Britain likely to enter coalition era

The UK could be on course for a hung Parliament as millions of people in 649 constituencies across the country cast their votes in the general election in one of the most keenly contested polls in a generation.
The big difference for the 44 million or so registered voters this time was that the election for the first time was a three-horse race between the two traditional mainstream parties Labour and the Conservatives and third party the Liberal Democrats.
Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown was trailing in the polls against Tory leader David Cameron, while Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats is confident of a strong showing following his commanding performance in the historic televised Prime Ministerial Debates over the last month.
Opinion polls have indicated that the likeliest outcome of voting is a “hung Parliament”, in which no party wins an outright majority in the house.
Britain has not had an inconclusive election since 1974 and unlike other European countries does not have a tradition of coalition rule.
That scenario could leave the Lib Dems holding the balance of power and certain to press their case for electoral reform to a more proportional system.
Voting in several constituencies, including those in which the three leaders voted was brisk. The weather was as eccentric as it could be, ranging from light rain to largely overcast. And mini exit polls conducted by party apparatchiks in a few constituencies allegedly reflected the national poll trends of a close call with the Conservatives having the slight edge.
Boundary changes in several constituencies may also take its toll. The newly created Hampstead and Kilburn constituency is a cross-borough seat taking most of the wards from Hampstead and Highgate as well as some from Brent East and Brent South. It is made up of Brondesbury Park, Kilburn, Queens Park, Belsize Park, Fortune Green, Frognal and Fitzjohns, Hampstead Town, Kilburn, Swiss Cottage and West Hampstead.
This affluent constituency was traditionally associated with the famous, the rich, those with huge mansions and new money. These can be found around Hampstead, but more socially mixed and deprived areas around Kilburn have come into the equation.
In the past this seat was a straight fight between the Conservatives and Labour, with actress Glenda Jackson winning the seat from the Conservatives in the 1992 election. But with the boundary changes, the seat is now a dogfight between Labour and the Liberal Democrats.
“We have had more than two decades of the Tories and Labour. They have promised the sky, but have failed to deliver. I think it is time for a change,” said Barry, a utilities worker.
Normally he would have leaned toward supporting the Tories, but this time he has rooted for the Lib Dems.
Cameron was the first of the main party leaders to cast his vote. Accompanied by his wife, Samantha, he went to a community hall in his Witney constituency, Oxfordshire, shortly after 10.50 a.m.
Similarly, Brown and his wife Sarah cast their votes half an hour later at a community center close to his home in North Queensferry, Fife in his Dunfermeline East constituency in Scotland.
Clegg voted at a polling station in Sheffield Hallam shortly afterward, also accompanied by his wife, Miriam, who is unable to vote in the general election because she is a Spanish citizen.
All three party leaders, accompanied by a scrum of photographers and journalists, were upbeat about their parties’ chances.
— With input from agencies