2010 General Election: The Cable Forum Exit Poll

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

That's democracy for you I'm afraid. You can't expect to get your way if the majority in whatever area is covered by the election disagree. In every election up to 49.9% of those who vote will be disappointed.

Since all you need a plurality you can actually have much higher numbers of disappointed people. A lot of seats do not return MPs who have 50.1% of the vote or more.

Such a system is actually what is proposed by the Liberal Democrats, you vote for your MP and list the candidates in order, if no one gets above 50% the candidate with the fewest votes has their voters choices moved onto their 2nd choice until a candidate does have 50%.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by danielf

Also, under PR you tend to have more parties, thus further reducing the effectivness of government

Fixed it for you.

[Ignitionnet]

Originally Posted by danielf

Under PR there can be options for voting for specific people. Candidates for a party are generally ranked on the ballot paper, and candidates are assigned to parliament according to that order. Voters can however vote for a specific person and if this person gets enough votes they can leapfrog candidates that are ahead of them in the queue. Thus, number 15 on the list could get into parliament at the expense of #10 for a party that wins 10 seats.

Also, under PR you tend to have more parties, thus further increasing the choice.

---------- Post added at 17:45 ---------- Previous post was at 17:42 ----------



Not if you have a coalition. The combined parties can have 60% of the vote, which means that only 40% of those who voted did not vote for one of the parties in government. Under FPTP that number can be higher than 60.

I thought of that and duly amended things - however you can't have a coalition in a single seat. I'm talking locally now not nationally.

I don't find the idea of losing some of the locality of the FPTP system good. While on one side one could say that the Lib Dems would receive far more seats the fact would be that a majority of the people in a majority of those seats did not vote for the MP they will receive as a result of PR. Great for the Lib Dems nationally, not so great locally especially in areas where strongly Tory or Labour seats find themselves with a Lib Dem MP who may not represent their views locally.

It's swings and roundabouts, it's all well and good jumping up and down saying that the Lib Dems didn't get as many MPs as their share of the vote suggests but there is a local flip side of denying the majority, potentially vast majority of people in some ridings the representative they voted for.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by Damien

Since all you need a plurality you can actually have much higher numbers of disappointed people. A lot of seats do not return MPs who have 50.1% of the vote or more.

Such a system is actually what is proposed by the Liberal Democrats, you vote for your MP and list the candidates in order, if no one gets above 50% the candidate with the fewest votes has their voters choices moved onto their 2nd choice until a candidate does have 50%.

What if your 2nd choice is the same as your 1st?

Originally Posted by Angua

The current system effectively disenfranchises a huge number of voters who live in "safe" seats of whichever party. Only those in marginal seats actually have a vote truly worth casting. This is what is wrong with the current system. The FPTP creates "safe" seats which can lead to complacent MP's who just ride the gravy train knowing as long as they don't stick their noses over the parapet they have a job for life.

The current would have worked when their was a greater focus on your MP rather than the party. Now a lot of people, most people, do vote for parties and their policies and as a result the safe seat issue is a problem. When your Tory MP get's twice as many votes as any other candidate then honestly why vote?

[Angua]

Originally Posted by danielf

Under PR there can be options for voting for specific people. Candidates for a party are generally ranked on the ballot paper, and candidates are assigned to parliament according to that order. Voters can however vote for a specific person and if this person gets enough votes they can leapfrog candidates that are ahead of them in the queue. Thus, number 15 on the list could get into parliament at the expense of #10 for a party that wins 10 seats.

Also, under PR you tend to have more parties, thus further increasing the choice.

---------- Post added at 17:45 ---------- Previous post was at 17:42 ----------



Not if you have a coalition. The combined parties can have 60% of the vote, which means that only 40% of those who voted did not vote for one of the parties in government. Under FPTP that number can be higher than 60.

And given that the Labour Government got in last time with less than 40% of the vote. That is 60%+ that did not vote for them.

[danielf]

Originally Posted by Xaccers

Fixed it for you.

How adult and constructive

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by danielf

How accurate of you

Fixed that for you too.

Originally Posted by Xaccers

What if your 2nd choice is the same as your 1st?

