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Scott2006
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Political Allegiance Diverging - Scotland v England.In Scotland in 2008 the political landscape seems to have an SNP administration at Holyrood riding a wave of public support, with the main opposition party, Labour, flailing around poorly led and unsure of what position to take on a range of subjects.
The Liberal Democrats would have to work very hard to be noticed at all. They have no real impact at Holyrood and seem to appeal to a middle-class strata of society that is quite happy with being a minor player in Scottish politics.
The Conservatives in Scotland seem rooted in the past. They speak for a party that has governed Scotland from Westminster for 35 of the last 63 years. All the most able Conservative politicians value the Westminster Parliament over Holyrood as a stage for their career. The Conservatives are always looking over their shoulder at how the Conservatives at Westminster are doing and have few policies that speak exclusively to Scotland.
So what changes can be detected? A retrospective look at the bald figures from all the General Elections since WWII can demonstrate real divergences that words alone can sometimes fudge.
YEAR DATE SCOTLAND ENGLAND DIFFERENCE
RED=LABOUR BLUE=CONSERVATIVES ORANGE=LIBERAL PURPLE=SNP
1945 JL05 47.881 48.554 -0.673 40.342 40.260 +0.082 5.558 9.318 -3.76 1.280
1950 FE23 46.188 46.133 +0.055 44.816 43.830 +0.986 6.611 9.386 -2.775 0.356
1951 OC25 47.887 48.813 -0.926 48.573 48.781 -0.208 2.746 2.255 +0.491 0.262
1955 MY26 46.714 46.782 -0.068 50.091 50.439 -0.348 1.858 2.579 -0.721 0.476
1959 OC08 46.682 43.606 +3.076 47.245 49.979 -2.734 4.084 6.267 -2.183 0.814
1964 OC15 48.724 43.520 +5.204 40.602 44.059 -3.457 7.593 12.101 -4.508 2.430
1966 MR31 49.910 47.973 +1.937 37.638 42.711 -5.073 6.756 8.975 -2.219 5.033
1970 JN18 44.529 43.369 +1.160 37.968 48.296 -10.328 5.493 7.934 -2.441 11.412
1974 FE28 36.632 37.650 -1.018 32.928 40.200 -7.272 7.937 21.325 -13.388 21.931
1974 OC10 36.277 40.076 -3.799 24.702 38.915 -14.213 8.297 20.167 -11.870 30.441
1979 MY03 41.535 36.674 +4.861 31.411 47.186 -15.775 8.990 14.931 -5.941 17.289
1983 JN09 35.072 26.940 +8.132 28.375 45.976 -17.601 24.521 26.361 -1.840 11.753
1987 JN11 42.392 29.507 +12.885 24.027 46.238 -22.211 19.207 23.835 -4.628 14.033
1992 AP09 38.984 33.933 +5.051 25.648 45.461 -19.813 13.093 19.177 -6.084 21.474
1997 MY01 45.561 43.547 +2.014 17.504 33.696 -16.192 12.971 17.950 -4.979 22.066
2001 JN07 43.271 41.410 +1.861 15.587 35.233 -19.646 16.338 19.417 -3.079 20.068
2005 MY05 38.872 35.457 +3.415 15.827 35.742 -19.915 22.626 22.908 -0.282 17.664
2010 AP?? 35.000 31.000 +4.000 16.000 45.000 -29.000 19.000 21.000 -2.000 28.000 ??
David Cameron's Tories seem to be on course in England to get a similar percentage to that which John Major won in England in 1992, about 45% while in Scotland the Tories are flat lining around 15%.
A near 30% difference between Tories in Scotland and England could hasten the end of the UK.
Labour in Scotland don't seem to believe their vote can ever fall much below 35%, even in the bad times - but where does that leave them in England if the LibDems hold at the 20% level then Labour can only manage 30 or 31% - enough to give the Tories a small majority.
A figure for the SNP advancing by 10% on 2005 seems reasonable but may be closer to 15% up on that election if Labour are deemed to be a failure and deserving of defeat at the polls.
Gordon Brown, as a Scotsman on the make, as the Anglocentric media likes to stir things, is unpopular, perhaps because he fails to speak in a South-Eastern twang and may get as few votes as the Welsh sounding Neil Kinnock did in 1992.
We seem to be set for another 2 years of relaunches from Labour, forever chasing the Mail and Express readers votes in middle class populism.
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agentmancuso
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Re: Political Allegiance Diverging - Scotland v England. | Scott2006 wrote: | | A figure for the SNP advancing by 10% on 2005 seems reasonable but may be closer to 15% up on that election |
Are you sure? With the exception of very unusual circumstances of the Alliance in 1983, no party in Scotland has ever seen a 15% increase in a single election.
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Scott2006
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Agentmancuso: It depends on the political atmosphere.
If the mood in the country is one where Labour is seen as ineffective and weak, the Conservatives lacking a way to communicate to the working class vote they mostly lost in the 1970s and 80s.
The Liberal Democrats in a Scottish context might suffer from the fact that Nick Clegg is not as charismatic as Charles Kennedy, which might translate into a small dip in their percentage vote across the country.
If the SNP are seen as a successful party, and relevant (which is not always the case when Westminster politics is either pro or anti the government of the day) then a level of support might reach up towards the October 1974 peak at a General Election.
A 15% increase would only be possible if all the other parties failed to connect during a general election campaign with the floating voters in the electorate.
As you say, the Liberal-SDP Alliance in 1983, drastically altered the centre of public opinion by spectactularly increasing the middle parties votes, thereby consigning Labour to another 14 years writhing in opposition but failed to remove the Tories from the shires as a unified right beat a divided left and centre.
The SNP vote is the most fluid in many years. In one scenario the SNP could be beaten back to 20% in a General Election if they were guilty of the sleaze that parties in power seem to attract.
Yet in a situation where Labour is in protracted disarray, perhaps having cabinet ministers jousting for the succession even before the election is held could see Labour hit about 33% in Scotland, unlikely but not impossible that Labour could marginally out-poll the SNP.
The old oil question could get an airing if the price of oil got nearer to $150 a barrel.
So if the SNP had a spectacular election campaign they could peak nearer to 32% or if labelled as sleazy political opportunists could fall to about 20%.
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William_Cleland
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Re: Political Allegiance Diverging - Scotland v England. | Scott2006 wrote: | | A figure for the SNP advancing by 10% on 2005 seems reasonable but may be closer to 15% up on that election if Labour are deemed to be a failure and deserving of defeat at the polls. |
Seems doable based on the 9.2% increase in the constituency section of the last Holyrood vote if Labour continue to perform over the next two years as they have of late.
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agentmancuso
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| Scott2006 wrote: | | A 15% increase would only be possible if all the other parties failed to connect during a general election campaign with the floating voters in the electorate. |
That's true, but fairly unlikely. If one party (Labour...) is proving desperately unpopular, voters will be more likely to express their anti-Labour feeling by voting tactically for however is best placed to win the individual constituency, even if not all that enthused by the second placed party's policies.
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