Saturday, September 17, 2011
Never Mention “STV” Again
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: never mention “STV” again. But I don’t mean running scared – I mean widening our appeal. Because if we’ve learned one thing, it’s that an electoral ‘reform’ campaign that only appeals to Liberal Democrats is stuffed, whether it’s this Spring’s or in a decade or two’s time.
I’m passionately committed to the system called the Single Transferable Vote. No system is perfect but, for me, it has two massive advantages. It’s broadly proportional – which means it’s fair to parties, and means that the House of Commons is broadly in line with people’s votes across the country. And it gives voters more power to choose the candidates who win – when every other system gives all the power to the parties. But I’m a political beast, and most people aren’t. Let’s not kid ourselves: a system where you choose different candidates in order of preference was obliterated this year, and it would be easy to attack STV as complicated and weird in just the same way (as Mark Thompson’s excellent if depressing article Outline of a No2STV Campaign illustrated). If there had been an STV referendum this year, it too would have been thrashed. And no proponents of STV have come up with anything like an answer save ‘campaign harder’. That’s necessary – but it’s not good enough.
There’s still time, if you want to, to get your answers in to the Liberal Democrats’ Campaigns and Communications Committee’s consultation on the elections and the referendum. It’s already made up its mind on four key reasons for AV’s failure:
The one good thing that came out of this year’s débâcle (other than establishing a grassroots movement for electoral reform, which is now largely dispersed and demoralised) is that we can learn how not to do it next time.
You know the story. The “No” campaign was full of lies. But it was brutally effective. They identified issues that Labour voters in particular wouldn’t like about AV – “Costly, Complicated, Clegg” – and pushed them hard. The Conservatives, always assumed to be anti-reform, as they have been for every reform in history from votes for ordinary people to votes for women, outdid themselves by at the same time using their party slogan “Working together in the national interest” to say how good it was that they were in coalition, and pouring wads of cash into vicious attacks on the Liberal Democrats for being in coalition and attacking the very idea of coalition to make AV scary. A finer example of saying one thing in one place and another elsewhere has surely never been seen. And perhaps most importantly, they made the political weather. It didn’t matter if what they said was truth or lie – they got in first. Almost every issue was then debated on ground set by the “No” campaign. The “Yes” campaign’s wider base of grassroots campaigners was completely let down by a disastrously faltering “air war”, and was simply overwhelmed by messages that they didn’t have the people or cash to counter.
So there are two key lessons to learn for ‘next time’, whenever it may come.The first is the lesson of the electoral mechanics, and that’s one for the long term: it can be planned for, but only really put into operation when the time comes. For what it’s worth, though, here are a few markers we must learn for taking the fight to “First Past the Post”:
But the biggest lesson can – and must – be implemented as soon as possible, and it’s not about campaign mechanics, but about principles. If you’re involved in policymaking with the Liberal Democrats or with the Electoral Reform Society, here’s what you can do today, rather than in ten years’ time: never mention “STV” again.
Who, other than a political junkie, is going to get enthused about a set of initials? And when you expand it into the Single Transferable Vote and explain about transfers, people’s eyes are no less likely to glaze over. Yes, we’ll have to find a clearer, simpler way to explain how it works – but the name we use for it just makes it seem all about the mechanics. And that’s always going to be a loser. We’ve feebly addressed that by talking about “Fair Votes” – but that doesn’t appear on the ballot paper (you might say it’s a loaded term; when calling the current system “First Past the Post” is such a lie that it literally has no winning post, loaded terms are hardly new!), and we all saw how trying to refer to AV as the even feebler “Fairer Votes” failed.
The next campaign must be between “First Past the Post” and “British Proportional Representation”.
This is the ‘director’s cut’ of an article published earlier on Liberal Democrat Voice, written to follow this morning’s depressing consultation session and Simon McGrath’s article earlier today on election results within the Electoral Reform Society.
I’m passionately committed to the system called the Single Transferable Vote. No system is perfect but, for me, it has two massive advantages. It’s broadly proportional – which means it’s fair to parties, and means that the House of Commons is broadly in line with people’s votes across the country. And it gives voters more power to choose the candidates who win – when every other system gives all the power to the parties. But I’m a political beast, and most people aren’t. Let’s not kid ourselves: a system where you choose different candidates in order of preference was obliterated this year, and it would be easy to attack STV as complicated and weird in just the same way (as Mark Thompson’s excellent if depressing article Outline of a No2STV Campaign illustrated). If there had been an STV referendum this year, it too would have been thrashed. And no proponents of STV have come up with anything like an answer save ‘campaign harder’. That’s necessary – but it’s not good enough.
Where AV Went Wrong (and more of AV’s greatest mistakes)
There’s still time, if you want to, to get your answers in to the Liberal Democrats’ Campaigns and Communications Committee’s consultation on the elections and the referendum. It’s already made up its mind on four key reasons for AV’s failure:
- Labour completely failed to deliver, being mostly part of the “No” campaign despite being the only party committed to AV in their manifesto;
- The Tories turned out to be complete bastards willing to say and do anything, and with an endless pot of money (who knew?);
- Holding the referendum on election day seemed like a good plan – maximising turnout, when polls showed broad but unenthusiastic support – but instead it meant both that Lib Dems were unable to give time to the referendum, and that the “No” campaign could give us an extra-big kicking, particularly through appealing to Labour voters;
- And, to contrast with the “No” campaign’s ruthless efficiency, the “Yes” campaign was basically rubbish.
