To find myself quite envious of people in marginal seats?

[drivinmecrazy]

I'm in a constituency with a huge Conservative majority. To my mind our MP is a prize twat (James Cleverly) and was only parachuted into our constituency because it was so safe and he's nothing more than a slimy career politician.
Some how we have always been a Conservative safe seat apart from a very short spell under a Labour MP.
I don't want to vote Conservative for many reasons but primarily Brexit (I have in the distant past been an historical Tory voter but much has changed over the past ten years).
So to my point. If you are lucky enough to live in an area where your vote might actually make a difference then you must feel more empowered than me in a safe seat when any vote against the Tories is nothing but an insignificant protest vote, no better than non voting or spoilt ballot.
I almost feel disenfranchised

YANBU. Mine is a safe Labour seat - 20,000 majority - and my MP never ever responds to lobbying.

I tell myself that the fight for women's votes took two generations and keep bunging money at organisations promoting electoral reform.

I think people should vote tactically if that gets BoJo out. Interesting HuffPost article.

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/tactical-voting-can-deny-boris-johnson-a-majority_uk_5db975eae4b00d83f72021d9

@Parsimon

Ahhh yes, that's where I am. Our constituency needs a big shake up and let's reduce his majority if nothing else. Old Etonian, private Landlord who voted against the LL bill, Brexiteer despite his constituency being Remain, and is only there because he's related to seven other previous MPs. And the fact he never replies to emails

getvoting.org offers this year's tactical voting advice, of course ...

No matter who I vote for I get DUP brexit spokesman sammy Wilson. Last election he got 57% of the vote with the runner up getting 15% . It’s enough to put you off democracy.

I’m not jealous, sadly any vote in our constituency will be nothing more than a protest vote, but it will save me having to spend to much time worrying about which one of the current shit shower to vote for.

Marginal by about 4,000. I have signed up to leaflet deliver for the underdog. Never felt more need to do something more than this election.

My constituency is very, very marginal. Do I vote for the man I like who is a brilliant MP. Or do I vote for a person I cannot stand but for a party that I support, more or less. FPTP is such a stupid system and has never been seen to more stupid than now.

seen to be

My area could actually be interesting - small Tory majority last time after being previously Labour for a while. Except our MP is now not Tory any more, and the new Tory candidate is a clear parachute - don't think he's ever even visited the place. So maybe that'll split the Tory vote enough to get Labour back in...?

@Roussette Geoffrey Clifton Brown never replied to any of my emails either.

I agree with you, OP.

I am in a very safe Conservative seat which usually has a majority of around 25,000. Not James Cleverly's seat, but a neighbouring one. People round here often just vote Conservative like sheep.

I often feel obliged to vote LibDem, and will very likely do that on 12th December. I don't like the Tories, especially under BoJo. I do like some Labour policies, but I am not comfortable voting for them while Corbyn is leader. I am totally against Brexshit, so I would never vote for UKIP or the Brexshitters if they stand here. That leaves just the LibDems because it has been a long time since any other parties or even independents actually set up in this constituency.

The Conservative candidate will get in again though. It will be gobsmacking if she doesn't. She was parachuted in for the 2017 General Election when our previous Tory MP retired. I did actually like him, though never voted for him. He was at least prepared to make the odd stand if he didn't agree with some party policy or another. I don't think this current one ad even visited the area before. She makes no waves of any sort and always just toes the party line. She has never failed to vote with the government.

Parsimon frustrating isn't it?

Although my day was made when he was chucked out the Tory Party Conference, hilarious! It was only that there was so much going on politically that more wasn't made of it. Big news of some sort took over quickly, he was very lucky.

I'm a lib dem voter and always have been but I do sometimes vote for an independent MP that seems to care. I really wish people would look at what their MP is offering (they all put flyers through the door near election time and through out the year) and stop focusing on who they want to be prime minister or leading the government. We have a Tory MP right now and I can't fathom why. It's a mainly working class area I believe so you'd expect it to be SNP or Labour but no...

I think I might live in a interesting constituency. Our Tory mp has just got the whip back in a constituency that was Lib Dem till 2010 and which voted overwhelmingly to remain. His last majority had reduced to 10,000 which probably sounds like a lot but double that signed the revoke petition. He's an excellent local mp but has upset almost everyone by supporting the WA, so the minority Brexiters baying for No Deal aren't happy and the remainers feel he's not representing his majority. So there's a good chance the Lib Dems will take it back.

I also live in very safe Tory seat. Usually the Tory gets about 3x the vote of the next candidate, been Tory for nearly 100 years.

To posters thinking of not voting or spoiling their ballot paper, please do vote. Your vote might make the difference between a party losing their deposit or not (most parties don't have the tax avoiding big donors the Tories do and can't afford to lose their deposit). Also the votes a party gets translates into TV time during the next election, this is why Nigel Farage is never off Question Time.

I live in Norman Lamb's constituency. Could well be interesting.
I dunno who the LibDem candidate will be (Lamb is personally popular, but stepping down).
This has been a marginal seat in recent past Tory vs. LibDem.
The Tory candidate is son of prominent local businessman who was active UKIPer (candidate in several elections).
So the Tory will have name recognition.
That could count for a lot in this area: voted strongly Leave in 2016.

I think I read that 25 Tory MPs are sitting in fairly strong Remain areas. Future is not ours to predict.

After years of my votes not counting because I lived in safe seats for another party, I moved to Scotland where the parliamentary elections use a system of proportional representation. I love the fact that your vote counts every single time. The Westminster elections feel like a real step back.

YANBU

We live in one of the safest Tory seats in the country and I don't see that changing any time soon (ever). What makes it worse is our MP is a complete and utter attention seeking twat.

I vote every time and would never not vote but ffs I sometimes wonder why I bother.

Ooh.. that's interesting. Where we used to live, Loughborough, may also be up for grabs. Nicki Morgan is not standing again & it was held previously by Labour. The Tory candidate isn't listed on Wikipedia yet (not yet chosen?!)

Is there a list or map of the most marginal constituencies, somewhere?