Shall we see if this works? I will say a majority of 60 to the Conservatives. Normally that would be seen as a great result, but four weeks ago I would have said a majority of 120. So if it is a majority like that I suspect Theresa May will be seen as slightly damaged goods.
What does everyone else think?
Depends on the 18-24 vote. If they can be arsed I’d say a hung parliament.
If not, the Grey Vote and the Kippers will give the Tories a 60-100 seat majority.
And we’ll be fucked.
Is the Afterword the 24-96 vote?
heh heh
(nobody gets that. I hope Hitler wins, you ungrateful sods)
The better defined amongst us are in the 24-192 demographic……
Don’t fall into the trap of filing the ‘grey vote’ away in one great lump. Me and my mates tend to greyness (or in my case whiteness with prominent pink bits) and would all rather cut off our dangly bits than vote for either of the bunch of chancers and villains you mention.
As it happens I’m disenfranchised anyway, because my postal vote forms only turned up on Monday, in nice time for a Thursday election. 😡
As long as it gets there by 10pm it will be counted.
Or, you can hand it in to your Council Offices and they’ll take it.
It’s actually 10,466m from Brisbane to St Austell…
It is. I’ll write that down.
Tory majority of around 70, SNP will lose around 10 seats, Lib Dems might pick up one or two in especially non-Brexity areas, Ukip vote will evaporate mostly going to the Tories.
I think Tories win with a reduced majority: 12 seats.
The pessimist in me agrees that it’ll be a small Con win, in the 10-30 range.
The miserabilist in me sees this as giving renewed hope to the Very Soft Leavers / Closet Remainers in the party, with the consequence that all The Big Egos will once again start bellowing and stamping the ground, and the whole damn Europe / In / Out / Leadership circus will start up again, cuz that’s just what Tories do. (That said, I think that the battle would be presented / fought entirely via a proxy issue, prolly ‘national security / combatting extremism’.)
The pragmatic reluctant-optimist in me sees a small win for Corbyn. I base this on four observations:
1. The astonishing number of ‘Vote Labour’ placards I’m seeing in Reading East, particularly in the part of the constituency that’s over the borough border in the [Tory] Wokingham area of Woodley. To see one Labour placard in Woodley is a rarity; to see many is just absolutely bloody astonishing, particularly considering that Woodley butts right up against Theresa May’s home village of Sonning, in her constituency of Maidenhead
2. The way that ‘the national public mood’ seems to have turned against May so comprehensively, and that, amazingly, she seems to have squandered the hitherto nailed-on support of the conservative commentariat
3. The fact that, amazingly, Corbyn seems to have developed some presentational smarts, and is making hay while May repeatedly hangs herself. He appears to be being liked by increasing numbers of members of the public, seemingly across all age groups
4. The remarkable levels of active interest in the Election, and the even more remarkable levels of furious hostility being shown towards the Tories and May in particular, amongst the 18-35 demographic that largely makes up Reddit. It really is angry but well-informed, articulate stuff; the impression I get is that they’re so hacked off that they didn’t turn out in numbers for the Referendum, and thus found themselves stuck with the old farts’ Brexit, that they look like they’re going to be turning out in droves on Thursday. Let’s hope it’s not raining
So, I’ve got all bases covered there, ie narrow wins for both May and Corbyn. Because WTF does ANYONE know these days about how people are going to vote?
EDIT: Ok, I’ll come off the fence. A narrow win for May. Why? Because Shy Tories and de-camping Kippers. And ‘Diane Abbott as Home Secretary’
Woodley Butts ought to be a constituency in its own right.
[A Dimbleby]: “…aaaand we’re just getting news of a massive swing in Woodley Butts”.
🙂
I think the Tories have had a poor campaign, but I also think that a sizeable chunk of the electorate that will go out & vote will give the fragrant Theresa a 30ish seat majority.
But WTF do I know.
FWIIW, I will be voting Labour as I have always done, but more out of habit than any strong sense of conviction.
I have no real optimism for the future & I don’t foresee any improvement in my quaility of life/standard of living any time soon.
I got Brexit wrong. I got Trump wrong. So in that spirit: huge conservative landslide. For sure. 😉
With a heavy heart I say Tories with a majority of 40 to 50, just enough to cling on and with enough of a mandate at the polls for Corbyn to stay in position too.
Tories will win with a 50-60 seat majority. SNP will lose 5-10 seats, Lib Dems will gain 5-10 seats and Labour will not be destroyed and thus Corbyn won’t resign as leader.
In my constituency the hope is that Alliance will oust DUP.
* sound of Afterword room going quiet as no-one knows what I’m talking about *
I do!
I just vote for any party on the ballot who’s top 5 policies do not include staying in the union or getting out of it. Narrows the field considerably.
I will be voting Alliance in South Belfast as they do stand a chance.
As the cliché goes, it’s the hope that kills you: I was a reluctant Labour supporter at the start of the campaign, thoroughly dissilusioned with Corbyn, but since then I’ve really come to admire his quiet conviction and the way Labour has run its campaign – barring a few hiccups, and Diane-fucking-Abbott.
But I just can’t trust the polls – like an earlier poster i was right about Brexit and Trump, so this might just be the hat-trick from hell. But I’d love Theresa to at least have a reduced majority.
Labour to win on the final black ball after sixty-eight minutes of tense counting in the final constituency.
