Will Brexit happen?

westernpromise

Conina wrote: »

phillw, you can try as hard as you want but suggesting that people who for whatever reason when given the opportunity and yet still not taking that opportunity to vote "expressed their view, it wasn't one that supported leaving the EU" is delusional in the extreme but hardly surprising considering the same train of thought refuses to acknowledge a legitimate win in a democratic vote.

The only expression of democracy that counts is to use your vote.

I remember enraged lefty students making this argument to me, the only Conservative they knew, in 1983. Why should Fatcha get a majority when 58% of the voters had voted against her? The answer, of course, was because 73% had "voted against" Labour and 75% had "voted against" the Alliance.

The losers always want to conscript the abstainers to their cause, on the grounds that if the non-voters didn't vote for the winners, they must therefore like themselves also oppose the winners. The trouble is, it works in both directions, meaning it's a completely useless argument.

qwert_yuiop

Spy_Key wrote: »

So when you're asked and you give an answer, without any preset conditions stated, what percentage IS enough to enact momentous change?
Exact figure, please.

How about a majority of those eligible to vote , the actual electorate? The same as was used in the Scottish devolution referendum of 1979.

There’s your exact figure. Does that seem reasonable?

Enterprise_1701C

qwert_yuiop wrote: »

How about a majority of those eligible to vote , the actual electorate? The same as was used in the Scottish devolution referendum of 1979.

But that needed 40% of the total electorate, that is not a majority! As it happened only 32.9% voted for it.

There’s your exact figure. Does that seem reasonable?

If you did that you would have to make voting mandatory. That would simply not work in the UK. Look at the Scottish turnout for something as supposedly important to them as the eu referendum, 67%!! In the UK as a whole the turnout was 72%. For something that was supposedly so important to Scotland they still could not be bothered to vote!

No, you can't use figures for those eligible to vote, you have to use figures for those that care enough to actually vote.

Herzlos

I agree, without mandatory voting then you need to base it on the number that voted to decide on a result. You can obviously factor in the percentage of the total public when deciding on how to do the implementation though.


For any binary vote, you'd need at least 53/47 to get away from any doubts about statistical anomalies (usually +/- 2% for something this size).



For the Scottish Referendum, the result was 55/45 and that was accepted by almost everyone. Some of us didn't like the result but there weren't any claims that it was too close to count. Plenty of other objections though, like the lies and fearmongering on the run up to it, the promises made the day before and reneged on the day after. Exactly like Brexit but at least with a clear result.

Malthusian

phillw wrote: »

Can you explain exactly how you are misrepresenting the european election vote to come to that conclusion?

No I can't.

I can however explain exactly how the maths accurately adds up based on the various parties' position on leaving the EU, as endorsed by their membership. Or you could just get a calculator and do it yourself. Maths doesn't lie.

Takedap wrote: »

Are you sure? If only there were some way of checking. Like maybe asking them perhaps?

Or are you scared of that?

Not at all. Remain are terrified of it though which is why they didn't attempt to deploy the Ireland / Lisbon Solution during the three years it was their decision.

phillw

Malthusian wrote: »

I can however explain exactly how the maths accurately adds up based on the various parties' position on leaving the EU, as endorsed by their membership.

This is like pulling teeth, you really don't want to explain which parties you've personally attributed to each side because you know it doesn't stand up.

Malthusian wrote: »

Maths doesn't lie.

Right, only leave voters do.

Herzlos wrote: »

I agree, without mandatory voting then you need to base it on the number that voted to decide on a result.

I disagree. I don't think that gives you a mandate if you've managed to put people off politics so much they won't vote.

I do agree with mandatory voting though. We do need to do something about the way leave commited fraud on an epic scale though.

Enterprise_1701C wrote: »

If you did that you would have to make voting mandatory. That would simply not work in the UK.

Please give a detailed explanation of why would it not work in the UK? They made seat belts mandatory & that really annoyed people, that seemed to work pretty well in the long run.

SpiderLegs

I think mandatory voting is less democratic

mayonnaise

Malthusian wrote: »

Maths doesn't lie.

Maths doesn't lie, but brexiteer maths do.

e.g. Tim Martin who will slash beer prices once freed from crippling EU import duties on beer, which are currently.... 0%. :rotfl:

BikingBud

phillw wrote: »

Parliament has been sovereign the entire time we've been a member of the EU.

Whilst they may have been sovereign they have yet to deliver what the country wants and what they agreed to deliver by agreeing on A50.

phillw wrote: »

They knew some people wanted to leave, less than half the total population of the country.

But more than half of those that actually bothered to engage and vote.

You cannot assess that as anything other than they did not get their bodies down to the polling station and therefore there were no votes to count, either way.

BikingBud

phillw wrote: »

I disagree. I don't think that gives you a mandate if you've managed to put people off politics so much they won't vote.

If the electorate cannot engage in what is classed as the most significant political event in our lifetime then it is what it is but it doesn't make it a false or inadmissible result.

phillw wrote: »

I do agree with mandatory voting though. We do need to do something about the way leave commited fraud on an epic scale though.

Two separate issues. How would you like to vent against each of them rather than just conflating them?