Why I’ll be Voting ‘Yes’ to AV

Having just read ‘Why the Left Should Oppose AV’ over at Socialist Unity, and seeing plenty of other criticism of AV from various left-wing blogs, I still can’t see what any of them are driving at.

Would I prefer STV or an additional member system? Yes. But is AV better than FPTP? The answer is also yes. I don’t see how anyone who calls themselves ‘progressive’ can oppose a change to our democratic model which allows people more choice. Once AV is in place, we can move on to seek PR, or any other preferable system, but there must be a journey towards this, and adopting AV is a step in the right direction.

It seems to be a theme on the left that partial reform is not enough, and this kind of thinking is dangerous. In Engels’ The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 he criticises this sort of “dogmatic” view. He writes:

They acknowledge no historic development, and wish to place the nation in a state of communism at once, overnight, not by the unavoidable march of its political development up to the point at which this transition becomes both possible and necessary.

This is not to say that we should only seek reform. Marx himself said that we should not “exaggerate… the ultimate working of these everyday struggles.” Reform without a revolutionary backdrop is ultimately futile, and hence is flawed, but within a broader revolutionary ideal, individual reforms can be beneficial.

As an example, let me use minimum wage regulations. It represents a victory of Labour against Capital, but doesn’t represent the end of wage-slavery, nor poverty. A Marxist, however, shouldn’t oppose a minimum wage on this basis (ie that the reform doesn’t go far enough). What is more important for the Marxist is to ensure that once the small victory has been gained over Capital, the forces of Labour demand more.

A TUSC candidate stood in my constituency in May, and I voted for him knowing full-well that my vote would be wasted. At least with AV, I’d have been able to back him as my first preference, putting a more realistic candidate as my second choice.

For those who are saying that this will play into the hands of the BNP, that is nonsense. The tone of the immigration debate in Westminster and in the press plays into the hands of the BNP, and this should be the focus of the left. The rise of the BNP is also due to New Labour’s shrinking commitment to the working class (perhaps using the word betrayal is a little strong, perhaps not), and their reluctance to contradict the tabloid press on the issue. Sort these issues out, treat the working class with respect, and the BNP should largely go away. The Left’s fear of the BNP is disproportionate.

Hope Not Hate managed to batter the BNP in Barking and Dagenham before the last election, and more of the same in the future can and will have an effect, whether we vote using AV or FPTP.

Project Prevention

I’ve just been reading about Project Prevention, a scheme which offers addicts £200 to be sterilised. Because, of course, addicts are always capable of making sensible decisions and are never a bit hard-up for cash, are they? I am convinced that this is an evil project. And I don’t mean evil as in “bankers are evil”, I mean Adolf bloody Hitler evil. I’m talking Darth Vader evil. We’re talking here about people who are ILL, who have a curable DISEASE, being given money to never, ever have children. But there I sort of run out of words, and so the rest of this post will be a pastiche of the plans, in the hope of making the sheer nonsense of this initiative apparent.

Irresponsible Adults Offered Cash For Sterilisation

Today, the first recipient of money under the “You Can’t Go Out Like That,” scheme, originally piloted in the Outer Hebrides, goes under the knife. “Bill”, from Weston-Super-Mare, was given £200 under the initiative, which seeks to stop people who dress inappropriately for the weather from bringing innocent children into their world of chilly walks to the shops and damp t-shirts.

“Bill” admits he doesn’t deserve children. “Well, it’s embarassing, and very difficult to talk about, but I’ve been known to pop to the bookies without a coat in the middle of December. It can’t have been much more than seven or eight degrees outside. Imagine if I took my little nipper with me, dressed in jeans and a shirt… I dread to think what could happen. It’s just not right for someone like me, who doesn’t feel the cold, to have a child of my own. You can’t bring a little ‘un into a toxic environment like that. You might as well make him run back and forth across the M25.”

June Dixon, from the Not Even a Pullover Foundation, said the plans were perfectly justified. “I see them every day,” she said. “Why, just the other day I was buying some cream of tomato soup and a woman walked past me, bold as brass, with her kid in nothing warmer than a t-shirt. I didn’t have a thermometer on me, but I took a second opinion and it was definitely a bit nippy. It is October, after all. Walking round with your kids freezing their tiny little fingers off, it’s not right. It’s basically the same as putting them in a fridge in short trousers, or feeding them suphuric acid or something. It makes me sick.”

One GP we contacted said, “It’s disgusting what these people do. They might as well be smacking their kids over the head with a shovel and feeding them raw sewage. I’m 100% behind this scheme.”

Only time will tell whether others follow the example of “Bill” from Weston, but it’s reasonable to assume that if they do, these awful members of society, whom one can barely consider human, will at least be unable to perpetuate their sordid life choices and foist their problems on another generation.

Just a Quickie

David Cameron, in a press conference yesterday, when asked about Ireland’s economic problems:

Ireland is in the euro, Britain is not in the Euro… the problem with being in the Euro is you are not able to have a monetary policy tailored for the UK, for the benefit of citizens of the UK.

And here’s a mention in the Daily Mail:

And he dismissed comparisons with Ireland, which has returned to negative growth after imposing a tough package of public spending cuts to reduce its deficit.

Unlike Ireland, the UK remained outside the euro and was able to pursue a monetary policy on interest rates designed to support its own economy, he said.

And here’s a Reuters article from April 28th of this year:

Ratings agency Standard & Poor’s downgrade of Greece’s credit rating to junk status is a warning to Britain of what happens if government borrowing gets out of control, shadow chancellor George Osborne said on Wednesday.

“I think they stand as a warning to all countries, including the UK, of what happens if you don’t deal with your public finances in a timely fashion,” he told Reuters Insider television.

So, either the Tories are perfectly aware that being in the Euro makes economic comparisons worthless, but before the election were deliberately ignorant of this fact to score points against Labour, or George Osborne’s even thicker than I thought he was.