ambleside counts as a hold as you ‘gained’ it when the defection occurred.
As a floating voter I would like to see your minority control continuing with RAs in a scrutiny role which suits them better.
You also have more people with the skills to form the executive, and the best geographical coverage of members (except Molesey at present).
You’ll probably need to take Central to secure overall control, and the Heart flats could help. I don’t think you’ll shift Roy Green in Hersham. St Georges also looks difficult.
288.
“Whats with Labour considering taking legal action over the Scottish elections?”
Are they allowed to sue Tony Blair for being such a pratt?
Impeachment of Tony Blair? With ‘friends’ like that……
291 - Thanks for your condititional support: we must continue to be broad-based to extend our appeal and retain it.
You are correct: we have 28 members.
287. Chris, who the hell is saying these results are good for the Lib Dems? They are very bad for the councillors involved in some of the areas. The point is that they do NOT reflect any kind of serious shift to the Tories in General Election terms in the battleground seats that matter. There are seats where the Lib Dems will lose to the Tories on these figures if they don’t pull up their socks, but they are not many, and there are more than a handful of Tory seats and three-way marginals which look more vulnerable to the Lib Dems on these results.
If you want to prove me wrong, list me the seats Tories are likely to gain. After a few score you will make even yourself realise you are being silly.
Can anyone readily say it what seats for the Scottish Assembly elections where the majority of the winner was less than the recorded number of spoilt ballots?
Apologies. My comments were to Mingvase at 290.
288.”Whats with Labour considering taking legal action over the Scottish elections?” Yokel, any more information on this?
287 Chris I accept a lot of what you are saying as true but last year there were many posts saying Conservatives were pulling out all the stops and going to win Brooklands in Manchester result you went backwards . This year loads of posts from same people said it would be City Centre result no progress . If it is not important that you have no seats in Manchester and other cities why all the spin and hype and effort clearly put in there ?
151. Nearly all these politics academics, like Curtice, are left-wing. Same goes for the BBC.
The BBC question: how can the Tories be happy with nearly 900 gains when they haven’t won a single ward in Manchester? My question: how much longer do Tory voters have to put up with the blatantly unbalanced BBC?
297. In the papers tomorrow, on the BBC tonight.
It appears SNP sources have in turn commented on this by saying that although they want abn inquiry into the adminstration of this election there is no evidence of the spolit ballot issue have disadvantaged one party more than aother.
I get the impression that, largely, where Labour came home first, they generally had majorities bigger than the number of spoilt ballots. Where they lost out in some areas, however, its possible the winning majorities were smaller than the number of spolit ballots.
You can see why I’m looking for any constituencies where in the FPTP elections the winning majority was smaller than the spolit ballots. I’m trying to confirm where the focus may be.
297 They may challange the result in Cunninghame North.
Would you adam and eve it the Labour Party are telling the BBC that they’re considering legal action over the Scottish election results!
297. By the way I have no idea if that scenario exists as I didn’t follow the detail of the majorities in each FPTP constituencies in particular. I’m looking to see.
296. I agree about broadening appeal - a greater age mix of candidates helps you reach out and did no harm in Central
(though it could be the electorate there was also reacting against the ghastly RA leader).
There does need to be a non-party initiative from the Civic Centre to increase turnout - I suspect some polling districts eg. Fieldcommon, Vicarage Field, Longmore estates and rural Downside are virtually voter-free zones.
West Byfleet (a safe C ward )and other Woking wards achieved 50%
Ewhurst, the seat C lost in Waverley a remarkable 60%
Best in Elmbridge - 44%
average turnout dropped 2% over 2006
301. Yep, just look at that result. Close eh.
I think we can see where this one is going.
301. Yokel. Aberdeen Central (Lab) has a majority smaller than the spoiled papers. That’s the reason of the delay of the declaration there. After the count SNP apparently asked to check better since there were many spoiled papers. The returning officer agreed and they had a re-count on Friday afternoon.
