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REPRESENTATION OF THE PEOPLE BILL [MONEY]
Queen's recommendation having been signified--
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Representation of the People Bill, it is expedient to authorise the payment out of money provided by Parliament of any expenses incurred by the Secretary of State in consequence of the provisions of the Act relating to the free delivery of election addresses at the first Greater London Authority mayoral election.--[Mr. McNulty.]
10.24 pm
Mr. Bernard Jenkin (North Essex): We are dealing with a money resolution that results from an altercation between the opposition parties and the Government about the issue of free mailshots for candidates in the London elections. I am pleased to inform the House that the Government have been forced into the most miserable and humiliating climbdown on the issue.
The last time I stood at the Dispatch Box to discuss the matter, I explained that it was important because the London elections are extremely important. We are dealing with an electorate of 5.1 million people. The precedent set by the Government in their legislation for the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly, the Northern Ireland Assembly, the European elections and for parliamentary elections established the principle that free mailing should be available to candidates. I pointed out the need to promote a high turnout and fairness in the elections. It is a matter of democracy. Election rules should be agreed by consensus among the parties, as they always have been, rather than the governing party abusing its position to impose on all the other parties its view of how the elections should be conducted.
The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the hon. the Member for Streatham (Mr. Hill), put up all the old canards about why the Government could not allow that to happen. First, he said that the London election was a local election. That reason was repeated in the Upper House when these matters were debated there, despite the fact that the Government were already arranging experimental free mailings for the Watford local elections under the Bill.
The Minister put up ludicrous scare stories about the cost of free mailings in the elections, which were exposed in this House and the other place as utterly fraudulent. Finally, there was the curry house argument--the idea that every two-bit restaurant in London would put up candidates for the London Assembly and the London mayoralty in order to advertise its take-away services.
In the other place, the arguments for truth, fairness and democracy prevailed. As the hon. Member for Hackney, North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) said, it was a question not of the elected House versus the peers, but of the Government versus the people, with the peers representing the people--and the peers won. They caught the Government ballot rigging.
Not only did the Government attempt to rig the ballot for the selection of their candidate for mayor, they attempted to rig the election itself and, indeed, before they made the concession, they threatened to rig the voting in the House of Lords by appointing extra peers in order to get their way there as well. The Government would rig the entire constitution in their fit of pique and determination to get their way.
Mr. John Gummer (Suffolk, Coastal):
Will my hon. Friend remind the House that during the campaign before the last election, the Labour party called for a voice for London? Will he ask why the Government now want to make that such a muted voice, unable even to communicate with London?
Mr. Jenkin:
I agree with my right hon. Friend. The Government's political and constitutional project is designed to create a voice for the Prime Minister in every corner of the United Kingdom, and to stifle dissent.
In the London election, the Government are about to send an expensive booklet containing information about how wonderful their constitutional reforms are, but they want to deny the same right to the candidates standing in the elections. They have been forced by the Upper House into a dramatic U-turn.
I want to question the Minister about the money resolution, because although the Government have been forced to concede the principle, they have been crabbed, bitter and grudging in their concessions on the detail. They have insisted not on the right of individual candidates to send their election manifestos in separate envelopes or even in a joint envelope to the electors, but on creating an A5 booklet. Candidates will have to send their camera-ready copy to be edited and included in a booklet that will be stapled together and contain the candidates' addresses. What sort of constitutional abomination are we considering?
Mrs. Jacqui Lait (Beckenham):
Did my hon. Friend use the word "edited"? If so, who will edit the booklet?
Mr. Denis MacShane (Rotherham):
Alastair.
Mr. Jenkin:
It should be put on the record that the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane) said "Alastair" in response to the question that my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Mrs. Lait) asked. I presume that he means Alastair Campbell, who is the press secretary at No. 10 Downing street. I fear that the hon. Gentleman may be right; I shall give way to him so that he can dig his hole even deeper.
Mr. MacShane:
The hon. Gentleman interrupted me too quickly. I was referring to that great editor, paymaster, diarist and literator of the Conservative party, Alistair McAlpine.
Mr. Jenkin:
I rest my case on the size of the hole that the hon. Gentleman is in.
There is a mess. I accept that the other place has let the unsatisfactory measure pass because it rightly wanted the London elections to be conducted in an orderly fashion, and without chaos descending on them. However, the Government have consequently taken advantage of the leniency and reasonableness of the other place. There is a constitutional mess, which involves the stapled A5 booklet. My hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham asked a good question, which the Minister should answer: who decides on the order in which the A5 leaflets are printed and stapled together?
Mr. Tom Levitt (High Peak):
The alphabet.
Mr. Jenkin:
The hon. Gentleman claims that it is the alphabet. We are back to the hereditary principle that God will decide. The leaflets have nothing to do with fairly conducted elections, for which our original proposal would have provided.
Mr. John Greenway (Ryedale):
If the booklet is to be in alphabetical order, will my hon. Friend speculate on the order in which the candidates who bear the name "Frank Dobson" will appear?
Mr. Jenkin:
I am confused about which one my hon. Friend means.
Mr. Jenkin:
My hon. Friend is right. I do not know whether that means that there are two or three Labour candidates in the election. That remains to be seen.
Mr. Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton):
The second Mr. Dobson lives in my constituency. His name is Frank S. Dobson. I believe therefore that his name would appear below that of the official Labour party candidate on the ballot paper.
Mr. Jenkin:
We are presenting the argument that the leaflets will be stapled in a specific order.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin):
Order. The money resolution is a narrow matter. There will be an opportunity to discuss booklets, leaflets and ballot papers later.
Mr. Jenkin:
Of course I shall concentrate on the money resolution, but the current debate is not part of the time-limited debate that follows. I fear that some hon. Members may not want us to reach the relevant amendments.
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
Order. The hon. Gentleman's fears are nothing to do with me. He must keep to the money resolution.
Mr. Jenkin:
I shall keep to the money resolution because it compounds the mess that the Government are creating as they try to wriggle off the hook of the concessions that they have given. The money is provided not only for the booklet but, according to the money resolution, for
the first Greater London Authority mayoral election.
8 Mar 2000 : Column 1117
My noble Friends thought that they were extracting a concession on the conduct of London elections in the future and in perpetuity, for as long as elections shall exist in London, and providing through their amendment a general power for the Government to supply free mailings not only for mayoral candidates but for Assembly candidates at some future date. However, it turns out that the money resolution, which we are attaching to the Lords amendment and which gives Ministers the power to authorise such free mailings, applies solely to this election.
We are compounding the constitutional mess that the Government have created by setting a precedent for free mailings in London elections, but the Government clearly have no intention to honour it at a future mayoral election. That may be an academic matter for Labour Members, but they may not be sitting on the Government Benches after the general election. The measure will make the mess that they have created so much worse and I ask the Minister to explain why a freepost is right for this election, but not others. He would not have tabled the money resolution if he did not agree with that proposition. Goodness me, I cannot believe that he is about to stand at the Dispatch Box and say something in which he does not believe.
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