Sean Fear’s Friday slot
May 11th, 2007
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How Did the Parties Fare on May 3rd?
The Conservatives won 5,315 English council seats on May 3rd, a net gain of 911. The Liberal Democrats won 2,171, a net loss of 246. Labour won 1,877 seats, a net loss of 505. The Conservatives made a net gain of 39 councils, leaving them with control of 206, Labour a net loss of 8, leaving them with control of 46, and the Liberal Democrats a net loss of 4, leaving them with 27.
Rallings and Thrasher project the parties’ national vote shares at Conservative 40%, and Labour and the Liberal Democrats at 26% each (actual vote shares will of course be different).
In Scotland, the SNP won 363 seats, Labour 348, Liberal Democrats 166, Conservatives 143, and Others 194. Figures for gains and losses are irrelevant, as Scotland has switched to using proportional representation for local elections. Two Scottish councils have Labour majorities, three are held by independents, and the remaining 27 are under No Overall Control.
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Labour have claimed their results were better than expected. That is correct. They were extremely bad, as opposed to catastrophic. In common with a number of other commentators, I had expected their vote share to fall below 25%, and for the Liberal Democrats and minor parties to make big gains at their expense. This did not materialise.
That does not alter the fact that Labour’s position in local government is now grim. The party has lost half its councillors since 1997, and now holds a smaller proportion of England’s council seats than it held in 1978, its previous worst year. Labour has been forced back into its heartlands, the Metropolitan Boroughs, and County Durham, and even some of those were lost, such as Sheffield, Oldham, Wear Valley, or nearly lost, such as Derwentside, and Sedgefield. Labour has no representation at all on 80 councils, some of which it controlled in the recent past, such as Fenland and Castle Point.
Its representation in many marginal seats, such as Swindon, Peterborough, Welwyn Hatfield, Dartford, has fallen to a dangerously low level. The party did have successes last week, regaining Luton and Leicester, as Muslim hostility to the Party over Iraq has cooled, and North Lincolnshire, on the back of disputes over refuse.
However, for three years in a row, in local elections, the Party has polled every bit as badly as the Conservatives did from 1994-1996, and its leaders should not believe otherwise.
The Liberal Democrats must be disappointed with this result. I had thought they would break even on the night, gaining seats from Labour to compensate for losses to the Conservatives. In the event, their gains from Labour were modest, while some of their losses to the Conservatives were spectacular; just 7 authorities produced 146 losses to the Conservatives.
Torbay may be a poisoned chalice for any party which holds it, but the loss of North Devon, and Conservative advances in North and West Wiltshire, Herefordshire, and Bath and NE Somerset are bad news for the party. That said, Liberal Democrat support seems to have held up well, or increased, in quite a lot of places that are already strong for the Party, such as Hampshire, Somerset, Solihull, and South Lakeland.
If these results were repeated in a general election, their seat losses to the Conservatives would probably not be great, albeit their chances of gaining further seats from the Conservatives would be remote.
The Conservatives have best reason to be pleased. In England, they now hold almost as many council seats as Labour and the Liberal Democrats combined, and are now stronger, in terms of both councils and councillors, than at any point since 1979.
Contrary to much of the spin on Thursday night and Friday, the Conservatives performed well across most of the Midlands, and much of the North, gaining control of councils like Lincoln, East Riding, Blackpool, Chester, as well as holding Hyndburn, which I had expected to fall. The Conservatives are now very strong in Lancashire, outside Greater Manchester, and in a considerable part of Yorkshire. However, as they have done for some time, the Conservatives failed to make any advance in West Yorkshire.
The Conservatives held Calderdale from 2000 to 2004, but are now not close to winning overall control of any of its five authorities. This is a crucial electoral battleground, with nine marginal seats, and it is essential for the Conservatives to make headway here.
