Fixed-term Parliaments Bill
Lord Norton of Louth Excerpts(13 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, I added my name to the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, to remove the words “earlier or” in order to press the Government as to the circumstances they believed could possibly arise that would make it necessary to bring forward a general election by up to two months. I can understand delaying an election, for reasons that I shall come on to, but I am not sure to what extent one could anticipate a situation, presumably a crisis, that would justify an early election. There may be such circumstances and, if there are, it would be helpful to hear from the Minister as to what they are.
However, I wish to devote my principal comments to Amendment 24, to which the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, referred, which stands in my name. The amendment deals with an important point of principle that distinguishes it from the rest of the Bill. Under the Parliament Act 1911, the maximum duration of a Parliament is set at five years. Within that period, the Prime Minister may exercise his discretion to advise the monarch to dissolve Parliament, or he may be forced to resign or request a Dissolution in the event of the House of Commons passing a vote of no confidence in Her Majesty’s Government. The principal purpose of the Bill is to remove the Prime Minister’s discretion within that five-year period. As the law stands, it is not within the Prime Minister’s discretion to advise Her Majesty to extend the life of a Parliament beyond five years. An extension requires an Act of Parliament, and such an extension has been treated as exceptional. That is why this Bill is subject to the Parliament Act, and falls into that category because of the provisions of subsection (5). The only occasions on which extensions have been made by statute have been during wartime. During the Second World War, parliamentary elections were postponed on an annual basis by a Prolongation of Parliament Act.
Subsection (5) thus engages an important principle that is not engaged by the rest of the Bill. Whether or not we have a flexible or semi-fixed maximum term is not relevant to the issue raised here. The question is whether we should permit the term itself to be breached. The importance of the principle is in effect conceded by the Government in Amendment 26. That recognises that the Prime Minister must make clear the reasons for seeking to change the date of the election. My amendment seeks to define the reasons.
The Elections Act 2001 was enacted in order to delay the local elections of that year because of the foot and mouth crisis. During Second Reading of the Bill, I said that we needed to generate clear criteria that would justify the postponement of elections. I advanced four criteria that must be met in order for Parliament to postpone an election. First, there must be a clear and recognised national crisis. Secondly, there must be a situation that affects the capacity to conduct the election. Thirdly, there must be an agreement between the parties that there is a case for delay. Finally, there must be proper parliamentary debate. Although there may be a case for speed, it should not be at the expense of parliamentary scrutiny. All four conditions were met in wartime and in 2001.
Those criteria should apply to any attempt to postpone elections. I appreciate that in the context of this Bill, the period involved is short. It is not equivalent to what was undertaken in wartime, although it is on a par with the situation in 2001. In the war and the foot and mouth crisis, elections were postponed through primary legislation. Here, provision is made for a postponement through secondary legislation. That will be debated, but it is not on a par with what is possible with a Bill. If subsection (5) is to remain, any exercise of the power to postpone an election must be on the basis of the criteria that I detailed.
My amendment provides that:
“The Prime Minister shall only lay an order … when he … is satisfied that there is a situation that renders holding an election”,
within the set term,
“impractical or injurious to the economic, social or public health of the nation or a part thereof”.
The Government's Amendment 26 provides that the Prime Minister must state his reasons for proposing a change of polling day when laying a draft order before Parliament. However, it leaves open the possibility, alluded to by the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, of the Prime Minister proffering a reason that is politically acceptable to a government majority but that does not meet what I regard as the necessary criteria for taking such a serious step.
I suspect that the Minister will remind us, as he did earlier, that at the moment there may be more than five years between general elections. I appreciate that two months may not seem an exceptional period of time; but eight weeks can make a significant difference to electoral fortunes, and a fundamental issue of principle is engaged by this provision. That is why I regard my amendment as necessary if subsection (5) is to remain in the Bill. I appreciate and support government Amendment 26, but I consider it necessary but not sufficient. More stringent constraints must be built in to the Bill. I believe that the choice is either to accept Amendment 24 or to omit subsection (5). The Bill cannot remain as presently worded.
Lord Rennard
My Lords, I will speak first in support of the principle behind Amendments 22 and 23, tabled by my noble friend Lord Norton and by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, who is not with us this evening. The amendments deal exclusively with the power of the Prime Minister to bring forward the date of the general election by two months. I speak on the basis that I have yet to hear any substantive or convincing reason for giving this power to a Prime Minister in a context in which we are supposed to be taking away from the Prime Minister the power to determine the date of a general election.
I cannot see how one could anticipate unforeseen and extraordinary circumstances that will occur in two months’ time, and thereby justify bringing forward an election by two months in order to avoid the unforeseen and extraordinary event. It was said that Nancy Reagan used her knowledge of astrology to influence the timing of some of President Reagan's decisions; I do not believe that our constitutional principles should be based on star gazing and prophecies about future disasters. If we can foresee such an event and there are extraordinary reasons for bringing forward an election by two months, there are procedures in the Bill that will let Parliament decide to do that. I believe fundamentally that the power to bring forward an election by two months, if it is necessary, should lie with Parliament and not with the Prime Minister, and that a change to the five-year rule should be made only when there is a transparent and justifiable reason that can be properly debated and considered in Parliament.
I recognise that there is a much stronger case for saying that it may sometimes be necessary to postpone an election by two months, as effectively happened in 2001 with the outbreak of foot and mouth disease. Therefore, I am not convinced that it is right to remove completely the flexibility for a two-month delay, as proposed in Amendment 18 by the noble Lord, Lord Howarth.
With my noble friends Lord Tyler and Lord Marks, I have suggested in Amendment 25 that a two-month delay, if necessary, should be subject to a two-thirds majority in the House of Commons and a majority in this place. We believe that that brings in sufficient safeguards to prevent a Prime Minister abusing his power, which is the principal intention in the Bill.
We note that the noble Lord, Lord Norton, is attempting in Amendment 24, as he has just said, to put a legal restriction on the use of the Prime Minister’s power to vary polling day to situations where it would be impossible to hold an election because it would be,
“impractical or injurious to the economic, social or public health of the nation or a part thereof”.
