Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Rooker
My Lords, when I first tabled this little group of amendments, I included one that was along the lines of a side-title to it: “the people’s choice”. That is what this group is about. At the moment, nobody has asked the people. Nobody has asked anybody whether they want to change the voting system. This group of amendments splits the question into two parts. It is fairly self-explanatory, although it is not as easy to see when they are split up on the Marshalled List. The first question is in Amendment 21 and would ask people:
“Do you wish to change the voting system?”.
People are not being asked this. It was implied by Amendment 16. People were not asked whether they wanted change; it said that it had been agreed to change the voting system. I want to ask people whether they want to do so.
The second part, if there are yes and no answers to that first question, is in Amendment 27:
“If a majority vote for a change in the voting system, which of the alternatives”—
I call them families—
“would you prefer?”.
There are four there; it is a little package. I will not labour the point. I did not invent this. It is a replica, although not exactly, of what happened in New Zealand nearly 20 years ago. New Zealand had first past the post, a very modern democracy and votes for women 30 years before this country did, so we should not lecture anyone there about democracy and parliamentary systems. It had first past the post and there was pressure for change. I shall not deploy all the documentation and so on but a referendum was held in New Zealand in two parts. The people were asked, first, “Do you wish to change the system? Yes or no?”, and then below that on the paper was the second question, “If the yes vote wins, which one of the following do you want?”. The options given were in families—I use that term because of the debates that we have had—rather than in detail. Parliament took it away, worked on it to make it a practical reality and then a year later, in 1993, there was a second binding referendum between first past the post and the alternative, which won the vote and was turned into a practical system. It worked. I do not know how many times it has been used—probably at least four or five—but in New Zealand the people were asked before a change was made.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Perhaps I may ask my noble friend what the turnout was in the referendum. Is there anything that we can learn from that level of turnout?
Lord Rooker
I regret to say that I have not brought my New Zealand file with me. I could not get away from the Chamber and my file is across the road, so I do not know. It was a hot issue and I have copies of the information that at the time was distributed to people by the equivalent of the Electoral Commission to explain the systems and what was going on, together with copies of the ballot papers.
I am not going to spend this debate deploying the whys and wherefores of the system. The principle is clear: first, we should ask the people, “Do you want to change the system?”. I can make the case for that but the change, when it occurs, has to be cemented, and that is my anxiety about what is being proposed. This is not intended to be a cemented change, because it is clear that, assuming it is carried, the Liberal Democrats will come back later for a move to PR. Were I in favour of PR, I would go straight to PR, but that is not the point that I am making here.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I was sitting here confidently waiting for either the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, or the redoubtable noble Lord, Lord Rennard, the bravest of the Liberal Democrats, to get up and intervene, but since no one has, I shall say just a few words.
We are now down to the anoraks, the loyalists and the payroll vote. I am two out of three, by the way. I always hesitate to disagree with my noble friend Lord Rooker, because, just as he said that the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, fills him with awe, my noble friend fills many of us here with awe. He was one of the most effective Labour Ministers and he is an even more effective Back-Bencher and debater, so it is always with some hesitation that we get up to disagree. But I come from a fundamentally different point of view, in that I think that first past the post is, as I argued earlier, the best system, for a range of reasons.
I wonder, though, whether he is right in using the New Zealand example as a precedent for us, for two and maybe three reasons. First, New Zealand has a unicameral Parliament, so there is only one Chamber and only one election takes place. They do not have, as we do, two Chambers and—as I said in relation to the previous amendment—the possibility of having two different systems, one of which produces the Government and the other which produces the balancing force, or balancing Chamber. That is very important.
Also, as far as I remember—and I am sure that my noble friend Lord Rooker will get up and correct me if I am wrong—the example that he suggested was introduced by the Labour Government in New Zealand. They thought that it was right to change the electoral system. I visited New Zealand a few years later and spoke to a number of Labour Party members who were very strongly of the view that they had made a mistake in introducing it. I know that my noble friend Lady McDonagh was General Secretary of the Labour Party and has contacts with the New Zealand Labour Party. I was there on a CPA visit and met them and they were very regretful that they had moved in that direction. Despite his deep knowledge and the detail that my noble friend gave us from the Plant report and the system in New Zealand, he was not able to answer my noble friend’s question about the turnout, about how many people actually turned out to make these great changes in the two referenda that took place, and whether or not that could be justified.
That brings me to two final points. Someone suggested earlier that there was filibustering going on. There was actually a very good debate, which seems to me to be the purpose of these kinds of Chambers. I was pleased that quite a few Conservatives got involved in the debate.
The Liberal Democrats and some Labour people keep arguing that democracy is all about an arithmetical correlation between the number of votes and the number of seats, as exact a correlation as possible. That is democracy, they say—to get the nearest you can to the number of seats relating to the percentage of votes cast. I think there is another, perhaps even more important, aspect of democracy, which is accountability: that is the ability, first, of your party in the constituency and, secondly, of the electorate in the constituency to hold you to account. In my view, that can be done properly only by the first past the post system.
Earlier, the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, made a very strong argument about wasted votes. One aspect of that was dealt with by one of my noble friends. The argument was that there are safe seats that never change. Come up to Scotland and go to Edinburgh South, which was held by the Tories for generations and is now a Labour seat, or go to East Renfrewshire, which was held by the Tories for generations and is now a Labour seat. We used to think our votes were wasted, but we worked hard, we convinced people, we got people on to our side, they voted for us and we got a majority. Surely that is what democracy is about. It is about convincing people and changing people’s minds. It is Gilbertian to think that because someone was born a Tory, they will always be a Tory or because they were born a Labour person, they will always be a Labour person. You can change people, you can convince people. If you will excuse me saying so, I was talking to my noble friend Lord Maclennan—I still call him my noble friend—earlier on. He won the seat through his campaigning, his personality and the Labour Party in Caithness. We had never held it before. We can win these seats and can convince people to change their minds. Surely that is what democracy is about.
Although my noble friend Lord Rooker has very powerfully argued the case for his amendments, I do not find it totally convincing. I say to the Tories that I wish that more of them in this place would have the courage of what I know to be their convictions and would stand up as the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, did earlier today and say what they really believe: that first past the post is the best way of electing people to the House of Commons.
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, I join my noble friend in calling upon the Conservative Benches to take a view because I do not know whether they really understand the danger that would arise in the event that an AV referendum was successful. It has huge implications for the Conservative Party. They sit there and say very little, apart from the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, and it leaves me quite bewildered.
I can now answer the question that I asked my noble friend about what happened in New Zealand because it is in Review of Voting Systems: the experience of new voting systems in the United Kingdom since 1997. On page 136, it sets out precisely what happened and it is very interesting, so I shall put it on the record:
“New Zealand provides a particularly interesting example because it has changed its electoral system from FPTP to the MMP”—
mixed member proportional—
“system (similar to AMS in the UK) in recent times. The first election to be held under MMP was in 1996, following referendums”—
which my noble friend referred to—
“in 1992 and 1993 which first rejected FPTP and then selected MMP from four proportional options. The 1993 referendum, which was binding, took place at the same time as the 1993 election where 84.5 per cent of voters favoured replacing FPTP and 70.3 per cent chose MMP”.
That shows that, when you ask the electorate what have been deemed in these debates to be complicated questions over the detail of various proportional systems, they actually understand what they are being asked and they are prepared to go out and vote and state a preference. The evidence is there in English-speaking New Zealand. It did it, and it shows the way forward. It is interesting to note, in the following pages in this section, that the turnout in New Zealand elections following the change in the electoral system in 1990 has consistently remained around the 80 per cent mark. That is almost as high as in my former constituency in one election, but it is vastly higher than the average within the United Kingdom. Again, we may have something to learn from New Zealand.
It is also worth noting what the review says is the impact of the system that New Zealand chose in this well-supported referendum.
“Since 1996, New Zealand has been governed by coalitions, usually with a minority of the seats in Parliament. Obviously this makes it more difficult for the leading party to achieve all of its policy aims but, arguably, policy decisions reflect the views of a wider coalition of voters. Tina Day, a Director of the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust interviewed 21 MPs in the 2002-05 Parliament for her research. She argues in her 2005 paper Increasing the representativeness of parliament … that there has been a shift of power from the Executive to Parliament, with select committees (whose composition reflects the multi-party Parliament) assuming a very powerful role”.
That reservation, expressed during the course of that consultation, might well be the one to which my noble friend refers.
The review continues:
“There is also a greater representation of women (around 30 per cent of members), Maori and the Asian population in Parliament. She argues that this has increased the legitimacy and standing of Parliament (notwithstanding the early unpopularity of coalition government). It also means that divisions in opinion within the country are played out in Parliament to a greater extent”.
