John Major has added his alto to the Tory choir warning of the business risks of a hung or balanced Parliament. The Tories would have us believe that it would be bad for the Pound. They point to the worries in the City last week. However, we are told that the City looks ahead, and last week's wobble has now been corrected. Any "hung Parliament" effect is vastly overshadowed by the plunge caused by the dire news from Greece.
In any case, elections are about the will of the people, not the political preference of the City of London.
A Government which includes more than one party is the norm in most other modern democracies. Democracy means that the will of the people is the ultimate source of power, and the will of the people is diverse, not monolithic. Government formed of two or more parties reflects this reality.
Wikipedia lists 79 countries using some form of PR. It is absurd to argue that these countries suffer economically because they routinely have mixed Governments.
In fact a hung Parliament would probably mean Vince Cable in the Treasury, if not as Chancellor, which would boost popular confidence at least, since he is regarded as the least untrustworthy in economic matters.
Nick Clegg was perfectly reasonable to argue that he should be guided by the size of the popular vote, not by the number of MPs, given the perverse results that FPTP throws up. The downside to this principle is that it would put the country at risk of a Cameroonian Government. So he offset that by setting PR as a precondition of his cooperation. That's politics.
The Conservatives scream that Clegg wants electoral reform just to benefit the LibDems. Although it is true that the LibDem preference is STV, which is not strictly proportional, it would be an improvement on what we now have. Best outcome would be AV+, based on AV which is the direction in which the Government supertanker is steering, with a top-up from party lists to ensure proportionality.
Electoral reform is not an end in itself, it is a precondition of a root-and-branch political and constitutional reform.
This stuff is not rocket science. Why to the media have so much trouble explaining it to the public? The net effect of most media reports is obfuscation and confusion, not clarity and enlightenment.
Showing posts with label electoral systems. Show all posts
Showing posts with label electoral systems. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Thursday, February 04, 2010
Should we keep FPTP to exclude the BNP?
Someone on the Weston Mercury discussion board argues that one advantage of the First Past the Post electoral system is that it closes the door on dangerous minority parties like the BNP.
The answer is that the BNP are a dangerous, anti-peace, anti-democracy party with views and policies that are repugnant and alien to the British tradition.
Many of them are criminals, and the law is forcing them to bring their membership policies into line.
BUT, despite the increase in hate-crimes in some areas where they have been successful, and despite the fact that the German Nazis were initially voted in, it is better on balance for them to be brought into the democratic discussion, where their views can be tested and argued against, rather than using a dysfunctional electoral system to exclude them artificially.
The Greens have been patient during our 30-year exclusion from the political process. The BNP cannot be trusted to be so patient. Exclusion is likely to make them more violent.
Homelessness and joblessness are the twin burners that lift the BNP hot air balloon. Both of these are unnnecessary, and maybe grey politicians will be stimulated to address these problems if the BNP makes progress.
The answer is that the BNP are a dangerous, anti-peace, anti-democracy party with views and policies that are repugnant and alien to the British tradition.
Many of them are criminals, and the law is forcing them to bring their membership policies into line.
BUT, despite the increase in hate-crimes in some areas where they have been successful, and despite the fact that the German Nazis were initially voted in, it is better on balance for them to be brought into the democratic discussion, where their views can be tested and argued against, rather than using a dysfunctional electoral system to exclude them artificially.
The Greens have been patient during our 30-year exclusion from the political process. The BNP cannot be trusted to be so patient. Exclusion is likely to make them more violent.
Homelessness and joblessness are the twin burners that lift the BNP hot air balloon. Both of these are unnnecessary, and maybe grey politicians will be stimulated to address these problems if the BNP makes progress.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Mousavi "defeated" - not ; Guardian limp - true
To the Editor
The Guardian
Will the Guardian please stop calling Mousavi the "defeated" candidate in the Iranian elections? There is good evidence that the poll was rigged, and in days gone by Guardian journalists would have collated and published this evidence. Now it is left to citizens to do this work.
Richard Lawson
This is my third attempt to get this point across, and clearly it is not going to get in this time. I have seen no letters about Iran in the Guardian letters page - I may have missed them, but I don't think so.
The Guardian editorial lnie seems to be flaccid and immobile, unsure what to do, confused because they are not sure if it is OK to be "for Iran" or "against Iran".
Guardian Policy Committee meeting: Agenda Item 3: Policy on Iran: Bush was "against Iran" so the Guardian should be "for Iran". Problem: Iran is against women, so do we hate Bush more than we love women? Put it to the vote. The majority hates Bush more than they love women. So that's it. Mousavi was defeated. Next Item on agenda: Journalist expenses. All agreed? Ok. Next item...
The Guardian, like most others, clearly does not understand the difference between a people and its government. AhmadiNajad no more speaks for the Iranian nation than Brown speaks for the British nation. A nation is a complex system of alternate and conflicting interests. Sometimes those interests can be summed up by a leader; sometimes not, and for Iran, this is one of the times when the leader most clearly and definitely does not speak for the nation.
So on the issue of the Iran elections, the Guardian is as crisp and strong as the outer leaf of a limp lettuce that has been left out of the fridge for three days in a warm room. Just as the media generally were when George Idiot Bush stole the American election in 2005.
I must say it gives me immense pleasure to criticise the media in this way. Before the days of blogging, when the media fell down on the job, we thought the thought but dared not talk the talk, for fear that they would ban us totally. Now, I do not care that they do not publish corrective or critical letters. The Web is here to correct the uncorrected power of the Fourth Estate, and eventually, in the end, dead tree journalism will be all the better for the compteition coming from its younger sister.
The Guardian
Will the Guardian please stop calling Mousavi the "defeated" candidate in the Iranian elections? There is good evidence that the poll was rigged, and in days gone by Guardian journalists would have collated and published this evidence. Now it is left to citizens to do this work.
Richard Lawson
This is my third attempt to get this point across, and clearly it is not going to get in this time. I have seen no letters about Iran in the Guardian letters page - I may have missed them, but I don't think so.
The Guardian editorial lnie seems to be flaccid and immobile, unsure what to do, confused because they are not sure if it is OK to be "for Iran" or "against Iran".
