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| Eastleigh byelection - results: Politics live blog | Eastleigh byelection - results: Politics live blog |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| 10.19pm: Unusually, there have been five opinion polls during the byelection campaign. Here are the results. A poll by Lord Ashcroft published on 8 February | |
| Conservatives: 34% Lib Dems: 31% Labour: 19% Ukip: 13% | |
| Conservative lead: 3 points | |
| A poll by Survation for the Mail on Sunday on 10 February | |
| Lib Dems: 36% Conservatives: 33% Ukip: 16% Labour: 13% | |
| Lib Dem lead: 3 points | |
| A Populus poll for the Times on 23 Feburary | |
| Lib Dems: 33% Conservatives: 28% Ukip: 21% Labour: 11% | |
| Lib Dem lead: 5 points | |
| A Survation poll for the Mail on Sunday on 24 February | |
| Conservatives: 33% Lib Dems: 29% Ukip: 21% Labour: 13% | |
| Conservative lead: 4 points | |
| A poll for Lord Ashcroft published on 26 February | |
| Lib Dems: 33% Conservatives: 28% Ukip: 21% Labour: 12% | |
| There's a neat Guardian interactive graphic here which shows all five polls on a chart. | |
| And here are two surveys of the polling published at the end of the campaign | |
| • A final analysis by Survation • An analysis by Anthony Wells at UK Polling Report | |
| 10.00pm: It's 10pm. The polls have closed. Some ballot boxes, containing postal votes, are already here and the verification process - checking that papers are valid - is not underway. | |
| 9.34pm: Here is some background about the Eastleigh constituency. | 9.34pm: Here is some background about the Eastleigh constituency. |
| The Eastleigh constituency | The Eastleigh constituency |
| • The Eastleigh constituency Wikipedia page, with the results of all elections here since 1955. | • The Eastleigh constituency Wikipedia page, with the results of all elections here since 1955. |
| • A ward by ward analysis of the political makeup of the constituency on the all that's left website. | • A ward by ward analysis of the political makeup of the constituency on the all that's left website. |
| • A Telegraph graphic with demographic and other information about Eastleigh | • A Telegraph graphic with demographic and other information about Eastleigh |
| And here are the key election results from 2010. | And here are the key election results from 2010. |
| Chris Huhne (Lib Dem) - 24,966 (46.5%) | Chris Huhne (Lib Dem) - 24,966 (46.5%) |
| Maria Hutchings (Con) - 21,102 (39.3%) | Maria Hutchings (Con) - 21,102 (39.3%) |
| Leo Barraclough (Lab) - 5,153 (9.6%) | Leo Barraclough (Lab) - 5,153 (9.6%) |
| Ray Finch (Ukip) - 1,933 (3.6%) | Ray Finch (Ukip) - 1,933 (3.6%) |
| Lib Dem majority - 3,864 (7.19%) | |
| 9.32pm: Here's the scene from where I'm sitting at the count. | 9.32pm: Here's the scene from where I'm sitting at the count. |
| Half an hour to go until the polls close. | Half an hour to go until the polls close. |
| 9.00pm: Let's start with a bucket of cold water. For all the hype about tonight's Eastleigh byelection being the most important for 30 years, it's worth remembering that byelections themselves don't normally tell you very much about who's going to run the country after the next general election. "It cannot be stressed strongly enough that journalists, editiorial writers, party leaders and political scientists should be highly cautious about reading too much into individual [byelection] results," says Pippa Norris in British Byelections, one of the standard academic books on the subject. And Anthony Wells made a similar point on his UK Polling Report blog last night. | 9.00pm: Let's start with a bucket of cold water. For all the hype about tonight's Eastleigh byelection being the most important for 30 years, it's worth remembering that byelections themselves don't normally tell you very much about who's going to run the country after the next general election. "It cannot be stressed strongly enough that journalists, editiorial writers, party leaders and political scientists should be highly cautious about reading too much into individual [byelection] results," says Pippa Norris in British Byelections, one of the standard academic books on the subject. And Anthony Wells made a similar point on his UK Polling Report blog last night. |
| Anyway, let's assume the results are as the polls suggest – that the Liberal Democrats narrowly hold the seat over the Conservatives, UKIP do extremely well and Labour get squeezed down to fourth place. Journalists will write comment pieces concluding that the Lib Dems will do much better than the polls suggest as they'll still be able to get tactical support from Labour, that UKIP pose a serious threat to the Conservatives and that UKIP voters DON'T seem willing to vote tactically for the Tories and, for the Conservative leaning amongst them, that the poor Labour performance shows that Ed Miliband's "One Nation" mantra is just empty words. | Anyway, let's assume the results are as the polls suggest – that the Liberal Democrats narrowly hold the seat over the Conservatives, UKIP do extremely well and Labour get squeezed down to fourth place. Journalists will write comment pieces concluding that the Lib Dems will do much better than the polls suggest as they'll still be able to get tactical support from Labour, that UKIP pose a serious threat to the Conservatives and that UKIP voters DON'T seem willing to vote tactically for the Tories and, for the Conservative leaning amongst them, that the poor Labour performance shows that Ed Miliband's "One Nation" mantra is just empty words. |
| All of these conclusions are nonsense. | All of these conclusions are nonsense. |
