04 May 2007

How Does Today Feel?

I am delighted with the Tory results overall and also the excellence of the predictions I made early in April.

I predicted the Tories would poll 41% nationally - we did.

I predicted we would hold all our seats in Birmingham - we did.

I predicted we would gain three seats in Birmingham namely Kings Norton, Billesley and Erdington - we did.

I need to check the detailed results before concluding that we won the popular vote in Birmingham - I suspect we did. I am going to be in a bullish mood on 18 Doughty Street between 9 and 11 tonight. After that appearance, I'm going to be offline for a few days as Ms PT and I are visiting friends in the countryside.

25 comments:

Anonymous said...

Are you in the UK Praguey? Or has 18 D Street got a foreign correspondent these days??

Anonymous said...

I sat up all night waiting for the results only to find that they had postponed the count till today!! I wish someone had told me. Its enough to kill my new found enthusiasm for politics..

Anonymous said...

That's great news for Brummie. I must tune in tonight on Doughty Street. Fantastic. Just how bullish will you dare to be?

Andrew Allison said...

It is a fantastic result. Great news in Birmingham and great news too here in the East Riding. NOC to a 27 seat majority. 18 Conservative gains. We are pretty gobsmacked here. It goes to show, put in the hard yards and you get results.

Dr Michelle Tempest said...

Will tune in to add my support tonight on 18DS and wishing you and Ms PT a lovely countryside break.
Michelle

kinglear said...

Evfen the BBC said that 600 more councillors would be an excellent result for the Tories. However, they rapidly changed their minds when it became apparent it was going to be well north of that. I'm just waiting for the line "Well, David Cameron can't be overpleased with this result can he?"
Er, er....

Tony said...

Absolutely King Lear. This result has surpassed all expectations.

But now we Conservative Councillors need to earn the right to keep the seats and do what we can to improve the towns and cities for the people that live and work in them.

We have to make sure this is not merely a swipe at Labour and the Lib Dems. We have to make sure that in four years time people feel they voted Conservative to see improvements and got them.

PoliticalHackUK said...

Sorry PT, Labour won the popular vote quite comfortably with a 32% share, compared to the Tories' 27.1% and the LD 21.5% (81187, 68782 and 54651 votes respectively if my figures are right). Labour is the only party with significant support across the city.

Anonymous said...

The BBC last week said that if the Tories could snatch 330 seats from Labour it would be great and anything more would be hailed as a triumph..but now they have changed their minds as you say. We're now looking at nearly 900 gains, and let;'s not forget that that is coming from a solid base previously.

Labour down 470 at least.

Labour are literally decimated and the 3rd party in local Government.

How bad does it have to get before it is truly bad?

In England the worst figures for Labour in almost every way, EVER

IN Scotland the worst resulkts for AT LEAST 50 YEARS

In Wales the worst rseults since 1918

Yep...looks like a disaster for the Tories.

THAT is the message you should take to doughty street PT and attack every example of fantasy and negativity and treat it with the contempt it deserves.

Man in a Shed said...

How does Today feel ? Big grin all day.

Anonymous said...

Apparently though according to the BBC the Conservatives will be disappointed not to have made more gains. Seeing that we won more seats than all the others put together and now have more thn half of the councillors in the country it does make you wonder what exactly we are supposed to have done

Time to relaunch Pravda, I think

James Higham said...

Job done - now for the country.

Anonymous said...

Newsnight 22.35pm...

Sopme bint extrapolating the figures to show that Labour actually did quite well and the Tories not that well.

I'm genuinely amazed that the BBC can be so blatantly pro-Labour and anti-Tory.

Anonymous said...

Newsnight 23.04

Michael Crick saying Labour didn't do so bad and Newsnight saying the Tories didn't do that well. Then of course the obligatory BBC Bliar interview saying they did better than in 2004 etc. and how it is a triumph for Labour.

Trying to portray Cameron as a loser.

All going on now to say how bad the figures are for the Tories.

BBC are wankers.

Anonymous said...

The BBC was telling the South that the only important story was the Scottish Parliament - what a crock - -t means nothing tome -never even been to Scotland and I could give a shit who they elect.It seemed tome to be aimed to down play the story of the English locallecetions...

Dr Michelle Tempest said...

PT - well done on 18DS last night. Michelle

Anonymous said...

Yes, I saw you too, well done. Is your hair shorter now?

Cheriton Chav said...

The trouble is that most Tories are wierd Little Britain characters. If there were more that were like Cameron then they would win hands down.

Although even Cameron has an Eton silver spoon in his mouth.

Anonymous said...

Wheres wee Gordie Mc Broon the anointed successor today??

Duncan Connors said...

Hey Praguetory,

I think your predictions were on the money, but I am actually not so certain about the long term prospects of the Conservative Party and David Cameron come a general election.

This reminds me of Neil Kinnock and Labour between 1988-91, where every local election had a good result for Labour, led in the polls leading upto the 1992 election for most of the preceding 18 months and then lost.

I wonder how much the, 'were're comfortable' factor will influence voters, especially if a boom is engineered by Brown prior to an election. Moreover, when individual questions are asked in polls, such as 'Who do you trust on?' or, 'Who is better at?' the Conservative lead is much smaller in some areas than what it should be, which was Labour's issue 15-20 years ago.

It will boil down to the economy. I am not a fan of Brown's inflationary neo Keynesian crap, but many people are now employed in the public sector, or rely on the public sector for employment than was the case 10 years and self interest, as we saw in the 1970s, rules the roost at election time. The Conservatives need to be very smart about this and, to be honest, I am not sure whether George Osbourne is smart enough to do so. There are others, however, that could...

I would go on (and on as usual) but I am too sick at the moment (I ate a dodgy Burrito in Nevada 10 days ago). My blog (http://duncanphilipconnors.blogspot.com/2007/05/bigger-victory-for-snp-than-we-realise.html), as ever has more on this.

Dunc.

Anonymous said...

Omar Cruz managed to comment on 221,000 blogs in one night - he is a weird internet based life form. Or possibly he is a spammer...

Newmania said...

Hallo PT good stuff well done . I would ignore that Duncan he postedthe identical stuff on my blog , he is a student..( and a traitor to the Party in Islingotn). I `k fed up that I missed you on Doughty street. I must look in more often .

Sorry

Newmania said...

In fact that really is pain. I don1`t suppose you will in the UK for ages now. Grrrrr

Duncan Connors said...

Paul,

Why keep writing a different entry when you can use the same one again and again and mean the same thing?

You appear to have an obsession with my finishing a PhD and why is being a student such a derogatory thing to be? Remember, prior to that I was a Flt Lt for quite a while until the policies of Mr. Bush and Mr. Blair left me with a fractured spine and a pension.

Didn't the neo Conservatives support that war, by the way?

The only traitors to the Islington Conservatives, indeed the entire centre-right libertarian cause are those who never criticise, never comment and just continue allowing the degredation of the Conservative part, in exchange for a nice title and the potential for politcal self agrodisement. At least I had the decency to leave and say so publically!!!!!!!

Sound familiar?

PS: Apologies Prague Tory, if you actually meet Paul face to face, you'ld certainly see him from my eyes and perhaps those of another 200 members of the local Conservatives. Cuckoo!

Praguetory said...

Thanks for all the useful comments. My 18DS performance is in their archives, but I haven't managed to watch it all yet - I was a bit under-prepared on the local elections as I spent all Friday travelling and seeing friends. I was a bit nervous and it was definitely a safety first performance.