Outrage over election law confidence votes

(ANSA) - Rome, October 11 - The anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S) and several leftwing parties are set to continue staunch protests on Wednesday against the government's decision to put a bill for a new election law to confidence votes in a bid to push it through.
    The M5S say the bill is designed to scupper their chances of winning the next election, set to take place early in 2018, and other groups have also described it as an affront to democracy.
    Two of the three planned confidence votes on the so-called Rosatellum election bill are scheduled to take place on Wednesday.
    Protests are set to take place outside the Lower House and the Pantheon during the day. M5S founder Beppe Grillo on Wednesday called on the public to rise up against the bill.
    "If you let the election rules be changed again so that the slime of the country get back to the top, once again your children will pay the price," comedian-turned-politician Grillo said on his blog.
    "The citizens will have their share of the responsibility if the umpteenth dirty-trick law comes to life". The Rosatellum 2, nicknamed after Democratic Party Lower House whip Ettore Rosato, would harmonise the present differing laws for the House and the Senate. It would introduce a system that is two-thirds proportional representation and one-third first-past-the-post system aimed at favouring the emergence of a winner. There are fears the next general election, expected early in 2018, could be inconclusive with the current laws. The bill has the backing of the ruling PD, Silvio Berlusconi's opposition centre-right Forza Italia, the Northern League and the small centrist Popular Alternative (AP) group.
    "Today democracy is in danger, it is at risk," Alessandro Di Battista, a senior M5S lawmaker, told Radio Capital. "Parliament is made up of representatives of the people. With this law it will be made up of representatives of the parties".