Why you should vote YES to AV on Thursday:

[tech_guy]

Some good arguments off the BBC site:

 

1. AV makes MPs work harder

It can't be right or fair that with the current system MPs can get elected on fewer than three out of ten votes. The Alternative Vote raises the bar. All MPs would have to aim to get more than 50% of the vote, and so will have to work harder to win - and keep - our support. They'll have to speak to more voters and reach out to the wider community. That's bad news for complacent MPs - and extremists.

2. AV cuts safe seats

While many of us have to worry about our jobs the old system means most politicians don't have to. Most seats are currently so "safe" that their incumbents don't have to worry about re-election. It's no wonder MPs seem remote and unresponsive when their elections are a foregone conclusion. AV reduces the number of safe seats - and "safe" MPs will have to up their game, because they will no longer be able to enjoy "jobs for life" with minority support.

3. AV is a simple upgrade

When politics was a two-horse race in the 1950s the old system worked. But as voters have embraced more parties it's easier for MPs to get in with a handful of votes. AV keeps what is best about our current system - the link between an MP serving their local constituency - and improves on it. Your ballot paper is unchanged, hung parliaments are no more likely, but every MP will have to do more to secure majority support. It's a small but necessary change.

4. AV make votes count

The old system has given MPs license to ignore millions of voters across the country. Parties and politicians just target the few swing voters they need to win, with the last election decided by fewer than 460,000 voters - just 1.6% of the electorate.

AV means you will have more chance of deciding who speaks in your name in Westminster. Just rank the candidates 1,2,3… and you can show your support to anyone you think is up to the job. Then if your favourite candidate can't make it, you can still have a say. There's no longer any need to vote tactically, and more voters in more seats will help decide our elections.

5. AV is our one chance for change

This is the first time we have been given a say on changing the way we do politics in this country. We may not get asked again. On Thursday the choice is simple: if you're happy with business as usual at Westminster, vote No. If you want to change politics for the better, vote Yes.

[Greenbeast]

well said

[JJonas]

purely for the sake of balance Why you should vote No. (also from the BBC site)

 

1. AV is unfair

 

Under the AV system, some people would get their vote counted more times than others. For generations, elections in the UK have been based on the fundamental principle of 'one person, one vote'. AV would undermine all that by allowing the supporters of fringe parties to have their second, third or fourth choices counted - while supporters of the mainstream candidates would only get their vote counted once.

 

2. AV is not widely used

AV is only used by three countries in the world - Fiji, Australia, and Papua New Guinea - and even they don't like it. In Australia, av hasn't made their MPs work any harder, got rid of 'safe' seats, or stopped negative campaigning. By contrast, our first-past-the-post voting system has been copied around the globe. It is used by 2.4 billion people, making it the most widely used system in the world.

 

3. AV is expensive

 

AV would end up costing our country an estimated £250m. This referendum alone is costing us £91m and AV would be a more costly way of running elections. Australia's elections under AV cost three times more than ours do. When preferential voting systems were introduced in Scotland and London, expensive vote counting machines were bought in at a cost of millions. That's without even counting the need for more polling stations and election staff because av ballots take longer to complete.

 

4. AV hands more power to politicians

AV is a politicians' fix and will do nothing to fix our broken politics. By boosting the number of Lib Dem MPs, AV makes hung parliaments more likely - leading to more broken promises, more back-room deals, and more power in the hands of politicians rather than the voters. If AV was the answer to the expenses scandal, why didn't we hear about it at the time and why are Members of the European Parliament abusing their expenses even though they're elected under a different system?

 

5. AV supporters are sceptical

 

Even the Yes campaign think av isn't good enough for our country. Those people telling you it is the best thing since sliced bread have spent years pointing out its flaws. Nick Clegg dismissed it as "a miserable little compromise" while Chris Huhne said "there would continue to be safe seats where the MP will effectively have a job for life". But now they've all changed their tune. AV remains unfair, obscure and expensive and would be bad for our country. That's why people should vote No.

[tech_guy]

And there's another reason for voting YES on Thursday - Cameron wants you to vote NO......

[TechMonkey]

The thing that annoys me about that article is that no thought has gone into it, they have just copied and pasted the guff going around. Like the safe seats, a fair portion of those all ready have over 50% of the vote so they are safe still. The only way this might change is if those are made up of tactical votes. I also don't see how it will make them work harder, they do what they do.

