prediction

WARDS N-Z: NORWICH CITY COUNCIL’S MAY ELECTIONS

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by Anonymous

Read the Preview to the May Elections here.

This year, thirteen out of Norwich’s thirty-nine council seats will be up for election on May 3rd in thirteen different wards across the city. The big four parties (Conservatives, Greens, Labour and Lib Dems) are expected to be contesting every seat, possibly alongside some independent candidates.

The four different parties will have four very different set of objectives and aims, with hopes of defences and gains mixed in with aspirations of breakthrough success for some here in Norwich. With the release of nominated persons on Monday April 9th, here’s a breakdown of Wards N – Z with predicted outcomes to keep you all abreast of what’s to come in this Fine City. You can find A-M here.Continue Reading

THE 2017 GENERAL ELECTION – LEFT US HANGING

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by The Norwich Radical

The following piece was created, compiled and co-written by a number of Norwich Radical contributors, across a number of locations, devices, and even countries. We followed the exit polls, the first counts, the calculations and predictions as they became available across the media. We do not have any inside information, but have combined our experience and information during the night to produce this article in time for the morning readers.

There is no final result confirmed at the time of publication, but it has been confirmed that we have a hung parliament, as it is mathematically impossible for any party to claim an overall majority.

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A BEGINNING, NOT THE END – THE 2017 GENERAL ELECTION

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by Chris Jarvis

In a couple of hours, polling stations will close, and the fate of the United Kingdom will have been decided. Throughout the night the gentle trickling of results will sprinkle their way in, as the aftermath of the most fascinating election for a generation will begin to unravel. Psephologists will debate the relative merits of their predictions, political spin-artists will argue their respective parties have actually done quite a lot better than they expected, and the hacks (myself included), will drift further into the early hours, wearing out their laptop keys.

Right now, we know that the election campaign has been riddled with ups and with downs. We’ve seen Labour climb steadily in the polls, narrowing the Tory lead from over 20 points to single figures; two atrocities claimed the lives of 34 people; campaigning was suspended twice; the Tories launched a manifesto into a whirlwind of negativity; UKIP’s support collapsed; and Labour proposed a political programme further to the left of any Government in four decades. Any one of those alone would make this election remarkable. Combined they make it unique.

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WAR OF CULTURE AND IDENTITY: THE FRENCH PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

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by Chris Jarvis

All eyes in the UK are currently on the snap General Election called by Theresa May earlier this week. Across the English channel though, another election, possibly with more seismic impacts for the future of Europe and the wider world took place today. French voters went to the polls in what has been an ever-changing and eye-wateringly close first round of their Presidential election. With 80% ballots counted at the time of publication, we now know that Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen will be going forward for a second round run-off vote on May 7th.Continue Reading

THE 10 PEOPLE WHO COULD BE THE NEXT LEADER OF THE GREEN PARTY

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by Chris Jarvis

Something somewhat unprecedented is happening. The media is paying attention to the internal workings of the Green Party. Since Natalie Bennett announced her intentions not to stand for re-election as the party’s leader, speculation has begun to bubble around the online media about who her replacement might be. Early predictions from pundits included the party’s 2016 London Mayoral Candidate Sian Berry, former European Parliamentary candidate Rupert Read and Member of the House of Lords Jenny Jones have each ruled themselves out of the race (Sian Berry was technically ineligible to stand in the first place).

Almost immediately, Ladbrokes opened a market on the race, initially comprising the obvious frontrunners, before eventually taking random, and sometimes outrageously comical suggestions of potential candidates from Twitter. Unsurprisingly, then, little light has been shed on the realistic contenders, the notable exception being The Guardian’s quote heavy coverage, and Josiah Mortimer’s round up in Open Democracy. We have a long way to go from now until the end of the election in September, and much could change between now and then, but here is some mostly unfounded speculation on who the big contenders could be.Continue Reading

6 POLITICAL PARTIES, 6 PREDICTIONS AND (ROUGHLY) 160 WORDS OF ANALYSIS #5: CONSERVATIVES

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2014 has been a rocky year for the Tories. The one piece of good news throughout the year comes from the narrowing of the gap between themselves and Labour. In spite of this, the shrinking of the Labour poll lead has not come as a result of a resurgence of Tory support, but instead from a drop in the number of people saying they will vote Labour. Rather than winning over legions of new voters, the Tories are simply losing support at a slower rate than Labour. Add to this third place in the European elections, the assent of UKIP and the defection of two MPs, followed by losing the by-elections in both of their seats, the past year has been difficult. There’s little indication that 2015 will be any easier.

by Chris Jarvis

1. The Tories will scrape past 30% of the vote in May

Five political parties vying for votes in England means that the traditional splitting of large chunks of the electorate between the Tories and Labour is largely over. Combining this with the existence of a surging SNP in Scotland, a steadily rising Plaid in Wales, and what looks to be the closest battle between the two largest parties since the 1970s, the likelihood of any party emerging with between 35-40% of the vote is astronomically low.Continue Reading

6 POLITICAL PARTIES, 6 PREDICTIONS AND (ROUGHLY) 160 WORDS OF ANALYSIS #1: LABOUR

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A rather uneventful year for the Labour Party – a stagnant poll rating (it has fallen around 3 or 4% since this time last year), underwhelming European election results and few major changes in personnel or policy (Emily Thornberry’s resignation being the notable exception). What this has masked, however, is a Labour Party in flux.

2015 will be a crucial year for Labour as it, for the first time after the Blair/Brown years, comes to terms with its own identity. Accordingly, the fortunes of Labour are particularly difficult to predict, aside from that we may see significant soul searching and muted internal conflict.

by Chris Jarvis.

1. Labour will emerge as the single largest party in 2015

A peculiar prediction to begin with, given what has been said previously about the difficulties of predicting Labour’s fate. However, electoral arithmetic would suggest that Labour will probably emerge as the largest party in May next, year, albeit without a majority. As has been frequently noted, Labour need a smaller proportion of the vote to gain a majority – and so a squeeze on their polling over the next five months should still allow them to hold on to being the largest party.  Significant gains from the Liberal Democrats, as well as similar wins from the Tories should inch them 60 or 70 seats up on their 2010 result. In and of itself this would put them just shy of a majority in the House of Commons, but combined with losses to the SNP in Scotland means that Labour will hold only a handful more seats than the Conservative Party.Continue Reading