May 2011 Election

[joejag]

Unfortunately for you I didn't. That is why I used the word suspect

I await your latest "gem".

Unfortunately for you your first two lines are factual staements.

[xbl]

I've only just picked up on this, so apologies if I've missed it already, but this was somehow apparently the worst Tory performance ever.

[Smit]

Unfortunately for you your first two lines are factual staements.

Thankyou I'm glad you agree with me!

Statements that can easily be backed up with hard facts unlike your desperate quiverings.

[capybara]

I've only just picked up on this, so apologies if I've missed it already, but this was somehow apparently the worst Tory performance ever.

Yip even my humble abode in Edinburgh Pentlands is now Yellow.

[HibeeJibee]

I've only just picked up on this, so apologies if I've missed it already, but this was somehow apparently the worst Tory performance ever.

Well, yes, in that's it's been every party except the SNP's worst night ever, in terms of Holyrood seats won.

As I said though, the Conservatives will be pretty content. This "tsunami" (as Alex Neil called it) has totally smashed the Lib Dems, and batterred Labour... but the Tories have managed to weather most of it. In real terms they lost 2 seats, when Labour lost 9 and the Lib Dems 11. They kept 3 of their 4 constituencies, increasing the share in 1, and only lost a city seat (being Edinburgh Pentlands). They've also kept most of their front-liners, where Labour and the Liberals have seen so many big-guns massacred.

Annabell Goldie - and Patrick Harvie, btw - will be sitting comfortably tonight, knowledgeable of the contex of "what-might-otherwise-have-been".

[Smit]

The main thing I have gathered from this election is that Lib Dems are fucked. I really cannot see them recovering from this at all. Nick Clegg has really fucked things up for his party and for what? Nothing. They didn't even the refrendum they wanted and the one the comprised on failed.

The Lib Dems have managed to raise the threshold on income tax. Personally I think the electorate has hit them harder than they deserve.

[Smit]

I think its more due to the fact that the electotrate now see the Lib Dem as the Tories. They will need to re-invent themselves.

And they should representing Liberal views within the framework of an independent Scotland.

[Le Tout P'ti FC]

I may be slightly half-cut after opening a lovely bottle of Caol Ila tonight, but I'm sure John McTernan a bitter bitter Labour flunky just argued on Newsnicht Scotland that the SNP have no mandate to call an independence referendum. Well Mr McTernan, you throw in your 37 votes to the Holyrood bill, I'll raise you 32!

Other than Henry McLeish, I am seeing no evidence from Labour that they are understanding the message they received today. And McLeish is part of their problem in the first place.

A wonderful crazy old day!

[HibeeJibee]

Also I agree with some earlier comments regarding the 'No' vote for AV. It's not due to people being unimaginative, or a lack of voter education, or scare-tactics from a 'No' campaign that... AFAIA... achieved very little profile, albeit more than 'Yes' managed.

The idea was routed. Completely hammerred. It scraped 30% of the vote of a 9 in 20 turn-out... It was humiliated and destroyed by the voting public. Consider also that people with a drive to change the electoral system were presumably the most motivated to turn-out? (Especially in London - no other elections happening).

It was gubbed. It needed almost half of all those people who didn't vote to have voted mostly 'Yes', to pass!! Complete fantasy.

Also, this idea that we should've all voted for AV to get us AMS or PR... would we? Mightn't we just have ended-up with AV forevermore? The public have, on a frankly astonishing scale, set their stall out: they didn't want it. You can't label a 70% rejection anything other than emphatic.

[The Master]

HibeeJibee...king of the superlative since 2007.

[HibeeJibee]

I may be slightly half-cut after opening a lovely bottle of Caol Ila tonight, but I'm sure John McTernan a bitter bitter Labour flunky just argued on Newsnicht Scotland that the SNP have no mandate to call an independence referendum. Well Mr McTernan, you throw in your 37 votes to the Holyrood bill, I'll raise you 32!

Other than Henry McLeish, I am seeing no evidence from Labour that they are understanding the message they received today. And McLeish is part of their problem in the first place.

A wonderful crazy old day!

Spot on. From what I see so far, the reaction of almost every Labour official is one of 3 things... [1] anger and disbelief that their safe-seat voters have turfed them out; [2] a refusal to admit they've had a bad night, just blaming Liberals who voted SNP (why didn't they vote Labour?); and [3] an inability to see why/believe their campaign, and their attitude, was rejected.

