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Mr. Eric Forth (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con): Given the recently expressed worries about obesity, is the Leader of the House concerned that he is effectively preventing 14 million people even from walking to their local polling stations? He did say a moment ago that a full assessment is going to be made of the postal voting fiasco, and he mentioned a report back to the House. Will he give us an absolute undertaking that there will be a proper debate in this House on postal voting, and that such voting will not be extended—or, indeed, continued—until both Houses of Parliament express their full satisfaction with every detail of the postal voting regime? We cannot have this going ahead with people being unable to trust the process, and we cannot regard an increase in turnout, if it is based on fraud, as acceptable.

Mr. Hain: I strongly dispute the idea that an increase in turnout would be based on fraud. The instances of malpractice are tiny in comparison with giving 14 million people the chance to vote from the comfort of their homes. I would have thought that the right hon. Gentleman, as a parliamentary champion, would be the first in line to say that he is very worried about the consistent decrease in election turnouts since the second world war. If, as previous pilots have shown, turnout has been increased—I am sure that, by the end of today, we will know that it has increased—more people will have participated in democracy, and more people participating makes our democratic system much more legitimate. That should be seen in perspective and set against the small number of instances of malpractice that have been uncovered, and which involved officials and members of all parties.

On the right hon. Gentleman's substantive point, he knows that this legislation applies to today alone and expires after that. It is pilot legislation, and there will of
 
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course be an opportunity to debate it fully in the House after the Government, the Electoral Commission and others have made a proper assessment. There is no intention to bounce anybody into this. The intention was to improve the quality of our democracy and its legitimacy by increasing turnout. If the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats are content with the remorseless decline in turnout, that says something about their view of democracy.

Ms Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op): May I add my voice to the demand for a debate on the real benefits of all-postal ballots? Not only were they welcomed by many of my constituents on the doorstep, many of whom would otherwise have been unable to vote, the 41 per cent. turnout reported in Sheffield on Wednesday constituted a significant increase that demonstrates that the Opposition's claims are completely false.

Mr. Hain: I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. Indeed, I was in Sheffield last Thursday campaigning in the elections, and the turnout is very encouraging. It is only the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats who are frightened of democracy and the ballot box. Labour is proud to be a party that wants more and more people to vote, regardless of which party they vote for, although we would of course prefer that they voted Labour. Many will have the opportunity to do so as a result of the extra postal votes.

Mr. Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD): Could time be made available for a Minister from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to explain to the House what it is doing actively to support the case of Kenny Richey, the Scotsman on death row in Ohio, and in particular why it has yet to get around to lodging an amicus brief? There is a new urgency in Mr. Richey's case, as the campaign suffered a severe setback yesterday when the Ohio supreme court refused to rule on a point of law referred to it by the sixth circuit court of appeal.

We no longer have an automatic right to lodge an amicus brief, but of course application can be made to the court to do so. If the FCO were to take that opportunity, it would send the clear signal that people in this country are not prepared to sit back and see the execution of one of our citizens, whose case has been described by Amnesty International as one of the most compelling cases of innocence that it has come across.

Mr. Hain: The hon. Gentleman has made the point very eloquently and with passion, and I know that the Foreign Secretary will want to take close note of it. Because of the urgency of the situation, I shall ensure that the Foreign Secretary's office is notified as soon as possible.

Keith Vaz (Leicester, East) (Lab): May we have a debate on the use of school facilities after school hours? A constituent of mine, Mr. Rahman, wants to teach the Koran to Muslim children within the mainstream setting of a primary school after school hours, but he has not been allowed access to Northfield House primary school. He is asking not for a separate school but to be able to use such facilities to give something to the local community that our mainstream education system does
 
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not provide. May we have a debate on this issue, which affects not just the Muslim community but other communities that might want to teach their religion in such settings?

Mr. Hain: I know that it is very important, both for the Muslim community itself and for the wider community, to ensure that young people have the opportunity to learn about the Koran and the Muslim faith in a proper environment. I know that many imams have also strongly taken that view, so it is a matter that I am sure the Secretary of State for Education and Skills and the Home Secretary will want to examine closely, bearing in mind the important point that my hon. Friend has raised.

Mr. John Wilkinson (Ruislip-Northwood) (Con): Will the Leader of the House grant a debate on the way in which the Government are mortgaging the country's future through the abuse of the private finance initiative? Would the Chancellor of the Exchequer wind up such a debate by explaining how in this financial year he is going to sign off 75 PFIs at a cost of £7.7 billion, which did not appear in the Budget statement or the documents attached thereto? Could the Chancellor also explain at the end of such a debate how the £40 billion worth of PFIs already approved since 1997 will be financed without increases in taxation?

Mr. Hain: The point of the private finance initiative is to ensure that the private sector, including private sector capital and expertise, is brought in to enable us to construct many more new hospitals, schools and other public sector projects than were ever contemplated under the Conservatives or would have been possible had we relied entirely on the public purse to generate that finance. That is the point. We keep the procedures under constant review, but I should have thought that the hon. Gentleman would welcome the fact that there are more new hospitals being built, more new schools opened, and more new construction projects going ahead as a result of this extra facility.

Mr. Gordon Prentice (Pendle) (Lab): May I return to the allegations of cheating and stealing votes? If the Electoral Commission finds that the election has been seriously contaminated, will there be an opportunity for a rethink on the decision already taken to have all-postal voting in the regional referendums to set up assemblies, which are coming up in October?

Mr. Hain: I make the same point to my hon. Friend as I did to Conservative and Liberal Democrat Members. I am sure that my hon. Friend, as a good democrat, would want more people in his constituency to have the opportunity to vote today and in the forthcoming regional assembly elections. We need as high a turnout as possible in all our elections, particularly in referendums. That is self-evidently desirable.

Dr. Julian Lewis (New Forest, East) (Con): I assure the Leader of the House that Conservative Members want all their constituents to have the opportunity to vote, but we want each to have the opportunity to cast his or her own vote, not other people's votes en masse on their behalf. Does he accept that, when he accuses us of
 
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being insufficiently democratic, the sort of democracy that he may be talking about is the democracy of the former German Democratic Republic, which used to have turnouts of 98 per cent. in elections? Will the Leader of the House deal with the fact that a journalist reported last Sunday that he was able individually to obtain 36 postal votes? Of course the turnout will go up if he chooses to use those 36 votes, and if he had not disclosed them, he could have used them.

Mr. Hain: The hon. Gentleman's comparison with the German situation is, frankly, insulting drivel. On the question of postal votes, he is making a case against such votes under the old system. He is making a case against postal votes of any kind at all, ever. That is what he is saying. We know that there were instances of fraud under the previous system. We know that that is the case. That is why extra procedures were put in place. The concerted attempt by the Conservatives—the hon. Gentleman, I am sorry to say, included—to derail the opportunity for at least 2 million more people than before to vote from the comfort of their own homes means that the Conservatives are scared of democracy. They are scared of a high turnout, and the question is why.

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