• This topic has 6,282 replies, 176 voices, and was last updated 4 years ago by kelvin.
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  • 2019 General Election
  • Onzadog
    Free Member

    In 2017, we were 49.2% blue, 43.5% red. Ukip, Lib dems and greens all lost their deposit.

    Guess that makes it pretty simple.

    I just wish someone had offered up an ammendment suggesting that if the GE fails to show a single party majority, it would trigger a referendum. Otherwise, nothing is actually going to change.

    sootyandjim
    Free Member

    …and there’s a clear reason why the LibDems could win this time:

    You’re too funny.

    Believe it or not quite a few people are interested in policies other than Brexit.

    Lib Dems have as much chance of winning the GE as the Brexit Party. Two single issue parties at either end of the spectrum.

    Other than ‘revoke’ what policies do the Neo-Lib Dems have that weren’t copy and pasted from old Tory manifestos?

    mariner
    Free Member

    Where can I look at a full list of MPs standing down?

    Is that those who are retiring or those who don’t know they are retiring?

    Why do commentators keep alluding to the tories being in trouble in the southwest?
    Hopefully JRM is included.

    We have a parachute tory as our mp. Guards, City, then a safe seat and knighthood.
    Was a Cameroon. Sacked by May and refused to campaign for her last time round. Anti Boris but now pro.
    Remainer now a leaver and will be back in parliament by Christmas.
    Depressing init.

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    ads678
    Full Member

    …and there’s a clear reason why the LibDems could win this time:

    Leave vote is split.
    Revoke vote is not split.

    The problem is, the voting system we have is a load of shit and people keep voting tactically rather than voting how they actually want. Until this changes we are stuck with 2 party politics with the libdems every now and then doing ‘ok’….

    kerley
    Free Member

    people keep voting tactically rather than voting how they actually want.

    Got any evidence for that? I would think most people do not vote tactically at all.

    kiksy
    Free Member

    …and there’s a clear reason why the LibDems could win this time:

    Leave vote is split.
    Revoke vote is not split.

    Revoke is not split, however, remain is split, as Labour are offering a referendum which could lead to remain.

    I voted remain, I believe we should remain, however revocation is not the path to that in my opinion, as it will hand over the narrative to the hard leavers that the system is corrupt.

    In reverse, how happy would people be if the vote had been for Remain, but then Brexit party campaigned to ignore that and just invoke Article 50?

    dissonance
    Full Member

    Where can I look at a full list of MPs standing down?

    list from institute for government

    ads678
    Full Member

    Got any evidence for that? I would think most people do not vote tactically at all.

    No obviously I  haven’t got any evidence of that. But read the thread and you’ll see it happens….

    kimbers
    Full Member

    Turns out that Johnson isnt the one in charge at number 10

    kelvin
    Full Member

    Vacant: one Conservative nomination.
    Only Hard Brexit drones need apply.

    I presume Rudd voted with the whip while May was PM?
    She stood in for her at TV debates in 2017 when others in her party were already out to get her.
    How many MPs showed “ill discipline” by stopping May taking us out of the EU, yet are now in government?

    scruff9252
    Full Member

    I just hope Jeremy Corbyn actually has the grace stands down after his forthcoming defeat in December so we can get an effective opposition for once. I fear it’s going to be a hard right Con/Brexit party coalition for the next 5 years.

    kelvin
    Full Member

    Nah, many of us are going to vote for Labour to stop Johnson, and then our votes will be taken as a vindication of Corbyn’s leadership, and a Labour Brexit, and he’ll cling on for a good while yet. I’m resigned to that narrative, but have to vote to try and get rid of our Tory MP anyway.

    binners
    Full Member

    Corbyns going nowhere.

    I think the labour narrative will be the same as last time:

    ‘yes, he’s shit and we lost, but he’s not as shit as you said he was going to be, and he didn’t lose as badly as you said he would’

    I believe the technical term is ‘managing expectations’. It only works with the terminally gullible and those with unimaginably low expectations, but that seems to be what constitutes the membership of the Labour party nowadays.

    Defeat is victory. Another 5 years of Boris will be sold as ‘an opportunity to transform the party under Jeremy’

    kerley
    Free Member

    No obviously I haven’t got any evidence of that. But read the thread and you’ll see it happens….

    You said it as though it was fact and until it stops there will always just be a 2 party system. Yes it happens from a very few politically savvy people but as that will be less than 1% of the population (see I can make up stuff too) then what you said is just rubbish.

    kerley
    Free Member

    Corbyns going nowhere.

    I thought Corbyn and McDonnell were both going to stand down if they lost? We will have to see if they are as bigger liars as Johnson.

    avdave2
    Full Member

    Not a hope in hell. If the current situation hasn’t persuaded them to reconsider, a teenager certainly won’t be able to.

    The current situation is conflict and accusations flying everywhere, that persuades no one it just entrenches positions.