The one good thing that came out of this year’s débâcle (other than establishing a grassroots movement for electoral reform, which is now largely dispersed and demoralised) is that we can learn how not to do it next time.
You know the story. The “No” campaign was full of lies. But it was brutally effective. They identified issues that Labour voters in particular wouldn’t like about AV – “Costly, Complicated, Clegg” – and pushed them hard. The Conservatives, always assumed to be anti-reform, as they have been for every reform in history from votes for ordinary people to votes for women, outdid themselves by at the same time using their party slogan “Working together in the national interest” to say how good it was that they were in coalition, and pouring wads of cash into vicious attacks on the Liberal Democrats for being in coalition and attacking the very idea of coalition to make AV scary. A finer example of saying one thing in one place and another elsewhere has surely never been seen. And perhaps most importantly, they made the political weather. It didn’t matter if what they said was truth or lie – they got in first. Almost every issue was then debated on ground set by the “No” campaign. The “Yes” campaign’s wider base of grassroots campaigners was completely let down by a disastrously faltering “air war”, and was simply overwhelmed by messages that they didn’t have the people or cash to counter.
Attack “First Past the Post”
So there are two key lessons to learn for ‘next time’, whenever it may come.The first is the lesson of the electoral mechanics, and that’s one for the long term: it can be planned for, but only really put into operation when the time comes. For what it’s worth, though, here are a few markers we must learn for taking the fight to “First Past the Post”:
- Explain the new system, or the “No” campaign will. “Yes” decided not to explain AV; “No” sent a Freepost booklet to every single house summing up “First Past the Post” as simply and positively as possible, and AV as complicatedly and unfairly as possible. “Yes” didn’t even send any leaflet to the vast majority of houses. Idiots. Perhaps even have a Parliamentary Bill ready to show how it’ll work and counter the inevitable lies.
- Perhaps the biggest reason why the “No” campaign won this year is that they had an enemy. The “Yes” campaign didn’t. And in politics, attack is much easier and more effective than defence; once you’re defending yourself, you’re already publicising your opponent’s attack points.
- So find an enemy. The simplest, biggest change would be to attack “First Past the Post” ruthlessly, and get our attacks in first. This was where this Spring’s “Yes” campaign was not just timid, but hamstrung: AV is in fact such a small change from “First Past the Post” that almost all of the same problems apply, so it was very difficult to make a case for change. With a fight between “First Past the Post” and “Proportional Representation”, you can take the gloves off and batter the current system.
- Under “First Past the Post”, most people vote against the “winning” party – but the system gives them all the power anyway. Why should any party be able to do whatever the hell it likes when most people are against it? Say that “First Past the Post” means that the loser wins. Every party since the War has lost the vote – then, until we finally got a hung Parliament, been able to do what it likes.
- In Labour areas, stick up big pictures of Margaret Thatcher: you never voted for her, but “First Past the Post” let her give you the poll tax. Add that in 1951, Labour got the most votes – but “First Past the Post” is so crooked that the Tories won anyway.
- In Tory areas, stick up big pictures of Tony Blair: you never voted for him, but “First Past the Post” let him invade Iraq. Add that in 1974, the Tories got the most votes – but “First Past the Post” is so crooked that Labour won anyway. Then throw in the Winter of Discontent.
- And when this year’s “No” campaign’s most breathtaking bit of chutzpah was in saying that AV would increase influence for the BNP – when it’s a fact that, of all electoral systems ever invented, AV most hurts the BNP – attack “First Past the Post” for how time and time again it’s let the BNP in when most people have voted against them. There have been dozens of BNP councillors elected – only one has ever had the majority of the vote. In the USA, they call it “swiftboating”, making your enemy’s strength into a weakness: next time, the “Yes” campaign should do it first, and ruthlessly. Show how “First Past the Post” helps the BNP and leave “No” gasping for air.
Time For British Proportional Representation
But the biggest lesson can – and must – be implemented as soon as possible, and it’s not about campaign mechanics, but about principles. If you’re involved in policymaking with the Liberal Democrats or with the Electoral Reform Society, here’s what you can do today, rather than in ten years’ time: never mention “STV” again.
Who, other than a political junkie, is going to get enthused about a set of initials? And when you expand it into the Single Transferable Vote and explain about transfers, people’s eyes are no less likely to glaze over. Yes, we’ll have to find a clearer, simpler way to explain how it works – but the name we use for it just makes it seem all about the mechanics. And that’s always going to be a loser. We’ve feebly addressed that by talking about “Fair Votes” – but that doesn’t appear on the ballot paper (you might say it’s a loaded term; when calling the current system “First Past the Post” is such a lie that it literally has no winning post, loaded terms are hardly new!), and we all saw how trying to refer to AV as the even feebler “Fairer Votes” failed.
The next campaign must be between “First Past the Post” and “British Proportional Representation”.
- The system now called STV was invented in Britain and used to be called “British Proportional Representation”. It’s used today throughout the British Isles – in Scotland, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland (do the “No” campaign want to say the English and Welsh are stupider?), and was even used for some of the House of Commons until 1950. When the “No” campaign smeared AV as weird and un-British, with British Proportional Representation we can fight back. Or we can keep an academic-sounding name, and leave it just an academic talking-point.
