Wondering why I haven’t been blogging recently? I’ve been building this:
After the nightmare that was Vote Match Europe, this one was comparatively plain sailing (on the launch of the Europe version I was still trying to make it work five minutes before Stephen Fry started promoting it at the launch). Nonetheless, I’m desperately in need of some sleep. Please spread the word and give us some linky love.
Congratulations on your hard work! It’s clearly a very valuable resource. There are a couple of glitches though: the Lib Dem answers to questions 5, 12, 16, 17, 20, 24 are wrong, 27 looks iffy, and the UKIP answer to statement 12 looks a bit odd as well. Hope that’s helpful!
Overall superb – excellent statements. The additional party comments are a bit haphazard (a few repeated for the wrong policy areas). Will linkylurve.
The second question is confused:
“Homeowners should be free from prosecution when protecting themselves against intruders.”
I think everyone agrees with that. Then there are some people on the right, who think not only that, but that its okay for people like Tony Martin to shoot people in the back (i.e. that’s not protecting oneself).
Otherwise, good work.
I’m really very sorry for the inaccuracies on the Lib Dem answers. This was meant to have been checked by someone else. It wasn’t. I have now gone through them and amended accordingly.
What’s especially galling is that the Lib Dem Policy Unit really engaged constructively with this project. Not a party political point – just look at the comprehensiveness of their answers. So on a personal note I am extremely embarrassed and humiliated by this.
James King
Why are they wrong? If you look at the parties answers and the statements they give with them, they seem correct to me?
Do examine what the parties say – these are their answers which they have provided us. The Lib Dems were really good at providing answers to the statements. Thanks for using the site.
Matt Oliver
Unlock Democracy
Project Co-ordinator
Matt,
They were incorrect, we screwed up, I have now corrected it. End of. Let’s take this offline.
Aye, Jennie definitely found one wrong, but it’s now right.
I did try it earlier on the mobile, but it crapped out half way through (Opera Mini browser on a Nokia 5800), probably due to the way Opera compress things but it might be a fixable glitch.
Overall, nice job, I like. And I find out a few policies I disagree with the party on, which is good.
Can I correct/clarify The BNP’s position as I understand it on a few of these question?
Q8: Since the BNP supports the reintroduction of grammar schools with entrance exams at 11 and 13, your positioning of them on this issue is questionable.
Q13: The BNP supports the introduction of workfare.
Q30: The BNP’s position is that income tax should only begin to be levied on those earning over £15,000 pa.
Q31: The BNP actually opposed the Olympics coming to Britain as they believe they should be permanently held in their proper historic home: Greece.
I think you could have had more questions, as there are lots of other interesting policies proposed by the various parties. Overall though, great job – well done.
Timon,
The parties write their own responses to the statements and I have had no role in deciding which ones we used.
That said, you make interesting points about Q8 and Q13 and we do reserve the right to change responses. I will raise this and see what people say.
Q30 and Q31 are not a problem as those precise position are covered by the statement.
Statement 20 refers to “people not born in this country”, rather than the “foreign nationals” specifically referred to in UKIP’s answer. The Lib Dems rightly draw the distinction in their answer.
This is bound to cause confusion – do you mean to include British Citizens born abroad? And not foreign nationals born here?
TBH I thought it was already the case that foreign nationals would generally be deported if convicted.
There seems to be a glitch in this test: the questions stop at number 30 whereas when I look at the detailed results it is clear there are, in fact, 35 questions!
interesting application.
I answered the questions from how I think and then was pleased to discover that your application correctly classified me as a LibDem!!!!
Thanks for this. Always been a Lib Dem but see that the Greens just edge it for me. Good to know where I should place my vote! 🙂
I think there could be more in here to distinguish the Greens from the others, eg:
-Increase tax burden from 36% to 45% of GDP
-National minimum wage of £8.10 per hour
-Reintroduce 10p tax band and basic rate up to 22p
-Boycott Israel
-Bring majority voting to the UN security council
-Fight for the interests of “smaller countries” in trade talks
(all from the manifesto)
Joe’s ideas are solid. Until I read his post last night, I had no clue about some of their more batshit ideas, especially tax policy, will be pointing th eWSYVF guys in that direction as well.