UK Election!

But that assumes that everyone would have voted the same way under PR.

I haven’t assumed that! But from turnout and split, I’m only able to conclude that the election points to profound disillusionment. Starmer has a huge job to turn it around.

But the two parties combined had less than 50% of votes cast, which I find troubling.

Are you sure about your arithmetic? But yes it would appear that the combined Tory-Labour vote on Thursday was the lowest since WW2 or WW1 or something, this I actually welcome.

We need to nail this false claim that there are only two choices and everyone simply has to accept that.

Speaking of elections I really hope this helps

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx824yl3ln4oReformist Masoud Pezeshkian has been elected as Iran’s new president, beating his hardline conservative rival Saeed Jalili.
The vote was declared in Dr Pezeshkian’s favour after he secured 53.3% of the more than 30 million votes counted. Mr Jalili polled at 44.3%.

Are you sure about your arithmetic? But yes it would appear that the combined Tory-Labour vote on Thursday was the lowest since WW2 or WW1 or something, this I actually welcome.

I was talking about Labour and the Lib Dems, which were 46% combined. They were 43.7% in 2019.

More of the groundbreaking idea of placing experts with progressive, forward-looking views into the appropriate roles. Its mad that after the recent ‘we’ve had enough of experts’ years, this is actually quite as novelty

Spend three minutes watching this man talk in a humane, evidence-based way about penal policy. Then realise that he is now in charge of prisons. And then feel the waves of relief wash over you. https://t.co/HgLqy0plft

— Ian Dunt (@IanDunt) July 6, 2024

I was talking about Labour and the Lib Dems, which were 46% combined. They were 43.7% in 2019.

Ah. But it’s still more than the Tory vote. TBH nearly half isn’t bad imo

https://x.com/SayeedaWarsi/status/1808463945298018467

Sorry I can’t embed so here’s the text from the Tory baroness:

Sit back down Suella !! 

And rein in the indignation Rishi!!

And accept the role you’ve both played in the toxic culture that’s now biting you.

If you spend years dog whistling , ratcheting up divisive rhetoric , stereotyping and demonising communities and failing to act on racism within our own ranks don’t be surprised if you get called a “f’ing ****” by those you enabled , empowered and emboldened.

Let this be a lesson – culture wars may get you headlines but they damage us as a nation.

Brilliant words which hit all the nails on the head. It’s a crying shame that she cannot be Tory leader

Timpson is a great appointment. He’s currently VC at my university too, not sure if this means he’ll be stepping aside.

…and yeah, pretty much bang on from Warsi. It’s quite awkward to talk about as a white bloke arguing with the rhetoric of the likes of Braverman and Badenoch etc….but quite simply they are setting themselves up to fail. The voter base that they are trying to appeal to will simply not vote for people of their ethnicity.

I have just got back from the village fete and a couple of pints of fete special IPA from the local craft boys, so I might not be bang on, but looking at vote share etc, I’m not sure we can make any conclusions looking at national totals on this singular snapshot. Local data is interesting –

looking at the Sussex seats that went LibDem – turnout in the early 70s…….

Reform seats (well Boston and Great Yarmouth) – turnout late 50s…….

what is the rationale behind those 2 lower turnouts – is that predictive of something in deprived areas

I suspect that we will see lots of psephological deep dive in the next few weeks into voting trends – and i am not sure that the national trend we see from this election is necessarily reflective of how the country splits on the big questions. I suspect that the middle will come out of this better than it seems. Will be interested to see the analysis of why people voted Reform

The fact that at least 3 people have posted that Timpson clip already is suggestive that we like where this is going and Michael Gove can F right off on his take on expertise

Also – are Reform what they appear to be, or sock puppets…….

https://x.com/josiahmortimer/status/1809583328049168541

…and yeah, pretty much bang on from Warsi.

She always is bang on – she was on Last Leg last night, very direct in her comments.

If you spend years dog whistling , ratcheting up divisive rhetoric , stereotyping and demonising communities and failing to act on racism within our own ranks don’t be surprised if you get called a “f’ing ****” by those you enabled , empowered and emboldened.

Absolutely spot on, I said as much a few pages back – zero **** given from me when he or his children get called such, Sunak and his ilk brought it on themselves with divisive policies, reap what you sow/suck it up princess/you deserve it etc….etc.

OK here’s an idea to restore faith in democracy in the HoC. Given such a huge majority how about giving Labour MPs a free vote without the whip. That way they can possibly demonstrate their willingness to support their constituents views.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9r3kywqlkno

Worth a read to anyone curious about people still voting Tory, well sort of, most of the reasoning makes absolutely no ******** sense at all.

reasoning?

That’s a bit of a stretch.

