What's so wrong with a hung parliament?
Discussion
I can see why the politicians don't want to be sharing power, but for us is a hung parliament such a bad thing.
Both Labour and the Tories are talking up the green agenda, road pricing is on the cards, etc. Whoever wins outright will no doubt come up with some annoying new legislation soon enough.
I was surprised to hear recently that most European countries have hung parliaments, most of the time. The UK is pretty unusual.
Am I wrong to think our politicians spending the next 5 years arguing between each other could be preferable to having an outright winner?
Both Labour and the Tories are talking up the green agenda, road pricing is on the cards, etc. Whoever wins outright will no doubt come up with some annoying new legislation soon enough.
I was surprised to hear recently that most European countries have hung parliaments, most of the time. The UK is pretty unusual.
Am I wrong to think our politicians spending the next 5 years arguing between each other could be preferable to having an outright winner?
Baby Huey said:
Vixpy1 said:
It means another general election within a year, and uncertainty, and markets hate that. So expect a dive in shares
The country can't get any more knackered, can it?A majority parliament can get to do what it wants - good or bad. It need only convince or bully its members. This is particularly easy with a large majority and a new influx of young turks (who still have ministerial ambitions and can therefore be manipulated, unlike the old dinosaurs).
With a hung parliament you have two options - coalition or a minority government.
The coalition is a formal agreement with other parties to obtain a majority. You will temper certain aspects of your manifesto, risk having the other party walk away, and there is an increased risk of having to bribe that party with concessions.
A minority government will take this a step further.You have to temper your manifesto even further. Everything you propose is likely to be broken down, interrogated, and scrutinised before being made law. Everything is likely to be tempered. You are likely to get better written laws, and more suitable/popular laws. But progress will be slow as you can't hustle things through, and necessary but unpopular laws will struggle to be processed. And the backroom horse-trading with other parties is likely to be higher still. And ultimately, you will give up and call another election early.
So a majority parliament allows you to be more radical, and act faster and more decisively. You can maintain a purity of your ideals and minimise compromise. Of course, it depends on the times and the morals of the leaders whether this is a good or bad thing. Abe Lincoln emancipating the slaves, definitely a good thing. Blair's Terrorism Act and SOCPA (both badly written and restrictive on civil rights), probably less so.
(In interests of fairness, the same can be applied to Thatcher - some of the things she pushed through were unpopular but very good, some were just stupid)
With a hung parliament you have two options - coalition or a minority government.
The coalition is a formal agreement with other parties to obtain a majority. You will temper certain aspects of your manifesto, risk having the other party walk away, and there is an increased risk of having to bribe that party with concessions.
A minority government will take this a step further.You have to temper your manifesto even further. Everything you propose is likely to be broken down, interrogated, and scrutinised before being made law. Everything is likely to be tempered. You are likely to get better written laws, and more suitable/popular laws. But progress will be slow as you can't hustle things through, and necessary but unpopular laws will struggle to be processed. And the backroom horse-trading with other parties is likely to be higher still. And ultimately, you will give up and call another election early.
So a majority parliament allows you to be more radical, and act faster and more decisively. You can maintain a purity of your ideals and minimise compromise. Of course, it depends on the times and the morals of the leaders whether this is a good or bad thing. Abe Lincoln emancipating the slaves, definitely a good thing. Blair's Terrorism Act and SOCPA (both badly written and restrictive on civil rights), probably less so.
(In interests of fairness, the same can be applied to Thatcher - some of the things she pushed through were unpopular but very good, some were just stupid)
Baby Huey said:
Am I wrong to think our politicians spending the next 5 years arguing between each other could be preferable to having an outright winner?
Hung Parliament - no one votes for a hung Parliament.People vote for Party X who believe in X, or Party Y who believe in Y, or Party Z that believes in Z. They didn't vote for 70% X and 30% Z. So you end up with a minority of people getting policy through.
And can you imagine the Liberals being your bed partner? The intransigence will blow any sort of coalition Govt apart in months. The infighting would be stellar, and they spend more time arguing than actually getting policy through.
If you want to see what hung Parliaments do, take a look at Italy that has a perpetual coalition Govt and a General Election every 18 months.
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