On May 5th, the British electorate has the task of choosing its voting system. It is a simple binary choice: to stick with first past the post (FPTP) or take a hesitant step into the unknown with the alternative vote (AV).

The Lies About The Alternative Vote and First Past The Post

The campaigns on both sides of the argument have muddied the waters by making false claims to try and weaken the other sides’ argument – propaganda, disjointed thinking and BS (not the Big Society, the BS you shovel).

Here are few examples of the misrepresentations peddled by the “Yes to AV” side:

• “There are no safe seats with AV” – simply not true – the impact on safe seats will be small. The impact of AV affects marginal seats more. There will be a few more marginal seats as having only 35% of the vote was ‘safe’ under FPTP might make the sitting MP vulnerable under AV
• “AV encourages MPs to work harder” – Not generally true; most MPs will not change their work habits due to the change in the voting system: only MPs in marginal seats will have to ‘work harder’ for voters’ second and third choice votes
• “With AV the winning candidate has at least 50% of the votes” – For this to be true all voters would have to use all their preference votes. In likelihood voters will only use 2 or 3 preference votes and hence if all their preference candidates have been eliminated before the final round of voting, their vote will not count in the last round – hence the real winning percentage might be as low as 45% in some cases.

And on the “No to AV” side the bogus claims are:

• “AV produces more coalitions governments” – not true, either theoretically or in practice in other countries – as AV is NOT a Proportional Representation (PR) system of voting the chances of a coalition government are just the same as first past the vote
• “AV is against the principle of ‘one man one vote’” – not really, each person has a single vote in each round of vote counting until all their preferred candidates have been eliminated
• “It will cost hundreds of millions of pounds to buy new counting machines to count the vote” – not true – AV can be counted by hand. The counting will take longer and be more error prone since multiple rounds of counting are required as each candidate is eliminated from the count. It is true that some of PR voting systems are more complicated to count and hence an significant investment would be required – but that is an argument for another time, not now
• “Nick Clegg will be in power forever with AV” – not true. Liberal Democrats will likely pick up only a few more marginal seats typically where there was a three horse race between Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrats where Liberal Democrat has less first votes that other two candidates but much more second preference votes. This ‘Clegg in power forever’ statement would have much more credence under a PR system where say both the Tories and Labour each had 35% – 40% of the votes and Liberal Democrats 20%. In that case Liberal Democrats could be permanent coalition partners.
• “AV is too complicated for voters to understand” – Not true. For sure it is more complicated then FPTP but millions of people worldwide use the system successfully to elect governments. Putting 1-2-3-4 in a few boxes rather than an ‘X’ in a single box is within almost everyone’s capabilities.

The Truth About The Alternative Vote and First Past The Post

Let’s look at the two systems rationally and dispassionately.

First Past The Post

Method: Choose Your Favourite Candidate Then Stick an ‘X’ in the box

The candidate with most votes wins.

It is a misleading name as there is no ‘post’ as such; ‘most popular’ or ‘furthest along the track’ would be more accurate as there is no finishing line. The winning candidate will win typically with somewhere between 25% and 75% of the vote. If the turnout is 40% then the winner may have as little as 10% of the electorate.

Positive Aspects Of First Past The Post

The strongest aspect of this system is its simplicity: the candidate with most votes wins.

Its simplicity extends beyond just the understanding of the principle: it is easier to vote, it is easier to count the vote, the scope for miscounting of votes is reduced.

It is a system understood by all the UK voters.

Negative Aspects Of First Past The Post

If your candidate ends up winning you probably don’t care too much about the negatives.

However there are many down sides to this voting system if you do not support the candidate who is the likely winner in your constituency. And that is now the majority of voters. So while FPTP works well in a two party system where those two parties have 80%-90% of the vote it ceases to work as well where there are more contenders involved. This first happened in the 1974 election where the 2 large parties received around 75% of the vote with the winning party getting 42% of the vote. In more recent elections the more than 70% of the electorate did NOT vote for the winning party so the mandate to govern is weaker.

Here are some of the negatives of FPTP:

• Wasted Vote – “I voted but it was pointless” – If you don’t vote for the winning candidate you may as well not have voted at all
• Discouragement To Vote – “I did not vote as there was no point” – If your preferred candidate is unlikely to win you are disinclined to vote at all
• Tactical Voting – ” I voted but not for the candidate I really wanted” – If your preferred candidate is unlikely to win you are tempted to vote for the candidate that you would not vote for normally, but is most likely to beat the candidate you like the least
• Unrepresentative – “I voted but my party is not fairly represented” – Countrywide a party can get 25% of the votes but only 10% of the seats in parliament – yes it’s a post code lottery

Summary on First Past The Post

Good if your candidate wins; otherwise a bit rubbish.