The point I am making is that if you trust the people and give them the information in a form that they can understand, and put realistic options on the paper, they may well surprise us and actually choose a system that—
Lord Sewel
I am grateful to my noble friend, my near neighbour, for giving way. Could he resolve this dilemma? He mentioned that there was the early unpopularity of coalition Governments at the same time as there was popularity for a change to a more proportional system. A more proportional system will more than likely—I put it no stronger than that—lead to coalition Governments. How does he square the circle of the popularity of the voting system with the unpopularity of the product it produces?
Lord Campbell-Savours
It is because it was only in the early days prior to coalition that public prejudice on the issue of coalitions led to this general view that coalitions cannot work; whereas following the referendum decision and the creation of the coalition, and a recognition by the public that the system did work, the coalition then gained in popularity. All I am saying to my noble friends is that I find this particular amendment very appealing because it offers the public the opportunity that many of us believe they should be given during the referendum.
Lord Falconer of Thoroton
That raises a fundamental point which my noble friend Lord Rooker puts very well; you have to be able to explain why AV has been chosen and the public are not being given a choice on anything else. I have to say again, rather distressingly, that the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, did not deal with that at all in relation to the last amendment. He said that clarity was important. That is an answer, but it does not deal with why AV has been chosen. There is a profound sense in this House that there are a range of options. My noble friend Lord Rooker and the noble Lord, Lord Lamont, have pretty well destroyed the idea that AV is an effective choice.
If at all possible, I should like the coalition to explain why it has chosen AV as the only alternative proposition that it is putting to the electorate. If the answer is—I think that the Deputy Chief Whip is trying to tell me this—“Well, that is all we could agree with the Liberal Democrats”, that is fine, and I hope the electorate will treat that with the contempt that it deserves. Then the position is that we are not suggesting that it is the best alternative; we are saying that it is the only one on which we could reach agreement. I very much hope that the coalition is straightforward about that, because this is a serious debate about the constitution. Unless no answer is forthcoming, there is no other option but for this House to debate which are the better options. I know that that wearies the noble Lords, Lord Strathclyde and Lord McNally, but if you cannot explain or debate the best alternative to first past the post, the position is that the merits of each of them have to be debated.
Lord Falconer of Thoroton
I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Adonis. The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, was not in a position to deny the assertion that they were seeking AV without a referendum. So the Liberal Democrats trust the electorate but only on the basis that they give them the answer that they want.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Is there not a distinction between how this House would have handled the matter then as against now? Earlier in the year if every Member of the House had been voting for what they wanted, that would not have gone through. It is a distinct possibility that the Labour Government would have been defeated on the issue of AV in this House. Now it is going through on the basis of people being prepared to vote for something they do not believe in. Which is the most honourable and honest House in those conditions?
Lord Falconer of Thoroton
The head-turning going on is easily identified. The public, however, are interested in the merits of the argument. What I cannot understand at the moment, because no argument has been advanced, is why AV is the only alternative that has been given. That is the question posed by the amendments of the noble Lords, Lord Skidelsky and Lord Rooker. There must be an argument beyond simply saying, “We reached an agreement over the weekend and that seemed a sensible thing to do”.
Lord Strathclyde
I agree, but if the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, wishes to continue, I shall be happy to carry on. It will not take long.
Lord Campbell-Savours
To put it bluntly, I would prefer to go to bed. I do not know whether that suits noble Lords.
Lord Strathclyde
If noble Lords opposite have had enough, I am happy with that and we can resume the House. But if the noble Lord wants to move his amendment, we would be happy to carry on.
Lord Campbell-Savours
I am prepared to be helpful. If the House wishes to adjourn now we could regroup the next two amendments, which would help the House as two debates could be combined. I am perfectly happy with that.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Soley
My Lords, I rise with one intention only: to ask a specific question of the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, and ask him to deal with it in his response. In asking it I should declare an interest as one of the political panel drawn from all the political parties, from both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, who act as advisers and information givers to the Electoral Commission.
At the moment the Electoral Commission believes that it is possible to hold these elections on joint dates without problems. Along with everyone else, however, it acknowledges—I think this was the key point made by my noble friend Lord Rooker—that problems could arise; and if they do arise, that will have a major impact on how well the referendum—or indeed the elections, but particularly the referendum—is held.
If in the course of events the Electoral Commission decides that it is not able to conduct a referendum in a manner that is acceptable to both national and international standards, will the Government put off the referendum to another date? That is an important question and I hope the noble Lord will address it with some care.
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, I want to follow that specific question. I am pleased that my noble friend was able to intervene before me. It is not just a question of whether the Electoral Commission would recommend that the date be changed; it is whether the Government for other reasons might wish to change the date of the referendum. I would remind the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, that in 2001 a Government had to defer elections due to the foot and mouth crisis. All over the country, returning officers were arguing with their local authorities that it would be impractical, because of problems at polling stations, to carry out polling on that particular day. In addition to the question asked by my noble friend, I would therefore like to know what would happen in those circumstances.
In Clause 4(7) of the Bill there is reference to,
“Section 16 of the Representation of the People Act 1985 (postponement of poll at parish elections etc) does not apply to any polls taken together under subsection (1)”,
and subsection (1)(b) refers specifically to,
“a local referendum in England”.
So I think that we should have some assurance about what would happen in the emergency circumstances that might arise.
I had to leave the Chamber for personal reasons during the course of a couple of speeches, but I understand that reference was made to our alleged inconsistency in these matters. I would like to draw the House’s attention to the then Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill which was considered by Parliament earlier this year—a Bill produced by the then Labour Government. Under Clause 29 of that legislation we find my noble friend's amendment. Under “Referendum on voting systems”, it states:
“A referendum is to be held, no later than 31 October 2011, on the voting system for parliamentary elections”.
In other words, we showed in our Bill the flexibility that my noble friend seeks to establish in this Bill. Our position is perfectly consistent with the position that we took earlier this year.
I am very pleased to see a large number of Cross-Benchers in the Chamber today. The other day we debated an aspect of this Bill, when some of us were a little concerned that the Cross-Benchers had perhaps not been able to hear the debate. That is the insufficiency of consideration that has been given to the effectiveness of the electoral system proposed in this Bill. There is a lot of evidence out there to suggest that the optional multi-preference election system under the alternative vote system—which applies not in Australia generally in its federal Parliament arrangements, but only in one state, Queensland—is flawed. There has been a lot of academic work to prove that. In later stages of the Bill I will bring forward evidence, on the basis of international evidence which we have been able to collate, to dismantle systematically the case made for that system.
Even this morning I received a paper on STV which applies under the Scottish system for local elections. The interesting thing about STV in Scotland is that when a by-election takes place there it triggers an AV election. In other words, within the United Kingdom we have examples of AV operating which have not been fully considered by Parliament. The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, drew my attention to that the other day—he nods his head. What happened in those 32 by-elections in Scotland will be of great interest to the House when we produce that information. This morning I received a document, whose authors are Professor David Denver of Lancaster University, Dr Alistair Clark of Belfast and Dr Lynn Bennie of Aberdeen, on the operation of the STV system in Scotland—not on AV as it applies in individual constituencies when there is a by-election.
More work needs to be done on the electrical system proposed in the Bill before Parliament finally decides what the system should be. Furthermore, in the event that we proceed with the system proposed in the Bill, there should be time for a full public debate before any referendum takes place within the United Kingdom.
Lord Rennard
The noble Lord seems to suggest again, as have a number of noble Lords, that there simply has not been sufficient time to consider the relative merits of electoral systems and in particular AV. Is the noble Lord aware that a royal commission recommended the adoption of the AV system in 1910; that an all-party Speaker’s Conference made the same recommendation in 1917; and that the House of Commons voted for the introduction of the alternative vote system in 1931? Does he consider that this is perhaps the only place where 100 years is deemed inadequate time for consultation before voters are allowed to say how their representatives should be chosen?
Lord Campbell-Savours
That is the intervention of someone who has not done all his homework. It is true that AV was considered, but not in the form that is proposed in the Bill. That is at the heart of my argument. It is a different system. There are three major systems available under the alternative vote and the historic debate in this country has taken place on the Australian system, where it is compulsory to vote. Indeed, if you do not exercise all your votes, under the Australian AV system, your vote is discounted, not even taken into account.
Lord Howarth of Newport
I am very grateful to my noble friend, who has certainly done his homework and research very carefully indeed. Have I been advised correctly that the type of AV system that the Government propose should be used for elections to our House of Commons is found elsewhere in the world only in Papua New Guinea and Fiji? Has my noble friend, in the course of his research, found any lessons of more general application from those two laboratory experiments, which may be useful for us to think about as we consider an appropriate system for use in this country in the future?
