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Recent political stuff:
- The vote to see if Britain should adopt Alternative Voting has failed.
- Lib Dems lose lots of councils and councillors, whilst Labour make the majority of the gains in England.
- The Scottish National Party do really well in the elections.
A link to the BBC politics page containing relevant information.
Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 3rd 2023 at 11:15:30 AM
And yet despite all that he still nearly topped or joint topped the opinion polls.
*frustrated sigh*
"Yup. That tasted purple."
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
He's polarised - he's also topping "worst performance" polls apparently.
I'm hearing that even Gideon has been praising Sturgeon's performance. This is a seriously good result from SNP.
edited 2nd Apr '15 2:37:08 PM by CaissasDeathAngel
My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.
And apparently his crap about "civilised" and "non-civilised" countries is nationalist, not racist.
*frustrated sigh*
"Yup. That tasted purple."
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
English people want to vote for Sturgeon now. My own step mother is among them.
I think the three women ran away with this (Greens, SNP, PC - referenced in no particular order). Of the men, I think Milliband did best out of the lot of them. Cameron looked incredibly weak against the other six, and especially when compared to the women.
However, Farage is a very smooth talker - a lot of the time he doesn't hesitate, pause, um, ah, or stutter when he talks. It creates the illusion of being in control, confident, concise and clear - everything people want politicians to sound like. I wonder if this is why people think he comes off so well against the other politicians? It certainly can't be because of the content of what he says, because that's absolute bile.
The summaries at the end showed the difference in experience (regarding national exposure) between SNP and PC - Nicola Sturgeon talked about Scotland but eventually remembered to include a message for the rest of the country, which was very sensible. Leanne talked about Wales and didn't comment on the rest of the country - whether or not that's sensible depends on whether or not you view her as understanding just how big a piece of the pie to try and bite off (ie, target Wales first and worry about the national stage in the future) given that PC doesn't have the strength of SNP.
One thing I did notice at the very end which I found interesting. Milliband was the only one of the seven to go down to the audience afterwards and thank them for their participation. I honestly expected most of them to try doing that (which is why I was looking out for it).
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
That's not new, however. Sturgeon's had a good reputation in the rest of the UK ever since she took over. In fact, her taking over boosted SNP's reputation a lot because the people who disliked the SNP solely because they disliked Salmond didn't have that issue any more. She won a lot of people over when they realised she wasn't going to be Salmond's lapdog because a lot of what he's been spouting she hasn't been supporting and her responses have gone down well accordingly. That was all well before tonight.
edited 6th Jul '17 2:40:55 PM by Wyldchyld
If my post doesn't mention a giant flying sperm whale with oversized teeth and lionfish fins for flippers, it just isn't worth reading.
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
Plaid Cymru seem to have an eye on their own parliamentary elections next year - thing are very close between them and Labour, and as such Labour were the main target tonight. SNP are looking beyond Scotland and influencing the country overall, which obviously PC have no prospects of doing.
I was hoping for a bit more from the Greens, but I think Bennett's interview disaster caused her to be a bit more cautious tonight than she might have been.
Did anyone else notice Milliband slip slightly over his words in his opening statement? Small stumble but I noticed it.
My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.
Yes, PC seem very focussed on winning in Wales. That's why I said it depends on the person as to whether they'll think that sensible or not. They have to focus on the battles they can and should win (Wales) before they can ever think about taking a wider stage like SNP are currently beginning to do. I suppose what I'm thinking of is more long-term. If PC want to follow in SNP's footsteps, they cannot alienate the rest of the country by seeming so localised, yet they have target Wales to get a strong foothold there before thinking about anything else. It's a tightrope that PC has not traditionally been good at. Now that SNP is much more successfully than it historically has been, there's a role-model for PC to learn from.
One thing I did notice during the summation speeches was Cameron fumbling over trying to avoid saying 'Labour' every time he talked about the last Government. He's knows that people are sick to the back teeth of him falling back on blaming the Labour government for everything and that people think it makes him look weak, but it's very noticeable every time he pulled himself back from doing that. It definitely wasn't the summation speech to go out on. If someone had no idea who those seven people were, I wonder if they'd have been able to pick out the prime minister - he did not shine at all.
edited 2nd Apr '15 2:58:16 PM by Wyldchyld
If my post doesn't mention a giant flying sperm whale with oversized teeth and lionfish fins for flippers, it just isn't worth reading.
Am I the only one who felt kinda creeped out by Milliband's puppy eyes?
As for the others, Cameron was weak, Clegg was ok (which is saying a lot), Farage was... Farage, Sturgeon played well, Bennett was not very coherent, Wood was mediocre.
edited 2nd Apr '15 2:57:19 PM by Quag15
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
No. My brother said it looked like Milliband was trying to stare into his soul.
I was sure I was going to join the Greens but would vote SNP tactically (resisting uge to stab self for mistyping that as UKIP somehow). Now genuinely might join SNP tonight on the basis of that performance.
I still like the Greens a lot, and political compass stuff tends not to leave me with the SNP, but I do like them a lot and that was so very powerful tonight.
This is the heckler who interrupted the debate, by the way.
