An alternative to not voting or spoiling your ballot in a general election

[redrobbo]

...This pretence of suddenly supporting reform when on the brink of finally getting turfed out after a decade of enjoying substial majorities on a minority of the vote is fooling no-one so please don't insult us by pretending a vote for Labour is a vote for PR.

 

I have not pretended that a vote for Labour is a vote for PR. Like you I am usually very careful in what I post on the forum, and I have been careful not to make any such pretence.

 

Please have a look at this link to a paper in the House of Commons library on Voting systems in the UK.

 

Link: http://www.parliament.uk/commons/lib/research/briefings/snpc-04458.pdf

 

It states:

 

In 2001 the Labour manifesto promised a review of the new PR voting systems introduced during the Labour government’s first term of office for the devolved administrations, the European Parliament and the London Assembly. The Independent Commission to review Britain’s experience of PR voting systems was established to assist that review and the Commission published its report, Changed Voting Changed Politics: lessons of Britain’s experience of PR since 1997 in 2003. The Commission pointed out that every new representative body set up since 1997 had been elected using an electoral system other than first-past-the-post which was no longer the predominant system outside Westminster.

 

In 2005 the Labour Party manifesto stated that the party remained ‘committed to reviewing the experience of the new electoral systems’ and repeated the 2001 statement that a referendum remained the ‘right way to agree any change for Westminster’.

 

The Government’s review of voting systems in the UK was subsequently published on 24 January 2008.

 

The publication of the review was announced in a Written Ministerial Statement by Michael Wills, Minister of State, Ministry of Justice. Michael Wills said that the review provided

…a summary of the experiences of the new voting systems introduced over the past decade and on that basis sets out the advantages and disadvantages associated with each. It uses a range of commonly accepted criteria for assessing the experience of the new voting systems. These include the degree of proportionality under different systems, the impact on voters in terms of the choices available, voter turnout rates, the impact on political campaigning, social representation, Government formation and administration of elections under different systems.

 

A Ministry of Justice press notice summarised the findings of the review:

•

there is no clear causal relationship between proportional representation and a range of desirable outcomes;

•

the new voting systems have led to more proportional allocation of seats in devolved administrations, which has resulted in more parties being represented in the elected bodies and given rise to a tendency towards coalition government;

•

it has not been the experience of the UK that voter participation has risen with the introduction of proportional systems, although there is some evidence that proportional systems have a marginally higher turnout internationally;

•

positive action policies have a greater impact on increasing women's representation than more proportional voting systems;

•

there has been little change to party campaigning, with continued emphasis on winning constituency seats;

•

changes to voting systems require significant research, planning and testing to ensure voters understand the system and can use their vote.

 

The Government has not made any recommendations based on the review and its publication is intended to inform debate about the voting system for Westminster. The Government added that any proposed changes to the first past the post elections to the House of Commons would need to be endorsed by a referendum.

 

Labour is now going to legislate for that referendum. I personally hold the view that the proposed referendum is too restricted, and should include an option on PR (as well as options on the alternative vote and also retaining first past the post). It may be late in the day, but better late than never. And if the Tories return to government, there isn't a cat in hells chance that they will hold any referendum on electoral reform.

[esme]

I would stand if I thought I could do as esme suggests, and NOT lose my £500 - and show how the system can be beaten by using the system as esme said .... OR - I would definitely support the person who did it. ESME - over to you!

well Darth Vader suggested a whip round for the £500 which I would suggest could be banked for the next GE, providing this worked, so anyone else wanting to try this didn't have to scratch around for the money

[plekhanov]

See my previous post in reply to esme.

I saw that reply and have already rebutted it, Blair and Browns decade long opposition to PR was as transparently self serving as Brown's supposed last minuted conversion to voting reform.

 

You couldn't be more wrong plekhanov. You overlook that Labour has introduced the greatest number of constitutional reforms of any government.

 

Labour legislated for a Scottish parliament and a Welsh Assembly.

 

Labour legislated that voters could choose a mayoral system of running their local council, as now happens for the London Assembly, and in Mansfield, Doncaster, Newham and elsewhere.

 

Labour legislated for a revived Northern Ireland Assembly, based on a power sharing agreement, and elected by proportional representation (i.e., the single transferrable vote).

 

Labour legislated to reform the House of Lords, reducing the number of hereditary peers.

 

I'll be the first to admit that there is still more work to be done on electoral and constitutional reform. But I also feel that you are being manifestly unfair in claiming that "Labour have demonstrated beyond any doubt that they can absolutely not be trusted to carry out constitutional reform". The constitutional reforms already carried out under Labour clearly demonstrate the opposite.

