Talk:2024 United Kingdom general election/Archive 2

Dissolution Policy

Please see my proposal in the WikiProject. Robin S. Taylor (talk) 21:42, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

Election map

A map has been added to the infobox. It has a large number of insets, text, decorative lines, and empty charts that appear ready to fill in a chloropleth with constituencies shaded by both winner and winner's voteshare. This is a kind of map which has been added over previous, simpler, maps in a number of articles. Please can we consider not using this kind of map? Insets with random levels of zoom do not effectively counteract geographic discrepancy in constituency sizes. They just add another confounding factor while making it harder to read the results by having arbitrary built up areas shuffled around into arbitrary positions. The additional dotted lines to demonstrate inset locations on the map or the Isles of Scilly are part of the St Ives constituency are distracting. Additional charts can be their own graphics, ideally produced with Wikipedia markup so that users of screen readers can understand them—doubling up a map to include extra graphs, numbers and text does not improve it.

Worst of all is having a map with multiple (apparently more or less infinite for the one currently in the infobox) shades of multiple different colours. These are hard to read and hard to interpret. Shaded maps showing levels of support are great for a single party, but with multiple parties winning seats it is an unusable and poor data visualisation technique. I strongly feel that we should be showing a simple geographical map with constituencies that should be coloured in with a single shade of the official colour of the winning party. We can also have a secondary map with equal area geometric representations of constituencies, also coloured with a single shade of the official colour of the winning party. Shaded chloropleths are great for showing distributions of support. Let's have several, elsewhere on the page: one for each party of interest, showing that party's voteshare in each constituency along four or five different shades selected to be accessible to colour-blind readers. That's so much more useful than combining it with winners.

If that sounds sensible to other editors I'm very happy to produce these maps myself. But I do think we should have an idea of what data visualisation we want to see on the page before we end up with more maps that are stuffed with an assortment of information to an extent that they obscure information in the guise of revealing it. Ralbegen (talk) 23:31, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

I completely agree with this. The infinite tones of different colours will undoubtedly make the final product very cluttered and hard to read. The main map should be simple and easy to read with solid colours. Quite often with election maps on Wikipedia, people are too focused on cramming every piece of statistical information into one visual representation.

In terms of the map's layout, although I like the consideration of the bodies of water (lakes, rivers, reservoirs etc.), I'm not entirely sure whether it is necessary with an election map; it blurs the borders between constituencies in certain areas (see SW London for example).

Moreover, I think the borders between the constituencies are somewhat flawed in their design. Firstly, the thickness of the borders is very low; when completed with colours it might be difficult to distinguish where the borders are. Secondly, they are white in colour, which not only contributes to the difficulties I've mentioned with the bodies of water, but it also could make it difficult to distinguish where the borders are when throwing the bright party colours into the mix. So, perhaps changing the colour to a dark grey or black and increasing their thickness should be considered.

Finally, I also think the number of insets with different degrees of zoom is quite excessive. Whether they ought to be removed entirely is up for debate. The Wikipedia maps for UK general elections pre-2010 do not have them at all. Post-2010, they focus on the same areas: 1) Belfast, 2) Greater Manchester, Merseyside, South Yorkshire and West Yorkshire, 3) South Wales, 4) Scottish Central Belt, 5) North East England, 6) West Midlands, 7) Greater London, 8) South Wessex, Brighton and Hove. For some reason, from 2017 onwards, 9) Aberdeen is added. If we are to keep these insets as a feature of the main map, it should be in line with previous maps, focusing on those areas with a high concentration of constituencies in a smaller area (with a uniform level of zoom). Mapperman03 (talk) 01:30, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

We have previously agreed not to have "empty" maps: that is, maps before the results are out to colour them in. So, until the election, definitely no map. Bondegezou (talk) 08:56, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Very happy to hold off until there are results. I will produce less cluttered versions of the notional results map in the body of the article, though, and hopefully there's a general view that simpler and more direct maps are better practice. Ralbegen (talk) 09:33, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Great. I very strongly agree that there are too many unreadable election result maps all over Wikipedia. Whatever we use should be readable at the size it is shown in an article. Bondegezou (talk) 10:07, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

SDLP in infobox

In the infobox, the SDLP is displaying as Social Democratic and Labour, which makes the infobox overly wide and isn’t how the party is usually referred to. How do we change it to say “SDLP” while maintaining the template colour? Bondegezou (talk) 19:46, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

it'd have to be changed in the political party module by changing the shortname to SDLP I believe. CipherRephic (talk) 20:33, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

Sure. I have no idea how to do that! Anyone...? Bondegezou (talk) 09:17, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Done! Ralbegen (talk) 09:30, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Hi Ralbegen, it appears to have changed back. Where can I make these edits? Thanks. Bondegezou (talk) 06:08, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I get as far as Wikipedia:Index of United Kingdom political parties meta attributes, but then get stuck. Bondegezou (talk) 06:16, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Hi Bondegezou — I did it by editing the source of Module:Political party/S. You have to scroll all the way past the article to get to the editing panel. The editor was GoldRingChip, who also set "SNP" as the short name of the SNP with "Scottish National" and reverted my change. I don't think either of those reflect usage in the vast majority of reliable sources ("Social Democratic and Labour MPs" is a phrase which appears a handful of times compared to "Social Democratic and Labour Party MPs" or "SDLP MPs" (which is introduced in high quality sources without explaining the acronym). The short names as actually used are the acronyms rather than the party names sans "party" and that should be reflected by the encyclopaedia. Ralbegen (talk) 16:50, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

MPs standing down

As there seems to be some contention over this, is it better we create a "List of MPs who stood down at 2024 election" page now? Naturally, with 100+ members having announced their stepping down it will need to be created; we have created such an article for every election since 2010, with the exception of 2017 as not many (only 30 or so) stood down then because it was a very sudden election. This being the first time since 2010-15 a parliament has run its full course, more have announced their retirements in good time. 2A02:C7C:DB33:8300:A5F9:4FE1:BD33:91EB (talk) 17:38, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I think the job's been done it’s now on the page entitled Candidates in the 2024 United Kingdom general election; thank you.

Timetable

The timetable includes, under 5 July, the text: "New Ministry expected to be formed." which also comes with a footnote saying "The only likelihood of a ministry not being formed the day after the election is if no party wins a majority and a hung parliament ensues." I removed this and an IP editor has restored, so I'm bringing it here for discussion. I think the text should be removed as (a) this is WP:CRYSTALBALLy, we don't know when this will happen; and (b) no citation is given. What do others think? Bondegezou (talk) 09:31, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

A citation is given for the timetable overall, but that citation does not include this item. Bondegezou (talk) 09:41, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

@Bondegezou It may not be in the citation but it's true, no? If a party has a majority they form the government, if they don't then, as in 2010, coalition talks begin DimensionalFusion (talk) 09:43, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

But we don't know which of those is going to happen, so it's WP:CRYSTALBALL to present this as the former, with a footnote to the latter. Bondegezou (talk) 09:55, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

If we want to discuss the formation of a new government, we could cite the Cabinet Manual for this, assuming it can be justified under WP:PRIMARY:

2.10 The application of these principles depends on the specific circumstances and it remains a matter for the Prime Minister, as the Sovereign’s principal adviser, to judge the appropriate time at which to resign, either from their individual position as Prime Minister or on behalf of the government. Recent examples suggest that previous Prime Ministers have not offered their resignations until there was a situation in which clear advice could be given to the Sovereign on who should be asked to form a government. It remains to be seen whether or not these examples will be regarded in future as having established a constitutional convention.

 M2Ys4U ^(talk) 12:46, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I don't see how that gives us a date and it's all getting rather WP:SYNTHy. We don't have to put everything on the timetable. Some things are a bit uncertain or complicated. They can just be left off the timetable and, if we wish, discussed elsewhere. Bondegezou (talk) 13:32, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Agreed, we should not include this line. Ralbegen (talk) 18:34, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Predictions........ before the vote

AS with the pervious election pages I dare say we will have these again but what I would liked to suggest is we have it as follows:

• Predictions Four weeks before the vote
• Predictions two weeks before the vote
• Predictions one weeks before the vote
• Final predictions

Difference being Three weeks moving to four to give a better gap: Crazyseiko (talk) 19:31, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I think the amount of space given to these in the last article defies due weight. Let's take our cue from reliable sources: when do they single out a time to take a snapshot of predictions? Which predictions are made by reputable media organisatins and which are done by bloggers with scant secondary coverage? No matter what we end up going for, we should be aiming at smaller, tighter coverage of seat predictions than the 2019 article ended up with. Ralbegen (talk) 19:42, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Your ignoring 2017 and 2015 ones which ALSO had this set up but with date points.? --Crazyseiko (talk) 19:47, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I also think that those articles dedicate more space to seat prediction tables than is justified by reliable source coverage! Ralbegen (talk) 19:54, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I'd support this, but I suppose we'll be crossing that bridge when we come to it. It may be worth having a discussion as to which predictions to include and which not to beforehand. CipherRephic (talk) 21:18, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I current have a Shortlist (includes many which were USED over the past few elections) which people could look at over the course of next week and we could then pick the best or all if they need be for the first rought date of 4th June for Predictions Four weeks before the vote? --Crazyseiko (talk) 22:02, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I think we generally need fewer tables and more prose. We’re meant to be an encyclopaedia. Encyclopaedias use words. We can have these tables of predictions if editors want them, but we should be discussing the significance of predictions throughout the campaign, with reference to reliable sources having those discussions. Bondegezou (talk) 22:16, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

we better get rid of all the graphic, pics etc if that is the case.

Anyways here is the short list:

• https://electionmaps.uk/nowcast
• https://britainelects.com/
• https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html
• https://principalfish.co.uk/electionmaps/?map=predictit
• https://yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/49061-yougov-mrp-labour-now-projected-to-win-over-400-seats
• https://ko-fi.com/electionmapsuk which is of course: https://x.com/ElectionMapsUK
• https://www.electionpolling.co.uk/

Here is the template:

Predictions Five weeks before the vote

Parties		PrincipalFish as of 30 May 2024	ElectionMapsUK as 30 May 2024	Election polling as 30 May 2024	Financial times as 30 May 2024	THe Economist as 30 May 2024	Survation as 30 May 2024	Polling Report as 30 May 2024	Electoral calculus as 30 May 2024
	Labour Party	472	467	397	451	388	468	393	476
	Conservatives	101	101	186	134	187	98	192	66
	Liberal Democrats	35	46	29	27	22	22	28	59
	SNP	16	12	14	16	24	41	17	26
	Plaid Cymru	2	2	2	2	2	2	1	3
	Green Party	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1
	Reform UK" |	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
	Others	21	19	19	19	19	19	19	19
Overall result (probability)		Labour majority 294	Labour majority	Labour majority 144	Labour majority	Labour majority	Labour majority	Labour majority	Labour majority

References

First election for King Charles III

There seems to be a war as to whether this is included. As the original editor has notice there is precedent (cf 1955 United Kingdom general election), and it is as relevant as as it being the first election since Brexit, in terms of setting a historical context. Please can we restore it. Hoffie01 (talk) 11:57, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

The lead should summarise the key points in the article. Reliable sources tell us what the key points are. Reliable sources, of which there are a large number, are not talking about the election being the first in Charles III's reign. It is clearly not a key fact about the election. Ergo, it should not be in the lead.

