2023 Tedusian Senate Election

350 Seats - 176 for a majority

The 2023 Senate Election took place on the 1st of June 2023 in sync with the independence of Tedesu and was the first election in Tedesu since the 2008 Tedusian State Election. It was originally planned to take place in 2020 when talks of independence for Tedesu arose, but those talks failed and it took two years for serious talks to begin again. After the results of the 2022 Sheaman Parliamentary Election, P&D swore to give Tedesu independence by the start of the new year. It took until the 1st of June for independence to actually come but when it did come, it was celebrated.

The election included; the People's Socialist Party (PSP), Social Democratic Party (SDP), Radical Party (RAD), Moderate Party (MOD), Unionist Party (UNION), and the Alternative For Sheaman Party (AFT).

UNION won 101 seats and was the only party to win over 100 seats the Senate. RAD won 89 seats, PSP won 52 seats, SDP won 44 seats, MOD won 33 seats, and AFT won 31 seats. The election resulted in the Progressive Alliance to win the election, winning 185 out of the 350 seats in the Senate, giving them a majority. The Progressive Government was officially formed at 00:00 on the 9th of June 2023.

## Campaign

### People's Socialist Party

PSP campaigned strongly for a major increase in welfare, healthcare, education and social care spending and campaigned for decreasing military spending significantly by a major amount, promising to cut military spending by at least 10% of the entire budget. They promised that they would nationalize a great number of industries in the country such as the Bank of Tedesu, nationalizing all metro, train & bus systems, nationalizing all electricity companies in the country to form a national power grid. They also wanted to set up a government funded media organization and almost take complete control of both the Health & Education sector; improving workers' rights is also another campaigning issue for PSP who believe that workers should be treated with high respect and that they should have a say in how the country is governed and how the company they work for treats them. PSP have also promised to introduce a brand new currency to Tedesu that would differ from the Shea and would be implemented by, at latest, 2025 if they are elected. The party wanted to introduce their own health service that would be heavily funded by the government, offer considerably high wages for doctors and decrease the price of drugs, operations etc as well as making many simple tasks free like the SNHS in Sheaman. The party wants to support mental health institutions for depression and other severe conditions and they want to make schools an easily accessible space for that by introducing a policy that would require one carer for every 25 students that could discuss mental health issues and support young people who are struggling in school or outside of school. As another education-related topic, the party wants to end university tuition fees and promise anybody enrolling that the government would pay for them instead of the student paying.

The party wants to increase sentences for murderers, child abusers, rapists stating that the current laws for those offenders are "too soft" and that those offenders deserve a terrible punishment. The party wants to make owning/possessing a gun much more difficult and possible even just for people who need them such as farmers/hunters etc. The party has come out as LGBTQ+ friendly and campaigned for constitutionally protecting Trans & Queer people as they are "Under threat by all of the supposed "Progressive Countries" in the world. The party has stated that they are planning on cracking down on drugs; banning Marijuana, nicotine (including cigarettes & E-Cigarettes), as well as pulling back on the use of Euthanasia.

### Social Democratic Party

#### Main Issues

SDP promised that they would introduce there own national health service like PSP and that it would see heavy subsides by the government as well as decreasing the price of things in the health sector by between 10% - 100%. The party wanted to greatly improve mental health institutions and specifically wanted to focus on depression, movement disorders as well as improving care for all age groups no matter their struggle and severity of their struggle. The party wants to increase maternity leave to 18 months after the birth or adoption of a child which includes 12 months of fully-paid maternity leave, 3 months of half-paid maternity leave and 3 final months of quarter-paid maternity leave, after then there is no pay and maternity leave is not guaranteed. Paternity leave is also something that the party wants to introduce nationally, they want to allow 6 months of full-paid paternity leave and then another 6 months of half-paid paternity leave, then they are also no longer paid and guaranteed paternity leave. The party promised to massively increase Samprier's housing estate by building 30,000 new homes and guaranteeing green jobs for those with the qualifications that are also willing to move to Samprier.

SDP promised to normalize relations with Sheaman after independence and "reject any hard feelings" to or from Sheaman. The party believes that working with Sheaman rather than against Sheaman is the most beneficial way to go about independence and that other foreign relations should also be normalized. The party expressed interest in joining an economic union with Sheaman or even discussing joining ANSEC if an economic union with Sheaman isn't available or accepted by Sheaman. The country also wants to contribute to the the war in Ukraine by sending equipment from Tedesu that will no longer be in use after Independence to Ukraine as a means to help Ukraine win the war against Russia.

