Not so simple and a lot more tactical

From the very start of the debate, many advocates for the alternative vote (AV) have insisted it eliminates the need for tactical voting. Whilst I’m sure this is a genuine mistake it does rather point to another common fallacy; that AV is simple. On the surface it is; what could be simpler than ranking your preferences in order? However, it would be foolish to judge a system solely on how it is intended to be used, whilst ignoring how it can be used.

With AV, if I vote “Conservative, Labour, Liberal” am I expressing a preference for Conservative ahead of Labour, and Labour ahead of Liberal, or am I actually expressing a preference against the BNP who also stood? Perhaps the “Conservative” preference is genuine and “Labour, Liberal” is tactical? A tactical vote, to quote Wikipedia, is when a voter supports a candidate other than his or her sincere preference in order to prevent an undesirable outcome; I would re-phrase this only slightly to say it’s when a voter expresses anything other than a sincere preference in order to prevent an undesirable outcome.

Tactical voting under our current first-past-the-post (FPTP) system is still a clear indication of how I intend my vote to be counted. Tactical voting under AV is nothing of the kind. It may indicate how I intend my vote to be counted, it may only in part, or it may be wholly designed to exclude an unwanted option; and there are other variations which, for the sake of brevity, I’ll omit.

A mantra of “voters should rank the candidates in order of preference” doesn’t cut it when - frankly - they don’t have to, and if AV were as simple as some suggest, then its advocates would be more aware of this. That they’re not shows that it isn’t.

Once more, with feeling

An abstract avoids prejudice but fails to engage, an analogy whilst having sound maths is vulnerable to complaints of being too simple. And an illustration using our political parties is at risk from the same criticism, but I thought I’d re-write the case of an alternative vote (AV) that leads to an ‘unfair’ result. The point isn’t so much “Party A voter would never vote for Party B”, but that they might express such a preference in order to keep out a substantially worse candidate. For instance, as someone who generally votes Conservative, I have no fondness for either Labour or the Liberal Democrats; however I wouldn’t hesitate to vote for either of these options to ensure exclusion of the BNP. Here’s the example:

There are four political parties standing in your constituency; in alphabetical order of party (and as it happens, candidate): BNP, Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat.

48,226 votes are cast.

The BNP receives 2,296 first preferences, of those votes the second preference where stated is split 978 for Conservative and 620 for Labour. 20,668 people vote Liberal Democrat; it subsequently turns out their second choice isn’t relevant – likewise for the 16,075 who vote Labour. The vast majority of the 9,187 people who vote Conservative don’t really care for the other two main parties, which shouldn’t surprise anyone, however most of them also loathe the BNP.

That’s understandable, and the best way to express this is a feature of AV that isn’t afforded by our current first-past-the-post (FPTP) system; the ability to vote against one party by voting for all the others. In our example, most of those whose first preference was Conservative do exactly this, and since they don’t have a preference with the other parties they rank them according to the order in which they are listed. This is called a donkey vote and whilst it is most common where full preferential voting is required, it applies equally here. As a result the ‘second preferences’ for those who vote Conservative are divided 8,177 for Labour and 991 for the Liberal Democrats.

With the vote in, the count can begin, and after the first round the BNP, having the fewest votes, is eliminated. The next preferences of those votes are added to the remaining candidates to give us the following: just over 42% would like a Liberal Democrat MP with around 35% opting for Labour. It’s still not a majority so the Conservative vote is eliminated… and something interesting happens when the ‘second preferences’ are added to the count. These would be the people whose other preference was mostly ‘anyone but BNP’ and consequently voted for the other candidates in the order that they appeared.

Despite having significantly less of the ‘positive’ vote, Labour’s candidate wins through having a superior position in the alphabet.

As I stated previously, what this illustration and others show is how AV can work; the result – fair or otherwise – depends on how the example is framed. I could as easily have had the Conservative candidate prosper as a result of Labour’s anti-BNP sentiment; not perhaps to the extent of the numbers used above, but certainly enough to affect the outcome. This example doesn't say how likely it is, only that it’s possible; under AV you can have a result that many people would consider unfair; it’s a system not nearly as simple as some would have us believe.

A plague on both your houses

In 1975 the UK held a referendum on whether to maintain its membership of the European Economic Community, a forerunner of the European Union; skipping the argument on the seemingly inexorable move from economic to political union, the result was a huge majority to maintain the status quo. I was eight. Thirty-six years later we have a referendum on the method for electing MPs to the House of Commons. I can’t remember anything about that earlier ballot; though I remember much that was ghastly about the seventies, it’s difficult to imagine the debate being worse than the one we have today.

At present, the UK uses the 'first past the post' system to elect MPs to the House of Commons. Should the 'alternative vote' system be used instead?

First up was No2AV who, faced with the difficulty in pointing out how irrational the link from an expenses scandal to a need to change the voting system, not surprisingly ducked the issue. You’re not going to win any votes from the ‘something must change’ lobby by highlighting such nonsense, so instead they crunched numbers in a way that would make even Enron blush. Deep breath… it’s going to cost you… ooh… let’s say £250 million to change your voting system. And just when you think someone has finally managed to put a price on democracy you find out a third of that questionable figure includes the cost of holding the referendum itself. Eh? Next thing you know they’ll try suggesting the ‘alternative vote’ benefits the BNP. Oh… Baroness Warsi, how could you? Not only is that dubious, it’s irrelevant.

