1/7 (1.14) may be an unattractive betting option, but surely Blatter is nailed on to win this.
The maths just do not suit Ali.
Africa: 54 votes Europe: 53 votes Asia: 46 votes North & Central America: 35 Oceania: 11 South America: 10
105 needed to win on second round.
As for Blatter: BBC sources say 50 of 54 African votes "nailed on" (just kidding on the words :P). Even if that were optimistic, 40 would be realistic. Plus a similar proportion of Asia (say 35) and the central part of Central and North America (25). There will be UEFA dissenters - Platini is not particularly well liked - say 10. Oceania and South America will be split, say 10 total. That's 120 at a minimum as I see it. DYOR.
Yes, can't see Blatter losing this vote. Which moves us on to the question of possible boycotts/ withdrwals. The one factor that makes that possible in my view is that Barcelona, Real Madrid, Bayern Munich etc might lobby for a boycott of Qatar, so that the Champions League and domestic leagues can continue unimpeded that year.
I agree that the whole Qatar summer/winter debarcle is going to add to pressure for a boycott... but it's a long way off and and I still think an idle threat. I think far more likely UEFA will refuse to co-operate in a myriad of smaller ways over the next couple of years, e.g. members not voting/taking their seats... maybe not even paying.
Time to sack Blatter and hand control of world football to someone in touch with the common fan, like His Royal Highness Prince Ali bin Al-Hussein of Jordan.
It's an ideal job for Vlad when he decides to step down.
The principle of making seats of equal size is surely unarguable, we will have to wait and see what it means in practice. The swing in marginals this time is a large contributor to the vote efficiency, but that tory success from 2015 is not a given in 2020. What constitutes a marginal will be less clear by virtue of the large shake-up of boundaries.
The principle isn't unarguable. I don't think anyone is advocating that seats should all be exactly the same size, so the question to argue is whether the variation should be 1% or 5% or 10% or 20% or what. A very tight range means lots of boundary changes which will probably annoy sitting MPs, so I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories loosened it a bit.
OK you know what I mean - pedant! Labour seem to be saying that somehow the tories asking the neutral boundary commission to do the job is the same as gerrymandering.
The Wales thing is the most egregious. It isn't that hard to do +/-5% if you aren't wedded to county boundaries. +/-20% would be far too much surely?
It would be helpful if some of the boundaries were redrawn completely. Some are very peculiar and helpful to one party (normally the one that is strongest in the area).
If you have multi-member STV constituencies the boundaries are a lot less important - the main consideration is the number of members per constituency.
Time to sack Blatter and hand control of world football to someone in touch with the common fan, like His Royal Highness Prince Ali bin Al-Hussein of Jordan.
Someone who doesn't claim they are untainted by the scandal because they are incompetent (if not in those exact words) would be a good start, never mind being in touch with common fans. Lord only knows if Ali fits that bill, not the question seems likely to aris.
It's a disgrace that an election was fought on such boundaries.
Quite. And I was a beneficiary (Cardiff Central) in terms of being in a relatively small seat. Now even I can see that Wales being so over represented is just not justifiable, especially when we add in asymmetric devolution, which Ok is not quite as bad as in Scotland, but why should I get to vote on hospitals and schools 35 miles away in Bristol, through my MP, when the reverse isn't true?
The principle of making seats of equal size is surely unarguable, we will have to wait and see what it means in practice. The swing in marginals this time is a large contributor to the vote efficiency, but that tory success from 2015 is not a given in 2020. What constitutes a marginal will be less clear by virtue of the large shake-up of boundaries.
The principle isn't unarguable. I don't think anyone is advocating that seats should all be exactly the same size, so the question to argue is whether the variation should be 1% or 5% or 10% or 20% or what. A very tight range means lots of boundary changes which will probably annoy sitting MPs, so I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories loosened it a bit.
OK you know what I mean - pedant! Labour seem to be saying that somehow the tories asking the neutral boundary commission to do the job is the same as gerrymandering.
The Wales thing is the most egregious. It isn't that hard to do +/-5% if you aren't wedded to county boundaries. +/-20% would be far too much surely?
A distinction should be drawn between addressing existing unfairness toward one side, which technically confers 'advantage' on the other as things move to a fairer apportionment, and the addressing of the existing unfairness going too far in the opposite direction and leaves the end result unfairly benefiting the other. Both 'advantage' one side against the other, but only the latter in an unreasonable way.
I've long advocated the bounday commissions being allowed to take projected population growth into account when deciding the variation in electorate sizes, instead of a fixed % either side of the average.
