“It looks like the Conservatives have won more seats that we have for 80 years.” – David Cameron
That clip may well be played again and again today, as his spin doctors would have hoped when they wrote the line. But what would those words mean to you if you were not one of the political cogniscenti?
When David Cameron stood up in his Oxfordshire constituency last night and said these words, he was surely attempting to spin the result as a great Conservative victory.
They were hoping that many ordinary people would think the Tories had ‘won more seats’ in absolute terms than at any time since the 1920s. Of course they did nothing of the sort. And our spin doctors need to be pointing it out to the public all day today.
The reality is that the Tories may have gained more seats in a single election than at any time in the last 80 years.
But they are still short of an overall majority, so this is a much worse result for them than 1979, 1983, 1987, 1992. Both in term of votes and seats, this is the the Tories’ fourth worst result in recent history.
It looks a deliberate sleight of tongue to me. Or perhaps he just ‘mis-spoke’, like any other politician might after all-night campaigning (and a good day’s sleep?)?
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27 Comments
Very well put, Ed!!!!
Mis-spoke my left buttock.
As you say, he’s doing what all the party leaders must try to do – create a narrative.
Ours should be along the lines of ‘everyone lost, no-one won, and now we all have to work together in the open, no backroom deals, to fix this rotten, broken system so that everyone’s vote counts, and everyone gets to vote’.
Or ‘Labour has lost it’s mandate to govern…ALONE’.
Perhaps Nick should simply do what he said he would do i.e. allow the party with the strongest mandate to attempt to govern.
The party would have been in a better position if all along it had argued that NO government has a “mandate” if it has the support of less than half the voters.
The failure yet again of the Lib Dems to have a narrative has contributed to this result. While other parties had vote Clegg get Brown or Vote Clegg get Cameron we had vote Clegg ?
We could have set out beyond the 4 policy points,which were good, that what we’d like to see happen waspoliticans behaving like adults, and an agreed open programme with one of the parties over a fixed time scale followed by a general election.
People where told not to mention tactical voting – a more approriate response would have been vote Lib Dem tactically and we will change the elcvtoral system so you never have to vote tactically again.
If a deal can be done with the Conseravtives for AV for the commons (do we need a referendum if all three parties sign up?) and PR for the House of Lords and STV for local Govt. then I’d be sorely tempted.
This election yet again makes clear why the Labour Party are the true Conseravtives in thought, they could have introduiced AV, PR etc and only now concede what was obvious.
In any event, surely there must be enough voted for a referendum on the voting system even if the Conservatives don’t want one ?
SNP, PC, Green, Alliance must all be favour ?
I’m glad you’ve highlighted this Terry. I heard it and thought it was very strange.
And turkeys will vote for Christmas, Mouse? The Tories will be for ‘one more heave’ rather than AV for the Commons.
Iain Dale vowed to run naked through the streets if the exit polls were accurate.
[…]
[…]
Get your kit off, Iain!
“Mouse”
As you say (and as I have been saying for many years), STVS (“AV”) for the Commons, to keep the consituency link, STVM (“STV”) PR for the Senate (with one third elected every four or five years so that the Commons mandate is always more recent) and STVM (“STV”) for local government. Exciting times!
Thanks Paul. (I should have been a (paid) spin doctor…. 😉 )
Its just occurred that a good line would be:
“David Cameron has said he wants strong and stable govt. The voters have not given him enough of a mandate to do that alone. Will he now put his own party advantage aside, reform the voting system, and govern with us. Or will he insist on the old broken voting system, and struggle on as a weak and vulnerable govt – the very govt he said he did not want?”
Or: “Just as Peel recognised _against his party interest – the need for reform of the Corn Laws, and Disraeli – likewise -the need to extend the franchise, will Cameron now recognise the historic need to reform the broken voting system?”
Oh, come om guys, this is rubbish, The Conservatives won, and we were crap. Let’s get used to it and move one.
Disappointed.
