UK Election Arcana, Explained By Software

An anonymous reader writes "For the first time in 35 years the UK government is looking to be at risk of getting a hung or coalition government. (The most recent previous hung parliaments were in 1974 and 1929.) The voting rules are somewhat arcane and the votes this time are such that there are many strange possible outcomes and a surprisingly large number of permutations of coalitions that could be formed and political strategies that may go into their forming. There are at least 60 permutations, some more politically plausible than others. Adam Back wrote some software to work out the permutations, and lists some of the arcane factors affecting the outcome. If Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown chose to, it would appear even that he could simply refuse to resign, ostensibly trying to form a coalition indefinitely, maybe even forcing the Queen to dismiss the current government, which last happened in 1834 under King William IV."

Comments

Silly Brits

[ShakaUVM]

Silly Brits.

This is why they need a reasonable, commonsense system like our electoral college.

Re:Silly Brits

[xaxa]

It's why we need to Take Back Parliament and get a fair voting system. I went to the protest in London yesterday, and I encourage anyone that can to come to the next one, on Saturday (14:00, 15th May, Parliament Square, London).

Re:Silly Brits

[Darkness404]

The way the British do it -is- a reasonable commonsense system and it lets -everyone- more or less have their voices heard. There are 650 seats in the house of commons there are 535 seats in the US congress. The UK has a population of 62,041,708, the US has a population of 309,230,000. That means that there is one representative for every 95,448 people in the UK, in the US there are 578,000 people for every one representative. In the UK, that leads to a lot more accountability. Similarly look in the US, there are only, what? 3 seats in congress not filled by a republican or democrat? There is not a single libertarian in congress which claims is the third largest party in the USA. On the other hand, there are -many- niche parties represented in the UK House of Commons that aren't Conservative, Labour or even Liberal Democrat. This means that more people have their political views represented in their government than the US. Mix this in with the fact that each country with the exception of England have their own parliament, means that each person has a lot more say in their government without compromising.

Shouldn't -everyone- have at least one MP/representative of their chosen political ideology in government? The UK system makes this possible, the US system does not.

Re:Silly Brits

[funkatron]

From reading wikipedia, the systems sound similar. In the UK each region elects an MP and then the MPs vote in a government. The current problem is that none of the parties has enough MPs to actually vote in a government. If one party tries; all the other parties will vote against and prevent it. The US hasnt had this problem because only 2 parties seem to get elected there.

Re:Silly Brits

[Darkness404]

Just be glad your broken system is a lot less broken than the US system. At least you guys -have- minority parties. Good luck finding a single person in the US congress that isn't a republican or democrat (or an 'independent' who votes 99.999% with one of the 2 parties).

While the UK system may be broken, its a lot better than the system from across the ocean....

Re:Silly Brits

[0123456]

The way the British do it -is- a reasonable commonsense system and it lets -everyone- more or less have their voices heard.

Oh, bollocks.

If I remember correctly, the UKIP got about twice as many votes as the SNP and the BNP got about the same number of votes as the SNP, yet the SNP got six seats and the UKIP and BNP didn't get any. The British government is determined primarily by the votes of a million or so voters in central England, because most of the rest of the country is a safe seat for one of the three main parties... consequently the main parties crap on the core supporters while they all fight over those few voters who can determine the outcome.

It's an abysmal system and it's hard to see how you could create something worse if you really want to to 'let everyone have their voices heard'. Where I used to live my vote was utterly irrelevant because the Tory MP had such a large majority that they would get elected regardless of who I voted for.

You may be right that the US system is even worse, but the idea that the British system 'lets everyone have their voices heard' is simply absurd. That's precisely what it's designed to _NOT_ do.

Re:Silly Brits

[CowboyBob500]

Bollocks. The Liberal Democrats got 25% of the vote but only 8% of the seats. How is that common sense? Due to constituency boundary changes their share of the vote went up but the number of seats they have actually went down. The system we have is crap and needs to change.

Re:Silly Brits

[martin-boundary]

It all went downhill when they got rid of the Ministry of Silly Walks.

Re:Silly Brits

[Kjella]

From what I gather the UK system was rather screwed up and in 1832 they had a huge reform, making it more like the US system with first past the post. Not sure how much the Brits cared about what the Americans did at the time, but it seems they already brought the US system back. Not the best choice, then again there weren't that many great choices in Europe at the time...

Re:Silly Brits

[xaxa]

The UK system is crap -- it's not as bad as the US system, but it's still pretty awful.

In many areas it's more-or-less irrelevant who you vote for -- the same party wins every year.

In other areas it's a contest between two of the biggest three parties, and not voting for one of those two is essentially wasting your vote; many people in these situations vote for the "less bad" of the two parties. (e.g. they might like party B, but 'know' that either A or C will win. A isn't as bad, so they vote A to try and stop C winning.)

The Liberal Democrats get a decent number of votes all across the country (23% this year) but don't get a fair number of seats in Parliament (9%). Labour got 29% of the vote and 40% of the seats, the Conservatives got 36% of the vote and 47% of the seats in Parliament. The smallest parties are even worse-off than the Lib Dems: the Greens got 1% of the vote this year, and for the first time got a single seat -- 0.15% of the seats! (results.)

Re:Silly Brits

[Darkness404]

Better than the US though, a party could easily have 25% of the popular votes and no representation.

While I agree that changing of boundaries to undermine the political system, its still better than the US.

Re:Silly Brits

[ShakaUVM]

>>The way the British do it -is- a reasonable commonsense system and it lets -everyone- more or less have their voices heard.

I was also being firmly sarcastic with my comment.

In all honesty, the American system is heavily flawed (it excludes third parties almost entirely), but it's also given us a reasonable government that hadn't screwed up things too too badly over the years.

It's actually very interesting to study early American history and the notions they had of deference and whatnot. While I'm not advocating returning to a system where you had to be a landowner in order to vote, the Jacksonian revolution led to the rise of the political machines and whatnot, which is a legacy we're still dealing with today.

Re:Silly Brits

[gbjbaanb]

but it's also given us a reasonable government that hadn't screwed up things too too badly over the years.

George. W. Bush.

Re:Silly Brits

[TheRaven64]

Better than the US though, a party could easily have 25% of the popular votes and no representation.

That's also possible in the UK. Each seat is contested on a first-past-the-post basis, and the winner typically has 30-40% of the vote. The remaining 60-70% are then discarded. If you get 25% in every constituency but another party gets 26% then you get no seats. It's even more fun than this, because it doesn't have to be the same other party; one other party could get 26% in 326 seats and 0% in the other 364. They would then have a majority of seats and control of Parliament, with only 13% of the popular vote, while the party with 25% of the popular vote had no representation at all.

There's a reason why electoral reform is the key issue for all of the smaller parties. One or other of the two major parties needs to get them on board to be able to form a government, but the price of doing so is likely to be a form of proportional representation for the next election (which, if we go by 1974's precedent, will be in a few months) and then neither Labour nor the Conservatives will be able to get a majority ever again. Even the 36% or so that the Conservatives got is probably a lot more than they'd get under PR - a lot of people voted Conservative because it meant not-Labour (just as a lot of people voted not-Conservative in the past), and would likely vote for a smaller party if their vote would actually be likely to affect the outcome.

Re:Silly Brits

[vadim_t]

No, that's the wrong way to see it.

"Well, at least it's better than in bumfuckistan" is a justification for complacency. Don't wait for it to get worse, do some work and help make it better.

At least you guys -have- minority parties. Good luck finding a single person in the US congress that isn't a republican or democrat (or an 'independent' who votes 99.999% with one of the 2 parties).

So are you trying to do something about it, or just complain about it online?

The grandparent is setting an excellent example here.

Re:Silly Brits

[Leynos]

The MPs don't decide the government. The party with more than (total number of MPs / 2) MPs forms the government.

Since no party has an overall majority, the previous government stays in power. Traditionally, they are given first dibs at forming a coalition, however, since the Tories got more votes, they are giving them that opportunity.

But what you're saying has more or less the same effect.

Re:Silly Brits

[tomhath]

Shouldn't -everyone- have at least one MP/representative of their chosen political ideology in government?

IMHO, the answer to your question is "No". In a two party system, both parties try to appeal to the majority of the voters. This tends to keep the elected officials reasonably moderate and avoids coalitions in which a fringe group has a vastly disproportionate voice. Republicans moved too far to the right and got voted out; Democrats are currently too far to the left and will soon be voted out.

Re:Silly Brits

[OnlyJedi]

Mod parent up. As much as it seems silly that the two losing parties still remain in power, it isn't when you think of it. If combined they still represent more votes (and thus a higher percentage of people's views), shouldn't they be the ones in power rather than a party that a majority of people didn't want?

This is pretty much what happened when Nader "spoiled" the vote for Gore in Florida back in 2000. Even if you discount the whole recount issue, if Nader hadn't been running most of his votes would have likely gone to Gore (both being liberals), and Gore would have easily won the state and the election. Similarly, if the UK were a 2-party system, the Labour and Lib Dems (which if I recall are both more similar to each other than the Conservatives) would be a single party and easily have won.

The benefits of having multiple parties is that no matter who "wins", without a clear majority the ruling coalition needs to be built on compromise. Whether it's Conservatives + Lib Dems, or Labour + Lib Dems, or one of the other permutations, the government can't go too far to one extreme. More importantly, minor parties are still needed to form a coalition, giving them a chance to make some of their views heard.

This can give new ideas—ideas that may be popular with the electorate but too risky/unknown to make traction with the main parties—a chance to be tested while still having a sort of buffer preventing them from being taken too far to quickly. Think, for example, the Pirate Party; major parties are too beholden to big corporate donations to advocate sensible copyright reform, yet that doesn't mean there shouldn't be advocates for it in the legislature.. Compare this to the US, where the two parties have been pretty stagnant for as long as anyone can remember, and new ideas are quickly shot down as "radical" from both sides

Re:Silly Brits

[caseih]

I looked at that web page but I'm a little unsure of what Take Back Parliament is calling for. Are they calling for a system where the number of seats in parliament for a party is proportional to their percentage of the popular vote? If so then this is a recipe for disaster, in my opinion. Under such a scheme how would you get direct representation from ridings in parliament? How would you ever get a majority government? Israel has a proportional representation system (the Knesset) and it's complete and utter chaos much of the time. In fact, many Israelis consider it broken and are calling for reform to create a more American-style system. As a consequence of Israel's system, frequent elections and very frequent reversal of policies which makes it very hard to make progress on many issues.

Re:Silly Brits

[TheRaven64]

In the UK each region elects an MP and then the MPs vote in a government

Not quite true. The MPs don't vote in a government ever, the Queen invites someone to form a government (typically the leader of the party with the majority). The MPs can hold a vote of no confidence in the current government and force an election, but they don't vote to form one. All members of the government are appointed by the Prime Minister, and must be MPs, but they may be either Commoners or Lords (in a few cases, people have been given peerages to allow them to hold government office, but it's quite rare. Lord Mandleson of the Sith is the latest example).

A government does not always require a majority. Currently, we have a minority Labour government, until either there is a Parliamentary vote of no confidence in Gordon Brown or the Queen invites someone else to form a government. This is what happened in 1974, after a couple of by-elections, but it didn't last very long.

Re:Silly Brits

[ShakaUVM]

Precisely. Not great (I'm not a fan of the man), but not a total disaster either.

Well, I guess it was a disaster for Iraqis. But for Americans, he presided over a relatively stable and growing nation.

Re:Silly Brits

[tepples]

As I understand it, the UK never really got rid of Silly Walks; they just folded gait correction into the National Health Service.

Re:Silly Brits

[TheRaven64]

Ouch. If you think the 1832 Reform Act made it worse, you really need to look at the way it worked before...

The act didn't introduce first-past-the-post, that was always the electoral system in the UK. It changed where the seats were. Previously, MPs represented areas that a previous monarch had granted a Commons seat to. The populations of these changed during the Industrial Revolution, as many people moved to the cities. Places with populations of tens of thousands had no MPs, while some villages with only half a dozen eligible voters had one. Because it's very easy to bribe half a dozen voters, these were known as Rotten Burroughs, and were typically represented by the younger son of a local landowner.

The act also extended the vote to slightly poorer people. Universal suffrage did not come for another hundred years, and even most men couldn't vote after the act, but it was a step in the right direction.

Re:Silly Brits

[IAmGarethAdams]

Yes, no countries anywhere successfully use a proportional representation system

Re:Silly Brits

[biryokumaru]

... and one part radical anarchism disguised as Reagan worship.

Ronald Wilson Reagan. Each of his names has six letters. 6 6 6. Think about it.

Re:Silly Brits

[Jenming]

Those are valid points, but it is not as black and white as you make it sound.

First the two parties have not been stagnant "as long as anyone can remember". They have not even been stagnant over the last 1-2 decades. While one party will win and have need for only limited compromise with the losing party that does not mean no compromise or coalition has been formed. Rather the party platforms are fluid and coalitions are formed within the two parties with certain interests moving to the party that will best represent them.

For example, what do labor unions, gay men, women and environmentalists all have in common? They were not well represented by the Republicans when the Republicans where in power. They compromised and brought in other interests until the democratic party was strong enough to take power. Looking at the same party in different regions of the country will also show just how much compromise and coalition forming goes into the US parties.

Its not an ideal system certainly, but I would look at the electoral college and various senate problems as bigger problems than our current 2 party system.

Re:Silly Brits

[biryokumaru]

Yes, because in an ideal democracy, people whose opinions you don't like never get a chance to speak up.

Re:Silly Brits

[Anonymous Coward]

Further, at least in the UK even the Conservatives aren't batshit crazy. Unless I've missed the coverage about how Gordon Brown is actually from Kenya and wants to kill your grandma whilst implanting the Mark Of The Beast into your forehead.

That's what passes for "conservative" nowadays in the US: one part racism, one part religious wingnuttery and one part radical anarchism disguised as Reagan worship.

The reason the US conservatives aren't in power right now is because they are batshit crazy. Once they appear not to be batshit crazy then they will get power again. US voters really like conservatism in theory, and they have a really short memory.

Re:Silly Brits

[Angostura]

Please stop modding this disingenuous argument as 'Informative'.

The Scottish National Party (SNP) fielded 59 candidates in the Westminster parliamentary elections - one in every of the 59 Scottish constituencies.

The BNP fielded more than 300 candidates across the whole of Britain and UKIP fielded over 500 candidates. So UKIP stood in for nearly 10 times as many areas, but only got twice as many votes in its 500 areas as the SNP did in its 59.

Let's face facts. The BNP put its leader up in an East London constituency where it only narrowly lost last time around and where it had 12 local councillors voted in. The leader scraped home in 3rd place. All the BNP councillors were voted off. There is not a single constituency in the whole of the UK where the voters thought - 'yes, the BNP or UKIP candidate is the best one'.

The first-past-the-post may not be to your liking, but don't try to pull the bogus 'comparison with the SNP' trick.

Re:Silly Brits

[nedlohs]

I don't think anyone in the US congress votes "99.999%" with one of the parties, given that the parties don't vote as one very often anyway.

Re:Silly Brits

[SpeedyDX]

We had a similar proportional representation movement in Canada. It failed. Particularly for many of the reasons you mentioned. The biggest and most fatal flaw of proportional representation, in my opinion, is the lack of direct representation as you mentioned. This entails several unsavoury results:

- No local representation. Geography-based representation is huge for a country like Canada. Small communities need a voice. Although they may not have an equal voice in Parliament, at least they won't get ignored as they would in a proportional representation system.
- No accountability. In a FPTP (first past the post) system, an MP is accountable to their electorate. If you F up, you will be voted out. In a proportional system, the parties decide who the MPs are, so even if an MP Fs up, they may not be replaced by the party.
- No attachment to electorate. This is related to both of the above. An attachment to their electorate means that, at least in principle and outwardly, MPs need to take into account the interests of their electorate. Of the people they represent. In a proportional representation system, MPs will not be representing the people. They will be representatives of their party.

The last point illustrates, I think, a very important, but also very subtle, difference. When you represent the people of your electorate, you have to at least have your electorate's interests in the back of your mind. You will ultimately be judged by the people. Even if you F up and still manage to keep the party's candidacy, the people may vote you out. However, when you represent your party, your boss is not the people, but the party's bigwigs. As long as you can keep the favour of your party, you will keep your seat. All you need to be concerned with is maintaining the party line, while the party does the PR for you.

There's almost no situation where a proportional representation system would beat out a FPTP system, in terms of keeping the people in charge in a democracy. I think a proportional representation system is only appealing because people don't really grasp all the concepts involved in a solid, democratic Parliamentary system. I'm not saying that FPTP is the ideal system, but it's the best that we have so far. Proportional representation falls short on so many aspects that it's just not worth any serious consideration. You'll notice that proportional representation movements are almost ubiquitously popular movements that don't have much expert or academic support. People who know the Parliamentary systems well know that it won't work.

Re:Silly Brits

[DigitAl56K]

Where I used to live my vote was utterly irrelevant because the Tory MP had such a large majority that they would get elected regardless of who I voted for.

So what you're saying is that this guy would get elected because he had an enormous majority of voter support... ... and the problem is?

Re:Silly Brits

[Toonol]

Yes, we got Bush instead of Kerry and Gore. System works, evidently.

Re:Silly Brits

[Jenming]

So you are saying George. W. Bush created the worst screw up in American government since the early 1800s.
Now lets compare that against any other country in the entire world in the same time frame.

Re:Silly Brits

[xaxa]

The police estimate was 2000 people in London, the BBC say 1000. I couldn't see from near the front, but apparently there were more people than could fit in Smith Square. The protest was organised with just two day's notice, and there were other protests in other cities. It was raining. There were lots of kinds of people -- some were students, but there were plenty of older people too. Nick Clegg came outside and spoke to the protesters -- a very good result, especially as he didn't know in advance it was happening. The protest was widely reported in the media, perhaps you'd like to hear Clegg's speech.

Whatever you think of me or the protest, I think less of you for sitting at home and ranting on Slashdot. That doesn't achieve anything.

Re:Silly Brits

[HBoar]

The fact is that a 'perfect' democracy is mathematically impossible. Any system will always be a compromise between having everyones voices count and having an effective government with enough power to actually get things done. The UK's system is a reasonable compromise between those two extremes.

Re:Silly Brits

[gnasher719]

"Hung parliament" makes it sound so negative. Germany hasn't had a single party having the majority of parliament seats since 1957, and things seem to be working out quite nicely. I'd say the system is very successful, 1957 was the last time that one party had uncontrolled rule, since then there was always a coalition in power.

At the very least it prevents one of the worst stupidities that can be found in British governments: The tendency to leave "poison pills" to their successor. Like the Tories did when they pressed through privatisation of the railway system at the last second with disastrous consequences for the quality of the railway system, or what Labour has recently done signing billion dollar IT contracts for useless projects that they knew the next government would want to cancel, intentionally negotiating contracts with huge penalties for cancellation.

Re:Silly Brits

[boxwood]

Except for the Americans in New Orleans.

Re:Silly Brits

[xaxa]

All that proportional representation guarantees is a hung parliament every time.

That's a good thing.

Or do you like that a party with a majority in Parliament -- but not a majority of votes -- can pass whatever laws they like?

Re:Silly Brits

[HBoar]

Too far left?! Your democrats would still be considered pretty far right in many countries..... More than anything else, this just shows that simple 'Left' and 'Right' are inadequate descriptors of political parties -- you need to describe them on at least two axes for it to even begin to makes sense.

Re:Silly Brits

[Anonymous Coward]

That's what passes for "conservative" nowadays in the US: one part racism, one part religious wingnuttery and one part radical anarchism disguised as Reagan worship.

American "conservatives" are in no way anarchist. They are 100% for government if is to wage war or to enforce "family values".

Re:Silly Brits

[ShakaUVM]

You're one of those people blaming hurricanes on ol' GW, are you?

I'm curious what your camp will do when it gets more and more tenuous to connect GWB to anything. Keep blaming him? Or find a new scapegoat for all of life's misery?

Re:Silly Brits

[stinerman]

The very obvious problem is that his vote for someone else didn't translate into any increased representation for his minority views. This is called the "wasted vote" problem and is one reason why FPTP voting systems suffer from lower turnout than do proportional systems. In a PR system, 10% of the vote for a particular party nets you 10% of the seats. In FTFP, 10% of the votes gives you 0% of the seats.

Re:Silly Brits

[Sir_Sri]

what coalitions actually mean is that the lunatic fringe (yes including the one trick pony pirate party who has nothing meaningful to say on things like EU tax rates, monetary policy, Ukraine or georgia membership in NATO/EU, muslim immigration to europe etc) gets a disproportionate share of power in exchange for not toppling the government, or they get a free reign on a collection of their particular issues, which may, on the whole, be disastrous for the country, but in the short term prop up one party.

In canada we have an even worse scenario. The minority conservatives essentially govern unopposed on all but the most serious of issues because the liberals are too spineless to risk losing another election. In this case we have a party with ~30% popular support governing like it has a majority.

In the UK case, a party - the lib dems, or (god help them) collection of small fringe parties have been handed the power to let the conservatives or theoretically Labour govern. The vast majority of britons looked at what the lib dems offered, said 'he looks nice but no thanks' and actually reduced their vote share - yet they could get cabinet seats. Even worse would be the scenario of say a conservative coalition propped up by the UKIP, SNP etc. (that's the UK independence party and the scottish nationalists party) who at least have opinions on a broad range of issues, but are mostly out of touch with reality. Of course they'd also need to throw some northern ireland only parties in (sinn fein, the democratic unionist party etc..). An impossible mix as I've presented it but one could pick and choose a few from the list.

The EU is a great example of a full on multi party system. The term unmitigated disaster doesn't do it justice. There's a reason everything is so unwieldingly slow as to not get anything useful done on time. Every fringe group gets it's piece of the pie in subsidies and delays so that very little useful is ever actually accomplished. The vision of a united europe acting in concert for the good of it's people and the world is trampled on daily by a bunch of local politians in a trans-federal office asking for 'mine mine mine' at the expense of everyone else - and they're given it to keep coalitions together.

Multi party systems either waffle around in indecesion until eventually a majority is formed (good or bad), or are ruled by a minority acting like a majority due to the incompetent complicity of other parties. Both of these scenarios should be avoided vigorously. The hung parliments of the UK in the 70's led to much of the disastrous state the country was in during the 80's when Thatcher took over, and had put them in the position of needing much more radical and expensive reform than had it been done gradually in the first place. A coalition of lib dem and conservative will see the UK budget funding priorities of two groups at once rather than one, leaving no one partiuclarly happy and the public purse that much worse off (which given it's current state is a sad commentary).

With governments it matters less which party is in charge, than there being only one group in charge. If you cannot pass a budget the government shuts down, which is, despite the libertarian bent on /. is an extremely bad thing to have happen. Major strategic priorites (whether it be nuclear weapons and aircraft carriers like currently in britain or the environment and the budget in the US) get more or less ignored until a majority is formed to pick up the pieces. It matters less to your employer (even if that's you) what healthcare plan is being chosen, as long as they know which one it is, they can prepare for it, and that is only one of many examples.

At every stage people should resist proportial representation and multi party systems - for all of the things wrong with the US system, and there are many, at least one of the parties is actually able to make decisions and pass budgets. Indecision is the enemy of future planning.

I realize the pirate party is

Re:Silly Brits

[peragrin]

exactly the only reason we got Bush was because the other options sucked even worse.

Re:Silly Brits

[WillDraven]

I can't speak for the parent poster but personally I'm working on it.

We just launched a new site so the forums are a bit sparse. We're still working out the kinks in the organization and it sure will be a long hard road but at least I feel like I'm finally doing something about it instead of bitching on the internet and getting pepper sprayed at protests.

Re:Silly Brits

[stinerman]

The US system differs structurally from the UK system in only a few ways:

1) Their districts are drawn by an independent body. Ours are drawn by the state legislatures in almost all cases.

2) They have equal ballot access laws for all parties. We have various discriminatory treatment of independent and minor party candidates.

3) They have voters who aren't afraid to vote their conscience in the form of the Lib Dems even though they know that the Lib Dems aren't going to be the largest party anytime soon. We're a bunch of fools who vote for the least worst and wonder why we get worse politicians each election cycle.

Re:Silly Brits

[aslate]

I think will is a bit of a strong word, however in the current example the Conservative party represent the one with the most stringent cuts proposed and the others may disagree enough to vote against it.

However the Conservative party is only 20 seats short, so they just need 20 people out of the other 344 to agree with them. It's called running a minority government, and depending on how much of a minority you are it may simply fall apart.

Re:Silly Brits

[cyp43r]

You can compare it to the US electoral college and win but that is not a reflection of how good the UK voting system is. A lot of people share the dominant ideologies than have fringe views. In fact, having fringe views like that in government that very few people agree with seems pointless. Just because there are more representatives doesnt mean politicians are more accountable - it's possible that you have too many, bloating the system and draining public resources.

Re:Silly Brits

[aslate]

Except multi-party politics breeds compromise. If another party comes along promising most of what you do but without the crazy you'll start to lose votes to them. The Lib Dems are left-of-centre, but are still in the middle, whereas Labour are on the left.

The 65% bitching about the 35% being in power are probably less disgruntled than the 48% bitching about the 52% in the US, because each side over there is so polar.

Re:Silly Brits

[Cassius Corodes]

Works well in Australia. For the minor parties its a good place to start. The lower house is more about local issues, whereas the senate is about larger issues that dont necessarily have enough local interest to get a seat in the lower house but enough so that they can have a seat in the upper house. For the major parties, people who are on the fence often vote one of the major parties in the lower house and for the other one in the upper house so that there is no complete control.

Re:Silly Brits

[Paua Fritter]

New Zealand used to have the silly British system but ditched it in favour of the Mixed Member Proportional, which, despite being proportional, still provides for local representation. There have been 3 or 4 elections under MMP in NZ and the system remains fairly popular.

Re:Silly Brits

[Miseph]

"but I would look at the electoral college and various senate problems as bigger problems than our current 2 party system."

Of course, most of those problems are directly related to the two-party system. In the case of the electoral college, it is the primary means by which the system is enforced, and most of our Senate shenanigans are a direct result. Serious reform of any one will result in changing all three.

Re:Silly Brits

[demonlapin]

No, it shows that the US political axis is very, very different from Europe's. Ample land and absence of historic aristocracy can do a lot for a country.

Re:Silly Brits

[herojig]

Best post I've read on /. today!

Re:Silly Brits

[Sciecan]

Australia's senate uses a proportional representation voting system.

Re:Silly Brits

[MightyMartian]

Governments exist because a majority of MPs back a given government. The Westminster system didn't evolve full-blown political parties until near the end of the 18th century. Previous to that, the Whigs and Tories, while in some ways being ideological centers of gravity, did not exist as definite parties with a singular hierarchical structure. Even with the evolution of political parties, the development of the party system didn't happen for a few more decades, along with the tradition that Ministers were selected from Parliament, which was itself later modified so that most Ministers came from the House of Commons. So while, for all intents are purposes you right, technically the British constitution could envision a situation where a government formed that wasn't simply the government with the majority of seats in the House. The UK has had two National Governments that were essentially formed by all parties, during WWI and WWII, when events were sufficiently dire that the need for a unified Parliament was clear. In a way this shows the malleability of the Westminster System, that a lot of its functional aspects are modifiable at need.

Re:Silly Brits

[Capsaicin]

Works well in Australia. ... The lower house is more about local issues, whereas the senate is about larger issues that dont necessarily have enough local interest to get a seat in the lower house but enough so that they can have a seat in the upper house.

With all due respect to my compatriot that is a very strange characterisation of the Australian political system. The lower house was always intended to be about inter- and intra-national issues (we are a federation of states), whereas the upper house was intended to represent the interests of the states as a house of review. This is why upper house members are elected (proportionally) on a per state basis. The lower house members being elected on a seat-by-seat representative basis.

That was, historically, the theory, however the fact of party politics means that the Senate (upper house) reflects the interests of the party rather than the state (except perhaps for Queensland where the majority conservative party is the minority partner in federal conservative govts). In effect the lower house is the house of government dominated by the major parties, while the upper functions primarily as a house of review. "Local issues" are handled by state and local government.

It is true, it does work well, if not as designed. Because of the representative nature of the lower house, the two major parties are favoured (even in the face of preferential voting), giving government a measure stability lacking from systems which have proportional representation (PR) in both houses. Whereas the semi-PR nature (ie PR on state-by-state basis), better reflects the diversity of the electorate, giving minor parties a review role. IMO it could be improved by making the upper house PR on a national basis, but the obstacles to achieving that are probably insurmountable.

Re:Silly Brits

[nmb3000]

Just be glad your broken system is a lot less broken than the US system. At least you guys -have- minority parties.

Minority parties might have benefits but as this demonstrates perfectly, they're just as full of flaws as our traditional two-party system. In either case, however, I have to say that the line "maybe even forcing the Queen to dismiss the current Government" is something I hope never has an analog in the United States. The idea that an unelected figurehead can simply sweep away the electorate when it's convenient is terrifying.

No system of government is perfect but as for myself, I'll take our checks and balances over a monarchy any day.

Re:Silly Brits

[Akzo]

We don't have those problems with MMP, the people vote for both a local representative and a party.

Re:Silly Brits

[deepershade]

They did have a chance to speak up, it's just no one liked what they had to say. Thats how it works in an 'ideal democracy'.

Re:Silly Brits

[HBoar]

That's pretty much what I pointed out in my second sentence. Because political parties can vary in more than one dimension, a one dimensional description doesn't work.

Oh, and I wasn't only referring to Europe....

Re:Silly Brits

[barath_s]

"FPTP accountability" "There's almost no situation where a proportional representation system would beat out a FPTP system, in terms of keeping the people in charge in a democracy."

Indian elections, like the British, are based on first past the post. However, as India is diverse, this leads to regional http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recognised_political_parties_in_India" > parties . Even most "national" parties are present and represent quite narrowly. As a result, coalitions are built and reform to ensure a national government. This results in coalition partners having an outsized say in governance and in slower change ("common minimum program") and extremism pandering to narrow political (caste, linguistic) constituencies. The nature of coalition building means that at the highest, there is a loss of accountability and stability.

I wonder if a proportional system would be fairer in that it would result in broader base, nationally (parties running a good second everywhere would be rewarded) and perhaps in less extremism, as "our people" in charge gets defined more narrowly

The Indian provincial elections of 1937 led to Muslim parties coming in second in most places in mostly FPTP system, and hence not being part of those governments. One could make a case that this concern (of being ignored and swamped in a FPTP system) led to demands for a separate muslim country and hence towards the partition of India, (creation of Pakistan) and the associated genocide.

