Okay - who has any predicitions for this election?

lol at hovercrafts and challenging teeth

Will read blog link tomorrow MrsB, I'm two G+Ts down.

re the hovercraft the 70s really were another world

there's a fabulous Labour poster from (I think) the first election of 1974, showing doughty British workers, management and politicians (all of one gender and race - guess which) sharing a joke together - message is, we are tough but tender, we are modern, we are negotiators, we know how to get things done. From a 2010 pov all the people in the poster look almost grotesque - the teeth at a challenging range of angles! the hair (or lack of!) the skin, apparently both pasty and muddy! the manly paunches on all concerned! the clothes! it's both sad and funny that a picture like that would simply be impossible as a political poster now. it doesn't seem that long ago to me but it really looks like another era.

it's in roy jenkins' autobiography but i've never found it online unfortunately.

BTW - what is that dodgy looking scarf the ERS guy I link to abovee (Lewis Baston) is wearing in his picture byline? He needs some fashion advice from Style & Beauty methinks.

Have a look here

The Director of Research at the Electoral Reform Society (ie an elections-expert-with-a-big-swingometer-type-person) predicts a minority Conservative administration in a hung Parliament, extrapolating from previous elections.

He says some interesting stuff about how the Lib Dems tend to pick up support over the course of an election campaign because the rules re political balance mean they get more media exposure.

He also mentions that in 1974 the Lib Dems had not a campaign bus but a campaign HOVERCRAFT! Did they REALLY?? Did anyone SEE THIS?

Could Mumsnet get its own hovercraft?

Tories maybe but by the tiniest margin
think hung parliament preferable, mostly curious as to what would happen

I think that the previous incumbent is given first dibs at attempting to form a government. Not sure though. The civil service has been frantically drawing up memoranda for all these possibilities.

the queen decides who to ask to form a government, based presumably on advice on which party is likely to be able to make a deal on a coalition. she invites that leader to the palace and he/she says whether they can form a government or not. if not, the other one gets a go, and if nobody can form a government, we have another election.

Oh OK. I will go back to my relentless Pollyanna-ish thinking then. And you can pick up the pieces on May 7th and tell me I should have known better

pw sorry when I said 'know this' it sounded as if it was some sort of huge edict! it's just an opinion! marginals are worked out more scientifically than that i'm sure but i still think that the results never actually follow the pattern of alleged 'marginals', there are too many other factors.

No, I didn't know that choosy

Len, I think it just means that the government loses the vote - unless it's a vote of no confidence, in which case the government would fall. In practice, MPs from opposing parties have a twinning system when majorities are very tight, so that if MP from Party A can't vote because of unforeseen circs, MP from Party B is honour bound not to vote either. Weird but there you go.

well you can build defences at the previous high tide mark, and even put them a few feet further up the beach, but if the flood is strong enough the defences aren't going to withstand it

Not that it will mean much change to us all in the true sense of the word but I get this feeling the Tories will win only because people in general want some form of change and it is human nature to do so and as the options are narrow , it is my guess they will either win or we will have the hung parliament issue

as in the latter years of the major government leningrad - there is massive horsetrading for every vote

but not stall exactly - just the government has less chance of winning the vote

sorry pw i don't believe it. marginals are the marginals from the previous election. a bigger shift in voting behaviour will create a new pattern of marginals. (sorry if that sounds like i think you don't know this - am just explaining my thinking!)

Yes I'm feeling a bit gloomy too, choosy. But MrsBaldwin posted a good link the other day to a Reuters poll that seemed to show that the Tories aren't doing as well in the key marginals as everyone had been thinking.

I'm pretty certain (although I have no special knowledge, apart from the doomed feeling in my stomach). Am thinking about putting a bet on for the Tories at around 30 seats. Especially because nearly everything I bet on falls at the first fence

The great thing about this election is that nobody knows for certain what will happen. Today's YouGov poll, for instance, puts Labour just 3% behind. (Not saying that it's necessarily correct, mind.)

Hoping for a hung parliament myself.

If the Tories win then Gordon gets the sack.

If Labour win then Gordon gets the sack in 6 months time.

You seem very certain for someone who doesn't have a clue