The UK went to the polls yesterday in the General Election, and the nation is now in a political state of flux and turmoil as no party can claim an overall victory, leading to the first hung parliament in decades.
In an amazing turn of events the political map of England, Wales, Scotland & Northern Ireland was turned upside down over night after a busy day at the polling stations. Around 64.6 % of those eligible to vote, did so, on a national scale, almost 4% more than during the last general election. This in itself caused a few problems, there are reports of wanna be voters being turned away from numerous polling stations around the UK at 10pm. An inquiry has already been launched in to why and how so many that wanted to vote didn't get a chance to, as most polling stations followed the letter of the law and closed their doors dead on 10pm.
The big story of the night as the declarations started to roll in was the absence of a massive swing to the Conservative party that many in the media had been predicting. They had failed to sweep up enough support on the ground, leading to an ultimate victory, much to the visible disappointment of smug leader David Cameron. Neither was it the trouncing of Labour and Gordon Brown that the Conservatives had promised it would be, however, it was also a rather disappointing showing for the current Prime Minister as his party failed to win and hold seats, in what has been the most tightly contested election in living memory.
Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat leader also was rather downbeat on the news that his party had done far far worse than the polls had suggested all the way through the election campaign. At the time of writing, with most of the constituencies now declared, it looks like this Conservative 291, Labour 251, Liberal Democrat 52, Scottish National Party 6, Plaid Cymru 3 (A Welsh nationalist party). A single party needs to reach 326 in order to have a winning majority, and form the next government.
One of the more surprising results of the night came from my home city of Brighton, which in the city center area of Brighton Pavilion, voted in the Green Party with their leader Caroline Lucas.. This is not only a Brighton first, or a UK First, but a World first that a green 'environmental' party person has been elected to serve office in parliment in such a system of first past the post elections. "Thank you so much for putting the politics of hope above the politics of fear," she told us at the Brighton Centre "I pledge that I will do my very best to do you proud," she said, adding: "For once the word historic fits the bill." Ms Lucas previously said a hung parliament would be "interesting".
Another surprise, a very welcome one that was greeted positively by gay rights groups was the Northern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson was ousted from his Belfast East seat, a seat he has held for the last 31 years! Robinson you may remember was at the center of a scandal surrounding his homophobic wife and corruption back in August last year.
In other good news of the GLBT community is confirmation that Margot James, the openly gay Conservative has been elected and set to become Parliaments second Lesbian MP. The other being Angela Eagle who swept to victory in her Liverpool seat with a respectable 52 % of the vote. Chris Bryant, recently married in The Houses of Parliament also kept hold of his seat in the house, however, as it's a hung Parliament he wont know if he keeps his position in government as Welsh minster for some days to come.
It was also good news for some of the other openly gay MP's, the friendly Ben Bradshaw held on to his Exeter seat, Stephen Twigg kept control of his Liverpool West Derby seat with 64.1% of the vote, Clive Betts also kept hold of his seat, though with a much smaller and majority and share. Old collegue and mate Chris Oxlade failed to win election as an openly gay Labour candidate for Crawley, just up the road in Sussex. Three top rated Tory gay men keep their seats including Nick Herbert, Alan Duncan and Greg Barker.
As I say, we are in hung parliment terratory, a time where all the parties are talking to one another, frantically searching and negotiating a way where they will 'collectively' share power and form a coalition government. Many fear this will spell disaster for the UK, leading to much greater disruption to all major UK services, ending our recovery from recession and possibly, according to some anaylists leading the UK to a complete meltdown like Greece is currently suffering. Indeed, some are even forecasting street riots and national strikes before the end of the year!
However, if the parties can not agree a deal, broker a power sharing agreement, then, it's highly likely that another general election will be called within a few days or even possibly hours, and we'll have to go through the whole thing again. A prospect, that I and a whole multitude of others are not looking forward to, however, a hung parliament with no proper government, with no proper strength is a prospect I am even less in favor of.
Staying awake overnight is a normal routine for me, however this election has been anything but routine, it;s been a trial and a close run race all the way through, from start to finish. And, whilst many thought the actual election itself would be an end to the political unbalance of our nation once and for all, are sadly mistaken. As we head to hung parliament land, we as a nation face quite a number of days of uncertainty and instability ahead. Which way it will go, no one knows, but one thing I do know for sure - it aint over yet!
Jason Shaw
GayAgenda.com's UK Correspondent
Jason's daily slice of life is here - www.seafrontdiary.com
© 2010 Copyright Jason Shaw
No comments:
Post a Comment