Vote Drink Moan (Again)

Many Moons ago, on the last election day, I suggested that voting should ideally partaken of during the evening, just prior to pub opening time.

After voting, the voter should congratulate themselves on their exceptionally good electoral choice and sink a significantly dangerous quantity of alcoholic beverage.

This election is no exception.

You can be a namby-pamby - "Oh I always vote first thing in the morning" type. Or you can be a real man (or woman) and get them lined up down the boozer ready for the post voting binge.

As for the liquor of choice, I would personally recommend Old Rosie - the Cider of Champions. Old Rosie is served in a pint glass. It is cloudy. Whether this is because cloudiness is its natural cidery state, or because it is dissolving the glass has yet to be determined.

One for you doubting bastards who
thought Old Rosie was a figment of my imagination 

Of course, this time we have the AV/FPTP referendum to vote for as well as the local elections. In my locality we also have Parish Council elections to congratulate ourselves over. It promises to be a hell of a night.

While down the boozer and before the result is in, maybe we can view the future optimistically. After all we all know we are likely to be disappointed. But just because the game is rigged, does not mean you should not play.

I suppose even the early morning voters, though denied their liver challenging late night alcoholic consumption can still indulge in a bit of optimism.

Personally I recommend you support AV. A vote for AV will seriously restrict the room for maneuvre for the dirty men and women of politics.

The Eton boys, the dirty old guard of the Labour party, the dinosaurs, all want AV voted down - because it suites their ugly purpose.

True there are some real unadulterated tossers supporting AV - like Clegg and Co. But just because we have to endure these fellow travellers does not mean we should do the bidding of the ugly status-quo self servers either.

But whatever you vote, get out there and vote.

Don't forget - no vote no moan. If you can't be bothered to vote, don't expect anyone to listen to you moaning about politicians.

When you are down the pub next, how the hell will you be able to legitimately complain about the politico's if you didn't even vote?

I suggest you vote for AV.

But whatever you do:

Vote.

Love&Kisses
Billothewisp

First Past The Post, AV and Honest Men

Wonderfully, every now and then, the sterility of the First Past The Post voting system fails to stop the electorate having their way.

Two fine examples were Martin Bell who stood as an "anti-sleaze" campaigner in 1997 and  Dr Richard Taylor who stood as "Independent Kidderminster Hospital and Health Concern Party" candidate in 2001. Both were Independants. Bell was actually the first elected Independant MP since 1951.

These results are really interesting because the both show how First Past The Post could easily have failed the electorate under "normal" circumstances (and eventually did in Kidderminster) and how AV would have returned  the result.

First Martin Bell. Tatton 1997

The case of the man in a White Suite versus the Arch Sleazeball.

The bad guy? Neil Hamilton, MP in the ultra safe seat of Tatton.  The "Cash for Questions" King. All he really needed was a black hat and the whole thing would have been perfect. Bell, a highly respected journalist and reporter, stood against him.

Here is the previous electorial result.

Even under AV this was a safe seat with Hamilton having more than 50% of the vote.

Then in the 1997 election a benign subversion of FPTP took place. Both the Labour and the Lib-Dem candidates stood down. They essentially transferred their vote to Bell, as would have happened under AV. The Conservative vote collapsed. But it did not collapse completely. Here is the result (I've left off minor parties - they only got 700 votes between them)

So the excellent Mr Bell won and the whole country rejoiced. One in the Eye for crooked politicians. Hurrah!

But look again at the results. Bell won because dissolusioned Conservatives stayed at home and the Labour and Lib-Dem votes "transferred" to him. But both supporters of Labour and the Lib-Dems were denied their true aspirational vote. With FPTP, if either the Labour or Lib-Dem candidates had stood (as was their right) not only could Bell have been defeated, but Hamilton may well have still won.

That would have been on in the eye for Democracy courtesy FPTP.

With AV, even if all candidates had stood, the preferences would have ensured that Hamilton still lost. Nobody would have been denied their right to vote for the party of their first choice either.

Bell only stood for one term, which was a shame for British Politics. But at least he did us all a favour by turfing out liar and a cheat.

Second: The case of the Good Doctor versus the Evil Government.

Dr. Taylor campaigned largely on a single issue - the restoration the A&E dept of Kidderminster Hospital, which had been closed in 2000 due to cuts in the NHS (That is Labour cuts by the way). The sitting MP was a Junior Labour minister David Lock.

