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by petercooper
5525 days ago
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Perhaps this comes from living in the north, but the people I associated with are less sophisticated than you give them credit for. My wife has next to zero understanding about any of this and is not voting because she has no understanding of the issues involved. Ditto for my parents. And my in-laws. Assuming that everyone's an intellectual and will research and consider the options and then make an informed choice is both idealistic and unrealistic. Many people have better things to do with their lives than thinking about politics and they're out there doing them. Making the voting process even more complicated is hardly going to compel them to get involved. |
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Also, you seem to be talking about the decision making process of assessing whether to vote for AV or FPTP, not the not the complexity of voting using an AV system.
I'm not convinced that the AV voting method is too difficult to understand, though. Ranking things in order of preference is not hard for anyone to do. The finer points of the difference in electoral outcomes given different voting statistics might be more sophisticated, but that could be applied to any of the voting systems.
Voting itself though is no more complicated saying "I'll have a pint of Stella. If they don't have Stella, I'll have Fosters."
The No campaign has made the AV system out to be more complicated than it is as a scare tactic to put people off voting for it. That seems to have worked, which is deeply unfortunate, but indicative of political campaigns across the world. Fear and doubt are excellent motivators, and seem to be far more effective than a clear, reasoned and 'intellectual' argument.
Call me an unrealistic idealist, but I would much rather people research and consider the options before making an informed choice. Making a case for FPTP because it encourages more people who are uninformed and unconsidered to vote isn't going to win me over, though :)
However, as I say, the AV voting mechanism really isn't complicated at all - my wife is an early years teacher. Voting under an AV system is so easy that - literally - a five-year-old can understand it. I don't see anyone being put off by it.
Moreover, I think more people will be enthused by i) their ability to vote for the candidate that they believe in, ii) the greater accountability of their elected MPs to engage with their constituents and more accurately reflect their views and iii) their ability to express their opinions in a more meaningful way through the ballot box, that turnouts would be greater, not smaller. Low turnout and voter apathy has a multitude of causes, but the ones that I hear most often are "lack of accountability" and "my vote doesn't count anyway."