Sibling Rivalry

Some sets of siblings, like my brother and I, play out our sibling rivalry by putting on football helmets and playing tackle football. Others, like Ed and David Miliband play their rivalry out by running against each other for the leadership of a major political party.

The former Energy Minister Ed Miliband won a narrow victory to be elected Leader of the Labour Party and become Leader of the Opposition in Parliament. Coming in second was former Foreign Secretary, and Ed's brother, David Miliband.

It is unclear which brother Mama Miliband loves the most but the love that trade unions have for Ed provided the 1% margin of victory. The big questions are whether David will serve in the shadow cabinet and does Ed's election represent a shift to the left for the party?

Christmas Should be Interesting

at the Milibrand house.

Who's at No. 10?

David Cameron

Clear as the Thames

Yesterday's election obscured as much as it cleared up. David Cameron and the Conservatives won 306 seats but that is still 20 seats short of what is needed for a majority. After a day of jockeying, the Tories and the Liberal Democrats are working on some type of deal; either a coalition or some type of informal power sharing arrangement. Gordon Brown and Labour lost 91 seats and are currently on the sidelines. If the Tories and Lib Dems can't form a government then Brown as offered to work with Nick Clegg and for a Lib Lab government.

In a strange election, nobody can claim they did great. The Tories fell short of a majority, labour lost 91 seats, the Liberal Democrats momentum faded and they actually lost seats. Labour, as the current party of government, has the right to be the first to try to form a government. However Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg said that the Conservatives deserve to get the first crack because they won the highest portion of the popular votes and the most seats. Cameron earlier today offered the deal to the Liberal Democrats that is currently under discussion.

That is the big news but there were several smaller stories about the election that we should note. Both former Home Secretaries, Jacqui Smith and Charles Clarke along with several other ministers lost their seats. In Northern Ireland, both of the unionist leaders lost their seats in Westminster. The Speaker was able to hold his seat and Rory Stewart won in Penrith and the Border. History was made when Caroline Lucas won the Green Party's first ever seat in Parliament when she won Brighton Pavilion.

The other big story was the confusion that reigned in some polling places. Some polling places were not prepared for the hight turnout and some voters were turned away and not allowed to vote. One of the constituencies involved was Sheffield Hallam, which is represented by Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg. Clegg, and his party, are the biggest supporters of electoral reform and some type of referendum on electoral reform might be their asking price.

Whatever happens, the election is sure to stretch into the weekend and possibly until the new Parliament convenes later this month.

UK Election Viewing Guide

Tomorrow voters all across the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland will go to the polls and vote. Voters will vote for their local MP and the party that means a majority of seats forms the next government. To help follow the election, here are some of the seats that whose results I will be watching for. Some of these are bellwether and threshold constituencies that will give hints about the trend in the election and some of these are constituencies that I am just interested in. Much of my understanding comes from the good people at ukpollingreport.

The first seat to watch is Houghton and Sunderland South. This constituency, when it was known as Sunderland South, was the first to declare the winner and did so every election since 1992. Chris Mullin, the outgoing MP, used to joke about forming his own government during the brief minutes when he was the only elected member of Parliament.

Based on uniform nation swing, Labour will lose its majority if they lose Stourbridge. If the Conservatives win in Dudley South then they will be in the largest party in the Commons and if the Tories are victorious in Derby North then they are assured a majority.

If you are looking for some Bellwether seats then look to see who wins Dartford and Chorley. The winning party has won both of the these seats since 1964. Luton South, and its predecessor seats, are the most reliable bellwether seats. The victorious party has won this seat in every election since 1951.

Since all 3 major parties are significant players in this election there are 3 seats in which all 3 parties poll within 10% of each other. Ealing Central and Acton, Watford, and Filton and Bradley Stoke are the seats to watch get an idea of which of the three parties can expect to have a good night.

Since ministers are member of Parliament, most general elections see a minister or two lose their seats. The Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy in East Renfrewshire and Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling in Edinburgh Southwest are both considered somewhat vulnerable. However, the most likely to lose their seat is the Minster of Culture, Sports, and Media Ben Bradshaw in Exeter and Children, Families, and Schools minister Ed Balls(who is a close ally of Gordon Brown) in Morley and Outwood. Two former Home Secretaries could also lose their seats. Jacqui Smith in Redditch will almost certainly lose her seat and Charles Clarke in Norwich South could be vulnerable.

It's always good to watch the leaders and how they do. Gordon Brown is in the Scottish constituency of Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath, David Cameron represents Witney, and Nick Clegg represents Sheffield Hallam.

