It's election day. There is no voting in London, but every other adult in England and Wales has the chance to vote for one of 41 police and crime commissioners. Putting the police under the control of a directly elected politician amounts to a radical change in the way policing is organised in this country, but you would not guess that from the public reaction to the elections, which has mostly been marked by indifference and apathy. My colleague Alan Travis explains the background in an article in today's Guardian.
The latest polling suggests that the turnout for voting on the powerful new job of holding to account the 41 police forces outside London will reach 25-30%, which is not far below the level of some recent English local government elections, but just above the record low of 23% in the 1999 European elections.
The birth has not been auspicious. Firstly, David Cameron's hopes of attracting people from all backgrounds – not just politicians – to a "big job for a big local figure" were dealt early blows when Falklands veteran Simon Weston withdrew because he felt it was "too political," and Iraq war veteran Colonel Tim Collins pulled out because he only wanted to do the job part-time.
There are also byelections in Corby (where Labour expects to win the Tory seat vacated by Louise Mensch) and in two safe Labour seats, Cardiff South and Penarth, and Manchester Central. And they're also electing a mayor in Bristol, as well as voting in Hartlepool on whether or not to keep their mayor (the monkey).
So, it's a feast for electionphiliacs. (Or should that be psephiliacs?) But today is really just a warm-up because most of the results will not be coming in until tomorrow. The Cardiff and Manchester byelections and the mayoral polls in Bristol and Hartlepool are counting overnight, as well as one police commissioner area (Wiltshire). Otherwise, we will have to wait until Friday, when most of the results should come in between 12.30pm and 6pm. I will be blogging all tomorrow for a bumper election special.
As for today, apart from the voting, here are the items on the agenda.
9.45am: A group of healthcare professionals launch a new political party, National Health Action.
11am: Vince Cable, the business secretary, announces funding worth £60m to help university scientists turn their ideas into commercial businesses.
11.15am: Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, and David Laws, the education minister, launch a consultation on new ways of measuring child poverty. As Patrick Wintour reports in the Guardian today, they will propose a new range of indicators including family stability, worklessness and educational achievement. Laws was interviewed about his plans on the Today programme earlier, and I will summarise his comments shortly.
1pm: The World at One broadcasts an interview with Lord McAlpine. During the interview, McAlpine's solicitor, Andrew Reid, says McAlpine will be taking action against anyone who named him on Twitter.
As usual, I'll also be covering all the breaking political news as well as looking at the papers and bringing you the best politics from the web. I'll post a summary at around 1pm and another in the afternoon.
If you want to follow me on Twitter, I'm at @AndrewSparrow.
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