General Thread for the election (old Electioneering starting early thread from Local News)

[Declan]

1 hour ago, Rhumsaa said:

it's definitely not been the sizeable shift in direction that we hoped for with such a sweeping change of MHK.

I basically blame LibVan for that missed opportunity because without the hubris of Kate Costain taking the 3 LibVan votes we would have had Alf as CM and avoided the HQ drifting years

That's unfair. There should have been a second round without her. There would have been but for the underhand behaviour of Legco.

[SleepyJoe]

It was Rodan who refused to allow the House of Keys to reach a majority

LegCo have had their votes removed as a direct consequence of his decision

[Ham_N_Eggs]

1 minute ago, SleepyJoe said:

It was Rodan who refused to allow the House of Keys to reach a majority

LegCo have had their votes removed as a direct consequence of his decision

Actually it was Chris Thomas playing games that caused this. It was his motion that put that ridiculous voting system in place. I presume he did it to highlight LegCo's role. But it ended up causing his candidate (Cannan) to lose. 

Also people can point to LegCo, Rodan or Costain all they want but there was one member who ran from the Tynwald chamber after he was rumoured to have changed his vote to Quayle. His name did not appear on the final confirmatory vote. That man was Moorhouse.

[Rhumsaa]

38 minutes ago, Declan said:

That's unfair. There should have been a second round without her. There would have been but for the underhand behaviour of Legco.

I don't disagree that there should have been a second round - an interesting "misunderstanding" of the agreement by LegCo

[SleepyJoe]

14 hours ago, Ham_N_Eggs said:

Actually it was Chris Thomas playing games that caused this. It was his motion that put that ridiculous voting system in place. I presume he did it to highlight LegCo's role. But it ended up causing his candidate (Cannan) to lose. 

Also people can point to LegCo, Rodan or Costain all they want but there was one member who ran from the Tynwald chamber after he was rumoured to have changed his vote to Quayle. His name did not appear on the final confirmatory vote. That man was Moorhouse.

I'm surprised that Mr Thomas would have Mr Cannan as a preferred candidate

Did his motion prevent the House of Keys reaching a majority before involving LegCo?

Edited March 30, 2021 by SleepyJoe

[Andy Onchan]

15 hours ago, Ham_N_Eggs said:

He's rumoured to be in the running.

I sincerely hope not.

[Barlow]

Chris Thomas is a meddler.

[SleepyJoe]

Meddling is better than doing nothing, but I do wish MHKs would band together to achieve positive change

[Rhumsaa]

17 hours ago, Roger Mexico said:

It's going to be more difficult to tell what is going to happen because a lot of potential candidates probably won't declare now till after the local elections.  Both as a way of assessing their support and because it doesn't look good to stand for a job and saying you want to quit it in 3 months.  This will apply in a lot of constituencies, particularly with sitting councillors/commissioners.

Do you think there's a great deal of transition between Local Government to National Government? I don't think it's a route used as much these days.

I can think of 4 immediately who became MHK's after serving as Commissioners and I think maybe 2 or 3 others. But generally I don't think that people use it as a "stepping stone" or a place to gain knowledge or experience. It certainly doesn't seem to benefit many potential MHK's although that could be simply a lack of quality.

What I always find most damning is the number of potential MHK's who miss out but then never stand as a commissioner afterwards. There is something to be said for the differing level of impact you can have I admit but I wonder whether the pay packet is a bigger influencer. 

[Roger Mexico]

1 hour ago, Rhumsaa said:

Do you think there's a great deal of transition between Local Government to National Government? I don't think it's a route used as much these days.

I can think of 4 immediately who became MHK's after serving as Commissioners and I think maybe 2 or 3 others. But generally I don't think that people use it as a "stepping stone" or a place to gain knowledge or experience. It certainly doesn't seem to benefit many potential MHK's although that could be simply a lack of quality.