IIRC Edinburgh Central (Lab) has also more spoiled papers than the majority. Airdrie and Shotts also had a Lab majority smaller than spoiled papers
305 - “I think we can see where this one is going. ”
Florida?
302 The problem with Labour is they are bad losers but parade success over their opponents when they win! This is why I loathe them so much.
I think it will be difficult to prove one way or the other. Some voted only on the List as they didn’t see the other vote on the right - we had a lot of calls from voters to say sorry they messed up their votes for us - some put two ‘x’ on the Constituency vote, a lot put two to four ‘x’ depending on the number of seats in the council wards thinking that was what they did. I cannot see how they can prove ‘voter intent’ from the spoilt ballots.
Labour’s top brass misleading the public? That’s a first haha.
306. Reliable as ever Andrea. Thanks
Given that, surely Labour need to be careful here.
It does appear that indeed Labour’s focus is Cunningham N because of the tiny winning margin.
309.”Some voted only on the List as they didn’t see the other vote on the right ”
isn’t it possible to vote just on the list? I would have thought the no vote in the constituency would have counted as an abstantion.
Yokel I’m pretty sure the SNP lost a seat by less than the number of spoilt ballots. Still where does this end; Parties could all say they lost seats on the Regional list because of spoiled ballots. Also it will be argued that all voters were sent explanations by post and that, however regrettable, voters have only themselves to blame. This is Florida all over again but even Gore didn’t argue for a rerun over the butterfly ballot( I think a left wing group did actually but it was thrown out); only for a recount of rejected ballots. I suppose the spoiled ballots could be re-examined if they still exist. Is there any requirement to keep them for any length of time?
307. What can we call unclear ballots..Hanging Gordons? Not so Smart Alex’s?
311. Yokel, there may be other seats with more spoiled papers than majority. The 3 I listed are the ones I’m sure about
Andre I think people were double voting on either the list or FPTP without making clear a preference. In those circumstances you have to discard both votes.
314 Not so Smart Alex’s?
to be fair to some - some people do feel pressurised voting - how many on this site think to themselves , did I vote correctly?
315. What you’ve poiunted though is that this could work both ways. If Labour starst bring cahllenges over Cunningham North it could be open to challenges itself.
Having said that I would guess Labour would be more confident of hold some of those seats in the event of a re-run. Cunninghame North however is a tiny number of votes and a re-run would be a real sweat for the SNP, and of course it has the potential to change the end result.
In short, it is a potential choke point for Labour to change the lie of the land. They may have a case on the technicalities, they may not, time will tell.
Livingston (SNP) has a 810 majority and 1634 spoilt papers. Govan (SNP): 744 majority and 1220 rejected papers
In Glasgow Baillieston spoilt papers were a comfortable third ahead of tories and LDs
263 Ash is in Surrey Heath (Constituency but not Borough, it is in Guildford Borough) Pirbright and Normandy definitely are not in Surrey Heath for either Constituency or Borough!
318.”Having said that I would guess Labour would be more confident of hold some of those seats in the event of a re-run.”
If I were them, I wouldn’t. For ex Edinburgh Central has LDs in second and LDs in a byelection are almost umbeatable!
Chad is a good Scottish word. Chad Gordons?
On the other hand an x is the first unknown quantity in an algebraic expression, usually the independent variable.
X is also a sign of error (as against a tick) so it is the Comedy of Errors?
312 - I think it would - we had calls from many to say sorry they didn’t vote in the Consituency part of the voting forms.
Electoral reruns after legal challenges have not a great history in England. Usually makes the voters rather mad.
Yokel This is ridiculous. The time to complain about spoiled ballots is during the count. They could have asked for a recount; I presume in fact that one probably took place. Once the candidate accepts the result and allows the declaration I’ve never heard of a result being overturned. Andrea will probably tell me I’m wrong. I can see no case for a rerun because of voter error. Also the SNP will have a field day in court blaming the Labour Party for causing problems and then going to court about them. This is the new face of Labour under GB. We are all warned you need to win not just beyond the margin of error but the margin of litigation.