If only TJ, if only…
It’s Macron, May, then Merkel
Ain’t on Cor(byn)ers on a circle..
Conservatives having been doing their best to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
I still think they will get enough votes to give them a majority, but not much more (if it all) than they previously had.
I’m thinking there is also a chance of the re-birth of the Conservative-LibDem coalition.
I can see it ending up pretty much as we started with the Tories maintaining a slim majority which would surely lead to calls for May to go as she won’t have the mandate she wanted. Serves her right too given the fact she called an election when she said she wouldn’t and produced a manifesto which appears to be funding every spending promise on the back of tax receipts from a growing economy at a time when the country is about to go through one of the most turbulent periods in its recent history.
If she did go, would we end up going through it all again later in the year.
Corbyn has really surprised me. I don’t agree with everything he says but what I do know is that he believes in what he is saying which is incredibly refreshing in modern politics. It’s also the complete opposite to May who has repeated the same few soundbites that Lynton Crosby appears to have told her to learn with hardly an ounce of conviction.
Labour – SNP coalition anyone?
SNP’s red line would be IndyRef2, shirley? JC won’t give them that. Anyway, a Tory government in Westminster is in the SNP’s interests.
It was the threat of that which sank Ed Miliband in 2015.
No. Wrong in principle and unnecessary in practice.
Blimey. She’d be happy with 40. I’m not ruling out an upset though. I shall be sitting under for it all!
I dunno. I was wrong on Election ’15, Brexit and Trump, so what do I know?
My guess is that on Friday May will be weaker and Corbyn will be stronger, and that’s as it should be; two opposing parties, each influential enough to limit the worst excesses of the other.
I think the Tories will win, but with their majority increased by much less than they’d assumed – say 30 or so. Given the initial expectations of a landslide, and May’s abject performance by avoiding any kind of debate, the knives could be out for her.
And to think it might have been Andrea “I’m a mum” Leadsom.
I predicted a small conservative majority the other day but I am not so sure now.
The choice before the voters has never been so clearly defined. This is nothing like the 2015 election. An interesting nugget from that campaign was that Milliband and Johnson went to the same primary school. Crazy coincidence or an indication of the limited Oxbridge gene pool that seems to (does) produce our senior politicians?
As it always should be, the future is in the hands of the young people. There’s an amazing manifesto promise to scrap University fees from this September.
If they can get to the voting booths in the marginal seats, we may well see a change of Government. May’s majority is small – and I think her position is weaker now. I think it’s a Labour win. If it isn’t – then they have a great campaign and will be stronger next time.
It has occurred to me that just as many people didn’t realise there was such a strong anti Europe feeling because Brexiters felt disenfranchised when all the main parties supported member ship,of the EU, there may be a left wing vote which has had no way of articulating itself cohesively at the ballot. Box when the last few decades have seen the main parties campaign on variations of Centre right and a bit more right.
I predict a landslide victory for the Labour Party. And it’ll be brilliant. Just like in A Very British Coup.
Funny that that was written by Chris Mullin, who in practice isn’t especially left wing by the standards of his generation of Labour MPs. His memoirs are well worth reading.
Mrs. Paws feels that the Tories actually want a hung parliament. Her thoughts are that this gives the Tories a massive excuse when they go super soft on the brexit- “we had to do it that way, the (fill in name of patsy) made us do it.”
Personally I think I could be any one of Australia, England, India or South Africa. Not sure if we’re watching the same channel on the TV.
Well done Mrs Paws!
I so want the Conservatives to haemorrhage votes in this election. Can you imagine 5 more years of austerity, with the country crashing out of the EU with a thump, ever more of the country’s dwindling assets sold off to foreign governments, while the Mail and Sun and the BBC mock anyone who dares to present a credible alternative to the strong and stable facade? The brain drain will leech the country dry of talent.
It may well be the last general election I can vote in – I’ll have been out of the country for too long, come the next round. Not that it matters anyway – I read today that the second place candidate to the Conservatives in the constituency I’ll be voting in is a UKIPer – my vote’s really going to count…
“The brain drain will leech the country dry of talent” – well, at least I won’t have to move…
Hull is other people, you’re abroad already
Up.
And t-shirt. . .
Cons majority by 40-50. They’ve run a rubbish campaign, while Corbyn has run a far better one against everyone’s predictions. But Britain is not ready for a 1980s hard left pacifist with a shower of economic illiterates and Remaintards on his front bench. Maybe one day but not now.
The main problem for Corbyn is that, following Brexit, the whole centre of gravity of UK politics has shifted to the right rather than the left. And the SNP are also losing ground in Scotland to a Tory renewal under R Davidson. Sturgeon has overplayed her independence card which has alienated a significant number of Scottish Remain supporting Unionists and even some Scottish independence supporting Brexiteers.
Labour will hold onto most of their core vote as in 2015 and the Lib Dems might pick up a couple more seats but Farron has miscalculated the impact of his Brexit reversal message, which is now boring the media and public.
I wouldn’t be that surprised if UKIP win at least one seat – Thurrock, Thanet South or Boston – by a very slim majority.
If I get this wrong I shall, of course, not eat my hat nor run naked down Whitehall.
“Remaintards”? You do realise you’re talking about 48% of the Brexit turnout? Including me. So rock off.
For every 4.8 of us Remaintards there are 5.2 Brextits.
