Friday, November 21, 2008

June Election 2009?

Interesting post over at the CoffeeHouse noting that specualtion is rising of a June 2009 poll held on the same day as the European Elections. James Forsyth has noted
importantly, holding the two polls on the same day would dent the Tory vote; the thinking is more Tory-inclined voters would vote UKIP in the general if they were voting UKIP in the Europeans that day. This could make the difference in some closely contested marginals.
I made much the same point back in March under the title "Is Brown preparing to split the Tory vote?". At that time the June 2009 date started to be floated around some of the papers and I noted,

Currently, if I recall correctly, there has been a polling tendency for some Tory voters to vote UKIP in European elections. If offered that decision on the same day as a General Election might we see a split in the Tory vote in key marginals?
It's a no-brainer really. A double-whammy day of polling with the General and European Election could make for some interesting results I think.

However, if people are really pissed off with Brown by this point perhaps they will not go for the slate and be more sophisticated calculating that Brown for another five years is worse than wasting a vote on UKIP?

8 comments:

Mulligan said...

Yep definitely a no brainer, which is exactly the number of grey cells that anyone would need to have not to twig that a vote in general election for UKIP is a vote for Brown and Lisbon.

nought.point.zero said...

Travis: I've got a few grey cells and I might vote Ukip in a general. Why? Because I live in one of the strongest Tory seats in the entire country: has been solidly conversative since 1945 and probably before that too. Whatever happens, the Tories will take my constituency so I might as well chuck in a vote for Ukip in the futile hope that someone, somewhere will tot up the total number of Ukip votes cast and realise "hey, there are some people who actually don't like the EU, waddayouknow"

Alan Douglas said...

And I would vote UKIP where it DOES impinge, in a proportional EU election, while being a loyal Tory in the first-past-the-post UK.

Eventually someone in a major party will have to see there are votes in being anti-unelectable bureaucracy of EU.

ALan Douglas

Anonymous said...

By June a lot of shit will have hit some very big fans. Yet Gordon revels in these bad news days. Have you seen how high as a kite he seems? Very odd.

With some previous elections the opposition has requested access to Government Departments many months before the election. It has to be authorised by the PM.

There would be nothing wrong in Cameron asking for this kind of access now.(Major gave permission 16 months before the end of his Parliament I think.) I'd be surprised if Brown could refuse it with any credibility but then, stranger things have happened. He'd have to rule out an election for some time ahead to get away with saying no.

If an election were called say, in early March, would Parliament be dissolved for several weeks and we'd have no budget until afterwards?

A snap election in the middle of winter is not a great idea. Wait too long and the financial problems may be unsurmountable from a Labour perspective. Using the system to both delay an election until better weather and also delay the budget might be the sensible option for Brown.

Anonymous said...

There is also the (theoretical) possibility that the Euro comes out of the current economic mess better than UK Sterling does, and boosts the cause for closer European integration.

That won't help UKIP one bit, and hence would boost Tory chances.

Alex said...

It depends on whether any UKIp candidates will stand in key marginals and in the middle of a recession the number of UKIP candidates who will be willing to blow the required £1k will be limited.

Putting both elections on the same day may mean that some disaffected Tories/UKIPpers will go to the polls who wouldn't have turned out at a General Elevtion. If there is no UKIP candidate then they will probably vote Conservative having got to the polls, so the exercise could easily backfire on Labour.

haddock said...

The British public are quite clever enough to vote UKIndependence in the EU elections and for a different party in the general election.
It matters not a toss which party Lab or Con goes to Europe they are mostly interchangeable on Matters European

Anonymous said...

That would mean in some areas 3 elections as Local elections will now take place on the same date. I understand that you cannot hold 3 elections on the same day.