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Originally Posted by joeysteele

It wasn't impossible the Lib Dems and Labour would have had 8 seats more than the Conservatives.
The SNP and PC said they would support a govt that nurtured the recovery in place, looked at electoral reform and made no austerity cuts in the first year.

The SDLP in N Ireland would have also supported the Lib Dems and Labour in govt.
In fact mathematically Labour and the Lib Dems could have relied on the votes of around 330 MPs.
Much as what this govt has now in fact.

On an agreed programme over 4 years, we may never have lost the 1.1% growth that was in place and the cuts would have been less and easier.
The plan to halve the deficit over 4 years would have likely been achieved, since even the coalition managed that although they promised to clear it completely in 5,which the didn't.

It actually could have been a coalition govt that would have governed with far more consent and support of near all the parties in the Commons.
Mathematically challenging yes, impossible no.

More than the Tories yes but the Tories couldn't have governed on their own hence the coalition. And more than the government's majority right now, yes, but that is a slim majority for one party never mind a coalition of five different parties all with competing interests.

I still hold that view that it would have been completely untenable and that a Con-Lib government made easily the most sense after that election.