Be Excellent To Each Other

And Luton South.

I think the BBC are predicting that 6 of the 9 that remain will be blue, to take them to 331.

331. I guessed 281 and I thought I was being a bit optimistic! I'll be happy for Cavey to take my £2.

There goes Ed. Bye Ed. Give your brother a call and ask if he's busy for the next 5 years.

Given that Sinn Fein aren't going to take seats, the majority is already met.

Good speech by Ed Miliband.

Bet Cameron is regretting saying he would only serve one more term.

Ed still seems wishy washy to me. I'm glad he's not PM.

...And so ends the absolute and total unraveling of a cynical, cynical strategy to let the Tories take the heat in 2010, only for Labour to cruise back into power as a shoe-in once all the hideous flak had been endured, horrible decisions taken and heavy lifting done. Hilarious to think that in reality, they actually did much worse than even a post-apocolypse Gordon Brown... thank fuck for the SNP, I say.

It's the LDs I feel sorry for though; there's no justice at all for them. Vince Cable in particular is a terrible loss, and my elation is now being tempered by the fear that an unbridled, fulll-fat Tory government will cut TOO hard.

Politics, eh? 'It's a rough old game' etc.

Oh man. The vote share numbers for smaller parties really do show up how badly FPTP dictates the electoral map

SNP: 56 Seats. 4.8% share of the vote
Lib Dem: 8 Seats. 7.8% share of the vote
UKIP: 1 Seat. 12.6% share of the vote

...And that's it folks, a Conservative majority has been achieved.

Never have I been so grateful to Scottish politics because, make no mistake, that is what won it for the Tories.

£12bn to come out of the welfare budget, out of areas that were clearly too controversial to be disclosed publicly before the election. Winter is coming.

Redwood on telly earlier, talking the usual incredibly Euroskeptic angle he always talks. Reminders that Cameron will get a very rough time from the hardliners during this referendum. Going to be some tricky manoeuvring required.

Farage may stand for party leadership in September, knowing full well the party will likely flounder without him. That's not resigning, that's "going on holiday."

A thought I had whilst vaguely hallucinatory last night – what's to stop the SNP attempting to capitalise on its momentum by standing candidates south of the border? Sturgeon stated quite clearly that she's leaving independence off the table (which I don't believe, but whatever), which would be the only obvious obstacle I can see. And if it can demolish the Labour vote in Scotland on a leftish platform, which couldn't it do the same in the north of England on its way to becoming a national party?

You'd have to be pretty damned persuasive to get voters in an English constituency to vote for the Scottish Nationalist Party, I suspect. There's a whole immediate mindset of 'this party isn't for me' that would be massively difficult to overcome.

Even if every single scottish region voted Labour they still wouldn't have got in, though.

A CDU/CSU style permanent alliance would be more likely, but there's no obvious partner on the left for them. Labour certainly wouldn't surrender Scotland like that.

Just a handful of byelections or one tiny backbench rebellion away from a minority government, however; and with tricky party-dividing waters around Europe and Scotland to navigate. This is still the third weakest governing mandate in 70 years. Cameron can't get too comfy.


Even if Labour had all 58 seats the SNP took, it would still be far behind.

The swingometer analysis I saw late last night showed almost no movement of voters between Labour and Conservative. The lion's share of the Conservative gains were coming from the Lib Dems, where the swing was huge. Labour picked up some of that too, but not as much, and in less key seats. I think that's the real story: the party that won was the one that most effectively picked over the bones of the Liberal Democrats. I think the Lib Dems have handed the Tories power for the second parliament in a row; first via self-immolation, and now in their last will and testament.

Yes I know mate. I suggest, though, that the combined effect of depriving Labour of 40-odd MPs *and* galvanising the rUK population to get out and vote (including tactically) to prevent the SNP holding sway over English matters in Westminster, was more than enough.

"Vote SNP, get Tory".

The irony is the SNP's victory is actually wholly Pyrrhic; a majority Tory government, free to redraw boundaries and act with relative impunity in all matters, including Scotland, is their very worst nightmare made real. They'll just be able to have a front row seat in the Commons' opposition benches to see it all first hand.

As it goes, I also think the SNP did for UKIP too, for essentially the same reasons.

Tristram Hunt for Labour leader. They need a complete break with the past. And some bloody principles.

Harriet Harman says she will stand down as Labour deputy leader when the new leader is elected.

Add to that Labour having to focus their energy of fighting the SNP, and I think it was a big factor in the result.

His "One Nation" call in his speech will be for naught - his thin majority means that his government is going to be dragged far to the right by the swivel eyed brigade on his back benches, who, having seen themselves as being chained to the lefty centre ground by the Liberals for five years, will be champing at the bit to go full on nasty party.

I don't think too badly of Cameron (Osborne's another matter) and I think he is genuinely instinctively a "compassionate conservative", but he's got feck all chance of doing anything other than bowing to his party's baser instincts now.

Yes, good point Troops.

I actually think the Tory campaign was pretty rubbish, but the SNP's declaration of voting aggressively in Westminster and their resurgence must've been manna from heaven to Cameron. They (the SNP) are just so unsavvy politically, it's untrue. Talk about unnecessarily and totally overplaying your hand; they could've achieved the same result in Scotland off the Indyred whilst sounding far more conciliatory, thereby doing far less damage to Labour in rUK - but that's just not their style, is it? About as much subtlety as a flying anvil; just couldn't resist turning the "crowing" dial to 11 and pissing off the average English voter to breaking point. Now, as a result, they've got no power whatsoever and a Tory majority government for the next 5 years.