Re:Silly Brits

[Neoprofin]

The problem is that this negates the OP's Libertarian point. Yes the Libertarians may or may not be the third largest party in the US, however no constituency thinks they should lead, thus they have no seats.

Sounds like the system doesn't make much difference.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

The idea that an unelected figurehead can simply sweep away the electorate when it's convenient is terrifying.

Just as well nobody's suggesting it, then.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

PR allows two (or more) parties, each with a smaller minority of votes, to pass any laws they like.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

But even less people liked what the SNP said - and yet they got several MPs. I understand the reasons why (geography), but it kind of shits on your idea of an ideal democracy.

Re:Silly Brits

[jonbryce]

Our system is pretty much identical to your electoral college. In your system, each party contests individual districts and the party with more than 50% of the districts wins. It works for you because there are only two parties that are capable of winning any of the districts. Usually it works for us as well, but about once every 50 years on average, it doesn't.

Re:Silly Brits

[jonbryce]

A "fair" voting system would mean problems like this after every election, and maybe we would rival the Belgians for inability to form governments.

Re:Silly Brits

[jonbryce]

That's not really true. SNP wants Scotland to be an independent country, which is only really of concern to people who live in Scotland. Within Scotland, the SNP's support is much higher than BNP or UKIP support.

Re:Silly Brits

[jonbryce]

Now compare that to Belgium where the King has to keep on intervening because the elected MPs are completely incapable of forming a government.

Re:Silly Brits

[Homburg]

Of course they can: Germany uses PR, but the German equivalent of the BNP, the NDP, have no seats in the Bundestag. France doesn't use PR, but uses a two round system which is more favorable to small parties than FPTP, yet the French equivalent of the BNP, the Front National, have no seats in the French National Assembly. There are plenty of more proportional systems which still exclude fringe parties.

Re:Silly Brits

[mwvdlee]

So basically the british system is taking away the citizens' vote and lets the parties decide how to compromise?

Re:Silly Brits

[Don_dumb]

The vast majority of britons looked at what the lib dems offered, said 'he looks nice but no thanks' and actually reduced their vote share - yet they could get cabinet seats.

Wrong. The Lib Dems got 23% of the vote, an INCREASE of 1%. Citation - BBC Full election results.
They had a reduction in the number of seats. - more votes, less power.

It has to be a broken system that gives them less than 10% of the seats for almost a quarter of the vote. Especially when you consider that they increased their vote, yet decreased their number of MPs and that Labour got 29% (only 6 per cent more) of the vote somehow giving them 4 times as many seats. In fact both Labour and the Tories (Conservatives) got over 10% more power (seats) than their share of the vote.

Re:Silly Brits

[Will Fisher]

The idea that an unelected figurehead can simply sweep away the electorate when it's convenient is terrifying.

What she'd be doing is forcing a new election. Not overriding democracy, but saying to the people that the politicians have failed and the country requires politicians who can succeed.

I think you misunderstand the idea of a constitutional monarchy.

Re:Silly Brits

[omglolbah]

It also sounds like a political porn..

Re:Silly Brits

[Nyder]

It's why we need to Take Back Parliament and get a fair voting system. I went to the protest in London yesterday, and I encourage anyone that can to come to the next one, on Saturday (14:00, 15th May, Parliament Square, London).

I'll go and help ya.

you'll need to send me a plane ticket and some money first though.

Re:Silly Brits

[Will Fisher]

Yes, because what I want is the politicians deciding everything important behind closed doors in back room deals, like they are doing right now.

Seriously, what is happening right now is a terrible advert for PR. I would hate for this to happen after every single election, but it's what we'd get with PR.

To say that our system is unfair is untrue, every constituency has equal weight in parliament. You could argue that the constituency boundaries are unfair, and you'd probably be right and they probably should be fixed. But to switch to a system where minor parties get overrepresented in coalitions (like the Israeli system) and back room deals override the electorate (like right now) is a huge mistake.

Re:Silly Brits

[damburger]

Labour have not been on the left since the 1980s. You are almost as bad as the guy who wrote the analysis calling them 'socialist'. In everywhere except ultra-rightwing america, that assertion would be laughable. But to you guys, I guess anybody whose primary policy is not giving tax breaks to millionaires is a commie...

Re:Silly Brits

[Anonymous Coward]

Take a good look at what happens in Israel, and you'll learn a few good lessons.

The coalition creation process has led, slowly and inevitably, to the point there are twelve (12, dozen) parties in the parliament, the largest two having ~22% of the votes each. Everybody hates it, one of the reasons being one of the religious parties (there are three of those, the largest getting ~10% of the votes at best) is *always* in the government, while the arab parties (there are three of those as well, getting ~10% of the votes all together) are *always* out of the goverment.

[The late prime minister Rabin had, for a while, a minority coalition, which was stable because the arab parties would not dare vote against a left wing coalition and let a right wing coalition rise. Nice trick - keep them out of the coalition, yet force them to support it.]

Because the coalition is so unstable, it's rare that a government actually survives a full term. This has led to a temporary fix, in which the prime minister was elected separately. He still had to make a coalition, so nothing changed.

The only fix is to avoid the need for a coalition to begin with, which means either separate elections for the executing branch (as in the U.S.), or changing the elections process so as to guarantee one of the parties has a majority (as in the U.S.)

Re:Silly Brits

[Anne Thwacks]

he looks nice but no thanks

Or, depending on who you ask We'd like them, but the truth is, we wont get them, because the electoral boundaries are rigged

Mugabe must be thrilled at the shenanigans that went on with voters not being allowed to vote, postal votes going missing, voters not correctly registered, etc. quite apart from the fact hat minorities do not get any say in the matter.

Re:Silly Brits

[swilver]

You mean with enough power to push through their hidden agenda regardless of what they promised during elections. No thanks, atleast most coalations will prevent this sort of under the table politics.

Re:Silly Brits

[Anne Thwacks]

Except multi-party politics breeds compromise.

You make it sound like compromise is a bad thing!

What we voted for is a situation where only policies that everyone agrees are good can get passed. That is a good idea

What we dont need is a situation where one loony can impose his mad ideas ("can you say mwa-ha-ha"?) on the whole country.

Dont lame me - I voted for the Monster Raving Loony Party.

Re:Silly Brits

[Anne Thwacks]

No, its a polite way of saying "Minister for corruption".

Re:Silly Brits

[HBoar]

At the extreme end, yes that is what I mean. Obviously that isn't a good option, but neither is the other extreme. Coalitions need some sort of coherency, otherwise decisions can't be made at all -- even on the most basic and inconsequential issues. For example, imagine the situation if you removed the distinction within parliament of the governing coalition and the opposition -- it would be utter chaos.

Re:Silly Brits

[blackest_k]

To make British politics work for its citizens a system of proportional representation is needed.
The current system forces you to vote for the party you think can defeat the party you really detest.

Luckily for me I chose non of the above and left the UK however as I found out a couple of days ago I can vote in British Elections for fifteen years after leaving where I was last registered.

In a system of proportional representation you finally get the chance to have a representative that more closely aligns with your views. Labour would probably lose my vote unless I had faith in the particular candidate and that realistically means he/she will have experience in local politics in the city or county councils.

Dumping a candidate on an area by the national party will become more difficult again a plus point.

The trouble is like turkeys the labour and conservative parties will not want to vote for christmas but here's my take on the current situation.

The conservatives have the most number of seats so the liberals have to be prepared to talk to them but the conservatives will not agree to proportional representation which they know will result in they never having a majority government again.

Having offered to attempt to form a government with the conservatives but failing due to no proportional representation. Nick Cleg is forced to work with the labour party who will go for proportional representation (at least they set up regional assemblies). It is unlikely that Gordon Brown can remain as prime minister , he makes a better chancellor to be honest.

The smaller parties will go along with this at least until PR becomes law before declaring a vote of no confidence and getting a fresh general election.

I don't think Nick Cleg can form an alliance with the conservatives without a deal for PR on the table his party will not let him blow this chance for real reform.

His party cannot allow him because without a deal they will hemorrhage seats in the next general election.

The current system largely splits the population into the rich and the poor and both parties kick the oppositions supporters in the nuts when they come to power. Thats not really strong government , whats needed is leadership that works for the country as a whole.

I really hope PR is introduced as it will muzzle MP's any get greedy and they can be replaced with a number of alternative candidates.

Re:Silly Brits

[Teancum]

As I don't consider the electoral college to be a problem at all, other than the presumption that each state must have a "winner take all" approach to allocating the electoral votes (something not even listed in the constitution and therefore can be changed by statute or individual states acting unilaterally). The last state to try and make a change was Colorado, which I think had a pretty good concept of a proportional allocation of electoral votes.

I think the turn-off was that Ralph Nader would have earned an electoral vote under that system on the year it was presented to the Colorado voters, and the two major parties closed ranks to keep an upstart from spoiling their fun. It had earlier been endorsed by both parties (at different times... depending on who got the advantage for the change when the question was asked).

If several of the larger states in America had proportional voting with the electoral college, America would also have to be worrying about coalition governments or in that case a coalition president taking over the White House. It actually would empower the minority parties where groups like the Libertarians or the Constitutional party could step in and swing their support for one of the major parties and actually decide the outcome of the election in a significant manner, or throw the election to the U.S. House of Representatives.... something the Democrats didn't want to try after the 2000 election as they were quite certain they were going to lose in that forum.

As for the Senate, it serves an important role too, and helps to protect the interests of the smaller states. That is precisely what it was designed to do in the first place, so again, what is the problem? Of course I think it was a mistake to have direct election of the senators as well, but that is a separate issue.

Re:Silly Brits

[Timmmm]

Utter rubbish. You just aren't being imaginative enough about alternative election systems. Consider this system I just made up:

It is based on range voting (i.e. give each option up to, say 10 votes). On your ballot you have *two* choices. One is for the party you want to be in power, and the other is for your local MP. Each choice is decided by giving all options up to 10 votes.

You local MP is decided by whoever gets the most votes. Simple.
Then we sum up the votes for each *party* to get N for each party. The 'power' of each MP in the house of commons is then made proportional to the votes for their party, divided by the number of elected MPs in that party. Where 'power' is how much their vote is worth. Again, reasonably simple.

Advantages of this system:
* Eliminates tactical voting.
* Separates voting for the party (which is what everyone wants to do) from voting for your MP (which is what everyone has to do)
* Retains local representation.
* MP is *more* accountable to their electorate since everyone is free to vote them out without hurting their party.
* Your last point about 'attachment to electorate' is complete bollocks anyway.
* One can freely vote for a MP they like even if he is in a party they don't, and vice versa.

Claimed disadvantages:
* Too complicated. I really don't think it is. All you have to do is rate each party and candidate out of 10.
* Results in a hung parliament. I honestly think that wouldn't be such a bad thing. Parties just pretend it is because *of course* they want a majority. Besides, this is easy to fix - just lower the voting threshold for something to pass in the house of commons.
* People might complain that their MP can't represent them as well *in local issues* because his vote is less powerful. True, but he can still debate, and can't do anything with one vote anyway.

Actual disadvantages:
* More complicated than FPTP.
* MPs will have to do slightly more maths to work out if they will win a vote in the house of commons.
* Although it would be way better than FPTP, it's not perfect, so people will always say "We can't use it because "

A man can dream...

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

First, is there some part of "geography" you don't understand? Or do you think I'm a Yank?

Second, it was a UK general election, not a Scottish nor an English nor a Glocestershire nor a home counties one. Counting an arbitrary subset of the country is bogus.

Re:Silly Brits

[Teancum]

I don't think anyone in the US congress votes "99.999%" with one of the parties, given that the parties don't vote as one very often anyway.

Lately they have been voting along party lines. Not 100% of the time and not for every vote, but it does tend to happen where a vast majority (80%+ for each party) of the members of that party vote a certain way for many votes cast in congress. Just sit down and watch C-Span for awhile and you will usually see several votes where you can clearly tell what party is the one pushing forward the idea.

I would say at least one vote is like this every day while Congress is in session... usually several votes. I guess that doesn't count as "very often"?

Re:Silly Brits

[Pinky's Brain]

Even ignoring that party support is necessary to get elected, they are only accountable to the people they need to elect them and not the electorate as a whole. They are entirely unaccountable to the disenfranchised voters if they don't need them, which in FPTP is true in the majority of districts.

In reality though party support is essential ... so even the people who get to decide whether Kang or Kodo represents the party it doesn't matter. They are accountable to the party whips (or whatever they call them in the US) more than they are to the voters.

Re:Silly Brits

[mjwx]

It all went downhill when they got rid of the Ministry of Silly Walks.

And replaced with the Ministry of Silly Ideas.

Re:Silly Brits

[chrb]

it encourages those who would try to run the country to consider problems for the country as a whole

It depends on what exactly you mean by "country". Are you referring to the people, or to the land? If you mean that power should be divided by land area, and that 10 people living on an island should have the same power as 1000 living in a town, then that is fine. But if you think that power should be divided equally amongst the citizens, so that 1000 people have more power than 10 regardless of where they reside, then the existing system is not fine...

Re:Silly Brits

[Teancum]

Keep in mind that the 435 members of the U.S. House of Representatives is a number that is set up by ordinary law and can be changed at any time. For myself, I'd rather see an enlargement of the House to encourage more local representation and to fix some of the problems perceived with the electoral college as well (electoral votes are based on the number of representatives allocated to each state). The original intent for the framers of the U.S. Constitution was to keep the number at roughly one representative for about every 30 thousand to 50 thousand citizens.

As for how a legislative body with over 4k members would function, that is something that can be debated too. Then again, if you look at how many staff members are involved with running congress, there are well over 4k people running around on Capitol Hill at any given moment and in fact most of the major decision making is being done by the staff members as well.

Re:Silly Brits

[jimicus]

Similarly, if the UK were a 2-party system, the Labour and Lib Dems (which if I recall are both more similar to each other than the Conservatives) would be a single party and easily have won.

In order to win, a party needs 326 MPs.

Labour got 258, Lib Dems 57. Giving a total of 315.

Sure, they'd have more seats than the Conservatives, but they'd still be a minority government. They'd have to form a coalition with smaller parties to be sure of getting legislation through - without that, the Conservatives could deadlock Parliament by voting against the government on everything regardless of their own views, which would doubtless force an election sooner rather than later.

(For non-Brits - we don't have a three-party system. We have a multi-party system, it's just that parties other than the big three generally have very little support).

Re:Silly Brits

[jonbryce]

You said that less people like what the SNP says than like what the BNP says. That's not true, firstly because there is probably more support for an Independent Scotland in England than there is in Scotland, and secondly because people outside of Scotland weren't asked what they think about the SNP.

Re:Silly Brits

[chrb]

Small communities need a voice... at least they won't get ignored as they would in a proportional representation system.

That may be true for geographic communities, but what about all of the other small communities that aren't bound by geography? If someone wants to go ahead and create a party for World of Warcraft players, why should they have less power at the national level because they are geographically distributed, rather than residing in a single region? Regions should obviously have some degree of ability to self manage, and that is what local councils are for. But when dividing power at a national level, why should a citizen of a small village in the highlands have more power than a citizen living in one of the UK's cities? Why is their point of view on national topics - national defence, global politics, the EU etc. - given more weight , and hence more importance, than a citizen who chooses to live in a city? Are people living in the country wiser? More experienced in worldly matters? Why is their view more important?

In a FPTP (first past the post system, an MP is accountable to their electorate.

Hypothetically, this may be the case. In reality, it is not really true. There are many MPs sitting in safe seats, where they know that nothing short of serious crime will stop people voting for them. The truth is that most people already vote for a party - they look for the Conservative or Labour candidate, then check the box.

I feel inclined to point out that it was the FPTP system that brought us the expenses scandal. How well did that work out? Apart from Jacqui Smith, I can't think of a single MP that was voted out in the way you suggest.

MPs need to take into account the interests of their electorate. Of the people they represent

MPs in a FPTP system do not need to take account of the interests of their electorate - they only need to take notice of the interests of the ~30% of people who voted for them. The rest have no representation.

In a proportional representation system, MPs will not be representing the people.

In a proportional representation system, MPs will be representing everyone equally, and not just the largest single voting block.

Re:Silly Brits

[iserlohn]

The British system is actually quite pragmatic. The Queen routinely dismisses Parliament, but only does so under the advice of her (or his) Government (which is formed by a majority consensus in Parliament), when a new general election is called. The check and balances in this system were developed over the ages and, therefore, deeply rooted in convention, but some parts of the process is governed by statute.

The hypothetical situation is if the new Parliament is unable to form a new government, then what happens next. The speculation that Gordon Brown refusing to resign is just hyperbole. The Prime Minister can refuse to resign after any election (which is against convention and Parliamentary procedure), but he will not do so, as the political fallout will otherwise be unthinkable. The Queen has the power in theory to dismiss Parliament without advice (from her Government) under her reserve powers which will result in a new election called, but this power has never been used in modern times. As a reserve power, this is only used in emergencies when the Government is non-functional.

What you forget is that the UK is a Constitutional Monarchy, which basically means (in modern terms) that the Monarch governs by the consent of the people through a constitution. In fact, it would be more accurate to describe it as a Parliamentary Monarchy in which supreme power has been fully divested from the Crown to Parliament, governed by the Mandate provided by the public through suffrage.

Re:Silly Brits

[jez9999]

They could have a workable majority by throwing in the SDLP, Alliance, and Green parties, all of which are very likely to be OK with jumping into the alliance. That way it would take the Conservatives, DUP, *and* the SNP to vote them down; and if the SNP do that, they would be exposed for the opportunistic bastards they are. I doubt they'd dare, it's worth a try.

Re:Silly Brits

[jez9999]

what coalitions actually mean is that the lunatic fringe (yes including the one trick pony pirate party who has nothing meaningful to say on things like EU tax rates, monetary policy, Ukraine or georgia membership in NATO/EU, muslim immigration to europe etc)

As opposed to independents, who have nothing meaningful to say on anything other then 'cleaning up sleaze in politics' or 'save $MYHOMETOWN hospital', independents who are so trumpeted as a good thing in our current system?

Re:Silly Brits

[makiaea]

this pie chart also shows clearly the difference between the proportion of votes and the proportion of seats. charting-uk-20100506-election-votes-and-seats. (I made this pie chart using BBC data and google charts)

Re:Silly Brits

[chrb]

So what you're saying is that this guy would get elected because he had an enormous majority of voter support... ... and the problem is?

Hermann Göring was a fan of "First Past The Post" - at Nuremburg he said that if Germany had had a FPTP system like Britain's or the USA's, the Nazi Party would have taken every seat in the Reichstag at the elections. As it was they only got 37% of the vote, and rose to absolute power by subverting the system rather than by votes. Regardless, Proportional Representation did actually work to give them only a representative number of seats to their 37% vote, rather than the 100% they'd have had in Britain.

So, the point is that it would be nice to have a political system that gives a single political party that represents 37% of the electorate only 37% of the power in running the country. A political system where 37% translates to 100% of the power, completely ignoring the desires of the other 63%, is a bit odd. Unfortunately, people tend to only arrive at this point of view when their favoured party loses.

Re:Silly Brits

[zoney_ie]

That's only true in genuine full PR systems. In many cases, having "proportional representation" really just means "more proportional". For this reason I think those in opposition to PR in the UK are being silly. They could keep their mostly 2+1 party system but have transferable vote to dispense with wasted votes and PR to allow a fairer link between vote share and seats (so Lib Dems would instead of about 10% seats would be a bit under 20%).

However, the crazy thing is that they are not even looking at introducing PR! The "Alternative Vote" that Labour propose would mainly just get rid of wasted votes. Indeed for this reason, it might mean that Labour are boosted most of all, not the Lib Dems. Why? Because increased voters might turn out knowing they can vote Lib Dem (or SNP, or whoever) and put Labour second to avoid the Conservatives getting in.

All AV will do is perhaps allow Lib Dems to take some seats they should already have but for voters not voting (thinking their vote will be wasted) or currently voting strategically for one of the other two parties (probably Labour).

In my opinion, the UK should take the Irish PR-STV method and in order to keep some aspects of the results of FPTP that they like, they could limit it to three-seat constituencies. This pulls up the bar for small parties and big parties still get a "seat bonus", just not as extreme as under FPTP. Indeed even with urban constituencies of up to 5 seats, Ireland has a seat bonus for the largest party due to all the rural three seat constituencies (the biggest party getting two seats, the second party getting one). This would probably result in a quite variable election outcome for the UK. Depending on the political climate, it could benefit Labour, Cons or Lib Dems more than the others, with the former two still getting boosts beyond their current vote share, just not as extreme as under FPTP, but if a sustained vote share increase for Lib Dems occurred in just one election, it would quickly translate to more seats and they could even quickly bounce ahead of Labour.

The UK already use PR-STV for Scottish local elections and Northern Ireland assembly elections, so they are not without experience in it. For the latter it is the opposite strategy of what I propose, they have six-seat constituencies to have much greater proportionality than even the Republic of Ireland has.

I assume that even voters in much of the UK or the main parties don't want great amounts more proportionality, just no wasted votes and some people/parties want a bit more proportionality.

Re:Silly Brits

[jez9999]

Which is a lot better than one party being able to pass any laws they like. (Note: I'm not joking)

Re:Silly Brits

[ShakaUVM]

>>1) Their districts are drawn by an independent body. Ours are drawn by the state legislatures in almost all cases.

And both systems have their problems.

Here in California we had a proposition to have a bipartisan body draw district lines. Voters shot it down.

Re:Silly Brits

[jez9999]

For comparison, protests against the Iraq war that the Labour party you love (as it pays you never-ending benefits for sitting on your arse [ass]) achieved numbers exceeding 1,500,000 - which of course were ignored.

What better evidence do you need that we desperately need to fix the electoral system?

Re:Silly Brits

[mrrudge]

Depends how you look at it, I'm viewing it as a messy transition from a two ( almost identical ) party system to a three party system, which I see as an improvement and something I didn't believe possible even at the last general election.

We've got rid of the party which has so badly eroded civil liberties, ( the workers party ! ) and we're likely to get a government which is mainly capitalistic, with an element of liberalism which is confined to fighting it's strongest arguments, which is exactly the target my tactical voting hoped for. ( Whether a hung parliment can do any meaningful work is yet to be seen. )

The citizen's vote has just resulted in a change of power away from people who say I'm dying to carry an ID card and run to war everytime America wants something, so as a British voter I feel my vote has changed something pivotal.

Re:Silly Brits

[jez9999]

If I remember correctly, the UKIP got about twice as many votes as the SNP and the BNP got about the same number of votes as the SNP, yet the SNP got six seats and the UKIP and BNP didn't get any

Actually the most painful comparison is between the DUP which got 150,000 votes and 8 seats, and UKIP which got 900,000 votes and 0 seats. Whatsmore UKIP were nowhere near getting a seat; they could probably have gotten 2 million votes and 0 seats.

Re:Silly Brits

[mrrudge]

As an aside, British people don't generally think of themselves as 'citizens', it's a fairly new term in British politics and generally used in relation to the patriotisation of immigrants.

Re:Silly Brits

[L4t3r4lu5]

Gaits are fine, but what will they do about my fence?

Waaa waaa waaaaaaaaaa!

Re:Silly Brits

[Alioth]

You cannot oblige a future parliament to pay for the contracts of a previous - there will be no huge penalties for cancellation of these projects.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

By fair, you mean one that favours your party?

Re:Silly Brits

[Jedi Alec]

Precisely. Not great (I'm not a fan of the man), but not a total disaster either.

Well, I guess it was a disaster for Iraqis. But for Americans, he presided over a relatively stable and growing nation.

Absolutely. He managed to go from a situation where the entire western world felt sorry for you and sympathized deeply with the US(9/11) to a situation where you've pretty much squandered every shred of credibility you had left(right now). Your enemies hate you a bit more, the neutrals have grown a lot more distrustful, and even your best friends are taking just a few steps back.

Awesome job G.W! *pats back*

Re:Silly Brits

[dave420]

The Queen can only call for a do-over, and that hasn't happened for centuries. She's not riding in and bossing people around, just calling out the politicians' inability to get their shit together. Why does that get you all scared? Weird.

Re:Silly Brits

[Ragzouken]

The vast majority of britons looked at what the lib dems offered, said 'he looks nice but no thanks

The majority of the electorate did not vote for any one party, and so this is true of every party. 77% of the electorate did not vote for the Conservatives, 82% did not vote for Labour, 86% did not vote for the Liberal Democrats. 35% of people said no thanks to every single party.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

The citizen's vote has just resulted in a change of power away from people who say I'm dying to carry an ID card and run to war everytime America wants something

Yeah, I remember Mrs Thatcher. She let ol' Ronnie Reagan know who was the boss alright.

Re:Silly Brits

[dave420]

Christ. Give it a rest. No one blames GWB for the hurricane, but some definitely blame him for his complete lack of action after the hurricane hit, causing deaths and massive loss.

Re:Silly Brits

[Ragzouken]

As far as accountability goes, all three major parties have pledged to give the ability to sack your MP and have him replaced.

Re:Silly Brits

[Ragzouken]

It allows an alliance of parties with votes summing up to a majority of votes to reach a compromise to pass laws that are supported by every member of that alliance. You make it sound as if a coalition government will pass every unpopular law that any single member of the coalition wants.

Re:Silly Brits

[Shrike82]

It is unlikely that Gordon Brown can remain as prime minister , he makes a better chancellor to be honest.

Yeah, he did a great job presiding over the economy last time, deregulating the banking sector because banks said they needed less regulation. That worked out brilliantly.

Re:Silly Brits

[Eunuchswear]

Uh, Britain does have an electoral college. It's called the Commons.

What we have here is a hung electoral college.

Re:Silly Brits

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually Labour and Conservatives are closer to each other than they are to the LibDems. On paper Labour is Left, the LibDems Centre and the Tories are to the Right. However under 13 years of New Labour, Blair and Brown have moved the Labour party further to the right, such that they are really as far to the right as the Tories on most issues.

It's true to say that most Labour voters are not as far to the right as the party but that's another issue.

On paper PR would reduce the Labour seat count, possibly increase the Tory seat count and drastically increase the seat count of the LibDems and the various smaller parties. Given the electoral reform has been a LibDem top issue for most of the history of the the UK parliament, certainly the past 200 years, you can expect to demand it in a coalition. Hence the delicate negotiations at the moment as the Tories as they are dead against electoral reform - to be honest most senior Tories probably think if you aren't a right thinking country gent with a decent sized estate you shouldn't be allowed to vote anyway....

Re:Silly Brits

[TheRaven64]

The independent who stood in my constituency had quite a broad range of sensible sounding policies, but basically didn't stand a chance. Only the Labour and Lib Dem candidates had enough support to stand a good chance of winning and in the end there was only a difference of 500 votes between them.

Re:Silly Brits

[lordholm]

In Belgium they have devolved the federal state so much, that parties are either Flemish, French or German speaking, there are no multi-region parties that people vote for. Their failure of forming governments are related to that division, and not the fact that it is proportional.

In Sweden, there is a PR system based on regional lists and electoral districts, each district receives a number of seats in the parliament based on the districts share of the national population. Essentially, a party gets seats if they have more than 4% votes nationally, or more than 12% in the district (voters can also tick a preferred candidate on their ballot, so it is not only about party). Not everything is perfect in this system, but from a representation point of view, almost every persons vote counts, which is the main idea of democracy. This system have several times resulted in minority single party governments which have successfully lasted their mandated time. The system have also resulted in minority or majority coalition governments. Despite of the many minority governments and "hung parliaments" being the norm, very few Swedish governments have fallen.

Re:Silly Brits

[TheRaven64]

Yes, it would have really sucked in the USA to have had someone unelected come in after the 2000 Presidential election and force another election.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

What we voted for is a situation where only policies that everyone agrees are good can get passed. That is a good idea

Given that some people think murder, kiddy-diddling and parking on double yellow lines[1] shouldn't be illegal, we've established that it's impossible to get everyone to agree.

So now we argue about how many the many have to be in order to legitimately impose their will on the few; IOW, the situation we currently have. This is why talk about making every voice heard is airy fairy nonsense. You can't go to war and not go to war at the same time. You can't raise taxes and cut taxes at the same time.

[1] Separately. Not all at once.

Re:Silly Brits

[patch0]

FPTP Error 404: Government Not Found. Reset your voting system to proportional representation and try again.

Re:Silly Brits

[mrrudge]

Yes, fair point. As the child of a coal miner in the north of England I remember Mrs 'Milk Snatcher' and eighteen months of living by the charity of others well.

That's quite a long time ago, and was in the shadow of a very real nuclear arms race between superpowers able to destroy this country easily. Having a big friend made sense, and Europe was still recovering from a horribly destructive war.

Since then we've been involved in 'wars' without general British public support and that have not only made England unpopular in the world, but have shown our previous military ability to be on the wane.

I would expect a new government of any party to be incredibly wary of this, and to be actively moving our involvement in international affairs away from what is now a general distrust of American foreign policy.

Empires fade quickly.

Re:Silly Brits

[slim]

Not disagreeing with this:

Let's face facts. The BNP put its leader up in an East London constituency where it only narrowly lost last time around and where it had 12 local councillors voted in. The leader scraped home in 3rd place. All the BNP councillors were voted off. There is not a single constituency in the whole of the UK where the voters thought - 'yes, the BNP or UKIP candidate is the best one'.

... but the electorate in Barking had a fright with the last council elections, there was vigorous anti-BNP campaigning, and as a result thousands voted tactically rather than risk splitting the non-BNP vote.

Under a proportional voting system, these people could have voted for their first choice, safe in the knowledge that the system would also account for their non-preference for the BNP.

Re:Silly Brits

[vegiVamp]

In mathematics, I believe this is called a cumulative rounding error.

Re:Silly Brits

[TheRaven64]

There is no such ministry - it's an inter-departmental policy.

Re:Silly Brits

[soliptic]

Why?

Why are you asking someone to justify something which was clearly a rhetorical construction and not something they actually believe?

Hint: just before the bit you selectively quoted, " IF you mean that power should be divided by land area... then that is fine." Just after the bit you selectively quoted: " BUT if you think that power should be divided equally amongst the citizens...then the existing system is not fine"

Try reading the entire paragraph before "arguing" with it (aka restating what GP was obviously getting at themselves).

