Obviously that's a huge subject, and the more information I added, the more background I felt was needed and I ended up writing a lot, even at the end of it all, it's still only a summary - and as I'm a total masochist I thought I'd share it here for "review"...
I attempted to stay mostly impartial, but it clearly has a left/liberal bias, other than that, I'd be interested to hear of anything I've got factually wrong or misunderstood? Or any gaping holes I've missed out...
Dons flame-proof suit and stands-back...
Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin...
Some Background
For a stupidly long time, both main parties have been indistinguishably centrist, (fatuous remarks warning) the main way to tell them apart being the colour of their ties... You effectively had the choice of whether you wanted them to laugh or look sympathetic while they shafted you...
A few years ago Nigel Farage's UKIP, started getting traction with shouty right wing fear-mongering; "too many foreigners, caused by the EU's open border policy, sponging on our benefits" etc... This appealed to the further right "Eurosceptic" Tory voters who never wanted to join the EU in the first place, as well as typically working class Labour voters who see jobs disappearing, communities changing and finite public services being over-saturated.
Both parties noticed voters leaving them; to appease growing elements of dissent within his party David Cameron agreed to have the referendum on EU membership, never believing it would happen, just hoping to shut up his detractors... We all know how that turned out...
Meanwhile, Jeremy Corbyn, a more left wing candidate than Labour had seen for decades, was nominated for leader, almost as a joke. However this move from the centre chimed with many Labour party members and he was voted in, much to the annoyance of many in his own party, which has lead to much in-fighting...
The press, and other members of his party have vilified Corbyn ever since, and the notion of a left wing party succeeding has been hugely derided.
At the previous General Election (a couple of years ago) the Torys gained an overall majority, but only just. This effectively means that getting parliament to do what you want is harder than it could be. With 'Brexit' looming, and May's decision to go for a 'Hard Brexit' (all-or-nothing & piss off the EU and non-brexit voters as much as possible) she needed/wanted all the voting power possible.
Additionally, May took over after Cameron stepped down post-Brexit, as opposed to having been voted in by the public, which some were arguing didn't give her the mandate to go for such a drastic version of 'Brexit' (I really hate the term Brexit, it trivialises a significant event, but I guess we're stuck with it), there's also an element of her ego in play here too...
With the polls showing that the Torys had a massive lead over Labour (>20%), and the opposition looking weak and chaotic due to in-fighting, May thought she could make an easy land grab and kill several birds with one stone.
But...
- Since the Torys got in they've slashed benefits and public services massively
- Only a very slight majority voted for Brexit, so going for a hard uncompromising version pissed a lot of people off
- Corbyn held a blinder of a campaign, even managing to engage young voters who typically don't bother, whereas May appeared to act as though she didn't need to campaign and even published a manifesto that hurt typical Tory voters
So...
In the end, the Torys gained the most votes on the night but took fewer seats than they had to start with - not enough to govern on their own - meaning they have had to form a coalition or risk losing power. To do this they've aligned themselves with a particularly unpleasant party from Northern Ireland (run by creationist, homophobes etc) which runs the risk of damaging the various peace accords that have been stable(ish) for many years and potentially reigniting "the troubles" from the 70s/80s - who knows, Islamist terrorists may eventually have some competition over here...
Despite the Torys starting with;
- being in power
- there being no need to call an election
- the polls all being massively in their favour
- have fewer seats
- are dependent on an obscure extremist party for power
- look foolish and weak
- have enabled Corbyn to no longer seem like a joke but rather appear as a credible opposition to more of the population instead.
If it wasn't all so terrifying it would be hilarious!
To the future...
May is clinging on by the skin of her teeth, but looks very weak and even with the coalition they only have a 2 seat majority.
It looks inevitable that she'll be gone before too long, and if only 2 seats are lost or the coalition breaks down we'll possibly have yet ANOTHER election! Sigh...
If/when there is another election Corbyn would be starting from appearing credible and may even have support of his own party so it's not impossible to think that he could win. BUT if it puts him in charge of Brexit he would likely be being set up to fail. You just can't please all the people so no matter what outcome is achieved a lot of people will be pissed off so I don't believe it'll be possible to make a "success" of it - but that's a topic for a whole other load of waffle.
Yay........................