Imagine an alternative reality. The Referendum was 52% Remain, 48% Leave. For nearly a year now, we’ve had a constant roar from the tabloids and UKIP demanding a second referendum, because the first wasn’t binding and a four percentage point difference wasn’t enough to settle the question – a figure of ten percent is commonly quoted by ‘Kippers. Cameron’s government is all but paralysed, with deep divisions across his front and back benches, and several more of his MPs either triggering by-elections, or ‘crossing the floor’.
Or. Cameron fails to win the 2015 election with a decisive majority, and forms another coalition. Despite a vast amount of pressure, it proves impossible to have a Referendum, and government continues in much the same way it did before.
Or. Despite a few outlying polls suggesting a small overall Tory majority, Ed Miliband’s Labour are able to govern as a minority party, with confidence-and-supply support from the SNP and LDs. No Referendums take place within the full term of his government, and Miliband proves to be a capable leader. His Twitter feed becomes a welcome antidote to that of Donald Trump, and Miliband forms useful relationships with Macron and Justin Trudeau.
Yeah but he looked a bit funny eating a bacon sandwich, didn’t he. So his political career is finished.
PS Tory majority of 32
No, I wasn’t talking about the 48%. I was talking about the Remaintards on Corbyn’s front bench. Most of those who voted Remain have now moved on and, as reliable polls show, want the Govt to just get on with Brexit. The Labour front bench’s late conversion to Brexit was opportunist rather than principled, which is why they cannot be trusted to deliver the biggest political mandate in British history. Even Corbyn, a lifelong Bennite Eurosceptic, has shown himself to be a hypocrite on the issue. Which is partly why he and his merry band of Islingtonian retro socialists will get a damn good trouncing tomorrow.
But you are fine with the “Remaintards” on the Tory front bench? Rudd, Hammond, Soubry, Greening, Truss, Hunt, Letwin, Fallon? If checking boxes for opportunist conversion then these fine principled people are only overshadowed by one other and that’s the vicar’s daughter.
Conservatives will scrape in with a much-reduced majority. May will be ousted and whoever gets the job (Boris), their party will be in a mess they will be unlikely to fix before the next general election. If they last that long.
Labour will do so much better than originally predicted that Corbyn’s leadership will be assured. Diane Abbott and the few remaining prominent Blairite dissenters will be put out of harm’s way.
The Lib-Dems might get a few here and there.
The Greens will stay exactly as they are.
The DUP will continue their stagger into oblivion in Norn Iron.
Alliance will improve their standing.
The SNP will lose a few to the Tories, but not to Labour. Indyref 2 will be put on the absolute lowest back burner. So low you’d hardly notice it was even on the stove.
UKIP’s vote will go completely over a cliff. They are all but finished.
The Tories will be saved by the stampede away from UKIP in England and by the few they’ll nick from the SNP in Scotland.
Having realised that the overall Conservative majority is far smaller than I thought, I’m now thinking they’ll gain about 25 from Labour, maybe lose a couple in return. Lib Dems will gain a couple each from Labour & Conservative. Greens will stay the same. SNP will lose 5 to the Conservatives. UKIP will lose their 1 to the Conservatives. Both Ulster Unionist parties will lose seats to the Alliance party.
Overall Conservative majority of 44.
Tory majority of 71.
… in the House of Uncommons?
Don’t mention Uncommon People.
Corbyn has exceeded expectations. May has had a mare of a campaign and has not been able to keep the agenda on Brexit as she wanted (it was marked in the first TV ‘debates how the one time she looked confident and got roars of approval from the audience was when she got on to Brexit).
But Corbyn was starting from a low base, and I am not sure the fact that people may have seen that he isn’t quite the incompetent ogre they thought will translate into actually voting for him. Labour’s real problem is that so much of their vote is concentrated into the North (of England) and the major urban centres. I suspect we will see that they can’t convert the floating voter, particularly in the South.
So i think its going to be a strong Tory majority of up to 100. Hope I’m wrong.
Seems to have got to the point where it’ll be Diane Abbott who will lose it for Labour rather than Corbyn. Why she hasn’t been bundled off for a nice little lie-down I don’t know.
Apart from her Labour have run an exemplary campaign (mostly), but although the Tories are probably bricking it that won’t be enough to defeat them. 30-40 majority 🙁
She has been to an extent. She was meant to be on some programme today but pleaded illness, and I believe that when Corbyn wrong-footed May by agreeing to appear on the leaders’ debate it was Abbott’s place he took.
Can’t he add her sacking to the manifesto?
Looks like he pretty much has done that
Greater Love Hath No Man Than To Lay Down His Friends For His Life
Nice line on the Guardian website this evening from Marine Hyde – The Tories are thinking that Theresa May has ” something of the shite about her”.
72 seat Tory majority. I was thinking about 120 at the start, so that almost feels like a win right now, but once it’s all over that’ll be no consolation. For all Theresa’s horror show campaign, it’ll quickly be forgotten once she wins and the party falls in line behind her (they’re good at that), while Labour will rip itself to shreds again as Corbyn refuses to resign and the PLP tries to oust him again. Basically a repeat of Brexit…
Tory majority. But a reduced one, an closer than they think.
Tory leadership election within 18 months either way. Hammond to win
I would give my left dangly bit for the Tories to lose their majority altogether, but it won’t happen. Weather forecast’s bad though, so that should keep some of the old Tories from venturing out to the polling station. But feck me, what I don’t get is why anyone up here in the chilly north is buying any of May’s rubbish.
