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Mr. Martin Linton (Battersea): Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. MacGregor: I ought not to give way because of the time factor and the 10-minute limit. Many Members on both sides of the House want to speak.
I want to discuss the great virtues of the first-past-the-post system because they were not touched on at all--inevitably, because of the way in which the terms of reference were drawn up--by the Jenkins commission, and they probably have not featured strongly enough in the debate so far. First, I emphasise the importance of the direct constituency link, which is one of the great virtues of the British system. The experience of all of us who have been Members of the House for some time is that the longer we are Members, the more we understand the virtues of that direct constituency link. It brings to Members of Parliament awareness of a range of issues, and awareness of what people in the country feel, so we are much better informed than others.
During the many years in which I was negotiating on behalf of this country at various European Councils of Ministers--particularly in the Agriculture Council, where we waited, frequently late at night, as the presidency went round all the individual Ministers to reach some consensus--there were many hours in which Ministers had nothing to do. I dictated constituency correspondence into my tape machine. I was often away for a week at a time, and I knew that I would not catch up when I got back, so I dealt with correspondence then.
The interesting point was that many colleagues came to ask me what I was doing. I explained that I was dealing with a range of issues that affected my constituents. They said, "We don't have to worry about any of that because we have the proportional representation system." I asked how often they went to their constituencies and how many meetings they addressed. Their approach is vastly different from ours. I have always thought that the constituency link is one of the greatest virtues of the British system, but we will lose that entirely if we use for Westminster elections the system that we use for the European Parliament.
Mrs. Anne Campbell (Cambridge):
Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. MacGregor:
I fear I cannot, because of the time constraint.
That point was tellingly made recently in a leader in The Daily Telegraph, which said that meaningful representation in a democracy can be established only by the direct link between the Member and his constituents. I believe that that is right, and we would lose that link at our peril.
Secondly, electoral systems other than first past the post involve the danger of increasing the power of the party at the centre. My right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire has quoted the Jenkins report and, as it went round the country, the commission discovered near-unanimous distrust of any electoral system that increases the power of the party machines.
Mr. William Ross (East Londonderry):
Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. MacGregor:
On the Jenkins report?
Mr. Ross:
No, on the increase of the power of the party at the centre.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst):
Order. We cannot have conversations going on in that way. If the hon. Member for East Londonderry (Mr. Ross) wants to speak, he should make a proper intervention.
Mr. MacGregor:
I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I should not have allowed an intervention in that way.
The systems that we have seen--for example, in the European Parliament elections--increase the power of the party at the centre. The system that the Labour party has chosen has greatly increased its power over who stands as candidates in elections. We have therefore moved to a position in which MEPs at the top of the list can remain at the top of the list provided that they keep their noses clean with the party bosses at the centre. That means that many of them will pay much less attention to what their constituents say. Given the size of their constituencies, it is almost impossible for them to pay attention to their constituents. The East Anglia constituency, for example, covers 56 parliamentary constituencies.
The other great virtue of first past the post is that it usually gives a clear outcome in the form of a Government committed to their manifesto. Having been in this House for 25 years, and the more I study other systems and meet representatives from other Parliaments, I feel passionately that the constituency link that first past the post provides is one of our great assets and we should not reject it.
There are numerous other criticisms of proportional representation, but my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire mentioned them, so I need not elaborate. For example, a party that comes fourth in the table of electoral success has a key stake in the Government. Proportional representation also produces two classes of Members of Parliament, about which we shall hear more and more in the Scottish Parliament. We do not want that in Westminster.
The Jenkins report shows that a step needs to be taken to make our system fairer. It demonstrates that the effect of the current boundaries is such that equality of votes between the two main parties, Conservative and Labour, at the last election would still have produced a Labour
majority of 76. The Conservatives would have had to have a lead of 6.5 per cent. to get an equal number of seats. That cannot be a fair way of handling first past the post.
There is clearly a big bias in the current system. The boundary commission should be asked urgently to look at the boundaries again, with a view to eliminating that bias. I do not expect the present Government to do that. We all remember how Mr. Callaghan, when he was Home Secretary, gerrymandered the Greater London council elections. Nevertheless, the Conservative party should do it, because it is the only unfairness in the operation of our first-past-the-post system.
Mr. Linton:
The reason for that bias is entirely to do with tactical voting. It has nothing to do with how the boundaries are drawn.
Mr. MacGregor:
The Jenkins commission accepted that analysis, and made it clear that it thought that there was a bias in the system. Therefore I believe that the boundary commission should look at the matter.
