Purple protest perplexes politicians
Proportional representation protests
Politicians and journalists have been taken by surprise as campaigns for electoral reform have leapt into the mainstream.
Demonstrations were held around Britain last week to call for proportional representation (PR). Downing Street received a petition signed by over 54,000 people. All had signed in the nine days since the election.
Chanting ‘Fair Votes Now’, around 1,000 campaigners gathered peacefully outside parliament on Saturday. They dressed in purple to demonstrate their continuity with the women’s suffrage movement and the Chartists. Purple shirts, purple skirts and even purple hair were visible in the crowd. Younger voters were particularly well represented, with at least half the demonstrators aged under thirty.
The rallies were organised by the Take Back Parliament alliance, whose members say the government’s offer of a referendum on Alternative Vote (AV) does not go far enough, as AV is not proportional.
Addressing the rally, Pam Giddy of Power 2010 – which is backed by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust – urged a vote for AV when the referendum comes. But she insisted: ‘Once we get [that] change, it’s not going to stop there.’
Opponents of electoral reform argue that Britain faces more pressing issues and that PR means unstable government. Conservative former cabinet minister Norman Tebbit said last week that PR would lead regularly to a ‘continental-style electoral shambles’.
But PR campaigners say that voting reform is connected to wider social and economic issues. Addressing the rally outside parliament, the writer George Monbiot urged reformers to tie in the campaign for PR with campaigns on economic power. He argued that ‘Britain still belongs to the bankers and billionaires’.
