Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

You think that if you need to. No need to apologise. I'll survive.

Ah, the excuses begin. So, when the referendum results are announced, you plan to answer the likely 'no' vote by claiming that if it had offered a full PR system, such as the additional member system used in Scotland or full-on STV, then we would have had a 'yes'?

Much as I agree that people who are in love with PR should have voted 'no' in this referendum, I don't for a moment believe that most 'no' voters have rejected the specific system on offer. Rather, people simply see no imperative for change.

---------- Post added at 17:08 ---------- Previous post was at 16:31 ----------

Referendum results are starting to come in now - very convincingly on the 'NO' side so far.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Seems to be about a 70% / 30% split in favour of the current system. Bit of a kicking for the yes camp IMO.

---------- Post added at 18:13 ---------- Previous post was at 18:10 ----------

Possibly the most truthful sentence ever to come from the Guardian.



---------- Post added at 18:13 ---------- Previous post was at 18:13 ----------

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...eferendum-lost

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Wrong I am saying no such thing.

I am simply saying you cannot say the people have rejected PR because a PR voting system was never offered.

Now I have put that to you in very simple terms, I really hope you dont manage to twist that.

As to the current results, I put down to 2 things. 1 - People for whatever reason dont like AV compared to FPTP, I dont like AV myself but if the polling card did arrive I would have voted yes as I see it as a way of saying FPTP is bad. 2 the campaign for NO simply been much better than the campaign for YES, one reason I hate things like leafleting as it allows smear campaigning which is what the NO campaign was all about, smearing the YES campaign calling it over complicated and expensive.

End of the day if people want a system where only a minority of the country decides every election then so be it but I wont take part in such a mockery of a voting system.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I dont have a say now. I have made that point in multiple posts.

I am really banging my head against a brick wall.

Here is the point again.

"FPTP means millions of people including me have no say in the election result"

Hope that makes it clear.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

It may be clear, its also complete nonsense. Every vote has a say.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I have seen extremes bigger than the gap you mention.

Marginals can be one with a majority of say 10 votes, but a neighboring seat may have a majority of 20k. The value of each vote in different seats varies by huge amounts.

How about a FPTP system but without constituency voting? would you object to that, so simply total tally for entire country. Simple as well.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

But that breaks the local representation and accountability link, which I believe is very important.

btw, Scunthorpe in 1997 had a Labour majority of nearly 15K - in the by-election, it was down to 2.5K; things can change.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Correct it would be a PR version of FPTP.

---------- Post added at 19:23 ---------- Previous post was at 19:20 ----------

Less important than a fairer voting system that reflects amount of votes cast.

Think about what your argument is and the current system.

Now lets give an example the current labour shadow chancellor. Did he manage to keep his safe seat dispite the corruption? Accountability didnt do much there did it? Because at the end of the day if an MP does something wrong if they in a safe seat they will still get voted back in again. probably 98-99% chance, the freak 1-2% chance they will get kicked out, much more likely their own party will kick them out if the press is too bad, which would happen anyway under a different system.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

There was someone from the No camp on Sky News saying that it was a shame the Yes campaign dragged down the tone of the debate!

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Ok an adjusted variant of the idea I posted.

one vote per person on national FPTP no constituencies.

Parties get amount of seats based on amount of votes achieved.

Obvious downside is independents would have a harder time of it as harder for them to reach out on national level than local level.

For accountability allow an area to vote their MP out if performing badly. So eg. have a place that can be contacted by disgruntled voters, if enough in an area complain about a particular MP then that MP is kicked out and another replaces them. Not another election but be replaced by someone from same party.

The main issue I see with this is how ind's are handled. I dont see how the current system is particurly good for local relationship's between mp's and their voters because before the election I had never heard of my MP and after the election she has never replied to any emails I sent to her. She will in all likelyhood be reelected next election barring her not standing.

---------- Post added at 19:56 ---------- Previous post was at 19:47 ----------

Ok updated idea.

Keep constituency voting but have it not apply for local parties, so like this.

