Monday, April 25, 2011

Av it.

I don't think AV is too complicated.
I don't believe money spent on electoral reform is a complete waste.
I'm not going to use the referendum to send a message to Nick Clegg, the Tories or in the hope of Labour winning more seats.

I'm voting 'no' to AV because I've examined the facts and I don't find it significantly fairer than FPTP, and in fact I find some aspects of it to be completely unfair. Basically, I think if you're shit at voting and your first preference is the Monster Raving Loony Party, the Natural Law Party, the Church of the Militant Elvis or the Greens you have shit for brains and don't deserve another go. In a safe seat like mine (Bootle) where more than 50% of the electorate are likely to vote Labour (unlike I did between 1997 and 2010, incidently) it will make fuck all difference, the rest of the votes still won't count at all. I'm more than a little pissed off that years of lobbying and campaigning for proportional representation has led to the first referendum in my lifetime for something completely different.

I reached this conclusion using GCSE Maths and my own ethical standards. Amazingly, when asked a simple question, 'do you think the country should adopt AV?' I managed to make my own mind up and not listen to the blatantly vested interests of the Tory No campaigners or the Lib Dem Yes ones. It's been a slight comfort to me that my own party, Labour, are spilt on the issue as it hopefully means we're still capable of independent thought (I can dream).

So my stance is Make Your Own Mind Up to AV.

1 comment:

  1. You've nearly got me convinced on the

    'you have shit for brains and don't deserve another go'

    point.

    ReplyDelete