This is not a hung parliament, That implies a noose around the neck of government. That’s silly, Its a balanced paliament, where no one party can impose its will for 5 years – just on the basis of one days vote by the electorate. This election result was not just a vote against an unjust first past the post system. Most of all, the people want change where our views are represented on a day to day basis within parliament by proper balanced debate and voting.
Cameron having a mandate? Give us a break!
No one can dispute the fact that the UK is a democracy. But how democratic? If you look at the elections results in percentage, the primary numbers that really matter (before talking swings and seats), it is obvious that a majority of the population has voted for left-of-centre to left policies.
The need for electoral reform is also blatant when looking at the gaps between percentages and seats and by comparing the Labour and Lib Dems votes and their respective numbers in seats.
In most democracies, talks to form various forms of coalition would now start.
PS: And you Lib Dem Voice please stop placing those ads for the US right-wing channel Newsmax featuring Sarah Palin’s face?
Arguably this is a very poor results for the Tories against a very unpopular Govt and PM that had been in power for 13 years and a LibDem campaign that promised much but failed to deliver. 36/37% of the vote with just one MP in Scotland and none in many of the major cities, isn’t much to write home about.
A very strange set of results all round…and we’ve still got those from the local elections to come!
@paul mckeown – just plain wrong. They did better than us. With vast resources. But they failed to ‘win’. If they struggle on as a minority after all they have said about weak government, they will the deserve derision of progressives everywhere – and we are the overwhelming majority in terms of votes, and may be still (just) in terms of seats.
@mike guillaume – if the Republican Party Reptiles want to waste their money where no-one gives them any heed, why not! I suppose their may be US facsists here having googled ‘liberal Democrat’, but they seem rare.
@Terry
Grow up, please!
Lib/Lab/APNI/SDLP/SNP/PC/Sylvia Hermon/Green would be a fissile disaster and we would end up with a fresh election within months. Anyone who suggests it has either their head firmly stuck in the sand or, is a Labourite mini-me-ist. The facts speak for themselves: Conservative minority government, with Lib Dem’s voting down any obvious Tory nonsense on a bill by bill basis. The Tories know this and will simply pull their necks in. We should be prepared for an election next spring, as this is what the Con’s will try. Clegg knows this, hence his clear statement.
We should post mortem our campaign fairly soon, but ultimately it was rubbish, and the public found us out.
i voted for bob russell in colchester really glad he won. but if nick clegg backs the tories when only 37% of the country voted for them . i will never vote liberal democrate again.
Look, Nick, what else can we do?
Say no to the Tories, then we must go with Labour, but we don’t have enough together, even with our Alliance Party partner (great result there!) and the SDLP. So that means going to the Scot’s Nats and Plaid Cymru, whose price is going to be gizzabob, completely unacceptable given our enormous fiscal overhang. The only alternative would be a fresh election – and we would be wiped out. We need to be grown up about this. If the Lib Dems lose some lefties in the process, well, it might actually help us in the long term to establish our identity more clearly as Liberals and Democrats.
If Mr Clegg links with Mr Brown, his career as Leader will be over
Cameron just rephrased as “gained more seats than in 80 years”. Rare attack of clarity and honesty?
… followed by an “offer” of phenomenal arrogance: “Hey, Lib Dems, join up with us and we’ll reward you by implementing in full the half-dozen policies on which we agree with you, and another half-dozen on which we allegedly believe the same thing as you except our way of doing it would achieve it better, and in return of course you’ll let us implement all the rest of our manifesto, including the issues – Europe, immigration, Trident – on which we are most evidently in disagreement.” I would like to call it unbelievable, but it’s all too unsurprising.
Do you mean if Clegg gets in bed with Tories, the progressives will abandon the Lib-Dems.
These are my thoughts emailed to the Party:
It is a good principled move to abide by the offer to explore working with the party ‘with the most number of seats and he most votes’ – the Tories.
Lib Dem plus Labour seats do not give a majority in Parliament.
There is a paradox that we agree with the Tories on many issues that in the past we may have expected to agree with Labour, and vice versa. We need to take a more rational view and not respond to this moment in a visceral manner.
