Local Authorities (Mayoral Elections) (England and Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2011

Baroness Golding Excerpts

Wednesday 16th March 2011 Grand Committee

[Lord Tyler]

My Lords, I hope not to detain the Grand Committee for more than a few minutes. Before I come to specifics of the regulations that my noble friend introduced, would he comment on the report I read today? It said that Ministers and departments are under strict instruction, under the deregulation initiative or in/out process, that every time a new directive or regulation is introduced, one should also be abolished or repealed. If that is the case, I hope that we will, in future, get a brief description of what will be repealed to enable the new regulation to be introduced. Obviously, this is a very helpful and entirely desirable improvement to the situation, and I commend my noble friend for introducing it—in a totally non-partisan spirit, because I anticipate that the main advantage will be to the opposition party. I hope that the noble Baroness will acknowledge that on this occasion at least there is no ignoble partisan initiative or motive behind this, because clearly the primary benefit will be for Labour and Co-operative candidates. I know that there is a long tradition of them working together, and I hope that this will be accepted as an extremely helpful and consistent implementation of a principle that has been accepted in other parts of the electoral law.

I have three specific questions. As I understand it, it will now be possible for candidates standing for more than one party to have exactly the same opportunities for the use of an emblem on the ballot paper as those who are standing for a single party. However, it is a standing policy of all Governments that there should always be one emblem. The idea of combined emblems will provide a very interesting design objective in some circumstances. Whether the red rose is sometimes painted green—or there may be other opportunities for amalgamation—it will be a challenge to all designers. But there is also a problem of definition. I imagine that bringing together two emblems in a way that apparently creates a combined emblem will not be entirely easy to distinguish from two emblems separately put on the ballot paper. That is something that all Ministers in all Governments have rightly sought to resist as, once you open to door to that, you could have multi-emblems attempting to get on the ballot paper and more space being required—or else they would be too small to be legible. Is my noble friend entirely satisfied that the regulation will prevent what would otherwise look like two emblems being rather loosely combined? That may seem a small design problem, but it could turn out to cause difficulties.

Secondly, and relating to that, we are approaching the noon deadline on Monday 4 April at considerable speed. The consultation on this issue took place immediately after the 2010 election, both with the Electoral Commission—and I have declared an interest as having a minor role on an informal advisory group for the commission—and more widely. It is unfortunate that the elections for mayors in Bedford, Middlesbrough, Mansfield, Torbay and Leicester, where they must now already be starting their campaigns, have not been briefly and appropriately informed of the change. I have no idea whether there are candidates in any of those five locations who intend to stand on behalf of more than one party, but we are near the deadline and I hope that some attempt has been made to inform people in those areas, the political parties and those responsible for electoral administration, that this proposal was coming forward.

Thirdly, in his introduction, my noble friend referred to the fact that in due course primary legislation would be required for UK parliamentary elections. Can he tell the Grand Committee whether this is yet another candidate for the so-called “Christmas tree Bill”? That is rather an unfortunate description; it might be more properly described as the “Odds and Sods Constitutional Reform Bill”, because I know that a number of different proposals are likely to be contained in it. If it is, how soon may we expect to see that Bill? To adopt more parliamentary language, perhaps it could be called a portmanteau Bill. Either way, it is obviously important that the parties are given due notice that proposals will be brought forward as soon as time is available to deal with the bigger issue of the 2015 general election. As my noble friend has said, it is extremely important that we have total consistency so that the political parties, candidates and agents, as well as those responsible for electoral administration, have clear guidance that there will be a consistent approach right across the board.

Very briefly, since we are dealing with mayoral elections, I hope that my noble friend will be able to confirm that some of the issues arising over how executive mayors have been introduced into this country over the past 10 years are being reviewed in preparation for the Localism Bill, which is already under consideration in the other place. There are important problems that arise from that legislation, not least the fact that financial decisions are incredibly controversial when they are made by an elected mayor, because he or she can introduce a budget when two thirds of a council votes against it. There is also the issue of special responsibility allowances, which give the elected mayor huge patronage opportunities.

Obviously, this afternoon is not the opportunity to discuss these issues. However, I hope my noble friend will acknowledge that we cannot completely detach the issue of mayoral elections from wider concerns about the way in which the system is working, after a long period where it has caused some controversy in different parts of the country. When we come to the Localism Bill shortly, I hope that we will be able to address these.

I think my noble friend and his colleagues in the coalition Government have introduced some very sensible and, some might say, rather latter-day improvements to the system. They are correcting an inconsistency, a discrepancy that unfortunately managed to find its way into the previous basis for the identification of candidates on the ballot paper. I very much support and welcome the order before us.

[Baroness Golding]

My Lords, if I may for a moment, I was on the Committee of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. I can remember very vaguely why it was called that. It was something to do with political parties so-called registering themselves in similar names—I think it was something like Liberal and Literal—so that voters would be confused by not reading properly. I had a letter in 2007 from someone saying that they had attempted to obtain the committee minutes and reports of this committee. He goes on to say that the committee office had performed a search in the Houses of Parliament and the parliamentary archives for the committee’s records. Unfortunately, and also rather incredibly, they reported on 20 January that the contents of the only file they had located related mainly to the establishment of the committee and included virtually nothing about any advice it may have given about the registration of parties. That seems incredible. I would like to know if in fact these minutes were found. I think it is important, because the registration of parties came before the registration of these emblems. The parties that are registered should be proper political parties, not ones that were originally trying to imitate another party. So I would be grateful if the Minister could let us know if the minutes have been discovered.

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon]

My Lords, I, too, am grateful to the Minister for his clear explanation of the order before us and I completely accept, of course, that it was under the Labour Government that the oversight occurred. I am very glad that the Minister and his colleagues are seeking to put that right. As the noble Lord said, some Labour candidates are also members of the Co-operative Party. I myself am a proud member of both parties. I recognise that we will benefit from this particular regulation, as the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, said.

As a consequence of the oversight, if a person stands for both parties, they are unable to use an emblem for either one on the ballot paper. Clearly, that was not the intention, and I am glad that that is going to be righted. The noble Lord suggested that he was very glad, because there would not be able to be a plethora of emblems on a ballot paper. While I accept that we would not want to have rows and rows of emblems, I would ask the Minister why one cannot have two emblems, perhaps, rather than one. It is just a simple question.