British election live

Live commentary on counting for the British general election.

10:05am Wednesday December 18: A post-election YouGov poll of over 40,000 respondents has the startling finding that low-income people voted Tory by greater margins than high-income people.  The Tories won the middle class (ABC1) by 43-33 and the working class (C2DE) by 48-33 (44-40 and 44-42 respectively in 2017).  The Tories won those with the lowest educational attainment by 58-25 (55-33 in 2017).  Labour won those with the highest educational attainment 43-29 (49-32 in 2017).

3:25pm Saturday: Conversation article up.  I believe a major cause for the bad Labour loss was its Brexit policy, but another important difference from 2017 was real wage growth: -0.5% before the 2017 election vs +1.7% in the latest available data.  People are only willing to vote for left-wing policies if they are not doing well financially.  There’s also US politics stuff in that article.

Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is an honorary associate at The University of Melbourne. His work on electoral matters for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.

7:50am Saturday: The Conservatives HELD St Ives overnight with an increased majority over the Lib Dems.  Final seat numbers are 365 Tories (up 47), 203 Labour (down 59), 48 SNP (up 13) and 11 Lib Dems (down one).  I will have a write-up for The Conversation later today.

7:10pm Most polls had the Tory lead over Labour at nine to 12 points; the final result will be 11.5 points, so most polls were about right.  Survation, Ipsos, Opinium and Kantar had the Tory lead at either 11 or 12 points, and are the best pollsters.  The worst were ComRes (just a five point lead) and ICM (six points).

7:03pm How the Britain Elects Poll Tracker compares to the actual results excluding Northern Ireland.  William Bowe has said the two majors were too high in the polls, but most UK polls exclude Northern Ireland.

6:13pm: In Northern Ireland, the DUP won eight of the 18 seats (down two), Sinn Fein seven (no change), the Social Democratic Labour Party two and the Alliance Party one.  Vote shares were 30.6% DUP, 22.8% Sinn Fein, 16.8% Alliance and 14.9% SDLP.  So the Alliance got only one seat on 17% vote.

5:57pm: Final Scotland results: SNP 48 of 59 seats (up 13), Tories six (down seven), Lib Dems four (no change), Labour one (down six).  Vote shares: SNP 45.0% (up 8.1%), Tories 25.1% (down 3.5%), Labour 18.6% (down 8.5%) and Lib Dems 9.5% (up 2.8%).

4:52pm: With 13 seats to go, the Tories have 355 seats, Labour 202, the SNP 48 and the Lib Dems ten.

4:33pm: Another ex-Tory gets pummelled

4:24pm Labour has got to 200 seats with 37 left for the whole UK.

4:20pm: With all 40 Welsh seats declared, Labour won 22 (down six), the Tories 14 (up six) and Plaid Cymru four (no change).  Vote shares were 40.9% Labour (down 8.0%) and 36.9% Tories (up 2.5%).

4:16pm: With 41 seats still to be declared, the Tories have passed the majority mark (326 seats), and are now up to 335 seats.

4:11pm: Another not-great tactical voting, with the Tories HOLDING Finchley with 44%, the Lib Dems second with 32% and Labour 3rd with 24%.

3:36pm Tories GAIN Kensington from Labour by just 0.3% because the Lib Dems took 21%.  Additional note: Some polls in this seat put the Lib Dems ahead of Labour, so tactical voting plans were confused.

3:22pm: Ex-Tory Dominic Grieve LOSES his seat to the Tories.

3:12pm: In Leave seats, Labour lost votes directly to the Tories and Brexit party.  In Remain seats, the Lib Dems often split part of the vote, and anyway there aren’t enough Remain seats in the UK.

3:09pm With 424 of 650 seats declared, the Tories have 220 (up 32), Labour 146 (down 44), the SNP 35 (up 12) and the Lib Dems seven (no change).  The Tories have a 42.6% to 33.5% lead over Labour with 10.7% for the Lib Dems.  On a matched seat basis, Labour is down 8.3%.

2:54pm: Lib Dems miss out in Wimbledon; Labour had too many votes.

2:52pm Socialist Laura Pidcock LOSES her seat

2:50pm: Jo Swinson LOSES her seat to the SNP

2:47pm: Boris Johnson easily HOLDS his seat.

2:46pm: Really UGLY result for Labour in Bassetlaw

2:41pm: Labour loses Tony Blair’s old seat of Sedgefield.

2:35pm: Corbyn easily holds Islington N, but has announced he will resign as Labour leader.

2:32pm: Lib Dems GAIN a seat from SNP in Scotland

2:29pm: Overall, with 281 of 650 seats declared, the Tories have 140 seats (up 25), Labour 104 (down 31), the SNP 20 (up seven) and the Lib Dems five (down one).  Labour’s vote is down 8.1%, with the Tory vote up 1.8%.

