Politics – General Election 2015 – A Three Party Coalition?
General Election 2015 Could It Really be A Three Party Coalition? The New Statesman was showing that given the polls at the end of February the two main parties would win 271 seats in the general election. Tories down by 36 seats Labour up by 13. They were also showing the SNP up by 50 to 56, the Liberal Democrats down to 25 seats from 57. I imagine that Nick Clegg is not reading the papers at the moment, or for the last year or two come to that. For a majority a party needs 326 seats. We are back into coalition territory, again, unless either Miliband or Cameron wants to try to run a minority government. Using the New Statesman’s projections what coalitions could evolve? The SNP has said that it would not enter into a coalition with Cameron. It would be suicidal for them to say anything else before the general election. Even after the general election they could not get into bed with the Tories. That leaves the way open to a SNP and Labour coalition. Except that they would still not have enough seats. They would only get to 327, 9 short. UKIP may have a higher percentage of the votes cast than the Liberal Democrats but the first past the post system guarantees that, unless something extreme happens, they will end up with just 4 or 5 seats. They could influence the outcome though as most of their votes would come from the Tories, those that do not come from thr BNP. that is. Where the Liberal Democrats are fighting the Tories in second place in 2010 the UKIP vote could sink the Tories. The way the vote splits on the left could determine whether Labour wins a few seats. Seats such as Plymouth Sutton, Bristol West (a constituency dear to me heart), and Hove could well be decided by the tactical voting of Green and Lib Dem supporters. There are some Tories that see the DUP in Northern Ireland being able to support them after the general election. The trouble is they may well get just the 8 seats. The Tories and Labour then need someone else to support them in a coalition. Who will be the first one to call Nick? That assumes that Nick will still be the leader of the Liberal Democrats, of course and hat is not guaranteed. Have the Liberal Democrats got the appetite to be in another coalition after the bruising experience of this one? God, I love politics, bring on the general election!
Politics – General Election 2015 UKIP Another Barking Candidate
UKIP Shoots Itself in the Foot Candidate Threatens to Shoot Tory Between The Eyes! UKIP are mad and bad. They are obviously bad given their odd policies and stance on immigration. They are obviously bad when their leader wants to leave the EU but is happy to pocket the EU cash. They are obviously bad when Diddy Neil Hamilton can not stand them. But mad? Oh yes. UKIP has announced that they will review their candidate selection procedures after their candidate Robert Blay, their candidate for North East Hampshire threatened to shoot his Tory opponent. He was caught on camera, at a public meeting at which Farage was speaking on Saturday. He said that if Ranil Jayawardena ever became PM Blay would shoot him “between the eyes”. Blay has been suspended by UKIP. The other reason that UKIP is both bad and mad is that it has taken them until the eve of the poll to realise what we all knew. Their candidate selection has allowed some very odd and deranged people to pass the vetting. One more reason, if one was needed why UKIP candidates are not fit to be elected to be dog wardens let alone parliament. Just for the record; The Mirror reported that he said: “If he is I will personally put a bullet between his eyes. If this lad turns up to be our prime minister I will personally put a bullet in him. That’s how strong I feel about it.” Questioning Mr Jayawardena’s background, he said: “His family have only been here since the 70s. You are not British enough to be in our parliament. I’ve got 400 years of ancestry where I live. He hasn’t got that.”
Politics – General Election 2015 – Tory Claim, Labour to Increase Taxes by £3,068.
What is the truth behind this Tory Claim? There are always Tory claims and Labour claims during an Election. Very few are accurate. Sometimes they seem to be pure fantasy. What about this Tory claim? What is it based on? The claim is that a future Labour government would raise taxes on every working family buy £3,068. That is a remarkably specific amount, so it must be true, mustn’t it? Not according to Labour, they dismiss it as being just made up, plucked out of the sky. To begin with the claim says “every working family”. What is a working family and how many are there? According to the Office for National Statistics there are 17.4m families with at least one member working in the UK. Take out the working families in Northern Ireland, the Tory Claim says British families, and the figure becomes 17m. So 17m x £3,068 and Labour would raise £51bn. What? Really? (Have I got the decimal point in the right place?). Labour is askance at the suggestion that it would need to raise that much through taxation. They would raise the top rate of tax, we know that. Mind you The Tory claim that that tax rise will not actually increase the tax take for the Exchequer. The Tory claim is based on their belief that Labour is committed to save £30bn a year as it has signed up to the Charter for Budget Responsibility. Labour denies that. Remember that the Tories do not want to borrow at all while Labour is happy to borrow for investment. Confused yet? I will press on. The Tories claim that Labour has to raise £30bn either by tax rises or borrowing. They also claim that Ed Milliband said that he wanted a 50:50 split between tax rises and spending cuts. Milliband says that he has not committed to a 50:50 split. Even if he had and he did need to raise half of £30bn that is £15bn and not £51bn. So have the Tories just reversed the figures? Apparently not. The Institute of Fiscal Affairs has the answer to where the original figure came from. The Tory claim has been beefed up. It is their calculation of the tax rise under Labour per working family over the life of the next parliament. So, what looks like a massive tax rise is, actually, not that big. The Institute of Fiscal Affairs also says that “Cumulating numbers like this over several years is, at best, unhelpful. Ignoring the existence of non-working households doesn’t help provide sensible averages either.” Besides which, having analysed labour’s rules on taxing and spending the IFS calculates that Labour would need to borrow only £6bn, not £15bn, or £51bn. Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics. We can look forward many more Tory claims and Labour counter claims. All the fun of an election and there are still weeks to go! What’s not to love?
