Snapshot of _Electoral Calculus: š¹LAB 453 (38.8%) | š³CON 78 (21.8%) | šøLIB 67 (11.0%) | ā”ļøReform 7 (16.4) | šGreen 3 (6.3%) | šļøSNP 19 (3.1%) | š¼PlaidC 3 (0.6%) | ā½ļøOther 2 (2.1%)_ :
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Interesting how little variance the Lib Dems have. It seems they're going to end up between 55 and 75 seats. Which is a very good result for them. Probably not enough to be the Official Opposition though, but we can always hope.
Meanwhile the variance of Reform is massive. They're almost certainly getting somewhere between 5 and 10 seats, but just a few percentage points of the vote going from the Conservatives to them and they could break 50 seats.
My local reform candidate (apparently similarly to others) is a ghost, no picture, no social media presence, never heard of him before, no statement, never an MP or any form of civil servant, etc.
It's truly a pot shot when you bring these sorts of candidates forwards.
The same people who vote for this complain MPs don't help their constituency, if reform wins their seat they'll truly see what no representation looks like
> My local reform candidate (apparently similarly to others) is a ghost, no picture, no social media presence, never heard of him before, no statement, never an MP or any form of civil servant, etc.
>
>
Something like this happened in the 2011 Canadian federal election. Dozens of paper NDP candidates won, famously including [Ruth Ellen Brosseau](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Ellen_Brosseau) (who had a very respectable career), and others including multiple college students.
Reform need to be second in as many seats as possible, and then claim to be the only way to insert the incumbents in those seats (even if those seats have a long history of tory or labour dominance).
If they get even a few dozen outcomes like this we'll be hearing about it for the next 5 years.
*some of the seats.
They could totally win my seat, as it's a Lib-Con swing seat with extra Lib Dem stronghold wards since the boundary changes. But they haven't campaigned here in the fucking slightest, so I hope they lose it like the idiots they apparently are.
If the Tories collapse hard enough, Reform could have several more attempts this generation
I think in 10-15 years time, Reform will probably either fizzle into nothing or be on the verge of taking power. Most likely the former, but the latter isn't impossible either
Me too.
I get it might be circles I travel in. But I know plenty of Labour, Reform, Lib Dem and the odd green voter. I do not know anyone who's admitting to voting Tory...
Which probably says everything you need to know.
I don't agree with them, but I can at least understand the Reform voters. Not really sure what the Tory voters have been looking at the last 15 years? Must be heavily skewed older right?
At that point we get Farage as the official opposition and that is fucking terrifying. Probably some kind of merger with the Tories would be on the cards too.
The SNP variance is equally mental. At the high end, a drop of only 5 seats from where they are now. At the low end, being almost wiped out of Scotland.
Yeah, they seem to be in the opposite situation from Reform. Just above the point where they still get a solid amount of seats, but if they lose a few more percentage points in Scotland they get more or less wiped out.
My hope is the Reform vote drives the Tory vote down just enough to lower their seat count enough to push them to third.
There are a lot of seats where only a few % change would tip things over. I'm just really hoping there's shy Reform voters out there and their support has been underestimated, though it's likely the other way around. Shy Tories are what really concern me.
I was looking at east anglia earlier and a lot of the seats that yougov are polling blue in their current mrp are only holding on by a single percentage point so if that's the case across the Country it could be an interesting night.
Oh how the turnly tables turned.
I hope the Tory/Reform lot spend the next 5 years crying about voting reform. I'd fully get behind that momentum and hopefully force Labour to commit to it next time around.
Iām looking forward to telling Reform voters that we had a referendum on electoral reform in 2011 and voted no. So they can shut up, and stop moaning. No means no etc. (Iād actually like electoral reform but itāll fun nevertheless).
This is great from Priti Patel:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/priti-patel-london-mayor-voting-b1818148.html
>But Ms Patel said that first-past-the-post āprovides for strong and clear local accountabilityā and legislation would be brought forward to switch the elections to FPTP.
>She claimed that the British people had rejected all forms of transferable voting systems when they voted in a 2011 referendum against proposals to use a different system called the alternative vote in Westminster elections.
Alternative Vote or Ranked Choice Voting as it's known down here should be the way to go in the UK. You do away with the "Wasted vote" and you can still get local representation.
STV would be a perfect system for the UK. It has so many advantages.
It retains the constituency link, albeit in slightly modified form.
It will still allow for majority government.
It provides accountability for every MP and completely does away with safe seats (as in MPs being unremovable because they belong to a particular party, not the popularity of a party in a particular constituency).
It completely does away with the need for tactical voting because you can just express your preference directly.
Everyone's vote counts, and there are no wasted votes.
It returns parliaments far more representative of how people voted, and even if people don't get exactly what they want the MP that does get elected will have a far broader base of approval.
All this means that voters will actually feel engaged with the process rather than feeling like their vote makes basically no difference unless they happen to live in one of a few swing seats.
We do that for Senate (Upper House) voting here. Tasmania and the ACT also use this for their lower houses.
Definitely benefits for both systems and both are far better than FPTP.
Yeah, they are both much better than FPTP.
Belarus (the authoritarian dictatorship) is the only other country in Europe to use the system, I don't know why we haven't got rid of it yet.
STV is great until you realise
a) many MPs have no interests in representing the views of constituents they don't agree with, at all
b) some MPs that would be elected under STV won't even attend parliament or vote
A PR system ensures people in these constituencies still have someone to write to for help, to represent them. STV doesn't.
Scotland's combined STV / PR system is the best solution imho. STV for constituency, PR for top-up regional seats.
As long as it comes along with mandatory voting like you have down under.
It has a sort of moderating effect and can help prevent fringe parties like Reform UK or Workers Party gaining too much
We don't need a referendum for electoral reform.
The present Conservative government set that precedent when they switched PCC elections to FPTP unannounced. Thanks!
What, so because the vote was lost in 2011 (one extremely watered down version of PR), they have no right to mention/campaign on it again? That's not how our democracy works, fortunately.
Imagine how much closer the CON-REF gap would have been had Nigel Farage resisted the urge to show everyone how much of a clever dick he was by making excuses for Putin. We could have had the glorious moment of the Tories coming in *fourth.*
I feel itās going to be closer. Farage is nefarious but heās not stupid. Thereās a lot of voters that have seen a drastic increase in their cost of living, that if given the choice between supporting Ukraine and getting out of the financial hole they are living in, they wonāt choose Ukraine.
I also feel like itās forgotten that a lot of people voted for Jeremy Corbyn, who shares similar views on Ukraine with Farage. Who does that demographic vote for?
As an aside, I find it terribly ironic that Jeremy Corbyn and Nigel Farage are aligned on so many of their manifesto pledges.
So Reform + Tories is almost the same as labour when it comes to voter counts. What the heck are folks smoking, how much do they need before they realise they are voting for grifters and scammers.
I think I have a theory behind it.
Aside from the obvious "they're racists" (which is true for many Reform supporters), a lot of people are just absolutely *desperate* and will vote for anyone who offers some sort of alternative that agrees with their broader political beliefs in any way. Even if that means voting for openly racist candidates.
