Rights and wrongs - could he be right?

In common with the originator of the blog, I've not always had a significant amount of time for the current Prime Minister, and whilst thoroughly enjoying the ridiculous overreaction from various humourless feminist prigs to his put down of the appalling Angela Eagle, his performances in the Commons have generally been well below that of even William Hague in the first post landslide Parliament of 1997 to 2001. That combined with his concessions to leftist opinion, attempting to woo the likes of Polly Toynbee had many of us concerned that he wasn't really a Conservative at all. Indeed very few UKIP supporters who have defected from the Tories since 2006 or ex Tories who were eligible then, of my acquaintance didn't vote for David Davis in the Leadership election that brought Cameron to prominence. Nevertheless, despite what appeared to be a disappointing performance in last year's General election, where faced with the worst government in recorded history possibly anywhere in the world, he failed to deliver an overall majority, being forced into a coalition with political opportunists par excellence the Liberal Democrats perhaps it will be the man from the Bullingdon club who has the last laugh. Although with serious misgivings in the end I think most reasonable people probably gave some thanks for his ending 13 years of quite literal hurt at the hands of the Blair/Brown administrations and reinstating a government which comprised at least a majority of Conservative MPs.

However, as some Leftist bloggers pointed out yesterday, he may have played the proverbial blinder, and it would appear to be his critics on the right who have misjudged both him and the public mood. Consider that even with a 400,000 strong march against the cuts(before they diverted to bash in the Local Santander), huge swathes of the populace dependent on state aid (either directly or indirectly), and a massively hostile media (at least the portion of it being funded by a £170 stipend on every household in the land) Cameron's vote has held steady. With the economic clouds worsening, he looks to have come in with 37 per cent of the vote. Given the state of the Tory Party even after Michael Howard's sterling efforts in 2005, this is no mean achievement, and even the most churlish naysayer has to acknowledge that the party probably wouldn't be here with Howard, Duncan Smith or Davis at the helm.

So, the question is, has Cameron's lurch to the left actually been a masterpiece of strategy? By inviting the Liberal Democrats into government he has enasured that they have acted as a lightning rod for much of the criticism from the usual suspects on the hard left. If I had one comment on the wisdom of his strategy, it was that he has spent far too much time trying (at least whilst in opposition) cosying up to the likes of Polly Toynbee and indeed the entire 'democratic left'. As Thatcher learned, basically trying to appease these people from a conservative standpoint is frankly as fruitless as trying to placate a crocodile by offering it your hand. The organisers of the so-called 'march for the alternative' would have us believe that a small group of malcontents were responsible for the violence that seems to accompany every such march in London. However, I think anyone studying Marxism or indeed Leninism as a historical philosophy will know that the use of criminal elements to undermine the existing system is a key aspect of Hard leftist philosophy, especially if the forces opposing the violence are 'reactionary elements'

Anyhow, Ed Miliband's dismal performance in Scotland gives Cameron an opportunity to press ahead with urgent redrawing of the constituencies maps to redress the balance which was skewed massively in favour of Labour over the past 13 years. One of the ironies of the left's portrayal of this government as extreme right is it suggests they see politics through the prism of the 1980 Inner London Education Authority, an organisation so barking that Trotskyites were considered 'the right'. If Cameron looks carefully at trying to limit the franchise, and adopts a more cautious policy towards Europe bringing disaffected UKIP supporters into the fold he might well be able to break the 40% mark, and as the aforementioned Miss Toynbee suggests:'A long period of Conservative hegemony' . One can only hope that this might indeed be the case and that Cameron continues to confound his right wing critics by delivering electoral success in spite of my significant misgivings. With any luck, it could lead Toynbee, the appalling Brian Reade and other members of the 'democratic left' to more amenable shores, perhaps even here if they're feeling the need for some comfort from 'ideological brothers in arms' .

Last thoughts on AV: bad question, sad answer

Well, the AV referendum was lost by about 70% to 30%.

My erstwhile friend Tom Clark of the Guardian offers - like a vastly more erudite Jason Donovan - 10 good reasons why Yes lost. I won't duplicate that here because it's a fantastic analysis and I've covered a lot of similar ground in previous posts anyway. Instead I'll offer some thoughts on why AV was the wrong question to ask - and where future efforts at voting reform might go from here.