A very simple example would be something like:
Seats with a broadly static electorate: (-5% to +5% variation) Seats with an increasing electorate (-10% to 0 variation) Seats with a decreasing electorate (0 to +10% variation)
This would result in places suffering exodus must have a larger than average electorate on the basis that it's likely to shrink further, and areas of growth are guaranteed a smaller than average electorate because it will go up.
This should future-proof things a bit so we won't have the nightmare scenario of a boundary review before every single election just to keep things fair.
Amazing how convoluted some of the constituencies seem. Broadland is very odd for example. Huntingdon and South Cambs border also seemingly randomly convoluted.
Amazing how convoluted some of the constituencies seem. Broadland is very odd for example. Huntingdon and South Cambs border also seemingly randomly convoluted. And those lines in the Wash, was someone drunk?
A lot of that is determined by the weird shape of the wards which are the building blocks for constituencies. The boundary commission try not to divide wards if possible although it is legal, apart from in Northern Ireland.
The principle of making seats of equal size is surely unarguable, we will have to wait and see what it means in practice. The swing in marginals this time is a large contributor to the vote efficiency, but that tory success from 2015 is not a given in 2020. What constitutes a marginal will be less clear by virtue of the large shake-up of boundaries.
The principle isn't unarguable. I don't think anyone is advocating that seats should all be exactly the same size, so the question to argue is whether the variation should be 1% or 5% or 10% or 20% or what. A very tight range means lots of boundary changes which will probably annoy sitting MPs, so I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories loosened it a bit.
OK you know what I mean - pedant! Labour seem to be saying that somehow the tories asking the neutral boundary commission to do the job is the same as gerrymandering.
The Wales thing is the most egregious. It isn't that hard to do +/-5% if you aren't wedded to county boundaries. +/-20% would be far too much surely?
A distinction should be drawn between addressing existing unfairness toward one side, which technically confers 'advantage' on the other as things move to a fairer apportionment, and the addressing of the existing unfairness going too far in the opposite direction and leaves the end result unfairly benefiting the other. Both 'advantage' one side against the other, but only the latter in an unreasonable way.
Surely they should ignore any perceived advantage and base it all solely on the electorate's size.
Time to sack Blatter and hand control of world football to someone in touch with the common fan, like His Royal Highness Prince Ali bin Al-Hussein of Jordan.
Someone who doesn't claim they are untainted by the scandal because they are incompetent (if not in those exact words) would be a good start, never mind being in touch with common fans. Lord only knows if Ali fits that bill, not the question seems likely to aris.
A member of the Jordanian Royal Family would be the breath of fresh air football needs.
Time to sack Blatter and hand control of world football to someone in touch with the common fan, like His Royal Highness Prince Ali bin Al-Hussein of Jordan.
Someone who doesn't claim they are untainted by the scandal because they are incompetent (if not in those exact words) would be a good start, never mind being in touch with common fans. Lord only knows if Ali fits that bill, not the question seems likely to aris.
A member of the Jordanian Royal Family would be the breath of fresh air football needs.
i.e. The real power in modern football lies with the big clubs rather than the national federations.
That's one possible angle, that the clubs still in the Champions' League and UEFA Cup decide to make their players unavailable for a WC in the winter - but that would be a logistical boycott rather than an ideological boycott.
Better is that UEFA refuse to have any involvement with FIFA and their corrupt events, the FAs decide not to take part in the 2018 qualifying tournament.
The principle isn't unarguable. I don't think anyone is advocating that seats should all be exactly the same size, so the question to argue is whether the variation should be 1% or 5% or 10% or 20% or what. A very tight range means lots of boundary changes which will probably annoy sitting MPs, so I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories loosened it a bit.
And what do the Grand Minds of PB think the variance should be? [I mean variance from the ideal, not variance from high-point to low-point.] +/-5% for me. Gut feel, not science. 10% too lax given the (approx) 20% difference from high to low point.
The unimplemented review in the last Parliament was based around 5%, with a handful of specific exceptions for geographical reasons. Any less than that is very difficult without cutting wards in half.
I wonder if the Scottish exemptions (islands / large constituencies) might be revisited now that the LDs have no say. I can't see why there shouldn't be just one MP for the Western Isles, Orkney & Shetland [combined electorate still only 56k].
There is a serious practical issue, in that there are no direct travel links btween the groups as far as I recall - you'd need to fly via Edinburgh or Glasgow, and there is a very long drive between the ferry ports for the various groups even ignoring Barra and Uist. (Even Shetland to Orkney isn;t straightforward.) It would make more sense to merge O&S with Caithness etc, and so on.