People vote for either a party or ind MP.
If a ind wins that area, then he gets seat, votes for that area for other parties could either then discard or keep them towards general pool of votes.
All areas with no ind winning (vast majority of areas) votes go to national pool.
Allow MPs to be kicked out with a compliance committee that voters can use.
if an ind is kicked out there is an election in area but only for ind's.

there obviously wouldnt be then voting for individuals to represent a party in your area as well as even which party gets which areas but in all honesty most people dont vote for individuals they vote for parties.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Or you could just follow the example of the Germans. Merge each 2 of the current constituencies into a single larger one, which will have one MP elected via FPTP and a second via PR, ideally regional PR so that the second MP also retains some link with his/her constituents and more appropriately reflects the area's views rather than having Labour use some of their PR elected MPs to put MPs into pretty much anywhere outside of bits of London in the South East or have the Tories put MPs into North-East England.

Still have a number of areas that would elect a steaming, stinking turd if it had the appropriate colour rosette but those not voting for that candidate can feel their vote counted for something in the PR.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Sounds like a reasonable compromise - bloody Germans, thinking things through in a logical manner.....:D

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

so a half and half system sort of a compromise, thats something I guess and would be better then what is now.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

The "No" vote is expected to be 69%...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-13297573

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Hmmm, country says no...

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Quite emphatically.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I can't say I'm really surprised. Yes campaign was poor because nobody could really get excited about AV. Supporters of PR, as I am, where placing pictures of Nick Clegg on the dartboard when details of his soul selling.... I mean negotiations with DC were revealed.

The slim chance of seeing PR in Westminster changed some months ago to nil chance in my lifetime. :(

I remember when the election process for the Scottish parliament was announced the political experts at the time insisted that it was very unlikely that a party would form a majority administration...... or was it unlikely that Labour would form a majority administration.;)

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

yep his mistakes started when he backed down from STV to AV, the tories needed him for power and STV should have not been negotiable. This country barring a revolution will likely now not see this again as a voting issue for decades, wasnt it last before ww2 this was put under vote? it actually won the MP vote but lost in the lords.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Well it's all over and done with now and i doubt very much there will be another vote on this in my lifetime and being honest good right now we have more important things to sort out. I do think those who pushed for this so quick have shot themselves in the foot by doing so as people have so many other real life concerns at the minute that reform of the voting system was never really on anyones mind. It would have been better to wait a few years let the country recover let people get back to some form of normality and then try and get reform through.

I do think this amongst other things is going to come back hard on the lib dems in future and last night might end up not being that bad compared to what might come in the future certainly if the lib dems round me are anything to go by.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

So... What now for Clegg? Will he survive after suffering massive defeats with this & the elections?

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Pity we did not have a few more by elections as the Lib Dems would have lost heavily if we had more of them.

I have heard a rumour that if we had AV or similar then a certain female primeminister would never have been elected, now I wonder how different this country would have been if that had happened.

No idea if it is true but an interesting thought never the less and how many other famous politicians would have never been elected under this now failed system.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

One possibility is that the country would have been held to ransom by Authur Scargill, the coal miners and the Unions.

The Unions in turn would be much more powerful than they are today.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Another is that we'd have joined the Euro and presently be enjoying EU enforced austerity, as we wouldn't have been able to devalue or do a Quantitative Easing programme.

We'd also likely be less wealthy, and the 'assault on living standards' as Labour call it, or living within your means rather than dumping debt on our kids who can't vote and therefore don't get a say in the minds of the authoritarian power obsessed Labour party as most people call it, would feel more bitter as the 'means' would be lacking.

Things could also be better, as we might have had a genuinely liberal governance, rather than socialist under the guise of 'liberal' or authoritarian statist under the guise of 'progressive'.

We could quite do with someone with the testicles of Thatcher right now actually to sort out a couple of issues, sadly my 8 year old daughter has more testicular fortitude than Cameron, Clegg and Miliband put together.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

All just supposition but an interesting thought either way especially as the last time they thought about this was pre war, so how many famous names would we have not seen in the last 80 years.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

The lib dems are weak right now, the problem for cameron tho is he still needs them, if he were eg. to call an election tommorow I reckon labour would win it outright with a majority.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Are you quite serious? Presumably you were watching an entirely different set of election results coming in last Friday.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I am serious, there is a lot of people unhappy about the current cuts and my guess is the tories are currently less popular then the day of the last election. People hated brown and yet the tories could only crawl into power with the lib dems help.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

There is no need to guess. The Tories gained seats in councils across England last week at the same time as the bottom dropped out of Labour's universe across the whole of Scotland. Labour gained far fewer council seats in these elections than the Tories did with William Hague as leader in the late 1990s and while they have improved their standing in Wales, they have done so from a very low base and have failed to advance nearly as far as they hoped, or needed to.

