Democracy: Power Inquiry

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 11:48 am on 15 June 2006.

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Photo of Lord Goodhart Lord Goodhart Spokesperson in the Lords (Shadow Lord Chancellor), Constitutional Affairs, Advisory Team On Legal Matters, Cross-Portfolio and Non-Portfolio Responsibilities 11:48, 15 June 2006

My Lords, I welcome the noble Lord's intervention. The single transferable vote is, I believe, a very substantial improvement. Of course the situation in Northern Ireland is different from that on this side of the Irish Sea because it is a country where there are deep and fundamental divisions between two parts of the community. I do not want to go into the advantages of STV and I recognise that no system is perfect, but I believe that it offers us a more balanced representation of public opinion in Parliament and that it will give us more diversity of membership.

As the Power commission points out, a PR system such as STV or an open list would mean that individual voters would be far more likely to influence the outcome of elections and would provide an incentive to vote.

The other shift of power which the Power commission calls for is from central to local government. For a long time, particularly for the past 25 years, power has constantly been taken from local government and transferred to the centre. That process continues to this day. One hundred years ago the great cities of this country had civic pride and local government mattered. Birmingham City Council, in the days of the Chamberlain family, was a body of national importance. The great town halls in cities such as Manchester and Bradford really stood for something. It is not surprising that as powers have moved to the centre, local pride in cities and counties is lost and the turnout at local elections becomes shameful.

I am not nostalgic, but in this case I believe that something of real value has been lost, and we need to get it back. Powers need to be restored to local authorities. Local authorities should raise more of their own funds as the Power commission recommends with, of course, a subsidy from central funds for local authorities with weaker tax bases. I recognise that this could lead to more postcode differentials in the exercise of powers, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. It could give rise to innovation and experiment on a wider scale around the country. Again, however, a vital element here is a change in the electoral system to avoid inertia and corruption, which develops in places that are single-party monopolies under the present system.

The Power commission proposes further ways of re-engaging citizens in politics. I do not agree with all of them. I have to say that I am dubious, to say the least, about the proposals for citizens' initiatives. Last year, the BBC's "Today" programme invited listeners to propose new legislation. The winner of the vote was a Bill to make it easier for householders to shoot burglars. I therefore remain somewhat doubtful about the value of that proposal. I also think that the Power report seriously underestimates the extent to which most MPs already engage with their constituents, perhaps because I do not think the Power commission included anyone with experience of service as a Member of the House of Commons.

I agree, however, with many other proposals, including the reduction of the voting age to 16. We raised this in the debate on the Electoral Administration Bill, but we were defeated by the combined forces of Labour and the Conservatives. We believe that the casting of a vote should be treated as one of the rites of passage to adult citizenship. Giving 16 year-olds the right to vote would mean that most young people who stay at school until 18 would have the chance to vote in local elections, if not in a general election, while still at school. This would give a sense of reality and immediacy to citizenship courses, and would get young people into the habit of voting.

Another important recommendation relates to party funding. The report proposes the capping of contributions by individuals and organisations. The figures proposed for the cap are open to question, but we believe that the principle is plainly right. A corollary to this is the need to increase state funding. In this, the Power report makes a very useful suggestion, borrowed, I think, from the USA. Each voter could tick a box on the ballot paper at a general election which would require the Treasury to donate £3 a year to the party of the voter's choice in their local area. This could well be coupled with the recommendation of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, of which I was a member at the time, to allow a form of tax relief similar to gift aid on small donations to political parties.

Finally, the Power commission does not deal with one issue that we believe is of great importance: the need for a written constitution. We have, although we do not always recognise it, what is already to a very large extent a written constitution. The central principles of the system of government are now written in statute. There are, however, several problems. First, there are a significant number of gaps. There is, for example, no statutory control over what is described formally as the Royal prerogative, but is in fact the Prime Minister's prerogative. We have, as yet, no Civil Service Act, and we have incomplete reform of your Lordships' House and, as I mentioned earlier, of other institutions. Secondly, the constitutional bits of statutes are mixed in with a lot of stuff that is not really constitutional. For example, the Constitutional Reform Act not only sets up the Supreme Court and the Judicial Appointments Commission, which are clearly matters of the highest constitutional importance, but contains a great deal of detail, for example, on the procedure by which the ombudsman will deal with complaints against the judiciary—administrative rather than constitutional matters.

Thirdly, at present, we have no entrenchment of the central provisions of the constitution requiring a special procedure for their amendment. In constitutional theory, the Scotland Act could be amended or repealed by ordinary Act of Parliament. The Human Rights Act, which I regard as a modern Magna Carta, could be repealed or mutilated by a decision of the House of Commons alone. That is not just a theoretical but a real risk with a Prime Minister who appears to regard the Human Rights Act as a tiresome nuisance.

I began by welcoming the constitutional reforms introduced by the Government since 1997. Let me finish by emphasising that much remains to be done. The Power report makes a vital contribution to that process. The rebalancing of powers as the Power commission proposes is essential. We should not only take note of those proposals but act on them. I beg to move for Papers.