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ON THE RECORD
PADDY ASHDOWN INTERVIEW
RECORDED FROM TRANSMISSION: BBC ONE DATE: 22.11.98
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JOHN HUMPHRYS: But first, the Liberal Democrats.
Paddy Ashdown has been more successful than any other Liberal leader since
Lloyd George: forty-six seats in the House of Commons and, on the face of
it, real influence with the government. They even sit on a joint cabinet
committee. And all of that raised hopes to new heights that the ultimate
prize of proportional representation was, at last, in their sights. But in the
last few days there's been a serious setback. The Bill to change the voting
system for the European elections was thrown out by the House of Lords and it's
now possible that it won't happen in time. Mr Ashdown is at his home in
Yeovil.
Good afternoon Mr Ashdown.
PADDY ASHDOWN: Good afternoon John. Nice to be with
you.
HUMPHRYS: Thank you. What assurances has Tony
Blair given you that he is going to get this Bill through in time so that we
will have a different, what you would call a fairer system of voting for the
European Elections?
ASHDOWN: None and I haven't asked him for any.
HUMPHRYS: Why not?
ASHDOWN: Because this is a matter for the
Conservatives not for the Prime Minister, as we well know. The Parliament Act
is now being enacted and let me just say to start with John, that this is
nothing to do with Paddy Ashdown. It's nothing to do with closed lists and open
lists. It's nothing to do even with Proportional Representation. What this is
to do with is the Conservative leadership, the schoolboy mullahs of the
Conservative Right who have now taken over the Conservative Party, using the
hereditary peers in order to overturn the democratic wishes of the British
people for a fair voting system at the European Election, for which two thirds
of them voted last year. And this is a constitutional impropriety being taken
to the level of an outrage that the hereditary peers of this country should now
seek to overturn the democratic wishes of the British people and ultimately
that is the issue. It must not be allowed to happen.
I personally believe the Conservatives
will pay a very very heavy price indeed if they do try to make this happen in
the ballot box next year. I see the Observer is saying today that if there is
substantial tactical voting and I wouldn't be surprised if that took place in
order to punish the Tories for this undemocratic act, then all but two of the
Conservative European seats will be lost and the Liberal Democrats and Labour
will clean up and that's not what I want to happen. But the issue here is
about who takes the decisions in this country: is it the voters in the ballot
box or is it the hereditary peers being used as a weapon by the, in my view,
extremely ill-advised actions of the leader of the Conservative Party and a few
of his small Right-wing coterie who are now advising him.
HUMPHRYS: You say it's nothing to do with closed
lists, it's everything to do with closed lists-
ASHDOWN: It's not-
HUMPHRYS: Well, if Tony Blair said, well look,
alright, we've taken on board what the House of Lords have said, and indeed
what a lot of other people, apart from Conservatives in the House of Lords have
said, and we will now have a system of open lists. It would sail through the
House of Lords, as you well know, your own members would be delighted, you I no
doubt would be delighted as well, and therefore you would get your Proportional
Representation that you want. It isn't Proportional Representation that the
House of Lords has blocked, it is the closed list system.
ASHDOWN: No, what this is about is democracy.
Proportional Representation is a second-tier issue. It's about whether the
wishes of the British people in the ballot box will make decisions or whether
hereditary peers will do so. Now let me prove to you that this is not about
open and closed lists. If this was about open lists, the Conservatives would
have voted in committee stage, when the Bill could have been changed, in
favour of the proposition for open lists put forward at that time. They did
not do so, they refused to vote for this when it could have been changed,
indeed their spokesman in the House of Lords described the very thing that they
are now going to war over as manifestly unfair.
Now this is a piece of rank hypocrisy
on the part of the Conservative Party. Its intention is to use the hereditary
peers to overturn the wishes of the British people and in my view the person
who will really suffer from this is probably the British people who voted for
an electoral system if it goes through, and almost certainly Mr William Hague,
whose party is now manifestly divided against them. The wise heads in the
House of Lords against what I have called the schoolboy mullahs of the
Conservative Right who have now taken over this party and are in my view
engaged in an act of near-suicide. I think it's stupid for the Conservatives,
I think it is extremely dangerous for democracy in this country and at the very
least it is an example of opportunism and double standards on the part of the
Conservative Party and on the part of Mr Hague which is quite simply
breathtaking.
