Forum Topic

Well, well

Labour winning in 2024 with fewer votes than 2019 apparently (3 seats still to call). Someone please explain.

David Ainsworth ● 355d21 Comments

Thought it was the local elections that Boris didnt have the correct ID.

Andy Pike ● 347d

I wondered if it had been made more complicated for the prospective candidates just as casting a vote has been made more complicated for the electorate.  I noted from the press that Boris Johnson turned up to vote at this General Election without any ID - and it was HIS Govt that brought that ID qualification for voting!

Philippa Bond ● 347d

I'm not sure who you are asking Philippa.There seems to be a lot of moaning about smaller parties - it is almost as if some people would prefer just one party on the ballot. Provided they follow the law the more independents & smaller parties the better.There was lots of choice in Putney - perhaps more is needed given the turnout?Anyway here is an extract "Nomination form – Subscriber requirementsNomination forms must include an indication of support for the candidate from 10 electors registered on the UK Parliamentary register in the constituency. These are known as subscribers - the first two are the proposer and seconder, while eight other electors are the assenters to the nomination.1 There is nothing preventing a candidate from subscribing their own nomination provided they are registered in the constituency. Each subscriber is required by law to sign the nomination form in the appropriate place and must include their electoral number in the spaces provided alongside their signature, along with the polling district’s identifying letters. https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/guidance-acting-returning-officers-administering-a-uk-parliamentary-election-great-britain/nominations/forms-nomination/nomination-form-subscriber-requirements

Ed Robinson ● 348d

Are you suggesting that candidates don't have to show ID the way that voters have to do?

Philippa Bond ● 349d

Wasn't Matt a paper candidate for the Green Party a while back - if my memory serves me correctly?Seems something small parties do. However one chap from a clip on GB News looked very much like his generated image. I hope that this is not the case for some of the other so-called paper candidates.Farage was always going to disrupt the Conservatives more.Without Reform Conservatives would have probably not lost 80 seats according to the Telegraph - still would have lost of course.

Ed Robinson ● 349d

I think that's very much in line with my previous post about many standing for Reform being 'paper candidates'. It says to me that Farage's aim was just to be disruptive, but fortunately it was the Conservatives he disrupted assisting Sir Kier and Labout to win :-) Even 'paper candidates' can attract votes - it seems a lot of right wing ones! 

Michael Ixer ● 349d

https://www.thenational.scot/news/24438729.reform-uk-accused-using-ai-generated-candidates-election/

Lucille Grant ● 349d

They’re already unelectable so a merger with Reform will hardly help restore their fortunes. Imho of course!

Jonathan Callaway ● 350d

Almost half the Tory members want a merger with Reform according to a recent poll.https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2024/jul/10/conservative-leadership-james-cleverly-reform-uk-labour-keir-starmerThe upcoming leadership election will be fun.If Kemi Badenoch wins, she'll know that she was second favourite to someone who isn't even eligible (Johnson), and half of the membership would prefer another candidate (Farage) that isn't even in the same party (yet).

John Kettlekey ● 350d

Some independents lost by a few votes as did some of the main party candidates,I Personally voted for a small progressive party and didn't vote for the so-called lesser of two-evil parties.It wasn't a wasted vote as it is reflected in the popular vote.I did not give either of the two lesser of two-evil a mandate.The progressive parties need to become more organised if they ate to defeat parties with extreme views.

Ed Robinson ● 350d

The General Election we just had had a lot of Independent candidates who seemed to be standing as a protest vote.  I saw five in one constituency.  These will have split the voting up.  Is this large number unusual??

Philippa Bond ● 350d

Fair point but French and British politics are not really comparable.  Yes, PR would likely mean coalition politics takes over but that happened as recently as 2010 without the world falling apart.  And if Labour had to sit down with the LibDems and/or the Greens how bad would that be?

Jonathan Callaway ● 351d

Any enthusiasm here for moving to a PR system of voting might be dampened by recent events in France!

