My Lords, I too am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, for laying before the House this admirably brief Bill and, in so doing, allowing us to debate some of the possible remedies to the apparent difficulties of the additional member system as legislated for in the Scottish Parliament.
Before I start, I must say that the noble Lord obliquely reminded us that part of the roof of the Scottish Parliament collapsed yesterday. I entirely blame the United Kingdom Government. It was their decision to choose the site and the architect, and to commission a building whose plans had not been completed and that therefore could not be measured by any quantity surveyor. I sometimes wonder whether there was an intention to get the Parliament off to a bad start. A better approach would have been to arrange temporary accommodation, as was done on the Mound, and to leave a calmer process of procurement to the Scottish Parliament in the fullness of time.
That invective discharged—much to the relief of my psychiatric advisers—my first response to the Bill is that it was the British who imposed the AMS system in West Germany in 1945. There must be evidence from there as to how the system settles down. I am also mindful of the fact that Konrad Adenauer was the Chancellor for 20 years as a regional member. I believe that the additional member system was chosen for Germany to prevent the domination of the German Parliament by any one party. It can be said that Scotland also benefits from the avoidance of such domination, although it must be galling for whichever party is the natural party of government.
This Bill attempts to remedy the difficulties between constituency and regional members by preventing candidates appearing in both ballots. I can just about see the logic of this suggested change; the winner of the constituency vote would not see his defeated opponents having any public role. The regional member elected for his constituency area would have campaigned throughout the region, and more strategically so. So far so good. But then there is a problem of how the voters engage with the regional campaigns and, subsequently, with the regional members. So far, they have lacked visibility and personal identification in some cases. In contrast, where a regional member has fought in a constituency campaign, they will at least have some profile with the voters in that constituency, if not across the whole region.
I recall in 1999 being a constituency candidate in Ochil, and a regional candidate for Mid Scotland and Fife. I suppose that I was also a candidate for the Clackmannanshire Council; maybe in my case there was a need for my family to catch up with democratic procedures. People told me after the election that they had given me their second vote. Of course that was not true, for I was No. 5 in the list. They had in reality voted Liberal Democrat in their second or regional vote. It is also worth noting that the constituency is another where, of the four candidates, three ended up in the Scottish Parliament and, obliquely, one returned to this House with a life peerage, so there were clearly no losers there.
I am not in denial about the conflicts that sometimes evolve between constituency and regional members. It is worth noting that, in this United Kingdom Parliament, it is well recognised that Members of Parliament in the Commons do constituency casework, and that your Lordships restrict yourselves to a more strategic or interest-based approach to parliamentary work. I hope that a convention can evolve around those principles in the Scottish Parliament.
My choice for reform of the additional member system in Scotland is not in the Bill. I am in favour of retaining the mixed member system—terminology recommended by the Arbuthnott commission—and the adoption of open lists. Open lists come in more than one form. Because I want to see regional candidates developing some profile with the voters, and to get a real regional campaign going among the candidates on each party list, the system that I promote is one where the party would select the candidates and decide the number of candidates, but where there would be no numbering system imposed by the party. That would be decided by the voters. I would allow there to be an alternative opportunity to vote for the party, but this would not influence the decision on who was elected. That would wholly be determined by the voters. The voters would have decided who was the runner-up, and hence the successor in the event of a regional member departing for any reason. At present, the succession is seen largely as a mystery. Clearly I am asking the parties to give up some control of their lists, but they would retain full control of who was on them.
I have not talked up the single transferable vote today; I expect that my noble friend will do so. The mixed member system can be improved and, in any case, I prefer evolution. In Scotland we must always wrestle with Lord Cooper’s 1952 judgment that sovereignty in Scotland lies with the people. My system of open lists without any predetermined order is near to the fulfilment of that little-understood constitutional principle.
The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, is entirely right to bring this subject to the United Kingdom Parliament, as the Scotland Act is currently a reserved matter and the issues behind the Bill are real. His ban on dual candidacy would give the regional contest a different and separate flavour from that of the constituency contest. On the other hand, a strong constituency candidate may well end up with weaker candidates against him or her, thus denying the voters a real choice. The strongest candidates from the other parties are more likely to go elsewhere, to their party’s regional contest. I look forward to a further debate about the Arbuthnott commission’s report, and to constitutional evolution in Scotland.
Scottish Parliament (Candidates) Bill [HL]
Proceeding contribution from
Earl of Mar and Kellie
(Liberal Democrat)
in the House of Lords on Friday, 3 March 2006.
It occurred during Debate on bills on Scottish Parliament (Candidates) Bill [HL].
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679 c493-5 
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2005-06
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