I am going to do some maths now with regards to the voting system know as Proportional Representation. Proportional representation (PR), sometimes referred to as full representation, is a type of voting system aimed at securing a close match between the percentage of votes that groups of candidates obtain in elections, and the percentage of seats they receive (e.g., in legislative assemblies).
Ralph Waldo Emerson said "Beware what you set your heart upon. For it shall surely be yours." I am just not sure the Lib Dems are aware of this nor anyone else for that matter.
Consider the election results in the European Election. Turnout across Great Britain was 15,136,932, representing 34% of the electorate. Which means first of all that no one gave a shit since it was such a profoundly pointless election anyway, more like elected dictatorship.
Conservative, votes received: 4,198,394
UKIP, votes received: 2,498,226
Labour, votes received: 2,381,760
Liberal Democrat, votes received: 2,080,613
Green, votes received: 1,223,303
BNP, votes received: 943,598
SNP, votes received: 321,007
Plaid Cymru, votes received: 126,702
Anyhow, 15,136,932 people turned out and that will form our main body from which the proportional system is based. If PR were used in a national election then a higher turnout would be expected somewhere around 30 million perhaps. But I want to demonstrate what would happen if the above number of voters in the EU Parliament election, were used for Westminster elections.
There are 646 seats in the British Parliament in Westminster.
The maths is trivial: Take the number of votes received per party, divide this by the total number of votes cast and take this number times the number of seats available i.e. 646. Then this is what would happen:
Conservative, seats received: 179
UKIP, seats received: 107
Labour, seats received: 102
Liberal Democrat, seats received: 89
Green, seats received: 52
BNP, seats received: 40
SNP, seats received: 14
Plaid Cymru, seats received: 5
Only the most naive and arrogant political pundit or mandarin would suggest that these results could never happen. This is politics, nothing is certain, who thought that arch-mongrel Nick Clegg would actually have a real shot at Nr 10 a few weeks ago? And this is the fundamental message of this exercise, if you adopt PR you will truly adopt elected dictatorship and the UK will most likely follow in the steps of every other major European nation: revolution, death, war and finally a shit coalition government to sort the mess out. The BNP would get 40 MPs for heavens sake! What is more, the LibDems love the EU yet the do not seem to realise that adopting PR might actually results in the UK leaving the EU. You might wonder then why I am so against the PR if it aids the UK leaving the EU, simple: I want to leave on the strength of argument not simple human shortcomings reflected in the PR system. I want to convince people, make them see and believe that the EU is a very very dangerous concept which does control our lives to a very high degree. If you convince by argument, reason and debate you win, if you do it with a hodgepodge coalition government who gave the people a say on the EU because of political advantage - that is not fair play. I do not care what the current political class or what the current 'Political Science' Degree tells its students; always country before party, those are my principles. Always.
The UK was taken into the EU on a lie, lets take her out on the truth.
Just because the establishment is drenched in dirty politics does not mean that we have to be; raising the bar is no particularly hard seeing as it is set so low already. Perhaps I am just a sucker for historical poetic justice but somehow I think it is wrong to change the constitutional settings for short term political gain. It leaves a very bad taste in the mouth.
However, we do get the final say on PR. The cattle are yet again queuing up to get whacked. Funny how they always fall for the same lame old story: the farmer just pretends that they’re going on a little trip to pastures new where everything is nice and sunny and lovely and the grass is greener etc. Today we have the politicos herding the bovines into the same old queue with the same old yarn and telling them that the politics is greener on far yonder hill, in the next valley, over the hill, just beyond the rainbow, round the bend.
Changing the system is the easy way to out, taking responsibility for their actions is not, clearly why no one is offering that platform.
By the by, you do not have to be a Ladbrokes Mathematician, with a PhD in statistics to work this out; I did it with Excel at 2AM in the morning.
5 comments:
"And this is the fundamental message of this exercise, if you adopt PR you will truly adopt elected dictatorship and the UK
Errr, wut?
You list the results, and then jump to this concluson, i don't really see the connection between the results you listed = electoral dictatorship. Do you actually want to explain your rational argument for this conclusion?
"The BNP would get 40 MPs for heavens sake!"
And why is this a problem?
Oh i see, you don't like X political party, so how dare they have elected representation!
I am glad you left a comment, and of course I will engage you in rational debate.
The speed of FPTP usually allows for a new government to take over power swiftly or if the incumbent government wins the general election, allows for a swift return for the continuation of government without too many disruptions to the political life of the nation.
FPTP has created within Great Britain a political system that is essentially stable as politics is dominated by just two parties. The chaos of the political systems of Italy and Israel is avoided using FPTP. Minority governments have occurred in the UK using FPTP, but the life span of those governments was limited. In recent years, governments have been strong as a result of the clear mandate given to it using the FPTP system.
With PR you cannot throw out the government, with FPTP you can. With PR you are doomed with coalition government which rarely if ever get their arse out of the van and do something. Look at Italy again. Look at Germany - the parties are so similar there that they agree with each other during debates. This is partially true here as well, but not to such a degree. You can still seperate blue, red and yellow.
As for the BNP. I would be very worried if they got a single MP as they are a very dangerous party. Naturally I would respect the view of the electorate would that to happen, but I would seriously start to question where it all went wrong (as I am doing in this blog). Immigration, too high, certainly, but I personally do not think it can be solved by the BNP as their methods are too extreme. Like Gordon Brown they espouse an entirely different point of view away from the media.