Well of the 12 newbies in 2016 four came direct from LAs: Allinson and Hooper from Ramsey, Callister from Onchan and Corlett from  Douglas.  And five of the six by-election winners in 2011-16 were from LAs (Thomas, Malarkey, Boot, Harmer and Joughin) only Peake wasn't.  So there's clearly still a route there, though it mainly applies to situation where the LA covers all of the constituency (now Douglas, Onchan, Ramsey) rather than just being one of several in its boundary.

Of course a lot of candidates for MHK seem to stand for the Gizzajob platform (Douglas South by-election was notable), but's that nothing new and few get in.  I'm actually more worried about the business types who see it as a non-executive directorship and leaf through the papers, make a few 'sensible'-sounding remarks, vote how they're told and do nothing for the rest of week.

[Rhumsaa]

17 minutes ago, Roger Mexico said:

Well of the 12 newbies in 2016 four came direct from LAs: Allinson and Hooper from Ramsey, Callister from Onchan and Corlett from  Douglas.  And five of the six by-election winners in 2011-16 were from LAs (Thomas, Malarkey, Boot, Harmer and Joughin) only Peake wasn't.  So there's clearly still a route there, though it mainly applies to situation where the LA covers all of the constituency (now Douglas, Onchan, Ramsey) rather than just being one of several in its boundary.

Of course a lot of candidates for MHK seem to stand for the Gizzajob platform (Douglas South by-election was notable), but's that nothing new and few get in.  I'm actually more worried about the business types who see it as a non-executive directorship and leaf through the papers, make a few 'sensible'-sounding remarks, vote how they're told and do nothing for the rest of week.

You see I'd say that of the 12 newbies 8 of them had no route through LA's, it's the same facts but the emphasis to me is more telling in that you don't need any political grounding to go for it.

As I type that - it's 5 and 7 isn't it? Ashford? 

I do agree with you on the non-exec nod through risk but for me there's still an annoyance that people have the genuine belief that they can make a difference to the area and island for 5 years but only if there's a full time paid job involved. This is by no means a great example, but.... Nick Crowe attracted a good number of votes in Ramsey in 2016 standing as an MHK but was not interested enough to stand in the LA by-election prompted by Hooper's ascendance.

[Roger Mexico]

12 minutes ago, Rhumsaa said:

You see I'd say that of the 12 newbies 8 of them had no route through LA's, it's the same facts but the emphasis to me is more telling in that you don't need any political grounding to go for it.

As I type that - it's 5 and 7 isn't it? Ashford? 

I do agree with you on the non-exec nod through risk but for me there's still an annoyance that people have the genuine belief that they can make a difference to the area and island for 5 years but only if there's a full time paid job involved. This is by no means a great example, but.... Nick Crowe attracted a good number of votes in Ramsey in 2016 standing as an MHK but was not interested enough to stand in the LA by-election prompted by Hooper's ascendance.

Heaven know how I forgot Ashford, though it makes my case stronger.  But it does reinforce how it's only certain authorities where it works. 

The argument that you make about people not being interested unless they are paid is actually about the same sort of people.  Of course some of these do end up on local authorities and behave in the same lackadaisical fashion, only showing interest when something that affects them personally appears on the agenda. 

[Rhumsaa]

1 minute ago, Roger Mexico said:

Heaven know how I forgot Ashford, though it makes my case stronger.  But it does reinforce how it's only certain authorities where it works. 

The argument that you make about people not being interested unless they are paid is actually about the same sort of people.  Of course some of these do end up on local authorities and behave in the same lackadaisical fashion, only showing interest when something that affects them personally appears on the agenda. 

I always forget Corlett.... generally.

The correlation I'm seeing is that it tends to follow a "town" LA compared to a "country" LA, although Douglas is 50/50 even then. I suppose there is something to be said for the natural progression of a similar voting pool around a town compared to the multiple LA's that take up the rest of the North say, but I don't recall there even being a commissioner stand in 2016 (Pat Ayres doesn't count)

[Barlow]

4 hours ago, SleepyJoe said:

Meddling is better than doing nothing,

Erm....no it is not.

[SleepyJoe]

Dear me, you'd think representatives were elected to Tynwald with a mandate to prevent change