we march on a road of bones

9:30pm Right. Liveblogging. Yes. I believe it’s traditional to start by laying out the terms of a drinking game, so here goes with the official B & T election drinking game. 

 i) watch election results. 

 ii) get drunk. 

 How’s that? 

And while we prepare to meet our doom, let’s take a look at this rather scholarly essay on how European social democracy slowly abolished itself, while nonetheless becoming surprised and anguished when the electorate duly concurred.

10:03. Blimey. Exit poll puts the Lib Dems down on seats from last time, on 59. Labour on 255 Tories on 307, 19 short. Sounds a little on the iffy side. Seems to imply that the Tories have taken LD seats, which is difficult to believe. That, plus postal votes not accounted for.

Gove on TV saying people were "flocking" to the Tories. Like Eastern Europeans to Rochdale, eh Mickey?

10:22. Mandelson on the Beeb, basically saying that the exit poll was evidence of a "long comeback" by Labour and looking incredibly sinister as he did it. Everything he says sounds like a blackmail demand. Evil man. Astounding balls, though.

10:30. Hey, insider knowledge from Richard in comments: "The missus, who is out at a work election do, reports a very muted response there, which as they're the guys responsible for the poll in the first place..." Looks like we've got an iffy one. Tories talking it down too.

10:45. Alan Johnson and the Colour Out of Space now promising PR to the Lib Dems, live on TV. Presumably they think it's worth the effort.

10:56. The mackems have done their usual speedy vote counting trick; now the exhausted counters are being thrown herrings. Low poll, labour vote down 10%. Some local character scooped up two and a half thousand votes as an independent, which may complicate things.

11:03. Apparently the DUP expect to sweep the board in Northern Ireland. Expect Tory minority government to ban papal visit on grounds that he is the antichrist. Douglas Alexander pushing "long comeback" meme to Paxman. Cold dead fingers, etc.

11: 12. Andrew Neil and Portillo: "Woe, woe, hung parliament. Think of the markets! The poor, poor, little markets! Who will think of them?" Yep. It's the love that dare not speak it's name.

11:30. Mackem vote skinners strike again. 11% swing to Tories.

11:35. Clarke just on Sky saying that PR would cause both Labour and Tory to split. He's put his finger on it, and also maybe on why it would be a good idea.

23:45. BBC talking up Tory chances in Sunderland central but it didn't fly. Majority down by 3000, 5% swing to Tories, less than in the other two seats. Back in hung parliament territory.

23:48. Reports of people turned away from the polls in Sheffield going to Nick Clegg's house to ask for his personal intercession. Now that's Cleggmania. 

23:53. "So when Nigel Farage's plane crashed, was he delivering a box of Milk Tray to someone?" laugh lines of the night, courtesy of Mrs Treasure.

The Chimes of Midnight. AP reporting that Tories are going to take Battersea. Rescue party for Charlie, anyone?

12:07. Constitutional expert wheeled on. Blah, blah, blah. So what are you all drinking then? Got me a nice little rioja. Followed by some cheap vodka I think.

12:13. David Starkey: "I call it a L'Oreal election." Thanks David. How about fuck off? Martin Amis very very drunk. 

12:22. The missus - the missus who used to read Spare Rib - just asked me which of the party leader's wives I would prefer to "do". Crazy night. Obviously, and taking a merely impartial and disinterested interest, there is a very good chance that Mrs Clegg would win this particular straw poll, while Mrs Brown's Bobby Charlton knees would be something of a deal breaker. But I throw the question open to the floor.

Sky are saying that the Lib Dems are going to take Edinburgh South.

12:28. The Beeb seem to have teleported Mandelson back to Planet Tharg. Shame. We may have been about to actually see his tentacles.

12:40. Querulous Dimbleby asking why, oh why, can't people vote. Because there's no redundancy in the system, fool. It's efficiency. It's what you all wanted. It's what you all want now, like strong government.

12:50. Peter Robinson has lost his seat in Belfast, to the Alliance no less. Which is kind of a Lib Dem win. Arch tosser Toby Young wants to do the election all over again. Maureen Lipman also very, very drunk. Celebrities of all persuasions seem to be generally crapulous. This makes me happy.

1:06 Tories take Kingswood on 9 per cent swing; also Basildon, according to the BBC. Beeb are talking up Tory majority.

1:10 Lib Dems hold Torbay. Small Lib Dem swing. Not over yet, but the Labour vote looks very, very weak. They were trained to vote for Blair, and now a lot of them are voting for the heir to Blair.

1:21. reports from Stoke Central project the BNP pushed into fourth. Yay, Tristram.

