“Go on…” said Coulson.
“We bring up each and every area where Congdon’s said something that agrees with our manifesto. Or looks like it agrees with it. Or might look like it agrees with it if you look at it right. And each and every place where we can claim Congdon’s view isn’t reflective of that of UKIP candidates.”
Jonathon leaned forwards. “That could work. With UKIP, splits are easy. Get two UKIPpers in a room and you’ll have three factions by lunchtime. Give me four hours – I’ll get you half a dozen splits stories.”
Coulson nodded. “Yes. The media love splits.”
“Right. Andy – get a different line in to any pet journos we’ve got left every morning between now and election day, about a policy Dave’s raised that we can argue that Congdon’s agreed with – deficit cutting, elected coppers, something about free schools, that kind of thing –,” said Hilton.
Coulson’s smile flashed." And we target Boulton.”
Jonathon wasn’t looking convinced. “Isn’t that a bit dangerous? You’re thinking of a ‘taking advantage of a senile old lady’ approach, yeah?”
“Not exactly,” said Coulson. “Remember he said something like ‘as we were just talking about’?”
“Aaaahh…” said Hilton.
Coulson nodded again. “We get a tame columnist to come up with something along the lines that they’ve heard a rumour that Boulton spent ten minutes talking about economic matters with Thatcher and said he’d ask her a question on Congdon’s economic credibility and whether he’s a loony or based in reality. So the line becomes that she just confirmed he wasn’t a loony, but wasn’t commenting on his wider platform. And Boulton overegged it for a scoop.”
“Can’t we run into legal issues there?” asked Carl.
Coulson waved a hand, airily: “You just start with ‘I heard an unconfirmed rumour that’, sprinkle in ‘allegedly’ here and there, and end with the statement that you hope the rumour will be disproved as it’s stinky journalistic ethics. By then it’s in the public mind and only has to stay there until Thursday.”
“Could almost be an opportunity, you know…” said Jonathon, quietly.
“How so?” asked Hilton
“There’s a big chunk of almost-swappers in the 30-45 age band who are put off us because of the Thatcher era. If we can find a media platform that primarily talks to them and some kind of commentator who could muse – just thinking out loud – that nothing else could show that Cameron’s Conservatives aren’t like the old Thatcher Tories.”
Coulson frowned. “Bloody risky. Might be worth a shot, though. Nothing that wrinklies will see, or Essex voters. Is there some kind of ‘Look North’ programme?”
“Put it on daytime telly,” suggested Hilton. “The stay-at-home Mums and the unemployed are horrible for us already. Not much to lose there.”
“Will any of this work?” asked Carl. “Seems a bit feeble.”
“It’s damage limitation, kid.” said Coulson.
“Actually, it could work fairly well,” said Hilton. “What you’ve got to remember is that Conservative voters are … well … conservative.”
Jonathon muttered, “Clue is in the name, there, really…”
“What we’re aiming to do is give them an excuse to not vote UKIP,” said Hilton
“You mean, ‘not to vote UKIP’,” said Carl.
“What?”
“Well, it’s a split infinitive, and…” explained Carl.
“Thank you, Mr Bernard Woolley,” said Hilton. “Now if there are any sensible points you’d like to make?”
Carl flushed. “Sorry, Steve, it’s been a long day,”
Hilton continued. “Anyway – people find it difficult to change their votes at the best of times. If we just put enough doubt in there, when they are face-to-face with the ballot paper, they’ll put the cross where they always have.”
“And quite a few of the postal voters have already voted – quite a few of the oldies won’t be able to change their minds now,” added Jonathon.
Hilton nodded. “Good point. Right, we know what to do.”
The staffers filed out. Hilton stopped Coulson just before he left. In a quiet voice, he murmured, “We’re still screwed, aren’t we?”
Coulson tilted his head: “Moderately so - we’re never going to get back to where we were this morning. With the momentum we were building up, I reckon we were looking at 35% by polling day and a possible majority. That’s gone, but we can aim to keep as close to thirty as we can. You were right – play this right and if we get a bit of luck, we aren’t totally shafted.”