Among the minor parties, the Greens made a net gain of 17 seats, which was fewer than last year, when less than half the number of seats was contested. This masks an impressive average vote share of more than 10%, for their 1,400 candidates. In the wards making up Norwich South, the party came first, with 29% of the vote.
More strikingly, a high average vote share for the British National Party, 15%, resulted in a net gain of just two seats. It is clear that that party suffers from a version of Palmer’s Paradox, in that the better the party does in any particular area, the more its opponents are stimulated to vote for whichever candidate is best placed to beat it.
In a string of seats, its candidates polled strongly, but still lost narrowly. UKIP managed to poll more strongly than its performance in recent by-elections had implied it would, but still suffered an overall loss of one seat.
Sean Fear is a London Tory activist.
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Sean, when I looked at the ward results for North Wilts, the North Wilts Parly consticuency seemed to have gone heavily Conservative but the bits in Chippenham constituency seemed more yellow.
One of the Green gains was my home ward in Rushcliffe.
So what do commentators think the Cameron Government will be like. Who will fill the top four posts? Will end up governing for a lot longer? One, two or three terms? How big will the majority be?
2 - imaginary
Does anyone know where I can find the share of the vote from the Scottish council elections (i.e. first preference % by party)?
chickens your count before hatch they dont
I like Brown’s pronunciation - ‘Miwyons’. Whatever happened to the word ‘Millions’!
Will we all be saying ‘miwyons’ in 3 years time?!!
Hopefully between now and next year the Tories will actually produce some policies - and hopefully they will address immigration and concerns in such a way that this year marks the BNP’s peak and they start to decline, rapidly
4. Overall or council by council? If the latter, individual council websites, but much depends on the council. Clackmannan, Dumfries & Galloway, Dundee, East Renfrewshire, Eilean Siar, Moray, North Lanarkshire, Orkney, Renfrewshire, South Ayrshire, South Lanarkshire and West Dunbartonshire give only incomplete results (e.g. names of councillors’ elected and/or the stage at which they were elected, but not the full results).
The other councils give full results, but some are easier to follow than others. Many have links only to the standard STV programme, which gives names and totals for each stage, but not the candidates’ parties, which one has to get off the (Glasgow) Herald website.
6. Good to see you tackling the meaty issues there Will…
I’d have to say Brown has made a huge effort to tone-down the Stalinist side in his speech today - yet there are still Freudian slips - which are basic threats against anyone who disagrees with him. Is this the sort of behaviour we want from a British Prime Minister.
9. No, I am looking for the national vote share.
6/7 - a new thread has been started, but the creature still howls.
You are obsessed man, get over it.
6/7/11 - total non sequiturs. Obsessive ranting of a mad man.
Do you secretly fancy Gordon Brown, or something?
12. Oops, but thanks all the same!
Hyndburn’s following day newspaper headlines were ‘Tories hold on by skin of their teeth’. A titanic struggle by all accounts. Labour came within 60, 80 and 80 votes (out of over 17,000) from a clear majority. Labour also spectacularly increased majorities in all but one of their seats.
12. In that case, no idea. Until Clackmannan et al make their results public no-one is going to be able to collate the totals, unless s/he contacts the individual returning officers. Presumably Rallings and Thrasher will be made privy to the figures?
I saw the Tories perform usefully in the North West in Chester, South Ribble (with dishonest Incinerator campaign - elsewhere in the region the Tories are promoting incineration as a ‘fix’ to avoid fortnightly wheelie-bins) and Blackpool.
Elsewhere, are the Conservatives anywhere near being in with a shout in a winnable Parliamentary Constituency? They have lost any hope in Warrington South where the Lib Dems are steaming in, and the six Lind Dem MPs are laughing at them in their wake as their majorities rack up.
Bury’s ‘move forward’ was pretty much a disaster. Nearly all the Bury seats are marginals and, in good years for Tories in the past, there have been landslide victories there.
18
So with that synopsis how many seats do you expect the Lib Dems to take from the Tories at the next GE?
