The Alternative Vote (AV) offered to the public in a referendum this week as an alternative way of electing MPs to Westminster is dead in the water. Out of nineteen million people who voted thirteen million reacted to the prospect of minor constitutional change in the way a seven year old does when presented with a plate of broccoli risotto; meaning they screwed their collective face into an exaggerated expression of disgust before pushing it away.
Nick Clegg, some time Deputy Prime Minister and full time poster boy for everything the ‘NO to AV’ campaign hates about change described the result as ‘a bitter blow for all those people who believe in the need for electoral reform.’ He remains, he told the BBC on Friday ‘a passionate supporter of electoral reform,’ but was also one who accepted that ‘you ask someone a question and get an overwhelming answer; you just have to move on.’
Ed Milliband, also a supporter of AV said the public had ‘delivered a clear verdict which I accept’, he went on to say that elections in the UK have to change to make ‘people feel more included in our politics.’ Since then he has called on those Liberal Democrats who support electoral reform to withdraw from the coalition which was meant with total earnestness but is unlikely to provoke a meaningful response. A few Lib Dems, Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne for one, might jump ship, but faced with the certainty of electoral annihilation now most will plump for clinging to the Tories in the hope that an improved economic picture in four years time will save their bacon.
David Cameron has played down the result, describing it as a ‘difficult moment’ for the coalition; difficult but not fatal. In the longer term the nagging worry that his coalition partners might one day pull out could spoil things; but for now there is only one alpha male around the cabinet table and he’s called Dave.
The gloating was left to Matthew Elliot of the ‘No to AV’ campaign who smugly declared that Friday’s result would ‘settle the debate about changing our electoral system for the next generation.’ It was left to Kate Ghose of ‘Yes to Fairer Votes’ to point out that the ‘debate’ on AV hadn’t been centred on the ‘issues of democracy’ that really concern people and that even though they lost this round of the contest ‘over five million people voted for change.’
Lets put our cards on the table the ‘Yes’ campaign was fatally flawed from the start, too many self satisfied celebrities and squabbling amongst political egos; too little in the way of meaningful connection with voters. It was also evident from that start that AV was too much of a ‘miserable little compromise’ to satisfy believers in real change; even though many of us voted for it anyway.
Even so five million people voted for AV, more than the membership of all three main political parties put together and then multiplied. Not enough to swing the vote but still a sizeable constituency, add the that the fact that the result of the last general election shows that the public don’t trust any of the main parties sufficiently to let them take power outright and the prospects for the progressives don’t look anywhere near so bleak.
The ‘No’ campaign won the battle over AV because it played on the fear of the new that is an innate part of the British character and they did so with consummate skill and shameless cynicism. Never mind the personal attacks on Nick Clegg that grabbed so much media attention think instead about the assumptions they made about you and me; the voting public. We’re all too stupid and impressionable to be trusted with ranking election candidates in order of preference, what we want instead is to be patted on the head and told what’s good for us by the people who have always done so.
It is troubling to think that a democracy has a defined ‘political class’ at all, but the realisation that this is how they see everyone else is enough to turn your stomach. Last Thursday five million people saw the need for change, not enough to win the day but more than enough to form the foundation for a campaign movement dedicated to bringing political power back to the people of this country. Working together to build such a movement rather than retreating to lick their wounds and nurse their recriminations is what progressives of all parties and none should be doing today.
Showing posts with label AV-referendum. Show all posts
Showing posts with label AV-referendum. Show all posts
Sunday, 8 May 2011
Tuesday, 3 May 2011
A coalition of the unwilling
For a while over the weekend it looked like the whole country was loved up following the royal wedding, even David Cameron, in full on ‘Dave’ mode obviously, was caught twittering that it was ‘like a fairytale’ to the BBC .
Thankfully the squabble, sorry debate, over voting reform has brought us all back to earth with a reassuring bump.