Listening to interview swith the likes of Rory Stewart after he had the whip withdrawn and Caroline Lukas; a whip not only makes sure you vote the way the patyr needs/wants you to vote but also steers you to vote with some sort of clarity. Votes come so thick and fast that as an individual without a team to guide you, it’s barely possible to know what you are actually voting on let alone have read enough to have a coherent view on everything you are voting on.

codybrennan
Free Member

Does anyone else find it strange that the AV Referendum of 2011 has been almost entirely forgotten about? I dont engage much on social media these days, but found myself drawn into a YT comments section decrying FPTP, and demanding PR. Mostly Reform voters who’d switched from Cons.

I think this is mostly because PR has screwed a different set of people this time round and so people who jsut didn’t care very much about it before, are just discovering why it’s a problem. At the same time a depressing number of people who hated it for the last few elections seem really happy with it now that it’s giving Labour a majority and screwing Reform, and the lib dems are probably pleased enough with their result to not be thinking much about aynthing else.

I see Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire has now been declared with an LD majority of 2160.

More of the groundbreaking idea of placing experts with progressive, forward-looking views into the appropriate roles. Its mad that after the recent ‘we’ve had enough of experts’ years, this is actually quite as novelty

Well said @binners

It finally begins to feel like the adults are back in charge at the asylum. Sure, it’ll take time to unpick the piles of shit all over the place but at least the common sense is back rather than flag-shagging sloganistic populism.

GBNews are heavily leaning into PR now. This is going to be increasingly pushed over the next few years.

As someone mentioned, suddenly people that didn’t give a crap about FPTP/PR  are hugely invested in adopting PR.  We all know who these people are.

Rather amusingly, the generic talking head on GBN suggests that the Greens/ LibDems might want to team up with Reform to push for PR.

Whilst I don’t doubt that the Libdems/Greens want PR im not so sure that are willing to fight for it along side Reform!

The fact Reform and the likes of GBN now want PR has renewed my scepticism of it to be honest, I can’t lie!

Does anyone else find it strange that the AV Referendum of 2011 has been almost entirely forgotten about?

The problem with the 2011 referendum was that PR was then seen as the LibDems little baby, indeed one of the conditions the LibDems demanded for going into coalition with the Tories was that there should be a referendum on PR, it was a non-negotiable demand for the LibDems.

That close association with the LibDems doomed the proposal imo.

A year on from Nick Clegg’s fateful decision to prop up a Tory prime minister and austerity those on the left of the political spectrum, Labour and most LibDem voters, wanted revenge on Clegg and his Tory-enabling cohorts, killing off their little PR baby seemed an obvious way of doing that, although maybe not entirely rational – revenge often isn’t.

Also – are Reform what they appear to be, or sock puppets…….

I did wonder about this. Our candidate did exist, he was caught up in some of the bad press over Facebook links to New British Union and other unsavoury posts. Had visits from all the parties, all happy to chat and seemed clued up on local issues but no Reform leaflets or visits. Still got almost 12% of the vote somehow.

On competence: (forum not letting me add images ATM)

https://x.com/JonnyGabriel/status/1809658646927683972

Here you go…

The Rt Hon Jordan Pickford MP @JPickford1 has been appointed Secretary of State for Defence @DefenceHQ. pic.twitter.com/iao0g64OLJ

— Jonny Sharples (@JonnyGabriel) July 6, 2024

The trick at the moment is to edit X URLs and replace X with twitter and it works

Lol, I didn’t get that at first.

I’m fairness I haven’t a clue about football!

The trick at the moment is to edit X URLs and replace X with twitter and it works

I’ve tried that recently and for some reason I can’t get it to work.

Hopefully it will be sorted so that editing won’t be necessary?

The problem with the 2011 referendum was that PR was then seen as the LibDems little baby, indeed one of the conditions the LibDems demanded for going into coalition with the Tories was that there should be a referendum on PR, it was a non-negotiable demand for the LibDems.

That close association with the LibDems doomed the proposal imo.

A year on from Nick Clegg’s fateful decision to prop up a Tory prime minister and austerity those on the left of the political spectrum, Labour and most LibDem voters, wanted revenge on Clegg and his Tory-enabling cohorts, killing off their little PR baby seemed an obvious way of doing that, although maybe not entirely rational – revenge often isn’t.

It wasn’t really that at all. Libs asked for PR and Tories offered AV which they knew nobody wanted.

