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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Going for a 5-year fixed term might have been mistake
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Going for a 5-year fixed term might have been mistake
I’m not a big fan of fixed terms, but what stuck me at the start of the Coalition was how little debate there was about the length of fixed term that was being proposed. The majority of fixed term governments are run on a 4 year cycle, yet the Coalition were determined to lock in 5 years of government. This in itself will pose challenges for all parties.
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"Seems to chop & change all the time: you can never be sure what it stands for" Con 24% Lab 27% LD 27% None 7% Don't know 15% #YouGov
Politico Daily @Politico_Daily 6m
"Leaders are prepared to take tough & unpopular decisions" Con 43% Lab 11% LD 5% None 25% Don't Know 16%
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"Is led by people of real ability": Con 17% Lab 15% LD 4% None 45% Don't know 16% #YouGov
Politico Daily @Politico_Daily 9m
"Kind of society it wants is broadly the kind of society I want": Con 27% Lab 27% LD 11 None 22% Don't Know 14% #YouGov
YouGov/Sun: Con 32% Lab 39% Lib Dem 10% UKIP 12% Green 2% SNP/PC 3% BNP 1% Respect 0% Other 1%: Govt approval rating -34
I prefer 4 years anyway...
Consider this — Australia will have held two general elections during this parliament.
Cost of attempting to remove Abu Qatada since 2005: £1,716,306.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22909465
Australia is the classic example that proves the sun doesn't fall out of the sky if voters have a regular chance to change the government - three year parliaments, and that's only the maximum.
Personally, I think the Chartists had it right - let's have general elections every May.
Genuine question : has Labour proposed that?
Furthermore any large changes need time to bed in, just imagine if governments changed regularly and the structures of the NHS, or education etc changed every few years. Even taxation changes as well.
It might be a good idea to have mid-terms, or a series of staggered elections for half the house every 2 years....
The problem is governments have been changing the structure of the NHS almost constantly in recent years.
You don't want to go longer than five, but even that's a bit short to judge them on results. Most decisions have longer timescales.
A better solution is to stagger the MPs' elections, so each MP has five years but a different one is up for election every few days. That gets rid of the electoral cycle altogether, which is better because it produces bad incentives.
AMLA RUNS: Great maths on http://www.willhill.com website. Amla over 27.5 runs 1.85 or over 30 runs 1.8. You couldn't make it up!
Tell that to John Major.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/lotto-lout-michael-carroll-working-1951670
Lame article. I dont remember Henry calling for an early election in 2009-2010.
Fact is that governments are already blighted with short-termism, and 4-year terms make that worse. I consider a 5-year term the shortest I'd like, and I'd be happy with a 6-year term too, lest we fall behind the benefits that China gets from not having to indulge in short-term populism every couple of years..
I think the issue with short-terms is that they mean that governments are unwilling to take unpopular measures that take time to have positive effects, as it will be their successors that benefit.
The issue with long-terms is that they (potentially) reduce democratic legitimacy, especially if a government has endured constant by-election losses.
Of course, we could make things really fun by having one fifth of the HoC elected every year. This would have the distinct advantages of (a) more betting events; (b) the ability to bring governments down; and (c) greater independence from the party machine for MPs, especially early in the electoral cycle.
It would also probably result in parties like UKIP being able to build up their support over time, which would be good for both them, and the country as a whole.
In that case, let's stop mucking about and just have a one-party state. That's what we fought the war for.
http://www.espncricinfo.com/county-cricket-2013/engine/current/match/593567.html
However they will need to ditch rEd to do that.
That only works if a general election ever comes round. Oh well, I suppose even the Soviet Union only lasted 74 years.
- UKIP at 12% with YouGov two days running
- UKIP at 12% with ICM
- UKIP at 12% with MORI
Really now looking as if UKIP is starting to settle back a bit.
Is there actually a chance that UKIP may do a bit worse than expected in Euros? Could it be UKIP novelty factor will start to wear off - people "tried them", got a bit bored, and went back to the traditional parties?
ie Has UKIP peaked too early?
If we had annual Parliaments both the electorate and the politicians would have to have a more honest discussion about the state of the country and what to do about it. Manifestos would be shorter and more focussed, with only the legislation and tax changes to be introduced in that one session of Parliament. The voters would be forced to make the grown-up decision to keep on supporting a government through hard times if they thought that was best.
I think if I had to choose between the two I think moving to Annual Parliaments would have more of a beneficial effect than changing the voting system away from FPTP.
Five years is quite common though, including countries such as France, Austria, Canada, Ireland, Italy and North Korea.
I don't know if anyone is qualified to do it, but one article I'd like to see on PB is an attempted Europe-wide prediction of the European parliament elections, based on current trends in each individual country.
The UKIP-Labour battle in the UK could be critical if the arithmetic is tight.
Think before betting: Judge carefully. And then worry about cats, dogs and useless Brummies master-debating from Scouseland....