Evening All
Excuse me for being so dense but can someone explain (very simply) which ‘authority’ in their opinion is responsible for the voting cock up in Scotland?
Btw Mike S, many thanks for the obviously diligent and sterling hard works over the last few days.
The Greens have apparently demanded to see all spoiled papers
http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=699002007
326 -The Scottish Office run by Douglas Alexander. His department is responsible for the running of elections. It is not a devolved matter.
lots and lots of attempts by our usual Tory suspect to compare apples with pears. Is there likely to be any useful analysis of where local changes in seats, and yes well done to the Conservatives on gaining 900 more councillors, are due to local factors, and where they are due to national standings by the respective parties? I doubt it, and thus we end up with the sterile nature of the discussion over the past day or so.
For the Cons to have a Parliamentary majority at the next election they must win the vast majority of their target seats. There is clear evidence that those which are targets from the LibDems are not making any significant contribution to the overall councillor gains of the Conservatives. Thus it is reasonable to conclude that these targets will not be achieved, and by extrapolation, they will not achieve the number of gains needed to have a Parliamentary majority, whenever the next election is called.
OK then……….is there any Con out there who wishes to dispute this analysis?
Andrea, is the BBC share of the vote Nationwide an accurate guide svp???
294. zebidee, Michael Portillo in 97′.
There are a few MSP’s who are feeling very lucky after the big swing to the SNP on Thursday in Scotland. There will be libdems who might increase their majority come election day, but there are also a few who might be squeezed out if the election is close.
I do remember a rerun of a Richmond Council election but that was based on breaches of electoral spending law by the LDs, not complaints about spoiled ballots. The Tories won the challenge and got thumped in the rerun. Also, now I come to think of it Winchester had a rerun but I can’t remember why. Again the Tories won the court case and got absolutely thumped by the LDs in the rerun.
332 There were I think 35 votes that hadn’t been punched.
329 Give Gordon Brown a few months in office, and your analysis will be worthless methinks. Infighting will result in MP’s going native and Labour will fall apart just as the Tories did in 94-97
Also, now I come to think of it Winchester had a rerun but I can’t remember why. Again the Tories won the court case and got absolutely thumped by the LDs in the rerun.
I think it was due to disputes over ‘borderline’ ballot papers which were or weren’t counted as valid. Like you say, a challenge is not always a good idea even if you get the rerun you thought you wanted.
Wouldn’t Labour be mad to start poking at this hornets nest and doesn’t it make them sore losers?
If the focus on the spoilt ballots keeps the story in the press, won’t it be bad for the administration who were in charge of implementing it despite the warnings?
What are Labour going to do, cherry pick the results which hurt them the most and hope that the other parties don’t bother trying the same tactic?
After the results last week Labour would be nuts to try this, if we ended up with having to do the whole thing over again I think that Labour could end up even worse off. They would be better to accept defeat gracefully and get behind the SNP on having a full enquiry.
334:
Will Gordon have come out of hiding “within a few months”? There is a good chance that he may not be seen again until he hands the keys of number 10 to D.C.
btw Thanks, marcia
335 The Winchester by election was just such great fun. Being in the hall for the declaration comes 3rd only in my favorite memories after my wedding and the birth of my first child. There were some great stories.
332 There was also a rerun of a Richmond Council election many years ago caused by voter impersonation by Conservatives , they lost the rerun then too .
What I don’t quite understand re Scotland is this is the 3rd time there have been elections to the Scottish Parliament under the Constituency and List system , the previous 2 times there was not this number of spoilt voting papers so what was changed this time from previous times ( if anything ) who changed it and why .
Re 332 and 333, and mark Oatens original majority was 2.
