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Mr. Mitchell: Although the right hon. Gentleman praises the open list system with faint damns, does he agree that it is much preferable to a closed list system?
Mr. Trimble: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments. I did not think that I was praising the open list system. I had intended to criticise it rather gently--perhaps I was too gentle, and did not give the Committee the correct impression. Even if we concede that an open list system is preferable to a closed list system, we should
go one step further and move to a system that is clearly and unambiguously a vote for persons. That is what the single transferable vote system is.
The STV system compels the electorate to vote for a person. It compels every elector to think about the persons who are standing for election, and it compels every elector to think about how he or she will vote. When STV was introduced in Northern Ireland, concerns were expressed that it was unnecessarily complex and that people would have difficulty with it. At one of the first elections under the STV system--it was not the first: there was a local government election in May and then the assembly election in June 1973--there were 18 or 19 candidates in the constituency where I resided and was foolishly persuaded to stand as a candidate. I should remember the number of candidates as, when it came to the count, I was at the bottom of the poll and came 18th or 19th.
My experience on that occasion was that the people thought carefully about their vote. They examined the election material from the various parties and looked through the potted biographies of the candidates. They came to the polling booth with the lists of candidates that they wanted to support, and they voted accordingly. Consequently, the voters took an interest in the elections. The electorate will not take the same interest in individuals standing under a party list system--whether it is closed or open--and the people will obviously take less interest in a closed list than in an open list system.
We are moving to larger regions--which were rightly criticised in the previous discussion--with more people and an electoral system that discourages paying any attention to the personalities involved. That degrades the system.
Mr. Cash:
The right hon. Gentleman has related his own experience with respect to the STV system. Does he agree that the first-past-the-post system, which he has not addressed, is the best, because it gives a clear choice and a connection between the local area and the decisions that are taken at the ballot box by individuals who know exactly for whom they are voting? Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the problem with the regional list system is that it can result in the tyranny of the party leadership, and the STV system has the grave disadvantage that people lose the ability to make a clear choice when their vote is shuffled through the system?
Mr. Trimble:
I shall deal later with the relative merits of first past the post, as there are some comments that I should make with regard to it. In his other comment, the hon. Gentleman gives expression to a misconception about the system. The vote is transferable, but it transfers in accordance with the choices and preferences indicated by the elector--
It being Ten o'clock, The Chairman left the Chair to report progress and ask leave to sit again.
To report progress and ask leave to sit again.--[Jane Kennedy.]
Committee report progress; to sit again tomorrow.
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Jane Kennedy.]
Miss Ann Widdecombe (Maidstone and The Weald):
The issue which I am about to raise is of concern not just to farmers, on whose incomes I shall comment shortly, but to the economic health of the countryside as a whole. [Interruption.]
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord):
Order. Would hon. Members leave the Chamber quickly and quietly, if they are going?
Miss Widdecombe:
It is not insignificant that a point of order was raised with you earlier, Mr. Deputy Speaker, about the fact that an important statement affecting farmers has apparently been made available in advance to a pressure group whose principal aim is to make farmers' lives difficult, yet it has not been made available to Parliament. That sets the background for the way in which the Government look at the problems confronting farmers.
It is true that farmers have faced problems in the past. The main source of their current difficulty is the strong pound. Of course, this is not the first time in our economic history that we have had a very strong pound, but on this occasion there are other factors, not just in one or another section of the industry, but across farming as a whole. Those factors, taken together with the strength of the pound, are making life so difficult that we should be concerned for the future of farming if matters are not sorted out.
Mr. Christopher Gill (Ludlow):
Does my right hon. Friend recognise that the problem is not so much the strength of the pound as the weakness of the other continental currencies, as European Union member states pursue their convergence criteria, with all the resulting damage to their economies?
Miss Widdecombe:
Yes indeed, but that weakness leads to the comparative strength of the pound, so what I am saying is a summary of the rather complex model that my hon. Friend was introducing.
I shall deal with specific parts of the farming industry. Fruit farmers not only experience the difficulty of exporting in the face of the strong pound, but are confronted with all the results of frost in May. I could be cynical and say that I believe that frost in May greeted the arrival of a Labour Government, but I could say rather more realistically that frost in May has not happened for an extremely long time. No serious help has been given to fruit farmers, who make up a large percentage of the farmers in my constituency. No real help has been given to them, or much hope held out.