:HIC!:
The loons are still battling away. Amendment 1:
"Page 1, line 5, leave out “Marriage” and insert “Union”"
They are just making fools of themselves.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/bills/lbill/2013-2014/0029/amend/ml029-i.htm
Man: "You should be ashamed" Alyn: "Might I ask why?" Man: "Sorry mate I just saw the rosette and thought you were a LibDem" How we laughed.
I tend to think that if an election was always less than a year away that the Opposition would have to be a bit more mature about their opposition, because they would be that much closer to being in charge and having to sort out the mess themselves. Would we really have had to endure the last three years of pointless anti-cuts posturing from Ed Balls if there had been Annual Parliaments?
Not really. It would have been taking a rough average of previous parliaments, most of which did not go the full five years.
Very disappointing. Should have been cut much, much deeper.
Plus should have reopened BBC Licence Fee settlement. Licence Fee settlement done in 2011 for period up to 2017 so BBC is not taking any share of additional cuts now being made.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2013/jun/14/department-culture-spending-cut
Is it true that the fixed-term act could be repealed by a simple majority and is therefore not worth all that much?
But the established rule was changed - it's no longer "up to" 5.
It is yet to be seen if moving to fixed parliaments will be an improvement, but several arguments to that effect were made - stability, taking away a PM's power to dictate when an election would be to their own advantage etc - whereas reducing to 4 lacks compelling reasons as to why it would have been better than the tradition.
It is for those making a suggestion of change to make the strongest argument for that change, as opposed to those advocating the status quo - which as a Scottish Nationalist I am sure you are well aware of, and is a big part of the reason the Nats have the more compelling argument and momentum - so it's not a question of whether the argument for keeping the upper limit of 5 is weak or not, but whether the decision to change it is strong enough.
Arguing nothing ever should be changed because of tradition would indeed be wrong, but that is not what anyone has said as far as I can tell, and arguing that because something is tradition so it must be changed would be equally absurd. Those are not the arguments being made - just that in the absence of good reasons why make a change?
The argument is not about tradition, but how good the proposed reasons are, that's all.
Given the craphole we are currently in with the Coalition, it's probably one of the few things I cannot fault them on at the moment, although they'll find a way I'm sure.
A 2020 election would be on the same day as the London Mayor and the National general elections unless they are moved again/back. It's a mess.
What about elections being on Thursdays? Any research to indicate other days would be better, as that's another area that we could look at I think. Again, no reason to change convention if no benefit, but worth looking at.
Nick Clegg has rejected calls from three former home secretaries to revive plans for more data monitoring powers, after the murder of Drummer Lee Rigby.
The deputy PM warned the cross-party group against "knee jerk" reactions to difficult events.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22910482
Question Time is, in short, a pretty miserable failure when it comes to informed debate. The bulk of panellists are drawn from the same upper-middle-class, upper-middle-aged pot of journalists, lawyers and politicians, and are often profoundly ignorant on topics outside of that narrow culture. Science, sex, the internet... attempts to tackle anything outside their world result in bewildering exchanges that confuse more often than they inform. It was Question Time that taught me I should be careful when doing my work on the Facebook.
A great example of this occurred in last night's show, which addressed the mysterious topic of Scottish independence by pitching a single advocate against an array of opponents that included George Galloway, and noted Scottish politician Nigel Farage. Parties that actually have elected representatives in Scotland were bizarrely excluded. David Dimbleby mounted a tetchy defence of the policy, but his argument that it didn't matter because the audience were "split fifty-fifty" on the issue only dug him deeper into a hole. The obvious retort: if it's so important for Question Time's audience to be balanced, why not also the panel?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-lay-scientist/2013/jun/14/bbc-question-time
But I reckon in the run up to the Independence referendum there will be a QT special with an evenly balanced panel.. what price do you want to bet at?
It's probably peculiar to coalitions or deeply divided parties - if the government had a clear sense of direction, they could get on with it. But they don't.
I must have at least four ongoing bets with PBers on various aspects of the referendum, so I think that's probably enough to be getting on with. But for what it's worth, I wouldn't be at all surprised if no such special occurs. There will certainly be balanced debates produced by the BBC, but the Question Time production team just seem congenitally incapable of "getting it".
Well there obviously should be, personally I would be amazed if there wasn't.
As previously stated I marginally prefer a 4 year to a 5 year fixed term . You would have lost Broxtowe a year earlier and by a much larger margin in May 2009 .
If we had had the traditional uncertainty they might have had to act like grown ups at an earlier stage. Since they are probably not capable of that the 5 year term has simply hidden their deficiencies. Strange tactics.
It is of course highly influenced by the desperate hanging on but the pattern also shows 4 year governments getting re-elected and 5 year one's not. This may not be completely down to the desperation factor. Are people minded to say after 5 years that you have had your turn but after 4 are more amenable to the "job not yet finished" argument?
After Brown if there had been a snap referendum whether to make it 10 years it would probably have romped through.
..
RBS penalised yet again for trying to fix lending rates and exchange rates. Looks very like LIBOR. Not that there wasn't a culture in that bank that it wasn't important to preserve you understand.