Lord Campbell-Savours
I have identified those areas, but I think that the more relevant results are those in Queensland in Australia and in Scotland, which we will go through in some detail as we proceed on the Bill.
Lord Campbell-Savours
As I say, I have spent the last weekend talking to people throughout Scotland about how it operates and it is very surprising to see how it operates.
Lord Grenfell
My Lords, may I have the temerity to point out to the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, who correctly told us when it was last discussed, that a lot of us here, and, indeed, in the country, were not around at that time?
Lord Campbell-Savours
At this stage, I shall resume my seat and await later opportunities to discuss these matters.
Baroness McDonagh
I thank noble Lords who have come back to this issue of confusion. Can we knock on the head, once and for all, the suggestion that we are calling people stupid? People are not quite as obsessed by politics as we are and I always thought that it was the role of this House to look at legislation, to look at how it would work out in the country, in the community, in our experience, and bring back any concerns before legislation is passed. That is what we are doing. We are not, for a moment, calling anyone stupid. On Tuesday, the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, thought that in changing his parliamentary constituency in Scotland, he had also changed his European parliamentary constituency. I would not, for a second, call him stupid just because he does not appreciate that Scotland has only one European constituency.
I take this opportunity to ask about the 12 cities that are holding a referendum for mayor. I understand that some might be put off until 2012, but will the Minister tell us exactly where we are on that and, indeed, when the localism Bill will enter the House? Before I move off this issue of confusion, I say only that, if we are not careful—this is a serious point—we could end up having more spoilt ballot papers than the majority of votes, either for or against, under the alternative vote referendum. Given the legality of the Bill, there will be deep problems.
Who are we expecting to convey the arguments on the doorstep, if we proceed with an election in May? I would like to see anyone here get together a group of councillors facing re-election. These people are now going through very difficult times, having to cut something like 30 per cent of their budgets over the next four years. There will be serious cuts in adult services, child services and street cleaning, and some people may be moving to fortnightly waste collections. Any idea that you are going to knock on the door and explain that to the public and then say, “By the way, let’s have a chat about the alternative vote referendum”, is not living in the real world. I would like to be a fly on the wall in a room when anybody here attempts to do that. Without people on the ground being active in campaigns, be they for referenda or elections, they are not democratic election.
It seems rather ironic to have a referendum on our democracy at a time when there are elections in some parts of the country and not in others. By that very fact, you will skew—
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, we have had another series of interesting debates, largely on the same issue that we discussed the other night—the question of the date. Noble Lords who were there will have recognised that many of the issues that were raised last week were raised again today. I make no great criticism of that. It is inevitable in the early stages of discussing a Bill. The only surprise is that nobody, in an hour and a half of debate, mentioned a subject that was raised several times last week—that of the royal wedding. So as far as I can see, we have moved a great step forward over the course of the past week.
The debate really divided into three groups of speakers. First, there were those who were against the amendment and in favour of the Government’s proposal. Secondly, there were those like the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, who sensed that the Government were doing the right thing in offering a referendum but that they have not thought through all the various contingencies and needed some help and support—the word “lifeboat” was used and that sort of language. And thirdly, there were those like the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, my noble friend Lord Hamilton, and one or two others, who were opposed to the referendum and opposed to AV, and they also would support the amendment.
Lord Campbell-Savours
There is another group as well. There is a group of us who passionately support a reform of the electoral system.
Lord Strathclyde
Yes, there is a fourth group which supports a reform of the electoral system but not this reform. But this amendment is about the date, and all those who will support the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, if he presses it to a vote, have understood that by accepting this amendment, in practice the referendum cannot take place on 5 May. Amendment 5 does not specify an alternative appropriate day. Setting the date in the Bill, as we have done, gives certainty to those involved in the planning and campaigning. I could not help thinking during the course of the debate that if the Government had published a Bill with no date, noble Lords opposite would be the first to get up and say, “How outrageous this is. How can anybody campaign? This is the Government making it up as they go along”.
We decided on 5 May because it is the best date. It is when 84 per cent of the population will already be going to the polls. Or I should say that 84 per cent of the population will have the opportunity of going to the polls—the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, is right to admonish me on that. I made the argument last week and I make it again: it will save us a great deal of money—something like £30 million—if we go ahead on the day that we have decided.
The noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, said that people will be confused. There is a lot of outrage in the House today about this sense of confusion. As my noble friend Lord Tyler said, people have no difficulty in voting in local elections and general elections on the same day. In this House, we are used to making lots of decisions every day, but the poor people outside are not so blessed with our brains and will find it much more difficult. I think not. People are well capable of deciding who should represent them in terms of local government, the Welsh Assembly or Scottish Parliament. They are able to decide on a simple yes or no whether they wish to have AV. I have no truck with these arguments about confusion.
The noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan, made a point that was echoed by one or two other noble Lords including the noble Lord, Lord McAvoy, about whether it was negligence or discourtesy that we had not consulted the other parliaments and assemblies in the United Kingdom. The Government wanted to make an announcement on a national basis on a given day to Parliament. Even if it was a lack of respect, should we change the date just because of that lack of respect, if there is no other reason not to continue?
Lord Campbell-Savours
The Plant commission did not turn down AV. It said that it was a perfectly acceptable system, but that it just preferred another. That system was within the AV family of systems; namely, the supplementary vote. I know that the noble Lord has had to pick up the brief from others who unfortunately are not able to attend, but I am having difficulty in understanding why he does not accept the supplementary vote in his amendment. He alluded to it previously, but it was not clear to me exactly what he meant in his explanation. Will he tell us that before he sits down?
Lord Skidelsky
I think that those who tabled the amendment did not want to overcomplicate the choices being put to voters. When people get into the nitty-gritty of constitutional change, first, they can get obsessive about having their own preferred system and, secondly, it can become very complicated. In our view, it is simply a device to delay any changes. We thought that it would be a better idea to have three broad choices, one of which was proportional representation, leaving it to the House of Commons to decide, if that was the preferred option—that is, if more than 50 per cent of people support it—on which particular variety they would legislate. That was the logic behind it.
I urge this amendment on the Government and ask them to consider it seriously. Not to take advantage of the chance opened up by a promised referendum in order to offer the electorate a major choice about the future of the electoral system would be to miss a major opportunity to test their appetite for political reform. I beg to move.
Amendment 16A (to Amendment 16)
Lord Campbell-Savours
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 16A and 17, which are in this group. I wish to follow up on something to which the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, referred. He referred to “a proportional vote system”, which would be inserted under proposed subsection (3)(c) to be inserted into Clause 1 under Amendment 16. In other words, this referendum would not deal with only clear alternatives set out in the referendum question; it would pose the question, “Do you want a proportional vote system?”, which at this stage is not to be identified in the referendum question. By implication, there inevitably would have to be an inquiry arising out of a referendum which might choose new subsection (3)(c) as the option.
I am very interested in inquiries because last week we spent several hours arguing the case for an inquiry. What interested me about this amendment, and why I sought in my Amendment 17 to include the supplementary vote, is that that is precisely what I want to see. I want to see an alternative vote referendum based on the need for an inquiry in exactly the same way as is proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Owen, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Blackburn and the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, in their amendment.
In private conversation, I asked the noble Lord, Lord Owen, whether he might be prepared to accept this amendment. There may well be conditions in which some of us would like to divide the House on this. It raises very important issues. He gave me the same explanation; namely, that it is too complicated. But the reality is that, of all the electoral systems that confront the British electorate at the moment, apart from first past the post, the supplementary vote is the simplest system. It is used nationally in the mayoral elections. It has been supported by many millions of voters. Next year, when the mayoral elections finally take place in the new mayoralties—I think that there was reference to 12—I presume that they will also be fought on the supplementary vote. I cannot quite understand why introducing the simplest possible system should be regarded as a complication of the question.
In winding up, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, might offer to take back to those who have their names to this amendment the suggestion that before Report they might be prepared to include, if they were to retable their amendment, reference to the supplementary vote.
The content of Amendment 16A is the substance of an amendment that I shall move later and, again, it is about the principle of an inquiry. The referendum question at the moment refers specifically to “the” alternative vote—a specific system that has been identified, which I and many of my colleagues reject for different reasons. My amendment, which I would have slotted in as paragraph (d) of subsection (3) as proposed under Amendment 16, would enable the public to vote on a question which asked whether they were in favour of “an” alternative vote system. That would then beg the question of an inquiry to take place and a decision to be taken by Parliament or whoever wanted to make representations. Finally, a decision to be taken by government could be put to the House. I ask the noble Lord to take this back to his noble friends, because I regard the amendment that he has moved as one of the most important to be considered on this Bill.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
My Lords, as always, the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, has made an attractive speech which was full of interesting references, although I think that this is a somewhat curious amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, made a powerful point, but it leads me rather in the opposite direction to the noble Lord and to think that one could not support this amendment.
