Many of the seats the Tories lost would not have been lost if Reform were not running and the Tories had received those votes instead.
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British By Elections - Tories Lose Big
- Thread starter Cheerful Charlie
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Cheerful Charlie
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Reform is going to get 13 seats. If Tories got all 13 instead, they still lost overwhelmingly. Part of Labor's problem is many voters were not voting for Labor, but against the Tories. Now Labor has to really prove effective.
Canard DuJour
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Indeed. The Tory vote has been split by a neo-nationalist right wing party, with Labour the default beneficiary in terms of seats, thanks to FPTP.
Despite the purported "landslide", Labour's vote share has barely increased since the purported Tory "landslide" at the last election, and is substantially lower than in the one before that, which Labour narrowly lost.
It's nigh impossible for any govt to fix the discontents which have sunk the Tories in one term of office - even if it had a plan to do so, which Labour hasn't. And this country is much less forgiving of Labour govts than Tory govts.
It's now conceivable that Farage will take over the Tory party, much as Trump took over the Repugs, which was inconceivable until not long before it happened.
As in the US and Europe, UK mainstream politics must now contend with a proto-fascist insurgency. Nothing to celebrate here, I'm afraid.
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I'm glad Great Britain is going to hopefully get a better government.
I hope Britain somehow shakes off a lot of bad cultural habits it seems to have gotten from the US.
I hope Britain somehow shakes off a lot of bad cultural habits it seems to have gotten from the US.
bilby
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For sure. Vote splitting has been a huge problem for the Tories, from both right (Reform), and left (Lib Dem).
Labour's landslide would dissapear under an Instant Runoff Voting system. But that's not what they have in the UK, and in this election, Labour were best positioned to take advantage.
A lot of talk is being generated by Reform, and people are saying that the Conservative Party must move to the right, or suffer further loss of support to Reform; But they lost far more seats to the Liberal Democrats than they lost to Reform, so maybe they should be moving leftwards, if they want to find more votes next time around.
We might even be seeing the beginning of a fundamental shift to a Lib vs Lab 'two party system', with Con as an 'also ran'. A similar shift has happened before, when the Libs gave way to a Lab/Con system, and ceased to be either government or opposition.
FPTP systems tend towards two-party systems, but which two can, occasionally, change, given sufficient disruption. Whether Brexit/Covid is sufficiently disruptive remains to be seen. The last such transition required two World Wars.
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bilby
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I hope not. The Tories are in enough trouble without putting that pound-shop Mosley in the driver's seat.
bilby
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With just one seat not officially declared, (Inverness, Skye, and West Ross-shire), where a recount is underway, but where the SNP candidate has conceded defeat, and the Liberal Democrats seem unlikely not to win*, the final tally is:
Labour 412
Conservative 121
Liberal Democrat 72*
Scottish Nationalist 9
Sinn Fein 7 (Irish Nationalists)**
Democratic Unionist 5 (Not democratic at all extreme Northern Irish Unionists)
Reform 5 (Neofascists)
Green 4 (Eco-left)
Plaid Cymru 4 (Welsh Nationalists)
Social Democratic and Labour Party 2 (Northern Irish non-sectarian)
Alliance 1 (Northern Irish very non-sectarian)
Traditional Unionist Voice 1 (Think the DUP is too democratic and not unionist enough)
Ulster Unionist 1 (sane(ish) wing of the Irish unionists)
Independents 6:
*The recount in Inverness, Skye, and West Ross-shire is due to a technicality (a discrepancy between the number of ballots issued, and the number counted) rather than to a close count; It is highly unlikely that the recount will change the result from that of the original count, but the exact number of votes to each candidate will likely change slightly.
** Sinn Fein MPs do not sit or vote in parliament, as they do not recognise the legitimacy of UK rule in Northern Ireland
Labour 412
Conservative 121
Liberal Democrat 72*
Scottish Nationalist 9
Sinn Fein 7 (Irish Nationalists)**
Democratic Unionist 5 (Not democratic at all extreme Northern Irish Unionists)
Reform 5 (Neofascists)
Green 4 (Eco-left)
Plaid Cymru 4 (Welsh Nationalists)
Social Democratic and Labour Party 2 (Northern Irish non-sectarian)
Alliance 1 (Northern Irish very non-sectarian)
Traditional Unionist Voice 1 (Think the DUP is too democratic and not unionist enough)
Ulster Unionist 1 (sane(ish) wing of the Irish unionists)
Independents 6:
Adnan Hussein (Blackburn)
Alex Easton (North Down)
Ayoub Khan (Birmingham Perry Barr)
Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley)
Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North)
Shockat Adam (Leicester South)
*The recount in Inverness, Skye, and West Ross-shire is due to a technicality (a discrepancy between the number of ballots issued, and the number counted) rather than to a close count; It is highly unlikely that the recount will change the result from that of the original count, but the exact number of votes to each candidate will likely change slightly.
