Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Ed Miliband: 'don't let Nick Clegg put you off AV'

Mr Farron indicated his irritation with the dispute over whether Labour was prepared to campaign alongside Mr Clegg.

"I think it would be wrong for us to get into silly rows about who should or should not be on a platform," he said.

Mr Kennedy said it was vital that the supporters of electoral reform took the opportunity presented by the referendum on May 5

"This represents the force of political reform," he said. "This is a chance that has got to be seized."

In his speech, Mr Miliband said that despite the current Lib Dem coalition with the Conservatives, he still believed that AV would help progressive centre-left parties to "build bridges not barriers".

"The tragedy for progressive politics in Britain has been that division on the centre and left has handed a united right victory after victory," he said.

"For most of the last 80 years, there has been one Conservative Party but several competing for progressive votes. No wonder the Tories back the current system.

"They know Britain is not a fundamentally Conservative country. But with first-past-the-post, they are more likely to govern whenever progressive forces are divided."

Mr Farron said he was "absolutely sure" that the Conservatives would honour their agreement to legislate for the introduction of AV if there was a Yes vote, even if it was on a very low turn-out.

Meanwhile, Foreign Secretary William Hague was joined by four former holders of the office - including Labour's Margaret Beckett - in warning it would be a "grave error" to abandon a voting system which had been copied by countries around the world.

"Those of us who have represented Britain internationally know that one of the many reasons why we have always punched above our weight is our simple and straightforward voting system, a system that everyone can understand, because it gives one person, one vote," they said in a letter to The Times.

"Democracies all across the world have been founded on the example of our voting system."

Other signatories included Conservative former foreign secretaries Sir Malcolm Rifkind, Lord Hurd of Westwell and Lord Howe of Aberavon. Labour former Foreign Office ministers Keith Vaz, Tony Lloyd and Caroline Flint also signed.



Powered By WizardRSS.com | Full Text Feeds | Amazon PluginsHud-1

Source: http://telegraph.feedsportal.com/c/32726/f/568387/s/13b74234/l/0L0Stelegraph0O0Cnews0Cpolitics0Ced0Emiliband0C84133890CEd0EMiliband0Edont0Elet0ENick0EClegg0Eput0Eyou0Eoff0EAV0Bhtml/story01.htm

Mike Huckabee Saddam Hussein Hu Jintao Kim Jong Il Islam Karimov

No comments:

Post a Comment