It will not surprise anyone that I speak as someone who has been over time a strong supporter of our existing system. In the 1970s, I even wrote a pamphlet defending our system, called Electoral Reform No Reform. At least I stand by the title because it has always seemed to me that the advantages and disadvantages of electoral systems are more evenly balanced than people acknowledge. The word “reform” is tendentious and “change” would be a better word. I have to confess on reading my pamphlet written 40 years ago that not all the arguments have stood the test of time brilliantly. I accept that there is more of a case than it appeared then for something like the German mixed system.
Some of the criticisms, however, that are made of our system, including one made by the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, are fallacious. The noble Lord referred to the first past the post system as one that depends on making the winner someone with a plurality rather than a majority of votes. The criticism is commonly made about our system producing over 50 per cent of the seats with people who have perhaps only 40 per cent of the votes and this is not a majority. The point is made that the Government do not reflect majority opinion under our electoral system. The fallacy in this argument is that there naturally exists in public opinion such a thing as a majority. It is true that if you take any single issue—like whether people are for or against the euro, whether they are for or against privatisation, whether they prefer public expenditure to lower taxes—you can get a majority for any single proposition. But elections are not fought on one proposition; they are fought on four or five issues. Opinion polls show that it is much more difficult to get a majority for four or five issues at once than it is for one issue. So it is a wrong argument to say that you have an electoral system that produces a majority when there is not in fact an underlying real majority.
What is the magic of a majority anyway? In a democracy, power, even by a majority, must be exercised with restraint and with respect towards one’s opponents. All electoral systems create a majority in an artificial way. The first past the post system does it by converting around 40 per cent of the votes into 50 per cent of the seats. The alternative vote system creates a majority artificially by taking the second preferences of the bottom candidate and allowing those to determine the outcome. But the second preferences of the second candidate do not count. The second preferences are given undue weight, which is why I was able to quote in Second Reading what Winston Churchill said about the system when he called it the least scientific in which the most worthless votes for the most worthless candidate determined the outcome. That is the artificiality of the AV system in creating a majority. With PR, equally, majorities are created rather artificially because people take two or three parties that may have fought the elections on completely different programmes, as we well know, and add them together and call it a majority, although nobody actually voted for the programme of the Government. So the artificiality of a majority is something that has to be recognised before one pours all this criticism on first past the post.
Lord Rennard
There are many places in this country with very safe seats, where issues of electoral reform are rarely debated. I accept that people are far more interested in outcomes than they are in processes, but I believe the process by which MPs are chosen is rather important in determining the outcomes. In your Lordships’ House, reference has constantly been made during these debates to the words of the Deputy Prime Minister considering the alternative vote system. Shall we just deal with those words for a moment? The first point is that the alternative vote system that he is now advocating is a compromise. Yes, it is a compromise. If no one party wins a general election, there is a need for compromise. I believe that many people in this country think that compromising is sometimes a good principle, not a bad one.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Compromises have to be settled, and the actual words of the Deputy Prime Minister were:
“I am not going to settle for a miserable little compromise thrashed out by the Labour Party”.
But he did settle on that very compromise.
Lord Rennard
My Lords, I thought that we had a very good compromise in 1997 agreed with the party of the noble Lord opposite but, after 13 years, that compromise was never delivered. I was quoting the Deputy Prime Minister rather more fully; I was going to talk about the word “little”, which he used. I believe that it is a little change, which preserves the single-Member constituencies, which Members in other parties hold very dearly. I happen not to. But since it preserves the single-Member constituency principle, I believe that it is a little change that will bring greater benefit.
There is also, of course, the word “miserable”. The only thing that would make me really miserable—and I say this in all sincerity to noble Lords who supported Amendment 16—would be if we failed to give people their say and made progress on a form of voting system that was effectively designed for the political circumstances in 1872, when Gladstone brought in the Secret Ballot Act.
Lord Rennard
My own view is that since Gladstone introduced the current system in 1872 in the Secret Ballot Act, for 138 years noble Lords and Members in another place decided that that system was perfectly good without revision and without letting people have their say. It is a good precedent to let people have their say, and we will wait to see when there is public demand again to have any further say. But for 138 years we have kept the same system. One hundred years ago, a Royal Commission recommended the adoption of the alternative vote, and 93 years ago, a Speakers Conference recommended the use of preference voting. Seventy-nine years ago, the other place voted for the adoption of the alternative vote, which was blocked on five occasions by your Lordships’ House. It is 36 years since a minority Conservative Government offered another Speakers Conference on electoral reform and it is 13 years since a Labour Government with a large majority had a manifesto promise and were elected on the basis that there would be a referendum on the issue of proportional representation. So it is a significant achievement for all those committed to electoral reform that twice this year in the House of Commons, with different Governments in place, there have been substantial majorities for a referendum to be held on the alternative vote. I want to see progress on this issue and hope that we will not give Members in another place a further opportunity to deny the voters their say on this issue and leave us back where we were in 1872.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Why does not the noble Lord be more honest—although I am not accusing him of being dishonest, he could be more honest—about where we stand who are in favour of electoral reform? Is not the reality that this is simply the first building block and that, once we have changed the system to a single-Member constituency arrangement, it will then go on to the next stage and ask for more? Is not that what is actually being said? I openly admit it; that is why I am arguing about the building block. I am saying that the preferential system being selected by the Government is the wrong building block on which to build the later stages. I wish noble Lords on the Liberal Democrat Benches would be more open and honest about that.
Lord Rennard
My Lords, I think that I have been remarkably open and honest all the time I have been in this House speaking on these issues. The noble Lord’s argument suggests that perhaps until the 25th century we should keep the political system exactly as it is and ignore centuries of progress. I do not think that that would be fair or democratic. Perhaps we should say that, given that 2,000 years ago in Athens people all turned up to vote on issues, we should have that sort of system now. I am not arguing that my system or my preference should be imposed on the British people. I am simply arguing that the British people themselves should have the democratic right to say for themselves how their representatives should be chosen. I do not understand how people who consider themselves democrats can resist that fundamental democratic principle.
Lord Liddle
Is it the case that under that arrangement what you would have in practice would be more instability? What you would have is a Lords with full democratic legitimacy, elected on proportional representation, which would feel able to overturn the decisions of the House of Commons. Therefore, you would not get stability by that system.
Lord Campbell-Savours
I remind the noble Lord of a speech he gave to the parliamentary Labour Party about four years ago, where he made precisely the point that is now being made. He said that in the event that we were elected here by proportional representation and they by first past the post we would claim legitimacy where they could not.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I remember it well. On that occasion, I said that, if senators were elected for Scotland, for example, or for Wales, Northern Ireland or England, to a second Chamber, which was a Senate, they would certainly claim some legitimacy or might even claim a greater legitimacy. However, if the Lords continues as a revising Chamber, I would argue the case for proportional representation for that revising Chamber.
Lord Campbell-Savours
If it could be shown that by changing the electoral system in favour of STV or AV, turnout did not rise, would that in any way influence how the noble Lord thinks about the proposition on the table?
Lord Phillips of Sudbury
Yes, of course it would, but the noble Lord cannot demonstrate that until we have tried it. It is no good telling us about Ireland or Iceland.
Lord Campbell-Savours
If it could be shown that in Scotland turnout did not rise, would that influence the noble Lord?
Lord Phillips of Sudbury
It would influence me to some extent but I would want to know a great deal more about it before I admitted anything more than that here and now.
Lord Campbell-Savours
I hope the noble Lord is able to attend our future debates on this issue.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Perhaps I may remind my noble friend that the only party that has consistently supported and campaigned for AV is the Labour Party. We are the only ones to have done so. Am I being helpful?
Lord Snape
My noble friend is indeed being helpful and I am grateful. The fact is that we got it wrong. At least that is certainly the opinion that many of us hold, and we will continue to get it wrong if we continue to support it. I accept the sincerity of my noble friend and my noble friend Lord Rooker. I remember a conversation that I had with him in 1987 after the then—from the party’s point of view—unsuccessful election. I asked him why he was in favour of PR. I cannot imagine why we were discussing PR—we must have been stuck on a very long train journey. I hope that I am not betraying any confidences when I say that my noble friend was brutally honest and said, “Because we can’t win under the present system”. However, we did eventually win under that system. The Liberal Democrats argue that they cannot win under the present system because their votes are diffused throughout the United Kingdom. I understand why they campaign in favour of proportional representation and I would understand them supporting some parts of the amendment before your Lordships tonight. However, I wish that they would be a little more honest, as was the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, in their declared support for AV. It is totally in their interests, although it is against everything for which they have campaigned for over 100 years.
