House of Commons Hansard Debates for 17 May 1991

Column 563

from the Scottish enlightenment, but missed one. Whether it was deliberate or she could not bring herself to mention him, we know not, but she missed the greatest figure, Robert Burns.

Burns is the man whose philosophy has had the greatest influence on the creation of egalitarian ideas in Scotland. The right hon. Member for Chesterfield told us all about patronage. As he spoke, I was reminded of Burns' poem that :

"A prince can make a belted knight,

A marquis, duke and a' that ;

But an honest man's aboon his might,

Guid faith, he maunna fa' that."

The essence of the Scottish view lies within that short quotation. We are all Jock Tamson's bairns. Nobody should be elevated above anyone else. We are all human beings with considerable qualities and a contribution to make to our decent society. Because we are a different nation with a different set of philosophical principles, we can operate them only by having a Government of our own.

The speech of the right hon. Member for Chesterfield was, as ever, fascinating. I am extremely glad that in my parliamentary life I have bumped up against intellects such as his. He has strong views, but is always willing to listen to every other view and give an intellectual argument the utmost respect. He talked about what is essentially the English constitution. The Scottish constitutional position does not accord with it. I refer him to further research, particularly to Lord President Cooper's speech in the Court of Session in the 1953 case, McCormick v. Lord Advocate, in which he described Mr. Dicey as an extremely cynical individual. He pointed out that the Scottish constitutional view of the sovereignty of Parliament did not concur with that of Mr. Dicey, that we took an entirely different view and that we believed in the sovereignty of the people.

As the right hon. Gentleman delved into the democratic tradition of what he thought was Britain, he was drawing entirely upon the English experience. He was almost wholly ignorant of the Scottish contribution over a long period to the idea that the monarch should not be all-powerful and that the people themselves should be sovereign. The hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) quoted the declaration of Arbroath in 1320. He could have quoted the legal case when James VI was on the Scottish throne only and thought that he could not be taken to the King's court. The judges ruled that he was no different from anyone else and that if he had violated the law, he had to turn up in court and be judged like everyone else.

The great problem that I have with people such as the right hon. Member for Chesterfield is not that they are malicious--he is not, because he is in favour of home rule--but that when it comes to an essential interpretation of circumstances and power he, like many others, forgets about us altogether.

Mr. Benn : I do not want to disturb the courteous words that the hon. Gentleman is using and, as he knows, I am only half English. If he considers Tom Johnson's "History of the Scottish Working Class Movement", which he will no doubt know very well, he will discover similar traditions in England and in Scotland. Slavery existed in Scotland at one time. The hon. Gentleman may think that

Column 564

the Scots have been oppressed by the English, but England is the last colony of the British Empire. The Scots may get out of the system under which we are governed earlier than we do. The hon. Gentleman would do better to draw a parallel between our traditions rather than suggest that my speech should have been twice as long in order to consider the great contribution of the Scots.

Mr. Sillars : I am aware of the right hon. Gentleman's Paisley ancestry so he need not worry about that. I want to disabuse him of the idea that people like me think that the Scots have been oppressed by the English. That is not the case and I have not argued that for a single minute.

I believe that we are badly governed under the present system and that, in Scotland, principles of political policy that were born in England are visited upon us. They are not put upon us maliciously, but they are sometimes derived from ignorance, indifference or from the belief that that is the medicine that the Scots require. That is the message we got in the past 10 years of what is known as "Thatcherism"--people with a dependent mentality needed a strong dose of what came from Finchley.

Unfortunately, there is a difference of political philosophy north and south of the border. That does not mean that there are no radical traditions in England from which we have not learned, contributed towards or received contributions from. The rise of the trade union movement shows that there is no such thing as an artificial dividing line either within the United Kingdom or anywhere else. The Transport and General Workers Union has members in the Republic of Ireland, Malta, Gibraltar and elsewhere. I am not guilty of the implied charge made by the right hon. Member for Chesterfield.

