by Dan Hodges
The No campaign has won. On Thursday, the bid to change Britain’s voting system will be swept aside on a tidal wave of apathy. Babies, soldiers and policeman will sleep safely in the their beds once more.
To those Yes supporters lunging towards your keyboards, save your energy. Your moral outrage at the nature of the No campaign is wasted on me.
You wanted this stupid referendum. You were the ones convinced a grateful nation would make a small change and usher in a big difference. That sweeping away our venal, corrupt Parliamentary system would be as easy as one, two, three.
You blew it.
There’s nothing I’d like better than to claim it was Hodge’s killer baby adverts wot won it. But I wouldn’t be able to maintain that façade for long.
It wasn’t the adverts. Or the “Tory millions”. Or the right-wing press.
The No campaign didn’t win the referendum. The Yes campaign lost it.
It didn’t begin to make a case. Not even close. In fact, it couldn’t manage to get as far as putting on its wig and gown.
Anyone wondering why need look no further than this month’s Progress editorial. Under the headline, “The No campaign has failed to make a positive case to Labour supporters”, it reads,
“A referendum on an issue as complex as changing the electoral system places a special responsibility on the main protagonists to ensure the debate which is conducted is honest and open. Sadly, the No campaign have singularly failed to discharge this responsibility”.
No. The responsibility on the main protagonists was to win the campaign. This was a vote on how we elect our government, not a civics lecture.
If there was an abdication of responsibility, it was from those who forgot that when people propose a change to the status quo, especially a fundamental constitutional change, the emphasis rests with them to make their argument. That’s why in many cases constitutional reform requires a two thirds majority, or a turn-out threshold. Except in this instance, because, though outraged at MPs being elected by thirty per cent of the vote, the Yes camp was perfectly happy to see our entire electoral system reconstructed on the votes of three men and a dog.
Yes supporters began the referendum with the belief that just offering people something new would be enough. Newness always prevails. Then, when they realised that wasn’t working, they decided to try to turn it into a referendum on the first past the post system, rather than AV. Duck houses and moats were the key to victory. When that failed they just lost their heads, and got Chris Huhne to run around shouting “liar, liar, pants on fire”.
At no stage did the actually try to sell AV, the system, on its own merits. Their messages were exclusively defensive, “It’s not complicated”, “It’s not like first past the post”, “it’s not really a big deal”.
In fairness, trying to sell it hard probably wouldn’t have got them very far either. That’s because there was one significant weakness with AV. Nobody actually wanted it.
This obscure fact will be lost over the next week as the handbrake is slammed on, and the car thrown into reverse. Those who once condemned the No camp for insulting the intelligence of the British electorate will instead be roaming the air waves bemoaning that electorate’s capacity to be duped. The voices that at the outset hailed the entire exercise as a means of bringing the people closer to the politicians will be raised in fury at a further staining of our politics.
Please spare us the hand wringing. When are the liberal intelligentsia going to recognize that just because they want something, and don’t get it, it doesn’t mean they were cheated out of it.
It would also help if they realised that pinning on a badge that says “progressive” does not automatically place you outside the political elite and make you a people’s champion. At least not in the eyes of the people.
The most ridiculous part of this morning’s Today interview with Nick Clegg was when he tried to claim that those opposing change were lickspittles of the British establishment, while he and his band of heroic rebels were the modern equivalent of the liberators of the Bastille.
Who does Nick Clegg think he is? Literally. The bloke was born in a place called Chalfont St Giles. He was educated at Westminster and Cambridge. His dad is chairman of a bank. His paternal grandmother was Kira von Engelhardt, daughter of an Imperial Russian baron. He served at the European Commission, then as an MEP, then an MP. He’s currently Lord president of the council and deputy prime minister of the United Kingdom. Just how much deeper into the bowels of the establishment can one man penetrate?
The voters aren’t stupid. The Yes campaign was at least right about that. And they’re wary of politicians. Yes were right about that too. So when someone like Nick Clegg turns up on their doorstep and says, “I know you don’t like people like me. But trust me. I’ve got just the thing to change all that”, you’d better be damn sure they’re buying what you’re selling.
And he wasn’t. An extra copper down your street. A fiver off your weekly shopping bill. A hundred off your council tax. OK let’s talk. A new voting system? He may as well have been selling chocolate fireguards. AV wasn’t a challenge to the political elite. It was their creation.
Because here’s the rub. There is no progressive majority. It doesn’t exist.
There’s potentially a Labour majority. Fingers crossed we’ll see some evidence of that tomorrow. But the progressive’s cause is not the people’s cause. At least not yet.
