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Latest Articles in 'UK'
- The House of Lords is a mess - 01/05/2012The House of Lords is a mess. It brings together in one place party political nominees (often former MPs), acknowledged experts on particular issues, descendants of drinking buddies of long-deceased...
- The uncertain boundary between politics and law - 24/11/2011Here is an interesting examination of the interaction between politics and law in the British political system, delivered by leading barrister (and future judge) Jonathan Sumption QC. Delivered as the...
- The report on funding for political parties published today outlines some interesting ideas for reforming the way that politics works in the United Kingdom, improving it in some ways but...
Latest Blog Entries
- How the world turns - 20/05/2012It is not only the world of politics that is turned upside down by the European banking crisis and the ineffectual way in which political leaders are dealing with it. ...
- Authentic euroscepticism - 20/05/2012A very interesting article in the Daily Telegraph last Friday by Jeremy Warner (read it here) sums up the eurosceptic dilemma and reveals the perverse nature of the way they...
- Overwhelming - 18/05/2012This blog has described before the difficulties associated with Greek departure from the eurozone. It would reduce the Greeks to a cash or even barter economy for a while, and...
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electoral reform Archive
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Why was the electoral reform referendum lost?
Posted on 10/05/2011 | 1 CommentThe referendum on the introduction of the Alternative Vote (AV) on 5 May was lost by 68 per cent to 32 per cent. This is a crushing defeat. What went wrong for the Yes campaign? The explanation can be divided into three possible families of... -
Electoral reform: does the winner always win?
Posted on 19/04/2011 | 2 CommentsOne of the arguments raised by opponents of the Alternative Vote is that it allows the candidate with the second or even the third largest number of first preference votes to win the seat. This is a clinching argument against AV and in favour of... -
“AV is not British”
Posted on 18/04/2011 | No CommentsThose were the words of Labour peer John Reid speaking at a No2AV press conference with David Cameron this morning, reported by John Rentoul of the Independent. The interest of most political correspondents lay in the fact that Labour and Tory politicians were on the... -
Step out of the 19th century
Posted on 18/04/2011 | 1 CommentThere has been some concern among campaigners that, with the royal wedding held only a few days before the referendum on electoral reform, attention might be distracted from the Big Day. But there is something appropriate about two ancient features of our constitution being celebrated... -
A rotten way to fight a referendum
Posted on 15/04/2011 | 2 CommentsThere is something unsatisfying about the arguments deployed by the Yes side in the referendum campaign on electoral reform. They are right that the Alternative Vote is preferable to First Past The Post, but it is not vastly preferable and will not solve all the... -
The Alternative Vote Electoral System – the referendum is coming (14 April 2011)
Posted on 23/03/2011 | No Commentsorganised in association with Democratic Audit 14 April 2011, 3.00 – 5.00 pm, followed by a reception Mary Sumner House, 24 Tufton Street, London SW1P 3RB Programme: 15.00 – 15.20: Introduction and Welcome Stuart Wilks-Heeg, Director, Democratic Audit The AV System – The view from... -
Time travel: the limits of parliamentary democracy
Posted on 25/02/2011 | 10 CommentsA forthcoming proposal to change the time zone raises an interesting question about how our parliamentary democracy represents the diverse interests of this country. Putting the clocks forward by one hour will be suggested as part of a government tourism strategy to create more jobs... -
Why are all our politicians so similar?
Posted on 08/02/2011 | 2 CommentsA common contemporary complaint is that British politicians are now all too similar. There is not enough diversity at the top. (See, for example, “The fall of the meritocracy” by Andrew Neil in the Spectator.) Andrew Neil sought to criticise the narrow educational background of... -
AV rewards honesty
Posted on 10/01/2011 | 1 CommentLetter published in The Times, 10 January 2011 Sir, Daniel Finkelstein (Opinion, Jan 5) wonders why supporters of what he calls “pure proportional representation” might support the Alternative Vote. Here are two reasons. First, there is a strategic question. A Parliament elected by AV might... -
How much difference would AV make?
Posted on 22/10/2010 | No CommentsIn the light of the forthcoming referendum on replacing First Past The Post with Alternative Vote for general elections, an interesting seminar yesterday looked at what difference it might have made to the result of the general election earlier this year. Of course, there is...
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