Saturday, 7 May 2011
10 reasons the AV referendum was lost (GB2011)
No one ever claimed that Guardian readers were representative of the wider population, but compare the referendum result with the views you expressed in our own survey a couple of years ago, and you could be forgiven for thinking that planet Guardian exists in an entirely different universe. At the height of the expenses crisis, 5,000 of you gave your views on a new politics, and by a country mile you said that the top priority had to be fixing the voting system. Well, the nation has now had its say on electoral reform of a type, and has decisively flipped its thumbs down.
But this is not, in fact, a case of a chasm between those branded the chattering classes by their detractors, and the wider population. A year ago, opinion polls were suggesting strong support for the general idea of reform, and even recording double-digit leads for the particular option of the alternative vote, which has now been so squarely rejected. So there was a chance for change, but that chance was blown. Here is a quick top 10 of the reasons why. As with the hit parade, we will work our way up from the bottom, until we reach the top spot in the blame game.
10. The referendum format. A yes/no plebiscite reliably puts reformers on the defensive. Instead of attacking the status quo in general terms, which is always easy to do, they must suddenly pin their colours to the particular change on offer on the ballot paper, in this case the alternative vote, and then stick by it – warts and all. Australia's referendum on the republic in 1999 provides a case study of how an impulse for change can dissipate over the detail, as voters fretted about whether they wanted the sort of presidency on offer, or a directly elected one instead.
9. In this context, the alternative vote system itself posed particular problems. Infamously dismissed by Nick Clegg as "a miserable little compromise", it is loved by no one, with most of the yes camp hankering for reform that links a party's tally of votes to its tally of seats, something AV fails to deliver. Few Labourites, and no Lib Dems, regard AV as an end itself. It scarcely mattered that from the reformist point of view it is unambiguously better than the system we start out with. What did matter was that the reformists could not muster the energy to market something that they did not truly believe in.
8. Leaflets from the electoral commission, which were designed to explain what the reform would mean to every household with meticulous neutrality, ended up making AV look horrendously complex. The blurb summed up first-past-the-post in just three sentences, while describing AV with an excessively complex example election, which required three diagrams and text that spilled over four pages. The commissioners included entirely superfluous information, such as the fact that the lack of an obligation to rank all of the candidates means an election can, in certain circumstances, be won with less than half the total votes.
7. A bigger blow was dealt by the shockingly deep conservatism of much of the Labour party. Although Gordon Brown had stuck an AV referendum in the last manifesto, candidates never had to declare how they would vote, and when the moment arrived to show their hands half the parliamentary party turned out to be against. Labour has always been split on electoral reform, and for the moment the ranks of the naysayers are swelled by intense animosity to coalition government as currently practised, and towards the Lib Dems in particular. Despite the pro-AV leader, Ed Miliband, having stuck his neck out a few times for the yeses, belligerent turns by grumpy old stagers such as John Reid and David Blunkett have created the impression that the people's party has no interest in giving the people more of a say.
6. And then there is the rather less shocking conservatism of the Tories. David Cameron had signalled he would be quite relaxed about the whole thing, and there were a few rumours that some modernising Conservative ministers would support AV. But after his backbenchers and backwoodsmen made plain this was one thing they would not wear, Cameron threw both the Tory machine and the considerable Tory bankbook at the operation. Obedience is the Conservative creed and before long the polls were showing decisively that Conservative voters were falling back into line.
5. A no campaign that got down, dirty and deceitful in the best traditions of the party of which it had became a wholly owned subsidiary. Made-up costs were attached to made-up voting machines, and posters proclaimed that these would be paid by soldiers making the ultimate sacrifice. After an infant's need for a maternity unit failed to shift the polls sufficiently, a sick baby in intensive care was deployed instead. The cynical message was that because hospitals matter democracy doesn't, and so you'd better vote no or else the little one gets it.