Over the weekend Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne raised serious concerns about the attacks on the Liberal Democrats made by the ‘No to AV’ campaign in their leaflets and broadcasts. Just for the record although it’s nominally at least a cross party organisation much of the campaign’s money comes from people who also donate to the Conservative Party.
Speaking the to Guardian Mr Huhne criticised David Cameron for not urging the No campaign to tone down its attacks on the Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg , saying he ‘has had the power to stop these leaflets saying Nick Clegg has broken promises and told lies. He has done nothing about it.’
This, he asserts, is no way to treat coalition partners who have made painful compromises to help push through Tory policies. For his part the prime minister claims he has no control over the content of the materiel put out by the No campaign and that he and Nick Clegg would continue to work together in the national interest.
Speaking for the No campaign Lord Boateng, a former Labour cabinet minister, proof if you needed it that the No campaign is a Roman orgy of strange bedfellows, said that if the Liberal Democrats ‘find the Tories so distasteful, you have to ask why they’re in government with them’ before suggesting that if they don’t like how things are playing out they should ‘resign from the coalition.’
At the risk of getting into the sort of trouble Mr Cameron did at PMQ’s last week my first response to Lord Boateng’s comments is ‘calm down dear’; it is seldom difficult these days to spot the difference between a ray of sunshine and a Lib Dem with a grievance but this time they might just have a point.
Read the leaflets put out by ‘No to AV’ and there is something distinctly mean spirited about the way they single out Nick Clegg for attack, it is almost as offensive at the assertion they make that voters are too stupid to rank candidates in order of preference. Has the noble Lord really thought about the attitudes of the people to whom he’s lending his support, come to that have any of the senior Labour figures who have backed the campaign against AV, aren’t they members of a supposedly progressive party; the attitudes of the No campaign are anything but progressive.
The Yes campaign has been lazy and inept from day one, this has translated into a ten point gap between them and the supporters of FPTP, as we’re all learning to call the old way of voting, down from a high of eighteen points but still enough to see them crash and burn come Thursday.
What you might wonder happens then? David Cameron will have got the upper hand in a coalition where the Lib Dems need the Tories more than the Tories need them; at least that’s the theory. The thing about theories is that they often turn out to be nonsense.
Friday night might yet be the last decent nights sleep David Cameron gets between now and the next general election. If, as looks likely, the No campaign win he will spend the next four years shackled to a resentful coalition partner; they probably won’t bring down the government because that would be electoral suicide for Clegg and co; but he will be haunted every day by the possibility that they just might.
Kicking the electoral reform into the long grass for a generation or more, the intention from day one of the No campaign, might seem like a fairytale ending for David Cameron’s Tories. The old way of doing things with all its institutionalised unfairness will roll on as before; the thing about fairytales though is that they don’t always have happy endings.
Thankfully the squabble, sorry debate, over voting reform has brought us all back to earth with a reassuring bump.
Over the weekend Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne raised serious concerns about the attacks on the Liberal Democrats made by the ‘No to AV’ campaign in their leaflets and broadcasts. Just for the record although it’s nominally at least a cross party organisation much of the campaign’s money comes from people who also donate to the Conservative Party.
Speaking the to Guardian Mr Huhne criticised David Cameron for not urging the No campaign to tone down its attacks on the Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg , saying he ‘has had the power to stop these leaflets saying Nick Clegg has broken promises and told lies. He has done nothing about it.’
This, he asserts, is no way to treat coalition partners who have made painful compromises to help push through Tory policies. For his part the prime minister claims he has no control over the content of the materiel put out by the No campaign and that he and Nick Clegg would continue to work together in the national interest.
Speaking for the No campaign Lord Boateng, a former Labour cabinet minister, proof if you needed it that the No campaign is a Roman orgy of strange bedfellows, said that if the Liberal Democrats ‘find the Tories so distasteful, you have to ask why they’re in government with them’ before suggesting that if they don’t like how things are playing out they should ‘resign from the coalition.’
