On The Election Results

Well, the election is over, and if there are two things I've learned, it's that:

1. I don't really understand UK politics
2. I can't find my passport

We now have what is known as a 'Hung Parliament'.  Most of the country do not understand what this means, but the concensus seems to be in favour of it being a Bad Thing.  There is also talk that we will now have to have another General Election in 6 weeks' time, which would be on my birthday, so I hope we don't.  Until then, I think all three of the people we weren't that mad on are in charge, and also the Queen actually gets to have a bit of a say, which is nice, because for a while there I was worried she didn't really do much.

My main question is this: who gets to live in 10 Downing Street?  Because I think I have a way to avoid another election, and if anyone of influence is reading this, I would like you to consider it, please.  In fact, someone once told me that if you mention Che Guevara in an email, someone in government reads it, so hopefully that applies to blogs and I have their attention now.

Anyway, here's my idea: put them all in 10 Downing Street, and then do it like Big Brother.  Make them do contest things, and look after chickens, and budget for their meals (this last one being particularly useful for the viewing public to watch).  Have a diary room with the Queen as Big Brother.  After a couple of weeks, we vote one of them out.  Then the following week, we vote another one out, and whoever is left in, gets to be Prime Minister (or we could let other party leaders as well, and get the summer out of it).

I have other ideas too:

• Throw all the names in a hat, and just pick out however many it is that you need to make a government.
• Make it like Krypton Factor.  Test them on Mental Agility (that one where they have to put bits of plastic in the shape of an elephant), Quick Thinking (a straightforward quiz would work, but for a laugh they could do the Citizenship Test), Calmness Under Pressure (with the aeroplane landing thing, but don't tell them it's a simulation), and Physical Agility (for the sheer joy of watching them do the aerial slide).

Of course, a fundamental issue is that the democratic process in the UK is such that we can all not vote for someone, and they can still end up in charge.  Much has been made of the fact that Labour got 258 seats with 29.0% of the vote (so that's 8.89 seats for each percent), while the Lib Dems got 57 seats with 23.0% of the vote (2.48 seats for each percent).  Even better, the Alliance party got 1 seat with 0.1%, which is 10 seats for each percent.

Also, as far as I can tell, these are percentages of people who actually voted, so if you take them as percentages of the total population, they are smaller.  But, frankly, if people aren't going to bother to vote, then don't come whining to me in 6 weeks' time when you realise you don't like what's going on.

Another interesting point is that in Fermanagh and South Tyrone, a candidate won by 4 votes, which is a majority of, like, 0.00000001% or something.  But I suppose you have to give it to someone.