The Barnsley Chronicle had a four page advertorial wraparound for the Conservative Party last week. Around £9k they got for that apparently. They can use that to make up for some of the lost sales last week and on an ongoing basis. Was the editor too young to remember what the 1980s were like for Barnsley?
But Jeremy Corbyn has become my favourite politician for many a year. He has the establishment shaking at the thought of him getting anywhere near number 10, as the press coverage has shown. Just wish he’d chosen somebody else, anybody else, other than Dianne Abbott. I guess he’d have had more to choose from though had there not been so many of his MPs who threw their teddies out of the pram. Bet some of them are regretting that now. Had they all stood together when the Tories went to pieces post-Brexit who knows what could have happened.
Go, Corbyn!
IIRC @bricameron – you were right about Brexit and Trump…
I hope I’m right now.
Will probably end up as a bit of an anticlimax with a comfortable win for the Tories.
Not the land slide they expected – which could cause May trouble. Will she continue to be seen as the Strong / Stable leader she tried to present herself as? Seems unlikely.
Meanwhile it is going to be tough to demonise Corbyn as stridently now. The public has seen him and he’s not the looney leftie the Tory press painted him to be. Much of his party’s manifesto seemed encouraging and hopeful. Let’s see how that optimism plays out now.
Getting the Tories to “clean up Brexit” is like getting Johnny to clean up his little brother’s nose which he broke with a cricket bat.
Brexit is as much due to Corbyn though. Mind you he is a man of principle as we know – he’s always been opposed to the EU – rich men’s club etc.
No referendum, no “Brexit.”
Corbyn’s input into calling a referendum was zilch.
Miliband was also promising one. Once called surely the thing to do is fight it, not sit on your hands.
What if May gets a smaller majority than she has now? Her judgement on calling the election and her craven perfomance during the campaign mean she would surely be busted as a Prime Minister. So do the Tories have another leadership contest, and we get another unelected PM?
One of the best things about a Corbyn win would be that all those Momentum twats would have to calm down and behave themselves. Imagine – you’ve spent a lifetime sniping from the sidelines, dreaming up daft conspiracy theories and complaining that the media is SO UNFAIR to you, safe in the knowledge that you’ll never have to answer for any of it – and then, hey, you’re in charge! You’re finally responsible for something! The rebels have taken over the Death Star!
I suspect there will be a brief period of peace on Twitter, followed by the first allegations that Murdoch and Crosby conspired to make Labour take the blame for Brexit, and then a concerted anti-Corbyn backlash when it turns out he’s sold out, man, by having tea with the Queen every Thursday.
I think we’d see a takeover by McDonald, Milne and co and a new hard left set of policies rather then the middle class friendly manifesto.
Imagine if we had a Labour Prime Minister who passionately defended the right of rich homeowners to get free social care and pass their wealth on to their children, who wanted taxpayers to buy posh kids’ lunch, and who was committed to putting more armed police on the streets. And who supports Trident. How long would the Left stand for that?
Quite.
I’ve voted Labour already (by post), not that it’ll count for anything in my staunchly Conservative constituency (with UKIP runners-up to boot…)
… BUT, I honestly think this is the most open GE in a long while, and I wouldn’t be surprised with anything from a (very narrow) Labour win to a Conservative landslide. As is often (always?) the case, it’ll come down to turnout – a low turnout has been forecast, and if that followed through, but with the potential big young Labour vote actually happening, a significant swing might not be impossible…
And I’m very wary of the social media echochamber after the last GE, Brexit & Trump, so caveats aplenty, but it genuinely feels like a groundswell is happening (and apparently the betting patterns at the bookies are currently way in Labour’s favour, based on what happened with Brexit & Trump…)
However, if you put a gun to my head, I’ll (sadly) go for a Conservative win, but at the current or even a slightly decreased majority, effectively turning TM into a lame duck with her own party and the EU, perhaps that’s the best we can realistically hope for… interesting times (again!)
Vote Moon Weasel.
What is the Moon Weasle manifesto?
Foxy Boho Chick’s second LP. . .
Not one of Zappa’s kids?
1. A return to Hunter Gathering.
2. Re-installation of Goddess Worship, and Cave Bear Veneration on Tuesdays.
3. Compulsory Free Jazz For All.
4. Gnome Dunking Apprenticeships for the under 5s.
5. Super High Speed Astralband for every yurt.
6. Lots of sex and psychedelics.
7. Witchcraft Wednesday.
8. A commitment to build 5 million new megaliths by 2025.
9. Rob C to be anointed Sri Emperor Moon Weasel.
10. A blanket ban on Jazz Funk Slap Bass.
Shiva On Board!
*sighs*
You’d have my vote, but for the free jazz.
We can always come to an ‘arrangement’ GCUdude.
Finally some real policies that the electorate can relate to. But what does the Cave Bear do on the other 6 days of the week when it is not being venerated?
It feasts on Jazz Funk Slap Bassists, in a large torchlit pit, by moonlight, to the sounds of sitars, mellotrons, crumhorns, and ecstatic grunting.
Sounds grand.
Shall I bring me Thermos?
If it contains a hearty brew of Ainsley Harriot’s Cup-a-Psychedelic Reindeer Piss, most certainly!
