UK General Election

[CWCissey]

He looks like Boris Johnson but the voice is terrible.

 

[Dudeofteenage]

It seems there's been a grassroots uprising within UKIP over Nigel's "I'm quitting, no I'm not" thing. I suspect this whole thing with the party begging him to stay has been stage managed, and doesn't actually reflect the real feelings of a lot of UKIP members. I realise I don't have a huge amount of insight into the perspective of UKIP voters but I've always been moderately surprised to see people saying that Farage is personally responsible for UKIP's success. There seem to be a lot more people who like some of UKIP's ideas but don't like Farage than vice versa.

 

[Holdek]

Oh and it seems we aren't rid of Nigel.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-32696505

Good, the man's a laugh riot to have around!

Not sure they should laugh so hard. UKIP got the third most number of votes in the last election (more than the Lib-Dems, SNP and others) even though they only won one seat. The day of the election I noticed his talking points shifted almost exclusively to electoral reform, but seemed a bit little too late. Still, it would be hard to jettison as leader after such a meteoric rise in voter preference.

By the way, can someone tell me why all the news reports talk about Plaid Cymru winning three seats but don't mention the parties of Northern Ireland winning numerous seats (only Sinn Fein abstains, from what I recall)? And also why the NI parties were excluded from the debates but PC wasn't?

 

[Vitriol]

Not sure they should laugh so hard. UKIP got the third most number of votes in the last election (more than the Lib-Dems, SNP and others) even though they only won one seat. The day of the election I noticed his talking points shifted almost exclusively to electoral reform, but seemed a bit little too late. Still, it would be hard to jettison as leader after such a meteoric rise in voter preference.

By the way, can someone tell me why all the news reports talk about Plaid Cymru winning three seats but don't mention the parties of Northern Ireland winning numerous seats (only Sinn Fein abstains, from what I recall)? And also why the NI parties were excluded from the debates but PC wasn't?

the logic behind the NI parties being excluded is that none of the non irish parties run against them so it would be strange for them to be debating with parties they are not running against. I would presume bbc NI held a separate debate.

politics in NI is a bit of a mess but broadly speaking the unionist separatist vote stays roughly the same with seats shifting more between union parties than from unionists to separatists or vice versa. PC by contrast is a separatist party so seats going from lab/lib/con to them is considered more newsworthy because it potentially indicates a rise in nationalism. I'm not all that up to speed on welsh policies but i think the welsh vote has a reputation for see-sawing.

 

[Holdek]

the logic behind the NI parties being excluded is that none of the non irish parties run against them so it would be strange for them to be debating with parties they are not running against.

The Conservative Party runs in NI (though, they don't have anyone elected there, even at the local level, so maybe that's why).

 

[Dudeofteenage]

Labour seems to be doing a better job holding on in Wales than it did in Scotland. Just like Scotland, Wales (especially the industrial south) has a long tradition of diehard Labour loyalism, but unlike in Scotland Welsh Labour loyalism seems to still be going strong. Plaid have always identified strongly with the SNP and hoped that Scottish independence would spark greater interest in Welsh independence, but it doesn't seem to be happening, although I guess if Scottish independence actually does happen all bets are off.