it was a crap campaign from both sides over a crap voting system. who cares

@Nick

Voting machines aren't used in Scottish elections. And since Scottish elections don't use AV, what would the relevance be, even if they were?

Australia’s elections under AV cost three times more than ours do. When preferential voting systems were introduced in Scotland and London, expensive vote counting machines were bought in at a cost of millions. That’s without even counting the need for more polling stations and election staff because AV ballots take longer to complete. An AV system would cost more than FPTP if only because multiple counts would cost more in the wages of those doing the counting.

To me it seemed like the only argument of the no campaign was that it was expensive and we're not in a great financial situation, not that they actually opposed the AV system (I can't see any reason why FPTP would be better), which makes it so ridiculous that they lied about the one reason not to change. It's pretty sad that these people are more concerned with making sure their jobs are easy instead of doing what's right for all of the citizens they supposedly represent.

When you think about it, is it so surprising that the 'No' campaign lied? Led by the conservatives, who were not exactly very truthful in their manifesto, it could have been read two ways and I certainly didn't see the damning cuts to the NHS. Anyway, people or should i say politicians always tend to mislead the public on figures in our 'democracy', so should we really be so surprised?
On the coming AV vote, there is no wonder that the YES campaign may be defeated as there has hardly been any publication about the event in most areas of the country. There should have been more information on the news, more publications sent to homes etc. I'm not talking about for or against material. I'm talking about truthful facts, a list of pro's AND con's so that the public could adequately make up its mind over AV. How can a public, of whom at least 40% don't vote in general elections, whom are ill informed don't necessarily understand the system make a proper decision? The play that the No campaign have used about money is petty when really this vote is about true democracy, surely Conservatives and Labour should look at it from the democracy side of things, not how many seats they may potentially lose? Surely it's about how much more choice the public should gain, and therefore how much more democratic our country could become.

The London Mayoral Election uses the Supplementary Vote system, not AV. It counts about 2.25 million votes, the average parlimentary consituency counts about 60,000. That's why it needs machines, parlimentaries using AV DO NOT, its a lie.

Bernard, as you would see if u were at an AV count, the only votes recounted and distributed are from the eliminated...why would they waste time recounting ballots that can't change?

The fact that it counts some peoples' second preference doesn't make it unfair to others, it makes it fair to everyone, since everyone can then vote for whoever they think truly represents them, instead of having to vote against what represents them the least. It's not like those whose first preference remains are getting their votes discounted, it's just changing the vote of those whose vote wouldn't have counted because they voted for a less popular party.

I second that.
Blunkett and his ilk - career politicians more concerned about their own perceived rather than their duty to the electorate - ALL of the electorate, not just the 30% or so of each constituency that keeps returning them to parliament under FTTP.

If either machines or humans have to count between 3 and 10 times as many votes, how can AV not cost more?

The arithmetic is completely indisputable. It MUST COST MORE TO COUNT MORE VOTES WHETHER PEOPLE DO IT OR MACHINES ARE PURCHASED.

Which raises the question: If someone disputes this, are they being truthful and factual?

Marc - the No campaign said voting machines would cost £130m. There is no need for voting machines, so that is untrue. If they'd said that AV would cost a bit more in overtime for counters you might have a point. But they didn't and you haven't.

I'll third support for a legal challenge should the Noes have it as looks likely. Perhaps we can then campaign to include PR as an option which it should have been all along.

Marc, have you ever been at a count? Do you understand how AV works. If candidate A has 35% and B 25% you only have to recont a possible 40% until A or B (or maybe C) passes 51% and you still have your full team of counters only counting the 40%; it's much faster. In most cases you'll only get a 20% to 30% increase in count time. Count time is not total cost of count, call it 50%. Total GE count cost £6m today, it will be less than £7m under AV. Peanuts. The cost argument is fantasy.

So, what do you do when you don't know the actual figures - because let's face it, none of us do, though some of us think there will be an increased cost.

You make a guess, or an estimate, you make up some numbers and (here's the contentious bit) hope that they're accurate.

All figures in election campaigns are "made up" as no one knows exactly how much policy commitments will end up costing.

It is clear that there is a strong possibility voting machines (as they are already used in Scottish and London mayoral elections) will be adopted and this will entail a cost.

Huhne doesn't have a leg to stand on.

He'd have been far smarter to have said that whatever minor cost was required to fund voting machines was a small price to pay for democracy.

I hope Nick Clegg will be treated a little more sympathetically now we can all see what lying toads he is having to deal with. Bet he wishes he had coalesced with Labour in retrospect.

The No campaign was never going to play fair as the Tories only care about themselves, if they cared anything about our electorate system then they'd have pushed for PR! The most fair voting system we could have! If ANY politician worth their spit cared they would have pushed for it and have countered the Tories on everything they've done so fair...and that does include all of the Lib Dems...if they had a back bone!

I am amazed that people would believe anything an MP says.
We should all know by now that they are not good with figures!
They only tell us what they want us to hear and what will feather their own nest.
Has anyone got the bottle to make it compulsory to vote? This would address the poor turnouts and we would then have a party who would be in government because they received the most votes - even if they were not our choice.

Its a good point. The only way to get round that is to have Open Primaries so that Party supporters, not necessarily Party members, choose who to have as their representative. Otherwise its jobs for the boys and jobs for life again.

Hugh (05 May, at 11:18) points out that machines have been used to counts where new voting systems have been introduced. There use has to be questioned, however, as they have not been overly reliable. They may not be appropriate for election of MPs

Whatever you think about AV, this is a staggering and frankly appalling admission from David Blunkett.

Barny: But you can't have a referendum with more than two choices, otherwise we then have to decide what voting system to use for the referendum... would you really want a FPTP vote between FPTP, AV and a PR system, and then see the anti-FPTP vote split between the latter two options?

Gibbo: You can vote for candidates under open list PR systems, as well as top up systems like Additional Member System (used in Scotland, Wales and London).

Nick: But why do Scotland/London use machines? They use AMS, but that's not a preferential system. If they've started to use machines, that's gone nothing to do with AV. (Indeed, Australia has AV but no machines; and the USA has FPTP with primaries, each round is counted by machines.)

Collins: There was no way the Tories (or Labour, come to that) would offer PR. The Lib Dems having "a back bone" would simply mean the only alternative is no coalition, and no AV referendum. By all means, one might argue whether they should have entered a coalition or not, but there's no way they could have got a PR referendum simply by better negotiations.

The only way we'd have got (or will ever get) PR is if they had or get more seats. (Though now with people seemingly wanting to punish the Lib Dems the most, you can kiss goodbye to that - and if No wins today, we'll be set back to two party politics, between the Tories, and Labour who have despicable MPs like Blunkett.)

The worst part is how long he waited to say this. Clearly letting it slide as a referendum tactic but trying to come off as honest despite that. Disgraceful.

Why do we need machines to vote on when we all have internet access and an individual National Insurance number that we could login to our 'Facebook' (lol) Voting page and vote there! Saving massive costs of polling stations, machines etc etc...

When John Humfryes interviewed David Cameron, the PM misleadingly said some people's votes are counted twice under AV and accused Humfryes of being wrong, In fact in the second round everyone's vote is counted again. I thought Cameron had done a good deal to detoxify the Tories but he showed himself up badly here.