Why Cameron is full of bullshit

At the No to AV conference earlier this week, almost everything David Cameron said was untrue. Firstly, he descried the  Alternative Vote as obscure. So obscure in fact, that it was the very same system that elected him as leader of the Conservative Party. He said it was unfair, and expensive. The AV election is going to be much cheaper because it is being held on the same day as local elections, and if the vote passes through or not, it is just as expensive.

He said it will lead to candidates winning who ranked third. For the Prime Minister, it’s worrying how little this sentence makes sense. Also, it will make our politics less accountable, apparently. Maybe Cameron can be forgiven for being mistaken here. Under AV, a third of MPs would need to reach out to an increased number of their electorate.

Cameron believes that power should  lie with the people, as he said yesterday, and AV will take this power away. Under AV, everyone’s vote will count, unlike First Past The Post, wrong again Cameron.

Our Prime Minister believes that there should be real accountability between the pledges politicians make and the action they take in Government. Again, I struggle to see how AV will make politicians anything less than more accountable.

One main argument against AV is that it is complicated. For those who can count past one, it is not. And it is patronising for politicians to say otherwise.

AV, Cameron said in his speech, will lead to more coalitions. For every majority Government we have had since 1945, it would have also been a majority Government under AV. Australia, who use AV, have just had their first Coalition for a century. And we’ve just seen how FPTP is not immune to Coalitions.

Cameron believes in one person, one vote. How noble. Under AV, people may cast more than one vote if they wish, in preferential order, but only one vote will count. Unlike FPTP, where votes don’t always count. One person, no vote, in many cases.

Our Prime Minister believes that there is unfairness at the heart of AV, which is damaging for our democracy. That’s funny. Cameron has been linked to Former News of The world editor,Rebeckah  Brooks, and Andy Coulson, who was recently under Cameron’s employment. Both have been under fire in the media for seriously undermining Cameron’s favourite word, ‘democracy’.

He also said in his speech that the second, third or fourth vote of someone who  supports the Monster Raving Loony Party can have their vote count as much as someone who votes Conservative. Basically, this is our Prime Minister saying those who vote for such parties do not deserve their vote to count equally. Did he not say in his speech that everyone is equal and everyone deserves one vote?

Also, he said that the biggest danger is that we wake up on May the 6th with AV. Wrong again. The votes are being counted on May 6th. So unless you sleep in all day, which Cameron might as well do, you wont wake up to a new system on May 6th.

Cameron says that AV is wrong because he feels it in his gut. Clegg, give him some Rennie tablets and then re-evaluate.