Analysis: Individual Electoral Registration Could Swing 16 Seats For The Tories

Individual Electoral Registration (IER) came into effect across the UK from July 2014.

IER places the onus on the individual to register to vote rather than by household registration as before. It also places new burdens on individuals to produce proof of ID.

Every year, electors will need to check to see if they have been removed from the electoral roll, or not added to it, and will need to re-register with NI number and date of birth. This particularly affects "attainers" - (those turning 18), students or anyone who changes address.

Proponents claim this will improve the accuracy of the register and reduce electoral fraud. It is also claimed that allowing one person to register the whole household is "old fashioned", "patronising" and raises security and privacy issues.

If this claim about accuracy was really true, it would be true in other areas too. Yet curiously no-one seems to be claiming they can improve the decennial household Census with an individual based one. Probably because they know that the claim is complete nonsense!

Anyone with experience of collecting data knows if you increase the data collection points, you increase the complexity, the chances of inaccuracy and the administrative costs. This was one of the reasons why the poll tax failed. Corresponding with every elector rather than by household increases all these problems by three or more fold.

As for the privacy and security issues of household voter registration. Living with someone per se is a privacy and security issue. People who live together have to share risks of fraud in far more lucrative areas for a fraudster than voter registration, such as their personal possessions, banking details, ID & confidential mail etc. There is no real incentive for someone to fill in a household voter registration form inaccurately.

Also, if you opt people out of something and rely on them to opt back in, even when there are big incentives to opt in, default can be high. But we don't need theory to know IER will seriously deplete the electoral roll and votes cast. We have the experience in Northern Ireland where IER was rolled out in 2002.

From the 2001 general election to the 2005 general election, the number of votes cast in Northern Ireland fell by 13%. This was the first ever recorded fall for general elections in Northern Ireland and came despite votes cast across the rest of the UK increasing by 2% across those same elections.

The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee noted "the adverse impact that individual registration appears to have had on disadvantaged, marginalised and hard to reach groups, including young people and people with disabilities". The drop in turnout was "a cause for concern".

On the issue of voter impersonation fraud which IER is designed to address, the Electoral Commission noted that they had "received no evidence to suggest that this was an issue".

So, we had been warned about IER and also that voter impersonation fraud was not an issue.

Yet, voter impersonation fraud is still used as an excuse to defend IER. On this, I quote the words of one investigator into voter impersonation in the US "voter impersonation is rarer than being struck by lightning".

As we know, to have an effect on the result, fraud has to be widespread. This is impossible by voter impersonation without being pretty obvious.

Yet the one area where widespread fraud could be an issue is postal ballots. The most likely electoral fraudsters are the candidates who could collect postal ballots and forge signatures or alter votes. (Rather than mythical hordes impersonating voters at polling stations, which would be easy to spot). Curiously this is something the government haven't addressed despite real evidence that postal ballot fraud is a problem. In fact they have made postal ballot fraud more possible by allowing postal ballots for every voter, rather than just those voters who have difficulty voting in person.

At best, IER is a sledgehammer to crack a nut. And it probably misses the nut too!

For me, it is clear that the introduction of IER has nothing whatsoever to do with reducing electoral fraud.

I knew that IER would help the Tories electorally. But my analysis tells me the effects could be more immediate and shocking than I thought!

My focus has been on the distortion of the electoral roll, which will affect the drawing of constituency boundaries in 2018. Boundaries are drawn on registered voters not those eligible to vote. Because of this, IER is likely to increase the number of rural seats and decrease the number of urban seats. This is because registration has fallen more in poorer urban seats. The Tories do better in the more wealthier rural seats.

My analysis of Northern Ireland IER shows a huge drop in votes cast and not just the electoral roll numbers.

Due to the unique politics of Northern Ireland we can also see clearly the divide between how IER has impacted differently on nationalist and unionist turnout. A 14% drop in the nationalist vote compared to just 10% drop in the unionist vote. The nationalist community tend to be poorer and more marginalised.

We know that poorer people are more likely to rent rather than own property. And renters are more likely to move more often and consequently be taken off the electoral roll by IER. We also know renters are more likely to support left of centre parties in the UK.

If these figures are transposed to the UK, it could mean a 0.6% gain for the Tories over Labour nationally and probably higher in marginal and Labour held seats. Around 16 seats have less than a 0.6% majority. The number of votes cast nationally could drop by over 3m and this despite population growth of 2m since 2010. Turnout last time was just under 30m votes. This is the figure to watch.

In Brighton and Hove, a drop in turnout will hit the Greens hardest. Particularly the young and students falling off the register. Especially since the scandalous and completely indefensible decision to end the block registering of students in halls of residence that Universities automatically carried out previously.

Council leader Jason Kitcat and Brighton and Hove council are doing their best to encourage registration with a widespread advertising campaign, but they are fighting against a flawed system.

Voting should be an automatic right, not something you're made to jump through hoops to get.

Votes cast could fall by as many as 20,000 across the City. A drop of 7,000 in Brighton Pavilion alone, more than half of those potential Green supporters.

Since Caroline Lucas's majority is just 1,600 votes, they should be very worried by this. With Hove and Kemptown also marginals with small majorities between Tory and Labour, all 3 seats here could be affected by IER.

The Tories knew exactly what they were doing introducing IER. Together with 5 year fixed terms and boundary enlargements passed for 2018, this is another measure that has eroded democracy and accountability. Shocking that the Lib Dems have also supported these measures.

These measures bring us closer to seat majorities "won" on 29% of the vote, as envisioned recently by Lord Ashcroft.

Also, these measures coupled with the rise of the SNP and UKIP, Labour might need a substantial lead in votes to gain the same seats as the Tories. Inverting the situation of 2005 and 2010, so bemoaned by the Tories. Food for thought to those short sighted tribal Labourites so pleased with first-past-the-post.

The 2010 and 2015 General Elections Will Dispel A Lot Of Untruths About Coalition Government

In 2015 we are likely to get a second consecutive hung parliament. And without radical and controversial boundary changes, that are due to come in in 2018, we could get a third or even more.

We were told by proponents of our current voting system that this could only happen under proportional systems.

We were also told that coalition government was unstable and couldn't be long lasting or provide "strong" or radical government.

As we near the end of five years of one of the most radical governments ever, we find other myths about coalition are dismissed too.

We were told coalition would mean perpetual Lib Dems in government, though that seems unlikely after 2015 with the most likely coalition a Labour/ SNP one.

The only claim left is that coalition can be unpopular and divisive. Yes, as unpopular and divisive as the Thatcher governments were. But I suspect that has more to do with our politics being bought by big business.

The truth is, our voting system is the straitjacket imposed on voters to maintain the two party duopoly. But thankfully this is breaking down. Lots of voters are scared into voting for the big two parties because their fear of one is greater than their distaste of the other. The spoiler effect and disproportionality are the big parties' friends.

As the combined vote of the big two plummets towards 60%, the system still delivers them 85%-90% of the seats. The coming boundaries could make this worse. But people want more choice. They want political parties that listen to their members not big donors. If voters keep voting for newer more radical parties and the combined vote of the big two drops below 50%. Could they still resist voting reform? They would certainly try.

Voters accepted 35% of the vote delivering a majority. Would they accept 29%?

But more than the percentage of vote for the "winning party" or the "turnout" percentage. The numbers we need to watch to determine the health of our democracy are the total number of registered voters compared to the voting age population, and the total votes a "winning" party gets. So 35% of the vote in the future, could be far less than 35% of the vote is now.

Even when the voting age population was 10m smaller, Thatcher, Major and 1997 Blair were getting seat majorities with 13m to 14m voters. By 2005, Blair got a majority with less than 11m. Cameron nearly got a majority with 10.7m.

With the new harder registration rules already "disappearing" millions off the register, with millions more predicted to go by 2020, this "winning majority" of voters could drop dramatically.

Registration numbers are failing to keep pace with voting age population growth.

In the 1950s, a 50m population had 40m on the electoral roll. Today's 65m population has around 45m on the roll. 3.5m eligible voters are estimated as unregistered and this could grow to 10m with the new rules.

