2010 United Kingdom general election

The Prime Minister Gordon Brown visited Buckingham Palace on 6 April and asked the Queentodissolve Parliament on 12 April, confirming in a live press conference in Downing Street, as had long been speculated, that the election would be held on 6 May,^[5] five years since the previous election on 5 May 2005. The election was called on 6 April, and Parliament was dissolved on 12 April for the ensuing campaign. The election took place on 6 May in 649 constituencies across the United Kingdom, under the first-past-the-post system, for seats in the House of Commons. Voting in the Thirsk and Malton constituency^{[note 1]} was postponed for three weeks because of the death of a candidate. There were reports of electors being prevented from voting as polling stations closed at 10:00 p.m., mainly from insufficient time or electoral staff, but also from a lack of ballot papers.

The governing Labour Party had campaigned to secure a fourth consecutive term in office and to restore support lost since 1997.^[6] The Conservative Party sought to gain a dominant position in UK politics after losses in the 1990s, and to replace Labour as the governing party. The Liberal Democrats hoped to make gains from both sides and hoped to hold the balance of power in a hung parliament. Since the televised debates between the three leaders, their poll ratings had risen to the point where many considered the possibility of a Liberal Democrat role in Government.^[7] Polls just before election day saw a slight swing from the Liberal Democrats back to Labour and Conservatives, with the majority of final polls falling within one point of Conservatives 36%, Labour 28%, Liberal Democrats 27%.^[8][9] However, record numbers of undecided voters raised uncertainty about the outcome.^[10][11] The Scottish National Party, encouraged by their victory in the 2007 Scottish parliament elections, set themselves a target of 20 MPs and were hoping to find themselves in a balance of power position.^[12] Equally, Plaid Cymru sought gains in Wales. Smaller parties who have had successes at local elections and the 2009 European elections (UK Independence Party, Green Party, British National Party) looked to extend their representation to seats in the House of Commons. The Democratic Unionist Party looked to maintain, if not extend, their number of seats, having been the fourth largest party in the House of Commons.

The key dates are as follows:

All three main parties went into the general election having changed leaders since the last election. David Cameron became Conservative leader in December 2005, replacing Michael Howard. Gordon Brown succeeded Tony Blair as leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister in June 2007. Nick Clegg was elected as leader of the Liberal Democrats in December 2007, succeeding Menzies Campbell who had replaced Charles Kennedy in January 2006. The last time all three main parties went into a general election with new leaders was in the 1979 election, when James Callaghan as Labour leader, Margaret Thatcher for the Conservatives, and David Steel with the then-Liberal Party took to the polls.

The leadership of each party may have implications beyond party popularity at the polls, especially if a hung parliament requires the formation of a coalitionorminority government. Tony Blair courted the Liberal Democrats for possible coalition in the 1997 Parliament even though Labour had a clear majority, and similarly Gordon Brown made comments about the possibility of a coalition in January 2010.^[15] In 2009, it was reported that senior civil servants are to meet with the Liberal Democrats to discuss their policies, an indication of how seriously the prospect of a hung parliament is being taken.^[16] Nick Clegg^[17] and Menzies Campbell^[18] have continued the position of Charles Kennedy of not being prepared to form a coalition with either main party and of voting against any Queen's Speech unless there was an unambiguous commitment in it to introduce proportional representation.

David Cameron has made a pitch to "Middle England"—voters who supposedly abandoned the Conservative Party after 1992 for Labour or the Liberal Democrats.^[19]

Other parties with representation at the previous general election at Westminster include the Scottish National Party from Scotland and Plaid Cymru from Wales, and Respect – The Unity Coalition and Health Concern, each of which held one Parliamentary seat from England. Since that election, the Scottish National Party have won the 2007 Scottish Parliament elections and currently control the Scottish Government and also won the largest share of the 2009 European Parliament election vote in Scotland.^[20] In Wales, the Labour Party remained the largest party in the Welsh Assembly, though Plaid Cymru increased their share of the vote and formed a coalition government with Labour.^[21]

The sole Ulster Unionist Party MP subsequently resigned from the party, leaving them with no representation at Westminster.^[22] This shift continued trends in both the nationalist and unionist communities that had been seen in the previous two elections, and was also replicated in the 2007 elections to the Northern Ireland Assembly. In 2008, the DUP announced their intention to sit with the Conservative Party in parliament, and in 2009 the UUP and the Conservative Party announced they had formed an electoral alliance: the two parties will field joint candidates for future elections under the banner of "Ulster Conservatives and Unionists – New Force".^[23]

