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Effects of a 'yes' victory in the 2011 Alternative Vote referendum?

Say that the Yes campaign manages to fight a more competent campaign and the No vote makes some massive blunders.

What impact would this have on the 2015 General Election, and British politics in general?

I remember reading that the Conservatives would have actually gotten a larger majority in 2015 with Alternative Vote. I assume there would have been no 2017 election.
 
I wonder if the larger majority affects brexit-does Cameron still start going for the referendum without the pressure to keep kippers on board?
 
True, although I guess I'll just do a bit of light goalpoast shifting by asking if he even makes that campaign promise if a bigger majority is projected.
 
The BBC did ask this before the 2015 election:

AV itself was an "uneasy compromise" between the coalition parties, says Prof Paul Whiteley of Essex University. His view is that the Greens and UKIP might have picked up some extra seats but that the overall effect would not have been dramatic.

Another politics professor, Steven Fielding of Nottingham University, said the potential boost for smaller parties could have been "crucial", with recent polls suggesting a hung Parliament and talk focusing on potential post-election alliances

More recent figures come from pollster and former Conservative Party treasurer Lord Ashcroft, who looked at voters' second preferences in a poll carried out in December.

Among his findings was that UKIP voters were almost twice as likely to name the Conservatives as they were Labour as their second preferences.

Lord Ashcroft said his findings suggested the Conservatives could have benefited from AV.

This view that the system opposed so strongly by the Conservatives - David Cameron called it "undemocratic, obscure, unfair and crazy" - could have helped the party is backed by Peter Kellner, president of pollster YouGov

"In Tory-Labour marginals, second preferences of UKIP voters would have gone more to the Tories than to Labour - so if you've got seats where Labour takes them by 1,500 to 2,000 votes, the Tories might have taken them," he said

"If AV had gone through, we would now be looking at the clear possibility of an outright Tory victory."

Ah, well, about that, Peter.

Obviously the actual results weren't what polls found, but:

Political commentator John Rentoul, of the Independent on Sunday, said evidence of a major boost to the Conservatives under AV was "a bit mixed".

"A lot of the experience of AV in Australia is that it does change people's behaviour," he said.

"You can't just assume people will vote as they do under one system, under a different system."

Mr Rentoul believes the Conservatives and Lib Dems would have done "slightly better", while Labour might have recovered some votes from the Green Party.

and if you've just changed the election system and third-parties think they have more of a chance & make sure to say this to voters while the big parties have to warn voters "no no you have to vote us first Or Else THe Other Guy Wins", the voters surely change accordingly.

If votes don't change at all, here's the Electoral Reform Society in 2015 commissioning YouGov to see what happens. What happens is the Tories have six more seats, Labour has five less, Lib Dems have one more, and no change after that. So you need the voters to change to get any noticeable affect on British politics, as AV on its own seems barely relevant.

(If it had been STV and won in 2011, we get a Tory/UKIP coalition government)
 
If we are to take subsequent studies at face value, then it's true the Tories would have actually done slightly better in 2015. I personally think that doesn't butterfly 2017, as having half a dozen more seats still isn't going to insulate May from the brexit related rebellions she likely had in mind when calling the election.

And this is where things get interesting. According to ERS, Labour would have done two dozen seats better in 2017, with the Tories losing 13 from OTL. Interestingly, the SNP would have lost exactly half of the 54 seats they would have gotten in 2015. What would have happened from there has already been litigated in other 2017 GE threads, but it's clear that a Conservative government would not have been viable.

Of course, voting behaviour would change too. My guess is that we'd see more votes going to parties like the Greens and UKIP/BP as first choices. They wouldn't win more seats because of that, but it could have an important effects for the way they are covered, and possibly in terms of Short Money too. It might also prevent BP standing down for the Tories in a 2019-type scenario, if that ever arises.
 
If we are to take subsequent studies at face value, then it's true the Tories would have actually done slightly better in 2015. I personally think that doesn't butterfly 2017, as having half a dozen more seats still isn't going to insulate May from the brexit related rebellions she likely had in mind when calling the election.

And this is where things get interesting. According to ERS, Labour would have done two dozen seats better in 2017, with the Tories losing 13 from OTL. Interestingly, the SNP would have lost exactly half of the 54 seats they would have gotten in 2015. What would have happened from there has already been litigated in other 2017 GE threads, but it's clear that a Conservative government would not have been viable.

Of course, voting behaviour would change too. My guess is that we'd see more votes going to parties like the Greens and UKIP/BP as first choices. They wouldn't win more seats because of that, but it could have an important effects for the way they are covered, and possibly in terms of Short Money too. It might also prevent BP standing down for the Tories in a 2019-type scenario, if that ever arises.
I'm flicking through the strongest UKIP seats in 2015 and I reckon there's a fairly good chance Farage would win South Thanet on Labour second and third preferences, which probably wouldn't achieve much more than Farage making a nuisance of himself in the house.
 
I'm flicking through the strongest UKIP seats in 2015 and I reckon there's a fairly good chance Farage would win South Thanet on Labour second and third preferences, which probably wouldn't achieve much more than Farage making a nuisance of himself in the house.
I highly doubt that. Those Labour voters who do express a preference between Farage and the Tories would break overwhelmingly for the latter. Even before the referendum, most Labour voters were liberal remainers, especially in southern seats.
 
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