How will you vote tomorrow?

[goldstone]

Was going to vote NO, but now wonder if AV might have prevented all those years of Labour/Tony/Gordon?

So now I'm confused.

Probably won't now vote anyway as will not be home during the polling station open hours.

 

[The Large One]

Was going to vote NO, but now wonder if AV might have prevented all those years of Labour/Tony/Gordon?

Highly unlikely. Not that you get to vote for a Prime Minister.

So now I'm confused.

'Now...'?

 

[Guy Fawkes]

Indeed they don't... which is the entire point of AV - FPTP doesn't produce majorities any more (unlike when it was introduced for the then-current two party system). Never mind though, do ignore the point and carry on...

But for AV to work the parties have to be similar - they had a piece yesterday on a programme trying to explain AV in which they had 10 people deciding what to do, in a 2 choice race it was a choice between getting a coffe and going to the pub which won 6 to 4

The second example and their justification for AV was that there are now 4 choices as there is now a choice between 3 pubs, the Royal, the Crown and the Anchor - the split was 2 for the Royal, 1 for the crown, 3 for the anchor and 4 for coffee so by FPTP - coffee would win but they said that 6 out of the group wanted to go to the pub so the majority view wasnt represented by the voting outcome - fair enough in that example but in relation to politics, what if the senario was that a group of 10 went to Brighton for the day and were deciding what to do, the choices were pub, cinema, coffe or beach and the result was 2 pub, 4 coffee, 1 cinema and 3 beach - the majority is split over different imcomparable ideas (like the political parties are not the same) so how does AV improve the situation ?

Doesn't it tend to push politics towards having similar parties and policies where votes can be switched to suit the AV vote and not towards having a wide spectrum of political views and ideals which people decide which they want most to represent them out of all the available candidates, and the candidate that the most people see as the best person for the job (not their 3rd, 4th or 5th choice) gets in.

It shouldn't necessarily be about getting 50% of all the available votes in an area before your election win becomes valid, it should be about being able to select your preferred choice of candidate whoever it may be and the candidate that gets the most vote in the constituancy is the candidate that candidate that more people wanted to see elected compared to the others, otherwise they would have gotten more votes instead to start with.

 

[DTES]

how does AV improve the situation ?

It guarantees that the majority of those "voting" (or whatever word you want to use in your hypothetical example) prefer the winning option to the others. In your example, coffee wins under FPTP but what if 6 out of the 10 people would rather do anything than waste a sunny day in the coffee shop? Less than half of the voters can even bear the idea, so how can it be the winner?

 

[Westdene Seagull]

But for AV to work the parties have to be similar - they had a piece yesterday on a programme trying to explain AV in which they had 10 people deciding what to do, in a 2 choice race it was a choice between getting a coffe and going to the pub which won 6 to 4

The second example and their justification for AV was that there are now 4 choices as there is now a choice between 3 pubs, the Royal, the Crown and the Anchor - the split was 2 for the Royal, 1 for the crown, 3 for the anchor and 4 for coffee so by FPTP - coffee would win but they said that 6 out of the group wanted to go to the pub so the majority view wasnt represented by the voting outcome - fair enough in that example but in relation to politics, what if the senario was that a group of 10 went to Brighton for the day and were deciding what to do, the choices were pub, cinema, coffe or beach and the result was 2 pub, 4 coffee, 1 cinema and 3 beach - the majority is split over different imcomparable ideas (like the political parties are not the same) so how does AV improve the situation ?

Doesn't it tend to push politics towards having similar parties and policies where votes can be switched to suit the AV vote and not towards having a wide spectrum of political views and ideals which people decide which they want most to represent them out of all the available candidates, and the candidate that the most people see as the best person for the job (not their 3rd, 4th or 5th choice) gets in.

It shouldn't necessarily be about getting 50% of all the available votes in an area before your election win becomes valid, it should be about being able to select your preferred choice of candidate whoever it may be and the candidate that gets the most vote in the constituancy is the candidate that candidate that more people wanted to see elected compared to the others, otherwise they would have gotten more votes instead to start with.

