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The politics and truth of AV is that it achieves very little!

Here we go again, you get debating on Twitter and you run out of space, politics is an all-consuming game.

A final question from one of my debating partners, after which I think we may have to beg to differ!

willwybrow says: @dalewood but you agree that it’s fairer for MP’s to be elected ONLY if they get at least 50% of the vote?

Not necessarily, AV does not actually guarantee a 50% victory for every MP and I am unconvinced about 2nd and 3rd preference, sometimes frivolous, votes changing the outcome of an election, as I have said before FPTP has the nack of delivering a result that mirrors the mood of the country.

For example
With the mess that Labour made and the ineptitude of the Lib Dem’s Cameron should have had a landslide but because he wasn’t brave enough to fight on key Conservative policies such as Immigration, Human Rights, Europe etc he lost momentum and the country just was not sure, hence the current result.

Lie’s is a strong word but there has been some stretching of the truth within the YES campaign, for instance:

  1. It will not guaranty a 50% winner every time
  2. It will not make MP’s work harder, the majority work very hard at the moment
  3. It will not clean up our political system, which is still one of the least corrupt in the world
  4. AV will not do away with safe seats
  5. It WILL give smaller parties power way beyond their political mandate

The real reason the Lib Dem’s are supporting AV is that they believe it will be a stepping stone to full PR, similar to other countries such as Italy, if that were to happen it would be virtually impossible to remove the Lib Dem’s from power, such is the political clout PR gives to the 3rd party and that certainly is not democratic!

The Lib Dem’s also have to remember that the legislation provides that if the YES vote is successful it can still only go forward as the voting system when the equalization of the constituencies has been completed, the two are in tandem, there is a strong chance that Labour and the Lords could block the constituencies bill, at least until after the next general election.

I am fairly open and have listened to all the arguments but have heard nothing convincing from the YES camp, I firmly believe that if we can get the constituencies equalised we will have, in practice, the fairest system in the world in the form of FPTP.

You can put all the theories forward you like about proportionality but in practice FPTP works.

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