Next week the second reading of the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill will be debated; the measure in parliament that intends to introduced the proposal to hold a referendum on the Alternative Vote system.
Caroline Lucas on behalf of the Green Party, Plaid Cymru and the SNP will proposed an amendment to the legislation which will offer alternatives to voters in the referendum. A choice between AV the list system used for Assembly elections and European elections, or the Single Transferable Vote system, a system that the Liberal Democrats have supported for several decades.
Under such circumstances, what will the Liberals do?
They can support the Green amendment in the hope that Labour and the Conservatives will join together to kill the motion between them. A dangerous proposition, because Labour might back the Greens just for the thrill of giving the coalition a bloody nose!
The Liberals can abstain; which will ensure that the vote is lost, or they can vote against the amendment, in effect vote against a policy that they have supported for decades!
Opposing the Green and Nationalists amendment is the most likely response; then spinning a justification for voting against a policy that has been at the core of Liberal policy for generations.
Unscrupulous bastards? We wait an' see!
Showing posts with label Fair Votes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fair Votes. Show all posts
05/09/2010
14/05/2010
Fair votes from students!
So the main responsibility of the New Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, will be constitutional issues. I wish him well in the job, there are, without doubt, a number of constitutional anomalies in the current, so called democratic, system that we have desperate need to sort out.
There is one glaring anomaly that Clegg probably won't even think about changing The Corrupt Student Vote.
Nick won't deal with it because it has benefited his party for the last two elections.
Residential students can register to vote in both their home constituency (at their parents address) AND in their collage constituency (their hall of residence or lodgings address).
Despite the presidential style of last week's election, where we were fed the line that we were electing a Prime Minister, the fact is that the election was about electing 650 constituency representatives.
In many of those constituencies the residential student vote made the difference between which candidate was elected and which was defeated. Up to a third of those students whose votes made the difference will move out of the constituency within the next month and a half. If we have a five year fixed parliament 90% of the students will have left, leaving both locals and new students with an MP who may not represent them.
Much worse than the fact that student voters vote for a local candidate, when they know that they are about to up sticks and burden a constituency with an MP, whom they will not have to suffer for much longer, is the fact that in reality students have two votes.
There is no way to cross reference that a student registered in both Oxford and Barmouth hasn't voted twice. If s/he has been inspired to vote the chances are that s/he did vote twice.
I can't find a reference but I have heard anecdotal claims that the Tories could have got an overall majority for want of 16,000 votes in the right constituencies, and Labour could have won with 40,000 extra votes! I don't know if these figures are correct, but the potential difference that a small minority of the 1.9 million UK students voting twice could make may be very significant!
Sorry Nick, but the student vote that you have chased so vigorously over the last two elections is fundamentally corrupt, if you really want to clean up politics get rid of the two vote student's vote!
There is one glaring anomaly that Clegg probably won't even think about changing The Corrupt Student Vote.
Nick won't deal with it because it has benefited his party for the last two elections.
Residential students can register to vote in both their home constituency (at their parents address) AND in their collage constituency (their hall of residence or lodgings address).
Despite the presidential style of last week's election, where we were fed the line that we were electing a Prime Minister, the fact is that the election was about electing 650 constituency representatives.
In many of those constituencies the residential student vote made the difference between which candidate was elected and which was defeated. Up to a third of those students whose votes made the difference will move out of the constituency within the next month and a half. If we have a five year fixed parliament 90% of the students will have left, leaving both locals and new students with an MP who may not represent them.
Much worse than the fact that student voters vote for a local candidate, when they know that they are about to up sticks and burden a constituency with an MP, whom they will not have to suffer for much longer, is the fact that in reality students have two votes.
There is no way to cross reference that a student registered in both Oxford and Barmouth hasn't voted twice. If s/he has been inspired to vote the chances are that s/he did vote twice.
I can't find a reference but I have heard anecdotal claims that the Tories could have got an overall majority for want of 16,000 votes in the right constituencies, and Labour could have won with 40,000 extra votes! I don't know if these figures are correct, but the potential difference that a small minority of the 1.9 million UK students voting twice could make may be very significant!
Sorry Nick, but the student vote that you have chased so vigorously over the last two elections is fundamentally corrupt, if you really want to clean up politics get rid of the two vote student's vote!
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