Guardian Policy Committee meeting: Agenda Item 3: Policy on Iran: Bush was "against Iran" so the Guardian should be "for Iran". Problem: Iran is against women, so do we hate Bush more than we love women? Put it to the vote. The majority hates Bush more than they love women. So that's it. Mousavi was defeated. Next Item on agenda: Journalist expenses. All agreed? Ok. Next item...
The Guardian, like most others, clearly does not understand the difference between a people and its government. AhmadiNajad no more speaks for the Iranian nation than Brown speaks for the British nation. A nation is a complex system of alternate and conflicting interests. Sometimes those interests can be summed up by a leader; sometimes not, and for Iran, this is one of the times when the leader most clearly and definitely does not speak for the nation.
So on the issue of the Iran elections, the Guardian is as crisp and strong as the outer leaf of a limp lettuce that has been left out of the fridge for three days in a warm room. Just as the media generally were when George Idiot Bush stole the American election in 2005.
I must say it gives me immense pleasure to criticise the media in this way. Before the days of blogging, when the media fell down on the job, we thought the thought but dared not talk the talk, for fear that they would ban us totally. Now, I do not care that they do not publish corrective or critical letters. The Web is here to correct the uncorrected power of the Fourth Estate, and eventually, in the end, dead tree journalism will be all the better for the compteition coming from its younger sister.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Electoral Hooligans? I blame the papers!
Euro-Parliament elections 2009. Low turnout. Tories benefit. Ukip booms. BNP 2 MEPs. Somebody must be to blame, so I blame the media.
Well, not entirely, of course. There is never any single cause for any event, because everything is interconnected. We live in a wondrously complex nexus, a system. But it is right to examine the role of the media.
First, the Euro-elections were vastly under-reported in the British media. Just compare the reportage with the wall to wall coverage of the USA Presidential elections, where we had no vote. The Euros must have been given, ooh, at least 1% of the US election. OK, the US president is a bit more important than the European Parliament, and we should certainly have been informed of the results of that election, but not the blanket coverage that we were given. And despite the amount of coverage of the US elections, I am still not confident that I understand what a caucus is, and what it does. Which illustrates another point - the media are not good at communicating facts; they just do stories.
Given the lack of coverage, the low turnout is no surprise. 60% of the electorate made no use of their power. They threw it away. MPs and Government must accept their part in this pervasive voter disengagement, but the media must also accept their part in the fiasco.
What would the result have been in a 100% turnout? Who would the abstainers have voted for?
Maybe it is good that they stayed away - they might have voted more for the BNP. We do know that they were Labour supporters mainly, and many of those supporters who did vote went for the BNP.
We need to have an opinion survey of non-voters to discover precisely what their motives were, and what would induce them to exercise their democratic power. I wonder if the Green Party could commission such a survey. I have a strong feeling that we should emphasise that the Green Party is just as disaffected with the political system as are non-voters, and they would best express their disgust by voting Green.
We do know that a lot of the voters were hacked off with the Westminster parties. So they voted for Ukip. Ukip. Protesting against MP venality, they boosted the party that has the worst record in the European Parliament in terms of not turning up for work, not opposing waste, and opposing transparency.
There is no excuse for the media on this one. They knew the facts about Ukip in Brussels. I know they knew, because they had a press release about it, and also I phoned all the major newspapers and broadcasters, made contact with a reporter, and emailed the facts to them.
In any case, they are the professional journalists, and they should have researched MEP records for probity.
Why did they not test the Ukip programme? I asked the Ukip candidate (and also the far left No2EU candidate) when I met them what their programme was for withdrawing from the EU. What were the mechanics? Would we have to buy our way out? What would happen next? Would we then start re-applying for membership, because our trade would plummet? Answer came there none. The Paxmen should have been pressing them on this. They did not. They fell down in the job.
Our local paper used to give candidates 300 words apiece, unedited, in the weeks running up to an election. Not for this one. OK, they are donating costly space which would otherwise have been devoted to vital stories about cats trapped up a tree or cats stuck down a drainpipe, but even so, democracy calls for sacrifices. Party activists give masses of time to democratic process. Even voters give time in walking into the polling booth. Why do newspapers not give a little space to democracy. They shour remember that in the end, democracy is a guarantor of the free press.
Is it worth making a formal complaint to the Press Complaints Association and the BBC board and whoever it is that covers the other broadcasters? Probably not, because it is a systemic failure, not a specific failure, and so is probably "outwith the remit".
In any case, the Green Party would not make such a complaint, because we would get even less coverage than we get at the moment if we complained. So the official position has to be that we have the best journalism in the world. Along with having the best wild rodent population in the world, as Steve Bell once showed.
Also, the media watchdogs are toothless tigers. The Fourth Estate is effectively in charge of its own monitoring. They moan constantly about doctors closing ranks when a medic is up on charges before the GMC, but how often do we read about an editor being arraigned for unprofessional conduct? Not a lot.
So along with the Parliamentary system, we need a root and branch reform of the media. Easier said than done. The blogosphere is a promising tool, but we have to confess that our readership, although more intelligent and perspicacious than the newspaper readers, is not quite as numerous. We need a revolution in the way the media conducts itself, but the problem is that this particular revolution is definitely not going to be televised.
How can we hit back at the media? People are addicted to their daily fix of falsehoods. But maybe we could send a shot across their bows by persuading people not to buy papers on April 1st.
One of the metaphysical poets wrote of censorship
"I can say only this,
that I can nothing say"
A chinese poet (I am not having much luck this morning with identfying my sources) wrote:
"Oh bright wind,
You cannot read;
Why do you turn my pages?"
The Ming emperor cut his head off for writing that, because the Chinese word for bright is Ming.
I do know who wrote this:
Owed To The Press
Well, not entirely, of course. There is never any single cause for any event, because everything is interconnected. We live in a wondrously complex nexus, a system. But it is right to examine the role of the media.
