Of men and machines

George Osborne seems to have recently joined the ranks of ministers who stand accused of poor personal judgement. Having willingly backed claims by the No2AV crowd that the Electoral Reform Society (ERS) faced a financial conflict of interest by giving the pro-AV campaign a £1.1m donation, the Chancellor subsequently found himself named in a messy legal wrangle after making some rather unwise allegations.

The ERS, which has secured more than £15m in contracts from the public purse over the past three years, reacted very badly to Osborne’s assertion that it "stands to benefit if AV comes in because it could be one of the people who provide these electronic voting machines. That is exactly the sort of dodgy, behind-the-scenes shenanigans that people don't like about politics and politicians."

The Independent reports that Sian Roberts, the chief executive of the ERS business arm, Electoral Reform Services Ltd, accused the Chancellor of getting his facts wrong as the company supplies voting papers and not counting machines. Solicitors acting for the company warned they were considering legal action as they issued a detailed rebuttal of No to AV's "wholly untrue" and "misleading" claims.

They said a change in the voting system would make no difference to the company's income and added that practically every British company earned some money from the state sector. The firm's solicitors added: "It is, for example, practically certain that every one of the Tory businessmen financially backing the No campaign has earned money from the public sector."

They said claims it had made £15m from taxpayers were misleading as it paid corporation tax on profits and handed a dividend from its income after its costs to the Electoral Reform Society.

Perhaps it’s asking too much, but you would normally expect a Chancellor of the Exchequer to know that sort of detail before sounding off.