However, it seems to me that we might get into a very lengthy and quite detailed legal argument about what constitutes such circumstances. In our opinion, it is better to leave to Parliament’s discretion the question of what circumstances are appropriate. I am confident that such support would have been forthcoming in the case of a big national crisis, such as the foot and mouth epidemic of 2001, and I hope that during the passage of this Bill the Government will be able to accept that principle.
To my mind, it is better to subject the power in Clause 1 to vary polling day to a political restriction, requiring political consensus, than to a potential legal argument that may leave polling day to be decided in the courts rather than in Parliament. I accept that the question of whether Amendment 24 or Amendment 25 provides the best safeguard against the misuse of power to vary polling day is a matter of debate, but I think that noble Lords will be very attracted to one option or the other. I also believe that many of us will agree that the potential prime ministerial power to bring forward an election by two months should simply not remain in the Bill.
In conclusion, it seems that there is a fundamental flaw in the logic of this part of the Bill in relation to varying the date of elections. I say that because it makes no provision for varying the fixed date of the local council elections. As we are legislating for general elections to be held in the first week of May, and as council elections every year in much of the country are held on the first Thursday in May, if it were necessary for whatever reason to vary the date of the general election, surely it would be equally necessary to vary the date of the local council elections. There are of course provisions to vary the date of the Scottish Parliament or Welsh Assembly elections but only by one month. Therefore, why should the Westminster general election be varied by perhaps two months when elections in Scotland or Wales can be varied by only one month?
Lord Norton of Louth
That is why the amendment says “impractical or”, not “impractical and”.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
My Lords, it still refers to the fact of the holding of the election being,
“impractical or injurious to the economic, social or public health of the nation”,
as opposed to external circumstances that, while not being injurious to the election, certainly could make it impractical to hold it. However, I do not think that my noble friend’s amendment covers the circumstances where the external event could make it difficult actually to hold the election. I think that that is more than just a technical point, quite apart from what criteria the Prime Minister would use and what the threshold would be.
I have raised these points because they go beyond normal technical difficulties. They also illustrate the difficulties that arise when you devise formulas to try to address situations that, by their very nature, are unforeseeable. The technical matters point to the general principle agreed by your Lordships’ Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. It said that,
“it would be unrealistic to specify in the Bill a constraint which would embrace all of the possible circumstances in which it might seem appropriate to change a polling day”.
Problems arise when you start specifying circumstances. You can bet your life that a circumstance will come along that is glaringly obvious to everyone but was not covered when the legislation was going through. The greatest safeguard on the use of the power is the fact that it must be approved by both Houses and must be accompanied by a statement setting out the reason for seeking to vary the date of the general election.
That brings me to Amendment 25, tabled in the names of my noble friends Lord Rennard, Lord Tyler and Lord Marks. It provides that an order made by the Prime Minister under Clause 1(5) would have to be approved by a two-thirds majority in the other place. It also provides a role for the Speaker to certify whether the order had been approved by a Division and had the support of at least two-thirds of all MPs. I recognise the logic behind the amendment, as the Bill provides that a vote on an early Dissolution of the other place would require the support of at least two-thirds of all MPs. That measure is designed to ensure that an early general election can take place where there is cross-party consensus, a point emphasised by my noble friend. However, the order-making power in Clause 1(5) is somewhat different from the power for early Dissolution. Unlike the power to force an early Dissolution, it is a power to vary a scheduled general election and is limited in terms of time. Also, my noble friend may have sought to put in something to avoid abuse, but I believe that the circumstances are such that that would not occur, given the safeguards in place.
However, I am grateful to my noble friend for clarifying that this House would still have a role to play. As I understood it from some of the things that he said at Second Reading, it was not clear whether this House would still have a role to play. Given the comments that have been made by a number of noble Lords, that is important. In the light of that, I want to consider the amendment. I will consider, too, the fact that this provision would again involve the Speaker of the other place. That has raised issues where it appears later in the Bill, so I would want to reflect before agreeing to something that again would give the Speaker a role. It is something that I would want to have an opportunity to discuss with the authorities in the other place. Therefore I am certainly willing to consider it in the light of his assurance that this House would still have a role to play and what the implications might be for the other place.
The other point that my noble friend made was on local elections. There might be circumstances where it would be desirable to move a general election date but where local elections could continue as scheduled. However, and more important, this Bill focuses solely on what is strictly necessary to establish fixed-term Parliaments. To try to introduce other issues could lead to complications.
These are important issues and I hope that I have given assurances that the Government’s mind is not closed to them. I believe that there are safeguards in the Bill, which I hope will be added to by noble Lords agreeing to government Amendment 26. In the mean time, I invite the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Norton of Louth
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, Amendment 27 seeks to leave out subsection (1) of Clause 2. My purpose is to tease out the reasons for this provision.
Although this is termed the Fixed-term Parliaments Bill, it is not a measure providing for fixed-term Parliaments. It stipulates a fixed term unless certain conditions are met. There may be deviations from the set term of five years under Clause 1(5) and Clause 2(1) and (2). The Bill thus seeks to move from a flexible to a semi-flexible or, if one prefers, a semi-fixed Parliament in terms of its duration within a maximum life of five years.
The Bill proposes two safety valve mechanisms enabling a parliamentary election to be held prematurely. One is the Dissolution Motion introduced by Clause 2(1) and the other is the vote of confidence covered in Clause 2(2). In evidence to the Constitution Committee, Professor Robert Hazell, director of the Constitution Unit at University College London, said that he was,
“slightly puzzled why the Government sees the need for a dual threshold”.
Although the committee concluded that it was appropriate to include two different safety mechanisms, I wish to probe why we need this particular mechanism.
I know the argument that this provision ensures that the House, in the event of some unbreakable deadlock, does not have to engineer a vote of no confidence in order to ensure an early election. However, the problem with this provision is that it sets the bar at a high level and, as a result, the Bill fails to deal with the situation where there has been a breakdown within the Government but the Opposition are not prepared to support a Dissolution Motion. The Opposition may not be able to muster enough votes to pass a Motion of no confidence, but they may find it politically advantageous not to vote for a Dissolution. If the Government resign without either a no confidence Motion or a Dissolution Motion having been passed, then the 14-day trigger is not engaged. We could have a period of instability, with no Government but with no election in prospect either. I appreciate the situation is unlikely but, as long as it is not impossible, we need to consider it.
