Hansard

We have less than a week left of the current parliamentary session. We have debated many issues, and there has been some agreement and some disagreement, but all with the intention of improving the lives of people in Scotland.

Although the Local Electoral Administration (Scotland) Bill may not be the most newsworthy piece of legislation that we have considered, it will make changes to give the people of Scotland the electoral system that they deserve: a system that is properly administrated to ensure that votes can be properly cast and accurately counted. There is consensus on the bill’s content, and I am grateful to stakeholders and members for their support before and during the bill proceedings. I am sure that members in the next session of Parliament will want to continue those good relationships and continue the process of improving electoral administration in Scotland.

I was struck by Michael McMahon’s opening remarks regarding consensus, and the risk that it may reduce the content of speeches and limit what can be said. Perhaps that shows that we are reaching the new politics, where discussion, conversation and the involvement of stakeholders and real people can reduce the disagreement when we get to stage 3 debates such as this one. That is exactly what we tried to do with the Arbitration (Scotland) Bill, and we took the Census (Scotland) Order 2010 through by getting people involved at an earlier stage.

There is scope for maintaining that approach and for the EMB to keep it going. I anticipate that the board will have an annual meeting that will be open to all returning officers and electoral registration officers and will enable issues to be discussed more widely with stakeholders. That will ensure that we have a crucial feedback loop, which will also allow feedback to flow from the EMB when it reports to Parliament.

As members know, the board will report to Parliament on the performance of its statutory functions, and it will then be for Parliament to decide whether it wishes to have a detailed discussion on the report’s content, which would provide the opportunity to raise particular issues with the convener. However, it is important to stress that the board is independent and must be seen to be separate from political influence.

It seems that we have made considerable strides forward. I was interested to hear about the chance conversation between Alex Johnstone and Willie Rennie; it appears that we have perhaps evolved to handle consensus a bit more effectively here than they have in Westminster. That might be because we are fewer in number, we represent a small country and we can get everyone in the room to debate the issues, or because we increasingly have open minds and a willingness to address unintended consequences by taking a more structured and thoughtful approach to the process.

I was taken by Jim Tolson’s one-man stress testing of the new system. He is building a bit of a track record there and maintaining his scepticism. To be fair, that scepticism is a useful catalyst. It is a prompt for further motivation to all concerned to ensure that the system is as resilient as we want it to be and that it passes the test of fewer spoiled ballot papers.

I was taken by Stewart Stevenson, who will ably pick up the baton that is about to be passed to him by Chris Harvie, and who gave us a thoughtful speech. The numbers were a wee bit dodgy, mind you. He said that in the 1832 election, 658 members garnered 827,000 votes, which was about 1,000 a head. However, that calculates as closer to 1,200 a head. Nevertheless, the bill would pass the Thomas Muir of Huntershill test. It will make the system much more representative and much more able, so he would approve of what we are doing.

I was also taken by Stewart Stevenson’s comment about marketing people who sell computer systems to the public and private sectors sometimes being wrong by a factor of 10. I thought long and hard about that, because having been a marketing man who was involved with IBM and ComputerLand in selling to Mr Stevenson in his persona at the Bank of Scotland, I would have to be the exception to that. I will talk to him about that later.

I am grateful for Duncan McNeil’s contribution, as I have been throughout the process. He gave a thoughtful and useful overview of what the bill is all about. I welcome the enhancement and development of the committee’s scrutiny role and the part that it has played with Government in the wider engagement, such as the seminar in the Parliament to discuss highly relevant issues such as voter turnout and voter registration. He recorded the fact that the bill is another step in the right direction and will consolidate and put on a statutory basis much of the good ad hoc work that has been done. He highlighted the issues of risk management, which is being addressed, design guides and adjudication booklets. He set out the essential overall purpose of addressing any residual lack of confidence out there while being prepared to face the planning and logistical challenges. He pointed out the need for feedback to ensure that we improve all the aspects and at least leave a clean pass to our successors to do exactly that when they re-engage with the issue in future.

We are in an interesting place. We still have the AV referendum, which is a reminder of the benefit of increased electoral autonomy and other levels of autonomy. I noted Stewart Stevenson’s comment that he has heard not a single question raised by the public on the matter, which has been my experience, too.

We have put together a very tidy piece of work. It might not be the most exciting bill, but it is significant, as Duncan McNeil set out. It is a function of excellent work by the committee. We are grateful for the way in which the committee worked together on the issue and to the witnesses, who gave us the inputs that allowed us to refine the bill and keep it on track. We are grateful to the committee clerks. I am particularly grateful to the bill team, who were absolutely impeccable in guiding me through the process and helping me make my contribution.

With that, I commend the motion: that the Local Electoral Administration (Scotland) Bill be passed by the Parliament.