- To win the next fight, electoral reformers must win the battle of values, and that can’t be done overnight. With full-blooded proportional representation to fight for, attack “First Past the Post” as rigged and unfair, and make our system the one for “Fairness” – and do it first. But that’s not the only value we should appeal to. If fairness is a good one to reach out to Labour voters, Tory voters might respond better to patriotism and tradition. And if you can bed a change into British tradition, it’s much more likely to succeed. So change the name in the Lib Dem Manifesto; change the articles of the Electoral Reform Society; and change the name of the system from one that will only ever appeal to policy wonks to one that appeals across the board. And after a few years, no-one will ever use the term “STV” ever again.
- British Proportional Representation is about fairness, and it’s about British traditions. Look at how “First Past the Post” slices up traditional communities. Is it right to have MPs crossing county boundaries, or chopping neighbourhoods in half? Throw out this unnatural gerrymandering! Bring in British Proportional Representation to strengthen the link from MPs to Britain’s historic towns and counties, with boundaries everyone can understand. Make “First Past the Post” the complicated and weird one – make “No” explain why they want such bizarre and unnatural constituency boundaries. Bring in British Proportional Representation to get common sense, based on British values of fairness and Britishness.
This is the ‘director’s cut’ of an article published earlier on Liberal Democrat Voice, written to follow this morning’s depressing consultation session and Simon McGrath’s article earlier today on election results within the Electoral Reform Society.
Labels: British Politics, Conservatives, Ideas, Liberal Democrats, Nationalism, Proportional Representation, Referendum
Thursday, May 05, 2011
YES! To AV – 8
I’m voting YES! to the Alternative Vote today. I’ve given my top seven reasons already. There’s just one left: a wholly negative reason, like your least favourite candidate on the ballot (who you can leave blank, or have the satisfaction of putting “last”; it works the same). What’s at the bottom? Appropriately, the BNP. Choosing an electoral system just because of how it affects one party is a crappy reason. But face facts: of every voting system ever invented, AV is the best to stop the BNP ever winning; with “first past the post,” they’ve “won” dozens of council seats.
I believe in democracy. I believe AV gives fairer votes – it makes MPs more accountable by giving voters more power. And choosing a system just to stop (or benefit) one party is despicable. It’s undemocratic. It’s basically wanting to rig the election.
But against the BNP, it works.
If the British National Party was your sole concern, electoral systems fall into three main categories of how ‘helpful’ they are to the BNP – though, as far as I’m concerned, fighting against them in the ballot box and persuading people it’s wrong to vote for them is always better than trying to rig the system. If they get enough votes, no voting system can stop them winning; if they get too few votes, no voting system will give them a place.
In theory, the most favourable ground for the BNP would be a pure proportional system, like a party list. Give seats exactly in proportion to votes – which in many ways is the most purely democratic system – and even very small parties should get very small representation. In practice, even elections using party lists have hardly ever resulted in BNP seats: they’ve almost always been defeated even in European Parliament elections, and the one time they managed to get a couple of seats it was only by a whisker. Why? Because even in the most ‘favourable’ territory, very, very few people vote for them over an area of any size (and pure PR is only used in big, big areas). And if they don’t get the votes, they can’t get elected. So persuading people not to vote for them works best!
The electoral systems that are sort of middling for the BNP are – ironically – my favourite and my least favourite. STV, the best system, is a little bit more helpful to the BNP because it’s quite proportional… But it’s also a little bit less helpful to the BNP because it’s preferential, so people can gang up and vote for ‘anyone except the BNP’. That means the BNP get hardly any preferences except for first (from the people who actually want them) and then last / none at all (which, as I’ve said, works the same. Using your ‘last’ preference in STV and AV merely means you can be satisfyingly vindictive).
The worst system, “first past the post” or more accurately ‘biggest loser wins’, is the one we have now. And because it doesn’t need a “winner” to get a majority – because, like two thirds of the MPs we have now, most people can vote against the “winner” – the BNP can get in on a split vote as the ‘biggest loser’. And, as I show below, they do.
The very worst system of all for the BNP is the Alternative Vote. It’s simple. That’s because it’s no more proportional than “first past the post,” but it is preferential. That means it’s as hard as the current system for small parties to break through on the one hand, and much harder on the other because it lets votes gang up on the BNP. It could almost be designed to gang up on the least popular party, as I’ve pointed out before, or the least popular candidate, as I’ve shown with AV’s power to throw out crooks.
The BNP is the most hated party by almost everyone who doesn’t actually support them. That means they’re almost certain to be ganged up on and clobbered when preferences are counted under AV. With the Alternative Vote, ‘anyone but the BNP’ is almost built into the system.
That’s why the BNP has been working hard for the No campaign.
I have never quoted the BNP before on this blog. I feel soiled for doing so. But if you want the facts…
Here’s BNP Deputy Chairman Simon Darby:
“First past the post” has given the BNP more than thirty times as many elected representatives as every other system used in the UK put together. It is “first past the post” that allows people to be elected with just a fraction of the vote. It is the current system that means that – not just some of the time, but most of the time – the ‘biggest loser wins’.
The first elected representative the BNP ever had was one local councillor, on the Isle of Dogs, in 1993. He was elected by “first past the post” – even though two thirds of people voted against him.
Sadly, they didn’t stop there.
Throughout the 2000s, the BNP made gain after gain with “first past the post”. They won dozens of council seats. Their highest number of councillors at any one time, a couple of years ago, was 58 – but they’ve won more seats than that altogether (thankfully, people often wake up at the following election and they lose them again).
