Election

Ahhhhhh, now I remember, levitating on gym mats in their pj's.

 

Oh. I thought they'd abolished the rules saying you had to be a tax payer to vote sometime in the depths of the last century. Last time I looked you simply had to be a British subject over 18 to vote.

 

Yeah thats what I think, its nice they aren't labour or conservative but I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw them. At least the others have some experience .
Our system sucks, no one hears any disagreement. My green vote should help them win another seat so they get listened to a bit more (not sure I'd really want them in power though, only in an ideal world) but it won't because the other people in my area won't vote for them. Daft.
Someone told me once if enough people put down that they refuse to vote for any of the candidates then there has a to be a political review/reform in the country. That would be interesting.

 

I am coz it wont be spent wisely, it'll be wasted just like the billions thats wasted now. If we focused on the core areas of public funding then the tax we already pay would provide us with great public service.......but then I always wake up with cornflakes stuck on my face.

One thing that really bugs me, well theres hundreds but this is my fave at the moment, Im on long-term medication (yeah yeah insert joke here) and I have to pay my £6.50 every 3 weeks or so. However everytime I go to the chemist I swear Im the only one who actually pays, its really pissin me off.

 

Always voted Labour but the Iraq thing has really stuck and angered me - so much for being the voice of the people - don't agree with some of these anti-terror laws as well. The US government really scares me and we are too much in their pocket - just can't trust Blair anymore.

I think many Labour people will be voting Lib Dem as, for me, it will be a long cold day in Hell to vote Tory.

I've never minded paying taxes but agree with other comments that it would be nice to see where they were going and it would nice to see of the public sector jobs could be streamlined so fewer paper pushers and more nurses and doctors for instance.

I'm sat in an office full of tories and the arguments have already begun.

However I think too many people in this country actually vote based on what the Sun tells them to vote for - if they vote at all.

 

I want to vote Green. I don't think I'd want the Greens running the government but at least with a voice in parliament they (and therefore the represenation I would like to have) would at least have a voice.

I will vote Lib Dem because as I see it its the only way we will ever get a fair system.

 

I'll vote Green as a protest vote.

If the BNP could do the "tough on crime" without the racial BS that goes with them, I'd vote for them, as at least they don't BS on what they think of disabled people like me. If a party was honest about this issue, that would make all the difference, rather than whenever they need to save money, mooting the idea of means testing disabled punters or removing ALL their benefits/opportunities (eg "special" schools") whilst shelling out hand over fist for dole-scrounging chavs and pregnant single mothers - almost ALL of which have a choice in their situation (getting a low-paid apprentiship with prospects, or getting family planning free johnnies are two options that spring to mind here). Don't you DARE give me the pinko refrain of "live and let live" here - they have choices - people like me don't.

BTW - I voted Lib Dem in the local elections and Green in the last general; if I can do Green again it's got to be worth a shot...

 

That's bullshit and you know it. The wealth I now enjoy has been almost entirely built up under Labour. The one thing I have the Tories to thank for is being stuck with a London flat in massive negative equity during periods of mortgage interest rates as high as 15% from 1990-1998 when I finally managed to just sell it for what I paid for it.

You've tried to make this argument before and it's no more convincing now than the last time. Being wealthy and having left-wing views are by no means mutually exclusive. FWIW I'm in the process of selling my car for a BMW 320d Touring.

Well, the law says I can have an overseas vote for 20 years (I think) as long as I'm a British Citizen. If I'm given the right I'll excercise it. I'm not coming back btw . Most countries have similar schemes.

Personally I'm much more in favour of being able to vote in the country where you are legally resident than the one you're a citizen of. I'd much rather have the right to vote in general elections in Portugal (I can vote in local elections here) but that requires me getting Portuguese citizenship which is some way off unfortunately.

Michael.

 

I'm an unvoter. I've never been able to convince myself that choosing between any of the various inverted pyramids of piffle on offer makes a blind bit of difference. Bring on the revolution, brothers and sisters.

-- Ian

 

Look - you know my tongue is firmly in my cheek when I'm giving you stick - I do the same to a socialist mate of mine who, by marrying someone with her own property, has ended up as a landlord of his old place i.e. making money out of tennants and effectively speculating on the housing market.