The role of the monarch was somewhat different in 1955. I don't feel able to comment on the appropriateness of such content in that article's lead. Bondegezou (talk) 12:42, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Fully agree - though it appears a vandal may have done the work for us already. CipherRephic (talk) 14:34, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I agree with the point about following what reliable sources say (I'm sure BBC News mentioned it being the first election under Charles III while I was watching their live coverage of the Prime Minister's announcement but it was probably just a passing mention), but I'd like to point out to @Bondegezou that the role of the monarch has not changed since 1955. Charles' powers are the same as Elizabeth's were. It is perhaps true that the public perception of the monarch's role which has changed, but not the actual role of the monarchy.

If reliable sources start mentioning it prominently, we absolutely should include this factoid. As it stands, it's just a largely irrelevant passing comment. Adam Black ^{t • c} 23:54, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

In my opinion, it deserves to be mentioned, but not in the lead, and not with a large amount of trivial embellishment. GenevieveDEon (talk) 14:30, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I'm happy for it to be mentioned elsewhere. Maybe the Background section would be appropriate? Bondegezou (talk) 14:49, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I’d agree with this proposal. OGBC1992 (talk) 15:32, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I would agree that it's best included somewhere. A mention of the first or last general election under a certain monarch has in several articles been mentioned in the final paragraph of the lede (eg. 1935, 1951, 1955, 2019). I wouldn't be opposed to it being in the background, but I believe its best if its in the same place in each article. estar8806 (talk) ★ 16:43, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

A brief mention ("the first general election during the reign of Charles III" or similar) would fit in well in the lede, alongside the other firsts. Constitutionally relevant. But no more than that: yesterday it had an explanation that Charles had taken over following his mum's death whenever that was, which was a bit much. Moscow Mule (talk) 18:01, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

In addition to this being the first General Election of the present reign, I request a correction is made to the common error that the Prime Minister advises the Sovereign to grant a Dissolution. The Prime Minister can only REQUEST a Dissolution of the Sovereign, and this is laid out quite clearly by Constitutional experts, both living and dead, along with the reasons why.

Newsflash almost nobody cares about who sits on the golden throne with stolen jewels bring on the republic

The conduct and result of the election is in no way determined or influenced by this factoid. It is more relevant that it is the first election called by a drenched PM who was being heckled by a boom box. Also thoughly irrelevant that it is the first since Brexit or the repeal of the Dissolution Act. Far more relevant that it is the first since the Truss lunacy, the first in which one of the main leaders hoping to be Prime Minister has been fined for breaching the law in a manner related to his role in government, and the first since the Rwanda project. The July factoid is incredibly tedious too: there are 12 months in the year, so 2 out of 21 elections being in a particular month is exactly what anyone might expect. Kevin McE (talk) 22:51, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

The edit warring over this has gone on long enough, earlier discussions appear to indicate a consensus on keeping the info in the article but moving it to the background section. I'll thus be doing so, unless anyone has any particular objections? CipherRephic (talk) 23:28, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

There appears to be a persistent IP editor who keeps adding this to the lead. The appropriate response is to treat this as disruptive editing, promptly revert them and seek a ban. Bondegezou (talk) 06:05, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I have a particular objection. Nobody has even attempted to give any reason why either the occupant of the throne, nor the number of elections to have been held during the current reign, is of any relevance at all. Constitutionally, it is relevant that there is a monarch, but the identity of that post-holder and the amount of time they have been there changes absolutely nothing in terms of the election itself. Kevin McE (talk) 23:26, 25 May 2024 (UTC)

Inappropriate personal attack, please do not respond Adam Black t • c 23:39, 25 May 2024 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
We have a royal sycophant here^— Preceding unsigned comment added by 2a02:c7c:db33:8300:b44c:a60a:8b92:21 (talk • contribs) 11:07, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Lucy Allan - Reform?

Lucy Allan recently left the Conservative Party and endorsed a Reform UK candidate in the election. We counted her as an independent MP. The i now reports she is discussing being a Reform UK candidate. I take that to be sufficient to show her as being in Reform UK and thus for Reform UK to have 2 MPs at dissolution, given dissolution is tomorrow. But it’s a messy situation, so I’ve made that edit, but happy to discuss. This also has implications for how we edit her own page, the House of Commons template and the Reform UK article. Bondegezou (talk) 16:16, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

I can't get through that article because of the paywall, but it looks like all the claims that she might stand from Reform come from someone anonymous within Reform. This BBC article https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0kkzv12wndo doesn't include those claims, and I think it's reasonable to suggest that the i's source is not reliable or neutral. If she had actually crossed the floor to Reform, that would be clearly stated in multiple news sources at this point, as it was when Lee Anderson did it. GenevieveDEon (talk) 16:25, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

I agree that we should hold off until/unless a reliable secondary source is explicit about it. Ralbegen (talk) 18:33, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Regional UK election maps of 2024

Please can SVG election maps with the updated boundaries for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland and each of the nine regions of England be created please as we only have currently really have National maps only available at this time. (MOTORAL1987 (talk) 11:24, 30 May 2024 (UTC))

All data in ‘2024 United Kingdom general election’ table is wrong.

The sub heading says it’s for the 2024 election. This is wrong. All that data should be listed for the 2019 election. There is no data yet for the 2024 election. Either change the sub heading to say it’s the results of the 2019 election, or remove the table completley, or input all the parties with zero as their number of seats … and update after the election. 94.105.120.41 (talk) 05:15, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

I take it you mean the infobox? Yes, I agree we could be clearer that this is showing the Commons at dissolution. Could we add some wording to that effect? Bondegezou (talk) 06:41, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

I’ve added some explanatory text. Do people think that’s better?

Another option is to have an “empty” infobox that doesn’t show any MP numbers. Bondegezou (talk) 06:48, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Technically, from the moment of dissolution, there are no MPs, so I guess there cannot be numbers of current MPs Kevin McE (talk) 17:20, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Correct, dissolution formally takes place today so technically after today (May 30) there are no MP’s please can the election info box be changed to reflect, also we need more of the election maps updating to reflect the new boundaries. (MOTORAL1987 (talk) 08:49, 30 May 2024 (UTC))

The text has already been changed to say these were the figures at dissolution. Bondegezou (talk) 11:03, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

That is no longer sufficient as election infobox shows the current number of MP’s. Well there are now no current MP’s, we should now be using a infobox with images of the main party leaders in line with previous elections. (MOTORAL1987 (talk) 11:27, 30 May 2024 (UTC))

Notional result table Workers Party?!

The table of notional results now claims that the Workers Party won a notional seat in 2019. This is nonsense. Has someone been vandalising the page? Can we work out when that got added and whether any other errors were added? Bondegezou (talk) 15:24, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Added here by an IP editor whose edits have mostly been about Workers Party candidate Wayne Adlem. They also moved the Workers Party in the infobox, which has been reverted. Ralbegen (talk) 15:46, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Background section much too long

We've already got links at the top of the Background section to the articles for the Johnson, Truss, and Sunak premierships. We don't need blow-by-blow accounts of the collapse of the Truss government in this article. (Certain IP editors are also fond of wordy turns of phrase, which is further padding a long section.) I'm reluctant to cut large swathes of it without discussion, but the whole thing should be cut back to 2-3 short paragraphs. GenevieveDEon (talk) 07:34, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. It just needs an overview of Johnson's last premiership, a paragraph on Truss' which should be befittingly brief, and a slightly more in-depth look at the last year or so, and similar for the opposition of course. As you say, further information is linked. Irltoad (talk) 07:54, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

I've trimmed it a bit, but it could definitely still be a lot shorter. I feel that the material on local elections is repetitive and possibly largely redundant. GenevieveDEon (talk) 09:30, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Agreed, plus much of the content in the background section lacks references. CipherRephic (talk) 10:50, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

We definitely need sources, especially for some of the stuff that's now being added to the campaign section. GenevieveDEon (talk) 16:18, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Agreed, the shorter version looks a lot better. Further information is linked and fits better on the linked articles than here. --150.143.27.147 (talk) 16:01, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

We've already got a good amount on Northern Ireland, Scotland and England/the main parliamentary parties. Should we have a brief bit on Wales, eg the recent travails of Welsh Labour? A sentence or two including Drakeford's resignation and Gething's victory would be enough, I think, along with the SNP leadership changes and the state of the DUP. Tim O'Doherty (talk) 16:26, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Agree, including a sentence or two on Wales would complete the background section. --150.143.27.147 (talk) 16:44, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

phrasing in the intro

Hi all, reading through the intro I found some of the phrasing (particularly in the last paragraph) to be a bit stilted and hard to parse. I've had a crack at changing some of the more egregious examples, but i'm interested in what other people think on this topic? CipherRephic (talk) 23:20, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

"The results of the 2019 general election are given below"

Any particular reason why the results of the last election are linked in the background section? None of the other general election articles do this. For the sake of consistency, we should either not have the table here or have tables on all previous general elections. 150.143.27.147 (talk) 16:02, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Per WP:OTHERCONTENT, a simple statement of "other pages do/don't do this" is not a convincing argument. Especially when you're comparing past and future elections, which is a false equivalence. --TedEdwards 19:09, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Elections that have happened are different to elections that are forthcoming, thus their articles look different. Elections that have happened can and do show the change from the previous election in their results section. We can't do that here as we don't have any results yet! The previous result is always relevant and included, just in different ways. Bondegezou (talk) 21:03, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Alright, makes a lot of sense. --150.143.27.147 (talk) 06:19, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

Candidate details

A large amount of this article at present -- maybe half? -- consists of various large tables about candidates not standing again, candidates moving constituency, candidates who used to be MPs etc. This seems to me like too much focus on minutiae rather than on the core narrative of the election.

