Firstly, to the 637 people who voted UKIP in the elections for my local County Councillor - nearly ten per cent of the votes cast. We'll find out Sunday evening how many more people voted UKIP (or not necessarily UKIP, but "I'd like a referendum") in the elections to the EU Parliament.
Secondly, to the 46 people who have so far taken part in the final round of the poll on how many members a constituency should have - one or five - the results are unfortunately still too close to call. Anti-Citizen One asks "Basically do you want to vote for an MP or a party? As parties always corrupt politics I can never agree with PR."
True - but how about a system where each voter has one vote and votes for one named candidate? Seats would be then allocated to parties using the d'Hondt method, but instead of parties then awarding seats according to how high an internally-selected candidate stood on their list, seats could be awarded to winning candidates according to how many votes he or she received personally. The link between MP and geographical constituency could also be retained by allowing the successful candidate with the most personal votes to choose which of the five merged sub-constituencies he or she wants to represents, and so on.
C'mon, it's not rocket science.
Friday 5 June 2009
Thank you, thank you
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5 comments:
Congrats on coming third
There are endless suggestions of systems to replace FPTP but they all fail the tomato test.
When push comes to shove we have to be able to throw soft tomatoes at someone.
Any list system dilutes the tomato effect. At best it gives us two, three or more possible targets but not a single target. Having a single target is an important part of our constitution.
No doubt you would question how often metaphorical tomatoes are thrown and the answer, of course, is not very often. But every now and then, in times of trouble, they are thrown and people feel a hell of a lot better for it.
Take Portillo's loss of his seat in 1979. Objectively it doesn't matter much that one person is voted out, but it is not a purely objective exercise. Purging the Commons of those who are perceived to represent what has gone wrong is enormously important.
By making each MP, however highly ministerial or lowly backbenchery they are, answerable to a small chunk of the population is the best way yet devised of preventing a ruling elite from becoming unanswerable to the little people.
One of the greatest problems with the EUSSR is that those with real power are answerable only to others who wish to attain the same power.
Any list system will result in the same problem arising in this country. To allocate seats according to how many votes individual party candidates receive is just a list system in disguise. Those favoured by Central Office will be given the constituencies in which they are likely to receive the most votes.
There is a lot to be said for being able to identify someone as "my MP", even if we disagree with everything he or she says.
TFB, "Any list system will result in the same problem arising ... Those favoured by Central Office will be given the constituencies in which they are likely to receive the most votes."
That's applies even more to FPTP, so it's completely irrelevant.
The weird thing is that people who want to choose a person to vote for oppose something like STV (or Condorcet). Anti-Citizen One seems to want to disempower the party, but rejects the very system designed to do this!
Under FPP, each party decides who their candidate is (by some daft scheme, or STV, if you're lucky) and then locks out all other party members. So FPP gives enormous power to the party. This is evil.
Under a list PR like these Euro elections, the party has even more power (giving a virtual certainty to the top candidate from popular parties). This is also evil.
Under STV, the party power is severely curtailed. This is because independents can run and not suffer from "wasted vote" syndrome. And factions within a party can be offered, but cannot parties "force" people to vote for certain candidates ahead of others. If each party allows a bunch of candidates to stand in an STV election, you are likely to get a relatively wide spectrum of candidates (party and independent) offered. Tomatoes can be thrown at candidates with remarkable precision! I might put bankers at the bottom of my ballot, with Georgists at the top. Somebody else might put mums at the top and public schoolboys at the bottom. These preferences show through in the outcome of the election, with the last selected candidates always having slim margins of victory. This keeps them on their toes!
So the issue with PR is "proportional to what?". A system which specifically tries to make proportionality to party vote is fundamentally broken. What is needed is proportionality to how people voted in general! If 30% of people vote for disabled black lesbians, shouldn't roughly 30% of those elected be disabled black lesbians? Parties are essentially a political fiction designed to appeal to voters' sense of unity and politicos' desire for mutual support. But the electoral system should be completely blind to parties. At present, the parties have effective power to block all their members from standing (except one) in each election. That's against the public interest and against the spirit of democracy.
So I give a resounding "no" to PR, an even more resounding "no" to FPP. And a qualified "yes" to multi-member STV (or Condorcet). And I would (based on opinions expressed) expect AC1 to agree.
Just to add... well done. 9% ain't bad, considering it's under FPTP. Maybe I should do it...
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