The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform: A History of Constitutional Conservatism

The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform A History of Constitutional Conservatism Peter Dorey The Labour Party and ...

Author: Peter Dorey

11 downloads 518 Views 1MB Size Report

This content was uploaded by our users and we assume good faith they have the permission to share this book. If you own the copyright to this book and it is wrongfully on our website, we offer a simple DMCA procedure to remove your content from our site. Start by pressing the button below!
Report copyright / DMCA form

DOWNLOAD PDF

The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform A History of Constitutional Conservatism

Peter Dorey

The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform

Also by Peter Dorey BRITISH POLITICS SINCE 1945 POLICY MAKING IN BRITAIN: An Introduction THE CONSERVATIVE PARTY AND THE TRADE UNIONS WAGE POLITICS IN BRITAIN: The Rise and Fall of Incomes Policies Since 1945 DEVELOPMENTS IN BRITISH PUBLIC POLICY (editor) THE LABOUR GOVERNMENTS, 1964–1970 (editor) THE MAJOR PREMIERSHIP: 1990–1997 (editor)

The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform A History of Constitutional Conservatism Peter Dorey Department of Politics, Cardiff University

© Peter Dorey 2008 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2008 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 Companies and representatives throughout the world PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave Macmillan division of St. Martin's Press, LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. Macmillan® is a registered trademark in the United States, United Kingdom and other countries. Palgrave is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries. ISBN-13: 978–0–230–20535–2 hardback ISBN-10: 0–230–20535–6 hardback This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Dorey, Peter, 1959– The Labour Party and constitutional reform : a history of constitutional conservatism / Peter Dorey. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0–230–20535–6 (alk. paper) 1. Constitutional law—Great Britain. 2. Law reform—Great Britain. 3. Labour Party (Great Britain) 4. Great Britain—Politics and government—1997– I. Title. KD3989.D67 2008 320.441—dc22 2008014354 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne

‘We Englishmen are Very Proud of our Constitution, Sir. It Was Bestowed Upon Us By Providence. No Other Country is so Favoured as This Country.’ ‘And other countries’, said the Foreign Gentleman, ‘They do how?’ ‘They do, Sir’, returned Mr. Podsnap, gravely shaking his head; ‘they do – I am sorry to be obliged to say it – as they do’. (Charles Dickens, 1963: 125) We hardly appreciate how delicately adjusted is the whole of our system of government. Remove from it the trust and deference of the people, make it common and unclean, and it begins to crumble to dust like a human body from which the breath of life has gone. And what can we put in its place? Nothing. (Ramsay MacDonald, quoted in Hanson, 1956: 459–60) Traditionalism and empiricism henceforward fuse as a single legitimating system: traditionalism sanctions the present by deriving it from the past, empiricism shackles the future by riveting it to the present. A comprehensive, coagulated conservatism is the result, covering the whole of society with a thick pall of simultaneous philistinism (towards ideas) and mystagogy (towards institutions), for which England has justly won an international reputation. (Anderson, 1966: 32)

This page intentionally left blank

Contents

Introduction: The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform

1

1 Electoral Reform

14

2 The House of Commons

49

3 The House of Lords

100

4 The Civil Service

141

5 Open Government

183

6 Scottish Devolution

203

7 Welsh Devolution

241

8 English Regionalism

281

9 Northern Ireland

312

Conclusion: A Century of Constitutional Conservatism

347

Bibliography Index

380 396

vii

This page intentionally left blank

Introduction: The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform

The constitutional reform measures introduced by the 1997–2007 Blair Governments were a curious and contradictory amalgam of radicalism and conservatism. They were radical in so far as they went much further than any constitutional reforms pursued by previous Labour Governments and had serious implications for both the British system of governance and Britain’s unitary state tradition. Yet many of the reforms were also highly conservative in the manner in which they sought to sustain traditional and long-standing features of the British political system, rather than genuinely decentralize and redistribute political power, or provide for more rigorous checks and balances within and between Britain’s political institutions. Much of this curious and contradictory amalgam derived from the Blair Governments’ singularly atheoretical approach to the British constitution and State, with the various reforms lacking a clear philosophical basis. Instead, they were largely pursued in a somewhat desultory or unenthusiastic manner, with the clear impression conveyed that they had not been seriously thought through. On this point, perhaps more than any other, most commentators on the Blair Governments are in agreement: New Labour’s ‘programme’ of constitutional reform was not a programme at all, in the sense of being carefully and strategically worked out in advance, with a clear set of inter-linked objectives and a discernible rationale. On the contrary, as King observes, the Blair Government’s constitutional reforms ‘did not constitute a coherent package . . . were not based on any fixed set of principles, and they had certainly not been conceived in relation to one another: they were . . . a rag-bag’ (King, 2002: 45). In similar vein, Richards and Smith suggest that whilst there have been some elements of radicalism in Labour’s constitutional reform measures, the Party ‘has not thought through this programme and how it relates 1

2


to the operation of the state, nor to the complex inter-relationships that exist within the British constitutional framework’ (Richards and Smith, 2001: 145). As such, whilst the constitutional reform measures enacted by the Blair Governments from 1997 were undoubtedly radical when compared to the paucity of similar measures successfully implemented, or even attempted, by previous Labour Governments, the lack of systematic thinking about constitutional issues can be viewed as part of a more general lack of theoretical reflexivity amongst most Labour politicians throughout the Party’s history. The Labour Party’s antipathy to political theory has been well-noted and documented, for while the Party has undoubtedly comprised numerous intellectuals amongst its members and proselytes, it has, in general, remained remarkably antipathetic to philosophic ruminations on the nature of power and representation in Britain and the character of Britain’s political institutions. This clearly owed much to the primacy of electoralism and parliamentarianism, but also reflected a profound suspicion amongst much of the British – and especially English – working class, of intellectuals and their allegedly abstract theorising (see, for example, Nairn, 1966: passim). Certainly, Crosland’s 1956 The Future of Socialism, oft-cited as a classic statement of social democratic revisionism, paid little heed to constitutional matters, focusing as it did on an analysis of the extent to which British capitalism had apparently been totally transformed during the previous 50 years, how full employment and trade unionism provided working people with relative parity of bargaining power with Capital and how remaining inequalities were to be ameliorated through social and educational reforms, rather than any extension of nationalization or increased taxation of the better-off. Constitutional reform was conspicuous by its absence from The Future of Socialism. Of course, these lacunae were partly explicable because of the benign experience of the 1945–51 Attlee Governments, which convinced most Labour politicians (both at the time and subsequently) that the acquisition of a majority of seats in the House of Commons was sufficient to effect important social and economic changes beneficial to ordinary British people. There was, it seemed, little reason to question the efficacy of the electoral system, the character of parliamentary democracy, or the professionalism and political impartiality of the civil service. Thus did benign empirical experience combine with the Labour Party’s already established antipathy to theory and intellectualism to militate against any serious consideration of the nature of political power in Britain, the

Introduction

3

operation of the British system of government or of the constitutional framework within which it was couched. The Labour Party did begin to consider some constitutional matters in the 1960s, partly because it had lost three consecutive general elections, but more importantly because the decade heralded growing awareness of Britain’s relative economic decline, which in turn began to raise questions about the efficiency of political institutions. The same relative economic decline was also a factor (but certainly not the only one) fuelling the rise of Scottish and Welsh nationalism, which obliged the Labour Party to pay at least some attention to the issue of devolution for Scotland and Wales, if only in order to provide arguments for rejecting nationalist demands. Indeed the 1964–70 Labour Governments did pursue a number of measures and initiatives to reform Britain’s political institutions and the relationship between central government and the regions, but these were never melded together to provide a systematic framework or coherent programme of constitutional reform. Instead, various measures were initiated under the rubric of ‘modernisation’ (as indeed they were three decades later, by the Blair Governments), but were nonetheless notable for their largely ad hoc and atheoretical character. Furthermore, various of the proposed reforms revealed divergent opinions and disagreements within the Labour Party, tensions which were usually of three varieties: disagreement over whether a particular reform was necessary or desirable in the first place; different interpretations concerning the precise purpose of a specific reform; debates about the actual details or extent of a broadly agreed reform. These tensions have since permeated most of the Labour Party’s sporadic attempts at constitutional reform. Undoubtedly, the Labour Party’s ostensibly greater commitment to constitutional reform since the Policy Review of the late 1980s, through to the emergence of ‘New Labour’, have remained theoretically uninformed or underdeveloped, so that the various proposals and measures have often been of an inchoate and inconsistent character. As Tony Wright observed, writing in the late 1980s, ‘for a radical party, Labour has displayed a marked lack of radical imagination as far as the constitution is concerned’ (Wright, 1989: 202). Similarly, Marquand observes that for most of the twentieth century, such was the Labour Party’s faith in parliamentary sovereignty, civil service professionalism and State neutrality, that most ‘constitutional arguments . . . were frivolous diversions from the serious business of social and economic transformation’ (Marquand, 1992: 45).

4


Consequently, much of the Labour Party’s conservative approach to constitutional reform, and its faith in extant political institutions and processes, can readily be attributed to such factors as the influence of social democratic assumptions about the neutrality and impartiality of the state (as intimated by Marquand, see quote above) and its capacity to be deployed by whichever political party can secure a parliamentary majority through the ballot box; a similar assumption about the neutrality of the state enshrined in Fabianism, with its emphasis on a rather top-down and technocratic perspective of government, with Ministers, faithfully assisted by expert administrators, pursuing policies to benefit the wider citizenry; the influence of ‘labourism’ deriving from Labour’s organic links with the trade unions, which fostered a primary concern with economic and industrial measures, along with social reform, to improve the material conditions and status of ordinary working people, but with these measures pursued largely through existing political institutions. All of these perspectives informed and underpinned the Labour Party’s assumption that the British state was essentially benign (Barker, 1978: 48), and that rather than radically reforming – yet alone overthrowing it – Labour ought to secure control of the state through becoming the governing party – by winning a majority of seats in the House of Commons – whereupon it could ‘steer the ship of state’ itself. Consequently, few Labour’s Ministers – least of all Prime Ministers – have displayed much interest in constitutional reform, and even on those occasions when some interest has been discernible, it has usually been prompted primarily by pragmatic considerations or calculations of partisan advantage (Jones and Keating, 1985: 193). However, the three dominant philosophic or ideological strands within the Labour Party which we have just alluded to, and the general absence of any serious or sustained interest in constitutional reform by senior Labour Ministers and Prime Ministers, also reflect and reinforce the Party’s tacit acceptance of the tenets of the Westminster Model of British government, whose defining characteristics are parliamentary sovereignty; Ministerial accountability (both individually and collectively, to the House of Commons on a day-to-day basis, and the electorate every four to five years); governmental authority deriving from one party winning a majority of seats in the House of Commons in a free and fair general election, based on the first-past-the-post voting system, and the power which this bestows on the executive; a strong Cabinet (reinforced by the aforementioned collective responsibility); the impartiality and neutrality of the civil service, which loyally serves any democratically elected government, with the latter claiming to have been given

Introduction

5

a ‘mandate’ by the electorate to implement its manifesto pledges. The Westminster Model also presupposes the existence of a unitary state governed from the centre, with the executive pursuing policies applicable to all citizens or regions, in the national interest or for the common good. Moreover, the unitary state is assumed to be a natural corollary of parliamentary sovereignty (for fuller discussion of the Westminster Model, see Dunleavy, 2006; Flinders, 2006: 131–35; Judge, 2005: 24–32; Rhodes, 1997: passim). The crucial point here is not whether the Westminster Model actually and accurately reflects the operation of British government and the structure of political power in Britain. Instead, its importance lies in the influence it has consistently exercised over successive generations of senior Labour politicians, thereby further militating against any serious, sustained or systematic pursuit of constitutional reform by Labour Governments. As Richards and Smith (2003: 48–9, 232) explain ‘The most important feature of this [Westminster] model is that it reflects how most politicians and officials perceive the system . . . it continues to inform and condition the way in which both sets of actors operate’, to the extent that ‘Labour politicians have been conditioned, as much as Conservatives, by the Westminster model.’ Consequently, ‘Labour has, historically, been a constitutionally conservative party, not a radical one . . . both Labour and the Conservatives have distinguished themselves from the Liberals by their support of existing constitutional arrangements’ (Bogdanor, 1997: 112). Of course, such assertions might appear to have been obviated due to the constitutional reforms introduced by the Blair Governments and their accompanying discourse of democratization, decentralization and modernization. Yet as will become apparent throughout the course of this book, the apparent radicalism of the Blair Governments’ constitutional reforms belied a remarkable degree of conservatism and a continued adherence to the Westminster Model. Moreover, in many respects, New Labour’s constitutional reform measures have been quantitative rather than qualitative; plentiful in number, but limited – intentionally so – in terms of effecting a genuine transfer of political power away from the executive and radically transforming the principles and processes of governing contemporary Britain. Indeed, many of the constitutional reforms introduced by the Blair Governments can readily be viewed as attempts at defending or strengthening aspects of the Westminster Model. As such, New Labour has largely accepted and endorsed the underlying assumptions and principles of the Westminster Model just as readily as ‘Old Labour’.

6


In seeking to examine and explain the Labour Party’s consistent constitutional conservatism, this book is organized on a thematic basis, with each chapter examining Labour’s attitudes and initiatives with regard to a specific aspect of the British political system. Within each of these chapters, however, the coverage is chronological, so that Labour’s perspectives and policy proposals (or the paucity of them) are traced from the early twentieth century through to the present day, along with the sundry debates within the Party. Chapter 1 examines Labour’s attitudes towards electoral reform (for Westminster elections), noting that whilst many of the Party’s MPs initially favoured alternatives to the first-past-the-post voting system during the early twentieth century, they were unable to agree on precisely which electoral system to adopt. Then, once the Labour Party had replaced the Liberals as the only credible alternative to the Conservatives, support for electoral reform amongst Labour MPs and Ministers rapidly dwindled. Only during the 1980s and 1990s did support revive, but not only did proponents of electoral reform once again disagree as to which particular system of election to adopt, they were still a minority – albeit a sizeable minority – within the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP). More important, though, was the lack of support for electoral reform amongst most of the Party leadership, with Tony Blair’s own initial lukewarm support appearing to cool further the longer that New Labour was in Office. Chapter 2 explores the Labour Party’s sporadic attempts at reforming the House of Commons, noting that the reforms which have variously been proposed or introduced have not normally enjoyed widespread support in the Party. Indeed, reforms (or proposed reforms) have sometimes occasioned discernible differences of opinion between Labour backbenchers and their Ministerial colleagues, for whereas Labour’s proreform MPs have variously sought a more active parliamentary and policy-making role, Labour Ministers have tended jealously to guard their own constitutional (individual and collective) responsibility for taking decisions and developing policies, and desired that their backbench colleagues should concern themselves primarily with supporting the (Labour controlled) executive. On the other hand, some parliamentary reforms have themselves been viewed with scepticism by Labour MPs, irrespective of the stance of their Ministerial colleagues. Yet when Labour has been in Opposition (and the Conservatives in government), Shadow Ministers and MPs alike have bemoaned the relentlessly increasing power of the executive and called for Parliament to be imbued with greater powers.

Introduction

7

Not until the 1960s was any serious attempt made at reforming the internal procedures and practices of the House of Commons, whereupon many of the tensions just alluded to became more apparent. Morning sittings were often disliked by Ministers, who resented the incursion into their (morning) Departmental duties and/or attendance at Cabinet/committee meetings, whilst the creation of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration (more commonly known as the Ombudsman) was initially viewed with suspicion by some MPs, fearful that their own role in providing ‘redress of grievances’ for their constituents might be undermined. During the 1960s and 1970s, select committees have tended to prove the most popular innovation, although even these have occasionally been deemed suspect by those Labour politicians who believe they foster an excessively ‘cosy’ bipartisan relationship between serving MPs of different parties, thereby detracting from the Commons apparent role in providing an arena for more partisan and ideological debates. Labour Ministers, meanwhile, have often wanted to avoid empowering the Commons, for to do so would invariably enable it (and Labour’s own backbenchers) to challenge and scrutinize the executive more effectively, and hence make it more difficult for Labour Governments to get their measures enacted. In this respect, as we will note, there has often been a clear tension between, on the one hand, improving the efficiency of the House of Commons, in terms of streamlining its procedures in order to expedite the Government’s business and legislation more swiftly, and, on the other, increasing the effectiveness of the House, in terms of providing for more thorough and detailed scrutiny of governmental or Ministerial measures, and also enabling backbenchers to play a more active or influential role in the parliamentary policy process. Not surprisingly, to the extent that Labour Ministers have variously sought to ‘modernise’ the House of Commons, it has been to improve its ‘efficiency’; they have not normally wanted to increase the power of the House and MPs in a manner which would, almost inevitably, slow down the processing of governmental business and legislation. Admittedly, throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, the Labour Party, in Opposition, lent its voice to those who complained that the executive was becoming too powerful and insisted that the House of Commons needed to be reformed in order to increase its influence and powers of scrutiny. Yet having been returned to Office, most of the Labour leadership rapidly lost whatever zeal it professed prior to 1997 with regard to reforming the House of Commons in order to strengthen the legislature

8


vis-a-vis the executive, leading once again to tensions between Labour backbenchers and their Ministerial colleagues. As Chapter 3 illustrates, reform of the House of Lords has tended to be ascribed greater priority by Labour politicians than reform of the Commons, but until very recently, the Party enjoyed only limited success in this area. Although virtually all Labour politicians have historically agreed that the hereditary principle in the House of Lords is indefensible and profoundly undemocratic, they have never been in agreement over who or what should replace the hereditary peers, or even whether the Second Chamber ought to be retained anyway. Numerous options for reforming and reconstituting the House of Lords have been mooted, but lack of agreement over which option is best has ensured that a coherent policy has never been formally adopted and implemented. Ultimately, the Labour Party has never been sure about what role(s) the Second Chamber should play, who its membership should be and how they should be (s)elected. Furthermore, whilst some Labour MPs have favoured outright abolition, others have deemed reform of the House of Lords an issue of such low salience – especially compared to ‘bread-and-butter’ issues such as employment; education, the NHS, pensions and so on – that the Party should not waste time pursuing it. Meanwhile, would-be Labour reformers have also been confronted with the question of what the relationship ought to be between the Second Chamber and the House of Commons, for whilst it has invariably been insisted that the Commons must remain pre-eminent, it has also become apparent that a more representative and inter alia legitimate Second Chamber would almost inevitably challenge the House of Commons more frequently and effectively. For all these reasons, therefore, Labour Governments have enjoyed only limited success in reforming the House of Lords, and although the Blair Governments actually succeeded in removing most of the hereditary peers, this success was insufficient to obviate the lack of agreement in the Labour Party over how to proceed subsequently, as illustrated by the extremely slow progress towards the completion of ‘stage two’ (an elected or partly elected Second Chamber). Meanwhile, as Chapter 4 explains, a number of critiques of the civil service have emanated from the Labour Party (and academic sympathizers or supporters) during the last one hundred years or so, yet these critiques have often been inconsistent and contradictory. For example, Labour politicians have variously complained that the civil service needs to be made more professional – to transcend the ‘cult of the amateur’ and efficient, yet this would almost certainly render it stronger and

Introduction

9

more effective, even though another Labour critique has complained about civil service power (which, Left critics have alleged, has been deployed to obstruct Labour Governments and prevent them implementing ‘socialist’ policies). There has also been a tension between those Labour Ministers who have been praiseworthy of their civil servants and those – often on the Left – who have been rather less so. These different experiences and ideological perspectives have further militated against a coherent Labour critique of the civil service and therefore prevented the development of a clear strategy for reform. This ambiguity over reform of the civil service continued under the Blair Governments. One of the criticisms which some Labour politicians have levelled against the civil service in particular, and about policy-making in general, concerns excessive secrecy, hence Chapter 5 delineates the debates in the Party over the alleged need for open government and freedom of information. What is apparent is the extent to which Labour MPs and Ministers tend to diverge on the issue, for whilst some Labour MPs have been amongst the strongest critics of excessive government secrecy, and called not merely for freedom of information, but also more openness in decision-taking and policy-making, Labour Ministers have tended to insist on the need for considerable secrecy, citing not only orthodox constitutional conventions concerning Ministerial responsibility, but arguing equally that secrecy contributes towards better policy-making, on the grounds that confidentiality enables those involved to speak more freely; if they thought that their arguments would subsequently be made public, they would become more reticent, and the pros and cons of a particular policy would not be fully considered, thereby resulting in more policy failures. Not surprisingly, Labour MPs favouring open government and freedom of information have not been persuaded by such arguments, viewing them as convenient rather than convincing. These debates and disagreements were clearly rehearsed under the Blair Governments, which stalled over the pledge to provide open government through freedom of information, for whilst the relevant legislation reached the statute book in 2000, its full enactment and implementation was deferred until 2005, and even then, matters deemed to concern policy-making were generally exempted from disclosure. Furthermore, it transpired that during 2006 and 2007, some Ministers were seeking to ‘tighten up’ aspects of the Freedom of Information Act, in order to reduce the amount of information which could be requested or released. Moving beyond Westminster and Whitehall, Chapter 6 delineates the hesitancy and ambiguity which has often characterized Labour’s response to demands from Scotland for devolution, as well as the

10


economism which has often underpinned the Party’s reluctance to take such demands more seriously. Initial support for Home Rule steadily dissipated as Labour replaced the pro-Home Rule Liberals, and thereby became concerned to establish itself as a genuinely national party/government. Thereafter, there was often a tension between those Labour politicians who continued to support Scottish devolution, emphasizing Labour’s commitment to democratization and decentralization of political power, and those – usually in the majority – who insisted that the economic and social problems afflicting Scotland would best be ameliorated by a strong Labour Government at Westminster pursuing ‘socialist’ policies which would benefit disadvantaged or deprived people and communities throughout Britain. As such, when the Scottish National Party (SNP) made electoral advances in Scotland during the 1960s, Labour politicians were uncertain as to whether Scottish devolution ought to be taken more seriously, or whether, in accordance with the economistic perspective, this was a temporary phenomenon which would dissipate once economic conditions improved. There was also the question of whether permitting a Scottish Parliament would counter, or actually boost, nationalist sentiment and support for the SNP north of the border. Labour’s attempt at legislating for Scottish devolution in the 1970s proved deeply divisive for the Party, with pro- and anti-devolution Labour politicians existing alongside those in the Party who considered the whole issue ‘boring’ and a time-wasting distraction from more urgent (economic and industrial) problems. It also confronted Labour with the vexatious ‘West Lothian Question’, which it has subsequently failed to answer, beyond reducing the number of Scottish MPs at Westminster from 72 to 59 (with effect from the 2005 general election). Even the first (1997–2001) Blair Government’s enactment of Scottish devolution appeared to lack any enthusiasm and was invariably depicted (by Ministers) as a means of strengthening the United Kingdom. As Chapter 7 explains, the Labour Party has shown even less enthusiasm for Welsh devolution, although when issue has been discussed, similar tensions have become apparent between those Labour politicians emphasizing the Party’s democratic and decentralizing strand and those who have insisted that ‘regional problems’ can only be adequately ameliorated by the implementation of ‘socialist’ policies from the centre. Many Labour politicians have also been instinctively antipathetic to nationalism, due to its right-wing connotations. Certainly, Labour opponents of Welsh devolution – with some Labour MPs from Wales proving the most hostile to nationalist demands for self-government – have viewed it as

Introduction

11

divisive of the working class and attributed socio-economic problems in the regions of the United Kingdom at least partly to the alleged failings of capitalism or the policies of Conservative governments, not geography. There have also been disagreements between those Labour MPs who fear that conceding to demands for Welsh devolution will serve to legitimize the calls for Welsh self-government (thereby providing an electoral fillip to Plaid Cymru) and those Labour MPs who calculated that devolution for Wales would actually undermine support for Welsh autonomy and semi-independence. Certainly, when the Labour Party has considered Welsh devolution, it has invariably treated it as somehow secondary and subordinate to Scottish devolution, with Wales only permitted executive, rather than legislative, devolution and also denied tax-raising powers. In this respect, the Welsh devolution enacted by the Blair Government was generally consistent with the approach pursued on previous occasions by the Labour leadership, whereby a ‘minimalist’ stance was adopted, one characterized by a distinct lack of enthusiasm, and treated as an unavoidable adjunct to devolution for Scotland. Yet as Chapter 8 shows, the Labour Party has displayed even less interest in English devolution for most of the twentieth century, with the concept of directly elected Regional Assemblies for England being a recent development, and one which has now been formally abandoned. To the extent that previous Labour Government acknowledged a regional dimension to the governance of England, it was overwhelmingly economic and administrative, whereby industrial regeneration and indicative planning were to be implemented via regional boards and sundry other administrative bodies. Labour’s devolution ‘programme’ in the l970s alluded to the possibility of elected Regional bodies for England, but argued that there was little public enthusiasm for them at that time, so that the Party’s commitment was rather nebulous and underdeveloped. Only with the advent of New Labour were English Regional Assemblies ascribed greater prominence in Labour’s pronouncements and proposals, although much of the leadership – with the exception of John Prescott – still remained ambivalent or antipathetic. The establishment of Regional Development Agencies (RDAs) ostensibly represented a significant advance towards English regionalism, but still reflected a highly economistic approach. Meanwhile, when the first (and, as it turned out, only) referendum was finally held on whether to establish a directly elected Regional Assembly – in North East England – the result was a clear rejection of such an institutional innovation, and consequently left New Labour’s formal plans for English regional government in utter disarray, although one suspects that many Labour MPs

12


and Ministers – Tony Blair included – were not too disappointed or dismayed. Not surprisingly, perhaps, the formal commitment to directly elected Regional Assemblies was subsequently abandoned, albeit not until after Gordon Brown had replaced Tony Blair as Labour leader and Prime Minister in June 2007. Chapter 9 illustrates that whilst Labour leaders and governments have often pursued or upheld a bi-partisan approach towards Northern Ireland, entailing broad similarity and continuity with the policies of the Conservative Party, ‘the Northern Ireland problem’ has raised rather more normative or ideological questions for Labour than the Conservatives. Whereas the latter are clearly in favour of retaining the Union (and thus aligning themselves with the Protestants/Unionists in the Province), the Labour Party has generally been formally committed to the principle of Irish (re)unification, albeit as a long-term goal or aspiration. In the meantime though, since the 1960s, the Labour Party has been obliged to develop policies for Northern Ireland which accept the Province’s current constitutional and political status as a member of the United Kingdom, whilst still subscribing to the long-term objective of Irish reunification. Prior to the 1960s, senior Labour politicians at Westminster sought to avoid becoming embroiled in Northern Irish politics, even though there was widespread concern about discrimination against the catholic community. Labour’s stance was effectively to feign disinterest and insist that matters pertaining to Northern Ireland were for Northern Ireland’s people and Stormont Parliament to resolve between them (a stance which clearly failed to address the fact that the Protestants enjoyed a permanent in-built majority, via the Unionist Party, in Stormont, which itself underpinned many of the catholic minority’s grievances). From the 1960s, however, this was not a tenable option, although the Labour Party’s formal position remained that of supporting the principle of (Irish) ‘unity by consent’, whilst recognizing that this was – and remains – unlikely to be achieved for many, many years. Finally, Chapter 10 explains more fully the reasons for the Labour Party’s general conservatism over constitutional reform and, in so doing, develops more fully some of the issues and themes alluded to in this introduction. The chapter will emphasize the significance of the Labour Party’s general antipathy to theorizing and intellectualism, which have tended to leave the Party bereft of a clear philosophy of constitutional reform, a lacunae reinforced by the tacit acceptance of the Westminster Model by most Labour parliamentarians throughout the Party’s history. As a result, constitutional reform has been sporadic and often illconsidered, indicating a marked lack of ‘joined-up thinking’. Particular

Introduction

13

measures often seem to have been inadequately considered, both in themselves and in relation to other aspects of the constitution and political system. There have also been tensions or inconsistencies in what Labour has recommended in Opposition, and what it has subsequently done (or failed to do) once in Office. Furthermore, while intra-Party debates over constitutional reform have sometimes reflected orthodox Left-Right ideological positions, what is perhaps more remarkable are the tensions which have manifested themselves between the parliamentary leadership and Labour Ministers on the one hand (acculturated to the norms of the Westminster Model) and the Party’s backbenchers on the other. In these respects, whilst the Blair Governments undoubtedly enacted many more constitutional reform measures than any previous Labour Administration, there still remained a number of similarities between New Labour and Old Labour, as will become apparent in the following chapters.

1 Electoral Reform

For most of the twentieth century, electoral reform – in the sense of seeking a more proportional voting system for general elections, as opposed to extending the franchise or abolishing university seats, for example – was conspicuous by its absence from most of the Labour Party’s sporadic proposals pertaining to constitutional affairs and Britain’s political institutions. This ‘absence of a debate on proportional representation’ ( Jones and Keating, 1985: 158) in the Labour Party is attributable to five main factors. Firstly, there has tended to be a highly traditional mandate theory of political support, whereby securing a parliamentary majority is deemed the key to implementing Labour’s policies, and the attainment of such a majority is invariably to be best attained via the plurality or ‘firstpast-the-post’ electoral system. This perspective, of course, reflects and reinforces Labour’s traditional acceptance of the precepts of the Westminster Model of British government, with its emphasis on a strong, single-party government formally accountable to Parliament and, inter alia, the electorate through regular general elections in which voters are ostensibly offered a clear choice between two or more political parties, whereupon the duly elected governing party has a ‘mandate’ to implement its election manifesto. Or as Roy Hattersley argued during his tenure as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party in the mid- to late 1980s, ‘[C]ritics of our present system underestimate the importance of the twin doctrines of the manifesto and the mandate’ (The Guardian, 19 December 1988). Moreover, in this context, accountability and representativeness are also assumed to be provided at local level through the direct linkage between a parliamentary (electoral) constituency and its MP, a link which might be weakened, or maybe lost entirely, under alternative electoral systems. Of course, Labour’s long-standing defence of the first-past-the-post electoral system has constituted a tacit acknowledgement that the Party 14

Electoral Reform

15

would be unable to secure the support of a genuine majority of the electorate if elections were conducted in accordance with the principle of proportional representation. Indeed, obtaining a majority of seats in the House of Commons, by virtue of securing 36–48 per cent of the votes cast in general elections, has been deemed sufficient by most of the Labour Party (and the Conservatives) throughout its history. Secondly, many in the Labour Party, especially (but not exclusively) on the Left, have been scornful of the almost inevitable recourse to coalition politics which electoral reform would engender. Not only would this be incompatible with Labour’s traditional notions of ‘the mandate’ and ‘accountability’ as noted above, it would also inevitably entail the Party having to compromise many of its professed principles and policies in order to construct a governing coalition with at least one other political party (most likely to be the Liberals/Liberal Democrats). For many Labour politicians, this would effectively have meant the abandonment of democratic socialism, as the Party’s leadership bargained with nonsocialist, centre or centre-Right, parties in order to gain or retain Office. Again, Roy Hattersley exemplified this stance, warning delegates at the Party’s 1989 conference that while ‘I do not say that under PR we would never have a Labour Government again . . . I do say that we would never again have a Labour Government that was able to carry out a Labour programme’. Thirdly, following on from this last point, many in the Labour Party, particularly on the Left, have tended to adopt an economistic perspective, whereby Labour’s primary task is deemed to be the pursuit of policies to improve the material conditions and living standards of ordinary working people. Prior to the late 1980s at least, this meant the pursuit of full employment, a welfare state and a progressive tax system to facilitate some redistribution of wealth. In contrast to such important policy objectives materially affecting and benefiting the everyday lives of millions of ordinary people, the question of electoral reform was widely assumed to be an irrelevance and a diversion from the primary goals and tasks of a Labour Government. Indeed, rather like many Conservatives, several Labour parliamentarians have depicted electoral reform as an issue which only the so-called chattering classes and cosmopolitan liberal elites at their Islington dinner parties are really concerned about, but which is of little interest to ordinary working people and voters. Fourthly, the traditional response of both Left and Right within the Labour Party to emphatic electoral defeats has been to insist on the need to clarify or modify its policies in order to regain support at the next general election. From the Left’s perspective, Labour’s general election

16


defeats were not explicated in terms of the vagaries of the first-pastthe-post electoral system, but deemed a consequence of the Party (or, rather, the parliamentary leadership) watering down or abandoning its avowed socialist commitments, whereupon swathes of disillusioned working-class voters lent their support to other parties on polling day, or stayed at home. The solution, therefore, was deemed to reside, not in reforming the electoral system (a thoroughly bourgeois preoccupation, apparently) but in revitalizing the Labour Party’s socialist commitments and thus reconnecting with the non-Conservative majority amongst the British electorate (see, for example, Benn, 1980: 20, 146–7). For the revisionists or social democrats on Labour’s Right, however, electoral defeat was viewed as evidence of the Party’s urgent to need to modernize its policies and image in order to make it attractive to a more affluent and aspirational electorate. What ‘modernization’ meant in this context, of course, was diluting – if not ditching altogether – Labour’s formal commitment to public ownership and wealth redistribution derived from higher taxes on the rich, as well as dispelling the Party’s proletarian cloth-cap image. Accepting embourgeoisement, not altering the electoral system, was how the revisionist Right viewed Labour’s salvation following defeat by the Conservatives (see, for example, Crosland, 1956; Crosland, 1962; Blair, New Statesman, 4 September 1987). Fifthly, and finally, many in the Labour Party throughout most of the twentieth century discerned clear electoral advantages to be gleaned from first-past-the-post, for once the Liberals had been effectively marginalized, the electoral system sustained a two-party system at national or Westminster level, in which Labour was the only main challenger to the Conservatives. A more proportional electoral system, on the other hand, would have enabled the Liberals to retain or regain a significant role in British general politics, thereby seriously impeding Labour’s determination to provide the only viable Left-of-centre or progressive alternative to the Conservative Party. Consequently, most Labour politicians have long favoured a first-pastthe-post or simple plurality electoral system which is deemed (by its defenders) to provide the electorate with a clear choice between two competing parties and which has offered Labour the potential for a relatively regular alternation of power between itself and the Conservatives. Put another way, many Labour politicians have been prepared to accept periods of Conservative rule on the assumption that the same first-past-the-post would eventually provide Labour with a period in Office, a point candidly acknowledged by the Deputy Labour leader, John Prescott, in a meeting with the then Liberal Democrat leader, Paddy

Electoral Reform

17

Ashdown (Ashdown, 2001: 169, diary entry for 18 February 1998). For Labour politicians of this cast of mind, such a system of alternating power and single-party rule is definitely preferable to a system which yielded a greater role for third parties and which would render it much more likely that Labour could only ever govern via a coalition or some form of electoral pact with the Liberals (see, for example, Cryer, 1992: 16). One further factor which has militated against the Labour Party’s adoption of an alternative electoral system for general (Westminster) elections has been the lack of agreement amongst those Labour politicians who have advocated electoral reform, for whilst they have been able to allude to the apparent inequities of the first-past-the-post or ‘simple plurality’ electoral system used for general elections in Britain, they have never been able to agree amongst themselves as to which particular alternative electoral system they wished to adopt. Expressed another way, this has meant that to the extent that there have been occasional debates in the Labour Party over electoral reform (more especially since the late 1980s), the disagreements and divisions have not simply been between the proponents and opponents of electoral reform in the Labour Party, but also between advocates of electoral reform themselves, due to the various options available. This has effectively left the balance of power inside the Party strongly weighted towards those Labour MPs and Ministers who have been quite content to retain the existing electoral system for general elections.

The early Labour Party and electoral reform The stance of the early Labour Party with regard to electoral reform was certainly characterized by a lack of both clarity and consistency. Resolutions calling for proportional representation were defeated at the 1911, 1914, 1925 and 1926 annual conferences, yet at the 1919 conference, delegates had indicated their support for electoral reform. Nor was the Parliamentary Labour Party any clearer or more consistent in its attitude towards electoral reform during its formative years. For example, some of the Party’s founders, most notably Keir Hardie, initially looked favourably on the Single Transferable Vote (STV), whilst Ramsay MacDonald initially intimated his preference for the Alternative Vote, but was emphatic in his rejection of proportional representation per se. A number of early Labour MPs, however, were members of the Proportional Representation Society during the first quarter of the twentieth century, including J. Clynes, Philip Snowden, J. Thomas and Josiah

18


Wedgewood, all of whom subsequently served as Cabinet Ministers in the first (1923–1924) Labour Government (Chadwick, 1999: 165–6, 203). MacDonald’s own rejection of proportional representation (but not the Alternative Vote) derived in part form his confidence and prescience that historical, political and social trends were working to the advantage of the fledgling Labour Party, to the extent that he believed it to be destined, eventually, to challenge the Liberal Party as the main rival to the Conservative Party. In the meantime, a year before the Labour Representation Committee formally became the Labour Party in 1906, MacDonald warned that when the Labour Party was formally established, it would be too immature politically to hold full political Office in the short term. Instead, MacDonald argued that if the labour movement was to have its own political party, then it would need to prepare itself for government over several years, thereby establishing its credibility and winning the trust and confidence of the electorate. This could not be achieved overnight, and as such, MacDonald was dismissive of those in the labour movement who, he alleged, viewed proportional representation as a panacea (Chadwick, 1999: 161; MacDonald, 1905: 23). According to MacDonald, although ‘the individual is in a hurry, because life is short . . . social evolution is in no hurry’, and whilst the existing electoral system ‘does put obstacles in the way of a new Party at first . . . it cannot destroy the Party if it be well-founded’. Indeed, he insisted that once a third party ‘has won its way into Parliament in spite of our single ballot system . . . its strength is all the greater because it can use the terrors of the single ballot in its own self-defence at future elections’ (MacDonald, 1905: 24). Meanwhile, Labour’s formative years also heard the Party’s parliamentary draughtsman, Henry Schloesser, argue that Parliament has to legislate, and, through its executive, the Cabinet, to administer our home affairs and to conduct foreign and colonial policy. For these purposes, a method of election which accentuates the majority at any given time is actually preferable to a method which actually represents it. (Schloesser, 1911) The extent to which the nascent Parliamentary Labour Party was divided by the issue of electoral reform, particularly proportional representation, was clearly indicated during 1917 and 1918, when Parliament debated the recommendations of a 1916–1917 Speaker’s Conference on reform of Britain’s electoral system. The Liberal-Conservative Coalition accepted the vast majority of the recommendations put forward by the Speaker’s

Electoral Reform

19

Conference (such as extending the franchise to all men), but declined to accept the proposals for introducing proportional representation in borough constituencies, and the Alternative Vote in all other seats. Instead, it decided to submit these proposals to a free vote in the House of Commons, whereupon ‘the issue shuttle-cocked back and forth between the Commons and the Lords’ (Bogdanor, 1981: 129), with the House of Commons repeatedly rejecting proportional representation, and the House of Lords equally consistently voting against the Alternative Vote. On the five occasions that the issue of adopting proportional representation was voted on, the Labour Party was divided as follows (see Table 1.1). Whilst a majority of Labour MPs voted in favour on three of the five occasions, the results overall indicated a distinct lack of unanimity or consistency in the Parliamentary Labour Party overall. It was also during this period that Ramsay MacDonald defended the first-past-the-post system by asserting that ‘The present method . . . compels candidates . . . to declare where their cohesion is, who their colleagues are, and what party they have got to work with, so that, on the whole, the majority in this House is a representative majority and not a scratch majority’ (House of Commons Debates, Vol. XCIII, col. 2232, 17 May 1917). By the time that Labour formed its first (minority) government, in 1923, opinion in the Party had hardened against proportional representation, in spite of – or perhaps because of – the fact that Labour was in such a precarious parliamentary position due to the narrowness of its victory. That the Party had failed to secure an overall House of Commons majority may well have reminded Labour MPs that similar general election outcomes would invariably be more likely under proportional representation, whereas the Party’s relative success in the 1923 election seemed to suggest the wisdom of MacDonald’s strategy and vision, with the Labour Party steadily amassing more support under the existing electoral system,

Table 1.1 Early Labour Party divisions over proportional representation Date of vote

12 June 1917 4 July 1917 22 November 1917 30 January 1918 13 May 1918 Source: Bogdanor (1981: 130–1).

Labour MPs voting in favour of PR 13 13 15 5 7

Labour MPs voting in against PR 11 7 8 18 9

20


until it eventually replaced the Liberals as the progressive alternative to the Conservatives. Indeed, MacDonald’s biographer observes that from 1922 onwards, ‘one of the main objects of his political life [was] the destruction of the Liberal Party’ (Marquand, 1977: 528). It was already becoming evident, therefore, that Labour’s attitude to electoral reform was informed primarily by calculations of partisan self-interest and Party advantage, although it could also be argued that MacDonald was at least thinking strategically, rather than allowing himself to be unduly influenced by electoral short-termism. Consequently, when, in May 1924, a Liberal MP tabled a Private Members’ Bill to introduce some form of proportional representation for subsequent general elections, it was defeated – in a free vote at Second Reading – by 144 votes, with 28 Labour MPs supporting the Bill and 89 voting against. The Cabinet itself was slightly less hostile, with 10 Ministers voting for the Bill and 6 opposing it, whilst MacDonald himself abstained (Hart, 1992: 223). The issue of electoral reform confronted the Labour Party again just seven years later, after MacDonald had formed another minority administration, in 1929. This time, MacDonald felt obliged to concede to Liberal demands for the introduction of the Alternative Vote, this being the price extracted from the Labour Administration in return for continued parliamentary support by the Liberal Party, although MacDonald had earlier expressed (in a diary entry) his distinct lack of enthusiasm for such a deal: ‘We get two years of office from the Liberals and give them in return a permanent corner on our stage’. This would also, MacDonald informed senior colleagues in a subsequent memorandum, ‘lead to an abandonment of any expectation we may have [of] returning to a two-Party system’ (quoted in Marquand, 1977: 529, 530). Yet in spite of MacDonald’s evident reluctance, some of his Ministerial colleagues felt that the Labour Government’s vulnerability in Parliament was so serious that a deal with the Liberals ought to be accepted. Labour’s National Executive Committee (NEC) had also, at a meeting on 17 December 1930, provided its ‘approval or acquiescence’, by 16 votes to 3, whilst a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party witnessed 133 MPs express support for the proposed measure, while 20 Labour MPs registered their opposition. However, when the Representation of the People Bill was introduced in the House of Commons, the Labour leadership imposed a three-line whip to ensure that all of the Party’s MPs voted – along with the Liberals – in favour. That the reform never reached the Statute Book, therefore, was due firstly to a ‘wrecking amendment’ in the House of Lords, which sought

Electoral Reform

21

to exempt boroughs with populations of less than 200 000. This was clearly intended to benefit the Conservative Party, which drew much of its electoral support from smaller towns and less populous rural districts. Secondly, but as a consequence, the Bill was sufficiently delayed to ensure that it did not reach the Statute Book before the Labour Government fell, to be replaced by a National Government – headed by MacDonald himself – in August 1931. The important point here, though, is that neither MacDonald nor most of the Labour Party had suddenly been converted to the principle of electoral reform, but had viewed the introduction of the Alternative Vote as the ransom to be paid in return for a further two years of Liberal Party support at Westminster (Bogdanor, 1981: 138), or, as two other commentators observe, ‘a rather cynical attempt to keep the Labour government in Office’ (Jones and Keating, 1985: 294; see also Catterall, 2000: 140). Electoral reform subsequently became almost a non-issue for the Labour Party during the next 50 years, one which was very rarely considered. Indeed, this reflected a more general lull over the issue of electoral reform in British politics, to the extent that in Vernon Bogdanor’s The People and the Party System, the two chapters devoted to the issue of proportional representation span the periods 1831–1931 and 1974–1979 respectively. On the rare occasions that the Labour Party did conduct desultory discussions about the topic, electoral reform and proportional representation (the two phenomena frequently being conflated) were emphatically rejected, as was the case when a sub-committee of the NEC’s machinery of government committee considered the issue shortly before the Second World War. The sub-committee argued that proportional representation might yield ‘grave disadvantages or consequences in its ultimate results and effects’, most notably in creating ‘a mosaic of representations in Parliament giving no security of robust or stable integration of governing authority or healthy and coherent opposition’. Indeed, the electorate was likely to suffer from ‘bewilderment . . . over choices’ which would have the effect of ‘stultifying the natural emergence of the big and elementary principles’ upon which the British electorate ‘has always hitherto liked to express its opinions in a major and direct way untrammelled by side issues’. Added to these arguments against proportional representation was that pertaining to the ‘personal relationship between Member and constituency, which is not likely to be abrogated’ (Labour Party Archives, RDR.27/November 1941). A similarly robust case against electoral reform, and thus in defence of the existing simple plurality (or first-pastthe-post) voting system, was offered by Hugh Dalton when he argued

22


that it ‘has very solid advantages’, not least of these being that the electorate was familiar with it, and that it ‘discourages freak candidates . . . [and] small separate parties’. By effectively offering voters a choice of two credible parties (credible in terms of their likelihood or potential for winning a majority of seats in the House of Commons), the simple plurality system, Dalton insisted, ‘makes coherent government possible and diminishes the chance of political deadlocks, and the excuse of feeble policies’, either of which would almost inevitably become commonplace if a system of proportional representation was adopted (Dalton, 1935: 34–6).

Electoral reform as a ‘non-issue’ from 1945 to 1973 Labour’s landslide victory in the 1945 general election ensured that electoral reform, in terms of seeking greater proportionality between votes cast nationally and seats won in the House of Commons, remained a non-issue for the Party. The Attlee Governments did pursue one particular reform concerning Britain’s electoral system, namely abolition of the University Seats in 1948, but this merely reaffirmed the primacy of the principle of ‘one-person, one-vote, one constituency’, rather than ‘one vote, one value’ as a truly proportional system would entail. With regard to a more proportional system of voting, the Labour Party clearly shared the view trenchantly expressed by Harold Laski [Professor of Political Science at the London School of Economics from 1926 until his death in 1950 and member of Labour’s NEC from 1937 to 1949], namely that the ‘first and most vital function of the electorate is to choose a House of Commons the membership of which makes possible the creation of a Government which can govern’. As such, he did ‘not think it important that, from time to time, a minority of the electoral votes should give a party a majority of seats so that it is able to form a government’. In defending the existing electoral system, Laski argued that proportional representation would yield a whole range of problems, most notable of these being the almost inevitable recourse to minority government, one which would therefore constantly be engaged in doing deals and seeking compromises in order to ensure its survival. This effectively meant that ‘Minority government is invariably uneasy government, and usually it is cowardly government’, because they would only rarely ‘put before the House a clear and coherent body of measures’, preoccupied as they invariably are with ‘always evading the measures they believe to be necessary whenever they suspect these are likely to prove unpalatable’. Laski even approvingly quoted Benjamin Disraeli’s (nineteenth century Conservative leader and Prime Minister) claim that

Electoral Reform

23

‘England does not love coalitions’, adding that this assertion constituted an accurate ‘insight into the character of our people’ (Laski, 1951: 53–7). Laski has been cited at length here because the views and assumptions he expressed in rejecting electoral reform accurately reflected the premises and perspectives which prevailed in the Labour Party at the time (and have mostly continued to do so subsequently). Needless to say, of course, the scale of the first (1945–1950) Attlee Government’s parliamentary majority, and its subsequent success in implementing a comprehensive programme of economic and social reform – much of which was broadly accepted by the Conservative Party throughout the 1950s and early 1960s – reaffirmed the Labour Party’s faith in the perceived virtues of the existing first-past-the-post electoral system. It also indicated the extent to which Labour had successfully replaced the Liberal Party as the Left-of-centre or progressive alternative to the Conservatives – just as Ramsay MacDonald had previously envisaged – for in each of the 1951, 1955 and 1959 general elections, the Liberal Party returned only six MPs to Westminster. Not even Labour’s successive defeats in these three general elections prompted any reconsideration of electoral reform within the Party. Instead, the response in the Party was primarily concerned with ways of broadening Labour’s electoral appeal in an era of rising prosperity (although pockets of poverty were ‘rediscovered’ during the 1960s), full employment and increased social mobility. For senior revisionists, such as Anthony Crosland and Hugh Gaitskell in particular, Labour’s problems were not attributable to the electoral system per se, but to the Party’s image vis-a-vis the electorate, which was deemed to necessitate revising its policies and toning down its rhetoric about class-based politics, in order to attract support from the burgeoning middle class and professional or managerial strata, whilst also retaining the support of those sections of the working class deemed to be acquiring middle class lifestyles and views as a consequence of embourgeoisement. The subsequent 1964–1970 Labour Governments, meanwhile, in spite of pursuing various constitutional reform measures (discussed in subsequent chapters), conspicuously failed even to consider electoral reform (beyond reducing, in 1969, the age for voting from 21 to 18).

A few siren voices are heard, 1974–1987 Even in the wake of the 1974 elections, with Labour forming a minority government 34 seats short of an overall parliamentary majority in February, and then only securing a three-seat majority in the ensuing

24


October election, the issue of electoral reform for general elections was not seriously considered in the Party. This was also in spite of (or, perhaps, partly because of) the pact entered into with the Liberal Party in March 1977, whereby the Liberals agreed that their 13 MPs would support the Labour Government in the House of Commons, particularly in the Division Lobbies, in return for being consulted on forthcoming policies and legislation. Some leading Liberals, most notably Jo Grimond (the former Party Leader), believed that they should insist on a commitment from the Labour Government to pursue electoral reform for general elections, ‘the only prize which could have justified the pact’ (Grimond, 1979: 250). Yet the then Liberal leader, David Steel, did not believe that such a demand was plausible or practicable at the time (not least because few within the Labour Party would have accepted it, in spite of their Government’s precarious parliamentary position) and, instead, hoped that merely entering into a pact with Labour might presage a longer term ‘progressive’ realignment in British politics, thereby lending greater credence to the idea of coalition government in the future. Indeed, one commentator has suggested that David Steel ‘seemed more interested in the concept of an agreement’ rather than actually securing ‘tangible gains’ (Cook, 1993: 164). The most that the Liberals were able to extract from the Labour Government with regard to electoral reform, therefore, as a condition of sustaining it in Office, was a commitment to hold a free vote on legislation introducing a regional list system for elections to the European Parliament (due to be held in 1979). Such legislation was duly drafted by the Labour Government, but subsequently defeated in the House of Commons by 321 votes to 224, with 85 MPs abstaining. Although 64 Labour Ministers and ‘payroll’ MPs, along with 83 backbenchers, voted in support of the regional list system on this occasion, 14 Ministers and ‘payroll’ MPs, as well as 101 backbenchers, voted against (Bogdanor, 1981: 167). Indeed, the problems which the Labour Party encountered in retaining the support of the Liberals during the 1976–1978 period, and the difficulties of conducting parliamentary business in the absence of a working majority, merely confirmed the anxieties which many in the Party already harboured about the problems likely to accrue from electoral reform, namely the almost inevitable coalition building or, at the very least, ad hoc alliances and deals with minor parties which might vary from one policy to another. It was not a scenario which many in the Labour Party found appealing. As Barbara Castle recalled, the Cabinet’s general view was that ‘If we were not careful [about resisting electoral reform] we could see the end of any possibility of a Labour government’

Electoral Reform

25

(Castle, 1990: 445, diary entry for 4 April 1974), a perspective endorsed by Ron Hayward, Labour’s General Secretary, when he argued that ‘Proportional representation means coalition government at Westminster, on the lines of our European partners, and it is goodbye then to any dreams or aspirations for a democratic socialist Britain’ (The Daily Telegraph, 28 February 1976). The Labour Party’s reluctance to consider the possibility of electoral reform at this time was further reflected in its refusal to submit evidence to the Hansard Commission on Electoral Reform, which published its Report in 1976. Chaired by the Conservative historian Lord (Robert) Blake, the Commission came to the unequivocal conclusion that Britain’s first-past-the-post or plurality electoral system provided ‘a recipe for instability of the most damaging nature’ due to the regular changes of government it yielded, along with the discontinuity or reversal of public policy which consequently ensued (Hansard Society, 1976: para 10). Yet not only did the Labour Party decline to submit evidence to this Commission, two of the three Labour members who initially agreed to serve on the Commission subsequently withdrew, whereupon Labour opponents of electoral reform could question the objectivity or legitimacy of the Commission’s subsequent recommendations. It would be an exaggeration, though, to assert that there was absolutely no interest in electoral reform in the Labour Party after its return to Office in 1974, for one senior figure, Roy Jenkins, was actually becoming quite enamoured with the idea of a centrist coalition or National Government comprising the Right of the Labour Party, the Left of the Conservative Party and assorted Liberals. Indeed, Jenkins subsequently viewed the second half of the 1970s as ‘a great missed opportunity’ for such political figures as Edward Heath, David Steel, William Whitelaw, Shirley Williams ‘and a whole regiment of . . . Conservative “wets’’ ’ ( Jenkins, 1991: 425–6). Jenkins even called, just weeks after Labour’s February 1974 election ‘victory’, for a Speaker’s Conference to consider aspects of electoral reform, partly to prevent the Liberal Party from seizing the political initiative on the issue {National Archives, [formerly Public Records Office (PRO), hereafter NA] CAB 129/175, C(74) 18, Memorandum by the Home Secretary, ‘Speaker’s Conference on Electoral Reform’, 29 March 1974}. However, few of his Ministerial colleagues supported this demand, and they therefore ‘sent Roy away with a flea in his coalition ear’ (Castle, 1990: 444–5, diary entry for 4 April 1974). Thereafter, Jenkins became increasingly detached from the Labour Party, until he eventually became a co-founder of the breakaway Social Democratic Party in March 1981, for whom electoral reform was a cardinal policy objective.

26


Meanwhile, on the backbenches, a Labour Study Group for Electoral Reform was established, this later becoming the Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform (LCER). As well as favouring reform of the electoral system for general elections, the group also recommended the use of proportional representation for the 1979 European Parliament elections (Linton, 1993: 14). Among some of the Labour MPs who subsequently joined the group were Robin Cook, Austin Mitchell and Jeff Rooker, and by about 1990, the LCER had more than 60 of the Party’s MPs on its list of sponsors, having become ‘the largest campaigning group within the Labour Party’ (Linton, 1993: 16). Following Labour’s 1979 general election defeat, the Bennite Left was briefly in the ascendant in the Party, and pushed for a number of internal reforms ostensibly intended to render the Party more democratic, and its MPs more ‘accountable’. The two main reforms which were successfully introduced were the introduction of an electoral college to elect the leader (and deputy leader) of the Parliamentary Labour Party and the mandatory re-selection of Labour MPs. Both of these reforms were deemed to render the Party leadership and Labour MPs more accountable to the Labour Party as whole (and in the case of the electoral college, in which 40 per cent of votes were allocated to the trade unions, accountable to the wider labour movement), which, in turn, it was envisaged, would make it more difficult for a future Labour government to ‘renege’ upon its professed Socialist principles and policies. For Labour’s Left, therefore, lack of democracy and accountability within British politics was viewed in terms of the Party’s parliamentary leadership and MPs failing to implement manifesto commitments once in Office, and thereby betraying the trust and aspirations of the millions of ordinary people who voted for the Party and thus secured its election in the first place. Whether this ‘betrayal’ by the parliamentary leadership was explained in terms of Labour Ministers being ‘captured’ by the Establishment and (conservative) personnel of the State or by a process of ‘embourgeoisement’ occurring once Labour politicians spent much more time in cosmopolitan London than in their metropolitan constituencies, the solution was not viewed in terms of reforming the electoral system itself. Indeed, the Left remained generally hostile to electoral reform on the grounds that proportional representation would make it even more difficult for the Labour Party to secure an overall Commons majority and thus introduce a Socialist programme, because it would almost certainly be obliged to form a coalition government with its ‘bourgeois’ opponents and thereafter pursue centrist, essentially conservative, policies.

Electoral Reform

27

Yet one of the factors which doubtless subsequently persuaded some ‘revisionist’ Labour politicians of the apparent virtues of electoral reform was precisely the Party’s shift to the Left in the wake of the 1979 defeat and the consequent concern that a public backlash against the Thatcher Government might enable an equally ideological and doctrinaire Labour Government to be elected almost by default. These social democratic Labour MPs therefore became convinced that electoral reform, precisely because of its propensity to produce coalition government, would militate against the ideological polarization of British politics, whereby voters could only choose between a Thatcherite Conservative party and a Bennite Labour Party; between free market Capitalism and State Socialism. Such MPs therefore joined Roy Jenkins, David Owen, William Rodgers and Shirley Williams when they left to form the Social Democratic Party. Needless to say, the enthusiasm of these social democrats for electoral reform merely hardened Left opinion against it and fuelled suspicion about the motives its advocates, with Tony Benn warning that ‘you have to be careful . . . to ask yourself just exactly who wants PR and why’ (Benn, 1982: 63). Incidentally, Benn was also opposed to proportional representation on the grounds that a national list system would greatly enhance Prime Ministerial patronage; apparently, in the late 1980s, Benn said to the then Labour leader Neil Kinnock that if Britain had a system of PR, then he (Benn) would be 599th on the list whist fellow-Left-wing Labour MP Dennis skinner would be 600th, to which Kinnock responded: ‘Do you want that in writing?’ (cited in Vernon Bogdanor’s submission to the Independent Commission on the Voting System, 1998). Yet after Labour’s catastrophic election defeat in the 1983 election, some of those on the Right who had remained in the Party rather than joining the SDP began wondering aloud whether it was sensible to continue eschewing electoral reform, suggesting that ‘Labour needs to break out of its ghetto’. This would entail, among other things, rejecting ‘an unthinking attachment to a dogma about a first-past-the-post system which has so demonstrably failed to serve us’ (Mitchell, 1983: 160–1).

Electoral reform moves up labour’s agenda, 1988–1994 However, it required a further general election defeat, in 1987, before the Labour Party finally evinced a greater willingness tentatively to contemplate the possibility of supporting electoral reform, although there was certainly no Pauline conversion. For example, in the year of Labour’s third successive election defeat (following what was nonetheless widely

28


regarded as an impressive and highly professional campaign), a resolution was presented at the Party’s annual conference, calling upon the leadership to launch an inquiry into Britain’s electoral system, although this was decisively rejected on a show of hands. Meanwhile, immediately following the 1987 defeat, the Labour leader Neil Kinnock launched a major Policy Review lasting three years, entailing seven panels addressing broad spheres of policy. Issues pertaining to constitutional reform, for example, were examined by the Policy Review’s ‘Democracy and the Individual’ Group, but there were no proponents of electoral reform amongst its membership. Consequently, and perhaps not surprisingly, its final report claimed to have ‘found no merit in replacing the present system of voting with an alternative which inevitably entails the confusion of coalition government, and grants to the smaller, and increasingly irrelevant, parties, a degree of influence over policy which is utterly disproportionate to the size of the vote’. Instead, the Review Group was emphatic that ‘Most important, we are opposed to change in our present system of election to the House of Commons because we believe that, far from increasing democracy in Britain, it would decrease it’. This exegesis against electoral reform was subsequently deemed by Tony Benn, at a meeting of Labour’s NEC to discuss the recommendations of the Policy Review, to be the best section out of all the seven review group reports, although such conservatism and complacency concerning Britain’s electoral system stood in clear contrast to the review group’s other proposals for reforming Britain’s constitution and political institutions (Hughes and Wintour, 1990: 161–3). Elsewhere in the Labour Party, though, there were signs of increasing support for electoral reform. In 1988, for example, the LCER appointed Jeff Rooker MP as its chair, whereupon it began to adopt a more proactive role in campaigning for an alternative to the first-past-the-post method of election. With a few other well-known Labour MPs making known their support for electoral reform, including Austin Mitchell (1987: 28) and Robin Cook (the latter a member of Labour’s Shadow Cabinet), the issue began to move up the Party’s policy agenda, in spite of – or maybe partly because of – its eschewal by the ‘Democracy and the Individual’ Policy Review group. Another resolution urging an inquiry into Britain’s electoral system was debated at Labour’s 1989 conference (at which there had been 43 resolutions or amendments supporting electoral reform, a notable increase on the 25 submitted to Labour’s annual conference just two years previously), yet Roy Hattersley reiterated the leadership’s antipathy towards electoral reform by arguing that the main beneficiaries of adopting a

Electoral Reform

29

(more) proportional voting system for general elections would be the Social Democratic Party, whose electoral advance would almost certainly be at Labour’s expense. In so doing, Hattersley appeared to be adopting a similar stance to Ramsay MacDonald back in the 1920s, when he opposed electoral reform at least partly on the grounds that it would keep the Liberal Party alive. Although Labour’s 1989 conference rejected the resolution calling for an inquiry into Britain’s electoral system by 4.6 million votes to 1.4 million, about half of the Party’s constituency delegates voted in favour, indicating that ‘Labour’s support for the existing system was more fragile than it had been for nearly sixty years’ (Marquand, 1992: 56). Nonetheless, the 1989 document yielded by the Policy Review, Meet the Challenge Make the Change, made no concessions to the Party’s electoral reformers, insisting that whilst the Policy Review had ‘given the arguments in favour of such a change serious consideration . . . we have found no merit in replacing the present system of voting with an alternative’. Instead, it was insisted that ‘democracy is best served by a government which is accountable to the electorate’, and thus ‘we have carefully considered but rejected alternative forms of voting for the House of Commons’ (Labour Party, 1989: 64–5). Robin Cook had sought to have this particular statement deleted, but with only four fellow NEC members backing him was unsuccessful (Linton and Southcott, 1998: 98). However, at Labour’s 1990 annual conference a motion calling for an inquiry into the electoral system used for elections to the European Parliament, the House of Lords, and Labour’s proposed (via the Policy Review) national and regional assemblies within the United Kingdom, was narrowly carried, by 2.7 million votes to 2.5 million. Crucially, however, and against the advice of the NEC, the 1990 annual conference voted also to broaden the remit of the proposed Working Party so as to include elections for the House of Commons. The NEC had, earlier that year, reiterated its unwillingness to countenance electoral reform for Westminster elections, although by this time, Neil Kinnock himself was apparently becoming more open-minded about electoral reform, to the extent that he sought to delete a passage in the 1990 policy document Looking to the Future, which insisted that ‘Labour is opposed to changing the electoral system for the House of Commons’. He was outvoted on the NEC, though, and the assertion remained (Linton, 1993: 17). However, following the decision of the annual conference, the Labour Party’s NEC felt obliged to commission an inquiry (chaired by Professor – later Lord – Plant) into electoral reform, paying particular attention to

30


which electoral system would be most appropriate for elections to a Scottish Parliament, a Welsh Assembly, English Regional Assemblies, the European Parliament, the House of Lords and the House of Commons. The Commission’s remit was later extended to include local government. Although the NEC itself had not diluted its opposition to electoral reform, pressure was growing elsewhere in the Party for Labour to reconsider its traditional support for the first-past-the-post method of election. While the 1987 election defeat was obviously one factor prompting at least a few within the Labour Party to reconsider their stance regarding the extant voting system for general elections, various other developments were also of significance in strengthening the case of Labour’s proponents of electoral reform. One of these was a study conducted by Jeff Rooker, which indicated that the next review of constituency boundaries, due in 1993, would itself deprive the Labour Party of about 20 parliamentary seats. This was because the previous decade had witnessed population shifts to the more prosperous South of England and the Home Counties, and also to the suburbs and shires, shifts which were almost certain to benefit the Conservatives. Indeed, Rooker argued that even if Labour did win a general election in 1991 or 1992, the 1993 boundary changes would probably ensure that the Party lost the following election. Similar observations were made by Paul Ormerod in Labour and Britain in the 1990s, an internal report written by Labour’s Shadow Communications Agency following the 1987 election defeat. Meanwhile, other senior figures in the Labour Party were beginning to express their new-found support for electoral reform, such as John Reid, a former adviser to Neil Kinnock, and Jack Cunningham, a member of the Shadow Cabinet (Hughes and Wintour, 1990: 161–2), whilst various individuals within the Labour Party produced a steady stream of pamphlets and articles presenting the case for reform of the electoral system – albeit disagreeing on precisely which voting system should be adopted (Hain, 1992: 47–50; Rooker, 1992: 51–6) – as did a number of politically sympathetic academics, commentators and organizations (see, for example, Catt, 1990; Georghiou, 1991; Institute for Public Policy Research, 1991; Kuper, 1990; Labour Co-ordinating Committee, 1990; Linton, 1988; Samizdat, 1990; Samizdat, 1991; Tongue, 1989; Weir, 1992). Although the Working Party chaired by Professor Plant was ostensibly semi-independent, the 18 members were comprised almost entirely of Labour MPs (including Hilary Armstrong, Margaret Beckettt, Alistair Darling, Bryan Gould and Jeff Rooker), MEPs (Geoff Hoon and Gary Titley), Labour peers (Patricia Hollis and Reg Underhill) as well as senior Labour Party and trade union officials (Tom Burlison, Judith Church,

Electoral Reform

31

Richard Rosser and Larry Whitty), and Left-inclined academics such as Professor Ben Pimlott. Furthermore, the 181 submissions which the Commission had received by mid-May 1991 included 57 from Constituency Labour Parties, 24 from Labour Party Branches, 9 from organizations with Labour Party connections, 8 from local government Labour groups and 4 from trade unions. The Commission also received 27 submissions from Labour MPs, 2 from Labour MEPs and 5 from Labour Peers. Of these 181 submissions, 107 were in favour of some kind of electoral reform, whilst 50 inclined towards retaining the first-past-the-post system of election (the remaining submissions declining to make a recommendation either way). Amongst those favouring electoral reform, 48 expressed general support, whereas 27 expressed a preference for the Additional Member System (AMS), compared to the 14 in favour of the Alternative Vote and the 12 who preferred the STV. A further four submissions recommended a hybrid of the AMS and the Alternative Vote (Plant, 1995). As the opening pages of the Interim Report explained, the Labour Party’s willingness at least to consider electoral reform was a logical and necessary corollary of its more general commitment to constitutional reform, for if it was committed to creating both a Scottish Parliament and a Welsh Assembly, along with the establishment of English Regional Assemblies, and a reformed – presumably elected – House of Lords, then it was obliged to consider by what means these new institutions would be elected. Yet this in turn prompted questions about the method by which the House of Commons was elected, and depending on the electoral system(s) adopted, which of these representative institutions would subsequently be imbued with the greatest legitimacy. It was also pointed out that if a system of English Regional Assemblies was established but elected on the first-past-the-post system which benefited political parties with a geographically concentrated vote, then the result might well be unwittingly to instigate virtually permanent regimes of regional one party domination. This would obviously be incompatible with one of the professed primary objectives of constitutional reform, namely the democratization of the British political system via the devolution of power and the creation of more ‘representative’ institutions. With the First Report having delineated the Labour Party’s objectives, and the issues or problems involved, with regard to creating a range of elected bodies, the Second Report offered recommendations for an elected Scottish Parliament, whereby a majority of seats should be elected by the first-past-the-post system (thereby retaining the constituency

32


link), whilst a ‘top-up’ provided by the AMS would provide a degree of proportionality. Meanwhile, in the run-up to the 1992 general election, Neil Kinnock responded to a series of opinion polls predicting either a hung Parliament or a minority Labour Government, by suggesting that if this were the outcome, then he would be prepared to consider the possibility of reforming the electoral system, probably in the context of an all-Party inquiry. Yet this was widely seen at the time, not as a conversion to the principle of electoral reform per se but as a pre-emptive tactical move to secure the co-operation of the Liberal Democrats in the event of a hung Parliament (see, for example, Marquand, 1992; Rentoul, 1995: 177). In the immediate aftermath of the 1992 election, some within the labour movement ‘maintained this issue alone was to blame for the Party’s . . . defeat’ (Jones, 1994: 185), although subsequently, it became clear that doubts pertaining to Labour’s economic competence and stance on taxation, coupled with the trade union links, were the key factors accounting for the late swing to the Conservatives. Labour’s shock defeat in the 1992 election – its fourth in succession – and Kinnock’s replacement as Party leader by John Smith, seemed to push the issue of electoral reform back down the agenda, partly because the leadership’s last-minute allusions to electoral reform had enabled the Conservatives to warn the electorate of the dangers which would arise from such reform, namely the virtual inevitability of weak coalition government, in which minority parties would wield excessive power. However, what also seemed to push the prospect of electoral reform back down Labour’s agenda in the aftermath of the 1992 election defeat was John Smith’s preoccupation with reforming the Party’s links with the trade unions, a concern largely prompted by private polling conducted by Labour’s Shadow Communications Agency which confirmed that the Party’s organizational and financial links with the trade unions were a significant factor in accounting for the electorate’s anxieties about the prospects of a Labour Government. Nonetheless, during the Labour leadership contest, Smith himself had admitted that he had ‘not yet reached a conclusion’ on electoral reform, although he fully acknowledged that the case for it was undoubtedly becoming stronger (Smith, 1992: 11). The Third (and final) Plant Report was published in 1993, half-way through Smith’s leadership, making recommendations about electoral systems for elections to the House of Lords and the House of Commons. With regard to elections to the House of Commons – ‘obviously the chief battle ground in the Working Party’ (Plant, 1995: 14) – common agreement proved elusive. Although a majority of members on the

Electoral Reform

33

Working Party acknowledged the need to reform the first-past-the-post system, they struggled to agree on an alternative method of election. Jeff Rooker, for example, favoured the Additional Member or ‘top-up’ system, whereby 500 constituency MPs would be voted by first-past-the-post, with a further 150 selected, on a proportional basis, from the unsuccessful candidates with the highest number of votes. However, he was unable to persuade a majority of his Working Party colleagues to support this particular option (Plant, 1999: 71). Instead, the Supplementary Vote was opted for, albeit by a narrow margin. Whilst it was fully recognized that this was not a proportional electoral system, it did provide a means of ensuring that most MPs were supported by more than 50 per cent of those voting in their constituencies, whilst retaining the representative constituency link which the Working Party agreed was vital. Yet in the context of the Working Party’s own internal divisions, some viewed the Supplementary Vote as ‘perhaps the lowest common denominator or “least worst’’ option’, one which may have been endorsed by some members ‘on the basis that, if there were to be change, this represented the minimum’ (Lamport, 1995: 19). The Working Party’s evident lack of enthusiasm or unanimity concerning the Supplementary Vote was replicated at senior levels of the Labour Party itself, with neither the NEC nor John Smith sufficiently persuaded to endorse the Working Party’s recommendations. It was in the context of this ambivalence and agnosticism that John Smith decided to make electoral reform the subject of a referendum by a future Labour Government, a stance subsequently endorsed at Labour’s 1993 conference. Ominously, perhaps, for Labour supporters of electoral reform, the Working Party was disbanded by the NEC after the publication of its Third Report, even though it had planned to work towards a Fourth Report which would make recommendations concerning elections to a Welsh Assembly, along with English Regional Assemblies.

New Labour and ambivalence over electoral reform since 1994 Labour’s stance on electoral reform continued to be mired in ambiguity and equivocation after Tony Blair had replaced John Smith as Party leader in July 1994, following the latter’s untimely death. Blair reaffirmed the pledge of a referendum on electoral reform for elections to the House of Commons, whilst also endorsing Labour’s commitment to an elected

34


House of Lords and to a Scottish Parliament elected by a system other than first-past-the-post. Yet beyond this formal commitment to a referendum on electoral reform for Westminster elections, Blair’s leadership, both in Opposition and subsequently in Office, was characterized by constant equivocation, with Blair himself simultaneously acknowledging the unfairness of aspects of the first-past-the-post system whilst remaining ‘unpersuaded’ of the case for a (more) proportional electoral system, not least because of the likelihood that ‘small parties [would] end up wielding disproportionate power’ (Blair, 1996: 319–20). Indeed, in the wake of the 1987 election defeat, Blair had appeared even more dismissive of electoral reform, observing that ‘Labour’s new enthusiasts for PR put their case for not primarily on grounds of constitutional principle, but as a strategy for power’, whereupon ‘what cannot be achieved through the front door of majority government can be bundled in by the back door of coalitions and electoral impacts’. Yet this approach reflected ‘dangerous delusions’, according to Blair, for it sought to avoid the ‘real question’ as to ‘why it [the Labour Party] is not achieving sufficient electoral support’ (emphasis in original). As such, he alleged that ‘The campaign for PR is just the latest excuse for avoiding decisive choices about the Party’s future’ (New Statesman, 4 September 1987). Certainly, Blair was concerned that some of his Labour colleagues were beginning to ‘see PR as a panacea for their problems’ (Sopel, 1995: 132). Reform of Britain’s electoral system was, therefore, always likely to constitute one of the most equivocal parts of New Labour’s professed commitment to constitutional reform, and so it proved. Tony Blair’s equivocation enabled both proponents and opponents in the Labour Party to claim that he shared their view on the issue. Certainly, the scale of New Labour’s election victories in 1997 and 2001 seemed to reinforce Tony Blair’s reluctance to commit himself one way or another, although he certainly seemed to have become more sceptical about electoral reform during the course of his premiership. Labour proponents of electoral reform had originally been heartened by the establishment, in October 1996, of a joint consultative committee between the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats, comprising 16 senior politicians and academics (eight from each Party), whose objective was to facilitate co-operation between the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats with regard to constitutional reform. When the committee published its Report the following year, it reiterated the formal commitment to a referendum on electoral reform, but also recommended the establishment of a ‘commission on voting systems’ to consider

Electoral Reform

35

which ‘proportional alternative to the first-past-the-post system’ should be presented to the electorate in the proposed referendum. Both of these proposals were included in Labour’s 1997 manifesto, although Tony Blair himself remained ‘unpersuaded’ of the case for electoral reform vis-a-vis Westminster elections. Eight months after its May 1997 election victory, the Blair Government did establish a commission on voting systems, chaired by Lord (Roy) Jenkins, with its Report following a year later. However, in its own submission to the Jenkins Commission, Labour’s NEC presented a robust case against a proportional voting system, thereby further indicating the divisive nature of electoral reform within the Labour Party. In this submission, the NEC argued that ‘Britain’s stable and representative government over the last 50 years has been assisted by the preponderance of single-party administration’, for the ‘existing system produces a clear winner and loser in accordance with the public mood’ (the NEC evidently overlooking the less than emphatic results of the 1950, 1964 and 1974 general elections). By contrast, the coalition governments which would invariably be produced by proportional representation would break the link between MPs and their constituents, whilst making it much more difficult for governing parties to fulfil their manifesto commitments. The latter problem would, in turn, exacerbate public disillusion and disengagement with the political system and parliamentary process. The NEC also insisted that a government did not necessarily lack legitimacy ‘because it has won less than 50 per cent of the vote’ (The Observer, 9 August 1998). Meanwhile, although a number of individual pro-reform Labour MPs individually submitted their own proposals and recommendations to the Jenkins Commission (Independent Commission on the Voting System, 1998), it became clear that they favoured a range of alternative electoral systems, including the Alternative Vote, AMS, Supplementary Vote and STV. Consequently, Labour MPs favouring electoral reform were not in agreement as to which particular voting system they wished to see adopted, which meant that they lacked a clear or coherent voice in seeking to challenge the conservatism of Labour MPs and Ministers who wished to maintain the first-past-the-post electoral system which had delivered New Labour such a decisive victory in the 1997 general election. When the Jenkins Commission published its report, in October 1998, it recommended that about 500 seats in the House of Commons should be elected by the Alternative Vote System (thereby retaining the constituency link between MPs and voters), with the remaining 150 seats

36


filled by a ‘top-up’ system to ensure a greater degree of proportionality with regard to total votes received by the political parties. Crucially, however, the Jenkins Report also pointed out that the redrawing of constituency boundaries which this system would necessitate could not be achieved before the date of the next (2001–2) general election. In other words, even if the Blair Government was to adopt the Alternative Vote system, presumably subject to the outcome of a referendum, it would not actually be operational until the 2005 election at the earliest. The implications of such a time frame immediately caused concern amongst Labour proponents of electoral reform that this would become a means by which electoral reform would be deferred almost indefinitely, with the issue being permitted to slip down, or even off, the Party’s constitutional reform agenda. Such concerns were certainly lent credence by some of Jack Straw’s comments when he opened a Commons Debate on the Jenkins Report. Widely recognized as an opponent of electoral reform, Straw effectively damned the Jenkins Report with faint praise, merely observing that he and the Government were ‘extremely grateful to . . . the commission and its staff for their considerable work in bringing together the Report in relatively short time’, before proceeding to point out that it had left ‘a number of important points of detail . . . to be resolved’, a task which ‘would plainly take time’. Indeed, Straw emphasized that ‘the process certainly could not be completed before the next general election’, and as such, he announced that ‘the Government will not rush into holding a referendum’ (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 318, cols. 1036–7). A number of senior or veteran Labour MPs then followed Straw in attacking the recommendations of the Jenkins Report (and thus electoral reform generally), with Gerald Kaufman, for example, castigating it for being ‘glutinously euphuistic and intellectually shoddy’ as well as ‘self-contradictory’. Kaufman alleged that the system recommended by the Jenkins Report was ‘hopelessly complicated’, would entail ‘a complex ballot paper with three confusing choices’, and that it proposed an ‘arbitrary’ and ‘unfair’ top-up system. He also alleged that the Report ‘deliberately aimed at reducing the number of Labour Members of Parliament . . . a poisoned chalice being offered by our ex-colleague [Jenkins]’ and ominously warned that if the Blair Government decided to persevere with electoral reform, then ‘the Labour Party will be split in a referendum campaign’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 318, cols. 1044–6). Meanwhile, Stuart Bell, the leader of Labour’s First-Past-the-Post Group, rejected the Jenkins Report by offering a robust defence of the

Electoral Reform

37

alleged virtues of the existing electoral system, reiterating, for example, that it had generally provided the British people with stable government, whilst also ensuring maintenance of the constituency link. First-pastthe-post was also deemed to offer voters clear accountability, whilst providing the winner of each general election with a mandate for their manifesto policies and pledges (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 318, col. 1066). Also highly critical of the Jenkins Report was Tony Benn, who described as ‘ludicrous’ the notion that ‘the Parliamentary Labour Party would go through the Lobby to destroy 50 of is own Members, to redraw all the constituencies and to introduce a new group of piggy-back Members’. Benn warned that adopting a more proportional system would almost inevitably ‘provide a permanent coalition’ which would actually result in less, not more, choice for the electorate’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 318, cols. 1053–5). A further argument advanced by Labour opponents of electoral reform was that there was little, if any, public clamour for abandoning the existing first-past-the-post system of election. Not once, in any election campaign, Clare Ward claimed, had any voter told her that they were going to vote Labour in order to secure electoral reform, a point reiterated by David Watts, who claimed that during his 35-year political career he had ‘never met anyone who has demanded a change in the electoral system’, and also by Alan Keen (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 318, cols. 1087, 1098 and 1091). Clare Ward also warned that the system recommended by the Jenkins Report would not only result in larger constituencies, and thereby further increase the caseload of MPs, it would also, by virtue of the ‘top-up’ element, mean that up to 20 per cent of MPs would not represent a proper constituency at all, something which Siobhan McDonagh feared would render politicians even more remote from the British electorate and thus exacerbate the sense of alienation and cynicism about politics, which she believed was experienced by an increasing number of people (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 318, cols. 1088 and 1101–2). Many of these arguments in defence of first-past-the-post were rehearsed again in June 1999, when the Conservative Opposition initiated a House of Commons Debate urging the Government either to hold a referendum immediately or to abandon its formal commitment altogether, in order to eradicate the uncertainty which prevailed on the issue. In response, Jack Straw insisted that the Government’s stance remained that which ‘allows for a full debate in the country on the merits of the Jenkins system before a referendum is held’. However, Jack Straw added that the Government’s ‘original intention to hold the referendum before the

38


next election could no longer apply because the particular system that the Jenkins Commission had chosen was not one that, in practice, could be in place in time for the next election’. As such ‘The impossibility of having the new system in place at the next general election means that there is less urgency about holding a referendum, and no decision has been taken about timing’ (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 333, cols. 1187 and 1193). Blair had already intimated his increasing lack of enthusiasm for electoral reform when, in response to publication of the Jenkins Report, Downing Street had insisted that ‘We have to be realistic about the balance of opinion in our party and the rest of the country’ (The Independent on Sunday, 25 October 1998), while also further damning the report with faint praise by merely welcoming it ‘warmly’ and observing that it made ‘a well-argued and powerful case for the system it recommends’ (The Guardian, 30 October 1998). Furthermore, Blair was, by this time, advancing another argument to justify the lack of urgency vis-à-vis electoral reform, namely that the Government had already embarked upon a series of constitutional changes and innovations, to the extent that ‘the public are constitutionally satiated and could suffer from constitutional indigestion if another big change was put to them now’. Moreover, Blair added, a referendum campaign on electoral reform during the first term of Office would be fought ‘with a Labour Party badly divided (possibly with a majority anti) and a press and Opposition united. The danger then would be losing the referendum’ (quoted in Ashdown, 2001: 259, diary entry for 11 September 1998). Labour’s advocates of electoral reform therefore fully recognized the magnitude of the task confronting them, for not only did they need to persuade the British electorate of the case for abandoning the first-pastthe-post system of election, they also needed to convince a great many of their colleagues at all levels of the Party. The First-Past-the-Post Group, for example, boasted approximately 130 Labour MPs amongst its members, whilst at Cabinet level, Jack Straw’s opposition to electoral reform was shared by several senior Ministers (and former Ministers) such as Margaret Beckett, David Blunkett, Gordon Brown, Frank Dobson and John Prescott, as well as the Party’s Chief Whip (in 1998), Ann Taylor. Indeed, it was suggested that the late Robin Cook, as a prominent proponent of electoral reform within the Cabinet, was ‘in a minority of one’ (Ashdown, 2001: 120, diary entry for 3 November 1997). Furthermore, Labour’s pro-reformers have also been disadvantaged by their own lack of unanimity, both over the precise rationale for adopting an alternative system and as to precisely which alternative

Electoral Reform

39

to adopt. With regard to the purpose or rationale for pursuing electoral reform, it is not clear whether the primary objective is simply to provide for greater proportionality between votes cast and seats won in the House of Commons, thereby ensuring that general elections yield much greater fairness and representativeness, and possibly entailing also a House of Commons which is also more representative of the demographic composition of the British electorate (see, for example, Oona King, House of Commons Debates, Vol. 333, col. 1211; 1999; Short, 1992: 18–9), or whether electoral reform is viewed in terms of ensuring that MPs enjoy the support of at least 50 per cent of those voting in their constituencies (Spellar, 1992: 17). Other Labour MPs advocate electoral reform in the hope that it will facilitate more consensual politics and policies, thereby yielding a move away from adversarial approaches and traditional tribalism (Anne Campbell, House of Commons Debates, Vol. 318, col. 1058, 5 November 1998; Church, 1995: 41–5; Wright, 1997: 89–91). This, in turn, has fuelled the debate amongst Labour proponents of electoral reform about which particular system they wish to see adopted in place of first-past-the-post. For example, Martin Salter has declared that he supports electoral reform, ‘but not proportional representation’, because he is deeply concerned to retain the constituency link which ‘is the foundation stone upon which our system of representative democracy is built’. He thus declared his opposition to the Jenkins Report on the grounds that the ‘top-up’ element would weaken the constituency link (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 318, cols. 1071–2), although another Labour proponent of electoral reform, Richard Burden, disputed this, pointing out that if the Report’s recommendations were implemented, then ‘every elector in every constituency would [still] be able to elect a constituency Member of Parliament’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 318, cols. 1075–6). Other Labour politicians favouring electoral reform, however, most notably Ken Livingstone, opposed the Jenkins Report because of its potential for increasing the power of the Party leadership in determining which candidates were selected via the ‘top-up’ element (The Guardian, 27 September 1998; see also Livingstone, 1992: 17–8). Elsewhere, Jeff Rooker has expressed his support for the AMS (Rooker, 1992), as has Oona King (2000: 24). Such differences and disagreements have been further manifested through the various groups which campaign for electoral reform, each one advocating a particular type of voting system, or at least insisting that a particular principle should underpin any change in Britain’s electoral system. Thus, although the LCER has probably been the Party’s most well-known or high-profile group on this issue, having increased

40


its activities, membership and profile considerably after the 1987 general election defeat, there has also been the (cross-party) Make Votes Count group, and a group called Keep The Link, which campaigns for an electoral system which maintains traditional constituency representation and accountability, but which also seeks to ensure that an MP is supported by more than 50 per cent of those voting, thus inclining the group strongly towards either the Alternative Vote or the Supplementary Vote (Cole, 1999: 78–80). A further manifestation of the lack of agreement or cohesion amongst Labour proponents of electoral reform was provided at the 2004 AGM of the LCER, when Peter Hain (supported by Martin Linton) urged ‘a consensus around AV’ (whilst not ruling out ‘further reform’ at a later stage) and Lord (Jeff) Rooker called for a system of proportional representation, whilst other delegates variously expressed their support for AV+ and AMS. Labour’s advocates of electoral reform have therefore lacked the cohesion and confidence traditionally enjoyed by the Party’s supporters of first-past-the-post. Irrespective of the merits of their criticisms of Britain’s existing ‘simple plurality’ voting system, Labour’s proponents of electoral reform are lacking in agreement over precisely how that system should be reformed and, as such, are involved in a public debate amongst themselves as much as with the opponents of electoral reform. This, in turn, has effectively enabled Labour’s defenders of the first-past-the-post electoral system to prevent electoral reform for Westminster elections to date. Furthermore, these Labour opponents of reform could point, if they so wished, to the results of a 10-question consultation exercise conducted by the Party at the end of 1999, which revealed that the vast majority of the Party’s members in the country at large were opposed to replacing the first-past-the-post system for Westminster elections. Of the 1500 responses (some from individual Labour Party members and others from constituency parties or local policy forums), about 1250 expressed opposition to electoral reform, with just 250 in favour, a clear 5-1 majority in favour of the status quo (The Independent, 5 January 2000; Kemp, 2000: 2). Such was the apparent antipathy towards electoral reform within the Labour Party by mid-2000 – as confirmed at the Party’s National Policy Forum in Exeter in July – that Roy Jenkins publicly acknowledged that the ‘AV-plus’ scheme, recommended by his Electoral Reform Commission two years previously, was unlikely to be implemented (The Times, 31 August 2000). It seemed unlikely that the re-election of the Blair Government, by another landslide margin in June 2001, would herald any change in

Electoral Reform

41

Britain’s electoral system (for Westminster). Although Blair still declined to rule out electoral reform entirely, he was known to remain ‘unpersuaded’, and unenthusiastic, so that the position seemed little different to that which pertained after the Party’s poll victory in 1997. The most that was offered, and probably the least which was deemed necessary to sustain continued co-operation with the Liberal Democrats, was a review of the issue of electoral reform, including the original Jenkins’ proposals, in the context of the partially proportional systems used for elections to the Scottish Parliament and the Assembly for Wales (Labour Party, 2001: 35; see also Tony Blair, House of Commons Debates, Written Answers, Vol. 371, col. 94w). Yet even this review was not scheduled to be conducted until after the next elections to these two devolved bodies, in 2003, which would effectively ensure that there would be insufficient time to reform the electoral system for Westminster elections before the next (2005) general election, particularly if a new system was to be adopted which entailed the redrawing of constituency boundaries. As a spokesperson for the constitutional reform group Charter 88 noted: ‘Once again, we [supporters of electoral reform] will be in the position of fighting a rearguard action in an attempt to keep the issue alive in the Labour Party, rather than being able to make the positive case for reform to the public’ (The Times, 23 March 2001). The Liberal Democrats, however, withdrew from the joint Cabinet committee on constitutional reform in September 2001 (although it had only met twice during the previous two years), tired of the Blair Government’s inaction over electoral reform for Westminster elections, and recognizing that this situation was unlikely to change in the foreseeable future. Certainly there have been no discernible developments concerning electoral reform (for general elections) since 2001. Indeed, well into the Blair Government’s third term of Office, following Labour’s re-election – albeit with its parliamentary majority halved – in May 2005, no progress was evident. There was no public announcement of the review which was supposed to have been undertaken once the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly had completed their first terms (in 2003), and no indication of when such a review would be conducted. Nor did Labour’s 2005 election manifesto offer any clarification, merely observing that ‘Labour remains committed to reviewing the experience of the new electoral systems – introduced for the devolved administrations, the European Parliament and the London Assembly. A referendum remains the right way to agree any change for Westminster’ (Labour Party, 2005: 110) As the LCER ruefully acknowledged in the run-up to the 2005 general election, ‘we cannot in all honesty argue that there has been much movement on

42


electoral reform for the Commons since the Jenkins Commission reported in 1998’ (http://www.electoralreform.org.uk, ‘campaign overview’, April 2005). Nor had there been any further movement in the direction of electoral reform by the summer of 2006, New Labour’s 10th consecutive year in power. On the contrary, the occasional allusion to electoral reform by various Ministers was invariably dismissive, with Lord Falconer (Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs) for example – speaking just one week after the Blair Government had been re-elected with a 66-seat parliamentary majority, but receiving just 36 per cent of votes cast from a turn-out of 61 per cent – asserting that he did not think that was ‘widespread discontent with the way the electoral system works. It’s worked for some time, and I’m not sure there is pressure for a change’ (The Guardian, 14 May 2005). Moreover, 10 days later, Lord Falconer confirmed in the House of Lords that the Government has ‘no plans to introduce legislation on changing the current electoral system’ (House of Lords Debates, Vol. 682, col. 243). Meanwhile, the then Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw was robustly defending the first-past-the-post electoral system, arguing that at local level it ensured a clear link between each MP and the voters in their constituency, to whom that MPs was accountable, whilst at national level the existing electoral system, ‘by producing governments with clear majorities’ provides for ‘strong majority government; which is what ‘the British people preferred . . . rather than some mush in the middle’. However, like sundry other Labour defenders of the existing electoral system during the last one hundred years, Straw’s defence of first-past-the-post was made by disingenuously comparing it to PR, thereby using the latter as a ‘straw man’ against which to compare the alleged advantages and virtues of the simple plurality voting system for general elections (Straw, 2005). Indeed, at his monthly Downing Street press conference, just a few days after New Labour’s third successive general election victory, Tony Blair himself defended the existing electoral system by noting that ‘the problem with PR systems is that you can often have a result where a small party actually holds the balance of power, and that is unfair as well’ (http://www.number10.gov.uk/output/Page7481.asp). Elsewhere, Labour’s recently appointed Leader of the House, Geoff Hoon, was arguing that ‘quick fixes’ such as ‘changing the electoral system’ would not address the sense of political apathy or alienation which had been indicated by the low turn-out in the 2001 and 2005 general elections (Hoon, 2005). What was more surprising than the expression of such views, and the continued conflating of electoral reform with the adoption of PR (as if

Electoral Reform

43

this was the only alternative to the first-past-the-post voting system), was the fact that by the early summer of 2005, the Blair Government had quietly launched its review of the different electoral systems used in Scotland and Wales, and for the Greater London Authority. Indeed, so discrete was the launch of this review that its existence only became apparent through a series of Ministerial answers to questions in both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, and even then, the Government sought to downplay its significance, with Baroness Ashton blandly confirming, on 26 May 2005, that ‘We have an internal piece of work under way which will feed into a new ministerial committee on constitutional affairs’ (House of Lords Debates, Vol. 672, col. 615). A fortnight later, Harriet Harman, then Minister of State for Constitutional Affairs, informed the House of Commons that My Department is conducting an official level review of the experiences of the new systems for the election of Members of the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly, the European Parliament and the Greater London Assembly and Mayor . . . We have embarked on a considerable programme of voting system reform, as well as constitutional reform, and it is right that we look at the experience of the new proportional voting system and understand the effect of the electoral reform that we have already achieved . . . in the new voting systems that we have introduced in the devolved Assemblies, and for the Mayor and the European system, there is an element of proportionality and we are reviewing those experiences. (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 434, cols. 1121–2) This review was being conducted under the auspices of a Ministerial sub-committee on electoral policy, which was itself established by the Cabinet committee on constitutional affairs. However, both committees were chaired by John Prescott, who was known to be an opponent of electoral reform (for Westminster) and whose appointment led Charles Kennedy to quip that it was rather like appointing King Herod to manage a maternity ward. Nor were other senior Ministers serving on these committees, including Hilary Armstrong, Margaret Beckett, David Blunkett, Gordon Brown, Charles Clarke, Lord Falconer, Geoff Hoon and Jack Straw, known to be enthusiastic about electoral reform. Furthermore, the review, whose report was scheduled for publication during summer 2006, was ‘a piece of “desk-based’’ research, without public consultation . . . a closed review’ (Make Votes Count, 2006: 1), with

44


officials in the Department of Constitutional Affairs readily acknowledging that ‘It’s certainly not Jenkins’ (The Guardian, 14 May 2005), a clear allusion to the inquiry into electoral systems chaired by Lord (Roy) Jenkins during the Blair Government’s first term, and which had publicly invited submissions from all interested individuals and organizations. The low-key status of this review neatly reflected the lack of priority which the Blair Governments ascribed to electoral reform (for Westminster elections). Although they allowed the use of alternative electoral systems for the Scottish Parliament, Welsh Assembly, Northern Ireland Assembly and the Greater London Authority and Mayor, Blair and the vast majority of his Ministerial colleagues – along with a large proportion of the PLP – were not willing to replace the first-past-the-post voting system used for general elections in the United Kingdom. Of course, Blair and his Ministers could cite the deployment of these alternative voting systems as evidence that New Labour was not opposed to electoral reform, but they evidently viewed these as ‘second order’ elections compared to general elections for the UK Parliament. For the latter, therefore, the Blair Governments remained committed to the continued use of the first-past-the-post electoral system, insisting on the vital importance of a voting system which ensures a close link between MPs and their constituencies at local level, and provides for a strong and clearly accountable government at Westminster, which is consequently able to enact the manifesto commitments for which the voters have apparently give it a mandate. In other words, after a decade in Office, New Labour remained wedded to the Westminster Model of the British Government. Blair and his Ministerial opponents of electoral reform thereby contrasted these qualities with the alleged defects of proportional representation, namely the loss of the constituency link, and the almost inevitable recourse to coalition governments at Westminster, in which smaller (and possibly extremist) parties would frequently hold the balance of power, and whereby accountability would be weakened, due to voters being unable to determine which particular party to hold responsible for the policies enacted. In so doing, of course, the Blair Governments not only continued disingenuously to depict proportional representation as an electoral system in itself (rather than characterizing it as a principle which allows for a variety of voting systems enshrining varying modes and degrees of proportionality), but also referred to PR as if it were the only alternative to the first-past-the-post system used for general elections in the United Kingdom – an either/or choice. As such, in both their continued refusal to introduce electoral reform for general (Westminster) elections – after 10 years in Office – and the arguments deployed

Electoral Reform

45

in defence of the first-past-the-post voting system, many within New Labour and the Blair Governments proved highly conservative and conventional, with defence of the status quo depicted favourably against the alleged risks and recklessness of electoral reform. The only glimmer of hope offered to electoral reformers within the Labour Party, after 10 years in Office, was a brief passage in a Green Paper on constitutional reform, entitled The Governance of Britain, published just one week after Gordon Brown had finally replaced Tony Blair as Prime Minister. This stated that the Government was still reviewing the different voting systems introduced for regional elections following devolution, but that upon completion of this review (which was continuing in order to consider the 2007 elections in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland), the findings would ‘contribute to the debate’ on electoral reform (Straw, 2007: 46). Such an anodyne assertion was hardly likely to quicken the pulse of any proponent of electoral reform, and in the unlikely event that the review does recommend reform of the first-past-the-post voting system, there would be insufficient time to introduce any changes prior to the Gordon Brown’s first general election as Prime Minister. There would, therefore, be ample scope for yet more procrastination and prevarication.

Conclusion Although sections of the Labour Party were favourably disposed to electoral reform during its formative years, there was a marked lack of agreement not only over how much importance to ascribe to the issue overall, but also over what type of electoral system ought to be adopted. Furthermore, when the second (1929–31) MacDonald Government did introduce legislation to introduce the Alternative Vote for Westminster elections, it was not due to any sense of principle or commitment to electoral reform, but derived from ‘an entirely opportunist agreement’ between the minority Labour Administration and the Liberal Party, due to Labour’s reliance upon the support of the Liberals in order to remain in Office. Indeed, it has been claimed that on this occasion, the Alternative Vote ‘was put forward not for any intrinsic merits, but as the lowest common denominator that the Liberals and Labour could agree if nothing else were possible’ (Anderson and Mann, 1997: 293, 429, footnote 40). Thereafter, the Labour Party exhibited little, if any, interest in electoral reform until the late 1980s. Once Labour had replaced the Liberals as the only credible alternative (in terms of ability to win a general election and govern alone at Westminster) to the Conservatives, and had secured

46


a landslide victory against all expectations in 1945, the Party strongly embraced the existing simple first-past-the-post electoral system, leaving just a few individual MPs to call sporadically for a fairer or more representative method of voting. Having won so emphatically in 1945, the Labour Party assumed that subsequent defeats were not due to any faults or failings of the electoral system itself, but due to the Party’s policies or public image (or a combination of both), whereupon the revisionists would call for greater moderation and modernization of the Party’s policies, and the Left would call for renewed radicalism and a return to ‘true socialism’. Furthermore, just as MacDonald had opposed proportional representation in particular during the early twentieth century, partly because of the manner in which it would have sustained the Liberals, so did most Labour MPs during the 1980s refuse to countenance electoral reform, partly on the grounds that the prime beneficiaries would be the ‘traitors’ of the break-away Social Democratic party (who themselves favoured electoral reform). A few Labour politicians did prove willing to consider electoral reform, however, to the extent that the issue began to move up the Party’s agenda towards the end of the 1980s and into the 1990s, and although most of Labour’s leadership remained unenthusiastic or unconvinced, Neil Kinnock hinted at the possibility of considering electoral reform in the event of a Hung Parliament in the 1992 general election, mainly in the context of a possible pact with the Liberal Democrats (although Kinnock’s stance was subsequently deemed, by some in the Party, to have been a contributory factor in Labour’s defeat in that election). Meanwhile, the Labour Party in Scotland had already decided to adopt a different method of election for the proposed Scottish parliament. After 1992, neither John Smith nor his successor, Tony Blair, was personally convinced of the case for electoral reform for Westminster elections, even though under the latter’s premiership, alternative electoral systems were adopted for elections to the Scottish Parliament, the Northern Ireland and Welsh Assemblies, the Greater London Authority and London Mayor, and the 1999 European Parliament elections. Although Blair did promise a referendum on whether the electoral system should be changed, and in the meantime appointed Lord (Roy) Jenkins to chair a commission to examine alternative voting systems, the New Labour leader always made clear his own lack of enthusiasm, in spite of his own rhetoric about forging a new style of less tribal, more inclusive politics. Not surprisingly, perhaps, the promised referendum never materialized during Tony Blair’s 10-year premiership.

Electoral Reform

47

Although electoral reform has been supported by more Labour backbenchers since the 1990s than at any time since the (1919–38) inter-war period – up to one-third after the 1997 election (Anderson and Mann, 1997: 299) – Tony Blair’s clear lack of enthusiasm was buttressed by opposition to electoral reform from most of his senior Ministerial colleagues, and this, in turn, was underpinned by the problems encountered by the Labour leaderships in the Scottish Parliament, and Welsh Assembly (in creating and then sustaining coalitions), as well as the outcome – victory for Left-winger Ken Livingstone – of the London Mayoral election. In this respect, Blair’s suggestion that the Government wanted to see how the new electoral and institutional innovations in Scotland and Wales operated in practice before contemplating electoral reform for Westminster elections acquired added resonance. Electoral reform looked like being deferred indefinitely by the leadership of New Labour, but without ever being formally or explicitly abandoned outright. New Labour politicians thus seem to have shared a similar (Westminster Model) view of electoral politics to their Old Labour forebears, namely that the primary purpose of a general election is to provide voters with a clear choice between (two) alternative parties – in effect, a form of ‘democratic elitism’ (Bachrach, 1969: Chapters 2 and 3; Sartori, 1965: Chapter 6; Schumpeter, 1944: Chapter 22) – with the electorate’s primary role being to determine which of them should be granted the opportunity to govern for the next 4–5 years, based on obtaining a majority of seats in the House of Commons, rather than a majority of votes at either constituency or national level. Such a perspective also assumes that electoral victory bestows upon the victorious party the authority to implement its manifesto pledges, in accordance with the notion of ‘the mandate’. This, in turn, has clear implications for the Labour leadership’s approach to, and assumptions about, the role of Parliament in general, and the House of Commons in particular, as we will note in the Chapter 2. Before doing so, however, it is worth noting one final point, namely the manner in which Labour’s defenders of the ‘first-past-the-post’ voting system tend to conflate (either inadvertently or disingenuously) electoral reform with proportional representation and treat the two as interchangeable. Of course, many alternatives to first-past-the-post do seek to ensure a much greater degree of proportionality between votes received and parliamentary seats won, but to suggest that there is a simple choice between first-past-the-post and proportional representation is, at best, disingenuous and, at worst, downright dishonest, yet it is a simplistic alternative frequently invoked by Labour’s opponents of electoral reform (and a mistake perpetuated by many students of

48


politics!). For example, when Roy Hattersley was quoted, at the beginning of this chapter, as defending first-past-the-post on the grounds of the ‘mandate’ and the ‘manifesto’, he sought to underline this point by arguing that ‘With proportional representation, that process . . . is rendered impossible’ (The Guardian, 19 December 1988). Tony Blair also engaged in similar semantic sophistry when he declared that he had ‘never been persuaded that under proportional representation we can avoid a situation where small parties end up wielding disproportionate power’ (Blair, 1996: 83). In conflating electoral reform with proportional representation, and treating them as interchangeable, it would seem that Labour’s defenders of first-past-the-post are either blissfully unaware of the various types of alternative voting systems or are simply not interested in engaging in a serious and intelligent debate about electoral reform. Most likely, it has been – and remains – a combination of both, albeit with the latter reinforcing the former.

2 The House of Commons

Introduction Labour’s lack of a distinct philosophy or conceptual framework concerning Britain’s political system, reflected and reinforced by the tacit acceptance of the Westminster Model of British government, has meant that the Party’s approach to reform of the House of Commons has been characterized by hesitancy, ambiguity and inconsistency. Certainly, the rhetoric of reform – often couched in a discourse of ‘modernization’ – has invariably belied a tension between the Party leadership’s desire to improve the ‘efficiency’ of parliamentary procedures, in order that governmental business can be processed more swiftly, and the concern of backbenchers (and academic proponents of parliamentary reform) to render the House of Commons more effective, in order to provide improved scrutiny of the executive and/or to enable MPs to enjoy greater influence, and play a more active role, in shaping public policy. Or to put it another way, to the extent that some Labour Ministers have occasionally favoured reform of the House of Commons, they have usually been motivated primarily by a concern to enhance the dominance of the executive over the legislature, whereas Labour MPs have viewed the House of Commons’ reform in terms of strengthening the role and influence of backbenchers. Yet some Labour MPs have not discerned any serious discrepancy between the two objectives, on the grounds that a greater input from backbenchers into policy-making might serve to enhance the quality of government policies, thereby ensuring, in turn, that parliamentary scrutiny actually improved, rather than impeded, the efficiency of the executive (Morris, 1970a: 126–7). Yet the tension, and thus scope for 49

50


conflict, has remained, particularly as Ministers tended jealously to guard their autonomy and discretion and have therefore been reluctant to relinquish any power to their backbenchers. Furthermore, to have done so might well have had significant implications for the traditional doctrine of Ministerial responsibility, a constitutional convention which many Labour Ministers have also alluded to in order to deflect demands for greater backbench input into the parliamentary policy process. Such tensions derive from two contrasting perspectives about the role of Parliament in general. One perspective holds that Parliament (or more specifically, the MPs of the governing Party) ought to support the elected government of the day, and enable it to implement its policies, as pledged in the election campaign and manifesto. According to this perspective, for Parliament to seek to obstruct the Government is to defy the will of ‘the people’ as expressed via the ballot box and in the polling booth. To the extent that any parliamentary reform is countenanced, its primary purpose should be to enable the Government to expedite its parliamentary business more smoothly and swiftly, a perspective which has generally been subscribed to, not surprisingly, by the Labour leadership when in Office. A second perspective, though, insists that the proper function of Parliament is to hold Government collectively, and Ministers individually, to account. This requires that they be accountable and answerable to backbench MPs (the latter, in turn accountable and answerable to their constituents) via a variety of parliamentary forums. This view of the proper relationship between government and Parliament – executive and legislature – holds that as the former has extended its responsibilities and increased its powers during the twentieth century (particularly since 1945), so too must the latter be permitted to enhance its powers of scrutiny and investigation, in order to ensure continued (and effective) Ministerial accountability to the House of Commons and backbench MPs. Cleary, this perspective strongly implies support for reforms which would strengthen the House of Commons vis-a-vis governments and inter alia increase the role and influence of backbench MPs, quite possibly to the extent of allowing them to play a significant and active part in shaping public policy. Needless to say, this is a perspective which governments (Labour or Conservative) and their Ministers have not normally been sympathetic to. These two perspectives naturally inform two corresponding approaches to the primary purpose of reform of the House of Commons, for the former is concerned to enhance its efficiency, while the latter seeks to increase its effectiveness. In this context, efficiency means ‘maximising

The House of Commons

51

the outputs of the House of Commons’, often by streamlining its procedures in order ‘to expedite the business of government and remove any perceived undue hindrance to the progress of legislation’ (Kelso, 2007: 145). Effectiveness, however, invariably means enhancing the House of Commons’ capacity to scrutinize the executive and its policies more thoroughly, thereby both rendering Ministers more accountable and answerable to Parliament (strengthening the cardinal constitutional principle of Ministerial responsibility) and granting MPs a greater role in the routine business of the House of Commons. Of course, while the two primary objectives usually cited by proponents of House of Commons’ reform – improved efficiency and increased effectiveness – are not necessarily or always mutually exclusive, they do tend to derive from different motives, whereby those advocating reform on the grounds of improved efficiency (invariably Ministers) are primarily concerned to enhance the Cabinet’s ability to secure parliamentary endorsement of the Government’s legislative measures and policy initiatives, while those urging parliamentary reform in order to make the House of Commons more effective (normally backbench MPs and academics) are usually motivated by a determination to shift the balance of power between the executive and legislature back towards the latter, thereby providing backbench MPs and their plethora of parliamentary committees with a more active or influential role in the policy process. Although reform of the House of Commons has featured (even) less prominently among Labour parliamentarians than the reform of various other political institutions and arrangements, such as the House of Lords and devolution, for example, on those occasions that the Labour Party has sought to address the issue, these differing perspectives or motivations have been clearly discernible, to the extent that several proposals for reform of the House of Commons have either been abandoned due to lack of support or, having been duly adopted, have subsequently suffered from a lack of coherence and consistency due to the inherent tension between these two perspectives about the proper relationship between the House of Commons and the government. Ultimately, though, the dominant perspective which seems to have informed the approach of Labour’s leadership during the last one hundred years or so is that the will of the executive (government) ought to prevail in the House of Commons, a stance which reflects the almost sublimal acceptance of the Westminster Model by the vast majority of senior Labour parliamentarians. Certainly, ‘[I]n the Westminster Model, the House of Commons is literally at the centre of the state’s institutional constellation’ (Judge, 2005: 25), so that the House of Commons is

52


perceived and portrayed as ‘the most important institution in the British political system’, providing ‘the absolutely indispensable legitimation for the government of the country’. As such, the House of Commons ‘has been at the core of the theory and practice of British government for over three hundred years’ (Judge, 1993: 2; Miliband, 1982: 20). Yet this does not mean that the House of Commons itself actually makes public policy in a direct way, in spite of the central role implied by the doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty. Instead, it has been almost universally accepted (by Labour Governments as well as Conservative administrations) that it is the Cabinet’s role to determine policies which are then subject to approval or amendment by the House of Commons. At the same time, accountability is ensured by the twin doctrines of individual and collective Ministerial responsibility to the House of Commons whose members are, in turn, periodically elected, or rejected, by the voters at large. Moreover, Labour Ministers have not been averse to insisting that electoral victory has granted them a mandate for their policies, thereby clearly implying that if these measures are subsequently obstructed by the House of Commons, then it will be Parliament itself that is denying the will of the people and hindering a democratically elected government. Consequently, Labour Governments have not usually been inclined to introduce constitutional reforms whose intention or impact would be significantly to enhance the power of the House of Commons or backbench MPs – even Labour MPs. Instead, sporadic Labour measures to reform or ‘modernize’ the procedures and practices of the House of Commons have usually been viewed by the leadership as a means of streamlining the legislative process, in order to expedite the passage of government legislation, rather than genuinely enhancing the power of the Commons and/or backbenchers in order to increase parliamentary scrutiny of the executive; the concern with improving ‘efficiency’ has invariably prevailed over the desire for increasing ‘effectiveness’.

