AV or not ?

The list of public figures who support and pay for the No campaign has made it very, very easy for me to decide to vote Yes.
Also the sheer brainless quality of the No propaganda...complete logic failures, many times over.

Note the same government wants to use AV to vote in new police commissioners 'to ensure they have the widest support' hypocracy or what!!!!

First Past the post is the last remnant of the 'old men in grey suit' politics .

People behind NO = Tory's sleaziest backers, Rupert Murdoch and his media, Tax Payer's Alliance (who want to reduce taxes paid by business) and the BNP. Largely a tory campaign but enhanced by the more right wing.

David Cameron support No because of the wealthy backers, but was elected himself under AV and would have lost if the leadership election were First Past the Post. Just shows how duplicitous the guy is.

For me, the best reason to vote Yes is that it will destabilise the conservative party, and see camerons losing the faith of his party. The conservatives this time round are just not ready for government - they don't understand economics, they don't understand the will of the people or have the integrity to keep to manifesto policies. Best example is that they allowed universities to raise fees, which means the loan expenditure by the treasury will be £450million more than it was preeviously - so much for cuts! Dafties.

It shouldn't be get the tories out, it should be get the dafties out!!

FYI most countries in the world use someonthing other than First Past the post - it is the fastest declining election system in the world - we are backing a losing horse! FPTP 35 countries number of democratic countries - 150 or so...

Giddy, I know what you're saying. But I'm not intrinsically against coalitions so that aspect of PR doesn't bother me at all. Most of the coalitions we'[ve had since WWI have done pretty well, often in times of great stress and European examples show that coalitions can work and not work, depdneing on circumstances at partiular times. Just like FPTP.

I'll vote No.
I think - on the whole - you are a bit more likely to get what it says on the tin if they get in by FPTP. If someone gets in because of second or third or fourth round distributions in the vote, to whom to they owe their vote, and therefore their policies? What do they stand for by the end of so many rounds?

I'm not personally against tution fees at all, just pointing out the absurdity of the argument that getting rid of FPTP somehow guarantees that manifesto promises will be more likely to be kept. I chose it because it was the most glaring and recent one I could think of. I could list plenty of others broken by all the major parties.

Manifestos counting for little or nothing is a fact of life already, nothing to do with PR, AV or FPTP. What poltical party didn't dismantle theirs after being elected? Look at what we have now under FPTP. Tuition fees anyone?

Nick Griffin still fondly believes his party can win under FPTP.... as Shakespeare put it 'the triumph of hope over experience'.

The fact that Nick Griffin is anti AV is enough to send me to the Yes please camp

No from me. Do not see the point.

Potentially, yes. But only if the first-place candidate didn't get >50% of the votes on the first round. Those who vote for the last-place candidate (who is eliminated) have their second choices taken into account. This keeps going until one candidate has 50%+

I agree 100% with theoldbrigade's fears on 'manifestos going out of the window'. Maybe not so much with AV but certainly PR. The result may be fairer and more representative on paper but even those who vote for the bigger parties don't get quite what they expected - as we've seen in the last year. PR is marketed as engaging more people in politics but I could see how a built-in post-election blurring of commitment would put more people off.

It's a no from me. Have just started to understand AV so let me know if I'm wrong on this, but doesn't it mean that potentially those who've voted in the most extreme way (e.g. BNP/Monster Raving Looney etc.etc.) could get their second choice votes counted, with equal weighting to everyone else's first choice?!

This seems quite barking mad, frankly...

Yes. It is a miserable compromise but I fear that if the vote is lost any momentum for proper change will be lost too. It would be too easy for anti PR people to argue that if the country couldn't vote yes to AV, there is no point in even discussing PR.

Any change is better than no change.

I completely disagree with this. Sometimes the right thing to do is nothing. Just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

I'm in the 'no' camp. Disagree with the sentiment that 'it's better than nothing' and think the current system at least results in speedy transition of workable government.

Is AV the system which gave us Ed, not David, Miliband?