The Reform Thread

[iansums]

25 minutes ago, sadoldgit said:

A bit of light relief. I’ll start.

The Racist’s Retreat

Don’t worry, you’d be banned anyway.

[iansums]

4 minutes ago, Gloucester Saint said:

1974 Mk2. Oh hang on, Saints got relegated that year as well…

Two elections in one year, remember it well.

[egg]

10 minutes ago, Lord Duckhunter said:

Starmer withdrew the whip from people who voted against maintaining the two child benefit cap. A policy they opposed in opposition and promised to abolish. So you’re making MP’s who actually didn’t deceive the public face a bye election because A PM who did, decided they should. 
 

 

If for a sustained period an MP loses the whip, they cease to represent that party, so should face a bye election. They can then stand as an independent, and if their constituents want them, they're back in. A sustained period could be, say, 6 months which is more than long enough for a party to decide if it wants an MP back in the fold. 

[Gloucester Saint]

7 minutes ago, iansums said:

Two elections in one year, remember it well.

1976 would have been better from a football perspective…summer certainly a hot one.

Sadly the JPT is closest I got to seeing them win a major trophy and I’m not far off 50.

[hypochondriac]

19 minutes ago, egg said:

Surely it'd be a Reform/Tory coalition with a slim majority? Grim prospect, but sell the point that Farage is an English Trump, and people will hopefully come to their senses. 

They'd be short of a majority on those projected figures I think. 

[sadoldgit]

32 minutes ago, egg said:

Interesting. An MP is usually voted due to the party they represent rather than who the are as an individual, so I'm very much of the view that if they defect them have a bye election. Ditto if they lose the whip for a sustained period. 

It’s a no brainer. The party candidates campaign on their party’s manifesto. No one voted Honest Bob in on the Reform manifesto. If that is what they want now they should vote for it.

Duckie would soon change his tune if his local MP defected to the Sharia Law Party.

Back to the pub

The Failed Tories Return

The Migrants End

 

 

Edited 7 hours ago by sadoldgit

[The Kraken]

4 minutes ago, egg said:

If for a sustained period an MP loses the whip, they cease to represent that party, so should face a bye election. They can then stand as an independent, and if their constituents want them, they're back in. A sustained period could be, say, 6 months which is more than long enough for a party to decide if it wants an MP back in the fold. 

In general I agree with you. Duck makes a reasonable point though, it’s not quite that cut and dried. But I do believe that if you voluntarily leave the party to defect to another then it should trigger a by-election. But I’m sure there would still be more loopholes to be found.

[Lord Duckhunter]

People moan about MP’s being lobby fodder so what’s going to happen if they face by elections if they’ lose the whip. That’s one way to get MP’s to vote on party lines & stop independent thinking. 
 

If MP’s want to stand in a by elections as Carswell & Reckless did, that’s great. If they don’t, like Soubry & Gove didn’t, that’s up to them, they’ll face the electorate eventually. I don’t recall Soggy calling for Corbyn to face a by election…

Edited 7 hours ago by Lord Duckhunter

[The Kraken]

An extremely simplistic response would be…..If you voluntarily leave the party, it’s a by election. If you get the whip taken away, you can stay put as an MP but only as an independent. Granted, if the “independent” does a Jenrick and gets themself sacked then they’re just going to follow the line of the party they want to join, so it’s a bit of a worthless move. So I’ll just remain being Peter O’hanrahanrahan, I don’t like it but I’ll have to go along with it.

Edited 6 hours ago by The Kraken

[Holmes_and_Watson]

Although we say we're going to vote for party x, y or z isn't it the case that we're technically voting for a candidate? They may represent one party, and voters may vote on that basis. But they are actually voting for that person. So, if they no longer represent that party, they are still the winning candidate. Therefore, there's no requirement for a by-election.

For similar reasons to Kraken and LD, it's not perfect, but I'm okay with it. 

 

[The Kraken]

20 minutes ago, Holmes_and_Watson said:

Although we say we're going to vote for party x, y or z isn't it the case that we're technically voting for a candidate? They may represent one party, and voters may vote on that basis. But they are actually voting for that person. So, if they no longer represent that party, they are still the winning candidate. Therefore, there's no requirement for a by-election.

For similar reasons to Kraken and LD, it's not perfect, but I'm okay with it. 

 

Technically, yes.  Realistically, absolutely not in the majority of cases.

You would have to be really engaged in local politics to know what your local MP is all about and how they’ll go about it.  Given how much the main parties whip their MPs to just vote per party policies, there’s not too many Dennis Skinners around any more who vote with their principles first. I’d not trust any MP aligned to a major party to vote their own wishes first, they’ll get booted out before that.

It would be great if every single vote in parliament were down to the MP but it’s a sad reality that we are miles away from that, and have been for ages. I’m ok with it only in that I can’t do much about it.