Talk:Next United Kingdom general election

Use of TILE rather than TIE

There is a hidden comment saying "There is a consensus to use this infobox style, not Template:Infobox election. This is because the latter cannot include all the parties, and therefore if we included it before the results of the election are known, we would have to guess which parties will make a significant impact, against what WP:CRYSTAL says. So do NOT change the infobox without consulting the talk page to change the consensus."

I'm not sure what the basis for that logic is- neither infobox template can include all parties. It is perfectly possible (albeit perhaps not likely!) that a party which currently has no MPs such as the SDP ends up having a major impact in the election, yet it is not included in the infobox.

However, there is one criterion which is already known when it comes to the chances of a party making a significant impact in the next election: if a party only stands in Scotland, or Northern Ireland, or Wales, then it is mathematically impossible for it to exceed 56 seats. Exclude all such parties and there are five remaining: Labour, the Conservatives, the Lib Dems, Reform, and the Greens. All five of those parties are clear in their intention to stand across the country as they have always done. They are also the five parties which are all included in regular opinion polls. So I really don't see how using TIE with a five-party layout would violate WP:CRYSTAL any more than using TILE does, and TIE fits in with the practice in past election articles. This would be my proposal. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 05:09, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Next United Kingdom general election

TBD
All 650 seats in the House of Commons 326 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
First party Second party Third party   Leader Keir Starmer TBD Ed Davey Party Labour Conservative Liberal Democrats Leader since 4 April 2020 31 October 2024 27 August 2020 Leader's seat Holborn and St Pancras Kingston and Surbiton Last election 411 seats, 33.7% 121 seats, 23.7% 72 seats, 12.2% Seats before 404 121 72   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Nigel Farage Carla Denyer Adrian Ramsay Party Reform UK Green Leader since 3 June 2024 1 October 2021 Leader's seat Clacton Bristol Central Waveney Valley Last election 5 seats, 14.3% 4 seats, 6.7% Seats before 5 4
Prime Minister before election Keir Starmer Labour Elected Prime Minister TBD

Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 05:09, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I'd be inclined to agree; I don't think it's unreasonable of us to go for TIE for an election like this. TILE is better suited for electoral systems where seats are spread across dozens of smaller parties, rather than concentrated in five or so bigger parties. — Czello ^(music) 07:22, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Introducing a criterion around parties that only stand in some regions would be WP:OR.

We’ve had this format of TILE for the “Next…” article for several election cycles. Bondegezou (talk) 07:36, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

"It has been done in previous articles therefore it should be done here" isn't a great argument for using it. But as I recall, there was significant pushback from using TILE in previous "Next..." articles DimensionalFusion (talk) 06:26, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

Looking at other countries' election articles' infoboxes, I can't see any that do something similar (exclude parties which won more seats because of some sort of judgement of their significance). Bondegezou (talk) 08:56, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

2024 British Columbia general election doesn't show the currently-second-largest party in the infobox, BC United, as it is not standing candidates in the election. By extension, it is certainly not unreasonable to exclude parties which are known to be only standing a small number of candidates in the election.

We obviously have no way of knowing yet which parties will have the most seats, until after the election! But we can follow the reporting of reliable sources such as opinion polls, which primarily include the five major national parties. I really don't think it is unreasonable to follow the practice of reliable sources here (that cannot possibly count as original research). Similarly, consensus has already been agreed on Talk:Opinion polling for the next United Kingdom general election to only include columns for the main five national parties. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 15:45, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

A party saying they are not standing is a good reason to exclude it. We do not have that here. The SNP, DUP, PC, SF etc. are all expected to stand in the next election. Opinion polling for the next United Kingdom general election still includes the SNP in its main table, although there has been a recent Talk page discussion on removing them. I'd say that's still a bit up in the air rather than a settled consensus.

Your logic presumes that what matters is only the party that "wins" the election, i.e. gets most seats. However, in the event of a hung Parliament (as happened in 2010 and 2017), it matters how many seats other parties have won. It is WP:CRYSTALBALL to presume that seats won by regional parties won't matter for coalition formation after the next election (cf. the DUP in 2017).

If you want this article to use TIE, it would make more sense to copy the TIE infobox at 2024 United Kingdom general election, not to make up a different TIE infobox with different parties based on a rule with no precedence anywhere on Wikipedia. Bondegezou (talk) 08:15, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

I remember that when I initially created the article that I added Infobox election instead of Infobox legislative election because I disliked using Legislative Election in the previous "Next..." article, but within a short while (literally 1 day) it was changed to TILE for whatever reason. The edit summary was Infobox should be this style until next election has happened. This was the consensus for the 2024 election, and the arguments to support that consensus hold for this article as well (having to guess who might do well at the next election). So changing despite seeing note about consensus.

