[Politics] May 2021 local elections and Hartlepool by-election

[dsr-burnley]

It is an absolutely breathtaking victory, Khan has built a reputation for getting things done and standing up to racism and facism. London has clearly spoken, lets hope the country are listening.

Unfortunately the rest of the country hasn't noticed Khan doing anything so his reputation for getting things done hasn't spread.

Anyway, you appear to have the same idea that's been roundly condemned on here - the idea that the working classes in the north will look at London voters and realise how they shouldn't have an opinion of their own, they should follow the intelligent people of London.

It won't work.

 

[crodonilson]

Unfortunately the rest of the country hasn't noticed Khan doing anything so his reputation for getting things done hasn't spread.

Anyway, you appear to have the same idea that's been roundly condemned on here - the idea that the working classes in the north will look at London voters and realise how they shouldn't have an opinion of their own, they should follow the intelligent people of London.

It won't work.

The working classes are institutionally racist, almost always massively vote leave areas, Khan would never be listened to in this seats so unfortunately you are probably right.

 

[KeithDublin]

Unfortunately the rest of the country hasn't noticed Khan doing anything so his reputation for getting things done hasn't spread.

Anyway, you appear to have the same idea that's been roundly condemned on here - the idea that the working classes in the north will look at London voters and realise how they shouldn't have an opinion of their own, they should follow the intelligent people of London.

It won't work.

You make it sound like the whole of the northern working class vote the same way. Plenty of labour MPs in places that still have a bit of pride....like proper Lancashire cities like Preston

 

[pastafarian]

The results from the rest of England are very depressing and show the institutional racism that pervades particularly in working class communities.

what a load of bollocks, talking out of your arse.
Love you to provide a list of all the results from England that you have decided are institutionally racist outcomes.

 

[crodonilson]

what a load of bollocks, talking out of your arse.
Love you to provide a list of all the results from England that you have decided are institutionally racist outcomes.

I think the events of the last 12 months particularly have called out the institutional racism in our country as a whole. It is no surprise that nearly all of the Tory gains have been in working class communities where the Brexit party votes have been unilaterally transferred to Tory votes. I don't need to provide a list, do your own research.

 

[dsr-burnley]

The working classes are institutionally racist, almost always massively vote leave areas, Khan would never be listened to in this seats so unfortunately you are probably right.

"I'm glad I'm not prejudiced, like all those northern people".

I take it that when you say working class people are racist, you mean white working class people? Or does a black man become racist as soon as he takes a job in a factory?

 

[Eeyore]

We had a referendum on FPTP only a few short years ago and the people unanimously voted that it was their preferred system, that is democracy.

That was the AV vote- a fudge. That wasn't proportional representation.

Still, my point is that no-one has ever offered an argument against PR being the best representation of government.

Some said it would lead to too many hung parliaments- which suggests a party clearly being in power is better. It is not. The Tories run the country with a clear majority making the opposition (56% of the vote) almost redundant.

If hung parliaments were a problem how have European nations managed to function all these years ? Most have coalitions.

 

[crodonilson]

That was the AV vote- a fudge. That wasn't proportional representation.

Still, my point is that no-one has ever offered an argument against PR being the best representation of government.

Some said it would lead to too many hung parliaments- which suggests a party clearly being in power is better. It is not. The Tories run the country with a clear majority making the opposition (56% of the vote) almost redundant.

If hung parliaments were a problem how have European nations managed to function all these years ? Most have coalitions.

The opposition hold the government to account? And if they are successful in doing so and the government are punished for not doing what they were out in power to do hen they too get that opportunity at the next eltion?

The chaos of the Lib Dem Tory coalition shows why hung parliament's just don't work.

 

[dsr-burnley]

That was the AV vote- a fudge. That wasn't proportional representation.

Still, my point is that no-one has ever offered an argument against PR being the best representation of government.

Some said it would lead to too many hung parliaments- which suggests a party clearly being in power is better. It is not. The Tories run the country with a clear majority making the opposition (56% of the vote) almost redundant.

If hung parliaments were a problem how have European nations managed to function all these years ? Most have coalitions.

