Election Debates

[Carruthers]

It's unfortunate that General Elections are now such negative experiences when so often we find ourselves voting for the marginally less worse party or casting our vote tactically in order to keep a candidate out rather than voting another one in.
It beggars belief that we still cling to the first past the post system where an MP can be in the position of having more people voting against him/her than voted for him/her.
That peculiarity manifested itself in the governments of both Mrs Thatcher and Mr Blair whereby they were elected on the basis of achieving 42% or thereabouts of the popular vote.
Governments elected by proportional representation are often said to be weak, but at least have the merit of representing the distribution of votes cast.

Anyway, whoever takes up residence at No 10 is going to need a large dose of good luck and the agility to dodge the copious quantities of ordure heading his way.