Brian The Dog on 6/5/2011 at 09:04
Apart from the errant statistics being banded around by the "No" campaign, their most effective campaign message has been Nick Clegg. He's appeared in lots of their adverts, with slogans like "If you have AV then things like THIS are much more likely!". Considering the kicking the LibDems are getting in the polls at the moment, I don't blame them for going down this route, the party is unpopular and it's given them a 10% swing over the past few months. Just a shame it's been such a negative campaign.
Edit - Nicker, I think that's been the problem over here too (apart from the main desirer of the campaign being so unpopular, anyway!) - the Yes campaign never really engaged with the voters or explained things simply. It looks like it's going to stay FPTP for at least the next few parliaments.
d0om on 6/5/2011 at 10:32
They could at least give us AV for local elections, in some wards near me the vote went 26%/25%/25%/24% to Various combinations of Labour/LibDem/Conservatives/Greens. At least with AV we would know who people actually wanted rather than just getting essentially random people chosen based on who you think other people will vote for.
steo on 6/5/2011 at 12:29
Good to see that TTLG is so level-headed in regards to AV. Of course, a lot of the people here who would vote no, probably don't care enough to bother posting in this thread.
Unfortunately, the referendum will (
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/04/av-poll-indicates-defeat-yes-campaign?INTCMP=SRCH) almost certainly fail. This, coupled with the redrawing of constituency boundaries, probably ensures that the Tories will win the next general election - unless the coalition falls apart first, which is probably more likely than ever now.
It seems to me that if the majority of people had a decent understanding of politics and how each system works, the referendum would easily go through, but I reckon a very sizeable number of voters, particularly younger voters, don't even understand the current system. I have in the past explained to people the system of proportional representation - saying that every vote in the country is added up and if a party gets 30% of votes nationwide, they get 30% of the seats in parliament - to have them then ask 'but isn't that how the current system works?'
A discussion with some friends lead us all to the conclusion that the greatest thing we could do for democracy in this country would be to introduce a compulsory GCSE in politics. Obviously this would be a far from perfect way of teaching people how to vote in their own best interests - as opposed to their newspaper's best interests - but it would be a massive step in the right direction.
d0om on 6/5/2011 at 13:26
Indeed, if people don't understand how ridiculously unfair and un-democratic FPTP is, then there is little hope for change.
I remember when I was 7 the teachers in my school told us instead of them simply choosing who would star in the school nativity, they would let us vote. However, they would choose the candidates. They then proceeded to choose 1 candidate from the other class in our year-group, and 2 from my class.
Since we had somewhat tribal loyalties to our class aged 7, predictably my class split its vote in some ratio (70:30ish) between its two candidates, while the other class voted 100% for its one candidate, resulting in a win.
Then then protested that this wasn't in any way a fair election, that they rigged it and might have well just picked the person they wanted in the first place. Everyone else in my class seemed to just think it was OK as we voted...
This scaring childhood memory of the injustice of FPTP is why I am quite so keen on AV!
Matthew on 6/5/2011 at 13:35
Turnout is poor in Northern Ireland, in the mid 50s by some estimates.
And Scotland is indeed brave.
steo on 6/5/2011 at 19:47
Fuckin' lost. Predictably.
Matthew on 6/5/2011 at 22:31
The parental units voted no. I have taken to sarcastically calling them after ancient Prime Ministers in derision.
ffox on 7/5/2011 at 15:53
The children units voted No!
steo on 7/5/2011 at 16:42
What are you sarcastically calling them now?