I am not clear why there needs to be the two-thirds hurdle in the context of the Bill. I am familiar with the fact that some legislatures have a two-thirds provision, but to what extent does this exist in the context of a dual as opposed to a single safety valve? Is it not the case that the two-thirds provision in other legislatures applies more often than not in respect of a confidence Motion? Perhaps my noble and learned friend can tell us which other national legislatures utilise an extraordinary majority for the passage of a Dissolution Motion.
Lord Empey
I am grateful to the noble Lord. If my memory serves me correctly, the Northern Ireland Assembly needs 70 per cent of its Members to vote to bring the life of the Assembly to a conclusion, albeit subject to the assent of the Secretary of State.
Lord Norton of Louth
I choose my words carefully and refer solely to national legislatures. If we are to have two mechanisms for triggering an election, then we could usefully explore the alternatives to what it proposed. Do we need the subsection at all? In evidence to the Constitution Committee, David Howarth noted that if there is all-party agreement that a situation has arisen necessitating an early election, then it would be relatively straightforward to pass an amending Bill. If the measure was introduced for political advantage then this would, he argued, deny the measure the necessary broad support and it would make slow progress in the Lords.
Adopting such an approach would avoid the problems associated with the artificial hurdle created by the subsection. My view is that the most appropriate way to proceed, if we wish to remove the Prime Minister’s discretion as to when an election is to be held, is to provide that an early election is possible only if the House of Commons passes a vote of no confidence in the Government or if the Government resign and there is no prospect of another Government being formed. My amendments 35 and 38 seek to achieve that and I shall develop the arguments for those shortly. They overcome the problem I have identified with the Bill in respect of the Government resigning without having been defeated on a vote of confidence.
I know that the principal argument for this provision is that it is in the coalition agreement. The problem with that assertion is that the provision is not in the coalition agreement. The agreement said that a binding Motion would be introduced in the House of Commons and a Bill brought forward providing for a Dissolution Motion to be passed if 55 per cent of MPs voted for it. In the event, there has been no binding Motion and the extraordinary majority to pass a Dissolution Motion is now two-thirds of all MPs. We know from David Laws’s book, 22 Days in May, which has already been quite extensively quoted from, that the figure of 55 per cent was the product of political calculation. It is a threshold utilised by no other national legislature. Given that, the case for the subsection must rest on more than its inclusion in the coalition agreement. I am not convinced that the case for it relative to the alternatives is compelling. I beg to move.
Lord Howarth of Newport
My Lords, I too, put my name to the amendment to remove the two-thirds provision. This was an improvisation when the coalition’s original proposal—that 55 per cent of Members of Parliament should be able to require an early general election—was greeted with widespread derision and, indeed, anger. It was noted, even before Mr Laws underlined it in his book, that the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats together had 56 per cent of the votes in the House of Commons. The Liberal Democrats and Labour had less than 55 per cent, and so this deal would have guaranteed that Parliament could only be dissolved at the wish of both partners in the Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition. They could not get away with that, so they built in the two-thirds requirement. They certainly did so with a continuing view of protecting their hold on office.
This two-thirds figure has not been adequately considered. It is argued in its support that no post-war Government have commanded two-thirds of the votes of the House of Commons, but it has also been noted that the National Government of 1931 did command two-thirds of the votes of the House of Commons. We cannot rule out the possibility that there could be another landslide general election. It is admittedly unlikely that one party could secure quite such a large proportion of seats in the House of Commons, but it is not inconceivable.
What is more reasonable to anticipate is that a new coalition could be formed. Perhaps this coalition could seduce other minority parties to join it. It would need only another 10 per cent of Members of Parliament to get to the magic figure required. This is a constitutional innovation of major significance that is quite unheralded, unconsulted upon and undebated by academics and the public. It is true that under its own standing orders the House of Commons does in certain situations stipulate that certain numbers of Members of Parliament must vote, for example, for a quorum or a closure. So it is not entirely novel as a principle of Commons procedure, but it is certainly novel constitutionally. If a super-majority is felt to be preferable, why does it have to be provided for in legislation? Could it not be provided for in the Standing Orders of the House of Commons? Indeed, why should we not accept—this is after all the status quo—that a simple majority for an early general election would be sufficient in the House of Commons?
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I am happy to do so. I think that I corrected myself the first time I got it wrong. I am grateful to my noble friend for reminding me of that. As I say, since the Second World War no Government have been able to command two-thirds of all the seats. This means that Parliament can choose to dissolve itself but Government cannot dissolve Parliament for their own political advantage.
The noble Lord, Lord Howarth, asked why the two-thirds requirement should not be set out in Standing Orders rather than in statute. The two-thirds requirement is set out in legislation as opposed to Standing Orders so that any change to the requirement would have to be made by fresh primary legislation, which would require the consent of both Houses of Parliament, whereas Standing Orders of the other place would require only one House of Parliament to determine that and probably could be amended or revoked by a single simple majority in the other place, and therefore could defeat the purpose of the measure. It is better to have the two-thirds vote set out in statute, which means that it has to be changed by statute. That would involve this House rather than the other place simply determining it by means of its own Standing Orders. It is not appropriate that a significant detail of reform affecting Parliament as a whole with implications for our prerogative should be amended by Standing Orders of one House of Parliament.
The noble Lord, Lord Howarth, very helpfully indicated that he would speak to his Amendments 28 and 29 at the same time. The first of those would omit the requirement for a two-thirds majority while the second would increase the figure to three-quarters of all MPs voting in favour of the measure instead of two-thirds. The reason why we are opposed to the simple majority—it would be a majority in that case—for the Dissolution is because it would undermine one of the purposes of the Bill: namely, establishing a fixed term and removing the Executive’s ability to decide when Parliament should be dissolved. Noble Lords may recall that at Second Reading mention was made of the late Lord Holme of Cheltenham and his analysis of arrangements whereby the Prime Minister can choose the timing of the election. Lord Holme described a general election as,
“a race in which the Prime Minister is allowed to approach it with his running shoes in one hand and his starting pistol in the other”.—[Official Report, 1/3/11; col. 1007.]
I have reflected why he would not have his running shoes on, but he would certainly have the starting pistol in his hands. Unfortunately, Amendment 28 of the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, would preserve the Executive’s ability to decide when a Parliament was dissolved, by providing that a Dissolution motion could be passed by a simple majority.
