2024 General Election Review

The result: Wales stops feeling blue

I stayed up until almost 5am watching the election results come in. Admittedly, I didn't watch it all - after the exit poll announcements at 10pm I watched the Star Wars film, Solo, to kill a bit of time before the actual results were declared.

By now, everyone with a passing interest in politics will know the headlines. Labour won with a big majority - something that felt unthinkable after Boris Johnson's huge win for the Tories in 2019. 

The Liberal Democrats went big as well, their 72 seats being the party's highest total for a century - going back to when they were just Liberal, no Democrat. 

Plaid Cymru won 4 seats, doubling their representation in the House of Commons. The number of constituencies in Cymru had dropped from 40 to 32, so some MPs had been squeezed out already. Every remaining Tory incumbent lost - including a record 4 former Welsh Secretaries. Most of the seats were won by Labour and the Liberal Democrats got one. 

The exit polls predicted a depressing total of Reform winning 13 seats. In the end they got 5, including panto politico Nigel Farage finally becoming an MP. Subsequently there have been questions over whether several Reform candidates were real people. The picture of their candidate in Clapham appears to be AI generated. Several candidates in Scotland have a nonexistent digital footprint. They still got thousands of votes though. 

I was happier to see the Green Party win a new record total for them of four seats. Jeremy Corbyn held on to his seat in Islington as an independent candidate having been ejected from the Labour Party. Amazing to think he was leading Labour in the previous two elections. Other independents won in areas with large Muslim populations, which is being taken as a protest vote against the Labour Party's stance on Gaza. The success of the independent candidates took some of the gloss off Labour's victory. 

I was flicking between channels on election night. I stayed mainly on BBC 1 Wales which focused on results from Cymru. BBC2 was the general BBC UK coverage chaired by Laura Kuenssberg, who I feel has been very partisan towards the Tories for several years. She was matey with Boris Johnson and seemed like his personal PR machine at times. Watching Laura slowly assimilating what was happening was quite amusing. Her expression turned increasingly sour as the night wore on. 

Meanwhile, on ITV there were some decent guest pundits including Ed Balls and Nicola Sturgeon. Sky's coverage was also quite good. It seemed that Sky announced results a fraction before the BBC. Sometimes they announced a bit too quickly, at one point they erroneously credited the Greens with a win in a seat Labour won off the Tories.

Early on in the night Andrew RT Davies, leader of the "Welsh" Conservatives, lost his cool on BBC1 Wales and lumped the blame for the Tory defeat squarely on (now ex) Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. In fairness, he wasn't wrong in his criticism of the decision to call an election without a coherent campaign strategy. Rishi may have felt a July election would wrongfoot his opponents but it also seemed to wrongfoot his own party. 

I knew two people personally who were standing as candidates. My fellow Barry Town fan, Ian, was the Plaid Cymru candidate in the Vale of Glamorgan. A former work colleague, Charlie, stood as the Tory candidate in Llanelli. Neither won, but props to them both for standing. 

Now the dust has settled and we get to see whether Labour have been all mouth and no trousers in their promises of change. It's been barely a week and so far they seem to have made the right noises. I'm a bit concerned that the new health minister has links with private healthcare companies. But overall it feels that things may be different now. 

Virgin Media come good

Got home today to find a piece of junk mail from Virgin waiting for me, announcing that we now have Setanta Sports on Virgin cable for free. Wahey. But, even better, all premier and football league goals are now available for free on the Virgin Media website.

So, for example, if you wanted to see Shrewsbury stick four past Lincoln, all you'd have to do is visit the web-page.

I have to admit the spat with Sky which saw me lose Sky Sports News (the perfect breakfast accompaniment) annoyed me because it seemed more about the colossal egos of Branson and Murdoch than about consumer service. But with the website goals and the promised Setanta Sports News channel launches, Virgin may well have redeemed themselves.

Not so special offer

Sky TV keep mailing me with their special offer for live football, broadband and phone calls. And it seems very special until you read the small print and find you need to pay for a BT line as well, and a one off payment for a box, and phone calls at certain times, and so on.

And then there’s the bigger objection, which is Sky TV are bastards who, by giving money to the biggest clubs have made top flight football virtually unwatchable. Every season is billed as the most exciting yet, but the truth is the Premiership is about as formulaic and processional as a Formula One race. The biggest hype is reserved for the end-of-season rush for the last Champions League slot, which could go to anyone, but will inevitably be either Liverpool or Arsenal. Since when has finishing fourth been at all important, in any league, in any sport, in any country, ever? Since Sky.

Such are the diminished ambitions of the majority of football clubs - don't win anything, just get into the Champions League and earn enough money to fund next season's unsuccess.

Of course the Champions League is yet another example of TV money ripping the throat out of football and gorging itself on the still-warm blood of pseudo-competition. The European Cup it replaced used to be a contest of champions. Now it’s various big clubs from around Europe cashing in, regardless of whether they’ve won anything in their domestic league or not. The last “British” (don’t get me started) winners were Liverpool, who have never won the Premier League and were top English team most recently when Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister. In what way do they qualify as champions?

So, Sky TV, stop sending me junk mail. You’ve ruined football. It’s a boring soulless affair and I hate you for that. Why don’t you sod off back under a rock and get your clammy, undead hands off things that matter.

Play offs in the pub

I went to The Grange pub last night to watch the mighty Shrews take on MK Dons in the League Two play offs and Sky’s surprisingly unpatronising coverage of a fairly dull, if fast-paced, scoreless draw. The pitch, now free of ducks and even swans, was muddy, but held up reasonably well in what will be the last ever Town game on it.

I did feel nostalgic though, as the cameras panned around a ground I know so well, lingering on the crumbling terraces, the trees above the stands, and the parochial advertising hoardings, while the commentators dutifully reminded us that this was the last game at Gay Meadow after 97 years…

So farewell then, the family stand, where as a lucky mascot I watched Town decimate Grimsby in the old second division; goodbye Christmas Steel Stockholders, the blue ad sign on the Wakeman End where me and Jim used to stand during our sixth form years; arrivederci the Riverside, with its tiny snack bar and stinky bogs.

It’s the end of an era. And I watched it live on Sky in a run down pub where no one cared. Except me.