Lib Dems & Tories... Can they work together?

Soubrette

globalds wrote: »

I think the Tories are working themselves up to forming a minority government.

The old guard will be convinced it would be easier without any baggage.

That should be interesting to watch - do you remember the gloom every time there was a by-election for John Major?

I guess there would be another general election soon, I wonder what happens if it returns another hung parliament?

Sou

globalds

Soubrette wrote: »

I guess there would be another general election soon, I wonder what happens if it returns another hung parliament?

Sou

The sharks swimming around will see it as more signs that Britain will be unable to make the decisions to repair the economy.
I agree with Peston ..We may get the first assaults pretty damn soon if things stay in flux.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/robertpeston/2010/05/a_coalition_forged_by_a_sterli.html

Emy1501

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Sorry, but this is nonsense.

All three parties lost the election.

Let me be clear about that, in case you have a hard time understanding such a simple concept.

The electorate were convinced that Labour should not be re-elected. The electorate were also clear that they did not want a Tory government.

After that, all bets are off.

Both socially and economically, the Tories are centre right. The Lib Dems and Labour are centre left.

If you look at the total votes, around one third of voters want a centre right government. Around two thirds want a centre left government.

The Tories and the Liberals are both far more libertarian than authoritarian. Labour is more authoritarian than libertarian.

So two thirds of voters also want a more libertarian than authoritarian government moving forwards.

But if I had to bet on voter priorities, social and economic policy would trump civil liberty concerns.....

A tory/Lib pact would be doomed to disaster within a year.

A Lab/Lib pact may just survive a full term.

A minority government wouldn't last 6 months.

Interesting times.....

Can't see a Lib/Lab pact working. They will need the support of most of the small parties. The markets will also hate it and will probably turn the screw to force cuts way before next year. It will collapse within a year I suspect and the Tories will romp home.

mitchaa

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Sorry, but this is nonsense.

All three parties lost the election.

Let me be clear about that, in case you have a hard time understanding such a simple concept.

The electorate were convinced that Labour should not be re-elected. The electorate were also clear that they did not want a Tory government.

After that, all bets are off.

Both socially and economically, the Tories are centre right. The Lib Dems and Labour are centre left.

If you look at the total votes, around one third of voters want a centre right government. Around two thirds want a centre left government.

The Tories and the Liberals are both far more libertarian than authoritarian. Labour is more authoritarian than libertarian.

So two thirds of voters also want a more libertarian than authoritarian government moving forwards.

But if I had to bet on voter priorities, social and economic policy would trump civil liberty concerns.....

A tory/Lib pact would be doomed to disaster within a year.

A Lab/Lib pact may just survive a full term.

A minority government wouldn't last 6 months.

Interesting times.....

What did Margaret Thatcher do to ruffle your feathers Hamish? Time to forget and move on perhaps? It was 30yrs ago old chap. Sorry but as a Scotsman myself there are too many bitter Scots with long memories. I spoke to a few old school friends in Dundee on Thursday who were voting Labour just so the Tories didn't get in. No other reasoning but just to stop the tories:mad: My blood was boiling as I knew fine well they were not old enough to remember the MT era, they were just voting Labour as their parents had drilled it into them that voting Tory was for the toffs. They had no past experience with the tories, they were just following 'orders' from their disgruntled parents. I had a blazing row with my own family who followed the same logic. My mum, my dad, my 2 brothers and sister all voting Labour just to stop the Tories getting in. There was no other logic. I reminded them about all the wrong doings of the current Labour government to which the answer was, everything that is wrong now will be doubly as wrong if the Tories are elected. I felt like banging my head off a brick wall but this is common place in Scotland. In my workforce, in the pubs, in the supermarkets, everywhere you go, it is anti Tory just because of old fashioned views.

The figures themselves look dreadful for the Tories in Scotland...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/election2010/results/region/7.stm

41 seats to Labour, 11 to Lib Dems, 6 to SNP with only 1 seat to the conservatives. However, look at the actual numbers, Tory support in Scotland is not actually that far off of Lib Dem or SNP support, a couple of % points. If the voting system is to get a reform (For Scottish elections too) The Tories based on this result would have 17% of the seats in Scotland in comparison to just 19% for the Lib Dems and 20% for the SNP. A far different picture to that of the view at the moment.

To the rest of your points, forget this left and right nonsense, it holds no basis. If it did, Clegg would most certainly not be speaking to Cameron. It's your opinion, that is it. I know a lot of LD voters that would prefer a deal with the Tories than they would Labour, just like as I'm sure you know a lot of Lib Dem voters who would side with Labour.