HUMPHRYS: Yeah, but there is no question is
there, they have based their opposition, whatever you may believe about the
past, they have said, time and time again, what we are opposed to here is
closed lists-
ASHDOWN: Then why didn't they support that in the
House of Commons.
HUMPHRYS: Well let's forget about what they did in
the House of Commons the last time around and try and move it forward. I'm
trying to move it forward. You know there's not a lot of point-
ASHDOWN: It's not moving it forward.
HUMPHRYS: Of course it is.
ASHDOWN: I'm showing you quite clearly that this
is a piece of breathtaking hypocrisy. When they could have changed the Bill
rather than destroyed it, which is what they are now trying to do, in committee
stage not only in the House of Commons but also in the House of Lords, when
they could have voted for open lists and with us and changed the Bill, not
destroyed it, they refused to use their votes.
HUMPHRYS: Yeah but you changed your position as
well and I'm not intending, I was not intending to go into that in any great
detail because I'm trying to move it forward, but you changed your position,
you did not want a system of closed lists.
ASHDOWN: Yes, but it's a question of whether or
not.... We proposed closed ...open lists, it didn't get through. What's at
question now is whether the Bill as a whole gets through and that's why it's
not about open or closed lists. It's about whether or not the Bill gets
through, whether or not the wishes of the British people...
HUMPHRYS: Yeah but it's a bit more than that isn't
it? I mean you own man Bob Maclennan.... well your own man Bob Maclennan said
that the argument for open lists is overwhelming and yet you then change your
position and support closed lists.
ASHDOWN: John, John, this is hardly a new
proposition in the House of Commons. If in the House of Commons in the process
of the committee stage and amendments put forward which falls it means that
when the whole Bill comes back you'll have to make your decision as to whether
the whole Bill is worth supporting with your amendment having fallen and we
believe it is. We believe that not to do that would be quite simply to
overturn the wishes of the British people for a fair voting system. Now the
Conservatives are engaged in a piece of idiocy in my view in a piece... you
remember that the last time this happened they were referred to by Lloyd George
as 'Balfour's poodle'. Well it seems to me that they're now Mr Hague's
instrument for doing exactly what was done before. The real issue here is the
Peers against the people, that's the key issue. It's not about open and closed
lists it's about whether or not the people of this country have a right to
insure that when they vote for something in the ballot box this is not
overturned by the Conservative Party - in my view with great folly.
HUMPHRYS: Yeah but......
ASHDOWN: ...using the hereditary peers to do
that.....
HUMPHRYS: Yeah but... the mistake in that answer,
if I may say so , is that that we have never voted. Nobody here. We didn't
vote for the Labour Party because they promised to give us closed lists. They
didn't say they were going to give us closed lists in their manifesto. They
said they were going to give us a form of proportional representation. Now
we're down to this question of closed lists and what I'm trying to do, what I'm
trying to.... I'm trying to be helpful here for once in my life. I'm trying to
move it forward a bit and say, 'look why.... if you went back to Tony Blair now
and said look clearly we've got a problem here. Let me try to persuade you
Prime Minister to accept that there ought to be open as opposed to closed
lists. What I'm saying to you is - it would then sail through and it's a bit
odd to some people perhaps that you haven't done that'.
ASHDOWN: Two things happen. No, we've argued
that case in the House of Commons. Two things happen: One, this is the Labour
Party's policy and they have a majority four times larger than my parliamentary
party. And secondly, you're allowing the hereditary peers to overturn the
views of the House of Commons at this stage is not in my view a
constitutionally correct practice and, you know, I may disagree in the detail
of this Bill but I do not disagree with its fundamentals and I understand that
it is putting into practice the sovereign wishes of two thirds of the British
people. Now I am not in favour of allowing the hereditary peers to overturn
the wishes of the elected chamber in Westminster and that, it seems to me, is a
larger principle which needs to be defended and secondly, I'm not in favour of
allowing them to overturn the wishes of the British people. This is the peers
against the people.
HUMPHRYS: Come back to that question of the wishes
of the British people. I can't as I say remember anybody voting for closed
lists but put that aside for one moment. Now that you know what the situation
is we've got to come back, the Bill is going to come back again in the new
parliamentary term, government can then institute the Parliament Act. Now if
the Tories refuse to co-operate as they have said, as Mr Hague has said they
will, what are you going to do aboout that? One of your lieutenants Simon
Hughes, a very senior Liberal Democrat MP said this morning that you should sit
throughout Christmas and the New Year, take a day off for Christmas Eve and
Christmas Day and the rest of it the Lords will be forced to sit there and
argue this thing through so that they cannot delay it indefinitely and
therefore miss the opportunity to have the different system in time for spring.
