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September 26, 2006
Are Labour finally about to call for a referendum on electoral reform?
Jack Straw, Peter Hain and Alan Milburn, no small players them, have all apparently come out in favour of the Alternative Vote for elections to the House of Commons.
From the Independent:
Jack Straw, the Leader of the Commons, told a Labour conference fringe meeting organised by The Independent that he had "no problem" with a move away from the traditional system for choosing MPs if it was approved by a referendum.
Mr Straw, who has always been regarded as a staunch opponent of electoral reform, backed a move to the alternative vote system, under which voters can express a preference for several candidates in each seat.
Peter Hain, the Northern Ireland Secretary and a contender for Labour's deputy leadership, repeated his call for the first-past-the-post system to be replaced with the alternative voting system, which has become central to his campaign for the Labour deputy leadership.
They were joined by the former health secretary Alan Milburn, a leading Blairite figure in the party, who also backed a move to an alternative vote system for Westminster.
Mr Hain: "I have always supported the alternative vote ... But we should not hand down policies such as this from on high. The type of electoral reform we support should be a product of real debate in the party and in the country."
So there we go. Is a referendum on the way? A Brown premiership is looking increasingly likely to at least give it some thought, and if one of the above, or Alan Johnson, ends up as his deputy, the chances are greater still.
Backers of the system say it would retain the traditional link between MPs and their local constituencies, but produce a result at Westminster more in keeping with public opinion.
And that's where it gets a bit tricky. It all depends how one measures public opinion, of course, but it's debatable that at the last election the nation really wanted a Labour government strong enough to act in the way it has over the last year and a bit. Under AV, it would have been an awful lot stronger, which makes the claim for 'keeping with public opinion' a bit dubious. Being able to rank candidates is a move in the right direction – it enhances voter choice, means candidates, by having to campaign for second- and third-preferences, aren't so encouraged to simply sully their opponents, and it does a better job of keeping extremists in their place.
However, with single-member constituencies, the nationwide result can get terribly distorted. Safe seats still abound, with the distinct possibility that more get even safer. On the whole, its advantages over FPTP are hard to discern. The only advantage it's worth getting excited about is the possibility that, were it open to debate, its shortcomings would come to the fore, and by the time a referendum came around, we'd get the better option, i.e. STV.
STV's multi-member constituencies scare supporters of AV, who think that voters feel a stronger attachment to, say, an arbitrary 20 per cent chunk of Manchester, rather than Manchester as a whole.
Either that, or there're more sinister motives at work.
The clue's in the title
At the fringe meeting titled "How do Labour win a fourth term?"…
If you aren't likely to win enough seats for a fourth term under the current system…
With the Labour party in the state it's currently in, AV is the single best chance they have of winning a working-majority fourth term (possibly after introducing the change as a short-term minority government following a hung parliament and no coalition deals). If they managed to secure a change to AV before the next general election (and I doubt they'd even try), there is the chance that voters would desert them in their thousands, as they saw the change as a cynical move to keep them in power, a la Berlusconi. Which is why the change, if it comes, will come from a referendum. It's not cynical if the people sanction it.
UPDATE: Polly briefly mentions that we should switch to AV now. History would suggest probably for much the same reasons that Hain & Co. want it, but you never know...
Posted by pauldavies on September 26, 2006
Comments
Here's how have e-mailed Polly Toynbee:
Dear Ms Toynbee,
Good to see a commentator at least mentioning the electoral system. If there is one thing that stands out during the period of the Labour conference it is the complete ignoring of NEW Labour's outstanding commitment to hold a referendum on how we should elect our representatives ie to take the decision out of the hands of the politicians and put it in the hands of the electorate where it belongs.Unfortunately most people seem to be ignorant of the fact that such a commitment even exists which of course reflects the fact that commentators in general and the BBC in particular never even mention it - much less the NEED for reform.
I have come round to the view that if Labour is not to risk losing the next election they should indeed without delay introduce AV, which would not need time-consuming boundary changes. AV would at least represent the WEIGHT of left-of-centre opinion without, as under FPTP, our having the absurd situation under which a constituency where a majority votes left-of-centre can land up being "represented" by a right-wing Tory. However, I cannot agree that AV would give a chance to small parties. LibDems might benefit in some constituencies but I cannot imagine the Greeens benefitting - the only benefit would be that Greens' later preference votes would go to either Labour or LibDems and not split the left-of-centre vote - but Green policy would still not be represented.
The main immediate advantage of AV is that it would certainly keep out the Tories. Better another NEW Labour government than the return of the Tories. And we could hope that the change in electoral system would excite interest and lead to the evolution of AV - ie STV in single-member constituencies - into STV in multi-member constituencies. So in general I'm happy to agree with you!
Best wishes
J Patterson
Posted by: Joe Patterson at September 26, 2006 11:44 AM
Interesting. Peter Facey recently said that PR may be a mitigating factor in answering the West Lothian Question.
Presumably he meant that the better balance that resulted from PR would mean that answer to the West Lothian Question could be deferred to a later date.
Might this reasonning feature in Brown's constitutional plans; muddy the waters a lttle to distract people from the fact that he is Scottish?
Posted by: Gareth at September 26, 2006 07:56 PM
The WLQ can probably be indefinitely postponed anyway, because not that many people outside of Westminster really give a toss about it.
But yes, PR would make 'dealing with the WLQ' even less important, as the idea of undue influence around parliament as a whole would be largely diminished.
Not sure that electoral reform would muddy the waters enough to make people forget Brown is a Scot, though: nationality is a much easier concept to grasp.
Posted by: Paul Davies at September 27, 2006 11:23 AM
Well, I suppose we shall see how many people give a toss about it if and when Gordon Brown becomes prime minister.
It's true that the issue is not very high up on the publics' political radar but I think that it is an issue that increasing bothers people.
I also think that the lack of devolution to England is something that will complicate constitutional reform. It's difficult to implement reform on a state doesn't yet know whether it is centralist, federal or quasi-federal. We shall see.
Nationality is not a difficult concept to grasp. The anomally of Scottish MPs voting on legislation that their constituents have mandated an MSP to represent them on is a rather more difficult concept to grasp. It may be that the obvious nationality of Brown - rather than the fact that he sits in a Scottish seat - is what crystallises this issue. If that's the case then it's a shame that constitutional unfairness must wait for anti-Scottish sentiments to rise before someone does something about it.
Posted by: Gareth at September 27, 2006 02:43 PM
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