First, the Euro-elections were vastly under-reported in the British media. Just compare the reportage with the wall to wall coverage of the USA Presidential elections, where we had no vote. The Euros must have been given, ooh, at least 1% of the US election. OK, the US president is a bit more important than the European Parliament, and we should certainly have been informed of the results of that election, but not the blanket coverage that we were given. And despite the amount of coverage of the US elections, I am still not confident that I understand what a caucus is, and what it does. Which illustrates another point - the media are not good at communicating facts; they just do stories.
Given the lack of coverage, the low turnout is no surprise. 60% of the electorate made no use of their power. They threw it away. MPs and Government must accept their part in this pervasive voter disengagement, but the media must also accept their part in the fiasco.
What would the result have been in a 100% turnout? Who would the abstainers have voted for?
Maybe it is good that they stayed away - they might have voted more for the BNP. We do know that they were Labour supporters mainly, and many of those supporters who did vote went for the BNP.
We need to have an opinion survey of non-voters to discover precisely what their motives were, and what would induce them to exercise their democratic power. I wonder if the Green Party could commission such a survey. I have a strong feeling that we should emphasise that the Green Party is just as disaffected with the political system as are non-voters, and they would best express their disgust by voting Green.
We do know that a lot of the voters were hacked off with the Westminster parties. So they voted for Ukip. Ukip. Protesting against MP venality, they boosted the party that has the worst record in the European Parliament in terms of not turning up for work, not opposing waste, and opposing transparency.
There is no excuse for the media on this one. They knew the facts about Ukip in Brussels. I know they knew, because they had a press release about it, and also I phoned all the major newspapers and broadcasters, made contact with a reporter, and emailed the facts to them.
In any case, they are the professional journalists, and they should have researched MEP records for probity.
Why did they not test the Ukip programme? I asked the Ukip candidate (and also the far left No2EU candidate) when I met them what their programme was for withdrawing from the EU. What were the mechanics? Would we have to buy our way out? What would happen next? Would we then start re-applying for membership, because our trade would plummet? Answer came there none. The Paxmen should have been pressing them on this. They did not. They fell down in the job.
Our local paper used to give candidates 300 words apiece, unedited, in the weeks running up to an election. Not for this one. OK, they are donating costly space which would otherwise have been devoted to vital stories about cats trapped up a tree or cats stuck down a drainpipe, but even so, democracy calls for sacrifices. Party activists give masses of time to democratic process. Even voters give time in walking into the polling booth. Why do newspapers not give a little space to democracy. They shour remember that in the end, democracy is a guarantor of the free press.
Is it worth making a formal complaint to the Press Complaints Association and the BBC board and whoever it is that covers the other broadcasters? Probably not, because it is a systemic failure, not a specific failure, and so is probably "outwith the remit".
In any case, the Green Party would not make such a complaint, because we would get even less coverage than we get at the moment if we complained. So the official position has to be that we have the best journalism in the world. Along with having the best wild rodent population in the world, as Steve Bell once showed.
Also, the media watchdogs are toothless tigers. The Fourth Estate is effectively in charge of its own monitoring. They moan constantly about doctors closing ranks when a medic is up on charges before the GMC, but how often do we read about an editor being arraigned for unprofessional conduct? Not a lot.
So along with the Parliamentary system, we need a root and branch reform of the media. Easier said than done. The blogosphere is a promising tool, but we have to confess that our readership, although more intelligent and perspicacious than the newspaper readers, is not quite as numerous. We need a revolution in the way the media conducts itself, but the problem is that this particular revolution is definitely not going to be televised.
How can we hit back at the media? People are addicted to their daily fix of falsehoods. But maybe we could send a shot across their bows by persuading people not to buy papers on April 1st.
One of the metaphysical poets wrote of censorship
"I can say only this,
that I can nothing say"
A chinese poet (I am not having much luck this morning with identfying my sources) wrote:
"Oh bright wind,
You cannot read;
Why do you turn my pages?"
The Ming emperor cut his head off for writing that, because the Chinese word for bright is Ming.
I do know who wrote this:
Owed To The Press
If your mother doesn’t need yer
Get a job within the media.
If you're regularly pissed
You could be a journalist.
Want to lie without redress?
Get a nice job in the press!
If you like to cast ordure
You could be an interviewer.
If your thing is smearing poo
Broadcaster's the job for you.
If you'd like to be a Nazi
You can join the paparazzi
Don't let them fool you all the way -
Make April First your No News Day!
Monday, June 08, 2009
Euro-woe
Oh dear. Oh dear o dear o dear.
The words of the Tragedian's Lament came to at one a.m. last night when I watched three vicorious Tories and two u-Kippers lined up on the platform (the LibDem was in Brussels working on his plan to become President of the EU Parliament):
"Death, death, death, alas.
Death, death, death, alas.
Oooooooooooooooooooohh woe!
Death."
And since then the questions have been bouncing off the walls of my sleep-deprived cranium like a litre of worms in a pint jar: What made people think, in the midst of a scandal of MPs expenses, that it would be a good idea to elect a bunch of Kippers who have the worst integrity record of all British MEPs? Just how is that expected to help?
Also: Which intrepid journalist will dare persistently to question Dave "vote Blue, get Green" Cameron on the logic that sends his swollen army of Tory MEPs to sit with homophobes. Must go and see what Ian Dale thinks about this move. [5 min later] Ian Dale has no search facility on his blog. Not one that I could find anyway. Huh!
The words of the Tragedian's Lament came to at one a.m. last night when I watched three vicorious Tories and two u-Kippers lined up on the platform (the LibDem was in Brussels working on his plan to become President of the EU Parliament):
"Death, death, death, alas.
Death, death, death, alas.
Oooooooooooooooooooohh woe!
Death."
And since then the questions have been bouncing off the walls of my sleep-deprived cranium like a litre of worms in a pint jar: What made people think, in the midst of a scandal of MPs expenses, that it would be a good idea to elect a bunch of Kippers who have the worst integrity record of all British MEPs? Just how is that expected to help?
Also: Which intrepid journalist will dare persistently to question Dave "vote Blue, get Green" Cameron on the logic that sends his swollen army of Tory MEPs to sit with homophobes. Must go and see what Ian Dale thinks about this move. [5 min later] Ian Dale has no search facility on his blog. Not one that I could find anyway. Huh!