4. A wet yes campaign, on the other hand, entirely failed to meet fire with fire. The wrong celebrities (Eddie Izzard) were marshalled by worthy functionaries who looked like they would be most at home arguing in favour of a Financial Times editorial about joining the euro (something else Izzard once campaigned for). In a political culture that rewards those who pitch themselves against the system, for all the semi-comprehensible suggestions that AV would make politicians work harder, the campaign looked like the work of a metropolitan elite. More use should have been made of self-interested yes-mavericks, such as Ukip's Nigel Farrage, to summon up a rabble army.
3. Mistrust of coalitions. They represented a new politics last year, but are now seen by many, whether fairly or not, as the byword for dodgy deals and broken promises on health, universities and cuts. No matter that AV only marginally raises the chances of a hung parliament, most of the yes supporters want more of these, so they could not bring themselves to point this out.
2. The abject luck of a winning argument, and a failure to target the top. Abstractions about fewer safe seats and the need for representatives to reach out to a majority of their electors were never likely to cut the mustard, and particularly not when the yes team could never seem to settle on one of them as its central argument. There's no easier enthusiasm to whip up than the enthusiasm of hatred, and the campaign to have fought would have ruthlessly targeted on David Cameron. Here was an Etonian prime minister, asking for a licence for business as usual from those whom he deigns to rule over. The yes camp should have made no bones about a call to the nation to shake things up, by bringing him down a peg or two.
1. If the lack of a hate figure was the gaping hole for the yes side, Nick Clegg provided an unbeatable one for the noes. The man himself recognised that voters wanted to poke him in the eye, and he dutifully kept a fairly low profile in the campaign that was by far the most visible single concession that he obtained from the Conservatives. Shrewd as it was for him to go to ground, it could not prevent the noes from warning that "President Clegg" would be kept forever in power by everybody's second preferences. He had a horrendous hand to play last year, but he made things worse for himself by appearing to the country as a head boy thrilled at being unexpectedly tasked with helping to run the school. When the headteacher and his staff meted out their long-planned litany of horrors, it was not they but Clegg who felt the force of the pupils' revolt. Having once dismissed Gordon Brown's pre-election promise of an AV referendum as doomed by association with him, there is a bitter irony here. It is not association with Brown but association with Clegg that has now sunk the electoral reform he was so desperate to achieve.
Tom Clark @'The Guardian'
But this is not, in fact, a case of a chasm between those branded the chattering classes by their detractors, and the wider population. A year ago, opinion polls were suggesting strong support for the general idea of reform, and even recording double-digit leads for the particular option of the alternative vote, which has now been so squarely rejected. So there was a chance for change, but that chance was blown. Here is a quick top 10 of the reasons why. As with the hit parade, we will work our way up from the bottom, until we reach the top spot in the blame game.
10. The referendum format. A yes/no plebiscite reliably puts reformers on the defensive. Instead of attacking the status quo in general terms, which is always easy to do, they must suddenly pin their colours to the particular change on offer on the ballot paper, in this case the alternative vote, and then stick by it – warts and all. Australia's referendum on the republic in 1999 provides a case study of how an impulse for change can dissipate over the detail, as voters fretted about whether they wanted the sort of presidency on offer, or a directly elected one instead.
9. In this context, the alternative vote system itself posed particular problems. Infamously dismissed by Nick Clegg as "a miserable little compromise", it is loved by no one, with most of the yes camp hankering for reform that links a party's tally of votes to its tally of seats, something AV fails to deliver. Few Labourites, and no Lib Dems, regard AV as an end itself. It scarcely mattered that from the reformist point of view it is unambiguously better than the system we start out with. What did matter was that the reformists could not muster the energy to market something that they did not truly believe in.
8. Leaflets from the electoral commission, which were designed to explain what the reform would mean to every household with meticulous neutrality, ended up making AV look horrendously complex. The blurb summed up first-past-the-post in just three sentences, while describing AV with an excessively complex example election, which required three diagrams and text that spilled over four pages. The commissioners included entirely superfluous information, such as the fact that the lack of an obligation to rank all of the candidates means an election can, in certain circumstances, be won with less than half the total votes.
