Tag Archives: proportional representation

Opinion: Never Mention “STV” Again

By Alex Wilcock | Published 17th September 2011 - 3:15 pm

The Liberal Democrat Conference opens today in Birmingham with perhaps the most depressing talking shop ever put on a Lib Dem Agenda. It’s the consultative session for the “May 2011 Election Review”: a big drop in the popular vote; a major setback on local councils; a disaster in Scotland; a total and utter thrashing in the AV referendum. And it’s the last that looks the most hopeless.

Is electoral reform finished for good, or at least for a generation? Instead of endlessly debating what went wrong, there’s one major change we can make right now to improve things next time: …

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“Take AV seriously: it has advantages over PR”

By Nick Thornsby | Published 2nd May 2011 - 4:25 pm

One of the common criticisms of the alternative vote is that it doesn’t produce parliaments that proportionally represent the wishes of the people, which is largely true. Such a criticism rests, of course, on the premise that proportionality is the most important facet of an electoral system. However it’s also worth pointing out that there are things that the alternative vote delivers which proportional systems do not, which is the subject of a recent post by John Ashton.

Here’s a sample of what John has to say:

You don’t get far in a discussion of the merits of AV before somebody

…

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Opinion: the Australian election and AV

By Fred Carver | Published 1st September 2010 - 1:40 pm

Fans of the alternative vote system would do well to look at the result of the Australian election. Australia and Fiji are the only two countries in the world to use AV. The two main parties got about 80% of the vote. A record* 2 million+ people voted for minor parties, that’s around 17% – a 50% increase of the number of people not voting for the big two.

And the result? Well the two main parties got 145 seats and the minor parties 5.

Now at this point defenders of AV will be saying “yes we know AV isn’t that good …

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Opinion: Why Lib Dems should have no reservations about campaigning for AV

By Adam Bell | Published 3rd July 2010 - 11:40 am

Lib Dems are necessarily an introspective bunch, given to minute analysis of the implications of our own policies in order to ensure they’re entirely fair & liberal. As a consequence, the compromises involved in the coalition agreement (and the practices thereof) have come as something of a brutal shock to many party members – most significantly over the VAT increase. I still find that unbelievable – why on earth would you raise a transaction tax when demand is weak? However, that’s not the issue at hand, which is the Alternative Vote.

The Alternative Vote works by enabling the voter to rank …

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Opinion: Proportional voting

By Simon Read | Published 10th May 2010 - 9:20 am

I propose a method of voting in the House of Commons which has the effect of proportional representation without any of the complexity.

There are two possible sacred principles in British democracy:

1) A Member of Parliament has one vote;
2) A party’s voting strength in the house should match its share of the countrywide vote.

Each principle has its adherents. Principle (1) seems to be assumed by everyone but never mentioned.

These principles are in fact contradictory, leading to much complexity, so I propose to abandon principle (1) above, leaving us with principle (2).

The mechanism is simple: take the number of votes cast at …

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Posted in Op-eds | 38 Comments

Opinion: Go for STV!

By Anthony Tuffin | Published 4th May 2010 - 10:00 am

I liked it when a woman asked Gordon Brown in a radio phone-in whether he would support the Tories or Lib Dems if no party had an overall majority and Labour came third. However, to be realistic, the chances are with our ridiculous voting system that Labour will come at least second in seats even if it is third in votes. So, if no party has an overall majority, the Lib Dems are more likely than any other to hold the balance. How would they use it? Could they achieve PR by STV with it? …

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How can we sell the Single Transferable Vote to the public?

By Stephen Tall | Published 11th February 2010 - 10:25 am

The last 24 hours’ focus on voting systems – surely every Lib Dem’s dream come true? – have highlighted just how hard it will be to gain acceptance for the party’s preferred proportional voting system, the single transferable vote.

It’s no surprise that almost all MPs from the two establishment parties, Labour and the Tories, are desperate to hold onto the electoral system that secures their cosy hold on power: just five Labour/Tory MPs voted to include STV in any referendum on voting reform.

But it will also be the case that a significant portion of the country will …

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The 14 non-Lib Dem MPs who backed the Single Transferable Vote

By Stephen Tall | Published 10th February 2010 - 6:43 pm

The House of Commons yesterday voted by 365 votes to 187 to hold a UK-wide referendum on changing the voting system next year from first-past-the-post to the alternative vote. The Lib Dems reluctantly voted for the alternative vote, as the most modest of improvements on the current, broken system.