1:27. Wesleyan Pixie uprising! Plaid take Arfon, fail to take Ynys Mon. Labour vote seems to be holding up better in the Northwest. Nonetheless, Blunkett now predicting Tory majority. First Labour spokesman to say so.

1:41. It's the same old story. Labour bleeding votes in all directions, though not yet enough to benefit the Lib Dems hugely. They haven't quite chewed through the bottom of the conscience vote. If you stay a loyal Labour voter, you're going to be in the position of the Squiffyites sooner or later, probably sooner.

1:45. Labour keep Tooting, withal. So no Northwood size swing nationwide. Also, tactical voting from the Lib dems. Chaos rules.

1:58. Tories fail to take Gedling, one of their East Midlands targets. Lib Dem vote collapses in Newbury. There's no pattern here. Thy hand, great anarch!

2:02. Gerald Scarfe is showing Andrew Neil a picture of Gordon Brown with an Albatross round his neck. How about fuck off, Gerald?

2: 24. Welsh farmers take the opportunity to get rid of Lembit Opik. They're tired of carrying a professional eccentric because he carries a party label. It's just personal here, isn't it? The general point about this whole thing is that people are trying to vote as though they are free, in whatever direction suits them. You might characterise this as the individual versus the market, which we are told wants things more regulated.

2:42: Lib Dems hold Itchen and beat the Tories in Eastbourne, but lose Harrogate on a nine percent swing. Major discovery process going on among the comfortable.

2:51. George Bush looks likely to retain Edgbaston: a road of bones bones indeed.

3:04. I don't think the bond markets are going to like Cameron's acceptance speech; all the more so since it was directed to them.

3:21. Griffin concedes defeat in Barking, according to the Guardian. Paxman outraged that talks may have already begun between Lib Dems and Labour.  

3:37. Lib Dems win Burnley, but lose very badly in Oxford East. The general story is "electorate breaks free, for better or worse."  the Beeb are showing angry thwarted voters in Withington, who look like Lib Dems to me..

3:47. The BBC are saying that there were queues at polling stations in Hulme. That's unprecedented. 

Incidentally, Labour have held Rochdale: politician beats elderly female bigot. Tories win in Carlisle but Labour hold them off off in most of their Northwest marginals.

4:07. OK. time to check out now. Thanks to everyone for visiting, and putting in. I like the way the result has made the whole process difficult for the bastards of whatever party. They will no doubt adapt. The Beeb right now are predicting a narrow victory for the Tories over Ed Balls. Oh, boo fucking hoo.

Ha. Andrew Neil is taking a thirty second soundbite from considerably bald hollow eyed commentator, Nick Cohen. And on that note...

Comments

[Chris Williams]

Battersea. Con. See?

[Chris Williams]

Is Gordon resigning? The speech was rather valedictory, but there was also a big electoral reform chunk.

[Charlie]

With nearly a 6,000 majority as well. And with about 7,000+ going to the Lib Dem candidate.

[Charlie]

And some major tactical voting in Tooting. Lib Dem vote way down, and Labour hold it.

[Charlie]

Battersea now officially a borough of aspiration.

Since I've only recently moved here, what I really care about is Richmond Park. If Susan Kramer loses to Zac Goldsmith, there'll be tears.

[Phil]

Deeply depressed by Blunkett (even blogged it). The position is starting to look a bit less clear, again. Big f-off swings to the Tories absolutely everywhere... but not absolutely everywhere enough? Be still my beating heart.

Whichever of the main parties loses is going to absolutely tear itself apart, starting Monday at the latest. This may apply to all three of them.

[Phil]

"...and I'm joined by Kirstie Allsopp, Chris Addison and Shappi Khorsandi." Says Andrew Neil.

What's on the other side?

[Chris Williams]

sanity

[Chris Williams]

Scarfe was, at best, a homeopathically dilute Ralph Steadman. He has lost even that.

Phil - what are you drinking?

[Phil]

Nothing at the moment - a couple of pints and a Springbank earlier on.

[Chris Williams]

You shame me. I can't cope with the coverage without serious booze. The reality is easier to handle.

[Charlie]

Annunziata Rees-Mogg: unsuccessful.

[Charlie]

My theory about the Lib Dem difficulty: those on the Tory end of the Lib Dem spectrum are pissed off at what they consider to be a wet Lib Dem immigration policy, Trident, etc., and have defected Tory.

[Phil]

...and those of us who actually agree with a lot of current LD policy wouldn't touch them because they refused to come off the fence wrt equidistance from Labour and the Tories (see my blog recently, passim). Wheels come off permanent triangulation strategy.