#### Green Revolution, the Environment & Transport

SDP (unlike most parties) made major promises in their manifesto for the 2023 Senate Election that would greatly expand green energy and nationalize part of the energy sector that would include major subsides to fund this program. They intended for 50% of all energy produced to be green energy by 2035 and that they wanted to shut down all of the Nuclear power stations in Tedesu as the party wanted to focus on "green energy that can save Tedesu and promise a better future for this generation." The party also wanted to cut carbon emissions and threats to the environment by greatly expanding the public transport network in hopes of cutting the unnecessary usage of cars and other vehicles. The party promised to nationalize all of the local councils' public bus services and integrate them into one national bus service (allowing other private services as well). The party also wanted to increase public transport in rural areas pointing towards the complaints from farmers & villages that they couldn't travel without using a car with the party hinting towards reducing the usage of cars in rural areas as well. The party also wanted to establish national parks, introduce laws to protect certain animals & introduce preservation for said animals as well as more public parks in cities to promote a green environment.

### Radical Party

The Radical Party focused heavily on equality, rights and ensuring that people are safe an protected in the party's Manifesto. The party showed a lot of support for LGBTQ+ people in their manifesto outlining many issues such as ensuring that LGBTQ+ aren't discriminated against in school or in public, including government discrimination for things such as public services. The party wanted to increase funding and promote public schools to introduce more LGBTQ+ friendly sex education and history, explaining & outlining how LGBTQ+ are people and should be respected. The party have also promised to create a Minister for LGBTQ+ Equality alongside a minister for Equality including protection for Trans people with the party coming out against the anti-trans bill in Sheaman. The party intends to protect workers from striking but focusing on disallowing the armed forces to strike if in a conflict as well as public services to strike for longer than 7 days in a row. They want to decrease crime by majorly funding the police force and equipping them with tasers, body cameras, and protect LGBTQ+ or minorities police officers from discrimination from peers and the general public. The party promised to make immigration into the country easier, allow those currently residing in Lower Andrulasias who will become part of Tedesu around 1 year to leave that area and move somewhere else in Sheaman, and the party also wants to allow Dual Citizenship for Andrulasias Sheaman if they choose to stay in Andrulasias after it is incorporated into Tedesu. The party wants to introduce a public health service and cut the cost of medical/healthcare amenities as well as guaranteeing those on vacation to Tedesu the right to use the public health service. RAD promise to increase maternity leave & introduce paternity leave by offering 24 months of fully-paid maternity leave and 12 months of fully-paid paternity leave and once a child is 2 years old they are legally allowed to enroll in a public Nursery. RAD wants to slowly legalize drugs such as marijuana, hallucinogens, LSD and other drugs for public use under some restrictions such as an age requirement and amount that can be bought in a single-payment.

RAD wants to increase spending in all sectors of the economy with most spending going towards education, healthcare and agriculture. RAD wants to increase subsides in the agriculture sector, support farmers in rural areas, provide funding for struggling farmers and small businesses and require companies to pay more for farmers' products. The Radicals strive towards a competing economy and want to ANSEC as quickly as possible to ensure for a sustainable and growing economy rather that economy growing on its own. The party has also promised to create their own currency by the end of the decade seeing other issues as more important than a Tedusian currency.

### Moderate Party

The Moderate Party didn't release a manifesto and instead put forth the major changes that they wanted to make for the country such as: Increasing access to healthcare by requiring cheaper products, lowering income tax, major rise in pensions for old people, configure immigration system set up by Sheaman by introducing tougher immigration and quotas, increase funding in nurseries, education, healthcare, social services, welfare and housing. The party also intends for a major increase in spending for the police, fire, and ambulance services by the end of 2026 and ramping up protection in neighborhoods and recruiting 2,500 more police officers. They also put forth complaints about drug use in the country hinting towards making drug laws much stricter and offenders serving a longer sentence.

