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May 7th | UK General Election 2015 OT - Please go vote!

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C

CCS

Banned
RedShift said:
How come people generally expect Labour to have less seats than the Tories anyway? They're polling the same or even possibly a tiny bit higher, and don't they have a built in advantage from the boundaries?

I think it's quite possible they'll be the largest party.
Click to expand...

Partly due to the fact that Labour poll better than the Tories in Scotland, but they're going to get almost no seats there, so their extra vote there is effectively wasted. Hence, in the seats that matter, they're slightly behind.
 
S

Stevie Gerrard

Member
The betting markets have the conservatives 20+ seats ahead of labour but miliband still slight favourite to be next PM. Only trailing by 12 and assuming SNP 50+ would put labour in a strong position numerically to run a minority government.
 
phisheep

phisheep

NeoGAF's Chief Barrister
I’ll be voting Conservative for Parliament. (Libdem for local council, but that’s all to do with local issues and personalities, so not really relevant here).

With some trepidation that I might be dismissed as an economically illiterate tax-dodging loony-right uncompassionate bastard I thought I would try to explain briefly why. Incidentally on PostionDial I come out as Centrist, Libertarian, Eco-friendly and strongly progressive – apparently a natural match for Libdems or Labour, which just goes to show that voting is rather more complicated than you get out of answering a quiz on some website.

First, let’s cover off a few things that I’m not particularly concerned about as between the main parties:
1) The economy. Governments tend to overestimate how much impact they can have on the overall economy, to overstate whatever impact they think they have had and to assume that the world started whenever the last lot got chucked out. It’s mostly bollocks, and our economy is pretty resilient overall (government finances does not equal the economy by the way, and even then there are probably enough checks and balances).
2) Constitutional reform. I can’t get excited about reforming the House of Lords – not until the Commons gets its act better together in committee. I’m not particularly fussed either way about extending devolution in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. I don’t even have an opinion on Scottish independence as it isn’t my call, not being Scottish.
3) Electoral reform ditto. Like with constitutional reform it’s something not to be rushed at. Sure, it is important – and a second hung parliament this time round would provide some incentive, but I’m not hung up about it.

I’m also not going to vote for UKIP or Green (both parties attract way too many fruitloops and utterly batty policies) and, reluctantly (because I think they did an honourable deal in 2010 and have performed well in Government), not for LibDem because essentially that means just giving my vote to Nick Clegg and it’s my vote dammit. So it comes down to the big two.

For me the key things are:
1. Reform of public services. Desperately needed, and only the Conservatives have shown any appetite for it. I probably won’t support everything they propose, but it is good that something gets proposed and debated or all we are left doing is lobbing money at things. That goes for
• The NHS
• State Education (I liked what Gove was doing, must admit to that)
• The Arts Council and the rest of the impenetrable morass of grant-giving organisations, including the Medical Research Council
• The whole damn Civil Service – it is woefully inefficient and unresponsive
• The benefits system
• … everything else …

2. Understanding business. Labour shows no sign at all of understanding the needs of –particularly - small businesses. Conservatives at least have some irons in the fire, though not yet enough. I’d like to see
• Significant incentives for small businesses, including revamp of business rates, reduction in corporation tax for small companies – (that’s tricky because it will also need changes in income tax for the self-employed, but it needs to be considered), *and* breaks in the benefit system to allow people to start business up from nothing and the state to bear some of the risk.
• A huge crackdown on offshoring profits for tax purposes, and a big emphasis on the moral dimension of taxation. This seems to be more of a Labour thing than a Tory thing, but Labour seems to be doing it all wrong by treating taxation as a punitive thing rather than as a consequence of doing business. This one is personal. It irritates me hugely that I’m paying more corporation tax this year than Starbucks did in 14 years.

There are some downsides though:
• I don’t favour repealing the Human Rights Act. It’s a good Act.
• I don’t favour getting out of the EU. Of course 85% (or whatever) of laws get made in Brussels, but life would be a load harder across Europe if the laws were all different.

Yell at me if you want guys, but it seems to me – roughly - that Labour have not done a damn thing about public service reform since they set up the NHS.

