UK General Election called for 8th June 2017

[Saracen]

At an unexpected announcement just after 11am, outside Number 10, PM Theresa May has announced a snap General Election for June 8th.

The reason is over "political game-playing" by other parties in Westminster, including obstruction from "unelected lords".

We have, it seems, a brief window of opportunity while the EU gets its ducks in a row over their negotiating position to avoid undermining from other parties, and the lords, weakening the government's negotiating position.

So, General Election it is.

[Smudger]

Oh great. So totalitarian PM sick of people saying she's unelected, chooses time when opposition is in a shambles.
5 more years of cuts then. Maybe she'll risk an Erdogan-style constitution change on spurious grounds...

[TheAnimus]

Bye Bye Labour. Corbyn, you've given the power to a rather worrying lady.

I really wish we had the Lib Dems + Camaron again...

[scaryjim]

Can we change "called" to "proposed" please?

May needs either 2/3s of the entire house (including empty seats) to agree to the election, OR needs to propose and win a vote of no confidence in her own government and avoid a new confidence vote within 14 days of that.

She may want an election, but she's a long way off getting one yet...!

[Galant]

Will May definitely be the Con. leader or is there a chance she'll step down?

As for Labour, it's their own fault they're in a shambles. Quite frankly, I'm not sure another two years would be enough for them to get their act together.

Little bit surprised for the dislike towards May. She's hardly had time to do anything much beyond all the Brexit tasks. She's seemed quite reasonable to me. But maybe I've missed something?



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[TheAnimus]

Who is going to vote against it?

Labour can't block it, it would look very bad, not to mention 2/3rds of the MPs probably want it, just to get Corbyn gone.

[spacein_vader]

What odds over 450 Tory MPs? I wouldn't be surprised, lets look at the other parties:

Labour: Corbyn is about to find out just how small a group Momentum are in the grand scheme of things, he's about to make Michael Foot look popular.

Lib Dems: Sadly lost their way, a religious nutter in charge & seemingly no policy platform beyond Brexit is bad mmkay.

UKIP: Might take a couple of seats if they're lucky, but why would you vote for a single issue party that already achieved their single issue?

Greens/Plaid Cyrmu: Same old, they'll probably keep their current holdings but won't make any serious dents.

SNP: With the Tories persona non grata north of the border & Labour being an even bigger shambles than they were at the last election I'd expect them to hold almost every seat up there again. If they do, expect Sturgeon to see it as the population validating her calls for another referendum.

So basically the Tories will steamroller it with no meaningful opposition south of Gretna, should get the biggest majority for decades. Anything less will be seen as a failure internally I would suggest.

Do that and she'll have enough of a majority to stop the Tory far right tail wagging the brexit dog at least. Her only problem will be the Scots wanting out.

[Saracen]

Can we change "called" to "proposed" please?

May needs either 2/3s of the entire house (including empty seats) to agree to the election, OR needs to propose and win a vote of no confidence in her own government and avoid a confidence within 14 days of that.

She may want an election, but she's a long way off getting one yet...!

Technically, that's correct. What's she's actually called for is a vote in Parliament tomorrow to use the Fixed Term Parliament Act provision of a two-thirds majority to call an election.


But given the circumstances, given that she's basically called a "Brexit Election", can you see either LibDems or SNP voting to not have one, and therefore implicitly back the government's position?

And as for Labour, she's putting them on the spot, too. Can you see the Labour leadership ducking the challenge? Refusing the chance to oust the Tories?

And then, there's the rift between Corbyn and a very substantial chunk if his own Parliamentary party. He's won two leadership challenges within the wider party, but most Labour MPs can't him and consider him an existential threat to Labour as an electoral force. About the only way Labour can ditch Corbyn in the next few years is if he suffers a humiliating General Election defeat.


So what choice does Corbyn have but to back going to the country? Even if hd was stupid enough to call for blocking the GE, and three-line whip it, my bet is that the small Tory
majority, plus likely LibDem and SNP support (as the only chancs to block Brexit) plus a large number of Labour MPs, nany if whom are remainers, will see an each-way bet .... win and they damage or stop Brexit, and loose and they can probably defenestrate Corbyn.

So I think they'll even defy a three-line whip to vote for a GE.

Time (about 24 hours, give or take) will tell, but I bet thus election WILL happen, probably on 8th June, because I can't see any politically acceptable way Labour et. al. can conceivably turn down the chance.

[ik9000]

oh good Lord, just when you think it can't get any weirder. Surely the time to call this would have been BEFORE enacting article wot-not...?

Likely outcome:

Don't get me wrong I don't like the current bunch, but what viable alternative is there that enough people will vote for to supplant them?

