Are labour voters the worst losers in the history of the world?

[Tyrone Biggums]

I've just never met a white Australian that I liked except for the barmaid with the big wobblers who gave me a blowy by the bins behind the bins at the back of The Kings Arms in Dorking on her tea break. And I didn't like her much.

Seems the only thing common in all of those meetings was you...

 

[Triggaaar]

1st, see my reply to Buzzer.

Well I do agree with you that it pushed them over the line. I doubt they'd have got a majority without the SNP issue. But I'm sure they'd still have been the largest party, maybe big enough to form a minority government, maybe not. I was just arguing with the assertion that it was a fact that they only won because of the SNP.

2nd, there probably would have been some back room dealings at some point. But, if labour had just stood their ground and refused any dealings with the SNP, what could the they do?
If they were to vote the non existent labour government down, they'd just bring in the conservatives...

It wouldn't have brought in the conservatives, the SNP would have supported Labour becoming a minority government, but then it would have been difficult for Labour to get anything done. Labour wouldn't have tried to pass bills only to see them voted down, they would have asked the SNP each time, and the SNP would have agreed a few changes, and made many others conditional on a bit more power going to Scotland. Scotland are already demanding more power, imagine how much louder their demands would have been if they held the balance of power in Westminster.

 

[PILTDOWN MAN]

It's far more logical than your idea. The polls aren't usually that inaccurate.

I don't care about being in an ideological minority. I care about the country being ruled by a party that was voted for by just over 35% of voters and who ran a very negative campaign.

The landslide of 1997 where Labour got 418 seats to Tories 165 was 43.2%, Hardly a big difference and yet a massive majority in seats due to the very biased system (in Labour's favour)

 

[Soulman]

Well I do agree with you that it pushed them over the line. I doubt they'd have got a majority without the SNP issue. But I'm sure they'd still have been the largest party, maybe big enough to form a minority government, maybe not. I was just arguing with the assertion that it was a fact that they only won because of the SNP.

It wouldn't have brought in the conservatives, the SNP would have supported Labour becoming a minority government, but then it would have been difficult for Labour to get anything done. Labour wouldn't have tried to pass bills only to see them voted down, they would have asked the SNP each time, and the SNP would have agreed a few changes, and made many others conditional on a bit more power going to Scotland. Scotland are already demanding more power, imagine how much louder their demands would have been if they held the balance of power in Westminster.

Exactly

 

[ThePompousPaladin]

...


I don't really understand your point of view. If Labour got 270 seats, they could have formed a minority government, getting their queen's speech in with support from the SNP, and then when it came to individual policies they wanted to pass, the SNP would have supported them in exchange for a better deal for Scotland. Now of course that wouldn't have meant scrapping Trident, and it wouldn't have meant another Scottish referendum in 5 years, but there would have been some concessions. Even with a Tory majority we're a bit concerned about what we're going to offer the noisy, selfish SNP, we'd have undoubtedly offered them more if Labour needed them.

...

2nd, there probably would have been some back room dealings at some point. But, if labour had just stood their ground and refused any dealings with the SNP, what could the they do?
If they were to vote the non existent labour government down, they'd just bring in the conservatives...

...

Apologies for the second post, let me elaborate a bit more.

The SNP is a party with many new members. It would appear the majority of them have come from the labour camp and are socialists.

If the SNP caused the conservative party to come in, by weakening a labour government, they'd lose the faith of their support.

It's for this reason i think the fears of SNP pulling the strings were overstated.

Anyway, more conjecture...

 

[Igzilla]

Its far more fundamental than that...

Our democracy is deliberately a confrontational one. The "opposition" are supposed to do just that... oppose the government.

They are supposed to offer the alternative perspective and force debate. This is why FPTP is the perfect system for the parliamentary democracy we have in this country (rightly or wrongly). Change the voting system and you need to overhaul the ENTIRE parliamentary system that we have from confrontational to cooperative. You need to remove the Whips, offer everything as a free vote and realistically move to a new building with out the deliberately confrontational aspects of 'sides' and voting chambers.

I'm not saying we shouldn't do this but its not a straight forward as just implementing a new voting system.

Excellent point, well made. Just what sort of democracy do we want?

 

[Nibble]

Seems the only thing common in all of those meetings was you...

And the Australians I mentioned. I mean it makes sense I would be at these meetings, seeing as I met these people. It's cool man, I know it's not a popular opinion, possibly quite xenophobic and wrong but every One of the I've met has spent the entire time trying to blah free cigs/ beers/ food/ bed for the night and being loud mouthed and self obsessed. It's why I keep beer and cigs on me all the time, pays for my blowies.

