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Last night was without doubt the worst night you could realistically imagine for Labour. They already have less councillors than the Lib Dems from Friday’s results, lost top spot in Wales for the first time since 1918 (when Welshman Lloyd George was PM), and scored their lowest GB wide vote share since 1910. Back then Edward VII was King, the Titanic was still safely tucked away as a work in progress at Harland & Wharf’s Shipyard, Winston Churchill was Home Secretary under Prime Minister Herbet Henry Asquith and Liberal MP for Dundee, and the Labour Party was just four years old!

They polled third behind UKIP - with their vote share lower even than that of Stanley Baldwin after his unpopular coalition with the Conservatives - and only escaped the humiliation of 4th because of the Greens heavily eroding the Liberal Democrat vote. (Did anyone else spot Simon Hughes’ Freudian Slip when discussing the rise of the BNP with David Dimbleby he accidently said (not verbatim) “We are totally opposed to the views of the Greens and are very worried about the Greens, I mean BNP.”)

But although Labour very much lost this election, the Conservatives cannot truly claim to have won it either. They may have topped the poll in Wales, but the national vote share was up less than 2% and was still below 30%. In some regions the vote share had even dropped. Last night was a victory for the minor parties more than anyone, and this poses two questions: will these votes return to the main parties at the general election, and will they go blue?

The risk for Cameron is that people have taken a ‘curse on all your houses’ view under the opinion that “you’re all the same” and - having had several Euro elections under PR - become used to voting for other parties. Do some people now even identify themselves as Ukippers or Greens, rather than just voting for them as a one-off, in the same way traditional Labour or Conservative voters proudly view themselves as such?

I still think the odds are in the Conservatives favour, but to form a majority they need the third biggest swing recorded in post-war history and there is still everything to play for.

For Labour to win they would have to be radical - personality wise, rather than with policy. Brown would have to go, as would all of his hated, creepy cohorts. Both of the Millibands, Ed Balls, Harman et al would have to go (if they haven’t already, it’s so hard to keep up). But a fresh face, the fresher the better, and preferably (for them) as surprising as possible. But if Labour did go for electric shock treatment - say Frank Field, Caroline Flint or Diane Abbot - with a cabinet featuring these along with say Kate Hoey, Bob Marshall-Andrews, Tony Benn as a sop to the oldies, Hazel Blears as a sop to the Blairy-bunch… It would be a disaster policy wise (no change there then) but be such a shock it could bounce enough to pull through.

It’s roughly the same as the Conservatives should have done in the 1990s! It’s a case of ‘new broom sweeps clean’; and if you want it to be your party you have to become a new broom.

Even so the Conservatives can win - but they must close their right flank with Ukip by promising a Referendum, and then be free to attack Labour on the issues that move Lab/Con swing voters without fear of losing votes of core voters. Ukip cost them 30-odd seats last time, they can’t be left to cost them the election.

In a few hours time we will know the results of the European Parliament elections, indeed the rumour is that the South East ‘region’ will declare at 21:02 - some 58 minutes before the BBC coverage starts and unfortunately clashing with The Apprentice!

What we do know however is the lunatics are well on their way to taking over the asylum!

BBC North West are reporting that the BNP have likely won a seat.
The Greens are reported to be doing well in Scotland.
The Cornish Nationalists have outpolled Labour in the pasty principality.

Meanwhile far-right lunatics across Europe are reported to be doing well; and a party called ‘The Party of Animals’ may win a seat in the Netherlands.

Reminds me of a Yes Minister quote:
Activist: Humans are animals too!
Minister: Yes I know, I’ve just come back from the House of Commons.

With the election results not due until after 9pm, and everyone at ConservativeHome making their predictions, I have decided instead to set some benchmark predictions against which to judge the party’s respective performances.

The election really is the Conservative’s to lose. There has been no management of expectations, and so anything other than a first place finish and anything less than the 26.7% they achieved in 2004 will be seen as a poor result. I expect the first place finish is in the bag - coming second would be disaster territory - and they’ll probably get 25-30%. Anything over 30% would be a huge achievement.

The battle for second place is really between UKIP, Labour and the Lib Dems in the polls. The odds are on Labour coming 4th in my opinion, with all three parties grouped around 15%, and if Labour are spared this embarassment it is purely because of the Green vote eroding the Lib Dems! Add the Lib Dem and Green votes - which you could fairly certainly do if you had 2nd preference votes -and Labour would certainly be 4th!

UKIP has very much promoted themselves as THE party to beat Labour into third, so if they don’t out perform the failed party of the sociopathic PM then the night will be seen as a big failure. They must also keep their tally of 12 MEPs and in my view poll over 15% to be seen as doing well; any decline in MEPs or a sub 15% vote will be seen as severe failure, but any increase a big success - there really isn’t a static middle option for them.

The Liberal Democrats came 4th last time - behind the Conservatives, Labour and Ukip - and I expect it close today in 3rd/4th due to the Greens eroding the Lib Dem vote. Again like Ukip it will either be a huge success for them if they outpoll Labour and come 3rd, or a humiliation if they don’t and come 4th, especially as this is a vote under their boloved proportional representation and
having outpolled Labour at the council elections held on the same day! Again in terms of vote 15% is the line between failure and success.

