The Independent published new polling yesterday that showed that 61% of people in the UK wanted a completely new type of political party and would reject both the Tories and Loabou if only they felt able to do so.
As they noted:
Britain is increasingly pessimistic, distrustful of government and disdainful of politicians, according to Edelman's annual trust barometer poll.
Three-quarters of people (75 per cent) said they thought the UK was heading in the wrong direction – a record figure since the survey started in 2001.
I treat all polling with some suspicion, and I am aware that I want to believe this is true, as I am sure many readers here will do. But I would add a little caution. The report notes:
And 61 per cent agreed that the UK “needs a completely new type of political party to compete with the Conservatives and Labour for power”.
Just 23 per cent of people said they felt close to the Tories, down four points since 2022, compared with 29 per cent saying the same about Labour, an increase of six points.
Those findings are slightly contradictory, although if 'close' is meant to represent being or right or left-wing persuasion they may be reconcilable.
What should be concluded? I suggest four things.
The first is that, as other opinion noted suggested, our existing political parties are not providing the answers people want. They are only being supported in the absence of a viable alternative.
Second, if there was a viable alternative (as there is in Scotland and Wales) then it would be voted for.
Third, we desperately need to end first-past-the-post elections. As it is any representative of either major party who denies the right to this is no friend of democracy.
Fourth, that denial may feed this disillusionment. Our politicians look to be self-interested and out of touch because that is exactly what they are.
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I wonder what the breaking point for this is. There’s no end in sight for neoliberalism and the degrading of social/economic supports for people, and we’re fast heading towards ecological catastrophe. What’s clear from the poll is that neither the Tories nor Labour have meaningful consent and neither are or plan to govern on behalf of all, but rather a tiny group of the wealthy. Personally, I tend towards direct forms of democracy, as “representative” government the world over presides over poverty it either does little about or actively creates, as in the UK, US, EU, etc. It saddens me that many people in government seem to want to use their power to wreck others’ lives. At some point the supposed legitimacy of government must fail if its interests are so hostile to most people’s lives.
The alternative route has been procured for us already by the so-called ‘political adviser’ class.
It is called Fascism.
This makes the need for a real alternative even more urgent.
Contrast with Ireland:
In the UK about 70% of the electorate’s votes are cast for people not elected. In Ireland about 70% of the votes cast are for people who are elected.
In the UK there is one MP per constituency. In Ireland multi-seat constituencies guarantee that a constituent has the ability to have an issue raised in parliament whether the government of the day likes it or not.
In the UK people vote to keep out those they fear most. In Ireland votes can be and are cast for those whom constituents best represent them without needing to worry that doing so will be a wasted vote (if the preferred candidate is eliminated they have another preference).
In the UK politicians demean and demonise their opponents polarise their electors in order to win a winner-take-all fight. In Ireland politicians need to obtain both first and as many preference votes as possible so trashing political opponents is not wise. As result politics is more civil (the greatest division on the island is one imposed and sustained by British imperialism).
Ireland is a far happier, fairer and better off place than the UK, ahead of it on every metric of human wellbeing from child mortality to longevity and everything in between. This has everything to do with two things
1. It’s a Tory-free zone
2. It’s a member of the EU
Once it was a captive state of the UK to which 90% of its exports went (now 10% and falling). Sooner or later the Scots will find the contrast intolerable–because the divergence is continuing, thanks to Brexit.
Westminster delivers an 80 seat majority for the Conservatives, simply because the constituency boundaries and FPTP with the votes of only 24% of those entitled to vote.
Largely agree that the Irish electoral and governmental system is far superior to that of the English dominatd UK system. However the 2 main governing parties in the coalition are right-leaning semi-Tory parties, only mitigated by having to rely on the Green Party to have an overall majority and mitigate this to some degree. It looks though that SF will get in in the next election if they stand a full slate, as they would have won the last election if they had.
Not in the least bit surprised by the numbers stated: if anything I’d have thought that 61% figure is a little on the low side. And yes, “feeling close to” is a pretty ambiguous descriptor to categorise by even when interpreted as being left or right wing as those loose labels might mean quite different things to different people.