I think that the point of the infobox is to display information pertinent to the Next election, but currently Infobox election would display identical information to 2024 United Kingdom general election, which isn't great. Wikipedia:Table dos and don'ts says to not use tables for visual layout, and I think Infobox legislative election fundamentally misunderstands this. An infobox is inherently visual, so an infobox that's mainly a table fails at its task. DimensionalFusion (talk) 06:52, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

Thinking about it, this is a good argument for including the latest polls in the infobox (see the poll1 parameter at Template:Infobox election), as for all the flaws of polls, they are at least something which is unequivocally about the next election (the subject of the article) rather than simply repeating the results of the last election.

Bizarrely, I can't get the poll1 parameter to show (not sure if I'm doing something wrong)- can ask on the template talk page about it if we want to take this route. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 16:49, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

I’ve reverted to TILE. The use of TILE has been a long-standing consensus, although I agree it’s often been debated. I suggest we need more discussion and clearer consensus before switching from that.

Also, Chessrat is making two changes: (1) a change to TIE, something that has often been discussed; and (2) excluding certain parties from the infobox. The latter is a more novel suggestion and has gotten lost in the discussion. I definitely do not see sufficient support for it. For a contentious subject like this, I suggest an RfC is in order. Bondegezou (talk) 07:51, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above has been up 4 days and seen 4 people comment. Those are 3 for TIE and 1 (me) for TILE. No-one has explicitly supported Chessrat's initial suggestion to exclude regional parties. The infobox discussion going on for the 2024 United Kingdom general election has seen over 40 editors commenting. I think this demonstrates that it was premature of Chessrat to make a change to the article and is why I have reverted. Bondegezou (talk) 08:07, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

I included the demonstration infobox (including only the five national parties with seats, which are also the five parties commonly included by reliable sources in opinion polls for the next election) when starting the discussion. There were no suggestions of alternative layouts to be used, other than your own suggestion to not use TIE at all.

Happy to wait a few more days just in case others chime in, but I think the consensus is fairly clear so far- not sure there's a need for an RfC as I don't think the use of TIE is particularly contentious aside from your own objection. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 14:55, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

Czello, DimensionalFusion, are you happy with the proposal for an infobox that includes smaller parties, but excludes parties that won more seats than them at the 2024 election (SNP, Sinn Féin and DUP)? As far as I know, this would be without precedence on Wikipedia. Bondegezou (talk) 15:12, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

I've changed my views on having the Infobox here since the 2024 article. Why do we need an infobox with a list of parties at all before the Next United Kingdom general election has even taken place? All it does it display the current number of MPs per party, which is already listed at House of Commons of the United Kingdom. Would anything be lost the party list were removed? DimensionalFusion (talk) 15:16, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

I am quite happy with having no infobox, or a small infobox that doesn't show the 2024 results or current seats. Bondegezou (talk) 15:22, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

I have asked for more input at some WikiProjects and the 2024 election article's Talk page. I think you're being a little sneaky, Chessrat, trying to get this through while few people are thinking about the page! You know this is a contentious issue and lots of Wikipedians will have views. Bondegezou (talk) 15:22, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

Not really? The rationale used in the hidden note's claim for using TILE is nonsensical, and there was certainly no longstanding consensus at this article to adopt TILE (indeed I believe TIE was used first). The fact is that the little sourcing there is about the next election discusses five parties (in terms of polls on voting intention, leadership approval, etc) more than it discusses the rest.

Use of TIE with a limited number of parties has justification from sources, whereas usage of TILE with all parties represented in Parliament would have had the absurd consequence that, for example, a year ago when Reclaim had parliamentary presence with Andrew Bridgen but Reform UK did not have any parliamentary presence, then Reclaim would have been included in the TILE infobox but Reform would not have been, despite reliable sources only discussing Reform out of the two as being a potential significant factor in the election.

It is entirely WP:OR to imply that the most relevant parties in the next election will just happen to be the parties which currently have MPs. When it comes to coverage of the next election, we need to reflect the way reliable sources treat it. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 15:36, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

Use of TILE for the next election article and TIE for past elections has been the usual pattern for many years, although there have been variations at time and the matter is contentious. You don't have to like that, but it's the closest we've got to a consensus.

The two things we know with certainty are the previous election results and the current seats in Parliament. Everything else has to be careful of WP:CRYSTALBALL. I don't want to rule out what RS are saying about a forthcoming election, but we need to be cautious.