At the other end of the scale, the noble Lord suggests a majority of 75 per cent of Members who vote. Again, it is not an unreasonable proposition, but I believe that, on balance, the threshold of two-thirds strikes the right balance in providing a safeguard against abuse of the power, while ensuring the effectiveness of the Bill’s provisions. This Parliament passed similar provisions in relation to the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly.
I have sought to explain why there are two mechanisms and how they are different. I indicated clearly that the 55 per cent originally proposed did not find favour. Therefore, it was only right and proper that the Government listened to those views, and we have come forward with two trigger mechanisms—one for when there should be an election, if there is a consensus, and another for when the Government have lost the confidence of the House of Commons. They are different issues that are dealt with separately. Interestingly, the Constitution Committee, whatever other concerns it may have had, thought that the Government’s proposals on the two trigger mechanisms were an appropriate way forward. In those circumstances, I ask my noble friend to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords who have spoken in the debate which, despite the late hour, has been quite useful and has teased out the reasons for the provision. Perhaps I may begin by briefly correcting my noble and learned friend Lord Wallace of Tankerness on his reference to the German example. He said that the Government there had engineered a vote of no confidence in themselves. In fact, they engineered defeat of a motion of confidence, which is not the same thing and is relevant to discussions that we will have later on how one defines a vote of confidence.
Reference was made earlier to the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act and pre-legislative scrutiny. I served on the Joint Committee on the draft Constitutional Renewal Bill, as it then was. The title was later changed because I and others pointed out that nothing was being renewed by the Bill. My point is that the Joint Committee met for two hours twice a week for nearly three months. The more we discuss this Bill, the more convinced I am that it would have benefited from extensive pre-legislative scrutiny. The problem with much of the Bill is that it is not grounded in evidence. It is not exceptional in that respect but, as we have heard, this part of the Bill was the product of negotiations by politicians who are not necessarily noted for their knowledge of our constitutional arrangements.
Subsection (1) is highly unusual—certainly in comparative perspective. My noble and learned friend said that he would write to me with details of where this provision applies elsewhere. It may be helpful if I tell him that I can save him a letter. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, thought that we were unique in this provision. That is not quite the case. Lithuania, Mongolia, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan have a similar provision. I wanted confirmation that the Government were unaware of that.
Lord Falconer of Thoroton
My Lords, I apologise for misleading the House in that respect, and I accept the helpful correction of the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth.
Lord Norton of Louth
I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord; I am glad he found that helpful, although my remarks were directed far more at the Government and to put the issue in comparative perspective. It is that sort of information from which the Government should have started when looking elsewhere to draw up the provisions. In terms of being unique, the noble Lord, Lord Howarth of Newport, will not be surprised to know that if his three-quarters proposal were to be implemented, it would render us unique.
However, my point is that measures of this type need to be better grounded in thorough evidence before we proceed with them. This provision needs scrutiny that deserves far more consideration than we are able to give it this evening, and we may wish to reflect on that between now and Report. For the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, I am not sure whether the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, will speak to Amendment 40, but perhaps I might anticipate that one as well. I suspect that my noble and learned friend Lord Wallace of Tankerness will be advising the House against these amendments and I thought that at this hour of the night I might bring him some joy by saying that I shall agree with him in doing so.
I shall quickly adumbrate the problems that I foresee with the amendments. I understand what they seek to achieve, but I have concerns. I understand the motivation for limiting the Motion of no confidence to be moved by the leader of the Opposition. As we have heard, it is to limit the Government so that they do not engineer a vote of no confidence. However, it does exclude other Members of the House from the opportunity to move a vote of no confidence. The circumstances in which that is likely to happen may be exceptional but in historical terms they are not unknown. One of the most important debates that took place in wartime happened on a vote of no confidence which was not moved by the leader of the Opposition. It is unusual but I am not sure that should be excluded. I have certain concerns about the way in which that amendment is drawn. I can see the reasons for trying to prevent the Government doing that, but there are problems if it is solely confined to the leader of the Opposition.
My second problem with the amendment is the way in which it is drawn in relation to what constitutes a Motion of no confidence. It limits it to the House passing a Motion expressing no confidence in the Government. That narrows it in relation to what we presently understand to be a confidence Motion in the House of Commons and it narrows it unduly. Therefore, because of Amendment 50, to which we shall come on the next day in Committee, I would prefer to go down the route that seeks to preserve, as far as possible, our existing understanding of what constitutes a vote of confidence rather than narrowing it in the way that the amendment proposes.
I now anticipate Amendment 40, to which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, will speak. I suspect that, had my noble friend Lord Cormack been here, he might have accused the noble and learned Lord of tabling it on a mischievous basis. I am sure that the noble and learned Lord will say that it is serious. Perhaps we could compromise and say that it is serious but mischievous. The amendment states that,
“a vote of no confidence cannot be a valid mechanism to precipitate an early general election if the Speaker of the House of Commons has reason to believe that it is called with the support or collusion of the Government and issues a certificate to that effect”.
I have problems with the existing wording of the Bill in relation to the Speaker. As drafted, it could draw the Speaker into political controversy in issuing a certificate. If he can be drawn into controversy under the Bill as presently drawn, he would be drawn into it in spades under Amendment 40. We can just imagine what would happen if the Speaker said, “No, no, the House has passed a Motion of no confidence, but I think that the Government has probably colluded in it”. One can imagine the uproar that would be caused. The noble and learned Lord may be proposing his amendment to tease out that very fact; we shall hear shortly. On the face of it, as it is worded, his amendment exacerbates what I consider to be an existing problem in the Bill. Although I appreciate the reasons behind the amendments relating to the leader of the Opposition and votes of confidence, I cannot support them and will be quite happy to support my noble and learned friend in resisting them.
Lord Falconer of Thoroton
First, on the amendment of the noble, Lord Marks, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth. It fails to deal with two particular problems. First, when a Government lose a vote that is obviously a vote of confidence—if the Government had been defeated on the Motion authorising the use of force in Iraq, that would plainly have been a vote of confidence—it would be wholly wrong if there then had to be a vote of no confidence thereafter.