Plus, about the “conservatives don’t care” thing – I’ve spent probably half my time over the last five years helping out the poor, the disabled, the unwanted. #notallconservatives

That’s it. Well except that I don’t think a Tory landslide would be a great idea – there’s enough right wing nutters to make that unpalateable. So I’d prefer a continuation of the current coalition or a majority so slim that it needs the votes of sane backbenchers, of which my (soon-to-be I hope) MP is one.
 
C

CCS

Banned
phisheep said:
Oh, I don't feel bad at all. I'm just a bit apprehensive about being assumed to be bad!
Click to expand...

I don't necessarily disagree with your points. I just give less weight to some of the stuff you care about and more weight to Europe and things you don't mention :)
 
C

CCS

Banned
Out of curiosity, do people on here have any personal "red lines"? Mine was when the Tories started fucking with support for people with disabilities.
 
K

Kathian

Banned
SNP would lose seats based on what we expect them to gain but would gain on where they are currently under PR. Its time for all the main parties to acknowledge in Scotland FPTP is producing one track politics which kills other parties under the next major shift.
 
K

kmag

Member
phisheep said:
I’ll be voting Conservative for Parliament. (Libdem for local council, but that’s all to do with local issues and personalities, so not really relevant here).

With some trepidation that I might be dismissed as an economically illiterate tax-dodging loony-right uncompassionate bastard I thought I would try to explain briefly why. Incidentally on PostionDial I come out as Centrist, Libertarian, Eco-friendly and strongly progressive – apparently a natural match for Libdems or Labour, which just goes to show that voting is rather more complicated than you get out of answering a quiz on some website.

First, let’s cover off a few things that I’m not particularly concerned about as between the main parties:
1) The economy. Governments tend to overestimate how much impact they can have on the overall economy, to overstate whatever impact they think they have had and to assume that the world started whenever the last lot got chucked out. It’s mostly bollocks, and our economy is pretty resilient overall (government finances does not equal the economy by the way, and even then there are probably enough checks and balances).
2) Constitutional reform. I can’t get excited about reforming the House of Lords – not until the Commons gets its act better together in committee. I’m not particularly fussed either way about extending devolution in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. I don’t even have an opinion on Scottish independence as it isn’t my call, not being Scottish.
3) Electoral reform ditto. Like with constitutional reform it’s something not to be rushed at. Sure, it is important – and a second hung parliament this time round would provide some incentive, but I’m not hung up about it.

I’m also not going to vote for UKIP or Green (both parties attract way too many fruitloops and utterly batty policies) and, reluctantly (because I think they did an honourable deal in 2010 and have performed well in Government), not for LibDem because essentially that means just giving my vote to Nick Clegg and it’s my vote dammit. So it comes down to the big two.

For me the key things are:
1. Reform of public services. Desperately needed, and only the Conservatives have shown any appetite for it. I probably won’t support everything they propose, but it is good that something gets proposed and debated or all we are left doing is lobbing money at things. That goes for
• The NHS
• State Education (I liked what Gove was doing, must admit to that)
• The Arts Council and the rest of the impenetrable morass of grant-giving organisations, including the Medical Research Council
• The whole damn Civil Service – it is woefully inefficient and unresponsive
• The benefits system
• … everything else …

2. Understanding business. Labour shows no sign at all of understanding the needs of –particularly - small businesses. Conservatives at least have some irons in the fire, though not yet enough. I’d like to see
• Significant incentives for small businesses, including revamp of business rates, reduction in corporation tax for small companies – (that’s tricky because it will also need changes in income tax for the self-employed, but it needs to be considered), *and* breaks in the benefit system to allow people to start business up from nothing and the state to bear some of the risk.
• A huge crackdown on offshoring profits for tax purposes, and a big emphasis on the moral dimension of taxation. This seems to be more of a Labour thing than a Tory thing, but Labour seems to be doing it all wrong by treating taxation as a punitive thing rather than as a consequence of doing business. This one is personal. It irritates me hugely that I’m paying more corporation tax this year than Starbucks did in 14 years.

There are some downsides though:
• I don’t favour repealing the Human Rights Act. It’s a good Act.
• I don’t favour getting out of the EU. Of course 85% (or whatever) of laws get made in Brussels, but life would be a load harder across Europe if the laws were all different.

