I think that the difference is marginal though. Bearing in mind that people can already vote for their preferred candidate/party, is there much advantage in offering them second and third preferences? Would that outweigh the additional complexity of changing the voting method? Certainly worth considering now that we might already have AV/IRV for the next general election anyway.

There are a few other circumstances where decisive govts are needed – terrorist attacks, attacks on eg Falklands, Northern Rock.

There’s no inherent reason why STV parties couldn’t come to some pre-Govt arrangement on things like this. I look at the arrogance of the Labour Party and recent Tory Parties and remember everyone making jokes about Italy’s government which collapsed every few months. But these parties were a product of the system as you indicate.

So I think if we were to move to STV, doing it gradually might be a good plan.

I should be there at the meeting.

I will definitely try to attend that meeting in Bristol. I went to the first two Bristol events.

Britain has the highest debt ratio of any European country excluding Greece but an even higher deficit than Greece. It is anomalous that we have a AAA credit rating and the rating agencies keep telling us that rating is contingent upon having a credible plan to cut the deficit over the medium term.

Without a government, there’s no credible plan. If we lose our credit rating, the cost of borrowing will triple or more – and it’s already going to cost us £67 billion in 2014.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article7150196.ece

I found you on this site:
http://www.democracyforum.co.uk/electoral-reform/76247-demo-outside-lib-dem-meeting-demands-electoral-reform.html

If you still live in Long Ashton, you’re only a couple of miles from me. A local TBP campaign has just started. Meeting on Monday:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=130562390305165

I am not sure why you believe that the state would be bankrupt if the coalition Government fell apart. I see no particular evidence to support the fact that coalition Governments lead to state bankruptcy, certainly in the countries such as Germany who have had a PR system for a while.

That’s an interesting system that you are proposing. I think that there is a distinct difference in terms of the starting premise. Your emphasis on moulding a perfect Government out of a General Election result is certainly original and has definite merits.

However, for me personally, democratic representation wins over electoral engineering in terms of importance. I think that it is more important for Parliament to represent the views of the people as accurately as possible.

I am very uncomfortable with your suggestion that the system might be rigged against the BNP. Either we believe in democratic representation or we don’t, regardless of what we think of their policies. It is a sign of weakness in an electoral system when particular outcomes in favour or against a particular party are mooted I think. The sky didn’t fall in when the BNP gained 2 MEPs

Nice site though. Here’s my effort at a new electoral system:

http://waronfreedom.wordpress.com/2010/05/11/fptp-av-and-stv-arent-the-only-electoral-systems/

I am working on the remaining regions, but each one takes a bit of time to do.