Thanks to “first past the post,” the BNP were elected in 2006 as the main opposition party on Barking and Dagenham Council. Thanks to “first past the post,” the BNP have had councillors in Oldham, Burnley, Blackburn, Calderdale, Stoke-on-Trent, Epping Forest, Solihull, Redditch, Redbridge, Pendle, Leeds, Bradford, Kirklees, Thurrock and more!
Do you still think “first past the post” is bad for the BNP?
Of course, if people didn’t vote for them, no system would give them a seat.
But the reason the BNP love “first past the post” is that in almost every election they’ve ever “won,” most voters didn’t vote BNP. Most people voted against them. But they still “won”.
The first time BNP councillors were elected in Burnley, their average share of the vote was just 28.1%. Yes – that’s right. Nearly 72% of people voted against them – but thanks to “first past the post,” the BNP won. And that’s how they’ve got in, again and again, “winning” dozens of councillors as the biggest loser. Take a look at this chart of one election they “won”.
So how many councillors would the BNP have had – ever – under the Alternative Vote?
Just one. Ever.
AV lets ‘anyone but the BNP’ become not just a slogan, but a reality. It lets every other voter gang up against them perfectly. Under AV, the BNP need to win an absolute majority; and in a democracy, if more than half the votes are for one party, they have the right to win (again – to stop the BNP winning, you should persuade people not to vote for them).
In the Goresbrook ward of Barking in the 2004 local elections, the BNP candidate won 52% of the vote. That’s the only time they have ever won a true majority of voters. So that is the only time they would ever have won with AV.
Experts and campaigners agree – AV would lock the BNP out. And academic research shows they would get no more influence. If you want to rig the system against the BNP, vote YES! to AV.
The No Campaign have told nothing lies, more lies and a lot more lies on top of that, because they can’t come up with a case in favour of the current “first past the post” system (where usually the biggest loser “wins” when they’re nowhere near the “post” – even, dozens of times, the BNP). Here’s a useful post knocking down a lot of those different lies, including on the BNP. But there’s one lie – and one liar – it’s appropriate to deal with today.
The No-mongers’ liar-in-chief, Conservative Party “Chairman” Sayeeda Warsi, isn’t much of an expert on elections. In fact, she’s lost so many that the only way she’s managed to get into Parliament is by being made a member of the unelected House of Lords. But you may have heard the unelected Baroness Warsi claim that AV could lead to politicians “pandering to extremism” – even though it actually means parties have to appeal to a majority, not a tiny, hateful minority.
As the BNP’s history of council success shows, it’s “first past the post” that lets small, hateful minority parties “win”. Because “first past the post” doesn’t need a majority – it just needs the ‘biggest loser’.
That means that under “first past the post”, if a big party candidate needs only a bit more support to be ahead of the next biggest party – not a majority, just the ‘biggest loser’ – it pays to tell extremist voters, ‘Your nasty little party can’t win, but vote for me and I’ll be almost nasty enough to make you happy’.
Here’s the proof. Before she was unelected Baroness Warsi, she was unsuccessful candidate Sayeeda Warsi, standing for Parliament in Dewsbury in 2005. And here’s what one of her leaflets said, desperately trying to convince enough BNP voters to vote for her to get ahead:
Unelected Baroness Warsi was also caught lying on camera here.
Or, in the interests of political balance, Labour dinosaur David Blunkett – who also appealed to BNP voters with his strident anti-immigrant attacks and generally being an illiberal bully when he was Home Secretary – is, of course, also backing “No”. And in a flash of honesty (carefully timed to be too late to make a difference) he’s admitted today that the No-mongers’ figures are all made up. Well, I told you that already!
Not completely convinced yet to vote #Yes2AV? Try 1 of my other YES! reasons. Or 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7…!
I believe in democracy. I believe AV gives fairer votes – it makes MPs more accountable by giving voters more power. And choosing a system just to stop (or benefit) one party is despicable. It’s undemocratic. It’s basically wanting to rig the election.
But against the BNP, it works.
The Facts: Which Systems Are ‘Best’ For the BNP?
If the British National Party was your sole concern, electoral systems fall into three main categories of how ‘helpful’ they are to the BNP – though, as far as I’m concerned, fighting against them in the ballot box and persuading people it’s wrong to vote for them is always better than trying to rig the system. If they get enough votes, no voting system can stop them winning; if they get too few votes, no voting system will give them a place.
In theory, the most favourable ground for the BNP would be a pure proportional system, like a party list. Give seats exactly in proportion to votes – which in many ways is the most purely democratic system – and even very small parties should get very small representation. In practice, even elections using party lists have hardly ever resulted in BNP seats: they’ve almost always been defeated even in European Parliament elections, and the one time they managed to get a couple of seats it was only by a whisker. Why? Because even in the most ‘favourable’ territory, very, very few people vote for them over an area of any size (and pure PR is only used in big, big areas). And if they don’t get the votes, they can’t get elected. So persuading people not to vote for them works best!
The electoral systems that are sort of middling for the BNP are – ironically – my favourite and my least favourite. STV, the best system, is a little bit more helpful to the BNP because it’s quite proportional… But it’s also a little bit less helpful to the BNP because it’s preferential, so people can gang up and vote for ‘anyone except the BNP’. That means the BNP get hardly any preferences except for first (from the people who actually want them) and then last / none at all (which, as I’ve said, works the same. Using your ‘last’ preference in STV and AV merely means you can be satisfyingly vindictive).
The worst system, “first past the post” or more accurately ‘biggest loser wins’, is the one we have now. And because it doesn’t need a “winner” to get a majority – because, like two thirds of the MPs we have now, most people can vote against the “winner” – the BNP can get in on a split vote as the ‘biggest loser’. And, as I show below, they do.
