Vote for Policies

Sorry, I couldn’t resist a political post here on the weblog! Worse still, this is far too late, but it is interesting.

I’ve been complaining about the media coverage in the run up to the election and the fact that there is very little information about the policies of the parties, but more emphasis on the characters of the party leaders and what they are all up to rather than what they would do for us. I was quite looking forward to having a politician knock on the door as part of their campaign so that I could explain our personal situation as a family and see how their policies would affect us, but no one came calling.

I did however find a site called ‘Vote for Policies‘ that presents the policies of the major parties on various topics without telling you whose they are. You pick the policies you like and afterwards it tells you what the parties were. You start by telling it which topics interest you and work through from there. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to include Plaid Cymru so in our constituency it isn’t very accurate as the two main parties were Plaid Cymru and the Liberal Democrats, but despite this the results make interesting reading.

Based on my choices on policies related to Crime, Health, Education, Environment and Immigration my results were as follows.

  • Green Party 33.33%
  • Labour 33.33%
  • Conservatives 16.67%
  • Lib Dems 16.67%

More interesting is that from the 232 people who have taken the survey in our constituency, the results are as follows

  • Green Party 32.11%
  • Lib Dems 19.93%
  • Labour 19.00%
  • Conservatives 12.54%
  • UKIP 9.10%
  • BNP 7.31%

Based on policies alone the Green Party are way ahead in this small survey, but it was the Lib Dems that won the seat. Of course, the number of people that have carried out the survey is small. The nationwide stats make interesting reading too. With almost 300,000 surveys completed the results were:

  • Green Party 23.66%
  • Labour 20.34%
  • Lib Dems 17.84%
  • Conservatives 15.66%
  • UKIP 12.04%
  • BNP 10.45%

Once again the Green Party was up there at the top. It does make you wonder what would happen if the media concentrated more on policies rather than personalities. Of course, it’s easy to write policies that the majority of voters will like, actually being able to follow through and implement them is what really matters. Most people would want lower taxes, better health and education, less crime etc. but doing it all just isn’t possible.

This survey is good and gives you an idea of which parties policies you mainly agree with but you are cherry picking the best policies without seeing the whole picture. You may find that you agree with more policies from one party but have really strong negative feelings about one of their policies that would make you not vote for them. This survey doesn’t allow you to see that.

Sorry this is too late, but did you vote for the right party?

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Alan Cole

Alan is a Freelance Website Designer, Sports & Exercise Science Lab Technician and full time Dad & husband with far too many hobbies: Triathlete, Swimming, Cycling, Running, MTBing, Surfing, Windsurfing, SUPing, Gardening, Photography.... The list goes on.

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