Talk:2019 United Kingdom general election/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

Infobox edit-warring

@Kevin McE and BitterGiant: Stop edit-warring over the infobox. Whatever the right decision is, this back and forth is not acceptable Wikipedia behaviour. At least one of you has to stop. We can discuss further here. We can have a formal RfC process if necessary, but edit-warring is not the answer. Bondegezou (talk) 15:29, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

I would like it to be clear that I will not stop reverting edits that outright remove the infobox. The inclusion of an infobox is a standard feature of all articles that concern future elections, and I do not view there to have been a compelling argument made to break the status quo on this particular occasion and remove it. Indeed, I cannot help but note that it is only here in this article that there has been a major push to remove the infobox, rather than in any other articles, such as the next German Federal election, or next Irish Dail election. If precedent changes site wide, I will concede and stop reverting removal edits, but until then, I will make it very clear that I have no intention to stop reverting edits that I view as being akin to tossing the baby out with the bathwater in regards to the earlier debate that was had over the infobox. Ultimately I do not view this as a discussion that should be taking place here, on this Talk page, as it feels very much as a discussion that has greater implications across the site, and of course we cannot have one precedent for future British elections, but another precedent for every other country on the planet. BitterGiant (talk) 15:43, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Any change on Wikipedia depends on the quality of, and response to, the arguments put forward.

I have repeatedly invited those who want to include an infobox to argue why it is appropriate to this article (ie, that it is specifically about the election of unknown date, with the details at such time unknowable): I have yet to see any real attempt to do that.

BitterGiant is threatening to ignore any consensus building here, has presented no positive reason why any of this data is relevant to an unknown future date, and appeals to a rule of precedent that simply does not exist in Wikipedia. Kevin McE (talk) 21:10, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

BitterGiant, what you are suggesting ("I will not stop reverting edits that outright remove the infobox") is not acceptable editing behaviour. You do not resolve disputes by edit-warring. You will get banned for such behaviour. Follow WP:DISPUTERESOLUTION. Bondegezou (talk) 21:43, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

I also note that it is not the case that "all articles that concern future elections" have an infobox. See 2019 Namibian general election, for example. MOS:INFOBOXUSE states, "The use of infoboxes is neither required nor prohibited for any article. Whether to include an infobox, which infobox to include, and which parts of the infobox to use, is determined through discussion and consensus among the editors at each individual article." Bondegezou (talk) 21:48, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

More examples of no infobox for a future election article: 2019 Guinean legislative election, 2019 Norwegian local elections, 2019 Swiss federal election, 2019 Belarusian parliamentary election, 2019 Haitian parliamentary election, 2019 Emirati parliamentary election, 2019 Omani general election, 2019 Nauruan parliamentary election, 2019 New Zealand local elections, 2019 Marshallese general election, 2020 Tanzanian general election, 2020 Taiwan general election, 2020 Kuwaiti general election. That said, it is true that most future election articles have infoboxes and most, but not all, future election articles without infoboxes are stubs. Bondegezou (talk) 22:08, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Okay; so as MOS:INFOBOXUSE notes, the purpose of an infobox is twofold. Firstly, its purpose is to summarise the key features of the page, and when that key feature is, I would hope we can all agree, the next election, surely an infobox should summarise, well, just that: the next election. Now how we go about summarising that next election is another question, but considering how election boxes generally summarise elections, and considering how other countries have their next election summarised, I don't think it'd be too far fetched to note that the best way of summarising the key feature of the article is through an election infobox. Secondly, as I believe I've noted before, the infobox is for the readers benefit, as it, to quote MOS:INFOBOXUSE, "allow[s] readers identify key facts at a glance", and those key facts would, at least from my perspective as someone who was drawn into the earliest part of this back-and-forth edit warring by being someone who was trying to just read the article, be clearly who the parties leaders are, what the current seats standings are, and, admittedly something we don't represent in the infoxbox, which the state of the opinion polls are. Now, the reader's perspective is important, at least in my view- the current box presents the summarisation of key information of the article quite well for a reader, and excludes information which, while suitable for the old style box that will likely be used after the election, whenever it comes, is just kinda a 'faff' for the present information box preceding an election. What I ask of you Kevin McE, and really everyone else who wants no infobox, is to look at this page from the perspective of the reader: Does the lack of an infobox allow you to identify key facts (the standings of the parties, the party leaders, (possible) date of the election, etc.) at a glance? Because from my perspective, and looking at the arguments to retain, quite a few perspectives, it really doesn't serve any benefit to the page to not have an infobox like the one currently in place, and indeed responding with "Literally one click from the top of the page" to "It makes the political situation much clearer to many of us" rather misses the point. I hope this is acknowledged as a 'positive reason' as to why my position is so strongly to keep the infobox.BitterGiant (talk) 22:39, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

"'Does the lack of an infobox allow you to identify key facts (the standings of the parties, the party leaders, (possible) date of the election, etc.) at a glance?'"