We already have a spin-off Candidates in the 2024 United Kingdom general election article. Could we move some or all of the current content here to that article? What say people? Bondegezou (talk) 09:22, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Agreed DimensionalFusion (talk) 09:27, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Please, yes. I like having the information but I having so many bulky lists is not good for the main election article. Ralbegen (talk) 09:35, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I think it's in danger of getting a bit crowded and there could probably be a better home for it, likely the spin-off page you have suggested. As much as I think the list of candidates standing down is the most relevant, there is precedent for having an entirely separate article just for this information - 2019, 2017, 2015 and 2010. I don't know if this should be created now or post-election though? OGBC1992 (talk) 10:02, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Although actually 2017's list remains as part of the wider Election article, rather than being its own article. The others have distinct articles. OGBC1992 (talk) 10:03, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Happy to discuss different options. My initial thought was to include up to the table labelled "Number of MP retirements by party affiliation", but then move everything else out of this article. Bondegezou (talk) 10:06, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I think that would probably be fine. My impulse, as I say, would be to keep the table of retirements on this article and move all the tables beyond that, certainly for now while it's still being added to, but that's just a personal preference. OGBC1992 (talk) 10:33, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Given support here, I have moved all of these tables, except the table of retirements. I would also favour moving the table of retirements, but left that while there was a lack of unanimity on the matter. Bondegezou (talk) 08:09, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

This is looking better now, but at present the long list of individual MPs not standing for re-election is still in the main article, and there's a long sentence in the body text describing which lists are in the separate article, which might be better as a hatnote. GenevieveDEon (talk) 08:14, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Yes, as I said, I've left the list of MPs not standing for re-election as the above discussion was not unanimous on moving it. We can continue that discussion and move or not move it later. Feel free to edit the sentence describing what is in the separate article. Bondegezou (talk) 08:25, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, I hadn't checked the edit history - that wasn't meant to be a dig at you. Your revisions are good, and I'm not criticising the wording of the longer 'see also' - it's more a stylistic thing that those sorts of texts are better as notes than body text, but I don't feel confident enough with the appropriate style for hatnotes to make the change myself. Personally I strongly favour keeping only the summary table (and possibly re-adding summary tables for other changes), and moving every detail table to the other article. GenevieveDEon (talk) 08:39, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I would just like to add support for removing the list of retiring MPs from the article and keeping only the summary table. Even with the others removed it is by far the most prominent part of the article. It's a good detail to have, but the summary table would be the right amount of weight to apportion to it. Ralbegen (talk) 18:31, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I think most people here were in favour of keeping the summary table, which has now gone as well as the list. What's the best way we can cross-include it from the candidates article so that both can be updated together? A template? Ralbegen (talk) 09:25, 25 May 2024 (UTC)

Next time, make it separate from the start

Given the all those (very crufty, IMO) lists have now been hived off into separate articles, is it reasonable to ask whether they should ever have been in this article at all? The fact that they have been removed is an indication that they did not have a long-term place here from day one, and therefore under the principle of the ten year rule should never have been here ( they seem to me to be a symptom of the "I have heard something on the news, I must edit Wikipedia" reflex).

But if there is a place for such gatherings of factoids, and if they are destined to have their own article eventually, should that not be the case from the start? Of course Wikipedia articles can get split into a more manageable collection of articles in a topic as they grow, but I am ot aware of any principle whereby sub-topics are to be grown within an article with the full knowledge that they will eventually be subdivided. Just as there will, soon after 4th July, be Next UK general elektion article (misspelled deliberately to avoid linking back to this) started, could and should there not be a Candidates at the next UK general election started simultaneously? Kevin McE (talk) 08:35, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

That sounds sensible. Of course, there may not be any material for such a fork article immediately, but the replacement 'next election' article should contain a hidden note to editors directing them to create that fork rather than add such tables to the main article. For what it's worth, as an historical researcher, I have previously found it very useful to know who was a candidate for whom at long-past elections, so I think this stuff will survive the ten year rule - but I appreciate your caution. GenevieveDEon (talk) 09:15, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

There are no "Current seats"

The infobox heading of "Current seats" should say "Previous seats" or "Old number of seats"? There are no current seats as all MPs have ceased to be MPs on the dissolution of Parliament. Every party therefore currently has 0 seats. Nonetheless, this wouldn't be a helpful presentation to show all parties at zero. Therefore the heading should refer to the seats they have most recently had (but don't currently have). aspaa (talk) 21:30, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

I tried to tell them this yesterday @aspaa but at the moment no one seems to listern. (MOTORAL1987 (talk) 06:41, 31 May 2024 (UTC))

@Aspaa: I've just seen your message and I made an edit so that column says "Seats". Unfortunately you can't change the name of that column to anything else unless you edit Template:Infobox legislative election to allow this, and I doubt that would be worth it. --TedEdwards 01:09, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

What is the significance of seats at dissolution?

Hi.

I started a topic a few days ago, which somewhat also concerned this issue, but I didn't feel I got my point through, so I'll try to put it here.

I'm not really familiar with arguments behind the infobox informing about the distribution of seats on the dissolution. Why is this considered more important than each party's latest election result? Why are we not informing about the latest election's result in the infobox?

The media rarely talks about current seats, and I do not know a single media outlet who is going to compare the results of the upcoming election with the seats that each party had at the dissolution. On the contrary, the media compares GAINS and HOLDS to the last election result. People is, in my view, more likely to come to the page, to see how many seats each party got at the last election. After all, this is still what we are gonna compare the 2024 results to.

I'm not thinking that seats at dissolution is irrelevant information, I just think it belongs further down the page or at the House of Commons page.

So I just wanted to understand why the current decision is to have seats at dissolution being such a main thing of the page.

Have a nice evening 😊 Thomediter (talk) 22:14, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

"On the contrary, the media compares GAINS and HOLDS to the last election result." I really do not believe that the media does that at all. If (as it surely will) Labour wins the constituency of Blackpool South (a recent by-election gain, won by Conservatives in 2019) it will be considered a Labour hold by all main outlets. Swing, nationally, may be compared to the last election, but not holds and gains. Kevin McE (talk) 08:20, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

"I really do not believe that the media does that at all."

However this is the case, for at least Sky and the House of Commons official website.

House of Commons Library calls it "gain", even though the tories held the seat as a result of the by-election [1].

I can't post Youtube, but if you go on Youtube, you can see that Sky News calls Brecon and Radnoshire a "CON HOLD", despite the seat prior to the election being Lib Dems. Video is "The Brexit Election: Part 3 (3am-6am)" and the constituency is visible at 40:27 in the video. Thomediter (talk) 08:40, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

The media often compare gains/losses to the last election, ignoring by-elections/defections, and that's what our results tables in general election articles do. Sometimes, however, the media do compare to the situation at dissolution, so accounting for by-elections/defections. There isn't unanimity in the approach. To complicate things, after boundary changes, the media normally compare to the notional results at the last election. I expect Tim Farron will win Westmorland and Lonsdale, as he did in 2019, and yet it will be reported as a LibDem gain because the notional result for the new boundaries makes it a 2019 Conservative win.

More broadly, the media do pay attention to by-elections and defections in their election coverage. Even if they are more often comparing gains/losses to the last election, they will talk about by-election wins and defections. Galloway winning, Anderson defecting, these attracted considerable media attention in the run-up to the election being called.

We have a table in the background section describing the 2019 results and subsequent changes. That seems appropriate to me. It shows both sets of figures. However, Thomediter raises the question around the infobox. Infobox discussions are frequent and fraught! I can live with the infobox either showing the state at dissolution or just the 2019 results, although I think the former is preferable. We could also switch to an "empty" infobox that doesn't list any parties, which we had for periods in the run-up to the 2019 election. Bondegezou (talk) 10:47, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

To me, this currently seems more like a discussion about the infobox, than answering my first question (this is also partly my fault for swaying the topic that way). I am still interested in the arguments for showcasing seats at dissolution as the main thing of the page.

I think that an infobox is good to have, so I do think we should keep one with the parties. But I really struggle to see, why information about the parliament on May 30 is more important than the latest election result. When it's election night, the show will tell viewers about some of the defections/by-elections that has happended in the latest period, but it will be a secondary or tertiary thing. The main thing the media will talk about, and comapre the results to, is going to be the latest election result. Therefore I really believe, that readers will have a larger interest in seeing how the parties did at the latest election, instead of how the parliament looked before the election campaign started. I don't see how there being 17 Independent MP's at the dissolution is such a major thing, that it has to be in the infobox. The media is very unlikely to talk about all of these defections. Thomediter (talk) 10:59, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

Do they currently have seats, or not?

We have the current number of seats held for each political party, in the House of Commons. Yet, on the separate party pages, we list 'no' seats. Why the inconsistencies? GoodDay (talk) 00:01, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Not sure I follow. Are you talking about this article's infobox? It's "at dissolution". Tim O'Doherty (talk) 00:02, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

@GoodDay: I've recently done a somewhat counterintiutive edit so the infobox now says "seats". With the text in the infobox it should be clear that these are seats at dissolution. --TedEdwards 01:12, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

There is no current seats as Parliament is dissolved. (MOTORAL1987 (talk) 09:01, 2 June 2024 (UTC))

@MOTORAL1987: I know there aren't any current seats. That's why I changed the infobox so it says "seats", not "current seats" with a previously written note at the top saying it's the number of seats at dissolution. That's also why I said what I said two lines up. So it's clear those numbers are seats at dissolution. --TedEdwards 13:56, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Apparently, it's handled differently at the Canadian Parliament. We keep them as current seats, in both the 'active' election page & party infoboxes. GoodDay (talk) 15:44, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

BTW - Within this article itself, there's inconsistency with the numbers at dissolution. GoodDay (talk) 19:46, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

@GoodDay: Thank you for alerting us to that inconsistency, where it says there are 345 Conservative seats, 206 Labour seats and 15 independent seats in the infobox, but 344 Conservative seats, 205 Labour seats and 17 independent seats in Template:UK House of Commons composition, which is transcluded onto this page in the background section. I will try to find the reason for this, and which figures are correct, but if any editors know why this is the case, please correct it. --TedEdwards 16:19, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

I think this is about Lloyd Russell-Moyle, who was suspended from Labour just before Parliament was dissolved, so there's been some uncertainty and conflicting editing about how to count him. I think we should count him as gone, so Labour 205 is more accurate, but I've not edited the infobox to allow for further discussion. Bondegezou (talk) 10:49, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

Trying to mine through the edit histories of various articles trying to find where the discrepancy started and why, but it's three separate articles (including List of MPs elected in the 2019 United Kingdom general election, where at the bottom it gives same figures as the composition template). And at dissolution the numbers were already different. But the Russell-Moyle thing Bondegezou pointed out is plausible. --TedEdwards 13:47, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

So at start of 28 May, all 3 had 345 Conservative and 205 Labour. Infobox said 15 independents but that's definitely incorrect as the numbers don't add to 650, so must have been 16 independents at the time, as said by composition template and party totals in List of MPs article. Since 28 May and before dissolution, Mark Logan defected from Tories to being an independent (may be confusion as he supports Labour, but I can't see evidence he took Labour whip. And the defection was announced after dissolution), Diane Abbott regained the Labour whip and Lloyd Russell-Moyle, as Bondegezou said, lost the whip. So maybe 344 Conservative, 205 Labour and 17 independents (so composition template is correct)? I will look more into how the discrepancy actually arose though. --TedEdwards 13:58, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