I am also interested in seeing if the Green Party can win in Brighton Pavilion and win their first ever seat in Parliament. As Speaker, John Bercow is a non-partisan figure and the major parties don't run candidates against a sitting speaker. However the UK Independence Party is running against Speaker Bercow in the traditional Tory seat of Buckingham. I am also watching to see if the Tories can win back Margaret Thatchers old seat of Finchley and Golders Green.

Finally, I am interested in Penrith and the Border because former army officer, diplomat, best selling writer, Harvard don, and critic of U.S. and UK efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq Rory Stewart is the Conservative candidate and the heavy favorite to win.

Enjoy election day and I hope to join you some tomorrow night to share some of my immediate observations.

Is This Thing On?

Unfortunately for the Prime Minister the mic was on.

It is tough to analyze Gordon Brown's gaffe except to say it was a huge one and that it makes it very hard for Labour to gain any traction in the polls.

Andrew Rawnsley, who has written two accounts of Labour's 13 years in government, puts the episode in context of Gordon Brown's general manner of conducting himself while Prime Minister.

All I know is that Liturgygeek will be terribly upset.

The Price of Victory

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has named his price for forming a coalition with Labour and the price is apparently Gordon Brown's departure. Gordon Brown's most likely replacement would be David Milibrand, the current Foreign Secretary. A big question then would be where does Nick Clegg end up in a coalition government. The most logical place would be to replace Milibrand at the Foreign Office but does the Liberal Democrats reputation on economic matters put Clegg or Vince Cable at the Treasury?

The Liberal Democrat strategy is now clear. They are telling voters if you want a center left government, and if you want to keep the Conservatives out, but you don't want Gordon Brown then vote for the Liberal Democrats.

Lib Dems Ascendent

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg won the party leaders debate and the results have shaken this election its core. Recent polling shows a strong surge in favor of the Liberal Democrats and one poll even had the Lib Dems moving ahead of Labour.

So, who are the Liberal Democrats?

They are first and foremost a fusion of two political parties. The Liberal Democrats are the heirs of the old Liberal Party that was a major party in the UK until overtaken by Labour in the first couple of decades of the 20th century. The second group was formed when a group of moderate Labour MPs, called the Social Democratic Party(SDP), split from the party in the 1980s and joined forces with the Liberals and by the early 1990s they resulting party was known as the Liberal Democrats.

The party tends to be the most left leaning party but economic issues do cause divisions and tensions within the party. Originally they were more moderate then the democratic socialism of Labour but Labour under Tony Blair moved right on economics, and now the Lib Dems might be more left than Labour. Liberal Democrats are most assoociated with pushing for reform of the political system, strong support for civil liberties, and for their opposition to the Iraq War.

Nick Clegg is the party leader but the real star is the treasury spokesman Vince Cable. Cable is popular, in large part, because of his predictions of the financial crisis and for his criticism of London's banking culture. Cable is also credited for the best insult of Gordon Brown when he said that the Prime Minister transformed himself from "Stalin to Mr. Bean."

Since the 1997 election, under the leadership of previous leaders Paddy Ashdown and Charles Kennedy, the Liberal Democrats have made gains in the number of seats in the Commons. Yet as the Lib Dem success has increased, the level of expectation also increases and many success are interpreted as disappointments when compared with the party's goals.

This year may be different. The Lib Dems may achieve their goal of becoming the official opposition party. More important they are slated to be kingmakers and Clegg is coy about how he will decide which party to support. The possible eclipsing of Labour by the Liberal Democrats and the possibility of the traditional UK two major party system become a 3 party system are two of the most important stories that will develop over the final stretches of the campaign.

Manifesto Destiny

The parties launched their campaign manifestos this week. A manifesto is a like a campaign platform but unlike in the U.S. the parties adhere much closer to their manifesto then American parties adhere to their platforms.

Two major issues are appearing to dominate the election. Since the UK is mired in the global recession then the parties are making a big deal out of economic and budgetary matters. The other issues deals with reform of the political system and gaining the people's trust after the scandal involving MP's expenses.

Labour addresses the budgetary issues by promising to halve the deficit in 4 years. They do so by promising to cut wasteful spending. However, Labour went to great pains to promise to not raise taxes on most incomes and to keep the Value Added Tax(a type of national sales tax) from being extended to food and children's clothes. However there is no promise to not raise the existing VAT. To reform the political system, Labour promises to end the last hereditary peers and to pursue reforming how MP's are elected.

