Political

The Labour and Conservative MPs who were in favour of AV before they were against it

Here’s a curious detail about the voting record of MPs on the alternative vote: before the general election, the House of Commons agreed to introduce elections for select committee chairs using the alternative vote (and the first set of these such elections have now been held).

Most of the Conservative and Labour MPs who have said they oppose AV for public elections were also MPs when this decision was taken – and not one of them forced a vote on the matter, let alone vote against introducing AV. Instead, they all let the introduction of AV go through.

Now, of course, that would be a reasonable approach, if – but only if – the reasons they use against using AV in general elections are all ones that don’t also apply to other sorts of elections. Because if they are general anti-AV arguments, then the question is – why didn’t they oppose AV for their own use?

So I’m 100% we’ll not see any of those Labour MPs use any of the arguments the No campaign has been pushing which apply to the voting system generally, such as how votes transfer at full value or how the person who comes first on first preferences might not win. After all, that then would be a matter of saying that a voting system that’s good enough for MPs to use somehow then isn’t good enough for the rest of us.

So I’m 100% sure, as I said. I’m sure you are too.

(Well, actually – make that 99% sure, because after roping in the views of a military dictatorship on the best voting system to use, who knows quite what No campaigners will do next?).

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