British Exit Polls Project Hung Parliament and Conservative Gains

2 years ago

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Senior Correspondent

As Big Ben struck 10 o'clock in London and the polls closed across Britain, the BBC released its exit polls on the general election that forecast a hung Parliament with the Conservatives projected to win 307 seats, incumbent Labor to drop to 255 seats, the Liberal Democrats to snag 59 seats and minor regional parties to pick up 29 seats.

If these results are accurate (and this is a major if), it would leave the Conservatives just short of a majority in the 630-seat Parliament.

Since this has been an unprecedented election campaign featuring the first national party leader television debates in British history and the rise of the Lib Dems to near equal footing with Prime Minister Gordon Brown's beleaguered Labor Party, there was initial skepticism about the spot-on accuracy of this exit poll. It seems puzzling, for example, that the Lib Dems (whose leader Nick Clegg became a meteoric figure in British politics after winning the first TV debate in mid-April) are projected to win fewer seats than the 62 that they hold in the current Parliament.

Britain does not have proportional representation in its Parliament, like most other members of the European Union. What this means is that the BBC exit polls reflect the projected pick-up of parliamentary seats rather than the estimated share of the popular vote won by each party. But with an election this contested – and small margin-of-error adjustments in the popular vote triggering significant differences in seats won – this is looking like a long night of hand-counting actual ballots. And even then, it is conceivable that the next prime minister will not be Conservative Leader David Cameron but a national leader (probably not Gordon Brown) who emerges from backstairs negotiations between Labor and the Lib Dems.

Filed Under: Polls, Predictions

Tagged: British elections, BritishElections, Conservative Party, ConservativeParty, Labour Party, LabourParty, Nick Clegg, NickClegg

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