Oldham East and Saddleworth By-Election

Well, a couple of hours ago the polls opened for what will be the first parliamentary by-election since the formation of the Coalition government in May. There was, of course, the postponed Thirsk & Malton poll on the 27th of May, but by then the coalition dyanmics had yet to really come into play electorally speaking.

Here are the 2010 results for Oldham East and Saddleworth:

LAB - 14,186 (31.9%)
LIB - 14,083 (31.6%)
CON - 11,773 (26.4%)
(and others, although they are not numerically signficant)

A great deal of analysis has been done on this by-election and it is generally expected that Labour will win. The general trend of the opinion polls since the general election suggests the Labour vote nationally is up around 13% whereas the Liberal Democrat vote is down by around the same amount. Notably, the Conservative vote remains more or less unchanged.

Much has been made of local factors. The previous Labour MP, of course, had his result voided following a court ruling which showed that the Labour candidate had effectively told untruths about the Liberal Democrat candidate in his campaign literature - a factor which may have proved decisive given the extremely close result. I don't expect this will damage the Labour vote here too much, indeed, there has been some resentment at what is perceived as their result being decided by a distant court.

It is significant that the combined Liberal/Conservative vote here is as high as it is: 58% compared to Labour's 32%. Although these are pre-coalition figures, it does indicate that for Labour to guarantee victory they will have to shift a lot of these votes.

Despite the Conservatives' strong third-place performance here in 2010 it is widely expected that many Conservative voters will vote tactically, lending their vote to the Liberal Democrat candidate to stop Labour from winning.

I shall make a prediction:
LAB - 13,476 (46%)
LIB - 7,531 (26%)
CON - 4,538 (15%)
OTH - 3,837 (13%)

Turnout being roughly 40%.
Based on these figures, the old saying that this will be the 'first real test for the Coalition' is somewhat misleading, as it is not a test they are expected to pass. The expectation is with Labour, although this may harm them: first it may encourage even more tactical voting from Conservatives to boost the Libdem vote. Second, any increase in expectation will just make defeat all the more unstomachable. The Liberal Democrats will only be humiliated if they come third. Labour will be humiliated if they come second. The Tories... if they come fourth I suppose. Despite the BNP polling 11% here in 2001, there is no single significant fourth party presence here.

Polls close at 10pm and results are expected at 2am.

Also, we'll be expecting another by-election sometime early this year! The MP for Barnsley Central has stood down after admitting fraud over his expenses. He was elected as a Labour MP in 2010 with 47% of the vote, 30% more than the second place candidate. Consequently, it will be rather a different type of by-election to this one, and potentially less interesting. Oldham East and Saddleworth is rare in that it was a genuine three-way marginal in the General Election. Barnsley Central is a definitive Labour safe-seat and so there's not even much chance of a two-way scrap, let alone a three-way scrap. More signficant would be a by-election in a Tory held marginal (with Labour in second place): or better still, a Tory held marginal with the Liberal Democrats in 2nd and Labour in 3rd. Of course the next major electoral test (one whose date is non-negotiable) are the Scottish Parliamentary and Welsh Assembly elections in May, as well as the council elections of the same month.

Election Astrology

"Unpopular government tries for a fourth term. Vibrant Opposition team lined up to have the reins of power handed to them. Incumbent PM faces first general election after being elected by his party a few years earlier following the resignation of the previous leader after ten years. Uninspiring economic situation. Opposition cheered by the polls but not carried away by them. But could the government make a surprise recovery at the last minute? Are the people really ready to let the other guys into power? No. They haven't changed. They'll do more harm than good. Give'm another five years in the wilderness.. they're still not ready to govern. Always keep ahold of Nurse, for fear of something worse."

"Discredited government. Desire for change not overwhelming, but decisive. A series of bitter industrial disputes. Government warn that the Opposition will damage the economy and induce unemployment. General mood indicates that a change of government and economic direction is inevitable and neccessary. Government seen as outdated. Opposition get into power on a 5% swing and form a goverment with a working majority."

"General feeling that the current government has been around far too long. Sleaze, incompetence, corruption and leadership disputes all add to the notion that some fresh blood is needed. The young, optimistic and newly revamped opposition provide a clear, positive message for change, aiming to make a break from the politics of the past. Britain can do better. Although economic circumstances appear to be improving, people are not giving credit to the governing party. The governing party poll exceptionally poorly and on election night itself barely scrape 30% of the vote."