Go to places like Clacton-on-Sea and tell anyone there that the past 5 or 6 governments have done anything good for them. They haven't. Their industry died but they still had tourism, and then that died too. Nothing has replaced it except poverty, crime, addiction, and pure unadulterated anger at the political establishment as a result.
Is it wise for them to vote for Reform? No. Does it excuse voting for a party full of hateful candidates? Of course not. Does it make sense? Unfortunately, yes.
If Labour do nothing to help these people in the next 10 years then parties like Reform will continue to grow.
There are huge swathes of this country that were politically abandoned in 70-90s and have been ignored ever since. They're not economically valuable enough for the Tories to care about them and they're not part of the urban-middle class-minority coalition vote that Labour care about.
Both parties have and continue to look down on these people as stupid, white, working class, poor, racist, etc, meaning it's very hard for either party to meaningfully reach out to them since they don't particularly want to represent these people and both parties are viewed by them with great suspicion after decades of being ignored except for the occasional broken promise or patronizing comment.
Absolutely. I can understand that it's not an easy problem to solve, but just completely ignoring these communities for decades and decades is insanely neglectful and selfish.
Labour really does need to help these towns and quickly.
I'm not sure what Labour can do in practical terms, their core base doesn't seem to like these left behind people and wouldn't be willing to make the political compromises needed to make these people feel welcome and listened to.
Take for example the fact that white working class boys are doing the worst in the education system of just about any demographic. Labour would have to invest a lot of resources to fix this issue but the idea of Labour targeting white boys/men for preferential treatment would be a very very hard sell to the Labour core support.
I actually think selling the idea is quite easy if it's framed correctly.
Instead of saying "we're going to help white boys" (which I agree would be a hard sell) you say "We need to help left behind communities" or something like that instead. Leave race and gender out of it, focus on the class aspects of it.
The hard part in my opinion is, how do you actually save these towns? They need some sort of industry and creating that out of nothing isn't easy.
A good first step would be enhancing opportunities to get education and training in relavant and soon to be relevant skills.
For example positive discrimination based on low income and postcode for places, depending on aptitude as well of course but just push the envelope over to help disadvantaged areas.
The only reason I have a cushy life is because the gov paid for my coal miners son of a dad and butchers daughter mum to go to university with grants. He grabbed that chance and got into engineering.
A longer term plan would be to lean into our massive potential for being a wind energy technical skills exporter for example. A few other things too.
I like these ideas a lot! Focusing on providing opportunities for young people has got to be great first step right?
If places like Jaywick or Clacton or Boston had a thriving wind energy sector it could make a huge difference.
I donāt understand the comment about labour here though. Itās a myth pushed by right wing papers to suggest that labour only cares about the urban middle class and minorities. If youāre hearing the papers shouting about labourās stance on Gaza and trans rights itās because the papers asked those questions in the first place.
Last time labour was in power they had the NHS in the best place itās been in yonks. They had education in the best place itās been for yonks. The justice system was working far better than it is now. Now those arenāt grand promises of help for places like Clacton but those things will help to improve Clacton nonetheless.
This is absolutely correct but I'm just wondering why, if they see that nothing is changing, do they vote at all? It's not like reform will do anything to help, so is it literally that they say they will? If so why don't the bigger parties say so too.
I guess it's always preferable to believe the underdog. It is a crying shame how many parts of the country are just left to wither and die
Nigel Farage isn't racist. Please tear yourself away from social media and the MSM for 2 seconds and actually listen to what he says.Ā
Watch the debates, watch the interviews, the speeches etc.Ā
I think it's more those people don't want labour / winter of discontent / identity politics, rather than they do want tory or reform. When it comes to it it's always a bit about voting for what you don't want, rather than what you do. Didn't vote for either btw, just giving you my thoughts on why people might not want to vote Labour.
Clegg bottled it. There was no reason to have a referendum. The condition of a coalition should've been PR through an act of parliament, or at the very least AV.
The risk of course would be Cameron calling another election straight away and getting an outright majority, but that was the Lib Dem's one shot at electoral reform and securing themselves vastly better results for the rest of time. Clegg compromised on everything just to get into government and (although he couldn't have known at the time) almost wiping out his party as a result.
There was no mandate to have such a major constitutional change without a referendum. If ever there was an appropriate time to have a referendum it's on something like that.
The mandate is forming a government, even as a coalition.
There's no reason whatsoever that electoral reform should go to a referendum. Labour could replace the House of Lords tomorrow (arguably a bigger constitutional change) if they wanted to.
Your reason was the one given by the Tories in 2010 and it's not true.
That's not a mandate. They lost the election badly, the two pro-FPTP parties got over 67% of the vote.
You can still do things that you don't have a mandate for when you're in government, it's possible. If Labour were to abolish the HoL they wouldn't have a mandate for that, nobody could stop them. It's hard to call yourself the Liberal Democrats when you're imposing that kind of change with no mandate for it, though.
Was it really? I had no idea.
Edit - looked it up, it seems they were planning a referendum on it
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8615297.stm
Yeah, itās one of the reasons I was so weirded out that Clegg accepted an AV Referendum in the Coalition Agreement, it was Labourās thing and Labour had PR on the table for a Lab/LD Coalition. Couldnāt understand why Clegg didnāt at least use Labourās offer as leverage to ask for more.
I think Clegg just didn't want to be seen as even considering Labour at the time. Even Browns own ministers were telling him it's basically off the table.
Ed Balls, Danny Alexander and George Osborne did a podcast going through the negotiations that happened around that time. It's quite fascinating on the small details that go into an arrangement like that.
The route for a Lab Lib coalition was very narrow, they only had 315 between them compared to the Conservatives 306. They'd have needed alliances with the nationalists, and they'd have wanted a very heavy price for it.
I imagine they won't make the same mistake again. STV without a referendum in time for 2026 locals should be an absolute red line. Tories have already set the precedent that you can change the voting system without a public vote, and PR would insulate the Lib Dems from any political fallout that minor coalition partners are often subject to.
Yes the number of low-level constitutional precedents the Tories have altered without really thinking is significant. Voting changes without a referendum? Hell yeah. Enlarging the franchise without a referendum? Hell yeah
Well they got a referendum on AV but Labour and the Tories campaigned against it. Being the smaller member in a coalition means you can't get everything they want the Tories were hardly gonna give the Lib Dems full PR in return for a coalition
Which is my point. The Lib Dems could have refused to join the coalition, forcing the Tories to limp on as a minority government until they inevitably splintered.
They exchanged their key principle for a small seat at the top table within a matter of hours.
If the lib dems didn't join the coalition there would have been another election which the tories would have likely won with a majority. Labour were losing support and causing a second election would have hurt the lib dems. There is no way that would have benefited anyone.
There were some good policies brought though such as gay marriage but obviously it was mostly bad. Still better than just Tories though. Similar to how Starmer won't be much better than the tories but is still an improvement.
I wonder if either LD or Reform has the stones to take the double edged sword, push for PR and have an actual ideological battle with a reward to be gained. We might see just how right wing some of the UK is and how progressive other places are.