The very worst system of all for the BNP is the Alternative Vote. It’s simple. That’s because it’s no more proportional than “first past the post,” but it is preferential. That means it’s as hard as the current system for small parties to break through on the one hand, and much harder on the other because it lets votes gang up on the BNP. It could almost be designed to gang up on the least popular party, as I’ve pointed out before, or the least popular candidate, as I’ve shown with AV’s power to throw out crooks.
The BNP is the most hated party by almost everyone who doesn’t actually support them. That means they’re almost certain to be ganged up on and clobbered when preferences are counted under AV. With the Alternative Vote, ‘anyone but the BNP’ is almost built into the system.
The Facts: The BNP Say “No”
That’s why the BNP has been working hard for the No campaign.
I have never quoted the BNP before on this blog. I feel soiled for doing so. But if you want the facts…
Here’s BNP Deputy Chairman Simon Darby:
“We are never going to get our feet under the table under the AV system.”And here is the latest message about today’s referendum to his supporters from BNP Leader Nick Griffin:
“AV is designed to ensure permanent left-liberal government and is aimed at stopping the BNP.”The BNP know AV is the biggest institutional threat they will ever face. They are desperate for a “No” vote.
The Facts: “First Past The Post” Has Given the BNP Dozens of Councillors When Most People Voted Against Them
“First past the post” has given the BNP more than thirty times as many elected representatives as every other system used in the UK put together. It is “first past the post” that allows people to be elected with just a fraction of the vote. It is the current system that means that – not just some of the time, but most of the time – the ‘biggest loser wins’.
The first elected representative the BNP ever had was one local councillor, on the Isle of Dogs, in 1993. He was elected by “first past the post” – even though two thirds of people voted against him.
Sadly, they didn’t stop there.
Throughout the 2000s, the BNP made gain after gain with “first past the post”. They won dozens of council seats. Their highest number of councillors at any one time, a couple of years ago, was 58 – but they’ve won more seats than that altogether (thankfully, people often wake up at the following election and they lose them again).
Thanks to “first past the post,” the BNP were elected in 2006 as the main opposition party on Barking and Dagenham Council. Thanks to “first past the post,” the BNP have had councillors in Oldham, Burnley, Blackburn, Calderdale, Stoke-on-Trent, Epping Forest, Solihull, Redditch, Redbridge, Pendle, Leeds, Bradford, Kirklees, Thurrock and more!
Do you still think “first past the post” is bad for the BNP?
Of course, if people didn’t vote for them, no system would give them a seat.
But the reason the BNP love “first past the post” is that in almost every election they’ve ever “won,” most voters didn’t vote BNP. Most people voted against them. But they still “won”.
The first time BNP councillors were elected in Burnley, their average share of the vote was just 28.1%. Yes – that’s right. Nearly 72% of people voted against them – but thanks to “first past the post,” the BNP won. And that’s how they’ve got in, again and again, “winning” dozens of councillors as the biggest loser. Take a look at this chart of one election they “won”.
So how many councillors would the BNP have had – ever – under the Alternative Vote?
Just one. Ever.
AV lets ‘anyone but the BNP’ become not just a slogan, but a reality. It lets every other voter gang up against them perfectly. Under AV, the BNP need to win an absolute majority; and in a democracy, if more than half the votes are for one party, they have the right to win (again – to stop the BNP winning, you should persuade people not to vote for them).
In the Goresbrook ward of Barking in the 2004 local elections, the BNP candidate won 52% of the vote. That’s the only time they have ever won a true majority of voters. So that is the only time they would ever have won with AV.
Experts and campaigners agree – AV would lock the BNP out. And academic research shows they would get no more influence. If you want to rig the system against the BNP, vote YES! to AV.
No To All Those Lies (Part VII) – Who Is It Who Appeals For BNP Votes, Exactly?
The No Campaign have told nothing lies, more lies and a lot more lies on top of that, because they can’t come up with a case in favour of the current “first past the post” system (where usually the biggest loser “wins” when they’re nowhere near the “post” – even, dozens of times, the BNP). Here’s a useful post knocking down a lot of those different lies, including on the BNP. But there’s one lie – and one liar – it’s appropriate to deal with today.
The No-mongers’ liar-in-chief, Conservative Party “Chairman” Sayeeda Warsi, isn’t much of an expert on elections. In fact, she’s lost so many that the only way she’s managed to get into Parliament is by being made a member of the unelected House of Lords. But you may have heard the unelected Baroness Warsi claim that AV could lead to politicians “pandering to extremism” – even though it actually means parties have to appeal to a majority, not a tiny, hateful minority.
As the BNP’s history of council success shows, it’s “first past the post” that lets small, hateful minority parties “win”. Because “first past the post” doesn’t need a majority – it just needs the ‘biggest loser’.
That means that under “first past the post”, if a big party candidate needs only a bit more support to be ahead of the next biggest party – not a majority, just the ‘biggest loser’ – it pays to tell extremist voters, ‘Your nasty little party can’t win, but vote for me and I’ll be almost nasty enough to make you happy’.
