I’m pretty sceptical of the chatter about Gordon Brown calling an early general election*. Here’s one the reasons which hasn’t been much talked about.
Imagine we have an early election. Imagine too that Labour manages what is probably the limit of its hopes – largest party in a hung Parliament. (Witness Labour MPs going round telling Liberal Democrats how much they now love voting reform.)
Labour then hangs on to power.
But in May along comes a round of local elections, in which Labour will – almost certainly – suffer massive losses. If you’ve got experience of a no overall majority council, you’ll know just how much the political momentum – and hence the range of plausible governing arrangements which can hang together – can get shifted by election results one way or the other.
It immediately makes clinging on to power that much harder.
Don’t forget too that the logic of calling an early election is meant to be to hold it before the budget. So you do that, and then have to have the budget and get thumped in the local elections: two big hits to your popularity just as you’re trying to hang on. Not exactly a plan that stacks up is it?
* Pedantry corner: of course, a general election in May is itself an early election as you have to dissolve Parliament after five years, which means when you add on the length of election campaigns that it can be more than five years between general elections. But ‘early’ is generally being used to mean ‘before May’.
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13 Comments
More pedantry corner please!
Seriously, May has got to be the most likely date. Mark’s right about the downside of a March date. To have a GE campaign which consisted of several weeks of debate over the content of the pending budget including a dutch auction of tax increases and spending cuts (if such a thing is possible) would be horrendous. On the other hand, you never know….
I think the March date is one being whipped up by the Tories as an attempt to stop him taking advantage of a dip in the Tory lead. They kmow they are nowhere near where they need to be and want the extra time until May/June. They want to get it in people’s heads that if Brown goes before May it’s to avoid doing a budget before the election.
Imagine the difficulties a March election would pose for Electoral Officers already preparing for the May 6th local elections. Thousands of extra staff would be needed, polling stations hired, plus much more. Who would meet the additional cost ? Ashcroft – not likely ! Just an additional charge on each one of us.
“They kmow they are nowhere near where they need to be and want the extra time until May/June.”
Judging by the recent movement towards Labour in the polls, I should think the last thing the Tories want is “extra time”.
In a poll out tonight.
Tory lead soars to 17% again in new ComRes poll
No way will Brown call an election before May 2010.
The Indpendent poll today puts the Tories on 41, Labour on 24, Lib Dem on 21, (up four).
Doesnt say much, other than in a week when the papers were dominated by the pre-budget report and there was a massive squeeze on anyone who wasnt either Tory or Labour, the Lib Dem positioning not only held, it went up more points than the others, despite a lack of column-inches.
But it’s always wise to avoid concluding too much from a single poll. Two other new ones paint a very different picture:
YouGov: CON 40 (-) LAB 31 (+4) LD 16 (-2)
BPIX: CON 41 LAB 30 LD 17
A spring General Election in 2010 would be the proper thing to do for this Government to separate out the national from the local issues as our electorate should be given the chance to vote on different days.
In 1910 there were 2 Elections both held during winter months in January and November when shamefully only men voted but voting was done over 2 weeks and not on one day.
I am not advocating that voting and counting should not be held on the same day, except in a few remote geographical constituencies but that voters should have the right to decide on their next choice of of Government separately- for Local and General Elections- on different dates in 2010, as this is fairer for voters, especially in London.
It is also the case that all incumbent Governments in recent history have lost, when they have waited until the last embers of possible available Election dates, to go to the Country.
But… If Labour were to come out of the General Election as the largest party then the press would shift massively behind them by running ‘Gord the miracle worker’ and ‘Cameron blows it’ type headlines. Brown would not be sitting easy, but would then have a renewed honeymoon. He would be in no real hurry to conclude a deal with another party and would seek to pin the blame on them for the delay. With all the good press for Labour and the inevitable Tory regicide, you could expect Labour to do quite (but not very) well in the May elections. Good enough for them to hang on to Brown for the time being and cue another 5 years of chaos.
Another reason for Labour’s infatuation with electoral reform may be that they perceive it as the only way they might have a meaningful voice in Parliament over the next decade.
“But in May along comes a round of local elections, in which Labour will – almost certainly – suffer massive losses.”
That may not hold in a post GE where Labour have done (in perception terms) well. The tories did well in 1992 post GE – with gains in contrast to 1990, 91, 93 and 94.
Mark’s got this wrong (unusually) – people really only make their minds up once, so an early GE locks down voting intention for the locals a few weeks later (as it did in 92). The point for Labour is two fold – they’re likely to poll better in a national election than in a local one (so will boost their local turnout due to the ‘lock down’) and even if they don’t they really don’t care enough about local government to bother about losing a few dozen more councillors on top of the 6,000 they’ve lost over the last 10 years.
25th of March it is – Malcolm Tucker said so!
On the other hand, holding the election in March means they can’t use the budget to promise vote-grabbing goodies. Of course, if they go for a March election we will know in advance that the budget will be dire…
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