Labour and the House of Commons before 1945 The Labour Party was established (in 1906) with the express objective of securing parliamentary representation in order to advance the interests of ordinary working people and the trade unions. As the House of Commons was widely viewed as the main institutional forum through which the Labour Party would eventually achieve its objectives, the primary purpose, from the outset, was to increase the Party’s representation in


53

the House to the extent that it would secure a majority of seats (Labour’s electoral advance proceeding pari passu with the decline of the Liberal Party), and thereafter be able to govern in its own right. Moreover, this perspective reflected, in large part, the influence of Fabianism on the nascent Labour Party, whereby socialism was to be attained through the ‘right’ people securing the ‘right’ political positions in the ‘right’ institutions of the state and thereupon enact laws and other measures of public policy which would steadily transform Capitalism into Socialism. Not surprisingly, therefore, most Labour politicians did not generally view the House of Commons as inherently problematic, and to the extent that proposals for reform were variously canvassed, these were concerned to enhance its efficiency. The early Labour Party’s approach to the House of Commons was reflected (and reinforced) by the emphatic rejection of Marxist claims that the House was, as part of the ‘state apparatus’, an inherent institutional instrument of the (capitalist) Ruling Class. This Marxist perspective rejected the assumption that there was a ‘parliamentary road to socialism’ and maintained, instead, that a revolutionary overthrow of the state would be necessary to achieve Socialism, because the Ruling Class would use ‘its’ state institutions to resist measures to transfer wealth and power to ordinary working people. In this respect, Marxists largely dismissed Parliament as an element of ‘bourgeois mystification’ serving to conceal the real sources of power in capitalist Britain. In rejecting this Marxist critique, senior Labour parliamentarians advanced two related arguments to explain their faith in the parliamentary road to socialism, and inter alia the efficacy of the House of Commons. Firstly, in accordance with the Westminster Model, along with the assumptions of both Fabianism and social democracy, there was an unequivocal faith in the premise that a government supported by a majority in a free and fair general election (notwithstanding the vagaries of Britain’s simple plurality electoral system, whereby governments have usually been elected with less than 45 per cent of votes cast, and sometimes as little as 36 per cent) would have a mandate to enact the programme on which it won the election. As Clement Attlee argued:‘When it [the Labour Party] has obtained a mandate, it will utilize the ordinary machinery of the legislature and the administration in order to carry its programme into effect’, for having obtained a mandate ‘by utilizing the well-tried constitutional method of democracy . . . it shall have the right like any other Party to carry through its programme’ (Attlee, 1935: 112, 3; see also Attlee 1937: 113). This faith had previously been evident in Ramsay MacDonald’s assertion that if a Socialist government ‘has

54


the country behind it, it will stand no humbug in Parliament’ (Barker, 1972: 232). Underpinning this perspective, to a considerable extent, was the Fabianesque faith that popular support for socialism would steadily increase, as the instability and injustices of Capitalism became apparent to increasing numbers of people, and the negative aspects of Capitalism affected sections of the middle class too, rather than just the industrial working class. At the same time, this perspective held that as citizens experienced the benefits of socialist legislation which steadily created a fairer and more stable society, so too would support for Socialism and the Labour Party increase, buttressed by rational argument and an understanding of social problems deriving from the methods of empirical social science. All of this underpinned the Fabian faith in the ‘inevitability of gradualness’ and the conviction that socialism could – and would – gradually be established through the effective utilization of existing political institutions to pursue continual, but piecemeal, social reform. Following on from this sanguine approach, the second aspect of the early Labour Party’s faith in the efficacy of the House of Commons (and thus its rejection of the Marxist view that it was an inherent part of the bourgeois state apparatus protecting the interests of the Ruling Class) was the firm belief that the House could be used by, and thus to the advantage of, whichever section of society secured a parliamentary majority. This perspective was clearly enunciated by Ramsay MacDonald when he argued (in 1919) that if Parliament had hitherto served the interests of the rich and powerful, that was because it had been staffed by the representatives of such people. What was needed, therefore, was not the overthrow or abolition of parliamentary democracy, but, on the contrary, to ensure that ordinary working people, represented by the Labour Party, became the majority in Parliament. Once this objective was attained – facilitated by the further extension of the franchise, in 1918, to those working class men who had not already been enfranchised in 1884, and women aged 30 plus – then the House of Commons (with the House of Lords either reformed or abolished, as discussed in Chapter 3) could be utilized by the Labour Party to enact socialist measures which would directly benefit working people and their families. In other words, MacDonald maintained, there was little which was inherently wrong with Parliament qua institution, the problem hitherto had been who controlled this vitally important institution: ‘Parliament itself is a machine of government, and it has been worked hitherto by one section of the community. Labour has . . . not [yet] run the machine’ (Barker, 1972: 221). The problem had been one of agency, not structure.


55

This perspective was widely subscribed to in the higher echelons of the Labour Party, to the extent that when Labour published its 1918 policy programme Labour and the New Social Order, committing the Party to radical economic measures, most notably public ownership (nationalization) of key industries, it ‘had nothing to say about the organization and procedure of the House of Commons’ (Hanson, 1956: 463), primarily because the authors ‘fervently believed in the continued validity of parliamentary government as a means of achieving the new society they declared to be their aim’ (Miliband, 1972: 62). From the outset, to the extent that some Labour parliamentarians or academic supporters did canvass proposals for the reform of the House of Commons, these invariably focused on establishing or extending parliamentary committees (see, for example, Attlee, 1937: 171; Dalton, 1935: 52–4; Laski, 1922: 20–36; Laski/ILP, 1925: 224; Laski, 1938: 167, 217; MacDonald, 1909a: 125–6), although immediately, the afore-mentioned (and subsequently recurring) tension was discernible between the twin objectives of rendering the House of Commons more efficient, in terms of expediting governmental business and legislation more swiftly, and making the House more effective, in terms of improving its capacity for scrutiny and facilitating a greater input into the policy process from backbench MPs. Senior Labour parliamentarians soon inclined to the former perspective, adopting the view that the House ought to support the (democratically elected) government, while Labour MPs often subscribed to the latter, desirous of playing an active role in shaping their Governments policies. Indeed, although he was a consistent advocate of expanding parliamentary committees in order to facilitate increased backbench involvement in scrutiny, Laski himself was emphatic that this should be achieved ‘without treading on the essential right of Government to initiate legislation . . . such an enlargement ought not to interfere with the Cabinet’s control of the main stream of parliamentary activity’, not least because with regard to pubic policy, ‘if a matter is important enough to be embodied in a bill, it is desirable that the responsibility for its passage should rest with the Government’. Conversely, ‘if it is a matter upon which it does not feel keenly enough to introduce it, the chances are strongly against it being worthwhile spending the time of the House on its passage’ (Laski, 1938: 167, 166). Meanwhile, Dalton recommended that the number of standing committees should be increased, but with their size reduced, and while this ostensibly implied greater scrutiny of government legislation by MPs, the real rationale was to facilitate the passage of more legislation than could be achieved through existing

56


parliamentary procedures, for with more standing committees sitting concurrently, more Bills could be processed ‘a most valuable step in expediting the process of legislation’ (Dalton, 1935: 52–3). Apart from reorganizing parliamentary committees, though, reform of the House of Commons was not an issue which particularly concerned most Labour politicians in the Party’s early years, which is hardly surprising given that it was seeking to establish itself as a credible Party of government, and was thus, first and foremost, seeking to gain a majority in the House of Commons itself and thereby prove its constitutional credibility and political propriety. Furthermore, as the first two Labour Governments (1923–1924 and 1929–1931) lacked an overall parliamentary majority, and had rather more urgent matters to address – particularly the second Administration – reform of the House of Commons was certainly not high on their agenda, and besides, they would not have wanted to strengthen the role or influence of backbench MPs and thereby further weaken or immobilize the embattled Governments. Indeed, in the context of the economic problems and concomitant political paralysis which afflicted the first two (minority) Labour Governments, it was very difficult seriously to claim that if backbenchers had enjoyed more power or influence, these Governments would have fared rather better in tackling the serious problems with which they were confronted, particularly between 1929 and 1931 (Hanson, 1957: 44). On the contrary, the conclusion which seemed to have been drawn by some senior Labour parliamentarians and academic supporters was that a future Labour Government would need to acquire greater power in order to act decisively, not devolve it to the Party’s backbenchers. Thus did Stafford Cripps call, from the platform at Labour’s 1933 conference, not only for the abolition of the House of Lords, but for the immediate introduction, by the next Labour Government, of an Emergency Powers Act, and reform of the procedures of the House of Commons, in order to expedite the implementation of socialist policies (Hanson, 1957: 46; Marquand, 1999a: 94–5). In similar vein did Attlee suggest that ‘a great deal of time could be saved by sweeping away obsolete forms’, a reform which would be vital ‘if the great changes proposed [by socialists] are to be put through without delay’, and while Attlee acknowledged that ‘Parliament must be an effective forum of criticism’, he was also adamant that the next Labour Government ‘will not allow its work to be hindered by obstruction’ (Attlee, 1935: 112–13). Meanwhile, G. D. H. Cole declared (albeit with a hint of hyperbole) that ‘The [next] Socialist government will not be able to spare several hundred of its picked men to sit day after day in Parliament listening to one


57

another talk . . . There will be no time for superfluous debating while we are busy building the Socialist commonwealth’, and as such Cole recommended that Parliament leave ‘the Socialist administrators to carry on with the minimum of day-to-day interference’ (Cole, 1933: 173). This perspective seemed to be shared by Dalton, who alleged that ‘Legislative output is severely limited by antiquated parliamentary methods’, to the extent that ‘Those who want to get things done, wilt; those who want to get things said, luxuriate’ (Dalton, 1935: 44, 51). To overcome such problems, and thereby ensure ‘a more businesslike use of parliamentary time’, Dalton called for reforms which would ‘speed up the rate of the legislative process’, including limits not only on the length of individual debates (to prevent undue obstruction by just a few MPs), but also on the extent to which debates were ordinarily conducted on the Floor of the House, rather than ‘upstairs’ in an expanded number of legislative committees (Dalton, 1935: 48, 50–4). Dalton also proposed that Government legislation should increasingly comprise of general objectives or principles whose technical or administrative details would be provided via Ministerial Orders or Orders in Council, thereby effectively making much more use of delegated legislation. This procedure, Dalton claimed, would be much more efficient than the traditional system of producing, and then repeatedly revising or redrafting, ‘Bills with a hundred clauses and a dozen schedules’, which were not only ‘a legislative monstrosity’, but also ‘an intolerably slow process’ (Dalton, 1935: 58, 59). Such proposals never satisfactorily resolved the tension between the apparent desirability of securing the involvement of (Labour) MPs through increasing the number or scope of parliamentary committees on the one hand and ensuring the ability (and autonomy) of a Labour Government and its Ministers to act decisively on the other. On the contrary, many Labour parliamentarians and academic supporters seemed simultaneously to advocate both enhanced executive powers for the next Labour Government and greater involvement by Labour MPs in the policy process, through the reform of parliamentary committees. This dichotomy was neatly personified by Cripps, whose insistence that ‘We cannot hope that any democratic assembly will be able to carry on the detailed legislative or administrative work. This must be left to Ministers’, was accompanied by a parallel demand for a reformed system of parliamentary standing committees which would undertake ‘the work arising in connection with a particular group of governmental activities, and thereby prevent the cabinet from becoming dictatorial’ (Cripps, 1933: 64–5). To the extent that the potential tension or contradiction between these two goals was acknowledged, it was usually assumed or

58


implied that the quality of Labour’s policies would be improved by greater backbench involvement via committees, and that by involving MPs and Ministers alike in policy-making, the (Labour) Government would enjoy greater cohesion and sense of shared purpose. Ultimately, though, this discrepancy was rarely directly acknowledged, so that the proposals emanating from Labour’s inter-war proponents of House of Commons’ reform remained ‘extremely ambiguous’ and characterized by ‘vagueness’ (Hanson, 1957: 51). Even Laski, who was a prominent inter-war advocate of expanding parliamentary committees and ensuring a more active role for backbench MPs, insisted not only on the continued primacy of the Cabinet (as noted above), but maintained that, in general, the House of Commons was ‘an assembly admirably constructed, on the whole, for the work it has been called upon to perform . . . the fundamental characteristics of the House, especially its basis in Party control through Cabinet control, are essential . . . to the success of parliamentary government’ (Laski, 1938: 217).

The 1945–1951 Attlee Governments and the House of Commons The programme of economic reconstruction and social reform embarked upon by the Labour Party following its 1945 election victory ensured that little time or energy was expended on reforming the House of Commons itself. Parliamentary reform – indeed, constitutional reform in general – was not a priority for the 1945–1951 Attlee Governments, partly because of the entirely understandable urgency and priority ascribed to post-War economic reconstruction and social reform, but also because few Labour politicians at this time harboured serious reservations about the efficacy of the British system of government or its constitutional conventions. As will be explained in Chapter 4, even the inter-war doubts of Labour politicians, including Clement Attlee, about the neutrality and reliability of senior civil servants rapidly dissipated upon entering Office, these previous doubts having already been greatly ameliorated by the experiences of serving in Churchill’s 1940–1945 Coalition Government. Constitutional reform in general and House of Commons’ reform in particular were not, therefore, notable features of the 1945–1951 Attlee Governments’ policy agenda. When the Labour Party was elected in 1945, the leadership did establish a series of backbench committees, these corresponding to specific


59

subject or policy areas, with membership open to any Labour MP with a particular interest in the subject matter or policy area concerned. Yet Labour MPs generally viewed the role of these backbench ‘subject committees’ rather differently to their Ministerial colleagues, for whereas the former anticipated a more direct and active input into policy-making, Ministers were inclined to view the committees as a means of keeping the Party’s backbenchers occupied precisely so that they would be less inclined to encroach upon the Government’s business, or as (future Labour leader) Hugh Gaitskell suggested:‘it will have the useful by-product of splitting up the troublemakers, or to put it another way, canalising their grievances’ (Williams, 1979: 19, Gaitskell’s diary entry for 13–24 August 1945). Certainly these ‘subject committees’ tended to lack access to much of the detailed, specialized information which would have enabled them to play a more active and constructive role in governmental policy-making. Yet had they been privy to such information, and therefore capable of playing a constructive role in formulating Labour policies, the constitutional position and authority of their Ministerial colleagues might have been compromised, with implications both for confidentiality (official secrecy) and the convention of collective responsibility. Thus did Herbert Morrison, who served as Leader of the House (of Commons) during the 1945–1950 Labour Government, subsequently insist that ‘It would be unconstitutional, injurious to good government, and likely to lead to ill-thought-out decisions being foisted upon the Government to admit the right of the Party to instruct Ministers, or to receive premature details in advance of Cabinet decisions’ (Morrison, 1964: 148). In this respect, Morrison’s stance seemed to mirror that of his leader, for just two years before the start of the Second World War, Attlee was noting that for a government to discharge its political responsibilities efficiently ‘The elaborate machinery of the Whips Office, and the discipline imposed on supporters of a Government, are essential if it is to function at all’ (Attlee, 1937: 125). Meanwhile, many Ministers in the Attlee Government soon acquired – or had reinforced – a rather sanguine attitude towards the operation and ‘efficiency’ of the House of Commons, although given the scale of the economic and social reforms implemented by the 1945–1950 Labour Government, such satisfaction with the parliamentary process was hardly surprising, for Ministers’ favourable experience strongly vindicated the view that a socialist party could peacefully transform British society provided that it had secured a majority in the House of Commons through the ballot box in a general election. Indeed,

60


Morrison – whose image was that of ‘the classic House of Commons man’ (Morgan, 1992: 180) – recalled his ‘satisfaction with and admiration of’ the procedure of the House of Commons, based in part on ‘custom and practice’, regardless of how ‘quaint or cumbersome’ critics might consider them (Morrison, 1964: 210). Moreover, in opposition to those Labour MPs who wished to strengthen the powers of backbenchers, or increase their opportunities for greater scrutiny of the executive on the Floor of the House or in committee rooms, Morrison insisted that Ministers ‘must be constantly mindful of their legislative requirements, and proceed with the main objective of facilitating the passage through Parliament of legislation which the Government regard as necessary for the well-being of the nation’. This, in turn, meant that a ‘parliamentary procedure [was] needed which enables work to be done with reasonable speed and efficiency’, particularly for governments (most notably Labour Governments) seeking to ‘carry through a large legislative programme’ (Morrison, 1964: 210, 231). Similarly, Laski looked back with considerable satisfaction at the extent to which the 1945–1950 Labour Government (during part of which time he had served as Party chairman and member of Labour’s NEC) had successfully implemented a wide-ranging programme of economic and social reform through existing political institutions and constitutional arrangements. Although he continued to believe in the virtue of ‘advisory committees’ which could act as a conduit between Ministers and backbench MPs, he was adamant that ‘they would have no executive responsibility of any kind’, for Laksi was ‘a strong believer in a stable executive with sufficient authority to drive an important and substantial programme through the House of Commons in the lifetime of a Parliament of five years’ (Laski, 1951, 53), a belief which had undoubtedly been reinforced and vindicated by the achievements of the Attlee Government. The views of senior Labour figures such as Morrison and Laski, coupled with those enunciated by Attlee prior to the War, clearly reflected the executive-minded perspective which permeated the 1945–1950 Labour Government, and which then informed the stance of most Labour Ministers and Prime Ministers in subsequent Labour Governments. Certainly after the Party lost the 1951 election (in spite of polling more votes than the victorious Conservatives), the remainder of the decade did not witness any notable Labour thinking with regard to future reform of the House of Commons. On the contrary, ‘the demand for parliamentary reform in the Labour Party died a natural death’ (Hanson, 1957: 54).


61

Labour and House of Commons’ reform, 1964–1970 It was only during the 1960s that the powers and procedures of the House of Commons were granted somewhat more serious consideration by some figures within the Party, although many, if not most, Ministers remained uneasy, if not openly hostile, to the notion of providing (Labour) backbenchers with an enhanced parliamentary and policyinfluencing role. However, when the Labour Party was returned to Office in 1964, after 13 years in Opposition, the issue of House of Commons’ reform received added impetus for four discrete reasons, even though it had not been a notable feature in Labour’s election campaign and manifesto. Firstly, reform of the House of Commons became inextricably linked to the Labour Party’s more general commitment to reform of Britain’s political institutions under Harold Wilson’s leadership. As with other constitutional reform proposals, the underlying premise was often that Britain’s relative economic decline – which had become increasingly evident via a range of official statistics during the early 1960s – could partly be explained by the antiquated character of the country’s political institutions. Hence political reform and economic renaissance were yoked together, with the former to contribute immeasurably to the latter. Secondly, some Labour politicians recognized the extent to which decision making and power in contemporary British society had steadily become more remote from ordinary people and therefore viewed political reform as a vital means of reducing the widening gap between rulers and ruled and of ‘extending democracy’ (see, for example, Radice, 1968). The third reason why reform of the House of Commons assumed greater significance within the Labour Party during the later half of the 1960s was that in the 1964 and 1966 elections, a significant number of younger, often university-educated, Labour MPs were elected for the first time, many of whom anticipated playing a rather more active parliamentary role than had traditionally been expected of backbenchers (Anderson, 1968; Baines, 1989: 188; Dalyell, 1989: 150–1; Dorey, 2006; Stacey, 1975: 22). For these new Labour MPs, therefore, reform of the House of Commons appeared particularly attractive, as a significant goal in itself, because it seemed to promise a more participatory role for backbenchers like themselves, who were not content merely to be lobby-fodder herded hither and thither through the Division Lobbies at the behest of their Party Whips. Fourthly, the demands for reform of the House of Commons now emanating from the Labour backbenches were buttressed by similar calls

62


from elsewhere, most notably from academics such as Bernard Crick (1964), and the Study of Parliament Group, which had been formed in the early 1960s by a number of academics and parliamentary clerks. Indeed, in its evidence to a Select Committee on Procedure, appointed by the Government in December 1964, the Study of Parliament Group argued that Parliamentary scrutiny of the Executive is fundamental to the whole question of parliamentary reform. For though it is the business of the Government to govern, it is also their business to give a running account of their stewardship to the House of Commons which was elected to support them. Consequently, when the Labour Party was returned to Office in 1964 (and again in 1966, with a comfortable majority), the issue of backbench investigative committees moved back up Labour’s agenda, in the context of the Party’s professed commitment to parliamentary reform (which itself was presented as integral to the ‘modernization’ of Britain’s political institutions). Not only did many newer, younger Labour MPs seek a more active parliamentary role (as noted above), the Study of Parliament Group itself pointed out that to enable the House to arrive at a correct judgement on the workings of administration and on the Government’s conduct of affairs, some process of enquiry is needed. Specialist Committees are needed to scrutinise the actions of government in their own fields. The main weakness in Parliament’s present methods . . . is the limited ability to obtain the background facts and understanding essential for detailed criticism of administration or any informed discussion of policy. Specialist committees . . . could go a long way to remedy this. (Fourth Report of the Procedure Committee, 1964–1965, HC 303: 134, 137; see also Anderson, 1968: 149–53) Harold Wilson initially envisaged the establishment of a small number specialist or select committees, which could consider whether legislation was needed with regard to a particular issue or policy area, and if so, what sort of legislation would be appropriate. Such select committees might even assist in drafting the Bills they proposed. Such an initiative, Wilson believed, would simultaneously serve to show that the Government ‘far from being arrogant in its relations with Parliament, is desirous of giving


63

more work and authority to the House as a whole’, whilst also providing ‘useful and constructive employment’ for Labour backbenchers, particularly as a sense of frustration was likely to develop amongst those not offered Ministerial posts (NA PREM 13/1053, Wilson to Bowden [Leader of the House], 21 November 1964). Bowden, however, was concerned that the involvement of Labour MPs and select committees in pre-legislative work along the lines suggested by the Prime Minister, rather than expediting government business, would serve to ‘add a stage, perhaps a fairly lengthy one, with considerable demands on the time of Ministers and backbenchers alike’. Bowden acknowledged, though, that such committees ‘would be useful in giving backbenchers varied and interesting work and the feeling that they were contributing to policy’ and, as such, suggested that specialist or select committees might be deployed to carry out investigations into specific topics and policies, whereby they could ‘call for papers, interview Ministers, officials and other Members, but would not be expected to come up with legislation’ (NA PREM 13/1053, Bowden to Wilson, 3 December 1964). Yet Bowden encountered anxiety from some of his Ministerial colleagues appointed to the Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Procedure, who were concerned not only that they might lose some control over, and responsibility for, their Departments and related policies, but also that the investigative role of select committees would add to their already onerous workloads and parliamentary responsibilities (NA CAB 134/3130, PP(66) 1st Meeting, 18 April 1966; NA PREM 13/1053, Bowden to Wilson, 19 April 1966; NA PREM 13/1053, Trend [Cabinet Secretary] to Wilson, 19 April 1966). Regardless of such reservations, Labour’s 1966 manifesto included a pledge to ‘improve procedure and the work of committees’, although soon after Labour had been re-elected with a significantly increased majority, Bowden was replaced by Richard Crossman, who hastened the pace of reform. Crossman believed that ‘the modern House . . . had lost its main function of controlling the Executive’ and therefore needed to ‘reshape itself and redefine its functions if it ever wanted to be anything again’ (Crossman, 1976: 165, diary entry for 14 December 1966). Harold Wilson had himself apparently been persuaded by Bowden’s previous suggestion for investigative committees, believing that they would ‘not only provide useful work [for the increased number of Labour MPs accruing from the 1966 election victory] but would give a very forward looking image to Parliamentary reform’ (NA PREM 13/1053, Wilson to Crossman, 6 April 1966).

64


Between 1966 and 1969, several select committees were thus established, focusing on agriculture, education, overseas aid and development, race relations and immigration, science and technology and Scottish affairs. Also established was a select committee on the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration (see page 69). Although the topics investigated by these committees invariably concerned the policies and administration of the relevant Government Department, they were nonetheless viewed primarily as ‘specialist’ or ad hoc, rather than ‘Departmental’ committees. For example, among the topics considered by the committee on education were student unrest in the late 1960s and the role of art colleges, whilst the investigations of the race relations and immigration committee included the operation of the 1968 Race Relations Act, and the problems encountered by ‘ethnic minority’ school leavers. In developing this system of ‘specialist’ committees, though, Crossman encountered similar Ministerial anxieties and antipathy as his predecessor, with Michael Stewart proving to be one of the most trenchant critics, arguing that Labour’s backbenchers ‘should be thankful that as a socialist government we want to keep the Executive strong, not to strengthen parliamentary control’, for which he was ‘applauded by many people round the [Cabinet] table’ (Crossman, 1976: 130, diary entry for 17 November 1966). Another opponent of Crossman’s proposals was James Callaghan, who declared that ‘we’ve got to resist him’ (Crossman, 1976: 130, diary entry for 17 November 1966; see also Dalyell, 1989: 155–8; Howard, 1990: 282). With support from the Prime Minister himself, however, Crossman succeeded in getting his proposals accepted, although, as intimated earlier in this chapter, Wilson seemed to view subject committees mainly as a means of keeping potentially troublesome Labour backbenchers occupied, rather than a means of genuinely involving them in governmental policy-making. As such, Crossman and Wilson seemed to support the establishment of such committees for rather different reasons. Crossman subsequently encountered further hostility when he put forward proposals concerning Ministerial appearances before these select committees. Indeed, Crossman discovered that ‘the majority were really against Ministers appearing at all’, with Michael Stewart and James Callaghan again proving to be the most vocal critics. Stewart ‘couldn’t understand how any socialist could propose to limit the powers of the Government by creating Specialist Committees to poach on their preserves’, while Callaghan deemed the proposal ‘an outrage’ (Crossman, 1976: 308, diary entry for 11 April 1967). Again, however, Crossman


65

secured the endorsement of his proposal, largely by virtue of support from Wilson. That most of the Cabinet was opposed to this latest reform proposal further illustrated the extent to which most Ministers automatically accept, or soon become acculturated to, the executive-centred Westminster model of British government, and therefore seek to resist any perceived backbench encroachment on their authority or autonomy, even when those backbenchers are MPs from their own party. Pro-reform Ministers such as Crossman (and decades later, Robin Cook) have been very much the exception and, as such, have struggled to overcome the constitutional conservatism of their Cabinet colleagues. It is perhaps worth noting, in this context, that a few months previously, a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party had heard a number of Labour MPs complain about the manner in which certain Ministers replied to them at Question Time, their answers ‘couched in terms which lacked “a spirit of comradeship’’ ’ (PREM 13/1055, Shinwell to Wilson, 14 November 1966), suggesting something of a gulf developing between various Labour Ministers and their backbench colleagues. It is also worth noting that some Labour MPs were apprehensive about the likely impact of select committees with regard to the Party’s professed ideological commitments. This was partly due to the anticipation or hope amongst some supporters of select committees (particularly in the Study of Parliament Group) that they would foster as new sense of bipartisanship and consensual politics in the House of Commons, with policies viewed more from an administrative or technocratic, rather than adversarial or ideological, perspective (Jones and Keating, 1985: 154). According to one Labour backbencher ‘The proposal to create more and more specialist committees could completely undermine one of the major purposes of the House of Commons, namely, at all times to carry on the great national debate on the important issues of the day’, for such committees would promote ‘a tendency towards bipartisan government and consensus politics’. Furthermore, he warned, they would serve to create a two classes of MPs, with those backbenchers serving on specialist or specialist committees acquiring a first-class status, against those ‘second class’ MPs who remained ‘amateurs’ or generalists by virtue of not having been immersed in committee work away from the Floor of the House (Mendelson, 1970: 113, 111). Also concerned about the potential drift towards consensus politics as a consequence of expanding parliamentary committees was Michael Foot, who claimed that ‘Anybody with any experience of committees upstairs [in the House of Lords] knows that the cosier the atmosphere the less the clash between the parties’. Foot preferred to retain the more

66


traditional, adversarial, debates on the Floor of the House, with ‘the clash between the parties . . . being in the open, because the public has a right to hear them. The clash at elections should be reflected in the House of Commons’ (quoted in Morris, 1970b: 9). Meanwhile, the decision by the Select Committee on Agriculture to examine current and likely future trends in food production and imports caused further anxiety in some quarters, for two main reasons. Firstly, there was concern that select committees might increasingly go beyond their remit by considering the future of particular policies, rather than adhering to examination of the administration of existing or recently enacted policies. Secondly, it was pointed out that certain topics of inquiry would entail a select committee seeking information from another Department, such as confidential plans and economic projections from the Treasury. This would clearly have serious implications for the confidentiality within individual Government Departments, particularly as the Select Committee was then likely to publish a report based on its findings (NA PREM 13/1983, Peart to Crossman, 30 January 1968). Certainly, the chosen topic of investigation by the Agriculture Select Committee on this occasion prompted concern in Whitehall that select committees might ‘become a law unto themselves’ (NA PREM 13/1983, Trend to Wilson, 31 January 1968). During the last two years of the second (1966–1970) Wilson Government, however, the impetus for ‘specialist’ committees dissipated, the NEC’s home policy sub-committee noting regretfully that ‘the Government appears to have hardened its heart against new select committees’, even though – or maybe because – such committees were ‘the best means available’ of ‘maintaining effective oversight of the administration’ (Labour Party Archives, RE.440/April 1969). Certainly, Crossman’s successor as Lord President of the Council, Fred Peart, evinced a notable lack of enthusiasm for the select committee ‘experiment’, candidly observing that those which had been established had proved rather more independent than originally envisaged and somewhat less responsive to Ministers’ own suggestions concerning topics for investigation. He thus suggested that the experiment should cease at the end of the current Parliament and then be reviewed (NA CAB 134/3032 P(69) 1st meeting, 27 January 1969). Besides, by this time, the Cabinet was concerned with more pressing problems, most notably prices and incomes policies, reform of industrial relations and House of Lords’ reform. Furthermore, by 1969, the Government was increasingly thinking in terms of the next general election, whereupon ‘parliamentary reform . . . became the hobby horse of a


67

very small number of ideological democrats’ (Mackintosh, 1976: 121). There was little enthusiasm for continuing with the select committee experiment.

Morning sittings Another reform initiated by the 1964–1970 Labour Governments was that of altering the House of Commons’ hours of business, whereby Debates have not normally commenced until mid-afternoon (or later), and then continued at least until 10 pm (occasionally lasting well into the following morning). However, during the 1966–1967 Parliamentary Session, an experiment was conducted whereby the House sat on Monday and Wednesday mornings (Tuesday and Thursday mornings were already occupied by standing committees), the intention being that MPs could then return to their homes or constituencies a couple of evenings during the week (if they lived in or near London), rather than being unable to get away from Westminster until Thursday evening at the earliest. This initiative, which had originally been recommended by Bert Bowden whilst he was Lord President of the Council in the 1964–1966 Labour Government, and then narrowly endorsed by the Select Committee on Procedure, was actually pursued by Bowden’s successor Richard Crossman, as part of the latter’s package of parliamentary reforms. However, although Crossman became enthusiastic about many aspects of parliamentary reform during the second half of the 1960s, and firmly supported the principle of more parliamentary business being conducted in the morning, he recognized that the particular plan for morning sittings which he inherited was ‘a most half-hearted proposal’ which would ‘merely consist of a collection of bits and pieces of business’ and as such, ‘a miserable solution’. However, as it had already been approved by the Procedure Committee, Crossman felt obliged to pursue the proposal (Crossman, 1976: 24, diary entry for 6 September 1966), whilst making it clear to a meeting of the PLP, on 23 November 1966, that morning sittings should be regarded as an ‘interim solution’ pending more coherent and consistent parliamentary reforms. The initiative was not a success, however, for it enjoyed only limited support. It was largely opposed by the Conservative Opposition, many of whose MPs had occupations in the legal or financial professions in ‘the City’ which they wished to pursue in the mornings prior to attending the House after lunch. Furthermore, because Conservative MPs tended to represent constituencies in Southern England and the Home

68


Counties, they were not particularly concerned about sitting during the morning in order to get away earlier in the evenings or on Thursday afternoon. Yet while it might have been expected that Labour MPs and Ministers with constituencies or homes in the North of England, Scotland or Wales would be more enthusiastic about morning sittings intended to free-up their evenings, the proposal attracted mixed support in the Party. Certainly, backbench MPs were divided in their opinion as to the merits of morning sittings, as Crossman discovered when he presented his proposals concerning the future of the ‘experiment’ in the PLP in June 1967. Indeed, such were the various views expressed at this particular meeting that discussion had to be adjourned and resumed at the meeting of the PLP the following week. On both occasions, it became apparent that morning sittings did not enjoy widespread support amongst Labour’s backbenchers, many of whom were engaged in committee work at this time of the day. This, in turn, led to a relatively low rate of attendance at most morning sittings, which further meant that genuinely important governmental business could not be considered at such times. Furthermore, the changing composition of the Labour Party, entailing MPs and Ministers who themselves emanated from professional backgrounds, meant that they too needed to be elsewhere, such as in Chambers, during various mornings, a point trenchantly made by some of the backbenchers at the meeting of the PLP on 14 June 1967. Besides, morning sittings intended to allow backbenchers to return home in the evenings were of little benefit to those Labour MPs – the overwhelming majority – whose constituencies were in the north of England, Scotland or Wales and thus beyond daily commuting distance. Ministers, meanwhile, were concerned about the implications for their Departmental responsibilities and functions, many of which were performed during the mornings prior to attendance at the House of Commons itself during the afternoons. Some Ministers pointed out, for example, that if Debates were conducted in the Mornings, they might find themselves summoned to a Division whilst in the middle of a Cabinet committee meeting, or whilst engaged in discussions with their officials or representatives from an outside body or organized interest. Certainly, George Brown, as Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, believed that it ‘would be impossible’ to run his Department effectively if he were obliged to attend morning sittings, an objection shared by Denis Healey at the Ministry of Defence (NA PREM 13/1678, Brown to Strauss, 28 September 1965; Healey to Strauss, 14 October 1965; see also Anderson, 1968: 147).


69

Other Ministers, however, were willing to accept the principle of morning sittings, and pursue it as an experiment, but were emphatic that it would require significantly improved facilities at Westminster to enable them to conduct their Departmental business. In particular, there was widespread concern that there might be a shortage of office accommodation and suites in which Ministers could receive visits from outside bodies and their representatives (NA PREM 13/1678, Benn to Strauss, 20 September 1965; Castle to Strauss, 20 September 1965; Cousins to Strauss, 6 October 1965; Greenwood to Strauss, 2 October 1965; Robinson to Strauss, 15 September 1965; Soskice to Strauss, 11 October 1965). Also supportive of the principle of morning sittings was Anthony Crosland, although he pointed out that the innovation would require a generous pairing system by the Party Whips in order that Ministers could be spared attendance at too many Divisions (NA PREM 13/1678, Crosland to Strauss, 17 September 1965). As noted above, one particular dilemma which had arisen with morning sittings was the nature of the business conducted, and the implications for attendance. It became clear that if important parliamentary business was assigned to a morning sitting, the appropriate Ministers would often be unable – or unwilling – to attend, due to their required attendance elsewhere (such as meetings of the Cabinet or one of its many committees). Yet if unimportant business was ascribed instead to morning sittings, there would probably be little interest or inclination among MPs to attend. Ultimately, and perhaps not surprisingly, the lack of overall enthusiasm for morning sittings amongst Labour MPs and Ministers was such that the experiment was not continued into the 1967–1968 Parliamentary Session (although, as we will note shortly, morning sittings were re-introduced by the post-1997 Blair Governments). Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration One other Labour Party initiative pertaining to the House of Commons, and which was rather more successfully implemented during the 1960s – albeit only after overcoming initial scepticism among Labour MPs and Ministers alike – was the establishment of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration (more commonly known as ‘the Ombudsman’). Indeed, this innovation sought simultaneously to improve the link between the House of Commons, backbench MPs and citizens, whilst also enhancing the accountability of the executive to Parliament. The notion of providing citizens with greater scope for ‘redress of grievances’ had developed during the later half of the 1950s, due in large part to growing concern about the increase in centralization and bureaucracy

70


which was characteristic of an advanced industrial society like Britain. It was recognized by those who contemplated such matters, that a society characterized by greater government intervention in economic and social affairs, a comprehensive welfare state, and increasing complexity and specialization in policy-making, also ran the risk of widening the gulf between government and individual citizen as political power increasingly accrued at the centre. These concerns were given a coherent voice in 1961 by a cross-party group of lawyers via an organization entitled Justice, which published a report The Citizen and Administration: The Redress of Grievances. Having identified some of the key problems of contemporary governance and accountability, the report proposed that a Parliamentary Commissioner for Investigations be established, who would examine complaints made by citizens against government Departments, but forwarded to him/her by MPs on behalf of, not by, the citizen directly. The Parliamentary Commissioner’s remit would be the investigation of alleged maladministration by a Government Department, not the efficacy or ethics of a particular policy per se. The then Labour Opposition embraced the proposal for such a Parliamentary Commissioner for three reasons. Firstly, a few senior figures in the Party themselves acknowledged that Labour’s policies were often perceived or portrayed as increasing the power of the State, and enhancing bureaucracy, at the expense of the individual citizen. Richard Crossman had already expressed his bemusement at the fact that ‘too many Socialists regard it as reactionary . . . to take up the cudgels for the individual citizen who feels that his rights have been violated by a Department of State, a public board or a semi-public authority’ and therefore considered that such ‘political activity . . . should be left to the Tories or Liberals’. Yet Crossman insisted that the ‘growth of a vast, centralised State bureaucracy constitutes a grave potential threat to social democracy’ and, as such, he insisted that it was ‘a fallacy’ to claim that ‘we are being disloyal to our Socialist principles if we attack its excesses or defend the individual against its incipient despotism’ (Crossman, 1956: 6, 18, 20). As such, it was entirely fitting that Crossman later played a crucial role in establishing the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration, although still facing the antipathy of some of his Labour colleagues. The second reason why the Labour Party, during the early 1960s, embraced the idea of some kind of Parliamentary Commissioner was that the recommendations enshrined in the Justice Report were rejected by the Macmillan Government, partly on the grounds that such an institutional innovation would impede the efficient conduct of government by adding


71

another tranche of administration and bureaucracy, but also because MPs already provided an adequate conduit for citizens’ grievances against Government Departments or other public bodies. Sensing a degree of political and electoral capital to be gleaned from the Conservative’s dismissal of the recommendations in the Justice Report, and viewing this as an issue on which Labour could present itself as a forward-thinking, modernizing Party (compared to the allegedly backward-looking and increasingly out-of-touch Tories), the Labour Opposition consequently pledged that it would establish a Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration, although there remained pockets of resistance within the Party to such an innovation. Foremost among these opponents was Douglas Houghton who believed that alongside MPs there were a variety of agencies and tribunals to which citizens could turn to if they felt that they had been unfairly treated or suffered from maladministration. He was concerned that many of the arguments being advanced in favour of a Parliamentary Commissioner were derived too much from hypothetical cases of what might happen, rather than empirical examples of what had actually occurred and, as such, ‘are mere lawyers’ stuff’. Furthermore, Houghton warned the Labour leadership that they were in danger of raising totally unnecessary public concern about maladministration, whilst also giving the impression that ‘Labour means more bureaucracy, more controls, and more . . . rules and regulations’, from which the public will need protection via the Parliamentary Commissioner. Far better, Houghton suggested that the Labour Party should pledge itself to ensure that it governed more efficiently and effectively than the Conservatives and that ‘the public services . . . be encouraged to give cheerful and helpful service to all citizens’ through ‘prompt, courteous and sympathetic attention in all matters and at all times’, thereby ensuring that citizens had fewer grievances in the first place (Labour Party Archives, RD.775/May 1964). Yet others in the Labour Party clearly recognized that however ‘cheerful’ or ‘courteous’ public servants might be in their dealings with individual citizens, instances of maladministration would still occur. Failure to acknowledge this, by providing for more coherent redress of grievances, would almost inevitably fuel frustration and alienation amongst a growing number of British people, possibly leading to growing disillusionment with the political system itself. It was argued that if Government Departments were left to conduct their own internal inquiries in response to allegations of maladministration, then doubts would naturally be raised about the impartiality and robustness of such investigations and their findings. It was therefore essential that any charges

72


of maladministration should be investigated ‘by some outside authority free from the real or apparent influence of the Department’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.777/May 1964). The third reason why the Labour Party pledged itself to the establishment of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration was that such an initiative neatly accorded with a more general avowed commitment to rendering government more open and accountable. Indeed, the Labour’s 1964 manifesto depicted the creation of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration as integral to the Party’s desire ‘to humanise the whole administration of the State’. Ironically, once Labour had been returned to Office in 1964, Douglas Houghton was appointed to chair the Cabinet committee designated to prepare the legislative proposals for the Parliamentary Commissioner. However, while Houghton might have become persuaded of the alleged virtues of such an institutional innovation, a few other Ministers, most notably George Brown, remained concerned about the constitutional implications and apparent impropriety of permitting an ‘outsider’ to investigate the internal decision-making procedure in a Government Department with regard to specific cases. This, Brown argued, seriously undermined the principle of Ministerial responsibility to Parliament whilst also potentially jeopardizing the convention of Civil Service anonymity (Brown, 1971: 149–50). For their part, some Labour MPs were anxious that if aggrieved citizens were permitted to approach the proposed parliamentary commissioner directly, then their own representative role would be undermined. This anxiety was clearly viewed sympathetically by the Cabinet committee, for when the White paper The Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration was published in October 1965, it emphasized that In Britain, Parliament is the place for ventilating the grievances of the citizen - by history, tradition and past and present practice. It is one of the functions of the elected Member of Parliament to try to secure that his (sic) constituents do not suffer injustice at the hands of the Government . . . We do not want to create any new institution which would erode the functions of Members of Parliament in this respect, nor to replace remedies which the British constitution already provides. Our proposal is to develop those remedies still further. We shall give Members of Parliament a better instrument which they can use to protect the citizen, namely, the services of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration. (Cmnd 2767, 1965: 3, para 4)


73

It was therefore envisaged that such a Parliamentary Commissioner would be empowered to investigate allegations of maladministration against Government Departments, but only after such matters had been passed to him/her by an MP. Citizens would not be entitled to approach the Parliamentary Commissioner directly. Although the ensuing Parliamentary Commissioner Bill was given its First Reading in February 1966, Harold Wilson’s decision to hold a general election the following month (in order to increase Labour’s wafer-thin majority) meant that the Bill had to be re-introduced after Labour had increased its majority to 97 seats. It was therefore given another First Reading in July, with the Debate on the Second Reading taking place in mid-October. The Second Reading Debate was opened by the recently appointed Leader of the House, Richard Crossman, who immediately emphasized the link between establishing a Parliamentary Commissioner and the pursuit of parliamentary reform. In delineating the Parliamentary Commissioner’s powers and functions – largely as stipulated in the White Paper – Crossman explained that s/he would not be entitled to investigate a policy per se, nor would they be able to look into discretionary decisions which a citizen was unhappy about, provided that the decision had been taken in accordance with the appropriate regulations and procedures. The Parliamentary Commissioner’s role, therefore, was investigating allegations of maladministration, and while Crossman acknowledged the difficulty of providing a succinct definition replete with clear examples, he nonetheless alluded to criteria such as bias, neglect, inattention, delay, incompetence, ineptitude, arbitrariness and so on, although he readily acknowledged that these would by no means constitute a definitive list (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 734, col. 51). Although Crossman’s peroration was described by one commentator as ‘really a tour de force’ (Stacey, 1971: 73), a few Labour backbenchers – most notably Leo Abse and A. J. Irvine – remained uneasy about the implications of a Parliamentary Commissioner for their own role as constituency representatives and pursuants (through traditional parliamentary channels) of redress of grievances on behalf of constituents. Crossman’s response was to reiterate that aggrieved citizens could not approach the Parliamentary Commissioner directly, but would have to convey their grievances to an MP. Furthermore, Crossman insisted, the Parliamentary Commissioner would actually benefit MPs, by assisting them in more effectively securing redress of grievances on behalf of their constituents, particularly when more traditional methods, such as Question Time or Adjournment Debates, had proved ineffective (House

74


of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 734, col. 61). In this respect, it was envisaged that the linkage between Parliament, MPs and the public would actually be strengthened. Regardless of the afore-mentioned reservations, most Labour MPs who spoke in the Debate on the Bill’s Second Reading were highly supportive of the Parliamentary Commissioner, with Sydney Silverman describing it as a move towards ‘the greatest constitutional amendment that this House of Commons has ever approached since the days when universal suffrage became applicable to our electoral system’. It would, Silverman claimed, contribute greatly to making ‘the individual House of Commons back-bench Member’s defence of his constituents against the Executive more effective than it has ever been’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 734, col. 124). Limited success and lack of support Nonetheless, the 1964–1970 Labour Governments’ overall approach to reforming the House of Commons remained characterized by a lack of clear thinking, and on various issues, many Labour politicians – particularly those of Ministerial rank – were less than enthusiastic. Certainly, many Ministers became concerned at the constitutional implications for their own roles and responsibilities which would arise from empowering backbench MPs or establishing a Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration. Labour backbenchers were also divided over parliamentary reform in general, for whilst some were primarily concerned to support ‘their’ Government in pushing its legislation through and expediting its parliamentary business, others – particularly newer, younger MPs – wanted to play a more active and influential role on the Floor of the House with regard to the policy process. However, some Labour MPs soon realized that a more active role, and the type of reforms necessary to facilitate this, would significantly increase their workloads, whilst also leaving them with less time on the Floor of the House where the most important items of legislation and public policy were debated. Certainly, many Labour Ministers became even less enamoured with measures to empower backbenchers – not least Labour’s own backbench MPs – in the late 1960s, due to the increasing problems which the leadership encountered vis-à-vis cohesion and discipline in the Parliamentary Labour Party (for an account, see Shaw, 2006). The 1966–1970 Labour Government was characterized by increasing discontent amongst many Labour MPs, due to some of the policies which the Cabinet adopted in the context of stringent economic circumstances and sterling crises,


75

most notably statutory incomes policies, and – in response to the limited success these enjoyed – proposed statutory curbs on the trade unions via the In Place of Strife White Paper. Indeed, the latter was eventually abandoned, in June 1969, due to vehement opposition by many Labour backbenchers (and of course the trade unions themselves). By this time, the Cabinet had already abandoned a Bill to reform the House of Lords (discussed in Chapter 3) due to lack of support amongst Labour MPs. Faced with such dissent and disunity in the PLP, and the concomitant ‘problem of party management’ (Shaw, 2006), it was hardly surprising that Ministers – with the notable exception of Richard Crossman – became even less enamoured with reforms which would empower (Labour) backbenchers. Given the nature of the reforms proposed or pursued, and the often limited or ambivalent support which they enjoyed amongst Labour parliamentarians, it is perhaps not surprising that that one of Britain’s leading academic experts on Parliament notes that, with the benefit of hindsight, ‘it is possible to describe the [1964-70] reforms as being . . . either ineffective, or so minor as to be irrelevant’, and ‘in terms of affecting significantly the ability of the House to scrutinise and influence the Government, they must be deemed a failure’ (Norton, 1980: 477–8).

Labour and House of Commons’ reform in the 1970s The issue of select committees, as discussed during the later half of the 1960s, had still not been resolved when the Labour Party was returned to Office in 1974. Labour’s leadership, perhaps understandably, displayed little interest in, let alone enthusiasm for, reviving the select committee ‘experiment’ of the late 1960s, particularly as the 1974–1979 Labour Governments lacked an overall Commons majority for most of this period, and was thus ‘muddling through’, often engaged in crisis management. Clearly, Ministers in such a weak position were not favourably disposed to granting more power to backbench MPs, even those on their own side. Indeed, it has since been alleged that some senior Ministers, such as James Callaghan (subsequently Prime Minister) and Roy Mason, were strongly opposed to select committees, viewing them as a threat to strong and effective government and because ‘it was more difficult to avoid questions there than at [Ministers] Question Time’ (Donoughue, 2005: 645, diary entry for 27 January 1976). Yet precisely because of this weakness, Labour Ministers were vulnerable to pressures from the Floor of the House, where there did appear

76


to be greater support for more extensive use of select committees. For example, a 1977 Expenditure Committee Report on the Civil Service expressly called for a more coherent system of select committees linked to Government Departments, whilst the Select Committee on Procedure, which had been established in June 1976 ‘to consider the practice and procedure of the House . . . to make recommendations for the more effective performance of its functions’, called, in its 1978 Report, for the establishment of 12 permanent select committees to ‘shadow’ the main Departments of State. These were intended to contribute to ‘a new balance . . . enabling the House as a whole to exercise effective control and stewardship over Ministers and the expanding bureaucracy of the modern state for which they are answerable’. Yet in a House of Commons Debate in February 1976, Labour’s Leader of the House had already emphasized the need to make legislative procedures swifter and more efficient, an argument which clearly implied that the Government was hardly likely to want to grant additional powers to backbenchers, particularly given its lack of an overall majority by this time (Baines, 1989: 26, 27). Ironically, the Leader of the House during this particular period was Labour’s staunch opponent of select committees, Michael Foot, yet his Government’s lack of a parliamentary majority meant that when the Conservative Opposition and Labour supporters of select committees combined, he felt obliged, in spite of his own antipathy to such bodies, to accede to their demands for a Commons Debate on the Procedure Committee’s recommendations. Furthermore, the Labour Party’s own machinery of government group of MPs had been considering the issue and put forward proposals – subsequently endorsed by the NEC and approved at the Party’s 1978 conference – which went rather further than those of either the Expenditure Committee or the Select Committee on Procedure. It not only called for a system of ‘investigatory committees’ which would be more powerful than the existing select committees, but also for the establishment of new ‘legislative committees’, which could call witnesses (including Ministers themselves, civil servants and outside experts) and elicit evidence vis-àvis legislative proposals before the Government introduced them to the Floor of the House. Crucially, however, it was envisaged that the membership of these investigative committees would primarily be drawn from the governing party itself, there apparently being ‘no future in consensus government by all-party committees’ (Labour Party NEC, 1978; see also, Sedgemore, 1980: 194). As various commentators have noted, though, what was effectively being proposed in this instance was a strengthening


77

of the (Labour) Party’s, rather than Parliament’s, control in relation to the executive. It was Labour backbench MPs, rather than to the House of Commons as a whole, to whom the machinery of government group and the NEC wished to make (Labour) Ministers more accountable (see, for example, Jones and Keating, 1985: 156; Theakston, 1992: 175). This, in turn, reflected part of a more general Left critique emerging in the Party at this time, namely that Labour Governments repeatedly failed to pursue ‘socialist’ policies and implement manifesto commitments due, in part, to leadership ‘betrayal’, and the apparent tendency for Ministers ensconced in Whitehall to lose touch with the wider labour movement. In this context, therefore, the recommendations of the machinery of government group and the NEC can be seen as part of the Left’s emerging strategy for rendering Labour Ministers more accountable to the Parliamentary Labour Party, rather than to Parliament per se, although their advocates tended to depict the proposals as a means of making Britain and its political system ‘less secretive, elitist, oligarchic and bureaucratic’ (Sedgemore, 1980: 195). Not surprisingly, these proposals were not universally or unanimously supported in the Parliamentary Labour Party. On the contrary, it was variously pointed out that if implemented, they would make the task of Labour Governments and Ministers even more difficult, with the inevitable delays arising from the investigatory committees making it likely that fewer manifesto commitments were implemented during the lifetime of a Labour Government. Certainly, the TUC-Labour Party Liaison Committee was concerned that the proposals would make it ‘virtually impossible’ for a Labour Government to enact legislation during the first and second Sessions of a new Parliament (Labour Party Archives, RE.1697/June 1978). Meanwhile, a two-day debate on the proposals for a new system of Departmental Select Committees heard Michael Foot reiterate his arguments of a decade earlier against the greater use of such committees, for he remained concerned about the likely diminution of partisan Debates on the Floor of the House and their replacement by an increasingly cosy and consensual (between backbenchers of different Parties) plethora of committees meeting upstairs in committee rooms. Far from reviving the role and power of Parliament vis-à-vis the executive, Foot, feared that select committees would serve to diminish the House of Commons further (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 963, cols. 291–3). Yet many of Foot’s Labour colleagues were highly supportive of the proposed select committees, with Ian Mikardo deeming them to be ‘the only way in which we can narrow the gap between, on the one hand,

78


what Ministers and their civil servants know and, on the other, what hon. Members know’, while John Garrett welcomed the proposed select committees as ‘crucial to strengthening parliamentary scrutiny’, due to the fact that in recent years, ‘the powers and procedure of the House of Commons have not developed sufficiently to allow adequate surveillance of the Executive’ (House of Commons, 5th series, Vol. 963, cols. 112, 138). Also declaring their support on the grounds that select committees would enable backbench MPs to acquire the greater specialization now necessary to scrutinize government more effectively was Philip Whitehead, whilst Giles Radice argued that select committees would facilitate more informed and intelligent debates on the Floor of the House of Commons (House of Commons, 5th series, Vol. 963, cols. 192, 355). Alex Lyon, meanwhile, believed that select committees could play a major role in improving ‘the quality of government’ by enabling them to ‘share in the decision-making process before decisions are made by the Government’ (House of Commons, 5th series, Vol. 954, col. 545). However, with the Labour Government losing the May 1979 general election, it was left to the Conservative Government to introduce the new select committee system later that year and into early 1980 (due, in large part, to the enthusiasm of Norman St. John Stevas, the Conservative Leader of the House) by which time, ironically, Margaret Thatcher and some of her Ministerial colleagues were beginning to lose some of their former enthusiasm for this particular parliamentary reform.

Labour and House of Commons’ reform, 1979–1987 The ambiguities which characterized Labour’s approach to the reform of the House of Commons during the 1960s and 1970s remained, unabated and unresolved, in the 1980s. Although the Labour Opposition of the early 1980s was under the (temporary) influence of the Left (strongly influenced by, and effectively coalescing around, Tony Benn), and therefore campaigned for rather more radical and ‘socialist’ policies than had been pursued by the Labour leadership during the 1960s and 1970s, there remained a paucity of clear or coherent thinking with regard to constitutional reform, beyond Left-wing calls for the abolition of the House of Lords. The lack of systematic thought given to the role and functions of the House of Commons, though, meant that Labour’s policy proposals continued to lack consistency or coherence, as indicated by the policy document, Labour’s Programme 1982, which declared, on the one hand, that ‘an incoming Labour government will be faced with the urgent task


79

of introducing the various measures needed to plan for growth and create jobs’, so that there was no intention to ‘inhibit a Labour government from acting to achieve its paramount objective of creating full employment’, but then urged, on the other hand, that the House of Commons should be reformed in order to facilitate greater backbench investigation and scrutiny of governmental policies and legislation. As in the 1978 recommendations, these would include pre-legislative inquiries, involving evidence from outside experts, as well as increased resources and support staff for MPs serving on select committees. It was also proposed that once a Bill had passed through its Report Stage, ‘a new and influential Revision Committee of the House of Commons’ could be established to ‘take a further look at legislation . . . and consider “second thoughts’’, as [is] sometimes done in the House of Lords’ (Labour Party, 1982: 207–8). Meanwhile, John Silkin, Labour’s Shadow Leader of the House of Commons at this time, insisted that We must recognise that backbench MPs are not merely lobby fodder whose function is solely to vote their party line. Labour governments need criticism from their supporters both in and out of Parliament. The notion that the duty of Labour MPs is simply to vote through an Enabling Act and let the government get on with the job is a dangerously naïve view. (Silkin, 1983: 185) Labour’s approach to the House of Commons’ reform therefore enshrined two particular inconsistencies or contradictions. Firstly, the proposed abolition of the House of Lords (discussed in Chapter 3) would significantly increase the workload of the House of Commons – given the extent to which the House of Lords has traditionally shared some of the Commons’ work, and thus alleviated some of the timetable pressures (Shell, 1992: passim) – thereby placing even further pressure on backbench MPs and greatly increasing the risk of complete overload. Certainly, the radicalism of many of Labour’s formal economic and social policies during this period of Left ascendancy in the Party would have imposed a heavy legislative burden on its backbenchers, the more so if there were no longer an Upper House to share the workload. Overworked MPs were hardly likely to be able to provide effective scrutiny of Ministerial policies and proposals. The second – and most obvious – inconsistency enshrined in the Left’s proposals concerning the House of Commons was that between imbuing backbench MPs and parliamentary committees with enhanced

80


powers and opportunities for scrutinizing the executive, and holding the Government to account, yet simultaneously emphasizing the need for Labour Ministers to be able to implement, as a matter of urgency, the Party’s radical programme of economic regeneration and social reform. Clearly, an enhanced role for backbench MPs in terms of parliamentary and legislative scrutiny would inevitably slow down the passage and enactment of governmental Bills. Once again, there was a clear tension between enhancing the efficiency of the House, in terms of expediting governmental business and legislative measures, and improving its effectiveness with regard to enhancing the scrutiny (by backbench MPs and/or the Opposition parties) of the Government’s policies and legislation.

Towards New Labour and renewed House of Commons’ reform Although the call for greater scrutiny of government by backbenchers initially emanated from Labour’s Left, it was increasingly echoed from other sections of the Party during the course of the 1980s, albeit with a somewhat different rationale. Whereas the Left envisaged that an enhanced role for Labour backbenchers would render the Party’s leadership more ‘accountable’ to both the PLP and the extra-parliamentary labour movement, and thus reduce the scope for leadership ‘betrayal’ of democratic socialism, more mainstream Labour parliamentarians began calling for greater scrutiny and involvement by backbench MPs in response to the Thatcher Governments’ increasing authoritarianism and centralization of power during the 1980s (in spite of Thatcherite rhetoric about ‘rolling back the state’). By virtue of their huge parliamentary majorities following the 1983 and 1987 elections, Margaret Thatcher and her Ministers were able to push a number of increasingly radical and controversial measures and Bills through the House of Commons – with abolition of the Greater London Council (GLC) and six (Labour-controlled) metropolitan councils and the eventual introduction of the poll tax, being two of the most notable examples – in a manner which renewed concern in some quarters over what Lord Hailsham had once termed ‘elective dictatorship’ in Britain. That the Thatcher Governments were able to secure the passage through the House of Commons of such controversial measures, in spite of opinion polls indicating widespread public disapproval or hostility, enabled the Labour Party in general (rather than just the Left, which steadily declined in influence anyway after the election 1983 defeat) to argue for greater parliamentary scrutiny of the executive, and thus for


81

a more active, assertive House of Commons: ‘the role of Parliament in holding the executive account is largely a myth, as is the notion that Ministers are in any effective sense accountable to parliament for their actions’ (Wright, 1986: 423). Such arguments clearly informed the deliberations of the Policy Review which Neil Kinnock launched after Labour’s 1987 election defeat, via its Review Group on Democracy for the Individual and the Community, for the ensuing policy document Meet the Challenge, Make the Change placed considerable emphasis on reform of the House of Commons, with a view to rendering it ‘a more democratic and accountable institution’. Yet ambiguities or contradictions were still discernible in various proposals, for alongside the recommendations concerning the need to enhance the role of MPs and ensure greater scrutiny of government policies and proposals, it was also made clear that ‘urgent steps will have to be taken to streamline procedures’. Indeed, one particular proposal was to establish ‘Legislative Committees [which] would be able to call witnesses and take expert evidence’, yet this initiative was depicted as means ‘to expedite the scrutiny of Public Bills’ and, as such, would be required to operate according to ‘strictly observed rules about the time-tabling of legislation’. Meanwhile, the review group on democracy proposed that the Departmental select committees should be strengthened in three ways, partly by more systematic investigation of Departments’ expenditure programmes (in tandem with extended powers for the Public Accounts Committee) and partly by providing the committees with more permanent research staff. It was further suggested that select committees could be provided with ‘the opportunity to introduce legislation based upon their specific reports’ (Labour Party, 1989: 56). Labour’s 1992 election manifesto reaffirmed this commitment to ensuring that Parliament would be rendered ‘more effective in . . . holding government to account’, by improving ‘the procedures and facilities of the House of Commons’, although the manifesto also alluded to the possibility of introducing ‘as a general rule, a fixed parliamentary term’ (Labour Party, 1992: 20). Although John Smith, who replaced Neil Kinnock as Labour leader following the 1992 election defeat, had not been renowned as a passionate advocate of House of Commons reform, the Party’s formal commitment was maintained throughout the two years of his leadership. For example, 1993 witnessed Labour’s Policy Commission, established to consider the Party’s approach to constitutional reform, present its report, as a NEC statement, to the 1993 annual conference. Furthermore, the report, entitled A New Agenda for Democracy, was formally presented

82


to Labour’s conference by the Party’s then home affairs spokesperson, Tony Blair. With regard to the House of Commons, A New Agenda for Democracy reiterated the 1987–1989 Policy Review’s commitment to enhancing parliamentary scrutiny of the executive by enhancing the powers of the Departmental select committees and ensuring their independence from the Party whips. There was also confirmation of the Party’s aim of taking evidence prior to introducing a Bill. It was further proposed that the hours in which the House of Commons sat might be altered, with a view to making it more ‘family friendly’ (this being closely linked to the Labour Party’s formal commitment to increasing the representation of women in Parliament). However, all these were expressed as possible reforms, rather than definite commitments, due to the professed need to conduct further consultations and give more consideration to the issues involved. Or to use a term which became part of New Labour’s general lexicon, these possible reforms of the House of Commons represented ‘aspirations’. These ‘aspirations’ were retained when Tony Blair became Labour Party leader in 1994. Indeed, by 1996 – with a general election due the following year – a number of sources and statements reaffirmed ‘New Labour’s’ intention of seeking to ‘modernize’ the House of Commons. Firstly, during the summer of 1996, the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats established – at the behest of their respective leaders – a joint consultative committee, whose remit was to consider the scope for cross-party collaboration and co-operation with regard to constitutional reform, whereupon the committee’s subsequent 1997 report emphasized that ‘Renewing Parliament is key to the wider modernisation of our country’s system of government’, and to this end, a number of specific measures were mooted, most notably: • To arrange parliamentary business in a manner which enabled fuller consultation, more effective scrutiny of Bills, and better use of MPs’ time. • To improve the quality of legislation, by more frequent and more effective use of pre-legislative consultation, coupled with greater use of special standing committee procedures to take evidence prior to the passage of legislation. • To reform Prime Minister’s Question Time ‘to make it a more genuine and serious means of holding the government to account’. • To strengthen the ability of MPs to make the government answerable for its actions’.


83

• To give the Departmental select committees an improved role in holding Government Departments to account. • To establish a Select Committee on Modernising the House of Commons, with a view to securing the maximum possible cross-party consensus on reform. (reprinted in Blackburn and Plant, 1999: 477–8) These proposals were reiterated in New Labour’s own ‘pre-election’ policy programme, published in 1996, entitled New Labour, New Life for Britain (Labour Party, 1996a: 29), and further affirmed by Labour’s Shadow Leader of the House, Ann Taylor, in a speech to Charter 88, entitled New Politics, New Parliament (Ryle, 1999: 117–8). Meanwhile, two leading architects of New Labour, Peter Mandelson and Roger Liddle, were even suggesting that the independence (from the party whips) of backbench MPs serving on select committees could be ensured by determining membership via some form of ballot of backbenchers, possibly deploying the STV. Mandelson and Liddle also added their support to the proposal for making more use of pre-legislative inquiries and evidence gathering, through either the select committee system or greater use of special standing committees. Preparing public policy in this way, it was claimed, would yield ‘more intelligent and informed debate on legislation’ in the House of Commons’ (Mandelson and Liddle, 1996: 203–4). Such reforms, Tony Wright envisaged, would make the House of Commons ‘less of a party pantomime and more of an effective instrument for scrutinizing legislation and holding governments to account’ (Wright, 1997: 87). Calls for reform of the House of Commons, particularly with regard to its procedures and the conduct of business, were lent added impetus during the mid-1990s due to the allegations of ‘sleaze’ and ‘improper conduct’ which were levelled against a number of politicians and which serve to tarnish Parliament’s image and reputation. In particular, two Conservative MPs were reported to have accepted cash payments in return for asking parliamentary questions. Other Conservative politicians were also involved in highly publicized scandals, often of a sexual nature, during the mid-1990s. It was largely in response to the succession of unsavoury revelations and allegations that John Major, whilst Conservative Prime Minister, established a Committee on Standards in Public Life, chaired by Lord Nolan. Such scandals lent added resonance to more general calls for reform of the practices and processes of the House of Commons, partly to render future misconduct less likely (or more likely to be exposed sooner) and partly, as a result, to repair the damage wrought on the

84


public’s perception of politicians and politics in general. Many MPs and Ministers readily recognized that they needed to put their own House in order. Following its May 1997 election victory, the Blair Government did enact a number of the measures pledged in the joint consultative committee’s Report, The first of the promised reforms of House of Commons procedure was the replacement of the twice-weekly – 15 minutes every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon – Prime Minister’s Question Time, with one half-hour Session on Wednesday afternoons. Yet even this was open to clearly contrasting interpretations, for whilst Blair was keen to emphasize that he was presenting himself for a longer, and thus more indepth, period of parliamentary questioning, sceptics retorted that he was actually ensuring that he only needed to appear before MPs on one occasion each week, rather than twice. The latter interpretation seemed to be vindicated by Blair’s more general disinclination to attend the House of Commons, as confirmed by the fact that he only led Government Debates on three occasions during the first two Parliamentary Sessions of his Premiership and voted in less than 10 per cent of Divisions during the same period. Put another way, both his attendance in House of Commons Debates and his voting record in Parliament during his first term were the worst of any modern British Prime Minister (Norton, 2001: 54). The first Blair Government did act swiftly in establishing the promised select committee on modernization of the House of Commons, this being constituted barely a month after New Labour’s election victory, and chaired in its early stages by Ann Taylor (see Kelso, 2004 and 2007, for detailed accounts of the Modernization Committee and its recommended reforms). Its remit was ‘to consider how the practices and procedures of the House should be modernised, and to make recommendations thereon’. The following month, the committee published its first report, entitled The Legislative Process (HC 190, 1997–1998), whose proposals included the carrying over of Bills from one parliamentary Session to the next and greater consultation at the pre-legislative stage. Further reports followed on a regular basis, to the extent that within a year of being appointed, the committee had published seven reports, whilst by the summer of 2000, a further five substantial reports had been produced (Norton, 2001: 47). However, it has also been noted that out of 15 substantive reports published by the Modernization Committee between 1997 and 2001, ‘only two contained proposals to help enhance the power of the Commons in relation to the executive’, the remainder being for


85

‘cosmetic or tidying-up purposes, or for the convenience of members’ (Cowley and Stuart, 2005: 27, 28). Another recommendation emanating from the Modernization Committee’s reports, and implemented by the first Blair Government, included the establishment of a parallel chamber, in the Grand Committee Room off Westminster Hall, in which parliamentary business not involving votes could be conducted, when there would not otherwise have been sufficient time on the Floor of the House of Commons itself. However, as with many reforms of the House of Commons and its procedures, the significance of this particular innovation was disputed: the Government claimed that ‘parallel sittings’ enabled the House to consider more aspects of public policy than it would otherwise be able to scrutinize, whilst critics argued that this reform merely assisted the executive by enabling the Government to despatch even more of its business each Session, whilst potentially placing an intolerable strain on MPs’ time and attention. Many other recommendations, however, were minor ones (albeit often entirely sensible or long over-due), such as abandoning the requirement that MPs have to wear a collapsible opera hat – ‘seated and covered’ – in order to raise a point of order whilst a Division is taking place. One of the most notable of the Blair Governments’ reforms to ‘modernize’ the House of Commons was the change in its hours of business. Just as the 1966–1970 Labour Government experimented with morning sittings, so too did the Blair Governments seek to make more use of mornings for debates, in order to bring an end to the regular late-night sittings, which sometimes used to involve parliamentary Debates and Divisions being conducted in the early hours of the morning (by which time, some MPs may have been rather ‘tired and emotional’). Proponents argued that such a change would ‘normalize’ the hours of parliamentary business, so that MPs would work somewhat similar hours to ‘ordinary people’ and thereby help overcome the public perception that MPs were out of touch with the real world – a point strongly emphasized by Labour’s Leader of the House, Robin Cook, when he opened the debate and spoke in favour of ‘modernizing’ the hours in which the House sat (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 391, col. 704). However, proponents also argued that ‘modernizing’ the House of Commons’ hours of business would render it much more ‘family friendly’, in the sense of enabling more MPs to spend evenings with their partners and/or children. This was considered to be a particularly important consideration in the context of attracting more women into parliamentary politics.

86


The House of Commons’ hours of business were therefore changed by the second (2001–2005) Blair Government, in order to reduce ‘late night sittings’. Instead of starting at 2.30 pm1 and ending at 10.30 pm (or sometimes rather later), the House of Commons would officially operate from 11.30 am to 7 pm. Yet many Labour MPs were opposed to such a change (as were many Conservatives), pointing out that for the vast majority of MPs who did not live in close proximity to London, finishing at 7 pm would still not enable them to go back to their family home for the evening, thereby rather undermining the ‘family-friendly hours’ justification being advanced in support of the reform. Indeed, this particular point was noted by Labour’s Chris Mullin when he wryly enquired, The proposal might make this place more family friendly for those who are lucky enough to live within commuting distance of Westminster, but what are the 500 or so of us who live beyond commuting distance supposed to do—wander around this place in twilight? . . . Are we supposed to go on cultural outings? Perhaps the theatres and art galleries of the west end will be full of newly liberated Scots and Welsh Members. Somehow I doubt it. If I were a spouse living several hundred miles away, I would prefer to know that my other half was in Parliament, instead of roaming the streets of the west end with too much time on their hands and too much money in their pockets. (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 391, cols. 724–5) Furthermore, it transpired that many MPs rather liked the apparently ‘clubbable’ atmosphere and camaraderie of the House of Commons when it conducted its business late into the evening. Certainly, some Labour opponents of changing the House of Commons’ hours of business, in order to render it and its Members more ‘normal’, believed that this was to miss the point that There is no way in which we will ever turn this House of Commons into a rational organisation comparable to other workplaces and activities in which people are employed. This place is sui generis . . . There is nothing like it—we cannot compare the way in which we conduct our activities with the very important work done in a motor car or computer factory. This is different. This is a House of Parliament. It

1

Of course, this did not mean that MPs only started work at 2.30 pm, because many of them were busy ‘behind the scenes’ in the mornings, serving on committees or dealing with constituency correspondence, for example.


87

is not a sausage machine or a conveyor belt. It is not here to be efficient. A Parliament is not about time and motion studies; it is about listening to views, perhaps conflicting, and, out of the clash of views, changing the way in which the country works and reflecting the views of its people. This is a Parliament, not a factory . . . If we lose sight of what we are here for, and believe that by . . . working from 9 to 5, or whatever it is, we will persuade our constituents that we are like them, we will fail. The very fact that we are here is because we want to represent our constituents, but we are not like them. If we were like them, we would not be here. If we were like them, we would not have fought to get here; we would not have done the things that got us here. We are sui generis—we are the British House of Commons. Although I support many of the proposals that my right hon. Friend makes and shall vote for them, I fear that the proposals on . . . the change in hours will damage us as a House of Parliament. (Gerald Kaufman, House of Commons Debates, Vol. 391, cols. 740–1. See also the comments by Gwyneth Dunwoody, ibid., cols. 756–8). The views of Labour MPs such as Kaufman and Dunwoody were evidently widely shared, for although the ensuing vote on the proposed change in the House of Commons hours of business was won, many Labour backbenchers voted against or abstained. Moreover, the opposition of many backbenchers to the revised hours of sitting remained unabated, to the extent that, in January 2005, Tuesday sittings reverted back to the hours which had been operated prior to the ‘modernization’ reform of 2002, namely 2.30 pm to 10 pm. In the meantime, it became apparent that while bringing forward the House of Commons’ hours of business had been portrayed as a means of encouraging a better ‘work-life balance’ amongst MPs and of rendering the House more ‘family friendly’, a major impetus for the change had actually been to secure greater media coverage, by ensuring that parliamentary debates and votes were concluded early enough to appear in the following morning’s newspapers, thereby hopefully restoring public interest in politics and helping to ‘reconnect’ the voters with Parliament (Cook, 2003: 235–6, diary entry for 29 October 2002). Overall, though, the reforms of the House of Commons introduced by the Blair Governments generally attracted attention precisely for their modesty, with Norton noting how, in a wider political context, ‘the changes appeared limited, and failed to change significantly the relationship between the legislature and the executive’ (Norton, 2001: 48). Similarly, Cowley and Stuart argue that ‘few of the proposals had the

88


potential to enhance the scrutinising role of the Commons’, reflecting the ‘continuing lack of interest of many [Ministers] in Parliament, except as an institution which could be controlled to make life easier for the government (Cowley and Stuart, 2005: 27, 21). Hence Riddell’s observation that ‘The basic questions of scrutiny and accountability – of power – have not been addressed’ (Riddell, 2000: 248). Indeed, so insignificant were most of these measures that in their respective chapters on the Blair Government and constitutional reform, neither Richards and Smith (2001) nor King (2002) refer to the reform of the House of Commons. Similarly, Evans’ examination of the Blair Governments’ constitutional reforms includes a chapter on House of Lords reform but does not directly address reform of the House of Commons (Evans, 2003). Certainly, the modesty of these reforms persuaded a number of commentators – and some Labour backbenchers too – that the Blair Governments’ modernization of House of Commons procedures was not genuinely concerned to enhance the executive’s accountability to Parliament and MPs. On the contrary, the main impetus seems to have been to make the Government’s life easier. Or as Cowley and Stuart noted, ‘The [Blair] government’s approach to legislative modernisation always owed more to its desire to secure the passage of its business than to a desire to improve the effectiveness of parliamentary scrutiny’ (Cowley and Stuart, 2001: 238), thus echoing Gray and Jenkins’ observation that ‘modernisation may mean an increasing separation of the executive from the legislature’ (Gray and Jenkins, 1999: 146). In this context, the assertion by Peter Mandelson, following the 1997 election, that ‘Labour MPs have been elected in order to carry out our manifesto’ and therefore have a responsibility ‘not to impede or present barriers’ to its implementation (The Times, 19 May 1997) strongly suggested that once Labour was in Office, traditional Ministerial dominance would prevail over greater backbench influence. Certainly, Mandelson’s comment – which seemed at odds with his call, in the previous year (noted above), for greater backbench scrutiny and involvement in the parliamentary policy process – seemed to echo the sentiment expressed by Michael Stewart 31 years earlier. Similarly, it has been suggested that Margaret Beckett, who served as a Leader of the House from 1998 to 2001, took the clear view that ‘The Labour Government has been given a mandate from the electors to carry out a manifesto [hence] legislation should pass through both Houses as smoothly as possible’, and as such, her approach to modernization of the House of Commons was unlikely to have been motivated by a desire to increase the power or influence of backbenchers or genuinely


89

enhance the House of Commons ability and opportunities to scrutinize the executive (Gay, 2005: 374). Some Labour MPs themselves, meanwhile, expressed their disappointment with the timidity of the Blair Governments’ reforms of the House of Commons since 1997. In March 2000, the Liaison Committee, primarily comprising the chairs of the various select committees (and therefore including several senior Labour MPs), published a report Shifting the Balance: Select Committees and the Executive, which called for a strengthening of the select committees in the House of Commons, including the allocation of more resources, and greater independence from the Party whips with regard to the appointment of MPs serving on the committees. The Government, however, made little attempt at concealing is displeasure at the Liaison Committee’s report and duly disregarded the recommendations enshrined therein. Indeed, it even refused to provide parliamentary time to enable MPs to vote on the Liaison’s Committee’s report and associated recommendations. After four years in Office, Labour’s 2001 manifesto pledge concerning further House of Commons reform was notably vague, merely asserting that the Party ‘will continue to modernise the procedures of the House of Commons so it can more effectively fulfil its functions of representation and scrutiny’ (Labour Party, 2001: 35). Yet barely one month after its landslide re-election, and little more than a year after rejecting calls for greater independence in the appointment of select committee members, the Blair Government clashed with Labour backbenchers over its ‘removal’ of two of the Party’s more outspoken select committee chairs. Donald Anderson was dismissed as chair of the Commons select committee on foreign affairs, whilst Gwyneth Dunwoody was removed as chair of the transport select committee. Although the Labour leadership claimed that changes to the membership of select committees was routine following a general election (given that MPs served for a four- to five-year term on such parliamentary bodies), many Labour backbenchers viewed the dismissals as (further) evidence of ‘control freakery’ at the highest levels of the Party and Government, representing Ministerial attempts at stifling genuine debate and scrutiny, both within the House itself and amongst Labour backbenchers, whilst Robin Cook (shortly to be appointed Leader of the House), condemned the attempted removal of Anderson and Dunwoody as a ‘display of naked power of government over Parliament’ (Cook, 2003: 20, diary entry for 12 July 2001). Moreover, although Labour’s chief whip, Hilary Armstrong, was widely blamed for the attempted removal, it was subsequently claimed that she

90


‘got her instructions from Number Ten’ (Cook, 2003: 23, diary entry for 17 July 2001). Such was the anxiety amongst many Labour MPs that well over 100 of them defied the Party leadership by voting in favour of restating Anderson and Dunwoody to their respective select committee chairs (see Kelso, 2003: 60–1, for a discussion of this episode). Four years later, following the Blair Government’s re-election in May 2005, observers experienced a distinct sense of déjà vu as Ministers (via the Party whips) again attempted to replace Anderson and Dunwoody as chairs of the foreign affairs and transports select committees respectively, only to be obliged once again to back-down when Labour MPs rallied to Anderson’s and Dunwoody’s defence (White, 2005a,b). Although some commentators hailed such ‘victories’ as evidence of a shift in the balance of power between Labour backbenchers and the executive, it remained ‘one that was very much at the margins’ (Cowley and Stuart, 2002: 283). Meanwhile, having been appointed Leader of the House in July 2001, Robin Cook acknowledged that the manner in which select committee membership was determined needed to be reformed, with a view to permitting MPs themselves to choose who the members should be, but was also emphatic that such a change could not be rushed (The Guardian, 17 July 2001). There were subsequent proposals to reform and strengthen the select committee system, partly prompted by the furore over the attempted removal of Anderson and Dunwoody. This episode had exacerbated concerns about the independence or autonomy of select committees, the method of appointing MPs to serve on them, and their ability to choose topics for investigation. The proposals for strengthened select committees, presented to the House of Commons in May 2002, included greater pre-legislative scrutiny of draft Bills, proposing changes to existing policies where defects were identified, taking evidence from each Minister on an annual basis and making more general policy proposals. It was also proposed that the method of appointment to serve on a select committee be modified, with a view to reducing the role of the Party whips in determining their Party’s nominations for select committee membership. Two further issues were raised, however, which served to reveal the problems inherent in striking a balance between the legislature and the executive, namely the size of each select committee, and whether their chairpersons ought to be remunerated. With regard to the first issue, some MPs sought to increase the size of select committees, for by enabling more backbenchers to serve on them, more MPs could be involved in scrutinizing the executive and holding Ministers and their


91

Department to account in the House of Commons (more effectively than they could, for example, through Ministers’ Question Time on a four-weekly basis). It was also variously suggested that larger select committees would increase opportunities for MPs from minor parties to serve on them (thereby weakening the Labour-Conservative duopoly in the Commons) and contribute towards more effective scrutiny of the executive. However, it was pointed out that some select committee chairpersons themselves were uneasy about this particular proposal, fearing that not only would it render some select committees unwieldy, and make it more difficult to secure a consensus when writing reports and making recommendations, it would also mean that each MP might have less time or chance to ask thorough and searching questions of a witness (particularly a Minister), due to the need to let other MPs also ask questions. In other words, by expanding select committees to allow more backbench MPs to serve on them, the effectiveness of parliamentary scrutiny of the executive might actually be reduced – the very opposite of what select committee reform was ostensibly intended to achieve (see, for example, Gwyneth Dunwoody, House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 385, cols. 675 704). Most MPs appeared to find such an argument convincing, for when there was a Division on expanding the size of the select committees, and ensuring more places for MPs from minor parties, 50 voted in favour and 352 against (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 385, cols. 712–15). With regard to payments for select committee chairs, some MPs supported this proposal on the grounds that it would provide an alternative career path for MPs who did not seek or expect Ministerial Office. If select committee chairs were remunerated, it was argued, then it would send a clear signal to MPs that acquiring expertise and scrutinizing the executive was highly valued and that bright or ambitious MPs would not have to confine themselves only to seeking Ministerial Office in order fully to utilize their talents and energies. Yet this proposal was opposed by a number of Labour MPs, partly because it was likely to make the post of select committee chair the subject of patronage (and thus reduce, rather than enhance, their independence and willingness to scrutinize the executive more thoroughly), but also because it was held that all MPs ought to be actively scrutinizing the executive, not merely through membership of select committees, but through the plethora of other parliamentary processes and procedures at their disposal (see, for example, Tony Lloyd, House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 385, cols. 680–1; Gwyneth Dunwoody, ibid., col. 704).

92


However, in a Division on whether the Review Body on Senior Salaries should consider possible remuneration for chairpersons of select committees, MPs voted 199 to 158 in favour, but with Labour MPs almost equally divided over the proposal, as 108 voted in favour and 109 voted against (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 385, cols. 723–26; http://www.publicwhip.org.uk). Meanwhile, in an apparent attempt at pacifying those critics who claimed that he was becoming too presidential, and was too cavalier in his attitude towards Parliament (due to the aforementioned reform of Prime Minister’s Question Time and his limited participation in Debates and Divisions), the summer of 2002 witnessed Tony Blair initiate a twiceyearly, three-hour appearance in front of the Liaison Committee, thereby enabling senior MPs to question the Prime Minister on a wide range of topics and policy issues. Previously, Prime Ministers had not normally appeared before select committees, because it was Departmental Ministers who were deemed to be constitutionally responsible for particular spheres of policy (agriculture, education, health, transport and so on), rather than the Prime Minister per se. Blair himself was thus inaugurating an institutional innovation in the House of Commons, but it remained (like most of the others) a relatively modest initiative and certainly did little to effect a discernible shift in the balance of power from the Government to the House of Commons. Ultimately, the modesty of the Blair Governments’ reforms pertaining to the House of Commons, coupled with the slow or sporadic manner of their introduction, clearly suggested that this was an aspect of constitutional reform which many Ministers, particularly the Prime Minister himself, were either relatively uninterested in or rather antipathetic to. Just as Lord Hailsham’s anxieties about an ‘elective dictatorship’ in the later half of the 1970s (when Labour was in Office) seemed instantly to disappear once ‘his’ Conservative Party was returned to government, so did New Labour’s erstwhile concerns about executive dominance and Ministerial arrogance vis-à-vis Parliament rapidly dissipate once in Office. Elected in 1997 and 2001 with enormous parliamentary majorities, and with the Conservative Party languishing at about 30–32 per cent in most opinion polls throughout, the Blair Governments appeared to lose whatever enthusiasm they previously professed for shifting the balance of power away from the executive towards the legislature, from government to the House of Commons. Indeed, acutely aware of the extent to which Old Labour often appeared deeply divided and fractious, and thus incapable of providing strong and effective government, Blair (like his close colleague and confidant, Peter Mandelson) soon


93

seemed to subscribe to the view that the primary task of Labour backbenchers was to support ‘their’ Government and leave the Conservative Opposition to implode through factionalism and in-fighting. Only by showing the electorate how united and cohesive New Labour was, Blair believed, could the Party prove its effectiveness and competence in Office. However, this perspective clearly militated against strengthening the House of Commons in a manner which would afford either the Opposition or Labour’s own backbenchers, further opportunities to scrutinize the executive more effectively and rigorously. Adopting a zero-sum conception of political power, Blair and many of his Ministers feared that an enhanced role for Labour MPs would inevitably entail a reduction in the Government’s own autonomy and authority. Consequently, it increasingly became apparent that when Blair or his closest colleagues did occasionally allude to the need to ‘modernize’ the House of Commons in order to render it ‘more efficient’, they were defining efficiency in terms of the swift and expeditious despatch of government business and legislation, rather than the more efficient scrutiny of Ministers and measures by backbench MPs and/or the Opposition. In this respect, reform of the House of the Commons was generally viewed by most Ministers as a means of strengthening government itself, rather than providing for greater checks and balances between the executive and the legislature. As such, those reforms which were enacted largely focused on ‘procedural and timetable issues’, rather than genuinely facilitating more effective parliamentary scrutiny of Government Ministers and their policies (Flinders, 2004: 133, 134). Clearly, then, reform of the House of Commons, particularly reform which would strengthen its ability to scrutinize Ministers and their policies more effectively and rigorously, was not an aspect of constitutional reform which was accorded a high priority by the Blair Governments. Apart from not wishing to create potential obstacles for themselves by empowering backbenchers and the Opposition, the Blair Governments judged reform of the House of Commons to be an issue of low electoral saliency and public interest. This was clear from Blair’s dismissive response when the then Conservative leader, William Hague, launched an Opposition Day Debate on the relationship between Parliament and the executive in July 2000, ‘he could have discussed jobs, the economy, schools, hospitals or even crime. I do not know whether people in his pubs and clubs are talking about pre-legislative scrutiny, but they are not in mine’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 353, col. 1097).

94


Such has been the apparent dominance of the executive over the legislature in recent years – in spite of or partly because of the Blair Governments’ extremely modest reform of Commons procedures – that by the summer of 2006, Michael Meacher, a former Labour Minister was complaining about the imbalance of power in the British political system, alleging that it has become ‘more centralised . . . than at any time since the second world war . . . sucked upwards to No. 10 . . . funnelled towards more presidential rule from the centre’, to the extent that constitutional ‘checks and balances have all but collapsed’. As such, Meacher argued, the end of the Blair era ought to provide ‘the springboard for a democratic renewal’, providing for ‘a new constitutional settlement whereby parliament reasserts its democratic rights’. Among some of the possible reforms mooted by Meacher were the ratification of Cabinet appointments ‘by the relevant departmental select committees’ and the election, by all MPs via a secret ballot, of select committee members (in accordance with party balance in the House of Commons), who would then, in turn, elect their own chairs. The former initiative would greatly enhance Ministerial accountability to the House of Commons, whilst curbing Prime Ministerial patronage, Meacher claimed, whilst the latter would tilt the balance firmly away from the party whips towards backbench MPs. He also called for the liaison committee (comprising select committee chairs) to be entitled to table motions and topics for debate, thereby reducing overall governmental control over the parliamentary timetable (Meacher, 2006: 33). Yet it was barely conceivable that Labour Ministers would be willing to countenance such radical reforms, thereby voluntarily surrendering much of their power to backbench MPs. On the contrary, as Hazell notes, it has become clear since 1997 that ‘what is lacking in the Labour government is any real desire to make Parliament more effective’, for in spite of its constitutional reforms elsewhere, it has been ‘so feeble when it comes to the House of Commons’, not least because ‘Labour has never seen parliamentary reform as central’ (Hazell, 2001: 48; see also Riddell, 2000: 245–51). The veracity of this observation was borne out by the fact that in its 2005 election manifesto, the New Labour devoted just one sentence to further reform of the House of Commons, in an anodyne statement pledging that the Party would ‘continue to support reforms that improve parliamentary accountability and scrutiny led by the successful Modernisation Committee’ (Labour Party, 2005: 110). Yet having been returned with its majority halved, it was even less likely that Blair and his Ministerial colleagues would want to enhance the House of Commons’ powers of scrutiny during their third term.


95

Gordon Brown’s surprise declaration Indeed, it was only after Blair had finally resigned as Prime Minister and been replaced by Gordon Brown that the prospect of further reform of the House of Commons was revived. Just one week after Brown had succeeded Blair, he surprised many commentators and critics (particularly those who had, just weeks previously, been accusing him of being a ‘Stalinist’ due to his alleged control over key aspects of governmental policy whilst Chancellor) by declaring his intention, as part of a wider programme of constitutional reform, to tilt the balance of power away from the executive back towards Parliament, particularly the House of Commons. This intention was explained in a Green Paper entitled The Governance of Britain (published, rather oddly, under the auspices of the new Secretary of State for Justice, Jack Straw, rather than by the Department of Constitutional Affairs and its Secretary of State, Lord Falconer), in which considerable attention was devoted to proposals for reinvigorating the House of Commons and empowering MPs. In particular, it was proposed (Straw, 2007: 16–21, 27–30, 34–6) that the House of Commons should be entitled or empowered to: • Authorize the deployment of British troops overseas vis-à-vis military conflict. • Exercise a greater role in scrutinizing and ratifying international treaties to which Britain was a signatory. • Grant its approval when a Prime Minister wishes to seek a dissolution of Parliament in order to call a general election. • Recall Parliament, if a majority of MPs favoured such action (that is, recall itself, in effect, rather than having to rely on a government to recall Parliament in a crisis). • Consider (via an inquiry by the most relevant select committee) the appointment of various senior public officials, such as the heads of various ‘quangos’, or possibly the Ombusdsman, for example. • Debate the Government’s proposed legislative programme for the forthcoming parliamentary Session prior to the final programme being announced in the Queen’s Speech. • Examine (on the Floor of the House, rather than only through select committee inquiries of Ministers’ Question time) the objectives and plans of the key Government Departments each year. The Green paper also announced the proposed establishment of nine regional select committees, one for each of the English regions (discussed in Chapter 8).

96


If enacted, these reforms will grant the House of Commons a significant increase in its formal powers, although for this very reason, Gordon Brown might well encounter resistance from some of his senior Labour colleagues. It should also be borne in mind, however, that even if all these proposals are enacted, the Government’s wishes are likely to prevail on certain issues, by virtue of ‘persuading’ its own backbenchers to vote for (or against) specific proposals, such as the dissolution of Parliament in order to hold a general election or ratifying international treaties. Moreover, the Government would still enjoy a massive advantage vis-àvis the House of Commons with regard to the crucial role of introducing legislation and enacting other measures of public policy.

Conclusion Having been formed in 1906 to secure parliamentary representation for ordinary working people, the Labour Party subsequently evinced considerable ambivalence and ambiguity in its approach to the House of Commons. Proposals for reform have been sporadic, often devoid of enthusiasm or urgency on the part of the parliamentary leadership, lacking in coherence and invariably caused disagreement within the Labour Party, both between MPs themselves and between backbenchers and their Ministerial colleagues. For these reasons, the Party’s record in reforming the House of Commons is somewhat sketchy, reflecting the fact that there has been ‘no Labour philosophy about the organisation of Parliament’ (Jones and Keating, 1985: 152). The main tension discernible in Labour’s approach to the House of Commons concerns the two broad roles available to it vis-a-vis the executive, namely scrutiny and support, and while these are not necessarily mutually exclusive, they have, in practice, been viewed by many Labour parliamentarians as ‘either/or’ functions. As such, whilst some Labour MPs sought an activist role on the backbenches, whereby they would hold the executive (in the guise of their Ministers) to account through systematic scrutiny, and even play a significant role in shaping public policy and legislation, usually via parliamentary committees, other Labour politicians have adjudged their (and inter alia the ‘House of Commons’) primary role to be that of supporting their Ministerial colleagues in Office, in order that a Labour Government could expedite its business more swiftly. Needless to say, this latter role is the one that Labour Ministers especially have tended to ascribe to their backbenchers, although the


97

Party’s leadership is itself likely to insist on the need for greater parliamentary scrutiny of government when Labour occupies the Opposition benches against a Conservative government. Once in Office, though, most Labour Ministers have lost any enthusiasm they may previously have had for reform of the House of Commons, and even if they do remain enthused or committed (or, in the cases of Richard Crossman and Robin Cook, become passionate proponents of parliamentary reform), they are likely to find that a lack of interest or agreement amongst their Ministerial and some backbench colleagues serves to limit the scope and pace of reform. Crossman himself noted how some of those around the Cabinet table, when he was seeking to reform Parliament during the later half of the 1960s, had themselves previously been committed to such reform, but ‘after two years in Office they’ve become Whitehall figures who’ve lost contact with Parliament’ (Crossman, 1976: 130, diary entry for 17 November 1966). This serves to highlight a paradox noted by academic experts such as Judge, whereby, Ultimately, the fact remains that the logic of parliamentary reform is that of ‘Catch 22’: the reassertion of Parliament’s power is dependent upon the fragmentation of the executive’s power, but the centralisation of power in the hands of the government effectively means that it alone has the capacity to sanction the diffusion of power necessary for the rejuvenation of the legislature. (Judge, 1981: 191; see also Kelso, 2003) Furthermore, on those occasions when Ministers have articulated the case for reform of the House of Commons, their inevitable rhetoric about enhancing its efficiency has invariably meant streamlining procedures so that the Government can expedite its business more swiftly and smoothly, unencumbered by too much scrutiny from the Opposition or its own backbenchers. Yet for those Labour backbenchers desirous of a more active parliamentary role in the policy process, the purpose of reform is – or ought to be – to make the House of Commons more effective through empowerment, so that it can scrutinize the actions of government more carefully and confidently, and enable backbenchers (or, at least, government backbenchers), to play a more direct role in shaping public policy and legislation. Thus it is that when a Labour Government has occasionally pursued reform of House of Commons procedures, the objectives of Ministers and backbench MPs in supporting the measures have almost been diametrically opposed.

98


Part of this problem, of course, derives from Labour’s traditional pretence at intra-party democracy, whereby the leadership was expected to serve the interests of the wider labour movement. As such, some Labour MPs have been on their guard against the leadership acquiring to much autonomy and thereby ‘failing’ to pursue (or pursue with sufficient vigour) policies to which the Party was formally committed and which were allegedly in the material interests of the wider labour movement and ordinary working people. This therefore implies greater scrutiny of the executive, and a notable role in the policy process, to ensure that the leadership pursues the ‘correct’ policies, and thereby avoids ‘betrayal’. Against this, Labour Prime Ministers, along with most of their Cabinet colleagues, have tended to insist that they and their Ministers seek to govern on behalf of the British people as a whole, or in the national interest, and must therefore be granted the autonomy and discretion to exercise their judgement, and make compromises, as and when circumstances require. The implication of this, of course, is that the Labour leadership’s room for manoeuvre would be severely constrained if the House of Commons was reformed in order to imbue (Labour) backbenchers with greater power and involvement in parliamentary business. Moreover, as noted in the Introduction to this chapter, most Labour Ministers have tacitly or implicitly accepted the tenets of the Westminster Model of British government, whereby a strong executive is imbued with a mandate by the electorate to implement its manifesto programme, having won a majority of seats in the House of Commons in a general election, but which remains, individually and collectively, responsible and responsive to the House of Commons, and, in turn, the wider British electorate on polling day. In spite of their rhetoric about ‘modernization’, the Blair Governments accepted this interpretation of the Westminster Model just as readily as their predecessors, having remained adamant that The House of Commons has . . . long since been established as the preeminent constitutional authority within the UK . . . . The Party which secures a majority [of seats] has the right to form a government and, subject to sustaining its Parliamentary majority, to carry through the programme set out in its election Manifesto. Ministers are continually accountable to the House of Commons through debates and votes . . . This constitutional framework, founded on the pre-eminence of the House of Commons, has provided Britain with effective democratic Government and accountability for more than a century, and few would wish to change it . . . . (Cm 5291, 2001: paras 13–17).


99

Such a perspective, firmly located within the normative framework of the Westminster Model, provides much of the explanation for the Labour Party’s long-standing reluctance to reform the House of Commons in such a way as to enhance its powers of scrutiny or enable backbenchers to play a more active and influential role. Moreover, the ultimately conservative consequences of operating within the paradigm of the Westminster Model have been compounded by calculations of partisan advantage and self-interest by successive Labour Governments. Regardless of their sporadic reformist rhetoric, senior Labour politicians have not wished to relinquish the power which a parliamentary (Commons) majority bestows upon them, and in this respect, the Blair Governments proved little different to their Old Labour predecessors.

3 The House of Lords

On summer evenings and winter afternoons, when they have nothing else to do, people discuss how to reform the House of Lords. Schemes are taken out of cupboards and drawers and dusted off, speeches are composed, pamphlets written, letters sent to newspapers . . . . Occasionally legislation is introduced; it generally fails. The frenzy dies away until next time. (Morgan, 1982: 294)

Introduction The Labour Party has been more critical of the House of Lords than of any other political institution or constitutional feature of British politics, yet has never been able to agree on precisely what to do about the Second Chamber. This is because the Party has advanced a variety of criticisms of the House of Lords, and whilst these have not been mutually exclusive, they have implied different ‘solutions’. For example, some Labour MPs have focused on the socio-political composition of the House of Lords, particularly the extent to which it comprised (until the very end of the twentieth century) hereditary peers, most of whom tended to be Conservatives. This, in turn, yielded much Labour criticism concerning the power (to delay legislation) of these unelected and thus unaccountable peers, even though this power was usually invoked only sporadically and sparingly, at least until the mid-1970s. Yet these two key objections raised a number of issues which the Labour Party has struggled satisfactorily to resolve. For example, if the primary objection to the House of Lords concerned its composition, then the question arose as to how precisely its membership should be reformed. Two particular options have variously been mooted in 100

The House of Lords

101

an attempt to address this question, namely the appointment of more Labour peers, in order to negate the inherent Conservative preponderance in the Upper Chamber, or the democratization of the Lords through some form of election. For those inclined towards the latter option, two further questions have immediately presented themselves. Firstly, by what means or mechanism ought the Upper Chamber to be elected; who or what would it represent? For example, should a reformed Second Chamber represent the regions of the United Kingdom? Secondly, what relationship would a more ‘representative’ House of Lords have vis-a-vis the House of Commons, for a more representative and accountable Upper Chamber might consequently be imbued it with the legitimacy to challenge the Lower House more readily and more frequently? On the other hand, for those Labour politicians primarily concerned with the power of the House of Lords, the issue has arisen as to whether the Upper House is too powerful or not powerful enough? Should the primary purpose of reform be to weaken further the (delaying) power of the House of Lords, or to increase its powers, thereby enhancing its ability to impose a delay on ill-conceived government legislation? These issues also raise the question of how far the powers of the House of Lords should be linked to its composition, such as whether a more ‘democratic’ House of Lords ought to be imbued with greater powers. Meanwhile, some Labour politicians have harboured such strong opposition to the House of Lords that nothing less than outright abolition would satisfy them, yet in advocating such a radical policy, they have been confronted by the question of how the House of Commons and its MPs would cope with the additional workload and responsibilities which would accrue from abolition of the Upper House. Labour’s apparent unwillingness, or inability, to provide clear answers or coherent solutions to such constitutional conundrums has thus militated against systematic and widely supported (in the Party) measures to reform – or even replace – the House of Lords. Consequently, those reforms which have periodically been proposed or pursued have invariably appeared hesitant or half-baked, and subsequently scaled-down or abandoned altogether. However, one important factor which has also prevented agreement amongst Labour parliamentarians over House of Lords’ reform has been the insistence, in accordance with the Party’s subscription to the Westminster Model of British government, that the House of Commons must remain pre-eminent, for it is the House of Commons which is directly elected, and from which the governing party is drawn, arguably with a

102 The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform

mandate to implement its manifesto programme. Consequently, proposals to strengthen the House of Lords or/and introduce direct elections to the Second Chamber have invariably prompted opposition from those Labour MPs and Ministers who fear that the primacy of the House of Commons – and inter alia the authority of a Labour Government within it – would be correspondingly diminished. This has left many Labour parliamentarians simultaneously opposed to hereditary peers (on the grounds that they are unelected, unaccountable and also overwhelmingly Conservative), opposed to a directly or wholly elected Second Chamber (lest this challenges the primacy of the House of Commons, and thus proves more obstructive of a Labour Government) and opposed to a Second Chamber whose members are appointed (this option giving rise to concerns about Prime Ministerial patronage, along with questions about accountability). Such concerns and considerations mean that a hundred years after its formation, the Labour Party had still not succeeded in devising – yet alone implementing – an agreed policy on House of Lords’ reform. Moreover, as with reform of the House of Commons, Labour Party debates over reform of the Upper House have inevitably revealed the often conflicting objectives of increasing efficiency and effectiveness, with most Ministers only really concerned with House of Lords’ reform to the extent that governmental measures and Bills could be more swiftly – efficiently – despatched through Parliament, whereas other Labour advocates of Lords reform have often envisaged a more effective Second Chamber, one which can subject Ministerial measures to proper scrutiny, either through enhanced power or by acquiring greater legitimacy by virtue of a more ‘representative’ membership. As with House of Commons’ reform, though, ‘effectiveness’ in this sense strongly implies that the progress of governmental measures and legislation would be somewhat slower, and thus, from a Ministerial perspective, less efficient.

Labour and the House of Lords prior to 1945 The Labour Party was first obliged to give serious consideration to its stance vis-a-vis the House of Lords as early as 1910, when Herbert Asquith, the Liberal Prime Minister, called a general election after peers in the House of Lords (most of them Conservatives) had defeated Lloyd George’s ‘People’s Budget’ by 350 votes to 75. The Labour Party’s election manifesto declared that

The House of Lords

103

A general election is being forced upon the country by the action in the House of Lords rejecting the budget. The great question you are to decide is whether the peers or the people are to rule this country . . . The time has come to to put an end to their power to override the will of the Commons . . . The Labour Party welcomes the opportunity to prove that ‘the frugal age’ is passed and that people are no longer willing to live on the sufferance of the Lords . . . The Lords must go (emphasis in original). Certainly, this unequivocal denunciation of the House of Lords reflected the attitude of many senior Labour politicians during the Party’s formative years, with Arthur Henderson in particular declaring that There are unmistakeable indications that the Democracy of this country is determined to take the management of its affairs into its own hands. An irresponsible and non-representative Chamber so long tolerated when the people slumbered will be swept aside by the onrushing tide that is carrying us forward to the triumph of complete democracy. (Labour Leader, 25 May 1906) In this context, Keir Hardie was emphatic that ‘if their lordships are spoiling for a fight with the Democracy we shall not say them nay, and once entered upon, the fight will go on to the finish’ (Labour Leader, 25 May 1906), whilst Henderson sustained his denunciations of the House of Lords, alleging that it ‘had never contributed one iota to public liberty or public freedom, or done anything to advance the common weal’ (Labour Leader, 28 June 1907). The Labour party’s formal commitment to abolition of the House of Lords was reaffirmed at its 1910 and 1911 conferences, as well as in its manifesto for the first of the (two) 1910 general elections. However, when the re-elected Liberal Government unveiled proposals for reform of the House of Lords, in order to remove the right of veto over Money Bills, and limit peers’ power of delay to two years, the Labour Party generally supported these measures, if only in lieu of eventual abolition. However, following the implementation of the 1911 Parliament Act, Labour’s formal commitment to outright abolition of the House of Lords was tempered by a recognition that the Liberal’s legislation had virtually assured the supremacy of the elected House of Commons over the unelected Upper Chamber, so that abolition no longer seemed quite so imperative. Subsequently, while the Labour Party remained generally hostile towards the House of Lords, with many of its MPs still favouring


abolition, official Labour policy was often more equivocal. For example, whereas Labour’s 1918 annual conference strongly supported a resolution declaring ‘that a hereditary chamber such as the House of Lords should be abolished’, making clear also the Party’s ‘confirmed opposition to any form of Second Chamber whether elected by the House of Commons or otherwise’, the Party’s policy programme, Labour and the New Social Order, published the same year, stated that while ‘the Party stands . . . for the complete abolition of the House of Lords’, it also had ‘a most strenuous opposition to any machinery for revision of legislation taking the form of a new Second Chamber, whether elected or not, having in it any element of Heredity or Privilege’. Such ambiguity was thereafter to be an almost constant feature of the Labour Party’s stance towards the House of Lords, as exemplified by Labour’s 1922 manifesto, which merely insisted that ‘there must be no restoration of the Lords’ veto’, whilst none of the Party’s subsequent manifestos during the 1920s made any reference whatsoever to the House of Lords. Official Labour Party policy during the early 1930s was to abolish the House of Lords if it sought seriously to obstruct the legislative programme of a Labour Government, with Labour’s 1931 manifesto declaring that if returned to Office, ‘it will tolerate no opposition from the House of Lords to the considered mandate of the people; and it will seek such emergency powers as are necessary for the full attainment of its objectives’. By 1935, however, the Labour Party was claiming, via its manifesto for that year’s election, that ‘it seeks power to abolish the House of Lords and improve the procedure in the House of Commons’. Clement Attlee, meanwhile, was castigating the House of Lords for being ‘an anachronism . . . a natural expression of a society based on privilege and wealth, but [which] is out of place in a modern democracy, and should be abolished’. As such, he warned ‘Any attempt at thwarting the will of the people will be met with effective action’ (Attlee, 1935: 113–14).

The 1945–1951 Attlee Governments and House of Lords’ reform With the two inter-war Labour Governments having declined to act upon the Party’s instinctive antipathy towards the House of Lords, not least because of their minority status on both occasions, and the urgency of the economic problems which they faced, the first real Labour attempt at reform of the Second Chamber occurred during the 1945– 1950 Attlee Government. The Labour Party’s 1945 manifesto Let Us Face the Future had declared that ‘we give clear notice that we will not tolerate

The House of Lords

105

obstruction of the people’s will by the House of Lords’, although there was no indication as to what Labour would do if were to encounter such obstruction (Labour Party, 1945: 3). Maybe it hoped that merely making such a declaration would provide sufficient warning to the House of Lords not to obstruct a Labour Government’s programme? If this was the intention, then initially at least, it seemed to serve its purpose, for in the wake of Labour’s landslide election victory, the Conservative leader in the House of Lords, the (fifth) Marquess of Salisbury, decreed that ‘it would be constitutionally wrong, when the country has expressed its view, for this House to oppose proposals which have definitely been put before the electorate’. This subsequently evolved into the Salisbury Doctrine, whereby the House of Lords refrained from opposing measures which were in the governing party’s election manifesto. Following the Marquess of Salisbury’s pledge, not only did the Attlee Government experience a singular lack of opposition or obstruction from the House of Lords during the first two years in Office, it also recognized that because of its major legislative programme, ‘the volume of government work was so great that a Second Chamber could hardly be dispensed with’ (Crick, 1964: 118). What finally prompted the first Attlee Government to introduce legislation to reduce the power of the House of Lords was actually Labour’s plan to nationalize the iron and steel industries. Having discussed the Government’s programme of public ownership during the summer of 1947, the Cabinet, clearly guided by Attlee, agreed that the nationalization of iron and steel would be deferred until the 1948–1949 parliamentary Session (NA CAB 128/10, Cabinet conclusions, 7 August 1947), ostensibly to facilitate the introduction of other governmental measures and legislation. It was recognized, however, that the nationalization of iron and steel would probably prove more controversial than previous measures taking industries into public ownership and that legislation might therefore be subject to obstruction in the House of Lords. If this were to be the case, it was recognized, then the House of Lords’ power of delay for two years might well be invoked to prevent iron and steel nationalization from reaching the Statute Book prior to the next general election, due in 1950. In order to pre-empt such a scenario, and also to placate those on the Left – such as Aneurin Bevan – who were disappointed by the deferral of iron and steel nationalization, it was proposed that a Bill be introduced to reduce the delaying power of the House of Lords to one year only. This would ensure that legislation to nationalize iron and steel would, if introduced during the 1948–1949 Session, come into effect before the


next election, whilst also serving to convince the Left of the Labour Party that the Attlee Government had not abandoned its radicalism and reforming zeal. Yet in agreeing to reduce the House of Lords’ power of delay, the Cabinet effectively prompted a major debate within the Labour Party over more systematic reform of the Upper House, addressing not only its powers, but its composition and overall functions or rationale. Indeed, this debate presaged divisions within the Labour Party which were to resurface when subsequent attempts at reforming the House of Lords were pursued in 1968–1969 and 1999. These divisions first appeared within the Cabinet itself at the beginning of 1948, when Lord Addison, Labour’s Leader in the Lords, presented a memorandum to his Ministerial colleagues on the issue of reforming the constitution of the Upper House. He pointed out that the Opposition Parties in the Lords were likely to raise this issue in relation to the Parliament Bill. He therefore sought the Cabinet’s views on how the House of Lords might be reformed beyond merely reducing its power of delay to one year. In discounting outright abolition, Lord Addison suggested that the Labour Party was effectively faced with three options, namely maintaining the status quo, pursuing a programme of reform in conjunction with the Opposition Parties and establishing an elected Second Chamber. In opting for the second of these options, Lord Addison suggested that the Government’s approach ought to enshrine five particular principles, namely that the power of delay should not be extended beyond that determined in the current Parliament Bill, abolition of the right of hereditary peers to attend and vote in the House of Lords, provision for the creation of Life Peers, payment of a salary for peers and altering the political composition to ensure that no Party enjoyed a permanent or in-built majority (NA CAB 129/12, CP(47)337, 6 January 1948). It immediately became apparent that the Cabinet was divided on the issue of whether the Government should pursue such a programme in the immediate future. Those Ministers supportive of such an approach pointed to the potential for achieving a reasonable consensus with the Opposition parties over reform of the Lords, which meant that the Government ought to seize the initiative whilst political circumstances were at their most propitious. Others within the Cabinet were more sceptical, concerned that wholesale reform of the House of Lords at this particular juncture might prove overly ambitious. It was suggested that not only was their little public clamour for reform of the House of Lords, but also ‘no settled body of opinion on this question in the Labour Party’, and as such, there was

The House of Lords

107

concern that ‘once the question was thrown open for discussion, many difficult and controversial issues would be raised on which there might well prove to be wide differences of opinion within the Party’, possibly extending to questions such as ‘whether any Second Chamber was necessary at all’. Furthermore, if the Labour Party did become embroiled in a protracted internal debate over reform of the House of Lords, ‘the Government would be open to serious criticism if they allowed Parliament to occupy itself with these matters at the cost of postponing urgent measures of social and economic reform’ (NA CAB 128/12, 1st conclusions, 6 January 1948). In the light of the Cabinet debate engendered by Lord Addison’s proposals, Attlee felt obliged to acknowledge that whilst he personally agreed with them, it was clear that they lacked sufficient support in the Cabinet, and that ‘if any consultations on this question were now held with the Parliamentary Labour Party, the Government might be pressed to advocate more drastic measures . . . arousing keen controversy’. Consequently, it was agreed that further discussion on reform of the House of Lords would be deferred until after the Parliament Bill had reached the Statute Book (NA CAB 128/12, 1st conclusions, 6 January 1948). Yet once the Parliament Bill did reach the statute book, there was little further discussion, with neither Attlee nor Morrison considering reform of the House of Lords composition to be a particularly pressing matter (Morgan, 1985: 85), particularly given its potential for both distracting and dividing the Cabinet at a time when more urgent issues were presenting themselves, most notably in the spheres of economic and foreign affairs. Indeed, as Morrison subsequently observed, once the House of Lords’ power of delay had been reduced by the 1949 Parliament Act: The Labour Government was not anxious for the rational reform of the democratization of the Second Chamber, for this would have added to its authority and would have strengthened its position as against that of the House of Commons. Changes which gave the House of Lords a democratic and representative character would have been undemocratic in outcome, for they would have tended to make the Lords the equals of the Commons . . . The very irrationality of the composition of the House of Lords and its quaintness are safeguard for our modern British democracy. (Morrison, 1964: 205) In 1953, the Conservative Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, invited the Labour Opposition (Labour having been narrowly defeated in the 1951 general election, in spite of polling almost ¼ million more votes


than the Conservatives) to participate in a further series of talks concerning reform of the House of Lords, claiming that ‘such a review is urgently required if the House [of Lords] is to play its proper part as a Second Chamber under the Constitution’ (quoted in Morrison, 1964: 202). However, Clement Attlee – still leader of the Labour Party at this time – was less than enthusiastic, replying that I have carefully considered with my colleagues your invitation to take part in an informal conference on the subject of reform of the House of Lords. In view of the fact that the previous discussions in 1948 on this subject revealed a fundamental cleavage of opinion between the Labour and Conservative parties on what is the proper part to be played by the House of Lords . . . we have come to the conclusion that no useful purpose would be served by our entering into such a discussion. (NA, PREM 11/2029 Attlee to Churchill, 18 February 1953) Neither was the Labour Opposition any more enthusiastic when the Conservative Government introduced the Life Peerages Bill at the end of 1957. On the contrary, the Labour line, as enunciated by Attlee’s successor, Hugh Gaitskell, was that the Bill would leave the hereditary principle and peers intact, along with the over-representation of the Conservative Party in the Upper House and its power of delay. Yet at the same time, it was likely to ‘enhance the prestige of the House’, whereupon it ‘may very well seek to use its existing powers far more extensively and far more frequently’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 582, cols. 417–18). As such, the Labour Party put forward a ‘reasoned amendment’ as Second Reading stage, declining to support ‘a Bill which leaves the House of Lords overwhelmingly hereditary in character and with unimpaired powers to frustrate and obstruct the will of the elected representatives of the people’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 582, col. 411). Instead, Gaitskell argued that ‘the first condition of any adequate reform’ should be eradicating ‘the permanent Tory majority’ and insisted that the House of Lords ‘should not be hereditary in character’ and should not be able to ‘overrule or obstruct the House of Commons’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 582, cols. 422–3). Yet the ensuing parliamentary debate, however, indicated a marked lack of agreement amongst Labour MPs over what precisely should be done about the House of Lords (see, for example, Aneurin Bevan, House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 582, cols. 683–95; Elaine Burton, ibid., cols. 48–85; Dingle Foot, ibid., cols. 669–75; Jennie Lee, ibid., cols. 610–15; Fred Mulley, ibid., cols. 657–64).