Is Gordon going to ditch ID Cards?
20. It’s possible. Here’s what I wrote on PB last December (comment 67):
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2006/12/23/is-tony-still-the-magic-maker/
Re the point someone made about ID cards: the Home Office was due to begin asking for tenders from IT contractors in June 06. This got postponed to Sept 06, and then got postponed indefinitely: a combination of lack of funding from the Treasury and John Reid deciding that the Home Office had more important things to concentrate on. Neither Reid nor Brown is going to humiliate Blair in public over ID cards. But if Brown were really keen, he wouldn’t delay the funding, the only probable reason behind the delay is that he either doesn’t want to start spending money on something he doesn’t intend to carry out as PM or he’s decided that the govt can’t afford it and simply doesn’t want to waste money on it full stop. This is speculation of course: we shall find out in due course.
I understand that the Treasury still haven’t approved the ID card budget. Plus Jack Straw hates the idea of ID cards.
18 - try Sutton & Cheam and Carshalton & Wallington for starters!!
Good analysis by Sean Fear. But no mention of the tories’ relatively modest advance in vote share. If the tories on this site had been told they would get 911 gains, what would they have predicted for the implied vote share? I seem to recall about 40% was expoected, but so was ~4-500 gains.
911 gains? spooky huh? Blair unpopular because of the Iraq war, which grew out of a reposnse to 9/11, which… oh forget it…i’ll get my coat.
19, obviously the major opportunity for Lib Dems is still to gain seats from Labour. In the North West region which I know best there are too few Tory seats left to be able to predict gains off them at the present stage of affairs. I reckon there will be some exchanges in the South, though, and there will be a considerable number of Tory failures in three-way seats which may result in Lib Dem victories.
23 - but the vote share projection is statistical nonsense!!
Thanks for the analysis Sean - I’m glad that it is a regular feature of the site. You say above:
“Rallings and Thrasher project the parties’ national vote shares at Conservative 40%, and Labour and the Liberal Democrats at 26% each (actual vote shares will of course be different).”
R & T are somewhat discredited to regular PBers. Do you have a feel for what the vote shares actually were?
>just 7 authorities produced 146 losses to the Conservatives.
Many thanks for the excellent analysis Sean.
I have to say I have just had sight of the last Liberal Democrat leaflet in my ward, which says that they don’t do negative campaigning!
Any non LD activists like to comment on that one?
25, 26: OK, what were the actual vote shares?
It may be that the big seat gains despite apparently modest vote share advance is a GOOD sign for the tories, indicates better targeting, or ‘get the vote out’ campaigns?
How much difference does having people on the ground make? I assume having more councillors will mean more doorknockers, canvassers, etc. Does this actually translate into more X’s in the boxes on polling day (be honest now…)
If the difference is significant, does Labour having half as many councillors now as in 1997 bode ill for them for that reason alone?
I have only been personally canvassed once, by alan Howarth. I was only 17 sadly for him, and he joined Labour anyway later on!
27: well a non-Lib Dem might well think that worth repeating, but where is the in-depth (if slightly partisan) analysis we are so enamoured of?!
Anyone know what the actual, as opposed to extrapolated, vote shares were?
28 - Benedict would you like a copy of the attack they tried on me?
Also the smear they tried in Woodley on a Sikh candidate who they said was standing to get a Mosque built in the ward! lol
RikW, wouldn’t mind! Email address is on my blog!
When I stood for Student Union president on a non party ticket (after all the union should act in its members interests and assist in protests of a political nature if there is the support regardless of affiliation) the Labour group put it about that I was racist, even though one of my running mates was from Tanzania and of Indian extraction!
So a Sikh wanting to build a Mosque seems almost logical!
33. Wrong religion. There are very few Sikhs keen on Mosques full stop - check out the history of the religion - 3 Sikh holocausts perpetrated by Muslims.
Interesting developments in US presidential race…thanks for the original tip PtP
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/05/11/nbloomberg111.xml
Re 34, Will L, if you read my comment you would have realised I knew that.
