Not Just Tactical Voting!

The current UK general election and the political environment in which it is taking place has triggered a lot of debate on the subject of tactical voting. Not all of that “debate” can be considered helpful, and it is detracting from the main goal which is to ensure that another term of office is not granted to the destructive and incompetent Conservative Party under the leadership of Boris the Liar.

Personally, I have been burnt by tactical voting before to the point where I swore I would never do it again, therefore this election presents me with somewhat of a quandary. I have been stabbed in the back by both the Conservative Party and the Labour Party and as a result have regretted voting for either in the past simply as a way of getting rid of the other. This is before getting into the subject of brexit where both parties have essentially twisted the knife. I therefore have the difficult choice of having to decide whether or not to hold the line or, because of circumstance, vote for a party that I feel has betrayed me.

That is, however, not what I need to discuss here.

Caution

I can see that under certain circumstances and in particular constituencies that tactical voting may be counterproductive and may yield a result which is undesirable. This would be as a result of the current political situation in this country particularly with regards to brexit, but also because of the disconnect which is occurring between some voters and the parties they traditionally vote for.

We have a number of things which are not “normal” going on here:

• a large number of people are about to vote on the basis of one political issue (i.e. brexit);
• a larger proportion of the electorate (recently estimated to be around 14% according to polling) are prepared to vote purely tactically to remove the Conservative government;
• traditionally Tory voters may not vote Tory because of their brexit position;
• moderate Tory voters may not vote Tory because of the party’s swing to the right;
• moderate Tory voters may not vote Tory due to possible connections with Nigel Farage and his party;
• Tory voters may not vote Tory because it is being lead by Boris the Liar;
• Labour remain voters are viewing the Labour Party as supporting a “leave” stance;
• Labour leave voters are viewing the party as supporting a “remain” stance;
• moderate Labour voters may be uncomfortable with the current leftist position of the party;
• moderate Labour voters may not be happy with Jeremy Corbyn.

These are conditions which have potentially created a larger proportion of floating voters than normal, and it is these people who determine the result. The electorate may be prepared as a collective to behave in a manner which is inconsistent with previous elections. As a consequence we cannot rely solely upon previous results and who came second as a guide to who is the ideal candidate to vote for to remove a Tory. Also, political polling makes use of statistical modelling in order to extrapolate out a reasonable predicition from a much smaller sample size. If the modelling does not take into account the unusual circumstances, the predictions made could be wildly adrift, particularly those at a national level.

Given that tactical voting websites are going to base their recommendations on just this sort of data, the first point I would make is that care needs to be taken in selecting a candidate. Some of the sites that I have seen have not updated their details to include correct information about which candidates are standing and therefore include results for parties that will not represented on the ballot. In choosing a candidate to vote for, please look at the local situation in your constituency, find any more detailed polling information and do not leap blindly. I would also add that as campaigns progress, the polling will change and so the recommendations will change and you may need to reassess your position much closer to polling day. In some cases the choice will be difficult or less than obvious, in others it will be simple.

Self-Moderation

Unfortunately, there has been much arguing and bickering online about tactical voting which has been counterproductive, achieves nothing and is deflecting away from the main goal.

The second point I would therefore make is accept that you cannot control the game.

You cannot dictate to others how they should vote; it is their choice governed by their reasoning. It is pointless to get into blazing arguments with people just because they are not planning on doing what you want them to do. By all means, persuade and make the needed information available, but recognise that there is a point at which persuasion can become cajoling and bullying. Accept that it is their choice and move on.

I’d also point out that the date for announcing candidacies in constituencies is long past, so there’s no point in complaining about who’s standing or expecting people to step aside because it’s too late for that now. As I am about to explain, many of the candidates that people think should step aside are actually serving a useful purpose.

The candidates and their parties will be publicly saying and acting as if they are playing to win, and that is only natural. Do not condemn them for not campaigning to come second.

Diversification

My final point (this is the reason for the title and probably the more important point); there are many ways to play this game, NOT JUST TACTICAL VOTING!

