Holyrood predictions

[Auld_Reekie]

2 hours ago, aaid said:

I'm sorry but you've got that completely wrong.  AMS is not a second preference system like STV, it is a system designed to give as near as possible a proportional share of the seats based on the list vote.  So if a party gets 50% of the list vote they should broadly  get 50% of the seats.

Of course the modified system and the fact that there are 73 FPTP seats and 56 list seats skews that as it means that if a party has national support across the board of 50.1% they will at the minimum win all the constituency seats.  That's a flaw in the current system - arguably constructed to avoid the current state of the parties occurring - although nowhere near as bad as Westminster.

None of that changes the fact though that AMS is fundamentally not a "second choice" system.  

I think you're misunderstanding my point. Greens arent a second choice or second preference. The SNP just havent done enough to earn both my votes, so won't be getting them. If Green's stood a chance of winning my constituency they'd probably get that vote, with my list vote going to the SNP.

You've been reading too many Wings or similar posts that are trying too hard to view everything as tactical voting.

[scotlad]

23 minutes ago, ErsatzThistle said:

Where is the "Conservative re-birth" and "Corbyn bounce" we were promised ?

The Corbyn bounce has taken a Dugdale dunt.  She'll be doing well to still be oposition leader, the way things are going.  I reckon SLab will still finish second though.
 

23 minutes ago, Armchair Bob said:

What Auld Reekie said.
 
I am personally quite excited about Andy Wightman being in Parliament. That's about the size of it for me with this election. I can see the SNP sweeping the constituencies but failing with the list seats to end up with roughly the same total as last time. Maybe the Tories gaining a few at the expense of Labour. And the Greens getting one or two more than at current. Effectively a no-change election. If that is the case, I hope the SNP are a bit more radical in 2016-20 as referendum apart (and to be fair, that was a biggie) the impression on the streets is that nothing much was achieved in this last session.
 
And like last time when I really didn't want George Galloway strutting the corridors of Holyrood, I fervently hope UKIP fail to gain any seats.

Wightman is a class act but is he not the second candidate on the regional list?  If so, it could be tricky for him to get elected.

Patrcik Harvie is running against Sandra White in Glasgow Kelvin.  I reckon the SNP will hold the seat, but at least Patrick will won't be the shortest candidate on the podium for a change!

[aaid]

27 minutes ago, Auld_Reekie said:

I think you're misunderstanding my point. Greens arent a second choice or second preference. The SNP just havent done enough to earn both my votes, so won't be getting them. If Green's stood a chance of winning my constituency they'd probably get that vote, with my list vote going to the SNP.

You've been reading too many Wings or similar posts that are trying too hard to view everything as tactical voting.

You are entirely entitled to vote whatever way you want for whatever reason.  You are completely wrong about how the electoral system is designed to work though, its not a second preference system.

[Orraloon]

Here's my thoughts on why i think the Greens won't do as well as some folk think. And I could be completely wrong in this, as it involves a fair bit of guesswork.

In 2011 the Greens got about 90,000 regional list votes. Labour got about 110,000 less votes on the list as they did in the constituency vote. That reduction was more than the reduction in votes for the SNP, Tories and Lib Dems put together. Now, lots of these "lost" 2nd votes went to the other smaller parties but this suggests to me that the Greens got most of their list votes from folk who had voted Labour in the constituency vote. Traditionally Labour have never taken the regional list vote very seriously because they thought they could rely on winning enough constituencies. This time round it's different. Labour know that they are not going to win many (if any) constituencies so they have to focus on making sure they get their supporters to give them their 2nd vote. I think the Greens will be the biggest losers out of this. 

[thorbotnic]

4 hours ago, aaid said:

I'm sorry but you've got that completely wrong.  AMS is not a second preference system like STV, it is a system designed to give as near as possible a proportional share of the seats based on the list vote.  So if a party gets 50% of the list vote they should broadly  get 50% of the seats.

Of course the modified system and the fact that there are 73 FPTP seats and 56 list seats skews that as it means that if a party has national support across the board of 50.1% they will at the minimum win all the constituency seats.  That's a flaw in the current system - arguably constructed to avoid the current state of the parties occurring - although nowhere near as bad as Westminster.

None of that changes the fact though that AMS is fundamentally not a "second choice" system.  

You're very wrong there, I'm afraid. See the post by euan2020 above. The D'Hondt method gives a weighting to list votes according to how successful each party was in winning constituency seats - it doesn't divvy up list seats according to the proportion of list votes received.

Basically it's a very hard system to 'game', but given that the SNP are certain to win virtually all constituency seats it does mean that a list vote for them is worth less than for other parties.

Edited April 6, 2016 by thorbotnic

[aaid]

4 minutes ago, thorbotnic said:

You're very wrong there, I'm afraid. See the post by euan2020 above. The D'Hondt method gives a weighting to list votes according to how successful each party was in winning constituency seats - it doesn't divvy up list seats according to the proportion of list votes received.

Basically it's a very hard system to 'game'.