ASHDOWN I very much hope and believe that the
will of the Commons and the will of the British people will prevail.
HUMPHRYS: Is that a good way to do it?
ASHDOWN: .. and I think there are mechanisms for
doing that, one of which is to put the Bill down early and then to drive it
through by using the House of Lords and the Commons and making sure that it
happens,
HUMPHRYS: And making them sit through Christmas
and New Year.
ASHDOWN: John, let's not get into the detail....
HUMPHRYS: Well, it was your man who suggested it.
ASHDOWN: Well, that would be interesting. Simon
Hughes is entitled to speculate with ideas of his own. But what I'm clear
about is that this thing now has to be driven through, and I believe it will,
and I think that the person who will end up with egg on their face is Mr Hague
for extremely foolish and rather immature action in this matter, in which
incidentally his own party is catastrophically divided and I think there is
every prospect that this Bill will get through and we will have the wishes of
the British people honoured by having a proportional system at the European
elections.
HUMPHRYS: I don't see why you can afford to be so
optimistic unless you do this sort of thing that Simon Hughes suggested this
morning.
ASHDOWN: Look, I'm not going to get in here John
- Simon can do it, but forgive me I'm not going to - into what are the
constitutional procedures of the House of Commons. What I know is that this
Bill can be delivered and I believe it can be and will be delivered, and I
think the chances are strongly in favour. If the Conservatives want to play a
rearguard action in order to destroy this, then they can do that, no question
about that, and it just possible that they could destroy the Bill. You want my
judgement - it's not going to happen.
HUMPHRYS: But if it does people are entitled to
say: What on earth did Paddy Ashdown get out of all this co-operation with the
Labour Government? They're entitled to say that aren't they. He gave a lot,
what did he get in return?
ASHDOWN: So what are we suggesting, that our
relations with the Labour Government which open a new style of politics should
be damaged because of the idiocy of the Conservatives?
HUMPHRYS: No. On the contrary because - because
Tony Blair has not given you what you want. He's talked about proportional -
I'm sure he has - he hasn't even given you the promise .... guaranteed you the
referendum that you want before the next election. There are so many things
that you went in there hoping, intending to get, telling your supporters that
you were going to get - it maybe that you haven't got any of it by the time it
comes round to the next election.
ASHDOWN: Interesting speculation John. Ain't
gonna happen.
HUMPHRYS: You can't be sure.
ASHDOWN: Look, you know, when I was in the Royal
Marines I used to have a young marine in any tactical situation, he used to
rush up to me and say, "But sir, but sir, what happens if a tank comes along?"
HUMPHRYS: The tank would have crushed you.
ASHDOWN: Hang on, the tank hasn't arrived. And I
used to say to him ,"Calm down. When a tank comes along I'll tell what we'll
do. For the moment let's just concentrate on the people in front us who are
shooting at us". Now that's where we are. You can speculate, you can
hypothecate about what might and what might not happen. I'm interested in one
thing, and that is making sure that a constitutional principle is upheld, that
the wishes of the British people is not frustrated by the hereditary peers in
the hands of the Conservative Party, foolishly allowing themselves to be used
to do that, and that this Bill gets through. I believe that can be done. We
can all speculate till the cows come home about what will happen if it doesn't,
but that'll wait till then. The tank has not yet arrived.
HUMPHRYS: Well, maybe not, but it maybe is on the
horizon. If you don't get this, you're going to have to resign as the leader
aren't you?
ASDOWN: Rubbish.
HUMPHRYS: You're under pressure aren't you?
ASHDOWN: I said rubbish.
HUMPHRYS: Mm. I heard what you said, but have you
been reading and listening to what everybody's been saying?
ASHDOWN: John, I have some things I want to do
with the Liberal Democrats. I've done a lot with them as you were kind enough
to say earlier on. I have some other things I want to do with the Liberal
Democrats, and when I've done them I'll then stand down. My advice from those
who are over-eager to try on the crown is very simple - don't hold your breath.
HUMPHRYS: Paddy Ashdown, thank you very much
indeed. May there be no tanks on your lawn.
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