…meaning that they die off! Or if pensioners… have a lot to be grumpy about!

You only have to take a cursory glance at the turnout to see that the months of sleaze resulted in a significant chunk of the electorate being utterly turned off all the political parties on offer.

The observable inability of the opposition parties to make major inroads into such a floundering government is surely testament, not to the resilience of the party, but rather to the continuing decay in turnout?

The LDP seem to me to be doing a sterling job of being a fluffier version of Labour; yet they’ve been stagnant for years.
They seem to have a little bulge in support every ten years… ’63, ’73, ’83, ’93, ’03, so now they’re in their regular gentle trough perhaps? Far from where the dizzy heights they reached with Kennedy (Lookout 2013!).

Whatever the percentages are, I can’t see turnout poking it’s head above 60% next time unless there’s something to positively vote for. Perhaps 55% is not only a plausible figure, but an optimistic one as well?

Some have made (perhaps tenuous) parallels between Major and Brown; and Callaghan and Brown, except there are no charismatic figures waiting in the wings this time.

Surely the more likely scenario is that voter turnout decays even more (another 5% perhaps), and the major effect of that is to take a slice off Labour more than give an extra portion to the Tories?
The other factor of course, is the demographic… your older voter is arguably more likely to vote Tory or UKIP; your younger one LibDem, Green, or not at all!

I reckon the phrase “Browned Off” is going to have new resonance for a whole generation of mainstream working voters, who now have had their expectations progressively raised ever since “Things Can Only Get Better”; and now dashed at the summit of an unprecedented P2E ratio mountain.
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article8080.html
(Check out that HBOS spectacular divergent phugoid being chased by a Japanese bear!)

From my own encounters, I would bet that it’ll be the infamous WWC who stay away more than any other category; perhaps feeling more than a little taken for granted in those “Labour Strongholds”.

As for election timings; I can imagine Brown being constantly henpecked to go early; but my sense is that he would rather hang on to the bitter end; enjoy that PM jet-setting; the limo; the perquisites and luxury: even as a lame duck. Perhaps he is already subconsciously beaten… and he will no doubt tell us all about it for the following 5 years after in a big fat book deal.