Sunday 9 May 2010

I’d Like My Change Now, Please…

wun_luv

I’ve spent the last two days listening pretty much solidly to speculation and discussion about the outcome of the General Election. I’m enjoying the uncertainty in a way – but at the same time I’m getting heartily sick of pundits and politicians, on both wings, making assumptions about why I voted the way I voted. I was particularly annoyed about various Conservatives telling me that ‘people didn’t vote for electoral reform’ – personally, I did. And apart from that, the Tories didn’t win and they have no idea what people were thinking when they voted.

I voted against the Conservatives partly because my local Labour MP was a good man and partly because I wanted a hung parliament (the only realistic way to tell politicians that we don’t like the way things are). And also out of a genuine worry that our new MP, Richard Drax, can’t possibly understand the needs of the average person – he has huge shoes to fill if he’s going to be even half the MP that Jim Knight was. Whatever they said, our local Lib Dems didn’t stand a chance of  winning in South Dorset, but if Nick Clegg can somehow wangle genuine electoral reform out of one side or the other, I’ll be happy.

The argument that PR is bad because it would let parties such as the BNP through the doors of parliament is a denial of democracy. In my own view, it’s better to let them air their views so that the nation can see how abhorrent they are – that’s why their vote fell so badly this time around. People would vote quite differently under PR, though, and new parties would undoubtedly form and win seats here and there – there would probably be a Marxist MP for every BNP member elected, maybe a Monster Raving Loony too.

Personally, I hope that Clegg forms an alliance with Labour (ideally under a new leader, otherwise the Tory Press will burst a blood vessel) because Labour have already embraced, if a little late, the idea of electoral reform. The Tories are hell-bent on getting themselves another elected dictatorship like they had in the 80’s so will never allow the people to genuinely have their say. PR would be another nail in the coffin of the vested interests that have distorted the political leaning of the UK for so long – the left of centre parties have always won more than 50% of the vote, yet for much of the last century we’ve had right of centre political control.

So: To the politicians: all of you promised ‘change’ and none of you won, so now give the people real change - a fair voting system. Then I’ll probably vote Green. Hooray for Caroline Lucas, by the way!

[Photo taken in a shelter on a pier in Falmouth – on the left is a long list of names and a little heart. It seemed mean to leave any names out.]

love | landscape

No comments: