You may Sir!

Well we went and voted tonight and took the opportunity to introduce the dog to the local pub. I'm very pleased to say that he behaved impeccably and made quite a few new friends.

Well, I got to the voting booth this morning and had a slight rethink of my voting intentions; on realising I actually had 4 votes instead of 3 - 1 for parliament, 1 for district council, and 2 for town council - I used my 'spare' vote for a bit of a protest.

Looks like it's going to be a clean sweep for the Tories!

Yes Margaret, the best (and by God that's saying something!) of a very, very, bad lot.

I'm afraid the UK has got what it deserves by way of politicians; and until more people recognise the importance of the vote and are prepared to hold their elected representative to account we'll continue down this unsatisfactory road.

Interestingly, before the elections I emailed all of my candidates three times about issues that were of importance to me. I had no response from the Tories or UKIP. Labour and the union coalition party (or whatever their full title is) both replied twice and the greens once. Now, if that's the treatment I get before they're elected (and they want my vote) what can I expect afterwards?

Rebbonk, could you answer me this question as someone who knows the Coventry scene.
How is it that Geoffrey Robinson, a multi-millionaire who lives in a palace in Surrey has now been a Labour MP for Coventry South for about 40 years and keeps getting elected?
Robinson is the guy who introduced ISA's when he was secretary to the treasury under Blah. He had quite a lot to do with Brown I recall, but Brown quickly ran away from him when Robinson got mired in some scandal.

Is he a director of Coventry City Football Club, because he doesn't seem to be putting much money their way.

Ah, Mr Robinson...

Ex general manager of Jaguar cars and they cried when he left. He was very popular. He was also chairman of the Italian company Innocenti in the early 70s and involved with the Meriden motorcycle co-operative. He was involved with Trans-Tec an aerospace company (read big profits) which he founded in the 80s.

Robinson apparently lent Mandelson money but Mandelson failed to declare it and it caused a bit of a rumpus.

I understand that he was (is?) a member of the local football club board and allegedly lost quite a lot of money with them.

I can't say I've ever met him, but did see him once in the distance when he was canvassing around my area. (They've since redrawn the boundaries).

How someone can represent an area they don't live in is beyond me and I think it ought be made illegal.

I see him as a champagne socialist and suspect he is repeatedly selected for this 'safe seat' because of his financials, and connections. There are a lot of inconsistencies in his past that I can only put down to having the right connections. (For example, he's held a financial role in Jaguar when he has no financial qualifications)

How his fortune was amassed.... well, I believe he was bequeathed that by a Belgian millionairess who (depending on the source you read) was a former model.

As you can see from here link he's been a busy businessman outside of politics

That's very interesting, thanks for that.
It may be of course that Mr. Robinson is an excellent constituency MP, and I can't think that he would have lasted so long if he wasn't. That said, I've always had the sense with him, a whiff of all not being as it should be, and I think there was some problem with this Transtec that either the courts or the law just couldn't get to the bottom of. He obviously has powerful friends, but even Blair's sleaze ridden government found Robinson too much bear. I always recall the way he used to smarm his way round Brown and regularly got him to go to Coventry games in the box area, but Brown is nobody's fool, and when some scandal blew up again around Robinson, he was out. He always reminds me of one of these old style US politicians from the 1930's, pulling the strings and doing all kinds of wheeler dealing. I think they call it pork barrel politics.
Thanks for the link.

Well, not only was the result a bit of a surprise, we've seen more than a few apple carts upset.

Several high profiles lost their seats. 3 leaders have resigned, and the liberals lost their deposit in several areas.

No doubt we'll now have public outpourings of what went wrong and blame being apportioned. Frankly, I hope that Clegg and Miliband are proud of themselves.

Clegg sold out and wondered why his party got trounced.

Miliband whilst admittedly struggling under the ever present shadow of Blair and his tenure, made the grave mistake of forgetting just where the roots of his party are and of saying that he'd support minority groups.

I think we will be in for an interesting and tumultuous five years. Anyone care to take a bet on how long before we see civil unrest?

I read a brilliant comment in the comment section of the New York Times.
Someone said, that the problem of Scottish Independence is greater than the solution of a conservative parliamentary majority.
Clearly there are now huge cultural difference between Scotland and England and pretty soon Cameron has got to start working to draft what will be complex legislation on the EU referendum which the Scottish Nationalists are opposed to. I guess what they are going to do is to extort as much money as possible from English voters using the threat of the break up of the UK and then blame Cameron when it does.
There is going to be a lot of pressure on Cameron from his own party to make no more concessions such as free tuition fees to the Scots, etc.
It seems to me that this so called solid majority that the conservatives have is less solid than appears.

At the end of the day, people want stability. I think maybe the Conservatives won because the alternative road lead to chaos. 'Better the devil you know' etc.

When the 'Cannabis Is Safer Than Alcohol' party gets more votes than you, maybe it's time to call it a day.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election/2015/results

I was thinking along those lines too Lex,
On the brighter side we've got of rid of most of the muppets!
Obviously its the EU referendum because there is surely going to be a majority against that.

The EU played a part, I think, but that never seems to be the main issue in General Elections. UKIP always do well in EU elections due to the protest vote, but at the end of the day most people seem to want a quiet life with a few spare pounds in their pockets.

Beer, fags, footie and reality TV, Lex.

Basically, yes.