Amazing how convoluted some of the constituencies seem. Broadland is very odd for example. Huntingdon and South Cambs border also seemingly randomly convoluted. And those lines in the Wash, was someone drunk?
A lot of that is determined by the weird shape of the wards which are the building blocks for constituencies. The boundary commission try not to divide wards if possible although it is legal, apart from in Northern Ireland.
Accepted, but in that case the question is why are the wards like that.
Some of it must be lost in the mists of time almost.
Is there info anywhere about ward electorate size? Despite the massive size of the task, I would love to have a go at doing my own boundaries :-) Start at Lands end and work up...
The principle isn't unarguable. I don't think anyone is advocating that seats should all be exactly the same size, so the question to argue is whether the variation should be 1% or 5% or 10% or 20% or what. A very tight range means lots of boundary changes which will probably annoy sitting MPs, so I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories loosened it a bit.
And what do the Grand Minds of PB think the variance should be? [I mean variance from the ideal, not variance from high-point to low-point.] +/-5% for me. Gut feel, not science. 10% too lax given the (approx) 20% difference from high to low point.
The unimplemented review in the last Parliament was based around 5%, with a handful of specific exceptions for geographical reasons. Any less than that is very difficult without cutting wards in half.
I wonder if the Scottish exemptions (islands / large constituencies) might be revisited now that the LDs have no say. I can't see why there shouldn't be just one MP for the Western Isles, Orkney & Shetland [combined electorate still only 56k].
There is a serious practical issue, in that there are no direct travel links btween the groups as far as I recall - you'd need to fly via Edinburgh or Glasgow, and there is a very long drive between the ferry ports for the various groups even ignoring Barra and Uist. (Even Shetland to Orkney isn;t straightforward.) It would make more sense to merge O&S with Caithness etc, and so on.
"Is it true that the nearest railway station is in Bergen, Norway?
It’s an appealingly romantic notion, but a modern Norse myth. The railway stations at Thurso and Wick in northern Scotland are both closer to Shetland, though not by very much if you’re in our northernmost islands. Bergen does, however, distinguish itself by having the nearest branch of IKEA – the next closest is in Edinburgh."
Amazing how convoluted some of the constituencies seem. Broadland is very odd for example. Huntingdon and South Cambs border also seemingly randomly convoluted. And those lines in the Wash, was someone drunk?
A lot of that is determined by the weird shape of the wards which are the building blocks for constituencies. The boundary commission try not to divide wards if possible although it is legal, apart from in Northern Ireland.
My understanding is that constituencies are also linked to counties. So many by county based on its size.
The principle of making seats of equal size is surely unarguable, we will have to wait and see what it means in practice. The swing in marginals this time is a large contributor to the vote efficiency, but that tory success from 2015 is not a given in 2020. What constitutes a marginal will be less clear by virtue of the large shake-up of boundaries.
The principle isn't unarguable. I don't think anyone is advocating that seats should all be exactly the same size, so the question to argue is whether the variation should be 1% or 5% or 10% or 20% or what. A very tight range means lots of boundary changes which will probably annoy sitting MPs, so I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories loosened it a bit.
OK you know what I mean - pedant! Labour seem to be saying that somehow the tories asking the neutral boundary commission to do the job is the same as gerrymandering.
The Wales thing is the most egregious. It isn't that hard to do +/-5% if you aren't wedded to county boundaries. +/-20% would be far too much surely?
Surely they should ignore any perceived advantage and base it all soely on the electorate size.
Which er, IS what they do isn't it..?
I don't know. All I meant is that if what is there now is unfair on one side, then fixing that to make it fair (however one fixes it) technically advantages them, which the other side might call gerrymandering, even though the end result would be a situation where neither side has an advantage any more. Whether the proposals achieve that I do not know.
The Telegraph is reporting that the 'In' side in the referendum will be allowed to use the Civil Service to lobby for them. I find this jaw-dropping. I had pooh-poohed the claims of UKIP supporters that this referendum would be 'rigged' as some sort of conspiracy theory, but if this goes through, they will be proven right. The Civil Service turning out to lobby for the government side in an election is the sort of thing you expect from African tin pot republics, not the United Kingdom. Why is David Cameron endorsing this sort of dishonesty? Is he so lacking in confident that we can win this in a fair election?
I take it you protested at this arrangement for the Indy Ref as well?
If you read the article, this was explicitly banned in the legislation for the Scottish independence referendum.
The Civil Service couldn't produce documents saying "Vote No" but they could do anything up to that - I got literature from the government that strongly suggested that a No vote was the correct vote. There was a specific Civil Servant unit set up in the treasury to secure a No vote.
