THE British National Party could gain overall control of Burnley council because of flaws in the electoral system, a report claimed today.

The Electoral Reform Society warned that the party could win a majority of seats on the council in spite of "minority support" and advocated a change in the system.

However, the call for reform of the voting system was today rejected by the town's MP Peter Pike who said it was not the way to stop the BNP.

Last year the BNP won six seats in the 12 wards it contested in Burnley, despite having received little more than a third of the votes in these seats.

In Blackburn the BNP won a seat in November last year when Robin Evans took the Mill Hill ward with just over 32 per cent of the vote. He has since left the party.

The Electoral Reform Society, which campaigns for improvements in democracy, surveyed more than 2,000 electors across three wards in Burnley, which was rocked by race riots in May 2001.

Its 56-page study, entitled Burnley and The BNP found a different electoral system would prevent parties from gaining power well beyond what could be justified by their share of the vote.

Under the current First Past the Post system the candidate with more votes than any of the others, and not necessarily a majority of the vote, wins the seat.

Votes are cast for each candidate with the one receiving the most votes becoming councillor.

Under the proposed proportional representation system of the Single Transferable Vote (STV) suggested by the ERS, voters would list five or six candidates in order of preference. If their first choice vote was not needed, either because the candidate was elected or had no chance of being elected, the vote would transfer to the second choice.

The system would result in fewer votes being wasted and parties gaining seats with a minority vote.

Electoral Reform Society chief executive Ken Ritchie said: "If people vote the same way this year, the BNP will win a further six seats, and in the following election we could see the BNP holding 100 per cent of the seats in these wards with only a third of the vote."

The report found most supporters of mainstream parties would rather see any of the other major parties win in preference to the BNP, a preference which would become reality under STV.

The system is already in use in the Republic of Ireland, for the Northern Ireland Assembly and in Australia.

Many electors who considered themselves supporters of a mainstream party voted BNP in 2003 as a protest against Burnley Council, the study found.

Burnley MP Peter Pike said: "I do believe in First Past the Post and I am not keen on Single Transferable Vote. I do not think people understand the system and you cannot change a system just because you have problems. The way to defeat the BNP is to attract more votes than they do and to address why people are attracted to them."

Leader of the Liberal Democrats Coun Gordon Birtwistle said: "I am a firm believer in proportional representation as every vote counts."