A Westminster balancing act and the politics of 2015

As the election campaign kicks off, here is a look at what the year ahead holds for the main protagonists in British politics.

n 1. Politicians will overestimate how interested people are in the election.

The campaign for the general election officially began on December 19, 2014, when the first legal limits on politicians’ campaign spending took effect. No one outside Westminster noticed, which should tell politicians something about how interested people really are.

Opinion polls also suggest that many voters are not yet paying much attention. That will not stop the politicians, of course. Parliament returns from its Christmas break this week, but almost all legislating and governing is now over as politicians focus more and more of their energies on annoying the voters at every possible moment until election day, May 7.

Away from the phoney political war, there are two important dates in the political diary before the election: On March 18, George Osborne will deliver the last budget of the parliament. Then on March 30, parliament will dissolve and the full-blown election campaign will finally get under way.

n 2. Party leaders will take part in televised debates.

The first real moment of broad public interest in the campaign will come when party leaders — some of them, or all of them — face each other in live-broadcast debates. Unlike 2010, it is likely that these will start before the official campaign period, as the parties try to minimise the risks their leaders run from the debates. Because many more people will follow the television clashes than day-to-day politics, they have the potential to dominate political debate.

And while it seems unlikely that the second round of debates will have quite the electrifying impact of the first — remember Cleggmania and “I agree with Nick”? — putting politicians live on camera without scripts or safety nets still raises the prospect of significant and unforeseen events. Will Nigel Farage’s bubble burst live on air? Will Britain fall in love with Natalie Bennett, the Green Party leader?

Or even decide that, actually, Ed Miliband is a normal bloke after all? They are all possible outcomes and the only way to find out will be to watch. But where will you be watching? The conventional broadcasters are proposing their conventional debates.

However, the Telegraph, working with the Guardian and YouTube, is also seeking to host a Digital Debate that would be shown online, the preferred forum for many younger people. Politicians all talk about reaching out to new voters and doing politics differently. Soon we will see if they mean it.

n 3. There will be a new government, eventually.

Predicting the outcome of the election on May 7 is a mug’s game. The polls put the Conservatives and Labour agonisingly close and complicating any forecast is the impact of smaller parties: United Kingdom Independence Party (Ukip), the Scottish National Party (SNP), the Greens and — yes, they still matter — the Liberal Democrats (Lib Dems).

An unexpectedly strong (or weak) showing by any of those four could determine whether the Conservatives or Labour finish with the most seats in the House of Commons. If, as many pundits and politicos expect, neither party gets a majority of those seats, the business of constructing a new government will be complicated and potentially protracted. In 2010, David Cameron and Nick Clegg stitched their coalition together in five days; most European countries take weeks or even months to do the same.

And this time, there could be many more options on the table: Minority government? An informal pact with the nationalists? Full-blown coalition again? The horse-trading could take weeks. Britain could just experience a prolonged spell without a real government — a happy or worrying situation, depending on your perspective.

n 4. The Davids will wound the Goliaths

What does appear likely is that the old pattern of two-party politics will continue to fade: The Conservatives and Labour will both struggle to reach even 35 per cent of the vote. That means they will effectively be fighting each other for around two thirds of the vote, while the smaller insurgents take the rest.

The long-term political consequences of the decline of the big two are almost limitless, but in the short-term they could well include a fresh crisis over Scotland (and an English backlash) as an enlarged SNP demands a new independence referendum or other concessions as the price for supporting a new government at Westminster. Northern Ireland could also loom large on the UK political agenda as its MPs emerge as potential kingmakers. There could also be renewed pressure for electoral reform as parties such as Ukip and the Greens win big chunks of the vote, but scarcely any parliamentary seats.

n 5. Stars will fall and rise

Whatever the outcome, it is hard to see how Cameron and Ed can both keep leading their parties after May. Cameron failed to secure a majority for the Conservatives in 2010. Failing to at least keep them in power this time will probably bring an abrupt end to his never-easy relationship with his party. For Miliband, the stakes are even higher. His party already has doubts about him, so failing to win an election that many feel is still Labour’s for the taking will surely be fatal for his leadership.

Clegg, meanwhile, may just surprise everyone. Friends say he is already mentally checked-out, preparing to leave the stage after five exacting years, trying to keep the Lib Dems alive and in government. But what if his party clings on to 30 or so seats and thus the balance of power?

The prospect of vacancies at the top will put some attention on who comes next: How will would-be leaders such as Boris Johnson, Theresa May, Chuka Umunna and Yvette Cooper perform when battle is joined? And could the campaign make others into potential candidates, putting names such as Nicky Morgan and Dan Jarvis in the frame? Behind the scenes, other careers are at stake too. The big parties have both employed big-name foreign consultants, men hired to advise on elections around the world: Lynton Crosby and Jim Messina for the Tories, and David Axelrod for Labour. The international standing — and thus commercial fortunes — of these imported gurus will be significantly affected by the way Britain votes.

n 6. We will get some answers about spending cuts and tax rises.

If you are more interested in how politics affects your day-to-day life than the careers of men in suits, you will have to wait until after the election for any useful feedback. The government is in deep financial trouble, spending much more than it raises in tax. That means spending less or taxing more, or both.

And while all the parties are being a bit candid about that fact, none of them is spelling out all the nasty things they will have to do to balance the books and keep the lights on. It is political common sense to do unpopular things as quickly after your election as possible. Soon after the 2010 general election, Osborne used an emergency budget to announce the beginning of an austerity package that included increasing Vat to 20 per cent. With the deficit far from fixed, the first statement from whoever is Chancellor after this year’s election may well be equally joyless. There could just be a very similar international backdrop too; events in Greece threaten a renewed Eurozone crisis. The resultant jitters in the financial markets could add some real urgency to the second act of Britain’s fiscal drama.

n 7. Can 2015 be a year of two general elections?

There is a precedent in February 1974. Then, an inconclusive election was followed by a failed Conservative attempt to create a stable coalition, meaning a short-lived minority Labour government and a second election eight months later. The prospect of a close election in 2015 has serious people in Whitehall and Westminster wondering if May’s polls will produce an unstable government and a second election before long.

Still, there are reasons to doubt here. First, the current government has changed the law to fix parliamentary terms at five years; the only way to force an early election is to defeat the government of the day on a confidence vote, something generally easier said than done given ministers’ ability to bribe and cajole smaller parties. And second, the current parliament proves that an inconclusive election can still mean stable government.

In 2010, even many of the participants didn’t expect the Conservative-Lib Dem Coalition to last a full five years. Yet, the Coalition endured. Sometimes, uncertainty breeds solidity.

— The Telegraph Group Limited, London, 2015