Here’s the proof. Before she was unelected Baroness Warsi, she was unsuccessful candidate Sayeeda Warsi, standing for Parliament in Dewsbury in 2005. And here’s what one of her leaflets said, desperately trying to convince enough BNP voters to vote for her to get ahead:
“Are you thinking of voting BNP? Think again.”Which system has let the BNP in with dozens of seats? “First past the post”. Which system encourages big parties to appeal to just a little bit more votes by pandering to vile, evil, homophobic racists like the BNP? “First past the post”. And who proved the case for AV over “First past the post” by not fighting against the BNP, but promising them more of what they wanted? Leading No-monger unelected Baroness Warsi.
“If you vote BNP you are allowing Labour to creep in with more political correctness and uncontrolled immigration and asylum.”
She told BNP voters the Conservatives are
“the only party that can deliver and put you first.”
Unelected Baroness Warsi was also caught lying on camera here.
Or, in the interests of political balance, Labour dinosaur David Blunkett – who also appealed to BNP voters with his strident anti-immigrant attacks and generally being an illiberal bully when he was Home Secretary – is, of course, also backing “No”. And in a flash of honesty (carefully timed to be too late to make a difference) he’s admitted today that the No-mongers’ figures are all made up. Well, I told you that already!
Not completely convinced yet to vote #Yes2AV? Try 1 of my other YES! reasons. Or 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7…!
Labels: Bigotry, British Politics, Proportional Representation, Referendum
Thursday, April 15, 2010
“OMG! Voting For THEM Might Let THEM In!”
It’s tired already. The soundbites, the leaflets, the screaming newspaper headlines – when it’s this hysterical from the start, what will it be like come May? So what’s the real truth?
And you know what?
Prepare yourself for a shock: every single one of those hysterical accusations is true.
But not one of them is true for the whole country.
They may well be true for individual constituencies… Though no-one knows for a fact which ones, because voters change their minds. OK, with quite a few you can make a pretty good guess, and most of the time it’ll be right – but even then, it’s only a probability, and in only one seat at a time.
The newspapers and leaflets and soundbites that say it applies across the whole country – like the literally millions of Unite-funded Labour leaflets claiming it’s between Labour and the Tories in seats where the Tories are in a poor third place and there’s either a Liberal Democrat MP already or perhaps soon will be – are simply telling a massive, shameless lie. It doesn’t say much for any positive reasons for voting, does it?
Yesterday, I saw Gordon Brown on TV saying that the Liberal Democrats really agreed with Labour – while his unelected crony Lord Adonis has made this into an art form (my friends Stephen and Prateek, like most Lib Dems, are not impressed) – and David Cameron on TV saying that the Liberal Democrats were really closer to the Conservatives. At the same time, I saw Conservative leaflets claiming a Lib Dem vote was a vote for Labour, and yet more Labour leaflets claiming – usually shrieking hysterically, insofar as you can do that on paper – that a Lib Dem vote was a vote for the Tories.
Here’s a newsflash. While Labour and the Tories both try alternately to insult, bully and love-bomb Liberal Democrat voters into supporting them, Liberal Democrats aren’t Labour or Tories. Most of us believe that the Conservatives and Labour are much closer to each other than they are to us: whether ideologically, with both hideously authoritarian; or on their near-identical records in government of green inaction, centralisation and warmongering; or just for a laugh about the Labservatives. But that’s a teeny bit of negativity coming through.
Let me ask a simple, positive question about why you think Liberal Democrats are Liberal Democrats: it’s much, much easier to get ahead and get power in a slightly bigger party that, thanks to the electoral system, has alternated in absolute power for most of the last century. I can see why people would become Labour or Tory even if they don’t really agree with them at heart, because, pragmatically, it makes a kind of sense. But given what a struggle it is even to be heard, let alone win power as Lib Dems – though we’re on 23% in the polls today, and have 63 MPs, when I joined we were on 19 MPs and struggling to make 5% – why on Earth would we bother if we didn’t believe in it?
Some Liberal Democrat supporters this election have got tired of all the negative campaigning and anti-voting, and set up a new Positive Voting site. Why not take a look? As opinion polls have often said – if everyone who said they’d vote Liberal Democrat ‘if they could win’ voted Lib Dem… Then we’d win.
If you’re passionately in favour of the Conservatives, or Labour, or any of the others, and if you’re really not keen on the Lib Dems… Well, then don’t vote Lib Dem. But why not take a look at what we stand for, if you’re not sure, and if you like what the Liberal Democrats say – then vote for us. Don’t be bullied into something you loathe fractionally less than something else.
Here’s the full Liberal Democrat Manifesto.
Or you could just read Nick Clegg’s and Vince Cable’s top priorities.
For me, I’d say vote Liberal Democrat for fairness. For freedom. For a green future. To fight poverty, ignorance and conformity.
And because we’re the only party that’s had the honesty to put all the figures in our Manifesto so you can work out for yourself if the sums add up.
The more votes and the more seats Liberal Democrats win, the more likely it is that Liberal Democrat policies will count in the next Parliament. Even while Labour’s had absolute power on a third of the vote, we’ve still made the difference on issues like the Gurkhas and civil liberties: every Lib Dem vote increases the chance of a Lib Dem government, or at least of stopping the other two being able to do every single thing they want to without anything like majority support and let some new ideas in for a change.
Which brings me to my final reason for a positive vote for the Liberal Democrats – even if you’re not a Liberal Democrat by natural inclination. If you think more voices need to be heard in politics… If you think absolute power when most voters oppose you isn’t healthy… If you think a government should represent the people… Then vote Liberal Democrat, not to shore up the system, nor to inherit it, but to break it open.