Did I hear her right? When Cameron talked right over her to start spouting off the 'very valid point' he claimed she was making, did I hear her in the background saying 'that's not the point I'm making'?
If my post doesn't mention a giant flying sperm whale with oversized teeth and lionfish fins for flippers, it just isn't worth reading.
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
Hmm, didn't notice but very interesting if true!
My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.
Full Fact have been fact-checking the debate.
V
Election TV debate: Parties claim spoils after seven-way battle — But it looks like nobody came out ahead...
David Cameron said he was delighted he had "come out on top" in opinion polls, while Ed Miliband said he had set out the "clear choice" between the two men. The SNP's Nicola Sturgeon has been praised for an "impressive" performance by some senior Conservatives.
Seven million people watched the two-hour debate on ITV. In the most high-profile event of the campaign so far, the seven politicians - also including the leaders of the Lib Dems, UKIP, the Green Party and Plaid Cymru - were questioned on a range of issues including the NHS, immigration and the deficit.
In other post-debate developments:
- ITV say their audience for the debate peaked at 7.4 million, a 33% share of the audience, compared with 9.4 million for their debate in 2010. Across ITV, BBC News and Sky the average audience was 7.7m
- Snap polls taken after the poll suggested there was no clear winner
- Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg said he relished the encounter and insisted his party had a "great story" to tell
- UKIP has defended comments by its leader Nigel Farage over whether the NHS should treat foreign migrants diagnosed with HIV
- Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood said she had succeeded in "speaking directly for Wales"
- Conservative Chief Whip Michael Gove said Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland could not hold separate EU referenda and a vote would be on a "UK basis"
- Mr Gove says "no thanks" in response to talk of a coalition with UKIP
The party leaders have returned to the campaign trail in the wake of Thursday's encounter - the only time before polling day on 7 May that Mr Cameron and Mr Miliband will share a stage.
"The overall impression people will have got is if you want to look and say 'who is the best person to lead the country over the next five years', David Cameron will have come out clearly ahead," Mr Gove told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. But shadow energy secretary Caroline Flint suggested that Mr Cameron had "faded". "Given that David Cameron designed and demanded this debate... he didn't seize the opportunity to make his case."
Amid suggestions of a hung Parliament and possible coalitions and deals after the election, commentators have said that the debates made the British political system look very different from the traditional two or three-party set-up.
Both the Conservatives and Labour conceded that the three parties appearing in a national debate for the first time - the SNP, Plaid Cymru and Green Party - could have benefited the most from the primetime exposure.
Ms Sturgeon, Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood and Green leader Natalie Bennett all argued against austerity. The SNP leader signalled areas, such as on tax, where she could work with Labour but said getting more SNP MPs elected to Westminster was needed to "keep them honest".
Speaking in Edinburgh on Friday, Mr Sturgeon said she had made the case for a "progressive change" in Scotland and across the UK. The SNP, she suggested, could work with Labour to "lock" the Conservatives out of power but also make sure Labour did not "sell out its values" in government.
Mr Gove said the SNP leader had done "very well". "I think it is also legitimate to say Nicola Sturgeon emerged as the most impressive debutante on the stage," he said.
Labour have suggested it is in the Conservatives' interests to talk up the SNP, as the more seats they win in Scotland, the less likely the chances of Labour getting a majority.
The BBC's assistant political editor Norman Smith said Ms Sturgeon had "managed to project herself as a distinctive, articulate voice of anti-austerity in a way which we've not really had on the national stage". But he said both Mr Cameron and Mr Miliband's supporters were "pretty pleased" as "they felt their men came through it relatively unscathed, they got over their core message, they both believed they managed to look prime ministerial..."
Other notable clashes during the debate came between David Cameron and Nick Clegg on schools funding and between Mr Clegg and Mr Farage over immigration. Speaking on Friday, Mr Clegg said it was clear politics was becoming more "fragmented" and no longer a "game of pass the parcel" between the Conservatives and Labour.
"I actually think that most people watching last night will have realised no-one's going to win this election outright so it's all about who's going to work with whom," he said.
Mr Farage was attacked by his opponents after highlighting the number of foreign nationals with HIV whom he said were treated by the NHS. But the party's immigration spokesman Steven Woolfe said the debate had been a "resounding success" for Mr Farage because he had been "straight-talking, honest and had set out commonsense policies for leading Britain and putting Britain's interests first".
A YouGov poll of 1,100 people gave a clear victory to the SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon, with 28%, followed by UKIP leader Nigel Farage on 20%, Mr Cameron on 18%, Mr Miliband on 15%, Mr Clegg on 10%, Green Party leader Natalie Bennett on 5% and Plaid Cymru's Leanne Wood on 4%.
But a ComRes poll for ITV made it a dead heat between Mr Cameron, Mr Miliband, Mr Farage and Ms Sturgeon, although Mr Cameron came out on top on the question of who was most capable of leading the country.
Mr Miliband was judged best performer in an ICM poll for the Guardian, taking 25% of support, just ahead of David Cameron on 24%.
