The General Election Thread : Thu Mar 26, 2015 11:24 pm  

Mildly surprised no-one has started a thread on the GE...or does no-one care?

I'm undecided. I think the Tories have actually done a pretty good job overall - although issues such as zero hours contracts and food banks tell me we're still in a pretty bad way, their benefit reforms seem damaging (particularly to the disabled), and they've failed miserably on immigration. I'm loathe to vote Labour partially because of their last stint, their wet leader, their failure to handle the economy and Blair's outrageous 'open door' immigration policy as a means of winning share. I'm also loathe to consider UKIP but at the same time a little voice is saying "at least they'll actually do something!!" - but then they also seem like complete muppets. The Lib Dems have doomed themselves and are far too left for me anyway. The rest are also-rans, though SNP's influence could be telling. The Greens in particular are a joke.

I don't particularly like any of them. A small thermonuclear device under the Houses of Parliament would have been the best idea and we start from scratch. But apparently that's illegal.

I can see Labour losing more of the working class vote, where generational loyalty largely thanks to the old unions is dying. The SNP will largely kick Labour out of Scotland and could ultimately scupper the democratic vote, and UKIP will pick up some more of the poorest areas where people are desperate for radical change - possibly more if their campaign is any good. I think the Tories will see similar share to 2010 within a few percentage points. IMO, a hung parliament is the only outcome.

BTW if anyone's wondering, votes are confidential.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 7:24 am  

Not being a fan of the party whips and toe-ing the party line for five years of sheep-herding and establishing rules and dogma behind closed doors while conveniently ignoring the tales you spun at the sales pitch (the general election), I simply vote for my representative and not his party. He is a good bloke, works hard in the constituency, tweets every time he goes for a p1ss break in the Commons so I know exactly where he is and what he's doing, and he campaigns in the House on constituency issues.

All of which is 100% more than I knew about the previous Labour and Conservative MP's who held this seat before Greg Mulholland came along, admittedly they didn't have the advantage of a smart phone but nor did they ever bother to let anyone know via other media what they were up to.

I know that to some it comes down to party issues and that to some its a very passionate affair, personally I see nothing between the parties anyway (not like it was when I first started to vote) and so that being the case its only down to who I want as a representative and the incumbent has proved that he is worthy of continuing in the job.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 8:04 am  

Dissillusionment at the disingenuity of todays mainstreamism has left, sadly, its irrevocable mark on me.
I'll have to vote for a socialist party so my X will be going next to the Respect candidate.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 8:24 am  

Absolutely no idea. Whoever I end up putting the X next to will be the best of an absolutely shocking bunch.

[TimperleySaint]

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 8:49 am  

Don't vote - never have, never will! Which ever party you choose, you will get shafted on something so all are as bad as each other!

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 9:38 am  

Seems crazy to focus on TV leaders debate when you can only vote in your local constituancy, and most of the time the candidates there are complete "unknowns".

Getting people interested in voting again needs to build from the bottom up.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 10:31 am  

shinymcshine wrote:

Seems crazy to focus on TV leaders debate when you can only vote in your local constituancy, and most of the time the candidates there are complete "unknowns".

Getting people interested in voting again needs to build from the bottom up.

Agree with this. Its something I've thought for a while as when I first got to vote I found it strange that no-one knew who their own MP was. Some of the "apathy" toward politics is just ignorance or laziness masquerading as apathy on behalf of ignorant or lazy people who can't be arsed to just watch the news once in a while. During one of the recent by-elections that UKIP won (I think it was Clacton) the media spoke to one old woman who had never heard of UKIP. In the same way as a few years back my mates girlfriend at the time voted BNP because she'd got a leaflet through the door from them and it said all about British jobs etc. She had no idea who they were but voted for them anyway. That has nothing to do with apathy or politicians but is just lazy ignorant people who will spend hours watching complete crap on tv but can't be bothered to just think for a few mins a week about what's going on in the world around them.

