What can we do to change the minds of decision makers and people in general to actually do something about preparing for the forthcoming economic/energy crises (the ones after this one!)?
Interesting how Labour get the most seats on all the polls, even with the lowest percentage. Even if the votes are shared equally, Labour get the most seats, and the Lib Dems only get half as many as the other parties.
Other countries may fix their elections to get the result they want, but we've got a system that can do that without any cheating
I've just finished watching 'This Week' on the BBC. Michael Portillo said that he thought that the Tories would be willing to offer the LibDems full PR as a price for LibDem support if they thought that otherwise Labour would make the same offer and thereby remain in power.
This assumes we're in hung parliament territory AND that Labour are prepared to make such an offer. Part of the LibDem price could well include Brown stepping down.
Portillo also pointed out that constitutionally the Queen does not have to invite the leader of a political party to become Prime Minister, e.g. even if Brown was reluctant to step down as Labour Leader, he could find he was an isolated figure and it was a Milliband or Alan Johnson that was invited to form a government (Cameron is a distance cousin of the Queen, of course!).
Alan Johnson has expressed his support for full PR in the past and therefore would probably go down better with the LibDems. As full PR is not in any manifesto, I assume that they’d have to be a referendum first.
The Tories electoral reform proposal is interesting - a 10% reduction in the number of MPs; these would of course be predominantly for the small inner city constituencies that return Labour MPs. There is a certain logic to the proposal - and also benefits the Tories - in a two-party race. But IMO I think proportional representation is fairer for the whole electorate.
BTW, there is a strange lack of reaction so far by the stock market and currency traders to the Tory horror stories of a hung parliament.
Quintus wrote:Part of the LibDem price could well include Brown stepping down.
Yes, it's less a case of Vote Clegg get Brown, rather Vote Clegg get Miliband.
I agree!
foodimista wrote:The Tories electoral reform proposal is interesting - a 10% reduction in the number of MPs; these would of course be predominantly for the small inner city constituencies that return Labour MPs. There is a certain logic to the proposal - and also benefits the Tories - in a two-party race. But IMO I think proportional representation is fairer for the whole electorate.
Reducing by a handful the number of MPs will have little significant effect, other than making it a bit easier for the Tories at a future election. The electoral system would still be grossly unfair to the LibDems and the smaller parties. FPTP has to go, in my view, if we're to see anything other than business as usual in British politics - right up to the next crash.
foodimista wrote:...Tory horror stories of a hung parliament.
I can only hope it's because enough people realise that a hung, or balanced, parliament is no bad thing. In fact given the severity of the situation we face it could be exactly what we need!
FPTP is not good for the tories either in Westminster elections in Scotland and many other parts of the UK where they have few representatives, despite a reasonable share of the vote. But they never acknowledged that.
We have to abandon the elective dictatorship that is FPTP. AV would be a little better but I prefer full PR with some kind of link retained with the constituency.
I don't think FPTP is all bad nor that PR is all good. FPTP is a good system if people do it right! By that I mean independently evaluate all the candidates on merit and vote for the one they like the most. Ignore party affiliations.
This way the house is made up of people, each whom won an election as the most popular person standing.
The problem is that people don't even bother to find out the names of the candidates let alone what they actually think, and just vote along party lines. This isn't the way to do it in a FPTP system!
PR, especially with closed lists, has a major problem in that some highly unpopular individuals can get and remain in power if their party likes them. Sure the number of seats might be proportional to the electorate's voting but the individuals will not.
I'd like to see a system with far weaker political parties, with 650 (well, 500 would be better) individual people who had won the right to represent their constituents on their own merit - not on their party's merit.
clv101 wrote:FPTP is a good system if people do it right! By that I mean independently evaluate all the candidates on merit and vote for the one they like the most. Ignore party affiliations.
Wouldn't that give us government by the party that has the largest number of likeable candidates ... and not the party with the best policies for the country?
