She won't win

There are times when I despair about public opinion in the UK. It makes me think that the public should not be allowed to vote for anything.

I don't believe that anyone thought that the "leave" camp would win the referendum on Brexit. Certainly the PM at the time didn't and I don't think even Gove, Leadsom and Johnson were counting on a victory. And yet, the unexpected happened and "leave" got a slim majority.

In rapid succession, those that had championed an exit bowed out leaving a remainer to carry out their  cause. I still contend that the public were duped into voting for something that nobody knew how to deal with. The Brexit that people get will certainly not be the one they thought they were voting for.

This week we had the semifinal of Strictly Come Dancing, a show that is supposed to end up with the best celebrity dancer winning the coveted Glitterball trophy.

However, the format allows the public to have an equal say in the result and therein  lies the rub.

The judges, who are all ex professional dancers of one sort or another, give their verdict and score each couple accordingly. Those scores are translated to a ranking with the top couple getting the highest.

Then the public vote and their scores are also converted to a ranking The two rankings are added together to give a final figure.

Next week there will be four couples dancing it out to be the winners. That means that the top combined score that any couple could obtain will be 8 and the bottom will be 2.

The thing is that, the public don't allways vote according to merit. There are clearly good dancers who the public don't like for one reason or another and so they are marked down and others, who have two left feet,  that get marked up.

This year, Alexandra Burke has scored consistently high with the judges and yet has appeared twice in the "dance off". In order for that to happen, she had to come at or near the bottom of the ranking with the public. It seems that, for whatever reason, the young lady is not popular.

On that basis, it is highly unlikely Alexandra will win, even if she out dances the competition and gets perfect scores from the judges.

My prediction is that Joe MacFadden will come third with the judges giving him a score of 2 but will come top with the public giving him a total of 6. Debbie McGee will get a score of 3 from the judges and 3 from the public which will result in a draw and Joe McFadden will win because the public vote takes precedence. Miss Burke will come third even though she has arguably been the best dancer overall.