The two largest parties got less than 60% of the national vote but over 80% of seats. FPTP is preventing us from being what we are: a multi party democracy.
I think it's a bad day to be criticising first past the post. Labour stole a bunch of seats from Farage with his kill-the-NHS policies, a turd who oughtn't to be allowed to attend D-day celebrations, given that he stands against almost everything that we fought the war for. Not sorry one bit for that disproportionality.
A proportional system would have been to Reform's benefit, but it would also have been to the Green's and SNP's.
IRV would have actually been to Labour's benefit in the two seats I randomly happened to notice. Though I'm sure there would also be some seats where it would've benefited the Tories.
But I think the most important thing is that belief in a better electoral system should not depend on which party world benefit. It should be about creating a more democratic outcome. And what we saw yesterday really highlighted how deeply undemocratic the UK is.
Could have had a Labour, LibDem, Green coalition with a helping of SNP with broader positive policies (actual policies, which are currently lacking from Labour) a strong mandate. Instead we have a Labour landslide on a thin voting base. Better than the last lot for sure, but this system is so in need of a reform.
You came so close in 2011. I wonder what could have happened if Clegg had stuck to his guns and insisted on a referendum on a proportional system, to remove the "progressive no" (to borrow a term from a recent Australian constitutional referendum) argument against the reform.
The Lib Dems got so excited about being granted a referendum that they forgot to take it seriously.
AV was a terrible system and arguably worse than FPTP. It's a more complicated system for people to vote in, and would potentially lead to even more disproportionate results.
Sorry but no. Absolutely no. The only downside is the ability to use it as an excuse not to upgrade to a proportional system in the future.
More complicated? Yeah, I guess. But not enough to actually matter. Not unless you think British people are just exceptionally stupid compared to Australians.
More disproportionate results? Impossible. They're both single-winner systems. The key difference is that FPTP allows a plurality to win while IRV requires a majority. It might create a situation where it seems less proportionate, but that's only because you reduce strategic voting so people are voting their true beliefs, so candidates that weren't going to win under either system end up getting more votes under IRV. But the ultimate result is that the candidate who wins in each electorate is the one who had the most support.
The British were given the choice and voted against proportional representation. They deserve the duopoly and everything that flows from it e.g. terrible healthcare, the illegal war in Iraq, royals, pointless and expensive aircraft carriers. They chose to leave the only institution that is defending their basic freedoms. These bigoted Dunning Kruger morons cannot be told.
What an utterly moronic stance that stems totally from your complete lack of understanding of what was actually offered.
Proportional representation was never on the table, what was offered was single transferable vote, which would keep the first past the post system but add the option to transfer your vote to another candidate if your preferred candidate lost. There was never proportional representation stop with the false narrative.
Instant Runoff was on the table in the 2011 referendum. Very similar to STV, but generally STV is what's referred to in a multi-winner situation. Australia uses STV in the Senate, as does the Irish Dáil. IRV is what Australia uses in the House of Representatives, and a few areas of the US, like Maine. STV actually is a proportional (or at least quasi-proportional) system, unlike IRV.
But you're right that unfortunately proportional representation has never been on the table in the UK. I don't agree with the guy's more recent takes on comedy and "free speech", but I have great respect for the fact that this is something John Cleese has been on about since 1987. And again in 1998. And most recently in 2018.
The reason a lot of people voted against it was that there was a concern that if it was implemented the government would consider themselves to have taken action and would just shut down any talk about proportional representation by arguing that we already had it. Even though we wouldn't have.
The theory was that by not voting for the weak source option the idea of proportional representation could be floated at a later date, and to be honest I actually agree with the analysis.
Not an unreasonable concern, to be honest. In politics there is often a balance to be struck between "letting the perfect be the enemy of the good", and "not allowing a weak compromise option that's just not good enough to pass because it's ever so slightly better than the status quo".
We use IRV for our House of Representatives, which is by far the more politically significant chamber, and it sucks. Our most recent federal election saw just 4 Greens MPs elected after an absolute record performance for them (their previous best was 1). That's 2.7% of seats from their over 12% of first-preference votes (not to mention votes for closely-aligned minor parties like Animal Justice Party). Labor (yes...we spell it the American way in this one specific context, for some reason) got 51.3% of seats from 32.6% of the first preference votes.
But on the other hand, it is better than FPTP. Enormously better. Those 4 Greens seats would probably be 0 with FPTP, because who would vote for them? They first got into Parliament thanks to receiving preferences, and many of the new seats they won in 2022 were dangerously tight. I know even as an ardent Greens supporter, I would never have voted for the Greens under FPTP, because I'd be terrified of increasing the chance that the conservative LNP won instead of Labor.
If I were voting in the UK in a referendum like the 2011 one, I don't know how I would vote. Probably yes, but the threat of stalling any progress to an even better system is strong enough it's hard to blame people who vote no on that grounds.
The British were given the choice and voted against proportional representation. They deserve the duopoly and everything that flows from that e.g. terrible healthcare, the illegal war in Iraq,
But whoever they poll to determine the points makes me sometimes feel utterly insane watching the show. When they don't know obscure Australian towns as well as me, that's one thing, and not very surprising. But when major Disney Renaissance films, or some other thing that to me is part of the most fundamental 21st century culture, scores in the low 20s, it makes it very hard to relate to the show.
If the polling was done by an audience more representative of the general population in terms of age, instead of clearly skewing very old, it would be greatly to the show's benefit.
I'm watching the BBC program, currently just discussing the exit poll before any official results.
Exit poll shows conservatives losing 241 seats, Labour landslide predicted with 410 seats. Not a huge surprise, but a welcome start.
I did find it entertaining that the labour guest in the show is congratulating Kier Starmer and Co. On a job well done, when really this is almost entirely caused by Tory self destruction.
Peter Mandelson? I think he had a point in that Starmer has changed the party from unelectable with Corbyn (which sadly, they were) to a more than realistic prospect for a sensible alternative to the Tories.
You're right of course that the Conservatives have utterly fucked the pooch (not to mention the country) but Starmer has nonetheless made a massive change in making the party palatable to many, many more people (not that I personally agree with quite a lot of his policies and policy reversals)
I agree, and I do infinitely prefer Corbyn. I didn't vote Labour this time. I think the nuance here is that Corbyn motivated Tory voters to vote against him, whereas Starmer was less threatening to them, so they didn't worry so much about vote splitting or staying home
I don't want to see Reform get any seats really when it's filled with people like this.
They're just a live action version of the Daily Mail. They only believe immigrants and trans people are a problem because Farage and his crew tell them so. Otherwise I bet those groups of people have barely any impact on their daily lives whatsoever.
Oh good, so now Truss can now piss off too the US and moan about the apparent conspiracy that was against her all she likes, and it won't inconvenience her constituents anymore.
And of course no one in the US will really care, because will have no idea who the hell she is.
Yeah. She has convinced herself that her complete failure is a result of a grand conspiracy. This conspiracy requires some of the most uncharitable and profit driven people in the world, to be bleeding heart liberals, which is why no one believes it.
Apparently a bunch of venture capitalists, economists and fellow politicians decided that, rather than making vast sums of money under her "brilliant" scheme, it was instead better to crash the economy just despite her.
This is clearly a great result, but I think that given the popular vote, that it's important to accept that this election was anti-tory, not pro-labour.
Labour have five years to make a substantial tangible change in people's lives or we may very well find ourselves back where we left off or even worse.
Not really a bad thing. Reform plus the Lib Dems attacking fptp. Means both right and right of centre. (Pretty much the only views available under fptp
). Will have strong options for voters to switch vote and split the fptp possibility of a win for them. This may end up the final option that forces PR of some form.
Honestly, as close as both sides are. It's the first time both the government and the opposition has had parties truly risking a future split in the vote.
Jacob Rees Mogg suggesting Conservatives were demolished because they weren't far right enough. Interviewer says "don't you think maybe it's because you let down the centre?" And Mogg is like "no way. Maggy Thatcher is based."
I mean, I hate him, but he's right. Reform are basically the newest farage far right party, so the rabid nazis of britain aren't satisfied with the bullshit the tories are serving up.
EDIT : they got fed up of still seeing ethnic minorities after brexit, and don't want to vote for an ethnic minority for prime minister. It's disgusting.
Except apart from the proud ex BNP the motives for voting Reform seem to come from a scared impotent scarcity helplessness. It's a "all these immigrants taking my stuff and my opportunities and there isn't enough to go round" - if they're paid properly and the NHS works the far right is less appealing. 🤞
Historically, people turn to the far right when things are going terribly wrong. The conservatives ran the country into the ground and legitimised everything the far right stood for, then were upset that people started voting far right. I say it was unsurprising. Why not vote Reform if you're a rabid racist and your usual party are about the same policywise but have a boring British Asian leader instead of a white laddish thug of a politician?
