Hi lads, thought you could do with a break from the ever exploding clown car that is American politics so here is a little introduction to goings on in the most United of all the Kingdoms. We have an election in a couple of weeks
The
Conservative Party, led by Theresa May, is currently in power. The 'Tories' (as they are colloquially known) believe in austerity, low taxes and the reintroduction of fox hunting. May has promised to deliver a 'hard Brexit' if elected, ie goodbye and go **** yourselves Europe. The Tories are supposedly most winningest party in the history of democracy.
The
Labour Party led by Jeremy Corbyn is the main opposition. Corbyn was elected leader on a wave of lefties putting the middle finger up to Tony Blair's legacy (Blair was Labour leader and PM for 10+ years). Corbyn believes in unilateral nuclear disarmament, renationalisation of some industries (rail, energy, mail) and higher taxes on the wealthy. Labour has promised to 'prevent the elites from hijacking Brexit', ie goodbye and go **** yourselves Europe.
The
Scottish National Party aka SNP led by Nicola Sturgeon broke the back of the traditional parties last time out by winning 56 out of 59 seats in Scotland, up from 6/59 previously. Remarkable! The SNP want an independent Scotland. They say that the 'remain' result of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum is now invalid due to Brexit and so want another go.
The
Liberal Democrats aka Lib Dems are traditionally the third most powerful party, but they got a battering in the most recent election (their popular support dropped from 23% to 8%). The Lib Dems are the only major party which is promising to reverse Brexit. I think they believe in the abolition of student fees. They also believe in some other stuff but nobody in Britain is quite sure of what that is, and unfortunately I am not an exception.
The
United Kingdom Independence Party aka UKIP got 12.5% of votes last time out, millions more than the SNP managed, but due to the diffuse nature of their support they only got one seat in parliament. Their support is expected to collapse now that Brexit is happening and their leader Nigel Farage has quit to become a professional talker of bollocks for Fox News over in America. UKIP is interested in Brexit (in triplicate).
Note: the current Lib Dem and UKIP leaders are unimportant and I wont waste your time with their names.
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Here is a precisely constructed electoral map prediction showing the likely outcome of every voting constituency according to the bookmakers:
Odds:
(In yank odds this is Conservatives -3300, Labour +1500 etc)
Polls: