Repeal of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011

John Hemming Excerpts

Thursday 23rd October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Allen]

I am not saying that it is the fixed term that has helped create a lively Parliament; it is Members of Parliament who have done that, by carving out a niche and exploiting the difficulties of coalition Government, and more credit to them for doing so. However, I have to say to the hon. Gentleman, who is foremost among those pushing back the envelope—I congratulate him on that—that what the Executive giveth, the Executive can take away. Were we to return to a one-party Government, of whichever party, I guarantee that they would seek to roll back some of the gains that he and just about every colleague in the Chamber today have played a part in securing, bringing greater responsibility to Parliament. I warn colleagues here today that the tide will go out very rapidly indeed. We now have, for the first time in parliamentary history, Select Committee Chairs elected by secret ballot and by the whole House, as in my case, and that could easily become a thing of the past. In a one-party Government, the Prime Minister would instruct people to clamp down on dissent and nonconformity.

Similarly, colleagues elected to Select Committees by secret ballot and by party, such as the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope), could be under threat. Difficult and awkward customers of the sort I revel in dealing with in my Committee, many of whom are in the Chamber today, will be the first casualties. I say that not because I am trying to scare them, but because I used to be in the Whips Office and had to take Members out of Select Committees and try to get compliant Chairs elected. Sadly, I have been there, done that—I am the gamekeeper turned poacher, and possibly turned gamekeeper again.

The idea that we have cracked it and that we now have a Parliament that in a one-party Government will be as frisky as this one is misleading. We have to protect the small gains we have made in recent years and build upon them, rather than regressing to the good old days when we used to allow Prime Ministers the unprecedented power in a democracy of deciding the date of an election.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

I share the hon. Gentleman’s concern about the power of the Executive. Does he agree that the constitution should be established in the best interests not of the Prime Minister, but of the country as a whole, particularly in circumstances in which we are having to borrow a lot of money on the money markets to fund the deficit, which means the stability that arises from the Prime Minister not having the power to call an election anytime he feels like it is in the interests of the country as a whole?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

This is an important debate and I welcome the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) opened it. The subject needs to be aired by this House. I do not necessarily see the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 as the work of the forces of evil or, indeed, the Liberal Democrats. On the other hand, the alternative of the previous system is not necessarily a panacea.

In practical terms, if the coalition had fallen apart at some point, the Prime Minister would probably have come to the House and proposed a Dissolution, and I would have been extremely surprised if the Leader of the Opposition had not agreed with the proposition of having a general election to sort out the situation. The need for a two-thirds majority principally means that the Conservative party and the Labour party could conspire to have a Dissolution on a date on which they both agree. Essentially, it does not prevent a general election from taking place; it just means that there would have to be a degree of consultation between both major parties.

I do not think that fixed-term Parliaments are necessarily a good thing, for some of the reasons that have already been discussed. I think there comes a time—four years is probably long enough—when a Government ought to try to get a new mandate from the electorate. If we look back at history, we will see that at one point we had seven-year Parliaments and then the term was reduced to five years. We have always taken a pragmatic approach to general elections. We missed a general election in 1940, for the very understandable reason that we were doing other things at the time. That was quite reasonable and one must remember that that Parliament ran all the way to 1945.

Whenever the United Kingdom has had early general elections—I think we ought to focus on early general elections, rather than those that have taken place towards the end of a term after four, four and a half, or five years—it was usually because the electorate gave an indecisive result and, for the sake of good government, the political parties wanted the electorate to reconsider through another general election. At the end of the day, apart from holding the Government to account, Parliament is about ensuring that there is a Government, who have to deliver the health service, education and pensions. Of course, the 2010 Government had to manage the British economy, which has to be managed in a particular way. Those are very important issues.

Governments have gone early on two occasions in my lifetime. The Wilson Government of February 1974 went and got a small majority that October, and the 1964 Labour Government were re-elected in 1966, having initially got a very small majority.

[John Hemming]

Obviously, we have had fixed-term Parliaments for a long time; it is just that the Prime Minister had the power to call an early election. Who does my hon. Friend believe should have the power to decide to have an early election?

[Mr Syms]

Actually, the power to call a general election is a poisoned chalice for a Prime Minister: if they win it is great, but if they lose they generally get the chop because they made the wrong decision. Under the old system, Conservative campaign headquarters told its candidates that there were only so many Thursdays—which, by convention, we used—and only so many days of the year, because of summer days and autumn, on which we could have a general election. When it comes down to it, there are only four or five dates a Prime Minister can choose from. A Prime Minister has the seals of office from the Queen and the responsibility to discharge a Government programme. If someone has to decide, I would prefer it to be the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

[Mr Syms]

I am perfectly sure that, in normal politics, some incumbents have a slight advantage. Clearly, both Mrs Thatcher and Tony Blair used it to the maximum. One election was delayed by foot and mouth, so events can intervene and cause a delay, if everyone agrees to it. At the time, there was consensus across the House that it would have been impossible to have a general election. I remember driving through Devon and seeing pyres of the carcases of animals being burned. That showed the British system being flexible to deal with something that emerged very quickly.