For the Greens they must retain their 2 MEPs, and will be very pleased to reach double figures. I’m guessing however 8-10% to be the likely range, and if they fail to reach that they have failed miserably. They will also want to out poll the BNP, who will be judged as a success if they gain an MEP or poll greater than 5%, and a failure if they don’t. If they beat the Greens they will have scored a major coup.

My guess is Conservatives in first, UKIP in second, Labour in third very narrowly ahead of the Lib Dems, with Greens and BNP roughly equal and probably (and very sadly) winning 3 MEPs each.

Given the devastation of today’s political events the Napoleonic comparisons are easy, even more so given the fact discussed on Newsnight yesterday that now is the first time since the Duke of Wellington in 1834 that a Prime Minister has struggled to form a Cabinet. Of course Wellington didn’t have Glenys Kinnock and so had to appoint himself to most of the other ministries…

But Brown is no Wellington, even though in his period as Prime Minister - when he experienced an extremely high degree of personal and political unpopularity - his residence was a target of window-smashers and iron shutters were installed to mitigate the damage earning him the nickname “The Iron Duke”. So Gordon Brown may yet truly be “The Iron PM” as he once falsely claimed to be “The Iron Chancellor” in this way at least!

Gordon Brown is however not the Duke of Wellington - far more Napoleon - and today is most certainly his Waterloo or Trafalgar. the question now is which?

Many believe it’s Waterloo and he will soon be gone. Bookmakers Paddy Power believes Gordon Brown is toast and are already paying out on the Prime Minister leaving his post before the end of August. But to trigger a ballot requires 70 MPs, and with well over 120 bound by collective responsibility, the rest divided between Blairite and Brownite, and fears of infighting worsening the party’s chances, I can’t see it.

Plus who’d want to take over now? If they called a general election to take advantage of any honeymoon poll boost he/she would end up beating George Canning’s title of 119 days as the shortest period in office (and he can be excused…he died!). And it could be worse, with all the infighting and lack of suitable MPs the new leader might be like the Earl of Bath (2 days), who was asked to form a government however was unable to find more than one person who would agree to serve in his cabinet.

But with less than a year to go they’d have no time to really do anything even if they could form a government, but plenty of time to get associated and blamed. Either way they’d go down in history as a disastrous loser, and then be expected to quit as Leader after the election anyway (maybe have to due to infighting).

It’s a suicide leadership suited only for someone wanting nothing more than their photo on the wall by the Downing Street staircase, a Government car, and the ability to bore their grandchildren with the fact they was once the Prime Minister.

I might be wrong, but I think Brown will survive. This is his Trafalgar rather than his Waterloo; it’s over for him ambitions wise, but he will linger on until everything comes into alignment at the general election next year.

People across the UK are casting their votes in elections to the European Parliament. Or rather some people are casting their votes in elections to the European Parliament.

Lots of people don’t seem to have noticed. The news story is currently ranked 6th in the BBC News ‘Most Popular Stories Now’ - rather like where Labour will come - behind ‘Boris Johnson stumbles into river’.

Turnout under 25%?

UKPollingReport feature a prediction of the European Parliament election results.

The same team produced a similar prediction for the 2004 elections, which predicted that the UK result would be CON 32, LAB 27, LD 12, SNP 2 and PC 2, with the Greens and UKIP loosing all their seats. Hopelessly wrong. Real result: CON 27, LAB 19, UKIP 12, LD 12, GREEN 2, SNP 2, PC 1.

Now they are taking into account all sorts of things - the latest opinion polls, the last national election, who is in government, how close the last national election was to the last european election, whether the party is an “anti-European” party or not, whether they watch Neighbours or not… - though how you weight these things is anyone’s guess. Projection: CON 27(nc), LAB 22(+3), LDEM 13(+1), UKIP 4(-8), SNP 2(nc), PC 1(nc), GRN 0(-2).

Is this the most hopeless poll ever? The notion that the Conservatives make no progress on their 2004 result (their lowest vote share in a national election since 1832) despite a UKIP meltdown; that Labour make significant progress; the Lib Dems improve from their post-Iraq War highs; the SNP make no progress; and the Greens vanish despite the global warming fears…it’s bonkers. What are they on?

My prediction (excluding Northern Ireland) is that the UKIP meltdown largely aids the Conservatives who win 40 seats, with UKIP being reduced to a 3 by holding a single seat in each of the South East, East Anglia and South West constituencies; Labour gets reduced to around 11 MEPs again aiding the Conservatives but also seriously affected by low turnout and the BNP, who I expect will sadly gain a seat in each of the North West, Yorkshire & Humber and London regions; Liberal Democrats will do poorly and be reduced to maybe 10 seats; whilst the Greens will do well with 4 seats, two in London and two in the South East. The SNP will probably gain a seat to have 3, with Plaid Cymru holding their 1.

We will see which is more accurate…