Arguments in favour of FPTP:

1. You get your own MP. MPs have a useful purpose other than being a party mouthpiece. It is a good thing for each of us to have an MP who represents us, even if we didn't vote for them.

2. You get the government that is most popular. With PR, you get the government that is least unpopular. There are disadvantages to letting the party that causes least offence take charge, for one thing because it discourages innovation and ideas.

3. FPTP gives too little power to minorities, but PR gives too much. If we have a position where two main parties each get 40-45% and a third party gets the odd 15%, then under FPTP it's the 85% that make the difference; under PR the 85% are barely relevant because the 15% have the balance of power.

4. A minor point, but under PR, to get elected an MP only needs 1 vote - his leader. Under FPTP, they can be thrown out by their constituents.

 

[crodonilson]

"I'm glad I'm not prejudiced, like all those northern people".

I take it that when you say working class people are racist, you mean white working class people? Or does a black man become racist as soon as he takes a job in a factory?

Yes, those with white privelige are more likely to be racist. Racism occurs in many forms but the biggest club hung holding this county back is taxi from people with white privelige against their BAME counterparts.

 

[dsr-burnley]

Yes, those with white privelige are more likely to be racist. Racism occurs in many forms but the biggest club hung holding this county back is taxi from people with white privelige against their BAME counterparts.

Do you want to try that again?

I would have thought that people without privilege are more likely to be racist. There is a lot of knife crime in London, so they tell me (in spite of the mighty Khan running the show) and a lot of that is race related. It isn't the rich white people doing it. It is the poor white people and the poor black people.

One of the problems with the current approach to race relations, slavery being dragged in and everything, is that the poor black people are being told that it isn't their fault they are poor, it's the racist white people who are doing it. And the poor white people are being told that they are more privileged than the poor black people because they are white and powerful, when they clearly aren't.

It stores up vast resentment on both sides.

 

[clapham_gull]

That was the AV vote- a fudge. That wasn't proportional representation.

Still, my point is that no-one has ever offered an argument against PR being the best representation of government.

Some said it would lead to too many hung parliaments- which suggests a party clearly being in power is better. It is not. The Tories run the country with a clear majority making the opposition (56% of the vote) almost redundant.

If hung parliaments were a problem how have European nations managed to function all these years ? Most have coalitions.

It's interesting retrospectively that AV vote.

The Lib Dems seem to forget what they were voting for, their version of democracy or power.

Brown's government were far more receptive to the idea, but the Lib Dems decided to go into bed with the Tories because they has received more votes.

Once the Lib Dems had effectively put the Tories in power (who behind the scenes ate them for breakfast) they were effectively finished as a political force in this country.

Strategically it has to go down as one of the worst political decisions in UK history.

I've no idea where they go from here and neither have they.

 

[crodonilson]

Do you want to try that again?

I would have thought that people without privilege are more likely to be racist. There is a lot of knife crime in London, so they tell me (in spite of the mighty Khan running the show) and a lot of that is race related. It isn't the rich white people doing it. It is the poor white people and the poor black people.

One of the problems with the current approach to race relations, slavery being dragged in and everything, is that the poor black people are being told that it isn't their fault they are poor, it's the racist white people who are doing it. And the poor white people are being told that they are more privileged than the poor black people because they are white and powerful, when they clearly aren't.

It stores up vast resentment on both sides.

The vast majority of knife crime in London is black on black. You are right though it is mainly white privilege why black people have felt for a long time they feel they gave no opportunities, which is why Khan is such a popular mayor in London because he's giving those people the opportunity they deserve.

 

[pastafarian]

I think the events of the last 12 months particularly have called out the institutional racism in our country as a whole. It is no surprise that nearly all of the Tory gains have been in working class communities where the Brexit party votes have been unilaterally transferred to Tory votes. I don't need to provide a list, do your own research.

Ah i see, when you said results from the rest of England are institutionally racist outcomes you simply meant those results that had a Tory gain.
"The working classes are institutionally racist" claim is the sort of nonsense i would expect from the lib dem camp, who are a bit crackers.
Get well soon.

