Brown’s Trousers - Brought to you by James Wormald -

Well, what has been to my memory, the longest election ever, is finally over. We have a result (sort of). We know who’s in power (sort of). Yet we still have no idea what’s going on. Let me break down the average person’s (my) point of view for you. From the start.

Thursday 6th May 2010: 19:30

I’m sat at home, at my desk. Beavering away to finish last week’s site update as usual. We leave for the train for Nottingham, and on to Alton Towers at 20:00 sharp, and I finally decide to get off my leather-smoothed arse and vote. I’ve been planning it, and putting it off all day. “I’ll do it later, I’m just too busy at the moment.” I’d been telling myself. “I’m on a roll with writing at the moment, I won’t be able to get back in to it.” With the cold morning light of hindsight, I can tell you the real reason I was putting it off, I just didn’t know who to vote for. In the past I’ve always gone for Lib Dems, their views about big issues, correlates with my own, if not directly, then at least closer in general than any other party. This is how you’re told to vote.

When you’re young and impressionable, you’re taught what the voting system means, you’re told that because there are so many people in the country, the country should be run by the people. That’s the fairest way. However if every decision were put to a vote, it’d just be a huge waste of time, money and effort, and nothing would ever get done. This is true. So instead, just the one group of people, led by just one person, is elected to make our decisions for us. It’s still seen as our choice, because we’re allowed to vote for the person who says they’ll do what we want done, and they’ll make the type of future decisions, we might make in that situation.

That method, even though simplified quite a bit, seems a little complicated, but fair. Sadly in reality, that isn’t the way it works. If you want group of people A to act on your behalf, but more people want group of people B to do it, you’re outvoted, and you feel like an outcast for the next 4 years. It’s too easy to simply say ‘Well I didn’t vote for him’. You become disillusioned with your own country, you lose patriotism, yet gain nationalism (you complain that Party B is ruining your country, meaning you’re less willing to stand behind it). However... more people want Party B to make the decisions, than Party A... If Party B are allowed to make them, more people are happy right?

Wrong. The choices on the voting sheet run more than just A or B. I counted seven different parties it was possible to vote for on mine. Most of these are smaller parties and probably won’t win the vote anyway (As the results came in, only one of these smaller parties received enough votes to win their area; The Green Party in Brighton). This method used to work fine all across the UK. Almost everyone gave their vote to either A or B, and those few who gave it to C, D, E, F, G... etc. were too minimal to even mount a combined attack on the bigger two. Upsetting for the minnows, but it made the final result simple.

Thanks to the monumental fuck-up (that was only really a fuck up at all if you either read a newspaper or heed Jeremy Paxman’s opinion) by the previous Government, a large percentage of Party A voters suddenly lost faith and didn’t want to vote A anymore. Trouble is, they don’t want to vote B either. The last time B controlled things, they fucked it up even worse! What choice did the mutinous party A supporters have? Party C? Don’t be stupid, you’re throwing your vote away! Or are you.

It’s a well-known thought, that a vote for a third choice party, is a waste of your well earned vote. It’s like betting on anyone other than Chelsea or Manchester Utd to win the league at the start of the season. This common view, is in the uncommon position or being both utterly stupid beyond belief, and true. On the 5th May, no one has made any votes. Party C, has exactly the same number of votes as both Parties A, and B... and even the unbelievably massively, so ‘racist you can’t believe they’re not in prison’ Party Z. It’s neck and neck. And yet, you know, I know, the leader of Party C knows, there’s no way they’ll win a nationwide majority. When voting for the National Party, you’re practically throwing it away.

I tend to stick with the former view. I vote for Party C. I vote because I believe they would make the same sort of decisions I would make, and I would want to be made. I know they won’t win, and I know my vote won’t count for anything. But it’s a system where you vote for who you like. It’s a system I believe in, against all evidence to the contrary. It’s a system I have no choice but to believe in.

Friday 7th May: 08:00

As dawn rolls up to greet my dirty, sweaty, pre-shower body on Gazz’ mum’s sofa, with a Nero’s coffee in one hand, and the other outstretched in front of its mouth, lazily making minimal effort to cover a yawn, the results have taken shape. Yet we’re still just as confused as to what has happened. Turns out, a surprising number of Party A voters had given up and plumped for the luckless Party C, the Blackpool of the election playoffs. It wasn’t enough to paint the streets ‘C’ no... but it was enough to throw the next week into absolute political disarray. These are the results as they came in:

Party A: 29.0%

Party B: 36.1%

Party C: 23.0%

From these results, you and I can both clearly see that Party B have won. This is because they have received more votes than anyone else. Fair enough. Yet with a little more thought... no it isn’t. For you see, when you’re told you get to vote for the party who runs the country... you’re lied to. What you’re actually voting for is the party who gets to run your area. Then they take the number of areas each party has won in, and tott them up to find a winner. The two systems sound similar enough, but they’re not. One is the fairest way of doing things, and one isn’t even close. More votes than anyone else in one area means one win. One win transfers as one seat in the House of Commons. This is basically the place you need to be if you want anyone to listen to what you have to say on matters. Then of course, the more people sat in the House of Commons on your side, the more noise you can make (Once you get in there, it’s a simple popularity contest. The more friends you have, the more likely you are to win the fight). If we look at the results in the number of people in the playground for each party, it looks similar, yet tellingly different.