Any magic mushroom cup-a-soup?
Of course dear Hubes, with peyote croutons!
It’ll groove with the Pict and other several species of small furry animals gathered together.
Full on woad, antler headdress, voleskin knacker pouch, and wolf pelt belt of skulls required, Sniffitybabes!
Small Tory win. Corbyn has come to life over the last couple of weeks but I feel that the Conservatives have not performed well. Possible turning point for a lot of Middle England was being told that they were going to be paying for their own care towards the end of their life with their homes. You can say what you like about “rich homeowners” and how they should have to pay for care but you can’t make them vote for it, despite the half baked U Turn May made, promising a cap on the amount anyone would have to pay.
I don’t really buy the “Corbyn has really come to life over the last couple of weeks” line. He’s always been pretty much the same, and certainly his values and opinions haven’t changed. It seems to me the major change is that some of the media, notably The Guardian, have stopped obsessively slagging him at every opportunity and started to sing his praises.
And his increased, more prolonged exposure has resulted in many, like me, thinking he’s not that bad after all. In fact, he’s a lot better than the current PM.
The more we get to see Corbyn, the more we like. The more we see May, the less we like.
He “presents” better. Much more enthusiastic on camera and comes across as likeable, rather than the dour introvert that he seemed (to me) to be before.
He’s out campaigning with his people, not sitting in Westminster with a bunch if MPs who hate him. No wonder he’s cheered up.
Interesting analysis by the Beeb – JC is mostly going to Labour seats – love that applause Jezza – and TM to targetted Labour seats….
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-40176539
Hate to say it, but that sounds like, based on their private polling, the Tories are expecting a thumping win and Labour are trying to shore up their core vote.
Read what the New Statesman – the New Statesman thinks…
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2017/06/labour-reckoning
Yes I saw that as well – feels like the most plausible analysis I’ve read so far. Interesting how the Statesman appears to have moved right just as the Labour leadership has moved left…
It does sound exactly like that: TM doing the obvious targeting of marginals, and JC all over the place.
Meanwhile, this piece on Facebook marketing is interesting:
https://www.marketingweek.com/2017/06/05/mark-ritson-%E2%80%8Bhow-win-election/?cmpid=em~newsletter~breaking_news~n~n&utm_medium=em&utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=breaking_news&eid=3507130&sid=MW0001
Whether the same marketing genius was used by Greg Knight is debatable:
https://youtu.be/Gt7lWRtfve8
I can echo that from ‘the ground’. I live in a Tory marginal – majority of less than 1000 in 2015 – it’s the sort of seat Labour should be targeting yet their campaign here is practically invisible.
I’ve seen one house – which belongs to a Labour councillor – with a Labour poster, they’ve sent out two leaflets, both careful not to mention Corbyn, and… That’s it.
The Tories by contrast have quite a few posters about have done at least four leaflets, a door-to-door canvas and a phone canvas.
Anyone would think Labour weren’t really interested.
I was just out stuffing leaflets for the LDs and saw one Labour poster. Now it’s always been a safe Tory seat but Peter Lilley is retiring so there’s a new Tory…surely an opportunity to give a “time for a change” message – zip, not a leaflet not a door knock.
People don’t make rational decisions. Just heard a very pleasant and considered gentleman on the radio who travels a lot by trains, has a partner with Alzheimers, 2 kids about to go to Uni, and is worried about Terrorism. He is going to vote Tory believing they are best placed to help him with that. Which is (with the possible exception of terrorism – when there are lots of possible options) the exact wrong choice (imho) for his interests.
So, the Maybot to win – but she is holed below the waterline and if the majority is less than 100 she is gone by next Easter. Corbyn will stay regardless – he was not the chaotic shambles the PLP predicted, and that rather takes the wind from their sails. (and I voted ABC)
For the country this is not a good result, but it is not a bad one for either Labour or the Tories. When the inevitable Brexit negotiation debacle unfolds the Tories will blame and ditch May, Labour will blame the Tories. UKIP will blame the EU. No one will listen to the LibDems saying “we told you so”, preferring to focus on their leader’s religion. No one will invite the Greens to QT despite getting more votes than UKIP (I predict) because it does not make good telly.
And if my bloody MP hangs on because of Sophie Walker and the WEP I shall be very very cross. (I suspect he will hang on because the 10% of UKIP voters will move over to him, neutralising any Tory defectors)
Re Diane Abbot, this just in:
https://www.ft.com/content/72663664-4b5d-11e7-a3f4-c742b9791d43
That’s got to be worth a few votes…
Can I make a plea to all those who haven’t actually posted a figure to do so?
I was very interested in this thread because of the basic premise of testing the wisdom of crowds, moreso than for any political discussion (interesting as much of it is – though whoever made the Remaintards comment can fade away and radiate).
Assuming @BigJimBob is going to do the sums, if we get the average figure from all our predictions, the theory is we should be very close to the actual figure.
So place your numbers – preferably a specific figure, not a range.
Okay, Tory majority of 117. Extra Labour votes either increase sitting majorities or close the gap slightly on an incumbent Tory, but are spread too wide to make any difference to FPTP.
I hope I’m wrong, I really do.
My best case imaginable scenario: Tory majority of 50.
My realistic scenario: Tory majority of 90+.
My absolute pipe dream: a hung Parliament. But I can’t even bring myself to hope for it: it’s too painful. I hate what we’re becoming.
