The Alternative Vote Report - AV in the UK? - A Politics Poll

there's probably some argument that AV could ensure a future of lab/ld coalitions, assuming the lds realign under their previous centrism once they're annihilated at the next election and clegg gets a 9mm to the temple

idk tho, i haven't rly been following the uk political clusterfuck so i don't know what martin kettle has to say yet

Scenario, AV wins, Govt go "oh that's interesting" and still refuse to implement it.

Scenario, AV wins, gets implemented, so, one type of thuggery for another, mostly.

ref for future thread historians: a thread about the civil unrest in egypt (& elsewhere in 'the region' if necessary)

FPTP is barbaric, disgusting, savage, anyway. PR > AV in theory but who knows in practice, both bring potential for lolz.

I'm tempted to vote Yes to AV, despite the fact that it'll make Nick Clegg happy.

because it will make Cameron un.

s0 ironic that we are forced to use FPTP to vote in this pressing poll

I don't think FPTP is a good system and AV seems a little better.

As to what I'd vote in a referendum I've no idea, as I fully expect the Tories to tie it to something I won't want to vote "yes" to. (And also the Nick Clegg thing.)

anyway voting yes, not specifically because "hopefully it'll lead to further reform" (would that this were plausible but not getting hopes up), more because it's better than FPTP

I fully expect the Tories to tie it to something I won't want to vote "yes" to.

Yeah, this is my worry, too. Or even if they don't actually attach anything else to it during the vote, if it wins then they'll use the public's desire for reform to gerrymander the fuck out of the constituencies.

the gerrymandering was part of the bill that set up the referendum. It will happen wether you vote yes or no.

Ah, so the gerrymandering is already set in stone? I did not know that.

Hmf.

My one hope is that AV will make gerrymandering less easy to achieve, or at least throw up enough unintended consequences to mitigate the effect.

O shit. Yeah, for some reason I thought this was still in the Tory proposal stage. Uh, I guess I'll vote yes then.

have a feeling i'm going to be ill on polling day, shame

I think the French model of two rounds of voting makes sense myself.

I think the French model of two rounds of voting guillotining their leaders heads makes sense myself.

The French model of 2 rounds is only for president, isn't it. Do they have 2 rounds for all their MP's? that would be crazy.

They have two rounds for MPs, because they have money to burn and love having two elections when one (with AV) would do.

I think in France, for parliamentary elections, any candidate who gets over a threshold of something like 12% in the first round MAY go through to the second, so you can still end up with wacky UK-style undemocratic outcomes.

the gerrymandering was part of the bill that set up the referendum. It will happen wether you vote yes or no.

this is the gerrymandering to make all constituencies contain roughly similar number of electors, unlike the existing situation?

AV seems to my eyes just as bad as FPTP, the only difference being that it'll mean the lib Dems stay in sort-of-power for eternity. Change it to PR or don't go messing imo.

AV seems to my eyes just as bad as FPTP, the only difference being that it'll mean the lib Dems stay in sort-of-power for eternity

Dunno how this follows. Probably means a few more votes for the Greens and UKIP and whoever at first followed by a big two-party squeeze.

AV is really not much of an improvement. Probably not enough for me to vote for it anyway. Clegg was right, it's the worst of both worlds.

... and shouldn't there be a Not Voting option above?

xp I think that is yet to be demonstrated; either way I feel compelled to vote for it because the alternative is "oh look, no appetite for vote reform, FPTP 4 LYFE, BITCHES"

I think it's been demonstrated, or at least extrapolated, that it doesn't prevent large unrepresentative majorities like Blair's, in fact Blair's majority (whatever the the ridiculously large one was) would have been even bigger with AV... and the Liberals wouldn't have won many more seats in the last election... tho, of course, people's voting patterns would probably change so extrapolation of past results might be misleading

Also, I don't agree that AV failing means FPTP 4 LYFE, BITCHES

... tho obv it does if the Tories have anything to do with ti

If the AV vote is lost, especially with low turnout, there'll be zero appetite from any government for holding another referendum for a long time.

http://i.imgur.com/xc7oK.jpg

^^ Can't be real, surely?

I can't see it, what is it?

Advert, Baby w/line in, incubator, slogan "We can't afford AV while she needs an incubator more"

sorry, "Cardiac Facility more"

as per: AV will cost £250M

That's about it.

