bring on proportional representation

[livenletlive]

we'll never see the tories again

Actaully long fingernails MEPs votes are completely unimportant because they have no power to make legislation - all that power sits with the unelected European Commission.

No - I am in favour of a Tory Liberal coalition, but realistically, I think we will get a Tory minority government.

I don't buy the idea that the Lib Dems are left-wing. Many of them are, many of them aren't.

I agree that if we are to have postcode lotteries then that fact should be discussed openly and implemented transparently. I also agree with provision and funding of services based on need. I don't think those are left-wing or right-wing values, they are libertarian versus authoritarian values.

'PR' is not the magic answer.

There needs to be an investigation, a series of debates, public education and a round of proposals which take into account every conceivable type of electoral reform. Too many people (especially on my FB feed ) are suddenly spouting PR and electoral reform yet know absolutely bugger all about it and the potential pitfalls.

Personally I do favour STV and increasing the size of constituencies which is one way around the problem mentioned but that's not the only problem with PR.

I said on another thread that PR needs a critical mass to form voting 'blocks' which make negotiations, consensus and coalitions possible. PR in the current system without a % bar lets in the BNP, with a bar it locks out the 'good' parties like the Greens leaving 3 main parties....

I'm not really saying left for the Liberals - it's a mix. What isn't a mix is the desire for PR, and the public offer of a meaningless committee is never going to be acceptable.

Agree completely on the authoritarian versus libertarian.

Even on a libertarian basis though, sometimes it makes sense to have some things organised centrally. It just has to come down to what ultimately gives more freedom overall - as an illustration, spending a lot of money to allow "choice" in public services at a local level can mean that things work worse everywhere when decisions are very costly to make. Not always, but it can happen ...

Oh, I agree. Some decisions are best made at UN level, some decisions are best made at EU level.

On the whole though, I like giving people more power. That means pushing power down to the lowest level at which it is feasible.

Over the last 40 years or so all the flow has been the other way.

and I am talking about the public services that provide opportunity - health and education especially.

If you've got a five-member constituency, a 10% vote share is sometimes enough to get in where there's one strong party.

Across the UK, I think we'd end up with the "big 3", the existing Welsh, Scottish and NI parties, the Greens and a right-of-tory party - probably UKIP.

I do doubt that the BNP would get in, and even if they did, restrictions could be set up to mean they couldn't sit until some ground rules were met. (In the same way as SF don't sit because they won't abide by the rules.)

I don't think all LibDems are on about PR. Their manifesto calls for a 'more proportional' voting system without calling for any one particular solution. So yes, I think a committee is called for, but it needs some teeth in the form of a committment to a referendum by x date on a series of options presented by the committee.

What is STV??

Single transferrable vote en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote

In my limited experience, it's typically the reason lib dem voters (where it's not tactical) would choose them over labour/conservative. After all, how different are lib dem voters to labour or conservative otherwise?

I think the Lib Dem platform (libertarian) is significantly different from Labour (statist, socialist) and Conservative (er, conservative).

Thanks for the info!

That's fair and is in there too, however ...

• The liberals aren't that different from parts of the labour party. (I wouldn't say socialist, but then again I wouldn't call a lot of labour socialist either.)

• The libertarians aren't that different from parts of the conservative party.

I still think electoral reform is a very big reason why they're not in those parties. If so, then there's no coordination with another party without moving strongly towards PR.

Interesting points about how the PR STV system would benefit parties such as the BNP or UKIP.
I'm not clear how people are coming up with what the result of the election would have been under PR? I don't see how it's possible to follow it through, though it probably doesn't take a genius to work a STV vote that gave BNP #1 would probably make it's way to UKIP and ultimately the Tories.

I saw a post on Sky that was of the opposite opinion - namely that the PR system would be biased in favour of the more left wing parties, as Plaid Cymru,SNP, the Lib Dem's and and Labour are more natural bedfellows.

I'm Irish. I think the PR system has huge advantages. It's highly complex in Ireland as each constituency has at least 3 TD's and in some cases up to 5, so eliminating candidates and transfering surpluses can go on for weeks.
However, the fact that there is only 1 MP per constituency here, would, I think simplify the administrative burden somewhat.
What annoyed me, is that no party came to our door, we didn't get any brochures. The only posters I saw were for UKIP. It wasn't until 2-3 days before the election when I read our local paper that I even knew who the candidates were aside from the sitting MP.Reason : I live in safe Tory area. Therefore no one bothers to canvas.
I'm passionate about the right to vote, and tiredly traipsed off down the local polling station, but for the first time, I really got how so many voters can get apathetic.

