An open letter to Jack Straw:

Dear Mr Straw,

Tory funding in marginal constituencies

The Guardian reported today that the Electoral Commission has “strong reservations” about your proposals to stop the Conservatives pouring millions of pounds into key marginal constituencies.

May I point out that the fundamental problem is the very existence of marginal constituencies which, in effect, disenfranchise the vast majority of electors who live in safe constituencies?

You could solve your problem of Tory money in marginal constituencies and enfranchise everybody by replacing the present voting system with the Single Transferable Vote.
Yours sincerely,

Anthony Tuffin.
Editor,
www.stvAction.org.uk

That’s what the Government claimed today, but it’s not how it’s acting. The quotation comes from Jack Straw’s written ministerial statement today, in which he set out the progress the Government claims to have made in meeting the year-old objectives of the Governance of Britain programme of constitutional reform. The full sentence is “Renewing our democracy is at the heart of our reforms, building a new relationship between citizens and government and ensuring that the rights of individuals are fully respected.” What is the most basic relationship between citizens and government? It is the way the legislature is elected and the Government chosen. What is the Government doing about that? Nothing!

The Government also states in the same document that it is committed to:

The headline story in today’s Daily Telegraph was about an allegation that the Labour Government is bribing voters by diverting taxpayers’ money from Conservative heartlands to Labour ones.  Whichever way you look at it, that is terrible.  If it is true, it is scandalous.  It is not very different from Zimbabwean soldiers and civil servants being told their jobs depend on Robert Mugabe’s remaining in power.  If it is untrue, it is one of the dirtiest of dirty tricks for a major newspaper to make such allegations.  Either way, it is unacceptable.

There is a very easy but effective solution – just change the voting system to STV.  Then there would be no Conservative or Labour heartlands.  There would be no reason for the Government to divert money in this way or for a newspaper to make such an accusation.

We warmly welcome the Councillors’ Commission's recent recommendation that “local authorities wishing to do so, following a consultation and majority vote, should be able to pilot STV for a minimum of two terms”.

Although this is just one (No. 21) of 61 recommendations, we think it is the most important. The Commission made the recommendation because there was “a view that STV could assist with broadening the diversity of councillors”, but there are many other advantages of STV, including –
• the ending of monopoly power in many areas by the largest minority party;
• fewer uncontested elections;
• encouragement of positive voting with an end to split and tactical voting;
• more co-operation between parties;
• fairer representation for voters by elected candidates most of them want and
• perhaps more people voting because their votes are more likely to have an effect.

This recommendation is central to solving the problem of the democratic deficit in English local government but we shall not be at all surprised if the Government tries to ignore it; it will probably cherry-pick those of the recommendations that suit it and reject those that do not suit its own purposes.

The report makes it very clear that STV is better not only than first-past-the-post but the other alternatives that are sometimes suggested:

“Electoral systems have the potential for influencing the selection of under
represented groups. Our research confirms that the first-past-the-post system used in
most English local government elections contains the least favourable combination of
factors likely to achieve this (Rao et al., 2007). The system coming closest to offering
the best chance of promoting under represented groups is the Single Transferable
Vote (STV) proportional system which was used for the first time in the Scottish local
government elections earlier this year.”

It is by no means only fringe parties that are under-represented; it is the Labour Party in many rural areas and the Conservative Party in many urban areas; it is also non-party groups such as women and ethnic minorities. STV is not just Party Representation; STV is People Representation.

Although it is a little disappointing that the Commission did not make an outright recommendation to change all local elections in England to STV, we would welcome the opportunity to see STV in action alongside first-past-the-post and we are confident that STV would be seen to be the better system. If the Government is so sure that first-past-the-post is better, let it take up the challenge and try to prove it by allowing the two systems to be compared side by side.

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The Commission’s report, Representing the future, was published on 10 December. It is available from http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/localgovernment/pdf/583990

STV can benefit voluntary organizations. It can also introduce people to STV and demonstrate its benefits. STV supporters, who are members of voluntary organizations, can work inside them to persuade them to adopt STV for their own elections. Please visit http://www.stvaction.org.uk/?q=node/169 for more details.