Scotland faces a number of choices. The first is the status quo in which the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland believes. Another is devolution and then there is our policy of independence within the European Community. I shall not spend a lot of time on the status quo. It carries with it an alien philosophy which would never become the governing idea in an independent Scotland.

For the first time outside the parameters of the Scottish Constitutional Convention I shall concentrate on its option and subject it to critical analysis. That has to be done and I do not think that anybody in the convention would object to me doing so.

Mr. Stanbrook : Before the hon. Gentleman does that, will he explain what he means by Scottish independence within the European Community? The Scottish National party always qualifies independence in that way. The European Community exercises powers over the United Kingdom, so does the hon. Gentleman believe that an independent Scotland should accept the restrictions on sovereignty that now apply to the United Kingdom?

Mr. Sillars : Yes, we would have exactly the same status as the United Kingdom, Ireland, Denmark, France, Germany and the other member states. Both north and south of the border and in Northern Ireland and Wales, we are tied to the Community not constitutionally, but economically for trading purposes.

The Scottish Constitutional Convention suggests that a solution is possible within the context of the United Kingdom. The Scottish National party did not join that convention because it is not our policy. It would have been wrong of us to lend our weight to something in which we

Column 565

do not believe. We do not believe that it is correct to establish an assembly within the United Kingdom. We have said practically nothing about the convention policy until now because we felt that it was quite proper to allow the convention time to develop and debate its ideas, to produce a package and to promulgate it throughout Scotland. However, there comes a time when the ideas must be subjected to criticism by people who do not necessarily agree with them.

The first point, which is a constitutional one, will interest hon. Members from England. Can unilateral devolution be delivered by the House of Commons? I do not believe that it can. The decision will have to be made here by a majority of hon. Members from English constituencies and they are bound to ask "What is the cost to the English political system of Scottish devolution?" I bear in mind Enoch Powell's accurate definition of devolution--power and sovereignty retained in the House of Commons.

It has been suggested that if there were an assembly in Edinburgh only Scots would be able to deal with educational policy for Scotland. Fine, everyone can agree to that. But Scotland sends 72 Members of Parliament to this place and they vote on the education of the constituents of the right hon. Member for Brent, North. From the English point of view, there are constitutionally valid arguments against that, the most important being that it is profoundly undemocratic for me to claim that I can vote in my own back patch and then come here to impose my views on others. That is the unsolved problem which lies at the heart of the convention package.

Mr. David Trimble (Upper Bann) : The hon. Gentleman raises an important problem, but I remind him that it is not a new one. It was discussed at great length during the debates on the measures introduced for home rule for Ireland and then Ulster from 1886 to 1920. After discussing various options, a solution was adopted in the Government of Ireland Act 1920 which reduced representation roughly in proportion to the revenue raised by different institutions. Should the problem arise again there is no reason why a similar solution should not be adopted.

Mr. Sillars : I do not see that arithmetic has anything to do with the principle. For example, suppose the number of Scottish Members of Parliament were reduced from 72 to 50, the principle would remain the same. Let us consider a hypothetical position in which a Labour Government had a very slim majority in the House of Commons borrowed from hon. Members from Scotland. That Government would not have a majority within the English polity. Would the English accept or object to that scenario?

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Allan Stewart) : I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman, and does not heagree that he is putting to the House the West Lothian question, which, for more than a decade, the devolutionists have wholly failed to answer because, in the words of the right hon. Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Sir D. Steel), there is no answer?

Mr. Sillars : I do not believe that there is an answer. My complaint about the constitutional convention is that it has either asked that question in private, so that it does not have to answer it in public, or it has deliberately refused to

Column 566

ask it in private, so that it does not need to answer it in public. However, it will have to answer that question in the public debate which has now begun.

The position of the Secretary of State for Scotland in the Cabinet raises the same problem. If his powers were devolved to a Scottish assembly in Edinburgh, what function would he have inside the Cabinet? Would English Members be content with what they would regard as a disproportionate amount of influence being exercised by Scottish Members and the Secretary of State for Scotland? That is why I do not believe that the convention package can be delivered once it is subject to a line-by-line examination, even supposing such a Bill is ever introduced.