To me the big takeaway, as noted by Richard, is that of our terrible electoral system. The sheer volume of people that I have listened to or who’s opinion I’ve read online where they argue for voting for Starmer’s Labour as being the sole option to be rid of the Tories while very candidly admitting that such a change in government would bring about only the very least improvement in most people’s lives is repeated testimony to a truly failed and unrepresentative system.
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I would also encourage supporters of PR to read up on the various forms of PR available along with their pros and cons – all of the various forms of PR have their good and bad points. In the UK the loudest voices have and continue to call for STV – a system that produces electoral bias in similar magnitude to that of FPTP. Adopting such a system is likely going to provide a wedge issue for some opportunistic swine to create anger and division in the future as both Brexit and the various topics of the synthesized culture wars have proven. I would sincerely urge everyone to consider the widely used party-based systems as they are arguably the most representative model available. No electoral system is perfect but with that being said, the party-based forms seem to be relatively straight-forward in operation while allowing for all views to be quite accurately represented.
Chris W, I took up your challenge of reminding myself of the various forms of PR.
As far as I can see, the main bias of STV is that it is likely to slightly favour candidates who voters for multiple first-choice parties might put second. So most likely candidates towards the centre of the political spectrum. But the bias wouldn’t be high, those second choice votes would only count when a more popular candidate had already achieved the threshold or by elimination of the most unpopular candidates. It seems to me likely to be a much smaller bias than FPTP squeezing out most candidates who aren’t from one of the two main parties. I think it is the system which Samuel Johnson (above) extolls in Ireland, so no doubt there is data to allow its distortions to be compared with the UK’s.
(That is assuming STV in multi-member constituencies, but I am not sure PR advocates would recommend it for single-member constituencies).
I take your point that party-list systems may be arithmetically able to achieve the closest match of MP numbers to proportion of votes cast, but it of course depends how much closer than other systems. My personal psychological problem with party lists is that they lead to MPs who no one has actually endorsed personally by voting for, it creates an even greater incentive for nepotism and old-boy networks in politics.
However this is a slight hijack of the discussion, Richard’s point is that FPTP is failing to deliver governments who properly represent their electorate and should be replaced by PR. Which flavour of PR needs discussing but is secondary to today’s blog.
The flavour does matter
I prefer STV on a multi member basis
I think the claim constituencies matter is absurd when they can be rewritten at will
Region matters more.
Re constituencies, for most of my life I’ve had the misfortune of living in Tory controlled seats. I would never contact my MP re a political matter. What’s the point? I tend to oppose everything they do. Can’t think of anything they have done well. Maybe on a more personal or non political issue, but I’ve never had cause to. I think the FPTP constituency MP/voter relationship is way overrated in terms of it’s importance.
I’d much prefer a regional list choice where you can pick someone who matches your politics. Only PR will give us that and make sure that your vote counts.
The Labour Party at membership level is no longer out of touch on PR, the Labour leadership still is.
Jonathan – there are various forms of party-list PR: closed list, open list etc. The open list system can empower voters with considerable sway over which candidates are selected. It is notable that STV has been adopted by only a tiny number of countries, whereas party-list PR is extremely widespread with open list being the most common. I do appreciate that a popular system does not implicate that it is necessarily an inherently good (let alone the best) system but I would claim fairly, I think that it is a reasonable indicator.
The very open list format used in Finland (and a few other countries) allows voters significant influence over the selection of candidates. The panachage system also seems to offer voters a great deal of power in the selection of candidates. I think that you may be underplaying the bias that can arise from STV – and it is very important to minimise this as much as possible both in action and perception. If people are going to be asked to change our electoral system they’re rightly going to angry as hell if they think that one or some parties are at an advantage compared with the one they support. The ensuing chaos and damage wrought by Brexit should serve as a dire warning to us all that large swathes of the electorate are very much open to persuasion by bad faith actors should they believe (for whatever reasons) that they are being put at any measure of disadvantage.
Discussing what flavour of PR replaces FPTP is as important as the issue that FPTP is a failed system. There are a lot of people out there who are genuinely resistant to the idea of consigning FPTP to history and (as I rapidly discovered) when discussing this matter the details of any proposed new system are among the very first questions asked.
Thank you for your response, you argue your points well.
My business partners in the UK (conservatives witha small c) tend to take the view that “all politicians are the same”. In the 1960s there was the comment that only an inch separated the Tories and Labour – but that inch mattered. Now nothing separates them. Liebore – Tories – no difference.
Furthermore, the disconnect between lived-reality and the political class is furthered by a Uk media that has a very narrow focus. Novara Media (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWKHA8fAv9k starts at 19.59: NHS in freefall – with v interesting observations @ 26 onwards) commented on recent reports that 500 people PER WEEK were dying unecessarily due to NHS failings. The news quickly dissapeared from view. The media & UK politicos – a cosy club unreflective of the lived reality for Uk serfs. Re-expressed it has taken me 20 mins to think & write this – & another person has died – quite unnecessarily. Total & complete political failure, greeted with a shrug by most politicos & their acolytes.
I offered the Lib-Dems funding for the next election – this is now recinded (they were wishy washy in their response). I am interested in funding independent candidates – with one difference – we leverage I.T./the Internet to the max. In the same way that Cummings weaponised I.T. & the Internet to drive Breixt – the same could happen @ the next election. Lets get a few hundred fresh faces that will force through P.R. for the lower chamber and selection by lot for the upper chamber.
Have you spoken to the True and Fair Party?
Mike
Speaking as someone who has had a generous offer from you once which I will always value, I hate to say it but your post tells me all I need to know about our faulty political process.
In reality, no political party should be able to take donations from a member of the public from any background.
Party funding should be by the state and on an equal basis. It should be an accepted cost of a functioning democracy.
This blind spot – much easily seen in North America – is the cause of much of the failure in democracy these last 13 or so years.
The Tories – as seen through the BREXIT debacle – easily outspend any opposition.
That is NOT democracy. That is buying power to abuse democracy.
The people though I really want to get my hands on are the Boundary Commission. I want a public enquiry into their motive and decisions going right back to Attlee’s government.
And then I want heads on pikes. My view is that the Boundary Commission is corrupt and until someone after a thorough and very public investigation tells me otherwise, they will remain corrupt in my eyes at least.
Thanks I will do, although my idea of a campaign is likely to be a bit more robust than theirs – I tend to favpur the Lydon Johnson style
example: LBJ – “Mr XYZ, my opponent in this election,.. f..ks pigs” … (he really said it btw – brilliant move – cos denying it is not a good look either).
Anyway, I’ll send them an e-mail.
PSR – thanks for the comments – I agree – only public funding – but we are in a very bad place – hence the need to turf out the current crop of imbeciles and replace them with fresh faces – thus private money and preparing to hit below the belt/go for the throat is the only way forward. The English are far far too “nice”. Being “nice” (or reasonable) lands you in Corbyn territory.
What is needed is a populist left movement and party prepared to go up against the Labour party rather than compliantly following along behind it. That means taking them on in marginal constituencies that they need to win. It is not initially about winning power but being the disruptive element that breaks the system. At the moment those on the left, this includes Mick Lynch and Sharon Graham, who could be leading this move are too squeamish to become the nemesis of the Labour party and the wider system they prop up.
Well, that depends what you mean by “left”, doesn’t it?
For example, Claire Fox might call herself a communist, and Peter Oborne thinks he’s on the right…
We need a complete rethink of politics & we need to step away from the binaries we’ve inherited. They will not serve us as our economy dies because of ecological failures.
Perhaps a Union Party, funded by union dues. We can all join a union, I believe.
Too narrow, I suggest, and I have worked with unions a great deal
There is one. It’s the TUSC, which has quite a few councillors, but no MPs at the moment, I think.
I was saying to the Higher Authority -i.e. my wife- that I was surprised there had not been more violent protest this winter. Her opinion was that many thought nothing could be done so it was best just to look out for themselves, which takes up most of their time and money.
I sometimes wonder if the government deliberately encourage apathy hoping that people will prefer the status quo to any risk which change might bring. Most of the media doesn’t publicise alternatives such as the ideas we debate here, and most of the newspapers vilify the opposition to increase the perception of risk.