Lock was not quite the evil bad guy aka Neil Hamilton, but still clearly the enemy.

Lock, like Hamilton had a large majority. But during the election, the Liberal Democrats pulled their candidate. Many Tory voters switched tactically to Taylor. Both in crude ways enforced AV onto the election.

Here is the result of 2001.

Notice there is no Lib-Dem Candidate and also the reduced support for Conservatives. If either the conservative vote had held up, or the Lib-Dems had fielded a candidate, Taylor would have probably lost. But due to people personally "fixing" the broken system of FPTP by transferring their vote or completely sacrificing their party's vote share, the good guy won - with an absolute majority

In 2005 the Lib-Dems pulled their candidate again, although a petulant local party stood a "Liberal" candidate. Taylor still won.

This time he did not gain an absolute majority, but he would certainly have also won the seat under AV.

Again one in the eye for the evil governemnt - twice in a row.

In the 2010 election, the Lib-Dems fielded a candidate (as is their right and duty) but then this happened.

If this had been AV I would put my money on Taylor still being the MP.

So the wishes of the majority of the electorate were denied because their votes were corralled into a false race to a non existent finishing poll. The guy who won simply had a slightly bigger pile than any of the other piles. If any owner of one of the other piles had stood down (or had their vote transferred under AV) the result would have been different - and fairer.

I expect as far as the government were concerned Taylor was a real pain in the ass and they probably all put out the flags when he lost. But really we need MORE people like Taylor and Bell not less. We need people who will not just tow the party line.

With AV we are more likely to get them and keep them. First Past The Post simply entrenches the sterile old guard and denies us a dynamic and adaptive democractic representation.

Vote for AV on Thursday.

Ugh! In Praise of Ed MilliBand

I'll have to say this quickly - or I will be sick.

Billothewisp wishes to praise Ed Milliband. Ughggghhh! There. I've said it.

Readers of this blog will know that Billothewisp is hardly a fan of New Labour. Or Old Labour. Or even New Virgin Labour.

You may recall Billothewisp particularly dislikes corrupt and amoral politicians, as represented by most of the last Labour cabinet.

So I was pleasantly surprised to find that Ed Milliband is supporting AV. Even though most of the shysters from the previous Labour administration are opposing it.

Milliband is supporting AV in the the teeth of party opposition from the old guard.  Most of this opposition comes from the old Dinosaurs and expense claim fiddlers who so lamentably failed us when in office. These days they make up the bulk of the corruption ridden corpse that is the Labour Party elite.

It looks like this will turn into a grand battle in the Labour ranks. Is it going to be the new boy king who prevails? The one who wants to reform his blood soaked party and maybe once again win the votes of the likes of Billothewisp?

Or is it the corrupt Dinosaurs who wrecked the economy, gerrymandered elections via mass immigration and sent our boys off to fight other men's wars?

I may not like Millibands politics. I may disagree with many things he has to say. But the fact that he is making a principled stand for AV means I will at least listen to him. Especially as this stand is coming in the teeth of political opposition froom the ugly branch of his party.

So, in future, I will listen to Ed Milliband.

As for the likes of John Reid, Gordon Brown, John Prescott, Margaret Reid and David Blunkett?

They can go to hell.

How First Past The Post Harms the Tories

Due to the unfairness of the First Past the Post voting system, the biggest losers in Scotland have been the Conservatives.

During the 2010 election, the Conservatives polled 18% of vote in Scotland but gained less than 2% of the seats. Without a fairer distribution of the votes in Scotland, the Conservatives will never be able to gain their fair Scottish representation.

Here is some Scottish Election data from the last two general Elections, 2005, 2010. Spot the (several sets of) unfairness:

Below, is the result table from 2010 General Election for Scotland. Again, spot the unfairness.

Notice the massive unfair seat allocation.  Particularly see the benefit to Labour and the grossly unfair penalisation of the Conservatives. In 2010, Lib-Dems actually got roughly the correct vote/seat ratio. If you divvied up the seats according to vote share Labour should have got 24 -25 seats, each of the other parties should then have got about 11 seats each

In Scotland, using the First Past the Post voting system, the Conservatives (and the SNP) are punished in exactly the same way that other minority parties are punished across the the UK. The people of Scotland end up with an unrepresentative grouping at Westminster, which strongly leans away from what a sizeable voting minority wish for, leaving these minorities with reduced  representation, or as with the Conservatives, with trivial representation.

Scotland may not  be a Tory heartland under any voting system, but under First Past the Post the Conservatives are guaranteed an insignificant representation.