[John Hemming]

I thank my hon. Friend for his previous answer. He said the effective test of whether the Prime Minister’s decision to have an election was a good one was whether the Prime Minister got elected, and that the test was measured by the political party. In essence, such a decision is driven by the party interest, not the public interest.

[Mr Syms]

There is an element of truth in that, but to go back to my earlier point, if a Prime Minister dissolves Parliament and loses, they usually end up losing the leadership of their party. Harold Wilson was unusual: he won three elections out of the four he contested, but survived after losing—by surprise—in 1970. He of course chose the date in 1970, but that was after a long period during which his party thought that it would win. In reality, most Prime Ministers go when they think they will win. Most of them hang on when they think they will lose, in the hope of something turning up, which it normally does not, and five-year Parliaments can be tortuous and difficult.

I believe we should go back to the previous system of having some flexibility in when general elections occur. In reality, they normally occur some time in the fourth and fifth year of a Parliament.

[John Hemming]

rose—

[Mr Syms]

I will give way for the last time.

[John Hemming]

I am sure that my hon. Friend agrees that a key priority of this Parliament has been to sort out the finances, but uncertainty creates greater instability in the financial markets. If we had to pay another 1%, it would cost us about £10 billion or more a year. Does he think that that is a reasonable price for the taxpayer to pay for giving back a power over general elections to the Prime Minister?

[Mr Syms]

One thing on which I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough, who introduced the debate in a very reasonable fashion, is that we may in future have more coalition Governments than some of us would like. If we look at the pattern of politics, we can clearly see that more people are willing to vote for a range of parties, which in itself brings challenges for the major political parties. It may well be that fixed-term Parliaments are used as a device when other coalitions are formed in future.

I hope that there will be a clear overall majority for the Conservative party when there is an election—or that there is a clear majority among the electorate—but if there is no such majority and, to return to my earlier point, someone has to run the economy, interest rates need to be maintained, restrictions on public expenditure are still needed and tough decisions have to be made, coalitions will sometimes be the best vehicle.

I have always taken a very pragmatic view of the British constitution. It has shown that it can be amended, changed and challenged by what is thrown at it. The remarkable thing about 2010 was that there was an indecisive general election but a strong Government were formed to deal with the very difficult issues we faced. Those issues will still need to be dealt with in the next Parliament.

I simply point out that it would be better to have flexibility in the system. At some stage, we will find ourselves in the situation where a general election is the solution to dealing with the problems. Given some of the current polls, with both major parties on percentage shares in the 30s, one possible result would be for each to have between 260 and 280 seats and for neither to be able to form a coalition with any other party, and that would lead us into grand coalition territory. We had that in February 1974, when the Conservatives conspired to allow the Labour party to govern until there was another general election. It would be unusual but not impossible to have a situation in which no Government could be sustained. In such a case, rather than having some absurd coalition with both major parties getting together but agreeing on nothing, it would be sensible for the electorate at some point to get the chance to decide which party or coalition of parties they wished to run the country.

The coalition has not done a bad job. It was necessary, and it has probably helped the British economy. Having fixed-term Parliaments was one part of the deal. That was perfectly respectable politics, because there was a need to reassure the junior partner in the coalition. However, being conservative constitutionally, I rather hope that we can go back to the previous system. If we do, it will be the decision of my right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr Cameron), if he is the Prime Minister after the next election, to decide about the following election. If he then made the wrong decision, he would have to pay the consequences for that.

[Austin Mitchell (Great Grimsby) (Lab)]

I support the proposal to repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011. I congratulate the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) and his colleagues on raising the issue. It seems to me that we should have much shorter Parliaments. It is possible to have fixed terms, but there has to be a right or an ability to end a Parliament in circumstances such as war, economic crisis or disaster. We can therefore have a term that is fixed, but the period should be shorter.

The best evidence against five-year Parliaments—frankly, five years is too long—is the long, slow death rattle of this Parliament. If Members want to see a monument to the failure of five-year Parliaments, they should look at what is happening now. In effect, this Parliament and this Government did all they were going to do in their first three years. Most of that was wrong of course, but it was done during those first three years. Frankly, we are now just hanging on in this House with nothing particular to do. It reminds me of the old Bing Crosby song:

“We’re busy doing nothing,

Working the whole day through,

Trying to find lots of things not to do”.

The attendance at this extremely important constitutional debate shows that Members do not particularly want to be in the Chamber; they would rather be in their constituencies fighting an election campaign. That is what, at the end of this Parliament, we are really doing: if we are not fighting an election campaign, we are busy throwing custard pies at each other.

