We don't normally publish what are apparently anonymous posts unless we know who has written them. But this case is an exception. It is cross-posted from the blog of ElectionLeaflets.org by Julian Todd and if you are a real person Julian we will change the author line. But it is well informed and signals some important information.

In May, immediately after reformers lost the AV referendum, I called on its main funders to hold an inquiry into what happened, drawing on report by one of the campaign's key activists Andy May. Now James Graham who ran its social media campaign has published an account in the Lib Dem magazine Liberator. It is cross-posted here with thanks.

Very serious criticisms of the ‘Yes’ campaign are being published. Cory Hazlehurst, an activist from its Birmingham group, has written a heartfelt personal account in his blog: “The mass incompetency of the Yes campaign ran through it like a stick of rock… This was an epic clusterfuck of a campaign which will go down in the annals of political incompetence.” 

One problem with such cries of pain is that they are all too easily ignorable by the perpetrators. A piece which will be less easy to dismiss comes from the Chairman of the Conservative Yes Campaign, John E. Strafford, in which he described how his party was sidelined from the campaign, along with UKIP and the Greens. But the most sustained critique so far is a potentially devastating document put up on the web by Andy May who was the National Manager of Regional Staff for the ‘Yes’ Campaign. His language is reasonable and measured. He links his critique to the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust (JRRT) and the Electoral Reform Society (ERS), as well as Power 2010 that was launched and run by the JRRT in response to the expenses crisis. Andy’s stance has prompted an outpouring of supportive tweets and comments from activists who have reinforced his criticisms. If he is right, then the very campaigns that orchestrated demand for reform in the wake of the revelations of MPs’ corruption and exploitation of privileges in 2009 were themselves perpetuating waste, winking, entitlement and failure of due process in the way they were managed.

On one level, today's referendum closes the political cycle that started with the eruption of the expenses scandal in 2009. That scandal brought forth a set of demands for political reform which found outlets in different channels.

On the one hand, there was limited institutional reform in Westminster itself (the creation of IPSA and the Wright Committee reforms, in particular), coupled with the deselection, resignation and even prosecution of MPs caught up in the scandal. This was mirrored at the grassroots by a rebirth of interest amongst politically engaged young people in democratic reform groups, like the Purple People who gathered in Smith Square to put pressure on Nick Clegg during the Coalition negotiations. But it was not more widely mirrored in the public, whose revulsion at the expenses affair did not translate into concerted political pressure for change - a fact which lies at the heart of the failure of the Yes to AV campaign's messages to connect with the electorate.

When British voters deliver their verdict on electoral reform today, the choice being put before them will represent the culmination of a long campaign for change. Yet, AV is not a system which reformers, including the Liberal Democrats, have previously called for. Indeed, since it is not a form of proportional representation, AV would represent a relatively minor change when compared with the other electoral systems which reformers have advocated. Meanwhile, public interest in the referendum appears to be modest, to say the least. Nonetheless, the UK’s second-ever national referendum asks the British electorate to make an historic choice – whether to keep or replace ‘first-past-the-post’. 

Democratic Audit has published a review to coincide with election day, setting out the evidence relating to how well FPTP serves as an electoral system in the context of contemporary British politics. This ‘audit’ of the current system draws on recent academic research and recognised international measures for evaluating the operation of electoral systems. It also considers the extent to which identifiable public support for reform has emerged over the past four decades.  Whatever the result, it shows that the referendum today will not resolve the debate about electoral reform in the UK.

Responses to opinion poll questions which ask directly about support for proportional representation 

There was a tremendously good ‘Yes to Fairer Votes’ rally last night. We sat in the raked theatre of the Royal Institution where the great 19th century experiments were tested that opened the way to the modern era. Will we be so lucky with the British voting system?

Cool chairing from Katie Ghose gave us Richard Wilson (who only needs to open his mouth to make everyone laugh) and Jonathan Bartley, who I knew as a shrewd co-editor of Ekklesia. Then John O’Farrell and Amisha Ghadiali came on, and Amisha made the obvious point that we have more choice in almost all aspects of our lives except the voting system. We then had Billy Bragg, Stephen Fry and Tony Robinson looming over us from the wall-sized screens like gentle big brothers.

Armando Iannucci followed and gave perhaps the best speech I’ve heard on the subject, responding to Cameron’s claims that First-Past-the-Post is simple, fair and decisive. Armando insisted that it should be a referendum about FTTP not AV and as for being simple, setting down your preferences is just more sophisticated, as in “cave simple, house sophisticated”.

On 26th April, Intelligence Squared staged a preliminary debate with the motion 'Vote for AV'. 

Arguing for the motion were OurKingdom Co-Editor Anthony Barnett, YouGov President Peter Kellner, and Times columnist David Aaronovitch. 

Arguing against were NOtoAV Chairman Rodney Leach, Conservative MP David Davis and Director of the International Foundation for Electoral Systems Michael Pinto Duschinsky.

Below are the highlights from the debate, chaired by political scientist Vernon Bogdanor.