AV is a piece-of-cack voting system, really, mainly because it's too similar to First Past the Post to get far enough away from the huge problems with that system. Most obviously, it's not proportional. As the main (and justified) complaint of the Lib Dems (and before them, the Alliance, and before them, the Liberal Party) about the British electoral system was that it was not proportional, it's a bit odd that they settled on a referendum on a system that didn't address their main complaint. "Ah", the Lib Dems will tell you, "but the Tories weren't offering that." Fine - they should have said "no deal" then. And then allowed the Tories to go ahead with a minority govt. They would be in a far, far better place now had they done that. It would have been the Tories, not the Lib Dems, who lost 700 local council seats today.

In the event, the main pragmatic argument from the Lib Dems for voting yes to AV was that it was a stepping stone to further reform later on. But that would imply that AV was a more proportional system than FPTP - and there is no strong evidence for that. So therefore, the 'stepping stone' argument was always shaky. As was the argument for voting yes on its own terms. It was a fuzzy, confused campaign, for a "miserable compromise", neither-this-nor-that voting system. And that, coupled with the inept way the campaign was put across and the uniquely catastrophic contribution of Nick Clegg, did for it.

So what next for electoral reform? Unless we get a freak result where a shrunken Lib Dem party can nonetheless hold the balance at the next general election, it's going to be a long while before they're in a position to demand a PR referendum - and even less likely that anyone will agree to it. So it's down to the other smaller parties in that case - particularly the Greens and UKIP. And if we're looking to those guys to hold the balance of power in a hung parliament - it's gonna take a while to happen. Current MP totals: Greens - 1, UKIP - zero. The best chance for PR is that one party becomes so dominant (the Tories for example) that there is an 'anyone-but-Tory' electoral pact across hundreds of constituencies to vote in MPs who will legislate for a PR system, followed by fresh elections. Possible... but hard to pull off.

But if this wretched referendum has had any value, it's the way the "Fib Dems" have become a salutary lesson to any third party that thinks it can sell out principles for quick power, and play fast and lose with its voters. Any third force emerging in the future - and I think the Greens are most likely - will have to act with much more principle than the Fib Dems to be taken seriously. And that, in the end, is a good thing.

Lies, Damned Lies and Chris Huhne

With the referendum only a day away, as per Giroscopers request, the Yes side has come out with various forms of calumnies and gone down low and dirty to try and pull out all the stops for a Yes vote.He launched into an attack on Monday portraying opponents of AV as on a par with Donald Trump and the 'birthers' making such a mockery of Republican pretensions to the presidency .





Whence this notion comes from is hard to explain. However, whilst it might take someone of Giroscoper's somewhat paranoid mindset to elicit the true motives of Nick Clegg's pushing alternative vote, the reason behind Huhne's motives are easy to discern. Perhaps one of the least enthused about the coalition, despite his cabinet position, it isn't much of a stretch to see him positing a leadership challenge, partly because:





A/ He thinks he probably should have been leader anyway. According to the analysis of results of the 2007 election (which he lost to Clegg) which include late delivered postal ballots he would have won by a very narrow margin. Had the Royal Mail been more efficient, could the country have taken a very different turn?

B/ By coming out with public attacks on the Conservatives within the coalition, he is no doubt hoping he can tempt back Libdem voters (who have proven their socialist credentials by defecting en masse to Labour) by some kind of 'John of the Cross' routine, wherein he can say, I tried to disassociate myself from it' and 'it's all Clegg's fault.' . It may not be a bad idea from the Libdem perspective to do this, as they risk suffering the fate of their 19th century predecessors who split over Irish home rule to the extent that the 'Liberal Unionists' were absorbed by the Tories .

However, where Huhne's attack falls down is in its somewhat simplistic portrayal of the Tories as mindless opponents of democratic reform 'throughout the ages'. Even a cursory look at any 19th century or early 20th century summary of British political history will reveal the Leading opponent of democracy (who many would say based on New Labour has been almost completely vindicated)Robert Lowe was actually a Liberal, and the Prime Minister who passed the second Great Reform Act, Benjamin Disraeli was a Conservative!