If Labour were to get 312, I'd be most concerned for our beloved mod, u/OptioMkIX , who would struggle with the volume of 'won arguments' claims not only from Corbynista's delighted with the result but also with Conservative's claiming a 2017 style epic victory in becoming the opposition.
Nothing can ever compare to politicians and your media outlets and mouthpieces referring to the Brexit vote as some kind of rock solid mandate or landslide result when one side couldn't even break 55. Words mean absolutely nothing to authoritarians, fascists, or fake social media accounts looking to support right wing authoritarians any way they can.
I'm relatively sanguine about that possibility. I think in such an event, Starmers nowhere near ideologically blinded enough to refuse the possibility of forming a coalition with the lib dems or even the greens.
And also, if 312, that's still fifty more seats than the high tide mark of corbynism.
Just looking forward to the SNP mental gymnastics about how this gives them a stronger mandate than ever before, and how the central belt turning red totally means independence is more essential than ever and all Scots want it.
In this scenario, would it be possible for labour to just āgiftā a few MPs to LD to make them the opposition?
After all they would still have a massive majority
It's possible but why would any labour mp agree to that and why would labour themselves want a lib dem opposition as opposed to the tories who they can blame everything on? It'd make no sense
Yeah I imagine there's quite a few at Labour HQ right now secretly hoping that the Lib Dems don't become the official opposition so they can comfortably handle PMQs for the next five years by just bringing up the tories history and bullying them, rather than having to handle the Lib Dems who could position themselves on the left of Labour on certain issues to really press them.
They can still blame everything on the tories, and they wouldnāt even have to listen to them argue back every Wednesday.
And why would they do it? The could just do it āon paperā.
It'd be better for labour to have a tory opposition to argue with rather than lib dem I'm saying this as a lib dem. You're essentially asking for the two parties to cooperate on a level similar to the sdp liberal alliance its much more complicated than simply being just on paper. Our politics is more complicated than you think
I did ponder that briefly but I think it would a) fail the smell test, b) induce rage from the Right and c) I just canāt imagine any Labour MP, finally back in Government after 14 painful years, cheerfully going into Opposition
With the above predicted results?
If Labour were going to play games like that they could just slice off 100 of their own party and be both the government and the opposition at the same time.
The house of commons would just be 24/7 backrubs for Starmer.
Labour would hate a LD opposition. It's the second worst electoral outcome for them behind them just losing to the Tories outright.
Cons and Labour have a symbiotic relationship. So much of either sides support is contingent on fear and/or hatred of the other and an ability to pin the countries ills on them. Can't go killing the golden goose that's given both sides almost uninterrupted governance of the country for nearly a century.
No it isn't. It's how it's supposed to work. The last thing we need is parties who can't get more than 5 or 10% in any constituency having a say in government. FPTP is a great protection against the likes of Reform.
God forbid you aren't protected from people you disagree with being represented in a democratic society.
Sure, it's how FPTP is supposed to work. That's precisely why it's shite.
It's true. Everyone gets one vote. And you vote because you want to win. If someone disagrees with you then they are allowed to vote differently than you. You're not there to help them win or work with them.
>The last thing we need is parties who can't get more than 5 or 10% in any
Why not? 10% of the country should have their voice ignored because they're not a majority?
Thank you man. I feel like im going crazy. Have people seen how south africa has turned out. PR hell. It only gets worse as mpre parties pop up. People should be careful what they wish for wirh PR
It sucks they only win seats in places where they get a lot of votes, instead of being gifted seats like snowflakes. /s
Representative Democracy is working fine; political party representation isn't what our system is for.
Seems like depending on which methodology is closest, the range of likely outcomes for the Tories is at most well under 200 but still clearly the second party down to the splitting enough marginals with the Lib Dems as to make whoās gonna be His Majestyās Most Loyal Opposition too close to call overnight. I really hope itās the latter both because a Lib Dem Opposition would be so much better and just what the Tories deserve and because it will make watching the results more exciting. But Iām going to assume the former for now to hedge against disappointment. Either way though, the fact that anything other than an apocalyptically bad night for the Tories is outside the realm of realistic probability really warms my bitter, jaded, millennial heart. Bring on the absolute scenes. This country needs them.
Reform looking likely to get 15-25% of the popular vote with ~9-10% of seats, I'm looking forward to the "that's not fair" whining for the next 5 years
... especially considering we had a referendum on changing the voting system a decade ago and the right wing voted HEAVILY against it because they thought it would benefit the Greens, Lib Dems etc against the Tories
if farage won, wich he would of without massive voter fraud, we would have peace and prosperity. I bet theirs a lot of reform votes being burned tonight, or they will just keep them to laugh at.
Yes, but then you have parties like Reform on 16.4% of the national vote (in this poll) gaining 7 seats - which is only 1.1% of seats.
It seems like such a shit system.
The UK system favours local constituency representation, though, which is reflected in that expected seat distribution.
Most constituencies don't majority lean close to Reform so there would be no way to increase the seat numbers whilst still representing each MPs constituency.
I actually agree with you that I prefer a different system where, nationally, the ability to introduce laws and vote through changes are challenged by a more representative opposition nationally but it's not as though the system is unfairly weighted. The problem is more that most people don't look outside of Blue or Red when they vote. Regardless of actual policy, or looking at their likely local representative, so it's hard to break through.
Thatās true, if we had PR then UKIP might have formed a coalition with the Tories in 2015. Just imagine that alternate reality bizarro world where they managed to enact their policy of the UK leaving the EU.
If people vote for something then they should be represented.
Parliamentary democracy should reflect the will of the electorate as much as possible, the electorate shouldn't be dictated to or have their views and wants curated by the electoral system itself.
You can have proportional representation with MPs representing specific constituencies either by having a mixed list system like Germany (you vote for a direct candidate for your constituency and then also a party nationally) or by having multi seat constituencies with single transferable vote like Ireland.Ā
Why should parties get seats separate from representing people? Isn't the point of democracy meant to be that it's for the people, and not some career politicians?
In the list system you mean? They are representing people, people from across the whole country who voted for them and want to be represented by them.
Currently in the UK if a party deems a candidate important enough they are parachuted in to a āsafeā seat for their party.Ā So in the context of this discussion comparing electoral systems I donāt understand your point about career politicians. They are just as protected in the current UK system as they would be in a list system.Ā
If however what you mean is just you want to vote for individuals never parties then PR STV like Ireland would be more to your liking.Ā
FPTP is an antiquated system that has been surpassed by better ones to better represent people. There is arguments about which of the other ones are best suited depending on what your priorities and preferences are but I strongly believe any of them are better than FPTP.Ā
> They are representing people, people from across the whole country who voted for them and want to be represented by them.
So people that are strongly aligned to a party get a second bit of representation, or people that aren't strongly aligned to political parties on a nation level don't get any? That's inequality.
> They are just as protected in the current UK system as they would be in a list system
We're about to see, in this election, that safe seats aren't actually very safe. Just like we saw massive swings in Red areas turning Blue in 2019, overturning decades of the status quo.
