politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Will “Angie’s” third term be with the reds or the yellows?

The flaws in this system are becoming more apparent by the minute.

If the far left had lent some of their votes to the Thatcherite FDP it might have given the former a sniff at power in a couple of years time, for example.

Has this other foreign political development, apparantly reported in the Sunday Times, been commented upon yet:

"Louise Mensch, the former Tory MP, has revealed that she has applied for American citizenship, sparking speculation that she may be considering a foray into American politics.”

62 million voters, 73% turnout, 45.26 million voters. So the difference between 4.9% and 5.0% would be about 45,000 votes.

another_richard said:

Has this other foreign political development, apparantly reported in the Sunday Times, been commented upon yet:

"Louise Mensch, the former Tory MP, has revealed that she has applied for American citizenship, sparking speculation that she may be considering a foray into American politics.”

This speculation is backed up by Louise's tweet today attacking Ed Miliband. She was clearly using Miliband's unpopularity in Washington and NYC to boost her own credibility state-side.

It was tim who first picked up on the tweet.

Nearly 10% voting for two classical liberal parties and getting no representation.

I am sure the Republicans will appreciate her years of tenacity and perseverance in British political life.

AveryLP said:

another_richard said:

Has this other foreign political development, apparantly reported in the Sunday Times, been commented upon yet:

"Louise Mensch, the former Tory MP, has revealed that she has applied for American citizenship, sparking speculation that she may be considering a foray into American politics.”

This speculation is backed up by Louise's tweet today attacking Ed Miliband. She was clearly using Miliband's unpopularity in Washington and NYC to boost her own credibility state-side.

It was tim who first picked up on the tweet.

It is a Gove "free school".

MikeK said:

Another step on the road to sharia law and islamic domination:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2428958/Muslim-school-banned-pupils-singing-reading-fairy-tales-hardliners-took-control-ousted-headmaster-deputy.html

Talk about 'While England Slept'.

RichardNabavi said:

another_richard said:

Would Merkel prefer a tiny overall majority or a grane coalition?

I would have thought a grand coalition as the SDP would be in a similar position as the LibDems are here.

Whether the SDP would want that is another matter.

They'd be weaker, because they couldn't be sure they could vote down the CDU/CSU.

BTW Sorry for not responding re Mark Carney earlier - I was off doing other things. The problem is that you can't pin down the job description to a specific set of tests. Basically his job is to use his judgement to 'do the right thing', depending on what happens.

No need to apologise RN.

While I understand your point this merely highlights the difference between 'them' and 'us'. Tens of millions of ordinary employees use their judgement to 'do the right thing' depending on what happens but they can still lose their jobs through no fault of their own irrespective of how successful they are at their level within their organisation.

But for a few thousand 'executives' its guranteeed contracts, guaranteed payments, guaranteed payoffs irrespective of how successful they are (on whatever metric their performance is judged).

Now if there was a sense of honour among the executive class then this might not be a problem. But its a long time since I heard of any executive resigning from having failed or any executive who didn't try to grab as much money as possible.

We have created an executive class which far from being willing to go down the ship guarantees itself a place in a lifeboat - and a lifeboat well stocked with champagne and caviare at that.

old_labour said:

That's an argument for having a referendum this side of a UK election. He might as well do it sooner rather than later if he is not going to get any concessions.

richardDodd said:

It would be great if the new German Party told Cameron to sod off .. then we could all vote for getting out.. job done

I think you're getting rather ahead of yourself there. Firstly there might not be a grand coalition. Secondly even if there is, so what? That's only one minor item in the whole picture, and Merkel would have the whip hand. And thirdly, Der Spiegel thinks a grand coalition would actually make a restructuring of the EU easier, not harder:

A grand coalition would also, thanks to its overwhelming majority in parliament, strengthen Merkel's hand in managing the euro crisis because it would lessen the threat posed by backbench rebellions against future European rescue measures.

With the SPD in her coalition, she would no longer face a hostile Bundesrat, Germany's upper legislative chamber, and she may even be able to muster two-thirds majorities needed to change the German constitution if future changes to Europe's institutions should warrant that.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/merkel-wins-third-term-in-general-election-exit-polls-suggest-a-923755.html

what is the the Institute of Directors? And is the Director of the Istitute of Directors a a Director of Directors?

RodCrosby said:

old_labour said:

I think this article is suggesting that this could be the first time since 1949 that there will be no FDP representation in the Bundestag.

http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/rekordverlust-bei-bundestagswahl-fdp-erleidet-historisches-desaster-1.1777647

RodCrosby said:

Best CDU result in 23 years...

But they could still lose, because they've lost the FDP...

Go figure...

