British Political Parties - Fun Poll!

[Brother_Karl]

Which British political party are you closest to? Why? Read along, decide who you are closer to and then vote in the poll. Also, feel free to comment on any of the stats, policy or leaders!

Conservative Party

http://img40.imagefra.me/img/img40/7/10/6/lunedi/f_jcfo4889rmxm_ce113bf.jpg

Stats
Leader: Prime Minister, David Cameron (http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_t2Ry7I5DNuQ/S-nVNo7jKWI/AAAAAAAAFi8/INXzrlvUjmw/s1600/David+Cameron+No10.jpg).
Seats in the House of Commons: 307 out of 650.
Seats in the House of Lords: 186 out of 724.
Seats in the European Union Parliament: 25 out of 73 British seats.
Names You May Recognise: Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher.

Ideology Summary
Regulation and Tax: Less regulation. Less tax. Less public services.
Social: More traditional family values.
Electoral Reform and Democracy: Against reform to the electoral system and the House of Lords.
Stance on the United Kingdom (The Union between Scotland, England and Wales): Staunch Unionists.
War: For the Iraq War. For the war in Afghanistan.
View of European Union: Eurosceptic

Conservative Party Factions
Thatcherites: Radical Capitalists. Believe in much less regulation, tax and public services. They believe in privatisation. "Theres no such thing as society".
One Nation Conservatives: Traditional family values and totally against any kind of radical reform. Their only goal being that they should just run the country and keep it together.


Labour Party

http://img40.imagefra.me/img/img40/7/10/6/lunedi/f_rf1bpx5v5xm_9efc76a.png

Stats
Leader: Leader of the Official Opposition, Ed Milliband (http://candobetter.org/files/UK%20MP%20Ed%20Miliband%20(2007).jpg).
Seats in the House of Commons: 258 out of 650.
Seats in the House of Lords: 212 out of 724.
Seats in the European Union Parliament: 13 out of 73 British seats.
Names You May Recognise: Tony Blair, Gordon Brown.

Ideology Summary
Regulation and Tax: More regulation. More tax. More public services.
Social: They want to "help people to help themselves".
Electoral Reform and Democracy: For changes to the electoral system (Alternative Voting System) and the House of Lords.
Stance on the United Kingdom (The Union between Scotland, England and Wales):Unionist but they also introduced legislation to give Scotland its own devolved Scottish Parliament etc.
War: For the Iraq War at the time but many prominent members have since condemned the Iraq War or said that it was the wrong thing to do.
View of European Union: pro-EU

Labour Party Factions
Old Labour: Socialist. Believe in the abolition on the Lords and the Monarchy.
New Labour: Social Democrats. A compromise between socialism and capitalism in an effort to move to the centre ground. "Tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime" sums this compromise up, between the left and right wing, quite well.


Liberal Democratic Party

http://img37.imagefra.me/img/img37/7/10/6/lunedi/f_vvr5p8icy2jm_865ef25.jpg

Stats
Leader: Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Constitutional and Political Reform, Nick Clegg (http://images.newstatesman.com/articles/2010//20100416_nick-clegg-1st-leader-debate-15-april-2010_w.jpg).
Seats in the House of Commons: 57 out of 650.
Seats in the House of Lords: 71 out of 724.
Seats in the European Union Parliament: 12 out of 72 British seats.
Names You May Recognise: None.

Ideology Summary
Regulation and Tax: Tax the rich at a higher rate. Belief in public services, coming somewhere between the Conservatives and Labour.
Social: More socially liberal than the other two in general.
Electoral Reform and Democracy: For electoral reform (Proportional Representation) and for the abolition of the House of Lords to be replaced with a Senate.
Stance on the United Kingdom (The Union between Scotland, England and Wales): Less Unionist than the Conservatives and either the same level of Unionism, or less, than Labour.
War: Were for a timetabled withdrawal from Iraq. Their leader, now Deputy Prime Minister, has recently called the war in Iraq illegal. Against the war in Afghanistan.
View of European Union: Extremely pro-EU.

Liberal Democrats Factions
Liberals: More capitalist.
Social Democrats: More like New Labour.




British politics today

There is currently a Conservative and LibDem Coalition Government with a Labour Opposition.

[finnbow]

From the descriptions provided, I would be Liberal Democrat (i.e., a raging moderate). Liberal democrat seems to have a completely different connotation on this side of the pond.

[BlueStreak]

I picked "Old Labor". But, really, I don't know much about British politics.

So.........

Dave

[d-ray657]

I would likely align myself with New Labour or Social Democrats. As far as your description of New Labour looking to move to middle ground, I see the middle ground in British politics much much further to the left than the alleged middle ground in the US. I don't know if you would agree, but it seems like President Obama would be to the right of the middle in Britain.

P.S. Thanks again Brother Karl for your interesting contributions to the discussion here.

Regards,

D-Ray

[JJIII]

I plead ignorance but from your descriptions I would fall in with the conservatives, leaning towards the Thatcherites

[whell]

I guess I'd be in the Thatcher bucket.

[Grumpy]

Probably conservative.

[piece-itpete]

Thatcher too, but when I was there right after we invaded Iraq, the conservatives I met were against the war (probably because Blair was for it).

Pete

[Brother_Karl]

I don't know if you would agree, but it seems like President Obama would be to the right of the middle in Britain.

Yes, agreed. Although, the Conservative Party here is, on the whole, against fiscal stimulus to get out of the economic crisis.

[Combwork]

[QUOTE=BlueStreak;41562]I picked "Old Labor". But, really, I don't know much about British politics.

So.........

Neither do the British. I'm not joking; the floating voter who doesn't make up their mind who to vote for until they get in the polling booth is the main target for all parties.

The present lot? Latest insanity is the decision to go ahead with the building of two new aircraft carriers even though latest estimate is we'll have nothing home built to land on them until 2020. For latest estimate read government prediction. IE think 2025 at the earliest. We're building them because the manufacturers contract penalty clauses are so draconian that it will cost the government more to cancel than to finish building them.

The problem with aircraft carriers is they are totally specialised; as far as I know there's no alternative use for them. I guess you could say the same for most navel vessels but aircraft carriers are of such high strategic value that they cannot go anywhere without a heavily armed escort.

[finnbow]

[QUOTE=BlueStreak;41562][I][COLOR="black"][COLOR="Blue"] Latest insanity is the decision to go ahead with the building of two new aircraft carriers even though latest estimate is we'll have nothing home built to land on them until 2020. For latest estimate read government prediction. IE think 2025 at the earliest. We're building them because the manufacturers contract penalty clauses are so draconian that it will cost the government more to cancel than to finish building them.

The problem with aircraft carriers is they are totally specialised; as far as I know there's no alternative use for them. I guess you could say the same for most navel vessels but aircraft carriers are of such high strategic value that they cannot go anywhere without a heavily armed escort.

In the words of the famous American admiral, Hyman Rickover, "There are two types of ships - submarines and targets."

[Brother_Karl]

The problem with aircraft carriers is they are totally specialised; as far as I know there's no alternative use for them.

The government has been talking about putting lighter and less expensive aircraft on them. I think I heard that helicopters was a possiblity but a Minister has previously denied that this is the case. So, I'm pretty confused.

I see that you have not voted in the poll. Scottish Nationalist by any chance?