Another issue to watch is the disparity between voter roll numbers for local and European elections, that includes all EU citizens resident in the UK and Westminster elections that don't.

Migration is an established fact and as the number disenfranchised in this way grows across Europe from around 5% of voting age towards 10% and beyond, it will become more and more unacceptable. As an already vulnerable group, this disenfranchisement will encourage political parties to treat them even more unfairly and will distort our politics.

All of this is relevant to coalition government because coalitions tend to increase the number of votes required to win a majority of seats. Under a proportional system, coalitions need even more voters to rule. Obviously this is more democratic.

Be very suspicious of those who argue in favour of a system that allocates power to parties on a smaller and smaller number of votes.

UK Democracy Has Failed

1. A constituency MP is accountable.

2. Single party government is decisive.

3. One person, one vote, it must be fair.

4. The candidate with the most votes wins, this is a simple system.

5. Our hereditary and unelected Lords are best at scrutinising our elected chamber.

All of the above are used to defend our present system. All are false.

1. Most constituents do not vote for their MP or even know their name. Yet 70% to 85% of seats do not change hands.

2. Our governments are slower at making decisions than those abroad and less likely to think long term.

3. The value of your vote is determined by constituency boundaries.

4. The link between total seats won and total votes cast is unfathomably complex for Westminster and local elections.

5. Amongst developed states only the UK has hereditary and unelected law makers.

All of this is beyond debate. These are undeniable facts.

The question is, what to do about it?

For a political animal like me, the triumph of UKIP on the back of what is obvious voter frustration at how our system works is very depressing.

Sadly, any party achieving power under the present system is unlikely to change the system. But worse, by the time they achieve power, the system will have moulded that party to its image. Real change seems hopelessly out of reach.

The failure of our political system can be summed up by two words - the lack of;

1. Representation

2. Information

1. You can increase representation by increasing the proportionality of results, so seats won more accurately reflects voteshare. You can also increase the frequency of elections and decrease constituency size to improve accountability. But in my opinion, good though these measures would be, it would not be enough.

Our current system is getting worse partly because the proportion of the electorate needed to win power is decreasing as our voting system fails to cope with votes dispersing among multiple parties. It is now possible to win power with less than 20% support amongst the electorate. But even the most proportional systems can deliver  power with less than 40% electorate support. Better, but still not a majority. And everywhere this figure is falling. There seems to be something fundamentally wrong with the process of voting itself.

The problem is that voting is a crude process that does not come close to capturing the opinions and views of voters.

2. The second problem is lack of information. It is pretty near impossible to get detailed and impartial information on candidates and party policies. We could improve the quality and range of information available to people by diversifying the ownership of our media. This would mean more opinions reflected and views more in line with the public mood. This would help, but once again in my opinion, it would not be enough.

People haven't the time to become experts on the main topics and no-one can be expert on everything and every candidate.

The other linked problem is that our political parties, candidates and media can be easily bought by the rich and powerful. We could have rules on donations and the dispersion of propaganda but how practical would this be and how long would these rules last?

Also the bigger problem is those people who need democracy the most are always the least likely to have the time or energy to participate. The poorest are not properly represented in political parties and certainly not in parliament. This will always be the case. And the longer this goes on, the more it alienates the poor from the system and the more likely they are to disengage.

What we need is a system that allows a truly representative sample of the population equal access to a diverse range of expert opinion, the time to deliberate, and the power to implement their collective decisions.

Thankfully we already have such a system - the jury service. We should extend this to selecting our government.

It is not perfect, but most of the objections are unfounded. People can make very informed decisions on the most complex situations.

Replacing our elected representatives with randomly selected representatives will deliver a much harder system for the powerful to corrupt. It would take the money out of politics and ensure proper representation of everyone.

We could experiment with term limits, a mix of elected and randomly selected. But ultimately I feel our system has gone so badly wrong that this might be the only way to put things right.

The numbers of "jury politicians" selected would have to be big enough samples to be representative. I suggest 500 in the Commons and 500 in the Lords.

This idea could take a long time to gain favour. But don't dismiss it, really think about it. Then think about where we are heading with our current elected alternatives. Which would you prefer?

The elephant in the room is proportional representation.

Westminster politicians rarely look worried. Why would they when 70% have got jobs for life as long as they keep their party happy. They are effectively immune from public opinion.

Since the universal franchise, only around 15% of seats on average change hands at an election, and never more than 30%.

70% of MPs have more to fear from boundary changes than voters.

Local government is increasingly about entrenched one party states in many areas. Not that that matters much with power so sucked into Westminster.

We are the most centralised state in Europe, with stagnant local government and undemocratic parties.

At every level there has been centralisation of power.

Our parties have taken power from their membership and handed it to their leaders.

Westminster are constantly eroding power from local government.

And turnout is so low in local elections that parties only have to address a dwindling minority to stay in power.

So, when something happens that makes Westminster worried, it is a revelation. The Scottish referendum was such a moment. A real decision concerning power in the hands of voters. And the unprecedented 85% turnout shows how much that makes a difference.

The problem for our political elite is democracy is a messy unpredictable business. It provides easy targets for our 24 hour media. But when policy making is slow and bland, it destroys hope and passion.
The Labour party in particular, now have a big problem. The Tories have their own ready made solution to devolution. They propose giving the Scots control of a few more percent of their own taxes and then to exclude Scottish MPs from Westminster. So the Scots remain slaves and Labour lose their Scottish MPs as well. Lose, lose for everyone except the Tories.

Because Labour tried to fob the regions off with feeble powers last time, nobody now trusts regional government in England. But without it we have a lopsided union. How can we devolve powers to Scotland and Wales without devolving to the English regions?

Answer is, to do that will cause justifiable resentment and present the Tories with a stick to hit Labour with.

But the Tories "English laws for English MPs" is equally unfair and so would be an English parliament. (And impractical, because spending decisions in England automatically affect Scotland and Wales and NI).

An "all England" solution will be as unfair to northern England as a UK parliament is to the Scots.

It is not just the Scots who have rejected the Tories for decades, it is northern England, Wales and many urban conurbations right across England. To be fair, devolution has to take this into account.

But for Labour to resurect regional devolution will mean an incoming Labour government offering to give away vasts tracts of power quickly. Real power over taxation. Not just the amounts, but how it is raised. This would take real courage and something Labour have lacked for decades - real democrats in their party hierachy.

I titled this piece about proportional representation. And I do believe our first-past-the-post voting system is a root cause of the power grab at the centre, unaccountability and the polarisation of our political geography.

I believe it essential that any new assembly/parliament is elected proportionally. But I also now believe that even PR may not be enough to stop our democratic drift.

We all know our corporate media are pushing us towards a plutocracy. Billionaires and big businesses buy policies at will from our political parties either with donations or through control of the media. Our elections are increasingly bought. We have to find a way to stop that.

I believe one way is to experiment with picking our politicians at random, like we do with jury service. We could start with local government, and if successful move on to national.

It would immediately take big money out of politics and allow a wider range of society and opinion a voice in making our laws. I believe it might bring new ideas, even trust back into our system.

Without something radical, I fear for the levels of inequality and dysfunction awaiting our society. Scottish independence was one democratic lever, now cruelly snatched away. How long will we wait for the next one?

Independence For Scotland, Britain To Stay In EU. Where's The Consistency?

I believe that not only is Holyrood better than Westminster, Brussels is too. Quite simply I would rather be ruled by Brussels bureaucrats than London bankers (Although I do admit this doesn't sound the most attractive choice).

That is why my position is consistent and logical and different from the unionist Eurosceptics whose arguments are full of contradictions.

If you believe the * British * press, Brussels is the root of all evil. The truth is, the flaws in the EU are much exagerated and the pernicious power and destructive activities of bankers much understated. And bankers fund our political parties.

