UK Referendum

Tomorrow is the second ever UK wide referendum.

'At present, the UK uses the 'first past the post' system to elect MPs to the House of Commons. Should the 'alternative vote' system be used instead?

This thread is biased!

Please vote if you can!

I was going to make a topic on this, but I wasn't sure how popular it would be. Anyways, I'm voting 'yes', although I'm starting to think that the 'no' camp will win out.

Yeah, I might vote yes. I'm lazy, anyone want to tell me how one votes?

Funnily enough, I had just read an articl about what effect alternative vote would have:

As statistician here at nef I find it so frustrating that the basic statistical implications of a switch to AV have simply not been discussed. This has frustrated me so much that I have actually spent well over two weeks of my time this year (my own time with no funding!) designing and running simulations on the likely effects of AV on the results of general elections right back to Margaret Thatcher’s victory in 1979. The results were published a few weeks ago for our report The Voter Power Index and showed that AV would mitigate some of the extremes of the First Past the Post (FPtP) system but it would in no way eliminate the problems.

So consider this blog as a myth-busting blog as most of the ‘so-called’ facts being bandied about are certainly statistical exaggerations and many are simply un-truths.

http://www.neweconomics.org/blog/2011/05/03/busting-the-myths-of-the-alternative-vote

http://www.neweconomics.org/publications/the-voter-power-index

Not entirely sure how reputable the whole study is, but it's interesting anyways.

While I believe that more people are opposed to changing the system, I think that a lot of these people will not be bothered to vote against whereas most who want the change will vote (or what's the point?).

I've been led to believe that AV is bad, since people who come in 3rd or whatever can actually win. I won't be voting at all, because I never do. Still, hope AV loses.

Martin_ said:
I've been led to believe that AV is bad, since people who come in 3rd or whatever can actually win. I won't be voting at all, because I never do. Still, hope AV loses.

To flip it on it's head, you could say that FPTP is like giving out the medals at the 1/4 final instead of waiting for the final race to give them out. Again, all you are saying are that the systems are different.

AV is in no way perfect or the 'best' system (which is down to personal view anyway), but to me it makes a lot more sense than FPTP as it means that at least 51% of the people voting will have in some way preferred the person who wins to win compared to the person who comes second etc.

No Shit

Surprised this story broke before the referendum, but not really a surprise that the No Campaign pretty much bull shitted about the costs in their leaflets.

Anything that the BNP and the Daily Mail do not want are fine by me, so I voted Yes. The chance to change politics doesn't come around very often, and this change seems to be for the better. The Mayoral elections around here already use the system to decide.

This picture shows the false claims made in the No Campaign leaflets:
Here

I voted No. I don't really want to get into a big debate as I'm too tired but yeah, I hope No wins.

The FPTP system is so fundamentally flawed and undemocratic that you basically have to be against the whole concept of democracy to want keep it. We only have it because it wasn't a problem when there were only two parties.

I can understand people not wanting AV either, since there is an even better system, but a no result will kill any chance of a change to the system for decades.

A Yes result doesn't guarantee us PR, but it does hinder the anti-democratic, interested elements who have safe jobs and opportunities to exploit under FPTP.

I voted Yes because I would quite like my votes to actually count one day.



( Edited 05.05.2011 21:35 by Raff )

I would have voted No had I gone, because I'd rather have a system where you vote once. Whether that means the current system or a new one, I really don't care.

There's a far better system than AV, I voted No, it wouldn't change anything since constituencies aren't proportional, so therefore we can still have a situation where no-one wins out right.

Plus, why should 2nd or 3rd choices count? Surely if you want a party, or representative to win you'll just vote for them? I know you can just vote for one person and leave it, but the way AV is advertised, it's as if you have to make those other choices, which in turn, when added up, could lead to the ones who had the most 1st votes to loose because loads of people voted for the ones who came in third as their second choice (that's a worst case situation though).

On the other hand, it could totally backfire on the lib-dems and bring either Labour or Conservatives into full power through loads of first and second votes.

In that worst case scenario, surely it's better to have a winner that most people can make a compromise on and put up with, rather than a winner that most people hate?

( Edited 05.05.2011 21:22 by Raff )

But most people vote without knowing what they're voting for, they just like the sound of things and don't actually look at the bad side of it. Most people are like sheep, just following something because it's popular, and not because it's actually good.

Well that's a seperate issue entirely.

And that's the last we'll hear of that.

Cheesing it up said:
And that's the last we'll hear of that.