Hexus OFFICIAL 2015 General Election results thread

[Saracen]

the only thing to change now will be the boundries to keep labour out - and maybe an answer to the west Lothian question , since the tories have a majority and care little for Scotland.

The West Lothian question needs addressing. It's needed it for a long time, and needs it now more than ever.

[Noxvayl]

peter did you delete your own post? I was replying to it... I have left it considering it was deleted, I suspect it was done to stop anyone replying to it.

Anyway, I disagreed with you. No surprise there.

[HalloweenJack]

so HS2 and another runway at Gatwick being pushed ahead


will severn lagoon actually be built??

[peterb]

peter did you delete your own post? I was replying to it... I have left it considering it was deleted, I suspect it was done to stop anyone replying to it.

Anyway, I disagreed with you. No surprise there.

Yes, sorry, but it was going in a direction I don't wish to pursue, as well as taking the thread off topic. I think we'll just have to agree to disagree! Suffice it to say that sometimes the bigger picture and greater good transcends individual 'right', provided appropriate controls and oversight are in place.

[opel80uk]

The West Lothian question needs addressing. It's needed it for a long time, and needs it now more than ever.

You're right, it does. The problem for the Tories is how to do it in a way that doesn't allow the SNP to use it as another tool to help further their independence agenda. As soon as it is brought up, the SNP will, en masse, be all over it like beans on toast, pointing it out as another example of Westminster dismissing the Scottish electorate (that's not what I think, but am certain it will be portrayed like that). I just can't see how you can answer the question in a way that satisfactory to the MP's calling for it and not damage the Union more.

I honestly think though that, any answer to the West Lothian Question is really only going to be temporary anyway. There is a clear difference in how the 2 electorates view the way forward for either the UK or England/Scotland, depending on how you look at it. Less than 15% voted Conservative and over 74% voted for a Socially Democratic party (in name at least) in Scotland. The English have clearly rejected that as the way forward, albeit not as decisively as Scotland voted for it, and how you reconcile the 2, especially with the EU vote now looming which, incidentally is a vote where Cameron may well be forced despite his own wishes, to campaign to leave the EU, and EU of which membership of was one of the cornerstones of the 'Better Together' Campaign.

I often wonder about Cameron. I've never viewed him individually as a Conservative ideologue, and certainly see the parallels between him and Blair and also, to a lesser degree, to Major who I think was a very decent person. I think it was convenient for Cameron to have the Lib Dems in Government, as it allowed him to indulge in his more Moderate Conservatism, whilst also allowing him to absolve himself of the responsibility to the right of his party for not going along with their agenda. Whenever discussed, I got the impression, rather than simply being uncaring like others in his Cabinet, there was a genuine uncomfortableness and sympathy from him with regards to issues like poverty (although not enough to force himself to do too much about it I might add). So in a way I find it slightly ironic that A Tory PM like that's legacy may well end up being that of the Prime Minister that oversaw the UK leave the EU, Scotland leave the Union and one that left England a far more an isolationist state than before.

[HalloweenJack]

SNP had under 50% of the vote in Scotland , yet won 56 of the 59 seats......


which means (as shown in the referendum as well) - over 50% do not agree with them....

[Saracen]

SNP had under 50% of the vote in Scotland , yet won 56 of the 59 seats......


which means (as shown in the referendum as well) - over 50% do not agree with them....

According to the BBC results page, the SNP got 50.0% of the vote. Which I guess means that 50.0% voted for someone else. Trouble is, they couldn't agree on which someone else.

Also, Cameron is now PM with 36.9% of the vote, implying 63.1% voted for someone else. Same is true, though .... they couldn't agree which someone else. And "someone else" goes from TUSC through LimDem and Labour, to UKIP, and if they still exist, the hard right.

That's democracy, and especially FPTP, for you.

Oh, and in a hypothetical constituency, ONE vote more is enough. So maybe,

A 33.333%
B 33.333%
C 33.334%

And C wins. Utterly.

I seem to remember one LibDem survived with a majority of 80. Last time, one Tory/Labour marginal was something like 54, and Labour failed to take it. Oh, and Ed Balls "safe" seat saw him lose by about 400. So a couple of hundred or so people switching Lab -> Tory could gave done that.

[Andy3536]

The problem i have with proportional representation, is it more often will end in coalition governments. You have partys finishing 3rd, 4th, 5th suddenly able to put thier policies to the front of the que by bargaining thier way into power with the largest party.
The BBC have a good article here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32601281
They have under a PR system UKIP getting 83 seats. Now, just where would you have the other 82 of those UKIP seats? As many votes as they got, in most regions they were 2nd, 3rd, 4th. Under PR you must then place in regions that may have voted Labour a UKIP MP?? Or under the old plan from 2011 from the Lib Dems, you have a region that might vote Labour with a comfortable lead, but as many of the other voters might be likely to have thier second preferance as Lib Dem then you may a Lib Dem MP elected in a Labour majority as they're lots of peoples second choice...
I can't see good in much of PR tbh.
The only thing i find odd is as part of the PR referendum there was a plan to cut down the number of seats on offer and rebalance the higher number of seats per population available in Wales and Scotland.
That should defenatly have been put foward as a stand alone piece of legeslation, re-drawing the boundries and having fewer MPs. A quick google shows the plan would have taken it from 650 - 600