We must prepare ourselves to bring down the next government in possibly 3 or 4 years following a referendum on electoral/political reform and once that is made law.
To both parties, we should:
a) Offer a co-operation deal, in the short term, for a limited Queen’s Speech, focussed on the economy and political reform, and for a further two year period, on a bill by bill basis.
b) Demand commitment to a referendum on electoral and parliamentary reform, working to a two year timetable.
c) Demand Lib Dems to chair an all party group to draw up options and timetable for implementation of the above. This should not be a rerun of the Jenkins Report and not a blank sheet academic exercise, but a programme to implement, by way of a referendum.
d) Refuse to take up Cabinet or Ministerial posts. It is a poisoned chalice.
e) State that the basis for the two year co-operation agreement is how closly any Government’s proposals are to the four Lib Dem central manifesto commitments. Compromise is built into this judgement, but total abandonment is not. This will protect Party integrity and ensure that the Lib Dem front bench will carry the support of the party.
Specifically in relation to the Tories:
a) They have won most seats and most votes and we must respect this. To do otherwise will not be to our credit, however unpalatable this appears.
b) The Tories offered a clear alternative in terms of economic policy. But at only 37% of the popular vote, they cannot ignore the 53% of voters opting for either Labour or the Lib Dems. Lib Dems must therefore ask for what we proposed, that is an ‘economic stability council’ bringing in all the parties, the Bank Of England, and the FSA. We need to de-politicise the economy as much as possible in the interests of the country.
Specifically in relation to Labour:
a) Starting with the fact that in combination Lib Dems and Labour would not give a Commons majority and at 53% of the vote, a bare majority, we should expect more in order to strike a deal.
b) We need to ensure that parties representing Scotland , Wales and Northern Ireland are brought in. This is not just for political expediency, ie. to make up the numbers in the lobby, but because of our belief in democracy, devolved power and that the distribution of ‘fairness’ is in itself ‘fair’.
c) We must reiterate what Nick Clegg said about the political and public effect of Gordon Brown’s remaining Prime Minister. Mr Brown’s continuation as PM will continue to cast a shadow on a Government, and will not provide a feeling that the election has actually resolved anything, or helped the country move on. It will also make any potential co-operation with Labour more difficult to ‘sell’ to the country, or even our own party. But ultimately, this is a matter for Labour and should not be made a red line issue. Policy has to trump personality in this.
Finally, the results are an enormous disappointment. But we must take comfort in the degree of enthusiasm that we as a Party brought to politics. Unlike votes, this enthusiasm can dissipate.
As Nick Clegg said, we need to redouble our efforts. We must reassure and even cajole people to vote for what they feel is right and not against something they fear is more wrong.
What about the majority of us the 63% who did not vote Tory!
If Clegg has anything to do with the Tories , I my family and most of my freinds will never vote Liberal Democrat again. No question ths is disgusting how Clegg can betray his supporters i this way.
I’m not sure some people realise what difficulties Nick Clegg and his colleagues are facing right now.
One thing that many of the comments fail to consider is that the electorate have overwhelmingly and humiliatingly rejected the Labour Government, not Gordon Brown. Is it just me who thinks that putting them back into power (which is what we would be doing, whatever wishfull thinking may be going on) as part of a coalition or partnership will endear us to the populace? As a party seen to put its own political ambitions above the needs and wishes of the country, what are our long-term prospects?
Will there even be any short-term benefits – on the evidence of the past 13 years the Labour Party leadership are so far removed from things we value, such as honesty and integrity, that we cannot put any faith in pledges or promises. I can quite see all future failures being spun as the results of LibDems blocking necessary Labour policies and forcing their own policies to the fore.
Maybe I’m not a true Liberal Democrat, as I don’t seem to have the obligatory political suicide switch fitted as standard?
We are NOT natural allies of either party and Nick and co are much more aware of what’s going on and what the implications are than any of us outsiders. Put your trust in their judgement – it’s why we put them there – and give them the time and space to cut the best deal for both us and the country.