So I found this on the parliament website, saying what the state of parliament on 29 May was, the last date were that website says there were MPs. The numbers there are the same as in the infobox. However that website I think says before dissolution that Lloyd Russell-Moyle and Mark Logan were respectively Labour and Conservative MPs. If they became independent shortly before dissolution, the numbers would be the same as in the composition template. --TedEdwards 16:12, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

Lloyd Russell-Moyle became an independent very shortly before dissolution and this change wasn't noted by the Parliament website, but was been noted by secondary sources, so I think we should count it. Bondegezou (talk) 12:15, 5 June 2024 (UTC)

England listed as "UK" in the 2024 United Kingdom general election debates in Great Britain section

I've not changed it as there might be some reasoning behind it being listed as such, but each location (Salford, Grimsby, York, and Nottingham) is in England, which is a constituent country of the UK. This is in contrast to both Wales and Scotland being listed separately on the infobox. Is there any reasoning behind this or should I change it? SirDoor (talk) 14:41, 5 June 2024 (UTC)

Changed it, revert if this is the wrong course of action. SirDoor (talk) 14:46, 5 June 2024 (UTC)

The STV debate and the BBC debate on 21 June are focused specifically on Scotland and Wales, respectively, whereas the other debates are UK/GB-wide. They're not specifically England-only even though they take place in England - the SNP and Plaid Cymru are invited to some of them so they're clearly not English-only debates.  M2Ys4U ^(talk) 15:54, 5 June 2024 (UTC)

Alright, reverted my change SirDoor (talk) 16:16, 5 June 2024 (UTC)

12 June Sky debate not a debate

In the Debates section, we list a 12 June Sky News event. However, this is not a debate. The two party leaders are being interviewed separately.[2] I suggest we remove this or add a note explaining the difference. Bondegezou (talk) 05:34, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

Error that needs fixing

Background section says "The Conservative Party changed leader twice during the 2019 -2024 parliament" as Boris Johnson was the leader who led the party in the last election. By that logic, the sentence "The SNP also changed leader three times" should be changed to "The SNP also changed leader twice" as Nicola Sturgeon led the SNP in the last election. 150.143.27.147 (talk) 22:53, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

This has now been fixed. Bondegezou (talk) 05:35, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

Notional Map - relates to revised proposals rather than the actual final constituencies

The notional result map does not actually relate to the final boundaries - Wimbledon near me is a completely different configuration to its final one and the seat names in Croydon are wrong - this will no doubt cause issues in quite a few areas. Trimfrim20 (talk) 14:58, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

We are in desperate need for both reconfigured, national and regional results maps for the 2024 Election (MOTORAL1987 (talk) 06:46, 8 June 2024 (UTC))

Display Speaker separately under "Predictions: A month before the vote"?

I was wondering if it would make sense to display the 1 seat of the Speaker separately from "Other" under the section mentioned in the title considering the other 18 seats seem to all be Northern Irish seats and there appears to be no clarification that the Speaker is included in this count. I suggest adding either a note in the "Other" field or adding a separate row for the Speaker. Anondoggo (talk) 09:38, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

Rhun ap Iorwerth / Liz Saville Roberts

I've recently noticed that the name of the leader of Plaid Cymru, as given in the Debates section, has been repeatedly reverted from the correct 'ap Iorwerth' to the incorrect 'Rhun'. This seems to be in line with Rhun ap Iorwerth's Wikipedia article, which bizarrely insists on referring to him throughout on a first-name basis, presumably from a fundamental misunderstanding of the Welsh language and Welsh naming conventions.

Without going into great detail on all that, suffice it to say that the BBC, as well as dozens of Welsh newspapers, refer to the Plaid Cymru leader as 'Mr ap Iorwerth' rather than 'Rhun' or 'Mr Rhun'. And if that isn't sufficient proof, his own party's website likewise refers to him, correctly and consistently, as 'Mr ap Iorwerth' in both its English-language and Welsh-language articles. Presumably one can trust Plaid Cymru to get their leader's name correct?

On the other hand, the name of the party's Westminster leader is, at time of writing, given in the same table as 'Roberts'. In this instance, her Wikipedia article correctly identifies her double-barrelled surname, 'Saville Roberts', and this should be replicated in the Debates table here. 150.143.153.242 (talk) 00:13, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

I have edited his article to use ap Iorwerth, as that is what reliable sources, including Welsh ones, do. Bondegezou (talk) 10:27, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

Withdrawn or disowned candidates

We should have a section for candidates who loose the support of their party now that nominations have closed. There is a precedent for this.

Here is a table with the first example.

Candidate	Party		Constituency	Reason for withdrawal	Date
Rahman Sharifah		Plaid Cymru	Cardiff South and Penarth	Plaid Cymru withdrew support due to social media posts about the "situation in the Middle East"	7 June

Kalamikid (talk) 10:38, 9 June 2024 (UTC) Kalamikid (talk) 10:38, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

The Candidates in the 2024 United Kingdom general election page would be a good place for this! Ralbegen (talk) 11:15, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

Agree Candidates in the 2024 United Kingdom general election is probably the best place for it, and for it already being quite long. Seems 2019 is the outlier, with previous elections not having such a table. DankJae 10:09, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

References

Debate viewing figures

The 7-way BBC Debate was watched by 3.2M people https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/bbc-angela-rayner-penny-mordaunt-labour-daisy-cooper-b2559158.html 2A02:C7C:823D:F200:32D2:D0E0:C2CB:2658 (talk) 19:59, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 10 June 2024

Add after it will also be the first to take place under the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Act 2022. a reference to be the first election called by or taking place with Charles III as Sovereign AlexMayE96 (talk) 23:44, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

 Done '''[[User:CanonNi]]''' (talk • contribs) 23:55, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

And undone, as it has been the subject of much discussion here and consensus has been to place it in the background, not in the lead. Kevin McE (talk) 09:29, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 June 2024

The infobox contains two sentences which should not be added until after the election. They read This lists parties that won seats. See the complete results below. Those sentences should be removed, as they are factually inaccurate until the election actually takes place. 64.66.123.248 (talk) 00:50, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

Annoyingly, i think that's an integral part of the legislative election infobox template which would need fixing by someone with template level permisson and can't be done page-side (at least for now) CipherRephic (talk) 10:42, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

Removing "Polling Report" as a forecast source

From looking at the UK Polling Report site, there seems to be a lot of areas where no care or attention has been paid - missing candidate names even now after nominations have closed, and silly mistakes like Rochdale being predicted as a win for Jess Philips (Labour) despite her being the incumbent (and standing again) in Birmingham. I've removed it as a forecast per WP:BOLD. Eilidhmax (talk) 22:30, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

Infobox (II)

Until the election is held, Sunak should be described in the infobox as the incumbent prime minister. GoodDay (talk) 17:08, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

@GoodDay: Just seen this. So the options are either have the infobox saying "current seats" in the third column (when all seats are vacant) and have the infobox say "incumbent prime minister", or have the infobox saying just "seats" in the third column and have the infobox say "prime minister before". Or we could edit the template itself so it works better for dissolved legislatures (I'll have a look at that). --TedEdwards 00:35, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

@GoodDay: I've just sandboxed some changes to the template in my sandbox (User:TedEdwards/sandbox1, the sandbox also transcludes from User:TedEdwards/sandbox2). If I were to make an edit request to add these changes to Template:Infobox legislative election, we could a) make that column say "Seats at dissolution" and b) have the infobox say "incumbent Prime Minister".

I also got carried away and made it that the infobox can now say what the seats won at the last election instead of current seats/seats at dissolution were (this is the only reason I needed my sandbox2). The two infoboxes in sandbox1 to the right are identical and were just to check which parameter overrides the other. --TedEdwards 22:05, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

The infobox was removed, and now replaced with England's? DankJae 23:17, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

just fixed that. CipherRephic (talk) 00:09, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

@GoodDay: I haven't made an proper edit request as my suggestions are pretty extensive, but I have suggested those changes at Template talk:Infobox legislative election#Suggested changes to change possible row headers for future election. --TedEdwards 18:55, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 June 2024

BBC Wales Cymru has announced who will be taking part in the BBC Wales debate sp it should be added into the debate template. --78.149.98.83 (talk) 22:57, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

 Done  M2Ys4U ^(talk) 21:48, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

One of the most significant part of the election is missing from the infobox

Hi.

So it seems like the infobox is talked about a lot. I really have a strong frustration over why we do not have information about the latest election result in the infobox. This information, is what the media will compare the polls and the upcoming election results to. The media coverage of the structure of the parliament at the dissolution is rare to non-existent.

Therefore I really struggle to see why the information about the parliament at May 30 is relevant enough to be part of the infobox.

Alternatively we could have information regarding the parties' seat count at the last election as well as the parties' seat count at the dissolution, although I still struggle to see why the seat count at the dissolution is relevant on any page but House of Commons.

Have a nice day. Thomediter (talk) 00:41, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Hi Thomediter. While I'm neutral at the moment on what set of seat numbers should be in the infobox, I have just suggested an edit to Template:Infobox legislative election, which would, if made, make it easier to display the seats at the last election. I've put more details about this discussion in Talk:2024 United Kingdom general election#Infobox suggested edit. --TedEdwards 18:55, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Amazing. For me the important part just is the inclusion of seats at last election being in the infobox, and I see these are included in your suggested infobox. Thomediter (talk) 10:28, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

Predictions box rejig

Hi all (particularly ccing in @Errora 404 and @Ralbegen due to the earlier kerfuffle)

I've noticed there appears to be a bit of confusion over what the predictions box is supposed to contain (i.e. whether it's supposed to serve as a record of previous predictions made or reflect the most recent predictions) so per WP:BOLD i've bifurcated the box into four weeks pre and three weeks pre, as is the case on the GE2019 page. The former contains predictions made last week and the latter should contain all the predictions made this week. next week's should go in a section entitled two weeks from the vote and so on and so forth. I'll be cleaning up the citations in this week's one in a bit. lmk any thoughts.

CipherRephic (talk) 18:33, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for tagging me! I think there are a couple of things here. It's clearly true that reliable sources cover seat projections quite widely and it makes sense for us to cover them here. However, the amount of the encyclopaedia article we dedicate to them should reflect the prominence in reliable source coverage of the election. I don't think there's been a recent burst of new coverage of seat projections this week compared to last week that justifes a second large table. If there had been projections showing something noteworthy (a Labour collapse and Conservative recovery, Reform or the Greens winning lots more seats, the Conservatives being overtaken by the Liberal Democrats), I feel confident that we would be able to justify adding a second table from media coverage of seat projections.

As it stands, I think sticking to the four-week one only for now is best. We don't have sources to justify giving so much more weight to them at the moment. As a reader, it's also not particularly interesting. Either the small changes are part of a trend, which will be matched by the polling charts and will be clearer in a week's time; or they are noise that will disappear in a week's time. Neither option justifies a second table yet.