If things get significantly better for folks, there's less motivation to vote in desperation.
Cons lost their votes to the nazis more often than the Lib Dems.
I left britain years ago when brexit happened, that country is stupid, and I wish the people that still live there the best of luck.
I also would like to remind them that I wasted much air trying to convince them that voting LD wasn't a waste of time, but for some reason, 4 million of them can be convinced to vote for a third party, but only if it's racist enough, and not civil liberties oriented enough.
Starmer didn't win this election, the tories lost it due to a split vote.
Labour
total votes 9,686,329
share 33.7%
share change +1.6
This doesn't look like the extremely winning party that run an extremely successful campaign. It looks like a bunch of chancers that got lucky flipping seats due to split voter base of nazis.
I'm not even optimistic that center left starmer is going to do anything all that impressive to be honest. I hope I'm wrong, I think Biden is doing great and getting no credit. Best of luck to him and to Britain, I hope things get better in that country.
My favourite quote: ‘Rees-Mogg congratulated the Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer, on “what seems to be a historic victory”, adding, as his final thought, “from the ashes of disaster grow the roses of success. So thank you very much everybody, and good night.”’
I can only read this as him admitting publicly that he and the Tories are a complete disaster.
Only one opposed to the trend. So long while before we can be sure.
But if it continures. Lab holds having huge reform vote. But Tory loss them being 3rd. It would support most Tories, only voting reform when they know Tories won't win. But hesitating when a reform win is possible. (edit: possible to prevent what they see as a more sane party)
This is as late as I can stand. I'll check back in the morning for the final scores. If it was anything resembling a closer election I might have stayed up. I'm hoping the exit poll has over estimated the tories and reform, with a few extra opposition parties.
Reform only on 4 instead of ~17 from the exit poll and the greens got 4 seats instead of 2! Happy days.
I would be a bit worried about proportional representation for parties like reform as they seem to have come second in a larger number of constituencies.
I've just switched over to watch Sky News' feed on YouTube. The allow chat, which for a serious news organisation is absolutely wild to me.
And the chatters are absolutely insane. Not in a good way. There's no attempt to discuss anything, just people spamming "💙💙 REFORM IS RISING 💙💙" and "🟥🟥 Labour Forever 🟥🟥🟥🟥". And weirdest of all, many variations on "netherite helmet trim".
But honestly, other YouTube live streams I've watched have actually had really great chats. Lots of fun discussion with other chatters or between chat and the streamer. I wouldn't expect a news org to be engaging with the chat themselves, but I would have hoped that chat could talk amongst themselves in a civil manner. I'm kinda disappointed how they're not.
After seeing the first few results come in, my main worry is how Starmer's Labour will react to the rise of Reform. If Labour cannot visibly begin to turn things around, and they also fail to effectively counter the building populist undercurrent, we could be heading for some dark times.
We will have to see what exactly Starmer's Labour will actually do once it has power.
Two Tories defected to them, and neither of them were standing for election this time, it was just a gesture against Sunak (although I do wish Labour had told them to fuck off).
And as for the S*n, they just put their weight behind whoever is going to win.
Labour and Starmer are far from perfect, but I think they will be far better, even if just from a competence and basic human decency standpoint.
And as for the S*n, they just put their weight behind whoever is going to win.
I was a bit surprised the S*n did switch to Labour. From what I've heard there still a grudge amongst Murdoch and his minions towards Starmer, due the prosecutions he pursued as DPP during the phone hacking scandal.
I wouldn't read too much into the Sun endorsement. Murdoch hates to be wrong, and they would have come out in favour much earlier in the campaign if they were actually ideologically aligned.
Considering some were suggesting a chance Sunak would lose his own seat, his victory is pretty overwhelming. Even if you try simulating an IRV vote where everyone apart from Reform preferences Labour, the distribution would still see Labour fall 5 thousand votes behind the tories before you distribute Reform's votes to the Conservatives. A 62% victory on 2 candidate preferred once all is said and done.
I'm not too far away and I'm hoping the area has some common sense, it's always blue here as well. Although my wife said many votes have been lost as some people didn't know about voter ID. Bloody Tories, it hasnt helped here though has it!
Looking at how Reform and Lib Dems made significant gains in vote share you have to wonder if its still worth Labour chasing after the right wing vote that Reform achieved. I just do not see the where the voters who voted Reform actually believe Starmer on the key issues that Reform campaigned on, immigration, anti "woke", and Brexit. I cannot see Labour ever gaining the lead on those issues over someone like Farage who will always position himself to the right of whatever Labour or the Tories campaign on. I cant even see Labour being trusted at the voting booth on these right wing issues over a rebuilt Tory party. Its a fools errand to try.
The Lib Dem vote share, as with Reform, boosted by previous Tory voters but Lib Dems campaigned on almost the opposite of Reform (with some tactical, local, NIMBYism) and achieved way more seats on a lower overall percentage vote than Reform. If you are going to pick a direction to go in, wouldn't it make more sense to move towards the Lib Dems position to shore up in time for the next election?
Labour did worse total percentage of the vote than 2017, its more that the Tories collapsed losing about 20% of their vote that caused this swing in seats. The Tories will rally next time around and a lot of the seats look winnable for them with only a small local swing. The current stance of Labour simply isn't popular enough to be a vote winner against a rebuilt Tory party.
Yes, but I think you're overstating how right wing Labour pitched it. There were no claims to be anti woke. I think it was a pretty firmly centrist pitch. It's the Conservatives who are going to panic and try to out-nutcase Farage. Labour are going to try and be responsible and fix the broken ship. It's just whether they can do it fast enough for people to notice a big improvement in the cost of living vs wages problem.
Are you forgetting Starmers statements around women only spaces as it seems like it.
Farages entire point of existence is to drag the overton window to the right, which he succeed yet again, particularly around Brexit.
The other big concession Starmer made, this time because of the Tories, was not to raise taxes, which was also incredibly dumb. As was honouring triple lock.
My biggest issue with Starmer making claims like these is that he will stick to them. Someone like Boris is too lazy and an out and out liar so has no problem dropping things. Starmers big pitch to be different is that he will stick with what he says.
By sticking to what he said around terfs issues, Brexit, taxes, he really fucks his options in these areas, and for what? As you and I have both said, toil not out crazy Farage or be trusted by people who these are important issues for, so it's a massively stupid thing to do.
Anyone got that link that recalculates the results of the GE by different voting systems? For example if we had a form of PR how would this election turned out? I swear it was posted here a few days ago.
Direct proportional representation is easy enough. Just look at the number of votes each party got, and assign that percentage to their overall parliamentary representation. That roughly gives you the answer.
IRV is more interesting, but more complicated. It relies on some assumptions (e.g. Green, SNP, LibDem, Labour all preference each other 100%, Conservatives & Reform preference each other 100%) and takes a lot of effort to do on a seat-by-seat basis. And of course it all assumes ceteris paribus, when in actuality people would vote differently if the voting system were different.
As one example, here's the seat of Tatton:
Under IRV, with the above assumptions, Labour's Ryan Jude would have won with 26,005 votes to Conservative Esther McVey's 25,904. But tweak those assumptions just slightly (give 90% of LibDem votes to Labour, 10% to Conservatives) and it could go the other way (26,365 CON to 25,544 LAB). There are dozens or scores of seats where these sorts of interesting hypotheticals can be asked and analysed. IRV is actually, in my opinion, the next-worst voting system after FPTP (if you exclude weird and rarely-used ones like approval voting, range voting, etc.), but it's one of the most interesting to do analysis with.
STV is an utterly impossible comparison to make, because it relies on multi-seat electorates, which would probably be done by merging existing electorates into groups of 3–8. STV is a more generalised case of IRV so if you decided on how to do those merges, then you can get even more interesting analysis. As one example, if we imagine a merged electorate involving West Ham, East Ham, Ilford North, Ilford South, Leyton & Wanstead, and Stratford & Bow. Some assumptions are necessary to make this work, my assumption is that anyone whose party name says "workers" or "socialist" preferences Green and then Labour, while those mentioning religion preference Conservative, and if I don't know, I'm giving them to LibDems then Labour. I'm also assuming all voters for a named party vote as a block, preferencing the same candidate 1st, 2nd, etc., while independents get the votes as they were actually given. This is somewhat realistic because ballot paper design can be set up to encourage this in an STV context (see how Australia does it with "above the line" voting in the Senate, for an example). I've merged the minor parties named "workers" or "socialist" into a single party.
::: spoiler A detailed explanation of my calculation is contained here.