Monday, May 25, 2009
Ed Miliband speaks with forked tongue on "major reforms"
Ed Miliband says that major reforms are the only way to restore public faith" .
Right.
So why does he go on to propose a few necessary but minor reforms of the Parliamentary pantomime routines, and leave out the big, crying-out-loud reform - Proportional Representation (PR)? Does Ed Miliband seriously think he can keep the archaic, dysfunctional First Past the Post electoral system that gives power to a tiny minority of swing voters in a few marginal constituencies? First Past the Post produces safe seats. Not only are expenses claims proportionally greater for safe seat MPs, but also voter turnout is proportionally less in safe seats.
The Government should honour their manifesto promise, and hold a national debate on PR during the summer, followed by a referendum vote on PR in September, and then go for an election under PR soon as possible afterwards.
This is possible, but to make it possible, it looks as if we the people are going to have to show our power and commitment by spending a few days and nights demonstrating outside Parliament.
One technical problem is that PR needs a re-drawing of the electoral boundaries (or electing another 70 MPs on top of the 645 we already have, which is a move in the wrong direction.
But never mind, if you don't ask, you don't get. Alan Johnson is calling for PR, and there is a wave building up. We need to start paddling like hell to catch the wave.
Right.
So why does he go on to propose a few necessary but minor reforms of the Parliamentary pantomime routines, and leave out the big, crying-out-loud reform - Proportional Representation (PR)? Does Ed Miliband seriously think he can keep the archaic, dysfunctional First Past the Post electoral system that gives power to a tiny minority of swing voters in a few marginal constituencies? First Past the Post produces safe seats. Not only are expenses claims proportionally greater for safe seat MPs, but also voter turnout is proportionally less in safe seats.
The Government should honour their manifesto promise, and hold a national debate on PR during the summer, followed by a referendum vote on PR in September, and then go for an election under PR soon as possible afterwards.
This is possible, but to make it possible, it looks as if we the people are going to have to show our power and commitment by spending a few days and nights demonstrating outside Parliament.
One technical problem is that PR needs a re-drawing of the electoral boundaries (or electing another 70 MPs on top of the 645 we already have, which is a move in the wrong direction.
But never mind, if you don't ask, you don't get. Alan Johnson is calling for PR, and there is a wave building up. We need to start paddling like hell to catch the wave.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Safe seat MPs claim more: PR NOW!
Important bit of work on this link showing that the safer the seat, the more likely the MP is to be involved in the expenses scandal.
It suggests in no uncertain terms that an MP who knows that s/he is in no danger of losing the seat in the next election feels able to claim more freely.
This should be read in conjunction with my own work on the relationship of turnout to majority, which shows that the safer the seat, the lower the turnout.
The case for Proportional Representation is overwhelming from the point of view of real democracy. Problem is that a House of Commons composed of MPs who won under the archaic First Past the Post system is not going to vote for a system which means that many of them are going to have to fight for their seat.
Therefore this change must come from popular pressure.
As I write Caroline Lucas is on Today making exactly this argument. Just as she began the plumber came to fix the cistern that leaked on the bathroom floor yesterday, shorting the lights and removing the hall ceiling paper, so I missed the interview. But it will be up soon on Listen Again. (scroll down to 8.40)
Saturday, May 16, 2009
MP Expenses: the System is Broken
Well the MP expenses jamboree is providing a lot of laughs and provoking a lot of anger. Perfectly right that it should, and nothing that follows should be taken as implying that the Mabinogogiblog is not as tickled and angered as the rest of the world.
But it is not just a story about venal, possibly fraudulent individuals. The system that the MPs evolved for themselves is a royal mess, just like so any other systems that Parliament produces, including the useless First Past the Post electoral system that puts them there.
The Commons fees office (Director: Andrew Walker) not only failed to quality check the MPs claims, they actively encouraged a house "flip" (changing and charging on first and second homes).
This from the Guardian:
Expenses claim systems are a way of begging for innaccuracies, dodgy practice and fraud. They are paperwork heavy, need loads of receipts, book-keeping, accountancy and checking. Like the FPTP voting system, the MP expenses scheme is not fit for purpose.
It has got to be abolished, and a better way to cover the need of MPs to live in London must be put in place. A hostel/hall of residence is suggested, but this has not been thought through option. Clearly, it would quickly degenerate into chaos, with MPs hitting each other with wet towels, arranging dangerous booby-traps, and b*ggering each other. It is a is a punitive remedy, but not really sustainable, because the quality of candidate would fall even further, and let's face it, the office of MP is vital for democracy, and they deserve to go back to a homely place at the end of the day.
So the obvious clear and simple answer is to give them a flat rate London Living Allowance, sufficient to rent a decent flat or house in London. Eliminate the time-wasting farce of expenses claims altogether.
But it is not just a story about venal, possibly fraudulent individuals. The system that the MPs evolved for themselves is a royal mess, just like so any other systems that Parliament produces, including the useless First Past the Post electoral system that puts them there.
The Commons fees office (Director: Andrew Walker) not only failed to quality check the MPs claims, they actively encouraged a house "flip" (changing and charging on first and second homes).
This from the Guardian:
"Yesterday the Conservative MP Steve Crabb said he had been encouraged to maximise his claims by a fees office employee who suggested the MP "switch" his properties. Crabb said "an official in the fees office" told him: "Steve, I'm looking at your allowances and you've spent hardly anything." Crabb then described the official as saying: "You'd get more for your allowances if you switched [the second home he claimed on]."
Crabb "flipped" the home he described as his second home and then claimed £9,300 in stamp duty on the new residence and £1,325 a month in interest on his mortgage. He was able to switch after renting a room from MP Daniel Kawczynski. In all, he has claimed £67,633 in second home expenses since 2005".
So there we have it. The Civil Service must shoulder some of the blame.Expenses claim systems are a way of begging for innaccuracies, dodgy practice and fraud. They are paperwork heavy, need loads of receipts, book-keeping, accountancy and checking. Like the FPTP voting system, the MP expenses scheme is not fit for purpose.