I also think we ought to be judicious in who we include. There are lots of bloggers who produce seat projections but as in previous years it would be sensible for us to limit ourselves to those produced by reliable news outlets (the FT, the New Statesman, the Economist) or those which have been covered by multiple reliable sources. I don't think Election Polling or Principalfish have received any reliable source coverage, so we should remove them. Ralbegen (talk) 22:30, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

@Crazyseiko:: Please see my reasoning here. Past articles having too many tables is not a reason to include indiscriminate numbers here without RS justification. We have discussed this topic before on multiple occasions. The default should not just be to add in a new large table!

In particular, there was agreement about removing predictions without reliable source coverage in 2019. I can't see any justification for including Election Polling or Principalfish. Ralbegen (talk) 14:11, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

@Ralbegen: I originally stated on here, that we should have 3 tables: 4 weeks before, 2 weeks before and day before. Mainly because there was a longer campaign, that has happened this time around. The only reason to included 3 weeks is if there was a major change compared to the last one, and looking between the two tables there isn't. So I could agree to removing 3 weeks before, as long as we can have 2 weeks before as that would prove without a doubt the the direction of travel for the polls. In relation to Election Polling or Principalfish If think your right however "Fish" was included as it covered Yougov. I also tried to add in some commentary about the table but it was removed. --Crazyseiko (talk) 14:30, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

Here is the template for 2 weeks before: Are the following good reliable sources:

Parties		YouGOv as of 21 June 2024	ElectionMapsUK as of 21 June 2024	Financial times as of 21 June 2024	THe Economist as of 21 June 2024	Britain Elects/ New Statesman as of 21 June 2024	Polling Report as of 21 June 2024	Electoral calculus as of 21 June 2024	Elections etc as of 21 June 2024
	Labour Party
	Conservatives
	Liberal Democrats
	SNP
	Plaid Cymru
	Green Party	2	2	1	1	1	1	1	2
	Reform UK	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
	Others	19	19	19	19	19	19	19	19
Overall result (probability)		Labour majority

Thanks—I think we should wait and see what each week brings before deciding in advance whether to include a new table. If there's something interesting enough next week that news sources cover it I think we should include another table; if it's the same again I'm not so sure. The New Statesman, the Economist and the FT are all worth including on their own merits. YouGov and Electoral Calculus projections are very widely covered. Election Maps UK projections have been covered by some local news sources so probably makes the cut. I can't find anybody covering Election Polling (though it's a tough name to search for), Elections Etc or Principalfish so I would be minded to exclude those for now. Ralbegen (talk) 16:16, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

Seconded. I'd say it might also be worth distinguishing between predictions made based on poll aggregations (e.g. the FT's) and ones made based on bespoke polling (e.g. YouGov's) - but not entirely sure where i'd put that in the table. CipherRephic (talk) 16:26, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

predictions boxes edit

Hi @DeFacto,

Just to let you know, the edit you just made to the prediction boxes has wiped out the Labour figures for a few of the columns. I'm not going to touch it because i'm pretty sure i've already done three reverts today and a *very* liberal interpretation of what a revert is could include this (better safe than sorry, yk). BTW, re: the pink shading, it's supposed to be a saturated version of the party colour meant to indicate the largest party in a given prediction as it was used on the 2019, 2017 and 2015 pages. I think it's worth keeping because the emphasis makes the table marginally more legible and there is precedent for it - this could be clarified in the bit above the boxes, maybe? CipherRephic (talk) 20:33, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Ah, missed that you've just fixed that. Ignore the top bit :) CipherRephic (talk) 20:35, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Yep, there was an edit conflict, which I fixed.

If the colouring adds something, complies with WP:COLOUR, and is fully explained near the table(s) I see no problem, but currently there is no explanation, so I cannot see the point of it. -- DeFacto (talk). 20:54, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

@DeFacto it copied 2017/ 2019 when the tories were in the lead --Crazyseiko (talk) 13:44, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

@Crazyseiko, that's not necessarily a good reason to keep it in this article. Do you know what the use it is? Does it comply with WP:COLOUR? -- DeFacto (talk). 14:25, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

@DeFacto I believe its complys with WP:COLOUR. The reason it was used was to highlight the winning party, ie in the case of 2019 the tories. In one section of the tables they only got 20 seat maj.--Crazyseiko (talk) 18:56, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

Seats @ Dissolution

Why, on the infobox and the table for seats at dissolution, does it say Conservatives has 344 Seats, when the source cited from the House of Commons website says 346?

I have changed this before but it got reverted. Thanks, Wikieditor019 (Talk to me) 14:39, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

I've rejigged the sources in the table to make clear where the numbers are coming from. --TedEdwards 16:28, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

Candidates table

There seems to be a bit of a scuffle over whether or not to include the candidate summary table and what to put in it, so in the interests of establishing consensus:

1. Should we include the table in the article?
2. If yes, what would constitute the criteria for a party's inclusion?

Discuss - I'll put my own thoughts as a reply. Most recent table below for reference.

Party		Party leader(s)	Leader since	Leader's seat	2019 election		Seats at dissolution	Contested seats
					% of votes	Seats
	Conservative Party	Rishi Sunak	October 2022	Richmond (Yorks)	43.6%	365	346	635 seats in the United Kingdom
	Labour Party	Keir Starmer	April 2020	Holborn and St Pancras	32.1%	202	205	631 seats in Great Britain
	Scottish National Party	John Swinney	May 2024	None	45.0%	48	43	59 seats in Scotland
	Liberal Democrats	Ed Davey	August 2020	Kingston and Surbiton	7.4%	12	15	611 seats in Great Britain
	Plaid Cymru	Rhun ap Iorwerth	June 2023	None	0.6%	4	3	32 seats in Wales
	Alba	Alex Salmond	March 2021	None	New party		2	19 seats in Scotland

CipherRephic (talk) 16:38, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

This was in a section labelled 'Great Britain' without any clear explanation as to why, and no corresponding material for Northern Ireland. I'm not sure what useful function this table serves. GenevieveDEon (talk) 17:08, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

I don;t see what new information this brings to the page? ALL the information listed in that table is covered else where in the page--Crazyseiko (talk) 18:58, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. We have this info in other forms already in the article, don't we? And why the weird choice of parties? Why Alba, but not Reform UK? Why no Greens? Why the wrong number for LibDem candidates? Bondegezou (talk) 21:15, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

And as I said when I removed it for a second time, it also contained unsourced commentary, an undue table, and was off topic in the 'Candidates' section. When I removed it the first time I said that it adds nothing to the topic other than confusion between UK, GB and NI and duplicates the 2019 results again in the article. I think it added nothing and was unencyclopaedic. -- DeFacto (talk). 21:42, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

Oh, right, I was going to put my opinion here.

Personally I think it's not worth keeping (it would be more fitting on the candidates page if it's anywhere at all) but if we do keep it then the criteria should probably be either 1. Had any MPs at dissolution (rather than multiple) or 2. Got >1% of the vote in 2019 (although this would exclude Plaid which feels like an oversight) CipherRephic (talk) 12:44, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

I would propose putting the table from the Candidates article as far as those that have 10 candidates (ie, to include all parties that have any real attention: I believe that in the context of NI, Aontú probably have enough profile to justify inclusion). There is then a mathematically objective cut off point that avoids any need for CRYSTAL BALL accusations, and avoids the accusation of bias against those not represented at the time of dissolution. 14 candidates could be an alternative cut off point: no party below that figure (assuming we are not counting Speaker as a party) has any real expectation of winning a seat or probably even retaining a deposit).

Text below the shortened box could explain the independents, that n other parties with fewer than 14/10 candidates are also contesting, and the situation regarding the speaker. A link to the full table could accompany it. Kevin McE (talk) 00:08, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

I have been WP:BOLD Kevin McE (talk) 09:08, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Another option is to follow the BBC (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cw55nk6yn01o) who only listed either parties that were standing in 25+ seats, or who were standing in more than 1/6 of seats in a single UK nation Eastwood Park and strabane (talk) 10:49, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Greens clarity, there are three

I think the "Green Party" has to be clarified as the "Green Party of England and Wales"/GPEW/Greens (E&W), as both the separate Green parties, Scottish Greens and Green Party Northern Ireland are also standing candidates and not part of GPEW. An exception is for polling which seems they're considered as one, depending on the respondent's location, unless the outcome seat prediction is specifically for one of the Green parties. While the debates table already does it somewhat. DankJae 00:07, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

done :) CipherRephic (talk) 12:43, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Revert to infobox with images, leader's seat, etc.

Not sure where to write this but a lot of people are particularly unhappy with the change - it's been spotted on Twitter (X) by followers of politics who may not be avid Wikipedia editors but regularly visit these pages. Please could we revert to the previous infobox which was far better with images, leader's seat, etc? Internet is Freedom (talk) 16:42, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

While I'm generally in agreement that TIE (the one with the pictures) is preferable to TILE (the one without), because this election hasn't happened yet the current consensus is to use TILE because TIE requires us to guess which parties will or won't be major players (see: 2017 DUP), which contravenes WP:CRYSTAL. The idea is to change it to TIE once the election has happened and we have an idea of the major players. CipherRephic (talk) 17:15, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

If people want images of the party leaders, they can be added to the article. Bondegezou (talk) 21:36, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Campaign section: chronological or by party

The Campaign section was being written chronologically, but someone has now re-arranged it to be split by party. I can see pros and cons either way, but I think it makes more sense to do it chronologically, so you can understand how the story of the election unfolded. What do others think? Bondegezou (talk) 21:33, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. Arranging by date allows the section to be read as a singular contiguous narrative and makes the addition of new events (particularly ones which concern multiple parties, or no parties!) substantially easier. CipherRephic (talk) 21:36, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

@ThingsCanOnlyGetWetter:, you made this change, I believe. Would you like to input into the discussion? Bondegezou (talk) 09:27, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

I think chronological would make sense for this article, given the amount of coverage it receives. (I've used party-split campaign sections for mayoral and council elections but that's normally a reaction to limitations in RS coverage!) Ralbegen (talk) 11:32, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

Agreed that chronological would be more informative. As an aside, per MOS:NOBACKREF, headings should Not refer to a higher-level heading, unless doing so is shorter or clearer so, eg., "Reform UK campaign" should be "Reform UK" if party-based headings are kept – I don't see that "campaign" adds clarity in this case. Irltoad (talk) 12:03, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

That’s 4/4 in favour of chronological. ThingsCanOnlyGetWetter, could you revert your edits? Bondegezou (talk) 12:40, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

Just restored it to the chronological version, whilst keeping the additions not in the previous edits (such as the Reform Manifesto, and some other info). I will respect the consensus and keep it this way. --ThingsCanOnlyGetWetter (talk) 13:39, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, TCOGW. Bondegezou (talk) 15:56, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

No problem, B. --ThingsCanOnlyGetWetter (talk) 22:58, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

Sub-articles by English region

Pinging @Moondragon21: as the creator of these sub-articles, like 2024 United Kingdom general election in North East England. The articles seem to be forks from the main list of candidates done on grounds of article size, but they're all bloated by a large number of unnecessary sources. Now that the SOPNs have been released, only one source is needed (e.g. https://candidates.democracyclub.org.uk/ ) for all candidates in the country, which would cut down article size a lot.

