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ON THE RECORD
RECORDED FROM TRANSMISSION: BBC ONE DATE:
18.06.00
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JOHN HUMPHRYS: Good afternoon. The
government's at loggerheads over the Euro. Are the policies of the opposition
parties any more credible? Labour managed to persuade more women than ever
before to vote for them at the last election, but can they hold on to them
next time? And they're planning to bring Parliament into the 21st century,
but will it be enough to satisfy the backbench MPs? That's after the news
read by SIAN WILLIAMS.
NEWS
HUMPHRYS: Blair's babes three years
ago .. a direct result, Labour said, of it's appeal to women voters. But
will they seek a new suitor next time around?
And have MP's finally
had enough of the old ways in Parliament?
JOHN HUMPHRYS: But first the Euro. This
has been has been a very difficult week for the government and it's the
Euro largely to blame. Ministers have always been divided over what strategy
to follow and now those divisions have surfaced in the most damaging way.
They're not likely to go away, certainly not over the next few days because
Europe's leaders are meeting in Portugal for their twice yearly summit.
A golden opportunity, then, for the opposition to make progress. Well,
that depends on whether THEY can convince an increasingly sceptical public
that their policies are the right ones. I'll be talking to Menzies Campbell
of the Liberal Democrats in a moment but, first, the Shadow Foreign Secretary
Francis Maude.
Good afternoon Mr Maude.
FRANCIS MAUDE: Good afternoon.
HUMPHRYS: In a somewhat windswept
sunny West Sussex garden it seems. Gordon Brown has very firmly reasserted
his position on the Euro, the government's position on the Euro and it
is incredible. What he is saying is that we prepare for going into the
Euro but we do not decide until we have passed - Britain has passed the
five economic tests that have been set for it. It's all about the economy
and what is right for Britain. That's a sensible position isn't it?
FRANCIS MAUDE: Well I mean it's an understandable
position. We think it's wrong because there's no way in which the British
economy can be right to join the Euro anytime during the next Parliament
so the right thing to do is to say no we won't join it and there are huge
political risks in terms of, you know there never has been a currency union
without a political union before. Now it may turn out that this one can
operate without a political union but it will be a first in history and
that's why we've concluded the right thing to do is to say no we won't
join the Euro. But, I mean it's a perfectly honourable position to hold.
What is not honourable, or honest, is to try and pretend to the public
that there is no debate and that's where I feel a certain sympathy, perhaps
unusually for Robin Cook who has assumed that government policy means what
it says and has sought to engage in a really open serious public debate
about the merits of scrapping the Pound and joining the Euro. It's rather
humiliating for him, he's been sought of stamped on by Gordon Brown and
told he mustn't do any of this but I think the people who really lose out
here are the public who are denied the chance for really serious debate
with the issues hammered out being treated like grown ups.
HUMPHRYS: But you can see that
Gordon Brown is right that it is about the economy. That it is all about
what is in the best economic interests of Britain, you'd accept that?
MAUDE: No it isn't. No I don't
accept that. It isn't just about economics, it's about the effect on the
way Britain governs itself as well. Of course economics matter and of course
it's right that Britain's economy is fundamentally out of sync with the
rest of Europe. It tends to drag what goes on in North America more than
it does the Continent of Europe which is why the Pound has been so extraordinarily
stable against the United States' Dollar but very volatile against the
Continental currencies so there is a huge economic issue which is no way
near to being resolved but is also, as I've just said, it is part of the
whole issue, what difference does this make to our ability to govern ourselves
and in reality that has already being eroded to a considerable extent and
we've taken the view by and large that the loss of self-government is a
trade-off worth making for the benefits that we've had from it. But, if
the cost of scrapping the Pound and joining the Euro is as we fear it will
be that we will end up with a full scale political union then that is not
a price that anyone could possibly contemplate paying. But we ought to
have that debate. Gordon Brown and Tony Blair simply maintain that these
issues don't exist, that there's no constitutional issues involved, well
there are and very big ones and we should talk about them.
HUMPHRYS: But just to return to
the economic argument for a moment. The OECD is now saying that we are
beginning to resolve those economic difficulties, that the convergence
that everybody says must happen before we join is now on its way, it's
happening.
MAUDE: Well that's based on very,
very slender evidence and a few sort of passing indications and in reality
you will want to look at something really sustainable. If you look at
what's happening at the moment, you know the interest rate cycle is different,
it's fundamentally different. The business cycle is different. We've been
through a long and sustained boom for quite some time now and it's now
our economy is probably cooling off now. The continental economies are
only just getting going so the cycles are fundamentally misaligned. Now
it may be that over time they will come back into -.or come into convergence
but they are not anywhere near that at the moment.
HUMPHRYS: But if that were to happen
during the lifetime of the next Parliament, I know you believe it to be
unlikely but nonetheless clearly not impossible, but if that were to happen..
MAUDE: No, I'd say it is impossible.
HUMPHRYS: You'd say it was impossible.
MAUDE: Yes it is, it is impossible
that you could have a sustained convergence emerging in the course of the
next five years, it just beggars belief that that could happen.
HUMPHRYS: How long is sustained
then?
MAUDE: Because you would want to
see it happen certainly over the course of a cycle wouldn't you, an economic
cycle, you wouldn't to see just a flickering convergence, the two paths
just happening to cross for a moment. You would want to see this really
sustained. Because we have seen with the Exchange Rate Mechanism what happens
if you try to lock currencies together without the cycles being properly
converged. We thought we were converged sufficiently in 1990 to join the
Exchange Rate Mechanism but within two years of that the divergence had
become so stark that we actually had to leave it. Now the thing about the
ERM is that it wasn't for ever, there was an exit from it, it wasn't a
very dignified or graceful exit but there was an exit. There's no exit
from the Single Currency, once you scrap the Pound that's it.
