Sir, The letter (Mar 11) from eminent historians excoriates the alternative vote (AV) electoral system for destroying the principle of one person, one vote. Their whole argument is based on a fallacy. There are good arguments both for and against AV. But this is not one of them.
Under AV, everyone’s vote has the same value. Voters can rank the candidates in order of preference as far as they want. Counting begins by focusing only on first preferences. If one candidate garners more than half of these, that candidate wins. If no one gets half the vote, the bottom candidate is knocked out and their second preferences are added to the totals for the candidates who remain.
This might create the appearance that the bottom candidate’s supporters are getting a second vote. But that is wrong. In the second round of counting, every voter again has one vote. If their favourite candidate is still in the race, it is their first preference that counts. If their top choice has been eliminated, their second or lower preference counts. No one has more than one vote.
The historians have simply misunderstood how AV works. This is a shame. Both the Yes and the No campaigns are promoting arguments that are false or exaggerated. The crucial issue of our electoral system should be decided on the basis of facts, not myths.
Professor Vicky Randall
Chair, Political Studies Association
Professor Paul Carmichael Secretary, PSA
Professor Ron Johnston
Professor Iain MCLean
Dr Alan Renwick
Sir, Up until their abolishment with the Representation of the People Act 1948, the existence of university constituencies meant that many people in the UK could legally vote twice.
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Tomas Forsey
Falmouth, Cornwall
Sir, Professors Abulafia, Beevor and colleagues argue that under AV “one citizen’s vote might be worth six times that of another”. They fail to acknowledge that the British people have lived with that sort of inequality since the granting of universal suffrage: it is called First Past The Post. In the 2010 general election 8.61m voters elected 258 Labour MPs and 6.84m voters elected 57 Lib Dem MPs, making the vote of the average Labour voter worth 3.59 times that of a LibDem voter. I rest my case.
Professor Frank Sengpiel
Cardiff