General Election (Leaders’ Debate) Bill

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Friday 15th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sandy Martin]

I believe that before that first televised debate, Richard Nixon was well ahead of John F. Kennedy, and it was seeing the performance of the candidates that led the American people to vote for John F. Kennedy. Does the hon. Gentleman share my profound relief that the American people voted for John F. Kennedy, not Richard Nixon?

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

Nixon got them out of Vietnam.

[Mr Bone]

Yes, as my hon. Friend has just said, it was President Nixon who got America out of Vietnam after the Democrats had taken it in, but that is a side issue. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that that debate did have an effect. Actually, people believe that Nixon won on the radio, but Kennedy won on television, so it had an influence. Nevertheless, I think that that result was more about the issues involved and what an interesting campaign it was. It may well have been a mistake of Nixon’s to travel to every state in the US, as he promised, rather than to concentrate, as we would do today, on what people would call the marginal states. The hon. Gentleman will also remember that there was some debate about whether Kennedy actually had won, or whether Nixon had won. Nixon had the good grace not to challenge the result.

Let me move on. Would it not have been wonderful to see Thatcher versus Callaghan in a debate? Or Major versus Kinnock? Or Blair versus Hague—would not Blair versus Hague have been a wonderful experience? It might not have changed the result of the general election, but people would have been much better informed by it. I think people would have paid to see that debate.