HUMPHRYS: So, you say - in answer
to the question how long? You say it has to be a full cycle, so in other
words if we were to see, let me put this - if we were to see convergence
beginning to happen, the economies coming together during the lifetime
of the next Parliament and let's assume a cycle to be, I don't know, five,
six years, something like that, is that a reasonable period?
MAUDE: Yes it's that sort of time.
HUMPHRYS: So by the end of that
five or six year period, it might well be that you would be in government,
I mean it's possible that the next, it might be in the next election of
course, it might be the one after that. You would then, you would then
say alright we will then take the country into the Euro, is that your position?
MAUDE: No, not a bit as you know
very well. Our position is that we think there are enormous risks in scrapping
the Pound and joining the Euro, both economic risks which are very clear
and it isn't just the cycle it is also that our economy is structurally
very different. It is much more liberalised, a much more open economy,
it trades in far more different directions. Our trade is very multinational,
it's globally orientated, not just European orientated and so there are
major structural differences which would need to be resolved before one
could contemplate it but also, as I said before, there are these major
constitutional concerns. Now it's just the case there never has been a
currency union before that's operated without there being a political union.
Actually a political union has happened before the currency union is created.
Now that's fine to do that but the fact is if you are going to go into
this, scrap the Single Currency.. scrap the Pound and join the Single Currency
you would want there to be really serious evidence that this wasn't drawing
political union in its wake. And of course the first aspect of political
union you would see is tax harmonisation and we are already seeing that
with intense pressure among our partners in Europe and the Commission to
introduce a really serious programme of tax harmonisation and you can understand
that case for that. But it is entirely to do with currency union.
HUMPHRYS: So in short, it's possible
to envisage the circumstances in which we would go in isn't it?
MAUDE: Well, I've made it very
clear on a number of occasions that I find it very hard to envisage circumstances
in which we'd want to join the Euro. I don't rule it out, I'm not arrogant
enough to believe that we know all truth for all times.
HUMPHRYS: .... pretty fine distinction......
MAUDE: .. that we can say never.
No it isn't at all, but do I find it hard to envisage circumstances in
which we would join, yes I do.
HUMPHRYS: Mm. I mean most people
listening to that would say, well come on, the Tories clearly aren't going
to join. Why don't they just come out and say so instead of spinning us
along so that they can say to some people in their party, you know we might
go in one day but in truth we know we won't.
MAUDE: Well, this is a discussion
you and I have had on a number of occasions John.
HUMPHRYS: And it's never been resolved,
and it's going to dog you right through the next election, and maybe the
one after that.
MAUDE: No, I don't think it is,
because actually I think most people, most people take a rather more robust
view of all this than you do. There's no other policy on which we're constantly
pressed to say what is going to be our manifesto after next. We get elected
for a parliament at a time, and of course we set down policies for a parliament
at a time. That's just ordinary parliamentary democracy, but you know,
we are saying vote Conservative at the next election to keep the pound.
If you want to keep, to be sure of keeping the pound the only way to do
it is to vote Conservative, and that's a very straight-forward position,
and Labour ought to be honest enough to say that they are robustly and
firmly committed to scrapping the pound and joining the Euro, which as
I say there's nothing evil or dishonourable about that. What is dishonourable
though is to try to pretend that there is no debate about it, to try to
suppress the debate, and as I say I have a lot of sympathy with those like
Peter Mandelson, Robin Cook, Stephen Byers who say that if the Government's
really serious about it and we know that they are, then it is their duty
to the public to go out there and make the case. We know what their plan
actually is, to try to win the election and if they win the election to
come in on, in the slip stream of that and have a referendum immediately
afterwards. And people will be very resentful I think if that's the case.
Let's have the debate, let's have it openly, honestly, let's explore the
issues, let's treat the public as the grown-ups, the intelligent grown-ups
that they are, and not pretend that this is somehow you, something you
shouldn't discuss in front of the children - let's keep it, you know, turn
Britain into 'don't mention the Euro' zone.
HUMPHRYS: As you raise the question
of the referendum there, you would have possibly a very large number of
referendums wouldn't you, because you're now saying that you would have
a referendum on any serious constitutional - or any serious issue, substantial
issue that comes up in Europe and that would be changed - change our relationship
with Europe. Are you doing that because you want to win back the support
of the very rich Mr Paul Sykes and other supporters of his. Is that what
this is all about?
MAUDE: You know very well it isn't.
I've heard the suggestion made and it is utterly absurd. The last time
I talked to Mr Sykes, which is I think the only time I talked him which
was about two years ago. We've formulated our policies on the basis, and
this may seem a bit old-fashioned to you John, but on the basis of what
we think to be right for the people of this country. And we do think it
right that if there were to be - and we're saying that under the Conservatives
there won't be further transfers of power from Britain to Brussels, but
if there were to be in an circumstances then there should be referendum.
The people should be consulted about it. I think support for Britain's
membership of the European Union has been eroded in recent years by the
fact that people felt that decisions - major decisions of this nature were
being taken without they're being consulted, and if you believe as I do
that Britain should remain in the European Union, then you would want the
legitimacy to come from the public being properly consulted. And that's
why at the end of this year when there's a further treaty which looks as
if it will be an integrationist treaty giving away further powers to Brussels
...
HUMPHRYS: The treaty of Nice...
MAUDE: ... the treaty of Nice,
there should be a proper referendum then. Tony Blair should not just try
and slide it in by claiming that it's just about technicalities. It won't
be about technicalities so far as we can see, and the people should be
consulted.
HUMPHRYS: What about the referendum
- the changes that are being proposed now at Portugal - the talk about
fundamental rights treaty and that sort of thing. Would you want a referendum
on that?
