The Devonshire; Or The Most Approved Methods Of Securing Votes, by Thomas Rowlandson, satirises Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire trading kisses for votes for Charles James Fox in the 1784 general election. Iconically, the duchess was the 18th-century equivalent of her descendant, the late Diana, Princess of Wales, and one can imagine the impact which that had on the electorate.

Nothing much has changed. We in Malta have just experienced an election where the party that won was actually renamed GonziPN to reflect its winning ticket, our present Prime Minister.

Yes, election times are curious. They are infused with an almost festive air of unreality as politicos of all shapes, sizes and descriptions, let alone beliefs, spend two to three months devising new ways of seducing the electorate into voting for them.

We are bombarded with promises of a utopia on earth; we are mobbed with example after example of the other party's incompetence, ineptitude or corruption. We are solicited most shamelessly and almost hoodwinked into thinking that the electorate is king and, yet, it is a given that after the dust has settled and the winners are ensconced in government all we get is more and more and more of the same. Will we ever learn? As if! This is something that is happening in countries where the ideologies of the major parties have merged into a practically indistinguishable centre right and centre left. Both parties demonise the far right and the far left as extremists that are "mad, bad and dangerous to know".

In each successive election one can sense that people are getting more and more fed up of this situation. This is what has just emerged in the UK, where, like the Three Tenors at Caracalla in 1990, Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg are "locking horns" on TV to the great delectation of the people. The second round has seen Mr Clegg's star shine even brighter but, although May 6 seems to be right around the corner, a day is a long time in politics, let alone three weeks. We cannot forget what happened in Madrid after the Aznar administration mishandled the Al Qaeda bombings to the extent that there was a completely unexpected and dramatic swing that elected José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero instead. That happened three days before the election.

What is being predicted in the UK is a hung Parliament, which, although it may reflect the mood of the electorate, will never be able to work efficiently so long as different parties and different leaders would, if for no other reason than to assert themselves, put forward their own ideas and methods as to how one should tackle a situation. Every major decision will perforce be some sort of face-saving compromise, which, when reached, will have probably been superseded. In theory, the hung Parliament idea may seem appealing but I am very sceptical about it working in practice.

I see the same situation developing here in Malta too. The Nationalist Party, in the years leading up to 1987, had long assumed the socialist mantle and what emerged in Eddie Fenech Adami's government was a centre-left party that guaranteed one electoral victory after another with the exception of the 1996 Labour Party blip that was, in less than two years, stymied by a backbencher's recalcitrance and the leader's pig-headedness. Irrespective of this, the ideological carpet had long ago been whipped from under the PL's feet, which is why the consolidation of the PL is proving to be so difficult.

To date, the Maltese Liberal Democrat equivalent, Alternattiva Demokratika, is slowly rising from the shambles that its outgoing leader left it in. However, I am sceptical as to whether by 2012 it will be strong enough to pose any serious threat to the two political leviathans.

In the UK, Tony Blair's former New Labour adopted so many Tory and Liberal ideologies that neither of these parties have been able to make inroads. However, post-credit-crunch UK wants a change and the fact that the swing seems to be shifting towards Mr Clegg and not Mr Cameron speaks volumes about the long-lasting ill-effects that the autocracy of the Iron Lady had on the Conservative Party; one that unfairly truncated a second term for John Major who was described as the grey man and, yet, was in hindsight one of the UK's best premiers. But who in 1997 could resist the gripping oratory and sex appeal of a man like Mr Blair?

With today's information technology being what it is, electoral public relations are changing continually as new ideas emerge as to how the public can be wooed. "Yes we can" being the most positive and effective.

We are witnessing before our very eyes on our TV screens a daily analysis of the jokes, the side-swipes, the veiled insults and the body language of the three British hopefuls. Before each public performance it is patently obvious that their every stance and every utterance is minutely studied and assiduously rehearsed. Mr Brown's comparison of Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg to the two Brown siblings bickering at bath time was a masterstroke and nobody will ever convince me that that was off the cuff. Yet, it sums up the shape of things to come as it is on the cards that unless the big parties adopt Mr Clegg neither will be the outright winner. Who will be the higher bidder, I wonder?