I'm afraid it's also difficult to take anyone seriously whose attitude to the EU is 'right or wrong, Europe is right'. Someone who supinely stood by whilst the EU took away our fishing industry. Someone who sided immediately with European partners behaving illegally against Commmonwealth nations whose soldiers died to protect this nation's freedom. Someone who doesn't believe in putting important constitutional questions on Europe to the people. So when Huhne picks the pieces out of the probable 'No' vote on Thursday night, he might care to look not at his 'coalition' partners, but perhaps himself, for the main reason as to why that is.

Why Nick Clegg WANTS to lose the AV referendum

With polls now pointing to either a fairly big or a very big win for No in Thursday's AV referendum, it's a huge pity that Nick Clegg didn't heed the Yes campaign's advice to seal himself inside a box for six weeks during the run-up to polling.

I'm not saying that everything would have been free and easy for the Yes people if Clegg had kept shtum. As explained in a recent post, their campaign has been largely crap. But continual speeches and media appearances on the Yes to AV theme from the UK's least popular frontline politician are, to borrow a vivid expression from US-based conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, a "turd in the punchbowl"... no-one is going to want to drink a fresh cup of AV after Clegg has just taken a dump in it.

Ed Miliband, to his credit, realised this, and has only appeared on stage with members of the Lib Dems who he believes have some public credibility left: e.g. Charles Kennedy, Shirley Williams, and more questionably, Vince Cable. But the Yes campaign have been powerless to stop Clegg from getting out there and pulling the vote down.

Which raises an interesting political question. Clegg must know that everytime he appears in public to endorse AV, the Yes vote takes another dive. And he's not obviously stupid. A liar and a closet Tory, yes, but not stupid. So why the hell is he out there for the Yes campaign?

It could just be vanity (not in short supply among several senior Lib Dems, to be sure). On the other hand, it could be that Clegg actually wants Yes to lose. On the face of it this would seem somewhat bizarre, but if you think about it some more, it starts to make sense:

• Clegg described AV as a "miserable little compromise" last year when it was in the Labour 2010 manifesto. He showed no particular enthusiasm for the system at any point before the coalition negotiations. We can conclude, therefore, that he probably thinks it's a fairly poor system.
• Although much of the research that has been done on AV suggests that it would increase the proportion of Lib Dem MPs (John Curtice at Strathclyde University, Nic Marks at the new economics foundation, the simulations run for the Jenkins Commission in the late 1990s) this is not a universally held view. Peter Kellner of YouGov, for instance, argues that the simulation research is flawed because it doesn't tell you how voters would modify their behaviour if the system changed - and if they did modify their behaviour, the Lib Dems could actually end up worse off. (the link to the Kellner piece is here - kind of: Prospect magazine haven't even managed to provide unique URLs for their election blog posts...) It could well be that Clegg and his advisers also believe that AV won't actually help the Lib Dems, so Clegg is actually deliberately damaging the campaign.
• It's possible that if the Lib Dems lose AV then Dave Cameron may offer them additional concessions on other policies as a consolation prize - maybe an elected House of Lords, further changes on the NHS bill, etc. So the Lib Dems may get more of an influence on the direction of the govt by losing the AV vote. Conversely, if there is a Yes vote it would result in the Tory right being mightily pissed off and Cameron might well have to legislate for other things that the Lib Dems don't want - tax breaks for marriage, for example - to keep his right wing sweet.

So in short, the arguments for a Yes vote from the Lib Dems' (or at least Clegg's) point of view are far weaker than they seem. Another factor is that defeat on electoral reform is another way of Clegg distancing himself from the old liberal reformist tendencies of the Liberal Democrat rank and file. Clegg has already spent somewhat less time than his predecessors as Lib Dem leader extolling the virtues of electoral reform; it's taken a back seat to extreme right wing 'Orange Book' policies such as public sector privatisation (in the guise of "reform") and "fairer taxes" (meaning that we'll raise the income tax personal allowance while also increasing VAT so that poorer households pay more tax). This could be yet another part of Clegg saying to people he regards as middle class soft-left handwringers: This Is Not The Party For You. Bugger off to Labour or the Greens. We want the right wing libertarians.

The ConDem govt so far has been about as Orange Book in outlook as Clegg could have hoped for: although it has failed to do anything about any of the excesses of the Nu Labor police state (for example, see pre-emptive arrests of "protesters" before the Royal Wedding took place). But then, civil liberties tend to be one of those issues which the opposition gets excited about but then drops as soon as they get into govt. Like electoral reform. On economic policy, this is an Orange Book right-wing Lib-Con administration with hints of Sarkozy-esque populism thrown in (e.g. North sea oil tax grab), thanks to the opportunism of the Osborne/Alexander team. That's where Nick Clegg wants to be, with a transfer to a safe Tory seat at the end of his 5 years if the Fib Dems stay at rock-bottom in the polls. And it's why he's deliberately undermining the Yes vote - because why Rock The Boat when it's moving in the direction you want already?

The last rites for AV?

Worth considering the seismic shift in intentions revealed by the recent ICM poll showing a 16% lead for the 'No' campaign in the referendum for a change in the voting system. Never mind the merits of the various polling orgnisations. Lest we forget according to even the most generous poll, Major was obliterated in 1992 by Kinnock, by at least 50 seats, except we all know that did not happen. And mercifully Britain didn't go into the Euro under Kinnock/Smith. Then I think the anti-cuts lobby would really have something to go crazy about. Look at Greece and Ireland.

Perhaps one of the main reasons why I think the opponents of change (almost always derided as reactionary) have the upper hand is that proponents of PR are never really able to define what PR actually is Just a brief summary from the web's most readily consultable reference source reveals about 15 different systems.

I am assuming Giroscoper would like STV rather than AV, although he may perhaps prefer LD or MMS. Just going through the bewildering array of acronyms perhaps makes one nostalgic for a taste of LSD to induce hallucination.

STV, regardless of what proponents say is significantly more complex to understand than FPTP. It seems designed for two purposes: 1/ to eliminate representation for the BNP, whose second place votes are likely to be negligible (I know almost no UKIP or ED supporters who would vote BNP - most would rather abstain than tar themselves with such a brush) 2/ to maximise support for the equally dangerous Green party, whose second preferences (as revealed by the London assembly) elections are usually very high. Perhaps a function of how effective their propaganda is, this fundamentally misanthropic, basically almost stalinist organisation has persuaded a number of otherwise intelligent people of its relative harmlessness. However, scratch beneath the green veneer and you find a vein of the deepest red, true heirs to the spirit of Beria .

Ironically, as revealed by the european elections, the much derided UKIP would probably be the main beneficiary.Despite being dismissed by the BBC (who cost every household more than £100)as a 'minor party', they actually outpolled the Greens by more than 3 to 1 at the last general election nationwide. Anyhow, it looks like a combination of misinformation, the presence of Nick Clegg in the pro AV lobby, and a lack of clarity about just what people are saying 'Yes' to has scuppered PR for now. Rest assured, though, its proponents won't give up after this setback.

The moment I knew YES was going to lose the AV referendum

I've recently become convinced that NO is going to win the AV referendum on 5th May. This isn't because of the recent ICM poll showing No with a 16 point lead. While the movement from a narrow Yes lead before Christmas to a strong No lead now is impressive, I place little store in ICM polling on anything because their headline voting intention numbers are ludicrously biased towards the Fib Dems (who poll 15% on ICM but 10% or less with YouGov or other pollsters) and away from Labour (who poll 42-45% on YouGov but 35-37% on ICM). It is quite simple really: the ICM numbers are made up by the Guardian's extreme right wing political commentator, Julian Glover. I think it's sad that a once-venerable institution like the Guardian allows Glover to get away with shit like this, but there you go. If I was the editor, he'd be toast.

No, what swung it towards No for me was finding sane, rational folks like Chris Brooke and Duncan Weldon moving into the No camp (or at least towards it). I'd expect to find reactionary representatives of Ye Olde Politiks (on both sides of the House), conspiracy theorists, English Democrats, birthers, press barons, Ku Klux Klan serving hot soul food and the band playing "In the Mood", etc. in the No Camp. Like Mos Eisley space port it is a wretched hive of scum and villainy, despite the absence of blasters. But when people like Duncan and Chris move into the encampment... you know Yes has lost it.

