Yorkshire Labour MPs on AV vote - follow my leader?
New Labour leader Ed Miliband is certainly not being blindly followed by his fellow Yorkshire MPs when it comes to the debate over ditching the first-past-the-post election system.
Both the Labour Yes! for Fairer Voting Campaign and the No2AV camps scrambled for attention in what is normally the political dead zone between the Christmas and New Year holidays.
Between them they had grabbed a fair bit of the space in my e-mail inbox by the time I returned from my Christmas break.
Ed Miliband had made it a key part of his leadership election campaign that he supports the switch to AV.
That is not much of a surprise as he wrote the party's general election manifesto which promised this May's referendum in the first place.
What is perhaps more surprising is the long list of Yorkshire and North Midlands MPs who have apparently signed up to the No campaign.
So far, they number 14.
It brings together some strange bedfellows with the shadow health minister and Wentworth MP John Healey marching side-by-side with Bolsover's veteran left-winger Dennis Skinner under the No2AV campaign banner.
The rest of those listed as opposing AV include Sheffield MPs Clive Betts and David Blunkett; South Yorkshire's Caroline Flint and Angela Smith; West Yorkshire's Gerry Sutcliffe, George Mudie, Rachel Reeves and Linda Riordan. North Derbyshire new boy Toby Perkins has also said he disagrees with his party leader.
Apparently, Huddersfield's Barry Sheerman was a little put out when he was also included on the No campaign's list. He told his local Huddersfield Examiner that he has yet to make up his mind.
The numbers of our region's Labour MPs definitely following their leader by supporting the switch to AV are a little thinner.
The "Labour Yes! for Fairer Voting Campaign" lists Leeds MPs Hilary Benn and Fabian Hamilton; York's Hugh Bayley; Sheffield's Paul Blomfield and the region's sole Labour MEP MEP Linda McAvan.
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I'm Len Tingle, the Political Editor for BBC Yorkshire. You can see me most Sunday lunchtimes when I hit the road with the Politics Show's live satellite truck. I also reflect the region's politics on Look North, the BBC's local radio stations and our web pages. Welcome to my blog.
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Can anyone explain why, when all recent opinion polling indicates public support for less unfair voting, so much of the establishment is so keen to retain the wooden spoon of EEA democracy for Westminster and English councils (the other home nations having rather more democracy in national and local matters)?
AV would at least promote the UK to runners-up for the wooden spoon, leaving France in sole possession with their two-stage quasi-AV, on which London mayoral elections are modelled.
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