Did you hear that Yes2AV? Doubtless Baroness Warsi was thinking of Churchill’s comment on AV, how results would be “determined by the most worthless votes given for the most worthless candidates”; but this doesn’t benefit the party itself, only those whose first preference may have been “worthless” and, in case I haven’t made myself clear, it’s irrelevant! To decide on one voting system over another based on a hypothetical that it may benefit a party of whom you disapprove is hardly a democratic stance. However, the more enthusiastic supporters of the “Yes” campaign must have skipped this rather basic lesson and are currently indulging in their own example of twisted logic; one that can be summarised as “the BNP want you to vote ‘No’, therefore you should vote ‘Yes’”. It is, I’ll grant, tempting; until that is you remember most proponents of AV would rather have proportional representation, a system that would most definitely benefit that obnoxious party. One might think they were prepared to say almost anything; that someone else started it, but presumably they’re going to finish it. Let’s hope not.

Why vegetarians are bad for AV

Fairness is often subjective, at least when it comes to electoral systems, so I am taken aback at the unquestioning ease with which the more ‘enthusiastic’ proponents of the alternative vote (AV) have appropriated the term. Ever contrary, I adapted an earlier example of how AV can lead to an unfair result, by using the dinner analogy popular with such support.

Imagine you are in a party of 21 and there are four restaurants within reach for a work-time lunch; in alphabetical order: Lentil Heaven, Liver Lounge, Pizza Palace and Thai Temptation.

One strange individual plumps for Liver Lounge and puts down Thai Temptation as his second preference. Nine people vote for Thai Temptation as their first choice; it subsequently turns out their second choice isn’t relevant - likewise for the seven people who choose Pizza Palace. The four people who remain are vegetarians, they’re cool; they don’t really care where they eat so long as they can avoid the liver.

That’s fair enough, and the best way to achieve this is a feature of AV that isn’t afforded by our current first-past-the-post (FPTP) system; the ability to vote against one option – by voting for all the others. In our example the vegetarians do exactly this, and since they don’t have a preference with the other options they rank them according to the order in which they are listed. This is called a donkey vote and whilst it is most common where full preferential voting is required, it applies equally here.

With the vote in, the count begins, and after the first round Liver Lounge, having the fewest votes, is eliminated. The next preference of that singular person is now added to the vote to give us the following: just over 47% of you would like a Thai, with around 33% opting for Pizza. It’s still not quite a majority so Lentil Heaven is eliminated… and something interesting happens. The ‘second preferences’ of the vegetarians are added to the count; those would be the people whose only real preference was to avoid the liver and who consequently voted for the other options in the order that they appeared - despite having significantly less of the ‘positive’ vote, Pizza Palace wins through having a superior position in the alphabet.

What this illustration and others show is how AV can work; the result - fair or otherwise - depends on how the example is framed. What this particular example shows is that under AV it's possible to have a result that many people would consider unfair; it's a system not quite as simple as some would have us believe.

AV tombola

The Alternative Vote tombola (AVt) is a refinement of the Alternative Vote (AV) voting system proposed in a referendum for later this year. It too is a form of preferential voting where voters mark the candidates in order of preference; the first choice is marked “1”, the second choice “2” and so on.

To quote one proponent of AV when addressing the issue of complexity: “The electorate will not need to know how to count the votes”, but should you be interested the winner in an AVt system is decided as follows:

1. Each candidate is allocated a colour.
2. For every 1st preference vote a candidate is given ten tokens of their allocated colour, every 2nd preference vote receives eight tokens, 3rd preference receives six - all other preferences are assigned one token each.
3. When every vote has been counted, the accumulated tokens of each candidate are placed in a large tombola and a winner is chosen by a local celebrity.

Hence the alternative view that when evaluating a voting system, understanding how to vote is meaningless without an understanding of how your vote is counted.

As easy as ABC… or ACB… or BAC... or...

The Alternative Vote (AV), it is often argued, is a voting system that provides more data on the preferences of the voter as it requires the available candidates to be ranked in order of choice. However, though there is certainly more noise, I’m not convinced this equates to more information.

For example, I have four candidates, A, B, C and D. I like candidate A and I loathe candidate D; how should I vote? Bearing in mind that the form of AV proposed for the UK doesn’t require a full list of preferences, the answer (it would appear) is ABC… or ACB. It’s the “or” that interests me. Since there is no ‘equal ranking’ – I can’t rank B and C as joint second – I am forced to make an arbitrary choice solely for the purpose of voting against D; most likely it will be a donkey vote.

If candidate C fails to obtain a majority in the first round and candidate A is eliminated through having the fewest number of votes, my randomly chosen 2nd preference is now counted for those who remain. Whilst I achieve my aim of voting against D, is democracy best served if candidate C, with the most (1st choice) votes, loses out to candidate B through having an inferior position in the alphabet?

Further, it may seem counter-intuitive but a vote of ABC doesn’t necessarily mean a preference of A over B, and B over C; it might do, but the only inference we can make with certainty is that it is a vote against D. Somewhat perversely, in comparison to this “anyone but them” portrayal of AV, our current first-past-the-post (FPTP) voting system in lacking this ability could be seen as requiring the voter to concentrate on who they vote for, rather than who they vote against. FPTP at minimum requires a “least worst” decision from the voter whereas AV, in this example at least, abrogates the responsibility.