The UK political thread (formerly independence thread)

[Haldamir319]

Jo Swinson seems to be considered the actual favourite.

[Metalchemyst]

Does anyone agree that our party political system is outdated? It's looking more and more like a blunt instrument.

[Haldamir319]

Yeah, it's antiquated. I'd prefer some STV/PR hybrid.

[Gandalf the Red]

Who's still voting in this? That's two extra votes for Labour since the other day.

And most of those votes appeared after Boneduster turned up....

[metaldinosaur]

True though. You get paid a small amount for every poll you participate in. By people who are online and have loads of time to waste. After so many you get a fiver. Exit polls are much more reliable.

There was one meaningful vote and the Tories won whether you like it or not.

Actually, Yougov get it closer than most; but yes exit polls are the only ones who seem to have it down.

Either way, it is retired people who swing it to the Tories. Postal votes massively swung it to them this time - big indicator of the grey voters intentions.

It is annoying that soon to be dead people voted for a Torie mess they wont live to see.

[Gandalf the Red]

Or young people voting for someone who probably won't be alive in five years...

[houston4044]

Jo Swinson seems to be considered the actual favourite.

Out of the running

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-40321277

Who's still voting in this? That's two extra votes for Labour since the other day.

And most of those votes appeared after Boneduster turned up....

The same people who vote in TV competitions when lines have closed

Does anyone agree that our party political system is outdated? It's looking more and more like a blunt instrument.

Has been for ages now, just a shame the referendum in 2011 failed. AV wasn't flawless but at least it would of kept the door open for further reform, now the doors shut and the Tories will keep it that way as FPTP benefits them.

[houston4044]

Indeed, the one goodf thing the Lib Dems managed in that coalition was getting the AV referendum and we bloody voted against.

Clegg being such a prominent part of the campaign just after the student fees fiasco was a bad move, I know so many people who just took it as a popularity contest and voted against it accordingly.

[Noodle]

People voted against AV because it was never a proposition in a manifesto. It was a token gesture to attempt to placate those demanding PR. It never got any genuine enthusiasm as said people had already resigned themselves to losing the chance of PR.

I'm starting to tire of this debate around changing the voting system, particularly those from smaller parties. The only alternative they talk about is PR, which has aspects I'd consider less democratic than FPTP. For a start it has the potential to cement unsavoury or unpopular characters. Under the current system even the incumbent prime minister has the (admittedly highly unlikely) possibility of being voted out of parliament - under PR the *entire* party would have to be wiped out and buried for that to happen.

We would lose the concept of a local MP. Yes I suppose fewer constituencies with a group of MPs allocated to represent them, but that itself could create problems.

PR advocates: Convince me that Proportional Representation is the best system and how it would work to achieve your aims.

[Metalchemyst]

The pro-AV camp were ahead to begin with but lost to a very cynical campaign against them. In retrospect, Clegg should just have insisted on PR for local gov. elections to let the public get used to it.

Our government is supposed to be representative democracy, but the 'first past the post' voting system is just not very representative and so not very democratic. How important really is this 'local link' between the MP and the Commons? Most things that people go to their MP about are matters for local government. And this argument that FPTP enables us to vote out individual politicians who turn bad does not impress me - you might still have to wait four years to do it, and what if you don't like the policies of the other candidates' parties?

I don't think PR is the Holy Grail but it is a stage on the quest. An end to private lobbying (crony capitalism) and an element of direct democracy (like the Swiss have) would also help a lot to get there.

[Gandalf the Red]

The only time PR gets used in this country is in the Euro elections. Now can you name all of your MEPs?

I've only ever known one of mine and that was Nick Griffin. Enough said. Got in with less than 8% of the votes.


There's also the case of whether a party leader will just pick his/her preferred members rather than who you and the rest of people in your area wants.

So thankfully we kicked this into the long grass and hopefully that's where it stays.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

Single Transferable Vote. It's the only voting system that makes sense in the UK.

[houston4044]

PR advocates: Convince me that Proportional Representation is the best system and how it would work to achieve your aims.

It's not so much that PR is the best system, it's more that I'd take anything over FPTP.

-FPTP is outdated, given it was designed at a time when the franchise was a lot smaller and government was a lot more laissez faire; it does not work in the modern climate. Every 4 years we get to vote for one person to deal with a wide span of topics, how is that either fair or going to lead to proper choice?

-It leads to safe seats, which in turn leads to political parties only listening to voters in swing seats as they can "count" on safe seats because they know most of these voters can't/won't change who they vote for. Under a different system they would have to listen and try to appeal to all these people which would be more democratic.

- The argument it leads to more stable governments....the last 7 years has undone that argument.

And that's just off the top of my head, I could reel off a whole bunch of reasons why FPTP is an antiquated system best left to history

[Haldamir319]

As I put a few posts back, I like the idea of a mix of STV and PR, alongside the creation of a small amount of extra MPs.

In your constituency
You would use STV for your constituency vote, so that whomever wins the seats is at least *somewhat* supported by 50%+1 of voters in your constituency. This should, in itself, help with voter turnout (particularly in marginal seats).

In Parliament
You compare how the seats have been decided by the above with how a pure PR vote would.
You then use a list system to balance out the number of MPs each party needs to fill out Parliament so that it matches (as closely as possible) PR.

The only concerns I'd have with the above:
* It would mean increasing the number of MPs (that means costs etc)
* The number of additional MPs wouldn't likely be a set one - it depends how close to PR the STV system would leave parliament looking.
* The Additional MPs wouldn't necessarily be linked to a constituency / their constituency may not have voted for them.

[Slev]

OK, time to convince Noodle!

PR is not just a single system, but a range of them, each with their own merits & flaws. So, here's how I'd do it.

1. Parlement via Single Transferable Vote.
Under STV, several adjacent consituancies (typically 5 in a city, 3 in the countryside) would join together to create one multi-member consituancy.

When you vote, you vote for specific politicians. You rank all the entrants, 1, 2, 3, etc until you're happy. You don't have to assign numbers to someone you find odious. You can vote for people you believe in regardless of party. You don't have to vote for someone odious just to keep your party in.

Let's say you join together five constituancies here in the labour heartlands.
Suddenly, teh combined Tory supporters in teh are have a chance of getting in a single MP. Likewise teh Greens and Lib-Dems. Each put up a single candidate.
Labour have good odds, so put up five candidates.

In teh end, we end up with, say, three Labour MPs, a Green and a Tory. The single odious Labour candidate nobody likes finds themselves without a seat. The right wingers can go to their Tory MP with any concern, even though they live in the left-wing heartlands.

It's an elegent system that retains geographical link, while holding indevidual candidates responsible, and allowing minority groups representation.

Second, teh Lords gets replaced with a new body. Every Election, we have a national PR vote, each % point scored by a party nationally, allows that party to put one peron into the Lords for 10 years. Every 5 years, half of them get replaced. they cannot be past of future MPs and cannot be re-elected.

Third up, we replace the PM with an elected president doing something similar, their cabinate being non-MPs. This means we can elect our leader AND our government seperately.

These three elements form counter-checks to each other to ensure the will of teh people is broadly and proportinately represented, and prevents overly extremist a group form progressing anything without very broad support form the citizens who own the country. It means veriosu groups ahev to compromise and actually govern, rather than just trying to force throu unpopular policies.

I'm not saying this would be oerfect, but it would be a damn site better than the mess we have now.