Personally I am pleased to see that the Commons voted for a referendum on AV. I am not really a big fan of referenda for various reasons, but as the whole issue revolves around democracy and whether particular systems of voting are better or worse than others it seems fitting to put it to a popular vote.At last week’s Crawley constituency meeting Laura Moffatt MP asked us to give some indication of the opinion of the local party on this topic before she voted – although I’m pretty sure a constituency party can’t actually mandate their MP to vote one way or another. There was a quite lively debate, ending up with an overwhelming majority in favour of having a referendum.
Some of the speakers at the meeting argued that AV would favour other parties and was therefore a bad thing, while others argued that it would favour Labour and was therefore a good thing, although the debate did drift into proportional representation, which is a different matter altogether.
I am always amazed at the vehemence with which many members of Labour attack the whole principle of PR. I can’t think of any way to attack PR without having to admit that you think disproportionate representation is a good thing. Having joined Labour because I favoured the ideals of fairness and equality I can’t see how to then argue for unfairness in a voting system. But that was all a red herring anyway because as far as I understand it AV is not proportional anyway: if anything it is more FPTP than the current FPTP system.
With AV you would still have the same constituencies and the formation of government would be determined by whichever party was first past the post of having 50% of the MPs.  The difference is that in each constituency the MP would have a post to be first past – 50% of the votes in their constituency even if some of them are second preferences.  At the moment 30% could be enough to win in one constituency or come third in another.
I suspect that if we already had AV and someone suggested the current system there would be similar outrage and resistance. I guess it is human nature to simultaneously demand improvement but resist change.
I don’t know what effect AV would have, I don’t think anybody does although there are plenty of guesses out there, but what would be interesting is to see how we, as a general public, would vote in a referendum on it.
On the subject of electoral reform, I have been looking at the website for Power2010. This is a site set up by a campaign looking for changes to the electoral system. Not a bad aspiration, but a deeply flawed execution of it.  Many of the individual suggestions for change may be good ideas but there are all sorts of incompatibilities. In some cases the merits of a particular reform only apply if you assume that everything else about the system remains the same and so some of the reforms are not compatible with each other.
For example, one idea is to have a fully elected second chamber. Fine idea, and I am all for that, but another one is to stop ex-MPs being in the House of Lords. I can see why people might want that, but if it was fully-elected then ex-MPs would surely have as much right as anybody to stand for those elections wouldn’t they? Also there would be no problem with ex-members of the second chamber standing for election to the fist chamber would there? Another idea is to ban Lords from becoming government ministers because they are unelected – but if the second chamber becomes an elected one what then?  If more than one of the proposals relating to the second chamber got in the top five I think they would have a hard job reconciling them.
One of the proposals stands out from the crowd, and it is currently one of the most popular – scrap ID cards. Whether that is a good or a bad idea it is not directly about ‘bringing change to UK democracy’ which is the stated aim of the site. It is popular, but that doesn’t make it about democratic structures. If there was an option for scrapping speed cameras it would probably come top of the list, but that wouldn’t mean it was about democracy.
And that is where the biggest flaw in the whole scheme lies – the vote is carried out by a self-selected sample, and a small one at that. Ironically, the idea with most support so far is to introduce a proportional voting system. It currently has 7200 votes. Why I say it is ironic is that you will end up with pressure being put on candidates in the next election to support a pledge to introduce proportionality based on a number of votes that represents a tiny proportion of the electorate – at the moment it has doesn’t have enough votes to win a majority in any individual constituency and yet the organisers think that should be decisive.
Apart from the actual numbers, this type of poll is open to manipulation, even if only for a joke – which is why you sometimes see somebody totally inappropriate getting the votes in Radio 4’s person of the year or whatever. It would only take one decent Facebook group campaign to make any of the ideas come top – even if it was the one about select committees, which the bast majority of the population really can’t get excited about.
There are other anomalies, like having support for directly elected mayors but not a directly elected prime minister – surely if the concept is considered to be good for one level of government it should at least be considered for another? Perhaps the whole concept falls down because it is not bold enough in its ambition: all the proposals are for tweaks to the current system with no consideration for starting from first principles on a whole new system like Socrates did in Plato’s Republic?
Maybe that is what the organisers actually would like but they think more limited proposals are easier to sell and would then become the first step (or thin end of the wedge) towards wider change. Which, coming back to the original topic, and very bloody neatly if I say so myself, echoes the hopes (of some) and fears (of others) with regard to AV.