MAUDE: Well, yes if that's going
to transfer powers, and it sounds as if that's going to be legislated through
the treaty in one way or another, even as an annex to the treaty. Now
Tony Blair will say well it's just technicalities, just declaring a few
rights. Well, we know what happens. When these things get decided they
get brought into the European Union jurisprudence, the court adjudicates
on them and before you know where you are you have British laws being overset
by European courts. Now, we know that that happens in certain cases but
we should - it's where we've taken a deliberate decision to hand over powers.
What shouldn't happen is it happening by stealth, by slippage, and by
the treaty somehow creeping forward by the way it's interpreted. So we're
saying......
HUMPHRYS: ...so why did you...sorry,
I was to say why didn't you have one on Maastricht if you feel this way
about things?
MAUDE: Well I think for one thing,
at that stage there was not the custom of having referendums, but you know
we've had referendums now on everything. We've even had a referendum
for heaven's sake on whether London should have a Mayor. If you can have
a referendum on that then, surely should be having a referendum on whether
Britain becomes a province of a United States of Europe.
HUMPHRYS: So the Conservatives
now like the idea of referendums. We're going to go the way of Switzerland,
is that it?
MAUDE: Well, no, not a bit, but
Mr Blair has introduced the referendum as a constitutional instrument.
We've now had what - four or five in the few years since he's been Prime
Minister, and I think people will say, well if we can one on Scottish devolution,
even rigged ones like the Scottish and Welsh ones were, and you have one
on Northern Ireland and you have one on whether London should have a Mayor,
and you're threatening to have them on whether the south-east of England
and the North-west should have their own regional assemblies, then you
should certainly have one on whether the Houses of Parliament are turned
into a regional assembly of the United States of Europe.
HUMPHRYS: Right.
MAUDE: People will be pretty resentful
if they're not given that.
HUMPHRYS: Well, Mr Sykes would
enjoy hearing you say all of this. He told us this morning that he wants
to come back into the Tory Party which of course he left a few years back.
Would you like to see him come back in?
MAUDE: Well, I mean I welcome people
who support our aims, but obviously we don't welcome people who don't support
our aims, and if he's seen our policies and likes what he sees then I'm
very pleased indeed.
HUMPHRYS: I imagine you'd welcome
his money wouldn't you?
MAUDE: Well, as far as I can say
- I mean I'm not aware that he's offered us any money. If he does then
we'll obviously be ready to listen, but I'm not at all confident that he
has offered any money.
HUMPHRYS: And then people will
say 'Ah, well, look, you see he's buying your policies'. That's what will
happen isn't it.
MAUDE: People always say silly
things like that, but in reality as I've told you I haven't talked to Paul
Sykes for two years. I've only talked to him once in passing, and you
know the idea that this policy has been developed to please Mr Paul Sykes,
it hasn't been developed to please him at all. It has been developed to
give the British public the sense that they actually have some say over
the destiny of their country, and they aren't just going to get dragged
further and further into a single European super-state which none of them
want.
HUMPHRYS: Right. Francis Maude,
thank you very much indeed for that.
MAUDE: Thank you John.
JOHN HUMPHRYS: Well if the government
does find itself in real political difficulty over the Euro, where can
it turn? Its natural allies in Westminster are the Liberal Democrats,
they even sit on a Cabinet Committee, so do they find the government's
approach more acceptable than Mr Maude did there? Their Foreign Affairs
spokesman is Menzies Campbell, he is in our Edinburgh Studio.
Mr Campbell, same sort
of question in a sense, that I put to Francis Maude there. The government
seems to have its act together now, a sensible policy as far as you are
concerned, prepare and decide?
MENZIES CAMPBELL MP: No, I don't believe so, and
what is interesting I think is that the dispute in the Cabinet is one of
strategy rather than principle and that's what makes the dispute all the
more difficult to understand. I don't think it is sensible to think that
you can conduct the next General Election in the belief that somehow the
issue of the Single Currency will not be right there at the very forefront
of people's minds. And that's why we say of the government, that they've
shown far too much timidity. If as the Prime Minister told us last Wednesday
at Prime Minister's Questions, the government believes it's right in principle
to join the Single Currency, then they should be out there arguing that
principle so that people of the United Kingdom understand what's involved.
HUMPHRYS: But, we couldn't possibly
join now, could we?
CAMPBELL: No, it's never been the
case, never been the policy of my party that we should join irrespective
of the economic conditions. We should join when the convergence criteria
have been achieved and in particular, when we have achieved a competitive
exchange rate. But as you pointed out yourself a moment or two ago in your
question to Francis Maude, the OECD believes that we are approaching those
convergence criteria and I think Deanne Julius, member....former member
of the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England, said something
similar this week as well. We are getting towards the convergence criteria.
All the more reason for the government making it plain that it supports
the principle and making the case as to why the principle is a well founded
one, rather than that rather curious shelf-life principle, which Mr Maude
was having some difficulty explaining to you a moment ago.
HUMPHRYS: Well, he said that you
can't just converge for, you know, a day or two or a year or two, you've
got to make sure it's sustainable. But, would you have a referendum the
moment we meet those criteria. I mean, somebody comes up and says, right,
that's it, now the OECD says yes, we've cracked it, you'd then say, right,
let's have a referendum, let's put it to the people.
CAMPBELL: Well, Paddy Ashdown as
you remember was the first party leader to call for a referendum. The
approach which I would favour would be to say, let's have a referendum
on the principle. If we get the endorsement of the British people on the
principle, then it's a question of judgement for government as to when
the convergence criteria have been achieved, and I think also, if you were
to have a referendum on the principle and get that endorsement, then of
course the convergence criteria would by virtue of that fact, become easier
to achieve, because so much of the convergence criteria depend upon subjective
assessments, I think to some extent Mr Brown may have drawn them in that
subjective way in order to suit his own political interest.
HUMPHRYS: But in a sense you would
be letting the tail wag the dog there, wouldn't you and the reason for
that is because your party believes, has always made perfectly clear, that
greater political integration in Europe is desirable and this would lead
us clearly in that direction.