Many constituencies were contested by other, smaller parties. Parties that won no representatives at Westminster in 2005 but have seats in the devolved assembliesorEuropean Parliament included the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland, the Progressive Unionist Party of Northern Ireland, the British National Party, the UK Independence Party (UKIP), and the Green parties in the UK: the Green Party of England and Wales, the Scottish Green Party, and the Green Party in Northern Ireland. In 2009, Nigel Farage announced his intention to resign as UKIP leader to focus his attention on becoming a Member of Parliament. Farage was replaced by Lord Pearson of Rannoch, elected by party members, whose stated intention was for the electoral support of UKIP to force a hung parliament. The Green Party of England and Wales voted to have a position of leader for the first time; the first leadership election was won by Caroline Lucas, who successfully contested the constituency of Brighton Pavilion.

In addition to a wide number of smaller parties which had no parliamentary representation, a new loose coalition contested a general election for the first time. The Trade Union and Socialist Coalition (TUSC), is a grouping of left-wing parties that participated in the 2009 European Parliament elections under the name of No2EU; members include the Socialist Workers Party, the Socialist Party, the Socialist Alliance, Socialist Resistance, and is supported by some members of UNISON, the National Union of Teachers, the University and College Union, the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers, and the Public and Commercial Services Union. Several members of these unions agreed to run as candidates under the TUSC banner.^[24] However, some former members of NO2EU, such as the Liberal Party^{[citation needed]} and the Communist Party of Britain,^[25] chose not to participate in the TUSC campaign. The coalition did not run candidates against left-wing Labour or Respect candidates.^[26][27]

This election had an unusually high number of MPs choosing not to seek re-election with more standing down than did so at the 1945 election (which on account of the extraordinary wartime circumstances came ten years after the preceding election).^[28] This has been attributed to the expenses scandal and the fact that redundancy-style payments for departing MPs may be scrapped after the election.^[29]

In all, 149 MPs (100 Labour, 35 Conservatives, 7 Liberal Democrats, 2 Independents, 1 Independent Conservative and 1 member each from Plaid Cymru, the Scottish National Party, the Democratic Unionist Party, and the Social Democratic and Labour Party) decided not to contest the election.

Each of the four national Boundary Commissions is required by the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986 (as amended by the Boundary Commissions Act 1992) to conduct a general review of all the constituencies in its part of the United Kingdom every eight to twelve years to ensure the size and composition of constituencies are as fair as possible. Based on the Rallings and Thrasher studies using ward by ward data from local elections and the 2005 general election, the new boundaries to be used in 2010 would have returned nine fewer Labour MPs had they been in place at the previous election; given that there are to be four more seats in the next parliament this notionally reduces Labour's majority from 66 to 44.^[30]

Pursuant to Boundary Commission for England recommendations, the number of seats in England increased by four, and numerous changes were made to the existing constituency boundaries.^[31]

Northern Ireland continued to elect 18 MPs, but minor changes were made to the eastern constituencies in accordance with the Northern Ireland Boundary Commission's recommendations.^[32] For the first time, these changes include the splitting of an electoral ward between two constituencies.

Following the recommendations of the Boundary Commission for Wales, the total number of seats is to remain at 40, although new seats have been recommended by radical redrawing of boundaries in Clwyd and Gwynedd: Arfon and Dwyfor Meirionnydd replace Caernarfon and Meirionnydd Nant Conwy respectively; Aberconwy replaces Conwy. Currently Welsh constituencies have electorates on average around 14,000 smaller than their counterparts in England.^[33]

Scotland saw its most recent large-scale review completed in 2004, so its 59 constituencies remain the same as at the 2005 general election.

The prospective Labour candidate for Moray, Stuart Maclennan, was sacked after making offensive comments on his Twitter page, referring to elderly voters as "coffin dodgers", voters in the North of Scotland as "teuchters", and insulting politicians such as David Cameron, Nick Clegg, John Bercow and Diane Abbott.^[34][35]

The UKIP candidate for Thirsk and Malton—John Boakes—died, causing the election in the constituency to be postponed until 27 May.^{[36][37][38][39]}

Philip Lardner, the Conservative candidate for North Ayrshire and Arran was suspended from the party for comments he made about homosexuality on his website, describing it as not "normal behaviour". Andrew Fulton, chair of the Scottish Conservative Party called the comments "deeply offensive and unacceptable", adding, "These views have no place in the modern Conservative party." However, he would still appear as a Conservative candidate because it was too late to remove his name from the ballot paper.^[40]