Suggestion: Move to a constituency where your party already has a MP

Likely MP Behaviours: A good MP will still be a good MP; a bad MP will still be a bad MP. That said, MPs can become complacent if they are in safe seats for life; long incumbency can lead to corruption and claims for cleaning the moat, fake mortgages, etc. – In marginal seats, MPs really do have to be seen to deliver value to their constituents as every vote counts.

The Alternative Vote

Method: Rank the Candidates By Preference – put 1,2,3,4,5 in the boxes

The candidate preferred by the majority wins. (Well almost a majority – typically will be at least 45% whereas with FPTP is can be as low as 30%).

AV is an elimination contest where the least popular candidate is eliminated each round until one candidate has 50% of the vote.

Voters whose first choice candidate has been eliminated in the first round have their second choice vote counted in a second round of counting. The least popular candidate is eliminated and their supporters votes are then distributed according to their second choices (or third choices if the vote has already been transferred from the first eliminated candidate).

This process is repeated until one candidate gets more than 50% of the vote (one could say they were first past the (50%) post but that would be downright confusing.

Once all a voter’s preferred candidates have been eliminated their vote is no longer counted. For this reason, in the final round of voting the winner may have less than the 50%

Positive Aspects Of The Alternative Vote

The strongest aspect of this system is that it promotes voting for your preferred candidate, irrespective of whether they are likely to win. So basically, it is more representative of what voters want rather than what they don’t want.

Tactical voting is reduced (but not entirely eliminated) as it is difficult to vote tactically since there is really no information available about voter’s preferences beyond their first choice.

Every vote counts. In fact, if you prefer the minority parties you can have all your preference votes counted in different counting rounds. If you vote for the winning party then your same first preference vote is counted in each of rounds.

Negative Aspects Of The Alternative Vote

This are also many down sides to this voting system if you do not support the candidate who is the winner in your constituency. (who also might not be the most popular even if he/she is the least unpopular )

• Lower preference votes will count the same as first preference votes
• Voters who don’t express second and lower preferences will have wasted their votes if their first choice is eliminated
• By electing a single candidate in each constituency it does nothing to address the post code lottery that means the distribution of candidates does not reflect the national vote
• The counting of the votes takes longer as multiple counts are required due to the elimination process
• There are likely to be more spoilt ballot papers as writing the numbers 1 though 5 is more difficult than placing an single ‘X’

Summary on the Alternative Vote

Good if your candidate wins, especially if they would have lost by first past the post. Good if you voted for a candidate that you wanted to win rather than against the one you wanted to lose. Good if you voted for the first time because you felt it was now worth doing.

Likely MP Behaviour: The system makes results much less predictable and hence MPs in marginal seats will work harder for your vote (your first, second, third, fourth and fifth vote). Once a candidate is elected there is no saying they will continue to work harder though.

Conclusions

I think the Alternative Vote could prove to be a worthwhile change in the voting system if it ultimately delivers high voter participation as more people feel their vote matters.

But since the benefit is marginal, and the country is facing bigger issues right now, it is doubtful that enough people will be motivated to get out and vote for it.

This new coalition government has surprised me yet again! This time by abolishing the Audit Commission.

This is a body created in 1983 by a previous Conservative administration to monitor the performance and expenditure of publicly funded organizations. According to Eric Pickles, Local Government Secretary, it has now lost its way and grown too fat and self serving. But rather than a change of leadership and a change of diet, it is getting the chop. Clearly the £60,000 anti-pickle campaign irked him somewhat so there was going to be no reprieve when he finally got the axe in his hands.

Michael O’Higgins, the Commission’s chairman, reported

The Audit Commission’s responsibilities for overseeing and delivering local audit and inspections will stop. The Commission’s research activities will end: audit functions will be moved to the private sector, councils will be free to appoint their own independent external auditors from a more competitive and open market, and there will be a new audit framework for local health bodies. This will save council taxpayers’ money and decentralise power.

The commission’s in-house practice will be moved into the private sector – possibly through a management buy-out or as a staff-owned mutual.

So gone is low fee, high expense, public sector, critical auditing. It is to be replaced higher fee, lower expense and less critical private sector auditing.

