The reason the party canât win is because of FPTP, and because the UK electorate were too stupid to vote for voting reform to get a system that gives minority views even a seat at the table, weâre still all stuck with holding our nose and picking least bad. The Greens have their support and deserve a say but their policies wouldnât win many seats even if people thought they could win.
Which in my case means voting for a Labour party that was an authoritarian disaster area last time out because they canât be worse than the Tories or a UKIP party polling at 20odd% in my constituency. Luckily I donât live there any more! 
The whole point of this is to overlay alternative voting atop FPTP, by allowing people to signal a first preference before the election. If you use the service now, you can help to oust a bad Labour authoritarian candidate without having to risk leaving the path open for a worse Tory one.
Is it open to manipulation? For example, consider a Tory/Labour marginal, where Labour are slightly in the lead in the polls. Lots of Tory voters lie and say theyâll vote Green - enough to make a Green victory look likely. A number of the more more left-wing Labour voters therefore defect to the Greens, splitting the left vote, and the Tories get in.
I just checked my constituency. 13 people registered!
2010 was the first time the Greens had even had a candidate on the ballot since before 1983 - and as far as I can tell they arenât fielding one this year either.
http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2015/01/erewash/
Last time out, the BNP were the 4th party with >2000 votes, and before that, Kilroy-Silkâs was with almost 3000. I expect a miserably high UKIP vote, to be honest.
I am not sure that in a depressed post-industrial midlands constituency dominated by two small market towns and no universities, the Greens would stand much of a chance.
As mentioned elsewhere, I feel a bit skeevy for voting as an ex-pat anyway. But if they do field someone, I might vote for them.
That would require a lot of tories lying about their intentions. There arenât that many places with the scenario that you suggest.
I think this is meant for seats where Ukip/Conservative donât do that well (but could win if the vote is split in certain ways) but there might be enough disillusioned Labour and LibDem voters to win the seat for the Greens.
This was tried in the US in 2000 in support of the Green Party. Then, the idea was to let Greens in âswing statesâ still vote Green, but not take support away from Al Gore. Slate got behind the idea.
(Actually, this being the Greens, there ware many differently individual motivations â I am certain the BoingBong Commentariat will set me straight 8)
Several state Attorney Generalâs deemed it illegal (âsellingâ ones vote is a crime in most stats), and legally harassed the websites supporting the co-ordination, largely stopping the project. Oddly, many of those Attorney Generals were Republicans. Later legal analysis suggest the vote-swapping WAS constitutional.
I wish you better luck in the UK.
My worry about the green party is that theyâll try to go greener at our expense. Years ago i remember one of their policyâs being that they would extend the congestion charge to outer London. Iâm all for âgreenerâ but ultimately it will mean more money from my pocket.
Basically more taxes under the guise of being âfor the environmentâ.
Coffee table communism. Far left, far right both cause misery
Could we leverage international cooperation here? American-run server for European coordination, EU-run one for American voters? Where the ones who run the respective project are outside of the reach of vindictive AGs from either side? What would be the risks for such server operators, is this an extradition-worthy âcrimeâ?
So, âyesâ, then.
We already have four mainstream neoliberal parties and you seem to think that the alternative being offered is far left.
Bear in mind the Tories have caused me severe mental health problems over the last five years, Labour have already said that they wonât change anything significantly, Ukip look like they will be even worse than the Tories and the Lib Dems are about to become a minor party, Nick Clegg somehow managing to turn his safe seat into being 10 points behind in the polls.
All I want is some time to recover, I donât know if I will survive another 5 years of neoliberal austerity.
So prior to Tories coming to power in 2010 you were fit and healthy through many years previous years of Labour rule?
Iâd do what I always do and let it hinge on the candidate.
I wouldnât support a bad candidate in order to support their party. That happens quite a lot. More campaigns should be tuned to candidate instead of party, except pursestrings & nomination fixes often pervert any opportunities to do so.
Mind you, Iâm in Canada, but we have a Green Party too. In the last Federal election I participated in (as a volunteer, since Iâm not allowed to vote) I happily stood for the underdog NDP candidate instead of the underdog underdog Green. Nothing to do with contrasting platforms, it was primarily on candidate. The Green candidate was an admitted joke candidate whereas the NDP candidate was quite sincere & of a long proven personal integrity.
In the last Provincial election I was faced with the same situation, the Greens could only muster a joke candidate, with too obvious flaws, despite their platform being head and shoulders above the rest.
second disclaimer for those that missed it, these are Canadian Greens Iâm dissing
No, but that was because of living in a flat that was attacked by fascists for a year, and I was recovering right up until the Conservatives started enacting their policies to the indifference of their LibDem coalition partners.
But I wasnât a Labour supporter even when they were elected in 1997, they lost me when I was still in my teens and John Smith was leader. Iâm also not a Green Party supporter, although they look far better than the alternatives on the ballot paper at the moment.
I sincerely wish you good health for the future.
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