2,378 postal voters in Bristol West were wrongly sent ballot papers for Bristol East by mistake. Bristol City Council officials asked people to tear up the wrong papers and said "Every effort will be made to ensure delivery [of new ballot papers] by 30 April."^[41]

Gordon Brown privately described a 65-year-old pensioner, Gillian Duffy, from Rochdale, Greater Manchester, as a "bigoted woman" after she asked him about vulnerable people not receiving benefits because non-vulnerable people are receiving them, including "all these Eastern Europeans what are coming in".^[42][43] Brown's remarks were recorded by a Sky News microphone he was still wearing, and widely broadcast. Soon after the incident, Brown talked to Jeremy Vine live on BBC Radio 2 where he publicly apologised to Duffy. Subsequently Brown visited Duffy in her house for 45 minutes in order to apologise in person. Upon emerging, he described himself as a "penitent sinner",^[44] while Duffy refused to speak to the press and would not shake hands with him in front of the cameras. She said the incident had left her feeling more sad than angry and that she would not be voting for Labour or any other party.^[45]

The Scottish National Party failed in a court action to ban the broadcast in Scotland of the final party leaders debate. They had argued that "the corporation [the BBC] had breached its rules on impartiality by excluding the SNP." The judge, Lady Smith, ruled that "the SNP's case 'lacks the requisite precision and clarity'" and added she could not "conclude the BBC had breached impartiality rules." Additionally, broadcasting regulator Ofcom ruled that it had not "upheld complaints received from the SNP and Plaid Cymru about The First Election Debate broadcast on ITV1 on Thursday 15 April 2010."^[46]

The leader of the UK Independence Party, Lord Pearson, wrote an open letter to Somerset newspapers, asking voters to support Conservative candidates, rather than UKIP candidates in the Somerton and Frome, Taunton Deane and Wells constituencies. This action was criticised by UKIP candidates who refused to stand down.^[47]

Labour candidate for Bristol East and former MP Kerry McCarthy revealed information about postal votes cast in the constituency on Twitter. Avon and Somerset police said they were "looking into a possible alleged breach of electoral law." Bristol City Council stated that "This is a criminal matter and [it] will be for the police to decide what action to take."^[48]

The former Prime Minister Tony Blair returned to the campaign trail for Labour, visiting a polyclinic in Harrow West, after a troubled Labour campaign.^[49]

Postal voters in the marginal Vale of Glamorgan constituency had to be issued with new ballot papers after mistakenly being told they did not have to sign applications for postal votes.^[50]

InHornsey and Wood Green constituency, 749 postal voters were sent ballot papers "which asked voters to pick three candidates instead of one." Haringey Council had to deliver new ballot papers by hand.^[51]

The Metropolitan Police launched an investigation into allegations of bogus voter registration after revelations that fictitious names had been added to the electoral roll in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It was also reported that a last minute surge in applications to vote before the 20 April deadline had led to 5,000 names being added to the register without being checked, enough to sway the outcome of the election.^[52]

The Labour candidate for North West Norfolk, Manish Sood, described Gordon Brown as Britain's worst ever Prime Minister.^[53] The comments, which he repeated to a variety of news outlets, took attention away from the previous day's speech by Brown to Citizens UK, widely described as his best of the campaign.^[54][55]

A Conservative Party activist in Peterborough was arrested after alleged incidents of postal voting fraud.^[56]

Simon Bennett resigned as the head of the British National Party's online operation, then redirected its website to his own website on which he launches an attack against the party's leadership.^[57]

On the morning of polling day, the former leader of UKIP, Nigel Farage, was injured when a light aircraft in which he was a passenger crashed near Brackley, Northamptonshire.^[58] There were also several reports of voters being locked out of polling stations in Sheffield Hallam, Manchester and Leeds, "and police said one London polling station was open at 2230 BST."^[59] Counting in Londonderry was also suspended around 2300 UTC, after a car which was abandoned outside the counting centre caused a bomb scare.

The counts for the Foyle and East Londonderry constituencies were suspended due to a security alert.

