Election night result rumours that turned out to be BS

[Deleted]

Mar 2, 2018 0:57:30 GMT timmullen1 said:

Mar 1, 2018 23:00:19 GMT @conservativeestimate said:

In 1997 Gordon was projected as a Conservative hold and ended up being a Lib Dem win.

At one point it was the last chunk of Scottish blue on Peter Snow’s map, which was obviously slow to update as Malcolm Bruce’s win had already gone across the straplines on the bottom of the screen.

Bruce didn’t just win the seat, his majority was 6,997. But the sketchy notionals made it look like a more vast swing than it was.

My heart sunk for a bit on election night 2017 as I’d bet £50 at 10-1 on the Conservatives taking Gordon and the BBC were forecasting a Lib Dem gain!

[swanarcadian]

Mar 1, 2018 23:29:33 GMT Davıd Boothroyd said:

Elizabeth Shields was 90 the other day - the oldest former Liberal/Lib Dem MP.

A lot of people expected her to hold on due to name recognition, decent anti-Tory votes in the towns, and village activism. It sometimes works - Alan Beith managed it in Berwick.

To her credit she is not only still a councillor but the leader of the Lib Dem group on Ryedale DC (though admittedly there are only two Lib Dem councillors in total, in fact there are twice as many Liberals). She wrote a book: "A Year to Remember".

[Andrew_S]

I'd like to see some footage from the Ryedale by-election but it seems to be difficult to find any.

[hullenedge]

Mar 1, 2018 23:12:47 GMT @barnabymarder said:

Don't know if we're allowed pre-election-night nonsense - I recall in 1987 hearing that the Conservatives had "given up hope" of retaking Ryedale which they had lost in a by-election the year before to the Liberal Elizabeth Shields. They comfortably regained the seat, of course.

One of my old uni friends was involved with Ryedale Tories (stood in the 87 locals). He was horrified by their lack of organisation, snobbery and extreme social conservatism (although those standing as Independents made the Tories look a shade pink).

There was a bit of a hoo-ha when it was revealed that Elizabeth Shields had shaved a few years off her age but hardly likely to have cost her many votes.

The Labour candidate, Shirley Haines, for the 1986 by-election was adamant that she was going to win until her canvassing returns revealed an eve-of-poll dramatic swing to the Liberals.

[Davıd Boothroyd]

Mar 2, 2018 10:01:36 GMT Andrew_S said:

I'd like to see some footage from the Ryedale by-election but it seems to be difficult to find any.

Think it was the same day as the 1986 local elections (they were postponed by a week due to a Jewish religious holiday) so it will be combined with the local elections programme.

[Deleted]

I'm sure Andy JS could find some.

Has uploaded some very good footage of by-elections in the 80s.

[Chris from Brum]

Mar 2, 2018 10:15:40 GMT Davıd Boothroyd said:

Mar 2, 2018 10:01:36 GMT Andrew_S said:

I'd like to see some footage from the Ryedale by-election but it seems to be difficult to find any.

Think it was the same day as the 1986 local elections (they were postponed by a week due to a Jewish religious holiday) so it will be combined with the local elections programme.

That was the official reason.  Cynics speculated that it was because M Thatcher didn't like the idea of elections happening on May Day (which it would otherwise have been).

[Andrew_S]

Mar 2, 2018 10:31:07 GMT @barnabymarder said:

Incidentally at a very similar time (I think it was on the same day as the Fulham by-election, in which I did a great deal of work) there was a by-election in W Derbyshire caused by Matthew Parris's resignation to pursue journalism. The exit poll said the Liberals had won, but when the votes were counted the Tory candidate had won by exactly 100 votes, and of course he's still there.

The Tories were probably saved by the Labour vote increasing by 3% in third place.

[Andrew_S]

Mar 2, 2018 10:25:10 GMT @conservativeestimate said:

I'm sure Andy JS could find some.

Has uploaded some very good footage of by-elections in the 80s.

Yes but I'm struggling to find footage of this particular by-election. It'll be on someone's home video collection of course.

[hullenedge]

Shirley Haines was a firebrand who rattled many cages in York. The Tories were shocked when she won Fishergate in 1981, N Yorks CC. She was (is) a v.confident lady.

Derbyshire West - there's a Spectator article about the 1986 by-election. The correspondent didn't rate the Tory. The Labour candidate was praised.

The Ryedale by-election count...it was said that a 'new system' was employed to count the votes that would lead to a much quicker result being declared. No idea what the system was but a distant memory of the reporter saying that the bundles were checked as the count progressed.

[Davıd Boothroyd]

Patrick McLoughlin in West Derbyshire was somewhat famous before the byelection - he spoke at the 1984 Conservative conference as a Conservative-supporting working miner.

[hullenedge]

Speccie article:-

archive.spectator.co.uk/article/3rd-may-1986/18/west-derbyshires-flame

[The Bishop]

Mar 1, 2018 23:12:47 GMT @barnabymarder said:

Don't know if we're allowed pre-election-night nonsense - I recall in 1987 hearing that the Conservatives had "given up hope" of retaking Ryedale which they had lost in a by-election the year before to the Liberal Elizabeth Shields. They comfortably regained the seat, of course.

In fact "comfortably" if anything slightly understates it - they won by over 9k votes.