Re:Silly Brits

[ocularsinister]

• The smaller coalition partner does not hold 'the balance of power' - it's a coalition, and the two parties would agree a set of common objectives. That would involve compromise, but far more compromise from the smaller party than the larger. More contentious policies (such as repeal of the fox hunting bill) become impossible, but more broadly popular policies get implemented.
• Strong governments rarely make good governments (think 'power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely'). Note that Greece has a strong majority government, yet right now is the basket case of Europe. Germany has had a coalition government for 60 years and seems to do OK. Of course, Spain and Portugal aren't doing so well, either, so the best one can say is that whether or not a government has a strong majority has little or no effect on that country's economic well being.

• Yes, they waffle about in indecision. But this is a *good* thing. A government think more and do less is a good thing in every way possible.

• It wasn't Thatcher's fantastic economic skills (or Reagan's, for that matter) that saved the country, it was North Sea oil. It is not entirely by accident, in my opinion, that our current economic decline is mirrored by the decline in North Sea oil productivity. Both Labour and Tory governments have squandered what was quite possibly our most valuable resource. We will live to rue this in the coming decades.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

In a system of proportional representation you finally get the chance to have a representative that more closely aligns with your views.

You do nothing of the sort. You vote for the party. The more votes a party has, the further down the list they go. The party leadership choose who's on the list, and in what order.

Dumping a candidate on an area by the national party will become more difficult again a plus point.

Tripe. See above.

It is unlikely that Gordon Brown can remain as prime minister , he makes a better chancellor to be honest.

He's good at being in the right place at the right time, and getting out of the way before the reckoning comes.

Vince Cable would be miles better as chancellor. He actually understands economics. In fact almost everyone understands economics more than Brown. Any silly bugger can look good in a boom.

Re:Silly Brits

[xelah]

To make British politics work for its citizens a system of proportional representation is needed. The current system forces you to vote for the party you think can defeat the party you really detest.

STV might help more there, but I can see PR makes it less necessary (because your vote still influences the outcome when it wouldn't have done if your party gets few votes in your area);

In a system of proportional representation you finally get the chance to have a representative that more closely aligns with your views. Labour would probably lose my vote unless I had faith in the particular candidate and that realistically means he/she will have experience in local politics in the city or county councils. Dumping a candidate on an area by the national party will become more difficult again a plus point.

I don't see that one. How would you have a particular candidate for your area with PR? Are you thinking of a system basically like the current one, but with a national list which tops-up the number of the various parties' MPs to match their national share of the vote? That gives more power to national parties, doesn't it? Or maybe one like the European voting system, with a list for each region, which means your MEP isn't really local at all?

Re:Silly Brits

[Xest]

Sorry, but your entire final paragraph is just complete and utter bollocks.

"There's almost no situation where a proportional representation system would beat out a FPTP system, in terms of keeping the people in charge in a democracy"

Wrong. In the UK I live in an area known as a safe seat, it has been held by Labour since 1918, and they currently have a majority of around 10,000. This means that because I do not support Labour, and the MP in the safe seat does not represent my views (i.e. he's pro-ID card etc.) I do not have a representative. Worse, no matter how I vote, unless I support Labour, my vote is completely and utterly irrelevant because it'll still lead to a Labour candidate gaining power regardless as there simply aren't enough people in this area willing to overturn that.

What's ironic is I actually have more say in the running of Britain for my European parliamentary vote, because it's proportional and whilst it's 1 vote in 535,000,000, that's still 1/535,000,000 more than my UK vote which has zero worth or effect.

For people in safe seats who vote against the safe seat which was around 19 million people in the UK in 2005, more now, FPTP does not give these people any real worthwhile democratic vote. PR however does. If you think FPTP keeps people in charge of democracy you're completely and utterly delusional- it keeps a very small group of people in charge- those in marginal seats, and no one else. The majority of the population has no democratic say under FPTP, whilst under PR everyone would have an equal say. Your suggestion that over 19 million people in a country of 60 million having no say at all, whilst far more have a say, but only because they agree with the results of the marginals in a voting population of around 44 million, is somehow more democratic than everyone having an equal say is mind blowingly nonsensical.

In 2005, Labour won the election in the UK with only 33% of popular vote, yet they had 60% of seats in parliament. This meant that they were able to pass laws, and even change prime minister against the will of 67% of the population. I just can't comprehened how someone can suggest that system is more accountable when you have a minority dictating against the majority.

A suspect part of your misunderstanding comes from the fact that Canada's consistuent boundaries are much better laid out and work better right now, but they're far from perfect, and over time you can be rest assured, that like the UK, they will become much worse.

"I think a proportional representation system is only appealing because people don't really grasp all the concepts involved in a solid, democratic Parliamentary system."

It's appealing because it's the only fair way of selecting ministers, whilst some are better than others, every other method is prone to some arbitrary fudging that can benefit some parties over others and mean that government does not represent the people. It is still wrong to call FPTP democratic as it is barely that when large swathes of the population have no real say in the running of the country.

"Proportional representation falls short on so many aspects that it's just not worth any serious consideration."

Actually, there's no real aspects it falls short on unless you're in support of laws that only benefit you and a minority, and want them pushed through to the detriment of the majority. I suspect you don't actually understand the details of PR or the different implementations of PR or partial PR, as FPTP is weaker than most PR systems. The main criticisms of it, and the counter points are:

Argument: PR removes local representation
Wrong, under a PR system you can still have local representatives, this is how votes in the European parliament work for example. What's more, under PR you can communicate with the local representative that actually represents you, under FPTP you can only contact one that doesn't represent you if you voted against him, this is often the same as having no representation because if you di

Re:Silly Brits

[Xest]

Just to add one of the largest idiocies of the system and the latest election.

The Liberal Democrats, in 2005, got 22% of the popular vote, and had 9% of the seats at 62 seats. This year, they got 23% of the popular vote, but lost 5 seats and now only have 8% of the seats.

So despite the fact the Lib Dems have gone up 1% in terms of votes gained, they've gone down 1% in terms of the amount of power they have in parliament.

I just don't know how people can justify keeping the FPTP system like this, it's so utterly broken- under no circumstance should an increase in support lead to a decrease in power like that.

Re:Silly Brits

[Glasswire]

In a system even more like the actual British system, Canada has had minority parliaments where the PM asks the Govt General (in the Queen's stead) to let him form a Govt without a majority for about 3 years now. Without formal coalitions they simply need to ensure that they can find one of the other two major parties to support any given piece of legislation and as long as the opposition does not unite to force a confidence vote, the govt goes on. I could see UK Conservatives getting agreement from LibDems on enough issues to make a minority govt work. In a time of Euro (and other) instability in the world, it's irresponsible of the British and world press to talk about a 'hung' parliament as if that represented some kind of paralytic constitutional crisis. Parliamentary democracies are designed to deal with this in a orderly way.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

The smaller coalition partner does not hold 'the balance of power

They can bring down the larger party by changing sides or simply becoming neutral. If that doesn't constitute holding the balance of power, I don't know what does.

Strong governments rarely make good governments (think 'power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely').

If I wanted simplistic soundbites & claptrap, I'd go to Faux News. Strong government and absolute power are not the same thing. A strong democratically elected government (say the post-war UK Labour one) is nothing like a dictatorship. A dictator who dithers does not deliver strong government.

Note that Greece has a strong majority government, yet right now is the basket case of Europe.

It has a strong majority government now.

Please forward me the memo. The one about how they reset everything so a new government starts with a clean slate. I appear to have missed it.

Yes, they waffle about in indecision. But this is a *good* thing. A government think more and do less is a good thing in every way possible.

More fodder for the peanut gallery. Actions speak louder than words, and thoughts are silent.

Re:Silly Brits

[delinear]

what coalitions actually mean is that the lunatic fringe (yes including the one trick pony pirate party who has nothing meaningful to say on things like EU tax rates, monetary policy, Ukraine or georgia membership in NATO/EU, muslim immigration to europe etc) gets a disproportionate share of power in exchange for not toppling the government, or they get a free reign on a collection of their particular issues, which may, on the whole, be disastrous for the country, but in the short term prop up one party.

I think you're exaggerating the influence this gives to minority fringe parties a little. Remember, votes are generally yes/no, and if they're close enough that one or two votes can sway the result, then perhaps they need further consideration in the first place, regardless of the motives of those one or two fringe voters (after all, if 45% of people are against a new law and 55% in favour, that's still a pretty big group of people who don't want the legislation to just ignore their views, which is what a strong majority government would do, and suggests that further consideration would be useful).

Re:Silly Brits

[delinear]

In a system of proportional representation you finally get the chance to have a representative that more closely aligns with your views.

You do nothing of the sort. You vote for the party. The more votes a party has, the further down the list they go. The party leadership choose who's on the list, and in what order.

There's nothing to say it has to be this way - it could just as easily be the party members who vote on the candidates (in fact, I thought Labour and Lib Dem already did this, at least to some extent, and only Conservatives left it up to the leadership, but I could be wrong).

Re:Silly Brits

[Don_dumb]

The reason the Liberal Democrats lost seats is because their support geographically was diminished. They may have had more voters overall, but those voters were more concentrated in fewer districts than had been the case earlier.

That sounds like a pretty fair system where it encourages those who would try to run the country to consider problems for the country as a whole and not to just a few places where the voters are concentrated.

Please look again, as in fact it does the opposite.
The Labour and Tory votes are concentrated in small areas (rich and poor respectively), hence they get lots of seats. Whereas the Lib Dem vote is spread across the entire country and thus they don't get many seats.
Note also that the Tories don't get many votes in entire nations (Scotland), as opposed to the Lib Dems.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

In 2005, Labour won the election in the UK with only 33% of popular vote, yet they had 60% of seats in parliament. This meant that they were able to pass laws, and even change prime minister against the will of 67% of the population.

Actually, rounded to the nearest whole number, the breakdown was (Votes) Lab 35%, Con 32%, LD 22% - and iIn seats 55%, 35%, 10%. A little less disproportionate than you suggest.

But you're making an assumption that anyone who votes for X is against Y. Not so. He might just prefer X. He might be against Z...

Make a lib-con coalition from the 2005 election figures. 78%[1] are against the LDs. 68% are against the Tories. So presumably 146% of people would be against that coalition?

[1] using the correct figures, not the ones you made up.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

The police estimate was 2000 people in London

Must be true then. Fucking masons, the lot of 'em.

Re:Silly Brits

[Dr_Barnowl]

signing billion dollar IT contracts for useless projects that they knew the next government would want to cancel, intentionally negotiating contracts with huge penalties for cancellation.

They should just man up and cancel the contract without penalty - after all, they are the frickin' GOVERNMENT.

On a similarly frivolous note, perhaps they should say "your contract is with the Labour government, and MMMM they don't seem to be around anymore. Get them voted back in if you want your cancellation payment."....

Re:Silly Brits

[tehcyder]

If I remember correctly, the UKIP got about twice as many votes as the SNP and the BNP got about the same number of votes as the SNP, yet the SNP got six seats and the UKIP and BNP didn't get any.

But that is an argument in favour of FPTP. One of the few positives from the election was that the far right didn't get any seats.

Also, it's a bit unfair picking on the SNP, as I'm pretty sure their votes were concentrated in Scotland rather than spread around the whole UK...

Re:Silly Brits

[PybusJ]

Actually I believe that US congress people are less likely to vote along party lines than UK parliamentarians. Just look at the trouble Obama had getting his health care reform through despite majorities in both chambers. The party whips (those in charge of party discipline in UK politics) wield considerable power in the Westminster parliament.

Not that this is necessarily a good thing. It does mean that US representatives seem to hold out for pork barrel concessions far more than in the UK system (though the minor regional parties in the UK are openly looking for these type of concessions to be part of any coalition). On the other hand, the way the UK parliament has become marginalised by the executive in the last decade or so, is bad for good government.

Re:Silly Brits

[tehcyder]

So what you're saying is that this guy would get elected because he had an enormous majority of voter support... ... and the problem is?

The problem, fuckbrain, is that in a lot of constituencies a large number of voters are effectively disenfranchised, and that overall the two main parties end up with an unrealistically high percentage of seats compared with their overall share of the vote.

Also, if you are the MP for a constituency with a large labour or tory majority, you don't have to worry about being a good MP, and the notion of local accountability becomes laughable.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

Leadership is a rather vague word and I could have chosen a better one, but I certainly didn't mean the leader.

But whether it's the parliamentary party, the executive committee or the star chamber of the grand temple it's still a relatively small cabal of insiders - a long way from the people deciding.

Re:Silly Brits

[mikechant]

You do nothing of the sort. You vote for the party. The more votes a party has, the further down the list they go. The party leadership choose who's on the list, and in what order.

You seem to be quite uninformed about PR. You describe a feature which most people would regard as a flaw of a *particular sort of PR*, i.e. one involving a party list where no intra-party preferences can be expressed, and then use that to attack PR in general, including systems not involving party lists at all or involving party lists where intra-party voting preferences *can* be expressed.
Wikipedia has a reasonable introduction to the main types of PR.

Re:Silly Brits

[Xest]

You're right, those numbers were off a bit, I was going by figures I thought I'd read on Wikipedia some months back, but probably mis-remembered them. Either way it's pretty irrelevant, because it still represents a massive disparity between the actual support, and the power granted.

"But you're making an assumption that anyone who votes for X is against Y. Not so. He might just prefer X. He might be against Z..."

But this works both ways. Say someone votes Tory because they like most their policies, but disagree with the anti-ID card stance of them, then sure that doesn't mean all Tory supporters are against ID cards, but in contrast, it also doesn't mean all Labour supporters are for them either. On average though, in the context of per-issue polls, it tends to balance out quite well, so it's really not that relevant in practice.

"Make a lib-con coalition from the 2005 election figures. 78%[1] are against the LDs. 68% are against the Tories. So presumably 146% of people would be against that coalition?"

This makes no sense, for obvious reasons. A coalition assumes compromise, meaning no one gets their full way, hence why your numbers add up to a nonsensical figure. People accepting compromise for the sake of a coalition doesn't mean they're no longer against the policies they disagree with from the other side of the coalition however, it just means they're willing to put up with them for the sake of the coalition, or in some cases, some people wont support the coalition of course. Effectively whilst they still disagree, they're willing to put that disagreement aside because the alternative of a broken parliament would be worse.

Re:Silly Brits

[mikechant]

It has a strong majority government now.

Please forward me the memo. The one about how they reset everything so a new government starts with a clean slate. I appear to have missed it.

Greece has also had a single party goverments with clear majorities for the last *14 years*

Re:Silly Brits

[asc99c]

I am very optimistic of the potential of a hung parliament. For the last 13 years, it seems barely a single Labour MP has had the backbone to vote outside of the party line. Law after ridiculous law has been passed without proper debate. Time and again, these laws have been badly worded and badly scoped. But it just doesn't matter because all the Labour MPs vote according to their party position. Perhaps a dozen seem to actually engage their brain and vote as they believe, but the parliamentary majority was big enough that it made no difference.

The media always seem to portray the Conservatives in a very negative light for their internal disagreements on policy. This for me is one of the more attractive features. They have many more MPs who have strong beliefs they are willing to argue for publicly, that don't necessarily go along with what the overall party believes. Assuming people vote properly for their local MP based on that persons views this is a very good thing.

I'm really hoping that in this next parliament, controversial and unpopular laws are going to be unpassable, at least without a proper discussion of the merits, and attempts to remove or minimise the possible deleterious effects. Even the Conservatives + Lib Dems will have a smaller majority than Labour had, and so I hope the laws that do get made will be far more sensible than the ones we have had these last 13 years.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

Let's say the question is to go to war or not to go to war. There is no middle case that any amount of consideration can change (other than dithering so lang that you lose before you even start).

If 30% are against, what do you do - have the war, but don't use any tanks? 40% against you just have a bar-room brawl? Closer than that you have a fist fight, no heeders and putting the boot in?

Re:Silly Brits

[Krommenaas]

You'll notice that in countries with PR, there IS NO movement to change to fptp, and there IS NO support for such an idea, academic or otherwise. EVEN though the large parties and all the people who vote for them would gain from it, while in the USA and UK only the smaller parties and their smaller electorates would gain from changing the system.

Re:Silly Brits

[asc99c]

Definitely. I live in Rochdale, which previously had a Lib Dem MP on a very slim majority. The constituency was changed to move a solidly Labour ward from a nearby solid Labour constituency into Rochdale. It worked perfectly. We now have a Labour MP on a narrow majority. And the nearby consituency is slightly less solid Labour, but still Labour. Nice result for the Labour government.

Supposedly, the constituency boundaries are independantly set, but strangely they always seem to favour one side.

Re:Silly Brits

[rapiddescent]

Labour and Conservative got around 33,000 votes per seat - based on a UK average,
The SNP received 106,000 votes per seat won
Lib Dem was something like 215,000 votes to win a seat.

So you get madness like the Lib Dems winning 25% of the national vote but only getting 55 odd seats.
And the SNP winning 20% of the Scottish vote only to achieve 1% of the seats in parliament.

There's a lot of theory about why this happens but the main one is that electoral boundaries do not follow geo-political boundaries (like they do in the USA for example) and have been gerrymandered over the years to achieve political results.

Re:Silly Brits

[asc99c]

But if you look outside of southern England, the accepted wisdom in many areas, particularly Scotland, is that the Conservatives aren't going to win a seat. I think a lot of voters in these areas vote Lib Dem or other parties as their way of voting for not-Labour.

As it is, there's little point voting Conservative if you know they'll only get 10% of the vote. They just won't win the seat, and your vote will mean very little. I wonder what the real Conservative vote would be in Scotland if people thought their vote would count.

Re:Silly Brits

[Xest]

If 30% are against, then you go to war, because 70% aren't, and hence the vote to go to war will pass a PR parliament easily.

If 40% are against, then the same goes.

There's only really contention when you have say 51% for, and 49% against in terms of popular support, and a fringe party holds the balance of power, but in this case the solution is generally quite simple. The parties requiring support of the fringe party have to ask themselves if it's a party they want the support of, if it's a far right party, is it worth taking the risk and gaining their support knowing this'll destroy their support come next election?

Of course, even FPTP risks this exact situation, so it's not a PR problem, it's a problem with democracy in general. It can happen more often under PR, but it's still quite infrequent, and again, the decision is far easier than you seem to think- how far do you have to go to gain the support of the fringe party? if it's too far, don't do it, let the law fail to pass, if it's not too big a deal, go for it and accept the consequences of dealing with the fringe come next election.

PR hasn't stopped countries like Germany and so forth being extremely successful and for a nation that has a rather nasty history with the far right- more so than any other country in fact, it still hasn't allowed the far right to gain any real ground.

Re:Silly Brits

[mikechant]

This entails several unsavoury results:

- No local representation. Geography-based representation is huge for a country like Canada. Small communities need a voice. Although they may not have an equal voice in Parliament, at least they won't get ignored as they would in a proportional representation system.
- No accountability. In a FPTP (first past the post [wikipedia.org]) system, an MP is accountable to their electorate. If you F up, you will be voted out. In a proportional system, the parties decide who the MPs are, so even if an MP Fs up, they may not be replaced by the party.
- No attachment to electorate.

Yet another comment that uses a version of PR with certain characteristics to attack all forms of PR including those which do not suffer from these defects.

A couple of examples:
1/ Small Multi-member constituencies with single transferrable vote. If my city, which has 3 MPs, had these pooled into a single consituency, using STV, I would not consider them 'less local' than at present, in fact they would need to compete to be the 'best MP for the city'.
2/ Contituency MPs + Regional 'top-up' MPs with voter decided party-list preferences: Constituency MPs are elected as at present, giving local representation etc as at present; regional MPs are elected on a PR list system where voters can express preferences between candidates within a party list. The ballot papers for the list system don't have to list the party candidates in preference order (could be random etc.). This actually has the advantage that you get both local *and* regional representation.

Anyhow, the point is you can devise various systems which are much more proportional than FPTP (if not perfectly so) and still provide good local representation.

National, party-dictated list-based PR systems (which is effectively what you are attacking) are probably the worst sort except possibly for very small countries. They are also pretty rare and no-one serious has ever proposed such a system for the UK house of commons.

Re:Silly Brits

[Xest]

Yet New Zealand remains the least corrupt country in the world according to the Corruption Perceptions Index, one of the nicest countries in the world to live according to the UN Human Development Index, and one of the top 30 countries in the world in terms of GDP per capita, and is in the top 15 countries by life expectancy.

So I guess it's not working too badly after all then and you're in fact completely wrong about the reality of New Zealand's parliament, because by just about every measure, New Zealand is doing pretty well, particularly considering it's in a pretty remote part of the world far away from most of it's natural allies and trade partners apart from Australia which puts it in a tough position to begin with. PR seems to be working pretty damn well for it in fact.

Re:Silly Brits

[TheRaven64]

The Conservatives didn't stand a chance in my constituency, which has been a Labour seat for almost all of the time since the Labour party was formed, but they still got 20% of the vote (up from 16% last time). Labour beat the Lib Dems by 500 votes (down from 4,000 last time and 7,000 the time before). Conservative voters are unlikely to see either Labour or the Lib Dems as a lesser evil.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

Party list is by far the most common variant of PR. So presumably when you sandal-wearing kumbaya-chanting types are wittering on about how great it must be because so many countries (and the E sodding U) use it, that's the kind you're advocating.

Re:Silly Brits

[mikechant]

In 2005, Labour won the election in the UK with only 33% of popular vote, yet they had 60% of seats in parliament.

35.3% of popular vote and 55% (356/646) of the seats according to the BBC 2005 website.
Still not acceptable though.

Re:Silly Brits

[mdwh2]

As much as it seems silly that the two losing parties still remain in power, it isn't when you think of it. If combined they still represent more votes (and thus a higher percentage of people's views), shouldn't they be the ones in power rather than a party that a majority of people didn't want?

Indeed - and the side-benefit of an improved voting system would be that we could see what people's second choices really where, and know whether Tory were really the most popular choice, or if it was a Lab/Lib coalition.

I find it particularly amusing that the scaremongering against voting reform is coming from people whining about "PR will mean it's always like this" when they're also complaining that the choice of who forms Government now is undemocratic and "in back rooms", "behind closed doors" (they should talk in the street?) - if we have voting reform, we'd know what the popular mandate was.

Nick Clegg is in a dilemma as he has no idea what the 2nd choices of his own voters are (and hence whether they would rather Tory or Labour) - all he can go on is that Tory have most votes, but that could be very misleading if most Lib Dem voters might prefer Labour to Tory.

Re:Silly Brits

[Xest]

Yeah, serves me right for trying to remember the figures off the top of my head. I'm sure I recall reading the figures I stated on Wikipedia sometime last year, but I can't be bothered to look all the way through Wikipedia's change logs to see if it's my memory that sucks or if Wikipedia had the wrong data on it!

As you say, and as I pointed out to the other guy that responded to me, it still demonstrates the point, it's far too big a disparity between proportion of vote, and proportion of power.

Re:Silly Brits

[mdwh2]

You've got it backwards - under FPTP, parties are better off if they have concentrated support, and the Lib Dems lose out precisely because their support is much more uniform.

Case in point is Oxford: it's arbitrarily divided into two constituencies. Overall for Oxford, Lib Dems had most support. But who did they elect? One Tory MP, and one Labour MP. Why? Because the Lib Dem support is uniform across the city.

Re:Silly Brits

[mdwh2]

The Lib Dems advocate STV with voting for candidates, not parties ( http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article7121275.ece , http://news.stv.tv/election-2010/analysis/176335-stvs-guide-to-stv/ ).

And the Alternative Vote Plus system (which a commission recommended under Labour) would also have people voting for candidates.

So yes, you can argue with your straw man, but the rest of us are proposing something different.

Re:Silly Brits

[mdwh2]

what coalitions actually mean is that the lunatic fringe (yes including the one trick pony pirate party who has nothing meaningful to say on things like EU tax rates, monetary policy, Ukraine or georgia membership in NATO/EU, muslim immigration to europe etc) gets a disproportionate share of power in exchange for not toppling the government

By "disproportionate" you mean proportionate to what people voted for? How do they topple the Government?

The minority conservatives essentially govern unopposed on all but the most serious of issues because the liberals are too spineless to risk losing another election. In this case we have a party with ~30% popular support governing like it has a majority.

How is this worse than the UK's FPTP, where we always have the case where a party with ~30% popular support governments with an actual majority?

In the UK case, a party - the lib dems, or (god help them) collection of small fringe parties have been handed the power to let the conservatives or theoretically Labour govern.

False. Tories and Labour have the choice too. They have more power - the Tories can do a deal with either Labour or Lib Dem, or they can go ahead as a minority Government. Labour also have a choice who to do a deal with.

Can you give me an example of a law that everyone agrees should be passed, but wouldn't pass in a coalition? Everytime I ask someone this question, I've yet to get an answer. I mean what, would the opposition parties just veto everything just to be awkward, even if they agreed with it?

On the other hand, there are plenty of draconian and dubious laws which are swept through with a majority Government, with no ability for anyone to stop them.

We've got a hung Parliament now, and the sky hasn't fallen down like the scaremongerers predicted.

Anyhow - proportional or not, I don't care. But there's no excuse for keeping with a broken voting system like FPTP. Give us Alternative Vote, Condorcet or whatever - even for non-PR systems, there are vastly better ways of electing MPs. The side benefit of a ranked voting system would also be that in a hung Parliament, we'd know which party or coalition really had the popular support. Right now, thanks to FPTP, we don't have a clue.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

Post hoc ergo propter hoc.

There are a lot of countries using PR that rank lower on that index than the the UK - which doesn't.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

the rest of us are proposing something different.

That's as far as it will get.

Re:Silly Brits

[mikechant]

But to switch to a system where minor parties get overrepresented in coalitions (like the Israeli system) and back room deals override the electorate (like right now) is a huge mistake.

Yes, it's much better to have the current system where one party with just over one third of the vote can completely override the wishes of two-thirds of the electorate, rather than have a coaltion which at least partially represents 59% of the electorate.

Are you seriously argueing that 'the electorate' really wanted an unrestrained Convservative government when only 36% of those who voted supported them?

First past the post works reaonably acceptably as a sort of tie-breaker when winning parties get around 40-50% of the vote and there are two main parties, the situation we pretty much had until 1983 in the UK. When you get toward a situation where there are three (or more) parties with substantial (say > 20%) support it's a democratic disaster. For example, you could have perpetual single party Labour government on the current system with just 35% of the vote.

If you're concerned about 'the wishes of the electorate' you should be particularly incensed by the FPTP 'safe seat' issue whereby the entire election campaign is effectively addressed to the one third or less of voters in seats which can possibly change hands.
Under the current system two-thirds of the electorate are effectively irrelevant and are treated as such. Under some form of PR, all or most votes are important.

Re:Silly Brits

[mikechant]

By fair, you mean one that favours your party?

No, they presumably mean one which does not *massively discriminate against* their or any other party, by giving it less than 10% of the seats for around 25% of the vote. See the difference?

Re:Silly Brits

[Will Fisher]

I'm certainly against safe seats, but this could be fixed very easily by having open primaries. If you live in a (for example) safe labour area, you could then at least decide which person within the labour party represents you area, and vote them out if you wish.

I'm also not arguing that the conservatives deserved a majority this time, clearly they didn't (and nether did labour in 2005 for that matter, they only got 36% of the vote). A hung parliament is probably the correct outcome this time.

PR results in coalitions. Coalitions give:
1) Too much say to smaller parties
2) Too many decisions made behind closed doors

Now, imagine if we had this same outcome in seats terms with PR. This is what would be happening:
A party with ~45% of the vote is being blackmailed by a party with 10%, and extracting demands and cabinet seats. This would be quite wrong. The views of the 10% would be vastly overrepresented and the ~45% under-represented.
Plus everything would be happening behind closed doors.

This would clearly be quite wrong, and is what I am arguing against.

Re:Silly Brits

[pdcore]

Where's the 'problem'? Despite the best efforts of the UK media to make the ongoing discussions into a major issue, our country is still working...

And, to be frank, a great many folks would be happy _not_ to have any 'strong leadership' for a while; a lack of government means a lack of new bullshit laws etc.

Re:Silly Brits

[Xest]

I think you failed to follow the thread to this point because your comment doesn't make any sense in the context of it.

The last few posts have been specifically about New Zealand and whether PR works there, not whether you could extrapolate whether PR would or wouldn't be a success elsewhere from this.

Clearly New Zealand is a very good nation by just about all important metrics, this demonstrates that at very least PR isn't doing them any harm like the AC seems to imply, but suggests counter to the AC that New Zealand is actually working very well under PR.

Re:Silly Brits

[nedlohs]

80% isn't party voting. Has there ever been a congress in which *every* Democrat voted one way, and *every* Republican voted the other way on every vote?

And it's higher than 80% too, it's 90% in the house http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/110/house/party-voters/ which outweighs the senate at 80% by sheer numbers http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/110/senate/party-voters/

I'm guessing the UK is like Australia (I may be wrong on that of course) in which case it's 100%. *Nobody* votes against the party line, if they do they can kiss party membership good-bye. Aside from the occasional "conscience vote", which really just means its an issue that the party doesn't want to take a side on since either way would alienate a large portion of their voters.

Well you do get the occasional floor crosser in the Senate Barnaby Joyce has made a habit of it - though no one had in the 20 years before he first did. Of course "habit" means 19 times in 5 years.

Re:Silly Brits

[Ltap]

"Well, at least it's better than in bumfuckistan" is a justification for complacency.

It amuses me that, in this case, the United States is "bumfuckistan". What goes around comes around?

Re:Silly Brits

[Clueless Moron]

You're mixing up representation systems with voting systems. What Canada has is "regional representation", and they use FPTP as the voting system.

You can keep the regional representation MP system and get rid of FPTP. For example, use the single transferable vote system when voting for your MP.

Re:Silly Brits

[jewelie]

Nick Clegg is in a dilemma as he has no idea what the 2nd choices of his own voters are (and hence whether they would rather Tory or Labour) - all he can go on is that Tory have most votes, but that could be very misleading if most Lib Dem voters might prefer Labour to Tory.

And I think his guess is going be wrong, and he'll learn a very hard lesson that may cost the LibDems most of their votes for many decades to come.

However, he's in an awkward fix - he's probably going to have to do something that the Conservatives certainly will not do - put party politics aside for the sake of country, and run with this, with or without a promise of AV or AV+ (a researched for Parliament suggested better voting system for the UK that all parties ought to be capable of agreeing to, but won't - LibDems prefer STV, personally, although a LibDem supporter, I'd be happy with AV or AV+ as the Jenkins Commission suggested.)

