Alan Johnson's referendum on AV+
As a known, self-confessed Liberal Democrat, it should come as little surprise that I'm in favour of proportional representation. However, I'm not in favour of just any form of proportional representation, and therefore I'm slightly sceptical of Alan Johnson's referendum.
For example, I'm not a huge fan of the Additional Member System used in Scotland and Wales. Yes, it's proportional. Yes, it means that - by and large - parties are represented in a fairer way, instead of a few percentage points meaning the difference between a crushing defeat and a massive majority. However, I don't like the list system. In any given area, you can reasonably easily predict that at least one or two members of a particular party are going to be elected. So if I think the Pink Party will get two list seats in Southwest Countryshire, I - the runner of the Pink Party - can put someone who isn't very popular at position one on my list. The person at position two is well-liked and narrowly missed out on a constituency seat. I, as a voter, am completely screwed if I don't want person one but do want person two.
Broadly, I don't like proportional systems that keep the power of selection with the party and remove it from the hands of the people. I'm similarly not a fan of First Past the Post, for similar reasons. You have your local Pink Party MP. You like the Pink Party itself. You link the Pink Party leader. You like Pink Party policies. But your local Pink Party MP is shockingly awful. Corrupt, incompetent, malicious, divisive, money-grabbing, careerist, immoral and lazy. You want to vote them out. But they have the thumbscrews tight on your local constituency Pink Party, so they get reselected. Do you:
a) hold your nose and vote for the Pink Party, despite your reservations about the MP you'll be electing
b) vote for the Grey Party because they're the closest competition to unseat the Pink Party - but you disagree with the Grey Party on quite a few issues
c) don't vote
?
There aren't that many other options for the average voter.
AV+ still leaves you lumped with a single choice per party for your constituency. There is only one Pink Party PPC, one Grey Party PPC, and one Turquoise Party PPC. You rank them - and any other candidates - in order, 1, 2, 3... If no-one has 50% of the vote, you knock out the lowest candidate and move down to the next preference. Repeat. The Mayor of London vote works similarly, except you only get one second choice (so you have to guess who the top two will be).
Now, where AV+ scores over FPTP is that if the other voters are utterly against the sitting Pink Party MP, you can't (easily) let the corrupt Pink Party MP sneak back in. Pink Party gets 35% of people's first preferences. Grey gets 30%. Turquoise gets 25%. Some other random independents gets a few votes from the remaining 10%. The Independents get knocked out, and it splits up: 42% Pink, Grey 31%, Turquoise 27%. Turquoise get knocked out and overwhelmingly vote for Grey. So it ends up 45% Pink, 55% Grey. The "split" vote between Grey and Turquoise is resolved, and Pink doesn't get back in.
However, if you're a Pink Party supporter, you still don't get to choose a better Pink Party member.
And the top-up proposed by Jenkins for AV+ was very small. Take a city+suburbs area of six constituencies now - that's about 500,000 people. Split that up into five constituencies, and have one uber-constituency top-up seat. If you get 3 seats for the Pinks and 2 seats for the Greys, but there were a lot of votes for the Turquoise, the top-up seat goes to the Turquoise. It would reward minor parties who get quite a lot of votes, but not many (or even any) seats. (This is a simplification, obviously.) Again, little choice, little accountability.
Moving back to the real world:
I want pro-Europe Tories to be able to vote for a pro-Europe Tory candidate, instead of only having a Euro-sceptic to vote for.
I want Blairite New Labour supporters to not have to vote for an Old Labour union candidate. And I want the Old Labour union supporters to be able to not have to vote for Blairities or Brownies.
I want people who support the Green Party to be able to express their voice, but not be written off by the political process because their vote was 'wasted', because their vote continues to count. (Which AV+ does allow - enough green votes could get a top-up seat, and you could vote Green, then other parties in your constituency.)
I want people who have a corrupt, incompetent MP to be able to vote for another person of the same party.
I want young people to be able to express their support for an MP/PPC who represents their views on the environment or technology or jobs, and not an MP who's wedded to big business.
I want pensioners to be able to vote for someone who will look after their interests, and not the young whippersnapper who's barely out of nappies.
I want a popular local independent to be able to gather, say, 25% of the vote across a city and get in, even though they wouldn't necessarily win any seat on its own.
In short, I don't like people's choices being so heavily restricted by political parties.
That's why, in general, I'm much more in favour of STV. An area of six seats might get split in two, or you might have one big seat. Most parties put up several candidates, and this makes it harder to focus them all on one wing of the party, or one demographic, or whatever. You get to vote for the Green first, then the economically conservative Labour candidate and the more liberal Conservative, if you want. Or you can vote for all the Conservatives. Or whatever else you want.
I think it works and works well. Yes, the counting is hard, but I don't think that's too big a problem, to be honest. AMS isn't that obvious, either. And one of Jenkins' objections - that STV wasn't what was used elsewhere in the UK - is no longer true. It's what's used in Scottish local elections.