Lord Strathclyde
If noble Lord, Lord Owen, had been here—like others I wish him well—I am sure that he would have been immensely proud of the way in which the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, moved his amendment. I expect he would also have been reminded of the reasons why he left the Labour Party in the first place.
The purpose of the amendment is to give people the choice of a proportional system along with the choice of first past the post and the alternative vote. As the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, explained, they had previously tabled an amendment giving a choice of AV+, AMS or STV but had subsequently changed their amendment, so it was not about specifically wanting to pose AV+, AMS or STV as options in their own right but to pose the principle of PR as an option.
We believe that on an issue as fundamental as voting reform, the public need to be given a clear choice that will produce an equally clear result. The key point is about the impact that this sort of approach will have on the result. I understand that the noble Lord wished to see a multiple choice of voting options, including some form of PR. However, for the sake of simplicity—this is the crucial point—it is better to present people with a simple yes/no alternative, exactly as set out in the Bill. Multiple choice questions go against the recommendations of the Lords Constitution Committee report on referendums, which concluded that the presumption should be in favour of questions posing only two options for voters. That is one of a number of many points on which we agree.
A referendum on AV replacing the existing system will give a clear choice to the electorate, with the ability for them to express a clear view. Offering more than one choice could lead to an indecisive result and confusion over the interpretation of the result. The watchwords that we need to stand by when holding any referendum are simplicity, clarity and decisiveness. We would risk disregarding each of those if we went down the road suggested by these amendments.
The question in the Bill as it currently stands reflects the recommendations of the Electoral Commission, which tested the question through focus groups and interviews with members of the public as well as through input from language experts. This amendment risks going against that independent advice from the Electoral Commission, which recommended that, unlike a question requiring a yes/no answer, this style of question has never been used in a UK-wide referendum, and, as such, fuller testing would need to be undertaken before recommending this style of question ahead of a more traditional yes/no question.
Lord Campbell-Savours
If during the referendum campaign the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, is in a television studio and is asked why the public cannot decide on the system that they want—first past the post, a variant on the alternative vote system or a proportional system—how would he reply?
Lord Strathclyde
I would reply that this is the system passed by Parliament: that, in particular, the House of Commons agreed on the system, as we did—if that is what has happened—and that is why we have the choice of AV. As to why we have AV above the other systems, no doubt we will get to that in other debates. Of course, AV is the one that preserves best the link between elected Member and constituency.
Another issue is that the wording in the amendment could influence voters, as it says:
“It is proposed that the system should be changed”.
The Government are neutral on which voting system should be used, and that statement could be misleading.
In these amendments there is not even an indication of the kind of proportional voting system that the public would get if they voted for this option or of how this type of system would work. One attraction of the approach taken in the Bill is that for all the arguments there might be about how AV works, the Bill sets that out in Clause 9 and in Schedule 10. Any questions about how AV works can be resolved by looking at the Bill, which would not be the case with these amendments. The results might be a lack of clarity and voter confusion.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Campbell-Savours
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, in moving Amendment 1, I will speak also to Amendments 3 and 14, which are related or consequential. I have tabled two groups of amendments on this issue in the Bill, both of which deal with problems that follow the Government’s limiting of choice of electoral systems and total failure to consult. Amendments 1, 3 and 14 would provide for the establishment of an inquiry for the purpose of selecting a voting system that, following debate in Parliament and consideration by the Government, would lead to a decision by Parliament on the referendum question. Amendments 25 and 26, which come in a later group, would allow Parliament to decide on an electoral system after a referendum had approved an alternative vote system in principle. Although Amendments 25 and 26 are not in this group, I will seek to degroup them when we reach that debate so that we can consider them at a later stage.
At the heart of Amendments 1, 3 and 14 is my concern over the failure of the Government in specifying the optional preferential AV system, which has been decided on without any consultation whatever. The proposed AV system is mired in controversy and has never been the subject of any inquiry or examination. There has been no independent assessment of its impact, nor was the proposed system the subject of any debate in Parliament prior to the Bill. There was not even a full debate in the Commons on its operation. The proposed system is, and always has been, opposed by the Liberal Democrats, whose leader, the Deputy Prime Minister, described it as a “miserable little compromise”. The proposed system is utterly inconsistent with the historic position taken by the Liberal Democrats and has been opposed by the Conservatives on the basis that it would lead to endless coalition—which, by the way, is untrue. The proposed system has divided the academic world on the basis of its perverse results and it has been heavily criticised by the House of Lords Constitution Committee, whose report stated:
“We regret the fact that this Bill has not been subject to either pre-legislative scrutiny, or to prior public consultation”.
Lord Strathclyde
I stand by what I say unless the noble Lord can produce further amendments reflecting how he believes the various systems of AV should be explained in the Bill. We have done so. We have done the work and we have explained in Clause 9 and Schedule 10 exactly how it works.
Lord Campbell-Savours
It is not necessary to have the AV system in the Bill: that is a matter for the inquiry to deal with.
Lord Strathclyde
The noble Lord’s amendments seek to determine that crucial matters relating to the referendum should be set out in an order made by the Secretary of State instead of in the Bill. How often have we heard that such issues should be debated during the course of the Bill rather than by using secondary legislation—yet here the noble Lord is arguing for secondary legislation?
The order could be made only after an inquiry had been conducted by the committee of inquiry established specifically for that purpose and would then need to be approved by affirmative resolution. This would inevitably lead to delay. It would certainly delay the 5 May referendum, possibly by a considerable period. If the amendment was carried the Bill would state that there is going to be a referendum on a matter of considerable constitutional significance but it would give no date; nor would it provide any mechanism for settling the date. Having made a firm commitment to hold the referendum next year, we would therefore be in limbo. I cannot imagine that the public would be prepared to accept that.
Quite how the process would work is unclear from the amendments. No timescale is proposed within which the committee of inquiry should report and there is no indication of who should sit on the committee. It is not clear what the extent of its powers would be nor whether its recommendations would be binding on the Government. Not only would these amendments delay a decision being made on the voting system, but they would do so unnecessarily.
The Bill’s passage through Parliament would mean that Parliament had already decided on all aspects of the Bill. Parliament is deciding on whether or not there should be a referendum on the alternative voting system and, if it passes the Bill, it should be content to let the public decide which voting system they want. The Bill offers clarity and I urge the Committee to accept it. I also urge the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, I greatly appreciate the contributions of noble Lords across the Committee on my amendment. I do not want to delay the Committee, but I do want to say a few words on the comments made by noble Lords. The speech of the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, was very welcome because, of course, it was he, who, on 1 February 2000, in debate on the Local Government Bill, described my system as,
“a perfectly respectable system. It has a number of strong features to commend it … It is nice and simple. Academic research has found that people like using it”.—[Official Report, 1/2/00; col. 172.]
That really is at the heart of this whole question. The system I was proposing and which I want to be on the table during the course of the inquiry that should take place is simple and easily understood by the public.
I welcome the support of the noble Lord, Lord Deben, and his understanding of the unlikelihood of voters using additional preferences. I obviously dissent from his conclusions. My noble friend Lord Rooker commented on the question of the 50 per cent. That has got to be sorted out because even the noble Lord, Lord McNally, for whom we have immense respect, said during the course of his Radio 4 “Today” programme interview the other day—I took it down word for word—that he believed it took 50 per cent to elect a Member of Parliament under the AV system. That is simply not true.
The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, said that the Liberal Democrats have not political advantage in mind when promoting AV. That is simply untrue. I have talked to huge numbers of Liberal Democrats over the years who have said, where they support AV, which is not their preferred system, that at least it gives them more seats in Parliament. I cannot see how he can possibly dissent from the view expressed by so many of his colleagues.
Lord Rennard
With the greatest respect, I did not actually argue that case. I simply argued that it should be for the voters to decide what is more important to them rather than for any party. The contrary argument to that just made by the noble Lord is that first-past-the-post simply favours the Labour Party or the Conservative Party. My argument today is a very simple one; that it should be for the voters to decide which system gives most power to the voters, irrespective of party interests.
Lord Campbell-Savours
I think that when the wider public read the noble Lord’s comments, they will agree with my interpretation of his views. My noble friend Lady Liddell of Coatdyke brought to the debate her very valued experience of how the law of unintended consequences applies in the case of AV in Australia. It was her contribution at Second Reading which took me down the Thrasher and Rallings route, because I suddenly realised the implications of perverse systems and how they apply in Australia.