* The British press is mostly foreign owned  and the owners located in tax havens which might explain their paper's focus on welfare rather than bankers and other wealthy tax avoiders *

If UKIP and the Tories stated clearly that they wanted Scotland for its resources they would at least have some intellectual honesty to their argument. But instead they simultaneously claim Scots are a burden on English taxpayers while crowing about us all being "better together". While using the exact opposite arguments about sovereignty to decry the EU. They are all over the place and only get away with it because Labour and the media are complicit.

Labour party careerists put their party before the interests of the people (both Scottish and rest of the UK). But even in this they are misguided. Ignoring the interests of the people will only damage Labour in the long run.

Scottish independence is fundamentally about restoring democracy. Not only will it set free Scotland, it will help regional England, Wales and Northern Ireland loosen the grip of destructive London dominance. And that is why, as an Englishman I am all for it.

10 policies to reinvigorate the Left

John Harris is right to say the Left are stuck in the past. They rarely set the agenda. In particular he refers to a Labour party, which feels compelled to dance to the right wing corporate media. I have sympathy with the overwhelming challenge Labour face from a distorting 24 hour media, but continually conceding ground will get the left nowhere. Rightwingers control the media and so control the future. The Right popularise policies from delinking pensions from annuities to a punitive welfare "cap", that look fair but push an individualist agenda favouring the well off. The Left need to find popular collectivist policies to reset the balance. Here's how.

1. Corporations and rich individuals donate  over £30m every year to political parties. Obviously, they do this to influence policy (mainly towards a rightwing agenda). This distortion has to be addressed if we care about democracy. In future all political donations (including trade union donations) will need to go into a general political fund. This will be allocated to political parties in proportion to their percentages of the vote. In addition, a political levy will apply each year equivalent to the yearly average of the previous 5 years of political donations from each company or individual. No longer should wealth determine political influence.

2. Corporations spend hundreds of millions on political PR. This must be balanced with an equivalent political levy that is distributed to parties according to votes. The more a corporation or wealthy individual seeks to influence policy, the more they have to donate into the general fund to allow others a response.

3. Just as broadcastors provide free space for party broadcasts. So too must newspapers, websites and magazines that carry political content. A few pages would suffice to allow some redress to newspapers's slavish following of the agenda of the big corporate advertisers that fund them.

4. The rightwing are using local government to circumvent democracy. Devolving the most difficult cuts down to councils controlled by opposition parties is a disgraceful way of avoiding blame. Local councils are now little more than central government lackeys dictated to from above on everything from their spending priorities to how they raise their revenue . This has to change. Councils need the power to decide how they raise their revenue and by how much. As a first step give them complete control over council tax, to revalue, reband or even replace with a land value tax.

5. Our constitution should not be easily changed by parties with only a temporary mandate. Most governments are now elected with less than 40% of the vote, let alone 50%. Yet they have the power to completely rewrite everyone's basic rights. This has to stop. We need to construct a proper written constitution decided by a two thirds majority that protects not just local democracy but also basic democratic ideals on the media, elections and other rights. For instance, it is a disgrace our second chamber is chosen by PMs and the landed gentry.

6. Link MPs pay (and expenses) to median earnings. Populist, but also a leftist point. There should be no need to pay MPs more than twice average earnings. Public sector pay generally should be limited to a 4:1 ratio from top to bottom (with a generous floor above the living wage) to set a good example for the private sector.

7. Link tax to inequality. There is growing evidence that inequality damages the economy as well as society. Ever greater rewards for those at the top has not increased the economic pie. Indeed the debt crisis can be linked to "fast buck" economics that is now an entrenched vested interest defending the unproductive financial industry & "rip off" economy. Corporation tax should be proportional to a company's pay inequality. Of course the global movement of capital to avoid tax will be a problem but can we afford to keep giving in to this threat? We could even link the welfare budget to the level of inequality.

8. We cannot continue to ignore environmental and social damage just to get short term economic gain. We need to build support for policies to address pollution and obesity. We need to control vehicle use.  We need to build housing for good health and efficiency. Only when there is wide public support can we implement "sin taxes" on sugar or plastic packaging etc. As a first step, we could follow Finland's example of a 70's style deposit on packaging and bottles to encourage their return to the shop. Only by putting the environmental costs on retailers/producers will we discourage over use of packaging (and reduce costs of litter, recycling and refuse collection). A tax on land would discourage free carparks. We could give companies significant tax breaks for the number of their employees who travel to work by means other than the car. Households that go car free could get council tax rebates or even free bus passes.

9. We need to build some more homes. But there is no point building surburban sprawl or building for property "investors" or worse, yet more second (or even third or more) homes. We need to address housing inequality. Real garden cities would be high speed rail connected, compact and car free with comprehensive metro systems and high density quality housing, yet with walkable large green spaces. A land tax would cap housing costs and speculative profiteering.

10. Finally we need competition between political ideas. A stale party system where constituency boundaries and voter registration rules are fought over for party advantage is no good. A bias towards the bigger two parties perpetuates the status quo and stifles competition of political ideas. Labour needs to embrace more proportional elections, but also more radical ideas on direct democracy. Each street could have  an elected rep, with a small budget they could pool with other streets if they desired. Some councillors could be randomly selected in the same way as juries, to widen representation. Elections could be held yearly. Above all, the Left should not fear more democracy. The masses are their biggest ally.

If We Want To Increase Turnout We Have To Remember Why People Vote

The chances that any one individual vote will make a difference to an election result is almost non existent.

At the last general election, every majority was greater than one. Hardly a surprise. So why should any one individual make the effort? And there is an effort involved. However small you may consider the effort in voting, the effort is much larger than the chances that individual vote will actually "make a difference" to the result.

Obviously there is the rationale "well, if enough people thought like that it would make a difference, a big difference". Indeed. And that thought alone can act as a big incentive to turn out.

When talking about low turnout, usually a lot is made of "apathy", the so called apathetic masses. This of course shifts the blame from those in charge. It lets them off the hook. It's those lazy plebs at fault, not us. In fact the only lazy ones are those using apathy as an excuse.

Think back to the opening paragraph and you can see it is not apathy that makes a person consider their vote worthless, it is rational consideration of the facts.

And this is why any barrier put in the way of registering to vote or the actual process of voting, however small, is going to have a significant effect. And why Individual Electoral Registration could have a massive effect. There are millions registering and turning out who can hardly be bothered at the moment.

So if individual votes are worthless, why do so many individuals actually turnout? Turnout of 50,60,70% or more seems unbelievable for a worthless act.

Of course voting from an individual viewpoint may be worthless, but from a collective point of view it can be far from it.

These are the main reasons why people vote and it may surprise you.

HABIT

If people vote when they are young they are likely to continue voting. And the more they vote, the more likely they are to vote. And vice versa.

Me and my friends are of an age group that had to wait till we were nearly 23 before we got to vote in our first general election in 1992. Which was a 5 year gap from 1987. The difference this makes is really noticeable in the turnout demographics - something like a 10% drop from those a few months older who got to vote at 18 in 1987. Most of my friends didn't get into the habit of voting when young and so never will.

We must remember the corporate strategy. McDonalds was one of the first companies to target children with its advertising and promotion because they worked out that if you want repeat frequent customers you need to get them into the habit. Get them young. Tobacco companies also know this.

Once people hit their early twenties they have made their mind up about most things. Rarely will people much change their political ideology and that includes whether they bother voting or not.

That is why changes that impact on turnout are so important, because that impact can last generations. It is going to be incredibly hard to break the non voting habit of the younger generations.

CONTENTMENT

Some commentators argue that content people are likely not to vote because they are happy with the status quo. In fact the opposite is the case, content people vote more. And the more society treats you well, whether in status, income, wealth etc, the more fearful you will be that your good life will be taken away. So you vote to keep what you've got. Unhappy people with little to show from society turn out less.

PEER PRESSURE

We all know family and close friends influence how you vote but they also influence whether you vote at all. The longer you know someone and the earlier their influence, the more chance you will copy them.

CULTURE: IT'S COOL

Difficult to imagine how voting can be cool, but when the franchise is first extended, turnout is usually at a high point.

