After the 2010 UK general election, I made this:

It shows what we voted for and what we got. As you can see, what we got was, as usual, not terribly close to what we voted for. Now, we have a chance for change, but, as usual in the UK, it’s not change anyone wants. We’re going to get the option to replace the awful first past the post system with the barely superior alternative vote.

The BBC sums up the parties’ stances, and it makes for bonkers reading. In summary:

• The Conservatives want to stick with FPTP, although most Tory MPs don’t think AV would make any major difference to their party.
• Labour, now finding itself in opposition and with its seeming self-enforced policy of always having to play reactionary politics, is supporting AV. Again, AV won’t make much difference to Labour.
• The Liberal Democrats are in favour of electoral reform, but really want STV (single transferrable vote), not AV.
• The SNP is undecided but its leadership says it really wants STV rather than AV.
• Plaid Cymru supports electoral reform and backs AV, but wants STV.
• The DUP will back AV, but wants STV.
• The Green Party will support AV, but wants voters to be able to choose between a range of systems and favours “a fair, inclusive proportional way of voting”.
• UKIP is backing AV, but wants AV+.
• The BNP hates AV almost as much as the French and will campaign against, and favours “proportional representation”.
• The English Democrats, Christian Peoples Alliance, Respect, Jury Team and Communist Party all want a proportional system, and have varying stances on AV.

Reading through that, it’s pretty clear what’s going on and what’s going to happen. FPTP favours those in power, hence the Tories campaigning against AV. AV isn’t a big enough change to make any odds to big parties, hence Labour campaigning for AV, largely to piss off the Tories. For smaller parties, everyone wants a proportional system, so most are backing AV in the hope that it’s a first step towards one.

I’ll bet what’s going to happen, though, is that the Tories, backed by the aggressive and right-wing element of the UK press, will give the AV campaign a serious kicking until the day of the vote. We’ll hear a lot about how poor the coalition has been and how any change to the electoral system could result in more coalitions. (Never mind that the one coalition we’ve had in recent history was, seemingly, supposed to be magical and perfect, yet all the shitty UK governments elected by FPTP haven’t led people to go: “You know what? FPTP is rubbish.”)

Despite this, AV has a chance, because it’ll be backed by almost every non-Conservative party and some major press, and so it might win. But at that stage, we’re done. This won’t be a stepping stone, because Labour at that point will shut up shop. Labour knows that it’d be much harder to win 2015’s election under any form of PR, and so we’d be left with support for further change in the hands of the Liberal Democrats (who almost everyone in the UK now hates) and small parties that are either bonkers (hello, BNP!) or who make sense but have relatively little voice (nationalists, The Greens).

Personally, I’d love to see the UK finally embrace democracy in a very real way and so I’ll be supporting AV, and clinging to the sliver of hope that it’s a stepping stone and not a full stop. It’d be great to show up at the election booth in 2015, knowing that—for the first time in my adult life—my vote actually mattered. I just can’t see it happening though.

The BBC’s having to apologise to Mexico (BBC News) after Top Gear did an episode in a very Top Gear manner, taking the piss out of Mexicans in a low-brow, vaguely xenophobic way. This, apparently, has caused “outrage”, for some reason, because, clearly, Top Gear is a serious news programme and not just three blokes arsing about and wanking over car porn.

One of the few sane voices on the spat, Robert Llewellyn, says:

One of the most intelligent men I’ve ever met was a Mexican architect. He wasn’t lazy, he didn’t wear a poncho, he cooked some of the best food I’ve ever eaten and he was a gentle, non judgmental kind man. I also know if he’d watched Top Gear the other night he would have laughed because he wouldn’t be threatened by such inanity. He would have known that the three middle aged men in jeans had not a clue about Mexican history and culture, he would know what they were really doing was revealing their own ignorance and frail self worth.

Llewellyn’s post seems to swerve between whether Top Gear was ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, but ultimately comes to the conclusion that the episode was merely embarrassing. The bigger argument, though, is should the BBC be self-censoring? It’s one thing for the news to carry on in this manner (almost unheard of in the UK, although some US channels, like Fox News, do this kind of thing all the time), but should television be sanitising an entertainment show? And if so, what about comedies?