In our merged hypothetical under STV, they win 3.03 quotas on first preference, Conservative wins 0.88, Reform 0.41, LibDem 0.28, Green 0.78. So Labour immediately win 3 seats, before 0.03 quotas are distributed lower down in their party. After numerous more rounds (my attached spreadsheet simplifies multiple rounds that by eye would obviously not result in a new quota being reached being merged down into 1), the LibDems win a quota. I've decided to distribute their excess 50/50 to Green and Conservative, since Labour has already been eliminated. To be frank, after that I'm not sure what to do. LibDems having been eliminated, the 3 remaining independents can't go to them as was my initial plan (the basic thinking being independents are probably more centrist, but LibDems and Labour being eliminated already. I've decided to give them 50/50 to Conservative and Green, but the reality could be so, so much more complex. After one of those is eliminated, Conservatives get a quota. One final independent distributed to Conservatives/Green and the Greens win the last quota.
:::
This is Labour heartland and in FPTP Labour won all 6 of these seats. My calculation ends up with 3 Labour, 1 LibDem, 1 Conservative, and 1 Green.
MMP ends up with basically the same overall result as direct proportional, but can be interesting in terms of independents & very minor parties and resulting overhang seats.
Given, many systems require more than just marking one box. While, even those that do not, would drastically change how people choose their vote.
I am unsure any such site can give a realistic result from available data?
Edit:
If we just assume proportional based on % of vote yesterday.
Tor 22.9%
Lab 35.2%
LDe 11.3%
Ref 14.5%
SNP 2.5%
Oth 13.6%
It is bloody hard to see how either party could form a viable 50% Lab LD SNP and a few independents would take it over 50. But honestly, it is hard to imagine that working with the politicians voted yesterday. Tory Ref would need all independents. So less likely to work.
But as I said. Voters would go to the polls with very different ideas about how to vote.
"Other" is not all independents. 6.8% of the vote share was Green, and 0.8% is between Workers Party and Social Democratic Party who, based purely on the names, I cannot possibly imagine would ever back the Conservatives. Unless LibDems were to support that coalition (which, after the 2010 Government I cannot imagine they'd be super keen on), there is no path to a Tory Government from these results under a proportional system. Labour can form a Government with just LibDem, SNP, and Green parties.
An independent (SNP) and unionist (Labour) party would be hard-pressed to form a government.
But again the whole idea of the votes being identicle under a vastyyly different system
Honestly the big question would be how government is formed. With seat numbers matching % of vote. under our current system. Labour could run a weak gov by depending on greens snp and others never supporting a tor ref vonc.
But with centre right lab, it is likely only ld and lab would be garmented to support most policy votes. Others, often refusing because it's not left enough and not right enough at the same time.
Unfortunately, while the right has clasped over this election. The right has a long history of unity to fight the left.
An independent (SNP) and unionist (Labour) party would be hard-pressed to form a government.
Would they? Outside of the question of independence, the two parties agree on more than not, don't they? If they alternative is no functioning government, couldn't you see Labour giving some minor concession to the SNP (like maybe allowing Holyrood to have power over one or two of the things that was recently denied by the Supreme Court) in exchange for the SNP's support in Confidence?
the big question would be how government is formed
I'm not really sure what you mean. (It doesn't help that the rest of that paragraph is ridden by typos to the point of being unintelligible. Sorry.) Government would be formed the same way they do it in Germany or New Zealand or any of the many other countries with proportional systems. They would find a way to reach a majority by agreeing on whatever compromises are palatable to both sides. In a hypothetical where the SNP had way more seats, Labour might have to agree to a second independence referendum. If they really needed Green support they might agree to pass strong climate legislation. They might have to give the LibDems a couple of significant cabinet positions. Proportional systems force politicians to actually do politics and pass legislation that is supported by a majority of people, instead of giving a single party a majority of seats based on a minority of people supporting them.
SNPs manifesto included it as a key point. So actual coalition government. Well look at how lib dems got hit over student fees. SNP voters would feel the same having voted for an independence party.
Hence why labour have faced the question at all past elections where a win os less probable amd denied they would form such a coalition.
But as said. A confodence amd supply agreement where snp agree to non confidence votes. Is probable on such situs.
Their last two Labour MPs not only were kicked out in scandal, but also ran in this election splitting the vote. It looks like the Lib Dems also got a significant vote share which has helped the Tories.
I don't see how that makes them vulnerable though. I can't see the reform voters going back to the conservatives so reform are going to continue to split the conservative vote forever.
Similarly to what happened with UKIP, the Tories will just take Reforms policies, bring in new further-right leadership and support will come back.
Especially after Labour (who just got elected on a fairly bland centrist manifesto) won't manage to magically fix things in 2-3 years. Conservative media will blame Labour for all the issues (even though most are the fault of the Tories) and Conservative voters will rally around the banner of "Labour out!".
Or Reform just eats the Tories, which seems a but less likely to me, but either way the split won't last.
But one of the main reasons that the conservatives are so unpopular is because they've been chasing the right and leaving the centralist politics basically defended, which is why Labour wandered over there, and they have clearly done well out of that.
They have done well but they only won because Reform stole votes from the Tories, and because of the voting system, those votes go in the bin. Labour barely got a third of the national vote.
I'm not convinced that the Tories downfall were their right wing policies, most people are thinking of partygate, Lizz Trusses disaster budget and the cost of living crisis in the ballot box.
I personally think that labour would have won whether they were trying to court centrists or not and labours biggest risk is that the the Tories will mop up the reform vote.
This election shows that the Tories still have a HUGE core vote, these are people that will never vote labour and I think chasing reform voters is a fools errand because it's likely they'll never vote labour either.
In 1993 in Canada, there was a Reform party that along with the BQ, split the Tories so much that the latter won only 2 seats. Though not as badly, the splitting was repeated in 1997, and 2000. Then they (i.e. Reform, renamed Alliance, and the Progressive Conservatives) merged. After that to present they were in government for about 9 years, over half as a minority. Presently 118 Canadian MPs are Conservative.
So if Canada is a guide, Farage might be replaced, then the replacement replaced by one maybe born in the early 1980s and one who will be compared to a Vulcan. Reform will merge with the Conservatives, and he will become leader, and will run the Conservatives for over 10 years. During this time, he will lead minority government for about 4 years and then a majority another for about 5 years; but all of this won't happen for at least 10 years.
I'm watching the ITV feed on YouTube. Dunno what other people actually from the UK would recommend because I don't really know the British media landscape.
They're currently discussing the issue of Scottish independence. I must say, I find it very frustrating, including from Nicola Sturgeon. As a complete outsider, it would seem to me the number 1 reason in favour of a second referendum is very simple: "you'll not be allowed back into the EU if you secede from the UK" was a major campaign point during the first referendum. And then 2 years later England voted to leave the EU anyway. How is Sturgeon not bringing this up?
I’m watching the ITV feed on YouTube. Dunno what other people actually from the UK would recommend because I don’t really know the British media landscape.
ITV will be just fine. The Beeb's coverage is usually pretty definitive.
Unfortunately BBC doesn't seem to be live streamed on YouTube. Or if it does, it didn't turn up in my search. I was choosing between ITV, Sky News (I know Sky in the UK isn't quite the same as Sky here in Aus, but the stink of that name is very hard for me to shake off), something called "TalkTV", and two separate feeds from "The Times and The Sunday Times". Oh, and CNN, but that's just silly.
They bring that up regularly, but it's a false equivalence. At the time of the independence vote it was absolutely true to claim that voting No was true best way to stay in the EU. There was no expectation, none, from anyone that Brexit was on the way. So, at the time, if Europe was the issue then voting to stay in the UK was the logical choice to make.
As for now - well, Swinney (and before him Sturgeon herself) was talking in terms of winning a majority of seats being a mandate for opening independence talks. That's clearly nonsense, since a majority of seats is possible with a fairly small plurality of votes. And, it's looking like it's a moot point anyway, since the SNP seems to have taken a right good kicking this time round.
So Sturgeon is probably not bringing this up tonight because she'd look ridiculous to do so given the (apparent) results in Scotland tonight. If this was a referendum on independence as she and Swinney have suggested, then the result would appear to be a solid No.
According to the conversation tonight, not even a majority of seats, but a plurality.
Anyway you're absolutely right that given the tact that they had chosen it's hard to read today's projected result as anything other than a failure. But I was speaking more about when the conversation turned away from the direct outcome of today's results and more towards the general longer-term future prospects for independence. I don't recognise any of their other panellists (pic attached below), but the guy on Sturgeon's left (camera right) and to a lesser extent the other panellists were making reference to the fact that the previous referendum failed and how no future government would ever allow another referendum (with the exception of if Labour relied on the SNP to form a minority government, which was thought possible a year ago). That's when it would have seemed obvious to me for Sturgeon to point out the false promise that led to the result in 2014.
