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Today’s polling day! And I’ve been busy most of the day helping the Yes campaign leaflet parts of Leeds for the final push. Mostly the university, but with some leafleting taking part in the city centre, especially near the train station.

The response I got was surprisingly positive. Discounting the people who shrugged me off — it’s Leeds, they probably thought I was advertising for a new bar — there was a lot of interest and support in a Yes vote. Only a handful of people said they had already voted no. I did work on the currents of “yes to democracy”, “yes to people power”, “make your MPs work harder”, and “if it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for us!”. This was quite effective in swaying floating voters. (more…)

Because AV is fairer, more democratic, and ends tactical voting.

It’s fairer because never again will the most unpopular candidate win, as they do in council elections all the time, and even in a few general elections (take a look at Scottish elections from 1970, where the anti-Tory vote still eclipsed the Tory vote). If there is truly a “progressive majority”, as last year’s elections apparently stated, then representation in the Commons will reflect that. The same applies for a “conservative majority.” (more…)

The AV campaign is in full swing but strangely, I’ve only received campaign literature from the No campaign so far. As a Yes supporter, I find this amusing but disheartening: with only a week to go, where is the Yes literature? It is really squeaky-bum time now.

In any case, they’re going full frontal on the Nick Clegg attack angle, after seeing no joy in the BNP argument. As the new Private Eye so eruditely summarises: Yes to AV’s arguments are about cleaner or fairer politics. The No campaign’s argument is a picture of Nick Clegg. And they list so many discredited arguments. (more…)