Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Lord Fowler and Lord Lipsey

Monday 6th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Fowler]

The noble Lord has had to listen to the debate for only the short time in which we have been speaking to know that the attack is coming on several fronts at the same time. It is perfectly true that the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, stuck to that particular argument, but that has not been the only argument adduced. My argument is, counter to that of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, that all power and effort should be devoted to having the referendum on 5 May because that is to the advantage of the public and the whole system. That is how we will get the biggest possible vote, and it is for that reason that I support the 5 May date. We would be quite mistaken to turn our back on it.

[Lord Lipsey]

Like many other noble Lords, I did not find it easy to get in here from where I live, in Wales, this morning. I regret that I did not see the groupings suggested for these amendments in advance, because we would have done better to separate the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, which would give us a contingency plan in case it was impossible to make 5 May, from the amendments that I and some other noble Lords have put forward, which suggest an alternative date. It is my view, which I shall argue again, that it is not right to have these referendums on the same day.

Before I come on to the aspect of that argument, I shall say a couple of words in response to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, who is a great supporter of the alternative vote—and I am glad to have common ground with him. I did not take it terribly well when he said that the debate on this has already been interminable. It is a bit odd to say that a debate has been interminable as you jump to your feet to make a substantial contribution yourself. Leaving that to one side, I believe that this is a desperately important matter, particularly to the people of Scotland and Wales, who have some representatives on the Benches opposite. To say that we have had an interminable debate—I think that we had one of about an hour and a half the other day—suggests that this Government are uninterested in concluding debates in a civilised and thorough manner and merely want to push this Bill on to the statute book with a sort of droit de seigneur because they won the general election. So I thought that was sad.

I also did not find the noble Lord’s 1998 analogy terribly convincing. Yes, there were two separate polls in London in 1998, but they were both on local government matters—elections to the council and changes in the structure of government in London. People’s minds were on local government at that time, and it is not unreasonable to expect a combined vote on that. But here you are having local government elections at the same time as you debate what system should be used for national elections. I certainly do not underestimate voters’ intelligence; it is when Governments try to confuse them that voters get confused. There could not be any recipe more confusing to the voter than combining a referendum on what system should be used for general elections in future with one on who should run their local council tomorrow. That is a very sad combination and, on this side of the House, we have tried various ways to skin the cat and to avoid it.

The other topic that will come up on other amendments is cost; it is the only substantial argument put forward by most of the speakers for the Government for combining the two things. I except the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, from that charge. On this matter, I have just received a most helpful and polite note from the Leader of the House in response to the promise that he made last week to set out the cost in full. It sheds light on one confusion that arose last week, when nobody knew whether it would save £15 million, or whether £30 million would be saved, by having the two things on the same day. I shall paraphrase the noble Lord’s letter, and no doubt he will interrupt if I get him wrong; he said that it would save £15 million, because it would cost less to have the referendum on AV, and that it would save £15 million in addition because it would cost less to have local government elections if there was an AV referendum. My sense is that an official has sensibly not tried to get too sophisticated in the analysis and has attributed half the cost to one thing and half to the other.

That is a great clarification for which the House will be grateful. It enables us to concentrate on the wider figure. I am not going to have a discussion on whether £80 million, £50 million or £30 million is a very large sum of money. My experience is that many people do not distinguish the number of noughts on the end of a figure anyway. If I had £1 for every time the Guardian has said £1 billion when it means £1 million or £1 million when it means £1 billion, I should be rich enough to pay for the referendum out of my own back pocket.

There is a curiosity highlighted by this. If it is worth having such a referendum at a cost of around £80 million, surely it is right to pay an extra £15 million—less than 20 per cent of that—to have a referendum that really means something and settles the argument one way or the other once and for all. Penny-pinching to the tune of £15 million would not make great sense and is in danger of dumping us with an illegitimate referendum. The reality, as every Member of this House knows, is that it has nothing to do with cost. The Government want it on that day as part of a deal. The Lib Dems, wrongly in my view, think that they are more likely to win the referendum if it takes place on 5 May. It has nothing to do with cost, which is a convenient stick to beat opponents with.

So, do we think that combining referendums with local elections is a good thing? It saves money, which is a good thing. Why then, in Wales, is there to be a referendum in March and another in May? Why not combine those two? It would save money. That shows again the vacuity of the cost argument. It is not about cost. That is why the Government are prepared to pay for a referendum on Welsh legislative powers in March separate from the one in May. It is about the view of Lib Dem members of the coalition that they are more likely to win on 5 May and the Government’s view that the Lib Dems can have what they want, as long as they—the Government—get their boundary changes and a reduction in the number of MPs that will increase their advantage in the House of Commons as a result.

This is a crude political deal justified to this House as it was to the other place on arguments that have no substance. I hope that noble Lords will not back the Government in this attempt.

Media: Ownership

Debate between Lord Fowler and Lord Lipsey

Thursday 4th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lipsey]

My Lords, when you think about it, I am afraid that Vince Cable has shot our fox—whether from high principle or from funk at the thought of the ferocity of the assault that he should expect from the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, I do not know. Seriously, however, we should not for one minute underestimate the importance of the decision that was taken this morning. Just think of the counterfactual of no reference being made. Whatever arguments Mr Cable’s department could have cobbled together for that, the message would have been absolutely clear—that Rupert Murdoch stood above any British Government and their powers. By making that reference today, that myth is destroyed. Power, as a famous American columnist once said, is being believed to have power, and today the complete belief that Mr Murdoch had total power has been set back—a great moment for our democracy.

I think that I am in a unique position among those who have spoken in this debate: I have worked for Rupert Murdoch. I was economics editor after he took over the Sunday Times and Simon Jenkins’s deputy at the Times. I am glad that this debate has not demonised the man. I can report frankly on Mr Murdoch’s interventions. I remember only one instruction that came down from the chairman; namely, Simon and I were told that whatever we might think of the column written by the late Lord Wyatt, he was under the chairman’s protection and could not be removed. We sometimes had difficulty in explaining that to our critics who were not as enamoured as the chair of the content of that column.

What happened by way of self-censorship is another matter. These things are much more complex than they are believed to be. But the idea that a crudity of power is exercised is badly overdone. The fact of ownership conveys quite a lot of power in itself. We have heard a lot about news today, which is important. We are protected in news to some extent by the impartiality rules, which is a great thing, although those rules are always under siege, including from the great chairman himself. We cannot take it for granted that they will always by there.

I worry slightly more about a different kind of plurality—cultural plurality. If you think of a News International of the size that is contemplated—two BBCs—imagine the effect that that would have on the marketplace for the cultural product that is television; for example, for the balance on our screens between American productions, European productions and British productions. I do not think that you will find Mr Murdoch, an American, saying, “Oh, we must keep up the European and British content”. That will affect what is made and what is shown. There are many other ways in which ownership, in effect, affects culture. Although I yield to no one in my admiration for American culture, I would like plurality of culture as well as plurality of media.

Following the sentiment expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Lloyd-Webber, although not perhaps the content of his recipe for it, my final point is that the single biggest protection we as a nation have of plurality of provision and of variety of what we consume is the BBC, especially so in a week when ITV has admitted that its object is to achieve the lowest common denominator.

[Lord Fowler]

You certainly succeeded in that.

[Lord Lipsey]

I defer of course to the opinion of the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, in that matter.

A strong BBC is absolutely at the centre of a varied and plural media in this country, which is why the brutal beating administered to the corporation last week by the Government is one which we will repent of at leisure.