Because, you see, electing MPs by proportional representation would all but eliminate feeling you have to make a choice between the lesser of two evils when there’s something better on offer. Of course it wouldn’t stop people and parties campaigning negatively in other ways – there’ll always be attacks, and that’s an argument for another day – but it would cut off at the knees most of those daft ‘voting X is only a vote for Y’ babbles. Your X would simply be your X – or, in the Single Transferable Vote system the Lib Dems prefer, your 123: putting it simply, most types of PR give fair shares but too much power to parties, but STV gives voters a double power. Not only does it reflect your votes in proportion, but it lets you choose which individual candidates you want, either within or across different parties. Sounds a bit technical? It would mean the safe seats that led to the lazy arrogance of the MPs who most abused their expenses would be swept away, too.
The Conservatives will never choose to back proportional representation – unless actually letting the people in is the only way they can get power. And we all know now that Labour will never change the system on their own. In 1997, they had the largest majority in the House of Commons (on one of the lowest pluralities of votes) for a century. They promised in their manifesto that they would hold a referendum on proportional representation. They had the power to do it: they didn’t. They made the same promise in 2001. They broke it again. Last year, with defeat staring him in the face, Gordon Brown promised a referendum on ‘the Alternative Vote’ – a half-way system does give preferential voting, but that’s often even less proportional than the one we have now (at random). Then, just a week ago, they dropped that policy in the House of Commons. Now they promise to bring it back after the election. Of course you will, Gordon. No. You broke your promise when you had power, then broke it again, and again: offering a much weaker policy at some time in the future doesn’t deserve a second glance (though you might take a pause to realise that the Labour leaflets pretending sitting Lib Dem MPs can’t win deceitfully pretend the country is one big seat, despite the fact they’ve been the main protectors of it being lots of little ones).
A vote for the Liberal Democrats is a vote to deliver real change. It’s not the only possible vote for change in all seats: if making every vote count is your main aim, then in Scotland or Wales you might look to see if Plaid Cymru or the SNP are ahead in your seat, while in one seat in England – Brighton Pavilion – the Greens have a decent chance. I’d argue even then that you should vote Liberal Democrat, of course, but that’s because I do passionately believe that we need a party that’s fair, liberal and green, and mine’s the only one that’s all three. And I’ve already given you my reason my STV’s a better, more voter-powerful system of proportional representation than those other parties support.
If you support any smaller party, or even if you are Labour or Conservative supporter, and you want proportional representation, so every vote counts – then in nine out of ten Westminster Parliament seats the Liberal Democrats are almost certainly the party which is best-placed to gain PR. So, why not give us a try? If enough people support us this time, we are committed to changing the system – and then all those leaflets can go in the dustbin, and you can vote safely for your first choice for ever afterwards. Where the Labservatives want to scare you into voting for them by keeping the crooked system that might make you feel that’s necessary, the Liberal Democrats want to break open the system and run the risk you’ll then feel free to run to someone else. I think that’s a better way, don’t you?
And finally (courtesy of my friend Andrew)… Who do you get into bed with if you vote Liberal Democrat? The dreadful truth!
‹Older
- Voting Lib Dem might let Labour in!
- Voting Tory might let Labour in!
- Voting Green might let Labour in!
- Voting UKIP might let Labour in!
- Voting Labour might even let Labour in!
- Voting Lib Dem might let the Tories in!
- Voting Labour might let the Tories in!
- Voting Green might let the Tories in!
- Voting UKIP might let the Tories in!
- Voting Tory might even let the Tories in!
- Voting Tory might let the Lib Dems in!
- Voting Labour might let the Lib Dems in!
- Voting Green might let the Lib Dems in!
- Voting UKIP might let the Lib Dems in!
- Voting Lib Dem might even let the Liberal Democrats in!
And you know what?
Prepare yourself for a shock: every single one of those hysterical accusations is true.
But not one of them is true for the whole country.
They may well be true for individual constituencies… Though no-one knows for a fact which ones, because voters change their minds. OK, with quite a few you can make a pretty good guess, and most of the time it’ll be right – but even then, it’s only a probability, and in only one seat at a time.
The newspapers and leaflets and soundbites that say it applies across the whole country – like the literally millions of Unite-funded Labour leaflets claiming it’s between Labour and the Tories in seats where the Tories are in a poor third place and there’s either a Liberal Democrat MP already or perhaps soon will be – are simply telling a massive, shameless lie. It doesn’t say much for any positive reasons for voting, does it?
Lib Dems Must Really Want To Be Either Labour Or Tory, Mustn’t They?
Yesterday, I saw Gordon Brown on TV saying that the Liberal Democrats really agreed with Labour – while his unelected crony Lord Adonis has made this into an art form (my friends Stephen and Prateek, like most Lib Dems, are not impressed) – and David Cameron on TV saying that the Liberal Democrats were really closer to the Conservatives. At the same time, I saw Conservative leaflets claiming a Lib Dem vote was a vote for Labour, and yet more Labour leaflets claiming – usually shrieking hysterically, insofar as you can do that on paper – that a Lib Dem vote was a vote for the Tories.
Here’s a newsflash. While Labour and the Tories both try alternately to insult, bully and love-bomb Liberal Democrat voters into supporting them, Liberal Democrats aren’t Labour or Tories. Most of us believe that the Conservatives and Labour are much closer to each other than they are to us: whether ideologically, with both hideously authoritarian; or on their near-identical records in government of green inaction, centralisation and warmongering; or just for a laugh about the Labservatives. But that’s a teeny bit of negativity coming through.