LACK OF DISTRACTIONS

Modern life is full of activities, stuff. Things to do. We have moved on from Harold Wilson asking the BBC to move Steptoe & Son (they refused), but distractions do make a difference. How do we find time to vote?

RACE, CLASS, GENDER of candidates

People are racist, "class"ist and genderist (men more so than women it seems). They vote for people in their own image. Sad but true. See no-one like you and enthusiasm for voting wanes. The under-represented in parliament, turn out less. Which in turn means they are even more under-represented, which leads them to turn out less...and so on. A vicious circle.

IDEOLOGICAL or EMOTIONAL CONNECTION of candidates/party with voter

Politics, charm and good looks. Policies do make a difference, but in a world where trust is in decline generally and particularly of politicians, charm and good looks are getting more important. Charm and good looks however are not enough to restore lost turnout from a disengaged electorate caused by disillusionment at disappointing policies and broken promises.

NEGATIVITY

If you were going to buy a certain item and every advert you saw just slagged off a competitor producing that item. You might decide not to buy at all.

Negative political campaigns reduce turnout. And the longer the negativity goes on, the bigger the impact on turnout.

There is something about politics thats makes negative campaigning so successful.

Unlike in a healthy competitive marketplace, where increased sales drive profit. Politicians can profit just as much by driving down the votes of an opponent as winning votes themselves.

PERCEIVED IMPORTANCE of the ELECTION

Obviously General elections are more important than local and Euro elections because that is where the power is. Also close elections can drive turnout. We all know the difference between a marginal and safe seat.

PROPORTIONAL or FAIRER ELECTIONS

Proportional voting can reduce negative campaigning, under-representation of certain groups, devalued votes in safe seats and disillusionment at distorted national results. But it doesn't stop the general decline of turnout completely.

AND FINALLY, EASE OF REGISTERING & VOTING

Anything that increases security and accuracy of an election usually comes with a cost.

As I explained at the start, even small barriers to voting can be enough to put people off. The benefits of combating fraud do have to be weighed against the numbers put off voting altogether.

CONCLUSION/SOLUTIONS

Wherever there is a cost to voting, it needs to be countered with an incentive.

People can have a "moral" problem with voting being anything other than a voluntary duty that people should be willing to perform no matter what the costs and barriers to themselves. As I have already explained, from an individual point of view the incentive to vote is non existent. Yet we all know that it is of huge benefit collectively to us all.

The only way I can see this circle squared is to recognise that people incur costs in voting and recompense them for the good they are doing society by turning out.

A financial allowance set at just enough to compensate for the expense of voting (in time, effort & financial) has the advantage of appealing to those groups who turn out least - the poor. It would be simple and overcome the deterrent barriers of having much more secure election procedures and finally it would work. Turnout would soar if you paid people to turn out.

Labour needs a policy on boundary changes that stops the march towards gerrymandering

In the US, the incumbent party in each state gets a once in a decade chance to draw the congressional boundaries. Sophisticated computer programs are designed that manipulate boundaries to maximise seats for the party in control. Boundaries are drawn that can significantly skew results. Keeping parties in power even with less votes than their opponents.

Aside from this the Republican party in particular have become experts in voter suppression - finding more & more ways to remove targeted groups from electoral rolls.

All in all. Not a healthy situation for a so called democracy to be in.

Thankfully the UK is in a better position, but, we are moving in the US direction.

Like in the US, the UK uses a system for electing its national parliament where the drawing of constituency boundaries can have a bigger impact on the result than the actual votes cast.

For example, it is estimated that about half of Tony Blair's majorities in his three election wins were down to the favourable boundary review in the 1990s done under John Major's Conservative government.

This Coalition government have introduced measures that are going to impact significantly on the democratic process.

The most important will come in June this year - Individual Electoral Registration (IER). It is predicted that the move from household to individual registration could reduce UK rolls by 10%, removing 4.5m people across the UK. A 10% reduction is the experience from N.Ireland where it is already in place.

Initially around 10m people will be removed from the electoral roll. Those with incorrect address details with the DWP will not be automatically added to the register. These geographically mobile people - mainly young, urban and poor will (for the first time) have to provide proof of ID to re-register.

I am assured that the main impact of these changes will not affect the register until after the 2015 general election. So the impact will be most felt at the 2020 general election. So there is time for a Labour government to find a better way.

IER will not only remove millions of potential voters from the rolls, the new boundaries due to come in by 2018 will be drawn using these incomplete rolls. These boundary reviews are where the real impact will be felt because ignoring unregistered electors will make urban constituencies bigger than they should be devaluing all urban votes.

By drawing boundaries that ignore the unregistered, the current unregistered who vote in future, along with regular voters, will find their votes are devalued even before they get to the polling booth.

Which brings me on to the second significant change made by this government.

The coverage of the boundary vote in parliament by the UK media will have implanted the idea in most people's minds that the only unfairness in our current boundary based system are unequal sizes of electorates between constituencies. In fact this is probably the least significant factor in causing bias in our system.

David Cameron and a lot of other Tories have spoken of "equalising constituency electorates". And have made hay on the fact that this "fairness" has been blocked by the Lib Dems and Labour.

The current situation is that the vast majority of seats (over 90%) vary between 65,000 and 79,000 constituents. A handful of exceptional cases vary by far more e.g Western Isles 22,000, Isle of Wight 110,000.

Labour win seats with an average of around 68,000 registered electors in them, the Tories around 72,000. It is this "bias" the Tories are complaining about.

The Tories' proposal is to "equalise" to a variation of 2.5% around the mean of new bigger constituencies (73,000-77,000). Reducing the number of constituencies makes urban & suburban seats bigger & more rural. There will still be a handful of exceptional sized constituencies mentioned earlier which are exempted under the legislation. So the huge differences between these mainly rural constituencies will remain.

Drawing constituency boundaries is a difficult enough task even with a 10% variation. With 2.5% it becomes impossible to avoid breaking up communities, taking a bit of one town and a bit of another, crossing rivers and valleys, islands and mainland, slicing across council boundaries and having more frequent changes to counteract population movement, mainly "suburban drift".

These changes make accountability a joke as large numbers of voters find their MP has changed even before they get to vote, and there is little cohesion between local and national elections and the communities they serve.

Unlike in the US, an attempt is made in the UK to draw boundaries fairly with regard to all the conflicting considerations mentioned above.

The task falls to the four boundary commisions, one for each country of the UK. Of course they are heavily influenced by the main political parties - Labour and Conservative, in their decisions. And legislative guidelines can also heavily restrict their ability to be impartial.

One of the reasons the current boundaries are seen to favour Labour is that the last time a review was done in England in the mid 1990s, the incumbent Conservatives shored up their safe seats at the expense of their marginals. Labour were more than happy to accept these boundaries. which "concentrated" more of their vote in marginal seats and less votes in seats they couldn't win or in seats they win easily. The Tories did the opposite, moving more of their voters into seats they win comfortably anyway.

In the knowledge that they were heading for a heavy defeat, the highest ranking Conservative MPs, holed up in safe to fairly safe seats valued their own re-election above maximising the number of MPs for their party.

After 17 years without a majority and the prospect of many more lean years, the Tories have learnt the lesson of this individualist approach and have now adopted (ironically) a collectivist strategy to boundary reviews.

But even if the boundaries are drawn completely impartially, it is impossible to draw them without bias, especially bias against smaller or non geographically concentrated parties. Which brings me to why the current constituency electorate variations are a red herring.

Geographical concentration of votes (just enough votes in winnable seats and few in others) and what is called "differential turnout' (61% turnout in Labour seats, 68% Tory) are far more important. In fact an LSE study suggests over 80% of the "bias" is accounted for in these ways. So, at best the Tory "equalisation" will only address 20% of their "problem".

Another point to mention is that boundaries are drawn by numbers of REGISTERED voters in a seat, not by the actual "voting age population" which should be the real guideline.

Low turnout seats also have disproportionately high numbers of eligible but unregistered electors. So to compare just the number of registered voters in each constituency underplays the numbers of eligible voters in Labour constituencies.