[Deleted]

Mar 1, 2018 14:25:29 GMT rivers10 said:

Not quite a rumour as such but more a truly woeful bit of election night reporting but one of the things that really sticks with me from the nights results shows was a load of crap Andrew Marr said after the Kettering result early on in the night.

The result had came in, Tory hold (no surprise there) what was surprising was the 2.5% swing to Labour in the seat of which all the others commented upon at length. Andrew Marr then ways in with what was clearly a line prepared well in advance of the night talking about how Phillip Hollobone had arranged a pact with UKIP for them not to stand, how UKIP had endorsed him, how he was basically a UKIP MP etc etc and thus the UKIP vote has broken overwhelmingly to him and he's consequently had a great result...err no Andrew there was a swing TO Labour.

What that whole debacle tells me is either 1) Marr is an idiot (I don't think this is the case) or 2) Marr has such an ego and is so confident in his own evidently mediocre abilities that he wasn't paying the blindest bit of attention to the preceding ten minutes of discussion on the Kettering result and first chance he got wades in with his pre prepared line blissfully unaware at how irrelevant it ultimately is, a sad state of affairs demonstrating both how arrogant and how mediocre one of the Beebs most well paid and supposedly respected political journalists is.

The ignorance of political reporters about elections is really quite startling and depressing. It tells you how invested they are in the Westminster horse race model of journalism that they don't bother to inform themselves of anything outside of it, even stuff that is so fundamental like this. (There are exceptions e.g. Michael Crick and David Hencke, who are not always correct but at least have some curiosity)

[timmullen1]

Mar 2, 2018 11:24:00 GMT @strinity said:

Mar 1, 2018 14:25:29 GMT rivers10 said:

Not quite a rumour as such but more a truly woeful bit of election night reporting but one of the things that really sticks with me from the nights results shows was a load of crap Andrew Marr said after the Kettering result early on in the night.

The result had came in, Tory hold (no surprise there) what was surprising was the 2.5% swing to Labour in the seat of which all the others commented upon at length. Andrew Marr then ways in with what was clearly a line prepared well in advance of the night talking about how Phillip Hollobone had arranged a pact with UKIP for them not to stand, how UKIP had endorsed him, how he was basically a UKIP MP etc etc and thus the UKIP vote has broken overwhelmingly to him and he's consequently had a great result...err no Andrew there was a swing TO Labour.

What that whole debacle tells me is either 1) Marr is an idiot (I don't think this is the case) or 2) Marr has such an ego and is so confident in his own evidently mediocre abilities that he wasn't paying the blindest bit of attention to the preceding ten minutes of discussion on the Kettering result and first chance he got wades in with his pre prepared line blissfully unaware at how irrelevant it ultimately is, a sad state of affairs demonstrating both how arrogant and how mediocre one of the Beebs most well paid and supposedly respected political journalists is.

The ignorance of political reporters about elections is really quite startling and depressing. It tells you how invested they are in the Westminster horse race model of journalism that they don't bother to inform themselves of anything outside of it, even stuff that is so fundamental like this. (There are exceptions e.g. Michael Crick and David Hencke, who are not always correct but at least have some curiosity)

Not forgetting at General Elections not all reporters are political reporters, BBC Midlands used to send Radio Stoke’s Sports Editor to our counts until the BNP
made us nationally relevant.

[The Bishop]

Andrew Marr was a quite accomplished print journalist who decided, for some reason, to become a deeply mediocre broadcast journalist.

[carlton43]

Mar 2, 2018 12:53:58 GMT The Bishop said:

Andrew Marr was a quite accomplished print journalist who decided, for some reason, to become a deeply mediocre broadcast journalist.

I agree. He is slow, tedious, obvious and just a bit dim.  How did he get his own shows on radio and TV.  Paxman, Brillo and Day had real charisma and style and at their best could be dauntingly well informed to the detriment of the ill-prepared politico.  How did this lacklustre type cut it with anyone.  I don't dislike him and he is not rude, but i so think to myself..........'I could run this interview so much better myself'.

[carlton43]

And how does Jeremy Vine get even a sniff at politics? He is pathetically awful on Eggheads but in politics he is a complete useless know-nothing and demonstrates it minute by tedious minute.

[timmullen1]

Mar 2, 2018 13:13:28 GMT carlton43 said:

And how does Jeremy Vine get even a sniff at politics? He is pathetically awful on Eggheads but in politics he is a complete useless know-nothing and demonstrates it minute by tedious minute.

It was suggested elsewhere they swapped with his brother as he has the advantage of being vaguely humorous.

[timmullen1]

Mar 2, 2018 13:10:02 GMT carlton43 said:

Mar 2, 2018 12:53:58 GMT The Bishop said:

Andrew Marr was a quite accomplished print journalist who decided, for some reason, to become a deeply mediocre broadcast journalist.

I agree. He is slow, tedious, obvious and just a bit dim.  How did he get his own shows on radio and TV.  Paxman, Brillo and Day had real charisma and style and at their best could be dauntingly well informed to the detriment of the ill-prepared politico.  How did this lacklustre type cut it with anyone.  I don't dislike him and he is not rude, but i so think to myself..........'I could run this interview so much better myself'.

I think he was good as Political Editor, had good contacts in all Parties, and thrived on Westminster gossip and intrigue, but not being able to do that post-stroke has nullified his strongest suit. I also suspect there are some days when he feels so c**p he’s pretty distracted but he can’t really pick and choose which shows he does as his health permits.