CAMPBELL: Well I certainly agree
with you about that. This isn't just an economic decision, it's a political
and a constitutional decision too and that's why a referendum is appropriate
and I'd go on from that and say that if we think that staying out of the
Single Currency we are going to be able to enhance our influence on Europe,
we have got another think coming. If we want to have the political influence
which successive Prime Ministers in this country have claimed, including
even Mrs Margaret Thatcher, then we have to be part, in my view, of the
Single Currency, to exercise that political influence and to create a Europe
which is more liberal in terms of its trading policies, which allows a
far higher degree of economic flexibility and makes the single market about
which the currency is, some would argue, the last locking piece, makes
the single market much more effective.
HUMPHRYS: As you say, you like
the idea of referendums, you were the first to suggest one on the Euro.
What about the Tories' idea that we should have referendums on big changes.
The sorts of changes in Europe that fundamentally affect us and are non-constitution
as it were.
CAMPBELL: Well, I think if the
change is big enough, like the Single Currency, then there is some justification
for that, but if you read the small print, what Francis Maude was arguing
about, what William Hague has endorsed in the last week or so, would be
a recipe for paralysis. Francis Maude said in a speech last week in Germany,
there should be no more QMV, Qualified Majority Voting at all - and yet
we know that at the summit which is coming up in Portugal, questions will
arise about QMV, for example, in relation to the liberalisation of transport
policy. Now that in a sense, passes some part of Brussels in that the
veto would no longer be appropriate, but we can hardly go around having
a referendum of whether there should be qualified majority voting on the
liberalisation of transport policy.
HUMPHRYS: Yes, but he raised more
fundamental matters than that, didn't he. I mean are you saying that yes,
we would like of course a referendum on the Euro, but that's it, any other
changes and we are seeing ourselves drawn, or we have over the years, seen
ourselves drawn closer and closer into European integration. We have seen
our relationship with Europe change fundamentally, and mostly, we have
not been given an opportunity to vote on those fundamental changes. Are
you saying that apart from this, apart from the vote on the Euro, that's
it, whatever governments choose to do in future, we simply go along with?
CAMPBELL: No, I'm not saying that
and I have to point out as I think you did yourself, this new found enthusiasm
for the referendum on the part of the Conservatives who didn't have one
in relation to the Maastricht Treaty, or indeed some might say, more significantly,
the Single European Act of 1986 which created the Single European Market,
is rather unusual. But if it's a fundamental constitutional change, then
I think a referendum would be appropriate. But just to go back to the
hypothesis upon which you began that question. The integration which has
taken place over that period you described, has been in the interests of
the people of the United Kingdom, that's the important consideration.
HUMPHRYS: Well, yes, but that,
you talk about subjective judgements, that is entirely subjective isn't
it? Many people would say that those changes have not been in our interest
and we would rather like in future to have the opportunity to vote before
they happen and express our views then. So, let me repeat the question,
what sorts of changes, would you say, broadly you're in favour of more
rather than fewer referendums - what sorts of things would you have referendums
on? I mean Francis Maude mentioned the Treaty of Nice that's going to
be negotiated, is being negotiated as we speak, that .....
CAMPBELL: Well, remember what the
Treaty of Nice is designed to do, it's designed to create the circumstances
in which enlargement can effectively take place. There are three major
issues, they are sometimes called the Amsterdam leftovers. There's the
question of constitution of the commission, how many commissioners there
should be and whether every country should have two as of right. There's
the question of the re-weighting of the votes in the Council of Ministers
so that there's a reflection of the total population of a large country
like the United Kingdom rather than just a question of fixed votes in the
Council. And there's also further questions with regard to the mechanisms
by which enlargement should take place. These are not fundamental constitutional
issues of any kind whatsoever.
HUMPHRYS: No referendum on that,
then you wouldn't want a referendum on that?
CAMPBELL: You won't need one. Can
I also make the point that the system by which the United Kingdom ratifies
treaties is, of course, to put them through the House of Commons line by
line and those of us who served through the long watches of the night in
the Maastricht Treaty would not want to claim that that Treaty
had been anything other than examined in the most minute detail, at that
time mostly by government backbenchers, Tory government backbenchers who,
of course, were very substantial dissenters from Mr Major's policy.
HUMPHRYS: So apart from the Euro
is there anything we've done, vis a vis Europe that you would have had
a referendum on.
CAMPBELL: No. I...
HUMPHRYS: Limited enthusiasm then!
CAMPBELL: Because it's a question
of what you regard as being of sufficient fundamental nature. Now the Single
Currency is clearly of that kind but there's nothing that's happened in
my view during the period of Britain's membership which would have justified
having a referendum and I... invest (sic) any proposals against that.
HUMPHRYS: I thought you were broadly
agreeing with Francis Maude that referendums are a good idea except in
principle but not in practice it seems.
CAMPBELL: Where the principle is
satisfied. I think if you go around saying we are going to have a referendum
for example on the Treaty of Nice, which is going to deal with questions
of the weighting of votes in the Council, the number of commissioners,
an extension of qualified majority voting in relation to issues like transport
you will pretty soon get referendum fatigue. The public won't be interested.
HUMPHRYS: Alright, talking about
referendums and all that sort of thing and matters of principle effecting
you, proportional representation. As far as the Liberal Democrats have
been concerned has always been the big one, fair votes you call it. It
seems that your position seems to be changing now and that you are prepared
to accept a system that would not be genuinely proportional and that is
this mysterious thing called the 'alternative vote'. Is that true, that
you would do that?
CAMPBELL: Well I don't know where
that comes from but...
HUMPHRYS: It comes from your leader
ducking a few questions on the Westminster Hour last weekend as a matter
of fact.
CAMPBELL: Well ducking questions
is what leaders go in for isn't it, it's one of the qualifications..