Try being accused of being racist leading a mixed race ticket.
1. The Tories had a narrow lead in the wards making up the new Chippenham constituency, around 900 votes. Four years ago the Lib Dems led by 2000 though.
34: yes i rather think that was his point. Hence the “lol”
34. Then again Muslims seem to have perpetrated holocasts against virtually every other religious group on the planet. From Armenia to Egypt, from Pakistan to Saudi Arabia, from Sudan & Dafur to Indonesia and Palestine. Almost everywhere Muslims have a history of butchering non-Muslims in surprise attacks - which goes back decades and centuries. Perhaps that’s why the so called ‘war on terrorism’ was always such a pathetic response. Oh how terrible is terrorism. Let’s just deal with the symptoms but pretend we are ignorant of the cause.
Re 39, Will L “Then again Muslims seem to have perpetrated holocasts against virtually every other religious group on the planet.”
So have Jews and Christians, as well as Hindu’s and indeed some particularly barbarous attacks by Sikhs.
39. Time to put the straitjacket back on now I think, R & R over.
The party did have successes last week, regaining Luton and Leicester, as Muslim hostility to the Party over Iraq has cooled..
Luton maybe, but I don’t think the victory in Leicester can be put down to this factor. Labour gained with huge swings in wards like Abbey and Braunstone that are around 2% Muslim. The Lib Dems held on to two out of three seats in Stoneygate, with a Muslim population over 30%.
The split in the Lib Dem group, with some of their councillors standing under the banner of the continuity Liberal Party against official Lib Dems, probably played a bigger paert.
39. “And let’s lump together North Korea with Iran and Syria.”
North Korea is a communist state, which does not have a history of propagating terrorism external to its borders (although it invaded South Korea in the 1950’s).
Iran is only mildy guilty of this - its main crime is turning a successful and prosperous pro-western Iran into a poverty-stricken Islamic basket-case.
While Syria is a Baathist country - that is half anti-Islamic.
For that matter why did America attack Iraq at all - when Saddam Hussein was actually an ally against Islamic terrorism?!! It all reminds me of the Fourth Crusade, which was hijacked by Venetian merchants (thought to have been bribed by the Islamic Calipate in Turkey), who redirected the Crusade to attacking Constantinople (the very country that had requested the help against Muslim invasions in the first place - and to whom we owe the whole of Western civilisation - and now Glabal Civilisation - lock, stock and barrel).
(Many seem unaware that Greeks fled to Northern Italy during these invasions, and set up the universities that caused the European renaissance. They took over the Papacy, founded Bologna university, and onwards to universities in Paris, Oxford and Cambridge. That so few are aware of this is strange indeed.)
I suspect that a certain American critic got it spot on - when he pointed out that many in the Bush administration were on the pay-roll of Saudi Arabia. We know that the real axis of evil was always Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates - the three backers of the Taliban in Afganistan - and long suspected of organising and funding a highly organised campaign of Islamic terrorism which involved exporting nuclear arms technology (i.e. the Khan programme of nuclear mobilisation). Most of this has been covered-up which leads one to suspect that there is a major scandal that has never been properly addressed by the media.
Bob Marshall-Andrews is my favourite Labour MP (Have I got news for you tonight)
20 - that would be magnificent - exactly the right way to re-energise the grassroots, will it would work on me at least
35 Caveman - You are very welcome, but where did you get on? The only odds I could find were with Paddy Power, who allowed me the grand sum of £8.18! OK he was 80-1 (they’ve probably cut him already) but it isn’t quite what I was hoping for.
Betfair of course, cannot assist.
Paddy Power haven’t cut him. Portland betting are offering 26.00
47 Hmm…26 is a good deal less than 80. Spoke to PP just now and they would let me have more. Got to phone back tomorrow.
Have a feeling they’ve got my card marked.
wouldn’t let me have more…
43. “For that matter why did America attack Iraq at all?” You mention America’s interest in terrorist exports from Syria, Iran and Saudi Arabia. Spot the country that borders all three.
