Home Secretary Amber Rudd has only just held Hastings and Rye.
Lib Dems have regained Oxford West and Abingdon from the Tories! 
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I gotta say, Iām liking this whole parliamentary system youāve got.
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The Lib Dems may win Fife North East by only one or two votes.
Once again, it looks like weāre getting a hung parliament when Iām away on holiday. I might have to go away more often if thereās some cause and effect going on here.
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Well done Theresa May, you fucked that up good and proper. 
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Caroline Lucas holds Brighton Pavillion for the Green Party 
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So, reflections.
Tories
The Tories pissed away a 20 point lead. I personally think they looked good after the Coalition because the Lib Dems curbed their worst impulses. A couple of years of being reminded what theyāre really like has taken the shine off them. Also, May appears to be staggeringly incompetent at any sort of electioneering. I think what really did for her was having berated the police for scaremongering not that long before 2 terrorist attacks. They were only saved from worse by the ham-fisted Labour campaign.
Labour
Corbyn did surprisingly well given the predictions of doom at the start. However, heās not actually won anything, heās just failed to lose. Labour hasnāt really reached out beyond itās boundaries and was equally as bad as the Tories. Where May refused to meet the public, Corbyn only seemed to campaign in safe seats. If this had been Blair weād be looking at a 3 figure Labour majority. Unless Corbyn can tap into the more competent parts of the party this may be a high water mark.
Lib Dems
The tactic of being for the 48% was a good idea but fell flat. Most people seem to be resigned to Brexit now, weāre just waiting to see how much of a shit sandwich weāre going to have to eat. We certainly donāt want to have to vote on it again #JeSuisBrenda. Also, weāre still badly tainted by the Coallition and itās going to take a lot longer to get clear of that.
Sorry to see Nick Clegg go. I know he still gets a lot of hatred for the tuition fees thing (funny how no-one blames the Tories though) but I think weāve lost a decent, principled politician.
SNP
Feeling the heat of being the Establishment in Scotland. Also, no-one wants another bloody referendum #JeSuisBrenda. Never thought Iād see that many Tories in Scotland again.
UKIP
Disappearing into obscurity now that St Nige has abandoned them. Although heās threatening to come back. Stake, garlic, running water?
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I could likely look this up, but as Iām being lazy, do the areas that went Tory correlate with those that voted against independence? Just curious.
Iād add
Greens
A disappointing night with no seats gained and a loss of share of the vote, but Caroline Lucas looks like she will be MP for Brighton Pavilion for quite some time having got 51.8% of the vote there last night.
Jeremy Corbynās comeback hurt us a lot (not that Iām going to complain about the end result).
With him gone Iām already looking more favourably on the Lib Dems. Theyāre still too far to the right for me to consider them as my preferred party but at least they arenāt authoritarians like the Conservatives (and I get the same worrying feeling from some parts of Labour and Momentum too).
I guess Iām still angry at him.
They seem to correlate with some of the areas where the EU remain vote was weakest.
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I just this quick visual comparison. Looks pretty spot on in the conservative areas were more for Brexit.
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I thought we were talking about Scotland, which entirely voted remain but some areas were close.
That EU referendum map doesnāt show how strong the vote was in each area
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Sure, thereās plenty of context missing there. Iām not claiming will researched data.
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The Guardian has a referendum map that shows smaller areas and tells you what the local result was and my hypothesis seems to mostly work. The Westminster seats are smaller though.
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I can understand that. During the Coalition he got a battering from the right wing press who managed to paint him as responsible for all the nasty stuff he failed to stop the Tories doing but didnāt get credit for things like gay marriage or raising the personal tax allowance above Ā£10k.
Some people will never be able to forgive him for tuition fees, but I think history will treat him kinder.
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The bits of Scotland that have been lost to the Tories are all places that have the following in common:
- Rural areas, which always had some level of support for the nasty party.
- Areas which voted no to self determination in 2014
- Relatively low remain votes in the EU referendum.
The three main areas where the defeats have happened are the borders, Perthshire and the north east. All of them have the three points to a fair extent, but as the cartogram will show, they look bigger than they are.
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Lib dem leader goes.
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Oh go on - I know I said I wasnāt going to use it here, but May/Johnson/Davis/Fox in brave new strategy for Brexit negotiations.
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It is, in fact, due to me checking the news in the morning before my girlfriend. Brexit & Trump? I had a lie-in. France & UK elections? Up early. Itās a terrible sacrifice, but, I believe, worth it in the long run.
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The Tories may have broken election laws again
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