The evidence says that a snap election held right now would destroy the Lib Dems and hand the Conservatives a small, but workable, majority.

Your analysis is the worst sort of rose-tinted wishful thinking. Voters had a chance to condemn the "evil Tory cuts" last week. They voted not to.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

If the Tories are so unpopular, why did they gain seats and councils...

BBC Politics

An increase of 4 councils and 81 councillors.

On a related note, excellent results for the BNP - losing 11 seats....:D

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

lets post the full picture.

Party Total +/- Total +/-
Conservative 157 +4 4820 +81
Labour 57 +26 2392 +800
Liberal Democrat 10 -9 1056 -695

% wise the tories lost out.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Goalposts, moving, etc.

If they are less popular, why did their vote increase, and they gained councillors and councils?

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

What :confused:

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Labour gained 50% councils.
Tories gained 3% and thats me rounding it up been generous.
Lib dems lost almost half their councils.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

ROFL.

Seriously ? they "lost out" because they gained less than Labour.

You really should apply to be a spin doctor.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I am just posting facts. In terms of their votes compared to labour, labours went up by a significantly bigger margin so they would likely win a general election held tommorow if people voted the same way. Now when I said the tories popularity has gone down, granted the council results dont reflect that so I am unsure of what to think of that. This forum seems to have a high amount of right wing support, however other forums and people I know in real life dont reflect that.

Bear in mind the last election labour lost a lot of seats, the tories had a very high swing in their favour, its easier for labour to get small swing back then it is for the tories to get a further swing which would be needed to get all out power. Usually the party in power especially in recession does not get a swing in their favour at a general election.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Is that the full picture, or just England? Are you conveniently ignoring the electoral wipeout Labour endured in Scotland?

Your hypothesis seems to be that Labour's projected gain at Westminster, were these results to carry across, would result in them taking just about all the Lib Dem seats while the Tories fail to make up the dozen or so seats they need to command an outright majority.

This is utter nonsense.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Perhaps that the Tories' popularity has not gone down?

Occam's razor and all that....:D

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I have to be honest if there were an election next week i think the lib dems would be pretty much wiped out and labour wouldn't get near to government again. People might be willing to give labour a chance locally though i am not totally convinced thats the case despite the results last week but the chances that people have completely forgotten the mess labour made and left us in nationally is minimal.

Add in that apart from throwing a lot of muck about labour has come out with virtually no real world solutions to the problems we face and i think as much as people might hate the cuts they would vote tory and david cameron would be returned with a majority in the commons. People may well hate the cuts but they also know why they are happening, they know they have to happen and they do remember who caused all this.

If i were DC right now i think i would push the coalition to breaking point see how much of a spine nick clegg has and go to the country again if needs be. Sorry but his tough talk aside i think right now clegg knows he is in no real position to push his luck or that of his party and when push comes to shove he'll do what he has done from the start make a lot of noise but go along with it.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Nick Clegg may think that he isn't in a position to continue with the coalition anyway. They are bearing the brunt of the damage from the Government's cuts with the Tories looking well protected. He may think the Liberal Democrats will be wiped of the political map unless they change tact.

You may think he hasn't got a lot of 'spine' but I think he cleared did to take the course he took with the Coalition.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

The last thing the Liberal Democrats will want is to exit the coalition at this time. Repeating the kind of results they had in the local elections nationally would bring them incredible pain.

They have only themselves to blame, this is what happens when you try and be socialist in the north and free market in the south. If you are in the situation where you actually have the chance to be one way or the other you're in real trouble.

The party probably needs to look at where it's going and remember what liberal actually means rather than pandering to the left of their party who seem to be more orange than yellow.

If they were to follow that course some more and genuinely be yellow I suspect they would find themselves appealing to many who feel that both Labour and the Tories are failing rather than trying to be orange or turquoise.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Do you mean what it means, or what you would like it to mean?

Social Liberalism

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I thought our present Liberal Democrats were actually Labour members that got hacked off with their leaders?

