Local Government Committee, 04 Jul 2000

Meeting date: Tuesday, July 4, 2000

Official Report 183KB pdf

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Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Bill

Right, comrades, can we start? I welcome Kate Berry, who is a research assistant to Morag Brown—we will keep you busy, Kate.

We begin the meeting with the minister, Frank McAveety, who is here with Ted Davison. We have an Executive memorandum on legislation on a devolved matter to be progressed at Westminster. The deputy minister will make a statement and answer questions, if required, and then we will make a decision on the matter.

You will all have had a chance to look at the amendment to section 93 of the Representation of the People Act 1983. Essentially, the amendment is to update and modernise the act to address broadcasters' concerns about their ability to give fair treatment to all candidates standing at parliamentary and local elections. The provision was not applied at the elections to the Scottish Parliament and indications were that that did not lead to any problems. Therefore, it was felt right for the UK Parliament to replace section 93 with a more appropriate duty on broadcasting authorities and to ask them to draw up a code of practice on the involvement of candidates in broadcasts that include items about the constituency in the case of a parliamentary election, or an electoral area in the case of a local government election, pending an election.

Before writing the code of practice, the broadcasting authorities will be required to have regard to any views expressed by the electoral commission about it. Once the code is adopted, they will be bound by it. The code of practice will be a matter for the broadcasting authorities in consultation with the commission, but it is envisaged that broadly equal weight will be given to candidates from the principal parties—that is, those that currently have representation in the House of Commons. We should think about reflecting the broader dimension of Scottish politics.

The memorandum represents a pragmatic response to our experience at the Scottish Parliament election and our view on whether the change can be made at a UK level. The bill will go to committee stage in the House of Lords after the summer recess. It is likely to come into force for the local government elections in May 2001.

Paragraph 3 of the memorandum is pretty tortuous and does not actually say that broadcasts cannot take place unless all candidates agree. Is that the main issue—that section 93 means that every candidate has to agree before there can be a broadcast? If the voting system for local government is changed to multi-member wards, with the single-transferable-vote system or the additional-member system, that would make it even more important to make the change.

I would like to put it on record that I agree with Donald Gorrie. [Laughter.]

Are you sure?

That is what is known as a parliamentary opportunity. Now he will change his mind.

Are there any other questions? If not, I will put the question. The question is, that the committee is content that the matter will be progressed by the UK Parliament. Are we agreed?

Members indicated agreement.