Well, a referendum looms about changing our voting system - and I've thought long and hard about it. Now, to me, if I have been on any committee or part of an organisation and a vote has been needed, then everyone has voted and the person who gets the most votes is the victor, or whichever resolution has the most votes has been passed.
I can't help feeling that this still seems the best way. The AV system doesn't work for me, because people have very strong political views and are either a staunch Conservative, a Labour supporter, back the Lib Dems, or whatever, and so want that ONE party of their choice to get in. If we had as an example three political parties called VEGETARIAN, FISH and MEAT -- I might say that I really want the VEGETARIAN party to get in, I can just about tolerate FISH, but I absolutely loathe MEAT - so I rank them in that order on the ballot. Now if VEGETARIAN got the most votes, but not the 50% required to get in under the AV system, then people's second choice, and maybe even their third choice would be counted. Once that is done, MEAT might then actually end up with more votes. So, although I wanted VEGETARIAN to get in, I might actually have helped MEAT win because my third choice was counted.
I think that AV only works if you really don't care who gets in and so just rank them in order of which you can tolerate. But maybe a lot of people will feel very strongly about just ONE party and will therefore only vote for that ONE party in the ballot and not bother to rank the others. Then we could still end up with the system that we already have!
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