EU Referendum: Electoral Law

Heidi Alexander Excerpts

Tuesday 27th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

May I start by congratulating the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) on securing this debate and on the way in which he opened our deliberations? May I also pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Exeter (Mr Bradshaw)? He suggested that when he first started raising these issues in Parliament some people perceived him to be something of a crank, but I think he is one of the finest politicians of our generation, and I am proud to sit on these Benches alongside him.

So many things need to be said in this debate that it is hard to know where to start. The three contributions we have heard so far all referred to the recent revelations about the close relationship between Vote Leave and BeLeave, and what that might mean for the ongoing debate about Brexit and the referendum. I agree with all that has been said: there are serious questions that need to be fully investigated by the Electoral Commission, and no stone should be left unturned in understanding who knew what and when.

Having said that, I want to make some different observations about what recent events suggest about our politics and our democracy. At heart, I fear there have been appalling and repeated abuses of power. What seems to have gone on within the various different elements of the leave campaigns just does not sound right. We are talking about people with years of experience dealing with campaign volunteers, some barely out of university, and advising them on setting up a separate legal entity, through which serious funds end up being channelled, at a time when some of the individuals in question are having a campaign fling, only for that relationship to be outed 18 months or so later in a statement from No. 10—the whole thing stinks.

I do not know whether criminal offences have been committed or whether electoral law has been broken, but I am pretty sure that people have abused their power. I may be naive, but I am a firm believer in decency in public life: doing the right thing, even if it may not be to your own immediate personal interest or to your party’s or your campaign’s electoral advantage. Some people would say that I am not cut out to be a politician, and perhaps I am not, but this insidious, cynical, arrogant, perpetual game playing has to stop. It has real consequences for real people’s lives. It will also kill our democracy, and I am sick of it. Perhaps it was my upbringing, but I have some pretty basic values. You do not lie. If you do something wrong, you admit it. You treat people the way you would want to be treated. You respect the law—the letter of it as well as the spirit of it. You play fair; you do not play dirty. In having power, your primary duty is to exercise it responsibly.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Heidi Alexander]

I am afraid I will not. If the hon. Gentleman wishes to make a speech and contribute to the debate—contributions from the Conservative Benches have been so sadly lacking—he will have time to do so.

I have read the reports over the past few days and looked at some of the emails that were exchanged between some of the key players, and I am worried that what I see is a corrosive abuse of power. If we want the British people to have faith in us, we need to find a way to conduct our politics with decency. I fear that the opposite is currently the case. It has to stop.

[Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—