Well, it looks like A Tory-LibDem pact with the Tory cuts on and voting reform off the agenda.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/2010/may/09/general-election-2010-hung-parliament

Sorry, but it doesn't surprise me at all. I'd be interested to hear how the rest of you feel, though.

The Skin

So no, I don't think it's done and dusted.

The Skin

It'll do the Lib Dems far more harm than if they did nothing at all, they'll lose a lot of credibility in the eyes of many people who voted for them and could end up with them losing many of their new supporters and a lot of their long term supporters.

Media commentators have been confused about this too. Even some Guardian commentators thought a Con-Lib pact was pretty much there, while others thought Clegg would end up throwing his lot in with Labour.

Some commentators said Cameron held a strong position and all the cards, while others said the Tories were vulnerable and close to civil war. Some said that Clegg was inevitably walking blindly into a PR-less coalition with the Tories while others said he was negotiating from a strong position.

If I was Clegg I'd go with the rainbow coalition and watch as the Tories prepare yet another regicide for Cameron as he failed to deliver power and a majority. The Tory right thinks Cameron is a wet and begrudge all this "modernisation" that he has brought.

But if it does it's everybody's (at least, those of us who don't read the Mail) nightmare scenario. The Tories being propped up by the Lib Dems, and no electoral reform. We might as well have never even bothered with Magna Carta if we continue with FPTP.

Electoral Reform is essential for the future of the UK. Don't give me those moronic arguements about stability. Germany has only had one majority government since the restoration of sovereignty post WW2, and continaully leaves the UK economy in the dust (on less than half the Marshall Plan money the UK got). No other European country is so obsessed with annointing the biggest party as the government. No other European country lets its elections be decided be a small minority in marginal seats. This is no more democratic than the Estates General or parliament before the Great Reform Act.

I am a natural labour voter. From a working class background, brought up in a council house with a father who was a manual worker and a mother who did small work as and when needed to keep the family together. I am university educated, now upper middle class (as far as I can judge it) and, like Neil Kinnock, I owe all my life chances the the Labour Party. However, I would sacrifice Labour for the next ten years in order to win real electoral reform - governments which reflect how we vote, not just uninformed people in Watford and Oxford. Real democracy is bigger than any party.

"No other European country lets its elections be decided be a small minority in marginal seats."

Our elections in Canada are a clear-cut example of this phenomenon. Our country is more or less decided by people in suburban Toronto, the Golden Horseshoe, suburban Vancouver, and the B.C. Lower Mainland because they swing Tory-Liberal or Tory-Liberal-NDP and are therefore the only voters who decide the outcome of our elections in any meaningful way. Nobody is as concerned about winning in strongholds (Alberta and Quebec are full of places where the race is not meaningfully competitive) or swing ridings that do not involve these two configurations of parties.

If they go with the Tories only then they are going to leave

The Lib Dems and Tories happily work together on a number of local authorities (including the largest, Birmingham) and I've heard nothing about declining membership.

The Skin

early days

Although I didn't agree with some of their policies, I felt more of a affinity with them but didn't vote for them. I really wouldn't mind a Tory/LibDem alliance and feel it's not as scary as some here would think. I would rather a new leader than Gordon Brown.

Sounds like some Labour MPs are calling for Brown to step down so it's not a good sign for a Lab/LibDem alliance.

For about 4 years and it's quite a political unknown for me, learning new ways of voting etc. I've followed the Labour/LibDem/Tory parties with great interest. I've tried to vote as principled as I could, trying to see which party matched my views as an American Democrat (I hold dual citizenship). The biggest differences between the UK and the US is that both parties in the US have very clear views (I'm pro-choice, anti-death penalty, etc, views that the Democrats hold). Here it's not clear. LibDems and Tory agreed on some issues, Labour and LibDem agreed on others, etc etc. I have had long discussions with my husband, who is a card-carrying Tory member (His father ran for Tory MP in Cardiff, and grandfather was the Tory MP for Cardiff North West). We have the same agreements on certain political views and he's said that he has the same agreements with some issues of Labour and some issues of LibDems.

I could not vote Labour because I felt Gordon Brown was very Bush-like (not branding the entire Labour party that). So I voted for a party that best matched my views and it was a hard decision to make because the party I voted for, I wasn't sure of their politics (it could either be LibDem or Tory)!

We don't know what Cameron would be like as a Tory PM, especially one with a bipartisan coalition with the LibDems. We have experienced what Brown is like as the Labour PM and, I'm sorry, I think he's terrible. That was a big let down for the nice Labour candidates working to get elected in the south here.

If Cameron is a terrible PM, we can vote him out!

he is just serving a purpose for now.

plus a round of hefty tax rises. This is all aimed at keeping Britain's credit rating alive. Truth is that I dont think it is going to make much difference once the crap really hits the fan with regard to the European sovereign debt crisis. Then we may see countries defaulting and bank failures all around the globe. I suspect when that happens the details of the Tory-Lib pact will be the least of our worries.

Cameron's answer was quite straightforward. In the North of England and Scotland. Now.

You may have noticed the electoral impact.

The Skin

all of the Parties as well. Large pockets of the North East have public sector employment at 80%+ of the local economy. Washington for the DWP. Reductions in the number of non front line public sector jobs are therefore going to hit those areas hardest.

If anyone believed that under Gordon Brown cuts would not start for a year then they either never actually read the budget or are deceiving themselves.

All of the parties were going to have to look at the same area for cuts. The civil service options have already been made public by Labour, they just were not read. Many of the "front line" services are now protected by contract as a result of PFI. Cheese pairing of a Hospital closures here and a and school closure there are not really possible (and are extremely unpopular anyway). Therefore the cuts will come in big cuts on administrative jobs and in Local Government support grants (not the direct grants because the headline support grant will probably be protected so that the cuts are all the fault of the horrid mean Council). Any of the areas that are not tied to a contract will face cuts. Have a look at University budgets next year. Mandleson announced those cuts just before the election.

Some big numbers can be saved immediately. The harsher terms of Employment Support Allowance could be implemented, with no further change to the law. Half a million people are likely to lost about 1/3 of their benefit at least. The risk there is that puts half a million people on the headline unemployment figures. It is also very difficult to do if you have culled all the administrators.

as the price of his support for a Labor government?

From here, it does look as if one thing that is clear is that the British people don't want Brown any longer, so a
coalition government headed by him doesn't look very feasible.

That is one decision which IMHO is not one for the Liberal Democrats to make.

If Nick Clegg makes it clear that he will not enter into a coallition including Gordon Brown, then I suspect that he would stand aside 'for the good of the country and the party'. There are, however, two problems with this - first, the Labour Party's rules for the election of a new leader will take some time (postal ballot of members nationwide, if I remember); and secondly, such a coallition would not have a majority and would need further support from other smaller parties.