Unlike being the only gay in the village, being the only liberal on the “wrong side” of a constitutional reform debate is not necessarily a thing to boast loudly about.
Indeed, one cannot be absolutely delighted at the company one is keeping.
But, a couple of months or so on from my post setting out the liberal case against the Alternative Vote system, today I voted “No” to AV.
I do not feel that strongly about the issue, and the introduction of AV would be nowhere near a calamity; that is why I am merely posting an explanation today, rather than a post urging a “No” vote earlier in the week.
And I certainly have no wish for any post of mine to be used again by the hapless, misleading, and disgraceful official No campaign, and certainly no one should vote No by reason of costs, complexity, or Clegg.
All the same, my No vote was on a principled and reasoned basis, and so it may be interesting to others to know what that basis was.
First, I simply do not accept your second or third preferences should have the same weight as my first preference, or vice versa. Here, I am familiar with all the counter-arguments about this not meaning there are “two bites of the cherry” and that everyone (somehow) still has one vote. I am familiar also with the actual mechanism of AV in practice.
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.
Second, and as a consequence, I cannot accept that adding together first and second preferences, and so on, creates any real – rather than an artificial – majority in an applicable constituency.
Otherwise, AV seems to have exactly the same faults as First Past the Post in regards of proportionality. The legislature will still not reflect the proportions of votes cast overall, and safe seats will still exist. Nothing fundamental will change.
However, this is not an issue to lose either sleep or friends over, and a win for AV today will not upset any sensible person, and it will upset quite a few senseless ones.
Given the expected low turnout, 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.
Content from our partners
Related