It has got to be abolished, and a better way to cover the need of MPs to live in London must be put in place. A hostel/hall of residence is suggested, but this has not been thought through option. Clearly, it would quickly degenerate into chaos, with MPs hitting each other with wet towels, arranging dangerous booby-traps, and b*ggering each other. It is a is a punitive remedy, but not really sustainable, because the quality of candidate would fall even further, and let's face it, the office of MP is vital for democracy, and they deserve to go back to a homely place at the end of the day.
So the obvious clear and simple answer is to give them a flat rate London Living Allowance, sufficient to rent a decent flat or house in London. Eliminate the time-wasting farce of expenses claims altogether.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
MP expenses - we must sort it out for them
An open letter to my MP. If you agree, copy and send to your MP at They Work for You.
John Penrose MP
House of Commons
London SW1A OAA
Dear John
You have been a good MP as far as I am concerned, despite being a Tory. You are courteous, helpful, hard working and a good listener.
I do not know the details of your expenses claims, [update: I do now: he is a middle ranker, I believe] but we know that you are in the middle band of MP claims, and I hope and expect that you will emerge from this MP expenses mess unscathed. If you did turn out to be in trouble, I would not seek (as Green Party parliamentary candidate) to make undue political capital out of it.
Clearly there is a pressing need to come up with a simple system for paying MP expenses. The present mess is in danger of bringing democracy into disrepute, which could have very serious consequences.
Democracy is the system where the will of the people is the ultimate source of authority in the land. Democracy is by no means perfect in the UK, but it is a damn sight better than the alternatives - anarchy a la Somalia, or authoritarianism a la Zimbabwe or Burma. We British citizens are very lucky to live in a democracy, even one where the true power in the land is overlain with a creaking political house comprising much dead and rotten wood.
We, the people, need to sort this out and put in robust system for MPs pay. It is up to us to do this, as MPs have proved themselves in capable of reforming the system in past decades, and have evolved a complex bureaucratic structure full of loopholes.
It is not a difficult problem, if we start from first principles.
MPs generally work long, stressful hours, dealing with vast amounts of information on subjects that vary from the emotionally charged to the mind-numbingly boring. MPs carry the challenging responsibility of being the democratic representative of the people. They deserve a good salary. No problems there.
And they need to run an office, assistants, researchers.
No problems there, as long as good books are kept.
Their special condition is that they have to be in two places - their constituency, and Westminster. This mean travel and accommodation.
Travel no problem. Mileages should be paid on rail travel. If air or car is used the MP will need to fill out a 64-page form to prove why they needed to do this. Just like the forms their constituents fill in to get help from the Social. Spouses and family should get travel support too, to keep the family together.
Westminster hours, many of which are stupid, mean that you need to have accommodation in London. Some people have suggested that they should stay in a hotel, or even a dormitory, but that would be an unreasonable stress, in my opinion. There is such a thing as quality of life, and it is not found in a hotel. One or two nights in a hotel is tolerable, but imagine dry heat, corridors, obsequiousness and compulsory airfresheners for 5, 10 or 40 years? Let's be fair. You need a place they can feel at home in.
So the reasonable way to do it is to give out-of-town MPs a standard grant for accommodation, based on the rental of a decent London house. The same grant for all of you. If some choose to live in Mayfair and Park Lane, they can do so, and pay extra. If some choose to live in Whitechapel and Old Kent Road, they can keep the under-spent money, or give it to charity, or to their party. If they choose to buy rather than rent, that's up to them; the grant stays the same.
Any profits made by sub-letting during the recess or as a result of using the accommodation grant to buy a house should be subject to 50% tax, hypothecated to housing associations and Shelter.
It works a bit like Citizen's Income: Enough for everyone, equitably distributed.
Simple, quick, fair, efficient. Who could object to this solution?
I hope therefore that you will take on board this suggestion, and put it forward as a reasonable solution within the Conservative Party and within Parliament.
I am making this an open letter in order to give other voters the opportunity to support it as an exercise in their proper democratic power.
With best wishes
Richard
Green Party Parliamentary Candidate for Weston-super-Mare.
Candidate on Green Party list for the European Parliament
[update 4.2.10: well, in the end they paid back £1000000, but they've still got a dumb system.
The cost in terms of political disaffection and alienation of the electorate is incalculable.]
John Penrose MP
House of Commons
London SW1A OAA
Dear John
You have been a good MP as far as I am concerned, despite being a Tory. You are courteous, helpful, hard working and a good listener.
I do not know the details of your expenses claims, [update: I do now: he is a middle ranker, I believe] but we know that you are in the middle band of MP claims, and I hope and expect that you will emerge from this MP expenses mess unscathed. If you did turn out to be in trouble, I would not seek (as Green Party parliamentary candidate) to make undue political capital out of it.
Clearly there is a pressing need to come up with a simple system for paying MP expenses. The present mess is in danger of bringing democracy into disrepute, which could have very serious consequences.
Democracy is the system where the will of the people is the ultimate source of authority in the land. Democracy is by no means perfect in the UK, but it is a damn sight better than the alternatives - anarchy a la Somalia, or authoritarianism a la Zimbabwe or Burma. We British citizens are very lucky to live in a democracy, even one where the true power in the land is overlain with a creaking political house comprising much dead and rotten wood.
We, the people, need to sort this out and put in robust system for MPs pay. It is up to us to do this, as MPs have proved themselves in capable of reforming the system in past decades, and have evolved a complex bureaucratic structure full of loopholes.
It is not a difficult problem, if we start from first principles.
MPs generally work long, stressful hours, dealing with vast amounts of information on subjects that vary from the emotionally charged to the mind-numbingly boring. MPs carry the challenging responsibility of being the democratic representative of the people. They deserve a good salary. No problems there.
And they need to run an office, assistants, researchers.
No problems there, as long as good books are kept.
Their special condition is that they have to be in two places - their constituency, and Westminster. This mean travel and accommodation.
Travel no problem. Mileages should be paid on rail travel. If air or car is used the MP will need to fill out a 64-page form to prove why they needed to do this. Just like the forms their constituents fill in to get help from the Social. Spouses and family should get travel support too, to keep the family together.
