Campaign Blog

Back to Balls

This week we sent a message to David Cameron asking him how serious he was about Change. And it seems we were not alone.

Newsnight reported this week that our old rogue Schools Secretary Ed Balls is playing politics with reform, and his motives have little to do with actually fixing our broken parliament.

Balls seems intent on setting up voting reform as this parliament’s sacrificial lamb, for the Conservatives kill on queue.

But if Balls wants to prove a point about the Tories and their “Change” credentials they can’t forget about their own. Cameron would be wise to remember that his blocking of the bill has already been written into the script.

He needn’t play the role of Balls’ pantomime villain. Both Labour and Conservatives have an opportunity to make history. But first they’ll have to leave the cynicism at the door.

Well we’ve got a surprise for dear Ed. We’re asking our supporters to help redecorate the serial flipper's Normanton constituency. And you can help chose the colour scheme.

http://www.voteforachange.co.uk/EdBallsBillboard

We're putting up a billboard in Balls' Normanton seat, telling him exactly what we think of his opposition to a referendum. And we need your help to come up with a slogan for it.

http://www.voteforachange.co.uk/EdBallsBillboard

Any and all brilliant ideas welcome. Remember, we’re being cruel to be kind!

Dear David…

We popped by this morning to Conservative Central Office on Millbank with our letter to David Cameron. The message was simple. We want talks with Dave on why he's affraid to let voters have the final say on Britain’s busted voting system.

The staff at the front desk weren't all that pleased to see us. Take a looksy at youtube and you'll see what we mean. But message safely delivered nonthelesss.

We've already moved the government to accept the need to change the old system of First-Past-the-Post. But an amended constitutional reform bill now faces obstacles in both Houses of Parliament.

We aren’t expecting Conservatives to convert to reform overnight. We just expect them to practice what they preach on choice. And that means allowing the public to give our political system a vote of confidence at a referendum.”

The reform debate is alive and kicking outside parliament. Politicians of all parties have a simple choice: to make history or remain stuck in the past.

A Question of Leadership

Today we hear more rumblings of rebellion from inside the Labour Party. The outcome of that particular struggle is the subject for another campaign (which admittedly does seem to be keeping a good proportion of our MPs busy), but there’s another interesting side to this.

How should parties choose a leader? Perhaps good old reliable First-Past-the-Post. You know the old favourite. Traditional. Simple. Decisive.

Well no. Not one major party is satisfied to use Westminster-style voting to decide their leaders. For some reason they think first-past-the-post doesn’t quite cut the mustard.

And you know what; they might have the right idea.

We’re keeping this campaign running into the election. We’ve got nearly 40,000 supporters turned on to why voting reform matters. They’ve seen why politicians can only really be accountable when the many and not the few have a chance to affect the outcome of elections. The parties have achieved that in their internal elections, so why not extend that courtesy to the general public?

In leadership elections as with so much else there’s one set of rules for MPs and another for the rest of us. Another reason why we need this referendum, and the chance to really Vote for a Change

http://www.voteforachange.co.uk/pages/get-involved/

Hail to the King Makers?

“We will respect the will of the public. The voters are in charge and the decision is theirs. If voters decide that no party deserves an overall majority, then self-evidently the party with the strongest mandate will have a moral right to be the first to seek to govern on its own or, if it chooses, to seek alliances with other parties.”

Nick Clegg’s been talking hung parliaments. Him and every hack this side of the Palace of Westminster.

Voting reform is back making headlines. This time in the context of what might happen if – who’d have thought it – our electoral system throws up the one scenario it’s biggest fans can’t abide – a ‘hung parliament’ with no single party lording it up over the others.

Lib Dems, who’ve traditionally led the call for voting reform in parliament, are now cast as Kingmakers should polls ring true and we end up with a government without an overall Commons majority. And will they take reform as their price for support of a minority Labour or Tory government after the next election?

Nick Clegg’s words got us thinking. Since no party has actually deserved an overall majority since 1955 in terms of how people actually voted, who deserves his support? This system produces governments with no strong mandate almost by default. The public can't show their will. The decision isn’t with the voters. It’s with the system we want to change. That we have to change if we're going to get decent, accountable government.

We don't want to leave change to post election haggling, and the vagaries of a fickle system. We’re pressing to see a referendum on electoral reform make it to the statute book this side of a general. We want this out of back rooms and in the cold light of day.

Then we can let the people decide.

And they’re off…

Well you might not have heard it over the New Year’s fire works, but the starter’s pistol has been fired in this year’s general election.

