AV referendum

[newwave]

I am in favour of this and would introduce full proportionality if possible, I will however vote against AV so as to cause as much damage to Clegg as possible.

If the vote is "no" then all Cleggs lies and deceit has been for nothing as far as the LD party is concerned.

Erm, we've had more hung parliaments under FPTP than Australia's House who use AV to elect have.

I think people who want change but will vote No to spite the Lib Dems are daft. Get some reforms to the voting system through then spite them by giving your votes that may have been for them to smaller parties.

I don't think it's necessarily true that a failure of the AV referendum would result in the death of the Coalition. The LDs may not be too happy at the moment, they've certainly made a lot of mistakes and they may even remove Clegg from the leadership as a result. But they have also invested/risked a huge amount in making the coalition work so far, they know that forcing a general election too soon would see their party wiped off the political map and I think they're hoping that, by 2015, they can point to some genuine achievements and the electorate will be much more forgiving.

Im not sure which party I like at the moment, but I like AV because it will mean that a politician must have the support of at least 50% of their voters. Which means they will have to work harder to keep more of us happy :)

newwave, if the AV referendum fails, it's not going to damage the coalition. It may change some things, but it's not going to bring down the government. Dream on.

"without AV what does the coalition give to the LD party and non ministerial MP's except the prospect of electoral annihilation."

the prospect of putting the UK on a firmer footing, maybe? There's no way the LDs would want to pull the plug on the coalition in the middle of the current programme.

Giddypickle - but chris wasn't more prefered, because 75% of people wouldnt pick him as their first choice. So AV is indeed a fairer, more representative system.

The danger with our current system is that someone can be elected with a very small proportion of the vote, and the share of the vote required is dependant on how many people stand.

In the current system, if 6 people stand, it means someone can be elected with only 17 % of the votes! With AV, they need to have at least 50% support.

Giddypickle you need to look at first votes first.

There are other systems, but we are deciding between FPTP and AV only.