The one thing i can agree with reform on is electoral reform. unfortunately all the racism, homophonia and general goose-stepping made it so i couldn't vote for him.
Plus lib dems are better placed to actually make it happen.
unfortunately i was one of the absolute tools that voted no on the AV vote back in 2010ish
Honestly I can hardly blame you. It was set up to fail the moment Clegg agreed to let it be about IRV instead of a proportional system. That meant it was under assault from both sides which meant it never had a chance.
This year's general election, after all the votes counted, has a
Sainte-Laguë index of 48.36, and a
Gallagher index of 23.75.
This makes the (dis)proportionality worse than HUNGARY's (my home) FPTP component (SLI = 36.96) – a component of the mixed system which allows our ruling party to get 2/3 supermajorities each time, every time, with sometimes less than 50% of the votes, and which ultimately transformed our country to an "electoral autocracy"
You guys need electoral reform desperately. And do it before someone cheats with the current rules deliberately.
(PS: I calculated the electoral indices using the python package voting)
73 in Keir Starmer's electorate voted "for more than one candidate". I'd love to see what those ballots looked like. Or to speak with those voters. Was it a change of mind that they thought they could just cross out? Did they think they were doing an IRV vote? Approval voting? Was it just a deliberate nonsense protest vote?
A recount is called if one of the sides requires one. Obviously if you only had a difference of 10 votes, it'd be daft not to demand recount, but technically it only happens if a candidate requests one.
Remember the votes are technically recounted already. They are counted three times, by three separate people, who don't know what the other two people have found as results, so they cannot be influenced by their number. If all three people get the same answer, the count is probably correct, discounting incredibly bad luck, which is statistically unlikely.
If a recount is requested then three new people perform the task just to discount the possibility of collusion.
Am I calculating this correctly that it's now been nearly 4 hours since polls closed? How have we only heard 2% of results? You don't even have preferences to distribute.
But how is it so slow? We'd have far more results than that in Australia, despite a much more complicated process where we have to do the first count just like this, and then additionally distribute preferences. And then also count the Senate results.
Does your electoral commission just not hire enough people?
I'm from Australia, and here I know that it's a fairly common misconception that the AEC vote counting staff are volunteers. But they're not. They're hired to work on the day, and only on the day, with a little online training beforehand. They're paid minimum wage at casual loading rates. Usually they work the whole day issuing votes and then switch to counting once polls have closed. There are also "scrutineers", who are volunteers (IIRC they legally must be volunteers, not paid) representing the candidates/parties, who watch the counting process and may challenge how a ballot has been counted, but may not ever touch.
Majority just means a larger number. The word has nothing to do with above 50%.
It is just used so in parliament because all non government seats can vote against the government, so to have the largest voting block you must have more then any other group.
As that is not the case in a constituency election, 1 vote over each other party is a referred to as a majority.
"A plurality vote (in North American English) or relative majority (in British English)[1] describes the circumstance when a party, candidate, or proposition polls more votes than any other but does not receive more than half of all votes cast."
(countable) A number or part of a whole which is greater than any other number or part, but not necessarily a majority.
(countable) A number of votes for a single candidate or position which is greater than the number of votes gained by any other single candidate or position voted for, but which is less than a majority of valid votes cast.
Synonym: relative majority
(countable) A margin by which a number exceeds another number, especially of votes.
sometimes called a "relative majority" in British English
Which has been simplified to just majority in the normal parlance in political coverage in the UK (see BBC, Sky News etc. in their coverage, they all use majority to mean relative majority when reporting on GE election results)
In first past the post elections "a majority of X" means the winner got X more votes than the second place. Words can have multiple ways of being used.
In the parliament, yes. But there is no such concept in a seat. There majority can only be the dictionary def. As 50% makes no difference to the seats' winner under fptp. Only who has the most votes.
And the dictionary def has no relation to 50%. Because it is an English term, not as political one. Heck, even in parliament, it's a more media term to help explain who has the ability to control votes.
With the projected majority, he doesn't have to lurch anywhere. It's the Tories that are going to feel forced to get nastier and it could be the final nail in their coffin. JRM has already been on suggesting they've neglected their "core", which seems to be racists.
Agree with both points here but wrt. the possibility Kier lurching to the right I particularly agree. Left wing pals on whatsapp and folks online are being way too pessimistic about the prospects of the labour government not delivering left wing policies. Having played it safe during the campaign, Kier has a majority which gives him way more latitude to implement whatever policies make sense.
I wish people could be able to take the W and enjoy it for one night without cynicism or pessimism.
First Past the Post, everybody:
That's:
The two largest parties got less than 60% of the national vote but over 80% of seats. FPTP is preventing us from being what we are: a multi party democracy.
I think it's a bad day to be criticising first past the post. Labour stole a bunch of seats from Farage with his kill-the-NHS policies, a turd who oughtn't to be allowed to attend D-day celebrations, given that he stands against almost everything that we fought the war for. Not sorry one bit for that disproportionality.
Every day is a good day to criticise FPTP.
A proportional system would have been to Reform's benefit, but it would also have been to the Green's and SNP's.
IRV would have actually been to Labour's benefit in the two seats I randomly happened to notice. Though I'm sure there would also be some seats where it would've benefited the Tories.
But I think the most important thing is that belief in a better electoral system should not depend on which party world benefit. It should be about creating a more democratic outcome. And what we saw yesterday really highlighted how deeply undemocratic the UK is.
Could have had a Labour, LibDem, Green coalition with a helping of SNP with broader positive policies (actual policies, which are currently lacking from Labour) a strong mandate. Instead we have a Labour landslide on a thin voting base. Better than the last lot for sure, but this system is so in need of a reform.
And the depressing thing is that it will never change because the only parties with the power to change it benefit from the current system.
You came so close in 2011. I wonder what could have happened if Clegg had stuck to his guns and insisted on a referendum on a proportional system, to remove the "progressive no" (to borrow a term from a recent Australian constitutional referendum) argument against the reform.
The Lib Dems got so excited about being granted a referendum that they forgot to take it seriously.
AV was a terrible system and arguably worse than FPTP. It's a more complicated system for people to vote in, and would potentially lead to even more disproportionate results.
Sorry but no. Absolutely no. The only downside is the ability to use it as an excuse not to upgrade to a proportional system in the future.
More complicated? Yeah, I guess. But not enough to actually matter. Not unless you think British people are just exceptionally stupid compared to Australians.
More disproportionate results? Impossible. They're both single-winner systems. The key difference is that FPTP allows a plurality to win while IRV requires a majority. It might create a situation where it seems less proportionate, but that's only because you reduce strategic voting so people are voting their true beliefs, so candidates that weren't going to win under either system end up getting more votes under IRV. But the ultimate result is that the candidate who wins in each electorate is the one who had the most support.
"The conservatives and lib dems look pretty proportional to me. 10/10 voting system" /s
The British were given the choice and voted against proportional representation. They deserve the duopoly and everything that flows from it e.g. terrible healthcare, the illegal war in Iraq, royals, pointless and expensive aircraft carriers. They chose to leave the only institution that is defending their basic freedoms. These bigoted Dunning Kruger morons cannot be told.
What an utterly moronic stance that stems totally from your complete lack of understanding of what was actually offered.
Proportional representation was never on the table, what was offered was single transferable vote, which would keep the first past the post system but add the option to transfer your vote to another candidate if your preferred candidate lost. There was never proportional representation stop with the false narrative.
Instant Runoff was on the table in the 2011 referendum. Very similar to STV, but generally STV is what's referred to in a multi-winner situation. Australia uses STV in the Senate, as does the Irish Dáil. IRV is what Australia uses in the House of Representatives, and a few areas of the US, like Maine. STV actually is a proportional (or at least quasi-proportional) system, unlike IRV.
But you're right that unfortunately proportional representation has never been on the table in the UK. I don't agree with the guy's more recent takes on comedy and "free speech", but I have great respect for the fact that this is something John Cleese has been on about since 1987. And again in 1998. And most recently in 2018.
The reason a lot of people voted against it was that there was a concern that if it was implemented the government would consider themselves to have taken action and would just shut down any talk about proportional representation by arguing that we already had it. Even though we wouldn't have.
The theory was that by not voting for the weak source option the idea of proportional representation could be floated at a later date, and to be honest I actually agree with the analysis.
Not an unreasonable concern, to be honest. In politics there is often a balance to be struck between "letting the perfect be the enemy of the good", and "not allowing a weak compromise option that's just not good enough to pass because it's ever so slightly better than the status quo".
We use IRV for our House of Representatives, which is by far the more politically significant chamber, and it sucks. Our most recent federal election saw just 4 Greens MPs elected after an absolute record performance for them (their previous best was 1). That's 2.7% of seats from their over 12% of first-preference votes (not to mention votes for closely-aligned minor parties like Animal Justice Party). Labor (yes...we spell it the American way in this one specific context, for some reason) got 51.3% of seats from 32.6% of the first preference votes.
