Back in January I posted about the AV referedum with a reasonably open mind. Since then I've become more convinced that AV is a far superior system than first past the post. I don't mind publicly saying so.
AV will mean fewer safe seats, and more marginal seats which means elections won't be fought just in a few isolated places. True, the difference is quantitative, not qualitative. But it is an improvement. MPs will need to work harder to secure the public's vote.
AV will also mean more genuine choice. You won't be forced to vote for only two or three main parties. You can vote for who you really want, knowing the vote won't be wasted. No more tactical voting. If you're happy with the bigger parties, this might not convince you, but if you could imagine voting for smaller parties (or you at least want the option) then AV will allow you too.
AV will mean that extremist parties will be less likely to get into power, because the vast majority oppose them.
And AV is not comlicated. Even if it was, it's hardly a good argument. A one-party state is simple, a dicatorship is simple.
But AV is not complicated. It's the same as we use in the X Factor, or Britain's Got Talent. It's not simply the person with the most votes on week one who wins. It's the person who gets the least votes who's elimated, (OK they do make it a bit more complicated that that for dramatic purposes involving judges etc, but that's the basic system).
AV is just like a number of rounds of elections (weeks on Britain's Got Talent), when the person with the least votes is eliminated. It's just instead of it happening several times, it all happens at once so we don't have the cost of several rounds of elections.
Putting a "1" by JEdward and a "2" by Diversity is just like voting for JEdward but they get elimated so in the final you vote for Diversity. It's a simple system, a system used by most organisations I belong to, a system that MPs use to elect their leaders. If it's good enough for them, why isn't it good enough for us?
Oh, and, this is cute too:
AV will mean fewer safe seats, and more marginal seats which means elections won't be fought just in a few isolated places. True, the difference is quantitative, not qualitative. But it is an improvement. MPs will need to work harder to secure the public's vote.
AV will also mean more genuine choice. You won't be forced to vote for only two or three main parties. You can vote for who you really want, knowing the vote won't be wasted. No more tactical voting. If you're happy with the bigger parties, this might not convince you, but if you could imagine voting for smaller parties (or you at least want the option) then AV will allow you too.
AV will mean that extremist parties will be less likely to get into power, because the vast majority oppose them.
And AV is not comlicated. Even if it was, it's hardly a good argument. A one-party state is simple, a dicatorship is simple.
But AV is not complicated. It's the same as we use in the X Factor, or Britain's Got Talent. It's not simply the person with the most votes on week one who wins. It's the person who gets the least votes who's elimated, (OK they do make it a bit more complicated that that for dramatic purposes involving judges etc, but that's the basic system).
AV is just like a number of rounds of elections (weeks on Britain's Got Talent), when the person with the least votes is eliminated. It's just instead of it happening several times, it all happens at once so we don't have the cost of several rounds of elections.
Putting a "1" by JEdward and a "2" by Diversity is just like voting for JEdward but they get elimated so in the final you vote for Diversity. It's a simple system, a system used by most organisations I belong to, a system that MPs use to elect their leaders. If it's good enough for them, why isn't it good enough for us?
Oh, and, this is cute too:
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