2:20pm: In Wales, Labour has lost five seats to the Tories after 27 of 40 declared.  Labour’s vote is down 9.6% with the Tories up 3.6% and Brexit taking 6.6%.

2:16pm Scottish results so far are SNP all 17 seats declared, with the Tories and Labour losing three seats each.

2:06pm: Here’s one that could have gone to a non-Tory with preferential voting.

1:59pm: With 175 of 650 seats in, Labour has lost a net 19 seats, the Tories are up 15 and the SNP up four.

1:45pm: Labour HOLD Hartlepool after Tories and Brexit party split the Leave vote.  I think Labour is doing better than they would under preferential voting.

1:41pm: A narrow Lib Dem HOLD vs the Tories

1:36pm: Labour HOLDS Canterbury, the seat where the original Lib Dem withdrew, only to be replaced by another Lib Dem.

1:29pm: After 96 of 650 seats, the BBC has Labour down 8.8% in the same seats from 2017, but only 1.6% has gone to the Conservatives.  Labour has lost eight net seats, with the Conservatives up six.

12:55pm: An against the run of play result: Labour GAIN Putney from Conservative; that’s a London seat.

12:51pm Labour suffers the humiliation of losing its deposit in Bracknell.

12:46pm Gateshead illustrates how bad it would be for Labour if not for the Brexit party standing in most seats it currently holds.

12:43pm: On the BBC’s results page, Labour’s vote is down 11.4% after 20 of 650 seats.  The only good news for Labour is that only 2.7% of that drop has gone to the Conservatives, with 5.5% going to the Brexit party.

12:33pm: Conservatives GAIN Darlington and Workington from Labour.

12:26pm Labour’s big problem with the Leave vote: although Leave only won the Brexit referendum by 52-48, it carried 64% of seats in Great Britain (ie excluding Northern Ireland).  The Leave vote was far more efficiently distributed than the Remain vote, which clustered in the big cities.

This implies that an explicitly pro-Remain Labour leader would not have performed any better than Corbyn.  This election is the realignment around Leave/Remain that was expected in 2017, but which Corbyn thwarted with his pro-Brexit positioning.

12:12pm: Almost a 10% swing from Labour to Con in Nuneaton gives Con a far bigger majority.

12:08pm Tory vote down 6% in S Shields, with Labour down 16%, thanks to an independent and Brexit party candidate.

12:01pm

11:27am: Direct swing of 5% from Labour to Con gives Con a much bigger majority in N Swindon.

11:16am: Sedgefield was Tony Blair’s old seat, so would be a huge triumph for the Conservatives.

10:36am: Conservatives GAIN Blyth Valley from Labour after 15% crash in Labour’s vote.  Additional note: And preferential voting wouldn’t have helped Labour given 8% for the Brexit party.

10:30am First result in, Labour HOLD, but with a 7% swing against.

10:21am: Normally we’d have some results by now, but close contests in former Labour strongholds have slowed down the count in those seats.

10:08am: Vote shares according to The Exit Poll

9:39am: Nate Silver

9:30am: Antony Green

9:03am: The Exit Poll has a big win for the Conservatives

7:55am: As well as the UK, there is an electoral development in Israel.  A new election has been called for March 2, 2020, after no government could be formed after the September election.  It will be the third Israeli election within a year.  Early polling suggests the left-leaning Blue & White is ahead of the right-wing Likud, but do not have enough allies to form a government.

4am (AEDT). Adrian Beaumont will be taking care of business on the live commentary front, but this here is your editor reporting in the small hours to kick off proceedings. If you’re a Crikey subscriber, you can you enjoy my election eve account of the campaign horse race here. Here is one last update of my poll tracker, which tells the same story as before: the Conservatives had already devoured the Brexit Party before the campaign began, while Labour’s cannibalising of the Liberal Democrats has been a slower process that has persisted through to the end of the campaign. With the addition of seven last polls, the final scores are Conservative 42.9% (+0.2% compared with the last run, +0.5% on the 2017 result), Labour 33.7% (steady and -6.3%) and Liberal Democrats 11.9% (-0.4% and +4.5%).

For your convenience, here is a repeat of Adrian’s timeline of how things are likely to unfold, Australian time.

9am: Polls close and The Exit Poll is released (intentional capitalisation). In the last three elections, The Exit Poll has given seat results which greatly disagreed with pre-election polls and expectations. In all three cases, The Exit Poll was far closer to the mark than pre-election polls. Only seat counts are given, not vote shares.

11am: According to this article about the 2017 election, only three of 650 declarations are expected by this time.

1pm-3pm: These two hours should be the heaviest for declarations.  Initial results will be biased to Labour as the Conservative heartland regional seats take longer to gather their votes. The key is to watch the changes in vote share, and whether seats are being gained or lost.

