[Youngian]

An assortment of mixed nuts.

The god botherer and the English Democrats crank (who seems to think he's the bad guy in a shit action film) are probably the worst.

Official Raving Looney candidate looks
far from the looniest candidate. Lord Love, Emperor of India looks worth a punt.

[Yug]

My firm prediction for today is the candidate for the Christian Bigots Party will lose his deposit.

I would like to say that the English Fascist will also lose his, but having lived among the morons of Mid Bedfordshire for over 50 years I wouldn't want to put money on it.

[Youngian]

Maybe the rise in the Tory tally comes from the wingnut fringe vote. We’ll see, close.

[Abernathy]

Eh? How the blithering fuck can 30% of the Mid-Beds electors still be intending to vote Tory? Oh, yeah - they happily voted repeatedly for Nadine fucking Dorries.

Festus Akinbusoye (crazy name, crazy guy) certainly looks like he should be part of the chasing pack of cranks and nutjobs, of which there seem to be more than usual. I'm somewhat bewildered that so many of these chumps seem to be able cheerfully to chuck away £1000 on a lost deposit for the dubious privilege of a namecheck from the returning officer in the middle of the night. Two grand in the Prince of India's case - he stood in Rutherglen too.

[Andy McDandy]

Foot in the door money. Stand for office and you're a politician. Justifies your inclusion on them there telly shows.

[Boiler]

Eh? How the blithering fuck can 30% of the Mid-Beds electors still be intending to vote Tory?

You should read some of the forums I read: that figure comes as no surprise to me. There are a lot of people out there who care for no-one but themselves ("and my family", they will cry) and as long as they remain comfortable and their views unchallenged - such as "the NHS was Labour's big mistake in 1948" - then everyone else can go hang.

It is rather depressing.

Are we having a wager on this one? My bet is "Conservative HOLD", despite the weather forecast being pretty rotten according to the BBC.

[Yug]

I think it will be a close-run race between Labour and the Tories as per the poll Ian reproduced above, though I wouldn't like to predict the outcome (probably a Tory win- they really are that stupid round there).

[Yug]

I think the Reform Party may well have their best election result so far. The number of people on the local Facebook groups who are saying they've voted Tory for years but don't trust the Tories any more so will be voting Reform is not inconsiderable. And those posts hav not a few replies agreeing with them. By being so toxic, the Tories have given the racists a perfectly valid reason for not voting for a black man. Though they'll still vote for a poisonous right-wing twat. But anything that splits the Tory vote is fine with me.

[Crabcakes]

I’m thinking narrow Labour win, because the Tory vote in this area is - for want of a better phrase - the ‘bastard’ vote, where they’ll not protest at the appalling performance of the party but will be really not so keen on the PM being a dark skinned chap. Add in a dark-skinned candidate and a lot of them will be incandescent and simply unwilling to fire up the mobility scooter to take them down to the polls. But they’re not racist, you understand - they just want an English candidate for a traditional English area, like that nice Mrs Dorries. She was a nurse, you know?

Or to put it another way, Labour might sneak it not because the Tories are awful but because their voters are even fucking worse.

[Youngian]

I think the Reform Party may well have their best election result so far. The number of people on the local Facebook groups who are saying they've voted Tory for years but don't trust the Tories any more so will be voting Reform is not inconsiderable. And those posts hav not a few replies agreeing with them. By being so toxic, the Tories have given the racists a perfectly valid reason for not voting for a black man. Though they'll still vote for a poisonous right-wing twat. But anything that splits the Tory vote is fine with me.

Akinbusoye might not a Tory voter’s idea of ‘a local candidate’ in mid Bedfordshire. A lot of them left Luton to ‘get away from that lot.’

On the other hand, he will in no way remind voters of Dorries so that’s a bonus for the Tory vote.

[davidjay]

A typical Tory in these circumstances will invoke the Nice Mr Patel* doctrine rather than vote Labour.

*There's too many of them over here but Nice Mr Patel down the street is alright.

[Yug]

Why would normally Tory-voting people who are becoming dissatisfied with the Tories consider Labour to be their only alternative when there are two other fascist parties to choose from? Add to this the fact that they are racist, the Tory candidate is dark brown, and the fascist alternatives are both white...

Result - Tory vote is split.

[Abernathy]

Foot in the door money. Stand for office and you're a politician. Justifies your inclusion on them there telly shows.

No, I don't think that is right. None of these jokers is really that interested in getting a foot in the politics door.

If memory serves, I think that the phenomenon of nutjob/non-serious candidates frivolously standing in parliamentary by-elections can be traced back as far as a Monty Python's Flying Circus sketch from 1970 (see below). The Official Monster Raving Looney Party may even have had its genesis as a result of that sketch. And well, nutters standing in by-elections has been a sort of British tradition ever since.

To the Monster Raving Looney Party's credit, they have always treated it as a huge joke, albeit one whose shelf-life has been un-naturally extended by about fifty years.

[Tubby Isaacs]

i'd settle for a narrow Tory hold to focus a few tactical voting minds for the general election.

[Oboogie]

i'd settle for a narrow Tory hold to focus a few tactical voting minds for the general election.

If that happens the LibDems will, rightly, be blamed for gifting it to the Tories. The problem with that is what affect it has on the LibDem vote in the Blue Wall seats come the General Election.

[Bones McCoy]

Looking at the BBC news website, you'd struggle to find that there were By-Elections today.

Does LauraK expect her favourite party to have a bad night of it?

[davidjay]

Why would normally Tory-voting people who are becoming dissatisfied with the Tories consider Labour to be their only alternative when there are two other fascist parties to choose from? Add to this the fact that they are racist, the Tory candidate is dark brown, and the fascist alternatives are both white...

Result - Tory vote is split.

There's always a good proportion of 'A plague on both their houses' voters who will go from Lib Dem to whichever far-right party are in vogue at the time, based on the protest vote idea.

[Oboogie]

Looking at the BBC news website, you'd struggle to find that there were By-Elections today.

Does LauraK expect her favourite party to have a bad night of it?

Which news sources are prioritising by-election coverage over, say, Israel/Hamas?

I'm not sure that Laura Kuenssberg's job involves uploading stories to the BBC's website, she's probably too busy preparing for the BBC's all night election coverage.

[Abernathy]

In fact, I think Laura may still be away on compassionate leave. Her father has died.

[Oboogie]

Ah, so that's why Victoria Derbyshire's been filling in on Sunday mornings. I thought it was odd that Laura appeared to on leave at the start of a new Parliamentary session/Conference season.