The opening vote was: for AV 168, against 199, don't knows 112 (a 'no' majority of 31). The closing vote was: for 240, against 258, don't knows, 11 (a 'no' majority of 18).

You can read a brief account of the debate from Anthony Barnett, alongside the draft for his speech, here on OurKingdom.

Is AV too little and far too late?  OurKingdom has been debating in great detail the various pros, cons and mathematics of numerous voting systems, House of Lords reforms, the West Lothian question, Welsh, Cornish, and Scottish independence, written constitutions and home rule for the English. But what will any of this add up to, especially for the English, if Cameron has his way?

The Prime Minister's ambition in the name of a 'Big Society' is to privatise - meaning marketise - virtually the whole of civil society. The only exceptions would be the judiciary and the security services. If he achieves this what will we be asking our MPs to do if the contracts have already been signed?  Many that have been awarded are for more than 20 years.  i.e. four or five Parliamentary life-times.  Cameron may see this as a logical step: after all business already owns most of our utilities while many of our new hospitals are in thirty-year PFI contracts (see Oliver Huitson's overview).

It has been said that AV would be a “beautiful British compromise”. But for its combination of madness, naked lies and bile, the campaign surrounding it has seemed distinctly American. The Yes side, on which I sit, has been slightly dull. The Noes have been fascinating, not only for their outrageous campaigning methods, but for their surreal patchwork of supporters.

The slip into the absurd began with NoToAV’s infamous poster campaign. A new born baby was held aloft, “She needs a maternity unit, not an alternative voting system”. It would be less pitiful if the No campaign wasn’t run, and funded, by the sort of people who have dreamt of dismantling the NHS for decades. As for the validity of the claim, it has none whatsoever. The £250m figure includes £80m for the referendum itself, regardless of outcome – the nation doesn’t get a refund for answering No. A further £130m is attributed to the cost of electronic voting machines – which there are no plans to use.

Yesterday there was the Intelligence Squared debate on London on whether to vote AV in the referendum. I opened for the 'Yes' speakers and David Davis MP closed for the 'No'. David Aaronovitch and Peter Kellner were with me speaking for a 'Yes' and Rodney Leach and Michael Pinto-Dushinsky were the other two on the 'no' side. I was told to expect a quirky, Conservative west London audience (about 500) paying £25 a head. The opening vote was: for AV 168, against 199, don't knows 112 (a 'no' majority of 31). The closing vote was: for 240, against 258, don't knows, 11 (a 'no' majority of 18). So we closed the gap.

I was  shocked at the complacency of the 'no' side who assured the audience that the system was "not broken". There was one moment I thought we got through. In the question period they said how appalling it would be if the 'Yes' vote won with less than 20 per cent of the vote on a turnout below 40 or even below 35 per cent. I made the point that if they couldn't get a significant number out to support the existing system even if they in fact win it would confirm the profound disconnect between people and the political class and the broken nature of the system. I saw a glimpse of alarm in their eyes, not of me or of losing the vote but that their beloved system of rule might indeed be on an abyss.

Due to his banishment by the Yes campaign as 'too toxic', yesterday was the first time I had heard Nick Clegg argue his case for the alternative voting system since the campaign launch. I'd wholeheartedly supported the decision to distance the campaign from the deputy prime-minister, with his rock-bottom approval ratings, but settling down amongst a small audience at the ippr offices in Central London, I was prepared to be proven wrong. After all, here was Nick Clegg fighting for a referendum outcome, not speaking on behalf of the coalition; perhaps I would be transported back to the pre-election days before Clegg-mania became Clegg-phobia.

You can read the speech here. It opens with a promise to transcend party politics. A yes to AV, Clegg said, would be a "strong start to the job of cleaning up politics" at a time when Britain is faced with a "political crisis to match the economic crisis". It is about "more power and more choice". He accused the No campaign of peddling "falsehoods", and of attempting to "distract" the public by framing the referendum as being about the coalition and party politics.

Any assessment of the case for AV should begin with an account of the key characteristics of the contemporary British voter. But so far it hasn’t. Part of the problem with the referendum campaign is that it is dominated by the political class who tend to think, wrongly, that voters think the way they do.

IPPR’s new report therefore starts with the voter in mind and argues that the simplest yet strongest argument for AV is that, unlike FPTP, it is well suited to the times we live in. Voters today want more choice in their politics (as they do in all other aspects of their lives) and are far less tribal than they once were. An IPPR/YouGov poll designed to examine public attitudes towards party affiliation found that just 18 per cent agreed with the following statement: ‘One political party comes close to reflecting my views and values; I am strongly opposed to all of the others.’ Shifts in voting patterns strongly challenge the basic assumption of FPTP, which is that voters are only interested in expressing a single sacrosanct first preference. In fact UK voters are happy to express a range of preferences – certainly up to and including a third choice. Moreover, for the majority of voters, especially the growing number of non-tribal voters, their sense of allegiance to their top two or three preferences does not vary substantially. Those with loose party affiliation – 40 per cent of the electorate – give their first two preferences almost equal weighting.

