Upcoming AV referendum: does AV mean that the people who vote for the party which comes last get the casting vote?

Can't see anything wrong there, sorry. If Party D didn't exist Party A would have won. Yes parties B and C are splitting the anti party A vote but the party A and D supporters together need 50%+1 of the vote to win.

If A and D get 50% -1 of the vote, then C will be redistributed and if they have all put B second, B will win.

The end result is that the party that can attract more than 50% once clear losers have been eliminated wins.

Sounds like a good system to me - nice example LFN.

Paul88 Imagine the following simplified situation.

First round:

40% Party A
30% Party B
20% Party C
10% Party D

If Party C's voters all put party B as their second choice, and Party D's voters all put party A as their second choice, then (ignoring second preferences of those who put parties A and B as their first choice)

• 50% of people will have voted for party A with first or second preference
• 50% of people will have voted for party B with first or second preference

and yet party A will win on the back of party D's votes, ignoring party C's second preferences.

This is obviously a highly stylized examples but such anomalies abound throughout the world of AV - including in many very realistic scenarios.

AV means that the party who most people support wins. So the majority of people get the casting vote. And it allows people to support more than one party, in order of preference.

Second votes only start being counted if no candidate has the majority (over 50%) of the votes.

Paul88 explains it well, his only mistake is thinking it has anything to do with Clegg. This is more important than any single person or party.

AV was the voting system both Tories and Labour prefered (Labour even had it in their manifesto) and that is why we are voting on a change to AV.

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LFN - you are wrong (again). It lets people vote for fringe parties without throwing their vote away but there is no way a fringe party will end up with 50% of the votes even after redistribution. The end result will be no different than if the fringe parties hadn't stood. Nobody gets disproportionate power.

It does improve the chances of a third party in seats where there is a fairly even split between three parties. At the moment the third party always loses in these constituencies due to vote splitting even where they would win in a head to head against either of the others.

Of course I am still hoping NO wins and Clegg gets sacked by the LD and this coalition becomes something other than Tories by another name.

Yes.

If instead, the 3rd parties votes were re-allocated (or all the votes which didn't come 1 or 2) then it would actually be quite a good system. Basically, use first choices to knock out everyone except the top 2, and then see how many voted for each of them.

But AV isn't like that. It gives disproportionate power to voters of the BNP, Loonies, Greens and other fringe parties.

GiddyPickle - I don't think there is room for tactical voting in AV although a lot of people are talking about it.

As long as you don't put a party you don't like ahead of a party you do your vote will count. You don't have to express preferences for parties you don't like - if there is only one party you can stomach put them first and leave the rest blank. If your fave comes last your ballot paper will go in the bin - just like the current system.

Greythorne - it is one way of looking at it but a very negative one.

The people who vote for the party that comes last get their votes redistributed. If they don't express a second preference their ballot papers go in the bin. If they do, their votes are given to their second choice party - really it is as if the smallest party hadn't existed.

A better way of thinking of AV is as a cheap way of having a two round election which is what they do in France (and Iran) for presidential elections. If someone doesn't get 50% of the vote first time you have a run off election with the two top candidates.

I hope it doesn't sound like I'm selling it as although I think it is an improvement on FPTP I want to see Clegg dumped by the Lib Dems which might happen if NO wins.

And - reading your question again - yes, all the people who voted originally for eliminated parties will have their second place choice counted next time around. So if all the fringe-party voters had second choice Labour, say, they would then benefit the Labour candidate assuming there hadn't been an outright winner on the first round.

In each round, the candidate with the least votes is eliminated and their voters' #2 choices are used instead. I think it is technically possible that if a fringe party is placed high enough up not to be eliminated in the first round they could bounce through by being enough people's second choice