How to vote tactically (spreadsheet)

Annie Take account of the numbers and chances in your constituency but be careful about supporting a party that wants to break up the UK - which applies to both Greens and Plaid Cymru. Vote Liberal Democrat unless you think that they have absolutely no chance locally.

Reasons for voting tactically

Crises
Top of the list has to be the NHS. Hunt is probably the most hated Health Secretary ever. The NHS which entered this decade in reasonable order after the cash injection and over seeing by the Labour Party for the first decade of this century. It was sorely needed after the poor mismanagement by the. Previous Tory government.
This current decade has seen the worse crises ever in the NHS in all areas since they have been quite deliberately deprived of funding, and pushed towards privatisation.

Crises in welfare. Social Services have suffered the worse cuts ever. The result is severe shortages in all types of welfare, like care for the elderly, resulting in a knock on effect in the NHS, children's services cut etc.

Crises in schools. As a result of this governments costly vanity projects like "free" schools and the push to academies soon grammars, the state school system has never been in such a parlours state. Schools in the "rich" south east are writing begging letters to parents in the hope that they will give cash for such essentials as writing materials and toilet paper. The state school system has been under pressure from the Tory government since it took office and before. When Labour took office at the beginning of this century, the school infrastructure had never been in such a poor condition, with mould on walls, buckets to catch rain water in the classroom and general decay. Labour set up a funding project and began a whole series of school rebuilding and new works. The Tories stopped it as soon as they came to office. Prior to the Labour Government and poor funding they also plundered as much land from the school system as they dared as sold it to the rich developers. Remember the selling of the playing fields??

Crises in prisons. Tories love to "lock-em-up" but also hate to pay for it so they cut the staff and prisons budget.
The police have had thousands of their numbers cut, and this Tory government has come near to loosing the police trust and faith.

Roads - can you ever remember when our roads were in such a bad state?

Economy - never has an economy been so badly managed. We have the biggest deficit ever, even after nearly a decade of austerity, in which the poorer you are the more you have had to suffer. Hammond is now looking to raise tax and Vat as well as NIC, you can be 100% certain that it will hit the poorest hardest.
Inequality and loss of opportunity is as bad as it's ever been. Zero hours contract means that thousands upon thousands of people cannot plan for their future, have no hope of stability, have no pension, and can never be sure of any income next week or even tomorrow.

But the truth is that this Tory government is driven by an ideology that argues for a small state and low tax economy. Fine if you are wealthy and can afford, private health, private education, help in looking after you if you are elderly, but disastrous if you are not.

Don't even get me started on Brexit!!! Apart from saying that the Cameron government was distinguished by the fact that every thing they touched turned to dust.

So how have they got away with this for so long? Well certainly not because the UK has voted Tory with any enthusiasm. 2010 election they could not have governed without Lib help. And 2016 they only managed a majority of 12 -so clearly at best the UK is luke warm towards a Tory Government.
What has allowed them to get away with this awful decade is the weakness of the opposition, and its inability to override a largely hostile media. 70% of the population rejectvTory values, they need and deserve so much better.

This and so much more is why we are considering voting tactically.

I am undecided,who has the best chance of getting the Tories out, Greens or Plaid Cymru?

The Tories certainly encouraged tactical voting in 2015 - using scare tactics to frighten those who did not like the thought of a Labour/SNP coalition to vote for them as the "only alternative"

Perhaps on JUne 8th we can show that what worked for them last time can work for the rest of us this tim.e

Whitewave

I have an opinion you have yours.

If so desperate why such support for a leader such as Corbyn

No pogs wrong - it is the choice of those 70% of voters who despair at what the Tories are doing to this country and will try anything to prevent the type of state the Tories are aiming for.

So for the 70% almost any candidate is better than the Tory candidate.

It isnt gutless or cowardness, it is desperation and determination to try to rid us of this pestilential government.

