by Michael Collins

Created on: January 21, 2010   Last Updated: January 22, 2010

This is actually a difficult question to answer as it depends greatly on your definition of 'win'. Whilst it is almost certain that Labour will lose its overall majority in the house of commons, it is less certain that the Conservatives will be able to attain one of their own.

This could lead to a hung parliament which may result in a Labour/Liberal Democrat coalition which will probably have its bad side in that Brown will still be PM but it may also have a positive side to it as Vince Cable may end up being Chancellor.

It is likely that the Conservatives will be the largest single party but I feel that they will fall short of the magic number of MPs needed to govern without relying on other smaller parties.

If Brown had called the election shortly after he came to office, it is more than likely he would have been returned to number ten with a fairly good majority the so-called election that never was could have been one of Browns biggest personal blunders. This is mainly as Labour were ahead in the polls and most of us were thankful that we had finally got rid of Blair.

As it stands from the last election, the Conservative need a national swing of around 7% in order to gain an overall majority in the new house of commons after the election.

However, this swing is based on the results from the 2005 election and has not been adjusted for the boundary changes which have mainly favoured the Conservatives.

The latest opinion polls still put the Conservatives lead in double figures but personally I never read too much into them. I can still remember just how wrong the polls and even the BBC's exit poll was for the 1992 election.

This had predicted a hung parliament with the Conservatives short by around 25 seats. The result was that they won with a majority of around 20.

There is also the problem of getting the core vote out. Normally the Conservatives are better at rallying their so called core support in an election than Labour are.

To add to the problem Labour's core vote have been abandoning the party as they feel the party have turned it's back on the working classes, who the party originally were the champions of.

It will, as usual, come down to what is affectionately known as middle Britain to decide this one. Although it has to be said that the mess the country is in with the economy etc, this election may actually be the one to lose.

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