John Healey has become the most senior shadow cabinet minister to declare that he will
be voting no to AV. In a pugnacious article for the
Independent, the Shadow Health Secretary describes the proposed system as a ‘perverse’ leg-up to extremists and one that will make Nick Clegg a permanent kingmaker. He added that he had
not been ‘persuaded that AV is an upgrade to the voting system’.
This is a small but important intervention. Until now, Labour’s contribution to the no campaign had been a procession of ghosts from former regimes: messrs Reid, Blunkett and Prescott being the most prominent of these heavyweight has-beens. Healey is a popular figure in the current PLP and the party at large, and he will lend the campaign a little more vitality, along with Caroline Flint and Mary Creagh – the other shadow cabinet ministers who have pledged to vote no.
Ed Miliband’s support for a yes has been conspicuous but qualified. Determined not to share a platform with Nick Clegg, Miliband is launching his own campaign this evening. He will argue that AV is a start rather than a panacea; an honest but uninspiring message that goes some way to confirming Healey’s view that AV is not an improvement on the current system. For this reason, perhaps it is unsurprising that more than 200 Labour MPs and peers have pre-empted Miliband’s launch night by declaring that they will vote no. The feeling is that Miliband’s plea for a yes is being overshadowed by his own party.
PS: Ed Balls, Douglas Alexander, Sadiq Khan, Tessa Jowell, Liam Byrne, John Denham, Peter Hain and Hilary Benn are supporting Miliband on this; the rest of the shadow cabinet is undecided.
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