That’ll cause an upset; Britain & Germany allied against Poland
In previous days we've seen issues where Poland takes Britain's side. It will really be complex to draw together the agreement rather than the disagreement.
In quite bizarre news, the government is asking Parliament to give it the power to ban alcohol, tobacco and caffeine by statutory instrument (see clause 3(2)(b) of, and para 6-9 of schedule 1 to the Psychoactive Substances Bill [HL]). We live in extraordinary times.
The Civil Service couldn't produce documents saying "Vote No" but they could do anything up to that - I got literature from the government that strongly suggested that a No vote was the correct vote. There was a specific Civil Servant unit set up in the treasury to secure a No vote.
Err, I think you've somewhat overlooked the role of the Scottish Civil Service, which was helpfully and independently publishing documents like this:
In quite bizarre news, the government is asking Parliament to give it the power to ban alcohol, tobacco and caffeine by statutory instrument (see clause 3(2)(b) of, and para 6-9 of schedule 1 to the Psychoactive Substances Bill [HL]). We live in extraordinary times.
One argument in favour of a deadlocked parliament was that we could have had a period of time without new laws being inflicted on the country.
Time to sack Blatter and hand control of world football to someone in touch with the common fan, like His Royal Highness Prince Ali bin Al-Hussein of Jordan.
It's an ideal job for Vlad when he decides to step down.
In quite bizarre news, the government is asking Parliament to give it the power to ban alcohol, tobacco and caffeine by statutory instrument (see clause 3(2)(b) of, and para 6-9 of schedule 1 to the Psychoactive Substances Bill [HL]). We live in extraordinary times.
One argument in favour of a deadlocked parliament was that we could have had a period of time without new laws being inflicted on the country.
I hardly think that's surprising. The legal power to ban alcohol, tobacco or caffeine is neither here nor there: it is the cultural role that is important, and until we decide an implement a policy to wind that down it won't happen. They are exceptional and they would quite literally be exceptions to any general psychoactive substances.
We have implemented such a policy for tobacco and I fully expect it to be made illegal within my lifetime.
It's a disgrace that an election was fought on such boundaries.
Manchester Central has had a dramatic drop in the electorate since the introduction of IER. It was over 120,000 at one point (much bigger than IOW), and the population is going up rapidly.
This was partly attributable to rapid population movement - the pre-IER system took a long time to remove people after they had moved out, but is also connected to the considerable difficulty of contacting a highly-mobile population who mostly live in private flats (so you can't just walk up to their front door, and they're not actually at home a lot).
There are about 20,000 new residences with planning permission in the constituency as well, so it's likely to be an ongoing problem - the population will be going up after the next review as well. The other four Manchester constituencies have a flat population, and the wards in use are large, making adjustments very difficult.
This is pretty much a worst-case scenario for our boundary system: large wards, rapidly changing population, a boundary that it's politically impossible to cross (Salford).
It will be interesting to see what the boundary commission comes up with in central Manchester.
Time to sack Blatter and hand control of world football to someone in touch with the common fan, like His Royal Highness Prince Ali bin Al-Hussein of Jordan.
It's an ideal job for Vlad when he decides to step down.
Vlad the Complainer?
Yep. He'd be ideal. If all the sponsors walk away, he can arrange for Gazprom and Gunvor to step in and refill the coffers.
It's a disgrace that an election was fought on such boundaries.
Manchester Central has had a dramatic drop in the electorate since the introduction of IER. It was over 120,000 at one point (much bigger than IOW), and the population is going up rapidly.
This was partly attributable to rapid population movement - the pre-IER system took a long time to remove people after they had moved out, but is also connected to the considerable difficulty of contacting a highly-mobile population who mostly live in private flats (so you can't just walk up to their front door, and they're not actually at home a lot).
There are about 20,000 new residences with planning permission in the constituency as well, so it's likely to be an ongoing problem - the population will be going up after the next review as well. The other four Manchester constituencies have a flat population, and the wards in use are large, making adjustments very difficult.
This is pretty much a worst-case scenario for our boundary system: large wards, rapidly changing population, a boundary that it's politically impossible to cross (Salford).
It will be interesting to see what the boundary commission comes up with in central Manchester.
Think that they'll have to bite the bullet and cross the Irwell to include Salford - it seems to me as if it's the logical thing, but appreciate that local politics may determine otherwise.
It's a disgrace that an election was fought on such boundaries.
Manchester Central has had a dramatic drop in the electorate since the introduction of IER. It was over 120,000 at one point (much bigger than IOW), and the population is going up rapidly.