The conservatives clearly won, yes won this election. They polled the most votes and had a majority of 2.1million. They gained 97 (98) seats. Labour clearly lost the election as they lost 91 MP's. Put the results of that into Westminster and the Tories have a majority of 49 seats (Incl the 1 result that is not in but highly expected to be blue)

They are the party with the majority, just not high enough.This does not mean they have lost.

In my opinion, Clegg would do himself a lot of damage siding with a party that had just lost 91 seats. You then have to ask yourself why the Labour party lost 91 seats? Dwindling support from people that want change. How can anyone ignore the 2.1m difference between total votes? Why spend for another year increasing our debt level even further?

I would be flabbergasted if NC made a deal with a failing Labour government. In fact it would be suicide as they would still have to rely on support from other parties in order to make that 326 figures. Lib-Lab is not large enough on its own.

We all know DC will be in number 10 in the next couple of weeks. Most probably Monday or Tuesday. I cannot fathom how the country can get in a bigger mess than it is at the moment.

Soubrette

globalds wrote: »

The sharks swimming around will see it as more signs that Britain will be unable to make the decisions to repair the economy.
I agree with Peston ..We may get the first assaults pretty damn soon if things stay in flux.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/robertpeston/2010/05/a_coalition_forged_by_a_sterli.html

It seems that our three losers are going to have to think very hard. Preston says there are only two non negotiables for the LibDems - if I were Cameron and honestly believed that most people were not interested in PR - then maybe a referendum is a chance worth taking?

Sou

chris_m

mitchaa wrote: »

What did Margaret Thatcher do to ruffle your feathers Hamish? Time to forget and move on perhaps? It was 30yrs ago old chap. Sorry but as a Scotsman myself there are too many bitter Scots with long memories.

Thirty years? That's nothing. If the SNP are to be believed over half of you are still bitter about the 1707 Act of Union, which was the end result of England accepting a Scottish king a few generations earlier :rotfl:

Mind you, the same anti-Thatcher stigma is present in England and Wales too - especially in what were mining areas. None of the political parties are what they were back then, surely it's time to forget (or, at least, discount) the past and move on?

tomterm8

mitchaa wrote: »

They are the party with the majority, just not high enough.This does not mean they have lost.
.

A couple of months before the election, the polls showed the Torys leading by 24%... the Torys had the backing of almost all the press... the Labour party got the lowest share of the vote since Foot... and yet the Torys did not get a majority.

I think the Conservative party lost the election.

I suspect so does Cameron.

PR may be becomeing more attractive to the Tories, since under the current scheme it is hard to see how they will form a majority government... given they are about to become very unpopular, given the cuts they have to make.

tessie_bear

does anyone think there might be another general election soon ???...if so im going to put a sign on my front door telling noone to bother knocking to share their bull sorry policies with me

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Emy1501 wrote: »

Can't see a Lib/Lab pact working. They will need the support of most of the small parties. .

Which they have.

That is the message coming from the leader of the Scottish National Party, Alex Salmond. He's calling on the Liberal Democrats to join him and Plaid Cymru and Labour in a "progressive alliance" instead of doing a deal with the Conservatives.

Mr Salmond says: "The assumption of a Tory/Liberal Democrat pact is not correct. There are alternative and more progressive options available if politicians have the will to seize the moment. The SNP and Plaid are indicating that we do."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/

The BBC has done the calculations, below....

Remember, they only need 326 to govern.

If Labour and the Lib Dems joined forces - the extra 57 votes are not enough to make them the biggest force even with the support of the Northern Irish SDLP (who sat on the government benches in the last parliament) and the one new Alliance MP who is allied to the Lib Dems. Together that's 319 votes.

With the support of the nationalists from Scotland and Wales they would reach 330.

If the DUP joined too and the independent unionist and the new Green MP this alliance would have 338 votes in the Commons.

Graham_Devon

Mitch, the tories would have lost whatever the number of seats.

350 seats would have seen - "yes, but they still didnt get more". 400 seats would have been "they lost really, they should have walked it". 420 seats - "they could have done better, even the greens got one seat, the tories lost there". This is evident from the masses of labour supporters trying desperately to say labour actually won....using the same theory, "they only lost 91 seats, they clearly won, it could have been worse". Check out Discussion Time for some of the dillusionists.

If they got the majority, it would boil down to the polls, and saying they didn't do as well as they were doing in the polls, therefore, they have lost.

Tories will never "win" or do good in anything, depending on the viewpoint of the person stating the tories lost.