How Democracies Vote

"This is a campaigning work in favour of proportional representation. It is highly detailed and knowledgeable. I knew Enid Lakeman – she is no longer alive – and although she was an indefatigable campaigner, she was scrupulous in her attention to fact and knew a tremendous amount about electoral systems in different countries. She was very deeply informed. So if you want to know, for example, how the electoral system works in Sweden, this is the book you must read. I hadn't thought of that! Enid Lakeman in fact came from a suffragette family. She was not an academic. It is indeed the case that there are many fewer women academics than there are men. But that may be subject to generational change, for these days girls do better than boys in school. And academic life is being made more woman-friendly: the hours can be fairly flexible, and in some subjects you can do your work at home if you have to look after babies or young children. But as in other fields of life, women perhaps get a raw deal. The great strength of AV is that it gives you a wider choice. In the current first-past-the-post system, you often have to vote tactically. For example, you may be a Green but fear that if you vote Green, you're letting a party you don't like win – say the Conservatives – so you vote Labour instead. But with the alternative vote, you don't have to do that: you can vote Green, because if the Greens have no chance of winning then your vote is transferred. The main argument against AV is that it can lead to more disproportional – and therefore unfair – results than first-past-the-post. For example, in 1997 it would have given Tony Blair an even larger majority than the majority of 167 that he actually got. AV can, under certain circumstances, amplify the swing. That is the main argument against it. No – if a candidate has won over 50% of the vote in a constituency, nothing will change. Admittedly two-thirds of the seats at the last election were won on a minority vote, but even so, the only simulation we have of the last election, by David Sanders of Essex, shows that only 32 seats would have changed hands, and they would all have gone to the Liberal Democrats (because they are most people's second choice). The second candidate has to be very close to the first for AV to make a difference. In Australia, fewer than 10% of candidates who were not top on first preferences ever win a seat – usually the figure is around 4% or 5%. And in Australia, one has to list all one’s preferences for one’s vote to be valid. In Britain, listing preferences will be voluntary. Experience in some of the Australian states where listing preferences is voluntary shows that a large number of people don't list preferences – therefore AV could make very little difference."