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Post by Devil Wincarnate on Feb 11, 2020 15:47:47 GMT
In the 1999 elections to the Scottish Parliament, Fergus Ewing was elected MSP for Inverness East, Nairn & Lochaber, his wife Margaret was elected in the neighbouring Moray constituency (having been the MP since 1987), and his ma Winnie was elected from the Highlands & Islands regional list (which covered both IENL and Moray, and the area for which she had been MEP between 1979 and the month after that Holyrood election). And Fergus’ sister Annabelle has represented Cowdenbeath since 2016. And not to forget their cousins Jock and Ellie who exercised quite considerable economic power in Texas and parts of California.
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Post by Davıd Boothroyd on Feb 11, 2020 16:03:34 GMT
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Post by finsobruce on Feb 11, 2020 16:05:44 GMT
And Fergus’ sister Annabelle has represented Cowdenbeath since 2016. And not to forget their cousins Jock and Ellie who exercised quite considerable economic power in Texas and parts of California. Arf.
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Post by Devil Wincarnate on Feb 11, 2020 16:07:51 GMT
A FF-FG-Indy coalition under Insert Name of Healy-Rae seems to have the numbers!
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The Bishop
Labour
Down With Factionalism!
Posts: 36,656
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Post by The Bishop on Feb 11, 2020 17:42:09 GMT
I'm against Ireland being in an international section. There should be a British Isles section to cover it. Nice trolling
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right
Conservative
Posts: 16,930
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Post by right on Feb 11, 2020 17:47:09 GMT
A FF-FG-Indy coalition under Insert Name of Healy-Rae seems to have the numbers! Fianna Fail, Sinn Fein and the Greens (or at a push the Social Democrats) could get through. Any Fine Gael coalition would need quite a few independents - although there are enough of those to go around.
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Post by greenhert on Feb 11, 2020 18:13:12 GMT
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Post by greenhert on Feb 11, 2020 18:17:13 GMT
A FF-FG-Indy coalition under Insert Name of Healy-Rae seems to have the numbers! An independent Taoiseach is certainly within the realms of possibility if they want to form a coalition that excludes Sinn Fein. But I can tell you that neither of the Healy-Raes would make a good Taoiseach in a million years!
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Richard Allen
Banned
Four time loser in VUKPOTY finals
Posts: 19,052
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Post by Richard Allen on Feb 11, 2020 18:28:44 GMT
A FF-FG-Indy coalition under Insert Name of Healy-Rae seems to have the numbers! An independent Taoiseach is certainly within the realms of possibility if they want to form a coalition that excludes Sinn Fein. But I can tell you that neither of the Healy-Raes would make a good Taoiseach in a million years! Thank you for that profound insight. I am sure that nobody on the forum could have reached such a conclusion without your help.
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mboy
Liberal
Listen. Think. Speak.
Posts: 22,396
Member is Online
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Post by mboy on Feb 11, 2020 19:32:07 GMT
It's important to remember that STV is *not* a proportional voting system. It is a preferencing system that tends to give increasingly proportional results as the number of seats grows. But in extreme cases, where a party gets no 2nd prefs and is just below the quota, it can give very disproportionate results. Having said that, even though this result produced the "wrong" winner, its overall proportionality was pretty good. Personally, I've gone off STV over the years (Lib Dems heresy!) and now favour regular MMP (my favourite is AV+, but that will never be implemented). AV+ was Garrett Fitzgerald's preferred system. He came to loathe STV (there's a forward, written by him, in one of the Nealon's Guides). That's superb trivia - how did you hear this? PS didn't you use to be yellow?
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right
Conservative
Posts: 16,930
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Post by right on Feb 11, 2020 19:35:27 GMT
AV+ was Garrett Fitzgerald's preferred system. He came to loathe STV (there's a forward, written by him, in one of the Nealon's Guides). That's superb trivia - how did you hear this? PS didn't you use to be yellow? Wasn't Fitzgerald quite a prominent sponsor of the ERG in the late 1980s?
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right
Conservative
Posts: 16,930
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Post by right on Feb 11, 2020 19:39:12 GMT
An independent Taoiseach is certainly within the realms of possibility if they want to form a coalition that excludes Sinn Fein. But I can tell you that neither of the Healy-Raes would make a good Taoiseach in a million years! Thank you for that profound insight. I am sure that nobody on the forum could have reached such a conclusion without your help. As the Irish system is built around retail politics, and the Healey Rae's are international standard retail politicians - sure they'd be grand.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Feb 11, 2020 23:26:33 GMT
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Post by Devil Wincarnate on Feb 12, 2020 0:07:53 GMT
Thank you for that profound insight. I am sure that nobody on the forum could have reached such a conclusion without your help. As the Irish system is built around retail politics, and the Healey Rae's are international standard retail politicians - sure they'd be grand. You laugh about retail, but has there ever been a better parody of modern Irish history than the story known as "Dunne's Stores"?
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Post by tiberius on Feb 12, 2020 0:19:38 GMT
I've heard that during multiple points in the 20th century FF mulled adopting First Past the Post. But they could never seriously bring themselves to seriously push it. They did push it... 1959 Referendum (narrow loss) then 1968 (big loss). Called it 'simple majority system'. Ah, so they did push it - and almost got it. You learn something new every day. the 1959 referendum going the other way would have made Irish politics unrecognizable.
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Tony Otim
Green
Suffering from Brexistential Despair
Posts: 11,350
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Post by Tony Otim on Feb 12, 2020 11:06:17 GMT
A FF-FG-Indy coalition under Insert Name of Healy-Rae seems to have the numbers! If FF and FG go into coalition rather than opposing each other, what reason would either have to exist anymore... Ps I do realise your suggestion is not entirely serious 😉
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Post by relique on Feb 12, 2020 11:37:37 GMT
Isn't there Carol Nolan (Laois-Offaly) missing ? Or is she put with Peadar Toibin (Aontu) into the penalty box because of her views on abortion ?
Edit: she is in the first sheet I believe but not in the second or third.
And I'm not sure in the first sheet we should tell that Marian Harkin is left. In the second, she's "centrist".
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obsie
Non-Aligned
Posts: 840
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Post by obsie on Feb 12, 2020 21:40:44 GMT
From the outside looking in... Has Varadkar’s grandstanding on Brexit and EU nationalism caused him any problems... Is it a lack of action on domestic affairs... Or a combination of each? As I said before: Varadkar's position on Brexit had cross-party political and societal support (barring a few crackpots on the hard right who were crushed in the election, and the Trots who reverse-ferreted on the issue). Arguably, it kept FG well afloat in public opinion until the Brexit issue was sorted (shades of Churchill 1945). What did for FG was their neglect and perceived indifference to domestic issues - health (waiting lists) and housing (an overheating local economy in Dublin meant that rentals went through the roof and new housing wasn't being built in sufficient numbers). With FF hobbled by confidence and supply for the last years, SF became the most plausible vehicle for the electorate's frustration this time. (I'm not convinced that their new level of support is sustainable.)
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Post by Devil Wincarnate on Feb 13, 2020 11:18:18 GMT
SF to meet the SocDems for discussions. The Provos and the Stickies back together.
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obsie
Non-Aligned
Posts: 840
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Post by obsie on Feb 13, 2020 13:45:54 GMT
SF to meet the SocDems for discussions. The Provos and the Stickies back together. Other than Murphy, the SocDems are either ex-Old-Labour (Shortall, O'Callaghan) or too young/recently politically-involved for the reference to make any sense (Gannon, Whitmore, Cairns).
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