Little bit 'o politicks

[Luddite]

OK, so now were hung...

Democratic Unionist Party - 8 seats - 168,216 votes
Scottish National Party - 6 seats - 482,823 votes
Plaid Cymru - 3 seats - 165,394 votes
Green - 1 seat - 268,024 votes
UK Independence Party - 0 seats - 864,284 votes
British National Party - 0 seats - 536,223 votes

How is that fair? How is that democratic? How is that representing the views of the electorate?

How is it fair that Liberals get 6,421,841 votes and 51 seats, while Labour get 8,194,900 and 247 seats.

Democracy?

[Steve J]

The New Scientist had a brilliant article last week on the different types of proportional representation. They showed how the results could be skewed one way or another dependent upon which system was used. Their conclusion was that you can get any party to hold power dependent upon whether you AB, AB+ etc forms of PR. Very enlightenening.

The FT did something similar this week but in less detail.

[Leon]

Let's throw the Lib Dem's and Labour together and see what they can do.

[clibinarium]

Wow, close result in my home constituency; out of nearly 49 000 votes cast the winning margin was just 4 votes!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/election2010/results/constituency/707.stm

There's a good chance this will go to the election court; it did the last time with a margin of  53.

[lentulus]

So does Britain tend to do coalitions or minority governments?

[Luddite]

So does Britain tend to do coalitions or minority governments?

Nope.

Last one was 1974.

The last successful one was 1910-1915 under Herbert Asquith...

We don't do this sort of thing very well because our politicians are, on the whole, a bunch of squabbling, infantile, muppets...

[Fenton]

Where I used to live( Lagan Valley) it would never be that close , not with the DUP in complete control there

[Steve J]

"We don't do this sort of thing very well because our politicians are, on the whole, a bunch of squabbling, infantile, muppets... "

Sounds like they frequent the TMP forum;).

[17-21l]

Gents - we are not supposed to talk about three things

Politics, Religion, and Women.

Thems the rules in the mess.

Who cares theyre all pumpers!!   

( give BNP a go - sort out the real crap then boot those out too) OOOOPs sorry thems the rules none of the above!!

[nikharwood]

Oh dear - I do so hope you're joking with your BNP comment...would you really want policy for this nation written by 'men' like this?

Not what I want for a decision-maker in running my country. 'nuff said.

[Luddite]

Indeed Nik.

Sooo glad to see the racist thugs got wiped out in Barking and everywhere else.  What the BNP seem to have missed is the rather simple fact that 'Britain' as a post-Imperial entity was formed out of the Imperial interrelation between England and India.  To be 'British', one must embrace the facets of identity ranging from the 'homelands' (England, Walse, Scotland, NI', through the colonies and commonwealth to the Jewel in the Crown that was India'.

Ah well...at least, for all our faults as a nation, the one thing the English don't do is political extremism...and thank the maker for it.


Still, things have taken a turn for the surreal in the post-vote horse trading eh?

Now we've got the bizarre chimera of the Con-Dem-Nation under David Clegg...time to walk off shaking my head muttering about how it'll never work...   Hehe...

[Leon]

Oh dear - I do so hope you're joking with your BNP comment...would you really want policy for this nation written by 'men' like this?

Not what I want for a decision-maker in running my country. 'nuff said.

Haha, you've got to love the BNP's 'direct' approach to decision making.  Idiots.

[Luddite]

So....

How do we all think the Con-Lib alliance is going?

Happy with the cuts proposed?  (40% off the defence budget?) 

Are the cuts too quick?  Too severe?  Or not going far enough?

Has Call-me-Dave hit a zietgeist with this 'Big Society' thing? 

[Sandinista]

This Tory govt - for that is what it is - is making the same mistakes all Tory govts do and is slashing the state regardless of what the impact is on the long term economic stability of the economy. I remember 25% unemployment on Teesside. As millionaire businessmen the cuts will not impact upon their personal finances, but the poorer elements, and this time the lower middle class, in our society will be shafted as we were when the mad bitch was in power. Cameron has nothing new to offer all his talk is just cover for more and harsher cuts.
Hang the bastards, time to sieze the power back into the hands of the democratic mass, and get rid of the the Eton and other parasitical cliques

[Leon]

It hasn't affected me too much yet, but I'm sure it'll work it's way down to me. 

I know Dave isn't too impressed with the cuts, they've reduced his teaching time for courses by almost half.  So as there's no way he can teach the whole course, they'll dumb down the exams to keep the pass rate up, leading to more people leaving education with worthless qualifications.