"Expectation of low turnout and high number of votes for third parties. Close result projected, but has the feeling of a reluctant poll - neither party seems overwhelmingly popular. Rather than one party set to win the election, it seems both parties are set to lose. Frequent media discussion over the possibility of a hung parliament. SNP poised to damage Labour in Scotland. Opposition take a narrow lead in the new parliament but unable to maintain a stable coalition or rule as a minority, and a fresh election is held."

"Opposition unable to get rid of their old, unpopular image despite leadership's best attempts. Government enjoying improving economic circumstances, and while many feel disollusioned by their policies there is a general understanding that the opposition simply don't have enough gravitas to form a government. Though it is widely understood that the Opposition will increase their represenation in Parliament on the back of remarkably poor showings in the recent past, the sheer number of seats they need to win combined with the fact that there is no genuine impetus for change implies that they have no real chance of forming a majority. Opposition leader obviously a talented orator and debater, but is for the most part singularly uninspiring and unable to muster popular support. Opposition gain a few dozen seats but remain a clear second place in the eyes of the electorate."

Sound familiar?

The previous paragraphs are descriptions of past general elections: 1992, 1979, 1997 and February 1974. The last quote could apply both to 1987 and 2005.

Yet all of these could apply to 2010.

This is no coincidence - what I have done here is show how easy it is to find parellels with past elections, and the vast array of different results you can anticipate depending on how you seek to interpret the opinion polls. The fact is we don't really know what the 2010 is going to be. Despite polling, we have only the roughest idea of the range of results. It is still concievable that either party could form a majority government. Wishful thinkers on all sides might wish to stretch this. A 1997 is possible for the Conservatives. Labour will hold on in a 1992. The Liberal Democrats must secretly hope for a 1974 - after all, a coalition government is the only real chance the Lib Dems have of getting into Whitehall.

Despite claiming that we shouldn't try to compare 2010 too much to any specific election, I do believe that looking at the swings in the past (as I posted about on Friday 19th) is a good way of contextualising the current expecations of swing. They provide a useful benchmark and provide a way for us to compare the public desire for change as it is now to how it was in the past.

However, I'm afraid to say that if there is any real desire for change it is a little more fundamental and bitter (if a little desparing and apathetic) than just which party governs them. I think there are many who would rather there was no party at all. Or no government at all.

General Election - my prediction *updated - now with historical swing data!

In seven weeks time we shall wake up with a brand new parliament, and perhaps a brand new government.

I've seen a lot of people posting their rather naive predictions as to what the general election result will be.

Well, I don't suppose mine will be any less naive.

Anyway, I shall make an estimate of the swings between the various parties and use this as a basis for my result.

In 2005 the share of the vote for the parties in Great Britain (excluding Northern Ireland) was as follows:

Labour: 36.20%
Conservatives: 33.24%
Liberal Democrats: 22.64%
Others: 7.92%

It should be acknowledged that the main impetus for the Lib Dem's high level of support in '05 was their opposition to the Iraq War. Well, there is no such impetus now, and I see no reason to expect they will do any better. LIBERAL DEMOCRATS DOWN 4%

The Others support will rise by the same amount - while I don't believe any extra 4th parties will be represented in the new Parliament, their over all collective vote will increase, especially with UKIP and the BNP fielding so many more candidates than last time. OTHERS UP 4%

As for the Labour/Tory swing, I see no reason why it should be too dramatic. Sure there is dissatisfaction with the incumbent party, but the Tories do not seem to be offering a firm alternative, and I honestly think it's a little too late for the Tories to do anything about this.

Nevertheless, I think a decent swing is likely. I was torn between 4% and 5%, so I will just go with 4.5%.

LABOUR DOWN 4.5%
TORIES UP 4.5%

This would mean new support figures of:
Labour: 31.7%
Tories: 37.74%
Libdems: 18.64%
Others: 11.92%

Obviously it seems odd to combine precise figures (05) with such rough estimates, but there's no real need for me to round up to the nearest percentage point either
.
Based on a uniform national swing, these support figures would yield the following result in terms of seats.
Tories: 295
Labour: 277
Libdems: 47
Others: 13 (plus 18 from Northern Ireland)

Thus no party would make it past the winning post of 325, the number of seats required to form a majority government, by defintion having more than half the seats in the Commons.

