A Lot to Play For... Again

Tomorrow, almost a year to the day after last year’s historic general election, voters across Britain go to the polls again. Whether it’s to elect MSPs, Assembly members or local councillors and/or decide upon how Westminster votes are counted in future, every registered adult in the UK has the opportunity to fulfil at least one democratic duty.

Of course, the likelihood of those duties being fulfilled will be heavily influenced not only by each individual’s perception of the significance of their ballot, but by how many ballots they can cast – venturing to the polling station to be one ‘yes’ or ‘no’ among millions becomes a much more appealing prospect if the identity of local representatives is simultaneously at stake.

And it is this curious logic of electoral turnout that is perhaps the single major obstacle to predicting the result of the referendum on the Alternative Vote. Opinion polls have thus far failed to take into account the theory that turnout in Scotland and Wales may be significantly higher than in London and other election-free areas of England.

On the other hand, voters hoping to see the Nationalists complete their overall majority at Holyrood may be somewhat nonplussed about the conduct of future elections in which they may play no part.

Another thing that is less than clear is simply the extent to which the electorate in general is interested in or educated about the referendum issue.

The recent holiday season will have done nothing to kick-start a campaign that has largely been played out in the margins of a media industry pre-occupied with events in Libya, Japan and now Pakistan, and over the heads of people far more concerned about their future employment than future elections.

All in all, then, turnout can be expected to be both widely varied and generally low, which means Britain could find itself stumbling its way through landmark democratic change. Just because AV is not PR does not mean its introduction – in the event – should be taken lightly.

Indeed it may prove to be a first step towards a more proportional system. If, however, the Noes outweigh the Ayes, interpretation will be all important – a vote of confidence in the current system and a rejection of change, or simply an electorate unconvinced by the ‘alternative’ on offer?

And what about the coalition government, whose two leading figures are poles apart on the issue? Both insist, of course, that they will accept the result with good grace but both have stuck their necks out by playing prominent roles in the respective campaigns and – in Cameron’s case, at least – by refusing to condemn the personal attacks that have defined much of the rival camps’ tactics.

The stakes are high for all three party leaders – a No vote would undermine the Lib Dems on their flagship policy, whilst strengthening the Prime Minister and representing an early electoral defeat for Miliband; a Yes vote would boost Labour and Nick Clegg, and anger backbench and grassroots Tories who will not bow to a leadership claiming it as a necessary coalition concession.

Labour, meanwhile, have other key battles to fight. Anything other than sweeping council victories for a sole major opposition party in a period of austerity will be seen as a rejection of the party’s economic policy and credibility, while winning back overall control in Wales and especially in Scotland will be far from easy.

You may not have heard or read much about it this time, but there’s a lot to play for at the polls once again.