Baroness Warsi today claims that "candidates will feel the need to pander to racist groups" under AV. The claim is absurd but Warsi has form on pandering to the BNP.
No-to-AV attack dog, Baroness Warsi, pops up today in The Sun making the ludicrous claim that AV would give “More votes, more power, more long-term legitimacy for the BNP and other fringe parties”. The claim is absurd but Warsi knows a thing or two about pandering to the BNP.
To illustrate her point, Baroness Warsi writes today:
“Take Dewsbury, which I lost by just over 4,000 votes in 2005. The BNP vote was 5,066 – more than the difference in votes between second and first place.
“It’s not hard to imagine where AV could lead in places like Dewsbury – more inflammatory campaigns, and policies which appeal to extremists.”
But Warsi didn’t need AV to make her own appeal to extremists. During that campaign she used dog whistle literature urging BNP supporters to vote for her.
And in 2007, Warsi denied ‘pandering to BNP‘ after telling the Independent on Sunday, “We must listen to BNP voters“. At the time, Simon Woolley of Operative Black Vote said:
“Pandering to racist views peddled by the BNP and bought by BNP voters is grotesque. This country would collapse if it wasn’t for migrant workers.”
The BNP claim has been made before by the No campaign. A recent Labour No leaflet claimed, “Extremist parties find it hard to win now. They cannot benefit from the transfer of votes. We should keep it that way.” But respected YouGov pollster, Peter Kellner, has written:
“it is worth noting that AV is the best system for keeping the BNP at bay. The party would seldom, if ever, win any contest under AV, whereas we now know that, if local conditions are right, it can win under both FPTP and proportional representation.”
Indeed, AV is the most “extremist-proof electoral system“. One of the reasons, perhaps, that the BNP are in tune with Warsi by campaigning against AV.
57 Responses to “Warsi makes hypocritical claim on BNP pandering”
Will Straw
@billyblofeld http://bit.ly/fztktN
Idontliketories
RT @Rich_Head: Baroness Warsi is becoming difficult to believe as a human being http://bit.ly/fztktN #yes2av
What You Can Get Away With » Blog Archive » Worth Reading 33: First preference
[…] – A handy collation of answers to all the disinformation being put out by the No campaign. Warsi makes hypocritical claim on BNP pandering – And I bet the next time she trots out some lies about AV on TV, no journalist will confront […]
Mattydug
Wdjstraw tweeter me this link. In 1983 I worked for the conservatives in hammersmith. At that election I was surprised by how many people said they would never vote Tory but would vote nat front. The same happened in Nwarks in the recent election. Luckily there was not a bnp candidate on the list. I suspect that most of these people didn’t vote. They were not bad people and they were largely labour voters but they were not being listened to. I have no problem with warsi reaching out to them but so should you reach outbecause they are natural labour voters. And I do not mean that in a snide way.
Debunked: The latest No2AV 'AV/BNP' spin | Left Foot Forward
[…] explained, such a strategy wouldn’t really make sense – and in any case, as Will Straw pointed out on Left Foot Forward on Wednesday, there are examples of mainstream candidates pandering to […]