The House of Lords

109

The Labour Party was again obliged to consider the composition of the House of Lords in 1961, when Anthony Wedgwood (Tony) Benn sought to renounce the peerage just acquired from his father, Viscount Stansgate, in order to remain in the House of Commons, where he was Labour MP for the Bristol South-east constituency. The Committee of Privilege’s refusal to permit Benn to pursue this course of action prompted the Labour Party to demand the introduction of legislation permitting peers to renounce their titles for the purpose of remaining in, or seeking election to, the House of Commons (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 638, col. 575, 13 April 1961).1 Later that year, the Labour Party’s annual conference received a significant number of resolutions calling for the radical reform or outright abolition of the House of Lords, although Anthony Greenwood, replying on behalf of the Party’s NEC, sought to dampen down expectations in this direction and pointed out that the next Labour Government would inevitably be faced with ‘an extremely full and complicated Parliamentary timetable’. The implication was not merely that House of Lords’ reform was unlikely to be amongst the Party’s legislative priorities and that there would probably be insufficient time anyway, but also that the next Labour Government’s economic and social programme would probably require the co-operation and assistance of the Upper House in order to expedite the passage of legislation. Consequently, Greenwood informed Labour’s conference delegates that the Party’s policy, as endorsed by the NEC, was to make clear to the House of Lords that it would not tolerate obstruction of its policies having been returned to Office with the support of the British electorate. However, he also pledged that once elected, a Labour Government would review the position of the House of Lords in the context of prevailing circumstances, a pledge which was warmly welcomed by the conference.

The Wilson Governments 1964–1970 and the Parliament (No. 2) Bill As it had done in 1945, the Labour Party entered Office in 1964 with a somewhat nebulous commitment to reform of the House of Lords. The Party’s election manifesto declared that ‘we shall not permit effective

1

In fact, as a consequence of the controversy arising from Benn’s case, the Conservative Government introduced the 1963 Peerage Act, which permitted the renunciation of hereditary peerages, thereby allowing such individuals to stand for election to the House of Commons instead.


action to be frustrated by the hereditary and non-elective Conservative majority in the House of Lords’, but there was little of substance or specificity beyond this. Besides, Labour won the 1964 election with a majority of just five seats (which was then reduced to just three within as many months) and, as such, refrained from introducing the type of radical legislation – such as re-nationalization of the iron and steel industries – which might have incurred the active hostility of their Lordships. Slightly more specificity concerning Labour’s approach to the Upper House was provided in the 1966 election manifesto, which pledged that legislation would be introduced ‘to safeguard measures approved by the House of Commons from frustration by delay or defeat in the House of Lords’. Having been re-elected in April 1966 with its parliamentary majority increased to 97 seats, the Labour Government initially resolved to reduce the House of Lords’ power of delay only, many Ministers fearing that a more comprehensive programme, involving changes to the composition of the Upper House, would raise questions of considerable constitutional complexity. Besides, they reasoned, if the House of Lords’ delaying power was reduced, or possibly even removed altogether, then the character of its membership would cease to be of much significance. One other reason why the Cabinet initially demurred from a more broad-ranging attack on the House of Lords was recognition that ‘it’s jolly useful to have a second chamber’, and as such, it was widely acknowledged that ‘in reducing its powers, we mustn’t reduce its utility’ (Crossman, 1976: 94, diary entry for 26 October 1966). However, after he had been appointed Lord President of the Council, and Leader of the House, in August 1966, thereupon assuming responsibility for parliamentary reform, Crossman decided that more comprehensive reform of the Upper House would be desirable, although still with the objective of ensuring that it rendered the House of Lords more useful to the Commons with regard to expediting parliamentary business. Indeed, by the end of the year, Crossman had linked reform of the Lords with reform of the House of Commons, seeing both as integral to the modernization of Parliament. Furthermore, he persuaded Harold Wilson to support this more ambitious approach (Crossman, 1976: 166, diary entry for 15 December 1966). Crossman therefore established a Ministerial committee to consider proposals for reform of the House of Lords during the summer of 1967, but whereas the Cabinet had previously agreed merely to reduce the House of Lords’ power of delay, it soon became apparent to many of those most closely involved that the issue of powers could not effectively

The House of Lords

111

be considered in isolation from that of composition. It was thus argued that the Government could not afford to miss this ‘glaring and unrivalled opportunity’ to deal with the House of Lords’ ‘ludicrous and reactionary composition’. Certainly it did not seem rational to reform the Parliament in the name of modernization if ‘the most irrational Chamber in the world is to be left untouched’ (NA PREM 13/1685, Longford to Wilson, 29 March 1967; NA PREM 13/1686, meeting between Wilson and senior Ministers on Lords reform, 18 September 1967). Consequently, at the very first meeting of this Ministerial committee, it was readily agreed that the hereditary principle should be abolished, so that the House of Lords would be comprised of Life peers. However, this automatically raised two important questions, both of which revealed differences of opinion within the committee. Firstly, if the House of Lords was to be comprised of Life Peers, then how were they to be appointed? If they continued to be formally appointed by the Prime Minister, then this would entail an enormous increase in Prime Ministerial patronage (it was during the later half of the 1960s that some Labour politicians, especially Richard Crossman, and a number of academic commentators became concerned about the apparent emergence of ‘prime ministerial government’).Yet if it were no longer to be the Prime Minister’s prerogative, then presumably some ‘appointments panel’ would need to be established, which, in turn, would raise two further questions, namely how such a body itself would be appointed and what its criteria should be for making appointments to the House of Lords. The second substantive question arising from the agreement to replace hereditary peers with Life Peers was what the political balance of the revised House of Lords should be. Some of the Ministers serving on the Cabinet committee believed that the political complexion of the Second Chamber should reflect that in the Commons, thereby guaranteeing the governing party an in-built majority in the House of Lords. However, this was opposed by others on the committee, including Crossman himself, who feared that this would compound the perceived problem of Prime Ministerial patronage (NA CAB 134/3114, PL(67) 2nd meeting, 5 June 1967. See also NA PREM 133/1686, Trend to Wilson, 5 September 1967). Barely one month later, the Cabinet committee heard a proposal from John Silkin, Labour’s Chief Whip in the House of Commons, that a twotier system of peers should be established, whereby a bloc of ‘voting peers’ would be created each parliamentary Session, in proportion to the political parties’ representation in the House of Commons, and receive more generous remuneration, whilst the rest of the Lords would be comprised of ‘speaking peers’ who could participate in Debates, but be debarred


from actually voting in Divisions. Yet this was deemed totally unacceptable by other Ministers on the committee because a higher payment for the (government’s) ‘voting peers’ would be widely viewed, both inside and outside of Westminster, as ‘an abuse of patronage’ (Crossman, 1976: 417, diary entry for 8 July 1967). It was also pointed out that if a new category of ‘voting peers’ was created, with remuneration based on regular attendance and participation in the House of Lords, then difficulties might arise in determining, ‘with sufficient precision’, what constituted ‘regular attendance’. The payment of salaries to ‘voting peers’ would also, it was suggested, require some means ‘to ensure that a corresponding amount of work is done’ (NA PREM 13/1686, Trend to Wilson, 10 October 1967). Indeed, when the full Cabinet was made aware of some of these issues early in September, a number of Ministers reiterated their opposition to reforming the composition of the House of Lords, continuing to prefer a reduction in its powers only. With Wilson’s support, however, the Cabinet committee was authorized to continue its deliberations concerning composition as well as powers. This it did at a Chequers seminar the following week, when Crossman devised a compromise strategy intended to endear itself to the whole Cabinet, namely that the Government should commit itself immediately to abolition of the hereditary principle, but then discuss more wide-ranging reforms with the Opposition parties, in order to elicit all-Party support for a ‘two-tier’ system in the House of Lords. Although a number of senior Ministers – including the Harold Wilson himself – endorsed this approach, George Brown expressed concern that reform of the House of Lords ‘would be regarded as trying to distract attention from the real issue of unemployment’, and as such, would expose the Government to criticism not only from the press, but also from its own MPs and supporters. Callaghan too was a little concerned that ‘this was a kind of bread-and-circuses stunt - or at least would be regarded as such’ (Crossman, 1976: 481, diary entry for 18 September 1968; NA PREM 13/1686, meeting between Wilson and senior Ministers on Lords reform, 18 September 1967). The inter-party talks In search of a bipartisan consensus, senior Ministers initiated a series of talks with their senior Conservative counterparts in November 1967, these yielding considerable agreement on a range of measures, many of which subsequently appeared in the White Paper on Lords reform (see below). However, these inter-party talks were terminated in June

The House of Lords

113

1968, primarily due to the Labour Government’s annoyance at Conservative peers in the House of Lords opposing legislation to enact sanctions against Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), in accordance with a United Nations agreement (for a fuller discussion of these inter-party talks, see Morgan, 1975: Chapter 7). Meanwhile, Labour MPs themselves were still unable to agree over how the House of Lords should be reformed, for when the PLP met on 15 November 1967, the whole gamut of proposals were advanced, including total abolition of the House of Lords, removal of its powers of delay and banishing hereditary peers. At the same time, several Labour MPs reiterated the concern that if membership of the House of Lords was based on nomination, then this would yield an unacceptable increase in Prime Ministerial power and patronage. Following the abandonment of all-party talks on reform of the House of Lords, the Cabinet had to decide on its own course of action. One option was to introduce ‘a short, sharp Bill dealing with powers only, leaving changes in the composition for the indefinite future’ (Wilson, 1971: 608). Yet Lord Gardiner (the Lord Chancellor), along with Lord Longford (Labour’s Leader in the House of Lords), remained convinced that if the power of the House of Lords was to be curtailed, then its composition ought to be reformed at the same time. In the aftermath of the abandonment of the all-party talks, Harold Wilson himself was inclined to rush through legislation to reduce the House of Lords’ power of delay from twelve to six months, but Richard Crossman argued that if their composition remained unchanged, then peers would deploy other means of obstructing government legislation, most notably by keeping debates going indefinitely, which would not only delay the particular item of legislation being debated, but create a backlog of other government legislation (NA PREM 13/1686, 19 June 1968). Ironically, it was the subsequent Bill to reform the House of Lords (discussed below) which was ‘to gum up the Parliamentary works for many months, cause great irritability, and seriously detract from the speed and force with which the other . . . measures could be handled’ (Williams, 1972: 278). Wilson was again persuaded by Crossman, for the following day, he declared his support for a Bill to reform both the delaying power and the composition of the House of Lords, an approach which was then endorsed by the Cabinet itself. Meanwhile, on the same day that Crossman was persuading Wilson of the necessity for a more radical package of reform, a meeting of the PLP heard demands both for the abolition of hereditary peers and of the House of Lords’ power of delay.


Then, at a subsequent meeting of the PLP, in July 1968, the divisive potential of House of Lords again manifested itself, for while the hereditary principle was roundly condemned, along with the Lords’ power of delay, some Labour MPs also expressed concern that the Government was devoting too much time and energy to House of Lords’ reform when there were more important issues and problems which needed addressing, especially of an economic character (thereby confirming the doubts which George Brown had previously voiced about persevering with this particular issue). It was also pointed out that the Lords reform was not a particular cause of concern in the country at large, and that Ministers ought to be focusing on more salient issues. The White Paper on House of Lords reform Enshrining many of the key proposals originally considered by the interparty Conference, a White Paper on reform of the House of Lords was published on 1 November 1968 – having gone through 15 drafts during the summer and autumn in order to get it right (Morgan, 1975: 199; Ponting, 1990: 346). The main proposals were the following: • A distinction between ‘voting’ and ‘non-voting’ peers, although both categories would be entitled to speak in the Lords, ask questions and table motions. ‘Voting’ peers would be Life peers, although hereditary peers who wished to be eligible to vote could do so by opting to become Life peers instead. • ‘Voting peers’ would be required to play a regular and active role in the work of the House of Lords, attending at least a third of its sittings. They would also be expected to retire at a certain age. • The House of Lords would comprise about 230 ‘voting’ peers, with the governing party ensured of a small majority over Opposition peers, but still subject to defeat if Cross-benchers also voted with the Opposition. • The House of Lords’ power to delay House of Commons’ legislation would be reduced to six months. Furthermore, such a period of delay could be continued into a new parliamentary Session (thereby superseding the existing stipulation that any legislation not approved by the end of one parliamentary Session had to be reintroduced anew in the next parliamentary Session). This would effectively prevent the Lords from deliberately imposing a six month delay on legislation during the summer in the knowledge that the parliamentary Session would end in the autumn,

The House of Lords

115

thereby terminating the legislation completely, and thus compelling the government to re-introduce the measure during the next Session. • The House of Lords should be entitled to insist that the House of Commons reconsider an affirmative order, but it should not be entitled subsequently to reject it. • Voting peers should be remunerated, the rate to be determined by an independent committee.

Yet, almost immediately, it became apparent that the proposals lacked sufficient support on the Labour backbenchers, a factor which was to prove fatal for the ensuing legislation. While some Labour MPs shared George Brown’s and James Callaghan’s concern that reform of the House of Lords was a foolish distraction from more important or urgent matters, most notably the economic situation and unemployment, others – mainly on the Party’s Left – deemed the proposals enshrined in the White Paper either to be insufficiently radical or to be dangerous, in the sense that they would imbue the House of Lords with greater legitimacy and authority vis-a-vis the (democratically elected) House of Commons. Such MPs were therefore concerned that a reformed House of Lords might prove even more obstructive of a Labour Government pursuing radical policies and legislation and much more willing to deploy a six-month power of delay than it had been to invoke its existing [12-month] delaying power. Thus it was that at the end of a two-day Commons Debate on the White Paper, in mid-November 1968, an amendment moved by William Hamilton, rejecting the White Paper on House of Lords’ reform, was supported by 47 Labour MPs, whilst a further 40 Labour backbenchers abstained, in spite of a three-line whip having been imposed to support the White Paper (Norton, 1975: 304: Ponting, 1990: 346) The Parliament (No. 2) Bill2 By the beginning of December, enthusiasm for reform of the House of Lords had waned further in the Labour Party, to the extent that the relevant Cabinet committee itself wondered about the wisdom of persevering when the PLP was ‘so sharply divided’, and up to 50 Labour

2

It was titled thus because a Parliament Bill had already been introduced as a Private Member’s Bill in the House of Lords earlier that Session, although it made no progress (Morgan, 1975: 208, foonote 6).


MPs were likely to oppose legislation (based on the White Paper) because they would accept nothing less than outright abolition of the House of Lords (NA 134/3115, PL(68) 6th meeting, 2 December 1968). Yet having committed himself to House of Lords’ reform so publicly on more than one occasion during the year, Wilson decided to persevere, albeit with little enthusiasm himself by this time. When the Cabinet met during early December 1968 to discuss the legislative timetable for the Parliament (No. 2) Bill, which was based largely on the provisions enshrined in the White Paper, the Home Secretary, James Callaghan, suggested that the legislation be abandoned entirely – even though he himself had been a member of the Cabinet committee on Lords reform – in the face of likely attacks from both the Left and the Right in the House of Commons which he doubted the Government could endure. Outright opposition to the Bill was also expressed by Barbara Castle, Tony Crosland and Denis Healey, but eventually, the Cabinet, with the support of Tony Benn, Richard Crossman, Fred Peart, Lord Shackleton and Peter Shore, committed itself to publishing the Bill before Christmas, with the Second Reading to follow in January. Although the Government obviously expected considerable opposition to the Bill from the Conservative Party (although it transpired that some senior Conservatives, such as Reginald Maudling and Sir Alec Douglas-Home, were actually quite supportive of the legislation), it was from its own backbenchers, particularly those on the Left of the PLP, that the Wilson Government experienced the most damaging hostility. Such critics complained that the Government’s reform would effectively serve to increase the obstructive potential of the Upper Chamber, for by reducing the power of delay from one year to six months, peers would be more likely to invoke this power against Labour’s legislation. For Left-wing critics such as Michael Foot, any measure other than outright abolition – ‘I am a fervent abolitionist’ – would merely serve to enhance the legitimacy of the House of Lords. Furthermore, Foot intimated that the very fact that a number of senior Conservatives were broadly supportive of the legislation ought to alert his parliamentary colleagues to the dangers posed for the Labour Party in giving the Parliament (No. 2) Bill its second reading (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 777, cols. 84–90). Following on from this, another Labour backbench opponent of the Bill, Robert Sheldon suggested that what the Government was actually doing ‘is taking away from the other place powers which would have destroyed it if the Members there had dared to use those powers vigorously to oppose a Labour Government . . . . We are taking away powers which the other place dare not use, and giving it powers which it can,

The House of Lords

117

and will, use’, and as such, the Bill ‘fundamentally weakens the House of Commons’ (House of Commons, 5th series, Vol. 777, cols. 110–14). Although the Parliament (No. 2) Bill was given its second reading by 285 votes to 135, the Labour Government saw 25 of its backbench MPs vote against the Bill, for which a two-line whip had been imposed. However, it was during the committee stage – which, because of the Parliament (No. 2) Bill’s obviously key constitutional character, was conducted on the Floor of the House, rather than being ‘sent upstairs’ – that the opponents of this legislation were able to obstruct its progress. From the outset, Right-wing Conservative and Left-wing Labour opponents of the Bill deployed a range of tactics to impede its progress through Standing Committee, most notably raising points of order (on one occasion, on 18 March, a series of points of order lasted almost two hours), making lengthy speeches, tabling various amendments as well as other procedural devices, yet these MPs were numerous enough to ensure that even if the Government had sought to impose a guillotine (to limit the time spent on remaining Clauses), this too would have been defeated in a Division. However, what also compounded the lack of support for the Bill among some Labour backbenchers was precisely the growing awareness that many of their Ministerial colleagues were, by now, unenthusiastic about persevering with it. In this context, Labour’s Left-wing opponents of the Bill had reason to believe that if they sustained their active opposition, the Cabinet would finally admit defeat and abandon the legislation. This perspective was underpinned by cognizance that even many of those Labour MPs and Ministers who supported the Bill were experiencing a steady loss of morale over the issue during the early months of 1969. Initially the Cabinet decided to continue with the Parliament (No. 2) Bill, partly through fear of setting a precedent whereby Government legislation would be abandoned if 30–40 Labour backbenchers strongly opposed it. This was a significant consideration at the time, in view of the other legislation which Ministers were concerned with, most notably on prices and incomes, and industrial relations reform, for these were also opposed by a number of Labour MPs (NA CAB 128/44, Part One, 10th conclusions, 27 February 1969, and 11th Conclusions, 6 March 1969). However, although the Cabinet remained formally committed to pursuing the Parliament (No. 2) Bill, there was also a clear recognition that the present situation could not be permitted to continue for much longer. Indeed, by early March, Crossman observed that ‘the inner crisis about Lords reform is deeply affecting all our legislative plans’ (Crossman, 1977: 401, diary entry for 9 March 1969), while Wilson acknowledged that the


Parliament (No. 2) Bill, in tandem with the Government’s controversial industrial relations legislation (based on the 1969 White Paper In Place of Strife), ‘was putting strain on the Parliamentary [Labour] Party’ (Wilson, 1971: 609). Abandonment of the Parliament (No. 2) Bill By the middle of April 1969, the Parliament (No. 2) Bill had spent two months making extremely slow progress through its committee stage, due largely to the obstructionist tactics adopted by its opponents. Indeed, only the Bill’s preamble and first five Clauses had been debated by midApril, which, Ministers realized, would mean that the Bill might still be in standing committee by August. If this proved to be the case, then there would clearly be serious repercussions for the remainder of the Government’s legislative programme, and with no guarantee anyway that the Bill would secure the Royal Assent before the end of the Session (in which case it would have to be introduced anew during the 1969– 1970 Parliament, the last full Session before the next general election). On 8 April, at a meeting between Barbara Castle, Richard Crossman and Roy Jenkins, it was suggested that the planned introduction of Castle’s Industrial Relations Bill would provide the Government with a pretext for abandoning the Parliament (No. 2) Bill, a proposal which Harold Wilson agreed with when he met the Castle, Crossman and Jenkins two days later. The proposal was then endorsed at a meeting of the full Cabinet on 16 April, although there was ‘a tremendous argument about it’, with a number of Ministers, most notably Tony Benn, George Gardiner, Lord Shackleton and Michael Stewart remaining in favour of persevering with House of Lords’ reform (Benn, 1988: 160–1, diary entry for 16 April 1969). It was pointed out, for example, that what the Cabinet was effectively doing was abandoning ‘a Bill to limit the power of the Peers in favour of a Bill to limit the freedom to strike’, yet overall, and however reluctantly, most Ministers agreed that to continue with the Parliament (No. 2) Bill would be to waste yet more time, with damaging repercussions for the rest of the Government’s legislative programme during the remainder of the parliamentary Session (NA CAB 128/44 Part One, 18th Conclusions, 16 April 1969; see also NA PREM 13/3402, ‘Notes of meeting with Douglas Houghton, Charles Pannell, Emmanuel Shinwell, Dingle Foot and George Strauss’, 25 March 1969). When Wilson announced the abandonment of the Parliament (No. 2) Bill in the House of Commons on 17 April, the reason given was the need to make more time available for other important items of legislation, most notably the Industrial Relations Bill. Wilson intimated that

The House of Lords

119

House of Lords reform would be resumed at a later date – a pledge reiterated in Labour’s 1970 manifesto (Labour Party, 1970: 17) – but given the lack of agreement or enthusiasm in much of the Labour Party, right up to Ministerial level, this apparent pledge seemed to lack conviction. In the meantime, there was great irony in the fact that having abandoned the Parliament (No. 2) Bill in order to permit the introduction of the Industrial Relations Bill, the latter was also abandoned due to lack of support amongst Ministers and Labour MPs, especially those sponsored by trade unions.

Labour and House of Lords’ reform in the 1970s Not surprisingly, the Labour Party lost interest in House of Lords’ reform during the first half of the 1970s, partly due to the failure of the Parliament (No. 2) Bill, of course, but also because, having lost the 1970 election, it was primarily concerned with opposition to the Conservative Government of Edward Heath. Heath’s Government was initially committed to a number of relatively radical proposals, which diverged somewhat from the paternalistic, ‘one nation’ approach of the 1951– 1964 Conservative Administrations. Possibly the most radical proposal was for major legislative reform of industrial relations, which almost immediately set the Heath Government on a collision course with the trade unions. Although many of the provisions in the Heath Government’s Industrial Relations Bill were not dissimilar to those which had been enshrined in Barbara Castle’s In Place of Strife, the Labour Party now had few qualms about vehemently opposing them. Such opposition, of course, afforded Labour an excellent opportunity to seek a rapprochement with the trade unions, following the bitterness which had arisen between them due to In Place of Strife. Joint opposition to the Heath Government’s legislative proposals would therefore enable the Labour Party to win back the trust of the trade unions, as would the concomitant development of a ‘social contract’ during the early 1970s. Such priorities and pre-occupations thus further ensured that House of Lords’ reform was not uppermost in the Labour Party’s mind during the first half of the 1970s, quite apart from other issues of fundamental importance, such as membership of the European Communities, which Britain finally joined on 1 January 1973. As such, the Labour Party entered the February and October 1974 general elections with no clear commitments or manifesto pledges concerning reform of the House of Lords.


However, lacking an overall parliamentary majority for most of the the 1974–1979 period, the Labour Governments encountered considerable opposition from the House of Lords, the latter implying that the narrowness of its election victories in 1974 hardly constituted a mandate for some of its more contentious measures, most notably various proposals for nationalization. Certainly, in view of Labour’s ‘minority government’ status for most of this time, peers felt less constrained by the ‘Salisbury Doctrine’, reasoning that the Party had hardly been given a ringing endorsement by the electorate to implement its manifesto programme. Yet the more confident and damaging, in terms of obstructing the Cabinet’s legislative programme – opposition of Conservative peers to various Wilson–Callaghan Governments’ measures prompted a rapid renewal of interest in reform or abolition of the House of Lords, particularly on the Left. Consequently, House of Lords’ reform was once again considered, this time by the NEC’s machinery of government group, partly in response to a request by the NEC’s Home Policy Committee (which was itself responding to a strongly supported motion passed at Labour’s 1976 conference, calling for a commitment to abolition of the Second Chamber). The ‘inquiry’ concluded that the constitutional and practical problems associated with the various schemes of reform were so vexatious that it would indeed be better for Labour to opt for outright abolition of the House of Lords, a recommendation which was then endorsed at the Party’s 1977 conference, and then, much to the consternation of many Ministers, included by the NEC in a draft of the 1979 election manifesto. However, James Callaghan, Labour’s Prime Minister by this time (Wilson having resigned in 1976), was so strongly opposed to such a policy that he personally vetoed the pledge, ensuring instead that the final manifesto merely contained a commitment to remove the House of Lords’ remaining powers. This veto, incidentally, was one of the factors which, immediately after the 1979 election defeat, fuelled the ascendant Left’s demand that Labour’s NEC should be granted full control of writing the Party’s manifesto (Jones and Keating, 1985: 161) and that Labour’s parliamentary leadership should be rendered more ‘accountable’ to the wider labour movement, in order to prevent such ‘betrayal’ in the future.

Labour and the commitment to abolition during the early 1980s In the aftermath of the 1979 election defeat, the Labour Party moved sharply to the Left, as evinced both by the internal organizational reforms

The House of Lords

121

introduced within the Party and by the subsequent policy commitments adopted. Among these policies was a commitment to abolish the House of Lords, on the grounds that the Upper House was ‘clearly an anachronism in a modern democracy’, and one whose ‘composition . . . is overwhelmingly anti-Labour’, to the extent that it could, as it had allegedly done previously, ‘seriously obstruct the programme of an elected Labour government’. As such, there was deemed to be ‘no place for such an outdated and unrepresentative body in a democratic legislature’, hence Labour’s intention ‘to abolish the House of Lords in the lifetime of the next parliament’ (Labour Party, 1983: 34). Those in the Labour Party supporting this approach could point to the manner in which the House of Lords had obstructed some of the Wilson–Callaghan Governments’ legislation, most notably the 1975 Trade Union and Labour Relations Bill, the 1976 Dock Work Regulation Bill and the 1976 Aircraft and Shipbuilding Industries Bill. In adopting a policy of outright abolition, the Labour Party of the early 1980s (with the ‘fervent abolitionist’ Michael Foot as Party Leader from October 1980 to October 1983) argued that none of the alternatives variously suggested for the reform of the House of Lords were satisfactory, either because ‘they would not be truly democratic, or they would have the makings of a built-in constitutional deadlock’, which, it was suggested, was precisely what motivated some professed advocates of reform: ‘they see it as a more effective back-door way of blocking radical change than the indefensible House of Lords’ (Labour Party, 1982: 206–7). As such, it was deemed vital that the Labour Party accept nothing less than to ‘finally remove the feudal power of the House of Lords’ (Silkin, 1983: 185). As such, the commitment to abolition of the Upper Chamber was included in Labour’s 1983 manifesto (Labour Party, 1983: 32), in the hope that this would provide the Party with ‘a mandate from the people to achieve the complete end of the House of Lords’ (Benn, 1980: 133).

Labour’s 1987–1989 Policy Review and the House of Lords Labour’s formal commitment to abolition of the House of Lords was maintained up until the Policy Review, which was launched immediately after the Party’s heavy defeat in the 1987 general election. Thereafter, the Policy Review Group on ‘Democracy for the Individual and the Community’, whose remit included constitutional reform, developed a new approach to the House of Lords, even though the Group’s chair, Roy Hattersley (also Deputy Labour Leader), had initially been inclined


to retain the commitment to outright abolition (Hughes and Wintour, 1990: 160). Part of the inspiration for the new policy which emerged regarding the House of Lords was the increasing authoritarianism of the Thatcher Governments – buttressed by their enormous parliamentary majorities – during the 1980s, which enabled the Labour Party to invoke Lord Hailsham’s former warning about the danger of Britain succumbing to an ‘elective dictatorship’. As such, whereas Labour had previously denounced the anti-democratic character and composition of the House of Lords, the Party’s Policy Review cast the Upper Chamber in a new light – subject to appropriate reform, of course, – as a protector of individual liberties and constitutional rights against an over-mighty House of Commons. Although Thatcherite authoritarianism provided much of the context for this new role, it was also linked to Labour’s ambivalence about committing itself to a Bill of Rights, on the grounds that liberties would henceforth be entrusted to the judiciary rather than Parliament. Yet determining that the House of Lords would be retained, and ascribed a new constitutional role, still left unresolved the vexatious question of its future composition, particularly as the Review Group readily accepted that an Upper Chamber ‘based on inheritance and patronage is unacceptable in a modern democracy’. The ineluctable logic of this premise was that the new House of Lords (or what ever nomenclature was to be ascribed to the second chamber) would have to elected, yet while it was acknowledged that ‘The form of election . . . will be a matter of further consideration’, it was suggested that a different system or basis of representation to the House of Commons would be apposite, with a recommendation that ‘members of the new second chamber should particularly reflect the interests and aspirations of the regions and nations of Britain’ (Labour Party, 1989: 55). This was indeed a remarkable about-turn regarding the Labour Party’s view of the House of Lords. Having traditionally lambasted the Upper House for being a reactionary obstacle to the will of the people mediated via the House of Commons, an elected House of Lords was now to become the progressive guardian of individual liberty and freedom, keeping vigilant watch over MPs to ensure that they did not legislate in manner which impinged upon the rights of the British people. Furthermore, having hitherto constantly criticized the Second Chamber’s power of delay vis-a-vis legislation approved by the Commons, the Labour Party now proposed that a reformed House of Lords be granted the power ‘to delay, for the lifetime of a Parliament, change to designated legislation reducing individual or constitutional rights’ (Labour Party, 1992: 20).

The House of Lords

123

Whilst this doubtless appeared an attractive and potentially populist proposal to many in the Labour Party, in Opposition, against an imperious Conservative Government, it only required the most minimal prescience to foresee the type of problems which it might engender for a future Labour Government. A House of Lords reformed and recast on this basis might, for example, decree that legislation to ban fox hunting or smoking in pubs and restaurants constituted an unacceptable reduction of personal freedom. Furthermore, by virtue off having been elected – by whatever method was subsequently adopted – the House of Lords might claim a legitimacy, even a mandate, which it had hitherto lacked and which would render it even more obstructive when Labour was next in Office. Meanwhile, the Labour Party also appeared to become more firmly committed to an elected House of Lords during the first half of the 1990s, as indicated by the 1991 policy statement Opportunity Britain, the following year’s election manifesto, and Labour’s 1993 constitutional reform programme A New Agenda for Democracy: Labour’s Proposals for Constitutional Reform, the latter pledging that once hereditary peers had been removed, a Labour Government would ‘then begin the process of introducing proper democratic elections’. The policy document also firmly rejected unicameralism, insisting that ‘there is a powerful case for a bicameral . . . legislature’, in which a reformed and democratized House of Lords would provide ‘a valuable revising chamber’, although no changes were envisaged with regard to the powers of the House of Lords (Labour Party, 1993: 35).

New Labour and the ‘two stages’ of House of Lords’ reform The House of Lords reform mooted under the aegis of Labour’s Policy Review was still official Party policy when Tony Blair became the leader in July 1994. Thereafter, though, Labour’s approach to the House of Lords changed yet again, for although the professed commitment to an elected Second House was retained (continued lack of clarity over the precise method and basis of election notwithstanding), abolition of hereditary peers became the first priority. Blair made clear his view that House of Lords’ reform should entail a longer term approach, probably involving at least two stages. Abolition or removal of hereditary peers would constitute the initial reform, whereupon a Labour government could then contemplate further reform, including how membership of the House of Lords was to be determined. This, it was widely assumed, would pave the way for an Upper House which was at least partly elected, although this


would again raise fundamental questions about the basis and nature of membership (for example, if a Labour Government fulfilled its pledges with regard to devolution, would a non-hereditary House of Lords be elected on a regional basis?) and the precise method of election. Yet right from the outset, Tony Blair’s commitment to an elected House of Lords was equivocal. For example, in February 1996, during a John Smith Memorial Lecture, Blair suggested that ‘we should first make the House of Lords a genuine body of the distinguished and meritorious - with a better, more open and independent means of establishing membership - and then debate how we incorporate democratic accountability’. Such words were, of course, open to differing interpretations. At face value, they could be viewed as confirmation that Blair was indeed committed, in the longer term, to an elected House of Lords and that removing the hereditary peers was simply a precursor to establishing a genuinely democratic Upper House. Alternatively, however, it was possible to interpret Blair’s speech as a retrenchment of the erstwhile commitment to an elected House of Lords, for not only did a two-stage process raise the spectre of almost infinite delay, whereby the second stage might be repeatedly deferred, the question was also raised as to whether a Blair Government would still consider an elected House of Lords desirable or necessary once the hereditary peers had been abolished. Indeed, it was not difficult to imagine that once the House of Lords had been imbued with a ‘distinguished and meritorious’ membership, determined in a ‘more open and independent’ manner, then Blair might well argue that this itself would suffice and that there was no longer any need to proceed to an elected Second House. This two-stage approach was reaffirmed in ‘New Labour’s’ 1997 election manifesto, which pledged that As an initial self-contained reform, not dependent on further reform in the future, the rights of hereditary peers to sit and vote in the House of Lords will be ended by statute. This will be the first step in a process of reform to make the House of Lords more democratic and representative . . . . The system of appointment of life peers to the House of Lords will be reviewed . . . to ensure [that] over time party appointees as life peers more accurately reflect the proportion of votes cast at the previous general election . . . No one political party should seek a majority in the House of Lords . . . . A committee of both Houses of Parliament will be appointed to undertake a wide ranging review of possible further change and then bring forward proposals for reform. (Labour Party, 1997: 26)

The House of Lords

125

The manifesto commitment was thus both lengthy (far more so than any previous Labour election pledge on House of Lords reform) and apparently provided a clear statement of intent, yet ambiguity remained with regard to who or what would follow the abolition of hereditary peers. Although the manifesto reiterated the commitment to ensuring that the House of Lords was rendered ‘more democratic and representative’, there was no explicit pledge on direct elections. Furthermore, sceptics could ask whether, if the party balance was made more commensurate with the proportion of votes cast for each of the parties in the general election, Labour Ministers would subsequently feel any compunction or inclination to introduce direct elections for the House of Lords. Might not such Ministers – particularly Tony Blair himself – retort that a more accurate party balance, achieved through a revised system of appointments, was itself politically ‘representative’, thereby obviating the need for a directly elected Upper House? Those in the Labour Party who were concerned that the leadership’s commitment to democratizing the House of Lords was somewhat equivocal or expendable would have felt even more anxiety in view of the omission of Lords reform from the Labour’s legislative programme for the first parliamentary session. Not until the second session was New Labour’s formal commitment to abolishing hereditary peers given legislative effect, in the form of a short House of Lords Bill introduced in January 1999. Depicted as ‘stage one’ of the Blair Government’s commitment to reforming the House of Lords, the Bill’s five clauses decreed that membership of the Second House would no longer be permissible merely by virtue of inheriting a peerage. Instead, hereditary peers who wished to participate in the House of Lords would be required to renounce their peerages and become Life Peers instead. Alternatively, they would be entitled to seek election to the House of Commons as MPs instead (for a full discussion of the Bill, see Shell, 2000). However, in order to ‘persuade’ Conservative Peers not to block either the House of Lords Bill itself or other items in the Government’s forthcoming legislative programme, Ministers intimated that they would be willing to accept an amendment to the Bill whereby approximately 10 per cent of hereditary peers would be permitted to remain in situ until ‘stage two’ was enacted. Known as the Weatherill agreement – having been proposed by Lord (Bernard) Weatherill, a former (Conservative) Speaker of the House of Commons – and agreed to by the Conservative Leader in the Lords, Viscount Cranborne (who was consequently dismissed by William Hague for entering into this agreement without Hague’s permission or knowledge), the amendment would effectively


grant a stay of execution to 92 peers until the second stage of House of Lords’ reform was completed. Although some Labour MPs were unhappy that their Government was apparently being ‘held to ransom’ by opponents of reform, and insisted that all hereditary peers should be removed by the Bill, Ministers themselves evidently shared Peter Mandelson’s view that the Weatherill agreement would provide ‘a proper reward for good behaviour on the part of the House that might otherwise be tempted to filibuster the Bill endlessly, thus doing enormous damage to the rest of the Government’s programme’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 324, col. 764). Some Labour backbenchers, though, queried the need for a Royal Commission at all, favouring, as they did, outright abolition of the House of Lords. Amongst them was Dennis Skinner who wryly suggested that against the options of retaining or reforming the Lords, abolition constituted ‘the third way’ and ought therefore to be the option adopted by the Government (House of Commons, 6th series, Vol. 323, col. 919), whilst Robert Marshall-Andrews – proudly declaring himself to be ‘an unashamed, intractable, practising unicamerlaist’ – caustically suggested that ‘we do not require the expense . . . of a Royal Commission; we require a gang of bricklayers . . . to wall up the entrance on the other side of the Central Lobby’ (House of Commons, 6th series, Vol. 324, col. 778). Yet some Labour MPs also strongly suspected that once the majority of hereditary peers had been removed, and a more politically balanced Upper Chamber established, the Party’s leadership would rapidly lose interest in further reform of the House of Lords, so that ‘stage two’ would never actually be reached. Or as Tony Benn expressed it, ‘I fear that the transitional scheme will be permanent – because it suits everybody at the top’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 324, col. 625). Similarly, Robert Sheldon expressed his fear ‘that the first stage will be the only stage’, and wondered whether Lord Cranbourne’s acceptance of the compromise, providing a temporary reprieve for 92 hereditary peers, derived from his realization that ‘there was a possibility that the arrangement would last in perpetuity’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 324, col. 794; see also House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 332, col. 668). For such sceptics, the establishment of a Royal Commission did not signify a desire to achieve a bipartisan approach to the House of Lords’ reform so much as an intention to delay, and then abandon, more wide-ranging changes. Furthermore, as Robert Sheldon pointed out, ‘the more defensible the composition of the House of Lords is, the more it will wish to use the powers it . . . has’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 323, col. 916).

The House of Lords

127

In the meantime, this compromise measure ensured that 17 hereditary peers remained, with cross-bench support, on the basis of being office-holders in the House of Lords, whilst the remaining 75 peers were elected, in accordance with the extant Party ‘balance’ in the Upper House, by hereditary peers from their own Party. This interim arrangement provided the Conservative Party with 42 seats, the cross-benchers 28, the Liberal Democrats 3 and 2 for the Labour Party. The White Paper on stage two and the Royal Commission The First Reading of the House of Lords Bill was accompanied by the publication of a White Paper (Stationery Office, 1999) delineating the Government’s strategy for securing the second stage of reform following the removal of the hereditary peers and establishing a Royal Commission to consider both the composition of the House of Lords and its subsequent functions and powers. It was instructed to publish a report containing recommendations for reform by the end of the year, its terms of reference being the following: Having regard to the need to maintain the position of the House of Commons as the pre-eminent chamber of Parliament, and taking particular account of the present nature of the constitutional settlement, including the newly devolved institutions, the impact of the Human Rights Act, and developing relations with the European Union: • To consider and make recommendations on the role and functions of a second chamber; • To make recommendations on the method or combination of methods of composition required to constitute a second chamber fit for that role and those functions. Reflecting Tony Blair’s apparent desire to pursue a consensual, crossParty approach to the House of Lords’ reform – as part of wider professed commitment to a more pluralistic and inclusive mode of politics – it was announced that the Royal Commission was to be chaired by Lord Wakeham, a former Conservative Cabinet Minister who had also served as a Leader in both Houses of Parliament. Other members of the Royal Commission included Labour’s Gerald Kaufman, Lord Butler (former Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Civil Service), Baroness Dean (previously leader of the print union SOGAT and then a Labour Life Peer), Lord Hurd (a former Conservative Home Secretary, Foreign Secretary and challenger for the Party leadership when Margaret Thatcher resigned in November


1990), Anthony King (Professor of Government at Essex University), Bill Morris (leader of the Transport and General Workers Union), Dawn Oliver (Professor of Constitutional Law at University College, London) and Sir Michael Wheeler-Booth (Clerk of the Parliaments from 1991 to 1997). When the Wakeham Commission did publish its Report, in January 2000 (Royal Commission on the Reform of the House of Lords, 2000), it offered no less than 132 recommendations for reforming the House of Lords, whose overall role would continue to be that of supplementing the House of Commons in scrutinizing the Government, whilst also providing ‘a formally constituted voice’ for the regions and nations of the United Kingdom (although a federal institution was explicitly ruled out). With regard to the former role, the Wakeham Report suggested that the reformed House of Lords should retain its power of delay visà-vis legislation from the House of Commons, and play an enhanced role in scrutinizing secondary legislation, even though the Commons would remain pre-eminent overall. It also suggested that the ‘Salisbury Doctrine’ should be maintained and that the Upper Chamber ‘should be cautious about challenging the clearly-expressed views of the House of Commons on any public policy issue’, this latter principle probably requiring the establishment of a new convention (Royal Commission on the House of Lords, 2000: Chapter 4, para 4.24). It was further suggested that the function of scrutiny could be enhanced by permitting Ministers recruited from the House of Commons to answer questions and make statements in the Upper House too. It was the Royal Commission’s recommendations concerning the composition of the reformed House of Lords, however, which attracted most interest, not least because the members had themselves been unable to reach complete agreement over how membership of the reformed Upper House should be determined. Although it was agreed that the Second Chamber should not be wholly or largely elected, but part-elected and part-appointed and with approximately 550 members, there was a lack of unanimity over what proportion of this membership should be directly elected, with three possible ‘models’ being suggested, namely 65 elected, 87 elected or 195 elected. The Royal Commission’s Report did indicate, though, that the second of these ‘models’ had attracted ‘the support of a substantial majority’, with the election of the 87 members to be via proportional representation and based on the constituencies used for elections to the European Parliament. The remainder of the second chamber’s membership was to be determined via an independent Appointments Commission, which would be

The House of Lords

129

expected to ensure that the Upper House was more politically balanced, and also representative of British society. To these ends, it was recommended that, politically, appointments to the new second chamber ‘should match that of the country as expressed in votes cast at the most recent general election’, although at least 20 per cent of appointees should not be affiliated to any of the major political parties. In terms of creating a more socially representative second chamber, the ‘Wakeham Report’ proposed that, initially, at least 30 per cent of the new members should be women, ‘with the aim of making steady progress towards gender balance in the chamber as a whole over time’. It was also suggested that representation of ethnic minorities should be ‘at least proportionate to their presence in the population as a whole’, whilst the second chamber should also ensure greater representation for the various religious faiths in Britain, including ‘non-Christian faith communities’. Following publication of the Royal Commission’s Report, though, Labour Ministers – Tony Blair especially – evinced little enthusiasm for proceeding to ‘stage two’, thereby fuelling the suspicions of those (including many Labour MPs) who feared that once the vast majority of hereditary peers had been removed, the ‘transitional’ House of Lords would acquire a sense of permanency, particularly given the rate at which Tony Blair has appointed Labour Life Peers to secure greater parity with the Conservatives in the Upper Chamber. True, an Appointments Commission was duly established, apparently to reduce Prime Ministerial patronage with regard to the allocation of peerages, and 15 so-called people’s peers were subsequently elected from an apparently open contest in which ordinary people were invited to apply, but given that seven of those finally selected by the Appointments Commission already had knighthoods, while three were professors and one was a Lord’s wife (The Guardian, 27 April 2001), a genuinely more democratic or ‘representative’ House of Lords still seemed a distant prospect. Labour’s 2001 election manifesto did declare the Party’s commitment to ‘completing House of Lords reform’ which would include removal of the remaining hereditary peers, coupled with the implementation of many of the reforms recommended by the Royal (Wakeham) Commission ‘in the most effective way possible’ (Labour Party, 2001: 35) – a pledge reiterated in the subsequent Queen’s Speech – yet less than 3 months after being re-elected, the Blair Government announced that it was abandoning a cross-Party committee which had been intended to secure bipartisan agreement on further Lords reform. Although this announcement implied that the Blair Government genuinely wished to proceed more swiftly to ‘stage two’ – the implication being that


inter-party talks would provide Conservative opponents of further reform with too much scope for delay and obstruction – sceptics were inclined to view it as a sign of further downgrading of Lords reform by Blair and his Ministers. Such scepticism was underpinned by the Government’s claim that it would be publishing its own proposals for reform during 2002, probably in the form of a draft Bill, and then inviting responses, for although this could be construed as a firm commitment or plan of action, it was also likely to afford the Government plenty of scope for further delay, on the grounds that either it was still considering responses and recommendations or there was a lack of parliamentary time to pursue the Bill, thereby deferring reform even further (The Times, 20 August 2001).

House of Lords’ reform after the 2001 election A few months after having been re-elected with another large parliamentary majority in June 2001, the Blair government published a White Paper entitled Modernising Parliament, in which it proposed a House of Lords comprising 600 members, of whom 20 per cent would be directly elected, a further 20 per cent would be appointed via an independent appointments committee and the remaining 60 per cent would be appointed to reflect their party’s share of seats in the House of Commons. Put another way, the Government’s proposals meant that 80 per cent of the Second Chamber would continue to be appointed rather than elected, a fact that was totally unacceptable to a large number of Labour MPs, many of whom signed a series of Early Day Motions between November 2001 and May 2002, calling for a much larger directly elected element in the House of Lords. The breadth and depth of criticism directed at these proposals for ‘stage two’ of House of Lords were such that May 2002 heralded the formal abandonment of them by the Government. The preceding months had not only heard continued criticisms from backbenchers on all sides of the House – the select committee on public administration, chaired by Labour’s Tony Wright, had itself published a critical report in February, which advocated the direct election of 60 per cent of the Upper House’s membership – the Cabinet too was variously reported to have been divided over the original proposals (see, for example, The Guardian, 14 May 2002). Meanwhile, almost 90 per cent of the 1000 responses received during the November–January consultation period had indicated a preference for a Second Chamber in which majority of Members were directly elected.

The House of Lords

131

Conceding, therefore, that November’s proposals did not enjoy widespread support, the Government opted to allow a joint (Commons and Lords) all-party committee to draft proposals for ‘stage two’, paying particular attention to the composition of the Upper Chamber. The committee would, it was envisaged, present various options to both Houses concerning the composition of the Upper Chamber (and thus the size of the directly elected element), with MPs and peers then permitted a free vote to determine the most popular option. It was widely anticipated that a majority of MPs would, given the option, choose an Upper Chamber in which at least 50 per cent of Members were directly elected (the option known to be favoured by Robin Cook himself), although peers themselves – perhaps understandably – were somewhat less enthusiastic about such a degree of democratization. A few Labour MPs, meanwhile, including Dennis Skinner, continued to advocate the complete abolition of the House of Lords (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 385, col. 526), whilst some other Labour MP, such as David Winnick, reiterated the concern that a predominantly elected Upper Chamber might challenge the authority of the House of Commons itself (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 385, col. 527). A rather different concern was expressed by Stephen McCabe, who was anxious that an elected Second House might, in the wider context of devolution and plans for elected English Regional Assemblies (announced at about the same time), actually encourage voters to believe that they were facing too many elections, thereby resulting in more apathy and even lower electoral turn-outs (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 385, col. 530). Almost immediately, though, the renewed optimism of those Labour MPs in favour of a largely elected Upper House was tempered by the announcement of the joint committee’s 24 members, for this apparently included a number of (Labour) MPs and peers unenthusiastic about a predominantly elected Second Chamber. Perhaps most worrying to ‘radical reformers’ was the appointment of Jack Cunningham to chair the allparty joint committee, not merely because he was known to oppose a largely elected House of Lords but also because he was widely viewed as a ‘Blair loyalist’, who might therefore seek to steer the joint committee towards more modest or cautious options, effectively meaning a much smaller proportion of directly elected Members. However, the joint committee subsequently offered Parliament no less than seven options to choose from, with a fully appointed House of Lords and a fully elected Second Chamber representing the two ‘purest’ options, plus further five permutations entailing various combinations of appointed and elected peers. In the ensuing House of Commons


votes, though, in February 2003, no single option elicited majority support among MPs, although the most popular was for 80 per cent of the Second Chamber to be directly elected, and 20 per cent appointed, an option which was defeated by just three votes: 284 to 281. Moreover, it transpired that ‘three Tory reformers had intended to support an 80 per cent elected chamber but confused about the multiple votes and by mistake voted against it’ (Cook, 2003: 279, diary entry for 4 February 2003). It has also been suggested, with hindsight, that the proponents of a predominantly elected House of Lords – 80 or 60 per cent – ought to have co-ordinated their votes more effectively (for an analysis of the different options and permutations of votes, see McLean, Spirling and Russell, 2003), for it appears that some MPs who favoured an 80 per cent elected Second Chamber subsequently voted against the 60 per cent elected option, and vice versa. Moreover, about 10 Labour MPs who wanted the House of Lords abolished, having been heavily defeated on that option, then proceeded to vote against all the other options (Cowley and Stuart, 2005: 37). With no single option securing the support of a majority of MPs, the joint committee suggested that the whole issue now ‘requires the reform process to be given more time and consideration’ (Joint Committee on House of Lords Reform, 2003: 7, para 12). The result made it highly unlikely that ‘stage two’ would be completed in the foreseeable future. Even by the beginning of 2005, Labour’s leader in the House of Lords, Lady Amos, was arguing that ‘there is still more work to be done’ and suggesting that with the hereditary peers now mostly removed and Labour MPs divided over how membership of the House of Lords should be determined, Ministers might turn their attention to the role and powers of the House of Lords instead: ‘we can’t look at composition until we have sorted out the powers of the second chamber’ (The Daily Telegraph, 24 January 2005). In other words, six years after abolishing all but 92 of the hereditary peers without knowing who, or what, was going to replace them, a senior Labour parliamentarian was now declaring that the government needed to decide what the role and powers of the House of Lords ought to be, before returning to the issue of membership and composition. Such an announcement seemed to confirm the suspicions of those Labour MPs who feared that, rather than heralding the transition to ‘stage two’, removal of the remaining 92 hereditary peers would probably be viewed by the Blair government as ‘stage two’ in itself, thereby postponing almost permanently the establishment of an elected, or partly elected, Second Chamber, on the grounds – from the leadership’s perspective – that ‘the removal of the

The House of Lords

133

hereditary element, by definition, results in a more democratic and representative chamber . . . an appointed house is more representative and democratic minus its hereditary peers’, regardless of the fact that such an argument clearly ‘cannot withstand scrutiny’ (Kelso, 2006: 567). One legislative measure that did reach the statute book and partly pertained to the House of Lords was the 2005 Constitutional Reform Act. This presaged the establishment of a British Supreme Court, which would replace the Law Lords as the highest court in the land and which would have its own independent appointments panel. The Act also provided for a statutory Lords Appointment Commission. However, this did not represent any advance in Labour’s thinking – or absence of – over the future composition of the House of Lords, nor over what the role, functions and power of the revised Second Chamber should be. It was somewhat surprising, therefore, that the Labour Party’s 2005 manifesto included a pledge to ‘complete the reform of the House of Lords so that it is a modern and effective revising Chamber’, this to be achieved primarily by removing the remaining hereditary peers and allowing MPs to have a free vote on the subsequent composition of the Second Chamber. It was also pledged that ‘reasonable limits’ would be placed on the amount of time that Bills spent in the House of Lords, namely ‘no longer than 60 sitting days’ in most cases, the professed objective being to ensure that the Second Chamber spent less time merely replicating the scrutiny performed by the House of Commons (Labour Party, 2005: 102, 110), although the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs, Lord Falconer, was at pains to emphasize that the proposal was ‘not intended to limit their [peers] powers at all’ (The Guardian, 12 May 2005). Nonetheless, sceptics inevitably viewed such a proposal as yet another means by which the Government could reduce the amount of scrutiny its measures received. Once again, what Ministers might justify on the grounds of enhancing parliamentary efficiency might well be at the expense of parliamentary effectiveness, expediting governmental business more swiftly rather than scrutinising it more thoroughly. The next initiative on House of Lords’ reform occurred at the end of March 2006, when Lord Falconer announced that a new round of cross-party talks would begin in May, in an attempt to secure a broad consensus on the future composition of the Second Chamber. These talks would presage the promised free vote on what proportion of peers should henceforth be elected. Yet this apparent attempt at reviving the stalled transition to ‘stage two’ still belied the lack of clear thinking or agreement within the Labour Party with regard to House of Lords reform. Although


it was envisaged that the free vote amongst MPs would be held in November 2006, it was not known what option(s) they would be presented with, nor whether the outcome of the vote would be deemed binding by the Cabinet. However, an indication that the status quo now appeared to be quite attractive and acceptable to some senior Ministers was apparent in Lord (Jack) Cunningham’s suggestion that there was a ‘dislocation in this whole debate, between those people who fundamentally believe that we should have a second chamber elected - regardless of the consequences and those people who believe that the second chamber works well within its limited framework as a revising chamber, that it does its revising job on the whole efficiently and successfully, and therefore it should be left to get on with that job’ (The Guardian, 3 November 2006). Alongside the ongoing debate about the composition of a posthereditary House of Lords, there was also a suggestion that the Second Chamber’s powers needed to be curbed and codified (doubtless prompted, to a considerable extent, by the number of defeats and delays which the partly reformed House of Lords had inflicted on various high-profile policies and Bills pursued by Labour Ministers since 19993 ). For example, in announcing the revival of cross-party talks, Lord Falconer also reiterated the Government’s desire to place the ‘Salisbury Doctrine’ (whereby peers do not block measures promised in the governing party’s election manifesto) on a statutory basis. This, along with Labour’s 2005 manifesto commitment to limiting – to 60 days – the amount of time which the House of Lords could spend debating Bills already approved by the House of Commons, and the intimations that some Ministers wanted to reduce the one-year power of delay to just six months, would all serve significantly to curb the House of Lords’ powers, thereby further enhancing the primacy of the House of Commons. Given that the Opposition parties were hardly likely to endorse such changes, it also made it highly unlikely that the Blair Government would be able to secure the crossparty consensus on House of Lords reform which it claimed to be seeking. The vote on House of Lords composition was finally held in early March 2007, when MPs endorsed both the 100 per cent elected option (337 to 224, a majority of 113) and the 80 per cent elected option (305 to 267, a majority of 38). In so doing, however, they were effectively rejecting the Government’s preferred ‘third way’ option of having 50 per cent

3

Moreover, a former Adviser to the late Robin Cook, Meg Russell, has calculated that from May 1997 to March 2006 the Blair Governments had suffered nearly 400 defeats in the House of Lords (cited in The Guardian, 28 March 2006).

The House of Lords

135

Table 3.1 How (Labour) MPs voted in the 2007 vote on the composition of the House of Lords Option

Labour MPs voting in favour

Labour MPs voting against

100% elected

212

98

80% elected

159

60% elected

Labour majority for/ against

All MPs voting in favour

All MPs voting against

Overall majority for/ against

+114

337

224

+113

164

−5

305

267

+38

135

184

−49

178

392

−214

50% elected

129

189

−60

155

418

−263

100% appointed

117

201

−84

196

375

−179

The 20 and 40% elected options were rejected by MPs without a Division. Extrapolated from House of Commons Debates (Hansard), 6th series Vol. 457, cols. 1602–28, 7 March 2007; http://www.publicwhip.org.uk. – see Divisions for 7 March 2007.

of the Second Chamber elected and 50 per cent appointed, which was, by this time, Tony Blair’s preference. The unwhipped vote clearly revealed the breadth of opinion both within the PLP in general and in the Cabinet itself, as indicated in Tables 3.1 and 3.2. However, because MPs and Ministers were entitled to vote for more than one option, it was difficult to ascertain their genuine preference(s), with John Hutton, for example, voting for the options of a fully elected, fully appointed and 50 per cent elected House of Lords. What also made it difficult to gauge the genuine preferences of some Labour MPs was the way in which Labour’s ‘abolitionists’ voted once this particular option had been rejected. Prior to the series of Divisions on the different options concerning the composition of the House of Lords, MPs had voted by 416 to 163 in support of a motion endorsing a bicameral Parliament. However, Labour MPs were clearly divided, supporting the motion by 169 to 155. Of the 155 who voted against this motion – thereby effectively expressing their support for unicameralism (i.e., abolition of the House of Lords) – 50 (including Margaret Beckett) subsequently voted in favour of a wholly appointed Second Chamber, whilst 77 voted in favour of a 100 per cent elected Upper House. Moreover, 37 Labour abolitionists

136 The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform Table 3.2 How Cabinet Ministers voted in the 2007 vote on the composition of the House of Lords Option*

Cabinet Ministers voting in favour of

100% elected

Douglas Alexander, Hilary Armstrong, Hilary Benn, Hazel Blears, Alistair Darling, Peter Hain, Patricia Hewitt, John Hutton, Tessa Jowell and David Miliband

80% elected

Douglas Alexander, Hilary Benn, Gordon Brown, Des Browne, Alistair Darling, Peter Hain, Patricia Hewitt, Alan Johnson, Tessa Jowell, Ruth Kelly, David Miliband, Jacqui Smith, Jack Straw and Stephen Timms

60% elected

Douglas Alexander, Hilary Benn, Des Browne, Alistair Darling, Peter Hain, Patricia Hewitt, Alan Johnson, Tessa Jowell, Ruth Kelly, David Miliband, Jacqui Smith, Jack Straw and Stephen Timms

50% elected

Douglas Alexander, Hilary Armstrong, Hilary Benn, Tony Blair, Hazel Blears, Des Browne, Alistair Darling, Peter Hain, Patricia Hewitt, John Hutton, Alan Johnson, David Miliband, Jacqui Smith, Jack Straw and Stephen Timms

100% appointed

Margaret Beckett, John Hutton, John Prescott and John Reid

*The 20 and 40% elected options were rejected by MPs without a Division. Extrapolated from House of Commons Debates (Hansard), 6th series, Vol .457, cols. 1602–28, 7 March 2007; http://www.publicwhip.org.uk/ – see Divisions for 7 March 2007.

subsequently voted both for a fully appointed House of Lords and one which was wholly elected. Just to confuse matters further, it was variously reported that some Conservative MPs voted in favour of a wholly elected Upper House, not because they actually desired a fully democratic House of Lords, but in order to embarrass the Blair Government. The reasoning was that Tony Blair was reported to have shifted his earlier stance, and now favoured a 50 per cent elected/50 per cent appointed Second Chamber, the option which was also publicly endorsed by the Labour’s Leader of the House (of Commons), Jack Straw. For some Conservative MPs, therefore, it would seem that a mischievous vote for a 100 per cent elected Second Chamber was too tempting too resist. Some of them also calculated that the constitutional and practical problems which would accrue from creating a wholly elected House of Lords would ensure that such reform would probably have to be abandoned or greatly scaled-down. As such, many MPs voting for the 100 per cent elected option were really doing

The House of Lords

137

so tactically, ‘because it puts things into the long grass’ (The Times, 9 March 2007). Certainly, the expectation of some of these ‘tactical democrats’ that the House of Lords would reject this particular option was confirmed the following week, when peers voted in favour of becoming a wholly appointed institution. Thus it was that when Tony Blair resigned as Prime Minister in June 2007, ‘stage two’ of House of Lords reform had still not been completed, nor was there any clear indication of precisely when it would be. Blair’s successor, Gordon Brown, had voted for the 80 per cent elected option and also made a high-profile speech in the House of Commons just one week after becoming Prime Minister in which he promised a tranche of constitutional reforms, including a reiteration of the commitment to a predominantly elected House of Lords. This speech was accompanied by the publication of the Green Paper The Governance of Britain, which reaffirmed the Government’s intention to ‘develop reforms for a substantially or wholly elected second chamber’, while clarifying the precise powers of the reformed House of Lords in relation to the House of Commons (Straw, 2007: 42, para 137). However, two weeks later, the Justice Secretary, Jack Straw (in whose name The Governance of Britain had officially been published), announced that the completion of ‘stage two’ of House of Lords’ reform would be deferred until after the next general election, in order that crossparty agreement could be secured in the interim, and clear proposals included in the manifestos of the main political parties (thereby ensuring that a mandate could subsequently be claimed by Ministers if faced with intransigence from those peers opposed to a predominantly elected Second Chamber). While this might make good political and tactical sense, it also, of course, offers further scope for yet more procrastination and prevarication. At the very least, it meant that if a predominantly elected House of Lords was finally to be established, it would only be during New Labour’s fourth term of Office (or, possibly, beyond that), assuming that Gordon Brown led the Party to electoral success. Moreover, if Labour does win a fourth successive general election and acts upon the commitment to creating a predominantly elected Second Chamber by introducing the necessary legislation in its first parliamentary session, the new Second Chamber might finally be established in, or by, 2011 – a full 100 years after the preamble of the 1911 Parliament Act had declared that reform of the House of Lords, to ensure that it is ‘constituted on a popular instead of hereditary basis’, is ‘an urgent question which brooks no delay’.


Conclusion The Blair Governments clearly proceeded much further in addressing the Labour Party’s primary long-standing objection to the House of Lords, by removing the majority of the hereditary peers (who were also overwhelmingly Conservatives), even though 92 were granted a temporary reprieve, pending the transition to ‘stage two’. It is on this point, however, that New Labour appeared to be remarkably similar to Old Labour, for both have been characterized by a marked lack of agreement, and thus considerable uncertainty about what a House of Lords sans hereditary peers should look like. The Labour Party has never been sure about how precisely membership of the House of Lords should be determined. Those who have called for its membership to be determined by some form of appointment have still been left with the issue of who should make the appointments and according to what criteria. Meanwhile, Labour opponents of an appointed Second Chamber have been concerned about the risk of increasing Prime Ministerial patronage, an objection which seems to have increased since 1997, particularly during Tony Blair’s premiership. The alternative to an appointed House of Lords is that of an elected Second Chamber, yet those Labour politicians favouring this option have themselves been faced with a number of (still) unresolved questions, most notably whether it should be wholly or partly elected, what method of election should be deployed and when elections should take place in relation to those held for the House of Commons. Many Labour parliamentarians, though, have been uneasy about advocating an elected House of Lords, due to concern that it might claim some form of democratic mandate or legitimacy with which to challenge a Labour Government in the House of Commons. As far back as 1911, Ramsay MacDonald was pointing out that ‘if you set up an elective Second Chamber . . . It is going to develop on its own lines . . . and sooner or later, you are going to have precisely the same difficulties in reference to the present hereditary House of Lords’ (House of Commons, 5th series, Vol. 25, cols. 466–9). Following on from the traditional lack of agreement within the Labour Party about how to determine the composition of the House, there has been a similar uncertainty about what powers a reformed Upper House should enjoy. For many Labour politicians, the most objectionable aspect of the House of Lords’ ability to delay legislation for one year has been the unelected and unaccountable character of the (hereditary) peers imbued with this power. Yet the removal of the hereditary peers would imply

The House of Lords

139

that this power of delay would henceforth acquire a legitimacy which it previously lacked, especially if the Second Chamber was elected (and thus able, perhaps, to claim a mandate of its own), whereupon the veto might be invoked rather more readily than hitherto, thereby causing considerable delays to a (Labour) government’s legislative programme. Consequently, many Labour MPs have wanted any reform of the House of Lords to include a reduction – or even complete removal – of its power of delay over legislation already approved by the House of Commons. As with the issue of composition and membership, therefore, there has never been a clear, coherent or consistent Labour Party line about what power(s), if any, the House of Lords should possess. For a few Labour parliamentarians, more particularly on the Left of the Party, these constitutional conundrums could best be resolved by simply abolishing the House of Lords altogether, thereby leaving Britain with a unicameral system of government. Believing that sovereignty should reside entirely with the directly elected House of Commons, Labour’s relatively small, but often vocal, band of abolitionists have feared that either an appointed or elected House of Lords would acquire a bogus legitimacy, leaving outright abolition as the only real solution. For most Labour MPs and Ministers, however, abolition of the House of Lords would place an intolerable strain on the House of Commons, due to the significant increase in the latter’s workload. Indeed, the abolitionists aside, there has been a widespread recognition amongst Labour politicians that the House of Lords performs a valuable role in sharing, and thus alleviating, the workload of the House of Commons, a particularly pertinent consideration given the heavy legislative programmes which Labour Governments have invariably pursued. This returns these MPs to the question of composition and powers. That the House of Lords remained relatively unaffected by Labour Governments (the reduction in its power of delay in 1949 not withstanding) prior to the Blair Government’s removal of most hereditary peers is largely a consequence of the Party’s indecision and lack of internal agreement as to what precisely to do about the Second Chamber. Given that there are so many ways in which the House of Lords could conceivably be reformed, and so many different models of what a revised Second Chamber might look like, it is unsurprising that Labour politicians have never been able to reach agreement on what sort of Upper House – if any – they actually want. Indeed, given the difficulty of reaching any kind of intra-party (and inter-party) consensus over what to do about the House of Lords, some Labour MPs have suggested that the whole issue should be left well alone,


insisting that Labour Governments ought to concern themselves with the more salient, ‘bread-and-butter’, issues which most concern ordinary people. For these Labour MPs, attempts at reforming the House of Lords – particularly when they seem, almost inevitably, to end in failure and disappointment – are a distraction from the Party’s more important social and economic objectives and, as such, should be avoided, lest valuable parliamentary time be wasted. Ultimately, Labour politicians have only ever been united when condemning the hereditary principle in the House of Lords (although most of them have refrained from attacking the same principle vis-à-vis the Monarchy). Beyond such condemnation, however, the Labour Party has invariably concluded that the alternatives to a House of Lords comprised largely of hereditary peers are, in many respects, even more problematic, so that Labour has never been able to establish a clear set of proposals or pursue a coherent programme of reform, one which could command the support of a majority of Labour MPs and Ministers.

4 The Civil Service

Introduction In his excellent exegesis on Labour and Whitehall, Theakston identifies four discrete strands of thought or criticism in the Party concerning the Civil Service, not all of which, however, are intellectually consistent or compatible (Theakston, 1992: 11–12). Indeed, Jones and Keating have noted ‘the contrasts and contradictions’ between Labour’s critiques of the Civil Service, ‘reflecting as they do the confused state of Labour thought on the issue’ (Jones and Keating, 1985: 144–5). Yet these four perspectives have invariably been invoked to justify periodic calls for reform of the Civil Service by Labour politicians and academic supporters. Firstly, there is the Fabian perspective, which did not doubt the political neutrality of the Civil Service, but which sought to improve its efficiency. Much of this critique, originally expounded by the Webbs, was, Theakston notes, discernible in the 1968 Fulton Report – ‘the bible of this school of thought’ (Theakston, 1992: 11). This perspective also readily assumed, in accordance with the Westminster Model, that the Civil Service would faithfully serve whichever party had formed a government by virtue of securing a parliamentary majority through a free and fair general election. Secondly, there has been concern in some quarters of the Labour Party, and among Left-wing academics, about the ‘unrepresentative’ character of the senior Civil Service in Britain, in terms of the socio-educational background of many mandarins. This critique was trenchantly expressed back in the 1930s by Harold Laski, when he observed that those constituting the senior echelons of the Civil Service ‘belong, effectively, to the same class . . . . Largely, they go to the same schools and universities; after 141


admission to the service, they belong to the same clubs’. In short, Laski argued, virtually all senior civil servants ‘come, in fact, from an extraordinarily narrow class within the community’ (Laski, 1938: 316, 321). More than 40 years later, Brian Sedgemore, having served as Parliamentary Private Secretary to Tony Benn, similarly complained about the ‘narrow social class’ from which most senior civil servants emanated, arising in large part from ‘a bias in the recruitment of higher civil servants towards those who went to public schools and those who went to Oxford and Cambridge’ (Sedgemore, 1980: 148), a criticism also once advanced by the Left-wing academic, Ralph Miliband (1973: 59). Some of those expressing concern at this aspect of the Civil Service have argued that such a narrow basis of recruitment renders senior civil servants ‘out of touch’ with the wider British society they purport to serve, whilst other critics deem the ‘elitist’ background of Britain’s mandarins incompatible with the Labour Party’s professed belief in equality of opportunity and/or a meritocracy. Again, Sedgemore is amongst those who have complained that senior civil servants seek to govern the country according to their own narrow, welldefined interests, taste, education and background, none of which fit them, on the whole, to govern a modern, technological, industrialised, pluralist and urbanised society. (quoted in Hennessy, 1990: 265) Meanwhile, Marcia Williams, having served as Harold Wilson’s Political Secretary during the 1960, alleged that the Civil Service, particularly at senior levels, was ‘undemocratic’, ‘exclusive’ and had ‘a strange personality of its own, half reminiscent of the Army, half of a masonic society. Certainly, many members of the Administrative Class seem unrelated to the outside world’ (Williams, 1972: 346). Thirdly, but following directly on from this critique, has been the allegation that a deeply conservative Civil Service has routinely deployed its considerable power to obstruct the more radical policies or programmes of Labour Governments and Ministers, a perspective which is therefore clearly at odds with the Fabianesque (and Westminster Model) notion of Civil Service neutrality and impartiality noted previously. One of the most renowned exponents of this particular critique has been Tony Benn, who points out that whilst it would be a mistake to suppose – as some socialists have suggested – that the senior ranks of the Civil Service are active Conservatives

The Civil Service 143

posing as impartial administrators. . . The problem arises from the fact that the Civil Service sees itself as being above the party battle, with a political position of its own to defend against all-comers, including incoming governments armed with their own philosophy and programme. (Benn, 1981: 50) Laski had advanced a similar argument in the 1930s, pointing out that while senor civil servants genuinely perceived themselves to be politically impartial and neutral, what was crucial was the context, by which he meant that mandarins had hitherto mainly served two political parties (Conservative and Liberal) – the minority 1923–1924 and 1929–1931 Labour Governments notwithstanding – who were both committed to a capitalist system based on the principles of property ownership and private enterprise. Their notions of . . . the practicable are set by their experience of the present system as a going concern. Their minds have rarely bent themselves to the speculative task of considering its transformation . . . . They have been neutral because their ultimate principles of action have been those upon which the policy of both political parties in this country were based . . . their neutrality has not been questioned . . . has not yet been tested by the need to support a policy which, like that of a Socialist Party, might well challenge the traditional ideas for which it [the civil service] has stood. (Laski, 1938: 337, 317) However, this alleged innate conservatism has also subsequently been cited by many Labour politicians and sympathetic commentators to account for the failure of post-Attlee Labour Governments to pursue, either systematically or successfully, their more radical or ‘socialist’ manifesto commitments. Such radicalism, it is argued, has invariably been subordinated to, or subverted by, the conservatism of the Civil Service and the innate tendency of civil servants to view themselves as guardians of the national interest. A former Downing Street ‘insider’ under Harold Wilson once suggested that the ‘civil service is all-embracing, like convolvulus’ and that the ‘danger we face today [the mid-1970s] is that the civil service has achieved too much power’ (Haines, 1977: 32, 25). On another occasion, Benn alleged that it ‘was one of the great myths of British parliamentary democracy that the British political civil service is politically neutral, ready, anxious, and willing to work with equal enthusiasm for any political party that may form a majority.’ This was actually ‘a complete illusion’, he maintained, perpetuated ‘by those who know


perfectly well that the civil service is neither ready, anxious, or willing to work for socialist policies, but has to be presented in that way so that it can perform its ask of obstruction without being accused of partiality.’ According to Benn, when they are presented with radical policies with which they disagree, civil servants will highlight the practical difficulties and offer what they deem to be a more ‘realistic’ approach, ‘in line with the policies the senior civil servants want, which is to steer radical Ministers gently into the mainstream of coalition politics’ (Benn, 1989b: 135, 136). Moreover, this alleged Civil Service conservatism has often been linked to the previous point concerning the exclusive socio-economic backgrounds from which the vast majority of senior civil servants have traditionally been recruited. Marcia Williams claimed that ‘while politically these people are said to have no direct affiliation to a political party, their whole background is so conservative in origin that their inclinations must be more to the Right than to the Left’ (Williams, 1972: 353), whilst Benn insists that as ‘most senior civil servants come from a very narrow class base’, they are invariably ‘broadly ignorant of, and unsympathetic to, the aspirations of socialism’ (Benn 1989b: 135). In a previous era, meanwhile, Harold Laski complained that the particular social backgrounds from which most senior civil servants emanated fostered a ‘negative’ attitude, one which was tended to be ‘cautious, hesitating, opposed to wide innovation . . . more anxious not to make a mistake than to risk an adventure’ (Laski, 1936–1937: 342–5; see also, Laski, 1943: 15; Laski, 1967: 339–408), for ‘Men think differently who live differently’ (Laski, 1938: 328). These characteristics, Laski elaborated, were not solely due to the privileged social backgrounds from which most senior civil servants emanated, vitally important though this was as an explanatory factor, it was also due to the ‘tradition of the department [which] makes . . . for continuity of policy’, so that ‘in a period of rapid change’, it tends ‘to be a brake on innovation’ and almost instinctively ‘tends to look at new ideas from the angle of how best they can be fitted into the existing scheme of things when the real need may be to depart from it’ (Laski, 1938: 326). Such characteristics, critics believed, would pose serious problems for a Labour Government pursuing socialist policies and radical socio-economic reform. The fourth strand of thought which Theakston identifies in the Labour Party is that which alludes to a democratic deficit, due to the constitutional conventions of Civil Service anonymity and individual Ministerial responsibility. This, Labour critics claim, has contributed significantly to a lack of accountability at the highest levels of the British political system.


According to Sedgemore, for example, the higher echelons of Britain’s Civil Service constitute ‘an elite arrogating to itself political power in a manner which betokens trouble for democracy’. As to the traditional textbook notion that the ‘the advice which civil servants tender is nonpolitical, objective and confidential’, Sedgemore insists that ‘None of these . . . will stand serious analysis’ (Sedgemore, 1980: 26, 148). It is also worth noting Drucker’s observation that Labour’s rankand-file has itself often been suspicious of the perceived influence of senior civil servants over ‘their’ Ministers. According to Drucker, this has meant that the problems of Labour Ministers are increased by the suspicion of their supporters that unless they are seen to be having trouble with their civil servants they cannot be doing their jobs properly . . . If they satisfy their supporters’ expectations, they have trouble using the machine effectively; if they use the machine effectively, they are suspected of betraying the movement. (Drucker, 1979: 102) Yet what has further militated against an intellectually coherent or consistent Labour critique of the Civil Service is the fact that several of the Party’s former Ministers have brooked little, if any criticism, of Whitehall, preferring, instead, to recall their own apparently happy and harmonious relationships with senior civil servants, based on a mutual appreciation of each other’s roles and responsibilities. According to Dennis Healey, for example, ‘a Minister who complains that his civil servants are too powerful is either a weak minister or an incompetent one’ (quoted in Young and Sloman, 1982: 23), for ‘a strong and able Minister will have little difficulty in controlling his civil servants’ (New Socialist, September– October 1981: 12), a stance evidently shared by Harold Wilson when he asserted that ‘if a Minister cannot control his civil servants, he ought to go’ (HC 535-11, 1976–7: q.1924). Meanwhile, Anthony Crosland claimed that ‘I never found any problem in establishing good working relations . . . a Minister who doesn’t do so is wasting a large fund of knowledge and expertise’ (Boyle, Crosland and Kogan, 1971: 209). Similarly, Michael Stewart, who served in the Cabinet alongside Crosland, Healey and Wilson in the 1964–1970 Labour Governments maintained that the ‘theory of British government’, in which ‘a Minister decides policy and Civil Servants help him to carry it out’, was generally borne out in practice. When it occasionally fails to do so, he insisted, ‘this is due, not to any inherent weakness in the system, but to personal defects of either Minister, or official, or both’ (Stewart, 1980: 135). Another senior


Minister in the 1964–1970 Labour Governments who came to share this benign view of the Civil Service was Richard Crossman. Although, as we noted in Chapters 2 and 3, Crossman was the key figure in attempting reform to both the House of Commons and the House of Lords during this period, he viewed the Civil Service with remarkable reverence, as illustatred by this fulsome peroration delivered in a public lecture at Sheffield University in 1971: My final lesson is this. People often say to me, ‘Look Mr Crossman, the system. It really doesn’t work does it? Let me tell you something. I spent six years inside the system. I think it works extremely well . . . We have a Civil Service which will carry out the programmes of politicians, provided the politicians are willing to fight night and day for their ideas . . . once they know that you are serious, a change takes place. Suddenly, it is all sweetness and light and you can get it done. I see nothing in the system which would have stopped us doing much better than we did. If we failed, it was because we made mistakes. I think I would conclude by saying, ‘The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our civil servants, bur in ourselves. (Crossman, 1972: 26) Subsequently, Merlyn Rees, speaking during his time as Labour Home Secretary in the late 1970s, dismissed criticisms of the Civil Service by declaring that ‘I have the highest regard for the small group of civil servants with whom I talk a great deal . . . . They work very hard. They deserve praise’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 960, col. 2174). Meanwhile, Gerald Kaufman, who was also a Minister in the 197479 Labour Governments, has insisted that even when civil servants ‘may not agree with you politically . . . they really do have a sense of loyalty to their ministers’, and as such, Kaufman claims that ‘The question that civil servants ask themselves when required to advise in implementing polemical proposals is not, “Do I agree with it?’’, but, “Can it be made to work?’’ ’ (Kaufman, 1997: 33, 35). Of course, critics would retort that if civil servants vehemently disagreed with a policy, they might well find reasons why it could not be made to work. It is clear, therefore, that whilst many either in the Labour Party or intellectually sympathetic to it have advanced numerous criticisms of the Civil Service, many former Labour Ministers and Prime Ministers have actually expressed great praise and admiration for Britain’s mandarins. Consequently, the attitudes emanating from within the Labour Party’s towards the Civil Service have reflected not merely a debate between those complimenting the Civil Service and those complaining about it,


but to some extent, a debate amongst critics themselves as to which reforms are most appropriate.

Labour and the Civil Service prior to 1945 Although some Labour critics, such as Laski (see above), expressed concern at the socio-economic background and apparent conservatism of senior civil servants, and suspected that they would obstruct ‘socialist’ policies when the Party was elected to Office, most of the leadership has proved relatively unperturbed by such warnings and thus uninterested in the issue of Civil Service reform. Indeed, for senior pre-War Labour figures such as Ramsay MacDonald, it could hardly be called an issue, because there was apparently no problem to solve. The lack of interest displayed by most senior Labour politicians during the early twentieth-century concerning the Civil Service derived from five discrete factors. Firstly, the doubts of critics like Laski notwithstanding, there was a strong belief in the neutrality and impartiality of the Civil Service, which would ensure that if and when a Labour Government was elected, mandarins would fairly and faithfully serve it to the best of their ability, irrespective of their own political inclinations or instincts. Of course, this reflected the faith of most senior Labour parliamentarians in the efficacy of the Westminster Model, whereby the attainment of a majority (of seats) in the House of Commons, as a result of a general election, would provide the Party with a mandate to govern and implement its ‘socialist’ policies, and that consequently, mandarins would faithfully serve their new political masters in accordance with the much-vaunted principles of political impartiality and neutrality. This also accorded neatly with the Fabianesque perspective that social reform was, essentially, a top-down and technocratic process, whereby professional administrators would implement and administer the measures enacted by a democratically elected (socialist) government – measures introduced for the masses but not by the masses. Secondly, the inter-war Labour Party was naturally concerned, first and foremost, with economic, industrial and social reform, rather than changes of a constitutional character, and as such, Labour’s early manifestos contained only a sporadic pledges concerning constitutional reform, none of which pertained to the Civil Service. After all, the Labour Party had been established, in 1906, with the express purpose of providing parliamentary representation for ordinary working people and organized labour. As such, it is perhaps not surprising that many of its policy priorities tended to be somewhat economistic, rather


than constitutional. Certainly, to those concerned with post-First World War reconstruction, and tackling the mass unemployment and social deprivation of the inter-War period, constitutional reform was generally considered an irrelevance, or at the very most something which could be considered at a much later date, once economic and social problems had been remedied (although, of course, if such problems were successfully ameliorated, this might well imply that the political system was functioning effectively and could readily be deployed by a Labour Government, thereby obviating the need for subsequent constitutional reform). Thirdly, as a relatively new political entity, the Labour Party during the inter-war years was necessarily concerned to establish its electoral credibility and prove its constitutional propriety. In view of the hostility which many of Labour’s ‘socialist’ policies or principles attracted from the Conservative Party and sections of the press (accompanied by dire warnings about Bolshevism being implanted in Britain by a Labour Government), the Party leadership was doubly anxious to display its respect and reverence for Britain’s existing constitutional arrangements and political institutions. Constitutional conservatism was assumed to be a prerequisite of establishing Labour’s political respectability. Fourthly, the two Labour Governments which were elected during the inter-war years were both minority administrations and, also, therefore, short-lived. The day-to-day problems of governance in the absence of a working parliamentary majority – quite apart from the chronic economic and social problems which Labour Ministers were confronted with – would have militated against embarking on a programme of constitutional reform, even if the Party leadership had been inclined to do so (which it clearly was not). Fifthly, and finally, the leadership of these first two Labour Administrations did not consider that they had experienced any problems deriving from the extant constitutional structure or processes, and as such, they became (further) imbued with respect for Britain’s system of parliamentary government, and in particular, the apparent loyalty and neutrality of the Civil Service. Certainly, the Labour leader and Prime Minister in both the 1923–1924 and 1929–1931 Administrations, Ramsay MacDonald, saw little evidence of Civil Service opposition or obstruction, although this was doubtless a reflection of the conservatism of the MacDonald Governments. Civil servants had little reason to cavil, not least ‘because no important changes in policy were made’ (Marquand, 1977: 315). In similar vein did Herbert Morrison subsequently remark that he was unable to recall any occasion ‘where civil servants . . . appeared to be running the show when it was not the fault of the politicians’ (quoted


in Donoughue and Jones, 1973: 153–4). As such, he insisted that ‘The popular fiction that civil servants are anxious to foist their own policy upon Ministers is not true in my experience’ (Morrison, 1933: 106). Not dissimilarly, High Dalton believed that – certain criticisms of Treasury dominance notwithstanding – the Civil Service could generally be relied upon for its political neutrality and impartiality and readiness to serve loyally a Labour Government as much as Conservative administration (Dalton, 1935: 11).

The Attlee Governments and the Civil Service In his magisterial opus Whitehall, Peter Hennessy refers to the Attlee Government’s approach to reform of the Civil Service not merely as a ‘missed opportunity’, but as ‘probably the greatest lost opportunity in the history of British public administration’ (Hennessy, 1990: 120, emphasis in original). Indeed, the issue is not so much the way in which the Attlee Governments sought to reform the Civil Service as the virtual absence of any such effort. As Theakston expresses it, in the opening sentence of his chapter on the Attlee governments and Civil Service reform, ‘This chapter is as much concerned with what did not happen to the civil service in the 1945-51 period as with what did happen’ (Theakston, 1992: 73, emphasis in original). The Labour Party’s manifesto for the 1945 election famously promised much by way of social reform, yet in spite of this – or, perhaps, precisely because of this – there was very little allusion to constitutional reform, except for an ambiguous passing reference to the House of Lords and an anodyne commitment to ‘the better organisation of Government Departments and the Civil Service’. Senior Labour politicians clearly recognized that they would need the maximum co-operation of Britain’s senior civil servants, in order to execute the extensive programme of economic, industrial and social reform promised in the manifesto. However, there was also an assumption among these Labour politicians – critics like Laski aside – that the Civil Service would indeed faithfully administer Labour’s ‘socialist’ programme (especially as the Party had secured such an emphatic parliamentary majority and thus a clear ‘mandate’ for its policies) and, in so doing, would effectively silence those siren voices from the Left which warned of obstruction and obfuscation by the mandarins. After all, several of these Labour politicians had served in the Wartime Coalition Government, whereupon their admiration for the proven competence and loyalty of the senior Civil Service had increased immensely.


Furthermore, the permanent character of the senior Civil Service ensured that when the Attlee Government replaced Churchill’s Coalition in July 1945, many of the mandarins who had faithfully served that Wartime Government remained in post ready to administer the policies of the new Labour Administration. Or as Hennessy observes, Attlee and his Ministers, despite being a radically intentioned government, did not embark on a reform of the Civil Service because they knew the wartime machine personally and liked what they saw. They had seen the recent administrative past, and it had worked. (Hennessy, 1986: 37) Similarly, in his biography of Ernest Bevin, Bullock notes that ‘men like Attlee and Morrison accepted, and were indeed attached to, the complex and interlocking structure of Parliament, Cabinet and Civil Service which they had inherited’ (Bullock, 1983: 69). Admittedly, Attlee himself had, back in the 1930s, written a memorandum on the reorganization of government, which opened with the declaration that ‘One of the most urgent questions requiring decision from the Labour movement is that of constitutional reform’, but by the middle of 1948 (by which time he had been Prime Minister for three years), he was at pains to point out that the paper had been written ‘before I had any actual experience of Cabinet’ (quoted in Harris, 1982: 589). Having acquired such experience, Attlee was emphatic that he had ‘always found’ the Civil Service to be ‘perfectly loyal’ as had his Ministerial colleagues, he claimed. As such, he believed that this was ‘the Civil Service tradition, a great tradition . . . . They carry out the policy of any given Government . . . They were all anxious to do the best they could by a Labour Government’ (quoted in Williams, 1961: 91). Furthermore, Attlee recalled that upon becoming Labour Prime Minister in July 1945, he had, for many years, ‘given a good deal of thought to the problem of the machinery of government’, but it transpired that this constitutional cogitation concerned the size, structure and organization of the Cabinet, rather than with the Civil Service itself (Attlee, 1954: 151–2). Indeed, the summer of 1947 heard Attlee deliver a glowing tribute to the Civil Service, when he declared that . . . our civil service is the best in the world and that it has in its ranks very men and women of great ability whose devotion to the public interest is unsurpassed. The Civil Service has never failed to be a


faithful servant, not only to successive Governments, but to the country as a whole . . . . I regret the fashion, now current in some quarters, of speaking slightingly of the Civil Service as though its members were less useful members of the community than other people. If attacks of this kind continue unanswered, we cannot expect to recruit able and energetic young men and women to the Service who will take a proper pride in their proper tasks; we shall then fail to build up a Service which will be efficient, economical, and responsive to the needs of the country as a whole . . . . We shall not get the best out of the Service unless we give them the support and credit they deserve. (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 439, cols. 197–202) The ‘attacks’ to which Attlee alluded were primarily concerns and questions raised by a few Labour backbenchers with regard to Civil Service manpower and costs, although his former personal assistant during the Wartime Coalition, Evan Durbin, acknowledged that whilst much of the criticism of the Civil Service was ‘ignorant and prejudiced’, there also existed among sensible people, a genuine concern that the selection, training and promotion of Civil Servants should be reformed in ways that will adapt the Service to the more active and positive work that it will be called upon to do in an increasingly socialist society. (NA T272/10: Durbin to Cripps, June 1946) For example, at a meeting of the PLP on 6 March 1946, a small number of backbenchers presented a motion urging the Government to establish a Royal Commission ‘to investigate and make recommendations upon reform required to make the Civil Service an efficient instrument’, one which would ‘carry out the policy of the present and future Governments.’ However, after a placatory speech by Stafford Cripps, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in which he both defended the Civil Service, whilst also indicating a willingness to consider sympathetically any practical suggestions for its further improvement which might be made under the auspices of the Liason Committee, the backbench motion was withdrawn. As we have already noted, the suspicions which a few Labour backbenchers harboured towards the Civil Service were not generally shared by their Ministerial colleagues. Attlee’s evident trust in the professionalism and impartiality of most senior civil servants was shared by senior Ministers such as Dalton, who spoke warmly of their ‘great loyalty . . . to


their political masters of the moment’. Consequently, there was ‘much less party political addiction than most party politicians would expect’, to the extent that ‘when Ministers change, this loyalty of officials seems to transfer itself, quite soon and without insincerity, to the new incumbents’ (Dalton, 1962: 15–6). Dalton’s sanguine view was, to a significant degree, informed by his own experience of returning to the Cabinet in 1948, whereupon he was immediately ‘impressed once more . . . with the efficiency of the Higher Civil Service’ which so skilfully made ‘crisp sense of ministerial wavering diffuseness’, whilst also ‘preparing admirable papers making it as easy as possible for ministers to choose between clear alternatives’ (quoted in Pimlott, 1987: 437, Dalton’s diary entry for 11 July 1948). Ernest Bevin, meanwhile, informed delegates attending Labour’s 1947 conference that ‘What the Civil Service likes is a Minister who knows his mind and tells the officials what to do. They will then do it.’ This observation, he pointed out, reflected his ‘good experience’ as a Cabinet Minister during both the Wartime Coalition Government and the subsequent Attlee Administration. This favourable view of the Civil Service was echoed by Herbert Morrison when he asserted that, in his experience, ‘if the Minister in charge knows what he wants and is intelligent enough in going about it, he can command the understanding, co-operation and support of his civil servants’ (Morrison, 1964: 320). Consequently, the most which occurred with regard to the Civil Service during the 1945–1951 Labour Governments was a desultory internal, in-house review, conducted under the auspices of the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Edward Bridges (who had also, incidentally, served simultaneously as the Head of the Civil Service for the first two years after the end of the War). The ‘report’, when it was circulated to senior Ministers in January 1948, proved a perfect example of self-congratulatory complacency, declaring that Our main concern has been with questions relating to efficiency of organisation in the Civil Service. We have given a great deal of thought to this and . . . . Neither we ourselves nor those whom we have consulted have been able to suggest any single or simple means of promoting greater efficiency in the Civil Service. (quoted in Hennessy, 1990: 126) This was in spite of having previously assured senior Ministers that if the Civil Service was permitted to conduct its own review – mandarins themselves ‘can tell better than any outsider where the shoe pinches


without any long process of collecting evidence’ – it would ‘diagnose any existing weakness . . . in no spirit of complacency [as] my colleagues are well aware of the need to strengthen the machine to meet the growing tasks ahead’ (NA T 273/9, undated memo, Bridges to Dalton). Reform of the Civil Service was not, therefore, an issue considered to be of any importance by the Attlee Government. Indeed, Attlee himself, and most of his senior Ministerial colleagues, considered themselves to have been served well by their officials, to the extent that the interwar warnings of Laski and others on the Left appeared to have been entirely ill-founded and unduly pessimistic. Nor was the wider Labour Party clamouring for reform of the Civil Service during this period (the concerns expressed by a small number of backbench MPs at the meeting of the PLP in March 1946 notwithstanding), with the issue never debated at any of Labour’s annual conferences between 1945 and 1951, ‘reflecting the fact that the rank-and-file of the Party, like the leadership, regarded it as a low priority’ (Stone, 1997: 36).

The Wilson Governments and Civil Service reform In view of the Attlee Governments’ benign experience of the Civil Service, as reflected by the Cabinet’s success in implementing its extensive programme of economic and social reform, Labour’s subsequent 13 years in Opposition, from 1951 to 1964, did not entail any serious consideration of whether the Civil Service needed to be reformed by the next Labour Government. On the contrary, the success of the Attlee Governments in implementing a wide-ranging and often radical package of reforms seemed to vindicate those senior Labour politicians who had eulogized about the political impartiality, neutrality and professional loyalty of Britain’s civil servants. For such Labour parliamentarians, their period in Office during the 1940s had not occasioned any need to consider the issue of Civil Service reform. Morrison was among those who looked back to the 1945–1951 Administrations and remarked upon ‘the meritorious loyalty which the Civil Service quite properly owes and practises towards its Ministers’, which serves to ensure that ‘the British Civil Service is loyal to the Government of the day’ (Morrison, 1964: 52, 345). What was most notable, however, after six years or a reforming Labour Administration, was the extent to which some former Left-inclined critics of the Civil Service now exuded a new-found respect. Foremost amongst them was Laski, who, by 1951, was asserting that ‘The high official in this country maintains, on the whole, a loyalty to the decisions


of any Minister he serves. He will always give way when the Minister has finally put his foot down.’ Laski had not suddenly become naïve to the scope for Civil Service influence on occasions, but he did now suggest that this was likely to reflect inexperience or indecision on the part of a Minister, rather than malign machinations by civil servants (Laski, 1951: 168) Only during the early 1960s – by which time the Party had experienced a decade out of Office – did some Labour politicians and Left-inclined academics begin to consider anew the role of the Civil Service in British politics. What primarily prompted this new willingness to contemplate the organization and operation of the Civil Service, and inter alia the extent to which it might require reform, was the wider concern which developed amongst some of Britain’s political elites during the early 1960s over relative economic decline. A range of criteria and statistical evidence, such as international rates of economic growth and productivity, and share of world trade in manufactured exports, for example, indicated that Britain was not matching the performance of rival economies, such as those of France, Italy, Japan, the United States and West Germany. It was largely in the context of this relative economic decline that some Labour politicians and like-minded academics became convinced of the need to modernize Britain’s political and governing institutions, believing that, somehow, this would facilitate an economic renaissance and thus restore the competitiveness and pre-eminence of the British economy. The Civil Service, therefore, was a prime focus of this critique of Britain’s relative economic decline and thus assumed to be in particular need of reform, albeit as part of a wider, more general, process of politico-administrative modernization. More specifically, some Labour politicians and sympathetic academics began linking reform of the Civil Service to the early 1960s’ penchant for indicative economic planning. Certainly, Thomas Balogh decided that greater planning of the economy would necessitate ‘modification in the selection and training of Civil Servants, deliberately emphasising the need to acquire economic analytical capacity’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.195/January 1962), while Douglas Jay suggested that ‘more competent and experienced outside personnel should be introduced into the official machine, and particularly into the Treasury’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.201/January 1962). The most trenchant criticism of the Civil Service in this context, however, emanated from Robert Neild, who called for ‘reform of recruitment, training and specialisation of the permanent staff’, on the grounds that it was ‘no good going on with the


present dilettante tradition, based on the 18th century view that an educated gentleman is omniscient, and that specialists should be treated like plumbers.’ To this end, Neild alluded to the desirability of establishing ‘a commission of some sort’, in order ‘to change the system properly and permanently’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.202/January 1962). The critique of the Civil Service which ensued identified two specific deficiencies, the first being that it had largely been established in the nineteenth century, with little subsequent change in organization or operation, this therefore rendering it ill-suited to the political and administrative requirements of an increasingly scientific and technological society. Anthony Crosland was amongst those in the Labour Party concerned that while the Civil Service – along with Parliament – was ‘brilliantly adapted to the needs of a bygone age’, it was ‘in need of drastic modernization’, not least because the ‘typical Whitehall attitude of mind’ was ‘pedantic and unadventurous’ (Crosland, 1962: 127). In similar vein, Hugh Thomas (a former aspirant diplomat in the Foreign office) characterized the 1960s’ Civil Service as an institution ‘whose organisation and raison d’etre derive[s] directly from the needs of Victorian England’, its ‘shibboleths, professional traditions and aspirations are in every case exactly one hundred years old . . . essentially pre, as well as anti-, collectivist’, and as such, ‘hindrances to the realisation of a truly socially-conscious society’ (Thomas, 1962: 15–16). The second main deficiency attributed to the Civil Service was the socio-educational exclusivity and narrowness of its personnel, more particularly in the all-important and influential highest echelons. Brian Chapman, for example, alleged that many government failures in Britain during the 1950s and early 1960s could be attributed to the narrow horizons and limited experience (of the real world) of senior civil servants (Chapman, 1963). Balogh, meanwhile, was highly critical of what he saw as the anachronistic (nineteenth century) structure of the Civil Service coupled with the ‘dilettantism’ of senior civil servants. This, he maintained, had serious repercussions for the quality of policy-making in Britain. ‘How purposive positive policy can be formed under these conditions is a mystery’, Balogh declared, ‘or rather it would be a mystery if purposive policy were formed’ (Balogh, 1962: 100). Certainly, for Crosland, the conservative mind-set of the senior Civil Service was attributable largely to its predominantly Oxbridge recruitment (Crosland, 1962: 177). These criticisms were synthesized in the Fabian Society’s 1964 tract, The Administrators, subsequently described by Hennessy as ‘one of the Society’s most superbly crafted pamphlets’ and one which


‘pre-echoed . . . the preoccupations of Fulton a few years later’ (Hennessy, 1990: 172). That The Administrators did replicate such criticisms was hardly surprising considering that those participating in the Fabian Society’s inquiry into the Civil Service included Thomas Balogh, Tony Crosland and Robert Neild, as well as Shirley Williams and Leo Pliatzky. As such, The Administrators reiterated claims that the Civil Service was ‘plainly out of touch with the times’, and ‘unfitted to more positive government’, based as it was on an amateurish and generalist approach to governance and characterized by elitism in terms of membership and recruitment. It was thus emphasized that significant reform of the Civil Service ‘may be a pre-requisite to enabling a Labour Government – or any other government – to carry through the modernisation of the country’ (Fabian Society, 1964: 3), thus echoing Balogh’s claim that while ‘Civil Service reform alone will not restore parliamentary democracy, or Cabinet responsibility in Britain’, and could not ‘by itself create the basis for a successful Socialist Government’, it was nonetheless ‘one of the most essential and fundamental pre-conditions of both’, and as it was ‘a challenge to Labour to achieve this and it dare not fail’ (Balogh, 1962: 115). Although Labour’s 1964 manifesto did not refer explicitly to the reform of the Civil Service per se, it did allude to the ‘need to make government itself more efficient’, which required that ‘the machinery of government must be modernised’ via a ‘probing review [of] the practices of its own Departments of State’ (Labour Party, 1964). Further impetus for reform derived from a 1965 report by the (House of Commons) Estimates Committee, which recommended that a ‘Committee of officials aided by members from outside the Civil Service . . . should be appointed to initiate research upon, to examine and to report upon the structure, recruitment and management of the Civil Service’ (House of Commons, 1965: xxxv). It was not until early 1966, however, that Harold Wilson announced the establishment of a committee of inquiry to ‘examine the structure, recruitment and management, including training, of the Home Civil Service and to make recommendations’, whilst Labour’s election manifesto the same year made explicit the Party’s intention to ‘overhaul . . . the Civil Service’, both in ‘the interests of efficiency’ and as an integral part of a wider commitment to ensure that ‘the machinery of Government, in all its aspects, is refashioned to meet the needs of a modern society’ (Labour Party, 1966). Indeed, some commentators have drawn attention to the fact that the announcement of the committee of inquiry into the Civil Service just weeks before the 1966 general election was perhaps no


coincidence; ‘the Fulton exercise may well appear, to a sceptical observer, as a political expedient for a government seeking to create a reformist image’ (Chapman, 1963: 39; see also Ponting, 1990: 260–1). Certainly in spite of Wilson’s rhetoric about reform and modernisation, he did not seem to want – or envisage – particularly significant changes to the Civil Service. To some commentators, the very fact that the review of the Civil Service was entrusted to a committee of inquiry, rather than a Royal Commission, was highly suggestive, for by convention, the latter would have been unable to appoint civil servants themselves as members. By opting instead for a committee of inquiry, suspicions were immediately raised in some Labour quarters about ‘a Whitehall plot to downgrade the status and importance of the inquiry even before it had started’ (Kellner and Crowther-Hunt, 1980: 27; Theakston, 1992: 123). It has also been noted that although Labour’s 1964 and 1966 manifestos referred to the need to modernize the machinery of government, the Fulton Committee’s remit did not extend this far. Indeed, Wilson himself made clear that ‘machinery of government’ issues would not be considered by the Committee and that no change was envisaged in the traditional constitutional relationship between civil servants and Ministers, whereby the former advised and assisted the latter in the formulation of policies, and Ministers remained accountable and responsible to Parliament (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 724, cols. 209–10). In other words, what was not to be considered by the Fulton Committee was the alleged power of the Civil Service, and its consequent ability, according to Left critics, to block radical policies introduced by Labour Governments. Indeed, if the Fulton Committee was to consider ways in which the Civil Service was to be modernized in order to render it more effective and efficient – through the appointment of more specialists, or by fostering greater overall professionalism, for example – then any reforms subsequently recommended might well serve to enhance the power of civil servants vis-à-vis Ministers and governments. Ironically, it was a senior civil servant himself who was to point out the limitations of the Fulton Committee’s remit. In his memorandum of evidence to the Committee, William Ryrie, an assistant secretary at the Treasury, argued that the kind of diagnosis which was being asked for was itself problematic, because the root of the trouble is not in the Civil Service itself but in the fact that the whole machinery of government is ill-adapted to the


tasks of government in society today . . . it is impossible to discuss the structure and management of the Civil Service constructively without giving some thought to its role, and indeed, to the changed role of government itself in modern society. (quoted in Hennessy, 1990: 192) What further raised doubts in the minds of sceptics and critics about the likely limits of the Committee of Inquiry into the Civil Service was the fact that the person appointed to chair it was Lord Fulton, described by one commentator as ‘an old crony from his [Wilson’s] days as a wartime civil servant’ (Kellner and Crowther-Hunt, 1980: 27; Ponting, 1990: 261). The Labour Party’s own written evidence to Lord Fulton’s committee of inquiry reiterated many of the aforementioned criticisms about the narrow social background and experience of many civil servants, their isolation and detachment from the world beyond Whitehall and their concomitant conservatism and traditionalism. Labour’s evidence also criticized the Civil Service’s continued reverence for the generalist administrator over the specialist adviser. All of these characteristics were deemed to militate against the role which the Civil Service was now expected to fulfil, namely ‘the business of managing a highly complex techno-industrial society’, and as such, concern was expressed that ‘the civil service is not adapting itself quickly enough to perform its new tasks as efficiently as it might.’ Ultimately, it was argued that ‘the problem essentially is that as the business of Governments has extended outwards, and departments have swollen, the Minster has become stretched’ to the extent that there was now a clear need ‘to strengthen the Minister, the “temporary politician’’ in his department, in relation to the “permanent politicians’’, his civil servants’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.37/September 1966; Labour Party Archives, Re.63/December 1966). To rectify these alleged deficiencies, the Labour Party suggested 22 specific proposals to the Fulton Committee (Labour Party Archives, Re.63/December 1966), namely, • Steps should be taken to develop a more powerful concept of public service, and a civil servant who is more professional, adaptive and creative. • There must be more personal involvement in the execution of policy, or negotiation on the public’s behalf with private interests. • The civil servant should be better integrated both with his colleagues performing different functions in his department, and with people working in fields related to his outside.


• That the formal division between the executive, administrative and professional classes of the Service should be abolished. • That graduate entrants to the non-professional Civil Service should enter at a single level, and undergo a common course of initial training. • That improved recruitment and better training for graduates should not stifle the career prospects of non-graduates within the service, and that improved training should be available for suitable non-graduates to fit them for the highest posts. • That ‘Administrative’ training should be given to those entering as professionals at an early stage of their careers, and opportunities should be available, and encouragement given them, to move into administrative jobs at appropriate points in their careers. • That a degree of specialisation be encouraged on the administrative side between those who are ‘private office orientated’ and those who are ‘research problem orientated’ as a means of breaking down any lingering informal barriers that may exist between the ‘administrators’ and the ‘professionals’. • That existing experiments in ‘mixed hierarchies’, e.g, in the Ministry of Technology or in the Ministry of Transport, should be extended into other Ministries with large and mixed establishments. • The transfer of the personnel management of functions of the Treasury to a strengthened Civil Service Commission, which would also be charged with the task of a continual review of the departmental structure of government. • The Commission should urge upon the departments the necessity for making the fullest possible use of staff, and should undertake studies of the effectiveness with which departments use their senior staff. • Individual careers should be better planned, so that an official acquires a steadily widening range of experience and is not expected to move frequently between totally unrelated jobs. • As an aid to individual career planning, and to administrative specialisation, within the departments, the Commission should investigate, in co-operation with the departments, the possibility of sub-dividing them into separate bureaux, within which there would be a greater continuity of staff, and a closer association between staff and policy. • A much more vigorous and determined attempt to recruit people from universities other than Oxbridge, and with other than arts


degrees, particularly by the development of much closer personal contacts in those universities. • A thorough analysis of the people the Service fails to attract and why. • A continued increase in recruitment of ‘specialists’ on both a permanent and a temporary basis. • Recognition of two special categories of temporary appointment: a) Experts called in to help implement particular Government policies. b) A small number of personal advisers appointed by Ministers to help them in their day to day work. • The revision of pension arrangements so as to facilitate free movement in and out of the Service; the secondment of staff to suitable outside occupations or to regional centres quite early in their careers; and provision for voluntary secondment or leave of absence for approved purposes later in their careers. • The advertisement of specific senior posts both inside and outside the Service. • A continuing study of how freer movement works in practice, to ascertain optimum ages and career points for recruitment and secondment. • An enlarged Centre for Administrative Studies, providing courses of about two years in length, for all the administrative graduate entry. They should combine courses of the kind now provided by the Centre, suitably supplemented, and practical training in the departments, in local government, and in industry. The courses should be followed by better planned ‘on the job’ training, and a period in a regional centre. • That professional entrants should share some of the Centre for Administrative Studies’ courses for administrators, and that secondment to industry, and, in suitable cases, to the universities, should be arranged. Middle and senior management courses should be provided for both administrators and professional staff without distinction.

