Talk:Cheadle by-election, 2005

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[edit] %change for parties not previously standing

Any election information site will tell you that swing is the change in vote share between the top two parties in an election, be it Lab/Con, Lab/LD or Con/LD; or for that matter Plaid/LD or SNP/Con. Cheadle is not, and never has been, a safe Labour seat, so the concept of calculating swing between the Conservative and Labour votes in a seat like this is pointless. The seat has been won and fought between the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives, as such the discussion on swing must focus on the parties which feature in the genuine and valid fight for the seat, not including any third placed party, be they Labour or anyone else.

Swing is not just for the main two; were it so, the calculations of by-elections in Northern Ireland would be meaningless, as would seats in the increasing number of Con/LD marginals. dok 15:44, 8 August 2005 (UTC)


I added the %change for the candidates from the two minor parties, which was abruptly reverted by User:Dbiv, the %change for those parties should be recorded, because, although they didn't stand at the last election, all loses/gains should be accounted for, they gained 0.2 and 0.6 % more votes than they did at the last election (because they didn't stand). If you look at news.bbc.co.uk/vote2005 you'll see the BBC also does the same -- Joolz 00:05, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

  • But if you look at all the other parliamentary constituency pages on Wikipedia, you'll see that they all uise N/A for the change when the candidate hasn't previously stood. Maltaran 07:56, July 15, 2005 (UTC)
    • They don't all use N/A. -- Joolz 14:00, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
    • Rollback is absolutely no different to editing an old version and saving it. I did explain the edits in comments I put in immediately after. Quite frankly I've dealt with too many people who put misleading statistics for 'gain' and 'loss' for parties who did not stand before to be interested in explaining the whole thing in detail yet again. David | Talk 08:15, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
      • According to WP:RV: "Its intent is solely to be a timesaving shortcut for reverting mass vandalism" -- Joolz 14:00, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
        • Note the word "intent". Intent does not mean practice. I intended to go swimming but actually I went ice-skating, etc. If it was not allowed then policy would say it was not allowed. Policy does not say it is not allowed and therefore it is allowed, QED. David | Talk 15:34, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Incidentally I notice a bogus 'Conservative to Liberal Democrat swing' has been inserted. I've switched it to the Conservative/Labour swing. David | Talk 08:45, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

  • Swing is always given as between the top two parties, even if they both increase their share of the vote. Maltaran 09:29, July 15, 2005 (UTC)
    • Oh no it isn't. David | Talk 09:33, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
      • It's the way I've always seen it, and it's consistent with how we did the general election results here. Maltaran 12:49, July 15, 2005 (UTC)
        • Swing is between Conservative and Labour. Anything else is slish. David | Talk 13:18, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
          • From the BBC's story: "The swing was 0.63% from Conservatives to Liberal Democrats." -- Joolz 14:00, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
            • I don't give a stuff what the BBC say. Quite a few BBC people were even claiming that South Staffordshire was a byelection, so I really wouldn't rely on them. David | Talk 14:34, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
              • So what are you saying? The swing isn't 0.63% from Con to Libdem? -- Joolz 15:01, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
                • That is precisely what I am saying. There is no 'swing from Con to Lib Dem'. No such concept. David | Talk 15:12, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
                  • What do you mean, there's no such concept? You're going to have to do a little better at explaining your position, I simply don't understand it. -- Joolz 15:20, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
                    • I don't know if it's possible to explain more thoroughly what 'The concept does not exist' means. There is no such thing. It is a nullity, an impossiblity. It is like giving a measurement of how loud an inaudible noise is. Swing is between Conservative and Labour. David | Talk 15:34, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
                      • Clearly not everyone agrees with you, the BBC and the Times both show swings from Con to Libdem (see [1] for The Times example). -- Joolz 15:46, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
                        • I don't give a stuff what the BBC or the Times say. They aren't specialists in reporting and analysing elections. David | Talk 15:50, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
                          • Presumably the writers of those articles on the BBC and the Times are more 'specialist' on the matter than you are.
  • Could you perhaps explain why the concept does not exist? The percentage gap between the Lib Dem and Tory share of the vote is larger than it was at the previous election, so why is this not a swing? Maltaran 16:28, July 15, 2005 (UTC)
    • If the difference between the Lib Dems and the Monster Raving Loony Party grows narrower between two elections, would you call that a swing also? Swing is between Conservative and Labour. David | Talk 22:38, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
      • Your comparison to the Monster Raving Looney Party is nonsense. The 'swing' should apply to the two biggest parties in the constituency, not in the country.

[edit] Swing again

I have reverted the swing to the Conservative to Lib Dem swing. This is a clear consensus from everybody apart from Dbiv. We should follow the common usage. The Land 13:18, 11 October 2005 (UTC)