Key Marginal
Now, here's something interesting about this General Election.
My vote might actually count, this time. For the last few elections I've lived in safe Tory seats. Seats where the Conservative majority is such that one vote, more or less, makes fuck-all difference!
Reading West, on the other hand, is a Key Marginal constituency. It is actually number 107 on the Conservatives' hit list, with a Labour majority in 2005 of only 4,682 with 45% of the vote, out of a total turn-out of 42,103 (61% turn-out). A swing away from Labour of only 5.74% would (theoretically) hand the seat to the Tories.
This makes a change from where I lived in 2005, in Hampshire North West. Sir George Young, the Conservative MP there, has had a safe majority almost three times that of the Labour MP in Reading West, and almost as many as the total number of votes gained by the Tory candidate in '05!
Seriously, living in a "safe seat" makes you feel unnecessary, even if you happen to support the candidate in question (which I didn't - not as a politician; as a person, Sir George is a wonderful man and does great things for his constituency, he richly deserves to remain in office, but as he didn't need my vote for that, I felt justified in voting for what I believed, rather than who...).
But this time... Heh. My vote actually counts. I could make the difference between Naz Sarkar keeping the seat that Martin Salter has bequeathed him and handing it to Alok Sharma.
Um yeah. Good old English names there! Reading does have a very high Asian population, though. Not surprisingly, UKIP lost their deposit last time, and the time before.
Anyway. I'm definitely voting. Who for? That's between me and the ballot box!
My vote might actually count, this time. For the last few elections I've lived in safe Tory seats. Seats where the Conservative majority is such that one vote, more or less, makes fuck-all difference!
Reading West, on the other hand, is a Key Marginal constituency. It is actually number 107 on the Conservatives' hit list, with a Labour majority in 2005 of only 4,682 with 45% of the vote, out of a total turn-out of 42,103 (61% turn-out). A swing away from Labour of only 5.74% would (theoretically) hand the seat to the Tories.
This makes a change from where I lived in 2005, in Hampshire North West. Sir George Young, the Conservative MP there, has had a safe majority almost three times that of the Labour MP in Reading West, and almost as many as the total number of votes gained by the Tory candidate in '05!
Seriously, living in a "safe seat" makes you feel unnecessary, even if you happen to support the candidate in question (which I didn't - not as a politician; as a person, Sir George is a wonderful man and does great things for his constituency, he richly deserves to remain in office, but as he didn't need my vote for that, I felt justified in voting for what I believed, rather than who...).
But this time... Heh. My vote actually counts. I could make the difference between Naz Sarkar keeping the seat that Martin Salter has bequeathed him and handing it to Alok Sharma.
Um yeah. Good old English names there! Reading does have a very high Asian population, though. Not surprisingly, UKIP lost their deposit last time, and the time before.
Anyway. I'm definitely voting. Who for? That's between me and the ballot box!