Westminster hours, many of which are stupid, mean that you need to have accommodation in London. Some people have suggested that they should stay in a hotel, or even a dormitory, but that would be an unreasonable stress, in my opinion. There is such a thing as quality of life, and it is not found in a hotel. One or two nights in a hotel is tolerable, but imagine dry heat, corridors, obsequiousness and compulsory airfresheners for 5, 10 or 40 years? Let's be fair. You need a place they can feel at home in.
So the reasonable way to do it is to give out-of-town MPs a standard grant for accommodation, based on the rental of a decent London house. The same grant for all of you. If some choose to live in Mayfair and Park Lane, they can do so, and pay extra. If some choose to live in Whitechapel and Old Kent Road, they can keep the under-spent money, or give it to charity, or to their party. If they choose to buy rather than rent, that's up to them; the grant stays the same.
Any profits made by sub-letting during the recess or as a result of using the accommodation grant to buy a house should be subject to 50% tax, hypothecated to housing associations and Shelter.
It works a bit like Citizen's Income: Enough for everyone, equitably distributed.
Simple, quick, fair, efficient. Who could object to this solution?
I hope therefore that you will take on board this suggestion, and put it forward as a reasonable solution within the Conservative Party and within Parliament.
I am making this an open letter in order to give other voters the opportunity to support it as an exercise in their proper democratic power.
With best wishes
Richard
Green Party Parliamentary Candidate for Weston-super-Mare.
Candidate on Green Party list for the European Parliament
[update 4.2.10: well, in the end they paid back £1000000, but they've still got a dumb system.
The cost in terms of political disaffection and alienation of the electorate is incalculable.]
One Green Vote is worth 100 abstentions from the ballot.
Monday, May 11, 2009
The Euro-Election voting system explained
The Euro Election on June 4th will be held under a weak system of Proportional Representation called the d'Hondt method.
In short, at the count, when all the votes have been spread out proportionally there will probably be a place left over for one of the 'smaller' parties. Which could mean the either the BNP or the Greens.
We know that if a Green is elected, there is no room for the BNP.
Therefore, anyone who wants to stop the BNP should vote Green.
Thanks to Roger Creagh-Osborne for the following explanation:
Under the d'Hondt proportional system each seat in order goes to the party with the highest number of votes. Then that party's votes are divided by the number of seats they have won plus one for deciding the next seat.
So suppose you vote for a major party that wins two seats out of the first five in your region, when it comes to the sixth seat your vote is only worth one third of a vote against a party that hasn't yet won a seat. Since the Greens are likely to be fighting with other smaller parties for the last seat, if you want to exclude a particular minority party your vote will be two three or four times more effective if you give it to the Greens rather than a big party.
Votes for big parties are diluted when it comes to defeating the BNP.
This means that a Green vote is far more effective at keeping out the BNP than a Con/Lab/LibDem vote.
Of course, there are many other excellent reasons for voting Green, such as, it is absolutely right to base economics on ecology, the Green New Deal will create hundreds of thousands of good jobs, the uK needs to join the rest of the democratic nations in having a Green voice in their parliaments. and a big Green vote will stimulate the other parties to clean up their act.
Saturday, March 07, 2009
George Osborne's economic threats. We need PR NOW!
Polly Toynbee summarises George Osborne's speech yesterday:
"The choice between Labour and Conservatives just got starker. Yesterday George Osborne, the shadow chancellor, laid out an economic policy that looks to any Keynesian like the perfect recipe for turning recession into deepest depression. It's Margaret Thatcher in 1980 all over again - cutting, sacking and reducing debt just when the state should expand.
Here's his programme: cut corporation tax and stamp duty on shares; abolish tax on savings; 'come off Labour's unrealistic spending plans' and 'bring national debt under control'; no investment in 'public works projects' but instead 'confront uncomfortable truths' - which means 'government can't just spend money on every worthy cause that comes knocking on the door'. Never mind what nice Mr Cameron says about 'capitalism with a conscience', it's the numbers in nasty Mr Osborne"
Osborne's speech is devastatingly superficial. I have already mentioned his lack of understanding of where money comes from.
A telling phrase, recycled from a speech he gave in September, is this:
"Our banking system is not separate from our economy, it is a reflection of it".
George, there is a fundamental difference between the real economy, based on provision of water, food, housing, low carbon energy and waste recycling, and the casino economy of the banksters and derivative peddlers. The one provides the materials of life; the other is a psychotic bubble, whose toxic assets threaten to bring the entire world economy to its knees.
George, to say that the one is a reflection of the other is a piece of total nonsense, and shows (a) that you do not understand what is going on, and (b) that a Conservative Government would constitute a real threat to economic recovery.
Osborne shows no consciousness of the destructive power of the Toxic Asset problem. He really does not get it. The self-proclaimed Tory grasp of financial matters has gone the way of the Norwegian Blue.
Yet it is pretty clear that the Conservatives are going to win the next election.
Allah knows that Labour are not behaving wisely with their quantitative easing, because they have so far been trying to shore up the banks with their money, rather than putting it into the real economy. We may see some better directed investment in the forthcoming budget (I heard Gordon Brown yesterday using the words "Green New Deal").
If the Tories win, and Osbornomics comes in to force, we will be in deep doo doo.
Polly Toynbee's response to this is to talk about getting Labour to put Proportional Representation into their next manifesto. Fat lot of good that. We need a Bill of Electoral Reform NOW, to become an Act before the next election. Yes, time is short, but it could be done, as part of an emergency reform package in response to the widespread popular demonstrations that are expected in the coming months.
We shall see.
"The choice between Labour and Conservatives just got starker. Yesterday George Osborne, the shadow chancellor, laid out an economic policy that looks to any Keynesian like the perfect recipe for turning recession into deepest depression. It's Margaret Thatcher in 1980 all over again - cutting, sacking and reducing debt just when the state should expand.
Here's his programme: cut corporation tax and stamp duty on shares; abolish tax on savings; 'come off Labour's unrealistic spending plans' and 'bring national debt under control'; no investment in 'public works projects' but instead 'confront uncomfortable truths' - which means 'government can't just spend money on every worthy cause that comes knocking on the door'. Never mind what nice Mr Cameron says about 'capitalism with a conscience', it's the numbers in nasty Mr Osborne"
Osborne's speech is devastatingly superficial. I have already mentioned his lack of understanding of where money comes from.
