A positive pirouette on the Alternative Vote

Kevin Meagher says the Alternative Vote system holds no benefits for Labour and should be vigorously opposed

by Kevin Meagher
Monday, September 20th, 2010

Support for electoral reform ebbs and flows within the Labour Party. John Smith first promised a referendum on the voting system back in 1993, and that commitment went in Labour’s 1997 manifesto in the days of the love-in between Tony Blair and Paddy Ashdown. Subsequently, given the record size of Labour’s majority, the enthusiasm for voting reform – and the affection for the Liberal Democrats – faded. Then, earlier in 2010, both were back. Labour’s manifesto promised to “hold a referendum on introducing the alternative vote for elections to the House of Commons” in order to “ensure that every MP is supported by the majority of their constituents voting at each election”.

The Tories have always opposed electoral reform and supported first the past the post – it’s the system under which they secure their strongest representation. The Lib Dems have the most to gain from altering the system, which is why they are such enthusiastic advocates of change. However, Nick Clegg’s view before the general election was that AV is a second-best option because it is not strictly a proportional system – a “miserable little compromise”, as he put it. Yet less than five months since the coalition was formed, a transformation has taken place. The Lib Dems have embraced AV and David Cameron has allowed a referendum on it, set for next year. He may not be able to convince many in his party that AV has any merit, but he also has to make his marriage of convenience with the Lib Dems work.

Given that the Tories and Lib Dems have pirouetted on the voting reform issue, Labour should do the same. The party should drop its manifesto commitment and actively oppose a switch to AV in the referendum planned for next May.

British politics changed fundamentally when the Lib Dems got into bed with the Conservative Party. Labour support for electoral reform has traditionally been based on the assumption that the Lib Dems are closer to us than the Tories. Now the much talked-about but seldom witnessed “progressive consensus” between the two parties is off the agenda. The Lib Dems’ coalition with the Tories has poisoned relations with Labour. At the very least, it will be impossible for Labour to work with the Lib Dems at Westminster while Nick Clegg remains their leader.

There are still those who cling to the naive view that all it will take is Vince Cable to resign and the coalition will fall apart. The Lib Dem rank-and-file backed the accommodation with the Tories. Not one Lib Dem MP has publicly condemned it. How could they? They all report to the Tory Chief Whip.

Divorce, annulment or even trial separation are not realistic options for the Lib Dems. Ending the coalition means an early general election – one in which, if recent polls are accurate, they would be annihilated. So instead they may seek an arrangement with the Tories ahead of the next election, whereby Conservative supporters are urged to lend their first preference vote to Lib Dem candidates in seats the Lib Dems currently hold, salving their consciences by with giving their second preferences to the Tory candidate. AV is tailor-made for the coalition’s survival.

Lib Dem deputy leader Simon Hughes denies any such arrangements are in the offing. But recent history demonstrates that Lib Dem promises have a habit of being broken. Labour members and supporters should trust the evidence of their own eyes and ears. Conservative MP Nick Boles argues his party should make a formal pact with the Lib Dems, with each giving the other a free run in seats they currently hold. “The Labour Party would find it very, very difficult then to beat the combined forces of Tories and Lib Dems in all of their seats,” he said this week.

Labour is already half way there in opposing AV. Before the summer recess, the Shadow Cabinet took the decision to oppose the legislation paving the way for the referendum. Its other provisions include the reduction by 50 of the number of parliamentary constituencies in a fairly blatant bid to slash the number of Labour-held seats. This attempt at gerrymandering gives ample justification for Labour opposition to the bill. But Labour should specifically oppose AV, too. This has become a positive, principled choice, and absolutely central for Labour’s survival. As Vernon Bogdanor, David Cameron’s former tutor at Oxford and a supporter of proportional representation, put it: “AV opens the door to a new political world in which coalitions become the norm, and single-party majority government a distant memory. Defeat for AV could quickly end the coalition. But success would bind it together – for a long time to come.” The Tory-Lib Dem tie-up is a union of the like-minded. Right-wing Orange Bookers such as Nick Clegg and David Laws have far more in common with David Cameron and George Osborne than they do with Labour. The progressive alliance hopes of Tony Blair and Paddy Ashdown were a pipedream – one that is long gone.

