Disproportionately elected majority governments have dominated British politics for nearly a century, so there’s no surprise that when it comes to making monumental decisions like leaving the European Union, the people of the United Kingdom demand a representational vote. Out with the politicians, in with the people – democratic bliss.

Initially, this seems to be the most rational process to follow; a decision that will initiate a tectonic-like shift in a country’s course towards its distant political and economic future should be made by the population, not by a temporary government that represents a minority of voters. 

In principle this logic is sound, and would suggest that the referendums in recent history, namely the Alternative Vote (AV) and Brexit referendums, were instrumental in upholding our nation’s democratic reputation. However, after examining the specifics of referendums like these, it becomes unequivocally transparent that the process is a wretchedly flawed instrument of democracy. It does more to impede our democracy than it does to enhance it, and this is not through a flaw in its own fundamental characteristics but is instead a result of its devastating interaction with our current political system. 

A clinical route to the heart of the referendum process’ dysfunction can be found through the analysis of the AV referendum in 2011. For those unfamiliar with the proposed AV system, it is an election process in which each voter is given the opportunity to rank the candidates on the ballot in order of their preference. If no candidate achieves a majority after the first preferences have been counted, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated, and whoever voted for that candidate has their second preference counted instead. This process continues through however many rounds are necessary for a candidate to receive a majority vote.

During a referendum, most political parties choose to officially support a campaign. In this case, the Conservatives and the DUP chose to support ‘NOtoAV’ (‘No’), Labour remained impartial, although most Labour MPs also supported ‘No’, and the remaining parties in the House of Commons supported ‘YES! To Fairer Votes’ (‘Yes’). This is where the issues began: It introduced political agendas and biases into a process that should be enabling the British public to make an unbiased decision. 

For example, the campaign director for the ‘No’ campaign was Matthew Elliott, a political strategist associated with the Conservative party. The AV system is undoubtedly bad news for the Conservatives. Not only does it allow the electorate to vote for smaller parties without wasting a vote, but it prevents votes from being split between parties on the left of the political spectrum. This could potentially cause the loss of Conservative seats in constituencies where the left-wing voters outnumber the right, but are split between two left wing parties. Therefore, if the Conservatives want to prevent a decrease in their chances of achieving a majority government, they have no choice but to support the ‘No’ campaign, and this results in some extraordinarily misleading messages being projected on to the British people.

The most indefensible of these was the ‘No’ campaign’s adoption of ‘one person, one vote’ as one of their slogans. The proposed AV system has no interference whatsoever with the ‘one person, one vote’ principle, so the ‘No’ campaign implying that AV systems result in a disproportionate distribution of individual voting influence among the British population is an absurd and ill-conceived, yet somehow successful, attempt to mislead the British people. 

Not only this, but the ‘No’ campaign launched with a claim that choosing AV would cost £250 million. This figure was criticised on multiple accounts; it included the £82 million cost of holding the referendum, which had to be covered no matter the outcome, and £130 million was billed to the cost of electronic voting systems. There were no plans to use these electronic systems under an AV system in the UK, so the ‘No’ campaign essentially took a £38 million cost, increased it by 658%, and then created emotive campaign adverts claiming we should spend the money on things such as the NHS instead. Sound familiar? 

The ‘Yes’ campaign complained to both the Electoral Commission and Advertising Standards Authority about these distorted figures, both of whom said that they aren’t able to regulate individual adverts within a campaign. This is how a substantial political bias problem turns into a democratic crisis.

The people running these campaigns are given immense and unregulated influence. Their selfish political ambitions fuel a desperate race to fabricate lies and distribute them to voters through an unregulated medium that is facilitating the manipulation of the British people.

An argument could be made that this isn’t as damaging to the democratic integrity of the referendum as it seems, because both campaigns are subject to the same lack of regulation. This actually exacerbates the problem, however, as it incentivises both campaigns to participate in the most effective voter manipulation techniques that they can; it becomes a requirement for winning. Consequently, this escalation puts even more power and responsibility into the hands of the leaders of each campaign, to the extent of the referendum result depending more on the leaders’ ability to mislead voters, than on the will of the British people. 

The outcome of a referendum should not depend on which campaign is able to employ the best strategical liar and manipulator of information, it should depend on the will of the British people. The fact that the former is the status quo showcases how political agendas interfere with referendums to the extent of desecrating the democratic integrity of the process.

Some may argue that this is the case for all political campaigns, including general elections, and so it’s unreasonable to aim all of this criticism at our referendum process as opposed to the regulation of political campaigning in general. The critical difference here is that there is no accountability whatsoever after a referendum. General elections have a self-correction and regulation process through a sense of accountability; the people can vote out a Government and have its policies reversed. This is not the same with a referendum, its decision is final and the Government is obligated to act on it, with the alternative being a collapse in the democratic reputation of our country and the trust within our politicians.

In fact, the case against referendums is so strong that Clement Attlee and Margaret Thatcher can be found in the same camp. Thatcher regularly quoted Attlee, reciting that, “Referendums are instruments of demagogues and dictators”. By encouraging politicians to perpetuate falsehoods without an accountability correction method, we only foster an environment of false truths and catalyse distrust in the political process.

This criticism of the referendum process has taken one specific route to the system’s cataclysmic core, but there are numerous alternative angles of attack that reveal its lack of democratic integrity. The Brexit referendum has showed us that data firms, such as Aggregate IQ, are actuating large groups of people to vote in a certain way, which is definitely a cause for concern if it remains unregulated. Additionally, the sheer divisive nature of the Brexit referendum has revealed how those on the losing side will look for opportunities to hold a revote based on the idea that time passing and further information being acquired will produce a different result. If that’s the case then should we hold a referendum every other month to include new voters coming of age? Or perhaps a best out of 11 over the course of a year incase people change their minds multiple times? As you can see, our referendum process produces undesirable results in other ways we haven’t discussed in detail.

And whilst all of these different criticisms provide alternative routes to the chaotic centre of the referendum, they ultimately all stem from the same origin, the crux of the issue at hand: Referendums are simply against the democratic tradition of the UK. Until the end of the 20th century we had never had one, and even then Thatcher was still quoting Attlee: “I could not consent to the introduction into our national life of a device so alien to all our traditions”. This is undeniably a testament to the outright incompatibility between our referendum process and our political structure.

With all of this said, perhaps it’s in our best interests to entertain the idea that our referendum process is not fit for purpose. An effort must be made to shatter the illusion crafted by a portion of the ever-powerful political class that referendums empower the people. It may be more democratic to suspend the making of monumental, potentially irreversible decisions until there is significant reform that enables sufficient regulation of the process, such as an extension of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act of 2000. If this is able to limit the influence that the elite political class have on the process, then perhaps referendums will become a productive tool capable of implementing the will of the British people. 

In the meantime, referendums will remain a tool of demagogues and dictators – it’s just that today’s dress in liberal clothing. 

Josh Lamyman