I created this thread to discuss the merits of the Alternative Voting system. Tiberius mentioned in one of my other threads that he voted for it in a UK referendum a couple of years ago and I'm curious to hear his views on it as I voted against it. It seemed a topic worthy of it's own thread.

So what does anyone think of AV?

I'm against it because it feels to me like a system not aimed at electing the most popular party, but one aimed at electing the least unpopular party.

I also suspect the Lib Dems had ulterior motives for proposing it as they are the third largest political party in the UK and are politically inbetween the other two.

First Past The Post (FPTP) does not elect the most popular party. It forces what should be a multi-party democracy into a two-party system. Now, I'm not saying that AV is perfect, but it is far more democratic than FPTP. Indeed, the only circumstance where FPTP is a good system to use is when there are only two parties allowed. This is because in those situations, a person can either vote one way or the other, and whoever gains the most votes must win (since they must logically have more than 50% of the vote).

The problems with FPTP start to form when more than two parties are allowed. Suppose there are three parties, A, B, and C. On election day, the results are counted like so:

A: 35%
B: 33%
C: 32%

Under FPTP, the party with the most votes wins. For simplicities sake, let's say that the election above is for a single voting district, with each party having a single candidate representing them. So, the clear winner is party A's candidate under FPTP. But hang on, 65% of the district voted against them! This is the main problem with FPTP; it lets a minority win the election.

To really see how unfair this is, take this example further and suppose there are 20 parties in the race. Party A gets 6% of the vote, and the other 94% is divided up amongst the 19 other parties equally (so each party gets 4.95% of the vote). Party A is still the winner...with only 6% of the vote. That isn't democracy...that's absurd. FPTP's solution to this problem is to force parties to quit and urge their supporters to vote for other candidates, which is why so many countries that use FPTP effectively have a two party system (the UK's Liberal Democrats are hanging on by a thread; give them a few decades and I think they'll disappear completely).

AV sorts out this problem by ensuring that no votes are wasted. You can rank all the candidates in order of preference, or a subset of them, or only one if you like. If a candidate wins over 50% of the vote in the initial count, they are elected to office. If they do not, then the candidate with the least amount of votes is eliminated, and their votes are counted again, but the "second preference" vote is counted instead, and distributed amongst the remaining candidates. This process repeats until either one of the remaining candidates has over 50% of the vote (which must happen at some point, since eventually the list is reduced to two candidates).

My argument can be summed up better by CPG Grey; his videos on the subject are here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y3jE3B8HsE

Of course, AV would be a first step in voting reform. Gerrymandering must also be addressed. If you still think AV is a terrible system, ask yourself this question: Why do all the three main parties use a form of AV to elect their party leaders?

Also, for the sake of openess, I voted Conservative in the last election, and I voted for AV, despite my party voting against it. As I said before, I don't care for party politics; if something makes voting fairer whilst reducing the number of my party's elected officials, it simply means they weren't supposed to be there in the first place. I think AV would force the two main parties to actually address issues rather than depending on "safe" seats to get elected.

I also think that the Lib Dems are a great third party to have, since they often bring completely new ideas to the table. It would be a damn shame if they were eradicated from the political spectrum.

My personal take: The problem with the first past the post system that we have in Britain is that it is designed for adversarial politics and set in the British culture that means a divide by class, So we have a politics based around wealth. This does not now fit so well in this society as it did say one hundred years ago, and an increasing number of people feel disfranchised as neither of the main parties represent them. However the main parties are driven to hold power and they like the first past the post system as it gives them a greater hold on power than any system that would defuse power among a large number of parties.

(October 7, 2012 at 8:39 pm)Tiberius Wrote: To really see how unfair this is, take this example further and suppose there are 20 parties in the race. Party A gets 6% of the vote, and the other 94% is divided up amongst the 19 other parties equally (so each party gets 4.95% of the vote). Party A is still the winner...with only 6% of the vote. That isn't democracy...that's absurd.

To continue with your example though it doesn't matter how you tally up the votes. There's no escaping the fact that at least 94% of people are not going to get their first choice. AV doesn't change that.

Tiberius Wrote:Also, for the sake of openess, I voted Conservative in the last election, and I voted for AV, despite my party voting against it.

I also voted Conservative. I voted against AV though. Not because the party were against it but because I don't agree with it.

Tiberius Wrote:I think AV would force the two main parties to actually address issues rather than depending on "safe" seats to get elected.

I think that practically everyone who votes Conservative and Labour would put the Lib Dems as their second choice to try and prevent the other party getting in. The Lib Dems would become far more involved, not because they themselves are popular, but because they are simply less disliked.

You could quite conceivably end up with a situation where Labour get 49% of the vote. Lib Dems 26% and Conservatives 25%. And the Lib Dems get elected. That seems absurd to me.

(October 7, 2012 at 9:02 pm)Hughsie Wrote: You could quite conceivably end up with a situation where Labour get 49% of the vote. Lib Dems 26% and Conservatives 25%. And the Lib Dems get elected. That seems absurd to me.

