Who do we vote for in the May general election and who do we not vote for?

[pjclarke]

They seem to be prevaricating a bit just now, however for those of us with offspring approaching Uni age, financially, Labour's policy of reducing Tuition fees to £6k/year probably outweighs any possible tinkering with tax allowances, IR35 etc.

I took the missus into Bolton on Saturday, first time for 5 years.
The place is filthy, litter strewn, pot holes in the roads and hardly an English voice to be heard. It is chav central and I am guessing a lot of English towns are like this

Something has gone badly wrong with this country

Sounds like you need a party that has the environment as a top priority, supports local communities and which proposes a Citizens Income so the chavs can afford to remove the matresses and fridges from their front lawns ...

[MicrosoftBob]

Is that C++?

No Html, more SGML ++ than C++

[Platypus]

They seem to be prevaricating a bit just now, however for those of us with offspring approaching Uni age, financially, Labour's policy of reducing Tuition fees to £6k/year probably outweighs any possible tinkering with tax allowances, IR35 etc

Humm I suggest you read a but more around this.
Tuition-fee cuts: five questions Labour needs to answer | Vince Cable | Comment is free | The Guardian

[eek]

Humm I suggest you read a but more around this.
Tuition-fee cuts: five questions Labour needs to answer | Vince Cable | Comment is free | The Guardian

+1. I dislike the £9k fees but the Labour proposal is utterly untested and unbaked rather than sensible. If you think it will result in your children being better off you are utterly mistaken.

Given the choice I would recommend your children trying to find a decent apprenticeship. The ones previous clientco (BAE Applied Intelligence) offered would leave your child in a far better position than any university course outside the best Russell Group unis...

[sal]

One of the biggest problems of breaking the status quo is the FPTP system. Most of you have probably seen this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo

[eek]

One of the biggest problems of breaking the status quo is the FPTP system. Most of you have probably seen this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo

Not quite. There was an option back in 2011 to fix the problem by moving to a different voting system (not perfect but better than FPTP). As that referendum was lost it will be another 5+ years until we get another chance to fix the voting system to support the new world of 5+ party politics...

[sirja]

If you really want 'TRUE' democracy then you should tactically vote Lib Dem.

I don't like the Lib Dems I think they are actually quite unprincipled, however they are the biggest of the small parties and I think it's essential they send back a large number of MPs to Westminster. My rationale for this is if there is a large enough Lib dem presence and another coalition is needed, they may be able to demand proportional representation (or at least a referendum on it) as their price for supporting either the Tories or Labor. If we can get this damm FPTP, done away with, and replaced with PR, voting Lib Dem will be a price worth paying. Then in future elections the parties will have to WORK REAL HARD, to get votes and hopefully they'll become a little less arrogant.

So for me it'll be into the voting booth, fingers on nose, and vote for Lib Dem.

[TheFaQQer]

If you really want 'TRUE' democracy then you should tactically vote Lib Dem.

I don't like the Lib Dems I think they are actually quite unprincipled, however they are the biggest of the small parties and I think it's essential they send back a large number of MPs to Westminster. My rationale for this is if there is a large enough Lib dem presence and another coalition is needed, they may be able to demand proportional representation (or at least a referendum on it) as their price for supporting either the Tories or Labor. If we can get this damm FPTP, done away with, and replaced with PR, voting Lib Dem will be a price worth paying. Then in future elections the parties will have to WORK REAL HARD, to get votes and hopefully they'll become a little less arrogant.

So for me it'll be into the voting booth, fingers on nose, and vote for Lib Dem.

The Lib Dems had a much better offer for proportional representation from Labour than they had from the Tories, and they blew it.

They messed up the initial agreement, and they've done bugger all since then.

Anyone remember how many members the House of Lords is meant to have by now, according to the coalition agreement, which was meant to be a core Lib Dem policy? 300. How many new members have been introduced since the coalition agreement? 164.

Sod the lot of them.

[OwlHoot]

If you think voting for a party that can't be elected will solve anything then go ahead but it will be a wasted vote. ..

Bollox to all that wasted vote nonsense, even if it may be largely true.

That's what the mainstream parties rely on - "If you vote this you'll get that", and if wishes were horses we could ride all the way to Romford

In the end you should vote for the party whose primary policies and aims best reflect your beliefs of what will benefit the country, and for me and many others that is now UKIP.

At the very least, we'll force the mainstream parties (in this case mostly Tories) to change tack, especially if they lose an election they might otherwise have won.

Also, who knows, UKIP may get a large enough proportion of the vote to join a coalition, as the Lib Dems did last time.

[VectraMan]

Not quite. There was an option back in 2011 to fix the problem by moving to a different voting system (not perfect but better than FPTP). As that referendum was lost it will be another 5+ years until we get another chance to fix the voting system to support the new world of 5+ party politics...

I voted yes for it, but I can't even remember what it was now.

From what I know about coallition politics (i.e. I watched Borgen) it results in a less democratic government as the smaller parties end up with more influence than their proportion of the votes justifies and can always resort to the nuclear option of bringing down the government if they don't get their own way.

Still, 5 years ago the doom mongers would have had us believe a coallition would be impossible and the government would collapse in weeks. But in reality it hasn't been such a bad thing.