HUMPHRYS: That's very honest of
you to admit it!
CAMPBELL: I mean let's be clear,
the alternative vote is not a system of Proportional Representation, although
if you look round the United Kingdom we now have PR in Wales, PR in Scotland,
we've got it for London, we had it for the European elections, there's
every chance that we'll get it for local government elections so the case
for PR is advancing step by step. So far as AV is concerned, it is not
a proportional system but if that were to be the first stage in an agreed
programme towards moving towards Proportional Representation for Westminster
then it would certainly be worthy of consideration. It would be very foolish
of any party which supported PR to say well we won't take the alternative
vote as a first step towards a fully proportional system.
HUMPHRYS: So you'd accept a referendum
on that then?
CAMPBELL: We might well, this government
has got a commitment of course as you know in its current manifesto..the
manifesto upon which it was elected, to hold a referendum on the system
of election. If the government makes a firm proposal of that kind then
a referendum may well be appropriate.
HUMPHRYS: Very quick thought. I
see in the papers this morning you're up for the Speaker at the House of
Commons, is that true, are you in for it?
CAMPBELL: Fascinating, even flattering
speculation but there's no vacancy and when I last saw Betty Boothroyd
on Thursday she looked to me like someone who was going to go on for a
very long time indeed.
HUMPHRYS: Well that's certainly
true. Ming Campbell, thank you very much indeed.
HUMPHRYS: One of the proudest boasts
of the Labour Party at the last election was that they'd managed to persuade
a higher proportion of women to vote for them than ever before. But that
was more than three years ago and now there are signs that some of those
women are becoming disillusioned. It's Labour's Women's Conference this
coming weekend and, as Iain Watson reports, they can expect to hear some
pretty tough talking from the women who feel that, so far, the promises
that were made have yet to turn into performance.
IAIN WATSON: Women like to shop around,
politically at least. And New Labour is being encouraged to listen closely
to their views. The massed ranks of the Women's Institute gave Tony Blair
his rudest reception yet and new research suggests that women of all ages
are beginning to feel let down by Labour.
HARRIET HARMAN: The issue of women's votes which
was so critical to our election success in 1997 remains critical and those
women who voted for us for the first time were not giving us a blank cheque
- they were giving us the benefit of the doubt and we've really got to
deliver for them.
DEBORAH MATTINSON: Women have a different approach
to politics than that of men - they are less tribal and less party loyal
- they are more likely to look at politics and say "what's in it for me?"
rather than enjoy it for the game and for that reason they are the essence
of the floating voter.
WATSON: Deborah Mattinson bases
her conclusions on focus group research conducted throughout South East
England. Her findings are published today in a pamphlet for the Fabian
Society - a Labour supporting think tank. Co-authored with the former Cabinet
Minister Harriet Harman, it's optimistically entitled 'Winning for Women.'
A pessimist would have called it 'Labour Losing Out.'
Labour swept to power
in 1997- winning marginal seats like Basildon - partly by narrowing an
historically large gender gap - the first time women were voting Labour
in almost equal numbers to men. But now there are signs that their conversion
to the cause could be short lived. At local elections here last month,
Labour lost control of the council. And now influential voices in the Party
are saying much more needs to be done to retain the confidence of women
voters.
MATTINSON: One of the achievements of the
current Labour government is that it has managed to maintain that reduced
gender gap at about 2% - there is as yet no evidence that the gender gap
is opening up again. However, what we have been seeing for the last year
or so is what I call the dissatisfaction gap; that is to say that women
are much less likely to be satisfied with the government's performance
than men. Quite significantly so - to the tune of up to about 13% - so
I think that's something the Labour Party really has to look out for, because
in time that might translate into an electoral gender gap.
WATSON: Club Kingswood in Basildon
is a plush leisure centre popular with all ages. It's also a place where
Labour's leadership could learn a lot more about the attitudes of female
floating voters. It could be said support for Labour in '97 was a mile
wide but only an inch deep. And now discontent with Tony Blair is surfacing.
UNNAMED WOMAN: In '97 I think he was perfect.
Perfect family man, absolutely perfect. I stayed up all night, first time
I've ever voted Labour and we did all believe, new beginning, and the song
that, you know, they were singing that was ringing and ringing in everybody's
brain - yet unfortunately I can't think of it now - "Things Can Only Get
Better" and unfortunately we all expected too much and they haven't delivered.
WATSON: Labour won Basildon in
1997 with a strong showing, the policies they promised seemed to be in
line with people's aspirations. But some voters can't quite summon up the
same enthusiasm now, they want to see evidence of firm progress on issues
like health and education. And women in particular seem willing to believe
William Hague's assertion that the Prime Minister is all mouth and no delivery.
UNNAMED WOMAN: I don't really see any improvements
at all, if not anything, everything getting worse again, they are still,
still talking about sort of, what the improvements they were going do with
education and health and I just don't see anything.
UNNAMED WOMAN: I know I won't be voting Labour
in the next election. I did think they were going to produce a lot but
unfortunately - we've seen no evidence of that - we just haven't.
HARMAN: I think particularly the
women who had always voted Tory previously but for the first time voted
Labour in 1997 were clear that they were doing it above all because they
wanted better schools for their children and because they wanted the hospital
waiting lists where their elderly mother was going to have a hip replacement
to be shorter, and that's how they are judging us. And therefore they're
not so interested or swayed by what politicians are telling them, about
what the government's done, they're judging from their own experience and
that's why they feel that more needs to be done. They voted for us to sort
out the health service and the education system and so far it still feels
a bit too much the same.
WATSON: Labour strategists are
refusing to be blown off course. They say that while the public may be
disappointed about a lack of progress on health and education, the next
election will be decided on the basis of a glowing economic performance.
Unfortunately for Labour, women see only gloom on this front, too.
When MORI asked voters
if the economy will improve, stay the same or get worse in next twelve
months, men were pretty positive, but women were far more pessimistic.
UNNAMED WOMAN: I don't think there's any investment
in what we need for the future. All you hear is things like the manufacturing
industry disappearing.
UNNAMED WOMAN: You're getting less value for money,
they say your food bill's gone down, but I wouldn't exactly say it has.
WATSON: There's a lively cr�che
at Club Kingswood in Basildon. But for many women, balancing home and work
life remains a challenge. The government has emphasised its commitment
to childcare to help encourage women back to work. But a growing number
of voters feel the government's approach undervalues those who stay at
home. So now there are calls for Labour's policy to catch up with public
opinion.
HARMAN: There's a new part of the
agenda which is helping women to be able to afford and have time with their
children, especially in the early months of a baby's life. And that's why
there's a new agenda which is a very important, a new radical agenda for
extending maternity pay and maternity leave so people can have the time
off they want with their babies before they go back to work.
WATSON: But some women in marginal
seats are surprised that this new agenda hasn't already delivered. The
government said new parents can have the right to time off with their kids
but some MP's argue they should put their money where their mouth is.
DIANA ORGAN: As for the parental leave,
yes I believe it should have been paid parental leave; because that means
then that parental leave will only be able to be taken by those that are
either in well paid jobs, you know, that actually can afford to say, well
I can take this leave because it doesn't matter - women that are working
in factories in my constituency, they need every cent that they're earning
to keep the family going, they won't be able to afford the luxury and neither
will the men and I think that we should have extended it to paid parental
leave and it should come from the government.
WATSON: Women, at 51% of the population,
are hardly a homogenous group - an unfortunate fact for Labour strategists.
While policies on childcare may appeal to younger women, recent research
shows that it's the over 55's who seem to be the most disillusioned with
Labour's performance.
MATTINSON: The dissatisfaction point actually
works across all ages, but the vulnerability for the vote is actually with
the older women. Labour's great achievement in fact, in '97 when it almost
closed the gender gap was shifting the votes of women over the age of 55,
that was where it did incredibly well - those women matter very much, they
matter because of their sheer volume, there are many more of them, they
are also more likely to vote.
UNNAMED WOMAN: Pensioners have been rather badly
treated by this government and they felt, the pensioners felt that the
75p on their pensions was an insult.
WATSON: The struggle of the suffragettes
to win votes for women more than eighty years ago is chronicled here at
the museum of London. But there are those who say that even now at the
beginning of the 21st century, the political advancement of women at Westminster
is still being held back. They're looking to Labour to increase the number
of women MPs, but they say it's also vital that competent women are given
their fair share of the top jobs in government.
MATTINSON: What I think a lot of women
have highlighted particularly in the last year is this sense that prominent
women have sort of disappeared, where have they gone? And this was mentioned
again and again in the focus groups, and I think it's a problem actually.
I think the Labour party needs to address this in a number of ways, I
think it needs to ensure as many of the new seats that come up as possible
go to women; I think that it needs to ensure that there are more prominent
women in government and that probably does mean running departments.
WATSON: Women used to fight for
the vote; now they're fighting for seats. Only one woman has been chosen
so far from 13 Labour constituencies where MPs are retiring. The 101 Labour
women elected in '97 may find their numbers diminished after the next election,
if male colleagues insist on getting in the way of aspiring female MP's.
HARMAN: We have to sort this out,
we can't let the clock turn back. I think we've got to do two things.
Firstly, we've got to change the law to make it possible to have all women
shortlists again; so that some seats can be set aside for women, so that
that's the only way we can guarantee women getting into the House of Commons.
But that would probably, that wouldn't help us for this election, because
we are already in the current round of selections; but for the current
round of selections there will be some late retirements, and the national
executive committee must make sure that they actually use those late selections
to actually ensure that we are increasing our numbers of women - it's down
to them.
WATSON: Harriet Harman also wants
the party machine to introduce institutional changes to enshrine women
in leading roles. She wants to see a new Labour Party leadership team of
three people - one of whom should always be a woman. But some of her colleagues
at Westminster don't think proposals like these will help them keep their
seats at the next election.
ANGELA SMITH: I think that may look a bit
tokenistic - what I think and I've picked up from in my constituency, we
want to see a woman's perspective on issues at every level of government
and every department; ensuring you've got one person in one position doesn't
do that.
UNNAMED WOMAN: As long as a job gets done, I don't
care if it's a man or a women, I think it gets a bit ridiculous.
UNNAMED WOMAN: Basically, if a man or woman's good
at their job, you vote for them, doesn't matter what sex they are.
WATSON: Some say that women MPs
did themselves no favours when, six months after Labour's victory, all
but ten of them voted for a cut in lone parent benefit. Some of those who
defied the protests and stayed loyal to the then social security secretary
- one Harriet Harman MP, now feel the issue could have been better handled.
SMITH: I think the timing on that
was very bad in the sense that the money was made up later through child
benefit, but it was taken away earlier. I think by the timing of that,
we didn't get that message across in the way we should have done, or acted
in a way that gave the best impression to people.
ASTON: In retrospect though, we
do regret bringing cuts to one-parent benefit.
HARMAN: Well, obviously there's
lots of things that you know you would have done differently but I think
that the course of the government, you're prioritising health and education
and bringing more women into parliament and into government is the right
one and that's what women voters are looking for.
WATSON: The Prime Minister is said
to be driven by a desire to prove that Labour can deliver. This meets with
the approval of many women MPs in marginal seats. Some of them say that
Harriet Harman's proposals on all-women shortlists, and other constitutional
changes, won't bring Labour any closer to victory. Women voters find it
all a bit of a distraction.
