Finishing second in the Olympics gets you silver. Finishing second in politics gets you oblivion.
Richard M. Nixon
Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
Napoleon Bonaparte
Even from your sun drenched lair you’ll be aware of the outcome of the UK’s five yearly flirtation with democracy. Whilst certainly a results orientated business history will soon summarise the 2015 UK General Election with a simple list of the winners and losers. Before this submission to tldr brevity I’d like to wind the clock back a few days and walk you through the events, the journey our country has taken and that rarest of things, a shared collective moment when we turned to each other and asked “Hey! what the hell is going on here?”
It’s Wednesday 6 May. Our political leaders are wrapping up last day coast to coast tours like bleak charity fundraisers. The latest opinion polls are in and exhibiting similar patterns to those that had been taken in the days and weeks that preceded it. The election result is predicted to be a hung parliament. This isn’t one poll, it’s all polls. The numbers go up and down by small increments but the resulting hung parliament is not in doubt. The final opinion poll is:
Party
|
Seats
|
Conservatives
|
273
|
Labour
|
268
|
Liberal Democrats
|
28
|
SNP
|
56
|
UKIP
|
2
|
Green
|
1
|
Other
|
22
|
Thursday is a meh day. A fine weather day, certainly no rain to affect the turnout. It was the first day in a long time that was mostly free from electioneering. I stop by my village hall and cast my vote for the fourth different party that I’ve given my pencil cross to in my electoral history. The through the night election broadcasts seem like a wasted effort. We joke at work, speculating how many days it’ll be before the next government is formed. Out of habit we tune in at 10pm and the shows start with the exit polls. These exit polls are targeted across a range of representative constituencies the experts say. They’re really accurate, the pollsters add. The results though are different to what we are expecting. Our attention snaps to the screen. What? we collectively ask.
Party
|
May 6 Opinion Poll
Seats
|
May 7
Exit Poll Seats
|
Conservatives
|
273
|
316
|
Labour
|
268
|
239
|
Liberal Democrats
|
28
|
10
|
SNP
|
56
|
58
|
UKIP
|
2
|
2
|
Green
|
1
|
-
|
Other
|
22
|
-
|
Suddenly the conservatives are tantalisingly close to overall majority (322 seat or 326 depending if you discount Sinn Fein not taking their seats). Paddy Ashdown turns to Andrew Neil and announces that if the exit poll is right he’ll eat his hat. This is debated at some length, not the polls, more the concept of hat ownership. Cast forward some hours and by morning Andrew Neil has found the required gourmet garment but sadly this turns out to be yet another broken Liberal Democrat promise. By early morning the result of the election was clear.
Party
|
May 6 Opinion Poll
Seats
|
May 7
Exit Poll Seats
|
May 8
General Election Result
|
Conservatives
|
273
|
316
|
331
|
Labour
|
268
|
239
|
232
|
Liberal Democrats
|
28
|
10
|
8
|
SNP
|
56
|
58
|
56
|
UKIP
|
2
|
2
|
1
|
Green
|
1
|
-
|
1
|
Other
|
22
|
-
|
21
|
What!? With 36.9% of those voting and 24.4% of those who could vote in the country the Conservatives take just over half of the available seats, enough for an overall majority. Labour’s vote remains the same as the last election but this in effect sees them losing seats. In every Liberal Democrat constituency in which the Conservatives came second the result is reversed. The reward for government stability, participating in a coalition and in soundbite terms, reversing a commitment on tuition fees resulted in the Liberal Democrats being reduced to a scorched root. Their heartland in the South West gone. Ministers like Vince Cable and longstanding MPs such as Simon Hughes, gone. Political opinions aside, there was limited light relief on the night. Thankfully Ed Balls, the Shadow Chancellor lost his seat by a few hundred votes and that kept us going until we could all cheer in the anonymous tory winning a the expense of Nigel Farage.
The result is a genuine surprise for all. David Cameron unpacked his suitcase and took the photo of Boris Johnson from his dartboard. Ed Miliband stopped practicing writing PM after his name and deleted Nicola Sturgeon’s number from his phone. Nick Clegg crouched in a dark cellar, googling how to tie a noose.
The morning wore on and the shock remained. With all the grace of Jose Mourinho winning a trophy David Cameron appeared outside 10 Downing Street to celebrate with party workers and the nation’s press. He’s a one nation tory they say. Sadly that nation seems to be populated solely by non-doms, our friends in the City and those who can trace their ancestry back to King Canute. The disabled, economically disadvantaged and those who foolishly pay tax might need to apply to be citizens of this nation. The words “death camps” seem a touch strong, but their equivalent, sinkhole estates in constituencies they have no interests in will do just fine.
By lunchtime it’s time for leaders resignation dominos. Nick, then Ed, then Nigel all fall on their swords for the good of their parties. In contrast Nicola Sturgeon quickly becomes as insufferable as Alex Salmond, full of talk of SNP influence in Westminster and the end of austerity. The 331 seats that the Conservatives are sat on and the fact that they can ignore all other parties seems yet to register. Yes they will have a presence but bar destroying the Union and cementing the Tories English 1000 Year electoral Reich we will think little of them.
Jesus rose three days after dying on the cross. Similarly Nigel Farage spent a similar period, hopefully in a cave before his own political resurrection. Less a triumph over death and more an acknowledgement of UKIP’s executive’s rejection of his resignation. A tumour would be more welcome. To extend the metaphor way beyond breaking point it points towards a cancer within our politics, our society - a manifestation of the economic fissures separating the haves and the have nots and how those with opportunism can rabble rouse with a simple message of blaming external actors, to champion division, discord and dissatisfaction. Fortunately Europe is falling down the political agenda...hang on, what’s that you’re saying David? Let’s have a referendum on Europe in 2016? Great. I can’t wait. More democracy and no doubt, more surprises.
Life is essentially a cheat and its conditions are those of defeat; the redeeming things are not happiness and pleasure but the deeper satisfactions that come out of struggle.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