Going into the election, and planning out article layout after the election, it feels to me that some changes to the layout would be useful. For the list of candidates, a layout comparable to Results of the 2019 Canadian federal election by riding is readable and is probably something to aim for following the election, whilst the information on boundary changes is useful but clutters the table so may be useful to be separated out into a different article. As a result, I'd propose replacing the England sub-articles with two new articles: the first one being Results of the 2024 United Kingdom general election by constituency and containing a table along the lines of this:

Constituency	Labour	Conservative	Reform UK	Liberal Democrats	Green Party	Others	Incumbent
Bishop Auckland	Sam Rushworth 25,000 50.00%	Jane MacBean 15,000 30.00%	Rhys Burriss 2,500 5.00%	Helen Cross 2,500 5.00%	Sarah Hannan 2,500 5.00%	Rachel Maughan (Transform)		Conservative	Dehenna Davison
Blaydon and Consett	Liz Twist 25,000 50.00%	Angela Sterling 15,000 30.00%	David Ayre 2,500 5.00%	Vicky Anderson 2,500 5.00%	Richard Simpson 2,500 5.00%	Paul Topping (SDP) Mark Logan (Workers)		Labour	Liz Twist
Blyth and Ashington	Ian Lavery 25,000 50.00%	Maureen Levy 15,000 30.00%	Mark Peart 2,500 5.00%	Stephen Psallidas 2,500 5.00%	Steve Leyland 2,500 5.00%			Labour	Ian Lavery

And the second one being something like 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies by constituency along the lines of this

Elected MP (2024–)			Constituency (2024–)	Constituency (2010–24)	Succession %	Incumbent MP (before 2024)
	Conservative	Anne-Marie Trevelyan	North Northumberland	Berwick-upon-Tweed	95%		Conservative	Anne-Marie Trevelyan
	Labour	Sam Rushworth	Bishop Auckland		75%		Conservative	Dehenna Davison
	Labour	Liz Twist	Blaydon and Consett	Blaydon	51%		Labour	Liz Twist
				North West Durham	49%		Conservative	Richard Holden

My examples obviously have dummy data/results as designed for following the election. But I thought I would raise the general idea- I think this change in layout would be preferable to the status quo. Would appreciate all thoughts on this. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 00:40, 17 June 2024 (UTC) Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 00:40, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

I agree fully! This change in layout is a big improvement. --ThingsCanOnlyGetWetter (talk) 22:57, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

Brilliant you had the same idea I had to use the Canadian style. I fully support this. Also I started two drafts on "Results" and "Results breakdown" for this election. - Moondragon21 (talk) 07:29, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

I've started off a draft: Draft:Results of the 2024 United Kingdom general election by constituency Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 15:09, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

@Chessrat, why have you removed Scotland's, Wales' and Northern Ireland's when this is just on "English regions"? Just surprised thats all. Although this is the first election the English regions were split-off. DankJae 00:18, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

All of them were originally in Candidates in the 2024 United Kingdom general election until a month ago, and in general result pages cover the entire country. Results of the 2019 Canadian federal election by riding, the analogy mentioned above, covers the entire country rather than having provinces in separate articles. So I didn't even consider the possibility of separate result pages for England/Scotland/Wales/NI, but if you feel there would be value in doing so I'd be interested in hearing. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 00:47, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

@Chessrat, not opposed to the change, just didn't assume this discussion would apply to them. Most of the "XXXX United Kingdom general election in XXXX" articles become largely on the results anyway.

I do believe however that the English regional articles should be merged into England as like 2019 United Kingdom general election in England and lack of 2019 United Kingdom general election in North West England, as the regions aren't usually discussed much compared to the other countries. Although not an important merge, and tbh I assumed that was the idea of this discussion. DankJae 00:59, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Agreed it's worthwhile to do so and I had been intending that, just not sure what to do with the remaining info on the English regional articles and if there's anything useful enough to keep. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 01:05, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

@Chessrat; The English region articles all largely share just a number of party candidates table which could easily be merged. While London's has a bit of the boundary review in which you proposed another article? or they can simply be merged/summarised/hatnoted/transcluded with Parliamentary constituencies in London.

Additionally, could the combined article's sections be transcluded back to the sub-articles, at least the nations ones? So transcluding Wales' section at "... in Wales". Like what was done for polling. Of course, the actual information remains at the combined article. DankJae 01:45, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

That makes sense, yes. I'll sort it out soon. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 02:00, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Outgoing members reversion

@GenevieveDEon Why did you revert my edit which added the link for "outgoing members" to the "outgoing members" section of the infobox? DimensionalFusion (talk) 11:19, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

Because the page you linked is of MPs elected in the 2019 election. Some of the people on that list - eg Cheryl Gillan, Jack Dromey, and James Brokenshire - have since died. Others such as Ahmad Khan have resigned from the House. And many of the people on that list who were still in office when parliament was dissolved will return when it is called after the election. These changes and others, including who's actually voluntarily stepping down, are discussed at length in the body of this article and others linked to it. It's not information we need in the infobox, and your link didn't provide it anyway. I stated in my edit summary "Those are not necessarily outgoing members - some of them are very likely to return - and there is accurate information on this topic in the article - we don't need this in the infobox." Your post here shows no sign that you even read that summary. GenevieveDEon (talk) 11:25, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

@GenevieveDEon That makes no sense. All other election infoboxes 2019 United Kingdom general election, 2017 United Kingdom general election, 2015 United Kingdom general election, 2010 United Kingdom general election, 2005 United Kingdom general election, 2001 United Kingdom general election, 1997 United Kingdom general election, all have an "outgoing members" link that leads to a list of MPs elected at the previous parliament. This is because the members of the previous parliament are... Outgoing. Why break this for nor eason? DimensionalFusion (talk) 08:25, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

OK, I see your point about consistency, although it's not how I would do it if I were designing the infobox. However - that's also a different infobox from the one this article is using at the moment; there's extensive discussion above about which infobox to use while the campaign is in progress. I think it's reasonable to expect that it will be replaced with the other sort once the election is done, at which point the 'outgoing members' and 'elected members' links will both be included through the template. Forcing the content of one infobox into the other isn't the answer. GenevieveDEon (talk) 08:30, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

@GenevieveDEon From a technical perspective, all members of the previous parliament are "outgoing" as the previous parliament does not exist anymore - a new one is taking its place. I see your point about them being different infoboxes, however they both have an "outgoing members" section for a reason - to see who was elected at the previous election. DimensionalFusion (talk) 08:59, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

OK, I do see your point - what you're doing is entirely consistent with existing practice, and I was wrong to remove it. But it still seems dissonant to be using a list whose main body includes several people who have died, and others who have resigned from parliament. I guess if others agree with me, there could be a discussion on the relevant templates' talk pages. But if it's just me being a pedant, it possibly doesn't matter. GenevieveDEon (talk) 09:29, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

I agree with DimensionalFusion. All members of parliaments are technically "outgoing" when an election is called, even if many of them may retain their seats in the new election. The "outgoing members" article provides a listing of MPs elected in the 2019 election, but also notes who of these died/resigned/were replaced/are stepping down/etc. Cannot see what the issue is, since that article is helpful to readers by providing them an easy look into previous members vs. future members without having to individually search for these. Impru20^talk 09:58, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

I agree, and I have reverted my change. Apologies for taking up your time. GenevieveDEon (talk) 10:01, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Reversion of edits

@Kevin McE Hi- you reverted 4 edits in the article without giving an explanation in the summary. Why was this DimensionalFusion (talk) 21:28, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Because a) the undo button on the dropdown menu doesn't give the opportunity to leave a comment, and b) contrary to the way it is described, and my expectations, it reverts to the version before that edit rather than just undoing that one edit.

I undid my undo, and removed the part I had intended, now with edit summaries. Kevin McE (talk) 21:43, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Ah, great DimensionalFusion (talk) 21:46, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Pre-filled post-result infobox

Hey all,

I've thrown together a pre-made TIE infobox (with --- for all of the seat counts, percentages etc.) so that we can switch out the infoboxes with ease once the results start coming in and we have a reasonable idea of the major parties. Right now it's populated based on an educated guess at the _very_ surface level returns but obviously this can be changed round if any surprises come about. It's on my user sandbox here. Hope this can be of some use!

CipherRephic (talk) 10:01, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

If you are showing N parties, you should show the top N parties by seats won. That’s what we’ve agreed previously. That’s going to be unlikely to be the Greens. It may not be Reform UK. It’s more likely to include the DUP and Sinn Fein, as with the 2017 infobox. Bondegezou (talk) 12:51, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

@Bondegezou I'm working more from the position of displaying the parties that seem likely to hit around 5% popular vote (as I believed the criteria to be) ordered by seat count - that's pretty much how it worked as far as i can tell with the 2015 infobox (UKIP's included, and they came joint tenth in seat count), and I think that's a more effective solution. the DUP and SF will almost certainly get more seats than the greens and probably more than reform, but the latter are far more politically important. Besides, isn't the DUP in the 2017 infobox because of its influence in the May govt. rather than any objective criterion?

Anyway, I think it's fairly clear that the six I've put in the infobox are the main six players politically, even if they don't get the most seats. The seven-way debate roster is indicative of this - it's those six plus Plaid (which is clearly the least influential party on that slate nationally), and they're acknowledged as the main six in the polling article since they're the only ones consistently polling over 1-2%. Unless there is a hung parliament (which seems unlikely) and the small parties do become relevant, it seems like including the relative success or failure of the Greens and Reform would be more informative to the lay-reader. Frankly, though, it's not a hill I intend to die on, and I'm perfectly happy to mock one up with the NI parties as well.