ORGAN: What they want to see are
the things that affect their lives, which is, better public transport,
better terms and conditions at work, better housing, better schools for
their kids and better health care for themselves; it's a real Islington
chattering class agenda and that's not the agenda, I have to say, of the
people in the Forest of Dean, and, I suspect, throughout the country.
WATSON: Women have been carefully
weighing Labour's promises against delivery. With time running out, Labour
must do more to retain the confidence of female floating voters. If women
change their minds at the next election, the gender gap could be back.
JOHN HUMPHRYS: Iain Watson reporting.
If William Gladstone
were to rise from his grave and pop into the Palace of Westminster this
week he'd probably feel quite at home. The MPs' dress might have changed
- not QUITE so many pinstripes - and he'd be staggered by all those women
on the green benches, but he'd find that Parliamentary procedures are much
as they were when he was running things. Well now, change is in the air.
Indeed a committee of MPs has been considering how to bring Parliament
up to date. But, as Paul Wilenius reports, the backbenchers are worried
that even if the changes they're considering do take place, Mr Gladstone
would still feel perfectly at home.
PAUL WILENIUS: It's a bright new morning
for a once new Labour MP. The political day starts early even though
it only ended a few hours ago. Just time for breakfast in his London flat,
before heading straight back to the Commons. His family are at home in
his West Midlands constituency, so MP Peter Bradley eats alone. It's a
daily routine he finds frustrating.
PETER BRADLEY: It's just not a sensible
way to run a modern legislature. From about half past six when I finished
my last meeting to twenty to midnight when we finished at the Commons I
reckon I did about thirty minutes productive labour. Frankly, when you
are as exhausted as you can get, doing these kind of hours and particularly
when you add in the frustration of wasting time, then of course you're
not going to be able to give of your best and that just increases the aggravation
and the frustration.
WILENIUS: Modernisation of our
traditional institutions to create a new Britain has been constantly promised
by Tony Blair. But when it comes to the House of Commons, his government
has been slow to reform. Now many of his own MPs are calling for far reaching
changes to the way it works to show that Labour has not lost its radical
edge.
TONY BLAIR: Modernisation is not an end
in itself, it is for a purpose.
WILENIUS: After Tony Blair's 1997
Conference speech many hoped his reforming zeal would extend to the House
of Commons. The Labour Government set up a Modernisation Committee to drive
through change. So far plans for more family friendly hours and electronic
voting have been put on ice. Even though a second debating chamber has
been set up and the bizarre ritual of MPs in tops hats has been ended,
this doesn't add up to radical reform.
BRADLEY: It's a hostile place.
It's introverted. All the values here are written in secret codes which
are available only to Members of Parliament and only if they've got the
time and patience to decipher them. I mean it is bizarrely antiquated and
it's almost expressly written in a language that people outside don't understand.
WILENIUS: At the Commons the one
thing Peter Bradley does understand is how much of his time seems wasted.
BRADLEY: I've got no idea what's
going on. We've had one vote at 6 o'clock this evening, no indication of
when the next vote is going to be and so really I'm trapped. This is the
second night running this week that I'm here just kicking my heels. I'm
going to find a friendly Whip to see if he knows any better than I do what's
going on.
WILENIUS: All MPs are at the mercy
of the whips, the party business managers. But now many restless Labour
backbenchers want the Modernisation Committee end this waiting around.
One of the key members of the Committee is the parliamentary leader of
all Labour MPs, Clive Soley. They're looking to him to tackle the needlessly
long hours.
CLIVE SOLEY: We really do have to address
this issue of a radical reform of the House of Commons and I think the
thing that most upsets people outside about the House of Commons is the
sight of it, sitting, as I say, at three o' clock in the morning voting
and speaking and they say nobody else would be passing legislation at this
time of the morning, when they're tired and supposed to be getting up at
eight or nine o' clock to go back into committees the next day. You think
this is crazy - why are they doing it?
WILENIUS: Mid-evening and MPs think
it's crazy too. They're shackled to Westminster while others are packing
up to go home. For Peter Bradley radical reform can't come soon enough.
BRADLEY: The whips expect the next
vote around about ten. They expect it around ten but they don't know that
it's going to be at ten, so I still can't go very far from the Palace of
Westminster and if I do, I'm going to have to risk sprinting back at the
drop of the hat. I'm going to have a bite to eat and then I'm going to
risk it, I'm going to go back to my office, try and get a bit more work
under my belt.
SOLEY: What we need to say is the
voting takes place normally at set times so that business of the House
comes to an end I would suggest about ten o' clock. I say ten o'clock simply
because if you're a Northern MP or from Devon or somewhere you know you'd
rather work hard during Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and then go
back to your constituency on Friday and work in your constituency.
ANN CLYWD: I'd like to see us working a
nine to seven day. I came here from the European Parliament where we rarely
worked beyond seven o' clock at night, which I think is sensible, it's
a reasonable time for people to finish, particularly as most of us come
here for first thing in the morning and if we're here until midnight, or
sometimes until one o'clock or two o'clock, on some occasions until six
o'clock then obviously people are very tired and when they've got committees
early in the morning the next day, they can't stay in bed to make up for
it. So I think it's not a sensible use of people's time.
WILENIUS: At Westminster, the feeling
is that Clive Soley's suggestion is hardly "radical reform" .The idea these
changes would bring the Commons bang up to date is seen as laughable.
CORBETT: If a Modernisation Committee
proposes ten o'clock, first of all I wouldn't believe them because there'd
be an exception in it, and secondly it is to totally misunderstand what
this is about. We run this Parliament as if - and this is the origins of
it - most of its members towards the end of July had to get back to their
fields and estates to gather in the harvest, then to celebrate it, then
to do the Autumn sowing and when all that was done they would come back
here in October and start the business of the nation again. Nothing has
changed in two centuries to that extent and it's absolute hogwash.
