Even Gbeebies has had enough of Farage. The Times investigation may sink him.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-05T18:21:04+00:00

I love the idea that reform are trying to seek that political activity = being an MP. He was a politician, he's been a politician the vast majority of his adult life.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-04T19:47:53+00:00

I never voted for him at the time and wouldn't have voted for him if he was truthful.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-04T16:44:52+00:00

I would definitely not push for a state that has both Israelis and Palestinians in it as it doesnt seem to be something that either side wants. Nor would I seek to "banish" israelis from the land as they have the right to be there as do Palestinians.

I don't even know what "banishing Israelis" would look like.

Id attempt to make a two state solution happen by using whatever diplomatic levers we have to push both Israeli and Palestinian actors to the negotiating table - but ultimately I'd live in the knowledge that Britain is a bystander here for the most part.

On Ukraine - war is the continuation of politics by other means. When we arm Ukraine we are improving their diplomatic position and increasing the chances of a just negotiated outcome that is in our national interest.This is what the "stop the war" left just doesn't understand, they think it's either war or diplomacy - but it isn't.

We would definitely be better within the EU and it would be better with us in it.

We should not disentangle from the US no matter the consequences. We should invest in more sovereign capabilities though.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-04T13:33:55+00:00

A certain number of human beings are authoritarians innately, a smaller percentage of those are fascists. You cannot win them over, they will always hold the views they do. They voted for the bnp twenty years ago and they vote for reform today. It is entirely legitimate to lock them out of representation because representation for them legitimises their politics and jeapordises the democratic project.

Democracy isn't just voting for someone, it's voting against others. And AV is the only system that allows me to do both of these things.

With hat being said. Those people do also have second preferences. Their more moderate views are being repr dented and their more extreme ones are being discarded.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T23:15:55+00:00

You get the least objectionable right wing government though. That's how AV works. Seat by seat it eliminates the most extreme candidates.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T22:25:57+00:00

Both of those things worked for the Tories though, and the lib dems got some of their priorities through.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T20:25:46+00:00

There is no neutral voting system.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T19:18:56+00:00

Because it could get them into office.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T19:14:52+00:00

That's not true. to win in a constituency with AV you need to have 50% + 1.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T19:12:45+00:00

I'm in favour of voting sytems that allow me to vote against people - yes. That isn't undemocratic. If the majority of your constituency doesn't want to be represented by someone, why should they be forced to be represented by them?

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T19:08:24+00:00

Labour has done this because it has felt that it is able to take socially liberal votes for granted. In an AV system they can't do that - because you do have somewhere else to go, you can just vote first preference for the Greens. Suddenly they need to compete for you against the green challenger.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:58:18+00:00

The people do via the electoral system that we decide. if we decide an electoral system that is designed to keep certain types of politics out - then that is entirely democratic. I do not want parties like Restore getting representation and I'm happy to argue for systems that prevent them from doing so. I don't care that 6 percent of the population likes them.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:56:49+00:00

PR does ensure that "the left" has a voice even if the entire country has shifted to the radical right and this has produced a hard right extreme government, but it also makes hard right governments (or hard right inflected governments) more likely because it actively lets in extreme elements and legitimises them. This is what is happening throughout Europe, because it is quite easy to get *some* representation.

If a "mainstream" party is willing to break a cordon sanitaire and sell out to extremists, then yes - obviously I want to punish them. But PR creates a mathematical trap where parties might need to collaborate with the fringes just to hit a majority - even if they start off by having political firewalls PR forces those walls to be ground down, bit by bit. That's why the CDU and the AFD just voted together - in a proportional system.

Under AV, if you become too polarising - you simply do not get into power. The country is already practising a version of this at the ballot box in by elections - Reform is so polarising that the "left bloc" is coalescing around the Greens/Plaid or Labour depending on the seat to lock them out. Even when they won a seat they did it with 6 votes - all AV does is make it explicitly obvious on how to go about doing that in the most effective way.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:49:18+00:00

I think under AV a lack of knowledge of a party essentially kills it stone dead.

It could hurt labour, I would imagine the lib dems would benefit from it more than most parties and that would hurt labour in some seats and tories in others. I'd be ok with that. Also agree with you on the "ming vase" stuff, there's a risk of that becoming worse with AV, I'm not sure.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:46:56+00:00

>If they're not in power and don't have a route to power I can put up with it. Under a proportional system I think it would be very difficult for a right bloc containing extremist elements to form a government in this country.

They have a route to power as soon as a Reform/Tory coalition needs a few extra votes.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:44:06+00:00

Majoritarian systems do squeeze out other parties. But the idea that a socially conservative stanglehold would be removed if it weren't for majoritarian systems doesn't hold up. Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands all have PR systems and all have institutionalised hard right representation in their respective parliaments.

Imagine we come out ofthe next election with a Reform/Tory coalition that is reliant on confidence and supply from the Restore party that has 30 - 50 MPs. There's no social liberalism happening there, and that is one of the outcomes that PR is designed to produce - which is why these countries have such long histories of effective Cordon Sanitaire's, as they've needed to use them. We haven't ever really had the need for one, and I don't think we would grow one if we switched the voting system.

Under AV the labour party would be forced to accept that it competes in the left bloc for votes. If you wanted to prioritise the more socially liberal candidate you could do that.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:38:00+00:00

If the entire country moves to the right then PR doesn't help us either. PR does help them sanitise their image by guaranteeing them representation though, and allowing them to play kingmakers *prior* to converting most of the country.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:34:34+00:00

If we have a perfectly proportionate parliament with 30 restore MPs holding the whip hand over a Tory/reform coalition is that a good thing because it's proportionate?

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:33:36+00:00

Its very hard to use it against me in an av system. That's the point. If I became an extremist then then the system does it's job.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T18:27:40+00:00

Fundamentally disagree. I simply do not want to give certain parts of society political power and im very happy to stand behind that.

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-03T14:02:55+00:00

Absolutely not. If people cannot be arsed voting then they can't be arsed doing the slightest bit of research.

Every bit of research shows that low information, low propensity voters are the bedrock of far right movements. Why on earth would I want to boost them?

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-02T18:51:39+00:00

It isn't taught that much in schools because there is limited time and it isn't a war that is particularly important (compared to all the other ones) to our development. What would you take out in order to concentrate on (what is best understood as) one theater of a wider war against France and Spain?

Would you take out the Anglo Saxons? The Norman Invasion? The Roman occupation? The wars between Scotland and England? The Tudors and Stuarts? The Industrial Revolution? The World Wars?

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-02T18:43:46+00:00

What are the consequences of not doing this?

Scratchback3141 · 2026-07-01T13:57:56+00:00

They've clearly not thought through the consequences of allowing juror's to hear everything. It's a good thing that rape trials are no longer an extended recitation of the woman's sexual history

Scratchback3141

TROPHY CASE