Yeah, I was thinking I'd probably end up not voting as I'd much prefer PR, but I think I'll vote just to spite whatever disgusting fuckheads came up with that.

still unsure if this is a good thing or not. my heart says YES purely because the tories want NO. nauseating article by cameron in the mail the other week which opened with him painting a vision of usain bolt coming first in a race at the olympics but gettin bronze when it comes to handing out medals, then went on to evoke a misty-eyed vision of churchill. the revolting shameless cunt.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/voting-reform-will-not-cause-more-cuts-treasury-insists-2226784.html

Ridiculous Newsnight about this the other week, Paxman hitting the pro-av representatives with bollocks like "is it fair that under this system, someone who puts the BNP down as their first choice will effectively get themselves a second or even third vote?".

Quite like a lot of the stuff on this (pro) site too. But tbf, lol at this particular article: http://www.yestofairervotes.org/blog/entry/why-the-oscars-have-said-yes-to-fairer-votes/

http://www.contrastingsounds.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/no2av.jpg

http://www.contrastingsounds.com/2011/02/17/vote-for-av-and-kill-a-solider/

christ the No campaign is shit

can't remember why labour is behind AV, but it shouldn't be

im not really sure what the yes campaign comprises

how do ye view our system?

well, yall are obviously doing something right

do soldiers actually wear "bullet proof vests"

one is probably enough

shit is heavy

but yeah they are supposed to wear some kind of body armour but they don't always via the uk writing liberal interventionist cheques its debt-laded arse can't cash

yah, they wear armour. "bullet proof vest" is from dirty harry or something.

in the end i didn't want this country to be run by the same old clique of arrogant right wing patricians. so i voted no

I succeeded in voting despite not having received a poll card and being told by the council that I was "probably not on the register but we can't tell you over the phone". Having thought I was ineligible to vote I didn't research the candidates like I probably should've done; was going to vote Labour but there weren't any Labour candidates (lol Oxfordshire) so I ticked some Green dude and voted Yes to AV.

Thanks to everyone who told me to go along anyway because I was fully prepared to sit on my arse all evening and of course my single randomly-assigned vote will have made a crucial difference to, er, something.

I was discussing this with my Ice cream man yesterday.

He was saying that he'd already gone to vote as he always has, mainly because "you can't moan if you don't vote"

Apparently, he wrote "Who Cares?" on his AV voting form...

But also, he said about how he'd been asked to vote for three candidates, whereas he'd always only put one cross down before. I told him that there were obviously three council seats up for election which is why they'd asked for three votes. "naah, I only put one cross down, that's all I ever have done"

I didn't explain AV to him...

didn't even bother broaching the subject with my ice cream man

So where do you get some perspective?

My ice cream man never stops banging on about Mussolini.

you can take the boy out of italy

Yeah, but he's from Barrhead

Mr. Chief Whippy

Always got the 99s made on time.

1513: Lib Dem minister Chris Huhne has conceded that the Yes camp looks set for defeat in the AV Referendum. He told the BBC he had no idea what the final percentages would be, but "if the boxes are anything like what I've seen it doesn't look good".

damnit i'm not gonna beat the spread

lots of undemocratic sentiment in the air today

The turnout in the West Midlands in the AV referendum was 39%. Other regions to follow.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5063/5693575322_78c0aef7f0_z.jpg

abt 75% no right now says bbc

dammit i backed 65

plenty of time left old boy

1752: Nowhere has returned a Yes to AV vote yet.

Still awaiting the result from Boredom...
http://media.sexpistolsofficial.com/non_secure/images/pvpsostsing72a.jpg

(and we don't care)

john reid has got his happy face on

surprised they can show that before the watershed

john reid happy face + chris huhne's toupee + adam boulton, agh my eyes

so far 3/280 are in favour, so that's 1.07%

Yes campaign hoping to catch up when the second preferences are counted

yes voter twitter tantrum well underway

that's that then, FPTP 4 lyfe losers

hardly seems fair all those Yes voters had their vote wasted

don't think clegg is taking this too well, he looks a bit ill

He looks quite pale. I bet his wife is dreading him coming home tonight. Crying into his dinner!

all that cured ham ruined.

Those tomatoes cut into cogwheel shapes...

the cheesy footballs turned soggy

so now it's 8/426, a glorious 1.87% of yesness, great stuff

The director of the No campaign, Matthew Elliott, said he had been "astonished" at the scale of the No victory: "I personally believe that this result will settle the debate over changing our electoral system for the next generation."

i voted yes and i'm not particularly upset about the result but the way politicians on either side have conducted themselves during this campaign makes me feel like not voting again for another decade. i want to be treated like an intelligent human being who can make a decision based on logic + facts and not slogans and fucking churchill. fuck this country.

bell hops is only a dick

Hell, it means that if a shitty (con) gov gets voted in that wouldn't have under AV those of us who voted 'yes' get to act all smug. So there is that.

look i'm sorry conrad if you think it's a big deal. i'm a socialist and i don't think it matters a fuck. the section of the public that could be bothered to vote clearly didn't think it was an improvement anyway. they got their referendum, they got spanked. would genuine PR have won more Yes votes? probably, but probably not enough. all I see from AV is the perpetual enforcement of centre right governments, which some might argue is cool because if that's what the electorate wants. i don't think it's cool. the arguments about the fundamental inequalities that prevent representative democracy from being very representative or very democratic belong somewhere else, but i've gotta say that as long as our economic and social institutions remain undemocratic, i don't believe that tinkering with the people who get to manage this undemocratic system will make a blind bit of difference.

12 months ago i would've agreed that AV might prevent a Conservative government down the line. then the Lib Dems proved that a vote for them was a vote for a potential Conservative government. all bets off now. consensus can't help but be in the interests of small c conservatism, obscurantism, and the status quo.

hmmph i remember when you useed explain yourself to *me* like that ;_;

lol my "hackles up" voice

guys if its any consolation we have pr and our cunts are worse

Also, your alternative govt are a pack of cunts also

*positivity*

as our economic and social institutions remain undemocratic, i don't believe that tinkering with the people who get to manage this undemocratic system will make a blind bit of difference.

this might be wrong but it's too vague for me to tell (appropriately)

how do you think economic and social institutions can be reformed?

look he doesn't say he has any of the answers okay

:p

oh touché

obviously i do have a "how to make the world a better place in 10 easy steps" plan in my head but i'll just make a few observations.

Poverty and social exclusion, including the part of the country you're born in and the kind of schools and other institutions that are available to you, make enormous differences in people's life outcomes including but not limited to their education, health and prospects of fulfilling employment.

The gap between the rich and poor has steadily risen over the last 30-odd years. The last Labour governments tried all sorts of methods of reducing the number of people in poverty, except for doing anything about reducing this gap, or increasing the number of fulfilling employment opportunities or the number of affordable homes.

Poverty, social exclusion and poor education affect your understanding of and commitment to the democratic process, whatever way you might want to run the ballots.

We don't have a genuine free market and we don't have much state control over the economy - we have a system that is as close to the worst of both worlds as possible.

Economic democracy would mean the state (potentially amongst other agencies) taking steps to ensure that businesses consider the needs of the wider community (up to and including the whole population of the planet tbh), and that those needs are comparably weighted with the interests of share-holders or other owners. One step might include compulsory representation of outside interests on the boards of large enough companies.

The state needs to enforce legislation that increases market competition, especially by stopping large companies from using economic muscle to gain an unfair advantage and distort the market. At the same time we need to take steps to improve the opportunities of all members of society, including improving education, social support and social housing.

Of course I don't think we can do that in a couple of years, or decades. I do think it's all more important than tinkering with an electoral system that, as I said, works much harder to preserve the status quo than it does to make this a country that you would be proud to be a member of.

"The gap between the rich and poor has steadily risen over the last 30-odd years."

has this problem been solved anywhere in the world?

lol ireland

has this problem been solved anywhere in the world?

no idea tbh. are you saying it doesn't matter or we shouldn't try to change this state of affairs or we shouldn't care? i agree with the shouldn't care bit on the whole, since people seem to have little inclination to do anything about it. i want to try hard not to care. but still, the kind of state-protected capitalism that has spread out from western Europe and the US over the last 100-odd years is so wasteful in its exploitation of resources both natural and human that it seems to be leading inevitably to, at the very least, a devastating reduction in humanity's viability as a species. swinging between defeated shrugs and gibbering outrage feels like a natural response to me.

france has been getting more equal in terms of income over the last 50-60 years, norway too to a lesser degree (to pick two countries which haven't been getting obviously poorer). half the fight is not falling for the idea that the gap between rich and poor is a natural and unvarying condition of the universe.