7. A bigger blow was dealt by the shockingly deep conservatism of much of the Labour party. Although Gordon Brown had stuck an AV referendum in the last manifesto, candidates never had to declare how they would vote, and when the moment arrived to show their hands half the parliamentary party turned out to be against. Labour has always been split on electoral reform, and for the moment the ranks of the naysayers are swelled by intense animosity to coalition government as currently practised, and towards the Lib Dems in particular. Despite the pro-AV leader, Ed Miliband, having stuck his neck out a few times for the yeses, belligerent turns by grumpy old stagers such as John Reid and David Blunkett have created the impression that the people's party has no interest in giving the people more of a say.
6. And then there is the rather less shocking conservatism of the Tories. David Cameron had signalled he would be quite relaxed about the whole thing, and there were a few rumours that some modernising Conservative ministers would support AV. But after his backbenchers and backwoodsmen made plain this was one thing they would not wear, Cameron threw both the Tory machine and the considerable Tory bankbook at the operation. Obedience is the Conservative creed and before long the polls were showing decisively that Conservative voters were falling back into line.
5. A no campaign that got down, dirty and deceitful in the best traditions of the party of which it had became a wholly owned subsidiary. Made-up costs were attached to made-up voting machines, and posters proclaimed that these would be paid by soldiers making the ultimate sacrifice. After an infant's need for a maternity unit failed to shift the polls sufficiently, a sick baby in intensive care was deployed instead. The cynical message was that because hospitals matter democracy doesn't, and so you'd better vote no or else the little one gets it.
4. A wet yes campaign, on the other hand, entirely failed to meet fire with fire. The wrong celebrities (Eddie Izzard) were marshalled by worthy functionaries who looked like they would be most at home arguing in favour of a Financial Times editorial about joining the euro (something else Izzard once campaigned for). In a political culture that rewards those who pitch themselves against the system, for all the semi-comprehensible suggestions that AV would make politicians work harder, the campaign looked like the work of a metropolitan elite. More use should have been made of self-interested yes-mavericks, such as Ukip's Nigel Farrage, to summon up a rabble army.
3. Mistrust of coalitions. They represented a new politics last year, but are now seen by many, whether fairly or not, as the byword for dodgy deals and broken promises on health, universities and cuts. No matter that AV only marginally raises the chances of a hung parliament, most of the yes supporters want more of these, so they could not bring themselves to point this out.
2. The abject luck of a winning argument, and a failure to target the top. Abstractions about fewer safe seats and the need for representatives to reach out to a majority of their electors were never likely to cut the mustard, and particularly not when the yes team could never seem to settle on one of them as its central argument. There's no easier enthusiasm to whip up than the enthusiasm of hatred, and the campaign to have fought would have ruthlessly targeted on David Cameron. Here was an Etonian prime minister, asking for a licence for business as usual from those whom he deigns to rule over. The yes camp should have made no bones about a call to the nation to shake things up, by bringing him down a peg or two.
1. If the lack of a hate figure was the gaping hole for the yes side, Nick Clegg provided an unbeatable one for the noes. The man himself recognised that voters wanted to poke him in the eye, and he dutifully kept a fairly low profile in the campaign that was by far the most visible single concession that he obtained from the Conservatives. Shrewd as it was for him to go to ground, it could not prevent the noes from warning that "President Clegg" would be kept forever in power by everybody's second preferences. He had a horrendous hand to play last year, but he made things worse for himself by appearing to the country as a head boy thrilled at being unexpectedly tasked with helping to run the school. When the headteacher and his staff meted out their long-planned litany of horrors, it was not they but Clegg who felt the force of the pupils' revolt. Having once dismissed Gordon Brown's pre-election promise of an AV referendum as doomed by association with him, there is a bitter irony here. It is not association with Brown but association with Clegg that has now sunk the electoral reform he was so desperate to achieve.
Tom Clark @'The Guardian'
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