The first major shift occurred when Peter Robinson, incumbent First Minister of Northern Ireland, lost his seat to Naomi Long of the Alliance Party.^[60]

Following a campaign by Sky News and with agreement of the party leaders.^[61] it was announced on 21 December 2009 that there would be three leaders' debates, each in primetime,^[62] and a subsequent announcement in March 2010 that a debate between the financial spokesmen of the three main parties, Alistair Darling, George Osborne and Vince Cable would be held on 29 March.^[63]

The SNP insisted that as the leading political party in Scotland in the latest opinion poll, it should be included in any debate broadcast in Scotland.^[67] On 22 December 2009, the UKIP leader, Lord Pearson stated that his party should also be included. Following a decision by the BBC Trust not to uphold a complaint from the SNP and Plaid Cymru over their exclusion from the planned BBC debate, the SNP announced on 25 April that they would proceed with legal action over the debate scheduled for 29 April.^[68] The party said it was not trying to stop the broadcast but it wanted an SNP politician included for balance. The SNP lost the case, in a judgement delivered on 28 April.^[69]

Since each MP is elected separately by the first past the post voting system, it is impossible to precisely project a clear election outcome from overall UK shares of the vote. Not only can individual constituencies vary markedly from overall voting trends, but individual countries and regions within the UK may have a very different electoral contest that is not properly reflected in overall share of the vote figures.

Therefore, the first past the post system means that the number of MPs elected may not reflect the overall popular vote share across the parties. Thus, it is not necessarily the party with the largest share of the popular vote that ends up with the largest number of MPs. (See details of the elections in 1951 and February 1974) Since 1935 no party has achieved more than 50% of the popular vote in a UK general election. The voting system favours parties with relatively concentrated support: a widely distributed vote leaves a party at risk of getting a large vote share but doing poorly in terms of numbers of seats (as the SDP-Liberal Alliance did in the 1980s), whereas parties with localised votes can win seats with a relatively small share of the vote.

That said, in previous elections, approximate forecasting of results were achieved by assuming that the swing in each individual constituency will be the same across the country. This system, known as uniform national swing (UNS) is used by much of the media in the UK to assess and extrapolate electoral fortunes from opinion poll data, though there has been criticism that such predictions may be naive and unreliable, even from providers of such data.^[70] By using UNS projections, several media commentators and politicians have suggested that significant swings towards the Liberal Democrats in the opinion polls may not necessarily amount to significant gains in terms of parliamentary seats, including predictions that even if the Liberal Democrats had the most votes, and Labour the least, it could be the case that Labour retains the most seats while the Lib Dems have the fewest.^[71][72][73]

Normally governments can easily survive for a full parliamentary term on a majority of more than 20 seats over all other parties. Below that level there is a danger of by-elections and MPs crossing the floor of the House reducing the government to a minority such that it would be at increased risk of losing a vote of no confidence.

Immediately following the previous general election, the Labour party held a double-digit lead in opinion polls. However, over the course of 2005, this lead was eroded somewhat. By December 2005, the Conservative party showed its first small leads in opinion polls following the controversial 90 days detention proposals and the election of David Cameron to the leadership of the Conservative party.^[74]

In early 2006, opinion polls were increasingly mixed with small leads given alternately to Labour and Conservative. From the May 2006 local elections, in which Labour suffered significant losses, the Conservatives took a small single-digit lead in opinion polls. Labour regained the lead in June 2007 following the resignation of Tony Blair and the appointment of Gordon Brown as prime minister. From November 2007, the Conservatives again took the lead and, from then, extended their lead into double digits, particularly in response to the MPs' expenses scandal, although there was some evidence that the lead narrowed slightly towards the end of 2009. By the end of February 2010, Ipsos MORI, ICM, YouGov and ComRes polls had all found a sufficient narrowing of the Conservative lead for media speculation about a hung parliament to return.^[75]

From 15 April 2010, following the first televised debate of the party leaders, however, polling data changed dramatically, with the Lib Dem vote proportion rising to 28–33%, and the Conservative vote proportion falling, putting all three parties within the margin of error of each other. In some polls, the Liberal Democrats have taken the lead from the Conservatives. Under UNS projections, this makes a hung parliament highly probable, if Lib Dem performance were to persist.^[76]

After the second debate on 22 April the polls, on average, place the Conservatives in the lead on 33%, the Liberal Democrats in second on 30% and Labour in third on 28%. If these polls reflected the election day results on a uniform swing nationwide, Labour would have the most seats in a hung Parliament.