[The Master]

Spot on. From what I see so far, the reaction of almost every Labour official is one of 3 things... [1] anger and disbelief that their safe-seat voters have turfed them out;

Is that right?

The Labour vote held up in most of their heartlands. It's the shift from the Lib Dems to the SNP that turfed them out.

That's not to say that Labour shouldn't have done more to encourage disenfranchised Lib Dem voters to switch to Labour, but I don't think their core supporters (i.e. the "ma da' voted Labour" lot) abandoned them.

[xbl]

Spot on. From what I see so far, the reaction of almost every Labour official is one of 3 things... [1] anger and disbelief that their safe-seat voters have turfed them out; [2] a refusal to admit they've had a bad night, just blaming Liberals who voted SNP (why didn't they vote Labour?); and [3] an inability to see why/believe their campaign, and their attitude, was rejected.

In a wider UK context I would add:

[4] A glossing over and dismissal of Scotland as just being an unimportant region. They don't seem to be taking Scotland seriously at all, and that is a bad sign for them when the party is so centrally managed; and [5] It worked in Wales, so why not Scotland?

[Swello]

I may be slightly half-cut after opening a lovely bottle of Caol Ila tonight, but I'm sure John McTernan a bitter bitter Labour flunky just argued on Newsnicht Scotland that the SNP have no mandate to call an independence referendum. Well Mr McTernan, you throw in your 37 votes to the Holyrood bill, I'll raise you 32!

Other than Henry McLeish, I am seeing no evidence from Labour that they are understanding the message they received today. And McLeish is part of their problem in the first place.

A wonderful crazy old day!

John McTernan comes over as an utter c**t every time he appears - with his type of politics, you can see why modern Labour turn so many people off...

And you've got good taste in Whisky...

[HibeeJibee]

Is that right?

The Labour vote held up in most of their heartlands. It's the shift from the Lib Dems to the SNP that turfed them out.

That's not to say that Labour shouldn't have done more to encourage disenfranchised Lib Dem voters to switch to Labour, but I don't think their core supporters (i.e. the "ma da' voted Labour" lot) abandoned them.

You are correct, it should've read "that their safe-seats turfed them out". Not their safe-seat voters explicitly.

[Le Tout P'ti FC]

Is that right?

The Labour vote held up in most of their heartlands. It's the shift from the Lib Dems to the SNP that turfed them out.

That's not to say that Labour shouldn't have done more to encourage disenfranchised Lib Dem voters to switch to Labour, but I don't think their core supporters (i.e. the "ma da' voted Labour" lot) abandoned them.

A fair point! Constituency votes for Labour held up well - 2007 648k (32%), 2011 630k (32%). Liberals on the other hand dropped 168k votes, the Tories dropped 58k, the SNP picked up 239k. That virtually all of the ConDem swing votes ended up with SNP is remarkable - a very unique set of circumstances. But Labour took a battering however much their faithful stuck by them!

[Smit]

In fairness to Labour in Scotland I thought generally they showed a lot of dignity in defeat. Gray spoke well and in particular Andy Kerr.

[HibeeJibee]

In a wider UK context I would add:

[4] A glossing over and dismissal of Scotland as just being an unimportant region. They don't seem to be taking Scotland seriously at all, and that is a bad sign for them when the party is so centrally managed

Good point. In 2 respects really... their prioritisation of talent towards London, and their initial campaign focus on Westminster (as if it was the only place that actually really mattered).

and [5] It worked in Wales, so why not Scotland?

This part of today has intrigued me. The only similarity has been the Tories holding-up in both nations (up slightly in Wales, down slightly here, but steady viewed generally). Labour were in government with Plaid, tbf, so perhaps they've taken SNP-style "done a good job" credit and Plaid haven't... Beyond that, it presumably comes down to the campaigns and personalities of the 2 elections.

It is a strange day when Labour roar back in Wales and the Nationalists crash, and the total opposite happens here.

[HibeeJibee]

Been looking at AV regional totals... In England bar London, rejections are all 69-72%. In London (where there were no council elections i.e. you turned out to vote if you were interested in the AV issue) rejection was 60%. Turnouts high 30s to low 40s, but mid 30s in London. In Scotland & Wales, rejections are 64/65%. Turn-out here was 50% but (oddly) it was only 42% in Wales.

So it's pretty clear that about 3/4 of the English didn't want it, with London skewed slightly by having no elections. In the Celtic nations, about 2/3 didn't want it.

[Mr. Brightside]

CAN WE GET MUCH HIGHER?

Answer - Yes.