Proportional representation - NOT!

[Steve_T]

Just set the vote percentages as close as poss to a third for each party on the beeb's election seat calculator: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_20...

The result is ~100 Lib Dem, ~210 Conservative, ~315 Labour and ~25 for the 0.1% I can't remove from the pie chart (Can someone post a pic?). The results may not be quite right, but even though I knew there was bias in the system, I had no idea it could be this much!

There can only be one message here - FFS don't vote for team Winky!

Edited by Steve_T on Wednesday 5th May 14:05

[Political Pain]

I put in my idea. [percentage based but no evidence]

Con 38.5% 338 seats
Lab 23% 188 seats
LD 29% 96 seats

[GT03ROB]

Try it at 50:50 Con : Lab

Winky still gets a 48 seat majority....fiddled by labour or what.

[bonsai]

Is there an article anywhere that shows how many constituency boundary changes they've made since 1997? How does that compare with previous decades?

Edited by bonsai on Wednesday 5th May 14:14

[Dupont666]

how does that work... its not a correct representation?

[Steve_T]

I'm not even sure I want proportional representation and coalitions all the time, but at least each party should be helped equally towards a majority as they poll a greater percentage of the vote.

LD: ~40% => ~215
Lab: ~30% => ~250
Con: ~30% => ~160

LD: ~30% => ~90
Lab: ~40% => ~370
Con: ~30% => ~165

LD: ~30% => ~80
Lab: ~30% => ~240
Con: ~40% => ~305


Just plain wrong!

Edited by Steve_T on Wednesday 5th May 14:46

[Dupont666]

Steve_T said:

I'm not even sure I want proportional representation and coalitions all the time, but at least each party should be helped equally towards a majority as they poll a greater percentage of the vote.

LD: ~40% => ~215
Lab: ~30% => ~250
Con: ~30% => ~160

Just plain wrong!

I have the answer...

Its based upon this:

Consider this simplified example of an election involving three parties competing in three seats, each of which has 30 voters.

A simple first-past-the-post election
S1 S2 S3 Total S won
Party A 13 12 3 28 2
Party B 8 7 15 30 1
Party C 9 11 12 32 0

Party A has won the election despite receiving fewer votes than the other two parties.

It is possible because there is no value placed on votes in seats that you do not win, so the 11 votes that party C received in seat 2 were effectively wasted.

There is also no value placed on having a bigger majority, so gaining extra support in a constituency that you already hold does not help your party very much.

This is a problem for parties that have some support in a lot of constituencies, but less concentrated support.

In 2005, the Liberal Democrats received 22% of the votes but only won 62 seats, which was less than 10% of the seats in the House of Commons.

In the 1951 general election, Winston Churchill's Conservatives won 26 more seats than Clement Attlee's Labour Party despite having received about 250,000 fewer votes.

The electoral system means that opinion polls that aim to reflect percentage support throughout the country may be misleading, because what matters is not the total proportion of votes won but the amount of concentrated support that wins seats.

(copied from the BBC site)

[timlongs]

Welcome to FPTP. This is why we need electoral reform.

[john_p]

A combination of
- If a party doesn't win the seat their votes mean nothing
- Less Labour voters vote in safe Labour seats (because they'll win anyway)
- Tory support is very low in Scotland/Wales, which are over-represented in terms of seats per population
- Tactical voting (LD votes from Labour supporters in Cons/Lib Dem marginals, etc)

Good article here
http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/conlabgap.html

Edited by john_p on Wednesday 5th May 14:49

[RV8]

The lib dems were canvasing the other day, they handed me a leaflet which seemed to basically warn if you don't want conservatives then a UKIP, Green or Labour vote would count in the conservatives favor so any of those was as good as a conservative vote. Now this suggested that they were implying you should make a tactical vote which is not how a democratic society should work even so this is a majority Lib Dem area. Far from it to me to understand the finer workings of these things but I wonder how many people have voted tactically this year rather than for a party with values that match theirs and I wonder how much this will affect the outcome.