Yes, I think it really is that close. Although the Tories are likely to do better in the marginal seats than the Uniform National Swing suggests, this might only amount to a dozen or so extra seats. But we'll take this dozen into account and predict the Tories 307 seats.

The polls fluctuate all the time, and different pollsters offer varying figures, caused not just by natural variation but also influenced by the polling methods. My figures are based more on my insticts than the polls, though it so happens that my own support figures are not too different from the current averages.

I enjoyed teasing my father about the possibility of the Conservatives having the most seats but Labour and the Liberal Democrats forming a coalition government, by whose end in 2015 the country would be ruined. But I really don't blame people for not having an awful lot of faith in the Tories.

Still, though I stick to my prediction I think it's fair to say that it's anyone's game, and to be honest the game hasn't really started yet. The board has been layed out and the player tokens have been removed from the box, but nobody has rolled a single dice!

I will update my prediction every Friday morning in the run up to the general election. I may change it from week to week, I may be satisfied and leave it unchanged. My aim is not to reflect simply the current state of the polls, but just my general aggregate perception of whether there is an "air of change". For you see, that is what it's all about. For Conservatives to win they need to get enough people who voted Labour or Liberal Democrat last time to vote for the Tories instead.

Here is a list of historical swings for those who are interested (God knows I am).
The summary swings have been rounded to the nearest half.

1945 - Labour Victory - Landslide (145 seats)
Labour: +11.7%
Conservative: -11.6%
Liberal: +2.3%
SWING: CON to LAB: 11.5%

1950 - Labour Victory - Wafer Thin Majority (5 seats)
Labour: -3.6%
Conservative: +3.8%
Liberal: +0.1%
SWING: LAB to CON: 3.5%

1951 - Conservative Victory - Small Majority (16 seats)
Labour: +2.7%
Conservative: +8.0%
Liberal: -8.1%
SWING: LAB to CON: 2.5%

1955 - Conservative Victory - Increased Majority (60 seats)
Labour: -2.4%
Conservative: +1.7%
Liberal: +0.2%
SWING: LAB to CON: 2%

1959 - Conservative Victory - Substantial Majority (100 seats)
Labour: -2.6%
Conservative: -0.3%
Liberal: +3.2%
SWING: LAB to CON: 1%

1964 - Labour Victory - Wafer-thin Majority (4 seats)
Labour: +0.3%
Conservative: -6.0%
Liberal: +5.3%
SWING: CON to LAB: 3%

1966 - Labour Victory - Substantial Majority (96 seats)
Labour: +3.9%
Conservative: -1.5%
Liberal: -2.7%
SWING: CON to LAB: 2.5%

1970 - Conservative Victory - Comfortable Majority (31 seats)
Labour: -4.9%
Conservative: +4.5%
Liberal: -1.0%
SWING: LAB to CON: 4.5%

1974 (Feb) - Hung Parliament - Narrow Labour Lead
Labour: -5.9%
Conservative: -8.5%
Liberal: +11.8%
SWING: CON to LAB: 1.5%

1974 (Oct) - Labour Victory - Tiny Majority (3 seats)
Labour: +2.0%
Conservative: -2.1%
Liberal: -1.0%
SWING: CON to LAB: 1%

1979 - Conservative Victory - Workable Majority (43 seats)
Labour: -2.3%
Conservatives: +8.1%
Liberal: -4.5%
SWING: LAB to CON: 5%

1983 - Conservative Victory - Landslide (144 seats)
Labour: -9.3%
Conservatives: -1.5%
Alliance: +11.6%
SWING: LAB to CON: 4%

1987 - Conservative Victory - Comfortable Majority (102 seats)
Labour: +3.2%
Conservatives: -0.2%
Alliance: -2.8%
SWING: CON to LAB: 1.5%

1992 - Conservative Victory - Small Majority (20 seats)
Labour: +3.6%
Conservatives: -0.3%
Lib Dem: -4.8%
SWING: CON to LAB: 2%

1997 - Labour Victory - Landslide (179 seats)
Labour: +8.8%
Conservatives: -11.2%
Lib Dem: -1.0%
SWING: CON to LAB: 10%

2001 - Labour Victory - Landslide (167 seats)
Labour: -2.5%
Conservatives: +1%
Lib Dem: +1.5%
SWING: LAB to CON: 2%

2005 - Labour Victory - Comfortable majority (66 seats)
Labour: -5.5%
Conservatives: +0.6%
Lib Dem: +3.7%
SWING: LAB to CON: 3%

Well, you can see that a 4.5% swing is actually fairly large when considered historically. That doesn't mean it's impossible - it just means that the level of disatisfaction with the government and level of enthusiasm for the opposition has to be pretty tangible.

