The headline story in today’s Daily Telegraph was about an allegation that the Labour Government is bribing voters by diverting taxpayers’ money from Conservative heartlands to Labour ones.  Whichever way you look at it, that is terrible.  If it is true, it is scandalous.  It is not very different from Zimbabwean soldiers and civil servants being told their jobs depend on Robert Mugabe’s remaining in power.  If it is untrue, it is one of the dirtiest of dirty tricks for a major newspaper to make such allegations.  Either way, it is unacceptable.

There is a very easy but effective solution – just change the voting system to STV.  Then there would be no Conservative or Labour heartlands.  There would be no reason for the Government to divert money in this way or for a newspaper to make such an accusation.