We need to realise that or we may end up supporting a measure that could lock Labour out of power for a generation. The very future of the Labour Party as an electoral force may be on the line. We should call for a “no” vote in the referendum and oppose AV with everything we’ve got.

Kevin Meagher is a freelance communications consultant and a former Labour special advisor

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  • http://wayneon.blogspot.com/ WayneSmith

    And after all, it’s all about what’s good for the party, right? Which voting system is fairest doesn’t come into the discussion. Screw the voters, who cares about them.

  • Courtenay Formosa

    Yes, this article’s thesis–that the Labour ought to oppose electoral reform with no ideological basis whatsoever–is truly repulsive. The charge that the Tories are ‘gerrymandering’ just because they want to equalise constituency sizes was bad enough. The British electoral system is hugely biased towards Labour, nearly as biased towards the Conservatives, hugely biased *against* the Lib Dems, and nearly as biased against everybody else. I’m glad that this article has made explicit what I assume Jack Straw and all the first-past-the-posters are actually thinking, but something is truly amiss with the author’s democratic principles. Appeal to a plurality of voters under a PR system, and Labour will get back into power. Until you can do that, Mr. Miliband (whichever one), you don’t deserve to be Prime Minister.

  • BenC

    At least 4 of the 5 Labour leadership contenders are in favour of AV, which was also in Labour’s manifesto for the recent general election. Hopefully for those reasons & many more beside them the vast majority of Labour party members, supporters & voters will also be in favour of AV & support this long overdue reform to our clapped out voting system.

    Your main arguments for Labour turning against this reform don’t appear to involve much actually about the voting system itself, or even a robust defence of FPTP as a voting system. Instead you cheapen yourself by peddling mere party self-interest, which leaves you no better than some of the most reactionary Conservative MP & commentators, moaning prominent UKIP people & the “AV as big conspiracy against our party” mentality of the BNP. I take it voters being the opportunity to make a fairer, more sophisticated choice at election time, & the virtually all MPs being elected with at least 50% support (instead of just 1/3 of them this last election) don’t mean anything to you then? The debate & referendum on AV (& electoral reform in general) isn’t merely about which party gains or loses what or “how do we keep that lot we hate out” it’s about what’s best for the representation of those who vote, regardless of party positions. Your view seems to be that democracy is ok as long people vote the way you want them to.

    One other point- Hung parliaments (& therefore coalitions) are no more likely under AV than they are under FPTP.

  • BarryS100

    I don’t know what you lot in the Labour Party are moaning about. AV will change very little about our politics which is why our ‘choice’ in the referendum is being restricted to this so-called ‘change’ and the disgrace of FPTP. Virtually every other country in the world could give us lectures about true democracy whilst we go around invading many of them and trying to impose it on them. Sometimes I’m ashamed about my country! I’m a eurosceptic but a dream of mine is that the EU impose PR on us.

  • Kevin

    Electoral reform is a trivial, banal fetish of amateur psephologists, political obsessives, urban fashionistas and Liberal Democrats. Who may in fact be all of the aforementioned.

    It doesn’t put food on plates, kids in schools or care for the sick. And that is what will utterly bemuse the voters next May if this expensive and unwanted encumbrance is visited upon them. £50 million quids worth of a referendum or schools and hospitals? What do you think the voters will make if that? I hope all my fiery critics are suitably up for having the doors of Britain slammed in their faces.

    Political reform is a much more interesting subject. I’m all in favour of that. The cancer eating away our democracy is the calamitous fall in turnout, particularly among the young, marginalised and poor. That should be our starting point for renewing our democracy: participation. Not jiggery pokery in the illusory pursuit of “fair voting”.

