Tony Blair is banging on again about how a protest vote against the Iraq war will let in a Tory government. Let’s get a few things straight.
If I don’t vote Labour, then it’s not just a protest vote against the war in Iraq. It’s also a protest vote against foundation hospitals, ID cards, top-up fees and dozens of other pieces of legislation brought in by this government over the last eight years.
My pro-war Labour MP had a majority of 5,000. The chances of 2,500 of those Labour voters deciding to protest vote and choosing to vote for the Tory candidate is tiny. If I don’t vote for the Labour candidate then it’s not going to mean that the constituency will change hands.
Even if the extremely unlikely happens and my constituency is won by the Tories, the Labour party has a majority of 160 in the House of Commons. There is no way that the Labour is going to lose that majority in this election.
The Tories are not going to win this election, no matter what the protest voters do. No-one honestly believes that they can. Tony Blair doesn’t believe that they can. Even Michael Howard doesn’t really believe that they can. Blair is just resorting to scare tactics in order to keep his majority as big as possible. And sane people want his majority to be as small as possible in order to make a leadership challenge likely.
And anyway, if the voting system was fragile enough to make it likely that a relatively small number of protest voters can make the kind of difference that Blair is implying, then maybe that’s indicative of a fundamental flaw in the voting system and maybe we should be looking at proportional representation.
Oh, bloody hell, listen to me. Maybe I am turning into a Liberal Democrat!
Update: Polly Bloody Toynbee is perpetuating the same nonsense in today’s Guardian. Robin Grant demolishes her arguments. And there’s a debate about the piece going on over at the Guardian Election Blog.
As well as perhaps persuading the Labour party to get rid of Tory Bliar, there’s another excellent reason to reduce their majority as much as possible. Governments with large majorities can afford to ride roughshod over parliament, knowing that the whips can get anything through. Governments with small majorities have to be careful, as a few principled back-bench rebels can bring defeat.
The great thing about this kind of language is that they assume that it is *their* vote. It isn’t – it’s yours to deal with however you choose.The arrogance of the main parties defies belief.