The London mayoral contest should have been the perfect electoral tussle. With all due respect to Paddick et al, it was always a two-horse race. Two instantly recognisable figures, well known by both broadsheet and tabloid readerships. A posh bloke versus a champion of the working class, neither of them 'party men'. Plenty of real local issues to focus on. Plenty of media exposure too. A fairer electoral system, allowing you a 'free vote' for your first preference (with all the possibilities that offers) before casting your 'proper' second vote. And most importantly, an end result that was genuinely in the balance.

Yet it only stirred 45% of Londoners to bother to vote. Granted, this was up from previous years: 34% in 2000, and 37% in 2004. But it falls well, well short of the 70% we used to expect at general elections. And it means that, even taking both first and second preference votes into account, the winner only won the active support of 21.5% of the total electorate.

Of course we should be happy to see turnout rising. But it's hard to imagine an election that could have been easier to 'sell' to the voters; and we only managed 45%. It's not great, is it.

PS: Interesting to see the Tories heavily promoting their Twitter account on the conservatives.com homepage. We knew it was official, but I guess this makes it a formal comms channel for them... although I note the promo goes for the 'subscribe via SMS' approach, watering down the commitment to Twitter a bit.