Order of the Bath

The Bristol Merchant Venturers are now very similar to provincial branches of Lions or Rotary Club but perhaps on a slightly grander scale. But in their foundation they were an early example of the modern venture capitalists. Where the merchants invested in new trade routes and new world plantations, their modern counterparts invest in genome sequences and social networks. Their names are often spoken in the same breath as hedge fund managers and futures traders (now collectively called “Bankers”) and not mentioned in polite company but they can on occasion, almost seem to be charities. They put money into causes that would probably founder without them, of long term benefit to the country and even mankind—in everything it seems except intent. Their objective is, if the venture is successful, to take a very healthy profit just like their forebears. Many ventures will fail, the visionary inventors swept aside like the lost ships to the new world, but the occasional star apparently justifies the trail of debris and, of course, every one turns a blind eye to the slave gallies.

So when an initiative such as the prisoner rehabilitation scheme comes up it is very much a venture capitalist scheme. They cannot take a profit unless they reduce the re-offending rate of their “customers’ by a significant amount. I would hope there are some restrictions on how they select the clients, because the risk is that they are competing with the genuine charities such as this one founded in Bristol—both in drawing off funding and cherry picking the good candidates for reform.

The way venture capital takes its profit is not usually long term investment, they can’t wait that long. Once a company looks to become successful the usual course is to float it on the stock market if it is very good and has become a known name or, for smaller ventures, sell it to a bigger company who needs the technology or expertise. I can’t see that being possible for the prisoner scheme except perhaps to sell it back to the government when funds or the politics are more amenable.

Another reason that a successful fledgling company might be bought is to put it out of business, to squash the competition. Playing devil’s advocate, the rehabilitation scheme could be attractive to Crime Inc. as it would be drying up their recruitment field.

I for one welcome our new two-headed overlords.

Politics again, I’m afraid.

The news reports are saying that all this bargaining for deals has caught them on the hop and they weren’t expecting it. Rubbish—we have been expecting a hung parliament for weeks, at least since the mysterious Clegg surge, and it was very likely before that as the swing needed by the Conservatives for an absolute majority was unrealistically high.

The Tory press are criticising the LibDems (and being very insulting about it) for first trying for a Con alliance and, when that looked unlikely, going to Labour. That is what they said they would do before the vote—first try to seek an alliance with the party with the most votes. Get over it; this is real politics. However flawed, the people have elected those they want to represent them and it is up to those representatives to govern and that means forming a government. How they achieve that, we have entrusted to them.

Now that Brown has announced his resignation there is talk of yet another (Labour) Prime Minister without a mandate. That is rubbish too. Prime Ministers in this country do not have a direct mandate. They would need to be directly elected, presidential style to have that; we have Tony Blair to blame for giving people that impression. Again, we leave it up to our directly elected representatives, once they have formed a government, to select people for the jobs that need to be done and that includes Prime Minister.

Looking at a possible coalition, let’s look at some numbers. There are 650 seats so technically 326 are needed for a majority. The Conservatives won 306 and we can allow them one more for the vacant but safe Tory seat. They can usually count on the support of the Unionists (DUP 8 ) which gives them a working total of 315. Labour won 258 and can usually count on the SDLP (3) making 261. The Liberal Democrats won 57 and both the Green party (1) and the Alliance party (1) are likely to support them on most issues making 59.

A Liberal/Labour alliance adds up to 320. Of the remainder, Sinn Fein (5) don’t take up their seats, so that means a majority of only 322 is actually needed. Both sides are a few short leaving them at the mercy of the two nationalist parties, Plaid Cymru (3) and SNP (6) and an independent. It is just possible that the Conservatives could pull off a coup and form an alliance with these but which ever side does it, it will be at the expense of some concessions for their national interests and neither looks good for the economy or a stable government.

Digressing a little, lets look at what it would have been in a true proportional representation system. This is not realistic because firstly, no system will allocate the seats strictly according to the votes cast as I have done here but also because, if you change the voting system, people will vote differently; but lets do it any way. The results would have been Conservative 235, Labour 189, LibDem 150, UKIP 20, BNP 12, SNP 11, Green 7, Sinn Fein 4, DUP 4, Plaid Cymru 4, SDLP 3, Ulster Con/Unionist 2, Alliance 1 and eight others.

I am not going to say how I did it (remember these are only my personal opinions) but I think that would give natural (if strained) groupings supporting a Conservative government of 275 and a Labour one, 193 with 158 supporting the Liberal Democrats. That would definitely form a stable left leaning alliance but I can see why the Conservatives would not be keen on voting reform—they would be unlikely to ever form a government again!

P.S. Don’t be frightened by those extremist parties that would suddenly get seats, that is real politics too, and it is highly unlikely that they would get so many votes once the system was in place and people could vote for the policies they really want with an expectation that they will actually be heard.

Did anyone hear what they said?

It is clear to me what they said and it is exactly the same as they have said since I was first able to vote back in the 70s—the electoral system in this country is broken. Just look at the figures. At the time of writing (08:45) the results are CON 36%, LAB 29%, LIB 23%, other 12% and the prediction is not a lot different. That says we don’t want a block-busting majority. We are fortunate that for the first time for ages, the seat count says something similar, though in very different proportions. So let’s listen to the people and do something about it.

of cabbages and kings.

I have always felt that I align mostly with the Left. That seems the appropriate place to be as a Christian, just like the Methodist founders of the socialist movement. Just that, somehow, the Left doesn’t seem to align with me. Giles Frazer summed it up very well in his Church Times column last week.

When I decided that I had to be at least a little politically active, I just couldn’t bring myself to join the Labour Party. In practice there is no party that anyone can fully believe in all of the policies—that would be an interesting challenge question to the candidates. But we are stuck with a party system and, perhaps if we ever get some sort of decent proportional voting system we will be able to say that “I like 50% of the policies of A, 25% of B and 25% of C” or similar. There seems to be no other way. So slightly active I am, but I won’t canvas because. if challenged on the doorstep over a particular policy, I can’t be sure that I would agree with what the manifesto says.