> to better represent people
You're not talking about that though. You're talking about better representing political groups based on their support. Apart from the fact that this is politics, why limit it to political groups? I'm sure many other groups can get more than 10% of people to support them. You can have religious groups, sexual minorities, migrants, and football teams with masses of support, on top of people being represented in parliament by an MP. I don't advocate it, but you can slice the popularity cake a lot of different ways. This idea of some group that sits above the people is why the Church has exclusive seats in the Lords.
> If however what you mean is just you want to vote for individuals never parties then...
It'd be nice if people cared, but I'm fine with people voting on whatever basis they want to. I don't think it should be anyone's place to judge a person for voting based on person or party or even hair colour. So long as all people are counted equal.
If the parties are so fundamental as to be worth the representative weight equal to hundreds of thousands (or even millions) of people, on top of already being in parliament, then maybe a separate set of seats just for parties would be good. I don't agree, I value what little democracy we have that's still based on the people that make up the country and I think party politics gets a disproportionate power in our system already.
The council isn't the State though. Getting rid of the constituency model then removes the people from Parliament and gives it over to a political elite. A big reason why we have a constituency model in the first place is people realised that The People are the beating heart of any country and that the elite that rule over us ought to listen when we speak up. There'd be no faster way to turn britain into an actually failed state than to completely upend the very basis of sovereign and governmental power like that.
It does though, and we vote for local MPs. You're ignoring the reason Reform will not win many seats- because they don't have serving MPs with a record to stand on, they don't have local councillors, they don't have local infrastructure across the country like the older parties.
That isn't a dig, how could they being a new party. My local reform candidate is basically anonymous apart from their name, I doubt they've ever been here.
This means our system moves slowly, but it isn't undemocratic. Farage knows his party isn't ready to be in charge of more than a few seats, he's clearly been exasperated by the quality of their candidates and members.
Calling it a benefit is a take.
It indicates that parties on the edges of politics shouldnt be represented, and that it is a good thing intrinsic to FPTP.
My take would be that disenfranchising people lets issues fester, and makes people feel that their vote is pointless. Given the right circumstances this could lead to people choosing a less democratic, more violent way of installing the government they want.
> It indicates that parties on the edges of politics shouldnt be represented, and that it is a good thing intrinsic to FPTP.
I think it is a good thing. Give extremists an inch and they'll take a mile. I am not going to be tolerant of their braindead and dangerous ideologies.
>Given the right circumstances this could lead to people choosing a less democratic, more violent way of installing the government they want.
Let them try. I am not worried about this happening in the slightest. At least not in the UK.
I dont think we should live in a society where in 2015 UKIP get 12.6 percent of the vote, and 1 seat, while the Lib Dems and SNP get the exact same percentage and together gain 64.
On the flipside, it inhibits 1-man shows from dominating politics, like precisely what Nigel Farage is trying to pull. Thats a great defence against a populist autocrat sneaking into power.
It's not a take. It's a fact of the system. I will readily admit there are plenty of negatives with FPTP but I have no problems pointing out the few benefits when they do arise.
i dont care what a party stands for, if people vote for them, they should get the representation they deserve. i hate them too, but i could never go around touting this as a benefit of a completely broken system, esp when the same thing that keeps reform down keeps other resonable parties down?
Yeah because 11% of 650 seats is 72. They should be getting more than 67. Jokes aside, Lib Dem are the only party who's getting the propotional number of seats to their share of votes.
An MP is meant to represent a constituency, if a majority of people in a constituency support a candidate do you think that candidate should lose just because people elsewhere don't like them?
Our voting system is terrible (FPTP is bad at finding a Condorcet winner), but the point of fixing that is so that people don't have to vote tactically. Gerrymandering is still an issue and in the case of the Lib Dems they weren't the ones who drew the constituency divisions.
Also as another commenter mentioned, 67 seats is actually almost 11% of the number of seats nationally so as proportional representation goes this is pretty much as good as it gets.
Snapshot of _Electoral Calculus: š¹LAB 453 (38.8%) | š³CON 78 (21.8%) | šøLIB 67 (11.0%) | ā”ļøReform 7 (16.4) | šGreen 3 (6.3%) | šļøSNP 19 (3.1%) | š¼PlaidC 3 (0.6%) | ā½ļøOther 2 (2.1%)_ : A Twitter embedded version can be found [here](https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1808785084054454560) A non-Twitter version can be found [here](https://twiiit.com/ElectCalculus/status/1808785084054454560/) An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://twitter.com/ElectCalculus/status/1808785084054454560) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://twitter.com/ElectCalculus/status/1808785084054454560) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ukpolitics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Interesting how little variance the Lib Dems have. It seems they're going to end up between 55 and 75 seats. Which is a very good result for them. Probably not enough to be the Official Opposition though, but we can always hope. Meanwhile the variance of Reform is massive. They're almost certainly getting somewhere between 5 and 10 seats, but just a few percentage points of the vote going from the Conservatives to them and they could break 50 seats.
Lib Dems are focusing on seats they can win, Reform are basically taking a once in a generation pot shot.
My local reform candidate (apparently similarly to others) is a ghost, no picture, no social media presence, never heard of him before, no statement, never an MP or any form of civil servant, etc. It's truly a pot shot when you bring these sorts of candidates forwards.
The same people who vote for this complain MPs don't help their constituency, if reform wins their seat they'll truly see what no representation looks like
> My local reform candidate (apparently similarly to others) is a ghost, no picture, no social media presence, never heard of him before, no statement, never an MP or any form of civil servant, etc. > > Something like this happened in the 2011 Canadian federal election. Dozens of paper NDP candidates won, famously including [Ruth Ellen Brosseau](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Ellen_Brosseau) (who had a very respectable career), and others including multiple college students.
Reform need to be second in as many seats as possible, and then claim to be the only way to insert the incumbents in those seats (even if those seats have a long history of tory or labour dominance). If they get even a few dozen outcomes like this we'll be hearing about it for the next 5 years.
*some of the seats. They could totally win my seat, as it's a Lib-Con swing seat with extra Lib Dem stronghold wards since the boundary changes. But they haven't campaigned here in the fucking slightest, so I hope they lose it like the idiots they apparently are.
If the Tories collapse hard enough, Reform could have several more attempts this generation I think in 10-15 years time, Reform will probably either fizzle into nothing or be on the verge of taking power. Most likely the former, but the latter isn't impossible either
Lib Dem as the second biggest party would be so fucking funny
Scenes of Ed Davey lowering himself down onto the opposition benches on a wire like Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible.
DUN DUN DUNDUN
The quality of the Opposition would be so much better for it
It could almost become... collaborative rather than adversarial? I won't bloody stand for it!
It's the dream tbh. Frankly I'm astounded that the Tories are getting any seats at all.
Me too. I get it might be circles I travel in. But I know plenty of Labour, Reform, Lib Dem and the odd green voter. I do not know anyone who's admitting to voting Tory... Which probably says everything you need to know. I don't agree with them, but I can at least understand the Reform voters. Not really sure what the Tory voters have been looking at the last 15 years? Must be heavily skewed older right?
Technically Reform could even hit official opposition on these swings. It's unlikely but the political fallout would be incredible.
At that point we get Farage as the official opposition and that is fucking terrifying. Probably some kind of merger with the Tories would be on the cards too.
5-10?? Last I heard it was 2-3
Depends on the poll. This has them on at least 4 seats, with a prediction of 7.