The Conservative plan to end the deficit by the end of the next parliament and they plan on doing so by cutting 12 billion pounds in wasteful spending over the next two years. The Tories big splash came in there ideas for reforming the political system. David Cameron announced that the Tories would cut the number of MP's by 10% and also cutting the pay of government ministers. Votes would also be able to recall a sitting MP under the Tory plan. The Conservatives also plan to allow for local referendums if 5% of the population wanted one and these referendums could be used to veto tax increases.

The parties also put forth some ideas that are distinctly their own. Labour focused on household budget issues. They propose creating a 4 week period of paternity leave for new fathers and giving tax credits to families with young children. The Tories idea focusing on scrapping the plan for a nation ID card and they want to hold a referendum on lifiting the ban on fox hunting.

Gordon Brown, David Cameron, and Nick Clegg(the Liberal Democrat leader) will meet on Thursday in the first of 3 debates. Now that the parties have set the terms for the election, the real campaigning begins.

Hang 'em High

The big question in this year's general election is will the results lead to a hung parliament. A hung parliament occurs when no one party garners a clear majority of seats. When voters go to the polls, 650 seats in the House of Commons will be up for grabs and the winning party will have gain at least 326 seats to form a majority. Labour will lose it's majority if losses 24 seats and the Conservatives gain a majority if they win 116 more seats then they have now.

While it is all but certain that Labour will lose the 24 seats, there are serious questions about whether the Tories can win 116 seats. For the Conservatives to win enough seats there will have to be a swing of 6.9% of the vote away from Labour and towards the Conservatives. The current polling appears to indicate a swing of less then what is needed and the Conservatives being 21 seats of the absolute majority needed.

If there is a hung parliament then the party with the largest number of seats can try to form a majority or the various parties can try to form a coalition government. Gordon Brown might have the advantage in this because as the sitting prime minister he, almost by default, will get the first crack at forming a government. The most likely possibility is that Labour will try to form a coalition with the Liberal Democrats and whatever 3rd parties can be brought into the coalition. If Brown can't form a coalition then the Conservative will probably form some type of government.

The most recent election to produce a hung parliament is 1974. Ted Heath's Conservative's lost on election day but Heath held on through the weekend trying to form a coalition before finally resigning in favor of Harold Wilson's Labour party. Peter Hennesssy tells a great story in his book The Prime Minister. During the weekend while the 1974 elections were in doubt, the cabinet secretary and the Queen's private secretary walked around St. James Park discussing all the options.

As an observer, and a person with no stake in the results, I want a hung parliament because I want to see what happens and how a hung parliament will resolve itself. Strictly as an interested observer, I am pulling for a close election and a hung parliament.

To the Hustings

Gordon Brown went to Buckingham Palace today and asked the Queen to dissolve Parliament, which will lead to a general election to be held on May 6. This parliament's last day is April 12 and then the campaign events really begin in earnest. The first big event after the dissolution of Parliament is the first of 3 television debates on April 15 between the leaders of the 3 main parties. Currently David Cameron's conservatives hold a lead in the pools of roughly 8 points.

The Backbencher is a complete anglophile and will spend much of the next month following the campaign. I hope to blog on the issues, personalities, and events surrounding the campaign as much as possible.

Fool Me Once

The Guardian ran a great April Fool's story about Labour's efforts to use Gordon Brown's temper as an electoral strategy.

Update: The Guardian has a series of posters that they and readers created.

Don't Call it a Comeback

Gordon Brown and the Labour party are skyrocketing in the polls and look poinsed to possibly pull off an upset and win the elctions. The real question is does Gordon ride the wave of momentum and call for an early election or does he wait things out in hopes that his poll numbers solidfy in advance the expected election date?

No Time Like the Present

If Labour's 1983 general election manifesto is "The longest suicide note in history," then it appears that the ensuing 27 years Labour has become more concise and efficient in committing political hari-kari.

During yesterday's session of Prime Minister's Questions (a session that the press said Gordon Brown won), two former Labour ministers circulated a letter asking for a secret ballot vote of the Party's confidence in Gordon Brown's leadership as Prime Minister. Patricia Hewitt and Geoff Hoon launched the coup believing that up to a half dozen Cabinet ministers would join in the coup. The coup fell apart as during the afternoon and evening Cabinet ministers announced their support.

