Stormont Election 2022

Sam Russell · 07-05-2022 11:50pm

The problem only arises from a surplus.

Say A gets 1.5 quota, and party member B get .01 of a quota, then it i reasonable to process the surplus otherwise B would be eliminated. After surplus distribution, B might have .5 of a quota.

The votes are spilled from the ballot box and all mixed up to randomise the votes so they are in no order. This means that any selection of surplus votes are representative. After the first count, eliminated votes move down the choice, and the excess is taken from these votes.

I do not understand where the fraction of votes comes from in the North.

L1011 · 07-05-2022 11:54pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119030366#Comment_119030366

They calculate out the exact proportion of next preferences and that's where the fractions come from. You could have a surplus of one vote and they will calculate out the proportion of your next preferences (lets ignore that a surplus of one is unlikely to ever become effective).

Its the exact same way we do Seanad vocational panels, except we hide the decimal by making each vote become 1000 votes.

Loafing Oaf · 07-05-2022 11:58pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119030352#Comment_119030352

Don't think I'd pick any UUP leader since Empey out of a lineup...

Larbre34 · 08-05-2022 12:46am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119030366#Comment_119030366

It's just a function of the transparency. They are calculated as a proportion in the Republic too, but only the roundings are announced for each count stage in our elections. Seems daft to do otherwise.

Larbre34 · 08-05-2022 12:49am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119030146#Comment_119030146

How sweet it is.

17 for Alliance is an absolutely outrageous conversion rate. Many congratulations to them.

L1011 · 08-05-2022 12:49am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119030390#Comment_119030390

You'd recognise Nesbitt from TV, if old enough and you lived in UTV-land not HTV-land.

I'd not know Empey from anyone else, could probably get Swann and maybe Beattie. Maybe.

pixelburp · 08-05-2022 6:51am

So quick napkin math says there's 52 definite pro-Protocol heads (SF, Alliance and SDLP), so that leaves the UUP who are all over the place so who knows. A majority pro Protocol Executive should be the end of it, but we all know it won't be.

At the rate the DUP blows a gasket Infront of the NI electorate, if we're here again in 6 months for a rerun, I'd not be at all shocked at SF/Alliance majority. I'd be a little surprised mind you, cos sectarianism is a hard drug to drop. You'd hope the Alliance would hit those DUP heartlands hard.

Sam Russell · 08-05-2022 9:56am

So after the earth shattering new dawn, SF on the same number of seats, DUP down 3, Alliance up 9, UUP down 1, SDLP down 4. Nationalist vote 38%, down 4 seats. Unionist vote 40%. down 4 seats.

So what has changed? No breakthrough for SF. No good news for DUP, but not meltdown.

Well, we are in for six months on stasis, while the DUP leader keeps his arse welded to his seat in Westminster as he cocks a snook at his bigoted voters in NI, fixated by the false aim of getting rid of the protocol.

Then what? Another election or direct rule, no money for the poor from the magic inflation fund, as the Tories concentrate on keeping Big Dog in power, and while the food banks begin to proliferate all over their green uplands, populated by unicorns.

Not to worry, Biden is due here soon.

Christy42 · 08-05-2022 11:19am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119031021#Comment_119031021

A nationalist as the biggest party is still historic. Even with Unionism split a bit to cause it the countries borders were literally chosen to stop that from ever happening so it is an historic event. Obviously the DUP are not going to play ball and run a democracy because that isn't what they are about. In addition a very much pro protocol majority in the North makes it harder to remove. Anytime the British come up now it can be pointed out that the people of Northern Ireland have voted in favour of it staying it pretty emphatic fashion.

pixelburp · 08-05-2022 11:23am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119031021#Comment_119031021

It's historic in its own right because it validates the nationalist voice as both authentic and significant enough to (co)run a government. As I said before all SF need to do is stay the course, speak in positive, inclusive language and let the DUP flounder their way to another election (and you'd hope further vote losses). Of the two largest parties only one seems to care about the Norths here and now. If SF can avoid getting dragged into constant asks about a Border Poll from the currently fascinated UK press, then they're set to be seen as the main States-people in the Nortth.

Brussels Sprout · 08-05-2022 11:41am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119030271#Comment_119030271

You're calling them soft Unioninsts. Sammy Wilson was accusing them of being Nationalists. That's probably a good indicator that they're neither.