But on the other hand, it is better than FPTP. Enormously better. Those 4 Greens seats would probably be 0 with FPTP, because who would vote for them? They first got into Parliament thanks to receiving preferences, and many of the new seats they won in 2022 were dangerously tight. I know even as an ardent Greens supporter, I would never have voted for the Greens under FPTP, because I'd be terrified of increasing the chance that the conservative LNP won instead of Labor.
If I were voting in the UK in a referendum like the 2011 one, I don't know how I would vote. Probably yes, but the threat of stalling any progress to an even better system is strong enough it's hard to blame people who vote no on that grounds.
And time travelling powers apparently 🤣🤣😂.
🤡
What's wrong with Pointless? It beats the shit out of most game shows.
Pointless is a fucking great premise for a game.
But whoever they poll to determine the points makes me sometimes feel utterly insane watching the show. When they don't know obscure Australian towns as well as me, that's one thing, and not very surprising. But when major Disney Renaissance films, or some other thing that to me is part of the most fundamental 21st century culture, scores in the low 20s, it makes it very hard to relate to the show.
If the polling was done by an audience more representative of the general population in terms of age, instead of clearly skewing very old, it would be greatly to the show's benefit.
Let's hope polling standards maintain their upwards trajectory.
It's a Tory wipeout in Wales!
CON: 0 (-12)
Love to see it.
I'm watching the BBC program, currently just discussing the exit poll before any official results.
Exit poll shows conservatives losing 241 seats, Labour landslide predicted with 410 seats. Not a huge surprise, but a welcome start.
I did find it entertaining that the labour guest in the show is congratulating Kier Starmer and Co. On a job well done, when really this is almost entirely caused by Tory self destruction.
Peter Mandelson? I think he had a point in that Starmer has changed the party from unelectable with Corbyn (which sadly, they were) to a more than realistic prospect for a sensible alternative to the Tories.
You're right of course that the Conservatives have utterly fucked the pooch (not to mention the country) but Starmer has nonetheless made a massive change in making the party palatable to many, many more people (not that I personally agree with quite a lot of his policies and policy reversals)
That's a fair take, and yes it was Mandelson.
Interestingly, Labour have less of the vote (proportionaly) than when Corbyn was at the helm.
I agree, and I do infinitely prefer Corbyn. I didn't vote Labour this time. I think the nuance here is that Corbyn motivated Tory voters to vote against him, whereas Starmer was less threatening to them, so they didn't worry so much about vote splitting or staying home
here is the entire exit poll for everyone interested btw:
I don't want to see Reform get any seats really when it's filled with people like this.
They're just a live action version of the Daily Mail. They only believe immigrants and trans people are a problem because Farage and his crew tell them so. Otherwise I bet those groups of people have barely any impact on their daily lives whatsoever.
Ree Smog is out! I repeat, Ree Smog is out!
Yes, despite many leftists decrying Labour's centreward shift, I think this is a good result. This result was helped by that shift in no small part.
Starmer is very well spoken and his morning after speech does well to inspire confidence.
Top hat wanker! Truss lost too, this is amazing.
Oh good, so now Truss can now piss off too the US and moan about the apparent conspiracy that was against her all she likes, and it won't inconvenience her constituents anymore.
And of course no one in the US will really care, because will have no idea who the hell she is.
Is she that head of lettuce who killed the queen?
Yeah. She has convinced herself that her complete failure is a result of a grand conspiracy. This conspiracy requires some of the most uncharitable and profit driven people in the world, to be bleeding heart liberals, which is why no one believes it.
Apparently a bunch of venture capitalists, economists and fellow politicians decided that, rather than making vast sums of money under her "brilliant" scheme, it was instead better to crash the economy just despite her.
This is clearly a great result, but I think that given the popular vote, that it's important to accept that this election was anti-tory, not pro-labour.
Labour have five years to make a substantial tangible change in people's lives or we may very well find ourselves back where we left off or even worse.
Countdown to Smog reappearing as a Reform candidate?
Just seen Count Binface arrive for the count, shit just got real.
Looks like Reform got a lot of votes despite not getting many seats. Those nasty cunts aren’t going to shut up about this for the next 4 years.
Not really a bad thing. Reform plus the Lib Dems attacking fptp. Means both right and right of centre. (Pretty much the only views available under fptp ). Will have strong options for voters to switch vote and split the fptp possibility of a win for them. This may end up the final option that forces PR of some form.
Honestly, as close as both sides are. It's the first time both the government and the opposition has had parties truly risking a future split in the vote.
Jacob Rees Mogg suggesting Conservatives were demolished because they weren't far right enough. Interviewer says "don't you think maybe it's because you let down the centre?" And Mogg is like "no way. Maggy Thatcher is based."
😬
I mean, I hate him, but he's right. Reform are basically the newest farage far right party, so the rabid nazis of britain aren't satisfied with the bullshit the tories are serving up.
EDIT : they got fed up of still seeing ethnic minorities after brexit, and don't want to vote for an ethnic minority for prime minister. It's disgusting.
Except apart from the proud ex BNP the motives for voting Reform seem to come from a scared impotent scarcity helplessness. It's a "all these immigrants taking my stuff and my opportunities and there isn't enough to go round" - if they're paid properly and the NHS works the far right is less appealing. 🤞
I hope you're right
Historically, people turn to the far right when things are going terribly wrong. The conservatives ran the country into the ground and legitimised everything the far right stood for, then were upset that people started voting far right. I say it was unsurprising. Why not vote Reform if you're a rabid racist and your usual party are about the same policywise but have a boring British Asian leader instead of a white laddish thug of a politician?
If things get significantly better for folks, there's less motivation to vote in desperation.
But would he win more electorates by pandering to the further right, or by giving the middle a reason to be enthusiastic about them?
https://www.bbc.com/news/election/2024/uk/results
Conservative
total votes 6,814,650
Reform UK
total votes 4,102,109
share change +12.3
Liberal Democrat
total votes 3,499,969
share change +0.6
Cons lost their votes to the nazis more often than the Lib Dems.
I left britain years ago when brexit happened, that country is stupid, and I wish the people that still live there the best of luck.
I also would like to remind them that I wasted much air trying to convince them that voting LD wasn't a waste of time, but for some reason, 4 million of them can be convinced to vote for a third party, but only if it's racist enough, and not civil liberties oriented enough.
Starmer didn't win this election, the tories lost it due to a split vote.
Labour
total votes 9,686,329
share 33.7%
share change +1.6
This doesn't look like the extremely winning party that run an extremely successful campaign. It looks like a bunch of chancers that got lucky flipping seats due to split voter base of nazis.
I'm not even optimistic that center left starmer is going to do anything all that impressive to be honest. I hope I'm wrong, I think Biden is doing great and getting no credit. Best of luck to him and to Britain, I hope things get better in that country.
My favourite quote: ‘Rees-Mogg congratulated the Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer, on “what seems to be a historic victory”, adding, as his final thought, “from the ashes of disaster grow the roses of success. So thank you very much everybody, and good night.”’
I can only read this as him admitting publicly that he and the Tories are a complete disaster.
all the socdem use of rose as a symbol makes it only better
It blows my mind that Tory candidates get even a single vote. Who's voting for them?!
And reform, its bloody terrifing seeing them get so much support
Yup. They've been coming second in most results so far. Not sure how much of it is a protest vote against the big two or people like their policies.
Only one opposed to the trend. So long while before we can be sure.
But if it continures. Lab holds having huge reform vote. But Tory loss them being 3rd. It would support most Tories, only voting reform when they know Tories won't win. But hesitating when a reform win is possible. (edit: possible to prevent what they see as a more sane party)
Be interesting to see if that continues.
The entire C4 panel laughed at Nadine when she just couldn't stop talking about Boris Johnson
This is as late as I can stand. I'll check back in the morning for the final scores. If it was anything resembling a closer election I might have stayed up. I'm hoping the exit poll has over estimated the tories and reform, with a few extra opposition parties.
That's how I'm feeling. I need my kip and some of the major heads I'd want to see fall won't be toppling until much later.
Rise and shine.
Reform only on 4 instead of ~17 from the exit poll and the greens got 4 seats instead of 2! Happy days.
I would be a bit worried about proportional representation for parties like reform as they seem to have come second in a larger number of constituencies.
Reform didn't gain many seats but came 3rd in total votes
about 1/7th of the total, or about 1/5th of Labour, Tory, and LDs combined.
Did the areas with a high Reform vote, have a higher vote turnout?
Starting the day and seeing Rees snob, grant schnapps and penny mordor are out.
