BURSON-MARSTELLER INSIGHT
UK Elections Day The winners and losers of last week’s elections in the UK 11 May 2011
Overview On Thursday 5th May the UK held elections for the Scottish Government, the Welsh Assembly, local authorities in England, and held a referendum on reform of the voting system.
which sees candidates ranked in order of preference. Of the 19 million people that took part, more than two-thirds opposed replacing the current method for electing MPs - an overwhelming rejection described by the Deputy Prime Minister as a "bitter blow". The Conservative Party, the senior party of the UK Coalition Government, did remarkably well in Thursday’s elections (for a mid-term) and made some modest gains whilst the opposition Labour Party saw a mixed picture with very strong gains in Northern England and Wales tarnished by a disappointing result in Scotland.
AV Referendum
Alex Salmond celebrates SNP victory with his wife
The clear winners of the day were the Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP) who managed to secure an outright majority in the Scottish Parliament, Holyrood. Unlike in the previous Parliament, the SNP is now free to pursue its own agenda in Holyrood without any outside support which will almost certainly mean a referendum on Scottish secession from the United Kingdom within the next 5 years, although most polls indicate that a yes vote for Scottish independence is unlikely to succeed. The biggest casualty of Thursday’s elections was without doubt the Liberal Democrats. The Lib Dems lost seats in the Welsh Assembly and in Holyrood, where their leader subsequently resigned, and they lost almost 700 council seats in England – forfeiting Nick Clegg control of 9 councils. A few Liberal Democrat local government leaders have been highly critical of Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and there have been calls for him to resign his position as leader of the party, although this is unlikely to happen any time in the near future. The Liberal Democrats also lost the referendum on electoral reform in which voters were asked whether to keep firstpast-the-post, where voters put a cross next to their preferred candidate, or replace it with the alternative vote (AV) system,
Voters across the UK expressed a resounding No in the referendum to replace the current first past the post method with the alternative vote system, by 68% to 32%. This was a bitterly disappointing result for the Liberal Democrats who had made electoral reform a major condition of their support in any coalition after the 2010 General Election. Even before the result it was clear that the campaign has put a great deal of strain on the Coalition with the Lib Dems accusing the Conservatives of a breach of trust. Lib Dem Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne is known to have sparked a row in Cabinet last week over Conservative Party funded No to AV posters and Lib Dem peer Lord Ashdown referred to Conservative leader David Cameron as ''bloody stupid" for the way he has handled the No to AV campaign.
Scottish Parliament Of the 129 seats in Holyrood the SNP gained 69 in the Scottish elections, 4 more than it required for outright majority. The SNP are therefore returned to Government in Holyrood with Alex Salmond as First Minister, but with the strongest mandate of any individual party since Scottish devolution.
The Green Party increased their representation by 1 seat, gaining 2 seats in Holyrood. Every other party will have been disappointed with their performance in Scotland: the Labour Party now have 37 seats in Scotland, down 7; the Conservatives have 15 seats, down 5; and the Liberal Democrats have just 5 seats, down 12, leading to the resignation of Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Tavish Scott.
Welsh Assembly Labour won 30 of the 60 seats in the Welsh Assembly, falling short of an overall majority by the narrowest of margins. Labour leader Carwyn Jones will be reinstated as First Minister this week, however it is not yet clear if the party will try to govern alone or form an agreement with another party. Plaid Cymru were the main losers in Wales, down 4 seats, whilst the Liberal Democrats were also down, one seat.
Election fallout The surprisingly good performance of the Conservative Party in last Thursday’s election means that the Prime Minister David Cameron has emerged in a position of greater strength, certainly among his own party. However, attention will now focus on how he continues to keep his junior Coalition partners on board after such a bitter campaign and in a situation whereby the Liberal Democrats have little left to lose. The Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has said there will be no redrawing of the Coalition Agreement, signed after last year’s General Election, but has vowed that the Liberal Democrats will now take a more assertive role in the Coalition. For the Labour leader Ed Miliband these results will be seen as a mixed bag when many would have expected Her Majesty’s Opposition to have gained royally from the unpopularity of the current Coalition Government. Ed’s position remains secure but many will be wondering if he has what it takes to return his party to power at the next General Election.
Despite their leader Nick Bourne losing his seat, the Conservatives actually increased their representation in the Welsh Assembly by 2 seats.
Local Government In England the Labour Party made significant gains, taking control of 26 additional councils and winning 800 new council seats. The Liberal Democrats suffered the most, particularly in the North of England where they lost control of Sheffield Council – Nick Clegg’s city – among others. The Lib Dems lost 695 councillors across England and lost control of almost half of the councils under their control in which elections were held.
The Conservatives fared rather well in England gaining control of 4 new councils and winning 86 new council seats.
Whatever the implications of last week’s elections for the dynamics of the Coalition Government or for the standing of party leaders, the fallout has been most significant to the north of the border. A referendum on the Scotland’s future is now seen as inevitable and, although the prospects for a yes vote appear slight, the break-up of the United Kingdom is a possibility, along with geopolitical implications for the EU, UN, NATO and elsewhere.
Original text by Andrew Cregan, Associate of the UK Public Affairs Practice. For more information, please contact andrew.cregan@bm.com or visit http://www.bursonmarsteller.co.uk