The Election Results

I'm not too unhappy with the election results (Mrs EP translation - I'm quite pleased, but not over the moon).
The Scot Nats won a majority in the Scottish Parliament, The vote on AV was a resounding "No", the LibDems got their comeuppance, and the Tories, by and large maintained their status quo. My only disappointment was that none of the UKIP candidates were elected, but as, in practical terms, there is absolutely nothing that they could do about their aims even if elected to local councils, it doesn't alter their position.

Firstly the Scot Nats. If they hold a referendum on leaving the Union as promised, one suspects that they would get huge support from the English, notwithstanding the fact that we wouldn't get a vote. Down south we are fed up with the continual winging of the Scottish politicians, in spite of the fact that Scotland gets a higher per capita proportion of the UK budget and has proportionately more MPs. The only problem is that Cameron might decide to give them an even bigger cut of the budget in order to encourage them to stay. Nevertheless, I feel it will force our Parliament to address the issue, not only of representation at Westminster but also the anomaly whereby Scots MPs can vote on purely English matters often reversing the position that would be reached by English MPs alone.

The LibDems in my view came unstuck because up to now, they have managed to be "all things to all men".
You can do this in local government, it is unlikely that anyone would notice if you have a totally different policy in, say, Yorkshire than your policy in Suffolk or Dorset. It can be tailored for a specific electorate, which is why they generally do quite well in local elections.
However, at Westminster, if you are in power, you have to have the same policy for Yorkshire as in Suffolk and Dorset. Suddenly they have discovered this is far more difficult and that policies which go down well in some parts of the country are not liked elsewhere. The University fees issue is part of this; telling the young voters that they would not increase fees, without explaining to the taxpayers where the money would come from would have been a loser with one group or the other when implemented.

And as for AV, most people saw this as what it was, a sop to the LibDems who believed that it could increase their representation in parliament. Yes, changes to the electoral system are needed, as I've blogged before (equalisation of constituency sizes and restriction of postal voting), but AV is not one for which there has been any sign of public demand. If parliament had responded to public demand, the referendum would have been on withdrawal from the EU, because unless we do that, our Westminster votes will soon become worthless as the EU imposes more laws of their own.

As I said, I'm not too unhappy with the results.