Feels like a good start to the day
Oh and Liz snubbed
I've just switched over to watch Sky News' feed on YouTube. The allow chat, which for a serious news organisation is absolutely wild to me.
And the chatters are absolutely insane. Not in a good way. There's no attempt to discuss anything, just people spamming "💙💙 REFORM IS RISING 💙💙" and "🟥🟥 Labour Forever 🟥🟥🟥🟥". And weirdest of all, many variations on "netherite helmet trim".
Wtf does netherite helmet trim mean?
Minecraft.
Reform have an online army that swarms comment threads. Not sure how many of them are based in Russia.
Oh yeah I worked that out thanks to Google. But I don't get the connection to the election, or why so many people were spamming it.
Trolls I suppose.
An unsatisfying answer, even if it is likely correct.
Maybe because of the fake Farage playing minecraft videos?
Honestly not very sure what else it would be.
Memecraft
the proper way to watch youtube chat is to click on the x.
Ha! Ok that got a serious laugh from me.
But honestly, other YouTube live streams I've watched have actually had really great chats. Lots of fun discussion with other chatters or between chat and the streamer. I wouldn't expect a news org to be engaging with the chat themselves, but I would have hoped that chat could talk amongst themselves in a civil manner. I'm kinda disappointed how they're not.
i'm actually only half serious since there are a lot of channels i watch that are great communities too. just not the political ones :)
It's subtle, but see if you can tell what party she represents. (lower third graphic unrelated)
Greens?
How could you possibly tell‽
It was a lot of deduction, induction and good old reduction.
After seeing the first few results come in, my main worry is how Starmer's Labour will react to the rise of Reform. If Labour cannot visibly begin to turn things around, and they also fail to effectively counter the building populist undercurrent, we could be heading for some dark times.
We will have to see what exactly Starmer's Labour will actually do once it has power.
Two Tories defected to them, and neither of them were standing for election this time, it was just a gesture against Sunak (although I do wish Labour had told them to fuck off).
And as for the S*n, they just put their weight behind whoever is going to win.
Labour and Starmer are far from perfect, but I think they will be far better, even if just from a competence and basic human decency standpoint.
I was a bit surprised the S*n did switch to Labour. From what I've heard there still a grudge amongst Murdoch and his minions towards Starmer, due the prosecutions he pursued as DPP during the phone hacking scandal.
I wouldn't read too much into the Sun endorsement. Murdoch hates to be wrong, and they would have come out in favour much earlier in the campaign if they were actually ideologically aligned.
Aww, Sunak retains.
Also, the ITV guy referred to Count Binface as "Mister". The disrespect. 😞
Why's a guy holding up a big "L" sign behind Sunak?
Considering some were suggesting a chance Sunak would lose his own seat, his victory is pretty overwhelming. Even if you try simulating an IRV vote where everyone apart from Reform preferences Labour, the distribution would still see Labour fall 5 thousand votes behind the tories before you distribute Reform's votes to the Conservatives. A 62% victory on 2 candidate preferred once all is said and done.
And Hunt also retains.
Holy shit the crowd's reaction at Jeremy Corbyn getting 24,000. 😲
well, it is a crowd that includes a number of that 24k.
I'm in maidstone, as blue as it gets. i'll be watching everyone else turn red with envy
NW Cambridgeshire here, it's never been anything but Blue since it's formation, I still doubt it would change.
Edit: It went Labour by 40 votes. Damn never felt my vote mattered more than now. And thank you Reform for splitting it so close.
That really is a razer thin win. congrats
I'm not too far away and I'm hoping the area has some common sense, it's always blue here as well. Although my wife said many votes have been lost as some people didn't know about voter ID. Bloody Tories, it hasnt helped here though has it!
Sorry mate, still blue by about 1500 odd votes.
tbf Helen Grants majority has been significantly reduced. i can take solace in that at least
So looking forward to the next five years...
Looking at how Reform and Lib Dems made significant gains in vote share you have to wonder if its still worth Labour chasing after the right wing vote that Reform achieved. I just do not see the where the voters who voted Reform actually believe Starmer on the key issues that Reform campaigned on, immigration, anti "woke", and Brexit. I cannot see Labour ever gaining the lead on those issues over someone like Farage who will always position himself to the right of whatever Labour or the Tories campaign on. I cant even see Labour being trusted at the voting booth on these right wing issues over a rebuilt Tory party. Its a fools errand to try.
The Lib Dem vote share, as with Reform, boosted by previous Tory voters but Lib Dems campaigned on almost the opposite of Reform (with some tactical, local, NIMBYism) and achieved way more seats on a lower overall percentage vote than Reform. If you are going to pick a direction to go in, wouldn't it make more sense to move towards the Lib Dems position to shore up in time for the next election?
Labour did worse total percentage of the vote than 2017, its more that the Tories collapsed losing about 20% of their vote that caused this swing in seats. The Tories will rally next time around and a lot of the seats look winnable for them with only a small local swing. The current stance of Labour simply isn't popular enough to be a vote winner against a rebuilt Tory party.
As an Australian, I have to once again apologise on behalf of my nation for the turd in a tuxedo that is Rupert Murdoch.
Thank you. But we don't blame regular Aussies. You're good with us.
Yes, but I think you're overstating how right wing Labour pitched it. There were no claims to be anti woke. I think it was a pretty firmly centrist pitch. It's the Conservatives who are going to panic and try to out-nutcase Farage. Labour are going to try and be responsible and fix the broken ship. It's just whether they can do it fast enough for people to notice a big improvement in the cost of living vs wages problem.
Are you forgetting Starmers statements around women only spaces as it seems like it.
Farages entire point of existence is to drag the overton window to the right, which he succeed yet again, particularly around Brexit.
The other big concession Starmer made, this time because of the Tories, was not to raise taxes, which was also incredibly dumb. As was honouring triple lock.
My biggest issue with Starmer making claims like these is that he will stick to them. Someone like Boris is too lazy and an out and out liar so has no problem dropping things. Starmers big pitch to be different is that he will stick with what he says.
By sticking to what he said around terfs issues, Brexit, taxes, he really fucks his options in these areas, and for what? As you and I have both said, toil not out crazy Farage or be trusted by people who these are important issues for, so it's a massively stupid thing to do.
You make very good points.
Truss is out! Defeated by Labour candidate Terry Jermy by only 630 votes.
The fact it was even close is ridiculous. She's the most terrible MP and PM we've ever had and yet she got a large number of people to vote for her.
There's something in the water over there.
One of the safest Tory seats
Anyone got that link that recalculates the results of the GE by different voting systems? For example if we had a form of PR how would this election turned out? I swear it was posted here a few days ago.
Direct proportional representation is easy enough. Just look at the number of votes each party got, and assign that percentage to their overall parliamentary representation. That roughly gives you the answer.
IRV is more interesting, but more complicated. It relies on some assumptions (e.g. Green, SNP, LibDem, Labour all preference each other 100%, Conservatives & Reform preference each other 100%) and takes a lot of effort to do on a seat-by-seat basis. And of course it all assumes ceteris paribus, when in actuality people would vote differently if the voting system were different.
As one example, here's the seat of Tatton:
Under IRV, with the above assumptions, Labour's Ryan Jude would have won with 26,005 votes to Conservative Esther McVey's 25,904. But tweak those assumptions just slightly (give 90% of LibDem votes to Labour, 10% to Conservatives) and it could go the other way (26,365 CON to 25,544 LAB). There are dozens or scores of seats where these sorts of interesting hypotheticals can be asked and analysed. IRV is actually, in my opinion, the next-worst voting system after FPTP (if you exclude weird and rarely-used ones like approval voting, range voting, etc.), but it's one of the most interesting to do analysis with.
STV is an utterly impossible comparison to make, because it relies on multi-seat electorates, which would probably be done by merging existing electorates into groups of 3–8. STV is a more generalised case of IRV so if you decided on how to do those merges, then you can get even more interesting analysis. As one example, if we imagine a merged electorate involving West Ham, East Ham, Ilford North, Ilford South, Leyton & Wanstead, and Stratford & Bow. Some assumptions are necessary to make this work, my assumption is that anyone whose party name says "workers" or "socialist" preferences Green and then Labour, while those mentioning religion preference Conservative, and if I don't know, I'm giving them to LibDems then Labour. I'm also assuming all voters for a named party vote as a block, preferencing the same candidate 1st, 2nd, etc., while independents get the votes as they were actually given. This is somewhat realistic because ballot paper design can be set up to encourage this in an STV context (see how Australia does it with "above the line" voting in the Senate, for an example). I've merged the minor parties named "workers" or "socialist" into a single party.