There are other problems, not so much of constitutional principle, but relating to the fact that constitutional power relates to the ability to run the country. Major problems arise out of the package as put forward. It is being sold north of the border as a powerful Scottish parliament, yet it is clear from the document that it would not have macro powers over the economy. There is talk of strategic economic authority, but it is a different matter when it comes to macro economic powers. They are not supposed to be assigned to the parliament in Edinburgh.

I have written to Canon Kenyon Wright, who has been in correspondence with the Prime Minister claiming that the Prime Minister has been unfair to the constitutional convention by suggesting that it might increase taxation in Scotland to an insupportable level. I wrote to Canon Kenyon Wright, who is the executive chairman of the constitutional convention, asking him the simple but important question whether the Scottish parliament as he proposes it would have unlimited additional taxation powers or would be capped. If he said that it would be capped by 1p, 2p or 3p, the Scottish people might believe that that was a price worth paying. We are entitled to an answer to that question.

There is a degree of dishonesty in the convention's document. It talks about the functions, powers and responsibilities of the Scottish parliament over fisheries and agriculture and claims that it would have a special role in the European Community. It says : "Scotland's parliament should establish a representative office in Brussels to facilitate relations between itself and the European Community institutions."

There is nothing new in that. The Italian ice cream manufacturers do it now. It goes on :

"There should be a statutory entitlement for Scotland's parliament and/or executive to be represented in United Kingdom ministerial delegations to the Council of Ministers."

Does that mean that the Scottish Minister from Edinburgh in the devolved parliament would go to Brussels with the United Kingdom Minister and cast a different vote from him? Would they cast a block vote of 10, or, when there was a difference of opinion, would they split the vote 7-3, 5-5 or 8-2? What would happen if there were a Labour Minister from north of the border and a Tory Minister from the United Kingdom Parliament? The proposition is made by fools or by people who are engaged in putting a fraudulent prospectus before the Scottish people.

Dr. Godman : I disagree with the hon. Gentleman on many points. In particular, I cannot accept his allegation that the genuine, decent and honourable people who formed the convention are dishonest. The only supporter the hon. Gentleman has in the House when he makes the claim of their fraudulent behaviour is the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, the hon. Member

Column 567

for Eastwood (Mr. Stewart), who wants the United Kingdom to remain as it is. Perhaps the convention has not solved to his own satisfaction the immense constitutional problems to which the hon. Member for Glasgow, Govan (Mr. Sillars) refers, but the only way in which those immense issues can be dealt with is by setting up an independent Scotland. I repeat, the people involved are not dishonest.

Mr. Sillars : I would not dream of calling, and would not be allowed to call, the hon. Gentleman dishonest. If the convention members have been sitting for two years and the best he can do is put in that plea for clemency--that these are extremely important issues which are difficult to resolve--one must reply that the convention was set up to resolve them. It was designed to analyse and take apart the problems and produce a solution to Scotland's problem. The hon. Gentleman is a member of the convention. Will he explain how we shall resolve the power equation in a joint delegation to the European Community when there is a fundamental difference of policy between Scottish and United Kingdom Ministers? Who will wield the 10 votes?

Dr. Godman : How would the hon. Gentleman solve the problem of the relationship between an independent Scotland--having got to that point--and the United Kingdom Parliament and constitution and the constitution of the European Community? His party ducks many questions concerning the position of an independent Scotland within the European Community.

Mr. Sillars : We are not ducking any questions. If we vote for our independence and the European Community is the democratic institution that it claims to be, it should acknowledge that declaration for member state status. I am amazed at the way in which the hon. Gentleman's mind works on this issue. I do not believe that there is anything fraudulent. I would describe them as nightmares based on nothing. Somehow he believes that the Scottish people, unlike everyone else in west and east Europe, have the mark of Cain on their foreheads, marking them as different, in terms of treatment, from everyone else.