By voting age population, the differences in constituency numbers actually FAVOURS the Conservatives the most. Urban constituencies average 102,000 population, rural 94,000. Tory seats are more rural, so their MPs already represent smaller populations than Labour.

Another factor is double registration of people in second homes and of students. These double registrations are largely in more wealthy rural Conservative seats so overestimate the numbers in these seats giving an impression these seats are bigger than they actually are.

Nationally the Tories got 47% of the seats from a 36% voteshare in 2010 but deem this unfair because Labour would do even better with such a voteshare.

The real solution to the manifold injustices of a boundary based voting system is to move to a proportional system where national voteshare is more important than drawing boundaries on a map. But that is not a solution favoured by either of the "big two" parties for obvious reasons.

They both do very well out of the present system, the only disagreement is over the share of these unjust spoils. Both parties receive a higher percentage of seats than their percentage of votes would manage under a proportional system and this is at the expense of the other parties.

Defenders of the present system defend geographical boundaries because each MP is directly accountable to electors in their constituency. Yet every Tory boundary reform proposed will reduce this accountable "constituency link" from bigger unwieldy constituencies to frequent boundary changes, reduced registration to unfathomable boundaries based on strict numbers.

Failing a more proportional system, Labour need to offer fairer boundaries. Stable boundaries sized by voting age population eligibility & complimentary with local council boundaries etc. Tory proposals will diminish democracy.

UKIP

Just analysed local ward that has just elected 2 UKIP councillors. A pretty identical turnout this time as in 2009, no Lib Dem standing this time but no Ukip last time, from this we can show how votes have moved.

It seems around a third of Tory voters last time went UKIP this time. But that still made up less than half the UKIP vote.

The rest was made up quite surprisingly of ex Lib Dem & Green voters & maybe some Labour. Although Labour did increase it's vote by picking up some of these spare Lib Dems (about 10%) & disenchanted Greens (most).

I imagine a lot of these new UKIP voters have quite fuzzy ideas of what UKIP (or maybe all parties) policies are. Unless switching from pro EU, PC, socially liberal parties, one of which is also vocally anti-austerity, to a party with policies basically the opposite is not a consideration.

That is not to say that surburban areas like this with large numbers of current & retired skilled working class has not developed an appetite for right wing policies, it has.

The press & broadcast media largely bow to their corporate & oligarch masters views that the private sector is king, we shouldn't be rude about Thatcher, and austerity is unchallengeable because Labour overspent on benefits & public services for people who don't deserve it.

Of course, people never cotton on that the media think 99% of the public are the undeserving. It is always the other person we look down on.

So they feed the right wing pig that the masses gorge on. But they have a problem - people know that their living standards are falling and they know deep down that the Tory brand is posh boys tarnished by their record in office. So they have to deflect and all parties subsumed in the establishment are took down with them.

But for now UKIP's brand is fresh & new & led by a charismatic & likeable character with a shrewd autocratic political control of his party. It is paying dividends. The people are fed up and crying out for change, but must at all costs be kept from socialist views. So UKIP is the diversion.

Will this benefit Labour? It depends. If the whole political debate is moved rightwards and Labour too, it could help shore up the Tory vote and remove weak protest voters from Labour. But if ex Tories remain so pissed off they stay with UKIP, our 2 party voting system with a new large centre right split & less so split on left could punish Tories more than Labour.

We could get even more bizarre results than usual. The European elections in 2014 under a form of proportional representation could be very interesting indeed.

Can the Tories really put the genie back in the bottle in time for the general election if UKIP top the poll & Tories fall to third place with less than 25% in 2014? Desperate times for Tories & their press, it has led them to dangerous tactics.

How do we combat the progressive's biggest enemy - "short-termism"

A lot of businesses think that planning 5 years ahead is 'long term' planning. The electoral cycle means political parties mainly get credit (or blame) for the here & now regardless of who is actually responsible. So how can we get fiscal responsibility, visionary environmental & social engineering and infrastructure spending whose main fruits may be decades or even centuries away?

Fortunately one solution is more democracy. We need a more informed electorate & less biased media that explains things in more detail & has less sensationalist "black & white" narratives that suit a proprietor's particular political taste/ business interest (usually right wing). This can only be done by opening up the monopolistic control of the media to many more sources,  imposing strict limits on donations to political parties & ensuring every voter has more direct input to parties.

A more proportional electoral system means more voting age adults are represented in parliament (probably doubling support needed to win majority of seats from 20% to 40% of electorate).

Harvard studies -  - have shown this has a direct relationship with inequality by giving more power to the median voter & lessening electoral power of the wealthy.

More equal societies spend more wisely on infrastructure like housing, universal healthcare, public transport, utilities etc & are more fiscally responsible. There is more pressure for full employment; so more is spent on training & education, and they curb more socially regressive aspects of companies who are short-termist. Long term planning is easier when (proportional) coalition government is fine tuned at each election rather than abrupt swings from one ideology to another.

Job done!

Tories Still Plan To 'Pack and Crack' Election

It is unlikely the Tories can improve upon the 10.7m votes they got in 2010. Although most Tory voters were under no illusion how harshly this government would hit the poor and they will remain Tory voters no matter how bad austerity is, the cuts will no doubt cost the Tories.

The narrative, that Labour's public sector spend caused the deficit, rather than the global banking crisis has been bought wholesale. These voters will be disappointed that cuts have failed the economy and deficit reduction but ideologically they wanted the cuts anyway.

But the Tories have a demographic problem. Tory support amongst the 18-34 age group is just 20% compared to 45% for Labour. Tories lead Labour by 40% to 30% amongst over 55s, but every year 200,000 Tories die compared to just 140,000 Labour voters. And every year Labour gain 130,000 Labour supporting teenage voters to just 60,000 Tories. (nb. 80% turnout of over 55s, 600,000 deaths, 40% turnout of 800,000 18 year olds).

So just to maintain voteshare, on top of new 18 year old voters, the Tories need to convert another 60,000 voters every year. Hard enough when you have an unpopular Labour government, but surely impossible when hitting so many people with unpopular cuts, even with the help of a servile media.

Labour are bound to improve on the 9m votes they got in 2010. Around 1.5m Libs have defected to them and I expect extra turnout will help them above 10.5m votes.

So it is not surprising the Tories are desperate for some help from boundary changes. To borrow an American term, the proposed changes are a classic gerrymandering example of 'packing and cracking'. Pack as many Labour votes into constituencies they win safely anyway and crack Labour marginals between several Tory voting seats.

Our system is all about maximising your opponents wasted votes rather than delivering truly representative democracy. Scandal? You bet, but most people don't understand maths, so its easy for people to not get what is going on.

The experts say this fix is worth 20 seats to the Tories and for a majority of seats they need a 7.5% lead over Labour rather than 10.5% previously.

This underestimates how much these new boundaries will help the Tories, for the following reasons.

Firstly, It is 20 seats from the new total of 600 rather than 650. This is 3.5% of seats. Since they won 47% of seats in 2010 with 36% of the vote, we can see how this figure is significant. It will deliver a majority of seats with the same 36% of votes.

Secondly, the demise of the Lib Dems helps the Tories more than Labour. The % lead required is calculated on there being 80-90 non Tory and non Labour seats. Since the Libs seem destined to lose over 30 seats, this slashs in half the lead either party would need to win outright. The Tories could win if just 3% ahead. In a dead heat election, the Tories might lose 30 seats to Labour but gain 30 from the Libs. A Tory minority government!

Of course packing and cracking does not solve the Tories regional problem. They are dying in the North of England, struggling in Wales and dead in Scotland. This limits their boundary gains to the South and possibly Midlands, but the Tories will settle for that for now. Expect the Tories to offer something to the Libs to get these boundary changes. But hopefully the Libs won't be so stupid, if only because they will be big losers themselves.

For further gains the Tories need to look to US Republican methods of voter suppression. Anything that makes it harder for people to vote benefits right-wing parties, and in the US this has been taken to an art form.