Party A: 258 Seats

Party B: 306 Seats

Party C: 57 Seats

This is ultimately, the most important result of all. Party B have clearly won, with more seats, and more friends, they’re more likely to win any argument. However they are not in the majority. If Party A and Party C both realise it, they have more friends together, than Party B by themselves.

Party B: 306 Seats

Party A&C: 315 Seats.

In a fight, it might be close, but there’s the possibility of Party B losing. Then what would we be left with? A country run by losers that’s what! We’d be the laughing stock of the U.N. the E.U. and France!.... France! I’m not having that, and neither would the rest of the country. What are we gonna do!? I’ll tell you what we’re gonna do... we’re gonna get everyone together and make a deal. A deal for who runs the country. At this point, there were three possible outcomes...

1.Party A agree to work with Party C, and together have a majority of 9 guys in the big fight. Not that much of a majority.

2.Party B agree to work with Party C, and together have a majority of  105 guys. Enough to win any fight on any day, even if they’d just been out for a big meal before hand, and Party A had been in the gym snorting cocaine and bench-pressing Renault Twingos all morning.

3.Party A and Party B agree to work together to blow the tits off Party C with a 507 guy advantage.

Tuesday 11th May: (about) 19:30?

After 5 days of tiring umming and awwing, being forced to look each other in the eye, shake hands and share a milkshake, the leaders of our country had come to a decision. But which one was it? Surprisingly we all knew 5 days before they did. What was the likelihood of Option 3 walking away with the golden ribbon? Well Parties A, and B are at complete opposite ends of the political scale to each other. Getting them to work together, and agree on even the smallest issue, would be like getting all the backdated Popes to agree with the entire S Club 7 fanclub on what they wanted to do on a stag night. Plus, who needs a 507 guy advantage. You’d take the piss, most of the guys would just be bored. How about Option 1 then? Logically the most likely of the options. Parties A and C are right next to each other in the political scale, differing on just a few key issues (Party C was originally an offshoot of Party A in the first place). But sadly politicians are rarely logical it seems. Due to the fragility of the prospective leadership (with only a 9 guy advantage) it would only take a few guys to take their eye off the ball, eat a suspect prawn butty and not turn up, and Party B would win, then we’d be a country of losers again. Remember the French... not a desirably situation. So Option 2 was the outright winner. The leaders of Parties B and C made a deal (even though they’re at nearly opposite ends of the spectrum). What does this mean?

If you assume (and I do) that a 107 majority will be plenty enough for a few guys to be allowed to get scared and abstain, then the B&C coalition (The BloC Party as I like to call them) will win any argument. Within that win however, with the two sides having such different opinions on most issues, how will the votes play? One person one vote? Not really, Party B will have 306 votes, to Party C’s 57. Hardly a competition. And so, there is our winner. Party B. How did this happen?

Were they voted in by the majority of people? No. 10 million people voted for them, 20 million didn’t. Do they have the most people in the place where the decisions are made, thanks to an unfair voting system? No. They have 306 people, compared to the overall 650. So why are they there? Well, the reality is that they weren’t. Not until Party A decided they couldn’t do a deal with Party C (perhaps because the parliament would still have been too uncertain). We could just as easily have been under the guise of Party A for another 4 years. Therefore, what was the general public’s role in the election? It’s like they asked us what we thought purely out of politeness. As soon as we gave an answer they made the decision by themselves anyway. Democracy is well and truly dead.

Friday 14th May: 14:00

At time of writing, I can see the stats of the votes. I can see exactly how unfair the voting system is. Let’s go back to that first stage again shall we.

Thursday 6th May: 20:00

After a half hour wait at my polling station for everyone living on a street starting with either A, B, C, D, E, F, G, or H (roughly 5% of people) to get fast-tracked straight to the front where unused voting booths were waiting every so patiently, I was given my voting papers, and stood at the booth, saliva-soaked pencil in hand, staring at the paper. I was told the yellow sheet was for the National Election. There were 7 choices. I had decided to vote for Party C, but as I looked in the box, the name next to their logo was not that of the leader of the party. It was my area’s representative. Turns out I was not voting for the person and party to run the country, but the person to run my area. Turns out I didn’t get a National vote at all! Yes, if I vote for Party C in my area, Party C wins, and Party C has another representative going to the big fight, my party stands a better chance of winning. But if Party C wins the area by 10,000 votes, and let’s say that’s 40% of the voters, that’s quite a majority. But it’s still only 1-0. If Party B then wins the area closest to me by just the 1 vote (0.001%), that’s 1-1. Even though Party C has received 9,999 more votes in the two areas, it’s still a draw! There’s no goal difference in this game. How, on a National level, is this in any way fair? Those results again:

Party A: 258 Seats

Party B: 306 Seats

Party C: 57 Seats

In percentages the seats vote looks like this:

Party A: 40%

Party B: 47%

Party C: 9%

This is the real chance Party C has of making any kind of difference in the House of Commons. However if you look at how the vote would look if everyone’s vote counted once, and wasn’t just ignored if they’d already won, the percentages would look a lot different.

Party A: 29% (-11%)

Party B: 36% (-13%)

Party C: 23% (+14%)

If this were the case then yes, the parliament would have looked much more multi-cultural (with more different opinions being heard). Two of them would still have to ‘team-up’. However it would have given a chance for Parties A and C to team up, as they have closer views on matters, and still present a strong enough Government to remain proud of themselves. It would mean that Party C would have had much more of a say in running the country (44% of a say), which would surely have been closer to 14 million of the public’s votes.