Labour to oppose AV bill
Labour MPs were told tonight that it will oppose the government's bill to introduce a referendum on the Alternative Vote.
Senior Labour sources tell me they have taken the decison on the grounds that though the party supports a referendum on AV, and it was in the party manifesto, the bill also includes boundary changes which Labour regards as gerrymandering.
If significant numbers of Tory MPs oppose the bill it may make it hard for the government to get it through Parliament, thereby endangering the coalition agreement.
I'm Michael Crick, and I'm Newsnight's political editor. My guiding rule is that in any story there's usually something the politicians would prefer the world not to know. My job is to find that out. Follow me on
Comment number 1.
At 26th Jul 2010, Phillip wrote:Labour are opposing because they know that fair constituencies will remove an in-built pro Labour bias in the electoral system we have at the moment.
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Comment number 2.
At 26th Jul 2010, Noetic wrote:Well considering that Labour admitted in the coalition negotiations that - even without equalising the boundaries to remove the pro-Labour bias - they couldn't get their MPs behind a vote for an AV referendum, that's hardly a surprise...
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Comment number 3.
At 27th Jul 2010, Neil Robertson wrote:Did you notice that at last Wednesday's Scottish Question Time Liberal-Democrat Scottish Secretary Michael Moore told the Tory MP for Epping
Forest (who was complaining about possible confusion if the referendum
on AV was held on the same day as the Scottish Parliament elections) that he didn't think people would get muddled as the referendum was
to be on the same system used for Holyrood elections ....?
Except of course it isn't! AV is AV .... whereas Holyrood elections
are AM (Additional Member) with two ballot papers - one for a list
and one for a constituency MSP. If Moore is muddled, what hope for
the rest of Britain?!
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Comment number 4.
At 27th Jul 2010, Isatou wrote:Yes, Labour have such a cheek. The current boundaries favour them. And they accuse the new government of "gerrymandering". Typical hypocritical socialists. At the end of the day, they don't really believe in democracy.
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