Book value. The margin was 2 votes after endless recounts. There were 50 odd I think ballots rejected, not because the voters had screwed up but because the ballots hadn’t been punched when distributed to the voters. The Court held that the rejected ballots would have changed the result and that , according to Wikipedia, since it wasn’t certain that this was the result of a mistake, the result should be overturned. This is not a precedent for Labour, I think. I’m pretty sure Malone challenged immediately in order to preserve the ballot papers. Theoretically the Court could ask for a rescrutiny of disputed ballots, if they exist, but surely the candidate is required to do this there and then. If he stands there accepting the declaration and then days later talks of legal action, he hasn’t got a leg to stand on. If there were a rerun, could this affect the list outcome in addition? I presume so theoretically. Will betfair pay up or make people wait?
340 Which of course meant that he increased his majority by over 1,000,000 percent
339 - Mark, previously we had three separate ballot papers - Douglas Alexander’s wheeze was to combine the list and constituecy votes onto one ballot and use e-counting instead of the manual counters. When STV was voted through for local council seats the publicity was very poor indeed and many were unaware of the changes as they binned the leaflet that came through their doors thinking it was another election leaflet.
339. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/6622379.stm
339. As I understand it the two ballots were on different pieces of paper before. This time they put them on one. It is a copy of the new Zealand system which worked without problems.
Re 342, Kjh, yes, which just goes to show how miffed voters get when forced to rerun an election.
341 - thanks
342 - I think that can be definitively said to be Oaten’s finest hour…
343 Thanks for the explanation Marcia , I can’t see why e-counting wpuld be any faster with a combined ballot paper rather than 2 separate ones .
299. “how much longer do Tory voters have to put up with the blatantly unbalanced BBC? ”
You mean that awful organisation which pollutes our minds on matters political with Tories like Nick Robinson and Andrew Neill?
From what I heard the STV vote went ok, it was only the parliamentary one that was a problem. I listerned to 2 scrutinies today on two different programmes on Radio 4. One has suggested that the small parties appear to be the big losers, I assume because they mainly appeared on the list ballot paper.
149 SeanT. I have been out all day (lucky me!). Because of this delay, and the thread moving so swiftly on, I wouldn’t normally reply. However, your reply was so intriguing, and begs a question.
You said, QUOTE
“Yes, John Major’s government was a disaster compared to New Labour. I mean, the cones hotline, how could they? Thank God we now have a government whose worst error is just invading a foreign country, illegally, and helping to kill 600,000 people.
Phew!”
END-QUOTE
The first Iraq war was conducted in John Major’s administration. The Conservative Party supported (and still do) the second war in Iraq.
(For the record, I supported neither).
Can I take it that you condemn the Conservative Party as utterly as you condemn the Labour Party for the actions in Iraq? And that since the Iraq war is obviously the most important political factor for you (it must be, since you seem to mention it every day), that you now support the Liberal Democrats as the only party to stand against the war from the start?
350 Sorry spelling shot to pieces!
339.This was one big unfolding disaster which could be seen coming from miles away. Andrea helped me find the figures for spoilt ballots in the 2003 elections a couple of days before, I was convinced we would see a sharp increase, but even I was shocked at the actual figure for the Holyrood vote.
341. Blue moon you are not correct. A candidate (or agent) can dispute what they like - there is no right to recounts or power to alter anything at all on the night if the returning officer disagrees with you. It is just custom and practice. Your legal rights as a candidate to challenge a result depend entirely upon the facts, not upon what you did or didn’t do (or were allowed to do by the returning officer) on the night.
325.
There has been a bit of potentially relevant background to this from Friday. It had been stated by, IIRC, the electoral authority in Scotland that both the company responsible for the counting system and also some Returning Officers that counts should be delayed until Friday. The reply from above was that the counts go ahead as planned.
On Friday, the Scottish Office relaesed a statement saying that they were demanding answers of the company who adminstered the counting system.
Those may be the opening shots in a war of words over that issue.
