WTF won't Labour, Lib Dems (& potentially the Greens) endorse tactical voting?

[Pipsquiggle]

This is obviously prompted by the by election result in Uxbridge. If there was no Lib Dem candidate, Labour could have won that seat (assuming their votes went to Labour).

I'll make no bones about it. I really dislike the Tories and want them out ASAP. Their policies have embedded generational poverty in so many parts of the UK. I reside in the home counties, a Tory stronghold seat - my middle class neighbours have zero clue how hard it is to grow up in a poor part of the country and thrive.

I want Labour to win a huge majority with other left leaning parties also getting seats. I would love electoral reform - PR and mandatory voting. The first past the post system is just shit and doesn't represent how the country voted.

YABU - Political parties should not endorse tactical voting, it's fine as it is

YANBU - Tactical voting should be encouraged as the FPTP voting system is shit

Not really they are posting from their own bias. And I’m countering that because it’s hypocritical and undemocratic

It would be a referendum btw not the GE system.

Do you find that undemocratic too?

How is everyone accepting something you want just because it’s you any better?

I want various things too but it’s even more important to get a mandate and a vote first

If it doesn’t go my way then that’s life, I might not like it but it’s the best way to decide what to do.

I don't think others are speaking from bias any more than you are, but the facts in the UK system is the manifesto is a convention with limited weight now due to weakened HoL powers.

I'll leave it there @SunnyEgg and wish you a good day.

There's a difference between things one wants and things one thinks might happen. I don't want the Tories to drag this out to the bitter end, but I still think they will. Or pretty close, anyway.

I don’t know how I’d vote on PR yet I haven’t heard the arguments: Small parties are not just left wing anyway.

But yes I think if it goes through without a referendum people will find a way to push back if unhappy.

Asking people is simple and if those who want it believe in it they can have faith they’ll succeed. With a mandate.

A mandate is always better. Unless you’re on the side of hoodwinking people and reducing their involvement for political gain.

Mandatory voting is a terrible idea. For one, it should be everyone's right to not give a shit, and two, mandatory voting would mean that people who can't be arsed to learn anything about any of the candidates would be obliged to pick someone.

That could be overcome by having a "none of the above" option on the ballot paper.

And maybe an "I don't give a shit" option.

There's nothing to say PR couldn't then be reversed by a subsequent government if passed by a coalition, of course. Because of the system we have.

I am aware of that, and actually, although UKIP is as far from my political home as I can think, I still think that if that proportion of the country wanted UKIP, then democratically, that is what should have happened.
It was a nonsense that something like 53 SNP MPs were in parliament when so few people actually voted for them.
Plus, of course, if there were a chance that your vote would actually decide the proportion of MPs sitting in the House, then a lot of people who don't vote in safe seats, or those who try to vote tactically might actually vote for different parties than those they currently vote for - or of course the huge swathes of people that don't vote, might choose to vote, if they felt their vote counted.

Well said

The most obvious counter to that argument is that FPTP instead delivered us a Tory government who did UKIPs job for them. I always thought it was one of the advantages of FPTP that extremists were kept at bay, but in the last few years that's clearly not been true.

I've been a Labour party member have been for the best part of 5 decades and I have no idea why tactical voting in 2-way marginals isn't endorsed.

I live in a Con/LD marginal. The Labour party puts up a candidate, but we don't campaign here, we go off and work in one of the two nearest Tory-held marginals where Labour has a chance of winning. Privately, every member here that I've ever discussed it with votes tactically for the LDs. Publically, not so much.

I've voted in, I think, 13 GEs, in 5 different constituencies. I've only ever voted for the winning candidate 4 times, and that was when I voted tactically. My vote would never have counted otherwise!

Constituencies change though. Three of the constituencies I've lived in now have Labour MPs, having formerly been pretty safe Tory seats. I guess the trick is knowing when to switch to voting with your heart.

Is it just because it favours your politics though

Wouldn’t you prefer everyone was asked what they wanted?

