Its not democracy if we always end up with a government we did not elect.

From 1945 to 2010 (covered by the data I looked at), the great majority of people in the UK had to put up with a government they did not help elect.   Until 2010, Conservatives governed with between 39.2% and 49.7%, or an average of 44.9% of the total vote; Labour governed with 35-48% of the vote or an average of 43%.   See the charts below.

(Data from Richard Kimber's Political science resources http://www.politicsresources.net/)

I have included the parties "natural allies" in each case, eg: Northern Irish Unionists with the conservative figures though some supported the government and some did not.  So the percentages overstate the main party figures.  

The actual level of support in the country is of course much lower than these figures suggest for a number of reasons including:

1.  Non-voters.  At least some of these are protest votes, confirmed by those UKIP voters in the recent by-elections who had never ever voted before.  Those "plague on all your houses" citizens views should not be ignored when the electoral system realistically gives them no voice.

2.  Tactical voters.  Votes cast "to keep the other lot out" are not an endorsement of the policies of the winning candidate.
3.  All parties are themselves coalitions, no more so than the "Red" and Blue", which means that a significant number of people voted for them who did not support all of their policies, and if they had had an alternative would probably have voted elsewhere.  

If you were to adjust for these categories alone, then I guess that the actual %age level of support for all the policies followed by the ruling party would be between 10 - 20% less than the national figures suggest.   That could be as little as 20 - 30% of voters.   If pollsters have more information about this I would love to know.

In contrast, in 2010, the Conservative Lib-Dem coalition brought together two blocks with a total of 60% of the votes cast.  The government is of course dominated by the Tories, for which many voters seem determined to punish the Lib-Dems, but pure Tory policy has been mitigated as a result.  That many Lib-Dems do not like some Tory policy initiatives, and some Tories do not like Lib-Dem initiatives is true, but is it any different from the situation within either of the two main parties which are themselves broad churches?  The rifts between Tory Euro-sceptics and pro-Europeans, or between New Labour and Clause 4 supporters, are as fundamental, if not more so, than the differences between Tory and Lib-Dem on some issues, but they were never an argument for punishing candidates at election time in the way that the electorate seem, as of today, to want to punish the Lib-Dems.

If you are looking for reasons for voter indifference and dissatisfaction with party politics in the UK today, then this is surely one reason.  To that can be added the effect of single member, first past the post systems where the vast majority of voters know that their vote will make no difference on polling day because theirs is a so-called "safe seat". The evidence to the contrary was clearly seen in the Scottish referendum where every vote had equal weight in the outcome.    

All this is a good argument for giving people the freedom to vote for a party that truly represents their opinions.  That does not mean a protest vote for UKIP, the Green Party or (in other times) Lib-Dems, It means we need proper proportional representation, preferably multi-member constituencies and  STV.  

In the meantime the fact is that there is good case for arguing that the current coalition government represents a broad swathe of middle-of-the-road opinion in the UK, and for the first time in the last 70 years the Tory-Lib Dem coalition has given us a government that represents the majority of those who voted in the election.  Furthermore, if a coalition is a likely outcome of the 2015 election, then it should be welcomed by the public for the same reason, even by people on the losing side.

10 reasons (and more) why UKIP want to go back to 1984

UKIP want the UK to be like it was in 1984.  As a reminder for those old enough that they should remember (UKIP probably suffering from dementia if they can't), and those young enough not to have been around, here are 10 highlights from 1984.

• Miners Strikes March - November with associated rioting, police clashes etc.
• Ulster Volunteer Force shoots senior Sinn Fein members
• Riots in the streets of Wolverhampton
• WPC Yvonne Fletcher shot by Libyan diplomat, during Libyan embassy siege.
• UK agreed to give Hong Kong back to China
• Provisional IRA attempted to assassinate Tory ministers at Party Conference
• Church of England agrees to ordain women (the slippery slope, eh?)
• British Telecom privatised
• Unemployment reaches all-time high of 3.3 mln
• Youth unemployment reaches all-time high of 1.3mln.

And, as a matter of interest here are a few others:

• EEC budget negotiation breaks down over UK rebate (ah, that why UKIP want to go back)
• Magazine Tit-bits closed (bedtime reading for Ukippers?)
• Lightening strikes York Minster
• Earthquake in North Wales
• Immigrant Zola Budd given UK Citizenship (would she have got any points on the UKIP / Australian scale for running around fast without shoes on?)
• Austin Rover launched a lot of new models,  Well at least we still had a motor industry that was not owned by foreigners! 

Presumably also UKIP would like real earnings to be significantly lower than they are today, and most of all, they would not have to try to understand the internet.

Finally, Orwell's distopian future 1984 begins here.