Huguenot

I have no interest in the outcome of elections, I am interested in them being fair and representative. I live in a country that is considerably further to the right than the Tory party. I see no reason why 'a start to set right...' could be hyperbole? It's the implication that we're on the beginning of a very long road to electoral reform. I don't suggest that we've made it, or that AV achieves all those goals in isolation. To fail to address this would be to remian exactly where we were in 1928. Whilst that may appeal to elderley autocrats dreaming of a non-existent glorious past era, it bears no relation to the complex modern multicultural world economy that we live in.

Copy & Paste? How terribly sophisticated! ;-)

Change of tactic silverfox? Now you've accepted it's not complex you're claiming it's boring. It's not of course, the opportunity to start to set right a massive injustice perpetrated by generations of self-serving career politicians is one of the most exciting opportunities the UK has had for years. It's a chance to have a political leadership that is required to get the endorsement of the electorate, that seeks consensus rather than partisanship, that rids us of the 'jobs for life' mentality, that strengthens the link with the constituency, limits the influence of extremism and that lessens the scourge of 'winners and losers' that taints our national cohesion. It would require a particular hatred of fellow Britons to see that as boring.

This thread should be in 'About this forum'. This section is for ED issues. If you'd like to see threads about things other than ED issues then visit the other sections. You show staggering arrogance that you think the forum should be reorganised to fit around the fact that you can't be bothered to go to the lounge. I'll be reporting the thread and I hope Admin does the sensible thing.

That's not true silverfox. All your points have been answered. You're deliberately trying to make it seem confusing, but it's not. These 'questions' are completely dishonest. You're not this stupid. You mentioned earlier that you were prepared to keep calling a recount in an election to prevent the election being completed. You are continuing to 'spoil' this thread. You have nothing constructive to add.

Ha ha, there are many levels of darkness on threads. Some of the more dispiriting are to be found those that have a direct impact on our lives. This often involves local planning activity, services, regulation or political decisions I tend to find irascibility or short-temperedness to be rather trivial compared with the major crimes of dishonesty, misrepresentation, exploitation or manipulation. Clearly if one is trying to commit one of the latter crimes, then armed with crocodile tears one could perceive bad temperedness to be so much more offensive. Either way, 'real life issues' are going to attract a lot more passion than hypothetical musings.

I think the point is Charlotte, that if you want one, then you need to organise it yourself along with the appropriate permissions. All James can help you do is get the road closure, for the rest of it you need to knock on a few doors and create your own team.

By the way, there's been a lot of chat about defending 'Metropolitan Open Land' However, it's a clear part of the Mayor's strategy that this should be used for sports or leisure facilities.

Ah well murphy, it may have escaped you, but this is a public chat forum not a planning hearing. It's a place to share views and opinions. I probably wouldn't protest too much about the counterpoints placed on this thread by people who disagree with you. Instead I would celebrate that it has helped you clarify your position, and reminded you that the planning committee are generally unlikely to be swayed by the list of supposed grievances you have against Alleyns. I'm genuinely shocked at the amount of irrational abuse aimed at the school. There are many things worth complaining about in the world, but a school trying to provide sporting facilites for children up to 6.30pm isn't one of them. And on that subject, I'm both entitled to my opinion, and justified in sharing it with you.

No silverfox. I believe you're deliberately trying to make it seem confusing, but it's not. To be honest, I genuinely think this 'question' is completely dishonest. You're not this stupid. You mentioned earlier that you were prepared to keep calling a recount in an election to prevent the election being completed. Here I believe that you are continuing to 'spoil' this thread. You have nothing constructive to add. There are no extra votes. This is an election by preference. Initially people were asked their preference amongst all four candidates. People who voted were D or C had their candidate eliminated. Their preference was identified amongst the remaining candidates. THESE ARE NOT SECOND VOTES. THEIR SINGLE VOTE IS A REQUEST TO LIST THEIR CANDIDATES IN ORDER OF PREFERENCE. If they said they had no preference beyond the first candidate then they lost their influence. If they had a preference the it was applied appropriately because this is representative democracy. Their vote counts. This is representation.

Eh what? It's actually you that's trying to dress up reality with your talk of multiple voting and stealing from shopkeepers. A preference is not an additional vote. Unpopular candidates are excluded from the process, and all the votes are redistributed according to preference. For those whose candidate remains in the process, the vote is reapplied back to their candidate, it's not discarded. AV gives you representative democracy. FPTP gives you minority government and a disenfranchised electorate.

