UK General Election 2015

[Tal]

With the dust settling, I just want to add my congratulations to all involved on what, in my view, is one of the best threads I've read on blonde. People of all shapes, sizes, political beliefs and levels of partisanship have offered thoughts on a range of small and large issues. That it has been kept broadly civil is nothing short of astonishing.

Massive credit and thanks to Tighty, but also to Dung, Rick, Camel, Kmac, Teacake, Woodsey, G2L, Adz, Doobs and everyone else who've shared their beliefs, analysis, prejudices, cheers, jeers, fag packet maths and high level economics. It's been both educational and entertaining. I've followed it and the election closely and read every post.

The thread has been a real triumph. Thank you, all.  

[The Camel]

According to the chart some votes went from Sinn Fein to the UUP

That laughable deduction must put into doubt all the conclusions it draws.

its not votes its seats, tracking the seats won and lost

Sinn Fein did lose a seat to the UUP

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-northern-ireland-32629703

Oh, I see.

Votes would be far more interesting than seats, but almost impossible to deduce.

The idea some people switched from Labour or Lib Dem to UKIP is just incredible.

These people don't deserve the privilige of universal suffrage.

Con to UKIP fine.

BNP to UKIP apt.

Abstain to UKIP makes sense.

Lab or Lib to UKIP WTF?

this may help

7-11% of 2010 Lab and LD voters went UKIP this time

Truly astounding.

If so many people care that little about how they cast their vote, then betting on elections is essentially pointless.

[Kmac84]

According to the chart some votes went from Sinn Fein to the UUP

That laughable deduction must put into doubt all the conclusions it draws.

its not votes its seats, tracking the seats won and lost

Sinn Fein did lose a seat to the UUP

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-northern-ireland-32629703

Only because the stoops split the Nationalist vote.   

[MintTrav]

It'll be interesting to see what happens with all these inexperienced SNP MPs. Most of them must never have thought, until recently, that there was any possibility of them actually being elected and some will surely struggle with their new responsibilities. It is likely to be easier for the SNP leadership to control their group than it is for other parties. If previous MPs have been 'lobby fodder', that term surely applies even more to them.

If Scotland gets independence, however, all of them are out of their jobs, so that is not really in their personal interest.

[TightEnd]

It'll be interesting to see what happens with all these inexperienced SNP MPs. Most of them must never have thought, until recently, that there was any possibility of them actually being elected and some will surely struggle with their new responsibilities. It is likely to be easier for the SNP leadership to control their group than it is for other parties. If previous MPs have been 'lobby fodder', that term surely applies even more to them.

If Scotland gets independence, however, all of them are out of their jobs, so that is not really in their personal interest.

if cameron offers them full fiscal autonomy soon, as he should and might, then the SNP is in a right pickle

£8bn shortfall on scottish revenue compared to overall expenditure at these oil prices

no wonder they want to delay that for 6 years..

refuse it and it doesn't exactly promote their path to independence does it?

[DaveShoelace]

With the dust settling, I just want to add my congratulations to all involved on what, in my view, is one of the best threads I've read on blonde. People of all shapes, sizes, political beliefs and levels of partisanship have offered thoughts on a range of small and large issues. That it has been kept broadly civil is nothing short of astonishing.

Massive credit and thanks to Tighty, but also to Dung, Rick, Camel, Kmac, Teacake, Woodsey, G2L, Adz, Doobs and everyone else who've shared their beliefs, analysis, prejudices, cheers, jeers, fag packet maths and high level economics. It's been both educational and entertaining. I've followed it and the election closely and read every post.

The thread has been a real triumph. Thank you, all.  

I must admit I honestly expected this to be an unproductive polorising rant thread like the Royal/Thatcher one, but 99% of it has been fascinating. Didn't change my vote, but certainly made me question it before and after it was all said and done. I've learned lots of new concepts and have googled a lot of new terminology I didn't know prior to this.

That said, I still think from a pure life EV perspective, not sharing your own personal political opinions during an election is the way to go.

[scotty77]

It won't matter if the SNP MPs perform badly.

They will just claim it was a Tory conspiracy and bullying and it further proves that they need independence, rather than admit that they simply don't have the knowledge and experience to be effective in House of Commons.

Kind of like during the referendum; everything positive about Scotland is due to MSPs and everything bad about Scotland was down to MPs.

Scotland lost many great MPs on Friday but the nationalist agenda will never begin to admit that.

[david3103]

According to the chart some votes went from Sinn Fein to the UUP

That laughable deduction must put into doubt all the conclusions it draws.

I
its not votes its seats, tracking the seats won and lost

Sinn Fein did lose a seat to the UUP

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-northern-ireland-32629703

Oh, I see.

Votes would be far more interesting than seats, but almost impossible to deduce.

The idea some people switched from Labour or Lib Dem to UKIP is just incredible.

These people don't deserve the privilige of universal suffrage.