If Clegg does what he needs to for the country, his supporters will not thank him with future votes though. Very very awkward position for him. If the Conservatives give a promise of voting reform, then it'd be worth it, but the Conservative Turkey's will definitely not vote for Christmas, so it won't happen. :(

Re:Silly Brits

[Chris Mattern]

The vast majority of britons looked at what the lib dems offered, said 'he looks nice but no thanks' and actually reduced their vote share

Their seats in the House of Commons went from 62 to 57. Their vote share *increased* from 22.1% to 23%. First past the post voting does funny things.

Re:Silly Brits

[jewelie]

In either case, however, I have to say that the line "maybe even forcing the Queen to dismiss the current Government" is something I hope never has an analog in the United States. The idea that an unelected figurehead can simply sweep away the electorate when it's convenient is terrifying.

Personally I find it quite comforting. We do have a constitution, she can't just "do it" 'cos she's bored, at least not without HUGE implications for the state of royalty here.

I'm not a royalist, but the alternative makes me shudder. We still have someone who's role is to remain unbaised except in the most ridiculously extreme of circumstances, and then kick the governments' arse if absolutely necessary. And really, it's never going to happen except in the most extreme circumstance - she's on a gravy train, living in the absolute lap of luxury, if any sovereign here abused their power these days, we'd soon make sure we cease to be a sovereign state.

She's the (almost) never used emergency back up plan should we, the stupid plebs of the country and our associated elected-by-the-idiots politicians, seriously make a balls up of it all.

Re:Silly Brits

[Chris Mattern]

Technically, Brown gets the first chance to form a government because he's the incumbent--he remains Prime Minister until he either resigns or the new House votes in a new PM, and as such he can try to assemble a coalition to confirm him. But the Lib Dems have already said that they're going to talk to the Tories first.

Re:Silly Brits

[Anonymous Coward]

What does the electoral college have to do with Senate shenanigans? The EC is only used for electing the President; Senators are elected in a direct popular vote from the citizens of their home state. Citizens vote for the exact person, listed right there on the ballot, and whichever one candidate gets the most votes wins.

In fact, there is nothing in the system of election for Senators and Representatives and Governors that inherently reinforces a two party system. IMO, the US's other parties just suffer from incredibly poor planning - why the hell do they focus on the Presidential election so much and not on the local ones? If Independents can and do win Senate and House seats and Governorships, that means the so could an actual party. And if I recall correctly, during periods where the US has had more than two significant parties, those parties rose and fell based on gaining and losing seats in Congress first, not by swooping in out of nowhere to take the Presidency.

I note that the most recent plausible third-party candidate was Perot (just under 20% of the popular vote, nationally, and as high as 30% in some states). Had a movement with that much momentum instead gone after state legislatures, state governors, and seats in congress? It'd probably have a good 5-20% of Congress today. (I'm not sure where the tipping point of new party growth is - at some point a party that gets big enough should siphon defectors from the big two...)

Re:Silly Brits

[markhb]

If several of the larger states in America had proportional voting with the electoral college, America would also have to be worrying about coalition governments or in that case a coalition president taking over the White House.

How so? As you allude to later in your post, anything short of an Electoral College majority throws the election of President to the House (with the vote to be taken by states), and the election of Vice-President to the Senate. But, once elected, the President isn't subject to Congress (impeachment excepted) any more than the Congress is subject to the President. So, I am unclear as to what your "coalition" idea would mean.

Re:Silly Brits

[Chris Mattern]

You seem to be a bit behind the times. Britain has not had "rotten buroughs" for over a hundred and fifty years now. "10 people living on an island" will be part of a district that will be the same population as the district containing the "1000 living in a town", so the "1000 living in a town" will indeed have more power.

Re:Silly Brits

[Captain Splendid]

What goes around comes around?

More like delayed understanding.

Re:Silly Brits

[Chris Mattern]

electoral boundaries do not follow geo-political boundaries (like they do in the USA for example)

*pfft* *snerk* HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Oh, man, that was good. Pull the other one, it's got bells on. Here's a map of the Illinois 4th Congressional District. Tell me again about how our electoral boundaries follow geo-political boundaries.

Re:Silly Brits

[dakohli]

As a Canadian who has watched the current minority Government exploit the Opposition's weaknesses to an extent that no one thought possible, I feel a Minority Government can work. However, they don't work as well as a Majority. In order to keep the Commons honest, I would rather see the electoral reform be directed to the Upper House (Senate). An EEE senate would do this:

Elected - not appointed

Equal - meaning each Province would get the same number regardless of population.

Effective, right now they have shown that they can delay legislation, but not stop it.

If we could take the Parties out of it even better.

Sadly, this will most likely never happen, as several Provinces would feel they would be disadvantaged by such a system.

Re:Silly Brits

[dakohli]

Unfortunately, people tend to only arrive at this point of view when their favoured party loses.

Sir, You have found the critical point.

Bravo!

Re:Silly Brits

[DragonWriter]

At least you guys -have- minority parties. Good luck finding a single person in the US congress that isn't a republican or democrat (or an 'independent' who votes 99.999% with one of the 2 parties).

There are several independents in the US Congress, and none of them vote 99.999% with anyone else (its very hard to even find two members of the same party that vote together that often; the same system that produces that solid two-party lock in the US also assures that those parties will be, by the standards of most other modern democracies, very weak parties.)

Re:Silly Brits

[DragonWriter]

I can't speak for the parent poster but personally I'm working on it [pirate-party.us].

How is that working on it? None of the platform planks listed for your party address any of the features of the US system of government and elections that promote duopoly, which means you aren't actually working on the problem that GP asked about (plus, given that because of those features, voting with a minor party in the US mostly helps the major party most opposed to the positions of your minor party, probably means that the efforts towards the things on your platform will be rather ineffective.)

Re:Silly Brits

[AthanasiusKircher]

This is pretty much what happened when Nader "spoiled" the vote for Gore in Florida back in 2000. Even if you discount the whole recount issue, if Nader hadn't been running most of his votes would have likely gone to Gore (both being liberals), and Gore would have easily won the state and the election.

Wow. Still this crap 10 years out. I'm no Nader fan, but the logic of this argument is (and has always been) preposterous. Nader didn't "spoil" anything. Gore did. To wit:

Gore needed 0.5% of Nader's votes to win. But Gore needed only 0.01% of Bush's votes. Which would be easier? Getting 1 out of 200 people dedicated enough to a third-party candidate to buck the mainstream, or 1 out of 10,000 random sheep who chose one of the two main candidates by default?

Also, 12% of registered Florida Democrats voted for Bush (roughly 200,000 voters). If Gore had succeeded in getting even 1 out of 1000 of these Democratic defectors from his own party to vote for him, he could have won Florida. Many more Democrats voted for Bush than all of Nader's votes combined (including Democrats, Republicans, and independents who voted for Nader).

The simple fact is that Nader's group of voters was tiny compared to the amount of Democratic defectors to Bush.

You don't get it. The fact is that elections are also lost by candidates who lose votes, including those from their own party. That was a hell of a lot more significant in Florida than Nader's "spoiling" effect. And given how many defectors were already present in Gore's own party (which dwarfed the Nader vote), how can you be so certain that if the entire election were run without Nader, a majority of the Nader voters would have gone to Gore?

The myth of the Nader "spoil effect" is just another way the Democrats have tried to blame their losses on someone else -- "It wasn't our candidate's fault -- it was... uh... Nader! Er... uh... the Supreme Court!" Sure, we might have created a different outcome by disenfranchising millions of voters nationwide who wanted an alternative to the two majority parties... or Democrats could have just had a candidate that would have caused about 0.1% fewer people to defect to Bush from his own party.

Re:Silly Brits

[DragonWriter]

Of course, most of those problems are directly related to the two-party system. In the case of the electoral college, it is the primary means by which the system is enforced,

The electoral college is not the primary means by which the two-party system is enforced. The primary means by which the two-party system is enforced is using majority-runoff or plurality elections for most purpose plus having independently elected executives (both at the state and federal levels) rather than a parliamentary system.

The electoral college on top of that reinforces it a bit in terms of the federal executive, but its a small effect compared to the more basic ones -- switching to a direct election (by either majority-runoff or plurality) for the President and Vice President, either separately or on a single ballot, wouldn't do much to weaken the two-party system.

A parliamentary system (while still retaining majority-runoff and plurality for most elections) would still weakly promote two-party dynamics in most individual elections, but would make it more practical for the dominant parties to vary between regions rather than being two dominant national parties (the combination of that with national media would mean that minor parties would gain more mindshare even where they weren't currently electorally competitive, which would make which parties were competitive in which regions somewhat fluid.)

Using a ranked-preference-based voting system that avoided the structural disincentives to supporting third parties (with or without moving to a parliamentary system) would probably do the most to end duopoly, particularly if, for legislative elections, a system which tended to produce roughly proportional outcomes were adopted (this wouldn't have to ge a party-list system, you could just have Single Transferable Vote with, say, 5 member districts.)

Re:Silly Brits

[DragonWriter]

It has to be a broken system that gives them less than 10% of the seats for almost a quarter of the vote. Especially when you consider that they increased their vote, yet decreased their number of MPs and that Labour got 29% (only 6 per cent more) of the vote somehow giving them 4 times as many seats.

Any system with single-member districts assigned simply by the vote winner (whether by simple majority with a runoff to settle ambiguous results, or plurality, or any other system that just looks at the first-place votes ) from the ballots in that district will have the possibility of doing things like that.

You have to have a more sophisticated voting system that produces proportional results to do that. Straight party list proportional systems are one alternative, but they have the defect that while they produce results that are proportional by party, they reduce the direct accountability of individual elected officials to the general electorate. Systems that produce fairly proportional results from ranked ballots among individual candidates in multimember districts (e.g., Single Transferable Vote) are another tool; with any reasonable district size they are less capable of perfect party proportionality than party list systems, but they can provide reasonable proportionality with the much the same kind of direct accountability to the general electorate that you have in single-member district, first-past-the-post type of elections.

Re:Silly Brits

[Cederic]

However, PR means you vote for parties and not for individuals.

I want to vote for individuals. I hate party politics. I have a diverse range of views and none of the parties represent me accurately. I thus want to select the individual that has a good level of agreement with my views, and that will act with integrity and represent my fellow constituents on the rest.

Any representative of a major party will on balance not do that. They will in many cases vote the party line.

I'm happy to have an alternative vote system, but PR merely perpetuates the flawed party based system and that's broken whether it's two or three parties involved.

Re:Silly Brits

[Cederic]

they would be exposed for the opportunistic bastards they are

Exposed? It was a key election campaigning message for them! "Vote SNP, we can use a hung parliament to fuck over the English even more than we do already"

Re:Silly Brits

[DragonWriter]

under FPTP, parties are better off if they have concentrated support

That's not quite right either.

Under FPTP, parties are best off if they maximize the number of districts in which they are the strongest party. For the same share of the total electorate, they get worse off if they are more concentrated than is ideal (so that they have a smaller number of districts in which they are the strongest party, even though they are farther ahead of the competitors in those districts) or if they are less concentrated than the ideal (so they are present in a larger number of districts, but not the strongest in as many of them.)

Re:Silly Brits

[DragonWriter]

We had a similar proportional representation movement in Canada. It failed. Particularly for many of the reasons you mentioned. The biggest and most fatal flaw of proportional representation, in my opinion, is the lack of direct representation as you mentioned.

Many systems of proportional representation feature local, direct representation. One model for this are mixed systems some of the seats in a legislative body are selected by direct election in mechanisms similar to those in FPTP systems, where the remainder are assigned from party lists to assure that the total makeup is proportional. Another is model where elections are by district in multimember districts, and the proportionality is within each district (this produces roughly proportional overall results, which while they are somewhat more sensitive to geographic distribution of support than party lists systems, but only slightly so, and makes all incumbents directly accountable to a specific district electorate.) A third is where elections are still in single-member districts, but a preference-based voting system is used which reduces the incentives for tactical voting (you provably can't eliminate them entirely, but FPTP has strong and simple incentives to select the least objectionable of the two apparently strongest candidates in the district), which improves proportionality slightly while maintaining single-member direct elections.

Since all the options being discussed in the UK are of the second or third models (as I understand it, the Lib Dems want Single Transferable Vote with small multimember districts which is an example of the second, and Labour wants a referendum Alternative Vote, which is the third), the distance pure party lists put between incumbents and direct accountability to the electorate are largely irrelevant to the immediate issue of "proportional representation", since party list systems (or even mixed systems) aren't being discussed.

Re:Silly Brits

[chrb]

Indeed, the hypothetical numbers had a greater variance than one would find in the modern British system, but the point is the same.

a district that will be the same population

In the UK today the population variance between constituencies still seems higher than it should be. At the extremes there are (according to the 2001 census) Meirionnydd Nant Conwy with 41.4k people, and the Isle of Wight with 132.7k people. That means some UK citizens effectively get "3.2 times more representation" at the national level than some other UK citizens. Politicians are fond of pointing out that the healthcare a citizen receives shouldn't depend on their postcode - it's a shame they don't apply the same logic to political representation.

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

The only "advantage" the UK has over the US system, if you can call it that, is that they have smaller districts. It's not much of an advantage, because having over 600 MPs is a problem in itself. But it does mean that minor parties have a very distant shot at influence.

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

The "two losing parties"? First of all, it seems the Lib Dems will support the Conservatives, not Labour. Second, if you look at actual popular vote, you'll see that Labour and Lib Dem combined still have 15 million votes to the conservatives' 10. If the Lib Dem and Labour voters want a coalition (and it looks like the Lib Dems at least plan to ask them before committing to anything), they still have a completely legitimate government - despite the relative setback in this election.

Re:Silly Brits

[Chris Mattern]

I was not aware that there were still such variances in British parliamentary districts. In the US, of course, there is a Constitutionally mandated census every ten years (we're having one right now, as a matter of fact), followed by redistricting based on that Census, including requirements that each district in a state have very close to the same voting population. What provisions does Britian have for census and redistricting?

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

Basically, no. That is just so harebrained it's barely worth replying to.

Look, 10 million brits want the conservatives to rule. But over 15 million agree that they don't want that. If they don't want it badly enough, they are allowed to form a coalition to prevent it.

If the vote in UK was fragmented even more, so the sane vote was spread over twenty parties, allowing the CFF party to become the largest, that would not mean the Crazed Fascist Fucks would be entitled to rule. No, not even if they were the party that made the most gains. The sane voters would expect and demand their squabbling representatives to form a coalition. The current situation is no different.

Re:Silly Brits

[jeremyp]

That must be a different George W Bush from the one that lead the USA into a disastrous illegal war.

And also a different one to the G W Bush who presided over the worst economic disaster since The Great Depression.

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

> The party membership choose who's on the list, and in what order.

Fixed that for you, in order to remove the classic FUD.

This is how it actually works in most proportional representation countries. Party members decide locally who their candidates will be. Very rarely they may be convinced to "take one for the team", and nominate an important national politician who otherwise faces unacceptable risks, but this is a desperate move.

In open list countries, voters can also rearrange the lists as they choose, so even if a party leadership with a democratic deficit managed to trump through their candidate (through expulsions, threats or other organizational gamemanship), he would face a coordinated campaign to rearrange him to the bottom come election day.

Re:Silly Brits

[ShakaUVM]

>>That must be a different George W Bush from the one that lead the USA into a disastrous illegal war.

Neither disastrous for us, nor illegal. But I'm sure your friends on HuffPo would love to hear all about it.

>>And also a different one to the G W Bush who presided over the worst economic disaster since The Great Depression.

Don't worry, the other team will make it worse.

Re:Silly Brits

[vadim_t]

Awesome, good luck with that. I'm a member of my local one.

Re:Silly Brits

[jwhitener]

If minority parties leads to things like massive CCTV surveillance, I'm not sure I'd want that in the US.

Re:Silly Brits

[aslate]

I was trying to make that point, maybe it wasn't clear as some people don't want it to breed compromise.

Breeding compromise is good!

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

I want to vote for individuals. I hate party politics.

I kind of understand this sentiment, but it's nonetheless wrongheaded. People can be charismatic. They can fool you, and they do. You think you know what your individual candidate is like, but it's very unlikely that you do. You're influenced (whether you want to or not) by all the campaigning on whether this or that candidate is "reliable" and "can be trusted", etc. instead of the issues which really matter.

It's never easy to judge people's character, even when they're people you know. You get candidates which are experts at appearing to be trustworthy and reliable. But only their closest know, and maybe not even then - just look at all the personal scandals.

But you know who can judge a politician's integrity rather well? The people who work with him. His party colleagues, the ones he worked his way up with (or which he stepped on to get up). Regular party members. They will know if he is a hypocritical ass.

The sad thing is, in personality-oriented electoral systems, they say, "well, he's an ass, but he's at least our ass - most of the time. When he hasn't listened too much to his corporate buddies. And he looks good on TV, we have no choice, we can't win without him" In party program oriented systems, they say "We want someone who can actually be trusted to implement the program we decided. If this guy won't do it, let's find another."

Now compare with parties. Parties suck at being charismatic. That's a feature, not a bug. They're institutions. Like people, they are occasionally a bit dodgy. But they're bad at hiding it. People don't love them and trust them the way they would trust a person. Parties are tools, and in PR systems, rather effective ones. Party programs, declarations and manifestos actually matter somewhat here. They aren't just airy statements of the attitudes of the people already supporting the party, they're statements about how those attitudes should be put into practice. For all the complaining about broken promises, they also manage to keep a lot of them.

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

they reduce the direct accountability of individual elected officials to the general electorate.

So they say. But is this really true? In PR systems, we know which regional seats are "in play", most likely to switch. The people on the marginal parts of the lists are undoubtedly most important - and we know who they are. But if the list top is unpopular, they will take a hit for it.

There are usually a lot of "safe seats" in majoritarian systems as well, especially with gerrymandering. If the party decides to put an unpopular candidate in a safe district, they may take a hit - but odds are it will be one that doesn't matter, since they will win anyway. Only "wasted votes", not needed to elect the candidate anyway, will be lost.

Re:Silly Brits

[TiberiusMonkey]

You can mark me as flamebait all you like, any system that keeps a far right wing, racist party of bigots out of parliament, can't be all bad.

Re:Silly Brits

[alexbfree]

Here's a visualization which shows what the result would have been if the same votes had been used to decide the number of seats (a simple version of proportional representation):
http://alexbowyer.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-would-have-happened-last-night-if.html

Also, here's some visualizations of alternative Proportional Representation systems and the effects they'd have:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/25541021@N00/4594758955/

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

Party members decide locally who their candidates will be.

Bullshit. In a party list system the concept of "local" doesn't exist.

Re:Silly Brits

[Hognoxious]

People can be charismatic. They can fool you, and they do. You think you know what your individual candidate is like, but it's very unlikely that you do. You're influenced (whether you want to or not) by all the campaigning on whether this or that candidate is "reliable" and "can be trusted", etc. instead of the issues which really matter.

You're right. We're all idiots. Perhaps we should ask someone else to vote on our behalf, since we obviously can't be trusted to make our own minds up. Bloody oiks.

Ooooh, shiny!

Where was I?

Ah, yes, another advantage of the link with the local area (assuming the candidate genuinely has one) - some of the electorate will have dealings with him. They'll know if he doesn't pay his bills on time. They'll know if he frequents madame fifi's "massage parlour". Or, desperately searching for a positive, that he turns up, rain or shine, to give out the prizes at the local school sports day. Word gets round a town quicker than a country.

But you know who can judge a politician's integrity rather well? The people who work with him. His party colleagues, the ones he worked his way up with (or which he stepped on to get up). Regular party members. They will know if he is a hypocritical ass.

They might well know, but are they going to say - especially when they're just as bad and they've got their snouts in the same trough? I very much doubt it. Mutually assured destruction. Conspiracy of silence. All pissing in the same pot. Call it what you will.

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

More FUD, myths and ignorance.

I'm not speaking out of theoretical considerations here, you know. I live in a country where there is a multiple district PR system - by far the most common kind. That "local" doesn't exist is maybe true of Israel (and there single-district arguably makes some sense), but it's not true of Norway.

I have always had the option to vote for representatives from close to where I live - even when I lived in a small rural municipality. And I understand how the parties choose their reps.

Re:Silly Brits

[alexo]

- No local representation. Geography-based representation is huge for a country like Canada. Small communities need a voice. Although they may not have an equal voice in Parliament, at least they won't get ignored as they would in a proportional representation system.
- No accountability. In a FPTP (first past the post) system, an MP is accountable to their electorate. If you F up, you will be voted out. In a proportional system, the parties decide who the MPs are, so even if an MP Fs up, they may not be replaced by the party.
- No attachment to electorate. This is related to both of the above. An attachment to their electorate means that, at least in principle and outwardly, MPs need to take into account the interests of their electorate. Of the people they represent. In a proportional representation system, MPs will not be representing the people. They will be representatives of their party.

A very interesting analysis. Completely untrue but still interesting.

1. The proposed system was MMPP, not a straight proportional one. That means you still vote for individual representative (as well as parties).

2. Voting for both a representative and a party increases both accountability and attachment to the electorate because it allows the voter to vote for a candidate not affiliated with the party they want to govern.

For example, in my riding, if the Liberals decide to enter a goat in the race, it would win by a significant margin because most residents vote along party lines. I actually had a talk with a person that tried to pull the "accountability" card and ask him who he would vote for. He said "the Liberal candidate". Then I asked what was the name of that candidate and he could not tell me. So much for personal accountability and attachment to the electorate.

In the current political culture, FPTP is effectively voting for a party. Independents almost never get elected. In fact, the last time that an Ontario MPP was elected without a clear affiliation with one of the 3 major parties (Conservative / PC, Liberal / Liberal-Labour, NDP / Co-operative Commonwealth) was 1955 when one "PC Independent" got in.

If there is a conflict between the party line and the wishes of the electorate, an MPP has an option of either toeing the party line or not having the party backing come next elections, which effectively means no reelection. Guess what they will choose 10 times out of 10?

An MMPP system decouples the individual from the party to some extent and therefore leads to greater accountability.
But then, that is bad for the big parties and could not compete with their spin.

Re:Silly Brits

[damburger]

Appeal to popularity fallacy. Ad hominem fallacy. This would seem to indicate the difference between 4: Insightful and -1: Troll, wouldn't it?

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

One thing the Brits will have to get used to sooner or later anyway, is that that local link will be stretched. There are very many members of parliament already, and the population isn't sinking as far as I know. How many can they put in there? 1000? 2000? at some point it gets impractical.

You're not an idiot, but you are a poor judge of the true intentions of people you don't know. We all are. Even if candidates are smart enough to do these symbolic things to their electorate (turn up to give out prizes, etc.), doesn't mean they are nice. It's pretty easy to give a good impression to your neighbors.

Don't you agree that you know better the people you work with? The people you have to rely on, who rely on you? IME, when you're cooperating with people to get hard stuff done, you get to know them better than you sometimes want to.

They might well know, but are they going to say - especially when they're just as bad and they've got their snouts in the same trough? I very much doubt it.

In a majoritarian system, no. They have very little choice in the matter. But you must remember that there are two kinds of power people seek through parties.

One is the power to influence decisions in a certain way. Political scientists call it I-power. You seek certain goals, you don't seek power for it's own sake. If you seek the power to run a conservative fiscal policy, you don't mind if anyone else has the power to run a conservative fiscal policy - you'll "share" that power freely.

But there is another kind of power. They call it P-power, for "purse" - how are you going to split the prize between you? This is the kind of power you want to share with as few people as possible. When forming a government coalition, as is done in the UK now, it's all about P-power. The parties want to rule, but they don't want a bigger coalition than absolutely necessary - because that would mean giving concessions and ministries you'd rather keep for yourself.

Now, by far the majority of rank and file party members seek the first kind of power. Unless it's the communist party of China or something, people who seek the second kind of power are rare. But - and this is true in PR systems too, but especially in majoritarian systems - party members who seek office are usually more than a little interested in P-power in addition to I-power.

Now we get back to the point. In a sense, party members and party leadership/office seekers don't "eat from the same through". They are allies, but the leaders seek something the rank and file do not - and that the R&F are in fact reluctant to give them.

In PR, the rank and file can sometimes rein in candidates who seek personal influence. Not always - personal popularity is a consideration here, too. I've seen a case where a formerly large, now almost vanished political party found themselves a charismatic leader, and proceeded to jettison almost all from their old politics, except an empty slogan or two.

But in majoritarian/personal popularity system (this includes MMP!), it would be so much worse. Arguably, what happened to the tiny party I mentioned, happened with a major party in the UK, namely Labour!

Re:Silly Brits

[CrimsonAvenger]

Look, 10 million brits want the conservatives to rule. But over 15 million agree that they don't want that. If they don't want it badly enough, they are allowed to form a coalition to prevent it.

Note that your statement applies equally well to Labour, Lib-Dem and Conservative Parties, in that while some people want each Party to rule, a large majority doesn't want that particular Party to rule....

Re:Silly Brits

[biglig2]

Exactly the point about having a local MP. My MP is a good constituency MP and was squeaky clean in the expenses; this was a very important factor in deciding my vote. (As was, to be fair, the fact that her main opponent had a good record of local civic duty. Almost a pity to have to choose.)

There were plenty of MPs at this last election who didn't steal quite enough taxpayers money to be deselected by the party but did enough to get kicked out of parliament.

Re:Silly Brits

[Cederic]

I write to my MP. I read his literature that tells me his position, his speeches in parliament and I check whether his voting record matches what he's telling me.

Candidates other than him, no, it's not as easy to assess their honesty. The local press certainly helps, it's possible I'll know them (maybe once removed) and they may hold a local council position.

I appreciate that I don't have a perfect set of information on which to base a position, but it's a hell of a lot more than "if I vote A then candidate 2 from that party gets in, but if I vote B then candidate 4 from this party gets in. Or maybe candidate 3 or 5. Or maybe by denying a vote to party A I make it possible for party C to get an extra candidate, even though I didn't vote for them, and I don't know which of their candidates that would be"

Voting specifically for an individual is a far closer tie, even if it isn't entirely reliable, and I don't have all the information available.

Re:Silly Brits

[biglig2]

No they couldn't. SDLP got 3 seats; Alliance 1; Green 1. Still only 320. They'd have to bring in the Scottish Nationalists as well to get to 326 and an absolute majority.

And that of course is the absolute minimum working majority. One MP refuses to do what the whips tell her and they loose.

Re:Silly Brits

[DragonWriter]

So they say. But is this really true?

Yes, straight party list systems (systems in which seats are assigned to parties simply in proportion to the number of votes cast for each party, and the individuals who get the seats are set by the order people are on lists determined by the parties participating in the election) reduce the direct accountability of individual elected officials to the general electorate, since people don't vote directly for individual candidates in the general election.

This is simply true by definition.

In PR systems, we know which regional seats are "in play", most likely to switch. The people on the marginal parts of the lists are undoubtedly most important - and we know who they are. But if the list top is unpopular, they will take a hit for it.

Right, the people on the list, taken together, do have an effect on outcomes. No sane person would argue that that isn't true.

But, the fact that the entire list is voted for together means that while all the individual candidates may have some effect on the general election outcome, none of the individual candidates are directly accountable individually to the general electorate.

There are usually a lot of "safe seats" in majoritarian systems as well, especially with gerrymandering.

Yes, that's true, and its a real problem (sometimes, for the party with more truly "safe seats", because that means that often they've been gerrymandered into being competitive in fewer districts than they otherwise would be. For instance, if you had only 5 districts and only two parties, and a party had a 75% majority in one district and a 49% minority in each of the others, they would have the only safe seat in the system, but they'd usually end up with fewer seats, despite making up a majority of the electorate.) Party list proportional and FPTP systems both have problems of different types. Candidate-centered, proportional elections in small multimember districts avoid the worst problems of both FPTP and party list systems.

Re:Silly Brits

[Flagran]

That's a remarkable map.

Re:Silly Brits

[Vintermann]

But, the fact that the entire list is voted for together means that while all the individual candidates may have some effect on the general election outcome, none of the individual candidates are directly accountable individually to the general electorate.

The key word here is not "accountable", but "individually". It's true that you can't throw out B with also throwing out C and D who are below him on the list - at least in closed list systems - but is this a problem? If a party nominates a bad politician, isn't that a problem with the party?

I think the party itself need to pay the price for it, not just the politician in question. What I think people in FPTP systems miss, is that we have better parties in PR systems. This is because we keep them accountable, as well as the candidates themselves.

Because of Duverger's law, FPTP systems will gravitate towards two major parties. This means parties have a great deal of clout with the voters and members. "So what if we're corrupt, and our internal democracy sucks? We still support slightly more of your positions than the others (and they are corrupt too). Our way or the highway."

They don't get to do that here. "Back room deals" are not tolerated. If the central leadership tries to dictate local lists (or regional, if you insist: they are naturally somewhat larger districts than single-member), active members will desert them in droves.

And they have no seats that are so "safe" that they can afford to offend local sensibilities - in a FPTP system, central leadership could dictate who the candidate will be in a 75% district, stepping on the toes of the locals. They might lose 20% for it, but so? that would just mean less wasted votes. They'd still win.

Re:Silly Brits

[VJ42]

However, PR means you vote for parties and not for individuals.

Not necessarily, The Lid-dems prefered system is the Single Transferable Vote, which maintains the constituency link & you vote for individual, the 1997, Labour, Jenkins commission reccomended a system called AV+ here also most MPs are voted in in person, a minority of 15-20% come from a party list.

Re:Silly Brits

[VJ42]

I was not aware that there were still such variances in British parliamentary districts. In the US, of course, there is a Constitutionally mandated census every ten years (we're having one right now, as a matter of fact), followed by redistricting based on that Census, including requirements that each district in a state have very close to the same voting population. What provisions does Britian have for census and redistricting?

A similar one, we also have a census every 10 years. And constituency are regularly re-drawn (every 8-12 years) by the boundaries commission using population data.

Re:Silly Brits

[Cederic]

STV is, frankly, fucking complicated. It does allow named individuals to be elected, but if you're electing multiple individuals for a given constituency I'd rather have a straight vote.

AV on the other hand, despite being non-trivial in itself, retains the one representative per constituency link, and helps encourage people to vote for minority candidates.

AV+ sadly seems the more likely proposal, and may prove the best compromise. I just still don't like it.

Re:Silly Brits

[Ragzouken]

Welcome to the parliamentary system, you vote for an MP/party, not a president.

Re:Silly Brits

[VJ42]

STV is, frankly, fucking complicated.

