Atrocious.
From the little I watched it consisted largely of meaningless soundbites(I suppose all 7 leaders being involved didn’t help). The Greens and Plaid Cymru were particularly bad on economic matters. Borrowing to build council houses is seemingly a sound economic plan that pays off in the long-term.
This is the worst part of the debate. The post debate spin begins.
What spin?
Arguing about who won the debate; who was best on economic competence; who looked most leaderlike; who looked least competent; who bungled certain lines and so on. Very little actual analysis of what was said goes on post debate. It’s all spin for the next 48 hours.
Those figures you posted will be the headlines tonight and tomorrow.
edit: my post wasn’t having a dig at you. I just know this script off by heart by now. It’s tiresome.
No, it’s a fair point. But the sad truth is that these debates are a beauty contest, not a policy forum. I’d happily not have them, tbh, but that’s the game.
Have now seen 3 polls, all saying different people won. All that spinners could wish for.
Here are a couple of discussion points on immigration:
If Cameron’s economy is so bad, why are 300K / year coming over here?
Cameron claims they’ve created 2M jobs; but if immigration is 300K/year, doesn’t that mean that 75% of the jobs have gone to immigrants? (Assuming every immigrant works.)
Can this thread also be used to discuss our actual local candidates, or would a separate thread suffice?
I’m a floating voter with the incumbent MP standing down (although in a safe seat), and am keen to discuss the merits of the actual candidates too.
I would have no issue with local candidates being discussed here.
Some predicted seat counts as of April 4th:
[ul]
[li]ElectionsEtc: CON 300, LAB 258, LDEM 20, SNP 47, OTHER 27[/li][li]ElectionForecast: CON 287, LAB 271, SNP 42, LDEM 27, OTHER: 23[/li][li]Ladbrokes: CON 286, LAB 273, LDEM 26, SNP 43, OTHER 25[/li][/ul]
Which to me, having been following the polls, are pretty surprising and seem to suggest the psephologists are anticipating a large swing to CON over the next month.
Cool 
So, for me, I have Sir Keir Starmer standing in my constituency for Labour - the former Public Prosecutor. He’s not without controversy for certain reasons coughRobinhoodairporttweetcough, and otherwise he strikes me as bland,
I also have Natalie Bennett, the leader of the Greens, standing. The Lib Dem is Julia Fraser, who is mayor of Camden and runs a chippie. She out of all the candidates seems to have pride and concern for the neighbourhood, although I’d like to ask her questions about what she thinks of the Coalition’s record.
The Tories, UKIP, and CISTA (‘Cannabis is Safer than Alcohol’) have zero chance and the parties know it, none of the candidates seem credible. So the choice for me is Labour, Green or Lib Dem, if I’m only looking at local candidates.
Anna Soubry is standing as incumbent where I live, she’s been a good MP for the last 5 years, one of the more outspoken Tories both on social issues (she’s pretty liberal) and willing to criticise the Government when appropriate. She also hates Farage, which is a good thing.
The Labour candidate is Nick Palmer, who was the MP here for 3 terms before Soubry. He was a very good local MP, and I’d have no problem with him being elected on a local level, but I’m obviously not voting Labour.
No idea what other candidates there are, and I don’t much care. Anyone who votes other than Labour or Tory in this election is voting for an ineffective at best, and harmful at worst, government.
My friend and I were discussing yesterday, and he observed: those who vote Labour or Tory are voting for which of those parties they want to be the senior, dominant party in government, while those voting for other parties are simply voting for the junior party in government, but nothing more.
These predictions of a swing to Con are based on two assumptions I believe. Firstly, the economic model; that a growing economy leads to voters voting for the party in power. Secondly, a memory of the old swings to Con during the election campaigns of the 80’s and 90’s. Whether these assumptions are correct for 2015 is another matter, but there is some basis for predicting a movement in voter preferences though not necessarily seats. The fragmenting of main party support is a complication in this election as is the added likelihood of tactical voting.
If Tony Blair had not said anything about Ed Miliband, one assumes that the press would have jumped all over this as evidence that there is a split in the Labour Party and use it as further evidence that Ed Miliband will be a weak PM.
Of course, he’s now said he’s 100% behind him, which is no use to Ed Miliband either, given the contempt in which Blair is held by much of the UK electorate. I suspect that Labour have a Thatcher problem in Blair and they could do with him fucking off ASAP, so as people aren’t reminded of him every election cycle.
Not really. At the risk of being accused of banging the same old drum, all these projections show is the allowances made for the major non-swing factor in this election. Going on national swing with Labour neck and neck in the polls, Labour should have a nets advantage of 10-20seats over the Tories. The applicant is upset by the acceptance that some 30 Labour and some half dozen LibDem seats are going to go on the Scottish swing to the SNP.
Adjusting the above figures to put the SNP back in its box would give an average of about Tory 290, Labour 300, LibDem 33 which is about what would be expected on a uniform UK wide swing.
My local MP is the only Scottish Conservative. The constituency was a Conservative reasonably safe majority over Labour with the SNP in third place. Lord Ashcroft and other polling suggest it is now an SNP Conservative marginal with a total collapse of the Labour vote in the industrial northern fringe. A high expectation of a further collapse likely as election day approaches. I shall be voting SNP in the knowledge that it cannot possibly militate against a leftist government here as Labour have no chance to win; the decision is easy.
Fucking off to The Hague, ideally.
My hunch is that David Cameron will win, but like 2010 the Tories will go into partnership with again the Liberal Democrats, or some of the other smaller parties. Same if Labour were to win.
But who knows really until election day?
Can Cameron still win after being photographed eating a hot dog with a knife and fork?