6pm: Only a few seats will not be declared by this time. Very close seats can take longer to declare owing to recounts. If there’s snow on the roads, results will be delayed.

490 comments on “British election live”

Comments Page 6 of 10
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  2. swamprat
    Would think Nicole had more political talent than Swinson and knew she was elected in Scotland which plays to her and the SNP’s advantage.

  4. Mexicanbeemer @ #249 Friday, December 13th, 2019 – 2:47 pm

    52% of people in Corbyn’s electorate didn’t bother to turn out speaking volumes about Corbyn.

    You were saying?
    Britain Elects
    @britainelects
    Islington North: Lab HOLD

    LAB: 64.3% (-8.7)
    LDEM: 15.6% (+6.6)
    CON: 10.2% (-2.3)
    GRN: 8.0% (+3.9)
    BREX: 1.4% (+1.4)

    Swing: -8.7
    Turnout: 71.6%
    Full results: https://britainelects.newstatesman.com/live-results/ #GE2019

    Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn back.

  5. “Yep Firefox – The night is a massive triumph for the Left. Get a grip on reality sunshine.”

    ***

    In Scotland and Northern Ireland it is. That was my point. The UK is deeply divided. That is the reality that we are seeing play out here.

  7. It’s started already…

    Nicola Sturgeon to demand powers for Scottish independence referendum

    Nicola Sturgeon is to declare she has won a renewed mandate for a second independence referendum after an exit poll forecast significant gains for the SNP.

    The first minister and SNP leader will demand on Friday that Boris Johnson gives her the powers to stage a further independence vote after Ipsos Mori’s exit poll predicted her party would win up to 55 of Scotland’s 59 Westminster seats.

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/dec/13/nicola-sturgeon-to-demand-powers-for-scottish-independence-referendum

  12. Northern Irish politics is hardly played on the Left-Right spectrum. The change there was largely due to SDLP agreeing not to stand. Also Belfast South has fallen to the SDLP too as SF didn’t stand.

  13. In NI the informal pact between SF and SDLP wins Belfast North for SF and Belfast South for SDLP both from DUP. Alliance picks up North Down which the unionists expected to contest with the retirement of the Independent

  17. The result in Wimbledon is a classic case of the difficulties of tactical voting.

    If enough Labour voters had instead voted tactically for LIbDem, the Conservatives might have been denied the seat. The trouble is, the Labour voters had no way of knowing that, because they came comfortably second last time. In fact, it’s possible that this time a few LibDem sympathisers might have voted tactically for Labour, not realising there would be such a turnaround.

  18. SNP vote reached a crazy zenith in 2015 with a big swing away in 2017 for it to be restored in 2019… is 2019 > 2015 or about the same, though?

    That Corbyn (and whoever is advising him) thought he would improve Labour’s position in this election says enough about their collective wisdom. I guess if he didnt support the election, then they would have fiddled a majority vote mechanism which the SNP would have supported (although totally against their own interests to gain seats but Tories to win a whopping majority).

    This election happening at all was a giant tactical mistake on the part of the opposition parties, handing all power to the extreme right for 5 years on an unimpedable basis.

    They should have held the “Address Brexit first, then election” line… all they have achieved is to hand the Brexit keys to Rees-Mogg and his like. Brilliance…

    So so stupid and self-deceptive in the face of all indicative polling. Corbyn and Swinson the biggest political geese of all time, worse than Hilary even. Collective political suicide.

  19. If the SNP gets 45 seats or more it will be a “mandate” in Scotland stronger than the Tory one in England.

    Nicola Sturgeon has no choice but to claim that. There is quite a bit of grumbling in the Party over the perceived timidity of the SNP leadership.

    If Westminster does not agree that there is a democratic way to independence the Scottish Government will have to develop a democratic process with the support of other international institutions.

  21. “I guess there are some who still think having Corbyn as leader, was a good move.”

    ***

    It was. The left don’t want right wingers representing them. What cost him and Labour was sitting on the fence on the major issue of the election and not having a clear message to sell. People obviously wanted Brexit resolved. The Tories had a simple message that even the simplest of people could comprehend. Labour’s message was all over the place and wasn’t helped by the constant attacks and misinformation from the right-wing mainstream media.

    Now is not the time to start waving the white flag. Now is the time to fight harder than ever for what we believe in.

  23. Firefox @ #271 Friday, December 13th, 2019 – 3:15 pm

    “I guess there are some who still think having Corbyn as leader, was a good move.”

    ***

    It was. The left don’t want right wingers representing them. What cost him and Labour was sitting on the fence on the major issue of the election and not having a clear message to sell. People clearly wanted Brexit resolved. The Tories had a simple message that even the simplest of people could comprehend. Labour’s message was all over the place and wasn’t helped by the constant attacks and misinformation from the right-wing mainstream media.