Con to UKIP fine.

BNP to UKIP apt.

Abstain to UKIP makes sense.

Lab or Lib to UKIP WTF?

So people who make different choices to those you would make should be denied the right to vote?

Seems more of a Stalinist line than a Socialist one

[Kmac84]

It'll be interesting to see what happens with all these inexperienced SNP MPs. Most of them must never have thought, until recently, that there was any possibility of them actually being elected and some will surely struggle with their new responsibilities. It is likely to be easier for the SNP leadership to control their group than it is for other parties. If previous MPs have been 'lobby fodder', that term surely applies even more to them.

If Scotland gets independence, however, all of them are out of their jobs, so that is not really in their personal interest.

if cameron offers them full fiscal autonomy soon, as he should and might, then the SNP is in a right pickle

£8bn shortfall on scottish revenue compared to overall expenditure at these oil prices

no wonder they want to delay that for 6 years..

refuse it and it doesn't exactly promote their path to independence does it?

The £8 billion forecast is assuming we carry on as is, the point of having FFA is that we can then be more specific to Scottish needs and work accordinly on improving conditions for the many.   Despite not being an SNP fan boy economically they do ok with what they have at the moment.   I suspect they will do better than anticipated.   I can also understand why they want to phase in FFA.    But as you say hardly a ringing endorsement of independence.  

[Kmac84]

It won't matter if the SNP MPs perform badly.

They will just claim it was a Tory conspiracy and bullying and it further proves that they need independence, rather than admit that they simply don't have the knowledge and experience to be effective in House of Commons.

Kind of like during the referendum; everything positive about Scotland is due to MSPs and everything bad about Scotland was down to MPs.

Scotland lost many great MPs on Friday but the nationalist agenda will never begin to admit that.

That is very blinkered and has no basis whatsoever. 

Althought I'd be interested in knowing who these many great MP's were  we lost?

[scotty77]

Con to UKIP fine.

BNP to UKIP apt.



Why would Conservative to UKIP be fine and BNP to UKIP be apt, but Labout to UKIP not make sense?  You do realise that BNP never affected Conservative areas, and they gained their votes from disillusioned traditional working class Labour areas?

[TightEnd]

Con to UKIP fine.

BNP to UKIP apt.



Why would Conservative to UKIP be fine and BNP to UKIP be apt, but Labout to UKIP not make sense?  You do realise that BNP never affected Conservative areas, and they gained their votes from disillusioned traditional working class Labour areas?

there is an (unwelcome) very right wing element that don't like immigration at current levels

there is a older working class segment of society, typically labour voters but not all, that doesn't like multi-culturalism. affected by globalisation and movement of labour, often more marginalised in society compared to decades ago

UKIP draws support from both, right and left 

11% of lib dems switching to UKIP is far more baffling than older labour voters doing so, imo

[arbboy]

The vast majority of people who voted ukip will have been protesting against perceived high levels of immigration and previous government's inability to control it.  The vast majority of these people will not know that ukip is a right wing party if they are labour voters.  They will not care.  They just don't think like that.  People on this thread don't realise how high level the discussion has been on here compared to most boards/forums/social media/newspaers/casual pub discussions with friends.  The ten most googled things on election day tighty put up proved that the average joe literally hasn't got a clue about politics.  That is totally their right to not be as passionate about it as we are.

[The Camel]

According to the chart some votes went from Sinn Fein to the UUP

That laughable deduction must put into doubt all the conclusions it draws.

I
its not votes its seats, tracking the seats won and lost

Sinn Fein did lose a seat to the UUP

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-northern-ireland-32629703

Oh, I see.

Votes would be far more interesting than seats, but almost impossible to deduce.

The idea some people switched from Labour or Lib Dem to UKIP is just incredible.

These people don't deserve the privilige of universal suffrage.

Con to UKIP fine.

BNP to UKIP apt.

Abstain to UKIP makes sense.

Lab or Lib to UKIP WTF?

So people who make different choices to those you would make should be denied the right to vote?

Seems more of a Stalinist line than a Socialist one

Was obviously joking David.

Will put a little smiley next to my jokes to avoid doubt in the future.

[The Camel]

Con to UKIP fine.

BNP to UKIP apt.



Why would Conservative to UKIP be fine and BNP to UKIP be apt, but Labout to UKIP not make sense?  You do realise that BNP never affected Conservative areas, and they gained their votes from disillusioned traditional working class Labour areas?

there is an (unwelcome) very right wing element that don't like immigration at current levels

there is a older working class segment of society, typically labour voters but not all, that doesn't like multi-culturalism. affected by globalisation and movement of labour, often more marginalised in society compared to decades ago

UKIP draws support from both, right and left 

11% of lib dems switching to UKIP is far more baffling than older labour voters doing so, imo

Working class people who are anti immigration or racist will have voted BNP last time.

That's why they did so well in some inner city areas.