Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Lord Grocott Excerpts

Wednesday 8th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

Those who are in favour of the system will no doubt be responsible for what they say during the course of the campaign, but that is not part of the debate that we need to have now. However, I can assure the noble Lord that the Electoral Commission—

[Lord Grocott]

My Lords, it is no use saying that those who are in favour of the proposal will deploy whatever arguments they like. Given that the Leader and the Deputy Leader of the House of Lords have joint responsibility for presenting the Bill to Parliament, presumably they have joint responsibility for presenting some of the arguments to people in the country. If it is not true, as my noble friend has made perfectly clear, that successful candidates under the proposed system would have the support of 50 per cent of the voters in their constituency, could we have that loud and clear, preferably from both the Leader of the House and—after all, this is a double act—the Deputy Leader of the House at the Dispatch Box? Accuracy is important. Surely the noble Lord would agree with me on that?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, on this Front Bench we are entirely tied by collective responsibility and my noble friend is totally aware of that. The point is that in the generality we would expect more than 50 per cent of voters to have voted for MPs, but there are circumstances, as I and the noble Lord have explained, where that will not be the case.

I was saying as a matter of assurance that the Electoral Commission will provide information on the different voting systems so that people will understand how the optional preferential system works.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Snape]

I do not want to argue with the noble Lord’s view of what took place 30-odd years ago, but that was not quite the impression that I had in the Whips’ Office at the time. However, that was quite a long time ago.

[Lord Grocott]

As one who was a foot-soldier when my noble friend and the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, were exerting authority, I can say only that voting did not seem to be an optional matter from where I was sitting.

[Lord Snape]

We had better leave it at that then.

I referred to the noble Lords, Lord Hamilton and Lord Norton. I am grateful for their partial support. Both were against compulsion but favoured the idea of a voucher or some financial incentive to the voters to turn up to vote. Perhaps, in withdrawing the amendment, I can point out that we three are all against compulsion but in favour of bribery. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.