Poll: General election voting intentions poll

[thep02]

My eldest lad's getting ready for maths and politics mocks so I just sent him those links, ta DP.

 

[ubersonic]

This is all news to me, I've never heard anyone say that David Milliband was a significant driving wheel of the Iraq war. He was Schools Minister in 2003. Presumably you can back this up with some evidence?

Sure, DM was Schools Minister in 2003 you are quite correct, it was his first ministerial position after a year on the backbench having only become an MP in 2001. Prior to that he wrote most of Labours 1997 manifesto and after their victory Blair was so happy wit his work he made him Head of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit, he held the position until 2001 when he became an MP.

The point I am trying to make here is that this is a guy who in 2003 was "just" the schools minister but he was also visibly on the fast track moon rocket to the top, and behind the scenes held a lot of power/influence as a shot caller. Hence why people were so shocked when the odds on favourite to become next Labour leader and PM was beaten by his brother (lets be honest here, if DM was labour leader today he would be pasting Cameron).

This is the type of thing you would know from reading papers/etc at that point in time (or from just watching have I got news for you).

 

[Mr Jack]

The fact he's opposing the war in Iraq and saying it's wrong alone isn't backstabbing his brother, the fact he's opposing the war in Iraq and saying it's wrong when his brother was one of it's chief architects however is. People seem to be forgetting that Blair and Miliband were the two biggest driving wheels of the war this side of the pond (Brown only went along in order to secure concessions from Blair on other areas where they disagreed).

Miliband wasn't even in cabinet when the war occurred. He was a junior education minister. Your characterisation of him as "one of it's [sic] chief architects" seems to have come completely out of left field; it's not supported by any major account of the events leading up to the war, the Wikipedia article on the UK vote doesn't mention him, and no-one at the time was discussing David Miliband as being a major player in the support for the war.

So I ask you: where is your evidence for David Miliband being one of the chief architects for the war on Iraq?

 

[ubersonic]

Miliband wasn't even in cabinet when the war occurred. He was a junior education minister. Your characterisation of him as "one of it's [sic] chief architects" seems to have come completely out of left field; it's not supported by any major account of the events leading up to the war, the Wikipedia article on the UK vote doesn't mention him, and no-one at the time was discussing David Miliband as being a major player in the support for the war.

So I ask you: where is your evidence for David Miliband being one of the chief architects for the war on Iraq?

Read the above post.

Guys I don't mean to sound rude/crass here, but.. you're asking me to explain to you things you should already know if your discussing Miliband, it's like walking into a big thread on API's in the GPU section and stopping people to ask what Glide was and if they can explain it's impact on API design...

 

[Mr Jack]

The point I am trying to make here is that this is a guy who in 2003 was "just" the schools minister but he was also visibly on the fast track moon rocket to the top, and behind the scenes held a lot of power/influence as a shot caller. Hence why people were so shocked when the odds on favourite to become next Labour leader and PM was beaten by his brother.

And this means he was a chief architect of the War on Iraq because? No-one is arguing David Miliband wasn't a rising star of the Labour Party in 2003, he was, nor is anyone arguing that he didn't have a strong connection to Blair - he's widely recognised as being a core Blairite - but there is no public record of him having any special part in the War on Iraq and certainly no record of anything approaching him being a "chief architect".

Guys I don't mean to sound rude/crass here, but.. you're asking me to explain to you things you should already know if your debating this subject, it's like walking into a big thread on API's in the GPU section and stopping people to ask what Glide was and if they can explain it's impact on API design...

No, this is like you walking into a discussion on the Pyramids and expecting everyone to know they were built by aliens.

 

[chef-borjan]

Right, so I admit I'm not overly political, but after the recent scandal over the child sex/murder ring that appears to have been going on in the past, I noticed the results of a vote that proposed to alter the law to ensure that those who wanted to give evidence would not fear prosecution.

Long story short is, The vast majority of conservatives and Lib Dems voted against this, everyone else for it.

Since I feel jaded by policies, I almost feel making up my voting decisions based on not voting for those who appear to be blocking the process of justice/covering their own interests.

Is this a bad idea?

 

[Mynight]

What happens if a perpetrator gives evidence are they then immune to prosecution?

If not then I can't understand why it was blocked.

 

[chef-borjan]

I believe it relates more to police being given whistleblowers immunity, so no I don't think that is a risk.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics...-abuse-case-against-cyril-smith-whistleblower

http://www.exaronews.com/articles/5...-to-lift-official-secrets-act-for-csa-scandal

Here is how they voted.

-------

Conservatives:
For - 8
Against - 254
Absent - 40

Labour:
For - 208
Against - 0
Absent - 48

Liberal-Democrats:
For - 3
Against - 40
Absent - 13

Green:
For - 1
Against - 0
Absent - 0

UKIP:
For - 2
Against - 0
Absent - 0

SNP:
For - 4
Against - 0
Absent - 2

Plaid Cymru:
For - 2
Against - 0
Absent - 1

DUP:
For - 4
Against - 0
Absent - 4

Sinn Fein:
For - 0
Against - 0
Absent - 5

SDLP:
For - 2
Against - 0
Absent - 1

Respect:
For - 0
Against - 0
Absent - 1

Alliance:
For - 0
Against - 0
Absent - 1

Independent:
For - 0
Against - 1 (Portsmouth South)
Absent - 4
--------

http://www.publicwhip.org.uk/division.php?date=2015-02-23&number=158&display=allvotes

And btw, I don't pretend to be an expert on this, and I am genuinely asking others if I have not got the whole picture here.