    Now is not the time to start waving the white flag. Now is the time to fight harder than ever for what we believe in.

    Sure, it’s only a flesh wound.

  24. The conservatives look to be winning a lot of seats more because of the drop in the Labour vote than a rise in their own. The latest, Birmingham Northfield, where Labour’s vote fell 10% but the Conservatives’ rose just 3 and a half for a four percentage point win.

  28. I guess there are some who still think having Corbyn as leader, was a good move.

    A centrist leader would not have delivered a stronger result. Brexit dominated this parliament and this campaign, which crowded out issues where Labor’s message was strong. Centrists screwed Labor by forcing it to take a wishy-washy approach to Brexit instead of steadfastly promising to deliver Brexit.

  30. If ever there was a place for tactical voting, it was Kensington. One hundred and fifty votes the difference, with nine thousand votes going to LibDem and five hundred to the Greens. *Heavy sigh*

  31. Nicholas
    If Corbyn was a strong leader he would have accepted May’s deal and allowed any problems with Brexits implementation to work for him but instead he choose to ignore what his own heartland wanted, he was a poor leader because if he was opposed to Brexit then he should have backed that in because he would at least had a firm position.

  33. AM

    If ever there was a place for tactical voting, it was Kensington. One hundred and fifty votes the difference, with nine thousand votes going to LibDem and five hundred to the Greens. *Heavy sigh*

    It will be interesting to see if Green dolts have gifted any more seats to the conservatives.

  34. Mexicanbeemer,

    I think Corbyn had a problem delivering what his heartland wanted, because his heartland was divided. I’m not convinced there was any way he could win, being damned no matter what.

  35. Ante
    He was between a rock and a hard place which is why he really needed to back his own real position, if that was for Brexit then he needed to go with May’s deal, if he was against then he needed to face those that wanted out and tell them why he was against. In someways I feel for him because this isn’t his policy and its an issue that would never have become one without Cameron. Under the Australian system Labour or Lib Dems would be making gains in London which shows how different this issue is playing in the south against how its playing up north.

  36. Here comes the Labor Right – barely able to contain their delight – to heap blame on the Greens to ease their own plight.

    *rolls eyes*

    Labo(u)rites are getting lots of practice at blaming everyone else for their own failings lately.

  37. Turnout is down one and a half percent on last time. I guess passionate enthusiasm for an issue of national importance is no match for a cold day.

  42. On tenterhooks to see if Labour can, from 260 base, can make it to 200 seats this time around… brilliant performance 🙁

    Can SNP Scotland govt call a non-westminister-endorsed referendum just for political optics purposes?

  43. I haven’t been around PB since the middle of last year but I thought I’d stop by to give my take

    The result is pretty much in line with my expectations, a shade better for Labour if anything .. I was expecting around 190 Labour seats

    I told you all last year that it would be disastrous in the Labour heartland seats if the party set it’s face against the Brexit referendum result – the polls were level pegging until that decision was made, but the Labour vote crashed immediately after

    I see some wonky analysis up thread asserting the ‘fence-sitting’ policy as the cause of the defeat – I beg to differ, a strong Remain policy a-la the Lib Dems would have made no difference. This election was unwinnable for the opposition parties once Brexit was frustrated in the last parliament

    The results also vindicate, IMO, something else that I asserted last year – namely that there has been no sea-change in voter opinion on Brexit. I firmly believe that a second referendum on the question would have delivered another Leave majority

    I do agree with the poster earlier who opined that it was a huge strategic blunder to frustrate Brexit and then go for an election

    The only good news right now is that I still have a Labour MP 🙂 , although the neighbouring seats to the south and west of me have gone Tory for the first time in donkey’s 🙁

  44. “It’s still pretty much bang on the poll trend.”

    ***

    True. Tories on 43 and Labour on 33, which is what the trend was. Seems like the pollsters have earned back some credibility, in the UK anyway.

  46. “Oops being too pessimistic…… SNP just won Gordon from the Tories”

    ***

    Mmmm the SNP is really cleaning up. Scotland is making a pretty powerful statement that they don’t want either the Tories or Labour.

  48. Remarkably for Scotland, the Conservative vote in Gordon actually went up a smidge. The SNP got up with an even stronger rise at Labour’s expense.

  49. City of London and Westminster:

    CON: 39.9% (-6.7)
    LDEM: 30.7% (+19.7)
    LAB: 27.2% (-11.2)
    GRN: 1.7% (-0.4)
    OTH: 0.3% (+0.3)

    The result would have been different had preferential voting been used. It would have been a walkover for the Lib Dems. Lots of other seats are like this, with Labor and Lib Dems splitting the anti-Tory vote. It would have made sense for Labor and the LIb Dems to come to some agreement – for Labour-LibDems- Tories a Win-win-lose proposition.

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