While this ultimately may or may not be directly relevant to Cunninghame North, which seems to be Labour’s line of attack it does give plenty of ammunition to those who want to point out that the Labour administration who have ultimate responsibility and oversight for these things were as complcit in cock ups as anyone else.
May not affect any legal challenge but may well stick with the voters.
Depending on how risky any challenge is seen to be the people at the top, it may well be left to the the losing Labour candidate in Cunninghame N to carry his own flag with everyone else saying absolutely nothing. Thus if it works, and I assume a successful challenge means a re-run, then great for Labour in that the SNP majority may be reversed.
If it goes wrong, then it can be protrayed very much a local challenge. I assume the people at the top of Labour wouldnt want to be seen to be getting too much behind a challenge should it fail.
Can anyone explain that, if Labour go ahead with an initial challenge regarding Cunninghame N only, and in retaliation others go and challenge other results what happens if the judgement is that Cunninghame N has to re-run. Does it:
a) Set a strong or absolute precedent that means every other challenge will also get a re-run because the basic case for Cunninghame N has been accepted.
or
b) Relate solely to Cunninghame N, meaning that every other challenge, even if the basis of the other challenges are the same as that for Cunninghame N, is judged purely on its individual case with no reference to any decision to the Cuninnghame N verdict?
This assumes that 1) Labour do challenge, 2) others retaliate, 3) Cunninghame N is the first challenge to be heard and decided upon.
10 points to anyone who actually gets through this post and understands it…I nearly lost my thread halfway through it….
339-332. The Richmond case involved an election decided by a single vote. The Liberal Democrats esablished that a German citizen had been registered and had voted.
The Court case was unique as the ballot papers were recounted face down by the judge, the ballot paper identified. The Judge confirmed it would have affected the result and ordered a re-run.
I suppose they haven’t thrown the ballot papers in the bin (did they?!), so if a legal challenge takes place, why can’t the judge just re-examine the spoilt papers?
When we have legal challenges here, we don’t re-run elections, we just look again at papers (re-count them and/or decide on what it must be considered spoiled and what not)
248 - it actually speeded up the counts in Dundee and we had the council seats all counted a couple of hours after the MSP’s had been elected. One of the few places where it did work - apart from the spoilt papers.
357 - Andrea - every ballot is actually copied like a photocpier and you can actually bring up on the screen all the ballot papers in turn so you can see what is wrong with a particular vote.
358. Do I take it that the ballots were oput into a stacking device and then the machine drew them in and scanned each ballot by reading where the paper marks were?
360 - yes that is what they did. It was quite a fast operation in Dundee.
359. Marcia, in the pre-election days I read that the ballot papers would have appeared on the machine screen, so counting staffs and agents could have seen the rejected papers and decide if they should be allowed or not. Did it work in that way?
It’s all Kinnock’s fault!
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23395179-details/Kinnock%27s+%C2%A333%2C000+job+with+computer+firm+in+poll+fiasco/article.do
Zebidee Fair enough. Thanks for putting me right.
361. Ok its a standard Optical Mark Reading System.
Was there a tallying the total number of votes scanned through the system (rejected or not) with a paper count of the physical ballots?
298
Mark, of course not winning Brooklands was a disappointment. I did say that all parties did better in some places than others and I would be the first to admit that not gaining a seat on Manchester City Council was one of the latter for us.
Why? Two reasons; first, if you aspire to be a national party you have to concerned at not being represented on any major local authority, just as I am sure Labour are concerned about the 89 councils on which they are now without a single councillor.
Second, winning Brooklands would have killed the ability of our opponents and certain elements of the media to use this particular line against us.
The point I was actually making was slightly different; it can be quite misleading to say “Manchester” when you really mean “Manchester City Council” because the area most people outside that city, and many inside it, understand by the word “Manchester” includes the local authorities of Salford and Manchester (and quite possibly a few others.) About a third of the department I work in are based at a building in the Salford authority area, and I don’t think I have ever heard a colleague refer to it as the Salford office. They invariably refer to it as Manchester.