It's like the way that the right in the UK accuse the BBC of being far-left and the left accuse them of being far-right.

cj maxx · 08-05-2022 11:49am

I find it typical of the dup to refuse to be part of a government with SF. Again its a case of its our ball and if you don't play by our rules we're taking the ball home. Fcuking pathetic

Danzy · 08-05-2022 11:50am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119031298#Comment_119031298

If you are not against the continuation of the Union, are you not a unionist by inaction more than ideological commitment.

Sam Russell · 08-05-2022 12:13pm

The vote only goes to show that the tribalist vote has reduced from 100% to 78%. It needs to reduce further - even below 50% for NI moves towards democratic politics.

There cannot be a united Ireland before there is a united NI, and that will only come when that tribalism reduces to about 50%. The hatred that Loyalists have towards nationalists need to abate significantly before such a change can happen.

Triumphalism from both sides works against this, and SF shouting about a border poll does nothing but inflame this, and the more they shout, the more likely such a poll will fail. If they want a poll, they should make certain it will pass when it happens. As Tipp O'Neil maintained - only take a vote when you have the votes.

Brussels Sprout · 08-05-2022 12:15pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119031326#Comment_119031326

I think the fact that they tend not to focus on those larger issues makes it easy for both sides to say that clearly they are on the other side. All of the Unionist parties opposed the Protocol. The Alliance party did not so the DUP and TUV are labelling them as Nationalists because for them it can only ever be a zero-sum game.

I had a look at their manifesto for this election and it neither mentioned the Union nor a border poll. Basically they're the party for people who are sick to death of having the same conversation over and over.

Loafing Oaf · 08-05-2022 3:17pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119031414#Comment_119031414

SF know a border poll within the next decade would fail. It's about placating their more unreconstructed supporters, giving the impression they are 'doing something' about Irish unity, which is supposedly their raison d'etre. Anything over 45% yes could be spun as a victory as it would ensure the issue remains 'live' and would justify calling another poll in ten years or whatever.

Mr.Nice Guy · 08-05-2022 3:18pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119031414#Comment_119031414

What does a united NI mean? Unionists ceasing to be unionists? There will never be a united NI because the entity was created to provide an artificial majority for unionists to reign supreme. The likes of Jim Allister, the DUP, loyalists, Orange Order etc. aren't interested in uniting NI because they view every step towards equality as a step towards surrender. Even the supposedly moderate Doug Beattie can't bring himself to support Irish language legislation.

The problem with the 'let's make NI work' narrative that soft unionists and Alliance like to trot out is that it ultimately begs the question: why should a society built on fairness, equality, cooperation and so forth - as great as it sounds - be limited to an arbitrary 6 county region devised in a smoky room by a bunch of men 101 years ago? Why can't it be had on a 32 county basis?

Sam Russell · 08-05-2022 3:39pm

Well, yes. But it has often been said that Loyalists are more loyal to the half-crown than the Crown. It has to be seen as in their economic interest to join a very successful Ireland and that hay can see they will be welcome on an equal basis. Unfortunately, the do not believe in either equality or democracy.

firemansam4 · 08-05-2022 4:39pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119032198#Comment_119032198

The numbers do not even show that their is up to 45% support yet either.

If we go by the election poll results, Nationalist parties got a share of just over 38% of the vote, now maybe a small percentage of Alliance may also vote for a UI, but I would say at best a UI poll may get 40% at the highest, going by the support in the assembly elections anyway.

IMO it would only damage any cause for a UI if a poll was held within the next 5 years.

O'Neill · 09-05-2022 9:56am

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgBMx2Lh1j4

Absolute mess of a situation. It's been about 6 years now since the Brexit referendum.....

Nody · 09-05-2022 10:03am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119035180#Comment_119035180

Groundhog Day as always when it comes to the British Government and the NI protocol; maybe they should implement a hot air baloon factory at this stage considering how much hot air they are blowing out about it...

Christy42 · 09-05-2022 10:49am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119035180#Comment_119035180

6 years of working at pace! For the people of Northern Ireland and putting their only objective as placating a minority of voters in NI.

Sam Russell · 09-05-2022 11:21am

If the UK had implemented the WA including the NI protocol as agreed, it would be apparent what parts were not working. However, they have refused to implement customs controls on imports from the EU, and refused to implement inspections of goods and animals going from GB to NI. They have refused the EU access to the data they would need to oversee the (lack of) inspections. The UK Gov are continuing to backslide, while falsely accusing the EU of intransigence - like a sketch from Monty Python or Faulty Towers or even Yes Minister.

Now, if this was happening with a local authority, it would be considered childish and grandstanding - which of course that is exactly what it is. The EU need to call this out and force the issue with real deadlines and actual sanctions.