Peter Evans ● 351d

The LibDems have been banging on about PR for decades but have been widely ignored.  For example in 1979 they won only 13 seats on 18.3% of the popular vote (4.3 million votes).  It's not a new problem.The referendum the LibDems were given during the coalition years was poorly explained, poorly constructed and failed badly but no doubt Farage, given the stronger position he now finds himself in, will work with them and the Greens to push through changes to our voting system so we see votes more accurately translated into seats.  Don't expect it to happen very soon though. And expect voting patterns to change substantially when people no longer need to vote tactically.  This was an anti-Tory election and people chose whatever party was seen most likely to help remove a Tory MP.

Jonathan Callaway ● 351d

"Unfortunately a compromise does not always lead to a sensible policy."That's where we have gone wrong, too many sensible policies.Despite both parties being in power for three terms each recently, there has been very little long term planning from transport to energy even to population.

Ed Robinson ● 351d

I don't think the Conservatives were particularly disadvantaged by FPTP. The real losers were Reform who only got 5 MPs despite having won 14% of the vote, compared to the Lib Dems who got 72 MPs on 11% of the vote. This is an absurd anomaly which will increase the pressure for electoral reform. But there is no obvious solution in my opinion. I am not personally in favour of PR which generally leads to  government by coalition where nobody gets the manifesto they voted for. This sometimes suits middle of the road voters who don't mind compromises agreed by the coalition partners since their main aim is to avoid the extremes of the Right and the Left. Unfortunately a compromise does not always lead to a sensible policy.

Steven Rose ● 351d

Some valid points made here, but the Labour Party won fairly and squarely under the rules.  A new found scepticism towards 'first past the post' from sources such as the Daily Mail will be slanted in such a way as to cast doubt about the legitimacy of Labour's landslide.  But it is perfectly legitimate under the system we have. As for Nigel Farage's comments on the matter - I wonder if he was calling for Proportional Representation when he was in the Conservative Party, no doubt joyous about Margaret Thatcher's three figure majority at the time.  We had an opportunity to change the voting system in 2011 - the only reason the Conservatives agreed to holding that referendum was because it was part of the Coalition Agreement with the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives did all they could to deliver a result in favour of keeping first Past the Post. So I don't think the Conservatives can complain now that it has worked against them.

David Beeney ● 351d

Labour won't want to change the FPTP system. It would be like turkeys voting for Christmas. I wasn't surprised at the low turn out. There are many like myself (a lot of women) who feel we are unrepresented by all the parties and remained undecided where to give our vote. Nevertheless I am happy to give Starmer the opportunity to help get the UK back on track. It will be an uphill struggle and take longer than his 5 year remit.

Lucille Grant ● 355d

Fleur has certainly impressed as an excellent constituency MP but I think tactical voting has played quite a role here.  Without PR it is the only way people can get the result they want - and a huge number of people just wanted the Tories out of Downing Street.Nationally there will clearly be a postmortem on how a single party can get a huge majority on just over a third of the votes - and on a low turnout too.

Jonathan Callaway ● 355d

Basically the Tory vote is concentrated in the over 65 age group which always votes no matter what.The Labour vote is spread between younger age groups and at the lower end they tend not to bother unless there is a particular issue they are concerned about or if they think it is a foregone conclusion. What Labour has done very successfully is put all their effort in getting the vote out in constituencies where it really mattered.This doesn't explain Fleur Anderson's relatively strong performance - perhaps it is the reward for being a very good constituency MP.

Peter Higgins ● 355d

Also Sunak has now resigned, so there will be another leadership election.I reckon there'll also be a by-election in Richmond within the next few months and Sunak will be off to the US to spend more time with his money.

John Kettlekey ● 355d

Tories have 6,771,974 votes so far this year (still a couple of constituencies left to declare).In 2019 they got 13,966,454 votes.Labour won this election with a huge majority because of FPTP and the fact that the Tories lost nearly 50% of their vote (mostly to Reform but some to Lib Dems).Hopefully we'll get another referendum on PR (and a better form of PR than the 2011 referendum) and then we can pretty much get rid of tactical voting.

John Kettlekey ● 355d