Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2015-06-29
Topic: Government Operations
Paul Tyler (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I am delighted to support my noble friend. In recent years, Parliament has been prepared to find fairer voting systems for everybody else: for Northern Ireland, for Scotland and for Wales, and even for the European Parliament. But of course the House of Commons has been a step too far. That does not mean that your Lordships’ House should not look carefully, in the context of this debate, at the failure of the present system to provide effective and representative local government. In recent weeks a number of Labour Peers, who have previously been opposed to electoral reform, have expressed support for it. I was taken by the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Cormack—I am sorry he is not still here—who said in our debate on 15 June, expressing some support for my views, that, "at the beginning of a new Parliament, there is a strong case for a commission or committee of both Houses—I am a great believer in committees of both Houses—to look at our electoral system thoroughly, dispassionately and in an unbiased way to see how we can improve it and make it clearer and more consistent, with the fundamental aim of engaging the interest of people, particularly young people and those who do not necessarily have a long history of residence in this country".—[Official Report, 15.6.15; col. 1061.] The noble Baroness, Lady Royall, made a similar point about disengagement and re-engagement a few minutes ago Local elections in England and Wales are so badly distorted by the system, as my noble friend said, that, in theory at least, we have to look carefully at what they are doing to the confidence that our fellow citizens have in the system. But we now have hard evidence of what can be done by an improvement to the system, as my noble friend has said. Thanks to Dr Lewis Baston, who has undertaken an analysis of the two rounds of STV votes in Scotland, there has been a considerable increase in fair-minded assessment. Under the STV system in 2007 and 2012 for local authorities in Scotland, the immediate increase in the number of those who actually had an impact on the result was dramatic, going from 40% or 45% to 75%. In Dr Baston’s terms, these are "happy voters"—they have had a result. Even more significantly, he goes on to show that if second and subsequent preferences are effective, the percentage of those who are satisfied can rise to 90%. There will be control freaks, in all parties, who take the view that this is dangerous territory because it gives so much choice to the electorate. Frankly, I think it is the consumers of the local democratic process who we should be interested in. It is clear that they are extremely satisfied with the way in which it now operates in Scotland. When he or she votes they get a much more representative outcome and, I think, a resultant quality of service and accountability. From an elector’s point of view, this is surely the moment we have to move on. I draw your Lordships’ attention to the fact that a large number of the cities, boroughs and counties in England where a majority has been given, on a minority vote, to one particular group or party for a very long time have been the ones that have failed. That is why it is extremely important that we listen to those who have identified these problems in England and Wales and we should look particularly at the evidence given by the Electoral Reform Society to us—all those involved in this Bill—that there is a real danger of a rise in cronyism, petty corruption, undue secrecy of decision-making and widespread disenchantment with the whole political process. Unless we make some change to this Bill, that will extend to the constituent authorities and the combined authorities under the Bill.