There was a tremor in the House of Commons on Tuesday night that may yet be remembered as the start of a political earthquake. For the first time, a majority of MPs agreed that the voting system which gave them their seats is broken, and voted in favour of a referendum on the Alternative Vote. While AV is not a proportional system, change does create opportunities and may well begin to open things out enough for a new sort of politics to edge in.
There’s still a way to go before the public are given a say on whether to keep first-past-the-post or move to the preferential system. Time is short – the constitutional reform and governance bill hasn’t gone through the report stage or third reading in the Commons yet, and must then go to the Lords, where its passage is far from a mere formality.
The naysayers are claiming that there isn’t the parliamentary time and that the Lords won’t pass the legislation.
But electoral reformers have learned to be an optimistic bunch in recent times. After all, two years ago we were being told that no-one was interested in electoral reform, and just weeks ago we were being told the idea of a referendum on the voting system was dead in the water.
So the Lords are just the next hurdle for us to overcome. And there are some sensible reasons to be optimistic.
As a totally unelected House – which still has members who are there by virtue of being born into the aristocracy – can the Lords seriously risk meddling with a measure that would give the British people the right to decide how their MPs are chosen?
With months to go before a general election, David Cameron realises how bad it would look if he used his unelected Conservatives peers to rob the people of their right to choose. With recent opinion polls showing that the British public would welcome the referendum, it’s a position no party leader who wants to be associated with ‘change’ would want to be in.
Peers themselves realise that standing in the way of the British people’s fundamental right to choose how their representatives are elected would raise serious questions about the future of their own House. They know they must pass the bill.
But the government have got to get the bill to the Lords first – and this requires real political will. The Vote For A Change campaign will be keeping the pressure up on both Houses in the coming weeks.
The fight for a fairer voting system is on – and for the first time in a generation, victory is in sight.
Willie Sullivan is campaign director at Vote for a Change