I’m quite sure there were other reasons, but it must have crossed the minds of the neo-Cons that if you control Iraq, you can control most of the Middle East. Of course, as it’s turned out, controlling Iraq has proved a mission too far.
One of the features of the electons last week was how varied the outcomes were ( perhaps it is just a reflection on their local nature ) which give everybody an opportunity to see positives. I must say I have some sympathy for the Liberal view that it was not as bad as it seemed. Most of their losses were either in a small number of councils or in small rural wards spread across the south. Whilst these were good for racking up tory gains / liberal losses they tell us little about what might happen at a general election. In areas that might make more of a difference at a general election they did do better. The same can also be said to some extent with Labour ( which to be fair to Sean he did point out in regard to West Yorks ) there were a number of areas, Bury being one example where Labour had reasonable results. Even across the south there were cities such as Bristol and Southhampton ( all containing key marginals ) where again the results were OK. Whatever the arguments about the estimated vote share ( I didnt see many folk questioning the methodology beforehand ) it does seem that the general media analysis of Cons goodish, Lab could have been worse and Liberal poor was about right.
The point about lack of councillors can be overplayed. In many cases councillors have little time for campaigning and general party work so it may be that in fact defeated councillors have more time available not less. That said having no councillors at all could have a damaging effect on a local party if it was used to having an important role in the local community.
Bloomberg hasn’t a hope of being president. He’s loaded alright but he is very New York, has no name recognition in the heartland, he makes Brown look charismatic and his cupboard is full of skeletons. And, by the way, this story has been knocking around for a very long time.
David I really think Bush bought the line from Wolfowitz and others that if they could introduce a successful democracy in Iraq it’s example would spread throughout the Middle East ensuring peace and stability for Israel and reducing sharply the threat of terrorism round the world( WMD was something required for a succesful recourse to the UN which was very important to Blair and therefore to Bush when he agreed to go down the UN road but I don’t think it was the prime mover for the White House). As Francis Fukuyama pointed out, sadly democracy did not turn out to be the ‘default position’ when Saddam was overthrown.
Old Bloomberg stories …..
nymag.com/news/politics/25015
http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20060710&s=smith071006
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/06/inside_report_bloomberg_for_pr_1.html
40. Indeed, a significant part of the Hebrew Bible is justification for the ethnic cleansing of other groups by the ancient Israelites! For every detestable passage in the Koran, there is a detestable passage in the Bible. Of course, both books have nice things to say too, and thats where our hope of reform lies. The Christian West has shown it can develop democracy and human rights despite having a holy book of mixed moral quality. In time, the same must also go for the Muslim Middle East.
53. That is sadly often the case in an ethnically heterogenous country with a long history of animosity between groups. Peoples’ sectarian hatred and tribal nationalism are more important to them than a fair and just society. Splitting the country into three would have been far more likely to foster democratic spirit (although by no means inevitable).
52 So even at 80s, you wouldn’t buy in, Mr Chip?
By the way, best cartoon I’ve seen this year:
http://www.channel4.com/news/media/2007/05/week_2/bbdo_the_exorcist_380.jpg
46 PtP. I used 2 x £10 of free bets I had with PP on at 80-1 a while back but they won’t take big money, and I wasn’t planning on on putting any more in anyway. It’s a useful place holder if he jumps into the running as an Independent next year but nothing more.
OT I note both Hilary & McCain prices have tightened recently at expense of Rudy and Obama. Any thoughts? Also, for any John Edwards backers (Yokel?), I don’t know how his approach to 9/11 conspiracy theories is going to go down with the mainstream US public! “Give me your details and I’ll get back to you….”