[jesusbuiltmycar]

RV8 said:

The lib dems were canvasing the other day, they handed me a leaflet which seemed to basically warn if you don't want conservatives then a UKIP, Green or Labour vote would count in the conservatives favor so any of those was as good as a conservative vote. Now this suggested that they were implying you should make a tactical vote which is not how a democratic society should work even so this is a majority Lib Dem area. Far from it to me to understand the finer workings of these things but I wonder how many people have voted tactically this year rather than for a party with values that match theirs and I wonder how much this will affect the outcome.

Are the Lib Dems a different party to the Liberal Democrats that were condeming tactical voting only yesterday?

[tinman0]

timlongs said:

Welcome to FPTP. This is why we need electoral reform.

No, we need the constituency boundaries set up properly again.

[Parrot of Doom]

tinman0 said:

timlongs said:

Welcome to FPTP. This is why we need electoral reform.

No, we need the constituency boundaries set up properly again.

Does anyone actually have evidence that the boundary commission have been fiddling the system to Labour's benefit, or are we to engage in baseless speculation again?

I thought the reason for the imbalance was mostly because the boundary commission is unable to keep up with population changes.

[john_p]

It wouldn't be PH without baseless speculation would it..

The boundary changes are all listed on the web

http://www.lgbce.org.uk/

Feel free to check into any area you believe has been "manipulated".

[FlatPack]

If you look at the BBC's seat calculator and the past election results...

1992 - last time a Tory government got elected. Same share of the vote with the current boundaries results in a hung parliament.

1974 - last time there was a hung parliament, with the current boundaries results in a Labour majority.

The system is broken, whether or not it's being manipulated I have no idea. It is broken though.

[MX7]

tinman0 said:

timlongs said:

Welcome to FPTP. This is why we need electoral reform.

No, we need the constituency boundaries set up properly again.

Exactly. Most of this thread has nothing to do with FPTP or PR.

[tinman0]

john_p said:

It wouldn't be PH without baseless speculation would it..

The boundary changes are all listed on the web

http://www.lgbce.org.uk/

Feel free to check into any area you believe has been "manipulated".

So, three women looking at a map, with the token black woman to represent diversity, marker pen in the hand, and slogan underneath "Corporate plan", and I'm meant to feel a bit better about its impartiality.

And all they are doing, their words not mine, is ensuring the right number of electors per councilour/mp/etc.

So frankly, that is totally open to abuse. Add in a council estate here, take one out there, and all of a sudden you get diversity, but more importantly you get swings in political power.

It's gerrymandering with a fancy website.

Edited by tinman0 on Wednesday 5th May 17:40

[nonuts]

Steve_T said:

LD: ~40% => ~215
Lab: ~30% => ~250
Con: ~30% => ~160

LD: ~30% => ~90
Lab: ~40% => ~370
Con: ~30% => ~165

LD: ~30% => ~80
Lab: ~30% => ~240
Con: ~40% => ~305

Just plain wrong!

That is fking scary if it's accurate!

[FlatPack]

john_p said:

It wouldn't be PH without baseless speculation would it..

The boundary changes are all listed on the web

http://www.lgbce.org.uk/

Feel free to check into any area you believe has been "manipulated".

That's for local electoral wards rather than parliamentary constituencies - you want this one http://www.boundarycommissionforengland.org.uk/

I had a read for my local area... The larger of the 2 constituencies is the more marginal, the smaller one is a very safe Labour seat. Wards that were previously split between the 2 were moved into the larger constituency, making it bigger and the smaller one smaller. Those same wards routinely elect Labour councillors. Make of that what you will.

[rypt]

jesusbuiltmycar said:

RV8 said:

The lib dems were canvasing the other day, they handed me a leaflet which seemed to basically warn if you don't want conservatives then a UKIP, Green or Labour vote would count in the conservatives favor so any of those was as good as a conservative vote. Now this suggested that they were implying you should make a tactical vote which is not how a democratic society should work even so this is a majority Lib Dem area. Far from it to me to understand the finer workings of these things but I wonder how many people have voted tactically this year rather than for a party with values that match theirs and I wonder how much this will affect the outcome.

Are the Lib Dems a different party to the Liberal Democrats that were condeming tactical voting only yesterday?

And 2 days before that one of the local LDs was telling me to vote tactically as Cons had no chance here so a vote for LD was the only way to remove Labour