Yeah, I get that, in my second sentence I mention the constituency seats skewing what would be a straight PR result.  The D'Hondt system in use in Scotland tries to address this somewhat but not to the same extent as they do in places like Germany where seats are reallocated in order to balance it out.

I agree about it being a hard system to game though.

[thorbotnic]

9 minutes ago, aaid said:

Yeah, I get that, in my second sentence I mention the constituency seats skewing what would be a straight PR result.  The D'Hondt system in use in Scotland tries to address this somewhat but not to the same extent as they do in places like Germany where seats are reallocated in order to balance it out.

I agree about it being a hard system to game though.

It wouldn't be a straight PR result if the constituency seat / list seat split was 50%, either. Or rather it would be very unlikely to be. No party getting 50% of the list vote is going to get 50% of the list seats or the overall seats, regardless of how seats are divided between list and constituency. 

[Orraloon]

8 minutes ago, thorbotnic said:

 but given that the SNP are certain to win virtually all constituency seats it does mean that a list vote for them is worth less than for other parties.

I think the maximum constituencies they will win is 68 and they could easily slip up in a few of those. So, I think they will need a few list seats as well. So, as far as the SNP is concerned, the list votes are just as important and as valuable to them as to anybody else. I know you might hope that SNP voters will give their regional vote to somebody else, but the SNP message needs to be very simple. "The SNP need your constituency vote and also your regional vote if you want the SNP to have a majority",

[thorbotnic]

2 minutes ago, Orraloon said:

I think the maximum constituencies they will win is 68 and they could easily slip up in a few of those. So, I think they will need a few list seats as well. So, as far as the SNP is concerned, the list votes are just as important and as valuable to them as to anybody else. I know you might hope that SNP voters will give their regional vote to somebody else, but the SNP message needs to be very simple. "The SNP need your constituency vote and also your regional vote if you want the SNP to have a majority",

Well yes, if you want the SNP to have a majority the best thing to do is to vote for them with both votes. But if you want a bigger, stronger majority of pro-independence MSPs, it may make more sense to vote green or for someone else on the list. Or if if you feel that the SNP represent, say 80% of what you stand for, but the other 20% is better represented by another party, you can split your ticket. It's an advantage of the 2-vote system.

Personally I prefer coalition or minority governments anyway - keeps big parties honest(er).

[Orraloon]

10 minutes ago, thorbotnic said:

Well yes, if you want the SNP to have a majority the best thing to do is to vote for them with both votes. But if you want a bigger, stronger majority of pro-independence MSPs, it may make more sense to vote green or for someone else on the list. Or if if you feel that the SNP represent, say 80% of what you stand for, but the other 20% is better represented by another party, you can split your ticket. It's an advantage of the 2-vote system.

Personally I prefer coalition or minority governments anyway - keeps big parties honest(er).

In most of the regions the Greens need a huge number of extra votes (compared to to 2011) to get anywhere near a regional seat. Moving some regional votes from SNP to Green is just as likely to result in an extra Unionist MSP as it is to get a Green MSP. I think that in most regions the SNP have more chance of winning a regional seat than the Greens even if the SNP have already won all the constituency seats in that region. But only if the SNP can convince their core voters that they need both their votes. 

 

[aaid]

9 minutes ago, thorbotnic said:

It wouldn't be a straight PR result if the constituency seat / list seat split was 50%, either. Or rather it would be very unlikely to be. No party getting 50% of the list vote is going to get 50% of the list seats or the overall seats, regardless of how seats are divided between list and constituency. 

 

Any system that has a either a constituency or regional element is going to have potential for an element of variance, e.g. a party that polls 60% in one region and 40% in another region may not pick up 50% of the seats in both regions depending on the arithmetic in each region.  It will however be a lot more proportional that straight FPTP which could conceivably see that party win every seat.

However what skews the result is the 73/56 split between constituency and list seats as this can result in the SNP breaking the system by winning an overall majority with 44% of the list vote as happened in 2011.

[phart]

I take it you can just vote on the list if you want?

[Orraloon]

42 minutes ago, phart said:

I take it you can just vote on the list if you want?

Yes.

Couldn't find anybody you like on the constituency list?

[Toepoke]

43 minutes ago, phart said:

I take it you can just vote on the list if you want?

It's two separate papers IIRC so yes...

[Scunnered]

1 hour ago, phart said:

I take it you can just vote on the list if you want?

Yeah, two separate votes. It's what I'll be doing.

[aaid]

1 hour ago, Orraloon said:

In most of the regions the Greens need a huge number of extra votes (compared to to 2011) to get anywhere near a regional seat. Moving some regional votes from SNP to Green is just as likely to result in an extra Unionist MSP as it is to get a Green MSP. I think that in most regions the SNP have more chance of winning a regional seat than the Greens even if the SNP have already won all the constituency seats in that region. But only if the SNP can convince their core voters that they need both their votes. 

 

I think you are probably right and even were the Greens capable of picking up a list seat in every region they would have no chance of picking up a second seat.