Cereals are facing an expanding world market in which additional supplies are coming from many quarters at the same time as a reduction in livestock has reduced demand, and once again the pound is strong. I hardly need to refer to the problems that are confronting beef farmers, which have not been helped by the Government's decision to ban beef on the bone. Finally, although this is not an
exhaustive list, there is the problem of sheep farmers, who are also suffering from a strong pound and from the increasing difficulties of live exports.
Mr. Lembit Öpik (Montgomeryshire):
Is the right hon. Lady aware that in areas such as mid-Wales, including Montgomeryshire, we are facing a fully fledged recession on account of what has happened to sheep and beef farming?
Miss Widdecombe:
I am indeed aware of that. Hon. Members must forgive me if I do not go into an exhaustive description of all that is wrong in farming. The number of hon. Members on both sides of the Chamber at this hour of the night is a sign of the concern that is felt in the House. I hope that the Government will take on board that concern and respond positively.
My debate has made special reference to the south-east, and that is because, notwithstanding the fact that there are obvious problems in other parts of the country, we have special factors. For example, huge capital investment followed the 1987 storm. There was the decimation of the hop market--it was more than decimation, of course, because that would have left 90 per cent.; that market was almost destroyed. There are higher labour costs in the south-east. There are also difficulties in transferring to something like beet because of the distance involved in haulage and processing. Also, in the south-east, we have a very mixed economy; there has not been, for example, the situation which until recently appertained in East Anglia, where there was extremely strong cereal farming, accounting for most of that economy.
At the same time, there has been a decline in the percentage of retail prices enjoyed by farmers. For example--these are only examples--in November 1995 a beef farmer received £2.35 per kg deadweight, which represented about 39 per cent. of the butcher's price. That farmer now receives only £1.78 per kg, which is slightly more than 30 per cent. of the butcher's price.
I could quote similar examples for milk, where there has been a reduction in the farmer's share of the end price from 72.5 per cent. to slightly less than 65 per cent. Lamb prices are now £2.16 per kg, which is only a 36 per cent. share of the butcher's price, which has increased from £5.37 to just under £6. Similarly, I could draw on the examples of pork and of cereals.
We have a strong pound and individual factors are affecting many sectors. We have a decline in percentage retail prices. In addition, we have a rise in the costs of regulation, which the Government want to pass on to the industry. The Government have proposed a food agency. I do not intend to argue the merits of such an agency, but I severely question the wisdom of making the industry pay for it. There are costs involved also in the traceability of individual animals.
All this is happening when others of the Government's policies are posing enormous threats to the countryside. For example, there is the proposal to build on the green belt--that proposal is now being somewhat softened, but it still remains, having been announced without, apparently, very much feeling for the farmers. There is a proposal to tax car parking. Who uses car parks? Who are the people who use cars to get to work? The answer is that cars are used by people who are coming in from the country, who do not have alternative forms of transport.
There was also the iniquitous right to roam. There has been quite a U-turn on the roam towards that. Nevertheless, the proposals were made, and earlier tonight we were presented with an example of how closely the Government were co-operating, apparently, with one of the pressure groups involved in the right to roam.
Will the Government comment on their attitude to the rural White Paper? The previous Government's rural White Paper was widely respected by all sections of the countryside. It was welcomed, and its implementation was monitored. Is that monitoring to continue at the same level and in the same depth as in the past?
Low income from farming does not just affect farmers but has many knock-on effects on ancillary trades--on those who supply farm machinery, feed suppliers, dealers and hauliers and on the small trades or enterprises that depend on a healthy rural economy for their survival. There are various measures that the Government could take and I do not propose a complete prescription for solving the problem, but the use of agrimonetary compensation has been inadequate. I appreciate that this would be the responsibility of the Chancellor of the Exchequer rather than the Minister of State, but the Government could consider a longer period of tax averaging. Above all, they could try to reassure farmers that there is not a huge amount of ignorance involved in ministerial decision taking. The feeling of those in the countryside is that, although Ministers may understand the theory, they are not clued in to the practice of what goes on.
10 pm
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