Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Lord Lipsey and Lord Grocott

Monday 7th February 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Grocott]

I am quite hurt. I have brought forward an amendment that precisely meets the noble Lord’s objection, which was—I repeat—that a huge number of people could vote for the yes campaign and it would still not carry if it was less than 50 per cent of the total turnout. So—having established that point, I hope—I have therefore brought forward this amendment which meets his objection. It states that it would require 25 per cent of the electorate for the yes vote to carry, which obviously completely removes the problem he identified in relation to my 50 per cent turnout threshold.

After my long preamble, far longer than I had intended, perhaps I may point out that all the amendment suggests is a change in our electoral system—which the Liberal Democrats, throughout my adult life and probably before then, have been saying is what the electorate is desperate for. I say simply that it would be a good idea if you could get one in four of the electorate to vote in favour because that would validate the referendum. Apparently, they are resisting that commonsense proposal as well.

We are in a silly position, unless someone wants to intervene from the Liberal Democrat Benches. I cannot believe that even Liberal Democrats would argue that if only three people voted in the referendum—two in favour and one against—that would be a valid basis on which we could change our country's constitution. If any of them thinks that that would be fair, right and sensible, will they please intervene? I am not filibustering; I want to get this over with as much as anyone else does. If they cannot tell me, the only difference between us is the level at which the threshold should be. In the absence of any intervention, I must assume that they are in what is, frankly, a silly position.

That would not matter to me too much, were it not for the fact that this referendum will not necessarily be the last one of this Parliament, because I have to take Nick Clegg at his word, confusing as that seems at times. He has described this as just part of the greatest reform package since 1832—greater than women's suffrage, universal adult suffrage, or anything of that sort. We have two more Bills coming down the line: one to establish fixed-term Parliaments and the other to abolish the House of Lords in its present form and replace it with a fully elected House.

It seems that, under the Bill, if three people in the United Kingdom vote in the referendum—two in favour and one against—we change the constitution. I ask those noble Lords who say that this is not as important a constitutional issue as abolishing the House of Lords in its present form the following question. Would any of them be happy with a referendum, should it come—and my word it ought to; it would surely be indefensible to have a referendum on a change in the voting system but not on one which effectively abolishes one of the two Houses of Parliament—on a two, one vote in the country? Or do they think, as I and other noble Lords do, that there should be a rather more convincing demonstration of the public will on abolishing one of the two Houses of Parliament? The danger of the present situation is that we have no threshold, which means that the precedent will have been set that future referenda on changing the constitution, however big that change may be, could be done on a very small turnout and a very small yes vote.

It is late, I do not intend to press this to a Division, but I am intrigued to discover that there is no one, apart from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Tankerness, who is highly skilful and whom I assume will respond to the amendment, can explain that. I assume that the noble and learned Lord has a graphic explanation as to why he would be comfortable with a very low turnout and a very low yes vote changing our country's constitution.

[Lord Lipsey]

I understand why those on the Lib Dem Benches do not rise to their feet to dispute the amendments. But, as one who, on the AV referendum, agrees with them, I shall do and speak for a minute or two. I think that thresholds are a bad idea in referendums. I supported the amendment proposed earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, because it seems to me that, generally, a pre-legislative vote is a good thing, but I do not support a threshold.

If there is a vote on this, if the threshold proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, is to be reached, it will require 264 Peers to vote in the Content Lobby for it to be carried. If that of the noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan, is to be reached, we will need a total turnout of 316 Peers. And if that of the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, is to be reached—50 per cent, and 25 per cent yes— we need 395 peers to vote with 198 saying yes. I do not see why we should have a different test for the legitimacy of the vote in the country than we have for the legitimacy of the vote in our own House. Thresholds are arbitrary, they introduce bias, they distort debate and they have absurd consequences. I deal very briefly with each of these. As regards them being arbitrary, look at the range of numbers before us. They could be nice round numbers. As Sir Patrick Nairne, chairman of the independent Commission on the Conduct of Referendums, said, the main difficulty in specifying a threshold lies in determining what figure is sufficient to confer legitimacy. There is no answer to that. On the bias aspect, one side has to achieve only one thing—

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Lord Lipsey and Lord Grocott

Tuesday 25th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lipsey]

My Lords, I come to another point that the Minister appeared not to have absorbed fully in our earlier discussions. He again said that there was constant upward movement in the number of seats in the House of Commons. This is simply incorrect. In 1918 there were 707 seats in the House of Commons— 57 more than there are today. In 1983 there was precisely the same number of seats in the House of Commons as there is today. The figure varies, and I agree that there is a flaw in the rules at the moment. It is like the Schleswig-Holstein question; I have forgotten exactly how it works but it has something to do with the use of the harmonic mean. There is a flaw in the rules that can tend, if not otherwise compensated for, to raise the number of seats. You just deal with the flaw; you do not need a Bill of this kind to deal with that. It simply is not true to say that the number of seats has increased.