I welcome the supportive comments of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and his expression of concern over the failure of the Government to consider options. I hope that he will join some of his noble friends on the Cross Benches in the Lobby.
I am very grateful to my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton for very clearly setting out what this amendment means in language everyone can understand and, I hope, support.
Finally, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, that he completely misreads my amendment. He read his comments from a brief, so I presume that civil servants wrote those comments. It seems to me that civil servants do not understand what my amendment is all about. As for the question of delay, I accept there will be delay, but we can agree a timetable on an inquiry and I feel quite sure that that can be agreed between the Benches. It would mean that any referendum would probably be in 2012, when at least the question on the ballot paper would be one which had been properly considered by those who have a responsibility to consider these matters.
In the light of the debate, I wish to test the opinion of the Committee.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Is the noble Lord giving that the strength that was given to his people’s undertaking on tuition fees?
Lord Sewel
My Lords, when it comes to major constitutional change, there is some benefit in looking at what has happened in the past when Parliament has confronted the best way of proceeding—a way that enables Parliament clearly to have the decisive say but nevertheless has reference to the directly expressed will of the people.
I hope that the House will forgive my making reference to Scottish devolution. There were two attempts to establish Scottish devolution. The parliamentary processes of those two attempts were markedly different. In 1979 there was a Bill that was amended by Mr George Cunningham—in the Cunningham amendment. This is where we pick up the point made by my noble friend Lord Rooker. Because it was effectively a referendum to implement the Bill, the Cunningham amendment was a threshold amendment. The Secretary of State was required to move an order abandoning the whole project because the threshold was not met.
In 1997 the process was different and, I think, sounder. Then the party went to the electorate with a manifesto commitment. It then produced a White Paper and held an indicative referendum on the White Paper. Parliament then considered the Bill in the light of the referendum. That seemed to be the better way of doing things. It enabled a fully informed debate to take place on the basis of the proposals in the White Paper. There was a national debate on devolution in Scotland and Wales, which people could understand much more clearly and meaningfully from a White Paper than through the technicalities of a Bill. There was the clear expression of the people’s choice through a referendum. Parliament then proceeded in light of that to produce a Bill that satisfied both the manifesto commitment and the referendum outcome.
That is the best way forward. If the Government do not accept the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, they will face the problem of thresholds. Thresholds are difficult; they have an element of subjectivity and politics-playing comes into them. It would be much better, clearly, for this referendum to be indicative, with Parliament then making the final judgment on the basis of its outcome and the degree and strength of the views expressed by the people through it.
Lord McNally
That is another one for the memoirs. If we wanted to continue in this way, the 1911 reform of this House was carried under the threat of creating a large number of Peers. The point is, as I have said before in this House, that constitutional change has come to us in a variety of ways. Perhaps I may say that my affection for the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, is boundless, as he well knows. We have the occasional joust in this House and I know that his position is sincerely held, but I do not have the faintest idea about the question he asked. I do know what the final agreement was. It was drawn together by the two parties, and adopted by my party in a special conference, as the basis for the coalition. As I have said, that is the basis on which we bring the Bill before the House. Noble Lords asked: where is our mandate? Our mandate will come from the decision of the people in the referendum. Everyone is making points about whether the Conservatives are in favour of this, or whether the Liberal Democrats or the Labour Party are in favour. The whole structure of this is that there will be two campaigns that will take their cases to the people.
Lord Campbell-Savours
On the basis of the historic utterances of the noble Lord, Lord McNally, on the whole question of alternative vote systems, does he think that the proposition being put to the House in this form of referendum question and this system is ideal?
Lord McNally
Of course I do, and I would not be at this Dispatch Box advocating them to the House if I did not. After all, for a while, I earned my living dredging up quotes from political opponents, sometimes out of context, for Lord Callaghan to use. I would not accuse the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, of using researchers—I know him too well. He probably did the research himself. Nevertheless, we go back to the central point recurring in this debate. The Opposition put forward various ideas, all of which have within them an element of delay.
Lord McNally
That is for the voters to judge. If you want this reform to fail, you do all the kind of things that the Opposition are putting forward. The coalition, on the basis of the coalition agreement, has put forward a simple proposition that we believe provides for fairer voting.
I can go on like this: we have all been in the House of Commons and seen the wind-up speeches. The last time there were 23 interventions, but I am okay—we’ve got many a long time. Of course you don’t like it, but the coalition agreement is for a fairer voting system based on fairer constituencies. We are willing to take our case to the country, and we have already had the approval of the House of Commons for that.
Lord Campbell-Savours
What the noble Lord is missing is that those of us who support electoral reform see what is happening now as our only window of opportunity, perhaps for a whole generation, to see through an electoral reform. So the system on offer has to be one that commands the support of the public. I cannot understand the Liberal Democratic view whereby they say it does not really matter what system we put forward as long as we get something through. They bear responsibility in history, in the event that this referendum fails, because they have not done their homework. They should be insisting on a system that is credible. They are not doing it, and nor is the Minister.
Lord McNally
We keep on making these speeches. That is the opinion of the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, but it is not the opinion of the Electoral Reform Society, which is just as committed to electoral reform as he is. We are putting our proposal to Parliament and our intention is to let the people decide. It is of course a difference between us, and if the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, wants to press his amendment, we will resist it.
On Saturday I was waiting with bated breath for the Blackpool result to come through. I flicked on my television and there were the final stages of that magnificent film “Waterloo”. It is absolutely marvellous because it is not digitally enhanced or anything—those were real people moving around. It showed you this depiction of the Battle of Waterloo with these two great armies ready to do battle. That is what I am hoping will happen on 5 May. There will be these two great armies ready to do battle and make their case to the people. I do not believe, and here I agree with my noble friend Lord Phillips, that we will get the engagement, the excitement, the involvement if we say to the people—
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I am happy to do whatever I can to bring clarity to this debate and I am happy to do what the noble Lord suggests. The saving has doubled because it is across all the polls on 5 May; £30 million is the net figure.
The referendum question is straightforward. It has been fully tested by the Electoral Commission and has been amended to incorporate its recommendations. The question will enable the electorate to understand the choice that they are being asked to make and to express their views clearly. Several noble Lords said that a national referendum will overshadow the devolved and local elections. However, having seen those elections, which noble Lords opposite experienced, I simply cannot imagine that that will be the case. There will be two different campaigns, run at different levels, over the run-up to 5 May. Given the important issues that are to be voted on at devolved and local levels, I do not see why those issues should be swept to one side simply because a national poll on a different issue will be held at the same time. I just do not believe it.
The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, says that there will be confusion but there is no evidence for that. There will be a national campaign and I believe that this will increase the turnout. As far as being confused on the franchise, which the noble Lord raised, the Electoral Commission will make voting eligibility utterly clear in the information that it distributes. Furthermore, polling cards will be sent to every voter saying which polls they can vote in.
Lord Campbell-Savours
On the issue of eligibility, can the noble Lord ensure that, prior to next week’s debate, we will actually have the registration figures for inner-city constituencies, an undertaking that I was given at the meeting that he attended with the noble Lord, Lord McNally, and the Bill team?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, if the figures can be produced, they will be produced for the noble Lord to see.
Furthermore on this question of confusion, the Electoral Commission—as my noble friend Lord Rennard pointed out—has advised that it is possible to successfully deliver these different polls on 5 May. The commission has issued briefing throughout the passage of this Bill in another place. It concluded that the Bill contains the necessary provisions for the combination of the referendum poll with the scheduled election, and says that it is satisfied that the technical issues it has identified with these provisions to date have been addressed by the Government.
The noble Lord, Lord Browne, went on to explain that the system failed in the Scottish elections in 2007. I say, slightly tangentially to this when it comes to confusion, that I now live in the former constituency of the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, for one election, I live in the former constituency of the noble Lord, Lord Browne, for another and I am in a third constituency for the European elections. We get used to this. It may not be ideal but, if there has ever been any confusion about different elections being voted on at different times with different systems, they are entirely decisions made by noble Lords opposite. We are not adding to the confusion.
As the noble Lord knows, there was an inquiry by Ron Gould, who at the time said that the problem in 2007 was that there were two votes on the same ballot paper. That is what confused so many people. That is not going to be the case here. Gould has, furthermore, said:
“I do not believe that the same factors which led to voter confusion and the large number of rejected ballots at the last Scottish … elections would arise if both the Parliamentary Election and the Referendum were held on the same date”.