In this election people were presented with change, or more of the same. They said more of the same please. They were asked if they would like fairer votes. They said no thanks. They were told “Yes we can”. Their response was “I’m afraid you can’t”.
It’s not because they are irrevocably opposed to the progressive case. It’s just that they’re not engaged with it. And the reason they’re not engaged with it is because the people trying to explain it to them are talking in a language they don’t understand.
Trying to sell progressive politics via an AV referendum is like trying to get someone to join a book club by handing them a copy of War and Peace. It is not in any way relevant, or accessible or enticing. The Yes campaign were effectively trying to force feed people the new politics. No wonder they were told to bugger off.
But the mistake will be compounded. As sure as night follows day. No lessons will be learnt. No souls genuinely searched.
Instead the moral outrage will pour forth. The baby posters will be waved like bloodied shrouds. And Nick Clegg will take off his progressive badge and settle back around the cabinet table to plan the next round of cuts.
You had your chance. You blew it. Don’t go crying about me.
Dan Hodges is contributing editor of Labour Uncut.
Tags: AV referendum, Dan Hodges
Dan,
You have hit the nail on the head, I was just discussing this with someone before reading your article and we are of the same opinion. The No campaign didn’t win, the Yes campaign handed them victory on a plate.
That said, I am now even more disillusioned with the Labour party. I cant believe that such political heavy weights as John Reid and John Prescott were working for the Tory paid for No campaign.
The only thing I can take away from this is that most Labour MPs don’t want a fairer system, they want to keep their high paid jobs (all of them £65k+ per year) with their expenses accounts (all in excess of £60k a year, most in excess of £100k per year) and have no desire for us plebs to have a fair say in how they get their jobs.
The No camp was full of lying MP’s, the Yes camp seemed apathetic and the majority of Labour MP’s need ditching for joining the No camp and repeating the lies they were told to.
We blew it by allowing the MP’s to become involved, just like we always do.
How DARE you slag off War and Peace. It’s never been more relevant!
Dan,
Whilst your ‘I’m hard as nails me’ routine is fast wearing thin, essentially I agree with all of the above. I voted Yes, but have been dismayed at the failure of the Yes campaign to put forward one compelling, unifying message to the electorate throughout the course of this most dismal of referendums. The Yes to AV TV adverts were spectacularly misguided; this isn’t March 2009 when the expenses scandal first broke and the public was positively seething. Yes I’m sure voter anger endures about MPs and their expenses, but two years after the event? And who said a different voting system was the answer? The public sure didn’t. Simple, and far more powerful, messages could have been put across – not an advert designed to scare the population into a ‘it could happen again oooo’ scenario.
Meanwhile the No campaign has been ruthlessly on-message. AV costs too much, is too complicated and breaks the principle of one person one vote. Whether or not you agree with it, those messages have been drummed into us since the off. The Yes campaign had to actively win this campaign, not just hope the No campaign wouldn’t put up much of a resistance or bungle it.
Unlike your last prediction (I voted for Ed), I feel you may well be right come Friday.
No need for Democracy. With 1/2 brain Dan using his Prophetic powere we can know the results in advance.
“Whilst your ‘I’m hard as nails me’ routine is fast wearing thin”
But I am hard as nails David…
KRodgers,
Well you wouldn’t expect me to completely share your analysis, but you make a good point about the MPs.
The No campaign had the same problem actually.
They wanted to keep MPs in the background, but the reality is you simply can’t run a political campaign without them.
Clegg was by far the biggest problem for Yes. They wold probably have lost anyway, but he was the biggest single factor.
Dan,
The problem was that the AV campaign thought the electorate was stupid, whereas people know it was just a deal cooked up over a weekend in May and not a genuine attempt to reform the electoral system. I hope this referendum won’t have blown something more important, that is a real look at our electoral system and a review of proportional representation
Dan, if you ask why people who were inclined to vote yes, have changed their minds, Huhne’s childish and self-defeating rants were a big reason. Not Clegg.
In fact the yes campaign behaving like adults and uniting behind a cause would have been a good start.
When diverse politicians like Cameron and Dr Reid can happily share the same platform for their cause, but very similar idealists like Miliband and Clegg cannot even share a stage for a policy they agree on thanks to Miliband’s infantile school yard politicing?
It made the Yes campaign look childish, petty and very unprofessional and turned off a load of undecided voters.
Very well said, Sir! I agree with every word you wrote.
Let’s hope this prediction is more accurate than your piece on how D Miliband had already won!
Oh god. The one thing left that could make me believe ‘Yes’ might win is Dan Hodges predicting a ‘No’ victory. The guy gets it right about as often as Cameron thinks he is in the wrong.