From stringent voter ID, limited and overcrowded voting booths, confusing ballot papers, overly slow bureaucratic and discriminatory, slapdash, deliberately over zealous even corrupt registration procedures, lifetime bans for any criminal record or even anyone with a similar name to a criminal - many millions of poor, predominantly Democrat voters have been disenfranchised.

The introduction of electronic counting machines without audit trails even brings into question the legitimacy of the whole counting process. Even if not true this can discourage turnout.

If all else fails, just make it prohibitively expensive and bureaucratically difficult for candidates to stand, let alone the exorbitant cost of running an effective campaign. This makes sure only the richest (usually right-wing) candidates can win.

From 2020, the Tories plan the more expensive and bureaucratic individual voter registration that the Electoral Commission warn could remove up to 10 million eligible voters from the electoral roll.

Already handicapped by a overwhelmingly hostile media, Labour cannot afford to lose out in the boundary/ registration fight. The Tories are fighting dirty. Watch this space.

How the new boundaries would have changed the result

In 2010, with 36% of the vote the Tories got 305 seats (47% of total), Labour with 29% of votes got 258 seats (40%), the Libs voteshare of 23% delivered just 57 seats (9%).

From this, we can see why the two big parties are so keen on the present system and also why the Tories are unhappy with how their spoils from the biased system are divvied up with Labour.

Opinion polls currently show Labour on around 40%, and Tories around 33% of the vote. I think it inevitable that Labour will do better than Gordon Brown's dismal 29%, but the Tories will struggle to get more than 36%.

So lets assume that at the next general election both get around 35%, with the Libs around 15%.

Under the current boundaries this would deliver around 300 seats to Labour, 290 to the Tories and around 30 to the Libs, with 30 others.

The others are split fairly evenly left and right so cancel out. Lib/Lab would have 330, a fragile majority of just 15 (as Sinn Fein don't take up their seats).

But under the new Tory proposed boundaries, the same votes would deliver 305 Tories, 250 Labour, 20 Libs and 25 others. This would give the Tories a 15 seat majority to govern alone. No wonder the Tories are so desperate for the changes.

In both situations Tory losses to Labour would be alleviated by Lib losses to Tories. The new boundaries hit Labour and Libs because of the loss of Scottish and Welsh seats. And Labour further lose out in England because of the way previously urban seats have been made more rural by the increase in size.

It will be near impossible for Cameron to get this through without Lib support. In the Commons the maths is tight but against him. He needs iron discipline from his 305 MPs even when some stand to lose their seats. He will need sufficient bribes for them. Plus he needs most of the Scots and Welsh Nats and the NI unionists. Even this would only bring a majority of one. Of course some Labour and Libs might vote for the changes though the opportunityvto defeat the government would probably be a stronger one.

The SNP would support him for concessions on the independence referendum and Scots parliament powers. Plaid Cymru are dead set against the changes as Wales loses a quarter of its seats, so Cameron would have to offer something on these changes as well as more powers to the Welsh assembly. Both high prices to pay.

And even if the Commons vote was won, it would be stopped in the Lords with probably insufficient time to guillotine before an election.

So, even Cameron must know these changes will be defeated. The Tories will use the vote as a propaganda exercise to win public support and maybe even as a platform for coalition break-up and an early election. Which probably explains why the Scots independence referendum in 2014 is deemed so inconvenient. Interesting times indeed.

Tories Should Be Very Careful When They Talk Of Fair Electoral Boundaries

For a party that in 2010 got 47% of the seats with just 36% of the vote, and stands to gain even more seats from the proposed new boundaries, the Tories should perhaps shut-up about fairness.

The idea that every seat should have identical size electorates sounds a very noble one and expect the Tories and the 90% of the press that supports them to push this line very hard in the next 14 months in the run up to the boundary change vote in parliament.

Equally, expect to hear very little about the uneven registration of voters that means poorer Labour supporting electors are effectively disenfranchised by the drawing of boundaries that ignores them.

Or the new individual voter registration that will make this problem worse.

Also, expect very little to be said about our electoral system where the power to decide where boundaries are drawn can overide the wishes of millions of voters by completely changing the results.

Or anything about the practical difficulties in limiting variation in constituency size to 5%, rather than  the 10% variation we now have for the vast majority of seats.

Or why Tory HQ gets to decide the size of constituency rather than the voters or boundary commissions.

Or why Tory HQ should draw up a law that effectively leads to the boundary commissions ignoring geographical, county and community boundaries in applying these new rules, leading to confusing absurd boundaries with no link to communities.

No, don't expect to hear anything about the sort of unfairness where the Tories currently win 82% of seats in the south of England with just 45% of the vote, and how the new 'fair' boundaries will give them even more.

No, don't expect to hear any of that.

The Boundary Changes Were Always Unfair And I'm Glad They Will Be Defeated.

As predicted the Tories have scuppered Lords Reform. Admittedly Clegg's bill wasn't the best, but as always with the slow progess of constitutional change, it was a step in the right direction.

To defend unelected lawmakers, as the Tory right now have, shows a disgraceful contempt for the principle of democracy, and we should remember that they have effectively argued in favour of dictatorial rule. Typical.

Less talked about in such terms, but a far bigger constitutional change than either AV or Lords Reform are the new boundary proposals.

This is not some minor adjustment that periodically takes place, as some commentators have claimed, but a massive hacking job on recognised community based constituencies into a system similar to the US where districts have numbers because naming them no longer makes any sense.

So we have a Gloucester constituency absurdly without the cathedral and town centre, part of Brighton lumped in with Lewes, countless slices of big urban areas merged with countryside crossing county boundaries. No link between local authority and constituency, voters more confused than ever, and with more frequent reviews no end in sight to the upheaval.

The precise enlargement of constituencies has been decided by Tory HQ, not the boundary commission or voters. The power to dictate how boundaries are drawn can overide the wishes of millions of votes. This is why this voting system is so corrupt.

This is not about being "fair" to the Tories as some have claimed. They got 47% of seats with 36% of the vote in 2010, these changes will give them even more seats.

And even this statistic hides the fact that a lot of voters sit on their hands in despair at a system where most seats are decided before the votes are counted and even more voters feel forced to choose between Labour and Tory to make their vote stand a chance of counting, rather than being free to vote for whomever they really want.

So, yes Lords Reform and Boundary changes were not explicitly linked in the coalition agreement, but constitutional change in the British tradition is inevitably piecemeal and partizan. The Tories have spite the Lib Dem face, the Lib Dems have cut off the Tory nose.

Cola Politics

Imagine you walk into a shop to buy a drink and are told you can have either Coca Cola or Pepsi. You don't want either and point to a whole host of other drinks on the shelf.

The assistant shrugs and says you are welcome to choose any drink you want but explains you'll only get what is the most popular at the moment, so you might as well choose from the two that have a chance of winning to improve your prospects of affecting the outcome.

You walk out of the shop in disgust at such a ridiculous restriction on your choice.

Yet this is exactly how our current voting system restricts our choice of politician. No wonder voters are frustrated.

A proportional system would mean the vast majority get their choice. It introduces more competition and allows more diversity and representation. In short it is more democratic.

The Lords Reform Dilemma

I'm genuinely torn on what Labour should do about Lords Reform. Here is an issue that should have been sorted long ago.

Knowing that elected governance is a given if you believe in democracy, the best that opponents of reform can do is argue that 'now is not the time' and that after a 100 years of waiting, we should all wait a little longer.

Despite being in their manifestoes since 2001, it is increasingly clear that the Tories never want reform. Labour equally have a large number of MPs happy with their future retirement home. Lords reform was always going to be a tough nut to crack.

So this is a clear opportunity that may not come along for a long long time.

Yet, I have sympathy with Ed Milibands position. By blocking the programme motion, opponents can and will 'talk out' the bill, the chance for reform in this parliament and probably the next will be lost once again. But equally if by doing this Labour hold up a whole host of right wing coalition bills and encourage the Lib Dems to block the undemocratic boundary changes who can blame Ed?