Having said that, Thatcherism turned the UK into a very wealthy country and New Labour, in fairness, have kept the economy on a steady path so good old Maggie is partly responsible for all our wealth.

No offence (you know that) - I just find it a bit funny that a socialist can drive around in a car that screams wealth/excess and isn't very environmentally friendly.

As it happens I went from a similar performance car (Impreza turbo) to a 320D and didn't feel too short-changed on the performance front due to the huge torque available - I also increased my mpg from 24 to 45!! The 320D is going tomorrow and being replaced with a 330D which should be fun without losing too much on the mpg stakes.

Matt.

 

I am not sure I can vote for a government that has priced me out of the house market and landed me with a massive debt to pay off. Many students feel the same as well, in mock votes at universities labour are loosing by a mile. Their top up fee's policies were madly handled because they descrimate against the poorer middle classes.

However if things would be a different under the tories or not is a massive debate. Having only been allowed to vote for four years I am really not sure. I hate the right wing views of the tories, and I hate the left wingness of labour. I am stuck in the middle.

 

Conservative. Although it will be a wasted vote as Sir Menzies Campbell is my local MP and he'll never get voted out...

 

There's more left wing to an England attack in the footy than there is in the Labour party these days...

I've voted Labour the last two times, and thought that I'd probably always vote Labour, but like many, feel they don't really represent what the party should be standing for, they seem to have shifted too far to the right, to the point where there's almost nothing between them and the Tories. They need to stop and realise that they aren't representing the people they set out to do good for in the first place.

My hope is, that if Labour do get back in again, that Tony will either stand aside after a year, or maybe someone will challenge him to a leadership contest which might make him realise that he isn't the only one in the party, or better still, see him removed in favour of Gordon Brown.

I can't see the Lib Dems doing that good a job were they to get in, purely down to the fact that, as a party, they don't have enough MPs with the experience to form a cabinet that could work effectively.

Voting against the Tories is something I don't think will be necessary, I can't see Ben Bradshaw losing his seat at the next election (a pity since he appears to have done bugger all for our city), so will see how I feel on the day. Green might be an option.

 

Manchester is a labour city and always has been. The sad fact is it mostly works well. I am probably tradiotionaly a tory boy, my dad had the right job, my parents had the house in the suburbs complete with the luxery car (ek em a Lada with a belgium wilton carpet).

However the council are good and the MPs seem to be quite good, the main problem is that the government is controlled in London, which dosn't reflect the rest of the country properly. This why I support regional parliments.

I won't be voting for the tories anyway, I just don't think I am ready to vote for labour and some their policies have really p*ssed me off.

 

If Labour win again by a comfortable margin what is the chance of that happening?

I agree there appears to be very little to choose between the main parties. Maybe what we need is a Parliament with more equal proportional share of MPs among the parties. So that who ever form the government and wish to commit the country to war again or whatever else took their fancy, at least the PM or should that be the 'President' has to engage in a proper debate with the House of Commons with effective oppositions.

 

I am always very dubius of these polls, according to this poll the Green Party has almost as many votes as labour, we all know that the real ratio will be somthing like 500:1.

 

Could the people who declare they are not going to vote explain what is your reason? Look what the Iraqis recently have to endure to have this privilege. You are probably going say all the candidates are all just as bad as any, if that is really the case should you not then vote for 'none of the above' or even vote in a local prostitute to drive in that point. Otherwise one of them will just walk into an easy job paid by our taxes and with actually a very good pension for working a lot less years that we have to do to get.

 

If there is one message throughout this thread, it's that the electoral system sucks. I think if more people took interest in alternative voting systems, you would have something to pester your MP to change;

http://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/votingsystems/systems.htm

and a more mathematical analysis:

http://bcn.boulder.co.us/government/approvalvote/altvote.html

plenty more on Google.........

 

There's a good debate about the election going on over at thedvdforums.com.

One very interesting point made was this:

If all three main parties get the same percentage of the vote (31.4%) you get this result:

Lab 326 seats
Con 202 seats
Lib 87 seats
OTHERS 31 seats
TOTAL SEATS 646

A clear Labour majority of 6 seats over all other parties combined!

All because of the ways the boundaries have been drawn.

Matt.

 

I know, sorry I overreacted

Michael.