Category Archives: News

On Thursday night when every part of my body hurt like hell and my eyes were melting with exhaustion, I couldn’t sleep. My body expected to be at a count and couldn’t understand why I was in my bed.

The three day wait to know whether our advance in the polls has been confirmed is excruciating.

By the time you read this, I’ll be on my way to the count in Edinburgh. We won’t know the Scottish result tonight because the Western Isles don’t count on a Sunday. That means that our result will be declared in a dramatic Royal Mile ceremony by noon tomorrow. Keep your fingers crossed that Sheila Ritchie makes it. Some polling suggests that, in equal second, we could be contesting the third or fourth seat, but it is more likely to be a scrap between us, the Brexit Party and the SNP for the last place.

In the rest of the country, the outlook looks a lot sunnier. Support was coalescing around us as the Remain alternative to the Brexit Party. By the end of the campaign, we were polling 20%. This is way beyond anything we have ever polled in a European election before if it is realised. Everyone I know has stories of friends and acquaintances who had never supported us before turning out for us on Thursday.

Election Maps UK has a prediction which is equally stunning and sobering:

https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1132622260613931008

While it would be fantastic to have 13 MEPs, the thought of 30 Brexit Party representatives is not pleasant.

This gives us 3 in London, 2 each in the South East and East of England, 1 each in Scotland, East and West Midlands, South West, Yorkshire and the Humber and North West. It would be disappointing not to get a seat in Wales. These MEPs would also be joined by Naomi Long for the Alliance Party.

That, if it came true, would be incredible. It would mean that we would have come first in London which would be unheard of.

This is the first time I’ve been to a European count since PR came in. In 2009, I was lying in bed with my days old baby as the results came in and we learned that Nick Clegg had won to become the first Liberal parliamentarian in the East Midlands in nearly 70 years.

To put in perspective, here is how we’ve polled in every European election since 1999.

1999 12.10% 10 seats out of 77

2004  14.9% 12 seats out of 78

2009  13.7% 11 seats out of 72

2014 6.87% 1 seat out of 73

You can see the effect of PR when you consider that in 1994, we actually polled 16.7% and got just 2 seats under first past the post.

So anything more than 15% is our best result in 20 years.

The thought of the Brexit Party doing well is pretty horrible, though. However, if the turnout is higher than expected, this might dilute their vote share.