Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Lord Phillips of Sudbury Excerpts

Monday 6th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

I do not believe in apologising when I am not fully aware of the facts.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

Will my noble friend comment on the fact that there are many other legislatures where elections, referendums and plebiscites are held simultaneously and the people of those countries do not seem to be incorrigibly undermined in their decisions as a result? Secondly, will he comment on the fact that paragraphs 9 and 10 of the first schedule to the Bill set out a very stringent duty on the Electoral Commission and the various election officers to inform the public? As I understand it, the Electoral Commission intends to circulate to every household in the land a plain English guide to the issues about which the referendum is to be held.

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[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

I am grateful to my noble friend for rushing to my defence in a distinguished and helpful way—I was going to say gallant, but that is the wrong way round. What I was arguing, as my noble friend said, is that we need to take account of these things when we are looking at this amendment and any changes in the election to the House Commons, the first Chamber. If the Lords is the revising Chamber and is not forming the Government, there is an argument for it being elected by first past the post because then you have a different system balancing what the House of Commons and what the Government are putting to Parliament.

As the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky—or perhaps it was my noble friend—rightly said, this would mean that you would have to carefully define the powers of both the Commons and the Lords. That is why I believe that we are moving towards needing some kind of written constitution with devolved parliamentary assemblies and parliaments, with a separate Supreme Court and with the possibility and the proposal to elect the second Chamber. Everything needs to be much more clearly defined. That is why it would be madness—and this is where I come to the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, which was moved on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Owen—to rush into this kind of referendum, or any kind of referendum, to change the system for the House of Commons. There are enough other changes taking place with the proposed reform of the House of Lords; we should learn from the changes that have taken place in Scotland, although it has not been a happy experience. We should not rush into something that has unexpected consequences just because the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, apparently puts a convincing case. Just because the noble Lord has spent 35 years arguing the case for proportional representation, we should not move in that direction. What is best for the Labour Party and the country is to stick to first past the post, which has provided election to the House of Commons with some degree of stability over a long period.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

My Lords, I will make some practical points in saying why I am in favour of neither this amendment nor the one to be spoken to later by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, which is not dissimilar. Frankly, if one were dealing in the theory of referenda and the reform of electoral systems at this time, I would find a great deal to favour particularly in the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. I will be frank—I have fought and lost five parliamentary elections. The first was for Labour in 1970. At that time, I confess, I did not think twice about electoral systems. I knew, as all Labour and Tory Members know, that the first past the post system was deeply in their favour. One of the problems of discussing reform here or in the other place is that we are all parti pris. We are all conflicted. Nobody can look at this complex but profound issue without party affiliation coming into play.

However, it is also fair to say—the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, expressed it very well—that, before and above that, we are concerned about Parliament: its respect in the country, its effectiveness and its health. I do not think anybody sitting here tonight believes that our Parliament, in 2010, is in good fettle. I do not for one second suggest that the lack of democratic adherence to it is, by any means, solely down to the electoral system. However, I maintain that it is one of the principal reasons why so many of our fellow countrymen do not even bother to vote—to use the precious vote that our forefathers fought so hard for. Four out of 10 do not vote and—I heard this statistic the other night—of those aged under 30, only around two out of six voted in the last election. One principal reason is that unless you are a Tory or Labour supporter your vote is apt to count for nothing. I think as much of the Greens and, indeed, UKIP as I do of the Liberal Democrat Party.

The other thing I know, which deeply affects my feeling about this amendment, is that we have been going round and round this mulberry bush my entire political life. There is always not just one but 10 reasons why we should not have reform now, and why we should wait until we have decided whether there is to be election to the House of Lords, and so on. There are always several reasons. My noble friend Lord Rennard gave, as the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, kindly admitted, an extremely clear and persuasive history of electoral reform—or rather the failure to have electoral reform—in this country. It is perfectly clear that many organisations and all the parties in this House use AV now. It has no deep defect. What is absolutely unavoidable is that the consequences of bringing in AV at this juncture will profoundly affect all parties in this country.

I come to my last point, which is to admit that the Liberal Democrats are plainly the party that is keenest on AV for electoral purposes. It is in our self-interest—of course it is. However, we also believe—I hope noble Lords will accept my sincerity—that it is also in the public interest, for the reasons I have briefly touched on, to give many more people a stake in government and a useful vote. Incidentally, if any non-Lib Dem was to go around with a Lib Dem on the doorsteps, my goodness, they would hear about electoral reform then. I am not surprised that you do not hear about it if you are a Conservative or Labour supporter.

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[Lord Campbell-Savours]

If it could be shown that by changing the electoral system in favour of STV or AV, turnout did not rise, would that in any way influence how the noble Lord thinks about the proposition on the table?

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

Yes, of course it would, but the noble Lord cannot demonstrate that until we have tried it. It is no good telling us about Ireland or Iceland.

[Lord Campbell-Savours]

If it could be shown that in Scotland turnout did not rise, would that influence the noble Lord?

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[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

It would influence me to some extent but I would want to know a great deal more about it before I admitted anything more than that here and now.

[Lord Campbell-Savours]

I hope the noble Lord is able to attend our future debates on this issue.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

All I can say—

[Baroness McDonagh]

Taking Wales as an example, why does the noble Lord believe that more people turn out to vote in first past the post elections than under other systems there?