Labour did not shut this down with any believable conviction and now we can see why, judging from the words of the odious Campbell and Balls - it looks like they actually had every intention of forming some kind of 'arrangement' with them regardless of what was said otherwise pre-election. Balls was quoted as saying, I think, that Labour should prepare for government even with 50 MPs less than the Tories, and Campbell was giving it the "just stating constitutional fact" line when interviewed last night. Democratic legitimacy, huh.

Seems to me that (very broadly):

- fiscal conservatives want to be in Europe
- social conservatives want to be out

Must be a real treat to be charge of herding a party with significant numbers of both through divisive referendum campaigning backed by the thinnest of majorities!

Yes, very true Doc. This could bring the party to an abrupt end in a year or two, reminiscent of the Major years.

Easy, you two. You might start agreeing with each other.

Is social conservatism really that powerful a force in the party any more? Cameron got gay marriage through without a significant fight.

And then the kissing inevitably starts.

How so? Surely those who want out have already won their victory in getting the referendum. The whole point of it is to put the issue to bed within the party. It's certainly not happening because the electorate were particularly crying out for it. It'll probably happen sooner rather than later.

With 50 Liberal MPs, and the Labour party's support you mean. He didn't need to care about the backbenchers on that one.

You think that staying in Europe wouldn't have the SNP and Labour's support?

Looking to the longer game, hopefully the rise of the SNP will give Labour cause to look to their base and stop assuming they can rumble along purely on a platform of "we're not (yet) as bad as the tories". I know shitloads of left leaning people who're sick of what they've become and have either switched to the SNP (if Scottish) or are only voting Labour grudgingly through lack of proper alternatives. If they can refocus on providing genuine opposition then they'll have a very good chance at the next election; not least because by that time people will hopefully be sick of the terrifying welfare cuts the tories are likely to be enacting during the coming term.

You might want to reserve judgement until you've seen me...

Yes, but I'm not sure what thats got to do with anything. He's now in a position where he can't piss off his backbenchers, because he doesn't have 50 liberal MPs he can use to counteract any backbenchers playing silly buggers.

Well, OK. The Euroskeptics then. The ones who get spittle-flyingly vehement about the Human Rights Act, say. Or whatever else it is that Redwood and his ilk have such a problem with.

I'm also using that as a dog whistle short hand for "the actual nutcase xenophobes", of which the party has at least a few. That Ukip councillor who said gay marriage caused the flooding was a Tory councillor for 20 years first, and (I am reliably informed) routinely said shit like that. It's just the media didn't pay attention. Not all the hard right wingers like him went to Ukip.

The hardline Tories have been marginalised by a comfortable majority and the LibDems pulling the coalition left, but they can get some time in the spotlight now, and it seems to me they are going to seize the chance.

If nothing else, this result has made me realise just how lefty I actually am. If these £12bn cuts start cutting into the vunerable and helpless then I might start getting politically active.

Look for me on Church Street with a copy of Socialist Worker any time soon

It's not about the referendum itself, it's about how the Conservatives campaign for it and phrase it. Presumably Cameron wants to campaign to stay in. So now he has back benchers who see this as a once in a lifetime shot to escape the EU, and relentlessly cause trouble on all the issues they can because they don't like the direction. Maybe Cameron wrings some concessions out of the EU; but enough to silence the dissent? A tall order, I think.

I just checked. 45% of Tory MPs voted against gay marriage. It would never have passed without Labour and LibDem support. Of 172 Nay votes, 136 of them came from the Conservative party. Only 127 Tories voted for it (I assume the balance was abstentions?)

If I'm looking at the Tory party in 2015 and the Tory party in 1997 I can't help but think that euroscepticism isn't the force today that it was back then. As you indeed yourself said they've lost a number of their hardliners to UKIP. I strongly believe that the referendum itself was a political ploy to draw in the eurosceptics in the populous, and that they will be campaigning to stay. As will every other party.

It's the Harold Wilson approach. To settle the issue and heal splits in the party, go to Europe to gain token concessions then hold a referendum. Wilson let his cabinet take sides during the campaign, and it would be dangerous for Cameron not to do so either.

Starting to wonder if our Dave is the Tories' version of Wilson. Let's just hope he doesn't go mad and think he is about to be overthrown in a coup (other than by Boris, natch).

We should move here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallis_and_Futuna They've got a population of 12,000 and elect by PR - throw enough of our natural awesome around and we could be kings!

Obviously the Tories are not beyond criticism and I could talk all day about the things I don't approve of, it just remains that I think they're the much better option than Labour, or any other mad left party of fanciful nutbars.

Gay marriage as an example, it's actually appalling that any of them would vote against it or not even have the balls to publicly come down on one side or the other. You have to give Cameron some due knowing that pushing that through made quite a lot of his party very annoyed at him.

Hopefully such regressive types will be washed away by the next generation, and the problem there will fix itself.

By the gay-induced floods, presumably.

Absolutely agree with that. He's going to have a hell of a time sheep herding that lot, now that he has to rely on them for everything.

In the last 40 years, only one person has won an election for Labour.

Was it me? I don't think it was me.

Is it Dimrill?

A pre taste of the BBQ

That's not BBQ. Also your house is EXACTLY WHAT I WOULD HAVE GUESSED.

Cavey is Monty Burns AICM5

Also, there should be two portions of chips there, for completeness.

Who is the pink lady on question time?