You're the only left-winger I know who's against it, Joe.

Most old tribal labour and trade unions are against.

Beckett I'm very disappointed in. The rest of the Labour politicians against it seem either to be afraid of losing their seats or reactionary old bores like Reid.

I would rather have PR instead of AV (Proportional Representation). Why isn't PR included in this referendum? Is it because the Lib Dems wanted a vote on AV and nothing else?

 

We should be given more choice in the future of our vote here.

No, it's because AV is the only system the Tories would allow a vote on.

 

And I agree that they should have been offering a fairer system, but if we don't vote yes for this one then we won't get a chance to change it again in our lifetimes.

Thanks Peter.

I should have read all the pages in this thread before posting, I usually do but jumped straight in instead.

 

For the first time ever, I'm tempted to spoil my ballot paper and scrawl 'I WANT PR'. Not that it would make a difference to anything.

We cancel each other out PeterCat. Most people I know are concerned that top end new labour are in favour. If they are so keen why don't they feck off and join the Lib Dems?

What makes you think we will have a vote on PR if we accept AV?

I don't understand the "we'll never get another chance!" either.

I didn't I can only assume the yes campaign didn't have the funds to leaflet in my area. I got several 'no' leaflets. 

 

TBH, it's fair to say that neither side has really avoided dirty tricks and lies but the no camp have definitely been worst offenders.

And if those in Labour who are not in favour can feck off and join the Tories!

I strongly hope we get opportunities in future to look again at our options and opportunities of our voting system.

It will hopefully not be allowed to drift away into history.

Because the FPTP lot, if challenged to allow another referendum no matter what the voting system involved, will just say "we had a referendum on this already and people want the status quo".

 

The point is that it opens up the possiblity of changing voting systems in people's minds, instead of just shutting it down by saying "oh the referendum says people want things to stay as they are".

Anyay, I'm about to go off and vote Yes, so thanks for all the debate. See y'all!

But those that don't want PR will just say we had a referendum on this already and people decided they wanted AV. Getting AV doesn't make getting PR more likely.

I suppose that we consider ourselves proper Labour, A faction still doing battle with a bunch of suits parachuted in from somewhere who seem to want to impose their views on us without debate. Call me old fashioned but my job is to make a labour government more likely not to provide succour to the LibDems.

Well I consider myself left-wing, no longer a supporter of any mainstream party. We've had over 30 years of continuous right-wing government and I've had enough of the lot of them. Anything which makes the system fairer is right, in my eyes.

I still don't understand this "fairer system" argument. None of the pro-yes gadjies have been able to demonstrate this. It's a myth put on the agenda by the LibDems to benefit the LibDems. We thought they were shieght! We were right! I wouldn't like to make any predictions. It's not over yet. But hopefully they'll lose the vote, collapse, and panic, thus leading to the coalition (sic) downfall.

I voted against AV ,stick it to Clegg.

I will have one last go, Joe, then I'm leaving this thread since, for now, it's all become academic.

 

In a two-party system, then FPTP is fair because a winning candidate HAS to get more than 50% of the votes polled. However, in a multi-party system, a candidate can be elected on a far smaller proportion of the votes. It's ridiculous that an MP or other politician is supposed to represent an area where over half the votes went against them. You may think that's a fair system, I don't.

Far better if you'd voted for it and stuck it to Cameramoron.

 

*crosses everything* 

I couldn't bare the thought of Clegg winning the AV vote.That smug look on his face.Couldn't do it.

Hopefully Clegg is on his way out.

But that means you are still looking at AV in terms of the present government only.

 

Whatever the outcome of the referendum it is going to be in force for many elections yet, what about them?

 

PS I know we're not all going to get the result we want from this, but are you happy to be 'stuck' with a system that you might  find in hindsight might have been better if you'd voted the other way purely because you were only thinking of how it will affect the PRESENT government.

The last time we had a referendum was in the mid 70's, the next time I'll probably be pushing 70

Looks like the Tories are going to win this one too

I know what you are saying is right,I should have looked at the bigger picture,I just couldnt give the man what he wants,I could not vote Yes.

I enjoyed the line in the Grauniad today. AV, a LibDem solution for a problem the vast majority weren't aware of.

eton college 1 - westminster school 0

never mind, hoping my future grandkids live in the same area as their ideology so they get a meaningful vote (if they can be assed to vote)

Agree

We in the North East rejected it out of hand and only a small percentage of us are Harrovians, Etonians, Wykehamists, etc. Though we have some nice comps.

AV wasn't the Lib Dem solution, it was the solution imposed on them by the Tories.  Clegg and his party would have taken full PR in a heartbeat over AV. 

 

Shame he was too busy thinking about his new career as Britain's highest paid tea boy at the time to walk away from a deal that any fool could have seen was a Tory stitch up.

it's ok. i'm taking great solice from the jubilation of the 'no' voters celebrating that nothing has happened. clegg is a numpty, but cameron is the problem!

Our rubbish right wing press are calling it a "Victory for Democracy".

 

Some victory for democracy when almost a million people can vote for a party yet it gets no MPs, where a party can form a government with an unassailable majority on 35% of the vote, most MPs sit in jobs for life, where the majority of votes are wasted, where the election can be won or lost by around 500,000 people changing from Tory to Labour or vice versa in the marginals.

Under the system used  for the Scottish Parliament elections, Labour got 15 of the 73 FPTP seats, and 22 of the 56 regional places via the Additional Member System .

We went on the weakest link basis. There is a great deal of material. For just one example, were you happy with the idea of Cameron deciding how long he would be in power? Don't you want to attack? Don't you want to undermine the coalition? Don't you want to put the fear of God within the LibDems? Sometimes, of course, we think politicians in that London are just living in some sort of fantasy land and have no idea what's happening out in the sticks.

Clegg was offered PR if he went with Brown,he went with the Tories instead, in the knowledge that the Tories would never agree to political reform.

 

well if scotland goes it's own way, less of the english left of centre sticks will have any voice under fptp. welcome to true blue england.