Extordinary hyperbole from both EDfor and Murphy. At least EDfor tried to keep his/her observations somewhat to the issue itself, whereas Murphy launched into flights of fancy and personal attacks. To remind us all, this is a question of lighting on an existing all weather surface to 6.30pm on winter nights only. Most of you won't even be home from work by then. There have been extended surveys into light pollution that at 1-2 lux is decidedly unthreatening. The rest of the time the lighting columns are barely visible through the treeline. It's hardly Dulwich Hamlet football ground is it?? The response has been a catalogue of unrelated greivances and misinformation. I trust the council will take the only reasonable conclusion that the complaints are weak and the benefits to the children paramount.

"They will be able [to use my site] to search out other members who are building lifeboats within 10 kilometres of where they live..." That one's a beauty.

There's nothing really to address. He's taken some rather obvious points like natural diasters having an economic impact and blown them out of all proportion. He's a little bit late to be talking about economic disaster anyway - we've just had one of those. Sure productivity will be affected, but then conversely rebuidling efforts will help drive comnercial growth in the medium term. 25% of UK firms have recruited since the beginning of the year, the US has generated 500,000 jobs in the same period. Despite Mr. Ruppert's convctions, these (and the rest of the wordl) are not all reliant on Japanese components. He's mainly obsessed with automotive because it's a US cultural meme.

It doesn't appear to have much environmental impact physically. The light stands are tiny. It's only illumninated until 6.30, so hardly an eyesore. I certainly don't think the school can do what it wants, instead I think this is an overreaction on behalf of some people based on rumour and incorrrect information, and some sort of worry about a nebulous futurecrime. On that basis I think the school's request isn't unreasonable. I like schools, I look sports, and I like schools to be able to provide sports facilities. It's great for our society.

New World Order, 9/11, Pearl Harbour, Kennedy Assassination, Obama is an alien...

Ha ha, more fool you if you make decisions about the democratic future of your country based on sulking over a disagreement on a web forum. :) I read your post well thank you, and I'm perfectly equipped to recognise both explicit and implicit suggestions that you are making. You implied that such extreme views have diffficulty taking root because of FPTP, and that AV would somehow make this more likely. I have simply pointed out that those assertions have no basis in truth nor evidence that would support them. In fact it's a regular myth perpetuated by anti-AV campaigners. The challenge with diuscussing AV is that its benefits are clearly and honestly demonstrated. Conversely the case against AV is disingenuous and deliberately untrue. Here's some of those myths exposed: You'll notice that most of them have already been presented by either you or silverfox as 'truths'. Myth 1) AV is too confusing Few people would be confused by this. Voters put a ?1? by their first choice, a ?2? by their second choice, a ?3? by their third choice and so on. The logic?s familiar enough to anyone who?s ever asked a friend to pop down to the shops for a coke and said, ?If they?re out of that I?ll have a lemonade.? Some people have a very low estimation of the British public. Myth 2) AV helps the extremists extend their influence The BNP have already called on their supporters to back a ?No? vote. Currently because MPs can get elected with support from less than 1 in 3 voters, there is always a risk that extremist parties can get in. The BNP have learnt this lesson, and have used it to scrape wins in town halls across Britain. With AV, no-one can get elected unless most people back them. Therefore the risk of extremist parties getting in by the back door is eliminated. Myth 3) AV is an untried experiment AV is a tried and tested system. In Britain millions of people in businesses, charities, and trade unions already use it. Political parties use it to elect their leaders. MPs themselves use it to elect their Speaker and their officials. When politicians are the voters ? when they are electing their own leaders ? AV is the system they choose. When you need a real winner who needs to speak for the majority AV is the go-to system. Myth 4) AV means some people get two votes No. With AV everyone gets one vote. The difference is that AV gives you a vote that really counts and more of a say on who your local MP is. If your first choice gets knocked out your vote is transferred to your second preference. Whether you just vote 1 for your favourite candidate or list a preference for every candidate on the ballot only one vote will be counted. If you go to the chip shop, and order cod and chips but they are out of cod, and you choose pie and chips instead, you have still only had one meal. Myth 5) AV means more hung parliaments No. Hung parliaments are no more likely with AV. And as you might have noticed First Past the Post has not given Britain any special immunity to hung parliaments. Britain has experienced hung parliaments in the 1920s, 1970s and in 2010, and had periods in the 1950s, 1960s and 1990s where a single party was unable to effectively govern alone. Canada, which uses First Past the Post, has permanent hung parliaments. Australia uses AV, and has returned its first hung parliament in 38 elections. Hung parliaments occur if enough voters support a third party. AV gives voters a greater say over candidates in their constituency. How they vote is up to them. Myth 6) AV means more tactical voting No. AV simply eliminates the need for it. Why should we have to abandon the party we actually support, to prevent the party we least support getting in? The dilemma facing millions of voters is often characterised as the choice between ?voting with your head or your heart?. AV allows people to do both. AV offers an honest vote. It gives everyone a chance to vote sincerely for the candidates they really want knowing their vote can go further. Myth 7) AV weakens the constituency link No. AV keeps the link and makes it stronger. Politicians like to talk about their constituency link. And a lot of them seem to enjoy it a lot more than the voters. Many of our MPs currently have a pretty dodgy link to their constituents. Barely a third of MPs can speak for the majority of their voters. AV strengthens the link by giving people the MPs they actually voted for. AV forces complacent MPs to take heed of the interests of their constituents because their jobs depend on it. Myth 8) AV forces you to give a second preference No. You can vote for as few or as many candidates as you like. AV gives you the freedom to vote sincerely for any number of candidates you feel are up to the job. You aren?t forced to vote for any candidate you don?t want. If you only want to support one candidate you can. Just mark an ?X? as you did before. Myth 9) AV means you end up with the least worst candidate No. First Past the Post just lets in winners that most of voters didn?t want. AV ensures a winning candidate has to work harder and go further to secure support from a majority. That?s what?s needed to be ?best?, and may explain why politicians are so keen on AV when electing their own? When Hollywood recently dumped First Past the Post for AV, they didn?t change the wording on the statuette to Academy Award for Least Worst Picture. They wanted a ?Best Picture? winner that could deliver on that promise.