650 seats to Labour.
Tory overall majority of 46
May, having revealed her poor judgement and complete inadequacy for the job, plays the health card to avoid defenestration – new PM refuses to call another early election
Corbyn gets enough of the popular vote to legitimately stay on long enough to change the rules and get a leftie candidate on the leadership ballot
None of it really matters anyway because Brexit, Trump, Climate.
OK, I’ll go for Tory overall majority of 86
Is everyone using the majority in the same sense? Is it a party’s overall majority in the Commons, or the gap between Labour and the Conservatives?
The Conservatives had an overall majority of 12 in the last parliament. They had 99 more seats than Labour. (Conservatives 331 seats, Labour 232).
Yeah, I’m using it in the sense of Parliamentary majority, not as compared with the nearest opposition. I thought their majority was 17 in this last Parliament, though?
Anyway, I’m really concerned that the intricacies of FPTP mean that they pick up a lot of seats regardless of how the campaign has seemed to play out. I think Labour will still suffer heavy, heavy losses. I have never before so hoped I’m wrong.
I think in effect it was 17, because the 4 Sinn Fein members don’t take their seats and the speaker doesn’t vote.
I don’t think Corbyn is having much of a positive influence outside his existing supporters – my local labour candidate doesn’t mention him on his leaflets. I guess Labour under 200 – about 180, and the Conservatives making a few gains against other parties. So, I think they will have an overall majority of 60.
Tory majority of 74. Me and the wife going to bed at 3am shaking our heads and wondering what the feck has gone wrong with the world. And in a few years, when it’s driven me completely doolaly, the missus can decide whether to sell the house to pay for my care or to put the kids through university.
At least the wealthy will be able to breathe a huge sigh of relief though.
Tory majority of 11.
BJ Prime minister by the end of the Cricket Season
Another election in October
Diane Abbott announced for I’m a celebrity get me out of here in November
Hepworth begins writing book about 2017’s year of political revolution in December
Who are you telling to BJ the Prime Minister?
Excellent! my post was even better than I thought it was
Johnson PM? I don’t see it. He’s a busted flush: nobody’s falling for his shtick any more. He’s an unprincipled grasping coward, and the bumbling wiff-waff-alea-iacta-est routine isn’t playing. Even my parents, who always maintained the “don’t believe the exterior, he’s got a mind like a scalpel” idea about him, now think he’s a prick.
Someone recently said on Twitter that Johnson is the correct answer to “is class still a big deal in Britain?” Can you imagine a person of his absolute moral vacuity, his total absence of beliefs, his infinite incompetence, rising to one of the great offices of state if they weren’t Eton educated?
Happened in America!
He manages the difficult feat of being lightweight and overweight at the same time.
Oh I’m pretty good at that!
Oh, Bravo! Mikethep.
I agree re Johnson. In fact one of the most appalling things about the current Tory shower is contemplating who in God’s name would become leader in the eventuality that May fails to secure a big enough majority to stop her party making her walk the plank. I can’t see Johnson or Gove. Hunt, Davis, Fox, Duncan Smith – surely not. Hammond I suspect would be viewed as too dull and wet. Damian Green and Michael Fallon are walking disaster zones. Greg Clark is anonymous. Liz Truss Justine Greening and Chris Grayling seem unlikely. Which probably leaves Sajid Javid or Amber Rudd.
Not exactly inspiring prospect, is it?
There’s Priti Patel – but I can’t see her runnin’ to be leadin’ the Conservative Party or bein’ Prime Minister of the United Kin’dom.
Too true. I just want someone with a positive vision. I was just debating with a mate of mine on What’s App and he was slagging Blair off, but I am starting to miss him. WTF.
Interesting to compare the media’s reaction meted out to Diane Abbott’s campaign interviews to that for Johnson, who is clearly just as incompetent.
Again New Statesman nails it. In their podcast the the very astute Helen Lewis and Stephen Bush compare him to the louche dude who used to “paartee” and sleep around at Uni. But now that he has reached his 30s – and is still doing the same sexist shtick, crashing on mate’s sofas and getting “really out of it” while they pair off, settle down, and start families – he has become a sad embarrassment.
When the election was called I made the parallel with 1966. I think the result will follow suit to an extent. Government majority goes up to about 60, but the campaign leaves the PM damaged as cynical and unreliable in the eyes of the electorate and the party. Meantime the leader of the opposition is strengthened despite the loss.
The other parallel is what happens next: devaluation.
And winning the world cup
…and, a bit later, joining the Common Market .
D’Oh!
Devaluation has already happened.
How would we fare if a travel allowance was re-introduced though?
1966’s £50 is worth about £650 today.
Not that I was around, but it wasn’t the March election that drained Wilson of credibility, so much as his subsequent Walter Mitty pronouncements about the imminent collapse of the Rhodesian regime and the (non-existent but forever imminent) recovery of the economy, his apparent support for an increasingly unpopular Vietnam war (“We can’t kick out creditor in the balls”), his inability to control key ministers (the continually resigning, perpetually drunk George Brown in particular), the never-ending sterling crisis, continuing cuts to public spending, the failed July 1966 ‘plot’ to oust him, the collapse of the panglossian National Plan and subsequent austerity package, the like of which (mandatory price and wage freezes, increases in surtax, excise and petrol taxes, heavy hire purchase restrictions, cuts to the overseas budget and public spending and £50 limits on foreign exchange for holidays) make George Osborne look like a spendthrift.