Yell at me if you want guys, but it seems to me – roughly - that Labour have not done a damn thing about public service reform since they set up the NHS.

Plus, about the “conservatives don’t care” thing – I’ve spent probably half my time over the last five years helping out the poor, the disabled, the unwanted. #notallconservatives

That’s it. Well except that I don’t think a Tory landslide would be a great idea – there’s enough right wing nutters to make that unpalateable. So I’d prefer a continuation of the current coalition or a majority so slim that it needs the votes of sane backbenchers, of which my (soon-to-be I hope) MP is one.
Click to expand...

That all seems sensible, except for the part about the coalitions educational reforms. They're objectively shit, and the free schools policy a fucking monumental waste of time, money and effort based on a failed Swedish policy which lo and behold ran into the exact same issues that Gove's brain fart has ran into.
 
Q

QuicheFontaine

Member
tomtom94 said:
To be honest if Miliband ends up 12 seats behind the Conservatives yeah, he should probably resign. He can pin the blame on losing Scotland on the uselessness of Scottish Labour but losing the English marginals from a very favourable position would be on him.

Of course that's incredibly unlikely to happen, you can tell by the fact it's Murdoch scaremongering... which is why I think barring a major collapse he'll lead Labour into the next election as well.
Click to expand...

What? Labour finishing 12 seats behind the Conservatives? I'd say that's "almost definitely" going to happen
 
K

kmag

Member
Wrestlemania said:
Am I right in thinking that PR would actually reduce the number of potential seats the SNP could hold?
Click to expand...

Based on their projected gains this time around, probably. But the SNP have long been in favour of proportional representation. It might change if push comes to shove though and their new found MP's ever had to vote on it.

I imagine a number of current MP's are theoretically in favour of PR but in practice just worry about losing out under the system. Small district PR basically keeps a constituency link for MP's but adds proportionality, the major argument against PR is that the link between MP and their locality is removed.

However FTFP simply does not work unless there are a small number of big parties, recently it's been the Tories vs Labour with the Lib Dems playing the part of pseudo Tory or pseudo Labour in the seats where one of the big two can't win. If votes continue to be diluted between an increasing number of smaller parties, and it's looking likely a 3rd of the 60 odd % of the electorate who can be arsed to vote will be going to other parties, then we'll need to change system at some point. Whether that need will get around the naked self interest of the big two and the sitting MP's is another thing.
 
phisheep

phisheep

NeoGAF's Chief Barrister
kmag said:
That all seems sensible, except for the part about the coalitions educational reforms. They're objectively shit, and the free schools policy a fucking monumental waste of time, money and effort based on a failed Swedish policy which lo and behold ran into the exact same issues that Gove's brain fart has ran into.
Click to expand...

We might have to disagree on that. But I do know that if I had the capital first thing I would do is set up a free school on a sink estate about two miles from where I am now and go for it.

I've met an awful lot of smart kids who have been woefully let down by the education system round here. They deserve better. A whole lot better.

"Objectively shit" might need a bit of qualifying there.
 
T

Tak3n

Banned
I don't know how Scotland is going to react if the tories get in, as they have spent the whole of its campaign making Scotland look like this country that will at any chance wreck the UK...

I don't get this policy as if they do win power they still have to govern the people they have been using as stick to hit labour
 
S

StealthGoblin

Banned
It'll be interesting to see what the government (whoever they may be) will do about the 880,00 school places shortfall we are about to walk into.

We don't have enough houses.
We don't have enough schools.
The teaching profession and incumbent politicians resent each other at the moment.
A worrying proportion of teachers are leaving the profession.
The teaching profession does not trust the judgement of OFSTED.

There is a catastrophe coming. I can feel it.

Those places need to be created by 2023. Eight years. Over 100,000 new places per year until then.
 
J

JesseEwiak

Member
On PR, in a lot of larger countries with PR, or at least countries with variations in support for various parties, there's a variety of constituencies where the PR vote is based on - for example, in Finland, there's 13 constituencies of various size representing the various portions of the nation where the MPs actually come from.

So, even with PR, you could have specific districts for each part of the UK.
 
T

Tak3n

Banned
Galvanise_ said:
It'll be interesting to see what the government (whoever they may be) will do about the 880,00 school places shortfall we are about to walk into.