Equally, there have been votes which the Government lose, for example, the vote on Maastricht in 1992, which they then followed—in my view, entirely correctly —with a Motion tabled by the Prime Minister on a vote of confidence in the Government. If that vote had resulted in the Conservative Government being defeated on the vote of confidence, which was the traditional method of dealing with that, the consequence should have been not that there then needed to be a vote of no confidence from the Opposition—which, as I understand it, is the view of the noble Lord, Lord Marks—but that there should be a general election, or a 14-day delay, which we shall debate later.
Those two examples would not be covered by the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Marks, and therefore lead to dealing, on one view, with the collusion argument but strengthen the other risk in the Bill, which is that a Government who genuinely have lost the confidence of the Commons are able to stay in power. Just as the noble Lord, Lord Marks, gets one piece of the wallpaper on the wall, another falls off.
On my amendment, I could not have asked for more from the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth. It is my view that in relation to a vote of no confidence, there is no possible mechanism one could adopt which would allow anyone to go behind the motivation of why a particular group of people voted in favour. That is an impossible task. It is like the vote of 100 in the Commons voting for an all-elected House of Lords. It has been suggested that that was a vote in order for there not to be an all-elected House of Lords. But one cannot go behind the vote; one must accept it at face value.
I tabled the amendment simply to illustrate the correctness of the conclusion of the committee on which the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, sits, chaired by my noble friend Lady Jay, that there is no ability to control a vote of confidence and that a Prime Minister with a majority can, if he or she wishes, engineer a situation where he or she loses a vote that is a vote of no confidence, even if not so called.
I have a third objection to the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Marks. Is it such a bad thing that, had these provisions been in place, it would have been open to, for example, Mr Heath to go to the country not by engineering in some deceitful way but by simply saying that he thought that the Government needed to have the confidence of the people to go on with the particular stance they were taking? He would therefore have put down a Motion of confidence in his own Government with a view to there being an election. Is that a bad thing? What is the view of the Government on that? These are probing amendments in Committee. The amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Marks, covers one situation, but it leaves a lot of others uncovered. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth.
I tabled my amendment simply to establish the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Norton. You cannot go behind people’s motivation, which means that the Select Committee is probably right. The Government of the day can always have an election whenever they want on a majority of one. Do the Government think that is necessarily a bad thing?
Lord Falconer of Thoroton
I completely endorse what the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, has said about the importance of this issue. It is no one’s fault, but starting this debate at 11.28 pm is a little odd. As the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, said, we shall obviously have to return to this when we debate both the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Cormack—Amendment 50—and the amendment to Amendment 50 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Howard, to leave out subsections (3) and (4). Unless other noble Lords have remarks to make, the best thing may be to move straight to the Minister and hear his response. The important point that the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, made about Mr Mark Harper’s comments that he could envisage the Speaker certifying in advance will obviously have to be debated when we come to the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Cormack.
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, I plan to be extremely brief, as I have classes to teach in Hull shortly after 9 o’clock in the morning.
I wish to raise one point arising from what the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, has said. I have considerable sympathy with the argument that he is developing that either the Speaker’s certificate goes out of the Bill completely or, if it stays in, it needs to be refined. He was teasing out the point made by the Minister that the Government would expect the Speaker to indicate in advance whether he would certify a Motion as one of confidence. So, on the basis of that expectation, I wish to raise this question. One could raise it on any serious Bill but I have used before the example of the European Communities Bill in 1972, where the Prime Minister, Edward Heath, said, “If we lose this, the Government cannot sensibly continue”. If, in a situation like that, the Speaker took a contrary view and declined to certify the Bill as one of confidence but the Prime Minister said, “This is essential to our programme and, if we are defeated, we shall resign”, what would happen?
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I appreciate the concern of the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, about the lateness of the hour. I always understood that this evening’s proceedings were going to go late. We tried to accommodate that by finishing somewhat earlier last time. Nevertheless, it is an important point, as he indicated, that there will be the opportunity at a later stage with a subsequent amendment to perhaps explore this further, including the point raised by my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth.
The effect of the amendment would be to require the Speaker to issue two certificates before an early election is triggered on account of a no-confidence vote. The clause already provides for the Speaker certifying that there has been a no-confidence Motion, and a Motion of no confidence in the Government during the ensuing 14-day period. The amendment, as moved by the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, would require an additional, earlier certificate issued in advance of a debate as to whether the Motion is to be regarded as a Motion of no confidence.
This again arises out of the concern that the House of Commons may not always know whether it is voting on a Motion of no confidence. It is highly unlikely that the House of Commons, in its ordinary business, would pass a resolution which was perhaps contrary to a matter of policy and the wishes of the Government of the day, but a matter on which no one had ever actually thought that there was any great store set, and then at the end of the 14-day period the Speaker unexpectedly issues a certificate. I have heard that concern expressed but it is not a realistic scenario.
The point was made that my honourable friend Mr Mark Harper indicated that in all likelihood a future no-confidence Motion would not only take the form that it did when a Motion was last passed but also, in the event of it happening, the Speaker of the House of Commons would be able to inform Members before they vote. For example, if it was on an amendment to the Queen’s Speech, the Speaker would inform Members of the House of Commons before the vote that, in the event of the Motion being passed, the Speaker would regard it as a no-confidence Motion for the purposes of Clause 2.
That is a simple and straightforward process. The Speaker advises the House of Commons on other procedural matters before it. I understand the point that has been made and, clearly as I indicated in my introductory remarks to the previous set of amendments, we will reflect on all these points. Yet we find it difficult to accept that there should be an additional layer of complexity to the process. One wonders how much time there would be to allow such a certificate to be issued if it was a pressing debate. It would be regrettable if such a debate was somewhat held up while the Speaker was engaged in the process of considering whether a certificate should be issued and that is then done.
We share the goal behind the noble Lord’s amendment—that the Commons should be well informed before it votes on confidence matters. The idea of an ambush is unfounded but I hear what the noble Lord says with regard to trying to import that greater degree of certainty. It is an issue to which we will return, one we will certainly reflect on and one we will perhaps have a wider debate on—perhaps with more participants—in the subsequent Amendment 51. On that basis, for the moment I ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment. Perhaps when we come to the later debate, we will address the questions that my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth has also raised.