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZTZjNWZiYmViY2Q4NWRmMmIzZmM4YmI4MjBkMmY1ODc=
There is an aspect of the council elections which has passed under the radar. Labour (and to a lesser extent the Lib Dems)use councillors and their “expenses” as a source of income for the party (paid “researchers”,etc). With so many fewer councillors, the financial position of local parties becomes even worse.
59 Caveman
Well I don’t blame them not taking big money on something like that. I expect they’ll give me an extra tenner if I ask nicely in the morning and to be honest that would do me too. Even before Mr Chip spoke, I felt this was really a bit speculative but I don’t mind backing the odd 80/1 shot to small stakes as long as there’s some chance he can get somewhere. I’ll let you know how I get on.
I’m not surprised at the tightening of Hilary and McCain. They’ve had some better poll news lately and Obama’s surge has eased off. You need to keep checking Realclearpolitics which covers every little twitch. There have been some debates involving the candidates recently and I think Hilary surprised people with an authoritative performance. I’ve always thought she would be difficult to beat and that having backed Obama at fifties, I would have to make do with laying off, albeit at pretty small odds. He’s currently 3/1 for the Democrat nomination, which I guess is about right.
I’ve a healthy respect for the political skills of Edwards (and the betting instincts of Yokel, but don’t tell him I said that!) and I won’t be counting him out until he does so himself. Currently 8/1, I wouldn’t want to be laying at that price.
Gore is a bit of a nuisance. I don’t believe in him but can’t quite put a line through him yet.
The Republican race is so wide open I’ve gone for a small all-green position. I really couldn’t say who I think will win. It reminds me of a pre-race summary by the legendary Mark Coton who said ‘None of these is good enough to win, but one must, and my pin fell on….’
60. I believe it’s fairly normal for all parties to expect their councillors to contribute something back to party funds. In my experience, the cost of their elections is usually a minimum over the four years, although some groups / constituencies / wards will expect a good deal more. I seem to recall Labour considering the introduction of a 10% levy for their councillors. I’m not sure what happened with that proposal.
You’re right about the financial aspect though: it will affect local parties’ finances, though not nearly as much as losing an MP does (in that case membership drops, donations fall, the quality of speakers at functions is harder to maintain etc etc). As by definition Labour has an MP in all the constituencies that will determine the outcome of the next election (the result of which depends on how many seats Labour loses - if they gain seats, they’ve already won), these council losses are only likely to have a significant financial effect in constituencies that are not intrinsic to the outcome of the next general election.
PtP - imagine Yokel needs to hear a bit of praise to help him overcome Sanchez’s departure from NI job.
57 - only if there’s a secondary market and I thought the market would tighten further between now and the day he either decides not to run or he drops out.
62 PtP. Thanks for the update. I haven’t been checking up on the US side of things recently (been focusing on the Grand Prix this weekend where Lewis Hamilton has been a profitable addition to the grid!).
As a more recent poster I missed out on the original Obama tip, but got in early on Fred Thompson, with small green positions on all the other runners. I see FT’s in Law & Order on Sky One at the moment - the Reagan movie comparison is interesting - and will certainly help his exposure to the mainstream public. To average 13% in the polls without even declaring as a canididate is not bad. I laid off most of my original stake when the price initially came in, but am waiting to see if it goes to Obama levels if/when he declares before making my next move.
Anyway good night to one and all - have volunteered to give the baby boy his late night feed shortly :o)
No third party candidate ever stands a snowball’s chance in Hades of getting elected. That said, if a vaguely credible alternative such as Bloomberg does give it a go, enough people will back him in betting terms to make 80/1 value as the odds would certainly come in from there. If one stands.
The simple fact is this: if a third party candidate is popular enough to win the election, they’d have almost certainly have tried to get the backing of one of the two main parties. They alone have the structure and voting base to deliver a winner. Why start from scratch otherwise? If the third candidate has come from within the Republicans or Democrats then they will split the vote and let the other side in.
