THE unity of the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties over the future
government of Scotland will be tested today by suggestions that the
number of Scottish MPs at Westminster should be cut, and that voting for
a future Scottish Parliament may have to be made compulsory.
In addition, the two parties are being asked to accept that MPs for a
Scottish Parliament should be elected by some form of the Additional
Member System, which will mean MPs in Parliament who have not won the
approval of the electorate.
The controversial proposals are contained in the working party reports
on a future Scottish Parliament which are to be presented to the
executive of the the Scottish Constitutional Convention at its meeting
in Glasgow today.
Representatives of both Labour and the Liberal Democrats, as well as
other Convention supporters such as trades unions and churches, took
part in the working parties which investigated what electoral system a
future Scottish Parliament should have and how it would operate on a
day-to-day basis.
They admit that they have not been able to agree on Scotland's future
representation at Westminster, although it is known that some members
favour cutting the number of Scottish MPs from 72 to 65, to bring it
more into line with the rest of the UK.
This is likely to be resisted by Labour as it is the party which has
the most to lose from such a suggestion.
However, the Conservative Party which has shunned the Convention,
claiming there is no need for a parliament or assembly in Scotland, will
quickly seize upon any suggestion of dissent among the Convention
members.
A system of compulsory voting, which is used in a number of countries,
also is likely to be unpopular with many people, yet it is one of the
suggestions that the working parties will put to the executive.
The difficult problem of which electoral system to use has also been
addressed, with the working party on the electoral system agreeing that
there should be some form of Additional Member System in order to give
the various parties a form of proportional representation.
The basic idea is that parties have their number of MPs topped up from
party lists to make the number in Parliament broadly in line with their
percentage of the total vote.
The problem is that there would then be MPs who are not answerable to
a constituency and may be seen in some way as ''second-class'' MPs.
The working party accepts that there are variations on AMS which will
have to be investigated.
There already is the sound of backpedalling in the proposals as the
working party says that there may have to be a review of the system
after it is in place, but again any signs of uncertainty will be
exploited by opponents, not only in the Conservative Party, but also in
the Labour Party where there is still a vocal minority pushing for the
first-past-the-post system to be retained.
Both Mr Malcolm Bruce of the Scottish Liberal Democrats and Mr Donald
Dewar of the Labour Party are expected to take part in today's executive
meeting and both are keen to emphasise the common ground between them.
Whether the working party reports cut away the common ground will
become clearer after some tough talking at the meeting.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article