From the BBC:
Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg is calling for the number of MPs in the House of Commons to be cut by 150.
This would save taxpayers millions of pounds and cut political parties’ need to raise cash from big donors, he says.
In a speech setting out his proposals for re-building trust in politics he will also call for a shake-up in party funding and a new electoral system.
He also proposes people be asked, when voting at elections, if they want to donate £3 to a party of their choice.
Mr Clegg is expected to say there should be a £25,000 cap on donations to political parties and a £10m limit on annual spending by political parties.
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30 Comments
I think Jeremy Browne said this ages ago? :@)
Can we cut the number of councillors by a third too. That way we could get electoral competition within parties.
I rather doubt that cutting MPs will substantially cut the campaigning costs of parties. Means fewer candidates sure but same number of voters so same need for leaflets, billboard costs, whatever. Just organised in bigger blocs for accounting purposes.
Lets think… Independent Scotland – that’s 59 less… Independent Wales – that’s minus 40… Northern Ireland -another 18… almost there… Cornwall?
Hmmmmm, 150 less MPs, 150 more opportunities for the Government to ride roughshod over parliament.
I would rather see a cut in the number of ministers to be honest.
Difficult to see quite why this line is being pushed. Electoral reform would be a more significant change, by several orders of magnitude, than adjusting the number of MPs – to save a reported 50p per citizen per year!
As for asking for political donations at the polling station, I suspect election day is the worst possible time for political parties to be extending a begging bowl, considering how many unwanted leaflets we’ll have just thrust through their letter-boxes.
But I don’t believe this kind of issue excites the electorate very much anyway.
Chris Phillips
I’m not instinctively against this but I have not seen a debate on this policy yet. Before we call for a cut in the number of MPs we need to think about what MPs should do, how much work they can delegate to support staff and how many MPs we need per head of population.
Has this policy gone through conference yet?
OK. Let’s cut the 60-odd Liberal Democrats plus 90 other ne’er-do-wells from the marginalia of British Politics.
Considering how few intelligent and competent people the Labour government can find to become ministers (roughly zero), I can’t see how reducing the choice available for ministerial positions will actually lead to higher-quality government. Unless parliamentaryr candidates have to face an IQ test and politics test before being placed on the ballot paper (and have their scores noted down next to their names). That might help raise the level of smart people in government and cut out some of the sycophantic mentalists like Nadine Dorris, Caroline Flint, etc.
@ Bikini (and others): This reads straight out of the Power Commission report (never did finish reading the whole thing but it was damned good) from a few years back, combined with a few other well-worn tropes, but represented better.
The idea would be that you reduce the number of MPs at the same time you a) have a better electoral system and b) devolve a lot of power away from Westminster back to councils, regions, provinces, counties, whatever.
Also, get STV and the quality of candidates will (slowly) rise anyway, it increases chances of election based on talent and reduces it for pure party apparatchiks.
If you devolve powers you need less ministers, etc etc.
@Mark (and others): are there any ideas in there not from the Power report? I think the donations cap is new.
What would be interesting would be a comparison of MPs per electorate in UK as compared to other Euorpean countries – e.g. France, Spain, Germany etc
Anyone know where those figures might be?
Then at least we could see whether we have more or fewer than similar countries.
I’m not sure how enlightening that would be, really, since other countries might not have the barmy Prime Ministerial / Ministerial / Constituency / Select Committee multiple roles system that we have.
Why MP’s and not MSP’s and AM’s? Since people are already overrepresented in Scotland and Wales compared to the UK it would be interesting to hear what Nick Clegg thought should be done with regards to them – although perhaps it’s too sensitive an area!
Sorry that should be overrepresented in Scotland and Wales compared to England
Nick’s speech neatly coincided – on purpose for once – with our Liberal Democrat debate in the Lords on fairer votes. We are beginning to develop a truly comprehensive package of constitutional reforms to take power back to the poeple. Take a look at Hansard on the much improved Lords pages of the Parliament website.
What a ridiculous proposal. It just plays to populist anti-politician sentiments & is just the sort of crap you would expect from NuLabCon, not a LibDem.
We have fully developed policy on electoral reform & constitutional change which is truly radical. This isn’t.
Um, Colin? I agree completely when you say “We have fully developed policy on electoral reform & constitutional change which is truly radical.”
But I’m confused when you go on to say “This isn’t.” having already called the policy ridiculous.
I quote from For the People by the People (pdf) which I seem to recall was passed unamended at Brighton (I voted to amend slightly IIRC):
“A smaller government, with further devolution of the powers that have been centralised over the course of the past century, would allow us to reduce the number of MPs. The eventual number would depend on progress with reform of the electoral system, not least the size of
constituencies under the STV system” (page 18)
So which part of policy as presented by Nick and voted for last Autumn do you think is “ridiculous“? Or am I misunderstanding and you’re talking about a different proposal?
This policy has been fished out & presented in this way now purely for its perceived resonance with the current very anti-politician views of the media. This is just populism.
Where does the figure of losing 150 MPs come from? Where’s the emphasis on fair votes & the essential parts of our constitutional reform policy in this little soundbite then?
Oh there they are, just mentioned in passing, at the very end, after all the populist crap.