Without Lords Reform and after the underhand tactics of Tories in the AV referendum, the Lib Dems will have no legacy to their time in government, nothing to show their supporters except supporting an ideological cull of welfare and public services that has not even eliminated the deficit. Lib Dem members didn't join to see poverty doubled and no progress on the constitutional stitch up.

Lib Dems can't blame Labour if Cameron cannot deliver his side of the bargain, they have to be direct and stop the boundary stitch up in retaluation. The problem is Labour think losing Lords reform is worth it to block boundary changes.

However losing a PR elected Lords is a big loss. Tories rightly fear that voters will get to like the fact that PR gives them more choice as parties other than the big two can get elected in large numbers. How long before people start asking for PR for the Commons?

Why Electoral Boundaries Matter.

If Central London had a Mayor, Ken Livingstone would win by a landslide. But in the 1970s the Tories expanded the political boundaries into leafy outer London.

Since then (like Scotland & Northern England) Inner London has had to endure Tory rule they never voted for. Would Inner London have been willing to tolerate the transport chaos and pollution on its doorstep (which only benefits commuters from Outer London) without this change?

Back in the 1950s the Tories could still win the majority of seats in Scotland. Which today seems incredible as the Tories struggle to hold even one seat there. And right into the 1980s, Tories could win in the urban North. But Thatcher put paid to that.

And it is quite conceivable that Northern England could become like Scotland with hardly any Tory MPs if present trends continue over the next few decades. Just 13% of Tory MPs represent constituencies in the North of England despite it being 24% of the UK electorate. And none of those represent the urban areas of the big cities.

Saying that, the Tory decline in the North is not as bad as Labour's decline in the South outside London. Only 3% of Labour MPs currently represent constituencies there despite this area also being 24% of the UK electorate. Something strange is going on that goes beyond sheer economics or ideology.

This also explains why the Lib Dems strength is crucial to Labour beating the Tories. The Lib Dems win 34% of their seats in the South. 19 seats to Labour's 8. These 19 seats would all go to the Tories if the Lib Dems do badly - which currently looks likely with low polling and radically changed boundaries.

All over the world, the Right has always done better in rural and small town areas and the Left in urban centres. But our voting system seems to exagerate and accelerate this process. Why?

I think part of the answer lies in the fact that people like winners and our winner takes all system makes change very difficult. Constituencies and councils can remain one party hegemonies for decades or longer.

In fact big change only really comes with significant boundary shifts like happened for the 1983 Tory landslide or 1997 Labour landslide that gave both parties long periods in power on ever diminishing minority support.

It took nearly 70% of opposition votes to finally remove the Tories and over 70% for New Labour to lose, and only then to a Tory/Lib Dem coalition.

In short, our system is hopeless at allowing voters to 'throw the buggers out'. The bigger power lies with the boundary commissions.

Once a party gets significantly ahead in a seat and national swings have no effect on the result there, it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy as opposition voters give up and can't see the point in turning out to vote for someone who can't win.

And the urban poor reach a point of despair quicker than the rich do in rural areas. This bigger drop in turnout in safe urban areas over the smaller drop in safe seats in rural areas is something the Tories are seeking to exploit by the new proposed enlarged boundaries and changes to discourage electoral registration.

The new boundaries are the Tories way of getting round the inconvenient problem of not getting enough votes to govern. The new boundaries will open the door to the big two parties gaining power on even fewer votes.

Sadly it is inevitable the gerrymandering will reach US proportions in the not too distant future. There, the governing party use computer programmes to draw boundaries to maximise the number of seats they get. There is little pretence about this and districts just have a number as there is no correlation with actual communities.

The frequent changes in boundaries before every election will hand more importance to the media as hard working MPs find their electoral base continually disappearing into neighbouring constituencies thereby making local campaigning less significant. As the media generally backs the Tories it is easy to see how fluid boundary changes helps them.

But even continual churn in boundaries might not be enough for the Tories.

By 2020 the Tories will also gain from the new registration rules disenfranchising more Labour voters and making urban Labour seats bigger, but it still leaves the regional problem of lack of support in the North.

The next few elections are crucial - the Tories need more than 36% of the vote nationally and it seems unlikely to get it, especially in the North as public sector redundancies devastate communities like mining redundancies did in the 80s.

There is another problem for the Tories that the US doesn't have. Plurality of parties. In the US a duopoly restricts competition through tough rules on who can stand. It is also much more prohibitively expensive to put up candidates than in the UK. Only the winner takes all system holds back new parties here but that is still one hell of an obstacle.

It is hard to overstate just how important boundary changes are to results. The common misperception with bias in our system is that constituencies need to have different size electorates as there were in the 'rotten boroughs' era but this is simply not true.

Also, most assume bias is deliberate, but even with identical size constituences and completely impartial drawing of boundaries the system can still throw up some quite shocking bias, as demonstrated by the 'gerrymander wheel' - http://www.stvaction.org.uk/gerrymander_wheel

You have identical voting patterns, but by just changing the boundaries you can vary results from a landslide for one party to a win for an opposition with far fewer votes.

We can see how this happens in practice by looking at the new boundary proposals for Brighton Pavilion, Brighton Kemptown, Hove, and Lewes. All currently marginal seats.

Currently, the 4 constituencies (all fairly equal in size) on current polling would almost certainly deliver MPs of 1 Green, 2 Labour and 1 Lib Dem as Labour support is up 11% nationally since 2010 and both Green Caroline Lucas and Lib Norman Baker have strong backing in their respective constituencies to hold on.

But the 3 new constituencies to replace them - Brighton Pavilion & Hove South, Brighton & Hove North, and Lewes & East Brighton will most likely deliver 1 Green and 2 Tory MPs.

The voters vote the same in both situations but the new Pavilion seat has been made a very safe Green seat and the combining of Lewes and Brighton has split Lib and Lab support. Ward results in local elections show that by doing this, 2 safe-ish Tory seats are created.

It would have been possible to have kept 2 of the 3 seats as marginals by drawing boundaries that actually make more sense than has been proposed.

Basically the new proposals slice central and west Brighton and all of Hove horizontally except mysteriously for a constituency called Brighton Pavilion and Hove South they put 2 coastal wards from Hove south in the more northern constituency and include 2 northerly wards instead.

If this was reversed it would still keep the constituencies the same size and would create 2 Tory/Green marginals instead of 1 safe Tory and 1 safe Green seat.

Why the boundary commission of England have favoured the Tories in this way I leave you to consider (since I believe voters given a choice would choose the Greens over the Tories in both seats).

And this seems to be the pattern the commission have followed right across urban England - creating more Tory safeish seats at the expense of Tory/Labour marginals that Labour would have won.

I think the pay off for the Tories will be bigger than the 20 seats being predicted. We could get a Tory majority government even though their vote falls. The wonder of boundary changes would be demonstrated. Sadly most voters know little of how they are being conned.

The Parliamentary Voting System & Constituencies Act

The Lib Dems expected to get the Alternative Vote (which can help elect new MPs in seats where over 50% of voters oppose an incumbent but are split between the alternatives). And the Tories would get enlarged boundaries (adding more rural votes to urban seats) to help elect more Tory MPs. That was the deal.

Thanks to the inept Yes campaign and aggressive misinformation of the Tory led No campaign (overwhelmingly backed by the media), the referendum was lost and the Lib Dems got nothing.

I think it is difficult to claim the AV referendum was fair when the promised literature to 'every household' from the Electoral Commission didn't happen. Most voters got nothing from the Commission (surely there should have been a legal challenge about this?) Personally, I wouldn't trust them to organise a piss up in a brewery after this debacle. The SNP are brave trusting them with their independence referendum.

Also, with the inexplicable decision of the Yes campaign not to use their free mailshot, the only information most voters received was from the No campaign, either through two mailshots or propaganda in the overwhelmingly hostile press.

Not surprising that most voters hadn't a clue what they were voting for. Here was a clear chance to educate millions on how different voting systems allocate power in wildly different ways, and the opportunity was completely missed and/or sabotaged.