I think the main reason that Yes is losing is that they have failed to get Down And Dirty with the campaign in the way that No have. I mean, just look at the No2AV leaflet (one came through our door yesterday): intellectually aimed at the level of an amoeba ("the person that gets the most votes should win the election" - but that DOES happen under AV kids, it's just that the votes are counted differently? HELLO?!) it is consequently good at banging home a simple message to the brain-dead component of the electorate. It also has the MASSIVE advantage of being able to put a big picture of Nick Clegg on the back cover (holding his tuition fees pledge, ho ho) with the slogans "AV leads to broken promises" and "the only vote that would count under AV would be Nick Clegg's". And thus, the man who is deservedly the most unpopular politician in Britain today derails yet another progressive cause.

Yes2AV, by contrast, haven't used their gut punches well. I'd have gone all out and said this was a referendum on whether we want the Tories in forevermore through boundary rigging and gerrymandering. I'd have pointed to the shady big money funding the No campaign. And I'd have put a VERY SMALL picture of Clegg on the cover and said "don't let this slimy punk spoil our chance for change." Yes kids, given the opportunity I could have designed a molotov cocktail of a leaflet which would have knocked the machinations of the No effort into a cocked hat.

Instead we got a truly daft Referendum Broadcast with unintelligible people with megaphones shouting at an Evan Harris(?!) lookalike, and no proper arguments either for AV or against FPTP articulated. No wonder Yes is losing.

There's no doubt that making the case for YES in this referendum is harder than NO. Throughout history, to vote NO, all you need to be is a reactionary stiff-upper-lip bastard. It's an easy line to articulate - "this shall not pass" etc. And you can play on people's fears. Yes is a harder case to make, partly because AV is more complicated than FPTP and also because there is only one status quo but many possible alternatives. And let's be honest, apart from John Rentoul, almost no-one in the Yes camp really wants AV as their preferred system. Most people, myself included, want PR. Indeed if this were a PR referendum I think Yes would be miles in front.

But even with those difficulties, Yes could have still run a much better campaign than they have done. It needed a gut punch to the status quo. What it got was a picture of Ed Miliband and Vince Cable with balloons coming out of their heads. At least Ed has very little staked on this one - with huge numbers of his MPs wedded to the status quo (which tells you something about the crapness of the Labour party in its current incarnation) he was always going to be a half-hearted yes man. For Vince and his fellow Fib Dems, by contrast, this could be the end of the line. That's a nice consolation prize for losing this referendum. But, in the wider sweep of British politics, it's not enough. Hunter S Thompson's "cheap, greedy killers" are winning again, and most of us will be the poorer for it.

Some quick reflections on 26th March

I thoroughly enjoyed "March for the Alternative" and although I didn't arrive in Hyde Park in time for Ed's speech, it's reproduced at the New Statesman and is really very good indeed. Ed is really coming into his own these last couple of weeks. He was excellent on the budget response and has been doing well against Dave at PMQs. The current political climate shows why it was a good idea to put him in in the first place. Can you imagine David Miliband addressing the TUC rally if he'd won the leadership? Maybe I'm being unfair to the guy but he spent the whole leadership campaign treating the unions like a piece of dog mess which had accidentally ended up on the Labour Party's shoe, and in the end that's probably why he lost. There is still some minute measure of justice in this world...

It was the most inspiring protest I've ever been on, with at least half a million people, and the only thing that slightly marred it for me was not UK Uncut (who I think are superb), and not the anarchists (who, to be honest, could have picked ANY large-sized public event to get into a running battle with the police... for example I'm sure the same thing will happen at the royal wedding, and it will be considerably more interesting than anything else going on that day). It was being given a postcard saying that many of our trade unions are backing No2AV. It's this kind of bone-headedness and alliance with the most reactionary elements in the Tory and Labour party that makes it harder for unions to connect with the outside world.

So let me restate for the record that this blog always has been and always will be YES TO AV. (Well, until they put a PR option on the ballot paper... that should really be "yes to AV until something better comes along." But you know what I mean, kids.