::: spoiler A detailed explanation of my calculation is contained here. In our merged hypothetical under STV, they win 3.03 quotas on first preference, Conservative wins 0.88, Reform 0.41, LibDem 0.28, Green 0.78. So Labour immediately win 3 seats, before 0.03 quotas are distributed lower down in their party. After numerous more rounds (my attached spreadsheet simplifies multiple rounds that by eye would obviously not result in a new quota being reached being merged down into 1), the LibDems win a quota. I've decided to distribute their excess 50/50 to Green and Conservative, since Labour has already been eliminated. To be frank, after that I'm not sure what to do. LibDems having been eliminated, the 3 remaining independents can't go to them as was my initial plan (the basic thinking being independents are probably more centrist, but LibDems and Labour being eliminated already. I've decided to give them 50/50 to Conservative and Green, but the reality could be so, so much more complex. After one of those is eliminated, Conservatives get a quota. One final independent distributed to Conservatives/Green and the Greens win the last quota.
:::
This is Labour heartland and in FPTP Labour won all 6 of these seats. My calculation ends up with 3 Labour, 1 LibDem, 1 Conservative, and 1 Green.
MMP ends up with basically the same overall result as direct proportional, but can be interesting in terms of independents & very minor parties and resulting overhang seats.
Given, many systems require more than just marking one box. While, even those that do not, would drastically change how people choose their vote.
I am unsure any such site can give a realistic result from available data?
Edit:
If we just assume proportional based on % of vote yesterday.
Tor 22.9% Lab 35.2% LDe 11.3% Ref 14.5% SNP 2.5% Oth 13.6%
It is bloody hard to see how either party could form a viable 50% Lab LD SNP and a few independents would take it over 50. But honestly, it is hard to imagine that working with the politicians voted yesterday. Tory Ref would need all independents. So less likely to work.
But as I said. Voters would go to the polls with very different ideas about how to vote.
"Other" is not all independents. 6.8% of the vote share was Green, and 0.8% is between Workers Party and Social Democratic Party who, based purely on the names, I cannot possibly imagine would ever back the Conservatives. Unless LibDems were to support that coalition (which, after the 2010 Government I cannot imagine they'd be super keen on), there is no path to a Tory Government from these results under a proportional system. Labour can form a Government with just LibDem, SNP, and Green parties.
Exactly, total up left(ish) votes and you get about 54% ✊️
An independent (SNP) and unionist (Labour) party would be hard-pressed to form a government.
But again the whole idea of the votes being identicle under a vastyyly different system
Honestly the big question would be how government is formed. With seat numbers matching % of vote. under our current system. Labour could run a weak gov by depending on greens snp and others never supporting a tor ref vonc.
But with centre right lab, it is likely only ld and lab would be garmented to support most policy votes. Others, often refusing because it's not left enough and not right enough at the same time.
Unfortunately, while the right has clasped over this election. The right has a long history of unity to fight the left.
the left much the opposite in fighting the right.
Would they? Outside of the question of independence, the two parties agree on more than not, don't they? If they alternative is no functioning government, couldn't you see Labour giving some minor concession to the SNP (like maybe allowing Holyrood to have power over one or two of the things that was recently denied by the Supreme Court) in exchange for the SNP's support in Confidence?
I'm not really sure what you mean. (It doesn't help that the rest of that paragraph is ridden by typos to the point of being unintelligible. Sorry.) Government would be formed the same way they do it in Germany or New Zealand or any of the many other countries with proportional systems. They would find a way to reach a majority by agreeing on whatever compromises are palatable to both sides. In a hypothetical where the SNP had way more seats, Labour might have to agree to a second independence referendum. If they really needed Green support they might agree to pass strong climate legislation. They might have to give the LibDems a couple of significant cabinet positions. Proportional systems force politicians to actually do politics and pass legislation that is supported by a majority of people, instead of giving a single party a majority of seats based on a minority of people supporting them.
Your final sentence is painfully true.
SNPs manifesto included it as a key point. So actual coalition government. Well look at how lib dems got hit over student fees. SNP voters would feel the same having voted for an independence party.
Hence why labour have faced the question at all past elections where a win os less probable amd denied they would form such a coalition.
But as said. A confodence amd supply agreement where snp agree to non confidence votes. Is probable on such situs.
There's this comment
I figure satire articles probably aren't allowed in the general community, but hopefully it's ok in the megathread? This was brilliant.
https://theshovel.com.au/2024/07/05/australia-loses-shortest-time-to-5-pms-ashes/
You can post satirical news in ![email protected]
Is a particularly biting bit of satire on the way we usually hear about sports reporting.
Italy: hold my beer
Toot-toot, moog got the boot!
The fuck happened in Leicester East that it's the sole Con gain in the country?
Their last two Labour MPs not only were kicked out in scandal, but also ran in this election splitting the vote. It looks like the Lib Dems also got a significant vote share which has helped the Tories.
Makes sense. Thanks
Labours majority is huge but vulnerable. It's clear that Reform bled millions of votes away from the Tories.
I don't see how that makes them vulnerable though. I can't see the reform voters going back to the conservatives so reform are going to continue to split the conservative vote forever.
Similarly to what happened with UKIP, the Tories will just take Reforms policies, bring in new further-right leadership and support will come back.
Especially after Labour (who just got elected on a fairly bland centrist manifesto) won't manage to magically fix things in 2-3 years. Conservative media will blame Labour for all the issues (even though most are the fault of the Tories) and Conservative voters will rally around the banner of "Labour out!".
Or Reform just eats the Tories, which seems a but less likely to me, but either way the split won't last.
I think that's right. Tories will move further to the right on immigration and force Labour to move with them. Populism isn't going anywhere.
But one of the main reasons that the conservatives are so unpopular is because they've been chasing the right and leaving the centralist politics basically defended, which is why Labour wandered over there, and they have clearly done well out of that.
They have done well but they only won because Reform stole votes from the Tories, and because of the voting system, those votes go in the bin. Labour barely got a third of the national vote.
That's my point really. Labour's biggest risk is that the Tories become moderately reasonable again. Then they'd actually have to step up.
I'm not convinced that the Tories downfall were their right wing policies, most people are thinking of partygate, Lizz Trusses disaster budget and the cost of living crisis in the ballot box.
I personally think that labour would have won whether they were trying to court centrists or not and labours biggest risk is that the the Tories will mop up the reform vote.
This election shows that the Tories still have a HUGE core vote, these are people that will never vote labour and I think chasing reform voters is a fools errand because it's likely they'll never vote labour either.
while also dragging labour further right on immigration and culture wars.
Yes. Thinking that reform will always be there is extremely naive, reform can disappear just as quickly as UKIP did after Brexit.
UKIP disappeared because they were a single issue party.
I've personally not met anyone that voted Reform for who immigration wasn't their top priority.
I know they're not a single issue party unless you consider "the Tories aren't right wing enough" as a single issue.
In 1993 in Canada, there was a Reform party that along with the BQ, split the Tories so much that the latter won only 2 seats. Though not as badly, the splitting was repeated in 1997, and 2000. Then they (i.e. Reform, renamed Alliance, and the Progressive Conservatives) merged. After that to present they were in government for about 9 years, over half as a minority. Presently 118 Canadian MPs are Conservative.
So if Canada is a guide, Farage might be replaced, then the replacement replaced by one maybe born in the early 1980s and one who will be compared to a Vulcan. Reform will merge with the Conservatives, and he will become leader, and will run the Conservatives for over 10 years. During this time, he will lead minority government for about 4 years and then a majority another for about 5 years; but all of this won't happen for at least 10 years.
lawrence fox wasn't running but he was still a loser last night
And every night.
Quick question - does anyone have the link to that "Tories being voted out" bingo card website? It was posted a few days ago, but I can't find it.
[EDIT] Found it - Feddit thread - I've probably not formatted the link properly
Torygeddon Bingo Website
Not a website, but here's a (low res, sorry) bingo card:
https://portillogeddon.com/
It wasn't this one I was thinking of, but this will do just fine, thank you :)
Try this instead https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lvm-xaq0fmVWBBKZPcokySP7oqezssXtJYYDYW4uiqA/htmlview#gid=847143152
Worth reading just for the "comments" column :)
Labour 5 for 5 so far! I'm no statistician but if this trend continues...
4, 5 now are labour holds. So does not show a real change yet.
11% swing in these seats def indicates a win. Just.
It will be interesting to see if the exit polls are correct in labour gains having a larger swing.
I'm watching the ITV feed on YouTube. Dunno what other people actually from the UK would recommend because I don't really know the British media landscape.
They're currently discussing the issue of Scottish independence. I must say, I find it very frustrating, including from Nicola Sturgeon. As a complete outsider, it would seem to me the number 1 reason in favour of a second referendum is very simple: "you'll not be allowed back into the EU if you secede from the UK" was a major campaign point during the first referendum. And then 2 years later England voted to leave the EU anyway. How is Sturgeon not bringing this up?
