Wes Tender

And what was that exactly? Refusing to hold a referendum on whether we joined the Euro? But on the other hand, signing up to the Treaty of Nice without offering the electorate an opportunity to vote via a referendum on whether they approved to the further loss of sovereignty that entailed? And yet he proposes to hold a referendum on our electoral system. Hypocrite!

Who are the Marxists posting on here?

This is a very interesting article giving the figures and also arguing that there will be an impetus for the break up of the union, or at least a movement gathering momentum towards an English Parliament. http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/gerry-hassan/facts-and-ficgures-on-fragmentation-of-uk

Not a lot of interest in this debate. The election was a poisoned chalice for whoever won it. Labour left the Country in such a parlous state economically that the medicine that needs to be taken to put us back on our feet is so nasty, that the electorate would almost certainly vote out the party having to administer it, at the next election. Fuengirola posts his opinion and says "end of", but typically carries on posting. He left this Country because he couldn't stand the Conservatives, but feels qualified to comment on them, even though his opinions are diluted through lack of personal experience of everyday life here. Well, you're a Mirror reader. Irishsaint makes his comments invalid as being fair and balanced because of his second line, which exposes him as a political bigot. He goes on to list those European states whose economies are on the verge of meltdown and claims that it is a global problem. It doesn't seem to occur that the problems might lie with the EU, where all of those economies are in a straight-jacket, unable to regulate their own economies when they overheat or fail. The fact that there are other countries that have largely escaped the impact of the widespread economic downturn, argues the point that it is a global phenomenon. VFTT uses such language about Dune that I thought was supposed to be worthy of an infraction. Like Andynorthern who calls Delldays thick, for a perfectly reasonable comment, they both lose the argument because they have to resort to name-calling rather than debating the points raised. Geneva Saint points out that the PR system of voting works perfectly well in Germany, whilst ignoring the opposite case in Italy, which has had more changes of Government since the war than any other country in the civilised democratic World. Saintandy points out that there were an extra million Lid/Dem votes this time around and believes it was because they had the right policies. Regrettably for him, the truth of the matter was that most of those extra votes were because the electorate were urged by Labour to vote tactically to stop the Conservatives getting elected and also because Clegg came across well as the "triumph of presentation over substance candidate" in the televised debates. Andy56 is closer to the mark of what will probably happen one way or another, with whoever has to administer the medicine getting a kicking from the electorate the next time around. For that reason, I hope that the Lib/Dems and Labour hammer out a deal, igniting public resentment if Brown tries to cling on in Number 10. But when he calls on there to be electoral reform so that the Conservatives are never elected again, I conversely call on electoral reform to remove the Scottish, Welsh and NI MPs and to form an English Parliament. If all of those bleating about how unfair the electoral system is had any sense of fair play, they would agree that this is the most unfair situation of all, those "Countries" having their own Parliaments/Assemblies, ability to influence our English affairs while we have no say in theirs.

Getting back to the long list of things that Labour's sole surviving supporter rag thinks that Labour has brought about this past thirteen years, there is one pertinent question that is just begging to be asked. If they did indeed do all these things, why did the country overwhelmingly reject them on Thursday? Could it be that many had cottoned on to the stealth taxes that paid for it all and resented it? Could it be that they considered that the Health Service, Educational standards, law and order had all seen declines since Labour came in? Or are the electorate a load of idiots, who aren't bright enough to realise just how good Labour has been to them?

Let's have this placed in its proper context please. I said: This was in reply to your statement: Patrick Bateman is perfectly correct. I did not question your teaching ability. I asked what sort of teacher you are if you could call somebody a thug if they administered a physical chastisement to a recalcitrant child. The language you used was rather extreme IMO and your response to my criticism does indeed call into question whether you have anger issues. How dare I suggest, etc. I am not one your naughty pupils that you can shout at for expressing a different opinion.

If it would be so hard for the MPs to vote against the holding of referenda, why have they denied the voters the chance to vote on Europe, the various treaties that have reduced our Parliamentary soveignty, Capital Punishment, the establishment of separate governments for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, or any of the other issues that have periodically been high on the publics' agenda.

OK, so he read up about it and made a dyslexic mistake by misreading the date, something that everybody is inclined towards now and again. I haven't bothered to bone up on it, but my recollection which might be flawed, was that shotgun legislation followed the Hungerford massacre, whereas the handgun legislation followed the Dunblane massacre. But you haven't answered my question. I asked that if you are prepared to dismiss all of his points because he got one thing wrong, will you be even-handed and dismiss all of the Mirrors' points if something was innacurate?

Laughs at the reasoning that because of one simple error, you discount the whole of Whitey's argument. So will you be consistent and discount the whole of that Mirror crap article on the basis of the several holes that can be picked in it?

Yes, apologies for the error, as you say, I meant the Labour, Lib/Dem MPs (plus of course the other minor parties, the nationalists), elected in Scotland, Wales, NI.

And of course, if you extrapolate the votes for either of the other two parties in the same way, the situation becomes that the electorate would want either of them even less.

Prompted by something on another thread, I can revise my post a couple above. Cameron can say that yes, he acknowledges that Electoral Reform is long overdue. He will promise to hold referenda on the the main issues that are a major concern of the electorate and the Lib/Dems and Labour parties. There will be a referendum on the reform of the voting system in its entirety, exploring the preference for the status quo, or whether it should single transferable vote or proportional representation. Simultaneously, also one on the membership of the EU Another on whether England should have a separate Parliament exclusively for MPs of English constituencies, to vote on matters that affect only England. By all means another on what mechanism there should be for the upper chamber. Naturally, to save money, they would be all have to be voted on at one time. I suspect that at this time of crisis and other more important matters to deal with, the appetite for this package of referenda and all it would entail in parliamentary debating time, the true expression of democracy that it would embrace would somehow evaporate.