So, what are RS saying about the next election? Not that much! It's probably 4-5 years off. Sources do discuss the 5 parties you have suggested (Lab, Con, LD, RefUK, Green), but Scottish sources talk about the SNP, Welsh sources talk about Plaid, and NI sources talk about the NI parties too. You can't just cherry pick some sources and ignore others.

One approach, as suggested by DimensionalFusion is to not have an infobox or to have a minimal one. This far out, I see a lot of sense in that. Bondegezou (talk) 15:29, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

I'd be fine with not using/only using a minimalist infobox for now, too (e.g. TIE with no parties but with a blank electoral map). Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 02:37, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

• I support using the TILE version on the basis that it lists all parties, rather than editors choosing (on what are IMO quite flimsy grounds) to list only five of the 13 that hold seats (and excludes three parties that hold as many seats as two that get included). I think infobox space is better used by having information on more parties than photos of a small number of party leaders. Number 57 15:21, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  I don’t think infobox space is a relevant factor in this - Wikipedia is WP:NOTPAPER and readers can simply scroll down DimensionalFusion (talk) 15:40, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  I'm not sure that's a relevant to my point; the TIE infobox contains fewer parties (despite being significantly larger) and is not capable of having 13 parties (the maximum is nine), so even if readers have to scroll, they still see fewer parties' details. Number 57 15:49, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  This is true, but what details is the reader actually getting? Just a list of parties currently in the House of Commoms and their MP counts. I don’t think this information needs to be in the infobox DimensionalFusion (talk) 15:55, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  So you support a version of TIE without party names, leaders or current seats? Joking aside, I disagree with what you say, hence the preference for TILE. Number 57 16:06, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  @Number 57 I disagree with what you say, hence the preference for TILE Could you clarify this? What is it you disagree with. I don't necessarily support either Infobox election or Infobox legislative election DimensionalFusion (talk) 16:47, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  I disagree with "I don’t think this information needs to be in the infobox". Number 57 17:23, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  Does it, though? It's just a list of parties and their MP counts. It has no bearing on the subject of the article, which is Next United Kingdom general election. We cannot populate the infobox if the election hasn't taken place yet DimensionalFusion (talk) 17:33, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  Well, obviously we can as nearly all future elections have a populated infobox. The question is more whether we ought to – ultimately whether it is helpful or not to readers. I personally think it is useful context to see which parties are currently in parliament, who their leaders are and how many seats they currently have. Number 57 17:41, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  It may be useful, but I don't think it needs to be in the infobox as it is only slightly related to the subject of the article – Next United Kingdom general election. Maybe in the "Background" section as it's part of the previous election, not the current one. Alternatively we could just do what is done in House of Commons of the United Kingdom and instead of doing it as Infobox legislative election does (a wikitable), it could just be an apportionment diagram with a legend below it. DimensionalFusion (talk) 17:51, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  Is it not more useful for readers to actually find information that is pertinent to the next election in the infobox, rather than simply information about the present House of Commons makeup? For example, recent opinion polls (which can only be added with TIE) are actually about the next election. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 18:54, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  While I don't think listing individual opinion polls an infobox (which is what TIE can in theory do) is a good idea due to the frequent updates required and likely disputes over reliability, what we could do is include the polling graph in the infobox in the map section (which can be done in both infobox types) – this would be much more useful as it would show the entire range of polling for all parties polling at a suitable level. It could look like this. Number 57 19:05, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

  Infobox size is a relevant factor. MOS:INFOBOXPURPOSE is very clear that infoboxes should be small, compact, concise things, not sprawling blocks you need to scroll through. Bondegezou (talk) 15:32, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

• Support TILE, best have a United Kingdom infobox for a United Kingdom article rather than "parties that stand in England are the only ones worthy". We shouldn't only promote the most popular parties (which always rely on England), but ideally represent all (with seats) likely to contest the next election across the UK not one part of it, even if England dominates. Of course, past practice is to switch to TIE when the election results begin counting, trimming it to the most popular then. The TIE proposed here would be perfect for Next United Kingdom general election in England. Non-England parties shouldn't be ostracised from a United Kingdom article's infobox. Understand the argument of whether we need an infobox here at all, but the results of the last election and the current MPs already do not match, so not duplicate? DankJae 15:31, 6 September 2024 (UTC)
• Comment. On the issue of using TILE for "next" UK general elections, I'm mostly neutral on the issue. On the one hand, I think that regional parties are not that important in the overall picture because it's mathematically impossible for them to get (or even come close to) a majority of seats, whereas the main national parties can get it since they contest enough seats. On the other hand, I'm sensitive to the fact that parliamentary elections measure parliamentary strength of parties, and on that level of course that regional parties can get more seats that some of the main national parties. Once the election is held, this is relatively easy to sort out (or not, considering the long discussions we have had throughout the years for the last UK elections), but it is difficult when the election has not yet been held. There are quite some people sensitive to this and the use of TILE for "next" UK elections has seemingly worked in recent times as a compromise solution to avoid needless edit wars on party placement when we don't have any set results. I would support TIE based on coherence with my past and current position on infobox use, but I would not oppose using TILE on the compromise level for this specific situation in UK elections, since it has worked well in recent years. Impru20^talk 15:52, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

