Should the Tories and Labour agree to implement PR to stop Farage becoming PM in the next election?

For 50 years the borough I live in has had a fallow year every 4 years. Only now the tin foil hat thickie puddings have leapt onto it. Why is that?

Hysterical much?

To take a few of these issues: we have the system of government we have. There’s no evidence that dictatorships or communism are better. No overthrow of our political system will happen and we are not prisoners of our political system. What else would you favour? A Farage dictatorship? An absolute monarchy?

ECHR was founded by us amongst others. We have a Supreme Court and our law interpretation stops with them for nearly everything. We also win many cases af ECHR. We have signed up to refugee rules and so has nearly everyone else that matters. These are fairly standard commitments amongst western countries.

Equal pay for equal work is hardly new. That Birmingham Council were asleep and didn’t evaluate jobs is entirely their fault! Everyone else did respect equal pay legislation and not pay women less for work of equal value to men’s work. Saying the legislation is wrong is unbelievable! Are you a dinosaur?

The Police are not what they should be. I have some sympathy with that. They don’t apply law in the same way across all of society and their leaders need to ensure this happens.

I don’t see the great flexibility debate. Flexible at what? Ripping off unprotected workers? Lack of laws to protect workers health? No. I don’t want to go back there.

Neither do a I buy the broken system dialogue. Mostly it’s not. Mostly it should work. What has gone wrong is lack of clarity of direction. Deciding what’s important and sidelining what isn’t. No LA will save much by getting rid of an equality officer. That won’t get the potholes filled! Reform voters have no idea of how LA finance works. Shouting about minor areas they don’t like makes no difference to the social care budget. It’s selling a dream - or snake oil. Mostly to the financially illiterate.

I don't generally blame the politicians, but right now they are prisoners of the system themselves. To take one problem I know a bit about—that human rights legislation has created an immigration system that we would never choose for ourselves—the solution is obvious but it's completely unimaginable that Starmer would go ahead and disapply human rights, because how could he? Pretty much the whole political class, and him in particular, have committed their careers to the idea that human rights are good, that internationalism is the ultimate in legitimacy, etc.

Other issues are similar, whether it's equal pay creating havoc in Birmingham, the third sector going off the rails on gender, criminal law being selectively enforced, university bloat or whatever – these problems are created by the things our politicians have believed in and upheld their whole careers. The public are howling for change but they cannot deliver, and I don't think it's solely because pain awaits the voters. If it was just that, wouldn't they sort out the enraging part of the immigration system? It's because they can't do it, they are stuck in the bad paradigm themselves.

I suppose I would make an exception and blame Blair and Brown for cheating by entrenching these systems. Britain's strength was its flexibility and they neutered it. This is the cost – a broken system and no way to change it without a massive rupture. That's what the surge in reform is telling us I would say.

Given they suggested that people from diverse backgrounds don’t contribute I’d say they’re on the bigoted side.

And don’t know how to punctuate.

Usually I’m not one for correcting people’s punctuation and spelling but when someone has such abhorrent opinions. I think it’s only fair to point out their intellectual inadequacies.

Much as I support PR, it won't happen before the next election.

Should say these children go through school without the help they need from schools When I had a child at school there was a pupil all through primary and secondary school no one wanted to sit near them No doubt they never got a job either

@SskkaI think the politicians do want change and prosperity for all. They just don’t always see how as their dogma gets in the way and they certainly have limited options. World events get in the way. The British public gets in the way. Reform can tinker at the edges but large scale reform won’t happen. Too many people would be howling. Look at winter fuel. Then look at pip. Then look at your list. I agree with it but changing anything will cause such a huge outpouring of bile - from people who would vote Reform.

Starmer would be better off helping out our more deprived communities and taxing the rich. Do what Labour should do. And maybe prosecute some of these disgustingly dog whistling racist rags for inciting racial hatred. Scumbags.

Those very rich men don’t own one of the biggest social media outlets in the world.

You're proposing gerrymandering the system just to avoid a single outcome that you don't like.

All the PR arguments assume that the parties would remain the same under a PR system. They wouldn't. Each side would fragment in to a number of smaller parties, each attacking and gaming each other. FPTP means poltiticians have to stay within their chosen party and work to change them for the better - it makes for more stable parties. More importantly, it ensures that extremist parties are locked out of government. Whereas, under PR, those parties can exercise vastly disproportionate influence if they hold the balance of power.

As for coalition government - we always have a coalition under FPTP. How so? Our broad church mainstream parties are effectively coalitions. The advantage of the present system is that you get to see the coalition before you elect it. With PR, it pretty much guarantees no overall majority and no-one knows what form of government they're voting for.

People imagine that the parties work together harmoniously under PR - they don't. Look at the dysfunctional way the German government recently fell apart.

And Scotland isn't exactly a great advert for PR if you've been paying attention.

There's no evidence that PR elects better governments.

I didn't get what you're saying, that's the whole point. There are some interesting opinions on this thread but from that post I couldn't work out which side of the fence you're on.

Even people with poor punctuation hopefully

Olddemdykye sounds like a teacher above as long as some people get what I'm saying it's ok with me Mumsnet is open to all isn't it

No, but they have the backing of other very rich men with their own agenda.

They have 5 MPs and 4% of local councillors
What we need is more balanced reporting around all parties and less Reform hysteria

They’re not getting the backing of the likes of Musk.

This is how all political Parties act!!

Look at Starmer and the Lord Ali scandal -he took 20,000 from him for clothes, and gave other MP's money as well (below).
Lord Ali gave 1.2m loan to Labour MP to buy a flat for her sister

Ed Milliband appointed Rachael Kyte who has links to Quadrature Capital, a company which has donated £4 million to the Labour Party.
Ed Milliband linked to Mega donor

Labour raised £9537,058 in campagne donations and In total, more than £8m of Labour’s donations came from 10 sources. They included: two unions, the former Autoglass boss Gary Lubner, hedge fund managers Martin Taylor and Stuart Roden, the sculptor Antony Gormley, the production company Toledo Productions, tech investor Danny Luhde-Thompson and former professional poker player Derek Webb, who founded the Campaign for Fairer Gambling.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cg3j131327yo

I've read this post three times and still can't make head nor tail of it. Your subsequent post was barely any clearer. Some punctuation might help.

I'm not convinced that's isn't how Labour and the Conservatives operate as well tbh !!

Against flatlined productivity, public squalor, mass immigration, niche favouritism, selective policing, decision paralysis, suffocating third sectorism, expanding costs against a narrowing tax base, ever-more individualism, a sense of decline while nobody in power shows any sign of wanting to change course. That sort of thing.

It’s also people reacting to the Labour party, who have managed to alienate a fair few.

@Sskka Downright lying is manipulation too. Falsely making claims you cannot carry out is a Farage specialism. Protest votes lead to mess and anarchy. Only the civil service will keep things sane. Some elements in society are easy to manipulate - remember Brexit lies? Doesn’t take much and now it’s Farage lies mk2.

Also protesting against what? A rich privately educated man leading a political party? One who supports a private health service and job losses? One who will trim state handouts to the bone? You might get a few less potholes but beware the big ticket items that will go. The uk is looking like a nation of duped fools.

But they are winning via media manipulation and the vast sums being poured into it by oligarchs who want even more power, control and money.

@BurntBroccoli how would you prevent media manipulation?

No they aren't! They're winning because everyone can see the current philosophy of government is defunct. Can't you feel it?

Reform have caught on because their ideas (such as they are) at least are different from everyone else. It might be a massive protest vote but that's exactly why it should take its course. Gerrymandering to keep the expounders of the current philosophy in place is the worst possible thing that could happen from here.