The following graph shows polls recorded over the entire period by ICM:

The following graph shows YouGov poll results since the calling of the general election on 6 April 2010:

At 10 pm on election day, coinciding with the closure of the polls, the results of an exit poll collected for the BBC, Sky and ITV news services were announced. Data were gathered from individuals at 130 polling stations around the country. The results of the poll initially suggested a hung parliament with the Conservative Party 19 seats from a controlling majority; this was later adjusted to 21 seats. The distribution of seats amongst the Conservatives, Labour, Liberal Democrats and other parties was initially suggested to be 307, 255, 59 and 29 respectively,^[77] although the seat numbers were later changed to 303, 251, 69, and 27 respectively.^[78]

Initial reaction to the exit poll by various commentators was of surprise at the apparent poor prospects for the Liberal Democrats^[79] because it was odds with many opinion polls undertaken in the previous weeks. However, the actual results showed that the exit poll was a good predictor.

A later BBC Exit poll (05:36 BST) predicted the Conservatives on 306, 20 short of an overall majority, Labour on 262, and Liberal Democrats on 55.^[78]

National newspapers in the United Kingdom traditionally endorse political parties before a general election. The following table shows which parties major papers are endorsing (or blank if they have not declared a preference).

The Independent and The Guardian advocated tactical voting to maximise the chance of a Liberal Democrat – Labour coalition, in order to make electoral reform a possibility.^[82][92]

Following the Boundary Commissions' reports recommending changes to seats in England, Northern Ireland and Wales, various estimates have been made of the electoral effect of the changes in each constituency. The most respected of these estimates is The Media Guide to the New Parliamentary Constituencies compiled and edited by Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher, which was published in February 2007.^[93] The website UKPollingReport has also compiled estimates.^[94] The various estimates differ in detail.

Arising out of those estimates, lists of the most marginal seats were compiled. They were the seats where a party needed to overturn the lowest percentage majority to win the seat. These were not necessarily the seats where it was easiest to do so, or the only seats that the party were actually targeting.

Template:Wikinewspar2

At 9:41am on 7 May, the BBC confirmed a "hung parliament", as it was by then impossible for the Conservative party to gain the number of seats needed to form a majority government. (326 or 323 for a majority, as the five Sinn Féin MPs are expected to boycott the House of Commons. At that time the Conservatives stood at 290 seats, Labour at 247 and Liberal Democrats at 51.)^[3][95] There is one constituency seat that, due to the unexpected death of one of the candidates, will be contested on 27 May and is currently unseated.

Of the 532 seats contested in England (a final seat will be contested on 27 May), the Conservatives won an absolute majority with 61 seats more than all other parties combined, and secured an average swing of 5.6% from Labour.^[96]

InScotland, Labour regained the two seats they lost in by-elections since 2005. There was a swing to Labour from the Conservatives of 0.8% (with Labour increasing its share of the vote by 2.5% and the Conservatives increasing by just 0.9%) This left the Conservatives with just a single MP representing a Scottish constituency.

There were 40 seats contested in Wales. The Conservative share rose from three to eight, taking one from the Liberal Democrats and four from Labour. Welsh nationalist party Plaid Cymru gained one extra seat, Arfon, from Labour. Overall, Labour lost four seats but remained the biggest party, with 26.

There were 18 seats contested in Northern Ireland. Both Irish nationalist parties, Sinn Féin and SDLP, held their seats. The unionist parties, DUP and UUP (the latter in an electoral pact with the Conservatives), lost one seat each. This left the nationalist parties with eight seats, the unionist parties with eight seats (all DUP), the Alliance with one seat and an independent unionist with one seat. It is the first time since the Partition of Ireland that unionist parties failed to secure a majority of Northern Ireland's Westminster seats in a general election.

Problems occurred with voting in various areas of the country, a situation which was condemned by politicians of various parties. Jenny Watson, chair of the Electoral Commission, the independent body that oversees the electoral process, was forced on to television to defend preparations and procedures. The Electoral Commission has announced it will be carrying out a "thorough investigation".^[98]

InChester there were reports that 600 voters who were registered to vote were unable to vote due to the electoral roll not having been updated,^[99] while in Hackney, Islington, Leeds, Lewisham, Manchester, Newcastle and Sheffield long queues led to many voters being turned away and unable to vote as the 10 pm deadline arrived.^[98] Some dissatisfied voters staged sit-ins to protest against what some of them had called "disenfranchisement".^[98]InLiverpool, higher than expected turnout meant several polling stations ran out of ballot papers, with defeated council leader Warren Bradley stating that some residents were unable to cast their votes.^[100]

In parts of Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg's Sheffield Hallam seat it was reported that students from the city's two universities were placed in separate queues from 'local' residents, who were given priority, resulting in many students being unable to cast their votes.^[101]

Just days after the election Clegg spoke at a rally saying the results showed the British system is broken and needs fixing, while vowing the voices of the protesters would be heard. The rally demanded Clegg affirm his promise to push for "democratic and proportional representation of the British public".^[102]

