Official Report 216KB pdf
Item 2 on our agenda is consideration of the Local Governance (Scotland) Bill. I welcome to this afternoon's meeting the Minister for Finance and Public Services, Andy Kerr; the Deputy Minister for Finance and Public Services, Tavish Scott; and Sarah Morrell and Murray Sinclair, who are officials at the Scottish Executive.
Tavish Scott and I are grateful for having the opportunity to give evidence to the committee on the Local Governance (Scotland) Bill. I hope to keep my opening remarks fairly brief, but we would like to make a few points to the committee before responding to questions.
I request that members ask questions on the bill's general principles and on the voting system. We will go into more detail later.
I will ask about two issues that the chair of a rural community council has raised with me. He said that he read and reread the explanation of the STV system but could not understand it. After asking the chair of another community council to explain the system, he still concluded that it was cumbersome, slow and confusing. How do you react to that? How would you convince him that he should go for the system? As he represents a rural ward, the chair of the community council is also worried that, to have a ward of three or four members, the ward area will have to be large. He thinks that the ward-member link will be missed.
When people try—as we have done—to set out how the process will work, that will involve complications and making mathematical calculations. However, it is easy to explain the principle of proportionality in the system, if not the technicalities. People might struggle over the technical detail, but we can explain that expressing their preferences under the system will allow the system to work for them by better reflecting how they want their views to be represented.
Other members want to talk about the number of councillors per ward, but I would prefer to keep that issue for a little later. I ask members to hold their questions until we go into the matter in detail.
Do you want me to ask about e-counting now or later?
Later.
Andy Kerr puts a good gloss on the issue, but in reviewing our evidence I found only one person who was positive about STV: the Liberal Democrat leader of East Dunbartonshire Council. I want to consider the evidence of the two professors, Professor Curtice and Professor Miller. In essence, Professor Miller said that we should do something as major as changing the voting system only if we have a good reason for doing so. Professor Curtice's general analysis was that the proposals would not make a significant change to the outcome in many councils. What is your good reason for changing the system?
My good reasons for changing the system go back to work that has been carried out in previous years. The McIntosh and Kerley reports have been widely consulted on and widely discussed and a great deal of consensus has emerged about them. There is an historical pattern. Another aspect is the consultation in 2002, during which Peter Peacock and I visited every council in Scotland to discuss the proposals. The vast majority of the responses that we received were in favour of some form of proportionality and, of those, the vast majority were in favour of STV.
There have been a number of discussions about voting systems. Indeed, your United Kingdom leader, Mr Blair, instigated one that was headed up by Roy Jenkins. Bill Miller said that STV is "excessively complicated" and "incontestably opaque" and that it therefore should be rejected as a voting system.
It is unfortunate that you have picked your witnesses selectively. We might also mention that Professor Farrell, Bob Benson of the Disability Rights Commission, Rona Fitzgerald of the Equal Opportunities Commission and, arguably, Jeremy Beecham of the Local Government Association were positive about what the system will deliver for their interest groups and about the system overall. You asked where the proposals come from; my answer is that they come from the detailed work of the McIntosh and Kerley expert committees, a huge consultation, visits to every local authority in Scotland and a response that was massively in favour of some form of change.
Minister, you have referred to the breadth of—mostly academic—support for the principles of the bill. David Mundell referred to the evidence from the Liberal Democrat leader of East Dunbartonshire Council, who, although he challenged many of the bill's details, especially on STV, supported the bill, because it is a political fix. Do you accept that the bill is a political fix and do you believe that a political fix is a good principle on which to base a bill?
Let us be clear: I used academics in defence because Mr Mundell used academics in attack and I thought that it was appropriate to balance the situation. I did not intend to use academics in defence because the Executive has a clear underpinning principle. I return to my earlier comment that the proposals come from the McIntosh and Kerley reports. Those reports were not fixes; they were an attempt to engage with people in local government and beyond—covering consumer interests and wider interests in civic Scotland—on the subject of electoral systems. There was a coalition around the idea that the electoral system for local government should change.
The McIntosh commission was set up by the Government of the day and the Kerley group was set up by the Scottish Executive to move forward the principle of a proportional system of elections to local government. Everything that flows from that is based on the principles that came out of McIntosh and Kerley, which Andy Kerr described in his previous answers.
On the evidence that we have received, very few local authorities support the bill. Of the two that do, one criticised the bill's content and accepted it only on the basis that it is a political fix. That is not a great endorsement of the bill by those whom it will affect, which plays heavily with the committee. If we do not have the confidence of the local authorities in bringing about a transformation in local government, surely we should take that into consideration when deciding whether to support the general principles of the bill.
Local authorities have selectively picked out many of the barriers to the introduction of the proposed system and used them to undermine the principles of the bill. We will probably discuss the detail of that in due course.
Tavish Scott referred to the McIntosh report in his exchange with David Mundell, but that report also recommends that independents should have a fair chance. Do you agree that independents would be disadvantaged by the STV system?
No, I do not agree on that point. In a system where the voter can rank candidates 1, 2, 3, 4 or 1, 2, 3—and let us recognise that independents generally are elected in the more rural parts of Scotland, where the evidence shows there may be more connection between the character, if I may put it that way, and the voter—there is every likelihood that independents will continue to be elected in large numbers. Indeed, I come from a part of the world where we have an independent council and I do not see any barrier to there being an independent council in my constituency after the next local government election, if that is what the people choose, because the system is based on the voter having choice.
