Tightening polls set stage for balancing act

Gordon Brown's Labour Party has closed the gap in opinion polls. Photo / AP

Is Britain heading towards a hung Parliament, and how would it work?

Until the end of January opinion polls were saying that the Conservatives were heading for a decisive victory at the general election, likely to take place on May 6. But in the past four or five weeks, the gap between the main parties has been narrowing. Judging by current polls, it appears the Conservatives will be the largest party in Parliament, but will not have enough MPs to control it outright.

How many seats do the Conservatives need?

The new House of Commons will have 650 MPs, but that figure includes the Speaker and three deputies, who do not normally vote, and is likely to include a handful of Sinn Fein MPs, who do not recognise Parliament so do not take their seats. If the Conservatives can take 322 seats, they should have a working majority. Currently they have 193. The experts say the Conservatives need about a 10 per cent lead to achieve an outright majority.

Has Britain had many hung Parliaments?

Since the war, only one election has produced a hung Parliament. That was in February 1974, when the outcome was 301 Labour MPs, 297 Conservatives, and 37 others. That Parliament lasted eight months, until Harold Wilson called a second general election, in which Labour secured an outright majority.

What about coalitions?

There has not been a coalition government made up of ministers from different parties since 1945. Former Prime Minister Tony Blair wanted to form one in 1997, but the fact that Labour won so decisively ruled that out. Between March 1977 and March 1978, there was an informal coalition known as the Lib Lab Pact. Labour had lost its overall majority and the Labour Prime Minister, Jim Callaghan, did a deal with the Liberal leader David Steel, under which the Liberals were consulted before decisions were taken. After the deal came apart, Labour continued for another year as a minority government.

Who would be Prime Minister in a hung Parliament?

Unlike MPs, who stop being MPs from the day Parliament winds up its business before an election, ministers carry on being ministers through the election. So Gordon Brown would be Prime Minister until he resigned.

But if there are more Tory MPs than Labour, surely Brown will have to resign?

It does not always matter which party has the greater number of MPs or has won the greater number of votes. The Prime Minister is the person who can command a majority in the House of Commons. If Brown did a deal with the Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg so their combined parties hold a majority, he could carry on as Prime Minister.

If voters have just kicked Brown out then surely he has to go?

Brown is not the sort to resign unless he has to. He can cite the precedent of Edward Heath, the Conservative Prime Minister, who tried to do a deal with the Liberals in February 1974 that would have kept him in office, and did not resign until they had rebuffed him. But Heath could point to the fact that, although the Tories had fewer MPs in 1974, they had won more votes than Labour. Brown is not likely to be in that position.

Would the Lib Dems do a deal with Labour?

Right now, Clegg is not saying what his party will do. Clegg has said that the party winning greatest support from voters should be allowed to form a government. What will tempt him to keep a Labour Government alive is if Brown promises a referendum on reforming the electoral system to make it fairer on the smaller parties. But as Clegg says, it all depends on the result. The Lib Dems will feel much more comfortable about doing a deal with Brown if Labour can emerge from the election as the largest party. If, as seems likely, the Conservatives overtake Labour, such a deal is much harder to justify to the public.

What if Clegg refuses to form a coalition with Brown?

If Brown cannot control the Commons, it is up to the Queen to send for someone else to form a government. In theory, that could be any politician. The political reality is that it will be Cameron.

How could Cameron form a government without a Commons majority?

Cameron will most probably choose to form a minority administration rather than enter into a coalition or any formal arrangement with the Liberal Democrats. He and Clegg would negotiate. Cameron is not going to offer to change the voting system but he will doubtless try to give Clegg something that he can take away from their talks, in the hope of reaching an informal understanding under which the Liberal Democrats do not prevent the Conservatives from drawing up a Queen's Speech or introducing a Budget - and do not support any votes of no confidence in the government.

How long can a minority government last?

If Cameron really wanted, he could keep going for four or five years without a Commons majority, provided he does not set off a crisis that causes all the other parties to gang up and pass a vote of no confidence.

John Major, who started out in 1992 with what seemed a clear majority, found himself under threat from Tory rebels, and at one stage proposed a motion of confidence in his own government.

It is likely Cameron would try to avoid being the prisoner of the smaller parties or of right-wing Tories by following the path that Harold Wilson took in 1974, and seizing the first opportunity to call another general election, in the hope it produces an outright Conservative majority. If it were to fail, politics would become very complicated.

- INDEPENDENT