Existing staff have been told to “form a company to bid for contracts”. So public funds will provide no doubt generous redundancy payments, then hire back the same people on a contract basis but saving the pension expenses and the fixed costs.

The question is that will these ex public servants feel some alienation and cynicism as the take on their old job with a lower salary, less security and less benefits? Will they do a better or worse job of monitoring the expenditure of public finances?

Will they protect public expenditure in the same way that auditors protected shareholders of the banks? Except that in this case the public have less control than shareholders over the appointment of auditors.

In my opinion the likely outcome is lower costs in the short term and bigger scandals in the longer term.

A change of leadership and a trimming of fat would have cost less in the short term and likely brought longer term benefits through economies of scale and reduced scope for corruption.

This decision to kill off the Audit Commission just looks to have been made for personal rather than practical reasons.

Liberal Democrats Swing Both Ways

It is a tough choice for Nick Clegg. He does not want to be the leader that failed to take that “once in a generation” chance to deliver a fairer voting system. So who is he going to choose as the father of his PR baby?

Firstly, there is the younger, stronger and more legitimate choice, the favourite of his family in the country. But David C is a reluctant father being unconvinced that a PR baby is affordable at this time. The future with David looks to be full of arguments and broken promises. Not a basis for a stable relationship.

And then there is older, more experienced and reliable but unloved Gordon, disliked by friends and family, but a much more willing father and someone with whom he shares commons ideas and values but no respect. And no spark of romance there.

So Nick goes out on separate dates with both David and Gordon. Neither takes his fancy. This is hard going. But Nick’s biological clock is ticking, and he must decide by Friday as that is market(s) day. If only there was a younger version of Gordon that his family and friends liked…

Gordon Makes Way For A Younger Man (or Woman)

Gordon does not want David to have the PR baby with Nick. He has recognized his lack of legitimacy so he has decided to step aside for good of his family. He has some younger siblings who can fulfil this marriage of convenience. There is Ed B, David M, Ed M, Alan J, Jon C and Harriet H. Surely one of these can woo Nick and those in the country.

Gordon wants to play the role of best man and make sure the wedding arrangements and the first trimester of the maternity proceed smoothly.

Now Nick has a way forward, he feels a tingle and he hopes it is not the MMPs but a STV

It’s A CONDEM Party as Cameron Gets a Clegg Over

In an admirable demonstration of democracy at work the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties put together a coalition agreement in around 5 days that allowed a successful transfer of power from the old regime to the new. The chemistry between the leaders and indeed the leadership teams with plenty of pragmatism has meant that there was enough goodwill to stitch together an broad agreement that allows the coalition government a practical working majority with the price (sic prize) being a referendum of Proportional Representation (in the weak form the Alternative Vote) in 12 months time.

You are Crazy Not To Vote Tactically

I want to spell this out. With the ‘first past the post’ voting system, if you don’t vote for the winning candidate, you may as well have not voted at all.

Think about it. A vote for losing candidate results in no representation whatsoever. Nothing. Nada. Nada di Nada. Zilch.

If your preferred candidate does not win, you may as well have stayed at home.

I will just say that again as I only really realised this in the past few days.

If you don’t vote for the winning candidate, you may as well not have voted at all!

How democratic is that?

Put another way, UK democracy is a post code lottery: your vote only counts in certain post code areas.

In a PR system your vote would count for something but not in the UK election 2010.

That’s why we need real change. (I think I might copyright that phrase.. Mmm oops too late)

Making Your Vote Count

So the only rational approach is to either:

1. vote for the party that is most likely to win in your constituency but only if you really want them to win; or
2. vote for the party that has a reasonable chance of winning in your constituency but if you really really want them to win; or
3. vote for the least offensive party that has a reasonable chance of beating the party that you most don’t want to win in your constituency

Making The Best Choice

Here in Central Devon, it is a two horse race between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats.

Applying the rules above, I want my vote to have some chance of counting, i.e. not being a wasted vote, so I must choose between these two parties.

The Conservatives lack competence on the economy, and may take the UK into a double dip recession, and hence are too big a risk to consider, so I will vote for the Liberal Democrats. Also Nick Clegg seemed the most honest of the three main parties’ leaders, and with Vince Cable as a competent Chancellor I am comfortable with my decision.

The other advantage of voting Liberal Democrat is that if they have significant leverage they may be able to change the constitution so we will have a PR system in the next election.