I appreciate that at the moment independent members are advantaged in some way with much smaller constituencies, but, with multimember wards, which might have an electorate of up to 24,000, it might be more difficult for a local single-issue independent candidate to be elected. Am I correct in saying that? Are independents more advantaged by the first-past-the-post system or are you saying that they are more advantaged by STV? If you are, that would go against the evidence that we have received from independent councillors.
I suspect that some independent councillors will have come to a view about their present situation and may feel challenged by the proposals. That is entirely understandable. However, I do not accept that they will be disadvantaged by the introduction of STV. I believe that individuals who stand as independents have a strong possibility of being elected in similar if not greater numbers, if that is what the electors want. Single-issue candidates have stood for the Scottish Parliament in large constituencies and they have gathered enough votes to be elected as constituency or list MSPs. The evidence therefore suggests the opposite to what you are saying.
I want to ask about voters' understanding of the electoral system. We would all accept that, with the present first-past-the-post system, there is greater—
May I ask you to keep that question for later, Paul?
I just want to clarify this, for my own benefit. You want us to ask about the general principles and we have already been discussing STV. That is what I want to come to.
Okay.
Does the minister accept that voters will never completely understand the STV system?
I do not think that it is fair to say that. I am not sure that people need to have a first-class honours degree in the system. It is important that they understand broadly what we are trying to achieve, that they have confidence in the counting system, that they have a broad understanding of how it works and that they know what happens to the mark or number that they put on their ballot paper. Some people make mistakes on first-past-the-post ballot papers. We will certainly try to reduce the possibility of mistakes and, when we come to questions on specifics, we may want to discuss innovative ideas for educating and helping voters in what could be a confusing situation—although we hope that it will not be.
The electorate clearly understand the counting of the first-past-the-post system and the way in which a result is achieved. John Morrison, the leader of East Dunbartonshire Council, said in evidence to us that the STV system is easy to understand. However, unless the ministers can convince me otherwise, I feel that most people will never understand the counting method of the STV system as easily as they can understand the simple first-past-the-post system.
Voters will understand that they put the number 1 for their first choice and then number their other choices. We will explain to them that those choices will be redistributed to others and they will understand that. That kind of thing happens with everyday choices in life—our real choices, the other choices available and how they relate to one another. I do not accept that people will never understand the new system. I would ask whether people need to understand all the mathematical possibilities of the voting system. Perhaps not, but they will understand—when they vote 1, 2, 3 and 4—the relationship between those votes and how they will be redistributed.
I am not sure that many people round this table fully understand the d'Hondt system that we use to elect members of this Parliament, but that does not stop us using it.
Members have had a number of Scottish Parliament information centre documents and Tavish Scott and I have both referred to previous work in the area. As I said, either Peter Peacock or I stood in every council chamber the length and breadth of the country and explained the available options and choices. Doing that was a refreshing experience for both of us. It cannot be argued that we have not tried to access the views of organisations and people who have a wider interest in the issue or that those organisations and people do not understand the proposals. Executive consultations are wide in their scope and we received substantial evidence in support of changing the system.
Do you also agree that people such as Councillor John Morrison who have expressed concern about some of the bill's details are not necessarily expressing concern about its general principles?
I am sure that we will be able to overcome some of the issues that were raised in evidence to the committee when we enter into substantial discussions about the detail of the bill.
Convener—
Bruce, do you want to ask a question on the general principles? If not, I want to move on to other areas of questioning.
My question is not on general principles. I just want to move the discussion on a bit.
We have taken a lot of evidence on the issue of ward sizes, particularly with regard to proportionality, geography and the size of the electorate. I encourage members to ask questions on that subject.
Mr Kerr, you said that you wanted to remove barriers, but I feel that a couple of barriers have been put up in the past few minutes. Moreover, you also said that three or four-member wards are about right. However, that is one of the potential barriers that you are putting in the bill unnecessarily. Instead, you should be taking more account of the STV working group's comments and the Kerley recommendation that there should be three to five members per ward. In many cases, such an approach would ensure that there was more proportionality. Furthermore, we should be able to bring the number of members per ward down to two if geographical circumstances so dictate. After all, two-member wards are perhaps the largest that one could reasonably expect in a number of areas in Argyll and Bute and the Highlands.
We have to strike a difficult balance with regard to the ward-member link, proportionality and other McIntosh principles. To be fair, I must say that we received the STV working group recommendations only a week or so ago, and I want to take some time to consider its views on the matter. However, I am sure that it is not beyond the wit and wisdom of the Local Government Boundary Commission for Scotland and local government to deal adequately with the three or four-member ward model. Ministers have a duty to sit down and consider the working group's findings. I want to spend more time with the committee chairman and analyse the report more before I make any absolute pronouncements on the matter. I think that three to four members per ward is well grounded and that it can and will work. However, I acknowledge in particular the view that the STV working group expressed and I need to consider it carefully.
On the same track, you have referred to the evidence that we have received so far. It is difficult to keep up with all the evidence because there is a large volume of it, but do you accept that every single piece of evidence that we have had on the working of STV from the academics has argued for a minimum of five members per ward, not three to four?
On my scan of the evidence to date, I accept that point.