At the risk of getting into the sort of trouble Mr Cameron did at PMQ’s last week my first response to Lord Boateng’s comments is ‘calm down dear’; it is seldom difficult these days to spot the difference between a ray of sunshine and a Lib Dem with a grievance but this time they might just have a point.
Read the leaflets put out by ‘No to AV’ and there is something distinctly mean spirited about the way they single out Nick Clegg for attack, it is almost as offensive at the assertion they make that voters are too stupid to rank candidates in order of preference. Has the noble Lord really thought about the attitudes of the people to whom he’s lending his support, come to that have any of the senior Labour figures who have backed the campaign against AV, aren’t they members of a supposedly progressive party; the attitudes of the No campaign are anything but progressive.
The Yes campaign has been lazy and inept from day one, this has translated into a ten point gap between them and the supporters of FPTP, as we’re all learning to call the old way of voting, down from a high of eighteen points but still enough to see them crash and burn come Thursday.
What you might wonder happens then? David Cameron will have got the upper hand in a coalition where the Lib Dems need the Tories more than the Tories need them; at least that’s the theory. The thing about theories is that they often turn out to be nonsense.
Friday night might yet be the last decent nights sleep David Cameron gets between now and the next general election. If, as looks likely, the No campaign win he will spend the next four years shackled to a resentful coalition partner; they probably won’t bring down the government because that would be electoral suicide for Clegg and co; but he will be haunted every day by the possibility that they just might.
Kicking the electoral reform into the long grass for a generation or more, the intention from day one of the No campaign, might seem like a fairytale ending for David Cameron’s Tories. The old way of doing things with all its institutionalised unfairness will roll on as before; the thing about fairytales though is that they don’t always have happy endings.
Sunday, 3 April 2011
I support AV but the debate about it sends me to sleep.
Did your heart start beating a little faster yesterday afternoon? It should have done because yesterday was the day when the campaign to get people to vote yes in the referendum on whether or not Britain adopts the Alternative Vote (AV) method for choosing its government was launched.
The launch event was attended by a legion of people who used to be quite famous in the 1990’s and are now mostly famous for being willing to put on the slap and turn up to the opening of an envelope. By teatime levels of apathy had reached fever pitch across the nation.
One time independent MP Martin Bell said that adopting AV would mean that our members of parliament would no longer be ‘elected by a minority’ whilst we were at the same time ‘going our and preaching democracy to the rest of the world.’
Former Olympic athlete Kriss Akabusi said that the current ‘first past the post’ system had ‘worked well in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries’, but is no longer fit for purpose. He dismissed as ‘poppycock’ suggestions made by opponents of AV that changing the voting system would allow the likes of the BNP to enter the political mainstream.
A spokes person for the campaign against AV told the BBC that the launch event was a ‘glossy veneer’ covering a costly and divisive plan, highlighting the latter aspect by pointing out that Labour Leader Ed Milliband and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg refused to play nicely and share a platform even though they both support AV.
He went on to say that ‘At a time when people are seeing their pay frozen and the cost of living rising, why should they listen to a bunch of celebrities who are backing a plan to spend £250 million scrapping our fair voting system for one that gives some people more votes than others.’
It is time, I think, to lay a few cards on the table; I support AV and will be voting for it in the referendum next month even though like many supporters I recognise it as the ‘least worst’ of the two options on offer. I will be supporting AV for one very simple reason, I believe that democracy in the UK is in a mess; too many seats are so safe they have become baubles to be handed out by powerful party managers, public trust in politicians has slumped to an all time low; something has to change and fast.
AV is far from a perfect solution, it is too fiddly to grab the interest of a voting public that has always been marked by its lower case conservatism and too timid for the liking of those of us who are hungry for real change; but it is a start. If a majority of the voting public can be persuaded that making this one comparatively small change won’t result in the sky falling down on our heads than it might be possible to start a mature discussion about one day embracing proportional representation.
