Why keeping first past the post is vital for democracy

„The British people recognised it was time for change – and the electoral system didn’t let them down. On other occasions, when the public has felt that none of the major parties have all of the answers, it has led to a hung Parliament – as it did last year. Under AV, such decisiveness is much less likely. It will make hung Parliaments more commonplace and make it more difficult to kick out tired governments. Indeed, if it had been in place at the election last year, Gordon Brown could still be Prime Minister today. I can’t imagine anything much worse than a voting system that leaves half-dead governments living on life support.

The third reason to save First-Past-the-Post is its efficiency. Everyone knows this country needs to cut spending and get back to living within its means. At this time, we need to protect those things that provide our country with real value for money. Our current voting system does that – it’s cheap to administer and comes with little bureaucracy. There is a real danger that AV could come with additional costs, from public information campaigns explaining the complexities of AV to the extra expense of counting votes at election time. At this time I think our money is better spent on public services than on our political system.

The fourth reason to save First-Past-the-Post is to do with our history. Each democracy in the world has its own story, shaped by its own chain of events. The American system, with its strong checks and balances, was born of revolution – designed to avoid the possibility of over-mighty government. In Europe, both after the Second World War and the fall of Communism, many countries adopted other more plural voting systems, again constructed to avoid the experience of being dominated by over-mighty governments. Britain’s democracy has its own story. Two centuries ago, voting was limited to a privileged few.”