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Mrs. Laing: Does the hon. Gentleman have any sympathy for the voter in my constituency who wrote right across the top of his ballot paper for the European elections last week, "Give me back my vote"? He bothered to go to the polling station, but his vote did not count because he spoiled the ballot paper. He believes that power was taken away from voters and given to politicians.
Mr. Twigg: I have sympathy for that voter's position, but the Home Secretary made it clear that fewer people spoiled their ballot papers in the European elections under the new proportional voting system than under the system of five years ago. I shall return to that point.
During the passage of the legislation introducing the new system for European elections, which my right hon. Friend reaffirmed, the Government gave a commitment to review the closed list voting system. I was one of a number of Labour and Liberal Democrat Members who made it clear that, although we supported the introduction of proportional representation and regarded such reform as a welcome advance, we would have preferred a different voting system that enabled the hon. Lady's constituent to vote for an individual.
I hope that when the Government conduct their review they will consider the option of an open list voting system, as is used in some other European Union countries. That would retain the positive feature of our new PR system--that votes and seats broadly match--but would also enable people to choose between individuals as well as between parties. I hope that that point of view will win support in all parties.
The debate on reform of the House is only just beginning. The Labour party is conducting a major internal consultation on the issue, and I hope that we will have a high level of participation. My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Mr. Burden) made the point that the Jenkins system is not a pure proportional representation system. Lord Jenkins and his colleagues have come up with a system that combines what is best about the British system, but changes what is bad. If a party has a clear lead--as Labour had in 1997 and the Conservatives had in 1983--it will still be able to form a majority Government, albeit with a smaller majority that more accurately reflects how votes were cast. That sensible reform will make for more effective government. It will also give more power and more choice to the voter, not more power to the parties.
The closed list experience does not have much to teach us about the Jenkins proposals. Lord Jenkins proposes constituencies for the vast bulk of Members, combined with small open lists for the top-up, so that we get around the problems that hon. Members have identified with the closed list system.
Mr. Jim Murphy:
I thank my hon. Friend for giving way, particularly as both of us survived the vagaries of a PR system in a previous career. Has he reflected on the fact that, in Scotland, the Labour party came first in the regional vote, but won no seats in seven out of the eight regional constituencies. In those regional constituencies, a Labour voter wasted his vote by voting for the Labour party. We must get beyond a system that allows people to waste their votes.
Mr. Twigg:
The number of wasted votes in the Scottish, Welsh and European elections was massively smaller than under the first-past-the-post system. The purpose of the second vote in the Scottish system is to compensate for the disproportionate outcome in the first vote. The Labour party did not win seats in the regions in Scotland under the top-up because it had already done well in the constituencies. Had we had first past the post in the Scottish elections, the Labour party would have won almost 80 per cent. of the seats with 39 per cent. of the vote. That cannot be justified in democratic terms.
The Scottish Constitutional Convention, which brought together people from different parties and from the wider civic society in Scotland, concluded that it wanted a Scottish Parliament that reflected the diversity of opinion in Scotland. The anomaly to which my hon. Friend referred is a small price to pay for an Assembly or Parliament that more fully reflects the balance of opinion in Scotland.
Ms King:
Does not that show that we support PR on a point of principle? We want Parliament to reflect the population, but perhaps hon. Members should consider the small number of women in the Chamber. PR is the only way that we will have a representative democracy.
Mr. Twigg:
My hon. Friend is right. One of the most positive features of the elections in Scotland and Wales was the high representation of women achieved with PR systems. I believe that 40 per cent. of the Members
Labour can take pride in the fact that we are pursuing the debate from a position of strength after an election in 1997 in which we secured two thirds of the seats in this House on the basis of 44 per cent. of the vote. Rather than turning our backs on the issue, we are proceeding with the debate and giving the people the opportunity to decide for themselves in a referendum. Lord Jenkins points out in his report that political parties' interest in electoral reform has tended to be inversely related to their ability to do anything about it. The Government have decided to let the people decide even though they are the main beneficiaries of the current system.
Mr. Twigg:
I have given way several times and I think that I have about a minute left, so I should like to draw my remarks to a close.
Mr. Simon Burns (West Chelmsford):
I add my congratulations to the hon. Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Benn) on his excellent and fluent maiden speech. I envy the way in which he carried out what many of us considered to be a parliamentary nightmare with such seeming ease and fluency.