What sticks in my craw though is the way that both sides of the debate have conspired, probably I’ll admit unconsciously, to turn what should have been a defining moment into a dispiriting playground squabble. The ‘No’ campaign have spent months filling the airwaves with emotive and inaccurate claims that AV will cost £250 million, meaning that hospitals will close and our brave troops will have to go into battle in Afghanistan or, heaven forbid Libya, armed with little more than sharpened sticks, the ‘Yes’ campaign seem to think we the voting public will only take an interest in politics if it is sold to us by celebrities who are themselves slightly past their sell by date.
None of this constitutes a reasoned and mature political debate; but it does tell you everything you need to know about the state of British politics in the second decade of the twenty first century. That two supposedly intelligent politicians with a common standpoint on an issue refuse to share a platform is a perfect example of the silly, divisive and counter productive nature of our political discourse and the best argument for change.
If we have the courage to reform the voting system noisy tribalism will have had its day, parties of all hues will have to work together for the common good. That is why however leaden the campaign for it I will be voting for AV and, I hope in a few years time for proportional representation.
The launch event was attended by a legion of people who used to be quite famous in the 1990’s and are now mostly famous for being willing to put on the slap and turn up to the opening of an envelope. By teatime levels of apathy had reached fever pitch across the nation.
One time independent MP Martin Bell said that adopting AV would mean that our members of parliament would no longer be ‘elected by a minority’ whilst we were at the same time ‘going our and preaching democracy to the rest of the world.’
Former Olympic athlete Kriss Akabusi said that the current ‘first past the post’ system had ‘worked well in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries’, but is no longer fit for purpose. He dismissed as ‘poppycock’ suggestions made by opponents of AV that changing the voting system would allow the likes of the BNP to enter the political mainstream.
A spokes person for the campaign against AV told the BBC that the launch event was a ‘glossy veneer’ covering a costly and divisive plan, highlighting the latter aspect by pointing out that Labour Leader Ed Milliband and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg refused to play nicely and share a platform even though they both support AV.
He went on to say that ‘At a time when people are seeing their pay frozen and the cost of living rising, why should they listen to a bunch of celebrities who are backing a plan to spend £250 million scrapping our fair voting system for one that gives some people more votes than others.’
It is time, I think, to lay a few cards on the table; I support AV and will be voting for it in the referendum next month even though like many supporters I recognise it as the ‘least worst’ of the two options on offer. I will be supporting AV for one very simple reason, I believe that democracy in the UK is in a mess; too many seats are so safe they have become baubles to be handed out by powerful party managers, public trust in politicians has slumped to an all time low; something has to change and fast.
AV is far from a perfect solution, it is too fiddly to grab the interest of a voting public that has always been marked by its lower case conservatism and too timid for the liking of those of us who are hungry for real change; but it is a start. If a majority of the voting public can be persuaded that making this one comparatively small change won’t result in the sky falling down on our heads than it might be possible to start a mature discussion about one day embracing proportional representation.
What sticks in my craw though is the way that both sides of the debate have conspired, probably I’ll admit unconsciously, to turn what should have been a defining moment into a dispiriting playground squabble. The ‘No’ campaign have spent months filling the airwaves with emotive and inaccurate claims that AV will cost £250 million, meaning that hospitals will close and our brave troops will have to go into battle in Afghanistan or, heaven forbid Libya, armed with little more than sharpened sticks, the ‘Yes’ campaign seem to think we the voting public will only take an interest in politics if it is sold to us by celebrities who are themselves slightly past their sell by date.
None of this constitutes a reasoned and mature political debate; but it does tell you everything you need to know about the state of British politics in the second decade of the twenty first century. That two supposedly intelligent politicians with a common standpoint on an issue refuse to share a platform is a perfect example of the silly, divisive and counter productive nature of our political discourse and the best argument for change.
If we have the courage to reform the voting system noisy tribalism will have had its day, parties of all hues will have to work together for the common good. That is why however leaden the campaign for it I will be voting for AV and, I hope in a few years time for proportional representation.
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