Fixed-term Parliaments Bill
Lord Norton of Louth Excerpts(13 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord Martin of Springburn
My Lords, I have a worry about the idea of a five-year Parliament. My experience of the other place was that when there was a four-year Parliament, although there were arguments between Back-Benchers and their own government leaders—the Executive—and between parties, at least the electorate had an opportunity to sort the matter out. They could decide who would be the next Government. Now we are proposing to have five years.
If my memory serves me correctly, during the time that I was in the House of Commons, there were two occasions when the Parliament went the full five years. The last Parliament went five years, and there are no two ways about it—in that last year, the electorate were not getting value for money, if that is the right way to put it. There was very little going through the House. Some may say that that was the fault of the Government for not finding legislation to put through the House, but it is a problem with the whole House. The electorate are entitled to better.
It is not the first time during my political lifetime that I have heard criticism of the great trade union barons, although there are none any more. The railway industry, which was traditionally the main industry in my area, employed 12,000 people in my constituency. You can imagine the numbers working for the railway industry throughout the country. The same went for the steel-working and engineering unions. Perhaps I should declare an interest: I am a card-carrying member of my engineering trade union. Maybe I am digressing, but this is a valid point: if any trade union leader had said, “By the way, I am going to have an extra year of office and I’m not going back to the membership about it”, there would be criticism on the Floor of this House and in the other place.
On the five-year term, we know that an arrangement has been made by the Conservatives and Liberals. I do not want to criticise that, but where arrangements are made there can be fall-outs. What kind of situation will we have if members of the coalition start falling out with one another? There are better scholars of history than me, but I got an opportunity to read some of our great country’s naval history. It turns out that Captain Bligh and Fletcher Christian were pals when they got on board but, after that long voyage, they fell out with one another. That could happen with the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives—they, too, could start to fall out with one another.
I have another point to make concerning the practicalities of a five-year Parliament. I noticed that on a Thursday in the House of Commons—noble Lords can check the records; they have no need to take my word for it—there were debates but no votes. The party managers arranged it that way. It was clear that after Prime Minister’s Questions Members of Parliament went back to their constituencies, where they were working hard. Perhaps they were a bit worried about the people in their constituencies who were attacking them. I remember Tam Dalyell, who was an excellent mentor. He would say to me, “Michael, you are elected to Westminster. You are elected by your constituents to be in Westminster and you shouldn’t be seen in the constituency while Parliament is sitting. You should be in Parliament. You are the only person in your constituency who can get to those green Benches, and you should do so”. However, that was not happening, and the five-year Parliament was part of the reason.
I have seen MPs promoted to ministerial posts. They have been bubbly and full of enthusiasm, and they have taken to the Dispatch Box like a duck to water. Then the Prime Minister of the day would have a reshuffle, and the Minister who was so pleased to take a portfolio from the Prime Minister was not too pleased when he lost it. He would call the Prime Minister of the day every name under the sun. When I heard that, I would say, “He wasn’t too bad a man two years ago. You liked him then. I heard you say so, but you don’t like him now”. Therefore, the handing out of gifts went only one way so far as some Ministers were concerned—they felt that they should be given the portfolio but not have it taken away. That brought about what was known as the ex-Ministers club, and with a five-year Parliament it is going to have a lot of members. The reality is that the Prime Minister of the day has to get fresh blood in because, if he does not, there will be a gnashing of teeth in the ranks. Therefore, others have to be pushed out and return to the Back Benches.
I may have spoken for too long, as I know that we have other amendments to consider. Regarding the five-year Parliament, I can only say to my noble friends on the Liberal Democrat Benches that it is happy days for them now. Some of their colleagues have ministerial jobs and they are all as happy as Larry. However, I go back to Fletcher Christian and Captain Bligh: there will be fall-outs, and that five years may end up being a millstone round their necks.
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, I share the view of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, but I am motivated to follow the words of the noble Lord, Lord Martin. There is a great deal in what he has said. When you look at Parliaments that have lasted for five years, they tend to suggest that it is very difficult for a party to generate a coherent programme of public policy that is sustainable over a full five-year period. By the time you come to the fifth Session, the Government tend to have moved from being a Government to being an Administration. They tend to be very reactive; they are deskbound; they are not generating policy; and they are certainly not pursuing the programme that they placed before the electors at the general election. There will be certain dangers if a Parliament is dragged out artificially for a particular fixed term. Electors should be given the opportunity to have a say before then if the Government have clearly run out of steam. Therefore, there is merit in what the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, is proposing, which is to inject an element of flexibility to take care of that very point.
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, the logic of my noble friend’s argument is that a Parliament might go for a full five years and a Government will have a programme for at least a full four years. Does he think the empirical evidence is there to support that?
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
Is my noble friend asking whether it is impossible for a Government to devise a programme for five years? Perhaps I have misunderstood the question.
Lord Norton of Louth
A Government who come in will have a programme for four years with the fifth year spent preparing for the election. I am asking the Minister whether he thinks there is the empirical evidence to support that Governments come in and have a full programme to cover four sessions.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
If this Bill becomes law and there is a five-year Parliament, the Government of the day can expect to be there for five years and therefore can plan their programme over a five-year period. They need not necessarily frontload the parliamentary programme. It may allow more opportunity for pre-legislative scrutiny, which is regularly being encouraged. That is a difficult issue in the first year of a Parliament when Governments clearly want to move on and do some of the things they were elected on. But if they know that there is a five-year fixed-term Parliament, there is a better opportunity to programme it.
If it was a four-year Parliament, the final-year problem described by the noble Lord, Lord Martin, would kick in in the fourth year, with people going back to their constituencies because they knew an election was looming. Therefore, the effective period of a Government’s programme would be much reduced. If you have a five-year period it will be possible for a Government to plan that programme over five years. We are talking about annual Sessions beginning in May. At the moment the final Session tends to start in late November and has to wind up in late March. I do not think any of us who saw the wash-up last March found it a particularly edifying experience. One would hope that if a Government knew that the final Session was starting in May and going through to a solution the following late March, that would allow for a much better programme in the final year and avoid the consequences of wash-up.
Fixed-term Parliaments Bill
Lord Norton of Louth Excerpts(13 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, by the end of the speech of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, I had almost forgotten that he had opened it by reminding us that the Labour Party supports fixed-termed parliaments. Like the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, I was surprised that he omitted to say how he would legislate for fixed-term parliaments. I look forward to the noble Lord, Lord Bach, telling us.
