UK General Election 2024

[Brian]

Congrats to all the UK members of the board...enjoy this brief window before disappointment sets in! 

[DaveF]

What kind of a democracy is that, in which a party who took about 34% of all votes gets the vast majority of the seats? To me looks like a sham. 

Increase in the Liberal Democrats' vote share: 0.6%
Increase in the number of Liberal Democrat seats: 60 (545%)

Total wipeout of the Conservatives here in Wales, from 14 seats to 0.  Particularly unlamented will be their candidate in Montgomery, Craig Williams, who was one of the first to be caught placing bets on the date of the election (although the BBC, in its impartiality, always managed to publish the most smirky, greasy, self-satisfied-looking pictures of him).  Not much more missed will be my former local man, ex-HM Secretary of State for Wales, David "Top Cat" Davies, an Army veteran from the Hanging and Flogging wing of the party.

[Florestan]

Increase in the Liberal Democrats' vote share: 0.6%
Increase in the number of Liberal Democrat seats: 60 (545%)

How anyone can find this situation normal is beyond me.

[DaveF]

How anyone can find this situation normal is beyond me.

In fact, I got the second figure wrong: increase in seats was 63, making their final total 750% of their original.

[Jo498]

It's because the vote is for candidates not parties. I used to find this grotesque as well but I don't think a proportional system (or a mix like in Germany) is better, or more precisely, it has different faults. The German system has been "captured" by parties all of which are disgusting and corrupt, and independent candidates would be possible but not feasible in practice because of party power. In the British system parties could in principle be abolished.

[Mandryka]

The thing you might not be aware of @Todd is that Sunak was pretty well campaigning alone. We saw very little of his cabinet over the past month, and practically nothing of his Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, the architect of Sunak's main claim to success. It's almost as if he was abandoned by the troops, who may well have been angry that he'd called a June election.

[Todd]

The thing you might not be aware of @Todd is that Sunak was pretty well campaigning alone. We saw very little of his cabinet over the past month, and practically nothing of his Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, the architect of Sunak's main claim to success. It's almost as if he was abandoned by the troops, who may well have been angry that he'd called a June election.

Poor fella.  I hope he will be OK.  I saw that he and his wife have a net worth of only £651 million, and upkeep of Kirby Sigston Manor is quite dear.

Now that Sir Keir has taken the helm, I trust the City will be brought to heel.

[Spotted Horses]

Poor fella.  I hope he will be OK.  I saw that he and his wife have a net worth of only £651 million, and upkeep of Kirby Sigston Manor is quite dear.

Now that Sir Keir has taken the helm, I trust the City will be brought to heel.

Too bad they found out about the U.S. green card he held while in UK government. Did he have to give it up in the end?

[Todd]

Did he have to give it up in the end?

That's an excellent question.  Hopefully he did, but bureaucratic snafus regularly stymie even the most routine actions.

[Brian]

He gave it up in fall 2021 before his first official trip to the US as a government minister. However, he still owns a $7M penthouse in Santa Monica:
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/06/19/rishi-sunak-california-00164050

[Florestan]

It's because the vote is for candidates not parties.

I'm not at all convinced by that. See the graph Mandryka posted above: the Labour was voted mostly to get rid of the Tories, ie people voted for one party and against other party. I very much doubt that if the Labour candidates would have run as independents they could have beaten the Tories so badly.

The German system has been "captured" by parties all of which are disgusting and corrupt, and independent candidates would be possible but not feasible in practice because of party power.

It's exactly the same in Romania but even so, PR offers a more correct image of the political spectrum of a country.

And in the very recent Romanian local elections independents did quite well actually, they won the mayoralty of Bucharest (re-election with more votes than all next three party candidates together) and another city and a seat in the EU, which is no small achievement.

In the British system parties could in principle be abolished.

I very much doubt that too.

[Todd]

He gave it up in fall 2021 before his first official trip to the US as a government minister.

Good to know.  Obviously, the place in Cali is a low rent Plan B, so who knows if he ever visits it again.

[Mandryka]

Now that Sir Keir has taken the helm, I trust the City will be brought to heel.

Well The City voted in a labour MP.

Conservatives have almost vanished from London. And that despite the fact that London has done better than most other places over the past 14 years. 

[Todd]

Well The City voted in a labour MP.

Does that represent capitulation or capture?

[Mandryka]

Does that represent capitulation or capture?

What it represents is clear thinking, the Conservatives are clearly unfit to rule. It's obvious now. I'm quite surprised that they won as many seats as they did - I expected they'd be down to double figures max.

This election has been the most boring I've ever experienced because the result was so predictable. There was no contest.

[Todd]

What it represents is clear thinking, the Conservatives are clearly unfit to rule. It's obvious now.

Wasn't it obvious with lettuce lady?

[Mandryka]

Wasn't it obvious with lettuce lady?

Truss was more complex than that - the history has yet to be written. In my view things fell apart a few days after her budget, when Kwarteng gave an interview effectively saying that there was more of this round the corner, you ain't seen nothing yet. That's what spooked the markets.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-62966306

Everyone (I think) agrees that Truss's perception of the problem was spot on - the problem is low productivity, low growth. Her solution, on the other hand, was implemented and presented disastrously.

[Todd]

Her solution, on the other hand, was implemented and presented disastrously.

That seems to imply being unfit to rule.

[Mandryka]

That seems to imply being unfit to rule.

Indeed. Kwarteng said that she felt that she had such a small amount of time to make an impact that major, drastic, measures were called for. He said that she pushed him to go further and further in his budget.

But this is a serious error of judgement on her part and yes, she was unfit to rule.

[steve ridgway]

I see Jeremy Corbyn got elected as an independent so expect to hear him raise the odd question in parliament.