After many months of hard campaigning, millions of leaflets, thousands of doors knocked on, hundreds of public meetings, scores of stalls and much more - Jean Lambert was re-elected to the European Parliament!
Nationally, the Green Party secured 1.3 million votes, and was the Party with the biggest increase in the share of the vote (+2.4% of the national share). In London, we got 190,589 votes, which equates to 10.9% of all London votes cast - and it's down to everyone who campaigned for Jean, in however big or small a way. Thank you to everyone.
Of course, in other regions (apart from the South East, where Caroline Lucas was also re-elected) Greens were just pipped to the post...and we all know that the fascist BNP also returned two MEPs. For that reason, Jean will be working harder than ever to lay out a clearly progressive, radical and bold vision for a tolerant future in the UK. We hope you will follow her progress over the next five years!
FULL RESULTS
Conservative 479,037 27.4% (+0.6)
Labour 372,590 21.3% (-3.5%)
Liberal Democrats 240,156 13.7% (-1.6%)
Green Party 190,589 10.9% (+2.5%)
UK Independence Party 188,440 10.8% (-1.6%)
British National Party 86,420 4.9% (+0.9%)
Christian Party-Christian Peoples Alliance 51,336 2.9% (+2.9%)
Independent - Jan Jananayagam 50,014 2.9% (+2.9%)
English Democrat 24,477 1.4% (+0.6%)
No2EU 17,758 1.0% (+1.0%)
Socialist Labour Party 15,306 0.9% (+0.9%)
Libertas 8,444 0.5% (+0.5%)
Jury Team 7,284 0.4% (+0.4%)
Independent - Steven Cheung 4,918 0.3% (+0.3%)
Socialist Party of Great Britain 4,050 0.2% (+0.2%)
Yes 2 Europe 3,384 0.2% (+0.2%)
Independent - Sohale Rahman 3,248 0.2% (+0.2%)
Independent - Gene Alcantara 1,972 0.1% (+0.1%)
Independent - Haroon Saad 1,603 0.1% (+0.1%)
Showing posts with label electoral system. Show all posts
Showing posts with label electoral system. Show all posts
Monday, 8 June 2009
Tuesday, 26 May 2009
Jean - or J P Floru?
The online D'Hondt voting system calculator is a marvellous thing, for electoral geeks. Like the ones who might, for example, spend their evenings writing a blog in support of a political candidate....
One of the things that feeding different percentages into the D'Hondt calculator quickly reveals is that, given current polling data, the most likely competitor with Jean for the last seat in London is the fourth Conservative candidate. Given this, I thought it might be an idea to look him up.
I was expecting a fairly bland Cameronista, without too much to overtly object to. Instead, I found Cllr J P Floru.
Wow. A more vivid and obvious contrast to the politics of social justice, ecological sustainability and community that Jean Lambert represents, you could not hope to find. For example, check out Cllr Floru's rather worrying Conservative Party profile. Apparently, he is the candidate on the Conservative party list most likely to say "The government must do nothing. The free-market will solve this". Quite.
A brief look at his Wikipedia entry reveals more fun facts. For example, 'in 2005 he founded the Freedom Alliance, an organisation promoting libertarianism and free market capitalism through Freedom Week, an annual week-long seminar for students at Cambridge University'. He 'is a committed free marketeer and the author of numerous articles on economics. His stated political heroes are Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, and is a follower of the philosophy of Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman. He is close to the Taxpayers' Alliance, the Institute of Economic Affairs and the Adam Smith Institute.'
For a more in depth look at the philosophy that inspires Cllr Floru's political outlook, take a look at this article for the Taxpayer's Alliance, which contains such gems as:
"In this time of economic downturn we need tax cuts to make the pie grow again. A substantial cut in corporation tax would do the trick....Whereas in the medium term the Laffer effect would ensure a larger tax take as a result of GDP growth, in the short term the tax cuts could only be afforded by cuts in public spending. The Conservative Party is far too timid on the subject."
It is actually rather heartening that Cllr Floru is so earnest and honest a free-marketeer. After all, democracy is meant to be about choice, and this makes the choice facing Londoners even more stark, and more pressing. You can have Jean Lambert, with her belief in a publicly owned government safety net, in government intervention to create jobs and stimulate green industries, in regulation to shut down the most polluting and unethical parts of the private sector - or you can have Cllr Floru, and the rule of the economic jungle.
Londoners, the choice is yours!
One of the things that feeding different percentages into the D'Hondt calculator quickly reveals is that, given current polling data, the most likely competitor with Jean for the last seat in London is the fourth Conservative candidate. Given this, I thought it might be an idea to look him up.
I was expecting a fairly bland Cameronista, without too much to overtly object to. Instead, I found Cllr J P Floru.