Since the Conservatives do have representation on Salford Council, and gained two more this week, I stand by the view that saying the Conservatives have no councillors in Manchester is misleading unless you make clear that this statement only refers to Manchester City Council.
294 Zebidee asked me “Chris, who the hell is saying these results are good for the Lib Dems?”
I refer Zebidee to the following two posts from Tressage.
187 Tressage said that it “is not only in the North West that the Lib Dem vote has held up - or even improved” in their key targets and that Cameron is a “loser” who can’t rely on winning a single seat from the Lib Dems.
207 Tressage said “there were 21 councils in which the Liberal Democrats lost 7 or more seats on Thursday. The total loss across these seats was 255. In other words, across the rest of England the party made net gains (just).”
I think my 287 post was a reasonable response to those two posts - and so was the suggestion at 207 that these comments and one or two others are moving into “men in white coats” territory.
359 - they did and all the agents discussed any questionable ballots with the Returning Officer. Then there was agreement if the vote should be classed as spoilt or not. Each candidate was given prior to the count a list of what would be classed as spoilt or would be accepted. If someone just put an X instead of 1 on the council ballot that would be treated as the first preference. If they put multiple X then it would be disregarded. We had quite a few SNP votes disregarded that way as the voter put 2 X against the 2 SNP candidates names. A few not many put the Parties in order of preference on the List vote.
356 Ah yes it comes back to me now , I remember at the time that was that what struck me was that although we hsve a secret ballot , it is in fact not secret and how we actually have voted can be determined at a later date . We put our trust in that noone would actually do so for nefarious purposes .
Do judges have the power to change a result after a declaration or do they have to order a rerun? In Malone’s case the failure of the council staff to punch votes cost him the election, in the judge’s view, yet still he ordered a rerun.
369. I would suspect only to order a re-run.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6629093.stm
There’s the story according to the BBC.
366 Chris , again I find little to disagree with you nor would I disparage the gains you did make in places such as Salford and describe them as kingbongo dismissed similar gains LibDems made from Labour in the Mets as inconsequential . Brooklands was the 2006 Conservative target , this year it was City Centre and Rob Adlard the great new messiah , but it can and does take many years of hard work to get into a winning position in these often large Met Labour wards . You may be one of the few Conservative posters on here who appreciates what is needed to get elected and I suspect thankfully that you are in a minority in your party .
371.Did the constituency involved have a recount or was the result just accepted at the time?
ChrisD A constituency can’t just accept a change. A declaration has legal force. Winchester had to have a by election. A judge can vacate the result but I don’t think he can replace one winner with another. On that basis Labour would have to prove that any errors would have affected the result and then would have to take their chances in a rerun. Labour would not get away politically with hiding behind the candidate. They would be crucified by the SNP and have precious little sympathy even from the biased Scottish press. The likelihood would be a thumping SNP win and an even more dreadful start to GB’s term as PM. The fact that they’re talking about it shows how frightened GB is of Alex Salmond, though.
368. Of course had it been now, the lady in question would have been entitled to vote in a local election.
372. It is not impossible to win seats for a party in difficult areas, it requires work and long term commitment.
Having run the Conservative campaigns that have taken Labour seats in Hackney, Barking and Tower Hamlets recently and, a brace of seats in Haringey some years ago, I have a certain amount of experience in this matter.
I would not announce what and how I am doing for opponents to read about, which is why I tend to only post on background and facts.
In fact I find some of the contributions here and on Vote 2007 extremely interesting. After the spectacular own goals regarding Bwthnal Green and Bow on Vote 2005, I noticed the trappist silence from activists here on Vote 2006.
369, 374 - what about the Birmingham Kingstanding local election result that was reversed by a court without a rerun? Or does different law apply to parliamentary elections?
374.Blue moon, sorry badly worded post. I was just curious to know if there had been a recount before the declaration of the result?