CipherRephic (talk) 13:09, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I’ll have to check out the 2015 infobox, but no. We’ve had these discussions before, at length. An election is about winning seats. Getting above a certain % in the popular vote has zero constitutional significance. The way to summarise a process of electing MPs is to show how many MPs were elected. You might disagree with the UK’s choice of electoral system (I do), but it is what it is, and the thing that matters is how many seats you won. That can be the only sensible criterion for ordering parties in an infobox for a democratic election. Bondegezou (talk) 13:17, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Zero constitutional significance, sure, but a party's popular support has vital political significance - and this is an article on politics. Reform splitting the Tory vote would have a much greater impact on British politics as a whole than the DUP losing a seat or two, even if they end up with more seats. Also, people in general are going to care a lot more about getting Reform results at a glance than they are DUP results (unless the DUP suddenly becomes very politically important, a la 2017. Ultimately the criteria should serve the article rather than vice versa and so if the seat criteria is hindering the usefulness of the article then it ought to be dropped for the article - WP:IAR, after all. CipherRephic (talk) 13:52, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Totally agreeing with this. Plus, it's not an actual Wikipedia policy that parties in infoboxes should abide to an strict seat-count criterion: that is rather the result of a loose consensus in election Wikipedia on what the party order should be in an infobox. But this does not necessarily preclude other parties appearing as well if relevance is justified. Last time this was seriously discussed for the UK was 2015/2017; much has come to pass since then, some consensuses have evolved (the 2021 Canadian election is one example) and new situations arise that may potentially warrant a review of such consensuses in order to improve on them. Impru20^talk 15:02, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Frankly, given the amount of coverage it's receiving and the amount of votes it's projected to receive, it'll be difficult to explain that Reform is either left out of the infobox or depicted as having a lesser relevance than DUP or SF, but specially if the scale of the Conservative crash leads to Reform scoring second in votes but still gets 0 seats. While the seat count has been agreed as general criteria for parties to appear in the infobox, there are some situations where additional criteria may entitle to it (and this election may prove to become one such situation). Impru20^talk 13:12, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

One might have some big, significant event that happens during an election campaign -- a terrorist outrage, the monarch dying, a party leader getting arrested -- that everyone agrees has a big impact on the election. Yet that wouldn't get captured in the infobox. Election infoboxes show the result, not the whole story. Reform UK getting lots of votes but not seats is kinda in this category. They can have a big impact, but if they don't win (m)any seats, then they aren't going to feature in an appropriate summary of the election results. Bondegezou (talk) 13:23, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Events are not depicted in an infobox. Parties do. We have criteria elsewhere in Wikipedia that feature parties/candidates if they cross a particular threshold in vote share, so it's not true that this solely comes down to how many seats are won. Impru20^talk 13:58, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Right, exactly. CipherRephic (talk) 13:53, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Threshold rules don’t contradict showing parties in an order determined by how many seats they won. As far as I know, they are only actually used for the election of a single position (a president, an MP).

While a party getting lots of votes but not seats under an FPTP system can be an important part of the story of an election, the repercussions of an election, its long-term significance, is nearly always about how many seats were won. In elections, winning matters. The top line messages of this article will be (1) who gets to form the government, and (2) who gets to form the official opposition. Those are determined by seats, not votes.

Deviating from showing parties in order of seats won would open up the biggest can of worms. How do you decide when a party with fewer seats warrants being higher in the infobox than a party with more seats? The Greens will get more votes than the SNP, so should we put them above the SNP? Etc. The DUP had a pact with the Tories after the 2017 election, so does that make them more important than the LibDems? These are impossible questions to answer. Bondegezou (talk) 15:16, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

A party winning a lot of votes, specially if those are detracted from a particular party (i.e. as polls show Reform are doing to the Tories) may deprive a party from winning seats without necessarily translating into any seats themselves. According to your criteria, if the Progressive Conservatives had got 0 seats in the 1993 Canadian federal election (they barely clinged on to 2), the rigid application of your criterion would have excluded them from the infobox despite them being the governing party at the time and their collapse being the story of that election. Other examples worth mentioning could be 1935 Prince Edward Island general election, 1987 New Brunswick general election... extreme cases do exist, yet those are handled as required to correctly represent an election result in the infobox.

Deviating from showing parties in order of seats won would open up the biggest can of worms. Not really, all you need to do is to include additional criteria (measurable criteria) that may entitle a party to enter into the infobox without excluding the seat count, i.e. getting more than X votes (1 million has been mentioned, 5% is used in other countries, etc.). Your 2017 example is boggy since DUP is already in the infobox and the LibDems won both more votes and more seats than them. Note that I am speaking of measurable metrics: media coverage could be a factor for considering the relevance of a party, but would be boggy as well. Actual results are measurable.

All in all, you must consider that most of the time elections will perfectly fit into the seat count criteria. Most of the time there won't be any debate on which parties will have to be included into an infobox. But weird things happen some times due to crisis within the political and electoral system. 2015 was one. And 2024 may be 2015 on steroids. Impru20^talk 15:50, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I have no objection to including parties that won 0 seats, as long as they are listed after parties that did win seats. Bondegezou (talk) 16:13, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Some parties that win seats may have less political relevance in a particular election that parties not winning seats. Precisely because popular votes are also a factor. Impru20^talk 17:12, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

> Deviating from showing parties in order of seats won would open up the biggest can of worms. How do you decide when a party with fewer seats warrants being higher in the infobox than a party with more seats?

There is a way around this: specifically excluding Northern Irish parties thanks to the unique nature of the political system in Northern Ireland. Here's an example of what that could look like: User:Chessrat/sandbox2

It's a bit ugly but could be the best compromise (depending on what the final result is). Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 21:37, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I'd support something like this but with the top two rows instead (that is, 3x2 rather than 3x3). Impru20^talk 21:44, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I don't think that's a particularly viable solution personally. a 3x3 grid gets far too bloated and the addenda would take up sufficient space on a 3x2 grid that we might just as well jettison them altogether and go with a 2x2 at that point. CipherRephic (talk) 22:09, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I think that is incredibly dismissive of the electorate of Northern Ireland. This is meant to be a UK election article. Kevin McE (talk) 07:54, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

I don't think that argument is sustainable. The election in Northern Ireland isn't a separate election. I don't think there is a precedence for just excluding parties that don't contest the election in the entire country (especially since the SNP would still be included). The argument you could make though, is that because these parties will receive a very low vote share (~1%), they could be excluded on the basis of the low vote share, whereas Reform UK and GPEW could be included due to a (likely) vote share above 5%, and also winning at least one seat. I think some people might disagree at focusing on vote shares though, but personally I don't think it is too unreasonable, especially since the media's election coverage have and will continue to focus on the parties currently polling above ~5% of the vote. Gust Justice (talk) 12:02, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Minor point, but Swinney has been SNP leader since 6 May. Tim O'Doherty (talk) 15:26, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

oops. corrected that. CipherRephic (talk) 17:35, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

This is not a presidential election: if the objection to a 3x3 box that allows a clearer picture of the result and the resulting parliament is that it is bloated, then drop the pictures of the leaders, drop their seats, and drop the info as to when they became leader. This is an encyclopaedia for literate people, so leaders are recognised by their names; their seats matter not one jot to anyone living outside those constituencies, and very little to those that live in them; the amount of time that a party leader has been in post may have some marginal relevance as background, but not enough to make inclusion here necessary. Kevin McE (talk) 08:06, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

I'm sure that we, as experienced Wikipedians, can explain our arguments without being openly dismissive or disrespectful to other people involved. Impru20^talk 08:26, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

Really not my intention, but edited since it has bothered you. Kevin McE (talk) 08:34, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

Muslim vote

I was listening to a podcast on the upcoming election, and was surprised to learn about The Muslim Vote 2024 initiative. The idea seems to be to get out the muslim vote, to target a number of constituencies to get the frontrunner to "care more about muslim issues" and possibly also to lift the war in Gaza. Apparently, there has been some harsh words from Ian Duncan Smith regarding the project.

I thought of adding a bit on this under the Campaign heading, but as a foreigner, living in another country, it is more difficult to evaluate sources and I was a bit reluctant to start editing. Are there thoughts on whether to include this project, where and how to do it, etc.? Thanks! OJH (talk) 07:01, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

I haven't seen any mention of it in the main election coverage. I think it's a fringe group, and our existing coverage of it is sufficient. GenevieveDEon (talk) 08:33, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

George Galloway, who is an MP for Rochdale (or at least was until after the snap election was called), and his Workers Party are in alliance with and can attribute much of their success to The Muslim Vote initiative. Just how fringe exactly is it? Galloway and his Party are under–represented in the British media, this article should not make that same mistake. Maurnxiao (talk) 01:25, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

We have to follow reliable sources, and at least some of the British media are indeed classed as reliable sources. However, if there are reliable sources showing close collaboration between the Workers' Part and TMV, that would be useful information to add to both their articles, at least, as there's currently no mention of it whatsoever. GenevieveDEon (talk) 06:17, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

It appears that the Workers Party was not endorsed outright, but almost all of its 100+ candidates standing in the election have been. This is quite clearly "close collaboration" and it is likely to have a significant swing in some seats. Galloway almost certainly wouldn't have won in Rochdale without it. Maurnxiao (talk) 10:45, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Again, we have to go with what reliable sources are saying about it. I have my own opinions about George Galloway, but they're not for this article. GenevieveDEon (talk) 23:36, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

On The Muslim Vote website you can type in any UK constituency and the website recommends you to vote for the candidate they believe to be the most prominent anti-imperialist (or another view, I suppose they may vary somewhat) candidate standing in that constituency, including George Galloway in Rochdale, where the Muslim vote is 26%. That is a huge swing, and considering Galloway won the by-election there a few months ago with about 39% of the vote (and how Galloway is the leader of a party with more than 150 candidates standing inthis general election) – I would even say that Galloway is the most notable and well-known MP outside government and the official opposition – I fail to see how it doesn't merit an inclusion in this article. Of course, as for reliable sources, are you referring to sources such as ITV, a British network that has hosted, as far as I'm aware, all the official UK 2024 election debates, and invited Nigel Farage, the leader of a party with no elected MPs and with less Councillors than the Workers Party, a party led by the aforementioned Mr. Galloway – who himself was not invited, nor were any other members of his party? Well, Galloway was... but only on another program to "discuss" the debate, which he was not a part of... did I ask for my views on Galloway to be included in this article? I doubt I did, so your last comment is not needed but appears to have been written condescendingly. Maurnxiao (talk) 23:59, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

By 'reliable sources', I mean WP:RS, which obviously does not include the organisation's own site, as that's not independent of the subject matter. GenevieveDEon (talk) 06:19, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

How about this one to merit an inclusion in this article? Maurnxiao (talk) 10:14, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, you guys, this underlines how hard it is for someone at a distance to discern whether TMV is a relevant factor for the article.

