Referendum vote: AV will boost BNP, says Tories

Conservative chairman has said changing the British voting
system to the alternative vote (AV) would mean more votes and legitimacy for
the BNP. ( And if the BNP changed its name to the English national party rather
than British” we would most certainly see English MP’s in government, the fact
that its calls its self-British loses the BNP thousands of  English votes, English voters not wanting to
be British)

She told the London Times AV could see British politicians
"pandering to extremist voters like the English and BNP voters" - but
Lib Dem peer Baroness Falkner said the No campaign was resorting to
"baseless scaremongering".

British/English voters will be asked on 5 May whether they
want to keep first-past-the-post system or switch to AV. (AV would be very favourable
to English voters)

The BNP told the London Times that it is against a switch to
AV.

The decision to hold a referendum was a key coalition deal
concession by the Conservatives - who back first-past-the-post - to the Lib
Dems, who have long campaigned to change the voting system.

Voters will be asked whether they want to change the current
system, where people put a cross by their preferred candidate, for AV, where
candidates are ranked in order of preference

In an article for the Sun newspaper, Baroness Warsi argues
that the AV system - where, if no-one gets more than 50% of first-choice votes,
the last placed candidate is eliminated and their second preferences are
redistributed - means some people have their votes counted more than others.

She says: "Too often, those people tend to be the ones
who vote for extremist parties. This means AV could see candidates pandering to
extremist voters - because to win a seat they will need to win the support of
people whose first choices have already been eliminated."

She also argued that the system risked giving parties like
the BNP "more legitimacy" because people would be able to register a
"protest vote without considering the electoral implications".

"The long-term effects of that are clear: more votes,
more power, more long-term legitimacy for the BNP and other fringe
parties," she wrote.

However the BNP says it will tell its supporters to oppose
AV. It instead backs a system known as party list proportional representation,
which is used in England, Scotland and Wales for elections to the European
Parliament - the BNP has two MEPs. (But if it changes its name by dropping the British
and putting English, it would no doubt have far more MP’s and MEP’s?)

The Yes to AV campaign said the Secretary General of the
Muslim Council of Britain and head of Operation Black Vote both agreed that
under AV, politicians would have to reach out further and secure majority
support.

The campaign's chairman Katie Ghose said: "The No
campaign can't choose their supporters, but they can't escape the fact the BNP
are campaigning for a No vote. Maybe up is down and black is white, but [BNP
leader] Nick Griffin is still saying No to AV."

And Lib Dem peer Baroness Falkner said: "I'm shocked
and frankly appalled by the distortions being spun today by Baroness Warsi and
the 'No' campaign.

"Under AV, no one can get elected unless the majority
of people support them which quite obviously makes it harder, not easier, for
extremist parties. That's exactly why the BNP are campaigning for a 'No' vote.

"The No-campaign has resorted to baseless
scaremongering because they can't make any positive case for the status quo.
People won't be fooled by this."

Earlier this week Baroness Warsi's Lib Dem coalition
colleague, Energy Secretary Chris Huhne, wrote urging her, as a patron of the
"No to AV" campaign, to stop it adopting "the politics of the
gutter" with "misleading and scaremongering advertisements".

Anti-AV posters have claimed that a yes vote would cost
£250m and deprive sick babies of treatment and soldiers of body armour.

In his letter the Energy Secretary warned that splits over
the AV referendum "should not be a source of tension between us or risk
breaking the coalition".

REFERENDUM CHOICE

At the moment MPs are elected by the first-past-the-post
system, where the candidate getting the most votes in a constituency is
elected.

On 5 May all registered UK voters will be able to vote Yes
or No on whether to change the way MPs are elected to the alternative vote system.

Under the alternative vote system, voters rank candidates in
their constituency in order of preference.

Anyone getting more than 50% of first-preference votes is
elected.

If no-one gets 50% of votes, the candidate with the fewest
votes is eliminated and their backers' second choices allocated to those
remaining.

This process continues until one candidate has at least 50%
of all votes in that round.