[Lord Grocott]

My noble friend is absolutely right, although the number of seats has tended to increase in recent years because of the tendency to round up, rather than down, at the end of a redistribution in individual areas. I mention this point simply to remind my noble friend that at some unearthly hour on Monday I spoke to an amendment that was intended to do precisely this in an attempt to meet some of the Government’s concerns. That would have provided that in each of the five-yearly boundary changes—of which I am not in favour, but we have to give and take in this kind of situation—there would be rounding down and not rounding up. I need hardly remind my noble friend that that persuasive amendment was not listened to by many noble Lords because it was spoken to at an unearthly hour. However, that is the kind of thing that we need to do if we are to reach a settlement on the Bill.

[Lord Lipsey]

Indeed, and the point about the escalation in the number of seats could quickly be dealt with if the admirable Professor Iain McLean were to be summoned by the Bill team to explain the changes in the rules, which I have heard him explain at innumerable academic conferences, to my great edification. That is how I know that the harmonic mean comes into it, even if its precise meaning escapes me for the moment.

I want to conclude where the Minister ended, when he said that the task of the Boundary Commission in producing a reasonable electoral map would be far harder if my amendment were to be passed. I agree that it is hard work being a boundary commissioner. However, although far harder work might be produced by my amendment, his Bill makes that work not harder, but impossible. We cannot produce an electoral map of Great Britain that makes sense with this Bill as it stands. I hope that in discussions on either the Floor or discussions that I devoutly hope are taking place elsewhere, there will turn out to be more flexibility in the Government’s position than the Minister, with all his courtesy, has indicated this afternoon, and that we can therefore move beyond this sterile position whereby arguments are repeated without evolving. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Lord Lipsey and Lord Grocott

Tuesday 30th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Grocott]

I had expected the noble Lord to tell me that I was a constitutional Conservative, or some other such epithet. I think that on the previous occasion he described me as a Neanderthal; now I am dragging red herrings. I asked a fairly simple question—but I think that the House feels that it is an important one—regarding the integrity of the passionate commitment to a legislative referendum which, as I understand it, his party was opposed to in the coalition agreement.

[Lord Lipsey]

My Lords, during the past half hour I have felt as if I have strayed to the wrong end of the building as I see a lot of people who I still think of as Members of Parliament in the Commons making the same speeches as I have heard them make so many times in the House of Commons Chamber. They bear repetition and it has been a great pleasure to listen to them, but I doubt whether they will be the most effective at converting the Minister because he and his party are in favour of AV whereas recent speakers have made it very clear that they are not in favour of it, and they are perfectly entitled to hold that view. As a supporter of AV, I want to put the case for this amendment. However, I will not put the constitutional case, which the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, has put very well.

The bit of the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, that convinced me—I came into this debate with an open mind—was that he saw this measure as an alternative to thresholds. The House will debate thresholds later. However, when I hear first past the posters advocating the enormous benefit of thresholds, when they are in favour of a system whereby it does not matter what the turnout is or however low the share of the vote a Member has—if he gets one vote more than another Member, he is elected—I do not take the case for thresholds from them terribly seriously. However, there is a political danger for those of us who believe in AV that that plausible argument for thresholds will come through and will be passed, even in this House, will go down to the other end and will be backed by the Tories. At the end of the day, we will be fixed with a threshold. I am long enough in the tooth to remember what happened with George Cunningham’s threshold and the devolution legislation of the 1960s.

It seems to me that the better approach to the genuine problems raised by those who seek a threshold—what happens if there is, for example, a 3 per cent turnout—would be better dealt with by this amendment and by making the referendum not absolutely binding. That would put aside the threshold issue and leave us to get on with the referendum on a basis which, I hope, all sides could accept.