It should be noted that some of these recommendations had a fairly long genealogy among Labour’s proponents of Civil Service reform, for Graham Wallas, a prominent early Fabian, had once suggested that ‘A wise system of official training would consist in “seconding’’ young


officials for experience in the kind of work which they are to organize’ (quoted in Laski, 1938: 325–6), a proposal which Laski himself endorsed, in order to imbue senior civil servants with experience of the real world beyond their narrow social milieux. Laski also urged reform of the Civil Service career structure to facilitate the faster promotion of talented young officials or to enable outsiders with appropriate experience and proven ability to enter the Civil Service, for such ‘an infusion . . . into the upper hierarchy would . . . break down that enclosure within traditional postulates which is still too characteristic of heads of departments. It would enable new views to be considered’ (Laski, 1938: 335–6). When Lord Fulton’s committee published its report, in June 1968, it identified six particular ways in which the Civil Service was ‘inadequate . . . for the most efficient discharge of the present and prospective responsibilities of government’, and many of the deficiencies identified echoed those contained in the Labour Party’s own evidence, namely that (i) it was still based too much on the philosophy of the amateur (or generalist); (ii) there were too many – more than 1400 – classes and grades within the existing organisational structure; (iii) there were insufficient opportunities for scientists, engineers and other specialists to reach senior positions and exercise greater authority; (iv) not enough civil servants were skilled managers; (v) there was insufficient contact between the Civil Service and the wider society it served; (vi) career development and personnel management were inadequate. To remedy these deficiencies, the Fulton Report offered 22 recommendations (the same number as had been included in the Labour Party’s own written submission to the Committee, and generally very similar), the most notable of these being the creation of a Civil Service Department, whose primary role would be the management of the Civil Service (thereby relieving the Treasury of the task); the establishment of a Civil Service College, this to ‘provide major training courses in administration and management and a wide range of shorter courses’, as well as having a significant research function; the abolition of the classes, these to be replaced by a unified grading structure; greater mobility, both within the Civil Service career structure (in order to provide incentives and reward talented civil servants) and between the Civil Service and the outside world, in the form of various temporary contracts and secondments to and from the private sector and other professions; improved efficiency through applying ‘the principles of accountable management . . . to the organisation of the work of departments’, entailing ‘the clear allocation of responsibility and authority to accountable units with defined objectives’ (Cmnd 3638: 104–6).


As several commentators have since noted, the Fulton Report was hardly a radical document (see, for example, Fry, 1981: 156; Jones and Keating, 1985: 147; Ponting, 1990: 261; Theakston, 1992: 129–31). Indeed, parts of it are notably anodyne. Before listing its 22 recommendations, for example, it blandly suggested that ‘a simple guiding principle for the future’ be adopted, namely that the Civil Service ‘must continuously review the tasks it is called upon to perform’, and ‘then think out what new skills and what kind of men are needed and how these men can be found, trained and deployed.’ Then, in concluding its recommendations for reform, the Fulton Report observed that the Civil Service ‘reconstructed on the basis of these proposals will . . . make possible the progressive and efficient conduct of our affairs’ (Cmnd 3638: 104–6). Certainly, Labour critics of the Civil Service were predictably unimpressed with the Fulton Report. According to one such observer, the Report was all sub-machinery with the super-structure of policy decisions, Departmental ‘views’, strong and weak civil servants, annual changes of Departments for Ministers, and all the other major determinants of power, remaining unchanged . . . . These reforms will not matter very much. They will probably strengthen and make more effective the working of the civil service. Whether this is more or less likely to bring socialism any nearer is an open and marginal question. (Griffith, 1968: 7–9) Robert Neild, meanwhile, who had actually served on the Fulton Committee, subsequently castigated Fulton for being ‘the most ineffective chairman I have ever known’, claiming that he ‘was charming but useless’ and ‘provided no direction’. Nield was also critical of Wilson’s role, claiming that the Prime Minister merely ‘patted Fulton on the back and they all felt better’ (quoted in Stone, 1997: 54). Not surprisingly, therefore, Wilson himself appeared to be delighted with the Fulton Report, to the extent that immediately upon its publication he announced the Government’s acceptance of three of its main proposals, namely the establishment of a Civil Service Department, the creation of a Civil Service College and the replacement of classes by a unified grading structure. A few other Ministers, however, were rather less impressed, with Roy Jenkins, the Chancellor, irked by the proposed loss of Treasury responsibility for overall management of the Civil Service and subsequently describing it as ‘a not very good report’ (Jenkins,


1991: 41). Richard Crossman, meanwhile, deemed it to be ‘a second-rate Report written in a very poor style’ which ‘lacks distinction’, although he believed that Wilson had committed himself fully to the Report ‘partly because he has a strong liking for Fulton . . . and partly because he thinks this way he can improve his image as a great moderniser’ (Crossman, 1977: 107, 103, diary entries for 25 June 1968, and 20 June 1968). Once Wilson had secured formal approval from a rather unenthusiastic – or disinterested – Cabinet, he was able to announce action on at least some of the main recommendations of the Fulton Report, with the Civil Service Department established well before the end of the year and the Civil Service College launched within two years. Progress on the replacement of classes by a unified grading system was a little less swift, however, as Wilson was persuaded by Sir William Armstrong (Permanent Secretary at the Treasury) that it would be wise to pursue ‘consultations with the [civil service] staff associations . . . so that a practicable system can be prepared for the implementation of unified grading’ (quoted in Kellner and Crowther-Hunt, 1980: 64). Progress in implementing various other proposals enshrined in the Fulton Report, however, was rather slower and in some cases nonexistent (see, for example, Kellner and Crowther-Hunt, 1980: Chapters 4–5). Although the patchy implementation and success of Fulton’s 22 proposals has often been blamed on Civil Service obstructionism – as soon as the Report was published, Roger Opie was suggesting that ‘the termites are no doubt already at work on the proposals . . . the reforms cannot start too soon’ (Opie, 1968: 859–60) – it was also the case that the Labour Government itself soon lost whatever interest it might have had in Civil Service reform, not least because, by the late 1960s, Ministers were grappling with a range of other problems and policies, such as the aftermath of 1967’s devaluation, shoring up an increasingly disliked (by the trade unions) incomes policy, the ill-fated In Place of Strife proposals for reform of industrial relations, an abandoned attempt at reforming the House of Lords and the rapid escalation of conflict in Northern Ireland, which prompted the sending-in of British troops in August 1969. Given that Civil Service reform was not an issue which enthused or inspired many Labour politicians anyway, the wider political context and circumstances of the late 1960s, coupled with a distinct lack of enthusiasm in much of the Civil Service itself, all combined to ensure that any momentum which might have been generated upon publication of the Fulton Report rapidly dissipated. According to Donald MacDougall, the Head of the Government Economic Service in 1969,


The Report contained some good ideas, but a lot of it was . . . rather general and even woolly; and I was obliged to read, and sit through discussions of long papers by the CSD which I thought were sometimes like sermons. First there was the text - a paragraph from Fulton; then ten pages discussing what it might mean; then another ten considering what might be done about it; and a final section quite often saying why nothing was possible or, worse still, with no conclusion at all. (MacDougall, 1987: 159) Marcia Williams, meanwhile, subsequently claimed that the ‘battle . . . against the Civil Service . . . was a struggle which we never fought with much heart or conviction.’ Indeed, she claims that ‘the struggle . . . was lost from the start’, for with the benefit hindsight ‘one can realise that this was inevitable’, not least because too many senior Labour politicians ‘were overconfident of their ability to handle the civil servants and come out on top’ (Williams, 1972: 344). Even Harold Wilson himself acknowledged that within a year of its publication, any interest in the Fulton Report ‘was tailing off a bit . . . the thing was losing steam, and that he was ‘not able to give my mind to it sufficiently’ due to the ‘many urgent problems’ with which the Government was grappling during 1969 (quoted in Theakston, 1992: 132).

Labour interest in Civil Service reform declines further after 1970 After the loss of the general election in June 1970, the Labour Party in Opposition continued to display a diminishing interest in Civil Service reform. As such, new thinking, yet alone new policies, concerning the Civil Service, were at a premium. Only a small number of Labour MPs, most notably John Garrett and Robert Sheldon, continued to recommend further reform of the Civil Service along the lines proposed in the Fulton Report (Garrett, 1972; Garrett and Sheldon, 1973), whilst Robert Neild (a Cambridge economist appointed as a special adviser in the Treasury when Labour won the 1964 election and who subsequently became a member of the Fulton Committee) also remained convinced of the need for Civil Service reform, as part of a wider reorganization of the machinery of government (Labour Party Archives RD.475/November 1972). Other Labour politicians, though, seemed to share Marcia Williams’ pessimistic prognosis that any ‘thoroughgoing reform of the Civil Service will be difficult and probably abortive’, with any recommended reforms


‘placed in the hands of the civil servants themselves to carry out.’ As such, Williams suggested that ‘A question mark . . . now appears over the whole question of Civil Service reform’ (Williams, 1972: 349, 351). Certainly, when Labour was returned to Office in the February and October 1974 elections, there was little discernible interest in returning to the issue of Civil Service reform, a lack of interest which was greatly reinforced by the immense economic and political problems with which the 1974–1979 Labour Governments were confronted, most notably, economic crises and the IMF loan; problems over devolution; defeats in the House of Lords (especially over plans for the nationalization of the aircraft and ship-building industries); the lack of a working parliamentary majority. Yet even if these problems had been absent, it is unlikely that most Labour Ministers would have evinced any enthusiasm for reviving the issue of Civil Service reform (Garrett, 1980: 25). Certainly, by 1974, Harold Wilson had lost his previous reforming zeal – although Barbara Castle wondered, in spite of establishing the Fulton Committee, just how committed he ever was in the first place, given that Wilson ‘had been a backroom boy himself during the war . . . so . . . had a natural appreciation of the work that civil servants do . . . [over time] his appreciation turned into something dangerously like an uncritical acceptance of the status quo’, to the extent that he ‘never seriously challenged the establishment’ (Castle, 1993: 341–2) – while James Callaghan, who succeeded Wilson in April 1976, had never displayed any enthusiasm for constitutional reform generally (in spite of presiding over Labour’s devolution proposals for Scotland and Wales). On the contrary, Callaghan not only believed that the Civil Service worked well, so that there was no need to meddle with it, but that it provided a model for other nations to emulate (Morgan, 1997: 509) As such, Theakston observes, ‘another round of civil service reform, Fultonstyle, was never on the government’s agenda’ (Theakston, 1992: 137), an observation confirmed by John Garrett (who became a Labour MP in February 1974, whereupon he was immediately appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Robert Sheldon, a Minister at the Civil Service Department, whilst having also previously played an advisory role vis-avis the Fulton Committee), when he recalled that ‘there was little progress on Civil Service reform’ under the 1974-79 Labour Government, for it ‘had clearly lost interest in the matter’ (Garrett, 1980: 25). In spite of – or maybe because of – the Cabinet’s lack of enthusiasm for reform of the Civil Service, 1976 witnessed the Home Policy SubCommittee of Labour’s NEC, chaired at this time by Tony Benn, establish a ‘machinery of government’ group, claiming that ‘British membership


of the Common Market, the Devolution debate, the renewed obstruction of the House of Lords, and certain other issues have moved governmental machinery and practice more into the centre of political discussion.’ More specifically, it was alleged that ‘the crucial political role played by the Whitehall machine in the formation of Government policy’ was ‘often at variance with policy-making in the Party’, whilst also ‘frustrating the implementation of policies hammered out by the [labour] Movement’ (emphaisis in original). It was alleged that the ‘Whitehall machine . . . is a political force in its own right . . . one which . . . is not at all sympathetic to Labour’s calls for “a fundamental and irreversible shift in the balance of power in favour of working people and their families’’ ’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.515, March 1976). On another occasion, it was claimed that although ‘the slant’ of Civil Service power was ‘not directly conspiratorial or overtly anti-reformist’, it nonetheless strongly inclined ‘ideologically towards the maintenance, albeit with improved operation, of the existing socio-economic system’. As such, civil servants deployed a ‘variety of tactics . . . to isolate and weaken a Departmental Minister who breaks with the broad Whitehall consensus or who seeks major changes in the power structure affecting class relations’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.904, January 1977). As one author has observed, membership of this Machinery of Government group was ‘a veritable “Who’s who’’ of interested and influential figures who had dominated the debate on the Civil Service in and around the Party since the early 1960s’, including Tony Benn, Thomas Balogh, Norman Crowther-Hunt, John Garrett, Michael Meacher, Robert Neild, Brian Sedgemore, Robert Sheldon and Shirley Williams (Stone, 1997: 81). The five main recommendations which emanated from the machinery of government group, and which were endorsed at Labour’s 1978 conference, were the following:

• Ministers to be permitted their own Cabinets, a private office staffed by specialist political advisers. • Ministers to be granted the right to select their most senior Departmental officials. • Enhance the role and responsibilities of Junior Ministers. • Create a unified grading system (as originally recommended by Fulton). • Introduce new selection and appointment procedures, in order to widen access and recruitment.


In spite of the ideological balance represented on the machinery of government groups, which ensured that the report and its recommendations could not readily be dismissed as predictable Left-wing complaints about the Civil Service, the Callaghan Government itself showed little interest in pursuing any of the proposed reforms, beset as it was by the various problems noted above. As John Garrett himself observed in January 1979, ‘It is as if Labour in Office has now lost all stomach for administrative reform’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 960, col. 1425), although as noted above, James Callaghan had never shown much interest in Civil Service reform, or constitutional reform generally, for that matter. However, the Cabinet’s apparent indifference to the machinery of government’s proposals was viewed by the Labour Left as further evidence of the need to reform and ‘democratize’ Labour’s own internal structure, in order to render the Party’s parliamentary leadership more ‘accountable’ to the wider Party and to ensure that the NEC was accorded an enhanced role in determining Labour policy, particularly with regard to the implementation of policies approved at annual conference.

Labour and reconsideration of Civil Service reform during the 1980s The apparent unwillingness of the 1974–1979 Labour Governments to pursue more radical policies (see, for example, Coates, 1980; Donoughue, 1987; Holmes, 1985; Whitehead, 1985) was grist to the mill of those in the Party who were deeply suspicious of the Civil Service. That the Party’s parliamentary leadership had apparently failed to implement various of its more radical 1974 manifesto commitments – regardless of the chronic economic and political problems which afflicted these administrations – was partly attributed by some Labour MPs and former Ministers to the power and innate conservatism of the senior Civil Service, with Michael Meacher among those who argued that it was now necessary to dispel the constitutional myth about Governments and Ministers being ‘assisted by an impartial civil service’ enabling them ‘to implement the policies on which they were elected’. He claimed that ‘The truth is very different’ and insisted that ‘the real nature of the exercise of power in Whitehall’ needed to be exposed, otherwise ‘the abuse of power and obstruction of democracy that constantly occurs’ would continue unchecked (Meacher, 1979: 170). Certainly, by the later half of the 1970s, Joe Haines, who had served as Harold Wilson’s press secretary during the 1974–1976 period, had


become deeply concerned that ‘the civil service today is at the peak of its powers’. Indeed, he claimed that a ‘major danger we face today is that the civil service has achieved too much power’, this deemed to be evident in ‘the contempt with which the manifestos on which a Government has been elected is held’ derived from ‘an instinct for coalition’ (Haines, 1977: 25, 29, 26). Meanwhile, as we noted above, Brian Sedgemore expressed strong criticisms about the power and conservatism of the Civil Service after serving as Parliamentary Private Secretary to Tony Benn at Department of Energy from January 1977 to December 1978 (Sedgemore, 1980: Chapter 4). Yet in the decade following Labour’s 1979 election defeat, the issue of Civil Service reform fell further down the agenda, although Labour did call more vociferously for open government and freedom of information during the 1980s and 1990s (see Chapter 5). To the extent that the reform of the Civil Service was alluded to during the early 1980s, the focus was primarily on the unrepresentative socio-educational background of Britain’s mandarins, and the consequent claim that more senior civil servants should be recruited who had not been educated at public school and/or Oxbridge, but who, instead, were able ‘to reflect the wide range of experience in our community’. This would entail ‘more opportunities for outsiders with experience in industry and elsewhere to enter government service’. It was also suggested that the training of civil servants should be reformed, in order to foster ‘the techniques required to manage the policies of a socialist Labour government’ (Labour Party, 1982: 206), although Labour’s 1983 manifesto confined itself to a rather vague pledge to ‘Reform the administration of government and the civil service machine so that it meets modern needs and is properly accountable to elected representatives’ (Labour Party, 1983: 31–2). Michael Meacher, though, was emphatic that ‘very radical overhaul’ of the Civil Service would be necessary when Labour was next returned to Office and that this was ‘perhaps more important than the preparation of any specific new policy departure, since only if the former is tackled can the latter be expected to be achieved’ (Meacher, 1979: 186). However, during much of the 1980s, the Labour’s Party’s traditional criticisms of the Civil Service were tempered somewhat, for two particular reasons. Firstly, the criticisms alluded to above tended to emanate mainly from the Labour Left, and therefore did not necessarily reflect more mainstream opinion in the Party. Many Labour politicians who had served in the Wilson–Callaghan Governments were less inclined to blame the Civil Service for the problems which they had encountered. Furthermore, there were intimations from certain Labour figures that


some of the problems which Tony Benn attributed to his civil servants were ultimately derived from a lack of support amongst Cabinet colleagues for his more radical proposals and initiatives. Certainly, there were those in the Labour Party who remained confident that a ‘united government can rapidly secure the support of the civil service in carrying through major and sharp changes of policy’, believing also that ‘a strong minister - with the support of the Prime Minister and his colleagues - can impose his will on the government machine’ (Lipsey, 1982: 6). In fact, in 1985, Neil Kinnock himself expressed cautious confidence in the ability of a Labour administration to work with the existing Civil Service, noting that whilst there was a need to ‘examine the degree of enthusiasm and loyalty that they [Permanent Secretaries] are prepared to demonstrate in support of a Labour Government and in the implementation of the policy of that government’, he was nonetheless ‘prepared to work on . . . the conventional basis, which has stood us in good stead in Britain, about the way in which civil servants are prepared to work’ (quoted in Hennessy, 1990: 639). Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, as a consequence of the reforms pursued by the Thatcher Governments during the 1980s (and continued under John Major’s premiership in the 1990s), the Labour Party actually found itself seeking to defend the Civil Service, both against its alleged ‘politicization’ by the Conservatives (due to Margaret Thatcher’s alleged preference for appointing senior civil servants who shared her objectives, or, at least, were considered ‘doers’) and from an apparent policy of ‘privatization by stealth’ via the ‘Next Steps’ programme which was launched in 1988 (for coverage of the ‘Next Steps’ programme, see Butcher, 2000: 61–70; Drewry and Butcher, 1991: Chapter 12; Flynn, Gray and Jenkins, 1990; Hennessy, 1990: 618–27; Thain and Wright, 1995: Chapter five; Theakston, 1995: 131–45). Against such developments, and in spite of traditional Left critiques concerning the Civil Service, the Labour Party found itself calling for a return to traditional notions of impartiality, political neutrality and a revival of the public service ethos which Thatcherite ‘politicization’ and ‘privatization by stealth’ were alleged to be destroying. However, the Labour Party’s criticisms of the Next Steps programme were themselves tempered by the fact that the Fulton Report had itself recommended a process of ‘agencification’, with a greater emphasis to be placed on policy implementation and service delivery. Indeed, Giles Radice, having previously chaired a Treasury and Civil Service select committee inquiry into the Next Steps, subsequently declared that he had generally supported the programme because it represented ‘a natural conclusion,


or extension, of the reforms suggested by Fulton’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 278, col. 319), whilst Roy Hattersley, speaking as Labour’s Deputy Leader, dismissed the announcement of the Next Steps programme as ‘an anti-climax . . . no more than what Fulton recommended twenty years ago’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 127, col. 1149). In this context, therefore, Labour Party criticisms of the Thatcher Government’s Next Steps programme tended to focus on the extent to which the initiative was really a policy of ‘privatization by stealth’, although concerns were also expressed about the implications for accountability, and Ministerial responsibility to Parliament, of semi-autonomous agencies. Such anxieties were evident in John Garrett’s observation that ‘What begins as a fairly neutral proposal for making the Civil Service run better, and more managerial – a concept I am wholly behind – then becomes the dismemberment of the Civil Service, the reduction of Parliamentary accountability, and the change in the standards and ethos of our Civil Service’ (quoted in Theakston, 1992: 199). That most of the Labour leadership ascribed a fairly low priority to developing new proposals for Civil Service reform during the 1980s was evident in the neglect of the issue in the Party’s post-1987 Policy Review, for the ensuing policy document, Meet he Challenge, Make the Challenge, made no reference to the Civil Service, even though the section on ‘A modern democracy’, reflecting the deliberations of the Review Group on ‘Democracy for the Individual and the Community’, promised reform of virtually all other areas and aspects of the British system of government, including the devolution and decentralization of political power, and freedom of information. This made the absence of any reference to reform of the Civil Service even more notable, the issue also conspicuous by it absence from Labour’s 1992 election manifesto. This lacuna seemed to confirm the view that the Labour Party of the early 1990s did ‘not possess a detailed and coherent programme of Whitehall reform’ (Theakston, 1992: 203).

‘New Labour’ and the Civil Service By the mid-1990s, the Labour Party had become less critical of the Civil Service than it had sporadically been hitherto, the concern about excessive secrecy not withstanding. Whilst there remained some concern about the extent to which the Thatcher Governments had ‘politicized’ the Civil Service and instilled a ‘Tory mind-set’ into senior civil servants – or, as


Giles Radice put it, ‘civil servants pick up the scent and begin to present Ministers with what they want to hear rather than with impartial evidence’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 278, col. 320) – there was a growing recognition in the Labour Party that many mandarins themselves were eager to ‘see the back of the Conservatives’ (Mandelson and Liddle, 1996: 247). In this respect, Derek Foster, as Labour’s Shadow Public Service Minister, rejected the view that ‘during the long period of one-party rule the civil service has become so politicised that it may be unable to respond . . . to the demands of a new government.’ Instead, what might prove problematic for Labour Government, Foster suggested, was ‘low morale and the sense of insecurity in the public service’ (Foster, 1996: 259), although for these very reasons, there was a high expectation amongst much of the New Labour leadership that many civil servants would positively welcome a change of government after almost two decades of being ‘reduced, fragmented, bullied and demoralised’ by Conservative Ministers (Mandelson and Liddle, 1996: 247; see also Hennessy, Hughes and Seaton, 1997: 2). Indeed, one academic expert on the Civil Service confirmed that in the immediate aftermath of the 1997 election, ‘the sense of relief throughout Whitehall was almost palpable’, even if formal neutrality ‘meant that any celebrations had to be private and muted’ (Drewry, 1999: 156). Consequently, some senior figures in what had, by the mid-1990s, become New Labour cautioned against the temptation to instigate a purge against senior civil servants following election victory by the Party. On the contrary, it was suggested that ‘Whitehall officials have been colonised, rather than politicised’ having ‘worked in the service of a single party for a long time’, yet they remained ‘professionals’ and, as such, would

loyally serve the government of the day ... the main issue is not that they have given partisan advice to suit Tory Ministers’ prejudices but that, very often, they have not been asked for their advice at all . . . there is no evidence that they will be unenthusiastic servants of a Labour government - quite the contrary. It would therefore be wrong and unjust for new Ministers to come into office with a hit list of senior civil servants they want to remove . . . good civil servants will be useful to Labour ministers . . . in asking frank questions about new policies, seeking clear departmental goals, clarifying the precise aims of a policy . . . and drawing up the criteria for its success. (Mandelson and Liddle, 1996; 247–8)


This perspective largely echoed the views, expressed back in 1987, of a former adviser to Anthony Crosland and James Callaghan, namely that the civil servants whose careers had prospered under Margaret Thatcher’s premiership had usually been promoted because they were ‘activists, men and women who get things done’, rather than because they agreed with her policies. Therefore, given that an incoming Labour Government would also obviously ‘want to get things done, it should not jettison its potential allies.’ In this respect, ‘to embark on a wholesale massacre of Whitehall’s top brass would be a blunder’ (Blackstone, 1987: 30; Lipsey, 1987: 25–6). Consequently, Labour’s approach to the Civil Service after Tony Blair’s election as Party leader in 1994 significantly downplayed the Party’s traditional criticisms of Britain’s mandarins. Indeed, not only did Tony Blair himself (like Neil Kinnock and John Smith before him) display little interest in reform in this area – possibly the most conservative element of New Labour’s professed programme of constitutional reform – New Labour has actually placed considerable emphasis on praising aspects of the Civil Service, reiterating that many, if not most, potential problems were legacies of the Thatcher–Major Governments’ approach, rather than deficiencies in the Civil Service per se. Upon entering Office in May 1997, therefore, the Blair Government appeared to have no coherent or systematic policy with regard to the Civil Service. This apparent vacuum was in stark contrast to the various other commitments which collectively constituted New Labour’s professed commitment to constitutional reform; Civil Service reform was conspicuous by its absence, as indicated by Labour’s 1997 manifesto, which made no reference to the issue. Thus has one commentator described the Blair Government’s ‘thinking’ on the Civil Service as being ‘rather anodyne’ (Drewry, 1999: 168), whilst Theakston observes that ‘it was by no means clear that Labour . . . had, in the mid-1990s, a clear and coherent set of policies on the Civil Service, or an effective alternative of its own to the Conservative government’s programme’ (Theakston, 1998: 14). Instead, and in spite of the Party’s professed concerns during the 1980s and early 1990s, New Labour’s stance towards the Civil Service appeared to be based on consolidating and continuing with many of the initiatives inaugurated by the previous Conservative Governments, thereby confirming that over the course of 10 years, the Party’s attitude towards the Conservative’s reforms had ‘moved gradually from scepticism tinged with hostility to almost complete acceptance’ (Pyper, 1999: 203). Tony Blair himself had already signalled this approach by asserting that ‘We


seek to build sensibly on what is in place. We [will] keep what is good and working. We [will] change what isn’t’ (The Times, 30 June 1995). Or as Derek Foster reiterated, speaking as Shadow Minister for Public Services, ‘By the end of 1996, 80 per cent of civil servants may be in such agencies, most of which are working well. Where that is the case, Labour will see no reason to change the structure’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 278, col. 314). This consolidationist approach therefore entailed the Blair Government accepting the agencification of the Civil Service, inaugurated by the Conservatives in 1988, via their Next Steps programme (although as we noted previously, agencies had actually been advocated by the Fulton Report 20 years earlier). Indeed, New Labour declared its objective of improving the operational efficiency of these agencies and thereby enhancing their performance. Similarly, in spite of various criticisms advanced in Opposition, Labour in Office soon made clear its intention of continuing with market-testing and contracting-out, when and where they were deemed appropriate, particularly if they looked likely to deliver value for money and more efficient use of resources (Clark, 1997: 12). Yet overall, it was difficult to discern a clear or coherent Civil Service policy during the first Blair Government’s term of Office, beyond the continuation of the Thatcher–Major reforms as just noted. Occasionally, Blair made known his impatience with the speed of change in Whitehall, without providing much specificity about what change(s) he actually sought, although he occasionally alluded to the need for greater focus by senior civil servants on policy implementation and what became commonly termed ‘service delivery’ (Draper, 1999: 29; The Guardian, 7 September 1999; The Guardian, 28 October 1999; The Independent on Sunday, 29 April 2001). Indeed, Hennessy quotes one senior Whitehall ‘insider’ who complained that ‘Blair confuses the civil servants around him’, because with regard to the Civil Service itself, ‘he doesn’t know what he wants . . . he keeps saying different things . . . a succession of knee-jerks’ (Hennessy, 2000: 10). A clue to Blair’s apparent ambiguity over how – and to what extent – the Civil Service should be reformed was provided in a newspaper interview published on the day of his 1997 election victory, when he asserted that ‘the best preparation you can have is not sitting and thinking about institutional structures. Those things are important, but what’s absolutely critical is to have redefined the purposes of your Party, and to have clearly in your mind the purposes of your government’ (The Guardian, 1 May 1997).


A White Paper, Modernising Government, was published in March 1999, purporting to constitute the basis of a five-year programme, but perhaps in true New Labour style, it was clearer on the challenges facing the Civil Service, rather than coherent or concrete measures to meet them. The fact that almost two years had elapsed between New Labour’s election victory and the publication of Modernising Government was also suggestive, perhaps, of either uncertainty or lack of interest, concerning reform of the Civil Service. Amongst the objectives ascribed to the Civil Service in Modernising Government were implementing constitutional reform ‘in a way that preserves a unified Civil Service’, integrating ‘the EU dimension into policy thinking’, devoting more attention to service delivery and quality and improving responsiveness to users and developing ‘a more innovative and less risk averse culture in the civil service’ (Cmnd 4310, 1999: 56). Some organizational changes were effected within the core executive in response to Modernising Government, with the Better Regulation Unit (in the Cabinet Office), for example, renamed the Regulation Impact Unit and charged with responsibility for checking with Departments that their policy initiatives would not place undue burdens on the private sector (Gray and Jenkins, 2000: 222). Yet in spite of the Modernising Government White Paper, and the concomitant restructuring of the machinery of government, the first Blair Government still seemed to lack a clear or coherent programme for Civil Service reform. Occasional internal reorganization apart, New Labour’s approach to the Civil Service was often to bypass it, or set up parallel bodies to consider policy issues and problems, many of these bodies staffed with a notable proportion of ‘outsiders’ and special advisers, and often operating under the auspices of a strengthened Cabinet Office (Blick, 2004; Foley, 2000: 313–4; Kavanagh and Seldon, 2000: 76–7). This was in spite of Labour’s former criticisms of the 1979–1997 Thatcher–Major Governments for employing such staff and allegedly bypassing senior civil servants when seeking policy advice. For example, Blair made extensive use of ad hoc policy review groups and task forces, as well as more permanent policy units, to the extent that his first 12 in Office witnessed the establishment of more than 190 such bodies (Platt, 1998). One study of the first 23 task forces established by Blair discovered that only four of them were chaired by a Minister, with the remainder chaired by ostensibly non-political ‘outsiders’ (Daniel, 1997). Although this doubtless reflected a desire to incorporate a wider range of expertise and experience from the ‘real world’ (especially from the business community and private sector) into the heart of government, the use of such non-Ministerial appointees inevitably raised


questions about the implications both for the role of the Civil Service itself and about traditional notions of Ministerial responsibility. Yet ‘Blairites’ did not view the expansion of such bodies, and incorporation of ‘outsiders’ as problematic, for any policy recommendations emanating from the deliberations of such task forces still required formal ratification from the Cabinet itself, thereby ensuring the continued applicability of collective Ministerial responsibility. Moreover, Blairites viewed the use of such bodies as a necessary corollary of their professed desire to facilitate ‘joined-up government’, which rendered it vital to overcome the strong tendency towards Departmentalism and Ministers acting as ‘barons’ primarily concerned with their own Whitehall ‘empire’. Besides the Blair Governments’ apparent downgrading of senior civil servants vis-a-vis policy formation reflected the New Labour view that mandarins should focus far more on policy implementation and service delivery. Such developments not only caused considerable concern in Whitehall itself, but also occasioned unease amongst those Labour MPs who disliked what they perceived to be Blair’s apparent ‘Napoleonic’ ambitions and increasingly presidential style of leadership. Other Labour MPs, however, shared Blair’s apparent impatience with the slow pace of change in Whitehall and the seeming preference of senior civil servants for policy formulation rather than implementation and service delivery. As such, just weeks before the 2001 election, the select committee on public administration called for a Royal Commission on the future and functions of the Civil Service, on the grounds that, not for the first time, it seemed to have ‘absorbed attempts at reform’. It was therefore suggested that the Civil Service might be incapable of internal reform and that change would have to be imposed from outside (The Guardian, 10 April 2001). Labour’s 2001 election manifesto, meanwhile, insisted that the Civil Service needed ‘reform to make it more effective and entrepreneurial’ and therefore pledged that ‘further radical steps’ would be taken ‘to ensure the civil service has the skills base necessary to meet the challenges’ posed by Labour’s promised ‘programme’ (Labour Party, 2001: 35). Nevertheless, there remained a remarkable lack of detail or specificity about what precisely Ministers envisaged by way of Civil Service reform during a second term of Office, although within days of the election victory, Tony Blair was announcing a reorganization of Government Departments and responsibilities, the most notable of which was the replacement of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food with a new Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. What


had been the Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions, now became the Department of Transport, Local Government and the Regions. Elsewhere in Whitehall, the Department of Education and Employment was rechristened the Department of Education and Skills, whilst the Department of Social Security was renamed the Department for Work and Pensions. The Department of Culture, Media and Sport, meanwhile, was to assume some of the responsibilities previously undertaken by the Home Office, particularly those pertaining to censorship, horseracing, gambling, licensing and video classification (The Guardian, 11 June 2001). Beyond such Departmental restructuring – doubtless intended to foster the illusion of dynamism and radicalism at the start of New Labour’s second term of Office – the precise character of Civil Service reform remained unclear, beyond periodic reiteration of such objectives as ‘joined-up’ government, improving the quality of outputs and delivery to users of public services and widening recruitment in order to attract talented individuals from ‘non-traditional’ Civil Service backgrounds and the private sector, thereby securing a genuine meritocracy in Whitehall and greater diversity of personnel. Certainly, Sir Richard Wilson, in introducing the annual progress report for 2001 (Cabinet Office, 2001), was emphatic that the modernization programme heralded by the 1999 White Paper was developing apace, for there was now ‘strong focus in Departments on outcomes, on raising the quality of public services and on equipping people with the skills to do the job.’ Yet modernization was also being achieved, Sir Richard insisted, ‘without sacrificing our core values: selection on merit, integrity, political impartiality and giving our best advice to the government of the day’ (Wilson, 2001: 2). Such declarations were often unconvincing to outside observers and academic commentators, though, with Rhodes noting that such reports merely confirmed that ‘Managerialism marches into the new millennium in a flurry of jargon’ (Rhodes, 2001: 99), while Hennessy confessed that his ‘personal bullshit detector glowed bright on encountering . . . this evangelical language’ when encountering the aspirations and pledges enshrined in the 1999 White Paper’ (Hennessy, 1999: 19). The professed changes to be secured from the Modernising Government ‘programme’ were to be pursued further under Sir Andrew Turnbull, who replaced Sir Richard Wilson as Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Civil Service in September 2002. Sir Andrew revealed that, in accordance with the Government’s own perspective concerning the future development


of the Civil Service, he would pursue a three-year plan, for which he had identified four particular goals (Turnbull, 2002): • A Civil Service respected as much for its ability to deliver as for its policy advice. • An enhanced capacity to think and operate strategically. • The creation of public value, meaning not only its efficiency in delivering quality public services, but its ability to maintain trust and integrity in so doing, as well as retaining impartiality in its treatment of citizens, and recruiting on the basis of merit and ability. • Ensuring that the Civil Service was one which young people, as well as successful people from other walks of life, would want to join, and in which they would be happy to serve. These four broad objectives – which probably caused Hennessey’s bullshit detector to blow a fuse – were to be achieved by a number of ‘key enablers’ identified by Sir Andrew, such as ‘shared endeavour with Ministers’; improved ‘strategic policy-making in Departments’; developing ‘key skills such as project management’; the use of technology to enhance ‘customer-focussed service delivery’; ‘flexible delivery structures’; improve human resources management in Whitehall. Although these objectives could be viewed as commensurate with the Blair Governments’ dual desire for ‘joined-up government’ (in order to overcome ‘Whitehall turf-wars’ and the propensity to Departmentalism) and a much greater emphasis on service delivery and implementation (rather than traditional Civil Service involvement in policy advice and formulation), it was debatable whether they amounted to a clear or coherent strategy for reform of the Civil Service, rather than another example of the vacuous verbiage which routinely emits from the mouths of public sector managers today and which demoralizes so many frontline staff. Like previous Labour Governments, the Blair Governments seemed uncertain about what precisely they wished to do with regard to reforming or ‘modernizing’ the Civil Service and thus oscillated between berating it for being one of the ‘forces of conservatism’ on the one hand and appearing to find the whole issue of Whitehall reform too time-consuming and tedious on the other. Certainly, one commentator concluded that having examined the second (2001–2005) Blair Government’s approach to machinery of government issues, ‘There was no fundamental or continuing effort to modernise central government’ in the way that other institutions of governance were subjected to constant


reform or reorganization, so that apart from the aforementioned Departmental restructuring along largely functional or strategic lines, ‘the core of central government remained largely untouched by “modernisation’’ . . . . Whitehall Departments continued with broadly the functions they had in 2001’ (Travers, 2005: 91, 90). Consequently, there had been no major or systematic reform of the Civil Service even by the end of Blair’s premiership in June 2007, just over 10 years after New Labour had entered Office. Instead, there had been a number of rather pragmatic and sporadic measures, entailing a combination of Departmental reorganization, increased Ministerial reliance on ‘independent’ sources of policy advice, a strengthening and expansion of both the Downing Street Policy Unit/Directorate and the Cabinet Office, the incorporation of private sector techniques with regard to performance indicators and management and periodic perorations about the need for senor civil servants to focus more on policy implementation and service delivery and somewhat less on their hitherto advisory roles and responsibility. Changes seemed to occur through a process of accretion and often built upon reforms introduced by the Thatcher–Major Governments through their Next Steps programme, rather than in accordance with any discernible plan devised by New Labour itself. The Blair Governments did not seek to devise their own equivalent of the ‘Next Steps’, nor was there any Fulton-style Commission to inquire into the role, structure or future of the Civil Service. Tony Blair’s occasional utterances of impatience with the ‘conservatism’ of the Civil Service never prompted him to seek a more coherent, explicit or systematic approach to the reform of Whitehall. Indeed, Blair himself rejected calls for a Civil Service Act which would place the values of the Civil Service, and its relationships with governments, on a statutory basis. Such demands, emanating variously from Lord (Robert) Butler (head of the Civil Service and Cabinet Secretary from 1988 until 1998), the First Division Association (the professional body representing senior civil servants); Sir Nigel Wicks chair of the Committee on Standards in Public Life and the House of Commons’ Public Administration Committee (chaired by the widely respected Labour MP, Tony Wright), became increasingly vocal during the course of Blair’s premiership, due to a growing perception that the independence and impartiality of the Civil Service was being compromised by increasing pressure to meet Ministerial targets or provide them with information which would justify Ministers’ actions and decisions (rather than influencing them or pointing out potential problems before a decision was taken). Some of these demands also reflected growing concern over the


apparently increasing influence of special advisers and their ambiguous – sometimes strained – relationship with senior civil servants. Instead, the most that the (third) Blair Government seemed willing to offer was a revised Civil Service code, drafted early in 2006 by the then Cabinet Secretary, Gus O’Donnell, which reaffirmed the independence and political neutrality of the senior Civil Service, but also pledged that aggrieved mandarins would be given the right to appeal to a Civil Service Commissioner. However, rather than foreshadowing a Civil Service Act, the code was apparently intended as an alternative to legislation, in spite of – or possibly because of – the widespread demands for the relationship between Ministers and mandarins to be placed on a statutory basis (The Guardian, 27 January 2006). Not until Tony Blair had been succeeded by Gordon Brown in June 2007 was there any further discernible development with regard to the Civil Service, when The Governance of Britain Green Paper (published just one week after Brown had become Prime Minister) pledged that the next parliamentary session would herald ‘measures which will enshrine the core principles and values of the Civil Service in law’, with the independent Civil Service Commissioners placed on a statutory basis and the ‘historic principle of appointment on merit following fair and open competition’ also given legislative effect. It was further intended that legislation would ‘clarify the legitimate and constructive role of Special Advisers within government’, such advisers apparently providing Ministers with ‘political advice’ in contrast to the ‘non-political advice’ proffered by civil servants. Legislation along these lines, it was claimed, would finally give statutory effect to the core values and principles of the Civil Service originally enshrined in the 1854 Northcote–Trevelyan Report (Straw, 2007: 21–2, paras 40–7).

Conclusion Two general features have emerged from this analysis of the Labour Party and the Civil Service, firstly the ambivalence within the Party as the importance or necessity of reform and, secondly, when reforms have been proposed or occasionally pursued, the inconsistency or uncertainty of their purpose or objectives. With regard to the ambivalent place of Civil Service reform in Labour’s history, the Party has oscillated between deeming such reform to be of paramount importance to the achievement of various other social and economic objectives on the one hand, to treating the issue as an irrelevance or diversion from actually achieving these objectives on the other.


Indeed, the Fulton episode epitomized both of these approaches, for the priority which Harold Wilson and some of his associates ascribed to reform of the Civil Service during much of the 1960s was not shared by others in the Party, for whom Civil Service reform (along with other aspects of constitutional reform) was a distraction both from the various industrial and economic problems which they faced and from the ‘bread-and-butter’ issues which voters were primarily concerned about. Furthermore, even Wilson himself appeared to lose much of his hitherto interest in Civil Service reform soon after the Fulton Report had been published. Certainly, by the time Wilson became Prime Minister again, in 1974, any previous reforming zeal had dissipated, this loss of interest compounded by the serious economic and industrial problems which his Government then faced, coupled with renegotiation of the terms of Britain’s membership of the (then) European Communities and the absence of a working parliamentary majority. The second particular aspect of Labour’s approach to the Civil Service which we have noted concerns the inconsistencies enshrined in the criticisms variously advanced and the reforms which have occasionally been promoted or pursued as a result. Once again, the critique which underpinned the establishment of the Fulton Committee, and the Labour Party’s own subsequent written evidence to it, clearly indicated the lack of coherence which has characterized much of Labour’s ‘thinking’ in this area. On such occasions, the Labour Party, or, rather, certain figures within it, have denounced the power of the Civil Service, particularly vis-à-vis Ministers, whilst simultaneously calling for greater professionalism amongst Britain’s mandarins, apparently oblivious to the fact that a more professional Civil Service would almost inevitably be more influential and powerful too. Furthermore, Labour critics of the Civil Service, along with the Fulton Report itself, have been critical of the ‘cult of the amateur’ in Whitehall, urging instead that civil servants be permitted to acquire greater expertise in particular areas of policy, or within a specific Department of State (this, too, linked to the professed desire for greater professionalism). Yet not only would such specialization further enhance the power and persuasiveness of a civil servant when ‘advising’ their Minister, it would also sit uneasily alongside another demand occasionally emanating from Labour critics of the Civil Service, namely that it needed to be opened up to people from a wider, more diverse or representative socio-educational background, thereby rendering it more in-touch with the real world. This aspect has been well-noted by Ashford, who


referred to the Fulton Report’s ‘naïve conviction that if different kinds of people, presumably more socially representative and more professional, were put in the upper ranks of the Civil Service, then the policy-making process would be simultaneously more “democratic’’ and more efficient’ (Ashford, 1981: 72). Ultimately, however, the Labour Party has effected little significant reform of the Civil Service because, apart from Harold Wilson in the late 1960s, Labour leaders and Ministers have not deemed such reform to be a priority. As such, even if the Labour Party had ever developed an intellectually coherent and politically consistent programme of Civil Service reform, much would still have depended on the enthusiasm and commitment of the leadership when in Office, yet as Theakston rightly notes ‘past Labour governments and leaders do not have a good record in this respect’, for ‘MacDonald, Attlee, Wilson, and Callaghan all disappointed would-be Whitehall reformers’ (Theakston, 1992: 204). Many Labour Ministers, meanwhile, have looked back to their times in Office with a sense of respect for Britain’s mandarins, sharing, perhaps, Barbara Castle’s admiration for ‘the unique quality of the British civil service: the capacity of its top people to develop a genuine loyalty to a Minister who wasn’t here yesterday and will be gone tomorrow’ (Castle, 1980: 130, diary entry for 5 July 1974). Much more recently, although Tony Blair was critical of the Civil Service in a number of respects, certainly more so than most of his predecessors, his admonishments of Civil Service conservatism certainly did not form the basis of a clear programme of reform. At most, Blair’s ‘approach’ relied primarily on occasional Departmental reorganization and mergers, coupled with a strengthening of the Cabinet Office, greater use of advisers, ad hoc working parties and task forces and repeated rhetoric about the importance of ‘service delivery’. These exhortations, however, hardly constituted a new Fulton-style programme. On the contrary, it seemed that, overall, both Tony Blair and most of his Ministerial colleagues viewed systematic reform of the Civil Service as being of even less significance than other components of New Labour’s professed constitutional reform agenda. Indeed, such demands for reform which have been articulated since the late 1990s have largely emanated from parts of the Civil Service itself, and the House of Commons public administration committee (chaired by the Labour MP, Tony Wright), reflecting concern in these quarters both about the political pressure which senior civil servants are being placed under by Labour Ministers anxious to ensure that performance indicators and targets are met and the increasing incorporation


of private sector or commercial principles and practices into Whitehall, thereby raising concerns that it was the Blair Governments themselves which were undermining or compromising the public service ethos and professional integrity of senior civil servants. In so doing, the Blair Governments seemed, in many respects, merely to have maintained the previous Conservative Governments’ approach to ‘modernization’ of the Civil Service.

5 Open Government

Introduction As noted in Chapter 4, one of the major criticisms of the senior Civil Service traditionally harboured by sections of the Labour Party was that it was closed and secretive. Consequently, Civil Service reform has sometimes prompted interest, for some Labour politicians, in the twin issues of open government and freedom of information, most notably through reform (or repeal) of Britain’s Official Secrets Act and/or statutory freedom of information. As with various other aspects of constitutional reform, though, there has often been a discrepancy both between what the Labour Party has demanded in Opposition and what it has delivered in Office and also between Labour backbenchers and their Ministerial colleagues. This is largely because once ensconced in government, Labour Ministers have usually insisted that effective policy-making requires confidentiality in terms of the advice proffered by senior civil servants, as well as with regard to what is actually discussed in Cabinet prior to a formal decision be reached [in accordance with the constitutional doctrine of collective (ministerial) responsibility]. In subscribing to such a perspective, Ministers have invariably insisted that ‘openness’ is already provided for by their accountability to Parliament (and ultimately the wider electorate) for decisions and policies. Such Ministers have tended to object that if policy advice was to be released under the provisions of freedom of information legislation, then the anonymity of civil servants would almost inevitably be compromised, along with their hitherto reputation for political impartiality and neutrality (due to them becoming publicly identified with a particular policy proposal). In these respects, the reluctance with which Labour Ministers have generally approached open 183


government and freedom of information is another manifestation of the pervasive influence exerted by the Westminster Model, with its assumptions about the relationship between Ministers and civil servants, as well as Ministerial responsibility and accountability to Parliament.

The early Labour Party, official secrecy and open government Writing just three years after the official formation of the Labour Party, Ramsay MacDonald argued that The argument that the work of these offices is so delicate that it cannot stand the east winds of public opinion is a pure fiction. But it tends to become true, because the methods of secrecy create their own justification. They establish a bureaucracy which hides itself from the public gaze and protects itself from public control by fictions regarding the marvellous work of the expert and the miraculous omniscience of the permanent official. It is just upon these offices which transact delicate business that the winds of public opinion should blow most freely. (MacDonald, 1909a: 36) Yet only seven other Labour MPs joined MacDonald in voting against the Official Secrets Act when it was introduced in 1911. Nor did the first two Labour Administrations, in 1924 and 1929– 1931 (both led by MacDonald), display much concern to tackle official secrecy in order to render British government more open and accountable. On the contrary, during his second period as Prime Minister, MacDonald reminded his Ministerial colleagues of ‘the particular importance of secrecy in regard to Cabinet proceedings’ (quoted in Theakston, 1992: 177), thereby providing an early example of manner in which senior Labour parliamentarians have tended to act like poachers turned gamekeepers once in government. Yet after the disintegration of the second Labour Government in 1931, one of the original eight MPs to have voted against the Official Secrets Act, George Lansbury, made a trenchant attack on the secrecy surrounding decision making in British politics, declaring that ‘This secrecy business is quite impossible’, before suggesting that ‘with extremely few possible exceptions’ the minutes of Cabinet meetings should be made available to the public immediately afterwards. Lansbury was emphatic that ‘In a Socialist Government all this make-believe of secrecy would be abolished’ (Lansbury, 1934: 129). The following year, though, Arthur

Open Government

185

Henderson admitted to Lansbury that he (Henderson) was not keen to secure reform of official secrecy, because ‘we might want to use the [Official Secrets] Act ourselves when we get back to power’ (quoted in Mackenzie, 1968: 85). Nor did many other Labour MPs seem to share Lansbury’s concern about official secrecy, and hence, it remained very much a minority issue within the Party, particularly amongst the leadership.

The Attlee Governments, official secrecy and open government The 1945 Labour Government led by Clement Attlee certainly seemed readily to accept the orthodox case for maintaining official secrecy, with the Prime Minister himself explaining to his Cabinet colleagues that ‘The method adopted by Ministers for discussion among themselves of question of policy is essentially a domestic matter, and is no concern of Parliament or the public’, for ‘No Government can be successful which cannot keep its secrets’ (NA CAB 21/1624; NA CAB 129/4, August 1945). This perspective was later elaborated upon by Morrison, when he explained that the need for confidentiality and secrecy of Cabinet memoranda and materials was so great that the information could not even be divulged by Ministers to their backbench colleagues, for this would inevitably result in leaks, which, in turn, would provide ammunition for the Government’s political opponents and other outside interests. Besides, Morrison maintained, the confidentiality which official secrecy provided enabled Ministers to speak more candidly in Cabinet or Cabinet committee, thereby ensuring that policies were subject to a full and uninhibited debate (Morrison, 1964: 148, 26). Thus did a Cabinet committee proudly proclaim that ‘the record of this country in these matters is extremely good’ (NA CAB 134/422, 26 April 1947).

Labour and open government in the 1960s It was only during the 1960s that reform of official secrecy and the concomitant advocacy of open government moved onto the Labour Party’s political agenda, in the context of its more general stated concern with the efficiency and effectiveness of Britain’s political institutions. The traditional argument that official secrecy facilitated more effective decision making was turned, by advocates of reform, on its head, with the argument now being advanced that ‘secrecy is an obstacle to good


policy-making when it prevents the tapping of a sufficiently wide range of expert advice’ (Fabian Society, 1964: 22). This perspective was endorsed by the Fulton Report when it decreed that ‘the administrative process is surrounded by too much secrecy. The public interest would be better served if there was a greater amount of openness’. Although it was fully acknowledged that ‘there must always be an element of secrecy (not simply on grounds of national security) in administration and policy-making’, it was suggested that more factual material could be made publicly available during the formulation stage of policy-making. The Fulton Report thus urged the Wilson Government to establish an inquiry with the intention of ‘getting rid of unnecessary secrecy in this country’ (Cmnd 3638, 1968: paras 277–80). In fact, Wilson had already partly pre-empted such suggestions by introducing two very modest reforms, the first being to reduce, from 50 years to 30, the period before which government records (most notably Cabinet papers and minutes) could be made public and, secondly, to make more extensive use of consultative publications, such as Green Papers (the first of which was published in 1967). Yet even the first of these modest reforms caused consternation amongst some Ministers, with the Foreign Secretary, George Brown, along with the Home Secretary, James Callaghan, favouring a reduction only to 40 years. However, with the support of Ministers such as Barbara Castle, Tony Crosland and Richard Crossman (Castle, 1990: 29, diary entry for 5 August 1965), the Cabinet endorsed Wilson’s proposal for a reduction to 30 years. Another reason for the modesty of such measures was simply that the reform of official secrecy remained a minority interest in the Labour Party, thus relieving pressure on the leadership to proceed further or faster towards more open government. Admittedly, the Labour Party’s written submission to the Fulton Inquiry claimed that ‘the civil service is excessively secretive’, suggesting that whilst this was an aspect largely beyond the Fulton Committee’s remit, it sometimes ‘almost seems that the whole structure of British Government is designed to protect the policy making functions of Government from public scrutiny’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.63/December 1966), yet the cause of open government did not appear to have many enthusiastic proponents in the Labour Party generally during the late 1960s. Indeed, on a number of occasions during 1967 and 1968, Wilson felt obliged to remind his Ministerial colleagues about the need for maintaining the confidentiality and secrecy of Cabinet and Cabinet committee discussions, these reminders being imparted in response to apparent

Open Government

187

‘leaks’ and unauthorized briefings to the media. In this context, senior civil servants considered ways of reducing the number of copies of official documents in circulation (thereby reducing the scope for unauthorized disclosures), only to discover that many Ministers and their Departments complained that they invariably needed more, not less, information, in order to make decisions and formulate policies. Recognizing that ‘the scope for restriction is not going to be very great . . . the present very large distribution of documents must continue’, mandarins instead wondered whether there might be greater selectivity in the extent to which sensitive papers were made available to junior Ministers, whilst also reiterating that Parliamentary Private Secretaries ‘should in no circumstances be given access to Cabinet papers’ (NA PREM 13/2291, Trend to Wilson, 13 March 1968), thereby reflecting a decidedly hierarchical view of entitlement to official information. A political culture which could justify providing only limited information to junior Ministers, and none at all to PPSs, was hardly conducive to facilitating freedom of information for the wider British public. One of the few committed advocates of more open government during this time was Tony Benn, who was convinced that ‘most of the current business of Government could easily be made more generally known to those who are interested in it’ (Benn, 1970: 19). Not surprisingly, though, Benn’s call for more open government was not echoed by many of his Ministerial colleagues. Indeed, while a 1969 White Paper entitled Information and the Public Interest reiterated that more statistical and factual material was now being made publicly available, it also insisted that it was vital to retain secrecy vis-à-vis policy-making at senior levels, in order for trust to be maintained, both between Ministers themselves and between Ministers and their civil servants. This presumably went some way to pacifying those in the Labour Party calling for ‘the provision of much more background information and a much greater knowledge of the machinery through which advice is turned into a draft Bill, or conflicts of advice resolved or reconciled’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.440/April 1969). Nonetheless, many Ministers were, by this time, convinced that the Government had gone as far as it could, or should, in disclosing information – ‘our record on improvements both in the collection of intelligence and in the supply of information is quite unusually good’ – to the extent that instigating further mechanisms for disclosure would ‘cause us a good deal of unnecessary embarrassment by exposing to the public eye sensitive areas in which we have good reason for not being completely forthcoming . . . [by] releasing more information with regard to those


areas when the discretion we are at present using is wholly justified’ (NA PREM 13/2528, Crossman to Wilson, 20 March 1969).

Labour, official secrecy and open government in the 1970s Following the Party’s 1970 election defeat, Tony Benn remained one of the few senior Labour MPs concerned with promoting more open government, urging ‘a completely fresh look at all the many barriers that exist to ensure that ordinary people do not know what is going on in Government’, so as to ensure that ‘people . . . know much more about why and how the decisions that affect them are actually made.’ Benn therefore suggested that the ‘theme of publicity versus secrecy should be a major one for a future Labour Government and the onus of proof squarely placed on those who want to preserve the mystique of secrecy rather than those who want to lift it’ (Benn, 1970). Benn reiterated his arguments in favour of open government in a 1973 paper entitled ‘The working methods of the next Labour government’. Written under the auspices of the NEC’s home policy committee, Benn’s paper called for a review of the Official Secrets Act, in order ‘to restrict it to those issues which really touch upon matters essential to protect the national, military, and economic and political, interest’. Beyond such matters, Benn insisted that there was ‘no real justification’ for most of the official secrecy which existed in Britain, much of which had little to do with the national interest (as was invariably claimed), but much to do with ‘the personal advantage of Ministers and civil servants, even though it may be to the disadvantage of the public’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.867/August 1973). Although the Labour Party promised little by way of reforming official secrecy in its February 1974 manifesto, its manifesto for that year’s October election included a pledge to ‘replace the Official Secrets Act by a measure to put the burden on the public authorities to justify withholding information’. This commitment emanated from a paper on People and the Media published in June 1974 by a Labour Party study group, of which Tony Benn was a prominent member. Yet once back in Office, the Labour leadership again showed little enthusiasm for reforming official secrecy or promoting open government, although the 1975 Queen’s Speech did announce that ‘proposals will be prepared to amend the Official Secrets Act and to liberalise the practice relating to official information’ (emphasis added). This formal commitment was partly a concession to pressure from within the Labour Party (Donoughue, 1987: 122), but it also constituted a partial and

Open Government

189

belated response to the recommendations of the 1972 Franks Report – on the operation of Section Two1 of the 1911 Official Secrets Act – which proposed replacing the existing legislation on official secrecy with a new Official Information Act. However, the fact that the Labour Government was merely promising to prepare proposals was indicative of how little urgency this issue was viewed by most of the Labour leadership. Indeed, a Ministerial committee established at the time of the Queen’s Speech decided that matters pertaining to the release of official documents would best be considered by the Civil Service Department instead, a move which did not augur well for proponents of open government. Not until July 1978, in fact, by which time the Labour Government had been in Office for four years, was a White Paper published outlining ways in which Section 2 of the Official Secrets Act ought to be reformed or replaced. Yet in certain respects, the White Paper was deemed ‘anti-liberal, and came up with even more draconian penalties for wider definitions of breaches of official secrecy’, although ‘the most disappointing feature was to see how many Ministers took a reactionary position on this issue’ (Donoughue, 1987: 122). Certainly, Merlyn Rees (who replaced Roy Jenkins as Home Secretary in 1976) evinced little enthusiasm for freedom of information, suggesting that there were probably only two or three people in his constituency who cared about the issue (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 954, cols. 546–7), a point he reiterated subsequently, when asserting that ‘to be blunt, The Guardian can go on for however long it likes about open government and reform of the Official Secrets Act . . . in my own constituency of 75 000 electors, I would be hard pressed to find many who would be interested’ (Rees, 1987: 32). As Bernard Donoughue, the head of 10 Downing Street’s Policy Unit during this period, recalls, ‘most people in central government saw only

1

Section Two of the 1911 Official Secrets Act had made it illegal to disclose to any ‘unauthorized person’ information obtained whilst employed as a servant of the Crown. Although the original inspiration for the Act was political concern about spying in the years leading up to the First World War, it subsequently became a means by which Ministers could seek to withhold a range of potentially embarrassing or controversial information whilst invoking the principle of ‘national security’. The issue became particularly poignant in 1975 because a former Labour Cabinet Minister, Richard Crossman, began publishing his Diaries, which contained a wealth of detailed information about Cabinet meetings and policy decisions under the 1964–1970 Labour Government, as well as Crossman’s sometimes less than flattering depictions of individual Ministers, several of whom were then serving in the post-1974 Cabinet.


potential embarrassment in revealing to the electorate more about their activities’. Indeed, Donoughue reiterated the extent to which ‘many Ministers took a reactionary position on this issue’, to the extent that after Roy Jenkins’ resignation in 1976, ‘there was no senior Minister who took a radical stand’, leaving Donoughue ‘shocked by the elitism and reactionary assumptions behind many of the assertions made against change’ (Donoughue, 1987: 122; see also Donoughue, 2005: 530, diary entry for 15 October 1975). One particular Cabinet committee meeting on reforming the Official Secrets Act became so fractious and ‘chaotic at times’ that a frustrated Roy Jenkins ‘lost his temper several times’, whilst Denis Healey was heard to mutter that ‘This is balls-achingly boring’ (Donoughue, 2005: 683–4, diary entry for 3 March 1976). What further indicated a lack of Ministerial enthusiasm concerning freedom of information and open government was the fact that in unveiling the White Paper, Rees declared that ‘With regard to legislation to put the Government under a statutory duty to disclose information on demand, we have not yet examined in depth how overseas experience might be applied to our constitutional system’, and because this was ‘a complex matter . . . it will need to be studied carefully’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 954, col. 537). Given that the Government had been in Office for four years by this time (albeit beset by serious economic and industrial problems and the loss of its narrow parliamentary majority), sceptics might have been forgiven for wondering why such a study had not been conducted already. Certainly, the statement by Rees seemed to provide ample scope for further prevarication and procrastination by Ministers reluctant actually to provide ‘a statutory duty to disclose information on demand’. The failure of the 1974–1979 Labour Governments to treat the cause of open government more seriously served to galvanize those in the Party who did favour greater openness, to the extent that a draft Freedom of Information Bill, prepared by the Party’s Machinery of Government Group, was approved by the NEC, and then endorsed by Labour’s 1978 conference. The draft Bill’s preamble declared that It is nothing short of absurd and conducive only to bad government that the general public should have less access to information than favoured individuals and groups to argue their case, who in turn have less access to information than junior ministers, who in turn have less access to information than their Cabinet colleagues, who in turn have less access to information than certain civil servants. (quoted in Theakston, 1992: 185)

Open Government

191

To remedy this situation, the draft Bill proposed that public authorities – defined for this purpose as Government Departments, nationalized industries, Quangos and local authorities – should make publicly available a much more extensive range of information than had previously been disclosed, although obviously there would remain exemptions for matters whose disclosure was deemed inimical to national security. It was also proposed that the papers of Cabinet and its committees should normally be published after a period of two years. To ensure that the Bill’s provisions were adhered to, it was further suggested that the House of Commons would establish both an Official Information Panel and a select committee. Not surprisingly, perhaps, the Cabinet response to such proposals was less than ebullient, with Merlyn Rees, the Home Secretary, claiming to wonder whether any organization can operate effectively if it has to do so all the time in . . . as though in a goldfish bowl . . . I believe that to grant access . . . could alter fundamentally and for the worse the entire working of government. (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 960, col. 2183) Continued Ministerial antipathy towards (more) open government was doubtless compounded by the imminence of the general election, and the problems engendered for the Labour leadership by mounting economic problems, the breakdown of the 5 per cent pay policy, which culminated in the politically disastrous ‘winter of discontent’ and the ill-fated devolution programme. Nonetheless, Labour’s 1979 election manifesto did include a pledge to introduce a Freedom of Information Bill in order to facilitate more open government, coupled with reform of Section 2 of the Official Secrets Act, even though Callaghan himself remained decidedly unenthusiastic about such measures.

Labour in Opposition and the issue of open government during the 1980s In the aftermath of the 1979 election defeat, it was Labour’s briefly ascendant Left which was most vociferous in demanding open government in Britain, with Tony Benn again proving particularly keen on this aspect of democratizing the British State and challenging the secrecy of decision making (see, for example, Benn, 1980: 112–36;


New Socialist September–October 1981: 13; Benn, 1982: 53–5). Benn’s calls were echoed by his former PPS, Brian Sedgemore, who asserted that ‘a civil servant’s overriding loyalty is to the democratic process’, which meant that when mandarins ‘knew that politicians were behaving improperly’, it should ‘be their duty to expose the politicians.’ In other words, Sedgemore declared ‘Doctrines of ministerial responsibility and accountability . . . cannot be a shield which allows politicians to act illegally or immorally’ (Sedgemore, 1980: 163–4). Meanwhile, the Left-wing policy document Labour’s Programme 1982 proclaimed that ‘the excessive degree of secrecy which surrounds the corridors of power’ was one of the ‘central features’ of the British system of government. In seeking to replace such secrecy, it was argued that open government would not only facilitate greater public interest and involvement in political affairs and decision making, it would also ‘make for better government’, presumably on the grounds that policies would be based on more extensive information and a wider consideration of views. It was further claimed that open government would also yield ‘less cynicism about the processes of government’, for excessive secrecy by policy-makers effectively encouraged public suspicion and scepticism: ‘only weak Ministers, and inefficient or corrupt bureaucracies . . . need fear greater public access to information’ (Labour Party, 1982: 204). This commitment to open government was reiterated in the following year’s election manifesto, in which a Freedom of Information Bill was promised, ‘providing for a genuine system of open government, and placing the onus on the authorities to justify withholding information’ (Labour Party, 1983: 31). This formal commitment to freedom of information was imbued with particular resonance when Clive Ponting, a senior civil servant in the Ministry of Defence, was charged, in the mid-1980s, under the provisions of the 1911 Official Secrets Act, having leaked confidential information about the sinking of the Argentine warship, the General Belgrano, during the 1982 Falklands War, to the Labour MP, Tam Dalyell. The high-profile court case saw Ponting acquitted (Ponting having successfully argued that the leaking of the information, which contradicted the official government line, was in the public interest, for the British people ought to know ‘the truth’) and served to vindicate those in the Labour Party demanding more open government and freedom of information. Labour’s Civil Service spokesperson, Oonagh McDonald, challenged the Conservative Government’s insistence that a civil servant’s duty and loyalty was exclusively to their Minister, arguing that such an interpretation was ‘far too narrow’. In so doing, McDonald alluded to the situation

Open Government

193

which operated in the United States, where a code of conduct encouraged civil servants to ‘put loyalty to the highest moral principles and to country above loyalty to persons, party or government department’ (The Guardian, 28 February 1985). Yet in refuelling the debate in the Labour Party over more open government and freedom of information, the Ponting case also highlighted the extent to which such reforms would impact upon traditional constitutional conventions, thereby causing some MPs to reconsider how far a future Labour Government should go in this direction. For example, in the context of the Ponting trial, Brian Sedgemore appeared to temper some of his previous enthusiasm, pointing out that ‘it may be too much for governments to institutionalize, yet less legalize, notions of disloyalty backed by dangerous philosophical concepts such as “the public good’’ ’ (The Guardian, 21 September 1984). Although the Labour Party retained its formal commitment to freedom of information legislation in the 1987 manifesto, the Policy Review which was launched immediately after the third successive general election defeat provided the context for further consideration of the whole issue and thus of the implications involved. Initially, the Policy Review Group on ‘Democracy for the Individual and the Community’ favoured a means whereby a civil servant aware of ‘improper behaviour on the part of Ministers’ could report the matter to the permanent secretary, who would then be obliged to investigate the matter and then report their findings to parliamentary select committee. Crucially, the ‘whistleblowing’ civil servant would not be subject to dismissal for reporting Ministerial misdemeanours in this manner (Labour Party, 1988). However, this proposal was absent from the final Policy Review publication, Meet the Challenge, Make the Change, although the commitment to freedom of information legislation was strongly reiterated, in the form of an Act, similar to that which existed in the United States, which would establish a statutory ‘right to know’, for an effective democracy necessitated that ‘both Parliament and the public must have a clear right of access to the vast range of information held by government.’ It was proposed that all information held by national, regional or local governments would be ‘made freely available – unless and until the government and other public bodies can prove that its dissemination will be against the national interest’, with the criteria for exemptions ‘clearly specified and tightly drawn’, and ‘with a right of appeal to an independent tribunal’ (Labour Party, 1989: 59). These proposals were reiterated in Labour’s 1992 manifesto, although electoral defeat ensured that the Party’s professed commitment to statutory freedom of information was never put to the test.


New Labour and the formal commitment to open government When Tony Blair became Labour leader in July 1994, he appeared to commit the Party even more firmly to open government and freedom of information. This impression was certainly confirmed in a speech Blair gave at an award ceremony by the Campaign for Freedom of Information in March 1996, in which he insisted that freedom of information was ‘an important and essential part’ of Labour’s commitment to constitutional reform and ‘absolutely fundamental to how we see politics developing’ in Britain. Blair promised that the passage of a Freedom of Information Act would ‘signal a new relationship between government and people’, whereby citizens would be seen as ‘legitimate stakeholders in the running of the country’. To this end, Blair envisaged legislation which enshrined ‘the presumption . . . that information should be, rather than should not be, released’, thereby ensuring that ‘vast swathes of government activity . . . would be exposed to public examination and to public debate’ (Blair, 1996: 219). Elsewhere, during the same year, Blair reiterated that ‘There should be no assumption of government secrecy, which is why a Freedom of Information Act is essential’, in order ‘to attack secrecy wherever it exists, in public or private sector’ (Blair, 1996: 20, 47; see also Labour Party, 1996b: 31). Proponents of freedom of information and open government thus had their hopes raised by the election of New Labour in May 1997, for under Tony Blair’s leadership, the Party’s avowed commitment to constitutional reform appeared more prominent and passionate than it had ever been in Labour’s history. The promise seemed to be of a Labour Government which would prove far bolder than the 1964–1970 Wilson Governments, partly because Blair himself appeared so strongly committed to constitutional reform from the outset, but also because of the extensive preparatory work undertaken in Opposition (via the Policy Review of the late 1980s and the Plant Commission of the early 1990s, for example) and the sheer scale of Labour’s parliamentary majority in May 1997. The speed with which the Blair Government acted upon its commitment to devolution for Scotland and Wales further heartened those who believed that New Labour was passionately committed to constitutional reform, and therefore, that open government, entailing much greater freedom of information, was imminent. After all, Labour’s 1997 manifesto had promised freedom of information legislation on the grounds that ‘Unnecessary secrecy in government leads to arrogance in

Open Government

195

government and defective policy decisions’ (although with hindsight, the use of the word ‘unnecessary’ assumed greater significance, given the extent to which governments themselves invariably determine what secrecy is necessary). Labour’s apparent commitment to freedom of information was confirmed when David Clark (Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster) published a White Paper in December 1997 entitled Your Right to Know, although perhaps overlooked at the time was the fact that this was actually a White Paper ‘with green edges’ (Cmnd 3818, 1997: 3), suggesting that it was still partly a consultative document, rather than a definitive statement of the Government’s legislative intent. Your Right to Know alluded to imminent legislation which would provide citizens with a statutory right to see virtually all forms of information held about them by public authorities, with an independent Commissioner supervising the operation of the proposed Freedom of Information Bill, and dealing with appeals. The White Paper also identified seven areas which would be exempted from such a Bill, such as national security and defence, the internal discussion of government policy and business activities whose public disclosure might be commercially damaging. However, Clark was subsequently dismissed from the Cabinet in July 1998, by which time, 241 MPs, the vast majority of them Labour, had signed an Early Day Motion calling on the Government to move more quickly on freedom of information legislation. Following Clark’s dismissal, responsibility for preparing legislation based on the White Paper was assumed by the Home Secretary, Jack Straw, the Government’s justification for this transfer of responsibility being that the Home Office was already responsible for a range of cognate issues, such as data protection, official secrets and human rights legislation (Flinders, 2000: 426). However, the switch caused anxiety amongst pro-reformers, due to the Home Office’s traditional conservatism on many issues. Such apprehension was not unwarranted, for it was not until May 1999 – a full two years after New Labour had entered Office – that a draft Freedom of Information Bill was published, by which time, many of the proposals enshrined in the White Paper had been significantly watered down, leading one commentator to assert that ‘the planned legislation has been eviscerated’ (Flinders, 2000: 422). Indeed, whereas the White Paper had included just seven exemption clauses, Straw’s draft Bill contained no less than 21, the most significant of which concerned information pertaining to the formulation and development of government policy and information held by a public authority in connection with investigations into air, sea, road and rail accidents; information likely to be prejudicial to the


British economy; information likely to prejudice relations between the UK government and the ‘governments’ of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland; information which constitutes a trade secret or could prejudice the commercial interests of an individual. In addition to the standard exemptions concerning information pertaining to defence and national security, there was also a ‘catch-all’ exemption concerning information which was not in itself deemed harmful, but whose public disclosure might be deemed harmful if its release was combined with information which was itself covered by the other 20 exemptions. Furthermore, not only did Straw’s draft Freedom of Information Bill contain 14 more exemption clauses than the original White Paper published a year ago, it also significantly altered the grounds on which information could be withheld. Whereas the White Paper had generally invoked the principle that information should only be withheld from the public if ‘substantial harm’ might be caused by releasing it into the public domain, the draft Freedom of Information Bill permitted the withholding of information on the grounds that it might be ‘prejudicial’ if released. Critics were quick to point out the generic nature of such a criterion, leaving the Government with remarkable latitude for withholding information on the grounds that it might ‘prejudice’ the British economy, national security and defence or relations between the ‘governments’ of the United Kingdom, for example. It was during the ten Cabinet committee meetings chaired by Jack Straw, following Clark’s departure, that the original proposals on freedom of information were systematically diluted (this section is based on Hencke, 1999). Not only was Straw himself antipathetic to much greater freedom of information, along with Jack Cunningham (the so-called Cabinet enforcer), a number of other Ministers were opposed primarily for Departmental reasons. For example, Frank Field, the Minister for Social Security, expressed deep concern at the implications for the workload of his Department if it was obliged to provide much greater information to the public, whilst the Minister of State for Defence, John Spellar, issued predictable utterances about the need for secrecy on grounds of national security. Meanwhile, the Paymaster-General, Geoffrey Robinson, was concerned about protecting the confidentiality of commercial information held by the Government. Also concerned about the implications of too much openness for the effective operation of Whitehall politics was Sir Richard Wilson, Jack Straw’s permanent secretary at the Home Office. Ultimately, though, it was Tony Blair himself who apparently ‘ruled that the freedom [of information] legislation should be manacled’ (Rawnsley, 2000: 376), which implied a total u-turn vis-a-vis

Open Government

197

Blair’s professed support for freedom of information prior to becoming Prime Minister. Other Ministers on the freedom of information Cabinet committee (officially titled CRPFOI, but apparently referred to in Whitehall as CRAPFOI, thereby indicating the contempt with which the policy was viewed by many insiders) contributed little to its discussions, with three in particular alleged to have been ‘too timid to speak up in front of [Peter] Mandelson for fear of their career prospects’ (Mandelson known to be another opponent of Clark’s original proposals and also a close confidante of Tony Blair). Furthermore, a number of prominent Ministers, most notably David Blunkett, Gordon Brown, Robin Cook, Donald Dewar, Mo Mowlam and Clare Short apparently never even attended the Cabinet committee. Obviously, they had their own onerous Ministerial duties to fulfil – for example, Mo Mowlem, the Northern Ireland Secretary, was deeply immersed in pursuing the Good Friday Agreement much of the time – yet as one un-named Minister on the Cabinet committee observed: ‘If only . . . just one of them had taken some interest, it would have been a different story . . . . Jack [Straw] was unchallenged.’ Rather more interest was shown by some of Labour’s backbenchers, who were openly critical of the timidity of the draft Freedom of Information Bill when Jack Straw appeared before the House of Commons public administration select committee a few weeks after its publication. The select committee’s subsequent report complained that the draft Bill would permit officials and public authorities too much discretion in deciding what information to release to the public, certainly more discretion than could be justified on grounds of national security or defence. As such, the committee urged ‘a rebalancing of the draft Bill in the direction of the right to know’ (quoted in Hazell, Russell, Seyd and Sinclair, 2000: 258). That the Government was not inclined to heed the select committee’s advice became apparent when the Freedom of Information Bill proper was published in November 1999. The Bill differed little from the draft version, reaffirming, for example, that policy-making would remain confidential, in order to ensure that Ministers and civil servants could continue to engage in ‘the free and frank provision or advice or exchange of views’ and reiterating that information would be withheld if its disclosure ‘would otherwise prejudice, or would be likely to otherwise prejudice, the effective conduct of public affairs.’ Furthermore, Cabinet Ministers themselves would be entitled to decide whether, and which, information could be categorized thus, whereupon these decisions could


not be over-ruled by the Information Commissioner. As the authors of a ‘democratic audit’ of the Blair Government’s record remarked, ‘Ministers have ensured that the wider culture of secrecy in Whitehall, in which they share, will continue’ (Beetham, Ngan and Weir, 2001: 385). Reaction amongst Labour’s supporters of open government was thus mixed, for while it was readily acknowledged that the Bill represented a welcome and long overdue challenge to the erstwhile culture of secrecy in British government, there were simultaneous complaints that the Bill was ‘flawed’ and ‘something of a lost opportunity’. Indeed, disappointment was directed at several features, most notably the range of exemptions, along with the criteria which could be invoked to justify continued secrecy; the independent Information Commissioner’s lack of power to compel Ministers to disclose certain information; the ability of Ministers to withhold information on the grounds that its release might prove ‘prejudicial’ (rather than the earlier criteria of ‘substantial harm’); the unduly wide scope of the exemption concerning commercial confidentiality; the convoluted and overly complex character of the Bill (see, for example, David Clark, House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 340, cols. 739–43; Mark Fisher, ibid., cols. 758–62; Helen Jackson, ibid., cols. 766–69; Helen Jones, ibid., cols. 771–4; Tony Wright, ibid., cols. 750–4). The Freedom of Information Bill reached the statute book towards the end of 2000, with only a few modest concessions granted by way of response to backbench criticisms, but its actual implementation was then subject to further delay. Initially, it had been envisaged that the Act would be phased in through a series of stages, each one encompassing a new set of public sector bodies, with the first phase scheduled for 18 months after the Royal Assent. Yet when the timetable was finally announced, in November 2001 – a full year after the Freedom of Information Bill had reached the statute book, by which time, 175 MPs, mostly Labour backbenchers, had signed an Early Day Motion, expressing their impatience at the slow progress in implementing the Act (Parliamentary Session 2000/1, EDM 296) – it was made clear that instead of phasing it in, a ‘big bang’ approach was to be adopted, with the Act not being fully implemented, and therefore applicable to all public authorities, until 2005. Sceptics could be forgiven for suspecting that by this time, Ministers might have ‘discovered’ reasons to justify a further deferral in fully implementing the Freedom of Information Act. Somewhat surprisingly, perhaps, no such justifications were proffered, so that the Freedom of Information Act did become fully effective on 1 January 2005, as promised. However, barely 18 months later, it was reported that Ministers were considering the introduction of restrictions on the operation of the Act,

Open Government

199

whereby ‘the most difficult requests’, or those which were likely to prove unduly costly to process, could be rejected. Also being considered by the Cabinet was the introduction of a flat-rate fee for requests for information under the auspices of the Act, ostensibly to deter what Ministers deemed to be ‘frivolous’ claims and to dissuade ‘serial requesters’. The Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs, Lord Falconer, envisaged that the introduction of such restrictions and charges would reduce requests under the Freedom of Information Act by more than a third. He insisted that while ‘our commitment to freedom of information remains unchanged’, the Government also needed to ensure that ‘public access rights must be balanced against other demands on public resources’ (The Sunday Times, 30 July 2006; see also The Independent, 10 August 2006). As part of this review of the Freedom of Information Act, a consultation exercise was launched in October 2006, which was scheduled to report in March 2007. Yet at the end of March, another consultation exercise was announced, this time to consider whether the proposed changes should be pursued after all. This time, a three-month period was provided for responses, with the Government then digesting these for a further three months before making a formal announcement. Throughout this period, the proposals were widely condemned, not only by sundry pressure groups, but by the House of Commons’ constitutional affairs select committee and by Labour MP Tony Wright, the chair of the Public Administration Committee, who suggested that the principle of freedom of information ‘has not yet entered the bloodstream of the Government’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 456, col. 305 [Westminster Hall]). Meanwhile, 55 Labour MPs signed an Early Day Motion (EDM 845, 2006–7), tabled by Tony Wright on 6 February 2007, condemning the proposed changes to the way in which fees would be calculated with regard to requests for information. Even while the second consultation exercise was in progress, though, there were two further indications that some Ministers and Labour MPs wanted to narrow the scope of the Freedom of Information Act. The first of these indications occurred in response to a Private Members’ Bill by Conservative MP, David Maclean, who sought to exempt MPs’ correspondence with public bodies or officials (on the grounds of ‘client confidentiality’ or constituents’ privacy) and also remove the House of Commons and House of Lords from the provisions of the Act, so that, for example, matters such as the details of MPs’ expenses would no longer need to be publicly divulged. Critics of Maclean’s Bill, however, argued that correspondence between a constituent and their MP was already exempted from the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act (in accordance with the Data Protection Act). As such, it was suspected that


the ‘Maclean Bill’ was really motivated by a desire to widen the scope of exemptions in order to weaken the Freedom of Information Act, thereby rendering it less effective, while also protecting MPs from public scrutiny concerning their activities and expenses (see, for example, Campaign for Freedom of Information, 2007). What was most significant about Maclean’s Bill from the perspective of this particular study, however, was the support it received, both tacitly and directly, from the Labour Government. Tacit support seemed to be offered by the Cabinet’s stance of ‘formal neutrality’, whereupon Ministers insisted that as the proposed reform was being pursued via a Private Members’ Bill, it was matter for MPs to determine themselves. Such a stance strongly implied that many Ministers were sanguine about allowing Maclean’s Bill succeed. At the same time, more direct support was provided by the 78 Labour MPs who voted to give the Bill its Third Reading, with only 9 Labour backbenchers voting against. Moreover, of the 78 Labour MPs endorsing the Bill at the Third Reading stage, 29 were (junior) Ministers and 9 were Parliamentary Private Secretaries, indicating considerable support for the Bill at high levels within the Government. Ultimately, though, the Bill’s parliamentary progress stalled when it failed to secure a sponsor in the House of Lords. The second indication that some Ministers now wanted to restrict the operation of the Freedom of Information Act was a leaked letter, dated 8 May 2007, from Alistair Darling (the then Secretary of State for Trade and Industry) to Lord Falconer. In this letter, Darling claimed that ‘we are increasingly concerned that in a number of respects the demands of the Freedom of Information Act are placing good government at risk’, because the fear of disclosure was inhibiting MPs from expressing themselves fully and freely in their correspondence with Ministers, while similar inhibitions were apparently affecting confidential discussions and advice between Ministers and mandarins, to the extent of causing ‘harm to the policy development process’. Darling therefore urged the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs to ‘conduct a speedy review of these aspects of the FOI’ in order to consider ‘whether a more robust approach is possible to applying FOI exemptions’ (BBC News, 24 May 2007, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news, 24 May 2007). Apparently in response to such concerns, the June 2007 Green Paper The Governance of Britain stated that The Government welcomes the recent debate about the confidentiality of MPs’ correspondence with their constituents. The Secretary of

Open Government

201

State for Justice and Lord Chancellor will be working with the Information Commissioner in the coming weeks to produce guidance to public authorities to ensure that they apply the Act in a way that balances openness with the need to protect the privacy of constituents. (Straw, 2007: 43, para 140) Whatever the outcome of this review, the fact will remain that many senior Labour parliamentarians are not happy with the Freedom of Information Act as it currently stands and would like to see it watereddown, even though Act itself was a much diluted version of what was originally mooted when New Labour was first elected. Just like their ‘Old Labour’ forebears’, many ‘New Labour’ Ministers seem to have become increasingly acculturated to the Whitehall ethos of official secrecy and confidentiality. Instead of modifying their perspectives in line with the principles of the Freedom of Information Act, they apparently wish to modify the Act itself and render British government less open once again.

Conclusion A formal commitment to freedom of information, linked to the promotion of open government, has been one of the Labour Party’s most recent constitutional reform initiatives, having only become official Party policy during the mid-1970s. Prior to this time, freedom of information was an issue which was canvassed by relatively few Labour MPs and which was invariably viewed with disdain by most Labour Ministers. Indeed, Labour Prime Ministers not infrequently felt obliged to remind their Ministerial colleagues of the need to avoid disclosures concerning Cabinet discussions, even to their colleagues on the backbenches. Certainly, when the Labour Party formally committed itself to freedom of information legislation in 1974, neither the then leader, Harold Wilson, nor his successor, James Callaghan, had much interest in the issue, whilst Callaghan’s Home Secretary, Merlyn Rees, made little effort to conceal his irritation with those Labour MPs demanding swifter government action concerning reform of the Official Secrets Act. Although the Labour Party appeared to adopt a stronger commitment to freedom of information legislation during the 1980s and 1990s, this time linked to a wider programme of constitutional reform, democratization and ‘reconnecting’ government with the people, the Blair Government’s apparent enthusiasm soon dissipated once New Labour entered Office. The publication of a White Paper at the end of 1997, followed by a draft Bill preceding the introduction of the official Bill, could


be portrayed by Ministers as indicative of the Government’s determination to ‘get it right’, but given that Labour had had 18 years in Opposition, the Party’s MPs might well have suspected that the leadership was seeking to stall on the issue. Certainly, the Freedom of Information Act which finally reached the statute book in 2000 was criticized by several Labour MPs for the breadth of exemptions and the degree of Ministerial discretion which it enshrined. The Cabinet’s lack of enthusiasm was then further illustrated by the announcement that the Act itself would not be fully implemented until 2005, a full eight years after New Labour had entered Office and 31 years after the Party first formally committed itself to freedom of information. Furthermore, within barely 18 months of becoming fully effective, it was widely reported that Ministers were considering the introduction of further restrictions on the information which could be released under the provisions of the Act. The relatively short history of the Labour’s formal commitment to freedom of information suggests that when in Office, much of the Party’s leadership actually becomes rather enamoured with the degree of secrecy which surrounds the core executive in Britain and is readily persuaded that it is necessary to maintain such secrecy in order to ensure confidentiality in the provision of advice and information upon which policy decisions are taken. Labour Ministers also tend to become wedded to the orthodoxies of the Westminster Model, whereby the anonymity of civil servants is maintained, Cabinet discussions remain confidential and formal accountability is ensured through virtue of Ministers being answerable to Parliament, and ultimately, the electorate on polling day. Such constitutional conservatism leads, almost inevitably, to a marked lack of enthusiasm by most Labour Ministers for legislation which would provide citizens with a statutory ‘right to know’, particularly if this would entail the release of information about how particular policies were made. The protection of secrecy is further justified by some Labour politicians by the argument that freedom of information is of little real interest to most of their constituents, but, instead, is an issue largely canvassed by the ‘chattering classes’ and The Guardian. Freedom of Information, therefore, is an issue on which the Labour Party’s constitutional conservatism has been particularly prominent and pronounced and continues to be so at the beginning of the 21st century.

6 Scottish Devolution

Introduction Lacking a clear and consistent theory of either the constitution or the operation of political power, and wedded to the precepts of the Westminster Model of British government (with its assumptions about the unitary character of the British state, governed by a strong executive at Westminster via a Parliament which formally enjoys sovereignty over the United Kingdom and its citizens), the Labour Party has equivocated in its response to demands for a Scottish Parliament and self-government north of the border. To a large extent, Labour’s responses to such demands have variously been informed by a combination of economism, electoral calculations and perceptions of political advantage. Although the nascent Labour Party endorsed Home Rule as it competed against the Liberals and sought to establish its radical credentials, this initial commitment steadily dissipated as Labour replaced the Liberals as Britain’s main ‘progressive’ party from the 1920s onwards. Indeed, Labour rapidly adopted a centralist approach to governing – a national, rather than nationalist, perspective – whereby it both portrayed and perceived itself as a Party and (when in Office) a government for the whole of the United Kingdom (although as we will note in Chapter 9, Labour tended to leave Northern Ireland’s Stormont Parliament to its own devices). This centralist perspective, most prominent from the 1940s to 1960s, derived partly from the Labour Party’s commitment to modes of economic planning and regulation of the economy, as well to a universal welfare state, and partly to the parliamentary leadership’s acculturation to the norms and values of the Westminster Model, with a strong executive based in the House of Commons implementing its manifesto commitments, or tackling unforeseen problems, in the national interest. 203


Moreover, in accepting that Britain was – and should remain – a unitary state, the Labour leadership in London invariably insisted that economic, industrial or social problems in particular parts of the country could best be ameliorated by granting a regional dimension to centrally determined policies, a stance which allowed for little more than forms of administrative devolution under the watchful eye of Whitehall. From the late 1960s onwards, though, this perspective was challenged somewhat by a resurgent nationalist movement in Scotland, as illustrated by some impressive by-election performances by the SNP in the late 1960s, and its performance in the October 1974 election, when it won 11 seats in the House of Commons and 33 per cent of the Scottish vote. Since this time, the Labour Party has often struggled to develop a coherent and popular (in the Labour Party itself) policy response to Scottish nationalism. Divisions emerged between those Labour MPs willing to acknowledge the strength and depth of nationalist sentiments in Scotland and who were broadly sympathetic to some mode of devolution – albeit not always agreeing on precisely what form this should take – and those Labour MPs and Ministers whose default position was set to ‘it’s the economy, stupid’, whereby Scottish nationalist demands were attributed to economic grievances which would dissipate once the Scottish economy recovered from recession, aided, of course, by the wise cure-all ‘socialist’ policies implemented by a Labour Government at Westminster. There was also a marked divergence of views within the Labour Party over whether a positive response to Scottish demands for devolution would satisfy and thus halt the advance of nationalism in Scotland, and thereby undermine support for the SNP, or whether any concessions to the cause of Scottish nationalism would serve to legitimize nationalist aspirations, and consequently boost support for the SNP, to the extent that the demand for Scottish independence would ultimately lead to the break-up of Britain. Those in the Labour Party who have proved willing, since the late 1960s, to countenance devolution to Scotland in the guise of a Scottish Parliament – debates and disputes about its precise powers and policy remit notwithstanding – have, understandably, tended to take the former view, but in so doing, they have also belied the electoral calculations underpinning any willingness by the Labour Party to enact devolution for Scotland. Moreover, consequent proposals for a Scottish Parliament have not been accompanied by any serious or sustained consideration, by the Labour Party, of the constitutional implications or nature of political power in the context of Scottish devolution. Instead, the dominant

Scottish Devolution 205

perspective has remained that of the Westminster Model, so that it has been emphasized, both to supporters and opponents of devolution, that parliamentary sovereignty remains undiminished and inviolate; that what government in London giveth, it can taketh away and that Scottish devolution is actually intended to strengthen the United Kingdom. All of these conditions have variously been reiterated in the context of New Labour’s willingness to permit – ‘tolerate’ is perhaps a more accurate characterization – the creation of a Scottish Parliament in 1999. Furthermore, the Labour Party’s underlying constitutional conservatism, in spite of the ostensible radicalism of enacting Scottish devolution, has also been evident in the Blair Governments’ continued refusal to answer the ‘West Lothian Question’, beyond the reduction, from 72 to 59, in the number of Scottish MPs elected to the House of Commons, with effect from the 2005 general election. In other words, although the Blair Governments have presided over the creation of a Scottish Parliament, nearly a century after the Labour Party first espoused the cause of Home Rule, Labour Ministers have still shown remarkably little inclination to think critically about the constitutional implications and ramifications of such an institutional innovation. This partly derives from Labour’s long-standing antipathy to theorizing about the nature of political power – priding itself, instead, on its pragmatic empiricism and political realism – which in turn is reflected and reinforced by its tacit acceptance of the precepts and practices enshrined in the Westminster Model. However, it also reflected the fact that neither Tony Blair nor most of his Ministerial colleagues were enthusiastic about, or deeply interested in, Scottish devolution per se.

The Labour Party and Scotland prior to 1945 The nascent Labour Party was formally in favour of ‘Home Rule all round’, with Keir Hardie widely recognized as a supporter of what has since become termed devolution, Ramsay MacDonald’s political career having its origins as secretary of the London General Committee of the Scottish Home Rule Association (Marquand, 1977: 23; McLean, 2001: 433; Morgan, 1987: 17), and Herbert Morrisson claiming, in 1911, to be ‘convinced that that Scotland should have Home Rule no less than Ireland’ (quoted in Keating and Bleiman, 1979: 53). Meanwhile, during the 1920s, at least 20 Labour MPs were actively involved in the Scottish Home Rule Association (Keating, 1977: 3). This formal commitment derived not only from the early Labour Party’s electoral competition with the pro-Home Rule Liberals, and Labour’s ‘shared background in


radicalism’ (Keating and Bleiman, 1979: 52, 58), but also from the fact that both parties obtained much of their political support from Scotland and Wales, and thus needed to emphasize the distinctiveness of these regions vis-a-vis England. Furthermore, there was an assumption amongst various Labour politicians and Liberals that Home Rule for Scotland was a pre-requisite of implementing ‘progressive’ policies north of the border. However, Labour’s initial support for Scottish ‘Home Rule’ diminished during the 1920s and 1930s, for although the Labour Party retained its formal commitment to devolution – as confirmed by the resolution endorsed at the Party’s 1928 conference, calling for ‘the creation of separate legislative assemblies in Scotland, Wales and England’ – it was (rather as Clause IV later became) largely symbolic, a principle which most of the leadership paid lip-service to. It certainly did not reflect a serious, heartfelt commitment to Scottish devolution by the Labour Party, particularly its parliamentary leaders. Thus did Ramsay MacDonald, during his premiership of the 1929–1931 Labour Government, assert that whilst he supported the principle of Home Rule for Scotland, his Government had far more important matters to address, and these were not to be jeopardized by wasting valuable parliamentary time pursuing Scottish devolution. Or as Jim Middleton, Labour’s assistant general secretary, suggested to a Scottish nationalist in 1924, ‘I do not think [that] all the large measures in which the Scottish, English and Welsh peoples are interested necessarily depend upon self-government for their success’ (quoted in Taylor, 2000: 159). As such, by the time that the Labour Party was first experiencing the constraints and responsibilities of high political office, ‘Home Rule . . . was too far down the list of national priorities for it to be worth putting the Government’s survival at risk for it’ (Keating and Bleiman, 1979: 82). These authors also cite Ramsay MacDonald’s assertion, shortly before becoming Prime Minister again in 1929, that as the United Kingdom was an economic unit, industrial and labour legislation ought to be the same throughout the country (Keating and Bleiman, 1979: 107). Several factors informed the Labour Party’s dwindling interest in Scottish devolution during the 1920s and 1930s, although these can effectively be placed into three categories, namely ideological, economic and electoral. Ideologically, the Labour Party’s rapidly developing disdain towards Scottish devolution reflected the view that nationalism was a divisive, and thus dangerous, political force. This argument became particularly convincing for many in the Labour Party in the context of the rise of fascism in inter-War Europe, for this was deemed to represent


nationalism in its most extreme manifestation. Certainly, for many in Labour Party, socialism and nationalism were diametrically opposed, representing polar opposites of the political spectrum, with nationalism explicable as a reactionary phenomenon seeking to halt, or even reverse, industrialism, modernity and social progress in order to revive some mythical, halcyon ‘golden age’. Many Labour politicians were also concerned that acceding to demands in Scotland for self-government would prove deeply damaging to the unity and solidarity of the British working class, for it would imply that Scottish workers somehow had different interests to workers in England and Wales. Anything which might serve to divide and weaken, ideologically or electorally, the British working class was thus to be resisted. The attainment of socialism, Labour assumed, was dependent, in large part, on a united working class with common interests – not only a class in itself, but a class for itself. The Labour Party’s economic case against Scottish devolution – one which developed during the 1930s, but became much more prominent after 1945 – was that the relative weakness of Scotland’s economy rendered it imperative that it be more fully integrated with the rest of Britain, and thereby included in any national economic strategy pursued by a Labour Government at Westminster and administered via Whitehall. Following the Wall Street crash in 1929, and the ensuing economic slump in much of Western Europe, some of Britain’s political elites become more sympathetic to the concept of economic planning, something which proved particularly attractive to those Labour politicians who viewed it as intrinsic to any socialist economic policy. However, the efficacy of such a strategy would be significantly undermined by any move towards self-government for Scotland. What also underpinned the Labour Party’s economic case against Scottish devolution during the 1920s and 1930s was the view that the relative weakness of Scotland’s economy rendered self-government economically unsustainable. In other words, one of the factors deemed to fostering nationalist sentiment in Scotland, namely the depressed or disadvantaged state of the Scottish economy, was itself increasingly cited by Labour politicians as an argument against Home Rule. Indeed, the clear implication was that self-government would exacerbate, rather than ameliorate, Scotland’s economic problems, thereby harming the material interests of the Scottish people. The economic case against devolution was trenchantly restated by Laski during the Second World War, when he warned the Labour Party that the ‘economic and fiscal problems of the United Kingdom


are indivisible . . . in their major aspects’, and as such, the arguments advanced by Scottish (and Welsh) nationalists were ‘fallacious’. Yet Laski also pointed out that the division of powers which would be engendered by a separate Scottish Parliament would inevitably ‘raise issues of the legislative competence’ of such an institution, thereby leading to judicial review and the increasing involvement of the courts. This, Laski claimed, was ‘likely to hamper Socialist Governments’ (Labour Party Archives, R.D.R.26/November 1941). However, some within the Labour Party sought to link the economic arguments with the possibility of devolution at a later date. This perspective suggested that some form of self-government for Scotland might become feasible in the future, once the Scottish economy had benefited from regeneration under the auspices of a Labour Government at Westminster. Only when Scotland’s economy was more buoyant, it was suggested, would self-government become a realistic policy option. One notable exponent of this stance was Tom Johnston, a Scottish Minister in the 1929–1931 Labour Government, who declared that For many years past, I have become, and increasingly become, uneasy lest we should get political power without our first having or at least simultaneously having, an adequate economy to administer. What purport would there be in getting a Scots Parliament . . . if it has to administer an emigration system, a glorified Poor Law and a graveyard. (Johnston, 1952: 66) The electoral dimension which informed the Labour Party’s antipathy to Scottish devolution during the inter-war years was the paucity of support garnered by Scottish nationalists at the polls in Scotland. For example, in the only two seats they contested in the 1929 general election, the National Party of Scotland polled 4.9 per cent in Glasgow Camlachie and 5.4 per cent in West Renfrewshire, whilst two years later, five Scottish nationalist candidates only secured a total of 12.4 per cent of votes cast. Then, when the SNP itself was formed in 1935, and fielded eight candidates in that year’s general election, it only mustered 9.9 per cent of the vote overall and saved its deposits in only two seats (Keating and Bleiman, 1979: 118–9). In this context, the Labour Party clearly felt little compunction to respond more favourably or urgently to demands for Scottish devolution. Indeed, Labour politicians could cite such electoral statistics as vindication of the Party’s general disinterest in Scottish nationalism, by claiming that there was little popular support for devolution in Scotland itself.


A further electoral explanation for the dissipation of early Labour support for Scottish Home Rule derives from the Party’s replacement of the Liberals as the main alternative to the Conservatives, for its emergence as ‘half of the two party system altered the terms of political debate . . . UKwide advance and the installation of a Labour government became the main aim’ (Keating, 1977: 9). Furthermore, once Labour became a credible Party of government at Westminster, the earlier premise that Home Rule was necessary in order to pursue ‘progressive’ measures was obviated, and attaining a House of Commons majority became the prerequisite to ‘radical’ policies, albeit now on national, not a regional, basis.

The 1945–1951 Attlee Governments and Scotland For the ideological, economic electoral reasons noted above, devolution was not a notable policy objective of the Labour Government elected in 1945, led by Clement Attlee. On the contrary, it was assumed that virtually any problems experienced north of the border would be remedied by Labour’s commitment to nationalization of key industries, Keynesian demand management of the economy and the Beveridgian (universal) welfare state. Labour confidently envisaged that these measures would benefit all parts of Britain, by virtue of regenerating industry, fostering economic growth and full employment and ameliorating poverty. Any grievances harboured by the Scots in 1945, the Labour Party assumed, would dissipate once the benign effects of the Attlee Government’s economic, industrial and social policies became evident. Thus has one commentator surveying this period observed that ‘An examination of the Labour government’s policies for Scotland from 1945-51 would be brief and unexciting, for there was little distinctively Scottish about them’ (Alexander, 1993: 195), although the latter observation might be rather overstating the case, for in several policy areas – education, housing the NHS and nationalization – there was a distinctly Scottish dimension to their administrative arrangements or organizational structures. After all Scotland had always retained its own education and legal systems, for example, which had thereby sustained a strong sense of Scottish distinctiveness and relative autonomy. To the extent that the Attlee Government was obliged to respond to nationalist sentiment in Scotland, it was the Scottish Covenant, rather than the SNP, which ensured that Labour could not feign complete indifference to the professed grievances of the Scots. The Scottish Covenant, which demanded a Parliament for Scotland but continued membership


of the United Kingdom, claimed to have acquired 1.25 million signatures by 1950 out of an adult population in Scotland of almost 3.7 million [although there has been some debate about the accuracy of the figure (Mitchell, 1996a: 144–7)]. Meanwhile, Labour’s Scottish Executive had also recommended that the Attlee Government should conduct an independent inquiry into ‘whether and to what extent legislative devolution of Scottish affairs is necessary, practical and advisable’, albeit whilst ‘retaining the integrity of the United Kingdom’. However, the primary objective in calling for such an inquiry appears to have been to secure ‘a victory over Nationalist-minded elements within the Scottish Party’ (Labour Party Archives, R.D.58/July 1947). Attlee himself, though, was rather sanguine about the situation in Scotland, observing that ‘our Scots friends are apt to be unduly alarmed at Scottish Nationalism’ (NA PREM 8/658, Attlee to Morrison, 23 June 1947), and subsequently refusing to meet a deputation of representatives from the Scottish Covenant. Somewhat less cavalier, though, was, Arthur Woodburn, who, shortly after his appointment as Secretary of State for Scotland in the autumn of 1947, suggested that there was a widespread feeling in Scotland that ‘the Scots themselves should have further opportunities of administering in Scotland the business of Government and of the socialised industries’. Whilst acknowledging that the strength of this feeling was difficult to gauge because of the extent to which ‘elections are fought between the main parties’, Woodburn warned of a danger that ‘this widespread feeling in Scotland . . . the general uneasiness that Scotland is held to be of no account by British Governments’ constituted ‘a kind of smouldering pile that might suddenly break through the party loyalties and become a formidable national movement’. This, he suggested, would actually become a more significant danger ‘as the Labour Party programme comes to fulfilment and the great dividing issues are settled, leaving the cleavages between the parties less deep and intense’. As such, Woodburn urged his Ministerial colleagues not ‘to adopt a purely negative attitude’, although he was adamant that ‘any proposal to set up a separate Scottish Parliament should be resisted’ (NA CAB 129/22, CP(47)328, 6 December 1947). Consequently, the Attlee Government offered a few minor concessions to Scottish opinion, most notably an increase in the number of civil servants employed in the Scottish Office in Edinburgh, slightly enhanced powers of legislative scrutiny for the Scottish Grand Committee and the establishment of a Scottish Economic Conference, to be chaired by the Secretary of State for Scotland himself. Nonetheless, these minimal initiatives did serve to reinforce the afore-mentioned sense of


Scottish distinctiveness and underpin the notion that various aspects of governance needed to be imbued with a ‘Scottish dimension’. Woodburn’s successor at the Scottish Office during the short-lived second (1950–1951) Attlee Government, Hector McNeil, was also alert to the dangers of appearing to disregard entirely the aspirations represented by the Scottish Covenant and, to this end, maintained the Attlee Governments’ dual strategy of granting limited powers of legislative scrutiny and providing economic information pertaining to Scotland, along with a small degree of administrative devolution, whilst firmly resisting demands for a Scottish Parliament (NA CAB 129/40, CP(50)101, 11 May 1950; Labour Party, 1951: 4). Scottish devolution was not, therefore, an issue of great import for the Labour Party during the 1950s. It was considered sporadically by the Party’s Scottish Executive, but even this yielded no new policy initiatives, reaffirming, instead, Labour’s opposition ‘on compelling economic grounds’ to a Scottish Parliament, whilst favouring instead a degree of administrative devolution (Labour Party Archives, Re.79/June 1956). The Labour Party itself, meanwhile, continued to subscribe to an essentially economistic and centralist perspective, insisting that the solution to the problems of Scottish industry and society – which were deemed the underlying cause of much nationalist sentiment – was to be derived from a programme of ‘socialist’ industrial and welfare policies, applied to the United Kingdom as a whole. Thus did a Labour ‘working party’ on Scottish affairs blithely conclude that Labour’s programme, because it aims at ‘the greatest good of the greatest number’ and recognises the welfare and happiness of the whole community as the primary objective of social and economic policy, will enable Scotland to make the maximum possible contribution to the prosperity of the Scottish people, as well of the people of the U.K. as a whole. (Labour Party Archives, Re.318/February 1958) The interdependence of the Scottish and English economies was therefore deemed to be such that ‘Scotland’s economic problems need for their solution not more Scottish nationalism, but more United Kingdom Socialism’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.231/November 1957; Labour Party Archives, Re.399/June 1958), particularly as ‘the Scottish economy is, and must continue to be, closely integrated with the remainder of the United Kingdom’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.404/June 1958). Similarly economistic perspectives were echoed at the 1958 conference of the Scottish Labour Party, which declared that ‘Scotland’s problems can best


be solved by socialist planning on a UK scale’ (Glasgow Herald, 14 September 1958), whilst Labour’s working party on Scottish policy asserted that ‘only a Labour Government, planning and working for the whole of the United Kingdom, can enable the Scottish people to take their rightful place in the Britain of the future’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.305/July 1962). Moreover, Labour’s working party on Scottish policy subsequently claimed that the Party’s general policy document Signposts for the Sixties ‘might well have been written as a document designed specifically to meet Scotland’s special needs and problems.’ As it was, a separate policy document Let Scotland Prosper was published north of the border, albeit consciously matching very closely the themes and chapter headings of Signposts for the Sixties (Labour Party Archives, RD.305/July 1962). Labour’s 1964 manifesto subsequently maintained the economistic perspective, with Scotland’s distinct status only acknowledged in the context of a ‘Plan for the Regions’, whereby economic investment and industrial regeneration were to be applied via Regional Planning Boards, under the auspices of a new Department of Economic Affairs. Beyond these bodies, however, no new institutional innovations were envisaged vis-à-vis Scotland, it being deemed that ‘unified structures of administration already exist’ which could ‘readily be adapted for effective regional planning’ (Labour Party, 1964: 7). In these respects, the Labour Party’s ‘thinking’ on Scottish affairs during its period in Opposition provided little advance or divergence from that which had prevailed in Office, with the same economistic perspective informing much of Labour’s approach, as indicated by Laski’s warning that different wage or tax levels, for example, ‘would be utterly destructive of an organic economic unity’ (Laski, 1951: 47). Furthermore, throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, there was a tacit recognition in the Party that if Labour did seek to promote a specific and systematic Scottish agenda, it might unwittingly serve to legitimize nationalist aspirations and thereby enhance the electoral fortunes of the SNP. In effect, most Labour politicians hoped that by virtually ignoring devolutionary demands from Scotland, the issue would dissipate and disappear.

