• 1974 election literature: firmness for fairness

    Updated: 2010-12-31 15:18:39
    This Conservative leaflet is from the February 1974 election, where 27 year old Tom Arnold failed to defeat the Liberal Michael Winstanley in Hazel Grove. Arnold had more success in the October General Election, becoming one of the youngest MPs in the Commons and holding Hazel Grove until 1997. The leaflet is good quality, though far more text heavy than anything any of the parties would put out today. One interesting point to note is that, although Arnold makes a virtue of living in the constituency, he's also happy to make a point of having stood in a different constituency ...

  • Rebels with lots of causes

    Updated: 2010-12-31 13:21:00
    Just when David Cameron and Nick Clegg thought that they might be able to relax over Christmas, The Independent publishes the results of some research that is guaranteed to send a chill down their back. They say that Government MPs are rebelling against their parties' policies on a scale not seen since 1945. During the Coalition's first seven months, dozens of Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs, including many elected for the first time in May, have repeatedly defied House of Commons' whips to vote against the Government: The findings suggest the Coalition - which has a Commons majority of 84 ...

  • Calls to end alphabetic ordering of candidates on Scottish local election ballot papers

    Updated: 2010-12-31 11:24:37
    It's a well established pattern that candidates with names higher up the alphabet do slightly better in multi-member ward elections in the UK than those with names further down the alphabet. Other factors (including the perceived ethnicity and gender of a name, along with other information such as the party label) usually have a larger effect, but there is something of an alphabetic effect all the same. New research has shown this to be the case in the first STV local council elections held in Scotland, leading to calls for change. The Scotsman reports: Across Scotland there were 247 cases ...

  • The Labour and Conservative MPs who were in favour of AV before they were against it

    Updated: 2010-12-31 10:25:24
    Here's a curious detail about the voting record of MPs on the alternative vote: before the general election, the House of Commons agreed to introduce elections for select committee chairs using the alternative vote (and the first set of these such elections have now been held). Most of the Conservative and Labour MPs who have said they oppose AV for public elections were also MPs when this decision was taken – and not one of them forced a vote on the matter, let alone vote against introducing AV. Instead, they all let the introduction of AV go through. Now of ...

  • The Lib Dems should back a state investment bank to regain the initiative on the economy

    Updated: 2010-12-31 10:15:58
    One major concern the public has is with the economy. One major problem them Lib Dems have is with the economy as the leadership changed its mind on the situation and what needed to happen to provide the security the population needed. The Lib Dems have been seen as sell-outs to the Tories as a ...

  • Social progress continues unabated.....

    Updated: 2010-12-31 10:03:56
    Aslie Pitter – we salute you!

  • Our starters for 2010 - how did we do? (Part I)

    Updated: 2010-12-31 08:30:14
    A year ago, Lib Dem Voice posed 10 questions, the answers to which we believed might shape the Lib Dem year - time to revisit them, wethinks. 1. In the 2010 general election, how many Lib Dem MPs will be elected? Will we increase our number from the current total of 63; or will we fall back? Will we increase our vote percentage compared with 2005, when we polled 22% of the popular vote? Or could we do, as we did in 1997, see our popular vote drop, but our Parliamentary strength grow? My prediction at the start of 2010 ...

  • Alex's Archives - Most read posts 2010

    Updated: 2010-12-31 07:30:01
    Here's the list of the top half dozen posts since I began this blog in October 2010, starting with the most frequently visited: The poverty of Nick Clegg's "new" progressives Exit, voice, loyalty: what's a Libdem to do? A fairer future or no future for social housing? The continuing saga of Housing Benefit "reform": unaware ...

  • Nick Clegg's New Year Message

    Updated: 2010-12-31 07:13:25
    Here's the list of the top half dozen posts since I began this blog in October 2010, starting with the most frequently visited: The poverty of Nick Clegg's "new" progressives Exit, voice, loyalty: what's a Libdem to do? A fairer future or no future for social housing? The continuing saga of Housing Benefit "reform": unaware ...

  • Pulling Apart the Count in Northern Victoria Region

    Updated: 2010-12-17 02:18:32
    During the Northern Victoria Region count, I was questioned as to why I thought the Liberal Party would win the final seat ahead of the Country Alliance, and why I thought the Liberal victory would be by a larger margin...

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