There used to be a phrase used to define those Conservative who rejected the old class base system. A phrase used to define Conservatives who sought to promote the best interests of the whole of the UK. They used to be called One Nation Tories.

So how can these "One Nation Tories" today still support First Past The Post, especially when it harms their cause so badly as shown above?

By supporting FPTP the Conservative simply entrench themselves in their English heartland and so fail to be a One Nation party. Conservative party supporters need to look to the long term, not just the petty gains to be made in the short term by staying with an outdated and unfair voting system.

Vote for AV on Thursday.

First Past the Post and Tribalism

On my post about how George Galloway won the 2005 Bethnal Green and Bow seat during the 2005 General Election, I described how FPTP was responsible for foisting an extremist candidate on the 65% of the electorate that did not vote for him. During the research for this post I noticed another very worrying issue related to FPTP.

Look at the result below from Bethnal Green General Election result 2010. Remember Bethnal Green has a very large (approx 34%) Bangladeshi community. However this is still by any standards a minority. Besides this large single community the rest of the borough is diverse.

Below is the demographics of Tower Hamlets which incorporates Bethnal Green.

Notice in the first table how most of the candidates in the 2010 General Election have Bangladeshi names even though the Bangladeshi community is a minority in the borough. While I am more than happy for all communities who are settling in the UK to strive to become part of this country (and that includes standing for parliament), I am worried that the candidates in this case, were not selected on ability but on their ability to command a large tribal vote.

Galloway demonstrated the under FPTP any electoral victor in Bethnal Green had to command the tribal vote of the Bangladeshi community. Consequently, in 2010 all the main parties presented Bangladeshi candidates, even though 65% of the seat is not Bangladeshi. Of course, each party would, no doubt, protest that their candidate really was the best candidate they had, but really it seems unreasonable that all top polling candidates have Bangladeshi names.  The candidate list has been stuffed in order to win the Bangladeshi vote on racial grounds not on policy grounds.

First Past The Post is highly sensitive to block voting. In the real world of the UK today we have  a number of communities who are prepared to vote according to what they are told to do or what they tribally fell obliged to do.

AV would have prevented the election of George Galloway and it would negate the need for political parties to select candidates on racial rather than ability grounds.

FPTP is yesterdays voting system. It is not capable of meeting the challenges of a modern society. It need to be replaced. Voting for AV is an opportunity to significantly improve the democracy in our country.

Vote for AV on Thursday.

A Dual Dictatorship of Vested Interest

Because of the First Past The Post voting system, minority party supporters are given no option but to use tactical voting to remove an unpopular MP. Voters unlucky enough not to support either of the two main candidates are  left with no option but to vote for the least worst choice.

Emerging parties get starved of recognition and their policies go unnoticed or ignored.

The major parties regularly ignore anything that does not suit their policies or backers. We end up with a dual dictatorship where the electorate have only a tenuous choice between two monoliths. Each monolith is directed by the party zealots who ignore the obvious wishes of the electorate. Both main parties have little synergy to the real wishes of voters. The monoliths pay far more attention to their financial backers than the electorate. The electorate can go to hell.

We end up with a government completely divorced from the realities and wishes of most people.

Take well known examples of common electorate concerns:

Immigration
Europe
Justice and Crime
Social Security Abuse
Defence over-stretch
Foreign Aid abuse

How many of those concerns are even given a passing nod from the ruling elite?


Neither of the main parties pay the least attention to what the people really want but go off and pursue what their activists wish to implement. Occasionally they may throw a few propaganda crumbs to the masses, but that is all. Without the visibility of minor party votes, without the guarantee that each MP is supported by at least 50% of the constituency, we end up with a pallid monoculture where it is difficult to distiguish between the career politicians or their policies.

If our country is to move out of this quagmire of apathy that embraces our political system, we must replace the obsolete and corrosive First Past the Post voting system. The Alternative voting system is not perfect but it is far far better than what we currently endure.

On Thursday - vote for AV.

First Past the Post and Extremism

While First Past the Post can deny due recognition to minority parties, it is also, paradoxically, far more vulnerable to  extremist manipulation than AV.

Minor party supporters who vote with their conscience, waste their vote. If they vote tactically, they deny their preferred candidate support. People usually vote with their conscience. While this is highly honourable, it can let the extremists in by the back door.