The 1964–1970 Wilson Governments and Scotland Yet instead of dissipating and disappearing, the issue of Scottish devolution assumed increasing significance for the Labour Party during the 1960s, for three main reasons. Firstly, when Harold Wilson became Labour leader in 1963, the Party became convinced of the need for a


programme of economic and political modernization as a prerequisite of reversing the relative decline of the British economy. This, indirectly at least, ensured that some consideration would be to given to the role of ‘the regions’ vis-a-vis Westminster and Whitehall as part of the Labour Party’s new commitment to reforming the institutions of government and administration in Britain. The second reason why the issue of devolution assumed greater importance for the Labour Party during the 1960s was the manner in which relative economic decline was impacting on Scotland. For example, during the first five years of the decade, the rate of unemployment in Scotland averaged almost 3.8 per cent, compared to 1.9 per cent in the United Kingdom as a whole. Furthermore, whereas the rate of unemployment in Scotland had been 2.4 per cent in both 1955 and 1956, it had increased to 4.8 per cent by 1963. Also in 1963, the average earnings of full-time male manual workers in manufacturing industry in Scotland were £15.92, compared to £17.29 for their English counterparts. Such figures, and the regional disparities they revealed, doubtless played a notable part in fuelling Scottish nationalism in the 1960s. The third reason why devolution became a more salient issue for the Labour Party during the 1960s was the political response which emanated from Scotland in the context of the relative economic decline noted above. Nationalists claimed that Scotland was suffering, to a significant extent, from economic mismanagement by Westminster-based governments and that this problem could only be remedied by granting the Scottish people greater autonomy, if not independence. In this context, the SNP began to make electoral advances during the 1960s (along with Plaid Cymru in Wales, as will be noted in Chapter 7), culminating in Winifred Ewing’s victory in the previously safe Labour seat of Hamilton, in a by-election in November 1967. A few months prior to this remarkable victory, the SNP had dented the Labour Party’s support sufficiently – securing 28.2 per cent of the vote – to allow the Conservatives to win the (Glasgow) Pollock by-election in March 1967. Yet while Labour’s parliamentary leadership was naturally shocked by such results, the SNP had already performed well in by-elections in Glasgow Bridgeton in 1961, and Lothian 1962, as well as local government elections during the early 1960s, clearly suggesting that many in the Labour Party had been somewhat cavalier in disregarding or denigrating Scottish nationalism. In response to such electoral successes, Peter Shore suggested that the people of Scotland (and Wales) should be consulted to ascertain their objectives, which might, he acknowledged, subsequently oblige


the Government to consider Home Rule (NA CAB 134/2697 DS(68) 10th meeting, 27 May 1968). Richard Crossman was even more candid, asserting that ‘devolution – i.e., home rule for Wales and Scotland - is absolutely necessary if we want to win any seats in Scotland (Wales is not quite so serious) in the next election’ (Crossman, 1976: 610, diary entry for 19 December 1967), although barely a month earlier, Crossman had emphasized that devolution ‘has got to be looked at as a problem not merely of appeasing the Scottish Nationalists . . . but as sensible regional devolution’, for which ‘there is lot to be said’ (Crossman, 1976: 594–5, diary entry for 27 November 1967). Either way, although he suspected that demands for devolution ‘may well have strong poujadist motives’, Crossman was convinced that the Government ‘would be unwise to disregard the growing feeling that Scotland and Wales are not getting a fair deal from Whitehall’ (PREM 13/2151, Crossman to Wilson, 13 November 1967). Yet these were minority views within Wilson’s Cabinet, for whilst there was a general willingness to contemplate some administrative devolution, and consider a Scottish affairs committee holding meetings in Edinburgh, it was emphasized that even these concessions to Scottish opinion would merely constitute ‘part of the successful presentation of the present unitary structure as a system of government which could fully meet the needs of Scotland and Wales’ (NA CAB 134/2697 DS(68), 7th meeting, 24 April 1968). Indeed, the Minister of State at the Scottish Office, Dickson Mabon, acknowledged that the Office’s existing responsibilities were such that there was little scope for further administrative devolution to Scotland, with the two possible exceptions of devolving those functions of the Ministry of Public Building and Works which pertained to Scotland (such as historic buildings and Royal parks), and doing likewise ‘with regard to the Board of Trade for Tourism.’ Mabon suggested that such measures ought to be pursued in conjunction with enhancing the role of the Scottish Grand Committee, and establishing a Select Committee on Scottish Affairs. He also mooted the possibility of transferring to Scotland ‘a sizeable part of the Headquarters of a Great Britain economic department’ such as the Board of Trade itself, although Mabon was at pains to emphasize that the primary rationale was that this would constitute an ‘excellent way of emphasising that Scotland is an integral part of the British economy’ (NA CAB 134/2697, DS(68)13, 26 April 1968). What further underpinned the Wilson Government’s reluctance to offer the Scots anything more tangible than the most limited administrative devolution was the stance of the Secretary of State for Scotland,


Willie Ross, whose opposition to Scottish devolution was such that he acquired the soubriquet ‘Hammer of the Nats [Nationalists]’. According to Crossman, Ross viewed nationalism as ‘a mere emotional suicide which can be cured by economic policies alone’ (Crossman, 1977: 106, diary entry for 24 June 1968). This last point reflected the view of many, if not most, Labour politicians – both in the Cabinet and on the backbenches and in Scotland itself as well as England – that the surge in support for the SNP was a temporary phenomenon which would recede once the Scottish economy reaped the benefits of the Wilson Government’s economic and industrial policies. This was certainly the view of the Labour Party’s Scottish Council, for example, as revealed by its evidence to the Royal Commission on the Constitution (see below). Also dismissive of the surge in support for Scottish self-government, as suggested by the electoral advances and successes of the SNP, was Tam Dalyell. Referring explicitly to the Hamilton by-election result, for example, Dalyell was convinced ‘that very few of the thousands of electors who voted for Winifred Ewing did so because they hoped to see a Scottish Parliament or Assembly established in Edinburgh.’ Instead, he attributed the SNP’s victory over the Labour Party in the Hamilton byelection, in large part, to local concerns and grievances pertaining to the constituency and its environs, rather than to wide-spread dissatisfaction with the constitutional relationship between Scotland and England, thus referring contemptuously to ‘the sea of trivia’ which carried the SNP to its famous by-election victory in Hamilton in 1967 (Dalyell, 1977: 76–81). As we shall note below, Dalyell’s opposition to devolution was to yield a particularly intriguing question when the next Labour Government felt obliged to legislate on the matter 10 years later. In the meantime, faced with the electoral advance of the SNP, but unwilling to contemplate anything more than very limited administrative devolution, Harold Wilson – at James Callaghan’s suggestion (and apparently without any discussion with Willie Ross) – ‘therefore resorted to a favourite expedient of a harrassed administration’ (Bogdanor, 1999: 147), namely the appointment, in April 1969, of a Royal Commission. Chaired by Lord Crowther until his death in March 1972, and thereafter by Lord Kilbrandon, the Royal Commission on the Constitution was instructed ‘to examine the present functions of the central legislature and government in relation to the several countries, nations and regions of the United Kingdom’, and to consider, with regard to ‘the administration and other relationships between the various parts of the United Kingdom, what changes, in the interests of prosperity and good


government, are desirable in those functions or otherwise in present constitutional and economic relationships’. The appointment of the Royal Commission on the Constitution could be seen as pacifying two divergent strands of opinion within the Labour Party during the late 1960s. Firstly, for pro-devolutionists such as Crossman, it could be seen as an indication, perhaps, that the issue was at least going to be granted serious consideration by constitutional experts and interested parties. Secondly, but conversely, some Labour MPs opposed (or merely indifferent) to devolution viewed the establishment of the Royal Commission as a stalling device, a means of buying time until the nationalist tide receded, and support for devolution dissipated, so that ‘the problem would have solved itself by the time this body’s deliberations were finished’ (Nairn, 1981: 61). However, Tam Dalyell believes that to dismiss the establishment of the Commission merely ‘as a crude exercise in buying time and political expediency is to fail to take into account the extenuating circumstances of the time’, for nationalism ‘was something new on the scene’, so that some politicians felt obliged ‘to ascertain whether it was a flash in the pan or a long-term issue, and how the grievances which gave rise to it could best be met’ (Dalyell, 1977: 89). As various commentators have since remarked, though, had Wilson or Callaghan seriously envisaged that the Royal Commission would recommend significant reforms of a devolutionary character, they would surely have suspended or disbanded the two Royal Commissions which were already examining the structure of local government in Scotland (under the chiarmanship of Lord Wheatley) and England and Wales (chaired by Lord Redcliffe-Maud). In fact, the chairmen of these two Commissions did indeed offer to halt their inquiries, but were asked to continue regardless. Incidentally, that there were now three Royal Commissions simultaneously considering constitutional affairs was particularly ironic, given Harold Wilson’s dismissive remark a few years earlier that Royal Commissions ‘take minutes, and waste years’. The submission to the Royal Commission of Labour’s Scottish Executive was less than enthusiastic about a Scottish Assembly or Parliament, concerned that such an institution would prove to be little more than ‘a short-term palliative’ which ‘in the long-term would inevitably create the wrong intellectual environment for the methods of government which we require.’ What this meant was that ‘the enormous problems which we face can only be tackled by firm government from Westminster’. Furthermore, it was maintained that ‘providing the resources necessary must be a problem for the United Kingdom as a whole’, particularly as any


notion that ‘the Scottish economy alone is strong enough to solve our social problems . . . is quite absurd.’ As such, it was argued that ‘legislative devolution would damage Scotland’s economic development’ and that ‘Labour’s record in this respect . . . is something we cannot afford to lose’. What was recommended, therefore, was a strengthening of local government, coupled with improved parliamentary scrutiny at Westminster, ‘rather than . . . working towards some Federal or semi-National solution’ (Labour Party Scottish Council, 1970; NA CAB 165/821, Ross to Wilson, 15 April 1970). Similarly, Labour’s 1970 manifesto expressly referred to the fact that the Labour Party in Scotland rejected ‘any separate legislative assembly’, before blandly pledging to ‘apply Scottish solutions to Scottish problems’ (Labour Party, 1970: 18).

The Kilbrandon Reports’ recommendations The Royal Commission on the Constitution (or Kilbrandon Commission as it variously became known) published its report in October 1973. In fact, it published two reports, reflecting a marked divergence of opinion between its members, to the extent that even the Majority Report revealed a significant lack of unanimity, recommending as it did three different options for Scotland. The most popular of these, supported by 8 of the 11 signatories, was for legislative devolution for Scotland. The second option was for an elected Advisory Council for Scotland, although this was only recommended by one of the Majority Report’s signatories. The third option enshrined in the Majority Report, and urged by the remaining two members, was merely for executive devolution for Scotland. The two authors of the Minority Report, meanwhile, proposed that there should be a system of executive devolution in Scotland, Wales and the English regions. The Labour Party at this time was in Opposition, having lost the June 1970 election to Edward Heath’s Conservative Party, and as such, might now have been expected to feign disinterest in the recommendations of a Royal Commission which it had unenthusiastically established four years previously. After all, those Labour politicians who had believed that the nationalist tide north of the border would recede appeared to have been vindicated, for in the 1970 election, the SNP lost the Hamilton seat (although it did win the Western Isles). As such, the Labour Party might readily have let the reports of the Kilbrandon Commission gather dust and turn yellow on library shelves. However, in November 1973 – just days after the Kilbrandon Commission’s Reports were published – the SNP overturned a 16 000 Labour


majority when Margo MacDonald won a by-election in Glasgow Govan (having previously made serious inroads into Labour’s majority in a byelection in Dundee East earlier the same year). Although Labour regained Glasgow Govan in the general election which followed three months later, the SNP made other advances, winning seven seats (four from the Conservatives and two from Labour, in addition to retaining the Western Isles seat won in June 1970) and securing almost 22 per cent of the vote in Scotland (virtually double the level of support attained in 1970). With the Labour Party forming a minority Administration, 34 seats short of an overall Commons majority, and almost certain to call another general election sooner rather than later, in order to secure a working majority, the issue of Scottish devolution lodged itself near the top of the policy agenda. Having hoped five years earlier that the Royal Commission would serve to stem the rise in support for devolution in Scotland, and then subsequently envisaged that the fragmented nature of the recommendations enshrined in its Reports – published whilst the Conservatives were in Office – would finally lay the issue to rest, the newly elected Labour Government, lacking a parliamentary majority, found itself obliged, as a matter of the utmost importance and urgency, to respond much more positively to the issue of Scottish devolution, albeit entirely for reasons of political expediency.

The Wilson–Callaghan Governments, 1974–1979 The Labour Party’s February 1974 election manifesto had contained no specific measures pertaining to Scottish devolution, whilst the subsequent Queen’s speech merely stated that Ministers would ‘initiate discussions in Scotland and Wales on the Report of the Royal Commission on the Constitution, and will bring forward proposals for consideration’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 870, col. 4). However, when Winifred Ewing sought further clarification, – in the form of somewhat firmer proposals – on behalf of the SNP, Wilson promised that the Government would be publishing a White Paper and a Bill, an apparently impromptu pledge which had not been discussed, yet alone approved, by either the Cabinet, the NEC, or Labour’s Scottish Executive. Having thus raised the expectations of Scottish nationalists, it was imperative that Wilson subsequently appeared rather more committed to Scottish devolution, reliant as his Government was on the support of ‘minor’ parties in the House of Commons and cognizant of the need to prevent the SNP from securing further electoral gains in the imminent [October] general election. However, this clearly presented Labour with a


serious dilemma, for while it was acknowledged that the Party ‘must have a comprehensive policy on Devolution developed as soon as possible before the campaign gets under way’ (Labour Party Archives, Res.24/April 1974), it was also recognized that the Party might ‘have a difficult job convincing the Scottish people of our real commitment on this issue’. This rendered it ‘extremely important that the impression is not gained that we are simple trying to get over the hurdle of, say, an October election’ (Labour Party Archives, RES.72/June 1974). Yet it was extremely difficult for Labour to avoid precisely such an impression, given that this was indeed a major impetus for the belated and hasty search by Party for a credible stance on Scottish devolution during the summer of 1974. Having established the Royal Commission on the Constitution back in 1969 in the hope that the issue would fade away or somehow resolve itself, it was a delicious irony that the Kilbrandon Report, with its plethora of proposals for devolution, was published just months before a general election (and only a week before Margo MacDonald won the Govan by-election for the SNP) in which a Labour Administration was returned to Office, but lacking an overall parliamentary majority, and thus heavily reliant on the support of the pro-devolution Liberal and nationalist parties. By this time, the Party’s devolution working group was arguing that the recent successes of the SNP were not a sudden phenomenon, but part of a general trend since 1951. Furthermore, it was claimed that Just as the Liberal failed to halt the growth of the Labour Movement, so the Labour Party may be facing a similar Movement in the form of Scottish Nationalism. Therefore our strategy on the future government of Scotland is of paramount importance for the future of the British Labour Party and the UK itself. (Labour Party Archives, RES.72/June 1974) Consequently, having spent many years dismissing Scottish devolution, the Labour leadership now prepared legislative proposals with almost indecent haste, with a White Paper entitled Devolution Within the UK - Some Alternatives for Discussion being published at the beginning of June (barely three months after a general election in which Labour’s manifesto was devoid of specific proposals on devolution). Indeed, the very fact that a consultative document was deemed to be a White Paper, rather than the customary Green Paper, was itself indicative of the haste with which the Government was now proceeding. As with the previous Wilson Government, special responsibility for dealing


with devolution was allocated to the Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons, this time Edward Short, whilst Lord Crowther-Hunt – co-author of the Kilbrandon Commission’s Minority Report – was initially appointed as constitutional adviser to the Government. Even before the October 1974 election, divisions had manifested themselves within the Labour Party concerning Scottish devolution. The executive of the Scottish Council of the Labour Party met on 22 June 1974, but with only 11 of its 29 members present, some of the others watching coverage of Scotland’s (football) World Cup fixture against Yugoslavia. Indeed, Willie Ross was actually in Frankfurt, attending the match in person. The 11 members thus present then rejected, by 6 votes to 5, legislative devolution for Scotland, insisting that as the Labour Party’s fundamental mission was ‘to bring about a fundamental and irreversible shift in the balance of power and wealth in favour of ordinary people’, with public ownership and North Sea oil both crucial to this goal, ‘constitutional tinkering does not make a meaningful contribution towards achieving our socialist objectives’ (quoted in Bogdanor, 1999: 141). Needless to say, this decision caused considerable displeasure to Labour’s NEC in London, where proposals for Scottish devolution were being finalized in readiness for inclusion in the Party’s imminent election manifesto. Consequently, Labour’s Scottish Executive was obliged to convene another conference, whereupon formal support for devolution was declared, via a motion declaring that ‘this conference, recognising the desire of the Scottish people for a greater say in the running of their own affairs, calls for the setting up of a directly elected Assembly, with legislative powers, within the context of the political and economic unity of the UK.’ That it did convene again, and reverse its decision of less than two months previously, has been variously attributed to considerable ‘arm-twisting’, particularly of trade union delegates, with Alex Kitson in particular, a senior official of the Transport and General Workers Union, undertaking ‘some neat lobbying to line up the major unions in Scotland behind the idea of an Assembly’ (Drucker, 1978: 28). Indeed, according to Tam Dalyell, who had attended prior meetings of the NEC in London (as a member of Labour’s Scottish Executive Committee), and then sat on the platform of the specially convened conference of the Labour Party in Scotland, ‘All too obviously, it had been “fixed’’, just as various other anti-devolutionists had suspected’ (emphasis in original). Yet when the NEC, via its Home Policy Committee, issued a paper on devolution a couple of weeks later, it claimed that the decision of the


Labour Party in Scotland had been taken after ‘an open, honest debate’. Furthermore, it was claimed that the special conference had ‘overwhelmingly called for an elected Scottish Assembly with legislative powers.’ Dalyell claims that the crucial word ‘legislative’ had been ‘deftly inserted’, for the delegates at the conference had assumed that they were endorsing an Assembly with executive and administrative (as opposed to law-making) powers (Dalyell, 1977: 103–9). Meanwhile, the Government’s consultations with various Scottish organizations revealed that whilst many Scots wanted a significant degree of devolution, in the form of an elected assembly with genuine powers, the vast majority nonetheless wanted Scotland to remain within the United Kingdom. This then enabled the Labour Party to declare that it was ‘at one with the majority of the Scottish people in opposing the creation of a separate Scottish State [or] the creation of a federal structure along the lines of the USA’. This, it was claimed, left the Labour Party and the Scottish people with two choices: ‘the status quo or devolution’, and as ‘the general consensus is that the status quo has outlived its usefulness . . . our response must lie in Devolution’, especially as Labour was ‘facing a potentially explosive political situation in Scotland’. Indeed, it was suggested that ‘our strategy on the future government of Scotland is of paramount importance for the future of the British Labour Party . . . itself’ (Labour Party Archives, Res.72/June 1974). This apocalyptic warning derived in large part from private polling conducted for the Party in February 1974, which had revealed that the SNP was attracting the bulk of its electoral support ‘from the working class, and young people rather than old; i.e, from Labour’s traditional source of support’ (emphasis in original). It was also discovered that ‘the SNP was the most attractive second choice for Labour supporters’ (Labour Party Archives, Res.70/June 1974). Nonetheless, it was emphasized that whilst Scotland ought to be granted its own directly elected Assembly, with jurisdiction over agriculture, education, health, housing, law and justice, public expenditure, town and country planning and transport, it would not be imbued with any revenue-raising powers, but instead would continue to receive a block grant from the Treasury. Furthermore, Westminster would retain formal responsibility for defence, foreign affairs (including Britain’s relations with the European Communities), monetary policy, social security and taxation. Westminster would also ‘continue to be the supreme legislative authority on all matters’ (Labour Party Archives, RES.72/June 1974, emphasis in original).


The Devolution Working Group, operating under the auspices of the NEC’s Home Policy Committee, also rejected the use of some form of proportional representation for any such elected Assembly, fearing that ‘its adoption could only increase pressure for a similar system to operate for Westminster elections’ (Labour Party Archives, Res.70/June 1974). Besides, it was maintained that the existing electoral system ‘was simple to operate and . . . understood by the public’, whilst ensuring ‘the clear and direct accountability of the elected representatives to his (sic) constituents’ (Labour Party Archives, Res.143/August 1974). What emerged from Labour’s consultation exercise north of the border, coupled with subsequent discussions in Cabinet, was the publication, in September 1974, of a White Paper Democracy and Devolution Proposals for Scotland and Wales, which promised that Scotland would be permitted its own elected assembly, with membership derived from constituencybased elections. Furthermore, this body would enjoy legislative powers, particularly in policy areas where ‘separate Westminster-enacted Scottish legislation already existed, as for example, in housing, health and education’ (Wilson, 1979: 48). With regard to finance, although the proposed Scottish assembly was not to be granted revenue-raising powers, it would be entitled to decide for itself how the block grant from central government was subsequently allocated vis-à-vis competing policy commitments and programmes in Scotland. Meanwhile, the White Paper confirmed that there would be no reduction in Scottish representation at Westminster and that the Secretary of State for Scotland would continue to be a member of the Cabinet. In effect, having offered no firm commitment to devolution in its February 1974 election manifesto, the Labour Party had concocted an extensive package of devolutionary proposals in less than seven months, leading an exasperated Roy Jenkins to warn Ministerial colleagues that ‘You cannot break up the United Kingdom in order to win a few seats in an election’ (quoted in Dell, 1991: 51), whilst Barbara Castle noted how ‘deeply alarmed’ many civil servants were ‘at the whole exercise’ (Castle, 1980: 497, diary entry for 10 September 1974). These proposals were reaffirmed in another White Paper, Our Changing Democracy: Devolution to Scotland and Wales, published in November 1975 (just over a year after Labour had been re-elected with a precarious parliamentary majority of just three seats), and this formed the basis of the Scotland and Wales Bill which was given its First Reading towards the end of 1976, although not before a Supplementary Statement to Our Changing Democracy: Devolution to Scotland and Wales had been published, in


August 1976, this representing the Government’s response to particular criticisms of its devolution proposals. That more than two years elapsed between the Labour Government’s October 1974 election ‘victory’ and the publication of the Scotland and Wales Bill can partly be attributed to the serious economic problems which the Cabinet was grappling with at this time, and the time and energy expended also both on renegotiating the terms of Britain’s EEC membership and conducting the ensuing referendum on continued membership, but it also clearly reflected the lack of enthusiasm with which many Ministers viewed the whole issue of devolution. Indeed, when Wilson chaired a Cabinet ‘away-day’ on devolution at Chequers, in the early autumn of 1975, some of his Ministerial colleagues, most notably Shirley Williams (see Castle, 1980: 497, diary entry for 10 September 1975) and Tony Crosland (Crosland, 1983: 277), were barely able to conceal their boredom and lack of interest in the issue. The same Chequers meeting heard Denis Healey warn that one Scottish and Welsh Assemblies were established, the Conservatives would almost certainly seek to reduce the number of Scottish and Welsh MP at Westminster (a move which would prove particularly damaging to the Labour Party electorally), whilst James Callaghan was ‘afraid of opening the doors to separatism’. Indeed, the meeting sporadically ‘dissolved into grumblings of doubt about the whole exercise’, and ‘at the end . . . deteriorated into dreadful squabbling’, while Wilson, as chair, ‘was totally bored with the whole question’ (Donoughue, 2005: 493, 494, diary entry for 10 September 1975). Thus did David Owen recall that devolution ‘had not been adopted by Labour out of conviction but out of expediency . . . many people within the Party did not truly believe in it’ (Owen, 1992: 409), whilst Tam Dalyell alleged that ‘the whole devolution caper . . . has been . . . primarily an exercise in party politics . . . cobbled together to meet to meet the electoral threat posed by the Scottish National Party’ (quoted in Evans, 2003: 231). Indeed, Bernard Donoughue, the head of his (Downing Street) Policy Unit, recalls that Wilson became enamoured with the perspective of Labour MP and academic, John Mackintosh, ‘that the Scot Nats will be destroyed in the new Assembly’ (Donoughue, 2005: 546, diary entry for 30 October 1975). Certainly, as two academic commentators subsequently noted, throughout this period, ‘doubts about Labour’s real commitment to devolution were never far from the surface’ (Geekie and Levy, 1989: 400). At the end of 1976, the Government introduced a Scotland and Wales Bill, based on the proposals enshrined in the 1974 White Paper, with the


then Leader of the House, Michael Foot, deeming it to be ‘logical that the matter should be dealt with in the same bill’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 924, col. 221). Yet right from the outset, the Bill encountered strong opposition from several Labour MPs representing English urban constituencies, some of whom expressed concern that a Scottish Assembly would diminish the sovereignty of Parliament. What compounded the concern of several Labour opponents of the Bill, particularly those representing urban constituencies suffering economic hardship, was that the establishment of a Scottish assembly was to be paralleled by the creation of a Scottish Development Agency to simulate industrial regeneration and expansion. This institutional innovation, such MPs feared, might lure investment and jobs away from economically depressed English regions, especially in the North West and North East of England (Wilson, 1979: 48, 49). It was also at this stage that one of Labour’s most fervent opponents of devolution, Tam Dalyell, raised what subsequently became known as ‘the West Lothian Question’: If Scotland was given its own legislative assembly, he enquired, then why should Scottish MPs – such as himself – be permitted to continue voting at Westminster, on laws and policies pertaining to England, when English MPs would no longer be vote on laws applicable to, and approved in, Scotland itself? Dalyell insisted that ‘there is no answer’ to this question, and subsequently voted against the Bill on over 100 occasions, in spite of the three-line whip imposed by the Labour leadership (McSmith, 1993: 63). One possible answer might have been to reduce the number of Scottish MPs returned to Westminster (as the Blair Government was to do three decades later), but Ministers were not inclined to adopt this approach, arguing that The United Kingdom Parliament and the central Government Ministers will of course remain fully responsible for the overall interests of the United Kingdom both domestically and internationally, and the Government conclude, therefore, that full Scottish and Welsh representation at Westminster should be maintained . . . . It is essential that the determination of United Kingdom policies should fully reflect the needs and contributions of all its constituent parts. (NA CAB 130/763, MISC 46(74) 1, 6 September 1974) Although the Scotland and Wales Bill subsequently secured its Second Reading with a majority of 45, it was opposed in the Division Lobby by 10 Labour MPs, while a further 45 abstained (Bogdanor, 1999: 180).


That it nonetheless secured a relatively comfortable majority was due to corresponding divisions within the Conservative Opposition, which ensured that a number of Conservatives either voted for the Bill or themselves abstained, although this may have reflected a mischievous desire by some Conservatives to embarrass the Labour Government, rather than suggesting genuine Conservative support for the devolution proposals. The readiness of so many Labour MPs to vote against the Bill or abstain at a time when their Government’s wafer-thin majority had already dissipated (due to by-election defeats, and the defection of Reg Prentice to the Conservatives) was a clear indication of the hostility which many in the Party harboured towards devolution. Nor could Labour Ministers derive much comfort from the majority granted for the Bill’s Second Reading, because two particular factors ensured that the Bill’s subsequent progress would prove rather more problematic. Firstly, as a measure of such major constitutional importance, the Scotland and Wales Bill’s committee stage was obliged to be conducted on the Floor of the House, thereby ensuring that Labour opponents of devolution could not be excluded from membership of this particular committee. Secondly, although a number of Conservatives had been willing to express support for the principle of devolution, they could not be relied upon to proffer similar support for the specificities and administrative minutiae of the Scotland and Wales Bill which the standing committee stage would be concerned with. The Labour Government thus faced the likelihood that the Bill would be subject to a variety of hostile or ‘wrecking’ amendments, some derived from genuine concerns, and others from mischievous motives (not least of these being to slow down the Bill’s progress and effectively waste the Government’s parliamentary time), by opponents of devolution. Certainly, the Scotland and Wales Bill made extremely slow progress during its committee stage, to the extent that only three (out of its original 115) clauses had been debated after 10 days. To expedite the Bill’s parliamentary progress, therefore, the Government tabled a guillotine motion, to limit subsequent committee stage debate to 20 days, but this was defeated by 312 votes to 283, with 22 Labour MPs voting against, and a further 23 abstaining (Bogdanor, 1999: 182). This defeat sounded the death-knell for the Scotland and Wales Bill, but also meant that the Government – by now lacking a parliamentary majority – was vulnerable to attempts by nationalist MPs, particularly those from the SNP, to precipitate its downfall by tabling a motion of no confidence. If such a motion were then supported by the Conservatives and other


minor parties, the Labour Government would be defeated, and thus constitutionally obliged to call a general election. To pre-empt such a situation, the Labour Prime Minister crafted a ‘pact’ with the Liberal Party, who had 13 MPs, just about sufficient to provide the Government with a narrow parliamentary majority. However, one of the conditions which the Liberal leader, David Steel, extracted from Callaghan as a pre-requisite of his Party’s support was new legislation on devolution, this time in the form of separate Bills for Scotland and Wales. Having hurriedly concocted a devolution policy in 1974 in order to assuage the SNP, the Labour Government found itself, three years later, obliged to pursue new devolution legislation in order to secure the parliamentary support of the Liberal Party. That political expediency and parliamentary exigencies prompted the Labour Governments’ pursuit of devolution during the 1974–1979 period is itself indicative of the lack of genuine enthusiasm for devolution within the Party. Pragmatic considerations, not principled commitment, underpinned Labour’s devolution policies during this period, the lesser evil compared to calling another general election. Consequently, the Labour Government introduced a Scotland Bill, also based on the proposals outlined in the September 1974 White Paper, which received its Second Reading on 14 November 1977. On this occasion, many of those Labour MPs who had declined to support the previous Scotland and Wales Bill endorsed the Scotland Bill at Second Reading stage, but not because they had become pro-devolutionists. Instead, two considerations underpinned the willingness of anti-devolution Labour MPs to support the Scotland Bill at this stage. Firstly, they recognized that if their Government were defeated again on this issue, then its resignation would be virtually inevitable. This did Eric Heffer explain that he was ‘in favour of sustaining the government’, and as such, ‘if I do vote for the government, it will not because I agree with the proposals, but merely to help sustain it. I have not become converted to devolution’ (The Guardian, 14 November 1977). The second reason why anti-devolution Labour MPs were willing to support the Scotland Bill at Second Reading was that the legislation included provision for a referendum, this to be held in Scotland once Parliament had approved the Bill. For Labour opponents of devolution, this effectively enabled them to proffer the Scotland Bill qualified support in Parliament, thereby sustaining their Government, but then hoping (and possibly campaigning) for a ‘No’ vote in the subsequent referendum. They would then be able to declare that the Scottish people themselves, rather than Labour MPs or a Labour Government, had vetoed proposals


for a Scottish Assembly. Eric Heffer was quite candid about supporting the Bill in Parliament in lieu of offering his services ‘to those in the Labour and trade union movements in Scotland and Wales who oppose the proposals and campaign in the referendums against the legislation’, in the hope that ‘at that stage the people will vote the proposals down’ (The Guardian, 14 November 1977). As with its predecessor, however, it was during the standing committee stage that the Scotland Bill encountered serious difficulties (in spite of the Government’s successful imposition of a guillotine on this occasion), due largely to the continued opposition within much of the Labour Party to devolution, particularly when this entailed an elected Scottish assembly with its own legislative powers. The most significant hostile amendment, moved by the Labour MP George Cunningham, stipulated that in the subsequent referendum on devolution, a ‘Yes’ vote would only be deemed valid if 40 per cent of the whole Scottish electorate voted in favour, as opposed to 40 per cent of those who actually turned out to vote. In other words, abstentions would effectively count as ‘No’ votes, thereby significantly increasing the likelihood that the Governments’ latest devolution proposal would be ‘defeated’ by the Scottish people, even though they had been approved by Parliament itself. This was rather ironic, given that many Labour MPs purported to oppose empowering the Scottish people, via devolution, on the grounds that the sovereignty of Parliament would be weakened. The amendment has since been described by one constitutional expert as possibly ‘the most important back-bench initiative in British politics since the war’ (Bogdanor, 1999: 186, for a detailed discussion of the amendment, see Bogdanor, 1980: 249–63). Certainly, it subsequently proved fatal, delivering the final blow to the Labour Government’s pursuit of Scottish devolution, for when the referendum in Scotland was held, on 1 March 1979, although 51.6 per cent of those voting expressed their support, a turn-out of 62.9 per cent meant that they only constituted 32.85 per cent of the electorate in Scotland and, as such, constituted rather less than the requisite 40 per cent. Yet it seems often to be overlooked that 48.5 per cent of those who voted (representing 30.78 per cent of the Scottish electorate) cast their vote against the Government’s devolution proposals, suggesting that even if there had not been a 40-per cent threshold, the narrowness of the majority in favour might have weakened the credibility of a Scottish assembly and enabled opponents to question its legitimacy. Having failed to secure the 40-per cent threshold, the Government was obliged to present an Order in Parliament to repeal the devolution


legislation, but before it managed to do so, it was defeated – by 311 votes to 310 – in a vote of confidence, and thus call a general election. With Labour losing this election, on 3 May 1979, it was the victorious Conservative Party which subsequently laid the Order before Parliament and repealed the Scotland Act in June. Prior to the confidence motion, Callaghan could, in theory, have presented the Repeal Order to Parliament and then urged Labour MPs (along with Liberals and nationalists) to vote against it, thereby enabling the Scotland Bill to remain on the statute book anyway. However, Callaghan was advised by Labour’s Chief Whip, Michael Cocks, that too many Labour MPs – particularly those representing constituencies in northern of England and Merseyside – would probably refuse to vote in such a manner, and as such, such an initiative to salvage Scottish devolution (and possibly the Labour Government itself) was not pursued (Morgan, 1997: 359–61). Although various factors contributed to Labour’s defeat at the polls in 1979 – not least the collapse of its incomes policy and the concomitant ‘winter of discontent’ – Harold Wilson ruefully reflected that ‘the immediate cause’ of the general election was ‘the impasse caused by the response of the Scots and Welsh in the devolution vote’ (Wilson, 1979: 213, n. 1). Arguably, the 1974–1979 Labour Governments were partly brought down by an issue which had not featured prominently in the Party’s February 1974 manifesto and which was subsequently viewed with indifference or hostility by many Labour MPs and Ministers, particularly some of those representing constituencies in the North East and North West of England, where there was a perception that ‘Scotland was receiving preferential treatment’ at a time when these English regions were also particularly affected by unemployment and deindustrialization (Benn, 1982: 78; Keating and Bleiman, 1979: 176). Yet the troubles and travails which Labour Ministers and Party whips experienced in seeking to secure the parliamentary passage of the legislation merely added to the public perception of a weak Government unable to exert authority, and drifting aimlessly, constantly at the mercy of events and circumstances which it seemed unable to control. Nor was the Labour Government’s popularity amongst voters in England likely to have been enhanced by its pre-occupation with a policy issue concerning Scotland – particularly when set against the serious economic and industrial problems affecting the Britain during the mid- to late 1970s, and which most voters considered rather more salient, and thus deserving of Ministerial attention.


Labour and Scottish devolution in the aftermath of 1979 Labour’s shift to the Left in response to the Party’s defeat in the 1979 election entailed a return to a rather more explicitly economistic perspective with regard to the problems posed for Scotland by Thatcherism. In this context, the Labour Party’s emphasis during the early 1980s was on Scotland’s need for a reinvigorated regional policy pursued by a genuinely ‘socialist’ Labour Government at Westminster, but administered through a strengthened Scottish Development Agency, whereupon the economic and industrial decline which was being accelerated by Thatcherism could be reversed. In particular, Labour envisaged that increased financial aid and assistance would facilitate economic revival in Scotland, with ‘the emphasis . . . on encouraging existing industry within the regions to invest and expand’ (Millan, 1983: 140). Furthermore, it was intimated that a significant part of such a financial aid programme could be funded from the proceeds of North Sea oil, most of which was being extracted off Scotland’s east coast, and which the SNP duly claimed was ‘Scotland’s oil’. In this context, Labour’s pledge to finance the revival of the Scottish economy partly through the revenues accrued from North Sea Oil was intended to undermine some of the electoral appeal of the nationalists in Scotland, while still enabling Labour’s approach to Scottish affairs to be couched within the economistic discourse of the Left’s Alternative Economic Strategy. Although this certainly did not represent a formal rejection of the erstwhile commitment to devolution – ‘the Labour Party has continued its commitment to Scottish devolution’ (Millan, 1983: 145), which ‘is still a live issue’ (Benn, 1982: 78) – it did mean that ‘Scottish policy’ was once again characterized primarily in terms of economic and industrial measures, rather than political decentralization and democratization. Ironically, this also meant that Labour was uneasy about the demand of the Party’s 1982 Scottish conference for an Assembly with considerable industrial, and limited financial, powers of its own. Faced with this demand, the Labour Party’s response was that such a measure ‘will obviously have to be carefully examined in terms of its consequences for the machinery of government as a whole’ (Labour Party, 1982: 209). Yet, at about the same time, a former (un-named) Labour Cabinet Minister was declaring that We are certain to lose the next election in England. We will return with even more MPs from Scotland, but we will be out of Office down here


[in London] for another ten years. We will have to play the nationalist card in Scotland. We will have to go for an Assembly with substantial economic powers . . . . (quoted in The Scotsman, 28 July 1982) Economism, electoralism and expediency were, it seemed, to be conjoined. Indeed, Labour’s commitment to establishing a Scottish Parliament, as confirmed in the Party’s 1983 manifesto, strongly emphasized ‘a major role for the Assembly in assisting the regeneration of Scottish industry – including the preparation and implementation of a Plan for Scotland – within the context of our overall national plan.’ However, it was now envisaged that the proposed Scottish Assembly would have limited tax-raising powers ‘thus ensuring that the level of services provided can be determined in Scotland’, although the vast bulk of Scottish finance would continue to emanate from the Treasury, in the form of a block grant (Labour Party, 1983: 33). There was little further refinement of these proposals during the next four years, following Labour’s crushing defeat in the 1983 election. Although Michael Foot’s successor as Labour leader after the 1983 election, Neil Kinnock, had been a strong opponent of devolution (particularly for Wales) in the late 1970s, he neither ditched nor developed the commitment to a Scottish Assembly following his election as leader of the Party. Instead, Kinnock’s first four years as Labour leader were consumed by other battles and issues, most notably the 1984–1985 miners’ strike, and the attempts at expelling Trotskyite ‘entryists’, the Militant Tendency, from the Party. However, Donald Dewar, whom Kinnock appointed as Labour’s Shadow Secretary of State for Scotland, advanced another reason for the absence of Scottish devolution from the internal deliberations of the Labour Party during the mid-1980s, namely that ‘within the Labour Party there are no longer arguments about the need for devolution.’ On the contrary, Dewar declared ‘I cannot think of any subject where the Party is more united than on the basic principles of devolution’ (Glasgow Herald, 1 March 1984). Agreement on the ‘basic principles’ there may have been, there was precious little intra-Party debate at this time about precisely how these ‘basic principles’ would be translated into practice. Besides, whether there really was the degree of unanimity in favour of the ‘basic principles’ of devolution claimed by Dewar must remain a matter of conjecture. The fact that there was little public debate might just as readily have derived from a tacit acceptance that ‘devolution should not be added to the list of disputes within the Labour Party’ during the mid-1980s (Mitchell, 1998: 482).


For the reasons already intimated, devolution was certainly not high on Kinnock’s list of priorities during this period, and hence the Labour Party contested the 1987 election still committed (as in 1983) to establishing a Scottish Assembly, ‘with a wide range of powers . . . over significant aspects of industrial and economic policy’, although, the hitherto promise of tax-raising powers appeared to have been downgraded (Labour Party, 1987: 11). In the meantime, Dewar suggested that if a Scottish Parliament had been in existence, then the people of Scotland would have been spared much of the Thatcher Governments’ ‘damaging legislation which does not reflect Scottish priorities’ (The Glasgow Herald, 1 March 1985).

Towards ‘New Labour’ and new proposals for Scottish devolution Following the 1987 election defeat, Neil Kinnock instigated a major Policy Review, convinced that Labour’s third successive election defeat was incontrovertible evidence of the Party’s urgent need to modernize its principles and policies. To this end, seven Policy Review Groups were established in 1987, whose recommendations were published in various Labour policy documents and programmes during the following three years. Although the Policy Review is most notable for committing Labour to aspects of the market economy, prioritizing consumer interests over those of producers and accepting most of the Thatcher Governments’ tranche of anti-trade union legislation, it also entailed a programme of constitutional reform far more explicit and extensive than any previously promoted by the Party. Of the various proposals for constitutional reform arising out of the Policy Review, devolution for Scotland was amongst the most prominent and unequivocal, with the Review Group on ‘Democracy for the Individual and the Community’ recommending that ‘at the earliest possible moment’, the next Labour Government should establish ‘a directly elected Scottish Assembly or Parliament, with substantial legislative powers’, to the extent that ‘Most decisions affecting Scotland will be taken in Scotland.’ Although the vast majority of Scottish public expenditure would still be financed by the extant system of a block grant allocated by Whitehall, it was also recommended that the proposed Scottish Parliament or Assembly ‘will have the additional power to vary the level of expenditure by varying income tax rates in Scotland’, for ‘If Scotland’s elected representatives want higher public investment, they must raise the cash


and answer for what they do at the ballot box.’ This was deemed ‘an essential discipline for any democratic arm of government.’ Pre-empting inevitable Conservative claims that these proposals would presage the break-up of the United Kingdom, it was emphasized that this ‘imaginative, effective response to Scotland’s needs will strengthen the United Kingdom’, particularly as the proposals for Scottish devolution explicitly linked them to ‘the move to regional Assemblies in England and the plan for Wales’ (Labour Party, 1989: 57). In fact, within weeks of the 1987 election defeat, Donald Dewar had urged the Party nationally to recognize ‘that the case put for an Assembly is not an abstract piece of theory’, but reflected genuine ‘problems which relate specifically to Scotland’. However, Dewar also sought to present the case for a Scottish Assembly in a wider context, namely that of ‘regional policy and regional government’ in general, which would offer the added advantage of placing the West Lothian question ‘in a more manageable perspective’ (Dewar, 1987: 17). What lent added impetus to Labour’s formal commitment to Scottish devolution during the later half of the 1980s was the continued dominance of Thatcherism via Westminster, even though support in Scotland for the (anti-devolution) Conservative Party was declining. Furthermore, the Thatcher Government decreed that the Poll Tax would be introduced in Scotland a year before its introduction in England and Wales. Thus was Robin Cook among those in the Labour Party who now became a supporter of Scottish devolution, for whereas in the 1970s, he had viewed it as ‘a compromise with nationalism’, by the late 1980s, it had become a means of protecting Scotland from Thatcherism (Glasgow Herald, 3 September 1987). Further pressure on the Labour Party to commit itself more fully or firmly to a Scottish Parliament was provided by the SNP’s Govan by-election victory, in November 1988, a result lent added piquancy by the fact that the SNP’s successful candidate, Jim Sillars, had been a Labour MP in the 1970s. It should be noted, though, that this period also witnessed the establishment (in March 1989) of a Constitutional Convention in Scotland, comprising the Scottish Labour Party, and the Liberal Democrats (the Conservative Party having declined the invitation to join, and the SNP withdrawing after the first meeting, expressing concern about Labour’s likely dominance of the new forum), as well as trade unions, local authorities and churches. This Constitutional Convention urged that the policy areas for which the Scottish Office had executive jurisdiction should become the domain of a Scottish Parliament. Whilst this in itself was remarkably similar to the proposals previously enshrined


in the ill-fated 1978 Scotland Bill, the Constitutional Convention added two significant modifications. Firstly, it was recommended that a Scottish Parliament, comprising 129 Members, should be elected by a system of proportional representation (which would also inter alia facilitate greater gender equality through ensuring more women representatives), and secondly, it was urged that the new legislative body ought to be imbued with tax-raising powers, enabling it to increase the basic rate of income tax in Scotland by a maximum of 3 pence in pounds. Yet Neil Kinnock was still unenthusiastic, it would seem, for he is quoted as telling one meeting of the NEC that ‘I can hardly bear the words “Scottish Parliament’’ to pass my lips’ (Benn, 1992: 607, diary entry for 24 October 1990). Nonetheless, the Labour Party’s 1992 election manifesto did pledge that ‘Labour’s legislation will be firmly based on the proposals agreed in the Scottish Constitutional Convention’, whereby a Labour Government ‘will move immediately to establish an elected Scottish Parliament’, elected on the basis of the AMS, and which would be granted extensive legislative and administrative powers pertaining to Scotland’s domestic and economic affairs. There was no mention, though, of any tax-raising powers, even though this aspect had been endorsed, not only by the Constitutional Convention but also by Labour’s own Policy Review (Labour Party, 1992: 18). These commitments were retained by John Smith, who replaced Neil Kinnock as Labour leader following the 1992 election defeat. Indeed, it is widely acknowledged that Smith was rather more enthusiastic about devolution than Kinnock had been, with the new Labour leader having originally piloted the Callaghan Government’s ill-fated devolution legislation through the House of Commons in the later half of the 1970s and consequently viewing devolution as ‘unfinished business’. At that time, Smith had insisted that devolution would actually serve to strengthen, not weaken, the overall unity of the United Kingdom, by virtue of ‘recognising the diversity of its different parts’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series. Vol. 924, col. 506). In this respect, Smith characterized devolution as ‘an exercise of tremendous constitutional conservatism’ (House of Commons, 6th series, Vol. 926, col. 1360), although it is often overlooked that until this time, Smith himself had been somewhat ambivalent about devolution, only becoming a committed proponent when he was appointed a Minister of State with special responsibility for piloting the Scotland Bill through the House of Commons (Keating and Bleiman, 1979: 182; McLean, 2001: 435; McSmith, 1993: 59–60; McSmith, 1999: 195).


Thereafter, Smith was dismissive of the anti-devolutionists’ charge that a Scottish Parliament entailed the dilution of parliamentary sovereignty, insisting that such an argument derived from a failure to distinguish properly between power and sovereignty. According to Smith, ‘Powers are devolved – indeed substantial powers are devolved’, but as these were granted – and could subsequently be reclaimed – by Parliament itself, ‘sovereignty is not devolved . . . . Parliament will remain the only sovereign Parliament’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 924, cols. 509, 1586; House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 943, cols. 403–4).

New Labour and Scottish devolution Yet the short tenure of Smith’s leadership, terminated by his untimely death from a fatal heart attack in mid-1994, ensured that no new initiatives were added in this area of policy. It did mean, though, that when Tony Blair was elected Labour leader in July 1994, he inherited a devolution policy to which his two immediate predecessors had been formally committed, and which he perhaps felt obliged to maintain, even though he had not previously evinced any particular interest in devolution. Nonetheless, Blair did subsequently announce one significant initiative concerning Labour’s Scottish devolution policy, namely that both the establishment of a Scottish Parliament and whether it should enjoy limited tax-raising powers would be subject to approval by Scotland’s voters via a referendum. Having been elected with a 179-seat majority on 1 May 1997, New Labour’s very first item of legislation was the Referendum (Scotland and Wales) Act, indicating that with regard to devolution, the Blair Government had hit the ground running. However, whether the immediacy of the measure reflected genuine enthusiasm for devolution, or derived merely from a view on Tony Blair’s part that the policy was a tedious distraction to be dispensed with as quickly as possible, in order to focus on the ‘important’ matters, is a matter of conjecture. That Blair never appeared as enthusiastic about devolution as his predecessor, though, suggests that the second, somewhat more cynical perspective, might be nearer the mark. It might also be argued, though, that holding the referendum early in the Parliament would make a ‘Yes’ vote more likely, with the Government capitalizing on its ‘honeymoon period’, and with the (Conservative) opponents of devolution in complete disarray. This, in turn, would serve to legitimize the Government’s subsequent measures


to implement Scottish devolution, thus rendering it more difficult for the Opposition to oppose it.1 On this occasion, the referendum in Scotland – held on 11 September 1997 – produced a rather more emphatic majority in favour of devolution (than the corresponding vote in March 1979), with 74.3 per cent of those voting declaring their support and 25.7 per cent expressing opposition. However, as the turn-out was 60.2 per cent (slightly down on the 1979 referendum), it meant that less than 45 per cent of the Scottish people actually voted in favour of devolution. The second referendum question, asking Scottish voters whether Scotland’s proposed Parliament ought to be vested with limited tax-varying powers, was also endorsed by a majority of those actually voting, albeit by a smaller margin – 63.5 to 36.0 per cent. The subsequent Scotland Bill, which was introduced in December 1997, and received the Royal Assent in November 1998, enshrined several differences from its 1978 predecessor. Firstly, the 1998 Scotland Act listed the reserved, rather than devolved powers, of the new Scottish Parliament. As Bogdanor explains, this means that anything which is ‘not specifically reserved lies within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament’ (Bogdanor, 1999: 204). With the reserved powers generally pertaining to matters of macro-economic strategy, defence and foreign affairs, this effectively granted the Scottish Parliament considerable legislative license to pursue its own domestic policies with regard to agriculture, education, the environment, health, housing and welfare (although the bulk of social security per se remains a reserved power). Secondly, unlike the proposals of the late 1970s, the Scottish devolution enacted by the first Blair Government granted Scotland’s Parliament limited tax-varying powers, permitting it to raise (or lower) taxes by up to 3 pence in pounds. However, Tony Blair immediately pledged that if the Labour Party won a majority in the new Scottish Parliament, and thus formed a Scottish Executive, it would not raise income tax during its first term of Office in Scotland. Thirdly, the 1998 Scotland Act facilitated the adoption of a different electoral system for elections to the Scottish Parliament, namely a form of Additional Member System (AMS), whereby 73 of its members were elected from existing constituencies by the traditional plurality

1

I am grateful to Professor James Mitchell for drawing my attention to this particular consideration.


system (although one additional constituency was created by virtue of Orkney and Shetland being given separate representation), while a further 56 Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) would be elected on a proportional basis, with each of Scotland’s 8 regional constituencies (previously used for the 1999 European Parliament elections) returning 7 MSPs. These elections were to be held on a fixed-term basis, every 4 years. Although this variant of the AMS could be viewed as evidence of New Labour’s commitment to a new mode of more inclusive or pluralist, politics, it has been pointed out that the Party’s former general secretary in Scotland, Jack McConnell, admitted that part of the rationale was to ensure that the SNP would be unlikely ever to win an outright majority in the Scottish Parliament. Or to put it another way, ‘Labour was prepared to surrender the likelihood of its own overall majority in order to achieve this aim [preventing an SNP majority], and the Liberal Democrats backed it because they expected to share in governmental power’ (Bradbury and Mitchell, 2001: 258). Fourthly, the 1998 Scotland Act partly genuflected towards the West Lothian Question by presaging an eventual reduction in the number of Scottish MPs at Westminster, envisaging a reduction from 72 to about 59 MPs, although this change would not be determined until after the next review of constituencies by the Boundary Commissioners, due in 2003, and implemented in readiness for the next (2005) general election. In the May 1999 election for the new Scottish Parliament, the Labour Party won a clear majority of the constituency seats – 56 out of 73 – but only three further top-up seats, thereby depriving it of an overall majority. By contrast, the Conservatives failed to win any constituency seats, but were awarded 18 MSPs on the basis of the top-up element, whilst the SNP won 7 constituency seats, but a remarkable 28 top-up seats, thereby ensuring that it was the main ‘Opposition’. The Labour Party thus formed a coalition government with the Liberal Democrats, who had returned 17 MSPs (12 via the constituencies and a further 5 on the top-up basis), this appearing to exemplify the ‘new politics’ and ‘inclusiveness’ lauded by New Labour. The Labour Party at Westminster has not seriously sought to develop Scottish devolution further since 1999, because the establishment of a Scottish Parliament with legislative and tax-varying powers was a relatively ‘complete’ measure (in contrast to the Welsh Assembly, for example) in the first place. Compared to Wales, devolution in Scotland has proved somewhat more of an event than a process. Of course, that is not to say that the post-1999 political situation in Scotland has been static – the Scottish Parliament has undertaken a review of its own


internal procedures, while the Scottish Executive has used its powers to pursue a number of policies which diverged from those pursued in England, most notably in the spheres of education, health and care of the elderly – but the Blair Governments effectively treated Scottish devolution as ‘finished business’. Certainly, one constitutional expert has suggested that ‘There was no obvious “Blair effect’’ on devolution to Scotland . . . in the 2001-5 Parliament because Tony Blair had no interest in reopening the done deal of 1997-8’ (McLean, 2005: 358), and his lack of interest was apparently shared by his Ministerial colleagues in London. It was hardly surprising, then, that there was no suggestion of devolving further power to Scotland in Labour’s 2005 manifesto, even though such a pledge was made with regard to Wales (Labour Party, 2005: 108). Nor has there been much serious or sustained interest elsewhere in the Labour Party with regard to strengthening or extending Scottish devolution in view of the scope of the legislative and tax-varying powers (which it has so far declined to exercise) already bestowed upon the Scottish Parliament. Certainly, when Labour’s First Minister in the Scottish Parliament, Jack McConnell, called for further powers to be devolved to Edinburgh, he received little support, either from other Labour MSPs or from Labour MPs at Westminster, many of whom seemed to share the view of Nigel Griffiths (Labour MP for Edinburgh South and PPS to Peter Hain, the Leader of the House of Commons) that ‘The Scottish parliament already has an adequate range of powers. It is too soon to judge whether those powers have been already used to the maximum potential and advantage’. This view was shared by Tom Harris (Labour MP for Glasgow South and PPS to Patricia Hewitt, the then Secretary of State for Health) who declared that ‘It’s a dreadful idea. Six years is not long enough to make a considered judgment on expanding the powers’ (The Sunday Times, 31 July 2005). Although the Blair Governments were undeniably much more successful than the Wilson–Callaghan Governments in enacting devolution to Scotland in the form of a Scottish Parliament with both legislative and (as yet unused) tax-varying powers, this accomplishment still seemed to owe rather more to electoral expediency and political pragmatism than a genuine commitment to decentralization and democratization. Indeed, as one commentator has asserted, In the 1970s, devolution emerged as a reactive policy in response to the threat of the SNP; in the 1990s, it was driven in part by Labour’s desire to protect its dominance in Scotland. Thus devolution


was shaped in both periods by a conservative impulse to maintain the institutional and political hegemony of Scottish Labour. (Hassan, 2002: 150) Moreover, just as the Wilson–Callaghan Governments seemed blithely unconcerned about answering the ‘West Lothian Question’, so too have the Blair Governments paid little heed to this continuing constitutional conundrum, apart from reducing the number of Scottish MPs from 72 to 59 with effect from the 2005 general election. Yet the result of that election served to imbue the ‘West Lothian Question’ with renewed resonance, for Labour was re-elected with its parliamentary majority reduced to 66, thereby making it more reliant on the support of its Scottish MPs. This point was quickly seized upon by many Conservatives, who pointed out that various measures applicable to England – but not Scotland, due to the policy jurisdiction of the Scottish Parliament – are nonetheless being voted for by Scottish Labour MPs at Westminster, without whose support, Labour might be defeated in parliamentary Divisions. Consequently, David Cameron’s Conservative Party reactivated William Hague’s earlier demand for ‘English votes on English measures’, whereby Scottish MPs would be debarred from voting at Westminster on policies which fell within the remit of the Scottish Parliament, such as education and health, for example. Clearly, all the while that the Labour Party returns the largest number of Scottish MPs to Westminster, it will remain vulnerable to Opposition demands that these MPs should not be permitted to vote on measures and laws which will only be implemented in England.

Conclusion We have noted the manner in which the Labour Party’s initial formal commitment to ‘Home Rule all-round’ dissipated once it had replaced the Liberals as the main electoral alternative to the Conservative Party, while the willingness to countenance a Scottish Parliament from the 1970s owed much to the threat posed by the Scottish Nationalists. In other words, for most of the twentieth century, Labour’s ‘approach’ to Scotland was derived from a combination of political pragmatism, electoral expediency, and economism, suffused for some of this period with considerable complacency which bordered on patronising arrogance. From 1945 to the early 1970s, demands emanating from Scotland for a degree of self-government were readily dismissed by most senior


Labour politicians as the temporary manifestation of economic grievances, which, it was blithely assumed, would be ameliorated by a Labour Government at Westminster pursuing the ‘correct’ economic and industrial strategy to rectify or reverse regional disparities in the British economy. Whilst this did seem to acknowledge Scotland’s status as a distinct region within the United Kingdom, it only did so in so far as it advocated economic regeneration, industrial modernisation, and regional planning, to reverse the economic decline and de-industrialisation which Scotland was experiencing, along with Wales, and parts of Northern England. This perspective was thus unsympathetic to political devolution, in the form of granting the Scottish people their own elected, lawmaking Assembly. On the contrary, the assumption shared by many in the Labour Party was that Scotland required greater integration with England (and Wales), rather than greater autonomy. Once this was achieved, it was assumed, then calls for devolution would quieten down, and the SNP returned to political oblivion. At the same time, some Labour politicians were reluctant to accede to demands for legislative devolution for Scotland precisely because they feared that this would lend credence to the SNP, and actually serve to enhance or legitimise its campaigns. The Labour Party’s response to the emergence of Scottish Nationalism, therefore, was not to grant political or legislative devolution to Edinburgh, but to emphasize the primacy of Westminster and Whitehall as the source of solutions to the grievances being articulated by the Scottish Nationalists. Electoral politics, however, obliged the Labour leadership to treat demands for Scottish devolution a little more seriously from the 1970s onwards, for not only had Royal Commission on the Constitution ‘failed’ to defuse the issue in its 1973 report, the 1974-79 Labour Governments were extremely vulnerable to parliamentary defeats if Scottish (and Welsh) nationalists entered the Division Lobbies with Conservative, and Ulster Unionist, MPs: the Nationalists thus needed to be pacified. Yet it was clear that many senior Labour politicians remained unenthusiastic about granting Scotland a Parliament, whilst many backbenchers were hostile. As one commentator has remarked, Labour had adopted rather than embraced the policy of Scottish and Welsh devolution. Apart from a small band of Home Rulers, the motive was negative. Labour wanted to halt the advance of the SNP. Devolution had was not seen in positive terms . . . . Opponents of devolution . . . within the Labour Party . . . probably knew that many


of those arguing for devolution shared their misgivings [and] were able to exploit the contradictions and divisions in the pro-devolution camp. (Jones and Keating, 1982: 197; Mitchell, 2000: 239) During the course of the 1980s, though, Labour’s formal commitment to Scottish devolution was given considerable impetus as a consequence of the Thatcher Governments’ relentless centralization of political power (in stark contrast to Thatcherite rhetoric about ‘rolling back the State’). With hostility to the Conservatives increasing in Scotland – fuelled further by the introduction of the Poll Tax in 1989, a year earlier than in England and Wales – the Labour Party became more confident about advocacy of a Scottish Parliament, although this stance also reflected the electoral need to prevent the SNP from capitalizing on anti-Conservative sentiment in Scotland. During the later 1980s, and through the 1990s, Labour was also more relaxed about endorsing a Scottish Parliament because the Party could present it as part of a wider programme of constitutional reform and devolution emerging out of the 1987–1990 Policy Review. Crucially, though, Labour also sought to depict Scottish devolution as a policy which would actually strengthen the United Kingdom (not least by pacifying the Scottish ‘backlash’ caused by Thatcherism in general and the Poll Tax in particular), rather than result in its break-up (as many Conservatives warned). In many respects, therefore, the Scottish devolution eventually enacted by the 1997–2001 Blair Government derived not from a serious consideration or questioning of constitutional affairs by the Labour Party (least of all by Tony Blair himself) – for whom the Westminster Model still constitutes the dominant paradigm concerning the nature and operation of political power and governmental authority in Britain – but by a combination of reactive politics, electoral necessity and the desire to maintain the overall unity of the United Kingdom, albeit through tolerating (often grudgingly, it would appear) greater diversity and some subsidiarity. New Labour’s enactment of Scottish devolution should not be interpreted as enthusiasm for it.

7 Welsh Devolution

Introduction For most of its political history, the Labour Party’s attitude towards Welsh demands for devolution ‘has been characterised by ambiguity and ambivalence’ (Fowler, 2005: 7). Although individual Labour MPs from Wales have variously urged the Party leadership (at Westminster) to pursue a more distinctly ‘Welsh agenda’, or grant Wales self-government, with Keir Hardie’s support for ‘Home Rule all round’ often being cited as an example (see, for example, Jones and Jones, 2000: 242), the Labour Party has generally tended to view demands for Welsh devolution as being of (even) less significance than devolutionary pressures emanating from Scotland. Consequently, even when the Labour Party has felt obliged to put forward proposals, and enact measures, to devolve power to Wales, these have been much more cautious and circumscribed than corresponding initiatives pertaining to Scotland, particularly in the sense that such initiatives have been primarily concerned with administrative – rather than legislative – devolution. The most recent manifestation of this stance, of course, was the 1997– 2001 Blair Government’s (unenthusiastic) creation of a Welsh Assembly, rather than a Welsh Parliament. Furthermore, unlike the Scottish Parliament, the National Assembly for Wales has not been vested with tax-varying powers. Labour Ministers sought to justify these differences by insisting that support for devolution has been lower in Wales than in Scotland, as illustrated by the results of both the 1979 and 1997 referenda in Wales. Ministers could also point to the lower electoral support enjoyed by Plaid Cymru in Wales compared to the SNP in Scotland as an indication that there has been less demand for self-government in Wales than in Scotland, although stating this too directly would leave 241


the Labour leadership open to the accusation that electoral calculations, rather than a genuine commitment to decentralization and democratization, provided much of the impetus for the recent enactment of Welsh devolution. It could further be argued that however limited the proposals for Welsh devolution have been, they nonetheless represented the most that could be agreed within the Labour Party itself, without the issue becoming more divisive and yielding (greater) intra-party dissent. In this respect, Labour’s creation of a Welsh Assembly – rather than a Parliament – was not only partly prompted by electoral calculations, but also by considerations of how the issue could best be managed within the Labour Party itself.

Labour and Welsh devolution prior to 1945 At its annual conference in 1918 (when it formally committed itself to a socialist programme and Clause IV), the Labour Party adopted a resolution which proposed that ‘along with the grant of Home Rule to Ireland, there should be constituted separate statutory legislative assemblies for Scotland, Wales and even England, with autonomous administration in matters of local concern’, yet the Labour leadership, most notably Ramsay McDonald, seemed unenthusiastic, even though the official commitment to Home Rule was reiterated at Labour’s annual conference 10 years later, and in the Party’s 1929 manifesto. As in Scotland, Labour’s early endorsement of Welsh ‘Home Rule’ owed much to the electoral dominance of the (pro-Home Rule) Liberal Party in Wales at the beginning of the twentieth century, the Liberals having won 33 out of Wales’ 34 seats in the 1906 election. As such, the ‘original impulse towards devolution was part of the heavy ideological baggage inherited from Liberalism’, so that ‘the electoral alliance which became the Labour Party at the beginning of the [twentieth] century happily accepted the old Liberal and radical demand of Home Rule all round’ (Jones and Jones, 2000: 242), although ‘this was a demand which the party could accommodate, given the vague formulation’ (Jones and Keating, 1985: 34). Certainly, in spite of pro-Home Rule conference resolutions, manifesto pledges and orations from senior figures like Kier Hardie, the Labour Party overall displayed little genuine interest in devolution during the early part of the twentieth century. Indeed, once the Labour Party succeeded in displacing the Liberals as the main alternative to the Conservatives, its desultory interest in Home Rule dwindled even further. Instead, what the Welsh might have viewed as issues specific to Wales were increasingly

Welsh Devolution 243

seen by the Labour Party as economic or class-based issues (particularly after the adoption of an explicit commitment to socialism via Clause IV of the Party’s 1918 constitution), with the Welsh working-class deemed to experience similar problems as their English counterparts. Or as Aneurin Bevan wryly remarked, in 1944, he did not know the difference between ‘a Welsh sheep, a Westmoreland sheep and a Scottish sheep’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 403, col. 2312). Furthermore, it was pointed out that many industrial and economic problems experienced in South Wales in particular ‘were of a character that could not possibly fall within the administrative duties of a Secretary of State for Wales’, for they required action ‘on a much wider basis’. It was also suggested that ‘the demand for small, national, units of administration seemed to be inconsistent with the present tendency in world problems’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.56/October 1943), the clear implication being that the trend in Western societies was towards political centralization and state intervention to tackle socio-economic problems. Such an economistic and dirigiste perspective inevitably militated against any distinct Welsh dimension to Labour Party policies during the pre1945 period, although several Labour MPs and parliamentary candidates in Welsh constituencies were in favour of the appointment of a Secretary of State for Wales, and some degree of administrative devolution (Labour Party Archives, Re.61/Febraury 1944; Philip, 1975: 277).

The 1945–1951 Attlee Governments and Wales It was perhaps unsurprising, therefore, that the Labour Party’s 1945 manifesto made no specific mention of measures for Wales – ‘Labour policy on Wales was not settled by the time of the 1945 general election’ (Jones and Jones, 2000: 249) – yet upon entering Office, Clemet Attlee’s Labour Government was faced with demands from a number of Labour MPs in Wales for some form of administrative decentralization or institutional innovation in order to imbue the Party’s policies with a Welsh dimension. The Cabinet, though, had little interest in this direction, to the extent that in January 1946 Herbert Morrison presented a paper to the Cabinet in which he argued firmly against the establishment of a Secretary of State for Wales, claiming that such a post ‘could not carry a cadre of officials of the highest calibre’ and that ‘the services of high English officials would no longer be available’. In the same paper, Morrison also rejected the suggestion of a Welsh Advisory Council, on the grounds that such a body would almost inevitably become ‘either a dead letter or a dilatory nuisance.’ A further, and more convincing, reason for


Morrison’s reluctance to respond positively to nationalist aspirations in Wales was his objective of facilitating a national economic plan which, he argued, would far more effectively address the economic problems which were deemed to underpin devolutionary demands in Wales, than the establishment of a Welsh Secretary (NA CAB 129/6 (46)21, 27 Jan 1946). Here, then, was a crystal clear indication of the Labour Party’s economistic perspective towards nationalist sentiments and devolutionary demands, whereby most Labour Ministers blithely assumed that ‘regional problems’ could best be ameliorated by central solutions implemented by a ‘socialist’ Labour Government at Westminster. Trenchant opposition to the creation of a Welsh Office and an associated Secretary of State (of Cabinet rank) also emanated from Aneuran Bevan, who shared Morrison’s faith in the apparent virtues of central economic planning. Certainly, Bevan came to realise that if he was to achieve his objectives and his burning desire to create a socialist society, it was imperative to reach out from the valley, and beyond the country, to the centre, where the levers of power were operated. He was impatient of nationalism which divided people, and enslaved nations within their narrow geographical and spiritual frontiers. He fears that devolution of authority would divorce Welsh political activity from the main stream of British politics, as he felt was already happening in Scotland. (Griffiths, 1969: 162) Thus did Bevan once declare that ‘My colleagues, all of them members of the Miners’ Federation of Great Britain, have no special solution for the Welsh coal industry which is not a solution for the whole of the mining industry of Great Britain. There is no Welsh problem’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 403, col. 2312). Bevan reiterated his objections to Welsh devolution a couple of years later, insisting that it was ‘rather cruel to give the impression to the 50 000 unemployed men and women in Wales that their plight would be relieved and their distress removed by this constitutional change’, for it would be ‘trying to pretend that deep-seated economic difficulties can be removed by constitutional changes’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 428, col. 405). Indeed, in the same parliamentary debate, the President of the Board of Trade, Sir Stafford Cripps, dismissed the notion of a Welsh economic plan by insisting that none of the economic problems or developments pertaining to Wales were ‘local in character in the sense of being financed or originated from Wales’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 428, col. 311). Or as the then Labour MP for Neath, D. J. Williams,


insisted ‘What Wales needs . . . is not separation from Britain but closer integration with the British economy . . . Wales has not had a fair share of British prosperity’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 428, col. 363). Here, then, were the clearly contrasting conclusions drawn by prodevolutionists and anti-devolutionists with regard to the problems of the Welsh economy when compared to England’s. For those in the Labour Party who favoured greater devolution for Wales, particularly in the form of an elected body, the relative weakness or vulnerability of the Welsh economy was deemed to render it highly desirable, if not essential, that Wales was granted a degree of self-government, in order that Wales’ economic and industrial problems could be tackled more directly and literally nearer home. Yet for Labour’s anti-devolutionists, it was precisely the relative weakness of the Welsh economy which made devolution unfeasible and impracticable, for Wales was not financially strong enough to be granted greater autonomy: the economic and industrial problems which were assumed to underpin devolutionary demands were actually deemed to render it imperative that Wales accepted the ‘socialist’ policies pursued by a Labour Government at Westminster. Devolution would exacerbate, not eradicate, Wales’ economic and industrial difficulties. The most that Attlee and his Ministers were prepared to countenance at this time was ‘some further co-ordination between civil servants in the regional offices in Wales that were distributed in different government departments’, and the appointment of a few Ministers from Wales to a Cabinet committee on the machinery of government, one of whom was the staunchly anti-devolutionist Bevan (Morgan, 1985: 310; NA PREM 8/1569, Attlee to Griffiths, 28 March 1946). Meanwhile, at the end of 1946, when the Attlee Government was nationalizing the electricity industry, the Minister for National Insurance, James Griffith, urged Herbert Morrison to treat Wales as a distinct and unified region (NA CAB 129/6, CP(46) 21, 17 December 1946), but instead, the regional electricity board covering North Wales also served Merseyside, whilst South Wales’ electricity was provided by a ‘South West Division’ which also supplied Somerset (Morgan, 1985: 309). The same year heard the Ministry of Transport announce that it was closing its office in Caernarvon, whereupon North Wales would be administered from Manchester. Such rebuffs led Huw Edwards, the President of the North Wales Labour Parties Federation, to suggest that ‘the impression has been created that the Government has not the slightest sympathy with Welsh aspirations’. He explained that the demand for a Secretary of State for Wales reflected


‘the desire to be on a par with Scotland’ although he also suggested that ‘it arises mainly from an inferiority complex.’ Nonetheless, Edwards insisted that this ‘psychological problem . . . can never be solved unless Wales is looked upon as an administrative unit’, even though he himself was not persuaded of the case for a Secretary of State for Wales ‘on grounds of Parliamentary time and the administrative difficulties involved’. Instead, he expressed a preference for the establishment of a Special Commissioner for Wales and ‘a small advisory committee’, thereby facilitating a conduit between Wales and the Cabinet’. Whatever institutional innovations were developed, however, Edwards emphasized that it would ‘be extremely unfortunate if this Government in particular misunderstood or under-rated . . . very evident signs of National re-awakening’, or dismissed them as the views of an extremist minority in Wales, when ‘they are the view of thinking Welshmen generally’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.29/Sept 1946). Yet two years later, the issue of a Secretary of Wales was discussed – and dismissed – yet again, this time by a Cabinet Committee, in which two of the most trenchant opponents were Herbert Morrison and Aneuran Bevan (NA CAB 129/30, CP (48) 228; NA CAB 128/13, Cabinet Conclusions, 15 October 1948, 18 November 1948). The Attlee Governments’ main concrete concession to Welsh devolutionary aspirations was the creation of a Council for Wales and Monmouthshire, this being established in May 1949, having been urged by several Labour MPs in Wales and the Welsh Regional Council of Labour. The terms of reference ascribed to this purely advisory body – to which Huw Edwards was appointed chairman – were the following: To meet from time to time, and at least quarterly, for the interchange of views and information on developments and trends in the economic and cultural fields in Wales and Monmouthshire, and to secure that the Government are adequately informed of the impact of Government activities on the general life of the people of Wales and Monmouthshire. Although this institutional innovation represented a reversal of the Cabinet’s 1946 rejection of a Welsh Advisory Council, it was nonetheless adjudged to be a ‘somewhat feeble body’, whose ‘weak powers’ ensured that – as Morrison had originally predicted – ‘the Council of Wales was to prove for much of its lifetime [1949-66] something of [a] “dead letter’’ ’ (Morgan, 1985: 311). In fact, Morrison had himself further undermined its potential influence or impact by insisting that a Government Minister should not chair meetings of the Council of Wales on the grounds


that ‘The difficulties which would arise between the Chairman and other Cabinet Ministers would strengthen the demand for a Secretary of State for Wales’ (NA CAB 129/30, CP(48) 228). This institutional innovation aside, the Attlee Governments’ main initiatives concerning Wales were a few measures which provided for a limited degree of administrative devolution, such as the establishment of a Welsh Hospital Board and the creation of Welsh offices within or under the jurisdiction of various Ministries, such as Agriculture, Forestry, Housing and Local Government and National Insurance. The Cabinet also agreed to the publication of an annual Welsh White Paper, described as ‘a compendious document that brought together the work of the a variety of departments’ (Morgan, 1985: 310), although Morrison hoped it would highlight the extent to which economic issues and problems pertaining to Wales were being addressed by the Labour Government, and thereby divert attention ‘away from vague talk on constitutional issues’ (NA PREM 8/1569, Morrison to Attlee, 24 January 1946).

Labour and Welsh devolution in Opposition, 1951–1964 In 1954, during its third year in Opposition, the Labour Party published a new document entitled Labour’s Policy for Wales, which reiterated the Party’s opposition to establishing a Welsh Parliament, but recommended instead the case for administrative devolution, and the provision of more parliamentary time to debate Welsh affairs. Labour’s Policy for Wales maintained that The Labour Party is not unsympathetic to the spirit which animates the proposals for a Welsh Parliament. Looking back to the pre-war days of mass unemployment and economic stagnation, it is easy to understand why Welshmen should seek to control their own affairs . . . But in our view, it is a serious error in political thinking to trace the cause of past and present Welsh problems to the constitutional arrangements which exist between Wales and the rest of the United Kingdom. The basic cause of pre-war distress was the failure of successive Tory Governments to combat the spread of unemployment. Wales was one of several areas of the United Kingdom . . . which suffered great hardship as a result . . . the prosperity of Wales is bound up with the prosperity of the United Kingdom as a whole . . . . The industrial life of the United Kingdom and Wales which has emerged organically over the centuries, merges and mingles into one economic system.


It was therefore quite clear that in rejecting demands for a Welsh Parliament, the Labour Party was continuing to view the problems of Wales from a predominantly economistic perspective, and as such, devolution, particularly legislative devolution, was deemed to be irrelevant – and even inimical – to the problems which were assumed to underpin devolutionary demands and nationalist sentiments in Wales. However, Labour’s Policy for Wales did contain one new institutional proposal, namely the establishment of a Minister for Welsh Affairs, who would be allocated a seat in the Cabinet. It was also suggested that the Council for Wales and Monmouthshire should be made ‘a more representative and more effective organ of Welsh opinion’, although precisely how this was to be achieved was not made explicit. Such opacity owed much to the fact that, as the Labour Party subsequently admitted, Labour’s Policy for Wales ‘was mainly concerned with refuting the demands of the Parliament for Wales Campaign’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.533/April 1959). In spite of – or possibly because of – the policy document’s rejection of the case for a Welsh Parliament, 1955 witnessed the Labour MP for Merthyr Tydfil, Stephen O. Davies, introduce a Private Members’ Bill to create a Parliament for Wales. This, however, was defeated by 48 votes to 14, with only 5 of Labour’s Welsh MPs voting in favour (although a few Labour MPs in English constituencies also supported the Bill), and subsequently being strongly rebuked by the Party’s national leadership for so doing (Jones B, 1983: 22; Jones and Jones, 2000: 253). The following year also witnessed another Welsh Labour MP, Goronwy Roberts, present a petition calling for the establishment of a Parliament for Wales. This petition had been signed by 250 000 people (representing about 14 per cent of the Welsh electorate), but as the vote on the previous year’s Parliament for Wales Bill had indicated, there was little support for a Welsh Parliament amongst Labour MPs in Wales (Philip, 1975: 257–8). The Welsh devolutionist case was reiterated by the 1957 publication of the Third Report of the Council for Wales and Monmouthshire, which addressed the issue of government administration in Wales. The Report highlighted a number of deficiencies pertaining to Welsh administration, most notably insufficient co-ordination between government Ministries concerning the implementation of policies in Wales, coupled with the low rank of civil servants in Wales, which effectively prevented them from exerting much influence or speaking with much authority, either in Wales itself or in Whitehall. The Report also expressed concern at the inadequate position of the Minister for Welsh Affairs, established


by the Conservative Government in 1951, but only operating within the jurisdiction of the Home Office. This Report prompted a renewed debate within the Labour Party concerning its approach to Wales, although, initially, this did not yield any discernible shift in its stance. For example, the NEC’s Home Policy sub-committee remained unconvinced of the case for any significant degree of Welsh devolution, even of a purely administrative character, insisting that ‘any Government wishing to act on Welsh affairs has perfectly adequate machinery at its disposal for any measures that it proposes to take.’ Furthermore, the report deemed it ‘extremely difficult to find out what Welsh people really want’, so that in the ‘absence of . . . concrete evidence, experimentation surely cannot be justified.’ As such, the Labour Party rejected the case for a Secretary of State for Wales, claiming that ‘perfectly adequate machinery . . . already exists’ for the implementation in Wales of policies agreed at Westminster and Whitehall. Ultimately, the NEC’s Home Policy sub-committee maintained, ‘there are very few major problems that have an exclusively Welsh character about them’, and as such, ‘we must regard the case for a Secretaryship of State [for Wales] as not proven’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.221/November 1957). However, a tripartite committee was established at the end of 1958, comprising four representatives each from Labour’s MPs in Wales, the Party’s NEC and the Welsh Council of Labour. Significantly, the chairman of this committee was James Griffiths, both a Welsh MP and Deputy Leader of the Labour Party (since February 1956), and strongly in favour of administrative – but not legislative – devolution for Wales. In the context of more propitious circumstances prevailing at this time (delineated below), Griffiths was able to convince the Labour leader, Hugh Gaitskell, and the NEC, to accept the case for a Secretary of State for Wales (Griffiths, 1969: 164; see also, Jones and Jones, 2000: 254), whereupon the Labour Party’s 1959 election manifesto proclaimed that ‘The time has now come for the special identity of Wales to be recognised by the appointment of a Secretary of State’, a pledge which was reiterated in the 1964 manifesto and subsequently implemented with immediate effect. This shift in the Labour Party’s stance reflected several developments pertaining to ‘the Welsh question’ during the later half of the 1950s. Firstly, far from granting Wales its own Secretary of State, the Conservative Government, in January 1957, transferred responsibility for Welsh Affairs from the Home Office to the lower ranking Ministry of Housing and Local Government. Furthermore, when the post was later allocated by Harold Macmillan to a Conservative peer, Lord Brecon, rather than an


MP from the House of Commons, The Economist was moved to observe that it ‘represents one of the most curious political appointments since Caligula made his horse a consul’ (21 December, 1957: 1034). Secondly, October 1958 witnessed the resignation of Huw Edwards as chairman of the Council of Wales, due to growing frustration with the Conservative Government’s apparent disregard for the Council’s views and recommendations, including the call for a Secretary of State for Wales. Thirdly, and finally, as the tripartite committee noted in one of its first reports, the Labour Party’s position in a number of Welsh constituencies was potentially susceptible to ‘Welsh National propaganda’. It was not that Plaid Cymru was considered likely to win any Welsh seats at this time, but that the narrowness of Labour’s majority over the Conservatives or Liberals in constituencies such as Anglesey, Brecon and Radnor, Carmarthen, East Flint and Merioneth meant that a relatively small swing from Labour to the Welsh Nationalists would be sufficient to allow the election of the Conservative or Liberal candidate (Labour Party Archives, Re.533/April 1959). The tripartite committee therefore published a report which recommended the establishment of a Minister for Welsh Affairs who would be granted full Cabinet status and spared other Departmental responsibilities. It was also proposed that a Welsh Grand Committee be established to consider the implications for Wales of imminent legislation and the administrative issues involved. It was envisaged that these proposals would be in lieu of a comprehensive review of the machinery of government and administration, not merely vis-a-vis Wales, but England and Scotland too, whose purpose would be ‘the establishment throughout the whole of Britain of a system of central, regional and local government’ which would prove ‘much more responsive to the needs and desires of ordinary people than is our present system’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.534/April 1959). From the end of the 1950s onwards, therefore, the Labour Party was formally committed to establishing a Welsh Office, which would be represented at Cabinet level by a Minister for Welsh Affairs (subsequently becoming a Secretary of State for Wales) and which would thereby entail a more coherent and systematic mode of administrative devolution. However, the twin proposals for a Welsh Office and a Minister/Secretary of State for Wales, with a seat in the Cabinet, were not accompanied by any commitment to an elected assembly or legislative body for Wales, although there had, throughout this period, been talk of an elected – as opposed to government-appointed – Council of Wales. Instead, the


Labour Party overall seemed to maintain the view that the ‘special problems of the Welsh economy’, namely the heavy reliance on a small number of geographically concentrated extraction industries such as coal and tinplate, coupled with ‘the geographical isolation of much of rural Wales’, as problems whose ‘origins [were] in natural and political factors’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.540/May 1959). Indeed, because ‘Wales has for centuries been integrated with the rest of Britain, both politically and economically, it is now undesirable as well as impracticable to separate their economic affairs’ (Labour Party Archives. Re.557/May 1959). In this context, it was evident that the establishment of a Welsh Office and a Secretary of State for Wales was intended to obviate the case for legislative devolution in the guise of a Welsh Parliament; the Welsh Office would provide for a degree of administrative and executive devolution to Wales, whilst the Secretary of State would articulate Welsh interests and concerns to the Cabinet. Moreover, there remained those in the Labour Party in Wales who were adamant that the ‘political, industrial and social history of the Welsh nation has inclined our people naturally and instinctively towards Socialist thinking’, thus ensuring that ‘the majority of Welshmen find the best means of giving expression to their aspirations within the Labour Party’, to the extent that there was ‘very little evidence they will demur from their former loyalty’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.387/January 1963). The Labour Party’s new commitment to establishing both a Welsh Office and a Cabinet-ranking Minister or Secretary of State for Wales was thereafter sustained through the early 1960s, although the Party also continued to insist on Wales’ ‘national status within the Parliamentary framework of the United Kingdom’, thereby still refusing to countenance legislative devolution via a Welsh Assembly (Labour Party Archives, RD.386/January 1963). Even when particular industrial or economic problems were acknowledged to exist in Wales, these were often presented as arguments against legislative devolution, with the Labour MP for Cardiff South, James Callaghan, among those insisting that ‘the prosperity . . . of many of the people of Wales is bound up with the prosperity of the United Kingdom as a whole’ (Labour Party Archives, RD.407/February 1963). In similar vein did Cledwyn Hughes prepare a draft paper for Labour’s working party on Welsh policy which emphasized that the Party’s ‘policy of planning for economic growth . . . will have a special significance for Wales’, while proposed dirigiste institutions, most notably a National Industrial Planning Board, would further ‘help to fortify and expand Welsh industry’ and thereby ensure that ‘Wales will thrive side by side with England and Scotland’(Labour Party Archives,


RD.385/January 1963). In short, Labour’s approach to Wales during this period sought to meld a willingness to countenance limited administrative and executive devolution with greater economic centralization, reflecting Labour’s continued top-down and increasingly technocratic approach to politics and policies, a perspective which itself tacitly reflected the influence of Fabianism on much of the Party, as well as continued adherence to the Westminster Model.

The 1964–1970 Wilson Governments and Welsh devolution Labour’s 1964 manifesto reiterated the Party’s commitment to establishing a Secretary of State for Wales, and with Labour winning the election, after 13 years in Opposition, the new Government (led by Harold Wilson) duly established the Welsh Office, whilst also providing the Secretary of State for Wales with a seat in the Cabinet. The Welsh Office was charged with responsibility for housing and local government, trunk roads and economic planning, although it was also responsible for overseeing the implementation in Wales of the policies of various other Government Departments. As part of the Wilson Government’s early penchant for economic planning (see Thompson, 2006, for an overview of Labour’s political economy during this period), 1965 saw George Brown’s Department of Economic Affairs establish both a Welsh Planning Board and a Welsh Economic Council. Whilst the former was to be primarily administrative in nature, the latter was to be a representative forum with an advisory and consultative capacity. However, this was deemed to undermine the rationale of the Council for Wales and Monmouthshire, which was therefore disbanded in 1966. Meanwhile, 1966 witnessed the remarkable success of Plaid Cymru in a by-election held in Carmarthen on 14 July. The by-election was held just four months after the general election, due to the death, in May, of the incumbent Labour MP, Lady Megan Lloyd George. When the result was announced, it transpired that the Plaid Cymru candidate, Gwynfor Evans, had increased his vote from 7,416 in March to 16,179, whilst Labour’s support fell from 21,221 to 14,743. Plaid Cymru almost secured another by-election victory the following year, when the Party’s candidate in Rhondda West reduced Labour’s majority from 16,888 (in the 1966 election) to 2,306, while in 1968, a by-election in Caerphilly saw the Labour Party’s majority of 21,148 cut to just 1,874 by the Plaid Cymru candidate. Such results, coupled with advances by the SNP in


Scotland, obliged the Wilson Government to treat increasing nationalist aspirations in Wales with at least a little more care and consideration. Consequently, there were four main responses. Firstly, several Acts of Parliament were introduced which were directly applicable to Wales, most notably the 1967 Leasehold Reform Act (for the significance of this measure in Wales, see Griffiths, 1969: 181–3) and the 1967 Welsh Language Act, whilst the 1969 Development of Tourism Act established the Welsh Tourist Board. Secondly, a Cabinet committee on devolution was established, this meeting periodically during 1968, before being disbanded in November of that year. George Thomas, who had by this time replaced Cledwyn Hughes as Secretary of State for Wales, drew the committee’s attention to the distinction between parliamentary devolution and administrative devolution and made clear his support for the latter. Not only did he believe that a Welsh Parliament would weaken Wales’ position vis-a-vis Westminster, he also feared that it would actually encourage the minority who wanted an independent Wales to make further demands to this end. By contrast, Thomas argued, administrative devolution did not weaken ‘the essential unity of the United Kingdom’ or the sovereignty of Parliament and was ‘consistent with both the democratic principles and economic strategies of our Party’. He therefore recommended that further responsibilities, most notably those pertaining to agriculture, education and health, be devolved to the Welsh Office in Cardiff. At the same time, he envisaged a strengthening of the newly formed Welsh Council, to be a part-nominated, part-elected body whose role would be similar to that of the Greater London Council (GLC). Indeed, he made clear his vision of the Welsh Council as ‘a local government rather than parliamentary body’, one whose members would have ‘plenty of executive and advisory work to keep them busy’, and thus unlikely ‘to transgress on the work of Ministers, of the House of Commons, or of the existing local authorities’ (NA CAB 134/2697, DS(68)11, 19 April 1968). The Cabinet Committee on devolution itself concluded that the case for a Welsh Parliament was far less convincing than for Scotland, for whereas Scotland already had a long-established separate legal system, which gave credence to the demand for a Scottish legislature, ‘the emotional basis’ of the ‘separatist movement’ in Wales was deemed primarily to be the Welsh language itself, which was only spoken by a minority of the population. Furthermore, it was suggested that in spite of recent electoral advances by Plaid Cymru, the electoral situation in Wales was less threatening to the Labour Party than it was in Scotland (NA CAB 134/2697, DS(68)23, 30 May 1968).


Thirdly, as both George Thomas and his Ministerial colleagues on the devolution committee had recommended, the jurisdiction of the Welsh Office was widened, so that in April 1969, administrative responsibility for agriculture and health services in Wales was added to its remit. The question of whether education should also be devolved to the Welsh Office was left unresolved, ostensibly to be determined at an unspecified later date, whilst a suggestion that the headquarters of a new Countryside Commission for England and Wales should be located in Wales was rejected by the Minister of Housing and Local Government. Meanwhile, these administrative initiatives were to be accompanied by a ‘vigorous and sustained campaign of public education . . . emphasising the benefits to be gained . . . from economic and political unity’ and explaining how the present ‘unitary structure’ of government in the United Kingdom was in the best interests of the Welsh people (NA CAB 134/2697, DS(68)23, 30 May 1968). Fourthly, as we noted in Chapter 6, a Royal Commission on the Constitution was established ‘doubtless in the hope that the problem would either solve itself or go away’ (Jones B, 1983: 23). Yet as we will note shortly, far from resolving itself or disappearing, ‘the problem’ was subsequently to return to haunt, and wreak havoc upon, the Labour Party during the later half of the 1970s. Beyond Labour’s blithe assumption that devolutionary demands were either a transient manifestation of short-term economic grievances which would soon dissipate, or derived from (minority) concern over the decline of the Welsh language, two contrasting assumptions were discernible in the Party about the likely consequences of granting Wales its own elected Assembly. Many Labour politicians, including some of the Party’s Welsh MPs, feared that establishing an elected body in Wales would actually embolden the nationalists, and encourage Plaid Cymru to go further, and perhaps garner more support, in demanding autonomy or independence for Wales. Yet pro-devolution Labour MPs tended to draw precisely the opposite conclusion, namely that granting the Welsh people their own elected Assembly would actually serve to undermine separatist sentiments, on the grounds that establishing democratic institutions in Wales would ‘begin to engage people’s loyalties and diminish nationalist support till the demand for total separation was lost in a healthy competition . . . for control of the Welsh Parliament or Assembly.’ Conversely, it was ‘the refusal to grant a measure of self-government when it is ardently desired that is most likely to lead to increasing pressure and more extensive demands for autonomy’ (Mackintosh, 1968: 150, 164).


Consequently, there was intra-Party controversy over the evidence submitted to the Royal Commission, for when the Executive of the Labour Party in Wales prepared a draft submission recommending the establishment of a 72-seat Welsh Senate with a range of legislative powers (Labour Party in Wales, 1970), this was deemed too federalist in orientation, not only by the Labour Party leadership in London, but by several Welsh Labour MPs, including George Thomas (Jones B, 1983: 23). Indeed, Thomas reiterated the argument that a Welsh Parliament ‘would inevitably lead to clashes and crises that would precipitate demands for complete separation’, although he did suggest that ‘an elected or a partly elected Welsh Council dealing with administrative functions is both practicable and advisable’ (NA CAB 129/821, ‘Memorandum by the Secretary of State for Wales’, August 1969). Meanwhile, realization that the Welsh Council of Labour was preparing to submit significantly stronger pro-devolution recommendations to the Royal Commission on the Constitution than the Scottish Labour Party caused considerable consternation to Labour’s NEC, which warned that ‘there is some danger of the Party nationally looking rather silly’, and therefore suggested that ‘it would be much better if all three parties spoke with precisely the same voice’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.540/November 1969). The Welsh Executive was subsequently ‘persuaded’ to modify its proposals, to the extent that when it did present its submission to the Royal Commission, it actually dismissed the idea of a legislative assembly for Wales on the grounds that ‘it would reduce the effectiveness of Welsh MPs and the influence of Wales in the UK, and would jeopardise the unity of the country as a whole’ (quoted in Jones B, 1983: 23). Instead, the emphasis was once again on an elected Welsh Council, whose roles would primarily be to provide advice and administrative oversight concerning the implementation of government policies in Wales, although by virtue of being elected, it was also intended to ensure a degree of accountability to the Welsh people, while also acquiring greater legitimacy. Labour’s 1970 manifesto then referred explicitly to the Welsh Labour Party’s support for an elected Council, whilst rejecting ‘a policy of separatism or a separate Parliament for Wales’, on the grounds that either would be ‘detrimental to the true interests of the Principality’ (Labour Party, 1970: 17). It was not until 1973, when the Labour Party was in Opposition (having lost the 1970 general election), that the Royal Commission on the Constitution finally published its report – or, rather, two reports, reflecting majority and minority viewpoints amongst the Commission’s members.


On the issue of Welsh devolution, the 11 members who signed the Majority Report were themselves divided between the six who recommended legislative devolution for Wales, the three who urged an elected Welsh Advisory Council and the remaining two who favoured executive devolution only. Meanwhile, the two commissioners who authored the Minority Report also advocated executive devolution for Wales (and Scotland), but in conjunction with devolved powers for English regions (see Chapter 8). As Jones subsequently noted, the only thing upon which the members of the Royal Commission were all agreed was that ‘the constitutional status quo was unsatisfactory’ (Jones B, 1983: 25; see also Stacey, 1975: 152).

The 1974–1979 Wilson–Callaghan Governments A similar lack of both unanimity and enthusiasm continued to characterize Labour’s approach to Welsh devolution during the mid-1970s, to the extent that the Party’s manifesto for the February 1974 election contained no specific proposal regarding Wales. The result of the election, however, was to have serious implications for the devolution issue and the Labour Party’s own subsequent approach to it. Forming a minority government, 34 seats short of an overall Commons majority, the Labour Party was obliged to accord the utmost respect to the ‘minor’ parties, namely the Liberals, Plaid Cymru and the SNP, who had returned 14, 2 and 7 MPs respectively. Had the result of the February 1974 election been more decisive, and returned either a Conservative or Labour Government with a comfortable Commons majority, then the Report(s) of the Kilbrandon Commission might well have been ‘left to gather dust on the shelves’ (Stacey, 1975: 152). Instead, in the context of Labour’s precarious parliamentary position, the Party hastily inserted a pledge in the Queen’s Speech, to ‘initiate discussions in Scotland and Wales on the Report of the Royal Commission on the Constitution, and . . . bring forward proposals for consideration.’ In its contribution to these ‘discussions’, during the summer of 1974, the Welsh Council of Labour informed the Party’s working group on devolution that while it remained in favour of a directly elected forum in Wales, it still did not believe it should be vested with legislative powers. Instead, a Welsh Assembly or Council of Wales should be created to facilitate executive devolution, thereby assuming responsibility for those policy areas which had hitherto been exercised by the Welsh Office. With regard to the elections for a Welsh Assembly or Council, proportional representation was firmly rejected, largely on the grounds that there was


‘no minority problem’ in Wales (compared to Northern Ireland), but also because adopting a different electoral system to that used for local and parliamentary elections might well prove confusing. It was further suggested that elections to a Welsh Assembly or Council should be held at the same time as a general election, because the issues which the citizens of Wales were interested in were little different to those pertaining to Britain as a whole. Indeed, simultaneous elections for a Welsh Assembly and Westminster would enable the voters of Wales to ‘properly take into account UK and world issues’. It was also argued that there should not be any reduction in the number of Welsh MPs at Westminster – given that Parliament would retain its sovereignty over the United Kingdom, and thus its financial and legislative powers – although it was envisaged that a Welsh Assembly might well alleviate some of the workload pressures on Welsh MPs, and thereby enable them to play a more active role at Westminster. For similar reasons, the Welsh Council of Labour also argued in favour of retaining a Secretary of State for Wales in the Cabinet (Labour Party Archives, Res.134/July 1974). When the Government published its White Paper Democracy and Devolution Proposals for Scotland and Wales, in September 1974, it once again illustrated the extent to which the nationalist aspirations of Wales were viewed differently by the Labour Party, for the Welsh were to be offered an elected Assembly whose powers would be significantly less than those to be granted to the Scottish Assembly. Indeed, the Welsh Assembly would be denied a primary law-making role altogether and confined instead ‘to exercising certain powers of the Secretary of State for delegated legislation’, along with ‘responsibility for many of the executive functions exercised by nominated bodies . . . and certain functions by the Secretary of State’ (Wilson, 1979: 48). In other words, whereas the Scottish Assembly was to be a legislative body, the Assembly in Wales was primarily to be an executive body, administering and overseeing the implementation in Wales of policies already determined in Westminster and Whitehall. However, like its Scottish counterpart, the Welsh Assembly was to receive a block grant from central government – neither Assembly was to be permitted revenue-raising powers – which it would then be entitled to apportion to different services, such as education, health, housing and transport, for example, as it deemed appropriate or necessary. Furthermore, as the Welsh Council of Labour had recommended in its submission to Labour’s working party on devolution, Wales would continue to return the same number of MPs to Westminster and be represented in the Cabinet via the Secretary of State for Wales. The Welsh


Secretary would also, therefore, remain accountable to Parliament, in accordance with the doctrine of individual Ministerial responsibility. Yet some Labour MPs in Wales remained implacably opposed to the prospect of an elected Welsh Assembly, even one devoid of legislative powers, advancing several arguments against such an institutional innovation. For example, as Jones and Keating have noted, anti-devolution Labour MPs in Wales expressed concern about reforming the structures and pattern of governance in Wales so soon after the recent reorganization of local government by Edward Heath’s 1970– 1974 Conservative Government. They also claimed that in becoming an alternative or rival locus of power, an elected Welsh Assembly was likely to have a detrimental impact on the authority and status, in the Cabinet, of the Secretary of State for Wales (Jones B, 1983: 26; Jones and Keating, 1982: 187). Meanwhile, the anti-devolution Labour MP for Pontypool, Leo Abse, alleged that a Welsh Assembly ‘would increase bribery and corruption’, whilst also warning that the Government’s devolution proposals exposed Wales to the risk of domination by a Welsh-speaking bureaucratic elite establishing itself in Cardiff (Western Mail, 25 October 1976). Neil Kinnock too (then Left-wing Labour MP for Bedwellty), in addition to claiming that devolution would prove divisive of the British working class (whose material interests were deemed to require social and economic – rather than constitutional – reform), also alluded to the extra tier of government in Wales which would accrue from the Labour Government’s proposals for a Welsh Assembly (Kinnock, 1977). However, whilst adumbrating such arguments against an elected Assembly for Wales, anti-devolutionist Welsh Labour MPs – recognizing that their Party at national level was now formally committed to devolution – increasingly focused on a demand for a referendum on the issue, to the extent that intra-party debates on the principles and constitutional implications of referenda occasionally superseded the arguments about devolution itself. In this context, two particular motives or calculations informed the demands of anti-devolution Labour MPs for a referendum. The first, and most obvious, was their expectation that referenda in Scotland and Wales would yield a ‘No’ vote, thereby proving that Parliament in general, and the Labour Government in particular, had wasted much valuable time in seeking to legislate for elected Assemblies which were not really wanted by the people of Scotland and Wales themselves. The second motivation was quite simply that a referendum would effectively constitute ‘a good Parliamentary device with which to foul up the Government’s devolution plans in the hope that that the


electorate would become more and more disenchanted with the whole idea’ (Dalyell, 1977: 146), which would itself increase the likelihood of a ‘No’ vote. For their part, Labour Ministers and (parliamentary) business managers reluctantly accepted the proposal for referenda in Scotland and Wales in the hope that the Party’s anti-devolutionists might thus be more inclined to support the Government’s devolution legislation in the House of Commons. In this respect – and rather like the 1975 referendum on continued membership of the European Communities – this apparent exercise in popular (as opposed to parliamentary) sovereignty could more cynically be viewed as a means by which ‘to bind together a political party that is deeply divided on an awkward issue’ (Dalyell, 1977: 146). As noted in Chapter 6, the Scotland and Wales Bill was abandoned early in 1977, following its painfully slow progress in standing committee and the Government’s inability to impose a two-day limit on parliamentary debate over the remainder of the Bill. However, effectively compelled to persevere with pursuing devolution, in order to secure the support of minor parties who might otherwise combine with the Conservatives to defeat the Government (which had by now lost its wafer-thin parliamentary majority), Labour Ministers introduced separate devolution legislation for Scotland and Wales, whilst also enshrining provision for a referendum in both countries. Having been given its First Reading at the beginning of November 1977, the Wales Bill finally received the Royal Assent on 31 July 1978 (for a detailed analysis of the Bill’s passage through Parliament, see James and Lindley, 1983: 34–61), but the Labour Government’s relief was greatly tempered by the fact that it would now have to expend further time and energy seeking to persuade at least 40 per cent of the Welsh electorate (the threshold stipulated as a consequence of the Cunningham amendment, noted in Chapter 6) to vote ‘Yes’ in the ensuing referendum campaign. This task – always likely to be difficult given that support for devolution was considerably lower in Wales than in Scotland – was subsequently rendered more problematic, because six of Labour’s MPs in Wales were vehemently opposed to devolution (and thus the 1978 Wales Act), to the extent that they campaigned for a ‘No’ vote in the referendum campaign. For example, Leo Abse, mockingly enquired ‘Is the Welsh political genius to have no future expression except in a miserable parish pump Assembly at Cardiff?’, before scathingly referring to ‘the choices of xenophobia and nineteenth century nationalism’ which would be offered to the Welsh people in the devolution referendum, although he confidently predicted that ‘Wales, whose spirit refuses to be


cribbed and cabined will surely reject such . . . options’ (quoted in Jones and Jones, 2000: 257). The Welsh people certainly did reject such options when the referendum was held on 1 March 1979, for on a turn-out of just under 59 per cent, only 20.2 per cent voted in favour of the proposals for Welsh devolution (11.9 per cent of the total electorate), compared to the 79.8 per cent who voted against. Put another way, barely one Welsh voter in 10 supported the devolution proposals presented to them in 1979, although pro-devolutionists in the Labour Party subsequently contemplated whether it was devolution per se which had been so decisively spurned in the referendum or the specific form of devolution being offered at the time which failed to attract support. Those who sought solace in the latter interpretation might therefore have been heartened by the Western Mail’s analysis, which suggested that whilst ‘this concept of a Welsh Assembly is now dead and buried . . . devolution will not die with this particular Wales Act. The rejection of the Assembly does not mean that the status quo has been fully endorsed’ (Western Mail, 5 March 1979, emphasis in original).

Labour’s ‘embarrassed silence’ over Welsh devolution, 1979–1987 For most of the Labour Party, the issue of Welsh devolution fell into abeyance during the first half of the 1980s. The emphatic rejection of devolution for Wales in the March 1979 referendum, followed two months later by the Labour Party’s general election defeat, ensured that the issue slipped far down Labour’s policy agenda, to the extent that Labour’s stance has been described as ‘an embarrassed silence on the issue’ (Griffiths, 2000: 126). Certainly, according to one commentator, the referendum and general election results in 1979 implied that ‘the prospect of a Welsh Assembly had disappeared without trace’ (Thomas, 1996: 696), in spite of the Western Mail’s upbeat editorial interpretation. What further ensured the near-disappearance of the Welsh devolution issue within the Labour Party during the early 1980s was the ascendancy of the Bennite Left, which strongly reaffirmed Labour’s economistic and statist approach to Britain’s problems. As the ensuing Alternative Economic Strategy clearly indicated, the Labour Left viewed many of the problems facing Britain during this time as indicative of a crisis of capitalism, although the weakness of British industry was also attributed to the hegemony of the City and finance Capital over industrial and manufacturing Capital. The solution was thus to derive from a


future Labour Government exercising much greater political control over British industry and the economy, as well as placing curbs on imports in order to protect domestic industries and jobs, via the Alternative Economic Strategy (on which, see Aaronovitch, 1981; Benn, 1980: passim; Cripps and Ward, 1982: 22–5; Glyn and Harrison, 1980: 147– 64; Hodgson, 1981: 6, passim; Labour Co-ordinating Committee, 1980; Rowthorn, 1981). In the context of the Left’s strongly dirigiste approach, and following the lack of support for devolution apparent in the 1979 referendum, it was held that with the Welsh people having ‘suffered disproportionately from the recession . . . recovery remains bound up with that of the whole country’, and this would best be achieved through the implementation of ‘all the elements of the Alternative Economic Strategy’ in Wales, especially those elements concerned with greater investment in public works and services, expansion of the construction industry and more financial assistance for the coal industry. Furthermore, it was envisaged that the coal and steel industries in Wales would be afforded further support and protection via the Alternative Economic Strategy’s proposed import controls, as well as the extension of planning agreements (Jones A, 1983: 149–50). Consequently, with regard to institutional initiatives, Labour’s emphasis vis-à-vis Wales during the early 1980s tended to focus on a strengthening of the Welsh Development Agency and establishing a Welsh regional planning agency. It was these bodies, along with the Welsh Office, rather than an elected Welsh Assembly, that formed the basis of the Labour Party’s approach to the governance of Wales during the early 1980s. This was evident in Labour’s 1983 election manifesto, whose commitment to a Scottish Parliament was not matched by any corresponding pledge for a Welsh Assembly. Instead, the most that Wales was offered was reform of local government (in tandem with England), with a view to establishing unitary authorities (Labour Party, 1983: 33). Nor did Welsh devolution immediately return to Labour’s policy agenda when Neil Kinnock replaced Michael Foot as Party leader following the crushing 1983 election defeat. On the contrary, as previously noted, Kinnock had, during the devolution debates of the late 1970s, made clear his opposition to devolution for Wales, partly because he saw it as divisive of the British working class, but also because he believed – just as Aneuran Bevan had done – that most economic and industrial problems experienced in Wales were also experienced in many other parts of the United Kingdom, so that the solution was to derive from a Labour Government pursuing the ‘correct’ economic policies nationally,


from Westminster. This economistic perspective was evident in Labour’s 1987 manifesto, where, once again, there was no mention of a Welsh Assembly, but instead, an assertion that ‘Wales and the Welsh economy will clearly benefit from Labour’s programme for investment in jobs and vital services.’ To this end, there was the promise of a new Wales Economic Planning Board, coupled with enhanced powers and increased funding for the Welsh Development Agency (Labour Party, 1987: 11).

