Izzard: AV Will Give Power To The People - Sky News

4:11pm UK, Saturday April 02, 2011

Alison Chung, Sky News Online

Comedian Eddie Izzard has kicked off the Yes To AV (Alternative Vote) campaign, telling Sky News that electoral reform is likely to make MPs "work harder" and "put power in the hands of the people".

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At the national launch of the campaign in London, Izzard urged electors to change the current first-past-the-post voting system in next month's referendum.

Speaking to Sky News, he said: "It is as simple as one, two, three - you have a choice of putting down just one choice, or two or three... It will be one person, one definite vote, before it was one invisible person whose vote does not get counted.

"It will mean MPs will have to work harder to get your vote because not only do they have to talk to their core support, but also to other people to get them down as a second choice.

"It's a fairer system, and in this world people want more choice. It's not like it was in the Fifties when broadly people were voting for the Labour Party or Tories.

"Politics is multi-coloured and people's lives are multi-coloured. We have never had a chance in 100 years to vote for how we do the voting, so I think it is good we take this chance otherwise we will wake up with politics as usual on May 6."

It is a system so undemocratic that your vote for a mainstream party counts once, while someone can support a fringe party like the BNP and get their vote counted several times.

David Cameron

Martin Bell, war correspondent and former independent MP who ousted Conservative MP Neil Hamilton in 1997 on a 'sleaze-busting' platform, is also backing the "movement against the political classes".

He said: "We cannot have our MPs being elected by a minority of their constituents and then still try preaching about democracy to the rest of the world. Let's first put our own house in order."

The launch came as Prime Minister David Cameron, a staunch opposer of AV, insisted the system was unfair, undemocratic and obscure.

"It is a system so undemocratic that your vote for a mainstream party counts once, while someone can support a fringe party like the BNP and get their vote counted several times," he said.

He went on to cite Second World War prime minister Winston Churchill's view that AV meant "the most worthless votes go to the most worthless candidates".

Echoing his sentiments, No To AV campaign director Matthew Elliott said: "Our current system which gives one person, one vote is easy to explain, understand and is fair.

"By contrast, even the independent Electoral Commission - who are overseeing this referendum - struggle even to explain the Alternative Vote.

"The message for May 5 is simple: vote No to keep our simple, fair system of one person, one vote."