It cannot often happen that a politician puts forward a proposal that will harm his party – but that is precisely what Lib Dem Peter Black is proposing for local councils.
On Wednesday, he will propose that the Assembly seek powers to change through a legislative competence order the way councillors are elected in Wales.
Mr Black, Lib Dem member for South West, does not spell out what changes he wants to see; he merely mentions that the Sunderland Commission set up by the first Assembly overwhelmingly supported the single transferable vote system, with a minority proposing that the current first-past-the-post system be retained, but with all wards restricted to having only one (rather than sometimes up to five) members.
But Mr Black is kicking over the traces which usually lead politicians towards self-aggrandisement.
For adoption of STV will almost certainly see the Lib Dems losing control of Cardiff council, and possibly of Swansea.
In Cardiff, the Conservatives, Labour and Lib Dems came very close to each other in terms of votes last month, and the parties polled in that order. But the Lib Dems won 35 seats, Cons, 17; and Labour 13.
In Swansea, voting by STV might even lead to the council returning to Labour control from the current Lib Dem. The FPTP figures for councillors returned were Lab, 30; Lib Dem, 23; Ind, 13; and Con, 4. Under STV, the Lib Dems would lose several members.
Which way the parties vote will be interesting. The Conservatives are split. It could be argued that their entire current existence in Wales is based upon proportional representation. A free vote for the group would be exceedingly interesting in helping to sort out who is following the lead set by Bourne towards a one-nation future, and who still hankers for the divided Britain which went to far towards killing off the party in Wales.
Comments
The Electoral Reform Society estimate that if the May elections in Swansea had been fought on STV then the Lib Dems would have 21 seats, Labour 26, Tories 11, Plaid 3 and the Independents 10 or 11. In short Labour would have been further from their goal of regaining control but the present Administration would have needed the Tories to get a majority.