Watching William Hague and Danny Alexander speak to the Press outside the Cabinet Office, it was obvious to me how shtum they were keeping about electoral reform.
There's a good reason, I think: a truly representative voting system would probably mean there would never again be a Conservative government.
Let's say that we had some form of nationwide Alternative Vote. The votes for the very small parties would likely pass on about equally between the Tories and Labour - maybe a little more Right than Left. The key would be how the LD votes would split, and I'd guess it would be not less than 80:20 in favour of a left of centre Labour party. Even now, that would mean an outright majority for Labour.
Just as American politics is basically a choice between two sides that from a British perspective seem right-wing, British politics under "fair voting" would be a choice between two left of centre parties, for to have any hope of power the Tories would have to share even more in "progressive" political values than they have done in many years. Indeed David Cameron's electoral sales pitch already reflects this, to some extent.
But if we go down this road, then we might be better off with a truly Presidential system, because the two candidates could be assessed not only on general policy direction but on character. We're mutating into a leader-driven system as it is, thanks in major part to the mass media, especially TV. At least a national direct election for the country's leadership would winnow out callow, jumped-up backroom boffins like Milliband - or so I'd hope.
It's much more difficult to judge what would happen if we retained the territorial constituency system but adopted the Alternative Vote. I don't have the time, the psephological database or the specialised computer programs and theoretical assumptions to study 650 constituencies and play out the permutations. But this is what Gordon Brown is rumoured to be offering the LibDems, and forming a coalition to get AV may be better than going for PR with the Tories and eventually ending up with a FrankenLeft party that swallows the LibDems whole.
If Clegg and co. come to a deal with the Conservatives without electoral reform, I think it'll be the end for Clegg; if they get PR, it could be the end of the third force in British politics. Yet Labour haven't enough to go on, even with the LibDems' support.
Perhaps the upshot will be another General Election, even sooner than the 12 - 18 months people are talking about. And that could fracture both Labour and the Conservatives, as Peter Hitchens has long suggested and wished.
We do live in interesting times.
Sunday, May 09, 2010
Should we fear proportional representation?
There are vested interests opposing electoral reform. One of their subtler strategies is to propose pantomime-horse variants on the Single Transferable Vote (AV+ etc) , I suspect to muddy the waters sufficiently so that people will say change isn't worth it.
The fact is, under the present system 95.5% of the seats went to the three major parties; if seats had been allocated in proportion to votes cast, the top three would still have had 88.3%. Between them, quite enough to vote down everyone else.
Yes, some of the "wrong types" (e.g. the BNP) would have got a voice in Parliament; but actually, the fourth biggest party would have been UKIP, with 20 seats - and under a different system, UKIP might have gained switch-support from those who voted BNP because of concerns about national sovereignty and the economic and social effects of relatively uncontrolled (yet disproportionately locally concentrated) immigration; leaving the race-haters fuming in an even tinier corner. Some other minorities would have even fewer seats than they have now, and we'd have some fresh voices on the benches. Is it really necessary to uphold a flawed existing arrangement merely because it gags mouths that might offend us?
Another objection is that the LibDems would be the kingmakers, the masters of the seesaw. Not necessarily: how many of those who voted LD tactically last week, would have voted directly for Labour or Conservative if they had thought their vote would count as much as anyone else's?
PR would break the link between an MP and his/her constituency, say some. Yet it seems that so much voting is simply for the rosette, and we have just seen a General Election campaign fought on presidential terms, without our having the right to elect the President.
In 26 years, I've been doorstepped twice by Parliamentary candidates - both them in the last month, because thanks to boundary changes I'm now in a marginal constituency. Before then, I had two Labour bods in succession, each obviously taking the view that they needn't make any effort because the seat was usually bombproof under First-Past-The-Post. (I have a sneaking - perhaps totally unfair - suspicion that the boundary was altered partly to shut out Respect, who were threatening to do well in this part of Birmingham.)
I'm not a fan of the party list kind of PR, because that takes away the voters' right to reject individuals they consider unsuitable - but the Single Transferable Vote (STV) would give a voice to us voiceless people, and we might be heard from time to time among the hubbub.
I give below a list of seats actually won, and another showing how brutally simple national PR would have allocated them; what it can't show is how votes would have been cast if people knew every vote counted absolutely equally, nationwide; or how the picture would change if you could express 2nd and 3rd choices in constituency-based STV voting.