** Sinn Fein MPs do not sit or vote in parliament, as they do not recognise the legitimacy of UK rule in Northern Ireland
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Derec
Contributor
That's not how spoilers in FPTP systems work. Both the spoiled and spoiler lose. In the seats Reform won they do not count as spoilers, but in the seats where Tories lost to somebody else because Reform drew enough votes from them they do.
This election (aka Independence Day Massacre) illustrates the flaws of UK's medieval FPTP electoral system quite clearly.
Labour got 34% of the seats, a bit more than 1/3, but won 63%, almost 2/3 of the seats.
Reform got 14% of the vote, but only 1% of the seats.
Lib Dems got 12% of the vote (less than Reform!) but got 11% of the seats (~11 times as many as Reform).
In a proportional system, that more accurately reflects the will of the electorate, Labour would not have a comfortable majority in parliament, but would have to have to rely on coalition partners.
It is popular to bitch about how antiquated US electoral college is. But what is the UK parliament, when selecting the head of government, than the UK version of electoral college? Except that the "winner takes all" is by constituency, not state. And because the minor parties are much more popular in the UK, but Duverger's Law still applies, that produces even more ridiculous results than the US system. After all, Keir Starmer was elected with just 34% of popular vote for his party, and he will also have a comfortable majority in the Parliament that will allow him to push his agenda through with no checks and balances.
barbos
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I was watching John Oliver:
Cheerful Charlie
Contributor
Farange's Reform party in the end only took 4 seats. No, he ain't gonna take over the Tory party. The Liberal Democrats threw in with the Conservatives in the past and that hurt them bad. But they have been moving away from that. Perhaps in the future they can find better leaders and do better if Labor falters.
Derec
Contributor
They did get 14% of the vote though. Their low seat count is an artifact of UK's medieval electoral system. Technically, a party could win all seats in the Parliament while not getting majority in any constituency. And yet, Brits voted down the proposed electoral reform some years ago. smh
Derec
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They may be technically "independent", but except for Alex Easton they seem to all be pro-Hamas fifth columnists.
Toni
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You have an interesting take on rounding and numbers.
Derec
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My bad. Took you long enough to figure out the mistake though.
Toni
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Just read your post. Busy these days IRLMy bad. Took you long enough to figure out the mistake though.
Derec
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A "massive landslide" and yet not even the majority of the vote? 51% voted for somebody other than Comrade Jezza, the friend of Hamas and Hezbollah.
Fuck him, the horse he rode in on, and everybody who voted for him!
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Derec
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Canard DuJour
Veteran Member
But in seat after seat, the combined Tory + Reform vote would have beaten Labour. The Tories need those votes back, and they'll have to do another deal with Farage to get them.
It's still unlikely that he'll become Tory leader, but it's now conceivable. It was inconceivable that teh Donald would take over the Republican Party until not long before he did.
More likely, he'll agree to not fielding candidates in seats the Tories would otherwise win, as he did in 2019. He agreed that on condition that the Tories committed to fully leaving the EU by 2020, decent trade deal or not. Before that, he tacitly forced the Tories into the Brexit referendum with the threat to split their vote. If he doesn't become Tory leader, he'll have more sway than any Tory MP except the leader.
So much for the idea that FPTP prevents tails wagging dogs.
It wouldn't matter if Labour were actually popular, but they aren't. They barely increased their vote share and got absolutely fewer votes than Corbyn did, even in 2019 (Corbyn would probably have won in 2017 under STV). Barring some cosmic stroke of luck, they're likely to be wildly unpopular by the next election.
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Derec
Contributor
Starmer is not wasting any time making stupid decisions.
New UK Prime Minister Starmer says controversial Rwanda deportation plan is ‘dead and buried’
While controversial, it at least was doing something about the scourge of mass migration. It looks like the Labour government will go back to the policy of twiddling their thumbs.
New UK Prime Minister Starmer says controversial Rwanda deportation plan is ‘dead and buried’
While controversial, it at least was doing something about the scourge of mass migration. It looks like the Labour government will go back to the policy of twiddling their thumbs.
Yeah, sending perhaps a couple hundred refugees to Rwanda at immense expense, and accepting an equal or greater number of exiles from Rwanda in return...