[Chris Williams]

Might be true. Tories appear to be breaking through on unexpected fronts, and being driven back also on on unexpected ones. The voting cock-up thang strikes me as another manifestation of cheap video.

Brown is toast: a counter to be thrown into the pot by the Shoggoth.

[Steve]

"Annunziata Rees-Mogg: unsuccessful."

Three-and-a-bit words that make me very happy.

[Charlie]

Cameron looking to defend his position in his Witney declaration speech.

[Chris Williams]

I hoping for a pattern to emerge about now so that I could crawl off to bed with a bon mot or deux, my homo clausus reflexivity intact. Looking like it's not to be. The morning's looking increasingly dodgy as I pour another glass, and commit myself to another hour ro so of trying to work out how it's going to endd

[Charlie]

Bond markets: I didn't spot that. Was it the strong and stable government spiel?

[jamie]

"another hour ro so of trying to work out how it's going to endd"

Oh dear. Never mind. I'll wrap it up in an hour or so, and we'll leave the rest to Satan. Have a cup of tea and a fag and straighten your head the while.

[Charlie]

Chris: it looks to me as though there's going to be an erratic walk to Tory gains of around 100 seats and Labour losses of about the same. What does that come to in the end?

[jamie]

...and thanks for showing up, one and all. This has been a pretty good night, though not outside our little bubble and all.

[Chris Williams]

Sorry Charlie, I haven't the faintest. Lots of London stuff still to declare. I'd put a fiver on the Tories being 5 short, but it would be a crazy fiver.

Staying up for Brighton Pav...

[Phil]

Lord forgive me, I'm staying up for Gisela Stuart. She's a dreadful MP, and I remember thinking her election in the first place was a sign that the New Labour wave had gone far too far, but it would be so nice if the Tories failed to take the seat.

(Really ought to get a left alternative into gear in time for the next round.)

[Chris Williams]

Good: Griffin down. Bad: perhaps Cruddas down also. Worse: no sign of a pattern til 5am. I'm to bed. There will be some very bad tempered and quick to anger transporting of the kids to school tomoroow. Such is life.

[Alex]

Looks like (pace Brian Barder and Charlie above) a Well-Hung Parliament; the Paisleyites won't be enough to push the Tories over the top. Greens in.

Lord (Robert) Armstrong on the radio; obviously vastly smarter than all the other participants, but clearly traumatised by 1974. Tories lying.

[Richard J]

Good: Griffin, Wonko Fuckola, Jacquie Smith, Phillipa Stroud, Esther Rantzen, & Clarke down. Green win in Brighton. Parliament looking good and hung. Tories in some state of shock. A general trend that Cameron's faction seem to have been the big losers in the Tory party in terms of who's got in.

Neutral: One of the Rees-Moggs got in. Over the years I've drunk champagne with two people who are now Tory MPs (Nice Tories, mind).

Bad: Disappointing slump in Lib-Dem seats. Evan Harris getting voted out in favour of a fundy Christian.

[Richard J]

Also, some surprise that exit poll was accurate. Score one for Mrs J's work.

[ajay]

It's not great for Cameron; I mean, if you can't beat the government outright on the back of two unpopular wars and the biggest recession since the 1930s, when can you beat them?

[Richard J]

What ajay said.

[ajay]

When Cameron was elected as Conservative leader, I noted that, up to that point, Conservative leaders had tended to last roughly half as long as their predecessors. Thatcher 15 years, Major 7, Hague 4 and so on. I ran the numbers on this - obviously Cameron has already broken the half-life decay-curve model, but if you do a best-fit polynomial it predicts he'd go in June 2011.
Still looking good for that.

[Richard J]

A few senior Tories are supposed to be about to come public with their gripes and gruntles on how Cameron ran the campaign, so, well, interesting times. I genuinely don't know how this is going to play out. He's lost an awful lot of political capital, and the Tories have always been like sharks in scenting blood in the water.

[Tom]

"He's lost an awful lot of political capital"

His backers now presumably consist of a few loyal trusties in the Parliamentary party and the tabloids. Not sure that's exactly a Coalition of the Willing, really.

Boris is making his move. Really overtly, too.

[ajay]

Oh, hey:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8668305.stm
A Moscow court has handed down a five-year jail term to one of the eight men detained over the mysterious seizure of the cargo ship Arctic Sea.

The Beeb is baffled by the whole affair...

[Richard J]

That one belongs in the file alongside the Moscow apartment bombings; just happening to be carrying out corps-strength military exercises near Georgia; and various assassinations of lippy politicians. One of those incidents that makes you wish that there's a Procopious in the Putin camp.