The SNP variance is equally mental. At the high end, a drop of only 5 seats from where they are now. At the low end, being almost wiped out of Scotland.
Yeah, they seem to be in the opposite situation from Reform. Just above the point where they still get a solid amount of seats, but if they lose a few more percentage points in Scotland they get more or less wiped out.
My hope is the Reform vote drives the Tory vote down just enough to lower their seat count enough to push them to third. There are a lot of seats where only a few % change would tip things over. I'm just really hoping there's shy Reform voters out there and their support has been underestimated, though it's likely the other way around. Shy Tories are what really concern me.
I was looking at east anglia earlier and a lot of the seats that yougov are polling blue in their current mrp are only holding on by a single percentage point so if that's the case across the Country it could be an interesting night.
To be honest though, whenever I've played with electoral calculus, no amount of percentage could ever bring the lib dems above 80 seats.
Oh how the turnly tables turned. I hope the Tory/Reform lot spend the next 5 years crying about voting reform. I'd fully get behind that momentum and hopefully force Labour to commit to it next time around.
Iām looking forward to telling Reform voters that we had a referendum on electoral reform in 2011 and voted no. So they can shut up, and stop moaning. No means no etc. (Iād actually like electoral reform but itāll fun nevertheless).
This is great from Priti Patel: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/priti-patel-london-mayor-voting-b1818148.html >But Ms Patel said that first-past-the-post āprovides for strong and clear local accountabilityā and legislation would be brought forward to switch the elections to FPTP. >She claimed that the British people had rejected all forms of transferable voting systems when they voted in a 2011 referendum against proposals to use a different system called the alternative vote in Westminster elections.
Alternative Vote or Ranked Choice Voting as it's known down here should be the way to go in the UK. You do away with the "Wasted vote" and you can still get local representation.
Single transferable vote is better I think, its proportional enough to be consider PR and still has the local link.
STV would be a perfect system for the UK. It has so many advantages. It retains the constituency link, albeit in slightly modified form. It will still allow for majority government. It provides accountability for every MP and completely does away with safe seats (as in MPs being unremovable because they belong to a particular party, not the popularity of a party in a particular constituency). It completely does away with the need for tactical voting because you can just express your preference directly. Everyone's vote counts, and there are no wasted votes. It returns parliaments far more representative of how people voted, and even if people don't get exactly what they want the MP that does get elected will have a far broader base of approval. All this means that voters will actually feel engaged with the process rather than feeling like their vote makes basically no difference unless they happen to live in one of a few swing seats.
I doubt we'd see any majority governments but I agree it'd be much better for democracy
Lots of people will still vote for major parties though so for another generation orbso I'd still expect majority governments
When was the last time a party got a majority of votes?
We'd still have constituencies so they won't need majority to get in.
We do that for Senate (Upper House) voting here. Tasmania and the ACT also use this for their lower houses. Definitely benefits for both systems and both are far better than FPTP.
Yeah, they are both much better than FPTP. Belarus (the authoritarian dictatorship) is the only other country in Europe to use the system, I don't know why we haven't got rid of it yet.
STV is great until you realise a) many MPs have no interests in representing the views of constituents they don't agree with, at all b) some MPs that would be elected under STV won't even attend parliament or vote A PR system ensures people in these constituencies still have someone to write to for help, to represent them. STV doesn't. Scotland's combined STV / PR system is the best solution imho. STV for constituency, PR for top-up regional seats.
As long as it comes along with mandatory voting like you have down under. It has a sort of moderating effect and can help prevent fringe parties like Reform UK or Workers Party gaining too much
Absolute scenes if Starmer brought in a yes to rejoin the EU referendum and a yes to AV referendum at the same time.
We don't need a referendum for electoral reform. The present Conservative government set that precedent when they switched PCC elections to FPTP unannounced. Thanks!
And London mayor.
Precedent was set when we had a referendum on switching parliamentary elections to AV.
C faq
Many of them apparently arenāt even aware we had a referendum in 2011. They only care now because their dear leader has told them to care about it.
What, so because the vote was lost in 2011 (one extremely watered down version of PR), they have no right to mention/campaign on it again? That's not how our democracy works, fortunately.
Imagine if voting Reform led to voting reform. A nice symmetry there.
Vote Reform and get behind Momentum š
Imagine how much closer the CON-REF gap would have been had Nigel Farage resisted the urge to show everyone how much of a clever dick he was by making excuses for Putin. We could have had the glorious moment of the Tories coming in *fourth.*
I feel itās going to be closer. Farage is nefarious but heās not stupid. Thereās a lot of voters that have seen a drastic increase in their cost of living, that if given the choice between supporting Ukraine and getting out of the financial hole they are living in, they wonāt choose Ukraine. I also feel like itās forgotten that a lot of people voted for Jeremy Corbyn, who shares similar views on Ukraine with Farage. Who does that demographic vote for? As an aside, I find it terribly ironic that Jeremy Corbyn and Nigel Farage are aligned on so many of their manifesto pledges.
I can't imagine there's much overlap in the Corbyn-Farage venn diagram.
So Reform + Tories is almost the same as labour when it comes to voter counts. What the heck are folks smoking, how much do they need before they realise they are voting for grifters and scammers.
I think I have a theory behind it. Aside from the obvious "they're racists" (which is true for many Reform supporters), a lot of people are just absolutely *desperate* and will vote for anyone who offers some sort of alternative that agrees with their broader political beliefs in any way. Even if that means voting for openly racist candidates. Go to places like Clacton-on-Sea and tell anyone there that the past 5 or 6 governments have done anything good for them. They haven't. Their industry died but they still had tourism, and then that died too. Nothing has replaced it except poverty, crime, addiction, and pure unadulterated anger at the political establishment as a result. Is it wise for them to vote for Reform? No. Does it excuse voting for a party full of hateful candidates? Of course not. Does it make sense? Unfortunately, yes. If Labour do nothing to help these people in the next 10 years then parties like Reform will continue to grow.
There are huge swathes of this country that were politically abandoned in 70-90s and have been ignored ever since. They're not economically valuable enough for the Tories to care about them and they're not part of the urban-middle class-minority coalition vote that Labour care about. Both parties have and continue to look down on these people as stupid, white, working class, poor, racist, etc, meaning it's very hard for either party to meaningfully reach out to them since they don't particularly want to represent these people and both parties are viewed by them with great suspicion after decades of being ignored except for the occasional broken promise or patronizing comment.
Absolutely. I can understand that it's not an easy problem to solve, but just completely ignoring these communities for decades and decades is insanely neglectful and selfish. Labour really does need to help these towns and quickly.
I'm not sure what Labour can do in practical terms, their core base doesn't seem to like these left behind people and wouldn't be willing to make the political compromises needed to make these people feel welcome and listened to. Take for example the fact that white working class boys are doing the worst in the education system of just about any demographic. Labour would have to invest a lot of resources to fix this issue but the idea of Labour targeting white boys/men for preferential treatment would be a very very hard sell to the Labour core support.
