Cheadle and Gatley Lib Dems are moving
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by Lib Dem team on 2 April, 2011
May 5th will be a big day in the local political calendar with local elections across Stockport and the referendum on fairer votes.
For the local election in Cheadle & Gatley, Pam will be standing for the Lib Dems. Pam’s an excellent councillor for Cheadle & Gatley and has been both an inspiration and a great help for me in the 18 months I’ve been a councillor. Pam and I will be working hard over the next few weeks to persuade the good residents of Cheadle & Gatley to vote Lib Dem on May 5th (or earlier, for those with postal votes).
There’s also the referendum on changing our voting system to the Alternative Vote and we’re campaigning for a Yes vote.
Under the proposed new system, you would rank candidates in order of preference (ranking as few or as many as you choose). That’s it – it’s as easy as 1-2-3!
The winning candidate must get at least half the votes.
Under our current system, an MP can be elected despite being the last choice of a majority of his or her voters. MPs in safe seats need barely campaign at all at election time, whilst in hard-fought seats like Cheadle the candidates have to work much harder.
A “yes” vote on May 5th is a vote for all MPs to work harder representing us and for more votes to count.
2 Comments
I will be voting no to the AV referendum because I believe in the principle of one person one vote but obviously the Libdems don’t. The proposed system means that some people’s votes could count 2/3 times – or even more. Also, if you are given the option of ranking as many candidates as you want, then the winning candidate may not necessarily get 50% (e.g. everybody only votes for one candidate). Ranking a candidate is in essence an endorsement of that candidate, irrespective of how high you rank him/her.
A decision as major as this should require a minimum of 60% turnout – if only 40% of people vote, and the ‘yes’ vote is 51%, that would mean only 20% of voted for it! It is also more complicated and it will be more expensive
I’ll be voting “yes”.
Our “first past the post” system is no longer fit for purpose. Perhaps it was back in the 1950s, when some 97% of votes were cast for Labour or Conservative.
But now, voters are more sophisticated in the decision making. We now vote for a range of parties – whether nationalists, Greens, UKIP, Lib Dem or whatever. And the two big parties only got 65% of the vote at the last election. This isnt democracy any more. The change will mean everyone will have the opportunity for their vote to really count.