 

[ThePompousPaladin]

Well I do agree with you that it pushed them over the line. I doubt they'd have got a majority without the SNP issue. But I'm sure they'd still have been the largest party, maybe big enough to form a minority government, maybe not. I was just arguing with the assertion that it was a fact that they only won because of the SNP.

It wouldn't have brought in the conservatives, the SNP would have supported Labour becoming a minority government, but then it would have been difficult for Labour to get anything done. Labour wouldn't have tried to pass bills only to see them voted down, they would have asked the SNP each time, and the SNP would have agreed a few changes, and made many others conditional on a bit more power going to Scotland. Scotland are already demanding more power, imagine how much louder their demands would have been if they held the balance of power in Westminster.

Yes i think you're right, the cons would have been the largest party, although bizarrely not in government (in the situation we're talking about).

The point i'm making is that i don't believe the SNP would have amended the bills. Labour could have told them where to go, and dared the SNP to vote them down. If the SNP did, they'd just be losing support from their members, and pretty much guaranteeing a con government the next time around.


That said i think it's likely there would have been some backroom stuff going on at some point.

 

[bernster]

https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourki...sts-were-wrong-ed-miliband-was-nowhere-near-b
Interesting article on poll related issues

 

[Triggaaar]

The point i'm making is that i don't believe the SNP would have amended the bills. Labour could have told them where to go, and dared the SNP to vote them down. If the SNP did, they'd just be losing support from their members, and pretty much guaranteeing a con government the next time around.

I disagree. I think it would all be backroom. There would be some changes that the SNP agree with so much, they'd just agree to vote it through, but there'd be many others where they'd say no, and if they pre-warn Labour that it will get voted down, Labour would look pretty stupid trying to put it through.

The SNP would justify this to their supporters by saying 'We're trying to get the best deal for Scotland, and Labour are saying no, so we won't support their changes. You voted us in to get the best deal for Scotland, and that's what we're doing.'

 

[piersa]

you won't be when you turn up at a hospital and its closed due to lack of doctors and nurses

I'm not worried in the slightest. The NHS will be privatised before they shut.

 

[ThePompousPaladin]

I disagree. I think it would all be backroom. There would be some changes that the SNP agree with so much, they'd just agree to vote it through, but there'd be many others where they'd say no, and if they pre-warn Labour that it will get voted down, Labour would look pretty stupid trying to put it through.

The SNP would justify this to their supporters by saying 'We're trying to get the best deal for Scotland, and Labour are saying no, so we won't support their changes. You voted us in to get the best deal for Scotland, and that's what we're doing.'

Perhaps. There would have been a fair bit of brinkmanship.

I must admit that when Milliband said there would be no deals with the SNP i didn't believe him. But i think if he had stuck to his guns there would have been very little the SNP could of done without wrecking their own party and support.

 

[father_and_son]

Excellent point, well made. Just what sort of democracy do we want?

Personally... A cooperative one made up of the best talent available across the political spectrum.

The key changes I would make:

No one should be allowed to stand for a political seat with "doing something" for 10yrs or more - remove all the career politicians! It doesn't really matter what they do, but they have to experience life outside Westminster for a decade or more before they are allowed to make decisions that impact the rest of us.

No one should be allowed to run a government department without an appropriate qualification - some degree of knowledge/experience of that field as a minimum.
Imagine a large organisation with a board of directors where the Finance Director quits... under no circumstances would the Chairman of the Board "reshuffle" the board, moving the Marketing Director to Finance, The IT Director to Marketing and the HR Director to IT, then recruit a new HR Director.... just plain idiocy. And yet this is exactly what happens in our Cabinet.

All laws should automatically lapse after 10 years. Put the politicians to work, reviewing and renewing the existing laws rather than just creating an endless stream of new ones just to be seen to be doing something!

The entire Roman Empire was run by 12 Senators and an Emperor. Why the f*ck do we need 650 MPs?? I'd cull the House massively. Broadly one MP per county, each with a small staff to run constituency matters while their "boss" stays in London to vote on the Laws we need to keep (see above).

 

[beorhthelm]

Excellent point, well made. Just what sort of democracy do we want?

which was rather what i was driving at. much of the perceptions of the "fairness" or otherwise of our elections is because we see national polling/votes and compare them to seats elected. it looks wrong, but that's because we didn't vote in one election for a national party or a leader, we voted in 650 elections. PR itself can only address so much if the structure of our system works with PR. just changing seats to regions doesn't really cut it, especially if we then have unintended consequences of party lists and such.

we may be fine with those issues, my point is we need to highlight and address them all and in depth, not only focus on the count methods. this is really why AV referendum failed, it was a rushed, half arsed solution, that didn't explain why we should change just assumed we wanted to. (i know the vote didnt assume literally, just how it was presented. it never made a case for the change, so the no campaign had an open goal of showing how shite the AV proposed was. if they had taken longer, explained and proposed system of structrual reform they might have got more interest or dare i say won it)

 

[Stato]

Its far more fundamental than that...