Those reforms were tinkering with the periphery in ways calculated to help Labour politically (end Tory domination of the Lords, cut support to Nationalist parties whilst trying to leave Scottish MPs who are disproportionately Labour over represented in the Commons and unjustly able to vote on laws not affecting Scotland, Shifting the miniscule powers local government has left from councillors to mayors...) or in no way impacted upon Labours power (Northern Ireland where Labour don't meaningfully stand) whilst leaving the PMs unchecked power at the centre untouched.

 

It was the same with the disastrous regional assemblies proposals, half baked bodies taking no real power from the centre. All such reforms were deliberately designed to leave the real seat of power in the UK the Commons unaffected, even when in the case of Scottish devolution reason and basic fairness suggested that the commons absolutely had to be affected. Except of course that would have cut Labours majority and so was unacceptable.

 

There were two reforms which would have affected Blair and Browns ability to ram any half baked legislation or war they wanted through parliament - voting reform and an elected upper house with real powers - and the moment they saw the size of their majority B&B instantly shifted from paying lip service to opposing voting reform. Just as as soon as most of the Tories were removed from the Lords follow through reforms which would make it a meaningful upper house were actively opposed by your party.

 

Your pretence that a vote for Labour is a vote for voting reform is just insulting, as I said in my earlier "fool me once..."

 

If you are fooled by Labour again this time, then shame on you.

If you are trying to fool us again on behalf of Labour, then shame on you.

[plekhanov]

I have not pretended that a vote for Labour is a vote for PR. Like you I am usually very careful in what I post on the forum, and I have been careful not to make any such pretence.

 

Please have a look at this link to a paper in the House of Commons library on Voting systems in the UK.

 

Link: http://www.parliament.uk/commons/lib/research/briefings/snpc-04458.pdf

 

It states:

 

In 2001 the Labour manifesto promised a review of the new PR voting systems introduced during the Labour government’s first term of office for the devolved administrations, the European Parliament and the London Assembly. The Independent Commission to review Britain’s experience of PR voting systems was established to assist that review and the Commission published its report, Changed Voting Changed Politics: lessons of Britain’s experience of PR since 1997 in 2003. The Commission pointed out that every new representative body set up since 1997 had been elected using an electoral system other than first-past-the-post which was no longer the predominant system outside Westminster.

 

In 2005 the Labour Party manifesto stated that the party remained ‘committed to reviewing the experience of the new electoral systems’ and repeated the 2001 statement that a referendum remained the ‘right way to agree any change for Westminster’.

 

The Government’s review of voting systems in the UK was subsequently published on 24 January 2008.

 

The publication of the review was announced in a Written Ministerial Statement by Michael Wills, Minister of State, Ministry of Justice. Michael Wills said that the review provided

…a summary of the experiences of the new voting systems introduced over the past decade and on that basis sets out the advantages and disadvantages associated with each. It uses a range of commonly accepted criteria for assessing the experience of the new voting systems. These include the degree of proportionality under different systems, the impact on voters in terms of the choices available, voter turnout rates, the impact on political campaigning, social representation, Government formation and administration of elections under different systems.

 

A Ministry of Justice press notice summarised the findings of the review:

•

there is no clear causal relationship between proportional representation and a range of desirable outcomes;

•

the new voting systems have led to more proportional allocation of seats in devolved administrations, which has resulted in more parties being represented in the elected bodies and given rise to a tendency towards coalition government;

•

it has not been the experience of the UK that voter participation has risen with the introduction of proportional systems, although there is some evidence that proportional systems have a marginally higher turnout internationally;

•

positive action policies have a greater impact on increasing women's representation than more proportional voting systems;

•

there has been little change to party campaigning, with continued emphasis on winning constituency seats;

•

changes to voting systems require significant research, planning and testing to ensure voters understand the system and can use their vote.

 

The Government has not made any recommendations based on the review and its publication is intended to inform debate about the voting system for Westminster. The Government added that any proposed changes to the first past the post elections to the House of Commons would need to be endorsed by a referendum.

 

Labour is now going to legislate for that referendum. I personally hold the view that the proposed referendum is too restricted, and should include an option on PR (as well as options on the alternative vote and also retaining first past the post). It may be late in the day, but better late than never. And if the Tories return to government, there isn't a cat in hells chance that they will hold any referendum on electoral reform.

:huh:So you detail ways in which Labour who've had a lock on power for over a decade now have done nothing but pay lip service to voting reform but you for some mysterious reason expect us to trust them this time?

 

Do you seriously expect those concerned with voting reform to see you post and go to themselves:

 

Well I know Labour made promises about voting reform before the last 3 general elections and I know that once they were in power they reneged upon those promises as they threatened to take away the power they'd just won but this time round I believe them. 4th times the charm

[esme]

plekhanov, redrobbo could you please stop attacking each others political stance, you are off topic

 

this thread is not about what labour propose to do nor is it about why we should or should not believe what they say, if you aren't going to discuss the issue then kindly take your argument somewhere else

 

the issue is that there is a way to change the system regardless of which political party achieves dominance in parliament

 

so is anyone going to change the system ?

