Kings and Queens

[Cambridgeskip 658]

At least you effectively only have 2 parties to chose from. In the UK the whole thing is a total mess.

 

Because we have 2 major parties (conservative, Labour), 1 medium sized party (Liberal Democrats) and a whole bunch of minor parties we have a situation where I dont think in living memory one party has ever got more than 50% of the vote. So by default we pretty much always have a Prime Minister that the majority of those who voted did not vote for!

 

In more recent years this has been exasperated by the drifting of the Liberal Democrats (our 3rd biggest party) to the left. Traditionally they occupied the centre ground but from the late 1980s onwards have gradually moved toward the left. This means that with the exception of foreign policy (they are much less interventionist) they are almost indistinguishable from Labour.

 

Hence at our last election we have a situation where the largest party in Parliament was the Conservatives but still with a minority of the seats and of the vote. The majority of votes cast and majority of seats won were actually by left of centre parties (Labour, Lib Dems, the Scots, Welsh and Irish nationalists and Green) and yet we ended up with a Conservative Prime Minister!

 

If that isnt an argument for massive constitutional reform I dont know what is.

 

[packsaddle 753]

Wanna trade a few parties?