Do you further accept that McIntosh and Kerley, to which you have referred, also refer to three to five members per ward? Do you accept that the STV working group that the Executive established refers to three to five members per ward?
Indeed.
Do you not think that a pattern is emerging that three to five members per ward is the consensus, rather than three to four?
I say in response that there are views in local government and elsewhere about the value or otherwise of the STV system and about the number of members per ward. Those who oppose the principle completely did not on the whole express views about whether there should be two, three, four or five members per ward. The Executive's task is to ensure that we reflect adequately what I argue are the two big twin demands around McIntosh—proportionality and the councillor-ward link. As I say, I think that three and four-member wards are sustainable. I worry about council wards in which there could conceivably be 30,000 people; an urban ward in Glasgow could have 30,000 people, which is difficult. If that is the maximum size it causes some concern. There are arguments about the matter. The job that Tavish Scott and I have is to sit back and listen to views. As I say, we want time to consider the response to the STV working group.
Professor Farrell, whom you referred to and who is certainly the British expert academic on the topic, states explicitly that a minimum of five members per ward is required for any level of proportionality. Do you concede, given the weight of evidence that the committee has received and the contents of the interim report from the working group that you established, that you have to be prepared to consider changing the bill for the first stage debate in order for it to reflect the responses that we have so far received to the consultation? Do you concede that that is at least a possibility?
On the first point, I will need to go back to the evidence. I did not pick up that Professor Farrell made the point that the absolute minimum should be five members per ward. I do not accept that point, because we have to balance proportionality with the member-ward link.
The second part of the question was to ask you to concede, given the weight of the evidence, that you might be prepared to make changes that reflect the weight of evidence.
I have said that I consider three or four members per ward to be sustainable, but we need to consider further what the STV working group said.
It is important to clarify the point, because it is important in relation to the evidence from East Dunbartonshire by Councillor Morrison, who has been much maligned. He is from a council in which the Lib Dems received 34 per cent of the vote, but 50 per cent of the seats. He benefits from the first-past-the-post system but is still prepared to recommend change. I am afraid that all the evidence that we have received against STV, including from Pat Watters—whose party got 48 per cent of the vote but 76 per cent of the seats—indicates clearly that there is a vested interest among some of those who have given evidence to retain a voting system that does not accurately reflect the wishes of the electorate. Do you agree?
No, I do not agree. Those who advocate the first-past-the-post system have made a clear case for it, which they have the right to do. That case includes the importance of the member-ward link, decision making in councils and making progress on manifesto commitments. It is dangerous to use the evidence selectively, as you have done. Councillors have expressed to me their desire to be excellent representatives of their communities, as many of them are. They want to be available in their local communities to deal with all the problems that councillors deal with, and they have a genuine desire to make sure that that link is not broken. We should give them some credit for that.
You referred to the possibility that ward populations will be as high as 30,000 if we move to a five-member system. Are you aware of the evidence that was given by Jeremy Beecham on ward sizes? He said that councillors in Birmingham have ward sizes of up to 24,000 and have expressed concern about the size of their wards. Through the bill, there exists the potential for ward sizes in Edinburgh and Glasgow to be as high as 24,000. Do you think that that is a significant factor that the Executive should take into account in judging the correct overall balance?
That is a fair point, but I took heart from much of Jeremy Beecham's evidence, especially from what he had to say about the way in which local councillors take a mature approach. When councillors get down to work in their communities, they address questions about the best way to represent people and share responsibilities in large wards to ensure that there is no duplication of bureaucratic effort, such as members taking up one another's cases, which can happen. I take your substantive point, but Jeremy Beecham's wider evidence suggests that even in big wards, councillors get down to business to deliver for their communities.
I have two questions. My first is about multimember wards and the STV working group, which has produced its interim report. The report seems to say that, in practice, informal arrangements are made between councillors on the ground, but we are not told how good they are. We asked the working group about research on that, but we did not get an answer—I think that it was trying to get information to give to the Executive. I wonder where the working group gained information from, other than from councils in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. If you know where else the information came from, perhaps you could elaborate on that. What seems to come out of the report is that it is important that broad principles be drawn up. How will you balance those broad principles with the need for flexibility that is reflected in the evidence that has been collected from Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland?
I ask Sarah Morrell to answer the first question on the working group.
As Dr Jackson mentioned, the working group considered evidence, much of which was anecdotal, from the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. It had access to a small piece of research by the Electoral Reform Society on how multimember wards operate in Ireland. It also had contact with some councils in England that have multimember wards. The working group found that there was a lot of anecdotal evidence and a lot of talk about how things operate, but that not much of it is written down. Its contact with academics such as Professor David Farrell suggested that there has not been much research on the subject. The working group therefore asked a researcher to do a desktop survey of the material that is available, and that exercise has nearly finished. The working group has not yet had the final report, but it is talking about commissioning further research on how multimember wards operate in practice because of the point that Dr Jackson raised about the shortage of information.
I think that Sylvia Jackson asked the Electoral Reform Society to provide some evidence on that matter. I was interested to read the other day a letter that was sent to all members in September about how multimember wards work in practice and the reflections of councillors of all political persuasions in England on that. The letter also covered whether the informal relationships work well and whether the councillor-ward link was stronger than in single-member wards. The very strong consensus across all political parties was that the link is stronger, partly because of the informal arrangements. The research paper "What councillors think"—I presume that it has been sent to the committee—indicates that there is broad support for how multimember wards work in practice. I suppose that that to some extent answers the question.