A telling phrase, recycled from a speech he gave in September, is this:
"Our banking system is not separate from our economy, it is a reflection of it".
George, there is a fundamental difference between the real economy, based on provision of water, food, housing, low carbon energy and waste recycling, and the casino economy of the banksters and derivative peddlers. The one provides the materials of life; the other is a psychotic bubble, whose toxic assets threaten to bring the entire world economy to its knees.
George, to say that the one is a reflection of the other is a piece of total nonsense, and shows (a) that you do not understand what is going on, and (b) that a Conservative Government would constitute a real threat to economic recovery.
Osborne shows no consciousness of the destructive power of the Toxic Asset problem. He really does not get it. The self-proclaimed Tory grasp of financial matters has gone the way of the Norwegian Blue.
Yet it is pretty clear that the Conservatives are going to win the next election.
Allah knows that Labour are not behaving wisely with their quantitative easing, because they have so far been trying to shore up the banks with their money, rather than putting it into the real economy. We may see some better directed investment in the forthcoming budget (I heard Gordon Brown yesterday using the words "Green New Deal").
If the Tories win, and Osbornomics comes in to force, we will be in deep doo doo.
Polly Toynbee's response to this is to talk about getting Labour to put Proportional Representation into their next manifesto. Fat lot of good that. We need a Bill of Electoral Reform NOW, to become an Act before the next election. Yes, time is short, but it could be done, as part of an emergency reform package in response to the widespread popular demonstrations that are expected in the coming months.
We shall see.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Blears blahs BNP
Communities Secretary Hazel Blears is giving advice about how to defeat the racist BNP.
"We must recognise that where the BNP wins votes, it is often a result of local political failure," she says.
Here is her list of diagnoses:
1 "Estates that have been ignored for decades"
Yes. So why has the Government not provided each estate with a funded community leader and a community meeting space? These act as a catalyst for local solidarity and empowerment. Click this link, scroll down to Stimulating the sense of community. The money invested will recoup itself many times over in money spent on trying (or indeed, not trying) to combat crime.
2 "Voters taken for granted"
Yes indeed. So why does the government not bring in a democratic electoral system, where every vote counts, instead of the ridiculous 18th century first-past-the-post system that prevails in this backward country, in which the Government is determined by swing voters in a handful of marginal seats, and in which voter turnout is inversely proportional to the majority enjoyed by the sitting MP. (Scroll down to the graph).
3 "Local services that have failed"
Which is an admission that after 11 years in power, the Labour Government has failed to stimulate local services.
3 "White working-class voters who feel politicians live on a different planet"
Which, of course, they do; in Planet Westminster, isolated from reality in a glazed environment dominated by Civil Service briefings, market dominance, lobbyists, and tradition.
What is lacking from Hazel Blears' paper thin 3-point diagnosis is jobs and housing.
While these are in short supply, the BPN can rally support by shouting, "Immigrants have taken your houses and your jobs" - irrespective of the truth or otherwise of their claim.
Shortage of housing and work lights the flame of anger that lifts the BNP balloon.
Homelessness is a failure of the State to provide responsibly for the basic material needs of the citizen. Joblessness is a failure of the State to provide an economy that works. Both of these result from Labour's shameful and mindless adoption of Tory free-market economics.
In Bills of Health I showed that it costs 10 times as much per year to put a family in temporary accommodation than it does to build a house, and that the reason for the failure is that the Treasury does not understand the concept of a mortgage. I also showed that there is no need for unemployment when so much good green work needs to be done.
Hazel Blears has in effect admitted the failure of Labour to tackle electoral reform, public services, political alienation, housing, and employment. The only choice we are presented with electorally is either more of Labour, or even worse, a Tory Government. No wonder that people are turning in anger and disillusionment to the heirs of the political ideology that plunged the world into an orgy of destruction and inhumanity in 1939.
A Green vote gives the same message rejection of the LabLibCon political consensus, but in every way is the opposite of a vote for the neo-fascists. Where they are hateful, we show political inclusiveness. Where they scream about symptoms, we advance preventive measures. Where they dream of right wing military coups, we dream of real democracy. Where they are given handsome media coverage, we are effectively airbrushed out of the political process.
"We must recognise that where the BNP wins votes, it is often a result of local political failure," she says.
Here is her list of diagnoses:
1 "Estates that have been ignored for decades"
Yes. So why has the Government not provided each estate with a funded community leader and a community meeting space? These act as a catalyst for local solidarity and empowerment. Click this link, scroll down to Stimulating the sense of community. The money invested will recoup itself many times over in money spent on trying (or indeed, not trying) to combat crime.
2 "Voters taken for granted"
Yes indeed. So why does the government not bring in a democratic electoral system, where every vote counts, instead of the ridiculous 18th century first-past-the-post system that prevails in this backward country, in which the Government is determined by swing voters in a handful of marginal seats, and in which voter turnout is inversely proportional to the majority enjoyed by the sitting MP. (Scroll down to the graph).
3 "Local services that have failed"
Which is an admission that after 11 years in power, the Labour Government has failed to stimulate local services.
3 "White working-class voters who feel politicians live on a different planet"
Which, of course, they do; in Planet Westminster, isolated from reality in a glazed environment dominated by Civil Service briefings, market dominance, lobbyists, and tradition.
What is lacking from Hazel Blears' paper thin 3-point diagnosis is jobs and housing.
While these are in short supply, the BPN can rally support by shouting, "Immigrants have taken your houses and your jobs" - irrespective of the truth or otherwise of their claim.
Shortage of housing and work lights the flame of anger that lifts the BNP balloon.
Homelessness is a failure of the State to provide responsibly for the basic material needs of the citizen. Joblessness is a failure of the State to provide an economy that works. Both of these result from Labour's shameful and mindless adoption of Tory free-market economics.