I think the link between the rejection of electoral reform at the referendum and punishing Nick Clegg and the LibDems is widely accepted:

Nick Clegg targeted as anti-AV campaign links him to broken promises

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2011/feb/05/av-get-clegg-campaign

Nick Clegg: Bitter blow for Lib Dems after AV referendum defeat

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2011/may/06/nick-clegg-av-lib-dems

Nick Clegg supported yes which in effect helped to kill the proposal

I think the link between the rejection of electoral reform at the referendum and punishing Nick Clegg and the LibDems is widely accepted

So is a potential conclusion that we rushed a discussion about PR, didn’t really understand the issues, and went early to a referendum which failed to hit its mark?

Cameron clearly the wrong person to be pulling the trigger on referenda after that …….. (and I’m thinking brexit and PR not scottish)…. anyway

I fear I’ll sound like an SNP independence advocate…(stretching things here perhaps), but….just because Cameron had a [few] half-assed attempt at a referendum that wasn’t properly set up, that doesn’t mean that the outcome then is still relevant now…

After some more fete special IPA, I find myself advocating for 3 rerun referenda:

1.  EU membership/rejoin
2. PR
3. Scawtish independence

…After appropriate discussion and reflection…

I appreciate that I my be too far down the IPA-hole at this point…

On the subject of different PR…

https://x.com/Andrew_F_Smith/status/1809685447800680505

I like these ‘experts’; they seem to know what they’re talking about – that’s a novelty after the past 14 years.

I remember that the rules governing campaigning for referendums were even less robust during the AV vote than they were for the two more significant referendums that followed it. Official No vote campaign material was full of full of factually incorrect stuff and I think that the financing of the No campaign was spectacularly shady.

As in pretty much all things with the coalition the LibDems were completely outmanoeuvred and outplayed by the Tories when it came to the AV referendum.

On the subject of different PR…

Well it does say “for a bit of fun” which is all that it can be because as it has already been pointed out people don’t necessarily vote the same whatever the system, indeed the opposite is true obviously, so that shouldn’t be forgotten.

Although having said that I think it is nevertheless fair to say that whatever the system was in place on Thursday we would still have a Labour prime minister today and not a Tory one.

I see one of the Reform wrong’uns has declared one of his first priorities.

Child poverty? The NHS? Social housing?

Nope. Defunding the BBC.

Apart from evidently not giving a shit about the concerns of his constituents, I’m guessing that a taste in opposition as a party of 5 might not be the all powerful platform he thinks it.lol

So is a potential conclusion that we rushed a discussion about PR, didn’t really understand the issues, and went early to a referendum which failed to hit its mark?

Yes just like Brexit.

Cameron clearly the wrong person to be pulling the trigger on referenda after that …….. (and I’m thinking brexit and PR not scottish)…. anyway

Yes.

Back in 2011 I was all up for PR (I’m a Libdem so…) but full one on PR based on the national percentage always left me with the question “who will my MP be”?

Apart from evidently not giving a shit about the concerns of his constituents, I’m guessing that a taste in opposition as a party of 5 might not be the all powerful platform he thinks it.lol

I can’t wait until we see these folk caught on camera when we see the next PMQ’s, they’ll be a toddler play pit in the centre of the commons chamber containing five grinning fools rolling around in their shit and throwing their toys around.

I can’t wait until we see these folk caught on camera when we see the next PMQ’s, they’ll be a toddler play pit in the centre of the commons chamber containing five grinning fools rolling around in their shit and throwing their toys around.

I suspect that it’s going to be a rude awakening for them that’s for sure.

Barely ever getting a question in to launch some “devastating” sound bite for X later, having to deal with their disgruntled constituents (many of whome will be “characters”)… not sure it’s really what they signed up for.

I think we all know that the only real “work” that they will do will be posting shit on X from the bog. Oh, and farage will just continue to go full trump and hold rallies for the faithful, complaining how the political system “stole” the election from them…

People are making the AV thing overcomplicated. The Lib Dems got their referendum but the Tories backed the status quo and Labour mostly did, because of course they ****ing did. Well, Labour took no official position- Miliband offered weak support for yes but most MPs and big hitters supported No. Because why would either of the 2 parties that get to take turns being either the winners or the opposition support a change that would ruin that? So the lies- and it was mostly lies, No2AV weren’t very interested in anything else- were far louder than the truth

Course, Labour had actually put an AV referendum into the constitutional reform bill. But they did it so late in the parliament that there was no chance of it actually happening, so it was pretty much dismissed as a stunt. And then Labour also included it in their 2010 manifesto. But when it came to it actually happening…

I’ve never quite understood why the LibDems didn’t wake up after the AV referendum stitch up, and realise that they needed to put some ideological distance between them and the Tories publicly.

After the coalition broke down they were only too eager to point out where they had supposedly softened the hard-nosed austerity driven programme, and talked about the successes they had had in toning down some of the worst potential excesses, but by then it was too late.