The most recent example of this was the election of George Galloway for the seat of Bethnal Green and Bow in 2005. Galloway represented the so-called Respect Party. If you have any doubts about the extreme nature of Respect, which is essentially an umbrella organisation for various extreme left wing and Islamic groups, have a look at WikiPedia Page Here.

The Bethnal Green and Bow constituency has a large proportion of Bangladeshi immigrant voters. It appears they voted en-masse for Galloway due to the Islamic identity of Respect and also because the incumbent Labour MP (Oona King) was a Black woman of Jewish-Afro-Caribbean ancestry.

Even so, Galloway only secured 35% of the vote. But he won with a majority of 823 over Oona King.

If this had been a AV election Galloway would have had to make it to 50%. I find it difficult to believe that if the Liberal and Conservative vote had been redistributed with AV that Galloway would have won.

The end result was that the 65% of good people of Bethnal Green and Bow ended up being represented by an extremist party, rather than the capable Oona King.

Pro FPTP supporters often moan about how with AV, the second (or even third) choice on the first ballot may potentially win. Well, I reckon the majority of the  people of Bethnal would have been overjoyed to see such a "travesty" in 2005.

Interestingly in the 2010, Labour regained the seat - with an Asian candidate who replaced Oona King. Many have commented on how Labour cynically sold out to the inherent racism of the Bangladeshi community in Bethnal simply to regain the seat.  With FPTP they had to.

I understand Oona King was promoted to the House of Lords (Baroness King of Bow) but I understand, from several sources from she was a considerable loss to mainstream British politics

Below is the Bethnal election result for 2010. You will see the emergence of another extremist party - the BNP. They may have only gained gained 2.5% of the vote, but it is a foothold. People who are disenfranchised by FPTP are easy pickings for extremists. Perhaps what the BNP hope for is that one day, due to the unfairness of FPTP they may, on a fluke, secure 35% of the vote and so gain the seat - just like George Galloway.

Maybe that's the reason the BNP among others, are so keen to see AV voted down.

We must replace FPTP. It is a decrepit system ill suited to a modern democracy. AV is far from perfect but it stands head and shoulders above FPTP.

Tactical Voting, AV and First Past the Post

Supporters of FPTP often promote tactical voting as a way minority party supporters can make their vote count.

While tactical voting under FPTP can obviously give a minority party supporter a greater influence over the outcome of a FPTP election, it is at a huge cost to the voters real desire.

With tactical voting under FPTP, the voter must personally transfer their vote without it first being counted for the minority party the voter would prefer. The result of this is that the actual true support for the minority candidate is not reflected in the election result. The positive policy preferences of the tactical voter are left hidden. The major parties, which are inevitably the beneficiaries of tactical voting, carry on their chosen paths without reference to the real but hidden wishes of significant sections of the electorate.

Smaller but important parties are ignored, simply because they appear to have no support. As far as their true wishes are concerned, the  tactical votes of the minority party supporters have gone down the drain.

The tactical voter has to guess where the most effective place for his vote is going to be. Remember while this is essentially their second preference vote it may up being cast for their third or fourth choice. The tactical vote is rarely a vote of support or preference. It will be a vote against the candidate the voter perceives as the less desirable potential winner.

While any form of voting is better than abstention, it is far better for people to vote for who they prefer rather than vote against those they dislike. That is why the 1,2,3 etc of AV is so important.

Finally and arguably the most important advance given by AV is that it is inclusive. It gives everyone a chance to see their vote count. People who would not bother voting because they dislike the concept of tactical voting, because of its usual negativity, will be enfranchised and more likely to vote.

The country is currently on a slippery downward slope. Less and less people vote in general elections and even fewer in council elections. Something must be done to defeat the apathy and re-enfranchise the disillusioned.

Tactical voting has some very large negatives associated with it. It is in no way a substitute for a proper transferable voting system like AV. AV is not perfect but it is far better than FPTP. AV is a way for the political establishment to re-engage with the electorate.

Vote for AV on May 5th.

First Past The Post and Vote rigging

Regrettably, things have changed in our country. Voting fraud is now no longer a rarity. Crooks have realised how vulnerable FPTP is to Gerrymandering and vote stuffing.

In council elections both main parties have indulged in despicable practices to boost their candidates. There is strong evidence that even during the last General Election major corruption was evident.

The May 5th FPTP/AV referendum only relates to parliamentary elections, but the scams and criminality of some council elections serve as a useful window into the dark world of subverting democracy - and how fragile FPTP is to such scams.

