Date published: 2010/02/10
The BBC says:
MPs have backed government plans to hold a UK-wide referendum on changing the voting system next year.
Voters would be asked if they wanted to keep "first past the post" or switch to the "alternative vote", which ranks candidates in order of preference.
But it is not certain the bill will become law before Parliament is dissolved ahead of the election.
The government says change is needed to restore trust in politics, but the Tories say it is a waste of £80m.
The one positive thing that could be said about this idea is that at least the "alternative vote" system is not completely crackpot. On the downside, it is totally ridiculous that Gordon Brown can have tea one day and decide by himself that this is the system that the country should change to. There has been no debate at all, and on such an important matter there should be consensus amongst all the main political parties unless one has been so compromised as to make it worth ignoring (and Gordon Brown is getting pretty close to making Labour like that). On a slightly less serious matter, the idea that the "alternative vote" system will have any impact on the public's view of politicians is laughable.
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