I blame Tony Blair

[lovingboth]

Not for the usual reasons but because of the failure to introduce PR when he had the power to do so following 1997. He had said he would, of course.

But Labour went 'Oooh, we've won big' and preferred the certainty of giving the Tories absolute power on just over a third of the vote in future to the certainty of having to share power themselves.

If there are any Labour MPs who would oppose electoral reform, can they please move to Scotland, now?

Comments

[jae]

Didn't both Tony Blair and Nick Clegg break that promise? (If this is something you'd rather not talk about today, I understand.)

This is a good reminder to me, though--my own political party just won a big provincial election in Canada, and needs to be pressured to implement the electoral reforms they have always supported.

-J

[lovingboth]

No. For Clegg, LibDem leader after Blair had gone from Labour, the worst that could be said is that he didn't make enough demands on entering the coalition. A referendum on AV was always going to be a very tough thing to win with a free vote for the Tories to oppose it. It's also a very so-so option in terms of electoral systems. (Like being buried to the waist in shit rather than to the neck...)

The maths didn't add up (and a pile of Labour MPs are fine with having no power now for the hope of power in the future) but Labour were offering AV plus a referendum on STV.

[jae]

I'm actually quite well-versed in UK politics and even more well-versed in the electoral reform world, so I know all this. :) (And I'd actually argue that AV is even worse than FPTP--certainly in Canadian jurisdictions it ends up yielding a less democratic result.)

I don't have a dog in your fight, obviously--I'm just an international political-geek observer who has a lot of British friends--but it was Clegg not making enough demands upon entering the coalition that I was referring to. I've always had a lot of respect for Clegg, but settling for a vote on AV, of all things, really seemed like a huge mistake.

Again, I apologize if this is painful this week--feel free not to respond if you don't feel like getting into all of this with an outsider. God knows I wouldn't want that in a LibDem's shoes.

-J

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure PR would materially improve this election outcome. We'd probably have a Tory plus UKIP coalition on this vote share, which I for one think would be much worse.

[lovingboth]

Hmm, depends on the system and how much people's voting changes with it.

Voting here was pointless, for example, and I don't know what people would do if it wasn't.

[porsupah.livejournal.com]

This, I suspect, lies behind Lord Ashcroft's newfound passion for electoral reform. I'd naturally still support some form of proportional representation, regardless, both out of fairness and the fact that it would open the gates to a great deal more political diversity (in my case, the Greens).