How will you balance broad principles with flexibility? Much of what makes the system work in practice is in informal arrangements, which might depend on political parties.
You are talking about the relationship that will exist between councillors in a multimember ward. I was concerned about that, but I took heart from what Jeremy Beecham said to the committee. He said:
I will ask another question, because—
I still have another question on which to come back to you.
Jeremy Beecham also said that he was not sure that he would like an STV system similar to the one that we envisage. He also said that the working relationships might be different from those in England, so he also gave contrary advice to that which you quoted.
I take your point about the principle of what Jeremy Beecham said, but he said:
There was a second question.
There was a substantial question on what is and is not in the bill. I will try to deal globally with that issue in order to address Sylvia Jackson's point.
I am glad that Andy Kerr places such weight on Sir Jeremy Beecham, because Sir Jeremy told us that he did not know of anybody who would support the particular form of PR that we are considering here in Scotland.
I hesitate to say it, but for a Tory to accuse anybody of gerrymandering is quite something; however, that is another matter altogether. I take David Mundell's point to mean that he does not want to have that opportunity. Clearly, we do not want the potential for that to happen, either.
Perhaps you will give the committee a clear view on whether there should be different-sized wards in the same local authority area. I am thinking of there being a three-member ward and a four-member ward in the same area. I think that you would accept that, for example, four three-member wards might produce a different result from three four-member wards.
My view is that we should try to get the best possible fit for the community. That might lead to three three-member wards and one four-member ward or to all wards being four-member wards or all being three-member wards. We have to be absolutely aware of the circumstances and reasoning behind all this, the initial key aspects of which are to reflect the needs of communities and to retain the member-ward link. David Mundell is asking me to look into the future. I cannot say that gerrymandering will not happen, but the mechanisms of and the focus and attention that is being paid to the subject should ensure that it will not.
I will press the minister a little bit further. I am not so concerned about gerrymandering. Have you considered the possibility of different outcomes depending on the number of councillors per ward, in terms of the proportionality of the result? David Mundell's question was not necessarily about deliberately gerrymandered results but about whether there could be accidental effects on the result if—as been suggested—rural areas predominantly had small numbers of councillors per ward and urban areas predominantly had the larger numbers.
I think that changes to ward boundaries could potentially affect political outcomes. If we were to draw a line around a bungalow in Paisley we could affect the outcome of an election. The boundary commission's remit is to reflect community ties and to ensure that there are appropriate numbers of members in areas. That is how we want things to be done. People correctly talk about large rural wards, but there are also large urban wards, as I said in my opening remarks.
I return to the question of what should be in primary, as opposed to secondary, legislation. Before the committee makes a recommendation on the bill, it is important that we at least try to decide whether it is a good idea to buy a pig in a poke.
With due respect, I am not sure whether we would want the primary legislation to indicate whether there will be a clean-slate approach or a build-up from previously existing wards. That is my view, although I accept that yours might be different.
I understand that it is important that the Executive knows about the group's deliberations, but would it not be a good idea to let Parliament know too, before asking it to give ministers the power to make that decision?
I am not sure whether I followed the question correctly. I understand that the working group's interim report is publicly available. Is that what you meant?
But you have not made a decision. Surely Parliament should know whether it could make a decision on the matter, rather than give the Executive that power.
Whatever decision we make will come back before Parliament in some shape or form. It would be worrying if I told the committee, "We have had this report for a week and I have signed off X, Y and Z but not A, B and C." To be honest, the report was quite surprising in many ways. I do not know whether you share that view of its content—you had an interesting exchange of views with David Green on the matter. I am not trying to be difficult; we need to consider the matter, but members can rest assured that the conclusion that Executive ministers come to, whatever it is, will come before Parliament. I would argue that ward changes could happen through secondary legislation. I will respond publicly to the report as soon as we have had an opportunity more carefully to consider its conclusions.
Will the committee know your recommendations before it has to make a decision about the bill?
I am just not sure about that, Michael, but I will consider the point closely.
I have two questions. First, the committee has heard evidence from academics, a number of whom referred to the question of three and five-member wards. I remember that Professor Farrell referred to the system in New South Wales, where there are 21-member wards, but can we use the analogies of systems in other countries? We compare the proposed system with the ones in, for example, Northern Ireland or the Republic of Ireland, which are very different. For instance, the statutory responsibilities of local government in Ireland are very different from what is proposed in the bill. New South Wales is also quite a different environment. Can we clear this point? Although it is interesting to have such comparators, they are not always like for like.
I do not have a difficulty with that. Certain principles of electoral systems are established throughout the world, but it is for individual countries to come to their own conclusions about implementation and how the systems work on the ground.
So, we should devise our system on the basis of our own experiences rather than pin its fundamentals on commentary from other countries.
It would be strange if we did not look beyond our own shores, but your substantive point is correct. As I said earlier, we need a solution to meet Scotland's needs.
Can we come back to the point about independent members? I do not think that we quite dealt with that. The minister raised the example of Shetland, where a large number of the candidates are independent. I am concerned about the transfer opportunities for independent members. I appreciate that this is a technical matter, on which Sarah Morrell can perhaps comment. For example, one independent member standing for election in a five-member ward would be seriously disadvantaged as compared with an independent candidate in Shetland, where there might be five independent council candidates.
