Here it comes. Fascism couched in a velvet glove. The 1st thing this new govt does is make it more difficult to dissolve parliament. Oh, hey lets all believe that this is to protect the LibDems against the Tories calling an early election. That'll be the spin.
In reality, it closes the door to any effectuality that LibDem MPs would have by resigning the whip or crossing over to Labour.
The touted legislation takes it from a simple majority of 1 to about 32.5 votes necessary to bring this desperate crew back to the electorate before 2015. Yeah, 55% of MPs sounds insignificant enough, but in reality it flies directly in the face of the advertised, & lets have it right, fondly supported, policy of the majority of the Tory govt.
Yes, the Tories will campaign against anything but a simple majority in elections we can take part in, but will require an increase from 50.154%, ie a simple majority of 326 votes, to 55%, or just enough of the right leaning &/or power hungry LibDems that can prop them up when it all goes wrong.
Well, nevermind, no matter what disasters are fomented between now & then, you can guarantee that the bulk of the media (owned by Tories) will have some irrelevant issue to concentrate on from 2014 onwards. My bet is something to do with immigration, but by that stage, we'll be in such a mess that I wouldn't be surprised if they have to reach back in time to blame single mothers, travellers, er... medieval brigands (remember that?), ie anyone but those who have the money that has been made by the ongoing rip off since the early 70s.

One could argue it is to ensure stability, so that the whole thing won't collapse if (when?) Clegg and Cameron have a tiff.

Another thing is if they actually bring in a form of PR and have fixed term parliaments, this really becomes a moot point. With a PR system there will be a much more fractured parliament and this little rule could lend a stabalising hand to any future Government, without the fear a collection of small parties could ruin the whole thing.

Britian likes stable Government. I doubt we would tolerate the constant elections and new PM's every few months that some EU countries have. This helps that stability while not making it impossible to dispose of the Government, just harder.

Don't forget, Tory and LD MP's could rebel and go against the Whip, which would make the possibility of a vote of no confidence more likely to succeed anyhow.

It is a bit dramatic to make claims such as "fascist" and the like.

Scotland and wales have 66% threshhold,we cant blame the bad old etonians on that can we? lol

I can see your point,it doenst look that good to be honest but when you reflect our friends in wales and scotland have fixed terms and 66% it shows this is slightly better!

Originally posted by Bunken Drum
Here it comes. Fascism couched in a velvet glove.

Can you explain what you think fascism is. I don't think you really know what it is except as a general term to cover anything you don't agree with.

Originally posted by Bunken Drum
Oh, hey lets all believe that this is to protect the LibDems against the Tories calling an early election. That'll be the spin.

Actually, I believe the 55% majority vote to dissolve Parliament was a stipulation of the Liberal Democrats (according to Liberal Democrats' Simon Hughes MP on BBC Question Time) which would force stability and prevent the Conservatives forcing a new election.

Originally posted by Bunken Drum
Well, nevermind, no matter what disasters are fomented between now & then, you can guarantee that the bulk of the media (owned by Tories) ...

The "bulk of the media" is not owned by the Tories. In the dying days of the last (Labour) Government some national papers aligned themselves from Labour to Conservative and from Labour to Liberal. Care to enlighten what parts of the media are actually "owned" by the Tories.

Regards

Bunken Drum

It is a flawed principal that stability is more important than representation. We might just as well move to a single party state if stability through rigging the vote is the plan

I agree brother. I think its disgraceful how everything, from Europe, to the number of places (for our MP's) at Westminister is being reduced without a referendum.

It's becoming a everyday fact, of political reality that at some point in the last 30 years, the (overall) political character; of the majority of people, we send to Westminister; just assumed that we are in a democracy (whilst forgetting all about, what one acturally looks like!!!)

Originally posted by Bunken Drum

I believe the 55% majority vote to dissolve Parliament was a stipulation of the Liberal Democrats

I dont care who proposed it, its wrong. It would have been entirely possible to protect the LibDems from a snap election by a fixed term parliament alone. All that would be necessary would be to prevent the govt from calling an election in the meantime, so that only dissatisfaction in the House could trigger an early election.

I agree with you that a change to the majority figure is totally wrong.
It's a basic principle of the constitution that the government needs to be able to get important measures through the Commons- including, crucially, the Budget, without which no government can operate.

Is the idea supposed to be that the government could be defeated on a Budget vote by a 51% vote- and then try to stay in power? That would be absurd. It would be unworkable. The straight majority has got to stay.

This country is disgusting. The law, the lawmakers, the politicians, the judges, the lords, the royals, all of them need to be eliminated so we can perhaps start again making sure we learn from all their evils, and maybe then this country can be good once again. But as long as the same twisted corrupt people who have destroyed this country run it, we are all screwed.

Originally posted by paraphi
The "bulk of the media" is not owned by the Tories. In the dying days of the last (Labour) Government some national papers aligned themselves from Labour to Conservative and from Labour to Liberal. Care to enlighten what parts of the media are actually "owned" by the Tories.

Regards

Well, it's daft to say that any media is "owned" by a political party, but all the same, media organisations are owned by people in business and they tend to be driven by politics generally. Murdoch's News International covers the Times, Sunday Times and the News of the Screws as well as the Soar away Currant Bun. Arguably, beneath the populist veneer which swings from government to government, it could be said that the Sun and the News of the World have been right of centre for a very long time.

The Torygraph and the Sunday Torygraph speak for themselves. Whilst the Daily Hate (gotta love those 'sturdy young Nazis' headlines!) and it's Sunday sister have been right wing since their inceptions.

The Daily Diana Express, whilst less right wing as the Mail, Telegraph, Times et al is still self-identifies with the right wing. The Daily Star, for all it's comic-ness, is actually fairly right wing politically and is from the same stable as the Express papers.

The Independent has always been a centrist mixed bag with left wing and right wing editorials and has had, historically, a large Liberal Democrat readership. It also once said it would, if it could as a newspaper, vote Green.

The Daily Mirror is even harder to get a handle on politically as it's been all over the place since it started but whilst it had a massive working class readership in the 1960s, it's probably best described as 'populist' or at a push, left of centre than genuinely out and out left wing.

The Guardian famously switched from supporting New Labour to the Liberal Democrats this election, although, I think this had been on the cards for a while.

I think that's all the mainstream papers. I don't think I've left any out but I've done this off the top of my head, so apologies if I've missed any out.

Anyway, so out of all that lot, is there much that isn't in bed with the Tories? On top of that, throw in Murdoch's SKY bollocks and the fact that for the last few years the BBC's lead on politics used to be the leader of the Conservative Youth faction and it pretty much dismisses any ideas that the media in this country is some namby-pamby New Labour-loving, yoghurt-knitting socialism fest. Not that you're saying that of course, but it's a view that I see time and time again.