As we said in last year's debate, the Jenkins report produced the worst of all worlds. It not only produced a system that has never been tried anywhere else but advocated focusing mainly on the alternative voting system, despite the fact that, in a chapter on that system, it outlined all the defects. In order to overcome those, it also produced a topping-up system, which presents a number of other dangers and difficulties. It is clear from the criticisms that have been made that that is not an attractive alternative; yet the Jenkins commission rejected all the other alternatives and produced cogent arguments for doing so.
First past the post operates in 62 countries and covers half the world's electorates. It has been tried and tested in the United Kingdom. We should not give up the huge virtues of the constituency link in the British system. The Prime Minister said today that he would listen to the debate. It is clear from the debate so far that there is no contest. We should keep first past the post for Westminster and make that clear now. We should not engage in a referendum, which, given the complexities of the Jenkins proposals, would simply confuse and probably lead to a low turnout.
Mr. Hilary Benn (Leeds, Central):
I rise with some trepidation, as I am sure is customary among Members making maiden speeches. There is, however, nothing customary in what I wish to say about my predecessor, Derek Fatchett. His tragic death just six weeks ago left us all the poorer. His family lost a much-loved husband and father; the House lost a fine parliamentarian;
Derek served his constituents with passion and with distinction. People liked him as well as respected him. That is why his passing is still deeply felt by many, and why he is and will be greatly missed by all who knew him. As the new Member, I am proud to serve the constituency that he served.
Over the years, the strength of the city of Leeds and the source of its prosperity have been both its diversity and its capacity to change with the times. That diversity is reflected in the constituency. Starting from the north, it covers two universities and two hospitals,"Jimmy's" and the Leeds general infirmary. It takes in the West Yorkshire playhouse. It then runs down across a thriving city centre, and on to a large area of manufacturing--to Holbeck, Hunslet and Beeston, which welcomed the first Kosovar refugees to this country. From Cottingley in the west to Richmond Hill in the east along the York road, each part is a unique community with its own characteristics and traditions. Let me add that the warmth of its people is matched only by their plain speaking.
The constituency contains two other great institutions: the Hunslet Hawks rugby league club, in its splendid stadium in south Leeds, and, of course, Leeds United football club at Elland Road. I shall always have a special affection for Elland Road, because that is where my selection conference took place. As my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Barron) can readily testify, as he was present, it was a colourful scene that night as the votes were counted. The ballot box was pitch black. The voting slips piled on the table were a very pale shade of pink--no political significance whatever should be read into that! The faces of the candidates were, to put it mildly, a little grey. But, resplendent in their traditional white, gazing down at us from their picture frames on the wall, were those two great heroes of Leeds United teams gone by, Gordon Strachan and Johnny Giles. I knew at that moment that there was something special about the constituency, and so it has proved.
There is, however, something else about Leeds, Central, which is why I wanted to contribute briefly to this debate. It contains some of the poorest parts of Leeds, and some of the most deprived communities. It has the highest unemployment in the city. For many of the people who live there, social exclusion is not a theory, but their life experience. These are people whose faith in the capacity of the democratic system to produce real and lasting improvement is tested daily by crime, poor housing and social decay.
Perhaps not surprisingly in view of that, Leeds, Central had one of the lowest turnouts in the country at the last general election: only 55 per cent. Just a fortnight ago, only 20 per cent. of the electorate voted in the by-election, under the first-past-the-post system, and in the European elections, under proportional representation. Such a low turnout must be a matter of concern to all of us; but perhaps there is a deeper message than one just about electoral systems. I hope that the House will forgive me if I do not comment today on the relative merits of those systems, let alone the complexities of the d'Hondt system.
I do not even understand the Lewis-Duckworth rule when it comes to rain delay in one-day cricket. However, I believe that the link between a Member of Parliament and his or her constituency is very important.
While there are steps that can and should be taken to make voting easier, I believe that the deeper message is this. The true test of our democratic system--and of the House, in the eyes of those who put us here--is whether we can demonstrate in practice to people in a constituency such as Leeds, Central that they can use this place to make a difference to their own lives.
As the community police officer for Lincoln Green said to me last Friday, when I was talking to him about the area which he knows very well and cares about so passionately:
It was that instrument of hope that, at the end of the second world war, created the national health service, and, under the current Government, created the minimum wage and the new deal, of which we are justly proud. I believe that it is that instrument of hope that remains our best chance of meeting the challenges of the new century that will shortly dawn.
Leeds, Central is special, if not unique, in one other respect: the potential of the people who live there to find a voice for themselves. As I travelled round the constituency during the by-election, time and again, I was impressed by the people I met who were not waiting for us to do something, but were trying to do something for themselves.
"People are looking for a sign that things will get better."
That statement summarises why the ballot box has to be an instrument of hope as well as of democracy, a means of economic and political progress, and a way out of poverty and despair.
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