Politics – General Election 2015 – The Leaders’ Debates, Now We Know Why Cameron Was Scared
General Election 2015 – Cameron Was Right to be Scared David Cameron and Ed Milliband were interviewed this week on the same night by Paxman. On the night the studio audience said that Cameron had won. However, a strange thing has happened in the couple of days since. The viewing public has decided that Milliband won! For months the two main parties have been neck and neck, each on about 34%. The Sunday Times commissioned a poll by YouGov. It showed that the Labour party is now 4% ahead of Cameron’s Tories! There are more facets to the poll, and none of them make good reading for Cameron. While he is still ahead in the who would make the better Prime Minister stakes, Milliband is coming up. More worrying for Cameron is that when asked who is most in touch with real people, Cameron is not second behind Milliband. Cameron is third behind both Milliband and Farage! Milliband is seen as more trustworthy, genuine and in touch than Cameron. Of course, one poll does not mean that the general election 2015 is decided. At present it suggests that Labour would get 314 seats, the Tories 251, SNP 48, and the Lib Dems 16. Not an overall majority, but enough to start working with to construct a government. Anything could happen, including votes for the SNP handing the government to Cameron. Thinking about the polling. It seems that those questioned were people who actually watched the programmes. What you have to ask is what their voting patterns have been in the past. For example, if they were all Tory voters you would tend to think that they would favour Cameron and the reverse if they were all Labour voters. AS far as I can tell the sampling was balanced, more or less. What really matters is what the wider public get from the coverage. The first day after the interviews the coverage was all positive for Cameron, the following days less so. Certainly, the coverage today, Sunday, is quite dreadful for Cameron. Even the Tory supporters are getting in on the act. Writing for “The Conservative Woman” blog Beatrice Timpson is scathing about Cameron’s preformance. Read it here. Not a happy woman.
Politics – General Election 2015 – The Polls
The latest General Election polls I saw 2 polls in the papers yesterday. The Observer Con 34%, Lab 35%, Lib Dem 6%, UKIP 14%, Greens 6%. YouGov Con 34%, Lab 34%, Lib Dem 8%, UKIP 14%, Greens 5% So the pattern of The Conservatives and Labour being neck and neck remains. Since 2011 Labour has been ahead in the polls, but never very far ahead. What does it actually mean for the result of the general election? The traditional wisdom was that with both the main parties on 35% Labour would win a majority. The trouble is that the traditional wisdom does not hold. Labour’s vote in Scotland has collapsed, some heartland constituencies have seen a 25% swing to the SNP. The Tories are challenged by UKIP, which has picked up most of the votes that would have gone to the BNP. There are other factors to consider, even in 2012 The Telegraph was arguing that the Tories could not win a majority. One of the reason being that the Tories attract less than 20% of the ethnic minority vote. As they move out of Labour heartlands they take their votes with them diluting the traditional Tory vote. What else is going on as we move towards the general election 2015? Look at the Liberal Democrats. Their vote has collapsed so where will it go? In the past Liberal Democrats have looked to the left to ward off the Tories. Well, that did not work, all Clegg did was to rush into bed with Cameron. That does not persuade Lib Dem supporters to return to the fold, they fear that he might do it again. Those that voted Labour last time will stick with Labour. Those that voted Lib Dem last time have had their fingers burned, many will not do it again. They are also, as group, very likely to vote for soemone. They will vote Labour. Some Tories are saying that they need an 11% lead in the polls to win a majority. That is too high but they certainly need a bigger lead than Labour does to win a majority at the next general election. The truth is that unless there a significant shift we are heading for Labour being the biggest party at the next general election, but without a majority. So, a coalition. Maybe not. Cameron, wanting to hold on to power, would probably try to run a minority government if the Tories were the biggest party or could argue that they won the popula vote. Not an impossible scenario. A difficult trick as their only natural supporters would the rabid UKIP mob. Labour could try running a minority government without a formal coalition. They would look for support from the SNP and the Liberal Democrats on a case by case basis. Who said that the general election 2015 is boring?
