Comments on: Politics Summary: Wednesday, June 2nd

By: RED MIST, ARM FLAPPING AND ITS CONSEQUENCES | Shoah

RED MIST, ARM FLAPPING AND ITS CONSEQUENCES | Shoah — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 16:08:20 +0000

[…] I’m sure that none of the chattering classes or media types, who helped to heighten the political temperature in Europe and […]

By: Red Mist, Arm Flapping And Its Consequences. « ModernityBlog

Red Mist, Arm Flapping And Its Consequences. « ModernityBlog — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 12:53:52 +0000

[…] I’m sure that none of the chattering classes or media types, who helped to heighten the political temperature in Europe and […]

By: tracy j

tracy j — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 12:01:34 +0000

the constituency sizes are biased in Labour’s favour. unsurprisingly as they were in office. the Conservatives would have won a landslide if the system wasn’t rigged against them. they won a landslide in England as it is. with a proper devolution and equally sized constituencies, it’s unlikely Labour could ever win again.

By: Anon E Mouse

Anon E Mouse — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 09:22:40 +0000

Will – I got work to do fella and you direct me to that hefty tome?… cheers for that.

OK I’ll be back…

By: Will Straw

Will Straw — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 09:11:24 +0000

The problem with your argument, Anon, is that even if we stick with FPTP, hung parliaments are likely to become increasingly frequent.

This academic paper explains why: http://www.democraticaudit.org/download/Hung_Parliament_final.pdf

By: Anon E Mouse

Anon E Mouse — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 09:07:58 +0000

Will – Seems to me the ComRes Poll is schizo to say the least – you seem to have been very selective in the bits you chose. Fair enough.

These people said that first past the post should be replaced by a proportional system. OK.

But they also stated: The political horse-trading which followed the inconclusive general election result showed that an outright win is much more desirable than a hung parliament – Agree 72%/Disagree 24%

Horse trading always follows a coalition agreement so it seems to me that as soon as this is put to the people they will vote for FPTP. We need to be able to boot the bums out and perhaps if Gordon Brown had had the decency to resign like Falkner, Blunkett and others suggested we would now have a weaker minority government instead of this coalition.

But irrespective of what Clegg agreed to I do not believe there will be a referendum on AV – the boundary sizes will “run into unforseen blah blah” and although the ward sizes will be changed the AV just isn’t going to happen.

You know I’m right Will as usual….