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4.12 pm
John Cryer (Hornchurch) (Lab): In common with most hon. Members who have spoken in the debate, I shall raise a series of mainly parochial issues. The first is about primary education in my Hornchurch constituency. There is a Conservative-run council in Havering—sadly, because it is both incompetent and bloody-minded. That has been demonstrated over recent weeks and months as it had created a position whereby at least two, possibly three, primary schools feel threatened with closure.
The brief history is that the council initially commissioned a report, according to which, because of surplus places in area that it defined as "Elm Park and South Hornchurch", the R J Mitchell school had to close. The school is named after the designer of the Spitfire because the school is located in what was once RAF Hornchurch, a historical site. A magnificent local campaign was conducted, with which I was involved, and it managed to defeat that proposal. Although school places were somewhat down in that particular school, it had a rising reputation, and I believe that in the next four or five years with house building in the borough and young families moving into the area the school numbers will increase.
The council then decided to set up a working party to reflect and report on the conclusions of the original report. Someone in the administration selectively leaked the findings of the working party, to the effect that two different schools were now under threat—Suttons and Ayloff schools in the same Elm Park and South Hornchurch area. Now, three schools are panicking over possibly facing closure and the council has managed to alienate the maximum number of people that it could. I attended meetings at Suttons, R J Mitchell and Ayloff schools and we had lobbies at the town hall.
If, a few months ago, someone had sat down to think about how to create maximum concern, panic and worry among governors, staff, teachers and children, they could not have produced a better plan. The council has gone as far as it is possible to go to alienate the maximum number of people in that part of my constituency.
Apparently, a decision will be made next week about which school might face closure, but there is no need for any of those schools to close. Suttons school is full and has a very good reputation. Ayloff school has some spare places, but only 14 per cent.—which is well under Government guidelines that stipulate that action should be taken only if the spare places reach 25 per cent. or more. Even then, the guidelines do not mention closure, but only the possibility, among other measures, of reducing capacity.
There is no reason why any of those schools should close. The latest to be threatened—Ayloff and Suttons—have good reputations; they are attractive schools and people actually move into the area so that
their children can attend them. The same is true of R J Mitchell. None of them should face closure. I hope that we can win a victory on that campaign, as we did for the R J Mitchell school.Secondly, I want to raise something that has been discussed many, many times in these debates and on other occasions in the House: mobile phone masts.
Mr. David Amess (Southend, West) (Con): Hear, hear.
John Cryer: The hon. Gentleman is already getting excited—perhaps he will be raising the same issue later.
Two campaigns are under way in my constituency. The first is on O2's proposal to erect a mobile phone mast close to a primary school in an area called St. Leonard's hamlet—the original name for the Shoreditch children's home, mainly for orphans from the east end of London who were moved there in the 1920s, 1930s and later. However, the Stewart report—the most substantive piece of work on mobile phone mast technology—made it clear that, as a preventive measure, such masts should not be sited near primary schools. The skulls of children aged under 12 are less developed than those of adults, so they would be the most affected by any radiation produced by such masts.
I am not thrilled about having such masts anywhere in my constituency, but I realise that millions of people use mobile phones so the masts have to go somewhere. O2 wanted to put the mast next to St. Mary's school. That plan was rejected and the company submitted a proposal to put the mast on top of Harrow Lodge sports centre. Again, the plan was abandoned and it was proposed to erect the mast near St. Leonard's hamlet—much of which, due to its historical significance, is a conservation area. An effective local campaign is resisting that plan and the council has persuaded O2 to go back to the drawing board and reconsider.
O2 is proposing to erect another aerial near two schools on the same site. Their names—the Scargill infants school and the Scargill junior school—will have resonance for many Members. In the light of the Stewart report, and given the defeat of the company's previous attempts to put up aerials near primary schools, the House might have thought that O2 had learned a lesson and would look elsewhere—but no, it is trying to stick another aerial next to a junior and an infants school. Again, there is a local campaign and I hope that those plans can be defeated, as were others in the past.
My third point relates to the docklands light railway. Much of my constituency is in the Thames gateway regeneration area, for which there are great plans. Indeed, some of them have already been put into effect, while others will come to fruition over the next decade or so. However, there is one thing missing for Dagenham and also for Rainham, which is in the south of my constituency next to the Thames: transport links. There is a plan to extend the DLR—perhaps as far as Barking. It should go not only as far Dagenham but also to Rainham, because the transport links to London are inadequate.
The current rail service—c2c, formerly the London, Tilbury and Southend railway—is not sufficient to carry people in and out of the City during the rush hour; even at peak times, there are only three trains an hour. Any
transport expert would tell the House that an effective commuter line for London needs at least four, and preferably five or six, trains an hour. Three trains an hour are not enough. The most obvious solution is to extend the DLR, and unless that is done the Thames gateway will not succeed. I have raised that with Transport for London, with the Mayor, Ken Livingstone, and with a number of people in various capacities. There is a possibility that those proposals will come to fruition, but I am raising the issue today to emphasise that we need those transports links.Lastly, I want to raise the issue of the Richard commission, although I am not a Welsh Member of Parliament—my constituency is in London. The Richard commission has recommended the introduction of the single transferable vote to the Welsh Assembly. What worries me is that if there were any possibility of the Richard commission proposals being accepted, such things could be proposed elsewhere. There are principally three areas—Scotland, Wales and London—where we have a kind of proportional system. A sort of vague, messy, bucket of pigs' entrails system has been introduced in London, Wales and Scotland. It is usually known as the additional member system. No one wanted it, and no one wants it now. It is very unclear, vague and not particularly accountable. Personally, as a matter of principle, I am completely opposed to proportional representation anyway. [Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."] Thanks for that.
Some time ago, shortly after the introduction of the Greater London authority, I tabled a question during the pilot period, when the precise definition of the GLA had not been completed, about what representations were made during the consultative period in support of what has become known as the additional member system. The answer that I received was that, out of 1,000 responses on the electoral system to be adopted, nine supported the additional member system, which, cynical as I am, led me to think that the Government would foist a tacky system like that on London, no matter what Londoners actually wanted. That is what we have seen.
If we move further towards a more pure proportional system, such as STV, we will have less effective representation. If we go down the route of increasing proportionality, we lose representation—we lose that constituency link. There is no choice about that. The problem for a lot of people who support proportional representation is that they think that, somewhere, there is a semi-mystical system that will provide perfect representation and a perfect constituency link will be preserved, yet there will also be perfect proportionality. Such a system does not exist.
The first-past-the-post system is obviously not perfect, but no system is perfect. First past the post is the nearest to a perfect system that we have. [Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."] All right, calm down. It preserves direct accountability to the electorate. If we move further towards STV, we will see further alienation from the democratic process and increasing numbers of people failing to vote. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Llew Smith), I am not
exactly clear of the genesis of the Richard commission, but if those ideas start to be adopted, it will be a disaster for representative democracy.I have always supported the concept of a Greater London authority. The Greater London council should never have been abolished—that was just a Tory plot to try to rig things. The GLC should have been preserved. If we have some sort of Greater London authority, it should be run using the first-past-the-post system, with a single member for each borough. That is the most direct way to do things.
In the past four, five or six years, I have not heard a convincing argument for why we have the absurd system of twinning boroughs and an additional member system that no one wanted in the first place. We should do away with that system, have a single member for each borough and go back to first past the post, so we can re-establish the direct link and democratically accountability.
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