At this moment in this Parliament, the Government have got to the end of their tether. There has never been a better moment to use Oliver Cromwell’s words—they apply to all of us—when he dismissed the Long Parliament:

“You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!”

But this agony now has to be prolonged, with the farce of pretending to do things when we are just electioneering and throwing trivia at each other, until the end of March, before there is a renewal in the election in May. This Parliament is conclusive proof that five years is too long.

The hon. Member for Poole (Mr Syms) said that four years might be reasonable, but emphasised the need for continuity in economic policy. The usual claim for a five-year Parliament is that that gives the Government time to implement their policies, but this Parliament has given this Government time to change every policy that they started out with. We started out with “Hug a hoodie”, but that turned out to be cutting benefits for young people. We started out with “Hug a Husky” and “Save the environment”, but that ended up as “green crap.” We started out with “Support the European Union”, but we now use every possible occasion to provoke dissent and argument within the European Union. We started out with “Immigrants welcome”, but it is now, “Keep everybody out.” We started out with “We’re all in it together”, but that has ended up with putting the penalties and pains on the poor, while rewarding the rich.

Even continuity of economic policy, which is claimed to be the most sacrosanct element during this Parliament, has not been provided by a five-year term. The only continuity of economic policy to which this Government can lay claim—apart from cuts to everything, or slash and burn, which is the Government’s only long-term economic plan—has been produced not by them, but by the Bank of England. Frankly, the independent Bank of England has saved the Government. We now have a recovery, but if interest rates are kept flat to the floor, as they have been for the six years since the crisis, and if money is printed at a record rate—through quantitative easing, we have printed £375 billion—there is bound, at some stage, to be a recovery. That is not the Government’s long-term economic plan. Their plan was to cut and slash and burn everything and to roll back the state. The Bank of England’s management of the economy has produced the only successful long-term economic policy. Therefore, the argument for long-term economic policies also fails.

My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) is too hopeful about long parliamentary terms. He mentioned five-year and even 10-year Parliaments, which caused me to shudder in my seat. What is the best term for a Parliament? I do not want it to be thought that, now that I am leaving, I want to cut everybody else’s joy and pleasure by reducing the parliamentary term to three years, but I would like to do so. I have said that consistently. I proposed it when the Fixed-term Parliaments Bill was discussed in 2011.

[John Hemming]

The hon. Gentleman is making the case for shorter Parliaments. The question is who should make the decision. Should the term be fixed or should the Prime Minister be given back the power to make the decision purely on party interest, thereby costing everyone a lot of money?

[Austin Mitchell]

There could be a combination of the two. That happens in Australia and New Zealand. In New Zealand, there is a fixed three-year term, but the Prime Minister can call an election earlier. The Executive has to have that right and power. Most Governments work out their three-year term and do not go earlier. Some go earlier to seize a particular moment or because of an emergency. We have to give the Government that power, otherwise we will have the situation that Germany found itself in when the Social Democratic party had to engineer its own defeat in Parliament before it could get an election.

[John Hemming]

Why does the hon. Gentleman believe that the Prime Minister alone should be able to make that decision, rather than Parliament through a majority?

[Austin Mitchell]

In saying the Prime Minister, I meant the Government. It has to be a collective decision. It will effectively be a party decision, although in my experience most of the elections that have been called by the Labour party have not been party decisions, because I have not been consulted. I am not sure whether the Liberal Democrats are consulted on such matters.

[John Hemming]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for the confirmation that it would be a party decision taken in the party interest. Should it not be a decision that is taken in the public interest?

[Austin Mitchell]

I think that that would be difficult to arrange. It is a political decision that is taken by the Executive. In a democratic party, I would hope that the Executive would consult the party. That did not happen before the elections that were called by my party when we were in power, but I felt that it should have done. Jim Callaghan certainly should have consulted me, because if he had called an election in October 1978, we probably would have won. He tended not to listen to my advice, however loudly it was put. That was a failure of Back-Bench power.

I am in favour of a three-year term. At a pinch, I would accept a four-year term. It should be a fixed term, with the ability to call an early election in extreme or difficult circumstances. If we had that, we would not have to have all the silliness of the recall legislation that we were dealing with on Tuesday. I have never known a more stupid Bill than the Recall of MPs Bill. I was not given the opportunity to vote against it, because there was no vote. All parties are grovelling before the electorate by saying, “Let us sacrifice ourselves and throw MPs to the wolves.” There would be no need for recall if we had a three-year term, because by the time the machinery of recall had cranked into operation, the three years would be over and the electorate would be able to turn everybody out and make a new choice.

I am being moderate by calling for short, triennial Parliaments. I am old enough to have been a Chartist, I suppose, but I am not espousing annual Parliaments, as the Chartists did. A three-year Parliament accords with the mood of the public, as we read it in the major polls and surveys. There is an alienated mood. People want to be heard. They are angry and upset. They want to have an influence, but they feel that MPs are not listening and that Parliament does not represent them.