There is school of therapy called Transactional Analysis and its founder, Eric Berne, thought people would usually only change meaningfully when 1) they were in a crisis 2) were bored-time for a change 3) when they could see a new way to do things which they hadn’t before.
We are certainly in a crisis but Richard has a point. Most people -or not enough people- can’t see a way forward.
We need real leadership. Labour spokespeople seem to be told they must criticise the Govt. but not lay out policy except in aspirational.or even vacuus terms.
There was a demo by weownit on Saturday about the NHS and the number of people who have died unnecessarily over the past few years.
There is going to be another on 11th March, organised by NHSSOS and KONP, which is probably going to be better and bigger, although again it probably will not get into MSM. That one is going to involve lots more unions.
All those three groups are part of Health Campaigns Together, and if any labour party CLP joins them, they will be banned from membership of the party.
I do keep telling people to join the Greens, or at least vote for them if they can’t be members of the other two parties.
The Peace and Justice Project has also been banned by Starmer. What hope for peace and justice from the labour party?
What I’m picking up is that people are sick of being taken for granted in all walks of life. It’s affecting everything from occupations to volunteering.
It’s a sure sign of stress in society
I think a lot of people would like “a completely new type of political party” to vote for – but only if it stood a reasonable chance of winning significant representation in Parliament.
Which in practice means one of the two main parties. Even the Liberals aren’t seen as worthy of significant support (though obviously they aren’t “completely new”) and breakaway parties like Change UK disappear without trace.
Interestingly the one party that did break through in recent years is the SNP, on the back of being able to build up credibility in the Scottish Parliament. Perhaps regional assemblies in England could shake up the two old dinosaurs.
If FPTP is not skewed enough, we have the new rules on voting.
I was challenged to do this quiz and got 5/7.
But it does show up how the system is being rigged. Out of 30 million + votes for Parliament in 2019, there were six convictions for misrepresentation.
https://38-degrees.typeform.com/voter-id?bucket=facebook-post-22_2_2023_Feb_TD_VoterID_Quiz_Facebook_Share&fbclid=IwAR1b6ED3JIT7iXgw8j0dVci7ilN3v0yE0HqH1AjP5jwDDcXekUIEIFho5mY&utm_campaign=22_2_2023_Feb_TD_VoterID_Quiz_Facebook_Share&utm_medium=post&utm_source=facebook&typeform-source=l.facebook.com
This is vote rigging
TRhere is no other description for it
Adding to this discussion (and the comments made by Ina Stevenson and JENW)- there was a rather good article by Terry Eagleton (about Putin but some bits were quite relevant)
https://unherd.com/2022/03/vladimir-putins-war-on-chaos/
Extract:
“In Freud’s view, what enforces law and order is the superego, a faculty which draws its …strength from the… unconscious. No political order could endure if it didn’t engage us at this kind of depth. You can’t govern people off the top of their heads, …. Any political power which can tap into the collective unconscious will prove remarkably difficult to dislodge. If it also provides its citizens with just enough satisfaction, however meagre, to keep them going, it is very likely to survive. There has to be something in it for you. If there isn’t, however, either affectively or materially, power is highly vulnerable.”
“Something in it for you” – well there is less and less of this on offer by either political rabble. Which begs the question – how to tap into the “collective unconscious”?
There are 600 odd MPs – many are bad people & there is plenty on each of them: Example: the tory chair of the Transport Committee ( Ian Stewart) claimed £51,896 on hotels in London (307 nights) – despite living in a constituency just 35 minutes’ train ride from the capital (and he claims to enjoy riding trains). I leave it to readers to develop attack lines (e.g. Ian nose-in-the-trough Stewart spent enough money on unecessary hotels to fund 2 NHS nurses – MPS living high on the hog whilst 500 people die each week because of an underfunded NHS). Link the event (people dying) – to the MP – Ian Stewart – and make it his fault in the eyes of his constituents. Then offer something in the style of FDR when he won his first election – positive & doable but not too precise.
I would suggest one other conclusion might be that it indicates the likelihood of a very low turnout at elections.
