OK, now it's time to complain...

[ffutures]

Apologies to everyone outside the UK - yes, it's election stuff again.

I voted, now it's time to complain about the results.

Basically, we've got more or less what I expected - a hung parliament (unless all of the remaining constituencies go the same way) where the results seem to bear even less resemblence to the number of votes cast per party than usual.

I used to be sure that the way to fix this was proportional representation, but I'm not so sure any more.

The big problem is that it would inevitably lead to party leaders getting elected - which I'm not too bothered about for the major parties, that usually happens under the current system, but it would ensure that scumbags like Nick Griffin got a seat. Most of the systems for preventing stuff like that involve disenfranchising supporters of the smaller minority party, which would mean that for example we wouldn't have finally elected a Green MP last night.

I've no experience with PR, but I assume that it also weakens the link between MPs and regions - at the moment there is a particular MP in Parliament allegedly representing my local interests.

Another problem, of course, is that all of the other systems are horribly complicated. For all the flaws that came out last night (mostly because nobody seems to have guessed how big a turnout there would be, which seems very silly given all the interest in the electoral debates, and some of the people running things seem to have failed their IQ tests), the current system has a good record for producing results quickly and apparently fairly. I'm not sure that would be true if we went over to PR.

Incidentally, I'm screening comments from non-friends on this one, for obvious reasons.

Oh, and this is one indication of how crazy the current system is

http://jonnynexus.com/2010/05/07/libdems-and-the-mad-fptp-dance/

Comments

[fjm.livejournal.com]

One could have STV which would make some difference to the outcome but wouldn't let tiny parties in (although yes, if Nick Griffin picked his seat carefully he might make it) and wouldn't reduce the link to constituencies, or one can go for bigger constituencies and multiple members (I think six was suggested in the last big review) and you would then have a local MP who you might actually support.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I'm a bit worried about the complicated nature of STV, which might be a problem for anyone with language difficulties etc, and would be fairly slow to produce results. Bigger constituencies and multiple members might work, I suppose.

[fjm.livejournal.com]

Many people with language difficulties(ie immigrants) come from countries with proportional representation. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportional_representation#List_of_countries_using_proportional_representation)

If we are really nervous, we could ask them to explain it to us.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Fair point

[1st-law.livejournal.com]

All the voter has to know for STV is "rank the following candidates in order of preference". The algorithm of remove the least popular candidate and reallocate votes then does the rest fairly straightforwardly. Admittedly you do need to enter the ballots into a computer to solve it and it's more work for the polling station staff.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's what worries me a bit - lots of delays etc.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

We used sTV for a while - it was simple and worked well. But it was only a 'trial period' thing, and so as our current system is pretty fair anyway (see below!) we reverted back.

Doesn't even need a computerised system - the counters look for '1' instead of 'X', and then just re-allocate the ones from the smallest piles.

OK - the results may take nine or ten hours, but, really, over a 5 year period, is that a problem?

(Our system; we have a number of multiple MHK constituencies - so in our constituency we have 3 seats. We can put one X if we want, or 2, or 3. It really doesn't matter. For quite a long time we had both the Chief Minister and the most outspoken MHK outside the governing group as two of ours (the 3rd guy was boring) - works really well. We also have fixed term elections - no second guessing when the election might be in the best interests of whoever is the most powerful MHK at the time.

Currently all but 2 MHKs have a role in government as either a minister or a 'political departmental member' - sort of affiliated. The 2 who aren't are Peter Karran, our favourite MHK in Onchan, who chooses to stay a complete outsider, and David Cannan who was bleating that he was being 'passed over' because he had been too critical of the Chief Minister (there is money for being a Departmental Member) - said CM then issued a statement saying that he had offered Mr Cannan to every individual Minister and all of them said they couldn't work with him! Who says there is no honesty in politics?)

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I suspect that the complexity rises rapidly with the number of voters, size of constituencies, etc.

Given that the City of Westminster (where I live) has three times the population of the Isle of Man, and is divided into only two constituencies, I'm inclined to think it might be a little more problematic.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Yes - that's why I didn't suggest you follow our particular version of government.

STV works fine in larger places - it just takes a day or two to reach a result, but I honestly can't see a problem with that.

However, the mixed member system, (part individual constituency representative, part list) works in Japan, which has a population of about twice that of the UK if my memory serves me well.

[pengshui-master.livejournal.com]

My analysis is that you would need multiple members to allow the Lib-dems to get more of the vote.

Essentially a lot of the Libdem votes is locked up in second and third place candidates. If you returned multiple members using STV or event or existing system and chose the top N candidates , then then those votes can have an effect on the standing in parliament - but at the moment they don't. (Except taking away votes from the winning candidate).

Perhaps if I have time I'll grab the spreadsheets of the results and see how the 1st and 2nd place voting would have looked.

I think you could characterise the current system as having a choice to vote between the winning candidate, the second place candidate (whose votes count as they set the level that the first candidate must beat) or not to vote). Of course it is complicated by the fact you have no prior knowledge of who the first and second place candidates are.

But in many places you can guess, you might not be able to guess which order, but you can guess the set [First_Place_Candidate, Second_Place_Candidate] with reasonable accuracy.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

[akicif.livejournal.com]

STV worked very well in Northern Ireland in the 70s - damn' near gave us an end to the troubles...