Wow, what a post, bravo POGS , but I still believe it is dishonest , it would be for me

Tactical voting is not dishonest but it is the domain of a party, a party of any colour red, yellow, blue ,green, pink polka dot, who believes it cannot possibly win.

ANY party, again of ANY colour, that promotes tactical voting is knowingly doing so to obviously 'try' and ensure the political landscape is altered to 'take down' another party because without the help of other parties their campaign, their share of the vote which would presumably be so weak, so low can only win by using 'tactics' .

You need not look any further than words to describe 'tactics' to know / understand why it is popular with a party / parties who fear their weakness in not being able to secure votes are prepared to use 'tactics' to thwart what most people see a a democratic voting system.

Manipulation
Controlling
Scheming
Ways and Means
Contrivance
Plotting
Subterfuge
Hustling
Etc. Etc.

My favourite word for the use of tactical voting is 'Covin'.

A conspiracy between two or more persons to act to the detriment or injury of another.

It is a spineless act used by those prepared to throw their away their principles and not vote for the candidate they believe in and in some cases have told others who to vote for.

If you are prepared to vote 'tactically' how would you ever know if your true chosen party candidate may have in fact won?. YOU helped blow your candidates chances by giving your vote to someone from another party who within weeks you will be calling all the names under the sun probably. Perhaps the use of 'tactical' voting has been the demise in some constituencies for years , who knows?

I don't care which party advocates 'tactical voting' , maybe ALL of them will do it, to my mind it is only for those who are too gutless to field a candidate and stand by him / her, they will happily 'throw their candidate under the bus / dispense with him / her like Confetti '. Any candidate who stands in a constituency that is knowingly / thought to be adopting 'tactical voting ' needs his or her head reading! The Party they are standing for doesn't deserve their loyalty as none is being given back, just political cowardice and spin.

Yes Paddy. A recession the Torres inherited - it was no more their fault than Labour's. The result was, as night follows day, a big drop in the tax take and of course, the tories had to keep on paying the interest due on the 800bn. They had to borrow a great deal of money to pay keep the country going and, again inevitably had to spend less than we all wanted them to spend. They returned the country to growth but as you say, we now have a lot more debt and have to pay that back. We are only just getting to the stage that the debt isn't still growing, let alone being paid off. They haven't made the hash of the economy you suggest. Actually they have not done too bad a job considering. Of course, maybe more tax and even more borrowing would have worked out even better, as mcem suggests. But you have to get the balance and the investment just right or you just make matters worse. My thinking at the moment is that O'Donnell is likely to go too far. In that event the people who will suffer most won't be The likes of Philip Green as Corbyn suggests, but the people who depend on Govt. support - as described by Annie, the vulnerable.
On the other hand, a hard Brexit will, in my view anyway, be very damaging, at least in the short to medium term, and I don't want to vote in a way that is likely to bring that about.
In any event, the issue is, as always, the economy. If we have sustainable long term growth, we can spend a lot of money. If we don't, no amount of good intentions will get us anywhere.

I am with .iam in her two posts , I share those fears, it is driving me to despair thinking of the suffering ahead for the vunerable

stillaliveandkicking I think you'll find it was a global recession that caused the 800BILLION debt ...thats the debt the tories tell us they're paying down and the debt that now sits at ONE POINT EIGHT TRILLION ....great with finances these tories eh?Oh and I'm not a labour voter so its not party loyalty thats talking just FACT

Or it could be as successful as Keynsian economic approaches have been in the past.

The real issue seems to me not how to spend money we don't yet have, but whether Labour's plans to raise a great deal more money to fund its plans are achievable in the short term and sustainable over the medium to long term. John O'Donnell clearly believes he can tax, borrow and invest us into increasing prosperity. But that could, of course, simply lead to greatly increased debt and a return to recession. Place your bets.....

The Tory government has slashed public services. Poor areas have had more taken from council budgets than wealthy ones.

