Nick Clegg, leader of the Federal Liberal Democrats, recently announced plans by the Con-Lib administration to hold a referendum to make the voting system fairer in the UK for Westminster elections. He’s encouraging all members of the party to join in and campaign a) for a referendum and b) for a yes vote on the AV method of voting. As someone who joined the party because of its stance on voting reform I have difficulty in getting behind this campaign. I want all elections to be conducted under PR STV in multi-member constituencies at all tiers of government.
In Scotland we have STV PR for elections to local authorities. While not truly proportional, you need 5/6 member wards not 3/4 members, it was part of the compromise to get the changes passed in the Holyrood parliament.
The Holyrood elections are currently conducted under a hybrid system of constituencies on first past the post (FPTP) and a “top-up” done under a version of PR using a closed party vote list. It’s referred to as the Additional Member System. Although its more proportional, its not STV PR nor is it multi-member. This is compounded by all the recent boundary changes proposed which are “ham strung” because you can’t change the number of MSPs elected under FPTP or under the regional closed party lists (see this ERS article). You have therefore ended up with hybrid constitiuencies based on a numbers game with little community links in common.
The Alternative Vote is too much like FPTP for my liking (see this ERS article). Its not proportional or multi-member, it just requires someone to get 50% plus 1 of the vote to be elected.That could be difficult as not very many members of the current House of Commons achieved this under FPTP. It may require candidates at future elections to become more “bland” and compromise in order to get enough 2nd or 3rd preference votes to get over this threshold.
AV+ would be a better compromise, it is a bit like AMS but the “regional” element uses open party lists where the voter decides the order of the candidates on the party vote not the political parties. So, as well as voting for a party on the second ballot paper you can decided which order they get elected in.
Yes AV is a slight improvement on the current system. Yes it could open the door to further electoral reform. Yes its probably all the Lib Dems at Westminster could have got from the Tories.
No, its not enough for me. I want a referendum but, I want it to offer the voters a choice of voting system. Those choices are: FPTP, AV+ and STV PR.
