Austin Mitchell
Main Page: Austin Mitchell (Labour - Great Grimsby)Department Debates - View all Austin Mitchell's debates with the Cabinet Office
Political and Constitutional Reform
Austin Mitchell Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Deputy Prime Minister
With respect—[Interruption.] It is absurd to suggest that it is artificially inflating turnout by just giving people the opportunity to have their say. There is absolutely nothing wrong with giving people the opportunity to have their say and doing so on a very simple basis, with a simple question and a simple yes or no answer, at a time when people are voting in any event—unless the hon. Gentleman is suggesting that we waste millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money on organising it for another occasion. I see no logic in that whatever.
Austin Mitchell (Great Grimsby) (Lab)
It is a great shame that the Deputy Prime Minister did not have the guts to fight for the best change in the electoral system, and the one in which he once believed and I still do—that is, proportional representation. Would it not be fair to give the electorate a say on that as well as on the alternative vote in the coming referendum? If he couples the alternative vote, which benefits only the Liberals, with a reduction in the number and redistribution of seats, which is designed to hurt the Labour party, is that really democratisation or the biggest gerrymander in British history?
The Deputy Prime Minister
Once again, another Labour Member calls a simple act of democracy—giving people in a referendum the right to have a say about how we are elected to this House—gerrymandering. Only in the weird and wonderful world of a party immersed in the most mind-numbing, introverted leadership contest would that be called gerrymandering. It is simply aimed at one objective: to make sure that our elections are conducted more fairly and people’s votes are of the same weight wherever they find themselves in the United Kingdom. That is an issue of principle which I believe is right, and I hope that when the hon. Gentleman thinks about it he will join the rest of us who want to give people the chance finally to reform our broken political system.