I will be very happy to subject the Opposition’s Bill to the same critical scrutiny that I now plan to bring to the Government’s Bill. I share the scepticism of my noble friend Lord Cormack, a fellow son of Lincolnshire, who I have known for well over 40 years since I was a young and precocious schoolboy.
I propose to discuss the Bill in terms of process and substance. I begin with process and the Government’s response to the report on the Bill from the Constitution Committee of your Lordships’ House. I declare an interest as a member of the committee. In our report on the Bill, as various noble Lords have noted, we drew attention to the speed with which it had been prepared. It was introduced with no Green Paper, no prior consultation and certainly no formal pre-legislative scrutiny. We had to move extremely quickly, as did the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee in the other place. We also made the point that in recent times there has been little public discussion of fixed-term parliaments, although the issue has been on the constitutional reform agenda for the past 20 years. The Bill, we further recorded, appeared to be the product of short-term political expediency rather than the result of a mature consideration of enduring constitutional principles or sustained public demand.
How, then, did the Government respond to these points? They claim in paragraph 3 that the committee had heard evidence from constitutional experts that,
“the concept of fixed-term Parliaments has been considered and debated by politicians and academics for many years and in great detail”.
Really? Some Private Members’ Bills have been introduced on the subject—three in the past 10 years—but what academic debate has there been? Perhaps the Minister can tell us what academic literature, since Owen Hood Phillips’s Reform of the Constitution, published in 1970, has addressed the issue of fixed-term parliaments and done so in any detail, never mind great detail? There is some work by Robert Blackburn, not least a section in his book, The Electoral System in Britain, but, apart from that, what literature is there and to what extent has that literature engendered debate? Can my noble and learned friend identify any substantial academic debate that has taken place?
The claim that there has been such a debate is taken as the basis for the Government not accepting that there has been no mature assessment of the constitutional principles relating to fixed-term parliaments. Perhaps, then, my noble and learned friend can explain why this Bill derives from a coalition agreement that said that there would be a “binding Motion” placed before the House of Commons stating that the next election would be held on the first Thursday of May 2015? At what point was it realised within government that there was no one to be bound by such a “binding” Motion?
The agreement also stated that legislation would provide for Dissolution if 55 per cent or more of the House voted in favour. Any suggestion that this derived from any clear constitutional principle is somewhat undermined by David Laws in his recent book, 22 Days in May, where he writes:
“After some work on Ed Llewellyn’s calculator, and consideration of by-election risks, it was decided that a 55% vote of MPs would be required to provide a dissolution. This was just greater than the combined opposition and Lib Dem parliamentary parties, thereby safeguarding the Conservative position”.
No doubt it was a more mature assessment of constitutional principles that led to the threshold being set in this Bill at two-thirds of MPs voting rather than 55 per cent.
The response also claims:
“It is also wrong to say that there is not public support for the principles of fixed-term Parliaments. There was a very strong demonstration at the 2010 general election that political reform was a high priority for the electorate”.
The committee report did not refer to public support—we know that people when asked say they support fixed terms—but to “sustained public demand”. Again, can the Minister kindly provide evidence for that claim? Were fixed-term Parliaments really an election issue? I remind him of what Dennis Kavanagh and Philip Cowley say in The British General Election of 2010. They note that political reform was, unusually, an issue but go on to say:
“But focus groups reported that media discussion about different electoral systems, hung parliaments and coalitions passed over the heads of voters”.
Perhaps the issue of fixed-term Parliaments did not go over their heads and they did engage, in which case perhaps my noble and learned friend can provide empirical evidence for that claim.
The Government in their response also refute any claim that the Bill is being rushed. We are told that the Bill was introduced in the other place on 22 July last year and did not complete its Commons stages until 18 January of this year. That may be because of the delay in scheduling the Bill. It had its Second Reading on 13 September and had three days in Committee, the last of which was an extra day that had to be allocated. We are told that at Report stage,
“all amendments which were selected for debate were in fact debated in full”.
The operative words there are,
“all amendments which were selected for debate”.
This is by way of failing to engage properly with the Constitution Committee’s observation that, save where there are justifiable reasons for acting more quickly, the proper way to introduce a constitutional reform proposal is to publish a Green or White Paper, or a draft Bill, and to take the comments and concerns raised in the process of consultation and pre-legislative scrutiny into account in the legislation that follows. As it stands, there has been no time for thorough scrutiny and examination. Why in any event is there a need to move so quickly? It is not like the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill where there was an obvious time constraint. In this case, as the noble Lord, Lord Armstrong, said, it is sufficient for the Prime Minister to announce that he will not be inviting the Queen to dissolve Parliament until May 2015. There is then the rest of the Parliament available to get the Bill through. I shall be interested to hear why this is a measure regarded as requiring such speedy passage.
I turn to the substance of the Bill. I have a particular concern with the definition of a vote of confidence in Clause 2(2). As we have already heard, an early general election is triggered if the Speaker of the House of Commons certifies that on a specified day,
“the House passed a motion of no confidence in Her Majesty's Government (as then constituted)”
and a period of 14 days elapses without the House passing any Motion expressing confidence in any Government of Her Majesty.
As has been noted, there is no definition of what constitutes a vote of no confidence. The elephant definition is assumed—that is, one knows one when one sees one, or rather that the Speaker knows one when he sees one. But will he? A vote of confidence takes different forms. It has not been confined to an expressly worded Motion. I did research looking at every vote for most of the 20th century. The Bill stipulates that a certificate is issued when the House has passed a Motion of confidence. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, asked, what happens if the Government introduce a Motion of confidence and it is defeated? The House has not passed a Motion of no confidence; it has negated a Motion of confidence.
However, I wish to focus on those Motions which the Government believe are so crucial that the Government cannot sensibly continue if they are defeated. I remind my noble and learned friend what the then Prime Minister, Edward Heath, said at the conclusion of Second Reading of the European Communities Bill in 1972. If the Government lost the vote, he said,
“this Parliament cannot sensibly continue”.—[Official Report, Commons, 17/2/72; col. 752.]
There have been a number of Bills of similar importance since that time.
