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The UK Alternative Vote Vote

I can’t make up my mind on the Alternative Vote, so I thought I’d put try pulling together all the propaganda and misinformation and come up with a decision. 

Main reasons for voting ‘yes’…

1. It guarantees a majority winner - over 50% of votes
2. MPs who get elected will work harder, and not mess about. 
3. The Tories want to keep First Past the Post
4. It’ll annoy David Cameron. 

Main reasons for voting ‘no’… 

1. We’re too thick to understand the concept of ranking candidates. 
2. Election officials won’t be able to understand redistributing votes. 
3. The BNP will be swept to power in the next election. 
4. It isn’t proportional. 
5. It’ll annoy Nick Clegg

A candidate having to get 50% of first preferences to secure a seat will make candidates work harder, but they’ll just end up making more promises they can’t see through. AV does nothing to guarantee that once they take the oath of allegiance that they will be any better than those elected through FPTP. AV *might* lead to more coalition governments, it *may* give smaller parties better representation (whatever their views) but probably won’t.

On the no side of the agument, ranking candidates doesn’t seem to be a problem for Northern Irish voters who are able to rank candidates standing for district councils, the assembly and European Parliament. In fact the only time NI voters put a cross on a ballot paper is in the General Elections and (of course) in referenda. Counting can take longer, but only where a candidate hasn’t reached the 50% threshold and a majority of votes cast. On the other side of the No2AV campaign (the left-hand-side), AV isn’t proportional representation, it is a compromise between FPTP and PR. 

The problem with this referendum is it’s about AV, a proper referendum would have given a real choice. I still can’t decide, like the last general election it may come down to who makes the best use of Twitter and puts together the best election broadcast.  

• BBC: What is the alternative vote?
• BBC: Where the parties stand on AV
• No Campaign: www.no2av.org
• Yes Campaign: www.yestofairervotes.org