Oh what a night. I've had very little sleep over the last 36 hours so my head is still rather mushy, that said I'll try to make sense of what happened last night.
It is clear that there was "national swing" in any meaningful definition of the term. There were seats that parties were expecting to win or to hold which they did not and seats which they were probably surprised to lose.
There were a number of local battles where the campaigning machines of the parties cancelled each other out, Hammersmith, Tooting, Westminster North, Cheltenham, Chippenham etc. These seats were well known as being Conservative target seats and were well defended by the incumbents.
The Conservative result is a good one, not a great one but a good one. The starting point was near our lowest ever level and while I had always hoped for an outright majority I knew that it would be a huge mountain to climb.
We now have a hung parliament which, as you may be aware, I think is a terrible situation. I genuinely don't know how the negotiations and party political positioning will play out but I hope it is resolved soon.
MEP Evans top of Plaid Cymru list
57 minutes ago
Posts
3 comments:
The hung parliament will allow the best of Conservatives and Liberal Democrat come to the fore. Both parties have their nutters (one less without Opik) but they both have incredibly talented people who can change the country.
The Conservatives will be prevented from doing anything stupid and unpopular (like the Poll Tax or Invading Iraq) but I cannot imagine Cameron letting Clegg walk all over him - his party would not allow that. So what we have is the first balanced parliament in a generation and the opportunity of a stable majority government to take us out of the economic mess which seems to have got worse overnight (nothing to do with the UK).
Clegg should also approach some of the talented people in the Labour party to see if they would like to take the Liberal whip and be part of a government of national unity! We could then watch the Labour party collapse back to communist rump they were under Foot.
Well put, Jimmy, I'm in total agreement.
Good to see you yesterday James.
Best of luck for that recount.
Post a Comment