Yes, the FDP will henceforth probably drop out as a 'major' party.

Possible vacuum to be filled by someone else?

Plus I don't think the Germans will like 16% of their people having no MPs (up from 6% last time). Possible further changes in their daft electoral system?

So glad we've always kept with FPTP rather than going down the "daft" route of Proportional Representation.

FDP have increased slightly from 4.5% to 4.6% with a couple of exit polls:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/22/germany-election-results-merkel-live-updates

Forsa's exit poll put them on 5% originally but I can't find out whether that's also being updated.

AndreaParma_82 said:

what is the the Institute of Directors? And is the Director of the Istitute of Directors a a Director of Directors?

It's a rather odd beast: a mixture of a private club, an organisation offering meeting rooms, lectures and so on in central London, and a pressure group which claims (with some justice) to speak for business, especially smaller and medium-sized businesses. (The CBI is more representative of very big corporations).

One of our "friends of the firm" at work is a foreign policy advisor to the CDU. His view going into the election was that Merkel was keen on a Grand Coalition. In his view, the (mildly) more eurosceptic FDP was holding back Merkel's more pre-European tendencies. In a grand coalition, he felt would see a revival of the "debt redemption" fund idea, where all government debts from EU members above 80% of GDP are put into a special 'jointly and severally liable pot'.

There is one interesting lesson of this election - assuming that AfD remains stubbornly below 5% - and that is that splitting the vote on the Eurosceptic right does not lead to electoral success.

@Philip_Thomson, there is no perfect electoral system. All have flaws of varying degrees. I worry - for example - that under FPTP you could have one party (probably Labour!) having a majority of the seats on as little as 25% of the vote (if the right continues to fragment).

RodCrosby said:

Philip_Thompson said:

RodCrosby said:

old_labour said:

I think this article is suggesting that this could be the first time since 1949 that there will be no FDP representation in the Bundestag.

http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/rekordverlust-bei-bundestagswahl-fdp-erleidet-historisches-desaster-1.1777647

RodCrosby said:

Best CDU result in 23 years...

But they could still lose, because they've lost the FDP...

Go figure...

Yes, the FDP will henceforth probably drop out as a 'major' party.

Possible vacuum to be filled by someone else?

Plus I don't think the Germans will like 16% of their people having no MPs (up from 6% last time). Possible further changes in their daft electoral system?

So glad we've always kept with FPTP rather than going down the "daft" route of Proportional Representation.

MMP may be daft (remember it combines the worst of FPTP and PR)

but FPTP alone is criminally insane...

FPTP alone works very well and I don't see any major fault in it that doesn't exist in some form in one PR system or another.

93.2% of voters who voted for a party have at least one representative elected which seems to me means we have less than half as many as the Germans "unrepresented".

New projections

ARD/ZDF

CDU 42.4/42.5%
SPD 25.4/25.9%
Linke 8.3/8.4%
Greens 8.2/8.0%
AfD 4.9/4.9%
FDP 4.5/4.6%

Seats projections

ARD/ZDF

CDU-CSU 301-304
SPD 180/185
Linke 59/60
Greens 58/57

rcs1000 said:

@oldLabour, mikeK

I do not understand why a single penny of my taxes goes to religious schools - whether Christian, Muslim or Jewish. If parents want their children educated outside the regular school system, they should pay for it out of their own pockets.

I'm an atheist and totally disagree. Both this and the last government have tried to move power away from central government and back towards parents. I would support a completely "voucher" style system (like in Sweden) where the parents can choose which school they want to send their kids too. If parents choose a Christian or Muslim or Jewish school why should that be no more valid than a unionised socialist state run school?

Scott_P said:

@annemcelvoy: Early lessons from SPD for Ed Mil. 1/Don't move so far left on econ, 2/ If you fixate on your opponent, you big them up and end up small

number 2 reminds me of someone here...

RodCrosby said:

Philip_Thompson said:

93.2% of voters who voted for a party have at least one representative elected which seems to me means we have less than half as many as the Germans "unrepresented".

Until you go down to the constituency level, and find that the majority of electors are not, in fact, represented...

Not true. At a constituency level you find that every single elector is in fact represented. They may not like who their representative is but that is representative democracy in action. I would be surprised if MPs or ex-MPs like NPXMP turned away at the door anyone who didn't vote for them last time when doing constituency work.

Removing the constituency link entirely means in a PR system you can get a situation whereby someone genuinely has no representatives as there is no local representative to turn to and no party representative either.

Philip_Thompson said:

rcs1000 said:

@oldLabour, mikeK

I do not understand why a single penny of my taxes goes to religious schools - whether Christian, Muslim or Jewish. If parents want their children educated outside the regular school system, they should pay for it out of their own pockets.

