Ramblings, rumblings, grumblings, and rambling grumbly rumblings.

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Wikipedia page including full result here. This by-election in the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse constituency was for the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, and was caused by the death of the sitting SNP MSP Christina McKelvie in March. The by-election was held under the first past the post system used for Westminster elections, and the top four in the result were as follows:

Labour......... 8,559 (31.6%, -2.0 pts)
SNP............ 7,957 (29.4%, -16.8 pts)
Reform......... 7,088 (26.1%, new)
Conservative... 1,621 ( 6.0%, -11.5 pts)

The six other candidates were even more also-rans than the Tories, with none of them winning more than 2.6% of the vote. Turnout was 44.2%.

I wonder how many people saw this result coming? There'd even been a front-page interview in the Daily Record by the SNP's First Minister, John Swinney, which was predicated on the idea that this would be a straight SNP/Reform fight and "Labour can't win here". In the event, they could and they did. My own view, for what it's worth, was that the SNP would probably hang on with a reduced majority, with Reform and Labour in a close battle for second. I was wrong too.

From down here in England I'm obviously missing some context, such as how much of a personal vote McKelvie had, but a few things come to mind. First, the days of the SNP simply cruising to election victories are gone. They've been in power at Holyrood for a long time now, and Swinney just doesn't have the star power of Nicola Sturgeon. "It's all England's fault, vote for us and independence" is a rather unfair way of representing the SNP's pitch, but the heavy fall in the party's vote suggests they'll need a lot more than that. They may struggle to get close to a majority in Holyrood next year.

Labour will be delighted on the surface, and after all a win is a win. However, they lost vote share since last time (2021), and only won the seat because the SNP lost a lot more. Given that Labour is an opposition party in the Scottish Parliament, getting under a third of the vote is not some kind of overwhelming mandate. I suspect that a lot of anti-Reform and anti-SNP voters simply coalesced around Labour as the least worst option. In parts of this constituency unionism is still a strong factor, and Labour might have been seen as best placed there, too.

Reform has, inevitably, got the lion's share of media attention. This has been a bit silly in places -- as someone said elsewhere, the BBC in particular has been a bit "Labour won from the SNP, now let's talk to third-place winner Nigel Farage", which is something they do far too much. Nevertheless, going from zero to over a quarter of the vote isn't something anyone can ignore. I said a little while ago that Scottish (and Welsh) politicians should not be smug about Reform's victories in English local elections and imagine they were magically immune. This underlines that.

The Tories had a terrible night. I'm sure they expected that, but it was a fall from a respectable position four years ago. They clearly lost a lot of voters to Reform, but Reform didn't only win from the Conservatives. I suspect in fact they took some from Labour -- and even some from the SNP. Although the SNP is fairly unusual in modern Europe in being a liberal, left-wing nationalist party, not all its members are of that persuasion. It would be a mistake to assume that Reform's blend of social conservatism and left-wing economics didn't appeal to some SNP voters.

First Past the Post is a poor electoral system, but it's an even worse one now we have an extra major party in the mix. I suspect that in Westminster by-elections too, we will see more results like this in the coming years, with winners on barely (or even less than) 30% of the vote. The optimist in me hopes this will finally see us adopting a modern voting system, but the optimist in me has been repeatedly disappointed over the last decade or so.

I do have one final thought about Reform's popularity, both here and in Great Britain as a whole. These days, the main traditional parties go for an almost obsessively targeted, data-driven approach to canvassing, concentrating heavily on winnable floating voters or getting their base out. That means a lot of people never see a canvasser at election time. It's easy for those voters to feel the main parties don't care about their views. There's a clear space there for a party who'll "do things differently", and some evidence suggests many Reform voters usually don't vote at all. I think the traditional parties need to take some note of this. To a certain extent, their laser focus on a small subset of voters may be helping Reform...

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125/365: Dog Lane car park, Bewdley
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It was pretty wet at times today, especially but not only in the morning. I did pretty much nothing of actual interest, just worked on boring everyday stuff, did chores, got a small amount of shopping and so on. That also means I didn't get any interesting photos for the 365 -- so you get this one of a car park! Actually two, since the barriered space on the left is for staff at the medical centre, which is the building you see on the left. The public car park is the area to the right, which extends out of shot. The chemist (pharmacist) I use is just out of shot to the left, and the public library is the last building in the row, just visible in the distance.

All kinds of political stuff happening, and no I don't just mean tonight's US soap opera/horror show involving Trump and Musk. We've got quite enough to be going on with here. A Parliamentary by-election in Scotland, one of Reform's leaders resigning in a strop, the Russian ambassador partly blaming the UK for the Ukrainian drone attack... there's more, but I'm too tired to write about all this tonight.

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124/365: Cattle below Silverwoods Way, Kidderminster
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I've finally been starting to catch up with Doctor Who. For ages I'd only seen the first two episodes of the current series, of which I had mixed feelings about "The Robot Revolution" but really liked "Lux". I also really liked "The Well", which was full-on scary in a way Who doesn't often nail these days. Probably the best episode since "73 Yards" last year. I also watched "Lucky Day", which was so nearly another great. The twist was superbly executed -- I did not see that coming -- but although I heavily sympathised with the Doctor's monologue to Conrad it seemed to have the common-these-days RTD fault of being far too unsubtle.

