If Welsh Labour wants a two-member-constituency voting system, this is the one they should adopt

In the recent row over possible changes to the voting system used for elections to the Welsh Assembly, one of the alternatives proposed by the Labour Party was a system of two-member-constituency First Past the Post (see the Devolution Matters blog for an overview of the row). In other words, to expand the number of [...]

To negotiate with the EU first and then have a referendum makes no sense

The idea that the UK government could negotiate with the EU on repatriating certain powers back to the UK first, and then hold a referendum to endorse the deal, makes no sense. And I mean that logically as much as politically or tactically. Imagine the following scenario. The coalition government does seize the opportunity presented [...]

All that’s needed is 25% support for Scottish independence to be carried

It’s a huge irony of last week’s various elections that, as the UK opted not to replace the First Past the Post voting system with the Alternative Vote, the SNP was being elected into power in Scotland using a voting system designed to prevent the disproportional parliamentary majorities that FPTP tends to produce. Had FPTP [...]

England sends A V-sign to Westminster – which sees it as a V for victory!

So the results are in: 4,824,357 (or 30.93%) say Yes to AV; 10,774,735 (or 69.07%) say No to AV. For clarity, that’s the result in England. Across the UK as a whole, it was 32.1% in favour of AV and 67.9% against. So England appears to have rejected AV even more decisively than the whole [...]

AV referendum: for the sake of England, don’t vote!

Do you think the First Past the Post voting system used for electing UK MPs should be changed to the Alternative Vote? Do you even care? Firstly, should anyone who supports the idea of an English parliament give a monkeys about the voting system used to elect the UK parliament? On one level, no: the [...]

If you want a preferential voting system, at least make it preferential

I feel like the kind of pedant that will jump on you for saying ‘less people’, rather than ‘fewer people’; or ‘something I like the sound of’, rather than ‘of which I like the sound’. ‘AV isn’t really a preferential voting system’, I say. Well, yes and no, as it were. It is the case [...]

DPEV: absolutely the best single-member voting system for the UK and England – honest

OK, I admit it: I’m a voting-system geek, if not obsessive. I really dislike AV, for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it leaves England short-changed: nothing done to address the West Lothian Question or the broader English Question, to say nothing about the unaccountable nature of executive power in [...]

Why the Yes camp is in danger of losing the referendum

According to the latest opinion poll, there’s a serious danger that AV will be rejected by the UK electorate on 5 May. Why do voters just not ‘get’ AV; or if they get it, why do they appear not to like it? Well, contrary to the Yes camp’s claims that AV is a fairer voting [...]

AV 2.0: revision to the AV counting method

Further on the question of the counting method for AV elections, it occurs to me that there is a simple revision to the AV counting method that would remedy some of the main concerns about its fairness and complexity. For the still non-initiated, AV elections are conducted as follows: Voters list candidates in order of [...]

Forget the pedantry and distortions: the reason the big parties oppose AV is that it will erode their support

Readers of this blog will know by now that I dislike the Alternative Vote (AV) voting system but like First Past the Post (FPTP) even less. But cutting through all the crud and the crap about those systems’ respective merits and demerits, the one big reason why Labour and Tory dinosaurs such as Margaret Beckett [...]