The Euro voting system is a disgrace

It's not just this Saturday's Eurovision song contest that will fall victim to - at its kindest - a dodgy voting system.

On Thursday 4 June, we Londoners - all 7 million-odd of us - will have the chance to elect eight MEPs to represent the entire capital altogether. I defy even the most politically savvy reader to reel off - without checking - the names of all of London's current nine MEPs. The vast majority of Londoners can't name one. Those who get elected on 4 June will be absolutely unaccountable to Londoners; not through any fault of their own but simply because where do you start in trying to serve a constituency of over 7 million?

A representative without any duty of representation - nice work if you can get it.

It gets worse. You see, you don't get to pick and choose which of the long list of prospective MEPs the parties are nominating - even if you were familiar enough with any of them to be able to make a refined choice. No. You are obliged to vote not for a candidate but for a party, and that party has determined the order of the candidates they want to be elected.

In the old days we had the same electoral system for electing Euro-MPs as we had for MPs and Councillors. The whole country was divided into constituencies, and each returned one MEP. Putney was part of London South West, represented first by Dame Sheila Roberts for the Conservatives, and then by Labour's Anita Pollack.

I'm not claiming those days were a utopia with everyone knowing and loving their local MEP - far from it. But at least a constituency of 350,000 people, represented by one MEP based somewhere in the area they represented is head and shoulders better than this farce of an electoral system.

This isn't a criticism of any of those individuals standing - indeed, the candidates making up Labour's team (of whom more can be found here) have my full support. But right from the start those elected will have an incredibly difficult job trying to understand, articulate and then represent such a large and diverse constituency as London. Nevertheless, it is time to reinstate fair votes for Europe and return to our constituency-based system.

The current system not only removes choice from voters - it removes the incentive for parties to get out and talk to voters: the one thing that people actually want their politicians to do more of.

Let me put it this way: my campaign team has been out and about in the constituency talking to voters all over the place. But if we fight the most fantastic campaign imaginable Labour will get two, maybe three MEPs elected in London on June 4. And if we had decided to do absolutely nothing, Labour will get two or three MEPs elected on June 4. Ditto the Conservatives. And in respect of the Lib Dems the same thing applies except they'll win just one MEP whatever they do.

In fact the only people motivated to work hard are those on the extremist fringe, who have a realistic chance of getting an MEP elected with just 6-8% of the vote. In a fair vote election under First Past the Post, no BNP fascist would ever get elected to Europe because instead of 6-8% they'd need at least 35%-40% to win.

Those ranked 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th or 8th on any party's list have zero chance of winning. Not even a fluke chance. There will be no "Michael Portillo moment" in this election - because the result's been determined before the first votes have even been cast. Only at the edges will one or two seats change hands between the fringe candidates.

Every argument that the PR lobby deploys against the first past the post electoral system is here is spades with this unfair PR system:

• It creates safe seats no incumbent can ever be shifted from
• It removes any notion of accountability to their constituents from those elected
• It gives the extremist fringe a much higher chance of getting their representatives elected
• It takes power from the public and gives it to parties
• It encourages apathy because six or seven of London's eight seats have already been decided because of the system
• And worst of all the PR lobby promised that people would no longer have to vote tactically: they could vote for the party they most supported, not the one that would beat the party they least wanted. And yet here we are, urging out supporters to turn out to stop the BNP winning. It's an important message, but it's not a positive incentive to vote FOR us, is it?

The response from those who support this unfair Proportional Representation system will be that changing back to fair first past the post is against the law: the European Union directs us to choose our MEPs by this sort of electoral system. I say in response: let the EU refuse to seat the delegation of one of Europe's largest countries - the second largest economy in Europe - solely because of the system used to elect them. It would be a democratic outrage were they to even attempt to, and I suspect the EU would lack the courage - or stupidity - to even try.

You know, despite my utter contempt for this appalling, rigged electoral system, I still want people to vote in these elections because there remain huge dividing lines between the parties on Europe. And also because voting matters - it's an important right: just ask those from some of the eastern European countries who were denied it until recently.

But until the European Parliament can truly claim to be representative of and accountable to the people it claims to speak for, there will never be public acceptance of the EU as having any sovereignty over the UK. Nor should there be.