THE BRITISH ELECTIONS.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 715, 14 January 1910, Page 4

THE BRITISH ELECTIONS.

■ The task of forecasting the result of tho election contest, which is now agitating Great Britain, is beyond the capacity of even the great London daily The Times. The figures cabled out yesterday and which purport to show' the estimate of. the prospects formed by,, tho paper referred to fail at a most tantalising ; stage. Unionist gains aro put down at ; 134, Liberal gains at 3, which . would still leave, the Government with a small majority. The Times, however, labels 88 seats as doubtful,, and as 88 seatß can, completely upset the balanoe ono way. or tho Other, the element of doubt remains as strong <is ever. It has been fairly generally J recog.niscd that the Unionists were certain to improve;, their; position as' the result of -the election.' ; Since the general election of 1906 : they have been steadily 'strengthening their forces in Parliament-, and) it is belicvod, 1 also throughout - the country. The difficulty has been to estimate whether that gain -will be. sufficient to give them' a working majority; or 'whether, indeed, theBudget proposals-will not have-suf-ficed 'to, turn the tide ,in favour of the - Liberal party.: Recent files to hand contain - the ; earlier of. tho Series: of articles. published by The Times. analysingthe prospects,' arid it. must be admitted that they appear '■ to deal. with the question of the chances of tho contending parties in a quite .impartial spirit. The writer, of'course, has not' been able to ignore the results of the by-elections and these may have influenced his judgment unduly. There have been 93 by-elections since the general election of 1006. At 35 of these noiconfcst.between' Liberals and Unionists took place, leaving 58 contested by-elections. The results are given as tinder:;' Unionist- gains. ......................... 12 . Liberal gains ...: 0 : Labour and Socialist■; gains, ... 3 . . No- ohange: .v.:..........................-.. 45.;.:. Tho votes - cast for Liberal' arid .Unionist candidates at tho by-elec-tions have been as follow: ■' \ i' • Gen.Election. By-election,' . - : . I Liberals. ; 3241236 :'■?' 277,26440.972 deo. Unionists 248,348 \ 2SG.W9 .: 38,201 inc. I Theso figures bear very striking ovidenfce of tho return to favour of the Unionist party and they ar6 also' claimed ..to demonstrate tho popularity of tariff' reform.. It cannot be denied, however, v that the Government has made a very- bold bid to sfcm' the tide with its Budget proposals, and ■it has manoeuvred with- iriucb "skill to force the House 'of Lords into an' embarrassing position. Hotf far ttese now issues will affect the polling can only be guessed at. It seems fairly certain, however,'that whateVor the final resuit may be tho margin cither way will not bo a largo one.