So, no real change in the polls, with the Conservatives, Labour, UKIP and the SNP all within two points of each other. Well, I was working last night and to be honest, I'm still underwhelmed by them all. It might come down to who do I vote against, than who for.
edited 3rd Apr '15 5:16:36 AM by Greenmantle
Keep Rolling On
Is the SNP running candidates in England?
Because if not, they really should try (or form an affiliate party for England). Maybe attack some disgrunted yellow-and-red strongholds.
edited 3rd Apr '15 6:11:48 AM by Ramidel
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
They're not running in England or Wales (or NI, but their politics are virtually separate from mainland Britain). Interesting idea though. It wouldn't have been possible before when they were just independence wonks, but the party has gone beyond that and proven it can run the country well in its own right.
Getting rid of Salmond will have helped - I rate Sturgeon far more.
My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.
As long as she acts like a sane and rational human being rather than being smug all the time, it's not hard to rate higher.
"Yup. That tasted purple."
I'm going to make a rather sad observation about reactions to this debate, speaking from the point-of-view of someone who qualifies under disability laws...
We all know Ed Milliband isn't exactly the most aesthetically-appealing person we've ever seen lead a party. However, whereas people have been complaining about, or critiquing, what the other six leaders said during the debate, an overwhelming proportion of the reaction to Milliband centres almost exclusively on his appearance rather than the content of what he's said, despite the fact that several of the other leaders are very much not lookers themselves.
It leaves me thinking this country has got a hell of a long way to go before it can ever consider itself a country that can hold the moral high ground on issues of equality and discrimination.
If my post doesn't mention a giant flying sperm whale with oversized teeth and lionfish fins for flippers, it just isn't worth reading.
Agreed.
Though that still doesn't excuse his puppy eyes moment.
Besides, he's, aesthetically speaking (in the context of media reception), in a spot as tight as Nixon's when he faced JFK. On a radio debate, he would have a lot more chances.
edited 3rd Apr '15 10:09:58 AM by Quag15
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
It's not his looks I have an issue with, his general body language and charisma suck.
The man does not look ministerial. He couldn't convince me to blow my nose much less vote for him.
My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.
You'd base your voting behaviour on a bunch of red herrings?
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
No, his policies don't convince me either.
But the simple fact is, people don't vote based on bits of writing on paper. It's human nature that we take into account the psychological, such as trustworthyness, believability, and whatever else.
Just because rationally we should ignore all these things doesn't mean that it makes any sense to in the world we actually live in. Charisma is important, and Milliband, for me, has very little.
A lot of the hate for Alex Salmond is based on his perceived attitude and "slimyness" not his actual policies for the same reason.
My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.
Another political quiz (I like them).
This time I was:
95% Green
62% Labour
52% Lib Dem
36% UKIP
19% Conservative
Agreement with UKIP came from:
"Private companies should be able to compete for all NHS contracts" - Disagree
"The "bedroom tax" should be scrapped" - Agree
"Housing benefit should only be paid to over-21s" - Disagree
"The government's top priority should be cutting the budget deficit" - Disagree
"Only English M Ps should be able to vote on laws which affect only England" - Agree
"The public should have the right to recall M Ps for any reason" - Agree
"The government should have the power to read anyone's digital communications" - Disagree
"The government should cancel the High Speed 2 rail link" - Agree
Strangely enough I don't think UKIP really believes most of these things, and are going for popularity, or maybe I'm being harsh.
(Edited formatting and added Con + UKIP results.)
edited 3rd Apr '15 11:39:15 AM by annemarisa
I have that issue with a few of the leaders. It's still going to be the content of their speeches, debates and their parties manifestos I base my decisions on.
- 97% Plaid Cymru
- 64% Welsh Labour
- 59% Welsh Liberal Democrats.
Green wasn't on my list of options and I dismissed UKIP and the Conservatives.
I don't like the question structure on this survey. Some of them are very leading. For example, the question "Private companies should only be allowed to provide services the NHS cannot provide itself". What if you believe there should be no aspect in which private companies should be involved and that the NHS should be able to cover everything?
My area (a long-term Labour constituency) comes out as the following:
- 31% Plaid Cymru / Welsh Labour
- 20% UKIP
- 12% Welsh Conservatives
- 6% Welsh Liberal Democrats
edited 3rd Apr '15 11:56:29 AM by Wyldchyld
If my post doesn't mention a giant flying sperm whale with oversized teeth and lionfish fins for flippers, it just isn't worth reading.
House Lewis: Sanity is Relative
Mine too, that shouldn't be in question. That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with my noting the non-policy reasons for voting.
If facts were the only factor, UKIP would have no votes whatsoever. That they are not is down to the salesmanship (albeit of the Snake Oil kind) of Farage and his populist xenophobia.
The chance to gauge such factors is part of the reason for a TV debate to be held in the first place - it's an advantage not held by radio, because we can see the candidate's faces, see how they comport themselves as people.
edited 3rd Apr '15 11:51:02 AM by CaissasDeathAngel
My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.
Re: "a vote for UKIP is a vote for patriotism":
edited 2nd Apr '15 2:08:34 PM by Deadbeatloser22
"Yup. That tasted purple."