Bradford politicians have their say

He said the AV system would “ensure that those elected really are the preferred choice of those who vote”. But then Colin Buchanan is also honorary president of the Electoral Reform Society.

Many will agree or at least sympathise with that view. But during a time of economic austerity, a costly referendum on an obscure alternative system of voting has already struck some T&A readers as eccentric, to say the least.

Former Bradford Council Conservative Group leader Ronnie Farley thinks the political make-up of Bradford is such that people tend to vote for a party rather than a candidate.

He says: “In 15 years of knocking on doors and another 16 years of working non-politically in local government, nobody has brought up the subject of PR [Proportional Representation]. People talk about day-to-day issues – schooling, getting their bins emptied. If PR does come up you’ve knocked on the door of a political activist.”

Strictly speaking, AV is a multiple transferable vote system which means that the candidate who gets elected gets the legitimacy of at least 50 per cent of the votes cast. In contrast, under Proportional Representation, a political party is allocated MPs according to the votes it gets.

Contributors to the T&A letters page have already pointed out that British voters have been denied a promised referendum on the European Union’s controversial Lisbon Treaty, but yet, according to Government figures released on April 9, the Alternative Vote referendum is costing £80 million – about £180,000 from every local authority in the country.

When the idea of a referendum emerged after last year’s General Election, opinion generally was that David Cameron’s Conservatives had agreed to the referendum to keep Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrats on-side during the negotiations about coalition.

After all, only four countries in the world use this transferable vote system – Australia, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Scotland, but the latter country uses it only for by-elections.

Mr Farley takes the view that a good deal of the debate is “sheer politics”.

“I don’t think the Conservatives would have given way on this when they were talking to the Liberal Democrats unless they believed it wasn’t going to get voted in, or if it was it wouldn’t make much difference.

“If I am honest, I don’t know which way to vote on this. Nick Clegg did say that under AV you can still vote for only one candidate rather than have multiple choices.

“I think Labour leader Ed Miliband was on a winner when he pointed out that the Conservative Party uses a form of AV to vote for their leader – people drop out.

“It’s not exactly the same system, but it is similar. I think it takes some explaining why the Tories use it internally but don’t want it to be used externally.

“I think it’s a red herring to say, that with AV, MPs will work their socks off for their constituencies. I don’t think it will make any difference. Most MPs work hard for their constituencies anyway,” he added.

When the T&A polled the Bradford District’s five MPs, only Bradford East Liberal-Democrat MP David Ward said he supported AV.

He says: “It’s not the best system in the world but it is considerably better than the largely discredited first-past-the-post, which is unfair on minority parties.”

Keighley Tory MP Kris Hopkins took up the issue of minority parties, explaining his opposition to AV because of his concern about Proportional Representation helping the BNP to obtain seats in the European Parliament.

Bradford South Labour MP Gerry Sutcliffe said he didn’t think AV enhanced the voting system.

Matthew Elliott, director of the ‘No’ campaign, claims the additional cost of AV in a General Election would be about £250 million. The administrative cost to the Electoral Commission of running this referendum is £9.3 million.

Those who think first-past-the post is unfair will say that AV is worth the trouble and expense. Those who have yet to be persuaded one way or another have until May 5 to make up their minds.