 

Don't even get me started on the No reasons!!!

 

[TechMonkey]

purely for the sake of balance Why you should vote No. (also from the BBC site)

 

1. AV is unfair

 

Under the AV system, some people would get their vote counted more times than others. For generations, elections in the UK have been based on the fundamental principle of 'one person, one vote'. AV would undermine all that by allowing the supporters of fringe parties to have their second, third or fourth choices counted - while supporters of the mainstream candidates would only get their vote counted once.

 

2. AV is not widely used

AV is only used by three countries in the world - Fiji, Australia, and Papua New Guinea - and even they don't like it. In Australia, av hasn't made their MPs work any harder, got rid of 'safe' seats, or stopped negative campaigning. By contrast, our first-past-the-post voting system has been copied around the globe. It is used by 2.4 billion people, making it the most widely used system in the world.

 

3. AV is expensive

 

AV would end up costing our country an estimated £250m. This referendum alone is costing us £91m and AV would be a more costly way of running elections. Australia's elections under AV cost three times more than ours do. When preferential voting systems were introduced in Scotland and London, expensive vote counting machines were bought in at a cost of millions. That's without even counting the need for more polling stations and election staff because av ballots take longer to complete.

 

4. AV hands more power to politicians

AV is a politicians' fix and will do nothing to fix our broken politics. By boosting the number of Lib Dem MPs, AV makes hung parliaments more likely - leading to more broken promises, more back-room deals, and more power in the hands of politicians rather than the voters. If AV was the answer to the expenses scandal, why didn't we hear about it at the time and why are Members of the European Parliament abusing their expenses even though they're elected under a different system?

 

5. AV supporters are sceptical

 

Even the Yes campaign think av isn't good enough for our country. Those people telling you it is the best thing since sliced bread have spent years pointing out its flaws. Nick Clegg dismissed it as "a miserable little compromise" while Chris Huhne said "there would continue to be safe seats where the MP will effectively have a job for life". But now they've all changed their tune. AV remains unfair, obscure and expensive and would be bad for our country. That's why people should vote No.

 

 

ARGGGGHHHHHHHH, you did it!!! You let the cat out of the bag!!!!!

 

1 - It doesn't give someone more than one vote!!! Everyone's vote is counted once but it is like holding lots of rounds of voting all at once. You still only get one vote!!!!

3 - EXPENSIVE!!!!! MPs are expensive, do we have the option of getting rid of them? And where did this fictional number come from? I know lets say that to carry on with FPTP will cost a Trillion Squillion pounds does that mean AV wins?

4 - A voting system can't give someone more powers!! We do, we have to give a damn and choose someone rather than blindly tick a box that has the same old logo we always follow next to it.

5 - Of course they previously said they didn't want AV, everyone wanted PR but those that didn't want it forced a compromise. As for more hung parliaments, we used to have lots of hung parliaments and we still managed to fight a world war or 2 introduce the welfare state and a few other things around the world. FPTP is only suitable in a 2 horse race, once the parties fragment so does the voting meaning people aren't getting what they wanted.

 

Right I'm off to beat a car with a branch!

[localzuk]

purely for the sake of balance Why you should vote No. (also from the BBC site)

 

1. AV is unfair

 

Under the AV system, some people would get their vote counted more times than others. For generations, elections in the UK have been based on the fundamental principle of 'one person, one vote'. AV would undermine all that by allowing the supporters of fringe parties to have their second, third or fourth choices counted - while supporters of the mainstream candidates would only get their vote counted once.

 

Finding it difficult to see an issue here. The opposite of this is 'if you don't choose the winning party, you are entirely unrepresented in government'...

 

2. AV is not widely used

AV is only used by three countries in the world - Fiji, Australia, and Papua New Guinea - and even they don't like it. In Australia, av hasn't made their MPs work any harder, got rid of 'safe' seats, or stopped negative campaigning. By contrast, our first-past-the-post voting system has been copied around the globe. It is used by 2.4 billion people, making it the most widely used system in the world.

 

I'm more interested in quality, not quantity. Fairness, not ease.

 

3. AV is expensive

 

AV would end up costing our country an estimated £250m. This referendum alone is costing us £91m and AV would be a more costly way of running elections. Australia's elections under AV cost three times more than ours do. When preferential voting systems were introduced in Scotland and London, expensive vote counting machines were bought in at a cost of millions. That's without even counting the need for more polling stations and election staff because av ballots take longer to complete.