If this Bill is passed and a similar measure comes before Parliament—one crucial to the Government’s programme—what does the Speaker do? Bear in mind that the situation is not comparable to the Speaker certifying a money Bill. There is a statutory definition of a money Bill and, for quite understandable reasons, the Speaker waits until a Bill has cleared the Commons before certifying it as a money Bill. This is all clearly explained in the Constitution Committee’s recent report, Money Bills and Commons Financial Privilege. Under the Bill before us, the Speaker will have to act prospectively without any statutory guidance. The Government’s response to the Constitution Committee report states:
“Where there is doubt about whether a motion is a no-confidence motion, we would expect the Speaker to inform Members before they vote on it whether, were it to be passed, he would certify it as a no-confidence motion”.
So, on a Bill similar to the European Communities Bill, what would he do? Would he check with Government as to their stance? Would that not raise the prospect of drawing him into political controversy? What if he failed to consult and took a view at odds with that of the Government? Again, there would be the prospect of being dragged into political controversy. Also, what happens if the Speaker fails to certify a vote as one of no confidence but the Government regard it as a matter of confidence and, on losing the vote, resign? In that situation, the 14-day rule does not apply. The quest to find a new Government, as the Minister, Mark Harper has confirmed, is not time-limited. If the Opposition wish to avoid an election and oppose a Dissolution Motion, what happens? The situation may be unlikely, but as long as it is not impossible, we need to consider whether more needs to be done to cover such an eventuality.
Before I leave Clause 2, I have one further question for my noble and learned friend. Subsection (2)(b) refers to the 14-day period ending,
“without the House passing any motion expressing confidence in any Government of Her Majesty”.
The Explanatory Notes refer to the House passing “a” motion rather than “any” motion. The wording appears more flexible than that in subsection (2)(a). Can my noble and learned friend explain the reason for that particular wording in subsection (2)(b)?
I turn briefly to the provision for a five-year rather than a four-year fixed term. The Deputy Prime Minister said that a five-year term flows with some of the founding texts of our unwritten constitution. When I asked him what these were, when he appeared before the Constitution Committee, he cited only the Parliament Act 1911. Can my noble and learned friend enlighten us as to what the other documents are?
We are told that for most legislatures around the globe, a four-year term is the norm, although the data appear to cover terms rather than necessarily fixed terms and do not distinguish by type of regime. Can my noble and learned friend confirm the evidence offered to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee in the other place by Professor Robert Hazell that a four-year term is the norm in continental Europe and in Westminster systems?
I was also going to quote Professor Hazell’s evidence in which he lists in some detail the commitment to four-year fixed terms by both the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrat Party, but that is no longer necessary as others have made the point. I was also going to respond to the Government’s response to the Constitution Committee’s report asserting that the reason that some Parliaments are ended after four years is political opportunism. I was going to point out that exactly the same observation could be made about Parliaments extending to five Sessions, but I no longer need to do so as my noble and learned friend conceded exactly that point in his opening speech. I heard nothing in his speech that constituted a compelling argument for a five-year term. I think it would be difficult for a Government to generate a full five-year programme and remain vigorous by the fifth Session. I do not think that it is necessarily healthy for the Government, as government, or for the electorate.
As we have heard, the Bill is supposed to restore trust in politics, but I am not sure how pushing ahead with it, with no pre-legislative scrutiny and no attempt to consult the public on whether they would prefer a five or a four-year term helps bolster trust in the political process. I know the argument that the measure reduces the power of the Prime Minister, but that is not relevant to the point I am making. Does one restore the trust of people in politics by leaving them out of the process?
That brings me full circle. Why the hurry? My noble and learned friend may feel that I have put a lot of questions to him but that is a necessary consequence of the absence of any consultation or pre-legislative scrutiny. There remain a lot more questions still to be put.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Norton of Louth Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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Lord McAvoy
I rise briefly to support my noble friend’s amendment. X has been around for a long time—not just in current elections or the past century’s elections. The amendment means that if we allowed people to put an X and everyone knew that, the various people who put ticks, 1s, kisses, sweethearts and all that sort of thing would then know that putting an X is a recognised way of voting. My noble friend is absolutely right about people not being able to read and write. I have my grandfather’s wedding certificate—or his wedding lines, as they are called in Scotland. It says, “Bernard McAvoy: his mark here”. The mark is an X. If it was good enough for him, it will be good enough for me and my noble friend.
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, I rise briefly to support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, which is entirely appropriate. I do not quite follow the point of the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours. Presumably a candidate could just go around inviting supporters to put a 1 beside their name and leave it at that. The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, is being a modern-day Lord Simon of Glaisdale, whom I remember opposing amendments that had been introduced for the avoidance of doubt on the grounds that there was no doubt to be avoided in the first place. However, in this case the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, has raised an appropriate doubt that reflects people’s experiences. The amendment would be extremely valuable for that purpose. There is one other point. Particularly if it is a transitional period, many voters who have not got used to the new system might put an X against a name. If there are a large number of those, it would undermine the legitimacy of the system if all those votes were then discarded.
Lord Rooker
I want to go home, to be honest. I did not realise how serious my noble friend was about his amendment. I know he supports AV, which I do not; I support PR. It is not our job to sow confusion in the ballot system, which is what this amendment would do. The Electoral Commission will spend a fortune distributing leaflets to every dwelling, informing the voters about the change in the system. They will not be talking about using Xs. I gave the example from my own experience. As every ex-Member of Parliament will know from being at a count, it is the indication of a candidate by the voter that counts. The officers have a whole list of charts, showing what you can put on a ballot paper, what counts and what does not. That is how you get your spoilt votes. Not every vote is like it is. The public do not understand this but the system works and I have every confidence in it.
What if the voters put an X against one and, because of all the publicity that has gone on, they put a 2 against someone else? How do you know the X is a 1 in that case? Only an X alone on the ballot paper would indicate a preference for a candidate. That, however, is the very antithesis of what we are trying to do with the alternative vote; it is not my preferred choice but it is a choice against first past the post. I ask the Government not to put this amendment in the Bill because custom and practice dictates, with returning officers, that the vote would count. This would actually sow confusion. Are we going to send back to the other place a Bill that we got from them and say, “By the way, we want you to use Xs.”.? Come on, that is absolutely preposterous.