Election algebra

I got interviewed for the BBC News web site at conference last weekend. I was quoted:

"Maybe they will have to compromise on some things, but I don't think it is necessary to form a coalition. I don't see why the largest party needs to be the one that forms the government.

. Actually, there's some stuff missing in that quote. What I really suggested was that if a coalition is formed, it doesn't need to contain the largest party. I gave the recent elections in Israel as an example, where there was a lot of talk of a coalition forming around the second party.

Anyway, someone was kind enough to email me and call me a cretin, on the basis of that quote. Using phrases like "completely fail to understand the concept of a democracy". Thanks, Iain, perhaps I'll return the favour some day.

"... based on that quote, you do come across as an utter cretin who's unaware they've just proposed something dangerously undemocratic and illiberal that would involve turning back the constitutional clock to the 18th century. "

he says.

But, now that he mentions it, perhaps there are circumstances under which the Queen might reasonably ask the second party to form a government. Indulge me for a moment, and please try not to blow a gasket, Iain.

Suppose, for example, that party A gets 40% of the vote, and 48% of the seats. Party B gets 55% of the vote, and 46% of the seats in parliament. Which party should form the government? What if supporters of party C (with 5% of the vote, and 6% of the seats) clearly express a preference for B over A in opinion polls.

Now, clearly a constitutional crisis (what Iain fears) occurs if party B is asked to form a government. But, in the figures above, I see a crisis occuring even if party A is asked to form the government.

iBlogger for iPhone

Last time I looked, there wasn't an iPhone app for blogspot blogs. You could, of course, use its web browser, but that's a little slow fir the purpose if you don't have a 3G or wifi connection.

Now, there's iBlogger, which supports a wide range of blogging engines, including blogspot. This is my first post with iBlogger, but I'm expecting it to be mangled somewhat because I need to change a setting on my blog.

It has some nice features. Allows tag management, lets you add links, and will use the iPhone's location services.

Mobile Blogging from here.

Edited to add:

My mistake. It seems I'd forgotten that I've used lifecast before. Lifecast supports picture blogging with blogspot and flikr, which is "coming soon" in iBlogger. iBlogger seems to work better with multiple blogs, though.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

iBlogger for iPhone

Last time I looked, there wasn't an iPhone app for blogspot blogs. You could, of course, use its web browser, but that's a little slow fir the purpose if you don't have a 3G or wifi connection.

Now, there's iBlogger, which supports a wide range of blogging engines, including blogspot. This is my first post with iBlogger, but I'm expecting it to be mangled somewhat because I need to change a setting on my blog.

It has some nice features. Allows tag management, lets you add links, and will use the iPhone's location services.

Mobile Blogging from here.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Conference Calendar

NB: I've fixed some problems with the file encoding. It now works with Thunderbird.

At conference, I like to have the conference calendar on my iPhone, to save me carrying bits of paper around. So, having done the work of entering all the events into Apple iCal, I've exported them into an iCalendar standard file. You should be able to import into your electronic diary if it supports the iCalendar standard.

The calendar contains separate entries for every event in the main programme, consultation sessions, opening times for the conference exhibition, and combined entries for training events and for fringe events.

click to download calendar

I've rolled all the "invitation only" training events in a given time slot into a single calendar event. Where there's only one public training event, I've given it an entry of its own. Otherwise, I've combined training events into single entries for the time slot. As far as I can see, all the training events are in the Harrogate International Centre's Queen's Suite

I've created separate entries each for the four "HQ fringe events", but the remaining fringe events I've bundled into two entries per time slot. One entry for events in HIC, and the other for events in the conference hotel.

All these conference events make for quite a crowded diary, but by combining fringe and training events, there's usually not more than two parallel calendar entries - except during the Friday consultative sessions. So, after importing the calendar, delete the events that you aren't interested in, and perhaps the exhibition hours.

If you spot any problems in the calendar (nobody has proof-read it), please post a comment here, and I'll try to update it as soon as possible.

Wikipedia has a list of applications with iCalendar support

Edited to add. I've fixed a couple of things on the calendar. One item had a duplicated UID, and I've converted it to iso-latin1 which Thunderbird seems to prefer, and removed some curly quotes and ligatures. The old version is at http://public.me.com/ianeiloart/Spring%20Conference%2009.ics?disposition=download

Spain loses 90% of its glaciers thanks to global warming

The Guardian reports that glacier ice in the Pyrenees has declined by 90% in the past century. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/23/spain-glaciers-climate-change

Labour out of touch on social housing

The Labour Party circulated a leaflet recently claiming that Lewes District Council had failed to meet its "25% target" for social housing. They even said that Liberal Democrats "admitted" their claim. They're wrong on both counts, and here's why.

The council doesn't have a 25% target for social housing. Our target for the year was to deliver 60 housing units. We've delivered 65 already, and think we'll deliver more before the end of the year (April).

The source of Labour's confusion, seems to be based on their misunderstanding of our method of delivery. We ask developers of large housing projects (more than 15 units) to provide 25% of their developments as social housing. But, we don't always expect to get that. Sometimes, we get other benefits like flood defences or decontamination of old landfill sites (you'd be surprised how many there are of those, or other contaminated land. So, it's our policy to ask for 25% there, but we don't expect to get it. That's not a target.

In fact, it would be ridiculous to make a target whereby the provision of social housing depends on the provision of private housing, which we don't control. If we've identified a need for 60 social housing units, we should be able to deliver it whatever happens in the private housing market. That should be obvious to anyone now that Labour's mythological "end of boom and bust" has been busted. Still, judging from Labour's leaflet, they're still denying responsibility for a recession caused by their deregulation of the UK's financial system.

Police oppose CCTV

It's coming to something when the police can't even trust themselves.