 

[spudbynight]

For reference, the Lib Dems went from ~4% in 1978 to ~42% in 1982.

I believe the Green party is actually the fastest growing party in the UK right now, and are 3rd place in the number of registered members behind labour and the Tories. The UKIP vote share has increased faster than the Greens in absolute terms over the same period though. In relative terms, the UKIP vote share has increased 4.5X since 2010 but the greens have increased around 6.5x. I the last mcouple of months green voter share has declined faster than UKIP has declined, at one point the greens were average around 8%.

All the other parties only allow those eligible vote to become members.

 

[scorza]

Sure, DM was Schools Minister in 2003 you are quite correct, it was his first ministerial position after a year on the backbench having only become an MP in 2001. Prior to that he wrote most of Labours 1997 manifesto and after their victory Blair was so happy wit his work he made him Head of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit, he held the position until 2001 when he became an MP.

The point I am trying to make here is that this is a guy who in 2003 was "just" the schools minister but he was also visibly on the fast track moon rocket to the top, and behind the scenes held a lot of power/influence as a shot caller. Hence why people were so shocked when the odds on favourite to become next Labour leader and PM was beaten by his brother (lets be honest here, if DM was labour leader today he would be pasting Cameron).

This is the type of thing you would know from reading papers/etc at that point in time (or from just watching have I got news for you).

So basically you're just speculating what went on behind closed doors in government. It's well known that David Milliband is a neo-liberal interventionist, but Chief Architect of the Iraq war along with Blair? That's more than a bit far fetched.

Read the above post.

Guys I don't mean to sound rude/crass here, but.. you're asking me to explain to you things you should already know if your discussing Miliband, it's like walking into a big thread on API's in the GPU section and stopping people to ask what Glide was and if they can explain it's impact on API design...

LOL - nice try but no dice.

 

[Mr Jack]

All the other parties only allow those eligible vote to become members.

Party membership is a surprisingly poor guide to party popularity when it comes to votes or, well, anything else. I'm not sure why that is.

 

[Judgeneo]

Party membership is a surprisingly poor guide to party popularity when it comes to votes or, well, anything else. I'm not sure why that is.

I'm not sure why that is really surprising, its like trying to work out the revenue and profit of a company based on the number of employees. Message, funding, and quality of members are much more important.

 

[Mr Jack]

I'm not sure why that is really surprising, its like trying to work out the revenue and profit of a company based on the number of employees. Message, funding, and quality of members are much more important.

I dunno, I'd have thought that membership would at least vaguely track the poll position whereas it is absolutely doing nothing of the sort.

 

[Mr Jack]

All the other parties only allow those eligible vote to become members.

I've just checked this, and it's not true. 14 year olds can become Labour members and anyone can join the Liberal Democrats (but voting rights may be age limited) or UKIP. I couldn't find the rules for the Conservatives.

 

[spudbynight]

I've just checked this, and it's not true. 14 year olds can become Labour members and anyone can join the Liberal Democrats (but voting rights may be age limited) or UKIP. I couldn't find the rules for the Conservatives.

Sorry, let me clarify. The other parties only allow British subjects or Irish nationals resident in the UK to become members. These are the only people allowed to vote in UK General Elections.

The Green Party allows anyone to join. They allow non nationals who can't vote to join. They also allow people who don't live in the UK to join.

 

[Mr Jack]

Sorry, let me clarify. The other parties only allow British subjects or Irish nationals resident in the UK to become members. These are the only people allowed to vote in UK General Elections.

Ah, I see, my bad; I thought you were talking about voting age.

Hmm, I don't recall seeing anything about that whilst I was checking. Are you sure? I don't have time to check again right now.

 

[spudbynight]

Ah, I see, my bad; I thought you were talking about voting age.

Hmm, I don't recall seeing anything about that whilst I was checking. Are you sure? I don't have time to check again right now.

Well, that certainly was the case with the other parties last time I checked.

Green party actively encourages members of other Green parties to sign up. You can be a member of the Green Party in France and the Green Party of England & Wales for example.

 

[MrMoonX]

Shows how out of touch the two main parties are when they think trident is an election issue! We don't need it, it's a waste of money that could be put to better use, hopefully the SNP can shoehorn labour into scrapping it

 

[McBain]

Trident won't be going anywhere, thankfully.

The SNP's stance on it just adds to the list of reasons I want nothing to do with the SNP forming any sort of coalition.

 

[mid_gen]

It would be fantastically short-sighted to get rid of our nuclear capability. It's not something you can just whip up again in an emergency.

It's easy to say "we don't need it" in these (relatively) peaceful times....being reliant on the US for protection is not a desirable situation long term.