There needs to be recognition that there is risk in tactical voting. The mere action of persuading many people to vote tactically can have an undesirable effect. If all you are trying to do is move votes from one non-Tory party to another, there is a chance that the votes that you move to the target party will countered by votes that are naturally moving in the opposite direction as a result of the circumstances listed above. We cannot predict this and we cannot do anything about it which is why it is wise not to consider tactical voting alone to be the magic bullet that is going to solve our ills.

Remember this; in this game you can win either by adding to your score or taking away from your opponents’ score. Ideally, you want to do both.

All tactical voting is doing is moving the score around between non-Tory parties. We have forgotten the fact that it is possible to move votes from the Tories to somewhere else, and we have failed to take into account why such people would want to reject their traditional voting behaviour.

There has been much discussion/argument about the Canterbury constituency that was held by Rosie Duffield (by a very small margin over the Tories) and the candidacy of a LibDem member there. The argument goes that the LibDems should have stood down to allow Labour’s pro-remain Duffield to retain the seat. This is, however, the incorrect way of looking at it and ignores the Tory voters.

In electrical terms, there is something called a “sink point” or an “earth”. The purpose of such connections is to allow stray voltages resulting from a fault to find a way to ground via a path of least resistance in order to protect the machinery in which the fault is occurring and any human who happens to be in contact with the equipment at the time.

The same thing applies here. The LibDems are a sink point for Tory votes.

Put yourself in the shoes of a moderate Tory voter. You are unhappy with the direction of the Conservative Party, unhappy with Boris the Liar, unhappy with the scoundrels that he has surrounded himself with, unhappy with the lies and the behaviour. If you are presented with a choice between a Conservative Party lurching to the right or a Labour Party heading to the left, where does your vote go? You would be asking these voters to swing politically far farther than many would be willing to go if you expect them to vote Labour, so there is a reasonably good chance that these votes will go to the Tories as the “least worst choice” especially given the treatment given to Corbyn by the right-wing gutter press.

With a Libdem candidate present in this situation, then those Tory votes have somewhere to sink to. It does not matter that these voters are not voting tactically for the candidate most likely to win; they are looking for someone more in tune with their thinking. Voting Labour would be the path of highest resistance for these people, LibDem the path of lowest resistance. The LibDems are a more natural choice for moderate Tories than Labour.

What matters is that it reduces the Tories’ score.

I accept that moving those Tory voters to Labour would be the best outcome as this would both reduce the Conservative candidate’s vote and increase Duffield’s vote, however, anything which enables the Tories score to be reduced is better than not moving it at all. The lower the Tories score is, the easier it is for Labour to win this seat again. Yes, some moderate Labour votes will sink to the LibDems as well, but this can be mitigated if we can get to those disheartened moderate Tory voters.

So, rather than sitting online complaining and arguing with people who have said they will not vote tactically, how about this instead… find ways of convincing moderate Tory voters who have not decided to shift their vote to cast their ballot for someone else. It does not matter who, remember, it reduces the Tories score. The same thing applies to those voters who are still undecided. If they can be persuaded to vote tactically, then fine, but if not, anywhere but Tory is the next best option.

Take into account the fact that not every one is online, nor necessarily on Twitter, Facepalm or whatever platform you are using. Some can only be reached by traditional means in meatspace.

Stop arguing and start looking for ways to reach these people.

Addendum: The YouGov Poll

The headline information about the YouGov poll that was recently released showing the Tories winning by 48 seats conceals some hidden depths which are not being openly discussed by the media who are only really interested in the big story.

While the poll shows the Tories winning, the more detailed data shows that they are not winning by much. They are facing strong challenges in many constituencies where the poll predicts that they will win by much narrower margins than in previous elections. As things change throughout the course of a campaign, these figures are what have the Tories worried as a late shift in voting intentions could see them losing the very seats that this poll told them they would win.

It is therefore important that what my third point above says is taken on board. I accept that promoting tactical voting is a potentially useful thing to do, but it could be hazardous if used alone. We really do need to find ways of persuading traditionally Tory voters, the moderate support for the party, to listen to the better angels of their nature and vote for someone else.

We also need to ensure that we get the vote out. A large turnout by younger voters, particularly the ones who have been registering to vote in large numbers over the past weeks, could potentially be enough to swing some of the seats that the polling highlights as being at risk for the Tories because these are people who are far less likely to vote Conservative. Find the apathetic voters and persuade them to vote.