Polly Toynbee highlights a recent Hansard survey which presents findings on the extent of the public’s engagement with politics. Unsurprisingly, it reveals apathy to be the strongest emotion people are feeling about politcs. Fifty five per cent say they know nothing much about politics, and only fifty three per cent say they are certain to vote. The government’s approach to overcoming apathy is a program of ‘instilling civil duty’, as outlined in Jack Straw’s draft Consitutional Renewal Bill this week. Polly, however, believes this will do nothing for political engagement, and worse, it is trying desperately to paper over the cracks in the class system by denying class interests and forces, in favour of attempting to instil a notion that regardless of class, we are all citizens. Radical and distinct policies, with more voter choice is what’s needed, according to Polly. An AV system of ranking candidates, could go some way to enticing people to the polls.

In this article Peter Riddell floats the idea that a switch to AV could be in the interests of the Conservatives. He argues that the key to AV is which is the more unpopular of the two main parties. With the Tories well ahead in the polls, AV introduced for the next election could push Labour further behind electorally. Labour are offering the prospect of AV to entice Lib Dems in the event of a hung parliament. As he argues, however, that there are unlikely to be any quick deals in a hung parliament. The CentreForum think-tank argues that on key policies, the Lib Dems are closer to the Tories than they have been for a long time.

In this article Iain Dale presents a mixed response to the idea of AV for the Commons. On the one hand, he believes that like Tony Blair, Brown is using reform to pursuade the Lib Dems to support a Labour government in the event of crisis for the party. Dale also presents the spectre of a permanent ‘centre-left’ coalition in power if AV were to be adopted. But Dale points out how, if this was Labour’s intention, it has backfired, with reform in Scotland and Wales leading to a loss of the party’s power, and has to a significant extent saved the Tories from extincition in those areas. Dale concludes that if reform to the electoral system is going to happen it must be achieved by consensus amongst the parties, and not through partisan interest.

In this article Mark Bell argues the case for Lib-Con cooperation in the event of a hung parliament in the next election. Cameron will need a swing of 7 per cent to secure a majority (but a swing of 1.5 per cent will deprive Brown of a majority), and in the last one hundred years there has only been two swings as big as the one needed for Cameron to win the election. For decades it has been taken for granted that if the need for cooperation between parties arose, the Lib Dems and Labour would naturally, albeit uneasily, get into bed together. Not so anymore, apparently, as Bell argues. Nick Clegg and Cameron have come to share a significant amount in common, and crucially share a very similar belief in a new kind of politics in which power is ‘post-bureacratic’ and devolved to smaller scales and units. There are many faultlines to this congruence – and they remain in direct opposition to each other in much of the country, but a crucial shift has occurred which means the Lib Dems are closer to the Tories than they have been for 20 years, and subsequently garner a huge advantage for this position.

For links to these news articles see the post A Bumper Day for Press Coverage.