Then everyone will be able to vote for the party that best represents their views. And have that vote count. That would be no bad thing.

Okay, I thought Nick Griffin would perform well on Question Time, under the normal round of day to day politics. But no, he tanked. The questions were all race-related and he obviously squirmed painfully under scrutiny of David Dimbleby, the chariman, the other guests and the audience.

One almost felt sorry for him, there was Nick, trying to make the British Nationalist Party (BNP) sound reasonable, having dragged it back from its Nazi past. But nobody on the panel or the audience was buying the idea that the BNP are no longer a racist party.

Step one in that direction is changing their constitution to allow non white members.

On Question Time tonight I would like Nick Griffin to comment on proposals in the BNP Policy Statement on Multi-culturism.

It reads:

Different groups can live side-by-side and at peace for generations. They can even enjoy each other’s cultures, but they must stick to their own, or ‘diversity’ will be but a short-lived stepping stone to nothingness.

…we also intend to develop a model of ‘multiculturalism’ which combines peaceful co-existence with the maintenance of cultural and biological separation. In parts of the world where mass immigration is irreversible, the only thing that can prevent human diversity vanishing into an antheap of rootless coffee-coloured consumerism is the celebration of difference.

Seems like the BNP want to end mixed race relationships. And there was me thinking that love making was a great way to celebrate difference.

Don’t they realize is that all humans are an end product of 200,000 years of evolution and it is 70,000 years since the black-later-to-become-white lot left East Africa and headed north to Europe and east to Asia.

What is so special about the gene pool that emerged out of caves in the South of France after the last Ice Age that makes it worth preserving?

This evening, Nick Griffin, leader of the British National Party, will appear on TV on Question Time. This will be a further step in his increasingly successful attempts to improve the electability of his party. Mr Griffin has been trying to rebrand the party – from a racist one to an ethnic one. Instead of the goal of creating a whites only UK it is now all about the preservation of an ethnic group and culture that arrived in the United Kingdom after the last Ice Age.

Is the BNP Still A Racist Party?

The BNP have had abhorrent views and practices in the past. Mr Griffin, once convicted of race hate crimes in 1998, says that he and the party have changed. Certainly, their press statements, and their propaganda on the more accessible pages on the website take a different tone – it is no longer talk of ‘blood in the streets’ but instead of immigration controls and voluntary repatriation.

Out With Swastika, In With The Spitfire

Also the imagery and symbols have changed, gone is the swastika, the admiration of Adolf Hitler and it replaced by Winston Churchill and the Spitfire, much to the recent chagrin of a group of British generals, Major-General Sir Patrick Cordingley, former Chief of Defence Staff Lord Guthrie, General Sir Mike Jackson and General Sir Richard Dannatt.

Why a Political Paedophile, not a Political Leper?

Racism is more akin to paedophilia than leprosy. While all these groups tend to cling to their own, preferring isolation, conformity and a mono-culture, the motives of racists are more similar to those of paedophiles than lepers: the lack of compassion or consideration for those they hurt, the absence of morality, and an illogical self-justification of their behaviour. Also racism and paedophilia involve free will and are both more of life-style choices while leprosy clearly isn’t.

Unfair Press Treatment

Are Nick Griffin and the BNP members being treated by the press and the other political parties like paedophiles? Is electing Nick Griffin as your Member Of Parliament like appointing a convicted paedophile as your local school’s headmaster? The press clearly believe that the BNP have not changed and cannot be trusted. Once a sinner, always a sinner.

Freedom Of Speech Should Prevail

We are in a free country that believes in free speech. Everyone has the right to express their views providing there is no incitement or encouragement to commit a crime. So providing no law is broken then he has the right to speak. And the BBC have been kind enough to give him a platform to speak from.

A Polished Performance on Question Time

Mr Griffin has polished his skills and knows exactly where the line is drawn. He will no doubt give a strong performance airing mostly sensible policies on local government, defence, education, health, finance, social services and industry. On immigration he will have a strong policy. He will come across a fairly normal, right of centre, politician, that gets a bad press. The likely outcome is that support for him and his Party will increase.