Of course, whatever the voting system, such activities are totally reprehensible.

But the facts of life are just this: It is easy to "game" FPTP.

Vote rigging in our country is easy, almost undetectable and already seriously undermining the confidence of the electorate.

In my last post (HERE) I detailed four such scams. Unfortunately this is only the tip of the iceberg.

Here I will detail a couple more that have resulted in prosecution or at least controversy. I would put money on that for every scam found out, ten go undiscovered.

So why is AV more resilient than FPTP? I went through the main mechanisms used by fraudsters in my last post (HERE). But here is a brief resume about the most common fraud - Vote stuffing

Vote stuffing involves falsly registering phantom electors Then the fraudster usually uses the bogus postal vote. The type of seat/ward that is particularly vulnerable to this is where there is a sizeable third/fourth vote and the two leading parties are closely matched.

Because, in FPTP, all the votes for the third/fourth parties are essentially wasted, stuffing the ballot by a handful of false votes may well be enough to tip the balance. With AV the need to reach 50% from either direct votes or transfers renders most vote stuffing scams totally ineffective. Stuffing the ballot by (say) 100 votes will be totally swamped by the thousands of reallocated votes from the second preference votes.

With FPTP, a General Election can be decided by a few swing seats. Due to the nature of FPTP this means that in a close election the result is determined by a few thousand geographically critical votes. The trouble is now that the infection of disonesty is so ingrained into some communities within this country that those few thousand voters may only be imaginary. Mere figments of a criminal plan.

Two More Scam Examples:

One of the scams below resulted in jail sentences for the fraudsters. At least the second must have given the crooks a few sleepless nights.

1. Birmingham City Council 2005 (Labour)

This was a major fraud mainly involving vote stuffing (via postal ballot) and Personation (where known non-voters have their unused vote stolen). Six Labour councillors were found guilty of fraud. The judge famously described the fraud as: "that would disgrace a banana republic". This fraud was only viable because of the fragility of FPTP to vote stuffing. With AV the second choice votes would have overwhelmed anything but a massive (and one would hope) easily discoverable fraud.

The Times article on this fraud can be found HERE. The Times described this as the most corrupt election since the Victorian era. The BBC article on this fraud is HERE.

2. Tower Hamlets General Election 2010 (Labour)

A criminal investigation into vote stuffing before the 2010 general election found that there were over 5000 new applications for a postal vote at the very last minute. In the news reports (below) are reports of 18 freshly registered "voters" living in a single flat. Several Labour councillors appeared to have numerous new voters registered at their address.
This though was only one of 28 criminal investigations across the Capital. Anti-sleaze campaigner Martin Bell said: ‘There is actually a possibility that the result of the election could be decided by electoral fraud.'
The Daily Mail article on this can be found HERE

Many will rail against changing our voting system simpy because it is open to abuse. But really, democracy MUST be defended. The crooks MUST be defeated.

AV would make life much harder for the crooks to get their way.

I personally think AV is a better system for many reasons. But top of the list is its resilience against vote rigging.

 

Reasons For AV - 1974

The first election of  1974 was held in February. It was all about who ruled the country.

Was it the elected government?

Or Authur Scargill and the NUM?

Ted Heath, the Conservative Prime minister called the election after a wave of strikes. He made it plain that the issue of who governed the country was the primary issue in the election.

But instead of getting the government with the highest popular vote, the country got the loser.

It got Harold Wilson.

Wilson's Labour Party won the most seats, even though they got a smaller share of the vote than the Tories. Because they got the most seats they were given the first opportunity to form a government

Wilson,  on the day of the election called a surrender parley with Arthur Scargill and the TUC to ensure the security of his minority government.

He then went on to form the Lib-Lab pact, (a poor mans coalition).

The country was in crisis. It needed popular leadership.

It got a coalition of losers. Courtesy of First Past The Post.

Heath was not asked to form the government because the Tories had won fewer seats than the Labour party. Even though the Tories had a greater share of the popular vote. What a travesty.

Wilson, the grand appeaser, forced a false boom and then held another snap election in October 1974. This time he won legitimately though at terrible cost to the nations wealth.

The country got a supine Labour  administration that sleep walked the country though devaluation and economic collapse when the country  really should have got something a little more "popular" and dare I say, effective.

The country ended up on a rudderless pre-Thatcherite course to the Winter of Discontent. Internally riven by extremists and in the middle of the depths of the cold war the country was, as in 1929 and 1951, bankrupt. It remained that way for a long time.

