[whizzing forward to the 2012 Olympic Games Men's 100 Metre Final]

Generic BBC Sports Commentator:

"And after a thrilling race, Usain Bolt of Jamaica takes the tape for first place... but after the judges submitted their preferences for 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th, Bolt now shares joint first place with Bogdan Dmimitar of Bulgaria, who came in 4th. It is felt that this is a 'fairer' result..."

Thanks, for another generation of Labour vs Tory tribalistic bollocks.

You're not my favourite person

@Bren Tierney. Great idea. Perhaps we should now move to a system where points in football matches are distributed according to the number of goals scored in the game and redistributed over the season as the proportion of goals for and against changes. This would lead to a "fairer" result at the end of the season since no goal would be wasted, wouldn't you say?

"I'm getting a little bored of this oft-repeated stock meme from AV/PR supports that, "you obviously don't understand the mechanism or the process of AV, therefore you've come to the wrong conclusions"."

Agreed. I do understand it, and I am against it in principle.

The constant condescension towards its opponents is possibly why the Yes campaign has not made any breakthrough, even though the No campaign was crap beyond belief.

The "You don't understand" crowd (and why exactly are so many of you so rude and hostile?) need to learn that until you have understood someones counter-argument on their own terms you are in no position to persuade them of anything. You don't have to agree, but just repeating words that people of good will and apparent brains say do not make sense is tantamount to saying "la la la" again and again.

And about as effective, as the result shows.

Since you don't understand them and they don't understand you, what grounds do you have for assuming any final meeting of minds would leave them agreeing with you rather than you agreeing with them?

@Ian Burdon

Assuming you want elections held every weekend, and not every four to five years, which is is why I used the analogy of the Olympics, then knock yourself out - but I doubt you'd carry the population's patience with you using your model. Hellishly expensive to boot mate.

Another reason your analogy doesn't work is that in a football match, there is only ever one of two results - at outright winner, or a draw - and the former is always preferable to the latter. Or perhaps the league should be decided by committee (or coalition) instead, as that would be even 'fairer', surely?

I don't understand your point on second preferences. Why does it make sense to give a lower weight to second preferences?

If the BBC is to be believed, only 4 out of 440 constituencies in England, Scotland & Wales votes Yes to AV - and two of those were in London.

It's clear that the other 436 constituencies didn't "understand" what they were voting for - the peasants.

I'm listening to the radio and all commentators agree on one thing: the *size* of the no vote has ended the question of reform. It's been, totally predictably, taken as an endorsement of FPTP.

So if you voted no because you want PR, you have made the most basic error under the satus quo of failing to vote tactically, because voting tactically is a necessary feature of the current system when the option you want cannot win. If you don't you help your opponent.

"However, I just cannot see how a second or third preference should be accorded equal weight with a first preference. For me, this violates the basic principle of equality of votes."

I think what you're saying is that somebody's second or third preference is not as strong as the first, so it shouldn't be allowed to count as though it were a first.

Yes, I may have a very strong preference of (say) the Greens, but only a mild preference for Labour over the Lib Dems, and marking them 1,2,3 does not express this. But I may just as likely have a very *strong* preference for Labour ahead of the Lib Dems (and the Greens must have been eliminated by this stage if we're caring about 2nd and 3rd preferences).

This applies under FPTP too. Someone who votes Green may prefer them greatly over anyone else, but another person who votes Green may only barely prefer them over anyone else, but these votes are counted equally. There's really nothing you can do about this, and AV neither fixes this nor makes this worse.

And as others have pointed out, a supporter of a small party under FPTP is likely to be voting tactically, so they won't be voting for their first preference anyway.

'A win for AV may also provide us with the harmless pleasure of hearing its advocates explain the legitimacy of a new voting system which was supported by less than 50 per cent of those entitled to vote.'

Shouldn't be any more difficult than justifying the old voting system which routinely provides governments supported by less than 50 per cent of those entitled to vote.

"First, I simply do not accept your second or third preferences should have the same weight as my first preference, or vice versa."

"I am familiar also with the actual mechanism of AV in practice."

Clearly you're not that familiar with it if you think a second preference vote carries equal weight to a first preference vote. If one candidate wins 50% of the first preference votes, no-one's second preference vote counts for anything.