I think that you are saying that one independent member in a sea of party-political candidates might have a higher hurdle to leap.
Absolutely.
That view would probably receive some support because that is an actuality of the system. However, that is not to say that it is impossible for an independent candidate to be elected, as single-issue candidates have been successful in the elections to the Scottish Parliament.
Yes. First-past-the-post candidates have been elected to the Scottish Parliament.
Single-issue first-past-the-post candidates.
Yes, although John Swinburne is a party candidate. However, in local government elections, those candidates would be disadvantaged in five-member wards in which there were four parties and one independent candidate.
I am not wholly convinced by that argument. That situation exists not just in Shetland, but in the Highland region and other large areas of Scotland where—as Mr Martin will accept—many independent candidates are elected. Members of political parties are also elected in those localities.
I do not think that that answers the question. Perhaps Sarah Morrell could comment on it. There is an issue about independent candidates not enjoying the same transfer opportunities that party candidates enjoy. Maybe I am getting it wrong, but I would appreciate some technical advice on that.
It is all down to local circumstances. A save-the-local-school candidate could run amok in the system and get over the threshold without any difficulty. Are we talking about a standard independent candidate? I am trying to understand your question. Substantially, I do not agree with your view, but I am trying to explain why I think that the system could work.
It is the transfer of party votes.
But votes can be transferred to independents. Many Labour Party members voted for the Scottish Green Party in the additional member system for the Scottish Parliament elections. They used one vote for Labour and then they voted Green, or for other parties that are represented at this table.
Is that what you did with your vote?
You can rest assured that I did not, but that is another matter entirely. It is not beyond the wit and wisdom of the electorate to decide to use their first vote for their party, their second vote for an independent and their third vote for their party again. I do not see it as a big issue.
I want to take two more questions on that point before we move on to other issues.
Does the minister agree that if an independent standing in an election in, for instance, a multimember ward of five, were to secure 25 per cent of the vote, they would not need any transfers to secure election? However, if that same independent stands for a first-past-the-post seat and secures 25 per cent of the vote, it is unlikely that they will be elected.
That is a fair comment.
Did Iain Smith have a question?
The minister has covered it.
Before we move to part 2 of the bill, I give members the opportunity to ask any other questions about the evidence that we have received on whether having three different elections on the same day would lead to voter confusion, on whether the elections should be decoupled, on e-voting, and on other issues regarding the voting system.
On the section relating to decoupling, there has been a lot of comment about the prospect of voter confusion. Holding three elections on the same day, using three separate systems, increases the possibility of confusion; indeed, the effect of any education or information system is diluted.
I say from the outset, so that members know where I am coming from, that I am minded to retain the current system. I will go on to explain why, but I am genuinely open to views about the matter.
I hear what you say about turnout. As recent opinion polls suggest that MSPs enjoy a lower public standing than councillors, there is perhaps a danger that the parliamentary election might pull down the turnout for the local government elections.
On innovative solutions, I am sure that we will have adventurous proposals on voter education and on the role that the ballot station will have in the conduct of ballots that use different voting systems. People might vote at one ballot station for the first-past-the-post election and go to another station to vote for the list and another to vote using the STV system for the local council election. In that way, we could provide clear and concise advice to individuals about how to vote. It is not rocket science to demonstrate to people how to carry out the new process. Although you are right to have concerns about such matters, the matters that you have raised are not insurmountable.
I have one question to finish off. A couple of members round the table have at various times suggested that the proposals should be piloted in one or two authorities. In your view, would a pilot scheme be feasible, realistic or desirable?
I cannot think who might have suggested that.
I will return to the issue of spoiled ballot papers, but first I want to ask about the basis on which you have chosen the system of transferring ballots under part 1 of the bill. In your earlier evidence, you gave your usual answer that if people put down their first, second, third and fourth preferences, their vote will be transferred. However, in the system that you have chosen, people's votes are not transferred in the same way. Some people's votes are transferred several times; other people's votes will not be transferred at all. How can that be a system in which everybody's vote counts equally? Why have you chosen to go down that route?
We chose that route after looking at international examples. We also chose it because the way in which the voting system works provides the best outcome in terms of who gets elected and who does not. The system that we have adopted seeks to achieve that outcome; hence it employs the measures that are detailed elsewhere. Those are the two substantial reasons for that choice.
Do you accept that, under the system that you have chosen, everybody's vote is not equal?
I am not sure that I would accept that. It all depends on the circumstances of the vote. I am not sure that any system would provide that sort of clear and concise way of doing things.
There are alternatives. For example, all votes could be transferred.
What we have tried to ensure is that the overall system is proportional and that the right people end up getting elected; hence the mechanism that we have chosen to employ.
How do you justify the fact that if I vote for somebody who then comes second and whose votes are just below the quota, my second choice votes are never redistributed, whereas somebody else's votes may be redistributed in such a way that their choice is taken over the quota and is elected and their votes are then redistributed again?
We go back to the original point, which is that overall the proposed system gives a better outcome in terms of who should and should not get elected in that process.
I find that a rather odd answer. Surely if we are introducing a proportional system in which everybody's vote counts, we should ensure that everybody's vote is dealt with in exactly the same way.