The German Democratic Republic of 18 million people, who have never been in membership of the European Community and who were in a Marxist centralist state, can perhaps join, through the back door, with West Germany. Despite all the inherent problems for the Community and the GDR, that can happen without any problem. We can entertain Norway, Sweden, Austria and even Switzerland as potential member states of the Community, but for some reason, the 5 million of us north of the border are in a different category from everyone else, even though we present no problems, except for physically finding an extra seat at the table. We have been in the Community for almost 20 years. All the necessary adjustments have been made and there is no material constitutional problem on one side or the other. But the hon. Member for Greenock and Port Glasgow (Dr. Godman) finds that difficult to understand.

Dr. Godman : The hon. Gentleman is making a fascinating speech. I am perfectly willing, by the employment of a referendum, to put the three questions to the Scottish people : do we remain where we are within the

Column 568

United Kingdom? Do we go for the system put forward by the convention? Or do we ask the Scottish people to accept the SNP's conception of an independent Scotland? It seems that by the use of a referendum on such an immense constitutional question, we could follow the lead given by the young Irish Republic, which has sought to solve certain constitutional issues by the use of the referendum.

Mr. Sillars : One reason why we are not members of the constitutional convention is that we suggested at the negotiating meeting that there should be a three-way referendum. We asked not for a two-way referendum, because we recognised that the hon. Member for Eastwood (Mr. Stewart), though perhaps he represents a minority, was entitled to have his position tested. So we asked for a three-way referendum on the status quo, on the convention package and on independence in Europe.

The Labour party, led by the hon. Member for Glasgow, Garscadden (Mr. Dewar), rejected that, and the suggestion has been rejected time and again when it has been put by the leader of the SNP, my hon. Friend the Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond). I am pleased to hear that the hon. Member for Greenock and Port Glasgow does not agree with the leader of the Labour party in Scotland, the hon. Member for Garscadden.

The convention is propogating the idea of entrenchment and says in paragraph 2 :

"The Convention endorses the principle of entrenchment in relation to Scotland's parliament as regards its powers, the Scottish executive and Scotland's relationship with the United Kingdom Government and the European Community, in order that these would be incapable of being unilaterally amended at a later date by the Westminster Parliament."

I cannot think how one drafts a devolution Bill which, if it does not simultaneously alter the British constitution, taking away from this House what it always claims, which is that one Parliament cannot bind its successor, can entrench a Scottish Parliament. I have tried to do so ; I have had long and learned discussions with professors of constitutional law and have corresponded with lawyers from Oxford and Cambridge. None has come up with a solution.

I thought on one occasion that I had found the way, but in a single exchange of correspondence a lawyer--from, I think,

Cambridge--demolished my argument in its entirety. That lawyer pointed out, quite fairly, that if the British Parliament could be persuaded to shift what is regarded as the cornerstone of its operations--the principle that one Parliament cannot bind another--a solution might be possible ; such a shift is, however, a prerequisite.

Arguments are advanced by people who are too simple to understand the nature of the problem or who are--I use this term

advisedly--exercising a deliberate fraud on the people of Scotland.

Mr. Allan Stewart : I disagree with the hon. Gentleman's prescription for an independent Scotland ; however, it is significant that I, a Minister, have yet to find anyone who disagrees with his essential proposition that the entrenchment proposals are not deliverable.

Mr. Sillars : Given the party-political nature of the cockfight taking place in Scotland, my problem is that if I agree with the hon. Gentleman, or if he agrees with me, we are both damned by others--and the hon. Member for

Column 569

Greenock and Port Glasgow had better be careful about agreeing with me, because he could well be damned by internal elements. This is, however, a civilised discussion, and it is true that the problem could not be resolved when it was last debated in the House. The debate continued to dominate the Floor of the House for nearly two years : we debated the so-called West Lothian question, along with the entrenchment question. I do not believe that a solution is possible.