John Joseph – War and Peace is just a litany of microscopic piffle. No discernible thread or plot arc, but plenty of wittering on about the looks in dancing aristocrats’ eyes and their possible feelings for each other (like a tame Martin Amis set loose on an incredibly lame royal wedding reception).
Never has a book so singularly failed to fulfill its remit – that is grip and entertain its reader.
On the contrary, this post did.
Ah well, here’s hoping this turns out to be as prophetic as Dan’s last prediction that David Miliband became leader of the party!
“The responsibility on the main protagonists was to win the campaign.”
By definition, you can’t have two protagonists in the same drama. The person opposing the protagonist is the antagonist. Aristophanes would punch you in the nose for a schoolboy error like that.
That is all.
Such is the scale of Dan Hodges’ overblown ego that he even flatters himself that people will be crying about him.
AB,
Well, Aristohanes would probably have to punch the Progress leader writer given I was quoting fro their editorial.
Progress indeed…
Ahh, Dan Hodges makes his now customary attempt to take the credit for something he has been only vaguely involved in, and then only because he was expecting it to win anyway.
Dan, we were always going to vote No anyway. All the campaign has done is make those involved in it look nasty
I’m still amazed that we’re having a referendum on this. Why don’t we have a referendum on whether the rich should be made to pay their taxes? Surely that would at lest be relevant to our society?
I’m voting YES but this is a fantastic article.
Any chance you can start submitting your blogs to Left Foot Forward because the contributors there appear to be living in a parallel universe…
“It would also help if they realised that pinning on a badge that says “progressive” does not automatically place you outside the political elite and make you a people’s champion. At least not in the eyes of the people.”
Indeed. Quite the opposite, since it is so obviously a “bullshit bingo” word that means nothing but just sounds positive, which is why politicians use it, usually as code for “left wing”. It always reminds me of the 2 mayors in Back to the Future, in the 50s and 80s, both using the slogan “Progress is my middle name”.
Plus did it occur to anyone that there were plenty of right wingers who might have been sympathetic to changing the voting system? 910,000 UKIP voters for example, who might have been amenable to having a system that put Nigel Farage in parliament? Possibly not the best way to reach them was to loudly claim AV as a system for keeping the right out of power?
That was the message I consistently heard from the Yes camp. Keep the right out, keep the BNP out, keep the Tories out. Leaving aside the morality of having an electoral system that shuts out parties you don’t like (and the fact that this is a Polly Toynbee fantasy that would not actually happen), how many people did they think that would impress? How many of the British public are left wing tribalists? The Tories didn’t spend the campaign saying “this will keep the lefties out”, they were very careful to try and appeal to as broad a spectrum as possible. That’s why they won.
The seeds of failure are in the back of a fag packet approach Clegg bought into. Rushed into it too early with not enough preparation. To win it needed not to clash with major local, Scottish and Welsh elections and to have had enough preparatory work in Govt to be presented as a thought through option. Opportunity for Labour to take up political reform as it is clear that it is the only party who might bring in something better. It doesn’t mean making it the highest priority or re-opening voting systems necessarily but recognising there is scope to occupy a political space empty from Friday onwards.
Dan McCurry says:
I’m still amazed that we’re having a referendum on this. Why don’t we have a referendum on whether the rich should be made to pay their taxes?
******************************************
Yawn – bash the rich – yawn.
I like to hear it though – it’s this sort of level of discussion and attititude that will keep you in the electoral wastelands.
Did you know that the entire Cabinet. went to Eton, and wear top hats.
‘Except in this instance, because, though outraged at MPs being elected by thirty per cent of the vote, the Yes camp was perfectly happy to see our entire electoral system reconstructed on the votes of three men and a dog.’
This comment alone indicates that you don’t understand the rationale behind AV. Maybe that’s your fault, maybe that of the Yes campaign, I don’t know.
If MPs are elected by 30% of those voting under FPTP, there is a serious possibility that 31% of the total voters would have preferred some one of the other candidates. FPTP makes co-ordinating on this candidate pretty much a matter of chance. Under AV this is much less likely to happen, because your vote can be reallocated once your first preference is eliminated.
A poor turnout in the referendum would be a pity, but given a straightforward Yes/No choice it is a reasonable assumption that non-voters are either equally happy (or unhappy) with either system or are happy to leave the decision to others. Here a low turnout is no justification for questioning the result.
