When is a majority a majority or margin ?

Clippo · 02-12-2005, 08:15 AM

In the thread below 'What has UKIP been doing recently' the discussion, to my mind has deviated sufficiently from the original posting by Anthony that I wanted to separate it.

Paul Birch wrote:-

Quote:

Clippo wrote:
Paul Birch wrote in reply to one of my statements:-
Quote:
Half a reasonable majority? That's a minority! It couldn't hardly do anything at all!
What strange & faulty logic you have! My definition of a parliamentary majority is the excess of MPs of the governing party over the combined MPs of the other parties. Therefore, ‘half a decent majority’ is still a majority albeit a reduced majority, not a minority.

Quote:

A majority is a grouping of more than fifty percent. Half of any percentage (up to 100%) is less than fifty percent, therefore no longer a majority but a minority. Simple maths. What you are calling a majority is actually the margin of a majority. But even with your usage (which though incorrect is not uncommon in the media) half of a reasonable majority would still be less than a reasonable majority, inadequate for major constitutional reforms.

You’ve tried this pedantic semantic approach to discussion on this forum in many threads before but it won’t wash with me.

Language evolves – if you can’t cope with colloquialisms, people will not listen to you and you will thus demean any of your fundamentally good ideas by tainted association.

I’ve raised this particular subject as a poll (& I accept that UKIP forum members may not truly be a random sample).

Here’s the problem -

There are 659 seats in Parliament & the Labour party has 559.

The difference is obviously 100, and to save you working out the maths, Paul Birch’s definition of a majority comes to 34.83 %

Would you, as a typical member of society with even some slight education, naturally call this a parliamentary majority of 100, or a margin of majority of 100 ? or a majority of 34.83% -

Please put your answer in the poll above.

N.B. I’m not going to say any more on this thread, whether the poll can be interpreted pedantically as proving me correct or not. I’ve wasted so much precious computer time on this that I’m losing the will to live!

Bryan Parry · 02-12-2005, 12:12 PM

The first two options imply Labour have 100 seats more than the other parties put together, if you ask me. Not that they have 100 less than maxmim. Therefore, I'm not sure how to vote.

Paul Birch · 02-12-2005, 12:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clippo

Quote:

Paul Birch wrote in reply to one of my statements:-

Quote:

Half a reasonable majority? That's a minority! It couldn't hardly do anything at all! :roll:

What strange & faulty logic you have! My definition of a parliamentary majority is the excess of MPs of the governing party over the combined MPs of the other parties. Therefore, ‘half a decent majority’ is still a majority albeit a reduced majority, not a minority.

Quote:

A majority is a grouping of more than fifty percent. Half of any percentage (up to 100%) is less than fifty percent, therefore no longer a majority but a minority. Simple maths. What you are calling a majority is actually the margin of a majority. But even with your usage (which though incorrect is not uncommon in the media) half of a reasonable majority would still be less than a reasonable majority, inadequate for major constitutional reforms.

You’ve tried this pedantic semantic approach to discussion on this forum in many threads before but it won’t wash with me.

You're the foolish pedant here. I made a quick joke (with smiley), and you decided to beat it to death - displaying your own ignorance of basic arithmetic in the process.

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Language evolves – if you can’t cope with colloquialisms

Legislation cannot cope with colloquialisms. Nor can a manifesto commitment to introduce specific legislation. Nor can analysis of how legislation functions. These things must be precise and unambiguous.

Quote:

There are 659 seats in Parliament & the Labour party has 559.
The difference is obviously 100, and to save you working out the maths, Paul Birch’s definition of a majority comes to 34.83 %

You can't even get the arithmetic right! On the standard definition of majority (which has nothing to do with me) 84.83% of the seats are held by the majority. Half would be 42.41%, a minority.

If there is a vote 559 to 100, the margin - sometimes called a voting majority - is 459, the difference between the greater and the lesser. What the media commonly call a voting majority, however, is the minimum number of people who would have to switch sides to change the result - here 230 - which is the integer part of half the margin-plus-one.

Quote:

Please put your answer in the poll above.

The correct answer is "none of the above".

View Poll Results: If a government has 100 seats more than combined other parties, do you personally call that :-
A Majority of 100?	3	75.00%
A Margin of Majority of 100?	1	25.00%
A Majority of 34.83%	0	0%
Voters: 4. You may not vote on this poll

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02-12-2005, 12:12 PM	#2 (permalink)
Bryan Parry Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Middlesex, England Posts: 394	The first two options imply Labour have 100 seats more than the other parties put together, if you ask me. Not that they have 100 less than maxmim. Therefore, I'm not sure how to vote.