I said in my opening response to you that we want to see the right outcome once the process has been completed. The STV system is the best route to get the best outcome. I cannot answer any better than that. We have examined the systems that are available, and the STV system is the one that best delivers the outcome that the voter intended.
Is the level of spoiled ballots acceptable? We have heard evidence that if we do what is done in Northern Ireland, and run elections on the same day where some ballots require an X and some require 1, 2 and 3, the number of spoiled ballots will be greatly increased. Indeed, if what happened in the Belfast City Council elections in 2001 had happened here, we would have had 62,388 spoiled ballots in the Scottish Parliament election.
You cannot transfer the reasons for spoiled ballots between electoral systems. I am not sure that you can argue that the reason for spoiled ballots was a lack of understanding of the system. That is not a fair comparison to make.
I hope that you will undertake to read the evidence, not just from me, because I might be biased from observing the Northern Ireland elections, but from all the professionals who went there, who gave evidence that the overwhelming number of spoiled ballots was due to people putting more than one X on their paper and not to people writing, "You're all useless," which is a more common experience in Scotland.
Are you talking from personal experience, David?
I will not make that cheap political point. The fact that we have been out there to see what happens should inspire us and make us creative and innovative enough to ensure that we reduce that possibility. My understanding of some of the returning officers' evidence is that we know we will not make similar mistakes in Scotland. I hope that that applies equally to the point about spoiled ballots. I return to my earlier comment: we are big enough and ugly enough to sort out the situation, and I am confident that we can deal with the issue of spoiled ballot papers as well. I am not saying that we can guarantee that, but it is our absolute desire.
Where are you in progressing e-counting and e-voting, which could help to address the difficulties that have been outlined to do with having elections for different bodies on the same day and to do with the count? Could you reflect on the experience in the Republic of Ireland, which was that with e-counting one has to be careful that the poor candidate is not told very swiftly that they have not succeeded? There could be a less brutal way of doing that.
I take your point about the brutality of it all. It is a clinical process. However, those matters are outwith the scope of the bill. We have a partnership agreement that says that we will seek to reform the electoral system and investigate postal and electronic voting. We need to do more work on that. We are coping with the bill and we will then move on to some of those areas.
This year's Republic of Ireland county elections will involve e-voting. Will the Scottish Executive seek to have observers there to see how e-voting works?
No doubt the officials will go to New Zealand and Tavish Scott might get to go to Ireland, but I will end up in Hamilton having discussions with returning officers.
I want to ask about turnout. Is it a concern that the STV system will encourage parties to reduce the number of candidates that they field in each multimember ward? Will that have an impact on turnout? If parties reduce the number of candidates that they field in each multimember ward, I expect that that will have an impact on turnout.
The committee has found that parties make political and strategic decisions about the number of candidates that they field, which is up to them, but I must ensure that the system is fair and open. What you have described might happen and international comparisons suggest that it will, but that does not necessarily reduce the political ferocity of the debate or campaigning. It is up to local parties to decide at a local level what they want to do.
I would like to clarify something. Parties will be encouraged to act by how results come out and, in three-member wards or other multimember wards, they will, in effect, be encouraged to put up fewer members than they otherwise would. Is the fact that parties would be encouraged not to field candidates not bad for democracy?
The key issue is that people feel that their vote counts. Whether two Labour members and one SNP member or whoever can be voted for, it is important that people have a political choice. In some areas, there have not been full fields of candidates from the political parties because those parties could not get enough candidates. I do not have a big hang-up about the matter. Democracy would not be greatly eroded if parties fielded fewer candidates. As long as there is a choice on the ballot paper for the voter, that is fair.
I want to clarify how you will deal with issues in the finance—
We will deal with such issues once we have finished with the voting system.
Yes, we have, but we opted not to go down that route because we did not think that such an approach was merited.
Has there been any significant support for that approach in representations to the Executive?
Not that I am aware of, and Sarah Morrell says no, so I shall take her word for that. I should also say that, although it is arguably quite a difficult legislative process that we have to go through, local councils have powers available locally, and referenda have taken place in the past.
My final question is not directly related to the bill, but it is on an issue that my colleague Alasdair Morrison wrote to me about—whether turnout could be enhanced in elections by a move to some form of compulsory voting. I know that you will be aware of that issue and I know that it is outwith your own powers and the powers of the Scottish Parliament to move in that direction, but has the Executive given any consideration to the issue or had any discussions with the UK Government on it? Do you have any views on the matter?
I can honestly say that I have not even discussed it with Tavish Scott. I know that the proposal is out there and that it got some quite interesting media attention on the pros and cons, but we have not discussed it at Cabinet or ministerial level. I would need to come back to the committee on that point.
Do members have issues to raise with regard to part 2 of the bill? I realise that we have gone over part 1 quite extensively, so I am prepared to take any questions on part 2—on age qualification and qualification to stand as a councillor, and on important issues of remuneration and the proposed severance scheme.
Could you comment on the basis for the one-off payment system for those councillors who decide to stand down after serving a period of time in office? Do you think that it is fair that only those who decided not to compete in an election would qualify, while those who decided after 20-odd years of service to fight again, but who found themselves lower down the lists and lost, would not qualify—even though in a first-past-the-post system, rather than a new and more proportional system, they might have won? Do you not think that there is a lack of fairness there?