I actually agree with many of Power2010’s suggestions, but having them try to impose them on candidates with such a small (so far) volume of support seems, dare I say it, undemocratic. At the election I won’t make any secret of my personal preference for a more proportional system but that will be because it is my personal preference and not because 0.02% ((possibly. I am guessing here)) of the electorate tell me to.
Finally, a quick word on the other burning electoral issue of the day – the campaign to ‘save election night’.  I am entirely agnostic about this and don’t really care one way or another.
Lots of good information about votingl reform here:
http://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/
“Some of the speakers at the meeting argued that AV would favour other parties and was therefore a bad thing, while others argued that it would favour Labour and was therefore a good thing”
Should we be really rushing into major constitutional decisions based on whether Labour (or whoever) do well out of the change?
I’m undecided about changing to PR – but I would like a much longer and detailed investigation (possibly a Royal Commission) into the pro’s and con’s of changing.
A publicity stunt because Gordon’s on the ropes is hardly the best way to advance democracy in the UK.
I thought that was my point. Maybe I didn’t make it clear enough.
Such decisions should be made on the basis of whether they are right or wrong and not on whether they are thought to confer an advantage or not.
If it was possible I would say that a voting system should be devised not by politicians but by a combination of mathematicians, philosophers and behavioural economists or others like that.
Politicians could define what the outcomes are to be and impartial scientists could tell you what system is most likely to deliver those outcomes based on knowledge of behaviour, incentives and other factors.
The key would be that the objectives would have to be publicly stated – leaving the experts to work on those rather than on hidden agendas.
No chance of that happening, so I’ll take AV as being a step in the right direction for now.
“No chance of that happening, so I’ll take AV as being a step in the right direction for now.”
Would you still be in favour of AV if it didn’t benefit the Labour Party?
I don’t know if it is better for Labour. Nobody does know, although many think that they do.
I support it because it could be more fair, and could ultimately lead to a fairer system.
If there was any sort of consensus that AV is better for Labour there would not be so much hostility towards it in the aprty.
It’s generally thought that a more proportional system is better for the Lib Dems and the smaller national parties (depending on what thresholds there are and what system is used), and neutral for the second largest party and regionally based parties, while bad for whoever wins.
AV isn’t that proportional, but I don’t see how it’s better or worse for either the Tories or Labour particularly – except that they will both have to try to get second preferences of people who support smaller parties.
Mind you, I prefer either FPTP or a more proportional system that retains a constituency system.
Would somebody please tell me what AV stands for…please. Thank you.
Something Voting I assume – but you party-politicals should try & avoid using abbreviations.
SFWGYAT
Alternative Vote.
Ironically it is the system used internally in the party for leadership elections and PPC selections.
It’s also what the Tories use, at least for their leadership elections. I’m not sure if they also use it for Parliamentary candidate selections or not.
Every voter gets to put down a second preference (some systems allow a full range of preferences)
Basically, what happens is that if no candidate gets 50%+1 of the vote, you take the second preferences from the losing candidate and see if that gives anyone a majority. If not, you keep taking the candidate in last place’s second preferences until the leading candidate has 50%+1
POLITICS is about Democracy (or No Democracy).
DEMOCRACY is about Freedom (or No Freedom)
FREEDOM is about Rights & Duties (or No Rights & Duties)
So, Skuds, don’t tell me people aren’t interested in POLITICS.
As I read this, you are saying that people are interested in politics because it boils down to rights and duties? Leaving aside the logic of the arguement I would say that large proportions of the general public are all about their rights and sod the duties. IMHO this is the heart of most of the problems of the day…..
For example, SS, a RIGHT to freedom of speech, and a DUTY to respect that freedom.
Sorry Richard. This sounds as if you are trying to explain to me the difference between rights and duties. Your worry should be the thousands, ten of thousands, whatever, out there who really don’t know the difference or, even, worse, don’t care.
I think, SS, I’m trying to worry out what I mean by rights & duties, and democracy & politics, in the hope of understanding the reasons why I – and others – should care about it at all.
I’m not there yet…as you can tell.
POLITICS is also about the PERCEPTION of the Elector, and the POWER of the Elected.
Richard – I like the SS bit by the way. I feel like a mysterious ocean liner heading for the Galapogos Islands or something. Must watch out for icebergs though…..
Ah, the Age of Innocence is not yet dead, SS – I thought you might be offended, as my twisted mind thought of a Nazi SS guard !
Abbreviating is pure laziness on my part – although it can throw up interesting things :
One ‘dyslexic’ Sussex member of our Gatwick City Forum (& very occasional contributor) calls himself “Xesnosamsus”. I delight in calling him “Sex”