As for reliable sources, there seems to be mentions of the movement (and I'm talking about the Muslim Vote movement here, not Mr. Galloway, nor his campaign, nor his party!) in the Guardian, the Times, BBC and Prospect. But if they are onky revelant in connection with a single candidate, that's not so interesting. If, on the other hand, they are influencing the elections in Bethnal Green, Rochdale and parts of Birmingham, that could speak for inclusion. Let's see what pops up in the next few days, and let's not limit the discussion to the Workers Party! OJH (talk) 12:27, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Coverage of The Muslim Vote is of course quite limited because the main purpose of the group is to oppose the major parties and their support for Israel and NATO foreign policy. Reliable sources, such as ITV, treat questions about Gaza like this, so of course media coverage is limited! The war in Gaza is certainly a major issue for Muslims and younger people in the UK, and, in constituencies such as Rochdale where Muslims make up 26% of the electorate, and 39.7% was enough to get current Muslim Vote-endorsed candidate George Galloway elected, then I'm not sure why it shouldn't receive attention in this article. Maurnxiao (talk) 12:44, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Why should this article care about the Workers Party considering they're currently polling at a dismal 0%? Tim O'Doherty (talk) 12:56, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

This article should care about the facts. The fact show that the Workers Party have a sitting MP, George Galloway, who was elected with 39.7% of the vote in a constituency with a 26% Muslim electorate, an electorate recommended by an organization called The Muslim Vote to vote for Galloway. The Muslim demographic is a significant one in the UK, and there may be a significant political disenfranchisement within this demographic. The article shouldn't merely care about the Workers Party; it should care about The Muslim Vote, who happen to largely support the Workers Party. Besides, since when was Wikipedia bound only to polls? Maurnxiao (talk) 13:10, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

The Rochdale by-election is not relevant to this article. Is there any source that says that "The Muslim Vote" is wot won it for Galloway? Tim O'Doherty (talk) 13:14, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Haven't I mentioned the demographics frequently enough already? 26% Muslim electorate in a constituency won with 39.7% of the vote by a candidate endorsed by The Muslim Vote. Maurnxiao (talk) 13:21, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

But you've not given a source saying this. Tim O'Doherty (talk) 13:23, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

I'm not from Rochdale, so I wouldn't know immediately but in The Muslim Vote website, you can type in your constituency and it will tell you the Muslim electorate in the constituency and will suggest who to vote for. Maurnxiao (talk) 13:29, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

That is not a source. Clearly this isn't an integral part of this election campaign and isn't due in this article. As for "Galloway and his Party are under–represented in the British media, this article should not make that same mistake": we weight our encyclopaedic coverage based on the media's; we don't make things up ourselves based on personal opinion. Tim O'Doherty (talk) 13:35, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

You don't make up the writing on the wall but you can add it to an encyclopedia. Maurnxiao (talk) 13:43, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Not if it doesn't exist. Tim O'Doherty (talk) 13:45, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Thankfully, the evidence I provided suggests it does actually exist so there really should be a discussion about this. Maurnxiao (talk) 14:11, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

The Muslim Vote is not an impartial source for the Muslim Vote. Tim O'Doherty (talk) 14:13, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

"This article should care about the facts." Yes, but the threshold for inclusion in the article is verifiability, not truth.  M2Ys4U ^(talk) 13:28, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

These things can be seen on their website and on a few articles. Maurnxiao (talk) 13:31, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Okay, so please provide links to those articles. If they are from reliable sources and they demonstrate that this specific organisation has had an impact on the campaign then we can put something in the article. Unless and until you (or another editor) can do that there is no justification for inclusion.  M2Ys4U ^(talk) 13:37, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

I looked at their website and they explicitly say they do not endorse anyone in particular — Iadmc♫^talk  13:44, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

To be fair, impact is more than endorsing specific candidates or parties. Demonstrating that they have had a significant effect on, say, voter registration or turnout then that would merit inclusion as well IMHO. But let's see what (if anything!) the RS say about them first.  M2Ys4U ^(talk) 13:49, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

This? Maurnxiao (talk) 14:07, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

• Comment is the Muslim vote any more signifiant than the Black vote or the Young People vote or the Female vote? I think Muslims have generally always voted Labour so this is nothing new really— Iadmc♫^talk  12:55, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  The Muslim Vote is an organization whereas I'm not sure if the others are as well. The Labour Party leader Keir Starmer has attracted significant controversy for his comments on Gaza and his "purging of the left of the labour party", as some has described it. And as far as I'm aware, The Muslim Vote is against Labour for these very reasons. Maurnxiao (talk) 13:13, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  As long as undue weight isn't give I might endorse the inclusion of a group like this. But how much real coverage i.e. WP:RS is there? How significant is this group in endorsing the Workers Party? — Iadmc♫^talk  13:17, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Not merely the Workers Party, but also independents, like Jeremy Corbyn in Islington North; 10% Muslim electorate! Maurnxiao (talk) 13:20, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Still looks like small fry. Not all Muslims will endorse the Muslim Vote group. I'm trying to distinguish the group from general voting trends by Muslims and having difficulty. Perhaps not realy that important in the grand scheme of things. — Iadmc♫^talk  13:26, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  But it is a group who's opinions and statements can be measured and quantified, and not just make generalizations with mere inanimate demographic numbers. Maurnxiao (talk) 13:27, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Their website doesn't mention Galloway, The Workers Party or Corbyn. Where is the sourcing for these? — Iadmc♫^talk  13:30, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Type in the box in the middle of the page the name of your constituency. If you put Rochdale they should suggest Galloway, Islington North Corbyn, so on... Maurnxiao (talk) 13:42, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  My own says to vote for the sitting Conservative MP Drew Hendrey... So what? — Iadmc♫^talk  13:46, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  I googled the name Drew Hendrey and the only politician that came up was Drew Hendry of the Scottish National Party... Maurnxiao (talk) 13:52, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Tis he. My mistake — Iadmc♫^talk  13:53, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Ergo, The Muslim Vote has made numerous significant endorsements that could shape the election in drastic ways. Already they have endorsed one candidate who leads a party they tend to support and who won over a constituency. Maurnxiao (talk) 14:10, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  They tend to endorse the Muslim as to be expected if the endorsements article is anything to go by. Others are unusual outliers — Iadmc♫^talk  14:28, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  How does this make their actions any less notable? Maurnxiao (talk) 14:30, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  There's notable but that needs to be verifiable. I'm not seeing it. — Iadmc♫^talk  14:38, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  I already shared an article that appears to have been missed or ignored. Maurnxiao (talk) 14:50, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  No I saw it but it doesn't say they particularly endorse anyone. This is not really news in my opinion — Iadmc♫^talk  14:52, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

This pressure group is already heavily featured, possibly over featured compared to other single-issue campaigns that state preferred candidates, in the endorsements article. I don't believe there is grounds to feature/promote them here. Kevin McE (talk) 13:47, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

And most of those say vote for the Muslim. Not a shocker and not in line with the suggestion that Galloways Party is heavily endorsed — Iadmc♫^talk  13:51, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Maurnxiao has been registered on Wikipedia for all of 4 days, and may not have a thorough understanding of what is required here. First and foremost, WP:Consensus is required, and it is clear that there is no consensus emerging for mention of this group in this article. Secondarily, there is no extensive second party coverage in reliable sources that suggests that this group is playing a significant part in this election as would be required. I move we close the discussion. Kevin McE (talk) 15:04, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Seconded: it's going nowhere — Iadmc♫^talk  15:09, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Rather than assuming bad faith it appears you are assuming ignorance on my part. But the demographics of certain seats which have either been won or are being closely contested by candidates endorsed by The Muslim Vote speak for themselves. I do concede, however, that a clear consensus has been reached among the custodians of this article, and it is to exclude many of the details of this group from the article. Maurnxiao (talk) 23:10, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

There are no "custodians" here: we are all equal. But the participants in this debate, all bar you, agree that the information should not be included for various reasons. Move on @Maurnxiao — Iadmc♫^talk  01:29, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Thank you all, I'm happy I asked before editing. I'm not sure that the discussion has been on "is The Muslim Vote important enough to be mentioned" as much as "is the Workers Party a factor", but I see the usual notable, impact, verifiable, Reliable Sources and so on being discussed and people closer to the matter seem to agree that TMV is not (yet?) influencing this election at a level that merits mention. Thanks again! OJH (talk) 09:11, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

As regards the Workers' Party, I have seen nothing that suggests they are likely to even retain a deposit in any seat other than Rochdale, so five mentions in the article seems appropriate. They feature very little in any discussion at national level, and that is what determines the amount of coverage they should get here. Kevin McE (talk) 09:37, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Is this article only for British readers or for English speaking readers? There has to be a larger criteria than just UK national coverage, surely? Maurnxiao (talk) 11:37, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Not just for British readers (I, for one, am not British), but that is not the issue. Do you have a reliable source that suggests that the Workers' Party are going to have a major impact in this election in any seat other than Rochdale? They already have more mentions that the SDP, who have a similar number of candidates, the SDLP, who have, and are expected to retain, two seats, the UUP, who have far more seats, etc etc etc Kevin McE (talk) 12:45, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Nigel Farage photo

The photo of Farage is accepted one to use (currently, for election pages and his article), but it is 6 years out of date. If he's elected, do we switch it to the official portrait (although it didn't exist at the time of the election), find a better photo that we have now, or keep the 6-year old one? Curious for thoughts DimensionalFusion (talk) 13:17, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Elected as what? PM? Don't make me laugh! The present pic is fine: he hardly changes! — Iadmc♫^talk  13:23, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Member of Parliament for Clacton. Also, polls have him far ahead of anyone else in said constituency. Maurnxiao (talk) 13:28, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

David Cameron's portrait from August 3rd 2010 is included in the 2010 election article which took place on May 6th, 2010, and Donald Trump's presidential portrait is included in the 2016 election article, so including a hypothetical Farage portrait taken after the election would not be unprecedented. Maurnxiao (talk) 13:26, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, it's just because other articles like July–September 2022 Conservative Party leadership election have comments like "do not replace with PM portrait, did not exist at time of election" DimensionalFusion (talk) 14:48, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

15 or 17 independents?

Template:UK House of Commons in the body says 17 independents, but the table at the top of the page says 15, which is correct? MarkiPoli (talk) 16:01, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Maybe two stepped down or were replaced in a by-election? — Iadmc♫^talk  16:05, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

At a guess, the difference is made up by Lucy Allan and Lloyd Russell-Moyle, both of whom lost their parties' whips after the dissolution of parliament. In which case there were no longerr MPs, so shouldn't be counted, and the source for the higher figure is wrong.

Edit: But there again, Diane Abbott only had her whip re-instated after that, so that should make 16, so I am less sure.

Further edit: Whichever individuals are involved, I think the issue is that the infobox claims that it is the position at the dissolution (30 May), but is it fact the state of play at the point of parliament being prorogued (24 May). Either the numbers or the description needs to be changed. Kevin McE (talk) 16:18, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Just as an aside, the infobox doesn't even actually add up to 650 I'm pretty sure MarkiPoli (talk) 16:43, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Yes, because certain parties such as the Workers Party have been omitted, to one's dismay. Maurnxiao (talk) 16:45, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

No they haven't: it is right there. Kevin McE (talk) 16:47, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

It was changed recently and I predict that it'll be changed again. It had Farage on there instead of Plaid Cymru or the Workers Party. Maurnxiao (talk) 16:48, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

648... Who's missing (Not Workers Party, though)? — Iadmc♫^talk  16:49, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Really don't know. The numbers are the exact same for all groupings in both tables except Independents. Probably ok to just go ahead and change it to 17 in the infobox MarkiPoli (talk) 16:57, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

That must be it: infobox is wrong as it misses out two indepenents — Iadmc♫^talk  16:59, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Done Kevin McE (talk) 17:00, 23 June 2024 (UTC)