General election results 2015

[P. G. Tipps]

Some seem to be saying that because enough people voted for this it's right. It isn't right no matter how many people voted for it. And anyway, as has been said, more people voted against it.

I'd always thought democracy is about votes. It has nothing to do with what individuals consider to be the 'right' or 'wrong' result, only the result itself. It's entirely because individuals have different ideas of what is 'right' and 'wrong' that we need elections in the first place, or alternatively some form of enforced dictatorship.

As for the last point nobody in practice voted 'against' anything but 'for' something, however reluctantly. And, even going by the wholly assumptive 'against' yardstick, more people voted 'against' any other party than the winning one, so the argument is completely destroyed by itself!

[ahinton]

You appear to be suggesting that the 'winner' according to the previously and universally-understood (presumably) rules of engagement should give way to some sort of curious pact between a whole bunch of mutually-despising and widely-rejected 'losers'?

I'm suggesting nothing of the kind! The Tories won the most votes and the mot seats, although the difference between their vote count and Labour's is far smaller than the difference between their respective seat counts. It's all down to boundaries.

There is undoubtedly a clear case for some sort of reform when the party with the most votes gets fewer seats than another. That has to be unsatisfactory though fortunately it's somewhat rare.

Indeed - but its come pretty close to that on this occasion, with its much vaunted "disaster" for Labour arising from a larger increase in voter numbers than that of the Tories. And look at UKIP and the Greens; over 5m votes between them and just one seat each!

However when a party with the most votes also gets enough seats to govern reasonably comfortably I fail to see the 'bunch of losers' have much to moan about. There is absolutely nothing to stop any party (apart from possible financial constraints) putting its case before the electorate and attempting to achieve the same.

The majority is tiny - and there are now seven parties in Westmonster (although PC's voter representation is far smaller than that of the other six). I don't think that the Tories will find governing a walk in St. James's Park at all.

I suspect the real reason for the e-petition website was pure political gimmickry.

It was launched by the Conservatives.

A Government 'pledged to look at something ' and not actually doing anything, after a purely arbitrary number of signatures have been collected and presented to it, is surely intended for more naive public consumption. Certainly it seems there is no great rush to re-open the website since the election. ...http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/ ... maybe it was a Lib Dem idea like increasing the income tax threshold and 'equal marriage' as it doesn't really smell like an obvious 'Tory' aspiration, does it?

I've asked the House of Commons Information Office about that; I understand that it's being redesigned and simplified, not put out to grass. I repeat, it was launched by the Conservatives and it's the current Conservative government that's revamping it.

I do not confuse my own preferences regarding the 'right result' with the actual and officially-endorsed result, ahinton ...

I said nothing about personal political preferences; I merely pointed out that the Tories' tiny majority will make life difficult for them and that there are more parties in opposition now than ever.

It's not a question of anyone 'considering' anything, simply a matter of whether a party has won fairly and squarely by the official rules of engagement, you see.

Crying 'foul' after a defeat is the time-honoured cry of both politicians and football coaches!

I'm not "crying foul"; I'm merely pointing out that thie General Election, with seven parties contending for Westmonster seats, illustrates the inequities of FPTP more clearly than most in recent years; shift a few boundaries around and the result, baed on exactly the same number of votes for each party, could have been substantially different. If the drawing of constituency boundaries becomes - or already is - of greater importance than the voters themselves, there's something rotten in the state of a non-Eurozone country that's not Denmark...

[ahinton]

That means nothing. The only conclusion to be drawn from this is that the Guardian probably mentioned it.

I've no evidence that it did, altough I rarely read it.

[ahinton]

You're confusing 'support' for the elected Government with 'support' for the actual electoral system and politicians in general.

The Tories won the election. It is amazing that some people can't seem to grasp this simple fact. Instead, they moan about 'unfair'.

I look forward to them staying in power in 2020. Labour won't have got their act together by then and unless the Tories nail these unnecessary strikes in the bud PDQ then the country will be heartily sick of unions and by association Labour that the Tories will probably be still in power post-2025!

Yes, the Tories won the election. I've never denied that. The system that enabled them to do so is what's unfair, not merely that they won it under that sytem.

[ahinton]

They don't matter. It's a sop to the whingers and Guardianistas.

It's nothing of the kind - and now that the Tories are out of coalition, why would they want to update it rather than quietly dispense with it?

[ahinton]

And the left. Poor losers, as ever.

UKIP's one of the losers; almost 4m votes and just one seat. I hadn't realised that they represented "the left".

[MrGongGong]

As for the last point nobody in practice voted 'against' anything but 'for' something, however reluctantly

You are wrong here
Assuming that people vote 'for' is one of the mistakes that politicians always make

[Once Was 4]

You are wrong here
Assuming that people vote 'for' is one of the mistakes that politicians always make

I have not read all of this correspondence so, sorry to butt in - especially if somebody else has already noted this: the new Tory MP for Morley - who defeated Ed Balls - is a state school music teacher, a vegan, anti-hunting and somebody who has taken a great interest in the re-settlement of offenders. Good Tory values? Oh, and female.

