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Mr. Simon Hughes: The hon. Gentleman puts a perfectly reasonable case, and I accept his good faith. I hope that he accepts that the argument--put differently by different parties--for having two questions on the central issue of structure is that the proposal in the Labour manifesto concerned the structure. The structure includes the novelty of a directly elected mayor. Matters such as tax-varying powers can be dealt with when we examine the Bill next year. Those views are put in equally good faith and I am sure that he accepts that there is an equally valid argument for them and for having two questions rather than one.
Mr. Twigg: I respect that, but the Liberal Democrat reasoned amendment suggested that three areas could be the subject for questions. The hon. Gentleman has, in good faith, argued that revenue-raising powers for the assembly are a major question that could be put to the people in a referendum. We must strike a balance. In Britain, the referendum is a constitutional novelty: it is not a device used often and we are still feeling our way. It is better to have had a proper debate in the run-up to the general election, which is what started the Green Paper process, continuing through to the publication of the White Paper in the spring. We shall then have a vote on the principle of what the Government seek, and assuming a yes vote, we can then have a full and proper deliberative discussion in this House and in the other place on the legislation.
I warmly welcome the new approach outlined in the Green Paper to the governance of our capital city. It is based on the principles of partnership, participation and building consensus. If the Greater London authority is to succeed, it must seek to involve and consult all the interests that make up our great capital city. In the consultation process, the importance of the voice of business and industry in London being heard loud and clear was frequently raised, building on the excellent work of organisations such as London First and the London Pride partnership.
Finally, but most important, it is vital that the assembly and the mayor enjoy democratic legitimacy. They must be a genuine democratic voice for the people of London. I should be grateful if my hon. Friend the Minister for Transport in London could tell us in her reply, in so far as she can, about the broad responses of individuals and organisations to questions about electoral issues and, in particular, how the mayor and assembly will be elected. There is widespread concern in all parties on that. On this, I agree with the remarks of the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey. It is crucial that both
the mayor and the assembly enjoy democratic credibility. That means that the mayor must have the clear support of a majority of those voting. The best way to achieve that is the alternative vote system. That must mean an assembly based on fair voting principles. We cannot have an assembly dominated by any one party, even my own. I hope and trust that the Government will listen to the concerns of people of all parties and none, and will adopt a system that will deliver the democratic and reasonable outcomes that I mentioned.
Mr. John Wilkinson (Ruislip-Northwood):
It is difficult to do justice to the important theme that is fundamental to this debate after a maiden speech of such eloquence as that of the hon. Member for Ealing, North (Mr. Pound) and after the memorable maiden speeches of the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Mr. Casale) and my hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge (Mr. Randall). I hope that the hon. Member for Wimbledon will not regard it as invidious if I do not follow his remarks but concentrate on those of my two geographic parliamentary neighbours.
I was delighted that the hon. Member for Ealing, North mentioned the gallant Poles, many of whom reside in his constituency, who fought at RAF Northolt and helped to win the battle of Britain. It is appropriate that he should have commemorated them on Remembrance day eve, as it was appropriate for my hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge to remind us that the headquarters of 11 Group RAF Uxbridge, which was commanded by Air Vice-Marshal Park, was at the heart of the Battle of Britain. The continuing service that the Royal Air Force provides our country, and the contribution that it makes to the borough of Hillingdon--where we both have the honour of serving as Members of Parliament--is treasured by all the people of Hillingdon.
Hon. Members will have been struck by the sturdy and admirable qualities of my hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge, which made him such a worthy winner of the by-election: his commitment to local people, the love of his country and his warm appreciation, which we all shared, of his fine predecessor, Sir Michael Shersby, who so sadly died almost immediately after the general election in which my hon. Friend played such a crucial part as his constituency chairman and agent.
I found it surprising that the Minister did not mention two issues that, for my outer London constituents at least, are at the forefront of their local concerns: public transport and the environment, about which my constituents and those of my hon. Friend for Uxbridge care most profoundly. Perhaps it was understandable that the Minister did not mention public transport. On the doorstep, Labour canvassers said that come 2 May, were we to have a Labour Government, the London
Underground system would be put right, there would soon be a directly elected London assembly and mayor responsible for it and the delays, constant fare rises above the level of inflation and inadequacies of the system would be addressed. We wait and see. All that I and my constituents know is that fares are to rise by well above the rate of inflation in the new year, the Government have announced no concrete plans to improve the London Underground transport system, and there are no concrete proposals about exactly how the mayor and the directly elected assembly are going to work hand in glove with the new investors in the system, if there are any, or with the Department of Transport, if it is to have a residual oversight role.
On the environment, there is a constant battle throughout London to preserve the few open spaces and patches of green belt that remain. In my constituency, as in that of my hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge, there has been a malign campaign by the socialist local authority--I say socialist advisedly, because that is how it behaves--to build social housing in areas that are utterly inappropriate for residential development and against the wishes of, I would say, 99.9 per cent. of local residents.
The Greater London assembly, if it is elected, is to have responsibility for structure plans that will set the overall pattern within which the development of Greater London is to take place, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Sir S. Chapman) made clear so admirably, it is uncertain how planning issues will be resolved.
We know from the consultation document that the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions will have ultimate appellate powers, but will the Greater London assembly arrogate to itself functions beyond structure plans? Will it, too, want to supervise and second-guess the judgments of the boroughs? Will the playing fields, public open spaces and the few patches of green belt that remain be better preserved under the Greater London assembly than they are today or not? That is what my constituents want to know, and they have their doubts because they remember what life was like under the GLC.