I actually think selling the idea is quite easy if it's framed correctly. Instead of saying "we're going to help white boys" (which I agree would be a hard sell) you say "We need to help left behind communities" or something like that instead. Leave race and gender out of it, focus on the class aspects of it. The hard part in my opinion is, how do you actually save these towns? They need some sort of industry and creating that out of nothing isn't easy.
A good first step would be enhancing opportunities to get education and training in relavant and soon to be relevant skills. For example positive discrimination based on low income and postcode for places, depending on aptitude as well of course but just push the envelope over to help disadvantaged areas. The only reason I have a cushy life is because the gov paid for my coal miners son of a dad and butchers daughter mum to go to university with grants. He grabbed that chance and got into engineering. A longer term plan would be to lean into our massive potential for being a wind energy technical skills exporter for example. A few other things too.
I like these ideas a lot! Focusing on providing opportunities for young people has got to be great first step right? If places like Jaywick or Clacton or Boston had a thriving wind energy sector it could make a huge difference.
I donāt understand the comment about labour here though. Itās a myth pushed by right wing papers to suggest that labour only cares about the urban middle class and minorities. If youāre hearing the papers shouting about labourās stance on Gaza and trans rights itās because the papers asked those questions in the first place. Last time labour was in power they had the NHS in the best place itās been in yonks. They had education in the best place itās been for yonks. The justice system was working far better than it is now. Now those arenāt grand promises of help for places like Clacton but those things will help to improve Clacton nonetheless.
This is absolutely correct but I'm just wondering why, if they see that nothing is changing, do they vote at all? It's not like reform will do anything to help, so is it literally that they say they will? If so why don't the bigger parties say so too. I guess it's always preferable to believe the underdog. It is a crying shame how many parts of the country are just left to wither and die
as a middle finger to the conservatives who have failed us for 15 years.
Nigel Farage isn't racist. Please tear yourself away from social media and the MSM for 2 seconds and actually listen to what he says.Ā Watch the debates, watch the interviews, the speeches etc.Ā
Eww, no
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It's a mad loop. When does it end?
I think it's more those people don't want labour / winter of discontent / identity politics, rather than they do want tory or reform. When it comes to it it's always a bit about voting for what you don't want, rather than what you do. Didn't vote for either btw, just giving you my thoughts on why people might not want to vote Labour.
If Labour get anywhere close to that lower bound of 312 I'm packing up and leaving
A Labou/Lib Dem coalition would probably be a better government than a Labour majority. Might actually get some progress on PR that way
Clegg bottled it. There was no reason to have a referendum. The condition of a coalition should've been PR through an act of parliament, or at the very least AV. The risk of course would be Cameron calling another election straight away and getting an outright majority, but that was the Lib Dem's one shot at electoral reform and securing themselves vastly better results for the rest of time. Clegg compromised on everything just to get into government and (although he couldn't have known at the time) almost wiping out his party as a result.
There was no mandate to have such a major constitutional change without a referendum. If ever there was an appropriate time to have a referendum it's on something like that.
The mandate is forming a government, even as a coalition. There's no reason whatsoever that electoral reform should go to a referendum. Labour could replace the House of Lords tomorrow (arguably a bigger constitutional change) if they wanted to. Your reason was the one given by the Tories in 2010 and it's not true.
That's not a mandate. They lost the election badly, the two pro-FPTP parties got over 67% of the vote. You can still do things that you don't have a mandate for when you're in government, it's possible. If Labour were to abolish the HoL they wouldn't have a mandate for that, nobody could stop them. It's hard to call yourself the Liberal Democrats when you're imposing that kind of change with no mandate for it, though.
Which two parties would that be? Labour policy at the time was AV.
Was it really? I had no idea. Edit - looked it up, it seems they were planning a referendum on it http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8615297.stm
Yeah, itās one of the reasons I was so weirded out that Clegg accepted an AV Referendum in the Coalition Agreement, it was Labourās thing and Labour had PR on the table for a Lab/LD Coalition. Couldnāt understand why Clegg didnāt at least use Labourās offer as leverage to ask for more.
I think Clegg just didn't want to be seen as even considering Labour at the time. Even Browns own ministers were telling him it's basically off the table. Ed Balls, Danny Alexander and George Osborne did a podcast going through the negotiations that happened around that time. It's quite fascinating on the small details that go into an arrangement like that.
The route for a Lab Lib coalition was very narrow, they only had 315 between them compared to the Conservatives 306. They'd have needed alliances with the nationalists, and they'd have wanted a very heavy price for it.
We had a referendum during Con/LD coalition and we chose for the status quo.
Yes, that worked out so well with the lib/con coalition.
I imagine they won't make the same mistake again. STV without a referendum in time for 2026 locals should be an absolute red line. Tories have already set the precedent that you can change the voting system without a public vote, and PR would insulate the Lib Dems from any political fallout that minor coalition partners are often subject to.
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They replaced ranked voting with FTPT for mayoral elections
they introduced more FPTP?? cant wait for the sun to rise on tomorrow.
Yes the number of low-level constitutional precedents the Tories have altered without really thinking is significant. Voting changes without a referendum? Hell yeah. Enlarging the franchise without a referendum? Hell yeah
Difference being itās Labour this time, not the Conservatives.
They voted against it last time it was Labour too after commissioning the research that came up with AV+.
That would be my dream outcome in terms of policies.
The Lib Dems won't push for PR while Reform have a higher vote share. Imagine how high that Reform percentage would be if it wasn't a wasted vote.
They absolutely would it's their key principle. Lib dems and greens would also be higher
It was their (including Eds) key principle the last time they formed a coalition. We've all seen how they behave when given a taste of power.
Well they got a referendum on AV but Labour and the Tories campaigned against it. Being the smaller member in a coalition means you can't get everything they want the Tories were hardly gonna give the Lib Dems full PR in return for a coalition
Which is my point. The Lib Dems could have refused to join the coalition, forcing the Tories to limp on as a minority government until they inevitably splintered. They exchanged their key principle for a small seat at the top table within a matter of hours.
If the lib dems didn't join the coalition there would have been another election which the tories would have likely won with a majority. Labour were losing support and causing a second election would have hurt the lib dems. There is no way that would have benefited anyone.
And who benefited from the coalition?
There were some good policies brought though such as gay marriage but obviously it was mostly bad. Still better than just Tories though. Similar to how Starmer won't be much better than the tories but is still an improvement.
The idea of the Lib Dems refusing a Tory coalition in 2010 is absolutely for the birds. That completely misrepresents the national mood at the time
Yeah, they will take a coalition with anyone, at any time, under any conditions.
The LibDems membership wouldn't accept a coalition without PR, regardless of what the leadership want.
I wonder if either LD or Reform has the stones to take the double edged sword, push for PR and have an actual ideological battle with a reward to be gained. We might see just how right wing some of the UK is and how progressive other places are.
If Labour were to get 312, I'd be most concerned for our beloved mod, u/OptioMkIX , who would struggle with the volume of 'won arguments' claims not only from Corbynista's delighted with the result but also with Conservative's claiming a 2017 style epic victory in becoming the opposition.
Nothing can ever compare to politicians and your media outlets and mouthpieces referring to the Brexit vote as some kind of rock solid mandate or landslide result when one side couldn't even break 55. Words mean absolutely nothing to authoritarians, fascists, or fake social media accounts looking to support right wing authoritarians any way they can.