As to why the politicians should never have been involved in the first place, see http://www.futureeconomics.org/2011/05/lets-av-it-for-the-voters
You can claim what you like about the yes campaign’s inability to connect with the public, you can throw as many ad-hominems as you wish at the people who supported it or stood to benefit, and you can use as much school-boy rhetoric about people not crying to you, as you see fit.
But sending millions of leaflets that contain lies to the general public during a democratic campaign? Put simply, that makes you a bad person. You did something unethical to achieve your political goal, and the left needs fewer people like you.
Richard,
“Such is the scale of Dan Hodges’ overblown ego that he even flatters himself that people will be crying about him.”
Which in fairness, I admit in my piece…
Dan,
“Ahh, Dan Hodges makes his now customary attempt to take the credit for something he has been only vaguely involved in”
Not saying you’re wrong, but for interest, when was the last time I did that…
Labour will never ever get my vote whilst reactionary conservative liars such as Hodges are running the show. I couldn’t give a toss if you couldn’t care less about what I think – but one day there will be a reckoning.
Not as ‘ard as me Dan!
I didn’t really care one way or the other, which is unusual for someone as opinionated as me.
The good thing about that however was that I could see both sides. It was clear that the “No” camp were crammed with vested interests representing the status quo.
As such, they lied, cheated and lied again to convince people to stay as they are. Good old politics of fear.
The “Yes” camp were useless too, but they at least tried to make an argument.
You’re right about one thing – “No” will win and the Tories will celebrate and the system will remain just a little more rubbish than AV might have made it.
Hardly anything to revel in really is it?
The first massive failure was to not demand a 40% turnout for the referendum in parliament.
The 2nd failure was the No2AV campaign then pulled its punches massively.
They didn’t focus on the LibDems being the main beneficary of the system, or how deeply unfair the AV system can be.
So they ran with the cost idea. So i think its still a very close call frankly now that complacency ‘we have won’ has set into the No vote.
IMO in many ways the No campaign failed, they should have been 20 pts ahead far sooner IMO. I have personally been so fearful of a Yes result, I have been spending hours on forums, radio phone in’s, and even produced my own youtube videos (That clip of auf weidersen pet using the av system thats been doing the rounds)
I think the lack of a 40% turnout for a major constitutional change was left out from the start of the bill because Cameron was all for AV initially. (He would rid himself of UKIP who cost him his majority by splitting his vote). He could swap preferences with the LibDems to keep Labour out of certain seats etc.. By the time they worked out the system would basically mean the Tories would lose seats unless they were in a coalition with the LibDems it was too late.
Sue,
“As such, they lied, cheated and lied again to convince people to stay as they are. Good old politics of fear. The “Yes” camp were useless too, but they at least tried to make an argument”.
Genuinely not trying to be ‘ard.
But that statement will be carved on the left’s gravestone.
Student,
“I couldn’t give a toss if you couldn’t care less about what I think”.
We seem to be in agreement then…
Dan Hodges
“Which in fairness, I admit in my piece…”
Since when did fairness matter to you as much as your out-of-control ego?
Nice article, thanks very much.
Dear Dan,
You’ve made some valid points (I shan’t bore you or others as to which), but you’ve also made some glaring assumptions that – in my campaigning experience on this referendum – are as wrong as the lies in your posters.
Are you sure you’re working for the right party? Labour was set-up as a force for change of the fortunes of the common man: you may know of them, the lower-middle to lower classes such as the miner, the farm-hand, the factory worker… the sorts of people who worked for the land-owning classes dominating the tories and whigs.
What ever the reasoning behind your thought process for the posters, the messages were a) blatant lies, and b) naive in the proposition that people were being offered the choice between a better voting system for their constituency representatives or maternity units, police officers and weapons for soldiers.
Are you so blinkered in your annoyance at Nick Clegg that you really think a Tory government will spend a supposed £250m on more public services when it is their over-riding objective to dismantle almost every aspect of a system set up by statesmen like Bevan?
If your prediction is correct, you will – whether you like to accept it or not – be the master of your own undoing: should AV not be brought in, Labour will be fighting the next election using a voting system that favours the tories over the left-of-centre parties with a new set of constituencies created by the reduction of seats from 650 to 600.
Unless you and your anti-AV colleagues can convince UKIP and the BNP to field right-of-centre candidates in every seat in order to split the tory vote, you will almost undoubtably find yourselves losing the 2015 and 2020 elections by ever-increasing margins. Learn from history, before your pride and ego force your own demise and those of your colleagues.
As for AV and the whole question of parliamentary reform, this isn’t a ‘miserable little compromise’ of Clegg’s, I believe it is the first, logical step in wholesale reform: Britain needs seperation of powers of the executive and the legislative bodies if we are to see a truely representative and accountable government.
