Another Hung Parliament?

Whilst being too young to actually vote, the first election I campaigned in was the General Election of February 1974. Those old enough will recall that this was the last election (prior to the last 2010 election) where no political party won an absolute majority to govern in parliament alone.

In the years between elections and the run-up to elections since (with the exception of the post Falkland war period), there have been media and political commentators predicting a “hung parliament”; nine General Elections later, they were finally right!

There are fifteen Lib Dems seats which were either by-election victories (Brent East, now Brent Central), seats with a substantial student/recent graduate population (Cardiff Central), or former northern industrial seats (Redcar), that Labour will be looking to re-gain or win from them.

Electoral calculus is predicting the 2015 General Election will give Labour a majority similar to that in 2005. I am bemused by those commentators who believe the Lib Dems can lose over half their national vote yet not lose a single parliamentary seat. Of course, no matter what the result of the next General Election, a hung parliament will be predicted by these same commentators.