Which can only be good news for The Tories and will surely fuel their strategy for the next to years.
Voter disenfranchisement is already going full steam ahead, but there will be a lot of painting Labour as just as venal and corrupt as they are.
Still think Labour are the likely winners but I fear it will be a lot closer than a lot of people think.
It’s the young and the poor they want to deny the vote to. I checked up on my grandson as I know his passport is out of date. However, even if they are out of date, apparently they can be used providing it’s a good likeness.
Fortunately many people are going to vote for their councillors this year, so will find out whether they are banned from voting. It should make them think before the next general election.
@Pilgrim Slight Return
You say: “In reality, no political party should be able to take donations from a member of the public from any background”, and favour State Funding instead.
I PROFOUNDLY disagree with you on both counts: why shouldn’t an individual be able to make a donation to the political Party of his or her choice, just as s/he can to a charity, or a worthwhile venture?
If, however, this is to be banned, and all funding to come from the State, then the political process could (will?) be at severe risk of central misdirection amounting to illegality.
Would you REALLY trust the present Government not to engage in some jiggery-pokery? Remember how Sunak boasted he’d got Leveling-up money shifted from poorer Labour-leaning areas to wealthier Tory ones?
There are two problems with the donation system – transparency and amounts.
To solve both I would wish to see the following:
1) Every Party standing for election should register with the Electoral Commission.
2) The EC will then set up a Donations Account for that Party, into which ALL donations would be paid, and CRUCIALLY FROM which ALL election expenses should be paid.
3) ALL other payments from elsewhere would be deemed illegal, and would attract a punishment of invalidation of 5% of votes cast for that Party. A second offence would lead to invalidation of a further 10% of votes cast, while a 3rd offence would result in the invalidation of the whole election, and a rerun being held.
4) Payments for Cambridge Analytica style tailored Internet ads would attract the same penalties, as such campaigning method should be deemed illegal.
5) There would be a limit on the amount an individual could donate, and ALL donations would be subject to regulation, such as solicitors have to adhere to with reference to money laundering and POCA (Proceeds of Crime Act), to avoid an individual donating more than once to avoid the limit on the size of donations.
6) Each Election Account would also have an upper limit, after which no more donations would be accepted.
That limit would be defined by some formula related to the number of votes cast for that Party at the preceding election, to encourage campaignng for votes even in seats a Party was unlikely to win, since PERSUASION should be the aim, not mere vote-grubbing (which FPTP encourages – basically the 500,000 swing voters could be left to make the decision, and the rest of us go down the pub).
I would not be against an element of State funding at this point, perhaps on a matched-funding basis, as it could be helpful in nurturing new Parties and new thinking – desperately needed – and also one-off Independents
7) Finally, ALL the election accounts would be fully accessible over the Internet, allowing the voters to go into their local library and see who was donating to whom, as well as, during the campaign, who was spending his much on what.
I suppose I would have to allow donor anonymity, but ONLY for individuals, and NOT organisations.
No such anonymity would be permitted in the case of expenditure, which would have to be openly declared (which would have spiked the guns of General Secretary McNicol’s secret anti-Corbyn expenditure on 2017.)
8) There would, of course, need to be official auditors for each Election Account, to keep a watch on what was really happening. Again, I’d like such auditors to be independent, perhaps via an organisation such as the Electoral Reform Society, or even from President Carter’s Carter
Center.
You make your points well and I think there is a lot to agree with in what you say
Mr Dickie,
Under 4) that isn’t going to stop anything. None of it will happen in an auditable, or perhaps even identifiable jurisdiction. Weight of money transforms what is possible. The donators will not be members of the Party, or be easily identified. You raise a barrier? A highly paid, very professional system of avoidance is immediately developed, loaded with the expensive lawyers and technical skills required; the digital world is global, and a veil of secrecy and illusion covers everything. We live in the Age of Surveillance Capitalism.
You world be better figuring out how we eliminate ‘Party’ altgother. Hume understood, it is ‘Party’ that creates the problem; ideology and entryism are products of Party. Party is the problem. I do not claim to have the practical answer, but that isn’t a good enough reason to avoid facing the problem.