The best example is still that of 1912. Theodore Roosevelt - probably the most popular politician in the country at the time - ran for a return to the presidency but was turned down by his party (this at a time before primaries became the dominant form of selection of delegates to the conventions, and his successor, Pres. Taft, had used his patronage well). Roosevelt formed his own Bull Moose Party, polled better than the sitting president but that split just let in Woodrow Wilson. Wilson might have beaten Taft, he probably would have lost to Roosevelt in a straight fight. These days, Roosevelt would have won the nominations in the primaries so eliminating the circumstances which necessitated his forming the third party in the first place.
Party identification may have dropped somewhat since then but it’s still strong enough to see off outsiders like Bloomberg - if he is an outsider.
63 Poor Yokel. He’s a Fulham supporter too. Won’t know whether to laugh or cry.
44. “Bob Marshall-Andrews is my favourite Labour MP (Have I got news for you tonight)”
Icarus, he was in sizzling form tonight and I haven’t laughed that much at HIGNFY in a while.
32 - The ’smear’ Rik would be to point out that you lived in Sutton until a few months ago, were/are on the electoral register there and were trying to pass yourself off as ‘local’ to Reading?
Funny I don’t remember your claims that you had ‘lived in Reading since 1995′ mentioned last year when you stood in the London Borough of Sutton.
Following on from last week’s STV vote the SNP are now part of the administrations of
Edinburgh
Highland
West Lothian
Renfrewshire
and more to follow next week.
http://www.theherald.co.uk/politics/news/display.var.1394187.0.0.php
70.Marcia, have hopes completely faded of the Libdems coming to the discussion table with the SNP even at a later date? There seems to be quite a mixed reaction to the news even among their own supporters?
Still amazed at how many people don’t understand why the Conservatives are not in the frame to join a coalition with the SNP.
60. You really are an idiot, aren’t you.
Re 72, Ah, ColinW, always there as the intellectual heavy weight!
72 Why do you say (60)is an idiotic comment Colin ?
Surely it’s indisputable and empirical fact ?
Clearly Norwich South, that Green vote can affect Charles Clarke positively. But do we know if Green voters will switch Liberal Democrat at General Election. Charles Clarke hanging in could hinge on the answer.
Still given that no one expects them net gain against the Tories, if they grow it must be against Labour. Can anyone show me where these results may give them hope for that.
Also can someone give me Lib Dem seat totals in Cardiff/Swansea with how many seats up next year. I wish to see if they can take outright control.
I could not see how the Lib demns would stride away against Labour. They were defending the 2003 movement Labour to Lib Dem and really have defended them quite well. They have the same to contend with next year and will overall lose again, mainly to the Conservatives, but this time to Labour, for their gains that year were considerable. After that they will bottom out and start gaining again, as the same seats come up for re-election.
Rallings and Thrasher give a prediction based on local government by elections. They are a different being, the Lib Dems are adept at getting people to “flock together” for these, and hence they produce better results than in a local “general” election. Prophesies from R & H, like Professor Curtice, should be ignored.
Has anyone actually added up all the votes the parties got? So far as I can see these percentage figures that have been produced are based on a small number of so called representative seats. Do we know which ones these are? Also what about all the seats where the Conservatives were returned unapposed. How many votes would have occurred if there had been contests. Presumably this would have significantly boosted the Conservative figure.
In my view the summarising of these elections has been poor, misleading and underscores the Conservatives real figure which I suspect is more mid 40’s to 40.
The Conservatives did very well.
PS I am not a Conservative.
76. I too suspect the Tory share is higher or the Tories targeting was amazing. But more interested in what it means in marginal seats. I mean the Tories winning a seat in Manchester, Lib Dems in Witney or Labour in Tunbridge Wells is nice for them but meaningless. Crawley, Norwich South and Birmingham Edgbaston are different matters.
“If these results were repeated in a general election, their (LD)seat losses to the Conservatives would probably not be great, albeit their chances of gaining further seats from the Conservatives would be remote.”