| Or at least, while some of them may very well be true, none of them will be things we can tell from Eastleigh. Firstly, if it votes in line with the polls Eastleigh doesn't really show the Lib Dems withstanding the national swing in seats they hold. In the final Ashcroft poll they were down 14 points on their general election score, which is pretty much what the polls show is happening to their national support. Secondly, I wouldn't conclude anything about tactical voting either Lab to LD or UKIP to Con – by-elections are very special cases, voters get an intense amount of literature and contact from the parties imploring them to vote tactically and send a message, and their vote won't change who governs so in many ways people are free to vote without consequence. The argument about Labour's one nation message is just point scoring – it is perfectly normal for a third party to be squeezed in a tight by-election and despite the exuberance of some Labour supporters at the start of the campaign it was bleeding bloody obvious from the beginning that Labour had no hope whatsoever in this seat. | Or at least, while some of them may very well be true, none of them will be things we can tell from Eastleigh. Firstly, if it votes in line with the polls Eastleigh doesn't really show the Lib Dems withstanding the national swing in seats they hold. In the final Ashcroft poll they were down 14 points on their general election score, which is pretty much what the polls show is happening to their national support. Secondly, I wouldn't conclude anything about tactical voting either Lab to LD or UKIP to Con – by-elections are very special cases, voters get an intense amount of literature and contact from the parties imploring them to vote tactically and send a message, and their vote won't change who governs so in many ways people are free to vote without consequence. The argument about Labour's one nation message is just point scoring – it is perfectly normal for a third party to be squeezed in a tight by-election and despite the exuberance of some Labour supporters at the start of the campaign it was bleeding bloody obvious from the beginning that Labour had no hope whatsoever in this seat. |
| Although Wells is exaggerating for effect, he's largely right. | Although Wells is exaggerating for effect, he's largely right. |
| And yet, as he goes on to point out, that doesn't mean byelections like Eastleigh aren't important. They are – not because they tell us anything particularly new about which party is up and which party is down, but because politicians think that they do. An election win is a solid event that confers authority, and after tonight either David Cameron or Nick Clegg (or conceivably both, but don't bet on it) is going to look like a loser. In a way that is hard to quantify, that will matter. | And yet, as he goes on to point out, that doesn't mean byelections like Eastleigh aren't important. They are – not because they tell us anything particularly new about which party is up and which party is down, but because politicians think that they do. An election win is a solid event that confers authority, and after tonight either David Cameron or Nick Clegg (or conceivably both, but don't bet on it) is going to look like a loser. In a way that is hard to quantify, that will matter. |
| Eastleigh is interesting partly because it is only the fifth time since 1945 that the Lib Dems, or their predecessors the Liberals, have defended a parliamentary seat in a byelection. But the main reason why swarms of journalists have come to this Hampshire town to cover this campaign is that it is the first time since 2010 that the two coalition parties have gone head to head in a byelection. Cameron needs to win to show that he has a realistic chance of winning an outright majority in 2015. Clegg needs to win to show that, when the general election comes, the Lib Dems can avoid a wipeout. That's why it is billed as the most important contest of its kind for 30 years. | Eastleigh is interesting partly because it is only the fifth time since 1945 that the Lib Dems, or their predecessors the Liberals, have defended a parliamentary seat in a byelection. But the main reason why swarms of journalists have come to this Hampshire town to cover this campaign is that it is the first time since 2010 that the two coalition parties have gone head to head in a byelection. Cameron needs to win to show that he has a realistic chance of winning an outright majority in 2015. Clegg needs to win to show that, when the general election comes, the Lib Dems can avoid a wipeout. That's why it is billed as the most important contest of its kind for 30 years. |
| And there's another factor in play too. This byelection seems likely to mark another step in the rise of Ukip. In November last year in Corby, when Ukip got 14%, it was their best ever result in a byelection. Two weeks later it got 22% in Rotherham and tonight it could do even better. With not a single MP in the Commons, Ukip is still in many respects a fringe party. But, in byelections, it is establishing itself as one of the four main parties in English politics. | And there's another factor in play too. This byelection seems likely to mark another step in the rise of Ukip. In November last year in Corby, when Ukip got 14%, it was their best ever result in a byelection. Two weeks later it got 22% in Rotherham and tonight it could do even better. With not a single MP in the Commons, Ukip is still in many respects a fringe party. But, in byelections, it is establishing itself as one of the four main parties in English politics. |
| I'm at the Fleming Park leisure centre in Eastleigh, where the counting will start after the polls close at 10pm. As I write, the media consensus seems to be that the Lib Dems will win, and that Ukip are challenging the Tories for second place. But, of course, no one really knows. It should be an exciting night, and I'll be reporting on all the developments as they happen. | I'm at the Fleming Park leisure centre in Eastleigh, where the counting will start after the polls close at 10pm. As I write, the media consensus seems to be that the Lib Dems will win, and that Ukip are challenging the Tories for second place. But, of course, no one really knows. It should be an exciting night, and I'll be reporting on all the developments as they happen. |