Ed Miliband Behind in Britain Exit Polls
British Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservatives are on course to win the most seats in parliament but will be just shy of an outright majority, an exit poll showed on Thursday after voting closed in a national election.
The poll put the Conservatives on 316 seats and the main opposition Labor Party on 239. The Scottish National Party (SNP) is set to win 58 seats, all but wiping Labor out in its former Scottish stronghold.
The centrist Liberal Democrats, who have governed in coalition with the Conservatives for the past five years, will get just 10 seats in the 650-seat Westminster parliament, according to the poll released by national broadcasters.
However, the combined total of 326 for the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats indicated that Cameron should be able to stay in office, maybe with the support of another small party.
“The Conservatives have clearly won this election,” if the exit poll was correct, Conservative government minister Michael Gove said.
Before the election, opinion polls had shown the two biggest parties neck-and-neck in a vote that could help determine the future of Britain’s relationship with the European Union and the place of Scotland within the United Kingdom.
The UK Independence Party, which wants an immediate British withdrawal from the EU, is on track to get two seats, the exit poll showed.
Cameron’s Conservatives campaigned on a promise to renegotiate Britain’s relationship with the EU before holding a referendum by 2017 on whether to stay in the bloc or leave.
They have pledged to eliminate the budget deficit, now running at 5 percent of gross domestic product, by 2018/19, including through cuts to welfare spending of 12 billion pounds ($18.3 billion).
Miliband’s Labor Party has promised to bring down the deficit less aggressively in what it says would be a fairer way. It has said it will aim to eliminate the deficit, excluding investment spending, but has not set out a firm timetable.
Labor has also said it would introduce a “mansion tax” on properties worth over 2 million pounds, and overhaul tax rules for wealthy foreigners.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30