Stephen

The Independent Network did endorse 47 candidates in the election and there were others, including one in Wansbeck - so they were there, but people didn't vote for them. For some people it's about electing an individual as your local MP, for others it's about voting for a manifesto for the country. IMO a voting system should try its best to let people do both.

Well STV is probably the most complex to count, but it isn't hard to vote. If Northumberland was a 4-member STV constituency, then you would have four Labour candidates, four Conservatives, four Lib Dems etc and would vote for all your preferred candidates in order of preference, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 etc So if you lived in Wansbeck and wanted to vote Labour but preferred that someone other than Ian Lavery got elected, you could vote for the other 3 Labour candidates first and him 4th, and keep going for as long as you cared. The result would probably be the most popular Labour, Conservative and Lib Dem candidates being elected and perhaps another Labour candidate - I reckon in this election it would have been Ronnie Campbell, not sure about the Conservative as there were no incumbents, Alan Beith, and A.N.Other. They would all be our MPs and we could choose whichever one we wanted to represent us if we had any issues we wanted them to take up. The biggest drawback (unless of course you are against proportional voting on principle) is the number of names on the ballot paper.

What the BBC are calling Proportional Representation above is really the List system, I suppose you could call it 'Pure PR'. We have a form of it in European elections at regional level, and I would strongly oppose this at a nationwide level as it gives all the power to the political parties to choose the candidates at the top of the list who would almost certainly get elected. Lib Dem policy is for Single Transferable Vote, and funnily enough this is also the policy of Conservative Action for Electoral Reform. This is currently in use for most elections in Northern Ireland (except Westminster), and council elections in Scotland. Also, I never realised until I read the Conservative site that it was in use in multi-member University seats in Westminster elections until University seats were abolished in 1950. Additional Member System is the one used for the Scottish Parliament. I think it's not a bad idea as you can vote for someone as your local MP based on the person concerned, and cast a different vote for the party you would like to have most seats. Alternative Vote isn't proportional, but it would mean every MP needed the support of at least 50% of their electorate, and would put an end to tactical voting. This was the system the Labour party were proposing until 10.01pm last Thursday when they appeared to convert to AV+, similar to the Additional Member System.

There aren't enough Labour and Lib Dem MPs in total to form a majority government, so a coalition would have to include the SNP and Plaid Cymru to scrape home, and Plaid wanted an extra £300 million a year spending in Wales. My feeling is that there isn't enough agreement on policy between the Lib Dems and the Conservatives though, and I think that a minority Conservative government with say, a 2 year stability deal not to bring down the government or oppose a budget within certain limits might be the most likely outcome. The Lib Dems weren't calling for spending cuts as big as the Conservatives' in this first term (there will have to be more cuts after the next election though again whoever wins it) but that probably means there would be some agreement in the first few years. The devil would be in the details.

What a dreadful thought!

Being a bit pedantic here I know but John Major didn't get the biggest share of the vote, he got the largest number of votes - over 14 million. I think Attlee got the largest share in post-war elections at 49.7% of the vote, but in 1945 that meant just under 12 million votes.

You mean the 0.9% over 100% that you get by adding 98.8% + 2.1%? Remember that not everyone who's born in the UK is white and not everyone in Wansbeck who's white was born in the UK. But then Bedlington was twinned with Mars for a brief period so you could be right.

Malcolm, I don't disagree with what you say about the Eurocrats but ultimately Greece is responsible for the terrible situation it is in and there is a lesson for the UK in this.

Reducing the tax paid by higher rate taxpayers = tax relief Reducing the tax paid by the lower paid = benefit So tell me, how high does your income have to be before a tax reduction is defined as tax relief instead of a benefit?

The Lib Dems have named £15bn of specific cuts initially including Child Trust Funds and a public sector pay cap, and said that more cuts are necessary (as the party believes the structural deficit is £70bn). You are right that there are no specific cuts identified for that yet although the party have said they will look at public sector pensions and the cost of replacing Trident. I do think all the parties should be open about the scale of deficit, whoever gets in will regret not doing so when they have to govern. But as NCC has found out, it's one thing to say we need to stop spending money we don't have, and another to actually name the things you'll have to cut.

This is a very interesting point. I've always been a bit sceptical of voting systems like the Scottish Parliament one which are a mixture of constituency MP elections plus a top-up to make the result proportional, as it means you have two types of MP. At the moment though how can people choose someone who they think would be the best local representative and put their area above party policy... while at the same time being able to choose between the party manifestos?

Don't know but Wansbeck constituency as a whole (i.e. the former Wansbeck district plus Morpeth) was 98.8% white at the time of the last census (2001) and 2.1% of people were born outside the UK.

This has to be a misunderstanding. Are they seriously saying that they can't find four streets from Hazelmere, Beaufront Park, Humford Way, Church Lane, Towers Close, Church Lane, the new bit of Bower Grange that aren't classed as disadvantaged (even if you don't count Nedderton, Hartford Bridge/Hall)? These statistics are usually done by council ward anyway, and I wonder if she meant only four wards in Bedlingtonshire?

West Bedlington Town Council has set up a 'Community Chest' scheme which gives local voluntary groups and organisations a chance to bid for funding. This might be to help establish a new group or to carry out extra activities that they wouldn't otherwise be able to do – e.g. sporting activities, arts, music or craft group, new equipment for a youth club – but these ideas will be coming from the community themselves. To qualify for an award the applicant must be able to demonstrate clearly that any funding from West Bedlington Town Council will benefit the Town, or residents of the Town. The rules and conditions are set out in the application form. There are two versions attached here - a Word document which can be filled in electronically or a PDF which you can print and fill in by hand. BedlingtonCommunityChest Application Form.doc BedlingtonCommunityChest Application Form.pdf

For a moment there (just for a moment) when I read Stevenson I thought you meant the former Wansbeck DC chief exec... I think it would help Bedlington Station a lot, not so much Bedlington town though there are some advantages to being part of a national network compared to a disparate system of bus timetables. We had an example on this site not so long ago of a potential visitor to Bedlington who just couldn't find out how to get here. Of course you also need to give people reasons to come in the first place. To be fair, it isn't mentioned though it is on the ABT line and SENRUG's proposal includes it. The main-line services don't stop more often at Morpeth because it would affect their timetables, and because they don't stop more often it makes Morpeth impractical for main-line travel. I travel by train a lot on business and even when I used to travel to Glasgow I had to drive to Newcastle to get a train that would go back through Morpeth, and probably stop there too... but getting a train back to your car left parked at Morpeth was another matter, and a taxi from Alnmouth to Morpeth station when you get stranded isn't cheap. There is a lot of travel on the Morpeth to Newcastle line though - it's one of the 10 most overcrowded services in the country - and I think the SENRUG idea of extending that line to Bedlington Station was a good one. If it hadn't had a new station with park and ride at Choppington added to it then I think the capital costs would have been far less (they were estimated at £5 million) and the annual subsidy of £50,000 is something that East Bedlington Parish Council could probably afford on its own.

I've always thought that Re-Open Nominations should be on the ballot paper so that if RON wins, there has to be a new election. There's a general assumption in politics that low turnout is down to apathy. No doubt some of it is, but if there was a 'none of the above' option that could make a real difference to the outcome, we'd see just how much is due to people not feeling they had anyone worth voting for.