This was partly attributable to rapid population movement - the pre-IER system took a long time to remove people after they had moved out, but is also connected to the considerable difficulty of contacting a highly-mobile population who mostly live in private flats (so you can't just walk up to their front door, and they're not actually at home a lot).
There are about 20,000 new residences with planning permission in the constituency as well, so it's likely to be an ongoing problem - the population will be going up after the next review as well. The other four Manchester constituencies have a flat population, and the wards in use are large, making adjustments very difficult.
This is pretty much a worst-case scenario for our boundary system: large wards, rapidly changing population, a boundary that it's politically impossible to cross (Salford).
It will be interesting to see what the boundary commission comes up with in central Manchester.
Think that they'll have to bite the bullet and cross the Irwell to include Salford - it seems to me as if it's the logical thing, but appreciate that local politics may determine otherwise.
Students are a big problem here - Manchester has one of the biggest student populations in Europe and a lot are based in Fallowfield, which is at the tip of Manchester Central.
Comments
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/250797/7032_i.pdf
The Wales thing is the most egregious. It isn't that hard to do +/-5% if you aren't wedded to county boundaries. +/-20% would be far too much surely?
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/29/russia-troll-sues-former-employer
A distinction should be drawn between addressing existing unfairness toward one side, which technically confers 'advantage' on the other as things move to a fairer apportionment, and the addressing of the existing unfairness going too far in the opposite direction and leaves the end result unfairly benefiting the other. Both 'advantage' one side against the other, but only the latter in an unreasonable way.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election/2015/results
A very simple example would be something like:
Seats with a broadly static electorate: (-5% to +5% variation)
Seats with an increasing electorate (-10% to 0 variation)
Seats with a decreasing electorate (0 to +10% variation)
This would result in places suffering exodus must have a larger than average electorate on the basis that it's likely to shrink further, and areas of growth are guaranteed a smaller than average electorate because it will go up.
This should future-proof things a bit so we won't have the nightmare scenario of a boundary review before every single election just to keep things fair.
http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/election-maps/
Amazing how convoluted some of the constituencies seem. Broadland is very odd for example. Huntingdon and South Cambs border also seemingly randomly convoluted.
Surely they should ignore any perceived advantage and base it all solely on the electorate's size.
Which, er, IS what they do isn't it..?
Question: what swing do Labour need from the LDs to win Southport at the next election?
2015 result: LD 31.0%, Con 28.0%, Lab 19.2%.
Answer: 8.8% not 5.9%.
Better is that UEFA refuse to have any involvement with FIFA and their corrupt events, the FAs decide not to take part in the 2018 qualifying tournament.
The Western media hasn't covered itself in glory covering the Ukrainian civil war but this has to be the best story so far.
Imagine how much "Tim" could have earned if Labour did this?
Some of it must be lost in the mists of time almost.
Is there info anywhere about ward electorate size? Despite the massive size of the task, I would love to have a go at doing my own boundaries :-) Start at Lands end and work up...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/eureferendum/11638423/Angela-Merkel-David-Camerons-demands-for-EU-reform-not-impossible.html
http://move.shetland.org/frequently-asked-questions
"Is it true that the nearest railway station is in Bergen, Norway?
It’s an appealingly romantic notion, but a modern Norse myth. The railway stations at Thurso and Wick in northern Scotland are both closer to Shetland, though not by very much if you’re in our northernmost islands. Bergen does, however, distinguish itself by having the nearest branch of IKEA – the next closest is in Edinburgh."
http://fair.org/home/reporting-on-russias-troll-army-western-media-forget-wests-much-bigger-sophisticated-troll-army/
http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2015/05/httpwwwreuterscomarticle20150518mideast-crisis-iraq-iduskbn0o20lt20150518.html
I do hope we aren't taking the theories of the peculiar Michael Aquino seriously.
Sponsored by NewsSense™
https://www.scotreferendum.com/reports/scotlands-future-what-independence-means-for-you/
We have implemented such a policy for tobacco and I fully expect it to be made illegal within my lifetime.
This was partly attributable to rapid population movement - the pre-IER system took a long time to remove people after they had moved out, but is also connected to the considerable difficulty of contacting a highly-mobile population who mostly live in private flats (so you can't just walk up to their front door, and they're not actually at home a lot).
There are about 20,000 new residences with planning permission in the constituency as well, so it's likely to be an ongoing problem - the population will be going up after the next review as well. The other four Manchester constituencies have a flat population, and the wards in use are large, making adjustments very difficult.
This is pretty much a worst-case scenario for our boundary system: large wards, rapidly changing population, a boundary that it's politically impossible to cross (Salford).
It will be interesting to see what the boundary commission comes up with in central Manchester.
new thread