This week's prediction: Conservative Short of a Majority by 18 seats.

WOT I DID DIS WEEKND

Hey stalkers.

Had a fun few days. On my return I was sometimes asked 'how it was', to which my usual, tired reply was 'pretty good. will write a blog post about it.

Well, here it is.

Woke up at 6.45am on Friday, and two hours later I boarded a train to London with my father. Our destination: Kensington Olympia, for the Who Do You Think You Are - Live event, where we were to man the stall for Deceased Online, with a team of around eight others.

We arrived at 10am, and as I did not hold a staff pass but, rather, a standard ticket, I had to walk all the way to the back of a several-hundred yard queue along the frontside of the building. I was surprised and encouraged to see such a high turnout. It seems that the anecdote I heard about genealogy being the second most searhed-up thing on the internet was no joke, and that curiousity about ancestry and heritage is, and always has been, considerable. 

Indeed, the number of resources for finding out about ones ancestry are increasing every day, and Olympia was filled with all manner of stalls. There were some video displays, workshops, and even a one-hour talk about DNA in one of the side parts of the venue. Most of the people were in their fourties or fifties and, as you might expect at a genealogy conference, basically everyone was English. After all, Parish records from the 1890s would not be much use to the man whose ancestors were from, say, Spain or Bangladesh. That said, there were some stalls catering for earlier-twentieth century groups, such as Anglo-Itialians, Anglo-Germans, Anglo-Jewish and even Anglo-Huguenots.

Some stalls were larger than others. One of the largest genealogy companies, Ancestry, had their own speaking area with around a hundred chairs for the audience. I heard Tony Robinson (of Blackadder fame) give a talk about the various companies.

I spent most of the time walking around. Though I was there to represent DOL, there was no shortage of staff, despite the business. My father reminded me, however, that the expo would get even busier in the afternoon, and especially busy on Saturday, where the 15,000 tickets had been sold out.

After having a 20cm pizza from the Pizza Express fast-food outlet connected to the Olympia hall on one side and to the street (to serve the public) on the other, I was told I was no longer needed, and headed off into the night sky.

Or should I say afternoon sky. It was only 1.30pm. I had a good hard look at this, which was on an advertising board over looking the passageway between Olypmia and the train station. I then walked about for a bit, stopping in a West Kensington pub for a large coke. At around 3.30pm I met David. Walked to his flat in Hammersmith and watched some TV (including Deal or No Deal, which I had not seen for years... I am glad to say it has not got any worse). Then at 5pm we went all the way to Camden Town to Josés flat.

Marco was there already, staying with Jose. Later arrived Ben, then Aidan. We sat down to a game of poker. We were using Josés loose change for chips, playing £0.01/£0.02 with £1 stacks. All completely casual, and we didn't stake any money on the game, despite using coins for chips. Around eight o'clock we left and took the tube to Liverpool St. wherefrom we walked to Brick Lane looking for a curry house. We were spoilt for choice, but eventually settled on one which had offered us two free rounds of drinks and 30% off the final bill.

For those who have not been to Brick Lane, it is a veritable chaos. But one worth seeing. Every restaurant had a man outside to draw customers in, making offers and generally being persistent and annoying. At first we thought it was only the lower-end restaurants (who did not have name recognition) who had to employ this strategy, but it turns out that every single place does it. It's just part of healthy, capitalist competition.

I had a chicken dopiaza and a pint of Tiger. Or was it Cobra. I get the two mixed up.

We returned home after a brief walk, and got to sleep at some time after midnight. I volunteered to sit on the floor. Sure, it's hard on the back, but better than trying to sleep on a sofa only to fall off, which, of course, is hard on the whole body.

However, not even the most comfortable, embracing bed would have made the night's sleep any longer. Several of us had set an alarm for 4 o'clock. I set a backup one for 4.30.