Edit: Just to add on the above.

https://www.rte.ie/news/ni-election-2022/2022/0509/1296874-ireland-north/

pixelburp · 09-05-2022 1:02pm

Relax guys, we don't need the Protocol anyway because .... *checks notes* .... uh, the Ukrainian refugees got in without checks. This is just going to drag on and on and on, isn't it? Beattie's in the minority opinion within the 90 members of the Executive and yet he seems too cowardly to stand up for common sense. I don't doubt SOME businesses have struggled with checks now between GB and NI but I refuse to believe this constitutes a majority situation.

https://www.thejournal.ie/doug-beattie-protocol-5758524-May2022/

Sam Russell · 09-05-2022 1:10pm

What would we check the Ukrainian refugees for - smuggled sunflowers or wheat born disease? People are not subject to checks at the NI/GB border.

petronius · 09-05-2022 1:17pm

Is there something wrong with an election system which allocated 1 seat for the TUV with over 7% of the vote and 17 seats for the alliance with less than 1/2 that with over 13%?

VinLieger · 09-05-2022 1:33pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036145#Comment_119036145

Those percentages are only for first preferences, things get far more complicated once you get into allocating 2nd preferences and beyond as people are elected or eliminated and arent as easy to distill down into basic percentages. But basically the Alliance were far more transfer friendly than the TUV which isn't that surprising.

If you want to see a really undemocratic voting system check out first past the post used in England for both Council and MP elections, that full thread has some awful examples of why it shouldnt be used and then compares it to Scotland who use STV like ourselves and NI and you will see its far more representative.

https://twitter.com/electoralreform/status/1522531687778955264

L1011 · 09-05-2022 1:33pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036145#Comment_119036145

Alliance received significant volumes of later preferences. TUV absolutely did not.

Under FPTP, TUV wouldn't have that single seat probably.

retalivity · 09-05-2022 1:36pm

TUV have their loons spread all over the North, the only one with enough concentration in a constituency (and visibility) is Jim Mór.

Alliance provided a safe haven for votes from Unionists and young people fed up with the DUP/TUV/Anti-EU or NIP rhetoric. Interestingly, they didn't win any seats west of the Bann.

breezy1985 · 09-05-2022 1:50pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036225#Comment_119036225

As the Alliance member said on BBC a few days ago. They naturally align with SF on a number of social issues and the NIP. Young people don't need to be ashamed of voting SF/SDLP the way they do the Unionists.

masterK · 09-05-2022 2:00pm

Probably a dumb question but can somebody explain why SF, Alliance and the SDLP cannot form a government? They would have the relatively comfortable majority

Brussels Sprout · 09-05-2022 2:11pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036406#Comment_119036406

The Northern Assembly doesn't run by conventional rules. Basically the government's are typically grand coalitions. It's a hold-over from the Good Friday agreement. They can't form a government without the DUP since they're the largest party that is designated as Unionist and will supply the Deputy First Minister.

pixelburp · 09-05-2022 2:17pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036406#Comment_119036406

The Executive can only be made from the largest parties within the 2 biggest Designated Groupings: Nationalist, Unionist or "other". That being, SF and DUP in this case. The First Minister posts are technically jointly powerful, though the party with the few representatives has tended to be called "deputy first minister"

Brussels Sprout · 09-05-2022 2:17pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036145#Comment_119036145

As others have said, the TUV and Aliiance are at the two ends of scale when it comes to how transfer-friendly they both are.

If the PR system was instead some kind of D'Hondt system then the TUV would have done a lot better.

Which is more fair? Well that depends on the criteria you use to define fairness. If it's purely who people's favourite party is then the TUV was hard done by. However if you're judging it on the basis of who people were generally content with, beyond their favourites, then they got exactly what they deserved for being a party that tends to alienate most of the electorate.

Personally I'd prefer a system that didn't cater to unpopular extremists so am happy with the way things turned out.

BluePlanet · 09-05-2022 2:21pm

The Alliance party can change all that by just declaring themselves Unionist. Everybody knows they are predominantly unionist already and the British government appears to consider them as thus.

pixelburp · 09-05-2022 2:26pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036573#Comment_119036573

And as said before, they do this and watch their vote share crash into the ground as every Soft Nationalist and those sick to their back teeth of either/or departs. The status quo is union with GB anyway, but the Alliance party isn't wedding itself to one or the other; and if the Executive stalls further they could see their share creep up.

VinLieger · 09-05-2022 2:30pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036605#Comment_119036605

Indeed we could easily see another election within the year and their Seats in that case would probably increase again. The worst thing they could do for themselves and NI is switch designation to unionist right now.