We don't have enough houses.
We don't have enough schools.
The teaching profession and incumbent politicians resent each other at the moment.
A worrying proportion of teachers are leaving the profession.
The teaching profession does not trust the judgement of OFSTED.

There is a catastrophe coming. I can feel it.

Those places need to be created by 2023. Eight years. Over 100,000 new places per year until then.
Click to expand...

my wife teaches, and she is sick to death of everytime a new government comes in it is all change on the curriculum....
 
K

kmag

Member
phisheep said:
We might have to disagree on that. But I do know that if I had the capital first thing I would do is set up a free school on a sink estate about two miles from where I am now and go for it.

I've met an awful lot of smart kids who have been woefully let down by the education system round here. They deserve better. A whole lot better.

"Objectively shit" might need a bit of qualifying there.
Click to expand...

Objectively shit in that Gove's got a deluded 1950's approach to how people learn which goes completely against the grain of the last 60 years of actual research into how people learn to understand concepts and apply them to real world problem solving. Here's a hint, it's not by rote. Rote is useful for passing certain types of shallow exams and for being able to pull Shakespeare quotes out your arse. Two things which impress Mr Gove no end.

And if the next sink estate 5 miles down the road had a state funded comprehensive bursting at the seams, while your sink estate had a shit school half full? You improve the school, you don't build a new one next to it regardless of demand and run both. There needs to be some oversight in how school provision covers the needs of the community. You can't let any fucker just set up a school where ever they want regardless of current provision and get taxpayers to pay for it especially when there is a national place shortage.
 
S

Saiyar

Unconfirmed Member
phisheep said:
We might have to disagree on that. But I do know that if I had the capital first thing I would do is set up a free school on a sink estate about two miles from where I am now and go for it.

I've met an awful lot of smart kids who have been woefully let down by the education system round here. They deserve better. A whole lot better.

"Objectively shit" might need a bit of qualifying there.
Click to expand...

Compared to state schools free schools are more expensive per student head and are three times more likely to fail.

The reforms have also made it practically impossible for councils to build new state schools meaning there is a huge short fall in school places in some areas of the country, and it is only going to get worse.
 
G

gerg

Member
As much as I would like Labour to be elected, Brand's last-minute endorsement won't actually change anything, will it?
 
R

Real Hero

Member
Watch Brand get unnecessary hate from people who decried his no voting stance was terrible but has now chosen to back the 'wrong' team.
 
R

RedShift

Member
Real Hero said:
Watch Brand get unnecessary hate from people who decried his no voting stance was terrible but has now chosen to back the 'wrong' team.
Click to expand...

Would love someone to ask Cameron if he's happy Brand has decided voting is worth it now.

As much as he is a bit of a pretentious git sometimes his message that democracy is something that has to be continuous through activism and not just something you do one day every five years is really good.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
Real Hero said:
Watch Brand get unnecessary hate from people who decried his no voting stance was terrible but has now chosen to back the 'wrong' team.
Click to expand...

Well I think he can get very legitimate ... let's say "criticism" from people who wasted their breath telling him his anti-voting (and anti-paying tax and anti-paying mortgages...) stance was silly only to find out that he either didn't mean it at all or that he doesn't mean this time. Or that, actually, as a 40 year old man, a chat with Ed Miliband changed his mind on the virtues of voting.
 
K

Kotetsu534

Member
UKIP became the first party other than Labour or the Tories to win a UK-wide election for over a century last year (since 1910, when the Liberals won 2 more seats than the Tories). Them polling 14% is pretty normal.
 
G

giant_frying_pan

Member
tomtom94 said:
To be honest if Miliband ends up 12 seats behind the Conservatives yeah, he should probably resign. He can pin the blame on losing Scotland on the uselessness of Scottish Labour but losing the English marginals from a very favourable position would be on him.

Of course that's incredibly unlikely to happen, you can tell by the fact it's Murdoch scaremongering... which is why I think barring a major collapse he'll lead Labour into the next election as well.
Click to expand...
The backlash is primarily against Brown and Darling. [Ed Milliband and Ed Balls] can still be a viable Labour leadership from a Scottish perspective even if they're short 10-15 seats. Jim Murphy is not unpopular here per say, but being essentially hand-picked by a Blairite (Darling) has given him an even tougher job.

