On Thursday everyone will have the chance to decide whether to keep our current voting system for electing M.P.’s or change to the Alternative Vote (the AV) system.
I believe we should keep the existing system. It is simple. Every voter votes once. Each vote is counted once and the candidate with most votes wins.
It is fair. Everyone can understand how the current system works, few people fully understand how AV works. I do not think it is right that under AV some people get their vote counted twice whilst others only get their vote counted once.
It is straightforward. Under our current system where the candidate who gets most votes wins and unpopular governments can be thrown out by the voters.
David Nuttall 
David, i would be interested to see your comments on lord taylors conviction and jail sentence seeing as you were very quick to castigate David Chaytor when he was sentenced, also on the tory peer awaiting a probable jail term. I notice you have kept very quiet recently and have failed to congraulate Bury Labour Party on winning back control of Bury Council. There has been no reply to a question from another contributor asking why Bury Council, tory council, increased it’s payment from our taxes to its pension service for employees. Why should our council pay, from my taxes, a pension to its workers when NOBODY paid a penny for me, if they want a pension they should pay for their own and not get owt from me.
Dear Mr Barber,
As a matter of interest I think it is absolutely right that all those who dishonestly steal public money should be dealt with appropriately by the Courts and that should normally mean a prison sentence – regardless of which party they belong to. Secondly, I do not remember Mr Chaytor congratulating the Conservatives when they took control of the Council! Thirdly I did investigate the enquiry about pensions and replied by email to the poster. For your information the pension contributions are determined by a national scheme and I do not think the political control of the Council has anything to do with it. if you are not happy with the contributions made to the pension scheme please fell free to take it up with the new Labour administration in Bury.
David
Under our first past the post system the control of our Council was determined by drawing a straw ! You would not believe it let alone call it democracy. Would it not have been better if we knew who the non Labour and Tory voters had chosen as their second choice. Who won a majority of those second choices would then have won – more fairly, democratically and satisfactorily. Too late now I know but this example demonstrates the benefits of the AV system.
David, can you justify why you claimed £229.63 from public purses to reimburse your expenses for water?
Hi Paul,
Yes I certainly can!
This claim is for reimbursement of the water and sewerage bill in respect of the flat I rent in London. All claims have to be submitted to the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority for verification. All MP’s are allowed to reclaim their rent/gas/electric/telephone/tv licence/Council tax etc. I choose not to have a telephone or broadband or a television licence at the flat in order to save money for the taxpayer.
In view of the high profile of Bury North in the expenses scandal I am always very careful about what I claim and there are many expenses which I could claim for but I choose to pay for personally.
David
David,
Being an honest man as I know you are, (and for a politician and solicitor that is some going!) I believe you.
But I also know that it is a party canvassing tactic to try that out with voters who suggest that they might be more Conservative than Labour but are considering voting for a smaller party.
I trust that you will discuss this issue with your canvassers, if you have not already done so.
So can I assume that in future when a voter tells you or one of your party helpers that they intend to vote for a smaller party you will not suggest that they would be wasting their vote and that they should vote for you?
Hi James,
Thank-you for your comment. I would not suggest they were wasting their vote because I believe voters understand the implications of the vote they are casting.
David
Get your CV updated David because you are on your way out and hopefully we get a MP who stands up to Andrew Lansley and demands he keeps his election promise to keep open Fairfield Baby Unit. After the slaughter of the libdems in the country at large it is a good job that all council seats are not up for grabs, which they should be, because there would be a virtual wipeout of tory councillors throughout the land and you know it. Your previous statement that the tory council are doing a good job running Bury Council now rings a little hollow and now we hope the council can save a ton of money by not appealing the judgement on equal pay.The lies told by the coalition government have come back to bite them on the backside and the sooner we have a general election the better.I had warned people who were daft enough to vote for the libdems that they would get a severe kicking yesterday and my forcast has come true. I hope you will have the good grace to congratulate the labour party on its sucess locally and warn your tory councillors who are up for election next year to get ready for a cut in their income because they will be out of office, roll on may 2012.
As a sitting MP you have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. I’m going to vote Yes.
There should also be a law that cannot be appealed by any elected government, that the Electorial Boundaries, should stay the same.
The voting system shouldn’t be messed about with at all!