As the AV referendum campaign gets seriously under way the prime Minister has weighed in against AV. He said that “the principle of one person, one vote is what makes our democracy fair. AV flies in the face of that.” He went on to claim that AV can lead to getting the second best candidate elected and used a rather clumsy analogy with a 100 metres race.

Obviously it slipped Mr Cameron’s mind how he got elected, so let me remind him. In 2005 four candidates were voted on by Tory MPs and Mr Cameron came – second.

First ballot (Tuesday 18 October 2005)

David Davies 62 votes

David Cameron 56 votes

Liam Fox 42 votes

Kenneth Clarke 38 votes

In a process which is very much like AV, the candidate with the least votes (Ken Clarke) was eliminated and MPs re-balloted. Only then did Mr Cameron emerge as the leading candidate, and subsequently go on to win the postal ballot of Tory members between him and David Davis. So does he consider himself the “second best” Tory leader?