Whatever anyone's views on the current electoral system for this House, it has undeniably given us stable government over the past century. How would proportional representation alter the workings of our constitution, and what would be the consequences for the Cabinet system and for this House? The answers depend on the specific qualities of the electoral system and on the traditions and political culture of this country. A system of proportional representation rather than first past the post would cause complex and far-reaching upheavals to our constitution and to this House.
Under a system that reflected the relative strengths of the parties, no single party would receive an overall majority. One of the major parties--almost certainly the largest party--would look for a partner to provide a majority in the Commons. However, that would lead to a pig-in-a-poke situation. Unlike Germany and Ireland, where parties usually say before a general election who they will support after the election, we have a tradition of
the Liberals, the SDP alliance and the Liberal Democrats not telling the country in advance what they might do in the event of a hung Parliament. As a consequence, there would be great uncertainty immediately after a general election.
We are all used to a swift transition of Government after a general election. In some ways, the transition is brutally swift. The alternative under PR would be delay, wrangling, haggling and deals in dark corners. We should not follow the example of other countries. In 1996 in New Zealand, it took more than two months to form a Government; in 1993-94 in Ireland, it took 77 days; it took 86 days in Austria in 1996; 126 days in Italy in 1979; 148 days in Belgium in 1988; and 218 days in Holland in 1977. I understand that, in Italy, on average four weeks of every year since the war have been spent haggling over who would form the Government.
Haggling would inevitably draw the monarch into the system. There would be a serious danger of the monarch being drawn into party politics. As Vernon Bogdanor has rightly said:
The right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) has suggested in the past that the way around the problem would be to devolve those powers from the monarch to the Speaker of the House of Commons. He wittily claimed that, in a three-party system, that would avoid replacing first past the post with first past the palace. I do not believe that the system would work, as it does in Sweden, because it would undermine the vital role of the Speaker in this House, who is independent and above party politics, by dragging the Speaker into party negotiations and bargains.
Others have suggested that the best way to protect the monarch would be to develop conventions that would avoid placing them in a position in which they had to make politically controversial decisions. However well intentioned the idea, it would not work because it would not be easy for politicians to develop such conventions, for the simple reason that they would be required to accept the existence of constitutional rules that took precedence over party conflict.
Similarly, PR has serious implications for the role of the Cabinet in the Commons. Coalition Government means a coalition Cabinet with members of different parties. That leads to the strength of the Prime Minister being undermined. There are conflicts over who can be sacked in a reshuffle and how, and over the drawing up of the Government's programme. The temptation for rows, internal wrangling and a do-nothing situation is overwhelming and condemns the idea.
There is an argument that a weakened Government would lead to a strengthened House of Commons because the Government would have to listen to the House more and would not treat Back Benchers simply as Lobby fodder. However attractive that might be in theory to
Back Benchers, I suspect that, in the real world, it would be unobtainable pie in the sky because, whatever the composition of the Government, the power of patronage and ministerial office, not to mention ministerial cars, remains. Where there is hope for Back Benchers, however thin, the power of the Executive will be dominant.
I remain deeply opposed to the idea of proportional representation. It would be a disaster, and I share wholeheartedly the views expressed by the Prime Minister in The Economist in September 1996. He said:
"When the incumbent Prime Minister resigned the monarch would have to decide whom to summon to the palace . . . This could involve the monarch unwittingly in party politics, for the candidate first called . . . would enjoy a considerable advantage over all rivals, since he or she would have both the political initiative and the authority to offer posts in a Government and would also acquire the aura of power which could well permit the formation of a Government even if he or she did not at first appear a likely choice as Prime Minister."
If the political situation was tense, the monarch could easily be accused of favouring one side over another.
"I personally remain unpersuaded that proportional representation would be beneficial for the Commons. . . It is not a simple question of moving from an 'unfair' to a 'fair' voting system. An electoral system must meet two democratic tests: it needs to reflect opinion, but it must also aggregate opinion without giving disproportionate influence to splinter groups. Aggregation is particularly important for a Parliament whose job is to create and sustain a single, mainstream Government."
Those words were right in 1996 when the Prime Minister wrote them and they are right now. After the most recent European elections, I suspect that, in his heart of hearts, the Prime Minister holds to that credo even more than when he wrote it three years ago. He probably rues the day that he ever embarked on the debacle of introducing proportional representation for those elections because of the Pandora's box that it has opened.
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