Wow. A more vivid and obvious contrast to the politics of social justice, ecological sustainability and community that Jean Lambert represents, you could not hope to find. For example, check out Cllr Floru's rather worrying Conservative Party profile. Apparently, he is the candidate on the Conservative party list most likely to say "The government must do nothing. The free-market will solve this". Quite.
A brief look at his Wikipedia entry reveals more fun facts. For example, 'in 2005 he founded the Freedom Alliance, an organisation promoting libertarianism and free market capitalism through Freedom Week, an annual week-long seminar for students at Cambridge University'. He 'is a committed free marketeer and the author of numerous articles on economics. His stated political heroes are Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, and is a follower of the philosophy of Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman. He is close to the Taxpayers' Alliance, the Institute of Economic Affairs and the Adam Smith Institute.'
For a more in depth look at the philosophy that inspires Cllr Floru's political outlook, take a look at this article for the Taxpayer's Alliance, which contains such gems as:
"In this time of economic downturn we need tax cuts to make the pie grow again. A substantial cut in corporation tax would do the trick....Whereas in the medium term the Laffer effect would ensure a larger tax take as a result of GDP growth, in the short term the tax cuts could only be afforded by cuts in public spending. The Conservative Party is far too timid on the subject."
It is actually rather heartening that Cllr Floru is so earnest and honest a free-marketeer. After all, democracy is meant to be about choice, and this makes the choice facing Londoners even more stark, and more pressing. You can have Jean Lambert, with her belief in a publicly owned government safety net, in government intervention to create jobs and stimulate green industries, in regulation to shut down the most polluting and unethical parts of the private sector - or you can have Cllr Floru, and the rule of the economic jungle.
Londoners, the choice is yours!
Tuesday, 19 May 2009
The European Elections - Voting System
Many people are still confused about the D'Hondt system being used in the elections on June 4th. The North West Green Party has produced this excellent video as part of their campaign to Stop Nick Griffin of the BNP from winning a seat, which explains it all admirably!
Tuesday, 6 January 2009
D'Hondt and other complications
One of the largest problems that the European elections (and elections in general) face is a lack of understanding of what is at stake, and how ordinary voters can influence European policy.
Obviously then, it makes sense for the elections to be run using the extraordinarily complicated and non-intuitive D'Hondt method of proportional representation. While D'Hondt does have some advantages in the finer points of electoral mathematics, it also makes it extremely difficult to ascertain exactly what percentage of votes a party needs to elect its first representative, then its second, third, and so on. It also makes it difficult to work out just what the best strategy to keep an undesirable party OUT of the European Parliament might be...for example, the BNP.
However, over on The Daily (Maybe), the redoubtable Jim Jepps has given it a good shot, with this excellent explanation of how D'Hondt might work in London this time around.
Evading too much geeky electoral maths, basically what he finds is that the crucial battle in London is going to be electing a progressive representative to the eighth seat, rather than a fascist. Due to the way that D'Hondt works, votes cast for a party that has already gained a representative (as Labour, Tories and Lib Dems are likely to have done before the Greens, more is the pity) are worth less for the eighth seat than a vote for a party that is still striving towards the threshold - like the Greens.
Just another of the many, many reasons to vote to re-elect Jean Lambert as one of London's MEPs. Not only is she one of the most progressive voices in the European Parliament in her own right - but she's the best option to keep out the fascists too! It's rare to get a win-win situation in UK politics...so lets make the most of it in June.
Obviously then, it makes sense for the elections to be run using the extraordinarily complicated and non-intuitive D'Hondt method of proportional representation. While D'Hondt does have some advantages in the finer points of electoral mathematics, it also makes it extremely difficult to ascertain exactly what percentage of votes a party needs to elect its first representative, then its second, third, and so on. It also makes it difficult to work out just what the best strategy to keep an undesirable party OUT of the European Parliament might be...for example, the BNP.
However, over on The Daily (Maybe), the redoubtable Jim Jepps has given it a good shot, with this excellent explanation of how D'Hondt might work in London this time around.
Evading too much geeky electoral maths, basically what he finds is that the crucial battle in London is going to be electing a progressive representative to the eighth seat, rather than a fascist. Due to the way that D'Hondt works, votes cast for a party that has already gained a representative (as Labour, Tories and Lib Dems are likely to have done before the Greens, more is the pity) are worth less for the eighth seat than a vote for a party that is still striving towards the threshold - like the Greens.
Just another of the many, many reasons to vote to re-elect Jean Lambert as one of London's MEPs. Not only is she one of the most progressive voices in the European Parliament in her own right - but she's the best option to keep out the fascists too! It's rare to get a win-win situation in UK politics...so lets make the most of it in June.
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