Nick Clegg made his pitiful address to the House of Commons on electoral reform as though it were the greatest package of constitutional reform since the Great Reform Act of 1832. The truth, however, is a little more prosaic. Of the three main changes he announced, two are very much the work of the Conservatives and suit their political prospectus far more than they suit Clegg’s.

Even the planned referendum on the alternative vote (AV) is hardly the stuff of Lib Dem dreams. For those idealistic Liberal Democrats who have battled for decades for the promised land of proportional representation, their leader’s announcement must have come as a bitter blow.

I oppose the alternative vote system. I should say that this is not because I think it will do me much harm come the next election. I was, after all, elected with more than fifty per cent of the vote in Perry Barr. I oppose AV because, for one thing, it compromises one of the very best aspects of our democracy: its simplicity. I have never met a single constituent of mine who cannot understand the physical action of voting: one cross in one box. (more…)