Nail on the head. The Union is farcical when Scotland, Wales and NI have their own Parliaments/Assemblies and the English do not have one exclusively for English matters. Take away the Labour/ Lib/Dem MPs from this last election and there would be absolutely no doubt at all which party the clear majority of English wanted to govern England.

The solution is easy on this. Sir Humphrey would be proud of me having the imagination to think of it. All the Conservatives need to do, is to suggest that while they are having the referendum on voting reform, for reasons of economy in these straightened financial times, we could hold the referendum on whether we remain in the EU or not at the same time. I wonder how strong the clamour on this issue would be then?

You're usually much more objective in your posts. I took the trouble to spend a couple of minutes researching the background of both Caroline Nokes and John Denham before they became MPs. It seems that their career paths are almost identical, both having worked for charities and become councillors. Therefore, being equally objective (or not), I could say that until he became an MP, Denham had hardly seen a days hardship in his life either.

"Hello, good to see you. How old are you, little boy? Which football team do you support? This is a good shop, isn't it? It has many products on the shelf, hasn't it?" And this is the chat from our Prime Minister, the head of the Government that has been running the country rather badly these past thirteen years. I must point out that it wasn't just aimed at juveniles either; it was his repertoire to adults as well. Thank God that we have got rid of him, unless he cosies up to the equally incompetent Lib/Dems. But that won't be lasting for long, neither would any other pact. You'll soon have your chance to vote again.

Well, I don't think that you came up with anything yet that could be classified as morally reprehensible about Cameron. The decision on the Iraq war was taken by Labour with Conservative support and it is easy to be wise with the benefit of hindsight as to whether it was justified or not. I still think it was. Which policy statements are less well thought out than those of the Lib/Dems? As far as I'm concerned, the most woolly Lib/Dem policy is on immigration and I think that Brown and Cameron exposed its weaknesses to the extent that many made up their minds about the Lib/Dems credibility on that. The proposal to give an amnesty to illegal immigrants who had been here over a decade, was as they both said, an invitation for many more to be encouraged to come here, knowing that after a decade they could stay. As for the proposal that immigrants be spread more evenly throughout the country so as not to put undue strain on the local resources of housing, health and education, the idea sounds at first glance to be commendable. Until that is, one stops to consider how it could possibly be administered. Exactly how do you keep an immigrant, say in Penzance, when he really wants to be close to others from his country of origin who might be concentrated into a community, say in Leicester? I was amazed to find from an AOL poll a few days ago that the number one issue in this election by some distance, was not the economy or Health, but Immigration. If that was correct, then it is possible that might be the reason for the Lib/Dems poor showing, when once it had looked so promising for them.

I'm perfectly capable of standing my ground against leftie teachers, Dune. But thanks for your concern.

I'm sure that Clegg is a big enough boy to look after himself. He certainly had as expensive and good an education as Cameron did. The superficiality of the television debate is to blame for the other two leaders ganging up on him and Clegg made the most of the opportunity to be on the same stage as the other two, on an equal footing with them. So his boyish good looks and his ability to be all things to all men because he was unlikely to poll the majority vote, gave him an advantage over all other previous Lib/Dem or Liberal leaders. He was able to stand aloof from the other two arguing amongst themselves which was in his favour, as they did not place him or his party's policies under the spotlight. When Clegg's performance gave the Lib/Dems a real surge in the polls, then it was not unexpected that the other two parties would seek to put him down. He would have expected it and knows that if one can't stand the heat in the kichen, one shouldn't be in politics. It isn't even as if they are innocent as a party of these things, urging tactical voting to achieve their own ends. There are some newspapers that blow the trumpet for the Conservatives, but Clegg had his fair share of good publicity from left-leaning publications too. Some of the electorate are dumb enough to vote Labour because that bald-headed geezer from East Enders told them to do so. I can't think of any celebrities who urged the voters to switch to the Lib/Dems, but the usual media lefties gave Cameron a hammering. I don't see that anything you have written illustrates any dubious morality on the part of Cameron. Perhaps you ought to dig a little deeper. As far as I'm concerned, those are all perfectly justifiable positions to hold on those issues if those are his beliefs. You might not agree with them, but they are not matters that are morally reprehensible. And yes. Good healthy political debate.

I'm of the same mind with most of this.

Thanks for pointing this out to Thorpe-Le-Saint, Patrick. Certainly for a teacher his comprehension from reading is poor, isn't it? So answer my question, Thorpe-Le-Saint. I know that your pupils are little angels, but assuming that you were teaching in a school that did have problem children disrupting a class and being abusive, how would you deal with it?

Abslutely amazingly accurate. Just 2 up on what the Conservatives actually got, Labour got 3 more than predicted and the Lib/Dems two less than predicted. There are still two results yet to be declared apparently, so it could be even closer. When the exit poll results were shown at 10 pm last night, people were amazed at the Lib/Dem prediction, but it seems that it was actually over optimistic.

So give us chapter and verse about where Cameron has lacked morals. So the Lib/Dems failed to make the breakthrough because of the nasty Tory press? You have a very low opinion of the intelligence of the electorate.

This piece I called one-sided simplistic claptrap. It is so obviously taken from some Ra-Ra Labour publication. As it wasn't written by you, why would you be offended by that?

Brilliant cut and paste job. Where did you find this one-sided simplistic clap-trap? It would be easy to pull it apart over several of those claims, but I'm tired from staying up late and really can't be arsed.