Comment (again) the entire word count of the actual article, Next United Kingdom general election, is 525 words. The word count of just this section of the talk page is 1,200 words. I don't think this is particularly productive. DimensionalFusion 🏳️‍⚧️ (talk) 19:08, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

• Support TIE. Both TIE and TILE arbitrarily exclude parties on the basis of expected performance (e.g. nobody is suggesting a TILE infobox should include UKIP or the Communist Party), so neither is inherently better for WP:CRYSTAL purposes. On that basis, if infoboxes for elections which have already happened are TIE (albeit I accept there is currently an RfC on the 2024 talk page), I see no particular reason for inconsistency between future elections and past elections. My preference overall is also for TIE, because in my view it presents more information in a more accessible way. CuriousCabbage (talk) 21:52, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

What about a minimal infobox with no parties?

Three of us in the above discussion have mooted having no infobox or a minimal infobox showing no parties. Is that something others can agree on? Bondegezou (talk) 13:42, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

Fine by me. Here's an example layout using Number 57's suggestion of including the poll graph (though may be worth editing the graph a bit to make the key more readable if we go for this). Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 16:40, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

I like it but it's been previous consensus not to include the blank map in the infobox DimensionalFusion 🏳️‍⚧️ (talk) 20:04, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

Next United Kingdom general election

No later than 15 August 2029
All 650 seats in the House of Commons 326 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Constituencies to be contested in the election
Opinion polls for the election
Prime Minister before election Keir Starmer Labour Elected Prime Minister TBD

OK, thanks for getting us started, Chessrat! My suggestions would be... a small thing, but I'd lose the flag, as per MOS:FLAG. Do we need the blank constituency map? I don't see that it adds anything. In recent discussions on other articles, we agreed not to use blank maps like that as placeholders. So, what would that get us... see second infobox below the first. Bondegezou (talk) 17:51, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

That looks good to me. I think we can be open to including parties nearer the election when there's more media coverage, but for now a minimal infobox would suffice. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 18:03, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

Sure, I concur that a different approach may be appropriate at a later date. Bondegezou (talk) 18:10, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

I agree that we should stick with what we have for now. The election is not on the horizon and we don't tend to put images of party leaders etc in until at least the second half of the Parliament. As things stand (and when the time comes), it makes sense for the infobox to just have the 5main UK wide parties (Lab,Con,LD,Ref,Grn) but that's not a conversation or an edit to be made for now. WestminsterWhistleblower (talk) 15:10, 14 November 2024 (UTC)

Agree, leave as is. Consider again in 2026. 31.14.250.83 (talk) 16:20, 16 November 2024 (UTC)

Next United Kingdom general election

No later than 15 August 2029
All 650 seats in the House of Commons 326 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Opinion polls for the election
Prime Minister before election Keir Starmer Labour Elected Prime Minister TBD

References

Date of the election

I emailed the electoral commision requesting the last date that the election could take place, and this was their response:

Thank you for your email to the Electoral Commission.

The power to call a general election rests with the Prime Minister. Once the date of a general election is set, the Commission advises electoral administrators and voters on the specific registration deadlines as set by the election timetable.

The last day a general election can be held is 5 years after the day Parliament first met. The state opening of Parliament, took place on the 17th July 2024 and the election timetable lasts 25 working days, which means the last date the next general election can be held is 21st August 2029.

Please let me know if you require any further information.

This would make the date provided in the article incorrect – but there is no way in which to cite this within the article DimensionalFusion (talk · she/her) 16:40, 15 November 2024 (UTC)

I think the Electoral Commission have got this one wrong. Section 4 of the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Act 2022 states that Parliament dissolves five years after it first meets, not five years after the first state opening of Parliament, and parliament.uk states that it first met on 9 July. -- M2Ys4U ^(talk) 17:14, 15 November 2024 (UTC)

Maybe. Until it's officially confirmed in a statement there's no way to know DimensionalFusion (talk · she/her) 17:36, 15 November 2024 (UTC)

You may ask here. The answer can be cited. Mike Rohsopht (talk) 01:21, 16 November 2024 (UTC)

I think there are a number of ways this legislation can be interpreted in this instance and it is perfectly plausible for the election to occur later in 2029, I'll explain why.