Sticking everybody into one box does not work in 2015.

[jean]

That's interesting certainly, but will she be able to make any kind of impact once the whips have got to her?

She would appear to have stuck herself in a box very inappropriate to her concerns and interests.

[ahinton]

I'd always thought democracy is about votes.

Bu where Britain's concerned, you'd be wrong, wouldn't you?! It's about seats far more than votes!

It has nothing to do with what individuals consider to be the 'right' or 'wrong' result, only the result itself. It's entirely because individuals have different ideas of what is 'right' and 'wrong' that we need elections in the first place, or alternatively some form of enforced dictatorship.

But in an election in which Labour increased its vote count more than the Conservatives increased theirs - and in which two other parties who polled 5,035,691 votes between them, thereby increasing their combined vote count from 1,184,714 in the previous General Election yet they're represented by just two MPs between them - how "right" a result can that be? Besides that, under the present FPTP system, if there's a single reason why the Tory party "won", it's the dismal failure - indeed near-collapse - of the Lib Dems whose vote dropped from 6,836,824 in 2010 to 2,415,888 this time around; that's a decrease of 4,420,936, which is far more than twice the difference between the Tory vote and the Labour vote this time around so, had the LibDems instead increased their share of the vote in 2010 by the average of the Tory and Labour increases in 2015, they'd have polled almost 7.5m votes, which would have altered the political landscape entirely.

It therefore seems a reasonable assessment of the result that the LibDems lost the election and two other parties who between them polled around one-sixth of all votes cast have just two seats out of 650. Given also the tiny majority of seats that the Tory party has, it looks pretty obvious that it'll be in for a rough ride on a number of counts.

As for the last point nobody in practice voted 'against' anything but 'for' something, however reluctantly. And, even going by the wholly assumptive 'against' yardstick, more people voted 'against' any other party than the winning one, so the argument is completely destroyed by itself!

Oh, so tactical voting suddenly disappeared, did it?!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

... and unless the Tories nail these unnecessary strikes in the bud PDQ then the country will be heartily sick of unions and by association Labour that the Tories will probably be still in power post-2025!

And just how do you define "unnecessary strikes"? Very few people would go on strike if they didn't consider it to be necessary.

[ahinton]

That's interesting certainly, but will she be able to make any kind of impact once the whips have got to her?

She would appear to have stuck herself in a box very inappropriate to her concerns and interests.

I have no idea, but she stilll managed to get in against a pretty heavyweight opponent, didn't she? - and presumably some if not most of those Conservatives who voted for her must have known at least some of these facts abouot her profile before doing so...

[ahinton]

You're confusing 'support' for the elected Government with 'support' for the actual electoral system and politicians in general.

The Tories won the election. It is amazing that some people can't seem to grasp this simple fact. Instead, they moan about 'unfair'.

I look forward to them staying in power in 2020. Labour won't have got their act together by then and unless the Tories nail these unnecessary strikes in the bud PDQ then the country will be heartily sick of unions and by association Labour that the Tories will probably be still in power post-2025!

Or 2030; or maybe 2035. If so, there;ll no loner be any need for 5 year terms - or indeed terms of any other length, becuase what you seem either to be advocating or expecting or hoping for or any combination of the three is a government without any meaningful opposition - a most dangerous ttate of affairs for any democratic government.

As to "unnecessary strikes", of the alleged non-necessity of which you presume to present yourself as ultimate arbiter (and not very convincingly since your lack of distinction between what you consier to be necessary and unnecessary ones implies that you believe all strikes to be unnecessary), on what do you base your view? There is another more effective mechanism than a strike, however, but it would only be possible on a very large scale and have to be absolutely certain of a degree of support far greater than that which currently demanded by law in a ballot - say at least 80% - and that is true withdrawal of labour, in other words mass resignation; could you imagine how much more powerful than any strike the resignation en masse of 80% of all NHS employees would be? Government would simply have to give in because it would have no means of replacing their services immediately.

Strikes are far less common today than they were a few decades ago; this suggests that employees opt for them only in the most grave situations and do not decide to go on strike lightly or on a mere whim. You wold do well to bear this fact in mind. Strikes are consequently "news" today because of their comparative rarity.

[Richard Barrett]

I'd always thought democracy is about votes.

Democracy means government by the people. Although we're allowed to vote now and again, we are clearly not in charge, and given the craven attitude of all the political parties towards "business", neither is the elected government. So where is the democracy actually?

[jean]

...she stilll managed to get in against a pretty heavyweight opponent, didn't she? - and presumably some if not most of those Conservatives who voted for her must have known at least some of these facts abouot her profile before doing so...

What her constituents knew of her unusual (for a Tory) views isn't really the point, which is rather how those views will ever be able to make much of an impact within the party system we've got.