There is a fundamental question about what the system is designed to do. I think that it is designed to recognise the contribution that elected members have made over many years and it is a disgrace that that is not reflected at the moment in any shape or form, other than perhaps by a night out and a clock from colleagues. It is a substantial step forward that we are now in a position to set out more sustainable ways of resourcing our local councillors. Let us recognise that.
With respect, I hope that you will accept that we have a system of, as you say, rewarding defeat—if an MP or MSP is beaten, they get a reward. It is called a resettlement allowance, but most members of the public would see it as a reward. I agree 100 per cent with the principle that you espoused—that we should recognise the contribution, sometimes long term, of members in local areas. However, you are saying that that principle is important only if members agree to stand down. If a member agrees to fight, the principle goes out the window because they will not qualify, even though their contribution has not changed.
We must await the outcome of the councillors' remuneration progress group. I say that as an absolute. However, I do not share your view that councillors are the same as MSPs and MPs. COSLA's survey found that only 26 per cent of councillors considered themselves to be full time. I have scanned the local councillors in my area of East Kilbride: 50 per cent of them work, 25 per cent are retired and the others have not had formal employment in the past. It is a different point to say that allowances should be made for full-time elected politicians who find themselves out of a job. Your argument is based on the point that MSPs and councillors are the same, but I do not think that they are.
My argument is not based on the point that MSPs and councillors are the same; I mentioned that because you mentioned rewarding defeat. My argument is that a councillor with 20 years' service who decides to stand down is the same as a councillor with 20 years' service who decides to fight an election. I am comparing two councillors: one who decides not to contest the next election and another who decides to try. Your proposal treats them differently, which is wrong.
I tried to address that point in my previous answer. We return to the point, on which you will no doubt come back to me, about recognising the contribution made rather than recognising that people chose to stand at an election and were defeated. When people are elected, they will enter a new system of remuneration and pension arrangements that will support them during their time as a councillor. That substantial change justifies the one-off opportunity that we are providing. People will take their choice; I have no difficulty with the choice that we are giving to elected members.
I am sorry, but if a councillor stands and gets beaten, they will not get the new opportunities that you are talking about—they will get nothing.
Correct.
That is my point. The scheme that you are providing will reward not standing. If that is what it is, let us call it that—it is an inducement not to stand. I do not think that it is a fair inducement, but that is what it is. You cannot justify the proposal by saying that people who are elected will get the benefits—which are long overdue and which we all agree should be introduced—because the people who lose the election will be penalised.
You may phrase the matter differently, but I am saying that we seek to recognise the contribution made and to allow people to decide well before the election whether they want to work in the new working environment. If they decide that they want to do so, it will be up to the electorate whether they enter that system. The proposal makes that differentiation, but it also allows those who do not want to go into the new environment to decide that at the right moment.
I want to pursue the point. You said clearly that the scheme will recognise councillors' contribution to public life, which I endorse whole-heartedly. However, Tommy Sheridan is right that the scheme will apply only to people who decide to stand down before the election. What part of people's contribution to public life will be devalued by them seeking re-election?
I am not saying that their contribution will be devalued. As part of the substantial change that will come about in local government as a result of our desire to increase different contributions to local government through the widening access opportunities, we are saying to local elected members, "Here is an opportunity for you. We will recognise the contribution that you have made." In other parts of Britain, such as Wales, although the system worked slightly differently, people made local democratic choices. I do not see why local democratic choices should not be made in Scotland. People will either decide to throw their hat in the ring and go for the new system or they will decide not to stand before the election.
We all recognise the chance that people would take. If you are not devaluing the contribution, you are simply refusing to recognise it. There is a good argument for having a redundancy scheme, but my problem with the proposed scheme is that the Executive runs the risk of being accused of simply having a voluntary redundancy scheme for Labour councillors in order to address internal Labour Party issues. Labour has a number of candidates who simply will not be elected under the proposed new voting system. Therefore, the redundancy scheme is simply a political fix rather than a genuine attempt to recognise properly contributions to public life.
I presume that no Scottish National Party members will take any interest whatever in the redundancy scheme.
Is that your answer?
You made a political point and I am making a political point in return. You said that the redundancy scheme would be for Labour members only, but that is not the case. The scheme will be for all members of councils.
Is not the redundancy scheme designed, predominantly, to address an internal Labour Party issue in Scottish local government? That is why councillors must stand down before the elections to qualify for the scheme.
If Mr McFee wants to lodge an amendment to the bill to propose that only Labour members should qualify for the redundancy scheme, that is up to him. The scheme will be for all members rather than just for Labour members.
I will take that as a yes, given the evasiveness of your answer.
All members of councils will be able to avail themselves of the scheme.
I will change the subject slightly. The widening access to council membership progress group has taken up my idea of secondment, which would allow prospective councillors—from the business sector, or the education sector or wherever—to get the feel of the job and decide whether they liked it enough to want to do it. What are the minister's views on the secondment idea?
It would be a creative opportunity. I have told people in the business community and the private sector in general that I am surprised and disappointed that they no longer encourage employees to participate actively in local democratic structures. Such participation would be a bonus for their employers' businesses. We must work with the business community to ensure that such contributions are recognised and regarded as a valuable additional resource within a business or a company. Public sector employers have taken a much more public service view of the matter. Anything that the widening access group can come up with will be worth discussing.
You will accept Rowena Arshad's evidence to the committee that none of her group's valuable work is predicated on a change in the electoral system.