The current First Past the Post system abjectly failed this country in 1926, 1951 and 1974. The intrinsic flaws in FPTP and particularly its sensitivity to swing seats mean it will fail again unless replaced.

FPTP has the potential to randomly foist either a coalition of losers or (much worse - as in 1951) promote a government with an absolute majority that clearly came second in the election.

FPTP must be replaced. To simply go along with the current system would be to fossilise our democracy and deny our children the right to a dynamic forward looking democracy.

There is only one way to vote in this referendum. Vote for fairness. Vote for AV.

Reasons For AV - 1951

Due to the flaws of the First Past The Post (FPTP) voting system, the 1951 General Election returned a Conservative Government with an absolute majority, even though they actually got a smaller share of the national vote than the Labour Party.

By any measure, such an event must be regarded as a catastrophe for democracy, and it was all down to the FPTP voting system.

Both the Tories and Labour increased their share of the vote but Labour clearly gained the largest share of the national vote.  But the conservatives gained the most seats.

Not only did the Conservative gain the most seats, they gained an absolute majority.

No prizes for spotting the horrendous anti-democratic outcome of the 1951 election below. All thanks to FPTP.

Image -Wikipedia

In 1926 and in 1974 the country was also ill served by the FPTP voting system that promoted the losing party to be the leading party in a minority government. Essentially the system promoted a losers coalition.

The election of 1951 was much worse.

Here the full potential horror of FPTP was realised. The loser not only went on to form a government but also governed with an absolute majority. Essentially governing against the wishes of the electorate.

Never again should we risk the catastophe of 1951 and having a government that, by a fluke of the FPTP voting system was totally illegitimate.

What has happened in the past can happen again, unless we replace this flawed FPTP system.

There is only one way to vote in this referendum. Vote for AV.

More on the 1951 election can be found on Wikipedia HERE

Reasons For AV - 1929

The 1929 General Election was a First-Past-The-Post election.

The national majority voted for Stanley Baldwin.

But they got  Ramsay McDonald.

Here is the result. There are no prises for spotting the flaw in this election

Baldwin was not given the opportunity to try and form a government, even though his party had the most votes.

McDonald's minority government, initially supported by the  Liberals, eventually collapsed.

Although McDonald desperately tried to do the best by the country, his 1929 victory was illegitimate. McDonald had no popular mandate.  

Remember McDonald's minority government was initially supported by the Liberals. This was a coalition. But it was a coalition of losers. The most popular party was not given the opportunity to try and form a government.

Although the Conservative Party had secured the highest share of the vote it did not win the most seats. It did not win the most seats because of the quirks and flaws of FPTP.

It is a misconception to suggest that coalitions are a peculiarity of AV. They can and do occur under FPTP, in fact exactly as we have now. But with FPTP it is more likely than with AV that the coalition will be formed from the losers rather then the party that got the most votes and a subsidiary.

The current FPTP System has failed this country and needs to be replaced. To simply go along with the current system would be to fossilise our democracy and deny our children the right to a dynamic forward looking democracy.

There is only one way to vote in this referendum. Vote for AV.

When First-Past-The-Post Failed Us

On May 5th, we go to referendum on which voting system we should use.

The choice, as we all know, is between the Alternative Vote (AV) or First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) which we use now.

I believe we should adopt AV, primarily because FPTP has an intrinsic flaw that can defeat democracy.

The First-Past-The-Post system has on three separate occasions in recent history, resulted in the party with the largest slice of the popular vote failing to get the most seats.

On one of these occasions the loser was even able  to form a government with an absolute majority.

The other two travesties ended up with a "losers coalition", where the most popular party was not even given the opportunity to try and form a government first.

These general elections took place  1929, 1951 and 1974.

(WikiPedia links here - 1929  1951 1974 )

Each of these elections was technically "won"  by a party that not only had failed to secure a majority of the vote but had also  failed to even secure the largest single share of the vote.

Because of the invidious way FPTP dictates that  a few swing seats can decide who rules the country, in each of these elections, the party that should have gone on to form the government, (gauged by the total national vote), ended up as the opposition.

Even by the ideal of FPTP these elections were a travesty. But by using FPTP as the voting system, such undemocratic results were, and will be in the future, inevitable.

But actually it was worse than that.

For each of these elections was at a critical time in the history of our nation. Each of these elections failed the electorate, diminished our country and led to weak indecisive government.

My next three posts will detail each of these catastophes.