Towards New Labour and the revival of Welsh devolution That the Labour Party did return to a more explicit policy of devolution for Wales during the later part of the 1980s is attributable to four discrete factors. Firstly, the 1987 election defeat was assumed by many Labour politicians to constitute irrefutable evidence that the electorate had ‘turned their back on top-down socialism’, which therefore ‘opened the way for the Labour Party to embrace a decentralist bottom-up socialism’, a politics which ‘must empower people . . . give them the tools to improve their own lives’ (Davies, 1999: 4, 6). Secondly, 1987 also signified the increasing rejection of the Conservatives by the Welsh electorate, for whereas the Conservatives only won 8 seats in Wales (compared to 14 in 1983), Labour won 24 (4 more than in the 1983 election, which might, of course, appear to contradict the previous point about the electorate turning its back on ‘top-down socialism’!). Put another way, the Conservatives’ share of the vote in Britain as a whole in 1987 was 42.3 per cent, but in Wales, it was less than 30 per cent. Furthermore, the resentment yielded by an increasingly anti-Conservative nation being presided over by a Conservative Secretary of State was compounded by the fact that some of these Secretaries were not Welsh; a predominantly Labour Wales was often presided over at the Welsh Office and ‘represented’ in the Cabinet by an English Conservative. Thirdly, Labour’s renewed commitment to Welsh devolution was in large part a response to the degree of centralization which occurred under the Conservative Administrations during the 1980s and 1990s. In spite of their constant rhetoric about ‘rolling back the State’ and ‘setting people free’, the Thatcher Governments steadily accrued political power at the centre, by virtue of their relentless attack on intermediary institutions (Burke’s ‘little platoons’), most notably local government. At the same time, however, and in contrast to Ministerial rhetoric attacking bureaucracy in Britain, the Thatcher Governments presided over a massive expansion of the ‘Quango State’, whereby increasing numbers of administrative or executive bodies were established, largely comprised


of Ministerial appointees, many of whom were businessmen (and thus likely, at the time, to have Conservative sympathies), whilst many other appointees were either members of the Conservative Party themselves or closely associated with Conservative Party members. This process continued apace after John Major replaced Thatcher in November 1990 and fuelled growing concern about the abuse of patronage powers, corruption, ‘cronyism’ and a ‘democratic deficit’ in British politics at local and regional level. For example, when the Conservative MP Ian Grist lost his Cardiff Central seat in the 1992 general election, the former Welsh Office Minister was appointed chair of the South Glamorgan Health Authority, whereupon he assumed control of an annual budget of £232 million. Indeed, following the re-election of John Major’s Conservative Government in April 1992, members of the Conservative Party were over-represented by 40 per cent on public bodies in Wales (Davies, 1999: 5; Hanson, 1993: 9). There was particular concern in Wales over the emergence of this ‘new magistracy’ – a term invoked to characterize the expansion of this Conservative ‘Quangocracy’ – because by 1996, there were more than 1400 Quango appointees in the Principality compared to 1273 elected councillors. It also became apparent that these Quangos enjoyed a combined annual budget of some £2 billion, which was almost as much as that spent by elected local authorities (Davies, 1999: 16, note 13). This concern was fuelled further by the Conservative’s diminishing electoral support in Wales, as previously noted, coupled with the fact that many of these Quango appointments were made by Conservative Secretaries of State who, from 1987 onwards, were neither Welsh nor represented Welsh constituencies. Such trends yielded growing concern in Wales about a deepening ‘democratic deficit’, and this, in turn, underpinned the Labour Party’s increasing commitment to a Welsh Assembly, for such an institution was by now widely viewed (even amongst many Welsh Labour politicians who had hitherto been ambivalent or antipathetic towards this form of devolution) as vital to ‘democratic renewal’ in Wales. Indeed, a further aspect of this ‘democratic deficit’ in Wales which informed Labour’s renewed commitment to Welsh devolution during the late 1980s, and then throughout the 1990s, was the changed attitude of Labour councillors in Welsh local government. Whereas in the 1970s, there had been considerable antipathy amongst Labour-controlled local authorities at the potential loss of power which they might experience (their fear being that Welsh devolution would entail a corresponding re-organization of local government and a consequent diminution of


their role and responsibilities); by 1989, Labour councillors had endured a decade in which their powers and responsibilities had been steadily whittled away by the Thatcher Governments at Westminster. That this loss of power had occurred in the absence of a Welsh Assembly served to modify the stance of many Labour councillors in Wales, to the extent that they became rather more enamoured with the prospect of Welsh devolution, and the restoration of at least some political power to Wales. The fourth factor steering the Labour Party back towards support for Welsh devolution was the increasing regional dimension to European Union politics. As Deacon notes, following the 1986 Single European Act, regional policy and governance was accorded a greater priority, and as such, ‘Labour saw devolution as a means to feed into regionalization of the EU and give Wales greater representation in regional policy-making in Europe (Deacon, 1996: 70; see also Thomas, 1996: 696). Indeed, Kinnock himself explicitly acknowledged the changing context and circumstances facilitated by developments at the European level, informing a 1990 conference on regional government, in Newcastle, that ‘in the decade ahead we are going to see the national boundaries of Europe diminish in importance while regional and local identities and decisions grow in significance.’ In the context of such trends, the Labour Party moved cautiously back towards more explicit advocacy of some form of devolution for Wales, as developed under the auspices of the Policy Review Group on Democracy for the Individual and the Community. When the Policy Review’s recommendations were published in Meet the Challenge: Make the Change in 1989, it was suggested that, following ongoing consultations by the Labour Party in Wales, Welsh local government might be further reformed, with a view to establishing between 17 and 25 ‘mostpurpose’ authorities, along with an elected body established to take over the responsibilities and remit of the Welsh Office, as well as the work of the various nominated bodies in Wales. It was notable, though, that Meet the Challenge, Make the Change only devoted two paragraphs to the Labour Party’s renewed commitment to Welsh devolution, compared to the eight substantial paragraphs which outlined Labour’s plans for a Scottish Assembly or Parliament (Labour Party, 1989: 57). These proposals formed the basis of Labour’s formal commitment to Welsh devolution in the 1992 general election, with the Party’s manifesto promising an elected Welsh Assembly, albeit ‘in the lifetime of a full Parliament’, rather than with the immediacy promised for the Scottish Parliament (Labour Party, 1992: 18). This evident lack of urgency reflected the fact that although Neil Kinnock was no longer as hostile as he had


been in the late 1970s, he was known to be lukewarm about devolution, with this lack of enthusiasm apparently shared by his Shadow Secretary of State for Wales, Barry Jones (Morgan and Mungham, 2000: 34). It was after Labour’s defeat in the 1992 election, however, when Kinnock was replaced as Party leader by John Smith, that the Party’s formal commitment to Welsh devolution was strengthened. Smith himself was renowned as a committed proponent of devolution, having supported a Parliament for his native Scotland since the mid-1970s, and believing devolution to constitute Labour’s ‘unfinished business’. Upon becoming Labour leader, therefore, he appointed Ron Davies as his Shadow Secretary of State for Wales, with a brief to ‘develop the same policies for Wales as we have for our planned Scottish Parliament’ (quoted in Morgan and Mungham, 2000: 35). One particular indication of Labour’s more forthright commitment to Welsh devolution under John Smith’s leadership was to be found in the policy document, A New Agenda for Democracy, published in the aftermath of Labour’s 1992 election defeat and approved by the Party’s annual conference in 1993, for this explicitly and unequivocally proclaimed the Party’s intention of establishing an elected Welsh Assembly. What further underpinned the Labour Party’s renewed commitment to devolution for Wales during this period was the result of the 1992 general election in Wales, where the Conservatives were reduced to six MPs, whilst Labour increased its representation to 27 MPs. Plaid Cymru, meanwhile, also returned an additional MP in 1992, raising their tally of MPs to four. Labour’s continued revival in Wales, at the clear expense of the Conservative Party, was viewed by pro-devolutionists in the Party as further evidence that the Conservatives lacked legitimacy and an electoral mandate in Wales, irrespective of their success in England itself. As such, following the 1992 election, the ‘democratic deficit’ in Wales became deeper still, thereby appearing to vindicate John Smith’s commitment to devolution, whilst finally convincing some hitherto sceptical Labour MPs about the political efficacy of Welsh devolution. This renewed commitment was further strengthened at this time by developments at the European level, most notably those deriving from the Maastricht Treaty’s proposal for a Committee of the Regions. This reflected and reinforced the European Union’s increasing emphasis on the principle of subsidiarity, which emphasized decisions should be taken, and policies implemented, as close as was practicable to the people affected. Pro-devolutionists in the Labour Party were thus able to link these developments in European Union politics to their own


commitment to devolution for Wales (and Scotland), while also linking them to their attacks on Conservative centralization, and the ‘new magistracy’ or ‘quangocracy’ in Wales. For example, in the context of the Maastricht Treaty’s proposal for a Committee of the Regions, the Welsh Labour Party proclaimed that ‘Labour’s plans for . . . an Assembly have as a primary objective the rejuvenation of a diversified and modern Welsh economy. Our approach is a recognition of the fact that that those regions in Europe with the most dynamic economies – like Baden-Wurttemburg and Catalonia – have proactive, decentralized government, which is democratically accountable’ (Labour Party in Wales, 1993). Yet Labour’s development of a more explicit policy of Welsh devolution differed from its Scottish counterpart in one particular aspect, namely the less ‘inclusive’ approach pursued in Wales. Rather than initiate a cross-party ‘Constitutional Convention’ (as in Scotland), the Labour Party’s approach in Wales was to establish its own Constitutional Policy Commission, in June 1992, whose primary task was to give further consideration to Labour’s proposals for an elected Assembly, in the expectation that these would form the basis of Labour’s proposals for Welsh devolution at the next general election. That the Labour Party declined to establish a cross-party Convention is explicable in terms of three factors. Firstly, the Party’s leadership was cognizant of the potentially divisive nature of the devolution issue in the Welsh Labour Party (as the ‘gang of six’ had illustrated back in the late 1970s), such that the Policy Commission was less concerned about securing cross-party support than with achieving intra-party support amongst Welsh Labour MPs themselves. Secondly, but linked to this consideration, was the fact that a cross-party Constitutional Convention in Wales would almost inevitably have necessitated Labour incorporating Plaid Cymru, which would have been deeply resented by many in the Party, thereby undermining the leadership’s efforts to secure overall support amongst Welsh Labour MPs for an elected Assembly. Thirdly, given the Labour Party’s electoral dominance in most of Wales, there was a tacit assumption that, in contrast to the rather more multi-party or politically pluralist Scotland, there was less need to establish cross-party consensus for devolution, via a Constitutional Convention, although Ron Davies himself was keen to keep the Liberal Democrats ‘on board’ in Wales. Indeed, during November 1994, in articulating his vision of a 100-seat Senate for Wales, which would be vested with considerable legislative and financial autonomy, Davies urged that this Senedd should be elected by some form of proportional


representation, arguing that the broader its basis of political support, the greater the degree of legitimacy it would enjoy (Morgan and Mungham, 2000: 37, 39). When John Smith’s untimely death in May 1994 was followed by the election of Tony Blair as Labour leader, there was immediate concern that the renewed commitment to Welsh devolution would swiftly be downgraded, for Blair had never indicated any serious interest in devolution. Indeed, it was ‘one of the policies inherited from John Smith that Tony Blair was least happy about’ upon becoming Labour leader (Anderson and Mann, 1997: 283). In spite of Blair’s ambivalent stance, the Policy Commission continued with its examination of the options available to the Labour Party concerning the proposed Welsh Assembly. One of the main issues deliberated by the Policy Commission, and for which Welsh opinions were solicited via a series of public meetings around Wales during the autumn of 1994, concerned the powers to be granted to a Welsh Assembly, particularly with regard to legislative competence and jurisdiction. Four options were considered (Thomas, 1996: 698), namely primary legislative powers across an extensive range of policy areas, with Westminster retaining power only for UK-level responsibilities; legislative powers which matched the existing responsibilities of the Welsh Office; powers of secondary legislation; a statutory obligation on the Secretary of State for Wales to consult with the Welsh Assembly. When the Policy Commission published its recommendations, in Shaping the Vision, early in 1995, it had clearly decided on the third and fourth of these options, namely the establishment of an Assembly for Wales which would be permitted to implement secondary legislation only (with primary legislative power remaining at Westminster) and a requirement that the Secretary of State for Wales would regularly consult the Welsh Assembly. Shaping the Vision also firmly rejected granting the Assembly for Wales any tax-raising powers, asserting that ‘the Welsh people are . . . not in a position to bear a significant additional tax burden.’ Instead, Wales was to remain reliant on an annual block grant allocated by Whitehall, although it was envisaged that the Welsh Assembly would be permitted considerable discretion over how and where the monies were allocated, in accordance with competing needs and priorities between various policy areas and service providers in Wales. Although the Policy Commission had clearly opted for a Welsh Assembly whose powers were rather more limited than that favoured by Ron Davies, Shaping the Vision was approved at a conference of the Welsh Labour Party in May 1995. Consequently, it appeared that the


Labour Party’s proposals for Welsh devolution constituted ‘the minimum level of devolution, because it was all that the party would support’ (Deacon and Lynch, 1996: 74; see also Morgan and Mungham, 2000: 39–40). Certainly, as one commentator observed shortly afterwards ‘Despite its apparent unity on the issue, the Wales Labour Party still contains a wide spectrum of opinion on the nature and extent of the powers of a Welsh Assembly’ (Thomas, 1996: 698), a point confirmed by a poll of Labour MPs in Wales, conducted at the beginning of 1995 (Wales on Sunday, 15 January 1995: 21). In spite of initial anxieties amongst pro-devolution Labour MPs in Wales, Tony Blair himself did not renege upon the commitment inherited from Neil Kinnock and John Smith, and reaffirmed by the Policy Commission, although Blair’s formal commitment to Welsh devolution probably owed much to the rather limited version proposed in Shaping the Vision. Indeed, some within the Labour Party in Wales suspected that the modesty of the Policy Commission’s final recommendations reflected, at least in part, subtle influence exercised from the national leadership in London (Hughes, 1995). Yet precisely because of the modesty of the proposals presented in Shaping the Vision, intra-party debate continued during the remainder of 1995 and into 1996, as Labour’s more enthusiastically pro-devolution MPs sough to imbue the Party’s devolution proposals with somewhat greater radicalism. In this respect, Ron Davies, along with other Labour pro-devolutionists in Wales, such as Rhodri Morgan, along with Eluned Morgan and David Morris (both Labour MEPs), enjoyed some success, for the Welsh Labour Party’s 1996 conference approved another policy document, Preparing for a New Wales: A Report on the Structure and Workings of the Welsh Assembly, which emphasized the need for a ‘more consensual basis’ for its operations, a term widely interpreted as a call for the Assembly to be adopted by some form of proportional representation. In fact, Tony Blair himself announced, on 28 June 1996, that the proposed Welsh Assembly would be elected by a variant of proportional representation, partly to ensure consistency with Labour’s proposals for the Scottish Parliament but also to strengthen support for devolution amongst other parties in Wales. In this respect, the adoption of a mode of proportional representation could be characterized by Blair as emblematic of his desire for a more ‘inclusive’, pluralistic approach to politics, although for this very reason, some Labour MPs were concerned that their Party’s electoral and political strength in Wales would be weakened. For enthusiastic devolutionists like Ron Davies, though, Blair’s apparent conversion was thoroughly welcome, for it offered the prospect


of ‘a new pluralist approach to Welsh politics which was libertarian, decentralist, and patriotic’ and thus facilitate ‘greater co-operation . . . a new style of politics which was less tribal and less dogmatic.’ Davies fully recognized the need to ensure that the proposed Welsh Assembly would ‘command the support of progressives outside the Party or in Plaid Cymru or the Liberal Democrats’. Indeed, ‘inclusiveness’ was deemed by Davies to be ‘a pre-requisite for the success of devolution . . . not an attractive marketing ploy, but an essential foundation stone for the whole enterprise’ (Davies, 1999: 6–7). However, at the same time, Blair also announced that the establishment of the proposed Welsh Assembly was dependent on support being expressed by the people of Wales, via a referendum in Wales, although unlike the 1979 plebiscite, there was to be no ‘threshold’ for a ‘Yes’ vote to be valid. Again, this particular measure could apparently be justified on the grounds that the proposed Scottish Parliament was already to be subject to approval via a post-general election referendum, although sceptics wondered whether Blair was quietly hoping that a referendum would result in the people of Wales rejecting devolution, just as they had done in 1979. Against this cynical view, it could be argued that by promising to enshrine an element of proportionality to the elections to the Assembly for Wales, the wider political support thereby garnered would itself make a ‘Yes’ vote far more likely, for as Blair himself argued in his 28 June 1996 speech ‘It is vital that all of Wales feels included in the process of devolving power, and feels represented in the Welsh Assembly.’

The Blair Governments and Welsh devolution In the referendum, held on 18 September 1997, pro-devolutionists won by the narrowest of margins, 50.1 to 49.9 per cent. Furthermore, turnout in Wales was barely 50 per cent, which meant that only one in four Welsh people actually voted in favour of devolution for Wales. However, whereas anti-devolutionists could readily cite this as evidence of a marked lack of genuine support for devolution in Wales, and thereby question the legitimacy of the proposed Welsh Assembly, supporters of devolution were inclined to argue that the narrowness of their victory and the poor turn-out were not so much indicative of antipathy or indifference amongst the Welsh people, but reflected dis-satisfaction with the particular form of (limited) devolution being offered to Wales by New Labour. The clear implication of this reasoning was that if the Blair Government had offered the Welsh people a more powerful elected body for Wales, with its own primary law-making capacity,


then a rather more positive and emphatic victory would have been secured in the referendum (for a detailed analysis of the referendum, see McAllister, 1998). The subsequent 1998 Wales Act (introduced into Parliament in November 1997 and given its Royal Assent in July 1998) provided for a National Assembly for Wales whose primary function was to exercise most of the powers and responsibilities hitherto exercised by the Welsh Office, most notably those pertaining to agriculture, economic development, education, health, housing, social services and transport. As such, the National Assembly for Wales was not vested with primary lawmaking powers but instead was confined to secondary and delegated legislation and the administration or implementation in Wales of legislation passed at Westminster. Nor was the National Assembly for Wales granted tax-varying powers, although it was permitted to determine how Wales’ block grant from Whitehall was allocated within the Principality (for a full discussion of the establishment of the National Assembly for Wales, see McAllister, 1999). Furthermore, because of the limited – almost non-existent – legislative and fiscal powers of the Welsh Assembly, no subsequent reduction of Welsh representation in the House of Commons was envisaged, which in turn meant that there was no ‘West Cardiff’ question to be answered. Like the Scottish Parliament, however, the National Assembly for Wales was to be elected by a form of AMS, with 40 Assembly Members (AMs) elected on the traditional first-past-the-post basis from extant electoral constituencies, whilst a further 20 AMs would be elected on a proportional ‘top-up’ basis, four from each of the five ‘Euroconstituencies in Wales. These elections were also to be on a fixed-term basis, every four years. Even before the first elections to the National Assembly for Wales, though, tension arose over the degree to which Wales was to be granted greater political autonomy from London and the Labour Government in Office there. After his infamous ‘moment of madness’ on Clapham Common, Ron Davies resigned as Secretary of State for Wales, and, in effect, from the imminent leadership of the Labour Party in the Welsh Assembly. In the ensuing leadership contest, Alun Michael was strongly supported by Tony Blair, against Rhodri Morgan, who enjoyed extensive support amongst rank-and-file Labour Party members in Wales. Indeed had a ballot of Welsh Labour members been conducted, then Morgan would almost certainly have won a significant victory. Precisely because of this likely outcome, Labour’s leadership in London imposed a form of electoral college, in which the votes of ordinary Welsh Labour Party


members constituted just one-third of total votes, with trade unions allocated another third, and the final third apportioned to Labour’s Welsh MPs, MEPs and candidates for the Assembly. Consequently, Alun Michael – publicly endorsed by Tony Blair – won 52.7 per cent of the overall votes, against Rhodri Morgan’s 47.3 per cent, the latter, as expected, proving to be the overwhelming preference of ordinary Labour Party members in Wales. In other words, Labour’s ‘party machine had delivered the trade union block-vote’ (Jones, 2000). In relying on such a method of election, of course, questions were raised about the extent the New Labour in general, and Tony Blair in particular, genuinely believed in devolution for Wales, thereby reviving the suspicion that Blair had never been particularly enthusiastic in the first place. Or as Roy Hattersley, a former Deputy Labour Party leader, observed Blair dictates that, in principle, democracy must be extended at every level. But, in practice, that means only so long as Tony Blair can be guaranteed the result which he wants . . . . By its very nature, devolution means that sometimes Cardiff will disagree with London. If the Prime Minister is not prepared to risk the leader of the Welsh Assembly arguing for Wales, he is denying the purpose of the Assembly’s existence. (Hattersley, 1999) It was also rather unedifying to see Blairites securing their preferred result through recourse to the widely discredited and much maligned trade union block vote, particularly as Blair himself had made it a defining feature of ‘New Labour’ that the trade unions’ traditional role in Party affairs would be diminished. However, in this instance, Tony Blair was behaving rather like many of his Old Labour predecessors who relied on the ‘praetorian guard’ previously provided by the trade unions and/or their leadership to protect the Party’s Right-wing leadership from potential victory by the Left (see, for example, Minkin, 1991: 84). Not surprisingly, perhaps, the contest for Labour’s leadership in the Welsh Assembly reflected differing conceptions in the Party about the character – and by clear implication, the future – of devolution. For example, Hattersley’s perspective was echoed by Kevin Morgan, supporter of Rhodri Morgan in the leadership contest, when he asserted that ‘Devolution is worthless if it doesn’t allow us to make our choice without fear, favour and pressure from London’, whereas Leighton Andrews supported Alun Michael on the grounds that the latter’s Whitehall experience would be vital to ‘building relationships necessary to deliver policies that work for Wales in Whitehall, as well as in the Assembly’


(Western Mail, 29 January 1999). As Jones and Balsom noted shortly after the contest, whether ‘the Assembly was the Cardiff headquarters of the Welsh government or the Cardiff branch of the London headquarters was now a defining issue for the future development of the National Assembly’ (Jones and Balsom, 2000: 268). In the first elections to the new National Assembly for Wales, held on 6 May, the Labour Party emerged as the largest party overall, but lacked an overall majority, having won 27 of the 40 constituency seats, but only one further seat by virtue of the ‘top-up’ element. The main beneficiaries of this AMS, though, proved to be Plaid Cymru, which won nine seats on the basis of first-past-the-post and a further eight ‘topup’ seats. The Liberal Democrats won three constituency seats and three ‘top-up’ seats, whilst the Conservative Party, which had been opposed to both devolution and a more proportional electoral system, won just one constituency seat, but was allocated an additional eight seats in the Assembly on the basis of proportionality. Initially, the Labour Party aimed to form a minority Administration in the absence of an overall majority in the Welsh Assembly, thereby raising serious doubts about New Labour’s professed commitment to the new style of inclusive politics about which the Party’s leadership waxed so lyrical. Yet its lack of an overall majority did oblige the Labour leadership in the new Assembly to form ad hoc alliances with the Liberal Democrats or Plaid Cymru on individual issues and policies. A more ‘inclusive politics’, though, was facilitated by Alun Michael’s resignation as Labour leader in the Welsh Assembly, in February 2000, in order to pre-empt a motion of no confidence against him by Plaid Cymru. The Labour leadership in the Assembly passed to Rhodri Morgan, who spent much of the spring and summer of 2000 in protracted negotiations, firstly with Plaid Cymru, and then, when these failed to elicit a formal agreement, with the Liberal Democrats. Consequently, in the autumn of 2000, Morgan announced that ‘a partnership agreement’ with the Liberal Democrats for the remaining two-and-a-half years of the Assembly’s term, based on joint agreement of a wide range of policies, and the allocation of two posts to the Liberal Democrats in the Assembly’s Cabinet, with the Party’s leader, Mike German, awarded the key Economic Development post (Bradbury and Mitchell, 2001: 262–3). As the 2001 general election loomed, it became apparent that there remained notable differences of opinion in the Labour Party concerning the future of Welsh devolution. The Party’s most enthusiastic devolutionists, such as Ron Davies, had always insisted that devolution was ‘a process, not an event’, with a clear expectation that once established,


the Welsh Assembly would subsequently be granted further powers. By contrast, though, having fulfilled the 1997 manifesto commitment to establishing an Assembly for Wales, the Labour Party’s leadership (in London) harboured little enthusiasm for granting further powers to the National Assembly for Wales, with Blair himself – towards the end of 2000, just a few months before the next general election – insisting on the need for a period of consolidation (The Western Mail, 30 November 2000). The only hope discerned by those desiring further devolutionary measures was the commitment to establishing a commission to review the powers and functions of the Assembly.

Developments in Welsh devolution since 2001 The National Assembly for Wales did establish a commission, chaired by the Labour peer Lord Richard, in July 2002, its remit being to examine the powers of the Assembly, along with potential alternatives to the existing method of election. While the commission received written and oral evidence from a wide range of organizations and individuals in Wales, it is the responses emanating from representatives of the Labour Party in Wales which concern us here, for these highlighted the markedly different perspectives which remained in the Labour Party – especially among its Welsh MPs and Assembly Members – about the extent to which further power should, or should not, be devolved to the Assembly. One of the most trenchant critics was Llew Smith, then Labour MP for Blaenau Gwent – previously described by one member of the Richard Commission as an ‘Arch-rebel . . . hard-line and “Old Labour’’, who had long opposed any measure of devolution as an unnecessary sop to nationalism . . . the loudest and most consistent voice against the proposals’ (McAllister, 1998: 159) – who admitted that he was ‘not sympathetic to an Assembly’, on the grounds that what the Welsh people needed was ‘good government, not nationalism’. As such, Smith argued that devolving primary legislative powers to the Welsh Assembly would not enable it more effectively to tackle the problems experienced by people and communities in Wales, because they were not specifically Welsh or unique to Wales. Instead – and with echoes of Aneurin Bevan 60 years earlier – Smith insisted that ‘the problems faced by the people in the United Kingdom are remarkably similar, and where there are differences, they are not normally based on or in national boundaries. More often than not, the issue is, instead, one of class, which is no respecter of [national] boundaries.’ As such, he alleged that those of his Labour colleagues who advocated more power for the Welsh Assembly were,


in effect, ‘merely pandering to nationalist yearnings’, when socialists ought to ‘divorce ourselves from politics based on national boundaries’. Smith also pointedly suggested that if there was a future referendum on whether to grant the Welsh Assembly primary legislative powers, the ballot paper ought also to include a question asking Welsh voters whether they wished to ‘scrap this institution altogether’ (Richard, 2004a). Less critical about the Welsh Assembly itself, but unenthusiastic about devolving further powers to it, was the then Labour MP for Llanelli, Denzil Davies, who expressed concern that strengthening the Assembly ‘would almost certainly have financial and funding consequences’, because further powers and responsibilities would almost inevitably necessitate additional expenditure. However, Davies suggested that a point was being reached whereby ‘it is democratically unacceptable that the United Kingdom Parliament should be asked to transfer functions to the National Assembly in circumstances where the cost of exercising those functions effectively falls on United Kingdom taxpayers, but where the democratic representatives of those taxpayers have no say in how those functions are exercised by the National Assembly’. Davies therefore argued that if further powers were to be granted to the Welsh Assembly, then any corresponding additional costs ‘should be met out of Wales’ own resources and not by any addition to the block grant’ (Richard, 2004a). Meanwhile, the ‘North Wales Group of Labour MPs’ claimed that the present arrangements were working satisfactorily, hence there was no pressing need for significant changes at this stage, particularly with regard to devolving primary legislative powers to the National Assembly. Not only did this group of Labour MPs claim that there was little public demand in Wales for such a change, they also argued that it was too soon, given that the Welsh Assembly was only in its second term. They also noted that in North Wales, there existed ‘a widespread feeling that the Assembly is a South Wales dominated body’. Rather than vesting the Assembly with further legislative powers, the North Wales Group of Labour MPs suggested that the House of Commons should ‘establish a better process for passing legislation for Wales’, possibly through the creation of a special standing committee to scrutinize the likely impact or implications for Wales of particular Bills, coupled with more joint meetings between MPs (at Westminster) and Assembly Members (Richard, 2004a). Also unenthusiastic about granting the National Assembly for Wales further powers was the Welsh Labour Party itself, for whom the existing powers ‘are not weak’ and had already served the people of Wales well.


Such constraints which were acknowledged with regard to the Assembly’s autonomy and effectiveness were largely attributed to the constraints which impinged upon all institutions – including the Westminster Parliament – in the context of contemporary governance, rather than lack of legislative powers per se. Instead, what was required, the Welsh Labour Party acclaimed, was a clarification – rather than an extension of – of the Assembly’s existing powers and responsibilities, due to the blurred or contested lines of responsibility between Cardiff and London over particular spheres of policy (Richard, 2004a). Perhaps not surprisingly, Ron Davies was one of the Welsh Labour politicians most enthusiastic about granting the Assembly more powers, this neatly corresponding to his original view of devolution ‘as a process, not an event’. Davies was adamant that with the Welsh Assembly into its second term, it was time for the Labour Government at Westminster to embark upon the next stage of devolution by granting the Assembly with further powers and responsibilities. To those in the Labour Party – and beyond – who argued that the Assembly should somehow ‘prove itself’ before being strengthened, Davies retorted that the Assembly’s lack of legislative power was itself a factor preventing the institution from realizing its full potential. Moreover, Davies wryly pointed out that the Welsh Assembly ‘is not a dog performing tricks for the reward of legislative “treats’’ from Westminster’ (Richard, 2004a). In its Report, published in March 2004, the Richard Commission asserted that the current powers and roles of the National Assembly for Wales were not ‘a sustainable basis for future developments’, but that, instead, there needed to be a progressive delegation of legislative powers to the Assembly, whose membership should also be increased to 80, preferably elected by the STV electoral system. It was acknowledged, however, that this version of the Welsh Assembly would probably not be operational until 2011, due to the incremental nature of extending legislative powers and policy competences and redrawing the electoral boundaries (Richard, 2004b: 255–61). The (UK) Labour Government’s response was, perhaps predictably, lukewarm, with Peter Hain noting that the Commission’s recommendations provided considerable ‘food for thought’ (Judge, 2005: 196) and suggesting that there would now need to be consultations both with Welsh MPs and with Whitehall departments. He was emphatic, though, that a referendum would be required before granting the Welsh Assembly primary legislative powers and also insisted that there should be no change to the existing electoral constituencies in Wales (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 419, col. 1792).


Yet in spite of the lukewarm response formally given to Lord Richard’s Report, a White Paper was subsequently published in June 2005, just weeks after the Blair Government had been re-elected or a third successive term, and with Labour’s manifesto having pledged ‘a stronger [Welsh] Assembly with enhanced legislative powers’ (Labour Party, 2005: 108). Entitled Better Governance for Wales, the White Paper delineated the Cabinet’s proposals concerning the next stage of Welsh devolution, suggesting that it was now ‘time to rebalance legislative authority towards the Assembly’, although this would be achieved ‘without affecting the overall constitutional supremacy of Parliament as regards Wales within the United Kingdom’. Better Governance for Wales acknowledged that there was no ‘consensus in Wales for a move to full law-making powers along the lines of the Scottish Parliament model’, and as such, it was appropriate to pursue ‘a more gradual, staged move towards greater legislative powers . . . an incremental approach’, although for the foreseeable future, ‘a significant proportion of legislation for Wales will still be made by Parliament.’ Furthermore, any eventual move to granting the Welsh Assembly full primary legislative powers would be dependent on a referendum in Wales (Wales Office, 2005: paras 3.8, 3.9, 3.13). With regard to the electoral system used for elections to the Welsh Assembly, the Government’s White Paper not only rejected the Richard Commission’s proposal for 80 Members to be elected via STV, it also proposed – in retaining the existing AMS – debarring candidates from standing simultaneously for a constituency and one of the regional list ‘top-up’ seats; candidates would have to choose between the two means of election to the Assembly, a reform reflecting concern that some candidates who failed to attract enough support to win a constituency seat were then securing a seat in the Assembly through the ‘regional list’ instead. The Government claimed that this tactic ‘both devalues the integrity of the electoral system in the eyes of the public and acts as a disincentive to vote in constituency elections’ (Wales Office, 2005: paras 4.4 and 4.5). The ensuing Government of Wales Bill, deriving from the Better Governance for Wales White Paper, was published in December 2005 and reached the statute book in July 2006, with Peter Hain declaring, during the second reading debate, that the Bill simultaneously built upon the ‘current devolution settlement’ by establishing a new Order-in-Council procedure’ whereby Parliament will be able to ‘grant the Assembly the power to make its own laws’ in certain specified spheres and to ensure that ‘the detailed work on policies affecting Wales will increasingly be carried out in Wales.’ The result would be to provide the Welsh Assembly


‘with much wider discretion and flexibility’. However, Hain was also quick to emphasize that ‘Westminster will still be in charge . . . it is Parliament that will determine the new powers that the Assembly will acquire. Parliament, as ever, remains sovereign’ (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 441, cols. 36–9). Yet Hain was unable to assuage the continued antipathy of Labour MPs such as Alan Williams (representing Swansea West), who claimed that ‘the House of Commons is sleepwalking and does not quite understand what the devolution process is about’, for with Scotland having already been grated its own Parliament, and the Welsh Assembly about to acquire greater powers, ‘increasingly large parts of the legislation going through the House of Commons will be England only’. The likely result, Williams warned, as devolution increasingly made ‘the Welsh more Welsh, and the Scots more Scottish’, was ‘a seeping effect of making the English more English’. In this context, Williams insisted that ‘there is a limit to how long the English electorate will put up with a situation where Welsh and Scottish votes determine what they will get’. He alleged that the Labour leadership had not really thought this issue through, and that sooner or later, there would ‘be a backlash’, whereupon ‘the [devolution] policy will come back to bite us’ (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 441, col. 55). In the context of the Conservative Party’s advocacy of ‘English votes on English measures’ noted towards the end of the last chapter, Williams’ warning was particularly pertinent.

Conclusion As was the case in Scotland, once the Labour Party had replaced the pro-Home Rule Liberal Party as the main challenger to the Conservatives, Labour’s early espousal of ‘Home Rule all round’ rapidly dissipated. Indeed, from the 1920s onwards, when Labour first attained governmental Office, the Party’s general attitude towards Welsh nationalist demands oscillated between outright rejection and grudging concessions, with the latter invariably owing rather more to pragmatic considerations of partisan advantage and electoral expediency that any genuine conversion to the principle of devolution per se. Throughout much of the post-War period, the Labour Party resisted demands for self-government in Wales, only countenancing limited administrative devolution. As we have noted throughout this chapter, a strong economistic perspective permeated Labour’s attitude to the articulation of Welsh grievances, with many in the Party adamant that


whatever socio-economic disadvantages or difficulties Wales experienced compared to England (or Scotland), these could only be satisfactorily resolved by the application of ‘socialist’ policies from the centre (that is, at Westminster and Whitehall). To the extent that Labour politicians did acknowledge the relative weakness of the Welsh economy, they cited this as evidence that self-government for Wales was not financially viable and that, instead, the future prosperity of Wales was indivisible from that of the British economy as a whole. The clear implication was that closer integration, not greater devolution, was to provide salvation for Wales. Meanwhile, Labour’s Left was scornful of nationalist sentiments which threatened to weaken (potential) working class unity in Britain and which would thus prove to be a major impediment to the advance of British socialism. If many people in Wales experienced socio-economic deprivation, Labour’s Left believed, then this was by virtue of the inequalities and iniquities of capitalism, exacerbated by the alleged neglect of Wales by Anglo-centric Conservative governments, rather than because of their Welshness per se. Such a perspective therefore reinforced the view that what the citizens of Wales needed was a Labour Government at Westminster, pursuing ‘socialist’ policies which would benefit the working class throughout Britain, regardless of region. Both perspectives were therefore dismissive of demands for Welsh devolution, especially in the guise of an elected Welsh Assembly or Parliament, with its own legislative powers. The most that the Labour Party was initially willing to grant Wales was an elected advisory council, coupled with a greater degree of administrative devolution, thereby imbuing policies emanating from Westminster and Whitehall with a Welsh dimension at implementation stage. This, in turn, eventually led the Labour Party (in 1959) to accept the case for a Secretary of State for Wales, of Cabinet rank, and presiding over a Welsh Office, which would then provide a conduit between Wales and London. Paradoxically, perhaps, many in the Labour Party assumed at the time that establishing a Secretary of State for Wales, in conjunction with a Welsh Office, would serve to weaken Welsh devolutionary aspirations and demands, not least because it could be argued that these institutional innovations would permit the views and grievance of the Welsh people to be expressed at the very highest level of British government. Nor should it be assumed that attitudes towards Welsh devolution in the Labour Party divided neatly between English and Welsh MPs, for while some of the Party’s MPs in Wales were certainly the most committed advocates of devolution, various of their Welsh Labour colleagues were also the most ardent and vocal opponents of greater autonomy for


Wales (as illustrated by the parliamentary opposition of the ‘gang of six’ Welsh Labour MPs during the passage of the ill-fated Wales Bill in 1978, and the trenchant response submitted to the Richard Commission by Llew Smith MP, for example). Moreover, even the Welsh Labour MPs in favour of devolution were not in agreement as to how much devolution Wales should have, with some seeking an elected body with legislative powers, others urging an elected Council of Wales which would primarily be consultative and advisory in character, while others confined themselves to advocacy of greater executive and administrative devolution, for which a Welsh Office was deemed the most appropriate institutional innovation. As such, the Labour Party’s leadership at Westminster has invariably viewed the cause of Welsh devolution less favourably than demands for greater self-government emanating from Scotland. This has ensured that even when Labour Governments have introduced legislation to grant Wales devolution, they have permitted much less autonomy, and far fewer powers, than they have bestowed upon Scotland. Indeed, Welsh devolution has often appeared to be an adjunct to Scottish devolution, although Labour Ministers could readily point to abundant opinion poll evidence showing that support for devolution (particularly that entailing the devolution of legislative powers) has invariably been rather lower in Wales than in Scotland. Indeed, the result of the 1979 referendum in Wales meant that for much of the 1980s, the commitment to Welsh devolution was effectively abandoned by the Labour Party, whereas the commitment to a Scottish Parliament was retained throughout. Even when Welsh devolution moved back onto the Labour Party’s agenda from the late 1980s onwards, and became a formal policy commitment under Neil Kinnock, John Smith and then Tony Blair, it was never imbued with much enthusiasm and was clearly viewed as somewhat secondary or supplementary to that proposed for Scotland. This is borne out by the refusal to grant the Welsh Assembly the same legislative and tax-raising powers vested in the Scottish Parliament, although the Labour leadership could retort that the narrowness of the majority voting in favour in the September 1997 Welsh referendum reflected a reciprocal lack of enthusiasm amongst the Welsh people themselves. Against such an argument, however, those favouring more extensive devolution in Wales – including some members of the Welsh Labour Party – would claim that the wafer-thin margin of the ‘Yes’ vote in Wales was largely attributable to the disappointing modesty of what was being offered, the clear implication being that if Wales had been offered a legislative


body akin to the Scottish Parliament, a much more resounding ‘Yes’ vote would have been delivered in the referendum. Yet neither Old Labour nor New Labour have ever been enthusiastic about Welsh devolution. The Labour Party’s tacit acceptance of the Westminster Model, the economistic response towards the articulation of Welsh grievances and the limited electoral support enjoyed by Plaid Cymru (compared to the support attracted by the SNP in Scotland) have all served to limit Labour’s enthusiasm for Welsh devolution. This lack of enthusiasm has been compounded by the fact that on those occasions when the issue of Welsh devolution has been raised, it has elicited a range of views and proposals within the Party, both in London and in Wales, thereby rendering it potentially divisive and damaging to Party unity and cohesion.

8 English Regionalism

Introduction As we have noted in Chapters 6 and 7, the Labour Party has traditionally enshrined a tension between its recognition of a regional dimension to British politics (and thus its occasional willingness – however reluctant or grudging – to countenance devolution for Scotland and Wales) and its faith in the virtue of regulation and planning by central government. Consequently, when it has been confronted by distinctly regional aspirations, the Labour Party’s traditional and instinct response has been to insist that the problems cited by the regions could only adequately be resolved by greater government intervention and the concomitant allocation or redistribution of resources from the centre. Even on those occasions when the Labour Party has acknowledged the desirability or need for devolution to the regions of Britain, there has been a clearly discernible emphasis on the economic justification, in the form of industrial regeneration, for some form of sub-national governance. At the same time, though, such acknowledgement has invariably involved administrative or executive modes of devolution, entailing the regional application and implementation of centrally determined policies, rather than any notable espousal of regionalism in terms of extending democracy at sub-national level. This stance is partly explicable in terms of the Labour Party’s tacit acceptance of the Westminster Model, with its emphasis on a unitary state governed from the centre, based on a strong government deriving its authority from the House of Commons, and beyond that from the electorate, but it also reflects the absence of any serious or sustained political pressure from most regions of England for self-government. In other words, although the Labour Party has periodically felt obliged to 281


respond (however reluctantly or desultorily) to demands for devolution emanating from Scotland and Wales, there has been no such electoral imperative or public pressure in England, and as a consequence, English regionalism has remained the ‘poor relation’ of Labour’s approach to devolution.

The 1945–1951 Attlee Governments Certainly, devolution of political power to English regions had not been a discernible feature of Labour Party ‘thinking’ prior to the Second World War, while the 1945–1951 Attlee Governments’ prioritization of economic reconstruction and social reform, rather than constitutional affairs, ensured that English regional government continued to remain a non-issue for the Labour Party during the later half of the 1940s and early 1950s. To the extent that regional interests were acknowledged, and policies imbued with a regional dimension, these were invariably in the guise of measures and institutional forums intended to secure industrial regeneration and reconstruction in those areas considered most economically disadvantaged or socially deprived. In essence, therefore, to the extent that Labour politicians acknowledged a regional dimension to public policy, they were economistic, rather than reflecting any desire to pursue political devolution or sub-national democracy. For example, the Attlee Governments ascribed a central role to the Board of Trade, which awarded Industrial Development Certificates in a manner intended to encourage firms to open new plants in areas other than the South-east of England and the East Midlands, whilst the provisions of the 1945 Distribution of Industry Act – already passed by the Wartime Coalition Government – were also deployed in such a manner as to ensure the location of new industries in areas such as the North East of England and South Wales (Morgan, 1985: 182–3; Scott, 1997). Valuable though these initiatives may have been in facilitating economic regeneration and industrial expansion in the most economically depressed or socially deprived areas of Britain, and thereby contributing towards the development of full employment, they were not linked to any principle or programme of regional government per se. On the contrary, the confidence of most Labour politicians during this time in the perceived virtues of central economic planning and State-directed distribution of resources was such that political devolution and regional democratization was not seriously countenanced by the Attlee Government. Instead, as noted in Chapters 6 and 7, when regional demands were articulated, the instinctive Ministerial response was to insist that the

English Regionalism

283

grievances which underpinned these demands were ultimately derived from economic and industrial problems which could only realistically be resolved by the central application of ‘socialist’ economic and industrial policies by a Labour Government at Westminster, even if these were then administered or implemented on a partly regional basis. Of course, this might just as readily have been an argument in favour of ‘devolution all round’, but this was clearly not the perspective of the Attlee Governments or of the Labour Party generally. Instead, the inclination to view such grievances as manifestations of problems afflicting the British economy overall clearly militated against a willingness to adopt a distinctly regional perspective, and thereby ensured that political devolution to the English regions was never on the Attlee Governments’ institutional policy agenda. The most that was countenanced was administrative devolution to facilitate the execution and implementation of policies formally determined by Labour Ministers in Westminster and – in partnership with senior civil servants – in Whitehall. Besides, it is difficult to envisage how a Labour Party formally committed to the nationalization of key industries and services could simultaneously have actively pursued a policy of English regionalism, for this would almost certainly have militated against the essentially dirigiste and top-down approach to industrial regeneration, and facilitated conflicts between central government and the regions. It should also be noted that many within the organized labour movement have been anxious that any explicit acknowledgement of a regional dimension to British politics would serve to weaken or fragment the working class, thereby preventing them both from realizing their ascribed or ‘objective’ interests and then collectively pursuing them. Such notions of ‘working class unity’ or class consciousness might appear overly naïve or romantic in hindsight, but during the late 1940s, in the context of a Labour landslide at the polls in 1945, and immediately following the defeat of Fascism, they retained a strong appeal within the British labour movement, and thereby further underpinned the Labour Party’s disinclination to develop a regional dimension (beyond the regional administration of centrally determined policies which we previously alluded to). Furthermore, even though the Attlee Governments did initially imbue various industrial policies with a limited regional dimension, this was being steadily downgraded by the beginning of the 1950s. For example, Scott has pointed out that regional policy expenditure was reduced from just over £12 million per annum in 1947–1948 and 1948–1949 to £6.5 million in 1949–1950 and 1950–1951. Indeed, these figures partly


reflected the fact that Cabinet reorganization in 1947 had ‘led to some diminution of the power of the Board of Trade to promote its regional policy agenda’ (Scott, 1997: 379, 377).

The 1964–1970 Wilson Governments and English regionalism A more explicit regional dimension was evident when the Labour Party was returned to Office in 1964, whereupon the newly created Department of Economic Affairs established eight regional Economic Planning Councils for England plus one each for Scotland and Wales. Yet with their membership drawn primarily from local government, industry and business, they were clearly not intended to provide a system of regional government based on directly elected assemblies. Instead, as their appellation clearly indicated, they were viewed by Harold Wilson’s Labour Governments as a means of more effectively implementing economic and industrial policies at regional level, in accordance with the priorities and policies of the Cabinet in general and the Department of Economic Affairs in particular. However, the emerging demand for devolution in Scotland and Wales during the later half of the 1960s alerted at least some within the Labour Party to the potential implications for the regions of England (see, for example, Mackintosh, 1968: 187–207), to the extent that the NEC established a study group on regional policy in June 1967, primarily to examine ways of improving the administration and co-ordination of Labour’s economic and industrial policies at regional level. Right from the outset, the group recognized that regionalism could mean either that national level decisions took greater account of regional needs and nuances or that decisions were actually delegated to, and thus taken at, regional level. Yet in this latter case, a further issue would arise, namely whether regional bodies existed primarily ‘as a means of furthering the aims of central government, or . . . as an element in a new structure of local government’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.135/May 1967). Labour’s economism ensured that it was the former approach which prevailed, whereupon the regional plans of the mid-1960s sought a more equitable or need-based allocation of investment, jobs and resources (Bray, 1970: 147–50; Labour Party Archives, Re.112/March 1967; Labour Party Archives, Re.356/September 1968; NA PREM 13/1681, Bray to Wilson, 5 October 1967). Laudable though these objectives may have been, they did not seriously address the issue from a political or participatory perspective; the primary concern was with the more

English Regionalism

285

effective and efficient implementation of centrally determined economic and industrial policies at sub-national level, rather than overcoming a democratic deficit by recommending elected regional assemblies and thereby politically empowering the regions. The assumption remained that the best remedy for apparent ‘regional problems’ was the existence of a Labour Government in London, which pursued the ‘correct’ economic and industrial policies, albeit administered via the appropriate regional bodies, namely the aforementioned Economic Planning Councils. One notable Ministerial exception to this dirigiste perspective was Richard Crossman, who, by 1968, was contemplating, with remarkable equanimity, the possibility of a quasi-federal system of government for Britain, whereby devolution for Scotland and Wales was accompanied by the creation of ‘a tier of government between Westminster and the Town Hall’, the format of which ‘might roughly correspond to that of the German Laende’. This would entail a ‘division of power between central and provincial governments’ which would ‘approximate more closely to the needs of our modern technocratic society than the traditional British highly centralised administration.’ Crossman’s consideration of such a structure derived from his apparent concern over ‘the sense of alienation which bedevils politics’, particularly at local or town hall level (NA PREM 13/2151, Crossman to Wilson, 25 June 1968). Crossman’s genuflections in this direction occurred in the context of renewed, and increasingly strong, demands for devolution which emanated from Scotland and Wales during the later half of the 1960s, as discussed in Chapters 6 and 7. Yet whereas Crossman seemed willing to acknowledge the case not only for Scottish and Welsh devolution, but also the potential for devolving government in England itself, most of his Ministerial colleagues were primarily concerned with neutralizing devolutionary aspirations in Scotland and Wales. A government seeking resist demand for devolution emanating from Scotland and Wales was hardly likely, therefore, to consider seriously the case for devolution in England via the establishment of English Regional Assemblies or some other form of elected bodies at sub-national level. However, English regionalism was obliquely included in the remit of the Royal Commission on the Constitution, whose brief was ‘to examine the present functions of the central legislature and government in relation to the several countries, nations and regions of the United Kingdom’, although Wilson doubtless hoped that English regionalism, along with demands for Scottish and Welsh devolution, could henceforth be kicked into the constitutional long grass.


The 1974–1979 Labour Governments and English regionalism When the Royal Commission on the Constitution had completed its inquiry (by which time, Labour was in Opposition, having lost the 1970 general election), it published two reports, in October 1973, these reflecting a marked difference of opinion concerning the degree of devolution favoured. Whilst the Majority Report was in favour of elected assemblies for Scotland and Wales, it declined to recommend such bodies for England itself, asserting that ‘There is very little evidence of a demand for representative assemblies in the regions of England comparable to the demand for Scottish and Welsh Assemblies, and probably very few people in England would consider that they had grounds for complaint if assemblies were established in Scotland and Wales’. Yet, the Minority Report, authored by Lord Crowther-Hunt and Alan Peacock, argued that England, Scotland and Wales ought to be treated equally, with elected assemblies for Scotland and Wales and the creation of five English regions, each with its own elected assembly also. Furthermore, it was suggested that, along with the Scottish and Welsh assemblies, the English regional assemblies should be elected by proportional representation. One further notable difference between the two reports concerned the issue of representation at Westminster following devolution. Whereas the Majority Report argued that there ought to be a reduction in Scottish and Welsh MPs in the House of Commons after devolution, the Minority Report – presciently pre-empting Tam Dalyell’s ‘West Lothian Question’ – suggested that if the English regions also had their own elected assemblies, then there would be no need to alter the existing balance of regional representation at Westminster. In the year that the Kilbrandon Reports were published, Harold Wilson signalled what appeared to be a new-found commitment to regional government for England, when he informed delegates attending Labour’s 1973 Local Government Conference in Newcastle that there should be more devolution of functions and responsibilities hitherto undertaken by central government, particularly those concerning economic planning, environment, transport and the NHS. Even more significantly, though, Wilson suggested that if regional authorities were subsequently to be established, they should be ‘democratically controlled’. In the first instance, this would entail them being indirectly elected by, and from, local authorities, but eventually, they would be elected directly by ‘the regional electorate’, although provision would also need to be made

English Regionalism

287

for adequate representation from those industries which were subject to economic planning. Wilson’s professed enthusiasm for elected regional assemblies was not shared by the delegates to whom he addressed his speech. On the contrary, they voiced a number of objections, most notably that elected regional assemblies would entail unduly large constituencies, probably experience a low turn-out on polling day, and place a considerable strain on the Labour Party’s organization and resources. Of course, the underlying concern of the Labour delegates might well have been that elected regional assemblies would undermine or override the role of (Labourcontrolled) local authorities themselves. Whatever the real reasons, Labour’s Programme 1973 indicated rather less enthusiasm than Wilson had displayed in Newcastle, blandly asserting that the recommendations of the Kilbrandon Reports would need to be carefully considered by the Party before it could take any ‘final decisions on provinces and their functions.’ Yet in some other parts of the Labour Party, there was no such ambiguity, with the Labour Group on the Association of County Councils expressing its support for ‘democratic regional control’ and expressing its hope that – following Labour’s return to government in February 1974 – a commitment to elected English Regional Assemblies would be included in the forthcoming White paper on devolution. Further support was proffered by the Party’s North-West Regional Council, which called on the Labour Government to let it develop its own regional policy, in the guise of an elected Regional Government with responsibility for a range of devolved policies, such as agriculture, economic and strategic planning, employment, environment, trade and industry, and transport. It was quick to acknowledge, though, that any devolved powers and policies would remain ‘within the framework of nationallydetermined policy’. The objectives, therefore, would be, firstly, to ensure that national policies were implemented in a manner most appropriate and responsive to regional needs and, secondly, to ensure that those responsible for implementation at regional level were accountable to the citizens of that region (Labour Party Archives, Res.134/July 1974). Although the minority Labour Government was willing to countenance devolution for Scotland and Wales (albeit largely for reasons of political pragmatism and expediency, rather than any genuine commitment to democratization and decentralization to sub-national level), it was less inclined to establish elected English regional assemblies, in spite of the insistence that it had ‘an equal commitment to democratic accountability of government . . . in the English regions’ (Labour


Party Archives, Res.143/August 1974), as an integral part of its ‘thoroughly committed’ approach to ‘democratic accountability of government and equality of political rights throughout the United Kingdom’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.281/September 1975). Consequently, when the Labour Government published its White Paper Democracy and Devolution – Proposals for Scotland and Wales, in September 1974, it explained that consultations were still being conducted over the question of devolution for England. In this respect, Labour’s thinking (such as it was) had not advanced much on the previous year’s Labour’s Programme 1973, which had merely stated the Party’s intention of facilitating ‘an effective devolution of decision making and functions from Whitehall’ to the regions and nations of the United Kingdom. However, as Labour’s regional and local government subcommittee (established under the auspices of the NEC’s Home Affairs committee) explained, any commitment to elected English Regional Assemblies would need to address a number of specific issues, namely the precise areas and boundaries of the regions; the method of election; the size of the elected Assemblies; their functions and responsibilities; their relationship and constitutional position vis-à-vis both central and local governments (Labour Party Archives, Res.92/June 1974). As part of the consultative process alluded to in Democracy and Devolution, a Green Paper entitled Devolution: The English Dimension was also published in 1974, which suggested that consultations undertaken during summer had indicated not only much greater desire for change in Scotland and Wales than in England, but also a clearer view as to what form it should take. Meanwhile, as part of a process of discussion within the Labour Party over English regionalism, the NEC itself published a paper, Devolution and Regional Government in England, in September 1975, which delineated the issues involved, but deliberately refrained from offering concrete proposals or conclusions. Instead, it insisted on the ‘paramount need . . . for a full democratic debate of the case for elected regional authorities in England and a balanced judgement’ (Labour Party Archives, Re.281/September 1975). The questions highlighted in Devolution and Regional Government in England ‘as an aid to discussion’ were the following: • How far would elective regional authorities go towards meeting practical needs of the people of England? • Would regional authorities attract adequate popular support? • Are proposals for English regional authorities a misguided response to economic difficulties of the depressed regions which would be

English Regionalism

• •

•

•

289

better dealt with by more determined central government regional economic and industrial policies? For what range of functions should regional authorities assume responsibility? How much freedom should regional authorities have to adapt nationally determined programmes to their own assessment of regional needs? Should regional authorities have economic, financial and industrial powers, or would this fragment the essential economic unity of the United Kingdom and destroy the chances of an effective Socialist industrial strategy? Are regional authorities the best response to problems of planning and democratising ad hoc nominated bodies? Could not existing institutions be adapted instead?

Although many of the arguments cited in favour (the paper also presented the arguments against, in accordance with its objective of facilitating discussion, rather than offering firm commitments or conclusions) could be viewed in terms of a commitment to democratization and decentralization, they were also explicable in terms of a possible programme of rationalization of sub-national government in England, for it was noted that the plethora of ad hoc bodies which had been established since 1945 not only often lacked accountability, but either led to a duplication or overlap of tasks and functions or made strategic policy-making and coordination (both at regional and Ministerial levels) extremely difficult. For example, it was noted that many government Departments operated through their own particular definition of a region, to the extent that the Department of the Environment operated through 11 different regional structures, depending on the specific policy in question – six regions for road construction, eight for housing and so on – whilst the Ministry of Agriculture as well as the Department of Employment effectively divided England into seven regions for administrative purposes, but not the same seven. Ultimately, though, the intra-party debate which Devolution and Regional Government in England was intended to promote failed to materialize, for English regionalism was not an issue which enjoyed strong or widespread support either within the Labour Party itself,or in England generally (Benn, 1989a: 402, diary entry for 16 June 1975). Consequently, Devolution and Regional Government in England suggested that although it might be considered that ‘regional government is desirable in principle, it would be irresponsible for the Labour Party to express an intention


of introducing regional authorities within the decade’ (Labour Party Archives, RE.281/September 1975). This stance was reaffirmed at the end of 1976 when, in the context of Ministerial discussions over Scottish and Welsh devolution, the Cabinet agreed its readiness ‘to listen to views about future arrangements in England’ but explicitly ruled out either an English Regional Assembly or English Regional Assemblies with legislative powers, claiming that neither enjoyed much support, and ‘were open to clear and persuasive objections’. Consequently, a rather desultory discussion about future English devolution focused on four possible options: regional assemblies ‘on the Welsh model’; regional authorities as a tier of local government; regional advisory bodies; reform of local government to imbue it with a more regional dimension. None of these, however, elicited much enthusiasm from the Ministers involved, thereby leaving Labour’s approach to English devolution unresolved (NA CAB 128/60, CM (76), 36th conclusions, 2 December 1976). As Jones and Keating (1985: 126–7) later explained, a number of factors accounted for the Labour Party’s lack of support for English Regional Assemblies. Firstly, the policy threatened to alienate a number of ‘functional interests’, most notably Labour-controlled local authorities wary of any potential loss of powers upwards to regional assemblies, coupled with anxiety that the policy would entail further reform of local government, which had only recently been extensively reformed by the 1970–1974 Heath Government. Hence, as we noted above, the unenthusiastic response of the delegates attending Labour’s local government conference in 1973 to Wilson’s peroration on elected English Regional Assemblies. Secondly, affected trade unions were less than enthusiastic, such as those in the health service who were concerned about the implications of regional assemblies acquiring responsibility for health care provision (Jones and Keating, 1985: 127; Keating, 1982: 246). This reflected a more general unease amongst the trade unions over the prospect of English regional devolution, namely fear that this might serve to undermine free collective bargaining, which had always been a primary objective of organized labour in Britain. There was some concern within the trade union movement that if the Labour Party pursued a policy of English devolution, then national level bargaining over terms and conditions of employment might be replaced with regional level bargaining, and inter alia, a decline of national pay awards, whereupon workers performing the same tasks in different parts of England could receive different levels of pay. This would almost certainly exacerbate, not eradicate, regional inequalities and disparities of income.

English Regionalism

291

Thirdly, the antipathy of many Labour MPs towards proposals for English regional assemblies was part of a more general opposition to devolution in the Party (as noted in Chapters 6 and 7), with some backbenchers evincing ‘deep boredom’ with the whole issue (Drucker and Brown, 1980: 111), while others were ‘sick of it all’ (Benn, 1990: 47, diary entry for 24 February 1977). By 1977, therefore, the evident lack of support prompted the Labour Government to abandon any plans for creating English regional assemblies, although even if it had been inclined to retain the commitment, the problems encountered in enacting legislation for Scottish and Welsh devolution would almost inevitably have precluded concrete measures. Meanwhile, one other issue was briefly raised in the context of Scottish devolution’s implications for English representation, namely the number of MPs returned to Westminster by England, Scotland and Wales. There had been a suggestion from the Conservative Opposition that once a Scottish Parliament had been established, the number of English electoral constituencies ought to be increased, on the grounds that Scotland was over-represented at Westminster. Increasing the number of English MPs would thus equalize representation throughout Britain and thereby address the disparity of Scotland having a Parliament without any corresponding reduction in the number of Scottish MPs retuned to Westminster. This proposal, however, was swiftly rejected as being ‘singularly unwise politically’, for any increase in the number of English constituencies would almost inevitably benefit the Conservative Party rather more than Labour. It was fully acknowledged that such an argument was ‘crudely political’, but ‘we are not in business to put ourselves out of business’ (PRO BD 108/364, Fowler to Shore, 19 August 1976).

Labour and English regionalism in the early 1980s Not surprisingly, in the context of the problems encountered in legislating for Scottish and Welsh devolution, and the lack of intra-party interest in English regionalism, Labour proposals for English devolution were generally conspicuous by their absence during the first half of the 1980s. For example, a collection of essays on future Labour objectives and policies, written in 1983 by members of Labour’s Shadow Cabinet, included chapters on Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, but did not include a chapter on English regional government (as opposed to local government and town hall politics) (Kaufman, 1983). Indeed, apart from a passing reference to ‘considering . . . proposals on the question of


reforming and improving the structure of regional and local government in England and Wales’ in Labour’s Programme 1982 (Labour Party, 1982: 209), the only notable source of continued commitment to English regionalism during this period was John Prescott, who was appointed (by Michael Foot, James Callaghan’s successor as Party leader after the 1979 general election defeat) as Labour’s spokesperson on devolution and regional affairs. As both a reflection of his own personal commitment and a contribution towards urging a debate within the Labour Party over English regionalism, Prescott published, in September 1982, a policy document entitled Alternative Regional Strategy: A Framework for Discussion (Prescott, 1982). This sought to link the issue of English regionalism more coherently to the Party’s Alternative Economic Strategy, which had been formally adopted as a consequence of the Left’s brief ascendancy during the early 1980s. In this context, Alternative Regional Strategy: A Framework for Discussion sought to ensure that Labour’s renewed commitment to central economic planning and more extensive public ownership was nonetheless imbued with a clear regional dimension, this to be realized through the appointment of a Minister for local and regional development, coupled with representatives from English regions on bodies concerned with economic planning, such as regional planning boards. It was also proposed that a Regional Planning Council be established, on which would sit those Ministers with responsibilities for industry (including the nationalized industries) and economic development. The Prime Minister would also sit on this body, as would the chairs of the boards governing nationalized industries. Furthermore, Alternative Regional Strategy: A Framework for Discussion recommended that public expenditure plans should include a regional dimension, alongside the traditional allocation to particular policy areas and services. This was an aspect which could be overseen by the Regional Planning Council (Keating and Jones, 1982: 11). Rather more significant, it seemed, was the suggestion that Regional Assemblies be established in England, these to be tripartite bodies comprising representatives from both sides of industry (that is, trade union officials and employers) and local councillors. It was envisaged that these Regional Assemblies would primarily be concerned with the coordination of, and liaison between, services and agencies at regional level. Initially, these Regional Assemblies would be indirectly elected, but it was intimated that in the longer term, they could be directly elected. Ultimately, however, the proposals remained firmly within the

English Regionalism

293

Labour Party’s dirigiste tradition, with the primary motivation for a regional dimension being economic, rather than democratic, and with representation clearly being of a corporatist character. Prescott was effectively conducting a solo crusade, however, in seeking to promote a policy of English regionalism for the Labour Party, because his interest in the issue was not shared by his colleagues. On the contrary, many Labour MPs and Shadow Ministers deemed it to be of low political and electoral salience (particularly after their experiences concerning Scottish and Welsh devolution just a few years earlier), and as such, English regionalism languished way down Labour’s policy agenda during the first half of the 1980s. Indeed, for most of those on the Left of the Labour Party advocating the Alternative Economic Strategy, it was precisely the alleged need for greater central direction and co-ordination of industrial and economic policies which informed their approach, to the extent that they paid little heed to the issue of devolution to the English regions during the early 1980s. Certainly, there was no mention of devolution for England (or Wales) in Labour’s 1983 manifesto, whose proposals regarding English governance were limited to a commitment to consider the reform of local government, with a view to establishing unitary authorities as a means of establishing clearer lines of accountability (Labour Party, 1983: 33).

Labour and English regionalism in the late 1980s and early 1990s It was not until after a third successive election defeat, in 1987, that the Labour Party began to look a little more seriously at the issue of English Regional Assemblies. As had largely been the case a decade earlier, the impetus for considering elected assemblies for the English regions was very much derived from the Party’s renewed formal commitment to devolution for Scotland, which had been pledged in the Party’s 1987 manifesto. With regard to England (and Wales), however, the manifesto merely promised that a Labour Government would ‘consult widely about the most effective regional structure of government and administration’ (Labour Party, 1987: 11). This apparent willingness to reconsider the issue of English regionalism was part of a more general process of Labour Party modernization, presaged by the Policy Review which Neil Kinnock launched following the 1987 election defeat. When the Policy Review had completed its work, it recommended that a future Labour Government should create 10 English regions, corresponding to existing geo-economic areas and regional


identities. Indeed, it was suggested that these would themselves play a significant role in enhancing regional identity. Nonetheless, economistic assumptions still informed much of Labour’s thinking with regard to this issue, for a number of proposals to establish a system of English regional governance were published in the section on ‘A Productive and Competitive Economy’ and were advocated primarily in terms of the alleged benefits of regional (economic) planning and investment: ‘We shall make a conscious effort to devolve to our nations and regions much more power and control over their own economies’, whereupon ‘English regional assemblies will become powerful agents for economic regeneration in the regions’ (Labour Party, 1989: 15). In this respect, it was assumed that ‘the main argument for regional government is that an elected regional assembly will be able to ensure that its region gets its fair share of the resources available’, with the principles of democracy and decentralization apparently being viewed merely as a ‘second argument for regional government’ (Coulson, 1990: 3, 8). However, English regional government was also considered by the Review Group on ‘Democracy for the Individual and the Community’, whose contribution to Meet the Challenge, Make the Change spoke of the need for ‘a new strategic power to bring management, intelligence and resources together at regional level’, following a decade of Conservative centralization. As such, it was envisaged that ‘new regional authorities’ would provide ‘a means of decentralising power from central government’, for not only would these acquire a range of functions devolved from Whitehall, they would also ‘absorb, under democratic control, the functions exercised by non-elected boards and quangos.’ It was emphasized, however, that the establishment of regional government in the 10 regions identified in England would only be pursued following ‘extensive consultation’, whilst the method of election to any subsequent regional assemblies was also ‘a matter for further consideration’ (Labour Party, 1989: 57–8). This formal commitment to English regionalism was given further expression in Labour’s 1991 Consultation Paper Devolution and Democracy, in which advocacy of English Regional Assemblies was explicitly linked to developments in (what was about to become) the European Union, especially those pertaining to regional funding. The following year, Labour’s 1992 manifesto pledged that ‘a new regional tier of government in the English regions’ would be established, these to exercise a range of powers devolved from central government, particularly with regard to economic planning and transport. It was further pledged that this regional tier of government would ‘later form the basis of elected

English Regionalism

295

regional governments’, although no timeframe was specified (Labour Party, 1992: 18). Defeat in the 1992 election served to provide the Labour Party with more time in which to hone its policy on English regionalism, as indicated by an NEC statement to the 1993 annual conference which alluded to the need ‘to look in more detail . . . at what structures of government will be appropriate for the various regions of England, what functions they should perform, and how they should be funded.’ It was also deemed necessary for the Labour Party to ‘look at what system of consultation will be needed for the introduction of regional government’ (quoted in Blackburn and Plant, 1999: 459). Crucially, however, the fourth consecutive term of Conservative rule also witnessed growing concern about the rise of a ‘new magistracy’, as the re-elected Major Government established increasing numbers of quangos and other Ministerially appointed bodies (for more on this development, see Jenkins, 1995; Morris, 1994; Skelcher and Davis, 1996: Stewart, 1996). The rapid extension of this ‘quango State’ or ‘new magistracy’ yielded considerable concern and criticism about patronage, ‘cronyism’ and possible corruption, particularly as a number of cases came to light in which appointees were found to have close links – financial or familial – with the Conservative Party. Certainly the appointment of large numbers of businessmen to a plethora of quangos and sundry other executive bodies was a significant source of concern and criticism, not only because of the apparent lack of accountability but also because whilst they were invariably deemed officially to be ‘non-political’, they were widely suspected of having strong Conservative sympathies and loyalties. Yet in 1994, the Major Government also established 10 integrated regional offices, which subsequently became known as Government Offices of the Regions (GORs). These GORs, each headed by a senior civil servant, represented an attempt at rationalizing the regional offices of various Government Departments and providing for greater co-ordination and coherence in the implementation of central government policies at sub-national level (Bradbury, 1996: 705). In establishing these GORs, the Major Government unwittingly emboldened the Labour Party’s own plans for English regional government, for a future Labour Government could claim that not only had the Conservatives explicitly acknowledged a regional dimension, they had also, in clearly identifying ten politico-administrative regions, established an institutional infrastructure upon which a future Labour Government could build. Indeed, New Labour yoked the development of these GORs to both


the ‘democratic deficit’ in English governance and the Party’s existing commitment to Scottish and Welsh devolution. In this context, the Labour Party was able to present a stronger case for English Regional Assemblies, depicting them as essential to eradicating the deep ‘democratic deficit’ which the Conservatives had presided over and as a vital means of reversing the trend towards political centralisation at Westminster and Whitehall. These aspects were given particular prominence in the Labour Party’s 1996 policy document A New Voice for England’s Regions: Proposals for English Regional Government – which developed some of the ideas mooted in the previous year’s consultation document, A Choice for England (Labour Party, 1995). Certainly, both documents deemed regional assemblies to be vital to the attainment of a number of objectives and principles. Firstly, as just noted, there was the need to tackle the ‘democratic deficit’ which had developed after 17 years of increasing and accelerating Conservative centralization, whereby England had acquired ‘a de facto tier of regional government’ which was ‘unelected, unaccountable, and largely unknown’, to the extent that the English regions have ‘administration without representation’ (Labour Party, 1996b: 1). Secondly, there was an apparent desire to invoke the principle of subsidiarity, with decisions being taken, as far as practicably possible, closest to those directly affected by them, a principle which had already been explicitly promoted via the European Union’s Maastricht Treaty, and which indicated that Labour’s regional policies were themselves being ‘Europeanised’. Indeed, the third reason cited in support of establishing English Regional Assemblies was precisely to provide the regions of England with an institutional voice which would help them ‘to get the best out of Europe’, a consideration given particular resonance by the growing importance of the European Union’s newly established Committee of the Regions, coupled with the opportunities for obtaining structural funds from the European Union for regional development and associated projects (Labour Party, 1996b: 5–6). The European dimension was underpinned by John Prescott’s 1995 appointment of Bruce Millan, a former Labour Minister and then European Commissioner – with responsibility for regional policy – to chair a Regional Policy Commission. When this published its report the following year, it unequivocally urged the creation of Regional Development Agencies in the English regions, these to be accountable to the appropriate Regional Chamber (Millan/Regional Policy Commission, 1996). However, while the need for accountability was acknowledged, the primary focus remained on the purported

English Regionalism

297

economic advantages to be gleaned from establishing regional bodies in England, thereby reinforcing the dirigisme which continued to underpin much of the Labour Party’s approach to devolution. Fourthly, A New Voice for England’s Regions referred to the Labour Party’s desire ‘to work in partnership with the people’, as part of a professed commitment to developing a more inclusive, consensual and less ‘tribal’ mode of politics. As such, A New Voice for England’s Regions adumbrated a two-stage process, the first of which entailed the establishment of Regional Chambers whose members would be indirectly elected from local authorities in the region, although with provision for the co-option of business, community and trade union representatives. It was envisaged that one of their primary functions would be ‘strategic co-ordination of a number of key aspects of public policy’, most notably in the spheres of economic development, transport, land use planning, environmental protection and health care. The Regional Chambers would also be ascribed an important role both in seeking funding from the European Union and in constituting ‘each region’s voice in Europe’, particularly vis-a-vis the Committee of the Regions, ‘whose English members they could in future help nominate’. At the same time, the establishment of these indirectly elected Regional Assemblies was to be accompanied pari passu by the creation of nine Regional Development Agencies, whose 12 members (six from the business community, four from local authorities and the remaining two from other bodies, such as voluntary organizations) would be appointed by Ministers – thereby theoretically providing a modicum of accountability to Parliament – their role being to develop and co-ordinate economic policies at regional level in England, in partnership with the Regional Chambers. The second stage outlined in A New Voice for England’s Regions would be the transformation of the Regional Chambers into directly elected Regional Assemblies albeit only when and where there was sufficient public support, as expressed via a referendum in the region. As Labour’s 1997 manifesto explained, the ‘demand for directly elected regional government so varies across England that it would be wrong to impose a uniform system.’ Instead, and ‘in time’, legislation would be introduced ‘to allow the people, region by region, to decide in a referendum whether want directly elected regional government’. Regional Assemblies would only be created ‘where clear popular consent is established’, via referenda (Mandelson and Liddle, 1996: 200). However, recognizing that the referendum requirement might be viewed by sceptics as a means of providing for subsequent prevarication, A New Voice for England was emphatic that


the ‘advocacy of referendums to measure popular support for elected assemblies is not intended to be a blocking device to prevent progress, but rather is a means of ensuring that these assemblies have their own legitimacy amongst local people.’ Yet it was also pointed out that prior to a referendum, proposals (drafted by the Regional Chamber) for the establishment of an English Regional Assembly would require some boundary changes ‘which would be agreed in consultation with the Local Government Commission’, as well as ‘voting arrangements agreed with the Electoral Commission.’ Thereafter, the Secretary of State for the Environment would consult the Opposition parties before reaching a final decision. Only if and when this stage was reached, and the Secretary of State gave their approval, would the referendum be held to gauge public support for an elected Assembly in the region concerned (Labour Party, 1996b: 11). New Labour seemed simultaneously to be proclaiming its commitment to English Regional Assemblies, whilst effectively ensuring that various opportunities existed for prevarication and procrastination. In this context, some commentators suggested that the Party’s proposals constituted ‘the most minimum democratic reform possible’ (John, 1999: 126), while others deemed New Labour’s commitment to English Regional Assemblies to be ‘half-hearted’, with English regionalism being the Cinderella of New Labour’s proposals for constitutional reform (Tomaney, 1999: 75). Certainly, the professed commitment to English regionalism, in the form of elected Regional Assemblies, was characterized by a notable lack of enthusiasm amongst much of Labour’s leadership and appeared to constitute one of the weakest links in the Party’s programme of constitutional reform and modernization of Britain’s political system. Or as an academic expert on devolution observed a year before the first Blair Government, ‘New Labour has advanced a little further than Old Labour in developing English regional reform, but not much’, for examination ‘of the proposals . . . reveal significant shortcomings in delivering decentralisation, democratisation and better government in England’, not least because of a determination to ‘maintain the levers of central control, and to appease [Labour] party interests in English local government’ (Bradbury, 1996: 8).

The Blair Governments and English regionalism Although the first New Labour Government, elected in May 1997, swiftly fulfilled its commitment to establishing a Scottish Parliament and a Welsh Assembly, whilst also holding a referendum concerning

English Regionalism

299

the creation of an elected Assembly for London – the Greater London Authority (along with an elected mayor) – it was subsequently made clear that no other directly elected Regional Assemblies would be established before the 2001 general election. The Minister for the Regions, Dick Caborn, insisted that whilst the Government remained fully committed to the devolution of power to the English regions, it was equally concerned to ensure that it proceeded ‘cautiously, and . . . to ensure that what we create has been well thought out’ (The Guardian, 13 May 1998). As such, he informed the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and the Regions that people living in the English regions would ‘be given the opportunity’ to instigate directly elected Regional Assemblies ‘at a time after the next [2001] general election’ (Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and the Regions, HC 415, 1997-98, Qu.561). Meanwhile, John Prescott, whom Caborn served, recognized that the establishment of Regional Assemblies would invariably require further reform of local government in England, in order to ensure a framework of single tier or unitary local authorities to function in partnership with ‘their’ Regional Assembly. This, in turn, would require serious consideration of the precise relationship between a directly elected Regional Assembly and the Ministerially appointed Regional Development Agency, for although the Government doubtless envisaged another ‘inclusive’ partnership, there would also be ample scope for disagreement, not merely between central government and the Regional Assembly, but between the Regional Assembly and the Regional Development Agency, especially given the weight of business opinion and representation on the latter, coupled with the Government’s expectation that the chairs of the Agencies’ 12-member boards would normally emanate from the private sector (Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, 1997: 48). Pending consideration of these issues, the Blair Government confined itself to establishing the Regional Development Agencies, as delineated in the 1997 White Paper, Building Partnerships for Prosperity. This also signalled the Government’s intention to proceed with the proposed establishment of Regional Chambers, which were depicted as ‘a first step towards greater devolution in England’ and as the precursor to directly elected Regional Assemblies. This last point was reiterated by John Prescott, when he insisted, in the House of Commons, that the Government was ‘committed to moving, with the consent of local people, to directly-elected regional government in England’, although he also pointed out that because demand for such government varied in different parts of the country, ‘it would be wrong to envisage a uniform approach


at this stage’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 302, col. 59). Indeed, in his introduction to Building Partnerships for Prosperity, Prescott observed that ‘There is a lot we believe we can do within the present democratic structure to build up the voice of the regions’ (Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, 1997: 7, emphasis added). In the meantime, the Regional Chambers – also widely referred to as Regional Assemblies and established under the auspices of the 1998 Regional Development Agencies Act – were comprised of local councillors (who generally constituted two-thirds of the membership) and regional ‘stakeholders’ comprising the remaining third or so, these variously recruited from such sectors of the community as business, education, faith groups, arts and culture, voluntary bodies and environmental groups. Although not directly elected – the members were nominated by the organisation which they served or were employed by – the membership of these Regional Chambers/Assemblies was intended to enshrine the principles of inclusiveness and partnership between regional ‘stakeholders’. Meanwhile, the very title of the White Paper heralding the Regional Development Agencies seemed to confirm that New Labour, just like Old Labour, was imbued with a strong economistic perspective, to the extent that this purported initial move towards English devolution was primarily concerned with the industrial and economic benefits which were expected to accrue ‘The main purpose of RDAs is to address the economic deficit that has bedevilled the English regions . . . . We promised each English region . . . agencies that would provide for effective and properly co-ordinated regional economic development, underpin the wider regeneration and enable the English regions to improve their competitiveness’ [Richard Caborn (Minister for the Regions), House of Commons Debates, Vol. 304, cols. 377, 372]. In this context, the objective of political democratization and popular participation by ordinary citizens via regional government appears to have been deemed a rather lower or lesser priority. Indeed, some commentators suggested that the political/democratic rationale had ‘come a poor second’ to the extent that ‘directly elected regional government’ was no longer ‘a live part of the political agenda’ (McQuail and Donnelly, 1999: 273–80). The Local Government Association was certainly disappointed ‘that progress on RDAs is proceeding much faster than proposals for regional chambers and directly elected regional assemblies’ (Local Government Association, 1997), while an academic expert warned that ‘Labour’s first foray into the English regions may turn out to have been a missed opportunity’ (Mawson, 1998: 174). The Government’s response to such criticisms

English Regionalism

301

was to ‘recognise the democratic deficit argument’, but emphasize that ‘the [Regional Development Agencies] Bill is evolutionary . . . the first stage . . . evolutionary legislation . . . the beginning of a process’ (Angela Eagle [Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions], House of Commons Debates, Vol. 304, cols. 448–9). Meanwhile, at the end of 2000, well into ‘New Labour’s’ fourth year in Office, it was reported that Tony Blair – supported by the Chancellor, Gordon Brown – intended to omit any pledges on elected English Regional Assemblies from the Party’s 2001 election manifesto. Although it was widely recognized that Blair had never been enthusiastic about English devolution, senior Labour Party sources apparently claimed that he had finally been persuaded to abandon the commitment in the wake of the low turn-outs in local and European Parliament elections during his premiership, for these convinced him that the British electorate would not respond positively to another tier of elected bodies necessitating further treks to the polls (Dillon, 2000: 5). What might also have dissuaded Blair from proceeding more swiftly or enthusiastically with directly elected English Regional Assemblies was the experience of establishing the Greater London Authority, along with an elected Mayor of London.

The Greater London Authority and Mayor of London The one notable exception to New Labour’s apparent reluctance to establish directly elected Assemblies for the regions of England was the creation of the Greater London Authority, accompanied by an elected Mayor of London. Yet the circumstances surrounding the subsequent candidacy and election of the Mayor further revealed the ambiguity amongst New Labour’s leadership with regard to genuine devolution, as opposed to a form of devolution closely regulated from the centre. The antecedents of the Greater London Authority can be traced back to the second (1983–1987) Thatcher Government’s abolition of the GLC in 1986 (followed by the Inner London Education Authority in 1990). Thereafter, services in London were provided through a plethora of appointed boards, committees and quangos, with the capital ostensibly governed through its 32 boroughs and the City of London. This raised questions about both accountability and strategic co-ordination in London, to the extent that John Major’s Administration felt obliged to establish a Government Office for London, in 1994, while the Department of Transport inaugurated its own Minister for Transport in London [this section draws upon the excellent chapter by Tomaney (2000)].


During the 1990s, the Labour Party moved steadily towards advocacy of a directly elected body for London, along with a Mayor. Its increasing advocacy of such institutional innovations was linked both to the Party’s more general commitment to constitutional reform and devolution, including a formal policy of elected English Regional Assemblies, coupled with criticism of the Thatcher and Major Governments’ increasing use of non-elected, Ministerially appointed quangos. It was not until 1996, however, two years after Tony Blair had been elected leader of what was now widely known as New Labour, that the Labour Party formally committed itself to a directly elected Assembly for London, along with a Mayor. As with Scottish and Welsh devolution, Labour’s proposed Greater London Authority and Mayor of London were subject to approval via a referendum, this being conducted on 7 May 1998 (the same day as the elections for London’s borough councils). Although turn-out was disappointingly low – less than 35 per cent – the referendum did elicit 72 per cent support for the Greater London Authority and associated Mayor of London, thereby providing the Blair Government with a ‘mandate’ to implement the proposals. Yet the complexities of governance in London were such that, at over 400 pages, the 1999 Greater London Authority Act was longer than either the Scotland Act or the Government of Wales Act (Tomaney, 2000: 247). The legislation provided for a Greater London Authority whose primary role was to promote the economic, environmental and social development of London, while also exercising the function of scrutiny vis-à-vis the Mayor (for a useful overview, see Bax, 2002: 103–19). The role of the Mayor of London meanwhile was mainly strategic, the objective being to provide leadership and co-ordination of the designated policy areas just mentioned, but with particular regard also for transport in the capital. Given the vital importance of transport in London, this particular remit subsequently proving particularly conflictual, as we will note shortly. The Mayor of London’s accountability to the Greater London Authority was formalized both through the provision of a monthly report and through an equally regular personal appearance for ‘Mayor’s Question Time’. In keeping with electoral innovations deployed for the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly, along with the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Blair Government adopted a novel system of election for both the Greater London Authority and the Mayor. The Greater London Authority comprises 25 Members, 14 of whom are elected on a traditional constituency basis (the constituencies based on groups of existing London

English Regionalism

303

boroughs), with a further 11 elected on a proportional ‘top-up’ basis. The Mayor of London, meanwhile, elected at the same time, is chosen using the Supplementary Vote. When the elections were held on 5 May 2000, the Labour Party won nine seats in total, six of which were constituency seats, plus three ‘top-up’ seats, whilst the Conservatives also won nine seats, of which eight were constituency seats. All of the four seats won by the Liberals, along with the three won by the Green party, were via the ‘top-up’ mechanism. However, it was the election for the Mayor of London, held at the same time, which proved most newsworthy. Indeed, ever since the Blair Government had announced its plans to institute a London Mayor, a highly public battle had ensued, as the Blair Government sought to oppose the candidature of Ken Livingstone, who announced his intention to seek nomination as Labour’s candidate in March 1999. However, Livingstone was not acceptable to Tony Blair, to the extent that the Labour leadership seem to become pre-occupied with a ‘stop Livingstone’ campaign, to which end Frank Dobson was persuaded – rather reluctantly, it seems – to resign from his Cabinet post as Secretary of State for Health, in order to seek nomination as the official Labour candidate and thereby compete against Livingstone. Yet whereas the Labour candidature for Mayor of London was originally expected to be subject to a ballot of Party members in the capital, once Livingstone had been grudgingly permitted to put his name forward, it was announced that an electoral college would determine the final choice. This electoral college comprised ordinary Labour Party members in London, affiliated trade unions in the capital, and Labour’s MPs and MEPs and candidates already adopted for the Greater London Authority (Tomaney, 2000: 256). It was widely suspected that the composition of this electoral college would make it more difficult for Livingstone to win the candidature, particularly when it became apparent that participating trade unions would not be required to ballot their members (for a damning indictment of the Labour leadership’s attempted ‘stitch-up’, see Freedland, 1999). Furthermore, prior to the ballot, Livingstone was ‘invited’ to offer two assurances. Firstly, that he would accept the Labour leadership’s commitment to partial privatization of London Underground, which Livingstone had publicly opposed, and secondly, that if he was defeated in the Party’s ballot, he would not subsequently contest the Mayoralty as an Independent. He was reluctant to offer the first of these two assurances requested, but did accept the latter.


When the ballot was held in February 2000, it was Frank Dobson who emerged as Labour’s candidate for Mayor of London, securing 51.53 per cent of the vote against Livingstone’s 48.47 per cent, with Livingstone having been publicly attacked, and Dobson supported, during the campaign, by both Tony Blair (1999) and Gordon Brown (2000). Two weeks later, in spite of his previous undertaking, Livingstone declared that he would stand as an Independent candidate in the Mayoral election, thus attracting further criticism from Tony Blair. Ken Livingstone was also expelled from the Labour Party and barred from membership for at least five years. When the election was finally held in May, Livingstone still emerged victorious, winning 39 per cent of the first preference votes and a further 12.6 per cent of the second preferences. By contrast, Frank Dobson attained only 13.1 per cent of the first preferences and 16 per cent of the second preferences, leaving him in third place behind the Conservative candidate, Steve Norris. Having been duly elected, Livingstone illustrated his own commitment to a new, inclusive politics, by appointing Greens and Liberal Democrats, alongside Labour members, to his Cabinet. The issue which dominated the first 15 months of Livingstone’s Mayorship was that of the future of London Underground, which, it was universally accepted, required major and urgent investment. However, whereas Livingstone strongly favoured raising the necessary revenues via the issuing of bonds (Livingstone, 1999), the Blair Government was committed to partial privatization, via the Public–Private Partnership scheme which New Labour had become so enamoured with, whereby private consortiums would assume responsibility for track and tunnel maintenance, whilst the trains and stations remained publicly owned and managed. Such was the depth of disagreement between Livingstone and the Government over the issue that it was only finally resolved via a High Court judgement in favour of the Government, although the judge was nonetheless critical of the Government’s handling of the affair, and in particular, its apparent failure to make sufficiently clear, when establishing the Greater London Authority and the Mayorship, that whoever became Mayor would only acquire overall responsibility for London Underground after the Public–Private Partnership scheme had been implemented (The Guardian, 31 July 2001). The week prior to this court case had also seen Tony Blair sack Bob Kiley as chair of London Underground, due to his refusal to implement the Public–Private Partnership, although Kiley remained as Ken Livingstone’s appointed Transport Commissioner. Transport also proved to be a source of tension between Livingstone and the Blair Government due to the former’s

English Regionalism

305

desire to impose ‘congestion charges’ on private motorists in London, in an attempt at reducing the volume of traffic in the capital. If, as was variously reported, Tony Blair had become less enthusiastic about the idea of English devolution towards the end of his first term of Office, then it is likely that the tensions and conflicts arising from the election of Ken Livingstone as Mayor of London – tensions and conflicts which continued into New Labour’s second term of Office – were themselves a major factor. Ken Livingstone had originally declared, at the launch of the Greater London Authority, that it was ‘blazing a trail’ for regional government in other parts of England (quoted in Bax, 2002: 103), but within a year of its inauguration, Tony Blair seemed to have adopted a rather less enthusiastic view.

Developments since the 2001 election Contrary to expectations that the issue would be discretely dropped, Labour’s 2001 election manifesto did reaffirm the Party’s commitment to facilitating directly elected Regional Assemblies, when and where the relevant populace indicated its support via referendum, and where a unitary system of local government was established (Labour Party, 2001: 35). The latter proviso was intended to obviate criticism that elected Regional Assembles would establish another layer of bureaucracy at sub-national level, for it clearly implied that a pre-requisite of establishing Regional Assemblies was a reform of local government too. This, of course, could be interpreted either as a manifestation of ‘joined-up government’ and strategic thinking or as a means of deferral and delay. It was not until almost a year after the Blair Government’s re-election, however, that the professed commitment to directly elected Regional Assemblies was reiterated and finally imbued with rather more substance. May 2002 witnessed the publication of a White Paper, Your Region, Your Choice: Revitalising the English Regions, delineating the means by which directly elected Regional Assemblies would gradually be established and what their remit would be. The delay in reaffirming the commitment to such Assemblies was due to lack of enthusiasm, and even antipathy, amongst some Cabinet Ministers, which thus necessitated several months of persuasion by the Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott. Once Gordon Brown and Tony Blair had been persuaded to lend their support – the latter in particular having previously been lukewarm – the Government was able to reaffirm its commitment with concrete proposals and a timetable for implementation.


Tony Blair himself actually provided the Foreword to Your Region, Your Choice: Revitalising the English Regions, in which he asserted that establishing directly elected English Regional Assemblies ‘builds on the success of devolution elsewhere in the UK’ and offered the people of England ‘more accountable, more streamlined and more joined-up government.’ John Prescott, and the then Secretary of State for Transport, Local Government and the Regions, Stephen Byers, then offered further justifications for directly elected Regional Assemblies, most notably reduced bureaucracy, less duplication and overlap of responsibilities, greater efficiency, improved co-ordination and greater democratic control by citizens ‘over decisions which matter to them’. The White Paper reiterated that English Regional Assemblies would only be established in regions which illustrated sufficient support, via a referendum. They would also require a reform of local government, entailing the creation of unitary authorities, this being deemed necessary to avoid (Conservative) allegations that English regionalism entailed a new layer of sub-national bureaucracy in England. The White Paper envisaged that the English Regional Assemblies would be comprised of between 25 and 35 members, elected via a version of the AMS (as used for elections to the Greater London Authority, Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly), a method of election which was again intended to illustrate the Blair Government’s professed commitment to ‘inclusive politics’, while also enhancing the representativeness and legitimacy of these bodies. Having been so elected, each Regional Assembly would then (s)elect a leader and a Cabinet of up to six Members, who would be charged with developing policies and strategies, securing the Assembly’s approval for them, and then supervising or co-ordinating their implementation. They would also be granted considerable discretion over the allocation and expenditure of their budgets in their respective regions, although they would nonetheless be expected to adhere to particular key targets or priorities specified by central government. The Blair Government anticipated that at least one regional referendum would be held before the next (2005) general election and that if this resulted in a ‘Yes’ vote, the ensuing directly elected Regional Assembly would be established very soon after the election. This time scale was ostensibly intended to provide the Government with sufficient time to introduce the necessary legislation and reform local government in order to establish a unitary authority in the region, although as with other aspects of constitutional reform, sceptics could equally view the time scale as indicative of a lack of enthusiasm and perhaps an opportunity to procrastinate.

English Regionalism

307

In fact, the promised referendum was duly held, in the North-East of England (the English region widely assumed to be most strongly in favour of its own elected Assembly) in November 2004, when the result was 197,310 (22.1 per cent) voting in favour of a directly elected Regional Assembly and 696,519 (77.9 per cent) voting against. On a turn-out of fractionally over 47 per cent, this meant that barely 1 in 10 voters in the North East of England lent their support to the proposed directly elected Regional Assembly (for a detailed analysis of these results, see Rallings and Thrasher, 2005, from whose coverage this paragraph extrapolates). Furthermore, even amongst Labour supporters in the region, there was little support for the proposed elected Regional Assembly, with 22 per cent of Labour supporters voting ‘Yes’, 37 per cent voting ‘No’ and the remaining 41 per cent not voting. Amongst the North East’s voters generally, there was a widespread expectation that an elected Regional Assembly would lead to higher taxes, and that overall such an institution would be ‘a waste of money’. Few of the region’s citizens expected an elected Regional Assembly to boost the North East’s economy, nor were many of them persuaded that it would provide ordinary people with a greater voice in how the North East was governed. Such scepticism seemed to be vindicated, a few weeks after the referendum rejection, by a select committee report which suggested that ‘the scope of the powers and responsibilities which the Government was prepared to give to Assemblies was disappointing and would limit their effectiveness. The general power proposed for elected assemblies needed to be more explicit . . . more ambitious’, for with the powers enshrined in the draft Regional Assemblies Bill ‘there would have been little chance of persuading the electorate . . . that the elected regional assemblies would be worth establishing’. It was also deemed vital that the ‘the assemblies have enough powers and were seen as worthwhile’ in order to ‘attract a new group of politicians’ (Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Housing, Planning, Local Government and the Regions, 2005: 3, 14, 13). Whatever the reasons for such an emphatic rejection, the unequivocal result of the referendum on an elected Regional Assembly for the North East of England made it very unlikely that the Blair Government would persevere with its formal plans for English regional government (Hetherington, 2004: 15; Morris, 2004: 18; Sherman, 2004: 6). With the North East having clearly rejected an elected Regional Assembly, Ministers accepted that no other region was likely to vote ‘Yes’ if given the opportunity in a referendum and that for the foreseeable future, the democratization of English regional governance would have to be ‘put


on hold’. In response to the referendum result, John Prescott made a statement to the House of Commons in which he declared that We will keep regional Government offices and regional development agencies, and as for the regional assemblies, we will keep them also. They are not as good as assemblies with directly elected members, but people are directly appointed to them. Elected councillors serve on them, so they can make decisions about regional priorities instead of the unelected members of quangos. I think that that is right. That dimension will continue and we will support it. (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 426, col. 591) However, given that few senior Labour Ministers, apart from John Prescott, have shown any enthusiasm for English regional democracy or decentralization, the setback represented by the North East’s ‘No’ vote was unlikely to have caused too much dismay to Tony Blair and most of his Cabinet colleagues. Indeed, the prevalent feeling may well have been one of the considerable relief that voters had emphatically rejected a policy which few Labour Ministers had themselves seriously supported or considered to be of high political salience. It should also be noted that some of this Ministerial antipathy apparently reflected and reinforced scepticism amongst various Government Departments, some of whom were concerned about the implications (for their own roles and responsibilities) of devolving power to directly elected English Regional Assemblies (Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Housing, Planning, Local Government and the Regions, 2005: 13). Not surprisingly, therefore, Labour’s 2005 manifesto contained no new proposals concerning directly elected Regional Assemblies, although there was a pledge to devolve further responsibility to existing regional bodies in relation to planning, housing, economic development and transport’ (Labour Party, 2005: 108). This, though, meant that while English regional bodies would be granted increased responsibilities, in accordance with the Government’s professed commitment to devolution and decentralization, the ‘democratic deficit’ would remain. Ministers could retort, though, that it was citizens themselves who did not want directly elected Regional Assemblies, rather than the Government resisting democratization of the English regions. Yet the fact remained that in the absence of direct elections, the Regional Assemblies suffered from ambiguous accountability, hovering somewhat easily between local authorities and/or central government, a constitutional conundrum candidly acknowledged by the Government’s own subsequent

English Regionalism

309

Review of Sub-national Economic Development and Regeneration, which thus announced their abolition (HM Treasury, 2007: 55 and 94–5, paras 4.35–40 and 6.95–100). The accountability of Regional Development Agencies and regional policy in general was instead to be facilitated by the appointment – in June 2007 – of new Regional Ministers (one for each English region), coupled with the establishment of nine regional select committees. These initiatives were part of the Government’s constitutional reform programme enshrined in The Governance of Britain Green Paper, in which it was explained that the Regional Ministers (who nonetheless retained their existing Departmental responsibilities) would simultaneously provide both a sense of political and strategic leadership for their region – working closely with the RDAs and GORs – and constitute a conduit between the English regions, Parliament and the Government. Certainly, it was envisaged that in the absence of public support for directly elected Regional Assemblies to monitor the work of the RDAs, the appearance of Regional Ministers before the relevant (House of Commons) regional select committee would provide an alternative form of accountability and parliamentary scrutiny and thereby reduce the democrat deficit (Straw, 2007: 37–8; HM Treasury, 2007: 96, para 6.107; House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 463, cols. 161–2, 165; Communities and Local Government Select Committee, 2007, paras 112–4). Moreover, the creation of regional select committees seemed to exemplify Gordon Brown’s professed desire to enhance the role of the House of Commons vis-a-vis the executive, as noted towards the end of Chapter 2.

Conclusion In its approach to English devolution, New Labour has proved itself rather similar to Old Labour in various respects. Both ‘variants’ of the Labour Party have tended to approach the issue from a highly economistic perspective, viewing regional questions in England largely in terms of economic and industrial strategies and co-ordination. In this context, the political dimension, defined as overcoming the democratic deficit and empowering ordinary voters in the regions, has been ascribed only secondary importance and alluded to as something which can readily be deferred for some unspecified date in the future. Furthermore, as Mather has noted, there are notable similarities between the regional bodies established by the ‘Old Labour’ Wilson Governments in the 1960s and those created by the Blair Government in the late 1990s (Mather, 2000: 10–38). The 1964–1970 Wilson Governments


established a series of regional planning boards (staffed by civil servants and thus constitutionally accountable to Ministers), in conjunction with a number of regional economic planning councils whose membership comprised government appointees drawn from industry, trade unions and local government. The first Blair Government, meanwhile, inaugurated nine Regional Development Agencies, alongside eight Regional Chambers (covering each of the Agencies outside London). Whilst the Regional Development Agencies have been ‘business-led’ (albeit with 4 of the 13 ‘board members’ drawn from local government), they are also formally ‘accountable to Ministers and Parliament’ (Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, 1997: 26, 50). Meanwhile, the Regional Chambers were to be comprised of ‘councillors from local authorities in the region’, along with ‘representatives from business; education and training; the voluntary, cultural and environmental protection sectors; and the trade unions’ (Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, 1997: 52). Under the first Blair Government, as with the Wilson Governments, the primary objectives of the regional bodies were economic in nature, their membership was ‘representative’ in functional terms and their accountability was to Ministers, rather than voters in the regions. In both cases, directly elected regional assemblies were alluded to as a possible development evolving from the existing bodies in the future, but with little sense of genuine commitment or enthusiasm from Labour’s parliamentary leadership. This too derived, in part, from the economism inherent in Labour Party thinking on this issue, for there has long been an assumption – sometimes explicit, sometimes implicit – that what underpins many regional grievances are economic disparities, such that once these are ameliorated through the ‘correct’ economic policies regionally administered, the demand for political devolution and directly elected regional government will dissipate. Yet if economic problems persist or worsen, as they did during Wilson Governments of the late 1960s, then this too tends to render the Party leadership even more apprehensive about relinquishing political control to the regions, on the grounds that even greater economic planning or co-ordination from Westminster or Whitehall is required. Either way, from the Labour leadership’s perspective, the case for genuine regional democratization is apparently obviated. With regard to New Labour, even if Tony Blair had displayed more interest in English devolution – in the guise of directly elected Regional Assemblies – then he would probably have been dismayed by the experiences of the other devolutionary policies which his Governments

English Regionalism

311

pursued. The various problems which he and the Labour Party have encountered in the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly, the Northern Ireland Assembly and the contest for Mayor of London seemed to compound his apparent lack of interest in the issue, although he could readily have pointed to the lack of enthusiasm in the regions themselves to justify a sceptical stance (one survey conducted during his first term indicated that in only two regions of England – London and the North East – did more than 50 per cent of citizens favour an elected regional assembly; The Economist, 27 March 1999). Moreover, Blair’s lack of enthusiasm for, or interest in, English devolution and directly elected Regional Assemblies seems to have been shared by most of his Ministerial colleagues, with John Prescott being the only senior Minister recognized as being a strong and consistent proponent of such English regionalism. Indeed, that the North East of England was able to vote in a 2004 referendum on whether it wanted an elected Regional Assembly owed much to Prescott’s dedication and perseverance. However, it sees reasonable to assume that the resounding ‘No’ vote delivered by the North East’s voters did not cause too much disappointment to Prescott’s Cabinet colleagues, least of all Blair himself; the electorate had decisively rejected a measure which few senior Labour politicians seemed to care much for, and for which, John Prescott had thus been virtually the sole standard-bearer for three decades.

9 Northern Ireland

Introduction It is widely acknowledged that the ‘Irish question’ was generally accorded low saliency by the Labour Party until the emergence of ‘the troubles’ during the latter half of the 1960s (Morgan, 1985: 200), for although (as noted in Chapters 6 and 7) Labour was initially in favour of ‘Home Rule All Round’, the issue was certainly not ascribed much importance given the Party’s primary goal of securing parliamentary representation at Westminster, in order to advance the material interests of the organized working class. Indeed, Jones and Keating point out that the Labour Party’s formal, yet unenthusiastic, support for Home Rule owed much to its concern to remove the Irish Question off the agenda, lest it served to divide the labour movement in England, Scotland and Wales, whilst also hindering Labour’s commitment to change through peaceful, constitutional channels (Jones and Keating, 1985: 170). Ultimately, nationalism was considered a digression from the Labour Party’s pursuit of economic and social reform to benefit ordinary working people, particularly when the nationalism in question was suffused with a deep and divisive religious dimension. Or as Jones and Keating express it, until the late 1960s, ‘Labour . . . found it politically expedient to disregard the constitutional and moral issues raised by Northern Ireland’ and was ‘prepared to ignore a question which only muddied the waters of the socio-economic priorities the party had set itself.’ Certainly, after the settlement of 1921 (which formally created Northern Ireland as a nation-state entirely separate from the rest of Ireland, and as part of the United Kingdom, albeit enjoying considerable autonomy from Westminster), ‘Labour’s concern for Ireland and Irish problems rapidly and perceptibly declines’ (Jones and Keating, 1985: 168, 170). 312

Northern Ireland

313

When the Northern Ireland ‘question’ did re-emerge in the 1960s, the Labour Party found itself seeking simultaneously to reassure the Protestant/Unionist majority in the Province that Northern Ireland’s status as a constituent member of the United Kingdom was secure, in accordance with the wishes of the majority of the population in the six counties, whilst also maintaining that Irish reunification was Labour’s long-term aspiration. In the meantime, the 1964–1970 Labour Governments sought to persuade the Unionist administration in Belfast to implement social reforms that would ameliorate the socio-economic deprivation of Northern Ireland’s Catholic minority, while from 1970s onwards, Labour policy has generally entailed the pursuit of some form of power-sharing between the two communities in Northern Ireland, whilst also maintaining or restoring civil order and combating terrorism. In pursuing such an approach (which has also been broadly pursued by Conservative administrations since 1970), senior Labour parliamentarians have accepted that Irish reunification is extremely unlikely – virtually inconceivable – in the foreseeable future, due to the vehement opposition of the Unionist majority. Instead, Labour (and Conservative) Governments throughout the post-1970 period have oscillated between devolving power to Northern Ireland (via power-sharing institutions and mechanisms) and imposing direct rule from Westminster, the latter occurring invariably as a form of crisis management when particular power-sharing arrangements break down.

Labour and Northern Ireland prior to the 1960s By the time that the Labour Party won the 1945 general election, it had accepted the position of Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom and, as such, was formally committed to maintaining the constitutional status quo with regard to Ireland. Indeed, the Attlee Government actually strengthened Northern Ireland’s status in the United Kingdom, firstly by bestowing on the province the right of veto over any change to its border with the Irish Free state and, secondly, by stating categorically, in May 1949, that ‘it is no part of the business of this Government . . . to take the initiative to diminish the territory of the United Kingdom’ (Herbert Morrison, House of Commons Debates, 4th series, Vol. 46, cols. 1957–9). The occasion for this declaration was the passing of the 1949 Ireland Act, of which Section 1 (2) reiterated that


In no event will Northern Ireland or any part thereof cease to be part of His Majesty’s dominions and of the United Kingdom without the consent of the Parliament of Northern Ireland. Certainly, having been elected in July 1945, the Labour Government, led by Clement Attlee, had been at pains to avoid alienating or antagonizing the Unionist community in Northern Ireland, even though there was significant anxiety at all levels of the Labour Party over the socio-economic deprivation and reported discrimination endured by the Province’s Catholic community (see, for example, NA CAB 129/2, memorandum by Addison, 7 September 1945; NA CAB 21/1838, Pakenham to Attlee, 11 January 1949; NA PREM 8/1464, Cabinet conclusions, 12 May 1949; House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 438, cols. 1467–530). The Cabinet’s stance, however, was to keep intervention in Northern Irish politics to an absolute minimum. This partly reflected recognition of the majority viewpoint in Northern Ireland with regard to the Province’s status in the United Kingdom, but also derived from acknowledgement of the active support provided by the Province during the Second World War, as compared to the neutral stance adopted by Eire (and the latter’s subsequent refusal to join NATO). Indeed, according to Philip Noel-Baker, a Commonwealth Relations Minister, ‘without the help of Northern Ireland, Hitler would have won the submarine war and [we] would have been defeated’ (quoted in Barton, 1993: 5). In similar vein did Herbert Morrison observe that Northern Ireland’s active contribution to the War effort, compared to the formal neutrality of Eire, was ‘bound to have a permanently modifying effect on many people’s opinions’ in Britain (quoted in Donoughue and Jones, 1973: 307–8; NA CAB 21/13, 12 September 1946). Although many Labour politicians hoped, and even assumed, that Northern Ireland and Eire would one day be re-united, the Attlee Government’s stance was to avoid explicit advocacy of unification and, instead, win the trust and co-operation of Northern Ireland’s Unionist community. Morrison seemingly spoke for many of his senior Labour colleagues when he informed Eamon de Valera, Leader of Fianna Fail (and many years later, a President of the Republic of Ireland), in the autumn of 1946, that any raising of the issue of partition would result in ‘a storm in Ulster’, an ‘explosion of no advantage to any of us’ (NA CAB 129/13, memorandum by Morrison, 16 October 1946). As such, the 1945–1951 Labour Governments sought to ensure that the ‘festering and acknowledged grievance of Northern Ireland remained a relatively minor issue’ (Morgan, 1985: 200).

Northern Ireland

315

A similar desire to avoid antagonizing or alienating Unionists in Northern Ireland informed the Cabinet’s refusal to authorize an inquiry into allegations of gerrymandering and other unfair electoral practices in Northern Ireland. The calls for such an inquiry emanated from those on the Labour backbenches, such as the young Michael Foot (Daily Herald, 13 and 20 May 1949), who were anxious that the 1949 Ireland Act, by effectively making partition permanent, would also serve to institutionalize political malpractice and corruption in Northern Ireland, to the obvious detriment of the Catholic minority. However, Attlee and his Cabinet colleagues were adamant that the Government ‘would be illadvised to appear to be interesting themselves in this matter, which fell under the jurisdiction of the Northern Ireland government’ (NA CAB 128/14, Cabinet conclusions, 12 May 1949). The point was reiterated by Herbert Morrison a few weeks later, at Labour’s annual conference, when he insisted that ‘It would be most unwise for us or anybody else to seek to invlove the British Labour Party in internal Irish politics . . . we do not want to interfere with the internal politics of Ireland . . . it would be inexpedient and unwise for us to be embroiled in all the excitement of internal Irish politics.’ In any case, following partition in 1920–1921, a convention became established at Westminster that questions pertaining to ‘transferred’ matters – which, in this context, included electoral arrangements in Northern Ireland – ‘were considered ultra vires since they were the responsibility of Stormont’ (Cunningham, 1999: 153), a convention which can be traced back to a ruling by the Speaker of the House of Commons, in 1923 (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 163, cols. 1624–5). This too served to reduce the Labour Party’s overall interest in ‘the Irish question’ from 1921 until the mid-1960s. During this period (and, indeed, beyond), the Labour Party sought to straddle two contradictory positions vis-a-vis Northern Ireland. The first stance, as already indicated, was to reassure the majority (Protestant/Unionist) community in Northern Ireland that their views and aspirations would remain paramount and that there could be no question of re-unification with the South unless they themselves declared their support. In this respect, the Labour Party sought to convince the Unionist community in Northern Ireland of the virtual permanence of the Province’s constitutional position within the United Kingdom. Yet at the same time, Labour remained formally committed to Irish unification at some unspecified date in the future, albeit based on the consent of the dominant community in the North. Yet here, Labour appeared uncertain as to likely future trends and the extent to which the


partition of 1921 would become more or less firmly entrenched. On the one hand, it was likely that the position of the Unionist majority in the North would become so firmly entrenched, and their material advantages so extensive, that partition would effectively become permanent, with no chance of Irish unification. Yet on the other hand, there also appeared to be an expectation within the Labour Party that, somehow through the ‘inevitability of gradualness’, the hostility and distrust engendered by partition would abate, thus presaging reconciliation, and, ultimately, reunification, although none of this would occur in the foreseeable future. Whether the Labour Party genuinely believed in the credibility of simultaneously endorsing both options, and thus discerned no contradiction between them, or enunciated them simultaneously in order to pacify divisions both in Northern Ireland and within the Labour Party itself is a matter of conjecture. It was Morrison, again, who articulated what soon became the prevalent, but ambiguous and equivocal, perspective of the Labour leadership until the 1960s, namely that the wisest course on all sides was not to hurry the partition issue. Time was a great healer, and . . . it would be a great healer between the three parties concerned, namely Great Britain, Eire, and Northern Ireland, but if the issue was raised in any precipitate manner, first class trouble might ensue . . . . Northern Ireland would not be a consenting party, at any rate in anything like the early future . . . much was to be gained and nothing was to be lost by a policy of developing good cooperative relations . . . but not precipitating the issue of partition. (NA CAB 21/13, 12 September 1946) A week later, Addison endorsed Morrison’s perspective, claiming that although ‘it is no doubt right and inevitable that Northern Ireland should enter into some kind of closer relationship’, in which event, the Government should not discourage ‘the North and South of Ireland in any move that they make with the object of getting together’, it was also the case that ‘for the present our only safe course is to maintain silence’ and ‘decline to be drawn on the matter of partition’ (NA CAB 129/13, 18 October 1946). The recommendations of Morrison and Addison were then approved at a Cabinet meeting at the end of October (NA CAB 128/6, 29 October 1946). Thereafter, the Labour Party hardly considered Northern Ireland for the next 15 years. During the early 1960s, there was some desultory discussion about the possibility of a future Labour government appointing a Northern Ireland Office in Whitehall, along with a junior Minister for Northern

Northern Ireland

317

Irish affairs, thereby providing a conduit for closer co-operation between Westminster and Stormont, particularly with regard to economic and fiscal matters. There was also a suggestion that Northern Ireland might be allocated an additional three seats at Westminster, but only in return for a reform of electoral law in Northern Ireland to eradicate the gerrymandering deployed to reduce Catholic representation at Stormont and in local government (Labour Party Archives, RD.550/November 1963). Yet these issues aside, the primary approach of the Labour Party during its 13 years (1951–1964) in Opposition, with regard to Northern Ireland, was similar to that adopted towards Scotland and Wales, namely that many of the Province’s problems would be ameliorated through economic planning and industrial regeneration presided over by a Labour government at Westminster, in which case, it was claimed, ‘Constitutional questions need not arise’. After all, it was pointed out, the Labour Party had ‘always shown the most scrupulous respect for the constitutional position of Northern Ireland’ (Labour Party Archives, R.D.578/November 1963). As such, when Labour was returned to Office in 1964, there existed a ‘blank wall of incomprehension and ignorance about Ulster’, to the extent that MPs who ‘knew about Saigon or Salisbury [the capital of Rhodesia, the African state now called Zimbabwe] seemed to know nothing of Stormont.’ Some Labour MPs were also wary of showing any interest in Northern Irish politics because they were ‘worried at the delicate balance of religious controversy in their own Constituencies’ (Rose, 1981: 179).

Labour and ‘the troubles’ in the 1960s It was during the later half of the 1960s that the ‘Irish Question’ seriously began to vex the Labour Party, for by this time, there was a growing awareness of systematic discrimination against Catholics by the Protestant-dominated regime in Northern Ireland (the Protestants by this time well into their fifth decade of unbroken domination in Stormont, the Parliament of the province), to the extent that Harold Wilson, the Labour Prime Minister, himself began to take a closer interest in the Province’s politics. Furthermore, Labour’s wafer-thin parliamentary majority in 1964 served to draw attention to the propensity for Northern Ireland’s Unionist MPs to vote with the Conservative Opposition in most Divisions (Labour Party Archives, Information Paper No.22, August 1966; Rose, 1981: 179). Consequently, in May 1965, the Northern Ireland Prime Minister, Captain Terence O’Neill, met Harold Wilson in London to discuss the


former’s progress in pursuing a ‘programme of ending discrimination in housing allocations and jobs and generally improving the lot of the [Catholic] minority in Northern Ireland’ (Wilson, 1971: 99). In August of the following year, at another meeting between Wilson and O’Neill, the latter explained that whilst he had made considerable progress during the previous two or three years (something which Wilson readily acknowledged), and fully intended to pursue further reforms in the future, he nonetheless ‘gravely underlined the threats to his position and to the reform movement’ and was thus convinced that having ‘moved so far and so fast by Northern Ireland standards . . . there must be a period of consolidation’ for at least several months, in order to prevent ‘a dangerous and possibly irresistible tide of reaction’ by hard-line Ulster Unionists who believe that O’Neill was effectively pursuing a policy of appeasement (Wilson, 1971: 270). O’Neill duly resumed his reform programme in January 1967, paying particular attention to the laws concerning local government elections and housing, but in so doing, he continued to attract increasing hostility from many of his own colleagues at all levels of the Ulster Unionist Party, this reaching unprecedented levels in April, when he dismissed one of his fiercest critics, Harry West, the Northern Ireland Agriculture Secretary. It was in October 1968 that ‘the troubles’ really erupted, when the [Catholic] Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association defied a ban imposed by the Northern Irish Minister for Home Affairs and persevered with a march through Londonderry. The marchers then found themselves embroiled in a bloody conflict with police, with several of them hospitalized. The few Labour MPs who had already been developing an interest in Northern Ireland’s politics, and in particular the position of the Catholic community in the Province, now became more vocal in demanding Ministerial action. Paul Rose, for example, in response to the Londonderry clashes, called upon Wilson to transfer control of the Royal Ulster Constabulary to Westminster (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 770, col. 1088), a request which the Labour leader firmly declined. Instead, the Cabinet’s approach was to continue demanding Unionist concessions and reforms vis-a-vis the Catholic community in Northern Ireland, although Wilson did warn the Unionist leadership that if such reforms were not forthcoming, then the Labour Government might feel obliged ‘to apply sanctions such as reconsidering the financial arrangements between the two countries, or even changing their constitutional relationship’ (quoted in Callaghan, 1973: 10; see also O’Neill, 1972: 147). Wilson also suggested that ‘a fundamental reappraisal of our relations

Northern Ireland

319

with Northern Ireland’ would be necessitated if ‘Captain O’Neill were overthrown, or what he was trying to do were overthrown, by extremists’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 772, col. 690). O’Neill did seek to introduce further reforms to ameliorate the discrimination and deprivation endured by Northern Ireland’s Catholic community, but these were not enough to pacify an emboldened Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association. The proposed reforms were nonetheless too much for many of O’Neill’s own Unionist colleagues, to the extent that in April 1969, O’Neill was replaced as Unionist leader and Northern Ireland Prime Minister by Major Chichester-Clark. Not only did hardline Unionists consider O’Neill to have gone too far in appeasing the Catholic minority, they also resented what they saw as interference in the internal affairs of the Province by Westminster. That it was ‘interference’ by a Labour Government merely added to the antipathy of many Conservative-inclined Unionists. Significantly, however, the Labour Government failed to pursue the action alluded to the previous autumn, when Wilson had intimated that the Cabinet would tolerate neither the obstruction of the reform programme nor the ousting of O’Neill as Northern Ireland leader. On both counts, the Unionists successfully called the Labour Government’s bluff. In the process, they also seemed to imply that the toleration which Labour had previously shown towards Unionist domination in the Province, and the Party’s unwillingness to challenge partition, counted for nought. However, the deteriorating situation in the Province did prompt the appointment of a Cabinet committee on Northern Ireland, this being comprised of Harold Wilson, Michael Stewart, James Callaghan and Denis Healey, although Richard Crossman also joined shortly afterwards. With O’Neill having been ousted by hard-line Unionists for being too ‘liberal’ towards the Catholics in Northern Ireland, and increasing civil disorder on the streets of the Province, Ministers on the Cabinet committee began to appreciate something of the magnitude of the problem they faced now that ‘the Irish question’ had been raised once again. Indeed, it was the restoration of order which was now the priority, so serious were the clashes and street violence arising from rival marches and demonstrations in the Province. Ministers on the Cabinet committee acknowledged that ‘it was impossible to evade British responsibility if there was civil war or widespread rioting’ in the Province, in which case ‘the police . . . or the government can ask for British troops to come’, but they hoped that such a scenario could be avoided for as long as possible


(Crossman, 1977: 463, diary entry for 29 April 1969; see also Callaghan, 1973: 15; NA PREM 13/2842, Healey to Wilson, 14 February 1969; NA CAB 130/416 MISC 238 (69) 4th meeting, 29 April 1969). Certainly there was a recognition amongst some Ministers that the sending in of British troops would itself raise two crucial issues for the Government. Firstly, it was clearly recognized – not least by Wilson himself – that the deployment of troops to Northern Ireland to maintain or restore order might be construed by many Catholics as an attempt ‘to maintain the Orange faction in power’ (NA CAB 128/44 Part One, 19th Conclusions, 24 April 1969). Indeed, there was also a recognition that military intervention might well ‘exacerbate the situation with which it was designed to deal’, in which case, political intervention would itself become ‘unavoidable’ (NA PREM 13/2842, Ministerial meetings, 19 February 1969 and 21 April 1969). The second issue which would necessarily be raised if troops were despatched to Northern Ireland was whether Westminster would simultaneously need to impose direct rule on the Province? Understandably, many Labour Ministers baulked at such a course of action, particularly when Wilson warned that the ‘constitutional consequences might be very grave, and ‘once we were involved, it would be difficult to secure our withdrawal’ (NA CAB 128/44 Part One, CC(69), 19th conclusions, 24 April 1969), for ‘once the English are involved in Ireland, they find it difficult and costly to extricate themselves’ (NA PREM 13/2842, Trend to Wilson, 18 February 1969). While the Ministers most closely involved in the preparations to send in British troops – namely Wilson himself, James Callaghan, as Home Secretary, and Denis Healey, as Defence Secretary – worked with senior officials to draft a Bill which would suspend the Northern Ireland constitution, and thereby impose direct rule from Westminster; they insisted that this was merely a contingency measure, one whose activation they clearly hoped to avoid. Yet they were also acutely aware that alternative options were extremely limited. Callaghan speculated about applying financial pressures or sanctions on a reactionary or oppressive government at Stormont and discussed the feasibility of such an option with the Treasury, but ultimately recognized that far from facilitating an improvement in Northern Ireland’s political situation, it was likely to ‘alienate opinion and strengthen resistance’. Furthermore, it was soon recognized that financial sanctions would probably ‘hit at the very people we are seeking to help’, namely the already socially disadvantaged Catholic community (NA PREM 2842, Callaghan to Wilson, 17 February 1969).