We probably end up with what we currently have, but on steroids as they claim a mandate for all there NHS-killing, school destroying, pandering to the uber-rich ways,

or else, and possibly worse:

Corbyn gets elected, brexit still happens, but with a limp wristed mumbler at the helm who gets us no deal worth having. Economy dives. He then cancels trident and nuclear deterent just before things really kick off with N Korea, Russia et al. And we get to sit impotently watching and getting pushed around economically and politically with no means to influence factors otherwise. Those domestic conditions and kind of humiliation to a previously comfortable populace tend to foster dissent, internal strife, civil unrest and even coups. Going by case-studies in Africa the outcome of which is either police-state crackdown or civil war. Occasionally spatterings of genocide get thrown in just for extra cack on the fan blades.

Get those emmigration papers out now folks. Any rellies in foreign climbs? Start tapping them up now. The trajectory could get real nasty if all the bad options align. And I'm not sure which is the good option. Is there one?

[Corky34]

Little bit surprised for the dislike towards May. She's hardly had time to do anything much beyond all the Brexit tasks. She's seemed quite reasonable to me. But maybe I've missed something?

In some peoples eyes she didn't cover herself with glory when she was home secretary.

[scaryjim]

Who is going to vote against it?

Labour can't block it, it would look very bad, not to mention 2/3rds of the MPs probably want it, just to get Corbyn gone.

Oh, so many issues with that.

Labour probably don't care about looking bad now if it delays a GE by 3 years. The Tories need more than 100 other MPs to vote with them to swing the necessary majority - and I'm not sure they'll even be confident of the support of all their own MPs. If you're a Tory MP in a pro-EU marginal there is no way you want a GE now.

Losing a GE now won't necessarily get rid of Corbyn - he has huge grass roots support in the Labour membership and even if there's another leadership contest there's no guarantee he won't win again - after all, he's won two in the last two years with huge majorities. It's a major indicator of just how much distance there is between the Parliamentary Labour Party and the general membership.

I suspect the Lib Dems are too precious to consider it, but a LD/Green alliance cold really shake things up...

[Corky34]

Question: If an early GE is held in June does that mean because of the fixed term parliament act that the next GE will be in 2022 or would it still be in 2020?

[scaryjim]

Question: If an early GE is held in June does that mean because of the fixed term parliament act that the next GE will be in 2022 or would it still be in 2020?

2022, as I understand it:

Section 1 of the Act provides for such polling days to occur on the first Thursday in May of the fifth year after the previous general election

Anyway, Corbyn's already hit up facebook with this message:

I welcome the Prime Minister’s decision to give the British people the chance to vote for a government that will put the interests of the majority first.

Labour will be offering the country an effective alternative to a government that has failed to rebuild the economy, delivered falling living standards and damaging cuts to our schools and NHS.

In the last couple of weeks, Labour has set out policies that offer a clear and credible choice for the country. We look forward to showing how Labour will stand up for the people of Britain.

Guess he reckons that a good election result (even if Labour don't win) might silence his critics? Or he's hoping that good results for the SNP and LD might give Labour a chance in a rainbow coalition without him having to commit one way or the other on the EU....?

[TheAnimus]

Oh, so many issues with that.

Labour probably don't care about looking bad now if it delays a GE by 3 years. The Tories need more than 100 other MPs to vote with them to swing the necessary majority - and I'm not sure they'll even be confident of the support of all their own MPs. If you're a Tory MP in a pro-EU marginal there is no way you want a GE now.

Losing a GE now won't necessarily get rid of Corbyn - he has huge grass roots support in the Labour membership and even if there's another leadership contest there's no guarantee he won't win again - after all, he's won two in the last two years with huge majorities. It's a major indicator of just how much distance there is between the Parliamentary Labour Party and the general membership.

I suspect the Lib Dems are too precious to consider it, but a LD/Green alliance cold really shake things up...

Already been reported that Labour are going to vote for it.

The problem is that when they changed it to be any member can vote for a leader, I guess to remove power from the unions, they didn't think about entryisim. Oh well.

As for an LD/Green alliance, I can't help but feel they might not have enough support to do anything at all. The LD's are still considered "betrayers" by the champagne socialists who felt that people who didn't go to uni, should have to pay for their education. It's probably not helped by having a non-secular leader too.

[scaryjim]

... As for an LD/Green alliance, I can't help but feel they might not have enough support to do anything at all. The LD's are still considered "betrayers" by the champagne socialists who felt that people who didn't go to uni, should have to pay for their education. ...

True, but they've had their kicking now. And since the LDs are the only "major" party running on an openly pro-EU ticket, I suspect a lot of those supporters will decide that they've learned their lesson and go flooding back, given an opportunity to increase the pro-EU loading of Parliament before Brexit is a done deal. Had the referendum gone the other way I wouldn't've given the LDs a chance even in 2020, but given the current political playground....

*shrug* It's all a bit crystal ball gazing, isn't it - fun, but not really helpful.

[peterb]

Pigeons - heres a cat..

However, I'm slightly surprised she is calling for one now - the logical time would have been in the September after the referendum when she was elected leader of the party. Still it will give the BBC something else to talk about other than Brexit.