Speaking with characteristic vigour and clarity, Winston Churchill told the nation in 1931 why it should reject an electoral system based on the alternative vote.
Ramsay MacDonald’s second minority Labour government had brought forward a Bill to authorise the introduction of AV. Churchill proceeded to tear it to shreds.
He denounced it as ‘the worst of all possible plans. It is the stupidest, the least successful and the most unreal [of systems]…The decision of 100 or more constituencies, perhaps 200, is to be determined by the most worthless votes given for the most worthless candidates…An element of blind chance and accident will enter far more largely into our elected decisions than ever before, and respect for Parliament and Parliamentary processes will decline’.
Churchill’s words remain as true today as they were eighty years ago. He exposed the folly and danger of creating circumstances, for the first time in our history, in which the votes of fringe eccentric or extreme candidates at the bottom of the poll could decide the outcome of constituency contests. Such votes would have greater weight than others. The historic principle by which Britain’s electoral system had been shaped progressively since the Great Reform Act of 1832—that votes should have equal value-would be overturned.
Under an AV system, the votes for a mainstream candidate who comes top of the poll have no further effect: the order of preference they indicate for other candidates is totally disregarded in the further round(s) of counting that ensue. But the votes obtained by the least successful candidates at the bottom of the poll who are knocked out are redistributed in accordance with their subsequent preferences.
If AV were adopted, it would introduce into our national parliamentary elections the grossly unfair proposition that one elector’s vote could be worth five or six times more than another’s, depending on the number of counts that take place. This is the crucial point that Churchill highlighted dramatically with his reference to ‘the most worthless votes given to the most worthless candidates’.
In 1931,when Churchill issued his stark warning to his own generation and to posterity, Britain had just completed the long political journey, begun a century earlier, from monarchical and aristocratic government to full democracy. The process had ended in 1928 with the extension of the right to vote to all adult women.
Throughout the nineteenth century the leaders of the Conservative and Liberal Parties rejected with derision all suggestions that Britain should set aside its historic practice of awarding victory to the candidates who came top of the poll. Gladstone led the way in dismissing the case for proportional representation which from the 1860s enjoyed some support (AV was then unheard of).
During the First World War both PR and AV were proposed by a Speaker’s Conference. Bitter and futile wrangling ensued in both Commons and Lords from which nearly everyone emerged convinced that alternatives to first past the post would never secure widespread support. The collapse of Labour’s AV scheme in 1931 reinforced the point.
The lessons of history must not be forgotten in the weeks leading up to the 5 May referendum. We are fortunate that Churchill encapsulated them for us so memorably.
Alistair Lexden is the official historian of the Conservative Party, a position that he took up as Alistair Cooke before his elevation to the Lords as Lord Lexden in January. He was one of the 26 historians who signed a letter published in The Times on March 11 warning that the introduction of AV would pose a threat to democracy.
( 9 comments ) Tags: Alternative Vote, AV, Churchill, First World War, Great Reform Act, history, Labour, MacDonald, PR, referendum, Speaker's Conference
Comment by Vishnu on March 20, 2011 at 10:41 am
You are absolutely right Alstair!
(AV)alternative voting system will remove the British Traditional Voting
System, Which is unfair , expensive and will gobble the the British TAx
payers hardly earned money. There are more and more negative aspects
rather than Positive aspects in in the AV. So let’s forget this AV
…system and continue our traditional Voting routine….
Comment by Norm on March 20, 2011 at 12:03 pm
“In 1931,when Churchill issued his stark warning to his own generation and to posterity, Britain had just completed the long political journey, begun a century earlier, from monarchical and aristocratic government to full democracy”.
And since then both Labour and Conservative governments have almost completed the journey from full democracy to EU dictatorship. Our votes are now worthless because we no longer are masters of our own destiny.
Comment by Paul Brennock on March 20, 2011 at 12:12 pm
I come from Ireland , where a version of AV has been used since the foundation of the State and where the people have in the past rejected attempts to change the system to first-past-the-post.
AV has always worked well in Ireland.
I cannot see that a system such as that used in the UK, which allows candidates to be elected with less than a majority of votes cast, can in any way be regarded as fair.
Comment by Nicholas Lane on March 20, 2011 at 2:13 pm
Dear Alistair,
It is simply incorrect to assert that under AV voters who have their preferences re-allocated a number of times have more of a say than those who vote for the eventual winner or the second place candidate. AV is a preferential system and it’s aim is to determine which candidate is the preferred choice of all voters voting in the constituency. So at the end of the process the winner is the candidate who is preferred by the majority to any of the other candidates.
Every voters’ voice is thus heard entirely equally and the system has the following major advantages over FPTP:
- Every voter’s preference, should they so choose, can be carried through to the final count between the two most popular candidates, thereby enfranchising many who currently feel they have little say.
- True voter intention for all parties will be established for the first time and tactical voting will be greatly reduced and eliminated over time.
- The outcome of government formation will not depend wholly on 150 or so marginal seats, mainly between Labour and Conservative.
Time to have a better politics and I wish Conservatives would engage with political reform to achieve this instead of pedalling the same old myths about AV and thinking current constitutional practice is always the best we can do.
Nicholas Lane
Comment by Richard Tebboth on March 21, 2011 at 1:39 am
AV seems to work well in Australia; despite propaganda from the No2AV movement, my enquiries down-under detect to appetite for reversion to FPTP.
Compulsory voting also would seem to be a ‘good thing’.
Comment by Malcolm Christie on March 21, 2011 at 8:25 pm
It seems silly that someone who would have lost their deposit under the current system, could be elected under AV.
Comment by Michael Klein on March 23, 2011 at 11:02 am
My main objection against AV would be that people’s second or third choice decides parliamentary seats. So, whoever gets a majority after, say three additonal counting rounds, can claim to be the first choice to a minority, but second and thord choice to a (remaining) majority (of second or third counts). Anyway, anytime several counting rounds are required, a majority of voters will get their second or third choice in Parliament and I struggle to see, where this outcome is different to first-past-the post, apart from (because of its being more complex) surrounding itself with an illusion of being more democratic.
Comment by V. De Maynard on March 24, 2011 at 12:00 pm
The only problem I have with AV is the obvious increased costs incurred whilst counting the votes over and over again! In any case, I see no one has come up with a better solution to appease the masses might as well not have voted at all?
Comment by Rob Archer on March 25, 2011 at 2:35 pm
One of the key advantages of AV is that voters supporting a less popular candidate in a particular constituency won’t have to second-guess how others will vote. They will not have to vote tactically to keep a candidate out, as many choose to do under FPTP. No voter should be placed in a position where they feel the need to do this.
Contrary to what is frequently stated, and the impression given above by Alistair Lexden, every voter’s preference is taken into account in every round if they provide a rating for all candidates.
Our leader was effectively elected by AV – the voting was just spread out over several rounds, that’s all, instead of giving preferences all in one go. Why wasn’t FPTP used for that?