Questions for Nick Griffin That You Won’t Hear On Question Time

Like an ex-paedophile in an interview for the headmaster role he won’t say why he really wants the job. Nick Griffin is not going to be completely honest about what motivates him and what he would do if he was elected. He will not answer questions on the strategic points of BNP policy which are all about strengthening white/Ice Age descendant ethnicity:

1. How would you reduce the percentage of the civically British non whites (a.k.a. non descendants of the peoples that populated the UK after the last Ice Age) from the current 7% to the target of 2%?
2. Why would do you want to remove the right to political representation from the civically British non whites?
3. How would you remove the property rights of non whites? What impact do you think this would have on international relations and and inward investment?
4. How would you test people to find out if they fall into your preferred ethnic group? How would you establish what the gene pool of the Ice Age ethnic group was? What percentage match with the target gene pool would suffice? 50%? 60%? 70%? 80%? 90%?
5. How would you deal with the children of mixed ethnic group marriages? Potentially a 70% white male marries an only 10% white female and has 40% white children, would the children lose rights of inheritance and potentially be deported? Where would you deported them to? Or would mixed ethnic marriages be made illegal?
6. How do your goals to control the United Kingdom’s ethnic make-up differ from those of Nazi Germany in the 1930′s and 1940s?
7. How far are you willing to go to achieve those goals?

I think the above questions would give Mr Griffin the opportunity to show the public what motivates him, what his vision for the UK is, and how he would achieve it.

Tories put shareholders interest before the public’s

Kenneth Clarke scored an own goal by criticising the government in allowing the Lloyds bank takeover of HBOS. What he is forgetting is that with Friday’s declared losses the takeover has saved the taxpayer almost £11 billion (at least in the short term) at the expense of Lloyds shareholders. So what the Tories seem to be doing again is putting shareholders interests ahead of those of general taxpayers.

What’s more he would have complained bitterly if the Government had blocked the deal on the principle of “too much state intervention” and also as it would have meant that HBOS would have been nationalised.

Lloyds shareholders jumped at the opportunity to takeover HBOS

Lloyds’s management went into this deal with there eyes wide open, with the goal of acquiring a large market share of British Banking with the focus mainly of what is a reasonable sound Halifax mortgage portfolio. They must take full responsibility for the lack of due diligence in failing to assess the amount of toxic debt in the corporate division, £7 billion of which was written off on Friday.

Lloyds TSB shareholders voted 95.98% in favour of the takeover. They paid £4.3 billion for the bank in November, having negotiated down for original agreed price of £12.2 billion in September so they thought they were getting a good deal. So did Sir Peter Burt and Sir George Mathewson – the former chief executives of Bank of Scotland and Royal Bank of Scotland respectively, who tried to scupper Lloyds’s takeover of HBOS takeover.

Fear of Lloyds becoming a superbank have retreated

The concern back in November was more about the government allowing a ‘superbank’ to be created that would be too strong for the competition. The government were complicit in the takeover because they did not want another Northern Rock, for financial, political and operational reasons. Bending the competition rules was a small price to pay.

Lloyds HBOS do have a commanding share market of the UK banking sector so the Competition Commission will have to take a look at the situation once the recession is over. No rush then.

In his inauguration speech yesterday, President Barack Obama reaffirmed the United States’ government’s vow to uphold its constitution and live up to the lofty ideals that support its claim as the world’s greatest nation.

And what exactly are those ideals which were first proposed by Norfolk’s most influential son, Thomas Paine?

American Ideals

The American Declaration of Independence states the every person is born equal and has inalienable (irrevocable) rights to

• life
• liberty
• the pursuit of happiness

American Loss of Authority under Bush

The USA lost much of its moral authority in the Bush years

• re the right to life: consider the killing on 100,000 Iraqi civilians in the pursuit of a ‘regime change’ that is illegal from the standpoint of international law
• re the right to liberty: consider the imprisonment of up to 625 detainees at Guantanamo Bay without trial or any recourse to justice
• re the pusuit of happiness: this is very tangential but consider the Bush regime’s failure to acknowledge global warming as a threat and the refusal to sign the Kyoto agreement: air pollution (I am a little athsmatic) and the disappearance of the Maldives as the oceans rise are certainly inhibitors to my pursuit of happiness

Remaking America

Obama’s message to the world is the adherence to those American ideals:

• On foreign policy, the expediency of the invasion of Iraq is recognized:
  

  “As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: Know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

  We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort — even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan.”

• One of Obama’s first actions was to address the prison at Guantanamo Bay, the executive order states the closure :
  

  “would further the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States and the interests of justice”

  “..the detention facilities at Guantanamo for individuals covered by this order shall be closed as soon as practicable, and no later than one year from the date of this order”

• On climate change:
  

  “With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet.”

One day on the job and the dream is still alive