http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/electio ... Short.html




Can't fault her on either point.

I'd love to see a hung parliament purely out of curiosity

with the lib dems stating that they will raise 'personal tax allowance' to £10,000
if they can get that message out, then that will be a vote winner for them …

You mean members of parliament being Hung surely

That works too

And what would be the criteria? You tried to fiddle 60p for a Mars bar. The court is being lenient in sentencing you to death. Execution will be immediate and broadcast on the bye election special.

It'd give new meaning to the swing-ometer

Clegg has also said it this morning, and I agree with both.

The whip system has led to all sorts of crap being voted for and against over the years. At least a hung parliament would mean MPs would have to be convinced of an argument before they voted for it, rather than relying on the party-bollocks winning over and forcing MPs to back an argument.

Incidentally, I wrote to Clare Short when she resigned from the cabinet and Nu-Labour party to congratulate her for sticking up for her principles. She's one of two MPs I've written to that actually got back to me personally

Yes that would be a good reason to vote for anyone but the two main parties. If I was in Wales I can easily support Plaid Cymru. They have better policies than the main parties.

It'll never happen, to close to having democracy, which is no good for big business and would probably result in the absolute breakdown of society as the consumer drones in this country wouldn't be able to handle it.

Not so. For many people politics is an irrelevance, hence low turn outs. Also Germany has had coalitions for decades and that has not harmed big business. It depends on the parties and the policies. The main parties are pro business, as are the Liberals to a lesser extent. If anything we need politics to be further away from big business. The easier it is to buy a party with business donations the less relevant the average person is. You end up entire economic policy decided by the bosses of a few mega corporations who paid the right people. When is that good for people. Look at America were big business has bought influence in both parties, and has extremely business friendly legislation. Standards of living in the US have fallen for more than a decade, they were only sustained by a property bubble. No its citizens are poorer than ever and businesses are getting stronger.

Policies dictated by said big businesses, hence the digital Britain bill.



Thanks, you've just explained very succinctly the point I was trying to make, that big business controls everything.

I think that a cap on donations from individuals would end the control by big business. If you were capped at £500 whether by party membership, company donation linked to shareholding or union memberships or fundraising dinners, or risk gaol would be good. These should all be linked to NI number. So the parties would have to have a verified donation list and find raising list which would have to be cross checked against party funds.

Another change would be a ban on party debts. Iceland's inspector into the crisis blamed the fact that the parties were funded by the banks with overdrafts which meant that they turned a blind eye to the banks. That problem is probably an issue with the parties here.

I would also end big business buying peerages for their bosses.

Brilliant