You’re making me wistful, Bartleby. (Sigh)
Just hope for a Jezza win Bri – it’ll all come back pretty quickly!
I meant that the election, even though he won it comfortably, brought his honeymoon period to an end. The true extent of his craposity hadn’t yet become apparent, so my analogy doesn’t end there.
TM thinks she’s got the handbag, or maybe even the cigar. She’s actually got the pipe. Or, at best, the Y-fronts.
And yet that government did great things and left Britain a better place. As did the much-maligned 74-79 government, which managed important reforms despite a wafer-thin (and then non-existed) majority. And then the SNP catapulted the Tories into power – no change there.
Tory majority of 70, boosted by gains in Scotland. Labour win back Leith from the separatists though, which is a consolation prize.
This is more pessimistic than my initial prediction and the reason is that I had expected the Lib Dems to do rather better and capture the remain vote. They seem to have failed to do so. In fact they seem to have failed to do anything.
Nailing my colours to the mast, I’m saying Tory majority of 23 seats.
My barometer is reading a win for Corby.
I for one welcome our trouser press overlords
I’ll say Tory win, majority of +/- 100. If Jezza’s young (and optimistic/gullible/social justice-minded/naive – delete to taste) voters manage to make it to the ballot box, possibly less. The last minute wobble may help get the Tory vote out. As with Brexit, expect a great deal of wailing and gnashing of teeth in the aftermath.
Pipe dream = Hung parliament
Realistic hope = Tory Majority of 30
Fear = Tory majority of 90 +
I have never lived in anything other than a rock solid safe seat – mainly for the Tories but occasionally for Labour. In all that time, election campaigns have passed me by; never had a leaflet (other than from the Lib Dems) or a phone call or even a candidate go down the street shouting at me through a megaphone. Never, that is, until this time round. The Tory candidate – sitting member – knocked on my door one morning and we talked for about five minutes. I’m still getting over the shock! I always said that whoever could be bothered to canvass my vote would get it, so I guess that’s decided.
As to the outcome:
Pipe Dream: unchanged Tory majority forcing a different approach to Brexit
Expectation: Tory majority in the 90 – 100 range
Fear: Corbyn – I remember the 70’s
Ok, Tory majority of 55 – not quite enough to see off Boris’s ambition, and May limps on till Brexit negotiations are over and is humanely defenestrated by the Conservatives who then call a brave new election for a brave new post EU world in 2021. Corbyn stays thoughout. Farron replaced by Nick Clegg, who actually becomes the LibDems (or as he is know, the Liberal Democrat) because there will be only him. Greens change leader again and nobody notices, as its that bloke who isnt Caroline Lucas. UKIP choose the ghost of Oswald Mosley as their leader and surprisingly win Thanet. The ghost gives up.
Just a guess mind.
In line with current political discussion, I would like to congratulate myself on predicting a hung parliament and to insist that any reports I said anything different (such as the message above) are fake news propagated by a fake Afterword media.
I fear the Labour surge will prove an illusion and the Tories will get a 100-seat majority.
Whatever happens Corbyn will hang on until the autum party conference so his gang can change the leadership election rules and his mini-mes can take over in perpetuity and put the final nail in the coffin marked ‘Labour Commons majority’.
There will be a major realignment of the centre-left led by Blair and whoever takes over from Farron and his giant can of voter-repellent.
May won’t see out the full term as Tory leader because there is no way on earth the party will put her in front on the voters again.
Tory majority of about 80 (they’ll take ten to fifteen seats in Scotland, and twenty to thirty off Labour in England). Afterwards, not much changes short-term: Corbyn stays and May stays (though she sure as hell won’t be fronting any more election campaigns).
Tory majority around 50.
As a lifelong centre-lefty I’ve never felt so disengaged from a general election. I believe that May is receiving her orders from Murdoch/Dacre and some major, very right wing party donors, and leading us into an economic car crash through Brexit. But also believe that Corbyn, despite a handful of competent TV appearances, is still way out of his depth, and don’t feel I can vote for him … even though we have a good sitting Labour MP.
I’ll be going LibDem: reckon Farron’s not particularly good but not particularly bad, and feel happier with their stance on minimising the damage from Brexit.
Next election will be more interesting; by then the economic implications of leaving the EU will be hurting a lot of people and damaging the Tories, but it’s not at all clear what shape the opposition will take by then. I’m among those who would welcome a new grouping among the centre/left Labourites, LibDems and Greens; but accept that the first past the post system would make it hard for them to build electoral momentum.
Hung parliament with SNP and Lib Dems forming a strong and stable alliance with Labour. Labour 270 seats, SNP 50 and about 20 from the Lib Dems. Sturgeon will be Deputy PM (if that’s allowed) Fallon a senior cabinet position. SNP effective kingmakers and fancy their chances of effecting the changes they want more if they snuggle up to Jezza, Conservatives fall short of an overall majority winning 300ish seats, losing the gains they made in 2015.
There will no no alliance between Labour and the separatists.
Anything can happen when the prize is Being in Power. The FPP system rarely delivers a result where coalitions are necessary but in other voting systems in other nations, unlikely coalitions are commonplace. If anyone has said “no, nay, never!” that is pre-election bluster. When it comes down to it, all bets are off when there is no overall majority.