This was Japan earlier this week: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/libor-scandal/9989252/Head-of-RBS-Securities-in-Japan-resigns-over-yen-Libor-manipulation.html
Same thing
And of course they also had a settlement with the UK/US at a cost of £390m in February: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/libor-scandal/9853939/RBS-fined-390m-for-rigging-rates-for-profit.html
Hester sure sorted them out.
Edit. And according to Taibbi currencies are next: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/everything-is-rigged-vol-9-713-this-time-its-currencies-20130613
What are the chances of RBS being clean in that one? At what point do we just stop believing the rotten apple excuses?
Basically it had to be there to remove the electoral nuclear button from Nick Clegg (and his party) and be five years due to Osborne's hopelessly optimistic pledge to eliminate the deficit in one parliament.
If we have to have fixed term parliaments, better four years rather than five as it's correct that governments only tend to go the full five when there's a change of PM and/or they're desperate. It was as I understood it a "maximum".
Better by far I think to have four, with an elected Lords which has a third of its seats up every two years. With this:
-Governments would be better held to account as the electorate could vote in a bunch of people to stop them if they were really hateful/crap.
-Renegade political movements would get the chance to make their mark (step forward Mr Farage).
-Opposition would be a far more urgent exercise as there'd actually be a chance of making a difference to policy other than just hoping to embarrass ministers into U-turns.
As it is five years with no serious electoral challenge to a government is far too long.
IM 1 & 2 were great, humour and action packed - this one was a definitely a franchise filler. I hope Man of Steel is a lot better - it'd be hard to be worse.
*turns on The Avengers to perk me back up*
Don't be so ridiculous.
http://goo.gl/RFcTW
Reminds me of Prometheus, which was a really gorgeous movie with a godawful script, and gets loads of flack for that. IM3 was not as badly written as Prometheus - there weren't moments where I could visibly see where lines/scenes had been cut from the script, and I at least knew what everyone was doing and why, and liked several characters - but it was unsettlingly poorly written, despite some good funny lines.
And who thought a giving prominent role on a precocious child was a good idea? When has that ever been a good idea?
The idea that we can control who our arms go to is fatuous and dangerous nonsense.
Cameron and Hollande are behaving as if Sykes and Picot were still alive and it's for the French and English to determine what happens in the world. Utter madness.
The second is just plain wrong. They've done most of the necessary legislation, and they're now bedding-in the implementation.
He came over last night as weedy, wussy, guilty, unwilling to be brutally honest. I would've thought most Scots would prefer a politician with more gusto. The only time he perked up was when he did his Farage-was-right-to-be-run-out-of-Scotland schtick. He was crap.
And that imbecile in the front row who reckons Scots get bullied south of the border probably lost you a few thousand votes. Must've been a BBC plant.
I also think that if they hadn't gone for the fixed term they would be facing stories about possible imminent General Elections every week and governing would be a nightmare as a result. (I'm not suggesting it's a dream now!)
In this case any good that might have been possible seems like it would have had to come much earlier than this, if it would ever work.
Not with a toerag/millstone like Ed Balls hanging around his neck he won't be.
Didn't really see it (only the last 20 minutes or so), but Robertson is an excellent debater so I doubt if he was "crap". The general opinion on the nationalist blogosphere is that he defended the case well, but that Riddoch was even better. It's not surprising that someone who has only recently become converted to Yes would make a more powerful advocate.
Essex bowled out for 20 by Lancs.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cricket/22898705
Robertson looked meek and safe by contrast. If you want independence and this is the big, big opportunity to get it, you need to be more inspiring that he was. You should've stuck Salmond on there.
I don't think you're the target market, Fenster.
Galloway's stance baffles me. He stood shoulder to shoulder with Alex Salmond after the national calamity of 1992 in a way that no other Labour MP (except John McAllion) was prepared to do.
Speaking of laughs and Man of Steel - some superb shots of Superman c1948 - they're brilliant http://www.cbsnews.com/2300-207_162-10017195-8.html
I still can't get Inception - I'll try again later but it feels like hard work.
You could tell the audience were in awe of him
My bestest mate - well, the only Scottish Regimental Boxing Champion I know - has posted this letter at News-Shopper, Lewisham: [Src.: http://www.newsshopper.co.uk/opinion/10478375.Build_a_memorial_for_Drummer_Lee_Rigby/ ]
I am still offering to have a pint with Wee-Timmy, MODERATED who thinks otherwise; just off Hither Green Lane....
At least Rev Ian Paisley was still a Northern Ireland representative when he declared "Ulster Says No".
If the government is "hanging around", well it think it's great if they don't want to pass legislation every ten minutes. My not just do some management stuff? Alternatively, if there isn't much of a legislative programme, maybe it's time for parliament to take charge of its own time and allow more backbenchers, or the opposition, or the coalition parties, to be able to propose legislation. That's what legislators are supposed to do.
Or maybe with 2 years left they have time to fix the West Lothian Question, or have a constitutional convention.
Henry said "From a democratic view I dislike the idea of having to wait longer to throw out a government of any colour." Fair enough then, as a Leveller I would be quite happy with annual elections.
On 2nd May 18.4 million people were eligible to vote and, of the 5.7 million who did, 48.2% voted either Conservative or Liberal Democrat.