What's exactly complicated about putting 1,2,3,4,5 etc. next to candidates in order of preference? That's all that STV requires of the voter. Then my City will get 3 or 4 MPs, but elected proportionally. Instead of the same 3 or 4 MPs elected to keep the Tories\Labour out.

Re:Silly Brits

[Cederic]

Lets say I want to vote for a minority candidate. They have only one candidate, so my other votes must be split between other parties.

If there are five seats, I'll have ranked my minority favourite first. Who do I rank 2-5? If all four are from the same party, which four from that party do I rank 2-5, and which comes in sixth (if at all).

This matters; if someone voting for another party ranks five people 1-5 from the same party, their relative rankings will be different to the rankings of the people I vote 2-5.

This is a massive game theory complexity, with unfeasibly difficult optimal outcomes made harder by the likelihood of collusion by party affiliations.

Sure, filling in 1-5 on a ballot paper is a piece of piss. Knowing the right order and which candidates to give 1-5 to is not.

Re:Silly Brits

[VJ42]

With STV you're allowed to stop at 1; you don't have to fill in 2 - 5 if it's a real problem for you. So in your scenario, I'd fill in "1" then stop. Or perhaps I'd remember that we vote for people, not parties in the UK, and vote on the basis of their respective election campaigns. Forcing people of the same party to campaign against each other is a feature, not a bug.

Furthermore, we know STV works in the UK because IIRC it's already used in the Scottish & Northern Irish Local council elections.

Re:Silly Brits

[Cederic]

So your solution to the complexity of determining how to vote is to disenfranchise myself? Interesting.

As for STV working, surely the results in Scotland demonstrate that it's rather flawed. Both the SNP and Labour got 50% more seats for each percentage of the vote than the Conversatives and Lib Dems. Hardly proportional.

Citing Scotland as a democratic example is inherently flawed anyway, given the Scottish MP influence on Westminster and their demonstrated willingness to fuck over England with laws that wont apply to their own constituencies. But I digress..

Re:Silly Brits

[jecblackpepper]

You can stop at any time. If you only feel you can support one candidate then you only put 1 against their name and do not put a 2 against anyone. If your choice of candidate is not successful and is eliminated then your vote is not transferred to another candidate.

Re:Silly Brits

[VJ42]

So your solution to the complexity of determining how to vote is to disenfranchise myself? Interesting.

If you re-read my whole post, you'll see that's not what I said at all.

As for STV working, surely the results in Scotland demonstrate that it's rather flawed. Both the SNP and Labour got 50% more seats for each percentage of the vote than the Conversatives and Lib Dems. Hardly proportional.

In the local council elections where STV is used? citation please.

Citing Scotland as a democratic example is inherently flawed anyway, given the Scottish MP influence on Westminster and their demonstrated willingness to fuck over England with laws that wont apply to their own constituencies. But I digress..

Like I said, I was talking about Scottish local council elections, not the General election. As you raise it, however, here's my solution to the West Lothian question: make the commons the English Parliament and kick all the Scots and Welsh to an elected Lords as a UK parliament.

Re:Silly Brits

[mdwh2]

And I think his guess is going be wrong, and he'll learn a very hard lesson that may cost the LibDems most of their votes for many decades to come.

I suspect the problem is that there is no right guess - there are enough Lib Dem voters who would hate a coalition with either party, for it to be a problem. Which is why I think any coalition should only be done for PR - otherwise, what do Lib Dems gain from it? (I suspect the only promise of implementing Lib Dem policies will be things the other party were wanting to do anyway - and if the Lib Dems remain independent, they can still vote on individual bills, from either party.)

I agree that AV+ seems good too, and has the advantage of seeming closer to what we have now, so may be more likely to pass in a referendum.

Note that AV is not proportional. It's still far better than FPTP, so I'm glad it's being considered as a possibility - though I wonder if it is worth the risk of forming a coalition.

If the Conservatives give a promise of voting reform, then it'd be worth it

The latest news according to the BBC is that Tory offer a referendum on AV, but no to PR. Labour offer AV (without referendum), with a referendum on PR - clearly the better deal, but the risk is that a Lab/Lib coalition is less stable.

I don't see there are any good arguments against AV compared with FPTP, but my fear is that Tory, and all the Tory papers, will campaign against it with scaremongering claims, possibly confusing it with PR, and a referendum ends up failing...

Re:Silly Brits

[DragonWriter]

The key word here is not "accountable", but "individually". It's true that you can't throw out B with also throwing out C and D who are below him on the list - at least in closed list systems - but is this a problem?

Yes, it is.

If a party nominates a bad politician, isn't that a problem with the party?

Yes, it is. But its a problem that is very difficult to directly deal with (or even for the general electorate to specifically identify to the party) when you aren't voting for specific candidates. That weakens the value of elections in straight party-list systems as inputs from the public on whose behalf the government nominally acts to the government that nominally acts on their behalf.

I think the party itself need to pay the price for it, not just the politician in question.

Having less seats is a price, so candidate-centered elections do make the party as well as the rejected individual pay a price.

What I think people in FPTP systems miss, is that we have better parties in PR systems.

Both more proportional and parliamentary systems have stronger parties compared to FPTP and separation of powers systems, respectively, and systems with effective proportionality on issues (which the strict proportionality on party preference provided by party list PR is but one of many ways to approach) have better overall satisfaction with government than systems where representation in the national legislature is less effectively proportional. Living in an country which has an FPTP (and presidential) system isn't really a barrier to being aware of the research on practical results of differing systems of government in modern democracies.

Because of Duverger's law, FPTP systems will gravitate towards two major parties.

Certainly that's true in any constituency; the degree to which it is true nationally varies a lot by factors in the structure of government outside just what system is used to elect members of the principal legislative body. Parliamentary systems with FPTP tend to have somewhat weaker tendency to national duopoly than FPTP presidential systems, for instance.

They don't get to do that here. "Back room deals" are not tolerated. If the central leadership tries to dictate local lists (or regional, if you insist: they are naturally somewhat larger districts than single-member), active members will desert them in droves.

Right. Parties are more accountable as parties in systems with more proportional representation, regardless of whether its acheived by party list or other means.

And they have no seats that are so "safe" that they can afford to offend local sensibilities - in a FPTP system, central leadership could dictate who the candidate will be in a 75% district, stepping on the toes of the locals.

Well, that, again, depends on factors aside from the general election system. If (as in, for instance, the US) candidate selection is by election by party members in the consitituency by the same or similar mechanism used by the general electorate in the general election, central leadership cannot dictate the nominee against the choice of the local party members (though they may be able to influence the selection by supplying campaign resources and related support.)

You seem mostly bent on arguing that PR is better than FPTP, on which we agree. I'm arguing that candidate-centered means of acheiving proportionality are in many respects better than party list systems (and, on top of that, are also an easier political sale in places that currently have FPTP candidate-centered elections, since they overcome one of the primary objections raised against party list systems.)

Re:Silly Brits

[caseih]

Not true in Israel. The only thing that is keeping them in their present system is the fact that no single party can ever get enough seats to change it. In other words the system is serving the parties' interests more than it serves the people. It's very sad indeed. If that's really what you want, then go for it.

Re:Silly Brits

[WillDraven]

While it isn't listed on the site as one of our primary platforms at the moment, ballot access for 3rd parties is one of the issues we plan on attacking.

I just talked to our promotions officer who does the site and he says once he finishes getting the design and back end stuff done he'll be adding a section on it to the site.

Risk?

[ytm]

Why is coalition government called "risk"? It's quite common in continental Europe and in European Parliament too. What is the problem here?

Re:Risk?

[digitalnoise615]

Why is coalition government called "risk"? It's quite common in continental Europe and in European Parliament too. What is the problem here?

Because neither of the major parties are willing to work with each other.

Re:Risk?

[apricotmuffins]

Because everyone in this country is still hung up on class. The working class would never vote for tories, and the middle/upper class would never vote labour. And only crazy hippies vote libdem. our parents did it, as did our parents parents... Maybe we'll realise we're being left behind before its too late.

Re:Risk?

[MichaelSmith]

Why is coalition government called "risk"? It's quite common in continental Europe and in European Parliament too. What is the problem here?

Because neither of the major parties are willing to work with each other.

But isn't that still to be tested? I don't think it should be called a hung parliament until they get to a point where legislation isn't being passed.

Re:Risk?

[Gordonjcp]

I don't think it should be called a hung parliament until someone shows up with 6500 metres of good strong rope.

Re:Risk?

[Fraser J Gordon]

Of course, it doesn't help that the article labels the Tories as "capitalists" and Labour as "socialists" when Labour are no longer anything of the sort. They may have originally been founded on such principles but they are now fairly right-leaning (by British standards). It would be more accurate the Lib Dems socialists but that's not entirely true either because they are a mix of social liberals and economic liberals.

Re:Risk?

[machine321]

Horses are hung. Parliament is hanged.

Re:Risk?

[apricotmuffins]

Bang on the mark. The political choices in this country are very close together. The only one who is truly liberal left is the green party.

Re:Risk?

[MichaelSmith]

I don't think it should be called a hung parliament until someone shows up with 6500 metres of good strong rope.

Easier just to blow the place up don't you think?

(damn, I'm going to have to avoid the UK now)

Re:Risk?

[Roger W Moore]

I don't think it should be called a hung parliament until someone shows up with 6500 metres of good strong rope.

That would be a hanged parliament. The closest we got to that was 1605...and we still celebrate it every year to this day.

Re:Risk?

[Roger W Moore]

And only crazy hippies vote libdem.

I think we'd be in even worse trouble if 23% of the country were 'crazy hippies'.

Re:Risk?

[MrSteveSD]

Because everyone in this country is still hung up on class. The working class would never vote for tories, and the middle/upper class would never vote labour. And only crazy hippies vote libdem. our parents did it, as did our parents parents... Maybe we'll realise we're being left behind before its too late.

The people who voted for the Lib Dems are not "crazy hippes", they are people who want a change in the system and/or are sick of Labour. They certainly didn't vote for the Lib Dems so that they could cement conservative power though. If they opt for a coalition with the conservatives I suspect that most of their support will vanish.

Re:Risk?

[0123456]

I think we'd be in even worse trouble if 23% of the country were 'crazy hippies'.

It's not that bad: only about 50% of people can be bothered to vote for any party that's on offer, and that's assuming that the stories of mass postal vote fraud by the Labour party aren't true.

So on that basis only about 10% of the population are crazy hippies.

Re:Risk?

[MichaelSmith]

Because everyone in this country is still hung up on class. The working class would never vote for tories, and the middle/upper class would never vote labour. And only crazy hippies vote libdem. our parents did it, as did our parents parents... Maybe we'll realise we're being left behind before its too late.

The people who voted for the Lib Dems are not "crazy hippes", they are people who want a change in the system and/or are sick of Labour. They certainly didn't vote for the Lib Dems so that they could cement conservative power though. If they opt for a coalition with the conservatives I suspect that most of their support will vanish.

I think the Liberal Democrats should push for electoral reform as their only requirement for joining a coalition, then sit down, shut up, accumulate money, and wait for the next election.

Re:Risk?

[zippthorne]

Ok, but how is that a bad thing?

Re:Risk?

[digitalnoise615]

Why is coalition government called "risk"? It's quite common in continental Europe and in European Parliament too. What is the problem here?

Because neither of the major parties are willing to work with each other.

But isn't that still to be tested? I don't think it should be called a hung parliament until they get to a point where legislation isn't being passed.

Except they don't have enough votes for a supermajority for a new PM.

Re:Risk?

[apricotmuffins]

I should learn sarcasm doesn't translate over the internet! I'm a total full-on libdem supporter.

Re:Risk?

[Shimbo]

Why is coalition government called "risk"? It's quite common in continental Europe and in European Parliament too. What is the problem here?

Essentially because it's not stable with a first past the post election system. It's easier for the two major parties to decide to reroll, and go back to business as usual.

Re:Risk?

[gbjbaanb]

true, but the european governments had similar problems until they realised that coalition rule was the only way things were going to be in the future. In other words, they were as argumentative and self-centred until the electorate bitch-slapped them into cooperating with each other.

In the UK, this is new to us, we're still in the argumentative, self-centered, un-cooperative phase. If the electoral system was changed to be a little more fair to the voters (ie a more proportionate representation system is established) then they will realise they have to work together and hopefully start to do that.

At least we have a load of new MPs now, after chucking the really corrupt ones.

Re:Risk?

[0123456]

They may have originally been founded on such principles but they are now fairly right-leaning (by British standards)

Labour have expanded government borrowing to 10+% of GDP and spending to 50+% of GDP. If that's 'right-wing', I'd hate to see what a 'socialist' government would do.

Re:Risk?

[TheRaven64]

And only crazy hippies vote libdem

20% of British people are crazy hippies? I think I need to get out more.

Actually crazy hippies vote Green (only 1% of the electorate).

Re:Risk?

[newcastlejon]

If they opt for a coalition with the conservatives I suspect that most of their support will vanish.

Hear, Hear.

Re:Risk?

[Jeremy Erwin]

The closest we got to that was 1605...and we still celebrate it every year to this day.

By burning Mr Fawkes in effigy.

Re:Risk?

[apricotmuffins]

The trouble with this is they WILL lose supporters for simply making a deal with the conservatives. Its sad, and I wish it wasnt the case because it probably is the only way to bring about a reform right about now. If we let the conservatives get a government in without agreeing to at LEAST a referendum, then thats it. They will do everything to secure their place for the forseeable future. which means reducing the number of MPs and changing constituency sizes - in their favour.

Re:Risk?

[jewelie]

It would be more accurate [to call?] the Lib Dems socialists but that's not entirely true either because they are a mix of social liberals and economic liberals.

And it's worth noting that in British politics, Liberal does not have quite the same meaning as it would in US politics. (Anyone got a link to a good explanation of the difference?)

Re:Risk?

[Blakey Rat]

It always makes me chuckle a bit when I watch the new Doctor Who episodes and they're always completely obsessed over master/servant relationships, usually with characters loudly proclaiming that they are either a master or servant of somebody else. Even when they're in the far future settings.

It doesn't come up in all the episodes, but when it does, it's one of those things so alien to the American way of thinking that it just throws me for a loop a bit. I've gone through my entire life in the US, and so far I've never been "master" of anybody, and I've never been "servant" of anybody, and that's exactly the way I like it.

Re:Risk?

[demonlapin]

I'm not certain, but I think you might be able to cover the difference in the US by calling someone a "classical liberal". That's the term usually used in the US for the Enlightenment sense of the word.

Re:Risk?

[demonlapin]

This is utterly off-topic, but I would like to thank you for not writing "here, here". Also, props to anyone who can still remember that it's "rein in" not "reign in".

Re:Risk?

[dkleinsc]

To quote the great W.S. Gilbert:

I often think it's comical – Fal, lal, la!
How Nature always does contrive – Fal, lal, la!
That every boy and every gal
That’s born into the world alive
Is either a little Liberal
Or else a little Conservative!
Fal, lal, la!

And that wonderful observation was penned over a century ago.

Re:Risk?

[koreaman]

"libertarian", maybe?

Re:Risk?

[jonbryce]

Because in Britain, we expect to have an election on Thursday and have the revmoval lorries in Downing Street on Friday morning. The idea that Gordon Brown was voted out of office on 6th May and is still Prime Minister is just not the British way of doing things.

Re:Risk?

[jonbryce]

Crazy hippies vote Green, which is why only Brighton returned a Green MP.

Re:Risk?

[Don_dumb]

The closest we got to that was 1605...and we still celebrate it every year to this day.

By burning Mr Fawkes in effigy.

Interestingly perhaps not. I had heard (later on in life) that historically the tradition is to burn the Pope in effigy. (Fawkes was a Catholic trying to restore a Catholic government)
But obviously the historical reasons aren't important any more so we call it Guy Fawkes rather than inspire sectarianism sentiments. Wiki doesn't back me up, so beginning to doubt myself as I write.

Re:Risk?

[damburger]

Spare us the 'land of the free' bullshit. Americans are not free-spirited and independent thinking - I know because I've seen the contents of your media.

Re:Risk?

[Anne Thwacks]

The only one who is truly liberal left is the green party.???

The UK greens are well to the left of the "Young Trotskyist Labour League".

Re:Risk?

[Anne Thwacks]

"libertarian"

Absolutely not. A libertarian is one who believes that market forces should prevail,. In the UK that is a Conservative of the Thatcherite kind.

A UK Liberal believes in small government, but that the government should direct things and protect the weak (you might become one yourself). Traditionally, the labour movement "fights for the right to be exploited".

I believe the government should steer the ship of state, (a liberal view) not row it (the Labour view) or let if go wherever the storm blows it (the conservative view).

Re:Risk?

[Hognoxious]

Why is coalition government called "risk"? It's quite common in continental Europe and in European Parliament too. What is the problem here?

We don't want to end up like Belgium.

Re:Risk?

[Hognoxious]

Like watermelons - they're red on the inside...

Re:Risk?

[Hognoxious]

Because everyone in this country is still hung up on class. The working class would never vote for tories, and the middle/upper class would never vote labour.

How are you posting? I didn't know they had internets back in the 1950s.

Re:Risk?

[mjwx]

I don't think it should be called a hung parliament until someone shows up with 6500 metres of good strong rope.

Sigh, Such a wasteful society we've become. There's only 600 of them, why do they need 150 Metres each?

What every happens to the old British tradition of beheading, off with his head I say. The good thing is you only need one axe and 600 pikes. Mount the pikes in parliament and no one would be able to tell the difference for a least a year.

Re:Risk?

[Anonymous Coward]

I realise you're probably American, and metric isn't really your thing, but surely 6500 / 600 is 10.8 meters each, which is just about right for a good strong noose....

Re:Risk?

[dunkelfalke]

The current German government (which is right wing - a coalition of christian democrats and free market fundamentalists) has just decided to make the largest borrowing in the whole history of Germany - one billion Euros for every German citizen.

Re:Risk?

[YttriumOxide]

I've gone through my entire life in the US, and so far I've never been "master" of anybody, and I've never been "servant" of anybody, and that's exactly the way I like it.

Hmmm... while those exact words aren't used, I would perceive many things in the US as being a much stronger master/servant relationship than what I'm personally used to. The "fanatical patriotism" of certain parts the US military (especially the Marine Corps) that leads to obeying even the most ridiculous of orders; The "at will" employment situation that guarantees people in the lower rungs of society are basically slaves to their bosses' whims to avoid being fired; The security theatre at airports and tourist attractions that basically forces you to do certain things or be denied access (which sometimes isn't an option (such as if your "at will" employer has told you to fly somewhere))...

Other than the names, I don't see a huge difference. Just think of when a butler in a fancy British home says that "the master of the house is not home at present", or that he is "the humble servant" - he doesn't really mean "master" and "servant" as you appear to be thinking... he really just means "boss" and "employee".

Re:Risk?

[TheRaven64]

In the last decade, I haven't seen a single guy burned, but I have seen fireworks - commemorating the explosion that might have happened - every single year.

Re:Risk?

[soliptic]

Because everyone in this country is still hung up on class. The working class would never vote for tories, and the middle/upper class would never vote labour.

Sorry, but that is a ridiculously false statement. Are you actually naive / ill-informed enough to believe this, or were you shooting for a Funny?

The Sun solidly backed Cameron; if you think this was because Murdoch is cosy with the Tories you're right, but if you think it was ONLY due to this, despite the entire (mostly working-class) readership of the paper thinking all the while "WTF why are they backing the tories I hate them" you are in dreamland. Not even Murdoch can get away with wholly flying in the face of his readership's leanings. On the contrary, there is a decent chunk of working class (self employed White Van Man, etc) who are Thatcherite/Tory for various reasons: disagrees with the welfare state ("I'm a self made man who didn't need no handouts"), disagrees with Europe/immigration ("Cheapo Polish builders taking all my clients"), etc.

Meanwhile, look at the stereotype of the New-Labour-voting Islington dinner party brigade. (Upper) middle class to a tee. Do you really think Labour had the last 13 years in govt without any middle class votes whatsoever? Relying solely on that traditional unionised working class base which... um... hardly exists anymore, what with the decline in our manufacturing industries? More dreamland.

Your ludicrously simplistic class-based analysis is at best extremely dated (certainly pre-Blair, perhaps even pre-Thatcher), and quite probably was never really accurate. In an international forum like this where people who don't know better are liable to take you at face value, I feel it's almost irresponsible to trot out this utter nonsense with a straight face.

Re:Risk?

[Gordonjcp]

Beheading them would take too long. This way you just need a bit of empty space, the 650 MPs, and a couple of cherrypickers.

Re:Risk?

[tehcyder]

If they opt for a coalition with the conservatives I suspect that most of their support will vanish.

Absolutely, in my consituency it was worth voting tactically for the Lib Dems to keep Tory candidate out (as Labour were only ever going to be a very distant third), but I, for one, would rather vote Green in future than Lib Dem if they now enter into a coalition with the Tories.

Re:Risk?

[Blakey Rat]

The "fanatical patriotism" of certain parts the US military (especially the Marine Corps) that leads to obeying even the most ridiculous of orders;

All militaries are like that, at least successful ones. If yours isn't, I hope you don't need to rely on them anytime soon.

The "at will" employment situation that guarantees people in the lower rungs of society are basically slaves to their bosses' whims to avoid being fired;

I'm in an "at will" state and I love it. I have just as much power as my boss-- you know what? If you're unskilled and ineffective, yes you should be afraid of being fired. If you're skilled, effective and even slightly ambitious your boss should be afraid of you. (Specifically: you leaving.)

Nobody in this state is a slave unless they want to be.

The security theatre at airports and tourist attractions that basically forces you to do certain things or be denied access

This one I agree with you with.

(which sometimes isn't an option (such as if your "at will" employer has told you to fly somewhere))...

Then grow a pair and tell him you won't go. Look, the government can't help you if you're afraid to stand up for yourself. It's not your nanny, you have live your own life. (Another way the US view of the world contrasts with the UK view, although that's sadly changing: GOVERNMENT!!! SAVE ME FROM UNHEALTHY TRANSFATS!!! I CAN'T STOP SHOVING FOOD IN MY FAT MAW WITHOUT YOU!!!)

Other than the names, I don't see a huge difference. Just think of when a butler in a fancy British home says that "the master of the house is not home at present", or that he is "the humble servant" - he doesn't really mean "master" and "servant" as you appear to be thinking... he really just means "boss" and "employee".

Except in the TV episodes I'm talking about, they literally do mean "master" and "servant", and sometimes the "servant" is actually a full-blown slave to boot. You never see this type of relationship in American TV. That's all I'm pointing out.

Of course, this being Slashdot, pointing out anything about the US instantly brings the US-haters out of the woodwork, so I guess I shouldn't have expected better. At least you had actual examples, as opposed to the other guy who (apparently) thinks we're all brainwashed by TV.

Re:Risk?

[Blakey Rat]

What do the contents of our media say about our ability for independent thinking? Or lack of master/servant relationships?

In fact, what he hell are you even talking about? Is this a conspiracy theory? Is your tinfoil hat a little too tight this morning?

Re:Risk?

[xaxa]

And yet it's Americans that complain that British/European waiters are rude (they're paid fairly, so they're not begging for tips), think it's weird that everyone queues with each other (fairest way), avoid public transport (it's not only for "poor people"), etc.

There is a class system in Britain, but it's nothing to do with master/servant stuff. You can be "upper class" but still quite poor, or "lower class" and rich, and either way you don't do what someone else says, or tell others.

Re:Risk?

[Blakey Rat]

And yet it's Americans that complain that British/European waiters are rude (they're paid fairly, so they're not begging for tips),

Huh? What does this have to do with anything?

think it's weird that everyone queues with each other (fairest way),

I don't know what "queues with each other" means, but if you mean "lines up single-file" then we do that in my part of the US. We also say "good morning" and "thank you" to the driver when we board and leave.

Hey, maybe you shouldn't fucking stereotype a HUGE country based on a few douchebags in New Jersey, huh? (Or more likely, based on what you see on TV... which is douchebags in LA, primarily.)

avoid public transport (it's not only for "poor people"),

Again, this doesn't exist in my State. Generally, people avoid public transportation because the system is too small and neighborhoods too spread-out to make it effective. (To take a commuter train into work, I have to drive about 8 miles to a neighboring city, for example. If I took the bus in from my city, I'd still have to drive about 4 miles to a park-and-ride, and I'd be screwed if I worked late since it only runs twice in the evenings.)

I've never heard anybody say that public transit is for poor people. Of course, I don't live in a douchebag state that you see on TV.

There is a class system in Britain, but it's nothing to do with master/servant stuff. You can be "upper class" but still quite poor, or "lower class" and rich, and either way you don't do what someone else says, or tell others.

Ok, but how about you guys work to make it not exist at all?

Re:Risk?

[xaxa]

Maybe you shouldn't stereotype a whole country based on one TV show.

Re:Risk?

[Cimexus]

Perhaps not in the traditional way of thinking, but I would dare say employees in the US (at the low end of the jobs market) are far more 'servants' of their employers than in other countries.

In the US you get very little (one or two weeks) annual leave, minimum wages starting in the single digits ($/hr), and health care tied to your employer. I was actually shocked when I learned how little some people in America made (and that some jobs are actually exempt from minimum wage, hence the culture of tipping certain professions in the US).

In my country (which FWIW is Australia but has much the same employment laws as the UK/Europe) the minimum wage is >$14/hour, there is a legal minimum of 4 weeks annual leave (and some enjoy 5 or 6 weeks) and although private health insurance does exist, it's completely unrelated to your employment status and even if you didn't have it, there's a free universal health system there as a safety net.

So OK, the US is the land of the free - technically people ~can~ choose to quit their job at any time they want. But freedom in the US also extends to the freedom of companies to make a lot of money while treating their employees comparatively poorly. And those employees (for health or other reasons) sometimes don't really have a choice to leave. Life as a unskilled/minimum wage employee in the US is more 'servant like' than in most other (developed) countries, I would say.

Not to say I'm actually saying they are servants - that would be pure hyperbole. But I honestly don't think you can say that 'master/servant' thinking is less prevalent in the US than other places...

Re:Risk?

[YttriumOxide]

The "fanatical patriotism" of certain parts the US military (especially the Marine Corps) that leads to obeying even the most ridiculous of orders;

All militaries are like that, at least successful ones. If yours isn't, I hope you don't need to rely on them anytime soon.

The world really isn't that scary of a place that one should have to rely on a military all that often. Of course, it is sadly necessary to have one, but I disagree that the fanatical patriotism is required. A clear-headed understanding that "my commander probably understands the situation better than I do, and therefore if he gives an order I should follow it" should be sufficient. It still at least leaves room for the "there is no way in hell this could ever be the right thing to do, so I won't do it" feeling that I believe is REQUIRED for a soldier to have in some circumstances.

The "at will" employment situation that guarantees people in the lower rungs of society are basically slaves to their bosses' whims to avoid being fired;

I'm in an "at will" state and I love it. I have just as much power as my boss-- you know what? If you're unskilled and ineffective, yes you should be afraid of being fired. If you're skilled, effective and even slightly ambitious your boss should be afraid of you. (Specifically: you leaving.)

This is of course true for any of the "higher" jobs, which I assume you have. I also work in a place where my boss is far more afraid of me leaving than I would ever be of being fired (I'm a software developer for a company that heavily relies on development but isn't specifically a development company), but I was referring more to the "lower" jobs... someone working at McDonalds is never going to have that kind of power over their boss - their job just doesn't justify it. Their bosses can and DO treat them pretty poorly in places with "at will" employment.

Nobody in this state is a slave unless they want to be.

Sorry, but I really think you need to get out and see a bit more of the place you live. While I think "slave" might be going a bit far, it's pretty close when all other avenues are worse than the bad situation you're in.

The security theatre at airports and tourist attractions that basically forces you to do certain things or be denied access

This one I agree with you with.

(which sometimes isn't an option (such as if your "at will" employer has told you to fly somewhere))...

Then grow a pair and tell him you won't go.

In a place with "at will" employment, in a job where you're replacable, this will almost certainly get you fired. Again relating to the above - doesn't really cause a problem for the likes of you or I, but you need to look a bit beyond your own situation.

Look, the government can't help you if you're afraid to stand up for yourself. It's not your nanny, you have live your own life. (Another way the US view of the world contrasts with the UK view, although that's sadly changing: GOVERNMENT!!! SAVE ME FROM UNHEALTHY TRANSFATS!!! I CAN'T STOP SHOVING FOOD IN MY FAT MAW WITHOUT YOU!!!)

I certainly don't disagree with you here. I don't live in the UK or the US and I find this attitude disgusting. Personal responsibility is something that I rank very highly and the kinds of people that ask the government to regulate things that they should be able to self-regulate do bother me a lot.

That said however, my political viewpoints can't really be summed up so easily as "left", "right", or whatever.

For example, I am relatively "socialist" in my viewpoints towards taxation, unemployment and so on. I am happy to pay high taxes to look after the people in my society that aren't doing as well as I am. Some people abuse it, certainly, but to avoid seeing homeless people on th

Re:Risk?

[Blakey Rat]

It still at least leaves room for the "there is no way in hell this could ever be the right thing to do, so I won't do it" feeling that I believe is REQUIRED for a soldier to have in some circumstances.

We might have to just agree to disagree, but I believe every American soldier does exactly that.

but I was referring more to the "lower" jobs... someone working at McDonalds is never going to have that kind of power over their boss - their job just doesn't justify it. Their bosses can and DO treat them pretty poorly in places with "at will" employment.

So then they need to make themselves more valuable. The Government is not your nanny. You have to run your own life.

While I think "slave" might be going a bit far, it's pretty close when all other avenues are worse than the bad situation you're in.

I don't believe there is a single American who has no avenues to improve himself and his life.

I certainly don't disagree with you here. I don't live in the UK or the US and I find this attitude disgusting. Personal responsibility is something that I rank very highly and the kinds of people that ask the government to regulate things that they should be able to self-regulate do bother me a lot.

Unless you work at McDonalds, in which case you're all "OH GOVERNMENT, SAVE ME FROM THIS LOW-PAYING JOB!!!" You're really coming across as a hypocrite, here.

I am however more "libertarian" in my views regarding freedom of choice. I should be allowed to do whatever the hell I want as long as it doesn't directly negatively affect others.

Then you should love "at will" employment states, where the worker and boss both have the *choice* to work with each other.

You can't love "choice" then also love "job protectionism" in the same breath. What kind of "choice" is it to tell a boss he can't fire somebody?

believe that the government has no right to tell me the gender or even number of people I can marry (I only want to marry one woman, but should I CHOOSE to marry 3 women and 2 men and everyone in the marriage agrees, that's none of the government's business);

I agree with you, the government should have no hand in marriage at all.

