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Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

Change in London's Mayoral electoral system threatens unpredictability in 2024

In today's Observer:

Sadiq Khan has warned progressive voters that they risk handing the London mayoralty to an "increasingly rightwing" Tory party unless they back Labour, amid concern in his camp that most Londoners are unaware of a complete overhaul of the voting system.

The battle for control of City Hall next May will be the first mayoral contest to switch to the first past the post system. It comes after a legal change last year that appears to be largely unknown among the capital's voters. The previous system allowed voters to pick their second preference.

Only 30% of Londoners are aware of the change, according to a new Opinium poll. It has led to concern in Khan's team that, despite his large poll lead, Liberal Democrat and Green voters will be unaware they can no longer back him as their second preference, as many have done in the past.

It also means that a strong challenge from the left could also cut Khan's support. There have been rumours that Jeremy Corbyn could stand. The former Labour leader said in the summer he will "have a think" about the prospect.

Needless to say, I wasn't one of the 30% and was glad to be put in the know.

The Institute for Government isn't impressed with the change:

The scrapping of supplementary vote in favour of first past the post, brought in with the Electoral Reform Act 2022, risks reducing voter choice and ultimately may damage the position of mayor.....

Last year, the Elections Act 20221 – more noted for its controversial voter ID requirement and attempts to rein in the independence of the Electoral Commission – replaced SV with first past the post (FPTP). The government dropped this change into the bill late in the day, with opposition from Labour muted at best, with the opposition preferring to concentrate their parliamentary fire on the introduction of voter ID.

.....FPTP suits the major parties. Supplementary vote meant that voters could take a chance on an outside candidate without worrying that their vote would be ‘wasted’ – this was because they could allocate their second vote to the candidate they preferred (or disliked less) of the parties most likely to get through to the second round, in which the ‘top two’ of the first round go head to head.

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I wasn't aware of this either until I read about it in yesterday's Guardian (sister to today's Observer) so thank you for bringing this to our notice locally, since this is really important.

Andy

Thank you for highlighting this. To be honest I didn’t know of changes but to be honest I agree with it. To me you should vote for one candidate and that person wins even if it’s just by 1 vote. 

I am surprised Khan didn't mention "Donald Trump".  And he is being mendacious as usual: The Tory party is not getting more conservative, quite the opposite and the globalist City wing of the party controls it completely.

They should have heeded their mandate to actually be "conservative" when they won the last election by a landslide as the base wants.  Instead they squandered it and will have their bottoms handed to them next year.

The ranked choice voting system always favours Leftists so one can understand why it was done away with.  Alaska adopted it and ensured that Susan Collins (a Republican in name only AKA "RINO") stayed in the Senate because all the losing votes for the Democrat went to her in the second round. It also ensured the only seat in the House was won by a Democrat in 2022, even through the state was ~+10% for Trump in 2020.  Ditto Maine. 

So I'm glad to see the Tories actually did something worthwhile in the last few years by getting rid of ranked choice voting for the London Mayor. 

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