Local elections, 2012

Voting is well underway here in the United Kingdom for the 2012 local elections. Over 6,000 council seats are up nationwide, several cities are holding referendums to decide if their inhabitants want to start directly electing mayors, the city of Doncaster is voting whether or not to abolish their own directly-elected mayor system, and three mayors are up for election.

The race that has been in the news most frequently has been the London mayoral election, where the incumbent, Boris Johnson (Conservative Party), is up for re-election. His main opponent is Ken Livingstone (Labour), with lesser challengers from the Liberal Democrats, Greens, United Kingdom Independence Party, British National Party, and an independent. Polls seem to be showing Johnson winning, with Livingstone coming in second, and the other candidates having some significant percentages but nowhere near anything close to actually winning the mayoralty of London.

While Johnson looks as though he will win in London, the Conservatives themselves are expecting heavy losses in the council elections. They are the largest party in Parliament, and with them receiving rising public dissatisfaction from issues such as a potential fuel strike, hostile reaction to the recent budget, and the current issue of MP Jeremy Hunt's involvement with News Corporation's former bid to take over BSkyB, they are polling several percentage points behind Labour. Labour are expected to win significantly in the councils; the Liberal Democrats lost several hundred seats in the 2011 local elections, and since they are currently polling at 8% (behind 16% for "others") that could happen this time around. The smaller parties hope to increase their amount of seats, or at the very least maintain what they already have. (Polling source.)

This is the second major election that has taken place since I have been back in the United Kingdom (the previous being the 2011 locals/AV referendum). I do not yet have the experience to predict the way an election will go in this country (for example, I was surprised in 2010 when Labour lost in Parliament but were the only party in that election to gain councillors), but I think the final results will be similar to what the polls have been saying.

As for Northamptonshire, none of the seats in this county are up for this election; the next elections here are in 2013. While I am not able to vote in this year's elections, I will still be keenly observing their results, which will be released tomorrow.