bring on proportional representation

[livenletlive]

we'll never see the tories again

Or the Labour party as a majority government!

And the BNP/UKIP could potentially hold the balance of power. In this election under PR, the BNP would have 12 seats, and UKIP more than 20, so DaftPunk and her friends would be pleased.

I do think that we should reform the electoral system, but I do not think that we need pure PR. I say this as someone who voted Lib Dem.

Don't be so sure. They polled the most votes in absolute terms on Thursday and a lot of Conservative voters won't have bothered to turn out in safe seats... under PR they'd certainly bother. If voting LD under a PR system always meant you got a Labour government (a permanent Lib/Lab alliance) that might drive many away from voting LD.

be very careful what you wish for...I've read another estimate if we'd had PR at this election the BNP would now have 19 MPs. Is that what you really want?

Do you think people would vote the same way if PR was in?

The thing about the BNP, while I am totally against them and everything they stand for, we do live in a democracy and if that's who people vote for.................. scary i know!

Under the 5% clause in the German system a party needs to obtain 5% of the national vote before they get any seats.

Take Back Parliament

PR sucks! I've voted in a PR system - it lends itself to corruption and back handedness and is so much less transparent than FPTP

The slimiest deal makers always get what they want regardless of how the people voted

the sneakiest slimiest bunch of the lot will form a majority.

Look at Ireland, where a vote for the Green party was really a vote for Fianna Fail!!!!!

you cant just go and vote for the party who's policies you like the most, you have to consider alliances etc. Its very complicated and very unfair!

A party that got a small percentage of votes can hold a lot of cards and get a lot of power. What if UKIP were the ones (with a relatively small percentage of votes) were the ones who could make or break a majority? Do you really trust the other parties to not sell their souls to the devil so that they'll get into power?

So if we didn't go completely PR is their another way to making the voting fairer?

FPTP is fairER than PR
I don't believe a 100% fair system has been invented yet

so we can either stick with a lesser evil which is not 100% fair, but is the fairEST, or change for the sake of it even though we cant think of a BETTER system to change to

I think that lots more people would vote for them and other extreme parties if they knew that their vote would not be wasted.

I agree that we live in a democracy, so these parties have to exist.

Also PR would prevent local indie candidates who often do excellent work for their constituencies. I know that Richard Taylor lost his seat this time around, but he would never had sat in parliament under PR.

without pr we lurch from running the country the Conservatives way to running the country the Labour way every few years and the majority of the country have no representation.

OYBBK the same thing happens under PR. Really it does! all they have to do is throw little bones to the smaller parties who get power hungry and sell out to be on the winning team

the smaller parties join onto the bigger ones. You don't tend end up with coalitions just made up of all the lil'uns throwing out the old boys, you just get the lil'uns TURNING INTO one of the boys IYKWIM

In Austria the far-right are the largest party now, thanks to PR. It's a gift to extremists.

think about it, the ones who are least likely to stick to their principles are the most likely to end up in the majority

its not a nice system, its not a FAIR system

and your vote means FA if the party you voted for changes their stance on vital issues RIGHT after you voted for them to form a majority with god knows who!

I think a lot of Tories don't mind PR for the Lords.

It makes sense. The Lords is appointed at the moment anyway; a party list system full of flunkies in the Lords would also encourage more independent-minded MPs to stand in the Commons.

My problem with PR isn't so much the "strong government" argument - we have seen that FPTP doesn't always deliver that anyway. It is the fact that the STV constituencies will be so huge - about half a million people in each - that there will be no connection between the people and their elected representatives.

Fundamentally, I believe that power should be as close as possible to the people. STV takes power away from the people.

What about mixed member proportional representation? Sort of the same thing as happens in Wales. A proportion of the seats are FPTP for constituencies, then a certain number are PR for regions. You get two votes, one for a person for the constituency and one for a party for the region. So you could theoretically vote for a Labour constituency representative because you liked the person, but the Conservatives for the region because you agreed with their policies.

Yes, a top-up system like in Wales or Scotland might be an acceptable compromise. I don't like having two different types of MP though.

The problem with any sort of list system is that there is no democratic method to remove an individual. Lembit Opik would not have been kicked out on a top-up list system.

I think the constituency size argument is a red herring. Aside from MPs and activists, does anyone feel much of a connection (good or bad) with their MP? Really, how much difference would it make if your constituency was 4 or 5x the size to the degree of (dis-)connection?

Having a single MP doesn't necessarily aid people. Hands up who thinks Norman Tebbit would have helped a single mother who came in with a problem when he was an MP? With larger constituencides and STV it's quite possible that you could find an MP that'd give a crap about the problems you face.

Finally, if you really have to have one MP to a location then elect 5 MPs and give each a territorial allotment. I don't think it helps but it gets around the poor arguments put forward against STV.

I don't think much of list system either - I'm a kiwi and don't rate the mixed member proportional system.

There are good PR systems and bad PR systems: some are better than FPP and some worse.

STV is one of the good 'uns IMHO.

MrJustAbout

People often have a very strong connection with their local MP. Good MPs hold frequent surgeries, and know every inch of their constituency.

You can see the difference for yourself by looking at the level of constituent contact between MPs and MEPs. Yes, there are obvious objections - but fundamentally, making constituencies too big means that the political elite become detached from the people who elect them.

And allocating people at random within a multi-member STV constituency won't go down too well. Imagine Kent (now a Labour free zone) as a multi-member STV constituency. Which part of Kent would you stick the Labour MP elected under STV in?

MP/MEP

The analogy would hold if they did the same thing. For all the belly-aching of the press, decisions are made by MPs, and MEPs have very little power in sorting stuff out.

An "allocated" MP need not be at random, and there's no reason to suggest that the same MP couldn't deal with the same constituency over time. I don't think that allocation is ideal - but some people appear to think it matters to have a smaller patch.

You seem to be arguing against yourself, by the way. What would be the problem with a person having a Labour MP in Kent that wouldn't also be a problem for all labour supporters in Kent now? Thank you for making the case re: connectedness for me .

Actually, MEPs often vote on far more important things than MPs, because too much power has been handed away.

Fundamentally, I believe decisions should be made as close to the people as possible.

As far as possible, people should be free to make their own choices, providing these are not directly damaging to others.

Far more power should be then given to local authorities. If this results in postcode lotteries, then so be it.

Far more power should be held at national rather than supranational level.

The only issues which should be decided at supranational level are things which genuinely require it. War, free trade zones, climate change are the only big things I can think of.

A change in the electoral system which devalues localism and shifts the balance of power towards the political elites is bad in my opinion.

It's not the perception when it comes to MEPs though - your MP "helps" but MEPs are just "over there".

I'm happy with the idea of postcode lotteries, but only if it's done with eyes open (i.e. no bleating) and where the amount of resources given out centrally correspond to need. Hammersmith and Chelsea does not need the disproportionate amount of the NHS budget it gets, for instance.

Having said all that, I really don't see STV as an issue of big or small government, or of liberalism versus statism.

... and further, I'm not sure you can point to any political party that doens't have an elite.

I guess - name aside - you must be in favour of a lefty alliance then?

At present, the rank and file of the tory and lib dem parties are so far apart that I don't think they could work together. The elites might though ... well, if the deal on offer was at all reasonable anyway.

Having said that it's not clear the tory political elites can even agree with each other at the moment!