A tale of two elections

As warned, this is a political entry.

I want to start by talking about the local council elections.  There are the closest we get to mid term elections and, as such, are used as a barometer for how the parties are doing.

Now, traditionally the party in power loses councillors in these elections.  And the Tories did.  They were predicting they would lose up to 1,000 councillors.  This was widely seen as lowering expectations, so that when the figure was lower it could be spun as a win.  It actually lowballed things, they lost about 1,300.  However, it wasn’t good news for Labour as, going against the normal flow, also lost seats.

So, who gained?  Well, the Lib Dems, mostly.  It was their best ever local election results with them gaining over 700 councillors.  The Green party also had their best ever result.  What do the two parties have in common?  Neither wants Brexit and both support a Peoples Vote or revocation of Article 50.

So, what does this mean?  If you ask the Lib Dams or the Greens, it shows that the public want a Peoples Vote.  If you ask the Tories and Labour, it shows that the voters just want Brexit to be done.

In reality, it doesn’t show a lot.  For a start, it wasn’t every council in the country.  Just some in England and Northern Ireland.  So, there’s really no way to say what would happen in a General election.  The other thing is that UKIP are, finally, imploding (on which more later) and Change UK and the Brexit Party (on both, more later) not running any candidates at all.

Next week is the EU elections.  Yes, before you ask, the ones we weren’t supposed to be happening.

The Tories don’t seem to have really bothered with these elections.  Apart from in Scotland, where they seem to think it’s about preventing IndyRef2.

Labour are doing their fence sitting thing.

Lib Dams are running on a platform which is basically “Bollocks to Brexit”.  They’ve also pissed off the other Remain parties by saying they are the only option to send the message that we don’t want to leave.

The Greens are looking to build on the local election results.

And back to the three parties I mentioned earlier.

UKIP, as I mentioned, are in their long awaited meltdown.  They’ve gone full on Alt Right.  One of their candidates in Scotland is a guy who became infamous for teaching his girlfriends dog to give a Nazi salute on hearing the phrase “Gas the Jews”.  Yeah.  He got prosecuted for that one.  One of their candidates in the South East is known for “joking” that he didn’t find a female Labour MP rapeable.  He then doubled down on the statement, saying he would rape her if drunk enough but he didn’t think there was enough beer in the world.  So, yeah.  Meltdown.

Then there’s the Brexit Party.  Nigel Farage’s latest scam, I mean party.  They have no policies.  They will not be announcing any policies until after the election.  They do not like being asked about this, nor about things they have said before.  They are also taking donations to a maximum of £499.  Why?  Because £500 is the threshold at which they have to name names.  Because that’s not dodgy…

Then there’s Change UK.  The party previously known as The Independent Group.  First of all, they revealed their logo.  Here it is:

Yeah, they paid actual money for that.  If you think that’s bad, this is the state of their battle bus:

Where the Brexit Party are a scam, CUK are the scammed.

They also have no policies, except the two on the bus.  They keep losing candidates.  Including one in Scotland who has said he’s supporting the Lib Dems, he’s voting Lib Dems but he’s still on the ballot as it’s too late to remove his name.

Oh, and Theresa May has announced another vote on the Withdrawal Agreement next month, after which May will stand down as Tory Party leader.  Meaning that by the end of the year we will have a new PM.

And it might well be Boris Johnston.  Joy.

Will