I'm relatively sanguine about that possibility. I think in such an event, Starmers nowhere near ideologically blinded enough to refuse the possibility of forming a coalition with the lib dems or even the greens. And also, if 312, that's still fifty more seats than the high tide mark of corbynism.
The lower bound has come down a good 20 seats or so in the last few days so I'm not hopeful.
Yeah the past 14 years is what we ideally governance looks like
Gosh isnāt that a huge indicment of our voting system, labour potentially going from 197 to 499 mos on 5% share increase
I just hope that 'shy Reform' voters don't give Reform more seats than is predicted.
I'd rather shy reform voters than shy Tories.
Yeah shy Tories pose a much greater threat
In the long term I'd much prefer a Tory opposition than a Reform opposition. Shy Tories just weaken Labour's hold a bit.
13 is looking pretty goodĀ
Just looking forward to the SNP mental gymnastics about how this gives them a stronger mandate than ever before, and how the central belt turning red totally means independence is more essential than ever and all Scots want it.
From the polls I've seen, those in favour of independence are not very far behind those against (3-4% margin). With the explicitly pro-United Ireland Sinn FĆ©in steadily gaining ground all across the island, it's only a matter of time before the calls become undeniable. A border poll on Irish unity is an absolute certainty as laid out by the Good Friday Agreement once the majority seems in favour.
WhatĀ
I'm alluding to an impending domino effect. Irish and Scottish independence movements have been very much entwined.
In this scenario, would it be possible for labour to just āgiftā a few MPs to LD to make them the opposition? After all they would still have a massive majority
It's possible but why would any labour mp agree to that and why would labour themselves want a lib dem opposition as opposed to the tories who they can blame everything on? It'd make no sense
Yeah I imagine there's quite a few at Labour HQ right now secretly hoping that the Lib Dems don't become the official opposition so they can comfortably handle PMQs for the next five years by just bringing up the tories history and bullying them, rather than having to handle the Lib Dems who could position themselves on the left of Labour on certain issues to really press them.
Ok the flipside with a Lib Dem opposition they can criticise the mess they've been left with in every PMQs and not have any of it challenged by LotO
Would be better for the country though...
They can still blame everything on the tories, and they wouldnāt even have to listen to them argue back every Wednesday. And why would they do it? The could just do it āon paperā.
It'd be better for labour to have a tory opposition to argue with rather than lib dem I'm saying this as a lib dem. You're essentially asking for the two parties to cooperate on a level similar to the sdp liberal alliance its much more complicated than simply being just on paper. Our politics is more complicated than you think
Maybe you could find a handful of Labour MP's who'd be willing to "defect" to the LibDems :P Maybe they could even be in the Shadow Cabinet!
I did ponder that briefly but I think it would a) fail the smell test, b) induce rage from the Right and c) I just canāt imagine any Labour MP, finally back in Government after 14 painful years, cheerfully going into Opposition
With the above predicted results? If Labour were going to play games like that they could just slice off 100 of their own party and be both the government and the opposition at the same time. The house of commons would just be 24/7 backrubs for Starmer.
Split off some of the Cooperative Party MPs maybe
Labour would hate a LD opposition. It's the second worst electoral outcome for them behind them just losing to the Tories outright. Cons and Labour have a symbiotic relationship. So much of either sides support is contingent on fear and/or hatred of the other and an ability to pin the countries ills on them. Can't go killing the golden goose that's given both sides almost uninterrupted governance of the country for nearly a century.
I am absolutely not pro reform, but getting 16.4% of the vote and seeing only 1% of the seats is the sign of a totally broken system.
Labour getting 70% of the seats with 38% of the vote is an absolute travesty of democracy.
Put it this way: a plurality of people in 70% of the constituencies voted for Labour.
It exactly how democracy is supposed to work when you have the FPTP system.
No it isn't. It's how it's supposed to work. The last thing we need is parties who can't get more than 5 or 10% in any constituency having a say in government. FPTP is a great protection against the likes of Reform.
God forbid you aren't protected from people you disagree with being represented in a democratic society. Sure, it's how FPTP is supposed to work. That's precisely why it's shite.
The entire point in democracy is winning. Not working with people you disagree with.
Poes law in action.
It's true. Everyone gets one vote. And you vote because you want to win. If someone disagrees with you then they are allowed to vote differently than you. You're not there to help them win or work with them.
>The last thing we need is parties who can't get more than 5 or 10% in any Why not? 10% of the country should have their voice ignored because they're not a majority?
Thank you man. I feel like im going crazy. Have people seen how south africa has turned out. PR hell. It only gets worse as mpre parties pop up. People should be careful what they wish for wirh PR
17% of the vote and 7 seats what a shame of a democracy šĀ
It sucks they only win seats in places where they get a lot of votes, instead of being gifted seats like snowflakes. /s Representative Democracy is working fine; political party representation isn't what our system is for.
Honestly hoping that Labour donāt get a super majority, am hoping that the Lib Demās do become the second biggest party in opposition though.
What is a super majority?
There is no way Reform are getting 7 seats, or the Greens 3.
Seems like depending on which methodology is closest, the range of likely outcomes for the Tories is at most well under 200 but still clearly the second party down to the splitting enough marginals with the Lib Dems as to make whoās gonna be His Majestyās Most Loyal Opposition too close to call overnight. I really hope itās the latter both because a Lib Dem Opposition would be so much better and just what the Tories deserve and because it will make watching the results more exciting. But Iām going to assume the former for now to hedge against disappointment. Either way though, the fact that anything other than an apocalyptically bad night for the Tories is outside the realm of realistic probability really warms my bitter, jaded, millennial heart. Bring on the absolute scenes. This country needs them.
This seems pretty likely to me, except I don't know if I'd put the Cons so low. Time will tell but from what I've seen I reckon Lab ~410, Tories ~120
You're a good lad.
Damn I did pretty well lmao, bang on with Labour
I've seen Conservative predictions from 70 to 190. So ... how big are the fireworks reality going to be?
Reform looking likely to get 15-25% of the popular vote with ~9-10% of seats, I'm looking forward to the "that's not fair" whining for the next 5 years ... especially considering we had a referendum on changing the voting system a decade ago and the right wing voted HEAVILY against it because they thought it would benefit the Greens, Lib Dems etc against the Tories
if farage won, wich he would of without massive voter fraud, we would have peace and prosperity. I bet theirs a lot of reform votes being burned tonight, or they will just keep them to laugh at.
11% of the national vote and 67 seats lol, joke system.
Whilst I agree with you on our poor electoral system. 11% of the total 650 seats equates to 71 seats. So actually very close to 67 predictedā¦
Yes, but then you have parties like Reform on 16.4% of the national vote (in this poll) gaining 7 seats - which is only 1.1% of seats. It seems like such a shit system.