Politics – The Save Dave Cameron Plan – General election 2015
The Sunday Times Says That Senior Tories Want to Save Dave Cameron. The story runs that despite all the public pronouncements about winning the General election outright a plan is being hatched to save Dave Cameron should he not win the general election. In spite of a somewhat lack luster performance by Miliband so far the Tories are worried. So they should be with the polls close and them no where near the sort of popular support that would guarantee a victory. Anything other than a straight forward Tory majority would be bad news for Dave Cameron. He “won” last time against a hugely unpopular Prime Minister but still had to form a coalition to become Prime Minister. Not to win out right this time against a weak leader of the opposition is unthinkable, if he wants to survive as the leader of the Tory party, and he does. Desperately. George Osborne told his MPs that they would all be re-elected, but they do not believe him. Apparently one minister is ready to call for Dave Cameron to fall on his sword if he does not win. The knives are not out, but they are being sharpened. There are mutterings that Dave Cameron and his cronies should be planning to win, not planning and escape route to save their jobs. However, Dave Cameron has a crafty wheeze up his sleeve. Should he lead the largest party, but without a majority, it seems as if he will try form a government without a coalition. The thinking is that there will be about 20 ministerial and government posts available to hand out after the general election in 2015. Those belong to the Liberal Democrats at the moment. 20 posts would make for a lot of goodwill from power hungry Tory MPs. The other scenario has Labour as the largest party. A coalition with the Liberal Democrats would be fragile. This time round they would drive a harder bargain. They would not be so naive. Dave Cameron would say to his MPs that to ditch him then would be foolish. A new, untested leader would be a mistake in those circumstances. Dave Cameron is the one with the big problem. Perhaps the biggest problem for him is that the loyalty of his friends is not guaranteed. The Tory party is a ruthless party.
Politics – General Election 2015 – Tory Bribe Extended
Tory “Granny Bonds” on Sale for Longer. Tory Chancellor George Osborne has extended the deadline for the pensioner band for another 3 months. That is, until after the election. The bonds, provided by National Savings and Investments, are backed by the government. They give up to 4% interest over 3 years which is far more than is currently available to savers. The BBC’s Joe Lynam said; “We knew these pensioner bonds would be popular but few expected them to be this popular. Their arrival three weeks ago has flushed out billions of pounds of cash owned by older people. They’ve found a safe new place to park their money, with incredibly generous rates of interest. The original ceiling of £10bn has been scrapped simply because the (Tory) chancellor and his deputy (Liberal Democrat) Danny Alexander didn’t want to risk the ire of such a key voting demographic who might have missed out on such a lucrative opportunity. The fact that the newly created window for investing in pensioner bonds closes almost as the general election polls do is a happy coincidence”. But what is the cost of this Tory policy? The government borrows money at 1.2 % it lends it out at 4%. That is not good economics. There has been another, unexpected, consequence. According to Which? “Our new study indicates that 63 savings accounts, Isas or bonds had their interest rate lowered in the seven days following the launch of the market-leading pensioner bonds by National Savings & Investments on 15 January”. In other words as the Tory policy is going to underwrite more than £10bn in savings there is no longer the need for financial institutions to battle for the savings market. They have slashed their rates for the rest of us. Critics will say that ordinary working-age taxpayers will be subsidising an often wealthy group of pensioners whose homes have multiplied in value and whose company pensions are far more generous than will be the case when younger generations Generation retire. The Institute for Economic Affairs, criticised the extension of the scheme, arguing that it was distorting the market. “This announcement well and truly proves that we are not all in it together,” said Director General of the Institute for Economic Affairs Mark Littlewood. “Borrowing more expensively than the government needs to is effectively a direct subsidy to wealthy pensioners from the working-age population.” Since when has that bothered a Tory Chancellor? Mr Littlewood went on to say “Pensioner bonds have never been anything other than a gimmick that will benefit pensioners at the expense of the taxpayer, and it beggars belief that the government is prolonging such a foolish policy.” The Tory Chancellor has said that the cost of extending the scheme would be in the region of “several hundred million of pounds”. Labour’s shadow Treasury minister Chris Leslie said pensioners had suffered under the coalition thanks to the rise in VAT and changes to age-related personal allowances. “Don’t be surprised if George Osborne, as we get closer to an election, tries to give away all sorts of things when, actually, he is trying to erase the memory of how much he has taken away from pensioners. And he has not said where he is going to get the money for this. What other public services are going to suffer as a result?”
Phil’s British Heart Foundation Donation – you know it makes sense