Last year, Stephen Fry said there was such a culture of fear at the BBC that it was shying away from taking creative risks. And, indeed, even the man himself has been hit, with the Japanese embassy complaining over a section of a recent QI that featured a discussion on the nuclear bombings of 1945. While some of the comments were undoubtedly in poor taste (such as Davis quipping that bombs had bounced off survivor of both blasts, Mr Yamaguchi), it’s insane to think this sparked a minor international incident. Even more crazy is the tone of the BBC’s own report, which adds:

And Stephen Fry expressed amazement that the Japanese trains were still running after the blast.

Indeed he did express amazement, but that wasn’t him being derogatory—he was amazed at how the country managed to deal so well with being bombed twice by brand new, deadly weaponry. That’s not something to be apologetic about in the slightest.

Still, lucky no other countries ever portray the British in a stereotypical fashion or make jokes at our expense, eh? Man up, BBC. The Top Gear thing wasn’t anything to be proud of, but it wasn’t, in the context of the show, anything to apologise over; and that QI—the best-mannered, most intelligent, most interesting panel show around—also finds itself in a similar situation is nothing short of maddening. Sometimes it’s like the BBC wants to find itself being the British PBS in a decade’s time.

As you may have heard, the Metropolitan police once again used a truly proportional response to deal with some tax protestors, hospitalising three with CS spray (Guardian) while they were protesting peacefully in Boots. Clearly, the staff were frightened for their lives, so much so that they subsequently gave the rampaging, highly violent protestors free treatment.

Still, it’s not only the Metropolitan police who covered themselves in glory sauce—the Boots spokesperson who provided a statement regarding the reasoning behind the company’s Swiss tax registration came up with an absolute gem:

In the longer term we believe it will better reflect the increasingly international nature of our wider group

Yes, Boots, that well-known international powerhouse that isn’t, say, a meandering British brand with a few outlets in other countries.

Not content with having dug a deep enough hole, the spokesperson continued:

If we had registered in Switzerland purely for tax reasons there are many other countries that we could have considered.

Well, that makes it OK then.

Top Tory Toff David Cameron revealed earlier today what “we’re all in this together” really means:

• The VAT hike, which hits poorest people worst (since they spend a larger proportion of their incomes on goods that have VAT), will stay.
• Cameron hopes the 50% tax rate, which only affects top earners, will be scrapped.

Hey, Tories, why not just allow the richest in the country not not pay any tax at all? (Oh, you already did that.)

So, Vince Cable says what everyone’s thinking—that Rupert Murdoch needs taking down a peg and his takeover of BSkyB needs to be stopped. And then he’s stripped of the role, humbled, and watches as the BSkyB takeover became the responsibility of Jeremy Hunt. Well, gosh, I WONDER WHAT HIS DECISION WILL BE? (Hint: Armando Iannucci links to a Hunt article that may as well be titled “Why I wuv Rupert and want to have his babies”.)

Cable was, of course, stripped of the role for making Rupert Murdoch cry and for being impartial, and not at all for going against Tory wishes to see the BBC killed by its commercial rival. After all, it’s not remotely hypocritical to demote Cable when David Cameron referred to the prospect of BBC cuts as ‘delicious’. Clearly, that little nugget wasn’t at all impartial and wrong.

And it’s not like The Labour Party comes out of this smelling of roses either. It had the perfect opportunity to play bipartisan politics and also to appeal to Lib-Dem MPs and voters alike. It doesn’t need Murdoch until 2015, and could have reduced his power over media and the voters. Instead, Ed Miliband leapt on the chance to smack Cable and score a couple of short-lived politics points, saying “Vince Cable should have gone”. Rather than weakening the government, this likely strengthened it, but it has weakened one of the few people in Cabinet seemingly trying to at least some things that aren’t entirely reprehensible.

So screw you, David Cameron and your Tory buddies for so openly going against the wishes of the people and tearing down one of your government’s best MPs time and time again.

Screw you, Nick Clegg for not having the balls to back one of your own, instead choosing to provide a ‘united front’ that will see your party wiped from Parliament in 2015 (well, apart from you, because you’ll likely be wearing blue by then).

And screw you, Ed Miliband for proving you’re just like every other tosspot Labour leader, playing reactionary politics when you had yet another opportunity to do something different.