Workshops
Workshop on Political Representation Issues
Interested persons, including research fellows and students, are warmly invited to attend the McDougall Trust's 2010 series of lunch time workshops on Political Representation. Light refreshments will be available from 12.45 pm and after the workshops.
Wednesday 17 March 2010, 1.00-2.30 pm (with a short break at 1.55 pm)
Prospects for the UK General Election of 2010
Speakers: Michael Steed, McDougall Trust Chair, together with Lewis Baston, Director of Research, Electoral Reform Society
Chair: Dr Ruth Farmer, Trustee, McDougall Trust
Venue: Thomas Hare House, Lakeman Library, 6, Chancel Street, London, SE1 0UX.
Two noted psephologists offer key insights into what could happen at the forthcoming UK general election, very probably on 6 May 2010. Michael Steed, Chair of the McDougall trust, and author or co-author of the statistical appendices to the Nuffield election studies of 1964-2005, will survey the prospects for the general election with Lewis Baston, Director of Research at the Electoral Reform Society and author of Reggie: The Life of Reginalld Maudling.
Topics to be covered include:
- The implications of different sorts of 'hung parliament'
- How turnout distorts the voting system
- What the Commons would look like under the alternative vote
- The political impact of regional variations in the swing
- How the Liberal Democrats and smaller parties could resist a squeeze
- How far ahead do the Conservatives need to be to win a majority?
- What another election in the autumn of 2010 or in spring 2011 might look like.
We hope to have the pleasure of seeing you at the workshop.
Places are limted. Please confirm your attendance with the Trust's Executive Secretary, Paul Wilder, by 12 noon on Monday, 15 March.
Telephone: 020 7620 1080. E-mail: admin@mcdougall.org.uk
Directions: The nearest underground stations are Southwark (Jubilee line) or Waterloo(Northern, Bakerloo and Jubilee lines). Chancel Street is at the end of the third turning south of Blackfriars Bridge, east side of Blackfriars Road, which is served by bus routes: 45, 63 and 100.
The McDougall Trust is a registered charity that encourages study in political science, with particular emphasis on research in democracy, elections, voting systems and forms of government. The Trust maintains the Lakeman Library for Electoral Studies, a unique resource, and publishes, through Taylor & Francis, the quarterly election studies journal Representation (ISBN 0034-4893).