Staring out at me from a No to AV leaflet is a shifty looking Nick Clegg. It’s rather blatant negative and personal campaigning and has nothing much to do with the AV issue. Unwittingly, however, it makes an important point. If AV is passed then Nick Clegg- or at least his Orange book agenda- is a very likely future for British politics. You may believe in this agenda or you may not- and hands up, part of the reason for my ‘no’ is instrumental, but it is the logic of the system.

If you hear someone use words like ‘democratic’, ‘pluralist’, or ‘choice’ in favour of AV then run. It is an electoral system from the ‘majoritarian’ family- in fact, it’s FPTP’s twin though they are non-identical. These systems all share certain family traits- they lock out distributed minority parties and views, party competition within them converges around amedian position thereby reducing choice, they are unrepresentative and anti-pluralist. FPTP is broken as the last two elections have shown- as Anthony Barnett recently argued in his Durham speech. But AV’s logic is very similar to FPTP. It just creates a different ‘median’ around which the parties converge. That median as things stand is something like Orange book liberalism.

Neal Lawson’s ‘democracy by machines or morals’ argument has something to it. The shift from a world of deep and monolithic institutions to one characterised by shifting networks is well established. It is a complete non sequitor, however, to claim that AV represents this new world. Ultimately, it is a majoritarian machine-like electoral system similar to FPTP.

Introduction

On 5 May 2011 British voters go to the polls to decide whether we put just one X on the ballot paper in future general elections or whether we can rank candidates in order of preference. On the face of it, who cares? Shouldn’t we be worrying about the cuts instead?

I want to argue that despite the Alternative Vote (AV) being just a small step-change in the way our voting system works it has profound implications for the future of our political system. 

There is a division opening up across British politics – which redefines but doesn’t replace the old left/right divide. It is between what we might now call machine politics versus moral politics and the AV campaign battle is sharpening the distinction. This distinction became clearer to me on the morning of Tuesday 29 March in a room in Westminster Central Hall when the all-party Yes to AV campaign was launched. Only it wasn’t quite all party. It was three parties. Or rather to be absolutely honest it was two and a half parties. The Greens and the Liberal Democrats are solidly behind AV, though both would prefer something more proportional; despite this they are not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. The Labour Party is split despite leader Ed Miliband being on the Yes platform and the vast majority of the Shadow Cabinet being pro-reform.

An AV count stops at the point where the leading candidate has more votes (both first-preference and transferred) than the other candidate or candidates left in the race. That much is logical and straightforward: the leading candidate can’t be caught up so has won.

This means, however, that some results will be declared when there are only two candidates left in the count, and some will be declared when there are three or more candidates left. This inconsistency makes it impossible to analyse the results and assess the number of winning candidates enjoying the genuine support of a majority of voters in their constituencies. And yet, this is the whole point of AV: that the winners are supposed to enjoy the backing of a majority.

A new ‘Yes to AV’ site has just been launched. This is an independent site with loads of Yes2AV e-postcards to choose from. You can send the appropriate postcard to the appropriate person you know, in a bid to enthuse them about voting Yes on May 5.

It’s a sort of myDavidCameron with the work already done for you…

To the left is just one example of many.

The site is the product of Matt Wootton, with editorial help from myself; it is a 'Green Words Workshop' production. (See our joint blog on reframing and values, of which this new site is an offshoot).

We think that this is the kind of thing that could potentially be transformative, over the next several weeks. The Yes campaign needs independent support; it needs a bit of razzmatazz and innovation; it needs to go viral.

Please send a postcard and make this happen.

 I support the Yes to AV campaign for British electoral reform. My colleague on the Green Words Workshop, Rupert Read, does too (and he’s written a couple of excellent recent pieces supporting AV here and here).

The British public is finally being offered a referendum on electoral reform because the faults of the Westminster system are all too apparent. The way it gives so many more seats in relation to votes to leading parties and squeezes out third-placed and smaller ones; the way if offers constituents only one Member of Parliament to represent them, despite the residents' diversity; the way some winners can get their seat with only a handful of votes more than the next candidate, while others can hold on to theirs for decades due to an in-built social majority of their constituency's residents; and the way our Single-Member Majoritarian system (FPTP) can give the leading party overwhelming dominance of parliament and government  –  such defects undermine confidence in the parliamentary system. 

Does this mean that critics of FPTP should embrace a change to the Alternative Vote? Unfortunately not. Alone in the world, Papua New Guinea (PNG) and Australia use it for their national parliaments. It has worked well in Papua because in polities that are highly fragmented along ethnic and tribal lines, AV prevents candidates from behaving in an overly partisan way, making them seek support beyond their own communal base in order to gain the 2nd preference votes and get elected with an overall majority. But this is the very opposite of Britain's situation, where three nationwide parties stand accused of becoming increasingly similar, and a worrying number of potential voters abstain from deciding between them. AV is said by specialists to be the best system for promoting centrist politics, just what reformers in Britain wish to avoid.

A week ago, a group of historians wrote a letter to the Times urging the public to take heed of the sacrifices of past generations in the name of democracy and vote no to AV. You can read the letter below. I found the argument provocative but unconvincing, as a supporter of AV (though like many it’s not my ideal) and particularly as a student of history.