Committee
Local Government Committee, 21 May 2002
21 May 2002 · S1 · Local Government Committee
Item of business
“Renewing Local Democracy: The Next Steps”
Professor Curtice:
Watch on SPTV
I will repeat what I said slowly. Irrespective of the system that is used, the more councillors there are, the greater the potential for generating proportionality. That is a simple point of mathematics. If only four councillors represent the whole of Edinburgh, it is very difficult to make the system proportional. If there are 100, it is at least possible to make it proportional.I have forgotten what the Kerley recommendations are, but let us say that Kerley recommended that there should be only 40 councillors and we have decided to retain 50 or 60. What do we do with the extra 10 councillors? Under STV, we could have an extra councillor per ward, so instead of having four-member wards, as recommended by Kerley, we could have five-member wards. That would result in greater proportionality. Alternatively, we could have more four-member wards, because there are 50 councillors to distribute across the authority rather than 40. That would produce a smaller average electorate per ward. Each ward would still have four councillors, as recommended by Kerley, but the total electorate in each four-member ward would be smaller. That would bring us closer to the goal of local representation.What could be done with the 10 extra councillors under AMS? They could all be made additional councillors, which would increase the proportionality of the system without increasing the average size of single-member wards from what it would have been with 40 councillors. Alternatively, I could go to the other extreme and make the 10 extra councillors directly elected. That would reduce proportionality, but it would also reduce the electorate size per ward and get closer to the idea of local representation.I want to say something fundamental in response to Dr Jackson's questions. As I said earlier, if someone truly believes that the only adequate way of representing people in local government is through single-member wards, they are, by definition, against proportionality—they believe that single-member wards are more important than proportionality. There is no way that we can derive a proportional system with single-member representation. The additional member system is an attempt to square the circle by saying that single-member districts are all right as long as some councillors are directly elected and there are other councillors to achieve proportionality. There is a basic tension there. Proportionality depends on the existence, somewhere in the system, of multimember wards. The opinion poll evidence suggests that there is still support for single-member representation, but there is also clear sympathy for proportionality. The electorate, like many politicians, would like to have its cake and eat it.
In the same item of business
The Convener:
Lab
We move now to item 2, which is phase 1 of our inquiry into renewing local democracy. We will consider the white paper—"Renewing Local Democracy: The Next St...
Professor John Curtice (University of Strathclyde):
Thank you. The committee has asked me to do three things: first, to provide an overview of the electoral systems that are mentioned in the Executive's white ...
The Convener:
Lab
If nothing else, you have put us in our place by saying that only 8 per cent of people contact elected representatives, although 43 per cent of people claim ...
Professor Curtice:
I do not think that any research has been conducted on what people understand the councillor-ward link to be. That is a set of buzz words that has little mea...
Ms Sandra White (Glasgow) (SNP):
SNP
I thank Professor Curtice for his interesting presentation. I do not know about you, but my mind is boggling with the information on the first-past-the-post ...
Professor Curtice:
The Kerley committee was politically unwise to suggest a reduction in the number of councillors because the parties that would lose out in an area from the c...
John Young (West of Scotland) (Con):
Con
I first became a councillor in 1964 in Glasgow where there were three councillors per ward, as you recall. The ward electorate ranged between 50,000 and 5,50...
Professor Curtice:
The concern about alleged second-class representation relates more to an additional member system than to STV. It is also a product of the rules according to...
John Young:
Con
I may be wrong about this, but I believe that the current Prime Minister of New Zealand indicated that PR at national level had led to a lack of stability in...
Professor Curtice:
I do not suggest that some countries have not had difficulties with PR because of instability. However, much of the Italian electoral system is now based on ...
Dr Sylvia Jackson (Stirling) (Lab):
Lab
I have three questions, although two of them are for clarification.You seem to be saying that we have no clear research evidence of what the public think abo...
Professor Curtice:
The answer to your question is twofold. First, we do not know whether the public prefers AMS to STV in Scottish local government elections. I do not think th...
Dr Jackson:
Lab
You have examined multimember wards. How do they operate? Have you examined areas where several political parties have several councillors within one large w...
Professor Curtice:
The operation of local government is not an area in which I specialise. However, I am not aware that anyone has compared what happens in single-member wards ...
Dr Jackson:
Lab
Are you saying that no one has examined how the system operates on the ground in England?
Professor Curtice:
From an English perspective, the question is irrelevant. No one in England wants to make the vast majority of wards single-member districts. The fact that mo...
Dr Jackson:
Lab
Is there no evidence of how those wards operate in England?
Professor Curtice:
I am not aware of any such evidence, but I am not a local government expert. Members may want to investigate whether local government experts who work on how...
John Young:
Con
I served as a councillor at a time when there were three-member wards in Glasgow. In those days, the Conservatives were still called Progressives. The ward t...
Dr Jackson:
Lab
My last question is about the slide headed "Keeping Councillors". I did not follow everything that you said about that, particularly the third point on the s...
Professor Curtice:
I will repeat what I said slowly. Irrespective of the system that is used, the more councillors there are, the greater the potential for generating proportio...
Elaine Thomson (Aberdeen North) (Lab):
Lab
I apologise for having come in halfway through your presentation. I was across in Ireland last week watching the general elections and considering matters to...
Professor Curtice:
The answer is almost undoubtedly that it is a feature of both. One way of thinking about it might be to say that STV encourages the Irish to be Irish. If any...
Ms White:
SNP
I have a question about accessing the voters who come out to vote. The conclusion that I came to from your presentation is that there are good and bad points...
Professor Curtice:
I am sorry if I do not remember all your questions—feel free to butt in. I will answer your questions in reverse order. As I suggested, the evidence appears ...
Ms White:
SNP
Does the first-past-the-post system discriminate against smaller parties?
Professor Curtice:
It discriminates against parties whose votes are evenly spread geographically, until those parties become the largest party, at which point, it gives them a ...
Elaine Thomson:
Lab
I want to follow up on that. Is there any evidence—either national or international—to show that STV systems result in a lower proportion of female represent...
Professor Curtice:
I am not sure whether there is evidence to suggest that the situation is worse under FPP. There is certainly no clear or significant evidence to suggest that...
John Young:
Con
Nuremberg is twinned with Glasgow. A few years ago, the council in Nuremberg was made up of a coalition of Social Democrats, Christian Democrats and Greens. ...