    AV is a side show that could be Labour’s undoing. And anyone who is not primarily motivated by having an electoral system that benefits their tribe is either the political equivalent of Forrest Gump or utterly disingenuous.

    First Past the Post delivered three decisive victories for Labour. Why on earth would we want to change it?

  • William

    The honesty is astounding and would be refreshing if it did not expose the underbelly of politics so grotesquely. This call for grubby ‘political fixing’ is exactly why people hold politics in such contempt and think you are all the same. This is why they often see no point in voting. I think the public will fully understand that the political tribes want to keep all the power to themselves and look after their own self interests. They will also understand why it is good to make their represenatatives work to appeal to more than half of the electorate instead of as little as a third. They are probable much more concerned about money wasted on bumped up expenses and publicly funded spin doctors than they are on giving them more say and holding their representatives to account. This silly spin about reform not being important in comparison to ‘ schools and hospitals’ etc is a construct of the worried vested interests. Thats like saying people are interested in the detailed working of the economy but that we shouldnt intervent to make it fairer . Support for two monolithic parties and sets of interests have been on steady decline since the war no matter what the system huge majorities are a thing of the past. A small upgrade to thecurrent system to make it work better should not be a problem for a principled Labour party.

  • Kevin

    Dear William – I’ll take your initial remark about my ‘honesty’ as a compliment. I’ve very open about it. I want Labour to win – on its own – and support the system best able to deliver that. Three-in-a-row shows Labour can win under first-past-the-post. Why on earth change that?

    AV will deliver coalition government. I despise the idea. I would have countenanced it back in May to keep the wretched Tories out. But AV will simply make coalition government commonplace. I’m not sure how lowest common denominator politics that surely follows, as manifestos are casually tossed aside, is a more ‘principled’ electoral system. After all, it is a system where the person with the most votes can lose. And you accuse me of political fixing?!?

    I genuinely cannot see any issue of principle in AV. Ensuring the person with the most vote wins is clear, fair, well understood and utterly transparent. You can stick your second and third preferences for me. I vote Labour. And that’s it. If a few noisy feeble-minded gadflys can’t make up their mind which party they want first then that’s their problem.

    When real people are invited to cast their judgement (assuming we actually get to a referendum) then AV will be revealed as a trivial chattering class obsession that will crash and burn. And it’s a good job for Labour that it will. As Tories and Lib Dems look to the next general election they will realise their destinies are symbiotic and enter into an electoral pact. By supporting AV, Labour is in danger of rolling out the red carpet for them.

  • Courtenay Formosa

    Kevin, have you really devoted any thought to understanding what AV is? You say that you ‘vote Labour. And that’s it’. This means that you would presumably vote Labour, even in a district where the only contest was between a Conservative and a Lib Dem. AV would allow you to put Labour first and Lib Dems second in such a district, thus ultimately contributing your vote to a candidate to a candidate outside of ‘the wretched Tories’. A Labour vote would otherwise simply be another vote that the Lib Dems would not get, and enough of them would lead to a Tory victory.

    (Now, I can already hear you saying that the Lib Dems are as good as Tories these days, but I simply don’t have time for that argument. We all know that, if the number of votes received by Labour and the Conservatives had been swapped, the Lib Dems would have leaped eagerly into bed with Labour. And a Lib Dem victory over a Tory in that case would have made a coalition of the left stronger.)

  • Kevin

    Hi Courtenay – I understand the point you are making, but we won three general elections in a row. With big majorities. On our own. We did it before, we can do so again. Why run the risk of moving to AV and making it easy for the Tories and Lib Dems to formalise their existing arrangement and keep us out of power for another five years?

  • Kevin

    Hi Courtenay – I understand the point you are making, but we won three general elections in a row. With big majorities. On our own. We did it before, we can do so again. Why run the risk of moving to AV and making it easy for the Tories and Lib Dems to formalise their existing arrangement and keep us out of power for another five years?

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