    I’m not talking about being harangued by anyone but about the people with the most to lose speaking to those with the in reality nothing to gain.

    kiksy
    Free Member

    Out of interest, anyone have a rough guess on how many Scottish remainers are unionist?

    binners
    Full Member

    I thought Corbyn and McDonnell were both going to stand down if they lost

    McDonnell has said he will. Jezza’s said nowt. Seamas probably hasn’t given him permission

    scotroutes
    Full Member

    Of course folk are already voting tactically. Time and again we see, hear and read of folk saying “I’d vote LibDem/Green/AN Other if only they had a chance of winning”. It’s been going on as long as I’ve been aware of politics (at least 50 years) and probably precedes that. That’s the inevitable consequence of FPTP and an electorate that can’t see past the immediate GE.

    sootyandjim
    Free Member

    @Kelvin – Interesting piece of daydreaming the Neo-Liberal Democract manifesto.

    I guess even they don’t believe they will ever get the chance to implement it (unless they jump into bed with their mates the Tories again and sell their souls for tit bits), hence their overwhelming reliance on a single issue to keep them in the news rather then pushing the rest of it.

    As I said, they’re a single issue party, and they’re as much extremists as the Brexit Party on that one issue.

    Brexit Party, Conservatives, Lib Dems – Three different shades of Tory.

    kelvin
    Full Member

    they’re a single issue party

    They are not. They just have a position on the most immediate question facing the UK, as do (nearly) all the other parties, and so obviously the focus is on that right now.

    Three different shades of Tory.

    Labour needs to grow its support, fast, and claiming that everyone outside the party, and indeed many inside the party, are all Tory is a sure fire way approach to permanent opposition. Labour need to look like a party of government looking to improve the UK for all its inhabitants, not a small group of navel gazing smelly men at the back of the pub shouting abuse at everyone not at their table.

    dazh
    Full Member

    Brexit Party, Conservatives, Lib Dems – Three different shades of Tory.

    At least the tories and the brexit party are consistent. The libdems are the worst kind of weather-vane politicians, chasing power simply for the sake of it, and then doing nothing with it if they get it.

    taxi25
    Free Member

    people keep voting tactically rather than voting how they actually want.

    Got any evidence for that? I would think most people do not vote tactically at all.

    Wiki seems to think a lot can, I was very suprised by this number 🤔

    In the 2017 general election it is estimated that 6.5 million people (more than 20% of voters) voted tactically either as a way of preventing a “hard Brexit” or preventing another Conservative government led by the Tactical2017 campaign.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org › wiki

    Tactical voting – Wikipedia

    kelvin
    Full Member

    Not surprising really is it @Taxi25… FPTP means you are voting for one MP, and most people understand that when they vote. Choosing your second or third preference candidate because they have the support locally to possibly win, when your first choice candidate clearly does not, is very common.

    sootyandjim
    Free Member

    What are you on about @Kelvin?

    – The Brexit Party is full of old Tories.

    – The Conservatives are, well, Tories.

    – The Lib Dems are led by an MP who stuck more to the Tory whip whilst in coalition than Gove and Hunt, have a number of ex-Conservative MPs (including a particularly nasty homophobic and xenophobic one) and a number of ex-Blairites who veer to the right of centre, in-line with the way the politics on this country has generally swung.

    That is perhaps the sadest thing about current politics. Lib Dem supporters still believe they follow a centrist party, despite their party being the happy resting place for Tory enablers, actual bigoted Tories and hard-line pro-corporate neo-liberals. Against this swing to the right accusations are then thrown at Labour, calling their progressive socialist policies “hard left”.

    We’re now being told to “vote tactically” and work with others, yet it is the Lib Dems who, through their campaigns of negativity towards other opposition parties and history of supporting the Tories, who have emboldened Boris Johnson and his ilk.

    binners
    Full Member

    We’re now being told to “vote tactically” and work with others, yet it is the Lib Dems who, through their campaigns of negativity towards other opposition parties

    …as opposed to the open-armed, welcoming inclusivity of the present labour party?

    They’re both as bad as each other. Given that the chances are pretty remote of an overall majority for anyone, pre-emptive slagging off of who will be potential allies is puerile and self-defeating and is exactly what everyone sane is sick of in UK politics.

    Coalitions are standard on the continent, and I suspect we’ll have to get used to them here too. So people neeed to start being less knee-jerk tribal

    Some chance. Pragmatism seeems to have left the building quite some time ago, but the pre-emptive slagging off by all parties is utterly depressing

    mooman
    Free Member

    kerley

    Member

    Not really. Democracy is working well, it is just the results that are causing problems combined with the fact the being in or out of the EU is now seen as much more important to people than it actually is or was ever before. When a 50/50 split occurs democracy becomes harder to deal with as the losers are pretty much the same number of people as the winners. When the winners have 80% is all seems a bit fairer and easier to swallow.