That's not to say Murphy is totally devoid of fault. I genuinely think if he was less combative towards the SNP, he'd be polling better here. The referendum campaign makes that difficult for him to do so. He's playing a dangerous game today as well by suggesting that the SNP and its supporters are undemocratic as he has this morning.

It doesn't help when Murphy's over-arching message has been 'Vote SNP - Get Tory'. The problem is that with FPTP, the exact opposite is true since the SNP is set to take seats from the Lib Dems too who we know are willing to prop up a Conservative government.

[EDIT - Had Ed Balls as a PM contender there!]
 
S

StealthGoblin

Banned
Tak3n said:
my wife teaches, and she is sick to death of everytime a new government comes in it is all change on the curriculum....
Click to expand...

We all feel like that. Instead of minimising the amount of paperwork we have to do, I conservatively estimate I now do 4x as much under the new system as opposed to the old system. The new assessments coming in next year will be a disaster. Kids will be expected to know an entire primary schools worth of material (which now includes material from the old year 7& 8) having only had two years to do it.

My school is in a deprived area in one of the worst local authority areas in the country. I am somewhat a social worker, counsellor etc to children hit by drug addict parents and parents who do not help at all at home. They don't stand a chance.

The government needs to take hands off education for a while. There is widespread confusion and now we can't hold each other to account because assessments are all over the place.
 
P

Par Score

Member
phisheep said:
I’ll be voting Conservative for Parliament. (Libdem for local council, but that’s all to do with local issues and personalities, so not really relevant here).
Click to expand...

A great post. You've given a hell of a lot more thought to this than most people, something you should never be ashamed of.

phisheep said:
For me the key things are:
1. Reform of public services. Desperately needed, and only the Conservatives have shown any appetite for it. I probably won’t support everything they propose, but it is good that something gets proposed and debated or all we are left doing is lobbing money at things.
Click to expand...

But is it reform for reforms sake? Does the unending stream of Doctors, Teachers, Academics etc. saying what a mess the Coallition has made not carry any weight with you?

I can't trust the Tories to not fuck up the NHS, and they have such a shocking track record that I sure as hell can't trust them to reform it.

phisheep said:
2. Understanding business. Labour shows no sign at all of understanding the needs of –particularly - small businesses. Conservatives at least have some irons in the fire, though not yet enough. I’d like to see
• Significant incentives for small businesses, including revamp of business rates, reduction in corporation tax for small companies – (that’s tricky because it will also need changes in income tax for the self-employed, but it needs to be considered), *and* breaks in the benefit system to allow people to start business up from nothing and the state to bear some of the risk.
• A huge crackdown on offshoring profits for tax purposes, and a big emphasis on the moral dimension of taxation. This seems to be more of a Labour thing than a Tory thing, but Labour seems to be doing it all wrong by treating taxation as a punitive thing rather than as a consequence of doing business. This one is personal. It irritates me hugely that I’m paying more corporation tax this year than Starbucks did in 14 years.
Click to expand...

It seems weird that, given these priorities, you've swung to the Tories and not Labour, given they are both explicit Labour policies.

Never believe a politician of course, but the Conservatives seem too captured by big business to ever give half a fuck about small or medium business. If you honestly think they're going to get Starbucks paying more tax than you or me, I may have a bridge to sell you.


Tak3n said:
Russell Brand just said vote labour......
Click to expand...

The latest example of the powers of The Miliband.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
Quite a funny graph:

CEKWA4yVEAAhxCo.png:large


Edit: That's courtesy of Ladbrokes btw.
 
R

Real Hero

Member
CyclopsRock said:
Well I think he can get very legitimate ... let's say "criticism" from people who wasted their breath telling him his anti-voting (and anti-paying tax and anti-paying mortgages...) stance was silly only to find out that he either didn't mean it at all or that he doesn't mean this time. Or that, actually, as a 40 year old man, a chat with Ed Miliband changed his mind on the virtues of voting.
Click to expand...
He's not going back on anything he's said other than it is worth voting for Labour as a starting point. He could have done that before the registration deadline though for sure..
 
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