See where you're coming from and PR would be much better. In my case, in a GE, I want to vote for UKIP but don't as it's a wasted vote. With AV I could vote for UKIP knowing I could use my second preference for one of the big 3 and possibly preventing the parties I didn't want to get in getting in. It sort of allows me to use my first preference as my heart really wants while using other preferences tactically.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

It guarantees that the majority of those "voting" (or whatever word you want to use in your hypothetical example) prefer the winning option to the others. In your example, coffee wins under FPTP but what if 6 out of the 10 people would rather do anything than waste a sunny day in the coffee shop? Less than half of the voters can even bear the idea, so how can it be the winner?

But none of them has 50% wanting to do one activity - your AV system states that for a result to be valid and therefore for an activity to occur, you need 1/2 the group to agree with just 1 round of voting and not count the preferred choice of activity by the larger group of people actually wanting to do that activity in the first place.

The activities arn't comparable yet AV says that the voting public has to decide between less popular choices for yourself (your 2nd, 3rd, 4th choice etc) in order to decide what to do - why?

In the real world you often find people don't agree on a subject and there could be a variety of views, but are the less popular views worthless because they weren't the top 2 choices of everyone?

Doesn't FPTP actually reflect more closely what people would want rather than settling for another candidate who still wasn't 50% of peoples 1st choice either but some people's 2nd, 3rd, 4th or maybe even 5th choice under AV, and only elected due to a over bureaucratic voting system which is then used to claim they get the candidate most people wanted in the first place.

You wouldn't ask a group of 11 people what their favourite colour was and if the result was split 4 red, 2 blue and 5 green you wouldn't have people saying "well your choice of favourite colour is invalid because it didn't receive enough votes to be in the majority and because we must have a clear winner from the choices selected therefore we will ignore your choice and make you choose again or else we don't have a fair representation of everyones favourite colour despite your new vote being for a colour you didn't pick as your favourite.

 

[mimi]

Cameron hastoday used the phrase "fairy dairy" in PMQ&A to refer to people presumably living outside of London. This man has the charisma of the plague if he says vote against the AV or in fact anything at all vote for it. A good spell down the pit or the sewers in fact a proper job at all would sort that lad out. He is so far removed from normality he is in orbit and as for his pal Hague don't get me started on that smarmy fellow. The man at number 11 is equally odious in fact anyone who needs people to vote for them to satisfy their fragile ego and line their pockets from the public purse is frankly highly suspect. What would they all do if no-one bothered to vote at all I wonder? I have not voted since 1984 and then I voted for my husband but I will vote for AV tommorrow just to vote against Cameron and all his goon conservative pals.

 

[Noldi]

The only choice I will make tommorow is to go home from work and vote or stop in at a reunion (pint and curry) on the way home.

Noldi

 

[beorhthelm]

The second example and their justification for AV was that there are now 4 choices as there is now a choice between 3 pubs, the Royal, the Crown and the Anchor - the split was 2 for the Royal, 1 for the crown, 3 for the anchor and 4 for coffee so by FPTP - coffee would win but they said that 6 out of the group wanted to go to the pub so the majority view wasnt represented by the voting outcome

just as well in the real world we dont "vote" on such things and our group of 10 would go to the pub that does the best coffee. so im not really sure how it is analogous, since i dont recall there being a party who offers beer and coffee for everyone.

except maybe the monster raving loonies, they did first propose all day pub opening and chocolate on the NHS.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

just as well in the real world we dont "vote" on such things and our group of 10 would go to the pub that does the best coffee. so im not really sure how it is analogous, since i dont recall there being a party who offers beer and coffee for everyone.

except maybe the monster raving loonies, they did first propose all day pub opening and chocolate on the NHS.

