Taxpayers foot bill for AV poll

Oldham will pay £230,000‘NO’ campaigners have hit out at next week’s Alternative Vote referendum saying it will hit Oldham taxpayers in the pocket.

They claim staging next week’s referendum on whether the UK should change its voting system from first-past-the-post will cost more than £230,000 in Oldham.

Councils are expected to pay for the referendum before claiming back their costs from the Government. The massive payout comes at the same time as Oldham Council has to make millions of pounds in savings.

Figures released by the Government show the referendum is set to cost £79.8million to host — including £236,499 here. The bill will cover the cost of paying counting staff and printing ballot papers for the public poll on changes to the way MPs are elected.

Matthew Elliott, campaign director for No to AV, said: “Nobody asked for this expensive referendum, but Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats were happy to junk their promises to avoid tuition fees and the VAT increase to get a vote on AV. As these figures show, the real losers from this referendum will be taxpayers whose council taxes are being wasted on Clegg’s political fix while they worry about their jobs and the state of their pensions.”

Under AV, voters would rank candidates in order of preference so, if no-one gets 50 per cent of the vote, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated and their backers’ second choices allocated to those remaining. The process continues until a winner is found.

A spokesman for Yes to Fairer Votes said: “This is another desperate move from the ‘no’ campaign. The cost of running the referendum is incurred regardless of a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ vote.”

Oldham East and Saddleworth MP Debbie Abrahams and Oldham West and Royton MP Michael Meacher are voting ‘Yes’ in the referendum but Lord Davies of Oldham will vote no.