[peterb]

<--snip

I often wonder about Cameron. I've never viewed him individually as a Conservative ideologue, and certainly see the parallels between him and Blair and also, to a lesser degree, to Major who I think was a very decent person. I think it was convenient for Cameron to have the Lib Dems in Government, as it allowed him to indulge in his more Moderate Conservatism, whilst also allowing him to absolve himself of the responsibility to the right of his party for not going along with their agenda. Whenever discussed, I got the impression, rather than simply being uncaring like others in his Cabinet, there was a genuine uncomfortableness and sympathy from him with regards to issues like poverty (although not enough to force himself to do too much about it I might add). So in a way I find it slightly ironic that A Tory PM like that's legacy may well end up being that of the Prime Minister that oversaw the UK leave the EU, Scotland leave the Union and one that left England a far more an isolationist state than before.

I'd have put things slightly differently and tended to see Tony Blair as more at home in the Conservative Party than the Labour Party.

But that aside, this election campaign seemed more about misrepresenting the other side than about the positive benefits of their own policies. The threat of a Labour Government propped up (when it suited them) by an SNP with a very clear agenda was one that the electorate couldn't take.

As for UKIP, while, Nigel Farage did clearly campaign on his parties policies, and they clearly chimed with a large portions of the electorate. Whether that was simply the way he campaigned, or actual support is hard to say, but there was no doubt about what was standing for.

As an aside, I thought David Cameron's speech outside number 10 was quite revealing in his praise of both Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband and perhaps gave a clue to the real men involved, rather than that portrayed by the individual party machines, and exploited by the media.

I am beginning to regret that Scotland did not gain independence. The promises made in the last few days of the referendum campaign have rather left the Westminster Government (of whatever political persuasion it might have been) backed into a corner. Perhaps it might have been better for Scotland to have cast itself off in a clean break, rather than be left with the constitutional mess that is likely to ensue.

[Splash]

There is also no restriction on gathering together to discuss ideas and plan action as far as I know.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/...ation-to-raves

I marched against this.

[Top_gun]

I think the election results may give fresh impetus to devolving London from the rest of the UK given London has increased its number of Labour MPs.

[Noxvayl]

The problem i have with proportional representation, is it more often will end in coalition governments. You have partys finishing 3rd, 4th, 5th suddenly able to put thier policies to the front of the que by bargaining thier way into power with the largest party.
The BBC have a good article here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32601281
They have under a PR system UKIP getting 83 seats. Now, just where would you have the other 82 of those UKIP seats? As many votes as they got, in most regions they were 2nd, 3rd, 4th. Under PR you must then place in regions that may have voted Labour a UKIP MP?? Or under the old plan from 2011 from the Lib Dems, you have a region that might vote Labour with a comfortable lead, but as many of the other voters might be likely to have thier second preferance as Lib Dem then you may a Lib Dem MP elected in a Labour majority as they're lots of peoples second choice...
I can't see good in much of PR tbh.
The only thing i find odd is as part of the PR referendum there was a plan to cut down the number of seats on offer and rebalance the higher number of seats per population available in Wales and Scotland.
That should defenatly have been put foward as a stand alone piece of legeslation, re-drawing the boundries and having fewer MPs. A quick google shows the plan would have taken it from 650 - 600

Voting under a PR system is very different to FPTP. So you can't take the number of votes cast in this election and then divide them proportionally to see how a proportional system would work under the D'Hondt system. Also that system is a party list system, no local MP candidates so it is again very different from our system and would encourage a completely different set of preferences for voting. Proportional representation also has much higher voter turnout than the UK gets, for example Malta has over 90% turnout. So those unknown 23+% of the population that don't vote in this country aren't accounted for under our system which could make a significant difference to which candidates get voted for when using a PR system like Single Transferable Vote (STV), much more similar to what we currently have.

You also don't have to have a coalition government; you can have one party form a cabinet that doesn't have a majority (just more seats than anyone else), they would then need support from other parties to pass legislation which is a good thing in my opinion. It would stop some of the more extreme legislation getting through because cross party support is more difficult.

This is a good explanation of how the STV system would work, illustrating the different voting that goes on under FPTP which makes our results quite far from what the electorate want: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8XOZJkozfI

Here is also more information on STV, with examples of countries using it: http://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/s...sferable-vote/

Oh and the vote for the AV system here in the UK was not a PR system, it was still FPTP just eliminating the spoiler effect. Same problems as FPTP just a more complicated vote to get you a different unproportional result. This is what the AV system would have been like: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y3jE3B8HsE

I voted against the AV system because it would of been a waste of time. I support any PR system though, STV being the most likely to be used in the UK.

Hopefully some of that information could persuade you that a PR system is not as simple to apply to our recent results as that article makes out. I find that article to be really bad for explaining a PR system.

[Noxvayl]

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/...ation-to-raves

I marched against this.

I don't even... sometimes I shake my head in dismay at some of the laws in this country.

[outwar6010]

[Galant]

Bit late but just saw this:

[directhex]

I can sum up my feelings on this election with a single picture.