Election Predictions

[andrewducker]

My election predictions (after conversation with chuma over here):

Vote results: Conservatives->Lib Dem->Labour
Seat results: Labour->Conservatives->Lib Dem

Public to get very confused and upset.

Comments

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure the public would get terribly upset or confused. We have had the First Past the Post system for a very long time and it is well understood. The Liberal Democrats would get upset, and Twitter would probably explode, but unless there is a hung parliament, it would surprise me if the same system wasn't in place for the next general election.

[andrewducker]

I don't recall ever having a time where the party with the most votes didn't also have the most seats.

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

1974. It happened in 1951 as well.

[andrewducker]

1974 saw a hung parliament and another election 8 months later - people clearly weren't happy with that result.

I don't know how much of a fuss there was in 1951, but I expect there to be a much bigger one this time around.

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

In 1974 another election was called because it was impossible to form a stable government. The Liberals had so few seats that neither a Liberal-Labour nor a Liberal-Conservative coalition had a working majority, whilst the Ulster Unionists and Nationalists refused to support either. I wasn't born in 1974, but I have not read any suggestion that public dissatisfaction with the discrepancy between votes and seats that brought about the second election in that year. Rather that it was the inability of any combination of the parties to form a stable government in the Commons.

[andrewducker]

Hm. Interesting. One wonders, in that case, _why_ people didn't see it as an obvious failing.

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

Because people in the UK have accepted the FPtP system for centuries. It's easy to understand, and each area elects an individual, which again is easy to understand. And since neither of the big two parties want to change the system, it's never seriously raised as a political issue.

[andrewducker]

There are lots of systems that are easy to understand and clearly very silly.

"Let's all do what Bob says" is about as simple as you can get, but even sillier than FPTP. Mind you, a lot of people would defend that too, I suspect, especially if Bob had a flashy crown.

[dougs.livejournal.com]

I was 9 in February and 10 in October, and it was during that summer that my interest in politics was born.