Short of real information, voters resorted to party lines, and the Noes made better use of their prominent Labour politicians than the Yeses did.

The Labour vote was key and the half hearted support at the top of the party was never going to beat the focussed half of the party led by prominent right-wing Labour MPs campaigning hard for a No vote just to save their own skins from left of centre competition. Self preservation is a powerful incentive even if it meant tribal Labour siding with the Tories.

Most Lib Dems are still understandably bitter about the underhand and dirty No campaign of the Tories and their cohort right-wing Labour MPs.

Another promise of constitutional change (this time on the Lords), now seems hollow. They want something concrete to show for their 80 year wait for power and who can blame them? Their only bargaining chip they have left is the boundary changes.

Let us not forget that AV supporters were at various times accused of being money wasting, baby killing, racist, commie extremists supporting MPs who were middle of the road, third placed Lib Dems elected by a ridiculously expensive system that no-one understands.

As incoherent as this illogical strategy sounds, in the absence of more impartial information and delivered with utmost ruthless efficiency by the No team, each constituency of voter picked up the bit that frightened them most and the truth was defeated.

It is hard to imagine how any referendum can be fair with the present press bias we have. Come to think of it the same applies to elections.

And don't give me the line that the press don't matter. Organisations spend billions every year on advertising and PR. What the rich and powerful Tories get is free PR worth tens of billions. As Jack Straw says, of course it makes a difference! It is disingenuous to suggest otherwise.

So, it is absolutely essential that the Lib Dems either stop the boundary enlargement or get something on the Lords in return.

The number of MPs will fall to 600 from 650. The new boundaries will average around 76,000 registered constituents and vary no more than approximately 4,000 electors either side of this average (5 seats excepted). And will be reviewed before every election (5 years).

The old boundaries averaged around 70,000 registered constituents with most seats within 10,000 electors of this. Reviewed every 8-12 years.

Seemingly, this doesn't sound much of a change. But the implications of this are massive - constant upheaval for voters, no respect for local authority (or even county) boundaries, geographical anomolies, community links broken and MPs even more remote and unaccountable. Fewer backbenchers will also mean weakened parliamentary scrutiny of bills.

But even more than this, this partizan change allows for more gerrymandering as Labour MPs in low registering urban seats find their voting age population will be far higher than the high registering Tory rural seats.

Boundaries are drawn on the electoral register numbers, not on how many voter age eligible adults actually live there.

If people fail to register they not only lose their vote but they enlarge their constituency. This is a particular problem in Labour voting areas which have more younger adults, more students and more poor people in rented accommodation who move more often and can easily be missed.

This will be even more of a problem in 2020 when the administrative nightmare of individual voter registration comes in and disenfranchises 10 million potential voters (as opposed to the estimated 3.5 million who currently fail to register).

All in all. The argument for this boundary change is that the Tories with 36% of the vote 'only' got 47% of the seats in 2010. Whereas Labour won a majority (55%) of seats with just 35% in 2005.

Obviously both these results are undemocratic and the real culprit is the voting system not the boundaries.

But rather than tackling the injustice of the Lib Dems getting just 9% of seats for their 23% voteshare or the fact that 10% of voters who voted against the three main parties in England have just 1 MP to show for it, it is the Tories who will benefit from boundaries that mean they get more seats from less votes.

Neither is this a 'Celtic' problem. A lot of right-wing noise has been generated suggesting Scotland and Wales have too many MPs. But in fact this is negligible.

Currently England has 83% of registered voters and is allocated 82% of the seats. After these Tory changes England will get 84% of the seats. So a move from 1% under-represented to 1% over-represented. Hardly earth shattering or for that matter more democratic.

No, the real prize for the Tories will be in slicing up urban seats in England and carefully adding more rural voters to tip the balance in their favour in many of these seats.

There is also a shift from North to South in the seat allocation. So expect even more Londonocentric policies. Already 34% of Tory MPs are in London & South East constituencies when these regions are only 24% of the UK electorate.

The Lib Dems should think very carefully before giving this boundary prize to the Tories. It will decimate the already thin constituency link which local Lib Dem MPs rely on. With their polling so low and constituencies so malleble in future it will be even harder for smaller parties to build local constituency votes. The Lib Dems are predicted to be big losers from this. They help the Tories at their and democracys peril.

Some Suggestions For Constitutional Reform

This coalition has introduced 4 main pieces of constitutional reform legislation.

2 mildly progressive measures and 2 regressive.

Of the progressive, AV was defeated in a biased referendum and the proposed progressive measure of Lords reform looks likely to be scuppered by the Tory right and Labour opportunists (a combination of Labour right neanderthals and those who scandalously oppose progressive change in a forlorn attempt to drive a wedge between the coalition). If it makes the statute at all, it is likely to be severely watered down and also face a poorly funded campaign and uninformed indifferent electorate in a referendum.

Of the regressive measures, the boundary enlargement and redistricting is the most far reaching and partizan. It will lay to rest any claim of a constituency link for the present system, as boundaries morph beyond recognition between every election. If any measure needed a confirmatory referendum, this was it.

Both boundary changes and the new regressive individual voter registration will disenfranchise millions of voting age adults. And they are both being done for one reason- to improve the chances of Tory government by removing and/or diluting the votes of the urban poor, who will be disproportionately hit by this in 3 ways.

Firstly up to 10 million voting age adults, the poorest who rent and therefore move more often, also the young and students will disappear off the register because of the change from asking households to list names to addressing individuals directly - a much trickier task as the poll tax demonstrated. Universities will no longer just send their list of student hall residents. Each individual will be addressed. A far more complex administrative task. And millions will disappear in a stroke.

Then no longer will registration be required by law. This is a scandalous way to entice non voters into thinking registration is also pointless. But of course by not registering, urban voters will find their constituency enlarged even more. Accountability will suffer as MPs in poorer areas will find themselves even more remote.

Finally, the ever changing boundaries will make it harder for smaller parties to build community support. This is bound to lead to even more voter apathy. A vicious circle as even less people register and constituencies get even bigger in the poorer lower turnout areas that typify Labour seats generally.

Then there are the changes to the Lords themselves that is being proposed. No real problem with single transferable vote being used. Not an ideal PR system but certainly will provide wider representation. The 15 year terms being proposed are a bit strange and undemocratic but a tenable idea to give more freedom to those elected to defy whips (at least in theory). But having a better represented second chamber will inevitably lead to legitimacy issues and clashes between the two chambers. (However, this would not necessarily be a bad thing).

One suggestion around the legitimacy issue would be to use the present first-past-the post elections for the Commons to also elect the Lords. We could allocate according to party vote to keep it proportional and take their best placed non-winning candidates who obviously will have less legitimacy than elected MPs who got most votes.

The advantages would be there would be no extra elections, primacy of the Commons would be clear and more votes would count. Also voters would have a say in who entered the Lords.

The disadvantages would be, we would still have a voting system that was disproportionate and open to gerrymander.

The other option is to avoid elections altogether on the basis that they are too easily bought by the rich and powerful. But instead of the PM selecting our revising chamber we ensure true representation by selecting them by lot. It works for juries and it worked for the ancient Greeks.

Lib Dems Should Stand Firm On Lords Reform

Tory rightwingers only want a referendum on Lords Reform so they can delay any change at all. If changes to a second order chamber require a referendum when an elected chamber was in all the major manifestos of pretty much all the parties, then Lib Dems must require a referendum on boundary changes that radically alter the result of the next elections to the main chamber.

Or to put it more bluntly, if the Lib Dems give in to the Tories on this (once again), what has their 80 year wait for power been about? Slightly increasing tax allowances for all basic rate payers is all very well but if they get nothing on constitutional reform, which is what the Lib Dems are really supposed to known for, what is the point of the Lib Dems. Even the tax changes are easily reversible over a few years and only help the poorest earners if taxes are increased on the rich in other areas which has not happened.

Oh dear, the Lib Dem members and back bench MPs had better box Clegg's ears on this and tell the PM. Back out of Lords reform and you can sing for the boundary changes.