OK, seeing as politics go right over my head and politicians annoy the hell out of me, can anyone explain to me what various people are offering?
As mentioned in t'other thread, I'll probably be voting Lib Dem, for two reasons:
1) My parents vote for them
2) They mentioned something about scrapping tuition fees.

Not the best reasons I agree. Who stands for what? I know the three main ones pretty much offer the same thing, but what are the subtle differences?

Also, what's all this Euro election stuff? Who is UKIP? What do they stand for? Who else is standing?#

How does it all fit together? Local elections, national and Euro? I presume the Euro people set out X rules, nation can then add Y rules on top and local will add Z rules?

Any answers would be very much appreciated, and I'm sure others will appreciate them too

Ben

All of them are bStards (very few exceptions).
Local councillers will screw up your local life.
National MP's will screw up the country
Euro Mps will screw everything up and will take a long time and a lot of money to do it.


Cynical moi!!!!

The Euro elections give you a chance to vote for an MEP - that is a member of the European Parliament. UKIP, and a few other single issue parties, want shot of being in the EU, and feel that the country could fare batter on its own. I suspect that if we had the economic model of the 1960’s, we could survive, but today, I am not convinced that we would survive without hitching up even closer to the USA. UKIP seems to run on “soft racism” – that is to say that they are quite happy to have Poles mend their plumbing, but they don’t want the other 180,000,000* Eastern Europeans knocking on the door, taking our jobs, women, and making a mess of the country by turning it into some kind of gulag where the writing is all funny and backwards.

*UKIP loves to use Very Big Numbers when talking about European immigration issues. They are careful to remind us that Turkey are going to join, but stops short to let you join the dots. The BNP also reminds us about Turkey, but is keen to point out that it’s a Muslim country, and that the inhabitants are (no doubt) brown. UKIP seems to play very much on innuendo, and this bothers me as much as the BNP. The BNP does, at least, place its villainous cards on the table. I feel that there is something grossly unpleasant lurking in the shadows in UKIP. Whenever Nigel Farage appears on the TV, I feel very uneasy. I feel he is hiding something. Both of these parties bother me greatly. Xenophobia has no place in modern politics.

Hmm, you don't want much do you

Anyway, political parties are traditionally aligned from right to left. At the extreme right you have the likes of the neo-nazis and at the far left you have the communists. Fortunately the vast majority of the political parties that are vying for your vote aren't as extreme as the far right or far left.
Furthest to the right, at least in terms of parties most people have heard of are the BNP. They try very hard to pretend they aren't basically racists/anti-gay/anti-Semitic and basically anti anyone who isn't white and English (for several generation preferably). As far as I'm concerned they are lying.

As m'colleague paulzolo intimated the UKIP (United Kingdom Independence Party) are also a right wing party, though not quite as scary as the BNP, at least on the surface. They were largely formed from the anti-Europe faction of the Conservative party.

Slap bang in the middle of the political spectrum you will find, in decreasing order of right wingedness, the Conservatives, the Labour Party (though debate rages on that one) and the Liberal Democrats. All three are pretty middle of the road (for which read maintaining the status quo). Of those three the Lib Dem's policies are probably the most interesting because they don't have much realistic chance of forming the UK's government so can say things the other two main parties wouldn't dare say for fear of loosing votes in their traditional supporters.
The Lib Dem's are fairly vocal supporters of proportional representation for voting as it would represent a more even distribution of how people actually vote than the current First Past the Post system we currently use (however PR also makes it much harder for a single party to form a majority government so coalition governments are more likely), however I digress.

The Green party sits somewhat to the left, generally speaking, compared to the big three parties and you can probably guess what a significant number of their policies are aimed at.

You generally get a far larger selection of parties at European elections and the voting is usually by some form of PR.
See here for a list of all the parties that will be standing in your part of the UK (it will be on the list somewhere). If you want to know more about each parties policies then the vast majority of them will have websites that will be more than happy to tell all about what they stand for (whether the actually do it if they get in is the real trick though).

Sadly, as far as I know, there is no 'None of the Above' option on the ballot paper if you don't fancy any of them but can still spoil your ballot paper if they all strike you as a bunch of tw@ts.
I always reckon that in order to have any justification in complaining about the system you have to vote (even if it is a protest vote or spoiled ballot) to try and change it so I applaud your interest in the electoral process.

A spoiled ballot is only any use if it's part of a massive campaign (unlikely), and/or the media suddenly start reporting on spoiled ballots, IMO.

davros and Paul, thank you very much for taking the time to inform me
I have found it hard to find out what one party does that another party does not. As you said, they may say one thing, but whether they act on it is something else entirely. Politics seems full of promises, and opinions that seem to make sense (certainly from the main parties, as you said, this keeps the status quo), and nobody actually answers questions (which is why they annoy me).
I think this is something that should be something that is taught in schools, having mock elections would be excellent, with staff representing certain parties, standing up and echoing what that party believes in, yet in an educational way.

From my stand-point, as someone who can vote, I've got very little knowledge (until now) of the system, and the whole thing seems to be a bunch of elitists who claim to fight for what is right for the common person...


I want to do what I think everyone has the right to do, make an informed and educated decision on how the country is run.

Once again, thank you very much to the both of you

I'll be voting Lib Dem at the European Election for one very simple reason - they're the only Party that have been consistently making the right noises about my freedom and civil liberties.

As for the locals - I'll be voting for independent candidates as I believe local issues should not be subject to party political wrangling and point-scoring.

Fair enough. I can't argue that one other than to say it's about as close to 'None of the Above' we can get. Shame it doesn't count.

I've always thought it would be amusing if "none of the above" was first past the post. For it to mean anything, they'd have to re-run the election with new candidates because otherwise it would simply be a wasted vote.

They do announce how many spoiled ballots there are when they read out the results on the TV. However, most people would assume a spoiled ballot is the result of someone who can't draw a cross in a box. It doesn't really mean anything.

They do get counted, but don't mean anything, sadly.

My grandma used to right “socialism” on her ballot papers. I don’t know if she still does, but she’s from a politically rebellious generation where left wing politics were far more fashionable than they are now. I have to say that I feel more and more disenfranchised as politics drifts further and further to the right. You can’t really tell the difference between the three main parties as they are simply chasing a small range of voters who have a chance to make a change.

Let’s form the None of the Above Party, and just tell people that we’ll do nothing if elected as we stand for a proper none of the candidates are any good box on ballot papers.

I was just looking at the candidates for my region and wondering what the hell half of them stand for. I think the Government should produce a leaflet with a paragraph on what each party stands for, then you can go and find out more if you are interested.

I like it. I'm sure I've mentioned before, but I always spoil my card. I've taken to writing Superman, then drawing a box and ticking it.

I'm still waiting for him to get elected.

me, myself and i am for Proportional Representation (PR) but Pure Proportional Representation (PPR) for our governance
along with a written constitution based on and within the common law structure supported by a bill of rights incorporating the human rights act for all individuals that are citizens of this Country …

link to a guide on Proportional Representation benefits
http://www.proportional-representation. ... efits.html