The Aftermath

What a result! I don’t think anyone in their right mind predicted the Tory party winning as convincingly as they did, let alone securing a majority. Who will ever trust the pollsters again?!

Although with the benefit of hindsight it does make sense. For the past five years sections of the left-wing have aimed such contempt and vitriol towards anyone even considering the possibility of voting Tory that they have made the whole Conservative brand socially unacceptable. Advantage them, you would have thought. But no, rather than convert voters to their side they seem instead to have spawned a generation of ‘shy Tories’, individuals unwilling to admit their political inclinations to anyone at all, not even to the friendly man from YouGov assuring them their details will be kept secret. Best lie and tell him you’re voting Labour. At least that way then you won’t get the ‘anti-facists’ (the irony) daubing ‘Tory scum’ on your house. Safety first. But once in the polling booth…

Needless to say, most of us loved the result here at Eton. After the tedium of the campaign, the election night was a crackerjack of entertainment. An almost unbelievable exit poll at 10pm – surely the Conservatives wouldn’t grab that many seats, would they? If so, it meant Cameron would be certainly returning to Downing Street as Prime Minister. But the polls, the polls!

And then the individual results: top Labour target seats held by the Tories. Not only that, but held with a vote swing towards the incumbent MP. What the hell! This wasn’t in the script! Gobsmacked Labour figures appearing on TV, reading from scripts unprepared for this outcome. The first whispers of a Tory majority. ‘Not in their wildest dreams…’

Next, a glut of David and Goliath stories. Vince Cable, Douglas Alexander, Jim Murphy, Esther McVey are felled. And lest we forget, the charming Ed Balls. The Conservatives celebrate as they secure the majority. Then the midday resignations: Nick Clegg, Ed Miliband, Nigel Farage – au revoir. The cavalcade drawing up into Downing Street, the Prime Minister getting out to greet his staff. You never seriously thought I’d be gone, did you? Politics, bloody hell.

Of course, not everyone at Eton is thrilled. The Labour supporters are, frankly, devastated by an outcome they never saw coming. Not because it wasn’t mathematically possible – of course it was – but because the whole country couldn’t be so stupid, selfish and well, stupid again to vote in an actual Tory majority could they? But it turns out they were, the narrow-minded, ignorant cretins, gullible enough to believe Rupert Murdoch and his lies in The Sun and then rush out to the polling booths chanting racist songs and breathing and eating racism.

Oh yeah, and the system was rigged! First past the post delegitimises the result. Only a quarter of the country voted for the Conservatives. An illegal government, a coup, a coup!

It’s funny how after my observation of David Cameron’s low standing at Eton last week the general opinion of him has picked significantly following this results. I guess that’s the effect of being a winner. After 2010, when Cameron couldn’t kill off a sitting duck of a Labour party headed by the architect of the recession, people weren’t willing to cut him much slack. Wishy-washy talk of a ‘big society’ didn’t help either. But now that he’s won it for real, won without having to rely on the Lib Dems, well maybe it means he’s not so bad after all.

The only downside to election night was the feeling of being a zombie the next day. I told myself I wouldn’t stay up the whole night, but go to bed at a reasonable hour, somewhere between two and three. Somehow though the note-to-self got lost in the drama of the evening. Although I’m no passionate Tory, to have stopped watching would have been like leaving the stadium during a cup final I knew my team was going to win.

A group of five of us did the whole stint in our house’s TV room. Earlier in the evening there were many more in there, as everyone crowded in to watch the exit poll. It felt somewhat like a movie night, as people had drinks and snacks for refreshments. When the result of the poll came through there was a moment’s stunned silence, before half the room erupted in delight. Once back in their seats there followed some very ungracious taunting of the Labour supporters in the house, who responded with defiant predictions that the poll was faulty.

But of course it wasn’t. For a good few hours no-one knew either way, but when the results began coming in thick and fast (at which time most people were happily asleep) any hopes of a wonky sample were dashed as key marginals swung to the Conservatives. Their projected number of seats ticked upwards as constituencies they expected to lose were surprisingly won, and before long it was clear they would return with a majority government.

Such an unexpected result did not go unnoticed on social media. The old advice of thinking before you speak was evidently ignored by a lot of my conservative friends, who took to Facebook to post some of the most pompous, doltish and unnecessarily belligerent comments I have ever witnessed in my entire life. But hey, I think they can be forgiven - it’s not often a general election comes around, let alone goes in your favour. Besides, I can hardly talk myself, being a mouse click away from posting ‘suck on that you dirty commies!’ on my Facebook timeline.

What a difference a week makes. As I write this, I think back seven days ago to when everyone was expecting a left-of-centre rainbow coalition to form a government. Instead, we have David Cameron and his pals in full power for the next five years.

They say you never forget many of the first things you do, and I think the first general election you follow is definitely one of them. I just fear the excitement of future elections will never be matched by this one. If it isn’t though, at least I can tell my grandkids about how all the way back in 2015 absolutely no-one in the country predicted…etc etc.

I might also add that the Prime Minister we elected at the time was an Old Etonian. And if I’m in a good mood, I may mutter under my breath ‘Floreat Etona!’