In practice, if the PM decides to leave calling the general election until the last minute and is essentially "timed out" by the legislation, in practicve, I can't see the Speaker allowing Parliament to be disolved without a proper wash-up period in the middle of the summer recess.

In the instance of being "timed-out", what would happen is that Parliament would return after it's recess in early September, there would be a wash-up week and the Speaker would have to seek the Monarch's permision to disolve Parliament and call a General Election with the election taking place 5 weeks later. So in theory, there could be an October 2029 election.

However, this could be dealyed further still due to Party Conference season usually occuring in October. Conferences are not just party political events, they are a big part of the business callendar and there would be a lot of pressure to ensure these go ahead. It is therefore perfectly plausible that the election is pushed on to November or December 2029.

I am not saying any of this is likely but it is not a well thought through piece of legislation - it was written with the expectation and assuption that elections would continue to only take place between April and June (usually May) as they did so for many many years prior. The legislation relies on the PM to willingly call an election - even when it is not in his/her interests to do so. After what happened with Sunak going early, I can see the temptation to stretch the term out a bit longer, should the current government have a difficult summer.

In short, I think it is impossible to put a firm date on this - it seems not even the electoral commission can settle on a date (but they are not the final arbiters of this). I think we should avoid putting a firm date, I don't see what value it adds, especially if it can't be firmly relied upon. 31.14.250.83 (talk) 16:43, 16 November 2024 (UTC)

There's no obvious way of reconciling your interpretation of the law with the text of the relevant legislation.

The legislation says, If it has not been dissolved earlier, a Parliament dissolves at the beginning of the day that is the fifth anniversary of the day on which it first met. If the parliament has not been dissolved by 9 July (if we use the date in the royal proclamation) or 17 July (if we use the state opening) then it will be dissolved on that day, regardless of if there's been a wash-up period, regardless of the party conference period, regardless of any other factors.

The only thing that can extend parliament beyond that date is new legislation. And by convention that would only occur in a fairly extreme national emergency (like, a third world war). Kahastok talk 19:13, 16 November 2024 (UTC)

That's quite a simplistic legal interpretation. Are you a lawyer? It is not a well written piece of legislation and it was written with certain conditions in mind. It is worth highlighting that UK's constitution exists in various documents and it is not as straight orward as looking at this one single piece of legislation, if the conditions surrounding the election do not neatly fit it.

E.g. the legislation as written ignores the fact that the Monarch has to be consulted/give permision in order to trigger a General Election. The dissolution of Parliament does not in and of its self trigger a general election. In practice a Monarch may feel duty bound to delay an election until after the summer as this could be seen as an afront to Democracy to spring an unprecedented August election on the public when many millions will be on holiday. Furthermore, the Electoral Commission may have similar concerns and face similar pressures to ensure the election is held at a more sensible time.

Furthermore, your national emergency argument is a bit odd - assuming Parliament has been disolved, how on earth do you pass new legislation to delay the election?

There is flexibility in the consitituion for the date to be varied - especially given that the "latest possible date" currently falls in mid-August (the most impractical time of the year possible). 143.58.151.120 (talk) 14:51, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

I find it interesting that you're asking "are you a lawyer", when you are the one making extraordinary unsourced claims about the law.

Do you really think parliament would pass a law that allows the king to just rule by decree for as long as he likes, just because otherwise we might have an election on a day that would be inconvenient for some people? We had rule by decree before once, and it ended with a civil war. That the king lost.

In this circumstance, no there is no flexibility. Of course there isn't. Parliament is dissolved after 5 years, and the election is 25 working days afterward. That's easy to source.

The last possible date for the election under the law as it stands is 25 working days from the date of automatic dissolution. That calculation is trivial so not OR per WP:CALC. The only question is whether to start five years from the date of first meeting (i.e. 9 July 2029) or the date of the state opening (i.e. 17 July 2029). Kahastok talk 16:21, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

Bluntly, all of this, including DimensonalFusion's reply from the Electoral Commission, is original research. Only a published statement from a qualified authority would be a reliable source for a detail like this. We should either leave our existing text as it is, or remove it. GenevieveDEon (talk) 15:34, 17 November 2024 (UTC)