Hansard

I am sorry about your voice, convener—you are obviously getting ready for the election campaign already.I understand that members have already received my paper. I will summarise the points that are made therein. Essentially, the draft bill makes provision to hold Scottish local government elections once every four years in the future and to do so on the occasion of elections to the Scottish Parliament. The Executive makes two main arguments in favour of its position. The first is that turnout would be higher and the second is that the longer time span for councillors' offices would help councils to take a more strategic view. I am not an expert on local government, so I do not wish to comment on whether four years would enable councillors to take a more strategic view than would three years. I note that four years is the norm in England and was the norm in Scotland prior to the last round of local government reorganisation. I primarily want to focus on the electoral aspects of the bill. I do not think that there is any controversy about the claim that turnout is higher in local government elections when they are held at the same time as another election that voters appear to regard as being more important. The turnout in the 1999 coincident elections in Scotland was 58.5 per cent, which is only a little lower than the turnout for the elections to Holyrood. Once people are in the polling stations, they will vote in local elections if a ballot paper is handed to them.The experience is the same in England, which had coincident elections on the occasion of the general elections in 1979 and 1997. Almost everybody who turned up to vote in the parliamentary elections also voted in the local government elections. Turnout in the election for Holyrood was about 58 or 59 per cent. That is above the level of turnout in any Scottish local elections since 1974. That part of the Executive's claim is uncontroversial. However, the committee might want to take four issues into consideration in deciding whether that is a sufficient argument for the proposal. The first objection to the proposal is that, although it may be the case that more people turn out to vote in coincident local elections, they perhaps vote on the basis of what is going on in Holyrood or Westminster so the independence of the electoral mandate that is given to local councils might be undermined. We can examine the evidence of the 1999 election. According to survey data, 28 per cent of people voted differently in the local elections from how they voted in the Scottish Parliament election, so voters do not necessarily vote in the same way in local elections as they do in parliamentary elections. Further evidence from England makes the same point. In 1997, when local elections and general elections were held on the same day, exactly the same percentage of people—28 per cent—voted differently in the two elections. The outcome in terms of party support, both in England in 1997 and in the Scottish elections in 1999, was different. Given that we know that, even if local elections are not held on the same day as another election, many of those who turn out to vote will do so not necessarily on local issues but on the basis of other issues, it is not clear that there is any evidence to suggest that holding the two elections on the same day makes it any less likely that voters in local elections will not vote on the basis of local issues.The second objection that could be made to the draft bill is that it prejudges, or may be thought to prejudge, the recommendation that the Executive has yet to make in response to the Kerley committee's recommendation that the electoral system for local government elections in future should be the single transferable vote. Without prejudging the issue, I think it needs to be appreciated that voters in a Holyrood election complete their ballot papers by putting an X against the name of one candidate and one list, whereas in a single transferable vote election, voters are given the different cognitive task of marking 1, 2 and 3 on their ballot paper. That may be thought more likely to produce confusion than the position in 1999 when, although we had different electoral systems, the cognitive task that voters faced was identical.Asking voters to vote two ways using the X-voting system and filling out a ballot paper in rank order is a relatively rare phenomenon. I do not know of any principal legislature that requires its voters to vote in those two ways in the same election. However, some quite well-documented evidence—details of which are given in the paper—was produced in the 1930s and 1940s in New York. At that time, local elections were held using the single transferable vote and, at the same time, the mayoral election was held using single member plurality. There is no evidence that turnout in the city council elections suffered as a result or that there was a higher number of invalid votes.The committee might wish to note one of the less well-commented-on provisions of the Elections Act 2001. That act postponed until 7 June the English and Northern Irish local elections that were due this month. It also contained detailed regulations to enable local elections in Northern Ireland, which are held using the single transferable vote, to be conducted at the same time as any parliamentary general election, which would be conducted using single member plurality. In the explanatory notes to the bill, the Home Office asserts that there is no practical reason to prevent combined elections being held in Northern Ireland using first past the post and proportional representation—STV. That may be the case. Assuming, as is expected, that the Prime Minister announces today a Westminster election on 7 June, the committee may wish to consider the direct evidence that Northern Ireland will produce as to whether holding a 1, 2, 3 election and an X election on the same day increases voter confusion. The third possible objection—I am sure that the committee will take other evidence on the matter—concerns the burden on electoral administrators. There were clearly some difficulties with the coincident elections in 1999. Equally, it should be pointed out that there is not much evidence of difficulties in England in 1979 or 1997. A small point to consider is that there is nothing to stop a UK Prime Minister deciding to hold a Westminster general election on the same day as a Scottish Parliament election. Under the provisions of the bill, it would be likely that that would be the day of Scottish local elections. In 1979, when coincident elections were held in England, the Government postponed the parish council elections that were due to take place on the same day. That was done on the ground that holding three elections on the same day was more than administrators and voters could be expected to manage.The fourth and final objection that might be made is that differences in the regulations between the Scottish parliamentary and local government elections might cause some difficulties for coincident elections. The committee might like to take an update on the subject, but my understanding of the current position is that the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 rewrites the regulatory framework for party and candidate finance and provides a new set of definitions of the expenditure that is incurred by candidates in their campaigns and how they need to report on that. Westminster has respected the devolved nature of Scottish local government elections so, although the provisions apply to English, Northern Irish and Welsh local elections, they do not provide for the Scottish local elections. Before the bill is enacted—if it is—it might be wise to ensure that the regulations for the definition of expenditure in a local government election in Scotland are the same as for a Holyrood election.I do not think that there is anything that the Scottish Parliament can do about this, but under the provisions of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, the definition of what counts as party expenditure in elections is simply the amount of money that is spent by the registered party over the four-month period prior to a Holyrood election, irrespective of the stated purpose of that expenditure. The implication is that if there are coincident local and Holyrood elections in Scotland, any national party expenditure incurred by political parties in Scotland within that four-month period—although it may be incurred principally to promote the party's local government campaign—will count towards the financial limits set for Scottish Parliament elections. There is no provision in the act to increase the amount of money that parties can spend if coincident local and parliamentary elections are held. The same point applies to the general election on 7 June. The expenditure that the Conservative party incurred yesterday in promoting its local government manifesto will count towards its financial limits for the Westminster general election. There is therefore an extra constraint on party expenditure.I will make one more point about stability. The bill seems to make it possible for ministers to call a local government election after less than four years—that is, if and when an extraordinary Scottish parliamentary election is called. Indeed, the bill makes that possible not simply should that extraordinary general election happen within the six-month period immediately before an ordinary general election is due—in which case the ordinary general election would not take place—but even if it is before. In theory therefore, if an extraordinary election were called two years into the Scottish parliamentary session, ministers would have the power to call a local government election at the same time; then two years later, when the Scottish Parliament faced an ordinary election, local government would be required to have another election. It is not clear in the documents that have been provided how that is consistent with the Executive's aim of ensuring greater stability in the longer term for local government councillors.