There is only one party with the funds to campaign right now and it isn't the Lib Dems and all the talk up to this is that the Tories would campaign against it in the referendum (for very obvious reasons). AV is a pretty poor form of reform anyway, more like fiddling with the current system than any real change... still, the right wing press (which is a lot of the UK press) are going to try and bury it all the same.
If the Lib Dems have sold out for a referendum on AV, they will lose a huge amount of votes until the current leadership are gone - they've sold out the party principles for a chance to play at being big boys in Parliament.
Of course I could be wrong and they may have got better terms on the deal than that. Early reports do say it is going to be their tax plans not the Tory ones that go through but that is a sop compared to real electoral reform.



Great, the Lib Dems have signed up to take a chunk of the hate on that - massive cuts aren't going to win elections over here, not once they bite in