 

No-one has yet been able to back this up. Australia have been using AV for many years without electronic voting systems. I can see that there'd be a bit more admin overhead, but can't see that it would cost 3 times as much. Bear in mind that Australia is 76m km2, compared to our 244k km2. Geography alone could easily account for extra costs.

 

4. AV hands more power to politicians

AV is a politicians' fix and will do nothing to fix our broken politics. By boosting the number of Lib Dem MPs, AV makes hung parliaments more likely - leading to more broken promises, more back-room deals, and more power in the hands of politicians rather than the voters. If AV was the answer to the expenses scandal, why didn't we hear about it at the time and why are Members of the European Parliament abusing their expenses even though they're elected under a different system?

 

We're getting hung parliaments from the current system, AV neither makes hung parliaments more or less possible. I admit, AV is a compromise, as those who wanted change originally said they wanted a PR system, but it is a good step in the right direction, giving more power to the people by allowing more people to be represented in government.

 

5. AV supporters are sceptical

 

Even the Yes campaign think av isn't good enough for our country. Those people telling you it is the best thing since sliced bread have spent years pointing out its flaws. Nick Clegg dismissed it as "a miserable little compromise" while Chris Huhne said "there would continue to be safe seats where the MP will effectively have a job for life". But now they've all changed their tune. AV remains unfair, obscure and expensive and would be bad for our country. That's why people should vote No.

 

If you had a choice between being stabbed, or being poked with a stick, which would you choose...?

[JJonas]

Sorry I only posted to give balance to the discussion, thats democracy for you every party gets to have their say even if you dont like it.

[Dos_Box]

But if it is that good why do only 3 other countries use it (one of which wants to drop it), and it will lead to more coalition govts where the Lib-Dems get to partner up each time. Anyway, given the vast majority vote one way or another, Labour or Conservative and given that both have more experience than fringe parties at governing voters will still list their prime candidat as first, but won't list the other as second, choosing another random candidate over their dislike of the 'opposition'. The current system does work, because the majority gets to decide who governs. That is democracy.

[Dos_Box]

We really need that politics froum don't we

[localzuk]

But if it is that good why do only 3 other countries use it (one of which wants to drop it), and it will lead to more coalition govts where the Lib-Dems get to partner up each time. Anyway, given the vast majority vote one way or another, Labour or Conservative and given that both have more experience than fringe parties at governing voters will still list their prime candidat as first, but won't list the other as second, choosing another random candidate over their dislike of the 'opposition'. The current system does work, because the majority gets to decide who governs. That is democracy.

 

Why do people always vote 'one way or the other'? Is it because they truly believe in their policies? Or is it because people engage in tactical voting, or think their vote would be wasted if they voted the way they really wanted to? I know I've wanted to vote for smaller parties in elections, but have always felt it is useless. This way, I would be able to vote for them, and still have a backup of one of the big parties should it fail to get someone different in.

 

Also, what has experience got to do with it? Experience is what keeps on getting us into recessions, wars, and other such fun things.

 

The majority does NOT get to decide. We basically have a conservative government, with little bits of Lib Dem in places, and they had far less than 51% of the vote!

 

We really need that politics froum don't we

 

That sounds scary. Kinda like 'eternal flames will burn in here'...

[JJonas]

more balance An A-Z of rubbish arguments from No2AV « Paperback Rioter

[Robz]

And there's another reason for voting YES on Thursday - Cameron wants you to vote NO......

 

Ed Milliband wants us to vote yes "to kick Cameron", is that really the way we want our political future decided? BTW what voting system was used to get him into the leadership seat?....

[TechMonkey]

Ed Milliband wants us to vote yes "to kick Cameron", is that really the way we want our political future decided? BTW what voting system was used to get him into the leadership seat?....

 

That's what really narks me, this shouldn't be a party matter or for political manoeuvring, it shouldn't be to show anyone anything it. It would have taken longer but I think we should have just had a referendum that asked do we need voting reform. That way we can see if there was a want for change or not, it would have been harder to politicise and then we would have had a country response. The way it is now many are voting no as they don't want AV, but they do want reform, voting one way of the other just to show xxx what they think of them or not bothering as it is just a complete bun fight!

[pooley]

This is as clear as mud, either way nothing much will change. I'd prefer a "none of the above" box ala Brewsters Millions Edited May 3, 2011 by pooley

[MK-2]

We really need that politics froum don't we

 

I vote NO

[Bromcom_John]

Ed Milliband wants us to vote yes "to kick Cameron", is that really the way we want our political future decided? BTW what voting system was used to get him into the leadership seat?....

