Anybody who has worked in any sort of office job will be familiar with the phrase “death by powerpoint” to describe the arse-numbing boredom of sitting in one place while being subjected to a stream of bar charts and bullet points. This week I coined the phrase “death by democracy” when faced with a local […]
Entries Tagged as 'Elections'
Death by Democracy
July 13th, 2024 · No Comments · Life, Politics
Tags: Crawley Council·Elections·Labour
Politically engaged?
June 23rd, 2024 · No Comments · Politics
I’m still not sure whether I count as politically engaged. I always vote in general elections, which should put me in the top 70%. I also vote in local elections, which probably makes me more engaged than the 60% (?) who don’t. I belong to a political party which must indicate a fair level of […]
Tags: Elections
Glad all over
June 12th, 2017 · Comments Off on Glad all over · Politics
Now the election is finally done and I am not feeling so much “Glad all over” like the Dave Clark Five sang but “glad its all over”, and I’m sure I am not alone in that. There does seem to be a bit of election fatigue round here. Because we elect our borough council by […]
Tags: Elections
Double hats
May 24th, 2016 · Comments Off on Double hats · Politics
I have been meaning to moan about this for a long time now, and tonight I am going to do it. It is the topic of councillors who serve on both a borough/district and a county council.
Tags: Elections·Local Government
Painting the town red
May 9th, 2016 · Comments Off on Painting the town red · Politics
The recent election campaign was one I think I will remember for a long time. With Crawley council having a Labour majority of just one seat it was always going to be a fight to keep control. Of the thirteen seats involved, eight were seats we were defending. Two of them were wards where there […]
Tags: Crawley Council·Elections
Electile dysfunction
May 9th, 2015 · Comments Off on Electile dysfunction · Politics
The last day or so went by in a bit of a blur, with frantic last-minute campaigning, the election day stuff itself and then the two election counts and a disrupted sleep cycle. As I am not any sort of political expert, there is zero chance of me composing a reasoned and erudite essay about […]
Tags: Elections
Tactical voting
May 5th, 2015 · Comments Off on Tactical voting · Politics
Sky News were talking about websites that facilitate vote-swapping for people wanting to vote tactically this year, like VoteSwap and Swap My Vote. I have been lucky in that I have never lived anywhere that tactical voting would have applied for me, Labour has always been 1st or 2nd so a pro-Labour vote is the […]
Tags: Elections
A new MP for Horsham
February 1st, 2015 · Comments Off on A new MP for Horsham · Politics
Whatever happens in May, Horsham will have a new MP because Francis Maude has announced that he is standing down. It will be interesting to see who is chosen there because Horsham is the sort of place where the Tories can win easily even when their candidate is unpopular with many people because of blatant […]
Permutations
January 20th, 2015 · 1 Comment · Politics
All the so-called experts are poring over sets of inconsistent polls, trying to work out what might happen in the general election. Will the Lib Dems still be in a coalition with the Tories or would the Tories combine with UKIP? Might Labour have to form a coalition with the Greens and SNP and maybe […]
Tags: Elections
First past the post explained
October 29th, 2014 · Comments Off on First past the post explained · Politics
This is a bit annoying, because I happen to think that proportional representation would be a good thing, but I thought of a good analogy to explain how first past the post isn’t necessarily unfair if a party gets fewer votes but wins more seats. I should throw in the caveat that by ‘good’ I […]