Certainly, I'm not wedded to STV. If someone has a better system that allows individual choice and proportionality, I'm all ears. And I do think AV+ is better than FPTP, it just seems the choice you'd make if you were a party politico and not if you were a voter who wanted to have their voice count in politics.
For example, I'm not a huge fan of the Additional Member System used in Scotland and Wales. Yes, it's proportional. Yes, it means that - by and large - parties are represented in a fairer way, instead of a few percentage points meaning the difference between a crushing defeat and a massive majority. However, I don't like the list system. In any given area, you can reasonably easily predict that at least one or two members of a particular party are going to be elected. So if I think the Pink Party will get two list seats in Southwest Countryshire, I - the runner of the Pink Party - can put someone who isn't very popular at position one on my list. The person at position two is well-liked and narrowly missed out on a constituency seat. I, as a voter, am completely screwed if I don't want person one but do want person two.
Broadly, I don't like proportional systems that keep the power of selection with the party and remove it from the hands of the people. I'm similarly not a fan of First Past the Post, for similar reasons. You have your local Pink Party MP. You like the Pink Party itself. You link the Pink Party leader. You like Pink Party policies. But your local Pink Party MP is shockingly awful. Corrupt, incompetent, malicious, divisive, money-grabbing, careerist, immoral and lazy. You want to vote them out. But they have the thumbscrews tight on your local constituency Pink Party, so they get reselected. Do you:
a) hold your nose and vote for the Pink Party, despite your reservations about the MP you'll be electing
b) vote for the Grey Party because they're the closest competition to unseat the Pink Party - but you disagree with the Grey Party on quite a few issues
c) don't vote
?
There aren't that many other options for the average voter.
AV+ still leaves you lumped with a single choice per party for your constituency. There is only one Pink Party PPC, one Grey Party PPC, and one Turquoise Party PPC. You rank them - and any other candidates - in order, 1, 2, 3... If no-one has 50% of the vote, you knock out the lowest candidate and move down to the next preference. Repeat. The Mayor of London vote works similarly, except you only get one second choice (so you have to guess who the top two will be).
Now, where AV+ scores over FPTP is that if the other voters are utterly against the sitting Pink Party MP, you can't (easily) let the corrupt Pink Party MP sneak back in. Pink Party gets 35% of people's first preferences. Grey gets 30%. Turquoise gets 25%. Some other random independents gets a few votes from the remaining 10%. The Independents get knocked out, and it splits up: 42% Pink, Grey 31%, Turquoise 27%. Turquoise get knocked out and overwhelmingly vote for Grey. So it ends up 45% Pink, 55% Grey. The "split" vote between Grey and Turquoise is resolved, and Pink doesn't get back in.
However, if you're a Pink Party supporter, you still don't get to choose a better Pink Party member.
And the top-up proposed by Jenkins for AV+ was very small. Take a city+suburbs area of six constituencies now - that's about 500,000 people. Split that up into five constituencies, and have one uber-constituency top-up seat. If you get 3 seats for the Pinks and 2 seats for the Greys, but there were a lot of votes for the Turquoise, the top-up seat goes to the Turquoise. It would reward minor parties who get quite a lot of votes, but not many (or even any) seats. (This is a simplification, obviously.) Again, little choice, little accountability.
Moving back to the real world:
I want pro-Europe Tories to be able to vote for a pro-Europe Tory candidate, instead of only having a Euro-sceptic to vote for.
I want Blairite New Labour supporters to not have to vote for an Old Labour union candidate. And I want the Old Labour union supporters to be able to not have to vote for Blairities or Brownies.
I want people who support the Green Party to be able to express their voice, but not be written off by the political process because their vote was 'wasted', because their vote continues to count. (Which AV+ does allow - enough green votes could get a top-up seat, and you could vote Green, then other parties in your constituency.)
I want people who have a corrupt, incompetent MP to be able to vote for another person of the same party.
I want young people to be able to express their support for an MP/PPC who represents their views on the environment or technology or jobs, and not an MP who's wedded to big business.
I want pensioners to be able to vote for someone who will look after their interests, and not the young whippersnapper who's barely out of nappies.
I want a popular local independent to be able to gather, say, 25% of the vote across a city and get in, even though they wouldn't necessarily win any seat on its own.
In short, I don't like people's choices being so heavily restricted by political parties.
That's why, in general, I'm much more in favour of STV. An area of six seats might get split in two, or you might have one big seat. Most parties put up several candidates, and this makes it harder to focus them all on one wing of the party, or one demographic, or whatever. You get to vote for the Green first, then the economically conservative Labour candidate and the more liberal Conservative, if you want. Or you can vote for all the Conservatives. Or whatever else you want.
I think it works and works well. Yes, the counting is hard, but I don't think that's too big a problem, to be honest. AMS isn't that obvious, either. And one of Jenkins' objections - that STV wasn't what was used elsewhere in the UK - is no longer true. It's what's used in Scottish local elections.
Certainly, I'm not wedded to STV. If someone has a better system that allows individual choice and proportionality, I'm all ears. And I do think AV+ is better than FPTP, it just seems the choice you'd make if you were a party politico and not if you were a voter who wanted to have their voice count in politics.