Tuesday, June 09, 2009

Brown wants to change the way we vote

Apparently, Brown wants to change the electoral system to introduce the Alternate Vote systems for Westminster elections. This is supposedly part of his plan to regain the political initiative.

Well:
  • Most ordinary people could not care less about this and the debate will be seen in most of the country as the Westminster village talking to itself. This at a time when people are very concerned about their jobs and homes.

  • This is very easy to attack as Labour trying to fix the electoral systems because they are scared of losing the next election. In fact, the Conservatives are already reported as taking this line.

  • Such a measure could only be introduced after a referendum, and the chance of Gordon Brown winning a referendum on anything at the moment is just about zero.
If Labour think a debate on this subject will help them then they are deluded. The country is crying out for real measures to address real problems, not least people getting tossed out of their jobs and homes. Electoral reform is not the problem, and even if it was what has Labour been doing for the last 12 years? Up until now the Labour government has devoted more time to fox-hunting than the constitution.

Monday, June 08, 2009

Angela Smith becomes Minister of State

Basildon MP Angela Smith has been promoted to Minister of State in the Cabinet Office. This is one aspect of the reshuffle at least that does not deserve criticism, and I am very happy to congratulate Mrs. Smith on her new role.

Sunday, June 07, 2009

General election prediction - Conservative 98 seat majority

A new prediction has been posted on 4 June 2009 at Electoral Calculus.
During the expenses scandal in May, both major parties have lost support, though the Conservatives have slightly increased their lead over Labour. Populus (Times) has 20% (up from 13%), ICM (Sunday Telegraph) has 18% (up from 10%), Ipsos-MORI has 22% (up from 13%), but ComRes (Independent) has 8% (down from 19%), and YouGov (Daily Telegraph) has 16% (down from 18%).

Overall, the Conservative lead is 16%, which is 1% higher than last month. The current prediction is that the Conservatives will have a majority of 98 seats, winning 374 seats (+1 seat since 2 May 2009).