Firstly there is the question of how a majority is defined. This is from Smarkets: This market will be settled based on which party (if any) wins an overall majority of the seats (50% +1) at the next UK general election. The speaker will not be counted in any party’s seat total but will be counted in the overall number of seats. By my reckoning, this means LAB moving from the 202 seats of GE2019 to 326 which looks daunting…
Remember the De Lorean fiasco? To provide jobs in Northern Ireland, the then Tory government paid the bouffant-haired car designer to set up his factory there. It collapsed a few years later amidst missing money and fraud. Arthur Andersen, the auditors, who admitted missing obvious fraud signs, were banned from government work and sued. It was only when Blair won that the ban on AA was lifted and a risible settlement agreed. (Doubtless entirely coincidentally, AA had provided free advice…
It must be worrying for the Royals and their sycophants that only a quarter of Brits were most looking forward to the coronation, more Brits were looking forward to the bank holiday. The first coronation is seventy years really didn’t appeal to Brits, the viewing figures for the coronation were substantially lower than when England ‘s men’s soccer team play in international tournaments or make the final. With the police arresting people for exercising free speech against the monarchy, that…
There’s some interesting analysis in The Observer Labour is making dramatic progress in winning back pro-Brexit voters across the country as the coalition of support for the Tories built by Boris Johnson collapses, according to detailed analysis of Thursday’s local election results. Figures from the BBC’s “key wards” data, obtained by the Observer, show support for Keir Starmer’s party was up by seven points compared with 2021 in the most heavily pro-leave wards. The data also shows that while the Tories…
Last year a woman in a castle died. Rumors and notes moved to black cloth and whispers and then the word: she had died and was succeeded by her son. She had been appointed when young by God to be Queen and she had been diligent, as the girl became a woman became frail and she and the years wore away. She had died and the duty passed to the man, and a strange period began. Life is a succession…
Perhaps that was the whole point of having the wedding today
The figures are: Labour: 35% Conservatives: 26% Lib Dems: 20% Others: 19% This is slightly lower than the national Westminster polls but still a good indicator of the challenge facing Sunak. Prof Michael Thrasher has said that his analysis suggests that these results show Labour is on course to be the largest party in parliament after the general election, but without an overall majority. Mike Smithson
It is important to note that we have only had a small number of results so far with the vast bulk of councils doing their counts during the day. I have little doubt that things will change in the next few hours. A big figure to look out for will be the scale of Tory losses. One projection overnight has the party losing over 1,100 seats. No doubt there will be speculation over Sunak’s position given that this is his…