CHAPTER SIX
30 Millbank, 2nd May
“You know, after this election, I’m not going to look at another bloody opinion poll for two months,” muttered Coulson to himself as he picked up a piece of paper on which two more polls had been scrawled. They’d be published in the following day’s newspapers and once again, he’d have to be ready to change tack for further damage limitation or to take advantage of any good news – and he really didn’t expect any of the latter.
He was not to be surprised. The top poll was from YouGov and claimed Labour on 25, Conservatives on 24, UKIP matching them on 24 as well, and the Lib Dems falling off on 19. The second was from ICM, with a fairly similar message, although slightly better for the Conservatives. The Blues were leading on 26, Labour second on 25, UKIP in third again on 22, and the Lib Dems on 20.
The UKIP surge was back again, and the Conservative lead had evaporated – as expected. He was relieved that the polls weren’t even worse, but the direction of travel was concerning him. He’d have to start considering worst cases. If the Conservatives didn’t make some real progress – say, two hundred and thirty seats or more – then Cameron would be in real danger. A couple of days ago, he was confidently looking at a result north of three hundred; now he was worried they wouldn’t get past two hundred and forty seats. Getting fewer than two hundred and thirty seats was looking like a real possibility.
He called Jonathon over to him. “This last minute poster campaign that Labour are launching tomorrow,” he said.
Jonathon nodded attentively.
“What do we have on it?” asked Coulson.
“Nothing at the moment,” said Jonathon. “I’ll see what I can get.”
***
30 Millbank, 3rd May
“So - what have you got for us, Jonathon?” asked Coulson.
Jonathon looked apologetic. “I’ve tried every source I’ve got, and all I’ve picked up is that they were planning on releasing it about a month ago but held it over ‘til now. Apparently Brown saw it and judged it would be best to leave it to the last minute for maximum impact and minimal chance for us to do anything about it. There was an argument between Mandelson and Brown about it – that’s all I’ve got.”
“Great,” said Coulson. “Have you seen the polls? Since Maggie’s intervention, we’ve dropped seven points and it’s all gone to bloody Congdon. Labour’s back in the lead – talk about kicking us while we’re down.”
“Any chance Brown could have cocked this up?” asked Hilton, more in hope than confidence.
Coulson shrugged. “Always a chance, but remember he’s credited with saving their last campaign.”
“What about the short notice effect?” asked Jonathon, obviously trying to grasp any straw available. “Polling day’s Thursday - how are they going to get posters up and about in time? Not to mention most people will have made up their minds by now, surely?”
“Ordinarily you’d have a point,” said Coulson. “But the point of this campaign is to get it on the telly and internet. Make a big splash, and it’s like getting five hundred free poster sites in no time flat. And I hate to say it, but with this insane campaign, Brown might have played it perfectly. There are a lot of people out there thinking ‘Am I really going to vote for them?’. And the scary bit is that ‘them’ can
refer to any of us.”
They were watching at the big screen. The Miliband brothers were in what looked like a large, airy Garage in Basildon. Coulson tuned out the sound
“Come on – just show us what you’ve got. Get it over with,” demanded Coulson.
The camera focused on a huge screen on the side of a van. It came to life with a poster showing Cameron on an Audi Quattro with the slogan “Don’t let him take Britain back to the 1980s.”
There was stunned silence in CCHQ. Then Coulson started to laugh.
“No way! No sodding way! Oh, thank you! Thank you, God! It’s beautiful!” said Coulson.
Hilton looked puzzled. “Huh? I mean, it’s not as bad as we’d feared, is it. In fact…”
Jonathon started laughing.
Coulson leaned back in his chair with a contented smile. “Yup. It’s telling the UKIP voters to come home to the Tories, and they’ll believe it ‘cause it’s Labour telling them – not us. We couldn’t have come up with a better one ourselves – really. Oh, Gordon! You bloody fool! You’re beautiful! Thank you!”