"However, this is not an issue to lose either sleep or friends over" Well said

Re: "I just cannot see how a second or third preference should be accorded equal weight with a first preference. For me, this violates the basic principle of equality of votes."

AV is a run-off system that for 'n' candidates, each voter has 'n-1' votes; each of those votes has equal weighting.

In doing so, it simulates a multi-round system - similar to systems that exist in, eg., France presidential (only 2 rounds) - but in one vote.

Say for example there are four candidates A, B, C & D.
You vote A-1, B-2, C-3
I vote D-1, C-2, B-3

Round 1: My vote is for D, yours is for A
D gets the least votes and is eliminated

Round 2: My vote is for C, yours is for A
C gets the least votes and is eliminated

Round 3: My vote is for B, yours is for A
Whoever gets the most votes wins

In each of these rounds, our votes were equal. How does this violate the principle of equality of votes?

p.s. If someone only marks '1' against D but knows full well that they have no chance of being elected, they are essentially staying at home for round 2 and 3 of the ballot (because they are disillusioned with the main parties). That is their choice (these folk might be advised to cast their second vote for a party that supports PR).

As a yes supporter, I've been dismayed at the quality of the #yestoav campaign. They were too slow to counter the accusations of "under AV, the loser wins" and "AV is undemocratic" and other nonsense (I mean, saying the 'loser wins' begs the question somewhat...). The negative tactics of the no campaign seemed to catch them by surprise - and by the time they started to produce counter arguments they'd already lost the momentum.

In some ways I think that the Lib Dems made a strategic error right up front - by allowing the choice to be between FPTP and AV, they lost some of their core support. If the choice was instead for the more proportional AV+, would we be seeing a difference in the national mood towards a change?

But I've also been struck at how well funded the no campaign has appeared in comparison. Of course the establishment (in a sub-conscious, non-conspiracy sort of way ;-) ) want to continue using a system that ensures that they can rule absolutely with a 36% majority.

Re "You have a misunderstanding of the process".

If I vote for a main party, say the Labour party, but this party does not secure 50% of the vote, then the lowest party drops out and their second votes are counted.

Supposing the lowest party is the BNP or a religious right candidate, and most of their second votes are for the Conservative party, then surely that second vote caries the same weight as my first if it leads to a Conservative reaching 50%. No?

Also assuming I vote for a major party, it is likely that my second vote will not be counted, as the second votes of minority parties will add up to enough to give the main candidates a majority, giving a minority of voters a stronger arm in deciding the outcome.

@Nakwan chinga - Calm down, dear.

So you voted Yes to FPTP I hope you can explain yourself to the next generation as they ask you why you didn't take the chance of voting reform when it was offered to you. Neither Conservative nor Labour will introduce reform on their own and the Liberals won't be in power again for a long time so if you are waiting for PR don't hold your breath.

@Alex - "If I vote for a main party, say the Labour party, but this party does not secure 50% of the vote, then the lowest party drops out and their second votes are counted."

And if they do secure 50% of the vote no one's second preference is counted at all; therefore it doesn't have equal weight with a first preference.

I many elections, second preference votes get a weight of zero, as the count doesn't progress that far. In *some* elections, a *small proportion* - only those whose first preference is knocked out - are counted with a weight of 1 (equal to first preference votes).

The average weight of a second preference vote is number of second preferences that actually get counted divided by the number of second preferences cast. It is clearly less than 1.

@DAG

*waves* :-)

When I wrote the above comment, I was using DAG as an abbreviation for David Allen Green. While I was drafting the comment, someone posted a comment using DAG as nom de plume. So my above comment refers to David Allen Green, not the commenter.

I'm rather disappointed by all the ad hominem in the comments. This is by far the most reasonable justification for a No vote that I've seen so far, even though I think David's reasoning is flawed.

I can't understand why my first preference should not be given the same weight as everyone lese first preference, it would be under Proportional representation but isn't under FPTP.

@Arthur Williamson

"Your believe your second, third, fourth preferences etc should not carry as much weight as your first choice. That sounds like you are passionate about one political party whilst rather idifferent about all the others."

This is simply twaddle. Even if your statement were true it has nothing to do with the argument for or against AV. I'm sure the party leaders, including Clegg, have a similar 'passion' for one particular party and indifference for the others - and I'm sure many of the have no time at all for the BNP. This has nothing to do with how they view AV.

this is the dumbest thing I've ever read.