The other thing to factor in is that depending on the regional arithmetic, the Lib Dems could manage to scrape the odd seat in the regional lists.  I'm not being so stupid to predict a Lib Dem revival but I think they probably bottomed out in 2011.

 

[phart]

55 minutes ago, Orraloon said:

Yes.

Couldn't find anybody you like on the constituency list?

No looked yet.

[thorbotnic]

1 hour ago, Orraloon said:

In most of the regions the Greens need a huge number of extra votes (compared to to 2011) to get anywhere near a regional seat. Moving some regional votes from SNP to Green is just as likely to result in an extra Unionist MSP as it is to get a Green MSP. I think that in most regions the SNP have more chance of winning a regional seat than the Greens even if the SNP have already won all the constituency seats in that region. But only if the SNP can convince their core voters that they need both their votes. 

 

I think you're underestimating the effect of being dominant against a fractured opposition has in an FPTP situation. The SNP won nearly all FPTP seats in the last election when Labour was still polling 31% - with the situation now (say Tories and Labour both in low twenties) they won't win a thing. This means that an SNP list vote is a very weak vote in all regions - the Greens might not have a great shot, but you've got to ask whether the SNP would get (for eg) nine times as many list votes as them, anywhere? Unlikely. 

[thorbotnic]

29 minutes ago, aaid said:

I think you are probably right and even were the Greens capable of picking up a list seat in every region they would have no chance of picking up a second seat.

The other thing to factor in is that depending on the regional arithmetic, the Lib Dems could manage to scrape the odd seat in the regional lists.  I'm not being so stupid to predict a Lib Dem revival but I think they probably bottomed out in 2011.

 

I'd be amazed if the Lib Dems didn't win about 5 list seats overall. As they won't win any FPTP seats.

[thorbotnic]

2 hours ago, aaid said:

 

Any system that has a either a constituency or regional element is going to have potential for an element of variance, e.g. a party that polls 60% in one region and 40% in another region may not pick up 50% of the seats in both regions depending on the arithmetic in each region.  It will however be a lot more proportional that straight FPTP which could conceivably see that party win every seat.

However what skews the result is the 73/56 split between constituency and list seats as this can result in the SNP breaking the system by winning an overall majority with 44% of the list vote as happened in 2011.

The SNP didn't win an overall majority because of the 44% list vote - they won because of the 45% constituency vote, and the effect of FPTP. They could quite conceivably win a majority without any list seats at all this time round.

[aaid]

9 minutes ago, thorbotnic said:

The SNP didn't win an overall majority because of the 44% list vote - they won because of the 45% constituency vote, and the effect of FPTP. They could quite conceivably win a majority without any list seats at all this time round.

That's exactly what I was saying - they won a majority despite getting 44% on the list  

12 minutes ago, thorbotnic said:

I'd be amazed if the Lib Dems didn't win about 5 list seats overall. As they won't win any FPTP seats.

I'm not convinced they are totally out of it in Orkney and Shetland.  A lot will depend on how take a view on how much Carmichael reflects on Liam McArthur and Tavish Scott.  

[stocky]

In Lothian where Margo Stood I think the greens might get a second seat.

 

Where will Margos vote go.

it will obviously go pro Indy, but not necessary SNP.. 

 

The libs will get 1 in every region, no constituancy ones.. 

UKIP will get 1 unfortunalely, they only need 5% somewhere. 

Lab will be second 22-25 seats

Tories 3rd with 15-18

Would love to see Cat Boyd get in , on a guid night she will. 

and also for the Greens to get more than the libs.. 

Snp to be just short of Majority 2-3 and it will be spun as a disaster by the press.However that will be better for the next Indy ref I think 

 

[hampden_loon2878]

1 hour ago, aaid said:

That's exactly what I was saying - they won a majority despite getting 44% on the list  

I'm not convinced they are totally out of it in Orkney and Shetland.  A lot will depend on how take a view on how much Carmichael reflects on Liam McArthur and Tavish Scott.  

http://www.shetnews.co.uk/features/election-2016/news-feed/12504-councillor-quits-wir-shetland-after-tavish-endorsement

 

the lad tulloch is a right pice of work,,, iv had a few debates online with him in the past and he is venomous,,, hopefullly the people of shetland will see him for what he is 

[aaid]

5 hours ago, scotlad said:

The Corbyn bounce has taken a Dugdale dunt.  She'll be doing well to still be oposition leader, the way things are going.  I reckon SLab will still finish second though.
 

Wightman is a class act but is he not the second candidate on the regional list?  If so, it could be tricky for him to get elected.

Patrcik Harvie is running against Sandra White in Glasgow Kelvin.  I reckon the SNP will hold the seat, but at least Patrick will won't be the shortest candidate on the podium for a change!

One the one hand you have Patrick Harvie and Andy Wightman, on the other Ross Greer. 

[Auld_Reekie]

5 hours ago, aaid said:

You are entirely entitled to vote whatever way you want for whatever reason.  You are completely wrong about how the electoral system is designed to work though, its not a second preference system.

Are you even reading my posts? I know exactly how the system works. I never claimed it was a preference-based electoral system?!