The people of Scotland have a choice. If they wish, they can continue as they are. The right hon. Member for Brent, North said that if something was working it should not be changed. The political system in Scotland is manifestly not working, for there is deep disillusionment, great unhappiness and a lot of anger boiling away in Scottish society. We believe that we are now being governed by an English Tory Government, and the system must change.

At the coming general election, the choice to which I referred must be between the position of the unionists--that of the Parliamentary Under- Secretary of State and others in the Scottish Tory party who say that there should be no significant legislative constitutional change--and that of the Scottish National party, which says that Scottish people must face up to their responsibility for what has happened to their country, and accept that responsibility through independence.

11.43 am

Mr. Graham Riddick (Colne Valley) : Before tackling one of the issues raised by the hon. Member for Glasgow, Govan (Mr. Sillars), let me touch on some of the remarks of the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn).

The right hon. Gentleman said that the leader of the National Union of Mineworkers, Arthur Scargill, was a strong believer in proportional representation and that Mr. Scargill thought that a policy or proposal should be supported by at least 50 per cent. of the membership before being enacted. I tried, without success, to intervene. That is no criticism of the right hon. Gentleman ; I merely wish to ask why, in 1985, the same Mr. Scargill refused to ballot the entire membership of the NUM on whether a strike should be called. I do not know what the right hon. Gentleman's response would have been had I put that question.

The right hon. Gentleman pointed out that new Members do not take an oath-- as we would in a court of law--to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Perhaps that is just as well for the newly elected Member of Parliament for Monmouth, who has told a number of untruths during his campaign. For instance, he has said quite baldly that the local hospital is to opt out of the national health service. That is simply not true.

Mr. David Nicholson (Taunton) : I hope that my hon. Friend will not be too hard on the prospective hon. Member for Monmouth, who is not alone in telling such "untruths". The same thing is being said by the bulk of the Labour party--and, I believe, by sections of the Liberal party that are resisting the establishment of NHS trusts, in my constituency and others. My hon. Friend should not be too hard on our poor new colleague.

Column 570

Madam Deputy Speaker : Order. This is a wide-ranging debate, but I hope that the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) will relate his remarks more closely to what is one the order paper.

Mr. Riddick : Of course, I take your comments on board, Madam Deputy Speaker. My comments related to the oath that new Members of Parliament must take, but I am none the less grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton (Mr. Nicholson), who has made his own point very well.

The fact is, however, that Labour politicians have been going round misleading members of the public about this issue. First, no decision has been made in Monmouth

Madam Deputy Speaker : Order. I called the hon. Gentleman to order only a few moments ago. I hope that I shall not have to do so again ; I am sure that he will now relate his remarks to the oath taken by Members of Parliament, which is, I believe, what he was attempting to talk about.

Mr. Riddick : Again, Madam Deputy Speaker, I take that point on board. I simply wanted to ensure that the record was put straight. Given the intervention of my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton and my own earlier comments, however, I think that enough has been said to ensure that the record will show the extent to which the public have been misled.

I rather agree with the hon. Member for Govan. There are, I think, many attractions in the idea of some form of Scottish assembly. The hon. Gentleman would go further ; he is calling for independence within the European Community. But many Opposition Members want a Scottish assembly-- indeed, it is official Labour policy. As an English Member of Parliament, I do not think that that is a bad idea. First, Scottish Members of Parliament are grossly over-represented in the House, as the hon. Member for Govan has already pointed out. Some of us rather resent that. If we take the population of Scotland as a basis, Scotland should have between 40 and 50 Members of Parliament. As the hon. Gentleman says, at some stage in the future--although not, I hope, for some time--a Labour Government may be in power simply by virtue of those extra seats. Secondly, the Scottish people enjoy a higher level of spending per capita than the English. That is hard to justify. Giving Scotland some form of self-government would provide an opportunity for that imbalance to be reversed.

Finally--I am afraid that this is a rather blatant point--if they had some form of regional assembly the people of Scotland would experience a dose of socialism. If the opinion polls are to be believed--I see no reason why they should not be--the Labour party would probably win a majority in such an assembly ; and, as history shows, whenever the British people have any experience of socialism, they reject it decisively at the next general election. I have no doubt that that would happen in Scotland--and, what is more, more Conservative Members would then be sent to the House of Comons, notwithstanding the fact that there would be fewer Scottish Members in total.