After a brief wash and no breakfast, we were out. Aidan was driving, José sat at the front. In the back was myself, Ben (in the middle) and David. Marco, who had never been planning to come anyway, stayed at home. We left Camden at around 5.10am, and then the long drive began.

It was about an hour till dawn began to break. All the while I was nervous about what lay ahead, as we had been promised gale force winds for our sea passage. On arriving at Dover, however, things seemed fairly calm. We had a light breakfast (a Gingsters peppered steak pie for me) and then boarded the boat. I was apprehensive about seasickness at the start of the voyage, despite never having been seasick in my life. However, I was infitinetly relieved when it turned out there was an area for standing outside. The fresh sea air makes you forget about any groginess (what an awful word) you might feel and being able to see land (often on both sides, England and France, at the same time) gives your coordination something to anchor on to, thereby minimising the disorientation of life on the wave.

Arrived at Calais. There followed a two hour drive to Lille. José, having somehow torn his trousers, set off on a quest to find some new ones. In the mean time, the rest of us toured the surrounding area. I was very happy to see a chocolatier which I had last seen in Le Touquet back in 2006 - Le Chat Bleu. I ate one of their famous chocolate golf balls, as did Ben.

After much walking we settled down for lunch at Cafe Leffe, named after the Belgian beer of which they served several varieties. As you can see from this map, the Belgian influence is not by accident. I had a beef burger which, instead of buns, had what seemed to be hash browns. I washed this weird stuff down with some forest-fruit-flavoured Leffe.

More walking continued. At around 5-something (French time) we realised that time was short and that if we wanted to go somewhere else, we should do it now.

Thus off we went, northwestwards, as the sun set. The only place we stopped in the end was a Carrefour 'hypermarket'. The others bought all manner of things...well, mainly cheese, wine and beer. I only bought some more forest-fruit-flavoured Leffe.

We had a little trouble finding Calais. There were lots of narrow roads and Flemmish placenames, but eventualy we stumbled upon the motorway home. The boat journey was calm and fairly relaxed. We all had some expensive ferry-food. As on the way there, the journey took one and a half hours. We were all pretty tired by now, having been up around sixteen hours, a full day, on minimal sleep. But Aidan, who was doing all the driving today, ensured he was alert for the last leg of the voyage.

Dover to London. It took about two hours, and involved driving through East London and under the Thames via the Blackwall tunnel. I never get to see much of East London, and so I made a special effort to keep my curious eyes open.

Back at around midnight, and after unloading the car we all went to bed. Not the same bed. In my case, the floor, where I had left the sleeping bag, pillow et al anyway. Most of us got up at 9.30am the next day to go to our various parts of the country. I was back in Brighton at around one o'clock.

Not that the adventure ended there. At Victoria station I had bought a copy of The Times, to see what had gone into the shock headline Gordon Brown on course to win election. It turned out that the Conservative Party conference was happening in Brighton while I had been away. I saw Cameron's speech live via BBC News, even though the actual thing was being given only a few miles away.

The election race really is getting tight/heating up/reaching fever pitch... whatever metaphor you wish, really. The latest poll from ComRes offers the following statistics.

Conservatives: 37%

Labour: 32%

Liberal Democrats: 19%

Others: 12%

Due to the way the electoral system works in practice, this five-percent lead basically translates to a hung parliament and a neck-and-neck race between the two sides.

Some people were suggesting Brown should call an election on Monday (yesterday) as things weren't going to get any better for him in the polls. I was secretly excited at this prospect, but realise that Brown has no intention of calling anything before the universally agreed date of May 6th. After all, he bottled it in 2007 and he'll keep bottling it again and again if he has to.

Some dreams

I don't mean some wavy aspirations. I mean those things that go on when you go to sleep.

Dream I

I was in what appeared to be the living room on the top floor of my house, but the dimensions of the room were a lot bigger than in real life. Furtheremore, there appearead to be a number of desks in the room (c. 20) as if it were a quiet study room, classroom or exam hall.

One of the guys I played poker with at Warwick, Richard King, was scuffling around, as there appeared to be a miniature tornado above his desk. The tornado was about twelve feet in the air and three feet high, so not a particularly large object but for some reason I was able to gauge its speed of rotation at around 600 mph.

