I'm voting for AV

And it's not just because this man is voting against it. My main reason is probably because I'm so unconvinced by the arguments put forward by the No camp, most of which are perpetuated and grossly distorted by Cranmer in his article. I sincerely hope Christians read his article and see it for what it is - full of prejudice, horribly distorted material, and often just plain wrong.

AV won't cost more (and anyway, why does that actually matter?), AV won't result in fringe parties getting in any more than the current one does - and that should never be an argument against a voting system - why is FPTP (first past the post) better because it ignores small parties and gives bigger parties huge mandates from a small proportion of the actual votes? FPTP allows established parties to effectively ignore the fringes and block them out, without ever actually countering the arguments they make, meaning that these parties continue to fester barely beneath the surface. A better system would force the main parties to actually address the issues that matter to the population - not necessarily to enact policies to support them since just because a lot of people think something doesn't mean its right - but addressing them.

And what's wrong with perpetual coalitions? It strikes me that other countries seem to do perfectly well with them, and the genuine discussion instead of mud-slinging it would encourage would have to be a good thing. And broken manifestos becoming more likely under AV? Don't make me laugh - find me a party in the last 30 years that hasn't broken a manifesto promise.

But there's another one given to me last weekend by a good friend. It enables you to not vote for a particular candidate for whatever reason, and not be forced to vote for a party you don't want to vote for just to keep them out. The classic example is Evan Davis, the fierce anti-Christian Lib Dem who was the MP for West Oxford and Abingdon until the last election. Had I been in that electoral ward, then to oppose Davis and to maximise the chance of getting rid of him, I'd have had to have voted Tory, despite my well known dislike for that party. However, with AV I could I have done what I wanted to do, vote Labour, but by putting every other party above the Lib Dems, my vote would still have counted against him.

The question is what exactly is un-Christian and undemocratic about AV? What is it that scares Tories and Cranmer so incredibly much that they write such vitriol? Is it because the simple fact is a lot of people would put the Conservatives as their least preferred party? I don't know, just thinking out loud. But their arguments are far from convincing and as a result, I'll be voting yes tomorrow. Join me!