Democracy is a good way to go don’t you think

Because it’s a pretty basic tenet of political parties that you want people to vote for you, not elsewhere.

Your goal may be to get the conservatives out, but their goal is to build their parties and to get people to vote for them.

Strengthening other parties by getting your own supporters to vote for other parties, is not in their interests. And it may mean the popularity of your party ends up being superseded by the growing popularity of a previously smaller party you persuaded your own supporters to vote for.

This. Many times over.

Women's and girls' rights are incredibly important to me, yes. If that makes me a 'weird fucker' then that's fine.

We need online voting rather than polling booths. That would up the numbers dramatically.

Also we had a FPTP vote a few years ago. Less then 30% turn out of voters...

Me too.
As an aside, the amount of people who seem to imagine Labour will fix all those issues mentioned just as soon as they’re elected is astounding. So, so naive.

And I would rather be broke due to the Conservative money ideology than have more money in my pocker and see sex based rights disappear. This madness needs to be sorted out and Labour are not the party for this. I know some will say it's occurred under Tory leadership, but that's the same as saying Labour were responsible for the global recession. Trans ideology is world wide and a world wide issue.

Because what favours my politics sorry? I don't want the Tories to stay on another 18 months because they're a shower of shit, Penny Mordaunt is an awful human being without even the redeeming quality of knowing what a woman is, and I don't know whether I'd be happy with a Labour and Lib Dem or SNP coalition after the next GE. I thought I was clear before but I'll say it again: I'm talking about things I think might happen, not a wishlist.

And so none of this affects my point or those of the people you've been arguing with, which is that we have a political system that allows governments to do things that weren't in their manifestoes. In fact we have a recent example of a party in coalition doing something they'd explicitly said they wouldn't in theirs, ie the Lib Dems and tuition fees. Someone understanding this fact doesn't tell you anything about whether they approve of the existing system.

That's refreshing to read. I share your priorities, to which I would add the shit state of education and the abysmally under-resourced public services generally.

By the gender stuff do you mean women’s absolutely basic human rights?

The right to go to women’s survivors of sexual assault groups and not have a male there? The right to go to women’s only accommodation such as homelessness or addiction centres and not have to share bedrooms or showers with males? The right not to have to undress in front of males? The right not to have males undress in front of you? The right to be taken seriously if you state you object to being made to do this? the right to compete fairly in sport, to have that same right that men do? The right not to be imprisoned with males? The right to be able to speak about this and organise politically as a woman, with other women, without being threatened, harassed, risk losing your job or being reported by TRAs to everyone they know you know, in an attempt to ostracize you?

You mean those rights?

Yes, I think standing firm on women having these basic rights in society is worth holding firm on. Because losing these absolutely institutionalizes woman as second class citizen’s to men in our society.

It was a direct question, not sure where all the Mordaunt stuff is coming in. A distraction for some reason.

Would you prefer people got to vote for PR, regardless of what’s possible, wouldn’t you want others to have a say?

Well said.

Tg for that. It’s weird to me women don’t care. To the point they post as pp did too.

I mentioned Mordaunt because you didn't say which of the things I've suggested might happen you were referring to.

On PR, I think it's less likely to last if it's implemented because of the junior party in a coalition, so it wouldn't be my preferred mechanism no. I don't think a sort of back and forth of changing electoral systems would be positive, and it might be a risk in that scenario.

However I'm not naive enough to think that means we don't have a political system that would allow for it. Because we absolutely do, and any A level politics student could tell you that. There are people who don't even believe in parliamentary democracy who still have that basic level of understanding.

@Enfys1982 ig is possible to care about the issues you have highlighted but also women’s rights, it isn’t a race to the bottom and yet again it is women being told to put up and shut up for the greater good.

Also I envy the posters on here who seem to think that Labour will come in and wave a magic wand for these things - they won’t. People will no doubt hark back to the Blair years but he inherited a robust economy, what we have now is anything but that. I’ll be spoiling my ballot as I cannot bear not to vote and can vote for any of the current parties.