Here in Germany it's definitely a completely foreign concept (these days) as the very first article of the constitution here (or equivalent of consitution) relates to the inviolability of human dignity. Seeing it on TV, whether in the UK, Germany or US however shouldn't be such a foreign idea - we (should) all understand that there are people that act that way, do those things, and even accept it as normal.

Ugh, Germans. On the one hand, you don't worship a royal family, so that's good. On the other, you have zero freedom of speech, which is worse. You're also the reason the baddies in Wolfenstein don't wear actual SS logos on their uniforms.

I hope you weren't referring to me as a "US-hater".

No, sorry. You seem pretty rational. This site is full of US-haters, though.

Re:Risk?

[YttriumOxide]

You can't love "choice" then also love "job protectionism" in the same breath. What kind of "choice" is it to tell a boss he can't fire somebody?

Well, like I was saying, I think "choice" is extremely important (pretty much the most important thing from an individual's perspective), but like everything in life it's not an "all or nothing" concept. I think a person should be able to be fired for being useless, or no longer needed, or a myriad of other things. But NOT simply because the boss says "I don't like you". Yes, this IS restricting the choice of the boss, but I don't feel a society can function well and take care of all its members when such a situation is possible.

I don't believe there is a single American who has no avenues to improve himself and his life.

Then we definitely differ on opinion here. I believe that most countries have people that this applies to, and unfortunately in the US there are more from my point of view than most other western nations. The homeless people on the streets of NYC for example tend to be in pretty bad situations with no obvious way out for them. They can go stay in shelters where crime and violence are worse than their own "communities" on the streets, but despite there being programmes there that are intended to help them, the success rate is extremely low.

Ugh, Germans. On the one hand, you don't worship a royal family, so that's good.

Well, like I said I'm not German, I just live here... but I don't think anyone really "worships" a royal family anywhere these days. There are quite a few Monarchies here in Europe and in almost all cases, they're pretty much just figureheads.

On the other, you have zero freedom of speech, which is worse.

That's patently untrue. Freedom of speech here is guaranteed by the constitution, as is the freedom of the press (a related and equally important topic)... The reason it's commonly perceived as though freedom of speech is limited here is that it's not the "highest" right that is given. That honour goes to (as in my last post) the inviolability of human dignity. You can NOT use speech to violate human dignity (such as hate speech and so on), as this is breaking a more fundmental right than the right to free speech. Other than this specific case though, all speech is protected. This is a deliberate design to avoid the fact that people are by their natures pretty easy to persuade when not presented with enough variable information about the world around them and only presented with information that shows one point of view (and if you think that's not true, ask yourself why advertising is so successful). This led to the problems with Adolf Hitler's government here and can be seen elsewhere such as the Christian fundamentalists in the US, the Islamic fundamentalists in the middle east, and Apartheid in South Africa not so long ago.

It can be argued that "human dignity" is a pretty broad thing and therefore this interpretation is open to abuse, and I wouldn't necessarily disagree with you, but in practice it seems to be working pretty well right now, and the Germans have learned from their past to be wary of governments that try to impose extreme views...

Re:Risk?

[Jeremy Erwin]

It is said that under Blair, Britain became more of a Nanny state than ever before.

Today, children are no longer allowed to buy fireworks or light their own bonfires. The Fireworks Act of 2003 prohibited people under the age of 18 from carrying fireworks in public. Bonfire night is now strictly controlled by grown-ups. Due to the influence of the US, Halloween has replaced Bonfire Night as children's big autumn festival. Even the cardboard Guy Fawkes masks have disappeared from most of our shops, to be replaced by Halloween masks and skulls. But some children do still build guys and go out to collect pennies.

Bonfire Night

And, of course, the movie did much to dilute the essential radicalism of "V for Vendetta". The surveillance state didn't really help.

Re:Risk?

[Blakey Rat]

Yes, this IS restricting the choice of the boss, but I don't feel a society can function well and take care of all its members when such a situation is possible.

So you're telling me that my society (in Washington State) isn't functioning well right now?

Moreover, it's functioning worse than (for example) California's?

The homeless people on the streets of NYC for example tend to be in pretty bad situations with no obvious way out for them. They can go stay in shelters where crime and violence are worse than their own "communities" on the streets, but despite there being programmes there that are intended to help them, the success rate is extremely low.

First of all, I'm going to sound like a jerk, but I really don't care about New York whatsoever. As far as I'm concerned, that's a completely different country from me-- I'm thousands of miles away and in a vastly, vastly different culture.

Secondly, homeless people are generally mentally-ill. That doesn't excuse the fact that they're homeless, but it does mean that the current programs to assist them (shelters) are only addressing a small portion of the actual problem.

Well, like I said I'm not German, I just live here... but I don't think anyone really "worships" a royal family anywhere these days. There are quite a few Monarchies here in Europe and in almost all cases, they're pretty much just figureheads.

The British do.

Freedom of speech here is guaranteed by the constitution, as is the freedom of the press (a related and equally important topic)... The reason it's commonly perceived as though freedom of speech is limited here is that it's not the "highest" right that is given.

Yah; it's guaranteed by the Chinese constitution also. (Seriously, look it up.) That doesn't mean you got it.

Putting a SS logo on the shoulder of a CGI soldier in a video game about WWII isn't "hate speech" by any reasonable definition of the term.

Even if it was, so what? Hate speech shouldn't be a crime by itself.

It can be argued that "human dignity" is a pretty broad thing and therefore this interpretation is open to abuse, and I wouldn't necessarily disagree with you, but in practice it seems to be working pretty well right now, and the Germans have learned from their past to be wary of governments that try to impose extreme views...

That's great. China seems to be doing ok, too. But that doesn't mean you have freedom of speech.

Re:Risk?

[Beyond_GoodandEvil]

Just a simple question(I am not trolling) what did the tories do that was so much worse then the 13 yr Labour govt. that people dislike Labour, but hate the Tories?

Re:Risk?

[YttriumOxide]

Yes, this IS restricting the choice of the boss, but I don't feel a society can function well and take care of all its members when such a situation is possible.

So you're telling me that my society (in Washington State) isn't functioning well right now?

Moreover, it's functioning worse than (for example) California's?

Having never been to Washington state, and knowing little about it, I couldn't say. I can assume that there are other factors that will have an influence on how well the society works, but I still stand by my belief that the "at will" employment situation is a negative factor and that without it, you'd be even better off as a society than you are currently.

Like I said though, I really don't know the societal situation there in Washington State and so don't want to speculate on details that I can't possibly know with any level of certainty.

The homeless people on the streets of NYC for example tend to be in pretty bad situations with no obvious way out for them. They can go stay in shelters where crime and violence are worse than their own "communities" on the streets, but despite there being programmes there that are intended to help them, the success rate is extremely low.

First of all, I'm going to sound like a jerk, but I really don't care about New York whatsoever. As far as I'm concerned, that's a completely different country from me-- I'm thousands of miles away and in a vastly, vastly different culture.

And Washington State is thousands of miles away from me, in a vastly, vastly different culture... yet I do still care, because we're all human beings. But I really wasn't ever talking about whether one should care or not, I was discussing societal things in general. I'm happy for you that you live in a society that you like, as do I.

Secondly, homeless people are generally mentally-ill. That doesn't excuse the fact that they're homeless, but it does mean that the current programs to assist them (shelters) are only addressing a small portion of the actual problem.

Many homeless people are mentally ill, but I'd wager that many became that way AFTER becoming homeless, not before. Not all, of course, but definitely a significant number. If the society were geared better towards taking care of low-income people before they become homeless, I'm certain the rate of homelessness would decrease (there would still be those that choose to be homeless due to mental illness or whatever other reasons, but those given the chance to avoid it when they didn't choose to be, wouldn't be)

Well, like I said I'm not German, I just live here... but I don't think anyone really "worships" a royal family anywhere these days. There are quite a few Monarchies here in Europe and in almost all cases, they're pretty much just figureheads.

The British do.

You don't honestly believe that do you? I've never lived there, but I have quite a few friends there and have visited there often. The British Royals aren't significantly different to the no-talent celebrities of the US (as in those that are famous for "being famous" with no skills whatsoever to have made them that way (Paris Hilton immediately springs to mind)). The only real difference is that there's a level of deference and respect rather than all-out media bashing (a "prince smoking pot" gets humorous headlines in almost every newspaper around, but much beyond that might be treated with a bit more caution).

There may be some "upper class" types that still truly consider the royals to be a "great family" or that they "hold the country together" or whatever, but the average citizen of the UK really doesn't think about them in daily life at all, and when they do, it's more in the same vein as when you think about any random ultra-rich person in the US.

Re:Risk?

[Blakey Rat]

That's a point we differ on. I agree with the German government (and many other governments) that yes, it should be. Speech is NOT harmless. It can influence people (again, look at advertising), and therefore large amounts of hate speech can cause serious problems.

If and When it is used to talk somebody into committing a crime, then a crime has been committed. Until an actual crime occurs, it's equivalent to 1984's "thoughtcrime".

If I do an action that hurts you, than I'm at fault and I could be prosecuted for it. If I say a word that hurts you, that's *your* fault... if you haven't learned by adulthood that "sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never harm me", that's not my problem. If you haven't internalized your sense of self-worth, well, I'm sorry, it's going to be a long, hard life for you-- but it's not my fucking fault.

I think people just prefer to err on the side of caution since it doesn't hurt. While I COULD make a game with characters wearing Nazi uniforms and plaster the walls of the game with Swastikas, and then have a VALID argument in court that it's okay because I'm showing the historical fact and not espousing the ideology associated with it, why would I WANT to go through all that hassle when it's easier not to? I think the only people that really WANT to plaster Nazi symbols everywhere are neo-Nazis, and that's exactly what these laws exist to stop.

Ok:

1) The government has already successfully regulated your actions by making you too terrified to exercise your rights.

2) How are you seriously suggesting that putting historically accurate costumes in a video game is equivalent to "plastering Nazi symbols everywhere." That argument is so specious I can't even believe you typed it.

Look, the US uses Nazi symbols in movies and video games... and somehow we have fewer neo-Nazis than you do, so I'm thinking the symbols are utterly unrelated to the problem.

Outlaw the ability to tell the children to hate black people, and racism will die (not immediately of course, there's still all of the societal problems to fix that were caused by it to begin with, such as higher crime rates in ghettos and so on, but it'd be a HUGE first step)

No, it won't. Make the law completely color-blind, like everything else, and racism will eventually go away. Every time you call out somebody based on skin color, *whether positive or negative*, you're encouraging racism.

BTW, how the holy hell are you saying all this and claiming to be a Libertarian? Do you even know what "Libertarian" means? This conversation is like, "yah I'm a vegetarian, but I think everybody should eat rare steaks twice a day." It's crazy.

However I've never seen anyone give a convincing argument why hate speech should be allowedquoting somebody else in his book! In Canada, quoting a radial Imam is equivalent to holding the same opinion yourself. This is where "hate speech" laws lead you!

You don't need to rely on a theoretical "slippery slope," you can watch it happen in real-time.

Re:Risk?

[Blakey Rat]

Goddamned, I fucked up the tags, and Slashdot sucks shit. That last paragraph should read:

However I've never seen anyone give a convincing argument why hate speech should be allowed

Because there's no universal agreement on what "hate speech" is?

Hell, look at Canada: Mark Steyn can be prosecuted by a special government commission for simply quoting somebody else in his book! In Canada, quoting a radial Imam is equivalent to holding the same opinion yourself. This is where "hate speech" laws lead you!

You don't need to rely on a theoretical "slippery slope," you can watch it happen in real-time.

Re:Risk?

[YttriumOxide]

If I do an action that hurts you, than I'm at fault and I could be prosecuted for it. If I say a word that hurts you, that's *your* fault... if you haven't learned by adulthood that "sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never harm me", that's not my problem.

I agree... I wasn't trying to say that speech should be illegal because it can directly cause "harm" - it can't. It can INDIRECTLY cause harm however by convincing people of certain points of view. The speech itself hurts no-one, the effects of it do.

This is a problem, but it's not a problem with the law, it's a problem with people. I like to think of myself as pretty immune to advertising and "popular opinion", but walk out in any big town (be it Seattle, Tokyo, Berlin or London) and just take a look how many people are wearing overpriced crap that is half the quality and twice the price of other clothes just because it's got a certain label on it. THAT is the power of speech, and when used for something more dangerous than just selling clothing to gullible people, it needs to be regulated.

The government has already successfully regulated your actions by making you too terrified to exercise your rights.

The government hasn't terrorised me in to anything. I wholeheartedly agree with this aspect of the law (note: "THIS aspect"... there are many other laws I don't agree with). If I was "too terrified to exercise my rights", that would imply I wanted to do something but didn't out of fear for some kind of negative action against me. I'm not afraid of doing what I want to do at all.

Make the law completely color-blind, like everything else, and racism will eventually go away. Every time you call out somebody based on skin color, *whether positive or negative*, you're encouraging racism.

Again, I agree... the laws here do NOT single out any specific race, religion, credo, or belief system. "Affirmative action" laws are indeed more harmful than helpful. That's not what we have here.

BTW, how the holy hell are you saying all this and claiming to be a Libertarian?

I never claimed to be libertarian...
I said: For example, I am relatively "socialist" in my viewpoints towards...
and then: I am however more "libertarian" in my views regarding...

Hell, look at Canada: Mark Steyn can be prosecuted by a special government commission for simply quoting somebody else in his book! In Canada, quoting a radial Imam is equivalent to holding the same opinion yourself. This is where "hate speech" laws lead you!

That may be possible in Canada, and if so I feel very sorry for their screwed up laws. It's not possible here. I can quote Adolf Hitler all day long and not get in any trouble if I choose. The moment I'd get in trouble would be the moment I say something like, "and this is a damn good idea, let's bring back the gas chambers!" (unless it's clear I was joking or in some other way not seriously proposing it, in which case I still wouldn't be in trouble (as a good example: I have a coworker (German) who constantly goes on about driving tanks in to Paris again whenever our daughter company in France gives us grief (far too often), and noone would ever dream of that being a punishable offence))

If Labour doesn't get in...

[ickleberry]

What will Slashdot do without the steady stream of news about how the UK is becoming more of a surveillance state? There will hardly be anything here anymore.

I'll be going back to hang out with the overzealous teenage ubuntu fanboys and militant atheists on Digg

Re:If Labour doesn't get in...

[Anonymous Coward]

Erosion of civil liberties isn't a party political or, indeed, national issue. It's a constant battle - eternal vigilance and all that. But the 1984 references work best when talking about the UK.

Re:If Labour doesn't get in...

[TheRaven64]

Jaqui 'Jack Boots' Smith, the Home Secretary (until Thursday) responsible for most of the low-budget 1984 policies lost her seat.

Re:If Labour doesn't get in...

[wvmarle]

Don't you worry, I bet whoever will come to power in the UK will have no problem to out-do Labour.

Re:If Labour doesn't get in...

[jimicus]

Jack Straw was just as bad - he was home secretary when the RIPA was passed.

Remember home secretaries are usually appointed by the PM - it's fair to assume that their views are broadly in line with the PMs.

Re:If Labour doesn't get in...

[tehcyder]

Don't worry, if the Tories get in to power then the last thrteen years will look like an oasis of freedom and tolerance in comparison.

It was a Conservative government which used the force of the state to destroy the miners for purely political ends.

Given what we have now...

[Jahmbo]

I would be perfectly happy letting a piece of software choose the goverment. As it is now we aren;t represented by the best person for the job, rather the person most able to gather votes.

Re:Given what we have now...

[s0litaire]

I'm all for it; unless Microsoft or Diebold write the software....

Re:Given what we have now...

[newcastlejon]

The problem is that losers with 25% of the actual votes only get a twelth of the voting power in parliament. It might be nice to have a democracy where 2 out of 3 parties have to support new law rather than it being a foregone conclusion most of the time.

Re:Given what we have now...

[sakdoctor]

I would be perfectly happy letting a piece of software BE the government.

Vote 'Helios AI' in the October elections!

Re:Given what we have now...

[digitalnoise615]

I would be perfectly happy letting a piece of software BE the government.

Vote 'Skynet' in the October elections!

Fixed that for you.

Arcane?

[NotoriousDAN]

How is this arcane? The article plainly describes how a British-style parliamentary system works, as practiced in many countries throughout the world (including Canada), and with a special emphasis on the outcome of the most recent election. This is only confusing to foreigners and people unfamiliar with basic civics.

Re:Arcane?

[Bugamn]

He is talking about the secret Mage Council that rules the United Kingdom.

Re:Arcane?

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

Well, your whole democracy is a patch. A hack. You still keep the queen around, of course, she has no political power and her role is to produce news for the tabloids that the illiterate of your country can follow. The queen in the UK = Oprah in the states. Except, that according to the law, the queen can still intervene. Her powers, while null in practice, are still intact on paper. Please remember the Fear of queen-intervention in Canada a few months ago, and a similar situation now in the UK. So, this arcane bitch that you keep for decorative purposes has actual power that she can use at any time. Off course, nobody will actually let her use it. The deal is: She gets to keep the crown and go to boring parties as long as she doesn't use her power. If she does, the people will kick her out in the blink of an eye.

So, that's what I call Arcane. That's an ugly hack. A workaround.

Off course, there are systems that are even more stupid and broken that the on in the UK, for instance, the electoral-college, two-party system in the US. /Disclaimer: I am neither from the States nor the UK.

Is this the M.P.L.A
Or is this the U.D.A
Or is this the I.R.A
I thought it was the U.K or just
another country
another council tenancy

Isn't it sad that Lyndon is doing ads for margarine, and that Dave Mustain said he won't do the cover of Anarchy in the UK anymore because he's now a stupid Christian?

Sorry to go off-topic ... my mind wonders ....

Re:Arcane?

[MichaelSmith]

You still keep the queen around, of course, she has no political power and her role is to produce news for the tabloids that the illiterate of your country can follow. The queen in the UK = Oprah in the states.

No, not true. The queen still has absolute control in at least the UK and Australia. I have a copy of the Australian constitution and it is a very thin book. It pretty much says "the queen may set up the government in a particular way, or she may not".

The people may not like it but the queen is effectively a dictator.

Re:Arcane?

[thetoadwarrior]

It's not arcane but it is a bit outdated and arguably unfair in the sense the Lib Dems had nearly as many votes as Labour but a fraction of the seats.

If you look at the numnbers, they have the following number of seats:
con: 306
labour 258
lib dem 57.

It sounds like the conservatives trashed the lib dems but that's not really the case.

If you look at the actual votes it goes like this:
con: 10,706,647
labour: 8,604,358
Liberal Democrat 6,827,938

While I don't want Labour back in power if they do form a coalition I don't think it's that bad of a deal. More people did get what the party they voted for and Labout and Lib Dems do actually have more in common.

I think the system needs tweaking to reflect the portion of votes that each party received. Should Lib Dems have such little power (assuming no coalitions) compared to Labour when nearly as many people picked them? Arguably all systems are like this when you group a whole nation's total votes but the UK is small enough, imo, that perhaps it should. You can't really say different blocks within London, for example, are so different that we should leave things as is.

Re:Arcane?

[thetoadwarrior]

I forgot to add, I think a hung parliament is actually a good thing. If we could keep it as is then they would have to work together rather than one dominant party pushing through what they want rather than what the whole of the UK wants.

Re:Arcane?

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

Dude, would you mind reading all of my post before posting stupid crap?

From my post:

Except, that according to the law, the queen can still intervene. Her powers, while null in practice, are still intact on paper. Please remember the Fear of queen-intervention in Canada a few months ago, and a similar situation now in the UK. So, this arcane bitch that you keep for decorative purposes has actual power that she can use at any time. Off course, nobody will actually let her use it. The deal is: She gets to keep the crown and go to boring parties as long as she doesn't use her power. If she does, the people will kick her out in the blink of an eye.

It was right in the NEXT SENTENCE after the one you quoted.

Re:Arcane?

[drsmithy]

Well, your whole democracy is a patch. A hack. You still keep the queen around, of course, she has no political power and her role is to produce news for the tabloids that the illiterate of your country can follow. The queen in the UK = Oprah in the states. Except, that according to the law, the queen can still intervene. Her powers, while null in practice, are still intact on paper. Please remember the Fear of queen-intervention in Canada a few months ago, and a similar situation now in the UK. So, this arcane bitch that you keep for decorative purposes has actual power that she can use at any time. Off course, nobody will actually let her use it. The deal is: She gets to keep the crown and go to boring parties as long as she doesn't use her power. If she does, the people will kick her out in the blink of an eye.

I think you mean the politicians will kick her out. I seriously doubt the vast majority of the population with the current Queen going a bit dictatorial, at least in the short term, considering what they think of the average politician.

Heck, if she decided to dissolve parliament and fire every current MP, you'd probably see people partying in the streets.

Re:Arcane?

[daver00]

Hangon, doesn't the Queen install Lords? So the entire upper house of parliment is one great big representative of the crown? I'd say thats a fairly large amount of active political power!

Re:Arcane?

[TheRaven64]

Actually, the Queen does serve a useful purpose. She is still there for exactly this kind of situation. A new government is formed at the Queen's invitation, and she is able to act as an apolitical mediator between parties. She also meets with the Prime Minister every week and, as someone who has met with the PM every week for the last 57 years, provides a lot of advice and a useful historical perspective.

Re:Arcane?

[Homburg]

The Queen's appointment of lords is, like the rest of her powers, ceremonial. The lords are actually chosen by the Prime Minister.

Re:Arcane?

[gmhowell]

You still keep the queen around, of course, she has no political power and her role is to produce news for the tabloids that the illiterate of your country can follow. The queen in the UK = Oprah in the states.

No, not true. The queen still has absolute control in at least the UK and Australia. I have a copy of the Australian constitution and it is a very thin book. It pretty much says "the queen may set up the government in a particular way, or she may not".

The people may not like it but the queen is effectively a dictator.

You underestimate the power that is Oprah.

Re:Arcane?

[gmhowell]

Actually, the Queen does serve a useful purpose. She is still there for exactly this kind of situation. A new government is formed at the Queen's invitation, and she is able to act as an apolitical mediator between parties. She also meets with the Prime Minister every week and, as someone who has met with the PM every week for the last 57 years, provides a lot of advice and a useful historical perspective.

It's so cute the way Brits and Anglophiles justify their bass-ackwards system of governance.

Re:Arcane?

[Jenming]

The electoral college is a leftover from unifying the states and is now relatively stupid, but only slightly broken. Recent events aside it almost never is different than a straight popular vote.

The two party system is not clearly broken. With a two party system the compromise and the coalition forming is done before the election, then the people vote on which coalition of interests they want in power. In a several party system people vote for a more unique set of interests that they agree with more closely (thats a good thing) then these parties compromise and form a majority coalition. This majority coalition never gets voted on and if the majority coalition was actually put up for election it very well might not actually receive a majority of votes.

Re:Arcane?

[UncleFluffy]

The lords are actually chosen by the Prime Minister.

I believe you mean "purchased from".

Re:Arcane?

[nanoakron]

I'm just worried about a repeat of the early 90's where the Conservatives sold off most of our nationalised industries to their corporate chums - british steel, british telecom, national rail and a couple of others I forget.

Only this time it will be with the NHS - watch for 'public-private partnerships' in walk-in clinics, or A&E departments, or out-of-hospital scanning departments.

You can bet we'll never see that money again, and we'll just end up with a horribly fragmented NHS just like like national rail.

At least the LibDems will act as a major thorn in their side if anything like that tries to pass.

Re:Arcane?

[cavetroll]

There may well be direct privatization of some parts of the public sector in order to raise funds; it is certainly clear that funds need to be raised in some manner in order to address the ludicrous deficit that currently exists (the other options are punitive tax hikes or extensive spending cuts, neither of which seem to command popular support). It isn't clear though that there is a great deal left in the public sector that would have much value in the private-sector (and I think potential buyers would be wary of taking anything labour-intensive after BT and British Airways were so badly burned by their pension deficits over the last 12 months)

Nonetheless, I don't think there is likely to be as much support for 'public-private partnerships' as you assume.

Over the last decade or so, Labour have used a lot of them, and they proved convenient insofar as they allow an multiple announcements of public spending projects to be made while hiding the cost from balance sheets for several years - but with existing lines of credit already running thin, the market is likely to take a dim view of any such 'hidden' commitments to public spending.

In the only place where there is direct executive power currently held by a the conservative party - The London Mayoralty - Public Private Partnerships have been wound down, indeed Boris Johnson only this week ended the PPP deal with tubelines for rebuilding the London Underground.

I don't claim that such a move is beyond criticism, in particular the compensation payment that tubelines has received from this looks to be excessive. Not only that, but when the books so urgently need balancing, then a long term infrastructure project such as rebuilding the tube may be the sort of thing that is canceled completely.

Re:Arcane?

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

Yes, actually none of the different variations of democracy works. After the direct democracy we knew in Antique Greece, everything has sucked badly.

The threshold to become president is huge. That is, to gain any kind of significant power, you have to go through the process of money making and power gathering, that involves corrupting yourself, effectively guaranteeing that anyone that reaches office comes from a select group of people, that answers to a specific group of interest.

No matter who we vote for, the same corporate overlords win.

Re:Arcane?

[TermV]

Well...You'd think so, but what ends up happening (as in Canada at the moment) is the government becomes entirely focused on surviving for the next few months and there's little in the way of long term thinking. Our Conservative party has become disturbingly adept at machiavellian political manoeuverings that have kept them in power for an impressive length of time. Unfortunately our main opposition party is so intellectually bankrupt that their platform consists of "elect us and you'll see" and do nothing but go on about the same 3 scandals ad nauseum trying to win short term political points. We're in this hell where the politicians are focused entirely on popping their polling numbers 3 points so they can trigger an election, and nobody is doing anything that the voters actually care about.

Re:Arcane?

[internettoughguy]

Labout and Lib Dems do actually have more in common.

Im not sure about this, the "old' labour sure, but ultimately there's fuck all to choose from between labour and the conservatives currently, they would be most successful if they just choose whoever was willing to concede the most policy to them.

They should have some sort of policy auction, whereby they list their most critical policy points, and the party who accepts the greatest number of them gains control.

Re:Arcane?

[Eli Gottlieb]

With a two party system the compromise and the coalition forming is done before the election, then the people vote on which coalition of interests they want in power.

Right, so if I want to vote for universal health care, my vote will also go toward homosexual marriage and pandering to Muslim extremists. If I don't want to pander to Muslim extremists but instead want to protect my country from them, it turns out that I have absolutely nobody to vote for, since the side that doesn't want to pander to them has decided it's a good idea to go randomly invading their countries.

Re:Arcane?

[jonbryce]

We have had relatively stable government in this country for the past 944 years. No other country in the world, apart from Switzerland, comes close.

Re:Arcane?

[jonbryce]

Er, they were all sold to the British public, apart from British Coal.

Re:Arcane?

[Malc]

More succinctly: the Lib-Dems got 23% of the vote, but only 9% of the seats in parliament. They increased their share of the vote by 1%, but lost nearly 10% of the seats they previously held. System broken?

Re:Arcane?

[damburger]

Yeah, lets just sweep all that nasty Cromwell business under the rug...

Re:Arcane?

[damburger]

They were sold to members of the British public with enough disposable income to buy shares. Don't try and pretend there was anything democratic about this move.

Re:Arcane?

[damburger]

Why is paying off the deficit so urgent that it requires a corporate raid on the assets of the nation? This sounds like neoliberal propaganda to me, a transparent pretext for turning over even more of our society to the false god of the 'marketplace' when the damage that has already done in the banking sector is still being felt.

Re:Arcane?

[jabuzz]

That would be incorrect they are put forward by the three main parties.

Re:Arcane?

[jabuzz]

The irony is that we do just that. Still it gives us 350 years of stable government. Though actually that is washing over the mass civil unrest that led to the Great Reform Act of 1832. Though this is much better going than the French who are on their fifth republic in just over 200 years.

Re:Arcane?

[Angostura]

It's actually a rather elegant workaround in my opinion. The UK's monarch is the equivalent of a permanently disabled root account, she holds the notional power, but cannot wield it. Politicians are the sudoers.

Re:Arcane?

[Some Bitch]

So, this arcane bitch that you keep for decorative purposes has actual power that she can use at any time. Off course, nobody will actually let her use it. The deal is: She gets to keep the crown and go to boring parties as long as she doesn't use her power. If she does, the people will kick her out in the blink of an eye.

Actually the deal is she's our last line of defence against an abusive government. Should she refuse royal assent to a bill then a major constitutional crisis would occur so it would only be done in the most serious of circumstances. In order to do so she would need to be in a position to immediately dissolve parliament, order a general election, and have overwhelming public support for her actions. If she didn't have that overwhelming public support that would be the end of the monarchy. The queen isn't meant to interfere all the time, she's meant to be there in case we REALLY need her.

Re:Arcane?

[Rakshasa Taisab]

What they meant was that looking from the outside (read; rest of the democratic world), the US/UK/Canadian system of election seems arcane and not very democratic.

So the title is perfectly valid.

Re:Arcane?

[d-signet]

Agreed While the (blatantly pro-tory) article itself seems to portray the UK population as being Labour-hating to the point that there would be riots if Lab/Lib-Dem work things out, the author seems to miss the fact that actually more people have voted to keep the Conservatives OUT than voted them IN. From the population as-a-whole, a labour - liberal coalition would be the preferred option

Re:Arcane?

[cavetroll]

3 reasons:

• Moody's
• Standard and Poor
• Fitch

If any of those decided to downgrade UK governmental bonds, then the cost of borrowing the current debt would rise and it would be even harder to pay off.

During the election campaign a lot of noise was made about £8billion of cuts in public spending that the conservative party wanted to make, if UK debt is downgraded, the extra interest payments would end up costing another £10billion http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/may/07/how-safe-uk-aaa-credit-rating - more than wiping out any benefit to doing this and causing the public sector deficit to increase still further.

I don't like this situation; I think the ratings agencies have far too much power with no effective oversight, and I think it is a major failure in the UK political system that the government was able to generate so much debt in the first place, but simply calling the current situation 'neo-liberal propaganda' won't change this reality and certainly won't make it go away.

Re:Arcane?