How many votes and major headlines has banging on about “fair votes” gained us recently? How interested are Joe Public in the minutae of constitutional reform?
I joined the party because getting a better Parliament through STV and reforming and updating the constitution are my overarching priority, every other problem comes from that. But given that it’s my top priority I’m very understanding that most people neither know much about it nor care much either, and I don’t really blame them.
If by doing this “populist crap” as you so nicely put it Nick gets us some headlines and helps get us more support and votes, by highlighting that we’re the only real chance to really reform and clean up the broken system, cashing in on the “anti-politician” feelings but turning them towards something positive (ie the rest of our package) then he’s doing exactly what needs to be done.
If the public don’t care about an issue, pick one we’ve got good policies on that they do care about. Capture the mood and move it forward. If we don’t do that, we might as well give up and go back to 6 MPs sharing a taxi.
Where does the figure of losing 150 MPs come from?
Well, I seem to recall it being in a 2001 policy paper, but to quote the 1997 manifesto:
So if it is ridiculous policy (the Tories have it too by the way), we’ve had it for at least 10 years (longer than that I think you’ll find actually).
I just don’t see it, I’m afraid. It is just another part of the dripfeeding of anti-politician sentiment.
If the electorate fail to see the benefit in fair votes of actually getting what they vote for, then I seriously doubt they will make the link between MP-bashing & constitutional reform.
Nick Clegg & his advisors should really then be finding ways to make the fair votes argument instead of jumping on the anti-politics tabloid bandwagon.
And James, if the Tories have the same policy then it’s very likely to be the wrong one, isn’t it?
The Tories oppose ID cards and are in favour of decentralisation—are they wrong on that too?
There is an anti-politician, anti-system, anti-status quo sentiment. Our policies are designed to solve the reasons for that sentiment, I fail to see why highlighting them in a way that’ll appeal to people is a bad thing.
“if the Tories have the same policy then it’s very likely to be the wrong one, isn’t it?”
I am deeply amused to hear someone claiming the moral ground in opposing “anti-politics” making that brain-dead argument.
I just think that right now constituencies are small enough for MPs to know them in detail, even down to neighbourhood level. Making them bigger might tip this in the other direction.
Oh dear MatGB & James, you REALLY have been taken in if you believe that.
The Tories, like NuLab have ABSOLUTELY NO PRINCIPLES. They will say ANYTHING to get elected, even, if as in the two policies you cite, their previous policies – and actions in Government – were the diametric opposite of what they say now.
Did you learn nothing from the last 10 years?
France – 577 members, pop 64,473,140
Spain – 350 (lower house), pop 45.2 million
Germany – 614 (Bundestag), pop 82,438,000
Italy – 630 (deputies), pop 59,206,382
It would appear we are towards the top end in terms of numbers.
I think what I found strangest about this is that it was being touted as a means of saving taxpayers’ money – “He told BBC Radio 4’s PM programme cutting the number of MPs by “at least a quarter” would save about £30m a year”.
What is that as a percentage of government expenditure? 2 or 3 hundredths of one percent?
If that’s the best idea we have for saving money, we’d better not say anything more about aspirations to cut taxes as a result of efficiency savings.
But if it’s not the best idea we have for saving money, why is it the headline? It’s difficult to believe it’s not a cheap attempt to play to the “John Lewis” issue.
Playing to the agenda of the right-wing tabloids is a very dangerous game. Surely the EU referendum debacle demonstrated that clearly enough?
Chris Phillips
Colin? What actual point are you now trying to make? First it was “where did this stupid idea come from” except it’s longstanding public policy then it was “populism” but I’m not sure what that is supposed to mean, then it became “it can’t be good if the Tories like it” which is insane as an idea—you’re right to suspect their motives, but they’re lifting our policies all over the place, we can’t just abandone a good idea because the Stupid Party have decided it is one.
So what, exactly, are you now trying to say?
Felix: Yes, you’re right, but also all those countries actually have much stronger (and frequently full time/professional) regional and/or local politicians. Our proposals are to build a local tier and thus allow the reduction at the national level.
Chris: Yes, it’s a fraction, but it’s a longstanding policy that I supported independent of the party and as part of a coherent overall settlement makes very good sense. If using the story-du-jour to promote elements of longstanding polciy gets us coverage, why is that bad?
I really have problems with the idea that Nick getting positive headlines for policies we’ve had since I was a kid is in some way bad.
Reducing the number of MPs by 150 changes the number of voters in the average constituency from 70,000 to 100,000 – a nice round number.
Since evolutionary psychology points to the optimum and maximum sizes of personal community measured by the amount of contact between members (~1,500 for a village, ~25,000 for a town etc), there may be an argument in favour of better and more accountable representation by corresponding the figures more closely with the ability to be represented.
Once such a link is fixed in principle, the legitimacy of the case for more proportional representation is strategically advanced. Thus it is a natural LibDem policy argument.
I would go further because I think this also makes a case for additional devolution and an extra level of government at a federal or regional level.
On those grounds I begin to differ as a dual approach to reform offers improvement by combination whereas a single shiny headline-grabbing announcement only threatens to undermine the current state of our institutions. One without the other won’t work.