Northern Ireland

321

Also rejected outright was the suggestion from the future Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) leader, John Hume, that United Nations troops be deployed in Northern Ireland as an alternative to the British army (NA PREM 13/2843, Memorandum to Wilson, 17 July 1969). This was deemed most inappropriate in view of Northern Ireland’s status as part of the United Kingdom, which ensured that the ultimate responsibility for matters of security lay with the British Government itself. Meanwhile, Unionist politicians were warning British Ministers that the suspension of the Northern Ireland Parliament would be widely regarded by ‘Protestant opinion . . . as a step in the direction of a merger with the Irish Republic’. Chichester-Clark argued that as the present constitutional position was that there would be no change to the Province’s status without the approval of the Northern Ireland Parliament, the suspension of Stormont would effectively remove this crucial safeguard. Should this scenario materialize, he warned, then ‘Protestant opinion would be widespread and might be very violent indeed’ (NA PREM 13/2843, Cubbon to Gregson, 8 August 1969). On the other hand, the Unionist-dominated Northern Ireland Government viewed the potential deployment of British troops with rather more equanimity, pointing out that in any part of the United Kingdom, a breakdown in civil order which traditional policing was unable to resolve could entail the temporary despatch of troops. As Northern Ireland itself was an integral part of the United Kingdom, it ‘never for a moment occurred to us that its role in relation to Northern Ireland differed in any way from that role in relation to Great Britain’, for ultimately, ‘the British Army is our Army too.’ As such, the Northern Ireland Cabinet was convinced that the despatch of troops to the Province need not be accompanied by a suspension of its constitution and the imposition of direct rule, although clearly matters concerning to security, and law and order, would ultimately be subject to Westminster accountability, albeit ‘in the context of the normal co-operation between the two Governments’ (NA PREM 13/2843, Chichester-Clark to Callaghan, 6 August 1969). In the context of a rapidly deteriorating situation in the Province, Callaghan rejected as ‘ill-considered’ a suggestion from a deputation of Labour MPs that he should visit Northern Ireland personally, claiming that to do so would embroil him even more deeply in the Province’s problems. Also dismissed was the option of banning the forthcoming Apprentice Boys march in Londonderry on 12 August, for although the Cabinet was acutely aware of the likelihood of further serious disorder, there was also a recognition that so well-established and popular was the


event that ‘any attempt to ban it would provoke more trouble’ (NA CAB 128/44, CC(69) 39th conclusions, 30 July 1969). Yet such was the violence and disorder which subsequently accompanied the Apprentice Boys march, that when Callaghan held an emergency meeting with Wilson in Cornwall (the Prime Minister having been on holiday in the Scilly Isles) on 14 August 1969, the Home Secretary warned that a request by the Northern Ireland Government for the deployment of British troops was likely at any moment. He advised Wilson that if and when the request was received, they should accede to it, albeit emphasizing that British troops were being deployed in the Province solely to assist in the restoration of law and order, whereupon they would then be withdrawn ‘as soon as possible’. If it proved impossible to effect their quick withdrawal, then the British Government would need to consider the subsequent constitutional and political arrangements between Westminster and Northern Ireland. The expected request for British troops to be despatched to Londonderry (and subsequently to Belfast) was finally received in the late afternoon of 14 August 1969 and immediately acceded to, although Wilson was adamant that nothing should be done which might create the impression that the British army was acting ‘in the interests of one section of the community against those of another’. This would be a particular problem, he noted, when ‘the disruption was the result of the activities of a catholic element’ (NA PREM 13/2844, ‘Note of a meeting’ between Wilson and Callaghan, 14 August 1969). Perhaps understandably, at that time, it was envisaged that the troops were only being despatched to help restore law and order in Northern Ireland, whereupon they would be withdrawn again as soon as possible. Or as Barbara Castle noted a few days later, ‘We had agreed to put troops in to restore law and order, but not to keep them there indefinitely to maintain it’, and certainly not ‘to maintain a reactionary government’ (Castle, 1984: 699–700, diary entry for 19 August 1969, emphasis in original). However, it soon became evident that the withdrawal of British troops was unlikely to be as swift as envisaged. On 19 August 1969, following disorder and violence in (London) Derry and Belfast, the small group of British Ministers dealing with the latest developments in Northern Ireland situation met – at 10 Downing Street – their counterparts from the Northern Irish Government to review the situation. Chichester-Clark expressed his concern that whilst there had been a significant and swift restoration of law and order, the immediate withdrawal of British troops was likely to be followed by renewed violence in the two cities. He also warned that, due to ‘a campaign of vilification’, the police forces of

Northern Ireland

323

the Province had become ‘discredited among some sections of the community’, thus seriously compounding the problem of restoring order to the streets of Belfast and Londonderry. His solution was to appoint the General Officer Commanding in Northern Ireland, General Sir Ian Freedland, to take charge of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) with regard to security matters in the Province. In response, Wilson insisted that this could only be a short-term measure, lest the hostility being directed towards the RUC was then turned against the British army itself, the latter ‘at present generally accepted throughout Northern Ireland [as] impartial and . . . in no way involved in sectarian or other disputes’, and thus enjoying ‘the confidence of all sections of the community’. The Home Secretary, however, insisted that before taking any decision about control of the RUC, the role of the ‘B Specials’ (an overwhelmingly Protestant-staffed auxiliary and armed police force in Northern Ireland, which many Catholics viewed as being particularly aggressive and discriminatory towards them) had also to be considered, for they were ‘the subject of grave concern throughout the remainder of the United Kingdom’ (although the Northern Ireland Home Affairs Minister retorted that they had been deployed for many years as a peace-keeping force ‘without complaint’). Healey also expressed concern about the alleged activities of the B Specials, claiming that, according to the General Officer Commanding, they had used excessive force and thereby ‘aggravated the problems faced by the British forces in restoring law and order’. Callaghan and Healey encountered some initial resistance from the Northern Ireland Ministers when they suggested that the B Specials should be disarmed, with Chichester-Clark claiming that obliging them to hand in their weapons might actually yield a further breakdown in law and order in the Province, because some sections of the community would feel that their safety had been compromised, whilst others would feel less need to refrain from violence if they knew that the B Specials were unarmed (NA PREM 13/2844, ‘Note of a meeting’ between senior British and Northern Irish Ministers and officials, 19 August 1969). Meanwhile, Chichester-Clark had previously conveyed to Callaghan the Unionists’ irritation at the various references to the deployment of British troops in the Province, for the impression allegedly given by Ministers in London was that Northern Ireland was ‘some sort of external territory’ in which the role of troops would somehow be different to that in any other part of the United Kingdom. ChichesterClark further informed the Home Secretary that he (Chichester-Clark) and his Ministerial colleagues in Northern Ireland were ‘appalled – I must not understate our reaction’ at the possible suspension of existing


constitutional arrangements by Westminster as a condition of deploying troops. This placed the Northern Ireland Government ‘in an almost impossible position’, he complained, for it would either have to preside over a rapid deterioration in the Province, as civil disorder and social unrest increased further, or be obliged to request military assistance ‘and thereby risk extinguishing representative institutions which we have built up and defended for nearly half a century.’ It was not right, he insisted, that if the Northern Ireland Government was faced with ‘the gravest of circumstances’, it should be expected to take a decision as momentous as requesting the deployment of troops ‘with a sword of Damocles hanging over our heads.’ Yet if the British Government did insist on suspending the Northern Ireland constitution, Chichester-Clark ominously warned, the people of Northern Ireland would be ‘as determined to have our own Government as the people of the South were from 1919 on’, and as such, he suggested that Callaghan ‘seriously consider the history of how Dublin Castle tried to cope with Sinn Fein at that time.’ In the meantime, Chichester-Clark requested a meeting with Callaghan as a matter of the utmost urgency (NA PREM 13/2843, Chichester-Clark to Callaghan, 6 August 1969). When Callaghan met Chichester-Clark two days later, the latter reiterated that ‘moderate Protestant opinion’ would view with the deepest concern any significant amendment of the 1920 Government of Ireland Act, especially the suspension of the Northern Ireland Parliament. Indeed, the Northern Ireland Prime Minister claimed that Stormont was viewed as a bulwark against Irish reunification, so that its suspension or abolition would be viewed by Unionists as ‘a step in the direction of a merger with the Irish Republic’, and as such, ‘the Protestant reaction would be widespread, and might be very violent indeed.’ In reply, Callaghan pointed out that whilst suspension of the Northern Ireland constitution was not an objective of the Cabinet, the British people would certainly expect that any deployment of troops, intended to restore order to the Province, would be accompanied by some political control over role of the army, along with related policies. In such a situation, the Home Secretary argued, intervention from Westminster would become inevitable, with the Northern Ireland Government acting effectively as agents over a very wide field. Chichester-Clark did not demur too much from this overview of potential developments, although his apparently sanguine stance may well have reflected Callaghan’s own acknowledgement that the British Government was unlikely to seek a suspension of Stormont due to ‘the likely Protestant reaction’ (NA PREM 13/2843, Cubbon to Gregson, 8 August 1969).

Northern Ireland

325

In order to assuage Unionist anxieties, Wilson issued his own ‘Downing Street Declaration’, on 19 August 1969, which asserted that The United Kingdom Government reaffirms that nothing which has happened in recent weeks in Northern Ireland derogates from the clear pledges made by successive United Kingdom Governments that Northern Ireland should not cease to be a part of the United Kingdom without the consent of the people of Northern Ireland or from the provision in Section I of the Ireland Act, 1949, that in no event will Northern Ireland or any part thereof cease to be part of the United Kingdom without the consent of the Parliament of Northern Ireland. The border is not an issue. (quoted in Wilson, 1971: 695–96) As Ponting observes, given that that the Labour Government ‘had never expected to be caught up in the tangled sectarian politics of Ulster, it is difficult to see how any government could have acted differently.’ Certainly, ‘in August 1969 it had little alternative but to use troops, given the scale if disintegration in the Province’ (Ponting, 1990: 341). Yet having so committed British troops, albeit on what was intended to be a short-term basis, the Labour Party was now obliged to give more consideration to the ‘tangled sectarian politics’ to the Northern Ireland. However, its room for manoeuvre and original thinking was limited indeed, for with Irish unification evidently a far distant goal, and one which would be dependent on the consent of the Province itself, Labour was left with the short-term objective of eliminating the violence, whilst simultaneously urging further social reform to improve the civil rights of the Catholic community. Yet though these aims ‘were understandable’, they were also, according Joe Haines (appointed as Harold Wilson’s Press Secretary in January 1969), ‘incompatible, for it was the burgeoning civil rights movement which provoked the Protestant violence’ (Haines, 1977: 113). Nonetheless, these were precisely the aims which the Wilson Government did pursue from August 1969 until the election in June 1970, when its manifesto reiterated that all citizens in Northern Ireland were ‘entitled to the same equality of treatment and freedom from discrimination as obtains in the rest of the United Kingdom, irrespective of political views or religion’ (Labour Party, 1970: 18). The crucial question which confronted the Labour Party, though, was how this objective could be properly realized, given the unique character, culture and history of Northern Irish politics. However, the result of the election ensured that any new Labour thinking on Northern Ireland would have to be conducted in Opposition.


Labour and Northern Ireland in the 1970s During this period Opposition, from June 1970 to February 1974, there were a number of crucial developments concerning Northern Ireland (for a detailed consideration of this period, see Arthur, 1996: 235–58). Firstly, in the wake of escalating sectarian violence and civil disorder at the beginning of the 1970s, the Northern Ireland Parliament introduced the policy of internment, whereby those suspected of being engaged in terrorist activities (invariably those suspected of having links with the Irish Republican Army (IRA), rather than with loyalist paramilitaries) could be imprisoned without trial. Yet the Labour Party’s criticism of this measure was notably muted, with Wilson mainly concerned that it might have the effect of ‘aggravating tensions and inter-communal hostility’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 823, col. 33). As the Labour leadership was now seeking to foster a broadly bipartisan approach to Northern Ireland, the Conservative Government’s willingness to endorse the policy of internment effectively ensured that the Labour Party – at least at parliamentary level – declined to oppose it outright, but, instead, merely abstained when there was a Commons Division following an emergency Debate on Northern Ireland in September 1971. However, over 60 Labour backbenchers did vote against their Government on this issue (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 823, col. 327). The second major development concerning Northern Ireland which occurred while Labour was in Opposition was the 1972 suspension of Stormont and the imposition of direct rule from Westminster, following an escalation of violence and killings in the Province since 1970 – for example, 1971 witnessed both the first killing of a British soldier by the Provisional IRA and the formation of the Loyalist paramilitary Ulster Defence Association as a response to the Provisional IRA – culminating in the fatal ‘Bloody Sunday’ shootings in January 1972. Thirdly, having imposed direct rule, the Heath Government sought to develop means whereby power could be devolved back to the Province, but not on the basis of a return to untrammelled Unionist domination over the Catholic minority in Northern Ireland. Consequently, the Heath’s Government sought to establish a power-sharing Executive and Assembly in Northern Ireland, in January 1974, whereby the Protestant/Unionist majority would be required to share power with the Catholic/Nationalist minority. There was also to be a Council of Ireland to consider matters of common interest between Northern Ireland and Eire, thereby providing Dublin with a consultative role in aspects of Northern Irish politics. Not surprisingly, many Unionists bitterly

Northern Ireland

327

opposed these institutional innovations, to the extent that in the February 1974 general (Westminster) election, no less than 11 of the 12 Northern Ireland constituencies elected Unionist candidates whose campaigns had been expressly based on opposition to the power-sharing initiative (the election having effectively been treated by them as a referendum on the power-sharing proposals). Thus did the Labour Government which formed a minority administration following the February 1974 election (34 seats short of an overall majority) inherit an additional array of problems pertaining to Northern Ireland. Indeed, the issue of the power-sharing executive was to confront the Labour Government within weeks of its February 1974 election ‘victory’. In the short period before then, though, Wilson and his senior policy adviser, Bernard Donoughue, along with Joe Haines, his Press Secretary, had a number of discussions about Northern Ireland, with a view to developing ‘a progressive policy’. Amongst the ideas they considered were ‘an “Algerian’’ solution similar to that imposed by [former French President, General] de Gaulle’ and a form of dominion status for Northern Ireland (similar to that once enjoyed by Canada), whereby Northern Ireland would be granted semi-independence, but with responsibility for matters such as defence, and overall parliamentary sovereignty, remaining with Westminster. This ‘dominion status’ would also entail a Bill of Rights, to guarantee the liberties of the minority (Catholic) population, coupled with a proportional electoral system, to prevent the return of permanent one-party rule. It was also envisaged that a tripartite international framework would be established to ensure that the new constitutional arrangements were adhered to, this comprising of the Irish Republic, the United States and the European Communities. This was intended to be a precursor to eventual full independence for Northern Ireland. However, Wilson, Donoughue and Haines soon realized that their musings were based on an unjustified degree of optimism about changing attitudes in Northern Ireland, a realization subsequently confirmed by the collapse of the power-sharing Executive following the Protestant Workers’ strike in May 1974 (Donoughue, 1987: 128–9). In the immediate aftermath of the Unionists’ sabotage of the powersharing executive – which some Ministers viewed as ‘basically an attempt by extremists to establish . . . [a] . . . form of neo-Fascist government’ in Northern Ireland (NA CAB 129/177 C(74) 56, 24 May 1974) – an official from Labour’s Research Department visited Northern Ireland on a fact-finding mission for the Party. Having interviewed a broad crosssection of political and social actors from both communities in the Province, a report was then submitted to the Home Policy committee


of Labour’s NEC, which suggested that the policy of internment ought to be abandoned immediately, not least because it was actually serving to increase support for the IRA amongst the Nationalist community in the Province, and hardening Catholic opinion against Britain; the British were increasingly being seen, not as impartial or neutral between the two communities but as actively underpinning Unionist hegemony. The report also suggested that the Labour Party ought to commit itself to a phased withdrawal of British troops from Northern Ireland, although immediate withdrawal was emphatically ruled out because it would leave a vacuum likely to be filled by Loyalist paramilitaries. A further warning enshrined in the report concerned the Government’s recent claim that ‘any pattern of government must be acceptable to the people as a whole, and to Parliament at Westminster’ (emphasis in original). The statement was deemed to be ‘too ambiguous to be interpreted by the extremists as anything else but interference by outside forces’. Given that ‘the slide into National Socialism by the Protestant working class is very real’, thereby raising the spectre of a ‘slide to Fascism’ in Northern Ireland, it was vital for the Labour Party to be ‘very careful how we choose to use our words’ (Labour Party Archives, Res.114/July 1974). Yet no such care was evident in Wilson’s furious response to the collapse of the power-sharing executive following the Ulster Workers Strike, when he railed that British taxpayers . . . have seen the taxes they have poured out, almost with regard to cost – going into Northern Ireland. They see property destroyed by evil violence and are asked to pick up the bill for rebuilding it. Yet the people who benefit from all this now viciously defy Westminster, purporting to act as though they were an elected government; people who spend their lives sponging on Westminster and British democracy and then systematically assault democratic methods. Who do these people think they are? (quoted in Wilson, 1979: 77) Understandable though Wilson’s frustration may have been in the circumstances, his words were also, as Jones and Keating pointed out, highly revealing of his underlying view of Northern Ireland, a view which was probably also widespread throughout the Labour Party generally. Wilson’s reference to the pouring ‘out’ of British taxpayers’ money ‘into’ Northern Ireland clearly indicated that the Province was viewed as a separate entity, not merely in the obvious geographical or physical sense,

Northern Ireland

329

but politically too, rather than an integral and integrated region of the United Kingdom (Jones and Keating, 1985: 177). It is also worth noting that immediately prior to the Ulster Workers’ Council’s sabotage of the power-sharing executive, the relevant Cabinet committee had agreed to consider imposing economic sanctions (NA CAB 128/54, CC(74) 18th conclusions, 24 May 1974), although, of course, had such sanctions actually been invoked, they might well have exacerbated the economic deprivation and unemployment already endured by the Catholic community in Northern Ireland (which is partly why they had previously been ruled out by senior Labour Ministers in the late 1960s). Following the collapse of the power-sharing executive, as Wilson subsequently acknowledged, Ministers had no more proposals for solving the Northern Ireland problem, so that ‘the policies of the Heath Government and of our own had reached a dead end.’ Convinced that ‘No solution can be imposed from across the water’, Wilson maintained that henceforth, ‘we had to throw the task clearly to the Northern Ireland people themselves’ (Wilson, 1979: 78), to the extent that Northern Ireland ‘was moved to the margins of the political agenda’, the Cabinet’s policy being ‘one of consolidation, trying to contain terrorism, and just trying to get through from year to year’, whilst also attempting to ‘lower the profile of the British military and make greater use of the police in restoring law and order’. Indeed, Bernard Donoughue (Wilson’s senior policy adviser at this time) claims that, from 1974 onwards, the Labour Government’s cabinet committee on Northern Ireland ‘never . . . actually discussed Northern Ireland policy: it only ever discussed law and order’ (Donoughue, 1987: 130, 132, emphasis in original). Yet clearly, without at least some interest and input from Westminster, the Unionist majority in Northern Ireland would have felt little compunction about ameliorating the problems in the Province, for the status quo would merely perpetuate their hegemony in the Province. On the other hand, it was acknowledged that ‘it is always difficult to impose the will of the [British] state on the Protestants . . . because the forces of law and order in the Six Counties come from the self-same Protestant community, and there is a limit to what the Ulster police will do against their religious brethren’ (Donoughue, 1987: 130). Nonetheless, as Labour’s Northern Ireland Secretary, Merlyn Rees, informed delegates at the Party’s conference in the autumn of 1974 that ‘We have a responsibility for Northern Ireland. There is no other government there. The government of the South doesn’t want it.’ Northern Ireland did yield one notable initiative from the newly elected Labour Government in the spring and summer of 1974. In response


to an IRA bombing campaign on mainland Britain – which included the notorious Birmingham pub bombing in which 21 people were killed – Ministers rushed the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Bill through Parliament, although in explicit acknowledgement of the ‘draconian’ powers invoked, the Home Secretary, Roy Jenkins, initially gave the legislation a life span of just six months, after which it would require further parliamentary approval in order to be continued. Although Labour MPs were generally willing to support the Bill in the Division Lobbies, the Second Reading Debate heard some of them warn that such legislation was ‘unfortunately distracting us to deal with symptoms and not causes . . . repressive legislation is no substitute for policy. We have no policy whatsoever’ (Leo Abse, House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 882, col. 658), a view echoed by Martin Flannery when he expressed concern that ‘we are moving further away from any solution to the great problem of Northern Ireland, because we need a radical reappraisal of our entire policy towards that country’, before insisting that ‘at some time we are going to have to withdraw from Northern Ireland and leave it to the Irish people to settle their own affairs’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 882, cols. 693, 695). In similar vein did Kevin McNamara, while acknowledging that ‘regretfully we must pass this Bill’, insist that ‘Unless we root out the injustices which exist in the Six Counties, we shall not get rid of the men of violence’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 882, col. 701). The Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act was nonetheless renewed or extended annually thereafter (albeit with 15–25 Labour MPs regularly voting against on these occasions) thus reflecting the extent to which the Northern Ireland problem was increasingly viewed primarily as a security and counter-terrorism issue, particularly after Merlyn Rees was replaced by Roy Mason at the Northern Ireland Office in September 1976. Mason soon received warm words of praise from senior Conservative politicians and also from Enoch Powell (who had left the Conservative Party in 1974 to serve as a Unionist MP for South Down), for his uncompromising stance on security and law and order in the Province (Bell, 1982: 126–31). Indeed, Donoughue observed that Mason ‘seemed more Protestant than the “Prods’’ and but for his [Yorkshire] accent might have been taken for a classic Ulsterman’ (Donoughue, 1987: 131). In the context of bolstering security and attempting to defeat terrorism, the Labour Cabinet’s search for a political solution, coupled with measures to alleviate the plight of Catholics in Northern Ireland, was ascribed a rather lower priority. Certainly, Mason implied that

Northern Ireland

331

countering terrorism and defeating the IRA was now the objective of the Government’s approach to Northern Ireland and that only after this had been achieved would political remedies be considered. As such, Mason even publicly rebuked those of his Labour colleagues who continued to talk about ‘the unity of Ireland or national aspirations’, claiming that ‘it does make it much more politically difficult for me’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 947, col. 1642). Consequently, the experience of the 1974–1979 Labour Governments has been viewed by some commentators as indicative of the fact that ‘Labour administrations . . . have never really sought to escape from the severe constraints imposed by a security agenda and a pervasive culture of containment and control’ (Hayes, 1999: 210; Newsinger, 1995: 83–94). However, the 1974–1979 Labour Governments’ approach to the Northern Ireland question was also informed by the Party’s precarious parliamentary position. With the wafer-thin majority obtained in October 1974 soon dissipating, the Labour Government found itself obliged to form a parliamentary pact with the Liberal Party, but when this was terminated in 1978, a desperate Callaghan courted the Official Unionist Party by offering Northern Ireland an extra six seats at Westminster (which would effectively mean increasing Unionist representation in the House of Commons). The ensuing Redistribution of Seats Bill, to create these six additional seats, prompted a notable backbench revolt in the Labour Party, with 37 of its MPs voting against the Bill, including Bob Mellish, a former Chief Whip (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 959, cols. 360–61). The Bill also prompted the resignation of one of the Government’s Assistant Whips, along with two Parliamentary Private Secretaries.

Labour and Northern Ireland in the 1980s With the ascendancy of the Left in the aftermath of the 1979 election defeat, Labour’s hitherto bipartisan stance on Northern Ireland was briefly subject to a more critical approach within sections of the Party. At Labour’s 1980 conference, for example, more than half of the constituency delegates supported a motion urging that the next Labour government ‘immediately begins the process of withdrawal’ of troops from Northern Ireland, although the combined votes of other (non-constituency) delegates ensured that the motion was defeated. Meanwhile, at a fringe meeting during the same conference, the doyen of the ascendant Labour Left (particularly amongst Labour’s constituency activists), Tony Benn, declared that ‘the partition of Ireland was a


crime’ and then claimed that as Britain’s continued political and military presence in Northern Ireland was itself an obstacle to long-term peace, the ‘sooner we withdraw the better’ (quoted in Bell, 1982: 138–9). Benn repeated his call for British withdrawal a year later, during his campaign to be elected Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, arguing that ‘the British troops there, far from solving the problem, are a big part of the problem itself’. As such, Benn suggested that a United Nations peace-keeping force might be stationed in Northern Ireland ‘to allow British troops to be withdrawn while the negotiations for re-unification take place’ (New Socialist, September–October 1981: 11; see also, Benn, 1982: 73). Elsewhere in the Labour Party, a backbench Northern Ireland parliamentary group had superseded the Campaign for Democracy in Ulster during the early 1970s, and by 1980 had been joined by over 30 MPs, including former Labour Ministers such as Reg Freeson, and NEC members like Joan Maynard. In 1980, the Group submitted a paper, Northern Ireland - Some Options for an All-Ireland Solution, to the NEC, which had itself established a sub-committee on Party policy towards Northern Ireland the previous year. This paper, authored by Freeson but endorsed by the Group overall, concluded that ‘Britain’s objectives in Ulster should be the withdrawal of troops to barracks as soon as possible, social and economic reform, reconciliation and the peaceful reunification of Ireland.’ To this end, it was asserted that ‘if bipartisanship stands in the way, bipartisanship should go’. Implicit in the paper was that the Unionist’s ‘veto’ over changing the constitutional status of Northern Ireland should not be permitted to obstruct these objectives, although it was acknowledged that the Protestant community (who would be in the minority in a united Ireland) should be granted special safeguards after reunification (Bell, 1982: 140). In other words, the Northern Ireland parliamentary group was calling, ultimately, for Irish unity without consent and, as such, was clearly departing from traditional Labour policy concerning the future of the Province. However, the NEC’s sub-committee on Northern Ireland published its own report, in January 1981, Northern Ireland: The Next Steps, which not only emphatically restated the case for maintaining the constitutional status quo, but even suggested ways in which Northern Ireland might be more closely integrated with Britain. Although the report had been written by a staunchly pro-Unionist official in Labour’s Research Department, Dick Barry, it had nonetheless been approved by the NEC itself prior to publication and thus revealed a marked divergence of perspective vis-à-vis Northern Ireland between sections of the Labour leadership

Northern Ireland

333

(in the guise of the NEC) on the one hand and a number of interested MPs, along with the Party’s Left generally, on the other. One of these ‘interested MPs’ was Kevin McNamara, who was later to become Labour’s spokesperson on Northern Ireland. Having nurtured his interest in Northern Irish politics since the 1960s, McNamara was outraged by the NEC’s Northern Ireland: The Next Steps, which he denounced as a ‘dangerous, foolish paper, a Unionist paper, some might . . . call it an Orange paper’. Instead, he believed that the Labour Party ought to ‘start with the concept of the island of Ireland, and work from that, rather than looking at the Six Counties as some sort of imperial relic’ (quoted in Bell, 1982: 142–3). Even though the principle of Irish reunification was most passionately supported by Labour’s Left, some senior figures on the Right of the Party – and with intimate experience of the Northern Ireland ‘problem’ – also began publicly expressing doubts about the wisdom of seeking to maintain partition in perpetuity. Merlyn Rees, for example, intimated that removal of the Unionist’s veto over constitutional change might be ‘a good step’ (The Times, 18 May 1981), while James Callaghan – Labour’s Prime Minister until just two years previously – now publicly expressed grave doubts about whether ‘our policy of direct rule combined with firmness will result in Northern Ireland emerging permanently - I utter the word permanently - from years of torment, with its people reconciled to the existing relationship with Britain’ (House of Commons Debates, 6th series, Vol. 7, cols. 1047–8). As such, Callaghan suggested that ‘Britain should bring forward no further solutions’ on the grounds that ‘Britain was incapable of ever offering a solution that would be acceptable to both sides.’ Instead, the British government should commit itself merely to the maintenance of law and order ‘for a predetermined, fixed number of years’, after which, Britain ‘would withdraw from the Province, which would at that time become an independent state’, albeit one which would be offered ‘generous financial aid’ by Britain and whose people would have the right to opt for British citizenship (Callaghan, 1988: 500). Meanwhile, John Silkin, another contender for Labour’s Deputy Leadership in 1981, asserted that ‘I do not believe that the division of Ireland into two countries is permanent. The future of Northern Ireland lies with the Republic rather than with Britain’, although he fully acknowledged that ‘the process cannot be forced upon people who look upon themselves as British rather than Irish’ (New Socialist, September–October 1981).


With such senior figures now echoing at least some of the sentiments emanating from elsewhere in the Labour Party, both from the backbenches and the constituencies, the NEC revised the report originally published by its sub-committee on Northern Ireland, to the extent that it now recommended a policy of ‘unity between the two parts of Ireland’ (Labour Party National Executive Committee, 1981: 11). Yet such a principle or long-term objective still required considerable fleshing-out, both in order to provide the Labour Party with a credible policy on Northern Ireland in the meantime and to indicate exactly how the transition to a united Ireland would be effected. Given that most Labour politicians recognized that Irish reunification could only ever be achieved with the consent of the majority (Unionist) population in Northern Ireland, the Party needed to consider precisely how that consent was to be attained, for as Denis Healey pointed out, it was ‘not possible to lay down a step-by-step plan or detailed blueprint for a united Ireland’ (New Socialist, September–October 1981: 11). From 1981 onwards, through to the first half of the 1990s, this attempt ‘to square the unity by consent circle’ entailed contemplation of three discrete options or strategies, namely seeking working class unity in the Province as the prerequisite of national unity; pursuing a ‘dual strategy’ of harmonization and reform; redefining the Party’s meaning of ‘consent’ (Bew and Dixon, 1994: 154). Right from the outset, though, seeking to approach the Northern Ireland problem from a class perspective proved highly problematic and thus short-lived. Not only did national identity and religious affinity militate against working class unity in Northern Ireland, it was also the case that ‘the hard core of uncompromising opposition to the unity of Ireland was the working class of the Protestant majority in the North’ (Healey, 1990: 342), who constituted what Lenin would have termed a ‘labour aristocracy’. Yet even if working class unity could have been attained, it was recognized that this might lead to pressure on the Labour Party itself to organize and put forward candidates in Northern Ireland. This would have embroiled the Labour party even more deeply in Northern Irish politics, whilst also effectively increasing the Province’s integration into British politics, thereby rendering the prospect of Irish reunification even more remote. After the 1983 election defeat – whereupon the influence of the Left steadily waned, and with Don Concannon becoming the Party’s Northern Ireland spokesperson – Labour’s stance vis-à-vis moved towards the second of the three options previously alluded to namely ‘harmonisation and reform’ (Concannon, 1983). The harmonization aspect of this dual approach would entail a range of intergovernmental institutions and

Northern Ireland

335

processes to facilitate co-operation and partnership between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. These, it was envisaged, would ultimately establish ‘the administrative, institutional, security, political, and economic structures of a united Ireland’, but with sovereignty continuing to be retained in London and Belfast. Indeed, the Conservative Government’s 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement itself placed great emphasis on an intergovernmental approach to securing closer links between the two Irelands. For the Labour Party, however, it was envisaged that as crossborder co-operation over a wide range of policy areas become more firmly established and institutionalized, so the border itself would become less important, ultimately facilitating moves towards Irish re-unification. The ‘reform’ dimension of this dual strategy simultaneously sought to tackle the discrimination and disadvantage endured by the Catholic community in Northern Ireland, both as a laudable end in itself, but also in the expectation that this would serve to undermine sectarianism, and especially support for Sinn Fein and the IRA. This latter consideration was lent added resonance by the April 1981 by-election victory of Bobby Sands, who was elected as Sinn Fein MP for Fermanagh and South Tyrone while on hunger strike in the Maze Prison (in protest at not being granted the status of ‘political prisoner’). The Labour Party envisaged that as sectarianism was undermined, then so Irish re-unification would become more feasible, but this assumption was inherently problematic for two main reasons. Firstly, as the experiences of the 1960s had illustrated, ameliorating the socio-economic deprivation of the Catholic community in Northern Ireland seriously antagonized many of the Protestants in the Province. The latter effectively viewed the allocation of material resources in zero-sum terms, so that any increased provision for the Catholic minority would ipso facto be at the expense of the Protestant majority. As such, this reform dimension was likely to increase Unionist hostility and intransigence and thereby fuel, rather than eradicate, sectarianism in Northern Ireland, especially amongst the Protestant working class. Yet at the same time, if such a reform dimension was subsequently to prove successful (in spite of the last point) in terms of improving the material position of Catholics in Northern Ireland, then this itself might weaken their assumed support for a united Ireland. After all, various opinion polls and attitude surveys in the Province have repeatedly indicated that up to 50 per cent of the Catholic community would be prepared to accept the permanence of partition – and thus their position as ‘citizens’ of Northern Ireland – provided that they enjoyed equal opportunities and treatment in the Province. As the precursor to eventual re-unification, therefore, the Labour Party’s dual strategy of


‘harmonisation and reform’ seemed to enshrine internal contradictions or inconsistencies, however commendable the two dimensions might have been in their own right. Some of these problems were subsequently acknowledged by Kevin McNamara, who became Labour’s Northern Ireland spokesperson following the 1987 election defeat, whereupon it was more readily recognized that economic harmonization does not automatically yield political integration. This realization resulted in the Labour Party adopting the third of the approaches noted above, that of seeking ‘unity by consent’ albeit with the definition of consent being revised somewhat. Indeed, it became apparent that Labour’s determination to secure Irish re-unification increasingly placed greater emphasis on the consent of the populations of both Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic, or to put it more starkly, the Party appeared willing to remove the Unionist’s veto, for ‘consent’ had hitherto meant the consent of the majority in Northern Ireland itself, namely the Protestant/Unionist community. Certainly, there were sections of the Labour Party which resented the constitutional veto enjoyed by the Unionists and which therefore shared the sentiments expressed by Kevin McNamara back in 1972, namely that ‘the best people to decide what is to happen in Ireland are the Irish people themselves . . . the Ulster members represent only the six counties, not thirty-two’ (House of Commons Debates, Vol. 834, col. 519). Eight years later, McNamara reiterated his view that ‘it is the wish of the majority within the island of Ireland that should be counted’ (Daily Telegraph, 24 May 1980). McNamara was therefore favourably disposed towards the 1986 recommendation from a joint NEC-PLP policy committee that the Unionists’ veto should be removed, so that although the Labour Party remained committed to ‘unity by consent’, there would only need to be ‘a significant degree’ of consent, which implied ‘less than majority consent.’ Not surprisingly, such a departure from Labour’s hitherto bipartisan approach to Northern Ireland, and the extent to which this entailed re-defining the meanings of both ‘majority’ and ‘consent’, caused considerable consternation amongst much of the Labour Party’s leadership, to the extent that the NEC itself declined to endorse this proposed new policy (Bew and Dixon, 1994: 158). Consequently, while reiterating the Party’s belief ‘in a united Ireland: to be achieved peacefully, democratically, and by consent’, Labour’s 1987 manifesto also included the somewhat ambiguous assertion that, with regard to the future of Northern Ireland, ‘no group or party will be allowed to exercise a veto on political development, or any policies designed to win consent’. As a

Northern Ireland

337

result, when McNamara was subsequently appointed Labour’s Northern Ireland spokesperson after the 1987 election, he was effectively obliged to promote a policy which he had previously been in favour of changing (Bew and Dixon, 1994: 158). Thereafter, both he and the Labour Party appeared reluctant to offer a clear or precise definition of what they would consider to constitute ‘consent’ (Cunningham, 1999: 161–3). In reiterating Labour’s formal commitment (as a long-term aspiration) to a united Ireland, Meet the Challenge, Make the Change acknowledged that such a change could only be secured with the consent of the majority of the people of Northern Ireland, yet added that ‘this should not be allowed to constitute a veto on political progress.’ Pending agreement on Irish re-unification, a Labour government would effectively revert back to the ‘harmonisation and reform’ strategy, entailing internal reform within Northern Ireland itself, coupled with greater co-operation with the Republic of Ireland. The internal reforms would entail measures not merely to revive the Northern Irish economy but to ensure that the subsequent increase in employment and prosperity were enjoyed by both communities, which in turn would entail measures to combat discrimination and injustice in the Province. These measures were to be accompanied by the establishment of a devolved power-sharing administration based in Belfast. Meanwhile, with regard to the second element of the revived ‘dual strategy’, Meet the Challenge, Make the Change adumbrated a number of policy areas which could facilitate closer co-operation between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic, including agriculture, economic development (including joint bids for European funding), security, tourism and transport. Indeed, with regard to developments at the European Communities level, it was suggested that ‘The Single Market will make the border less relevant and the benefits of co-operation between the two parts of the island more apparent.’ In conjunction with the reforms proposed for Northern Ireland itself, the Labour Party reiterated the expectation that ‘it will be possible, step by step, to build the consent needed to achieve unity in Ireland’ (Labour Party, 1989: 58).

Towards New Labour and Northern Ireland The Labour Party was obliged once again to consider its stance on Northern Ireland as a result of the 1993 Downing Street Declaration. This was a joint statement issued by the Conservative Prime Minister, John Major, and his Irish counterpart, Albert Reynolds, which declared that the British government had no selfish strategic or economic interest in Northern


Ireland, while the Republic now accepted that any change in the status of Northern Ireland had to be subject to the consent of the majority of its people. On the basis of these two core principles, the Downing Street Declaration envisaged a new devolved assembly for Northern Ireland, in which both communities (Catholic and Protestant) would be represented on a proportional basis and with a system of checks and balances to ensure that measures were based on the maximum possible consensus. Meanwhile, a consultative role would be encouraged for the Irish Republic on matters of joint interest, these to be pursued via new institutions on which both British and Northern Irish politicians would be represented, thereby ‘reflecting the totality of relationships between the two islands, and dedicated to fostering co-operation, reconciliation and agreement in Ireland at all levels’ (quoted in Cunningham, 1999: 159). Labour’s response to the Downing Street Declaration was broadly positive, particularly with regard to the overall principles involved, not least the explicit recognition of ‘the all-Ireland context of the problem and the legitimacy of the nationalist identity and aspiration’ (Cunningham, 1999: 161–2). That Labour’s endorsement of the Downing Street Declaration appeared to constitute a move back towards a more bipartisan approach seemed to be confirmed by the replacement, in October 1994, of Kevin McNamara by Mo Mowlem as the Party’s spokesperson on Northern Ireland. According to Mowlem, a Labour government ‘would not act as a persuader to a united Ireland’, but would ‘instead act as a persuader to a balanced political settlement’ (New Statesman and Society, 17 March 1995), a notably ambiguous form of words. Meanwhile, immediately prior to appointing Mowlem to the post of Labour’s Northern Ireland spokesperson, the recently elected Party leader, Tony Blair, had himself declared that the Downing Street Declaration, along with a subsequent IRA ceasefire, completely altered the context of the Province’s politics and thus ‘overtook all the historical positions of all parties’ (Daily Telegraph, 30 September 1994). The same year (1994) had heard Labour’s annual conference endorse an NEC statement that ‘Labour . . . seeks to encourage a balanced political settlement leading to an agreement in Ireland which will have the support of both traditions in Ireland’. Having spent much of the 1980s espousing a loosely defined policy of ‘unity by consent’, the Labour Party of the 1990s was enunciating an equally nebulous ‘balanced political settlement’. In spite of – or perhaps, rather, because of – the vagueness of such policy commitments, the 1990s witnessed a degree of renewed tension within the PLP over Northern Ireland, as evinced by the formation of

Northern Ireland

339

two opposed ‘ginger groups’. Firstly, in 1992, ‘Democracy Now’ was established, comprising approximately 50 Labour MPs (Sunday Times, 9 October 1994), and called for the Labour Party to organize in Northern Ireland itself, a stance with strong integrationist implications. Three years later, in 1995, an alternative (pro-nationalist) group was formed in the Labour Party, the ‘Agreed Ireland Forum’, whose membership included Ken Livingstone, Kevin McNamara and Clive Soley. Indeed, McNamara had already co-authored a pamphlet which was highly critical of the ‘Democracy Now’ group’s call for the Labour Party to establish itself in Northern Ireland (McNamara et al., 1993), while in 1994, McNamara was one of the Labour Party’s most vocal critics of the establishment of a select committee on Northern Ireland, viewing it as a further move towards integrating the Province into mainstream British parliamentary politics and thus moving away from the goal of Irish reunification. Such was McNamara’s dissatisfaction with Labour’s renewed bipartisan approach towards the Northern Ireland ‘question’ and thus the downgrading of an explicit commitment to a united Ireland, that he resigned from his post as the Party’s Civil Service spokesperson in September 1995. Meanwhile, in true ‘third way’ style, Tony Blair and most of the New Labour leadership sought to avoid aligning itself with either groupings (Barnes, 1995: 89; Cunningham, 1999: 162–3). In fact, the Labour leadership’s renewed approach was emphasized in the Party’s 1997 election manifesto, which acknowledged that ‘the option of a united Ireland does not command the consent of the Unionist tradition, nor does the existing status of Northern Ireland command the consent of the Nationalist tradition’. As such, Labour pledged its commitment ‘to reconciliation between the two traditions and to a new political settlement which can command the support of both’ (Labour Party, 1996a: 31; Labour Party, 1997: 35), although precisely how this would – or could – be achieved remained unclear. It was, in New Labour parlance, an aspiration.

The 1997–2007 Blair Governments and Northern Ireland Less than three weeks after New Labour’s emphatic 1997 election victory, Tony Blair used a keynote speech in Northern Ireland to reassure the Unionists that they could trust his Government, declaring that My agenda is not a united Ireland - and I wonder just how many see it as a realistic possibility in the foreseeable future . . . Let me make one


thing absolutely clear. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom because that is the wish of the majority of the people who live here. It will remain part of the UK for as long as that remains the case . . . Unionists have nothing to fear from a new Labour government. A Political settlement is not a slippery slope to a united Ireland. The Government will not be persuaders for unity. (The Guardian, 17 May 1997) Surprisingly for someone who had never previously evinced much interest in Northern Ireland, Blair subsequently invested considerable time and effort in seeking to address the Province’s problems and thereby build on the peace process inaugurated by John Major in 1993. To this purpose, Blair embarked upon a series of meetings with a wide range of politicians from Northern Ireland during the summer of 1997, including senior members of Sinn Fein (the IRA having announced a new ceasefire in July), although largely for this very reason, Ian Paisley’s Democratic Unionist Party declined to participate. These talks were to culminate in the Good Friday Agreement of 10 April 1998; whose main principles and proposals were the following: • Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom, in accordance with the wishes of the people of the Province. However, the people of the island of Ireland as a whole are also entitled to a viewpoint, and to this end, a referendum will be conducted in the Republic of Ireland over whether to repeal Articles 2 and 3 of the Irish constitution, thereby renouncing the territorial claim to Northern Ireland. • The establishment of an Assembly, electing its 108 members via the Single Transferable Vote system, based on Northern Ireland’s existing Westminster constituencies. This Assembly would be granted both legislative and executive powers over a wide range of policy areas, most notably agriculture, economic development, education, finance, and health. Key decisions, however, would require the support and approval of both ‘communities’ in Northern Ireland. • The creation of a North-South Ministerial Council, whereby Ministers from Belfast and Dublin would meet to discuss all-Ireland policies, particularly in areas such as agriculture, education, health and social security. Any initiatives would need to be agreed by both ‘sides’.

Northern Ireland

341

• The creation of a British-Irish Council (Council of the Isles), comprising of representatives from the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Dublin Government, the British (Westminster) Government, the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly. Its purpose would primarily be that of exchanging information, consultation, and co-operation concerning matters of mutual interest. • That both ‘sides’ reaffirm their commitment to the process of decommissioning of weapons by their paramilitary organisations. • An ‘accelerated programme’ for the release of paramilitary prisoners.

Also proposed under the auspices of the Good Friday Agreement were the establishment of both a Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission and an Equality Commission, as well as an inquiry into policing in Northern Ireland, this to be chaired by a former Conservative Party chairman, Chris Patten. A further institutional innovation was to be the creation of a new body to supervise the decommissioning of paramilitary weapons, under the chairmanship of General John de Chastelain. The Good Friday Agreement was subsequently endorsed via referenda, on 22 May 1998, in both Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. In the former, a turn-out of just over 80 per cent revealed 71.1 per cent support, with 28.9 per cent opposed, while in the Irish Republic, where turn-out was rather lower, at 56.3 per cent, the Agreement was supported by a remarkable 94.4 per cent of those voting. The following month heralded elections to the new Northern Ireland Assembly, in which the Ulster Unionist Party emerged as the single largest party, with 25.9 per cent of the vote and 28 seats, whilst the Social Democratic and Labour Party won 24 seats with 22.2 per cent of the vote. The third largest party, in terms of seats, in the new Northern Ireland Assembly was Ian Paisley’s Democratic Unionist Party – which was officially opposed to the Good Friday Agreement – whose 18.5 per cent share of the vote yielded 20 seats. Sinn Fein, meanwhile, secured 16.7 per cent of the vote – which translated as 45 per cent of the nationalist vote in Northern Ireland (McConnell, 2000: 245) – and won 18 seats. In spite of the initial optimism, however, the Good Friday Agreement was subsequently beset by a number of problems which stalled further progress and even threatened to derail the whole peace process on occasions, to the extent that the Northern Ireland Assembly and its power-sharing executive were suspended after just 72 days, before being reinstated in May 2000. In particular, there was a lack of support amongst


more intransigent sections in both communities, with David Trimble’s leadership of the Ulster Unionist Party appearing increasingly precarious due to the hostility of some of his political colleagues, while on the nationalist side, the IRA’s professed commitment prompted the formation of a break-away ‘Real IRA’, which then carried out bombings in both Northern Ireland itself and in London. Various Loyalist paramilitaries also perpetuated sectarian violence, including the fatal shootings of several Catholics in the Province, following the Good Friday Agreement. Further tensions were annually fuelled by the insistence of the Orange Order on marching through Catholic districts during the summer ‘marching season’, with the stand-off at Drumcree in July 1998 placing a particular strain on the peace process. Meanwhile, Chris Patten’s report into policing in Northern Ireland caused considerable consternation amongst the Unionist community, due to its recommendations that the Royal Ulster Constabulary should be renamed the Northern Ireland Police Service, with its badge and other traditional symbols replaced, and the Union flag no longer flown from Northern Ireland’s police stations. Patten’s report also recommended that the police service in Northern Ireland should increase its recruitment from the Catholic community, so that in 10 years time, Catholics would comprise 30 per cent of the police force in the Province, thereby more closely reflecting the demographic profile of the population. The main obstacle to progress, however, was the continuing dispute over decommissioning of paramilitary weapons, and in particular, the apparent stalling by IRA. The Unionists insisted that the IRA should surrender its weaponry either in advance of or in tandem with (and in accordance with a firm timetable) the progress of the peace process, thereby proving that it had finally and unequivocally turned its back on violence. Jeffrey Donaldson, an Ulster Unionist Party MP (and touted, at the time, as a possible successor to the then Party leader, David Trimble), asserted that ‘We are not prepared to consider anything until there is actual decommissioning’ (The Guardian, 16 July 2001). By contrast, Sinn Fein and the IRA tended to view disarmament as an objective of the peace process, rather than a pre-condition of it, the implication being that the IRA would only surrender its weaponry when it, and Sinn Fein, were convinced of the fairness and durability of institutions and measures deriving from the Good Friday Agreement. Sinn Fein and the IRA also sought to link decommissioning of weapons to swifter reforms of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, based on the recommendations of the Patten report, coupled with a reduction in military and security policing in the Province, the latter demand also endorsed by

Northern Ireland

343

the SDLP. However, Unionist impatience with the lack of progress in this area resulted in David Trimble resigning, in June 2001, as Leader of the power-sharing executive in the Northern Ireland Assembly, whereupon it was suspended, and the Assembly put ‘on-hold’, thereby once again throwing the future of the whole peace process into doubt. Although Trimble was subsequently re-appointed as Leader of the power-sharing executive (which was then restored and the Assembly re-activated), similar problems continued to hinder progress towards a firm and lasting peace in Northern Ireland (for more detailed accounts of developments and problems in Northern Ireland since the Good Friday Agreement, see Bradbury and Mitchell, 2001: 265–8; Bradbury and Mitchell, 2002: 308– 12; Meehan, 2002: 63–88; O’Leary, 2001: 449–87; Tonge, 2002: 219–35), to the extent that, in October 2002, the Northern Ireland Assembly was again suspended and direct rule re-imposed. Even by the summer of 2006, the Northern Ireland Assembly had still not been reinstated, whilst the previous year’s general (UK) election had witnessed the Democratic Unionist Party and Sinn Fein become the two most popular parties in Northern Ireland, attracting more support than the Official Unionist Party and the SDLP respectively. With continued wrangling over IRA decommissioning, coupled with allegations of IRA involvement in organized crime and sporadic terrorist activity in the Province (most notably their suspected involvement in the killing of Robert McCartney in Belfast in January 2005, and similar suspicions about their role in the April 2006 murder of a former Sinn Fein member who had subsequently become an informant for Special Branch), and the continued shift towards centrifugal politics in both Northern Irish and UK elections, the prospects for progress and lasting peace in Northern Ireland looked bleak indeed. Furthermore, Tony Blair’s post-2003 preoccupation with the Iraq War and the threat posed to national security by Al Quieda meant that the Prime Minister was unable to devote the time and energy which he had devoted to solving ‘the Northern Ireland problem’ in the early stages of his premiership. Understandably exasperated by the continued lack of progress towards a lasting peace and closer co-operation in the Province, the spring and summer of 2006 heard senior Labour Ministers warn that time – and patience – was running out. In April 2006, Tony Blair himself strongly urged the politicians from Northern Ireland’s two politico-religious communities to overcome their mutual distrust and suspicion, in order to resuscitate the peace process and ensure that the objectives of the Good Friday Agreement were successfully achieved. To this end, a deadline of November 2006 was stipulated for an agreement to be reached between


the two communities which would lead to the reactivation of the Northern Ireland Assembly and its Executive, although beyond continued suspension of the Assembly, it was not entirely clear what sanctions would – or could – be invoked by Labour Ministers if this deadline passed without a satisfactory resolution to the ongoing stalemate. Yet Blair’s call merely prompted Gerry Adams to accuse Ian Paisley of being the obstacle to progress by refusing to abide by the principles of the Good Friday Agreement, whilst Paisley, in turn, complained bitterly about the ‘putting of terrorists and criminals into the government of Northern Ireland’, adding pointedly that ‘Entrance to government cannot be dependent on a date, but only when terror and crime carried out by those allied to a political party is gone for ever’ (The Guardian, 7 April 2006). Such a response earned a rebuke from the Northern Ireland Secretary, Peter Hain, who suggested that the ‘crystal clear’ evidence of the independent monitoring commission’s latest (April 2006) report was that ‘paramilitary action has closed down, and decommissioning has happened.’ Consequently, Hain warned that the future success of devolution and power-sharing in Northern Ireland now depended largely on whether Paisley and the DUP were willing to adopt a more constructive stance and move forward with the other parties involved, or whether they wanted ‘to be seen as the party that brought devolution down’, in which case, direct rule from Westminster would continue (also entailing the implementation of various policies which the DUP might not like) and salaries and expenses would cease to be paid to AMs (The Guardian, 27 June 2006). It was nearly a year later, though, in May 2007, before the Northern Ireland Assembly and power-sharing Executive were finally restored, following agreement reached, a few weeks earlier, by Ian Paisley and Gerry Adams, at their first ever face-to-face meeting. In the preceding months, many politicians and officials on all sides, not least Tony Blair himself, had expended considerable time and energy seeking to ensure that the solving of ‘the Northern Ireland problem’ heralded by the Good Friday Agreement would be fully realized and not be added to the list of former failed initiatives. Following these strenuous efforts, Monday, 7 May 2007 witnessed Ian Paisley being sworn in as First Minister of Northern Ireland, with Sinn Fein’s Martin McGuiness inaugurated as Deputy First Minister. So confident were those involved that a lasting peace had finally been achieved, that less than three months later, on 31 July, British troops were finally withdrawn from Northern Ireland. The attainment of this peace in Northern Ireland will probably be viewed as Tony Blair’s greatest political achievement, although he himself rightly acknowledged the role

Northern Ireland

345

played by his predecessor, the Conservative Prime Minister, John Major, in the first half of the 1990s, vis-à-vis the ‘Downing Street Declaration’, on which the Good Friday Agreement built.

Conclusion As in most other spheres, the Labour Party has lacked a coherent or consistent approach towards Northern Ireland, and therefore veered from initial indifference up until the mid-1960s to a marked tension thereafter between instinctive and ideological sympathy with the nationalist Catholic ‘cause’ on the one hand and the political and electoral need to recognize the views and aspirations of the – Protestant – Unionist – majority in the Province on the other, with the latter emphatically wishing to remain part of the United Kingdom. Having therefore sought to downgrade or deny the grievances of the Catholic minority for most of the 1921–1964 period, preferring instead to assure the Unionists of the Labour Party’s acceptance of partition as reflecting the wishes of the majority in Northern Ireland, the Labour Party subsequently found itself – particularly at leadership level – formally committed to Irish unification as a long-term objective, but only if and when a majority of the population of the Province clearly wished to merge with the Republic. This meant that the Labour Party was obliged to accept that, for the foreseeable future, a united Ireland was not attainable, which in turn meant that a dual strategy would have to be pursued, entailing the implementation of social reform to ameliorate the discrimination (disputed or denied by the Protestants) and deprivation endured by the Catholics, whilst simultaneously seeking to reassure the Unionist majority that their own constitutional position was secure. This was always an extremely difficult path to pursue, for any concessions secured for the Catholics were likely to antagonize the Unionists, who resented the erosion of their privileged position, and viewed such pacification of the Nationalists as a process of reunification by stealth. By contrast, many Nationalists felt that the reforms secured on their behalf did not go far enough and that, in any cases, they were being expected to accept piecemeal reforms in return for the continued dominance of the Unionists in Northern Ireland, which therefore fuelled Catholic suspicions about precisely where the Labour Party’s loyalties lay. The Labour Party’s unease over Northern Ireland, particularly since the later half of the1960s, has been compounded by the electoral and political need to distance itself from Sinn Fein and the unequivocal


denunciation of terrorism. Clearly, for Labour politicians to have promoted the cause of Irish re-unification too vocally or vigorously would have rendered them extremely vulnerable to Unionist and Conservative accusations of being on the side of the (Nationalist) terrorists – namely the IRA – and thus of condoning the use of the bomb and the bullet against the ballot box. Consequently, in being obliged to denounce terrorism in Northern Ireland, and reiterate that any change to the status of the Province can only be secured through peaceful and constitutional means based on the wishes of the majority of the populace, the Labour Party has often found itself pursuing a bipartisan approach to ‘the Irish problem’, with little to distinguish Labour’s day-to-day policies and proclamations from those of the Conservatives. There is no doubt, therefore, that whilst the Labour Party has, particularly since the late 1960s, been formally committed to the principle of a United Ireland, this is always a long-term aspiration, to be realised at some unspecified date in the future, whilst in short to medium term, the objective has been to assuage the anxieties and suspicions of the Protestant/Unionist majority in Northern Ireland about their political status in the United Kingdom, while also pressing for measures to improve the economic and social conditions of the minority Catholic community in the Province. Yet if the Unionists felt sufficiently reassured about their political status, they might feel less compunction to introduce reforms intended to improve the material conditions of the Catholic minority. Clearly, pursuing such an approach has invariably proved extremely difficult, thereby reinforcing the perspectives of those in the Labour Party either who believe in more immediate Irish reunification and/of withdrawal of British troops or who have preferred, as far as practicably possible, not to become embroiled in the internal affairs of Northern Ireland. For most senior Labour parliamentarians, though, neither of these have been viable options, hence the pursuit of the somewhat incompatible objectives noted above, and the various attempts at establishing devolved power-sharing institutions and arrangements in Northern Ireland, of which Tony Blair’s Good Friday Agreement represents the most recent initiative, and also the boldest yet by a senior Labour politician (albeit building on John Major’s 1993 ‘Downing Street Declaration’). Most importantly, it also looks like proving the most successful in terms of delivering a lasting peace to Northern Ireland.

Conclusion: A Century of Constitutional Conservatism

The most notable aspect of Labour’s approach to constitutional questions throughout the Party’s history has been its conservatism and caution and its oscillation between ambivalence and antipathy over particular proposals for constitutional reform. Much of this constitutional conservatism has derived from the Labour Party’s traditional disdain towards theorization and intellectual genuflection and the pride which its leadership has invariably placed, instead, on pragmatism and piecemeal reform. While Labour has invariably been depicted by its Conservative opponents as being imbued with dangerous elements of dogmatism and radicalism, and thus repeatedly charged with posing a threat to the British political system and ‘a thousand years of history’, the reality has been that the Party has frequently displayed an almost ostentatious obsequiescence towards the political institutions and procedural norms which collectively and cumulatively comprise Britain’s constitutional framework. Most senior Labour politicians have taken for granted the principles and efficacy of Britain’s parliamentary democracy, for example, along with the professed impartiality and neutrality of the Civil Service. Indeed, such criticisms and reforms which Labour has occasionally applied to Britain’s machinery of government and political institutions have primarily been concerned with strengthening them, thereby increasing or restoring their efficiency. Furthermore, on such occasions, the ensuing reforms seem to have dissipated or lost their momentum, either because Labour leaders failed to sustain their initial interest (quite possible as an understandable consequence of being distracted by other issues or problems requiring immediate attention) or because the reforms faced implementation problems. To give but just one example at this point, it has been noted that the 1968 Fulton Report, which was supposed to provide the basis for Harold Wilson’s attempt at modernizing the Civil Service, ‘was only a shadow of what Wilson had once intended [and] was no more than the shadow of a shadow by the time it had worked its way through to implementation on the ground’ (Ziegler, 1995: 315), to the extent that this 347


‘attempt to reform the Civil Service ended in almost complete failure’ (Ponting, 1990: 391). Moreover, the Labour Party’s proposals and policies for constitutional reform have been notable not only for their conservatism or ad hoc character, but also for their ambiguous (and sometimes contradictory) objectives. Labour’s lack of a clear theoretical perspective about the nature of the constitution, and thus about why and how it should be reformed (beyond ‘strengthening’ or ‘modernizing’ it), has served to ensure that many of the proposals variously advanced have suffered from a lack of coherence and consistency, both with regard to their internal logic and also in terms of their concomitant impact or implications vis-àvis other political institutions (Jones and Keating, 1985: 193). Or, to use the parlance of New Labour, the Party has displayed a singular lack of ‘joined-up thinking’ on constitutional matters. Even the Blair Governments, in spite of pursuing the greatest number of constitutional reforms in British political history, seemed devoid of any apparent intellectual framework or strategy for their ‘modernization’ of Britain’s governing institutions. Or as one constitutional expert has expressed it, ‘the reforms are not designed or interpreted as aspects of a coherent and planned constitutional project. Each reform is viewed in isolation’ (Flinders, 2004: 137). In similar vein has Johnson (2001) noted the inchoate character of New Labour’s approach to constitutional reform and the Blair Governments’ overall failure – or unwillingness – to challenge the basic principles and practices of government in Britain, which retain a considerable element of elitism, in spite of enacting devolution to Scotland and Wales.

Labour’s commitment to parliamentarianism That the Labour Party has so often adopted a highly conservative attitude towards the institutions and practices of the British constitution is also partly a direct legacy of its historical origins at the very beginning of the twentieth century [although, clearly, the history of the labour movement stretches back rather further, as E. P. Thompson elegantly explained (Thompson, 1968; see also Fox, 1985)]. Of course, the primary rationale for the trade unions’ formation of the Labour Representation Committee in 1900, and its transformation into the Labour Party six years later, was to secure political – parliamentary – representation for the British working class. The Labour Party and its trade union founders were ‘essentially moderate, reformist and gradualist, content to work legally within the existing state apparatus’, with a major consequence of the

Conclusion

349

trade unions’ organic link with the Labour Party being ‘to establish the primacy of parliamentary rather than industrial action as the strategy for the achievement of socialism’ (Leach, 1996: 150). From the very outset, therefore, the institutional focus of articulating the aspirations and grievances of the industrial working class was Parliament, which in turn necessarily entailed acceptance of parliamentary democracy as the means of securing political representation and inter alia social reform. Or as Leach expresses it The circumstances in which the Labour Party was founded involved a clear commitment to electoralism and parliamentarianism. It was also implicitly assumed that electoral success would secure real power, and effective control of the state . . . . Indeed, Labour accepted without question most of the apparatus of the British state. Socialism was to be achieved by acquiring, through the ballot box, control of Westminster and Whitehall, winning and using the power of the state. (Leach, 1996: 156) Indeed, it has been suggested that Parliamentarism . . . has not been merely an orientation or predilection: it has been the very reason for [the Labour Party’s] existence. When the trade unions set up a political committee to arrange for their representation in Parliament, representation was what they had in mind: policy was secondary . . . . The purpose of the Labour Party has always been to win seats: to gain the election, at local and national levels, of men and women who are representatives of the working class. (Pimlott, 1977: 196) This purpose largely derived from the conviction that the ‘neutral’ institutions of the British political system were, in accordance with the doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty, accountable to the ‘will of Parliament’. Many in the Labour Party have been convinced that whoever gained control of Parliament, via a general election victory, would pari passu gain control of all other political institutions (Judge, 1983: 31). Or as Harold Wilson asserted ‘Not only Parliament, but the vast machinery of the State which it controls . . . [is] politically neutral, loyal to their political masters’ (quoted in Coates, 1975: 143). Even figures on the Left of the Labour Party who might have been sceptical or even critical of various other British political institutions, such as the Civil Service, for example, have often revealed a remarkable faith in


Parliament itself. Aneuran Bevan, for example, is said to have ‘acquired a deep respect, almost love, for the House of Commons’, coming to view it as a place where, given proper use of its possibilities, poverty could win the battle against property without bloodshed . . . gradually and imperceptibly – and the fact was of considerable importance for his own future and the Labour Party’s – he came to regard Parliament as the most precious political instrument in the hands of the people. (Foot, 1966: 227–8) Some senior Labour politicians even appear to have become overawed by the traditionalism and lack of logic pertaining to certain aspects of Parliament, to the extent that, with regard to the Upper House, Herbert Morrison once declared that the ‘very irrationality of the composition of the House of Lords and its quaintness are safeguards of our modern British democracy’ (Morrison, 1964: 205).

The impact of Fabianism A key philosophic strand within the Labour Party, but one whose constitutional implications were highly conservative, was that of Fabianism, for the Fabian approach was predominantly that of attaining formal political control of the State, whereupon the efficient implementation of policies and allocation of resources would themselves improve the material well-being of ordinary working people. This perspective broadly accepted the neutrality of the State and its constituent parts (most notably the Civil Service) and thus believed that it could readily be used by a Labour Administration to pursue social and economic reform. Indeed, the Fabians were ‘strict constitutionalists who looked on Parliament and the Civil Service as an adequate means of achieving socialism’. In believing that ‘the State was fundamentally neutral’, the Fabians were convinced that the state ‘could be captured by the industrious classes [instead of the leisured classes] through their socialist representatives by means of elections’, and as such, the issue was ‘merely one of which class was in control of its functions, and therefore of which class controlled the House of Commons’ (Foote, 1985: 27–8, emphasis in original). To the extent that the Fabian perspective did countenance constitutional reform, it was invariably concerned to improve administrative efficiency (as illustrated by the critique of the senior Civil Service advanced during the 1960s and which shaped much of subsequent

Conclusion

351

Fulton Report) rather than democratize Britain’s political institutions and constitutional arrangements. Indeed, the whole Fabian perspective was essentially top-down and technocratic in approach, thereby further militating against any serious pursuit of institutional democratization or political decentralization. The Fabians’ purpose was not significantly to reform Britain’s political institutions and the machinery of government per se but to acquire political control of them and to ensure that they were staffed by the ‘right’ people: ‘Labour’s Fabian inheritance commits it to the objectives of equality and efficiency through the agency of the centralised state’ (Jones and Keating, 1985: 193), with these twin objectives to be attained largely through ‘scientific administration by . . . properly trained and qualified civil servants’ (Leach, 1996: 154). Constitutional reform was not, therefore, a notable objective of Fabianism, except in so far as it sought to improve the efficiency of the Civil Service, so that it could more readily administer measures of social reform enacted by Labour governments.

The benign assumptions of Labour’s social democracy This essentially benign view of the State (Barker, 1978: 48) also underpinned the social democratic approach which much of the Labour Party – again, more particularly at more senior levels – has traditionally subscribed to. Here too, the key to pursuing economic and social reform was deemed to be the attainment of a parliamentary majority – even though invariably on a minority of votes cast, due to the operation of the first-past-the-post electoral system – which would, in turn, bestow upon the Labour Party both the legitimacy and the ability to deploy the machinery of the State to implement its policies. It was envisaged that a Labour government would not normally encounter serious opposition or obstruction, largely because of the assumptions (themselves enshrined in the Westminster Model of British government and political power) about the political neutrality and impartiality of institutions such as the Civil Service, but also because of the Party’s generally unquestioning acceptance of parliamentary democracy, which yielded a concomitant belief that electoral victory automatically constituted a mandate to implement the policies on which the election campaign had been contested. This, it was tacitly assumed, would militate against the liberal democratic State seeking to prevent a Labour government from implementing its policies. In this respect, it has been suggested that ‘British social democrats have been as enamoured of the ancient traditions of Britain’s parliamentary state as have their rivals on the right’, and as such ‘social democratic


thinkers gave much more thought to what the state should do than to what it should be’ (Marquand, 1997: 3–4). In similar vein, Judge notes that ‘The centralisation and concentration of formal political power in the Cabinet at Westminster was well-suited for the collectivist age’ (Judge, 1983: 28). For Labour’s social democrats, the ‘ship of state’ could, in effect, be steered in almost any direction and towards almost any destination. What mattered ultimately was the political ‘crew’ on board and which ‘captain’ was up on the ‘bridge’. If it was ‘captained’ by a Labour government, therefore, the ‘ship of state’ could apparently be steered towards socialism (although never travelling too quickly, and even then, only proceeding if sea conditions were not too choppy!). Harold Wilson actually used a non-nautical analogy to articulate his benign and trusting view of the State, likening it to ‘a car waiting to be driven’, and explaining that ‘Whichever way it is steered, the machine will go. What matters is the driver. If the man behind the machine is a Labour man, the machine will move towards Labour’ (quoted in Coates, 1975: 142–3). This faith in the capacity and flexibility of Britain’s uncodified constitution and its political institutions to prove amenable to the principles and policies of the Labour Party was reaffirmed by the successes enjoyed by the (1945–1951) Labour Governments led by Clement Atlee. Indeed, their benign experiences were such that even when Labour was in back in Opposition for 13 years after losing the 1951 general election, the Party gave little consideration to constitutional questions, for as Marquand notes, ‘Labour Minister discovered – or thought they had discovered – that, in good hands, the Westminster model could be the engine of a social revolution’, and as such, ‘For social democrats of Crosland’s generation, the point of political activity was to get back into the engine room and reach for the levers. There was no need to worry about the finer points of its design’ (Marquand, 1997: 3–4; see also Wright, 1990: 325). Looking back at the Attlee Governments, Crossman declared that during ‘the history of the Left, there can seldom have been an administration so conservative in its solicitude for the stuffier constitutional conventions’ (Crossman, 1966: 156). Certainly, there ‘was to be no real attempt [by the Attlee Governments] to break the hold of the civil service’, not least because ‘warnings about civil service domination . . . tended to issue from Labour’s intellectual outsiders, like Laski, rather than from its professional politicians’ (Eatwell and Wright, 1978: 44). Thus has Theakston noted how ‘Labour governments in Britain have . . . done little to disturb the established order in Whitehall’, with the 1945–1950 Attlee Government proving to be ‘constitutionally conservative, content to

Conclusion

353

operate the system it inherited’, so that Ministers ‘worked closely with top mandarins’ (Theakston, 1998: 13). Even former Labour critics, such as Harold Laski, seemed to temper many of their pre-War criticisms about such institutions as the Civil Service following the generally successful tenure in Office of the Attlee Governments and the extent to which these had been able to pursue a major programme of economic reconstruction and social reform. With the Attlee Governments providing clear evidence ‘that “the job’’ could be done through the normal machinery of parliamentary government, there seemed little point in Labour politicians insisting that the machinery was “obsolete’’ or “antiquated’’ . . . the old . . . parliamentary vehicle was capable, after all, of a carrying a socialist load’ (Hanson, 1957: 53, 54).

The Westminster Model These three ideological ‘strands’ in the Labour Party are effectively buttressed by Labour’s tacit acceptance of the precepts of the Westminster Model of British government, which, as we noted in the Introduction, enshrines a number of assumptions or norms concerning British government and parliamentary politics. In particular, the Westminster Model entails strong single-party government accountable to Parliament on a day-to-day basis, in accordance with the twin doctrines of individual and collective Ministerial responsibility, and beyond that to the electorate through regular (at least every five years), free and fair general elections, offering a choice of parties to vote for. The party which wins such an election by virtue of securing a majority of seats in the House of Commons (not, it must be emphasized, a majority of votes cast nationally) is then deemed to have a mandate to enact the measures pledged in its manifesto, subject to formal parliamentary approval, these measures then being implemented by a professional, permanent and politically non-aligned Civil Service. We also noted how the Westminster Model enshrines the principle of a unitary state whose constituent regions are subject to the over-riding authority of the ‘sovereign’ Parliament. Although many, if not most, of the defining principles of the Westminster Model have long been highly questionable (in terms of their empirical accuracy or continued validity), they have nonetheless shaped the attitudes and actions of many Labour politicians, with distinctly conservative implications and consequences for the Party’s approach to constitutional reform. For example, the emphasis on strong single-party


government has militated against electoral reform (for Westminster elections), while the notion of the mandate, coupled with the importance placed on strong and stable government, has reinforced a reluctance to strengthen Parliament in a manner which would tilt the balance of power away from the executive towards the legislature, because this would almost inevitably constrain Ministerial and governmental autonomy. Meanwhile, the emphasis on a unitary state which is subject to the sovereignty of Parliament has reinforced the Labour Party’s general lack of enthusiasm concerning devolution for Scotland and Wales and also for the English regions.

The conservatism and anti-intellectualism of Britain’s labour movement Labour’s organic and organizational links with the trade unions have also served to reinforce the Party’s constitutional conservatism throughout much of its history, for the dominant labourist ethos of organized labour in Britain, by focusing predominantly on economic and industrial issues, never seriously or systematically questioned the British constitution or politico-institutional framework. Instead, it too was primarily preoccupied with seeking material improvement for working people through free collective bargaining in the industrial sphere, and greater representation, via Parliament, in the political sphere, and as one writer has subsequently noted, the pursuit of ‘[H]igher wages, shorter hours and better working conditions do not lend themselves to a general philosophy of society’. As such, ‘The relationship of the Labour party to its trade union base provides [a] key to understanding the limits within which political debate has been held’ (Foote, 1985: 7, 6). Meanwhile, writing in the mid-1930s, Laski noted that The faith in constitutionalism among the working class is profound; and trade unions, whose habits have been framed by so long a record of the economic success of capitalism not unnaturally cling to the belief in the possibilities of profiting from the pressure they can exert upon it. They are unwilling to jeopardise their own safety by what appears to them . . . a gamble with revolution. The whole ethos of the British attitude is set by the realisation that the electoral defeat of Conservatism now means the victory of Labour [and] the prospect of peaceful transition. It means also the right, if a Labour Government is unconstitutionally challenged, to utilise the state for its defence. (Laski, 1935: 298)

Conclusion

355

Such questioning of the State and the constitution which did occasionally occur mainly focused on the judiciary, with some trade unions harbouring doubts about the impartiality and neutrality of the courts and senior judges when called upon to adjudicate in disputes between employers and organized labour. Such reservations were the exception, however, for overall, ‘trade-unionism remained deferential to the state and the constitution’ (Nairn, 1977: 40), for the organized labour movement’s ‘empirical, undoctrinaire origins, the indigenous nature of all its roots, signify a particularly intimate bond with the society that gave birth to’ (Nairn, 1966: 160). Or as Smith and Polsby (1981: 102) noted, Britain’s trade unions ‘are for the most part sceptical, even resentful, of intellectuals with highbrow ideas’, as are many of their members who are ‘easily frightened by grandiose projects that seem impracticable’ (which, incidentally, partly explains why the British working class has shown little, if any, interest in Marxism). This constitutional conservatism on the part of the trade unions was partly derived from their own anti-intellectualism and pragmatic empiricism, but also both reflected and reinforced the suspicion of ‘abstract theory’ which permeated the Labour Party itself. For the most part, Labour Party leaders and trade union leaders alike have prided themselves on their ‘realism’ and ‘practicability’, acutely aware of the limits to what could be achieved, in the short term, due to economic circumstances, politico-constitutional constraints and the vagaries of public or electoral opinion. Certainly, the leadership of Britain’s trade unions have traditionally ‘made clear their distrust of “intellectuals’’, their innate reverence for the “practical’’, and for moderate, unintellectual “reasonableness’’ ’ (Nairn, 1966: 181). This anti-intellectualism has been fully reciprocated by the Labour Party itself – ‘the Party . . . had never been prone to widespread theoretical debate’ (Eatwell and Wright, 1978: 39) – even though the Fabians, and assorted Left-wing intellectuals associated with the Party, have variously sought to provide a more theoretical framework or underpinning for Labour politicians. Such efforts, though, and particularly those of Leftwing intellectuals, have largely been in vain, as Labour’s over-lapping or inter-locking ‘strands’ of electoralism, Fabianism, labourism, parliamentarism and social democracy combined to sustain an unshakeable faith in ‘the inevitability of gradualism’ and pragmatism, with the Party’s primary goals of economic and social reform deemed dependent on securing majorities in the House of Commons; if such a majority could be attained, then all else would follow. These ‘strands’ and perspectives effectively entailed acceptance by the Labour Party of ‘the constitutional


norms and institutions of the State’, and to the extent that the Labour Party has sporadically sought to contemplate the role of the State and its political institutions, its genuflections and ensuing policies have ‘tended to be piecemeal and guided by pragmatic considerations’ (Jones and Keating, 1985: 195, 193). Meanwhile, Drucker once observed that Labour governments had often suffered ‘not so much from too much theory or from theory betrayed, but from too little theory. The Labour Party’s ideology does not contain a sufficiently coherent theory of the state or of [British] politics’ (Drucker, 1979: 90–1). Labour’s atheoretical empiricism was succinctly exemplified by Clement Attlee, when he reflected proudly on the achievements of his post-War governments, whereupon he noted that It had always been our practice to, in accord with the natural genius of the British people, to work empirically. We were not afraid of compromises and partial solutions. We knew that mistakes would be made, and that advance would often be by trial and error . . . in a country such as Britain . . . required great flexibility. (Attlee, 1954: 163) These sentiments were echoed 44 years later by Lord Irvine, during his tenure as Lord Chancellor in the first (1997–2001) Blair Government, when he sought to defend the absence of a clear or consistent programme of constitutional reform. In a speech to the Constitution Unit, Lord Irvine explained that The strands do not spring from a single master plan, however much that concept might appeal to the purists. We prefer the empirical genius of our nation: to go, pragmatically, step by step, for change through continuing consent . . . not absolutist master plans. (quoted in Flinders, 2004: 140) Such a perspective helps to explain why there has been ‘very little constitutional cement in terms of a uniting ideological or theoretical framework’ (Flinders, 2004: 138) with regard to the Blair Governments’ ostensibly comprehensive constitutional reform measures, and why, therefore, ‘the programme is confused and perhaps even incoherent, the product of ad hoc improvisations rather than systematic reflection’ (Marquand, 1999a: 240–1). Indeed, Marquand has remarked elsewhere upon the ‘deafening silence about the rationale, implications and ultimate goal of the changes set in train’ (Marquand, 1999b), while Gamble

Conclusion

357

and Wright (2000, 265) have emphasized the extent to which ‘In its genesis and implementation, the government’s enterprise of constitutional reform deliberately eschewed any engagement with first principles, with grand plans and templates’.

The consequences for Labour’s approach to specific constitutional reforms The Labour Party’s atheoretical, empiricist tradition, which has permeated Old and New Labour alike (regardless of the latter’s close association with the more normative framework of the ‘third way’), has therefore ensured that the Party has never possessed – nor sought – a coherent theory with which to approach constitutional reform (or any other reforms, for that matter). The absence of such an intellectual framework has served to ensure that the various measures sporadically promoted by the Labour Party to reform the constitution and comcomitant political institutions have often lacked coherence and consistency or have been concerned to strengthen existing arrangements and processes. Electoral system The Labour Party’s traditional commitment to executive dominance of Parliament, whereby the House of Commons enjoys primacy over the House of Lords, whilst the government itself is dominant in the House of Common, clearly reflects the Party’s continued adherence to the Westminster Model of British government. It also partly explains why the Labour Party has only occasionally shown any interest in electoral reform (for Westminster elections), and even on such occasions, this interest has generally been rather desultory or equivocal. The main reason why the Labour Party has only sporadically intimated any interest in electoral reform has been the lack of enthusiasm emanating from the Party’s leadership, for whom general elections should be concerned with ensuring that one political party is able to win by virtue of attaining a majority of seats in the House of Commons (even though this is invariably achieved on a minority of votes; as little as 36 per cent in the case of New Labour’s 66 seat majority in the 2005 general election), rather than a majority of votes cast nationally (although no government has achieved such a majority since the coalition ‘National’ Government in 1935). For most of Labour’s senior parliamentarians, only the first-past-thepost electoral system can ensure the election of a strong government,


one which has a sufficient number of seats in the House of Commons to enable it to implement its manifesto pledges and for which its electoral victory is assumed to have bestowed a mandate from the voters. This, in turn, is supposed to ensure that the House of Lords does not obstruct such measures (viz the ‘Salisbury doctrine’) and that when such measures have been formally endorsed by Parliament, they will be faithfully and professionally implemented by a politically neutral and impartial Civil Service. The dominant view in senior Labour circles for most of the twentieth century was that expressed by Laski, when he asserted that ‘The first and most vital function of the electorate is to choose a House of Commons, the membership of which makes possible the creation of a Government which can govern’ (Laski, 1951: 55). Labour’s many defenders of the first-past-the-post electoral system have also insisted that it provides for clear accountability and responsibility, both in the sense that voters know what they are voting for (due to the various parties’ manifestos and overall election campaigns) and that Ministers – both individually and collectively – are answerable to Parliament for their policies, and, ultimately, to the British electorate. Moreover, Labour’s defence of the existing electoral system has also entailed an emphasis on the importance of the constituency link which is facilitated between local voters and ‘their’ MP. Those Labour MPs and Ministers staunchly defending the first-pastthe-post electoral system have invariably argued that a voting system based on proportionality (between votes cast for a party and seats gained in the House of Commons) would both weaken the constituency link and almost certainly result in coalition governments, on the grounds that no individual party is likely to win more than 50 per cent of the votes cast. This, in turn, it is claimed, would render it almost impossible for the parties to make manifesto commitments, because they would not know who they would have to form a coalition with until after the election, and thus what deals would have to be struck (whereupon any policy pledges might well have to be abandoned). Furthermore, it is argued that the inevitable recourse to coalition government yielded by a (more) proportional electoral system would enable extremist minor parties to wield undue and pernicious influence, thereby generating political instability. Of course, in seeking to dismiss the case for electoral reform, Labour’s defenders of the first-past-the-post voting system have also tended to depict the alternative as Proportional Representation, as if there was simple either/or choice, rather than acknowledging the various forms of electoral systems which enshrine different degrees and modes of proportionality.

Conclusion

359

Meanwhile, Labour’s proponents of electoral reform have been weakened by their own internal divisions, emanating from the different voting systems which are variously promoted by those wishing to replace the first-past-the-post electoral system. This has meant that the Labour Party’s would-be electoral reformers have often been involved in a debate amongst themselves almost as much as with those of their colleagues who wish to retain the existing electoral system.

House of Commons Meanwhile, Labour politicians have sometimes sought simultaneously to reform procedure in the House of Commons, with the avowed intention of enhancing parliamentary scrutiny of government and/or providing a more constructive role for backbench MPs, while also urging reform of the machinery of government, so that the Cabinet’s agreed policies can be despatched more swiftly and ‘efficiently’. Clearly, these two objectives sit uneasily together, to say the least. Very often, of course, this has engendered a tension between Labour MPs and their Ministerial colleagues, for it is the former who have usually sought a more active role in Parliament, rather than being mere ‘lobby-fodder’ herded hither and thither by the Party’s whips, whilst it has often been Labour Ministers who have been most concerned to pursue their – and thus the Government’s and the Party’s – policies, unencumbered by ‘too much’ parliamentary scrutiny. The Labour Party’s 1964 manifesto, for example, spoke of the ‘need to make government itself more efficient . . . the machinery of government must be modernised’, yet this objective sat somewhat uncomfortably alongside subsequent attempts at granting backbenchers a more participatory role, through the establishment of new select or specialist subject committees. This tension between improving executive efficiency on the one hand and genuflecting towards an enhanced role for Parliament and (Labour) backbenchers on the other has never been satisfactorily resolved. On the contrary, it was evident throughout the Blair Governments, with most of the Labour leadership reluctant to grant its own backbenchers a more active or extensive role, especially if that meant that they might then call their own Ministers to account more frequently or critically scrutinize their policies more thoroughly. In other words, the Party leadership, even under New Labour, still subscribed to the view that the primary task of the party’s MPs is to support ‘their’ government and not act in an ‘obstructive’ manner.


It has also been noted how senior Labour politicians have tended to be (or become) particularly enamoured with the workings of the House of Commons, once they enjoyed a parliamentary majority sufficient to enact the Party’s policies. As one commentator has observed, although Labour politicians have been more willing than Conservatives and Liberals to criticize certain ‘antiquated’ procedures and practices pertaining to the House of Commons, ‘the deep respect felt by its most influential members for traditional ways’ has also been a notable aspect. Indeed, the majority of Labour leaders elected to Parliament ‘found little difficulty in adapting themselves to the manners and customs of the House, and soon became not a little proud of their parliamentary skill and savoirfaire’. As such, to those ‘moderate and “middle-of-the road’’ Socialists, who have never ceased to dominate the Party’s counsels, schemes for the radical reform of parliamentary government seemed both unnecessary and dangerous’: unnecessary, because the experience of the Attlee Governments seemed to provide confirmation that the House of Commons could readily pass ‘socialist’ measures and laws, if Labour secured a parliamentary majority, and dangerous because ‘any suggestion that Labour might lay impious hands on the ark of the Constitution would inevitably be exploited by political opponents to alienate those sensitive marginal voters in whose hands lay the key to parliamentary majorities’ (Hanson, 1956: 458–9, 456–7).

House of Lords A similar ambivalence regarding the Labour Party’s approaches to parliamentary reform has been apparent in its various proposals concerning the House of Lords. Not only has Labour often experienced intra-party disagreement over how to reform the House of Lords, it has also, on occasions, seemed uncertain about what the relationship and role of the Upper House should be vis-a-vis the House of Commons. In particular, those Labour MPs most desirous of abolishing the House of Lords often appeared not to have considered the dramatic increase in the workload of the House of Commons which would accrue from abolition of the Second House. Indeed, it might even be argued that a traditionally interventionist and reform-minded Labour government would have even more need of the assistance routinely provided by a Second Chamber, in order to avoid a complete overload of parliamentary and legislative business in the Commons. Similarly, ritual denunciations by Labour MPs and Ministers of hereditary peers have not been accompanied by any corresponding agreement

Conclusion

361

as to who, or what, should take the place of these unelected (and often Conservative) members of the Upper House. Every initiative to remove the hereditary peers has served to highlight the variety of opinions within the Labour Party over the subsequent composition of the House of Lords, with MPs and Ministers unable to agree on the basis of membership. An appointed Upper House immediately raises concerns about enhanced Prime Ministerial patronage (even when it is a Labour Prime Minister), and advocacy of an elected Second Chamber yields awkward questions about the method and timing of elections. Either option obliges its respective proponents to consider what the functions and purpose of a revised Second Chamber ought to be and what relationship this would entail between the House of Lords and the House of Commons. Meanwhile, some Labour politicians have actually shied away from pursuing House of Lords’ reform due to a realization that almost any changes will imbue it with greater legitimacy and thereby increase its readiness to challenge Labour governments. For this reason alone, such Labour MPs have preferred to ‘let sleeping peers lie’, a stance which led Robin Cook to observe that in ‘constitutional reality . . . Britain has a unicameral parliamentary system concealed by an elaborately colourful, but pathetically irrelevant second chamber’ (Cook, 2003: 280, diary entry for 4 February 2003). Meanwhile, there has also been bemusement or exasperation amongst some Labour MPs over attempts at reforming the House of Lords on the grounds that – in accordance with the Party’s labourist tradition – the leadership ought to be concentrating on ‘real’ issues, namely economic, industrial and social policies which address the concerns of ordinary working people, for whom parliamentary reform is neither salient nor meaningful. Indeed, many Labour MPs are inclined to dismiss constitutional reform in general as preoccupation of ‘the chattering classes’ and Guardianistas. Even the arch-modernizer and co-architect of New Labour, Peter Mandelson, once bluntly noted that ‘I never met anyone on the doorstep in Hartlepool [his former constituency] who claimed to be a convert to New Labour because of constitutional reform’ (quoted in Morrison, 2001: 495).

The Civil Service The generally conservative or inchoate character of the Labour Party’s approach to reform of Parliament and the (Westminster) electoral system has also extended to its stance concerning the Civil Service. Although Left critics have consistently attributed the (alleged) conservatism of


senior civil servants to their shared, privileged, socio-educational backgrounds and claimed that mandarins would thus be unwilling to implement radical policies introduced by a Labour government, this view has generally been dismissed by most Labour politicians who have served as Ministers. Instead, the mainstream view amongst senior Labour parliamentarians has been that the senior Civil Service has generally proved to be professional and supportive in its dealings with Labour Ministers and governments. This perspective, of course, neatly reflects and reinforces the Westminster Model’s premise concerning both the political neutrality of the Civil Service and the assumption that senior civil servants advise and assist Ministers in the formulation and implementation of public policy, but with ultimate responsibility residing with the Ministers who take the final decisions. As the erstwhile critic Laski observed towards the end of the Attlee premiership ‘The high official in this country maintains, on the whole, a loyalty to the decisions of any Minister he serves’, and while he will sometimes be strongly sceptical about a policy, and may seek to persuade the Minister to change course, ‘[H]e will always give way when the Minister has finally put his foot down’ (Laski, 1951: 168). If Labour Cabinets have occasionally been obliged to alter or abandon particular policies, it is argued, then the reason has invariably been that the policy itself proved unworkable or inappropriate to the problem it was intended to solve or that external events ‘blew the government off course’; the blame has not resided with allegedly duplicitous, reactionary, civil servants conniving to undermine democratically elected Labour governments and obstructing the implementation of socialist policies. Meanwhile, when individual Ministers have complained about being ‘dominated’ by their Departmental officials, the response of other senior colleagues, particularly Labour Prime Ministers, has usually been that the Minister was too weak or ineffective in imposing their authority on their civil servants, not that the mandarins were too powerful. To the extent that reforms have been proposed by Labour governments or senior Ministers pertaining to the Civil Service, these have been primarily concerned with enhancing its efficiency and professionalism, whilst always emphasizing that the final decisions are taken by Ministers who are accountable to Parliament. In other words, no Labour-inspired attempts at reforming or ‘modernizing’ the Civil Service have entailed any alteration of the formal constitutional relationship whereby senior civil servants advise Ministers, and those Ministers then take the final decision (in accordance with official governmental policy or strategy as determined by the Prime Minister or/and the Cabinet), whereupon civil

Conclusion

363

servants carry out or supervise the implementation of the policy or programme. What did change somewhat under the Blair Governments was the emphasis on the latter rather than the former, ‘with ministers concerning themselves with policy-making, and officials focusing on the “management’’ of the policy process’ (Richards and Smith, 2004: 120). However, this was largely an accretive process which built upon the Thatcher–Major Governments’ ‘Next Steps’ programme, and with Blair resistant to calls for the roles and responsibilities of civil servants to be placed on a statutory basis.

Open government Meanwhile, with regard to the twin issues of open government and freedom of information, Labour governments have again proved remarkably conservative and orthodox. Although many in the Labour Party have routinely demanded freedom of information legislation in order to facilitate open government in Britain, and the Labour Party when in Opposition has often been formally committed to such a policy, once they are back in Office, Labour Ministers have invariably become deeply sceptical about the desirability or efficacy of enacting such measures. Indeed, they have sought to dilute or defer policies intended to provide for the statutory release of more governmental information into the public domain. Regardless of their views and arguments in Opposition, and the exhortations of their backbench colleagues, Ministers in Labour governments appear repeatedly to have become enamoured with the alleged need for confidentiality and official secrecy in formulating public policy. Consequently, their primary concern in this sphere has generally been to restrict the release of, rather than make more readily available, official information; demands for open government when in Opposition becomes the defence of official secrecy once in Office. To the extent that Labour governments have occasionally pursued measures to facilitate freedom of information and promote open government, these have invariably been accompanied by a raft of restrictions and exemptions, so that the final policy is a pale shadow of the original proposal. Even the Blair Governments’ Freedom of Information Act was widely viewed as a rather weaker version of the proposed Bill originally envisaged in the preceding White Paper. Moreover, a range of exemptions were added, some of which were understandable, most notably matters pertaining to national security and commercial confidentiality (although even these are often open to interpretation), while other restrictions, particularly those relating to the actual determination


of public policy (such as what advice was proffered to Ministers in reaching their decisions), seemed to undermine some of the rationale of such legislation. The Blair Governments’ subsequent equivocation over enacting freedom of information legislation, in spite of New Labour’s professed enthusiasm when in Opposition in the 1990s, was also evident in the subsequent five-year delay imposed, so that although the Freedom of Information Act reached the statute book in 2000, it was not intended to become fully operational until 2005, leading Beetham et al. (2002: 401) to note that ‘ministers are determined to hold onto all their traditional powers at the centre and to reject, delay or frustrate constitutional changes that would check or make transparent their exercise of those powers’. Indeed, less than 20 months after the Freedom of Information Act became operational, it was reported that the Government was planning to introduce further restrictions on the release of information, ostensibly to prevent ‘frivolous’ or unduly expensive requests. Scottish and Welsh devolution Elsewhere, if the Labour Party has been characterized by a lack of coherence and consistency in approach to reforming Westminster and Whitehall, it has equally oscillated between ambiguity and antipathy in its responses to Scottish and Welsh nationalism. As Jones and Keating have clearly noted (Jones and Keating, 1985: 279), the Labour Party has been characterized by both a centralist tradition, which emphasizes the importance of securing political power at national level (in London) in order or to pursue economic and social reforms, and a more radical, decentralist tradition – partly inherited from the Liberalism against which the Party was competing during the first three decades of the twentieth century, particularly in Wales – which espouses democratization and the redistribution of power away from the centre. These two traditions have invariably proved particularly difficult to reconcile when faced with demands for Scottish and Welsh devolution. The centralist strand, often imbued with strong elements of dirigisme and economism, has emphasized the need for a (Labour) government at Westminster pursuing an economic and industrial strategy which will benefit all areas of Britain suffering from de-industrialization and deprivation (Mitchell, 1996b: 607). This centralist perspective has therefore viewed devolution as likely to make matters worse in those regions of Britain, namely Scotland and Wales, most affected by deindustrialization and the consequent decline of their traditional cultures due to the emigration of younger

Conclusion

365

people in search of work elsewhere, yet it has often been precisely these regions which have called for self-government or greater autonomy. Yet for many in the Labour Party, the industrial decline and relative economic weakness of Scotland and Wales has been cited as justification of greater intervention by central government, which in turn has invariably implied integration of the regional economies – particularly that of Wales – with England. In other words, the economic problems which are assumed to have underpinned demands for devolution would themselves make greater independence or autonomy economically untenable. Instead, this perspective has insisted that the economic and industrial problems affecting Scotland and Wales places these regions of the United Kingdom in even greater need of the ‘correct’ economic strategy implemented by a Labour government at Westminster. Or as Laski expressed it ‘The economic unity of the three nations [England, Scotland and Wales] which make up the United Kingdom1 is so close that any serious movement in . . . different directions would . . . raise insoluble financial problems’ (Laski, 1951: 46–7). Furthermore, some Labour politicians opposed to devolution have also viewed it as divisive of the British working class, insisting that workers have the same objective interests irrespective of whether they live and work in England, Scotland or Wales. Indeed, nationalism (which demands for devolution are clearly a variant of) has generally been viewed with deep suspicion by many Labour politicians, due to its connotations with the politics of the Right, and also as a manifestation of a reactionary backlash against modernity and progress. One other reason why many Labour politicians have been opposed to devolution derives from their concern that instead of pacifying nationalist sentiment in Scotland and/or Wales, devolving power to specifically Scottish or Welsh elected bodies would actually serve to legitimize the demands of the SNP and Plaid Cymru, and thereby increase their popularity. Indeed, Labour opponents of devolution have feared that their Party faces a no-win situation if it accedes to demands for greater autonomy by the Scottish or the Welsh. If devolution proves successful (in spite of the centralizers’ own claims that the Scottish and Welsh economies are too weak to sustain it – a further lack of coherence or consistency in Labour’s approach), then the nationalists in Scotland and Wales will appear vindicated, and consequently demand further

1

Of course, the ‘three nations’ actually constitute Great Britain, whereas the United Kingdom comprises these three nations and Northern Ireland.


autonomy, possibly leading to a call for complete independence. Yet if devolution fails to deliver the anticipated benefits to the people of Scotland and Wales, Labour opponents have feared, then the SNP and Plaid Cymru would doubtless claim that this proves the case for further devolution, on the grounds that the initial mode of devolution was insufficient. Either way, Labour’s ‘centralizers’ have tended to view devolution as, at best, a mistaken and inappropriate response to Scottish and Welsh grievances, and, at worst, a potential disaster which could lead to the complete break-up of Britain. Instead, the Party’s aim ‘has generally been to attain and retain power and to make Labour a “natural’’ governing party’, which in turn ‘involved a “national’’ approach, seeing virtually the whole population as its potential constituency’ (Keating and Bleiman, 1979: 17). Such a perspective, of course, has routinely ensured that ‘Labour’s enthusiasm for devolution has always been less than whole-hearted. It has tended to regard devolution as a means of preserving the unity of the state’ (Jones and Keating, 1985: 193), a view which Tony Blair certainly subscribed to when permitting Scotland to have its own Parliament in the late 1990s. By contrast, Labour’s decentralist strand has much more readily acknowledged the case for devolution to Scotland and Wales, even though there has often been a lack of agreement about the degree of selfgovernment or autonomy which the Scottish and Welsh people should enjoy, and therefore how much power ought to be devolved. In this context, Labour’s pro-devolutionists have invariably disagreed whether devolution should be of a legislative character, in the form of a Parliament vested with law-making powers over specific policy areas, or merely administrative and executive, in the guise of an Assembly, whereby Scotland and Wales would have much greater discretion over the implementation of a range of policies, but with these policies continuing to emanate from Westminster. In general, Labour’s devolutionists have deemed it appropriate for Scotland to have its own Parliament and thus be granted a relatively high degree of legislative autonomy (recognizing that Scotland already had its own education and legal systems), whereas Wales has been considered worthy only of administrative devolution, albeit with limited powers pertaining to secondary legislation. Nor should it be assumed that the division between centralizers and devolutionists in the Labour Party has simply been between its English MPs on the one hand and its Scottish and Welsh MPs on the other, for some of the most ardent opponents of devolution, more particularly of the legislative variant, have been Labour MPs and Ministers from Scotland and Wales themselves.

Conclusion

367

Meanwhile, on those occasions that the Labour Party has acknowledged the legitimacy of devolutionary demands or aspirations, it has still tended to give the impression of acting reluctantly or pragmatically, rather than with any genuine sense of commitment or conviction. It has been widely noted that the Labour Party’s willingness to adopt or pursue devolution during the latter half of the 1970s, and then again from the late 1980s onwards, was largely prompted by electoral considerations, namely the need to neutralize the electoral support being garnered by the SNP and Plaid Cymru in Scotland and Wales respectively. As one writer has noted, in the 1970s especially, devolution ‘was foisted on sceptical Labour Parties in Scotland and Wales in a hurry, with the result that Labour’s support for constitutional change looked extremely instrumental and concerned solely with protecting support within its electoral strongholds’ (Deacon and Lynch,1996: 68). Meanwhile, at parliamentary level during the mid-1970s, not only did Harold Wilson and Barbara Castle reluctantly accept the case for Scottish devolution on the grounds that it was now necessary to prevent a drift towards separatism – clearly the greater evil – Wilson also reckoned that proposals for a Scottish Parliament were necessary in order to dissuade the SNP’s 11 MPs from voting against the Labour Government (which lacked a working parliamentary majority and was therefore extremely vulnerable to defeat if the ‘minor’ parties entered the Division Lobbies with the Conservative Opposition) (Donoughue, 2005: 284, diary entry for 17 January 1975). Furthermore, the granting of devolution has been accompanied by a strong insistence by the Labour leadership that the policy is intended to strengthen the essential unity of the United Kingdom, with sovereignty still remaining with the UK Parliament at Westminster. Hence, an apparently radical measure is intended, ultimately, to have a highly conservative effect. As a biographer of Harold Wilson notes, for example, in introducing legislation for Scottish (and Welsh) devolution in the mid-1970s, Wilson’s main aim was not first and foremost to provide the regions with greater democracy, but to ‘Give a part to preserve the whole, make a concession to avoid having to make a bigger one’ (Ziegler, 1995: 453). Or as a Cabinet committee emphasized when discussing the draft of a White Paper on Scottish and Welsh devolution in the early autumn of 1974, ‘the integrity of the United Kingdom as a whole must be maintained . . . constitutional change must be undertaken with the clear objective of strengthening rather than weakening it’ (NA CAB 130/763 MISC 46 (74), 1st meeting, 5 September 1974). Much more recently, two commentators have observed that with regard to the devolution enacted by the Blair Governments:


Their commitments have been framed in the context of devolving greater power to the territories, in order, paradoxically, to strengthen and reinvigorate the unitary character of the [British] state, not as a transitory stage on the path to complete separation or federalism. (Richards and Smith, 2001: 155) That New Labour, and Tony Blair especially, appeared reluctant to devolve too much power was evident in the Government’s determination to ensure that Alun Michael became First Secretary in the new Welsh Assembly, even though Labour’s membership in Wales clearly preferred Rhodri Morgan. The subsequent problems accompanying Welsh devolution apparently reinforced the scepticism and lack of enthusiasm with which Blair had viewed the whole issue: ‘hanging in the air was the thought that it had been a monumental mistake. Blair would shrug his shoulders and say: “I had to do it’’ ’ (Rawnsley, 2000: 236). English regionalism It is with regard to England, however, that the Labour Party has generally displayed the greatest reluctance to contemplate devolution. Indeed, with the exception of a few Labour politicians, such as John Mackintosh during the 1960s and John Prescott in the 1980s, the Party has, until the 1990s, treated English devolution virtually as a non-issue. To the extent that any English regional dimension was occasionally acknowledged, it was almost entirely economistic, with the Labour leadership recognizing distinct English regions only in the context of regional economic planning and industrial regeneration to economically disadvantaged areas of the country. Such recognition was invariably couched within the framework of a national economic plan determined at Westminster and Whitehall, whereupon regional planning boards or councils would be established in order to administer central government’s economic plan or strategy. It was not normally intended that such regional bodies would be directly elected or provide the English regions with the opportunity for self-government. Furthermore, the economic or industrial needs of these regions were mainly to be decided by the Labour Government in London. Northern Ireland With regard to Northern Ireland, meanwhile, the Labour Party has sought to combine a formal long-term commitment to Irish reunification with a recognition that for the foreseeable future, this option will remain anathema to the (Protestant/Unionist) majority in Northern Ireland.

Conclusion

369

Senior Labour politicians have therefore simultaneously insisted that permanent ‘partition’ between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic is untenable, but that reunification is unrealistic for the foreseeable future. Indeed, until the 1960s, most Labour politicians – particularly in the senior echelons of the PLP – avoided concerning themselves with Northern Irish politics, in spite of some awareness of the plight of the catholic community in the Province. Since the 1960s and the emergence of ‘the troubles’ in the Province, Labour has often adopted a bipartisan approach to tackling problems in Northern Ireland, sharing with the Conservative Party the objectives of containing paramilitary violence, combating terrorism, seeking ways of devolving power (after the imposition of direct rule in 1972, albeit with safeguards to protect the rights of the catholic minority in any devolved framework) and urging moderate Unionists to ameliorate the socio-economic conditions of the catholic community, not least because the ensuing grievances effectively underpinned at least some of the support given to Sinn Fein. Almost always, however, senior Labour politicians have been at pains to emphasize the security of Northern Ireland’s status within the United Kingdom, in accordance with the wishes of the majority (Protestant//Unionist) population in the Province.

The Constitutional conservatism of Labour Prime Ministers One further factor which has reinforced the general conservatism of the Labour Party with regard to constitutional issues concerns the character of its Prime Ministers, for as Theakston (2005) has noted, those who have led the Party in Office throughout the twentieth century have rarely displayed any serious, systematic or sustained interest in constitutional reform. On the contrary, their approach towards the constitution, and the institutions and processes of British government, has invariably been notable for its reverence and respect. Ramsay MacDonald As we have variously noted previously, Ramsay MacDonald did not bequeath a legacy of constitutional reform following his two premierships, partly of course, because he led two minority Labour governments whose autonomy was thus seriously constrained, but also because his second Government was beset by severe economic difficulties. Yet even if MacDonald’s two Labour Administrations had enjoyed comfortable parliamentary majorities and presided over more benign economic conditions, there is little reason to believe that he would have pursued much by way of constitutional reform. His initial ostensible commitment to


Scottish devolution, as indicated by his secretaryship of the London branch of the Scottish Home Rule Association during the 1880s, had largely dissipated by the time he first became Prime Minister, whereupon he insisted that there were more pressing matters to address. Similarly, although he had argued in favour of the Alternative Vote (but not proportional representation), his Second Government only introduced a Bill (which did not reach the statute book) for electoral reform in 1931, in an attempt at securing more general Liberal support for the Government in the context of its lack of a parliamentary majority. Overall though, MacDonald was, understandably at the time, primarily concerned with establishing Labour as a credible and responsible party of government, and thus as a worthy alternative to the declining Liberals. This objective effectively militated against constitutional reform, as MacDonald’s Labour Party focused on using existing political institutions and procedures to pursue measures which would improve the material conditions of ordinary working people in Britain. This, after all, was ultimately what the Labour Party had been formed for in 1906: to secure parliamentary representation on behalf of organized labour and the working class, in order to introduce economic, industrial and social reform – not constitutional reform. MacDonald ‘was always deeply wedded to late-Victorian orthodoxies of stability, cohesion and evolutionary change’ which ultimately rendered him ‘a conservative force’ (Morgan, 1992: 48, 51). Like his successors, MacDonald readily accepted both the tenets of the Westminster Model and the social democratic view concerning the neutrality of the state and its governing institutions, once asserting that A Parliamentary election will give us all the power that Lenin had to get by revolution, and such a majority can proceed to effect the transition from Capitalism to Socialism with the co-operation of the people, and not merely by edict . . . if the government has the country behind it, it will stand no humbug in Parliament. (MacDonald, 1919: 92–3) In similar vein did MacDonald argue, during the Labour Party’s infancy, that ‘Parliament itself is a machine of government, and it has been worked hitherto by one section of the community. Labour has . . . not run the machine . . . the fault . . . is not of Parliament’, which is ‘the will of the people embodied in an institution’ (quoted in Barker, 1972: 221, 224, 226). Not surprisingly, MacDonald’s faith in the neutrality of Britain’s political institutions meant that apart from his early support for

Conclusion

371

Home Rule and advocacy of the Alternative Vote, he had little interest in constitutional reform. Indeed, he warned his Labour colleagues that All sorts of enticing proposals will be made from time to time for socialist support. Amendments in electoral laws, amendments in legislative methods – all apparently reasonable, all apparently just – will entice socialists. And yet they will probably not bear examination. They may be but will-o’-the-wisps leading into the bogs those who foolishly follow. (MacDonald, 1909b: 17) Such sentiments could readily have been articulated by any of MacDonald’s successors and certainly seemed to be tacitly shared. Clement Attlee For example, although the next Labour Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, presided over a major programme of post-War economic reconstruction and social reform, inaugurating Keynesian economic demand management and a mixed economy, along with a comprehensive welfare state – and as such, headed the most radical Labour government ever – he proved profoundly conservative on constitutional issues. Certainly, Attlee intimate little interest in constitutional reform during his premiership, beyond presiding over the establishment of backbench subject committees (which most Ministers viewed as a means of keeping Labour backbenchers busy, rather than actually involving them in governmental policy-making) and presiding over the introduction of the 1949 Parliament Act to reduce the House of Lords’ power of delay to just one year. Indeed, it seems reasonable to assume that his 1945–1950 Government’s success in introducing the aforementioned economic and social reforms strongly reinforced the view that the governing institutions of the British political system functioned quite adequately and could be deployed just as readily and effectively by a radical Labour government as a Conservative administration. Thus did Attlee proudly inform the House of Commons, in 1950, that ‘the British have the distinction above all other nations of being able to put new wine into old bottle without bursting them’ (House of Commons Debates, 5th series, Vol. 478, col. 2705), a sanguine view which doubtless reflected and reinforced his ‘cautious conservatism’ on machinery of government issues (Hennessy, 2001: 171; see also NA CAB 118/32, WP(43) 199, ‘The Application of Democratic Principles of Government; Memorandum by the Deputy Prime Minister’, 11 May 1943).