Having said that, let me add that I do not believe that a regional assembly would be good for Scotland. It would result in higher taxes and more bureaucracy. I am surprised at the hon. Member for Govan : he seems almost

Column 571

to want to be swallowed up by the European Community, with which Scotland's ties are surely far less secure than are its ties with England. Scotland has long-standing historical ties with England, which have stood the test of time and, surely, have done Scotland more good than ties with the Community could possibly do.

Mr. Sillars : I do not understand the logic of the hon. Gentleman's argument that Scotland should remain tied to the European Community through the United Kingdom, but should not be so tied through its own independent Government. The logic escapes me.

Mr. Riddick : The fact is that this Parliament and this country have far more power and influence, because it is one of the major players on the European scene, than Scotland would have if it were one of the smaller countries in the European Community. The hon. Gentleman cannot deny that Germany, France and the United Kingdom are the big players on the European scene. That is because we are the largest industrial nations and have the largest populations.

Dr. Godman : May I point out to the hon. Gentleman that for the vast majority of the people in the Irish Republic, being under the shadow of Brussels is a much better prospect than being under the shadow of London?

Mr. Riddick : That is not an option. The Republic of Ireland has had its independence for 70 years or so. That point is irrelevant in the context of this debate.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) on initiating this interesting debate. He referred to the history of the last 25 years and to the result of a MORI poll that suggested that the British people are desperate for constitutional change. However, during the course of his congenial speech he failed to spell out how the specific changes that he wishes would be introduced. The hon. Gentleman mentioned the need for regional assemblies, for a freedom of information Act and for proportional representation, but he also has a responsibility to tell the House just how he would introduce them and what form of proportional representation his party wants to introduce. That would have been helpful, but we did not get it. The truth is that his party advocates proportional representation because it believes it to be the surest way to get a taste of power.

It is revealing that the right hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Dr. Owen), Lord Jenkins of Hillhead, Shirley Williams and others--and perhaps, for all I know, the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan)--showed little interest in proportional representation when they were members of the Labour party, but they showed great interest in it once they switched parties and became part of the alliance. It was not always thus.

The report of Mr. Speaker's conference in 1916-17 unanimously concluded that proportional representation, or the single transferable vote form of proportional representation, should be introduced on an experimental basis in one third of constituencies. One comment that I read was that there could be no doubt that PR would have been carried at that time, if the Government had

Column 572

supported it. Lloyd George's Cabinet, however, adopted a position of neutrality and the House of Commons delivered a verdict against PR on a free vote.

Mr. Trimble : The hon. Gentleman is aware that flowing from the recommendation that he mentioned, proportional

representation--particularly the single transferable vote form of proportional representation--was introduced and legislated for by this Parliament in the Government of Ireland Act 1920 and that consequently it went into operation both for local government and parliamentary elections in both Irish jurisdictions that were created by virtue of the Government of Ireland Act. Consequently it survives, although it is regarded as very much of a mixed blessing.

Mr. Riddick : I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman is advocating PR and suggesting that that was the right or the wrong thing to have happened, but the Liberal Government of the time did not believe it to be appropriate to support the case for PR in England. It is interesting that a contemporary observer noted how Asquith

"while lucidly defending the desirability of a valuable experiment was at least as lucid in explaining its unsuitability to the county of Fife, his own constituency."

The Liberal party's interest in PR has increased as its own electoral fortunes have decreased.

Mr. Maclennan : This is a point which is often wrongly made. Does not the hon. Gentleman recognise that the case for proportional representation relates to the extent to which the voting system results in disproportionate representation in the House of Commons? At the time that he spoke about and until relatively recently--the last 15 years--the votes cast in the country were broadly reflected in the proportion of Members sitting in this House.