Richard ran out of the room and so did I, although we had a little trouble opening the door. This only added to our anxiety. We ran down two flights of stairs to safety, but once we had arrived at the ground floor it seemed that this friend of mine had changed from Richard King to Daniel Mumby (who I am sure reads this blog. Hello Daniel!)

Dream II

The building I was in seemed to be a hybrid between my old school sports hall and swimming pool hall. The main part of the building itself seemed more like the sports hall, and there was no pool to be seen. However, the changing rooms were identical to the ones in the swimming pool hall. Furthermore, there were wooden benches along the side in the same style as the swimming pool hall.

There was some sort of finger buffet to start with. Nothing too fancy, just sandwiches really. I do not recall eating very much.

Everybody around me had been a pupil at my school. There were no university friends or acquaintences to be seen, but there were a few people who did not exist in real life. The room was very crowded, and a football game emerged. Yet at the same time, people were casually walking around the 'pitch' as if the progress of the game wasn't really that important. The more concientious people were walking along the 'out of touch' areas around the perimiter.

I occasionally got involved in the football match, passing or shooting the ball, though I did not contribute very intently or significantly - I merely kicked the ball when it came to me. It was only when I stood in the corner afterwards to talk wtih some friends that I was criticized for getting involved, because apparently it was a team match, and I had not been selected for either of the teams. I tried to be nonchallant about it like "oops. yeah. easy mistake to make" but they kept criticising me. Not in the needling way, e.g. "you're such a fucking idiot", but more in the sort of "no look, you've done something really wrong here.", the sort of look you might get if you accidently broke a family heirloom or something... as if to create some sort of lingering guilt.

I didn't really do much talking beyond this. As I walked along the 'out of touch' area a Japanese boy/man/whatever grabbed my shin as if to trip me over. On regaining my balance I took him by the neck and, without any resistance on his part, dragged him to the toilet and threatened to lower his head into the basin. I did not threaten with words, merely with action and suspense.

I did not pursue my vengance any further and let him go. He smiled and apologised as if he were a Toyota executive and then slid off.

--------------------

And this was more or less the time I woke up, which was around 10.45am, even though I had set my alarm for 8. Basically I have to be up at 6am on Friday and 4am on Saturday, so I need to force myself to get up earlier in preperation.

Have to do some sorting out this weekend. Some serious sorting out. Yesterday was an extremely lazy day. Sure, I got up at 8.45am, but that was only so I could watch the Election 1974 (Feb) coverage, which started at 9.00am. Will definitely leave the house today though, otherwise I will go mad.

On the topic of elections, Gordon Brown is currently at my old university (I actually recognise the windows and trees behind him) right now, although by the time you read this the page will probably be a static news story. At the time of my posting it, Gordon is being shown live.
"Mr Brown was welcomed by supporters but there were some hecklers as he arrived at the University of Warwick, Coventry."

I know some of those hecklers very well!

I am still not convinced that a Conservative Majority Government is inevitable. After all, "nothing is inevitable until it has happened". And happened it has not!

Over the course of my lazy day yesterday I played a $8 Rebuy on Pokerstars. Won a few flips... until the very last one, where I called all in with 88 versus AK. Fortunately I was already in the cash stages by then, and for my $24.80 buyin I scored $67.70. Top prize was over $9K though. I almost wilt at the idea of winning that much.

That was the only tournament I played. Often in the past when I played tournaments I would insist on playing several at once, but I was glad just to play one yesterday.

"Take a second look at us. Take a long, hard, look at them."

Gordon Brown, 11.35am

He recieved quite some applause for this.

"How can they be the party of change, when they haven't even changed themselves."

Gordon Brown, 11.38am

No applause for this.

I'm not a Brown hater, but I do believe in individual responsibility and freedom of thought and enterprise. And that's why I'll be voting Conservative. As for the 'national economic scene', I am not convinced either party knows any better than the other, so I am voting for a philosophy rather than a practical plan. I'm not going to try and convince others to follow my lead though. I'm voting in my self-interest. If everybody else does the same, then we'll get as accurate a picture of the nationial interest as we can.

Come to think of it, will a Hung Parliament really be so bad? At least there'll be concensus, even if it is forced. I do fear that, at the moment, there seems to be an almost deliberate party-poltical agenda to make sure no concensus of any sort emerges. Slime.

I think this will be quite an exciting election.