To answer one of Loz's questions earlier... Approximately 2/3 of our current MPs were elected with a minority (i.e. less than 50% supporting them). If that's not a massive fraud perpetrated on the British public, I don't know what is.

Ha ha, unlike in the silverfox household, universal suffrage was introduced in 1928. Every time you say something you give a little bit away about your core beliefs ;-) As with universal suffrage, AV is about a fairer more representative system not tubthumping Victorians. It is important to note that AV only offers 1 person 1 vote. So silverfox is bullshitting again. Here's a smart summary I saw: The difference is that AV gives you a vote that really counts and more of a say on who your local MP is. If your first choice gets knocked out your vote is transferred to your second preference. Whether you just vote 1 for your favourite candidate or list a preference for every candidate on the ballot only one vote will be counted. If you go to the chip shop, and order cod and chips but they are out of cod, and you choose pie and chips instead, you have still only had one meal.

There is nothing cofusing about AV. If your first preference doesn't get enough support, your next preference receives your vote. Simple, and many thanks for the chance to highlight its simplicity once more. Loz is perfectly correct in saying that you can't apply the results of a FPTP election to a hypothetical AV election (as Marmora Man tries to do). FPTP is dominated by tactical voting - some commentators claim that as much as 20% of voters don't vote for their first preference. In that sense FPTP is much more opaque and complicated than AV. In FPTP people are having to choose candidates that they don't want on the basis of complex mathematical predictions and counts of other people's behaviour. By contrast the simplicity of AV is astounding. It allows voters to be both honest and transparent.

Why would anyone say that katienumbers? Piersy was not only thinking for himself, but pointing out that he wasn't convinced of the merit in quoting other people.

You make some extraordinary claims there Marmora Man. What's more, they've aready been made and refuted. Being governed by a minority elected politican is by no means 'common decency', in fact it's a venal rip off. AV is currently in use in several countries including Australia and has not resulted in fascists or marxists taking hold. There has been no 'conciliation of minorities' leading to weak policies. Australia's immigration policies are much stronger than the UK's. In fact AV creates a stronger mandate for politicians allowing them to be more 'decisive'. The issue with your list of 'problems' is that they were all generated under FPTP, not the Alternative Vote. Hence in listing them you've demonstrated the failings of FPTP not AV. Incidentally, I am deeply troubled by what you 'want' in politicians. In fact your description of a militaristic leader immune to the needs of his electorate is profoundly undemocratic. I'm consequently even more convinced that supporters of FPTP don't want democracy, they want power. silverfox's comments are simply nonsense. But somewhat ugly in the sense that it is just so many more lies about 'complex mathematics'. Why are you lying silverfox?

By the sounds of it they have been organised by the residents of those roads?

There will also be precedent on the pre 6.30pm noise pollution since they undoubtedly play outdoor sports there until that time in the summer.

That has nothing to do with AV silverfox. More nonsense. Whether it's FPTP or AV you may not have demonstrated a preference for the final winner, so you may not get what you want. However, unlike FPTP, AV allows voters to nominate other preferences if their first choice candidate has insufficient support. Regardless of the cretinous parrot example, your insistence that you don't accept votes 'for the greater utilitarian good' (the entire essence of majority rule) reveals how profoundly undemocratic your position is.