Podge_irl · 09-05-2022 3:00pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036573#Comment_119036573

How would that help? They would be the second largest Unionist party and could do nothing to help form a government.

Sam Russell · 09-05-2022 3:33pm

The point about STV is that it gives the voters the chance of voting AGAINST a candidate or party. This is achieved by giving preferences to ALL other candidates, but none for those candidates disliked. This is widely followed in NI as Unionists tend to only vote Unionist and no other, and Nationalists likewise, which is why elections tend to be tribal headcounts. Alliance was founded as a way to break this mould - founded 52 years ago.

With FPTP, the voter can only vote FOR a candidate, or vote tactically. Of course such voting is blind, since it only works if the tactic is widely followed by likeminded voters. A very clumsy strategy, and far from democratic.

A similar tactic is vote management in STV. This is where party voters are urged to vote in a particular way to maximise the number of seats by keeping all party candidates in the hunt as long as possible. It can backfire if the number of candidates is too many, and/or the transfers do not go quite to plan.

blanch152 · 09-05-2022 3:40pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119032204#Comment_119032204

Well, there are plenty of societies built on fairness, equality, cooperation and so forth that have been created on equally arbitrary ways ever since and some of them even smaller. So why can't it be done is the answer to that.

After all, the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland is probably the longest unchanged land border in Europe.

awec · 09-05-2022 4:08pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036225#Comment_119036225

I haven't looked up the data to back this opinion up, but my take on the Alliance and west of the Bann constituencies is that it's harder to tempt floating unionists to vote Alliance as there is a greater risk of all-nationalist representation in those constituencies if votes are messed up.

I don't think it's that the Alliance message doesn't resonate out west, it's just a riskier vote for people. Some of those elections in the past have been really, really close.

Nody · 09-05-2022 4:09pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119037012#Comment_119037012

I'd say you are a tad optimistic there on the NI border, Denmark has had a steady border for quite a while, Spain if we exclude the moving island (as that's part of an agreement with France) has had none for quite a while as well as Switzerland.

Brussels Sprout · 09-05-2022 4:10pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119037156#Comment_119037156

Yeah I'd say the 101 year old border in Ireland isn't anywhere close to being the oldest border in Europe.

L1011 · 09-05-2022 4:14pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119037156#Comment_119037156

The Danish border is almost exactly the same age - June 15, 1920 and the ROI-NI one is from the Government of Ireland Act 1920 which was November 1920.

Portugal-Spain border is unchanged on land since 1864, there was a water change in 1926.

Brussels Sprout · 09-05-2022 4:18pm

I can't imagine the Benelux borders or the Norway-Sweden, Sweden-Finland borders have changed much either - or Switzerland's borders for that matter.

retalivity · 09-05-2022 4:21pm

Sweden-Norway border has been in place since 1751, although it was an internal border for nearly 100 years when the kingdoms were united

L1011 · 09-05-2022 4:25pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119037196#Comment_119037196

Belgium was only invented in 1830 and they altered their border with the Netherlands in 2018 (and not for the first time). Luxembourg is a good shout I'd guess (edit: 1839)

CrabRevolution · 09-05-2022 4:38pm

Would the Treaty Ports have counted towards the Ireland-UK border....? Did they remain UK sovereign territory or did they simply get the use of them?

BluePlanet · 09-05-2022 4:42pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036805#Comment_119036805

I'm wondering where Brandon Lewis the British SoS for NI gets his numbers from.

SF 27 + SDLP 8 = 35 Nationalists

DUP 25 + UUP 9 + TUV 1 = 35 Unionists.

------

Alliance Party 17, but their official position is to not declare Unionist or Nationalist and to park the question of constitutional change. Now we all know that they are mostly unionist, but to what %? It's not fair to consider them all unionist when they don't delcare.

PBP 1, I don't know if they register as Nationalist in the NI Assembly.

blanch152 · 09-05-2022 4:48pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119037156#Comment_119037156

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borders_of_Denmark#cite_note-3

"A Danish-German treaty of 1922 settled a number of minor issues relating to maintenance of the border, fishing in the Flensburg Fjord, issues relating to the dykes relating to the Vidå part of the border and local affairs relating to communities on the new border"

Slightly younger than our border.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_protectorate_in_Morocco

The Spanish Border with Morocco changed in 1956.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Airport

Building work at Geneva Airport in 1960 saw a change in the Swiss/French border, through an exchange of territory.

Stormont Election 2022

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