In Bills of Health I showed that it costs 10 times as much per year to put a family in temporary accommodation than it does to build a house, and that the reason for the failure is that the Treasury does not understand the concept of a mortgage. I also showed that there is no need for unemployment when so much good green work needs to be done.
Hazel Blears has in effect admitted the failure of Labour to tackle electoral reform, public services, political alienation, housing, and employment. The only choice we are presented with electorally is either more of Labour, or even worse, a Tory Government. No wonder that people are turning in anger and disillusionment to the heirs of the political ideology that plunged the world into an orgy of destruction and inhumanity in 1939.
A Green vote gives the same message rejection of the LabLibCon political consensus, but in every way is the opposite of a vote for the neo-fascists. Where they are hateful, we show political inclusiveness. Where they scream about symptoms, we advance preventive measures. Where they dream of right wing military coups, we dream of real democracy. Where they are given handsome media coverage, we are effectively airbrushed out of the political process.
Tuesday, November 01, 2005
Relative Democracy
OpenDemocracy is discussing the threat that democracy might slip out of our fingers.
Having read all the postings of Hilton, Barnett, Scruton, Dunn and Leiwen, and the discussion here, I feel that we need to bring the discussion down to earth.
Having read all the postings of Hilton, Barnett, Scruton, Dunn and Leiwen, and the discussion here, I feel that we need to bring the discussion down to earth.
Democracy is based on the idea that sovereign power derives from the will of the people. That is an ideal, and none of the 36 or so designated democracies in the world approach that absolute ideal - they are just more democratic relative to other states. Our own system in the UK falls sadly short of the ideal.
Humans are, unfortunately, derived from chimpanzees, and we have inherited their hierarchical social structure. History shows us that if a single person, usually a male, dominates a hierarchy for more than a few years, he loses his psychological and social bearings, and becomes corrupted by power. There is an arrogance that comes to us when our wishes are untested and unopposed. Evidence for this is widespread, from god-emperors of ancient times through the dictators who project personality cults to the second term difficulties of American Presidents of which George W Bush is the latest example.
In practical terms therefore, democracy is a way of providing the hierarchical system with effective feedback from those at the receiving end of decisions of the president or prime minister.
Democracy is not the only form of such feedback. The UN needs to develop another form of peer-based feedback, to bring pressure for better standards of governance at the international level.
To manage anything we need first to be able to measure it. It is possible to measure governance through a variety of proxies. Free elections, political imprisonment, torture, position of women, freedom of the press can all be measured. Each single measurement might be approximate, but in combination, they could form a reasonably accurate picture of what is going on in a country. In this way, we could find the democratic standing of any state, with respect to its own past performance, and with respect to the community of nations. Such an Index of Human Rights could be a useful tool in bringing continuous pressure against regimes whose democratic credentials are in doubt.
Thursday, April 28, 2005
"Don't Vote, it only encourages them"
I agree that it is a sham democracy in the UK ( http://www.greenhealth.org.uk/Democracy.htm ) but any vote is better than no vote, and it is a shame not to use it - but just do it as you would pick up a piece of litter: a good thing to do, but not earth moving in its effect.
If in a marginal constituency, your vote can help keep the pro-war labour ond/or the Tory out.
If in a safe seat - vote Green, because of the principle of ecological wisdom that they represent. If no Green, pop in and spoil a paper.
If in a marginal constituency, your vote can help keep the pro-war labour ond/or the Tory out.
If in a safe seat - vote Green, because of the principle of ecological wisdom that they represent. If no Green, pop in and spoil a paper.
Monday, April 04, 2005
OSCE report takes the Republicans' word for it.
The OSCE report on the US elections is out. Here is a sample:
Civil society groups engaged with the issue of voting with DRE machines made numerous statements, and provided extensive information on their websites, demonstrating distrust of DRE machines that fail to provide a voter-verified auditable paper trail (VVAPT). Neither the vendors nor the county and state election officials with whom the EOM met shared this distrust.
So. That's all right then. Civil society says there is a problem? Ask the vendors and the beneficiaries. If they find no problem, end of story.
The odd thing is not that this is the methodology used, but that there was a 3 month delay before this came out. Was the extra time taken up in assembling the terse descriptive text? Or was it taken up in painful negotiations as the US authorities deconstructed the OSCE report line by line, robbing it of all critical statements?
Civil society groups engaged with the issue of voting with DRE machines made numerous statements, and provided extensive information on their websites, demonstrating distrust of DRE machines that fail to provide a voter-verified auditable paper trail (VVAPT). Neither the vendors nor the county and state election officials with whom the EOM met shared this distrust.
So. That's all right then. Civil society says there is a problem? Ask the vendors and the beneficiaries. If they find no problem, end of story.
The odd thing is not that this is the methodology used, but that there was a 3 month delay before this came out. Was the extra time taken up in assembling the terse descriptive text? Or was it taken up in painful negotiations as the US authorities deconstructed the OSCE report line by line, robbing it of all critical statements?
Strategic Voter?
I sympathise with the efforts of Strategic Voter 2005 and as a Green I sympathise with the criticism they make of Greens standing in marginal seats. In fact, at considerable political loss to our local party, I withdrew from contesting Weston s mare when it became marginal 12 years ago, in order to let the LibDem in.
However, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that IN SAFE SEATS, NOTHING HAPPENS! Voting changes nothing in Safe Seats, under First Past The Post. People are aware of this, which is why turnout is inversely proportional to winning margin .
In fact the country could save considerable trouble and expanse by holding elections in safe seats every other General Election, or every third in really safe seats, just ot test the waters.
So in safe seats, people should use their (otherwise useless) vote to further the Green cause, because their political philosophy of basing the economy on planetary ecology is the only philosophy that makes sense in the end.
However, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that IN SAFE SEATS, NOTHING HAPPENS! Voting changes nothing in Safe Seats, under First Past The Post. People are aware of this, which is why turnout is inversely proportional to winning margin .
In fact the country could save considerable trouble and expanse by holding elections in safe seats every other General Election, or every third in really safe seats, just ot test the waters.
So in safe seats, people should use their (otherwise useless) vote to further the Green cause, because their political philosophy of basing the economy on planetary ecology is the only philosophy that makes sense in the end.
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