The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Mr Mark Harper)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) on securing the debate. It is not the first time we have heard from him this evening, but no less the worse for that.
The Government want to improve public confidence in all aspects of our electoral system. I am sure that all hon. Members would agree that it is important that the conduct of all elections to this House, and to local authorities and the European Parliament, are beyond reproach. I agree with the hon. Gentleman when he says that we want elections to be decided through the ballot box and not in the courts, but some remedies should be available to deal with cases of corrupt or illegal practices by candidates or agents. There should be clear and robust mechanisms for challenging the results of elections, and he is right to say that they should include appropriate, proportionate and accessible safeguards. The Government’s view is that that is the case under the Representation of the People Act 1983.
The hon. Gentleman raised several issues of cost, including the overall cost, and made a specific point about a court’s ability to apportion costs. My understanding is that courts have a wide discretion under section 154 of the Act to apportion costs. He raised a specific case that I will endeavour to look at after the debate and consider what he said in the light of it.
The hon. Gentleman also made a point about proportionality. Although there may be technical reasons why a returning officer may have declared a particular result, revoking the election of somebody is a significant step and should not be done lightly. Although the hon. Gentleman suggested cases in which it might be considered only an administrative matter, if we think a little more about it we realise that those of us who have been elected would not want our elections to be overturned by some relatively straightforward process. It should be difficult to overturn an election, and we need to strike a balance in the level of proportionality.
Notwithstanding the relatively recent case of Phil Woolas, it is also worth saying that the election petition device—certainly for parliamentary elections—is rare. There have only been seven petitions issued against the results of UK parliamentary elections since 1997, and only two of those have been successful. Hon. Members on both sides of the House would agree that it would not be healthy if we had regular challenges.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned appeals. The High Court in the Woolas case confirmed that section 144 of the 1983 Act said that decisions of the electoral courts were final insofar as matters of fact were concerned. The hon. Gentleman was right about that, but I do not agree that that was a misconsolidation of the 1983 Act. If he goes back to the 1868 Act—I will not go as far back as the 400 years that he suggested—he will see that it was also clear that matters of fact were final decisions that the election court could take. In the Woolas case, the High Court made it clear that the decisions about the application of the law were judicially reviewable—
Mr Harper
I shall come on to that point in a moment. I just wished to make the distinction clear between matters of fact and the application of the law, which—to be fair—the hon. Gentleman did. The High Court made it clear that it was possible for judicial review of how the election court had applied the law.
On the basis of that decision, I do not think that the law needs to be changed to clarify the decision that matters of law can be appealed, although there was confusion in the reports of the case about whether Phil Woolas was appealing or requesting judicial review.
It is for Members to weigh up the issues, taking into account the hon. Gentleman’s point that we never know when we might be the subject of one these petitions. However, we must balance against that the need for a level of speed in the process. When Phil Woolas sought a judicial review, the High Court concluded on the justification for finality on fact:
“Election petitions must be determined with urgency. Finality in the determination is of great importance for not only must the electors have a representative in Parliament, but in times when majorities are small, the absence of a Member can be significant.”
A balance needs to be struck in this process between getting the right decision and getting it quite speedily. He raised several points about that matter. The Government keep it under review, but at the moment we are not persuaded by his arguments.
At the end of his remarks, the hon. Gentleman raised a more general issue about party funding. He will know that the coalition Government have made a commitment to deal with party funding—hopefully, on a consensual basis. We are waiting for the Committee on Standards in Public Life to publish its report. The committee might make proposals that we can take as a basis for conversations between the parties and that might deal with some of the issues he has raised. He also made a point about the danger of political arguments being used to try to overturn elections. I think that the High Court made clear the distinction between false statements of fact about a candidate’s personal character or conduct and their political or public position—a statement had to be one or the other, but could not be both. Members when approving literature and others when thinking about challenging us should bear it in mind that it is not about running off to court every time someone says something about someone’s political position.
The hon. Gentleman made a point about things that get authorised by us. The legislation makes it clear that candidates should be liable to have their election voided only if they or their election agents—not lots of other people, but specifically they or their election agents—have authorised or consented to those illegal practices. That should ensure that election candidates and their election agents are careful about what they authorise and approve the spending of money on. They should perhaps be careful not to delegate that responsibility to others. It is not the case that anybody involved in a campaign can put out pieces of paper—if they are not approved by the candidate or election agent, they cannot lead to what happened in the case of Mr Woolas.
In conclusion, the Government agree that there should be proportionate and accessible procedures for challenging elections. We will keep the current position under review, and I will consider the specific issues that the hon. Gentleman raised, particularly on costs, and come back to him one way or the other.
Question put and agreed to.