The Labour MSP is obviously looking into challenging the result, did he request a recount on the night or just accept the result and the decisions regarding the spoilt ballots?
Book value frankly you’ve got me there. Wasn’t that a question of proven fraud by the candidate, though? At the end of the day a scottish judge could ignore an english precedent, I suppose , because they have a separate justice system north of the border so we’ll just have to wait and see.
Still trying to work out why Labour lost Cunninghame North when there was a split in the SNP vote with the former SNP MSP Campbell Martin standing as an Independent and a lot of SNP activist worked for CM instead of Kenny Gibson.
378 - it wasn’t fraud, it was a manifest error in the count, as the returning office him/herself announced (unfortunately after making the declaration).
But good point, the English precedent won’t necessarily apply in Scotland.
ChrisD I can’t be sure but there must have been a recount with such a small margin; perhaps even two. Marcia do you think the Independent might drop out in a rerun?
378 No there was no fraud involved but an error by the Returning Officer in adding together the votes .
381 - he might do as he now realises he doesn’t have the support he thought he had. The local party was split when Capmbell Martin was expelled from the SNP a couple of years ago.
Conservatives now on 898 gains according to the BBC.
Will the last 2 councils take it over 900?
I doubt, having thought about it, that there is statute law setting out what a judge can and cannot do either north or south of the border. In any judicial review he would decide whether a decision by the Executive ie the declaration was unreasonable and should be quashed. I was just struck by the remedy decided on by the judge in the Winchester case. Even though he decided that, through the fault of council workers, the result had been affected he required a rerun. In the Kingstanding case I suppose a rerun would have seemed unfair because it was simply an arithmetical error. As I said before, however, these judgements won’t affect a Scottish judge’s decision, I wouldn’t have thought.
383.Marcia, do you know if there was one or more recounts? Like Blue moon I can’t believe that there was not one because of the small margin, but I don’t remember that constituency being one of the ones I heard listed as being delayed due to one.
The Herald article you linked to was interesting, didn’t Annabel Goldie make the point a while back in the campaign that the largest party had a mandate to govern even as minority administration if a coalition could not be formed?
Re Cunninghame North
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=5QJZG5BEKKTMVQFIQMFCFGGAVCBQYIV0?xml=/news/2007/05/06/nelec06.xml
Ballot tampering!
387 - That’ll open the floodgates for a mass of similar claims from other parties, labour open themselves up to intense scrutiny if they go down that route, not very wise I would imagine.
Mike–I’m very late in commenting on your original point about darling claiming “equity” of votes with SNP.
Re the figures you showed for Regional List votes, the Scottish Daily Mail showed these figures as
SNP–633,401 (same as you)
Labour—528,949 (not 595,415)
I would trust your figures more than I would the SDM,, but IF the SDM happened to be correct, Darling’s claim would be even more ludicrous. Please advise.
Still can’t sleep (too much coffee earlier).
Apologies if this has already been mentioned in the 387 posts before mine,but one of the other amazing results of the Scottish election is that the SNP now has 363 councillors to the Labour Party’s 348.
Anyone with a smidgeon of knowledge of the Scottish political scene will understand that this represents a shift of enormous proportions. Labour benefited hugely from the FPTP system, but STV has changed all that. Well done the LibDems for insisting on STV as a condition of their coalition with Labour in the last Parliamentary session (that’s the last praise however I give to the LibDems!)
The loosening of Labour’s grip also means a reduction in their powers of patronage, which in the Central Belt (and Glasgow especially, was a shameful state of affairs). Getting 47 seats in the Parliamentary election was great for the SNP, but I suggest that in the long run the demolition of Labour Council fiefdoms will have an equally important effect on the Scottish body politic.
re 389. My source was Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_elections_2007
Looking at the percentages in the table I think that this one is right.
Thanks Mike. Not sure where the SDM got their figures, especially as they showed separate figures for all 8 Regions, which added up to 528,949 (or perhaps I added them wrongly!!)