Mr. Raynsford:
If the hon. Gentleman looks at Hansard tomorrow, he will see that I referred to transport and the environment. I would not want him to think that I did not refer to those issues. I assure him that the Government are utterly committed to protecting green spaces, particularly in the urban area where they are so precious. We are also committed to improving the public transport system to ensure that there is a better service for the people of London.
Mr. Wilkinson:
I am grateful to the Minister. Perhaps those references were so cursory that they passed me by, or perhaps I was inattentive. I will take heart particularly if his Department will, as a consequence of his expression of good will, postpone the planning inquiry into the proposed Field End road recreation ground development from 6 to 9 January to a date more convenient to my constituents in March. I should be grateful if the Minister could consider that.
The hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr. Twigg) referred to a speech of mine on the Local Government Bill, which abolished the GLC. I hate to quote my own
speeches, but it is important to do so because, then, I urged my party to be utterly democratic in its approach. I urge it to be just the same today. If the referendum so decides that there should be a directly elected assembly, I would wish our party whole-heartedly to embrace it.
On Third Reading of the Local Government Bill, I voted against my Government because I thought that there was a need for some streamlined overall, elected, strategic authority for London. I asked:
One must recognise that borough leaders or senior members of borough councils are extremely busy individuals. Their time is fully occupied meeting their responsibilities on behalf of their borough electorates. I do not believe that they would have the time to go to Westminster guildhall or wherever the new assembly may be located. They should be doing their own job for their constituents in their own boroughs. One should also remember that they are part-time councillors with professions of their own; they have other things to do rather than spend their whole time in traffic jams or on the tube travelling to London assembly meetings.
I speak personally when I say that we should support a directly elected assembly. How should that assembly be constituted? I suggest that it should be based on 32 or 33 seats, including the City of London--32 is one of the numbers postulated in the consultation paper, and there are 32 London boroughs. I would have one representative per borough because a territorial connection is at the heart of our democracy in this country. On a strategic authority we need to have representatives who will fight for the interests of their local electorates. That is what truly counts.
The Minister spoke about accountability. Elected representatives are brought to account if constituents know who their representatives are and recognise that those representatives are fighting for the things that they, the voters, care about. The trouble is that what the Government propose is all part of their greater scheme for constitutional change. The mayoralty is not the normal British kind of mayor; the example cited by the Minister was that of New York.
The consultation document poses the question,
My fear for the mayoralty of Greater London is that it will be a platform for a big ego rather than the kind of office to which a public servant who is more dedicated to the traditions of municipal service might aspire. There must be a careful balance between the need to create an image for London as a whole--which will promote it as a centre of investment and enterprise--and excessive posturing, publicity seeking and personal photo opportunities, and so on.
According to the slimmed-down consultation document, the mayor should "make things happen". The GLC made things happen and it spent an awful lot of money on all sorts of weird activities that were way outside its remit as a London assembly. It encouraged many kinds of third-world activities. Unless the powers of the mayoralty are closely drawn, that kind of extravagance could happen again.
That is why I believe that it is important that the mayor should be kept under control by a directly elected assembly, elected by a system which our people comprehend and with which they are familiar. Instead, in all likelihood, the Government are proposing, if the Local Government Commission does the work of which the Liberals would approve, a system much more akin to the model for the European Parliament. It is all part of the exercise to change the fundamental governance of our country in line with European practices. That would thereby diminish the traditional authority of Parliament and the elected Government of the United Kingdom. As the Liberal spokesman, the hon Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) has said, the idea of an assembly and a mayor is a prototype, part of the greater design for regional government for England. We Londoners would be used as guinea pigs in an expensive experiment in constitutional change of a dangerous sort.
I turn to the question of timing--in politics, timing is all, and it is significant to analyse why the Labour Government want to hold the referendum on the same day as the local government elections. I suspect that the first reason is that they wish to maximise turnout. In a referendum of such significance as this one, there ought to be a qualifying majority, just as there is in normal referendums involving constitutional change. It was, of course, on the matter of a qualifying majority that the referendums for devolution in Scotland and in Wales failed in the late 1970s, at the end of the Callaghan Government: the turnout did not meet the qualifying figure. After what happened in Wales, where only 25 per cent. of the electorate voted for a devolved Assembly, it is little wonder that the Labour Government do not want a qualifying majority for the London referendum.
We are to have a referendum campaign that is coterminous with the local election campaign in London. Local elections are of the greatest importance to Londoners, in that they happen only once every four years. In other parts of the country subject to district councils, a third of the council is turned over every year and there are various other systems; but in London those elections happen every four years.
"why should this party"--
the Conservative party--
"be afraid of democracy and of the ballot box?"--[Official Report, 28 March 1985; Vol. 76, c. 751.]
There should be a directly elected, strategic assembly for London. I do not believe that delegated representatives of the London boroughs are the right people to fulfil that overall strategic function in support of the mayor. Why do I think that? For party political reasons, I believe that the Conservative party should be embracing whole-heartedly every opportunity to field candidates against the Government. It is by winning elections at every level--and by demonstrating, after we have won a few, that Conservative candidates are the ones to be trusted to look after their constituents' interests, not to waste people's money, and to work harmoniously at every level--that the Conservative party will win back support. It is by a proven track record of democratic success that we will steadily gain to the point whereby the party restores itself and regains power at national level.
"What would the Mayor and Assembly do?"
According to that document, the mayor must be modern. I am not quite sure what it means--perhaps that the person should be without flummery and trappings.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Brooke) and I know, however, that the mayor of the City of London does a first-rate job as a traditional mayor. He travels the world on behalf of the City and corporation of London and he is invaluable in reinforcing its role as the financial centre of the world.
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