Look to the shores of your own party for examples; the inciteful and inspirational step taken by Jack Straw by the creation of the Supreme Court is one of the most recent demonstrations of political brilliance, as it moved the British people one step closer towards constitutional protections from the excesses of the ‘strong Governments’ favoured by Cameron and Thatcher et al.
If you’re looking at people to blame for this ‘miserable little compromise’, then look to Blair and Brown and all the ministerial colleagues and back-benchers (including your mother) who failed this country when they did not seize the opportunity to change the structure of government in Britain so that the excesses of idealogy do not ruin the lives of millions such as were done under Thatcher’s ‘iron rule’.
The fact is, it is a tragedy for Britain that the Blair / Brown governments did not force through fundamental reforms when they’d had the chance in 1997-2001 and again in 2001-2005; Brown’s lazy attempt in his final year was too little and too late.
You are keen to lay the blame of your predicted lost vote on the Yes campaign itself; perhaps you’d do yourself a favour – as well as the millions of disenfranchised voters – if you’d spent more of your creative energies in attacking the regressives rather than undermining the progressives – of which Labour is supposedly a beacon.
You clearly have some talent; don’t waste it by undermining the work of those who are also fighting against the people/party/ideology you purport to oppose.
With best wishes.
C.
@Conrad: not being privy to the comrades’ infighting, I’m a bit surprised at the rather ad hominem approach you take to Dan’s piece. No doubt there’s an explanation which will keep all parties happy.
As to the country being ruined by ideology, I take it this is your definitive repudiation of ideology as the force behind Labour, which, as you say, was the party created by the trades unions for the improvement of the lot of the working man and the progress of society through education and cooperation, as I understand it, rather than the party of the public sector employee and the apparatchik.
Wow Dan’s gonna win one! Get in!!
IMO in many ways the No campaign failed, they should have been 20 pts ahead far sooner IMO. I have personally been so fearful of a Yes result, I have been spending hours on forums, radio phone in’s, and even produced my own youtube videos (That clip of auf weidersen pet using the av system thats been doing the rounds)
Oh, so you’ve been contributing to the lies too? You know as well as I do that the system used in Auf Weidersehn is not AV and nothing like the system that’s being voted on.
I know we are in politics and therefore opinionated but Dan has really wound some of you up with his erudite article.
I am voting NO because I see no evidence of having more than one vote being fairer. Every person has a right to vote, they do not have the right to vote for the Winner. I only want my Labour candidate to win, but accept democracy when they don’t. It is a misleading argument that MP’s will work harder under AV. I do not know one MP who asks how someone voted before helping them.
Jim,
…a couple of years too late, sadly…
Lewis,
“But sending millions of leaflets that contain lies to the general public during a democratic campaign?”
Well, there wouldn’t be much point me sending them all my lies once the campaign was over…
The borda count system used by the boys in the clip is like AV. AV reduces to a borda count if there are only 2 rounds.
Have a look at my other video ‘The Shocking Truth about AV’ and learn about non-monotonicity & non condorcet unfairness in AV.
“I know we are in politics and therefore opinionated but Dan has really wound some of you up with his erudite article”
Entirely unintentionally Jilly…
“Lewis,
“But sending millions of leaflets that contain lies to the general public during a democratic campaign?”
Well, there wouldn’t be much point me sending them all my lies once the campaign was over…”
Oh hey, clever of you. But the reason Labour no longer has the full support of the left that it once enjoyed is because Labour are no longer the “good guys”, because of people like you. You claim that the left has to engage in dirty tactics in order to win anything, but lying to the public undermines Labour’s position, and as a result people on the left who should be Labour’s natural base of support end up simply not voting out of disgust, or even going libdem.
I’m in Wales where we were never so badly infected by neoliberal blairism, so I had no trouble voting Labour today, but in England I truly would have struggled, and it is because of people like you. Get your act together, and fight nicely. We don’t have the media support to get down in the mud with the murdoch army.
Thanks for that – I was about to vote Labour, while I was at the polling booth to vote Yes anyway. Not any more.
I am against everything that you stand for politically, but this post is an absolute gem. Thankyou.
Lewis,
“I’m in Wales where we were never so badly infected by neoliberal blairism”
Presumably my evil strategy has backfired horribly where you are, and people are flocking in their drives to vote Yes to AV and provide a savage rebuke to my nefarious campaign…
Did you not get the recent labour leader vote wrong? You know nothing
You will feel silly if yes wins won’t you.
Andy: Yes
Labourtillidie: Oh , I think I do…