The fact is, under the present system 95.5% of the seats went to the three major parties; if seats had been allocated in proportion to votes cast, the top three would still have had 88.3%. Between them, quite enough to vote down everyone else.
Yes, some of the "wrong types" (e.g. the BNP) would have got a voice in Parliament; but actually, the fourth biggest party would have been UKIP, with 20 seats - and under a different system, UKIP might have gained switch-support from those who voted BNP because of concerns about national sovereignty and the economic and social effects of relatively uncontrolled (yet disproportionately locally concentrated) immigration; leaving the race-haters fuming in an even tinier corner. Some other minorities would have even fewer seats than they have now, and we'd have some fresh voices on the benches. Is it really necessary to uphold a flawed existing arrangement merely because it gags mouths that might offend us?
Another objection is that the LibDems would be the kingmakers, the masters of the seesaw. Not necessarily: how many of those who voted LD tactically last week, would have voted directly for Labour or Conservative if they had thought their vote would count as much as anyone else's?
PR would break the link between an MP and his/her constituency, say some. Yet it seems that so much voting is simply for the rosette, and we have just seen a General Election campaign fought on presidential terms, without our having the right to elect the President.
In 26 years, I've been doorstepped twice by Parliamentary candidates - both them in the last month, because thanks to boundary changes I'm now in a marginal constituency. Before then, I had two Labour bods in succession, each obviously taking the view that they needn't make any effort because the seat was usually bombproof under First-Past-The-Post. (I have a sneaking - perhaps totally unfair - suspicion that the boundary was altered partly to shut out Respect, who were threatening to do well in this part of Birmingham.)
I'm not a fan of the party list kind of PR, because that takes away the voters' right to reject individuals they consider unsuitable - but the Single Transferable Vote (STV) would give a voice to us voiceless people, and we might be heard from time to time among the hubbub.
I give below a list of seats actually won, and another showing how brutally simple national PR would have allocated them; what it can't show is how votes would have been cast if people knew every vote counted absolutely equally, nationwide; or how the picture would change if you could express 2nd and 3rd choices in constituency-based STV voting.
Saturday, May 08, 2010
Will Cameron support the breakup of the UK?
Scotland has 59 seats in the British Parliament, of which 41 voted Labour in this week's General Election, and only one voted Conservative.
David Cameron proposes to reduce the number of MPs by 10%, i.e. 65 out of 650.
On the GE results, giving Scotland her "independence" (within the European Empire, of course) would mean the Conservatives having 305 seats out of 591, a 9-seat majority. The DUP in Northern Ireland could add the support of another 8 seats, at a price.
Or the Conservatives could drop the Unionist part of their party's title altogether, and cut Northern Ireland and Wales "free" as well. Only 9 of the 117 constituencies in the quasi-Celtic countries voted Tory. This would leave an English-only Parliament (eagerly desired by some on the interwebs) of 533 seats, 297 of them Conservative - a 30-seat majority for the Tories, even on the latest disappointing showing. Central Office could then simply relocate to Buckingham Palace to begin a thousand-year reign.
The political temptation to assist the European fragmentarian project must be immense.
And then there is the financial side. Comparing revenue and expenditure, how much do Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales cost the British government?
David Cameron proposes to reduce the number of MPs by 10%, i.e. 65 out of 650.
On the GE results, giving Scotland her "independence" (within the European Empire, of course) would mean the Conservatives having 305 seats out of 591, a 9-seat majority. The DUP in Northern Ireland could add the support of another 8 seats, at a price.
Or the Conservatives could drop the Unionist part of their party's title altogether, and cut Northern Ireland and Wales "free" as well. Only 9 of the 117 constituencies in the quasi-Celtic countries voted Tory. This would leave an English-only Parliament (eagerly desired by some on the interwebs) of 533 seats, 297 of them Conservative - a 30-seat majority for the Tories, even on the latest disappointing showing. Central Office could then simply relocate to Buckingham Palace to begin a thousand-year reign.
The political temptation to assist the European fragmentarian project must be immense.
And then there is the financial side. Comparing revenue and expenditure, how much do Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales cost the British government?
Stockmarkets: don't join the crooked card game
UPDATE:
It may be worse than at first we thought. The savage drop could have been (this says it was) deliberately engineered by Goldman Sachs as a shot across the bows, warning legislators not to mess with them!
_______________________________________
Nathan Martin makes the point that Thursday's 1,000-point drop on the Dow Jones Index unveiled the truth: the current high valuation of the market is because of money thrown into it by banks and hedge funds, not ordinary private investors. The drop happened when the insiders stopped trading.
The question is, how much longer can the illusion be maintained? Why are they doing it? Is it to tempt investors back into the market so that they can suffer all the financial losses when the banks pull out?
This is an age when cynicism comes easily.
It may be worse than at first we thought. The savage drop could have been (this says it was) deliberately engineered by Goldman Sachs as a shot across the bows, warning legislators not to mess with them!
_______________________________________
Nathan Martin makes the point that Thursday's 1,000-point drop on the Dow Jones Index unveiled the truth: the current high valuation of the market is because of money thrown into it by banks and hedge funds, not ordinary private investors. The drop happened when the insiders stopped trading.
The question is, how much longer can the illusion be maintained? Why are they doing it? Is it to tempt investors back into the market so that they can suffer all the financial losses when the banks pull out?
This is an age when cynicism comes easily.
Thursday, May 06, 2010
Right, it's UKIP then
When even a major political party is encouraging us to vote tactically, you know the system is cracking. Good.
It's not about Britain's economic difficulties: disaster is pretty much assured whoever gets in. But we've been poor before; so what? Liberty is harder to recover than wealth.
First we have to get the power back from Europe, then we have to get it back from our venal and treacherous domestic politicians.
There is no system that will make people good and happy; that revolution is in the heart. The bureaucratic reification of good intentions becomes the slave of its own power and protocols.
We need some freedom to act. I shall do my tiny, practically insignificant bit to clear a little space so that those who have good will can practise it.
A vote for UKIP, this "contemptible little army", may encourage those elsewhere with a better chance - perhaps in the South West - to keep pushing back, to resist the Black Hole.
UPDATE
Some discussion of the deficiencies of Proportional Representation on Hatfeld Girl's site. I've submitted the following comment:
PR no, Alternative Vote (what I used to know as the Single Transferable Vote) yes. The latter is basically the same as First Past The Post but with AV the post stands at 50% of votes cast.
I don't see how this would necessarily lead to hung Parliaments, coalitions and weirdo fringe MPs, indeed I think it would help avoid them. You'd get more of a fight for the centre ground, but you'd get an MP that was more likely to have reflected some level of your choice so you wouldn't feel disenfranchised. And I think you'd get more examination of policies to determine 2nd and 3rd choices.
Turnout this time in the national elections was reportedly 65%, less than at any time in the 75 years from 1922-1997. And that's after market panic, credit crunch, the near destruction of the banking system, general hoo-ha, fedupness with Brown (how much of the vote depends on emotional spasm?) and Sam Cam's bump.
The present system is effectively useless and corrupt, which is why it will continue. I expect David Cameron to offer a Royal Commission and then do nothing, since the current arrangement suits Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
It's not about Britain's economic difficulties: disaster is pretty much assured whoever gets in. But we've been poor before; so what? Liberty is harder to recover than wealth.
First we have to get the power back from Europe, then we have to get it back from our venal and treacherous domestic politicians.
There is no system that will make people good and happy; that revolution is in the heart. The bureaucratic reification of good intentions becomes the slave of its own power and protocols.
We need some freedom to act. I shall do my tiny, practically insignificant bit to clear a little space so that those who have good will can practise it.
A vote for UKIP, this "contemptible little army", may encourage those elsewhere with a better chance - perhaps in the South West - to keep pushing back, to resist the Black Hole.
UPDATE
Some discussion of the deficiencies of Proportional Representation on Hatfeld Girl's site. I've submitted the following comment:
PR no, Alternative Vote (what I used to know as the Single Transferable Vote) yes. The latter is basically the same as First Past The Post but with AV the post stands at 50% of votes cast.
I don't see how this would necessarily lead to hung Parliaments, coalitions and weirdo fringe MPs, indeed I think it would help avoid them. You'd get more of a fight for the centre ground, but you'd get an MP that was more likely to have reflected some level of your choice so you wouldn't feel disenfranchised. And I think you'd get more examination of policies to determine 2nd and 3rd choices.
Turnout this time in the national elections was reportedly 65%, less than at any time in the 75 years from 1922-1997. And that's after market panic, credit crunch, the near destruction of the banking system, general hoo-ha, fedupness with Brown (how much of the vote depends on emotional spasm?) and Sam Cam's bump.
The present system is effectively useless and corrupt, which is why it will continue. I expect David Cameron to offer a Royal Commission and then do nothing, since the current arrangement suits Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
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