Parliamentary or Presidential?

Liberal Democrats Retweeted

Tim Farron @timfarron 1 day  ago

With @TheresaMay2016‘s coronation we need an early General Election. The Tories now have no mandate. Britain deserves better than this.

The implication of this would seem to be that Tim Farron believes in a Presidential system. Which is strange given that the last time the Liberals were in Government they relied on a parliamentary majority to sustain them rather than a general election majority

Under presidential systems elections get boiled down to a binary choice – which probably means no look in for the Liberals.

Parliament is just as representative today as it was yesterday; problem (1) is

Which house is most representative?

The above graphic shows an interesting take on the “representativeness” of the two Houses of Parliament in the UK. (graphic: © Outside The Marginals)

In Praise of Indirect Democracy

We like to think that we elect governments – and most parties encourage this view with national campaigning, leaders’ debates and an emphasis on party discipline.

But we actually elect representatives to form a Parliament. It is members of that Parliament that vote to support a government and they decide issues rather than us. In that respect our democracy is “indirect”.

We are being progressively encouraged to think that more “direct” democracy is “better”. Witness the introduction of Police and Crime Commissioners and the push for directly elected mayors.

I think this is wrong and that, for reasons of coherence and accommodating diversity, indirect democracy has a lot going for it.

This is particularly so as we face a potentially complicated hung parliament. This means that we are unlikely to have a government with a clear parliamentary majority – we will not have “elected a government”. So it will be up to our MPs, as a Parliament, to decide who forms the executive. This requires them to act as parliamentarians not as party hacks wedded to a series of “red-line promises”, “manifesto pledges” and “policy millstones”.

Myth Busting: The winner should win (take 2: The Tug-of-War)

Julian Ware-Lane in his blog reflecting on the Conservatives reaction to losing control makes the point:

The Conservatives, it could be argued, won in the Borough [with 30.29%]. I think a more accurate telling of the story is to state that with 69.71% voting for other parties it was quite a rejection.

To be fair to them this would be consistent with their approach to AV. Remember their comparison to a horse race and the slogan “the winner should win“. It is written into their political DNA which means that a lot of the behaviour that he complains about is actually instinctive rather than rational.

The problem with their analogy is that they rig the race.

Misleading Name for a Misleading System

“First Past the Post” is a lousy misleading name for a lousy misleading system. Under “first past the post” it is very rare for anyone to reach the “winning post”, so it should be better called something like “Best Failure” or “Least Worst Failure”.

Ironically,

Responses to Compulsory Voting

Following poor turnout in the Euro-election (22 May 2014), the question of compulsory voting has raised its head again.

The people have spoken – they can’t be arsed to vote for anyone. Compelling them to do so will not increase enthusiasm, but might increase resentment.

How might this resentment manifest itself?

Not “being arsed” to vote or positively stay away?

I am not a fan of Russell Brand, but that does not disqualify me from finding something worth debating in his pronouncements – once you have unwrapped them and thrown away the rhetoric.

I hope that his admission that he has never voted can generate discussion not about him, but about the state of politics in Britain. We might start with Paxman’s reflections (BBC News Website 5 November 2013) – the date is perhaps symbolic!: