|
|
Post by lbarnes on Feb 18, 2018 14:16:19 GMT
I assume that's accounted for. Maybe the real point is that as a whole those 14 seats on Thursday were under-representative of the Lib Dem vote. Would love to see the source material and methodology. They were actually slightly over representitive. How so? |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Feb 18, 2018 15:12:36 GMT
They were actually slightly over representitive. How so? 8.1% 2017 vs 7.8 nationally |
|
thetop
Labour
[k4r]
Posts: 945
|
Post by thetop on Feb 18, 2018 18:13:15 GMT
That last stat is particularly meaningless given that the LibDems will have tended to stand only in their more promising areas anyway. . Maybe the real point is that as a whole those 14 seats on Thursday were under-representative of the Lib Dem vote. Would love to see the source material and methodology.He's just grabbed the guesstimates off electoralcalculus and toted them up in a spreadsheet. Here's Doncaster Central with the methodology section on how they derived those figures. It's "for fun", but completely unreliable because you're not starting from actual published results. |
|
|
|
Post by johnloony on Feb 18, 2018 18:52:24 GMT
I am going to disagree with JohnLooney about the AV counting. Firstly it is eminently sensible to let a computer do the counting. It is the only reason we got the result on the night. Secondly it is a human who decides how many significant figures the computer uses in the output of the results. The computer is exactly as sensible or stupid as the people who control it. Thirdly, once you have a computer doing the counting it costs nothing at all to complete the process to the last stage, and gives useful information to psephologists and entrants to competitions on local election results! Pursuing the last point, at stage 5, 247 Con votes transferred to SNP, but 1033 were non-transferable. Does anyone know what "non-transferable" means in his context? Does it mean "last or blank" or just "blank"? If the latter, then "last" is being treated differently to "blank". In which case, shouldn't electors be told? Non-transferable just means that the voter hasn't given a preference to the SNP candidate beyond the Conservative candidate. |
|
Foggy
Non-Aligned
Yn Ennill Yma
Posts: 6,140 
|
Post by Foggy on Feb 18, 2018 21:34:31 GMT
AFAIK electronic counting has never been used for the constituency vote (and probably not for the list vote either). There were lots of spoilt ballots in 2007 because that was the only time it was attempted to hold all-out council elections and a Scottish Parliament election on the same day, plus STV had only just been introduced for the former. Besides, Sturgeon won by a majority of 3.5% on that occasion – so, close but not that close – and had been banging on the door in that seat at the previous two Holyrood elections. Electronic counting was in fact used for all three ballots in Scotland 2007. It enabled very accurate notional results to be drawn up for the 2011 Holyrood election based on the polling station breakdown. Also, the 1999 and 2003 Holyrood elections were combined with all-out local elections.
Thanks for the correction about electronic counting. It's a pity that they didn't carry on with that arrangement, considering the detailed information we get from GLA elections – although it's not even down to polling station there, is it? I actually knew that local (FPTP) elections had been combined with Holyrood elections in 1999 and 2003 but just phrased my explanation very badly.  |
|
|
|
Post by La Fontaine on Feb 18, 2018 22:43:10 GMT
Pursuing the last point, at stage 5, 247 Con votes transferred to SNP, but 1033 were non-transferable. Does anyone know what "non-transferable" means in his context? Does it mean "last or blank" or just "blank"? If the latter, then "last" is being treated differently to "blank". In which case, shouldn't electors be told? Non-transferable just means that the voter hasn't given a preference to the SNP candidate beyond the Conservative candidate. Indeed, I think it must. So marking "5" out of 5 counts as "giving a preference". This means 1033 electors left the SNP blank, which I initially found hard to believe, but perhaps there really is such hostility towards them, or is it just normal in STV/AV elections for electors not to number everyone? |
|
Foggy
Non-Aligned
Yn Ennill Yma
Posts: 6,140
|
Post by Foggy on Feb 18, 2018 22:51:45 GMT
Non-transferable just means that the voter hasn't given a preference to the SNP candidate beyond the Conservative candidate. Indeed, I think it must. So marking "5" out of 5 counts as "giving a preference". This means 1033 electors left the SNP blank, which I initially found hard to believe, but perhaps there really is such hostility towards them, or is it just normal in STV/AV elections for electors not to number everyone? I think it probably is normal not to give full preferences where it isn't compulsory (Australia is a different matter), but there is definitely a strongly anti-separatist pattern of tactical preference flows in parts of Scotland at the moment too. |
|
|
|
Post by Davıd Boothroyd on Feb 18, 2018 22:52:28 GMT
There really is little point in numbering your last preference in an AV/STV election. It can't make any difference to who wins. The only reason could be to make the earlier preferences clear and to satisfy yourself you didn't miss out any of the candidates.
|
|
|
|
Post by AdminSTB on Feb 18, 2018 23:13:25 GMT
There really is little point in numbering your last preference in an AV/STV election. It can't make any difference to who wins. The only reason could be to make the earlier preferences clear and to satisfy yourself you didn't miss out any of the candidates. There's always spite, David, never forget spite. I was always very careful who I put last on some LibDem ballots - usually one Qassim Afzal after his 2001 performance. |
|
|
|
Post by Davıd Boothroyd on Feb 18, 2018 23:23:03 GMT
There really is little point in numbering your last preference in an AV/STV election. It can't make any difference to who wins. The only reason could be to make the earlier preferences clear and to satisfy yourself you didn't miss out any of the candidates. There's always spite, David, never forget spite. I was always very careful who I put last on some LibDem ballots - usually one Qassim Afzal after his 2001 performance. Hmm, interesting, but thinking about it I took the diametrically opposite view when filling out my ballot paper for the Cities of London and Westminster CLP selection. I made a point of giving positive preferences to six candidates, but no preference at all to one candidate whom I did not wish to be a Labour candidate under any circumstance. Not giving any preference seemed to me to be a bigger insult than putting this candidate seventh. |
|
Merseymike
Independent
Posts: 40,489
Member is Online
|
Post by Merseymike on Feb 18, 2018 23:25:26 GMT
There really is little point in numbering your last preference in an AV/STV election. It can't make any difference to who wins. The only reason could be to make the earlier preferences clear and to satisfy yourself you didn't miss out any of the candidates. There's always spite, David, never forget spite. I was always very careful who I put last on some LibDem ballots - usually one Qassim Afzal after his 2001 performance. He stood against Godsiff, didn't he? |
|
|
|
Post by andrew111 on Feb 18, 2018 23:39:04 GMT
I am going to disagree with JohnLooney about the AV counting. Firstly it is eminently sensible to let a computer do the counting. It is the only reason we got the result on the night. Secondly it is a human who decides how many significant figures the computer uses in the output of the results. The computer is exactly as sensible or stupid as the people who control it. Thirdly, once you have a computer doing the counting it costs nothing at all to complete the process to the last stage, and gives useful information to psephologists and entrants to competitions on local election results! Pursuing the last point, at stage 5, 247 Con votes transferred to SNP, but 1033 were non-transferable. Does anyone know what "non-transferable" means in his context? Does it mean "last or blank" or just "blank"? If the latter, then "last" is being treated differently to "blank". In which case, shouldn't electors be told? Some of those non-transferable votes will have transferred several times before reaching the Tories, and many will be Tory votes that transferred to eliminated candidates but did not reach the SNP. We also don't know how many transfers occurred before Tory votes reached the SNP. As pointed out by David, there is not actually any point numbering all the candidates but most voters will not realise that. Hence the small number of Tory transfers to SNP is probably an interesting reflection of the Unionist/Separatist divide that appears to be particularly important to Tories. |
|
|
|
Post by timrollpickering on Feb 18, 2018 23:40:23 GMT
Thanks for the correction about electronic counting. It's a pity that they didn't carry on with that arrangement, considering the detailed information we get from GLA elections – although it's not even down to polling station there, is it? No - just wards with the postal votes allocated to the whole borough. And for the City it's just split between on the days & postals. Of course for those the procedure for each ballot paper is the same - single cross - but did Scotland ever experiment with two votes on one ballot paper? (Also the system isn't always familiar to voters and can confuse people into thinking it's a "second vote" or second preference, especially if parties talk about it that way.) |
|
|
|
Post by johnloony on Feb 19, 2018 3:46:13 GMT
Indeed, I think it must. So marking "5" out of 5 counts as "giving a preference". This means 1033 electors left the SNP blank, which I initially found hard to believe, but perhaps there really is such hostility towards them, or is it just normal in STV/AV elections for electors not to number everyone? I think it probably is normal not to give full preferences where it isn't compulsory (Australia is a different matter), but there is definitely a strongly anti-separatist pattern of tactical preference flows in parts of Scotland at the moment too. In real life, most people give only a few preferences to candidates (perhaps 2 or 3 out of 5 or 6). When I was a member of the Electoral Reform Society, I usually voted in internal elections by listing preferences for all candidates from 1 to n. In later years I sometimes filled in from 1 to n-1, and then 666 for my least favourite candidate. One other prominent member who was fairly pedantic used to list preferences from 1 to n-1, but left the nth blank in order to emphasise the logic that the vote cannot ever be transferred to the nth preference (unless it is counted by a stupid Scottish computer). |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Feb 19, 2018 8:02:12 GMT
Some else who enjoys degrees of freedom
|
|
|
|
Post by timrollpickering on Feb 19, 2018 11:06:52 GMT
When I was a member of the Electoral Reform Society, I usually voted in internal elections by listing preferences for all candidates from 1 to n. In later years I sometimes filled in from 1 to n-1, and then 666 for my least favourite candidate. One other prominent member who was fairly pedantic used to list preferences from 1 to n-1, but left the nth blank in order to emphasise the logic that the vote cannot ever be transferred to the nth preference (unless it is counted by a stupid Scottish computer). When I was a student at Kent the SU had the odd rule that you could either vote for candidates or vote for Re-Open Nominations but couldn't transfer between the two. Add in a rule/assumption that the quota stayed the same throughout every round of AV and in some elections it led to odd timewasting results whereby RON was one of the last two and every ballot paper for candidates was transferred to either the remaining candidate or the no further pile. (Other odd rules: * If only one candidate stood/the same number of candidates for a multi-member post and it wasn't a sabbatical then they were declared elected without a contest. If more stood then there was a contest with RON as an option. * If fewer candidates stood than multi-member places available then it wasn't quite clear and in an election when it actually happened the original candidates were told multiple things - all elected nem com with a by-election for vacancies, a contest for all places if more candidates came forward, nominations automatically re-opened, no poll...) |
|
|
|
Post by lbarnes on Feb 19, 2018 12:36:17 GMT
8.1% 2017 vs 7.8 nationally 8.2% nationally, so slightly under-represented. |
|
|
|
Post by AdminSTB on Feb 19, 2018 12:51:25 GMT
There's always spite, David, never forget spite. I was always very careful who I put last on some LibDem ballots - usually one Qassim Afzal after his 2001 performance. He stood against Godsiff, didn't he? He did. He was a truly awful candidate, I laughed like a drain when he pissed off to join Galloway's mob last year. |
|
|
|
Post by East Anglian Lefty on Feb 19, 2018 13:42:44 GMT
Indeed, I think it must. So marking "5" out of 5 counts as "giving a preference". This means 1033 electors left the SNP blank, which I initially found hard to believe, but perhaps there really is such hostility towards them, or is it just normal in STV/AV elections for electors not to number everyone? I think it probably is normal not to give full preferences where it isn't compulsory (Australia is a different matter), but there is definitely a strongly anti-separatist pattern of tactical preference flows in parts of Scotland at the moment too. What's the evidence for it being a regional as opposed to a partisan pattern? The Conservative, and to a lesser extent Lib Dem, vote tends to transfer in an anti-separatist manner, but it looks to me like the Labour vote normally transfers at a low rate anyway, and more to the SNP than the Tories. |
|
|
|
Post by No Offence Alan on Feb 19, 2018 17:00:32 GMT
Well, you would say that, since the SGP are a wholly-owned subsidiary of the SNP. Genuine question, since the SGP at least theoretically operates according OMOV: do you think that our leadership is in some sense failing the membership and/or circumventing internal party democracy, or do you think I'm lying when I say that I voted Labour for Westminster last year, gave my second preference to the Labour candidate in last year's council election, and voted Labour in the constituency in 2016, and that we're actually all in on some kind of mass scam? I just get the impression the SGP are in a comfort zone and not really challenging the SNP on environmental issues. For example, where are the protests against all that fracked fuel being landed at Grangemouth? |
|
