UK General Election thread

[giblets]

Did the BNP voters switch to UKIP?

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Proabably. Although UKIP would probably strenuously deny this.

[C0ckney]

UKIP + BNP at the last election had around 1.2 million votes. UKIP alone this time had 3.8 million. what was strange was the number of former liberal voters they seem to have picked up, suggesting that these voters aren't attracted to a particular ideology but rather the fact that the lib dems/UKIP aren't the big two parties.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

I'm not sure it's that straightforward, when you get 30% of the electorate not voting. I'm more inclined to think that people who voted UKIP this time were less likely to have voted in 2010, while people who voted LibDem in 2010 were less likely to have voted this time around.

[C0ckney]

i think there's an element of that, but it seems clear from looking at vote totals and polling that a decent number of liberals went over to UKIP. the lib dems used to attract a lot of protest votes and it seems some of those at least went to UKIP.

[kentonio]

Now beginneth Cameron's Tricky Second Term.

1- He'll be heading a government which, having no coalition partners, actually has a significantly smaller majority than the preceding 5 years.

2- He's spent the last 5 years blaming everything that's wrong on the previous Labour government. It gets harder to get away with that in a second term.

3- He's committed to a referendum on the EU, and if there's one issue that really hurts the Tories it's EU membership. The only way Cameron can really win that one is by negotiating serious concessions from the rest of the EU AND win a referendum to stay in on those terms. Anything else risks splitting the party between the Pro-Business/EU wing and the Little Englanders.

Yep, and more than anything I get the impression that the public school arrogance that drove a lot of people on the moderate wing of the party away is now going to come out more than ever. I think they'll misread this election as a huge win for their policies rather than an indictment of Labour, and try and do far more than they're capable of. May talking about bringing back the snoopers charter seems evidence of that.

The EU vote is terrifying. A whole lot of chickens could be about to come home to roost after all those years of scaremongering and blaming the EU for everything.

[regexcellent]

The EU's free trade agreement seems like the only good thing to come out of it for Britain (granted it is a very good thing); if there's a way to keep that without having to deal with its ridiculous laws that ought to be the best of both worlds.

[Dauphin]

To which laws are you referring? Or are you referring to the generic meme?

[Ben Kenobi]

The EU vote is terrifying

Kentonio voted for labor this time around?

[giblets]

i think there's an element of that, but it seems clear from looking at vote totals and polling that a decent number of liberals went over to UKIP. the lib dems used to attract a lot of protest votes and it seems some of those at least went to UKIP.

Or liberals went over to conservatives and conservatives went over to UKIP.

[regexcellent]

To which laws are you referring? Or are you referring to the generic meme?

Product regulations.

[pchang]

We won't have Ed's Balls to play with a any more

[Hauldren Collider]

To which laws are you referring? Or are you referring to the generic meme?

I'm looking at the antitrust lawsuits against, for instance, google, and having trouble seeing how the EU regulations can actually be good for the UK.

[kentonio]

I'm looking at the antitrust lawsuits against, for instance, google, and having trouble seeing how the EU regulations can actually be good for the UK.

Because obviously the state of Google, a company that was recently in hot water over dodging UK tax is a huge indicator of what's good for the UK..

[Hauldren Collider]

That, true or not, (I hadn't heard of it), is totally irrelevant to the point at hand.