And one glorious (side) effect was the shattering of the Unionist Party into competing smaller parties.

[secondsilk.livejournal.com]

Preferential voting still gets you a local member, unlike proportional representation (which is also a bugger to count). It also means that if 65% of people vote against the Conservatives, they're not likely to get up, even if no other party has more than 35% of the first preference votes.

[secondsilk.livejournal.com]

We have proportional representation in our upper house, which means that each state has six senators, chosen by the whole state. They supposedly represent state interests, but are usually party aligned. In Victoria we have a fundamentalist Christian senator because of preference deals (we have preferential proportional representation, actually, which is why it takes months to finish counting).

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

OK, I think the last few words there pretty much sum up what I don't like about the idea.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Sorry - preferential proportional???? Good grief!

[secondsilk.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I think it's the only voting on the planet that does that. It actually takes about five weeks to work out who the last senator is in each state (so my dad says). But the senators don't give up their seats until a set day (30 June, maybe. Their terms are set, and we vote for half of them at each election.).

They can usually call the lower house from a straight up preferential vote by the end of the following day (which is Sunday, polling day is always Saturday).

The parliament is in caretaker mode from calling the election to when the new ministry is appointed (after the PM is sworn in by the Governor-General, sometimes as soon as three days later).

[lonemagpie.livejournal.com]

One of the things the queues and voters being turned away shows is that we need to not have elections on a work day. They should be on sundays like in every other fucking country in the world.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

There are problems running them on a sunday. You have to find alternatives for every polling station that is used by a religius group, pay overtime to tens of thousands of employees to open buildings that would normally be closed, possibly heat buildings that would normally be shut down over the weekend, make sure that there is adequate public transport for people living in outlying areas, etc. etc.

[fhtagn.livejournal.com]

It's been a while since I rechecked it, but I seem to recall the Sarfrican PR system has both consituency MPs and list MPs, voted for seperately, with the one being (I think) STV and the other being pure PR.

If we could get it to work there, we can get it to work here.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Like local MPs and Euro MPs? Not encouraging...

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I think Scotland has both constituency MPs and list ones too. But honestly, it doesn't matter how good a constituency MP you have, people will get rid of them at the drop of a hat anyway as they see party before person. Someone on the NE news has just said basically that 'She was a really good MP - but I didn't vote for her this time.'

[akicif.livejournal.com]

Yes, and it works fairly well: everyone has a local MSP, and each region has a set of list MSPs chosen to make the proportions come out right for each region.

[armb.livejournal.com]

You can't possibly have a supposedly democratic system which disallows scumbag leaders of scumbag minority parties but allows cuddly leaders of cuddly minority parties. If the country has equal numbers of xenophobe scumbags as it has Greens, they deserve equal representation.
(But there are arguments for a threshold on the grounds that otherwise small parties, scumbacks or not, end up with disproproportionate influence.)

Larger multi-representative constituencies are a possible compromise - you can't make them as proportional as allocating seats in the whole house based on the overall result, but you have more locality (but less than the current system). Though you can combine them in various ways that try to end up with the overall result more proportional, either having some seats which aren't associated with specific constituencies, or allowing "overspill" votes from other constituencies to influence results. You can also combine them with transferable/alternative votes, so if your first vote is for a party that doesn't get a proportion that gives them one of the representitives, you still get a say.
Whether you can do that in a manner that the average voter will understand and accept is indeed another matter.
There is no perfect voting system, in the sense that there are a number of properties widely considered to be desirable that it has been proven you can't consistently ensure all of them.

See also http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627581.400-electoral-dysfunction-why-democracy-is-always-unfair.html?full=true

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Agreed - I know I'm asking for the moon, but I'd really like to see something just a little fairer.

[armb.livejournal.com]

The problem of delays in complex systems can easily be solved by voting machines and computer counting. My, look at all those worms. I think we're going to need a bigger can to put them back.

(Seriously, voting machines and/or electronic voting systems don't have to be as fundamentally broken as many current systems are. But producing a system which is not broken and which is understandable and verifiable by the average voter is again another matter.)

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Exactamundo

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

Although in Scotland, our pseudo PR system actually produces just about exactly the same results as a first past the post system.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Not terribly encouraging.

[armb.livejournal.com]

The other way of looking at that is that first-past-the-post doesn't always produce a grossly disproportional result.

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

No. I was genuinely surprised, I thought it would result in a lot more IND candidates, and Greens, and small parties. But it really didn't. The balance of power remained with the usual candidates.

[akicif.livejournal.com]

Um, no. Under FPTP, there would be hardly any Conservatives in Holyrood (see last night's results for an example of what Scotland looks like under FPTP)

[jonnynexus.livejournal.com]

One thing to bear in mind is that there is no such thing as *the* system of proportional representation.

There are many, many different systems under which you can run an election (of which FPTP is one) and each can be judged according to a number of criteria, one such criteria being how proportional a result they deliver.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Granted, I'm just interested in seeing which way things will go.

[sirernest.livejournal.com]

I'd prefer an MMP system like Germany's where you cast two votes, one for your local MP and one for the party. So you can approve of a particular candidate without doing so for his party.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Which sort of assumes you know all about your candidate - not always easy divorced from political affiliations.

[houses7177.livejournal.com]

Well, I may not be in the UK, but I do find this fascinating.