Sorry Mr Warren, but what you say is hopelessly naive.
Of COURSE there will be an army of smart-arsed lawyers and venal advisors working out ways to get round such legislation (ask Richard about tax legislation), but invoking David Hume, from the distant 18th century, when the electorate made up a tiny fraction of society, and there was SOME chance of the electors knowing a candidate personally, and being able to judge his (as it would ALWAYS then have been) character and worth was JUST arguable) is fairy-tale politics.
Even by the 1832 Great Reform Act such personally, non-Party, politics was already becoming difficult; after it, with the widening of the franchise, it was impossible.
Besides, character and a programme are not necessarily related. Just because a chap is a good sort doesn’t mean his political actions will be to your liking. And how do you know what he will support, and what legislation he will help bring in.
Sir Robert Peel understood all this, which is why he effectively set up a modern Party system in the 1835 Tamworth Manifesto, traditionally viewed as the birth of rhe Conservative Party – its ostensible purpose – but also of the Party system. The transformation of the Whigs into the Liberal Party followed somewhat later.
The fact is that ONLY the Party system permits 3 essential things
1) a coherent philosophy of political power that a voter can grasp, usually (always, I’d say) deriving from a class interest. (Any political theory that ignores class will lack coherence, and degenerate into a chumocracy, which will almost always be the chumocracy of the ruling class, so will be class-based but not openly so – there’s inevitable result of Hume’s “warm words”)
2) deriving from 1) a coherent programme of action aka a Manifesto that a voter can subscribe to.
3) Most importantly, a benchmark against which a political organisation can be judged.
What you are asking for are warm words, with no detailed direction in policy terms, and so no means of assessing performance.
Finally, it’s worth noting that the previous sentence exactly describes Fascist methodology.
But my point about chumocracy applies here, because the underlying philosophy, and political programme, will be that of the would-be ruling class, so will be class-based, but not openly so, and thereby not open to scrutiny.
In a large-electorate system, only a Party system, with all its faults (and they are many) offers the electorate some measure of control and oversight.
I admit I see no way around the party system
I have seen the supposed alternative in Jersey. It does not work.
Mr Dickie,
I wrote this: “I do not claim to have the practical answer, but that isn’t a good enough reason to avoid facing the problem”. There is nothing naive about that, or any statement I have made. I may at times be thought cynical, but not naive; you have no evidence for your conclusion. Party is essentially corrupt, and there is no permanent solution to that. As for Hume, his thought is still relevant, in philosophy, politics and economics. You are naive about 18th century (or 19th century) politics (or later!).
Here is how a ‘rotten borough’ worked into the 19th century. Steyning, in Sussex neatly describes how it worked. A small borough that declined in economic significance from the Middle Ages, but retained influence solely as a rotten borough. So rotten that in 1701, 1710 and 1712 protests at the scale of corruption of the election were taken up by the Election Committee of the House of Commons. So flagrant the corruption in these three elections that the result was declared void and the issue of a new writ suspended. In 1712 it was declared by the Committee that “scarcely a voter had not been corrupted” (Robert G. Schafer, ‘A By-Election in a Rotten Borough’, Huntington Library Quarterly, Vol. 17, No. 4, 1954, pp.397-405). All you had to do, was buy sufficient houses and you could remove the problem of competition in corruption; so the Duke of Chandos more or less bought Steyning in 1724 simply “to gain some interest in the Elections”. Personal knowledge of the candidates? Only required to guarantee the votes (Shafer, p.399). It was 1832 before rotten boroughs were removed, and that was considered almost a revolution, a dangerously reckless one be the political establishment.
Political Party is driven by the need to win; at any price. They are a corrupting institutional fact of political life – prone to irresponsible dogma, ideology and prone to entryism by the people you least ought to have near power of any kind. These are the facts. Everything else is window dressing.
Not a surprising poll. It’s a common view that Leavers wanted to send a protest note to an uncaring unrepresentative Westminster. As a Remain voter I saw the EU as a moderating force against an uncaring unrepresentative Westminster. Perhaps it wasn’t just me.