Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

We should make sure that the noble Lord’s microphone is finely tuned, so that should some noises which indicated to the contrary emit from him, the whole House would be aware of them. I did not mean to criticise him, because it will be a long hard Bill and we all have to get our naps in when we can. Turning to the amendment, I, as my noble friend knows, do not agree with him on which is the best of the different majoritarian systems proposed as alternatives to first past the post. I prefer the alternative vote; he prefers SV and the London alternative vote, which we will discuss the origins of in a minute. However, I most strongly agree with his fundamental point that this issue has never been looked at. Noble Lords will remember that I was on the Jenkins committee which proposed AV as part of its solution. I have to say that we had bigger fish to fry and we never considered the difference between various AV systems. We considered SV, but only fairly cursorily. That was perfectly appropriate for a broad committee of inquiry trying to take us to square one in this reform process. It is not appropriate at a time when Parliament and your Lordships’ House are considering matters which can fundamentally affect—I do not exaggerate by saying that—the constitutional future of this country. That we should be debating this today illustrates the sheer folly of plunging into this legislation without pre-legislative scrutiny, as a committee of your Lordships’ House has pointed out. If ever there was a Bill crying out for proper pre-legislative scrutiny it was this one. In the coalition’s first raptures of love, such considerations were cast aside and as a result they had the unsafe sex whose issue we see in front of us in this Bill. There are two key issues that need to be looked at properly before we proceed with a change in the system. The first, which my noble friend has referred to, is the two essentially broad variations of AV that exist. In one, a voter must put all the candidates in order of preference. Even if he only really cares about the first two or three, the voter must order them all or his vote is invalid. In the other, the voter numbers as many as he chooses. There is a great advantage to the first system of making them number all preferences or their vote does not count because it means the winning candidate unambiguously gets at least half the votes of their electorate. That is more than outweighed, however, by voter choice—this is all about voter choice. For some people—me for example—a choice way down the list may be the most important choice I make. If I am faced with a choice between a Welsh Nationalist candidate and a British National Party candidate, the order in which I put them is the most important choice for me. I do not want either of them elected, but I certainly do not want the BNP elected. That is a very important choice, so I will be numbering right down my list. Others may, like the people of Queensland, decide to opt for one party. There is nothing wrong with that; it does not cause a problem for the system. That is voter choice being exercised, too. I do not say which way other voters should exercise their choice; I am simply saying they should have the right. Those are two balanced arguments that should be objectively considered. The second issue concerns the concept of whether SV should be an alternative to AV. SV, incidentally, has been rechristened by Professor Patrick Dunleavy as ““London AV””. It is important what you call things and this is a credible way of resurrecting the SV system. I cannot object because often when I am talking to Liberal Democrats about the merits of AV describe it as ““STV in a single constituency””, which indeed it is. I do not mind using the phrase ““London AV””, therefore, but it is in fact SV. The arguments for and against SV and AV are quite well balanced. They can only be assessed by a proper look at the evidence. No objective body has had a look at that evidence. It is particularly strange that the Lib Dems, who are responsible for the AV proposal being before us, do not prefer AV at all. They wanted something quite different—STV. They made no secret of that in their election manifesto. They had not thought very much about what precise form of AV should be put in a referendum and therefore we have this snap decision that is incorporated in the Bill. I feel much more strongly that we should look at this properly than as to what the outcome of such examination should be. Whatever an independent inquiry comes up with on these issues is fine by me. However, I believe that it is the duty of this House, in its role as a constitutional reforming chamber and the backstop against hell-for-leather attempts at legislation coming from another place, to ensure that such an inquiry is held and made before we rush into this referendum and perhaps put before the British people a system that in due course they will regret rather than, as I hope, welcome.