We must have the debate on voting reform

MVC was asked by The Guardian to respond to last week's stories about the leaked review.  This is what we had published online on Comment is Free:

Somewhere out there is a very frustrated civil servant. Charged several years ago with writing what should have been a document at the forefront of our democratic future - a review of the new voting systems Labour has introduced for elections to the Scottish parliament, Welsh assembly, London assembly and European parliament - that person has seen their findings not only sat on by politicians for the past 10 months but also now leaked to an unsympathetic newspaper in an attempt to bury the report once and for all.

If that attempt succeeds, it is the voters of Britain who will be the real losers, denied a discussion of, let alone an actual say in, what they want from politics and what type of electoral system is most appropriate for that.

The public has already been shut out of this process. We did not need the leak to know that the Ministry of Justice's review of electoral systems has been "desk bound", lacking the views or active involvement of voters. But the leak should be a wake-up call to politicians who care about the health of our democracy and to the electorate as a whole to examine in whose interests the current situation really is, and who it is that deserves to be making these fundamental decisions.

It cannot be right that party officials and MPs, the very people whose "tried and tested" ways of working and job security would be most affected by changing the voting system, look like being the final arbiters.

Ironically, the government's past prevarication means the review is out of date even before the final version is printed, with little mention likely of the 2007 set of elections, including Scottish voters' first experience of the single transferable vote. As importantly, the report won't address that most pressing of questions: whether those voting systems that are unchanged - the first-past-the-post elections for English and Welsh local government and for the House of Commons - are still fit for purpose, and, if not, how to reform them.

Our current system accentuates the geographic and social divisions within the nation, and leaves many people without a proper choice or a meaningful contest. Making votes count should be a first step on that process of re-engagement. But it is also a step towards re-building truly national political parties incentivised to campaign and reinvigorate their activist base across a much broader swath of the country.

That is what an increasing number of people within Labour are beginning to recognise, faced with the party's "retreat" from representation in southern England and the knowledge of how long it has taken the Conservatives to re-establish themselves in northern and metropolitan areas. At the same time, others in the party are questioning whether the constant pursuit of voters in marginal seats disadvantages Labour's ability to deliver policies and win arguments that would most benefit its traditional supporters. The recent deputy leadership election also brought some of these issues to the fore.

Gordon Brown now needs to ensure that such discussions, in his party and out in the country, are not closed down but rather are integrated into the constitutional route map that he has set out. In one of his first speeches as prime minister, he called for a "national debate on strengthening our democracy". How he now handles the review's publication, and whether he does indeed open up its findings to some meaningful form of a public dialogue, will be a real test of that commitment.

<- Older

Newer ->

Blogged

Local Things

Postcode

Site Search

For what

Resources

• Activism Hub
• Campaign Materials
• Fun