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WI: Conservatives win 10 fewer seats in 2017

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AgentRudda

I DID EVERYTHING RITE AND THEY INDICTED MEee 👐
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The pod is that labour do ten seats better/Tories ten seats worse, so that Tories+DUP doesn't add up to a majority.

What would've happened immediately? I think that Theresa May would've likely been coup'd - she almost was otl despite forming a government. But if/when she resigns would Corbyn have become PM or would another Tory have gone to the palace and attempted to put forward a Queen's Speech? Constitutionally, this is unclear. Also it's unclear whether, having failed to pass a QS, the Tory PM would've had to resign in favour of Corbyn, or seek an election. They could've simply put Parliament in recess until October - the 2017 Parliament meeting once, to elect a speaker, then dissolving.

Similar questions apply for Corbyn. On those numbers, no government could've been formed.

Then there's the political ramifications.
 
The Conservatives would still have been the largest party so would have had first dibs on forming a government- a swift coup and sending someone to the Palace seems likely but who would be the sacrificial lamb to go forward in that case?

Looking at the likely flips we'd see the following:

Labour: Southampton Itchen, Priseli Pembrokeshire, Pudsey, Thurrock, Hastings and Rye, Chipping Barnet, Norwich North.
Lib Dem: Richmond Park, St. Ives
SNP: Stirling

So that's Rudd and Villiers gone, a slightly better night for the Lib Dems (would a slightly poorer performance for the Tories have meant we got NE Fife as well? Possible but probably immaterial) and a solid little set there for Labour.

Lib+Lab+SNP would be a majority in this situation, but I can't help but wonder if that would really be that stable- both the Lib Dems and SNP would probably put cancelling Brexit as a red line for coalition agreements (Labour might force them to moderate it down to 'literally just shunt out to the EEA').

October election seems likely here.
 
Alex Richards said:
The Conservatives would still have been the largest party so would have had first dibs on forming a government- a swift coup and sending someone to the Palace seems likely but who would be the sacrificial lamb to go forward in that case?

Looking at the likely flips we'd see the following:

Labour: Southampton Itchen, Priseli Pembrokeshire, Pudsey, Thurrock, Hastings and Rye, Chipping Barnet, Norwich North.
Lib Dem: Richmond Park, St. Ives
SNP: Stirling

So that's Rudd and Villiers gone, a slightly better night for the Lib Dems (would a slightly poorer performance for the Tories have meant we got NE Fife as well? Possible but probably immaterial) and a solid little set there for Labour.

Lib+Lab+SNP would be a majority in this situation, but I can't help but wonder if that would really be that stable- both the Lib Dems and SNP would probably put cancelling Brexit as a red line for coalition agreements (Labour might force them to moderate it down to 'literally just shunt out to the EEA').

October election seems likely here.
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Would the Lib Dems have the money to contest a second election?
 
KingCrawa said:
Would the Lib Dems have the money to contest a second election?
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Would they have had the desire to work with Corbyn?

An S&C deal for the Tories with the DUP and Lib Dems seems likely, with a soft Brexit deal and an exit referendum. I think the Lib Dems would be sufficiently horrified of Corbyn to go into business with the Tories again, and the Tories would be scared enough of Labour to accept the terms.

I'd see the possibility of a Remain leader, if one can be found, or maybe Boris Johnson as PM battling Brexit and muttering "only Nixon could go to China" as an excuse for brazen opportunism.

Whether this deal could last a year, I don't know. I think there'd be a strong motivation to try
 
Sideways said:
Would they have had the desire to work with Corbyn?

An S&C deal for the Tories with the DUP and Lib Dems seems likely, with a soft Brexit deal and an exit referendum. I think the Lib Dems would be sufficiently horrified of Corbyn to go into business with the Tories again, and the Tories would be scared enough of Labour to accept the terms.

I'd see the possibility of a Remain leader, if one can be found, or maybe Boris Johnson as PM battling Brexit and muttering "only Nixon could go to China" as an excuse for brazen opportunism.

Whether this deal could last a year, I don't know. I think there'd be a strong motivation to try
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Wouldn't the optics of the Lib Dems going in bed with the Tories again be...really toxic?
 
We possibly get our shortest-serving PM ever, if a caretaker takes over from May and governs for a couple of months before the forced election leads to - potentially - Jez getting a shot.

Canning was 100 days or so IIRC, so it's doable.
 
