Press Release - Liberal Democrat Autumn Conference

MOVING AHEAD: CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS

LIBERAL DEMOCRATS DETERMINED TO FIGHT FOR WRITTEN CONSTITUTION

The Rt. Hon. Robert Maclennan, M.P.
Liberal Democrat Constitutional Affairs Spokesman

In 1990, our party formally adopted as policy, what many of us had privately long believed that if the UK was going to be as good as it could be, it needed a modern written constitution.

Five years ago in Torquay, we proved that you could write such a constitution.

We gave the country the details and we even included a timetable.

You will remember that we called our proposals for modernising Britain's democracy: "Here We Stand".

And here we have stood.

Of course we have encountered much opposition.

In 1990, many people thought that a written constitution was plain cranky.

In 1993, a written constitution still seemed utopian.

However, today, a significant and growing element of the population support the idea of a written constitution.

This policy document re-presents and refines the constitutional goal of the Liberal Democrats.

With all the details in place and a schedule to plan its full implementation by the year 2005.

It recognises the significant steps which, under our urging, have already been taken along the road to its achievement.

And it offers a route map to its full implementation with the will of the British people.

The reforms that we advocated in "Here We Stand" have begun to rise from the two dimensions of words on paper into the three dimensions of reality.

We will soon see a Scottish Parliament, a National Assembly for Wales, a regional authority for London.

We have secured a system of proportional representation for the elections to the European Parliament.

The incorporation in to British law of the European Convention on Human Rights will protect and strengthen the rights and freedoms of our people.

This is welcome.

But we shall not stop until we can guarantee protection of those rights and freedoms in a Bill of Rights, as part of a written constitution.

We look forward with eager anticipation to the recommendations of the Independent Commission on the Voting System chaired by Lord Jenkins.

All these reforms were foreshadowed in "Here We Stand".

Despite all the different constitutional bills that the Government has introduced and despite the five years that have passed since Torquay, our constitutional affairs policy remains radical.

Why?

Our proposals attack at the roots the belief that public power is and ought to be exercised courtesy of those at the top.

Neither Labour nor Conservative politicians have shown themselves ready to jettison these archaic ideas.

They still speak in defence of the sovereignty of Parliament -

of power exercised without democratic accountability under the royal prerogative -

of treaties signed and public appointments made without even a bow in the direction of the will of the people.

When constitutional change comes the Tories have been known to lie down and enjoy it.

They will not fight in the last ditch for their hereditary noble friends.

Labour, on the other hand, has keenly embraced the need to renovate some less than democratic institutions,

and is more than ready to knock out systems of local government which have brought them embarrassment through Tammany Hall style manipulation.

But despite this ad hoc reformism, neither the Tories nor Labour care to admit that the so-called sovereignty of Parliament is a fiction.

The truth is the United Kingdom is ruled by a faction.

A faction which can appoint judges, civil servants, members of quangos, and now even Members of Parliament.

A faction which can bulldoze any parliamentary barricades thrown up to check the exercise of its will.

Liberal Democrats do not want to live in country ruled by a faction.

For however lily white the faction's initial motives, it cannot avoid being corrupted by the unobstructed enjoyment of its whims and appetites.

The rule of law is a necessary framework on which to weave a modern democratic constitution but it is not sufficient in itself to provide the colours and patterns of the constitution's fabric.

Our draft written constitution provides those patterns by its commitment to federalism.

The only way to have a coherent and lasting relationship between the different parts of the Union, and the different levels of government, is by incorporating them in a federal structure embodying the principle of subsidiarity.

That is what our written constitution provides.

Such a constitution would end Whitehall's exclusive domination of the levers of power.

It would distribute power between the nations and regions of these islands, within Parliament and to the Judiciary.

It sets up checks and balances so that a faction will never rule us again.

The winner-takes-all principle is wholly inappropriate in a modern representative democracy.

The Single Transferable Vote will ensure that the true wishes of the people are reflected in their parliament.

This will enable consensus to be sought and honest negotiation to take place, out in the open between the parties rather than out of sight within them.

I have never understood those who claim that , for example, the present weak and divided Conservative party is necessarily better for democracy than two parties that give the voters a clear choice.

STV would allow the real strengths of opinion in the country to be expressed and a government to be formed which commands a support of the majority of the electorate.

Our proposals are well thought through, comprehensive, coherent and practicable.

In the work of the Joint Cabinet Committee we have seized the opportunity to promote them whenever we are able.

In a very British way we have gone along with the piecemeal approach to implementation but we have an overarching vision of the whole.

And when the components of the new structure are finally in place and power is efficiently, effectively and accountably allocated to those with the duty to discharge it we would seek the consent of the British people.

The people will have their say in the new fundamental law of the Constitution drawn up by MPs fairly elected and chosen for that task.

It is the best possible agenda with which to embark on a new millennium.

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