General Election Turnout
1992 77.7%
1997 71.4%
2001 59.4%
2005 61.4%
Source UKPolitical Info
Percentage share of the Total Electorate that voted Labour in 2005 21%
Source Railings & Thrasher
Labour Party 35.3% of the Vote 356 seats 55% of total seats
Conservative 32.3% of the Vote 198 seats 31% of total seats
Lib Dems 22.0% of the Vote 62 seats 9% of total seats
Other 8.0% of the Vote 30seats 5% of total seats
Nearly 40% of our fellow citizens are not likely to vote in 2010 because of apathy,ignorance or they are disenfranchised.
If you live in a 'safe' seat and your vote is largely an irrelevance.
These depressing statistics show that we cannot pretend to be a democratic nation, we are an oligarchy. Yesterday Clegg came to Bristol. Big Poster on a truck, swarm of journalists, not one voter! He said with a straight face that he expected to be in No 10 to an open mouthed BBC reporter.
He is lying to himself, to the camera and to the voters and he should hang his head in shame. He knows he will never march into Whitehall under FTP because it is rigged in favour of the big two.
Clegg does not understand the zeitgeist and is weaker for it. He has already flunked his historic destiny for himself and his party.
Stop pretending that the Lib Dems are anything other than 'kingmakers' and set out your stall for proportional representation and an end to this squalid excuse of a gerrymandered 'Representative Democracy', these opportunities only come along once every forty years. Ashdown was conned by Blair, and Clegg has clearly learned nothing from the experience.
All three parties are quibbling over Tax, the real issue is Constitutional Reform, I have never seen such depression in the public and the minor parties, knowing that no matter how hard they try and how much money is spent it will make very little difference to the Political Elite. The Rotten Parliament is about to be replaced by the squalid Parliament, full of party placemen, and with precious little mandate and legitimacy from the Electorate.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Agreed, it is to their shame that the prospect of a few red boxen handed out by the minority "winner" is more important than credibility or integrity.
It is not for me to dictate LibSocDem policy or platform, but I wish they'd have it as a non-negotiable pillar.
Now, the KIND of PR...
Advert in Mandarin deleted. If you want to advertise we will give you a rate.
I disagree Guthrum.
Simply put, any form of PR undermines the sovereignty bestowed to our elected MPs still further in favour of an unelected oligarchy backed up by EU diktat - it would he Jury Team by proxy - putting the difficult policy decisions to the EU, our own parliament left to squabble. Not to mention strengthening the main parties in place by making them amorphous; making kingmakers and horsetrading the norm.
Put even simpler we would become Italy ;-0.
An alternative, far simpler solution would be two-fold:
1. Include a "None of the Above" above option, which, if voted for in the majority precludes the top 3 candidates from running in the second round, their deposits lost.
2. After one year in office the candidate can be recalled on the basis of a vote above his electoral mandate but based on a total electorate vote not the popular (to ensure that the recall vote is an artefact of the will of those said mp represents, not a dedicated minority of activists). However, the vote to recall would be based on a petition representing the percentage of the populist vote, with an overall no vote leaving the candidate free till the next election, a yes triggering a by-election which they would be excluded from.
A better alternative would be to keep FPTP
Post a Comment