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Welfare of Pigs
Mr. Chris Mullin accordingly presented a Bill to make provision with respect to the health and welfare of pigs: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time on Friday 12 December, and to be printed [Bill 91].
Mr. Mullin:
Friday 12 December--my 50th birthday, Madam Speaker.
Madam Speaker:
Friday 12 December--I hope that I shall be there to wish the hon. Gentleman many happy returns.
Orders of the Day
Greater London Authority (Referendum) Bill
Order for Third Reading read.
Madam Speaker:
I have selected the amendment standing in the name of the Leader of the Opposition.
3.47 pm
The Minister for London and Construction (Mr. Nick Raynsford): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
This Government were elected on a clear manifesto commitment that, following a referendum to confirm popular demand, they would establish a new deal for London: a Greater London authority made up of a directly elected mayor and an elected assembly. We made that commitment because we believe that London deserves better--better than having its democratic institutions summarily abolished, better than the shabby mish-mash of unaccountable quangos and committees that were set up by the previous Government in place of a democratic citywide authority, better than to be left with no effective, democratically accountable voice for 11 years.
We share with the people of London a desire to put things right and to give them back a democratic voice that will provide strategic leadership--something that the people of London should never have been denied. However, we see no benefit in simply looking back and trying to create what once was. What we propose will be different from the sort of institution that might have been appropriate to the London of the 1880s or the 1960s--that is inevitable.
We are proposing a new democratic settlement for London, one capable of taking our capital into the next millennium. That is why we believe that London needs a mayor, directly elected by and personally accountable to its people. We believe that such a figure would reinvigorate local democracy, and provide strong leadership across the capital.
We believe that London also needs an elected assembly, to question and scrutinise the mayor, holding him or her to account; to advise on London's needs and priorities; and to scrutinise the use of public funds across the capital.
Together, the mayor and the assembly will make up a new Greater London authority, which will be capable of commanding the support and respect of the whole of London.
What we are proposing is innovative, and I recognise that change and innovation are unsettling to some. I warned on Monday of the constitutional conservatives in all parties who may seek to oppose our proposals because they find them challenging--perhaps they are scared of change, or perhaps they want simply to preserve the status quo.
We have heard a lot of cant from the Opposition about the need for two questions, and not for the first time. We have explained our position patiently and repeatedly, on Second Reading, in Committee and yesterday in answer to a parliamentary question from the hon. Member
for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow). If necessary, I shall do so again now. I am sure that, yet again, our opponents will pretend not to listen.
We made it clear in the manifesto that we would offer the people of London proposals for a mayor and an assembly, both directly elected. We promised that we would offer our proposals to the people of London in a referendum, to seek their consent to what we proposed. We did not promise pick and mix. We did not promise it in the manifesto, and we are not promising it now.
To make matters easier to understand, I shall set out the reasons why I believe that our approach is right. A referendum is all about getting a clear mandate for change. It is not an opinion poll. There are at least five permutations on the subject of mayor and assembly: first, the proposition that there might be a mayor plus an assembly, both separately elected; secondly, the suggestion that there might be a mayor alone; thirdly, the proposition that there might be an assembly alone, without a mayor; fourthly, that there might be a mayor, together with an assembly made up of borough leaders; and fifthly, that there might be a mayor elected from among the members of the assembly.
Mr. Simon Hughes (Southwark, North and Bermondsey):
The Minister is proceeding carefully, and we are grateful for that. However, I challenge him on his five options. I am not aware that anyone has proposed the option that he describes as an assembly without a mayor. No one has proposed that there should not be a leader of the assembly, who would be called a mayor. An assembly without a separate mayor has been proposed, but no one is proposing that London should not have a leader.
Mr. Raynsford:
The hon. Gentleman is obviously unaware of what is going on in his own party, many of whose submissions specifically called for an assembly, but not for a mayor. That is precisely my point. If he wishes to argue that point, he may do so, but he is arguing against the evidence. There is a range of options and a range of different formulations. He is compounding the problem by identifying the number of different possible permutations of different options.
No doubt there are Liberal Democrats who would have no leader at all, and others who would have leaders elected on a job-share basis. No doubt there are others who would have leaders elected for a short term, and replaced--rotating leadership. I have no doubt about the ingenuity of the Liberal Democrat party in terms of constitutional devices. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will tell us what his colleagues favour.
Mr. Hughes:
The Minister is being mischievous. He knows perfectly well that no one is suggesting that there should be an assembly without a mayor as part of the assembly, and opposing a separately elected mayor. That reduces his list of five questions to four. From all the reading that I have done, no one to my knowledge has submitted a proposal for any of the other fanciful and fantastic suggestions that he made. Perhaps they come from his own fevered mind.
Mr. Raynsford:
Experience of the representatives of the hon. Gentleman's party over many years bears out the truth of what I am telling him. There have been specific
How can all those options be reflected in two questions? They cannot; there is no possible second question. There is a variety of possible additional questions--second, third, fourth and fifth. The leader of Wandsworth council has proposed seven or perhaps 11 questions. There are many different additional options, but there is no single alternative second question.
Mr. Eric Pickles (Brentwood and Ongar):
How does the hon. Gentleman reconcile those comments with what he said on Monday? He stated:
Mr. Raynsford:
The hon. Gentleman was obviously not listening on Monday, and he is not listening now. I repeat, for his benefit, that we are not being dogmatic. We are approaching the issue in an extremely pragmatic and sensible way. No formulation can provide a single second option that encompasses the range of different possibilities for which hon. Members have argued.
The Conservative party advocated a framework that included two questions: first, should there be a mayor; and, secondly, should there be an assembly? Those questions clearly did not satisfy the Liberal Democrats, who wanted the formulation to include another question: should there be a mayor elected as a member of the assembly? That framework also does not satisfy the Conservatives' subsequent position that the mayor should work within an assembly comprising borough leaders. The hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles), through his question, illustrates precisely the point that I made on Monday--to which he did not listen then--and which I repeat now. I see that the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Sir N. Fowler) is becoming impatient, so I shall give way.
Sir Norman Fowler (Sutton Coldfield):
The Minister made his comments in response to an intervention from me. I suggested that there was no formulation of two questions that he would accept. On Monday, the Minister said that I was wrong, but he has now confirmed that I was correct.
Mr. Raynsford:
The right hon. Gentleman suggested on Monday that the Government are implacably opposed to two questions. We are not: we are being pragmatic. I told him--I advise him to think about this--that we would be interested to see any formulation that covers those eventualities. The right hon. Gentleman did not advance such a proposal on Monday, and no such formulation appears on today's Order Paper. That reveals the hypocrisy of his position. He claims to support the
"The Government are pragmatic and not dogmatic about the matter. We said that we believe that a single question is correct and proper, but we consulted and listened to people's views."--[Official Report, 24 November 1997; Vol. 301, c. 682.]
The Minister has now ruled out such consultation.
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