Watch This Space

[mrph]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/vote2005/html/163.stm

The BBC's election coverage includes a very useful postcode search. This is their link for the Coventry North East seat - no results yet, of course, but it'll be updated when results come in.

Let's be honest here: it'll be Bob again. Barring miracles, nobody's going to break that 16000 majority. But maybe, just maybe, he'll lose a decently sized chunk of it this time. And hopefully the Conservatives are no longer going to be in a clear second place...

Comments

[inulro.livejournal.com]

Coventry East sounds exactly like Bristol East, give or take a couple thousand in the majority.

[mistdog.livejournal.com]

If the tories were in second place, and enough people switch from Labour to the Lib Dems, they let the Tory in by splitting the leftwing vote - exactly as happened in our Euro constituency. Bob may not be the MP you want, but he voted for the minimum wage, the human rights bill, freedom of information, civil partnerships, banning handguns and so on, whereas the tory would vote for massive public spending cuts, privatisation etc. I know which I'd rather have.

[mrph.livejournal.com]

So do I, but I find it hard to worry about the Tories getting the seat. If you think it's plausible for the Conservatives to overturn a 16000 majorityb (personally, I don't - it's a very safe Labour seat, and I'm willing to bet he still has a 8-10K majority tomorrow), why should it be implausible for the Lib Dems to do the same thing without letting the Conservatives in?

[mistdog.livejournal.com]

Because every indication is that exactly the same number of people (probably, much the same people) are voting Tory as last time. There is no evidence at all of the LDs benefiting from a swing from the Conservatives.

[mrph.livejournal.com]

...but if the Tories aren't gaining from Labour (and looking at the early results there wasn't much evidence of that, either - they were usually within 1% of their previous figure) where's their boost coming from?

However you rearrange the numbers, a vote here for the Lib Dems isn't going to let the Conservatives in unless the Tories manage to acquire another 10-15% of the vote from somewhere.

Without that, they're never going to have a majority in this constituency - the maths just won't allow it, even if you sum the Labour & Lib Dem vote then spread it evenly (which is the worst case) between those two parties - that would still give Labour and Lib Dem 36% of the vote each (and the Tories are currently on 19%).