WILENIUS: Time is a vital commodity
for MPs .They don't want to waste it. But to control Commons hours is to
exercise power. The government wants the power to get their business through
and the Opposition parties want to be able to exploit or even waste time,
forcing late debates to keep Government Ministers and MPs up all night.
SIR GEORGE YOUNG: I'm not in the business of keeping
the House up all night unnecessarily and it's interesting that some of
the people who kept me out of my bed, when we were in government, are now
the very people saying you must have reasonable hours. I think the argument
is that the opposition has to make sure that the bills get properly debated.
WILENIUS: But one former insider
- ex Tory MP and Party Whip Michael Brown, says it's all about the Opposition
putting political boot in.
MICHAEL BROWN: The aim of the game so far
as the opposition is concerned is to make sure that there is such a log
jam at the end of the annual session of Parliament that the government
are forced to drop some of their Bills, no government wants to do that
so the opposition by means of keeping the House up all night, getting Ministers
tired, getting Labour backbenchers very angry so they have to take two
days instead of one day or sit all night, it's a way of ensuring that there
is a complete sense of mayhem at the end of the session and the government
is then forced to jettison some of its legislation.
WILENIUS: Half past nine and Peter
Bradley's back in his office catching up. He's waiting around for another
vote, a slave to the green screens in every room in the Commons. But if
a radical change to these long hours would be controversial, there's another
area of Commons modernisation which is even more contentious.
In the 1980's, a system
of Select Committees was set up to look at and criticise the government.
But now many feel they're toothless. They don't have enough power to really
take Ministers to task.
BRADLEY: "Oops minister's up
- that means voting imminent"
WILENIUS: Modernisers also want
to see radical reform of this system. Successive governments have exerted
some control over the Select Committees and their reports, picking who
chairs them, and who sits on them. Forcing out those people seen as troublemakers.
BROWN: As the Government Whip,
the aim is to make sure that you've got your stooges on the committee and
what will happen is that the Chairman of the Committee of Selection will
advertise on the Whip for a vacancy and you will go up to one or two friendly
pals of yours, indicate that they're doing very well, if they want to help
out with the government intimate although not specify that perhaps promotion
might depend on this, perhaps they might like to go on the Transport Select
Committee
Now this is all highly
irregular and it's all done without fingerprints or anybody getting caught
but the reason is because you are part of the government and you want to
control, the last thing you want is a bad headline.
DIANNE ABBOTT: Government Whips have always
tried to interfere with Select Committees but under my government unfortunately
it's got completely out of hand. I've on the Treasury Committee for eight
years, I was a very assiduous attender. I was, I think, quite a good interviewer
at Committee and as one of the most experienced members of the Treasury
Select Committee I could have expected to have been re-appointed and even
possibly be in with a shout of being Chair and the Whips took me off and
they made it clear to me it was because of course Gordon Brown said on
no account was I to go back on the Treasury Committee.
WILENIUS: Ministers are reluctant
to give up any powers. Last month, Leader of the House Margaret Beckett
incensed Select Committee chairmen when the government kicked out proposals
to change the appointments system.
CORBETT: It devolves power to the
regions of the United Kingdom and it will not devolve power to the backbenchers
of the House of Commons and I simply do not understand it. They've got
everything to gain from this not to lose, because any organisation which
has got effective scrutiny, I mean half of the people who send us here,
is going to be a better government as a result of that, not a worse one.
WILENIUS: There's likely to be
wide public support for moves to give more powers to these key committees
and many Labour MPs were hoping the Government would loosen its grip on
appointments to allow greater scrutiny of its work. But it now looks as
if it is too much for Ministers to swallow and it will be brushed aside.
SOLEY: The chance of getting change
in the appointments to Select Committees in the near future I think is
very slim, but I certainly wouldn't like to lose the idea. It's a very
complex issue and it is frankly a balance between the rights of parliamentarians,
but also the recognition that Parliament can't work without parties and
parties need to have a say on things like this. I hope we'll revisit
it, but frankly I don't think there will be a change in the near future.
ABBOTT: The Select Committee system
is being fatally weakened by government interference and if this Modernisation
Committee won't act it will be a complete travesty and they'll be letting
down Parliament and also ordinary people who deserve proper scrutiny of
government.
WILENIUS: The Millennium Wheel
has become a symbol of modernisation, towering over the Houses of Parliament.
In politics too what goes around comes around. Margaret Beckett's now under
scrutiny by Select Committee chairmen. She faces possible defeat if she
doesn't listen.
CORBETT: Unless we can talk her
round we'll have to plan the next step which well may be a debate on the
floor of the House of Commons and we want to involve as many backbench
members in that debate as possible. We're deeply serious, we will have
what we have proposed or something near it and we shall if this is the
way they want to play it, we will do our best to put together an all party
majority on the floor of the House in favour of what we have suggested.
WILENIUS: Three Labour MPs have
already decided to quit at the next election, after only one term. They
are bitterly disappointed at the slow pace of modernisation of the Commons.
But if the government doesn't come up with more radical reforms soon,
then more Labour MPs may decide to leave or go off message.
The bell tolls again for
Peter Bradley. Only minutes to get to the voting lobbies from his office.
Some Labour MPs are now considering running away for good, but senior Labour
figures are urging them to stay and fight.
CORBETT: It is imperative that
all those who want change and it is a majority across all parties, join
with us in helping all of us there, backbenchers to achieve that change.
I think it is achievable and I want them to stay and help in that battle
instead of just packing their bags and saying I'm going off I'm going to
do something else.
WILENIUS: The day's finally at
an end for Peter Bradley. There's also little time left for the government
to deliver a new type of politics for Britain's Parliament. If it can't,
dispirited Labour MPs may accuse Tony Blair himself of representing the
"forces of conservatism".
HUMPHRYS: Paul Wilenius reporting
there. And that's it for this week. Don't forget our web-site. Until
the same time, next week, good afternoon.
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