### Unionist Party

The Unionist party offered an exceptionally long list in their manifesto that includes: cracking down immigration, only accepting immigrants from countries that extremely dangerous or that specific family is in immediate danger from things such as terrorism, majorly reducing corporations tax, income tax, Value added tax, capital gains tax, inheritance tax and airplane tax as welling as increasing taxes for the beer & cider tax and the wine tax to "combat the current alcohol consumption in Tedesu." The party proposed a large anti-progress and anti-LGBTQ+ agenda targeting progressivists by saying that they have caused harm to the country throughout the Tedusian war for independence and called for constitutional changes to the protection of LGBTQ+ people that would include banning gay marriages & civil unions but they did promise to preserve the legality of being LGBTQ+ with the exception of trans people who the party deemed "under review." In terms of workers' rights and unions; the party wants to ban and state-workers, working for a government-owned company from striking at any point but allowing any private-company workers to strike. The party wants to stop strikes and even ban the demand of higher pay by making it illegal; the porty said this about the issue; "We do not want to take the rights of our citizens away but we do want to ensure that when somebody breaks a leg, is shot or their house is burning down, that there will be an emergency service that can respond immediately instead of refusing to do so over striking for a higher wage." Other issues include; Making firearms more accessible and allowing different types of weapons such as shotguns & rifles, decreasing the minimum wage, increasing the age of retirement to 75 (from 70) as well as changing abortion laws by restricting an abortion after 6 weeks of conceiving the baby.

### Alternative For Tedesu Party

Alternative For Tedesu has offered a smaller but more direct range of policies which include: forcibly removing Sheaman people from Tedesu after independence or imprisoning those who refuse to, promoting Maxifolianism across Tedesu and only teaching the religion is school (stopping the teaching of other religions & atheism in school), banning women from attending high school, promoting a woman's role of looking after the children, attending church as well as tending to chores like cleaning as well as cooking, reversing measures taken to introduce green/renewable energies and relying more on traditional forms like coal, oil, natural gases etc, restricting black people in the country to marry a white person, reintroduce the death penalty, ban whistle blowers and if found they can serve up to 15 years in prison, remove maternity leave and pay for maternity leave, increasing military spending, almost completely privatize the economy, decrease spending for social services, healthcare, welfare and others.

## Opinion Polling

*Main Article: Opinion Polling for 2023 Tedusian Senate Election*

## Results

Polling Throughout late 2022 and early 2023 pointed towards a large majority for the progressive Alliance but instead in the last month of voting the right saw a surge in popularity. Jean Caddam put forth a new set of policies in late April that included the relaxation of immigration policy; originally Caddam refused to allow immigration for at least until the next election as well as pushing for life imprisonment for those who attempt to enter the country illegally. He changed this by relaxing them and agreeing to allow immigration with quotas and strict security and as well as that a scandal involving Poppy Ferguson called *Coupgate* took national headlines and led to SDP majorly dropping in the polls.

PSP won 52 seats and 14.8% of votes, SDP won 44 seats and 12.6% of votes, RAD won 89 seats or 25.4% of votes, MOD won 33 seats or 9.4% of votes, UNION won 28.9% of votes, and AFT won 31 seats or 8.9% of votes. UNION won the most seats in the election with RAD being the runner up and were the only two parties to win over 20% of votes.

## Aftermath

After the results of the election at 10:00 on the 1st of June 2023 all of the parties began discussing coalition possibilities. As of 19:00 on the 1st of June both a meeting between the Progressive Parties and Conservative Parties have taken place. On the 3rd of June large gains were made when the Prog-All parties (PSP, SDP, RAD) met another time and agreed on a set of policies to push forward on, this included: establishing a national health service, nationalizing the energy sector are creating a national power grid, majorly reduce university tuition fees, improve mental health support, increase maternity leave and introduce paternity leave, joining ANSEC, majorly increasing reliance on green energy, increase/protect LGBTQ+ rights, and relax immigration laws.

After the meeting on the 8th of June a final decision was made between PSP, SDP, and RAD in which a coalition was agreed upon. Karl Reese would become Chancellor and they would put forth Mathew T. Lewis to become Deputy Chancellor. The coalition held 185 out of 350 seats in the senate which is 52.8% of seats. At 00:00 on the 9th of June 2023 Karl Reese would become Chancellor and Mathew T. Lewis would become Deputy Chancellor after being approved by the President the day before, forming the new government.