[Youngian]

I know some of you think we're just a glorified county and our Parliament a glorified parish council, but this is our business. Leave it to us.

Dearly love to, whatever the practical difficulties of Wales transitioning to a sovereign state I wouldn’t want my country to remain an appendage to its larger neighbour.

[Spoonman]

Yep.

It won't be quite that bad with Wales, but 3 a constituency is too many. One of the bad things about PR is that people can get elected with very small numbers of votes and build a national profile on the back off pissing everybody about.

Exhibit A

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraser_Anning

]Anning was sharply criticised for his comments following the Christchurch mosque shootings, which occurred in New Zealand on 15 March 2019, during which 51 Muslim worshippers were killed. He claimed that immigration of "Muslim fanatics" led to the attacks, and that "while Muslims may have been victims today, usually they are the perpetrators". Anning also stated that the massacre "highlights...the growing fear within our community...of the increasing Muslim presence."

19 people put Mr Anning as their first choice in the whole of Queensland, though in fairness his party did pretty well.

How many votes is somebody going to need to come 6th in Neath Port Talbot? Turnouts in Welsh Assembly elections aren't exactly stratospheric anyway. Are they trying to bring forth a bunch of Welsh Fraser Annings?

The case of Fraser Annings in Australia is a very exceptional case of how elections for the Federal Senate in Australia are conducted, and how they are seemingly quite complex with leaving no candidate out until every seat is filled - he is not the only seemingly fringe candidate to have gained such a seat over there in the last few years. This is because there's PR and there's PR. If Annings was running for a council seat in NI under STV** and he obtained only 19 first preference votes (even in a seven seat DEA), he'd be eliminated on the first count without question. He'd also never get close to winning a seat in an MMP system either.

Oh, and note me down for being against closed lists as well - though I can see why they'd be necessary in an MMP system but if I was a benevolent dictator I'd suggest you could stand either as a list candidate or constituency candidate but not both - you shouldn't get the opportunity to have a parachute if you fail to win a constituency that you stand in.



** Also applies to local elections in Scotland & Rep. Ireland.

[Youngian]

Don’t see how expanding the number of representatives inevitably means you’ll have a gaggle of independent pork barrellers and populist rogues if there’s a 5-10% threshold bar before being elected. It can let in fringe far right parties but that’s democracy and you have to suck it up and try harder.

[Tubby Isaacs]

A threshold would certainly help.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Glad to hear Fraser Anning probably wouldn't get elected.

[mattomac]

The Senedd has a scrutiny deficit. Even though it's responsibilities and remit have increased, its membership has not. This means that practically every Labour AS is in government, and thus the committee system is barely functional and ruling party rebellions on major issues are impossible.
Expansion of the Senedd was in the last Labour manifesto, and was widely consulted upon and subject to a huge independent report by an Expert Panel during the previous Senedd https://senedd.wales/how-we-work/our-ro ... al-reform/
I know some of you think we're just a glorified county and our Parliament a glorified parish council, but this is our business. Leave it to us.

Edited to add: Closed lists are a mistake, though.

I did live there for 5 years, voted for more power to the assembly I just think the idea is shit.

[Yug]

This letter in the Grauniad raises a few questions

In recent accounts of Labour party activities in the Guardian, I have seen no mention of Keir Starmer’s decision to abolish the post of shadow minister for peace and disarmament earlier this month. This seems to be another retrograde step by the Labour leadership. Surely we need a party that will stand clearly for peace and abiding by international law?
Rae Street
Littleborough, Manchester

How long has "shadow minister for peace and disarmament" been a thing?
Why have I never heard of the post before this morning?
Which government minister are they shadowing?
Why would not having such a post make it unclear whether Labour gives a fig about international law or not?

All this head-scratching is giving me splinters.

[RedSparrows]

'But I really like peace'

[Andy McDandy]

And that'll go down really well on the Dudley council estates where they already think the party are stuffed with wimps, cowards, and Smiths fans.

[Crabcakes]

You can probably guess who created the position in the first place…

[Yug]

You can probably guess who created the position in the first place…

I thought as much.

Shadow minister for the disarmament of Israel and peace for the Palestinians.

Am I getting close?

[Tubby Isaacs]

Peace comes under the Leader and Foreign Secretary, one might reasonably suppose.

What's the idea? Richard Burgon travels round the world solving conflicts? "We should have thought of that solution!" say warring militias? Doesn't matter who it is, but the reaction will be 1) What's it got to do with Britain? and 2) We want to speak to the PM.

[Oboogie]

Peace comes under the Leader and Foreign Secretary, one might reasonably suppose.

What's the idea? Richard Burgon travels round the world solving conflicts? "We should have thought of that solution!" say warring militias? Doesn't matter who it is, but the reaction will be 1) What's it got to do with Britain? and 2) We want to speak to the PM.

Their solution to ending conflict always seems to be the same, surrender to the aggressor* and give them whatever they want.

*Unless the aggressor is Israel, of course.

[Crabcakes]

Aside from the fact it seems little more than yet another example of genuine virtue signalling from the absolute boy (life-long advocate for peace etc.), it’s just preposterous to have a role whose aim is to do something absolutely nebulous that - should all other departments and ministers be doing their job right - should be happening anyway.

[Tubby Isaacs]

I assume the disarmament part means nukes. How would that work with Jez renewing Trident?

[Crabcakes]

I assume the disarmament part means nukes. How would that work with Jez renewing Trident?

Simple. If Jez had made it to no. 10, he 100% would not have renewed trident. He just wouldn’t have. He’d come out with some long, worthy speech about conscience and doing what’s right, implying he’d been wrestling with what to do, but there would have been zero deliberation in reality.

There is, of course, a very complex debate about proliferation of nuclear weapons, maintaining and modernising a stockpile, and so on. But he wouldn’t have thought about that at all - it’d just be a flat ‘nope’, and maybe as an added bonus a letter sent to that nice Mr Putin asking if we can be looked after by him.

[Tubby Isaacs]

This did all sound too good to be true in the current climate. Going to be lots of major annoyance among heads and council leaders, I expect. This is what Sunak and Hunt do all the time, promise stuff and get other people to fund it.

[The Weeping Angel]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... ike-brexit

Some had raised concerns it could be used to exclude issues on which the Labour leadership has set out a policy, such as maintaining the two-child benefit limit, or areas like Brexit and electoral reform.

However, the rule will not be in force for the imminent Labour conference taking place in Liverpool this week, meaning such debates can go ahead on this occasion.

A Labour source said the stipulation would be unlikely to be interpreted very strictly at conferences when the policy forum was less detailed, for example just after a general election rather than just before.

Some Labour activists had feared the rule change could have been used this year to rule out motions to debate the party’s stance on Brexit, including calls for Labour to commit to future membership of the EU’s single market.

Another possible area of contention is calls for electoral reform and proportional representation. Last year’s conference overwhelmingly backed a motion calling for PR, an idea ignored by Keir Starmer.

Based on a text submitted by 140 CLPs, it passed after trade unions, which had previously blocked the idea, changed their stance.

The internal campaign group Open Labour criticised the rule change, saying: “A party that can’t listen to its own members at conference seems far too fragile and uncertain for a party leading in the polls.”

What are people's thoughts on this?

[Malcolm Armsteen]

Ming vase.

[Youngian]

Tories can fuck up and say what they like as it’s the next day’s forgotten fish and chip paper. They only lose power by being so used to this privilege they then fuck up every day. Eventually enough voters begin to notice they’re not very good at governing.
Labour only has to leave a door ajar and a hurricane blows in.