Our democracy is deliberately a confrontational one. The "opposition" are supposed to do just that... oppose the government.

They are supposed to offer the alternative perspective and force debate. This is why FPTP is the perfect system for the parliamentary democracy we have in this country (rightly or wrongly). Change the voting system and you need to overhaul the ENTIRE parliamentary system that we have from confrontational to cooperative. You need to remove the Whips, offer everything as a free vote and realistically move to a new building with out the deliberately confrontational aspects of 'sides' and voting chambers.

I'm not saying we shouldn't do this but its not a straight forward as just implementing a new voting system.

I think that the control held by the party system is another thing that has put people off politics. A pledge to remove whips and to allow party members to say what they think instead of keeping on message could be a game changer.

The success of UKIP and Johnson's mayoral campaigns have both shown that people may be ready for a less stage managed version of politics: If someone messes up, admit it and explain what you can do to put it right, if a gaffe is made, be honest about how it hasn't helped you, if someone in the party disagress with you, tell the media that that's what politics is about, if an interviewer is playing games in trying to get you to offer up a negative soundbite, call them out on it and ask for a more adult discourse.

If a party leader was to go to the media and state these type of things as aims, they may find that, when damage arose in the media they could turn it around easily by using it as an example of the party's more open and honest approach. Farage has been very good at this working off the cuff. I think that stating it as an aim of a new Labour leadership could lead to the sort of honest politics people want and begin the process of winning back lost trust.

 

[studio150]

It's far more logical than your idea. The polls aren't usually that inaccurate.

I don't care about being in an ideological minority. I care about the country being ruled by a party that was voted for by just over 35% of voters and who ran a very negative campaign.

So you were happy with the last Blair Government which received 35.2% of the popular vote from a turnout of 61.4% because that's who you wanted?

 

[sydney]

Personally... A cooperative one made up of the best talent available across the political spectrum.

The key changes I would make:

No one should be allowed to stand for a political seat with "doing something" for 10yrs or more - remove all the career politicians! It doesn't really matter what they do, but they have to experience life outside Westminster for a decade or more before they are allowed to make decisions that impact the rest of us.

No one should be allowed to run a government department without an appropriate qualification - some degree of knowledge/experience of that field as a minimum.
Imagine a large organisation with a board of directors where the Finance Director quits... under no circumstances would the Chairman of the Board "reshuffle" the board, moving the Marketing Director to Finance, The IT Director to Marketing and the HR Director to IT, then recruit a new HR Director.... just plain idiocy. And yet this is exactly what happens in our Cabinet.

All laws should automatically lapse after 10 years. Put the politicians to work, reviewing and renewing the existing laws rather than just creating an endless stream of new ones just to be seen to be doing something!

The entire Roman Empire was run by 12 Senators and an Emperor. Why the f*ck do we need 650 MPs?? I'd cull the House massively. Broadly one MP per county, each with a small staff to run constituency matters while their "boss" stays in London to vote on the Laws we need to keep (see above).

with all the mod cons these days ...i.e email , skype , text ....is there really any need for these chaps to quaff over 30k's worth of piss and biscuits in the house every week...?

 

[daveinprague]

So you were happy with the last Blair Government which received 35.2% of the popular vote from a turnout of 61.4% because that's who you wanted?

I would be fairly happy for a party to win if it won over half of the votes from a turnout of 61.4% tbh.

 

[hans kraay fan club]

You do realise that politics is real life don't you, not football? I am very very sad and very bitter about the result. It's not like chin up, there's another game next week - This is about how the country is being run and how we care for (or don't as the case is) our most vulnerable. It is not about being gracious, it's about what caring about what you believe in. Seeing how many tories are celebrating by poking fun at Milliband et al, tells you all you need to know about how them and their beliefs....

Excellent post.

The reason we are 'bitter', is because this stuff actually matters, and (in our opinion, obviously) the nation came to a fork in the road, and collectively chose the wrong path. We are all (again, in our opinion) going to suffer the consequences of that decision, whoever we voted for. If you share this view it is clearly a cause of angst. If you don't, the fact that more than 8 million of your peers DO, should at least give you cause to stop and think, rather than treating it all as a big joke, or indulging in patheic, childish 'bantz'.

Grow up.

 

[BLOCK F]

Its a world wide thing. Over here the left are without a doubt the biggest cry babies going around. And their tears are full of spiteful venom.[/QUOT


To be fair though it must be a bloody tough country to be leftie in, the majority of Aussies I've met are bullish racists only topped in their arrogance and judgement by white South Africans. Ghastly people.

Not going to Australia or South Africa on your travels, then Nibble?