NUMBER OF MEPs, ELECTORAL REGIONS AND ELECTORAL SYSTEM

Part of Orders of the Day — European Parliamentary Elections Bill – in the House of Commons at 4:45 pm on 26 February 1998.

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Photo of James Clappison James Clappison Shadow Spokesperson (Home Affairs) 4:45, 26 February 1998

Good, the Home Secretary knows the answer. Perhaps he will tell us why he chose the Belgian list, rather than any of the other lists in the European electoral systems—the Danish system, for example, which he also mentioned in his speech. The open list systems are not strange in Europe. On Second Reading, the Home Secretary told us with pride: I am prepared to listen to the arguments for adopting a Belgian-type system and to give them careful consideration. Since then, there has been a deafening silence from the Government for three months. We do not know what great debate has been taking place. We will be interested to learn what arguments the Government considered during the consultation and which argument clinched it for the closed list system, which was the Government's original preference. Did new facts come to light about the Belgian system that the Government did not know on Second Reading?

As a Belgian detective—Poirot, Simenon's Maigret, or Tin Tin—might say, it is all rather perplexing. Were those all red herrings that were thrown into the plot to mislead us, or have we yet to come to the final twist of the plot?