IMAGINE, if you will, a fourth term under a Labour government led by a triumphantly re-elected Prime Minister Brown.

Then imagine the ensuing referendum campaign on the subject of electoral reform. That’s the first crucial point: GB has proposed a referendum, not on proportional representation, but on the Alternative Vote (AV), which many regard as barely more proportional than the current system and, in certain circumstances, less so. When Peter Hain, whose long-standing support for AV is well known, approached me to ask if I would support him in the party’s deputy leadership election in 2007, I warned him that his stance on this issue was likely to alienate not only those who supported the status quo but also those who supported full proportional representation.

The second point, which few seem to have noticed so far, is that AV isn’t even Labour policy, and is unlikely to become so before any referendum. I’m not sure what precedents exist for governments holding referenda on policies which they don’t explicitly support. When we held referenda in 1997 on Scottish and Welsh devolution, the government was asking for popular endorsement of their own policy. The reason I don’t see the need for the government to hold a referendum on Scottish independence is because we don’t supprt that policy.

But still we’re supporting a referendum on a policy which some individuals support, others oppose, but which won’t be government policy at the time of the vote, and certainly not Labour policy.

Which brings me to my main point: will the Prime Minister allow members of the government to campaign against AV in the referendum, as Harold Wilson allowed his ministers to campaign for a “No” vote in the 1975 EEC referendum?

And if, after all of this, there’s a vote in favour of change, does the matter rest there? Obviously not, since those, like Chatter 88, would simply pocket that gain and use it as a stepping stone towards their next aim: full proportional representation (probably the single transferable vote, or STV). And what would constitute a “yes” result anyway? Would turnout in the referendum have to be over 50 per cent for the result to be legitimate?

Needless to say, this is not a policy I shall be campaigning on here in Glasgow South in the months leading up to the general election. I could be wrong, but I reckon local voters might be a bit more concerned about unemployment, the economy and the health service than whether those who make decisions in government were elected in their own constituencies with more than 50 per cent of the vote after an exhaustive ballot.