Comments on: On Power2010: We Need Electoral Reform. Everything Else Can Wait

By: The fifth tradition (part 4 of 6): A five point plan for the organisation of the Labour left « Though Cowards Flinch

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:02:19 +0000

[...] to class-based) campaigning that has been the subject of much debate on this blog and several others over the last few [...]

By: Owen

Owen — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 19:31:20 +0000

Salman’s exactly right. I meant that electoral reform is the most urgent and important constitutional reform to make, since it’s the only reform of that kind which I believe will really help to re-engage people with politics. I wasn’t making any claim at all about its importance or urgency relative to wider political issues like the plight of postal workers or impending public sector cuts. Nor was I claiming that abolishing FPTP would be a panacea for all the ills afflicting British politics.

By: Salman Shaheen

Salman Shaheen — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 18:37:05 +0000

I may be wrong (though I very rarely am), but when Owen said everything else can wait, I believe he was merely referring to all the other suggestions for Power2010 which don’t involve electoral reform. You know this site well enough to know where we stand on class struggles. No one’s saying these should take a back seat to democratic reform.

By: What are your priorities? « Though Cowards Flinch

What are your priorities? « Though Cowards Flinch — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 18:13:48 +0000

[...] are your priorities? An article over at Third Estate highlights quite succinctly the essentially liberal programme for reform and defeating the reactionary agenda of whatever [...]

By: Dave Semple

Dave Semple — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 17:56:20 +0000

Only a liberal could come off with nonsense about how reform of the electoral system needs to be our first step, and how everything else can wait.

A socialist, on the other hand, knows full well that we’re fighting a bunch of battles that simply won’t wait which are a damn sight more important to the people of this country than what electoral system we use.

Backing the CWU, for example, in the full knowledge that if the CWU fall, the RMT will be next and so on and so on, destroying unions and increasing the scope for further privatisation and marketisation.

A change to PR is not going to arrest that, because whatever you look at it, a bourgeois parliamentary election is always going to return a bourgeois government. There ain’t a PR system in the world which suggests otherwise.

How we defeat this agenda is not primarily through elections (note the primarily) but through working class militancy. That is what can’t wait.

By: Carl

Carl — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 23:20:33 +0000

I will be posting my entry for the power 2010 meme tomorrow morning on my blog. I’ve also linked TTE into the post

By: Greg

Greg — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:37:59 +0000

I totally agree with you (and I am a Conservative) that we need to get rid of FPTP ASAP. However I think the Jenkins Commission is unconvincing on why STV would not work and had some very weak arguments about the benefits of AV+.
AV+ still maintains rotten constituencies that make MPs pretty safe from voters. STV makes every single seat marginal.