UK Vote: Sorted
- May 12th, 2010
- Posted by 7thmin
OPINION: Less than a week after the elections which produced a hung parliament the coalition government under Tory Prime Minister David Cameron will have a clear parliamentary majority and a continental-style negotiated government program.
Winners are the Conservatives and Lib-Dems; Labour’s Gordon Brown cut out of the picture.
NUMBERS GAME: 43, No.10, MAJORITY OF 76
Cameron at 43 is the youngest British Prime Minister for nearly two centuries, (and incidentally the same age as President John Kennedy of the United States, when elected in 1960).
Similar in presentation and style is the Liberal-Democrat Leader Nick Clegg, as it happens also aged 43, who has been named as Deputy Prime Minister.
However, he has not been given the Treasury, so there is definite potential for future trouble.
Will the junior partner in government fail to restrain the Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Gideon Oliver Osborne, heir to the Osborne baronetcy, should that gentleman take to a full-scale attack on public spending plus large tax cuts for the very richest voters?
Might such failure cause voters to reflect on the future of the Lib-Dems as a separate party, as, “who needs two Conservative parties?â€
Tensions may be kept in check among these politicians though, by the comfortable girth of their majority in parliament, 306 Conservatives and 57 Lib-Dems will give them an edge of 76 votes.
NO MORE KANGAROO VALLEY?
The Liberal-Democrats have obtained a large concession: there’ll be a referendum on whether Britain should go over to an Australian-style preferential voting system. (See EUAustralia Online: “Gordon Brown’s decision …â€, 11.5.10; “UK vote …â€, 9.5.10; “Inching to Tory victory?â€, 5.5.10).
The Tory immigration policy is to kick in: to keep out many more non-members of the European Union, i.e. not so much room for bronzed Anzacs any more, it would seem.