There is a view that someone like me an 18 year old person who is not from a middle class background, when to a school which the year above me achieved 19% A*-C pass grades and from a so called bad town would be interested in politics never mind PR. My question has always been well I live in this country and the government dictates what I can and can not do. It would be irresponsible for me not to have interest in what is going on. With the recent election it highlighted a crisis in politics. A hung part was achieved which showed that the majority of the public does not support labour or the conservatives and that there is a range of opinions. Even though this occurred under the current electoral system the Conservative party with 36% did not have to form a coalition but could could of opted for minority rule instead. What bothered me was that the conservative party joined a coalition with the Liberal Democrats not because of a shared ideology, but for them to maintain control of the executive and in turn parliament. This choice is not based upon the foundation of trying to help people but to have power. For me the way to make sure it's the people put first and not politicians is to change the electoral system form First-past-the- post to Proportional Representation.
PR was the reason why I even bothered to walk down to the polling station to cast a vote for the Liberal Democrats so it would be appropriate to explain why I came to the decision to vote for them. Over the year up to the election I grew increasingly stressed by the fact I did not agree with Labour and the Conservatives proposed policies and yet their was no opportunity to cast a meaningful vote to oppose them. I had the opportunity to hear Vince Cable and Ed Davy speak at my college. They convinced me that a change in the electoral system needed to be done.
We have had a strangled on politics with two parties who are arrogant in their actions, if we keep voting for the same thing then how can we ensure that we are being told the truth. For example you shop at a certain stall in the market called 'old reliable' we have plenty of fruit around us, but the owner only lets us buy oranges and apples and claims it is the best two fruits there is, however there is a problem in that. How can we know it's the best fruit being sold by the best trader at the best price if we can only buy from the same person? It is the same for political parties we are always going to get corruption if we never look further afield.
You can't vote for change by electing the same parties. Why can't we have a political system where we can have meaningful discussions happen between many parties. We have other European countries who has PR and yet they still exist there hasn't been a break down in politics in Germany,Switzerland,Portugal,Belgium, Austria and many others inside and outside the EU. In fact the wider spectrum of political views has meant that there is very little chance that extremists could take over that country. Our society isn't divided into two, so our political system should not be divided into two either.
I have heard too many times people voting for Labour or the Conservative party without ever considering anything else. The idea of voting is for people to have been informed about the different choices so that they can make an informed decision. This means that a voter must be able to to look at different options with each one having a credible chance of being elected. A true wasted vote should not be one that is based on a party chances of wining, but on the basis that a voter as made an ill informed choice.
The two most popular arguments against this is 1) strong government is needed 2) the likes of the BNP will have more say. To the first point strong government means that there is less fear of them being defeated on legislation with people being opposed to them. Why would anyone regardless of political affiliation not want a government which is more sensitive to the views of others. For those who say that there is already a good system of that only has to look at Labour wanting to introduce ID cards even though there was opposition from the public and opposing political parties.
To the second point we live in a democracy where everyone has their right to voice an opinion in which people may not agree with. Regardless of the fact that the BNP would get a better political platform what we truly should be concerned about is that fact that people vote for them in the first place.It has been the lack of representation that forces people to vote for extremist parties because those parties get heard because of their controversial views. Nick Griffin leader of the BNP made a good point on Question Time on immigration only being debated because of their party. It is a sad time when a person has to vote and support a party which wants to unravel the multicultural society we live in which has made our nation what it is to be heard.We as a country have shied away from the BNP and the EDL from being hesitant in using the English flag to crying out when they were on Question Time. What we need is to have open conversations with these groups and expose their stupidity that is how we combat racism.
I am just an average person who sees that people are concerned that their views are being ignored. PR doesn't solve the problems we have, but it can be apart of a bigger wider change. Let us stop being afraid of progress and actually care for democracy, so that we can maintain the fundamental purpose of our government of representing us.
