Comments for Political Economy

Comment on “A Nation Stays Alive When Its Culture Stays Alive” by English Lament are you ‘Comfortably Numb’? | An English Voice

English Lament are you ‘Comfortably Numb’? | An English Voice — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 17:24:54 +0000

[...] New World’ there must be a political and cultural change, a positive recognition of our cultural heritage; common sense progressive discussion and heart driven desire to reinvigorate meaningful democracy [...]

Comment on Scottish Local Government Expenditure Cut By Only 5.6% by Aidan Vickers

Aidan Vickers — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 01:54:55 +0000

It shows what having your own government and parliament can do for you. That’s a huge difference.

Comment on Why Clegg Is Right And Cameron Wrong by Aidan Vickers

Aidan Vickers — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 04:52:34 +0000

A matter of fact article. Do you think the UK can ever have the same social mobility as the Finns?

Comment on The National Identity of England is English, Mr Cameron! by Alfred

Alfred — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 20:18:21 +0000

Here Here ! common sense something these politicians are void of, all straight from Uni into the Political Arena. All pretty useless, mummy’s boy’s
No experience in working and living with all the people of ENGLAND, makes Dave a distant and outlandish boy,
WE ENGLISH ! need leadership as in the Past by self made competent Men and Woman.
As for “Hug a hoody dave” He is on dodgy ground, will he learn and learn fast ? Will he LISTEN !
I doubt it.

Comment on The Low, Low Standards Of The “NO” To AV Campaign by Charles Vickers

Charles Vickers — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 11:45:02 +0000

Primaries are about selecting a candidate within a party. AV is about selections amongst parties. For example in your constituency you could find candidates standing for the Conservative party, Labour party, Liberal Democrat Party, United Kingdom Independence party (UKIP), Green party and English Democratic party (EDP). If you want a devolved parliament and government for England and a referendum on leaving the EU then you would like to vote first for the the EDP. Being realistic you know that the EDP are unlikely to win and could come bottom. So under the “first-past-the-post” system you would not vote EDP as this would be a wasted vote. Under AV you would vote EDP first. Since UKIP have a limited England option and want a referendum on the EU you might put UKIP second. You might not have any other party you would like to vote for but if you do you would put this third and so on.
Now if at the count no candidate has more than 50% of the vote and the EDP candidate does indeed come bottom s/he is eliminated and your vote goes to to your second choice which is UKIP -exactly as you would have voted under a “run-off” voting system. If at the end of the second round of counting there is still no candidate with more than 50% of the vote and UKIP are bottom they are eliminated and your vote goes to your third choice and so on.
Under AV the first round of voting is likely to give a much better indication of voter preferences, allows the voter to make a finer-grained choice (I like UKIP but not quite as much as I like the EDP as in this example), gives the voter greater power in strategic voting – not generally liked by the major parties as this can act against them unless they have taken the time to develop a broader base to their policies – and because it increases voter choice it is likely to increase voter involvement with the electoral process, which is surely a good thing.
As I said in my blog. What is not to like about the Alternative Vote system!