The Gang of Five or something? It's ages ago and my memory is unclear about it all.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

You're thinking of the SDP gang of 4 who merged (or swallowed by) with the Liberal Party to become the Liberal Democrats.

and here's a link

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/d...00/2531151.stm

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

there is a site where will calculate the result if predict votes.

my prediction had the lib dems been slaughtered down to 16 seats and labour 15 short of a power. so probably would have led to a lab lib coalition. Labour are easily more popular than they were when lost the election in england and dont need much of a swing to get ahead of the tories again in seats, remember lab need less votes per seat than the tories.

http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/swing-calculator

What happened in scotland is an event but those votes werent lost to the tories or lib dems which is very relevant.

Ironically I had the tories on a higher share of the national vote but with less seats, if that result came about in real life I think the media would make a big issue of a labour government been in power with less votes than the tories and PR would be raised again as it wouldnt be seen as democratic.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I repeat my earlier question: are you attempting to extrapolate UK Parliamentary seats from the %age votes cast in English council elections? Or have you allowed for the total wipeout of Labour in Scotland?

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

do the SDP affect english elections?

the uk council results are more relevant than votes SDP have got off labour because they a party people would vote for instead of labour. It was a change.

It would go against all historical data if an election were called tommorow for labour voties to vote for tory in an era of brutal cuts. The majority of lib dem voters are mor elikely to side under lab than the tories so lost lib dem votes is more likely to boost lab than the tories.

I have explained this to you multiple times, whilst you have made short comments saying you disagree but your only reasoning is what happened in scotland under a different voting system.

I wonder why the tories arent calling an election now? seems they disagree with you and dont think they will get power.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Why would they call an election - there is no need; they increase the number of councils and councillors they control.

I don't remember Labour calling an General Election every time there was council elections, especially the years when they did badly....

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

labour werent sharing power tho, if they were confident of winning they would call an election to free themselves of the lib dems.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Interesting viewpoint......

(doesn't appear to have worked too badly for them so far).

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

If my answers are short chrys, perhaps it's because all I'm doing is challenging you to provide some basis for your propositions. So far you're really not doing very well. And, by the way, it does nothing for my confidence in your grasp of the issues when you start talking about the SDP. I assume you actually mean the SNP.

You appear to think that someone has suggested Scotland would vote Tory rather than SNP in the event of a general election. This is bizarre. Nobody has suggested that - least of all me, because, guess what, I actually have some grasp of Scottish politics.

In Scotland, Labour tried to scare the voters by raising the spectre of evil Tories and suggesting that Scottish voters should use the Holyrood elections to send a protest message to David Cameron. Guess what: they didn't. The Tory vote in Scotland dipped a little, but well within its normal range. The Labour vote, on the other hand, totally collapsed, as did the Lib Dem vote.

The message is quite clear. Scottish voters are unmoved by the Tories (with the exception of about 10-15% of the electorate, the Scots don't like them, that's just how things are). They are fed up with Labour treating them contemptuously as some sort of mindless Labour-voting machine, and they blame the Liberal Democrats for the fact the Tories are in power.

You can stick your fingers in your ears and sing lahlah all you like chrys. The fact is, Labour cannot rely on the level of support it needs to deliver enough seats in Scotland; in the north of England Labour has merely reclaimed some of the disaffected instinctive Labour voters who went for the Lib Dems last time because they'd rather die than vote Tory, and in the south of England they made little or no impact at all.

If you want to concoct a Fantasy Commons based on last week's vote shares, you can't simply pick the %ages you like and ignore the ones you don't like (or don't understand). You either feed all the data in, or else don't bother.

And as for this:

I don't believe I have claimed that the Tories should call an election now and would 'get power'. I believe what I have claimed is that your idea that the recent elections show that Labour would win a snap election called now is a fantasy.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

chris I wont be responding to you anymore, I dont like been asked for basis in a credibility argument when I have provided basis and your only reply is to ask me for more. There is nothing wrong saying you disagree with me, but to keep asking for me to repeat what I am saying so we go in a loop for god knows how many pages isnt been constructive.

my view is based on local council results which labour had significantly better gains than the tories. I have told you this now 3 times, yet a new reply is "provide me basis". You completely close minded.

Ironically I think labour stand to lose out in the long term and will be in serious trouble if scotland vote for full independence.