Today's 365 photo is from Kidderminster. Yes, oh ye of little faith, I did indeed take this picture in Kidderminster! To be precise, I was looking down from Silverwoods Way in the south of the town. These cattle are not part of a normal beef or dairy herd; instead they are kept by the local authorities to make sure that the important wildlife habitat doesn't simply end up as endless scrub. They all seem to be lazing about a bit here, which is something I rather envied them for as I passed by! You can't go right down there yourself -- that rough path is used to take feed to them -- but it makes a change to see this in a very built-up area.

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123/365: Hole Farm, just outside Bewdley
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This isn't the most interesting scene in and of itself, I know, but I chose to include it in my 365 series for a reason. This is the entrance to Hole Farm, just to the west of Bewdley. An unusual name for a farm, but although it's a tranquil place now it has a dark history. It's named after the nearby "Bloody Hole" valley, where Royalist troops were caught and massacred in 1651 after fleeing the Battle of Worcester. That battle was the final major engagement of the English Civil War (more accurately, of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms) and the Parliamentarians' victory led to the flight of the future Charles II and, eventually, Oliver Cromwell becoming Lord Protector of England. The "Bloody Hole" is rarely mentioned now, and I only found out about it myself a few years ago thanks to a small book of local history which I'd been reading for another reason.

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Nell Gwyn (1934)
An interesting oldie today. Nell Gwyn tells the story of the actress who became the long-time lover of King Charles II. Amusingly, in the opening credits dialogue is said to be by the King, Nell and Samuel Pepys, with additional dialogue by Miles Malleson! Since Pepys is a minor character here and some well-known quotes from the other two are included, that's not as absurd as it sounds.¹ Sir Cedric Hardwicke is good as the Merrie Monarch, coming across as a good man with human tastes. Those include Anna Neagle, of course! This film was her breakthrough into stardom. She's a little too posh for the role, but it mostly works. Nell Gwyn was a big success in Britain and much of the world, but it hit trouble in the USA, as it had the misfortune to come out just as the Hays Code started to be fully enforced. The occasional use of words like "whore" and "strumpet" and bawdy (for 1934) scenes such as Charles openly looking behind a screen where Nell is dressing spelt problems. There's a weird flash-forward to see some 1930s Chelsea Pensioners (it does make sense in context but it's still an odd directorial choice) and some of the outdoor scenes are clearly still being shot in a silent-y way. If you're okay with Thirties staginess and slowness, though, this is a spirited and quite fun movie. Lowish three. ★★★
¹ The famous story about an American film being "by William Shakespeare, with additional dialog[ue] by Sam Taylor" seems to be only possibly true. This one is right there on the screen.

As an aside, Hardwicke was born in Lye, near Stourbridge. At the time Lye was in Worcestershire, so I'm claiming him as one of ours!

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BBC News article here. I'm interested to see that, from 1st July, France will significantly extend its anti-smoking laws. It will become unlawful to smoke in a wide range of outdoor spaces frequented by children, including parks, beaches, near schools and at bus stops. Terrasses at cafés and bars will be exempt, and perhaps more significantly so will vaping. It's also very unclear how much the new laws will actually be enforced, and that's crucial to whether it makes much difference or is just showboating by the government. Even so, I'm a bit envious. The place that I hate to encounter smoking most is at bus stops, because it's the one outdoor space where I can't just move away. I'd ban that, with enforcement, tomorrow if I had the power.

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119/365: Statue of Charles Darwin, Shrewsbury
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I was in Shrewsbury today, and although there was a disappointing rainy period in the early afternoon it wasn't a disaster. I discovered a couple of places I hadn't realised existed before, such as The Parade, a nearly unadvertised group of small shops and galleries in an old infirmary. I discovered too late to have the time that there was a second-hand bookshop in there as well. My photo today, though, is of something I absolutely did know about: the statue of Shrewsbury's most famous son that has pride of place in front of the public library. Charles Darwin was born in the town in 1809. Shrewsbury is proud of him, and his name is everywhere -- the main town centre shopping mall is called the Darwin Centre, for example.

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If your dog can't go more than 30 seconds without barking, and keeps doing this, then bloody well take it outside. Yes, even if you're in a "dog friendly" coffee shop. Yes, even if it's raining. Not everything and everyone has to fit around your pet annoying the hay out of everyone else.

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117/365: Canada Geese and goslings, Kidderminster
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I was in Kidderminster briefly today (which some may consider is the best way to be in Kidderminster...) and while walking to Sainsbury's I went along the canal towpath. That's where I saw these Canada Geese with their now quite well-grown goslings. At the time it looked as though it might start raining, but fortunately that held off for another hour or so, and so I was able to get to and from Sainsbury's easily enough. I know, can anything be quite as thrilling as that?

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113/365: Mural by 7th Pencil, Worcester Bus Station
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Off to Worcester today to meet MLP fandom friends. Six years on from the end of Friendship is Magic and our fandom steadfastly refuses to die. We had 14 attendees today, including several rare visitors and one complete newcomer (to the meets, not to MLP). It was a busy meet with plenty going on, and I think people found it enjoyable. I took today's photo on my way there, while passing through an exit of Crowngate Shopping Centre by the bus station. I really like this mural, which is by 7th Pencil; she's an established street artist from Warwickshire who has done lots of these things around the country. This one, which I don't think has a formal title, was created as part of last year's Worcester Paint Festival.