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Vice Blog

WOT'S ALL THIS THEN?

So, tomorrow Great Britain is holding a general election to decide who gets control of that weird oblong yelling room they call a congress, and possibly something else having to do with wigs. Vice UK has been running around Blighty in the lead-up,

filming all the different parties for VBS

, so we figured they'd be well suited to explain all this limey business to our American ears.

Vice: So how does this business work? Your elections don't have a set date or time?

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Vice UK editor Andy Capper:

The Prime Minister has to go and have a meeting with the Queen who gives him "permission" to hold a General Election. During the meeting they drink tea and have cucumber sandwiches.

That's pleasant.

The reason we made this film is because this is the only General Election for 13 years that anybody has really cared about.

Why's that?

Thirteen years ago, Labour took the Conservatives out of power and everybody thought they'd create a beautiful, prosperous socialist country. Instead they kept on doing what the Conservatives were doing but covered it up with beautiful, slightly-socialist rhetoric. Now, the Conservatives are likely to come back into power.

What kind of effect do you think that'll have?

I think the Conversatives will come in and make some really brutal social changes and next election you'll have Labour back again. Less immigration, less taxes for the rich, less benefits for the needy, and giving more power to go-getting individuals. Privatizing the health service is something they'll also try and do I think.

Ha, switcheroo. Seriously though, who's the Conservatives' support base? Is it all old rich people or are they skewing younger?

The funny thing is that a lot of young people who hate Labour now because of their support for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, think the Conservatives are going to offer an alternative to this. Whereas the Conservatives are actually going to put more money into defense budgets. As I have said to young people who've given me the whole "Labour sucks because of the war" argument. "Kid, if the Conservatives were in power when we invaded Iraq, you'd be in the army right now."

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Where do the Liberal Democrats fit into this delicious pie?

The Liberal Democrats have gained a lot of ground because people detest Labour and Conservative so much now. They have student-friendly policies like environmental stuff and things about being nice to each other. If there is a hung Parliament, ie, no one gets enough seats to hold a majority, then it will be the first time they've had any real say in the governing of the country, which should be interesting. A few years ago they wanted to bring in "cat tax."

Right, they'd be the power brokers. Wait, what's the cat tax?

They wanted to tax people's cats.

I see.

It didn't get through. This was when their leader was this tragic alcoholic guy, Charles Kennedy.

But now they've got Nick Clegg, right?

Clegg is the saviour of the Lib Dems. He won the first TV debate. He's a typical Lib Dem. Nice guy with good intentions, bit weird. Probably has vague hygiene issues. The kid we filmed for the Liberal Democrat part of the film is Alan Belmont, who could become the youngest MP ever if elected. I really hope he wins. He should be the leader of the party. Just listening to him talk makes me feel all warm inside.

So, students like Lib Dems, rich folks and people who in the US it might be fair to say wouldn't believe in Obama's citizenship like the Conservatives, and who is still into Labour?

People who remember how fucked the Conservatives were.

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What about the weirdo parties like the Scottish Nationalists and Plaid Cymru and the BNP? Does anybody give a shit about them?

Only in Scotland. We filmed the BNP as part of the "extremists" episode of our piece, along with the Communists and Class War, who are anarchy agitators.

Do folks in the UK actually put an effort into learning and debating the different parties' policies or do they just regurgitate their chosen party's soundbites like over here?

I don't think we could ever be as dumb as the general populace of America about anything, but the majority of us aren't going to score too high in any quizzes about policy. I refer you to the answer about "Labour sucks cos of the war."

What's up with you guys' media during this? Everybody in the US gets worked up about bias in the press, but it's all sort of small petty shit, even on like Fox and CNBC. You guys go to town right?

Ruper Murdoch's papers changed their allegiance from Labour to Consevative for this election. So

The Sun

is going all out to kill Gordon Brown and make David Cameron seem like a God. It is totally totally biased.

What have they dredged up so far?

Gordon Brown is so fucking bad as a leader that they don't need to dredge anything up. There's a good YouTube clip of his latest blunder, calling an old lady a "bigot" while his mic was still on. Poor old lady. Blair and Brown used to hate each other, so Blair is loving all this crap that Brown is getting.

Jeez, it's like Alan Partridge does politics.

There's a lot of Alan Partridge moments in the Election Film. Fans of Alan Patridge should go and watch Episode 1 right now. What really sunk the government was the right-wing

Telegraph

's expose of the expenses scandal, where they found out MPs had been claiming expenses on things like heating their swimming pools in their second homes and so on.