With a General Election this year, and the campaigning informally begun, there could not have been a worse time for an attempted leadership coup. All the recent polling indicates that Labour had pulled close enough to the Conservatives that a hung parliament was a possibility. At the very least the Tories would have a small majority in the Commons, and small majorities make it harder to push an agenda through and can often lead to early elections.

It seems to me that this aborted coup is the type of event that can seal a party's fate. The end result will be, I think, a reasonably comfortable Tory majority and a bloody Labour leadership election.

UK Political Nerdiness

Since the temperature is hovering around zero, and the wind chill makes it feel like the temperature is well below zero, I am spending my day off inside watching my DVD collection of Yes Minister. I am also spending my time playing with the greatest online political toy on the internet.

Ukpollingreport is the must go to site for making sense of events in the run up to the UK general election. They have a swingometer map that allows you to enter the projected percentages for each party. On a map of Great Britain(the map does not appear to have the Northern Ireland constituencies) the constituencies change color based on the party expected win the particular seat. I have spent the better part of the new year entering different percentages to see what seats would change hands.

Anyway, the swingometer map is a great way to waste time on the internet and yes I realize that I expose myself as more of a nerd then previously acknowledged.

Springtime for Elections in England

Both the Labour Party and the Conservative Party are preparing for the possibility of an early election. The reports all say that there is a growing likely hood that soon after the new year Gordon Brown will call for an early election scheduled for March 25.

The Tories have maintained a constant lead in the polls since the last half of 2007 but recent polling indicates that Labour is closing the gap. This strengthening of Labour's position is leading many Labour MPs to push for a March poll.

I don't think Labour can close the gap enough to win but they are pushing the polling into hung parliament territory. If that is the case then the Liberal Democrats become king makers and Labour might stay in office through Lab-Lib coalition.

The Debate is On

Prime Minister Gordon Brown agreed to debate Conservative leader David Cameron and Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg in a televised debate before next year's general election. If this debate would occur this would be a new development for British politics. Televised debates, though common in many other countries, are not a part of British campaigns.

I don't really like this development. I think it cheapens the debates in the House of Commons where the party leaders clash weekly during Question Time. Also, every major government initiative is debated is Parliament. The government presents its agenda and the opposition parties critique the government and offer its alternatives. In the UK, Parliament is supreme and I fear that a televised debate will further reduce Parliament's relevance.

I am also not a fan of televised debates. I have watched American style televised debates since I became politically aware in my teens. Rarely are the debates edifying. The goal in an American debate is to avoid a campaign killing gaffe and deliver a glib and snappy put down to the opponent. Positions and issues are not clarified and the debates are not very informative.

My criticisms not withstanding, I do hope they show the debate on C-SPAN.

If it Weren't for Bad Luck

Even though Parliament is now in its summer recess, there is still some political goings on.  This week there was a by-election in the constituency of Norwich North.  The by-election came about because the former MP, a Labour member named Ian Gibson, was forced out in the expenses scandal.  Local Labour leaders, and Gibson himself, thought that the Prime Minister and national Labour official formed a "star chamber" and  made Gibson a scape goat.  The result was that Labour voters stayed home and a 5,000 vote Labour majority turned into a 7,000 vote Conservative majority.

A ruling party losing a by-election is not that uncommon and often marks a party on its way out.  John Major saw his majority of 22 turn into a minority of -1 by the time of the 1997 general election.  However, there are a couple of things to take away from this by-election.  First is that people are as angry about how Brown handled the expenses scandal as much as they are upset over the scandal.  Second is that Labour does not have an effective attack against the Tories.  Labour tried at attack the Tories over the possibility of a Conservative government making spending cuts but the attacks had no effect.

There was the usual grumbling from Labour quarters about Brown's leadership but again the opposition is not yet strong enough to topple the Prime Minister and Labour is now looking to electoral reform as its main issues.

In the meantime, Chloe Smith is now the the youngest member of Parliament and has a year to use incumbency to strengthen herself for what appears to be a good election for the Tories.  The Backbencher congratulates Chloe Smith on her election.

Habemus Speaker

The House of Commons elected a new Speaker today.  Longtime Conservative backbencher John Bercow became the 157th Speaker of the House.  In a series of votes, Speaker Bercow defeated 9 other candidates in an election that for the first time in Commons history used secret ballots.  

The Speaker is a Tory who has has gradually moved  left; especially on social issues.  The Speaker is also the first Jew to hold this position.

The Backbencher wishes to congratulate Speaker Bercow on his elevation to the Speakership of the mother of all Parliaments.   

Liturgygeek is not

the only Gordon Brown fan in the U.S.