Good piece Sean. Albeit - I disagree with the above statement as have every intention of winning Eastbourne. Our substantial victory on May 3rd was a step in the right direction.
69 & 32 - re Dan’s response to Rik. Some of the Tory blathering about LD smears is quite ridiculous. In Eastbourne in the last few days of campiugning they put out two attack leaflets. Both contained a couple of total howling lies. I went to the press and said so.
Unsurprisingly they have not said anything since on the matter.
Meanwhile since the local election they have been bleating ad nauseum about our shocking ‘personal’ atacks. And what were these awful, terrible smears? Us pointing out the Tory Cllrs had voted themselves an increase in cllr allowances of 52% and the then Leader of the Council 82%, and that were we to win we would reverse and replace with an inflation only increase. Which we are shortly about to do at full council next Wed!
Strange bunch…..
77. “Birmingham Edgbaston are different matters”
The tories had a huge lead in Edgbaston wards last week. Labour has just 1 councillor left and he/she will probably lose the seat next year.
The tories were leading Labour also in Northfield and Selly Oak wards.
Labour was easily leading the Libdems in Perry Barr, Ladywood (all 4 wards won by Labour) and Hodge Hill (Lab lost Hodge Hill ward to LD, but they held Bordesley Green who was lost last year and they performed well in Shard End against the BNP). Labour leading in Erdington. LDs with a huge lead in Yardley wards.
Hall Green will probably be the most umpredictable Birmingham constituency next time. 2007 locals results were: LD 29.4%, Lab 26%, Respect 20.6%
76/77 I am still totting up the figures but the Conservatives will certainly not have achieved 40% overall . Re the treatment of figures in unopposed wards , the accepted practice is to estimate the vote share from previous contests in the ward . To give some idea of how the vote shares have changed from the 2005 GE for the main 3 parties .
All Met Districts Con + 2.8% Lab - 14.8% LD + 1.5%
Herts all seats Con + 2.3% Lab - 12.8% LD + 5.2%
Suffolk “” “” Con + 4.4% Lab - 16.4% LD + 2.8%
Devon “” “” Con + 5.1% Lab - 9.6% LD - 4.3%
Hants “” “” Con + 6.1% Lab - 11.9% LD + 2.8%
West Sussex “” Con + 2.0% Lab - 12.5% LD + 3.4%
Minor parties and independents well up in all cases which is the main reason the Conservative vote share will be around 37%
78.
“their chances of gaining further seats from the Conservatives would be remote.”
How many Solihulls are there left in the UK?
It’s not actual vote share that is being talked about, it’s the notional vote share.
79.So short of defection it is already sayonara Gisela Stuart then.
Northfield and Selly Oak. Not Tory for twenty years. Was their performance impressive enough to give hope for them.
Hall Green. I think the Lib Dems will get it unless Yacoub stands there, I think the Lib Dems will eat enough of the Respect vote, plus of course what remains of the Tory presence to win.
We’ll have to wait a while for someone (probably R & T) to add up all the figures for actual vote share. I would expect something along the lines of Conservative 37%, Labour and Lib Dems 23-24% each, Others 16% (of which Greens 5%, BNP 3%, UKIP 2%).
82 No Paul , Dave (s) and Punter were talking about actual Conservative vote share .
SAC: Agreed. Anyone with any serious experience of campaigning - rather than a bitter vendetta against one particular party due to a historic loss - knows that sadly all parties are guilty of bending the truth in leaflets.
I see no evidence of a Bloomberg bandwagon in his home town.
Hold your horses, Sean. The Tories made a spectacular advance in Wakefield, knocking off the deputy leader of the council in the process! Our vote share soared in wards where we were previously miles behind Labour.
Not all of West Yorkshire, thus, was a tragedy for the party
84 Sean .Is there no quick way of getting actual vote figures.We will have to wait a long time for T @R.
Agree broadly with your estimate of likely actual shares.