Saturday 14 May 2016

Who "Won "in Wales and Scotland?

Former first minister Rhodri Morgan has suggested Welsh Labour could learn lessons from the SNP in the way the two parties reacted to last week's elections and declared victory
With Plaid and Labour going into a form of Purdaah over he weekend as  the talks about of breaking the deadlock over the election of a first minister continues. We are privileged to hear the musing of that great Welsh Statesman Rhodri Morgan. who argues that Labour should have declared victory last week.
 Speaking on BBC Radio Cymru's O'r Bae programme the former  Labour First Minis  said: 
"Nicola Sturgeon was saying this is the third victory in a row that we've had in Scotland."So you create a psychology, so that everyone expects that you will master, you will govern, and that nobody can ask a question about what the way forward is."Now Labour was saying, no, don't rejoice, don't claim that we've won, because we haven't."Technically Nicola Sturgeon hadn't either, but she had created the psychology of expectation."

But there was a huge difference in the Result

In Wales  there are 40 seat constituency and 20 Regional seats

In Scotland  there are  are 73 constituency seats  and 59  Regional seats

The reason for this is that in Wales the ratio was made to make a Labour Majority more likely  Scotland the ratio was intended to  prevent the SNP getting an overall Majority something they did in 2011 to the astonishment of everyone. 
Details are from Wikepedia
e • d Welsh Assembly election, 2016
PartiesAdditional member systemTotal seats
ConstituencyRegion
Votes %+/−Seats+/−Votes %+/−Seats+/−Total+/− %
Labour353,86634.7-7.627-1319,19631.5-5.42029-148.3
Plaid Cymru209,37620.5+1.36+1211,54820.8+3.06012+120.0
Conservative215,59721.1-3.960190,84618.8-3.75-311-318.3
UKIP127,03812.5+12.500132,13813.0+8.57+77+711.7
Liberal Democrats78,1657.7-2.91065,5046.5-1.60-41-41.7
Green25,2022.5+2.30030,2113.0-0.500000.0
If we look at the Ratio using the regional vote we see that Labour are massively over represented
Popular Vote
Labour
  
31.5%
Plaid Cymru
  
20.8%
Conservative
  
18.8%
UKIP
  
13.0%
Liberal Democrats
  
6.5%
Abolish the Welsh Assembly Party
  
4.4%
Green
  
3.0%
Other
  
2.0%
Parliament seats
Labour
  
48.3%
Plaid Cymru
  
20.0%
Conservative
  
18.3%
UKIP
  
11.7%
Liberal Democrats
  
1.7%

The Result in Scotland still saw the SNP make a net gain in the constituency seats but lose out in the regional seats
e • d Scottish general election, 2016
PartiesAdditional member systemTotal seats
ConstituencyRegion
Votes %+/−Seats+/−Votes %+/−Seats+/−Total+/− %
SNP1,059,89746.5Increase 1.159Increase 6953,98741.7Decrease 2.34Decrease 1263Decrease 648.8
Conservative501,84422.0Increase 8.17Increase 4524,22222.9Increase 10.624Increase 1231Increase 1624.0
Labour514,26122.6Decrease 9.23Decrease 12435,91919.1Decrease 7.221Decrease 124Decrease 1318.6
Scottish Green13,1720.6Increase 0.600150,4266.6Increase 2.26Increase 46Increase 44.7
Liberal Democrats178,2387.8Decrease 0.14Increase 2119,2845.201Decrease 2503.9
UKIP46,4262.0Increase 1.100000.0
Solidarity14,3330.6Increase 0.500000.0
Scottish Christian1,1620.10.00011,6860.5Decrease 0.300000.0
RISE10,9110.5Increase 0.500000.0
Women's Equality5,9680.3Increase 0.300000.0

The  SNP were also represented if we look at the proportional  representation 
Popular Vote
SNP
  
41.7%
Conservative
  
22.9%
Labour
  
19.1%
Green
  
6.6%
Liberal Democrats
  
5.2%
UKIP
  
2.0%
Other
  
2.5%
Parliament seats
SNP
  
48.8%
Conservative
  
24.0%
Labour
  
18.6%
Green
  
4.7%
Liberal Democrats
  
3.9%


However  in Wales Labour saw a 7.6% fall in the constituency  vote and 5.4% in the Regional,


In Scotland the SNP saw a rise of 1.1% on the Constituency vote ans a fall of 2.3% in the Regions 


If we take into account that people in Scotland saw a Persuasive campaign to for Independence supporters to transfer their vote to the Greens for example then we can see why  the SNP claimed victory

Labour survived a fairly large swing and lost one seat in a system that has always favoured them , but they have no right to claim an absolute victory ot mandate 

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2 comments:

WelshnotBritish said...

I just can't see Dugdale and co voting for a Tory First Minister. That is the difference that Rodney fails to see.

East Neuker said...

Even if all of Labour and the Lib Dems did vote with the Tories, together they still have less seats than SNP, who are only 2 short of an absolute majority. It would take all six Greens to vote with the Tories as well. The Green voters would tear them to shreds (and compost them no doubt) if their MSPs did that........