So on May 6th/Today it's the UK General Election, but I'm sure #massassi people and those of you that watch the Daily Show probably know that.

Anyway, it's pretty much the closest election we've had in 20 years with the 3 largest parties pretty much level pegging [though the Conservatives do have a bit of a lead]. Like the US it'd usually be a pretty much 2 party system but thanks to some absolutely horrible TV debates, support for the Liberal Democrats has skyrocketed so it's a bit of a 3 horse race for now, though the Libs haven't actually been in power since the 1920s. Essentially after tomorrow Britain is probably going to have a government where no party has a real majority, theres going to be a lot of bickering and we'll be back at the polls in December. Yay!

Oh well, I'm happy so long as "Call me Dave" doesn't end up Prime Minister.

[Edit: If you're interested, check out http://voteforpolicies.org.uk and have a gander at what sort of UK Party Policies are your style.]

I wish Canada would get off it's ass and call an election, I have an itchy polling finger now that I can vote.

Imagine if they did everything according to Tibby's life situation.

And the day Tibby is no more, they would bring down the whole System.

Jesus, 10% BNP predicted?

'tis a sad time to be a human being.

(then again when isn't it??)

Bacoboco:

Even though the Lib Dems have about an equal share of the popular vote (CON 30%, LAB 28%, LIB 28%, OTHER 14%) their lack of concentrated support effectively shafts them. The distribution of seats in the above example would be approximately CON 223, LAB 300, LIB 98.

The countryside is Tory, the big cities with large workforces are Labour, and everyone in between in Lib Dem. Unfortunately there aren't really constituencies for "in between" - they're just one or the other (by and large).

Our voting system is even more broken than the Electoral College system.

This is how I imagine England:

Martyn: I say chaps, the writ has been dropped!

Detty: Indeed my dear fellow! Time to cast our ballots!

Matryn: Quite!

Detty: Allow me to hail one of our famous London motor carriages!

Martyn: But good sir, I haven't the pence!

Detty: Rubbish! I shall subsidize your ride with this fiver old bean!

Martyn: Capitol! I shant let this act of kindness go unrewarded!

Detty: Perhaps you would repay me with a round of bangers and mash at the local pub!

Martyn: Smashing!

Detty: Spiffing!

Martyn: Ripping B!

Then boco walks in and starts singing Loch Lomond.

awesome

of course in reality it's a bunch of chavs trying to knife you.

Oh yeah, well aware of that. Apart from north of the border it's essentially Labour in Edinburgh and Glasgow, Lib in most rural areas apart from places where complete arsewipes vote SNP.

Almost everyone in Scotchlant hates the Tories thanks to THAT WOMAN.

I hate the voting system.


There's an interesting site: http://www.voterpower.org.uk/

My vote is worth 0.13 votes: http://www.voterpower.org.uk/bedfordshire-south-west Great "The average UK voter has 1.92x more voting power than voters in Bedfordshire South West."

*sigh* I hate being in such a safe seat.

You think that's bad? I have 0.037. The average voter has 6.67x more voting power than I.

Which is actually a load of bollocks because our current MP is Jim Devine and he's sort of turned people off Labour.

I will be going Tory again.:colbert:

I don't know much about British politics. In the U.S. you have 2 party system where both parties spend most of their time pretending that they're less similar than they actually are. Tell me, is it like this in Britain, but w/ 3 parties pretending to not be almost identical or are there actually differences that make a difference?

Usually it's a 2 party system with Labour telling people how the Tories are bastards, The Tories telling people that they're not Thatcher anymore [but they are], and then the Lib Dems skulk about in the back telling people how they aren't the other two and moan about how they haven't been in power since the 1920s [though usually most people don't bother paying attention to them].

Why do so many liberal Brits get so worked up over Thatcher in particular?

I thought the Conservative party was the crazy English equivalent of tea party demonstrators that no one took seriously? Which one is that?

That's probably UKIP or the BNP you're thinking of.

Our Conservatives are not into Religion.

Because she absolutely tore the arse out of the country.

At least you guys don't have to worry about constipation anymore.

Also, I completed that survey on http://voteforpolicies.org.uk, and juuuust after I hit submit, the place went down.

BULLOX.

Edit: Nevermind. Apparently I'm 100% UKIP.

As long as no one's voting for the Clique Dedicated To The Restoration Of the British Empire By Eliminating Finland.

Wait what

I think my vote is 1.07 or so, but I think this place is going Conservative. Mostly because Labour have basically just given up on this area.

She sounded pretty good to me (note that I'm a Republican).



The conservative party is one of the two big parties. They're not against nationalized medicine or anything. Churchill was a conservative.

Despite the fact that she absolutely destroyed Apprenticeships and the mining industry?

[Edit - Also rampant unemployment and roaming power outages etc back in the 80s.]

I don't know if the Conservative Party is really conservative any more.

I've taken the test before and got about 78% UKIP, 22% Conservative.

i have no idea what my vote score is, and i'm not even voting, because i changed my name when i registered in southampton last year so i can avoid an old council tax bill. I dont exist!:downswords:

not that quite that cool actually. Yeah anyway, i was a Tory, now i'm not so sure. I will laugh my ass off if Libs succeed

if(getThingFlags(source) & 0x8){
  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

Where can I take this test

So I know who to vote for if I ever go to England

Didn't know we had a celebrity on these boards!

I was pretty sure who I was going to vote for in the last election, the problem is now that I'm registered in London, Lewisham for that matter, there are too many candiates and on a local level I don't think any of the big parties are what's best for the area...

I've been thinking about this for a while now...maybe I should stop thinking about what's best for the area and just go with the party who's policies I agree the most with....hhmm...not long left to make my mind up.

Who said that?

She wanted to close mines that were losing money, and then refused to give in to the demands of the union. Boo hoo.

Inflation had been brought down to around 4% (from 13.4% in 1979) and economic growth was rising at between 4 and 5% (compared to 2% in 1979). Government debt had fallen to 27.7% of GDP (from 44%) by 1990 with the government running a budget surplus of some £6 billion.

This seems to be in contrast to the Labour governments of Blair and Brown, with a budget deficit that could end up worse than Greece.

HAM

HAM

What's the big difference between Conservatives and Labour?

There's not much of a difference between Republicans and Democrats in the United States. I think it's the same way in Britain.

I tried to take the survey but all the policies are absolute **** and the same.

If the UKIP and BNP ones are the same as the rest, you're mental.

Whats the IKIP? BNP are the fascist party, right?

The test said I'd be something like 2/3 conservative and 1/3 labour.

The BNP is fascist. I think the UKIP is conservative or libertarian. They want to leave the European Union.

UKIP are genererally regarded as thinly veiled racists.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8666128.stm

Conservatives predicted to be ahead in Exit Polls. ****.

Looks like conservatives are going to have to form a coalition. Which hasn't happened since 1974, at least that's what I read.

Here in the Netherlands we have a lot of parties, a few big ones and a number of smaller ones, but the election results vary a lot.

No party ever has an absolute majority so we always end up with a coalition government. I think that's actually good, even though sometimes it can destabilize government when coalitions fall. The last decade that has happened unusually often, mostly because our prime minister is a sad sucker who can't keep his **** together. Yet people keep voting for the guy, it's uncanny.