adrock1976
Established Member
In the "Rail Operators call for leisure fares to increase" thread in the Fares Advice & Policy section, I replied to somebody who mentioned to express preferences at the ballot box of how to restructure the present fares system, which can be seen at the below link.
https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...eturns-to-increase.178399/page-5#post-3884395
Although I have focussed on voting patterns in Scotland for General Elections from 1979 onwards, I believe similar could be applied to Tyne & Wear, West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire, Merseyside, Greater Manchester, and the West Midlands (all former metropolitan County Council areas from 1974-86), West Glamorgan, South Glamorgan, Mid Glamorgan, and Gwent for Wales, in that most of the electorate did not get the government that they voted for. Over time, this obviously leads to a democratic deficit in that the government that is in charge may not properly take the concerns of the constituencies that did not vote for the government that is in charge that may be raised, and also can lead to disenfranchisement, as can be seen with the recent rise of Scottish nationalism with former solid Labour (both the red and blue versions) constituencies giving the SNP a go, but to no avail as it did not affect the outcome of the result of Scotland getting a government it did not vote for.
What I believe is that the governance of Great Britain (assuming Northern Ireland gets returned to the Irish, but maybe for a new thread especially when viewed in context of the upcoming events on 29 March 2019) needs to be radically overhauled. I would start with bringing back the Metropolitan County Councils that were abolished by Thatcher in 1986, plus create a few new ones too for areas which did not have them back in 1974. New ones would be Glamorgan & Gwent (covering Swansea, Cardiff, and Newport - it seems an injustice that at least one of Wales's three largest cities did not get one in 1974), North Somerset (covering Bristol, Weston-super-Mare (maybe), and Bath Spa), Exeter & Torbay (simple enough), and possibly Kingston & Grimsby (former Humberside CC, which would use the the first name of the port city of its full name, similar as to how the telephone network is Kingston Communications). These are just examples that could be refined and added to, and is not exhaustive.
Secondly, for the non-metropolitan areas, I would have regional devolution, with those regions being broadly based on the existing European Parliament regions, with the d'Honte method being used for elections. The local councils can use the single transferrable vote system as that is how councillors are elected in Scotland, with multi-member wards.
Thirdly, for General Elections, I would trim the number of MPs down and create larger constituencies, with the number of MPs each region sends to the Federal Parliament (relocated from Westminster to Birmingham, so as to make it more easily accessible to the whole of Great Britain) being based on one MP per X amount of population. For example, if West Midlands region has a population of 3.5 million (arbitrary figure), and the value of X is 250,000, this would mean West Midlands Region would have 12 MPs - a big chop from the present many there (maybe a lower value of X is needed?). The Federal Parliament would be elected using the d'Honte method of proportional representation, which would better reflect the voting patterns across the regions, with the regions and councils having greater powers than is presently the case, and would enable local (and maybe regional) tax raising for local needs (and maybe regional needs).
On a final point (apologies for the lengthy post), I would like to see that anybody who is standing for election must have been residing in the area for a minimum of five years. This would get rid of careerists standing for election that have no connection with the area, such as the likes of Tristram Hunt (never resided in Stoke-on-Trent before being elected) and Esther McVey (who got the boot in 2017 in West Wirral, and re-emerged in Tatton recently, despite not having any connections with that area). Any members that are voted out are to miss standing again for one election of Council, County, Regional, and Federal so as to prevent them from popping up again in another elected capacity (Frank "Sorry I was running late to cast my vote and almost missed doing so, as I was in the canteen scoffing all the pies" McAveety take note, as the electorate of Shettleston keep giving you the boot). I will end with that for MPs, Regional Members, and anybody who is elected, to pledge their allegiance to the electorate rather than the monarchy.
Any further thoughts?
https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...eturns-to-increase.178399/page-5#post-3884395
Although I have focussed on voting patterns in Scotland for General Elections from 1979 onwards, I believe similar could be applied to Tyne & Wear, West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire, Merseyside, Greater Manchester, and the West Midlands (all former metropolitan County Council areas from 1974-86), West Glamorgan, South Glamorgan, Mid Glamorgan, and Gwent for Wales, in that most of the electorate did not get the government that they voted for. Over time, this obviously leads to a democratic deficit in that the government that is in charge may not properly take the concerns of the constituencies that did not vote for the government that is in charge that may be raised, and also can lead to disenfranchisement, as can be seen with the recent rise of Scottish nationalism with former solid Labour (both the red and blue versions) constituencies giving the SNP a go, but to no avail as it did not affect the outcome of the result of Scotland getting a government it did not vote for.
What I believe is that the governance of Great Britain (assuming Northern Ireland gets returned to the Irish, but maybe for a new thread especially when viewed in context of the upcoming events on 29 March 2019) needs to be radically overhauled. I would start with bringing back the Metropolitan County Councils that were abolished by Thatcher in 1986, plus create a few new ones too for areas which did not have them back in 1974. New ones would be Glamorgan & Gwent (covering Swansea, Cardiff, and Newport - it seems an injustice that at least one of Wales's three largest cities did not get one in 1974), North Somerset (covering Bristol, Weston-super-Mare (maybe), and Bath Spa), Exeter & Torbay (simple enough), and possibly Kingston & Grimsby (former Humberside CC, which would use the the first name of the port city of its full name, similar as to how the telephone network is Kingston Communications). These are just examples that could be refined and added to, and is not exhaustive.
Secondly, for the non-metropolitan areas, I would have regional devolution, with those regions being broadly based on the existing European Parliament regions, with the d'Honte method being used for elections. The local councils can use the single transferrable vote system as that is how councillors are elected in Scotland, with multi-member wards.
Thirdly, for General Elections, I would trim the number of MPs down and create larger constituencies, with the number of MPs each region sends to the Federal Parliament (relocated from Westminster to Birmingham, so as to make it more easily accessible to the whole of Great Britain) being based on one MP per X amount of population. For example, if West Midlands region has a population of 3.5 million (arbitrary figure), and the value of X is 250,000, this would mean West Midlands Region would have 12 MPs - a big chop from the present many there (maybe a lower value of X is needed?). The Federal Parliament would be elected using the d'Honte method of proportional representation, which would better reflect the voting patterns across the regions, with the regions and councils having greater powers than is presently the case, and would enable local (and maybe regional) tax raising for local needs (and maybe regional needs).
On a final point (apologies for the lengthy post), I would like to see that anybody who is standing for election must have been residing in the area for a minimum of five years. This would get rid of careerists standing for election that have no connection with the area, such as the likes of Tristram Hunt (never resided in Stoke-on-Trent before being elected) and Esther McVey (who got the boot in 2017 in West Wirral, and re-emerged in Tatton recently, despite not having any connections with that area). Any members that are voted out are to miss standing again for one election of Council, County, Regional, and Federal so as to prevent them from popping up again in another elected capacity (Frank "Sorry I was running late to cast my vote and almost missed doing so, as I was in the canteen scoffing all the pies" McAveety take note, as the electorate of Shettleston keep giving you the boot). I will end with that for MPs, Regional Members, and anybody who is elected, to pledge their allegiance to the electorate rather than the monarchy.
Any further thoughts?
