The letter from G Stein (March 21) was typical of the disinformation being put out by the campaign against the alternative vote, so please allow me to correct some of the errors.

Australia is not planning to change its voting system from AV – and under that system they’ve had fewer hung parliaments than we have had in the UK!

Meanwhile, Canada uses the same electoral system as us, which continually produces hung parliaments.

If you only choose to use one preference under AV, then your vote is still counted and valid. However, you can also give preferences to other candidates, so if your chosen candidate doesn’t get elected, your voice isn’t completely ignored.

AV will make politicians have to be more open so they can get support from a majority of the electorate they represent.

As for the idea that AV will cost £250million to implement, that’s been shown time and time again to have been a completely made-up figure from the No campaign – plucking figures out of thin air to scare people away from changing a broken electoral system.

As the No campaign can’t come up with any good reasons to stick with the present electoral system, it instead chooses to sling mud at the Yes campaign, hoping no one will notice it has not got any positive arguments.

For the facts on AV, visit http://www.yestofairer votes.org/

Nick Barlow
Causton Road
Colchester