Well you list them numerically, you can't have that. You maintain the right not to choose a 2nd and if your candidate is eliminated then you haven't chosen a 2nd (because you hate them all for example) then you don't vote for anyone else.

---------- Post added at 17:53 ---------- Previous post was at 17:51 ----------

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

I thought of that and duly amended things - however you can't have a coalition in a single seat. I'm talking locally now not nationally.

I don't find the idea of losing some of the locality of the FPTP system good. While on one side one could say that the Lib Dems would receive far more seats the fact would be that a majority of the people in a majority of those seats did not vote for the MP they will receive as a result of PR. Great for the Lib Dems nationally, not so great locally especially in areas where strongly Tory or Labour seats find themselves with a Lib Dem MP who may not represent their views locally.

You don't lose the locality, the main suggestion put forward by the Lib dems does not remove your local MP. Only changes how they are elected, to remove safe seats.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by Damien

Well you list them numerically, you can't have that. You maintain the right not to choose a 2nd and if your candidate is eliminated then you haven't chosen a 2nd (because you hate them all for example) then you don't vote for anyone else.

So you're forced to either not vote or vote for someone you don't want.
And you say this is an improvement?

[Ignitionnet]

Originally Posted by Damien

You don't lose the locality, the main suggestion put forward by the Lib dems does not remove your local MP. Only changes how they are elected, to remove safe seats.

How can I keep my MP when the decision whether they are elected or not doesn't belong to this constituency alone?

We could vote Lib Dem and end up with a BNP MP - you want to tell a constituency that they just inherited the first BNP MP?

I suspect you'd need to replace constituencies with administrative areas similar to County / Borough Council boundaries. Don't think PR of any kind is really compatible with current constituencies.

[NoKnowledge]

Exit Poll

Conservatives 305
Labour 255
Liberal Democrats 61
Others 29

649/650 seats (Thirsk & Malton delayed due to death)

Conservatives 306
Labour 258
Liberal Democrats 57
Others 28

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

How can I keep my MP when the decision whether they are elected or not doesn't belong to this constituency alone?

We could vote Lib Dem and end up with a BNP MP - you want to tell a constituency that they just inherited the first BNP MP?

Hang on, I think I've got it, there might be more Lib Dem MPs and that's why it's so good, right?
The odd uBNP MP here and there is a price worth paying to give a minority party more of a say.
Or at least that seems to be the logic behind it (well ok, a more accurate one would be "Waaaaaaaaah! I wanna run the country but people don't like me enough. It's not fair, I'm going to stamp my feet and cry")

[danielf]

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

I thought of that and duly amended things - however you can't have a coalition in a single seat. I'm talking locally now not nationally.

I don't find the idea of losing some of the locality of the FPTP system good. While on one side one could say that the Lib Dems would receive far more seats the fact would be that a majority of the people in a majority of those seats did not vote for the MP they will receive as a result of PR. Great for the Lib Dems nationally, not so great locally especially in areas where strongly Tory or Labour seats find themselves with a Lib Dem MP who may not represent their views locally.

It's swings and roundabouts, it's all well and good jumping up and down saying that the Lib Dems didn't get as many MPs as their share of the vote suggests but there is a local flip side of denying the majority, potentially vast majority of people in some ridings the representative they voted for.

I agree about it being good to have a link to local areas, but frankly that is just about the only thing that FPTP has going for it, and as pointed out, that has its drawbacks as well. As you said a hybrid system would be good, but I'm not sure if such a system exists.

Originally Posted by Xaccers

So you're forced to either not vote or vote for someone you don't want.
And you say this is an improvement?

No you can select runners up. Let's take the French Presidential Elections, they must get 50% because they don't think a President can claim a mandate without 50% of the vote. If 50% fails to materialist they have a run off where the person with the lowest share of the vote is eliminated (it might actually be all candidates below a certain %, I forget) and people vote again.

This system does that but all in one go. You don't have to provide runners up, you can just vote for one person and decide you don't want your vote to go to anyone else in the event your candidate doesn't get in.

The effect is that over 50% of the population should be slightly happier with their MP, even if it wasn't their first choice. So that 35% of the area hasn't chosen the mp for the entire 100% of the constituency for example.