The cost of AV has been raised by opponents of AV, with the 'No to AV' campaign frequently referring to a figure of £250 million. They say that this money could be better spent elsewhere.

'No to AV': “The change to AV will cost up to an additional £250 million. Local councils would have to waste money on costly electronic vote counting machines and expensive voter education campaigns. With ordinary families facing tough times can we really afford to spend a quarter of a billion pounds of taxpayers' money bringing in a new voting system?”

'Yes to fairer votes': “The only piece of equipment you need to vote with AV is a pencil. The No camp’s sums... simply don’t add up. Electronic counting machines aren’t an issue in this referendum. Australia has hand counted its elections for 8 decades. The £130 million of make-believe machines don’t exist in Australia and won’t exist in the UK.

Facts

In short, the cost of adopting AV for general elections is uncertain.

The only firm costs identified by No to AV is the £82 million cost of the referendum and the 9 million cost of voter education. As there are no government estimates of the cost of AV should it be adopted, and because there are currently no plans to buy voting machines should AV be adopted, the £250 million figure must be seen as highly speculative.

'No to AV' break down the £250 million figure into several parts: the referendum itself will cost £82 million, with the cost of voter education ahead of the referendum at £9 million.

They go onto say that should AV pass, the cost of electronic vote counting machines will be £130 million and the cost of voter education on AV will be £26 million.

A Channel 4 Fact Check looked further into this figure, concluding that the £130 million figure for new counting machines was speculative, finding no government plans to buy any. They also said that no one in government know with any certainty how much AV would cost if it were adopted.

An important point to keep in mind is that Australia, who use the PR system, do not use voting machines. Indeed, Ireland has a much more complicated version of full proportionate representation and they also do not have electronic voting machines.

It therefore seems pre-emptive for the NO campaign to suggest the UK will need voting machines.

'No to AV' are right that the AV referendum will have upfront costs, and if the referendum is passed there will likely be costs associated with voter education. However, the £250 million cannot be used with certainty.