Let me ask a simple, positive question about why you think Liberal Democrats are Liberal Democrats: it’s much, much easier to get ahead and get power in a slightly bigger party that, thanks to the electoral system, has alternated in absolute power for most of the last century. I can see why people would become Labour or Tory even if they don’t really agree with them at heart, because, pragmatically, it makes a kind of sense. But given what a struggle it is even to be heard, let alone win power as Lib Dems – though we’re on 23% in the polls today, and have 63 MPs, when I joined we were on 19 MPs and struggling to make 5% – why on Earth would we bother if we didn’t believe in it?
A Positive Vote
Some Liberal Democrat supporters this election have got tired of all the negative campaigning and anti-voting, and set up a new Positive Voting site. Why not take a look? As opinion polls have often said – if everyone who said they’d vote Liberal Democrat ‘if they could win’ voted Lib Dem… Then we’d win.
If you’re passionately in favour of the Conservatives, or Labour, or any of the others, and if you’re really not keen on the Lib Dems… Well, then don’t vote Lib Dem. But why not take a look at what we stand for, if you’re not sure, and if you like what the Liberal Democrats say – then vote for us. Don’t be bullied into something you loathe fractionally less than something else.
Here’s the full Liberal Democrat Manifesto.
Or you could just read Nick Clegg’s and Vince Cable’s top priorities.
For me, I’d say vote Liberal Democrat for fairness. For freedom. For a green future. To fight poverty, ignorance and conformity.
And because we’re the only party that’s had the honesty to put all the figures in our Manifesto so you can work out for yourself if the sums add up.
The more votes and the more seats Liberal Democrats win, the more likely it is that Liberal Democrat policies will count in the next Parliament. Even while Labour’s had absolute power on a third of the vote, we’ve still made the difference on issues like the Gurkhas and civil liberties: every Lib Dem vote increases the chance of a Lib Dem government, or at least of stopping the other two being able to do every single thing they want to without anything like majority support and let some new ideas in for a change.
Which brings me to my final reason for a positive vote for the Liberal Democrats – even if you’re not a Liberal Democrat by natural inclination. If you think more voices need to be heard in politics… If you think absolute power when most voters oppose you isn’t healthy… If you think a government should represent the people… Then vote Liberal Democrat, not to shore up the system, nor to inherit it, but to break it open.
Because, you see, electing MPs by proportional representation would all but eliminate feeling you have to make a choice between the lesser of two evils when there’s something better on offer. Of course it wouldn’t stop people and parties campaigning negatively in other ways – there’ll always be attacks, and that’s an argument for another day – but it would cut off at the knees most of those daft ‘voting X is only a vote for Y’ babbles. Your X would simply be your X – or, in the Single Transferable Vote system the Lib Dems prefer, your 123: putting it simply, most types of PR give fair shares but too much power to parties, but STV gives voters a double power. Not only does it reflect your votes in proportion, but it lets you choose which individual candidates you want, either within or across different parties. Sounds a bit technical? It would mean the safe seats that led to the lazy arrogance of the MPs who most abused their expenses would be swept away, too.
The Conservatives will never choose to back proportional representation – unless actually letting the people in is the only way they can get power. And we all know now that Labour will never change the system on their own. In 1997, they had the largest majority in the House of Commons (on one of the lowest pluralities of votes) for a century. They promised in their manifesto that they would hold a referendum on proportional representation. They had the power to do it: they didn’t. They made the same promise in 2001. They broke it again. Last year, with defeat staring him in the face, Gordon Brown promised a referendum on ‘the Alternative Vote’ – a half-way system does give preferential voting, but that’s often even less proportional than the one we have now (at random). Then, just a week ago, they dropped that policy in the House of Commons. Now they promise to bring it back after the election. Of course you will, Gordon. No. You broke your promise when you had power, then broke it again, and again: offering a much weaker policy at some time in the future doesn’t deserve a second glance (though you might take a pause to realise that the Labour leaflets pretending sitting Lib Dem MPs can’t win deceitfully pretend the country is one big seat, despite the fact they’ve been the main protectors of it being lots of little ones).
A vote for the Liberal Democrats is a vote to deliver real change. It’s not the only possible vote for change in all seats: if making every vote count is your main aim, then in Scotland or Wales you might look to see if Plaid Cymru or the SNP are ahead in your seat, while in one seat in England – Brighton Pavilion – the Greens have a decent chance. I’d argue even then that you should vote Liberal Democrat, of course, but that’s because I do passionately believe that we need a party that’s fair, liberal and green, and mine’s the only one that’s all three. And I’ve already given you my reason my STV’s a better, more voter-powerful system of proportional representation than those other parties support.
If you support any smaller party, or even if you are Labour or Conservative supporter, and you want proportional representation, so every vote counts – then in nine out of ten Westminster Parliament seats the Liberal Democrats are almost certainly the party which is best-placed to gain PR. So, why not give us a try? If enough people support us this time, we are committed to changing the system – and then all those leaflets can go in the dustbin, and you can vote safely for your first choice for ever afterwards. Where the Labservatives want to scare you into voting for them by keeping the crooked system that might make you feel that’s necessary, the Liberal Democrats want to break open the system and run the risk you’ll then feel free to run to someone else. I think that’s a better way, don’t you?
And finally (courtesy of my friend Andrew)… Who do you get into bed with if you vote Liberal Democrat? The dreadful truth!
Labels: British Politics, Labservative, Liberal Democrats, Proportional Representation, The Golden Dozen