The standings of the parties is not information about the next election. It is appropriate to include it in the article, but it is not so key to a future event as to make it essential in such a prominent position.

The party leaders of which parties? When? A snapshot of the situation now does not give information about the next election. A selection of parties based on the last election is not necessarily indicative of the parties that will be significant in the next election. It is simply creating an area for dispute. There are parties that will be significant at the next election who are being omitted from the proposed infobox: that raises issues of neutrality and means the infobox is fundamentally flawed as a means of giving comprehensive information quickly.

Possible date of the next election. It is right there in the opening sentence. With the added benefit of an explanation of why it might not be on that date, which would require a footnote (and therefore not 'at a glance') if the infobox were actually to give proper information rather than supposition of the status quo being preserved.

The goal of wanting to give complicated nuanced information "at a glance" is itself flawed. We do not act encyclopaedically, nor do we serve readers well, by acting as though every subject can be dumbed down to simple gobbets of data. Kevin McE (talk) 07:34, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

I have started an RfC below to try to resolve this dispute. Bondegezou (talk) 10:24, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Allegiance switching?

Moving onto something more productive, would it be informative to include an information box detailing the switches in allegiance during the Parliament (perhaps in a small sub-article above the 'members resigning'), considering how many floor-crossings and defections and shifts to Independent and by-elections and etc. there have been? Or would this be better served elsewhere? BitterGiant (talk) 15:43, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

That would seem relevant to an article about the current parliament, not the next election. Kevin McE (talk) 21:11, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

It would seem useful to me. Election articles often note changes in allegiance since the previous election as relevant background to the next election: e.g. see 2019_European_Parliament_election_in_the_United_Kingdom#Campaign_background. Bondegezou (talk) 21:37, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

I was thinking of something similar Bondegezou, although more on the individual seat side- this is not to say I wouldn't agree to that kind of macro information box, of course, but I was thinking more along the lines of something like this (obviously using only one of the changes in the current Parliament to show what I mean):

Seat	Member before		Date	Member after		Cause
Lewisham East		Heidi Alexander	14 June 2018		Janet Daby	2018 Lewisham East by-election

BitterGiant (talk) 22:51, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

I don't think Labour holding a seat at a by-election tells us anything much about the next general election. By-elections that see a seat change hands or sitting MPs defecting do tell us something and are generally part and parcel of RS coverage of next elections. Bondegezou (talk) 10:13, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

I should be cleat that I'm only using Lewisham East as a simple example of the kind of layout I intended, although it may not quite have been the best example, as you note, and I should have instead used something, like, say, Umunna's floor crossings. My point is more this kind of layout for switching affiliation, although given how late I posted this last night, I hope I can be forgiven for using what may not have been the best example in illustrating the layout; a better example would be this (and to note, I do think that the seat name is important for any by-elections that may result in parties gaining/losing seats):

Seat	Member before		Date	Member after		Cause
Streatham		Chuka Umunna (Labour)	18 February 2019		Chuka Umunna (Change UK)	Formed a new group
		Chuka Umunna (Change UK)	4 June 2019		Chuka Umunna (Independent)	Left Change UK
		Chuka Umunna (Independent)	13 July 2019		Chuka Umunna (Liberal Democrats)	Joined the Liberal Democrats

BitterGiant (talk) 16:56, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

The detailed changes seem more appropriate to an article about the Parliament than about the next general election to me. I think a next election article just needs the final net changes. Bondegezou (talk) 12:10, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

I don't know that the article has quite the right name, but it's List of MPs elected in the 2017 United Kingdom general election that has all these details. Maybe we should link to it? Bondegezou (talk) 16:22, 23 July 2019 (UTC)

Unexplained changes

An IP user keeps making huge changes without reason (e.g. deleting the infobox completely). Just a heads up FriendlyDataNerdV2 (talk) 18:20, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

Is it possible to undo the changes? EKwiki2007 (talk) 09:33, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

There is an RfC below on how the infobox should be. Bondegezou (talk) 17:07, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

target seats

Shouldn't there be a section on target seats? Sorted by marginality? The articles on the next Canadian, Scottish and Welsh election all seem have it? 195.194.75.226 (talk) 18:20, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

Most target seat lists are WP:OR based merely on the previous result. While I think it's fine to have a list of close results in the article of an election that has been, I think any target seat information in an article about a future election should be sourced. Bondegezou (talk) 21:08, 26 July 2019 (UTC)