[TeaFan]

I don't spoil my ballot paper. I prefer to soil it instead.

[esme]

I don't spoil my ballot paper. I prefer to soil it instead.

I believe that is a criminal offence and also you can be identified from your dna in the stool sample, lets see indecent exposure, and possibly criminal assault should anyone actually touch it before realising what you've done

 

but hey don't let me spoil your fun by telling you you'll go to jail for it

[redrobbo]

...my suggestion was that the people who find themselves unrepresented by the current political offerings and therefore find themselves moved to abstain or spoil their ballot in protest, a markedly ineffectual protest you must agree, should attempt to prevent the formation of a new government by repeatedly forcing a general election by standing as candidates themselves and resigning when they win, this merry go round to continue until every party agrees to introduce full proportional representation and the right to recall MP's

 

I do agree that protesting by abstaining or spoliing a ballot paper is totally ineffectual. I have said so recently on another thread. So far, esme, you and I are in agreement.

PR and the right to recall being sufficient to make parliament accountable to the electorate in my opinion rather than the current case where they say jump and we don't even ask how high

 

I also agree with you that PR would indeed make the MPs more accountable to their electorate. (NB I have reservations about the right to recall, but let's skip over that for the time being).

 

Elections to parliament (and also local councils) are now the only occasions in the UK where voters have to use the first past the post system. Other systems are used for the devolved assemblies and the European parliament. It is, in my opinion, illogical to retain first past the post any longer.

 

First past the post worked when we had a two party system, and governments alternated between Labour and Conservative.

 

But a greater number of voters now vote for a candidate from smaller parties. When these votes are added to the number of abstentions - the result of the 2005 general election showed that not a single member of parliament was elected by a majority of their constituents. That's just one reason why I believe first past the post is now discredited.

 

Here's another reason to reflect upon: the majority of MPs (please note, from all parties) who have been ordered to repay parliamentary expenses represent constituencies where their election and re-election is never really in any doubt. They stack up massive majorities. Would they have behaved differently if they had been elected by another system - and they had to earn every vote?

 

 

there may be other better and simpler ideas which would achieve this aim, I'd love to hear them but for the moment these are the best I've got

 

Well yes, there is another way - make voting compulsory! Australia and other countries have mandatory voting. (NB redrobbo is not personally promoting compulsory voting - merely pointing out that there is another way to increase voter turnout)

 

the issue here redrobbo is one of trust, those who don't vote have lost faith with the system because they perceive that politicians have lied to them in the past are lying to them now and will continue to lie to them in the future and that nothing they do will change this so they don't take part in the process

 

Again, I agree with you esme.

 

Over many years of being on the election campaign trail (nearly 40 years actually) I've often been met with voter apathy. I've heard the familiar refrain over the decades "They're all the same". I can argue cogently that in fact the political parties are different. But in recent times, since the questions for cash scandal broke under Major's tenure, and now the parliamentary expenses scandal has broken under Brown's tenure, I've increasingly heard on the doorstep that other familiar refrain "They're only it for what they can get out of it". Whilst I believe that this applies to a small number of politicians, there is now more and more voters believing that most or all politicians are corrupt.

 

I believe voting reform - by adopting a PR system - is necessary to re-establish trust between the voters and their elected representatives.

 

And I would add, as a city councillor myself, I'd be more than happy to present myself as a candidate to the voters in my ward under a PR system of voting.

 

 

...it's not an attack on any particular party it's a demand that politics should represent the views of the electorate and not any one political party regardless of how many seats they have in the house

 

Once more, we are in agreement esme.

 

...I have suggested a way whereby those who feel disenfranchised can deal with them all together and do something about the things it doesn't like, some 68% of the electorate apparently felt this way at the last general election

 

all they have to do is stand up

 

... but now we part company! Your suggestion of candidates standing on a platform of None of the Above is, in my opinion, superficially attractive. But it would be a protest vote only. Come the general election, most voters will be concerned about the things that matter personally to them, such as jobs, hospitals, schools and suchlike.

[plekhanov]

so is anyone going to change the system ?

If the election returns a hung parliament the liberals will change the system, not in all the ways you hope obviously but there is at least a reasonable chance of that happening.

[redrobbo]

plekhanov, redrobbo could you please stop attacking each others political stance, you are off topic

 

this thread is not about what labour propose to do nor is it about why we should or should not believe what they say, if you aren't going to discuss the issue then kindly take your argument somewhere else

 

the issue is that there is a way to change the system regardless of which political party achieves dominance in parliament

 

so is anyone going to change the system ?

 

OK esme. I can take a hint!

 

Apologies if plekhanov and I appear to have gone off topic.

 

red