³ÉÈËÂÛ̳

1st - Alex Salmond - SNP leader wins targeted seat *

2nd - Nicola Sturgeon - SNP deputy leader win targeted seat *

3rd - SNP* picks up votes from Scottish Socialist Party (who are not fielding candidates in all elections) [1]

* a socialist party or what it now calls itself "left-of-centre political party committed to Scottish Independence" [2]

4th - meantime, the Labour Party share of vote in Scotland remains largely intact.

... whooppeedo Alex, hardly the voters storming the barricades is it :)

Surprise Surprise ... a socialist & republican party is drawings out left wing votes, fringe votes, protest votes & tactical votes.

But a sizable but disenchanted few do not a majority make - the United Kingdom is once again safe from Mel Salmond & his ilk ... FREEDOM NOT

vikingar

SOURCES:

[1]
[2]

I'm not sure that South Ribble can be described as a 'spectacular success' for the Tories. It's not exactly the heartland of the industrialised North West - instead, it wouldn't look out of place in Surrey. The areas in the NW where the Tories have made ground are the suburban and affluent, which is what we'd expect. Even Bury, Preston and Crewe have large areas of middle class suburbia.

It is somewhat telling that they remain a complete irrelevence in areas like Knowsley, Manchester, Tameside and Wigan.

A successful evening for the Tories? No. This is their precipice. The only way is down.

Come off it - I have heard this all night. If NuLab and LibDem won one seat each and the Tories won all the rest you'd be asking why they didn't do better.

You can not describe the Tory gains in South Ribble and Chester as 'spectacular'. These are areas where the Tories have done well in the past, they are largely middle class and rural in parts.

Cameron needs to break through in places like Liverpool, Manchester, Wigan, Sheffield, Newcastle.

He can't

On Thursday night's election results programme there was a somewhat vitriolic debate about the calculation of vote share. The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ has reported that the Conservative share of the vote was 40%, the same as last year, with Labour on 27%, one point up, and the Lib Dems on 26% - down a point.

But this is to exclude a factor which must be included to arrive at a mathematically correct calculation - surely the point of the exercise.

To extrapolate the results over the whole UK, it is necessary to factor in the percentage of seats in which each party failed to put up a candidate -a technique parties regularly use to spin the results. Labour chose not to put up candidates in approx 65% of seats, the Lib Dem figure was approx 70% and the Conservative about 83%. If these figures are included in the calculation the Conservative /Labour gap is far higher than reported.

To understand how this works - imagine a party only putting up in seats where it expects a high percentage of the vote. The extrapolation of its results in these seats would give it a sky-high national share!
Play the extrapolation game (i) take your favourite party (ii) pick its 10 best results (iii) extrapolate (iv) win the next election!

Dear Nick,
Re your report to camera Sedgefield @132? News ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ 1.

You may be amused to know that at your words "as he leaves" a prison van passed by behind you.

All that intricate spin and the truth just keeps squelching out!

You couldn't make it up.
Priceless!