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

Noble Lords are now asking me a series of questions at large that need very detailed consideration to be commented on sensibly. All I will say is that I am convinced that, because in many constituencies a Liberal vote, a Green vote or a vote for anything but the prevailing party is a waste of time, common sense says that people will not be engaged with the election in that constituency in the way that they would if they had a vote that counted.

[Baroness McDonagh]

I am sorry but the noble Lord is saying that if we have a different form of voting system, more people will vote. That clearly has not happened in Scotland and Wales. Will he now change his opinion?

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

I certainly will not. I can speak of this country, where I have fought five parliamentary elections. I know how people in this country—those who are not of the dominant party in the constituency concerned—think about the voting system. It seems blazingly obvious that if you are not of the prevailing party, the tendency not to vote is very strong and has led to the present facts. Please take note of the declining turnout among young voters. They are increasingly disenchanted with the hegemony of our system.

[Noble Lords]

Order!

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

Will noble Lords allow me quickly to conclude my speech? The noble Baroness has intervened twice already.

For us on these Benches, it is now or never. It is AV or nothing. We believe AV to be an improvement, and an improvement in the public interest. For those reasons I will not, I am afraid, be tempted to vote for either the amendment we are discussing or those that bear upon it.

[Lord Grocott]

My Lords, I was going to intervene briefly in any case, but the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, has given me so much material that I cannot guarantee that it will be as brief as I thought. His whole contribution was as though absolutely nothing had happened in the way of electoral reform during the last 15 years. A host of different electoral systems have been introduced. I have not as yet written my memoirs about the period of the Labour Government, but I can reveal to the House this little bit of information. Every time the word went round that we were suggesting there should be a change in the electoral system for Europe, local government, Scotland, Wales or wherever, I always did my best within government to try and prevent that happening. There is a chapter in my memoirs that I shall call “I told you so”. Before the European proportional representation system was introduced, people like the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, although I cannot speak for the noble Lord, and my noble friend Lord Rooker—for on this matter we have not always agreed—predicted with absolute confidence: “Look at all the wasted Labour votes in Surrey and Sussex. Look at all the wasted Conservative votes in the north-east. They will start flocking to the polls as soon as we have a proportional system and their votes won’t be wasted any longer”. It has not happened. That is not me in a seminar saying that. It has not happened.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

I am grateful for the noble Lord for giving way. We are talking about Westminster elections—not a proportional Euro-election, but Westminster elections.

[Lord Grocott]

But why on earth, if the noble Lord’s argument does not apply in Europe—and empirically I can show him that it does not apply—why would it suddenly start applying in Westminster elections? I just cannot understand the point.

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[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

My Lords, that was a fantastically revealing debate. The noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, delivered an extremely good speech that was rational, reasonable and sensible. It basically said that, if we are going to have a debate about constitutional reform, let everyone have a reasonable choice. Unfortunately—this is no fault of the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky—he has absolutely no understanding of what is going on in relation to the proposal for constitutional reform that is being advanced.

For the past 13, maybe 20, years, our approach to constitutional reform as a nation has been that this House has the role at least of producing as good a constitutional reform as we can. The work of the Cook-Maclennan report, which had lots of years behind it, was to produce the best constitutional reform. Extraordinarily, this constitutional reform, unlike any other constitutional reform I can remember, is being conducted without Parliament having a view on it. Individual parliamentarians like the noble Lord, Lord Lamont, who delivered an excellent speech, have a view on constitutional reform, but neither Parliament, nor indeed the Government, has a view on this reform. They had a view on devolution in 1997, and Parliament had a view on the Common Market in 1975, but this is a process, not support for constitutional reform.

The perfectly reasonable amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, therefore meets a car crash. The first part of the car crash is the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, who, with eyes popping with sincerity, tells us that he is strongly in favour of AV, having never supported AV before. The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, then gets up and says that he has been talking about constitutional reform since he was 15—I rather agree with the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, when he says “poor Lord Rennard”, whom we greatly admire in this House—and he says that he supports the alternative vote system. This lot on the Liberal Democrat Benches are therefore standing on their heads. The noble Lord, Lord Phillips, has the nerve to say that they are doing this to restore the people’s trust in our parliamentary representatives by adopting a system that the Liberal Democrats have opposed for so long and which, as has often been said, is described by Mr Nicholas Clegg as “a miserable little compromise”. The public think that they are doing this to get more seats, not because they are sincere, so they are eroding public support. Sensibly, the party opposite has remained completely silent throughout this debate in relation to whether there should be a change to the electoral system. Members opposite looked patronisingly on the Liberal Democrats for being so easily gulled into behaving in a way that brings the whole system into contempt.

The noble Lord, Lord Baker, in an embittered little speech, had the nerve to say, “I have been privileged to listen to a seminar on electoral reform from the Labour Party”. Yes he has, and he is lucky to have done so because no one else in the whole country appears to be debating what the right system is. Surely the least the public could expect is Parliament debating what the best system is, because no other debate is going on. In answer to the noble Lord’s question about how to bring all the strands together, I have great sympathy for the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky. There are problems with it. It is pretty eccentric to choose an electoral system on AV when you are asking the public to determine whether they like AV best. I understand why that is being done—it is a rational way of doing it—but I am afraid he is wasting his time because this constitutional reform is motivated not by what the best constitutional reform is but by a grubby deal that was done that had no reference to what was best for the public.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

The noble and learned Lord has made a rather passionate attack on my position. I am not standing on my head and I have not argued anything other than that I believe that this referendum should be held on an AV system, and I have explained why.