General Election - 4th July 2024

[SebastianBlue]

Good old Russia

To be fair, many of the FOCs down my local drink place struggle with Twxttxr.

 

[Kompany Car]

I have quite a lot in common with Reeves, in upbringing, education, and profession, so am quite proud of her becoming the first female chancellor in UK history.

I hope she is given the backing and resources to actually mitigate the abject ineptitude of the last decade and a half, to everyone’s benefit, whether they voted Labour or not.

Have a lot of time for Reeves, bright, articulate and with an impeccable CV for arguably the most difficult job.

 

[Churchlawtonblue]

Im not swerving, I'm deliberately not responding to what is a stupid crtiticism

You most certainly are, you could just answer the question.

Oh and by the way you have responded several times?

It was a minor point as initially stated, more of an observation with my take on it's wider importance. But I do feel like in this instance you and others have tried to win an argument by exaggerating the initial point made, which is a bit silly. But are now struggling to answer a simple question as presumably you may have realised I may have a point. And perhaps there is a reason why every PM before has always had a British car?

Anyway, I have enjoyed the debate what little of it there was.

PS Yesterday was a watershed moment for me. First time I have voted for Labour. I did hesitate over the LD box but wanted my vote to count double so to speak and our constituency changed for the first time from Consevative. I am pleased Starmer got in. A change was long over due. I want him to do really well for all of us. But in reality I doubt he will change much initially just steer the country in the right direction. Rachel Reeves has the toughest job imo she has to encourage growth in the UK economy which isnt easy. I really hope she removes Andrew Bailey first off, he has been a very poor Governor of the BoE.

Anyway have a good day.

 

[flook]

Just done a quick calculation on vote share versus seats won, and translated that into how many seats each major party would've won under 'pure' PR (i.e., percentage vote = number of seats).

FPTP
Labour 411
Con 121
Reform 4
LibDem 71

PR
Labour 219
Con 154
Reform 93
LD 79

So under PR you'd maybe have the right-wing of the Tory party collaborating with Reform and the majority Labour government having to rely on the LibDems for support. As we saw in 2010, when the LibDems made a huge mistake in committing to a coalition, that doesn't make for good government.

The other what-if factor was that Reform was second in 9i constituencies. I might do the maths later for individual seats but let's assume that in 74 of those the Reform vote made the difference between the Tories losing and winning, and that 50 of those went to Labour, and 24 to Lib Dems. Assuming negligible Reform support, or no Reform at all, that would have made the final result (bar the 2 missing results):
Labour 326
Con 196
Lib Dem 53

Corrected - So the barest Labour overall majority of one.

you've highlighted the issue with PR, it's near impossible to get a majority, so therefore near impossible to get a mandate to actually run the country. PR would mean a series of deals being struck to get bills through parliament, with each party looking after their own interests rather than those of the country.

Now I'm not naive enough to think that the dominant party doesn't look after its own interests, however with a majority government, at least they have the opportunity to put their manifesto policies into action without compromising on other issues

 

[I'm With Stupid]

you've highlighted the issue with PR, it's near impossible to get a majority, so therefore near impossible to get a mandate to actually run the country. PR would mean a series of deals being struck to get bills through parliament, with each party looking after their own interests rather than those of the country.

Now I'm not naive enough to think that the dominant party doesn't look after its own interests, however with a majority government, at least they have the opportunity to put their manifesto policies into action without compromising on other issues

But the problem with that is that almost always they are going to be steamrollering through policies that only a small proportion of the population wanted. Labour represent 36% of the voting population, and that 36%'s opinion will now completely decide everything for 5 years. Would it not be better if Labour could only pass things that over 50% of the country voted for by having to find other parties to support them?

That's 36% of the 60% that voted btw. So I make that just over 20% of voting-age adults basically entirely deciding everything for the rest. That 60% would almost certainly be higher under PR.

 

[mosssideblue]

You most certainly are, you could just answer the question.

Oh and by the way you have responded several times?

It was a minor point as initially stated, more of an observation with my take on it's wider importance. But I do like the way that you and others try and win an argument by exaggerating the initial point made. But are now struggling to answer a simple question as presumably because you may have realised I may have a point. And perhaps there is a reason why every PM before has always had a British car?

Anyway, I have enjoyed the debate what little of it there was.

PS Yesterday was a watershed moment for me. First time I have voted for Labour. I did hesitate over the LD box but wanted my vote to count double so to speak and our constituency cahnged for the first time from Consevative. I am pleased Starmer got in. A change was long over due. I want him to do really well for all of us. But in reality I doubt he will change much initially just steer the country in the right direction. Rachel Reeves has the toughest job imo she has to encourage growth in the UK economy which isnt easy. I really hope she removes Andrew Bailey first off, he has been a very poor Governor of the BoE.

Anyway have a good day.

Are you really get so wound up about him arriving in a non British car? The fella hadn't got over the threshold and you're on his back over something so trivial. I'm sure the taxpayer would rather see hundreds of thousands of pounds spent more productively considering the state of the economy.

 

[flook]

But the problem with that is that almost always they are going to be steamrollering through policies that only a small proportion of the population wanted. Labour represent 36% of the voting population, and that 36%'s opinion will now completely decide everything for 5 years. Would it not be better if Labour could only pass things that over 50% of the country voted for by having to find other parties to support them?

you're assuming that people support ALL the policies of the party they voted for. IF that was true and IF there were no deals made of the you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours, then I'd agree with you.

However I don't believe either of those scenarios are remotely likely

 

[johnny crossan]

Probably turn out was shite yesterday

All together now - OOOOH - JEREMY CORBYN. McDonnell has already warned Starmer the union red barons are waiting impatiently for his battle call. The class war is about to be waged in earnest - look to hide your assets if you've got any left.

 

[I'm With Stupid]

you're assuming that people support ALL the policies of the party they voted for. IF that was true and IF there were no deals made of the you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours, then I'd agree with you.

However I don't believe either of those scenarios are remotely likely

Well no they don't. But they have given their mandate for the party to implement the things that were in the manifesto, whether they agree with them or not.

 

[Churchlawtonblue]

Are you really get so wound up about him arriving in a non British car? The fella hadn't got over the threshold and you're on his back over something so trivial. I'm sure the taxpayer would rather see hundreds of thousands of pounds spent more productively considering the state of the economy.

No I'm not! There you go again twisting the debate to avoid the simple question i posed. I specifically said it was a minor point. Have a read of my initial post if you dont believe me.

We've had lots of good debates over the years. So I think its best to leave it there.

Cheers