I'm an atheist and totally disagree. Both this and the last government have tried to move power away from central government and back towards parents. I would support a completely "voucher" style system (like in Sweden) where the parents can choose which school they want to send their kids too. If parents choose a Christian or Muslim or Jewish school why should that be no more valid than a unionised socialist state run school?

So, you would support schools that teach intelligent design alongside evolution?

Can anyone explain why SPD/Linke/Greens if they get top end of the estimates ie 303seats couldnt control the Bundestag? without CDU/CSU. Is that even a remote possibility?

Scott_P said:

@andrewpercy: So if I get this right. Labour's policy could see foreign apprentices being recruited to match foreign workers!!!

As I said on previous thread - a plan Baldrick would be proud to call his own

rcs1000 said:

Philip_Thompson said:

rcs1000 said:

@oldLabour, mikeK

I do not understand why a single penny of my taxes goes to religious schools - whether Christian, Muslim or Jewish. If parents want their children educated outside the regular school system, they should pay for it out of their own pockets.

I'm an atheist and totally disagree. Both this and the last government have tried to move power away from central government and back towards parents. I would support a completely "voucher" style system (like in Sweden) where the parents can choose which school they want to send their kids too. If parents choose a Christian or Muslim or Jewish school why should that be no more valid than a unionised socialist state run school?

So, you would support schools that teach intelligent design alongside evolution?

No. I would support the state laying down the groundwork of curriculum that must be taught and doing end of term/year examinations to measure and maintain standards, doing inspections to make sure that standards are maintained and then getting out of the way of the day to day operations and letting privately run schools implement this in their own methods. Those that fail should be allowed to fail and be closed down.

Intelligent design would go against the curriculum - I would however be OK to them teaching religious education in a non-scientific setting. As already happens in state schools.

Philip_Thompson said:

rcs1000 said:

@Philip_Thomson, there is no perfect electoral system. All have flaws of varying degrees. I worry - for example - that under FPTP you could have one party (probably Labour!) having a majority of the seats on as little as 25% of the vote (if the right continues to fragment).

I find that incredibly unlikely but would still prefer that to PR.

I agree with you regarding the benefits of FPTP. However, it is important to recognise that if the proportion of votes that goes to "the top two" continues to fall then we run the risk of getting an election result that does not reflect the will of the people.

Let us imagine that at the next election, UKIP gets 15% and the Liberal Democrats 10% (not an unlikely outcome, if we're going to be honest). Yet, it's possible for the Libs to get 25 or even 30 seats and UKIP to get none. I would consider that a travesty.

If we go forward 7 years, it's possible we could have an election where UKIP was on 20%, and the Libs on 15%; perhaps the Greens got 5%. In this circumstance, you could see both Labour and the Conservatives just below 30% - would you consider it to be the will of the people if the second placed party, with 65% of the voters to the right of them, had a majority of the seats in the House of Commons? I would not.

Yet, I would also add, I haven't seen any system I prefer yet. I abhor Alternative Vote. I abhor Party Lists. Perhaps PR^2 or STV in multi-member constituencies is the best way. Whatever, I think that if voting patterns continue to fragment, we will need to reconsider the what the best voting system is.

Betting post:

***************************************************************************************

Sir Brad is 7/4 for the Men's ITT in Firenze. He is in great time trialling form and I think he will beat Tony Martin.

ARD new projections

2 seats short of absolute majority

Philip_Thompson said:

rcs1000 said:

Philip_Thompson said:

rcs1000 said:

@oldLabour, mikeK

I do not understand why a single penny of my taxes goes to religious schools - whether Christian, Muslim or Jewish. If parents want their children educated outside the regular school system, they should pay for it out of their own pockets.

I'm an atheist and totally disagree. Both this and the last government have tried to move power away from central government and back towards parents. I would support a completely "voucher" style system (like in Sweden) where the parents can choose which school they want to send their kids too. If parents choose a Christian or Muslim or Jewish school why should that be no more valid than a unionised socialist state run school?

So, you would support schools that teach intelligent design alongside evolution?

No. I would support the state laying down the groundwork of curriculum that must be taught and doing end of term/year examinations to measure and maintain standards, doing inspections to make sure that standards are maintained and then getting out of the way of the day to day operations and letting privately run schools implement this in their own methods. Those that fail should be allowed to fail and be closed down.

Intelligent design would go against the curriculum - I would however be OK to them teaching religious education in a non-scientific setting. As already happens in state schools.

That's a fair comment. What about if a school taught what it believed the correct role of women in society was?

299 constituencies so the 45,000 difference between 4.9% and 5.0% works out at about 150 votes per constituency.

