AV? Oh yes!

#yes2av

I have mentioned this before but it is worth mentioning again that in all of my 37½ years of voting I’ve never ever elected an MP or even manage to influence the election of my MP. It doesn’t actually feel very good. This is why I have always been in favour of voting reform. The first past the post system is just so unfair. Unless an MP is elected with well over have the votes that MP can never claim to represent the majority of their constituents. I used to think that some form of proportional representation was the fairest and most representative way forward and when as Prime Minister Gordon Brown stated that he would be prepared to offer AV to woo the LibDems I couldn’t understand why. But the more I think about it the more I think that AV is probably the best voting system to have. What AV gives you over some forms of PR is the retention of one MP to one constituency. Retaining the MP/constituency link is so important when it comes to accountability. Another advantage it has over say STV (the single transferable vote) is that it is not over complicated. AV is much fairer than what we have at the moment because it enables more people to elect their MP. A larger mandate for our representatives in parliament has to be healthy for our ersatz democracy. These are just some of the reasons why I shall be voting Yes for AV in May.

Izzard point

#yes2av

Eddie Izzard looks positively statesman-like in his photo that accompanied the latest missive from the Yes to AV campaign. I do wonder if he has a desire to go into politics. But that’s by the bye. Until the referendum is in site there doesn’t seem like a lot of point shouting about the joy of AV too often as people will just get totally fed up with it and switch off, but before the campaign can get started proper the Yes campaign is in need of some cash:

This is probably a once in a lifetime chance to make our voting system fairer. Please help by donating what you can.

Alternative Vote

Since turning eighteen I have voted in every election that I’ve been eligible to vote in. At every general election I’ve voted Labour. I’m now fifty-five and I’ve never elected a Labour MP in my life. Do you know how painful that is?

In 1997 I came close. Labour were less than 400 votes short of taking true-blue Bury St Edmunds. Now that would have been a victory. When we moved permanently to Norwich last year it was to a constituency that had a sitting Labour MP, Charles Clarke. Not an MP whose political views seemed to wholly equate to mine, buy hey it was a Labour seat. Then of course as we know disaster struck and Charles narrowly missed re-election. So close and yet so far. If I live until I’m sixty will I finally elect a Labour MP? I do hope so.

I have never liked the first past the post system. It is so undemocratic, and just plain unfair. How can it be fair when less than half the voting public in a constituency vote for a particular MP? Why have we put up with it for so long?

One thing that I along with many others don’t want to lose is having a member of parliament that is directly elected by a constituency, but that doesn’t mean you have to stick with first past the post. AV gives you a constituency MP, and an MP that has actually been elected by more people than first past the post gives you.

Democracy has to be about consensus and often compromise. It is totally wrong to stick with an outdated system just because it favours a particular party or parties. No political party should ever push for a system because it favours them. That’s immoral.

Emily Thornberry in her blog posting on LabourList doesn’t seem to grasp that first past the post is undemocratic and therefore can never be supported by a party that should always take the moral high ground.

Come the referendum I shall vote for AV. It may not be the very best solution but it is a damned site fairer than what we have now. I think that’s called progress. Labour is a progressive party, isn’t it?