Meadow said:
We possibly get our shortest-serving PM ever, if a caretaker takes over from May and governs for a couple of months before the forced election leads to - potentially - Jez getting a shot.

Canning was 100 days or so IIRC, so it's doable.
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Or potentially the Conservatives could admit that they can't form a government, and Corbyn could spend a day or two trying to cobble together a Progressive Alliance before admitting defeat and going to the country - in that case, the 'Corbyn ministry' could be even shorter than that of the Earl of Bath.
 
Youngmarshall said:
I'm not convinced the lib dems wouldn't just role the dice and force another election, tbh.
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After they've just had a grinding slog of an election where @iainbhx was talking about total wipeout being a possibility, but to their relief have just barely made it out with 12 seats on polling day even those they lost some of the 8 won in 2015 and Richmond Park?

Really?
 
Thande said:
After they've just had a grinding slog of an election where @iainbhx was talking about total wipeout being a possibility, but to their relief have just barely made it out with 12 seats on polling day even those they lost some of the 8 won in 2015 and Richmond Park?

Really?
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I think if there had been another general election last year I would have literally died.
 
Thande said:
After they've just had a grinding slog of an election where @iainbhx was talking about total wipeout being a possibility, but to their relief have just barely made it out with 12 seats on polling day even those they lost some of the 8 won in 2015 and Richmond Park?

Really?
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They spent most of that campaign arguing against forming a coalition. Its three bad options for them. Another election is something nobody wants but so is another coalition.
 
Youngmarshall said:
They spent most of that campaign arguing against forming a coalition. Its three bad options for them. Another election is something nobody wants but so is another coalition.
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Has there been another example in recent political history of a party making the centrepiece of its campaign 'x' in one election, and then the next (very soon) election running on 'the opposite of x'? The Lib Dems saying 'we need to be in coalition' and then saying 'we will not go into coalition' in 2015 and 2017 respectively may look a bit strange to future historians.

I guess you could say 'most parties in 2015 vs 2017 on Europe', but that wasn't the centrepiece of either campaign.
 
Meadow said:
Has there been another example in recent political history of a party making the centrepiece of its campaign 'x' in one election, and then the next (very soon) election running on 'the opposite of x'? The Lib Dems saying 'we need to be in coalition' and then saying 'we will not go into coalition' in 2015 and 2017 respectively may look a bit strange to future historians.

I guess you could say 'most parties in 2015 vs 2017 on Europe', but that wasn't the centrepiece of either campaign.
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Tim would have to go for us to be able to go into Coalition. I imagine the (obviously necessarily quick) leadership contest could drum up some interest if we had one leader saying "We should go Labour" one saying "We should go alone" and one going "We should go Tory". After his "gaffes" of the election I can't see any appetite for keeping him on into a next election...

And the actual "no coalitions, no, no, no, no, no" was obviously a reaction to how poorly received "look left, look right, walk into a bus" was, capitalising on the "Reverse Brexit All The Others Are Brexit Parties" USP.
 
On the issue of who forms a government, I think it's very much a good example of our 'make it up as you go along' constitution. Personally, my bet is that Theresa May says "no I'm staying deal with it", forms a government.

This then gets DUP and Lib Dem support. The former naturally falls in line; the latter more reluctantly. Sir Vince sends his MPs down the Aye lobby to 'prevent national chaos', but refuses to actually commit himself to a deal lasting more than a few months. This is seen as firing the starting gun for the October election, which happens two weeks after Tory conference.

By the way, a Labour majority at this election means Boris Johnson and IDS both lose their seats.
 
AgentRudda said:
On the issue of who forms a government, I think it's very much a good example of our 'make it up as you go along' constitution. Personally, my bet is that Theresa May says "no I'm staying deal with it", forms a government.

This then gets DUP and Lib Dem support. The former naturally falls in line; the latter more reluctantly. Sir Vince sends his MPs down the Aye lobby to 'prevent national chaos', but refuses to actually commit himself to a deal lasting more than a few months. This is seen as firing the starting gun for the October election, which happens two weeks after Tory conference.

By the way, a Labour majority at this election means Boris Johnson and IDS both lose their seats.
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It's Tim at this point. But FWIW, yes, I can see him propping up May more quickly than Jez. Though if the two men did pull off a deal, it wouldn't be the first photo op of Jez making friends with a homophobe amirite
 
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