***
From The British General Election of 2010, by Kavanagh and Cowley
“After the counter-productive Gene Hunt poster was revealed early in polling week, the final piece of bad news for the Labour campaign hit when a Labour candidate in Norfolk North West described Brown as ‘The worst Prime Minister ever’. The twists and turns of the campaign finally came to an end and the eve-of-election polls were published on election day itself:
YouGov/The Sun:
Labour - 29
Conservatives – 26
UKIP – 21
Liberal Democrats – 17
ICM/Guardian:
Labour – 28
Conservatives – 25
UKIP – 21
Liberal Democrats – 19
ComRes/ITV News/Independent:
Labour – 30
Conservatives – 24
UKIP – 22
Liberal Democrats - 18
Angus Reid / Politicalbetting.com:
Conservatives – 28
Labour – 24
UKIP - 23
Liberal Democrats – 17
Harris/Daily Mail:
Labour – 30
Conservatives - 26
Liberal Democrats – 20
UKIP – 18
Populus/The Times:
Conservatives – 28
Labour – 26
Liberal Democrats – 20
UKIP – 20
Opinium/Daily Express:
Conservatives – 27
Labour – 27
UKIP – 23
Liberal Democrats – 18
TNS-BRMB:
Labour – 28
Conservatives – 25
UKIP – 21
Liberal Democrats - 19
Ipsos-MORI/Evening Standard:
Conservatives – 28
Labour – 28
Liberal Democrats – 19
UKIP – 19”
PART TWO:
Election Night
CHAPTER SEVEN
30 Millbank, 6 May, 10pm - 7 May, 1am.
The hour after the polls closed felt almost hollow. The anticipation was palpable – Coulson kept getting the urge to jump to his feet and pace up and down. He pushed it to one side; he’d done all he could and rolled the dice. Now he had to wait before he could begin to read the pips.
The exit poll came up. Some of those in the busy room paid attention, but he’d known them to be way off before. Besides – they’d kept saying how fundamentally unpredictable this one was going to be, so what were the chances it could be accurate?
After an eternity, the first declaration came in from Houghton and Sunderland South. The declaration itself was irrelevant – in this, as in most cases, the election agent had already passed the details back to CCHQ. The analysts were poring over the first result.
“We’re down down two percent on the nominals,” announced one of the analysts. The results from the 2005 election were estimated after the redrawing of the seat boundaries, which explained the ‘nominal’ term used.
Not too shabby, really, thought Coulson. Pushing five and a half thousand votes in Sunderland isn’t bad going for us.
“Labour are a down nearly fifteen percent!” announced the analyst. “Christ! Under eighteen thousand votes in a heartland seat! Libs down and well behind us… and the UKIP candidate – some bloke called Richard Elvin – is second with a smidgeon under seventeen percent! He’s got nearly six and a half thousand. There’s a fascist who lost his deposit, and an Indie who kept his.”
Another analyst was waving something around in his hand. That’s not a calculator, thought Coulson. Probably some app on his bloody iPhone. I bet it’s called something like SwingCalc 2.3 or some crap like that. It’s always “there’s an app for that” with this lot.
He was saying excitedly “6.34% swing to us! If they all go like this, we’ll easily be largest party and in a position for a minority!”
There were cheers all round – but mainly from the younger activists. Coulson caught Hilton’s eye. Neither were getting excited yet. “One poxy seat in the North East? Come on!” muttered Coulson.
The minutes dragged until the result from Washington & Sunderland West came in. It was even better for the Conservatives.
“We’re pretty much level pegging on the nominal for 2005 with a similar number of votes as the last seat, Labour’s down nearly twenty percent, we’re ahead of the Libs – and UKIP are second again. Their girl’s got seven thousand, three hundred and fifty two votes – nearly twenty percent,” reported the first analyst. The iPhone geek called out a swing of over 9.5% - that was majority territory.
