Greater London Authority Bill

Perhaps I may intervene before the noble Baroness attempts to answer that. I am not particularly worried about the point that the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, has raised. The number of votes cast for candidates is declared and made public, so you divide that number by 10 and get 10 per cent. However, I am surprised that the amendment refers to setting a threshold at 10 per cent of those who voted for the Mayor. A 40 per cent turnout might mean that 2 million people voted. The amendment does not specify whether it is the first ballot vote for the Mayor or the second ballot vote; it simply talks about 10 per cent of those who vote for the Mayor. The number of people who cast their vote in the mayoral election might be a threshold but I argue that a 10 per cent threshold is rather low. In a tightly contested election, the losing candidate would have to persuade only slightly more than one-tenth of those who voted for him to sign a petition and the election would then be rerun. I am not sure that that would be in the interests of democracy in London. Having said that, I think that there is some point to the noble Baroness’s proposition. She cannot have it every way but she must be able to have it at least one way during these discussions. She has argued that the Mayor is in a unique position and that therefore a limit should be imposed on his term in office, he should be fettered by the Assembly in a way that was not envisaged in the original Act, or, as in this proposal, that a recall by the electorate should be possible. Because of the Mayor’s powers and his unique personal role, I can see that there should be checks and balances, and it is a matter for this Committee and for any wider review of the Greater London Authority to consider whether those checks and balances are precise. I assume that, in summing up, the noble Baroness will tell us, first, that she does not intend all these constraints on the Mayor to operate—that is, terms limits, much more power for the Assembly and a power of recall—but, if she is arguing for a power of recall, I shall be very interested to hear her justification for the low threshold. It seems unacceptably low. If she had said, for example, that 25 per cent of the electorate should be required to sign a petition, I do not think that many of us would argue that that would be anything other than a substantial number which any wise Mayor would take seriously and recognise the need to renew his mandate. Again, particularly in the context of term limits, which we debated earlier, it is not at all apparent from the amendment whether a Mayor facing a recall petition could stand for re-election.