Mr. Riddick : In response to the hon. Gentleman's point, let me refer to what Lloyd George said shortly after he had lost power : "Someone ought to have come to me in 1918 and gone into the whole matter. I was not converted then. I could have carried it when I was Prime Minister. I am afraid it is too late now."

He saw clearly that PR would have been the way to give the Liberals the chance to stay in power.

Mr. Simon Burns (Chelmsford) : Is my hon. Friend aware that one of the parish councils in the constituency of the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Bellotti) consists 100 per cent. of Liberal Democrat members? Does my hon. Friend think that the individual members of that parish council would be, for their own purposes, in favour of proportional representation?

Mr. Riddick : I understand my hon. Friend's point. I am afraid that I know none of those parish councillors, but there is a fair chance that they may be having second thoughts about proportional representation. The fact is that PR gives power to the minority parties.

After the general election in 1987, the Conservative party polled about 43 per cent., the Labour party 31 per cent. and the Liberal Democrats 23 per cent. Having negotiated in smoke-filled rooms behind closed doors in the bowels of this building, the Liberal Democrats, with proportional representation, could have come to an agreement with the Labour party that the Liberal Democrats would support a Labour Government.

Column 573

Therefore a minority Labour Government could have come to power, which I believe would have flouted the wishes of the British people.

Mr. Burns : Does my hon. Friend agree that in the case of Israel the vast majority of the people there have voted either for the Likud party or for the Labour party, yet the democratic wishes of the electorate are being thwarted because a very small number of members of the Knesset, members of minority parties, are using their unrepresentative power to dictate to the people of Israel what sort of Government should govern them?

Mr. Riddick : My hon. Friend must have had a prior look at my notes. That was the very point that I was going to make. It is true that in some cases, and Israel is a classic case, very small minority parties are given enormous power--I would say disproportionate power. That in itself can tie the hands of the majority party. Either that can happen or, alternatively, chaos reigns. Italy is now on to its 30th, 40th or 50th Government since the last war. That is no recipe for good government.

The other possibility with proportional representation is a weak coalition Government, in which the weakest--the lowest common denominator--decide Government policy. That is because consensus has to be reached. I believe, therefore, that weak government could come about. The call for PR is all about power. One is entitled to ask how the specific party that stands to gain most from the introduction of PR would perform if it were introduced in this country. We have already had a taste of that--the infamous Lib-Lab pact in the 1970s, which was an example of a weak coalition Government. The Lib-Lab pact was a shabby affair intended to keep a discredited Government in power and to give the Liberal party a taste of power. What did the Liberals achieve? Did the right hon. Member for Tweedale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Sir D. Steel) stop the Labour Government nationalising the shipbuilding and aircraft industries? Did he reverse the closed shop legislation forcing 7 million or 8 million people to join trade unions when many did not wish to do so? Did the Liberals reverse the Education Act 1976, the provisions of which forced local authorities to turn schools into comprehensives? Did they stop the Labour Government cutting capital spending on new hospitals by 30 per cent? Did they stop the defence budget being slashed by £2.5 billion? The answer to those questions is no.

Mr. Trimble : I am a little confused. I thought that the hon. Gentleman was arguing that proportional representation gave disproportionate power to minority parties. How does he reconcile that with what he is saying?

Mr. Riddick : The obvious answer is simple : the Liberal party kept the Labour party in power. If that is not disproportionate, I do not know what is. We desperately needed a general election in 1977 so that my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) and the Conservatives could take office and tackle some of the fundamental problems that we have now tackled.

Mr. John Bowis (Battersea) : Is my hon. Friend aware of the more recent example of the Liberal party keeping the Labour party in power in the London borough of Brent? The Liberals have supported that tyrannical regime, to the detriment of people of the borough. It was not until two Labour Members had the courage to resign that the people of the borough were rescued.

Column 574

Mr. Riddick : I am grateful for the point. Until last year, Kirklees council was hung. The Liberals refused to do a deal with the Conservatives to remove the Labour party. Nine times out of 10, they voted with Labour.

Next Section

Home Page