    I agree – when a 50/50 split occurs democracy becomes harder to deal with … but at the referendum there was over a 50% winner … democracy doesnt say a winner needs 51% or 81% to win; its just a majority which can be as little as 51%.
    To dress it up differently is just trying to muddy the waters.

    kelvin
    Full Member

    We’re now being told to “vote tactically” and work with others, yet it is the Lib Dems who, through their campaigns of negativity towards other opposition parties and history of supporting the Tories, who have emboldened Boris Johnson and his ilk.

    You are funny. You haven’t seen any “campaigns of negativity towards other opposition parties” by any of the other opposition parties? Not even the ever so slightly tribal Labour Party?

    chewkw
    Free Member

    At least the tories and the brexit party are consistent. The libdems are the worst kind of weather-vane politicians, chasing power simply for the sake of it, and then doing nothing with it if they get it.

    Libdems already sense the power is within their grasp once they have their numbers. They slept with Tories so they will sleep with whoever offer them power next.

    Out of interest, anyone have a rough guess on how many Scottish remainers are unionist?

    The want out regardless …

    kelvin
    Full Member

    its just a majority which can be as little as 51%

    It can take as little as 35% of voters to return a majority government.

    The smallest share of the vote an MP has been elected on is 27%.

    If you want to rant on about what a 52% vote in the 2016 referendum gives the outgoing or incoming government a mandate to do, or a 48% vote for that matter, please do so in the other thread, again.

    rone
    Full Member

    McDonnell has said he will. Jezza’s said nowt. Seamas probably hasn’t given him permission

    Christ, at least let us have the campaign and the election first.

    Northwind
    Full Member

    Why, exactly, would Corbyn say “If I lose I’ll resign”? Exactly how many votes do you think that’d win, and exactly how much time would you like him to spend in this election campaign talking about defeat?

    scotroutes

    Member

    Of course folk are already voting tactically. Time and again we see, hear and read of folk saying “I’d vote LibDem/Green/AN Other if only they had a chance of winning”. It’s been going on as long as I’ve been aware of politics (at least 50 years) and probably precedes that.

    I think in Scotland we’re more used to it, having had a 3 party westminster system in the past and then a one party system and now a two but a weird different two in which Labour voters will vote Tory to beat the SNP… 2005 was the first election in my life that I didn’t feel I had to vote tactically for Labour to try and get the Tories out of my seat.

    And we also witnessed the tipping point thing so clearly recently, when a party that “there’s no point voting for” suddenly shrugs that off, increases its votes by 300% and becomes the party with essentially all the seats, and 6 becomes 56, because FPTP is ridiculous.

    AD
    Full Member

    Oh great the **** Tories (or specifically some numb right wing think tank) have been to my hometown…

    They’re probably right about the rugby though 🙂
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cumbria-50239341

    I’m particularly impressed that the BBC found the local idiot who thinks Boris is a fruitcake and who wants Farage instead…

    dazh
    Full Member

    Well this is going to be a bit of a dent to Jo’s ego 🙂

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/oct/30/liberal-democrats-face-being-frozen-out-of-live-tv-debates-general-election

    Coalitions are standard on the continent

    You mean like Italy which elects a new govt every year? Or perhaps Belgium which went 541 days without a functioning government whilst they ‘negotiated’? it goes without saying that we need a fairer system than FPTP, but if you think we can suddenly adopt the German model then you have more faith in our politicians then I have. We’re about as far from that as it’s possible to be.

    deadlydarcy
    Free Member

    We’ve definitely gone over the edge into Swinson obsession.

    kiksy
    Free Member

    Andrew Neil program tonight was good. I’d like all parties leaders to face him in a prolonged exchange.

    Can’t see any of them coming out great, but at least it would put them to the test.

    dazh
    Full Member

    We’ve definitely gone over the edge into Swinson obsession.

    You’re absolutely right. I haven’t felt this level of antipathy towards a politician since Michael Howard. It feels like a long time since Charlie Kennedy was the acceptable 3rd option.

    scotroutes
    Full Member

    And we also witnessed the tipping point thing so clearly recently, when a party that “there’s no point voting for” suddenly shrugs that off, increases its votes by 300% and becomes the party with essentially all the seats, and 6 becomes 56, because FPTP is ridiculous.

    That’s my point. The tipping point never comes if enough folk don’t look more than a couple of years down the line.

    You mean like Italy which elects a new govt every year? Or perhaps Belgium which went 541 days without a functioning government whilst they ‘negotiated’? it goes without saying that we need a fairer system than FPTP, but if you think we can suddenly adopt the German model then you have more faith in our politicians then I have. We’re about as far from that as it’s possible to be.

    Is there something particularly dense about the English electorate that they can’t look a few miles north and see how coalition and minority government works in practice?

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