[Cimexus]

Seriously? The Westminster system (as practiced in the UK, Canada, Australia, NZ etc.) has its flaws (no democratic system is perfect), but it is no more 'backward' than the US system. In fact, it's actually better in terms of proportional representation and encouraging third and fourth parties than the US system. It also is less susceptible to the "he who has most campaign funding, wins" syndrome that you see in the US (elections in Commonwealth countries genuinely ARE less driven by money and corporate sponsors than in the US).

Personally I like the fact that so much in the Westminster system is left to protocol and convention, rather than hard coded in a written law. Under the Westminster system, governments are instead simply bound to the overarching principle of responsible government, which prevents the 'clever' manipulations of legal holes you might find in hard coded constitutional principles.

Re:Arcane?

[benedictaddis]

You know what? It works. Fudge works. Complexity works. As any software architect knows, systems accrete, evolve, become complex and self-regulating and balanced. It scares me much more that a zealot with a gleam in her eye would want to throw the whole lot out for being inelegant and make a clean sweep. That's how fascists get elected.

Re:Arcane?

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

You know, that's a pretty accurate definition. Except for the fact that the root account is disabled for login, but you left a process running under that account (nohup /bin/queen &), and that process is still running under uid 0.

Oh, and the sudoers ... they are definitely sudoing something. As usual, sudoing you.

Re:Arcane?

[laddiebuck]

The electoral college was an attempt to get something like the House of Commons, an independent body of representatives choosing an executive in a manner removed from direct democracy. But since they had this principle of keeping the executive and legislative separate, they had to split the Commons into a Congress and an Electoral College. Since the College isn't involved in legislation, it doesn't meet regularly, and withered just a few decades after being set up. This split hasn't been good for either Congress (weak) or the College (dead), as you'll observe if you listen to debates in Congress versus debates in any other democracy's Parliament (they're much more vibrant). You can be only so meaningful in law-writing if you're far removed from law-making. Obviously the party system hasn't helped things, but that's a bad trend that's taken over everywhere, not just in the USA.

Re:More than 2 parties

[MichaelSmith]

What electoral reform do you want?

Re:More than 2 parties

[DavidR1991]

The fact some polling stations ran out of paper for people to vote on.... well, that should pretty much sum up the things that need reforming. "Complete incompetence"

Hmm

[EyeSavant]

There are really only 3 permutations that matter.

1/ The conservatives go it alone, and try to run a minority government with occasional help from the Northern Ireland parties they are allied with, and possiby the liberal democrats on some issues. This is unlikely to last long to be honest

2/ The conservatives and Liberal democrats do a deal, and make a joint platform. This is the only one that has got any possiblity of lasting. The tricky part is as the 3rd Party the Liberal Democrats want some form of proportial representation (which would double their seats in parlament). The conservatives don't want that at all. They like the current system. I don't know what is going to happen here. I guess the Lib Dems will blink "for the good of the coutry", and a deal will be done.

3/ Labour and the liberal democrats do a deal, this does not give them a majority though, so they will need the help of again ulster parties (different NI parties are alligned to each of the mainland parties). and the welsh/scottish natioanlist parties. This will probably fragment after a while too. This grouping is possible as they limp along for a while, and would bring in some form of proportional representation or other electoral reform and eventually we have an early new election.

Some of the more outlandish things like Gordon brown not resigning if there was a viable alternative is just silly. He *could* do it and it would be a mess if he did, but it would destroy most of the support for his party for years to come. You have to be gracious in defeat in these things if you want to bounce back.

I suppose there is

4/ They just call a new election, as well, but that is not going to be popular with the public and noone really has the cash to fight it (particularly the liberal democrats, who have the most to lose from a new election).

Re:Hmm

[slim]

2/ The conservatives and Liberal democrats do a deal, and make a joint platform. This is the only one that has got any possiblity of lasting. The tricky part is as the 3rd Party the Liberal Democrats want some form of proportial representation (which would double their seats in parlament). The conservatives don't want that at all. They like the current system. I don't know what is going to happen here. I guess the Lib Dems will blink "for the good of the coutry", and a deal will be done.

The other sticking point for the Lib Dems is Europe. They are very pro, the Conservatives are very anti.

There's strong public campaigns at the moment for the Lib Dems not to compromise on electoral reform -- after all this is a once in a generation opportunity.

Electoral reform is the one thing I want to see achieved in this parliament.

Re:Hmm

[japonicus]

2/ The conservatives and Liberal democrats do a deal, and make a joint platform.

But if that happens the LibDems would be eviscerated. They'd lose almost all popular support and many of their current MPs would refuse to probably refuse to join a Tory coalition, fracturing the party. About the only credible reason to support them was to get voting reform, (and perhaps also as a left-wing protest vote against Gordon Brown) - as insipid Tory's they have nothing to offer.

Re:Hmm

[CowboyBob500]

How about:-

5) They just fucking grow up and vote on new laws according to what they actually believe individually.

All MPs are allowed to introduce legislation to be voted on. Why not just carry on doing this and allowing a free vote every time? We need to tell them to stop being so childish and that voting on strict party lines is no longer acceptable.

For the budget and other national issues, take the 3 most expert people on each subject from each party, and lock them in a room until they agree.

These people are supposed to serve us. We have no constitution only tradition, so there are no rules that can be broken. The result of the election should tell them that the general public are just fed up of the lot of them and the way the current system works. We should take the power back and tell them how to work for us.

Re:Hmm

[EyeSavant]

There's strong public campaigns at the moment for the Lib Dems not to compromise on electoral reform -- after all this is a once in a generation opportunity.

Electoral reform is the one thing I want to see achieved in this parliament.

Yeah that I agree with. That will be a big fat NO DEAL with the conservatives if they do that. The pressue is going to be building, and the only potentially stable goverment is some sort of conservative/Lib Dem deal. If Labour and the LD had got a few more seats (enough so they had a majority between them), then life would be a lot more intersteing. A good grass roots campaign on electoral reform is good, it gives the Lib Dems the oportunity to walk away if they have to, and do a deal with Labour. There is pressure building the other way, wiht "get a deal done by wednesday or the markets will tank" vibe being put out.

Re:Hmm

[GumphMaster]

2/ The conservatives and Liberal democrats do a deal, and make a joint platform. This is the only one that has got any possiblity of lasting. The tricky part is as the 3rd Party the Liberal Democrats want some form of proportial representation (which would double their seats in parlament). The conservatives don't want that at all. They like the current system. I don't know what is going to happen here. I guess the Lib Dems will blink "for the good of the coutry", and a deal will be done.

If two parties can arbitrarily change the number of seats they hold in parliament then democracy is dead and elections are pointless. They will be arguing over a proportion of (or particular) ministerial positions in the coalition government. This is a common event in Australian politics where "right-wing" governments are typically two-party coalitions, and "left-wing" governments are single-party (but nonetheless coalitions of internal factions).

Re:Hmm

[TheRaven64]

That will be a big fat NO DEAL with the conservatives if they do that

In this case, my favourite potential outcome looks possible: Gordon Brown remains PM and introduces electoral reform in the Queens speech. This is in the interest of everyone except the two main parties, so it gets through. Immediately afterwards, the Conservatives propose a vote of no confidence in the government and we get another election, with a better voting system. We'd still need a coalition, but neither Labour nor the Conservatives would be in such a strong bargaining position.

Re:Hmm

[sumdumass]

Here is another wrinkle that is being talked about in the US.

It appears that the UK's economic situation is a little messed up to where they will either have to raise taxes or cut some programs. It seems that the election went the way it did more because politicians were attempting to run away from that then run for an office. What they are saying here is whoever the controlling party is, that they will have to deal with the taxes or cuts and will be sitting out of power for quite a while. None of the parties want that.

This kind of means that no party exactly wants to be blamed for what is about to come so they may very well agree to not address the problems. That seems to mean that the UK will be at risk of seeing problems more along the lines of Greece and experience their recent problems.

In the US, fallout over some of the Tarp bailouts are being seen too in our attempts to fix our own problems. Evidently, one of the most conservative republicans was just outed on the republican ticket to represent the party next election because he voted for the bailouts. So there is a large backlash expected to incumbents who were in power when this mess came rushing down. This backlash seems to be including those who attempted to fix it after the fact regardless of if it was their fault or not. Even in well construed gerrymandered districts, it seems that incumbents at the federal level are at risk to some degree. It's this backlash that many US talking heads think will happen to whoever takes the reins of the UK government which makes some of them frightened to assert control.

Re:Hmm

[boxwood]

This is what they had to do in here in Canada. But Canada is weird in that we hate elections and we hate coalitions. Any parties that form a coalition to gain power will be screwed in the next elelction. And anyone that votes no confidence will also be screwed.

It works, but it doesn't stop them from acting childish. Oh well.

Re:Hmm

[aslate]

I voted for them but see the evisceration coming the other way (or probably both ways). The country's in quite a bit of shit with its debt and we need to make some nasty cuts.

If they side with Labour they won't have an outright majority and need a coalition of a load of smaller parties. You can't include the nationalist parties because they will "fight for Wales and Scotland", or summing up the SNP's party political, tell Westminister to fuck off if they suggest any cuts in Scotland. The only thing this loose coalition will be able to do is wangle through a vote on PR before collapsing in a massive heap in a very early election.

In the meantime, the markets will decide this barmy coalition of parties won't be able to control the deficit at all, certainly not in the long term. They'll destroy our credit-worthiness and increase the cost of borrowing / require us to print money to keep going in the way this coalition will want. In doing so they'll destroy the country and no-one will vote for the Lib Dems for being so stupid to put their "selfish" demands for PR above anything else.

Now this would be very different if Labour and Lib Dems had enough seats between them for the outright majority. They could actually form a stable coalition, have a fair amount of confidence and get PR through all at the same time. The problem is, the numbers don't add up.

Re:Hmm

[jonbryce]

Essentially the groupings are

Conservatives and Democratic Unionists

Labour, Social and Democratic Labour Party and Silvia Herman
SDLP and Silvia Herman both like Labour, but I'm not sure that they like each other. The people who voted for Silvia Herman certainly don't like SDLP.

Liberal Democrats and Alliance

SNP and Plaid Cymru

Green

Sinn Fein who don't take their seats, so can be ignored.

SNP, PC and Green sit together in the European Parliament
SNP wants independence for Scotland and PC wants independence for Wales. They work together as a single group in the UK parliament.

In Scotland, SNP is the minority government party and Labour is the largest opposition party. They are effectively in a coalition with the Conservatives, though they would never admit it as most people in Scotland detest the Conservatives. A formal SNP coalition with the Conservatives in Westminster is impossible. A coalition with labour is unlikely. PC is in coalition with Labour in the Welsh Assembly. A coalition with Labour in Westminster is possible, but their ties to SNP are stronger.

In Northern Ireland Sinn Fein and SDLP are Nationalist (Catholic) parties who want Northern Ireland to be part of the Republic of Ireland. DUP and Sylia Herman are Unionists (Protestant) who want Northern Ireland to remain part of the UK. The civil war (bombs, people being killed etc) between those two sides only finished a couple of years ago, and they still don't get on very well. The Alliance Party is a mainly middle class party which believes thats Catholics and Protestants should be nice to each other and try and get on. It would be very difficult for them to form a coalition with any of the Nationalist or Unionist parties.

Re:Hmm

[jonbryce]

That would mean that back bench Labour MPs that would appear towards the bottom of the party list would lose their jobs. I don't think they would vote for that.

Re:Hmm

[jez9999]

3/ Labour and the liberal democrats do a deal, this does not give them a majority though, so they will need the help of again ulster parties (different NI parties are alligned to each of the mainland parties). and the welsh/scottish natioanlist parties. This will probably fragment after a while too. This grouping is possible as they limp along for a while, and would bring in some form of proportional representation or other electoral reform and eventually we have an early new election.

'Would' bring in some form of PR? The biggest risk is that they wouldn't manage to; if they did, I think most people in the country would consider this to be the best deal by far. If the next election were fought with a PR system, finally the small parties would have fair representation and the Murdoch-supported Tories and 1984-obsessed Labour could shove their crappy policies where the sun don't shine.

Re:Hmm

[jez9999]

Heh. The Tories were scaremongering about a run on the Pound if we even got a hung parliament. Why the (non-Tory) media isn't exposing this bullshit now I don't know.

Re:Hmm

[slim]

In this case, my favourite potential outcome looks possible: Gordon Brown remains PM and introduces electoral reform in the Queens speech. This is in the interest of everyone except the two main parties, so it gets through. Immediately afterwards, the Conservatives propose a vote of no confidence in the government and we get another election, with a better voting system.

Attractive, but I don't think it's practical. PR has all sorts of knock-on effects, which need to be organised (moving of constituency boundaries, changes to the roles and responsibilities of MPs etc.). I heard a bod on the radio explaining that it would take a whole parliamentary term (by which I assume he meant 4-5 years) to arrange this.

Re:Hmm

[slim]

That would mean that back bench Labour MPs that would appear towards the bottom of the party list would lose their jobs. I don't think they would vote for that.

(1) We don't know that Party List would be the new system that's proposed. The LDs manifesto prefers STV, for example.
(2) Some MPs actually vote on their principles, rather than to protect their job.
(3) Their vote only means so much anyway.

Re:Hmm

[Ed Avis]

The 'Northern Ireland parties they are allied with' - the UUP - did not win any seats. They could form an alliance with the DUP or one independent unionist.

Re:Hmm

[brainiac ghost1991]

None of the proposed systems are party list based, STV is proportional, but keeps the constituency link, as is MMS and AV+ (AV isn't very proportional)

Re:Hmm

[ocularsinister]

I don't think Europe is that big a deal, in fact. The Tories themselves are fairly split on the matter of Europe, as are the Labour party - though they've done a better job at containing it. They could come to an agreement that any European legislature would be a free vote, for example. The important things are 1) Electoral reform. 2) The economy. I think there is enough common ground on 2 that it's most likely only 1 they are talking about.

Re:Hmm

[Rogerborg]

If the LibDems cause this hung parliament to end in disarray and finger pointing, how does that make the case for PR, which will inevitably result in hung parliaments? But it will end that way if they get in bed with the Tories, since the LibDem Fußsoldat will insist on election reform.

They have to compromise in order to show that what they want is workable. But if they compromise, they won't get what they want. Sucks to be them.

Incidentally, the idea that a Labour-led government will actually implement any election reform is so risible that it doesn't even bear considering. They'll just totter along for 6 months until the wheels come off, then hope for a majority in another winner-takes-all election, rather than guaranteeing that they become a bit part in an eternal coalition.

Re:Hmm

[asc99c]

I think the Lib Dems should go only for proportional representation, as their only demand. If that goes ahead, their views can be considered in line with their vote share for every future election. That has to be a great result, even if it means for this (most likely short lived) parliament, they are sidelined once more.

Re:Hmm

[Rogerborg]

Oh, please. Gordo will promise Clegg anything he asks for, including his own head on a platter, then renege and slope off out the back door to the lecture and consultancy circuit when the knives finally come out. He learned at the feet of Blair, remember?

No winner under a First Past the Post system will ever allow electoral change. They could not possibly gain anything from it. So Clegg will get his worthless promises from Brown, and when Brown goes in 6 months, a year, or whenever they pry his carcase out Number 10, the wheels will come off the wagon.

Worst case, there's another election. Note very carefully: Labour (collectively and individually) cannot do worse in that election than they would under any other system, and they may do better than they did last week. They have no incentive at all to introduce reform. You might as well ask turkeys to vote for Christmas.

What we're seeing right now isn't negotiation for government, it's the lull before the next round of electioneering begins.

Re:Hmm

[JasterBobaMereel]

Point 1 - Labour and the Lib Dems would almost certainly raise a vote of no confidence very quickly, and we would be back to another election

Point 2 - Is the most likely ...

Point 3 - As soon as Parlement is recalled, the first action would be an unwinnable vote of no confidence this would get rid of him...and force an election

Point 4 - Would most likely be a very similar result to the current election?

TFA is wrong

[pmc]

TFA is wrong - the most recent hung parliament was 1997 (before the election that year). Second most recent was 1977.

Full details in http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons/lib/research/briefings/snpc-04951.pdf

Re:TFA is wrong

[OzRoy]

They occurred in a different way though. In those cases the government started with a very slim majority, but lost that majority due to losing by-elections and defections.

Re:TFA is wrong

[ArwynH]

That is not the only place the TFA is wrong. Here are just a few of the other places that were incorrect:

1) Labour are not socialists.
2) There is nothing indefinite about it. The Queen makes a speech at the end of May, which is then voted on in parliament. If the vote fails, it's game-over for the proposed government.
3) You don't need a majority to form a government, you just need to survive votes of no-confidence.

In other words, the most likely outcome is a Lib-Lab minority government, with the Greens, SDLP, Alliance, SNP & PC supporting them on votes of no confidence and on a per-issue basis. BTW said 'minority' government will have over 50% of the popular vote.

Re:TFA is wrong

[MightyMartian]

There are theoretical ways to keep a Labour government alive longer. Brown could advise the Queen he could form a ministry, and then immediately ask for a prorogation. I believe that Parliament in the UK has to meet once a year, but hypothetically Brown could stay out of Parliament for over eleven months, putting off the next sitting until May. That happened in Canada, where the Conservatives tried to put poison pills in the legislative agenda after the 2008 election, and the other three parties (Liberals, NDP and Bloc Quebecois) got together, announced a coalition government in waiting and declared they'd defeat the government. The Conservative PM went to the Governor General (the vice-regal figure who represents and exercises the Queen's prorogatives in Canada) and prorogued Parliament for the better part of two months.

Remember, in the Westminster system, the technical executive; either the reigning monarch or the president or whoever, is bound to act on the advice of the Government, and until Gordon Brown resigns, Labour is still the government and still holds the monopoly on advising the Sovereign. While I'm not saying it's likely, mainly because it would be political suicide and because it would render the Government incapable of passing supply bills of any kind (Orders in Council can be used as pseudo-legislative powers, but are very limited), it would not be a violation, strictly speaking, of the constitution. You might call it the Charles I Solution because that is essentially what Charles I did between 1629 and 1640, without Parliament and raising money with the limited means at his disposal, before finally be forced to recall Parliament (the famous Short Parliament) to try to get money bills passed. In fact, for the most part the constitutions of the Commonwealth Realms can find much of their origin in the post-English Civil War period, and in particular in the Glorious Revolution, where the Crown was subjugated to Parliament.

Re:TFA is wrong

[jabuzz]

The speaker is obliged to vote for the status quo, and then only in the case of a tied vote.

Re:TFA is wrong

[starcraftsicko]

That is not the only place the TFA is wrong. Here are just a few of the other places that were incorrect:

1) Labour are not socialists.

Really? How is Labour different from 'Socialists'?

For clarity, I don't think being called a 'Socialist' is any worse than being called a 'Capitalist' in the context of TFA. Apart from disagreeing with the politics of the writer of TFA, why would that aprticular assertion be an error worthy of correction?

Almost no difference...just more efficient

[Roger W Moore]

This is why they need a reasonable, commonsense system like our electoral college.

Your electoral college was probably based on the UK parliament. We vote for MPs who then effectively determine the prime minister. The only difference is that the 'electoral college' then hangs around to pass laws in place of a separate house of representatives. In this way we have fewer elections and avoid the deadlock that would result from having a prime minister without legislative support.

I should also point out that the original article is wrong in that the UK is not 'at risk' of a hung parliament (not government): it already has a hung parliament. No need to get excited though: there is a word of difference between a hung and hanged! ;-)

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[Pvt_Ryan]

No need to get excited though: there is a word of difference between a hung and hanged! ;-)

such a shame I for one would vote to hang them all..

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[zippthorne]

it already has a hung parliament. No need to get excited though: there is a word of difference between a hung and hanged! ;-)

Either way, what's the down side?

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[sumdumass]

The electoral college in the US was built out of a representation of the state's not the people. That may provide a separate but distinct difference between he two systems.

You see, each state in the US was a separate and sovereign country that agreed to surrender certain portions of their sovereignty to the federal government. Most of this was in the form relating to state affairs (state as in foreign affairs) and in relations between the states. Originally, the people elected representative that sat in the house, the states appointed two senators who sat in the senate and they agreed by vote to a president who had some powers of direction. This way, the needs of the people, the state and the union would be represented and balanced out. Now, even today, there is no constitutional requirement for the people to vote on a president. The choosing of electors in the college is solely left to the states to decide on their own.

So it isn't really the representatives that vote on a prime minister in the US system. it's the states themselves who do it. Of course the state government can be seen as representative of the people within the state, but outside of the state's laws, they have no obligation to listen to the people of the state. But the original intent was to allow the states an effective way to agree on a figure head that could be presented to foreign powers and direct congress to some degree.

Now this has been changed a little in modern times but it's still very similar in retrospect despite the misinformation and flagrant abuse of positions out there. The constitutional amendment that made the president and vice president a party ticket instead of a run off between the electors still allows the requirement that one official has to be from another state or their state's electoral votes do not count. So clearly, even with the constitutional amendment, it wasn't intended to change from being a representative of the several states. This modern idea that the president is supposed to be over the people is somewhat misplaced making it nothing like parliament even though they act like it.

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[Jeremy Erwin]

Spare me the civics lesson, buddy. The seventeenth amendment was passed because it became too easy to bribe state legislatures.

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[sumdumass]

Spare me the civics lesson, buddy. The seventeenth amendment was passed because it became too easy to bribe state legislatures.

And now it's even easier to bribe one or two people instead of the entire state legislature.

Anyways, the non conspiracy nutjob version of why it was passed was because of partisan politicking that lead to several states not seating any senators along with the same partisanship of the elected and sentiments of being undemocratic. The public wanted the 17th amendment because it was a more democratic approach. Anyways, 5 of the 46 states beginning in 1912 were already was doing direct elections per state laws. Two more states gains statehood and chose their first senators but had elections after that.

It wasn't about bribery.

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[Anne Thwacks]

I for one would vote to hang them all.

You would probably get an outright majority.

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[Simon Rowe]

such a shame I for one would vote to hang them all..

In gibbets on Westminster Bridge. That would focus the minds of their successors.

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[Jeremy Erwin]

Senate Seat for Sale

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[sumdumass]

And you point is what, I didn't say it didn't happen, I said it's easier now. Anyways, your article backs up my point, partisanship in the state congress lead to senators not being seated and the public thought the process was undemocratic. The amendment was launched by the states, not the congress which fought it hard.

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[Jeremy Erwin]

I like voting for Senators. Screw Federalism.

Re:Almost no difference...just more efficient

[sumdumass]

And I like being able to bribe one or two senators per state instead of entire state legislatures. It costs way less money and outside of innuendos from disenfranchised idiots or disgruntles constituents, nobody knows it is going on. I guess we all get what we want. Screw Federalism.

Two misconceptions here

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Brown can't refuse to resign indefinitely -- there is always a confidence motion after the Throne Speech at the beginning of parliament, which is scheduled for the 25th. If he can't put together a majority vote in parliament then he will be gone then. So it'll be over in at most two more weeks, although it's unlikely to take that long. We'll probably know what's going on in the next couple days.

2. There are a bunch of tiny regional parties, but some of them are closely bound to one of the big players (SDLP is effectively Labour, Alliance is LibDem, DUP is Conservative), so there's really fewer options. In particular, if you consider a Labour/LibDem/Green/DSLP/Alliance combo they STILL wouldn't have a majority. Neither would Conservative/DUP.

In that scenario, the balance of power on every vote would come down to the nationalist parties: SNP (Scotland), Plaid Cymru (Wales), and Sinn Fein (Northern Ireland). [Note: Sinn Fein MPs make a point of *NOT* attending Parliament as a political statement, but if they thought they could control the balance of power they could always change that!] This would be completely unworkable and everybody knows it.

There's really only three options on the table right now:

• Conservative/LIbDem (plus, presumably, DUP and Alliance) combo. That's what the parties are working on right now.
• Conservative minority government. Neither Labor nor LibDem are in a position to fight an election right now, so a minority government would have a couple years at least. The risk is that they would be too weak to force strict budget controls
• "National Unity" Conservative/Labour coalition. Don't hold your breath for this one, but it is technically possible

Re:Two misconceptions here

[EyeSavant]

There's really only three options on the table right now:

Not quite sure why you are rejecting a Lib / Lab pact here, add in some of the Northern Ireland parties and the welsh/scottish nationalist parties occasionally (they are both quite socialist) and you have something that can survive at least as well as a conservative minority government.

I think in the end it does depend how hard ball people play on electoral reform. In the end it could be a deal breaker for both sides, as the conservatives don't want to change a system that suits them pretty well, and the Lib dems want badly to change a system that gives them 8.8% of the seats with 23% of the vote.

Re:Two misconceptions here

[TheRaven64]

If he can't put together a majority vote in parliament then he will be gone then

Only if the minority parties don't like the Queen's Speech. If it includes an electoral reform bill as item 1, there's a good chance of the confidence motion passing.

Neither Labor nor LibDem are in a position to fight an election right now, so a minority government would have a couple years at least.

Labour aren't, but I'm not sure about the Lib Dems. They lost here by 500 votes - I suspect in another election they'd pick up a lot of the Green votes and a few Conservatives who didn't want to see Labour get in again. They got a decent proportion of the popular vote, so they could probably persuade more people that they had a chance of winning. And, of course, if the electoral system changes, they're in a very good position.

Re:Two misconceptions here

[digitig]

I think in the end it does depend how hard ball people play on electoral reform. In the end it could be a deal breaker for both sides, as the conservatives don't want to change a system that suits them pretty well, and the Lib dems want badly to change a system that gives them 8.8% of the seats with 23% of the vote.

Labour have recently sided with electoral reform, although they favour AV rather than the STV preferred by the Liberal Democrats. That opens up another possibility: rather than a coalition, the LDs could agree to a "confidence and resources" arrangement: vote with the Conservatives on votes of confidence and on budget, but act independently on all other matters. That would give the Conservatives a majority to form a government, but leaves the Liberal Democrats free to pursue electoral reform. The LDs I've spoken to prefer AV to the present system, even though they would like STV better, so a compromise with Labour is possible. With Labour on side, and with all of the small parties likely to be in favour (because they all stand to gain from it at the expense of Labour and even more at the expense the Conservatives) they might have a chance of pushing it through despite the opposition of the Conservative government.

Re:Two misconceptions here

[MightyMartian]

It's not clear what Brown wants. All indications are that he still hopes somehow to retain power. But what is becoming clear is that a lot of Labour members are looking at the Greek economic catastrophe and the growing risk of a meltdown of the Euro, and the general economic chaos this will throw the rest of the EU into (not to mention the UK already has, even under perfect conditions, a lot of cutting to do to bring its deficit under control), and are saying "Maybe we'll let the Conservatives and the LibDems form the government, take the heat, and in a few years, we'll be much better placed to win a solid majority, with the bonus that we won't have to compromise on our principles like the Conservatives and the LibDems will."

What has become clear is that one way or the other, Gordon Brown is out. His caucus barely put up with him over the last year or so, and even if Labour strikes a deal with the LibDems, the LibDems are signaling that Brown has to go. If the Tories and the LibDems cut a deal and form a coalition of some kind, Brown is toast anyways.

Re:Two misconceptions here

[James_Duncan8181]

"Sinn Fein MPs make a point of *NOT* attending Parliament as a political statement, but if they thought they could control the balance of power they could always change that!"

This is very unlikely; it would require them to swear fealty to the British Crown.

Re:Two misconceptions here

[u38cg]

Even if he lost a confidence vote, he wouldn't be able to resign unless there was a successor in place. Presuming that there wouldn't be one if he hadn't resigned by then, the only alternative is dissolution and a fresh election - and he would still be PM until after that one.

Re:Two misconceptions here

[TheRaven64]

Labour have recently sided with electoral reform, although they favour AV rather than the STV preferred by the Liberal Democrats

The AV+ system was proposed by the Jenkins Report, commissioned in 1998 by Tony Blair's government. It's not exactly new for Labour to say that they're in favour of it, but it would be new for them to actually do something about it. Labour's 1997 manifesto said:

We are committed to a referendum on the voting system for the House of Commons. An independent commission on voting systems will be appointed early to recommend a proportional alternative to the first-past-the-post system.

I must have missed that referendum somehow. Or maybe we can just add it to the long list of expert reports that the Labour Government commissioned and then ignored.

Re:Two misconceptions here

[anaesthetica]

Indeed, wasn't Sinn Féin created in opposition to Parnell's Irish Parliamentary Party? It was the Parnellite strategy to use Ireland's kingmaking ability to extract favorable policies from the English. Sinn Féin is about abstention rather than participation.

Re:More than 2 parties

[MichaelSmith]

Well, one of the three main parties (Liberal Democrats) received ~20% of the votes yet significantly less than 10% of the seats, a situation which has happened in most recent elections. It is fairly simple to argue that this doesn't reflect the voting preferences of the population.

Yeah I know. I am an Australian so I am familiar with the different approaches to this problem. I am interested to find out exactly what solution the Liberal Democrats in the UK would like to see implemented.

AV+

[bmsleight]

AV+ * Maintain single-member constituencies.
* Would lead to a more proportional result than first-past-the-post system , but would still give a built-in advantage to the largest party and allow one-party rule during landslide years.
* Would be more likely to prevent extremist parties or fringe parties from winning seats than entirely proportional systems. [No BNP!]
* Would lessen the necessity of tactical voting.
The Roy Jenkins Commission settled on this option.

Re:AV+

[Darkness404]

Would be more likely to prevent extremist parties or fringe parties from winning seats than entirely proportional systems. [No BNP!]

Yeah, because its so great in the USA where we have 2 parties and any 'fringe' parties are out cold. Look at all those great solutions that the republicans and democrats have given us! Nothing better than 2 sides of the same coin...

Everyone should have some representation in their government, no matter what they believe. If you don't you have this -wonderful- system in the US where everything is just grand! After all we have no unemployment, no taxes and world peace! Oh wait...

Re:AV+

[mirix]

It means fringe parties would get less seats than in a full proportional system. They would still have more power than the current (US & most of UK) plurality system.

Re:AV+

[xaxa]

No, we need STV.

Don't worry about the BNP: they lost all their council seats in Barking & Dagenham, and were thrashed by Labour in Barking.

In any case, if a fair proportion of a constituency wants a particular representative then they should have that representative, no matter how much I disagree with their policies. They can argue about it in Parliament, and if their views are unpopular they won't make any difference (it's likely that almost all the other MPs will disagree).

Re:AV+

[aslate]

I agree, although i do need to read into all the systems properly.

The Lib Dems want something more proportional and call for PR, but I do fear the removal of the constituency link. The fact that a person represents ~70k people in a local area is a good thing and provides for accountability. If we remove this you could end up with some very unpopular people put at the top of each party's list resulting in them never being removed from power.