That is an authoritative statement.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Campbell-Savours
Does the noble Lord accept that low registration in inner-city constituencies means high-population constituencies? Is that not a central flaw in the Government’s whole approach?
Lord Strathclyde
No, my Lords. First, the basis of deciding constituencies based on the size of the electoral register is well precedented. Secondly, the Government will continue to seek ways of ensuring that individuals exercise their right to register. So we will want to avoid the problem that the noble Lord raises.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Does the Minister not accept that it is extremely difficult to get high levels of registration in inner-city constituencies?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, that does not negate the reason for creating fairly based constituencies of 76,000 electors plus or minus 5 per cent.
Members of this House have opposing views on which is the better system with which to elect Members of the other place, but the place for that debate is during the campaign. At the end of the campaign, it will be for the voters to decide which system will be used in the future, and this is fair too.
Before I finish, I will briefly outline the effect of the substantive clauses. I know that many noble Lords wish to speak, so I will not detain the House with a clause-by-clause commentary. I hope it will suffice to say that there are three main parts to this Bill: provisions for a referendum to be held and combined with other polls on 5 May are found in Clauses 1 to 7 and Schedules 1 to 9; provisions for implementation of the alternative vote system in the event of a yes vote in the referendum are found in Clause 9 and Schedule 10; and provisions to reform the setting of parliamentary boundaries are found in Clauses 10 to 13. The remaining Clauses 14 to 19 and Schedule 11 deal with technical and financial aspects of the Bill, and that is it.
It is not a complex Bill. It offers a referendum on the alternative vote, reduces the size of the House of Commons and makes the size of constituencies more equal. This is a fair Bill and a clear Bill. It gives people choice on how they vote and a more equal say when they do vote. The other place, which is uniquely affected by it, has approved it, and I commend it to the House.
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, my interest in this Bill is not so much in the reduction in seats and its effect on boundaries, although I regard the truncation of process in the boundary reviews as outrageous, and from what I hear it is causing concern across the Commons.
I have been through two Boundary Commission inquiries and I know that you simply cannot short-circuit the whole process—it leads to mistakes. For those MPs who do not pull their weight, it does not really matter, but for MPs who take pride in offering a service it is hugely important and can be very disruptive. Anyhow, enough of that, that is for the Committee stage.
My interest is AV and the question asked in the referendum—the Liberal Democrat agenda. Therefore, I direct my contribution to their Benches. I hope that they seriously consider my concerns. I believe in electoral reform and in a preferential voting system for the Commons which allows for the use of more than a single preference. I do not believe in STV for the Commons. I could stomach an additional member system but I am not advocating it. If AV as proposed survives the Bill, I shall reluctantly vote for it but I believe that the system is flawed and should be amended. Furthermore, I do not believe that the public will vote for it. A turnout of more than 30 per cent would surprise me.
A system which allows voters to number candidates 1, 2, 3, 4 and so on, eliminating the least popular in turn, has major flaws, which will be exposed during a referendum campaign. I believe that the Liberal Democrats are allowing their electoral reform agenda to be hijacked by a system which they do not believe in and which, if defeated, will delay the electoral reform agenda for a generation. They bear great responsibility. Even at this late stage, they should take stock and change tack. Too much is at stake.
The system is far too complicated. Even the Electoral Commission reports admit that the public find it difficult to understand the numbering of candidates and their relevance to the result. The commission believes that public education will help. I do not believe that. People will not be interested. Secondly, Ministers have repeatedly stated that candidates need more than 50 per cent of the vote to win. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord McNally, said it again this morning on the “Today” programme. That is plainly not true. Furthermore, they are still peddling this myth, using carefully crafted language and skilful juggling of statistical argument. It will all fall apart when exposed to public scrutiny. The 50 per cent argument has become the central plank pushed by advocates of optional preference AV. It will crumble when exposed, as indeed will the argument of those who suggest that AV is some form of proportional representation.
Then there is the argument, so clearly expressed by a Mr Attenborough of Lincoln in his article in the Daily Mail of 9 September, under the headline,
“Why this unfair system won't get my vote”.
He reveals in simple language a real concern already known to we anoraks. In tightly fought seats, the second preferences of the bottom candidate, the first to be eliminated, can determine who wins the seat. What that means is that the BNP and other extremes, can actually determine who wins, while all second and subsequent preferences of the majority are not even taken into account.
Then we have the work of Professors Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher, of the University of Plymouth. Their research into voting behaviour in Queensland, Australia, which uses the Government’s proposed system, concludes that the most likely scenario over time is that many voters will treat an AV election just like first past the post, and not cast multiple preferences. Incredibly, in Queensland in 2009, 63 per cent of those who turned out at the state elections voted for just one candidate. It defeats the whole raison d’être of the initiative that the Government are taking. This will be music to the ears of my noble friend Lord Grocott. We then have freak results. Do we really believe that when the public learn that third-placed candidates on the first ballot and, in extremis, fourth-placed candidates, can leapfrog the top-placed candidates and win seats, that they will support the AV system proposed? I believe not.
So why did the Labour Government propose a similar system? The answer is very simple. It was due to a combination of a lack of detailed research, insufficient consultation and a failure to draw lessons from our experience in the mayoral elections. We should have acted years ago and learnt from our experience. In 1990, in an attempt to select a credible system, Labour established the Plant commission, under my noble friend Lord Plant. The commission undertook the task of examining a number of electoral systems, and in its landmark and authoritative report recommended the introduction of a variation of AV called the supplementary vote—SV. In the previous year, prior to the Plant commission being established, I had worked on this system with the support of Professor Patrick Dunleavy, of the London School of Economics, and I recommended it to the commission. The benefit of SV was its simplicity. It would be easily understood by the public and it has subsequently been described by Dunleavy as “London AV”.
With the supplementary vote, there are two columns on the ballot paper—one for first choice and one for second choice. Voters can mark an X in each column if they so wish. All the first preferences are counted. If a candidate has more than 50 per cent, they are elected. If no candidate wins more than 50 per cent, then the top two remain and the rest are eliminated. The second preference votes of the eliminated are then added to the top two candidates and counted. The candidate with most first and second preferences is then the winner. It is simple and easy to sell to the general public.
When the system of mayoralties was established in 1998, Nick Raynsford MP and his department had to select an electoral system. They opted for the supplementary vote, the London version of AV, because of its simplicity and the fact that it was easy to sell to the public. It is a well proven system, already in use in the United Kingdom, that has worked very successfully for millions of voters in multiple elections. Boris Johnson and the mayors are elected under it, so why not MPs?
Professor Dunleavy at the LSE, Professor Helen Margetts and a number of other academics, including Professor Simon Hix and a few international commentators, all seem to prefer the supplementary vote, or London AV. Peculiarly, when asked to comment on how the Bill’s version of AV would work, both Labour and government spokesmen have used SV arguments to support AV. They did not even know how the system they were supposed to be advocating works—a sort of plagiarism in advocacy. I have often asked MPs how AV works in detail, and most of them got it wrong.
London AV is very popular in London and elsewhere. If we chose the London AV system, support among Labour and Conservative voters for a yes vote would go up and the referendum would be won, whereas the Bill's complex and problematic imported Australian AV model will fail to gain public support.
How do we get ourselves out of this mess? The Liberal Democrats might wish to ask themselves that question, as they control the agenda. We could amend the referendum question in Committee or on Report. I intend to table an amendment on London AV/SV, which I regard as a form of alternative vote, as does Professor Dunleavy. Alternatively, we could amend the referendum question in Clause 1, which states:
“Should the ‘alternative vote’ system be used instead?”.
This could read, “Should an ‘alternative vote’ system be used instead?”—we could substitute “an” for “the”. The effect would be that, after a yes vote in a referendum, Parliament would have to decide between AV systems. Professor Dunleavy's view is that the electorate may have difficulty in supporting a system that had not been specified. He suggests that an amendment might refer to a question being placed before the electorate after Parliament has specified the system that it wishes to legislate for. I shall therefore also table such an amendment.
Some of my amendments will introduce delay. I am afraid that that is inevitable if we are to place a credible system before the electorate. I appeal to the Liberal Democrats, who have it in their hands to sort out this problem. I am sure that they will find support on the Conservative Benches for a tweaking of the proposed referendum question. I remind the House that it was a Conservative Member of Parliament who moved the SV amendment in the Commons only a few weeks ago. It is not too late to do the same in this House and to change the question that will be asked.
House of Lords: Working Practices
Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)
My Lords, we have a fine number of speakers on the speakers’ list this afternoon, and I welcome the opportunity of hearing the views of the many noble Lords who have set their names down for this debate. Others who have not will, no doubt, make their views known over the next few months.