However (rant over) there is obviously an issue with local representation. I think it partly stems from that people don't know who is in charge or has responsibility for what and crucially local media is a joke. In the media's relentless drive over the last few decades to centralise and report only London-centric stories its left a huge gaping hole in the knowledge and accountability of local representation.

I think we need a new way of making local officials/councillors etc accountable for what happens in their region. Be that more responsibility for how money is spent in their region or just make it clearer what they can and can't do. Obviously decent local media would help hugely.

With MP's, again the local media would help massively too but I also think we're sort of in a bit of a no-mans land in terms of MP's. I think we probably either need a lot more so that you might have a chance of actually seeing or knowing them. Or fewer so that they get more media attention and more people would know who they are? Only a thought.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 10:45 am  

Him wrote:

Agree with this. Its something I've thought for a while as when I first got to vote I found it strange that no-one knew who their own MP was. Some of the "apathy" toward politics is just ignorance or laziness masquerading as apathy on behalf of ignorant or lazy people who can't be arsed to just watch the news once in a while. During one of the recent by-elections that UKIP won (I think it was Clacton) the media spoke to one old woman who had never heard of UKIP. In the same way as a few years back my mates girlfriend at the time voted BNP because she'd got a leaflet through the door from them and it said all about British jobs etc. She had no idea who they were but voted for them anyway. That has nothing to do with apathy or politicians but is just lazy ignorant people who will spend hours watching complete crap on tv but can't be bothered to just think for a few mins a week about what's going on in the world around them.

What Farage is, is a damn good salesman, I wish I still had a business because I'd employ him today as a sales rep, in fact I once did employ someone just like him, I gave this guy a laptop and loads of sales literature and he put them in the boot of his car and never took them out again, he reckoned he could sell our business software in ten minutes and if he didn't have an order by then he'd leave the customers premises, and it wasn't an idle boast because thats exactly what he used to do - thats what Farage is.

Check out the UKIP web site, they still don't have a firm manifesto, we have just over five weeks to go to an election and they have (apparently) a large amount of support among the public simply based on what Farage has said on TV, they have no other faces that are known to the public, no-one ever speaks to the media, and yet Farage gets the sort of publicity that billions of pounds couldn't buy and even when its bad publicity the media let him rise above it.

He would earn any business an absolute fortune in sales.

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:36 am  

I'd voted Labour since I got the mandate, right up to 2005. It was clear down here that a vote for Labour would be wasted, so the LimpDem got my vote. He was defending a tiny majority against another of the Rees-Mogg dynasty and I didn't want another tory snout in the trough. I ended up with a tory-lite, waste of space, whose only means of communication seemed to be through the local newspapers.

This year I'll be voting Green, the only party down here with any socialist policies.

I never left the Labour party, unfortunately over the years, Labour left me

Re: The General Election Thread : Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:39 am  

I want a labour majority but conservative local MP.

My prospective Labour MP thinks it’s hilarious to get kicked out of a night club for dancing on chairs, gossips about union members who support him and conspired with a union rep to have my mother suspended from a three day event just so his friend could go instead. His election campaign mostly consists of slagging the Tory’s off which I think is a wrong way to go about things. He should focus more energy on promoting ideas to solve local unemployment, the lack of affordable housing and other local problems.

My current local MP Stuart Andrew has experience long term unemployment and can relate to me even better than most of the union activist I started hanging around with from the end of last year, but one spirited individual can’t solve the long term unemployment crises in this country. Thankfully Labour has a good policy for solving long term unemployment by guaranteeing proper jobs as opposed to the work for your benefits policy that the conservatives currently have in place.

I recently questioned Ed Miliband in Sheffield on what he’s going to do with the Work Programme and he just wants to rebrand advisors as special advisors. IMO we should get rid of the Job Centres, their private providers and most of the DWP to free up some money to create jobs for the long term unemployed. Job Centre staff are supposed to help the unemployed but are stealing a living by delivering an ineffective service that doesn’t benefit clients much.

Stuart Andrew has been a lot quicker to deal with things than the union I’m involved in so I’d rather stick with him. At least he seems to know what he’s doing. Unions need to modernise fast but in my experience that’s not going to happen anytime soon.