VOTERS FROM ALL across the United Kingdom go to the polls on Thursday, with voters in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales all electing their regional parliaments while England also holds elections to some of its local councils.
But across the four countries, people will also vote in what is only the second ever all-UK referendum: a vote on abolishing the electoral system used for Westminster elections, and instead adopting a system close to that already used in Ireland.
Currently Westminster elections are held under the ‘first past the post‘ (FPTP) system – a simple electoral model whereby the candidate that receives the greatest number of votes simply gets elected.
While those in favour of safeguarding the current model argue that it is only fair for the top-ranking candidate to win election, those seeking to reform the system argue that the current model does not require the winning candidate to be approved by the majority of voters.
Take, for example, a typical constituency where a Conservative MP may have been elected with 35 per cent of the vote – defeating a Labour candidate who won 25 per cent, and a Liberal Democrat who won 20 per cent, while the remaining 20 per cent went to other candidates.
Proponents of FPTP say that it is wrong for anyone other than the top-polling candidate (the Conservative, in this case) to be deemed elected; but others would argue that a clear majority of voters actively voted against the Tory candidate.
They might argue that voters for Labour and the Lib Dems – who, despite being on opposite sites of the House of Commons, are considered more ideologically compatible – would be happier to see the other party elected, ahead of the Tory. Indeed, if the Lib Dem’s voters had all sided with the Labour candidate, their candidate would have won.
The proposed reform (which, uncoincidentally, is being proposed and backed by the Lib Dems themselves) would see the system replaced with the alternative vote, shortened to AV.
For Irish voters, this system will seem fairly familiar: it’s the same as our Proportional Representation model for general elections, with the only difference being that AV elects just one candidate, and not the usual three-to-five that our general elections do.
So, the alternate vote is what we use in by-elections (most recently the by-election in Donegal South West last November) and in Presidental Elections (most recently in 1997).
Fundamentally, the AV system will ensure that a candidate is elected if they receive 50 per cent of all first preferences – but if nobody reaches this threshold, then the second preferences of voters backing eliminated candidates can be taken into account to push a candidate over the line.
One argument being promoted by the Conservative Party and other opponents to the reform is that someone who cast their vote for an unpopular candidate shouldn’t be given what in essence is a chance to vote: entitled to transfer their support for a poor candidate to a stronger one.
Both sides also argue that the other’s system would be more beneficial to extremist parties like the British National Party: AV supporters say their system promotes compromise, meaning extremist candidates cannot secure enough broad support to win, while FPTP supporters say reform will give voters for fringe parties a greater influence.
FPTP supporters also argue that the reform would result in too many coalition governments – an odd point given that the current coalition partners, the Conservatives and Lib Dems, are on opposite sites of the argument.
Labour, meanwhile, has not adopted an official policy given internal divisions within its ranks – party leader Ed Miliband is backing a Yes vote, while heavyweights like former Northern Ireland secretary John Reid and former home secretary David Blunkett are opposing the change.
The two government parties have both insisted that the outcome of the referendum will not mean a split in the coalition – though David Cameron has come under fire for the actions of the overall official No campaign, of which he is a patron, though he claims to only be “directly responsible” for his own party’s tactics.
Current opinion polls have given the No camp a significant lead, but the 10-point gap is not insurmountable with just two days to go before the crucial vote that could forever change the UK’s political landscape.
If we had a similar referendum in Ireland, which system would you support?
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