If you weren’t aware it’s big day in the UK today. It is general election day, and will see eith Gordon Brown ousted as Prime Minister to be replaced by the first Conservative Prime Minister in 13 years, or see Labour given an unprecedented fourth term in Government.
London’s two big tabloids have backed different parties.
The Sun, a newspaper who backed Tony Blair 13 years ago, is now firmly behind Conservative David Cameron, the man who has painted himself as Blair’s natural successor.
Meanwhile the Daily Mirror has continued their support for the Labour Party, making Cameron’s privileged upbringing the focus of the attack. They make it more explicit in an alternate front page you can see below the fold, which reminds readers he was a member of Oxford’s famous Bullingdon Club (along with London Mayor Boris Johnson) that would go around trashing pubs and writing cheques for the damage.
Meanwhile the broadsheets are more restrained.
The Times has backed the Conservatives, arguing they are best to handle the problems with Britain’s economy:
This election is unlike other watershed moments. In 1979, the case for sorting out the economy scarcely needed to be articulated. When rubbish lies uncollected in the streets and the electricity does not work, you know it is time for a change. Today’s economic crisis, in contrast, is more remote. But it is no less real or significant.
The Times has already cast its vote. It is not, of course, for us to tell you how to vote, only how we think. We believe that the Conservative Party is best placed to tackle the vast economic challenges ahead.
While The Guardian, who didn’t back a vote for the Labour Party, couldn’t quite bring itself to advocate a vote for the Tories. It settled somewhere in between with the resurgent Liberal-Democrats:
Citizens have votes. Newspapers do not. However, if the Guardian had a vote in the 2010 general election it would be cast enthusiastically for the Liberal Democrats. It would be cast in the knowledge that not all the consequences are predictable, and that some in particular should be avoided. The vote would be cast with some important reservations and frustrations. Yet it would be cast for one great reason of principle above all.
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