No, but I believe that the proposed change to the electoral system will be a big bang, because there will be an explosion in the number of people who will believe that local government is for them and that access to it has become easier for them. Combining widening access with all the other things that we will do in terms of remuneration and pensions will make the bill a package. The proposals on the electoral system, remuneration, pension payments and special responsibility allowances, added to the widening of access, will create a coherent strategy for real change within our council chambers.
But all those other things could be done without changing the voting system in the way that you propose.
Likewise, we could have the part of the bill that proposes changing the voting system without having the other two parts. However, when a bill is about local governance, we should try to draw it in the broadest terms that we can. That is what we are doing.
Indeed, but there is a suggestion that there is a linkage between the parts when, in fact, there is not.
I do not know whether you are saying that I suggested there was a linkage. I am saying that the bill provides us with an opportunity to make substantial change in the way in which we elect our councils, in the way in which councillors are treated in terms of pay, pensions and superannuation, and in the councillors whom we elect. The bill is a package.
I want to ask about increasing the representation of groups that are not strongly represented on councils, especially women, ethnic minorities and people with disabilities. There is no provision in the bill that requires parties in the future to select a balanced ticket of men and women, for example. Did the Executive consider making that a requirement in the bill or is it the Executive's view that that is a matter for individual political parties? Would the minister encourage political parties to take the opportunity that this change in the system will afford to make their candidates more broadly representative?
We do not have the powers to bring about such a change, but I am strongly of the view that, at all levels of the democratic process, parties need to encourage a broader range of candidates. There have been positive changes of late, but that work needs to continue.
Do members have questions about areas of the bill that we have not yet covered?
I have a question about funding. Paragraph 11 of the Finance Committee's report on the financial memorandum to the bill refers to Executive guidance on the drafting of financial memoranda, which
The standing orders of the Parliament say that we must provide best estimates of what we consider the financial implications of the bill to be. Let us remember that. I am involved in producing many financial memoranda. We want to work with the Finance Committee to improve those memoranda and to make them more effective, but sometimes things are hard to cost. When we introduced the legislation on concessionary travel, we were working on the basis of consultants' reports and with local government to make a best estimate of what demand would be. If members have read the papers of late, they will know that there is a big demand for the scheme, which suggests that we did not get the numbers right. That presents the Minister for Finance and Public Services, in particular, with some issues. We try to make all financial memoranda as accurate as possible and to present the best possible estimate. That is what we have done on this occasion.
If some of those costs—for example, remuneration for the boundary commission and the impact of the decisions that the working groups are coming up with—had been made known to us before we considered the bill, the Finance Committee would not have been able to say, as it has done, that the financial memorandum
The Finance Committee's report came out at about half past 1 or 2 o'clock, and I tried my best to get through it. I will respond to the committee on that point.
You talked about the innovative way in which you will ensure that people are not confused at the polling station and said that you will do that by having more people on duty there—that is what I drew from what you said. Will you fund the costs of having those additional people at the polling stations, so that local authorities do not incur additional costs?
That depends on what the election is for. In the past, local authorities have funded their own elections. If the local government elections were held on a different day—as I have said, I am not signed up to that idea—local authorities would have to meet the cost. In the elections of 1999 and 2003, local government elections piggy-backed on the two Scottish Parliament elections. The contribution that is made by the UK Parliament has substantially reduced the cost of elections to local government. I am still mulling those things over, with regard to cost, but if the two elections were held on the same day, I would expect the cost to be met as we currently conduct our business.
You said that you foresaw a system that involved a lot more people as a way of combating the difficulties that might arise with voter confusion. The cost of that will be significantly higher.
I question whether the cost would be significantly higher, but that would be one way of ensuring that people understood the system and felt comfortable with it so that, when they got to the polling booths, they would do the right thing with the ballot papers.
So, although you will issue guidance to local authorities on how such things should be done, you are not undertaking to pick up the tab for them.
I am happy to discuss the matter with local government.
Do you agree that there are potential opportunities for reducing the costs of elections, such as e-counting and postal voting—which would not require polling stations to be manned all day—as well as the move away from the practice of overnight counting that has been suggested by some people?
That is right. There are many traditions that we need to reconsider. I talked earlier about how the banks do their counting and how we do our counting. Overnight counting and the impact of payments is another matter. Local authorities have not come to me and said, "Here is some money back because we held the 1999 and 2003 elections on the same day as the Scottish Parliament elections, saving £X million." I will have a robust discussion with local government about the potential costs of the new system and how we can fund it more effectively. I take your point that the opportunity will arise, in the future, to have a much better system of counting votes, which may be cheaper in the long run.
I do not expect the Executive to produce a figure before the remuneration committee has been set up, but there is a question about who would meet the additional costs—if there are any—of a new remuneration scheme. Given the fact that the remuneration committee will make recommendations to ministers and that ministers will implement those recommendations, do you think that the Scottish Executive will meet those costs, or do you expect the costs to be met from existing local authority budgets?
I expect the costs to be met from existing local authority budgets.
As there are no further questions, I thank Andy Kerr and Tavish Scott for their time. It has been a good session. I also thank the two officials, Sarah Morrell and Murray Sinclair, for their attendance. I am sure that the minister is not a full-time crazy person, but crazy only part of the time. Thank you very much for your evidence.
Meeting continued in private until 16:12.
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