I was a labour supporter for many years. But sadly Corbyn comes across as a weak nutter to be honest, so do the rest of the labour party. May hasn't "cut" anything. Mass immigration has. Do you really believe that life will be better under labour? Why? Didn't the last labour government promise this? All they did was get the country in so much debt it's ridiculous.

I'll vote for our current, Labour MP. It isn't a vote for Jeremy Corbyn, it's a vote for someone who has represented us well for many years. Our constituency was a marginal in il the current MP was elected. The majority isn't big and the alternative is a Tory so no need to consider tactical voting but I would if circumstances were different.
My fear is that Theresa May will get a bigger majority and so have a mandate to introduce selection for high schools, continue to cut essential health and other public services. Of the three leaders of the main parties, Theresa seems to manage to convince most people the country is safe with her at the helm, whereas corbyn and Farron just dont.

Why on earth would you do this? Beggars belief really and very stupid.

I was just responding to varian's comment that May and Corbyn were unattractive prospects, not giving my opinion on the fanciability of any of them...

We're not voting for a Prime Minister. Lucky is right. Tim Farron is certainly not Mr Universe, but he's more "attractive" than May or Corbyn (not that any of them are really my type ).

The LibDems have been the most consistent of the parties since Farron was elected. Their issues page on their website has hardly changed since the election and Farron hasn't done any major U-turns. Maybe that's not so difficult when there are only 8 (now 9) MPs.

When did a cult of personality and choice of headwear take over from policies in politics?

Even if Tim Farron might not be your "attractive prospect", voting Lib Dem could still make a lot of sense in some constituencies to prevent the party who you really do not want from getting an MP. You know the Lib Dems are not going to have a national majority of seats (so your Tim Farron fear has no basis) so your vote should be based on not letting the party you definitely do not want to govern us get in.

Do you really think Tim Farron is an 'attractive prospect'?

In a true democracy we would have proportional representation but we are stuck for now with the absurdity of first-past-the-post.

If any kind of democracy is to survive those of us who are not fans of TM's Brexit at any cost agenda, must take account of the local situation in the constituency and vote tactically.

This may mean voting for what you consider the lesser of two evils because of FPTP. The Liberal Democrats, and Liberal Party before them have always suffered, not gained from FPTP, because UK politics for a long time seemed to be a two party race.

I remember just before the 1979 election there was a poll where voters were asked "would you vote Liberal if you thought they could win?" 42% said yes, because they really liked the Liberals and thought they had the best policies, but of course most were convinced by the media that it could not possibly happen and voted Tory or Labour, whichever they considered to be the lesser of the two evils, and as we all know, Thatcher won.

Nowadays, politics is much more fluid. Both Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn are very unattractive prospects for so many voters. It is time to be more positive. Vote LibDem and only if you think there is absolutely no chance for the LibDem candidate in your constituency, support the second best party.

Party loyalty has no place in a democracy. It simply makes no sense. If someone votes out of party loyalty in the full knowledge that casting that vote will simply allow in a party they definitely hate, then it is a wasted vote.

Democracy is essentially selfish - each person has to decide what matters to them and vote accordingly. That way you achieve the greatest good for the greatest number of people. Voting so that a party with whom you disagree fundamentally gets in by default is a perversion of a sophisticated democracy.

The tribalism of party loyalty is what gets us into the mess we are in. If for instance, everyone who detested the Tories voted so that they would not get in in their constituency, then democracy will have been served. If some of those people vote with their tribal loyalties, then we will just get more of the same.

It is this sense of tribal loyalty that causes people to mistakenly think that tactical voting is underhand or dishonest. It is not - it is what democracy under a first past the post system is all about. Our government over the past few decades would have been very different indeed if people had realised that.

ab To take an extreme scenario, if the Conservative wins by one vote, you will end up with an MP who is even further from your views and values than if you hadn't voted LD. Your vote could have made all the difference.

It's the outcome which matters - not your sense of loyalty, especially as you disapprove of the direction of the Labour Party and have some right wing views anyway.