New poll from Labour Together that really underlines just how utterly negligent it was not to change the electoral system for mayors back to ranked voting.
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Cambridgeshire has very polarised politics. There was a time a few years back when there was not a single Tory councillor in Cambridge, and not a single Labour councillor outside Cambridge. Now there's a growing Lib Dem ring around Cambridge and in the south, but the Fens are very much Tory/Reform.
It's a curious combination of negligence from a self-serving standpoint (assuming that we do well out of this now so we'll do well out of this forever) and unprincipledness (FPTP is one of the worst ways to obtain the best consensus result in a multi-party system). The worst of both worlds.
It’s - just from an urbanism perspective- good if the mayors have the support of at least 50 per cent of voters, scrapping it was nakedly partisan, and it is in their interests to fix it. Inept.
Describing Starmer & McSweeney's Labour operation as inept is a very mild criticism. I'd go for suicidally incompetent. They seem determined to p*ss off supporters via adherence to neo-liberalism & are so scared of the billionaire press, that they won't publicise their achievements, such as they are
Indeed, different offices with different functions benefit from different incentives, but 'election of the least unpopular' is a good way to pick these mayors if that's how we insist devolution in England is going to work.
I don't enjoy being an embittered cynic who views the whole of politics through his negative experiences as a Labour Party member, but: suppose Labour were being run by a boneheaded clique whose answer to every question is "move Right so as to own the Trots". How would things look different?
TBH I would find it easier to support Labour if it weren’t for the tendency of *every* leadership to be a clique who, boneheaded or otherwise, is always trying to “own whoever the other lot are."
(To be fair to Ed Milliband, I don't think you can level any of those criticisms at his leadership.)
I tried writing an answer, but it's just full of so many inconsistencies it doesn't make much sense. They're still petrified of breaking the vase (from the election last year), but keep breaking it & getting spooked.
I think they're worried about reminding the party they voted for PR.
Add in the tendency of ministers to declare that directly elected mayors have more legitimacy than councillors and we have a recipe for populist clashes with central government. The government knows this but has chosen to go ahead.
But even if you're a big fan of PR, you can still think it's barmy to have PR for an elected Mayor. The "advantages" of PR only make sense for elected groups (councils, parliaments etc).
Ranked voting isn’t PR, though. And it is not “barmy” to want the mayor to be elected by more than half of people casting a vote, it’s why both Blair and Cameron wanted it.
I think we're agreeing. The "barmy" was in reference to Priti Patel saying that PR created 'strong governments' in relation to making elected Mayors a PR vote.
I'm going to take issue with the word 'back' here.
In SV elections with six candidates and the top two polling 54-62% (a sample size of eight), fewer than three in eight votes for eliminated candidates were transferred in the second round. Most were wasted.
This, the NIC changes and a perhaps a few other bits and bobs would’ve been so easy to do quickly under a ‘undoing the damage done by the last government’ banner
It’s someone’s incompetence but it is hard to tell who’s, because, well, blame game gonna blame game. Ultimately the buck stops with the PM, of course.
I didn’t include that because, well, it seems oddly popular with many voters. And given the push for ID in other areas I am less sure this government would want to roll it back.
There’s focussing on winning a GE which is good. But then there’s behaving for months as if the win was a bolt from the blue and no one could possibly have expected or planned for it. Which is less good
it kind of makes me thinking of the alternative possibility that it is a "heighten the contradictions" move to put the fear into anyone thinking of voting LibDem in the general
Mayors elected by SV were introduced by local referendum and the Tories had nothing in their manifesto about changing the voting system. Labour had every reason not to let this stand.
It was never ranked voting, but it should have been. The supplementary vote immediate runoff system broke down anywhere there wasn't a straight Labour-Tory race (London 2000, West of England 2017, Liverpool 2021)
Remember when Labour unexpectedly won this mayoralty in 2021? A wonderful moment, immediately overshadowed by LOTO imploding due to being unable to think about anything other than the parliamentary seat they'd just lost. "quick let's blame Ange" rather than, ya know "there's some good news here".
Annoying thing is that this has been something Labour staffers, members and MPs from the Eastern region have been consistently bringing up since at least 2023 😡 a lack of urgency is gonna hand this seat to a candidate most voters don't want 🤦♀️
It was an active choice not to revert the mayoral voting system. All the voices feeding into govt said to change. Ministers talked about changing it. Then didn't.
The Govt. seem to think that defending local FPTP is important for defending national FPTP.
Neglience doesn’t have to be passive, but also, the lack of decision has nothing to do with defending the principle of no change to first past the post.
There's much such ineptitude; failure to reform political donations being another one. And as per the mayoral electoral system, such a change would be:
A) Right
B) Popular
C) Beneficial for Labour, probably
Good. I hope Labour loses and it teaches them a lesson. Although it will probably teach them the wrong lesson, which is that voting should be as representative as possible. They’ll learn “we should totally change mayoral elections back to ranked but ignore calls for PR for the Commons and locals”.
McFaddenism in action; the Tories can do whatever they want with their majority but we need a cross party consensus to do anything, including restoring the status quo ante which the Tories breached without consensus.
This is part of the plan. Labour actively want to head into the 2029 election under seige from a very strong Reform challenge, so they can attempt to get re-eleced on the basis of 'it's us or the fash'.
Yes it’s being briefed that it’s basically Macron’s plan. The thing is, Macron’s plan worked in a runoff election and failed in a parliamentary one…(plus the Lib Dems can arguably play this role better than Labour because of Brexit, if one is deluded into thinking the plan works)
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The last lot were clueless at so many levels but knew enough to ruthlessly use power to change voting systems, undermine BBC independence etc.
We know Lab inherited a heap of shit, but why don’t they use the few good cards in their hand?
Both of those are the right thing to do in the interest of fair and free elections, which also happen to be in Labour’s self-interest.
So would restrictions on funding of UK parties by UK companies controlled by foreign interests.
No cost to taxpayer.
But: tumbleweed.
(To be fair to Ed Milliband, I don't think you can level any of those criticisms at his leadership.)
I think they're worried about reminding the party they voted for PR.
If they would rather lose than risk strengthening the case for PR, then who am I to stop them?
In SV elections with six candidates and the top two polling 54-62% (a sample size of eight), fewer than three in eight votes for eliminated candidates were transferred in the second round. Most were wasted.
But AV should absolutely be introduced.
There are many things that I admire about the United Kingdom 🇬🇧.
Your nation produced The Beatles, The Rolling Stones. Adele. Sting. Dua Lipa. Orwell. JK Rowling. Agatha Christie. JRR Tolkien ❤️
But your FPTP voting system is completely backward 🤦
It is just indefensible.
It was an active choice not to revert the mayoral voting system. All the voices feeding into govt said to change. Ministers talked about changing it. Then didn't.
The Govt. seem to think that defending local FPTP is important for defending national FPTP.
- You vote the first sunday.
- You vote again the next sunday.
Everyone finds this perfectly normal.
I don't get why it can't be done in Britain.
👇 👇 👇
A) Right
B) Popular
C) Beneficial for Labour, probably
They continue to be remarkably crap at politics
same with FPTP giving them such a huge majority, etc
The opposite of Bevanism’s “unyielding”.