Assuming you were't utilising sarcasm (which is tough to detect on the web sometimes). He was actually voted in using an AV system (albeit only within the labour party membership).

So he is a perfect example of how the system would work.

If no-one has a clear majority in the first count then drop the lowest candidate and count their next choice, rinse and repeat till you get a clear majority.

[CyberNerd]

2. AV is not widely used

 

AV is only used by three countries in the world - Fiji, Australia, and Papua New Guinea - and even they don't like it. In Australia, av hasn't made their MPs work any harder, got rid of 'safe' seats, or stopped negative campaigning. By contrast, our first-past-the-post voting system has been copied around the globe. It is used by 2.4 billion people, making it the most widely used system in the world.

 

The UK did lead the way in first past the post - hundreds of years before the rest of the world adopted it.

Because only a few countries use AV isn't a good argument against it. It is akin to saying we should never have adopted FPTP and a feudal/monarchy/dictatorship system would be better as thats what 'everyone else' used.

[K.C.Leblanc]

I vote NO

 

What's your second choice?

[tech_guy]

I'd vote 'yes' followed by 'no'......

[TechMonkey]

This is as clear as mud, either way nothing much will change. I'd prefer a "none of the above" box ala Brewsters Millions

 

Interesting, I wonder if you submit your vote with no choices if that would show up as a spoiled ballot or as a no choices vote.

 

& while I am randomly thinking I have wondered and not got an answer from anywhere, if you only put down one choice and your party is one of the eliminated ones, does your vote still count as part of the percentage or is it lost?

[GrumbleDook]

With AV you would still also have the option to only choose one person to state a preference for (we need to be careful about what you call a vote and a preference). It is already predicted on both camps and across all parties (at least at local party level for Tory, Labour, Lib Dem and Greens who I have spoken with ... and if they are looking at things then lots of other are too) that it will take a lot of explaining to people that you don't have to fill in all the boxes ... you can choose just one person or two. AV can be (and will be) used to target people into adding 3rd and 4th preference votes for people you would never even consider as a possible MP. If you don't like the policies of a particular party, or disagree with a particular candidate then why on earth would you stick them as 3rd preference? Yet, that is a strong probability as this is one way of people trying to target the extra votes.

 

And when I say votes, there is only ever one vote counted. However, it is traded around due to the preferences system.

 

It is also important to stop people saying (as I have heard a few times on TV for both camps) that you *rank* you preference ... you don't. Rank implies that you have to enter something for all candidates ... see my points above.

 

As for the arguments for and against ... those who say it will not be expensive ... it will cost more that it is costing at the moment until it is tweaked. Since we do not vote each week, it will take some time to do this and I do agree that the costs will be brought back in line (allowing for inflation, etc).

 

AV is a bit of a mess, but so is FPTP. Personally I don't think it will improve politics any ... it will just make it murky in a slightly different way, one which may take a few elections to get to grips with. I would prefer this referendum at a different time, when were aren't in a difficult financial position and where party politics is being used (and abused) to try to sway a very important change to how we select those who make the decisions on how the country is run.

[Domino]

http://www.salamanderorganics.co.uk/av.gif

 

Joking aside, I'd rather see something done to shake up the internal organisation structure - and have a bit more open discourse with politicians.

 

But if AV isn't good we can always go back to FPTP....it doesn't have to be forever. Change is sometimes good :-)

[GrumbleDook]

As an addition (to keep it separate from the yes/no debate and points I have just put up) ... I would also like to see it become compulsory to vote. You can choose to spoil your paper, have a 'none of the above' option, vote for The Official Monster Raving Loony Party (none of these part-timers for me ... if you are going to be mad, then be MAD), or simply vote for your preferred candidate (or candidates, depending on the result of the referendum).

 

If people are going to fight for free speech and free democracy, then it should be enshrined in how the country selects the decision makers (or doesn't, depending on your feelings) that we *all* do our part.

[featured_spectre]

There should be a none of the above....my nan who is German said in Germany back in the 70's a none of the above option was introduced and it was that which made the German ministers fight for their place. There are no safe seats there and you can serve no longer than 5 terms in office at county and state level and you cannot switch counties/states for representation, which means people are limited to 20 years in office at most.