If Jezza gives SNP an indy ref 2 in return for confidence and supply – as well as senior postion for the Sturge – then that’s a better deal than they would achieve with the Conservatives.
But what do I know? A BBC reporter, Julia Langdon, has just told Radio New Zealand “I can tell you here and now that Theresa May will win with an increased majority.” and she also said that the terrorist attacks have made UK voters feel that they will be safer under the Conservatives – and they don’t feel that way about Jeremy Corbyn.
Again – not an opinion piece – but a report from the BBC about how things are over in the UK of the eve of the General Election.
I was going to say something unpopular about the BBC but I’ll just leave it at this:
They will do absolutely anything to protect that charter. But it’s too late. The new government will privatise absolutely anything and everything, starting with them. And I won’t be that sorry.
I wish you were right Moose. Sadly, Theresa is about as radical and free market oriented as a county shire Butskellist. With Brexit, the deficit, terrorist threats on our doorstep, the NHS and housing at the top of most people’s agenda, I doubt the BBC will get much time or attention.
I don’t think Sturgeon is standing as an MP, is she? If she isn’t in either the Commons or the Lords, can she be the deputy PM?
The SNP will not want another indyref if there’s a Labour government. Their fox will have been shot.
All a minority Labour government would need to do is to govern and dare the SNP to vote against and let the Tories back in. The SNP would not be able to do so.
Tory Majority of 80
We’re doomed
Can anyone persuade our old friend the Pretend Northerner to de-lurk for a moment and gives us his prediction? I’d love to know what Forks thinks of all this.
They hate us all. You have no idea. They stay up all night hating us.
I sent Faux a message on FB. If we’re lucky, he may just put in an appearance. Fingers crossed.
Not if he reads the other comments here…
The deal’s been done, the BBC and NHS are for sale and will be gone within 3 years (that was 5 years ago). And as you say, they hate us, etc. I think that covers it.
Anyone with any intelligence will vote for Corbyn, and there lies the problem.
It has been refreshing to see an honest and principled man standing for PM. JC didn’t seem up to it when he became Labour leader but he has grown in stature and accomplishment for me. He still has faults – lack of guile for one thing – and has failed to reach out to the Blairites to consolidate a popular vote, but I have been surprised and impressed by his developing performance.
May, by contrast, should be walking it but has proved to be inept, empty and arrogant in equal measure. Labour’s manifesto is good and Conservative’s is bad.
I am hoping for a hung parliament with a coalition dogfight but I suspect the Tories will win by a hair – overall majority of 10 seats or less.
I’m concluding May is an effective minister but crap campaigner, Corbyn is a good campaigner but hopeless leader.
She’s been in either personal or ultimate charge of immigration and counterterrorism for the whole of this decade. She’s recently said “enough is enough” on how those briefs have been run, essentially admitting that she’s been crap at them. Not sure how effective that makes her.
That’s your interpretation of what she said. OOAA.
I realise OOAA, but what she said was: “It is time to say enough is enough. Everybody needs to go about their lives as they normally would. Our society should continue to function in accordance with our values. But when it comes to taking on extremism and terrorism, things need to change.”
She’s had seven years to change whatever these things are. It’s not like terrorism is new.
Loath as I am to say it, the first five years of her tenure of Home Secretary was as part of the Coalition. The Lib Dems would not have agreed to more aggressive measures.
As an aside, I am puzzled as to why ‘anyone with any intelligence’ would conflate effective campaigning with wider leadership skills. We already knew that Corbyn was good at the former, that is why he won two leadership campaigns. I still see little evidence of any of the other skills required.
Hung, please. Let’s have a 3rd shock result, if only to redress the balance. Just put a labour red rose in my lapel to celebrate my first vote since I resigned over Blair.
It seems like non-Metropolitan England will vote Tory whatever happens. I’ll go for a 36-seat majority.
Interesting, though, to note that the SDP (yes them with the red white and blue logo) are contesting six seats; five of them in Sheffield. Not sure what that means.
It means this 1983 revival has gone too far. I blame Bri’s Thompson Twins thread.
As Pete Wylie sang in 1983:
🎵First they take the French flag
Turn it on its side
…and then you realise
I’m telling the Story of The Red-White-and-Blues”
Another 1983 poptacular hit repurposed for GE2017:
I’m Still Standing – Craig Mackinlay
😜
Con maj of between 23 – 49. So I’ll say 36.
I am SO looking forward to the glorious sight of trendy lefties crying…should be about 3.30am.
also…first time student voters with a slender grasp of the british voting system brandishing placards bearing “NOT MY PM” slogans…….while crying.
Tissue, Fishface?
At this rate TM isn’t going to be anybody’s PM.
You’re obviously a ‘Kipper.
12 minutes before the polls close.
I’ll say a Tory majority of 76.
Wow. If that exit poll is right we’re almost all wrong. This could be a long night….
I’m going to have to stay awake all day.
We’re going to be in safe hands at the “Brexit” (which we didn’t need) negotiations, after this election (which we didn’t need), if the Tories (which we sure as damn it, don’t need) squeak past this f***** fiasco.
Wow. This exit poll looks shocking. Conservative – SNP coalition anyone?
Help ma boab!
So, @BigJimBob, have you done the sums and come out with a result that concurs with or disagrees with the idea of “the wisdom of crowds?