So what we have is over the years a natural conservative majority, and then occasionally middle voters moving to the left and a labour government that throws away its integrity to hold the middle votes, does nothing leftist other than ban fox hunting which does not work, maladministrates things and we return to a right of centre politics which does not have to be responsive to voters as it has a natural fixed majority. Over Time this set up is also Absurd, but also has the effect of disenfranchising voters as their views are not reflected in government.

Here in Aus, though we have compulsory voting, it's AV, so I have no concerns about my (forced) vote being wasted (any more than anybody else's is). I feel no obligation to vote for the lesser of two evils (who are still evil) simply because the other lot are worse.

(October 7, 2012 at 9:02 pm)Hughsie Wrote: To continue with your example though it doesn't matter how you tally up the votes. There's no escaping the fact that at least 94% of people are not going to get their first choice. AV doesn't change that.

No, but why should first choice matter when the first choice doesn't get more than 50% of the vote? You have to ask yourself what you think a democracy is; is a democracy where the person who gets the most votes overall wins, or where the person who is better supported by the overall vote of the public wins? AV doesn't change it, but it makes things fairer by reallocating wasted votes.

Tiberius Wrote:I think that practically everyone who votes Conservative and Labour would put the Lib Dems as their second choice to try and prevent the other party getting in. The Lib Dems would become far more involved, not because they themselves are popular, but because they are simply less disliked.

You have to stop thinking of things in a three party system, or a two party system. A democracy should be a multi-party system. Conservative voters may put the Lib Dems second, but a lot of them would probably vote for UKIP more than the Lib Dems. Likewise, the Labour supporters would probably put Socialist parties before the Lib Dems. AV lets smaller parties matter in politics; their votes are not wasted.

Quote:You could quite conceivably end up with a situation where Labour get 49% of the vote. Lib Dems 26% and Conservatives 25%. And the Lib Dems get elected. That seems absurd to me.

Why does it seem absurd? Labour got 49% of the vote; they didn't win. 51% of the country voted against them. With second preference votes, if all of the conservative supporters voted Lib Dem, clearly the Lib Dems actually got more of the vote than Labour. In any case, this only happens on the small scale; we aren't talking about forming entire governments with AV; that process would remain the same (i.e. whoever gets the most seats gets to form a government, or a coalition if a majority is not obtained). AV would affect the election of individual MPs only. It is likely that many safe seats would remain, but the people in those constituencies would have more voting power over their candidates. AV makes you accountable to your entire electorate, rather than just your supporters.

You didn't answer my question about the parties electing their leaders via AV by the way.

Finally, a comment on the whole "Lib Dems support this for ulterior motives". Whether they do this or not is quite irrelevant; if AV can be demonstrated to be fairer, it doesn't matter whether a party is trying to use it for ulterior motives; fairer is preferable. I believe they have a very good motive, and you can see it by looking at the ratio of popular votes to actual seats gained:

Lib Dems - 23% of the vote, 57 seats won (9.17%)
Labour - 29% of the vote, 258 seats won (41.55%)
Conservatives - 36.1% of the vote, 306 seats won (49%)

If that doesn't show you that the distribution of seats in parliament is clearly shifted towards the two main parties and away from third parties, I don't know what will.

We call it preferential voting in Australia and we have done it this way for a long time.

If we did not have preferential voting the small parties would not last IMO. I usually vote for Greens 1st then the major party of my choice(Labour) and the major party not of my choice last(Liberal National). If I did not have the ability to vote for more than 1 party then the greens would not get my vote because I would want to make sure my vote counted and that the Liberal National Party(like Tories) would not get in.

I get frustrated with our two major parties in Australia and I am glad that we have the ability to at least give a chance to other parties. Our Parliament this term is a "Hung Parliament", this basically means the Independents and Greens have a lot more power which to me is fantastic for democracy. The New South Wales state Government had to make a deal with a small party(The Shooters party). The shooters party will not last long IMO but they will have achieved something that would not have been possible under FPTP voting.

In my opinion, if you voted against Alternative Voting you were conned by the major parties. Even the name of the voting system is wrong. It should be called Preferential Voting because that is how it works. I prefer partyG but if they don't have enough support then I want my vote to go to partyL etc.

When voting we also have an option where all you have to do is put the number one next to the candidate you want and use there automatic preferences. This creates "semi coalitions" where deals can be had because the preferences are important.

(October 8, 2012 at 5:04 am)Tiberius Wrote: You didn't answer my question about the parties electing their leaders via AV by the way.

Sorry, can't really comment on that as I didn't know it until now. It may be something that works more effectively in that sort of situation that in a full election.

I suppose it allows people not only to vote for a particular person but to use their second and third choices to try and prevent a particular person getting picked. That would make it easier for compromise candidates to win.

There is no difference between voting a leader of a party, and voting an MP. It's the exact same setup. Multiple candidates, all with different views.

If AV works for internal party elections, it works for general elections.