Due to closure of United Kingdom airspace as a result of the Icelandic eruption, potential expat voters in New Zealand were denied a vote when postal voting papers arrived too late to be returned to the UK. ^[103], although Australian broadcaster SBS suggested that given the extremely tight timetabling of overseas votes, there is very little chance that voting papers [for voters outside Europe] will be received, let alone returned, in time to be counted. ^[104]

When it became clear that no party would achieve an overall majority the three main party leaders made public statements offering to discuss the options for forming the next government with the other parties. Liberal Democrat leader Clegg stated that he would initially discuss the way forward with the Conservative party on the basis that they had won the most seats and had obtained the highest overall public support. In a statement given outside No. 10 on 7 May Gordon Brown said:

I understand and completely respect the position of Mr Clegg in stating that he wishes first to make contact with the leader of the Conservative party ... Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg should clearly be entitled to take as much time as they feel necessary. For my part I should make clear that I would be willing to see any of the party leaders; clearly, should the discussions between Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg come to nothing, then I will of course be prepared to discuss with Mr Clegg the areas where there may be some measure of agreement between our two parties.^[105]

The following days saw many discussions between parties, with extensive news coverage focussed on the debates of a coalition government between the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives. Meetings involving Nick Clegg's Liberal Democrats and Gordon Brown's Labour Party also ensued. However, on 10 May, Brown announced that he would stand down as Labour Party leader before the next party conference in September 2010. It was suggested in the media that Brown's resignation was a pre-condition of a coalition government being formed between Labour and the Liberal Democrats, with Brown remaining as a caretaker Prime Minister until a leadership election could take place to determine the next leader of the Labour Party, who would then succeed Brown as Prime Minister.^[4]

An analyst from the Demos think tank suggested Brown's departure could bring about some sort of deal between the Liberal Democrats and with Labour, though she added that "It's going to be a very messy government whichever way you play it. Another election in October is what I've got my money on."^[106]

• British General Election, 2010 resources from Politics Science Resources
• Your Candidate Finder allows you to filter all the candidates in the database based on everything from what type of education they had, to their age, gender, profession, county and role (i.e. contesting, defending, standing for the first time or again)

Main parties

• Conservatives: Invitation to join the government of Britain
• Labour: A future fair for all
• Liberal Democrats: Change that works for you/Building a fairer Britain

Smaller parties already holding seats

• Democratic Unionist Party: Let's Keep Northern Ireland Moving Forward
• Plaid Cymru: Think Different. Think Plaid.
• Respect Party: Homes, Jobs and Peace, Manifesto for a Hung Parliament
• Scottish National Party: Elect a local champion.
• Sinn Fein: 2010 Westminster Election Manifesto
• Social Democratic and Labour Party: For Your Future
• Ulster Conservatives and Unionists – New Force: Invitation to join the government of the United Kingdom

Other parties

• Alliance Party of Northern Ireland: Alliance Works, Working for you at Westminster
• Alliance for Green Socialism: General Election Manifesto 2010
• British National Party: Democracy, Freedom, Culture and Identity
• British National Front: National Front 2010 Election Manifesto
• Christian Peoples Alliance: Not by Bread Alone
• Communist Party of Britain: Britain For The People Not The Bankers
• Co-operative Party: A Cooperative Agenda For A Fourth Term
• English Democrats Party: English Democrats 2010 Manifesto
• Green Party of England and Wales: Fair is Worth Fighting For
• Green Party of Northern Ireland: Make A Difference Vote Green
• Liberal Party: Principle, Policy and Purpose
• Mebyon Kernow: Key Campaign Priorities
• Official Monster Raving Loony Party: The Monster Raving Loony Manifesto
• Pirate Party UK: The 2010 Election Manifesto of the Pirate Party UK
• Scottish Green Party: A Living Wage For All, Protect Public Services, Support New Green Jobs
• Scottish Socialist Party: For An Independent Socialist Scotland
• Socialist Equality Party: Socialist Equality Party Manifesto for the 2010 British General Election
• Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition: No To Cuts and Privatisation! Make the Bosses Pay!
• Traditional Unionist Voice: Putting It Right
• UK Independence Party: Empowering the people
• United Kingdom Libertarian Party: For Life, Liberty, and Prosperity

• Boundary Commission for England
• Boundary Commission for Scotland
• Boundary Commission for Wales
• June 2006: Boundary changes make it more difficult for Labour to win an overall majority