Well, that’s shut them all up, thought Coulson, as the result from Sunderland Central came in. In the Conservative’s most promising Sunderland seat, there was barely any swing at all. Despite his resolution not to get excited by the first two results, he felt deflated.
“One silver lining,” said Hilton, quietly. “At least we beat the UKIP candidate – some woman with the fearsome name of Pauline Featonby-Warren – and got second place.”
Coulson shrugged. “UKIP are scoring an average of nearly eighteen percent and if things go on like this, I’ll end Election Night with no blood left in my caffeine stream.”
Hilton’s lips twitched.
Midnight had come and gone without anyone noticing as the first Northern Irish seats started coming in.
“Sinn Fein hold and a DUP hold. No shockers there,” called out an activist from the northern Ireland desk. “Our ‘UCUNF’ candidates are up in one and down in the other.
Meh. These are known hopeless seats. Anyway – thank Christ I talked those prats out of insisting that it be called a ‘New Team’ rather than ‘New Force’.
More Labour heartland territory, with the Durham North result. Coulson looked over the shoulder of the analysts.
Huh. We’ve dropped a couple of percent, Labour have shed over sixteen percent, UKIP have narrowly pipped the Lib Dems into third. So fourth in a hopeless seat for us, but another heartening swing – nearly 7%. What the hell’s happening?
“Another boring Northern Ireland seat’s next – Belfast East, certain DUP hold,” said Hilton, leaning back.
“Jesus Suffering Christ!” shouted the analyst from the Northern Ireland desk. Coulson automatically surged to his feet. “What?” he demanded.
“The Alliance Party have only gone and decapitated the DUP! An unbelievable swing of well over twenty percent. Un-sodding-real.” The analyst was looking shaken.
Coulson’s eyes widened. They were unlikely to have any chance of getting close enough to a majority for a
n arrangement with the DUP… he shook his head. That was almost irrelevant – this was a big shift for Northern Ireland.
***
From The British General Election of 2010, by Kavanagh and Cowley
“As with all Election Nights, the first handful of seats came in from the Labour heartlands. By one am, four mainland seats had declared – all comfortable Labour holds – and a pattern had apparently started to emerge. Labour had taken by far the greatest damage, the Lib Dems and Conservatives far less so, and UKIP had grabbed three second places out of the first four mainland seats to declare. The average swing from Labour to the Conservatives was nearly six percent and – if followed throughout the night, would have seen the Conservatives over three hundred seats and with an outside shot at minority Government.
This pattern broke shortly after one o’clock as a flurry of seats declared. Broxbourne demonstrated that UKIP could take second in a Conservative safe seat in the Eastern region just as easily as they could in Labour seats in the North East; Arfon showed that Wales might not be such easy pickings for Congdon’s team, as they were pushed into fifth place as Plaid Cymru delivered Labour’s first loss of the night.”
***
30 Millbank, 7 May, 1:00am - 1:30 am.
Safe seats, safe seats, safe seats, mused Coulson. However, the next half hour was going to deliver the first results from the target list. If the swings they’d been seeing held up, the Conservatives should pick up Edgbaston and Broxtowe and have a good chance at Kingswood. Once again he fought the impulse to start pacing.
News came in that Kingswood had gone to a bundle recount – requested by the Conservatives. Coulson rubbed the bridge of his nose as he was informed that on the first count, they were five hundred votes behind – and there had been over ten thousand votes in the UKIP pile.
Then a despondent message came in from Birmingham Edgbaston. It wasn’t declared yet, but Gisela Stuart was well ahead and had somehow delivered a swing away from the Conservatives.
“Dammit,” fumed Coulson. “I thought that one was in the bank – we just had to beat a two percent swing.”
“Well, she got nearly double that in the wrong direction. You’ve got to wonder what would have happened without bloody Congdon,” said Hilton, with a sigh. “Oh, and just to rub it in, I’ve just got a text message from the count at Broxtowe, where apparently Labour’s incumbent MP Nick Palmer has a big smile on his face.”