Laughable attack on AV from Cameron

Looks like Desperate Dave - increasingly so, given that polls show the Yes campaign moving into a widening lead - is clutching at straws with ludicrous claims like this:

AV system would have left Brown in Downing Street, claims Cameron

The Tory leader will say that, although he considers the Coalition to be a success, the current system of first past the post is preferable because it usually delivers strong outcomes. Under the alternative vote (AV) system, smaller parties are more likely to take votes from large ones because they can benefit from second or third preferences. As a result, Mr Cameron will say, Mr Brown’s “second rate” government could have stayed in power after May 2010.
He will also argue there is nothing more powerful than when people see their vote leading to the removal vans driving down Downing Street.
“That’s real accountability. Real democracy. Real people power. The problem with AV is that it makes this all the more unlikely. Hung parliaments could become commonplace.”

Here we have the ludicrous situation of a man only in Downing Street because of a coalition - formed after a First Past the Post election, which is (according to its supporters) immune to this sort of thing - saying to voters "don't vote for AV because it encourages coalitions (although actually I think the current coalition is really good."

A confused message? Just slightly.

Dave's argument is wrong even in its basic premise that FTTP delivers strong majority governments most of the time - see Guy Lodge and Glenn Gottfried's ippr paper Worst of Both Worlds for some very good evidence on why FTTP isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Dave's argument that small parties benefit from AV is also not necessarily true. It all depends on the distribution of preferences. For example, George Galloway won for Respect in Bethnal Green and Bow in 2005 with only 37% of the vote. If that election had been held under AV it's quite likely that Tory or Lib Dem votes would have been redistributed to Labour's Oona King and Galloway would have never got in. AV is actually least favourable towards candidates who are highly popular with a minority of the electorate but disliked by a majority.

The only good thing about this is that it's good that Dave thinks that the removal van coming down Downing St is a good thing for democracy. Because the van will be coming for him in 2015 - or quite possibly sooner - and it will be interesting to see what he thinks then, AV or no AV.

By the way I have a good slogan for the Yes campaign: "AV it!" Accompanied by a video from Peter Kay.

AV:a good idea but it harbours a shocking possibility

I haven't said that much on the forthcoming Alternative Vote referendum yet. Maybe nothing at all, in fact: I can't find an previous posts tagged "AV" or "voting reform" (although I know the tagging structure ain't always logical round here, but that's just me). I think I've probably mentioned it a couple of times in passing.

So, how is Hal gonna vote on this one? Quite simple really: it's gotta be Yes. Although it does feel a bit odd to be in the same camp as John Rentoul, in this particular contest I guess one finds allies wherever one can. First Past the Post is just so absolutely f***ing awful that any other system - short of the candidates sticking Rizla papers with the names of randomly chosen famous people on their heads and the first one to guess correctly gets the seat - would be preferable.

Unlike Rentoul, I can't say AV is my preferred system. It's still single-member based on single-member constituencies and isn't guaranteed to be any more proportional than FTTP. However, it does get the public used to the idea of a more sophisticated voting system than FTTP, and so may soften people up for the introduction of a form of proportional representation some way down the line. Also the Tories and a load of Labour dinosaurs don't like it, so it must be a bad thing in that case.

(Incidentally, if the No2AV campaign's frontline argument against AV is that Nick Clegg doesn't like it, you can bet it's pretty sure to get voted through. Have any of the No2AV campaign looked at Clegg's popularity recently? Talk about shooting yourself in the foot.)

But there is a sting in the tail of AV for anyone who doesn't like the ConDem govt (which on the basis of current polling, is more and more people by the week). If Labour support were to hit around 40% come the next election, with the Tories just below that - say 38% - and the Lib Dems on 10% (let's be generous here), Labour would probably win under FTTP. But under AV, it would be relatively easy for the Tories to come through on second preferences from the Lib Dems (if the Lib Dem voters do as they will undoubtedly be told come the election and specify Tories as 2nd preference, and if you are still planning to vote Lib Dem after all you've seen from Cleggie and co by then, it's unlikely you'd draw any distinction between the Tories and Lib Dems, so I think we can pretty much take 2nd prefs as read).

I'll still support AV even though this is a real possibility, because at the end of the day, once you start arguing for a particular voting system because it benefits one particular party, you've ceased to believe in democracy. But this may help explain the strength of No2AV among certain kinds of Labour supporter (and many Labour MPs). On the other hand, it could just be that Labour are in fact, more crap than we would like them to be. Oh well.