The pub vs Coffe example was used by the Pro AV campaign - it hought it was a very simplistic demonstrattion that doesnt really cover the complexity of the real electrol process and the vast differences between political parties, they assumed that if you vote for one party because you want it to win the seat, that you would be happy to vote for another party with completely different views and policies so that we could get to a candidate with 50% of the vote.

 

[tedebear]

Conservative and No

 

[Guy Fawkes]

A far better comparison would be to vote for the player of the season

Our result this season was:
1st - El-Abd 31%
2nd - Murray 30%
3rd - Bennett 15%

Is this a fair result, El-Abd didn't get 50 % of the votes so should he be player of the season as it doesn't represent the majority of the fans views because he was 19% short?

Should those who voted for the other players outside the top 3 be able to nominate any of the other players left in as their 2nd, 3rd or 4th choice for our best player in the 2010/11 season in order to try to get one of the players to 50% before he gets his award? - but then how could he be a fans player of the season if the fan who voted for someone else (his real player of the season) but his recipient was eliminated early and the player who he then voted for using AV was really only his 4th choice after his 2nd and 3rd choices were also emilinated before any player had reached the 50% target?

 

[Beach Hut]

I have voted No

 

[8ace]

A far better comparison would be to vote for the player of the season

Our result this season was:
1st - El-Abd 31%
2nd - Murray 30%
3rd - Bennett 15%

Is this a fair result, El-Abd didn't get 50 % of the votes so should he be player of the season as it doesn't represent the majority of the fans views because he was 19% short?

Should those who voted for the other players outside the top 3 be able to nominate any of the other players left in as their 2nd, 3rd or 4th choice for our best player in the 2010/11 season in order to try to get one of the players to 50% before he gets his award? - but then how could he be a fans player of the season if the fan who voted for someone else (his real player of the season) but his recipient was eliminated early and the player who he then voted for using AV was really only his 4th choice after his 2nd and 3rd choices were also emilinated before any player had reached the 50% target?

It's a poor example, 95% of Albion fans would agree that those three have played well all season so wouldn't begrudge any of them the player of the season award. The same can't be said of political parties.

 

[DTES]

A far better comparison would be to vote for the player of the season

Our result this season was:
1st - El-Abd 31%
2nd - Murray 30%
3rd - Bennett 15%

Is this a fair result, El-Abd didn't get 50 % of the votes so should he be player of the season as it doesn't represent the majority of the fans views because he was 19% short?

Should those who voted for the other players outside the top 3 be able to nominate any of the other players left in as their 2nd, 3rd or 4th choice for our best player in the 2010/11 season in order to try to get one of the players to 50% before he gets his award? - but then how could he be a fans player of the season if the fan who voted for someone else (his real player of the season) but his recipient was eliminated early and the player who he then voted for using AV was really only his 4th choice after his 2nd and 3rd choices were also emilinated before any player had reached the 50% target?

Well, as we're dealing with hypothetical examples...

The extreme case, using the example above - what if all 69% of people who didn't vote for El Abd, thought he was appalling - and in fact was the worst player of the year. A whole 69% think he was terrible, yet it's fair to give him the Player of the Year award? Seems a bit odd to me...

A less extreme case - nobody thought El Abd was terrible, but the 69% who didn't vote for him all thought Murray was better. 69% of the fans think Murray was better than El-Abd, yet El-Abd gets the award. Is that fair?

I guess it's all a game of opinions, and you may well think that even in the two cases I outline it's still fair to give it to the El-Abd.

Note - this is all examples for AV - for footballing reasons I do think El-Abd deserves it - he was bloody brilliant

 

[Deleted User X18H]

Do you think that HB&B will make a Phil Collins-like promise to leave the city if that comes to pass?

No and No

 

[Tory Boy]

Conservative and Yes.

Along with one other person.

TB

 

[Sergei's Celebration]

I was gonna vote yes, but reading this thread has just challenged that decision.

 

[Albumen]

Turncoat and you know you are

 

[Sergei's Celebration]

I used to be indecisive and now i'm not so sure...