But the party, in the person of Cambridge MP David Howarth, also moved an amendment to leave out ‘an alternative-vote’ and insert ‘a single transferable vote’ – in other words, to ask Parliament to approve an electoral system which would at last reflect the votes cast for parties across the country, …

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LibLink: Chris Huhne – The alternative vote is not the solution

By NewsHound | Published 9th February 2010 - 4:20 pm

Over at The Guardian’s Comment Is Free site, Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne argues Labour has got it wrong in proposing a referendum on the Alternative Vote: only the Single Transferable Vote will remedy the unfairness of the present system. Here’s an excerpt:

[The Alternative Vote] is very similar to first-past-the-post in two key respects. Because it is based on single constituencies – a virtue for its proponents, who say they prize the constituency link – the parties continue to select one candidate each, and the voters only have one choice for each party.

That means that in the majority

…

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Vince: financial markets have nothing to fear from hung parliament

By Stephen Tall | Published 7th February 2010 - 6:25 pm

Here’s how the Financial Times reports it:

A hung parliament might frighten the markets, but according to Vince Cable, Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman, the concerns are “completely and totally irrational”.

The Lib Dems point out that many of the world’s leading economies, including Germany and Italy, hold elections that almost always produce results where the leading party has to do deals with smaller parties. They add that some countries with single party governments, such as Greece, have some of the worst records in dealing with fiscal crises, while multiparty coalitions, such as the one in Sweden in the 1990s, conducted fierce

…

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Daily View: Electoral Reform Reader

By Iain Roberts | Published 3rd February 2010 - 7:27 am

It’s not very often electoral reform tops the news headlines – which is probably no bad thing.

As yesterday was one of those rare occasions, let’s see what was being said – Lib Dem bloggers had some differences of opinion:

The Futility Monster took the subtle, understated approach with the headline “Stick Your AV Up Your Arse“

The problem is that this is purely a gimmick, done purely to ask questions of the Lib Dems. Brown has no history of interest in electoral reform,

LibCync, on the other hand, was more positive:

I can’t believe anyone can seriously suggest that we shouldn’t support

…

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Huhne: AV “small step in right direction” BUT not proportional

By Stephen Tall | Published 2nd February 2010 - 9:32 am

What is it about Labour? Why are they waiting til the dying days of their last government for X years to propose anything new and radical? Yesterday, LDV posted the news that Labour has, eventually, U-turned on non-doms, and agreed to Lib Dem proposals that they will no longer be able to sit in Parliament.

And then later last night came the news that Labour will put to the Parliamentary vote next week proposals for a referendum to be staged as a step towards replacing the ‘first past the post’ system.

Chris Huhne, the Lib Dems’ shadow home secretary, …

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Déjà vu all over again: what the 1974 Liberal Party manifesto said

By Stephen Tall | Published 29th January 2010 - 9:30 am

This election will make or break Britain. It is already certain that the government that takes office after the election will face the greatest peace-time crisis we have known since the dark days of 1931… Before any government can begin to get to grips with the economic situation, it must regain the confidence and respect of the electorate.

A big tip of LDV’s hat to Rudolf Fara, co-director of Voting Power and Procedures (VPP) at the LSE (via Politics.co.uk) for pointing out the similarity.

Mr Fara, who was speaking ahead of a lecture last night by Vince Cable setting out his …

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The Independent View: Three myths about PR – and one uncomfortable truth

By Jason O'Mahony | Published 26th January 2010 - 4:30 pm

Jason O’Mahony was a former activist and candidate for the now defunct Irish Progressive Democrats. He now blogs on politics at www.jasonomahony.ie .

Let’s be honest. In the darkest chambers of British psephologist hell, beneath the pit of Parliament Channel subscribers, and even deeper than the cavern of sweaty handed ‘I’ve just found a 1970 Enoch Powell election poster. In crisp condition!’ enthusiasts, there is a special place reserved for Proportional Representation aficionados. Even amongst political anoraks and people who feel passionately about Peter Snow they are the underclass.

Of course, as an Irish political activist, who has lived his entire …

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Opinion: Power2010 gives a unique form of democracy a chance to blossom

By Andrew May | Published 15th January 2010 - 11:50 am

Statutory instruments. A Bill of Rights. Freedom of Information. Proportional Representation.

Such ideas are not ones you hear bandied about by your average man or women on the street. Yet they were among those chosen by members of the public to try and mend the lack of trust in Britain’s political system.

For those of you who’ve not yet heard of Power2010 it’s a campaign which launched in the wake of the expenses scandal, with public trust in politics at an all time low. It’s a campaign for political and democratic reform, but with …

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