Labour voters wouldnt vote tories in scotland in significant numbers, they prefer SDP to labour yes but no way they prefer the tories to labour. Thats your mistake. Also as said to you before scotland has a different voting system.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

SNP. SNP. It's the Scottish NATIONAL Party. Honestly, if you're going to castigate me for being thorough at least have the brains to research and understand your own subject.

Furthermore, please stop accusing me of claiming that Scottish voters might prefer Tories to Labour. If you had the common decency to actually *read* my post rather than simply hitting Reply and dribbling all over your keyboard you would have grasped that what I actually said is several light years away from that.

But, you assume you know it all and you don't enjoy having your unassailable grip on truth challenged, so if you find it easier to ignore awkward arguments rather than engage with them, by all means go for it, sit in a corner, plug your ears up and hum a happy tune.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Not sure where your results are from but from the BBC website

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12913122

Number of councillors

Con 5109 54%
Lab 2459 26%
Lib 1098 12%
Other 793 08%

Using this as a basis for national government, from the UK polling website this is

Conservative 476 seats (+170)
Labour 143 seats (-115)
Liberal Democrats 8 seats (-49)
Others 5 seats (-6)
Northern Ireland 18 seats (nc)

This is a Conservative Majority of 302.

Personally I don't think that this has much basis in real life either as I don't think you really translate local to national (my local vote would not be the same, and I didn't vote Conservative). but in general terms the Conservatives position has improved along with Labours.

JJ

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Those elections were not as good as labour thought they would be for them hell some labour people have even said as much and given the outright hostility towards this coalition at the minute they damn well should have done a lot better. There is absolutely no reason for a general election to be called but if it were i think labour would be in bigger trouble as what i think coalition has done is refocus people's minds and made them come round to one party government is better.

I am also pretty sure that the majority of people in the UK have no intention of labour being that one party until such time as the country is put back on it's feet and most still do remember who is to blame for our current woes.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

I think the chances of PR are dead in the water barring an election result which sees a party get power without getting the most votes (entirely possible with FPTP).

Look at the vote share of the 2010 election, with an extra few % labour would have won but would have had less votes than the tories. Labour by far are the best recipients of FPTP, if was PR they would have had only a bit more seats than the lib dems and the tories would have been much further ahead.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

This is because boundary changes over the past decade have tended to create seats that are easier for Labour to win (due to their size and demographics) and at the same time seats that are harder for the Tories to win (for the same reason).

The reform bill that would have contained AV will still come before Parliament, because one of the issues that is still going to be addressed by the coalition is the number of constituencies in the UK Parliament and their size. The aim is to reduce the number and equalize their size as far as possible.

Labour is dead set against this, as one of the main consequences of the changes will be to reduce the phenomenon you have described.

Incidentally, the Scottish National Party has an outright majority in Holyrood based on about 45% of the popular vote in a supposedly proportional electoral system. There's no such thing as perfect democracy, as they say. ;)

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

There is always the dream of a perfect voting system but as long as man is involved in it's creation no such practical result. I think this is now a dead issue and in some ways i am glad we have more important things to be worrying about as a country right now. Voting reform is something i don't see as a major thing in the UK at the current time and is more of an exercise for those already polishing a seat with their backside in westminster.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

yeah I know about that boundary changes, although I think the tories are playing the same game and will be aiming to give themselves the advantage before the next election. With PR tho it wouldnt matter.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

guys what about these graphs?

not some prediction by me but this is based on real world data.

http://www6.politicalbetting.com/ind...y-cut-and-run/

my gut feeling seemed right, however council results dont translate into general election results.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Love the comments noting how the general election landscape is rigged towards Labour and their pathetic and hypocritical whinging about Tory gerrymandering is over something that still won't get close to equalising things.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Of course both do quite well at the expense of the Liberal Democrats.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

If they will insist on showing a socialist face to the north and a centre-right one to the south I've little sympathy. Had they not been so busy telling people what they want to hear they wouldn't be having to confront so many accusations of broken promises in government.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

no sympathy from me either, I am one of those let down by them.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

Ok but then you can't really complain of boundaries being unfair if you have 'little sympathy' when it's working against a party you don't like.

Re: To AV, or not to AV?
 

As far as boundries go lets be honest all the party's including the lib dems if they get the chance will attempt to alter them for their own benefit none of the party's are lilly white in that regard.