It's a by-election week. Some say a critical by-election week, and most certainly they're significant. I've applied one of my usual tests. It's the 'what would I do?' test. In this case it's a 'how would I vote in Stoke / Copeland?' test. The answer is the same in both cases. I would vote Labour. In Stoke that would be to keep out UKIP. In Copeland to keep out a Tory. Neither is a vote for. Both would be a vote against.
And that's my point this morning. It irritates me that politicians think that people on the ground don't do compromise to secure what are overall least worse outcomes when it comes to voting. The rash assumption of most political parties - and most especially the two largest - is that people vote for them. I simply don't believe that in many cases. They vote for the least worst option, or against the worst. Most times I have voted in my life I have had to do that. First past the post has not given me any other effective choice. And yet still politicians will not cooperate to give me the positive choice I want.
I would like one candidate standing in my constituency next time who can reflect the broad interests of Labour, LibDems and Greens who might have a chance of changing the political narrative of this part of Cambridgeshire. I cannot be alone.
I would like that candidate to commit to PR so there is real choice thereafter.
I know full well that the candidate I'd get and the policies they would offer would not be all I want. But I get worse than that now. So I can live with suboptimal.
I just wish politicians could. Then we might get real change. Right now we don't. And I can tell you, I'd rather change with an occasional peg on my nose than no choice at all. I think all democrats would. It's why I wonder how many politicians are really committed to it.
And if we want to stop the decent into chaos I referred to yesterday this may be the first thing opposition politicians in the UK may need to agree upon: compromise to secure change is vital to deliver what the people of this country need.
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I agree, Richard. One of the things that annoys me most about the current electoral system is that MPs behave as if they have an unconditional mandate from their constituents whereas in fact they have a very conditional mandate. For example:
– many MPs are elected with less than 50% of votes cast
– in Labour/Tory marginals many of the people voting Labour may be indifferent to, or even hostile to Labour – it’s just they dislike the Tories even more. This is then taken as unconditional support for all Labour policies
– MPs claim to ‘represent their constituents’ whereas in reality, at best they represent the proportion of constituents who voted for them – which is very low in many constituencies (both due to FPTP only needing a plurality, not a majority, of votes, and due to low turnout).
We are fed nonsense about the UK ‘democratic’ system so often and I think it’s time some home truths were spouted.
Will keep trying
May get to that other web site this week too – finally feeling a bit better this morning
I cannot see how this so called progressive alliance is feasible until two conditions are met, one is Brexit ceases to be the dominant issue in politics, especially with the Lib Dems seeking to champion the case of overturning the referendum. The second condition is a recognition that the Lib Dems took part in a coalition govt that was far from progressive , that it was Lib dem votes that ensured the Health and Social Care Act 2010 was voted through enabling the wrecking of the NHS, not to mention the support for austerity. So if the Lib Deems are going to get a progressive alliance then they would have to repudiate their choices over those 5 years and not come out with statements like we would go into coalition with the Tories again, otherwise they just want their cake and eat it too.
Sorry: you’ll have to stop being so intransigent or you’re the problem and not the solution
If you want a Tory government forever just carry on laying down silly terms and conditions that guarantee continued neoliberal / feudal government
These weren’t meant to be my conditions but a realistic assessment of how things are.
That’s simply not true: they were stated as pre-conditions for negotiation
That’s not a statement of how things are and to say they are is nonsense
Given the Labour Party cannot agree amongst themselves, how do you expect them to agree with other parties?
What exactly do Jeremy Corbyn, Tony Blair, Nick Clegg and Caroline Lucas have in common?
Do you really think most LD voters or Blairite Labour supporters would vote for a Corbyn supporter as candidate? Or Corbyn supporters would vote for Nick Clegg?
They do
They have the maturity to do so to try to effect change
Is it too much to think those who claim political allegiance might share that sense? Or is a lack of it a pre-requisite of political participation?
“They do”
Evidence, please? They certainly don’t in sufficiently large number – hence the continued existence of three separate parties.
The parties do not exist to serve the electorate, but their own membership
[…] Source: People vote for the least worst options. It’s time they were offered real choice […]
The vast majority of the population are not political activists. They are not interested in ‘unfocused protest’, particularly if they are disenchanted with the whole democratic process. If there is no firm commitment by the (de-facto or likely) government to meaningful electoral reform, there is no choice but to use (and/or even abuse) the existing (unfair) democratic processes to secure reform of those existing (unfair) democratic processes. Under the existing (unfair) democratic processes, that means they must be presented with the option to vote positively for a Party (or Parties, or an Alliance of Parties) with a realistic chance of holding sufficient power to force change.
However, the constitution of any new such Party (or Alliance of Parties) must be carefully engineered. A new such Party (or Alliance of Parties) with a ‘mongrel’ or ‘coalition’ ‘manifesto for power’ would not be seen as credible. Indeed, the whole idea behind democracy and electoral reform is to give citizens a more meaningful choice of Parties for more accurate personal representation, so such a ‘mongrel’ or ‘coalition’ arrangement (for activists; but thereby reducing choice for electors) would anyway be a classic case of means confounding ends.
Thus, a Democracy Party must characterise itself as a mere ‘placeholder’ for a Democracy Campaign. They should both promote only their single-issue manifesto (i.e. the Democracy Campaign). On all other issues, they should offer ‘passive’ support for a moderate and pragmatic coalition of de-facto other Parties (until a re-election based on fully-proportional representation).
However, the real focus for such a Democracy Party and Democracy Campaign should be a Democracy Alliance; an open electoral arrangement between each and every Party (including the Democracy Party itself) willing to temporarily forego some electoral opportunities at each level of democracy until a fully-proportional electoral process had been established for that level of democracy. In subsequent election campaigns at that level (based on fully-proportional representation), the Democracy Party, Democracy Campaign and Democracy Alliance would all be redundant. The electorate would be offered a full choice from all ‘real’ Parties campaigning for election under their true and independent colours.
Thus, the de-facto ‘real’ Parties subscribing to the Democracy Campaign and Democracy Alliance should emphasise their differences rather than fudge them. After expressing their opinions on any topic other than electoral reform, they should highlight the ‘wouldn’t it be nice if it mattered’ message of the Democracy Campaign and Democracy Alliance as a ‘throwaway line’.
The current Labour ‘covert coalition’ Party (for that’s what it is!) and the current Conservative ‘covert coalition’ Party (for that’s what it is!) would almost certainly not ‘officially’ join the Democracy Campaign and Democracy Alliance initially, but they could be constantly challenged as to why not. Indeed, the Democracy Campaign and Democracy Alliance should highlight and emphasise mercilessly the internal differences within the Conservative ‘covert coalition’ Party and the Labour ‘covert coalition’ Party. The Democracy Campaign and Democracy Alliance should float the idea that, with fully-proportional representation, we would expect to see the current Labour ‘covert coalition’ Party break up into an ‘Old Labour’ Party and a ‘New Labour’ Party, and to see the current Conservative ‘covert coalition’ Party break up into a ‘Europhile Conservative’ Party and a ‘Europhobe Conservative’ Party. Thus, current Labour supporters and current Conservative supporters should be encouraged to support the Democracy Campaign and Democracy Alliance purely in order to ‘get their part of their Party back’ from their current ‘covert coalition’ partners. We would expect to see perhaps 10 or so clearly-differentiated substantial but non-dominant ‘natural’ Parties on offer, and those who wanted to vote for those underlying ‘natural’ Parties would have that option (with a much clearer idea as to what they were voting for, and with much greater confidence that they would actually get what they voted for).
You’re on the right track, I think