Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 6:05 pm  

The Video Ref wrote:

Regardless of which party you support, I am sure we can all agree that it is perverse UKIP can get roughly twice as many votes as the SNP, yet only 1 MP compared to their 55 (or so).

Agree totally. I hate UKIP and I think anyone who votes for them are simplistic idiots who can't be bothered to actually think for longer than 10 seconds.

But they deserve representation in the same way as everyone else. However changing constituency boundaries won't do anything to alter that. The only thing that will is doing away with First Past The Post and introducing another system. The fairest being PR. In which case everybody's vote will count.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 6:06 pm  

Neither of the two parties have got to grips with the changing demographics and nature of the country, although the Conservatives have done rather better. They have completely reinvented themselves over the years. Labour on the other hand has not coped with the loss of a mass blue collar working class. It tries to chase the middle of the road voter but cannot reconcile that in policy terms with its traditional voters (who are insufficient in number under the first past the post system to permit them a majority). Blair did succeed in his early days but drifted away from the traditional voters and the Iraq war buried him.

So, will they be able to reinvent themselves in an appealing way where they represent anyone? I think their best hope is PR. Their second best hope is if the Tories make the mistakes of their relatively recent past and become too arrogant and corrupt. I think with Osborne pulling the strings they will not fall into that trap for some time.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 6:09 pm  

PR was rejected early in the last parliament.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 6:12 pm  

Lord Elpers wrote:

PR was rejected early in the last parliament.

I appreciate that but if we have a protracted period of no serious opposition to the Tories (entirely possible) the "establishment" may go that way in the interests of "democracy".

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 6:26 pm  

After running from any scrutiny during the election campaign, inluding dodging a hustings in his own constituency, it hasn't taken IDS to carry on where he left off.



My disappointment with the result has been somewhat tempered by the £420 I picked up after predicting that UKIP would only return Carswell to parliament and also the fact that Richard Desmond managed to spunk £1.3m against the wall and the total result was a halving of UKIP's parliamentary representation

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 6:30 pm  

Him wrote:

Agree totally. I hate UKIP and I think anyone who votes for them are simplistic idiots who can't be bothered to actually think for longer than 10 seconds.

Views like this won't help Labour recover from their shambolic performance.

UKIP have picked up working class support and it would be wise to actually discover the real reasons for this rather than just dismiss them all as 'simplistic idiots' whose votes can be written off.

A long time in opposition for Labour with views like this.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 6:40 pm  

Lord Elpers wrote:

PR was rejected early in the last parliament.

You mean the referendum? That was AV not PR.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 6:43 pm  

Lord Elpers wrote:

PR was rejected early in the last parliament.

It wasn't. The vote was on AV, which I think Nick Clegg himself (the main force behind the referendum) described as a 'sh1tty little compromise'.

I fear the referendum on AV has killed off the prospect of electoral reform, bar a bit of tinkering with the boundaries, for a generation. And neither of the 2 main parties who have a majority government will ever agree to a referendum on PR, since if implemented they would never again form a majority.

The big thing to watch out for at the moment is the likes of Balls making a comeback via the Lords. Which is cronyism at its worst.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 7:05 pm  

Lord Elpers wrote:

This really has been a emphatic victory not only for the Tories but for David Cameron personally and without doubt his authority in the Conservative party will have dramatically increased which in turn will strengthen his position as he seeks to win those EU reforms.

Not only has he defeated the Labour party (with 99 more seats than Labour) but he has seen off his 3 main political opponents too. Bye bye to Labour leader Milli Ed, shadow chancellor Ed Ballsup and Nigel Farage (allbeit in his case until the autumn). The Lib-Dems were totally routed and it must have given him great satisfaction to have seen off their Leader (& disloyal Deputy PM) and totally out of touch "Big Fat Fib" Clegg and the grumpy Vince Cable too

The Tory tactics in their campaign proved to be successful including the PM's decision to avoid the waste of time TV debates, to concentrate on the economy and to point out the real risks of a Labour/SNP pact. They were right to concentrate their attack on Lib-Dem held seats and to trust that the English voters would reward them for their economic record in the end.

It just shows how thick the British public are that's all

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri May 08, 2015 7:07 pm  

Leaguefan wrote:

It just shows how thick the British public are that's all

Too many RIGHT WING APOLOGISTS out there.