A number among us think it may be time to review our working practices and, at the outset of a new Parliament, I share that view, which is why I proposed that this debate should be arranged. It is my intention that this debate should pave the way for a systematic review of our working practices to be conducted by a Leader’s Group that I will appoint before the House rises for the summer. I will ask the group to investigate what improvements could be made to our working practices to allow us to carry out our work effectively, while maintaining our efficiency in terms of the timeframes within which legislation is taken through the House.
That does not mean that I believe there are fundamental problems with procedure in your Lordships' House. Indeed, in the years I have been here, there have been times when I have contemplated ill digested legislation coming from the other place and reflected how much better the other place might operate if it introduced some of our own procedures. The privileges enjoyed by every noble Lord, the ability to table an amendment and have it answered, the wide freedom to speak and to question Ministers, the lack of restraint from the chair and other freedoms are immensely valuable to the House, and they are not shared by Members in another place. These open procedures enabled the House to carve out, after 1911, a role as the pre-eminent revising Chamber. Consider, for example, that over the last two full-length Sessions of the previous Parliament—2007-08 and 2008-09—we made on average over 80 amendments to each government Bill passed by this House.
As Leader of the House, I see it as my duty to defend that role and those freedoms. The essential self-regulating character of the House—rare in any legislative body—is something that I believe that noble Lords on all sides greatly value. Nothing this Government would suggest would set that at risk. I have never set my face against change; indeed, I was the other half of the conversation that led to the initiatives of my predecessor, the late Lord Williams of Mostyn, which resulted in some significant changes in the modern House, including the wider use of Grand Committees and the introduction of carry-over Bills. Furthermore, the House has regularly reviewed these matters—I need only mention the group set up by the noble Baroness, Lady Amos, in 2004, Lord Williams’s review or the Jellicoe committee of 1992—so it is time to look again at our working practices and consider ways we might refresh and improve the way we go about things.
However, we should not forget that one of the advantages of this House is that self-regulation allows us to adapt and change as we go along. Take, for example, the way we revise legislation in Grand Committees, which many of your Lordships rightly favour. After the Williams review, the number of Bills sent to Grand Committee, with full co-operation from the Opposition, rose from five in 2001-02, to 11 in 2002-03 and 18 in 2003-04. In 2005-06 there were 23, but since then their use has fallen away. In the past two Sessions, only six Bills have gone to Grand Committee, the same as in the last years of the old House in 1997-99. In 2003-04 and 2004-05, more than half the hours that your Lordships spent in Committee were spent in Grand Committee. In every year but one since 2003, the proportion of Committee time in Grand Committee has fallen from more than 50 per cent in 2003 to under a third in 2008-09 and less than 30 per cent in the previous Session. Yet the total number of hours spent in Committees of both types in our previous two full Sessions was more than 813, against 744 in the last two years of the old House and 404 hours in 1994-96. We are definitely talking more.
I use these statistics to show that our procedures are constantly evolving. It may well be that we should renew greater use of Grand Committees. The usual channels routinely consider whether the Committee stage of Bills could take place in Grand Committee, but the Leader’s Group could investigate whether morning sittings in the Moses Room might be introduced on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, for Bills or for other types of business. Then again, we already have procedures to send Bills for evidence-taking to Special Public Bill Committees or to Select Committees but, save for famous examples such as the Constitutional Reform Act, we have been sparing in our use of them. A Leader’s Group might consider whether that is right.
In the case of the Constitutional Reform Act, some who were most angered by the use of the Select Committee procedure, including the then Lord Chancellor himself, came to acknowledge its value. Indeed, our Select Committees have played a vital role in examining draft legislation, including secondary legislation, and scrutinising public policy. They have provided us with the authoritative analysis and advice that enables us to perform our scrutiny function effectively. On the other hand, wider use of these procedures would detract from the important principle that every Peer can contribute to revision and amendment at every part of every stage of a Bill.
In seeking to review how we scrutinise legislation, the Leader’s Group might also consider whether we could make better use of the minimum interval between the First and Second Readings of Bills. That interval could be used to invite evidence on Bills ahead of Second Reading, as some noble Lords have proposed, without prolonging the overall timetable for the passage of the Bill. The group may even wish to look at whether the case for minimum intervals of the length we currently observe is as compelling today as when they were introduced in 1977. The House has changed markedly since then, as have the technologies used to reprint Bills and Marshalled Lists of amendments.
Having re-examined its own practices, the other place is implementing many of the recommendations put forward by the Wright committee. Over time, they too might have an impact on this House, not least if legislation is more thoroughly scrutinised by the time it reaches us, so it is a timely moment for us to look at our own ways. In addition to some ideas that I have already mentioned, the group may wish to explore how we could ensure that, when scrutinising Bills that have arrived from the Commons, we focus on the provisions that received least attention in the other place. Some noble Lords have called for the provision of information on which clauses of Bills arriving from another place have not been subject to debate. I understand that this would not be as straightforward an exercise as it sounds, although I favour the idea behind it, but it merits further investigation.
There is much that a group might consider without extending the time that a Bill spends in this House. The Leader’s Group might wish to look at other areas of the House’s activity. It could, for example, examine how we might avoid duplication with another place when we repeat Ministerial Statements and Urgent Questions and consider whether the Moses Room would be a better venue for such matters. It may also wish to explore how we could ensure that our procedures are more transparent and accessible to Back-Benchers on all sides of the House, including those who have joined only recently or attend less frequently. This might, for instance, mean taking another look at how Private Members’ Bills are introduced and how Questions for Short Debate are tabled, with a view to widening the range of Back-Bench Members who successfully use these vehicles to raise matters of interest.
The overriding principle of self-regulation underpins all our work. The self-restraint that characterises this House has ensured that we have never needed to resort to selection of amendments, enforced groupings, programme Motions or guillotines. I sincerely hope that we never shall. We equally need to recognise that that would change if the freedoms that we have were unnecessarily abused. I am glad that they never have been, and long may that continue.
The usual channels are essential to this alchemy. They are a conduit for the different interests in the House and a vital lubricant in the conduct of business in a self-regulating House with no overall majority. I am conscious that there are some in the House who wish to see a greater role for the chair, notably at Question Time. My view is that our existing practice, whereby it is the responsibility of the whole House—of all the Members present—to draw attention to breaches of order or failures to observe custom, continues to serve us well. The government Benches of course have a special responsibility for assessing the mood of the House and intervening accordingly, and I take my responsibilities in this matter most seriously, as I know that former Leaders have done as well. It is not as easy as it looks perhaps and sometimes there are complaints of unfairness or favouritism to certain Benches. All I can say is that, on the anecdotal evidence, the party of the Opposition is hugely favoured in Question Time, but we are looking for the scientific proof to demonstrate whether that is the case.
This does not amount to a power of direction, and nor should it. Such powers, whether exercised from the—
Lord Campbell-Savours
The noble Lord did not refer to the Speakership in the context of work which might be considered by the Leader’s Group. I wonder whether he has a view on that.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, let me make it clear: I believe that it should consider that. It should be a widely drawn committee on working practices and not simply on the procedures of the House, so that it can examine all sorts of matters which are not strictly speaking procedural; that should, of course, include the role of the chair in the House.
As regards appointments to Select Committees—an aspect of the reforms in the other place which a number of noble Lords are keen to emulate—there is nothing to stop individual groups or political parties in this House from introducing elections for particular positions. Some have already done so, and I believe that it very much suits those groups.
I trust that this brief tour d’horizon has made clear that the Leader’s Group will have a wide-ranging remit. It will also have plenty of time in which to conduct its work, which I hope will culminate in a major piece of work that sets us on the right course for the years ahead. I hope that today’s debate will lend momentum to that process and serve as a reference point for the group in conducting its review.
There are many speakers and the debate will be wound up by my noble friend the Deputy Leader, who will also speak in his capacity as leader of the Liberal Democrat party in this House. All contributions are important in this discussion, including those from Members who will not speak today; I am sure that they will be invited to put evidence forward to the Leader’s Group. I beg to move.
Special Advisers
Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts(14 years ago)
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Lord Strathclyde
Yes, my Lords, and naturally that is subject to the coalition agreement. However, clear rules are set out in the Ministerial Code on the number of special advisers and who is entitled to them. That, of course, speaks for itself.
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, perhaps we could have this issue clarified at the beginning of the term of this Government. If a special adviser to a coalition Cabinet Member breached the code, who would be responsible for disciplining that adviser? Would it be the Prime Minister?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, discipline is up to the Minister who appoints the special adviser. The Prime Minister agrees the appointment, but it is the Minister who appoints the adviser who is responsible for discipline.