Harold Wilson Ostensibly, Harold Wilson was rather more interested in constitutional reform than his predecessors, as suggested by his emphasis on ‘modernization’ in the 1960s and his 1964–1970 Governments’ attempts at the reform of the Civil Service and Parliament and the establishment of a Royal Commission on the Constitution. Yet as we have previously noted, his appointment of Lord Fulton to chair the Royal Commission on the Civil Service was primarily motivated by a concern to render it more efficient and ‘professional’, which, in turn, seemed somewhat at odds with wider Labour allegations about the power of the Civil Service. Moreover, although it has been widely alleged that the Civil Service itself had subsequently diluted many of the reforms recommended by the Fulton Committee, it has also been noted that ‘one factor ensuring the limited success of the proposals . . . was that the prime minister did not push the reforms vigorously enough’ (Burch, 1995: 130). Certainly, by the mid-1970s, Harold Wilson seemed to have lost all interest in the issue for civil service reform, to the extent that when a couple of his closest colleagues broached the subject at the beginning of 1976, Wilson ‘showed no interest in it . . . in our suggestions for positive reform. Just a blank boredom’ (Donoughue, 2005: 639, diary entry for 21 January 1976). Meanwhile, the pursuit of parliamentary reform during Wilson’s 1964– 1970 premiership – most notably the experiments with specialist select committees (an early forerunner of the post-1979 Departmental select committees) and ‘morning sittings’ in the House of Commons, the establishment of an ‘Ombudsman’, and the aborted efforts at reforming the House of Lords – owed much to the enthusiasm and energy of Richard Crossman during his period as Labour’s Leader of the House. Wilson may have expressed his support, but he rarely seemed to view such reforms as of particular importance. Indeed, one of Crossman’s biographers argues that ‘whereas Dick believed passionately in the cause, the Prime Minister [Wilson] – as conservative in his attitude to the Commons as in much else – was never really prepared to pay it much more than lip service’ (Howard, 1990: 281). Furthermore, he sometimes viewed particular reforms from a rather different perspective, such as his intimation that specialist parliamentary committees might prove useful as a means of keeping Labour backbenchers occupied (lest the devil made work for idle hands), rather than seriously empowering MPs, and securing a more equitable balance between Parliament and the executive. With regard to Wilson’s establishment of a Royal Commission on the Constitution, in 1969, this was prompted primarily by the perceived need

Conclusion

373

to pacify nationalist demands emanating from Scotland and Wales, the hope being that such demands would have dissipated by the time that the Royal Commission reported, or, perhaps, that the ensuing report might present compelling arguments against devolution. Certainly, Wilson subsequently declared that devolution was a ‘boring and soporific subject so far as legislation is concerned’ (Wilson, 1979: 46), and to the extent that his governments did pursue it, the main objective was to undermine growing nationalist sentiments in Scotland and Wales, precisely in order to preserve, and ultimately strengthen, the United Kingdom. Looking back at his two periods as Prime Minister (1964–1970 and 1974–1976), one eminent Labour historian has emphasized the extent to which Harold Wilson was ‘committed to the institutional framework civil service, upper house, monarchy and all’ (Morgan, 1992: 259–60), while one of his biographers observed that whilst Wilson was eventually willing to countenance devolution to Scotland, ‘it was never a cause close to his heart’ (Ziegler, 1995: 453). Perhaps not surprisingly, Wilson was also uninterested in the twin issues of freedom of information and open government. Indeed, with regard to the desultory discussions about liberalizing the Official Secrets Act which took place during Wilson’s final (1974–1976) term as Prime Minister, the then head of the Downing Street Policy Unit suggested that Wilson ‘is the worst of all’ and would probably have been happy ‘with a more repressive measure under a liberalising gloss’ (Donoughue, 2005: 684, diary entry for 3 March 1976). Certainly, Donoughue argues, by the mid-1970s, Wilson’s ‘alleged earlier radical instincts had by then faded . . . . Most of his instincts were conservative and he was not simply joking when in the 1974 general election he said to me, with a hint of Stanley Baldwin, that his true personal manifesto was to offer the British people a quiet life’ (Donoughue, 2005: 13). Evidently, a serious programme of constitutional reform would have posed a threat to such peace and tranquillity. James Callaghan Similarly, Wilson’s 1976 successor as Labour leader and Prime Minister, James Callaghan, ‘did not leave a legacy of constitutional innovation’, partly because of the plethora of urgent economic problems with which he was faced, partly because of his Government’s lack of a working parliamentary majority, but also because ‘his views of the system of governance . . . reflected current orthodoxy and was relatively conservative’, and as such, Callaghan ‘was not a constitutional innovator’ (Morgan, 1997: 508–9, 360). With regard to the twin issues of freedom of information and open government, for example, Callaghan ‘found the subject


unutterably boring’, insisting that although ‘active and articulate people wanted it . . . they were a vociferous minority and the rest didn’t care (Benn, 1990: 472, diary entry for 15 March 1979). Callaghan was similarly uninterested on reform of the civil service (Burch, 1995: 130), believing that the Whitehall ‘should be left alone’, for it ‘worked well and efficiently and was a model for other nations. There was no need to tamper with it’ (Morgan, 1997: 510, 509). With regard to Northern Ireland, Callaghan’s previous experiences as Home Secretary and Foreign Secretary had made him painfully aware of the difficulties involved in dealing with the Province, and as such, by the time that he became Prime Minister in 1976, Callaghan’s ‘basic approach . . . was not to open the Irish can of worms’, for he knew only too well that ‘there was more downside than upside in opening up the Irish flanks’ (Donoughue, 1987: 135–6). Nor was Callaghan interested in parliamentary reform. Not only was he ‘totally against all select committees as threat to executive government’ (Donoughue, 2005: 645, diary entry for 27 January 1976) – even though the contemporary system of Departmental select committees was devised during his premiership (but clearly in spite of his own stance) – Callaghan subsequently incurred the wrath of the Left by deliberately omitting from Labour’s 1979 manifesto a pledge to abolish the House of Lords. Meanwhile, although it was during Callaghan’s premiership (1976– 1979) that the doomed devolution legislation was enacted, this was a political initiative which was partly inherited, and partly pursued in order to assuage the Liberals, SNP and Plaid Cymru, at a time when Labour’s parliamentary position was particularly precarious. Like other aspects of constitutional reform, devolution was not an issue which Callaghan himself cared much about or pursued with any enthusiasm; indeed, during his 1976–1979 premiership, he apparently considered that ‘changes in this direction [devolution] were a necessary evil, to placate the Scottish Nationalists and Plaid Cymru members in the House upon whom he partly depended, rather than something constitutionally desirable.’ In other words, Callaghan ‘ploughed the sands of Celtic devolution in the later 1970s without great enthusiasm or great commitment’ (Morgan, 1997: 510). Yet even if he had previously harboured any such interest – and there is no indication that he ever did – he subsequently confessed that his own experience as a senior Cabinet Minister during the 1968– 1969 attempt at reforming the House of Lords ensured that he ‘had been vaccinated against enthusiasm for legislation on constitutional reform’ (Callaghan, 1988: 502). Indeed, given that he was ‘the staunchest

Conclusion

375

defender of . . . the traditions of Parliament’, remained ‘uninterested in a freedom-of-information bill’ and ‘viewed . . . moves towards devolution as concessions to parochial nationalism’ [which were also] ‘in conflict with the central power of Cabinet and parliament’, it is not surprising that Callaghan ‘had little interest in constitutional reform’ (Morgan, 1997: 360; Morgan, 1999: 148).

Tony Blair Of all Labour Prime Ministers, Tony Blair appears as the most paradoxical with regard to constitutional reform. Since entering 10, Downing Street in May 1997, Blair ‘presided over the largest, most intensive and far-reaching programme of constitutional reform seen in any British government’ (Hennessy, 2000: 508; Kavanagh, 2005: 18; Theakston, 2005: 32), namely devolution to Scotland and Wales involving a partly proportional electoral system, following referenda to gauge support for devolution; the establishment of English Development Agencies (which were intended to be the forerunners to elected Regional Assemblies); an elected (via proportional representation) Greater London Assembly, with the London Mayor elected through the Supplementary Vote; the launch of a new power-sharing Executive and directly elected (via STV) Assembly in Northern Ireland; the enactment of freedom of information legislation; the abolition of all but 92 hereditary peers as the ‘first stage’ in reforming the House of Lords so as to render it more ‘representative’; modernization of the organization and procedures of the House of Commons; a commission to examine options for electoral reform for general (Westminster) elections. Yet, in spite of presiding over such wide-ranging measures, there is widespread agreement – among academic writers, biographers, political commentators and some of his former Ministerial colleagues – that Blair actually had little interest in most aspects of constitutional reform. Theakston, for example, observes that ‘constitutional issues do not really engage his personal interest or commitment’ and that, as a consequence, ‘Blair’s personal involvement has been sporadic’. Moreover, Blair has ‘no roadmap or blueprint for constitutional reform. There is no coherent overall Blairite strategy for the constitution’ (Theakston, 2005: 32, 33, 35). In similar vein, the constitutional expert, Robert Hazell, has claimed that in spite of the measures introduced since 1997, Blair was ‘not interested. He’s never been interested in the constitutional reform agenda. It’s not his bag. He took it over. He would not have thought it up himself’ (quoted in Morrison, 2001: 520).


With regard to specific aspects of constitutional reform during Blair’s premiership, it has variously been noted that devolution to Scotland and Wales was largely a policy commitment – ‘unfinished business’ – inherited from his predecessor, John Smith, and that Blair himself was unenthusiastic about it. Indeed, with regard to Welsh devolution, one commentator has wryly suggested that until the 1997 general election, ‘Tony Blair . . . devoted little more attention to the affairs of Wales than he did to those of Ruritania’ (Rawnsley, 2000: 236). McLean, meanwhile, notes that ‘Blair is not personally interested in Scotland (although he was educated there), or in regional politics in north-east England (though his constituency is there) or in Wales’ (McLean, 2005: 360). Nor was Blair much more enthusiastic about the reform of Parliament, certainly not in terms of strengthening the power of backbenchers in the House of Commons, or of enhancing the influence or legitimacy of the House of Lords through making it mostly or wholly elected: ‘parliamentary reform does not excite him’. Instead, what has prompted his wavering interest ‘is not the democratic principles of parliamentary reform, but the practical effect it will have’, Blair having ‘always been much more interested in politics in terms of outcome rather than process’ (Cook, 2003: 56, diary entry for 22 November 2001). Indeed, Cook was by told Lord Irvine that ‘Tony never wanted any elected members of the House of Lords’ and had appointed Lord Wakeham [to chair the commission into Lords reform] in the hope that he ‘would find a formula by which ever member of the House of Lords would continue to be appointed. It was Wakeham who let the genie out of the bottle’ (Cook, 2003: 85, diary entry for 22 January 2002).

Conclusion It is clear, therefore, that throughout its history, the Labour Party in general and its leadership in particular have proved remarkably sanguine about the constitutional framework of British politics and, apart from the hereditary principle in the House of Lords, have never seriously questioned or challenged, in a sustained or systematic manner, the principles, processes and practices of Britain’s system of government. Indeed, Labour politicians have generally operated quite happily within the framework of the Westminster Model just as readily as the Conservatives. When reform of either Parliament or the civil service has occasionally been advocated, for example, it has invariably been with the primary purpose of improving efficiency and pursuing ‘modernization’. Furthermore, many Labour Ministers have been loathe to pursue parliamentary

Conclusion

377

reforms which would provide their own backbenchers with a greater role in policy-making or which would serve to enhance the legitimacy of the House of Lords, for either outcome would circumscribe the autonomy and discretion of Labour governments themselves. In this respect, it has not only been Labour Prime Ministers but most of Party’s other senior figures too who have subscribed to an executive-dominated form of parliamentary democracy (for example, Cripps, 1933; Laski, 1938; Morrison, 1964), based on strong and ‘responsible’ single-party government, and therefore also rejecting a more proportional and representative electoral system. Indeed, many, if not most Labour politicians at Westminster, would rather have a Labour government alternating with a Conservative administration, via the first-past-the-post electoral system, than adopt a system which would almost certainly oblige the Labour Party to share power – at national level – in a coalition with the Liberal Democrats (even though this is precisely what it has done in Cardiff and Edinburgh). Similar conservatism and caution has tended to inform the Labour Party’s approach to territorial politics, with regional aspirations and nationalist sentiments initially dismissed as a short-term response to economic grievances. When this proved not to be the case, the underlying principle – to the extent that it can be termed thus – seemed to be one of ‘damage limitation’, contemplating the devolution of power to Scotland and Wales primarily in order to counter the rise of the SNP and Plaid Cymru. When devolution was pursued (unsuccessfully) in the 1970s, and then again (successfully) in the late 1990s, many Labour Ministers could barely conceal their lack of enthusiasm. Furthermore, they were emphatic not only that devolution would actually strengthen the unity of the United Kingdom (by marginalizing separatist demands), but that ultimately sovereignty would continue to reside at Westminster, a point reiterated by Labour’s Leader of the House, Jack Straw, in the summer of 2006, when he explained that Westminster had only delegated, not ceded, its powers over certain spheres of policy to the Scottish Parliament (The Guardian, 12 July 2006). Labour’s pursuit of constitutional reform has, therefore, usually been rather half-hearted and notable for its underlying conservatism. Reforms have not derived from any serious or systematic thinking about the nature of the political system in Britain or of its constitutional conventions. This partly reflects, of course, the Labour Party’s own historical development, the influence of the dominant philosophical or ideological strands within the Party and its attempt to integrate itself into the political system and prove its ‘responsibility’, but it also reflects the extent to which Labour parliamentarians have readily accepted the


principles and precepts enshrined in the Westminster Model of British government. Consequently, constitutional reform has, perhaps understandably, usually been ascribed a much lower priority than economic and social reforms by successive Labour Governments. Electorally too, many Labour politicians have viewed constitutional reform to be an issue of low saliency to voters, the vast majority of whom are primarily concerned with bread-and-butter issues like economic stability, education, employment, law and order and the NHS. Compared to such concerns impacting directing on people’s day-to-day material well-being and quality of life, reform of the House of Commons internal procedures or committee structures, for example, seems somewhat esoteric. The Blair Governments’ ‘programme’ of constitutional reform might imply that the preceding observations are not applicable to New Labour and that New Labour is, with regard to constitutional reform, qualitatively different to Old Labour. We would disagree. The Blair Government has undoubtedly given constitutional reform a higher public profile and pursued more measures of reform than previous Labour governments, but it has still done so on an atheoretical, pragmatic and piecemeal basis, bereft of a clearly considered and clearly constructed intellectual framework and without properly thinking through the nature of the reforms and their constitutional and political implications. Moreover, New Labour still seems to adhere to the orthodoxies of the Westminster Model, as delineated in our Introduction, and many of the constitutional reforms introduced by the Blair Governments since 1997 seem to have been intended to strengthen or conserve aspects of Britain’s political system. The ‘modernization’ of House of Commons procedures appears to have been motivated by a desire to expedite the executive’s business, rather than facilitate closer scrutiny by backbenchers and the Opposition, whilst House of Lords’ reform has also apparently been primarily prompted by a concern to enhance the dominance of the House of Commons (itself de facto dominated by the executive) over the Second Chamber. Similarly conservative concerns have seemingly underpinned the Blair Governments’ continued refusal to introduce electoral reform for Westminster election. Elsewhere, ‘modernization’ of the civil service has been intended to improve its efficiency in ‘delivering’ the Blair Governments’ policies, whilst freedom of information legislation has continued to exempt many materials and sources pertaining to the actual development and formulation of public policy. Finally, devolution has been accompanied by repeated Ministerial insistence that it has been

Conclusion

379

intended to strengthen the unity and integrity of the United Kingdom, within which the sovereignty of Parliament remains sacrosanct. Certainly, New Labour’s constitutional reforms do not seem to have been the product of any serious or systematic thinking about the nature of political power and processes in Britain, but have been intended primarily to ‘improve’ – from a Ministerial perspective – the operation of the British political system and render it more efficient (in terms of implementing New Labour’s policies). These objectives have certainly been ascribed a much higher priority than the goals of democratization, genuine decentralization of power or a strengthening of checks and balances between the executive and the legislature. Consequently, whilst the political landscape in the United Kingdom looks very different to how it looked prior to 1997, what is most notable is how little has really changed beneath that surface appearance, for New Labour, like its Old Labour predecessor, still subscribes to a rather conservative and uncritical view of political power and the institutions of the British state, with traces of Fabianism still discernible in the technocratic and rather elitist approach to governing, and remains wedded to the orthodoxies of the Westminster Model. Similarly, New Labour revealed a marked reluctance to engage in any theoretical reflection or critical examination concerning the nature of political power and the role of political institutions in Britain, so that in spite of the apparent intellectual framework provided by the ‘third way’, the Blair Governments’ approach to constitutional reform has largely been characterized by pragmatism, hesitancy and a sense of ‘muddling through’. It is certainly ironic that whilst Tony Blair variously railed against the ‘forces of conservatism’, he and most of his Ministerial colleagues evinced a highly cautious or minimalist approach to constitutional reform, and in this respect, New Labour bears a remarkable similarity to Old Labour.

Bibliography

Aaronovitch, Sam (1981) The Road from Thatcherism, London: Lawrence and Wishart. Alexander, Ken (1993) ‘Lessons form Scotland’ in Jim Fyrth (ed) Labour’s High Noon: The Government and the Economy 1945–51, London: Lawrence and Wishart. Anderson, Donald (1968) ‘Parliament and the Executive’ in Brian Lapping and Giles Radice (eds) More Power to the People: Young Fabian Essays on Democracy in Britain, London: Longmans. Anderson, Paul, and Mann, Nyta (1997) Safety First: The Making of New Labour, London: Granta. Anderson, Perry (1966) ‘Origins of the Present Crisis’ in Perry Anderson and Robin Blackburn (eds) Towards Socialism, Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. Arthur, Paul (1996) ‘The Heath Government and Northern Ireland’ in Stuart Ball and Anthony Seldon (eds) The Heath Government 1970–74: A Reappraisal, London: Longman. Ashdown, Paddy (2001) The Ashdown Diaries: Volume Two, 1997–1999, London: Allen Lane/Penguin. Ashford, D. (1981) Policy and Politics in Britain: The Limits of Consensus, Oxford: Blackwell. Attlee, Clement (1935) The Will and the Way to Socialism, London: Methuen. Attlee, Clement (1937) The Labour Party in Perspective, London: Victor Gollancz. Attlee, Clement (1954) As it Happened, London: William Heinemann. Bachrach, Peter (1969) The Theory of Democratic Elitism, London: University of London Press. Baines, Priscilla (1989) ‘History and Rationale of the 1979 Reforms’ in Gavin Drewry (ed) The New Select Committees, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Balogh, Thomas (1962) ‘The Apotheosis of the Dilettante’ in Hugh Thomas (ed) The Establishment, London: Ace Books. Barker, Bernard (ed) (1972) Ramsay MacDonald’s Political Writings, London: Allen Lane/The Penguin Press. Barker, Rodney (1978) Political Ideas in Modern Britain, London: Methuen. Barnes, H. (1995) ‘New Labour in a New Northern Ireland’, Parliamentary Brief, May. Barton, Brian (1993) ‘Relations between Westminster and Stormont during the Attlee Premiership’, Irish Political Studies, Vol. 8. Bax, Alex (2002) ‘The Greater London Authority’ in Stanley Henig (ed) Modernising Britain: Central, Devolved, Federal?, London: The Federal Trust. Beetham, David, Ngan, Pauline and Weir, Stuart (2001) ‘Democratic Audit: Labour’s Record So Far’, Parliamentary Affairs, 54.2. Beetham, David, Ngan, Pauline and Weir, Stuart (2002) ‘Democratic Audit: An Inauspicious Year for Democracy’, Parliamentary Affairs, 55.2. 380

Bibliography 381 Bell, Geoffrey (1982) Troublesome Business: The Labour Party and The Irish Question, London: Pluto Press. Benn, Tony (1970) The New Politics: A Socialist Reconnaissance, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 402. Benn, Tony (1980) Arguments for Socialism, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Benn, Tony (1981) Arguments for Democracy, London: Jonathan Cape. Benn, Tony (1982) Parliament, People and Power, London: Verso. Benn, Tony (1988) Office Without Power: Diaries 1968–1972, London: Hutchinson. Benn, Tony (1989a) Against the Tide: Diaries 1973–76, London: Hutchinson. Benn, Tony (1989b) ‘Obstacles to Reform in Britain’ in Ralph Miliband, Leo Panitch and John Saville (eds) Socialist Register 1989, London: Merlin. Benn, Tony (1990) Conflicts of Interest: Diaries 1977–1980, London: Hutchinson. Benn, Tony (1992) The End of an Era: Diaries 1980–1990, London: Hutchinson. Bew, Paul, and Dixon, Paul (1994) ‘Labour Party Policy and Northern Ireland’ in Brian Barton and Patrick Roche (eds) The Northern Ireland Question: Perspectives and Politics, Aldershot: Avebury. Blackburn, Robert, and Plant, Raymond (eds) (1999) Constitutional Reform: The Labour Government’s Constitutional Reform Agenda, London: Longman. Blackstone, Tessa (1987) ‘Advice at the Centre’ in Ben Pimlott (ed) Labour’s First Hundred Days, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 519. Blair, Tony (1996) New Britain: My Vision of a Young Country, London: Fourth Estate. Blair, Tony (1999) ‘The Last Thing We Want is an Extremist Mayor’ Evening Standard, 19 November. Blick, Andrew (2004) People Who Live in the Dark: The History of the Special Adviser in British Politics, London: Politico’s. Bogdanor, Vernon (1980) ‘The 40 Per Cent Rule’, Parliamentary Affairs, 33.3. Bogdanor, Vernon (1981) The People and the Party System, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bogdanor, Vernon (1997) Power and the People: A Guide to Constitutional Reform, London: Weindenfeld and Nicolson. Bogdanor, Vernon (1999) Devolution, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Boyle, Edward, Crosland, Anthony and Kogan, Maurice (1971) The Politics of Education, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Bradbury, Jonathan (1996) ‘New Labour, New Devolution? The Labour Party and the Politics of English Regional Reform’, Regional Studies, 30.7. Bradbury, Jonathan and Mitchell, James (2001) ‘Devolution: New Politics for Old’, Parliamentary Affairs, 54.2. Bradbury, Jonathan, and Mitchell, James (2002) ‘Devolution and Territorial Politics: Stability, Uncertainty and Crisis’, Parliamentary Affairs, 55.2. Bray, Jeremy (1970) Decision in Government, London: Victor Gollancz. Brown, George (1971) In My Way, London: Book Club Associates. Brown, Gordon (2000) ‘Livingstone Must Not be London Mayor’, Evening Standard, 19 January 2000. Bullock, Alan (1983) Ernest Bevin: Foreign Secretary 1945–1951, London: Heinemann. Burch, Martin (1995) ‘Prime Minister and Whitehall’ in Donald Shell and Richard Hodder-Williams (eds) Churchill to Major: The British Prime Ministership since 1945, London: Hurst.

382 Bibliography Butcher, Tony (2000) ‘The Civil Service: Structure and Management’ in Robert Pyper and Lynton Robins (eds) United Kingdom Governance, London: Macmillan. Cabinet Office (2001) Civil Service Reform 2001: Making a Difference, London: Cabinet Office. Callaghan, James (1973) A House Divided, London: Collins. Callaghan, James (1988) Time and Chance, London: Collins/Fontana. Castle, Barbara (1980) The Castle Diaries 1974–76, London: Book Club Associates. Castle, Barbara (1984) The Castle Diaries 1964–70, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. Castle, Barbara (1990) The Castle Diaries 1964–1976, London: Papermac. Castle, Barbara (1993) Fighting All The Way, London: Pan. Catt, Helena (1990) The Intelligent Person’s Guide to Electoral Reform, London: New Statesman and Society. Chadwick, Andrew (1999) Augmenting Democracy, Aldershot: Ashgate. Chapman, Brian (1963) British Government Observed, London: Allen & Unwin. Church, Judith (1995) ‘Electoral Reform, Economic Renewal’, Representation, 33.2. Clark, David (1997) The Civil Service and the New Government, speech at the Queen Elizabeth II Centre, 17 June, Cabinet Office/Office of Public Service. Cm 5291 (2001) The House of Lords: Completing the Reform, London: Stationery Office. Cmnd 2767 (1965) The Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration, London: HMSO. Cmnd 3638 (1968) Report of the Committee on the Civil Service 1966–68, London: HMSO. Cmnd 3818 (1997) Your Right to Know, London: Stationery Office. Cmnd 4310 (1999) Modernising Government, London: Stationery Office. Coates, David (1975) The Labour Party and the Struggle for Socialism, London: Cambridge University Press. Coates, David (1980) Labour in Power? London: Longman. Cole, G. D. H. (1933) ‘The Socialist Control of Industry’ in Stafford Cripps (ed), Problems of a Socialist Government, London: Gollancz. Cole, Matt (1999) ‘Party Policy and Electoral Reform: A Survey of Developments, Motives and Prospects’ in Justin Fisher et al. (eds) (1999) British Elections and Parties Review, Volume 9, London: Frank Cass. Communities and Local Government Select Committee (2007) Is There a Future for Regional Government in England?, HC 352-1 2006-07. Concannon, Don (1983) ‘Northern Ireland’ in Gerald Kaufman (ed) Renewal: Labour’s Britain in the 1980s, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Cook, Chris (1993) A Short History of the Liberal Party 1900–92, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Cook, Robin (2003) The Point of Departure, London: Simon and Schuster. Coulson, Andrew (1990) Devolving Power: The Case for Regional Government, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 537. Cowley, Philip, and Stuart, Mark (2001) ‘Parliament: A Few Headaches and a Dose of Modernisation’, Parliamentary Affairs, 54.2. Cowley, Philip, and Stuart, Mark (2002) ‘Parliament: Mostly Continuity, But More Change Than You’d Think’, Parliamentary Affairs, 55.2.

Bibliography 383 Cowley, Philip, and Stuart, Mark (2005) ‘Parliament’ in Anthony Seldon and Dennis Kavanagh (eds) The Blair Effect 2001–5, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Crick, Bernard (1964) The Reform of Parliament, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Cripps, Francis, and Ward, Terry (1982) ‘Road to Recovery’, New Socialist, No. 6, July–August. Cripps, Stafford (1933) ‘Can Socialism Come By Constitutional Means?’ in Stafford Cripps (ed) Problems of a Socialist Government, London: Gollancz. Crosland, Anthony (1956) The Future of Socialism, London: Jonathan Cape. Crosland, Anthony (1962) The Conservative Enemy, London: Jonathan Cape. Crosland, Susan (1983) Tony Crosland, London: Coronet. Crossman, Richard (1956) Socialism and the New Despotism, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 298. Crossman, Richard (1966) ‘The Lessons of 1945’ in Perry Anderson and Robin Blackburn (eds) Towards Socialism, Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. Crossman, Richard (1972) The Politics of Pensions, Eleanor Rathbone Memorial Lectures No. 19, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press. Crossman, Richard (1976) The Diaries of a Cabinet Minister: Volume 2; Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons 1966–68, London: Hamish Hamilton/Jonathan Cape. Crossman, Richard (1977) The Diaries of a Cabinet Minister: Volume 3; Secretary of State for Social Services, 1968–70, London: Hamish Hamilton/Jonathan Cape. Cryer, Bob (1992) ‘Electoral Reform’, Fabian Review, 104:6. Cunningham, Michael (1999) ‘Northern Ireland’ in Richard Kelly (ed) Changing Party Policy in Britain: An Introduction, Oxford: Blackwell. Dalton, Hugh (1935) Practical Socialism for Britain, London: Routledge. Dalton, Hugh (1962) High Tide and After: Memoirs 1945–1960, London: Frederick Muller. Dalyell, Tam (1977) Devolution: The End of Britain?, London: Jonathan Cape. Dalyell, Tam (1989) Dick Crossman: A Portrait, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Davies, Ron (1999) Devolution: A Process not an Event, Cardiff: Institute of Welsh Affairs. Deacon, Russell (1996) ‘New Labour and the Welsh Assembly: “Preparing for a New Wales’’ or updating the Wales Act 1978?’, Regional Studies, 30.7. Deacon, Russell, and Lynch, Peter (1996) ‘Launching the Devolution Decade: Labour and devolution to Scotland and Wales’, Contemporary Politics, 2.4, Winter. Dell, Edmund (1991) A Hard Pounding: Politics and Economic Crisis, 1974–1976, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions (1997) Building Partnerships for Prosperity: Sustainable Growth, Competitiveness and Employment in the English Regions, London: Stationery Office, Cmnd 3814. Dewar, Donald (1987) ‘Scotland: The Way Forward’ in The Fabian Society, Labour’s Next Moves Forward, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 521. Dickens, Charles (1963) Our Mutual Friend, London: J. M. Dent, first published in 1865. Dillon, Jo (2000) ‘Blair Drops Plans for English Devolution’, The Independent on Sunday, 10 December. Donoughue, Bernard (1987) Prime Minister, London: Jonathan Cape.

384 Bibliography Donoughue, Bernard (2005) Downing Street Diary, London: Jonathan Cape. Donoughue, Bernard, and Jones, G. W. (1973) Herbert Morrison: Portrait of a Politician, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Dorey, Peter (2006) ‘The Social Background of Labour MPs Elected in 1964 and 1966’ in Peter Dorey (ed) The Labour Governments 1964–1970, London: Routledge. Draper, Derek (1999) ‘Blair Set to Topple Whitehall’s Mandarins’, The Observer, 29 August. Drewry, Gavin (1999) ‘The Civil Service’ in Robert Blackburn and Raymond Plant (eds) Constitutional Reform: The Labour Government’s Constitutional Reform Agenda, Harlow: Longman. Drewry, Gavin, and Butcher, Tony (1991) The Civil Service Today, second edition, London: Basil Blackwell. Drucker, Henry (1978) Breakaway: The Scottish Labour Party, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Student Publication Board. Drucker, Henry (1979) Doctrine and Ethos in the Labour Party, London: Allen & Unwin. Drucker, Henry, and Brown, Gordon (1980) The Politics of Nationalism and Devolution, London: Longman. Eatwell, Roger, and Wright, Anthony (1978) ‘Labour and the Lessons of 1931’, History, 63. Evans, Mark (2003) Constitution-Making and the Labour Party, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Fabian Society, The (1964) The Administrators: The Reform of the Civil Service, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 355. Flinders, Matthew (2000) ‘The Politics of Accountability: A Case Study of Freedom of Information Legislation in the United Kingdom’, Political Quarterly, 71.4. Flinders, Matthew (2004) ‘New Labour and the Constitution’ in Steve Ludlam and Martin J. Smith (eds) Governing as New Labour: Policy and Politics under Blair, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Flinders, Matthew (2006) ‘The Half-Hearted Constitutional Revolution in Patrick Dunleavy, Richard Heffernan, Philip Cowley and Colin Hay (eds) Developments in British Politics 8, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Flynn, Andrew, Andrew, Gray and Jenkins, William (1990) ‘Taking the Next Steps: The Changing Management of Government’, Parliamentary Affairs, 43.2. Foley, Michael (2000) The British Presidency, Manchester: Manchester University Press. Foot, Michael (1966) Aneurin Bevan, Volume 1: 1897–1945, London: Four Square Illustrated. Foote, Geoffrey (1985) The Labour Party’s Political Thought: A History, London: Croom Helm. Foster, Derek (1996) ‘Labour and Public Service Reform’, Parliamentary Affairs, 49.2. Fowler, Carwyn (2005) ‘Labour and the New Regionalism’, paper presented to the Political Studies Association annual conference, University of Leeds, April 2005. Fox, Alan (1985) History and Heritage: The Social Origins of the British Industrial Relations System, London: Allen and Unwin. Freedland, Jonathan (1999) ‘Giving Ken the Push’, The Guardian, 13 October.

Bibliography 385 Fry, Geoffrey (1981) The Administrative ‘Revolution’ in Whitehall, London: Croom Helm. Gamble, Andrew, and Wright, Tony (2000) ‘Modernising Government’, Political Quarterly, 71.3. Garrett, John (1972) The Management of Government, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Garrett, John (1980) Managing the Civil Service, London: Heinemann. Garrett, John, and Sheldon, Robert (1973) Administrative Reform: The Next Step, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 426. Gay, Oonagh (2005) ‘Modernisation: The Commons’ in Nicholas Baldwin (ed) Parliament in the 21st Century, London: Politico’s. Geekie, Jack, and Levy, Roger (1989) ‘Devolution and the Tartanisation of the Labour Party’, Parliamentary Affairs , 42:3. Georghiou, Mary (1991) ‘PR and Choose’ The Chartist, Winter. Glyn, Andrew, and Harrison, John (1980) The British Economic Disaster, London: Pluto Press. Gray, Andrew, and Jenkins, Bill (1999) ‘Government and Administration 1997-98: Modernisation and Democratisation’, Parliamentary Affairs, 52.2. Gray, Andrew, and Jenkins, Bill (2000) ‘Government and Administration 1998–99: Overcoming “Conservatism’’ – A Job Half Done?’, Parliamentary Affairs, 53.2. Griffith, J. A. (1968) ‘The Civil Service We Deserve’, Socialist Commentary, August 1968. Griffiths, Dylan (2000) ‘Writings on the Margins: Welsh Politics’ (Review Article), British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 2.1, April. Griffiths, James (1969) Pages from Memory, London: J. M. Dent. Grimond, Jo (1979) Memoirs, Heinemann. Hain, Peter (1992) ‘The Alternative Vote’ in Gareth Smyth (ed) Refreshing The Parts: Electoral Reform and British Politics, London: Lawrence and Wishart. Haines, Joe (1977) The Politics of Power, London: Jonathan Cape. Hansard Society (1976) Hansard Commission on Electoral Reform, London: Hansard Society. Hanson, A. H. (1956) ‘The Labour Party and House of Commons Reform – I’, Parliamentary Affairs, 10:4. Hanson, A. H. (1957) ‘The Labour Party and House of Commons Reform – II’, Parliamentary Affairs, 11:1. Hanson, David (1993) Unelected, Unaccountable and Untenable – A Study of Appointments to Public Bodies in Wales, Cardiff: Institute of Welsh Affairs. Harris, Kenneth (1982) Attlee, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Hassan, Gerry (2002) ‘A Case Study of Scottish Labour: Devolution and the Politics of Multi-Level Governance’, Political Quarterly, 72.2. Hart, Jennifer (1992) Proportional Representation: Critics of the British Electoral System, 1820–1945, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Hattersley, Roy (1999) ‘Labour Back to its Bad Old Ways’, The Times, 16 February. Hayes, Mark (1999) ‘New Labour and Northern Ireland: Bipartisan Consensus and the “Peace Process’’ ’ in Gerald Taylor (ed) The Impact of New Labour, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Hazell, Robert (2001) ‘Reforming the Constitution’, Political Quarterly, 72.1. Hazell, Robert, Russell, Meg, Seyd, Ben and Sinclair, David (2000) The British Constitution in 1998-99: The Continuing Revolution’, Parliamentary Affairs, 52.2.

386 Bibliography HC 190 (1997–1998) The Legislative Process, First Report from the Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons, London: HMSO. Healey, Dennis (1990) The Time of My Life, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Hencke, David (1999) ‘House of Straw that Jack Built’, The Guardian, 21 June 1999. Hennessy, Peter (1986) Cabinet, Oxford: Blackwell. Hennessy, Peter (1990) Whitehall, London: Fontana. Hennessy, Peter (1999) ‘Tony’s Bane’, The Guardian, 9 July. Hennessy, Peter (2000) The Blair Revolution in Government?, Leeds: Leeds University (Institute for Politics and International Studies). Hennessy, Peter (2001) The Prime Minister: The Office and its Holders since 1945, London: Penguin. Hennessy, Peter, Hughes, Rosaleen and Seaton, Jean (1997) Ready, Steady, Go!: New Labour and Whitehall, London: Fabian Society. Hetherington, Peter (2004) ‘Defeat Halts Prescott’s Push for Devolution’, The Guardian, 6 November. HM Treasury (2007) Review of Sub-national Economic Development and Regeneration, July, http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/spending_review/spend_csr07/reviews/ subnational_econ_review.cfm. Hodgson, Geoffrey (1981) Labour at the Crossroads, London: Martin Robertson. Holmes, Martin (1985) The Labour Government, 1974–1979: Political Aims and Economic Reality, London: Macmillan. Hoon, Geoff (2005) ‘MPs Deserve More Respect’ The Guardian, 3 June 2005. House of Commons (1965) Sixth Report of the Estimates Committee: Recruitment to the Civil Service, HC 308. Howard, Anthony (1990) Crossman: The Pursuit of Power, London: Jonathan Cape. Hughes, G. (1995) Comments made at the AGM of the Campaign for a Welsh Parliament. Hughes, Colin, and Wintour, Patrick (1990) Labour Rebuilt: The New Model Party, London: Fourth Estate. Independent Commission on the Voting System (1998) Report of the Independent Commission on the Voting System, Volume Two: Submissions and correspondence from Members of Parliament, London: Stationery Office. Institute for Public Policy Research (1991) The Constitution of the United Kingdom, London: IPPR. James, Mari, and Lindley, Peter D. (1983) ‘The Parliamentary Passage of the Wales Act 1978’ in David Foulkes, Barry Jones, and R. Wilford (eds) The Welsh Veto: The Wales Act 1978 & The Referendum, Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Jenkins, Roy (1991) A Life at the Centre, London: Macmillan. Jenkins, Simon (1995) Accountable to None: The Tory Nationalization of Britain, London: Hamish Hamilton. John, Peter (1999) ‘New Labour and the Decentralisation of Power’ in Gerald Taylor (ed) The Impact of New Labour, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Johnson, Nevil (2001) ‘Taking Stock of the Constitution’, Government and Opposition, 36:3. Johnston, Tom (1952) Memories, Publisher Unknown. Jones, Alec (1983) ‘Wales’ in Gerald Kaufman (ed) Renewal: Labour’s Britain in the 1980s, Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Bibliography 387 Jones, Barry (1983) ‘The Development of the Devolution Debate’ in David Foulkes, Barry Jones and R. Wilford (eds) The Welsh Veto: The Wales Act 1978 & The Referendum, Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Jones, Barry (2000) ‘Labour Pains’ in Barry Jones and Denis Balsom (eds) The Road to The National Assembly for Wales, Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Jones, Barry, and Balsom, Denis (2000) ‘Conclusion’ in Barry Jones and Dennis Balsom (eds) The Road to the National Assembly for Wales, Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Jones, Barry, and Keating, Michael (1982) ‘The British Labour Party: Centralisation and Devolution’ in Peter Madgwick and Richard Rose (eds) The Territorial Dimension in United Kingdom Politics, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Jones, Barry, and Keating, Michael (1985) Labour and the British State, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Jones, Eileen (1994) Neil Kinnock, London: Hale Jones, R. Merfyn, and Jones, Ioan Rhys (2000) ‘Labour and the Nation’ in Duncan Tanner, Chris Williams and Deian Hopkin (eds) The Labour Party in Wales 1900–2000, Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Judge, David (1981) Backbench Specialisation in the House of Commons, London: Heinemann. Judge, David (1983) ‘Why Reform? Parliamentary Reform since 1832: An Interpretation’ in David Judge (ed) The Politics of Parliamentary Reform, London: Heinemann. Judge, David (1993) The Parliamentary State, London: Sage. Judge, David (2005) Political Institutions in the United Kingdom, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kaufman, Gerald (ed) (1983) Renewal: Labour’s Britain in the 1980s, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Kaufman, Gerald (1997) How to be a Minister, second edition, London: Faber. Kavanagh, Dennis (2005) ‘The Blair Premiership’ in Anthony Seldon and Dennis Kavanagh (eds) The Blair Effect, 2001–5, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kavanagh, Dennis, and Seldon, Anthony (2000) ‘Support for the Prime Minister: The Hidden Influence of No.10’ in R. A. W. Rhodes (ed) Transforming British Government, Volume 2: Changing Roles and Relationships, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Keating, Michael (1977) ‘Nationalism in the Scottish Labour Movement, 1914–1974’, paper presented to a conference of the Political Studies Association, Aberystwyth, 26–29 September 1977. Keating, Michael (1982) ‘The Debate on Regionalism’ in Brian Hogwood and Michael Keating (eds) Regional Government in England, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Keating, Michael, and Bleiman, David (1979) Labour and Scottish Nationalism, London: Macmillan. Keating, Michael, and Jones, J. Barry (1982) ‘Still a Burning Issue’, The Times Higher Education Supplement, 26 November. Kellner, Peter, and Crowther-Hunt, Lord (1980) The Civil Servants: An Inquiry into Britain’s Ruling Class, London: Macdonald. Kelso, Alexandra (2003) ‘ “Where were the Masses Ranks of Parliamentary Reformers?’’ – “Attitudinal’’ and “Contextual’’ Approaches to Parliamentary Reform’, Journal of Legislative Studies, 9:1.

388 Bibliography Kelso, Alexandra (2004) ‘An Invitation to Partisanship: The Labour Government, the Modernisation Committee and Efficiency Reforms in the House of Commons’, paper presented to the Political Studies Association annual conference, University of Lincoln, 6–8 April 2004. Kelso, Alexandra (2006) ‘Reforming the House of Lords: Navigating Representation, Democracy and Legitimacy at Westminster’, Parliamentary Affairs, 59:4. Kelso, Alexandra (2007) ‘The House of Commons Modernisation Committee: Who Needs It?’, British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 9:1. Kemp, Fraser (2000) ‘Right of Reply’, The Independent (Review), 13 January. King, Anthony (2002) ‘Britain’s Constitutional Revolution’ in Anthony King (ed) Britain at the Polls, 2001, New York: Chatham House Publishers. King, Oona (2000) ‘Losers Win’, The Guardian, 18 November. Kinnock, Neil (1977) ‘The Real Decisions Will Stay in London’, South Wales Echo, 18 December. Kuper, Richard (1990) Electing for Democracy: Proportional Representation and the Left, London: Socialist Society. Labour Co-ordinating Committee (1980) There is an Alternative, London: LCC. Labour Co-ordinating Committee (1990) Getting it in Proportion: A New Electoral System that Labour can Support, London: LCC. Labour Party (1945) Let Us Face the Future, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1964) Let’s Go with Labour: The New Britain, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1966) Time for Decision, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1970) Now Britain’s Strong – Let’s Make It Great To Live In, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1982) Labour’s Programme 1982, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1983) The New Hope for Britain, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1987) Britain Will Win, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1988) Social Justice and Economic Efficiency: The First Report of Labour’s Policy Review for the 1990s, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1989) Meet the Challenge, Make the Change: Final Report of Labour’s Policy Review for the 1990s, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1992) It’s Time To Get Britain Working Again, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1993) A New Agenda for Democracy: Labour’s Proposals for Constitutional Reform, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1995) A Choice for England, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1996a) New Labour, New Life for Britain, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1996b) A New Voice for England’s Regions, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (1997) New Labour: Because Britain Deserves Better, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (2001) Ambitions for Britain, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (2005) Britain; Forward not Back, London: Labour Party. Labour Party in Wales (1993) Wales and Europe: Towards a Closer Relationship (Interim Report of the Policy Commission), Cardiff: Labour Party in Wales. Labour Party National Executive Committee (1981) Statement on Northern Ireland (presented to 1981 annual conference), London: Labour Party. Labour Party Scottish Council (1970) The Government of Scotland: Evidence of the Labour Party in Scotland to the Commission on the Constitution, March, Labour Party in Scotland: Publisher Unknown.

Bibliography 389 Lamport, Tim (1995) ‘The Plant Report Two Years On – Some Reflections’, Representation, 33:2. Lansbury, George (1934) My England, London: Selwyn & Blount. Laski, Harold (1922) ‘The Civil Service and Parliament’ in Harold Laski (ed) The Development of the Civil Service, London: P. S. King. Laski, Harold (1935) The State in Theory and in Practice, London: George Allen and Unwin. Laski, Harold (1936–1937) ‘The British Civil Service’, Yale Review, 26. Laski, Harold (1938) Parliamentary Government in England, London: George Allen and Unwin. Laski, Harold (1943) ‘The Education of the Civil Servant’, Public Administration, 21. Laski, Harold (1951) Reflections on the Constitution, Manchester: Manchester University Press. Laski, Harold (1967) A Grammar of Politics, fifth edition (first published in 1925), London: Allen and Unwin. Laski, Harold/ILP (1925) The Reform of Parliament, London: ILP. Leach, Robert (1996) British Political Ideologies, second edition, Hemel Hempstead: Prentice Hall. Linton, Martin (1988) Labour Can Still Win, London: Fabian Society. Linton, Martin (1993) Labour’s Road to Electoral Reform, London: Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform. Linton, Martin, and Southcott, Mary (1998) Making Votes Count: The Case for Electoral Reform, London: Profile Books. Lipsey, David (ed) (1982) Making Government Work, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 480. Lipsey, David (1987) ‘Coming in: Labour and the Civil Service’ in Ben Pimlott (ed) Labour’s First Hundred Days, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 519. Livingstone, Ken (1992) ‘Rejecting party bureaucracy’, Fabian Review, 104:6, November. Livingstone, Ken (1999) ‘How I’d Save the Tube’, The Guardian, 13 October. Local Government Association (1997) Evidence to the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and the Regions, London: Stationary Office. MacDonald, J. Ramsay (1905) ‘The Second Ballot in Party Government’, Independent Review, February. MacDonald, J. Ramsay (1909a) Socialism and Government, Volume One, London: ILP. MacDonald, J. Ramsay (1909b) ‘Socialism and Proportional Representation’, Socialist Review, September. MacDonald, J. Ramsay (1919) Parliament and Revolution, London: National Labour Press. MacDougall, Donald (1987) Don and Mandarin: Memoirs of an Economist, London: John Murray. Mackenzie, Compton (1968) My Life and Times: Octave Seven 1931–1938, London: Chatto and Windus. Mackintosh, John (1968) The Devolution of Power, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Mackintosh, John (1976) ‘Failure of a Reform: MPs’ Special Committees’ in W. J. Stankiewicz (ed) British Government in an Era of Reform, London: Collier Macmillan.

390 Bibliography Mandelson, Peter, and Liddle, Roger (1996) The Blair Revolution: Can New Labour Deliver?, London: Faber. McAllister, Laura (1998) ‘The Welsh Devolution Referendum: Definitely, Maybe?’, Parliamentary Affairs, 51.2. McAllister, Laura (1999) ‘The Road to Cardiff Bay: The Process of Establishing the National Assembly for Wales’, Parliamentary Affairs, 52.4. McConnell, Allan (2000) ‘Governance in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland’ in Robert Pyper and Lynton Robins (eds) United Kingdom Governance, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Make Votes Count (2006) MVC Campaign Update: Summer Recess 2006, Make Votes Count. McLean, Iain (2001) ‘The National Question’ in Anthony Seldon (ed) The Blair Effect: The Blair Government 1997–2001, London: Little, Brown & Co. McLean, Iain (2005) ‘The National Question’ in Anthony Seldon and Dennis Kavanagh (eds) The Blair Effect 2001-5, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. McLean, Iain Spirling, Arthur and Russell, Meg (2003), ‘None of the Above: The UK House of Commons Votes on Reforming the House of Lords, February 2003’, Political Quarterly, 74.3. McNamara, Kevin, et al. (1993) Oranges and Lemons, Publisher Unknown. McQuail, Paul, and Donnelly, Katy, (1999) ‘English Regional Government’ in Robert Blackburn and Raymond Plant (eds) Constitutional Reform: The Labour Government’s Constitutional Reform Agenda, Harlow: Longman. McSmith, Andy (1993) John Smith: Playing the Long Game, London: Verso. McSmith, Andy (1999) ‘John Smith 1992–94’ in Kevin Jefferys (ed) Leading Labour: From Keir Hardie to Tony Blair, London: I. B. Tauris. Marquand, David (1977) Ramsay MacDonald, London: Jonathan Cape. Marquand, David (1992) ‘Half-Way to Citizenship? The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform’ in Martin J. Smith and Joanna Spear (eds) The Changing Labour Party, London: Routledge. Marquand, David (1997) ‘Reaching for the levers’, Times Literary Supplement, 11 April. Marquand, David (1999a) The Progressive Dilemma: From Lloyd George to Blair, second edition, London: Phoenix. Marquand, David (1999b) ‘Populism or Pluralism? New Labour and the Constitution’, Mishcon Lecture, University College London, May. Mather, Janet (2000) ‘Labour and the English Regions: Centralised Devolution?’, Contemporary British History, 14.3. Mawson, John (1998) ‘English Regionalism and New Labour’ in Howard Elcock and Michael Keating (eds) Remaking the Union: Devolution and British Politics in the 1990s, Abingdon: Frank Cass. Meacher, Michael (1979) ‘Whitehall’s Short Way with Democracy’ in Ken Coates (ed) What Went Wrong: Explaining the Fall of the Labour Government, Nottingham: Spokesman. Meacher, Michael (2006) ‘The End of the Blair Era is a Springboard for Renewal’, The Guardian, 3 August. Meehan, Elizabeth (2002) ‘Making a Difference or More of the Same? Devolution in Northern Ireland’ in Stanley Henig (ed) Modernising Britain: Central, Devolved, Federal?, The Federal Trust.

Bibliography 391 Mendelson, John (1970) ‘The Chamber as the Centre of Parliamentary Scrutiny’ in Alfred Morris (ed) The Growth of Parliamentary Scrutiny by Committee, Oxford: Pergamon. Miliband, Ralph (1972) Parliamentary Socialism: A Study in the Politics of Labour, second edition, London: Merlin. Miliband, Ralph (1973) The State in Capitalist Society, London: Quartet. Miliband, Ralph (1982) Capitalist Democracy in Britain, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Millan, Bruce (1983) ‘Scotland’ in Gerald Kaufman (ed) Renewal: Labour’s Britain in the 1980s, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Millan, Bruce/Regional Policy Commission (1996) Renewing the Regions: Strategies for Regional Economic Development, Sheffield: Sheffield Hallam University Press. Minkin, Lewis (1991) The Contentious Alliance; Trade Unions and the Labour Party, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1991. Mitchell, Austin (1983) Four Years in the Death of the Labour Party, London: Methuen. Mitchell, Austin (1987) ‘Rebuilding the Coalition’ in Martin Linton et al. (1987) Labour’s Next Moves Forward, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Pamphlet 521. Mitchell, Austin (2000) ‘A Manifesto for the North’ in Selina Chen and Tony Wright (eds) The English Question, London: Fabian Society. Mitchell, James (1996a) Strategies for Self-Government, Edinburgh: Polygon. Mitchell, James (1996b) ‘From Unitary State to Union State: Labour’s Changing View of the United Kingdom and its Implications’, Regional Studies, 30.7. Mitchell, James (1998) ‘The Evolution of Devolution: Labour’s Home Rule Strategy in Opposition’, Government and Opposition, 33.4. Mitchell, James, (2000) ‘Territorial Politics and Change in Britain’ in Peter Catterall, Wolfram Kaiser and Ulrike Walton-Jordan (eds) Reforming the Constitution: Debates in Twentieth-Century Britain, London: Frank Cass. Morgan, Austen (1987) J. Ramsay MacDonald, Manchester: Manchester University Press. Morgan, Janet (1975) The House of Lords and the Labour Government 1964–1970, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Morgan, Janet (1982) ‘The House of Lords in the 1980s’, The Parliamentarian, 63. Morgan, Kenneth O. (1985) Labour in Power 1945–1951, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Morgan, Kenneth O. (1992) Labour People: Hardie to Kinnnock, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Morgan, Kenneth O. (1997) Callaghan: A Life, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Morgan, Kenneth O. (1999) ‘James Callaghan, 1976–1980’ in Kevin Jefferys (ed) Leading Labour: From Keir Hardie to Tony Blair, London: I. B. Tauris. Morgan, Kevin, and Mungham, Geoff (2000) ‘Unfinished Business: Labour’s Devolution Policy’ in J. Barry Jones and Denis Balsom (eds) The Road to the National Assembly for Wales, Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Morris, Alfred (1970a) ‘Conclusion’ in Alfred Morris (ed) The Growth of Parliamentary Scrutiny by Committee, Oxford: Pergamon. Morris, Alfred (1970b) ‘Introduction’ in Alfred Morris (ed) The Growth of Parliamentary Scrutiny by Committee, Oxford: Pergamon.

392 Bibliography Morris, Nigel (2004) ‘Crushing “No’’ Vote Leaves Devolution Plan in Ruins’, The Independent, 6 November. Morris, Robert (1994) ‘New Magistracies and Commissariats’, Local Government Studies, 20.2. Morrison, Herbert (1933) Socialisation and Transport, London: Constable. Morrison, Herbert (1964) Government and Parliament, third edition, London: Oxford University Press. Morrison, John (2001) Reforming Britain: New Labour, New Constitution? London: Reuters. Nairn, Tom (1966) ‘The Nature of the Labour Party’ in Perry Anderson and Robin Blackburn (eds) Towards Socialism, Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. Nairn, Tom (1977) The Break-Up of Britain, London: Verso. Nairn, Tom (1981) The Break-Up of Britain, revised edition, London: Verso. Newsinger, J. (1995) ‘British Security Policy in Northern Ireland’, Race and Class, 37.1. Norton, Philip (1975) Dissension in the House of Commons 1945–1974, London: Macmillan. Norton, Philip (1980) Dissension in the House of Commons 1974–1979, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Norton, Philip (2001) ‘Parliament’ in Anthony Seldon (ed) The Blair Effect: The Blair Government 1997–2001, London: Little, Brown. O’Leary, Brendan (2001) ‘The Belfast Agreement and the Labour Government’ in Anthony Seldon (ed) The Blair Effect: The Blair Government, 1997–2001, London: Little, Brown & Co. O’Neill, Terence (1972) The Autobiography of Terence O’Neill, London: Faber. Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Housing, Planning, Local Government and the Regions (2005) The Draft Regional Assemblies Bill: First Report of Session 2004–05, Volume 1, HC 62-I, London: Stationery Office, January. Opie, Roger, (1968) ‘Implement at Once!’, New Statesman, 28 June. Owen, David (1992) Time to Declare, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Philip, Alan Butt (1975) The Welsh Question, Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Pimlott, Ben (1977) Labour and the Left in the 1930s, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pimlott, Ben (ed) (1987) The Political Diary of Hugh Dalton, 1918–40, 1945–60, London: Jonathan Cape. Plant, Raymond (1995) ‘The Plant Report: A retrospective’, Representation, 33.2. Plant, Raymond (1999) ‘Proportional Representation’ in Robert Blackburn and Raymond Plant (eds) Constitutional Reform: The Labour Government’s Constitutional Reform Agenda, Harlow: Longman. Platt, S (1998) Government By Taskforce: A Review of the Reviews, London: The Catalyst Trust. Ponting, Clive (1990) Breach of Promise: Labour in Power, 1964–1970, London: Penguin. Prescott, John (1982) Alternative Regional Strategy: A Framework for Discussion, Parliamentary Spokesman’s Group. Pyper, Robert (1999) ‘Parliament and the Civil Service’ in Richard Kelly (ed) Changing Party Policy in Britain: An Introduction, Oxford: Blackwell. Radice, Giles (1968) ‘Extending Democracy’ in Brian Lapping and Giles Radice (eds) More Power to the People: Young Fabian Essays on Democracy in Britain, London: Longmans.

Bibliography 393 Rallings, Colin, and Thrasher, Michael (2005) ‘Why the North East said “No’’: the 2004 Referendum on an elected Regional Assembly’, paper presented to the Political Studies Association Annual Conference, 4–7 April 2005, University of Leeds. Rawnsley, Andrew (2000) Servants of the People: The Inside Story of New Labour, London: Hamish Hamilton. Rees, Merlyn (1987) ‘The Parameters of Politics’ in Richard A. Chapman and Michael Hunt (eds) Open Government, London: Croom Helm. Rentoul, John (1995) Tony Blair, London: Little, Brown & Co. Rhodes, Rod (1997) Understanding Governance: Policy Networks, Governance, Reflexivity and Accountability, Buckingham: Open University Press. Rhodes, Rod (2001) ‘The Civil Service’ in Anthony Seldon (ed) The Blair Effect: The Blair Government 1997–2001, London: Little, Brown & Co. Richard, Lord (2004a) Commission on the Assembly’s Powers and Electoral Arrangements, Library of Evidence, http://www.richardcommission.gov.uk/content/ template.asp?ID=/content./evidence/full-libevidence-e.asp. Richard, Lord (2004b) Report of the Commission on the Assembly’s Powers and Electoral Arrangements, Cardiff: National Assembly for Wales. Richards, David, and Smith, Martin J. (2001) ‘New Labour, the Constitution, and Reforming the State’ in Steve Ludlam and Martin J. Smith (eds) New Labour in Government, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Richards, David and Smith, Martin J. (2003) Governance and Public Policy in Britain, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Richards, David, and Smith, Martin J. (2004) ‘The Hybrid State’: Labour’s Response to the Challenge of Governance’ in Steve Ludlam and Martin J. Smith (ed) Governing as New Labour: Policy and Politics under Blair, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Riddell, Peter (2000) Parliament Under Blair, London: Politico’s. Rooker, Jeff (1992) ‘The Additional Member System’ in Gareth Smyth (ed) Refreshing the Parts: Electoral Reform and British Politics, London: Lawrence and Wishart. Rose, Paul (1981) Backbencher’s Dilemma, London: Frederick Muller. Rowthorn, Bob (1981) ‘The Politics of the AES’, Marxism Today, January. Royal Commission on the Reform of the House of Lords (2000) A House for the Future, London: Stationery Office, Cmnd 4534. Ryle, Michael (1999) ‘House of Commons Procedures’ in Robert Blackburn and Raymond Plant (eds) Constitutional Reform: The Labour Government’s Constitutional Reform Agenda, Harlow: Longman. Samizdat (1990) Electoral Reform, 12, September–October. Samizdat (1991) Let a Thousand Plants Bloom: Voting Systems, 16, October– November. Sartori, Giovanni (1965) Democratic Theory, New York: Praeger. Schloesser, Henry (1911) The Twentieth Century Reform Bill, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Tract 153. Schumpeter, Joseph (1944) Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, second edition, London: Unwin Books. Scott, Peter (1997) ‘British Regional Policy 1945–51: A Lost Opportunity’, Twentieth Century British History, 8.3. Sedgemore, Brian (1980) The Secret Constitution, London: Hodder & Stoughton. Shaw, Eric (2006) ‘The Problem of Party Management’ in Peter Dorey (ed) The Labour Governments 1964–1970, London: Routledge.

394 Bibliography Shell, Donald (1992) The House of Lords, second edition, Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf. Shell, Donald (2000) ‘Labour and the House of Lords: A Case Study in Constitutional Reform’, Parliamentary Affairs, 53.2. Sherman, Jill (2004) ‘Devolution Blow to Prescott’, The Times, 6 November. Short, Clare (1992) ‘Promoting Pluralism’, Fabian Review, 104:6, November. Short, Edward (1989) Whip to Wilson, London: Macdonald. Silkin, John (1983) ‘Parliament, Government and Socialism’ in Gerald Kaufman (ed) Renewal: Labour’s Britain in the 1980s, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Skelcher, Chris, and Davis, Howard (1996) Understanding the New Magistracy: A Study of Characteristics and Attitudes, Local Government Studies, 22.2. Smith, John (1992) ‘The Leadership Debate’ in The Fabian Society, Labour’s Choice: The Fabian Debates, London: Fabian Society, Fabian Pamphlet 553. Smith, Geoffrey, and Polsby, Nelson W. (1981) British Government and its Discontents, New York: Basic Books. Sopel, Jon (1995) Tony Blair: The Moderniser, London: Michael Joesph. Spellar, John (1992) ‘Labour’s own system’, Fabian Review, 104.6, November. Stacey, Frank (1971) The British Ombudsman, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Stacey, Frank (1975) British Government 1966–1975: Years of Reform, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Stationery Office (1999) Modernising Parliament – Reforming the House of Lords, Cmnd 4183, London: Stationery Office. Stewart, John (1996) ‘Reforming the new magistracy’ in Lawrence Pratchett and David Wilson (eds) Local Government and Local Democracy, London: Macmillan. Stewart, Michael (1980) Life and Labour, London: Sidgwick & Jackson. Stone, Neal (1997) The Development of Labour Party Thinking on the Civil Service, 1945–1995: Ideological and Programmatic or Intuitive and Reactive?, unpublished MPhil thesis, University of Kent. Straw, Jack (2005) ‘There are No Short Cuts in Democracy’, The Guardian, 12 May 2005. Straw, Jack (2007) The Governance of Britain, London: Stationery Office, Cm 7170. Taylor, Miles (2000) ‘Labour and the Constitution’ in Duncan Tanner, Pat Thane and Nick Tiratsoo (eds) Labour’s First Century, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Thain, Colin, and Wright, Maurice (1995) The Treasury and Whitehall: The Planning and Control of Public Expenditure 1976–1993, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Theakston, Kevin (1992) The Labour Party and Whitehall, London: Routledge. Theakston, Kevin (1995) The Civil Service since 1945, Oxford: Blackwell. Theakston, Kevin (1998) ‘New Labour, New Whitehall?’, Public Policy and Administration, 13.1. Theakston, Kevin (2005) ‘Prime Ministers and the Constitution: Attlee to Blair’, Parliamentary Affairs, 58.1. Thomas, A. (1996) ‘The Moment of Truth: Labour’s Welsh Assembly Proposals in Practice’, Regional Studies, 30.7. Thomas, Hugh (1962) ‘The Establishment and Society’ in Hugh Thomas (ed) The Establishment, London: Ace Books. Thompson, E. P. (1968) The Making of the English Working Class, Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Bibliography 395 Thompson, Noel (2006) ‘The Fabian Political Economy of Harold Wilson’ in Peter Dorey (ed) The Labour Governments 1964–1970, London: Routledge. Tomaney, John (1999) ‘New Labour and the English Question’, Political Quarterly, 70.1. Tomaney, John (2000) ‘The Regional Governance of England’ in Robert Hazell (ed) The State and the Nations, Thorverton: The Constitution Unit/Imprint Academic. Tonge, Jonathan (2002) ‘Northern Ireland: A Different Kind of Election’ in Andrew P. Geddes and Jonathan Tonge (eds) Labour’s Second Landslide: The British General Election 2001, Manchester: Manchester University Press. Tongue, Carol (1989) ‘Liberty, Equality, and Solidarity’, The House Magazine , July. Travers, Tony (2005) ‘Central and Local Government’ in Anthony Seldon and Dennis Kavanagh (eds) The Blair Effect 2001–5, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Turnbull, Sir Andrew (2002) Reform and Delivery in the Civil Service, London: Cabinet Office. Wales Office (2005) Better Governance for Wales, London: Stationery Office, Cm 6582. Weir, Stuart (1992) ‘Waiting for Change: Public Opinion and Electoral Reform’, Political Quarterly, 63.2. White, Michael (2005a) ‘Veteran MP Keeps Watch on Transport Policies’, The Guardian, 29 June 2005. White, Michael (2005b) ‘MPs Opt for Merit on Committees’, The Guardian, 5 July 2005. Whitehead, Phillip (1985) The Writing on the Wall: Britain in the Seventies, London: Michael Joseph. Williams, Francis (1961) A Prime Minister Remembers: The War and Post-War Memoirs of the Rt Hon Earl Attlee, London: Heinemann. Williams, Marcia (1972) Inside No. 10, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Williams, Philip M. (ed) (1979) The Diary of Hugh Gaitskell, 1945–1956, London: Jonathan Cape. Wilson, Harold (1971) The Labour Government 1964–70, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson/Michael Joseph. Wilson, Harold (1979) Final Term: The Labour Government, 1974–1976, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson/Michael Joseph. Wilson, Sir Richard (2001) ‘Foreword’ in Cabinet Office, Civil Service Reform 2001: Making a Difference, London: Cabinet Office. Wright, Anthony (1986) ‘The Politics of Constitutional Reform’, Political Quarterly, 57.4. Wright, Anthony (1989) ‘The Constitution’ in Leonard Tivey and Anthony Wright (eds) Party Ideology in Britain, London: Routledge. Wright, Anthony (1990) ‘British Socialists and the British Constitution’, Parliamentary Affairs, 43.3. Wright, Tony (1997) Why Vote Labour? Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. Young, Hugo, and Sloman, Anne (1982) No, Minister: An Inquiry into the Civil Service, London: BBC. Ziegler, Philip (1995) Wilson: The Authorised Life, London: HarperCollins.

Index Aaronovitch, Sam, 261 Abse, Leo, 73, 258, 259 accountability Blair Government’s intentions, 88 calls for leadership, 120 and the Civil Service, 144–5 Commons’, 51, 52, 77 NEC strategies, 77 as provider of ‘openness’, 183 of quangos, 295 Upper Chamber, 101 Adams, Gerry, 344 Addison, Christopher, Lord, 106 Administration, The (Fabian Society tract), 155–6 agriculture, select committee on, 66 Alexander, Ken, 209 alternating power, system of, 16–17 Alternative Regional Strategy: A Framework for Discussion (policy document), 292 Alternative Vote Jenkins’ recommendations, 35–6 Macdonald’s perspective, 17, 20, 45 proposals for, 19 AMS (Additional Member System) Scottish Parliament, 235–6 Welsh Assembly, 270, 272 Anderson, Donald, 61, 62, 68, 89, 90 Anderson, Paul, 45, 47, 267 Anderson, Perry, v Anglo-Irish Agreement, 335 Armstrong, Hilary, 89–90 Arthur, Paul, 326 Ashdown, Paddy, 16–17, 38 Ashford, D., 180 Asquith, Herbert, 102 Assembly for Wales, see Welsh Assembly Attlee, Clement, 2, 22, 23, 53, 55, 56, 58, 59, 60, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 143, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 181, 209, 210, 211, 243, 245, 246,

247, 282, 283, 313, 314, 315, 352, 353, 356, 360, 362, 371 on the Civil Service, 150–1 on Lords’ reform, 108 on mandate theory, 53 Attlee Governments and Commons’ reform, 58–60 electoral reforms, 22 English regionalism, 282–4 establishment of backbench committees, 58–9 and Lords’ reform, 104–9 Northern Ireland, 313–16 and open government, 185 regional policy expenditure, 283–4 and Scottish devolution, 209–12 and Welsh devolution, 243–7 Bachrach, Peter, 47 Baines, Priscilla, 61, 76 Balogh, Thomas, 154, 155, 156, 166 Balsom, Denis, 272 Barker, Bernard, 54, 370 Barker, Rodney, 4, 351 Barnes, H., 339 Barry, Dick, 332 Barton, Brian, 314 Bax, Alex, 302, 305 Beckett, Margaret, 38, 88 Beetham, David, 198, 364 Bell, Geoffrey, 330, 332, 333 Bell, Stuart, 36–7 Benn, Tony, 16, 27, 28, 37, 69, 78, 109, 116, 118, 121, 126, 136, 142, 143, 144, 165, 166, 168, 169, 187, 188, 191, 192, 228, 229, 233, 261, 289, 291, 332, 374 on the Civil Service, 142–3, 143–4 commitment to open government, 187, 188, 191–2 on the Jenkins Report, 37 on Lords’ reform, 126 396

Index ‘machinery of government’ group, 165–7 on Northern Ireland, 331–2 on PR, 27 renunciation of peerage, 109 Better Governance for Wales (White Paper), 276 Bevan, Aneurin, 105, 243, 244, 246, 350 Bevin, Ernest, 152 Bew, Paul, 334, 336, 337 Blackburn, Robert, 83, 295 Blackstone, Tessa, 172 Blair Governments atheoretical approach to reform, 1, 3 and Civil Service, 172–9 commission on voting systems, 35 Commons’ reform, 84–94 departmental restructuring, 175–6 and English regionalism, 298–301 intentions for accountability, 88 Lords’ reform, 126–7, 127–30 Modernization Committee, 84–5 modesty of reforms, 92–3 and Northern Ireland, 339–46 PMQs reform, 84 policy review groups, 174–5 and Scottish devolution, 234–8 select committee chairs’ removal, 89–90 select committee reform proposals, 90–2 Blair, Tony, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 16, 33, 34, 35, 36, 38, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 48, 69, 82, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 92, 93, 94, 95, 98, 99, 123, 124, 125, 129, 130, 131, 132, 134, 136, 137, 138, 139, 172, 173, 174, 175, 177, 178, 179, 181, 182, 194, 196, 197, 198, 201, 205, 224, 234, 235, 237, 238, 240, 241, 267, 268, 269, 270, 271, 273, 276, 279, 298, 299, 301, 302, 303, 304, 305, 306, 307, 308, 309, 310, 311, 338, 339, 340, 343, 344, 348, 356, 359, 363, 364, 366, 367, 368, 375, 376, 378, 379 Commons attendance, 84

397

on freedom of information, 194, 196–7 on Northern Ireland, 338, 339–40 referendum pledge, 33 Second Chamber preferences, 136 views on devolution, 267, 268, 311 views on electoral reform, 34, 38, 41, 46–7, 48 Blake, Robert, Lord, 25 Bleiman, David, 205, 206, 208, 228, 233, 366 Blick, Andrew, 174 Blunkett, David, 38 Bogdanor, Vernon, 5, 19, 21, 24, 215, 220, 224, 227, 235 Bowden, Herbert William ‘Bert’, 63, 67 Boyle, Edward, 145 Bradbury, Jonathan, 236, 272, 295, 298, 343 Bray, Jeremy, 284 Bridges, Sir Edward, 152 Brown, George, 68, 72, 112, 114, 186 on morning sittings, 68 on the Ombudsman, 72 Brown, Gordon, 12, 38, 43, 45, 95, 96, 136, 137, 179, 197, 291, 301, 304, 305 and electoral reform, 38 Second Chamber preferences, 137 Brown Government Civil Service reform proposals, 179 and Lords’ reform, 137 Building Partnerships for Prosperity (White Paper), 299–300 Bullock, Alan, 150 Burch, Martin, 372, 374 Butcher, Tony, 169 Caborn, Dick, 299 Callaghan, James, 64, 75, 112, 116, 120, 165, 167, 168, 172, 181, 186, 191, 201, 216, 218, 223, 226, 228, 233, 237, 238, 251, 256, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 331, 333, 373, 374, 375 on Crossman, 64 on devolution, 223, 251 and Northern Ireland, 320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 331, 333

398 Index Callaghan, James – continued on select committees, 75 view of Civil Service, 165 Callaghan Government and Northern Ireland, 331 and open government, 188–91 cash for questions, 83 Castle, Barbara, 24, 25, 69, 116, 118, 165, 181, 186, 222, 223, 322, 324, 367 on devolution, 222 on electoral reform, 24–5 Industrial Relations Bill, 118 Catt, Helena, 30 Chadwick, Andrew, 18 Chapman, Brian, 155, 157 Charter, 88, 41 Chichester-Clark, James, 319, 321, 322–4 Choice for England, A (consultation paper), 296 Church, Judith, 31, 39 Churchill, Winston, 107 Citizen and Administration, The (report), 70 Civil Service, 141–82, 361–3 agencification, 169, 173 alleged conservatism, 143–4 and Blair Government, 172–9 Brown Government proposals, 179 Conservative reforms, 169, 173, 178 criticisms, 154–5, 183 development goals, 177 early Labour Party and, 147–9 Fabianesque perspective, 142, 147, 350–1 Fabian Society inquiry, 155–6 Fulton Report, see Fulton Report further decline of Labour’s interest in reform of, 164–7 Labour’s reconsideration of reform, 167–70 Laski on, 141–2, 143, 144, 153–4, 161, 362 ‘machinery of government’ group, 165–7 New Labour and, 170–9 politicization, 169–1 Royal Commission, 175

social class in, 142 Wilson Governments’ reform programme, 153–64 Clark, David, 173, 195, 198 Clynes, J., 17 coalition politics, 15 Coates, David, 167, 349, 352 Cole, G. D. H., 56, 57 Cole, Matt, 40 Committee on Standards in Public Life, 83 Concannon, Don, 334 consensus politics, potential drift towards, 65–6 Conservative Party reaction to Justice report, 70–1 Second Chamber vote, 136–7 constituency boundaries, 30, 36, 236 constituency link, retention of, 39, 40, 42, 44 Constitutional Reform Act, 133 Cook, Chris, 24 Cook, Robin, 26, 28, 29, 38, 65, 85, 87, 89, 90, 97, 131, 132, 134, 197, 232, 361, 376 and Commons’ reform, 65, 85, 89, 90, 97 and electoral reform, 28, 29, 38 and freedom of information, 26, 197 and Lords’ reform, 131, 361 views on devolution, 232 Coulson, Andrew, 294 Cowley, Philip, 85, 87, 88, 90, 132 Crick, Bernard, 62, 105 Cripps, Francis, 261, 377 Cripps, Stafford, 56, 57, 151, 244 Crosland, Anthony, 2, 16, 23, 69, 116, 145, 155, 156, 172, 186, 223, 352 on the Civil Service, 145, 155 on constitutional reform, 2 on devolution, 223 Crosland, Susan, 16 Crossman, Richard, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 70, 73, 75, 97, 110, 111, 112, 113, 116, 117, 118, 146, 163, 186,

Index 188, 189, 214, 215, 216, 285, 319, 320, 352, 372 on the Attlee Governments, 352 on the Civil Service, 146 committee development, 64–5 on Commons’ procedure, 63 on Commons’ reform, 97 on devolution, 214, 215 on Lords’ reform, 113, 117 Lords’ reform proposals, 110–11 on morning sittings, 67 on the Ombudsman, 70, 73 Crowther-Hunt, Lord (Norman), 157, 158, 163, 166, 215, 220, 286 Cryer, Bob, 17 Cunningham, Jack, 30, 131, 134, 196 Dalton, Hugh, 21, 22, 55, 56, 57, 149, 152, 153 on the Civil Service, 149, 151–2 efficiency/effectiveness suggestions, 57 on electoral reform, 21–2 standing committee recommendations, 55–6 Dalyell, Tam, 61, 64, 192, 215, 216, 220, 221, 223, 224, 259, 286 Darling, Alistair, 200 Davies, Denzil, 274 Davies, Ron, 262, 263, 265, 266, 267, 268, 269, 270, 272, 275 Davies, Stephen O., 248 Davis, Howard, 295 Deacon, Russell, 264, 268, 367 Dell, Edmund, 222 Democracy and Devolution- Proposals for Scotland and Wales (White Paper), 222, 257, 288 de Valera, Eamon, 314 devolution, 364–8 administrative, 211, 214, 215, 249, 251, 283 Conservative perspective, 225 Labour’s ambivalence towards, 281–2 manifesto commitments, 206, 222, 230, 233, 242, 252, 261, 264 Scottish, see Scottish devolution Welsh, see Welsh devolution

399

Devolution and Democracy (Consultation Paper), 294 Devolution and Regional Government in England (NEC paper), 288–90 Devolution: The English Dimension (Green Paper), 288 Devolution Within the UK (White Paper), 219–20 Devolution Working Group, 222 devolved institutions, and electoral reform, 29, 30, 31, 33, 43, 46 Dewar, Donald, 197, 230, 231, 232 Dickens, Charles, v Dillon, Jo, 301 dirigiste perspectives, 243, 251, 261, 283, 285, 293 Disraeli, Benjamin, 22 Distribution of Industry Act, 282 Dixon, Paul, 334, 336, 337 Dobson, Frank, 38, 303, 304 Donaldson, Jeffrey, 342 Donnelly, Katy, 300 Donoughue, Bernard, 75, 149, 167, 188, 189, 190, 223, 314, 327, 329, 330, 367, 372, 373, 374 Dorey, Peter, 61 Draper, Derek, 173 Drewry, Gavin, 169, 171, 172 Drucker, Henry, 145, 220, 291, 356 Dunwoody, Gwyneth, 87, 89, 90 Durbin, Evan, 151 Eatwell, Roger, 352, 355 Economic Planning Councils, 284 Edwards, Huw, 245–6, 250 efficiency, Blair’s definition of, 93 efficiency and effectiveness Attlee government attitudes, 59–60 Dalton’s suggestions for improving, 57 emphasis on, 7, 8–9, 49, 50–1, 55, 97 Houghton’s suggestions, 71 tension between, 80, 133 ‘elective dictatorship’, 80, 92, 122 electoral college, introduction of, 26 electoral defeat, Labour’s traditional response to, 15–16

400 Index electoral reform, 14–48, 357–9 2005 review, 43–4 antipathy towards, 40 arguments against, 37 Dalton’s case against, 21–2 and devolved institutions, 29, 30, 31, 33, 43, 46 early Labour Party and, 17–22 first-past-the-post defence, 14–17 moves up Labour’s agenda, 27–33, 46 New Labour’s ambivalence, 33–45 as‘ non-issue’, 22–3 Plant Report, 29–30 rationale for pursuing, 39 referendum for, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37–8, 41, 46 siren voices on, 23–7 see also Alternative Vote; first-past-the-post; proportional representation (PR) embourgeoisement, 16, 23, 26 Emergency Powers Act, 56 English regionalism, 281–311, 368 Attlee Governments, 282–4 Blair Governments, 298–301, 305–9 Greater London, 299, 301–5 Labour Opposition’s perspective, 291–3, 293–8 Major’s approach, 295–6 referendum on, 297–8, 306–8 trade unions’ unease over, 290 Wilson-Callaghan Governments, 286–91 Wilson Governments, 284–5 ethnic minorities, second chamber proposals, 129 European Parliament, election legislation, 24 European Union, 265–6 Evans, Gwynfor, 252 Evans, Mark, 88, 223 Ewing, Winifred, 213, 215 ‘extending democracy’, 61 Fabianism, 4, 53 impact of, 350–1 Fabian Society, 155–6 Falconer, Charles, Lord, 42, 133, 199

Field, Frank, 196 first-past-the-post alleged electoral advantages, 16, 358 Labour’s embrace of, 14–15, 46 MacDonald’s defence, 19 Straw’s defence, 42 First-Past-the-Post Group, 38 Flannery, Martin, 330 Flinders, Matthew, 5, 93, 195, 348, 356 Flynn, Andrew, 169 Foley, Michael, 174 Foot, Michael, 65, 76, 77, 116, 121, 224, 230, 261, 292, 315, 350 on select committees, 65–6, 76, 77 concerns about the Ireland Act, 315 on Lords’ reform, 116, 121 Foote, Geoffrey, 350, 354 Foster, Derek, 171 Fowler, Carwyn, 241, 291 Fox, Alan, 348 Freedland, Jonathan, 303 freedom of information Blair on, 194, 196–7 and civil service anonymity, 183 enthusiasm for, 189, 190, 201–2 formal commitment to, 192–3, 202 see also official secrecy; open government Freedom of Information Act attempts to narrow the scope of, 199–200 restrictions and charges, 199 Freedom of Information Bill, 190–1 backbench criticisms, 198 exempt areas, 195, 195–6 publication of draft, 195 select committee recommendations, 197 timetable, 198 Fry, Geoffrey, 162 Fulton Report dilution, 347–8 implementation of proposals, 163 Labour criticisms, 162–3, 180 proposals recommended to, 158–60 recommendations, 161–2

Index remit, 157–8 on secrecy, 186 Future of Socialism, The, 2 Gaitskell, Hugh, 59, 108, 249 Gamble, Andrew, 356 Garrett, John, 78, 164, 165, 166, 167, 170 Gay, Oonagh, 89 Geekie, Jack, 223 General Belgrano (warship), 192 Georghiou, Mary, 30 Glyn, Andrew, 261 Good Friday Agreement, 340–1, 343, 343–4, 346 Governance of Britain, The (Green Paper), 45, 95, 137, 200–1, 309 Government Offices of the Regions (GORs), 295–6 Gray, Andrew, 88, 169, 174 Greater London Authority, 299 voting system, 302–3 Greater London Council (GLC), 80, 301 Griffith, J. A., 162, 245 Griffiths, Dylan, 260 Griffiths, James, 244, 249, 253 Griffiths, Nigel, 237 Grimond, Jo, 24 Hague, William, 93 Hain, Peter, 30, 40, 136, 237, 275, 276, 277, 344 Haines, Joe, 143, 167, 168, 325, 327 Hansard Commission on Electoral Reform, 25 Hanson, A. H., v, 55, 56, 58, 60, 353, 360 Hanson, David, 263 Hardie, Keir, 17, 103, 205, 241, 242 Harman, Harriet, 43 Harris, Kenneth, 150 Harris, Tom, 237 Harrison, John, 261 Hart, Jennifer, 20 Hassan, Gerry, 238

401

Hattersley, Roy, 14, 15, 28, 29, 48, 121, 170, 271 on Blair, 271 on electoral reform, 28–9 and Lords’ reform, 121–2 on mandate theory, 14 on Next Steps programme, 170 on PR, 15 Hayes, Mark, 331 Hayward, Ron, 25 Hazell, Robert, 94, 197, 375 Healey, Dennis, 68, 116, 145, 190, 223, 319, 320, 323, 334 on the Civil Service, 145 on devolution, 223 on morning sittings, 68 and Northern Ireland, 320, 323 Heath Government industrial relations reform, 119 Northern Ireland, 326–7 Heffer, Eric, 226 Hencke, David, 196 Henderson, Arthur, 103 Hennessy, Peter, 142, 149, 150, 152, 155, 156, 158, 169, 171, 173, 176, 371, 375 hereditary principle, 108, 111, 112, 114, 125, 140, 376 abolition commitments, 125 Hetherington, Peter, 307 Hewitt, Patricia, 237 Hodgson, Geoffrey, 261 Holmes, Martin, 167 Hoon, Geoff, 30, 42, 43 Houghton, Douglas, 71, 72 House of Commons, 49–99, 359–60 and the Attlee Governments, 58–60 Blair Government reforms, 84–94 Brown Government proposals, 95–6 development of select committee system, 75–8 early Labour Party and, 52–8 hours of business reform, 67–9, 85–7 Labour opposition’s policy proposals, 78–80 morning sittings, 67–9

402 Index House of Commons – continued New Labour proposals, 82–3 the Ombudsman, 69–74 Policy Review proposals, 81–2 primacy, 58, 101–2, 103, 127, 134, 357 reform motives and approaches, 49–51 under Thatcher Government, 80–1 and Wilson Governments, 61–7, 74–5 House of Lords, 100–40, 360–1 abolition commitment, 120–1 Appointments Commission, 128–9 Attlee Governments, 104–9 Blair Government, 125–37 Brown Government intentions, 137 calls for abolition of, 56, 103, 116, 131, 138 Commons’ primacy over, 58, 101–2, 103, 127, 134, 357 composition vote, 134–7, 135 (tab.3.1), 136 (tab.3.2) consequences of abolition, 79, 101 Crossman proposals, 110–11 early Labour Party proposals, 102–4 hereditary principle, 108, 111, 112, 114, 125, 140, 376 improving social representation, 129 inter-party talks, 112–14 key objections to, 100–1 Liberal reforms, 103–4 Life Peerages Bill, 108 loss of interest in reform of, 119–20 and nationalization, 105–6, 120 New Labour’s two stages of reform, 123–7, 127–30 obstruction of legislation, 121 Parliament (No., 2) Bill, 115–19 power of delay, 103, 107, 110, 110–11, 113, 114, 134, 138–9 and Prime Ministerial patronage, 113, 138 proposals for new constitutional role, 122–3 and renunciation of peerage, 109 Royal Commission, 127–8

Salisbury Doctrine, 105, 120, 128, 134 Silkin proposals, 111–12 in the Policy Review, 121–3 ‘voting peers’, 110–11, 114, 115 Weatherill agreement, 125–6 White Paper proposals, 114–15 Wilson Governments, 109–19 Howard, Anthony, 64, 372 Hughes, Cledwyn, 251 Hughes, Colin, 28, 30, 122 Hughes, G., 268 Hughes, Rosaleen, 171 Industrial Relations Bill, 118, 118–19 Information and the Public Interest (White Paper), 187 In Place of Strife (White Paper), 75, 119 ‘investigatory committees’, 76 IRA (Irish Republican Army), 326, 335, 342 Ireland Act, 313–14 iron and steel industries, nationalization proposals, 105–6 Irvine, A.J., 73 James, Mari, 259 Jay, Douglas, 154 Jenkins, Bill, 88, 174 Jenkins, Roy, 25, 27, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 44, 46, 88, 118, 162, 189, 190, 222, 295, 330 on devolution, 222 on electoral reform, 25, 40 resignation, 190 terrorism legislation, 330 Jenkins, Simon, 295 Jenkins, William, 169 Jenkins Commission, 35–6, 46 John, Peter, 298 Johnson, Nevil, 348 Johnston, Tom, 208 Jones, Alec, 261 Jones, Barry, 4, 14, 21, 32, 65, 77, 96, 120, 141, 162, 198, 240, 241, 242, 242, 243, 248, 249, 254, 255, 256, 258, 260, 265, 271, 271, 272, 272,

Index 290, 292, 312, 328, 329, 348, 351, 356, 364, 366 Jones, Eileen, 32 Jones, G. W., 314 Jones, Ioan Rhys, 241, 242, 243, 248, 249, 260 Jones, R. Merfyn, 241, 242, 243, 248, 249, 260 Judge, David, 5, 51, 52, 97, 275, 352 Justice (organization), 70 Kaufman, Gerald, 36, 87, 127, 146, 291 Kavanagh, Dennis, 174, 375 Keating, Michael, 4, 14, 21, 65, 77, 96, 120, 141, 162, 205, 206, 208, 209, 228, 233, 240, 242, 258, 290, 292, 312, 328, 329, 348, 351, 356, 364, 366 Keep the Link group, 40 Kellner, Peter, 157, 158, 163 Kelso, Alexandra, 51, 84, 90, 97, 133 Kemp, Fraser, 40 Kilbrandon Report, 215–16, 239, 256 publication, 219, 255–6, 286 recommendations, 217–18, 255, 287 remit, 285 Kiley, Bob, 304 King, Anthony, 1, 88, 128 King, Oona, 39 Kinnock, Neil, 27, 28, 29, 30, 32, 46, 81, 169, 172, 230, 231, 233, 258, 261, 264, 265, 268, 279, 293 on the Civil Service, 169 Policy Review launch, 81 views on devolution, 230, 231, 258, 261–2, 264–5 Kitson, Alex, 220 Kogan, Maurice, 145 Kuper, Richard, 30 Labour and Britain in the 1990s, 30 Labour and the New Social Order (policy programme), 55, 104 Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform (LCER), 39–40 members, 26 PR recommendations, 26

403

Labour Opposition Commons’ reform proposals, 78–80 and English regionalism, 291–3, 293–8 and Northern Ireland, 317, 326–7, 331–7 and open government, 188–90, 191–3 and Scottish devolution, 229–31 and Welsh devolution, 247–8, 260–2 Labour Party centralist perspective, 203–4 first government, 19 internal reforms, 26 origins, 348 policy objectives, 15 Labour’s Policy for Wales (policy document), 247–8 Labour’s Programme 1973 (policy document), 287, 288 Labour’s Programme 1982 (policy document), 78–9, 192, 292 Lamport, Tim, 33 Lansbury, George, 184, 185 Laski, Harold, 22, 23, 55, 58, 60, 141, 142, 143, 144, 147, 149, 153, 154, 161, 207, 208, 212, 352, 353, 354, 358, 362, 365, 377 on the Civil Service, 141–2, 143, 144, 153–4, 161, 362 on constitutionalism, 354 on devolution, 212 on economic and social reform success, 60 on electoral reform, 22–3 on electorate’s function, 358 on PR, 22–3 Leach, Robert, 349, 351 ‘legislative committees’, 76, 81 Legislative Process, The (report), 84 Let Scotland Prosper (policy document), 212 Let Us Face the Future (manifesto), 104–5 Levy, Roger, 223 Liberal Democrats joint constitutional reform committee, 34–5, 41

404 Index Liberal Democrats – continued Welsh Assembly partnership agreement, 272 Liberal Party Labour’s challenge to, 18 pacts/co-operation with, 20, 24, 45, 226, 331 proposals for PR, 20 Liddle, Roger, 83, 171, 297 Life Peerages Bill, 108 Lindley, Peter D., 259 Linton, Martin, 26, 29, 30, 40 Lipsey, David, 169, 172 Livingstone, Ken, 39, 47, 303, 304, 305, 339 Lloyd George, David, 102 London Underground, 303, 304 Looking to the Future (policy document), 29 Lynch, Peter, 268, 367 Maastricht Treaty, 265, 266, 296 Mabon, Dickson, 214 McAllister, Laura, 270, 273 McCabe, Stephen, 131 McConnell, Allan, 236, 341 McConnell, Jack, 237 MacDonald, Margo, 218 MacDonald, J. Ramsay, v, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 29, 45, 46, 54, 55, 138, 147, 148, 181, 184, 206, 369, 370, 371 career origins, 205 on the Civil Service, 148 and devolution, 206, 242 on mandate theory, 53–4 on official secrecy, 184 on Parliament, 54 voting preferences, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21 McDonald, Oonagh, 192–3 MacDougall, Donald, 163, 164 McGuiness, Martin, 344 Machinery of Government group establishment, 165 membership, 166 recommendations, 166 Mackenzie, Compton, 185 Mackintosh, John, 67, 223, 254, 284, 368

MacLean, David, 199 McLean, Iain, 132, 205, 233, 237, 376 MacMillan Government, reaction to Justice report, 70–1 McNamara, Kevin, 330, 333, 336, 337, 338, 339 McNeil, Hector, 211 McQuail, Paul, 300 McSmith, Andy, 224, 233 Major, John, 83, 263, 340, 345, 346 Make Votes Count group, 40 mandate theory, 14, 47, 52, 53–4, 88–9, 354 Mandelson, Peter, 83, 88, 92, 171, 197, 297, 361 Mann, Nyta, 45, 47, 267 Marquand, David, 3, 4, 20, 29, 32, 56, 148, 205, 352, 356 Marshall-Andrews, Robert, 126 Mason, Roy, 75, 330 Mather, Janet, 309 Mawson, John, 300 Mayor of London, election, 303–5 Meacher, Michael, 94, 166, 167, 168 reform proposals, 94 views on Civil Service, 166, 167, 168 media coverage, of Commons, 87 Meehan, Elizabeth, 343 Meet the Challenge, Make the Change (policy review document), 29, 81–2, 170, 193, 264, 294, 337 Mellish, Bob, 331 Mendelson, John, 65 Michael, Alun, 270, 272 Middleton, Jim, 206 Mikardo, Ian, 77–8 Miliband, Ralph, 52, 55, 142 Militant Tendency, 230 Millan, Bruce, 229, 296 Minkin, Lewis, 271 Mitchell, Austin, 26, 27, 28 Mitchell, James, 210, 230, 236, 240, 272, 343, 364 Modernising Government (White Paper), 174, 176–7 Modernising Parliament (White Paper), 130 modernization, meaning of, 16 Morgan, Austen, 205

Index Morgan, Janet, 100, 113, 114 Morgan, Kenneth O., 60, 107, 165, 228, 245, 246, 247, 282, 312, 314, 370, 373, 374, 375 Morgan, Kevin, 265, 267, 268, 271 Morgan, Rhodri, 268, 270, 272 morning sittings, 67–9 Morris, Alfred, 49, 66 Morris, Nigel, 307 Morris, Robert, 295 Morrison, Herbert, 59, 60, 107, 108, 148, 149, 150, 152, 153, 185, 210, 243, 245, 246, 247, 313, 314, 315, 316, 350, 361, 375, 377 on the Civil Service, 148–9, 152 on Home Rule, 205 on Lords’ composition, 350 on Northern Ireland, 314, 315, 316 on Welsh devolution, 243–4, 246 Morrison, John, 361, 375 Mowlam, Mo, 338 Mullin, Chris, on family-friendly hours, 86 Mungham, Geoff, 265, 267, 268 Nairn, Tom, 2, 216, 355 National Government, 21 nationalist movements Scotland, 204, 210, 213, 219 Wales, 253 see also IRA (Irish Republican Army); Plaid Cymru; SNP (Scottish Natiomal Party) nationalization Attlee Government plans for, 105–6 iron and steel industries, 105–6, 110 Labour’s commitment to, 55, 209, 283 Lords’ opposition to, 120, 165 NEC (National Executive Committee) accountability strategies, 77 and Civil Service reform, 165–6 devolution paper, 220–1 endorsement of Lords’ reform, 109, 120 and English regionalism, 284, 288, 295 and Northern Ireland, 328, 332, 334, 336, 338

405

and open government, 190 policy proposals for, 120, 167 and Scottish devolution, 218, 220 and Welsh devolution, 249, 255 Neild, Robert, 154–5, 164, 166 New Agenda for Democracy, A (policy document), 81–3, 123, 265 New Labour and the Civil Service, 170–9 manifesto commitments, 124–5, 129–30 and Northern Ireland, 338–9 revival of Welsh devolution, 262–9 Newsinger, J., 331 New Voice for England’s Regions, A (policy document), 296, 297, 297–8 Next Steps programme, 169–70, 173, 178, 363 Ngan, Pauline, 198 Nolan, Michael Patrick, Lord, 83 Norris, Steve, 304 Northern Ireland, 312–53, 368–9 ‘Agreed Ireland Forum’, 339 Anglo-Irish Agreement, 335 Attlee Governments, 313–16 Blair Governments, 339–46 ‘Bloody Sunday’, 326 B Specials, 323 Cabinet committee on, 319–20 Callaghan Government, 331 creation of, 312 direct rule, 326 ‘dominion status’, 327 Downing Street Declaration, 325, 337–8, 345 Good Friday Agreement, 340–1, 343, 343–4, 346 Heath Government, 326–7 internment, 328 Labour Opposition’s approach, 317, 326–7, 331–7 New Labour and, 338–9 power-sharing executive, 327–8, 329, 344 re-unification aims, 315, 332, 335, 336, 337, 346

406 Index Northern Ireland – continued troop deployment to, 320, 322, 323–4, 325 troop withdrawal, 344 troop withdrawal calls, 331–2 violence, 318, 319, 322, 326, 342 wartime contribution, 314 Wilson Governments, 317–25, 327–31 Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association, 318, 319 Northern Ireland- Some Options for an All-Ireland Solution (study group paper), 332 Northern Ireland: The Next Steps (NEC report), 332, 333 North Sea oil, 229 Norton, Philip, 75, 84, 87, 115 O’Donnell, Gus, 179 O’Leary, Brendan, 343 O’Neill, Terence, 317, 318, 319 official secrecy early Labour Party and, 184–5 Fulton Report, 186 manifesto pledges, 188 reform agenda, 185–8, 188–9 see also freedom of information; open government Official Secrets Act, 184, 188 Ombudsman, 69–74 Bill, 73 concerns about, 72–3 Crossman on, 73–4 establishment, 69 reasons for embrace of proposal, 70–2 remit, 70 open government, 183–202, 363–4 Attlee Governments and, 185 Callaghan Government and, 188–91 early Labour Party and, 184–5 Labour Opposition and, 188–90, 191–3 New Labour’s formal commitment to, 194–201 reluctant approach to, 183, 201 Wilson-Callaghan Governments, 190–1

Wilson Governments and, 185–8 see also freedom of information; official secrecy Opie, Roger, 163 Opportunity Britain (policy statement), 123 Ormerod, Paul, 30 Our Changing Democracy: Devolution to Scotland and Wales (White Paper), 222–3 Owen, David, 27, 223 Paisley, Ian, 344 parallel chamber, recommendations for, 85 Parliament Brown’s proposals for recalling, 95 contrasting perspectives of the role of, 50–1 Study Group’s findings, 62 Parliament Bill, Cabinet debate, 106–7 Parliament (No., 2) Bill, 109–19 abandonment, 118–19 Conservative support, 116 Labour opposition, 116–17 legislative timetable, 116 second reading, 117 parliamentarianism, Labour’s commitment to, 348–50 Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration, see Ombudsman Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration, The (White Paper), 72 parliamentary committees backbench ‘subject committees’, 58–9 reorganization of, 55–6, 57, 57–8 see also select committees; standing committees, Dalton’s recommendations parliamentary reform, primary purpose, 50–1 Peart, Fred, 66 People and the Media (study group paper), 188 People and the Party System, The, 21

Index ‘People’s Budget’, rejection of, 102–3 Philip, Alan Butt, 243, 248 Pimlott, Ben, 31, 152, 349 Plaid Cymru, 241, 250, 252, 253, 265, 266, 272, 280 Plant, Raymond, 29, 30, 32, 33, 83, 295 Plant Reports, 29–33 recommendations, 31–2 Working Party members, 30–1 Platt, S., 174 PMQs reform, 84 Policy Review, 3, 28, 29, 170 devolution proposals, 231–2, 264 English regionalism in, 293–4 Lords’ proposals, 121–3 and open government, 193 see also Meet the Challenge, Make the Change (policy review document) Poll Tax, 232, 240 Polsby, Nelson W., 355 Ponting, Clive, 114, 115, 157, 158, 162, 192, 193, 325, 348 Powell, Enoch, 330 power of delay, 103, 107, 110, 110–11, 113, 114, 134, 138–9 Preparing for a New Wales (policy document), 268 Prescott, John, 11, 16–17, 38, 43, 136, 292, 293, 296, 299, 300, 305, 306, 308, 311, 368 presidential style, of Blair’s leadership, 92, 94, 175 Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act, 330 Prime Ministerial patronage, 27, 113, 138 proportional representation (PR) arguments against, 35 accounting for lack of debate, 14 in Bogdanor, 21 conflation of electoral reform with, 42–3, 44–5, 47–8, 358 and devolved institutions, 222, 233, 256–7, 266–7, 268 and the early Labour Party, 17–20, 19(tab.1.1) Laski’s perspective, 22–3

407

LCER recommendations, 26 Liberal proposals, 20 MacDonald’s perspective, 17, 18, 46 pre–war consideration, 21 Proportional Representation Society, members, 17–18 public ownership, see nationalization Public–Private Partnership, 304 Pyper, Robert, 172 ‘Quangocracy’, 262–3, 266, 295, 301, 302 Radice, Giles, 61, 78, 169, 171 Rallings, Colin, 307 Rawnsley, Andrew, 196, 368, 376 Rees, Merlyn, 146, 189, 190, 191, 201, 329, 330, 333 referenda for electoral reform, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37–8, 41, 46 English regionalism, 11, 297–8, 306–8 Good Friday Agreement, 341 legislation for, 234 Scottish devolution, 226–7, 235 Welsh devolution, 258–9, 259–60, 269, 269–70, 279–80 Regional Development Agencies, 299, 300, 310 regional elections, voting systems, 45 regional list system, 24 Regional Policy Commission, 296–7 Regulation Impact Unit, 174 Reid, John, 30 Rentoul, John, 32 Representation of the People Bill, 20–1 restructuring, of Government departments, 175–6 Rhodes, Rod, 5, 176 Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), sanctions, 113 Richard, Lord, 274, 275 Richards, David, 1, 2, 5, 88, 363, 368 Riddell, Peter, 88, 94 Roberts, Goronwy, 248 Robinson, Geoffrey, 196 Rooker, Jeff, 26, 28, 30, 33, 39, 40 Rose, Paul, 317, 318 Ross, Willie, 215, 220

408 Index Rowthorn, Bob, 261 Royal Commission on the Constitution, see Kilbrandon Report Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), 323 Russell, Meg, 132, 134, 197 Ryle, Michael, 83 Ryrie, William, 157–8 St. John-Stevas, Norman, 78 Salisbury Doctrine, 105, 120, 128, 134 Salter, Martin, 39 Samizdat, 30 Sands, Bobby, 335 Sartori, Giovanni, 47 Schloesser, Henry, 18 Schumpeter, Joseph, 47 Scotland Acts, 228, 235–6 Scotland and Wales Bill, 223, 223–6, 259 Scotland Bills, 226–7, 235 Scott, Peter, 282, 283, 284 Scottish Covenant, 209–10 Scottish Development Agency, 224 Scottish devolution, 203–40 Attlee Governments and, 209–12 Blair Governments, 234–8 consideration of constitutional implications, 204–5 divergence of views regarding, 204 early Labour Party, 205–9 Labour Opposition and, 229–31 New Labour’s proposals, 231–4 referendum on, 226–7, 235 the‘ West Lothian Question’, 224, 232, 236, 238, 286 Wilson-Callaghan Governments, 218–28 Wilson Governments, 212–17 Scottish Home Rule Association, 205 Scottish Parliament 1999 election results, 236 funding arrangements, 221, 222, 230, 231 voting system, 41, 235–6 Seaton, Jean, 171 Secretary of State for Wales, 249, 251, 257

Sedgemore, Brian, 76, 77, 142, 145, 166, 168, 192, 193 Seldon, Anthony, 174 select committees Bowden’s concerns about, 63 calls for strengthening of, 89 reform proposals, 90–2 topics, 64 select committee system, development, 75–8 Seyd, Ben, 197 Shaping the Vision (policy document), 267–8 Shaw, Eric, 74, 75 Sheldon, Robert, 116, 126, 164, 165, 166 Shell, Donald, 79, 125 Sherman, Jill, 307 Shifting the Balance (report), 89 Shore, Peter, 213–14 Short, Clare, 39, 197 Short, Edward, 220 Signposts for the Sixties (policy document), 212 Silkin, John, 79, 111, 121, 333 Sillars, Jim, 232 Silverman, Sydney, 74 Sinclair, David, 197 Single European Act, 264 Single Transferable Vote (STV), 17 Sinn Fein, 335, 342, 345 Skelcher, Chris, 295 Skinner, Dennis, 126, 131 Sloman, Anne, 145 Smith, Geoffrey, 355 Smith, John, 32, 33, 46, 81, 124, 172, 233, 234, 265, 267, 268, 274, 279, 376 Smith, Llew, 273–4, 279 Smith, Martin J., 1, 2, 5, 88, 363, 368 Snowden, Philip, 17 SNP (Scottish National Party), 213, 217–18, 218–19, 221, 229, 232, 236 ‘social contract’, development of, 119 social democracy, benign assumptions, 351–3 Social Democratic Party, 25, 27 socialist policies, failure to pursue, 77

Index Soley, Clive, 339 Sopel, Jon, 34 Southcott, Mary, 29 special advisers, influence of, 179 Spellar, John, 39, 196 Stacey, Frank, 61, 73, 256 standing committees, Dalton’s recommendations, 55–6 Steel, David, 24, 226 Stewart, John, 295 Stewart, Michael, 64, 88, 118, 145, 319 Stone, Neal, 153, 162, 166 Straw, Jack, 36, 37, 42, 43, 45, 95, 136, 137, 179, 195, 196, 197, 201, 309, 377 on electoral reform, 36, 42 on freedom of information legislation, 195 on the Jenkins Report, 37–8 on Lords’ reform, 137 Stuart, Mark, 36, 85, 87, 88, 90, 132 ‘subject committees’, 59 Supplementary Vote, 33 Taylor, Miles, 38, 83, 84, 206 Thain, Colin, 169 Thatcher Governments authoritarianism, 122 passage of controversial bills, 80–1, 232 Theakston, Kevin, 77, 141, 144, 149, 157, 162, 164, 165, 169, 170, 172, 181, 184, 190, 352, 353, 369, 375 Thomas, A., 260, 264, 267, 268 Thomas, George, 253, 254 Thomas, Hugh, 155 Thomas, J., 17 Thompson, E.P., 348 Thompson, Noel, 252 Thrasher, Michael, 307 Tomaney, John, 298, 301, 302, 303 Tonge, Jonathan, 343 Tongue, Carol, 30 trade unions, 4 constitutional conservatism, 354, 355 improving relations with, 119 proposals regarding, 75

409

unease over regional devolution, 290 Travers, Tony, 178 Trimble, David, 342, 343 Turnbull, Sir Andrew, 176, 177 unicameralism, rejection of, 123 University Seats, abolition, 22 voting systems Blair Government commission on, 35 Greater London Authority, 302–3 regional elections, 45 Scottish Parliament, 41, 235–6 Welsh Assembly, 41, 256–7, 266–7, 268, 270, 272, 276 Wakeham Commission, 127–8 Wales Acts of Parliament, 253 Secretary of State for, 249, 251, 257 Wales Bill, 259 Wallas, Graham, 160 Ward, Terry, 261 Weatherill agreement, 125–6 Wedgwood, Josiah, 17–18 Weir, Stuart, 30, 198 Welsh Assembly elections, 272 funding arrangements, 257, 267, 270, 274 leadership contest, 270–1 policy recommendations, 267–8 review commission, 273, 275–6, 279 voting system, 41, 256–7, 266–7, 268, 270, 272, 276 Welsh Council, 253, 256 Welsh devolution, 241–80 Attlee Governments, 243–7 Blair Governments, 269–73, 273–7 early Labour Party and, 242–3 Labour Opposition’s approach, 247–8, 260–2 New Labour revival, 262–9 referendum on, 258–9, 259–60, 269, 269–70, 279–80

410 Index Welsh devolution – continued Wilson–Callaghan Governments, 256–60 Wilson Governments and, 252–6 Welsh Office, 250–1, 254, 278 West, Harry, 318 ‘West Lothian Question’, 224, 232, 236, 238, 286 Westminster Model, 353–4 Blair government’s adherence to, 5, 240 characteristics, 4–5 Labour’s traditional acceptance, 14, 49, 51–2, 98–9, 203, 205, 281–2 White, Michael, 90 Whitehall, 149 Whitehead, Phillip, 78, 167 Williams, Alan, 277 Williams, D.J., 244–5 Williams, Francis, 150 Williams, Marcia, 113, 142, 144, 164, 165 Williams, Philip M., 59 Williams, Shirley, 25, 27, 156, 166, 223 Wilson, Harold, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 110, 111, 112, 113, 116, 117, 118, 120, 121, 143, 145, 156, 157, 162, 163, 164, 165, 180, 181, 186, 187, 188, 194, 196, 201, 212, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218, 219, 222, 223, 224, 228, 237, 238, 252, 253, 256, 257, 284, 285, 286, 287, 309, 310, 317, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322, 323, 325, 326, 327, 328, 329, 347, 349, 352, 367, 372, 373 on the Civil Service, 145 on devolution, 228

Wilson, Sir Richard, 176 Wilson–Callaghan Governments English regionalism, 286–91 open government, 190–1 and Scottish devolution, 218–28 and Welsh devolution, 256–60 Wilson Governments and Commons’ reform, 61–7, 74–5 English regionalism, 284–5 and Lords’ reform, 109–19 and morning sittings, 67–9 and Northern Ireland, 317–25, 327–31 and the Ombudsman, 69–74 and open government, 185–8 and Scottish devolution, 212–17 and Welsh devolution, 252–6 Winnick, David, 131 ‘winter of discontent’, 191, 228 Wintour, Patrick, 28, 30, 122 women commitments to increasing representation of, 82, 85 second chamber proposals, 129 Woodburn, Arthur, 210 Wright, Anthony, 3, 81 Wright, Maurice, 39 Wright, Tony, 3, 83, 130, 165, 178, 181, 198, 199, 352, 355, 357 Young, Hugo, 145 Your Region, Your Choice: Revitalising the English Regions (White Paper), 305, 306 Your Right to Know (White Paper), 195 Ziegler, Philip, 373

The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform: A History of Constitutional Conservatism

Constitutional History of the UK

The Attalid Kingdom: A Constitutional History

A Handbook of Greek Constitutional History

Ordered Liberty: A Constitutional History of NY

The Attalid Kingdom: A Constitutional History

American Indian Constitutional Reform and the Rebuilding of Native Nations

Constitutional Law

Constitutional Patriotism

Constitutional Interpretation

Constitutional Theocracy

Constitutional and Administrative Law

Constitutional Identity

Principles of Constitutional Design

The New Constitutional Order

Constitutional and Administrative Law

Originalism in American Law and Politics: A Constitutional History (The Johns Hopkins Series in Constitutional Thought)

The Gender of Constitutional Jurisprudence

Constitutional Reform and Political Participation in the Gulf

Nordic And Other European Constitutional Traditions (Constitutional Law Library) (Constitutional Law Library)

The Calculus of Consent and Constitutional Design

Constitutional Culture and Democratic Rule

Public Opinion and Constitutional Controversy

Constitutional Democracy (2000)

Constitutional environmental rights

Public Opinion and Constitutional Controversy

Constitutional rights moral controversy

On Constitutional Ground

Constitutional LawCard 4ED (Lawcards)

Constitutional Self-Government

Reflections on Constitutional Law

The Labour Party and Constitutional Reform: A History of Constitutional Conservatism

Constitutional History of the UK

The Attalid Kingdom: A Constitutional History

A Handbook of Greek Constitutional History

Ordered Liberty: A Constitutional History of NY

The Attalid Kingdom: A Constitutional History

American Indian Constitutional Reform and the Rebuilding of Native Nations

Constitutional Law

Constitutional Patriotism

Constitutional Interpretation

Constitutional Theocracy

Constitutional and Administrative Law

Constitutional Identity

Principles of Constitutional Design

The New Constitutional Order

Constitutional and Administrative Law

Originalism in American Law and Politics: A Constitutional History (The Johns Hopkins Series in Constitutional Thought)

The Gender of Constitutional Jurisprudence

Constitutional Reform and Political Participation in the Gulf

Nordic And Other European Constitutional Traditions (Constitutional Law Library) (Constitutional Law Library)

The Calculus of Consent and Constitutional Design

Constitutional Culture and Democratic Rule

Public Opinion and Constitutional Controversy

Constitutional Democracy (2000)

Constitutional environmental rights

Public Opinion and Constitutional Controversy

Constitutional rights moral controversy

On Constitutional Ground

Constitutional LawCard 4ED (Lawcards)

Constitutional Self-Government

Reflections on Constitutional Law

Recommend Documents