You can only either guess, or use the actual votes (which ignore tactical voting) to predict the election.

We also have to remember that there may be more parties under PR. That is, there'd end up being a block of right-ish parties too. Add a genuinely libertarian party alongside the tories and ukip and some of the "bias" argued by sky disappears.

The bigger issue is probably that the "right" accounts for 30-40% at present and is likely to lose every election under PR in favour of the centre/left until the population changes its tastes. However, this is democracy ... even if the sun etc appears to dislike it).

Ultimately, I wouldn't trust the sky analysis much, as it's probably flavoured by the fact that Uncle Rupert genuinely is a facist. I mean this advisedly of course, and only in the sense that he's extremely paternalistic, authoritarian, anti-democratic and intolerant of dissenting voices. I'm sure he's nice to kittens though.

You can't accurately predict- you can only speculate. There's another thread on if we had PR that I've speculated heavily on.

If we have PR and STV here I think we'd need to increase constituency size and the number of seats per super constituency otherwise we'll just end up with a 2 party system that locks smaller parties out, we won't have the political critical mass to create effective voting blocks for a govt to function and it would all go tits up.

But it depends how it would be done... Good systems and bad systems. Same votes or different votes.

You can make the numbers stack up almost any way you want, you can point out areas of similarity and difference all you like but under systems like STV in small constituencies little parties rarely get a look in

Agree Mr JustAbout, I reckon it was the happiest day of Murdoch's life when his microphone caught Gordon Brown's gaffe.
I don't think PR should be discounted because it's complex, or because it leads to coalition governments.
Ultimately, the system which is most likely to ensure the MPs the country elects are somewhat representative of the popular choice should take precedence in my view.
I'd be very cynical of Cameron's proposal to implement an inquiry into PR. What's the betting it'll be chaired by an old Etonian alumni with a name like Sir Humphrey Ponsonby Fortescue who probably hankers back to the days when only wealthy landowners could vote? Chances are we'd end up with a War and Peace of verbiage at excessive cost to the taxpayer, when the essential message is basically "Piss of Nick."

longfingernails, but the likely size of multi-member constituencies would be far smaller than the MEP's regions. I don't see how there's a comparison.

I wouldn't allocate MPs in such constituencies to particular areas- that would prevent the beneficial effects of competition between them to serve voters.

link to interesting map again.

Vesela

Do you have any data on what the level of constituent contact is like in STV systems (like in Ireland)?

I genuinely don't know but my instinct is that it is less than it is here.

MPs are legislators, but they are also "super-councillors" when it comes to their constituents. The latter role is crucial in informing their primary legislative work. I am just not sure it would be maintained under an STV system. I am prepared to be convinced by evidence to the contrary though...

Sin Fein dont take their seats as they dont recognise the legitimacy of the parliament.

If 5pc of people vote BNP they should have 5pc of the seats, it's called democracy, scary shit isn't it? Using fascists as an excuse not to move slightly towards living in a democracy is cheap...

Vesela,
The problem with Irish politics is that there are far too many politicians. I know it's a common complaint, but we have 166 in Ireland. Can't remember the population sizes of the UK and Ireland at this hour, but it's WAY more than in the UK.
Also, there are 3-5 TD's per constituency.
Hence, while it would be unheard of not to have canvassers call to your door at some point, (and we are bombarded with election posters during the run up to the day, so much so it's ridiculous), I have many complaints about Irish politics - namely it's so parochial. There are people serving the country who I think should be behind bars - yet they are easily returned time and time again as the locals think they're only great because they turn up at funerals and organised the new GAA clubhouse. Don't get me wrong, of course an elected representative should be mindful to his or her constituents' needs, but I loathe the way Irish politics operates in that sense.However, that's a bit of different arguement and not related to the PR discussion.

Sinn Fein don't sit currently because they won't swear the Oath of Alleigance which is slightly different to not recognising the legitimacy of parliament. And because if half if them came to Westminster most people would be absolutely terrified. They may have been elected but people still associate the people with the IRA. Younger members of SF may sit in the future, if they can square with the oath.