"The chaos of the political systems of Italy and Israel is avoided using FPTP"
Why pick these two countries in particular, and ignore other countries that have successful PR goverments?
"FPTP has created within Great Britain a political system that is essentially stable as politics is dominated by just two parties."
Well it depends on your definition of stable. What I have seen in my lifetime is a cycle of labour-con, or spend to breaking point, and then mop up the mess.
Would the last 10 years of prolific spending have happened under PR?
"Look at Germany"
The richest European country?
"With PR you are doomed with coalition government which rarely if ever get their arse out of the van and do something."
Which country has made sever austerity cuts, and has PR (no not Greece)?
And which country seriously needs to take such steps and hasn't (ours)
"As for the BNP. I would be very worried if they got a single MP as they are a very dangerous party."
But as your stats show, they would have gotten 40 seats out of 646, enough to get their voice heard (which a democratic elected party should be able to do), but not enough to seriously sway the results of votes.
Besides you make the argument that we should expose the EU, why not make the same argument for the BNP.
Give them their platform, let them be heard, let them be exposed for what they are.
Your argument here is pretty much a repeat of the first, You don't like the BNP, and so don't like a system that gives them any representation.
"The speed of FPTP usually allows for a new government to take over power swiftly or if the incumbent government wins the general election, allows for a swift return for the continuation of government without too many disruptions to the political life of the nation."
The same power that let's them do this, is the same power that let's them push through shitty legislation or "statutory instruments" much more forcefully. Especially as the queen never says no to anything, and the second chamber has been neutered.
With PR you are doomed with coalition government which rarely if ever get their arse out of the van and do something.
"Why pick these two countries in particular, and ignore other countries that have successful PR goverments?"
I note that you are not giving any examples.
"Well it depends on your definition of stable. What I have seen in my lifetime is a cycle of labour-con, or spend to breaking point, and then mop up the mess.
Would the last 10 years of prolific spending have happened under PR?"
You are assuming that the electorate has a collective memory and vote rationally. They do not. They never have. But I agree with you the last 10 years have been awful in terms of parliamentary democracy, in that there has been none. But I do not think changing the voting system would have changed that. Having leadership which was not completely demented would have helped.
"The richest European country?"
Dwindling to say the least, and besides that wealth is not derived from their voting system. Have you actually spoken to German people? They despise their politicians like we do but more because they are so similar and offer not change.
"Which country has made sever austerity cuts, and has PR (no not Greece)?
And which country seriously needs to take such steps and hasn't (ours)"
There are 192 countries recognised by the UN, you will have to help me out here. But again us not taking measures if because we have fucking Labour in the government, they are incompetent, we know that, but changing the voting system instead of taking responsbility in not the right way forward.
"But as your stats show, they would have gotten 40 seats out of 646, enough to get their voice heard (which a democratic elected party should be able to do), but not enough to seriously sway the results of votes.
Besides you make the argument that we should expose the EU, why not make the same argument for the BNP.
Give them their platform, let them be heard, let them be exposed for what they are.
Your argument here is pretty much a repeat of the first, You don't like the BNP, and so don't like a system that gives them any representation."
I do not like the BNP because they are racist and value people based upon the colour of their skin. If the electorate chooses them I will respect their decision but to not expect me to like it.
I make no case for exposing the EU. That does not need to be done, it is already exposed, everyone knows it is corrupt and we need out (well the majority at least) we just need to convince the MPs that this is so.
"The same power that let's them do this, is the same power that let's them push through shitty legislation or "statutory instruments" much more forcefully. Especially as the queen never says no to anything, and the second chamber has been neutered."
You know as well as I do that if the queen said no, constitutional monarchy would end. She would sign her own death warrant if parliament passed such a bill. She has no choice.
I hope you reply, this is a very interesting discussion.
"I note that you are not giving any examples."
Because there are about 70 countries that use it in some form, and I see no direct correlation between PR = bad government.
You have pointed to a few countries and made that correlation.
"but changing the voting system instead of taking responsibility in not the right way forward."
What does "taking responsibility" mean in this context?
Who is to take responsibility?
"(EU)we just need to convince the MPs that this is so."
I disagree, I meet many more people who are pro EU than not.
Hardly scientific though I agree, however I don't know of any really reliably way of knowing how many are pro or not. Most of the polls I see are not worth the paper they are written on as they are so biased or sample to small a populace.
"You know as well as I do that if the queen said no, constitutional monarchy would end. She would sign her own death warrant if parliament passed such a bill. She has no choice."
Which in a roundabout way confirms my point. With FPP you give that party the ability to do alot of stuff that they wouldn't be able to force through under PR.
Now if you happen to agree with the party, that's great.
If you are however the other 60% of the population (as most parties that win only get 40% of the vote), well it's not that great then is it.
"(germans)and besides that wealth is not derived from their voting system."
How are you judging bad governments here?
Bad laws, bad economy, corruption?
I don't see much of a difference between PR and FPP, other than PR reduces the chance of extremely stupid behaviour that can happen when lead by and incompetent or extremist, it restrains their madness somewhat.
I am not myself completly happy with PR, and would like to see something better.
but FFP is what causes my family, and some friends not to vote.
After all, under this system it seems so pointless voting, if you are not voting for one of the big 2/3.
I always vote for fringe parties, but it always seems such a waste in that they effectively have no power, I'd like to see choice that means more than voting for tweedledee or tweedledum.
"(germans)They despise their politicians like we do but more because they are so similar and offer not change."
Hehe.
I've yet to meet anyone who doesn't say the same about their politicians in any country under any system.
Post a Comment