ARD seem to project less uberhangs-mandaten than ZDF.

RodCrosby said:

AndreaParma_82 said:

ARD new projections

2 seats short of absolute majority

298 is three seats short, I believe.

>700?

298 is 2 short if the Parliament is 598. ARD is not projecting overhangs but, as you say, there should be a lot of them

Philip_Thompson said:

rcs1000 said:

@oldLabour, mikeK

I do not understand why a single penny of my taxes goes to religious schools - whether Christian, Muslim or Jewish. If parents want their children educated outside the regular school system, they should pay for it out of their own pockets.

I'm an atheist and totally disagree. Both this and the last government have tried to move power away from central government and back towards parents. I would support a completely "voucher" style system (like in Sweden) where the parents can choose which school they want to send their kids too. If parents choose a Christian or Muslim or Jewish school why should that be no more valid than a unionised socialist state run school?

IIRC one of the major means of discrimination in N Ireland was by asking job applicants where they went to school. The answer "St Whatever's" mean that they were Catholic; Antrim (or whatever) County High meant they were Protestant, and an employer could discriminate on the basis of their prejudices.
Are we creating a situation where an employer can ask the same question on the mainland, and discriminate as a result?

IMO the Germans have blown it if they've given Die Linke any chance of participating in a government in the next four years.

First constituency declared

Straubing in Bayern

Alois Rainer (CSU) elected

Turnout 64.4 (-0.8)

CSU 61.2 (+5.8)
SPD 17.6 (-4.9)
FW 3.5
AfD 3.3
Greens 3.2 (-0.7)
ODP 2.9
Linke 2.5 (-2.4)
FDP 2.4 (-5.4)
Pirates 1.7
NPD 1.7

Second vote

CSU 57.8 (+7.7)
SPD 16.1 (+1.9)
FDP 4.2 (-9.5)
AfD 3.9
Greens 3.9 (-1.4)
FW 3.8
Linke 3.0 (-3.5)
ODP 1.7
Pirates 1.5
NPD 1.4
BP 1.3

tim said:

Cameron should learn that pandering to UKIP

Tim, you'll probably be interested in UKIP's agriculture policy. It was presented at their recent conference. Link below.

http://youtu.be/-01_Wj8yTLo

OldKingCole said:

Philip_Thompson said:

rcs1000 said:

@oldLabour, mikeK

I do not understand why a single penny of my taxes goes to religious schools - whether Christian, Muslim or Jewish. If parents want their children educated outside the regular school system, they should pay for it out of their own pockets.

I'm an atheist and totally disagree. Both this and the last government have tried to move power away from central government and back towards parents. I would support a completely "voucher" style system (like in Sweden) where the parents can choose which school they want to send their kids too. If parents choose a Christian or Muslim or Jewish school why should that be no more valid than a unionised socialist state run school?

IIRC one of the major means of discrimination in N Ireland was by asking job applicants where they went to school. The answer "St Whatever's" mean that they were Catholic; Antrim (or whatever) County High meant they were Protestant, and an employer could discriminate on the basis of their prejudices.
Are we creating a situation where an employer can ask the same question on the mainland, and discriminate as a result?

Are we anticipating the vast majority of people to attend such schools and exclusively because of religion? And if that is where most parents want to send their kids (and not seeing any evidence it is) why shouldn't they?

Not all people who at present attend Anglican schools do so because they are Christian let alone protestant. Many do so because they believe it is a well run school.

FDP got 4.2% in Straubing, AfD 3.9%

Will Merkel be forced to have a coalition even if she's only a couple of seats short of a majority?

Is this another constituency result? Not sure how I alighted on this page:

http://www3.braunschweig.de/wahlen/ergebnis_bw13/mobile.php?site=ergebnis&wahl=312&gebiet=1&gebietx=0&gebietTyp=3&gebietx=0&sitz=0

bigjohnowls said:

SPD/Grüne/Linke coalition

CDU/CSU-SPD grand coalition

CSD/CSU minority

CSD/CSU-Grüne coalition

Look like only options. Which do the knowledgeable posters think most likely?

SPD refuse to work with Lefties. CDU-SPD "grand" coalition is most likely, like 2002-05

CD13 said:

"Large firms would have to train local apprentices if they recruited workers from outside the EU."

How do you define apprentice? The chance of would-be Chinese plumbers coming to the UK are tiny. Bulgarians and Rumanians wouldn't trigger that clause anyway.

So isn't it meaningless tosh?

Just curious.

Apprentice – A term so corrupted from the original that today it is almost meaningless.

Local – Equally meaningless as it would encompass all 27 EU countries.