With the constituency link they would need to be able to find anywhere that would actually take them!

Re:AV+

[VJ42]

I agree, although i do need to read into all the systems properly.

The Lib Dems want something more proportional and call for PR, but I do fear the removal of the constituency link. The fact that a person represents ~70k people in a local area is a good thing and provides for accountability. If we remove this you could end up with some very unpopular people put at the top of each party's list resulting in them never being removed from power.

With the constituency link they would need to be able to find anywhere that would actually take them!

The Lib-dems actually want STV. That keeps the constituency link.

Re:More than 2 parties

[mirix]

Proportional representation would be nice.

FPTP breeds a two party system generally. Kind of evil and broken.

what's wrong with minority government?

[FuckingNickName]

A government which can't use its whip to push its Party's MPs into voting a particular way such that a majority vote is inevitable is the best sort of government.

After all, an MP is voted in by his constituents to represent his constituents, not his Party.

Re:More than 2 parties

[Fraser J Gordon]

They desire Single Transferable Vote (STV). The BBC provides quite a good comparison of the proposed systems and where they are currently used within the UK, along with how the 2005 election would have gone with each system: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8644480.stm

Re:More than 2 parties

[Foobar of Borg]

[the murdoch media like to call this the coalition of the defeated but aslong as i get my electoral reform i don't give a shit]

Looks like what we really need then is a hanged Murdoch rather than a hanged Parliament. If you guys could take care of that, we in the US would be ever so grateful.

Educational, not electoral reform

[Roger W Moore]

That is best dealt with via educational, not electoral reform. e.g. the ability to solve complex maths problems like: 'if there are 2,143 people on the electoral roll for my polling station what is the minimum number of ballot papers I need?'.

Electoral reform is to solve problems like why does it take approximately 4 times more votes to get one lib dem politician vs. labour/conservative ones?

Re:More than 2 parties

[digitalnoise615]

[the murdoch media like to call this the coalition of the defeated but aslong as i get my electoral reform i don't give a shit]

Looks like what we really need then is a hanged Murdoch rather than a hanged Parliament. If you guys could take care of that, we in the US would be ever so grateful.

^^ + this

Um...

[MightyMartian]

For those not trained in the intricacies of the Westminster system, while it is true that Gordon Brown could refuse to resign, that's not quite the way it would happen. Gordon Brown, as the incumbent PM, has first dibs under the Westminster system to form a new ministry. Because, in the Westminster system, a country is never without a government, Brown's Labour party is still technically the government and still advises the Queen. Thus he could go to the Palace and advise the Queen that he is still capable of heading a government. Now, theoretically, the Queen could use her Reserve Powers to dismiss the PM, but such a thing has not been done in a very long. The normal constitutional procedure would be for the Queen to accept the advice of Her Prime Minister and Labour again would form the government, despite having less seats than the Conservatives, and no configuration of coalitions (there aren't enough Liberal Democrats, SNP and other groups who tend towards left-of-centre to add up to a majority in the House of Commons).

Now what happens at that point is entirely up to the Opposition. Immediately upon forming a new government, there is the Queen's Speech (or, as it's referred to in the Commonwealth the Speech from the Throne), which is a confidence motion. The Conservatives and whoever else they allied with would have the votes to topple the government. A vote of no confidence in the Westminster is instant death for a government. At that point, Brown would cease to hold the constitutional monopoly on advising the Queen, and she would have the choice of either calling a new election or asking someone else to form government.

However, political realities being what they are, if the Conservatives and the LibDems form a coalition, it's almost certain that Brown will resign.

Re:Um...

[digitig]

and no configuration of coalitions (there aren't enough Liberal Democrats, SNP and other groups who tend towards left-of-centre to add up to a majority in the House of Commons).

Yes there are, because Sinn Féin don't take up their seats (they won't swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen). Without them in the House, Labour + Liberal Democrats + Scottish Nationalists + Plaid Cymru gives a majority of 1. Actually, if Sinn Féin did take up their seats the left-wing majority would be bigger.

Re:Um...

[MightyMartian]

You're forgetting the Speaker, which will take care of 1 vote, meaning that all it takes is for a couple of the coalition MPs to be sick or unable to make a vote and the Conservatives could bring down the government. I don't think in modern times any Westminster Parliament has had a tied seat count with the Opposition, and I can't see how it would be any more stable than a minority government.

Re:Um...

[digitig]

True, The Speaker ties it -- but it looks as if the DUP might throw their votes in with such a coalition which would give a majority.

Re:Um...

[jez9999]

(there aren't enough Liberal Democrats, SNP and other groups who tend towards left-of-centre to add up to a majority in the House of Commons).

An overall majority, no. A working majority, most certainly.

The problem both parties have with PR

[Budenny]

The problem both Labor and the Conservatives have with PR, is that it would lead to coalition governments. This is easy to see. The Liberals had 23% of the last vote, the Conservatives 36%, and Labor 29%. This is more or less the share of the popular vote that the three parties have had for the last 30+ years.

You can see that if each party has the same number of seats as they have percentage of the votes, then no party is generally going to have a total majority over the other two. You will just about always have a situation, like in Holland, where the third party is in every government, sometimes in coalition with Labor and sometimes with Conservatives.

The reason why both of the two larger parties do not want this, is that they represent essentially minority interests. The Conservative Party historically represents inherited wealth and also the rural areas. Which are dominated by large landowners. The Labor party represents big cities, the industrial workforce and the public sector trade unions. And of course the large welfare population of dependents. Both are ready and eager to impose heavy costs on the country as a whole, as long as they get some, often fairly small, percentage of those costs for their own interest groups. This tendency, which is a form of looting, gets more extreme with the second and especially the third term of any government. In the first term of any government, it tends to behave responsibly. The first Blair term, for instance, was marked by restraint in public spending and no deals with the public sector unions.

The second and third terms have seen enormous public spending, mostly on public sector union wages, which has been marketed as 'investing in our great public services'. This has imposed costs on the country which dwarf the benefits to the recipients of the benefits, but no-one cares what it costs the country, as long as they are doing better.

The Conservatives are no better. We can expect something similar in the second and third terms of any Conservative government. The interesting difference about this Labor government has been its approach to the finance sector, which is referred to in the UK as 'the City'. This Labor government has been much closer to the City than any previous one.

You can see that this pattern of behavior will be eliminated by coalition governments. The problem is, in your first term you generally govern for the country, the better to get a second term. When in the second or third term you move to payoff time, and start the outrageous rewarding of your interest group, if its a coalition government, the other partner will just say no, force an election, and then move into coalition with the other large party. It will be game over.

The sheer rage that the idea of proportional representation arouses in the hearts of Conservative Party stalwarts is due to this. They are seeing the prospect of the second and third term troughs being smashed before their eyes. No more feasting. The whole rationale of the parties goes.

What happens with coalition government, on say the Dutch lines, is that it replaces the focus on who is in power, with a focus on what the program is going to be, what the policies are. In the UK at the moment all anyone cares about is who is in power, because whoever it is, can hand out the spoils. Once you cannot do this any more, you have to focus on governing for the country. Now that is not what either of the two large parties want to do, at least, no more than they absolutely have to.

And this is why far more of the UK wants PR than anyone in either of the two big parties will admit. It is not just the 25% that vote Liberal. It is also those who routinely switch from one party to the other, to give the other guys a chance.

If you think about it, in the situation I have described, what does the rational voter do? He/she is confronted with a two party system in which the second and third terms of any government are going to feature irresponsible looting of a sort mos

Re:The problem both parties have with PR

[niks42]

Great synopsis, and as a long-term LibDem voter, always being able to say from the sidelines that I didn't vote for the party in power, I probably agree with you.
I have a real problem with a Lib-Con pact. They are too far apart idealogically for a coalition to make sense. I'd rather we saw out the recovery for another year or so with Lib-Lab+associated smaller parties, and then go to the country again - with a reformed electoral system for preference. Of course if the system were reformed to something closer to PR, I would probably vote Green.

Re:The problem both parties have with PR

[jewelie]

Mod this person up!

One of most eloquent and informative posts I've seen on this subject - says everything I wanted to, but far better than I could!

It's *really* important to be aware of the controlling roots of our two opposing class-based self-serving extremist parties - it has such a profound effect on the behaviour of these two parties.

Re:The problem both parties have with PR

[lingu1st]

Nail on the head. Mod parent up, please.

However, it's the Labour Party with one of our quaint u-s. (I guess the Labour Party used to be Non-U http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-U... until it became `New' under Blair.)

S.

Re:The problem both parties have with PR

[myowntrueself]

The Labor party represents big cities, the industrial workforce and the public sector trade unions.

Yeah I think that the Labor party did represent these things.

However that party no longer exists.

Currently the UK does not have a 'Labor' party; it has a 'New Labor' party. I think its sufficiently different to be a whole new party, really.

The article is wrong.

[digitig]

Britain's last hung parliament was in 1996-97, under John Major, not 1974. 1974 was the last time a hung parliament was elected; Major was elected with a slim majority, and the government became hung due to attrition during the course of the parliament.

Re:The article is wrong.

[leathered]

Major's government seemlessly transitioned from a majority to a coalition with support from the Unionists. If this support had been withdrawn, only then could the parliament be described as 'hung'.

Re:The article is wrong.

[digitig]

Even with support from the Unionists, the parliament was hung -- no party had an overall majority.

Re:Just let the Queen rule

[MichaelSmith]

The way its going she may outlive him anyway.

slashdot title

[godrik]

Don't you find funny that the image displaying the slashdot show an american flag on a UK election article ?

Re:slashdot title

[VJ42]

Don't you find funny that the image displaying the slashdot show an american flag on a UK election article ?

We're the 51st state in all but name anyway. From that angle, it makes perfect sense...

Re:More than 2 parties

[takowl]

I am interested to find out exactly what solution the Liberal Democrats in the UK would like to see implemented.

Multi member constituencies elected by Single Transferable Vote. You vote for individual candidates in an order of preference, and the votes are used to allocate four or five seats for the region in which you vote. (This is their preferred option, although I think they've said that AV+ (Alternative Vote Plus) would also be acceptable).

Churchill Was Right, Enough Already!

[NicknamesAreStupid]

"It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried," Sir Winston Churchill. The Brits don't have to keep proving his point.

Re:Churchill Was Right, Enough Already!

[Sulphur]

"It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried," Sir Winston Churchill. The Brits don't have to keep proving his point.

Reply to This

Yes they do. Its called education.

Hare-Clark

[grainofsand]

The genius of Hare-Clark would be of great help in both the US and the UK. Pity only Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory have grasped its simplicity, fairness and genius.

stack overflow

[Hognoxious]

the UK government is looking to be at risk of getting a hung or coalition government.

Runaway recursion near line 2. Bailing out...

Re:More than 2 parties

[nonguru]

Never really understood the Murdoch "hate" exhibited by US and UK citizens. His newspapers and TV programs as such are rather benign and upmarket in Australia. What he is (or his organization at least) is an excellent judge of national character giving the people the news and the TV that they desire. Says more about viewing and reading habits in the US and the UK than most commentators would like to admit. He has got that (large) segment of the market figured out otherwise he would not be so successful.

I see Belgium on that list

[Hognoxious]

Where does it say they're successful?

Re:I see Belgium on that list

[Rakshasa Taisab]

Well, does 18 of 20 top positions on the UN Human Development Index list count for anything? (Oh, and the US is not successful as a country... actually it is quite far down the list these days.)

Re:I see Belgium on that list

[kevinNCSU]

Well I know my edumacation ain't very good being from the United of States and the South at that, but shoot, they always learned us that 13 racoon skins was less than 20: http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/

Re:I see Belgium on that list

[ocularsinister]

Belgium is interesting - it has not had a government *at all* for about two years as far as I can tell. The country is a union of Flemish and French and that union has failed, big time leading to current situation. I was there last week, however, and despite this things seems to be OK there - dustbins emptied, waffles eaten, mussels cooked, that sort of thing...

Re:I see Belgium on that list

[Hognoxious]

Actually Belgium did have a government until quite recently. But you seem to be confusing the presence of a government with the provision of government services - most of which are provided at local "commune" level anyway. And it would be nice if the absence of a government meant you could stop paying taxes and dealing with idiotic bureacrats, but sadly it doesn't.

Yes, visiting for a few days as a tourist really gives you a much truer perspective on the place compared to someone who lived there for four years. Wanker.

Hybridize.

[NNKK]

Take half the seats and make them geographic constituencies directly elected by Single Transferable Vote. Allocate the remaining seats proportionally.

Re:Hybridize.

[Marcika]

Take half the seats and make them geographic constituencies directly elected by Single Transferable Vote. Allocate the remaining seats proportionally.

Or even: Take half the seats and make them geographic constituencies directly elected - and allocate the remaining seats so that proportionality is maintained (this is not the same as parent's proposition and is called "mixed member proportional", currently used in Germany and New Zealand).

Re:Hybridize.

[NNKK]

I hope there are saner explanations out there than that page, because trying to read through it left me with a half-dozen contradictory ideas about what the results of such a system would actually be, and I knew none of them could be right since they were all simply absurd.

Re:Hybridize.

[TheRaven64]

You don't have to go that far to find examples. Similar systems are already used in the UK, just not for the Parliamentary elections. For the EU, I am represented by six MEPs (well, actually, I'm represented by one MEP - five others claim to represent me too, but never reply to letters and rarely do anything useful).

The Welsh Assembly has a slightly different system, where each constituency has a first-past-the-post system, but there is subsequently a top-up system which brings the total number of seats for a party closer to the proportional level. The Welsh Assembly Government as been a coalition since 2007, and has done a lot less damage than the Westminster government.

The Welsh Assembly also gets some style points because, in their first meeting, when one of the members addressed another as 'the honourable member,' the speaker interrupted him, saying 'there are no honourable members here boyo'.

Re:Hybridize.

[Marcika]

I hope there are saner explanations out there than that page, because trying to read through it left me with a half-dozen contradictory ideas about what the results of such a system would actually be, and I knew none of them could be right since they were all simply absurd.

The details are more messy than FTPT, but it's pretty simple: You have one vote for your local MP, one vote for the national party. Local MPs still get elected by FTPT, national MPs get in from the party list (so far, the same as your proposition). However, local MPs count for the national list as well, so you end up with exactly proportional representation as well as local MPs.

E.g.:
100 districts, half of them vote 60% Labour, 40% LibDem; half of them vote 60% Tory, 40% LibDem.
100 directly elected local MPs: 50 Labour, 50 Tory.
100 MPs from the national party list: The national result is also 30:30:40 for Labour, Tory, Liberals, but given that Labour and Tory already have more direct seats than 30, they get fewer seats from the list: The seat distribution from the national party lists is 10:10:80, the total seats are distributed 60:60:80.
Result: we get both local MPs (even independent ones, if we want!) and full proportional representation.

Re:Hybridize.

[mdwh2]

There's also a hybrid system called Alternative Vote Plus that was proposed by a Labour commission. It has the local constituencies (only slightly enlarged, due to having fewer MPs elected this way) - and as an added bonus, these would now be elected using Alternative Vote rather than FPTP.

But then there's an extra top up list of 100-150 MPs that people can vote for, who are elected to make the total number of MPs proportional to the votes cast.

I am an American living in the U.K.

[Lord Bitman]

As an American living in the U.K., I can't for the life of me figure out why having no clear majority, necessitating that opposing viewpoints actually talk to each-other and compromise, could possibly even begin to be anything other than a very good thing. All I've heard are vague notions of "strong government", but when I ask what that actually means, and why it would be a good thing, I haven't heard an answer at all.

And parliament still looks a thousand times more sane than congress.

Re:I am an American living in the U.K.

[lingu1st]

All I've heard are vague notions of "strong government", but when I ask what that actually means, and why it would be a good thing, I haven't heard an answer at all.

Perhaps you should cast your net wider: there are at least 6,827,938 of us who would agree with you.

S.

Re:I am an American living in the U.K.

[TheRaven64]

Stop reading the Murdoch press then. They think anything other than a strong Conservative government is a bad thing. Most other people think it's a good thing. 34% of the population voted for parties that did not have a chance of winning an overall majority, so they're probably not too opposed to the idea of a coalition government.

Re:I am an American living in the U.K.

[lordandmaker]

On the offchance you're genuinely wondering what a 'strong government' is, it's one with a majority in the Commons so one which can, in theory, vote anything it likes through the Commons. The greater their majority, the stronger the government, and so the greater the number of dissidents they can bear.

Strong governments get more stuff done but it being A Good Thing rather relies on that stuff being the right stuff, which is generally accepted as being unlikely.

Re:I am an American living in the U.K.

[greenpanda]

34% of the population voted for parties that did not have a chance of winning an overall majority, so they're probably not too opposed to the idea of a coalition government.

...or an opposition party - there's nothing shameful WHATSOEVER about being an opposition MP. It's an essential part of how our government works and this attempt by the LibDems to wangle their way into power is forgetting that.

Re:I am an American living in the U.K.

[greenpanda]

it being A Good Thing rather relies on that stuff being the right stuff, which is generally accepted as being unlikely.

Not really at all. Parties are elected on their Manifestos and any bills suggested that sit outside those manifestos would be open to a free vote. It's unlikely for example that a Labour government could pass a bill on tax reduction for bankers as their own members wouldn't vote for it.

Re:I am an American living in the U.K.

[brainiac ghost1991]

I don't think you quite understand... 1) The lib dem MPs have a mandate from their constituents to try and impliment as many policies as they can, by forming a coalition they can do this. 2) The lib dems want PR. This means that they must show that a coalition can work and that they can compromise! If there's one thing I've learned in this election is that a LOT of lib dem members don't seem to understand that with PR compromise must happen on both sides. However, I think people are starting to get it. 3) We do need a stable government who is able to do things, a minority tory government would not have worked as well, as the LDs/Lab could have toppled it easily and a "coalition of the losers" would not have pleased the electorate much. At the end of the day,the lib dems had to make a choice and in my mind they made the correct one (democratically speaking), they aren't really wangling their way into power, if there had been a confidence and supply agreement the Lib Dems would basically just be backing tory policies, with this situation, the Lib Dems are actually getting some of their policies implimented!!!

Re:More than 2 parties

[damburger]

He is a purely evil man with his finger on the idiot button. What is not to hate?

Re:More than 2 parties

[dugeen]

He lives in tax exile in the US, so you lot probably have more chance to give him what he deserves than we do.

No No No. 5 party coalition, like in holland

[SmallFurryCreature]

Here you can see the dutch system in a "game". The site is in dutch but it should be simple enough, even for people from the colonies. Coalition game

You can select a poll to base the results on, and then select the parties you want to form a coalition with, you got to fill half of the seats to have a majority.

I will briefly list the parties to explain them to people with different political systems.

CDA: Christian Democrats, the leaders of the last government. Bakellende (sorry Balkenede) is about as popular as Blair/Bush but with the honesty or razor sharp wit. In european terms they are moderate right-wing but did take part in governments that legalized cannabis, prostitution and abortion. By American standards: Communists.

PvDA: Partij van de Allochtonen, sorry Party of labor (Allochtonen = Immigrants), a once socialist party that has become increasingly liberal. Armchair socialists. The party is split between its socialists background and its more modern liberal elite. There are clashes, because being liberal about immigrants hurts the "workers first" of the socialist backing. By American standards: Communists.

SP: Socialist Party, the protest party originally, it is now more and more the home of ex-PvDA who are "power-to-the-people" rather then tree-huggers. The party used to be lead by a charismatic guy who made the party from a tiny protest group into one of the bigger parties, but he gave up and since then the party has been in trouble. It suffers a lot from strategic voting. People who agree with them instead vote on PvDA so their vote is not "wasted". By American standards: Redder then red.

VVD: Liberals, probably closest to the lib dems. People here consider them capitalist, closest to the democrates in the US. This shows how little people here understand the US. By American standards: Communists.

PVV: Party of Liberty, Geert Wilders. The spiritual succesor to Pim Fortyun but a lot less nice, not gay and a lot more scary. The answer to everyone who is dissatisfied with the last few decades. SP if you have a heart, PVV if you don't. The party goes up and down a lot, but the signal the party is giving is that first we had Pim, he first dared to address that there might be issues with muslim immigrants. He was killed. This guy goes far further and openly blames Islam for pretty much everything. If this time the system still doesn't listen, then I fear who comes next. I don't fear Wilders, I fear the guy that comes after him. Hitler did not create the National Socialist party. There were others before him, not the same but indicators of a upcoming problem that was ignored. By American standards: Communists.

GL: Green left, prove the political spectrum goes far further then just left and right. This one is like the SP to the left of the PvDA, but also completly different from the SP, these are the tree-huggers. By American standards: Communists.

CU: Christain Union, a party impossible to really classify. Part of it is left-wing, others are right wing. Think caring conservatives, how difficult a concept that might be. Part of the last government, one of the smallest parties being given a huge role because the PvDA was to scared to form a left-wing coalition. Not the smartest move they made. By American standards: Communists.

D66: Democrats, no, not like the American ones. Yes, you know it is coming. By American standards: Communists. Liberals mostly but with a strong elitst element. In Holland the biggest struggle right now isn't so much right vs left but elitst vs man of the people. A lot of voters feel politicians don't listen to them, that they rule from an ivory tower. D66 is so far up the ivory tower they sit on gods lap. Party was decimated sometime ago, but has come back with the support of the elite who can ignore the discussion about immigration because no muslims can afford to live where they do. By American Standards: The dreamier side of the democrats

Re:Silly Belgians

[Hognoxious]

No it isn't, it means you get twice as many shit laws. Horsetrading. We want to put property taxes up! But *we* want to put income tax up! Compromise: all taxes go up.

The exception is where a compromise would actually make sense; in that case nothing gets done.

Perhaps

[Hognoxious]

Perhaps his next program could find a better color combination than cyan text on a black background?

Re:Refuse to resign = technical possibility only!

[lordandmaker]

we've had 3 "hung parliaments" [wikipedia.org] (we call them "minority governments")

A minority government is way to resolve a hung parliament. The other popular one is majority through a coalition. A coalition to create a larger minority is possible, too.

/pedant

PR is still local

[mdwh2]

Lib Dems support STV with several regions, so you still get a local link - larger than what we currently have, but with 650 constituencies, the UK is already pretty huge. And you have several MPs in each region. This has a side-benefit that you have more than one MP to go to. The problem at the moment is that if your local MP is a Party puppet (always votes with his party line), directly opposed to the issue you're concerned with, or just plain useless, you have no one to turn to.

A commission set up by Labour proposed a system called Alternative Vote Plus, which maintains local constituences pretty much as we have them now, but makes it proportional using a top up system.

the parties decide who the MPs are

No, this is also false. In both systems under consideration, people vote for candidates. What you claim is only an issue in closed party systems (which I agree are bad).

So please look at what's being proposed, before you dismiss all systems of PR based on some flawed version you heard about.

There's almost no situation where a proportional representation system would beat out a FPTP system

Let's see:
* Large problems of tactical voting and "wasted" votes. This would be reduced under STV and AV+.
* Problems of vote splitting, again reduced under STV and AV+.
* Problems where parties are vastly under-represented, needing many more votes to elect a single MPs (Lib Dems need about 4 times as many votes per MP compared with Labour and Tory).
* FPTP doesn't even maintain ordering - even if Lib Dems came second or even first in the popular vote, they'd still be third in terms of number of seats. It's possible for Labour to get the most seats, whilst still coming second or third in the popular vote.

Pretty much anything beats FPTP. Even if you don't want proportional, let's still have something like Alternative Vote, Condorcet. Anything but FPTP please!

Hung...

[jandersen]

Well, I suppose we should do like in Australia, where they tend to have a well-hung parlament, or so I am given to understand.

Re:More than 2 parties

[Cimexus]

Yes on behalf of Australia I would like to apologise for releasing Murdoch on the world. If it's any consolation he dominates our media as much as he does in the US/UK...

How about a real god damned political party?

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

Instead of some fucking joke?

The Pirate Party is a fucking novelty. If you're working on the pirate party you're not making things better, you're making things worse.

If you were a Green, Libertarian, Free Soil, Whig, Tory, or anything but the current political system, sure, but Pirate Party? C'mon.

Re:How about a real god damned political party?

[WillDraven]

Thank you for that well thought out constructive criticism of our platform and methods of operation. I'll be sure to pass along these wonderful ideas to the other members.

Re:How about a real god damned political party?

[Sparr0]

You realize that the Pirate Party has won a seat on the EU Parliament, right? We are not a joke.

Re:How about a real god damned political party?

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

The Official Monster Raving Loony Party has occasionally won too.

Re:How about a real god damned political party?

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

No it hasn't. They've never won more than 1% of the vote. In fact, their very rules state that anyone that does well enough to get their deposit back (5%) has to quit the party.

Get a clue, and check your facts, moron

It might be against their own rules to win, but yes, even they've pulled off a few wins.

Bullshit.

[Anonymous Coward]

The ability to dissolve government is very powerful POLITICAL power. and exists as a check on the power of the Government to decide that it no longer wants to be a democracy. The deal, that you so badly mis-characterised is that the Queen can use that power any time she deems too, but if she did so without good cause then the country would be mightily pissed off with her. It's a fear-fear thing, the Government is in fear that the Queen will dissolve it if it overreaches and the Queen is in fear that the country will kick her out if she overreaches. Believe me - if a majority coalition was agreed upon that did not involve labour, and Gordon Brown refused to resign then the people would expect her to dissolve Government.

Whilst Oprah might want to be a queen, she most definitely is not. The Queen earns the UK a ton of money each year in tourism revenue. Oprah does not. The Queen is famously neutral (publicly) on politics as long as everyone follows the rules. Oprah wasn't able to achieve this (she let her guard down by campaigning for Obama).

No system is perfect, but the UK's is pretty good. I think it would be better if it introduced single transferable vote instead of first past the post, as that would eliminate the concept of a wasted vote (at the local level). It would result in more hung governments as more parties would gain seats, and some would say that's a problem. Personally I believe that all good government is a form of negotiated compromise anyway. It's the whack-jobs of the World with unlimited mandates that you've got to beware of. But I digress. My point is that your choice of words, "ugly hack, patch, workaround" suggest two things. Firstly that you're a coder, and secondly that you'd like to see the whole UK governmental system thrown away and redesigned from scratch in a waterfall manner. Various countries have tried that in the past (Russia, China etc) and they ended up with communism. I'll stick to the agile principles thanks.

BTW, don't call my Queen a bitch you wanker, I bet your code sucks worse than your arguments.

Americans may not quite realize the differences

[Budenny]

Americans may not fully appreciate the differences between the US and the UK systems. The most important is that the US system was deliberately set up to have lots of checks and balances. If you like, think of them as safety catches and damping mechanisms. The UK system has just about none of these.

If you look at a UK election, you see that one of three things has occurred to bring it about. One, the government of the day decides to call one. It can do that any time, and this is a very powerful weapon, as it can time elections to coincide with upsurges in the polls, caused by, among other things, short term financial booms. Two, it loses a vote in the legislature on some important issue. Three, it comes to the end of its term, which is a maximum set in statute. There is no minimum term. The UK does not have fixed length terms.

Once elected with a majority of seats in the legislature, the party winning now owns both the legislature and the executive. The leader of the party becomes Prime Minister, with something like presidential powers. There is no doubt of his/her ability to get legislation through - he has a majority in the legislature, and it was that which got him to be Prime Minister.

There is no written constitution. Parliament, by a majority vote and consent of the monarch, can pass any legislation at all. If it wanted to (for example) repeal Habeas Corpus, it could. If it wanted to implement rule by decree, it could. If it wanted to leave the EU, it could. There is no safeguard of any sort of civil liberties or human rights from an Act of Parliament. It could, to take a ridiculous and extreme example, legalize slavery. There is no constitution to be modified by a complex process of two thirds majority voting, it just needs a majority vote in the legislature, and its done.

The US of course is completely different. Various bits of the governmental apparatus are elected from time to time - there is no equivalent of a general election of the kind the UK has just had. Only part of Congress or the Senate is elected in any given year. And when the legislature is elected, it does not get to specify who is the President, that is a completely separate election process. The legislature and the executive were deliberately separated by the Founding Fathers. The result is that the process of getting legislation through the legislature is quite complex and difficult, and subject to delay and prevention. In effect, the US is most of the time in a sort of coalition government, in UK terms - one in which negotiation with other parties is necessary, for the party in charge to get legislation through. This situation is one that happens very rarely in the UK, the party in power can almost always get its legislation through at once.

So, in this system, the debate about proportional representation has a very different force from what it would have in the US. Winning an outright majority in the UK gives a party a degree of power in both executive and legislature that can only be dreamed of by a US President. This is what neither Labor nor the Conservatives are prepared to relinquish, and why only desperation to get into or stay in power would lead them to make the necessary concession on PR to get into bed with the Liberal Democrats.

Right now the Liberals have some 23% of the vote and 57 seats in the legislature. If the UK system were truly proportional, and seats were in proportion to share of the vote, the Liberals would have around 150 seats and the other parties less. Conservatives now have 206, they would have under 200. Labour would be, on their current share of the vote, in the low 200s.

The end result would be, as in Holland, that the Liberals would be in every government, with one of the other two parties as partners. In Holland, this role is played by the CDA. The effect of this is that by very different means you have a sort of check and balance which is similar to that which the US system imposes. It becomes very hard to loot the country and di

Less politics, more geek

[AlejoHausner]

All this talk about the subtleties of British politics ignores the most important aspect of this problem: forming a coalition is an instance of the 0-1 Knapsack problem: given a set of heavy objects (here the objects are the parties, their weights their number of seats), find the subset of the objects whose weight comes closest to a given knapsack's capacity (here the capacity is 50%+1 of the seats in parliament). As TFA shows, there are many many combinations to consider, which is not surprising since the problem is NP-complete.

I doubt that Gordon Brown can complete negotiations before the 25th, if only because the problem is algorithmically intractable.

Alejo

Re:More than 2 parties

[91degrees]

Rainbow would be a tricky one though. DUP would most likely side with Conservative, and SDLP never would. Plaid Cymru and SNP could side with Conservative but I doubt either party would be willing to offer what they want (Conservative out of ideology, and Labour because that would lead to an independent England and they need Scotland And Wales). There are many situations where it would be down to the single seat parties.

Re:More than 2 parties

[nonguru]

Stereotypical slash-dotter: comments loaded with adjectives and zero facts. Go troll and flame the Fox News site if it makes you feel better.