Calder Valley is an interesting place, election wise. A fair margin under FPTP keeps the Tories ahead, some 6-7k votes ahead. But still, this is only 40% of the total vote.
Under FPTP there is some tactical voting that can go on. If Labour wanted to push the "two horse race" angle, and the Lib Dems followed, Labour could win in Calder Valley...not necessarily too likely though. Lib Dems locally would almost have to give up.
Under AV though there is an opportunity for a simple tactical vote, though not perhaps how you'd expect.
Due to the percentages, 39.39%, 26.97% and 25.18% for Tories, Labour and Lib Dems in that order, AV can open things up to electoral tactics.
If people were honest then you could probably expect that one of two things would happen. Either the Lib Dem vote would heavily sway to Labour, in which case Labour may well just about sneak a victory, or the vote would split and go to both Tories and Labour...in which case Tories would still win.
The Tories may well think...I'd hate for Labour to win here, I want our MP to know we prefer someone else...so 930 voters for the Tories go and back the Lib Dems, putting the Lib Dems ahead of Labour now by 1 vote. Suddenly Labour are the third party. They're not going to give their votes to the Tories, only to the Lib Dems (and who knows, maybe not even the Lib Dems any more!).
The result? Again, either the Tories win...or this time the Lib Dems might sneak a victory. Labour would be robbed of their possible slight win because the Tories manufactured the Lib Dems to come second.
But this situation is extremely rare. It requires a) for the difference between the first and second placed candidate to be less than half the total vote of the third placed candidate in the penultimate round (if we follow voter polling on how often they'd transfer), b) the Tories and Labour to be first and second, mainly because they don't tend to try and get one another to win instead of the Lib Dems (though this may change) and c) requires the change of place between second and third place to be achieved through a small percentage (a realistic number) of tactical votes...perhaps around 1000-2000 for a typical constituency.
Thanks for the example!
ReplyDeleteLibDem/Labour close so... So final could be:
LibDem vs Con with either winning
or
Labour vs Con with either winning
Cons aren't confident of winning and prefer their chances against LibDems rather than Labour.
So a number of conservative voters could put LibDems above Conservatives to push labour out.
If too many mark Conservatives down against LibDems (3700) they don't even get to the final round, so LibDems stronger than under honest voting in final against Labour.
If fewer, but too many mark Conservatives down against LibDems then LibDems win in final against Conservatives (number dependent on labour transfer split between Conservative and LibDem).
If the 'right number' mark Conservatives down against LibDems, Conservative LibDem final
(that would otherwise have been Conservative vs Labour) but Conservatives weaker and LibDems stronger than under honest voting.
If not enough mark Conservatives down against LibDems then LibDems go out anyway and votes revert to conservative - same final Labour vs Conservative as honest voting.
I don't know what mechanism is suggested for controlling the number of tactical voters (maybe you could suggest?).
But it seems that the chances of strengthening LibDems (with your pref) so they beat labour, but without weakening Conservatives (by depriving them of your pref) to the extent they lose is quite a small window.
Could a 'tactic' as aparantly risky as this be considered rational?
I think it's down to the voters. I'm not against tactical voting personally, though I would prefer that it wasn't the *only* option available to people like it is under FPTP. Under AV Tories can make a judgement call, those that believe they'll do well enough can stay steady on their preferences...those less sure have the choice of trying to (in essence) give the Lib Dems the opportunity to beat them instead.
ReplyDeleteAt least under this AV example, the Tories have an absolute choice over what they do, hold fast or try to engineer something. It'd be great to stop it, but short of a much more complicated system, or PR, it's not going to happen.
At least this kind of example is extremely rare.
As the decision cannot be made by the voter in isolation - it would have to be coordinated by the party, and even then could accidently lead to their defeat when they could have won honestly I don't think it is a credible proposal.
ReplyDeleteYou'd have to work out the probability of each party making it to the final, the probability of beating each in the final, the probabilities of what the margin of defeat would be, then arrange for a number of voters to modify their votes - and then the probability of them actually voting as requested etc.
And if Gordon Brown turns up that morning and calls someone a bigot, you have to rapidly cancel it all!!
Its still an academic possibility, not a practical strategy.
I'm sure we'll have to just agree to disagree, but it's really not that hard to make such an analysis on probabilities as far as I'm concerned.
ReplyDeleteIf you can calculate that kind of probability with any reliability, you would have cleaned up at the bookies at every election.
ReplyDeleteYou accept that even based on the last general election you are uncertain who would win under AV - so what are the figures from there onwards?
I guess the question is "for any given conservative, what is the probability that them ranking lib-dems above conservative will reduce the chance of a labour win and not damage the chance of a conservative win"
If boundary changes happen then no-one will be able to reliably judge what will happen, thus for the next election only I can't see tactical voting being practical.
ReplyDeleteIf things stayed the same then I think a co-ordinated effort could easily make a certainty of who would win, as long as no-one "counter-tactically" voted.