Anyone know what happened last time we had a hung parliament? Did they form a coalition government, did parliament run for a full term? Not sure of what this hung thing means other than no-one gets a majority.

Seemingly Ted Heath tried to negotiate a coalition, failed and resigned leaving Harold Wilson to form a minority government. If I heard right they went back to the polls 8 months later where Labour got a majority.

I may have misheard, I can't really remember the event, I was busy being born that year. 🙂

I'm looking forward to seeing them all hanged! Is it on terrestrial tv, or did sky win the tv rights again?

I've no idea but I suspect it's going to give all the major parties some rather over-inflated ideas about what is the right thing to do and what can they do to make the other parties look stupid (which will ultimately slow any good down as they will all be arguing over the minutia).

Not ideal but at least there is change on it's way…which will hopefully improve things (although I'm not sure what can be classed as an improvement).

Basically what Resin42 said. And David Dimblebum wore an awful tie outside #10 and it was very cold. Then he handed back to Robin Day who was an entertaining old buffoon. This I have gleaned from watching BBC coverage this morning.

The same may happen again, except this time it will be Nick Robinson, the awful tie will be swapped for silly glasses, and it won't be quite as cold.

Are you sure, theotherjonv? Seems quite chilly this morning.

The key point in all this, is that I didn't say it wouldn't be cold. I just said it wouldn't be quite as cold. That's the problem in this period of uncertainty, we mustn't rush into snap judgements and need to think through what we are being told.

Everything veered deeper into shit, people listened to disco then punk happened. There was a climate of political uncertainty and confusion for a while and then there was Thatcher.

As Hunter S Thompson put it, "When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."

Yeah, well that was then.
😉

What about now ?. Without a clear winner, I fear the markets are going to hammer us.

They've already priced-in a non-hung parliament, and were possibly looking for change.

Anyone been watching the FTSE and the Vix

😯

CC.

Yeah but Greece has been a big factor and FTSE is reacting to world markets as much as anything (don't they just follow the Yanks?). If I was Gordon Brown I'd get the hell out of there – whoever ends up as leader of a minority government in the next few months is going to find themselves in a world of shit.

This time round it looks more interesting and more complex.

Tories + unionists is not enough for a majority but Labour + Lib dems is not enough either. The 9 or so nationalists are going to have some influence unless Lib dems go into a deal with the tories – but I don't think the tories will concede enough for a deal to happen.

Gonna be an interesting week

What a fricken mess it all is.

FTSE, most of the time, is a DOW tracker. Alot of indicies follow the DOW for obvious reasons. I've sat there and watched the FTSE on minute candles just track the DOW, level 1 data.

P/E ratios have climbed again to what I think are dodgy levels given that these have risen off the back of recent performance, which has been derived from cost cutting only. But you can only go so far with that…

Looks to me as if the city boys were hoping/wanting a clear majority, and probably not Lab.

If they don't see us getting to grips with our debt, they'll give us the Greece treatment. UK Gov bonds have already been questioned by Pimco and I think they've had to up the rates to be able to shift them.

If I was Gordon Brown I'd get the hell out of there – whoever ends up as leader of a minority government in the next few months is going to find themselves in a world of shit
Yeah, Thanks Gordon.

CC.

i think the main issue us are they all going to have to share the bed in No.10 ?

What a fricken mess it all is.

Exactly !

CC