The billboards have been designed, the speeches drafted, and – in what seems a bit of a throwback – the first baby of the season has been kissed.

You might have noticed in your area. But whether or not you find leaflets pilling up on your mat, a kindly image of a party leader smiling down on your high street or your newborns cheek suddenly dripping with a politician’s saliva does depends in large part where you live.

If you’re lucky enough to live in a marginal seat where your vote might mean something then expect attention. YOUR POLITICIANS WANT YOU! as Lord Kitchener didn’t quite say. If you’re in a safe seat then forget it. There’s no point politicians wasting money on you lot.

David Cameron has christened 2010 the ‘Year for Change’, launching a new year’s blitz using the ‘C word’ like it's going out of fashion. Change for everything is promised, except of course when it comes to our broken elections. His party remains wedded to a system that denies millions of voters – including almost every Tory voter in Wales and Scotland – a real voice in Westminster.

We still need your support for our latest letter to Dave. For the Tories, like all the other parties, change isn’t a word used to be used lightly. And where our politics is concerned change needs to tackle the problems where they begin – at the ballot box.

http://www.voteforachange.co.uk/page/s/Cameron

The Rogues Return

Sincere apologies to Andy Burnham.

Over the last few months our supporters have been flooding Westminster inboxes with over 12,000 messages saying that politics needs to change. We targeted the ‘Rogues’, the Big Beasts on both front benches that stand in the way of change. And somehow dear Andy missed the final cut.

http://www.voteforachange.co.uk/RoguesGallery

But here he is with Rogues Balls and Murphy reminding us why we chose them in the first place.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6962886.ece

Don’t worry Andy. If you’re feeling left out we won’t miss you next time…

Independent verification

The Independent reports today what we told you last week - the Cabinet is set to approve plans by the Government's Democratic Renewal Council to legislate for a referendum on electoral reform:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brown-plans-referendum-on-electoral-reform-ideas-1836799.html

The move opens the door to real change. But as the piece makes clear, opponents of reform in the unelected House of Lords will still try to take our choice away by scrapping the referendum. That's why we need your support more than ever before - it will take you just a couple of minutes to sign up here:

http://www.voteforachange.co.uk/referendum

We are the answer to the question

The politicians have been grappling with the question of how to recover their reputations after the expense scandal. And they're starting to come up with their own answers.

The government decided that more bureaucrats were the solution - the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority has been created to keep the MPs in line. The great and the good have been lined up to show that the establishment can regulate itself, and we needn't get involved. But today we've discovered the cost - Tribune reports that along with a mere £4m set up cost, the body will need a cool £100m a year to run. After all, the board will need their £400 a day expenses, while the chairman and chief executive need six-figure salaries to turn up to work in the morning. That's right - the solution to politicians pilfering taxpayers cash is to hand it over the bureaucrats instead.

The Tories, meanwhile, have been showing off their own solution, selecting their candidates by "primaries" - or at least two of them. But they have copied the very problem that got us in the mess in the first place - using the discredited first past the post system. So today's winner to replace Sir Peter Viggers - he who needed the mortgage on his duck house - was elected by less only 38% of those who voted...and only 17% of the electorate even bothered to do that. And the whole thing cost so much that the Tories have only even done that twice.

The sad thing is that we, the public, would happily hold MPs to account - and all for no added cost at all. Just give us our vote, with a fairer system that allows us to kick the guilty out.

That's why the most important thing the politicians can do is to let us solve the problem that they started - and keep our referendum. We are the answer to the question - and you can be part of the solution, by signing up here:

http://www.voteforachange.co.uk/referendum

More coverage of the referendum

There was also an interesting blog piece by the BBC's parliamentary expert Mark D'Arcy, who outlines some of the arguments around the referendum, but also explains why getting the referendum in to law will be important for reformers, even if there is a different government after the election:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/markdarcy/2009/12/why_is_electoral_reform_on_the.html

But he also warns that the opponents of reform - in particular the unelected Lords, who owe their seats to medieval monarchs rather than the British people - will try to use every trick in the book to take the referendum away from us.

That's why your continuing support is going to be vital. D'Arcy asks why electoral reform is on the agenda. We know why - it's because you put it there. And you can make sure it stays there by signing up here:

http://www.voteforachange.co.uk/referendum

Today’s headlines

You heard it here first, but today's papers are full of the news that we have won the argument with the government for a referendum - and for legally binding legislation on it rather on just more promises. You can read more in the Guardian, Independent or the Times:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/dec/01/electoral-system-reform-referendum-plan

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/ministers-force-debate-on-voting-reform-1832220.html

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6939951.ece