 

[crodonilson]

Ah i see, when you said results from the rest of England are institutionally racist outcomes you simply meant those results that had a Tory gain.
"The working classes are institutionally racist" claim is the sort of nonsense i would expect from the lib dem camp, who are a bit crackers.
Get well soon.

Yes because you can clearly see the swing gas not been from Labour to Tory in these areas it has been from BNP/UKIP to Tory so they have just cleaned up the right/far right vote.

 

[dsr-burnley]

The vast majority of knife crime in London is black on black. You are right though it is mainly white privilege why black people have felt for a long time they feel they gave no opportunities, which is why Khan is such a popular mayor in London because he's giving those people the opportunity they deserve.

If he is giving these people the opportunity they deserve, why is crime increasing? Anyway, it's good to know there is little race-related knife crime in London.

 

[Eeyore]

The opposition hold the government to account? And if they are successful in doing so and the government are punished for not doing what they were out in power to do hen they too get that opportunity at the next eltion?

The chaos of the Lib Dem Tory coalition shows why hung parliament's just don't work.

I don't agree. The coalition saw a dampening of the excesses of some Tory policies.

I didn't believe what the papers had to say on it.

 

[pastafarian]

Yes because you can clearly see the swing gas not been from Labour to Tory in these areas it has been from BNP/UKIP to Tory so they have just cleaned up the right/far right vote.

BNP ?

 

[dsr-burnley]

Yes because you can clearly see the swing gas not been from Labour to Tory in these areas it has been from BNP/UKIP to Tory so they have just cleaned up the right/far right vote.

Prejudice is the forming of opinions when you don't have facts to justify them.

Here's a fact that might help your prejudices. The BNP, at the 2019 general election, had 510 votes. In 2017, they did rather better with 4,580.

Here's another fact. The "red wall" was traditionally Labour, and although the Labour voters may have migrated to the Tories via UKIP, migrate they did. The current Toryness of the smaller northern industrial towns is not caused by a recombining of the right-wing vote.

 

[Sid in the Sharknado]

Arguments in favour of FPTP:

1. You get your own MP. MPs have a useful purpose other than being a party mouthpiece. It is a good thing for each of us to have an MP who represents us, even if we didn't vote for them.

2. You get the government that is most popular. With PR, you get the government that is least unpopular. There are disadvantages to letting the party that causes least offence take charge, for one thing because it discourages innovation and ideas.

3. FPTP gives too little power to minorities, but PR gives too much. If we have a position where two main parties each get 40-45% and a third party gets the odd 15%, then under FPTP it's the 85% that make the difference; under PR the 85% are barely relevant because the 15% have the balance of power.

4. A minor point, but under PR, to get elected an MP only needs 1 vote - his leader. Under FPTP, they can be thrown out by their constituents.

1. I'll grant you that having a representative MP is a major benefit of FPTP. Whether it's actually a good thing for an MP to be concerned by the local interest over the national probably depends on the situation of course.
A local MP is also provided by numerous other systems that do a much better job of representing the share of the vote, the Single Transferable Vote system comes immediately to mind (which is NOT a PR system, to be clear), but realistically any PR system can be split into relatively small constituencies.

2. Or sometimes, the second most popular party, who happens to get a better distribution of their vote. Numerous UK elections have resulted in the party who came second in the vote getting more seats.

3. Under our system, whichever party who receives 40-45% of the vote and happens to get more seats will get all the power, the other 65% barely matter. Even if a coalition is required, the powe the 15% party have only feels disproportionate because we're not used to functioning coalitions. To give an example, after the 2010 election the Liberal Democrats went into coalition and are widely regarded as having had a vaguely moderating effect on the conservatives. They had 57 seats, less than 10% of the total. To put that in context, even if they had that many seats now, they would still have fewer seats than would be justified by the 11% of the vote they received in 2019.

4. If you can find a PR system that actually allows an MP to be elected with a single vote, I'll happily concede that that system is bonkers. All the systems I can think of in practice have some minimum % of the vote that needs to be achieved to get an MP.