ITV will be just fine. The Beeb's coverage is usually pretty definitive.
Unfortunately BBC doesn't seem to be live streamed on YouTube. Or if it does, it didn't turn up in my search. I was choosing between ITV, Sky News (I know Sky in the UK isn't quite the same as Sky here in Aus, but the stink of that name is very hard for me to shake off), something called "TalkTV", and two separate feeds from "The Times and The Sunday Times". Oh, and CNN, but that's just silly.
They bring that up regularly, but it's a false equivalence. At the time of the independence vote it was absolutely true to claim that voting No was true best way to stay in the EU. There was no expectation, none, from anyone that Brexit was on the way. So, at the time, if Europe was the issue then voting to stay in the UK was the logical choice to make.
As for now - well, Swinney (and before him Sturgeon herself) was talking in terms of winning a majority of seats being a mandate for opening independence talks. That's clearly nonsense, since a majority of seats is possible with a fairly small plurality of votes. And, it's looking like it's a moot point anyway, since the SNP seems to have taken a right good kicking this time round.
So Sturgeon is probably not bringing this up tonight because she'd look ridiculous to do so given the (apparent) results in Scotland tonight. If this was a referendum on independence as she and Swinney have suggested, then the result would appear to be a solid No.
According to the conversation tonight, not even a majority of seats, but a plurality.
Anyway you're absolutely right that given the tact that they had chosen it's hard to read today's projected result as anything other than a failure. But I was speaking more about when the conversation turned away from the direct outcome of today's results and more towards the general longer-term future prospects for independence. I don't recognise any of their other panellists (pic attached below), but the guy on Sturgeon's left (camera right) and to a lesser extent the other panellists were making reference to the fact that the previous referendum failed and how no future government would ever allow another referendum (with the exception of if Labour relied on the SNP to form a minority government, which was thought possible a year ago). That's when it would have seemed obvious to me for Sturgeon to point out the false promise that led to the result in 2014.
Carol Vorderman is completely plastered on the C4 programme lol
tories lost, labour didn't win. labour's vote share plunging in constituencies they won is terrible for starmer's hope for a long mandate.
He should try not being neoliberal swine as head of "Labour" if he wants a long mandate.
Aaaand majority!
You just love to see it
The best thing is, they did worse than the exit poll so they can't even say "we did better than expected"
I love this guy's expression.
Here's the seat by seat exit poll predictions: https://news.sky.com/story/exit-poll-what-is-the-forecast-election-result-in-my-constituency-13163180
UKIP still exists? Wat?
I do like that Farage tries to call himself "centre-right".
On the other hand, I unironically do like that he calls out how shit FPTP is.
The one thing i can agree with reform on is electoral reform. unfortunately all the racism, homophonia and general goose-stepping made it so i couldn't vote for him.
Plus lib dems are better placed to actually make it happen.
unfortunately i was one of the absolute tools that voted no on the AV vote back in 2010ish
Honestly I can hardly blame you. It was set up to fail the moment Clegg agreed to let it be about IRV instead of a proportional system. That meant it was under assault from both sides which meant it never had a chance.
I do love the trend of Returning Officers wearing silly hats.
I believe most of those are mayors in their official garb.
i mean, it's both, it's britain.
Fucking everything on its most official capacity looks as stupid as possible. The courts, the soldiers, mayors, etc.
3 seats to go!
2 now
Feels quicker than previous years
This year's general election, after all the votes counted, has a
This makes the (dis)proportionality worse than HUNGARY's (my home) FPTP component (SLI = 36.96) – a component of the mixed system which allows our ruling party to get 2/3 supermajorities each time, every time, with sometimes less than 50% of the votes, and which ultimately transformed our country to an "electoral autocracy"
You guys need electoral reform desperately. And do it before someone cheats with the current rules deliberately.
(PS: I calculated the electoral indices using the python package
voting)73 in Keir Starmer's electorate voted "for more than one candidate". I'd love to see what those ballots looked like. Or to speak with those voters. Was it a change of mind that they thought they could just cross out? Did they think they were doing an IRV vote? Approval voting? Was it just a deliberate nonsense protest vote?
The ship is ship shape
There are some very close run seats out there, how close do they have to be to do a recount?
A recount is called if one of the sides requires one. Obviously if you only had a difference of 10 votes, it'd be daft not to demand recount, but technically it only happens if a candidate requests one.
Remember the votes are technically recounted already. They are counted three times, by three separate people, who don't know what the other two people have found as results, so they cannot be influenced by their number. If all three people get the same answer, the count is probably correct, discounting incredibly bad luck, which is statistically unlikely.
If a recount is requested then three new people perform the task just to discount the possibility of collusion.
Am I calculating this correctly that it's now been nearly 4 hours since polls closed? How have we only heard 2% of results? You don't even have preferences to distribute.
It's pretty much on time compared to previous elections.
But how is it so slow? We'd have far more results than that in Australia, despite a much more complicated process where we have to do the first count just like this, and then additionally distribute preferences. And then also count the Senate results.
Does your electoral commission just not hire enough people?
Possibly, I think it might actually involve a lot of volunteers.
Hmm, how confident are you in that?
I'm from Australia, and here I know that it's a fairly common misconception that the AEC vote counting staff are volunteers. But they're not. They're hired to work on the day, and only on the day, with a little online training beforehand. They're paid minimum wage at casual loading rates. Usually they work the whole day issuing votes and then switch to counting once polls have closed. There are also "scrutineers", who are volunteers (IIRC they legally must be volunteers, not paid) representing the candidates/parties, who watch the counting process and may challenge how a ballot has been counted, but may not ever touch.
Does it need to be any quicker? It's not really important to get the results in by 4am instead of 7am, surely?
From the Wikipedia article:
wp:2024 United Kingdom general election
is the,
UK general election 2024: live results in full
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/ng-interactive/2024/jul/04/uk-general-election-results-2024-live-in-full
As of 02:56 UTC, 5 July 2024,
Labour: 168
Conservative: 28
Lib-Dem: 18
As of 04:03 UTC, 5 July 2024,
(7:03 AM EEST/MSK/TRT, 5 July 2024,
5:03 AM BST, 5 July 2024)
12:03 AM EDT, 5 July 2024,
9:03 PM PDT, 4 July 2024)
Labour: 326
Conservative: 70
Lib-Dem: 44
Green: 1
As of 05:41 UTC, 5 July 2024,
(8:41 AM EEST/MSK/TRT, 5 July 2024,
6:41 AM BST, 5 July 2024)
1:41 AM EDT, 5 July 2024,
10:41 PM PDT, 4 July 2024)
Labour: 401
Conservative: 107
Lib-Dem: 66
SNP: 7
Sinn Féin: 7
Green: 4
Jeremy Corbyn describes his victory as "a good majority".
He did not, in fact, win a majority, although he got very close. 49.2%
Majority just means a larger number. The word has nothing to do with above 50%.
It is just used so in parliament because all non government seats can vote against the government, so to have the largest voting block you must have more then any other group.
As that is not the case in a constituency election, 1 vote over each other party is a referred to as a majority.
No, majority means 50%. The term for the largest number is "plurality".
"A plurality vote (in North American English) or relative majority (in British English)[1] describes the circumstance when a party, candidate, or proposition polls more votes than any other but does not receive more than half of all votes cast."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plurality_(voting)
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/plurality
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/majority
According to that same Wikipedia link you shared:
Which has been simplified to just majority in the normal parlance in political coverage in the UK (see BBC, Sky News etc. in their coverage, they all use majority to mean relative majority when reporting on GE election results)
In first past the post elections "a majority of X" means the winner got X more votes than the second place. Words can have multiple ways of being used.
In the parliament, yes. But there is no such concept in a seat. There majority can only be the dictionary def. As 50% makes no difference to the seats' winner under fptp. Only who has the most votes.
And the dictionary def has no relation to 50%. Because it is an English term, not as political one. Heck, even in parliament, it's a more media term to help explain who has the ability to control votes.
yeah the uk is royally fucked because starmer is absolutely going to lurch hard right on culture and immigration to respond to reform.
With the projected majority, he doesn't have to lurch anywhere. It's the Tories that are going to feel forced to get nastier and it could be the final nail in their coffin. JRM has already been on suggesting they've neglected their "core", which seems to be racists.
Agree with both points here but wrt. the possibility Kier lurching to the right I particularly agree. Left wing pals on whatsapp and folks online are being way too pessimistic about the prospects of the labour government not delivering left wing policies. Having played it safe during the campaign, Kier has a majority which gives him way more latitude to implement whatever policies make sense.
I wish people could be able to take the W and enjoy it for one night without cynicism or pessimism.