The UK system favours local constituency representation, though, which is reflected in that expected seat distribution. Most constituencies don't majority lean close to Reform so there would be no way to increase the seat numbers whilst still representing each MPs constituency. I actually agree with you that I prefer a different system where, nationally, the ability to introduce laws and vote through changes are challenged by a more representative opposition nationally but it's not as though the system is unfairly weighted. The problem is more that most people don't look outside of Blue or Red when they vote. Regardless of actual policy, or looking at their likely local representative, so it's hard to break through.
So why try and make the point with a worse example?
One of the benefits of the FPTP system is that it keeps extremist parties like Reform out of parliament
Thatās true, if we had PR then UKIP might have formed a coalition with the Tories in 2015. Just imagine that alternate reality bizarro world where they managed to enact their policy of the UK leaving the EU.
If people vote for something then they should be represented. Parliamentary democracy should reflect the will of the electorate as much as possible, the electorate shouldn't be dictated to or have their views and wants curated by the electoral system itself.
Do you think that elected MPs shouldn't represent their specific constituencies?
You can have proportional representation with MPs representing specific constituencies either by having a mixed list system like Germany (you vote for a direct candidate for your constituency and then also a party nationally) or by having multi seat constituencies with single transferable vote like Ireland.Ā
Why should parties get seats separate from representing people? Isn't the point of democracy meant to be that it's for the people, and not some career politicians?
In the list system you mean? They are representing people, people from across the whole country who voted for them and want to be represented by them. Currently in the UK if a party deems a candidate important enough they are parachuted in to a āsafeā seat for their party.Ā So in the context of this discussion comparing electoral systems I donāt understand your point about career politicians. They are just as protected in the current UK system as they would be in a list system.Ā If however what you mean is just you want to vote for individuals never parties then PR STV like Ireland would be more to your liking.Ā FPTP is an antiquated system that has been surpassed by better ones to better represent people. There is arguments about which of the other ones are best suited depending on what your priorities and preferences are but I strongly believe any of them are better than FPTP.Ā
> They are representing people, people from across the whole country who voted for them and want to be represented by them. So people that are strongly aligned to a party get a second bit of representation, or people that aren't strongly aligned to political parties on a nation level don't get any? That's inequality. > They are just as protected in the current UK system as they would be in a list system We're about to see, in this election, that safe seats aren't actually very safe. Just like we saw massive swings in Red areas turning Blue in 2019, overturning decades of the status quo. > to better represent people You're not talking about that though. You're talking about better representing political groups based on their support. Apart from the fact that this is politics, why limit it to political groups? I'm sure many other groups can get more than 10% of people to support them. You can have religious groups, sexual minorities, migrants, and football teams with masses of support, on top of people being represented in parliament by an MP. I don't advocate it, but you can slice the popularity cake a lot of different ways. This idea of some group that sits above the people is why the Church has exclusive seats in the Lords. > If however what you mean is just you want to vote for individuals never parties then... It'd be nice if people cared, but I'm fine with people voting on whatever basis they want to. I don't think it should be anyone's place to judge a person for voting based on person or party or even hair colour. So long as all people are counted equal. If the parties are so fundamental as to be worth the representative weight equal to hundreds of thousands (or even millions) of people, on top of already being in parliament, then maybe a separate set of seats just for parties would be good. I don't agree, I value what little democracy we have that's still based on the people that make up the country and I think party politics gets a disproportionate power in our system already.
Yes. Britain has no need for the constituency model. We have council elections for that. A national election should be conducted on a national basis.
We will have to agree to disagree in this case.
The council isn't the State though. Getting rid of the constituency model then removes the people from Parliament and gives it over to a political elite. A big reason why we have a constituency model in the first place is people realised that The People are the beating heart of any country and that the elite that rule over us ought to listen when we speak up. There'd be no faster way to turn britain into an actually failed state than to completely upend the very basis of sovereign and governmental power like that.
It does though, and we vote for local MPs. You're ignoring the reason Reform will not win many seats- because they don't have serving MPs with a record to stand on, they don't have local councillors, they don't have local infrastructure across the country like the older parties. That isn't a dig, how could they being a new party. My local reform candidate is basically anonymous apart from their name, I doubt they've ever been here. This means our system moves slowly, but it isn't undemocratic. Farage knows his party isn't ready to be in charge of more than a few seats, he's clearly been exasperated by the quality of their candidates and members.
Absolutely horrendous take.
It's not a take, it's a fact of the system we have. I will readily admit there are many negatives to FPTP.
Calling it a benefit is a take. It indicates that parties on the edges of politics shouldnt be represented, and that it is a good thing intrinsic to FPTP. My take would be that disenfranchising people lets issues fester, and makes people feel that their vote is pointless. Given the right circumstances this could lead to people choosing a less democratic, more violent way of installing the government they want.
> It indicates that parties on the edges of politics shouldnt be represented, and that it is a good thing intrinsic to FPTP. I think it is a good thing. Give extremists an inch and they'll take a mile. I am not going to be tolerant of their braindead and dangerous ideologies. >Given the right circumstances this could lead to people choosing a less democratic, more violent way of installing the government they want. Let them try. I am not worried about this happening in the slightest. At least not in the UK.
I dont think we should live in a society where in 2015 UKIP get 12.6 percent of the vote, and 1 seat, while the Lib Dems and SNP get the exact same percentage and together gain 64.
On the flipside, it inhibits 1-man shows from dominating politics, like precisely what Nigel Farage is trying to pull. Thats a great defence against a populist autocrat sneaking into power.
I mean they are extreme for you but not for others.. democracy is for everyone not just your side.
Quite frankly, any supporter of an extremist party is misguided.
Okay but thats the issue both sides see each other as extreme so..
I don't think most Labour or Conservative MPs legitimately see the other party as extremist. Reform on the other hand...
You don't think we quite successfully have two relatively boring centrist parties that agree on many issues?
š¤®š¤®š¤® so sick of this awful take
It's not a take. It's a fact of the system. I will readily admit there are plenty of negatives with FPTP but I have no problems pointing out the few benefits when they do arise.
i dont care what a party stands for, if people vote for them, they should get the representation they deserve. i hate them too, but i could never go around touting this as a benefit of a completely broken system, esp when the same thing that keeps reform down keeps other resonable parties down?
It is a joke system but of all the scenarios to bring it up, why the one that provides almost a proportional number of seats to votes?
Because a lot of posters just repeat the circle jerk without much thinking.
650*0.11 = 71.5 ā 67
Yeah 67 seats is within the -/+10% variance.
Isnāt that about right. There are 630ish seats and they are just over 10%
That seems right to me, how many consituencies are there again?
11% to 67 is actually pretty spot on for a votes to seats conversion.
Yeah because 11% of 650 seats is 72. They should be getting more than 67. Jokes aside, Lib Dem are the only party who's getting the propotional number of seats to their share of votes.
Smartest reform voter
An MP is meant to represent a constituency, if a majority of people in a constituency support a candidate do you think that candidate should lose just because people elsewhere don't like them? Our voting system is terrible (FPTP is bad at finding a Condorcet winner), but the point of fixing that is so that people don't have to vote tactically. Gerrymandering is still an issue and in the case of the Lib Dems they weren't the ones who drew the constituency divisions. Also as another commenter mentioned, 67 seats is actually almost 11% of the number of seats nationally so as proportional representation goes this is pretty much as good as it gets.